forever takes forever

This is the place. This is the place.

the leaves are turning
yet the hinge at my neck refuses
to unhook our gazes
you simply remember rainbows 
echoes edging the rain 

and pause to wonder if this poem 

will be reply or elegy 

_______________________

Pic: An overcast sky, but the fall colors were simply brilliant in Bellaire. (From our weekend trip.) 

a personal pause

In retrospect, I was unraveling a bit last week. I found Chiconky's advice, in particular the bit about how, "You don't have to bear witness to everything to hold sacred what is happening" so incredibly comforting. That coupled with my need to focus on making sure Big A had the best 50th celebration I could give him really helped me pause the spiral.

So a personal pause. In the lead up to Big A's birthday, I also bypassed the whole navaratri business/busy-ness, and instead of a multi-day celebration where I dressed everyone in saris, we did nothing... and I missed all the visits to other people's golus because we were away this weekend. There's always next year!

And we usually decorate for Halloween in the week after Big A's birthday, but I think I might just skip it this year because I'm off to a conference in a couple of days (and I don't like looking at scary things anyway!).

Pic: Big A and I walked over to the Wharton for a David Sedaris reading and it was delightful. (The weather was such a balmy 72 degrees.)  It was a full house. I kept thinking how much Nicole enjoys Sedaris and wished she could have been there too! Sedaris is a terrific reader and my favorite bit was a new piece where Sedaris reworked a banal Chat GPT essay written in "his" style, amping up the banality and incongruity.

the big day

Big A slept a lot and I had meetings all day, but we regrouped in the evening to sift through messages from family and go out to dinner. 

There was a lot of merriment. 

When I mentioned at the end of dinner how much I'd enjoyed all the jokes and giggling, At said "when are we NOT joking and giggling when we're together?" That is true and it was gratifying to hear the grown up kid validate that.

And perhaps this can be a "take-home gift" to anyone who sees this post--here's Talia Lakshmi Kolluri's amazing short story "The Good Donkey" from her collection What We Fed to the Manticore. I posted a link to this story on family chat, but no one has read it yet.

Pic: Big A with Birthday "bling," birthday cake, and a birthday smile. I know he said no party, but that didn't mean I couldn't go to the party store to buy knick knacks and tiaras that say "golden age" for all of us.

bye-bye, weekend

The weekend was lovely... the weekend is over... 

The stars were just so countlessly brilliant last night as Big A and I walked Huck and Max, I just wanted to stay up all night. After we got back, I grabbed At, who was still up, and we sat out on the porch marveling for another hour. I fell into a bit of a trance from the lapping of the waves and light-show in the sky.

Now it's back to reality. 

I love when we're all together, so I felt really sad when we dropped At off at his place. And I feel guilty because Max drooled and barfed through the three-hour road trip despite the meds the vet prescribed. He loves new places, but has such a tough time in the car! We're thinking no road trips with Max for a while...

Pic: Goodbye to Torch Lake. Huck, me, At, Nu, Big A, and Max (a bit obscured as he's taking another look at the water). The Fall colors on the opposite shore are sublime.

Golden

Big A turns 50 on Monday... it seems like a very BFD. It has been wild to reflect on the changes over the decades.

After I made everyone some (frozen) pizza for brunch, we commemorated this BFD by playing several rounds of how-well-do-you-know-the-birthday-baby.

Big A kept looking to me and asking if I had the key to questions like favorite book and favorite song--haha. I guess it is difficult to isolate things like that. But better than the right answers were the discussions the questions provoked. I think we did great job of figuring out his favorite author (Kurt Vonnegut), his favorite genre (hip-hop, which also turns 50 this year), and everyone was 100% certain that he'd never been on a blind date (he hadn't).

Pic: Nu, At, Big A, Max, and Huck. I imagine I can see the lake through the windows...  We got in around 2 am last night. KB had said the front door would be unlocked and we should just let ourselves into her parents' summer place. The door was unlocked and I did let myself in, but I was a bit worried that we may have let ourselves into the wrong house... I relaxed only after I saw a family picture with KB on the wall. 

here we go

Although it has stayed mostly green where we are, I can see the colors turning every day on my commute north to work. I listened to chants in Sanskrit in the car and it was pleasant and peaceful and gave me some time to enjoy the poetic beauty of the slokas and puzzle out the agglutinative meanings of words I don't know (my favorite this week is samudra-tanayaya-- body like an ocean).

I am excited to finish the 1001 meetings scheduled for today and then take off with the fam for Big A's birthday weekend. 

I couldn't find any places on the water that would allow us to bring Huck and Max, so KB kindly offered up her parents' place on Torch Lake. The plan is to get everyone a light dinner, pack a backpack each, pick up At after his shift... and go!

Pic: A glimpse of the Red Cedar north of us from CC.

Fall into bed (or not)

In truth, I'm having a tough time of it--unable to sleep, plagued by unspecific anxiety, my brain overflowing with sad details. I was just congratulating myself for holding it together... Look at me: making breakfasts and dinners, prepping lectures and discussions, doing house projects, attending every work meeting, making plans with friends, researching the next book chapter, keeping my million plants alive!

And then one day the thousand-yard stare of a shell-shocked child won't leave my head and I have to excuse myself from the classroom to compose myself. But isn't it great how much lighter it feels after a good cry? 

Pic: A couple of weeks ago when it finally started getting cooler, I changed us to Fall bedclothes and now the bedroom looks so golden and cozy. I wish I could log more sleep hours than I am currently though!

seen and felt

I'm moved by all the people all across the world protesting the ongoing war in the middle east and especially by the thousands of young people chanting "not in my name." The protests put into action the Rabbi Tarfon quote that has helped me in times of crushing weltschmerzen: "Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief... You are not obligated to complete the work but neither are you free to abandon it." 

The two main constituencies in the U.S. organizing for a ceasefire right now are (1) Palestinians whose families are under attack in Gaza and (2) progressive American Jews, some of whom lost family in the Hamas attack. This is an incredible coalition that gives me hope.

And this snippet from Marwan Makhoul I have been seeing everywhere is simultaneously insight and benediction. The text reads: "In order for me to write/poetry that's not political/I must listen to the birds/and in order to hear the birds/the war planes must be silent."

May it be so.

in a critical condition

Ivy clings like memories even when all the tenses fall wrong

I keep looking over my shoulder for the children are slower and left behind 

I tried to bring them bandages and medicine but find only their cinders in the air  

I fall, then my face falls, my sight falls away, and

then my mask falls

I've answered grief as loud as I can but how could I be louder than my disbelief

I sweep up my footprints in the dust, my imprints in the sand, and let my fingerprints burn

I have mourned the dead; I am mourning the dead; I will always be mourning the dead.

--------------------------------

Pic: Ivy wall with L.

for I don't know where I am

the day will happen soon enough
the shout of the sun 
the hit of to-dos 

how I will climb up the afternoon
then slide down
to dinner 

the hours search with serrated teeth 

to stitch time up

into context

sleep is a circadian memento mori  

yet I step to it

stirring

its shadows frantic, lurking in gaps

but once its here

its here

Pic: Huck and Max, tails aflutter.  (Cuddle time!)

it is what it is

I was relieved life conspired to give me a day of silence to gather myself yesterday. And as it turns out, today was the opposite with extra people-ing: the beginning of Navaratri, Sunday family dinner, people at home, walks and talks I had scheduled with friends earlier in the week... 

And although I started out by merely going through the motions, each interaction refueled me in big and tiny ways. When I called my mom this morning, I could hear the hubbub of the hundred+ guests at the family celebration of Navaratri in Pondycherry  and then I got passed from mom to aunts and uncles and cousins--each a little rush of love. My dinner--a colorful chopped salad and a fluffy frittata inspired by Seamus Mullen's Real Food Heals was beautiful and filling. (Fun fact: Big A went to college with Seamus, and our friend CC dated him.) My garden walk with HK was lovely, and I also got to go on a long ramble--geographically and conversationally--with L. Lots of mutual check-ins and chats with JG, EM, JL, and BL... Nu's very serious demeanor during our impromptu dermatological consult made me (still makes me) smile and they gave me products from their own stash of K-skin care to help with my recent acne outbreak. 

These are all blessings I am so, so lucky to have in this imperfect and difficult world.

Pic: Water Lilies at MSU Horticultural Gardens with HK. I thought about cropping out the clump of weeds and gathered gunk, but it is what it is...