Week in Seven Words #526

This covers the week of 2/16/20 - 2/22/20.

admirable

She's productive, patient, organized, and kindly, intelligent without being arrogant, a good teacher overall.

assenting

They keep cutting into each other's speech, and their voices are getting louder, so it seems at first like they're working themselves into a fight. But they're in agreement. They're vigorously, almost rabidly, agreeing with each other about a set of political beliefs. Around them, the other coffee shop customers keep their eyes fixed on phones and laptops.

burrowing

In a neighborhood that's otherwise cold and dingy, the library is a warm nook.

ciao

We part ways sweetly on a dark street.

conversing

We curl up side by side for a long conversation.

lackluster

A cheesy cartoon, crude jokes, and stilted conversation.

quarrel

Sobs, slammed doors, the seeming hopelessness of a fight with a good friend. Chances are that half an hour from now, they'll be on speaking terms again.

Week in Seven Words #473

catastrophizing
My mind is gripped by the potential mistakes, the possible costs, the hypothetical scenarios where things go terribly wrong.

chary
It's a social event where no one is at ease. People are sizing each other up, suspicious and assessing.

enclose
A homeless man has set up a small room made of blanket walls by the doors of a supermarket.

examining
Giving more thought to a chapter that portrays a slide towards despair, a character contemplating an end to her life. I check that I'm writing it with sufficient care.

hand-to-hand
Looking both embarrassed and proud, he talks about how he allowed himself to get really mad and fight a few other men at a subway station, just because he needed to relieve stress. I had never pictured him as the type to let off steam through physical combat with potentially lethal repercussions, a situation where someone could end up knifed or knocked onto the third rail.

lackadaisical
We aren't having a conversation, just taking turns talking. The topics drift and leave little impression.

untainted
A clear, crystalline day when the air seems to come from a fresh spring untainted by car exhaust and sidewalk garbage.

Week in Seven Words #390

abandoning
The loose grouping of historic buildings has the air of a ghost town. The grass in some places is unkempt. A mother and daughter fighting from opposite sides of a bench pierce the quiet but soon leave, as if they were spirits who hadn't known how to find rest. The crackle of bees from a wide porch, a cat sprawled on shaded gravel, highlight the absence of people.

bus
When the buses aren't too crowded, they can be relaxing. They roll and curve gently, sigh when they come to a temporary stop. The other passengers tend to be quiet, mostly caught up in phones or in staring out the window. When in pairs or small groups, they talk only now and then. At one point, a mother, son, and grandmother climb on board. The son lolls in his mother's lap as the bus glides on.

gifted
A mistake following the trail takes me to a quiet, stifling pond, bright green with algae. The air is still and hot. I wonder what I'm doing here, where I can go next, when a heron unfolds and takes flight.

matchsticks
There's a fragile atmosphere in this home, as if a misaligned paper on a desk will prod an ugly argument to life and ruin the evening.

reach
The real estate agent trots up and down the street, as she explains to someone over the phone that she's misplaced her car keys.

screened
It's a tiny museum; the air is cool and smells dusty. If I knew more ahead of time about Tibetan Buddhism, I would understand more about what I'm seeing. There are labels, but few explanations. The shelves are lined with placid gleaming statues and ornate metalwork. The gardens, set on a hill, are walled in by trees and stone and lined with prayer flags.

wariness
The deer watches me in stillness, a question in its eyes. It retreats because it doesn't want to risk the answer I might give it.

Week in Seven Words #361

absorptive
They have a quick, vicious temper. They'll unleash it without absorbing its effects; they may even forget, an hour later, just how angry they were. The absorption is left to me.

auxiliary
She's finished reading the Harry Potter series, but doesn't want to let it go. Potter Puppet Pal videos are among the media she's found to maintain her connection to the Wizarding World.

crayons
Teens with fruit punch hair bump shoulders as they drift through the park.

defense
For indoor soccer, the footrest is the goal. In the middle of the game, the dog trots over and lies down in front of it to lick the floor.

irrelevant
"He's entitled to his own opinion!" she tells me the day after. An irrelevant comment, as I never argued about anyone's right to share an opinion. As for the content of the opinion, I can't argue about that either, without being called names or told that I don't really mean what I'm saying.

melting
The gingerbread truffle bursts and melts on my tongue. I think with even more gratitude about the person who gave it to me.

runny
Throughout the store, there are sniffly kids with smeary noses and slurpy coughs.

Week in Seven Words #334

chirruping
A waterfall of bird chatter in the hour before dawn.

creeds
Tracing threads in the development of a religion. A move towards greater compassion here, an intensifying disgust of women there. Scholars scrambling to tie together the disparate threads.

fuzz
He's straining to grow a beard, so he can look like a worthy substitute for a respected older teacher. As he lectures, he scratches his cheeks.

letdown
After struggling over whether or not to call him, I reach for the phone, only to have it ring as soon as I touch it. Our conversation doesn't go well.

malfunctioning
If only my laptop could talk back. It would freeze halfway through its request for me to stop cursing at it.

misdeed
I show up five minutes late to find the stage set for a courtroom scene. I'm the accused.

perfidious
We watch Chamber of Secrets together, and the part that upsets him most isn't the basilisk, but the teacher betraying the students and threatening to wipe out their minds with a spell.

Week in Seven Words #330

clarification
What at first sounds like the wind crying resolves into choir music broadcast on a radio in a waiting room down the hall.

hamming
She makes short videos of evil twins leaping out of mirrors and people finding an intruder in the closet as they tour their new home. I'm cast in several roles. My favorite is the one where I get stabbed with a plastic pineapple and deliver a monologue for the ages.

meaty
All of the commuters packed, flesh to flesh, turn the subway car into a sausage link.

median
He continues to be fanatic about how normal he is. His way is the one true way of normality.

reactiveness
Waiting for the elevator, stone-faced as a Buckingham Palace guard, while a neighbor and her child scream at each other a few feet away.

spud
Pleasure from a potato's crinkly gold skin.

sway
In her marriage, she's a courtier. Dressed in elegant fabrics that pool on the floor as she bows and scrapes.

Week in Seven Words #311

causality
The desk chair that's meant to be sat on, not ridden, breaks. She slides off it with an expression that's part-guilty, part-puzzled. We live in a strange world indeed, where desk chairs just fall apart without warning, she seems to say.

fictive
Watching the Matilda movie from the 1990s, and the only person truly freaking out from Trunchbull is another adult in the room. "Is this... how can this be real? How can she get away with this?" he asks.

lashing
People looking for a purpose and a place find neither, seek someone near them to blame.

likeness
He prefers passive-aggressive insults. Instead of telling me directly what he thinks about my character, mind, and looks, he'll discuss someone I bear a resemblance to and make hostile remarks about the qualities I share with them.

phototropic
In an orange coffee mug, she's growing what looks like a valiant twig. Whatever it is has sprouted a couple of leaves and angled itself towards the window.

scholastically
Pages whirring, books thudding, students sniffling over their assignments.

treasuring
A pink evening glow of laughter and play.

Week in Seven Words #305

canid
The dog, tied up outside, whines low and long over all the things she can smell but not jump on and lick.

capture
I'm reminded of what it's like to play tag in a house. Ducking behind a door and waiting for the pursuer to run past into a different room. At the end, getting caught with a fierce hug.

eventide
Cold, clean air, a muddy lawn, leaves, a swing set at dusk.

fauna
He tells me about the relationship between manatees and elephants, and hippos and whales - just some of the topics we migrate through, using books, toy animals, and YouTube videos as supplements.

fidgeting
They show me a video of what at first looks like a skittering punctuation mark: a pygmy shrew, among soil and rocks and exploratory human fingers.

grumbly
We cram ourselves onto a gondola swing. It creaks in protest, lurching under our weight.

venom
This time, she finds a wound in me that she can tear open wider. My responding anger is so strong. It collects in my throat and chest, and I'm close to letting it fly. Like a snake that's reared back and spread its hood.

Week in Seven Words #264

blanching
The fluorescent lights wash the life out of her face. She stares at me with smudged eyes.

channeled
It occurs to me that I'm only really learning at this point in life what to do with anger. Before, my conscious attitude towards it was, "Don't have it" and "Feel guilty about having it." I hadn't really thought of it as a healthy emotion, although - when confronted, understood and directed in mature ways - it definitely can be. Denying it is self-destructive.

erudition
Books with gilt-edged pages bursting out of mahogany shelves.

mean-spirited
It's not ignorance that bothers me so much as people acting triumphant about what they don't know. They're proud to not make an effort to learn or think about something, even while sharing their opinion or making decisions about it. They smirk at my frustration, like they've beaten me at a game I never agreed to play. At this point, I try not to engage with them, or I don't show much of an emotional response when I do. Easier to do when there's no personal connection between us; but also manageable when there is, though that involves giving up on a part of the relationship.

regressing
When someone tries to take their problems out on me, one thing I do is picture them the way they looked as young children. This makes their adult-sized tantrum less stressful. Though they want me to parent them and deal with their problems for them, I don't want to be a stand-in for their mother.

sweetened
Pink stickers, Hershey's kisses - little things that brighten a run-of-the-mill evening of homework and TV.

undeterred
He stares at the orange, pink and white floral sofa. Then shrugs and arranges himself elegantly on it.

Week in Seven Words #262

bedazzle
The sun's out, and the sand looks like snow, white and glittering.

commitment
She gives me her trust like she would her child. I cradle it with awkward care, feeling its quiet hammering pulse and knowing I must never lose hold of it.

deceptive
On the playground, she encounters children who lie charmingly and convincingly, who are friendly one day and insulting the next. She doesn't know what to make of them; they confuse her. Beyond what they do, it's the why - the why is at the heart of the bewildered hurt.

greased
Sleek men attend to their ale and steak.

raring
The dog, at the end of her leash, recognizes my scent, whines, leaps and strains to get close, to be petted and present her belly for a rub.

sundering
Between me and him - a window pane, the twisted branches of a tree.

wrestlers
In their academic gowns, they circle the stage and size each other up, as if their battle of wits will be a physical brawl.

Week in Seven Words #220 & 221

220

asthmatic
Buses wheezing in the heat, looking battered and ill.

bitterness
They dwell on other people's failures, because they want to justify the lack of risk-taking in their own lives and distract themselves from their profound regrets.

briny
Broken, brown ground and a river that smells like an ocean.

brittle
Judging, measuring, comparing. Never just listening. Never accepting.

emerald
It's a precious green lawn in a neighborhood full of industrial lots, billboards and old apartment houses. Bright flowers have sprung up on it, and people hover around, starved for the simple beauty.

off-putting
"Nobody jumping out of it today," he says in an odd, cheerful voice after staring for a few minutes at the Freedom Tower.

self-defeating
She walks with the group because she wants to improve her fitness, but she gets winded too easily and has trouble keeping up. Discouraged, she settles on a bench and smokes a cigarette.

Week in Seven Words #198 and #199

#198

dolls
Before the play, the actors come on stage to finish dressing. They're an all-male cast, and one of them (a noble lady) does a few warm-up sashays in his green gown. Those in masculine costume need help with their buckles and buttons; one actor smiles benignly at the audience as a crew member tries to maneuver his feet into a pair of pinched boots.

dreary
We live with paradoxes every day, and they sometimes seem like cosmic jokes. People who try to impress a rigid order on the world have to first rid themselves of their sense of humor.

gasper
They've taken off the masks to their Sesame Street costumes and puff on cigarettes in the cold air.

peculiar
When the documentary shows parts of a Catholic mass, it occurs to me that for most of the audience, this will be the closest they ever get to watching a mass. It's an alien rite.

spear
Waiting in line outdoors in the brittle sunshine.

tallow
The stage is lit with real candles, hovering in chandeliers that hang on ropes. Throughout the play, candle wax plinks onto the stage.

tumult
He plays, on alternate days, a violent king and a noblewoman falling violently in love.

Week in Seven Words #188

leftovers
Cold chicken, sandwiches, and an easing of tension.

meltdown
It's an episode of self-destruction. Her senses splinter, her mind pursues the dozen sins and slights she thinks are aimed at her. With a single-mindedness, she runs the evening to the ground. Afterwards, her eyes are suspiciously bright, but she can't see that she shares any part of the fault for how badly the evening went.

rawness
The color of the day is burnt umber. That's what I feel in me: low-key anger that crisps and singes and stirs up the ashes. But I'm at peace from time to time as well. The day is one of shocking beauty.

redemption
Most of the notes are breathy and weak. But the last one comes alive and is held to the limit of human breath.

spun sugar
Weaving fragile lies for the children, so that they'll continue to not put a name to what they might suspect.

tenderfoot
He assumes a humble, pious pose and speaks as one who has little experience of the world. Maybe I'm in too cynical a mood to appreciate what he's saying.

waste
Food leaking from aluminum trays. Liquid on the carpet. Little of what matters is salvageable.

Week in Seven Words #187

authenticity
For sale at the Renaissance Faire: Ye olde funnel cakes and cheesecake on a stick.

bantam
The event is advertised as a chess match with actual people as chess pieces, going head to head on a grassy field. Only, it doesn't look like chess. There are some poorly choreographed sword fights and a guy who leaps into battle with a pair of rubber chickens. The people sitting behind us on the stands are speculating about the real-life occupation of each fighter. "That one's an insurance salesman," they say, "and that one's probably a secretary."

masterly
It's worth watching the artists and musical folks, the ones who make lovely clay bowls and wear a phantom-like mask as they play the organ.

menagerie
Their menagerie contains ducks, pigeons, and a tortoise. Also a kookaburra, trapped in a mesh cage far from its native soil. Across the lane, a patient camel waits to take children on its back and plod with them around a field as their parents wave and snap photos from the side.

nickel-and-dimed
The maze is advertised as an Amazing Maze, but the only amazing thing about it is that we actually coughed up an extra couple of bucks to wander through its short, creaky corridors.

novelty
The first time he rides on a school bus, he's over 60. Some experiences are too good to pass up on in life.

pageantry
It's a parade of dignified queens and saucy barmaids, warriors in eclectic armor and non-magical folk who wish they were wizards. Some have sprouted fairy wings; others have clapped aluminum swords to the waistband of their jeans. The ale on offer helps fuel their fantasies.