Detour

So many detours…I’m on a train to Connecticut, to go to Rhode Island, to go back to Connecticut, only to come back to New York again—all within 48 hours.

This post is definitely a detour from Marc Chagall and Der Spaziergang and the penguin-punting. I guess we’ll all have to ponder that a pinch longer.

And last but def not least, my life detoured…and I didn’t know it.

To recap the Miraculous Friday episode…I received an exquisite missive from my favorite author. That e is my new pocket pal. And then I discovered love—not the love I set out for with this particular pal, but the Plato credo…and that was goodness. And THEN the subway man sang to me. Me. And I knew I was a pretty girl, Mama.

AND THEN…AND THEN…

The stick fell off the wall.

What?

You heard me. The stick fell off the wall.

Not just ANY stick. THE stick.

Flashback to 1996—I was a princess on the BroadWAY. I started out in a little town, a quiet village, one might say, and ended up at the Palace. Midnight struck a little too soon and I had to flee in a coach that had definitely downsized to a pumpkin. And the horse that drew the coach? Became the Mouse. Some called it Mauschwitz. Some called it Donald Dachau.

I called it sad.

My flight was not easy…wolves howling at my door, threatening to huff and puff and blow my heart down. I got many parting gifts from my palace pals—sustenance for my new life—I left the poisoned apple behind but there were still books, toiletries, libations …my stick. The stick I wielded in the skit to protect myself. The stick given me by the prop master. The prop master who was tone deaf and impervious to singing but who could hear me and my soul for some reason. The prop master who knelt at my feet and sang “Nothing’s gonna harm you” with such pitch-free emotion, I wept.

I have held that stick firmly and dearly for many years and for many years it has held an honored spot in the feng shui career sector of my pied a terre. And for many years I’ve held the sneaking suspicion my career was not my own. But how could that be?

Feng shite.

At 11 pm August 28th, the stick fell off the wall.

I gasped. I belly-laughed. I wept. (If you know me, you know I actually kinda weep a lot.)

And my world exploded.

I stopped being scared. And I stopped caring what people thought of me. And the battle lines were erased. The battlements fell. And I pulled my head out of my ass and could see clearly because I was no longer looking through a belly-button window.

For the first time in forever I don’t feel like a phony. So what if I’m batshit insane? The pixie-faced pinhead is out of the woods and back on the path again. Who needs protection? Not I. Like the Phoenix and Cinderella I can arise from those ashes day after day…happily ever after.

Happy. Ever after.

The End*


*of the detour and the story—not my life. Geez, you’re dark. Oh yeah, please feel free to grab me if you see me toddling off the path again. It can get gloomy in them there woods…