I’m thinking, though not deeply, about death. The grandfather of a good friend died today. Funerals are sad, death not necessarily so. Sometimes death is a relief, or so I hear. I’m not sure how we can know if death really alleviates anything. The dead can’t tell us. The best we can hope for is it all ends with death being the balm of life.

The consequence of this death is that my friend is coming this way for the funeral, and I’ll get to spend some time with him over the next couple days. I love catching up with people on the “real friend” list, discussing girlfriends, boyfriends, life plans, work, school, and family dysfunctions. It’s peculiar that I totally hate discussing this kind of thing with people who are not good friends. The casual acquaintance bores me to tears with stories I find riveting if delivered by someone I have put in the “life friend” category.

Speaking of funerals. I wish everyone would shut up about Michael Jackson. Now we have to look at his hair burning Pepsi commercial, his nasty old father, his countless friends, who prior to this lived in some heavy woodwork, Larry King asking some of the stupidest questions imaginable to people we’ve not heard of before, not to mention the other CNN histrionic pundits extraordinary. Soon people will be posting autopsy pictures. Watching this stuff makes me sicker than eating ten bowls of cherries. We are an indecent people here on Planet Earth.

peace

Wonderland or Not.

I’m out to purchase some food. I’m giving my cousin a 20th birthday dinner tonight. Her birthday was a couple of weeks ago. It’s a convenient time for our yearly commiseration. She is in town for the weekend after a weeks’ vacation she took with her mother and friends. She’s heading back to Pittsburgh, where she goes to college during the regular term and works at two jobs this summer. It’s the first “not living at home summer” for her, necessary because she got an apartment for her junior year and it needs to be paid for. The beginning of the end, as it goes, or is called, in our family. The first signal that you won’t be home again except to visit. The females in our family historically are more likely to move out earlier and more permanently than the males. I’m not sure why that is, but it is curious. From The east coast to the west it is a distinct pattern on one side of my family tree anyway.

She can’t drink legally of course, and I feel like an ogre because when she asked about going to a certain club I declined to take her, fake id or not. She didn’t seem to concerned though, and we’ll spend the evening here in mindless conversation. I’ll fill her head with advice and she’ll pretend she is listening. Ill have to hear too much about her new boyfriend, who happens to be older than her and out of college. Yes, been there done that, but whatever. The guy also lives at home still, which I have to get a handle on because things like that sound suspect to me. I call them “homeboys”, and though somewhat derogatory it isn’t really meant to be, it’s just something I can’t get a handle on. It also disturbs me some that she only dumped her old boyfriend after the new boyfriend came into the picture. My advice always is to spend some time boyfriend-less, but that is personal preference I guess. Merlot will be involved of course, she is Cuban on her father’s side, and it is not illegal in the mind of Cubans no matter where they live, to drink decent wine with dinner, even when you are 12.

I’m dallying because I dislike buying groceries as a rule. I’ll probably hit the wine shop first.

Take out Japanese food is beginning to sound good.……

peace

Wonderland or Not.

All is well that ends well. I recovered both the book and the slice of my life. That they were found at the same time may or may not be central to any great life theme, but it did prompt these paragraphs.

It is Old School Friday and the theme is “keep it in the family”.

Technically not old school, if you haven’t heard these guys live and can, do so. You will love me for it. Robert Randolph and the Family Band . Not all family, but close enough.

Their version of Billy Jean.

I sometimes wonder (not often I’m not that lame) when watching this Staying Alive video, which Gibb I would have claimed for my own, had I been alive and 12 at the time this video was made. It definitely would not have been the dude in the high wasted white pants.

Probably would have been Robin.

Family Gibb on Old School Friday. I Started a Joke.

OSF sponsored by Conversations With Marva and Mrs Grapevine

The players:

Electronic Village | Kim | Kevin — A Slant Truth | Marcus LANGFORD | iriegal | John | CC Groovy | Kreative Talk | Regina | Vivrant Thing | AJ | Beleiver 1964 | SJP | BklynQueen 86 | Hey Shae | Malcolm

peace

Wonderland or Not.