Did you ever read Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Cat’s Cradle? It’s one I read in my early twenties, and certain phrases and coinages have entered my personal lexicon: your karass is basically your tribe–the people that you are destined to meet. A duprass is a karass of two very tightly bound people, and a granfalloon is a false karass, people who identify with something essentially trivial and meaningless. I think he uses the example “Hoosiers.” In the book, there is a religion, called Bokononism–you’ll have to read the book to get the full description. But “Busy, busy, busy” is what a Bokononist says when confronted with the mysterious, unfathomably complicated workings of life.
I find retirement to be busy, busy. busy. That is, the wonder of life is very present, along with wondering how I ever found time to work. In any case, I missed Monday’s poem this week, and didn’t even remember I missed it until today. It’s too late. In the meantime, I highly recommend Cat’s Cradle. I reread it a few years ago, and I think it holds up pretty well.
“Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly;
Man got to sit and wonder ‘why, why, why?’
Tiger got to sleep, bird got to land;
Man got to tell himself he understand.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Cat’s Cradle
Pretty darn good. Did you remember that?