Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Happy Birthday to Me



The picture above is me at ten.

It's my birthday. I am many decades past ten on the outside, but not on the inside. Read the poem at the end of this blog post and you will understand. I've posted the poem before. It is from my poetry book, soon to be published, Between The Lines.

Its pouring down rain again. Just like yesterday and the day before. I am hunkered down inside with three unhappy dogs waiting for the maids to come and clean the house. My helpful designer friends came over at lunch and I picked out new fabric for the sofa which turned out to be discontinued, but found a cool paint color for the dining room and finally decided on tile for the dining room, hall, and foyer floors. The living room will be refinished wood. Now, its only a matter of scheduling. Except for the sofa, load off my mind. Francie will find a similar look in another fabric book. Not much of a big deal really. Since I got the sofa when Amy was a baby, its 'bout time to recover it!!

I went out last evening for dinner with Laura, her guy, and Danny for a 'Birthday Eve' supper. I had this amazing dish...a Thai beef and cooked noodle 'salad' with peanuts, peaches, mint, soy sauce, avocados, onions, and tomatoes. Sounds like an impossible combination of flavors but it was wonderful! If you have a Houston's near you, try this dish!! Giant piece of key lime pie after was pretty rockin' too.

Danny's working and has web design class tonight so I won't see him until almost ten p m. Sorta a bummer on my birthday, but I enjoyed some funny e cards and am reading a new book by one of my favorite authors, Charles De Lint. It was a gift from Danny. I'm gonna curl up under a blankee and get back to it now.

Happy Birthday to me. Happy Un-birthday to you.

TEN


By Nancy Wayman Deutsch


I was ten once, long ago.

Ten on the outside I mean.

Inside I’m still ten

sometimes, ten and a half

which is six moons past July,

or, I’m ten minus a half

which I guess, would be five,

depending on whether I’m right side up or upside down.

I still see things like a girl of ten, or five:

the way dogs smile, and a caterpillar dancing on a twig,

that lizards are really dinosaurs, shrunken down to manageable size.


I’m Alice falling through the rabbit’s hole,

or I’m a princess in a castle built of books

dancing in crystal shoes past twelve on nimble feet,

feet that never hurt at all.

I know spiders hold all the evil in the world in their fat, squishy bellies

and fireflies are really golden fairies.

I know I’ll live forever, somewhere

maybe on the other side of the universe from here

because I am ten and I’ll never be eleven,

not even when they think I’m eight times ten

in the grown up world that other people live in.


2005



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