Leaving, Cleaving, and Conceiving

Fio has accepted the fact that parents love their children more than their children love them. It's nature's way of protecting the perpetuation of the species. Thus parents will sacrifice and even die for the sake of their children, but children are hell-bent to pull away from their parents and live their own lives from the moment they're born. It's called maturity--they are preparing to assume the parent role themselves, in which the pattern will be repeated.

We all love our parents, but we love our offspring even more, which is as it should be. Parents are the past. Children are the future.

Scheduling

Husband is insisting that he and Fio wash Fio's car today, but Fio thinks that's what rain is for. She doesn't wash floors either--because people walk on them. And what's the use of washing windows when Wendy Dog would just smear them up again?

No, Fio spends her time on useful things that will last forever--like this blog. Hello, Eternity!

Life as Fio Sees It

It's not just crossword puzzles--Fio also adores jigsaw puzzles. In fact, if she looks a bit bleary-eyed, it's because she's been working on one for two days now during her post-Christmas break.

Jigsaws, to Fio, are representative of life. All the pieces are there; she just has to put them together right. Time, effort, and a good eye--that's all it takes.

Fio Is Shallow

Ask me about world news and I'm a little slow to answer, but ask me about the latest on Lindsay Lohan or Mel Gibson and I bubble over with the juiciest details.

Celebrity idiocy is such a wonderful distraction from problems I don't want to think about and have no solutions for.

Shrinking World

As a child in Waco, Fiorella would read the newspaper from beginning to end, sport pages, business news, and all. But then, the Waco Times-Herald was not that thick, and Fio was at the stage when she'd read anything she could get her hands on.

Later, when newspapers became humongous, Fio would pick and choose what she read. Still later, she not only picked and chose, but got tidbits off the internet news reports.

But now, she's not that interested in news anymore. It's the same as it's always been--war, destruction, man's inhumanity to man, with an occasional blip of sunshine tossed in. Been there, done that. So Fio reads the comics, glances at the headlines, then, as Voltaire advised, tends her own garden.

The Way It Goes

Our lives are like parking lots. We leave wherever we come from, park ourselves, run around and do all sorts of things, then drive back to wherever we come from.

(And, yes, for those who noticed, sometimes we screw up and post something on Friday that was meant for Saturday. F)

Fragile

Every year, at least one of Fiorella's special Christmas tree ornaments breaks and she is sad. This year it was the banana.

Several years ago ornaments in the shapes of fruits and vegetables were on all the store shelves, but apparently they were all bought up because you don't see them anymore. There is no replacement for Fio's banana.

But such is life, which makes Fio treasure her watermelon slice even more.

Historical Precedent

There's always been tumult and trouble, ever since the world began--nation vs. nation, parent vs. child, brother vs. brother, husband vs. wife.

As Tiger Woods has demonstrated once again, we're all animals underneath our skins.

What Bob Wilson Taught Me

Fiorella had a bad night. Every insecurity in the world ganged up on her. She is often waterlogged this way, and the only thing she's found to counter it is self-absorbed focus.

She learned the technique from Bob Wilson, Nathaniel Mayfield, Bill Clinton ,and Richard Nixon. Bob, Fio's old high school duet acting partner, is now New York's leading avant grade dramatist. He is also a goof--but a single-minded goof who, by virtue of his never-look-to-the-side vision, convinced the drama world to see things his way.

Nathaniel, one of the world's top trumpet players, is on more solid ground than Bob, but he too has tunnel vision. Nothing stops him once he's committed himself to a goal. Fio used to car pool with his mother, and she remembers third-grade Nathaniel laying out his detailed plans about how he was going to beat out everyone else in the class book-reading competition. And he did.

Fio is also inspired by Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton, both disgraced politicians. Nixon resigned; Clinton, against all odds, stayed in office. But neither of them quit moving forward. Nixon redeemed himself with the Chinese thing, and Clinton buoyed along like a water balloon, refusing to sink, and is still riding high.

So maybe Fiorella can make it to. So what if she's worried about her family? So what if she doesn't have the time for things she should do, the money for what she wants to do? So what if she's aging by the minute and her brain is turning to mush even faster?

She needs to concentrate on finishing her current manuscript. Focus, Fio, focus!

Afterwards

Batten down the hatches--Fiorella has been thinking philosophically again.

This is not the best of all worlds. It is a place of hardship and sorrow, of cruelty and injustice. That is the reason, she thinks, why religions propose a life AFTER death, be it streets of gold, sexual delights, a blending with the universe, or comporting with mythic heroes.

Whatever, it's an escape.