Friday, November 26, 2010

The sound of our voices made us forget everything That had ever hurt our feelings

Sometimes when I am walking on stairs I make the mistake of thinking about what my legs are actually doing, thinking about how the steps work, and when I do that I suddenly find myself in fear of stumbling, forgetting how to navigate stairs, forgetting how I do that so often without thinking about it at all.  And then I have to stop and think for a second, picture myself finishing the flight of stairs without falling, and then force myself not to think about it anymore, trust my legs to do what they do without my telling them, and let my mind get out of its own way.

(Sometimes I have the same feeling when I think about breathing.  When I think about what it feels like to draw a breath, to hold it and to let it go, sometimes then I think I might easily suffocate or hyperventilate because I can take control of my own breathing and that means I can do it wrong.  I only do it right when I forget about it.)  A student in my class says Inhale, Outhale, aloud to herself when she struggles with stage fright and this always makes me laugh. 

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Turns out I was wrong when I looked into the future and predicted a rejection from Dr. Brilliant.  This is surprising, truly surprising, given how poorly I felt the interview went, in particular the part where I did an impression that was totally inappropriate and not at all funny (for crying out loud, who does impressions in an interview?).  But today Dr. Brilliant phoned me and said he wanted to work with me.  So now I am scared which is a far more active feeling than is feeling rejected.

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When I think about your lawn I can almost see it.  I probably project mine onto yours, overlay the pictures in my mind, a collage of faces and warm June sunshine.  It's good.  I wonder if disassociation is the same as rewriting history to make oneself easier with the role one played.  Sometimes I want to correct other people's version of the past but then I wonder if I have any reason to assume mine is the one that is most accurate.

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Our financial planner put down Shawn's middle name as (None) on the initial set of forms.  Now we occasionally receive mail from his office addressed to Shawn None.  The recent Spawn-mail was followed by some mail for Shawn None.  This kind of thing is so much fun, and my overeager iPhone auto-correct made a hilarious and pornographic suggestion when I was texting this news to Shawn, one which he wanted to hold me to.  (Why does iPhone have such an extensive sexual vocabulary?)  I love words.  If I was a word I would be lugubrious, not because I am lugubrious but because I like the way it tastes on my tongue.  What word would you be?




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6 comments:

heartinsanfrancisco said...

I like "evanescent" or perhaps "celestial." "Crystalline" is lovely, too, in an onomatopoetic way.

I also occasionally interfere with my legs' ability to do their assigned work by thinking about it, and suddenly all is lost.

Do you think I should get an iPhone so that I, too, can learn about sex?

mischief said...

Hi Susan. Yes, evanescent is a good word for you. I like the others too, but evanescent the most. Strange, isn't it, how thinking about your legs changes the way they operate. I don't think you need an iPhone to learn about sex. It isn't that auto-correct tells me things I didn't *know*, it just arranges things I knew in ways I hadn't thought of. It's really quite creative, which is fun, not that I do not think I can be creative when I want to be. But there's something nice about being able to blame a computer for the most deranged ideas rather than the psyche.

secret agent woman said...

I think it doesn't pay to pay too much attention to walking down stairs.

My iPhone is prone to pornographic substitutions also. Maddening.

AC said...

Jealous is the word I would be, of your husband who gets pornographic messages on his phone from you. Jealous is the word.

(ehC)

glnroz said...

"plain", perhaps,,,

mischief said...

AC - people say lots of things they don't mean.

glnroz - I like the word plain too, though I think it's probably inapplicable to you. I am also very fond of the word "perhaps".