Dancing animals

There is no notebook in the bedside table, so I write on the San Francisco Guide to the Arts, in the narrow spaces between advertisements.

I flossed last night for the first time in a few weeks and my gums are sore this morning.

Eliminating everything that doesn't need to be there: musical notes, words, motions.

Paintings of dancing animals: that is a subject I would not think to paint if I was a painter.

I know the things that my parents did and said, but not the things they thought.