Wednesday, November 4, 2009

I'll take a corner piece, please

My son believes that birthday cake could be the doorway to world peace. I say it is worth a try. We shared our refrigerator for several days with a chocolate cake-chocolate mousse filling (two layers)-fudge icing-buttercream frosting trimmed confection that really would rehabilitate a mean heart.

A friend once remarked that she enjoyed being anyplace that the Goodyear blimp appeared. In Los Angeles that can be at a parade, a football game, flying over your house...limitless choices. From my south-facing second-floor windows I have seen the blimp on illuminated night runs as well as droning northward to the Rose Bowl, readying for New Year's day. Occasionally we will see the blimp of another sponsor but the Goodyear ship, all silver and happily benevolent, one assumes, says the fun has started.

Wisely or foolishly, I notice things which I interpret as signs. As I heard the recent updates of a young friend's definitive diagnosis of a rare, troubling, ultimately curable but no day at the beach in the meantime neurological disorder, I empathized for the full roster of doctors and tests that led her to a good yet unsettling solution. In solving the mystery she had the best of care at a truly premier hospital, yet it was the sight of a party in the courtyard, cake and ice cream for all - and she said the in-patients were showing up as well, wheeling their I.V. stands - that took some of the dread out of the days and treatments to come. I recognized it as an indication that all would truly be well, that she was sent for her test and consultation - and their results - on the day when what was just birthday cake by another name was being served, joyously, generously, to the multitudes. Seconds? Don't mind if I do. The universe of my understanding has its cunning ways of giving us the nod and the wink, sometimes after the dope-slap, just to say there are better times ahead. If she had looked up, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the blimp sailed over with its own unique blessing. In spite of itself, life can be sweet.