Dear Reader,
Word Raccoon was slightly mollified for the indignity of cleaning yesterday by being permitted to listen to North Woods while doing so. I told her we could read it with our eyes if she would just wait, but she said she would absolutely go on strike if I didn’t let her hear it while cleaning.
(It’s a haunting, layered novel. While I often get frustrated with short stories because I get invested in one and then boom, it’s over, this novel felt like short stories but provided the structure of a house through the decades, and I loved the reimagining of its life throughout time. The “fortune teller,” the historian – his sass about academia made WR giggle, the twin sisters. Nicely done.)
BTW, WR informed me the only reason I am suddenly cleaning with such determination is because Zack is bringing his girlfriend over Sunday, and we haven’t met her yet. (Our family rule is that the children must date someone at least three months before introductions commence. I’m assuming that criteria has been met since he asked for a “plus one” for Mother’s Day.)
Fair enough. But the work needed to be done anyway, WR!
Here’s the newly hung chicken-wire frame currently displaying a deeply concerning number of finger puppets. WR and I are jumping up and down with delight. We will not be taking questions about our taste at this time, but we will accept gushing compliments, even if we’re not finished with it just yet. (When your raccoon is awake at 4:30 am and refuses to go back to sleep, you put her to work.)
I wrote one tiny poem yesterday, and then another, just to keep my promise to Word Raccoon that we would write something during this full weekend. I’m pretty sure they belong in my newest collection, but we’ll see. One is called “Do Not Disappear People.” Lack of comma intentional. The other is hokey, but I had to get it out first. I’m not telling you its title – too cringe.
I’m not sure just how much writing I’ll be able to do today, but I will try to find some time. I’m assuming renting a carpet cleaner is probably overkill for meeting the son’s newest girlfriend?
Maybe I won’t.
Random PSA/pet peeve shoutout to the younger generation: Tupperware is not a generic term for food storage containers. Stop it! Women of my mother’s generation would be scandalized by this linguistic drift. I have heard it way too often lately. Where’s the line between natural progression and tradition?
After dinner with friends last night, whom we had not seen in far too long, I asked to pick up wallpaper for a project Word Raccoon has become unreasonably invested in.
There’s a bookshelf in my writing room that I have been meaning to paint for years. This peel and stick wallpaper is for behind the shelves. I’ve been watching too many videos that feature color in small spaces and now my projects have projects. This one woman molds her own decorative plaster tiles and paints them…I’d LOVE to do that.
Imagine how the eyes will rest after these projects are finished. Art demands to be fed color.
“Where is that going?” Barry asked suspiciously when he saw the wallpaper, which he called Victorian. I’d say it’s Victorian adjacent. I mean, it does have birds on it, but the colors are trying to behave.
WR wanted to reply none of his business, but I told him because I suspected he was imagining me wallpapering the bathroom ceiling or something equally tragic. I don’t get indignant when I know I’m being falsely accused, I get sweet and pretend I do not understand that my intentions are being questioned. It tastes better for me and goes down worse for the other person.
Is that wrong?
(WR thinks someone has too many opinions over what is clearly her decorating domain. I pointed out to her that to be fair, she was scheming to put up a brightly colored chicken wire frame full of FINGER PUPPETS on the living room wall without notice.)
After all, this is the same beastie that just ordered red, white, and blue popsicle earrings. She insists she’s only ordered them to review them. But if she wears them more than once over the 4th of July weekend, I’m gonna know she’s fibbing.
(I’ve seen them. She is.)
Friday Forward,
Drema
dremadrudge.com 