Category Archives: sparkly

Something/ that more or less/ kills me/ with delight

Last week, I was email­ing with a friend– she was hav­ing a hard time, and I sent her this poem.  I was minded of it again this morn­ing, on my drive back from the Trader Joe’s, as I was pick­ing up a house­warm­ing gift for our hosts for a week­end away.

Mary Oliver’s “Mind­ful”, from Why I Wake Early-

Every day
I see or hear
some­thing
that more or less

kills me
with delight,
that leaves me
like a needle

in the haystack
of light
It was what I was born for–
to look, to listen,

to lose myself
inside this soft world–
to instruct myself
over and over

in joy
and accla­ma­tion.
Nor am I talk­ing
about the exceptional,

the fear­ful, the dread­ful,
the very extrav­a­gant–
but of the ordi­nary,
the com­mon, the very drab,

the daily pre­sen­ta­tions.
Oh, good scholar,
I say to myself,
how can you help

but grow wise
with such teach­ings
as these–
the untrim­ma­ble light

of the world,
the ocean’s shine,
the prayers that are made
out of grass?

There was a motor scooter behind me in traf­fic, rid­den by a man in a dark plaid shirt and khakis.  He had on a hel­met, wore loafer-like shoes.  They were Clarks or Mer­rells or some­thing sen­si­ble– prac­ti­cal– com­fort­able.  He was headed toward Boston’s med­ical area, and could have been any­thing, any­one.  A doc­tor, an admin, the per­son who cures can­cer or dia­betes or just keeps your med­ical records in order.  As the lights cycled and changed, he came up on my right, then pulled to the left and in front of me.

On the back of his hel­met he bore a prayer made out of grass, the thing that killed me with delight. He’d dec­o­rated his sen­si­ble, full-headed hel­met, com­plete with a visor, with the fol­low­ing sticker:

One of those perfect moments

It was early– 10 am in the morn­ing– and I had bright, gor­geous esca­role in my bas­ket.  I’d bought lamb shoul­der meat for this recipe and I was dressed if not to the nines, then, well, per­haps to at least eight and a half in a batik-print skirt, navy twin­set and san­dals.  I’d even put on some makeup and washed that grey right out of my hair.

These new, bright-shiny Whole Foods– they’re gor­geous, tem­ples to food porn, and at 10 am, you have them all to your­self. Well, you and the stock boys.  So, I wan­dered the aisles, find­ing all the things that I wanted and things I never knew that I needed, includ­ing a lovely bunch of dried laven­der, some expen­sive but worth-it organic vitamin-c facial scrub I swear gets me carded when I buy booze, and some nice aged parme­san.  As I con­tem­plated my options in Health and Beauty Aids, hav­ing already rocked out to the music selec­tions in Pro­duce and Wine (Guns n’ Roses “Sweet Child of Mine”, Bon Jovi’s “Bad Med­i­cine,” Bad English’s “When I See You Smile,”), I looked over all the bright and tempt­ing promises of regained youth and beauty just as Kansas’ “Carry on my Way­ward Son” came on the stereo.  Loudly.

I couldn’t help it.  I looked up and addressed the air.  “I love this store,” I announced (kind of like the Muppet’s Vet­eri­nary Hos­pi­tal, except in reverse).  The stock-guy looked over and did a dou­ble take at my soccer-mom duds, my bas­ket with lamb, red-wine, pimen­ton de la vera, and parme­san cheese.

What are you mak­ing?” he asked.  I showed him the recipe.

Are you mar­ried?” he asked.

Yeah.  I’ll be going back there.  Real soon.

Scor­pi­ons’ “Winds of Change” was com­ing on as I was leav­ing the store.  As if I needed any more rea­son to return.  Per­fect pro­duce, good wine, cheesy rock music, ample room to maneu­ver the aisles.

Heaven, thy name is the Ded­ham Whole Foods.  Just don’t change the radio channel.

A picture is worth more than a thousand words

Well, since my last post, it hasn’t quite been boils, fell beasts and death– but there have been a vari­ety of dra­mas and ail­ments.  To acknowl­edge the hard times of late, my Bet­ter Half bought me a present on what was– for me– not a Good Fri­day at all.

Pics, ’cause it happened.

Not Only on South Park

But wait.  There is more.  There’s the BACK of the box.

You know this is for reals, yo. This shit’s in HEBREW.

You know you want the man­u­fac­turer infor­ma­tion.  YOU DO.

You’re Googling this right now, aren’t you? Don’t lie.

They also make a walk­ing matzah ball.  To tell you the truth, I’m afraid to assem­ble the 9 pc. puz­zle that cor­re­sponds with the death of the first­born.  Wouldn’t you be?

I also got flowers.

If that’s not the best present ever, well– may a plague of locusts and frogs descend upon you.  (See pic­tures and prod­uct num­ber above.  Order your own, this seems to be the new, updated pack­age in a PYRAMID.  Come on.  You’ve always wanted your own pyramid.)

Who is the Unknown

Then who is the Unknown
Who answers for our fear
As if it were His own,
So that we reply
Till the day we die:
“No, I don’t know why,
But I’m glad I’m here?”

from Auden’s For the Time Being, A Christ­mas Ora­to­rio, The Vision of the Shep­herds, Part II.

Merry Christ­mas, friends.

I’m glad you’re here.

OMG!

The Back­street Boys have a new song! Why did nobody tell me this until I was lis­ten­ing to the Top 40 radio sta­tion in my car?!?

Yes, I AM totally seri­ous about being excited. I am unashamed about my love for the Back­street Boys, Brit­ney Spears, and Kelly Clark­son. I will have you know that I can rec­og­nize a song penned by Kevin Richard­son (the older, dark-haired one, and a Broad­way actor in his own right) before the first melodic “Ye-ah,” thank you very much– doesn’t mat­ter if it’s Celine Dion or some­one else I’d never oth­er­wise lis­ten to singing it. And I once heard LIONEL RICHIE sing a KR-penned song. Bliss, I tell you. Pure bliss.

Come on. You’ve watched Amer­i­can Idol, or real­ity TV, or eaten squirt cheese or whipped cream straight from the can at least once in your life, right? And you LIKED it. Admit it. I bet you’ve even acknowl­edged the awe­some­ness of Cool Whip right out of the freezer, straight, on a spoon. Oh, wait, maybe that one’s just me.

I will admit “Boys” is per­haps not the best name for them any­more (check out Howie’s reced­ing hair­line in the video, which has les­bian vam­pires, and spinny dance moves, and NO KEVIN RICHARDSON AAAAAH HE WAS MY FAVORITE, what does he MEAN he wants to have a fam­ily and life???) but still– there’s melody, and a dance beat, and MAN, this brings me back to vir­gin daiquiris at the Bahama Beach Club in Saugus.

Ye-ah.