Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
It was the beginning of the end the moment I was born but before the end was finalized, I was required to travel and seek answers, although I don’t think I ever understood the question.
Out for a break from writing, I was walking up Walker Street in front of SOU’s derelict houses. A doe just finished giving birth to a fawn in one of the yards. Hearing me, Mom turned attention my way, and then sniffed and licked her newborn. Standing, the tiny creature took a few tentative steps. Then Mom gave me another long look. I called out, “Be smart, stay safe, my friends.” Big ears coming my way, Mom and baby turned together and watched me continue my walk.
He always found himself waiting or planning for the next thing, as if he was trapped in some personal version of “The Jolly Corner”. The next season, the next birthday, the next death.
The next marriage, the next divorce, the next trip, the next vacation..
The next election, the political scandal, the next mass murder.
Next step in finishing a novel, the next novel to write, the next meal, the next task, job, bill, the next expense.
He kept reminding himself, stop. Stay in the moment and enjoy. But the next always kept coming.
Always.
Obflooftrics (floofinition) – The branch of living and existing concerned with the care of animals giving birth.
In use: “Although not recognized as anything formal, many people became involved with obflooftrics because of circumstance, as they help their pets give birth at home.”
Most of us
live life on an edge
sure of the beginning
ambivalent about the end
Today’s theme music is Live’s “Lightning Crashes” (1993).
I have several Live albums, but I find I must be in just the right mood to play them. It’s a very narrow space.
“Lightning Crashes”, though, came to me this week because one of my nieces gave birth to her third child. All this was shared on Facebook. Everyone is doting on the sweet newborn, including my mother, and there’s rich photographic evidence. The newborn is Mom’s seventh great-grandchild. That juxtaposition of Mom holding this young new life invited “Lightning Crashes” into my stream and the circle of transference of life and existing. One dies, and one is born, and so it goes. There’s a lot of overlap as it happens.
Michael Seidel, writer 