decorating, talking, listening

Yesterday in the morning I got a call from P saying I was needed at the temple--she forgot to ask me beforehand, but could I come right away to help set up for Krishna? I said yes and hopped in the shower and drove over there. I pinned garlands of fake flowers to the railings of the bridge that goes to the island where Krishna's statue is. The sun was hot. I'm going back this morning to do more work. Then Saturday morning I'll help make garlands of real flowers for adorning the Krishna statue during that evening's celebration of Krishna's birthday.

Then in the evening we went to the other P's place to drop off a proofread manuscript. His best friend J showed up on her bike, and we all talked for a while. She told us the translation of the characters on her hat, and P showed us a page of a book J made that was hanging on the wall of his living room. It felt really good to spend a little while. We share a sense of humor and goodwill.

Then Erik and I went to the Marxist talk I had been looking forward to for a long time, a talk by Martha E. Gimenez--she spoke on race and class in Obama's political discourse. It was really good, and my mind was stimulated by her thoughts and the thoughts of the other talk-goers during the discussion period.