Celestial Conspiracy Theories

Having lost a day of the weekend to work and an hour to Daylight Savings, I viewed Monday's arrival as something of an affront, and the morning's snowfall as clear evidence of a celestial conspiracy to prevent me from spending my precious appointment-free morning curled up with The Politics of Community Policing in the window seat at Tutta Bella. Fortunately Seattle Public Schools used up all their snow days on fictional precipitation back in December, so once I dragged my groggy children out of bed by their hair, I was able to deliver them to school only a little later than usual and head down the hill into town.

I arrived at the café to find John camped out there with a shopping bag on the bar next to him, out of which he was dispensing mimosas in honor of Giovanni's 21st birthday. (Giovanni, for those of you not familiar with Columbia City's colorful cast of characters, is the morning barista at Tutta Bella. He makes the best coffee in town, hands down -- there's a "Fans of Giovanni" group on Facebook, even. The fact that he's young, Italian, and adorable doesn't hurt, of course. But it's really all about the coffee. Honest.) I tucked Community Policing back in my bag and raised a glass: Buon Cumpleanno!

During the ensuing champagne-fueled conversation the following information emerged:

a) Melissa is now sugaring at Vitality Pilates.

b) The snow was caused by John's daughter Charlotte, who apparently has superpowers and was spotted early this morning with her face pressed up against the window chanting "Snow.... Snow.... Snooooooooowwwww..."

c) Last week a fly-by-night brothel was kicked out of the basement of the little house in Madison Park that used to be Izilla Toys.

d) Someone (we thought it was Land's End, but turns out it's Eddie Bauer) has now invented the "fauxkini" -- a bathing suit that looks like a tankini, but is really a one-piece. Why?

e) In Italy they don't spank you on your birthday; instead they pull your ear as many times as you are old. Giovanni's were looking a little red, now that we think about it.

There's a lot to be said for the idea of starting out the week with a mimosa -- it gave the whole rest of the day a nice festive aura. There was some discussion at the bar about whether this should become a weekly ritual -- Mimosa Mondays! -- but I wonder if the unexpectedness of it all was a crucial element of the magic.

* * *

Later on, after wrestling all day with sentences like: "Prevailing stories draw discursive resources from references to empowering communities with specified capacities while narrowing the possibility of more empowered communities by ignoring the relational basis of these capacities, that is, social capital and reciprocity (discussed below)," I trudged up the hill toward school with Cloud Cult blasting on the iPod.

The snow had started falling again -- big, fat flakes flying around in the wind like feathers after a really good pillowfight. A couple of them landed on my coatsleeve, but they melted away before I could get a good look at their six-pointed structure. I looked up at the sky wondering how hard it would be to catch one on my tongue, and suddenly realized that there actually were feathers swirling around among the snowflakes. I couldn't find the source -- no pillowfights or dismembered birds around that I could see -- just these white downy feathers falling out of the sky.

Are you thinking what I'm thinking? Charlotte.