A Memorial Day Post, A Little After The Fact
A few years ago, at a Fourth of July party, a friend brought along photocopies of the Declaration of Independence for us to read aloud. There was beer involved so I might not have taken it very seriously. My friend did, though. There wasn’t an ounce of cynicism in his voice as he read a paragraph and passed the paper along. We really did take turns (between giggles) reading it aloud. Some wiseass might have been piping the Battle Hymn of the Republic through his pursed lips. Someone else might have been saluting an invisible flag. It might have been me.
Advice From My Younger Self
This piece won’t finish itself. I was going to let it languish in the bottom of the “Things To Finish Later” folder on my laptop.
But then there were these signs that came my way, little bitty signs from the Universe that said: it’s okay to put this out into the world without a pretty ending. That endlessness is in the air right now, the Universe said. It’s the season of non-resolution.
Panama! Part 2
Those of you who know me know I don't like small dogs. I'm not subsumed by a baby-talking alter ego when I see their bulging eyes and stubby legs. Instead I'm compelled to ask myself big, esoteric questions, like, How far I can punt this thing? Why can't this thing carry its own weight in whiskey barrels or picnic baskets?
Dogs have always occurred to me as Man's Best Helpers, so the itty bitty ones that bark and fit into handbags seem like a gross abomination of the species. They seem to be made only for behaving obnoxiously and making their face hair wet with saliva. I hate them. It's probably because like repels like and our similar anxieties meet in the middle like two magnet ends trying to go at it. Anyway, you should know all this because even I was surprised at how I responded to this little ball of fuzz:
I absolutely fell in love with him. I can't explain it. If you had told me months ago that I would love a Pomeranian, I would have punched you in the face for even suggesting such a thing. And yet, there I was, covered in sweat and allowing a small hairy thing to rub against my bug-bitten legs. He wasn't as barky as other dogs- so he had that going for him. And he was genuinely cuddly without being cloying. He only sometimes came out to greet us when we came up the stairs. He played fetch with a stuffed mouse for a short while, and then he stalked off like a nuclear physicist insulted by our pedestrian requests to know what pee-pee was made of. He could take us or leave us, and that was refreshing to see in a small dog. Would I be anthropomorphizing too much to say I thought he was moody? Or brilliant? I rather like the idea that maybe he wouldn't come when he was called because he was sulking under the bed, writing in his diary, bemoaning how utterly alone he was in the world because his parents had brought him to this godforsaken place where no one understood him. It didn't feel like such a stretch. And since there was a time in my life when I was also sequestered away in a bedroom ignoring the calls of my family and scribbling about my sad, what-does-it-all-mean-anyway life, I related. It was like I was meeting the sixteen year old dog-version of myself.
Panama! Part 1
Well, the world didn't implode. It didn't even hiccup. It was just another day in Paradise the day I walked onto Isla Bastimentos and delivered a big ol' hug to the Other Lauren Ziemski.
Our hug, our meeting... it was all very normal, really. In fact, the whole trip had an air of total banality to it. It was, as they say, soooo Panama. Our plane almost crash-landed in Changuinola. No biggie. One day the whole island lost power. Whatevs. Whole sections of menus were unavailable at most of the eateries on the island. Meh. This is just how it IS on Bastimentos.
MOAR CHRISTMAS!
Yeah, so that blogging every day thing didn't work out so well, now did it? I should know better than to set the bar that high. I mean, for God's sake. I'd just come off a jag of showering only sporadically and ignoring the laundry while trying to write a novel. Who was I trying to convince that I would be able to blog every day?