So when Ms. Wonder suggested revisiting the idea as a palliative for losing the Straw Valley opportunity, I opened the door and invited the idea to make itself at home. It's a technique I learned from the Sufi poet, Rumi. No, it's more accurate to say that I learned it from Wonder and she learned it from Rumi.
The lack of chirpiness continues to hold me back, and it will come as no surprise that it's affecting my sleep. I'm up late, avoiding the thoughts that will fill my mind as soon as I place my head on the pillow. Then I'm up with the dawn and I seem to repeat the day that ended the night before. It's like that movie, Groundhog Day.
When day broke this morning I bunged a half-dozen cats off the bed and entered the master bath to find the tub occupied with a female form covered in bubbles with what seemed like another dozen or so feline accomplices. The female proved to be Ms. Wonder. (Wonder assures me that the house isn't chock-a-block with cats--more or less the normal allotment according to her--but I'm not buying it. You can't find a comfy spot near any window that isn't running over with cats.
"Oh, you startled me," she said.
"Not like you startled me," I said. "The top of my head nearly came off. I mistook you for Gina Lollobrigida."
"Who?"
"Never mind," I said. "Probably before you discovered your toes. What I came here to announce is," I paused here for effect, if that's the word, and then I let it go, "I do what I like now."
"What are you talking about?" she asked.
"I just don't have enough time to do everything."
"You came to bed late," she said, changing the subject abruptly. I thought of making an issue of it, and I'm sure I'm right on this point, that Napoleon would have made an issue of it. But after second thoughts, I gave it a miss.
"Went for a walk in the garden," I said.
"Good for you," she said, "the garden is at its nicest late in the evening. Soothing."
"That's your view, is it?" I said, meaning it to sting.
"And the stars," she said.
"What about the stars?"
"You know," she said. "Look how the floor of heaven is thick inlaid..."
I waved a hand, realizing that we were dangerously close to poetry and a heightened risk of hearing about young-eyed cherubims and the kind of harmony that exists in immortal souls, and I felt that something must be done quickly to prevent it.
"Ms. Wonder," I said.
"How does it go?" she asked, although I knew it wasn't really a question. She continued without pausing, "the smallest orb in his motion like an angel sings..."
"Wonder Woman!"
"Such harmony is in immortal souls..."
"Poopsie!"
"What?"
"You couldn't possibly put it aside, could you?"
"Oh, I'm sorry," she said. "Not in the mood for poetry then?"
"Is anyone ever?" I said. "And before we move on, let me point out that here again is another example of Shakespeare simply slapping down any old thing that comes into his head. Cherubims! The man was looney to the eyebrows!'
"It's not Shakespeare," she said.
"Well, I'm surprised it isn't. I'll bet that someone had to get up pretty early in the morning to come up with something that Shakespeare hadn't already written."
"You get up pretty early in the morning," she said.
"What of it?" I said.
"Just saying," she said. "Have you made any progress on how you hope to spend the next chapter of your life?"
"Yes, I have," I said. "I've ruled out a number of things." And with that, I made a masterful dash for the door. One thing about the Genomes is that we may be men of cold steel but we know when we're in over our heads, and I may not have the quickest mind in the village but I could tell that Wonder was about to make another of her suggestions that cause the earth to tremble and grown me to cry.