16h42-17h50, 04-March-2013
Color me surprised this afternoon to discover that both of the newish modernish hip-coolish wifi-ready coffee houses in my neighborhood conform to the oh-so-dusty-European custom of being closed for business on Monday. Always learning in this life, we are…and always walking further than we intended as a result.
Less than three hours ago, right at the tail-end of a lunch best not recounted here, I had a truly great idea for a topic on which to write about today. I did, I really did. The thought made me smile, it made me laugh, it lifted my spirit and filled me with anticipation, and then it took a partner and danced straight out of my mind with nary a backward glance. Not that I am spending much time aching over subjects, mind you, but when you’ve got a good one by the tail (never by the nose) there is no escaping a slicing sense of loss when it breaks free and skips away.
Metaphors. I see I am not lacking for those today, oh no. Of course, me without metaphors is like a laundry basket without socks, or or or a bulletin board without thumbtacks. Uh, a money-showered celebrity without an entourage? Nope, it’s true…the good ones really won’t come when you call.
The chocolat chaud that was meant to share the ride today is already gone, and that is because it was not hot, not marginally so, and thus it was no more in three easy glugs. And that is especially bothersome, considering Le clair de lune, the neighborhood bar/café I tap-tap-tap from today, is part of an affiliation of like establishments called HotCafe. Ironic? Nah. The point isn’t nearly important enough to be considered so and should be released on its own recognizance.
At this point it is evident that the loss of my afformentioned certain-world-beating topic has left me in a place of riffing (read: scrambling, reaching, clutching, grasping, flailing…). Hmm. Should I write about Airmail, the rollickin’ new email program I started beta-testing over the weekend? Uh, no. Or maybe go on a bit about the dreamy handmade camera half-case my eyeballs and fingertips have been tingling over (for Leyna the Leica…avid readers will surely recall my naming psychosis) and that I am thisclose to ordering, as a 48th Birthday gift to myself from My Missus? Uh, no. My ongoing effort to integrate the complete recordings of both Louis Armstrong and Miles Davis into the TOK Tunes digital music library? No no no, heavens no. My surprise over CuzJ being a tad jealous over my imminent Iceland holiday, this despite his leaving days from now for Hawaii? Huh? Of course, I could just share a cat story…
And there it is again, that utterly brilliant topic, rearing its ghastly head as expected and just in time to miss the whole of today’s session of Fill-the-Cruelly-Oppressive-Blank-Space. Caged that slippery beast in a note-to-self this time, though, thus finally subscribing to the notion that writing is at least as much organization as inspiration (perspiration, preparation, presentation, elucidation, and mental masturbation aside).