What's lurking around the corner?

Nothing ominous here.
(Not our Tiger, but could easily pass for him.)

O told me at dinner that he is "kind of scared all the time because"  he "could just walk around any corner and die." Z loudly proclaimed that she did not want to talk about this. I asked O if there is something in particular he is scared of around that corner. He thought for a second and said, "No, I just have figured life out, and I know that you can die at any moment."

I nodded, said something about our odds being good at any particular moment, and started trying to construct some piece of wisdom that would be reassuring but not bromidic. Some other subject flew across the table before I could come up with the right thing to say. I breed existentialists.

Reading: I got to sit and read Ex-Prom Queen while Z practiced violin. That's a loaded scene right there. Third wave feminist mother reads second wave feminist coming-of-age novel while 10-year-old daughter studiously applies herself to her exacting instrument. Made weirder by the fact I was reading the passage in ExPQ in which Shulman's narrator describes her school-aged socially mandated shedding of "boyish" interests and her dawning understanding of her feminine role:

"In fact, from the moment we got kicked out of the trees and sent into the walk-in doll house back in kindergarten, our movements and efforts had been so steadily circumscribed, our permissible yearnings so confined, that the only imprint left for us to make was on ourselves" (21).

Writing: A bit in the early morning, but I was interrupted by Z coming downstairs. She curled up with me on the couch and read for a little while, but then asked me to put down my computer and play a round of Egyptian Rat Kill (card game) with her. I did not feel I could say no. After all, death lurks around every corner. It was a heated game. She won.

Dinner: Rotini and jarred sauce with mixed lettuce and almond salad.

Note for the week: I have an inordinate number of limes. We will be making many limey dishes.

Soundtrack: I wish the DJ would just go ahead and turn it up already, so Coco Jones could stop hollering at him.

Random thing: Z's friend J, a bit older (6th grade) but practically a twin in many ways, wears goth-y smudged dark eye makeup wherever she goes. She told me this afternoon the triumphant tale of how she used her aunt to help her convince her mom that is was a necessity for her well being as a person.