just now i happened to plug in my telephone. that's the phone right here on my desk that is NEVER pluggged in because almost no one ever calls me and i need the jack for this here splendid old imac that i may be connected to this corner of the universe....

ok. well, really this unplugged condition is a mild, passively resistant attitude towards whatever force in the cosmos will not fix me up with a separate line. it would be so cool to talk on the phone and fiddle online simultaneously. if my dear old gray-haired mother can do it, why can't i? well, it's true, almost nobody ever calls me - but maybe i could call them - those others who never call me. yeah. i could do that. stranger things have happened.

so for some reason - following some dark random impulse - i plugged it in just now and found that little red message light smoldering like the eye of a bad dog from hell - blaming me.

aw damn, says i to no one in particular, how long has that been there?

and i'm getting ready to beat myself up and figure some kind of excuse for the offended party (some kind of excuse like ... uh ... my phone wasn't plugged in?) when i hear, "message received 2:02 p.m. friday february first." now that's not so bad ... almost normal .. a very respectable temporal differential. some kind of fateful timing no doubt. might as well give it a listen.

it's fr. dan from the provincial office. he's calling to remind me about "those medical documents i sent you about three weeks ago." wants me to return his call. wants those documents. seriously wants them.

oh. those. they're not really medical. they're legal.

it hasn't actually been just three weeks. it's been at least three years - certainly longer - since these papers and i began our monkey dance. their formal name is "durable power of attorney for healthcare." yeah. that. who gets to pull the plug - if (when) it (i) should ever come to that.

i've had many reminders. i just haven't gotten around to it. the papers get lost. i keep forgetting. i can't find anybody to witness it at the moment. it's not that important right now.

i remember that i had just about done it over a year ago. i even showed it to my brother pat. he had seemed a bit unhappy with my choices. then i set it down and forgot about it.

i know that you'll see this as classic avoidance behavior. i figure that's what dan believes he's dealing with (i can't imagine that i'm the only one he's having trouble with). i must be delaying this business because i am not prepared to deal with the potential eventual reality to which it pertains. i must be, you say. look, i can't even write the word.

sure i can.

dead dying deathdeadly dyingdeath. and dead. see. some day i'm gonna die be dead and die. some day i'm gonna be sick unto death and then the lights will go out. dead as a doorknob (don't know about them doornails). dead as a rock. dead as the ungainly clod o'er which the rude plowboy trods. dumb dirt dead. it's gonna happen. dead as last night's dinner. no doubt about it. and it could happen sooner rather than later. it could happen tonight or tomorrow. i know it. dead certain. it's happening right now in the tiny dark bits of me. damn tootin'. dead. me. deader than dead. kaput.

well, you get the point. dan wants me to sign the papers so they'll know what to do with my remainders just before - and just after - they become such. these are only tangentially medical documents. they are primarily legal and secondarily financial. they give somebody the right to act in the event that i may be tempted to overstay my welcome and start to stink up the place and cost way too much in the process. i understand that. and it's fine with me. not a problem. popthetubes and pulltheplug.

so why have i not signed the papers? (until now, that is. there they are. signed. not sealed. because i lacks a witness.)

i have not signed until this moment because i am a lazy son of a gun. i hate paperwork - just ask my students - will put it off and put it off. i'm sorry to have caused such effort on dan's part. he has better things to do, i bet.

but it's all settled now. the check's in the mail. or will be soon enough.

We defy augury. There's a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come. If it be not to come, it will be now. If it be not now, yet it will come. The readiness is all.

William Shakespeare