I forget where I first heard of it, but I can’t get Robert Fitterman’s storefront shop in the Bowery out of my mind. This is an old story, starting on May 5, 2010. And the shop didn’t last very long, by design. It closed on May 27.
It was only open Tuesdays through Thursdays, and then, only from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Worse than banker’s hours.
Now that might not seem ambitious on the face of it, but it is really about what Fitterman was selling.
Continue readingIt was one of those days when you wake up feeling so clever because a unique word came to you in the middle of the night — opportunipee.
And you wrote it down. In a notebook. In the dark.
And it was legible.
A Jabberwokian euphoria fills your pores.
Continue reading
Sorry for the Dad Joke. It just came to me in the wee hours of Sunday morning. Turns out, the Cosmos is as corny as I am.
“Hey, shiny new Artificial Intelligence program: Write me a poem about walking through the Scottish Highlands and do it in the style of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.”
OK, I didn’t do this. I may still do this — but I didn’t.
Not yet.
Recently, I re-read Longfellow’s “Song of Hiawatha” for the first time since my childhood.
Continue reading
Tough luck if you are over the age of, let’s say16, but a lot of this week’s events are geared toward children. With good reason: The last Saturday in April is Mexico’s National Day of the Child.
If you have kids or know families with young children, consider being a fairy godmother or godfather for a day and get them to some of these wonderful events. (Cover the cost of the tickets, godmother!)
Meanwhile, of course, there really is a lot going on for the rest of us. There is a prestigious horse jumping event and the 50 Best Bars in North America will be named in a splashy ceremony. Do not try horse jumping and bar hopping at the same time. Leave that to the professionals.
Continue reading
News headline: Hallmark has created 42 movies for the holiday.
Subsequently, House Beautiful magazine gushed about the “comforting predictability of these flicks … No matter which title you switch on, the best thing about a Hallmark holiday movie is knowing that pretty soon you’ll be watching a happy ending.”
I don’t know if people who watch all 42 of these movies get a participation medal or a stay at the sanatorium. And Hallmark isn’t the only one flooding the zone. Somebody, noticing the overwhelming whiteness of characters in Hallmark movies, began putting out ethnic versions with the same insipient stories.
Continue reading
A star fell from the heavens and landed in a pocket park in San Miguel de Allende,
Right behind the Parroquia de San Miguel Arcangel.
Crazy how people take such things in stride.
If a star had fallen anywhere else, people would have been looking for it on the five o’clock news.
Continue reading
Tis the season.
For what?
Commercials, of course.
Holiday commercials, filled with tinsel and snow, all merry and bright.
Urging you to get your Christmas shopping just right.
We’re here to help you, they say, with nary a snarky grin.
You see, we know what trouble you’re in with your kin.
The right presents can bail you out.
Listen to our adverts, Bubba, in case there is some doubt.
Matthew 25:40: “Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me. “
And the rain pours down
Like on no day before.
My Rose takes our red umbrella
And hangs it over the hummingbird’s nest.
.
Like on no day before
But the three tiny eggs
And their mother stay dry.
.
And the rain pours down
Like on no day before
But my Rose thinks only
Of the frailest among us.
.
My heart fills with love
For a woman who thinks like that.
Let the rain pour down
Like on no day before.
Postscript: There are now babies in the nest and Rose lets me place the umbrella up when it starts to rain. Sometimes.
(The author begs your indulgence if you already read this on Facebook. The blog seems a better home for it. Thank you for reading and commenting. — The editor)
A whole ocean spreads out before them
But for two little boys
A string of shallow pools
And some rocks
Are quite enough.
Splashing water with foot-stomping fierceness
They move rocks from pool to pool.
They wallow in the deepest one
Like beached sea lions.
All the while, the ocean calls
In vain.
It sends dolphins to entice them
But the boys will have none of that.
Yesterday, at a children’s park,
It was the rolling green lawn, the wind twisted climbing trees, and the incurious squirrels
That captivated their imaginations.
Not the swings, not the slides, not the plastic and rope confections of an adult’s imagination.
They are like cats with boxes and Christmas wrapping.
Give us nature’s raw materials,
they seem to say,
And we will build sailing ships and castles
And fantastic flying machines
In our fertile minds.
“Everything is made out of magic, leaves and trees, flowers and birds, badgers and foxes and squirrels and people. So it must be all around us. In this garden — in all the places.” — The Secret Garden, by Frances Hodgson Burnett.
It is easy to get lost in a garden,
No matter how small it might be.
There you are, sitting in full possession of your mind
Ready to conjure great things that will soon become
Continue reading
Musings, Magic, San Miguel and More 