Rolling on a river
Sundays can be this way sometimes – you get a lot done without even trying – breakfast at the Cakeman – YUM YUM YUM – the best biscuit I ever put in my mouth besides my grandmother’s fresh from the oven – on Spain and Chartres – the Cakeman rules for breakfast in the Marigny. The hot cross buns looked divine and we bought petite pineapple upside down cakes and I ate a half of one before I got my mega cheese omelette.
Perinos for garden supplies and then home to plant mums, pansies, and petunias. Still thinking I would get a run in before the night was over. I hosed down the outside of the house. Planted color in a few key places.
With gardening gloves on, S came by and introduced me to and then read me the obituary of Oriana Fallaci – here is a great description from The New Yorker of this woman I never knew till today:
Fallaci’s manner of interviewing was deliberately unsettling: she approached each encounter with studied aggressiveness, made frequent nods to European existentialism (she often disarmed her subjects with bald questions about death, God, and pity), and displayed a sinuous, crafty intelligence. It didn’t hurt that she was petite and beautiful, with straight, smooth hair that she wore parted in the middle or in pigtails; melancholy blue-gray eyes, set off by eyeliner; a cigarette-cured voice; and an adorable Italian accent. During the Vietnam War, she was sometimes photographed in fatigues and a helmet; her rucksack bore handwritten instructions to return her body to the Italian Ambassador “if K.I.A.” In these images she looked as slight and vulnerable as a child. When she was shot, in 1968, while reporting on the student demonstrations in Mexico City, and then confined by the police with the wounded and the dying on one floor of an apartment building, the first impulse of the students around her was to protect her; one boy gave her his sweater, in order to cover her face from the drip of a sewage pipe. Her essential toughness never stopped taking people—men, especially—by surprise.
Then friends came over and we took the boats out on the bayou – cruising down to Park Island and talking all along the way about what we truly want from life while all the while enjoying every single moment of our lives. We got back and headed to Wit’s Inn to play two rounds of pool and eat a pizza. The pizza there is damn good but they wouldn’t let us listen to music since it is Sunday night (read: football night) and so we had to keep singing Amy Winehouse’s Valerie all by ourselves. When we got back to the car we turned it way up and sang at the top of our lungs dancing in the truck.
In the end, we come back to where we start but always, always, always and again without missing a beat, we come back to the same place, only we’re different, and it starts all over again.
Valerie by Amy Winehouse:
Well, Sometimes I Go Out, By Myself, And I Look Across The Water.
And I Think Of All The Things, Of What You’re Doing, And I Paint A Picture.
Since I’ve Come Home, Well My Body’s Been A Mess, And I Miss Your Tender Hair, And The Way You Like To Dress.
Oh Wont You Come On Over, Stop Making A Fool Out Of Me, Why Dont You Come On Over, Valerie.
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Did You Have To Go To Jail, Put Your House Out Up For Sale, Did You Get A Good Lawyer.
I Hope You Didn’t Catch A Tan, I Hope You Find The Right Man, Who’ll Fix It For You.
Are You Shopping Anywhere, Change The Color Of Your Hair, And Are You Busy.
Did You Have To Pay That Fine, That You Were Dodging All The Time, Are You Still Dizzy.
Well Since I Come Home, Well My Body’s Been A Mess, And I Miss Your Tender Hair, And The Way You Like To Dress.
Oh Wont You Come On Over, Stop Making A Fool Out Of Me, Oh Why Dont You Come On Over, Valerie.
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Well Somrtimes I Go Out, By Myself, And I Look Across The Water.
And I Think Of All The Things, What You’re Doing, And In My Head I Paint A Picture.
Since I’ve Come Home, Well My Body’s Been A Mess, And I Miss Your Tender Hair, And The Way You Like To Dress.
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Valerie
Why Dont You Come On Over Valerie…