Shel Graves' Sensorium

Was the Worst Moment When...?  Or, Stolen Moments  Was the worst moment when I stood in my black velvet pantsuit and my pink Trample the Patriarchy t-shirt featuring a defiant unicorn — and realized nothing would be trampled — except me. Was the worst moment when you and I realized we were now in Seattle at the worst party ever, when The Stranger did its sad balloon drop, when the sympathetic man next to me said, "It wasn't about misogyny." — but it was. Was the worst moment when I talked to my matriarchs, when my aunt emailed, "I am in mourning."; when my mother said, "I'm scared."; when our mothers feared for their Medicare and said they wanted to protest — and they may. Was the worst moment when I watched despair spilling through my friends' Facebook feeds... Was the worst moment when it wasn't over... Was the worst moment when I turned off National Public Radio and drove to work in silence and stopped checking the front pag...

Senses of 2016...  Worst of 2016:  Taste:  None! (It was just a delightful year in taste, I recall nothing unpleasant!) Sight: A wine glass broken: the stem separated from the cup; blood-smeared and shivering in pain Smell: a stale peopled room Sound: "That's just logistics."; "Does that make sense?"; Snog - "Corporate Slave" Touch: aching heel, plantar fasciitis; a scraped shoulder, scraped knees; painfully vibrating bass; the rollercoaster on the Santa Monica Pier, eyes squeezed shut (and, yet, those last two kind of fun!) Extra: failing in multiple ways to make pancakes; smug and brutal cardiologists; a terrible minion Worst of the year is inspired by Molly Tenenbaum's "Ode to the Ugly Colors," in The Cupboard Artist by Floating Bridge Press

Best senses of 2016... Fiction of the Year: "That's the horror, the most awful thing: to have a child the world wants to destroy and know that you're helpless to help him. Nothing worse than that. Nothing worse." — Matt Ruff, Lovecraft Country — my review here Also, I read a number of excellent novels toward the end of the year and am still soaking in their goodness: Arcadia , Lauren Groff Hag-Seed and The Heart Goes Last , Margaret Atwood, age 77 and she gets better and better Memoirs of a Polar Bear , Yoko Tawada Too Like the Lightening , Ada Palmer Nonfiction Books of the Year:  "You should eat more fruits and vegetables as if your life depended on it, because maybe it does." —   How Not to Die , Dr. Michael Greger,   nutritionfacts.org  —   my book review  "It is these undeniable qualities of human love and compassion and self-sacrifice that give me hope for the future...we fight, we kill. But we are also capable of the most ...

Best senses of 2016... Quotes of 2016: "We have to get to know each other better...it makes us understand one another better, trust each other more, and live together more peacefully." — buddy-baer.com   Why animal activism? "Because it's the magic bullet that fixes everything...famine, ocean acidification, cancer, heart disease, zoonotic disease, rainforest, ebola, climate change are all linked to animal agriculture." — Moby on the Rich Roll Podcast  "Utopia is on the horizon. When I walk two steps, it takes two steps back. I walk ten steps and it is ten steps further away. What is utopia for? It is for this, for walking." — Eduardo Galeano  "Some commonly expressed themes in utopian writing include the following: social harmony and justice meld symbiotically with personal freedom peace and love overcome war and hatred material welfare is achieved for all without recourse to greed or exploitation work, if it exists, is almost alway...

Best senses of 2016...  Touch of 2016: I discovered trail running — what a hoot:   running up a trail over rocks and roots leaping over a stream - Grand Ridge Trail and ran the Seattle Marathon over the I-90 bridge in the wind and the rain. Also: paws, whiskers, soft fur, the cat's belly — Mary Shelley smooth fruit shakes spring air and petals  an apple that fits perfectly in the palm of your hand dance church - touching shoulders ocean breeze

Best senses of 2016... Smells of 2016:  morning forest and autumn leaves after light rain — trail running! waffle cones , trdlo, milano cookie — the scent of the streets of Prague glühwein - anise, cloves, cinnamon, merlot — from Leipzig to Cafe Flora

My best of senses for 2016...  Sounds of 2016: One of my favorite parts of training for my first marathon was all the time I spent outside, so this year my sounds of the year are birdsong and Icicle Creek, which I ran along and listened to while running my the Leavenworth Oktoberfest Marathon. When we traveled to Germany and the Czech Republic and walked all around Berlin, Prague and Leipzig I also asked, "Where was the birdsong loudest in Tiergarten (Berlin), on Petřín hill (Prague) or Clara Zetkin Park (Leipzig)?" Also: the Rich Roll podcast, " Peace + Plants " friends' laughter purring, meowing via Mary Shelley "something to amuse the palate" — our server at Cafe Flora's Thanksgiving  "Turn up the bass, the bass, the bass..." — Johnny Rotten at WGT a magical concert: Peter Murphy acoustic at The Triple Door jangling medals: Lake Washington Half, Anacortes Art Dash pickle, Seattle Marathon clapping, cheering  during the L...