no cure for who I was but who I am.
—Sophia Dahlin (from “I’m a Ninny”)
Back on Vulcan, everybody knew
exactly what they were doing.
Chronologically speaking, the
very act of existence is an
exercise in futility. Yesterday,
for example, I personally
ordered two, new miniature
microwave ovens. Both of
them were to be red. Each
were scheduled to arrive last
night: one at 20:30, the
other at 22:45. If, at
7:00 this morning, I
wake up and find that
I still have a total of
one microwave oven,
and that it is not red
at all, but a dull shade
of charcoal instead,
does this mean
that I am not yet
awake, but rather
in the middle of a
recurring dream
in which I am stuck
near the end of an
hilarious episode of a
sitcom from the Golden
Era of television in which
my husband and I, the
stars of the show, are
at our dining room table
eating TV Dinners in black
and white with the nosy
neighbors? While Judy
Garland is giving birth
to Liza Minelli, Ralph
suddenly rises and,
right on cue, swaying
top-heavily over his
tiny metallic plate,
wipes a few unseen
smears off of his
doughy gray face
with a paisley
print napkin, then
walks determinedly
toward and then out
the door, never again
to return, leaving me
at the table, a fuzzy
blob wearing a frilly,
off-white blouse with
a long khaki skirt, our
nosy guests, and the
masses of unseen folks
who sit up at the edge
of their seats, all of the
sofas and recliners that
stand sturdy upon the
invariably carpeted, tiled
or wooden (oak, cherry,
maple, mahogany) floors
in every single home in
America, the sum of
which are, as seen from
the tens of thousands of
people (or at least those
with window-adjacent
seats in cloudless skies)
in jet planes that make
distant staticky sounds
high up above, cons-
tellations made up
of tiny, glowing dots
lit with every color of
the rainbow that litter
a landscape that begins
at one coast and ends
at another. Trapped
at the kitchen table,
I can almost see them,
all sitting there, each
peripherally cognizant
of the unlit applause sign,
awaiting its flash, their
mouths pursed and prone
for something hilarious
that is just about to happen,
their eyes all itching for
the grand arrival of
Technicolor to swath
their snowy screens.
Only then will they
all know exactly
what next to do.
