FEEL IT ACCUMULATE

Has it ever happened to any of you that while reading a biography or a memoir that you became so entranced and beguiled by the protagonist that when that person met the demise you knew was coming all along that you kind of went into shock and mourning, even when that person had died so many years before? (Now that is a Proustian sentence there.) There was a book about Will Rogers (can't quite remember the name) that quite devastated me at the end. I tried to write it in my mind as a novel, so as to soften the blow of loss. Did not quite work. And now I am feeling a bit of sadness for Randolph Bourne. Worth a scan of his bio. A heroic fellow to be sure.

Now on Sunday.

The light and temperature have significantly softened and lowered. We already have blankets (as well as cats) on our beds. I am in countdown to New York mode, making lists in my head and trying to set dates while there.

Last night was the semi-regular cousins dinner. Since returning to California, I have reconnected with my cousins and first cousins once removed. As we all like to eat, drink, and chat, we try to get together, taking turns cooking with the challenge of making something that we personally have not made before. This time, it was Shelly's turn. She made an outstanding Persian meal with some amazing apple-rose-puff pastry at the end.

At least a week later ...

I am not sure where this week went. But up there are some snaps of our dinner.

The week has been a challenging one. I try to stay optimistic-ish however this has been the all-around "heaviest" year I can recall. I suppose a good aspect is that I am not devastatingly depressed, although there have certainly been moments. Somehow, I have managed to access, more often than not, that tiny crack of light and wrench it open to get a bit of other perspective. Other times, a bit of a nap helps.

This might come as a disappointment to some of you, but I have adopted two practices that somewhat fall within the "bliss ninny" range. Besides the looking at the crack of light, I try to accomplish three tasks a day. I know that sounds lame but when despair and indecision team up, it is hard to figure out where to start or stop. Those three things might be get up, swim, write the blog. In general, this rule of three has led to accomplish more than that. Baby steps, kids.

The other: when I am skidding on the slope toward the edge, I try to take a moment to remember 3 (that number is working for me) things that are not bad, possibly, in fact, good. Like 1) Mom still alive and knows who I am; 2) good cats; 3) people like my blog writing. Whatever.

So, I will save my meditations on the darkness and difficulty and just find a poem for good night.

THE OTHER SHOE

Oh if it were
only the other
shoe hanging
in space before
joining its mate.
If the undropped
didn't congregate
with the undropped.
But nothing can
stop the midair
collusion of the
unpaired above us
acquiring density
and weight. We
feel it accumulate.

— Kay Ryan, The Best of It: New and Selected Poems, New York, Grove Press, 2010