Mixed Spices
By Angelina Souren
Copyright 2011 Angelina Souren
Smashwords Edition
ISBN: 978-1-4660-9859-6
~~~~~
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com or to any bookseller's web site that offers it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
~~~~~
Table of Contents
~~~~~
It is not
(October 2008)
Once upon a time I came upon a mountain stream, and before I knew it, I'd tumbled in. We tumbled and twisted together, the mountain stream and I, and it was like a dance, a wonderful dance, like a crazy embrace.
"You're clean again" said the mountain stream, "clean enough in any case, and that is close enough." "I've washed it away, your life's grime, grime from the past." "Now go and be like new again" and then there was a waterfall and I bounced and I bumped and landed on the shore again while the mountain stream went on to do its thing.
I don't know exactly where it is now, but I know vaguely, and that is close enough.
Whenever I need to be clean again, renewed again, I can think of the mountain stream, imagine it tumble, here, there, everywhere, anywhere where gravity takes it.
~~~~~
The tomato growers
(October 2009)
Once there were two tomato growers. One was called James and the other one Gordon.
Gordon was very disappointed with his tomatoes. Every day, he would go to them and water them and check how much they had grown. Sadly, his tomatoes stayed pitifully small. He would twist them and squeeze them to feel if they were at least ripening a little bit, and accidentally dislodge one from the vine on occasion. It would drop to the ground and rot away.
Gordon felt something had to be done. So he purchased the best fertilizer he could find, with the right amount of potassium and all the other nutrients a tomato could wish for, and placed it in front of his tomatoes. He told them: "If you grow really really well, I will give you this fertilizer as a reward. This shall be your motivation." It seemed to have no effect on the tomatoes. If anything, they were only growing at an even slower pace.
Gordon became even more dissatisfied with his tomatoes and started withholding water to see if that would convince the tomatoes to grow. But all that happened was that the tomato plants became infested with pests and he had to spray them with pesticides. ("Damn, that stuff is expensive," Gordon grumbled.) It was too late. The tomato plants turned yellow and started dying. Gordon got very frustrated and kicked at the plants.
James, on the other hand, adored his tomatoes. He loved them! Every day, he went to them, and removed all those little sprouts from the armpits of the tomato plants and enjoyed that typical spicy tomato smell. That way, all the nutrition went to the little tomato fruits, not into making sprouts. He watered them every day, and made sure the quantity of water was just so.
He took care that they got the right amount of nice warm sunshine and on days without sunshine, he would provide artificial sunshine. He also gave them the right amount of fertilizer whenever they needed it. His tomatoes became famous. Everyone admired them. They were so beautiful, so healthy! His tomatoes seemed to be shining with joy. It was almost as if they loved James back and wanted to make him really really happy.
Gordon commented that life just is not fair and that there is nothing you can do about it and also that James had started growing his tomatoes a year earlier, hadn't he, and that there were no pests at James's location, and probably also a lot more sunshine. He knew it! Life ain't fair! And he had never liked James much anyway.
James was not aware of Gordon's grumblings at all. He found more than enough joy in caring for his tomatoes.
~~~~~
The girl on the moon
(1960s)
Once upon a time there was a girl who lived on the moon.
Her name was Aleta.
~~~~~
Turning tides
(July 2008)
On Monday, a poem came tumbling down the
stairs
And I caught it, and wrote it.
It had to do with shores.
Then yesterday, I went out the farthest I had ever
been
and when I could not go any further
the tide started
turning
and I had to retreat.
Now I need to ask myself
Am I afraid to see the
tide turning
Or afraid to have it catch up with me
unexpectedly?
Am I afraid to get mud all over me, or to get
covered in fairy dust?
~~~~~
Once upon a time in the east
(January 2009)
Once upon a time in the east, there was a spider who moved to the west. He lived in the wardrobe of a woman who danced the flamenco. She kept her long red skirt and her black lace scarf, dancing shoes and tights in that wardrobe and also the white ankle socks she wore in those shoes.
She would practice at home and the spider would watch and wish he could do that too. Yes, it was a male spider. Don’t ask me how I know, I just do. He watched her longingly day after day after day as she practiced her moves in front of the mirror. 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4.
She danced classical flamenco, made the classical moves as if they had been handed down by the genes from generation to generation, though she was not aware of any Spanish ancestry at all.
One day, the dancer decided to move to the west. She packed up all her stuff and shipped it to Nawlins. (This was before Hurricane Katrina.) Now, if she had emigrated to Australia, that probably would have been bad news for the spider as Australia worries about accidentally importing pests and therefore does not allow the import of any used furniture, or so I have heard, and that may be true for Canada as well. But luckily, it was the States she traveled to, so the spider was able to stay with her.
In Nawlins, the woman took up tap-dancing and the spider loved it even more than he had loved flamenco. I think it was close to the French quarter where they were living, but never mind, the point is that the spider often heard music he could easily picture himself tap-dancing to. So he went out and got himself the right shoes. Believe it or not, Nawlins has shops for spiders.
At the shop, he met a millipede and her name was Millicent. He thought that was a funny name, in view of the fact that she had a thousand feet. He wondered how on earth she managed not to get her legs tangled up and cover them all in black pantyhose without ripping even a single one of them. Millicent took him places and the spider, whoa, did he learn to tap-dance! He even put up with Millicent’s many feet occasionally stepping on his toes as he was fully aware that she was not doing it on purpose and admired her tremendously anyway.
The two of them became so well-known in tap-dancing circles that eventually, even the woman in whose wardrobe he had traveled to the States heard of it. She realized that it was her spider and though that he could provide some additional income for her. After all, she had paid for the ticket on which he had flown to the States. So she started making demands.
The spider didn’t like it much and I won’t repeat what Millicent had to say about it. Now, I can go on and on and on and on and cook up lots of stuff just like that – in an eye wink – but the thing is, I am editing yet another paper, so I have to cut it short.
Katrina saved them! Katrina happened when the spider and the millipede were on stage, immensely enjoying themselves. The theater was flooded and the stage was demolished, but it just so happened that the floor board – or whatever you want to call it – on which the spider and the millipede had been merrily tap-dancing away was a very special board, a bit like a flying carpet. And carried by the flood, the board took them to one of those gorgeous riverboats because well, it is the Mississippi River that flows smack down the middle of the town, after all, and the Mississippi has them, those riverboats.
And on that riverboat, they continued to dance for many years to come (oops, we must be in the future by now; either that or it was a different hurricane). The millipede broke a leg or two from time to time and even lost a few, but that hardly mattered. Then one sad but sunny Saturday, the captain of the boat did not watch where he was going and accidentally stepped on one of them (Millicent, if you must know) after which the other one jumped overboard and drowned. Sad, eh?
But if you thought that this was a suicide, you got it wrong. That fatal final jump had only been an unfortunate move to escape the captain’s feet, a jump in the wrong direction. That's how life goes.
~~~~~
Lousy birthdays
(June 2011)
Honestly, she didn't make it up. “Supercallerfaldisisossuss” It appeared on her cell on Memorial Day and it was from someone who wanted to come and warm her – because she was cold. Yes, it was a text message and she didn't recognize the sender's number. It could be anyone.
It showed up on the evening of a lousy day, and that word really doesn't do lice any justice. It's not as if they schemed to be here, and be lice. It just happened to them, and they were stuck with it for the rest of their lives.
I mean, be serious, how much choice do lice have? Now that is what she would call a lousy life! At least humans have some choices. Like the choice she had when she saw that text message. She could ignore it. She could delete it. She could forward it. (Hey, that's a good one! She hadn't thought of that one yet.) Or she could reply.
She chose to reply. Like she is choosing to reply right now, seated with her currently somewhat biggish butt parked on a thankfully much bigger lawn, writing and noticing a louse land on her paper, to the message on her cell phone. “I like.”
So she replied. Do you think lice have lousier lives than flies, by the way? They do have more choices, it seems to me. Flies, that is. Than lice, that is. “Who are you?” she asked. I agree, not very original. “I'm your sister! Don't you know?” No, she didn't. She hadn't heard from her in ages and had largely forgotten that she existed. Years ago, she somehow had gathered a load of money together – well, she must have – and started a luxury home decoration shop. The sister, that is.
She went to trade shows in Milan, and in Boston, and Miami. She visited people's homes, where she'd collect discarded furniture and turn it into the sort of stuff people paid a fortune for to have in their homes. She had designer plates and designer cups and designer saucers, designer glasses and designer hair. She had crystal bowls, not balls, filled with designer cookies and designer candy, and greeted everyone who stepped into her little paradise with a broad smile, a warm welcome, and a big wish.