Wednesday, November 23, 2005

more cuteness. really. In honour of the Great Vancouver Fog of 2005... a baby squinting into the sun at the zoo. Auntie Meg is still thinking this is profound cuteness. 6:08:43 PM    well, yes, but...  [] i'm just saying. Second time in as many months I woke up thinking it was Christmas. Was I worried I hadn't shopped? No. Was I at my family's home? No. Honestly, some days I have to wonder if my mind is trying to live in an alternate reality and my body keeps raining on the parade. I just pictured myself as a giant float in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Whoa. Speaking of, Happy Thanksgiving (tomorrow), my friends to the South! While you are watching football and eating turkey,  I'll be slogging coffee at work and blogging endlessly into the ether once I get home, only to receive a flurry of comments on Sunday night, when you all turn on your computers again. I did all these little blog quizzes this morning for no good reason at all. It occurs to me that, in most of them, I come off as fairly annoying. Like, if the quiz was "What Kind Of Noise Are You?", I would be the noise that our old fridge made. Freakin' quizzes. Anyhow, I should go to work now, but I just wanted to take a moment to say this: Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast. -- Oscar Wilde 7:09:55 AM    well, yes, but...  [] Reeses Peanut Butter Cups Very popular, one of you is not enough. What Kind of Candy Are You? 6:54:40 AM    well, yes, but...  [] happysad. The world is an odd place. I don't know if you knew that, but it's been apparent to me for years now. There is so much beauty on this planet, but so much ugliness at the same damn time. When I try and balance it in my head, I get overwhelmed. Because you can't... you can't balance it. It defies anything so logical as that. So I thought I'd try and think of some of the beautiful things tonight, in order to avoid dwelling on the sorrows. Because they're there -- they don't go away if you try and avoid them, those sorrows. They sneak up and overtake you. Today, I saw so many sorrows -- in eyes, on screens, in words, in thoughts. I don't want to take them in too deeply -- more deeply than they already exist -- but they burrow so quickly. But they will also be ignored at times. It is those times that I cherish. I open my eyes wide and hunger for all that is lovely and good -- and then I am fortified. So what exactly do I dream of? What is beautiful right now? Skies as big as the whole world, streaked rose and orange and blue and mottled with clouds. Skies that take you hard by the eyeballs and fill you to your toes. Snows as cold as the centre of an ice cube, sparkling bright with the fiercest chill. The soft, smooth, perfect skin of babies, scented with weet powdery smell that makes you bury your nose in the crook of their neck and breathe in until your lungs are full and your heart bursts. The earthy, pungent smell of a market table full of spices -- peppercorns and nuts and cloves and fine threads of yellow-ochre saffron lying in rubbled piles, setting nostrils and sauces and stomachs afire. The smooth, even honeyed-brown of a hardwood floor, stretching out towards a window and gleaming with the promise of sliding in sockfeet and smelling warm pine or oak every time the sun heats the room. The staccato clip of piano keys played roughly, building to crescendo and tumbling to a finish -- a song as lively as the play of shadows across the gleaming top of a baby grand. Old cloth yellowed with light and dark and age and air, but still vibrant with unmatchable, singular colours from herbs and flowers steeped in pots and kettles. Fog thick with salt air and mist and mystery and history and soft white light, breaking only for the brightest neon flashes and the persistent glow of buttery houselights. The celadon sheen of the old mugs on my shelf, lit from within under their milky, crackled glaze. The worn brass-gold of old rhinestone-studded pins tumbling in my jewel box, with flowers and filagree and twirls and swirls and pearls. The breathless laughter of a loved voice. The eyeshocking brilliance of lightning, spiderwebbing across a midnight-sooty sky. The soft look of patience and grace in a clear, knowing expression. Really, I could list the things that have snagged my heart until my fingers went numb from tapping the keys. There is so much to see and know and love in this world that I hardly know where to begin. But the same could be said for the hate and the hurt and the horrible, horrible emptiness that so many people feel from their bellies clean through to their spirits. It infests this earth with just as much vigour. I witness those things. And I've felt some of it, too. Still, I will cling to the love and the peace and promise of the good, and give that out to people as best as I can. Because at the end of the day, that is our only hope of even the slightest bit of balance. I think you should do the same. It's so damned easy to give into despair. The real challenge is giving into beauty. So as soon as you see it, make sure you take it in. Because that is your best service to this crazy world. And what more beautiful goal could there be? 12:16:01 AM    well, yes, but...  []

© Copyright 2006 Meg Fowler. Last update: 3/4/06; 2:30:18 PM.