The Temperature of Truth

I resent that my problems seem small compared to the world at large. The bread crumbs to my gingerbread personality would be of the artisanal sort. As crises of an existential nature are not covered by Obama's health care plan, I can only say this is it. I still value trailer-parks at camp value, not real estate. I wish I didn't like wine/cheese tastings, the big picture, aesthetics, twee so much. Or I guess admit that I do like these things as opposed to a value menu and a swimming pool. It's not that I'm deep, it's that I'm not shallow (thus obviously proving me wrong). I like mineral water, destruction in art, beauty in minutia, the moment, the then, SAT words, being the zeitgeist's cor(o)ner.

My sister and I used to call things/people "cheap". Not in the sense they were frugal, but in the sense they were histrionic, trite, garish, tacky (the entire cast of Saved by the Bell). I don't know why it made me laugh then and now, but I suppose it is indicative of something. My mother loved two things when I was growing up: depression glass and gardenias. Both are forever linked in my mind, mainly because when they bloomed, my mom would drive us to the nice neighborhoods and surreptitiously have her children steal these redolent flowers to fill the house. At the time, I thought my mom was unhinged (she is, but for different reasons and now there is pharmacological proof), but now I can think back almost fondly, and in a Faulknerian way on this simple act of familial bonding and trying to instill a bit of "class" in our apartment. I mention the depression glass because I seem to have inherited my mother's penchant for mismatched glassware. When I drink out of my Mayor McCheese tumbler, I think of these ridiculous rosewater shot glass sized things my mom would fill with the gardenias, thus instilling in me history and loathing for antique malls.

In honor of things past, and of trying to find value in the little things, I am going to make a peanut butter/honey sandwich, a boiled egg and an apple my lunch and pretend I am picnic-ing in my air conditioned room and Save Me the Waltz, which I got for a friend for Christmas, but never got around to seeing them, or sending it.