Norma and I got our flu shots in the Fall, just before winter holidays when large extended families travel far to gather and kiss germs all over each other as an expression of love and a test of faith. True, some people decline gatherings of celebratory infection in favor of safer demonstrations like snake-handling --unfortunately even
they consider it virtuous to go to church sick. The snakes must suffer greatly. This is the sort of civilized social dynamic that guarantees whatever virus slipped the vaccine will go forth and multiply.
Norma --whom I refer to in times like these as my stunt double-- caught that virus two weeks ago and I came down with it three days back. I now feel lousy all the time. Since I can't lie down without coughing this evening, I decided to see what's bloggable. Slim pickings. Had wanted to continue
Advanced Art Appreciation with this old favorite from the 1500s by Titian. It's called "The man with a glove":
But then my brother saw old pics in a previous post entitled,
Venustraphobia, A Case Study and sent me an old photo I'd not thought about for a long time:
It is called "L'Homme au aluminum chaise de jardin", or "Man with aluminum lawn chair". Perhaps it would be useful to inject an explanation. As Brother Frank wrote, this was taken "long ago", and long ago aluminum lawn furniture could oft be heard clacking and flapping overhead in mass migration to northern breeding grounds in August. These creatures would land for the day in peoples' yards to rest and were content to be sat on. With sturdy hollow bones and articulated joints they could support most people on their aerodynamic webbing. I would come home after 10 hours of working in the hop fields and collapse upon one or another of them. This brings us closer to the present.
Forty years after Frank's photo, 2009, I retired from gardening for this city's public school district. Strangely, my meteoric rise from farm laborer to gardener did not intimidate my children and cause them to live in my shadow. I have no explanation for this. I also have no explanation for my delirious, flu-flummoxed venture out into the garden today, seeing my reflection in the back porch windows, then hobbling in to report to my stunt double:
"Do you know there's an old diseased man creeping around in our garden?"
"Gah," said Norma.