I'll Just Keep Floating......

"This is not the end, nor the beginning of the end, but, perhaps.....the end of the beginning".....

I've toted that quote with me for a zillion years...
kept it in my back pocket, the center console of the car, the bottom of bottomless purses....

I've scribbled it in diaries, on bathroom walls, and borrowed books....

The words are weighted, heavy, good.

Suddenly important.

Just give me peace..... Until then, I'll just keep floating....

The list of Five

Five (5) Things I love to do…

Stay in my pajamas all day
(Not because I have a 104 temperature or because everything I own is in the wash and I forgot to put it in the dryer three days ago, but because I can and it feels good and I have pajamas!) Which I don’t, but I would if I could.

Swing
Like in a porch swing, a yard swing, a park swing, a tire swing, you understand….
As high as my dirty little heels pushing off from the sand can send me flying
With hair swooshing and a tummy full of “I’m afraid of heights” butterflies…

Sing
Loud
Guttural.
Very off key.
Because I can.
And in my world the louder you play the music, the better you sound.

Dance
In the kitchen, on the porch, in the street, on the beach..
Anywhere
Anytime
For any reason

Float
Belly up on a pink Wal-Mart raft
Finger-painting in the water
Eyes watching God….
Waiting on Peace….
In my little vinyl nightmare, the lazy round river… my backyard oasis
(OK, in My World it’s an oasis…to everyone else it’s a blow up pool)

Five (5) things I hate

Linda (An Angel who wears blue jeans) was aghast when I told her I was going to write down the five things I hate. “But you don’t hate anything! All that peace~love stuff, you know you don’t hate anything!” Well, I want to! And I do!
So here they are:

1. Prejudice.

2. War.

3. Eating octopus. Who ever heard of anything so cruel.

4. That there are, or have ever been, Children without hope. Don’t give me that “they can rise above the hate and the poverty and become a President” garbage. Odds are they will just grow up with the overwhelming feeling that they are not loved and that is heart wrenching. Everyone deserves to be loved. You don’t have to have opportunities served to you on a silver platter, but you have to know in your heart, you BELONG and then you can BELIEVE.

5. I’m going to really think about this one. I mean hate is a really big thing. I wouldn’t want to make a mistake.

The Leopard Skin Tan

Artwork (c) Singleton 2006
SOLD

The blue lagoon is vinyl and blows up and is balanced perfectly on the edge of my world. It cost exactly $218.00 and is worth a million lotteries. The hurricane tarp, draped over the leaky roof for months, is the perfect palette for paradise to plop on, and I have an orange and green sponge wedged under the PVC ladder to “prevent tears” in the liner. Ahhhh….cheap and tacky….and peaceful…. The lazy round river, 3500 gallons of water in a giant fishbowl in my back yard. You see, I am a mermaid. An old dried up one, but a mermaid nonetheless. Kind of like when you have a party and accidentally leave the can of open sardines out on the counter overnight. They’re not quite what they were the night before. Neither am I.

The backyard is private (not as private as it used to be), but it’s mine. There is a fence all the way around it that says “holler over” or “stay out” depending on the time of day. And back here, I can parade around anyway I like. That’s the law. (I think) So back here, I roll my tankini up to become a makeshift bikini and I bask in the Florida sunshine. I float in lazy circles in the blow-up pool, padding off the vinyl walls. I hold my breath and open my failing eyes and stare at my underwater toes….I used to have a mermaid tail and these forty something toes with red polish look silly on this temporary ocean floor. I try it with my glasses on. Big Bad underwater Blur. I float. Eyes to God. Rump drifting vicariously close to the river’s floor. I am a mermaid. And when my fingers wrinkle and the phone rings, I plod up the ladder and park my “out of water” body on the deck. All washed up. Periwinkles and sandspurs at my feet.


By night, the only tell-tale sign of the real me is the leopard skin tan. Mermaids tan evenly. Old ones don’t tan in the folds.

Death of a Mermaid, Singleton

(c) Singleton 2006




and now you see all of me....
floating...
face up and eyes closed....
as if in peace....



"ashes to ashes
dust to dust
light as a feather
lift me up...."