Today, in Pain Quotidien, in the middle of a conversation, I took up a cucumber garnish and began to wash my face with it. It was an “innocent” garnish, sitting next to my egg salad sandwich. I did not pre-notify my companion. I was fastidious, and spread it over every corner, from ear to ear; it was Manifest Vegetable Destiny; I conquered my own face; I hounded non-cucumber feelings to the far ends of my unshaven nape, to the very boundaries of my hoodie.
This cool slimy cuke unaccountably made all my sorrows rise, and dance for joy. (They could not comport otherwise with the clown they inhabited.) Their arguments for their own existence withered, they disproved themselves in a breathless glee of smell, in a cool evaporating flush. Happiness–at last I understood!–is a remnant of misused cucumber.
Tablemate J smiled too, at last. I had hoped to wake the room from its somnolence, but it snoozed on. Many rooms and persons seem to be dreaming away the winter, wide awake.
3 Comments
“Happiness–at last I understood!–is a remnant of misused cucumber,” said the beaming nun.
Was your concombre quotidien “common” or English?
Belly dancing can be for men too but I’m glad your playing piano –
I grew up with Rubenstein playing in the background, almost every day, WQXR….. love him, passion without the schmaltz
firefox worked just fine, thanks for the tip.