1.12.2006

Blechy

First of all, I just wanted to inform everyone that according to several blogs I have read recently, it is Delurking Week. I've done my part by delurking on several sites I have been haunting recently. I'm hoping that all my varied lurkers feel safe enough to delurk during this week (yes, I'm looking at YOU reader from Utrecht!) You don't have to comment on this post. You can comment on another, or just go sign my Frappr map.

I can't find out what other kinds of week it is, but for your education (and to guide the rest of your activities this month) here is a list of January's official designations:

National Eye Care Month
Yours, Mine and Ours Month
National High Tech Month
National Diet Month
International "Get Over It" Month
National Book Month

Soooo, take your stepkids and go get their vision checked, while your partner plays around with the ipods they received for Christmas and downloads some music to cheer you all up while you're eating cottage cheese and carrots. If the kids complain, tell them to "get over it" and go read a book!

***

We are still sick today. I have that nasty taste in my throat. You know the one. The one that doesn't leave no matter how many times you brush and gargle. The taste that tells you that adrenaline and sleeplessness and wishing-really-hard might fool you into thinking that you're getting better, but you're really not.

Last night I dreamed that Kiker arrived at my house on a flying bicycle with 2 oranges and a tangerine. She walked to the door and placed the fruit on a tray and said (very dramatically) "Let there be juice" and plunged straws into the fruit and handed the oranges to me and Kristin and the tangerine to Julia. Then she got back on her bicycle and flew away. I guess that'll teach me to read blogs right before falling into a bacteria-induced coma!

In honor of my yuckiness and that taste, here is a poem that I wrote a few years ago when getting over a bad spring cold.

The Sibyl of Cumae

1.
It's not that the visions and voices were such a burden;
she was born to them.
Occasionally they came on like a cold
clogging every portal in her head
until the only things she had were a pounding and a ringing
and a taste in the back of her throat.
Most of the time, though, her gift was like
the translucent eyelid of an amphibian;
it slid over as she slipped under,
as natural as breathing though skin.

2.
I wonder if she always looked through that crystalline film
and if this gave her eyes a glitter
visible only in reflection on the bodies and faces
of those who would not crowd around her,
and those who didn't look in her eyes?

Or was she, at odd times, drawn back to the surface;
opening herself to cold air and silence
to breathing in space through her skin?

I imagine her, in these moments,
shaking and raw, squinting to focus,
trying to figure out which eyelid to blink;
surrounded by strangers who look at her only
now that her eyes are crossed.
I see goosebumps on her skin,
a bluish tinge to her lips,
prophecy running down her body
puddling at her feet.
Just as that second eyelid is blinked away
and her vision cleared, just as she remembers
that noses are for breathing,
someone reaches out
touches her shoulder
shoves her back in.

3.
I can never imagine a different ending
just as I can never imagine away
the coldness given my hands when I pushed her.
They ache and sometimes wake me
from watery dreams to leave me alone
with the cold, the dark, her body, my hands.

Posted by Trista @ 8:03 AM

Read or Post a Comment

I lurk. I don't comment often because I talk to you enough! And I am boycotting blogger's word verification doohickey.

Posted by Blogger Estelle @ 9:12 AM #
 

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius looks interesting. i'll have to check it out. always appreciate new recommendations. just finished a book jon stewart recommended called
Why Do Men Have Nipples? Hundreds of Questions You'd Only Ask a Doctor After Your Third Martini. Pretty interesting/comical/informative all in one. hope you start feeling better

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous @ 10:11 AM #
 

Waiving hi!!!

I've posted every day this week.

Posted by Blogger WendyLou @ 11:08 AM #
 

This is one of my favorite poems of yours. You had the lines:

"Most of the time, though, her gift was like
the translucent eyelid of an amphibian;
it slid over as she slipped under,
as natural as breathing though skin."

on your e-mail for awhile, and I have thought periodically of them since then. I think they're lovely:)

Am I a lurker, or do I comment enough? What is a lurker?
-Lauri

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous @ 8:04 PM #
 

You are SO ready to be a librarian, Ms. What Week Is It! :)

Not a lurker...

Posted by Blogger Jen @ 8:11 PM #
 

De-lurking for the sake of this post...

I'm sending you my best wishes for improved health and good gadgetry for the remainder of this month!

Oh, and your description of the sickly throat taste is spot on. Blechhhh...

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous @ 8:14 PM #
 

Hey, welcome Kristen!

Lauri, YOU are not a lurker. A lurker is somone who reads a blog but doesn't comment. Thus while you are not a lurker, Benji is.

Though, I do think there needs to be a term for someone who reads blogs and comments on them but doesn't have one themselves. I am going to start thinking on that. Anyone have any suggestions?

Posted by Blogger Trista @ 8:57 PM #
 

Um, I've commented here once or twice but it was in the post re: racism and so I've bit my tongue since (not because of you). I also happen to have a blog, but it's all about our child and therefore we don't link to it except to family and real life friends - we live in Florida - it's a scary place to have little girls a lot of days. (So, while you're finding a word for people who comment without blogging, you'll have to work on one for people who comment whilst not sharing their blog. I like French words - could you find me something that sounds French?)

Anyway, I very much enjoy reading about Julia and come back daily hoping to see another picture of her with spiky fake hair (hat).

Best wishes-

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous @ 9:42 PM #
 

Hi Trista -- I've been reading since Julia was born, but haven't commented until now. I love your blog and reading about your family. We've got our own little x-chromosome family going on here in Philadelphia.
I'm a librarian -- you should totally be one too! Though we only get paid (sometimes) to read professional literature -- the good reading is still on your own time!

Germs be gone!

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous @ 11:00 AM #
 
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