Not Knowing Much

"Have you lost a loved one recently?" a close friend asked me today. His father passed away unexpectedly last night.

The answer is that I haven't, not since Sam, and he was my sister's loved one, not my own. I've written on this topic before, but it reminds me again how lucky and unlikely I've been: four living grandparents (knock wood) and not a single friend lost to disease or accident.

One cousin passed away, Benny, in my sophomore year of college. I took the phone call from my mom. It hit me hard, but maybe not for long enough. He drowned in a shower. He and I would play cards a lot when I was small, in a house in Chile with a cavernous dining hall. We'd eat red chicken watching television in the kitchen on nights when my parents and his dad were out on the town.

Benny's death shook my uncle to the core; he hasn't ever been the same. He still smokes out at his son's grave.

I don't know how I would handle a loss like that, or like my friend's, but, given my history, probably not too well. Here's hoping the best for him and his family and that I can help in whatever small ways are possible.

The Iambic Foreclosure

(verses written after watching Henry V and a conversation over rice pudding)

The suburbs perish home by home, the loans
Too large to pay in full; the "owners" moan
And writhe in subprime agony, while banks
Send notes that agitate; a market tanks,
A bubble pops! And there you have it... Kate:
A dismal fate some hedge funds celebrate.

America or Burst

"Sometimes I think my life is like a sitcom," I said to Craig, a few seconds after a large pepper grinder on the stove clattered into me, and eleven hours after we searched the apartment for a pink blanket that turned out to be under his bedspread.

"Daniel," he responded, "We all think your life is like a sitcom."

The other night we played an informal round of "name that tune" with sitcom songs from the 1980s; I instantly recognized the theme from Perfect Strangers. I learned a lot of life lessons from Balki, the sheepherder with a dance of joy who got himself (and his cousin Larry) into one curious fix after another.

As a kid, I was a Star Trek fan foremost, but Star Trek was only silly by accident; I'm often silly on purpose.

A Weight Off My Shoulders

On Friday, I bought a new backpack at Incheon Airport, in Seoul. On a whim, I picked one that was blue. Then I carried it to the Japan Airlines lounge, where I transplanted everything from my black backpack of the last two years in about five minutes. This included all the debris at the bottom; I didn't have time to sort out the chaff before my flight to Tokyo boarded.

(Incidentally, I didn't realize I knew the word "chaff" until I just wrote it down. I've clearly been playing too much Scrabulous.)

I write about it because the experience was remarkably cleansing. Literally, a weight off my shoulders. That black backpack had been lots of places with me: Egypt, China, Korea, Singapore, Boston, half the states in the Union. Some had been good places, but combined they had worn the backpack out. When it was empty, I dropped it in a wastebasket. This probably set off a bomb alert later in the afternoon, though at least I didn't wear a circuitboard around my neck. Then I scooped up the new one, slung it over my shoulder, grinned at how light it was, and hustled to Gate 39.