Saturday, April 25, 2009

Oh Crap It’s That Day Again

It’s been a hell of a year, and promises to get even more interesting pretty damn soon.  The new car arrived yesterday, not without tsurris but we overcame it as will we overcome all obstacles with which our way may be strewn in days ahead.  My birthday soiree to Rohan was diverted due to Rohan being clo-sed, so we retooled the plans for Aziza cocktails but they weren’t open in time for us, and ultimately we tried five places before settling on our favorite for appetizers and a local newbie for supper - both serviceable, though not particularly noteworthy except that we left the kids behind and went out on our own. 

Also we’ve now got a new cable remote that I don’t understand (plus like a million more on-screen options, plus all the old stuff but I’m not sure how to make it all work together).  PLUS ZACH AND JESSE ARE cURRENTLY SLEEPING IN THE SAME ROOM.  If this works the way I hope it does, THE FUTURE IS NOW.  For our home design, at least. 

Which brings me to my annual birthday poem.  I got some amazing and very sweet sentiments of a natally-commemorative sort from many friends of many stripes - old friends only recently renewed, longstanding friends who are like parts of my own soul, intensely dear friends I’ve actually never met and some passing acquaintances whose good wishes still are much appreciated.  But the most important felicitations of the day come from myself, in the form of a poem pursuant to hoary tradition of five or six years and if you want to read the old ones you can link through the archives, it’s getting too ponderous to link it all up.  But anyway, here’s this year’s, and I hope it’s everything you hoped it could be:

Man alive I’m 45
Looks like now I’m here to stay
Revolutions, colts and me
I lived to fight another day
I’m the new black, the new Coke, the new 30
Everyone’s doing it, starting with me
Open promptly, offer expires
Like you seen on your teevee
Invented by myself alone
to keep having birthdays till forty-and-five
I’ve played it by ear, building year upon year
and can you believe it - I’m still here alive.
Better faster stronger older
You can do it - Ask me how
Swim like shark but taste like chicken
Focus on the here and now
One more year has left me blinking
One year less left in my store
I’ve fared well for forty-five
So here’s to forty-five once more!

You may now return to your normal activities.  Thanks for your support. 

Thursday, April 23, 2009

The Night of Swirling Stars

I’ve already laid out the set-up - six years old, in England with my family, six months abroad and trying to keep up in school.  My first try didn’t work so well, but my second matriculation was rather better.  Sunnymeade House was near to home and dad’s bus downtown, as I recall, so he escorted me daily to school - a big old rambling place with a backyard and an upstairs.  The kids seemed mellower; we easily found a way to coexist if not even perhaps to get along.  I got the sense that my teachers viewed my educational shortcomings as opportunities rather than inherent deficiencies, and I began to feel more at home with academic exercise.  Wasn’t this the place where they ordered me to get my awesome little dictionary and my hip little satchel?  Sunnymeade House was okay in my book.

“My book,” I mean in the most important way: my principal advantage seemed to lie with reading, which I did with avidity and proficiency.  I read some weird stuff, too - those German mutilation nursery rhymes, and Grimm, and creepy stuff like that.  I’d read fairy tales about pixies and trolls and goblins and such… so it wasn’t like they’d unleashed some new concept to me when they asked me to read Rumplestiltskin to the class. 

Regardless, I was totally freaked.  Freaked in a way I don’t think I’d ever been at my previous school, where I’d been treated roughly.  This was a class assignment - everybody had to do it; we’d just go a few a day till we’d all had a chance.  At my prior school, I’d been able to deal fairly well with every incident that had befallen me at the hands of my peers, whether malicious or neglectful.  I’d just go through it and move on.  It was usually over before I’d had a chance to think about it much.  But now I had days to anticipate my impending public exposure.  An oral exhibition.  Front and center.  My exotic twangy voice and slightly “different” clothes and obvious anxiety would be impossible to hide… I might as well go to school naked for all the attention I’d be drawing to myself; I had a target on my back already and there I was passing around arrows… all my instincts urged me to flee from this spotlight, from this order to real aloud to English schoolchildren....

to read to them ... Rumplestiltskin. 

The name alone made my skin crawl.  Hell, it’s got “skin” right in it.  Then “Rumplestilt” - what a compelling evocation of brokenness, nominal determinism, a life trapped in fetters of twisted flesh, inhuman, both greater and lesser than those beautiful, cruel, weakling humans among whom he eked his pitiful existence; reduced, despite unimaginable powers, to petty extortion for his begrudged share of happiness, taught by bitter experience to trust neither the word of men nor the smiles of women; a soul so tortured and marginalized that he was prepared to resort to whoring out his extraordinary gift of transmutation to bind a maiden to his embrace, and to to take his pleasure from her since he rightly dispared of sharing it with her.  Quasimodo.  Hopfrog.  Deformed, unfinished, stranded in a world not his own....

And then, beyond the litany of tragedies constituting his essence, my mind was drawn with fascination to the vile abuses he perpetrated on that waifish strumpet of a knitting girl who verged on being more willing to to suffer a courtyard execution than to endure his kiss, she who owed her survival to taking credit for his work: a “maiden,” repulsed by the thought of him; she, the quintessence of a beauty of which he could never honestly partake.... From dross did he weave pure gold for her, yet his body and being were too wretched for her to see the value of his soul or to test the purity of his heart.  She knew him only for the goblin he was, even as she made him into be the troll she knew him to be.  In a sense, she could hardly even be faulted for fulfilling her role in this saga, vapid and cruel though it may have been - no more than he deserved the ignominy heaped on his own stunted shoulders for being what she made him.  So what.  I blamed her anyway.  Bitch.

I felt badly for Rumplestiltskin.  But, more importantly, he scared the piss out of me.  I feared his power, his subterfuge, his devilish bargaining and his physical grotesqueness.  The whole package just freaked me out, way more than any prior tale or fable had ever done to me before.  The very idea of reading the story at all was enough to make me woozy and short of breath.  And let us not forget that I was expected to read this hideous legend of exclusion and recrimination out loud, in front of everybody.  Of course I had no qualms regarding the technical aspects of the task - I was entirely capable of doing the reading, intellectually.  In fact, that worked to my disadvantage.  My reading skills had progressed to the point that I could think other thoughts at the same time as I read.  I could think about what I was reading, where and how I was reading it, and why, and to whom.  The story flew out of the book so smoothly that it could take on a life of its own, in the real world, surrounding me as I read it.  I would have the luxury, while standing before my classmates, of identifying with my anti-hero very personally indeed.  I would know my madness to be madness even as I sank into it. 

Time skulked past, day after musty day, and the appointed hour grew ever closer.  My limbs felt heavy and my pulse raced as I waited for my my destiny to claim its due.  Finally came the night before my presentation, and the fear was so intense and personified that it had itself become the homunculus haunting my bedroom.  Rumplestiltskin had me where he wanted me - just where he’d had that maiden fair I so detested.  I was beyond the ability to recognize where I ended and my fear began.  Reading aloud, Rumplestiltskin, in front of everybody.  And here was I, just a frail grub of a boy, lacking any ability to turn the gnarled finger of fate that swept inexorably toward me, my dark little bedroom now a weaver’s hutch, a dungeon, a hole out of which would crawl my undoing, and my undoing would be at my own hand, myself both Rumplestiltskin and his maiden, an evil committing itself upon itself, saving and sacrificing in one fell swoop.

I lay in my bed as all this passed through my mind, repeating itself, renewing itself.  Frantic to to escape my own cogitation, I turned my gaze to the window beside me.  Out it, as I knew well, was the courtyard, upon which I looked out from the fourth of six floors.  The night sky above that patch of lawn held no mysteries to threaten me; a well-surveyed scattering of stars decorated the heavens, and I looked to them for constancy and a sense of connection, those same stars having spangled my nights back home in California as well.  Familiar constellations greeted my anguished eyes… But as I watched them, they began to spiral around the sky, huge beautiful circles that terrified me utterly.  Silently and in despairing confusion, I hallucinated a broken heaven.

That vision of the cosmos cut adrift wrenched from me my last clasped shred of rationality.  In my bed, I wept - both for Rumplestiltskin, and as him.  The next morning found me indisposed; I stayed home from school and read friendly stories quietly in bed.  I think my mom may have spoken to the teacher; the assignment may never actually have been completed.  For about a dozen years after that night I had difficulty finding my rest at night.  I’d lie awake in bed most evenings, trying to relax.  Eventually I overcame my fear of public speaking, and then my insomnia.  I even eventually outgrew my neurotic anxiety about Rumplestiltskin.  But it’s not like I’ve forgiven him or anything. 

Well that was fun.  Just thought it was time to put something non-stoat-related up here for a while.  Birthday poem is coming up soon - gird your loins!

Monday, April 20, 2009

Moishe: Exploits Your Grandfather Should Have Told You

I told you in the last post about the big new idea for “selling” passover to the elusive younger crowd: The Legend of Moishe the Passover Stoat.  I explained then just exactly how genius brilliant an idea it was, so you can read it there and marvel.  But today, I want to share a few of the legends themselves.  These are the stories we’ve learned about Moishe, theoretically, at seder after seder, year after year, tradition after tradition.  Moishe, these are your legends.  I mean, here they are - again. 

The Disharmony of the Sages

Tarphon, Hillel, Amaranth and Kori were in deep discussion one seder night.  One sage thought that each of the plagues was multiplied because things bounced, rubber-like, off the Israelites and stuck, glueishly, to the Egyptians.  The other three believed this to be hogwash but they didn’t want to sound like blowhards so they all just sat around stroking their thick, full beards, and giving each other the hairy eyeball.  Then a stoat came upon them suddenly and scampered up Kori’s vestments, and fetched him a grievous but unmentionable injury.  But it had not been Kori who had imagined the stupid idea about the plagues, from which they learned: THE STOAT DISFAVORS BOTH ERROR AND ACQUIESCENCE.  The remaining rabbis acclaimed the wisdom and charismatic charm of this gifted weasel, and thus was borne the legendary Moishe the Passover Stoat. 

The Garden of Redemption

Moishe was reading QBVII in his tidy garden when he noticed that his horseradish and arugula were looking sad and chewed-upon.  As he took a closer look at the damage to his beloved little plants, he saw a bunny - possibly wearing a top hat and/or waistcoat- gnawing on a tender stalk of garden celery.  “Why, I never,” thought the Stoat refulgently, “that rabbit is reaping the fruits of my handiwork.  Let me enlarge him!” And with that the Stoat scampered over to the bunny and eviscerated him with a Garden Weasel.  As he returned to his novel, Moishe looked back over the rabbit’s twitching remains.  “If you can come back after I’ve done that to you, he cheerfully intoned, “you’re welcome to try me again!” FROM WHICH WE LEARN: A GENEROUS INVITATION COSTS NOTHING UP FRONT. 

The Runaway Macaroon

Moishe was wandering the arid tablelands, when he spied a macaroon tumbling toward him.  “Where are you going, my moist cocoanutty friend?,” the Stoat asked, but he received no reply because the macaroon was going too quickly and was a cookie anyway.  Moishe watched the macaroon roll and roll and roll right off the table and onto the floor, where the old family dog made ready to pounce upon it.  Moishe saw his friend in mortal peril, so to save the macaroon he scampered down off the table and used his sharp claws and powerful foreshanks to eviscerate the old dog right there in the dining room.  He then carried the fallen macaroon to a new seder where it could be properly appreciated.  FROM WHICH WE LEARN: A STOAT PROTECTS HIS MACAROON FROM DOGS AND DISRESPECT. 

The Stoat and the Fruit Gel

Tehe desserts were arguing about which one was finest.  The chocolates emanated an extravagant chalky confidence; the fruit bowl glistened lubriciously and the angelefood cake shone like a chaste queen.  (The macaroon was, of course, already gone.) With merry banter, they each advanced themselves as the perfect ending to a perfect seder.  “So rich and indulgent, for we were once slaves but now are free!” “So sweet and satisfying, the promise of springtime fulfilling itself, and it’ll help you shift that matzoh through your system if you know what I mean.” “Cake… sweet, cakey sweetness....” For hours they went on in this way, each professing ultimate supremacy. 

But then, shortly after supper plates were cleared, a new box arrived in the kitchen - a new dessert had been brought by a guest and was being placed in contention at the last moment before the ultimate judging of the pre-aphikomen course.  Sneering, the three other desserts watched the frosted translucent semicircles being transferred to a serving plate, four day-glo colors with slightly muted rinds, garish and exposed to the derision of the other desserts.  “What are you, to have earned a place among us?” they demanded.

“I am honored to share a table with you,” the fruitgels replied.  “I am a token of that gratitude for that very honor.  I am man’s work wrought in nature’s image; I am emulaiton; I am innovation.  I am light and cloud and honey-sweetness.  I am an object of desire and satisfaction; may it be your desire I am so fortunate as to satisfy.”

Then the back door blew open and who stood there but Moishe the Passover Stoat?  Quick as a whiskerflick he scampered into the kitchen and onto the table to see what was happening.  “Let us appeal to Moishe!,” acclaimed the desserts.  “He will decide!  Moishe, Moishe - which of us is the best dessert?”

Moishe took only a moment to look at the cake, the chocolates, the bowl of fruit, and the glittering, jeweltone fruitgels.  He leapt forth and devoured - first the cake; to the very last crumb; then he turned upon the chocolates, leaving nary a morsel on the plate.  Next, he unleashed his ravenous jaws on the parvenue fruit gels, smacking and salivating as he struggled go unstick the glutinous candy from his teeth. 

Finally he turned to the fruit bowl, the last remaining dessert.  He picked up an apple, a pear, and an orange, and contemplatively juggled them for several minutes.  Then he put them back in their bowl, uttered a brief prayer, and left.  FROM WHICH WE LEARN: ONLY JUGGLEFRUIT IS SAFE WHEN A STOAT’S IN THE PANTRY. 

Elijah’s Helper

It was late in the evening.  The third kiddush had been completed and every one at the splendid table was very full and comfortable.  Some fought sleep but the seder was far from over.  It had come time to throw open the door for the Prophet Elijah, to invite him to his seat and to drink his reserved cup of wine. 

The youngest at the table was sent to the door and opened it with childlike glee.  But much to his surprise, instead of Elijah, a majestic stoat stood on the doorstep.  “It’s Moishe!,” squealed the child.  “Invite him in,” encouraged the grandfather, “as an honored guest.”

The child stepped aside.  The stoat threw a macaroon at the grandfather and scampered up onto the table.  He knocked over Elijah’s cup and then caught his tail on fire on the candles.  With a haunting squeal he knocked over a chiffonaire and behind it, stuck to the wall with an iron spike, was the aphikomen.  Grandfather broke down in tears, and the child just kept looking out that front door for two weeks.  FROM WHICH WE LEARN: NOT ALL LEGENDS ARE SUPPOSED TO MAKE YOU FEEL GOOD.  BUT AT LEAST THIS ONE HAD A STOAT IN IT.

There may be more to be said about Moishe at some point in the future but I’ve got so much other stuff all of a sudden.  And some of it’s even blogfodder.  Lucky you.