two years ago (today)...

i invited a friend to my apartment and asked her to perform a puja on a small altar i had obtained four days earlier. i had purchased it at a thrift store in the western end of the county, and the location was staffed exclusively by downtrodden employees who lived in barracks-style dormitories on the property. the compound came into existence because (allegedly) a man had a vision of Jesus Christ in Fort Lauderdale in the 1950's. but this is beside the point.

the point is that the altar cost four dollars, and my purchase was inspired not so much by a vision as by blind faith. something compelled me to spend the weekend sanding and stripping the layers of varnish off the nightstand, and once this task was complete, i reapplied three layers of eggshell, hiding from the downpours under the stairwell at my apartment building. Mardou was in Denver with her boyfriend for Labor Day weekend and i was certain with her return would come the news of her relationship's demise, freeing us from the totem of infidelity around which we had been dancing.

that's not what happened, but this is also beside the point.

the point is that my friend came over and performed the puja. she explained to me that the altar would be no more holy after the ceremony than it had been before, that we were merely bringing awareness to the divinity that already dwelled within. she said that it had been

holy in the thrift store,

holy as a nightstand,

holy as lumber,

holy as a tree.

she said it would be holy in the landfill, long after i was gone...

the altar now sits in the bedroom we share.