I saw the world crashing all around your face

[sovay]

This afternoon my godchild's school was locked down because one of the students had a gun and the nineteenth and twentieth monarchs of the summer hatched. What am I supposed to say about the day itself? That I am reminded even without the martial canonization of a never-laid grief that nothing is easier to shovel under six feet of lime than memory? The last cousin of my grandparents' generation died earlier this week at nearly a century. The lines to the past snap fast enough, no one needs to hurry them along.

On that note, Andrew Kozma's "The Black Death" (2025). I like that Ulysses S. Grant is top of the list of historical characters Jared Harris wants to play, in part because of his civil rights commitments as president and as a counterweight to his negative figuration in the mythos of the Lost Cause. I need a door in the hall closet to BFI Southbank if they are going to keep doing inaccessibly tantalizing series like last year's complete Powell and Pressburger or, currently, Anna May Wong.

Comments

[gwynnega]

I am sorry to hear about the lockdown but happy that the day included monarchs.

[sovay]

I am sorry to hear about the lockdown but happy that the day included monarchs.

It's an all-time monarch record already! And my godson is safe.

[gwynnega]

I am so glad your godson is safe.

[nineweaving]

Thank heavens your godchild is safe. May a new world hatch with the monarchs.

Nine

[sovay]

Thank heavens your godchild is safe. May a new world hatch with the monarchs.

I am beginning to feel a little like Stephen Falken: we could be succeeded by a civilization of monarchs.

[ethelmay]

Is the door in the closet a reference to Josephine Daskam Bacon's The Door in the Closet?

[sovay]

Is the door in the closet a reference to Josephine Daskam Bacon's The Door in the Closet?

No! I do not know the novel. I was thinking more of general portals.

[mrissa]

So many sympathies on the lockdown, I hate this for you and godchild and everyone involved.

[sovay]

So many sympathies on the lockdown, I hate this for you and godchild and everyone involved.

*hugs*

My godchild conveyed with teenage laconicism that it was "a lot." It is not a place a country should be. The juxtaposition with recent news was also a bit of a trip.

[sabotabby]

I'm glad your godchild is safe. These things should never happen.

Hurray for monarchs!

[sovay]

I'm glad your godchild is safe. These things should never happen.

Thank you. I think sometimes about the fact that I belong to literally the last generation before school shootings were common and the problem is that then I feel violent.

Hurray for monarchs!

It's been such a summer for them!

[davidgillon]

Ugh on the lockdown. And America clearly needs more monarchs of the freely border crossing persuasion.

[sovay]

Ugh on the lockdown. And America clearly needs more monarchs of the freely border crossing persuasion.

Yes!

*hugs*

[aurumcalendula]

I'm sorry to hear about the lockdown. I'm glad your godchikd is safe and your day included monarchs!

[sovay]

I'm sorry to hear about the lockdown. I'm glad your godchikd is safe and your day included monarchs!

Thank you!

[scifirenegade]

Glad godchild is safe. Absolutely rotten thing.

Ah, monarchs...

All Anna May Wongs? Lucky those who get to go there.

[sovay]

Glad godchild is safe. Absolutely rotten thing.

Thank you. It is just not a thing that should happen. This state should never have been encouraged to happen.

Ah, monarchs...

We've never had so many in one summer before. The twenty-first took flight this morning.

All Anna May Wongs? Lucky those who get to go there.

Right? Teleporter!

[selkie]

Last night he slept for a few hours in our bed for the first time since we intentionally co-slept him for nourishment reasons. He’s always needed his own [brumation pit conditions] to sleep. He’s coming home after 5th period. It’s all revolting.

[sovay]

Last night he slept for a few hours in our bed for the first time since we intentionally co-slept him for nourishment reasons. He’s always needed his own [brumation pit conditions] to sleep. He’s coming home after 5th period. It’s all revolting.

Tell him I love him.

[selkie]

He’s apparently working with clay but says 🐴🔪 .

[sovay]

He’s apparently working with clay but says 🐴🔪.

Stabby horse back!

[thisbluespirit]

Oh, gosh, I'm so sorry.

That is a beautiful monarch, though. It looks almost unreal.

[sovay]

Oh, gosh, I'm so sorry.

*hugs*

It's just not a thing I should have to report was part of a day. And no one was even ("even") shot, but that's not the point.

That is a beautiful monarch, though. It looks almost unreal.

I love the soft glow as if by their own wings.

[minoanmiss]

Okease hug your godchild as soon as you get a chance (hug them for me)

[sovay]

Okease hug your godchild as soon as you get a chance (hug them for me)

Absolutely. The plan is still to travel for Yom Kippur and I can pass on the electronic version before then.

*hugs*

[selkie]

CAREFUL HE BITES

[sovay]

CAREFUL HE BITES

I GOT MY SHOTS

[radiantfracture]

my godchild's school was locked down

My god that's awful. I am sorry for your godchild and all the children. (I am sorry *to* them.) I am glad you have small beauties to captivate the heart but I wish small beauties scaled better --

I mean they do, for the viewer, they can overtake everything, that's the point -- but I wish there was something to be made of them, or some larger social analogue.

Anyway I am glad the butterflies were thought of and planned for and now are.

[sovay]

My god that's awful. I am sorry for your godchild and all the children. (I am sorry *to* them.) I am glad you have small beauties to captivate the heart but I wish small beauties scaled better --

*hugs*

I wish they did, too. No one including the kid with the gun was hurt, but it's a silver lining to a cloud that should never form.

Anyway I am glad the butterflies were thought of and planned for and now are.

It's less planning than finding the eggs or the newly hatched caterpillars on the milkweed and bringing them inside to be nourished through their growth and metamorphosis, but they are one of the nicest parts of the summer and I hope they contribute to healthy migrations. We wish them safe journeys when they fly.

[genarti]

Oh, man. I'm glad everyone is okay, for "this lockdown happened" definitions thereof, but I hate everything about this.

Love to your godchild and love to his parents and you and all involved. I'm glad the day contained monarchs emerging.

[sovay]

Oh, man. I'm glad everyone is okay, for "this lockdown happened" definitions thereof, but I hate everything about this.

As with so much of everything that happens in this country, I keep running mentally up against it being wrong. It's maddening. It's a misshaping of the world.

Love to your godchild and love to his parents and you and all involved. I'm glad the day contained monarchs emerging.

Thank you! We are down to the last chrysalis following the successful launch of Stripey the Twenty-First.

*hugs*

[a_reasonable_man]

So scary to hear about the lockdown and so sad to see the final passing of a generation--those old enough to remember FDR and the start of the Second World War. But I'm glad the monarchs took flight. Long may they reign.

[sovay]

So scary to hear about the lockdown and so sad to see the final passing of a generation--those old enough to remember FDR and the start of the Second World War. But I'm glad the monarchs took flight. Long may they reign.

We keep seeing them return every summer, their four-generation migration. At least they remember.

[asakiyume]

Blessings on the butterflies. May children with butterflies on their hands and heads one day be AT LEAST as common as children with guns (or children threatened by them).

[sovay]

Blessings on the butterflies. May children with butterflies on their hands and heads one day be AT LEAST as common as children with guns (or children threatened by them).

Amen.