today I want to believe

today I want to believe
fortune cookie fortunes are true

"You are headed in the right
direction.  Trust your instincts."

but they are so often wrong

My plans for the holiday

My plans for the holiday include
recovery from this cold
     (can you bore a virus to death?)
nothing constructive or practically valuable
reading, anime, manga
no significant interactions with other human beings
rest

Winter Carnivals and other insanities

What do you do when it's below freezing, winter is well underway, and you're going stir-crazy from being inside all the time?  If you live here, you have an outdoor winter carnival with a parade that makes those marching band kids actually appreciate their ancient wool uniforms!  And that parade lasts for more than three hours.  Oh boy!

So my friends who moved here last year took me to this event along with their tiny toddler, and we adults all gained a new appreciation for the joy of hot air balloons.  When they set off those jets, you feel like you're not actually frozen solid.  (Just nearly frozen and very, very stiff.) 

Their child is hilarious, very solemn in strange situations.  Not worried or afraid, merely extremely dispassionately observant.  I have no idea if she had a good time, but I sure got a huge kick out of watching numerous parade participants come over (with candy or necklaces or clown costumes and big, fake smiles) and totally fail to get any kind of reaction out of the child at all.  It's not like she ignored them; she just looked at them and really didn't see the need to get all jolly or anything.  It was still funny after two and a half hours and a couple dozen attempts.  I am so easily amused.

We actually left long before it was over because I guess we all just reached that point where we agreed, "This is ridiculous.  It's a parade that will never end, and we are built for other climes."

I think we still had to wait until the next hot air balloon float came by to thaw us enough to begin walking.

What do you do when winter makes you get cabin fever?

wisdom the crabapple tree passes on to me

.
some days
all you can do is
resist gravity
.


(I promise once I get this resettling thing settled, I'll stop copping out by only posting short pieces of poetry.  Maybe I'll go back to paragraphs.  Or at least longer poems. :)  Until then . . .

In some countries rain during a wedding is considered a blessing

.
Today the outdoor
wedding photographer prays:
cloudy skies, no rain
.

U-turns/Life

The kind of day when
you miss your exit by miles
and then turn around.

giving up haiku

I would settle for
sleep without dreams if only
I could get the sleep.

those worrisome spots out of the corner of your eye

.
tired enough to see
flashes of light and color
then: red-winged blackbird
.