Lightning bugs

Last night Daddy and Molly went out to catch fireflies. Molly's idea was that they would put the fireflies in a jar and then use their light to read stories. They went out in the yard equipped with a long green bug catching net with a fake bamboo handle. They stealthily snuck into the front yard, planning to catch the fireflies off guard but somehow the fireflies knew they were there and used evasion tactics such as flying out of reach. Daddy and Molly were only able to catch one firefly. This one firefly did not light up at all in his new home. Was it because the new home smelled overly of pickle residue? Was it because he was the only firefly in connecticut feeble enough to be caught and therefore too feeble to light up? Or was it perhaps because he was lonely for his friends?
Molly posited that he couldn't be lonely because we were his new friends but Daddy and I outvoted her and suggested that we return him to the wild where we could catch him again (now that we knew him personally) on another night when perhaps more of his friends would come along. Apparently (according to Molly) many of the fireflies were attending a big birthday party that night and so surely another night we would have better luck. So we read only one story that night, because we had only one firefly.

interlocking wings and things

A butterfly might flap its wings
Getting ready for to fly
The breeze it blows just grows and grows
Till it brings a storm in mid july

18 years ago today
They put a man in prison
He said he didn't do it
But nobody would listen

There was just one witness
to the crime
She was on crack
getting ready to do time

She told the policeman
Everything he wanted to know
He had a little cold
and wanted early home

That crack whore made him feel
Ever so much warmer
He felt the same way about
All the girl informers

She got a lighter sentence
For helping out the law
And all she had to do
Was exercise her jaw

She was out in 6 months
To get more crack
They found her dead in the snow
Flat on her back

For 18 years our friend's been away
His kids used to ask
When daddy could play

They grew up alone
they don't ask anymore
His son is a junkie
His daughter's a whore

If that butterfly's wings
Had flapped in a different direction
Maybe Bush
would have lost the election

Maybe the guys who count the votes
Would have had a healthier
Serving of their oats

Maybe thousands wouldn't
have had to die
Because of that little butterfly

He asked and he asked
If they could check the DNA
But he had to wait for a charity
'cuz the government wouldn't pay

It only cost 250
but the budget's really tight
The citizens only want to pay
For things they think are right

So for 18 years he sat there
In prison locked away
When he was finally freed
The newspapers asked the policeman
What he had to say

He sat back in his chair
gave a little laugh
Said 'that's the way the law is
It's only ever right by half'

He said of the 750 people
His staff had put away
Only maybe 1 or two
Were investigated the right way

Maybe he'll get some compensation
For the life he didn't get
Don't know how he'll get a job
He's never had one yet

There's talk 2million dollars
Are waiting for those
Who spent a life in jail
Cuz an addict took off her clothes

Multiplied by 750
That's a pretty hefty sum
The citizens won't like it
The checks'll probably never come

So the cycle will continue
As the centuries flit by
Like the tiny wings
Of a butterfly

Swatting at Flies

We’re all too busy to really rise
We’re just too busy swatting at flies

The man he tells us so many lies
We’re much too busy to open our eyes
The old man whispered before he died
I never went too far in life,
I was too busy swatting flies

Bills come in and bills go out
Like a new kind of breathing that steals your life
Meant to distract us and make us blind
There’s a much bigger picture, but we don’t mind

There are thieves in the hen house
and they want your back turned
They want you to spend all your time swatting flies
They come from the front, from the back,
They come straight on, between the eyes

Bills, to do lists, things to get fixed
Forms to fill out, wrists to slit
Checks to send, clothes to mend
No time left to talk to a friend
All your time is already spent

Swatting at flies
Swatting at flies

You make the bed
It comes undone
You’re never finished
The game can’t be won
But every day it goes on and on
And there you are

Swatting at flies
Swatting at flies

stuff

My stuff just arrived from California. I've been waiting for it for 5 years. So many of my loved ones have scoffed at the things that i've kept and spent so much money to keep in storage all this time. They've made me feel silly and petty to be so attached. I got this even from my parents who barely have a square inch of space left in their house because of all the myriad stuff they've collected over the years. The same parents who have a standing contract with a own shipping company because they have been known to purchase and import so many large items in such quantities that they cannot just send them back as checked bags like everyone else.

Why did i keep it all? Partially because from the time i made the decision to move across the country I have never had time to sort through all of what i wanted and what i didn't and it took me this long to be sure i was sparing the expense of shipping things destined for the Goodwill pile. Still I seem to have accidentally thrown out some treasures such as my lovely caran d'ache watercolor pencils. Other things broke in transit such as the windshield glass covered egg i once made for my grandma. After much internal debate i decided to part with my nana's sewing machine. I loved and carted it around for many years but i'll probably never use it for sewing and maybe some one else will.

So now i have the pleasure of unpacking the boxes finally and seeing what it was that was so important to me to have invested so much time and money in keeping. There are books from my childhood. A Little Princess by frances hodgson burnett. It's worn and dog eared and i will probably buy my daughter a new copy someday. But if i were to die tomorrow she would go through these 35 boxes of stuff and would be able to piece together who i was. And maybe that's at the heart of it. I keep these things to remind me who i am. To provide a framework to hang my personality on. It occurs to me that if i need a framework then i must consider myself quite weak. Can't i stand on my own the way everyone else seems to? Well, maybe not. I blame a shoddy memory but it's also that i've had an exorbitant life- how could anyone be expected to remember all the things i've done and seen without some touchstones?

This morning I opened my kitchen cabinet and my cups were there, looking down at me. The cups I chose. My cups. They are the right size. Their handles fit my hands. They are not the random cups i've been living with all this time. My cups, my stuff- these are things that make a home a home. This is why hotels are nice but they are not home.

Trans specied?

I feel lucky to have been born where i was but i don't think it was anything other than a happy accident. I was not more deserving than someone who was born in a place of war or poverty. I was just lucky. Similarly I was lucky to have been born human. I suppose dolphins feel lucky they are dolphins. Likewise dogs, cats etc. Maybe not cows. At least not american ones.
Some people feel they have been born into the wrong gendered body and i for one believe this to be possible. It seems odd to me that with the plethora of variations available to the human form that there would only be two genders. It seems likelier that there are some people with vaginas who feel they ought to have penises and so forth with all the transmutations of this idea. But what about different species? Could it be that you've been born into a human body but feel you have the soul of a cat? Why not? Maybe certain mental illnesses are really transpeciation- people who bray at the moon are not crazy after all, they are just wolves trapped in human bodies.
Just you wait a couple hundred years, science will back me up.