Friday, September 22, 2006

Familiar Reality

I've dropped anchor. The dust has settled. I've come in from the cold. The wheel of life has brought me back round to a housing start.

The suitcases are under the bed. I own, once again, a refrigerator and a washer and dryer. I bought a five burner gas range with a rotisserie spit in the oven.

I feel saddled with these onerous but necessary items.

On Tuesday afternoon Ikea furniture deliverers and assemblers came, armed with hexagonal allen wrenches and unloaded planks of unstained beech wood, bundles of steel frames, bags of nuts and bolts. The flat became cluttered with furniture before sunset.


I have a landline telephone number and a directory assistance listing. The custom tailored curtains have been hung. My cats arrived late Wednesday night.

Digging in does not necessarily mean digging my grave.

Next month, after Ramadan, the Rose of Tehran, her gaggle of cats plus a flipping yappy dog will arrive.
Can an appointed shopping-for-groceries day lag not too far behind?

As long as I don't stay on top of the news, I have a good chance of achieving intermittent moments of overwhelming contentedness.

Happiness, on the other hand, may be out of reach, still.

Happiness is a word that for me has never had any clear-cut significance but instead calls to mind an amorphous diffusion of feelings and a frame of mind absent of anguish.

It is a compulsion to act with explicit and enthusiastic purpose.

It is the gnosis with the mostess.

Appointed grocery shopping days have an explicit purpose but frankly speaking enthusiasm for them has always eluded me.


Monday, September 11, 2006

Taking Root

On TV while the world snacks on war news, I'm preparing myself for a home and home cooking. Next week I will put away my suitcases. They have been at the ready for nearly four years.