Of Samosas and Vaginas

Because I didn't plan ahead, cocktail samosas ($2.99 frozen; broiled for < 11 mins) and the dregs of a jar of mango chutney will have to do as my offering to the potluck of a new bookclub. Unusually, I seem to be the youngest, so they all love on me anyway.

 I'm looking forward to learning--among other things--how to work with mobility/speech/hearing issues in discussion formats.

The books I suggested were Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing and Carmen Machado's Her Body and Other Parties. I started talking about "The Husband Stitch" and couldn't shut up about vaginas for a quite a while :).

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A Project with Nu

While At was out discussing a podcast project with his erstwhile boss at the high school newspaper (also junior prom date; fire tweeter), Nu and I were at the antique store trying to find a small chair for the corner of the kitchen by the cookbooks' shelves. 

We found it.

Bonus: It seems to be an actual kitchen chair covered in old-timey vinyl. 

Bonus+: It cost $15 and once we'd thrown some (faux) sheepskin on it, was exactly what I'd envisioned.

Bonus ++: It turned out that an awesome student works there (her mother had recently purchased the store)

Bonus +++: Her mother and I were able to embarrass her by talking about all the ways in which she was awesome.

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Boss Day Indulgence

I inveigled them into selfies just before we walked over to Sansu because.... BAAAAS DAY!

  

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Winter Light

We carry
our shadows
through the snow
for hours

until noon
prunes them from us
with little fuss.
Suddenly

we are blessed
with light-ness,
a single body,
in samadhi

Until fading day
shades in companions
to take us downhill,
into the night


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Maps

My heart's fierce routes traverse here
maps curve cathedral arms out there

feelings scrambling across my face
in the stutter of heightened fights

I can miss all the people you have been,
the punctuation and pitch of your voices

I can learn all the places you have been
this body is--those borders are--prisons

I fill my thoughts with plots. Of weeping
until we drown--all the places in this town


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Jan 1st

For decades, the debris
of bored, unmoored hope.
Ordered: a brace of fullness.
Fulfilled: bits of loneliness.

Now there are these loves
for thousands of stories or
prayers. I never surrender/
care for myself this way


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The Prodigal Couple

It was good meeting so many old friends this week. We spent an evening with LV and NF and their families; had lunch with NM and his family today; and went to the M's NYE party where we saw EVERYONE.

Walking back from Stafford St. in the feathery snow and single-digit cold, Big A said that it's kind of fun, because people are so excited to see us even if we weren't that special when we actually lived here. It's true :) .

We got back 11-ish, so we could hang out with the kids and grandparents until midnight and chanted the countdown into 2018. I so want this year to be better than the last couple of years.

And I should take better pictures.

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