I Am Not Hamlet

I begin my life on Patmos Monday morning. Update: It is as I imagined.

      During breakfast today I was reading an excerpt from a play in The New York Times Magazine (I know, I was a day behind and read Saturday's edition yesterday) entitled Rust .  The play, written by a professor at Grand Valley State University, here in Michigan, is a nonfiction drama about the closing of a GM plant in Wyoming, MI.  The play itself sounds interesting and I enjoyed the excerpt, but what caught my eye was something a character said.  The character is "Academic" and plays a historian and guide to the playwright, also a character.  He is explaining the rise of the automobile factories and the effect of the car on American culture.  He says, "Women became independent, they go from producers of food and clothing to consumers of food and clothing."  This was meant as an earnest, praiseworthy point.     I would counter with "How far we've fallen."  To say that a woman (or a man) is independent because she has m...

            The Eighth day is the day of resurrection, the day of new creation.  This is the beginning of new creation as her king is only eight days new.  His birth was announced by fearsome angels and smelly, grass-stained shepherds.  His coronation begins with a torturous death.  But enough of that…there are still a few twinkling lights to be glimpsed.  Perhaps a forgotten present under the dresser?              Here in the midst of Christmas as we move toward Epiphany/Theophany it is the feasts of Basil, Gregory of Nazianzus, and Seraphim of Sarov, to mention only three.  Eight milking maids, eight beatitudes, eight days a week?  Though the insects claimed to be bigger than Jesus, no one receives a day off from work for John Lennon’s birthday.              Are you like S...

The Seventh day:  seven swans swimming on a not-quite-frozen pond, seven gifts from a Ghost that come wrapped in skin and tied up with a mindful bow.  A new year and Christmas is almost out of mind now.  Today, probably the lights come down—in between quarters—boxed up, the boughs tossed, the last of the turkey consumed.  The trouble with living in a culture that sells Christmas starting after Hallowe’en is one can’t celebrate it after today.  At least not without looks.  Christmas is a one-day orgasm that really only lasts as long as the wrapping paper in the fire place; a quick burst of light, sound, heat, and then cold, black and grey ashes.  Nothing to savor, nothing to hold, except gift receipts and sweaters that appear out of date.