Hits have gone down since National Poetry Month began, and I have to confess, I feel like a neighborhood restaurant that was doing a nice little business until management decided to celebrate National Liver and Onions Month. I thought if you didn’t like something on the menu you’d just ignore it, but apparently the stench was more than many could handle because you have been staying away in droves*. I have the feeling that at some point most people get the idea that poetry is a bunch of pretentious twaddle, and I don’t know if poets themselves have done much to help — god knows whoever invented the “slam” has a seat reserved in the third ring of the seventh circle of hell (usury, blasphemy, and sodomy).

Well, Poetry Month is over, and in an effort to go out with a bang (ha ha) here’s a nice link to some limericks about physics.

Thank god May is National Mental Health Month.

*or was it the clowns?

This morning Jack did this thing where he held his hand out, palm down, about a foot over the bed and Kitty would come put her head under it like he was going to pet her, but he wouldn’t, he’d keep his hand above her head and then move it away and she’d stretch her neck out and walk around the bed to follow his hand wherever he moved it. This went on for about two minutes and finally Jack said, delightedly, “I have a cat magnet in my hand!”

I left a note in my daily planner that says, “All my bras are crap but I get laid anyway.”

On Sunday our New York Times sat out on the lawn in its half-open blue plastic wrapper soaking up a lot of dew, so I called the bastards up and instead of asking them to deliver another paper I said I wanted the $5 unreadable wet paper credit. Then I went into the kitchen and dried the paper out in the oven section by section. And Jack watched all this (while reading the L.A. Times, which I hate and cannot read except for the Hot Property column and the comics) and said, “That is exactly what your dad would do.” Because my dad will go to great lengths to save a buck, and I grew up eating a lot of discount dinners, but I also went to a good college without asking for a dime in student loans because my parents had saved up and paid my tuition in cash, so I can’t really say that much against the habit, except for maybe that if you have a lifelong habit of deferring all your pleasures until later you may find that later never comes and you’re so used to making do that you never learn the difference between the thing in itself is fantastic and it’s great because we got it 30% off. However, when it comes to reading a wrinkly five-dollar paper for free on Sunday morning, I got no problem.

When I was home last week my mother gave me a book she used to read to us when we were small, The Tenggren Mother Goose. It was first published in the 1940s (click on the book if you want to see a really enourmous image of the cover) and apart from the fantastically Scandinavian illustrations (you might remember having a Tenggren nightmare after somebody read you The Poky Little Puppy) there’s also that wildly creepy strain of Brothers Grimm thinking that I think they banned from childhood once Holly Hobby made the scene. I flip through this book every night with Jackson before he nods off and I thank God he can’t read yet when I see how some of these rhymes actually end. The old woman who lived in a shoe? She had a lot of kids, yeah, but she knew what to do, she gave them some broth and she gave them some bread and then she fucking whipped their asses and sent them to bed. Then on several other pages there’s a bunch of animals that get the shit beaten out of them, as well as some fucked up marriages (viz. Punch and Judy), and it also turns out that if you don’t do your laundry until Saturday — WELL! “They that wash on Saturday, Oh! they are sluts indeed.” This book is fucking killing me.

Today at the park, where I was trying to get Jackson’s balsa-wood-and-rubber-band airplane to fly anywhere but into the koi pond, we saw a couple getting their wedding pictures taken. She looked like she’d stepped straight out of Sense and Sensibility, and he looked like he’d just time traveled in from the Zoot Suit wars. They also had a mariachi band getting warmed up before the ceremony, which was about to take place in a quieter corner of the park. Good luck to them, I hope they find some common ground for themselves somewhere in the sixteenth century.

Jack has a gig in Ventura tonight and Jackson’s in bed so I’m flying solo. I’ve got half a bottle of wine left but all the animal crackers are gone, so it looks like it’s time to move on to shots of twelve-year-old tawny port and fudge-covered Oreos while I reply to four weeks’ worth of e-mails. Yes, maybe you’re right, I should just finish what’s left in my glass and go to bed. Thank you, I often need a steadying hand like yours before I step off the curb into oncoming traffic. God bless us every one. Good night.

Um, I’m not sure how this works, exactly, but apparently the value of one of my outgoing links is $156.19. So all you bitches owe me.

The Big Fussy Festival of High School Remembrance is nearly over, I’m done talking about the strange teenage things I did that I thought would make me popular and am slowly backing into the lonely, middle-aged present once again. Whew. Time to let down the hems on all my skirts and leave the teenage boys alone. Maybe I’ll go for that French professor look again: short little bangs with a chignon, snug sweaters, slim wool skirts, tottery high heels. (No, no, no, must leave teenage boys alone.) Start posting baby pictures again. Quit dreaming about being Steve Buscemi’s girlfriend. (He was a postal worker and let me ride in his truck while he delivered the mail.) Eat more doughnuts, get fat, and start pestering Jackson for grandkids. He’s not even two yet but who cares! Let the nagging begin!

I had my first meeting with Jack’s partner/my new boss and their bookkeeper, and at last I confronted the horrifying reality of (1) trying to appear eager and interested when I’m silently worrying about whether taking a part-time job is going to turn me into a Bad Mother, (2) trying to learn a new-to-me computer spreadsheet program without looking like a slack-jawed ape, and (3) trying to follow an explanation of profit-and-loss sheets while stifling yawns and cranking up my inner cheerleader to silently bolster myself with little affirmations: “You like math! You like math! You always did well in math! This will be a snap once they stop speaking in code!” Every new job seems to come with a new vocabulary, and this one is no exception. I have absorbed a truckload of construction terms thanks to living with Jack for almost eight years, but the language of bookkeeping might as well be the language of beekeeping right now (which has some comedy potential — “Beekeeping Bookkeepers, Tonight on Fox!”).

Yesterday Jack bought Jackson a little stuffed Dalmation (we have watched 101 Dalmations about eight thousand times, but if you haven’t seen it lately I’ll remind you that the two main dogs are named Pongo and Perdy). Jack is now trying to teach Jackson to say “Pongo, old boy!” in a thick British nasty upper class accent. It is kind of funny and awful at the same time, like everything else in life right now, let’s face it. At least taxes are over, the war has wound down to the point where I don’t feel like I’m hearing the sound of fingernails over a blackboard twenty-four hours a day, and my rash is clearing up. Now if I can just get through Poetry Month without lapsing into long stretches of Alexander Pope.

75

Turning it over, considering, like a madman

Henry put forth a book.

No harm resulted from this.

Neither the menstruating stars (nor man) was moved

at once.

Bare dogs drew closer for a second look

and performed their friendly operations there.

Refreshed, the bark rejoiced.

Seasons went and came.

Leaves fell, but only a few.

Something remarkable about this

unshedding bulky bole-proud blue-green moist

thing made by savage & thoughtful

surviving Henry

began to strike the passers from despair

so that sore on their shoulders old men hoisted

six-foot sons and polished women called

small girls to dream awhile toward the flashing & bursting tree!

John Berryman

I accidentally put Oxycontin on my grocery list. I meant Oxyclean! Silly me!

A true e-mail exchange between me and Fahey: ex-boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend who introduced me to Jack and was best man at our wedding. Naturally there’s more to it than that. Maybe some other time.

Note the date of each e-mail.

Date: Fri Sep 27, 2002

To: Fahey

Subject: dude

How are you? How was New Jersey? I just ran into Darryl at a gas station. He’s forgiven me for not letting him use the phone at 2 am that one time and making him walk all the way to Milpas to find a pay phone. He’s married, too.

Date: Fri Sep 27, 2002

To: Mrs. Kennedy

Subject: Re: dude

Jersey was fun NYC was better. I took Britt to the Irish Reps “Playboy of the Western World” Aye Pageen Mike, thars no star brighter reflected upon the muddy pools of the fens! They left all the slang in so it was diffficult for Britt and Tom who kept whispering in my ear, “What’s a Peeler?” I felt thusly swelled in a tiny unit sort of way, don’t you know. I couldn’t shake the phony Irish accent for at least 2 hours after as Britt and I roamed around Soho and Noho quaffing tangerine cozmos and eating kamamoto oysters. People where exceedingly friendly in all boroughs of the city this time round. Daryl, last time I saw him he was pulling newly dead salmon out of an igloo with that disappearing eyes smile of his. Married is he! I should get on the ball…I’ve started compiling a list of guests.

Blowing kisses to all

The diminutive demeanor that is I

Date: Thu Oct 10, 2002

To: Mrs. Kennedy

Subject: Re: dude

We are so good at keeping in touch

Date: Sun Mar 23, 2003

To: Fahey

Subject: Re: dude

HI!!

Date: Tue March 25, 2003

To: Mrs. Kennedy

Subject: Re: dude

you guys are like friends maintained out of shouts from moving car windows.

(Begin Doppler) “IM FINE HOW ARE YOU!” (End Doppler)

Date: Tue Mar 25, 2003

To: Fahey

Subject: Re: dude

Every time I see a car like yours I roll up my window and pretend I didn’t see it.

Date: Sun Apr 20, 2003

To: Fahey

Subject: sensitive

I WAS JUST KIDDING.

Did somebody say cheerleader??

Well, technically I was a Pom. We were very specific on the spelling: it was pom-pon girl, not pom-pom girl, but everybody still got it wrong. We were the Laker Girls of Columbine High. We did synchronized dance routines at halftime — with the marching band during football season, and during basketball season we danced to a string of hits from “Jungle Love” to “Shattered,” with a little Evelyn “Champagne” King thrown in to show we had soul. Our skirts flipped up but you never saw a thing because Lori, Julie, Marcia, Annie, Rhonda, me and the rest were nice girls and we knew just how much it took to inflame your imagination.

Jack’s step-dad liked this picture so much that he kept it in a silver frame at his bedside when he was dying of cancer. He wasn’t what I’d call a dirty old man, but let’s just say he hid a few old copies of High Society in the back of his closet, which my brother-in-law found after the funeral. I think it’s a reminder for all of us to think very carefully about how we want to be remembered. Come to think of it, maybe being a Keeper of Old Porn isn’t the worst way to be remembered.

It’s not so creepy to drive by Columbine anymore. There’s a nice skate park right next to the school, where I took Jackson to watch the kids do their tricks. Half of them weren’t wearing protective gear of any sort, unless tattoos these days are made with special protective-force-field ink. No-gear skating would never fly here in Santa Barbara but Colorado still thinks it’s the wild west. (I can’t understand why everyone in that city hasn’t become an anti-gun nut.) Every time a motorcycle’d go by with a big hairy ZZ Top-looking muthuh riding it, Jackson would point and say, “no helmet.” They look scary but a lot of those guys are fairly polite and they’re good drivers, too.

And by the way, despite the light bulb joke I’m still NOT PREGNANT.

the first of all my dreams was of

a lover and his only love,

strolling slowly (mind in mind)

through some green mysterious land

until my second dream begins –

the sky is wild with leaves;which dance

and dancing swoop(and swooping whirl

over a frightened boy and girl)

but that mere fury soon became

silence:in hunger always whom

two tiny selves sleep(doll by doll)

motionless under magical

foreverfully falling snow.

And then this dreamer wept:and so

she quickly dreamed a dream of spring

–how you and i are blossoming

e. e. cummings