Posts
The story so far: Otello and I peeled vegetables. I walked. I fell on the ice and damaged my sternum. I went to my Continuum class. I walked from there to the subway. This brings us up to ten-thirty on Monday morning.
The next excitement for that day was my toning group. Eight of us meet once a month to tone and chant and work with the voice in any way we can. After warming up and toning OHM (the room resonated with thrilling overtones), we move to a new exercise. Our leader asks us to think of a song—any song at all—and imagine it as the sound track for the movie of our life. The song that popped into my head was Zip-pe-dee-doo-dah. And it wasn't until later that I remembered that it was, of all things, a Disney song. I am not a fan of Disney, in any of its corporate appearances. But there you are: me with a cheerful, upbeat Disney song as the soundtrack for the movie of my life.
So then someone chose a song about a train and New Orleans, which everyone but me seemed to know. I'd never heard it before in my life, while the others could sing the whole song by heart. That directed my thoughts to popular music and my [lack of a] relationship with it. It's long been clear that I know nothing about popular music after about 1956. In fact, it was only since I married my husband, with his amazing collection of popular music recordings (from the origins of recording through 1980) that I've learned to identify the occasional Beatles tune.
So what music DO I know aside from classical music and the popular songs of my junior high and high school years? (Can you sing Mairsie Doats? I can.) Then I remembered. Because of my children I know Jane Oliver (our house fairly reeked of Jane Oliver torch songs when someone's high school romance ended badly) and the Nylons. Also, in 1969 or 1970 I had a Joni Mitchell album that I listened to a lot.
So there. I do know a few pop names, though I doubt that anyone else knows Jane Oliver, and the Nylons are over the hill by now, having drifted off into an a capella sunset. That leaves me with Joni Mitchell. And Mairsie Doats.
Well, all of this thinking, occasioned by Zip-pe-dee-doo-dah, managed to clarify a bit of my relationship to popular culture. Wasn't THAT exciting?
After our toning we crossed Yonge Street to go to the Aji Sai for lunch. Could it get any better? Continuum (all about my body), toning (all about my sounds), and then a lunch with friends in a little Japanese place where they recognize us and greet us as old friends just because we eat there once a month!
But this is not the end of that day's excitement. After lunch I took the subway downtown to Sears. There I was, sternum still hurting, flowing body, tuned in to the sound of the universe, looking at: vacuum cleaners! We have a perfectly good upright that I hate and will not use. (My husband bought it when I wasn't with him. I said, "You use it, because I won't." So he has used it.) But I knew that if I had a vacuum cleaner that suited me, I would pull my own weight in the cleaning derby.
Have you looked at vacuum cleaners lately? They look like robots. Like implements for a space mission. It's all about bells and whistles and chrome trim. They are disgustingly ugly and pretentious. One Sears model cost $100 extra for a light that changes from red to green (or vice versa) to indicate an area where there is more dirt. It senses extra dirt. It senses extra dirt!!!
I bought an outdated model, $200 less than any of the others, exactly because it lacked most of the unneeded features and it had less chrome. Its biggest drawback, according to the saleswoman, is that after drawing out the electrical cord you have to manually hook it around a peg—otherwise it will spring back into its hole. When did we become a society too lazy to hook a cord around a peg? Anyway, I avoided all the parts I didn't want and saved a bundle, some of which I then spent on having the thing delivered. I'm looking forward to vacuuming with a machine that doesn't fall over when I use the hose attachment.
Now I'm still at Sears, still in the midst of my exciting day. Navigating my way to the subway takes me through the basement of the Sears store, where I see a display of sheets and towels. I think, "There's something around here that I'm looking for." Then I remember. I want a towel. One white towel, better than my other towels, just for me. I've had it in my head for months but never think of it. Here I am in towel-city. Towels on sale. Big fluffy towels, regularly $28, on sale for $14. I almost pass on by, knowing how awkward it is to buy things (especially with a damaged sternum): take off the green felt shoulder bag, then take off the backpack, where my wallet is. And then load up again when I've finished my purchase.
So I almost pass the towels by. And then I think "WWMHD" (what would my husband do?). Well, since he is a firm believer in retail therapy, I know what he would do. He'd buy half a dozen towels. So I bite the bullet and buy my one white towel, even though it means unloading and reloading the day's accumulation of stuff. Even though I have a damaged sternum.
And all of this is only the beginning of that week's excitement. You can see that it will be impossible for me to catalogue all the excitements of my life! It's taken three weeks just for me to get this far. I'll have to start keeping some of my exciting moments to myself.
And when I'm internalizing all that excitement, will I start bouncing as I walk? I'll let you know.
http://www.scenesfromthejourney.blogspot.com
No comments:
Post a Comment