As you can see from the last post it has been a while since I wrote anything other than a check. No Saturday Poetry; no commentary on the game of chicken the President and the Republicans are playing; no disquisition on the Casey Anthony trial and what it means about this nation of ours that the life of one white child is of greater import than say a dozen colored children or so it seems judging from the amount of media coverage; no thoughts at all about gay marriage being legalized in New York nor what it must be like to be Yale University and to have raised a reported $4 billion (don't forget that there are probably undocumented donors) during a worldwide recession and what impact that power will have on the governance of the host city it is devouring. Nope, I have nothing to say about all that.
Instead, I've been watching my feet and ankles swell. Yeah, it's summer and I hate it. Hate it. On the other hand Husband No. 1 hates the winter. Every time the temperature dares to go below 30 degrees Fahrenheit it's stop the presses time in our house. Did I tell you, he bellows to no one in particular, that I hate the winter? Oh. Really? The only thing he hates more than winter is south Florida so I guess he is going to have to suck it up and make peace with November through February in the far Northeast. As for myself, I want to get a doctor's note that temperatures above 65 degrees are Hazardous To My Health and that in order to prolong my life I should be confined to 24 hour bedrest (with internet access of course) and aging eunuchs to fan my weary brow. Why aging? I don't want to look at anybody who has a BMI less than 35 right now.
So again I beg off thinking and writing until I can get shoes on my feet. I'm going to stick with gardening, swearing, drinking and boycotting Woody Allen movies.
Not that my boycott matters at all, but even liberals such as myself have to draw the line somewhere and that somewhere for me came when Allen wooed and wed his own stepdaughter. (A pause while I once again say Ewwwwww, with mouth downturned and eyes squeezed shut.) Husband No. 1 and I don't agree on much but we do agree on the immorality of that behavior. I will have to remember this story the next time I want to tear off his head for plucking my one last (and frayed) nerve: Husband No. 1 used to attend New York's School of Practical Philosophy. He liked it. I was skeptical largely because I found it a little too precious for my tastes what with students addressing each other as lady and gentleman. (Yo, this America, yawl!) But, he liked being in the school for its philosophy and we were at that stage in our marriage where individuation was a highly prized trait. (Now we're at the "Can I borrow that ink-stained shirt that you're too fat to button up?" stage.) He told me that the Allen/Farrow breakup came up for discussion in his sex-segregated class (another reason I had no interest in the school) and the men were chortling and basically saying what's wrong with that? Yuk yuk yuk .... So, Husband No. 1 said to them, since we had only recently been married and at that time our family was comprised of one 42 year old bride who hadn't shown her legs since 1985 and one bee-u-ti-ful big-eyed clothes horse. Said Husband says to his chums: What if I left my wife to run off with 16 year old [D]aughter No. 1? That shut them the fuck up and not another word was said about the matter. So, I owe Husband No. 1 a big kiss. Plus, Woody Allen hasn't been funny or particularly interesting for years. On those counts alone I can do without him, but it's nice to have a dollop of moral outrage to reinforce shunning him.
Roman Polanski's also on my Do-Not-Watch List, and that's a harder deprivation because I'm sure his work is worth seeing. But I'll continue my small protest against pedophiles and rapists whose actions are excused because they are famous or powerful. It will take my mind off the heat.
Oh! I laughed my way through at the start of paragraph two. Pretty much I didn't stop except to nod, reflect or remember our conversation. I laughed out loud. Not just because I know you. I'm in your club of heat haters with a particular irritability towards humidity, like today. My remedy? A (N) ice cold bath. Yes, bubbles. Submerged in cold cool water my hypothalamus drops my body temperature. I learned this years ago, also like Husband No. 1 @ the School of Practical Philosophy. One 'bloody hot day' on retreat in Andover, MA I was asked to clean the walk in cooler. Little did I know the prize (boon) I was given. After spending several hours wiping down the various surfaces, sorting flats of vegetables, fruits, and crates of dairy, that evening I discovered the result. I was cool as a cucumber. My skin, dry, No perspiration. My clothes did not stick to me. My feet did not swell.
ReplyDeleteAh! Politicians who look cool under pressure must spend several hours a day in a walk in cooler. That must be where they pace to learn their lines until they learn them by rote. That must be it!