Frieda Dreams of Seratonin

I’ve finally managed to shake the weeklong intestinal malaise that’s been haunting me since my visit to Leslie’s substandard Asian buffet.

The absolute worse part of growing old by far is that the warranty on all one’s parts seems to be expiring so that one is forever besieged with strange little (and large) aches and pains, and internal organs that can’t or won’t function optimally. It’s inconvenient. And horribly boring.

Last week, Leslie regaled me for half an hour on his hip bursitis and the various remedies his team of medical professionals had recommended –

And I thought, Do I look as though I’m interested?

Truth is, I probably did since I aim for politeness in all social encounters.

But the one thing they apparently did not recommend is the one thing I’m quite certain would cure his bursitis: Lose 30 pounds.

Possibly the intestinal malaise was Karma’s way of telling me: Don’t be so fucking judgmental.



It’s been a busy flurry of days, though through no particular contrivance of my own.

On Halloween, we went to the Frieda Kahlo show at the New York Botanical Gardens.

Kind of an interesting exercise in marketing there. They’d managed to borrow fewer than ten paintings – all secondary works except for the famous one of Frieda with her black familiars and her crown of thorns – but managed to parlay them into a full-fledged spectacle that had simply thousands of people pouring into the park. It was an absolutely lovely day, and many of the people were in costumes, plus there were all these Dia de los Muertos celebrations going on on the side. Visually sumptuous.

Next day, Summer had a party for her mother who is visiting from Japan. Summer’s mother is Chinese but fled to Japan after being cast off in disgrace by her husband after failing to produce a male heir under China’s One Child rule. China and Japan hate each other. A legacy (still!) of WWII. They have looooong memories in that part of the world.

Summer’s mother does not speak English, which is a pity because I would have loved to debrief her. She took a number of photographs, which Summer posted and tagged on Facebook, and all I can say is that these days, I’m looking really elderly and crone-like. Plus I don’t really want photographs of me tagged on Facebook because when I successfully assassinate the 45th President of the United States, Donald Trump, I don’t want any facial recognition software getting in the way of a speedy getaway.

My appearance is nothing that $10,000 worth of Botox injections and eyelift surgery couldn’t fix, of course. But even if I had the money to spend on that kind of thing, I wouldn’t do it. I’m still a hippie: Natural is best. Natural with foundation and eye makeup – neither of which I was wearing when those unfortunate photographs were snapped.

Tonight I’ve been invited to celebrate with Democratic Party members at the local pub as we watch election returns. More likely, we’ll be renting our garments since Hyde Park is a Republican stronghold.

Later this week, the Bernie Sanders Dutchess County grassroots campaign group I helped put together is having its first meeting. But if Hillary Clinton really has 500 super-delegates lined up, I’m afraid it’s too late to influence the nomination process.

On top of that is the 1,500 words I’ve committed to writing each and every day for NaNoWri and the usual routine activities of daily life.

Daylight Savings Time has hit me very badly. I hate the fact that it’s now pitch black by 5:15pm and that in a mere two weeks, it will be pitch black by 4:30pm. My particular brand of seasonal affective disorder doesn’t make me depressed per se, it makes me nihilistic. Like what’s the point of being alive? You make the tiniest splash in the pond, you try to dupe your body into mass-producing seratonin, and then poof! You’re ashes.