Pears and Cardamon

I’ve spread the dining table with the Thanksgiving tablecloth, orange and maroon turkeys on a black background. Last night we had roast chicken and afterward, while the children and their guest cleared the dishes and set the table with rummikub, I sliced pears, ripe but firm, and cut butter into oatmeal.

After husband had won the the game and the children had thundered upstairs, I made a pot of strong tea and brought in the crisp, studded with small points of cardamon. Together we watched “Bad Education” by Almodovar.

I watched the beginning twice, so struck was I by the opening credits. “Woman on the Edge of a Nervous Breakdown” too had striking credits. The final credit in the opening sequence is on an image of women printed in Technicolor – the camera pulls back to reveal the wall on which the image hangs, the room in which the wall stands, the dwelling of which the wall is a part.

Everything is part of a whole.