good: i’m glad
*somebody’s* having a good day
around here — the air is
close — and grimy — my
alpacas look like refugees —
like i don’t care about them :o(… Continue reading
Tag Archives: Explain yourself
Never Say No
I like improv because the first rule is: Never say no. You can say “Know” or “Noh” even “Gno.”
But you can’t say “No.” You have to rise to the moment. You can’t whine about it. You can’t bargain over participating. You have to meet the moment wherever it finds you. Because — hello? — now it’s your turn to make something of it.
You’re not consenting to let the moment just have its way with you. You don’t have to let yourself be carted off, although that has its magic, too. You are allowed to steer. But first you have to take the wheel. And don’t settle for just the damned hubcap, either.
Absolutes are not my thing as a rule. But if ever I were to cave on this point and adopt a “never” or an “always,” it could be this one before a lot of other possibilities.
Never say no.
Swim
Goodness I love to swim.
I love slipping through water that is the same temperature as my skin. I love the way a cupped handful of water resists being pushed out of the way. I love the way my body feels, stretched all the way out, rolling in a rhythm, and weightless.
I especially like that my chest is weightless in water. That it stops pulling on my neck and shoulders and getting in my way. That for this interval I get a break from the pain this causes me the other 23 hours of the day.
Things I Like
I like the first cup of coffee in the morning.
I like t-shirt sheets.
I like the Boston Red Sox.
I like Bob Dylan’s music.
I like the Beatles, too. And John Prine. I love John Prine.
I like Annie Dillard’s essay, living like weasels.
I like the sound of snow at 15 below.
I like Elmore Mountain glittering the way it looks to me on the way to work in January from up on West Hill, or actually by then it is probably Town Hill.
I like encountering wild things in wild places; I like the way we stop time when we pause and take each other in. Continue reading
I tell them, “I am holding out for a deaf & dumb orphan.”I need a place…
I need a place to put stuff. Circumstances conspire. I witness people behaving well, or badly. I find things, lose things, choose among options. I read good stuff. Or I re-read good stuff. Or I hear an excellent lyric. I see something that says it all. Or I make a mess, some of which is salvageable, even promising.
Sh*t happens. I need to write it down or paste it somewhere. Pictures. Found objects: sounds, footage, bits of art. I need a place to keep this stuff. My mind is not as limber as (I once thought) it once was. Not as sticky. Or the shelves are shorter. Or something. Anyway, I need to collect this stuff somehow, somewhere, in a way that won’t get away from me.
If I don’t collect this stuff, I’ll lose it. But also, I like collections in their own right. I like the order that asserts itself. I like the way that grouping a passle of disparate objects forces them all to turn their common credential to the sunlight, like matching badges pinned to the undersides of their lapels. I like the patterns generated by juxtaposing instances that seemed initially to have absolutely nothing in common except my attention. I can even make entirely new moments by tossing the detritus of elapsed moments together in a big …collecting place.
I spend a lot of time online, so I figure I might as well collect stuff here.
This Day As-Is 