Happy Birthday Jr, November 28, 1966
The Saturday after Thanksgiving. Kids eating oatmeal on the couch in front of the TV, after 50,000 nasty squirmishes since they fell out of bed. The new particularly annoying call for justice is "ma-om, ____ (insert child's name) is being meee-een." More and more, fantasies of taser ownership fill my head. "Ma-aaa...arghhhhh" and blessed silence.
Thanksgiving was actually lovely at the Velmar homestead. Boss did the turkey and it was the best one yet. And hurray for Jr's crab hush puppies which had everyone begging for one more as they came out of the frying pan. The ladies indulged in maybe a little too much Cabernet, but it was all good. Oh god, more fighting behind me, they are done shoveling oatmeal and now they are slapping each other in the face with pillows. Dear god, make it go away....
On Thursday morning my brother-in-law Troy June of Verdon, Illinois, kept me company in the kitchen as I made the stuffing and sweet potatoes with marshmallows. We talked about the beat poets, and whether Robert Creely was really a beat, and who the founder of City Lights Books was. We are both old and forgetful now, and so resorted to the Norton Anthology of Poetry. Lawrence Ferlinghetti of course! Also couldn't remember who wrote Spoon River Anthology and looked that up too...Edgar Lee Masters. Troy waxed enthusiastic about Charles Bukoswki. Was the blue collar drunken bum thing a shtick? I think yes, Troy thinks maybe not.
Jr. and I went to the courthouse to make my final restitution to the traffic court. Then we went to Home Depot where we were given free coffee and Dunkin Munchkins in honor of Black Friday. Jr. bought a mini Xmas tree and I got screws to put the bedroom door back on. Little missy slammed it and it fell off. Hurray for Jr. again as she put the door back up. We scored BIG at the Dollar Store, three big rolls of x-mas paper and a gift for Uncle Troy for UNDER FIVE DOLLARS.
I wrote out my Christmas cards last night, as I like to do on Thanksgiving weekend. Had to make a few calls for addresses, inviting the wrath of my loving friends and family. "You're doing WHAT?" Followed by name calling, like freak and bitch, and by statements like "I hate you." This is about the only organized thing I do all year so I think I should be cut some slack! Speaking of cards, Buddy, please email me your address.
Oh yes, yesterday was Jr's birthday. She poked me awake at six am to make her coffee, and she almost became a birthday casualty. Jr. is 42! Sending lots of birthday hugs to Weezer, Jr., and a Lawrence Ferlinghetti poem...
The Plough of Time
Night closed my windows and
The sky became a crystal house
The crystal windows glowed
The moon
shown through them
through the whole house of crystal
A single star beamed down
its crystal cable
and drew a plough through the earth
unearthing bodies clasped together
couples embracing
around the earth
They clung together everywhere
emitting small cries
that did not reach the stars
The crystal earth turned
and the bodies with it
And the sky did not turn
nor the stars with it
The stars remained fixed
each with its crystal cable
beamed to earth
each attached to the immense plough
furrowing our lives
Lawrence Ferlinghetti
America
America, you ode for reality!
Give back the people you took.
Let the sun shine again
on the four corners of the world
you thought of first but do not
own, or keep like a convenience.
People are your own word, you
invented that locus and term.
Here, you said and say, is
where we are. Give back
what we are, these people you made,
us, and nowhere but you to be.
Robert Creeley
The Saturday after Thanksgiving. Kids eating oatmeal on the couch in front of the TV, after 50,000 nasty squirmishes since they fell out of bed. The new particularly annoying call for justice is "ma-om, ____ (insert child's name) is being meee-een." More and more, fantasies of taser ownership fill my head. "Ma-aaa...arghhhhh" and blessed silence.
Thanksgiving was actually lovely at the Velmar homestead. Boss did the turkey and it was the best one yet. And hurray for Jr's crab hush puppies which had everyone begging for one more as they came out of the frying pan. The ladies indulged in maybe a little too much Cabernet, but it was all good. Oh god, more fighting behind me, they are done shoveling oatmeal and now they are slapping each other in the face with pillows. Dear god, make it go away....
On Thursday morning my brother-in-law Troy June of Verdon, Illinois, kept me company in the kitchen as I made the stuffing and sweet potatoes with marshmallows. We talked about the beat poets, and whether Robert Creely was really a beat, and who the founder of City Lights Books was. We are both old and forgetful now, and so resorted to the Norton Anthology of Poetry. Lawrence Ferlinghetti of course! Also couldn't remember who wrote Spoon River Anthology and looked that up too...Edgar Lee Masters. Troy waxed enthusiastic about Charles Bukoswki. Was the blue collar drunken bum thing a shtick? I think yes, Troy thinks maybe not.
Jr. and I went to the courthouse to make my final restitution to the traffic court. Then we went to Home Depot where we were given free coffee and Dunkin Munchkins in honor of Black Friday. Jr. bought a mini Xmas tree and I got screws to put the bedroom door back on. Little missy slammed it and it fell off. Hurray for Jr. again as she put the door back up. We scored BIG at the Dollar Store, three big rolls of x-mas paper and a gift for Uncle Troy for UNDER FIVE DOLLARS.
I wrote out my Christmas cards last night, as I like to do on Thanksgiving weekend. Had to make a few calls for addresses, inviting the wrath of my loving friends and family. "You're doing WHAT?" Followed by name calling, like freak and bitch, and by statements like "I hate you." This is about the only organized thing I do all year so I think I should be cut some slack! Speaking of cards, Buddy, please email me your address.
Oh yes, yesterday was Jr's birthday. She poked me awake at six am to make her coffee, and she almost became a birthday casualty. Jr. is 42! Sending lots of birthday hugs to Weezer, Jr., and a Lawrence Ferlinghetti poem...
The Plough of Time
Night closed my windows and
The sky became a crystal house
The crystal windows glowed
The moon
shown through them
through the whole house of crystal
A single star beamed down
its crystal cable
and drew a plough through the earth
unearthing bodies clasped together
couples embracing
around the earth
They clung together everywhere
emitting small cries
that did not reach the stars
The crystal earth turned
and the bodies with it
And the sky did not turn
nor the stars with it
The stars remained fixed
each with its crystal cable
beamed to earth
each attached to the immense plough
furrowing our lives
Lawrence Ferlinghetti
America
America, you ode for reality!
Give back the people you took.
Let the sun shine again
on the four corners of the world
you thought of first but do not
own, or keep like a convenience.
People are your own word, you
invented that locus and term.
Here, you said and say, is
where we are. Give back
what we are, these people you made,
us, and nowhere but you to be.
Robert Creeley
posted by MJ at 8:50 AM
5 Comments:
Thank you for the strange birthday video. The lovely cook book that you sent is now one of my favorites with lots of history about the jewish community in New Orleans.... super awesome! Thank you for a lovely Thanksgiving AND birthday as well, although you never did make me coffee! I dreamt last night that evil beings were trying to take me out of my body, yikes! I will smudge today and pray for white light to fill the house.
I never read Ferlinghetti before, very nice, MJ, thanks! Hope you had a fabuloso birthday, Jr! Do your ghosts give you bd gifts? Messages?
No, no gifts from the dead, also no coffee from MJ, had to make it myself, on my birthday.... sigh. It was a fun day though. Sr. and I had fun at Home Depot, that's probably a testament to how old we are getting.
O.k., just wanted to share weird fortune cookie message.... A clean tie attracts the soup of the day. Can't figure out how that would apply to my unemployed ass, but did think it was funny.
Hi MJ! yeah on a little blog vacation. I'm good though. cant wait for two weeks off at holiday.
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