Practicing Domesticity: We're just missing the shamrocks

Thursday, March 17, 2011

We're just missing the shamrocks

"March 17. What a day. Happy Saint Patrick's Day, by the way. Hence why four of the five of us are wearing green (good work, Danielle). This picture represents our typical daily lives, which is good, because we need one of those in here with all of the excitement. We were listening to "Single Ladies," which is very apropos, considering our conversation was about my sudden motherly desires. That's why I'm eating fruit on the couch explaining my life. Rachel has her hands in the air, since she is a single lady (so, we all should have our hands in the air....but whatever). Danielle is petting Zazie thinking deeply about the conversation. Earlier I was petting her head as she pet Zazie. Charlotte is eating a concoction that she made in the kitchen earlier. Sarah is lounging, because she knows how to relax (I still haven't caught on yet...). Anyway, a typical day in the life. Welcome home." - Michelle

**with a few minor corrections:

Danielle Willard So, here's the thing:
Jenna Polenske I love it.
Danielle Willard a) I am wearing green
Jenna Polenske So heres' the thing. I think Danielle protests these pictures too much.
Danielle Willard b) I'm not simply petting Zazie - I'm restraining her from devouring your food
Danielle Willard c) false
Danielle Willard d) we are neither Catholic, nor Irish, therefore, we have no need to wear green in the first place

No comments:

Post a Comment

What I Learned From My Mother

by Julia Kasdorf

I learned from my mother how to love

the living, to have plenty of vases on hand

in case you have to rush to the hospital

with peonies cut from the lawn, black ants

still stuck to the buds. I learned to save jars

large enough to hold fruit salad for a whole

grieving household, to cube home-canned pears

and peaches, to slice through maroon grape skins

and flick out the sexual seeds with a knife point.

I learned to attend viewing even if I didn’t know

the deceased, to press the moist hands

of the living, to look in their eyes and offer

sympathy, as though I understood loss even then.

I learned that whatever we say means nothing,

what anyone will remember is that we came.

I learned to believe I had the power to ease

awful pains materially like an angel.

Like a doctor, I learned to create

from another’s suffering my own usefulness, and once

you know how to do this, you can never refuse.

To every house you enter, you must offer

healing: a chocolate cake you baked yourself,

the blessing of your voice, your chaste touch.

Source: Sleeping Preacher (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1992)

Alone

by Maya Angelou

Lying, thinking
Last night
How to find my soul a home
Where water is not thirsty
And bread loaf is not stone
I came up with one thing
And I don't believe I'm wrong
That nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

There are some millionaires
With money they can't use
Their wives run round like banshees
Their children sing the blues
They've got expensive doctors
To cure their hearts of stone.
But nobody
No, nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Now if you listen closely
I'll tell you what I know
Storm clouds are gathering
The wind is gonna blow
The race of man is suffering
And I can hear the moan,
'Cause nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

The Silence

by Wendell Berry

Though the air is full of singing
my head is loud
with the labor of words.

Though the season is rich
with fruit, my tongue
hungers for the sweet of speech.

Though the beech is golden
I cannot stand beside it
mute, but must say

"It is golden," while the leaves
stir and fall with a sound
that is not a name.

It is in the silence
that my hope is, and my aim.
A song whose lines

I cannot make or sing
sounds men's silence
like a root. Let me say

and not mourn: the world
lives in the death of speech
and sings there.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

We're just missing the shamrocks

No comments:

Post a Comment

Other Blogs