Monday, January 1, 1996 My idea is to write something every day of this year for the web. This is the start. I suggested that Cynthia call Mrs Marshall and offer to start her on a training program for her third century and her second millenium. She is now 97 and has, as a personal goal, living into the next century, and becoming a three century person. Of course, by making that, she also automatically becomes a two millenium dude. So I thought it appropriate that we start her out easy by having champaign on New Year's Eve for the next several years and slowly increase her training and consequent stamina, for the strenuous third century she is approaching. Tuesday, January 2, 1996 Cynthia is upset with her daughter. The daughter's grandmother, half-sister, half-brother, and nearly everyone else is upset with that gal. The daughter tells the mother that the mother doesn't know ANYTHING about the daughter. We do know, and can predict that the daughter will probably say the same thing to the mother in the future. The grandmother says the granddaughter harshly criticizes the mother and the mother's pal when she spends the mothers money to call the daughter's grandmother on the mothers phone. You think that's complicated? The daughter's hands are orange from too much vitamin A. She is deathly afraid of cancer, from which her father died, and so compensates with a diet of lettuce, seaweed, diet drinks, lots of salt, jello, things with few calories and NO fat, teas, stuff dissolved in water--as long as it has no fat. She in convinced meat and fat cause cancer. I suspect worrying about getting cancer is the number one cause of cancer. The mother complains about the daughter talking about her behind her back. She does the same. Fears saying what she thinks. Fears the daughter will stop loving her. Fears being abandoned by the daughter. The daughter takes every advantage. Packages of rice with little packets of flavoring inside. The boxes of rice are opened. The little packets are gone. Lots of tiny things like that. The mother is irked. The mother complains about the daughter talking sweet to someone she wants something from. The mother can see she does the same. She sees how she avoids confrontation. The daughter visited her half-sister the last two days. She left early. I suspect the half-sister, who just had a miscarriage, and who has an unemployed husband, was irked at her lack of sensitivity to these things. The gal is aggressively defensive. Won't listen to anyone. Bad news for her today. Purse stolen at the airport. Called someone and asked them to call her mother to have a Visa Card cancelled. Didn't have the nerve to call her mother, I suspect. She could have. Afraid to have contact with the mother. Didn't want to show any weakness to support her mother's fear of a child unravelling. Now the daughter is off to Korea and the last year of her four years of Navy service. The mother thinks the out-of-balance conditions may be due to a head injury of some years ago. She has recovered too well for that to be the case. It is a deeper and older thing. Something inside her that others have noticed and remarked on for years. Stubborn independence to the point of being in personal danger. The grandmother gave an example earlier this evening of what she considered bizarre behavior. I remind the mother that her own childhood had far more of the bizarre in it. She can't disagree with that. Wednesday, January 3, 1996 Mr Bill spots me in the Harvard Square post office. I see you are wearing the larger sizes now, he says to me, referring to my more spacious clothes. Its the lack of exercise from sitting at my keyboard, I explain. Perhaps this should be called "Diary of a Mad Homeworker" instead of the Cambridge Chronicles. Thursday, January 4, 1996 My daughter seems to be missing. My mom tells me she never heard from her after she sent her granddaughter a present and card. Usually she answers right away. Teaching school in Watts could make just about anybody go missing. She has a year and a half to go on her contract. An end-of-the-year letter from Carl and Marguerite. They include a picture of Eric and Erin. I don't actually know if that bit of HTML code will work. You'll know when you see it. An end-of-the-year letter from Ron Beatty. I've written and asked him for permission to publish it in The Cambridge Chronicles. Friday, January 5, 1996 Here it is, the fifth day, and nothing more to write. Union Street in Watertown. Someone shovels snow from their driveway into their yard, which is surrounded by a four-foot tall hedge. A dog is inside the hedge. The dog jumps into each shovelful of snow as its thrown into the yard. Neighbors are standing around watching this. They are taking a break from their own shovelling. Someone has created a Scandal page on the web for all the major Presidential candidates. One of the editors thinks Gary Hart could have won if he had just toughed out his sex scandal. Doubt it. His wife was not capable of carrying off her half of the show. The problem was how he treated her. Hillary managed that for Bill. She unambiguously stood by her man. Never blinked. So his sex scandal meant nearly nothing--given that his own wife gave NO impression of being bothered by it (or the suggestion that something had happened in the past). Women decided the last election. They will probably decide most of the future elections. Hart would have sunk like a rock because of the women's vote. Gingrich doesn't have a chance because of his wife. Dole has a chance because of his. I think the wives will make it Clinton versus Dole. Saturday, January 6, 1996 What happened today? A trip to the post office. Walking around Harvard Square with Cynthia. She finds a Cd player on sale and buys it. Then some CDs for her dad. I had an idea today, but it escaped me. I was desparate for something to hang the continuation of this effort off of. Then one ends up using of at the end of a sentence. Sunday, January 7, 1996 Snow. Snow. Snow. And still more snow. The weather report says its from the south of the country. I imagine Sarah having something to do with it. Of course she doesn't. It was just an excuse to think about her. A chance to imagine how she might have managed to do this. The mind finds a way to do those things, you know. Then there are the times, when lying awake at night, even till early in the morning and feeling the rush of life towards its end. That is magnified by being past the half-century mark. But it is an old thought for me. As the mind grows older and more sophisticated the world one creates becomes ever more complex. The wonder at how one will see the world when one no longer exists can leave you with a very perplexed sensation. Just how does one go about imagining that. There are many roads one can start down to make that picture--but none of them make any sense. Unless, of course, one is religious. But that never helps me. There is no feeling that it exists or is right. And now you won't have to put up with any more of this today. Monday, January 8, 1996 There is the opportunity to shovel the steps and walk in front of the apartment four times today. And it has been taken advantage of. Then one time clearing the sidewalk in front of DER. There are some parts of the back of my body that seem to be complaining about this. Later in the day, some muscles, latissimus dorsai, possibly, that complain considerably more and longer than seems necessary. John asks me how my christmas vacation was. In my hand there is a large piece of fruitcake from my mom. I tell him its my mother's annual Christmas boat anchor gift to me. Further, that the "beast" (and I motion towards Cynthia's office) was out of town for some days around the holiday. He laughs at this. Harvard Square post office. A woman is on the phone talking about a friend's party. Of particular interest was the dividing of the people into winner and loser categories. And what category do you put yourself into, I'm thinking as she describes some specifics from both categories. Her friend invited one guest who she met through a Phoenix ad, and had never actually met--till the day of the party. Tuesday, January 9, 1996 We learn today that our landlord's wife may have lung cancer. The husband doesn't understand it as she only smokes one or two cigarettes a day. Cynthia's mom has smoked two to three packs a day for 50 plus years and has no sign of this disease. The landlord's wife also has a family often struck by lung cancer or variations. He has had to cancel their annual four month trip to Florida. The tickets, the apartment, sending the car, etc. She doesn't know. I'm uncertain why this is so. Maybe a doctor from the old school who tells the husband but not the patient. Or maybe the husband doesn't want the doctor to tell her. He has somewhat of an emotional breakdown while giving Cynthia a ride to the T. John asks me to audition to read the part of Tsamko Toma in the preview of his next film. Sure, I say, in a part Donald Duck/Three Stooges type of voice. He and Cynthia have a laugh at that. So I read a paragraph. John is satisfied. Cynthia thinks I've not read it quite naturally. A native speaker of the San language will be used, along with the clicks, when they make the actual film. Probably a South African actor. But meanwhile, my chance at fame and fortune in Hollywood!