Week in Seven Words #504

This covers the week of 9/15/19 - 9/21/19.

bears
She likes being read to while she's being fed. And she likes repeated readings. This time, it's the Berenstain Bears and a dinosaur bone that goes missing from a museum. After the nth such reading, I sit across from her and her dad with a book about a different bear: Corduroy. She switches chairs and settles in for another story that bears repetition.

compliment
She tells me that her favorite teacher, a humanities teacher, resembles me, which is why it's her favorite class.

delights
She repeats the name of her car's model, in bursts of delight.

fisherman
His interest in wrestling has diminished. Now he's into fishing and fishing videos.

peripherality
Not for the first time, I wonder if I were to get up, push my chair back in, and leave, would anyone present care.

perspective
It amuses me when a teenager tries to be shocking. Kid, you don't know how young you look to me.

sonorous
His voice is wrenching. At midnight, the lights flicker out, as if in response to the feelings he has evoked.

Week in Seven Words #423

blatant
What they hate the most about homelessness is its visibility.

commits
This evening, I don't have the presence of mind to focus during a public reading, but I don't want to stay at home and leave an obligation unfulfilled. So the words flow past me, as if I were a dull rock in a stream.

defiant
Two young children playing. The older one says, "Be the baby." To which the younger one replies, "Not a baby. I growed up."

front
He acts as if he doesn't take things seriously. But from behind his jokey, sardonic front, a grave concern will sometimes emerge about the world and his place in it.

hermetically
They haven't come to learn but to assert their own certainty.

indigestion
I'm advised to temporarily avoid chocolate, tomatoes, and tomato-based products, basically half my diet. (Just kidding. A fifth of my diet, tops.)

unburdened
Meeting a deadline, sending something off, the relaxation that follows, muscles unknitting.

Week in Seven Words #381

boyishly
He rehearses his chorus song sweetly and a little goofily.

delighting
He's delighted by the rides he's taken on the subway. He likes observing people's behavior, how they make use of limited space and what they do to pass the time during their commute. As an older man, he hasn't become jaded. He loves to investigate and explore, and the mundane can be fascinating.

garbed
Leafy trees look like they're wearing green ruffled blouses.

memorization
She brings flash cards to the table. Her mouth is pressed to a thin line as she flips them over by her plate. Her food goes largely ignored.

relieving
People often unleash their anger on an easy target, but here she doesn't - she's nice to the waitress, who was nervous about getting blamed for the restaurant's mistake.

secured
It's been a while since I received a bear hug. It lasts long enough for the warmth to settle into my bones, but stops short of making me feel trapped.

sedated
The meal is heavy. The diners sag, and their eyelids flicker against the weight of sleep.

Week in Seven Words #303

discounted
I don't think her sense of humor gets appreciated enough. She isn't the designated "fun one," so in the typical all-or-nothing fashion, her loved ones dismiss her as no fun at all.

disintegrate
The ceiling comes apart in flakes like dandruff across the bathtub and sink.

riveting
By the end of dinner, I'm not sure what color his eyes are, as they were focused mostly on his phone. I should have sent him a text asking.

sets
The tennis ball dimples the net. As the kids practice, their sneakers scritch against the leaves littering the court.

synthetically
The bottle of soda bubbles and glugs as he tips it into his mouth. It looks like he's pouring gasoline into himself, to refuel mid-hike.

visualizing
Confronted by the large rock with the plaque embedded in it, we try to recreate a historic moment in our imagination.

warming
The hike takes us up a steep, leafy incline, on paths baked gold by the late afternoon light. Cloud shadows drift over the cliffs across the river.

Week in Seven Words #175

dribbling
For the first time in a while, I watch an NBA game. I like most of it, especially when the scores are close, and it's not clear who'll come out on top. Some of the players act like children though; they could still be adolescent boys. They're also living the life that many adolescent boys fantasize about. In a weird way, it's not an adult life.

engineered
When he asks me to play Legos with him, he's less interested in playing than in showing me what he's built in minute detail, like an architect or engineer explaining his latest work.

expectant
He hangs out in the background, waiting for us to entertain him. He needs some crumbs of attention and entertainment; maybe we'll show him a funny Youtube video.

migrations
In some ways he eats like a grownup. But then, most grownups don't wind up with pieces of avocado on their butt when they're done.

rehearsals
He pushes the plastic car around on the board game of Life, without understanding the milestones.

rut
Every time we drive along this route, we get into the exact same argument. It's like the road has a hold on our minds.

sonant
They giggle at the British accents of cartoon nannies and hounds.

Week in Seven Words #69

circumstances
The same sentence can mean a number of different things depending on the context in which it's uttered, the way it's uttered, who utters it, and who's listening. And from a very young age we grapple with all these sources of information - the words themselves, the words in a web of context. Day-to-day, without thinking about it, we perform these mental feats.

inattention
When the brain is a pool float, bobbing gently on light blue chlorinated waters.

knotted
At the wedding, two guests tie a bunch of cloth napkins into a makeshift rope and start twirling it round and round as a jumprope for the bride. She holds onto the skirt of her gown and jumps, smiling and laughing. Just as she starts to get tired her mother-in-law and then one of her sisters-in-law bounce in, and they hold out for a little while to cheers and shouts of encouragement.

motoring
The drive, late on a Sunday afternoon, is a surprising treat. Quiet suburban neighborhoods with deep green lawns give way to gas stations and highways.

proprietary
To help them prepare for their upcoming visit I send them information about what sites to visit, which neighborhoods to walk through (and which to avoid), and how they can best get around. I'm happy about their visit and also have a proprietary feeling towards the city where I live. I don't always think of this city as home, but in moments like these I feel it's mine.

smores
At the dessert reception a table with marshmallows, melting chocolate, and graham crackers. Guests in formal attire lick their fingers.

zest
Orange creamsicles at the end of a long hot day.