Roofless Ruin

September 30, 2008

Michael Minor’s wife writes from Cleveland Clinic:

It is anticipated that by tomorrow the atypical cells will be over 90%. Dear God, please help us.

I burst into tears, the balance of which I recognized as rage. The first person who says, "God is showing his glory through this, too" gets punched in the face.

The roofers have most of the old roof torn off. DJ says they worked until it was too dark to work anymore. I told them of the water jug in the fridge. They refilled it. These things impress me.

Tuesday after Black Monday on the Stock Market. For the first time, every single one of my stocks was plunging. For comfort I looked on the NYSE website to see that every single stock in the world was plunging (except a few obscure real estate ventures. Who knows why?) Worst since 9/11? Worse than that? I checked online, where they are saying it was the worst day, ever.
Glad I could join up just in time.

Picked the winner of the Jane Bingham Prize. Turns out that he and I won the Siena Prize in adjacent years–he with this very, and apparently already much-honored, play.

*
Evening

The roof was off as the first rain we’ve had in a week came swirling out of the west. I was home when it happened. Water poured into the light fixtures, sending them crashing, water-filled, onto whatever lay below. Cracks appeared in the ceiling following the seams, and water dripped out of them as from the ceiling of a cave. The ceilings are ruined; the piano is probably ruined; my computer survived but the printer didn’t; stacks of documents on the desk are waterlogged, and possibly ruined. Water flowed down the picture window on the inside. I ran out and said, "Water is streaming into my house." The guy on the roof said, "I know."

A comedy improv group in Chicago called Bad Review takes the worst play review in the Chicago papers and improves the play the critic apparently wanted to see. Last week it was–yes– Anna Livia, Lucky in Her Bridges. Fame but grows.

All I have to do is read the above to know why, before eight o’clock, I am almost too weary to drag myself to bed.