nine years of bad luck

Here we are, year nine in the new century. My husband started it off by breaking a mirror in the bathtub, his first act of the early morning of the first day of the new year. He felt it bode somewhat dismally for his future. I'm glad I don't believe in bad luck. Which is not to say I don't have any.

Caveat: I am still muddy-headed and cruising into week 6 of this funky headcold sinus infection flu cough common cold bronchitis walking pneumonia.

My great-neice is coming to stay for two weeks while she gets started in college. We will tuck her away in a corner and feed her vegetarian food. She's small and won't take up much space. And, as all children's plans seem to go, the apartment she was to rent is a myth and it is probably a better idea, according to her, to start school in March instead of January. It is cold, afterall. But, as I've come to learn, two weeks means two weeks, and I can return her, postage paid to her mother in Idaho, without question.

Living with two adolescent females is interesting. I do remember being eighteen. I was as full of hubris as either of them, certain I knew things -- important things -- things my elders could never conceive--things they had somehow passed by on life's journey, didn't have the awareness to pick up and could not go back for, like unredeemable coupons, outdated and worthless snips of paper. When I said happy new year to Nicole, she answered, "My new year began in September, on my birthday. This means nothing." Oh, how I wanted to remind her that, even as tragically unique she is, the laws of physics do apply to her.

Naw. They won't hear it. Not yet. And its not my job.

I wish I had learned, years earlier, that I am only one of many. And still it eludes me. It is true: I hate to be common... garden variety... but it is only when I can sincerely if momentarily grasp this fact that I have some hope of connection with the rest of the herd.

Plus, if you think your thoughts are worth recording, you're doubly-fucked.

Oh, well.

Yesterday was my son's birthday. I miss him. He is still the best thing I ever did. Happy Birthday, Marky.