Sunday sings such a slow song

Posted on | September 30, 2007 | 8 Comments

I have a slight fever today, and so am moving slowly, gently, with eyes squinting a bit. I try to keep my attention on what’s before me. The area rug spread out on the sidewalk, the vacuum and then the steamer running back and forth across it, by will of my hand. The larger carpet, rolling up the driveway until it’s a tight tube, ready for the dumpster. The neighborhood cats discovered it while it hung on the porch railing to dry and I say no thank you to the ammonia. Thank you very no. Next switch laundry and pull my thoughts back away from trying to solve problems that I cannot solve. Not now. Not ever.

Drop the two split chicken breasts into a pot with vegetable scraps, water and two bay leaves for stock. Make the dough for a Feta and Chard Tart—a savory dough with olive oil and kosher salt that will sit in the fridge until dusk. And what the heck, a batch of dough for Apple Crostates to make with the local, antique Opalescent apples I got yesterday at the farmers’ market. This a sweet dough of flour, butter, sour cream, salt and egg. Perhaps I’ll slice up a couple of the red pears to mix in with the apples. Pull my thoughts back again. Really, it’s of no use running over it all again and again in my mind, that just makes me feel more feverish. Everything will be okay. We’re all strong people in my family. The curve balls eventually go straight. Sip water. Take another vitamin C. Switch the laundry again. Chop onion, carrots, celery, chard stems and green beans for the soup. Step out onto the deck and turn my face up to the sun and let the breeze lift my hair from my neck. Back in to shred the chicken breasts between my aching fingertips.

Sweep the kitchen floor. Soak a dish towel and drop it and push it around with my foot to scrub up the most offensive stains. That will have to do, as I don’t have enough in me to deal with a mop right now. In the living room, begin to sort the million DVD and VHS cases. Make another pile of papers to sort some other time. Take a shirt of Lila’s that’s headed for the laundry, swipe it around on the exposed surfaces of the book case. Straighten the couch cover and the chair cover, sorry fat cat, you’ll have to find another spot to snore away the afternoon. Must be nice. Just curl up there in a furry comma and wait for your next instructions.

The neighborhood is mostly quiet. Tyler has some friends over—they camped out last night and raised quite a wild-boy ruckus until I told them that mothers would be called out of bed to come pick them up if they didn’t settle down around the campfire to tell stories and let the old folks in the hood get some sleep. Now they’re having another fire and using Tyler’s few blacksmithing tools to make weapons of some sort. Chris and Lila are at the old house. I’m moving from one task to another with measured steps and a bit of a headache, trying to keep the angst at bay. It’s almost time to sit on the front porch rocker with a glass of wine.

We try to hold so much in our hands, in our hearts, in our busy little monkey minds. But don’t you think that all we really hold onto is our ideas of ourselves? It seems so, at least right now.

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