sub rosa

Under the rose. Above the dirt. Across the great divide. Beyond the pale. To hell and back. For better or worse. Beside me. Under the rainbow (somewhere). Below standard. From here to eternity. On the brink. To the front. In the back. After the fall. Against all odds. Through thick and thin. Before time immemorial. Despite all evidence to the contrary. Along the watchtower (all). Above the fray. With malice aforethought. Over the top. Without scruples. Among thieves (thick as). In the beginning. During this time. Toward the end. Around the bend. On behalf of. Since forever. At the mercy of. To have and to have not. Under the watchful eye of. From the storm (shelter). Down the rabbit hole. Between you and me. Except us. Within these walls. Upon second thought. Beneath contempt. Up the river. Under the table. Until then. 

The Clothes Make the Man, Woman, Etc.

"Let's play dress-up," I told myself, in words not so foppish or dandy. Home alone, I was not sure anyone was listening.

"I'm tired of nothing more fancy or formal than jeans, T-shirts (long- or short-sleeved), sweaters, casual summer shoes in winter, matching or unmatching socks, deodorant-off days, pajama bottoms off-screen from the Zoom camera, and the absence of mouthwash that would have played a supporting role in any 'normal' 3D encounter." 

Those were not my exact words. Hardly. (And what difference would it make? I was the only one here, talkin' to me is who I was talkin' to, to paraphrase Travis Bickle in "Taxi Driver.") Besides, the sentence in my head was more meandering, sloppy, zig-zag, and self-referential, if you can picture that in your ears. Imagine a locution more or less halfway from the first sentence above to the second.

Why get dolled up? anyone would ask. To break up the monotonous habits of quarantine, isolation, or solitude during the coronavirus pandemic. This is not original. You hear people every day referring to "Groundhog Day," the movie. (Coincidentally, today, as I write this, it is Groundhog Day.) The Groundhog Day-ness of these days stems from the ceaseless repetition of customs and practices that no one observes or feels the effects of, except for yourself. These hamster-wheel marathons of déjà vu have become a shared code, a wordless nodding understanding, even if such recognition is only to yourself. Crazy, right? Will this sound crazier in years hence, assuming, Deo volente, that we get to the "years hence"?

So I got dressed up. I pretended I had an office to go to. Before leaving the apartment, I sprayed onto my neck an evanescent mist of Tom Ford Ombré Leather, because I like it, hope others do as well, and as a test for and a spur toward reacquiring my sense of smell post-Covid.

Again, this is not unique or singular in any way.

Is human dignity at the root of all this? I have a picture of my dad in a hospital bed, New Year's, 1958, when he nearly died of bleeding ulcers. I see shaving cream, a mirror, and the long single blade he used. Was he shaving himself, or was someone, one of his brothers, performing the kindly deed? And I see the same sort of image, with a more modern twin blade, of my dear friend Doug Sullivan in 2005. He would die a few days later. My mom, at a nursing home which she would never leave, became buoyant and brighter when the on-site hairdresser "did" Mom's hair. Whether it was cut or permed, it gave her a bounce, like a shot of espresso. The simple act of my combing her ever-matted bed-head hair, best as I could with her rake comb, yielded heart-breaking gratitude. A few days before my mother died, at 102, one of my daughters polished (painted? "did"; I don't know the technical term) her grandmother's nails. It elicited childlike pride and delight. Mom wasn't going anywhere. We knew the end was near, but uncertain as to exactly when, of course. I have a photo in my phone of her ancient, papery hand with its freshly done nails resting in my hand in her last hours.

Human dignity.

But that wasn't the primary motivation for me as I donned a blue dress shirt, a pale blue tie decorated with pink and lavender blossoms, a dark tweed sportcoat, olive-gray dress pants, and brown dress shoes (despite snow on the ground). I did not get an A+ in Proper Matching. Although the temperature was in the thirties, I wore no overcoat.

I stopped at Salt City Coffee to grab a cup to go and to visually strut and brag to Gabi, my barista-friend. She was not working.

No matter.

I swaggered back to my car as the boulevardier I have declared myself to be on my "business" card. Let's throw in "jaunty."

I carried this élan with me when I went to Spectrum to sign up with them and get a new iPhone. I kept my costume on when I went home and participated in a Zoom meeting that evening.

Outside in? Or inside out?

For me, the driving force was to "act as if." If the wearing of my uniform managed to lift me out of a rut, to raise me out of any lingering doldrums, all the better. In this unscientific experiment, I wanted to see if I could "act myself into a new way of thinking," as the saying goes. Although I won't be writing a peer-reviewed paper on my qualitative or quantitive (if that were possible) findings, I can report anecdotal evidence.

The episode planted seeds for future anecdotes that will surely be reviewed by peers, and others. Early drafts are positive.

PC: post-coronavirus

Me: Hey, Alfredo, you know what? Things just aren't going to be the same after this. They're really not going to be the same.

Alfredo: They never are.

And here I was the one pretending to be a Buddhist.
 

an abundance of caution

 Signs in the Age of Coronavirus.

An "abundance of caution" is invoked. On decrees, doorways, doors of banks, laundromats, churches, temples, mosques, malls, ballparks, restaurants, schools, universities, coffee shops, barbershops, city halls, meeting halls, union halls, walls, apartment buildings, movie theaters, toll booths, brothels, insurance companies, brokerages, pharmacies, gambling joints, opium dens, cruise ships.

"Out of an abundance of caution . . . "

"If you have enough, you have abundance," goes the maxim for maximum effect.

And what is enough?

Abundance, such a fulsome and lavish word, billowing its bountiful message. Says the OED, an overflowing, to flow in waves.

Lap it up.

Caution. The OED: bond, surety, a taking heed.

Signs of our times.

And speaking of signs, try my tiny book: http://amzn.to/1Mz8RkY

flattening the curve

One might argue that flattening the curve started with Twiggy (Lesley Hornby) with the Mod look in the Sixties. But one might further, and more strenuously, posit that curve flattening was conceived, pushed, and marketed by men in power desirous of a certain look (can that look be termed androgynous any more?). If the sinewy, slender, skinny (all subjective adjectives) appearance being modeled did not promote anorexia, did it nevertheless subconsciously mumble (or blare in the public square) a message about shape and body, a message about shame and acceptance, desire and hunger?

And what about the hollowed-out waif look?

Has such flattening of the curve ever ceased? Pick up a fashion magazine and tell us.

Then there's curvy. As a pendulum-swinging alternative, curvy embraces the contours, the sensuous curves celebrated by, say, Caravaggio. Fatten the curve, one might say to a Twiggy-era model. (Though, to drill down lexicographically, "fatten" is a semantic choice that would put one in hot water, ripe for boiling, or into a penitential sauna sure to drip off sweat and ounces.)

Take a look at Marilyn Monroe. No one dared suggest she flatten the curve.

Times change.

Times even change to the point where such an analysis as this, such a curvilinear discourse, is not limited to one sex or gender or identity. The curves are up for grabs, flat or otherwise. As are the angular lines, the straight edges.

Not "up for grabs." Wrong phrase. Delete that. Up for discussion, yes. But anything else must be consensual.

social distancing vs. social proximating

I have been known to have social distanced. It is not the same as socially distanced. I have known social distancing. I have known social distancing, in its comings and its goings. Have you? Haven't you? The social distancing of snubs and snafus and near-misses. Or near Missus. The social distancing of forays and fumbles, dalliances and disasters. I have known them all. As T.S. Eliot penned it:

For I have known them all already, known them all:

Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,

I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;

I know the voices dying with a dying fall

Beneath the music from a farther room.

               So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all—

The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase

I have known social distancing by any other name. Filed under the names of loneliness, alienation, indifference, rebuff, and buffering. Under the banners of taboo, time, and space. The labels of contagion or conjugation. Felt as intimacy or aridity.

I have socially distanced by one word, one sentence, a single faux pas. 

Haven't you? Have you?

Social distancing.

How about you?

How about us?

I have sung hymns to social distancing.

No one heard them.

Or no one replied.

Social distancing in the key of me, the key of you, the chords of coldness.

We sought the bridge.

They paid the toll.

They crossed the border.

I bridged the gap.

You narrowed the way . . . of distancing's definition, its social cues, its molecular matrix.

And while we're at it, at this safe distance, socially speaking, tell me, what is its opposite?

Social proximating?

As in: "I want to hold your hand . . . if you wash it." Or: "I want to touch your elbow (with my elbow) ..."

Social proximating, as in "Baby, socially proximate with me, babe."

It's a new brave new landscape, a brand-new vernacular.

Hold on.

But keep your distance.

For your good and mine.

For our good. And for the good of others.

pair this

Foodies, gourmands, and assorted oenophiles love to toss around, as in a salad, the verb "pair." You've seen it. Or heard it. "The escargot retains its maritime yet diffident character when paired with a 1973 L'Armandaise Bleu." That type of pinkies-out remark is readily slurped up by aesthetes. "Via Va Voom Venuto's menu boasts a zesty pasta sauce, called 'gravy' by the local denizens, that pairs well with a bottle of handcrafted red from the nearby GMO-abstinent, non-frackable vineyard."  

Pair. Pairs. Pairing. Paired.

Such a genial word, with its seductive invitation to couple, twin, or more! 

And yet.

And yet let us admit to its linguistic impediments.

Some pairings are ill conceived and ill fated, are they not?

You wouldn't pair a Trump with a Sanders, would you?

Or a vegan with a carnivore, a liberal with a conservative, a dove with a hawk -- WAIT! Maybe those are the very pairings we in fact covet and crave. Maybe we indeed need to conspire and courageously conjure oxymoronic pairings that will yield unexpected civility and eruptions of harmony and blasts of bonhomie.

Ya think?

hardscrabble, softscrabble, scrabble

If you had one word to describe your neighborhood, what would that one word be? (This is assuming you have a neighborhood. I am not so sure that suburban or rural areas qualify.)

"Hardscrabble" was the first word to pop into my head. But, consulting Merriam-Webster, I'm not so sure it is an accurate adjective:

1

a :  being or relating to a place of barren or barely arable soil hardscrabble

farm> <hardscrabble prairies>

b :  getting a meager living from poor soil hardscrabble farmer>

2

:  marked by poverty hardscrabble

cotton town> hardscrabble childhood> 

 

Since there is not too much unpaved or ungrassed soil, I'll skip sense 1 of the M-W definition. As for sense 2, I'll buy that. I'll buy poverty. (How much does it cost? You can't afford it. Don't ask; don't tell.) But even that is hard to tell. Some folks seem to go to work; others seem to malinger, especially by that nefarious-looking cornerstore.

Maybe we're a softscrabble neighborhood.

Or, for those given to wordplay, maybe we are merely a scrabble neighborhood. And if you are talking about that famous board game, cap that initial S.

Esquire

One of the pleasures of writing, even in the context of a blog, is to stumble upon something you composed a while ago, read it, and declare to yourself, "Hey, pretty cool. I like that. Who the heck wrote that?" And you find it was yourself.

It held up. It still worked. Maybe it even grew better with age.

Similar statements can be made of musical, artistic, or culinary creations (if they are not moldy).

I sheepishly but candidly have to say: I think my blogging was better two years ago.

You decide.

Hard to tell; hard to compare pears with apricots or whatever.

I knew I had blogged before about the word "Esquire" or its abbreviation "Esq." as an appendage (excuse me) after one's name.

I still say I should try it, the whole Esq. bit. Business cards and all.

I'd probably start getting more work, more respect, more junk mail, more antipathy, and more lawsuits.

Still, it'd be an interesting experiment in the realms of finance, sociology, anthropology, semantics, and legality.

Would the bank tellers I know cash checks signed with Esq. after my name?

Would the DMV give me heat if I tried to change my license accordingly? Do they allow "Esq." on passports?

If so, why?

Pawlie Kokonuts, Esq.

Blog Liberalization

McCain's people are complaining that "liberal" or "leftist" bloggers are smearing Sarah Palin.

Multipart question:

What, really, is a liberal blogger? Or a leftist blogger? Or a conservative or rightist blogger?

When I say "I Leap for Kierkegaard" is it liberal or conservative?

What about poetry?

What if I am liberal on some days and conservative on others?

What if I'm liberal on some issue but conservative on others?

What do I do about my anarchic tendencies?

Under what category does walking the dog fall under?

Whose politics is embraced by haiku?

The Litany of Social Contagion

War and peace
Talk and silence
Addiction and recovery
Driving vs. walking
Being rather than doing
And vice versa.

Work and idleness
Innovation and lethargy
Blogging vs. reading
Punctuation and anarchy
Kierkegaard and Kant
Voting rather than complaining
Blogrolling vs. not
Love or hate or apathy.

Faith and fear
Acceptance and control
Will and surrender
Community and solitude
Commenting and commuting.

Peace.

Labels Majora and Labels Minora

In looking over Blogger.com's options to "customize" my blog, I noticed an option labeled, Labels.

Presto! I clicked a few times and soon surveyed one of the longest lists in Christendom (second only to the list of remembered resentments of a particular ethnic group [hint: my wife's, whose ancestral lands we visited without resentments before or after last October], or possibly second only to the list of things to sort and dispose of at home and office).

Sheesh! Talk about a laundry list! Or talk about airing your laundry in public!!

Or exclaim about about excessive exclamation points!!

I dare say my list redefines the word eclectic.

Or obsessive. Or some other word.