The song without the snark
His magic was his voice. And his sense of humor.
Voices
Wrong isn’t right
Imperfection is cool, but the celebration of imperfection can lead to the misguided pursuit of its earmarks, the codification of imperfection in a set of manners and gestures available only to those who possess the right influences, the right sources of wrong.
A junkie’s a junkie
Golf, in the abstract, is hitting a petrified sheep turd with a cow’s leg into a gopher hole, and then gradually getting all human and scientific about roughly the same timeline as the Industrial Revolution.
Summer days, summer phase
I’ve been thinking about where we could go swimming safely when the weather reaches up towards 90 degrees. Much is being written about how to go to the beach Upstate, or down where the ocean touches our shores. Many others are thinking as we are. I lose myself in Googlemaps, running my finger around lakes, along river and stream courses. I do the same within my memory of little-known swimming holes I might return to.
Choices, choices
Way too many people are fussed-up about wearing a mask, but who still insist they have a right to go out and mingle, other people be damned. One person did that at a local livestock auction last week. He hung around for eight hours, without a mask. He then tested positive for Covid-19. Health departments in three counties are trying to track down everyone who may have been exposed.
Orpheus Morpheus
Sleep is not still. It is not passive. It is engagement. It demands composure, energy, and form. It has angles of entry, its own laws of physics, a language we can occasionally remember.
Pad Thai and cleanup
Music’s been playing out on the street for the past three days. Instead of the hard hiphop that’s usually the norm, the dudes on the stoop across from us are playing sweet soul, Quiet Storm balladry, sultry sounds that match the weather and lift spirits.
Meeting your children
I’ve been given an opportunity to get to know my daughter in a new way. She’s got a podcast. The first thing I learned is that I’d like her even if she weren’t my daughter. She’s smart, she’s funny, and she’s interested in things that I find fascinating.
We have our own stories
The cardinals came to Pope Urban XII, worried that the Vatican would have to expel the Jews from Rome. If only we could do so gently, Urban replied. Maybe we could set a challenge we know we’d win.
I do not cry, but laugh
Therapists collect the tears of men like AAA emeralds or a Jace the Mind Sculptor Magic: The Gathering card. They get a star on their helmets every time a man cries in the chair. With vials of our frozen tears, they have purchased second homes and red convertibles.