I was speaking with my dearest old friend, Claudia, on the phone last night (we check in three or four times a year; she lives with her adult daughter and two standard poodles on an island off the coast of Washington). She and I began resonating together back in 1985, when I was a practicing astrologer, who, at her invitation, would travel to San Francisco from Jackson Wyoming to read charts for her gay friends enduring the AIDS crisis in the Castro District, where she then lived.
Her first remark last night, after hellos, wryly, caustically: “Well, we signed up for this.”
We both laughed heartily. Thank goodness we can still laugh! In fact, laughter may be what saves us!
She went on to say, after I confessed my serious addiction to screens, “Hell, keep it up! I very much enjoy it!” That made me laugh even harder.
Then she pivoted to the time recently, when she had called some number to try to deal with a technical situation of some kind. A voice answered that she recognized as decidedly foreign. For me, that’s usually a red flag. But for her, at least this time, the situation veered in an unusual direction.
First, she recognized that English was not his native tongue, but even so, that he spoke it flawlessly. She praised him for this, said how unusual it was, and asked him where he is located. “Egypt.” Turned out he was Egyptian. She asked him how he learned English so well. “We watch movies!” That really set her off. She was thrilled, excited. “You should learn French, Chinese, German! You obviously have a gift!” He thanked her modestly and proceeded to help her deal with the technical issue.
A few minutes later he called her back: “I could marry you!” he exclaimed. She said, “Well, you might want to, but I’m nearly 83 years old!” Well, he continued, “in any case, I very much appreciate you.”
So, said Claudia, to me, “At nearly 83, I got a marriage proposal! My first!” (She had been the one to propose to the man to whom she was briefly married in her early 20s.)
Well, you can imagine how we laughed at this one. Suddenly proposed to, over the phone, sincerely, at 83, by an Egyptian who speaks perfect English!
Laughter truly is “the best medicine.”
Oops! It snowed last night. All of a sudden, huge weather change. Not even “Fall” anymore, and it’s not even mid-November.
Everythings’ changin’, all the time, all at once. I personally, am dealing daily, hourly, minute by minute, with huge complexities, each of which involves myriad, intricate complications . . . and most of them in the realm of electronic media and my nervous system’s chaotic relationship to it. Meanwhile:
Meanwhile, “Geez, Ann, watch your mouth!”
I was in the nearby branch of our dear local Credit Union (accompanied by puppy Scampi) the other day, when, upon finishing up with the clerk, I burst out, without having any idea I was going to, but humorously, I thought: “I hope the U.S. blows up!”
Oops! Shocked look on everybody’s faces . . .
Castigating myself on the way out of the bank. “Please, Ann, stay with what we all have in common, rather than what seems to be inexorably tearing us apart. Okay? Don’t be part of the problem; not even humorously. That’s not funny.
And don’t get caught up in this “Ascension” business, either. Because no matter what happens . . .
