FreeBird

Yayoi Kasumi's dots make my heart pitter patter and shorten my breath.

And now for lyrics:
If I leave here tomorrow
Would you still remember me?
For I must be travelling on, now,
cause theres too many places Ive got to see.
But, if I stayed here with you, girl,
Things just couldnt be the same.
cause Im as free as a bird now,
And this bird you can not change.
Lord knows, I cant change.

I was thinking about change earlier. I just finished reading Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire. I read it once before, in 2000, and I think I was really sick and probably not a little drugged because I found it annoying. Now I am charmed. So, it got me to thinking about change. The book is a "insider's look" at the life of Cinderella, but told from the perspective of one of her stepsisters and Cinderella (better known as Clara Van de Meer) doesn't show up til halfway through. For reference, Maguire is the author of Son of a Witch and Wicked (the basis of the Broadway sensation).

Anywho, every character goes through quite a few changes and their actions reveal their motivations over time. A well-told tale. Probably arduously written. There are a lot of ruminations on beauty and some compelling stuff on charity and survival. The end of the book has a lot to say about the inheritance children take from their parents: not the money stuff, but the emotional inheritance.

That makes me think of myself (naturally), but an interesting comment made to me by a guy I met once in Chicago. We walked all over that damn city that night and he told me about his father, the artist, and his mother - who I think became a pastry chef or something after their divorce. His mother had the last word, his father, so dedicated to art, would not work so as not to clutter up his artistic spirit. Mom supported herself and her child with her art. Necessity is always the mother of invention.

Well, this is enough prattling for one night. Dinner plans were scrapped due to family emergencies, so thank god I had a fantastic lunch at a new place up the street where our waiter had Bell's Palsey and the visigoth could not resist talking to him about treatment options. I went away to the bathroom and came back to spy the visigoth contorting his face while talking to the waiter and had a moment of alarm - he could not Possibly be poking fun! And he wasn't, they were involved in an informal discussion of symptoms and remedies and the waiter was genuinely grateful.

There is an itch inside of me, I am growing dissatisfied again. It's the most unpleasant and unrelenting sensation. Only slightly less troubling than a leaking suprapubic catheter.

Ah. perspective.