Week in Seven Words #584

This covers the week of 3/28/21 - 4/3/21.

foe

In her isolation, she has unraveled. She flails at imagined terrors, as they press in on her from beyond the apartment walls. 

giddiness

Dozens of daffodils swaying by the field.

intermittently

The vaccine website is a test in reflexes. New appointments wink into existence and are just as quickly snapped up.

lukewarm

One book stands out as a suitable gift. But even as I buy it, I get the feeling that it won't inspire enthusiasm.

misty

A rainy haze on the river.

reacquainted

Visiting parts of the park I've neglected for a while, like catching up with old friends. Which trees have fallen, which paths are overgrown, and is the stream still full and flowing?

translated

After creating a video message in another language, I review it multiple times, convinced that I've made a major grammatical error or mixed up two words in an unintentionally filthy way. But it seems OK.

Week in Seven Words #549

This covers the week of 7/26/20 - 8/1/20.

ballooned

Before the fast begins, my stomach feels like a water balloon.

evasion

Social distancing is a handy excuse to avoid people whose company is undesirable under normal circumstances.

feathery

Feathery white flowers beside a riverside path. Five geese on a sward by the rocky bank.

grooving

The dancing skaters are back. I love watching their meetup in the park, where anyone with rhythm and a pair of skates can join in (I have one but not the other). Most of them wear masks, and one balances a bottle of water on his head as he flies around in figure eights. 

lightening

A walk transforms profound disquiet into new ideas, and I feel somewhat hopeful.

self-care

The little girl chases her dog across a sunny field. They end up under a tree, in the shade. After catching her breath, she orders the dog to chase her. She runs away from the tree and waves her arms. Her parents urge the dog to run after her. But he's a smart dog. He isn't trading the relief of the shade for the mercilessness of the sunshine.

slurred

Wearing the night guard makes me sound like a boxer (the athlete, not the dog).

Week in Seven Words #548

This covers the week of 7/19/20 - 7/25/20.

barricaded

The side doors to a vacant hotel are barred with luggage carts.

dreading

I wish I were used to these feelings of foreboding by now, the way they stalk through my psyche and claw at my attention.

flag

We notice a duck with blue, black, and white coloring on its wings. It reminds me of a flag. Estonia's flag, maybe? To check, we don't need to consult an atlas or a search engine. All he does is type Estonia into a text message on his phone. He receives a suggested flag emoji for Estonia, and yes, those are the same colors on the duck.

hooray

The documentary about the park is less about information and more about celebration. I'm fine with that, especially because the park has been a refuge when so many other places remain closed. Let's be happy that it exists.

perspiring

Joggers glistening and puffing in the morning. Drops of sweat shivering on shirtless basketball players.

protection

A visit to the dentist is much as it ever was, except for the air filters in every room, the mandatory masks, and the empty chairs between patients in the waiting room. This time, along with the x-rays and cleaning, I get fitted for a night guard, an attempt to protect my teeth from the unconscious grinding I subject them to when I sleep.

training

Three rows of stout old people working out with wooden swords. Their instructor, a senior himself, walks among them and corrects their form. I pretend that what I'm looking at isn't an exercise group but a training session for elderly assassins. (They're effective because most people don't consider them a threat... until it's too late.)

Week in Seven Words #542

This covers the week of 6/7/20 - 6/13/20.

concerns

As protestors stream past and chant about defunding the police, two cops talk about their plans for the year. Thanksgiving comes up, and they wonder whether travel will be easier by then and whether restaurants will open up for indoor dining.

depriving

Two young women, both bony thin, compare notes on how they're hardly eating. They sound triumphant.

fainter

As we head deeper into the park, the chants from the protest fade and become a faint disturbance for the bike riders and people picnicking. 

feel-good

A guy in a motorized chair travels on the twisting paths and wishes peace to everyone. Oldies play from a portable radio tucked by his shoulder.

frenzy

The churn of turtles and fish in a dark pond. 

overwhelmed

I'm in the grip of some chaotic feelings. They flood me.

sapped

On the way to a doctor's appointment. The subway still looks depleted. Streets usually churning with shoppers, tourists, and workers are mostly stripped of people. I spot a handful of pedestrians and a few security guards planted in front of buildings.

Week in Seven Words #518

This covers the week of 12/22/19 - 12/28/19.

again
Her dollhouse, I discover, has musical features. So that I won't forget about these features, she replays them repeatedly.

alleviating
In the car, I'm a little nauseous from lack of sleep and a breakfast of a single square of chocolate, which seems to hop around like a checker piece in my stomach. What helps is a walk through the parking lot in the mostly fresh air.

halted
I'm struck most by a sculpture inspired by Abraham and Isaac, the near sacrifice of the son by the father. The father figure looks tense and determined but nonetheless reluctant, holding back at the sight of his adult son kneeling with throat bared. The son is prepared, appears not to resist at all, but his fists are clenched.

potbelly
One museum guard allows me to keep my small backpack on me, as long as I wear it in front, like an artificial potbelly. Another guard tries to get me to return to the coat check with it, but I clutch my potbelly protectively and defend it from removal.

seasonal
Scuffed-up stairs and tired-looking stoops are showered with tinsel and potted shrubs.

spotted
A deer among fallen branches by an empty swimming pool.

wintry
An elegant bridge and brittle ice, bare trees and dark, cold water.

Week in Seven Words #517

This covers the week of 12/15/19 - 12/21/19.

appendicitis
He's vibrating with tension as he waits to hear the news: Appendicitis or not? Surgery scheduled when?

fabrications
Her middle school experiences include kids making up lies about other kids to broadcast on group texts and social media. Fights manufactured from false accusations are a regular form of entertainment for many. No one is completely safe from being targeted.

glacial
They descend an icy stairwell with balloons in cold blue bunches trailing them.

image
Throughout the group conversation, he hints that his sex life is active, that he's successful, and that he's unbothered by anything. He isn't weak. Never weak. Beneath his performance runs an undercurrent of anger and bitterness.

improvisation
I try an indie RPG (role-playing game) for the first time. It's a game where you and the other players make up a storyline on the fly, based on improvisation and with structure provided by a set of rules. This game is set in a film noir universe. Without fully knowing what I'm doing, I make up a detective character and spend much of the time interrogating other characters and staging a clumsy break-in that gets me arrested. I like the collaborative aspect of the world-building and story-telling.

inconvenienced
I know what they'll say: They're busy. It's an excuse I won't argue with, because I'm uncomfortable about making myself an inconvenience. I just wish I wasn't in the category of potential inconvenience.

syntax
Arguing with someone about English grammar is not how I want to spend the next 20 minutes, but here we are.

Week in Seven Words #506

This covers the week of 9/29/19 - 10/5/19.

autumnal
The leaves are turning a spangly orange and gold. Coolness is working its way into the warmth of the day.

kindly
I respect how attentive she is to other people. She pauses in the middle of praying to make sure someone has a seat, and to soothe an elderly lady who thinks she's been transported to a date decades earlier.

mailing
The kids find a way to amuse themselves by chucking their shoes through a hole in the net. "Special delivery!" they shout.

multitask
When I return, I find her asleep on the couch with her fingers still suspended in front of her, her freshly painted nails drying. As good a time as any to catch up on some sleep.

pained
She's seized by moments of querulousness, and it's best to let them slide. Her hours are often pinched with pain, and one day washes into another.

purpose
What I touch I must try to make good.

salvaging
It's impossible to start over completely, he says with dimmed eyes, but you do the best you can.

Week in Seven Words #500

catch-all
She uses "heavy" to describe anything big or adult-like.

decoding
Even though he's more experienced with JavaScript than I am, he can still find it perplexing. Like why 2019 gets interpreted as a number even though it was typed as a string.

drenching
Right after we step into the store, the wind picks up, and the storm rushes through the streets like an overflowing river.

impatience
I'm caught up in a flurry of impatience with myself. But impatience is preferable to feeling undeserving and inadequate.

salesmanship
The salesman, crimped and white-toothed, hovers too much, but he does point me to something worth buying.

self-sufficient
An old woman walking with her spine perpendicular to her hips refuses help with her bags. She's holding one in each hand, and they seem to balance her.

warily
The doctor's office is tucked below street level. It looks grubby and shabby, and the air is thick with the tang of disinfectant.

Week in Seven Words #497

amusement
A young brother and sister play with a water bottle for about an hour. First they take turns tossing the bottle to make it land upright on the ground. Then they roll it and kick it back and forth. After that, they relocate to a flight of stairs and toss it up and down.

limiting
She channels her thoughts through narrow conduits of social justice jargon.

ominously
I don't know why a cloud of bees has formed above the bed of a pickup truck, and I don't get close enough to find out.

outmaneuvered
On seeing his grandma approach with the stroller, the toddler wails that he isn't ready to leave. He stomps off shouting, "Bye!" She blows him a kiss. He softens enough to send her one back. Her relaxed posture misleads him into thinking he's safe from capture. He toddles closer, grinning. He's still grinning when she snatches him up and straps him, wailing again, into the stroller.

overcoming
Her coughing fit ends, and her soulful voice crawls out, cradling each note of a slow melody.

sonogram
During the sonogram, the technician asks me to be patient as she tries to locate one of my ovaries. "It's like deep sea diving," I murmur, and she laughs. (The outer office has an ocean resort atmosphere. Soft pop music and a decor of seashell pink, cloudy white, and calm blue.)

soothes
Some shimmering classical piece is playing in the background, and I'm sinking into the sofa, my thoughts calm.

Week in Seven Words #494

cooling
The branches are flapping in a strong wind, as if the trees are fanning themselves.

employing
The kids are inexperienced executives; the parents are zealous secretaries and social directors.

evacuations
The male and female hikers break up to urinate in the woods. They're yards apart, forming protective circles around each pee-er.

fitness
Because the elevators aren't working, the stairwell echoes with dreadful gasps.

head-on
Unresolved trauma will ruin your life, she says.

old-fashioned
Their home is Colonial style with a broad, pale face. An American flag is draped over the porch railing. The front door opens to small rooms stuffed with comfortable furniture. Rectangles of light cast by the windows fall short of the photos on the shelves and walls.

outage
Aside from a radio blatting from behind a door, the hallway is silent. Shadows are ganging up on the feeble emergency lights.

Week in Seven Words #487

alimentary
A narrow path takes us through a narrow park. I get the feeling that I'm in an alimentary canal, a digestive tract. There's enough food and shit scattered around to strengthen that impression.

anxiety
Anxiety is like clinging to a salt-caked rock miles from shore as cold waves slap you around.

chariness
A cat investigates the automatic doors. She's too small to open them on her own. When a human passes through, she sticks her head and some of her body into the gap but quickly pulls back as the doors close. Maybe she's afraid of being trapped in the building, an unfamiliar place that smells heavily of humans and disinfectants.

ditch
Decades later, she still behaves like an unloved little girl not getting enough attention from her parents.

gorge
She eats cake with popping, slurping noises.

indignity
She has tripped and is lying facedown with her face in her hands. What hurts her more than the bruising is the awareness of a crowd around her, staring.

rubber band
She walks away from the math problem and for a few minutes pretends it isn't lurking in her notebook. With a sigh, she returns to it. Solves it. Smiles.

Week in Seven Words #484

bug
At the lecture hall, the walls are a Pepto Bismol pink. I sip Diet Coke to try settling my stomach, before realizing that I probably won't be able to sit upright for two hours, not with this 24-hour bug churning in me.

laptop
A sleek gray rectangle with an impressive amount of power.

renovation
Wires have burst from the walls like intestines. It's a cold and dusty room.

screening
The rooms are in gray and white, the lights are bright, the professionals simulate kindness.

tossed
The birthday card spurts from his hand and splats on the table, where a newspaper will soon slink over it.

trips
Staying up late to look at models of RVs. I imagine fitting one out and just driving for months.

well-wisher
I wish them all well, while feeling out of place among them.

Week in Seven Words #455

carpal
Two large stores that sell tons of electronics and related accessories, but no wrist rests for typing and no plans to stock any. I begin to wonder if typing is going out of style, somehow?

droppings
As if she's a dignified statue splattered in pigeon crap, she doesn't respond to the contempt they show her.

emending
When editing another person's work, I have to carefully strengthen the text without changing the author's voice to my own.

gardening
A glaring sun, the relief of the wind, weeds among the basil and old tomato plants.

jumbled
Her essay is disjointed, as if she has dropped it on the floor, gathered up the broken pieces, and spread them out on paper. This is what an early draft often looks like.

mollified
Though she's usually late, she usually brings cookies, so all is forgiven.

volunteer
She periodically flies in from the Netherlands to volunteer around NYC and write about her experiences. It's an interesting way to observe some of the social dysfunctions in the US and the civic or altruistic efforts in response.

Week in Seven Words #446

cascading
The waterfall reminds me of a rich lather, soap washing away from a crystalline dish.

easeful
A few of us settle at a picnic table. The trees cast large, blotchy shadows. I eat some nuts and dark chocolate. Although we don't have a lot of time to linger in the park, we don't feel rushed.

mirror
There's an almost perfect stillness to the water. It bears the imprint of the sky, the clouds, and the hillocks covered in dark green trees.

pace
We trudge along the slick dirt trail, our breaths heavy, our bodies sluggish, and talk about automation and AI, the functions that sophisticated machines will take over.

swiftly
A deer and her children bound past us, the leaves crackling with their energy. A few seconds later, the leaves are still. The forest is quiet, as if we had only imagined them passing.

trade
We're city-dwellers in a small town on a Sunday afternoon, stunned at how many stores and restaurants are closed.

unaware
I find out, after the fact, that he had to go to the hospital. Everything turns out well, but it's still disturbing that I didn't know. I was working, sleeping, going about my routine as usual.

Week in Seven Words #435

appearances
They're a young couple, boyfriend and girlfriend, looking like they've stepped hand-in-hand out of an ad for chewing gum or smartphone accessories. They're also deep in conversation. As they pass us by, I overhear a part of it. They're discussing whether it's possible to stab someone to death with a pencil.

enthuse
Most of the people in the group are men, and tough-looking men at that, but never mind the stereotypes, because they enjoy making the flower arrangements and giving each other (and the women) supportive comments over the creation of lovely little bouquets inserted into small silver-colored vases.

figurative
In the subway car, a young boy shimmies up one of the poles, shouts, "I'm a Tetris piece!" and slides down.

impressions
The room is dim, and incense burns by a small statue of Buddha. When asked if he's Buddhist, he replies that he isn't but was just trying to create a certain ambiance. A shoeless, quiet-voiced, spicy-smelling atmosphere of meditation.

murmurings
Leaf patting leaf, and one branch rustling to another.

sliced
She thrusts her hand into the soil and jerks it out with a gasp. Her finger is bleeding. She's been cut through her glove. Her first worry is that she's gotten nicked by a piece of glass or, worse, a discarded needle, but it turns out to be a thorn.

split
Pretending that mind and body are disconnected is terrible for one's health. Referring to the body as a mere "sack of meat" – to be disregarded or modified in whatever way you imagine – is profoundly damaging.

Two terrifying short stories

Both of these are from The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories.

Title: The Autopsy
Author: Michael Shea

Waiting behind him, Dr. Winters heard the river again - a cold balm, a whisper of freedom - and overlying this, the stutter and soft snarl of the generator behind the building, a gnawing, remorseless sound that somehow fed the obscure anguish that the other soothed.

This is one of the most chilling stories I've ever read.

The main character, Dr. Winters, is called on to act as a coroner for a small, rural town where a blast in a mine has resulted in multiple deaths. The explosion wasn't an accident.

The investigation is one of the last that Winters will participate in, because he is dying of cancer. The image of abnormal cells destroying healthy tissue and taking over the body hints at something else that Winters will experience before the story ends. (Winters, in a wry way, sometimes talks to his cancer, as if it's an entity with some degree of awareness.)

Among the chilling details are the visceral descriptions of an autopsy. Winters is sinking his hands into the aftermath of violent death. The language is elegant as it describes inelegant things. Winters' interactions with the bodies he examines also sets the stage for what he will experience by the time the story ends.

This story wouldn't have been worth reading if it was all about mindless gore. As awful and vivid as the physical details are, the atmosphere of psychological horror – the entrapment, helplessness, aloneness, and torture – is what lingers. Also, the story is excellent in how it uses the setting to enhance the horror: Winters, alone among the bodies in a small examination office ("... the generator's growl, and the silence of the dead, resurgent now").

It's also worth noting that the victims get a chance at the end to make a final spasm of effort to defeat the evil entity that has no pity for their poor flesh and for their minds and spirits.

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 #422

myology
A woman at the gym whistles and sings (something like, "Ooh, baby, don't leave me") as she does bicep curls. Her biceps are extremely well-defined. Maybe singing to them helps.

piercing
A teenaged girl poses for a professional photographer. A woman who's her mother, lovely too though blurrier around the edges with age, watches sharply, as if she's using her eyes to chisel her daughter.

pursuits
The toddlers stagger around blowing bubbles that they then try to catch with tiny hula hoops.

role
The latest game she's come up with is to have us pretend we're a variety of people auditioning for Hamilton. Seeing as I know few of the lyrics or melodies by heart, I'm the comic relief.

slogan
Heading down the block, I spot a man wearing a t-shirt that says "The Future Is Female," and a woman with a sweatshirt that says "Messy Hair Don't Care." Her hair is neatly pulled back.

splotch
Someone has brought a half-finished bottle of chocolate syrup to the food drive. Standing among the respectable canned foods and boxes of pasta and oatmeal, it looks sticky and disreputable.

uncomprehending
They think she's incapable of understanding people, when the real issue is that she isn't motivated to, mostly because the people around her don't invite understanding. They prod at her mind and lament that she doesn't think and feel as they do.

The Fits: Control and Loss of Control in Coming of Age

Title: The Fits (2015)
Director: Anna Rose Holmer
Language: English
Rating: Not Rated

While watching this movie, it occurred to me that I could have tuned out after 20 minutes if the lighting, the tone set by the music, or some other subtle element had been different. But the energy in The Fits, and the way all the elements came together, kept me engrossed in it. I found the movie compelling and thoughtful.

There's minimal dialogue, and a sense that there's so much more that needs to be said, but instead of being spoken, it's expressed in movement. The movie is filled with energy, much of it exploding out of the main character, Toni (Royalty Hightower), as she negotiates some of her first steps into puberty.

Set largely in an inner city community center, the movie focuses on two main activities. One is boxing, which is the boys' activity, though Toni starts off the movie training in it with guidance from her older brother. The other activity is dance, which is the girls' activity. Toni increasingly becomes drawn to the dance group, hovering at their perimeter, making some friends, but remaining uneasy about her place in it and what it means for her commitment to boxing.

The 'fits' refers to a kind of seizure that sweeps through the girls, affecting only them. It's never clear what it is exactly. In the movie, it's real enough (and very eerie), and it may represent something about the female body changing in adolescence, a kind of rite of passage. Toni witnesses the girls experience it, one by one, while not feeling anything like it herself. At least not at first.

The movie sets up various contrasts. Boys and girls, the vigor of boxing and the vigor of dance (the dancing is full of precision and power and includes punching movements, making it not too alien from Toni's experience of boxing). There are contrasts between the individual and the group, and tensions between simple conformity and a real sense of belonging. Are you doing something because it's expected or because you've found it's truly what you need or want to do? There are social pressures to fit in and find the place where one belongs, while struggling with doubt and feelings of displacement.

Toni also struggles to balance control over her body with the things she can't control. Mastering dance or boxing is an expression of power and individual commitment and skill. But the discomforts of growing up and changing, the loss of control that's part of experiencing the fits, these are overwhelming. They're frightening in how they can't be stopped.

The movements are the language in this movie. Toni and other characters make declarations with their movements and claim power for themselves through movement, even when confronted with the inexplicable and overwhelming fits, which seize control of their bodies and can't be resisted.

Week in Seven Words #387

concealment
Bored, he texts me from the party to list all the places where he could hide from the other guests. The shrubs by the pool provide good coverage. There's room for most of him behind the piano in the den.

freshening
I love an early Sunday walk when the light is soft and the streets are mostly empty.

humbling
I'm beaten badly by two children at Settlers of Catan. They rob me of all my resources. They laugh as I lose my lumber and ore.

refusal
There are different ways of saying good-bye. One is to avoid saying it at all, to turn away at the moment of parting and slip into another room.

soothed
She sits in a blanket nest on the bed and frets. I cup her cute bald head in my hand, and she calms.

teeming
A sulfurous odor leaks out of the pails of water he's set up in the basement for his plastic animals. He's lined some of the pails with dirt from the backyard, and without knowing it has invited new kinds of organisms into his collection, alive and bacterial.

unignorable
I don't pay attention to the tendons in my feet, until one of them painfully, insistently reminds me that it exists.