Living Room Dance

When I lived in a house full of girls, and in the college dorm, we would sometimes have what we called "a living room dance." Everyone would get out their favorite songs, and we would, quite unabashedly, dance around the room. One memorable time, I was able to lead a very smoothly choreographed group of back-up singers in Neil Sedaka's "Breaking Up is Hard to Do." It is still spoken of with reverence. I also once pulled off a perfectly timed leap from chair to floor with a downward guitar strum on the Tina Turner/Bryan Adams tune "It's only Love." Applause echoed through the dorm hallways.
The beauty of the Living Room Dance, is that you don't bother with any songs that you don't like, and your really belt out the ones you do. It is also acceptable to put on the same song several times. Restarting a song because you have thought of a good move or more importantly wish to change the imaginary audience, is also acceptable. The Living Room dance can also be done alone, in fact, I think its origins are there. It comes from the great desire to dance and sing and imagine yourself the center of attention. It is a good sign when you want to do a living room dance. It speaks of a surplus of energy and excitement.
I'm off to do a living room dance right now.
Thank goodness.

The Beach

The beach is clean and quiet. I sit and watch the surf. I lie down and read my book. I watch the clouds above me. There is quiet. It makes me sleepy and awake, all at once. I want to think beautiful and deep thoughts. How many people have wanted that? To use that loud crashing noise of the surf to find some great truth. I am hypnotized into thinking that I have something great to say, because everything seems important when I think it against a great canvas of noise and nothing. The air is balmy. I am lulled to sleep and my deep thoughts are buried in the sand.

Visiting

Visiting people. Calling people. Don't like it. Put it off as long as possible.

These aren't strangers either. Relatives. Dear friends. People who will welcome me, and love me, and I will enjoy myself, and wonder why I didn't call or visit sooner.

But now, this moment, this summer; home is where I want to be. Want to have a routine of waking, reading, writing, cleaning, and being with familiar friends, who know my story, so I don't have to explain.

Want to come to ground in my familiar spot. Afraid of being bored and uncomfortable with people I love.

I'll have a good time though. I know I will.

So I should shut up already.

They Stalk Us

They stalk us.
My cat.
His cat.
Wanting what we are eating.
Whenever we are eating.

Mine is yellow and fat.
His is black and skinny.
Black is sick and hungry all the time and never gets enough to eat.
The food does him little good.
Yellow always gets enough, and always wants more.

We eat in silence.
He looks at the bookshelf.
I look at the food.
And him.

He is skinny,
I am fat.
He eats a ton.
I linger over my smaller portion, and like when I was a child
am left alone to finish, because I am slow.

They are like submarines.
In the water of the floor.
Surfacing at couch level.

Yellow runs right up and shoves his nose in your bowl
To be pushed away.
Black watches.
Waits at a distance.
If food is placed before him he will eat. Maybe.
Yet at cat feeding times he yowls and cries
While yellow sits silent and watches.
Big eyes.
He tried to imitate black one time.
A whisper of a meow.

We eat.
The four of us.
Statements of will
and want
stalking about.

The Midnight Hour

Staying up late came naturally to him, but not so much to her. He had habits of the night; late snacks, quiet, cool darkness in a quiet courtyard. She was the day; morning conversations over coffee, the trash that had to go out early, sunlight on a clean pillow.

He drew her in. She began to stay up later and later and sleep later and later. It was never enough. She was given to bouts of sleepiness. Her regular job had recently ended and she felt lost during the day with nothing to do. Sometimes she fell asleep in the big chair, a thing she had done when she lived alone. Sometimes she stayed awake because she was too shy to say goodnight.

The cat, who during the winter would stretch out against her and snuggle his head under her chin making her loathe to get up, adopted a summer habit of leaping onto her chest on his way to the window sill where he would watch the birds. She would look at the clock: 6am. She would try to sleep longer, but it was broken sleep; daydream and idle speculation about once she got up, how long she must remain awake.

Damn, But this Coffee is Tasty

Morning comes, and I am sluggish, even though I have slept until 11, except for a brief awakening to feed the cats. A shower doesn't revive me, the Midol is of no help, and I stagger downstairs to consider a trip to the local Starbucks. (More on Starbucks in a tribute the the Evil Empire later.) My roommate suggests that his Folger's brew is available. I demure, since there is no milk. I must have milk. I must have sugar. And for the love of God, I must have espresso, not drip coffee. But desperate times call for desperate measures. In the depth of my cortex, the effort of walking across the street, in the deep summer humidity is valued as not worth the struggle. So a bit of the brew is poured, sugar is added, and a sip is had. At first I have no words to describe it. Tasteless, yet bitter? Harsh yet crappy? No. Nothing. But the factor that starts to chance the balance, that begins to tempt me, is the blood that seems to run afresh through me. Heavens! What is this feeling? Oh caffeine, how I long for thee! I will come to you, no matter what your flavor! Slowly the bitter becomes sweet, as I fall in love, all over again.