two old journal entries

3/28/93
Trying to throw away some stuff that was cluttering the kitchen.
I looked at a '92 wall calendar sent by the oil company - inside the front cover, under the flap where you dutifully tuck each page as the month passes, is a little grid with a dozen lines for entering the date and the amounts of your fuel deliveries.

Staring at it, I felt as though I might as well have been looking at a postcard from the Alps, or Polynesia; a picture of a life blessed with simplicity. A dream of a life so simple that you could hang this calendar in your laundry room, or near the back door, and whenever the oil truck came - maybe you'd have a pencil hanging on a string from the nail the calendar is hung on - you could write down the date, the amount, and the price.

I can do it from memory: the date is passed, the amount is never enough, and the price is always too high.

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4/29/93
My mood got fixed
maybe it was by the two little girls
chalking hopscotch diagrams on
that sidewalk. Maybe it was the
sunlight and the white splashes
as the ocean hit the rocks.