perfection

the much missed actor and writer spalding gray used to talk in one of his many monologues about ‘perfect moments’…when just about everything lined up in a sweet second to create this sense that everything was right, whole

in swimming to cambodia he talks of his time filming the killing fields and relaxing in thailand, cambodia and nearby islands…when on a beautiful sunny day events and elements conspired into one such moment…and it was he that i thought of as i bumped the tractor around the field intricately cutting the grass between new trees and fruit bushes, admiring both my new found skills as a tractor driver and the peach tree that id saved from peach leaf curl by carefully removing any blighted leaf on first sight

slowly it had regained its vigour, until it stood handsome and full of leaves, 6 months planted and now four feet tall

i remembered a discussion with a friend who laughed at spalding’s idea of perfect moments, insisting that perfection and genius were by their nature ephemeral, and needed an element of ‘crapness’, something to dirty them a little…the southampton player matt le tissier (whos sporadic moments of true footballing genius were sweetly counterbalanced by the sight of his portly frame being dragged around the pitch to no great effect for most minutes of most games) demonstrated this perfectly he said …genius had to be faulty to be genius…who else could score a staggering 48 (and yet not quite a perfect 49) penalties out of 49 in his career? he argued

as i sang rufus wainwrights ‘peach trees’ at the top of my voice, mercifully drowned from poor neighbours ears by the engine …a perfect moment beckoned …the sun blazing, the cool wind blowing, the beautiful peach tree rejuvenated, the chicken pecking and the sight of my wife planting in the garden

a man at home with his lucky life, what could be better … i knew what spalding was talking about

as i, distracted by the moment, mismanouevered the tractors topper across the peach tree turning it into a thousand pieces of sweet smelling mulch, the needle scratching across rufus’ voice in my head, the keepers outstretched hand tipping that 49th penalty around the post
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