some things just don't make much sense to me anymore.
1. this
2. and that.

i've got this new record. it's one of marlene dietrich's (the german actress). she does this strikingly beautiful version of "puff" from the fantastical kid's story of puff the magic dragon. i adore little jackie paper and his rascal puff. it's up there on my list of best pieces ever written for children that i still look to in my (almost?) adult stage for some stable footing whenever i feel a little wacky. along with other, more obvious ones like:
-the little prince
-the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe
-the poem of the jabberwock
but this slant on "puff" sends me off into the same pretend world that i think i used to live in. it's a fascinating place where walking across the street makes me a runaway-orphan and if i was ever lucky enough to fit into the sewer grate, i'd find a zoo of unicorns all waiting for me to take them for a ride. this world of marlene's is just a little more serious, a little more contemplative, a little more "where's the happy ending?" it might be the german vocals. it might be the traditional french instrumentals. whatever it is it makes me pace around my room, burning ovals into the carpet, tryng so very hard to remember how everything looked when i was kid.
welcome to my mid-half-life crisis. i visited my family recently, a strange group of people who i think are all wonderful. we rarely speak on the telephone though so i didn't catch these few bits of news until i actually witnessed them myself. my sister, who is 6 years younger than me, now has longer legs. my brother is getting married. in addition, i'm soon to have my own apartment. i like these adult things. but whenever someone mentions the ever-popular phrase of a twenty-something in crisis (often after my foolish advice), "i lost my imagination a long time ago" i get sad and mostly scared. like jackie paper and the little prince when they fear to lose something that they love.
a rose in a glass case.
a rascal dragon.
i have my fish. his name is circles. he has been dying for months now. upon his death, i'll most likely take a polaroid of him on a white piece of paper, fins splayed and body tiny. then grant him immortality in a children's story.
yes, he's real and he swims and is real. but we have conversations and i know he enjoys the symphonies of berlioz and i can tell when he's hungry and when he feels happier than a fly at a picnic. he's got a grip on my imagination like the jaws of life, that fish.
back to those things that don't make sense anymore: i don't know what they are. chalk it up to the half-mid-life crisis which i am sure is something that a corvette will not cure.

for now, marlene dietrich is singing "hush little baby."

enough of this being too old to pretend crazy talk.