Random poetry

 Miracle

Not the one who takes up his bed and walks
But the ones who have known him all along
And carry him in—

Their shoulders numb, the ache and stoop deeplocked
In their backs, the stretcher handles 
Slippery with sweat. And no let-up

Until he's strapped on tight, made tiltable
And raised to the tiled roof, then lowered for healing.
Be mindful of them as they stand and wait

For the burn of the paid-out ropes to cool,
Their slight lightheadedness and incredulity
To pass, those ones who had known him all along.

Seamus Heaney

Pop Pop is here and at work

That's my fabulous father who has paid us a surprise visit while my mother is traveling elsewhere. We've already been to the new neighborhood hardware store, purchased some stuff and he's fixing things. I am a lucky, lucky woman to have such a father.

On Becoming a Lacrosse Mother

Henry is Number 10

My baseball Saturdays have now officially become lacrosse Saturdays.

I watched Henry play two games of lacrosse today in two different locations for a total of three hours game time, 2 hours of pre-game warm-up and another hour of driving. The first game was a high school game, and Reader, it was intense. Henry's team played a high school that is known for its football team (I believe one of the best in the nation?), and a few of the lacrosse players (who also play football) had tattoos. I'm not sure what strange karma I'm acting out by being the decidedly unathletic and disinterested mother to a kid who at one point nearly knocked heads with another over something illegal or another, but I acted nonchalant while I died inside. A fellow parent whom I vaguely remember from flag football days, at least six years ago (when the boys had neither hair on their legs nor tattoos),  as a screaming type of coach-father, nodded at the posturing of the two boys, and when I asked him what the problem was, he said, Testosterone. Good for Henry. I never know what the hell is going on on the field, so I nodded my head,  but in my mind they were roosters with their chests puffed up. Don't worry, though, Reader. I refrained from using my words, at least those words that I am quite skilled at using, and I shed all metaphors and stood up occasionally to shout strong and admonitory verbs. Karma is a bitch.

At the second game, I believe my son was actually thrown out of the game toward the end for yelling something or other at the ref, but how would I know what the true story was as I was finishing another chapter of The Luminaries in my car.

Saturday Three-Line Movie Review

I went to the Chilean movie Gloria with great expectations that I'd sit in orgasmic joy watching a middle-aged woman find herself and prove her sexual identity in spite of her age or size or whatever, and while Paulina Garcia's portrayal was what they call a tour de force, I left the movie feeling depressed and hung over for the rest of the day. This is no Shirley Valentine, a movie I found charming, sweet and superficial, but more cinema verite, and while my view is perhaps contrarian, I felt dragged down and through the dark bars and false night-clubs of Santiago and utterly not seduced by the man with whom Gloria has a passionate affair. An intense female movie about aging, Gloria lingers on Garcia's face, her every expression, is a film about seeing, actually, and while I'm on the subject, Gloria's over-sized and awkward glasses that I could never quite figure out (were they purposefully vintage?) distracted me throughout the whole movie which might be the review right there: I just didn't want to see it.









Other 3-Line Movie Reviews:

Labor Day 
Philomena

August: Osage County

Her

American Hustle

When I Don't Love Los Angeles

I was just drinking some coffee (it was bitter) and eating an English muffin with egg white and turkey bacon (it was kind of gross, really), waiting for my morning movie to start (you'll get the three-line review tomorrow) when the woman pictured above walked in. She was Swedish, and she wasn't young. I'm not sure whether she was a Sikh practicing Kundalini yoga, getting ready to jazzercise or was just out for a cup of coffee on a Friday morning in Los Angeles, but this is the sort of stuff that makes me not enjoy the life here. I simultaneously feel superior and intensely inferior. I think Why? when I look at her, head to toe, and then I think God. I wish I were a thin, tall blonde Swedish woman with a smile on my face. I feel old this afternoon, bitter like my coffee and missing New York City where my dark hair, black tee-shirt and careworn visage might be appreciated. Better yet, I bet I'd be a goddess in Cosenza, my ancestral home in southern Italy.

Reader, what's happening in your parts (not pants)?

How We Do It, Part XL

I hate it when people ask me what Sophie knows. I don't know what Sophie knows. I'll say everything and I'll think nothing. I'll say nothing and think everything. A man once asked me whether she knew anyone, whether she could feel love. He popped peanuts into his mouth. He was nice, I heard, and now he's dead. A child therapist once asked what her abilities were, how much can she really contribute to the family? After I removed the hatchet from my chest, I cleaved her in two. So, I don't know. I've hissed at Sophie in the night when she doesn't sleep, when she's seized and is awake, agitated, her brain a seeming jumble, a jungle -- trees, a forest, dense and dark and obtuse. A ruin, her life and mine. These are jungle thoughts. I've hissed at her in the night, not nice, so not nice, and I know she knows me then. She knows me and I'll imagine she hates me. I reframe the not-knowing to punish myself. Where she leaves off and I begin or where I leave off and she begins. I am thrust backward to a motel room in La Jolla, the year of El Nino. The rain pelting down. The navys of the two rooms we shared, the electric stove, the overhead fan. The crib. How she never slept. She was so beautiful, her hair a cap of ringlets, her head tilted. She smiled and folded her legs, even then.

Sophie Rocking a Black Turtleneck and The Brothers

Slipstream

I love the word slipstream, to feel the soft s on the tongue, the hiss of air, hear Van Morrison's if I ventured in the slipstream and I thought about it, the slipstream, when I thought about Sophie tonight. Sophie is sleeping a lot lately, sleeping soundly and peacefully and while it might be because of the marijuana, it might be because she is resting, her brain is resting. She is resting.  A slipstream is defined as a stream of air forced backwards by a propeller or the area of reduced pressure behind a fast-moving object. I thought of Sophie when I read the word slipstream, and she might be in the slipstream or she might be the fast-moving object behind which we, the unknowing, the relieved (she isn't seizing!) stream, in the slipstream, an area of reduced pressure. I'm thinking these things and singing in my head, in silence easy.





Listen to Astral Weeks here.

Medical Marijuana Update, #10

art by Adrienne P.

When we visited Sophie's neurologist last week, Sophie was brewing a cold and had had a bad day, seizure-wise. She was clammy and spacey, sat in her wheelchair for the entire time and didn't make great eye contact. She had been seizure-free for nearly two weeks until that day, and a part of me was not only bummed that I wouldn't be able to share a seizure-free child with The Neurologist but also anxious that the seizure-free period was just a dream, a honeymoon, the usual. That being said, The Neurologist was pleased to hear of the efficacy of the Charlotte's Web, and she recommended that we start to wean Sophie from Onfi, the benzodiazepine that she's been taking for years. The Neurologist is a woman, younger than I, very kind, thorough and efficient. When I left her office and drove home, I had to wonder at her equanimity, and -- by extension -- the relative nonchalance of the neurological community in general, in the face of what I believe is a revolution happening in epilepsy treatment.

It seems to me that these people should be freaking out about these kids. Yeah, yeah, I know A Scientist has no business freaking out over anecdotal reports from a patient. I realize they have to do the double-blind placebo controlled studies and protocol must be followed. Yeah, yeah, I get that. But you know what? Sophie was diagnosed with infantile spasms when she was not even three months old. Since that day she has been on twenty different drugs in different combinations and has tried the ketogenic diet twice. She's been infused with immunoglobulin fifteen times. She's been tested for all known genetic mutations that would call for specific treatments and come up negative. She has never been seizure free in nineteen years. Until now. Until a few weeks ago.

That, to me, calls for a doctor shrieking in the hallway to his or her colleagues.

What this reminds me of, though, is the day, years ago, when Sophie was diagnosed with infantile spasms by two young Fellows of Neurology. I wrote about that day and mused on whether a more appropriate way to communicate the terrible news that was let loose would have been for those Fellows to wrap us in their arms and weep for us.

Humor me.

I want The Neurologist to shriek in the hallways about Sophie and the other kids who are seeing this treatment work for their kids.

Until then, I will do so.

The Anthem Bonfire Party

February 1, 2014

Dear Customer Service,

I have made repeated attempts to get in touch with you regarding my daughter, Sophie XXXX's  Anthem Blue Cross membership, but I have been unable to get through to a human for some time. I understand how busy you’ve been with changes because of the Affordable Care Act, and I am taking this opportunity to inform you that Sophie will no longer be a member as we have decided on a different and better health plan for her and for our family.

Please cancel Sophie XXXX's membership. Her ID number is XXXXXXXXX.

I will also take this time to let you know that our affiliation with Anthem Blue Cross has never been anything but a frustrating nightmare, that you have caused great anguish and stress for our family over the past decade and that we are beyond thrilled to be rid of you. I can only hope that your company will learn to be as ethical as you are profitable, but I imagine these are high hopes, indeed, and I don’t pretend that a small customer like ourselves will make much difference leaving your business.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth Aquino

The Anti-Super Bowl Party

Both my boys are off to a Super Bowl party at a friend's house which lets me off the hook from even listening to it from another room. I just made some lentil soup with kumquats, so I'm inviting you over to have a bowl of soup and some crusty bread. I've got a copy of Fruitvale Station and a Netflix copy of The Intouchables -- take your pick -- and some beer, bourbon or wine to drink. It's a blustery day here in Los Angeles, a tad overcast and temperatures around 60, so when you want to go for a walk, we can do that, too.

Oh, if you're one of those people that enjoy watching the billion dollar industry of violence and brain injury, or claim you love the commercials, and you think I'm just a stuck-up snob eating lentils and kumquats, I've bought some Velveeta, a can of Ro-tel and a bag of tortilla chips and plan to make a bit of that for Sophie and me.

Reader, let me know if you're coming.

Mooning Over Los Angeles

The Abandoned Valley

Can you understand being alone so long
you would go out in the middle of the night
and put a bucket in the well
so you could feel something down there
tug at the other end of the rope?

Jack Gilbert
Refusing Heaven (2005)

Saturday Agenda

I have lacrosse on the agenda today.

Lacrosse and, oh, more lacrosse.

Reader, what's happening in your parts (not pants)?

Saturday Three-Line Movie Review

I could probably write a three word review of Jason Reitman's saccharine peach pie (significant scene!) of a movie Labor Day, and those three words would be Really?, Really?, and Really? Neither Kate Winslet's acting chops nor Josh Brolin's manly biceps could possibly save this Damsel-in-Distress-Saved-By-Ex-Convict-Prison-Escapee-and-Creepy-Adolescent-Nerd-Son melodrama that ranks up there with Autumn in New York as a movie where I both squirmed in my seat because of the lack of explicit sex (which might have saved it) and felt embarrassed for the filmmaker. Really.





Other 3-line movie reviews:

Philomena

August: Osage County

Her

American Hustle