optimism

Last night, while trying my best, as a dinky-di auzzie, to be optimistic about the Past (I've more or less given up on the future and the present is so beguiling in itself I don't ever want to ask the half empty/half full question here) I realised that the glass paper weight on one of the two cd racks that was propping up the Vincent van Gogh self-portrait that came as an insert in Saturday's Sydney Morning Herald would look better on top of the other (taller) cd rack. Somehow as I was making the switch the paper weight slid through my fingers and fell onto the low table below, the one that held the cd player, cd racks, loose cds, mp3 player, a few books, a few other bits and pieces. It was a glass-topped table and the glass table top ... exploded. It sounded like a gun going off. Slivers of glass embedded themselves in me, one in a finger, another in a toe but I didn't notice that immediately, because the cd player had unaccountably started playing Richmond Fontaine's The Warehouse Life - "broken, blond 'n' lost 'n' blue" - and also, the Ralph Hotere/Bill Manhire collaboration Pine, which I'd just received as a review copy, was among the debris ... this fine printing of 16 images/poems retails for $300.00 unsigned ($800.00 signed) and although I don't think I'll ever sell it, I did feel like rescuing such a notionally valuable work (same price as The Times Atlas of the World) from the wreckage ... that was when I saw the blood. Well, the wounds are not too bad and the carpet's pretty stained already and the book was marked on the cover when I got it, now it's even more marked and has a Past as well which I will continue to try to be optimistic about; besides, I decided I like Richmond Fontaine a lot more than I thought I did and have been playing them/him all day today as I extract shards from the carpet and re-arrange the furniture and, yes, it's true, I didn't need that extra table after all. Now if I could just get the haunted look off Vincent's face ...