Monotony

Well, the good news is that life at the Soapy Water household is pretty much back to normal. The Kid is in school, and is doing okay. Still has some rough spots to work out (especially regarding working and playing well with his peers), and the day is long for him (the bus leaves home at 7:10 and then he is dropped off at Meema's at 4:00), but generally? He's improved so much.

I'm back full time at work and trying like mad to organize my life there again. It was chaos. The bills from the hospital are finally streaming in, and are looking accurate finally. Do you want to guess the amount of insurance claims my insurance company has paid on The Kid's behalf for services rendered between 9/11/06 and 12/15/06? I'm sure that you don't really care, but let's just say we've exceeded $72,000, and we've still another 3 weeks of claims to even begin to be processed. Hefty, yo.

And so, we've gotten, for the most part, back into the swing of things. Early to bed and early to rise, and all work and no play makes me absolutely boring.

So, rather that dither on about boringness, allow me to quote to you my very favorite poem of all time, the poem I turn to when my life is sucked into the 'polar drab of the suburb:'

The stilled hub
and polar drab
of the suburb
closes in.

In the round
of the staircase
my arms sheafing nappies,
I grow in and down

to an old spiral,
a well of questions,
an oracle:
will it tell me --

am I
at these altars,
warm shrines,
washing machines, dryers --

with their incense
of men and infants,
priestess
or sacrifice?

My late tasks
wait like children:
milk bottles,
the milkman's note.

Cold air
clouds the rinsed,
milky glass,
blowing clear

with a hint
of winter constellations:
will I find
my answer where

Virago reaps?
Her arms sheafing
the hemisphere,
hour after frigid hour,

her virgin stars,
her maidenhead
married to force,
harry us

to wed our gleams
to brute routines:
solstices,
small families.

-Eavan Boland, I love you for this poem.