Spring arrives in short, halted steps – retreating a bit with some wet snow, then advancing in tentative fashion – while we wait anxiously for things to warm up and give us a hint of sunnier days to come. The past week brought a full Pink Moon, and the requisite restless sleep and stressful exhaustion that accompanies such lunar stretches. That rollercoaster of a weekly recap begins now…
Do I even have the energy to build rapport with a new tailor?
I don’t feel like I do.
(And are we even in the first world anymore? I fear we’ve already slipped at least to second.)
My friend Anu asked me what the alternative to building rapport with a new tailor was, to which I replied I’d have to learn how to hem pants. Not a big deal, and I’d have saved myself hundreds of dollars in adjustments over the years, I just yawn thinking of the prospect. The other consideration is that my eyesight is nowhere near what it once was, and I don’t want to go blind like all the sewing nuns that came before me.
First of all, when did Jesus find a moment to cut his hair between all the floggings at this time of the year? I mean no offense; I’m all for a glow-up, especially that luscious beard, it’s just a little weird. Or maybe I’ve been out of the religious loop for so long that some new rendering of the Big JC is now in place. Whatever.
Anyway, if anyone is interested, the JW crew is putting on a party for Jesus’ Death at the Kingdom Hall tomorrow. As noted in the pamphlet, “At this important event, Jehovah’s Witnesses commemorate the death of Jesus just as he commanded.”
This pair of ducks has been here before, we are almost certain of that. They always arrive to scope out possible nesting sites, despite my sometimes elaborate methods of keeping them at bay. They seem a bit slow to learn, as we will be chasing them out of the vicinity for a few times over a few days.
It’s a sign of spring, and a happy one at that. It’s reassurance and warmth that nature continues on despite the sorry state of the humanity. We could learn a lot from these ducks. And I hope they learn a little from us (we simply cannot have ducklings at the pool this year!)
Yesterday was the last day of the recent period of Mercury in retrograde motion, so hopefully things will calm down a bit until we go retro again. A few days ago, I looked up into the sky and found the moon just as she was about to duck behind a bank of clouds. I paused where I was (at a gas station, having just filled up the tank and further breaking the bank) and took in the sky.
The older some of us get, the more we tend to look down as we go about our day. Our postures become more hunched, we don’t bother lifting our heads or holding ourselves erect – it’s just easier to give in to gravity at some point. I still like to look up – at the buildings, at the sky, at the moon wherever she might be. It’s a small moment of mindfulness, as it forces me to stop in my tracks (or run the risk of walking into something) and take in the surroundings. Mindfulness need not involve silence or sitting in the lotus position – it comes in little pockets throughout every day if we take a little care to allow it to manifest.
On that day, I looked at the moon, I thought of our small place in the universe, and I went on with my day, a little more grounded.
Most of us, if we are exceptionally lucky and fortunate, have that core group of friends who have been there from our earliest cognizance. I have a few groups of friends who have been there for the long haul, some going back to my childhood. As I look over the past two decades, inspired by the recent and ongoing premiere of The Divine Diva Tour: A Fairy’s Tale project, and photos like the one featured here, I feel a little exhausted. Not in a bad way, just in an expected manner of satisfied fatigue when one begins to contemplate all the years one has lived. When looking back on all the time that’s passed, I think of those friends, who were there when we were just starting off – graduating from school and embarking on the singular journeys we each had to make. That’s why this monologue from ‘The White Lotus’ spoke to me so movingly:
“That’s funny because if I’m being honest, all week I’ve just been so sad. I just feel like my expectations were too high or I just feel like as you get older, you have to justify your life and your choices. And when I’m with you guys, it’s just so transparent what my choices were and my mistakes. I have no belief system. Well, I mean, I’ve had a lot of them. I mean, work was my religion for forever, but I definitely lost my belief there. And then I tried love and that was just a painful religion just made everything worse. And then even for me, just like being a mother, that didn’t save me either. But I had this epiphany today: I don’t need religion or God to give my life meaning, because time gives it meaning. We started this life together. I mean, we’re going through it apart, but we’re still together. And I look at you guys and it feels meaningful and I can’t explain it, but even when we’re just sitting around the pool talking about whatever and name shit, it still feels very fucking deep. I am glad you have a beautiful face and I’m glad that you have a beautiful life. I am just happy to be at the table.”
With that, her character cleared the air, after a week of pretending that everything was happy and good when it didn’t always feel that way. It’s how most of us go through life – pretending we are ok even when we’re not, because often that is the only way to make it through. But friends – the best ones – see through it, and don’t let us get away with it. Every once in a while, it’s good to have that moment of acknowledgment and clarity, to accept that this life, this world, are far from perfect, that we, as human beings, are infinitely flawed, and it’s ok, it’s all right.
Robert Irwin takes the cake for his recent underwear unveiling, and that’s about all the news that’s fit to print in these parts. A few other things happened too, so let’s do the weekly recap and move deeper into April…
Whenever someone says they don’t know what it’s like to be glamorous, I always think they just don’t understand that. My friend Chris and I recently had a conversation in which he lamented that we hadn’t yet done anything in our own right to be celebrated in glamorous fashion. I understood what he meant – we weren’t famous or accomplished enough to travel in typically glamorous circles, but every once in a while we brushed up against it – at parties I managed to worm my way into through semi-famous acquaintances or film school events he hooked us into – where a certain director was so much drunker than I was that she stumbled down the stairs at one point – but we were casual acquaintances and guests – not the main attraction.
I also explained to him that I always felt glamorous at such times. And I still feel it whenever I get dolled up and outfitted in proper fashion. We have each had our moments of glamour – and it’s not something that depends on wealth or status or fame.
I don’t remember When I was young I don’t recall the day When I first saw the sun But what I am certain What is enough is just to remember That once, once I was loved
I still surrender The troubles I know No use pretending All the troubles ain’t my own But what I am certain What is enough is just to remember That once, once I was loved
Youth is usually afforded the affinity of glamour. I felt that way back then – I felt the eyes of a room on me, felt the focused vision of someone directed my way, and I was fortunate to feel it regularly. “My mother raised me to be admired…” as someone once said.
Chris lamented that we had no glamorous moments, unless we were at some fancy party by accident or approximation. “What are you talking about?!” I asked. We were young and attractive enough, and at those parties we were the ones that others viewed as glamorous – because glamour is youth. It made me sad that Chris didn’t feel that at the time, because it’s too late now – at least, it’s too late to feel the glamour of youth.
We can make up for it in other ways – and wisdom has a glamour that is even more enviable. Almost everyone has had the glamour of youth, whether they realize it or not; very few of us manage to achieve the glamour of wisdom.
All is not lost… not yet…
After the years gone by What amounts to the years in a life What have we come to When we reach our final days If we can surrender And that is enough Just to remember that once Once we were loved Once we were beautiful Once we were loved If we can surrender And that is enough Just to remember that once Once we were loved
When fifteen minutes of meditation, followed by fifteen minutes of cutting up vegetables for a salad for dinner, then eating said dinner, all fail to erase the stress of a wicked work day, then I turn to Duke Ellington and this song on ‘Solitude’ to ease our home into the weekend. It looks to be a sickeningly chilly and rainy weekend, so today was likely my last chance for doing any sort of outdoor work. Such is spring. You take the good, you take the bad, you take them both and there you have the facts of life.
Friday nights used to be the shit.
Now, I just want to sleep, but I can’t just yet because that would fuck up the night.
So I force myself to stay awake until a little later, and I write this, with the hope of summoning some collection of posts for the weekend. I cannot promise anything. I’m tired out.
While I usually have the company of a cherished friend along for my diner adventures, there are occasional moments when that’s simply not possible or preferable.
Diners are made for solitary dining, and no one bats an eye at the strange fellow by his lonesome at the end of the long row of single chairs near the kitchen. You can blend in at a diner better than you can blend in almost anywhere else. In a diner, everyone is an oddity, therefore no one is.
Many an artist has plopped themselves into a diner and thought or wrote or crafted something of significance, something that was more than its greasy, fried origins. Maybe because a diner represents a slice of humanity, as perfectly imperfect as a slice of pie or cup of black coffee. It is where the magnificent and mediocre meet under one tin roof, slightly rusted, and beautiful in an ancient way.
