Yes, I guess you could call it a crush

If there is an unseemliness to women of a certain age going full-on fanatic, then I am guilty once again of the faux pas. I am not the equivalent of tent-dwelling outside the Nokia Theater in Los Angeles where the newest TWILIGHT feature will debut, for a list of reasons so long it might never end. I am quietly cruising around with my computer keyboard while a squirrel eyes me from the nearest palm tree. He can't possibly know there were walnuts in the oatmeal. It is not any of my doing that a random phrase or notion launches a John Prine song in my head.

Each week I write an introductory paragraph to the e-newsletter for a local rubber stamp store. Today I thought of life as an adventure, of escaping the mind-anaesthesia that is the Republican debates and other national debacles and, of course, heard the advice to, "...blow up your tv."

Mr. Prine, as the New York Times would probably still call him in civilized fashion, and his music landed aboard my wobbling raft - best guess - in about 1971. My then beau, later husband, then not, wrote music reviews. He played JOHN PRINE for everyone who stopped by, made them listen. Mr. Kelly was adamant about his music. Soon the album was in the collections of most friends. The words from those first songs and the ones that came after reside in my trunk of "This makes me think of that."

It is a bright morning in Los Angeles County. Peaches, as sung about in the following video, are no longer in season but the brilliant orb of an orange sits on my kitchen counter, symbol of California dreams, of sweetness, of plenty. My siblings and I always found an orange in the toe of our Christmas stockings. If you feel ill-matched to your life or your skin today, it is not too late to change or at least think about doing some part of all this differently. Pyrotechnics optional.