Essays in Idleness

Last evening over Parkdale, the sky having cleared, the sublime marvel of a thin crescent moon put me under its arrest, low to the western horizon. Yet Venus was able to fit underneath, like the dot on a question mark.

Having no moon of her own, she is lonely. She has nor cat nor dog, neither, nor any living company, or so the astronomers believe.

I stood on my balcony, in the cold, bestilled; and in thanksgiving not only for a vulgar politician (see yesterday), but for a cosmos. In a moment, Venus was gone; and the Moon, too, was setting.

O, swear not by the moon, the fickle moon, the inconstant …

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From bathos to pathos, follow me gentle reader.

Today would be Black Friday, that one day in the year when I harass you for money. Please drop whatever you were planning, and send me some. I will not ask again! … unless I survive until Black Friday next year. But send nothing if you are expecting an inflatable globe, a digital alarm clock, a teeshirt or even a flowery thank-you note in return. What you now see is what you get, and I cannot promise regularity. Should I suddenly die, or migrate to Brazil, you will get no refund; although fourteen hundred previous Idleposts might well remain uploaded.

I don’t need much to get by, but I do need something, and a dollar is not worth much any more. I do have other income, but so small it is hardly worth taxing, I fondly hope. From anything but an old-fashioned paper cheque, something will be deducted by Messrs PayPal, or a worse authority, such as a guvmint. As I am not a communist, environmentalcase, or pervert, I am ineligible for charity status, so no tax advantage. This is all part of modern life, we must take our lumps. The less we complain, the less our progressive masters will retaliate.

Or if you don’t send money, think nothing of it, either. The great majority of my readers never do. If cornered, they might give an excuse, but I haven’t the technology to corner them.

I think I would continue this antiblog if no one sent me anything at all; but the proposition hasn’t been tested yet.

My request is itself dubious. I am often “double-minded” (beloved Punjabi phrase) about what good scribbling can accomplish, let alone scribbling on behalf of lost causes. Often one feels one is writing on water. The world ceased to value any sort of thought, long before it invented Black Friday.

But I am sincerely grateful to all who support my wee brazen scheme. I see every name (with the amount) as it pings in, or slides from the envelope, and pause to thank God for each gift, and each giver.