Tuesday on My Mind

It's been a rough week, but there's always something better around the corner, right? I think--I hope--that people and lives have astounding capacity for growth and change. To be a little less nebulous and a little more reassuring, everything is okay. But I felt like I should post something since it's been a little while, so here is a photo I found from January 2010.

To quietude and contentment.

Backyard in Platte County, Missouri

Upswing?

Alright.

Okay.

After a cold, two ear infections, a sinus infection, mono, and stitches...I think I'm on the upswing now (knocking on the wooden table as I type this). Really. I got my stitches out today. What's better is that I got to spend my day yesterday with a bunch of my remarkable family, talking and eating and sitting around. My cousin gave me a henna design around my wound, which made it look a hundred times more cool and intentional.

But I have a paper to write, and I've had more than several cups of coffee already today, so I'll keep this very short.

Here is a photo of some sassy polydactyl cats, just because their paws look like they have little opposable thumbs.

Country Life

I went for a walk today, along the road where I grew up. It was delightful. My neighbor's cows, whom I've named Claude and Édouard, were especially friendly today and they kept licking my hand when I stopped to pet them. I never knew this, but cow tongues are surprisingly rough and abrasive and strong. Almost painfully so. Later, when I got up to leave, the cows followed me all the way to the end of their enclosure.
I'll be paying them another visit very soon.

With A Little Help From My Friends

Joe Cocker died today. Considering that for a good majority of my childhood I watched The Wonder Years before bed, here is Joe Cocker's cover of The Beatles' "With A Little Help From My Friends," from Woodstock 1969.

Snitches Get Stitches

...and so do people who faint and hit their heads at the grocery store.

I was accompanying my lovely sister to Price Chopper and trying to find Orangina in the juice aisle. The next thing I remember is waking up surrounded with paramedics with a big puddle of blood under me. And now I have four stitches in my face.

Truth be told, this makes me feel pretty tough, especially since I also have mono.

But I still cried like a baby.

Crash

My sister and I were just at a convenience store when a truck crashed through the brick wall and broke the windows. No one was hurt, but there was a little girl an aisle over from where all the glass and bricks fell. She was okay, but to put it simply, it was scary and unexpected.

That is my Friday in a nutshell.

Goodbye Stranger

Not to be trite and predictable, but...

-"Goodbye Stranger" by Supertramp, from Breakfast in America (1979)

I fly home to Kansas City tomorrow, where my cat and bed await me. My goals for break are, in approximate order:

1. Catch up with my family and friends and cat and favorite climbing trees
2. Sleep and read and maybe recover from mono before getting my wisdom teeth out. Also, it would be nice if this full-body rash went completely away, but I'm not holding my breath on that count, especially since it's calmed down a lot in the past week and I should be less vain anyway
3. Write a final paper on Robert Lowell
4. Finish a final project for my other poetry class
5. Prepare for ESPAÑA
6. And probably some other stuff that I'm forgetting because I'm still pretty focused on packing, to be honest

Stuff.

I'm packing up my dorm room right now, and I can't help but wonder...

How did I end up with so much stuff?

A small sampling of the mess that is my room

Thinking about this, of course, brings to mind...

I'm just tryin' to find a place for my stuff.
This is one of my favorite George Carlin routines; this specific version is from his set at Comic Relief in 1986. What a guy.

Regardless, I am incredibly eager to be going home the day after tomorrow, and am trying to get all of my loose ends tied up and my goodbyes in before that. It's a lot to do in two days, but I feel optimistic and up to the challenge.

Charlotte Mittnacht (The Fabulous Destiny of...)

Surviving.

- DeVotchKa, "Charlotte Mittnacht (The Fabulous Destiny of...)," from How It Ends (2004)