The Muse and the Fool

Tonight I am bundled up in a blanket, huddling in a detrimental posture over the keyboard while Martin makes tea. I thought maybe he'd like to take advantage of the new disc of Glee I received in a cheery red Netflix envelope. But no, he wants to be a writer and huddle in a detrimental posture in bed and type away on his laptop. I can't complain too loudly because a. I respect his tete a tete with the muse, though, geez, she is really hanging around lately; and b. I do love the man, and c. I'm also supposed to be a writer. But I like to veg once and a while and turn in my brain for an evening with the hot man in the baggy grey sweatpants and slippers. Is that so wrong?

Last week, Martin's muse put on her own slippers, cozied into a flannel robe, and got so comfortable she would not leave. I respect her but I don't always like her. For instance, last Thursday night I was so fried that I could not figure out where my father was. I'd just received a e-mail from him that read, "It's Thursday night in Santa Cruz. . ." which, by the way, would be an excellent first line in a short story, if I had any idea where in the world it was. I typed into the old Googler: "Santa Cruz." Pages of California. Now, my Dad doesn't hang in places like California--more likely he'll be in Haiti or Cambodia (I thought he was in the latter, but I knew for sure S. Cruz was NOT in Asia). So then I typed in: "Santa Cruz not California." How stupid is that? And came up with--surprise, surprise! More sunshine state. FINALLY I figured out where he was. Do YOU know? It starts with a B and it's in South America. Bingo! (It's not actually "Bingo." There is no such place).

Anyway, I thought this whole cyberspace journey was hee-larious and I tried to tell Martin, but he was going like gangbusters with his poem and muttered, "I'm not listening to you. I'm writing," after which I gave up, put on headphones, and watched some BBC and laughed so much that Martin's Muse went all in a huff and dragged him out into the hallway where he continued typing on his knees.

Go, Martin! Muse, stupid Muse. You know what they say: Dead fish and Muses began to stink after two days.

Friday found me very down-in-the-dumps. The autumn is always terribly busy, and though I start the semester bright-eyed and full of hope, vim, and vigor for my career, my triumphant life as a mother of three who also writes and bakes and cooks and skims through it all as if I am on some kind of spiritual and emotional speed, I get a bit bedraggled toward November. So I dragged my sorry self over to my friend, Sally's house, where I melted into a puddle and said, not in a fit of melodrama, as it might appear, but it a moment where I expressed the exact emotion I felt at that point in time: My life is so unexciting. There's nothing to look forward to. My mother would have thrown back her head and laughed uproariously. Sally did laugh, out of sympathy, and warmed me up by her very presence and understanding, and then she made me sweat on her treadmill, made me a really good salad, and took Elspeth for the afternoon so I could write. My friend Tonya fed me tea and gingersnaps that afternoon by a roaring fire and then we hung out with Sally and her husband Kevin, who came over wearing the single most ugly boutonniere I have ever seen. It was a cactus flower, a lily, and a fake autumn leaf wrapped up in green floral tape. It was utterly hideous. And an excellent conversation piece.

At the end of the day I felt like a new person. I mused over it all that night: I had received no particularly good news about my writing that week; I'd spent much of my time with children; I'd lost my temper more than once; I'd cried more than once; I'd written one, and I fear, rather mediocre, short story and mopped various runny noses--and I felt so good. I'd been loved, and loved, and loved again, by people who will love me whether I succeed or not. I'd been showered in crazy, openhearted love--it was just raining down on me and I was soaked to the skin. Some days when I am really a fool this doesn't feel like enough--I sit in self-induced misery, waiting for my better future, for the next good thing. But always, this life of mine is more, and more and more than I deserve, and I feel richer than a queen.