I was thinking about Luciana's preoccupations with preparations. She was crazy with anxiety because I didn't get all enthused about buying helium-filled balloons to put on the door of the house. Before she was hospitalized she kept fantasizing about having people visit the house, sitting on the couch in the living room and drinking iced tea. She even went out and bought a large wooden tray to carry the drink on. She was despairing that we don't have a large glass pitcher with matching glasses. My reaction to all this: what madness!
I was reading last night about the Hundred Years War (Reformation & Counter-Reformation in the Netherlands) and found a wonderful description of the public works that were thrown into place to celebrate the arrival of the King of Spain's appointed regent in Brussels. All the artisans and artists suddenly had work, throwing up spectacular (and temporary) triumphal arches decorated with appropriately Catholic imagery, while housefronts and public places were fronted with great representations of dolphins, dragons, lions and monsters.
Maybe the balloons and the ice-tea-on-trays are just domestic versions of these great public celebrations, creating ceremonial passage through which the new Prince (or Princess) can make a suitably important entry.
Maybe blogging is the literary equivalent to erecting a cardboard and wood archway decorated with dolphins and dragons. An entryway for the arrival of princesses in this digital age.
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