April was wild.
May was cathartic.
June is gumptious.
gumption (noun): [adjectives: gumptious or gumptionless]
- 1. initiative; aggressiveness; resourcefulness.
- 2. courage; spunk; guts.
- 3. common sense; shrewdness.
Yeah. As the middle-aged adults say these days, “that tracks.” (Cuz, are the teenagers saying this or do they have some newer affirmative said aloud?) From week 1 of June to week 2 and week 3 just before the weekend. I feel vigorous having 8 days left in June, oh, where Cancer’s shadow casts over the calendar, to know this gumption, likely with fleeting moments of being gumptionless.
For two-thirds of this month, that is, until this morning, I haven’t had the one word descriptor like I did in April and May, both of which were evident and formed aloud in late April. In not knowing, I’ve been patient, curious, attentive, and waiting for word resonance; it hasn’t been for lack of wordplay, there’s been plenty of exploration with vernacular for the 3 weeks since May 31 as recently as AMR last Friday, reading the poetry of Mosab Abu Toha, even putting a podcast on yesterday during brunch listening to Ada Limon read poems on an On Being stage with Krista Tippett in Minnesota in 2023 recounting a childhood in two homes, immersed in a multilingual childhood, stories of nuanced Sonoma County that diluted my internalized racial oppression, and adulting in this post-social distancing society. That recorded conversation resonated for each of us, as we both listened yesterday, in different places and ways.
washing dishes: a father’s glimpses 