Making Donkey Ears in Vain
Making Donkey Ears in Vain
Couples meet at 6 in the cafe. Sorry, I'm late, say some. Others embrace. The two in front of me make smacky step-love while the old biddy scowls. (I'm the old biddy.)
The bottom sinks but doesn't fall out. Like a cardboard box that's been sitting in a damp basement. Did you hear about the woman who took the elevator down to the basement parking garage to get her car but the garage was flooded & she drowned. We don't like to think about it...I mean if she had time to scream, did she have time to hope there might be a trapped air bubble. Too much time to think.
Well, T.G., they quit sucking faces & left.
I kept my sour mouth...having a small dip on the graph of my joie de vivre.
I wish I could "think through" topics to completion, but the topics, thought about whole & shiny & amorphous like salmon at the bottom of the pool...never surface. Don't shed their scales, much less climb up on the platter.
It requires words. Sentences. It requires that I put a knife between my teeth & dive in. Or put on my wet suit & flippers & air tank & hop in.
If I am going to think thoughts never thought before, if I am going to be truly original, I am sure to be mis- or not understood. I don't think I want that. Anyway, after 30,000 years go by, how likely? So, I have to take some seldom seen ideas & bring them to the party dressed up in such splendid costume, that people will say, "Are those Abos? I had no idea they could be so...affecting. But what does it mean?"
And if we explore those ideas, what will that mean?
1) People do not want too much abstraction
2) Any meaning is better than none.
3) Beauty is its own reward.
So many people meeting for coffee. Gorgeous hair is better than a great dress. But a great dress is better than nothing, especially if you're fat.
Maybe I could come up on the ideas slantwise.
—Vicki & me. Idealized.
BM *Bux 6/14/01
Seas
And also seize (the day). Six heures à point. Cease (& that's what I want). Six Toes the cat. Sees & C's.
Cease is what I want mostly when I wake up: Oh no...
And when I get no mail. Like today.
When the writing doesn't flow (like most days). Or when it goes off in some weird direction & stops at last where the track ends in the middle of a bunch of scotch broom. (like today) (and yesterday)
You know, I know they're all in there. One leaps now & then, though by the time I look, there's only the spreading circle, but then a splash off in another direction, and so on. Maybe sleep deprivation? Coming back to day though, always seems hateful to me—and why? Is this the result of learning (50 years of frequent if intermittent thwart) (& 10 years of absolute despair) or is it hormonal? I used to have my ups & downs. Now I just have my downs.
All the coffee in Arabia would not wash this darkness bright.
I don't, BTW, believe that bit about getting stupid from lack of estrogen. I was never quite such a dunce as when full of heat. Smart, but stupid too, if you know what I mean.
And I mean really, what difference does it make if it's Korsakoff's syndrome or Reinecke's disease? But the fear of it will certainly get us girls running — to the doctor.
And I look like hell too. But still, there are others out there who look worse. Lots. That could make me feel better...
But it doesn't. I mean, I have to look at them.
So would you rather go blind or deaf?
So would you rather love in vain or be loved by someone repulsive or mean?
Rather have ALS where you body decays around an intact mind or
Alzheimer's where it's vice to versa.
Would you like some more bad choices?
Remember I didn't abandon Tomas until 5 minutes from the end. If I have to spend 5 minutes in hell for that—I think I already have. So there.
But I may be mistaken.
BM *Bucks 6/15/01
C's & D Cyst
I'm sure Ned Rorem could tell me why his songs are good, but I wouldn't believe him. He says all sorts of silly things in his journal too, yet was always forgiven because of his rare beea-uu-ty. No, really, why did they—and much more importantly, why is it nobody has ever recognized my 1) genius; 2) rare beauty. Too rare, I guess. Or maybe I was deluded. Mrs. Reynolds led me astray by praising my mediocre Christmas poem simply because, unlike the other 8th graders, I didn't try to rhyme.
I don't think I ever wrote another thing. I mean, I didn't think we were allowed to make it up. (Did ? I didn't think much...for myself anyway...that was frowned on too.) Originality was frowned on.
What was not frowned on? Playing piano. Singing if it was church music. Getting good grades. correct spelling & accurate math. Telling the truth.
I loved to draw & though never satisfied with the results (to this day) could amuse myself for hours. Most of all, I always liked getting the right answer.
Don't know what I could have done differently. The properties of light or vision or...if only someone could have told me it didn't have to be this/that way. But that's what no one ever tells children, in so many words. That's what education must lead you to, step by step. Or experience. Travel. Other people. TV? Maybe I should be grateful to TV for its window on the world.
The best thing in Greek history was the Spartan boy with his stolen fox. There's an Aesop story for you.
Yesterday, the beautiful girl with the great mahogany hair came by to ask me what I'm doing...we discussed those Hobson-style choices (burned at the stake or the death of 1000 cuts?) Her name is Liz. Today young Daniel is back, his beauty unimpaired after his bout of scarlet fever, but his bank account soon to be sadly depleted. He didn't have insurance! "Daniel," I say. "Don't pay."
BM Starbux 6/16/01
Her Middle Name is
Her middle name is damn. That's Ms. Perfect Day. My m.n. is Futile (yes, but what is it?).
At the end of this perfect day, I come to the Starbucks & find it's the Invasion of the Irksome clients. A dozen barricaded behind tables full of condiments. It seems to be a Meeting.
I woke up this morning alone, isolate & futile. But I didn't have to work & I took comfort in that and thought, if I have a means, I don't need the rent. I'm ugly beyond recounting these middle age mornings but I only look at my face in the mirror one eye at a time & it looks flat like a picture (of futility) & I don't take it personal.
It was only when I walked out at five to five that I found out it was a perfect day. I assisted (midwife manner) by walking down Interlaken in late afternoon solstitial sunshine. And this is what I saw: carpets of green, cascades of green, explosions of green, clouds of green & strange green stuff here & there. Also reddish-green repeating patterns with punctuations of color, some the same, some different: even the same ones were different, once you looked close. All the gaps were filled in with more beauty, as if the spirit of perfect form (Eida) could yodel forever without taking a break (& I'm sure she can).
I smiled as I walked & approved wholeheartedly everything I saw.
I'm sure a million pollen particles wafted through my sinuses, but I did not sneeze even once. All this after reading many pages of Simon Schama's history of the Frog Revolution. When men start talking, what strange things they say, and when they set to talking loudly at length, what strange things happen.
Down the hill (Olive Way) comes striding an upright old lady, wearing cotton pants & a blue work shirt. Reminds me of me.
I need to change direction. I need to change.
How can that be?
BM Starbucks 6/17/01
Couples meet at 6 in the cafe. Sorry, I'm late, say some. Others embrace. The two in front of me make smacky step-love while the old biddy scowls. (I'm the old biddy.)
The bottom sinks but doesn't fall out. Like a cardboard box that's been sitting in a damp basement. Did you hear about the woman who took the elevator down to the basement parking garage to get her car but the garage was flooded & she drowned. We don't like to think about it...I mean if she had time to scream, did she have time to hope there might be a trapped air bubble. Too much time to think.
Well, T.G., they quit sucking faces & left.
I kept my sour mouth...having a small dip on the graph of my joie de vivre.
I wish I could "think through" topics to completion, but the topics, thought about whole & shiny & amorphous like salmon at the bottom of the pool...never surface. Don't shed their scales, much less climb up on the platter.
It requires words. Sentences. It requires that I put a knife between my teeth & dive in. Or put on my wet suit & flippers & air tank & hop in.
If I am going to think thoughts never thought before, if I am going to be truly original, I am sure to be mis- or not understood. I don't think I want that. Anyway, after 30,000 years go by, how likely? So, I have to take some seldom seen ideas & bring them to the party dressed up in such splendid costume, that people will say, "Are those Abos? I had no idea they could be so...affecting. But what does it mean?"
And if we explore those ideas, what will that mean?
1) People do not want too much abstraction
2) Any meaning is better than none.
3) Beauty is its own reward.
So many people meeting for coffee. Gorgeous hair is better than a great dress. But a great dress is better than nothing, especially if you're fat.
Maybe I could come up on the ideas slantwise.
—Vicki & me. Idealized.
BM *Bux 6/14/01
Seas
And also seize (the day). Six heures à point. Cease (& that's what I want). Six Toes the cat. Sees & C's.
Cease is what I want mostly when I wake up: Oh no...
And when I get no mail. Like today.
When the writing doesn't flow (like most days). Or when it goes off in some weird direction & stops at last where the track ends in the middle of a bunch of scotch broom. (like today) (and yesterday)
You know, I know they're all in there. One leaps now & then, though by the time I look, there's only the spreading circle, but then a splash off in another direction, and so on. Maybe sleep deprivation? Coming back to day though, always seems hateful to me—and why? Is this the result of learning (50 years of frequent if intermittent thwart) (& 10 years of absolute despair) or is it hormonal? I used to have my ups & downs. Now I just have my downs.
All the coffee in Arabia would not wash this darkness bright.
I don't, BTW, believe that bit about getting stupid from lack of estrogen. I was never quite such a dunce as when full of heat. Smart, but stupid too, if you know what I mean.
And I mean really, what difference does it make if it's Korsakoff's syndrome or Reinecke's disease? But the fear of it will certainly get us girls running — to the doctor.
And I look like hell too. But still, there are others out there who look worse. Lots. That could make me feel better...
But it doesn't. I mean, I have to look at them.
So would you rather go blind or deaf?
So would you rather love in vain or be loved by someone repulsive or mean?
Rather have ALS where you body decays around an intact mind or
Alzheimer's where it's vice to versa.
Would you like some more bad choices?
Remember I didn't abandon Tomas until 5 minutes from the end. If I have to spend 5 minutes in hell for that—I think I already have. So there.
But I may be mistaken.
BM *Bucks 6/15/01
C's & D Cyst
I'm sure Ned Rorem could tell me why his songs are good, but I wouldn't believe him. He says all sorts of silly things in his journal too, yet was always forgiven because of his rare beea-uu-ty. No, really, why did they—and much more importantly, why is it nobody has ever recognized my 1) genius; 2) rare beauty. Too rare, I guess. Or maybe I was deluded. Mrs. Reynolds led me astray by praising my mediocre Christmas poem simply because, unlike the other 8th graders, I didn't try to rhyme.
I don't think I ever wrote another thing. I mean, I didn't think we were allowed to make it up. (Did ? I didn't think much...for myself anyway...that was frowned on too.) Originality was frowned on.
What was not frowned on? Playing piano. Singing if it was church music. Getting good grades. correct spelling & accurate math. Telling the truth.
I loved to draw & though never satisfied with the results (to this day) could amuse myself for hours. Most of all, I always liked getting the right answer.
Don't know what I could have done differently. The properties of light or vision or...if only someone could have told me it didn't have to be this/that way. But that's what no one ever tells children, in so many words. That's what education must lead you to, step by step. Or experience. Travel. Other people. TV? Maybe I should be grateful to TV for its window on the world.
The best thing in Greek history was the Spartan boy with his stolen fox. There's an Aesop story for you.
Yesterday, the beautiful girl with the great mahogany hair came by to ask me what I'm doing...we discussed those Hobson-style choices (burned at the stake or the death of 1000 cuts?) Her name is Liz. Today young Daniel is back, his beauty unimpaired after his bout of scarlet fever, but his bank account soon to be sadly depleted. He didn't have insurance! "Daniel," I say. "Don't pay."
BM Starbux 6/16/01
Her Middle Name is
Her middle name is damn. That's Ms. Perfect Day. My m.n. is Futile (yes, but what is it?).
At the end of this perfect day, I come to the Starbucks & find it's the Invasion of the Irksome clients. A dozen barricaded behind tables full of condiments. It seems to be a Meeting.
I woke up this morning alone, isolate & futile. But I didn't have to work & I took comfort in that and thought, if I have a means, I don't need the rent. I'm ugly beyond recounting these middle age mornings but I only look at my face in the mirror one eye at a time & it looks flat like a picture (of futility) & I don't take it personal.
It was only when I walked out at five to five that I found out it was a perfect day. I assisted (midwife manner) by walking down Interlaken in late afternoon solstitial sunshine. And this is what I saw: carpets of green, cascades of green, explosions of green, clouds of green & strange green stuff here & there. Also reddish-green repeating patterns with punctuations of color, some the same, some different: even the same ones were different, once you looked close. All the gaps were filled in with more beauty, as if the spirit of perfect form (Eida) could yodel forever without taking a break (& I'm sure she can).
I smiled as I walked & approved wholeheartedly everything I saw.
I'm sure a million pollen particles wafted through my sinuses, but I did not sneeze even once. All this after reading many pages of Simon Schama's history of the Frog Revolution. When men start talking, what strange things they say, and when they set to talking loudly at length, what strange things happen.
Down the hill (Olive Way) comes striding an upright old lady, wearing cotton pants & a blue work shirt. Reminds me of me.
I need to change direction. I need to change.
How can that be?
BM Starbucks 6/17/01
posted by K. E. Ellingson at 4:05 PM
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