pantoum's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE THINGS WE DO FOR LOVE My title refers to a hokey-dokey early-eighties pop song with a chorus that goes "like walking in the rain and the snow when there's nowhere to go and feeling like a part of you is dying. And you're looking for the answers in her eyes . . ." I used to be a whiz at the board game Songburst—probably because I spent most of my childhood living inside music and art instead of interacting with people—but just can't remember who sang this. Who really cares enough to google it though? I have some obscure 45s that would possibly sell on eBay for a nice price too: John Travolta singing his hit single Gonna Let Her In, David Soul (of Starsky and Hutch fame) singing his love song that does not mention that he is a spouse abuser, Barry McGuire singing The Eve of Destruction. Oh and hey, remember the Bay City Rollers? >i>S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y Night! Good lawd, how many perfectly good brain cells have we wasted listening to pop music? 'Course I listened to a lot of very good music too and have some great old albums: Maria Callas and Earl 'Fatha' Hines and Louis Armstrong and Harry Belefonte and loads of classical music. Plus ZZ Top's Trés Hombres album, which includes the wonderful Jesus Just Left Chicago and Hot, Blue and Righteous. And can I say that I just love the way vinyl sounds? So much deeper, richer than the digital files that I mostly purchase these days for convenience's sake. Got caught in a huge downpour a little while ago and returned to work with my hair and shirt completely drenched, looking as if I'd just stepped out of the shower after forgetting to take my shirt off. An editor saw me come in and said "Wow. You look completely different with flat hair." Well yeah. I love rain though and it felt good to run through it, even if I have been cold ever since and walking around all afternoon with hard nipples beneath a tight white shirt. Well whee! Give 'em a thrill where you can, I reckon. • I just promised my mother all of the extra cash I have for June and so foresee a serious cash-flow issue in the next thirty days unless I find some more fast-turnaround freelance work. (At least I will get several thousand at the end of the month though, after delivering this 1,200-page manuscript.) That unexpected $500+ car repair and my $1,200 dental bill are killing me. Cash-flow shortages are so damn frustrating to me because I created such a careful, thorough budget before making an offer on my house and they just remind me that all my planning was for naught. And we are talking cash flow. I have a decent amount of money in various retirement accounts but the point, of course, is to LEAVE that money in those accounts. Could borrow against IRAs if I'm in dire straits too, I reckon, but that's the only way I would do that. But I whine when I should just welcome myself back to how I lived for most of my earlier life. And my mother is in a much leaner place (and has been her entire life and, frankly), so I would rather live cheaply for the next thirty days and help her out. • I'll end with some words from Denise Levertov, a poet on the faculty of my MFA program: If woman is inconstant, 7:56 p.m. - 2005-05-24 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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