1. If you've read more than one post I've written, you know I keep things pretty insular (solipsistic) here. So of course I haven't talked about Japan, because what can you say about such destruction? What can you say about images like these? At least they have something left? If I could be spared anything, I'd want it to be Toby. But what about those who weren't spared anything?
2.Ruth Reichl has a way to live with that question. Mostly.
3. When things are upsetting, I like to think about space: This Saturday, a "super perigee moon”--the biggest in almost 20 years--will be out. According to NASA, that's a full moon that coincides with being closest to Earth in its orbit. But that doesn't fully explain why it will look so huge: "For reasons not fully understood by astronomers or psychologists, low-hanging Moons look unnaturally large when they beam through trees, buildings and other foreground objects."
There. All it takes is some mystery (not of the "why all this misery?" kind but of the "something incredible is waiting to be known") and I feel better.
I was going to wait about posting about the state of food TV in America and probably just not post about the movie about dolphin hunting. But then I saw that today is the 64th anniversary of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima. So let's just get it all out today and go back to fluffy quotes tomorrow.
If you want to see pictures of the event and think about worldwide nuclear disarmament, check out the Big Picture blog.
So Mr. Isbell and I got into a domestic dispute Sunday morning, and in the middle of it I noticed that, instead of going to the public open space two blocks west, a neighbor woman had decided to play with her dog on our lawn--complete with a stack of Frisbees and the dog running into the flowerbed and planted garden.
I lost it:
And then of course I felt bad, because I was really mad about the argument that was going on and I could have told her to get lost in a nicer way. Poor lady had no idea what she was in for...
So I went to the main library yesterday around noon. Nothing makes you feel more fortunate than seeing a homeless dude who's smuggled his dog into the library with him by hiding the dog under the blankets on his wheelchair. No, I don't have a job, but I don't have to smuggle Toby into a warm place to spend the day. Nor am I in a wheelchair.
Mr. Isbell has been out of town, and yesterday night I dreamed that instead of adopting Toby, I took him back to the shelter, realized my mistake, and went to get him again only to find out that he had been "donated" to the "University Cat Research Center". (It was a dream, but it was very ominous.)
Of course I was so relieved to wake up and see Toby sitting on my chest, but I had to think of my friend Sean: When I told him I wanted to get a cat, he said, "That will just open up whole new ways for you to be miserable!"
I understand his point. While the dream was just a dream, there are so many ways to be afraid for something you love. People can "die young, fail at love, fail of their ambitions," cats can get lost or sick--but you have to just accept that risk, because the happiness you get tempers the fear. (Sean disagrees, of course, but he also doesn't care for pets.)
(Title and quotes from one of my favorite Robert Hass poems.)
