Among Other Things...Potholders

I've been thinking alot about what in fantasy we call magic; in religion, prayer; and science, string theory because when my dog was hit by a car and bolted off in flight mode I felt like she was in a different dimension for the five days she was missing, and it was prayer, the magic of dreams and portals, and a healing candle from New Orleans that I lit in my kitchen by her food and water bowls that brought her back. A suitcase of someone's life packed by his daughter decades ago is a time machine full of such magic and inter-dimensional portals. When I had my housewarming a few weeks ago my aunt asked me what I needed, and I said potholders. As we were saying goodbye on the first day we began going through the papers in her father's suitcase, she asked me if I still needed potholders; I said yes, and she gave me two that she had made for her father around fifty years ago and that were in the suitcase. It felt like magic: her father blessing our project and saying to me that there are things in the suitcase of value to me and my personal life. The importance of the kitchen--a place of stability and sustenance--is where we eat. There is more here to tell about how people in the land of the dead use texts to talk to us in the land of the living and the story behind the pot I needed the potholders for. For another time...

The Papers of Paul Morgan Genge

I'm starting a new project. My aunt has a suitcase of her father's papers. Her father was Hollywood actor Paul Morgan Genge, best known for his role as Mike in the movie Bullit (1968). My aunt has been meaning to go through his papers for decades now. What is our responsibility to the legacy of our parents? What of value and to whom might we find? My aunt has asked me to help her with the latter question in the months following her diagnosis of stage four pancreatic cancer. I told her I would help her and document the process on my blog. Sometimes all we need is a deadline to get a project moving. Today was the first step. Taking out and opening the suitcase. The next step is sorting through and organizing the papers--letters, manuscripts, published writings, notebooks, daily calendars, random notes, among other things.