Being Afraid of the Dark

"For just as children tremble and fear all

In the viewless dark, so even we at times

Dread in the light so many things that be

No whit more fearsome than what children feign,

Shuddering, will be upon them in the dark.

This terror then, this darkness of the mind,

Not sunrise with its flaring spokes of light,

Nor glittering arrows of morning can disperse,

But only Nature's aspect and her law."

 - Lucretius,  On the Nature of Things Book VI

I was never afraid of the dark. I especially love the twilight. When I was a child, I heard that the some native ceremonies that had to begin at precisely dawn would begin when the officiating person could distinguish a red item from a group of other dark colored items. Somewhere, I was also told that reason fire trucks were red is that red is the first color you can distinguish at dawn and the last you can identify as it gets dark. Even as a kid, I was never sure why this was important, as it seems to me you should be able to see the shape of a fire truck with flashing red lights and a blaring siren regardless of its color. My childhood suspicions about the red fire truck theory were borne out when, as an adult, I observed that some fire trucks are painted a particularly ugly acid green instead of red.

The validity of either of these factoids is questionable however, because I also clearly remember believing when my big brother told me that if I used the toiled when there was an un-flushed cigarette in the bowl, my bottom would turn yellow. Thankfully, my parents stopped smoking – or at least stopped using the toilet as an ashtray – before that happened.

Instead of fearing that there were monsters in my bedroom closet who would creep out after the lights went out, I worried instead about whether I’d be able to see a red fire truck if I was up late, or whether I would remember to check the toilet before using it. I do remember not liking to get a drink of water in the dark bathroom at night because there might be a spider hiding inside the glass. I still maintain that worrying about spiders in the drinking glass is more sensible than fearsome: and still rinse the glass out in the viewless dark before refilling it to get a drink of water.

These days, while I lie away in the sleepless dark I worry about different things.  The glittering arrows of morning don’t disperse my gloomy thoughts about unfinished chores, leftovers spoiling in the refrigerator, the litter box I should have changed yesterday, or my dentist appointment later this week. I suppose the essence of maturity is that we replace our childhood fears with equally scary but more practical stuff as we age. Or maybe we just learn that there is more to fear in the light than in the dark.

Throwing a Shutout

I was talkin’ to my girlfriend

I told her I was stressed

I said I’m going off the deep end

She said give it a rest

We’re all waiting in the dugout

Thinking we should pitch

How you gonna throw a shutout

If all you do is bitch

 - Todd Snider, I Can’t Complain

I’ve been sick. Last night I slept through the night for the first time in about 3 weeks. I feel much better today.

So, instead of bitching, this would be a good day for me to work on the quilt. 

Obliviousness Vs Incompetence

"He who knows best, best knows how little he knows."

 - Thomas Jefferson

I’ve been thinking of expanding my mission statement to encompass my dawning suspicion that vicissitudes of my life don’t so much fluctuate these days as they increasingly tend to swirl around and down like water in a flushing toilet. I’d also like to express my inarticulate rage against the hegemony of the normative discourse that persists in believing life should have a purpose. Tough challenge. Like un-homogenizing milk, or growing tomatoes.

Or like dealing with Medi-Cal.

The lovely people at Medi-Cal have sent me a NOTICE OF ACTION. These words in bold caps at the top of a page strike fear into my heart, particularly if I’m not even halfway through my first martini when I read them. While just about any office of the great state of California is run with the bureaucratic efficiency that makes IRS bureaucrats look like precision diamond cutters in Amsterdam, the people at Medi-Cal are exceeded in their incompetence only by the people at CalTrans.

The letter begins: “You told us you were moving/moved to Riverside County. Therefore, handling of your Medi-Cal case will be transferred to Riverside County…”

Yeah, no. It’s actually more likely that the Medi-Cal recipient to whom this NOTICE OF ACTION was addressed would have told Medi-Cal she had used her frequent flyer miles to purchase tickets to the moon and would be “moving/moved” once they recovered her suitcase that fell out of the rocket shuttle while delivering her to the spaceport, and that she planned to depart as soon as her size XXX adult undergarments were gathered up by baggage handlers.

If my frustration could be expressed in the form of a death ray, it would melt glass. If the Medi-Cal bureaucracy could be described as a geographic phenomenon, I would be standing at the intersection of several merging tectonic plates where obliviousness is being subducted by incompetence and binders full of revised policies no longer mitigate the damage.

So, here’s what I’m thinking. I’ll reply in writing on the remote chance that the Case Worker can read. I’m not too optimistic about this because the unsigned letter identifies the “Worker Name” as “L. Case Closed”.  Here’s my first draft.

NOTICE OF REACTION    

Dear Mr/Ms Case Closed,

Noooooo! I’m not moving to Riverside County!

While it’s probably true that somebody told you they were moving, please be assured it wasn’t me.

Here’s why:

      a)     I am unable to get up from the toilet without the help of a very strong nurse’s aid, so it’s 

            unlikely I could waddle all the way to Riverside;

      b)    Also, I’m not strong enough to break through the crust on my vanilla pudding, so picking 

           up a suitcase filled with just my prescription meds and some dryer lint is probably beyond me;

      c)    Also, I’m incapable of putting together a thought more complex than the design of a Popsicle 

           stick, let alone articulating it coherently.

      d)    And finally, I can’t remember which end of the bedside telephone to put to my ear so the 

           chances that I would be able to communicate anything more than “Hello? Hello? 

           There’s nobody there.” are about as likely as you figuring out who actually did tell you 

           they were moving to Riverside.

I respectfully request that you check your records to be sure it wasn’t your drunken whore of a mother who told you this while you were both smoking crack, that is, if you maintain actual records, and if you are ever sober enough to read them.

Fondest Regards,

Pissedoffy McTaxpayer on behalf of client M______

O – No.

It's a fast paced world; you can either be informed or have an opinion. We don't have time for both. —A Softer World

Now, I’m all for free speech and whatnot and I accept the fact that if people are free to speak they are perfectly likely to assert something breathtakingly ridiculous. But still. We have to do something about the epidemic of idiocy that is engulfing us all, even at the supermarket. 

The other day, I had to buy the current issue of O magazine. Don’t ask. I initially wanted to go to a different market than my regular one to minimize the likelihood that somebody I knew would see me buy the magazine. In the end, the law of least resistance won out and I went to the regular store down the hill. In my defense, I also needed obscure stuff that I know how to find in my familiar market.

So anyway. Looking for the particular article I wanted to read, I had to page through the entire magazine. Big mistake. Oprah has an organic vegetable garden. In Maui. And an expert stooge to run it for her and pose next to her while she stands in her field wearing $600 jeans and holding lettuce or something. She has some incredible advice for people interested in growing their own vegetables, presumably even those who can’t buy fertile land in Maui or hire a master gardener to plant and tend it.

Then, there are some apparently regular articles by Dr. Phil, Dr. Oz and Suze Orman. All of them have some amazing self-help advice for people who couldn’t help themselves to move their hand from a hot stove without professional advice. This stuff is aimed at people whose lives are such a mess that they apparently couldn’t sort things out unless they listened to these pompous experts explain that their mommy was a drunk because they were a crybaby, or that their spouse’s gambling problem just might be the cause of the family’s financial insecurity.

Then there’s shit you simply have to buy, to read, to wear, to eat and to think. You simply have to, or you will remain mired in the stagnant meaningless muck of your own Oprahless life, condemned to wander around messing up your personal relationships, your finances, your complexion, your organic vegetable garden, and your spouse’s gambling problem.

I’m not a complete cynic. I’m all for feeling good about myself  -  even for having a lifestyle if I can’t manage to have an actual life. Who could argue with improving their wellbeing and intellect, and growing as a person and shit? But Christ, there are some things I can actually figure out for myself without paging through shiny magazines with bright pictures of beautiful people and advice about coping and inspiring stories and sage advice about more stuff I should buy to assure my own happiness and fulfillment.

I have to admit though, that I did learn something valuable from this experience. Like for starters, not to buy this narcissistic woman’s vanity magazine ever again. I’d rather be lost in the wilderness of my own devising than trampled in the herd of sheep blindly following her and her self-proclaimed experts with life-changing advice and opinions. 

And Now for Something Completely Different

Some writers make their readers feel

Provided with a good square meal,

While others – such a task is mine –

Supply the walnuts and the wine.

A sip of truth – the merest smack,

A pinch of salt, a nut to crack.

            -           Charles E. Benham, Jottings

Today’s sip of truth:  My fondest wish is to provide kazoo lessons for all my friends. And although it’s true that what is generally accepted as good taste involves subjective evaluation, I have a superpower that enables me, with perfect objectivity, to identify manifestations of bad taste. A kazoo marching band playing “Hard Times Come Again No More” would be a sublime expression of exquisite good taste, or my name’s not Charles Bonnet.

The merest smack: The first thing on my to-do list today is can the amazing roasted tomato sauce I made yesterday. Lunch is somewhere in the middle – a good square meal. The last thing on the list is to obtain enlightenment. My list is organized in order of importance.

A pinch of salt:  In 1830 William Hazlitt said “without the aid of prejudice and custom, I should not be able to find my way across the room; nor know how to conduct myself in any circumstances, nor what to feel in any relation of life.” It’s like good manners attacked common sense and wrestled it to the ground.

A nut to crack: I have accepted the monumental challenge of trying to craft a coherent sentence about personal hygiene that includes the phrases “splendid nonchalance” and “smoking hole in the ground”. Wait! I just did!

A Better Job

 Now

That

All your worry

Has proved such an

Unlucrative

Business,

Why Not Find a better

Job

-       Hafiz, Find a Better Job

This is the best Spring I’ve experienced in years. The Kid is home from the war, bearing invisible scars but smiling again. The back yard projects have been completed and now, when I go outside to play, I putter around, deadheading, repotting, rearranging instead of fretting over all the work still to be done.

The old waterfall at the top right of the above picture was long neglected and overgrown. Because of it's hight above the rest of the yard, it was visible from everywhere in the backyard – a silent reproach to my unfinished business. Because the large rock was cracked and difficult to seal, repairing the original waterfall’s path from the top beneath the large black wind chime and resealing the crack down to the pond would have involved more of an investment than we were willing to make.

Instead, the amazing pond guy made a smaller and more efficient waterfall that returns from the cleaned out and re-plumbed filter back behind the large rock on the left. The new setup is easier to maintain, less likely to leak, and makes just as lovely as sound. The gently splashing water reminds me how much I’ve missed it. It is almost as magical as the sound of my kitty with her head on my shoulder purring into my good ear. 

I have planted a rock garden where the old falls were, anchored by the large rock moved (from the lower center of above picture, next to Simone, the large rubber lizard) by the pond guy who I bribed with a pot of the overgrown green goddess calla lily that had taken over the entire shallow end of the pond.

Later, I persuaded the yard guys to move the big turtle from elsewhere in the backyard to the top of the big rock. I later wrangled the turtle into place next to the large rock. Together, the turtle, and the big rock to his right offer not only a sitting place from which to garden and view the pond, they anchor the other rocks and dirt for the succulents to root. 

It took the birds about a week to rediscover the fresh pond. The more modest waterfall seems to satisfy the mourning doves and other birds that like to splash around running water.

My new job isn’t any more lucrative than the old one of worrying. The newly rehabbed pond and waterfall however are much more enjoyable than the nasty the old mess of the pond and overgrown waterfall. The wildlife repopulating the yard seem to concur. My new job of simply spending time reading in the shade and listening to the waterfall is much more lucrative to my wellbeing.