Strangeness & 18

Such strangeness to mothering. My left thumb is sore today and I'm rubbing it, hoping to reiki out the pain. I broke it two years ago, on a horse, of course. But yesterday Minky whacked her thumb, the left one, playing a break-neck game of volleyball (I cheered till I was hoarse) and she thinks it's dislocated. Today my thumb, which never hurts, feels sore and swollen.

The Times (UK) has actually given column space to the superstitions and theories going around the internet regarding the Chinese earthquake. Many people predicted it, but were told 'run along' by the government. A pond completely drained of water. Thousands of frogs descended on one town; a mass migration of a million butterflies plagued another. I like this stuff. It reminds me of the Act 2, scene 1 of Midsummer Night's Dream, when Oberon and Titania are fighting and the whole world turns upside down (not coincidentally, Minks and I were reading this for her homework two nights ago)

Titania:
	Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
	Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
90	That rheumatic diseases do abound.
	And thorough this distemperature we see
	The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
	Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
	And on old Hiems' thin and icy crown
95	An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
	Is, as in mockery, set. The spring, the summer,
	The childing autumn, angry winter change
	Their wonted liveries, and the mazèd world,
	By their increase, now knows not which is which.
100	And this same progeny of evils comes
	From our debate, from our dissension.
	We are their parents and original.

My 18 year old son was not too happy to be woken at 6:45am for a birthday breakfast (Happy Birthday Ned!). J got up before me and covered the room in purple, pale green and white streamers, and I plonked an enormous jug of pink, orange and green flowers on the table. Minks put cherries and strawberries in bowls, and there were warm croissants and toasted bagels. He scowled through breakfast and theorized that we should fix the problems in our city before sending money to Myanmar or China. "The earth's population is like a great beach," I said, feeling clever "There are millions of grains of sand, but we are all connected. When something happens to one of us, it happens to all of us." "Yeah" he says sarcastically "great theory Mamma" and continues to make faces at his sister.