Cryptics

The old green hand-me-down tupperware container that holds the cat food looks almost exactly like the one that holds the flour. One day I'm going to get them mixed and end up with cats looking like they're hooked on blow.

"Why are your cats doing lines of cocaine off the bathroom floor?" she'll ask, standing in the doorway looking down at their twitching tails.

"The better question," I'll respond, "is 'how do they hold the straw?'"

***

Sitting down at a table in the Starbucks corner of Barnes & Noble, I find a pile of books that tell a story all together. Two books on golf and five books on love, ending with Talk to Me Like I'm Someone You love.

***

If I wrote a musical about my love life right now, the title song would be "Let's Do Something." And it would go, a little something, like this:

"I think I'd like to do something with her!"

"What's something?"

"I don't know! We were both pretty vague on the subject!"

"Why so vague?"

"I bet you think this song is about you!"

"What? No I don't!"

"You're so vague!"

"Your ass is vague."

"That doesn't make sense."

"I'll make your ass sense."

And it would star the cast of Community, with Jeff playing myself; Annie, Britta and Shirley alternating as the object of my affection; Troy and Abed playing themselves because why mess with success; and Chevy Chase in the role of Fletch, rather than Pierce because, c'mon, Fletch. Ooh, or maybe that doggy from the movie where the guy dies and comes back as a dog and it's Chevy Chase that voices the dog. I loved that movie.*

*It was called Oh Heavenly Dog and the doggy was played by Benji.**

**Replace Fletch with Benji.

***

I've talked about this before, but here, again. Every now and then I'll swing around in my chair and look out at the books and toys and dvds and stuff on my shelves and think about what of all this is excessive. It's difficult to pinpoint the difference between keep and keep not. It's a finely honed feeling that tells me the difference.

I set things on the coffee table. The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway. Catcher in the Rye. A few graphic novels, most of the Jeffrey Brown books I own, some DVD's I don't think I could download, several books on Buddhism and just one toy, the green Fin Fang Foom action figure I got when I was 16 which, arguably, decided the course of the rest of my life.

That's it. It's a small fraction of what I own, but when I look at the rest of it ... it just doesn't feel necessary. It's neat, yes, and I wouldn't say I own any of it just to own it. Everything has it's own specific enjoyment, it's own story, but when I think of what I have to have ... it all just falls away.

I can't dig in for any deeper meaning. I could, but it's not what I'm feeling. It's just something simple.

I might do it. I don't think I'd miss any of it and I could use the money to travel. I think I'd much rather have that experience than something to hold onto for later.

***

I mock my cats. They meow at me, I meow back, sarcastically. And sometimes, to make them meow, I'll mouth the word. And then they do it. It's like magic. Cat magic. Caaaaagic.