When only some lyrics from All Things Must Pass do the job right.
My last few months have been a little trying…like for lots of people…but yeah, “all things must pass.” Yup. We all (or maybe most) are dealing as we do. Who can compare multiple stomach-crunching losses and grief…we cannot. Comparisons like that make no human sense.
If we are one of the lucky ones (I am), we’ll find listening and empathy. And if we are one of the lucky ones (I am), a way forward with purpose and much appreciation for those who have supported me in so many countless diverse ways. If still some details to work out for my way ahead, yeah, sure, but that’s paperwork. It’s the people who “have your back” who give you confidence and belief that (some nature-of-life set-backs aside), it’s possible.
Many years ago, a work colleague came in late one afternoon to tell me “George” had died. I remember it so clearly, as I was splayed out on the office floor, wearing some kind of ankle cast (result of dog-walking broken-ankle mishap…I am accident-prone), sorting files. “George died? No, just no.”
Few weeks later, I was driving from Austin to Winedale for evening summer Texas Shakespeare in that big barn. On the way, passed a clearly awful, clearly fatal car wreck. I remain unnerved about those covered bodies on the road. I was playing All Things Must Pass on my car CD (the old days), turned off the music. Not right.
Now years later, I’ll be making salad and streaming “George,” (ATMP) when the delivery driver knocks and nods, thumbs up. I’ve learned just a little bit more about music from what the LYFT drivers play (a lot of Caribbean, South American, African, love hearing all), but when a 20-some-adult dressesed football (soccer) guy (wearing more earrings than I’ve ever owned) brings produce to my door and…and…likes my old-lady-streaming-George-Harrison…well there you go.
Get up signals too from the delivery folks on Mozart and Beethoven (which the cat, who no like-y my own favorite, Stravinsky, also prefers).
Ha ha cat. This episodic sleeper (thanks Derek Thompson of The Atlantic for that) and (not unconscious, but sometimes aimless, maybe, maybe not) wanderer (thanks George Harrison late of those Beatles for that), would be me, waking at almost 10:00 p.m. to make salad and annoy you with Petrushka. Yet. Cat will however snooze peacefully on his windowsill or in his pod or in his cat cabin through the veggie washing and chopping and mixing, and the background thumpity-thump.
(How my son detested the Rite of Spring. Serious thumpity-thump.)
Why does no one like Stravinsky?
Today cat’s litter box is spotless (oh yes, I did clean the stincky, you are welcome, cat). My Mr. Cat Oliver now has been sound asleep in his pod, he happily content as I (oh gosh do laundry, floors (again) clean refrigerator, and yup, like everyone, am at the desk doing the paperwork and paying the bills.)
But hey, no whining. It’s an almost summer Friday morning in Austin. Clean house, paperwork done, bills paid, time to write, and sunset at the pool.
And update (a couple of days late), Monday morning now May 23. Around midnight Saturday was another of those incomparable awesome Austin lightning/thunder/rain-bashing-the-windows storms. And update (not late), Wednesday morning May 25. Last night more lightning and thunder and this time also hail, really somehow weirdly comforting to hear and watch from the kitchen or the bedroom. If lucky enough to wander the house, indoors, with good-smell candles and tomato soup cheering the space and then eventually tucking in with a book until morning (while storm still going)…hey, no whining.
I
Dayna Finet 