O Captain! My Captain!

today i spent a wondrous afternoon at walt whitman's birthplace...thinking about the "leaves of grass" as i watched leaves falling on a cold but glorious fall day...but here is the irony...for twenty years i lived about two miles from the place...passed it all the time...wrote, edited and agonized over my poems at a panera across the road...moved to nassau county two years ago...entered some poems in a contest sponsored by the nassau county poet laureate society...didn't win but had one published in their brand new anthology...which was launched today...and there i was in whitman's house...an afternoon bursting with poems...funny and poignant...and inspiring...trying to listen as my heart raced waiting to hear my name...and suddenly it was my turn...and damn, it felt good...the best in life is often that minute or two when it all comes together...we often forget that and don't appreciate that moment...because just as quickly the mundane and ordinary will return...and it did...as i kicked the fallen leaves under my heels on the path when i left i closed my eyes...and breathed deep...but it wasn't the glory of whitman's leaves i smelled...but the aroma of the laundromat across the road...coffee from dunkin next door...and life returns...o captain...it does

the patron saint of schmucks

so I realize some of this may seem familiar...like thoughts from a previous blog post for those who've followed for a while...but since most of us are around that half century mark...or in the neighborhood...we won't remember...which is a blessing for this writer...anyway...i'm feeling cranky...sleeping like shit thanks to donut...(yeah, you've all read about that one)...and shoulder pain...which now after last week's mri seems less of an age-complaint and an actual tear...and so to pull a "scarlett"...as in "o'hara"..."gone with the wind" for the rest of you...i decided to think about all that another day and went to the movies with mike last night..."st. vincent"...which i enjoyed...despite some cloying plot devices and too-tidy for me scripting...but the title of this blog belongs to the woman who sat down next to mike at the multiplex...you all know her...she plopped in with her significant other, toting a coat, a vat of popcorn and a water bottle...in the middle of previews...her mouth didn't shut for the remainder of her stay...the two of them talking...loudly...mike bore the brunt of it...i opened my mouth many times to say..."shut  the fuck up"...but i remembered the multiplex shooting in florida and closed my mouth...sadly it's all over the place...no one shuts up at the movies...or at broadway performances...or on the lirr...or on a plane...the disconnect created by modern technology has rendered us all starving for the sound of our own voice...blah...blah...blah...and as i ponder this and dream wistfully of days gone by...dressing up to go to the theater...the sweet silence with an overture...no crinkling of twizzlers during the show stopping number...soft sobbing...the only sound in a movie theater during closing credits...i realize that shit...i am a cranky-pants...and i think of all the oscar-bait movies opening this fall...plotting when to see which one...how to cram it all in...and then about that patron saint...and wonder when all those movies will be available on netflix!

house of litter and fog

i am sleepwalking through fall...blame it on the meow..in july, donut, our cat, came out of his "diabetic remission"...and any shot at normal sleep, or a "good housekeeping" clean home went out the proverbial window...he sleeps all day...wakes to drain the water bowl...runs in and out of his pan...a lot....trailing litter that escapes mats, sweeps, vacuums, etc...a lot...and bellows at 230AM...a lot...i am the only one who notices...or hears...in theory...and so after weeks of this i find myself finding it difficult to distinguish the line between daily life...and r.e.m...and so I am sleepwalking...which in a warped alternative universe should be a goldmine for creative juices and writing and such...but instead of poems of epic proportion i concoct shopping lists...and spend free time watching the guity pleasures on the dvr...the sunday jackpot...and so as i picture myself a somewhat older alicia florrick...lustrous chestnut julianna margulies-maned...killer career...enviable wardrobe...i fear that i am more bug-eyed carrie mathison...running on fumes...and a good chardonnay...and the good stuff nucky thompson bootlegs...as i wait for that insulin to work...and to sleep...again...

next to normal

i am a woman in my fifties...there...i've said it and i'm still breathing...and i am trying to reinvent the wheel, again...so to speak...as my generation runs the treadmill that is life...trying not to fall off...trying to be current...relevant...not get left behind...trying to hang on to employment...and find some meaning if that employment has become little more than a paycheck...and as all this becomes unbearably loud in my head...that nagging thought rises like a crescendo...what have i done with my time...what will i do going forward...and how fierce will i be...blame all this angst on the jewish new year which always makes me pause...and think...and brood...and eat...which...being a woman in her fifties...is like immediately dialing up the freakin' scale five pounds for thought alone...i make a to do list...maybe a little more introspective than picking up cat litter or going to the cleaners...no, this is more like...get that second book out there...read more...laugh more...listen a lot more...and as i sit here and ponder the big picture...and where i fit into all of it...i look on my desk at a beautiful quote mounted on a wood plaque...given to me by a lovely women, sue, in my writers' group..."the old woman I shall become will be quite different from the woman I am now. another I is beginning, and so far I have not had to complain of her." ~ george sand...and as i start this new year...5775...i look forward to new beginnings...and to the challenge, and journey...and to the halvah sitting on the counter

six degrees of separation

only a few weeks ago i blogged about seeing joan rivers...first time...stand up...long island...but this was before robin williams...before joan...and this is no laughing matter...and i wondered about loss and grief...and how if we dissect things we are probably all six degrees or less from it all...and as i pause to wonder if the new york post is even fit for the bottom of a bird cage after it's horrible photos of pre-beheadings...(this is 2014, right...not tudor England of which i am totally immersed in courtesy of "wolf hall")...as i pause in awe at the swift passage of time as we approach the 13th anniversary of 911...i feel sadness in the waning days of summer...realizing how important robin and joan and all brilliant comedians are as they hold us tight in the warmth that is humor...keep us from falling into the abyss of the world as we know it...hoping that generation text will continue the tradition of comedy...which is a step away from tragedy...and find a voice or two that will make them laugh till they cry...and keep the world outside at bay...for a while

everything is illuminated....

fireflies on an august night...a breeze on a beach that hints of fall...a nice glass of wine in your hand as the sun sinks into the horizon...the clichés of summer...what we dream about on a biting cold winter afternoon...but the title of this blog has little to do with fireflies...or even summer skies lit up by crazy storms...it has to do with me thinking about the movie, wonderfully directed by liev schreiber...everything is illuminated...about love and loss and closure...about man's brutal inhumanity and gentle humanity...maybe I am thinking about this because september has always been a month of new beginnings...after august and all that was free and effortless, we move forward and start again...the responsibility of a new school year, or new school...for some back to work...and for me, in a few short weeks, rosh hashanah, the new year...a woman in my writing group read a beautiful piece she was working on...one that asked a pointed question of what you would ask for if given one wish...not that simple, huh?...would it be personal or global?...and I've been thinking about that...and all that is in the past...and what is now...and wondering about what will be...and i dig deep to really decide what that wish would be...one sunset closer to fall...and hoping for some illumination when my eyes close...and the world fades to black

Can we talk?

so, i am looking back at the past week and i realize how bizarre that last saturday i saw joan rivers...and last night sammy hagar (with michael anthony, vic johnson and jason bonham)...no real common thread...although the seeds of humor and music firmly planted in my earliest memories of growing up...vacations in the catskills...borscht belt fever...sneaking in to see the show...comediens...comediennes...and then there was music...my parents and their most eclectic album collection...broadway hits, sing along in yiddish, allen sherman, harry belafonte, ramsey lewis, tito puente, shirley bassey, janis joplin....wait janis joplin??...and there you have it...and so in one week i finally get to see joan...i want to be that fierce at 81...to take all life has handed you and then throw it back while the audiences cries in laughter...sammy hagar...not that i ever really owned any of his cds...but no one could deny his rock showmanship...i was actually very curious when jason bonham's name appeared...remembering how incredible he was with heart at jones beach...secretly hoping for zeppelin tunes...and then getting several...sammy wailing "whole lotta love"...jason slaying "moby dick"...of course, concerts always bring them all out of the woodwork...the almost fist fight over a seat at joan...yes, at a joan rivers performance security was called...not slipknot...then last night...the seat holder to my left...standing and pumping his right arm in the air wildly...while his wife or girlfriend sat in a catatonic state to his left...as the evening wore on he was getting closer to me...closer to pounding my skull with each pump...closer to knocking the steel plate out of my skull...would have sent it flying onstage...sammy probably would have just laughed...autographed it and tossed it back to the crowd...hey, there's only one way to rock...