anthropometaphors

It’s been unusually hot in SF this week, with cities in the Bay Area easily clearing the century mark. While my cats and I languished in the heat, I read about stormy weather and rainclouds.

Imagine: a catastrophic flood had drowned the entirety of Earth’s population beneath 7 miles of water, save a children’s hospital full of sick and deformed children in various stages of dying. Everyone and everything – dead and gone. Present and future had suddenly merged into one enormous flood of water. The only life remaining is the (seemingly) random assortment of employees, visitors, sickly and unfortunate that happened to be within the walls of a miraculously floating hospital on a particularly stormy night. This is the premise of Chris Aiden’s The Children’s Hospital, a recent McSweeney’s novel that literally haunts my dreams.

Despite my miserable description of Aiden’s text, I find the story irresistible. To stretch the water metaphor a bit, I began to think of myself as a wee sponge taking in the immensity of the flood that defines the world upon which the hospital floats. I’d read chapters at a time only to find my fingertips shriveled like prunes and my mind waterlogged with curiosity for children I’ll never meet. All from the safety of my kitty-ensconced couch.

In parallel, I’ve begun reading Granta #101, which is atypically themeless and, as a result, somewhat hodgepodge. The new editor, Jason Cowley, has re-opened the format of Granta. In the Editor’s Letter, Cowley clearly states his intention as Granta’s new editor:

Many assumptions have been made about Granta: we don’t publish writing about writing, we don’t publish poetry and each issue is themed…Granta has always succeeded when at its boldest and most unpredictable, when it has sought to challenge and confront as well as entertain and inform. Our intention, then, is to publish new writing in whichever form of genre we choose; to be more internationalist in outlook and ambition, to publish more literature in translation, more photography, more investigations and long-form reportage.

Speaking of large bodies of water acting in unpredictable – and undesirable – ways, a letter from Akash Kapur entitled “The disappearing beach” demands recognition. In short, Kapur describes the very non-fictitious account of several beaches disappearing due to economic development in India. Ports developed on idyllic beach front property – without even cursory environmental impact assessments – have caused the unbelievably fast destruction of delicate beach property near Pondicherry on the order of 30 metres of beach lost to erosion “in just a few months”.

Aiden’s piece describes the heaven-sent annihilation of >99% of the human population for yet undisclosed reasons.  The environmental devastation taking place in India has been driven by government officials insistent upon modernization for the benefit of the country and it’s people.  However, the lives of those in villages adjacent to eroded beaches are swimming in chaos and uncertainty; livelihood, home and family have been lost to the erosion.

In the face of the port’s clear failure, the Pondicherry government is considering building a new, larger port south of the existing site:

Local environmentalists have warned that a new port risks destroying a hundred-mile stretch of the coast.  But the government is insistent: India is developing, modernizing and Pondicherry can’t be left behind.

I feel the urge to surround myself with small, healthy plants. There’s something special about having fresh soil beneath my fingernails and pebbles in my pockets.

I’ve undertaken – what I’m coming to understand will be – the lifelong endeavor of appeasing the urge of my demanding green thumb by creating a wee living collage of succulents representative of the >300 species comprising the genera. Priceless as it is green, the small arrangement sits, turgid with life and water, as a centerpiece on the soon-to-be-painted coffee table.

a collage of theft

Perhaps “free” or even “stolen” would be a more appropriate adjective than “priceless” as the entirety of the collage was acquired by liberating succulent cuttings from plants who’ve overgrown their containers I’d encountered while meandering through various neighborhoods. I am a thief of life.

Possessing the omnipotence of a human stem cell, an entire plant – a clone – can be grown from a sampling of a full-grown succulent like jade or aloe. Knowing this, I would poke around streetside container gardens overflowing with a particular plant of interest, uprooting or taking a budding sample from a vigorously growing individual. So ripe were my selections for pruning, they nearly jumped into my waiting palm. With whispered thanks and a lilt in my step, I pocketed my treasure nonchalantly, happily toying with dirt clods in my pocket as a slowly walked on.

I can rationalize my theft to be harmless, if not beneficial!, to the donor plant (and it’s caretaker), as plants growing so densely are prone to disease and other unpleasant infestations. Perhaps it’s time I host a plant cutting party, as a way to voluntarily share cuttings with folks and prune back overgrown root balls of my own.

Speaking of overgrown root balls, I actually will have some of my own soon enough. We’re moving into our house in Berkeley at the end of May, complete with front-, side- and back-yards for gardening.