Scribbledom

Meditation on 100 Untitled Works in Mill Aluminum

2012-01-13T21:57:00.008-06:00

Image borrowed from The Chinati Foundation Website. For more information, visit them at www.chinati.org.

Over the holidays I visited the Chinati Foundation, in Marfa, Texas, to see Donald Judd's 100 Untitled Works in Mill Aluminum. Housed in two abandoned artillery sheds in the vastness of West Texas, each work fits into the same outer dimensions and is crafted from the same material: sheets of aluminum about three quarters of an inch thick and polished to a satiny shine.

The works fill the glass-encased space of the bunkers, airy above the concrete floors and amid the brick pillars. The tour for these spaces is half an hour, total, which didn't give me nearly enough time to give each work the attention I wanted. I found them fascinating and soothing and compellingly contemplative. Not nearly enough time to examine each of the 100 works, but enough time to write a poem upon them, penned into my little notebook as I wandered around and among them. I hope you enjoy it. I think I'll send it to the Foundation.

Meditation on 100 Untitled Works in Mill Aluminum

Fleeting glimpses of
Endlessness encapsulated,
Caught in the corners
Of light and shadow
Where sharp hard sheets
And obdurate joinings
Flicker, fade, evanesce,
Boundaries flooded, washed away,
In a spreading sprawl of mirrored time...

Time arcing though blue sky with the sweep of
Planets slanting over ageless mountains swept by
Shifting sunlight, shimmering, in the metal mirage and
Then, with a millimeter sideways slip of focus, suddenly
Edges,
Lines,
Planes,
Solidity,
All endings
Coalesce into prismatic space,
A single moment...

Infinity inverted
One hundred times.

I call this one... Egg Poem. Not much ring to that...

2011-08-04T21:32:00.002-05:00

Break, heart, and be done.
Crack like an egg, expell your gold,
Be barren, empty, dry.
Don't grieve, for what never really lived
Can never really die.
Don't look for the tiny, featherless bird;
If you see it, close your eyes.
The little love that was never born
Was never meant to fly.

Break, heart, and be done.

(I know it sounds a little angsty. There's nothing really new going on. It came to me as an image, though, a new way to look at some old things I've been working on.)

Another New Orleans Just Like in the Movies Moment

2011-02-06T12:29:00.005-06:00

This one is right up there with the time I met a guy with my same rainbow umbrella, and his iPod was playing "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" (see Silver Lining) But this one is better.

Some time during the day last Wednesday, February 2, I realized I still hadn't paid my rent. I think i have a three day grace period, but I am RARELY late on rent, and I pride myself on that, so this initiated a minor panic attack. Still, I recognized that I had options. I would just have to act fast.

Normally on a Wednesday, I'd drop the check off on my way to Rock'n'Bowl for Swing Night. Only there was a private party last Wednesday, no Swing Night. Now, I avoid moving my car at all costs, since I have street parking in the Quarter. But there's always the St. Charles streetcar, which runs right by my office building, and has a stop two blocks from the realty office where I drop my checks.

So that's the only reason I got on the streetcar that day, and ended up sitting a few seats back from a young man in a fedora who sat down on a side facing seat, pulled out his Macbook, and started typing. A few stops later, and old blind man was helped onto the car, and sat down next to him. They began talking about the Superbowl, how Green Bay was going to win, historic football games of note, it was just one of those wonderful moments of incidental acquaintance where everyone within earshot becomes a friend.

When the old man reached his stop, the young man mentioned that he'd left behind some stuff he need to work on, and he helped the old blind man off the streetcar and across the street as if they'd been friends forever. I was pleased and touched to be reminded that there are such effortlessly NICE people in the world, and I texted a good friend about what I'd seen, as one of those made-my-day moments.

But that's not the end of this story.

Last night I decided that there were too many distractions in my apartment, and that going down to the coffee shop for a few hours to finish my book would put me in just the right frame of mind and environment to do some writing afterwards. So I packed up my things and headed down to Community Coffee, on the corner of Royal and St. Philip. (I love living in the French Quarter.)

I was waiting at the counter when he got into line right behind me, the young man with the Macbook. With all my usual finesse, I turned to him and said, "You were on the streetcar. You helped the blind man across the street."

And somehow, with a smile and a laugh, it wasn't weird and awkward, and I was able to tell him how much I had appreciated seeing someone doing something so nice. He thanked me and held out his hand, and said, "I'm Bera, like Yogi, but only one R." So I introduced myself, then it was my turn to order.

I got my coffee, and sat down at a table (with other empty tables nearby). He did come to my area at first, but he needed a power outlet and couldn't find one, so he walked away. Looking around, I realized I was sitting right in front of one, and had been hiding it, and since he was still hovering at the other end of the coffee shop, scanning walls, I went over to him and told him I'd found one.

I offered to move to the next table, but he said the cord would reach, and I didn't have to move. Then he saw my book, Sandworms of Dune, the last of the Dune sequels by Bryan Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson. He asked me how Bryan Herbert's Dune books were, and that launched a discussion which also touched on Greek tragedy, PTSD, and Isaac Asimov's Foundation series. Then we both subsided into our respective work for the next hour or so, until CCs closed down.

Standing outside the coffee shop, we talked about Clash of the Titans, both the old one and the new one, other movies, Greek epics, aural poetry, Middle English literature, Steinbeck... and where I was headed next. I said I was headed home, but I'd probably stop at Lafitte's to see if anyone I knew was around to say hi to.

"What's Laffite's?" he asked.

"Laffite's Blacksmith Shop? How long have you lived in New Orleans?" I returned.

"A week and a half."

So I told him to come with me, and I explained a bit about Jean Lafitte and the blacksmith shop and bar, and brought him to read the information they have posted on their doors. We went in and I bought him a drink (a Coke, because he doesn't drink much). He let me pay, but said that I needed to let him buy me a drink in return soon. We sat down near the piano in the back and talked for another hour about, well, life and everything. It was that sort of evening.

When we left the bar, he gave me his number ("In case something comes up. I'm really good at lifting things.") and I texted him back with mine and my name ("Ah, Berwick, that's the English/Scottish you mentioned.").

So I had a great evening, just out of nowhere, and I've definitely made a new friend...

And all because I was late with the rent. What kind of lesson is that?

Big Bend ~ December 29 ~ Driving and Packing

2011-01-09T21:05:00.000-06:00

What with an entire day spent sick in bed and miserable, this trip has been a bit of a disappointment, but still, not completely so. Today I was well enough to drive from one end of the park to another, reading all the exhibit plaques along the way, stopping at all the overlooks. When I start home tomorrow, I’ll go up through part of the park and drive the leg from Panther Junction up to Persimmon Gap, picking up the only leg I’ve missed so far.

Today I felt again a sense of the spirit, the energy of this place. In a swamp, so very many things are alive and teaming that there seems to be a life-force that’s an aggregate of the multitude, that all the interconnected lives breathe an eerie spirit that stirs the murky waters and the Spanish moss. Here the many lives are thin and dry and brittle, and the essence that stirs in the wind whistling over the rock and sand is the breath of the land itself. Here, where the earth has heaved and gasped and bared its bones, its essence seems to pervade one as though it were resonating from the rock itself. One vast entity, not a myriad, a singular minimal power binding the elements together under the thinnest film of animal and vegetable.

Maybe the best part of this trip has been that for once it hasn’t been too cold to go out and enjoy the stars. Just now I packed up everything I didn’t need for the morning and didn’t mind leaving in the car over night, and I sent and loaded it in the trunk. I glanced up and was instantly captivated.

In sneakers without socks and wearing my nightshirt under my jacket and knowing I should really go up to bed to get an early start tomorrow, I found myself instead wandering away from the lights, into the darkness of a gravel sideroad. The desert grasses rustled around me with the wind, with water from hidden sprinklers misting the putting green, with Javelina, who knows? And me, sleepy and still sick, I only wished I could wander farther, leave the human lights altogether, and see only brilliance of the stars.

The stars! How could I have lived so long without picking out Cephus and Scorpio and the Pleiades and Cassiopeia, along with Orion, who moves me to tears whenever I catch a glimpse of him dimly in the city lights. And how do I not know more of them? How have I forgotten? And how long has it been since I actually saw the faint gossamer trace of the Milky Way? Why do I live so far away from where I can see them all? The only thing that’s ever made me want to go honest-to-goodness, middle-of-nowhere, no-shower-no-toilet camping is the idea of a perfect darkness on earth around me so I could see and know the millions of lights above.

My eyes have been turned down to this surface world, and that isn’t a bad thing, but I was touched, moved, almost broken by longing in those brief minutes I spent looking at the stars. I remember I used to do it all the time, when I lived out in the country. I forgot, fortunately, how much I miss it. Tomorrow, back to civilization. Tonight, soon, to bed. But the moment of this trip will be the starlight of tonight.

Big Bend ~ December 28 ~ Sick

2011-01-07T19:22:00.001-06:00

One of the worse things that can happen on vacation has happened. I got home last night feeling exhausted (to be expected) and chilled (not quite expected). I took my temperature and found I was running fever. I felt a little sick to my stomach, too. That resolved into hunger at one point, so I ate some bread and cheese. That turned out to be a mistake. I was fevered and nauseated all night and most of today. I’m mostly glad it didn’t hit me on the Ward Spring trail. I only met two people coming back ans I was headed out, and no one on my way back.

I didn’t even make it to the end, to the spring. I’d thought it was just my usual hard time with the thinner air, and the fact that I’m really not very in shape. I’d climbed down and back out of one wash and almost fallen asleep when I stopped to rest. When I saw the next downhill stretch, the tall cottonwood trees around the spring already in sight, I knew I just couldn’t do it. I’d already frightened myself by the nearly drowsing off.

It’s a real danger, hiking by myself. If I’d slept until sundown somehow, I’d have probably still found my way back to the car, since I had a flashlight and the Garmin. But I’m glad I didn’t have to find out, and I’m REALLY glad I didn’t start throwing up out in the Chisos foothills. The ravens perched nearby must have known something, but I disappointed them.

Tired as I was, I didn’t want to quit after Ward Spring. I drove up into the Basin and walked the Window View trail. That one is a sidewalk, pretty much, and I’d have to be pretty badly off to not be able to manage it. Then I stopped at Terlingua Ghost Town, but the inverse sunset on the Chisos wasn’t very dramatic and the porch of the store was pretty crowded. I saw a man in a number 8 Manning Saints jersey, and thought about striking up conversation, but I didn’t feel like it. I came here to be alone, after all. And when I got home, I found myself sick.

So today I’ve been all alone indeed, shut up in my room, away from the mountains and the desert I came here for. And even if I feel well tomorrow, I won’t be doing any more hiking. I should be able to drive and walk a little, which will be nice, but I’m sad to have missed so much of my time here.

I am, at least, feeling mostly better now. I walked around Lajitas some while the sun set. I’ll probably eat some bread and honey in a bit, if I keep feeling hungry. Here’s hoping that doesn’t ruin tonight!

Big Bend ~ December 27 ~ First Day in the Park

2011-01-06T19:30:00.001-06:00

I think I’ve done more driving than walking today. I’m definitely a flatlander from below sea level now. A two-mile hike to Burro Spring is worlds away from my two-mile walk to and from work. The sun and breeze and thin air make me so sleepy so fast! I did finally catch a second wind on my way back, after a sit and a drink.

I had just started thinking about how ridiculously soft I am when I heard children’s voices and was passed on the trail by three Suburbans’ worth of people of all ages. ( I saw the trucks when I got back to my car.) One of them, a beautifully-coiffed older woman in pristine and expensive hiking gear asked me with a laugh if it “was worth it?” I didn’t like to say that if she was already tired, after less than half a mile, then probably not. Her family probably wouldn’t have liked me much for that.

After my late start and slow progress, I’m thinking I won’t make it to all three hikes today. Maybe I’ll save the Blue Creek fragment I had planned for some time when I’ve either planned better, or might have more than one vehicle, so I can start in the Basin and go downhill the whole way. That leaves Ward Spring, which has lighter traffic, and which I wanted to do last year, but never managed. It’s almost 1:30pm. I’d better get started if I want to get through the 3.6 mile round trip before dark.

Big Bend ~ December 26 ~ Of Morning Frost and Drowsy Owls

2011-01-05T17:12:00.002-06:00

Today’s odyssey began at roughly 6:30am just outside of La Grange, Texas. I packed up my belongings, grabbed the muffins and juice my hosts at the Big Tin Flag bed and breakfast had provided for my dine-while-dashing convenience, and stumbled out the door into the dim pre-dawn light to find my car sparkling with frost. I loaded my bags and breakfast, turned on the defroster, pulled out an old gift card, and scraped away as a dim avian shadow, high in a leafless tree, silhouetted against the brightening horizon, hooted at me sleepily.

With visibility adequately improved, I drove to my grandmother's to launch a brief hunt for my missing sunglasses. An abbreviated search in the dark front rooms revealed nothing, and I didn’t want to turn on lights or hunt in earnest, because two of my cousins were crashed on couches within my search perimeter. I also just didn’t have much time. I dug through the suitcase I stowed last night in my sister’s Tahoe, full of the gear I wouldn’t need for Big Bend, until I came up with my old French Market Jackie O shades. Non-optimal for rugged terrain, but better than nothing. Then I hit the road for real. (I later found the missing shades on the floorboards in front of my passenger seat. Mystery solved.)

I’d forgotten about that time of day, early early, before the sun is quite awake, where every passing instant brings a change to the light, and the world looks completely different after a blink. The dry tawny fields were silver with frost, and as I crossed the Colorado, I caught a glimpse of the pearly wreaths of mist rising from its still-seeming waters. I’ve got my favorite book of all time, Jane Eyre, on my iPod now, and the miles slid by as I listened, driving through fields, past farms, churches, agricultural equipment repair shops, in the strengthening day, racing the sun as it rose.

I made excellent time, in spite of stops in Austin for groceries, Fredericksburg for a snack, and a handful of other towns along Interstates and lesser highways for gas, breaks, and additional supplies, shifting from westward to southward to westward again across the biggest state in the lower forty-eight. (It helps that the speed limit on I-10 is 80 miles per hour out west.) The road seemed to jump over the rolling hills like a kitten running through tall grass, peak around the shoulders of more rugged heights, curve in a long stretch playing with the horizon like a narrow string, then finally sprawl tired and flat for long stretches.

Around 4:15pm, during the golden hour, when the sun droops gracefully toward setting, my heart jumped to my throat as I topped a rise and recognized the Chisos Mountains and Casa Grande Peak ahead. I have so many homes these days, but the few weeks I’ve spent in the park have been so unbelievably rich that this particular horizon has been etched into my heart like the profile of an old love.

I pulled up to my hotel, cut my engine, and opened my car door to absolute silence. No traffic on the nearby roads, no people walking the surrounding gravel paths, no birdsong and not a breath of air to rustle the dry grasses. Just utter stillness for several heartbeats, until I climbed out, swung my door shut, and headed for check in. I’d found my room and was starting to unload my bags when the soft call of an early owl drifted from a nearby grove of scrub, like an echo of the cold central Texas morning I left behind.

I went for a walk after sunset, and remembered how the deepening of twilight mirrors the early dawn in that every blink brings new stars to view. I sprawled out on a park bench on a putting green in the middle of the Chihuahuan desert with the blossoming night all to myself, ignoring the cold for as long as I could just for the joy of seeing six of the seven Pleiades. I’ve been told the seventh sister just cannot be seen by the naked eye these days, but I may try again tomorrow when I’m better prepared to outlast the chill of desert night.

Now I’ve unpacked and am enjoying one of my favorite indulgences: Summer sausage and cream cheese on sesame rice crackers and a glass of sweet red wine. I’m also enjoying the broken and sporadic free wi-fi here in the Badlands portion of the Lajitas Resort. On the agenda for tomorrow: Burro Spring, Ward Spring, and the Blue Creek trail to Cedar Spring. A few relatively short hikes (one to two miles one way) to get me warmed up and to figure out just what I’ll be capable of this year.

On the agenda for tonight, coming soon: sleep.

New York, New York ~ The Voyage Home

2010-12-31T10:25:00.002-06:00

Sitting in La Guardia now. Mental note to self. Driver’s license is not enough to self-check in at a Delta Kiosk. My flight is delayed, and won’t take off until about 1pm instead of noon. But that’s okay. It just shortens my layover in Atlanta, without making it so brief as to be worrisome. It’s funny, I’ve been out of the loop a little, traveling and playing tourist. Getting back to the airport and news on television always seems to be a shock. I remember getting into the Spokane airport after a week in Glacier and finding out that back in Houston, Ken Lay had died. Right now I’m hearing that George Steinbrenner is dead. Wow. And tonight is the MLB All Star game. Very sad.

But it looks like they’re working to cap the well in the Gulf, and there’s some hope that this new plan could get things contained quicker than waiting for the relief wells. Fingers crossed!

I’m a little confused, because there’s information for a delayed flight to Atlanta up on the screen, but it’s a different number than my flight. The delay keeps moving later and later, so I should probably check this out.

Well, it’s not quite 1:30pm, and my flight through Atlanta has been cancelled altogether. There’s a flight direct to New Orleans leaving at 8:40ish PM, though, and I’m now booked on that. Here’s hoping that the weather has cleared and that everything goes well. It gets me home pretty late (11 something pm?) but it gets me home tonight. Work tomorrow is going to be decidedly unfun.

Of course, La Guardia is a zoo, because my flight isn’t the only one that’s been cancelled. A lot of people have no option but to go home and try again tomorrow. So I’m not so bad off. The point at which I was connected to a representative, and couldn’t hear her and asked her to speak up, and got hung up on, and then called back and was told that the call volume was so heavy that no calls were being taken, THAT was a pretty low point. I’m feeling much better now.

But it really just means that I have a whole day to sit in the airport and organize my photos and proofread my journals and meditate upon a very fun trip. I saw everything I really wanted to see, while leaving enough unseen for another trip some day. And exciting as it all was, I have to agree with the sentiments of the friends I made on my flight over. New Orleans is MUCH more fun! Definitely glad to visit Manhattan and live in NOLA! Love you, my city! Coming home soon!

New York, New York ~ Day 4, July 12

2010-12-31T10:25:00.001-06:00

The last days of a vacation like this always do seem to be like a test of will between me and my feet. My feet have hurt so much, but I’ve still walked as much as I’ve subwayed. There’s just too much to see to spend all my time underground. But I really appreciate the subway. I navigated it more today than any of the days before.

First, I took it down to Rector Street stop to see Trinity Church. I’ve been reading Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, and I believe it appears in the fifth book, which I finished last night. I’ve always enjoyed it when my travels interweave themselves with literature. I read The Da Vinci Code on the way to Paris and Angels and Demons on the way to Rome. I hadn’t known that Memnoch the Devil was set partly in New York, but it’s an apt coincidence, and since the church was said to be at the foot of Wall Street, and I wanted to look around down there anyhow, Trinity made a nice focal point for that wandering. When I got there, it was additionally AWESOME to find out that it was the resting place of Alexander Hamilton. How cool is that? I did not know!

It was a beautiful, ornate Episcopal church, and it seemed fitting to offer a prayer there for the souls that passed and the families bereft through the destruction of the World Trade Center towers, which was where I was headed next.

There’s not a lot to see at the site of the towers themselves right now. It’s off behind fencing and banners because of the extensive ongoing construction, but it does make an impression to see nothing but cranes rising into the sky, so empty compared to the rest of the city. There’s a memorial and a preview for the planned rebuilding set up in nearby offices. The weeping of people around me in these rooms as much as the exhibits themselves were sobering and moving. There are things I will always remember, as those before me remember hearing about the death of John F. Kennedy. I will always remember the Challenger and the shuttle Columbia, and I will always remember watching the towers fall. I couldn’t stay for long. I didn’t want to cry. I cry enough as it is. But it was important to me to go, and I’m glad I went. I will come back when the permanent memorial is finished, and pay my tribute there.

After that I had just enough time to catch the subway back up to Times Square and meet some friends at a really great little Italian restaurant called Sofia’s, a block off of Broadway. The food was wonderful, the restaurant virtually empty, and it was great to catch up with Jeremy and Cindy. (They’re doing well and staying busy and return the hellos everyone sent through me.) After lunch, they joined me in my wanderings to FAO Schwarz, Max Brenner’s for chocolate, eaten on a park bench in Union Square, the Strand bookshop, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and finally Lombardi’s and Ferrara’s in Little Italy for pizza and cannoli, respectively. They walked me to the Bowery subway stop before heading back to their car after a very fun and busy day.

But it wasn’t over yet. My friend Jayna, from New Orleans, was singing at a bar in Brooklyn, at the foot of the Bridge, so I took the subway over to see her. I’d hoped to walk the Brooklyn Bridge, but my feet were just too sore. The 68Jay Street bar is a wonderful little community place. The bar tenders knew everyone there, and everyone there knew each other. One patron’s dog wandered from person to person for attention, and the little toddler daughter of another climbed in and out of laps and arms all around.

And they all LOVED Jayna and her band. One bartender, who seemed like he might also be the owner, took a break during one song to dance with a lady there, another man began singing along and was cheered up to the microphone when Jayna invited him to join her. It was pretty much the ideal Monday happy hour. I could feel the hurry and go of the city draining from me in the relaxed and friendly atmosphere, even before I started my slow way through a glass of sangria. I headed back to Manhattan early so I could get most of my packing out of the way, but it was really the perfect end to my trip, quiet and relaxing. Tomorrow is all about the journey home. Tonight, with my packing done, I will rest.

New York, New York ~ Day 3, July 11

2010-12-31T10:23:00.001-06:00

Today I thought I’d jaunt across Central Park and finish the Metropolitan Museum of Art, then come back and do the Natural History Museum. Well, I set off across the park, munching on some rolls I’d bought for breakfast and sipping a tasty, low calorie, caffeinated beverage. I walked for about the time it should take to cross, and I saw buildings up above. I came up out of the park and found myself… on West Central Park Drive. Somehow I’d looped around and ended up about seven blocks south of where I’d started, sweatier and dustier, and ready to just forget the art museum all together. So I went to the Natural Science Museum. It’s on the west side.

And I actually saw ALL of the regular exhibits and two special exhibits!. I didn’t end up reading many plaques or looking at everything in detail, of course, but I did scan a lot, and I looked more intently at things that interested me. I was excited about the Lizards, Snakes Alive exhibit, because I hoped it would be interactive and informative, but it ended up being a zoo reptile house with some pretty poor habitats, so that was disappointing. I felt especially bad for the huge python who had nothing but a ten foot by ten foot concrete floor to curl up on, and seemed to be trying to sleep his way through the entire ordeal. I can’t blame him. I intend to write a disappointed letter. I’m not much of an activist for any cause, but we can and should do better.

Other halls were much more interesting, though the taxidermy animals are always a little sad to see. I enjoyed the halls of indigenous artifacts much more, especially the displays showing art, clothing, and tools of the Tlingit and Haida of Souteast Alaska. After my cruise there, I’ve felt a nostalgia for the huge trees of the temperate rainforest and the bold native iconography of eagles, ravens, bears, beavers, and whales. The halls of fossilized skeletons of dinosaurs and prehistoric mammals and such were fascinating as well. I took photos of a lot of things from reading Jean M. Auel novels. I’ll have a much better frame of reference now for some things I was having trouble picturing from the textual descriptions. Still, it wasn’t as awe-inspiring as the art museum, to be honest.

In spite of my poor feet, I tried again to walk across the park and finish seeing the Met. I stuck to a cross street this time, and it worked. I spent the two and a half hours from arrival to museum closing finishing out my photos of things I saw yesterday and seeing a few more new things. I’m glad I managed it. Then, to get back to my hotel on the West Side… I took a cab. I definitely needed a break. I soaked my feet in hot water and sorted through my photos some. I was debating a quiet dinner close to home, but after a good hour’s rest I felt much better, and decided to go find Café Lalo, recommended by a friend.

After a first glance at the menu, I was disappointed. The food seemed lighter and healthier than the substantial portion of beef I’d be hoping for. That’s how I get when I’m tired. But then I found the rather mouth-watering cheese menu. I ended up with a dinner of toasted bread with herbs, three delicious cheeses, and a tiny cordial-sized serving of cranberry wine. It was the sort of place your expected to take your time, so I read and looked out the window and ate my cheese and drank my wine and had one of the most relaxing and delicious dinners that I’ve ever had this side of the Pond.

I decided I was rested enough to see if Midsummer Night Swing was on at Lincoln Center, but apparently Sunday night is not a dancing night. Still, I got to see Lincoln Center at twilight. One of the halls has paintings on the Mezzanine level by Chagall, the same artist who did the new rotunda mural in the Opera Garnier. It was lovely, and I wished a little that I’d arranged to see a show, but, really, I could sit inside a concert hall for three hours and see one thing, or I could walk around a museum or the city streets and see hundreds of things. I think I spent my time wisely.

After Lincoln Center, I went to Times Square. For the first time I saw the New York I’d anticipated with just a little bit of fear. People, lights, ads, cars, sound everywhere, waves and waves of it all. I had to laugh, there were signs that said “Subway” and I couldn’t see why they needed a sandwich shop on every corner, until I realized they were actually entrances to… the subway! I went by Birdland see if I could have a drink there. But there was a show going on, and I couldn’t go in, though I could hear a little from the vestibule, and it was wonderful. At least I tried, and got a tiny listen.

But mostly today was the day of friendly New Yorkers. I didn’t really expect anyone to be rude, but I didn’t expect so many people to be friendly! One older man I passed on my way to Birdland saw my red hair and said, “You’re just like orphan Annie! Hah! You’re beautiful!” Two people spontaneously complimented my hat, one of them a docent in the art museum who also very patiently gave me directions twice when I got lost trying to exit the museum at closing and ended up back in her hall, and the other a young man at a snack cart near my hotel when I stopped to see if he had any bottled sodas. And in the subway outside Times Square, an older gentleman joked about cooking an egg on the sidewalk down in the stifling tunnels, which started a conversation about Houston where he’d worked once and New Orleans where I have a friend who once did cook an egg on a black car hood.

The subway tunnels were warm, for sure, but about like any of the outdoors back home. I was really fortunate to miss the triple digit heat from last week. The weather has been gorgeous, and I hope it keeps up tomorrow, because I’ll be out wandering in it all day. Better get some rest now!

Remissness

2010-12-31T10:21:00.001-06:00

Just realized I never finished posting New York trip journals, and now I have Big Bend journals on the way. Also Just realized I haven't been posting much at all.

New Year's resolution... be a better blogger.

To that end...

New York, New York ~ Day 2, July 10

2010-07-15T21:17:00.000-05:00

I am completely exhausted. I am beyond exhausted. I am utterly spent.

Today I saw the Statue of Liberty (after a two hour wait in line to catch the ferry over), Ellis Island, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. That last is what did me in.

For one thing, the two hour wait for the ferry threw off my schedule, so my meal time was squeezed away, and I ended up subsisting on a Milky Way bar and a 20 oz Diet Coke until after 5pm, when I finally grabbed a terrible hamburger at the museum (the cafeteria at the Louvre was SO much better). So much for all the wonderful food I’d planned on enjoying today! But I found a European bakery with a pizzeria in the back just down the street from my hotel on my way home, so now I’ve got a slice of pizza with pepperoni and sausage cooling over there, and some delightful looking tiny cookies next to it, just waiting for the moment when I’m no longer too exhausted to chew.

In addition to the physical exhaustion, my brain is… absolutely full. Part of me wants to go back and spend all day in the art museum tomorrow, because my camera battery died in the hall of musical instruments. Another part of me is still just so overwhelmed by the epic scope of the art on display. Grand halls designed as courtyards to display Italian marble architectural elements. An entire medieval choir screen, from floor to vaulted ceiling, surrounded by medieval art including carved boxwood rosary beads that seem to take the question of how many angels can dance on the head of a pin as a challenge. A vast room, with one sloping wall entirely of glass and fronted with a reflecting pool, containing, among other relics, several small rooms that were part of an Egyptian temple, which you could actually walk partway into. Suits of armor for four equestrian knights, mounted on four mannequin horses, also in plate mail, with every facet covered with intaglio, and that was just the centerpiece of a network of galleries devoted to armor and arms from at least a half a dozen cultures.

The three hours I spent there weren’t nearly enough, but I’m not sure I wouldn’t need three weeks. I was awed, overwhelmed, and finally almost browbeaten by the magnificence of it all, and I think the only way I could see it adequately and maintain my sanity would be to see one exhibit at a time, and only spend four hours at a time, for as long as it took at that rate. Imagine a Faberge egg the size of the Superdome, but with the level of intricacy and detail multiplied, not just enlarged, permeating the whole. Now imagine trying to see it all. I feel almost literally stupefied, and I may leave the remainder unseen on this trip and go only to the Natural History Museum tomorrow as planned, purely out of self defense.

It’s amazing, though, how much repair work can be done by consuming the necessary calories. I didn’t really feel hungry, but after the first bite just now, I consumed that pizza pretty much involuntarily, and now I think I’ll go soak my poor feets and completely unwind. No matter what I do tomorrow, it will be another long, full day.

~~~~~~~~~

Note: Two photo albums are up at http://leberwick.smugmug.com/Travel/New-York-New-York-2010. Got pics from my travels and wanderings around town, and from the Statue of Liberty.

New York, New York ~ Day 1, Friday, July 9

2010-07-14T17:55:00.000-05:00

Ah. Yes. Even here it’s still Friday, though only barely. And soon I’ll sleep, whether the city does or no. I brought ear plugs!

A friend once called New York City the pinnacle of civilization. Maybe he’s right. All I can say for sure right now is that Manhattan Island is the most intensely urban area I’ve ever been in, and I’ve been in Mexico City. Traffic saturation in the La Guardia airspace kept us on the ground an hour and a half in New Orleans. Think. A city so bustling that the fingers of its business extend invisibly throughout the country and perhaps the world, holding planes gently but firmly to the tarmacs in airports hundreds or thousands of miles away. Yet for all that, my luggage appeared on the conveyor only a few minutes after I got down to baggage claim, so they apparently run a tight enough ship. And I didn’t really mind the delay. After all, I’m on an adventure!

The adventure did start on the plane. I sat a seat away from a friendly woman who lives in Connecticut along with her friend who was across the aisle from her. She quickly drew me into their banter, and we chatted about what it was like to live in New Orleans. Pinnacle of civilization or not, they both agreed that New Orleans was a far superior city in terms of fun to be had. I can’t imagine they’re wrong, but then, I’m in love and biased. Because this is a cyber-age, chance meeting need not be an end as much as a beginning, and we exchanged names with the intention of becoming friends on Facebook. God bless Facebook.

A guy outside the airport offered to take me to my hotel for $49, but that seemed high, so I headed over to the bright yellow cab stand. It was the right decision. My cabbie was silent for the entire drive, but turned out to be incredibly nice when the hotel wasn’t where I expected it to be. He turned off the meter so we could go another block looking, while I called to verify the address. I’m glad that we found it within half a block. But for the half-block that I felt incredibly awkward and troublesome, he was incredibly kind.

I wish I’d asked him all the questions I was wondering. Like what, if anything, the beautiful old bridge beside the one we were on as we crossed over to the island was used for. Its stonework was heavy and ornate and it was a lovely structure, along completely different aesthetic principles than the ethereal trellis of the suspension bridge we were on. It seemed almost gothic, and certainly grand, in spite of the graffiti on its thick columns and its heavily-rusted girders.

It made me realize how much New Orleans complements or has shaped my sensibilities. In New Orleans, we would treasure this sort of bridge, and keep it maintained if we could, at least for foot traffic. Maybe they’ve done that here, though I doubt it. The lamps weren’t lit and the whole thing was in heavy shadow. But in my mind I could see horse carriages crossing a bridge like that, with lanterns swimming in murky, mysterious bay fog. And out the other window, buildings. Buildings. So many tall buildings. Until we reached the oasis of Central Park, that’s all there were… buildings. I caught myself wondering how people could live in so many buildings. But they do. We passed wrought iron railings around areas and flanking stoops while above climbed flat after flat, into the sky. Stoops that people sit on. People were sitting on a few, talking, just like in movies or on Sesame Street. I must sound like an absolute yokel. Maybe, for all my fairly adequate international travel experience and my 15 years resident in the nation’s fourth largest city, maybe I am.

And that’s the secret to why I didn’t chat with the cabbie, like I’m normally inclined to do. For a rare moment, I find myself utterly and thoroughly intimidated. It’s similar to the feeling I had at the doors of St. Peter’s in Rome, when I felt small enough to fit through the eye of a needle. But this is a crucible of a much different sort. Tomorrow I will leave this snug little hotel room I find myself in now, and I will step into whatever weekend traffic one finds on Broadway on the West Side. I expect it’s fairly epic. I will skitter like a small insect along the streets and down into the subway, probably brushing shoulders with hundreds of strangers and not making eye contact.

And for all the excitement I feel to be here, I’m afraid.

But I don’t really have time for fear. I need to sleep soon, because tomorrow is going to be a big day. I only have three days here, and spending them eating take out Chinese in a rented room and looking down on Broadway on tiptoe, peering over the window unit air conditioner because I’m too terrified to go out on the streets isn’t anywhere in the schedule.

For heaven’s sake, Laura, you’ve wandered Rome on your own. You can do this.

Remember. It’s an adventure!

The Price

2010-07-03T22:59:00.000-05:00

I took my car in for service today, and since the service station was only a couple of blocks from the National World War II Museum and I've been meaning to go there... I went.

It seemed the fitting thing to do.

I'll have to go back, I only got through the exhibit up to the campaign to retake the Philippines, and I didn't listen to any of the two-minute personal accounts. Still, I found it incredibly moving.

In fact, I spent the entire time holding back tears.

I suppose I don't know too well the men who have touched my life personally who were in those battles. And now I never will. They've all passed on. But I saw them. In every photograph, I saw them. Most especially, I saw Popo, over and over.

My mother's father was a Czech dairy farmer in central Texas. He had two sisters who were nuns and a brother in the priesthood. His accent was sometimes so thick I had a hard time understanding him, but I remember early mornings, before sun-up, helping him in the dairy barn, and I remember riding shotgun or in the back of the pickup, checking the cows.

He died on the land he was born on, and I of course never really thought about it, but it certainly never seemed to me like he'd ever left it in his life. It was his home. Where he belonged. Then one day I saw a photo of him...

In front of the pyramids.

A friend gave me a rosary from Rome, blessed by the Pope, and mom told me that Momo had one, too, that Popo had brought back for her, when he'd been in Italy during the war.

And he came back. Thank God. Or I wouldn't be here.

But seeing the photographs of what those boys went through, seeing them glassy-eyed with exhaustion, or, almost more chilling, seeing them smiling and bright on their way to D-Day, seeing the articles they carried with them or wore, reading their stories... It brought home to me what my Popo lived through, the man who always seemed so simple. I never even thought about it, that he was in the war, until he went through a bad time, and Mom said he'd have flashbacks of the fighting. Of climbing cliffs while the enemy fought to knock him off. I remembered that again and again today, and choked on the pain I will never have to feel.

Because it's a different world now. We don't have the draft and we don't have rationing and we no longer send so many of our men off to war that we have to fill the factories with women. Men and women both can and do choose to be part of the most powerful military in our world, and the vast majority of us can leave the worry and the suffering to them and their families. I'm sure all of us know someone serving, but how real is it for so many of us? How invested are we individually in American military action overseas? How much do we sacrifice, day to day? No one asks us to cut back on our use of gasoline, drive slower to preserve the rubber in our tires, use margarine instead of butter, recycle our used cooking grease.

All that war stuff is the business of the military, and so many of us have the luxury of approving or disapproving without really being touched. With the exception of one September day almost a decade ago, war and its devastation happens... on the news far away. Not here. Not to us.

It's trite to say that freedom doesn't come free. But it's true. Some of us, like my friend Emily, have been paying a price for months, while her husband is in Korea. My friend Nuance and her family have paid an enormous price, but, thank God, not the highest one, with her brother's injury. And me? I... I pay so little. So little.

There's no moral to this story, only my own reflections. Take away from them what you will, or take nothing at all. But today, among the black and white photos and the scratchy recordings of radio broadcasts and the written remarks of those who served from the lowest to the highest ranks, I was sobered, chastened, humbled. I owe SO MUCH, and I may very well never be asked to pay anything back.

Other's have paid and continue to pay that price for me.

They have all of my gratitude and respect.

In Like a Lion

2010-04-28T19:25:00.001-05:00

Head wind, tail wind
Any which way wind,
The crackling snap
Of fleur de lis flags,
The creak and the clatter
Of old wooden signs overhead,
Rothschild's, Keil's,
Valobra, Bevolo,
Riches I run past,
Pushed here and pulled there,
Hurried and held back
In a torrent of cold air,
Rushing like water
Through magnolias and palm fronds
And wrought iron railings,
Running through roses,
Lapping up storm puddles
Left behind like old winter,
Scattering sparrows
Like rustling brown leaves,
Whispering even in
The quietest courtyards,
The most hidden corners,
And out on the streets
Wind roaring around us
Through, over, among us
Like the horn blast that heralds
The change still to come.

Unconditional

2010-03-01T21:30:00.001-06:00

I've been pondering. No, it's never enough for me just to feel a feeling and leave it in peace. Sometimes I can do it for a while, but most of the time I have a... need? No... a THIRST to understand. What is it that I'm feeling, why do I feel it, what are its limits, if any? What are its depths, if I can even reach them? I dive into myself and begin to tease apart the water weeds, comb through the Lorelei's hair, insinuate fingertips into the oyster and root out the pearl. Then I can put it back and resurface and just be. The rest when the quest is complete.

My idea of unconditional love has been a bit simplistic. Not that the feeling itself isn't radiantly elegant in it's simplicity, but the words I reduced it down to in my mind were, "loving without wanting anything back." Does that seem right? It used to, to me, but now it seems... subtly wrong. To miss truth by only a slight shift. Maybe it's more loving without needing anything back? Or maybe even closer, loving without needing anything else, anything different. Even God, it's not that He doesn't *want* to be loved back. It's that not loving Him back does nothing to change His love.

So if a person loves and you don't really feel like you deserve that (and really, who of us *does* deserve it? who of us will never hurt, never disappoint, never fail in some small or large way?) but if you don't feel like you're worth that love, maybe it's tempting to think that the person doesn't really love YOU. They must really love the person they *think* you are. They don't know you, really, who you truly are, and if they did, they surely wouldn't love you. Because obviously they want something different, want something back.

Of course they *want* something back. But the full knowledge that they will never get that something isn't necessarily the cure-all you think it will be, the magical silver bullet that will kill this unwanted feeling and make the world a safer place for them in spite of themselves.

If that love is unconditional, it is what it is. No matter how you hurt, disappoint, or fail them, that doesn't stop it. Even if they can't honestly say they want nothing in return, the lack of return won't change what they feel. And if you try to prove them wrong about you, about their feelings, you can hurt them well enough without proving or changing a damn thing.

I've never been the sort to try, and I'm arrogant enough to think I deserve the best of most things, though in all honesty, I'm humbled at how many of the best things have come my way. Humbled by the people who love me deeply, even when I turned away and flew out on my own. Even when I was sure I had failed, and could only hurt and disappoint. I've never been so low that I would dispense with the people who cherished me, though sometimes I would wish some feelings for me different, for the good of the people who felt what I couldn't return.

Still, something in me always knew better than to try to change that feeling through actions of my own. I could never hurt someone any more than necessary, and I think it's the respect I tried to show and the care I felt that allows me to still be blessed with the friendship of those people today.

These are things I'm only starting to think on seriously. Maybe it would have come to my mind sooner if I'd had a child, because I'm beginning to see and feel the depths more and more when I see my Dylan friend. Those depths are glowing, and I hope I reach the light some day, feel the very utmost of all I can feel for a little someone of my own. There are other depths that are darker. But if I keep going, and keep untangling, maybe I'll find the light there, too.

This has all gotten far from the point, and it's time for bed. And for once I haven't made any more sense in my ponderings than I had when I started. Thanks for bearing with me.

Indulge! ~ The story of my first ever Mardi Gras.

2010-02-16T17:12:00.000-06:00

The carnival crescendo has been building, it seems, since Thanksgiving. First came the lightly racing rise in pulse of the holiday season, travel, festival, wassail, and the splendid fireplace warmth of yuletide. The serene peace of the nativity and diamond stars in a blue velvet night was a breath of respite before the joyous chorus and cry, welcoming in the New Year with masquerade, champaign, and fireworks. With the air cleared, and all that out of the way, we began Carnival in earnest, excitement mounting with every play-off victory that led our New Orleans Saints to the...

SUPER BOWL OMG!!!!!

With the Vikings in town, the streets teamed with Mardi Gras purple against our black and gold, purple that quickly disappeared in the minor explosion in the French Quarter, as fans erupted shouting from every bar when we won. The pause over the next two weeks was like the still surface of a giant river, belying the roaring currents beneath. We love our Saints, and would celebrate their glory, win or lose, when they came home from Miami, but when they went all out and won, we went all out, too, and PAR-TAYed. The Quarter was packed, and even my quiet street saw it's share of revelry in the early hours.

Now, with THAT so delightfully settled, New Orleans got down to the REAL business of partying.

Mardi Gras.

I have never seen anything like this. The air is electric with the wild-running energy of our passion for life. I wandered the streets this weekend past with a friend, and was almost overwhelmed by the force of it all. I wondered how any mere Tuesday could ever compare.

Then I stepped outside today.

I have to say, one can't enjoy Mardi Gras at it's best when one is not at one's own very best. And I'm not at my best. My head has been stopped up for days and the weekend has me exhausted still. But on a day dedicated to indulgence and license, even I have done my poor best. :-)

I first celebrated Mardi Gras by sleeping until noon. That was over twelve hours of sleep, which just goes to show that my reserves are pretty low. After getting up and readying myself to face the day, I went to pick up a prescription for my sinuses from the CVS across Canal Street and caught some beads thrown from a balcony on Burgundy.

This outing could have been much more of an adventure than it was, as some of the days parades could have cut me off from that CVS completely. I was able to cross Canal right after the end of Zulu past, and just as the beginning of Rex reached Canal and Baronne. I got my medicine and skittered back across Canal, ready to put my own personal Mardi Gras plan into action.

My favorite indulgence in the city is, of course, food. To me, Mardi Gras felt like a day to dedicate to rich and delicious tastes and treat myself to some really great food. Once I slipped back up the streets of the Quarter, I wandered slowly towards a restaurant that I knew could serve me both steak and sweet potato fries, approaching this goal slowly, savoring the anticipation, whetting the appetite, and photographing the bizarre, the absurd, the beautiful around me.

I enjoyed my steak and fries slowly while reading a good book, and decided my next stop should be the new cupcake shop I'd found a few weeks ago. I made my way there slowly through the milling crowds, and met a friend on a street corner, a masked pirate, who bowed as I curtsied, and greeted me with a kiss on both cheeks and a warm embrace. This little delight made up for the fact that the cupcake shop had run out of cupcakes and closed.

My reserves of energy were getting low, and I remembered the rock-slide brownies at the Community Coffee House on my street, and the praline crunch ice cream at Matassa's, so I decided to round off my day of indulgence with some sweet treats I could take home and enjoy while indulging in some movies or a season of X-Files on my couch.

Fortunately both of those shops were open, and my sweets await me downstairs. My very first ever Mardi Gras has been SO much fun, and I hope the next one will be even better. I will wear a costume. I will enjoy the parades. I might even have a drink. I will hopefully not be sick.

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday, and I have a lot to reflect on seriously this Lent. There's a noon mass at the church downtown. Tomorrow I imagine the streets will be empty and quiet, compared to today. Tonight the bars close early. Everyone will go home, and life will slip back into a comparative stillness and calm.

But there are a few hours left, my friends, so eat, drink, and be merry!

Indulge!

Hard Lessons Pondered During Morning Shower and Walk to Work

2010-02-03T18:39:00.000-06:00

Everyone… Feel free to laugh at my naïveté. I just learned that sometimes just because someone says they really do want to be friends doesn’t mean they have the same expectations of friendship that I do. I feel kind of stupid. When I put it like that, it seems like it should be fairly obvious. I’m normally pretty astute when it comes to people, and aware of and able to negotiate of this sort of disconnect.

Generally speaking, there is a lot I will personally do to maintain a friendship. Not all friendships are effortless. People can be hard to understand or engage with and still be good people, well worth cultivating. So it isn’t always easy to foster that sort of care and loyalty. Sometimes you have to go through some rough patches, but it seems like I’ve always managed when I wanted to. And I think it’s totally worth it to not lose a friend. My friends are good people, and I hate letting good people go out of my life.

But now I’ve come up against someone that doesn’t play by the same rules I do, and the cost is finally too much. If it were the sort of friendship I’ve come to expect, due to the many wonderful people I am blessed to call my friends, I would make the effort. But this isn’t friendship on those terms. I don’t really know what it is. All I know is that I’m no longer willing to pay the price to perpetuate it, now that I know what it isn’t.

Fortunately, I have many, many people that I care for, who care for me, and between us friends means the same thing. It means a lot. I am so blessed. But I wanted to be that kind of friend for someone, and I can’t any more. I know it’s not all my fault, but it does feel like a personal failing. I love my friends. But this has to stop. I’m only hurting myself, and I’m not benefiting anyone by that.

Still… I hate that this is so quantifiable. That the cost benefits analogy is even relevant.

And I really…

… really…

hate losing a friend.

Silver Lining

2010-01-29T18:45:00.001-06:00

I carry a bright, rainbow paneled umbrella. When the sky is gray and gloomy, I do what I can to keep the day bright. One panel is red, and one is orange. One yellow, one green, one turquoise. Blue and indigo and violet. I bought it somewhere like Walgreens, I think, so it's not like it's all that rare. But I've never seen another like mine out on the streets, and I've always thought it was a shame.

Today on my way home, through the wind and the rain, I saw three.

We'd pass each other, see, and smile. We called compliments and laughed. Finally I stood at a crossing, waiting for the light to change when a guy crossed over to stand beside me, holding the very same umbrella. We laughed and he said, "You'll never believe it, just as I saw you, this song started playing..."

He reached over and held an ear bud to my ear so I could hear.

It was Somewhere over the Rainbow

Quandry

2010-01-24T15:23:00.003-06:00

A man I know died last week. We hadn't even known he was sick. Then the day after we found out he was in hospital with terminal liver and kidney failure, we learned he was gone. We weren't close. I didn't know him very well. But we were friends and there were certainly things I admired about him.

There were also things I didn't admire as much. Now, I know I'm not very worldly, and might not be a good judge, but it did seem to me that he drank an awful lot. During one period of his life, he lost a LOT of weight, which was something he really needed to do for his health. When I asked him how he'd done it, he laughed and said he went on a gin diet. He didn't eat much, but he sure drank his gin. I don't honestly know how much of this was joking overstatement. But now that he's gone, it's instinctive for me to think this might have played a part in his final illness, or at least to think it didn't help.

It reminds me of Daddy, who had high blood pressure for years before he was killed by a heart attack, and how his doctor warned him again and again to stop smoking. It's easy enough to say that if he'd listened, he might still be here. And part of my grieving when I lost him was sheer fury that he *didn't* listen. That he didn't give up smoking for our sake, his girls, whom he always said he'd do anything for. That he didn't do everything in his power to preserve himself for us, if not for himself.

I've come a long way from the more intense grief, though I still miss him every day. And I'm not angry anymore. At the end of the day, it's easy, *too* easy, to say, "If only...." It's glib to think we have any answers. It's presumptuous to think we know better than another how they can best live their life.

To me, smoking was irrelevant to who my father was. But I'm not a smoker myself, so I'm no judge of how hard it is to quit. To him, smoking was something he did every day, as a matter of habit, as a matter of course. Maybe it was more. Maybe it was part of his self-image, a lifestyle choice made glamorous in his youth by people on television, on stage, on the big screen. Maybe if he could have seen the future with certainty, he would have quit. But without that foresight, it may have been a risk he was willing to take to live his life on his own terms. And I can't fault my father for his terms. My father lived life with a zest and joy and pleasure that few manage, and that was his greatest gift to me, the thing that makes him my hero, in spite of his flaws.

It seems to me the same could be said of my friend. Good food and good drink were part of his joie de vivre, and maybe if he could look ahead, he would have changed his habits if there was a chance it could have saved him even days or months. But we none of us know the future, and it's so easy to blame in hindsight what we can't change in the present.

I have other people I love, still living, that make choices that give me cause for concern. I am so proud of them when they make an effort to change. I worry when they don't. I want them in my life for always. I don't want to lose any part of them and their health and their joy. But when all is said and done, it's their life, not mine. If they don't want to alter it for their own health, I certainly don't expect that they'll alter it for my benefit, and if I start asking them to, I could easily be seen as intrusive, presumptuous, a nag, and lose what I have in their friendship already.

And now I've made choices of my own. A doctor wanted to put me on a medication to adjust my hormone balance. She said if I didn't address certain levels, I put myself at much higher risk for high blood pressure and heart problems in middle age and beyond. But the medication was something I would always have to take, and wouldn't cure the underlying cause, just force things into balance. And it made me sick as a dog, no matter what we tried. I currently have excellent blood pressure, so I made the decision that I would rather risk these issues in the future, since I feel the risk is reasonably small, than be guaranteed sick every day of my life in the present. It's the right decision for me, but it *is* a calculated risk, and I know it might catch up to me some day. Knowing what I now know, how can I blame someone else for doing as I've done?

I still feel helpless, though, when a friend tells me about actions that seem to me hurtful. I want there to be a change. I want them to take and be able to take the steps I don't or feel I can't. For their own sakes, and for mine, because if anything ever happened, I would miss them, and I don't want to hear that "If only" whispering in the back of my mind.

But we can't change people. We can only change ourselves, and sometimes not even that. We can suggest, but if we really love them, we have to, in the end, support them with our friendship even if we don't agree with their choices. It's their life, and their life is a gift they share with us, not an obligation.

We can only love them for who they are while we have them. And if we lose them, we can grieve, and grow past blaming, and love them still. That's all we can do.

I wish, of course, as always, that I could do more.

Paint

2009-11-29T17:27:00.001-06:00

Hmmm...

So I tried something different today. On my way home, I popped into a couple of my favorite galleries, and leaned in really close to the canvases to look at the paint. Especially the ones that look the way i want my painting to look. When I look at a work, I think I normally see a picture more than a painting. Sometimes we miss the forest for the trees, getting caught up in details, but sometimes the opposite is true. Sometimes we're so focused on the big picture that we remain in absolute ignorance of the the elements that create it.

A painting is, after all, made of paint, not picture. So I tried to focus on the details. Examining brush strokes, or knife strokes. Feeling in my mind the body of the paint on the brush, how it pulls on the canvas. Seeing the brush or knife in my mind. The size. The shape. The angle it's held at. Imagining even the mixing of the paint, the subtle variation in shade, the pools of color across the palate.

I think I see my problem. I'm just so damn scared of putting paint on the canvas.

This probably makes all sorts of sense, since I'm still very inexperienced with my medium. I've been trying to put the picture on the canvas somehow without really placing the paint, because I just don't have any idea what the paint is going to do.

The picture is what I want to see when I'm finished, and what I want others to see when they look, but I get so nervous about how to build that picture. I can mix the right shade, and i can put it on a brush, wield that brush with meticulous care, and I can make the shape where it needs to be, but I end up with something very static. Flat. Too polished, too smooth, too stylized, almost cartoonish.

Or I go to the other extreme. I put paint on my brush, then push brush to canvas with no deliberation, and hope the brush creates what I want to see. I'm not using it as a tool, but as a crutch. This gives those parts of the painting more motion and texture, but they're crude, inelegant, unlovely, and not at all what I want, only what I stopped at because things were getting worse instead of better.

Really, the only way to find out what the paint will do when it hits canvas is to just start scooping it up and putting it there. Playing with it. Experimentation and observation, like any good little scientist. But also, just like getting 8 count lindy hop steps into my muscle memory alongside 6 count east coast swing, or feeling where in my voice an interval falls, or how my fingers run through a lick on the trumpet, I just have to DO it so I can feel it.

In imagining the painting of the pieces I looked at today, I think I have my mind around it a little more. Next I have to get my body around it. Get the picture out of my head and sculpt it into the paint.

Then let it out into the world.

This Week in Review... or... Halloween, Part One

2009-10-25T18:59:00.003-05:00

There have been so many things I wanted to share, and thought to myself, as they happened, I need to blog about that. But I keep forgetting them. Such is life.

I do remember that people have been saying awesome things about my dancing lately. I still feel like following is fundamentally against the grain of my personality, and I'm not very good at it. There's a lot to work on, but considering I've only been dancing seriously for about five months and many of my partners have been at it for years, I should probably go easier on myself.

This past Wednesday at Rock'n'Bowl, one of my frequent partners who has been out of town for a while struck up a dance with me, and immediately said, "Wow, you're moving a lot differently now!" Something good about style, confidence, attitude, things I really found myself settle into during the 5 days of dancing around ULHS. I danced a lot and found my step in many ways, and I felt this, but it's nice to know that it shows.

Later, chatting at the bar with Mr. Bud (who is one of the most cheerful, courteous, and complimentary partners a person could have), Mr. Bud said how much he always enjoys dancing with me, how nice it is to have someone he doesn't have to be afraid to try new steps with, how ATHLETIC a dancer I am (I've never been called athletic before in my LIFE!), and how he'd come off the floor after a dance with me, and a brand new dancer he talked to was *amazed* at all the cool moves we had. I know I watch the dancerly dancers I know and marvel at the moves, so it was both humbling and exhilarating to think that someone thinks that when they watch me. Wow. Just... wow.

Today I got my latest and so far most cherished compliment. I had just finished a dance at Nickel-a-Dance on Frenchmen Street when an older lady with a cane, sitting in the front row of seats by the dance floor waved me down. She said she'd been trying to get my attention three times already, and as I leaned forward to hear her better, she reached up and took my chin in her hand and said, "Sweetheart, I just had to tell you how much I enjoy watching you dance. You and that young man you were just dancing with. I used to teach dancing, and you have such a step, you keep up so well, you dance beautifully. All you need to do is smile just a little bit more, but you dance just beautifully."

I swear, I nearly cried. I love dancing so much, and I have a good time, but I've tried not to worry about whether or not I look any good doing it, because I know self-consciousness will just kill whatever poise I'm currently scrounging up. Apparently I don't need to worry. I guess if I look half as good as I feel, I'm doing just fine.

Hmm. So far this hasn't been much about Halloween. Let me correct this. I know it isn't actually until next Saturday, but, like any other excuse for a party, they start early here in New Orleans. I went to a birthday/Halloween/swing dance party on Friday night. Costumes were optional, but I love dressing up, so I wore my gypsy ensemble. Seemed like it would be fun to dance in. I also brought a change of clothes in case I was the only one there in costume.

Well, I was, but every time I started feeling awkward, someone would say how awesome my costume was, so I never did change out of it. It was a BLAST to dance in. In fact, a little too fun. Every time I spun, my skirt would keep going for two beats, and I would watch it with that easily-amused, childlike delight that I tell myself is endearing, but is probably mostly silly. Whatever. :-P

Even cooler than my twirly skirt, though, was how, about halfway through the evening, a bassist, a banjo player, and a trombonist walked into the party. I know that sounds like the start of a joke. What it *was* was the start of the dancing to LIVE MUSIC portion of the evening. Some of the best musicians I've heard play around the Quarter and Frenchmen Street, and they just show up at a party as guests, and decide to pull out their instruments and play out the dance.

Love.

This.

City.

The next day I went to my friend Adé's Mad Hatter Tea Party as the Queen of Hearts. That was too, too fun, and we've decided to wear our costumes again on Wednesday at Rock'n'Bowl, so Halloween just grew an extra day. I went home early-ish in the afternoon so that I could get my car parked and all before things got too nuts for the Krewe of Boo parade. Then I decided to slink up my costume and go tool around the Quarter and see the parade in style.

I got SOOOO many compliments on my costume! Most were of the simple, "I love your outfit!" sort, but I think I did steal one heart. There was a guy standing by himself waiting for the parade whom I had to walk past to get where I wanted to watch from, and he watched me for about fifty feet as I walked towards him, and as I passed and smiled, he said softly, "You *are* something!"

The parade was fun, though I think maybe the most fun part was walking down the route after it had ended where I had been watching, and seeing three Ursuline nuns laughing and clapping and reaching to catch beads. No, those weren't costumes. I see those same three nuns often on my walk to work, as they head to morning mass. Too fun!

I decided to walk up and down Bourbon Street just to see and be seen. I got high-fived by two frat boys, told that I "got it goin' on" by lady encouraging people to enter one of the gay bars, and caught countless stares and double takes. It was fun.

Outside of Fritzl's I stopped and looked in to see the trombone and banjo players from the night before, along with a different bassist and a washboard player, on the little stage at the back. I hesitated, then couldn't resist, and went on in. I sat down near the band and ordered my drink while they finished a song. Afterwards, the banjo player said he wanted to welcome all the beautiful people who had just come in, and especially this pretty lady in the costume. He looked at me again and asked, "Weren't you at the party last night?" And I said yes I was, and he asked me to stand up and show everyone my absolutely beautiful costume. Yeah, I tipped the band and bought a CD after that. :-) After a while the guy who hosted Friday's party and the girl whose birthday it was came in. They didn't recognize me at first, but when they did they asked me to join them, and the guy said I looked BEAUTIFUL.

All that attention, all that costume-wearing, and Halloween isn't even until next weekend! Then the weekend after that I dress up again for Ren Fest! I am LOVING life right about now.

So, yeah, I feel amazing tonight. Incredibly happy, incredibly liked. If I'm walking around for the next few days or weeks with a really self-satisfied grin and a little extra confidence in my step, and if my head is a bit of a tight squeeze getting through a few doors, don't blame me! Everyone is saying such nice things! I love this town, I love these people, and I LOVE Halloween!

Dance, Dance, Yeah

2009-10-13T22:33:00.000-05:00

I want to tell you all how mind-blowingly spectacular Ultimate Lindy Hop Showdown this weekend has been for me, but I can't. I really just can't. But of course I'm going to try.

On Thursday, I danced on a paddleboat. On Friday I danced in front of the steps across from Jackson Square, then in a wax museum. On Saturday I danced in the rain at the French Market, then at the World War II museum. Today, Sunday, I danced all over Frenchmen Street.

I learned new moves. I met new people. I lost five pounds. I listened to phenomenal live music. I watched competition dancing that had me wide-eyed, jaw-dropped, clapping-along-until-my-hands-hurt, heart-poundingly enthralled. These people are magic.

I made new friends. :-)

I tried to work on some of my existing technical issues and, yes, discovered a few more. But thanks to one partner in particular, I started to loosen up and follow his steps in blues dancing better, and I'm MUCH better now at relaxing into a dip instead of doing the cat-about-to-be-bathed cling that I've been specializing in lately. Oh, and I found out that my hips CAN move like that, as long as I don't pay any attention to them. :-P

All in all, I can honestly say that I have NEVER IN MY LIFE had a more amazing, more fun weekend. I woke up every morning energized and ready to go, in spite of the late nights. I walked down the street to the next dance event with my heart singing and my feet keeping time to the song. I wish I could have done all the events today and this evening. Next year, because there WILL BE a next year, I'll schedule my vacation accordingly. This has been an experience of a lifetime for me, and over the next few days I expect I'll be thanking everyone who convinced me to come and who danced with me from the bottom of my heart for the gift it's been. If you EVER get the chance, even if you don't dance, go to one of these. Go search ULHS 2009 on YouTube and see some of what I saw.

Now. My legs and feet are screaming and I have to get some sleep tonight. I'm going to take some more Advil and go soak in a hot bath and dream of next year... when I'll actually know the Lindy Hop

If Chivalry Is Dead, You CanNOT Pin That on Me

2009-09-25T23:08:00.006-05:00

This one has been percolating around in the back of my mind for a while, ever since a friend IMed me as follows:

well, men and feminists alike agree that the reason men act this way is because women let them. they are so busy trying to be like men (independent), that they, the ladies, actually killed the chivalry. i think it might be true

The more I think about it, the more I feel like I have to go with my gut reaction.

Bull shit.

First off, let me get a rant off my chest about the men who would rather open a door or a jar than their hearts. For whom reaching something of the top shelf validates their existence more than reaching out to another person. Who would rather lift heavy luggage than help help shoulder an emotional burden. Who would rather buy dinner and drinks for a girl than share anything meaningful or personal with her. And who, if they want to get laid, would much rather it be with someone they don't know or care for or respect, because God forbid they have to recognize her humanity, her personhood, as commensurate (or superior!) to their own. That would make it so much harder to squelch down the guilt of using her than ignoring her. Those of you men who do not fit this description (I'm truly fortunate to know quite a few) BLESS YOU. Of course, it's no wonder most of you aren't single. :-P End rant.

Another quick point. I'm not sure many people would recognize my qualifications to lady-hood beyond having two X chromosomes. I don't care for clothing that is conventionally reserved for women alone (i.e. dresses and skirts). I've always been fascinated with, and only rarely frightened by, reptiles, insects, and all manner of creepy crawlies. I drive fast and assertively. On the other hand, I like to bake, I can mend clothing on a simple scale, and I sing and draw and write/talk about my feelings. The most "typically feminine" things about me are probably my tenderness for all things small and weak, my love of beauty in nature, and my hypersensitive emotions. I do maintain that in spite of everything I am a lady in the truest sense in that I have a regard for the feelings of others and am led by this to act graciously, generously, courteously, and kindly on most occasions.

Back to what my friend says about chivalry, or the lack thereof. Let's do a close reading.

men act this way because women let them...

I'm of the opinion that a man who is discourteous will be discourteous regardless of what any woman "lets" him do. It's not about allowing bad behavior, or rewarding politeness and punishing rudeness. It's about a fundamental consideration for others, and if a person has that, they will treat others with respect and deference. If they don't, I'm not quite sure how I, as a woman, have "let" things get that way. I think this assumes something fundamentally false about chivalry: that chivalry is a courtship behavior on the part of a man to obtain a reward from a woman, and that she can control this behavior on a Pavlovian level by granting that reward when he does it right, or withholding when he does it wrong. If that's all chivalry is, than it is certainly among the undead, still stumbling along causing what mischief it can now that it's lost its soul. Chivalry in its heyday (from the French chevalier, or knight on horseback) tenuously encompassed three duties:

Duty to country and countrymen
Duty to God
Duty to women

Principle among "women" was the knight's own lady, but women meant all women, the young and lovely and highborn AND the old, poor peasant. So I protest the notion that chivalry is about who pays for dinner and who opens the door. True chivalry is being respectful of and considerate to all men, women, and children. I concede that back when safety depended on how much physical strength you possessed or could co-opt, and highborn ladies were ideally seriously lacking in physical strength, it made sense that chivalry would be more of a one-way street. It's true that things are different now. If women aren't pale, tremulous, collapsing little morning flowers wearing flimsy footwear, then men may not feel that courtesy obliges them to cast their cloaks over puddles. But I'd contend that a more equal playing field demands that women show the same courtesy they expect to receive, not that men show less courtesy.

they [women] are so busy trying to be like men (independent)...

Okay. I think it's obvious that my friend could be called more conventional, more old-fashioned, more traditional, or more feminine than me. She inherently defines independence as a masculine trait.

I protest. A thousand times, I protest. I'm a very independent person. I always have been, and my parents always encouraged me to think and take responsibility for myself. I don't think they were trying to make me manly. I don't think dependence is inherently feminine. I think certain social norms try to make it so, and I think other cultural customs combat this. If females in nature, including our fellow primates, have typically relied on protective male strength for survival, I think it's true that males often rely on females to an equal extent for something else, like food. Drones do very little in a honeybee colony. Lionesses are the hunters of the pride. Females in nature often bear more of the responsibility of tending the young, and if you don't think this is something males depend upon them for, then you're ignoring the post-coital portion of the biological imperative of sex as procreation. A male's drive to sire as many offspring as possible isn't going to do him much good on a genetic level if no one takes care of the young. All in all, independence isn't some new-fangled crazy notion women have gotten into their heads. Self-reliance and mutual inter-dependence are much more natural patterns than total dependence one way or the other. In being independent, in holding my own well-paying job, in cultivating my own skills and talents to maintain that job, in relying on my own abilities to navigate my world, I'm not trying to be a man. I'm trying to be a woman who can survive and, more, thrive in a world that does not just hand me a male to take care of the dirty work. And I'm trying to put myself in the best position possible to be relied upon as well as rely upon the people I need and who need me, male or female.

they, the ladies, actually killed the chivalry

A woman who scolds a man for opening the door for her is equally as rude as a man who lets the door shut in a woman's (or anyone's) face. A man who feels so affronted if a woman opens the door herself that he considers himself justified in no longer opening doors for women is as dependent as a woman who never opens her own door. Not everyone is considerate, not everyone is fair, not everyone is generous, candid, and kind. Personally, I think I prefer knowing the have-nots up front, and not being in the dark because a strict social code has forced a person to behave with a consideration they don't really feel. (I also think that nice guys need to take gallantry back instead of complaining that girls prefer smooth-talking jerks. Of course we like to be flattered. So do you. Give a little, get a little. But that's a related but distinct topic.)

I don't think at all that independent ladies killed chivalry. We've only exposed the fundamental flaw in the system it propped up. I think people are just lazy, and are eager to blame the results of their laziness on anyone but themselves. In a world where gender roles are becoming less well defined, it *is* more difficult to negotiate the expectations on both sides. I think a more equal playing field demands more of everyone's courtesy, not less, as the old assumptions don't hold and we are all required to act and speak out of true respect and consideration, not just mouth and motion our way through a preordained script. And I think that if chivalry is dead or dying, it's not because women killed it with their independence, or men killed it with inherent sleezery; it means neither men nor women have risen to that challenge.

Oh, and by the way, if you want to say that's all well and good, but chivalry really means it's always the man's job to take care of the woman, and it's a woman's place to always require or insist upon that care, then personally, I think it can't die fast enough so we can replace it with something better.

But that's just me.

Hail, Poetry

2009-09-24T22:46:00.004-05:00

I've realized that I've started posting to Facebook a lot, and here not at all. I suppose there might be some overlap, but I do have a special place in my heart for Scribbledom, and so this makes me sad. Well. I have complete control over it. Here are some poems I've posted to Facebook recently. Enjoy!

French Quarter, Late Summer

French Quarter, late summer.

Glossy green leafed,

Red berried Magnolia.

Soft west wind, warm, light, dry

Brushing hair across my face

With gentle touch, a lover's touch.

Soft west wind, hands through my hair,

Lover wind, kissing away

Foot sounds, lost in street sounds

As I walk, and as I walk,

No sound around me

But the music in my heart.

Caddo Shade

Impossibly white
Like a ghost or a god,
An alabaster egret
Stands in somber niche,
Ancient, aloof, enigmatic,
Barring the gates
To a shadow world
With eye of unconcerned flint
And gleam of unworldly elegance
Between the cypress trunks
Like stony temple columns
Surrounded by worshippers
On their knees
Frozen in mystic rites
Beneath fluttering wraiths
Of trailing, faded moss,
Like tattered banners
Of long forgotten kings,
Barring the gates
To a world apart
From blue sky and blue stream,
Green moss beneath
Green leaves above
A world suspended,
Dark and still, a mystery
Between water and air
Haunted by one white spirit.

The way is shut.
I dare not pass
The silent sentry.
Even sun rays are muted,
Unable to penetrate
A secret inviolate.

The Magic Circle

2009-07-25T09:45:00.001-05:00

If you’re lucky like me, you have a couple or a group or even a couple of groups of the best friends you’ll ever meet. People you will always belong to, always share with, who will always be family, blood not withstanding. Amazing people who know you well and STILL both like and love you. I have this, and I am blessed.

When you’ve found friends like this, some people might question the wisdom of leaving them behind like I’ve done. These people aren’t really in my circle. My close friends know and understand, or at least accept and let me go my own ways. Sometimes that’s the best anyone can do with me, and it’s encouraging, humbling, and inexpressibly comforting to know that there are people willing to set me free and always take me back.

Being on my own has been easy enough so far because of the interwebs, and because I don’t mind eating at a restaurant or going to a movie or museum on my own. In fact, I often enjoy it as a treat to myself. That’s called being an introvert, I imagine. All the same, like many good things, quality alone time can become burdensome when it’s the only option, so I’m doing my best to make new friends. You can never have too many friends, or too many circles.

Meeting people isn’t so hard. Making good friends isn’t so easy. Joining a new circle… I’m finding that difficult indeed.

I’ve always wanted to add amazing new people I meet to my amazing circle of friends. Now I really need to find someone like that, who tries to push and expand and share their circles with new people. And I need to be someone that people want to share their circles with! I’m doing things like joining the band and taking dance lessons to meet people who have similar interests and regular times for coming together. I may not get collected into a circle that way, but at least it’s time I spend socializing with others and improving my chances.

When all is said and done, though, I’ve only been in New Orleans a little over two months. Circles as wonderful as the ones I have can take years to find/build/grow. I will try to walk softly. I will try to move forward steadily, but gently. I will try to find the balance between not forcing myself upon people and the sensitive pride that keeps me apart when people don’t openly invite me closer.

I will try not to feel daunted and discouraged by the task of weaving myself into circles already established. The most wonderful people I know love me and want me as a friend, so surely as I go through life I will only find more people who also want me. It isn’t really magic, after all, even though it can seem that way.

So above all, I will try to be active, yet patient. I’m just not very good at patience!

Otto's Trials, Otto's Triumphs

2009-07-23T17:44:00.002-05:00

Poor Otto. He had a bad weekend, didn't he? For those of you following along at home...

When your coolant temperature sensor fails, it can sometimes forget to tell your radiator fan to turn on.

When your radiator fan doesn't turn on, the coolant generally overheats.

When your coolant overheats too much, it can crack your radiator and ruin the pump.

Believe me. I ought to know.

So, while they were fixing Otto up with a new radiator, etc., they pointed out that the timing belt was due for a change. Well, was going to have to happen sooner or later. Sure, why not now, while he's already in various stages of disassembly?

With the engine out for the timing belt change, they noticed a cracked engine mount. Ooooh, so THAT's what that rattling sound was when I was stopped at stop lights.

With the damage repaired, or the damage done, depending on the damage you speak of, Otto came home with a NEW strange rattle. So the next day he went back to the doctor, to find that an exhaust clamp had slipped loose, but was repaired easily enough, and for free. Unlike the other repairs!

So now my Otto is no longer an overheating rattletrap of a little white car. He runs smoothly and quietly, and is perfectly content!

Except for the intermittent hiss of the air conditioner compressor valves slowly going out.

But that's another story, for another time.

Always an Adventure

2009-07-18T01:10:00.002-05:00

So after work today, I had two goals:

Purchase clear sewing thread.
See Harry Potter movie.

I decided to join these with another goal. Go see what's on the West Bank. Now, in Google searching for stores I've wanted to visit, I've often seen that there are locations both in Metairie and Gretna. Gretna is actually a bit closer, but, it's a funny thing, I've always gone to Metairie. See, to get to Gretna I have to cross the river. There's a bridge, yes. A HUGE bridge. For some reason, though, the river is just deeply ingrained in my mind as an insurmountable barrier. Which is ridiculous. So today, I set out to conquer the West Bank. Which, incidentally, is east of here. o_O

(N.B. I realized today that my office building is, in fact, east of the Mississippi, west of the Mississippi, north of the Mississippi, and south of the Mississippi.)

I also needed to pick three pictures up at the framers, but it was raining, so I figured I'd wait until tomorrow, after the couch is delivered.

I accomplished my two (or three) goals with reasonable ease, and even found a Texas Roadhouse restaurant, which I think Mom and Brooke had been asking about. Yes, they have one here. No, the chicken fried steak is not worth it.

Thread purchased and movie viewed, I turned to go back the way I came. Which worked fine until I saw the sign that said the bridge was tolled. Get that. No indication on the way over that there would be a toll coming back. It caught me a bit off guard. My thought process went something like...

"Toll, is that on the bridge *I* need."

"Looks like it. I have money, right?"

"Shit, do I have money?"

"Shit, what if they don't take money, and it's tag only?"

"Uh oh, last exit to not pay."

So I exited, found a gas station, bought a drink, and asked the attendant if the toll booths took money, and how late the ferries run. The ferries run until 9pm, apparently. This was told me at 9:15pm. Fortunately, the toll booths do, in fact, take cash. Disaster averted.

Or so I thought, especially after I paid my toll and reved up to cross the bridge and get back on my side of the river.

Everything seemed fine, until I took the exit for I-10 East and Slidell, and in glancing down at my dash, noticed...

The check engine light
The temperature gauge in the red zone

SHIT.

I'm on flippin' I-10. The closest exit is the one for home. I throw on the hazard lights, slow down to 40 mph, and start praying.

I prayed and prayed and prayed, and finally parallel parked as soon as I could, partially blocking a driveway, it's true, but I've been told no one ever uses that drive. I hope I've been told correctly. I'll sort it out tomorrow.

As I pull into my space, and, in fact, at any point off the highway when I had to slow down and stop, billows of smoke came from under my hood. This is not going to be good. I can feel it. I'm also pissed, because I know the problem has been there for a while, but the last time I took it to the mechanics and asked them to fix the rattling, they insisted there was nothing wrong. Great.

Well, it's parked now. I have the number for a mechanic, obtained from a friend here in the Quarter, who was finally available when I called (been trying to reach him for some other stuff for a while). Well, this was when it counted, and he was there, and let me come over and have my nervous breakdown with a friend. I'm thankful for that. I was feeling very alone.

So, tomorrow, after the couch is delivered, I'll be arranging for my car to be towed to a mechanic somewhere, and then I'll have to sort out how to get my pictures home from the framers. It's only 3 blocks. If the weather is dry, I'll just walk back and forth three times. That's about my morning walk anyhow.

So, yes. It's been an adventure.

Wish my Otto good luck. I'm really worried about him. :-(

Elegy for a Fading Love

2009-07-03T12:07:00.001-05:00

Shower streaming down on me

Early morning elegy

For a love not meant to be

Hot water pouring down on me

Cleaving me and crumbling me

Bits of me dissolved

Down the drain

Lost in sobs and shudderings

Drawn from me

Explode from me

Feeling love’s grasp slackening

Kill it now! It’s weak.

Crush it under foot, be strong!

Be brave…

Be quick…

Burn its Hydra neck before

Another head leaps out

Mouthful of teeth to bite and hold…

Not strong, not brave, not quick

Waiting, watching frozen still

Feel it loosen, washed down

Worn down by tears

Clinging somewhere out of sight

Faded into grief and night

I could have loved forever…

Couldn’t I?

Can’t I?

Won’t I?

Will I ever?

Now to live again just out of reach

Just out of touch

Heart wakened from a dream

Just to find itself alone

Come back but cold and quivering

Drawing heat from shower steam

Finally Caught a Brake...

2009-06-04T20:18:00.003-05:00

... Tag. A brake tag. They're infuriatingly hard to get. Elusive little beasts.

First, what is a brake tag? I have two simple answers.

1) It's the rough equivalent of the Texas state inspection, only it's fairly curtailed. They check lights, wipers, horn, and brakes, but not emissions or anything.

2) It's a scam.

Seriously. If it was really about my safety, it would NOT be so hard to get one!

Brake tags can only be obtained:

In your parish of residence
Between the hours of 8am and 4pm
Monday through Friday
When the streets are dry

I've compiled most this list through some trial and... well... error. So, there are eleven stations listed on the City of New Orleans website as providing brake tags. Four of them are reasonably close to the Quarter, though not exactly spitting distance. I had things to do nearish the closest one, so I headed down there. I pulled into the station at 4:06pm, and got several heads shaken at me, one arm waving me away, and another pointing towards a sign listing the hours. So I'd have to leave work early. Great.

So, this Tuesday I left work early, made it home before the downpour, changed, and hopped in the car. I pulled into the station parking lot, completely deserted. Then I saw the sign. I'd missed it the day before. "If it's raining, we'll be closed." Sigh.

Wednesday I was home sick. By the afternoon I felt pretty much better, so I thought about trying again. It had been raining off and on, but the sun kept peeking out, so I thought maybe it was done. I decided to call first this time. I looked up the numbers, and in passing noticed that one near me was open on Saturday mornings. Didn't see that before. Well, the place I called said that they were 1) out of brake tags and wouldn't have any more until the next day, and 2) it had been raining and the streets were still wet. Can't do the inspections when the roads are wet.

Well, glad I called.

Now, I'm not much of a morning person. Especially not on on Saturdays. Plus I have a lot of stuff to get done this Saturday. So leaving that for a last resort, I decided to take off early from work one last time and try to get this done.

So today I checked the weather forecast. After a drizzly morning, it was expected to be clear until night. I left work early for one last try before I resorted to the Saturday option. I drove out to a different station this time. I got there and it looked pretty deserted, but had a sign that it was still open during construction. So I pulled in, parked, and went in and asked the attendant if they did brake tags.

Guess what.

They don't. Funny, that's the station that listed Saturday hours. So much for even trying on the weekend.

At this point it was 3:15pm. I headed back to the closer station, the one I'd missed at twice.

Third time's a charm.

I pulled into a line with some other cars. After a bit of a wait, my car was inspected, FINALLY, the tag placed on my windshield, and I pulled back out onto the road and headed for home.

Just then, it started raining.

The Journey, the Saga, the Epic

2009-05-25T13:29:00.002-05:00

Well, I'm in New Orleans.

I've been here a week. I've been getting stuff in order. Once it's all done, I'll take pictures and set up a tour. It'll be fun. :-P

It started on Saturday. Salvation Army said they couldn't come get the couch until about the time I would be out at brunch, so I told them they'd have to cancel, decided the couch would come to NOLA after all, and went out to run some errands.

Went to drop off the cable modem. The Comcast location I normally go to was... closed. So I called Comcast to find another location. The moron on the line took ten minutes to tell me there were two locations I could go to in Houston. The Best Buy or the Target. Hmmm. The Best Buy didn't know what to do, and one of their managers gave me directions to a Comcast location, but that ended up to be corporate headquarters. Fortunately someone THERE told me where to go, and two hours later, I was able to shed that cable modem.

Got back in time for brunch with the family, which was lovely. We were about to start packing when Salvation Army showed up. For the couch. Which did not come to New Orleans after all.

We spent the rest of that day packing. I got up early on Sunday, which was just as well, because at 9am, the movers called and asked if they could move my time from 1pm to... earlier. Couldn't get the truck until 10:30, so told them 11am. When I walked outside at 10am to go get the U-Haul, the movers were already there. Things went into high gear from there.

I woke up at 2:30am on Monday. My whole life, just about, was in that truck. I was lying in an empty apartment on an air matress. I didn't sleep much after that, and at 5am I couldn't take it any more and had to check that no one had robbed my truck. It was fine, and after another hour of dozing, just getting up and getting to it seemed like the thing to do. So I did it. Everyone was rounded up and loaded on time, and we were on the road before 8am.

And stuck in morning traffic on I-10.

Which of course cleared out past downtown. The drive to New Orelans was smooth and uneventful. I got in about 30 to 40 minutes ahead of the truck, unloaded my car, mopped the floor, all that. The truck showed up and the spots I'd hoped to block were taken, but we managed to get it parked after a bit. Of course, I had to direct Greg on how to get it away from the car he had rested it up against, but there wasn't any damage at all. Thank God.

The movers showed up and started unloading. We had to move a big orange safety barrel that was coving the utility access hole missing its cover and filled with water right in front of my gate. I kept worrying about the dolly or the movers going into it. Should have known I'd be the one instead. :-P Was walking toward the gate and put my foot right into it. As Brooke pointed out, I'm lucky I have these short little feet. I went straight down with only a slight ankle wrench and some bruises and scrapes. And a bit of sprained dignity. But I was fine.

Finally the truck was unloaded and then... we got to work. Unpacking, cleaning, arranging, boxes everywhere. Then finally... stillness. Quiet.

And I slept that night in my own bed, in my new home.

Plugs for My Friends

2009-05-09T21:05:00.002-05:00

So, I have some very brave and daring and entrepreneurial friends. I wanted to give them a shout out, and might do so periodically, because they're just that awesome.

First off, there's my friend Joanna. She's just started her own business creating custom photobooks, and her product is amazing. I should know, I was one of her first customers, and she has taken my photos from my 2007 trip to Italy and made something really special. If you ever find yourself in need of a special gift, or are lost amid your own swathes of digital photos, you just have to check out http://photobooksolutions.com/ for more info on the options she can help you explore. And if you want to see my favorite sample of her work, just check this out:

http://photobooksolutions.com/samples/vacation_photobook_1/index.html

Second, my buddy Kevin and his lovely intended Nuance are the proud new owners of a bakery. I stopped by today to acquire some cupcakes, which are DELICIOUS. I peeked at some of the works in progress and was duly impressed. They'll have their new site http://frostedbakeryonline.com/ up soon. In the meantime they're still flying under the previous colors at http://yellowrosebakery.com/ .

Anyhow, it's an exciting time and I'm very proud of my friends!

New Digs!

2009-05-03T20:28:00.005-05:00

I spent the weekend scrubbing my new place from top to bottom, taking measurements, creating floorplans, and filling the refridgerator with Gatorade. I'm exhausted, but it was very productive, and I'm very excited!

I did have one scary moment while I was vacuuming. I stuck the nozzle of the hose down into a nook beside one of the fireplaces, and pulled out... well, at a glance my stomach dropped because I was pretty sure it was a dead mouse. If I could have reversed the vacuum and put it back, and had had someone else to come deal with it for me, I'd have done that. But it was up to me, so after a few frozen moments, I pulled the nozzle nearer and saw... a rubber mouse cat toy. Whew!

I need weather stripping, and the air conditioner doesn't really cool, so that needs fixing, but I love it love it love it!

Here! Go see pictures!

Sliding Down the Slippery Slope

2009-04-14T13:59:00.002-05:00

Posted this on Facebook a while back, but decided to put it here as well. As an update, the keys are being sent to me soon, so it's time to start planning! EEP!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So. It's official. I've signed a lease on a rental in the French Quarter. No backing out of it now! I'm moving.

Yesterday was a LONG day! I started looking at places at 10am. I saw a strange little place on Conti that was pretty much one large room with a notch walled off to contain a bathroom. I'd liked it on the listings website, but wasn't so sure in person. Then I saw a two-bedroom walk-up on Dumaine that left me fairly unimpressed. Not terrible, just not what I was looking for.

The priciest property I saw was a nice two story, two bedroom with balconies that have a view of Royal Street. Would have been very convenient for viewing festivities, but kind of noisy, kind of pricey, no washer/dryer, and a spiral staircase. Now, I used to like the idea of a spiral staircase. They're pretty, they save space, etc. But they give me nightmares. Going up I did fine, but when it came time to descend, I got to the head of the stairs and just froze. It took most of the will power I could muster to go down, and I never wanted to walk up that flight again. Unreasonable, irrational, neurotic, etc. It was a very nice place. Still.

We weren't going to be able to see the one on Madison until the afternoon, but in the mean time, we went to see the one on St. Philip.

When I walked in, I stopped, and behind me the agent showing me the apartment and I both said, "Wow!"

Now, it's not perfect. It's a little farther from work than I was planning. The window in the bathroom precludes the shower curtain from being more than 5 feet off the ground right now, which may or may not lend itself to some creative problem solving. But it just seemed so... right. So me. I was sold. Went back to the realty office, filled out an application for a lease starting May 1 (YES! that was my biggest worry, that i'd have to pay double rent in April or come back later), and I don't think it was 11:30am yet.

Of course, then I found out I would need certified checks for the deposit and the first month's rent. I looked up the nearest Washington Mutual and found that it was... in... Baytown. Texas. Nice. Well, I'd known I would be better off opening a new Chase account anyway, since they have a location in the French Quarter. So I headed down to the branch on Royal and Bienville to take care of that.

The rest of the day was a bit of a blur. I opened the account, got lunch, got approved, got certified checks for the deposit and first month of rent, walked back to the realtor's and signed the lease. Done by 5:30pm. What a day. I had to keep reminding myself the rest of the evening that it was still Thursday. It seemed like three days. But they were good days. :-)

So, I was so delighted with the rental property itself that I forgot to take photos. But I went back today and got at least some exterior shots. So...

This is my block. I'm not in the green house, or the one with the white balcony, or the orange one, but the beige one right after that.

Yup, that one there, between the orange and the pink. I think it's divided roughly in half front and back. I have the back half, by the little courtyard.

Yeah, back there somewhere. Not really going to be much fun getting furniture through there, I imagine. There was another door that might present a better option, but it was locked. I'll probably find out more in May.

But anyway, there's my place! I'm so excited!

Through a Glass Darkly

2009-03-17T22:41:00.001-05:00

Slowly she seeped into my awareness, until the sight of her filled my soul with wonder and the world, for a moment, stopped. The first thing I noticed was the color of her hair, like hayfields in the rain, then it's texture, fine, loose, wisps and waves slipping out of the pink bow perched on the back of her head. I've seen hair exactly like that in fading photographs. Then the size of her, the awkward slimness and smallness, head not reaching her father's waist as she stood by his side, shifting weight from one foot to the other. The longness of her still face, the high smooth forehead, the wide, solemn eyes, a spirit contained, quiet, thoughtful, in spite of the nervous, restless motion that set her hair swaying across her shoulders with the regular beat of a clock pendulum.

Seeing her during mass, standing in the front row of chairs with her family, her image expanded, unfocused, shifted in my mind, resolved and slipped again like a kaleidoscope into a hundred frozen moments from the pictures in our old family albums. That elfin little blond girl across the chapel was the image of me, twenty-five years ago.

I couldn't take my eyes off of her. I wanted to reach out and pull her to me, stoop down and gaze into those eyes and find myself again. Find the child I was, the dreams I had. Find the things that sometimes seem lost, though I've worked hard to keep so many things that make a child a child, but don't keep a woman from being a woman. Hope, wonder, trust. I know they're still here inside my heart, but not the way they were, and I wanted to hear her speak and drink them in her voice.

But for all I may have lost, and I'm not convinced I have, seeing her there thrilled me with a sense of excitement to think of all I've gained and grown to be since I was her. The things I've done, the things I've learned, the things I love about life and myself that I never dreamed as a child. Every beginning, and I'm standing at the edge of a beginning with my move to New Orleans... every beginning is a new childhood, a chance to turn back time and approach a new world as a new person. I feel myself as an extension of her, as a maturing tree stands straight in the same spot as the sapling it once was, only with more layers, thicker foliage, deeper roots. I haven't changed as much as you'd think. I'm only reaching out farther, all the time, and learning that I can bend and grow into that reach without breaking off and falling away.

Time resumed and she slipped away from me, still standing there rocking gently from one foot to the other, but she was herself and I was me again. I wished a little that I could approach her, take her hands and smile at her, give the vision back to her, though it's better that I can't. Who would want to project themselves onto the future of a child? Who could presume to so limit it? For her the possibilities for the years she'll traverse before she comes to where I am are still endless, and what a treasure that is.

But for me the treasure is the truth she gave to me, as my eyes traced and reveled in the uncanny resemblance, over and over again, with wonder.

I am still a child, and the possibilities are still endless.

The Birth of Christianity: A Jewish Story

2009-02-26T16:28:00.003-06:00

I'm taking the class offered jointly through Rice Continuing Studies and the Houston Museum of Natural Science based on the exhibit The Birth of Christianity: A Jewish Study. Personally, I feel I got much more out of this exhibit after just the brief lecture our class was given before we viewed it. To that end, I'm posting my impressions. Go see the exhibit. I found it incredibly moving and I can't wait for the other classes, to learn more about the people who gave rise to my faith.

*****

There’s a dream-like quality to a museum after hours. A stillness deepened by hushed voices, shadows deepened by the few last lights left on. I think this class will take on a completely different dimension from being in the museum in the evenings. Knowledge seems to hang in the air as palpably as incense in a temple.

Today’s first class began with a lecture given by one of the co-curators of the exhibit, Matthias Henze, a professor of biblical studies at Rice. Dr. Henze spoke about the creation and development of the exhibit as a collaboration between himself and two archeologists in Israel. He discussed the history of scholarship focused on Judaism during the period the exhibit covers, and the story the exhibit tells in response to that scholarship.

Until mid-way through the 20th century (CE), scholars of Judaic history focused on the writings of Josephus, a Jewish rebel captured by the Romans during the 1st century CE who eventually returned with Titus to Rome, Latinized his name, and became a historian. He described the Jewish people as three schools of thought, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes, and for many years his writings were taken as authoritative.

This changed midway through the 20th century, primarily due to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, expanded study of non-canonical texts, and archeological projects begun in the newly established state of Israel. This exhibit aims to show that Judaism of the Second Temple Period was much richer, more complex, and more diverse than Josephus' three-school paradigm, and that Christianity at its roots was one of many Jewish groups. Jesus himself and his followers were raised within Jewish society and tradition, and Paul in Romans 9-11 describes the foundling faith as a branch grafted onto an olive tree, and supported by the roots of Judaism.

Dr. Henze summarized the five time periods that divided the exhibit and suggested a particular display to take note of in each. The class then proceeded into the exhibit hall for a self-paced tour.

The first part of the exhibit comprises artifacts from the Helenistic period beginning in the 4th century BCE when Alexander the Great conquered pretty much everything. The Jewish people divided along the lines of acceptance or denial of the new Greek culture. Some took on Greek names, others adhered strictly to their own traditions. This reminded me of an idea I discussed a bit with a friend about what seems like a recent increase in neo-traditionalism in some Christian faiths. At any rate, those tensions culminated in the Maccabee revolt in the 2nd century, when the temple in Jerusalem was retaken and the Hasmonean dynasty established.

The first point of interest was actually the time line near the entrance, stretching from the 6th century BCE into the 1st century CE. Just standing at the timeline reading it brought forth things to give pause. After about three minutes of confusion, I realized that the timeline was oriented from right to left, the way Hebrew is read, instead of the left to right I was expecting. While I was realizing this, I overheard a Jewish couple as they discovered out loud that AD did not represent the years after the death of Jesus. They’d always thought that’s when the counting began, but here the death of Jesus was in 34 CE (AD).

Me being me, I piped up that AD, standing for anno domini, meant “the year of the Lord” and so measured time beginning with Jesus' life, and that I used to think it stood for “after death” and had been confused as well. When I began my unsolicited expounding, they turned to me with looks of rapt attention, and I remembered the cross hanging from a chain around my neck above my collar. For no real reason I began to feel like I must sound pendantic and patronizing, and I felt my face go hot. I’m sure I didn’t offend. I hope I didn’t. They seemed interested. It just made me feel so self-conscious of the things I take for granted. It’s not that I’ve never noticed them before, and worked to be more aware of them. It just hit closer to home for a few moments than it normally does.

I stared at the timeline for several minutes more, just collecting myself and letting my face cool before moving on to the next portion of the exhibit, covering the Roman period. Pompey conquered the Jewish lands in the 1st century BCE, and from 37-4 BCE, Herod the Great ruled as the king of the Jews, elected to this position by the Roman senate. The point of interest here was the model of Herod’s rebuilt Jerusalem. The docent and the accompanying text described the different sections along with Herod’s renovations to the existing temple (including the addition of a commercial arcade directly bordering the temple precincts). The docent spoke of Herod’s struggle to rule a Jewish people when he himself was Roman with only faint traces of Jewish ancestry, the controversy surrounding views of his personality and leadership, and his undeniably rich gift to the Holy Land in terms of architecture.

I found it interesting, of course, that the Herod who slew the innocents in the New Testament died four years before the birth of Christ. I think this is something I knew before. I’ve never had the benefit of a theological explanation, but to the literary critic in me, it seems like a clear retelling of Moses’ escape from the slaughter of Pharaoh, used in the context of the Gospel to emphasize the authority of Christ as a figure leading his followers out of oppression (it was hoped) and establishing with them a faith that in the time of the gospel writing would have been straying ever farther away from Judaism. Reason number 428, I suppose, why I can’t interpret the Bible literally.

The third section of the exhibit featured a number of ossuaries, relatively small boxes, about 1 ft by 3 ft, used to hold the bones of the dead after their remains have lain for a year in the customary rock tombs, sort of like the above-ground burial tradition in New Orleans.

What struck me most about the ossuaries was how, no matter how beautifully the stone boxes were carved, the names seemed to be scratched on, or even written on in ink, as an untidy after thought. The docent I questioned pointed out that one would buy these boxes from a master carver, the artist who created them, and the name would be put on later, but this didn’t really make sense to me, because after all, you have a year to be coming up with this box and all before you actually put the next person in it.

One ossuary had an elaborately carved rosette on one side, and an unfinished raised circle of stone on the other. The docent said that one theory of why it was left unfinished is that it was needed suddenly, and once the body was put in, the carver could no longer touch it for reasons of ritual purity. Again, this seeming haste doesn’t make much sense to me, considering that not only does one know for a year that one will be needing this thing, but one might also have already used it, since some ossuaries are inscribed with multiple names, and held the remains of several family members. It is interesting to note, though, that the unfinished one was inscribed in Hebrew while the only ossuary with artfully and carefully inscribed names had them in Greek. Another was inscribed with Aramaic, another instance of the cultural and linguistic diversity of the times.

The point of interest in this section, though, was not the most ornate ossuary. The most significant ossuary there hadn’t even been smoothed. Its sides still showed the scalloped marks the chisel that carved it out of a block of limestone. But faint scratches mark it as the ossuary of “Alexander, son of Simon the Cyrene,” the same Simon of Cyrene, father of Rufus and Alexander, that helped Jesus carry the cross.

Awe is not what a 52” LCD hi-def television inspires, no matter how many times my friend insists that his television is literally awesome. Awe is the icy grip that clenched my stomach and made my heart race standing before this plain stone box. The terror and humility of my own smallness before this depth of history and power of tradition, a force that can make something so rough and ordinary mean so much. Amazement that after so much has been destroyed by time or war, this box is still here to dovetail with a seemingly inconsequential detail from a text almost two thousand years old.

Still in awe, I walked into the Masada section of the exhibit, to be turned farther inward by the music of a flute, low and hauntingly sad, more of a moaning wail of breath than melody. Looking at a photograph of those startling hilltop ruins, the sigh of the flute became the sound of a desolate wind wailing around rock crags, the only voice in an empty waste.

The artifacts here aren’t the artifacts of commerce and luxury as in the other exhibits. They are the artifacts of life under siege. Jars for the storage of dry goods in storerooms that all too soon must have begun to look as bare as the unassailable and inescapable hilltop the fortress perched on. Built by Herod to house his family in safety during revolts in his own time, by the time the rebels of Masada fled there, the palace fortress was already a ruin. Long after the Romans put down the revolt elsewhere, Masada still stood in unconquered isolation, until the remaining Jewish rebels committed mass suicide rather than face their inevitable capture and enslavement.

The point of interest in this room is the Jeselsohn stone, a tablet of two columns of Hebrew are written in black ink, faded with time, the same format used for the Dead Sea Scrolls. The tablet appears to recall a visitation by an angel. One scholar, somewhat controversially, interprets the text as an angel’s account to a messianic figure of his impending death, to be followed in three days by his resurrection to eternal life. The stone is estimated to be contemporary with the Dead Sea Scrolls, dating back to before the birth of Christ.

The fifth and final section of the exhibit was in a room darker than any before it. I’m not sure if anything was intended by the journey from well lit rooms into this darkness, just as Jewish and Christian artifacts begin to appear side by side, other than protection for the most delicate pieces there: passages of gospel in Greek on papyrus, and the gem of the collection, fragments of the Dead Sea Scroll containing the book of Isaiah. I leaned over the display, my face close to the clear cover, taking in ever detail of the text, the discoloration of the fabric it’s written on, the fine, even grain of the material that makes it look like woven silk, and makes me wonder what methods of preservation were necessary to keep this brittle, fragile parchment safe on it’s travels. This scroll will leave next week, to be replaced by another. By law the scrolls cannot be outside of Israel for more than three months.

It was a gift to see it, Isaiah, beside early manuscripts in Greek of the gospel of Luke and a letter of Paul. To see newly emerging Christian imagery, the overlapping chi and rho, and even Christ with a sword defeating a basilisk, a drastic departure from the strict avoidance of graven images in the Judaic art, with its menorahs, shofars, wreaths, or purely geometric ornaments. The exhibit was a gift, and gave me so much to think about in the weeks ahead, as I learn more of the stories behind the objects.

I walked into the museum in a kind of dream. I left in a dream of a different sort.

2009-01-11T22:16:00.002-06:00

I saw this image just now. And it evokes about the same feeling as this painting I saw in the Vatican Museum. Mostly a wrenching in my gut and a barely controlled urge to sob.

Faith has inspired so much beauty in this world, elevated the creative power of humankind to the sublime. And then, in the name of God (the same Power, just under a different name, it seems to me so many times, as the Power that hallows what we're destroying) look at the shitty things we do to each other.

Why is it? No. Who even cares. It should stop. Or we should at least stop deluding ourselves and telling ourselves it's what God wants.

I'm pretty damn sure it isn't.

Touchstone

2008-11-30T19:41:00.000-06:00

I sat curled up against my father's tombstone this afternoon, back hunched against the north wind, eyes shut against tears, with stray gleams of the sun through the clouds warm on my right cheek. I'd been at Momo's for Thanksgiving Sunday dinner, and I wanted to stop by to visit Daddy, like I sometimes do. I'd taken my map with me from the car, to look over the new route I wanted to try going home, and I'd found myself talking out loud about the road numbers and towns I'd go through.

It occurred to me for the first time that this, too, was something I'd be leaving behind me when I moved. My father's essence I carry in my heart, but the place where his bones rest has been a center for me. If I have any home right now, it's at his side, but I can't live always on that windy hilltop. I still walk above the ground, and I have to find my home out here somewhere. But the times when I've felt soul-weary, over-burdened with the claims I place on myself or allow others to place on me, I've been able to get in my car and drive west. Drive to this place where my roots sink into the earth. It's a place where only the most fundamental feelings can live, where I am truly myself, and where everything else is tested, found wanting, and drops away. It's only an hour and a half from Houston.

It will be almost eight hours from New Orleans.

I was offered the choice between relocating to Florida or Oregon or losing my job when my company closed their Houston site the month after my father died. I couldn't leave then. I couldn't leave my family, and I couldn't leave his grave so far behind so soon. It doesn't have that hold on me now. I've risen from those ashes and gone out and onward, as I had to. Life in this world isn't a high plain of happiness we climb towards, where nothing troubles us and we're content. Life is always walking forward, as pieces of ourselves fall away, and are left behind, and as we find new pieces that become a part of us, adding more without replacing what's lost. But I've always been able to come back so easily to where his body rests. Knowing for the first time that I'd be leaving that behind, I hunched against the warm stone, almost hugging it, as I'd hug him if I could sit by his side again, telling him my plans.

I opened my eyes to the silver-gray gravel that covers the ground that covers him. My eyes were caught by one rough pebble. Maybe it was its shape, a small tablet, almost a tiny tombstone itself. Maybe it was the angle of the sunlight that sparkled on it's face. I brushed my hand through the shards of stone, closing my finger tips on this one. I held it lightly in my palm, then squeezed it in my fist. I slid it into my pocket as I stood up. I'll take this with me now, wherever I go. I'll keep it safe. I'll find some special place for it. And when life gets too crowded, too heavy, too crazy, I'll take it somewhere quiet, and in thinking on it, let the world fall away. It won't be quite the same, but it's the best I can do when I can't be by his side.

I turned to the carved headstone one more time, traced his name slowly with my eyes. I promised him I'd come again, soon, at Christmas.

And I promised I'd come and say good bye before I go.

The Roar of the Wind in My Ears

2008-11-21T10:48:00.001-06:00

Normally my weeks are paced by days when I don't have any obligations, and punctuated by things I need to be at.

I feel like, until a week into next year, I've been dropped into the headlong rush of constant engagement. I love the holidays, but not this part.

Rehearsals, football games, parades, concerts, appointments with doctors and the spa, on-line courses, hotel reservations, plane tickets, rental cars, highway mileage, Christmas shopping, gift wrapping, shipping and handling, work on the work days, and friends and family on the days I don't work. The last week of this is a vacation in the desert with just me. Sounds like heaven about now, if I can only get there.

A thought sprang up out of my heart a moment ago, as my soul curled into the fetal position and whimpered, "I want to go home." Over and over again. Has it really been so long since I felt this way that it comes as a surprise, or is it that I've felt this way for so long that the litany has become the constant background of my thoughts?

And where is home, if not here? The hills where I grew up? The desire for home pervaded my mind at times even when I lived there. My mother's house, my grandmother's? Where my family is? I love my family, but I feel so distant from them in some ways, even though there's comfort in the way they're always there. Is home where my heart is? My heart has no home. It's not welcome where it wants to be, and it's so tired of searching for a place to rest. Is my only true home in the next world? I could have a long wait, and I'm not a patient person.

The wind of these days is a constant roar in my ears, drowning out and beating down the small things inside. Things happen all around me at the same racing tempo, and they become not changes but a lack of change. Every day there are new things to do, but every day there are things to do, so no day stands above the rest, a goal to reach, a place to pause. There will be days of rest, I know, unseen now, but found again like warm hollows in a winter field. And in these hollows, treasures lie, of love, of hope, of peace, memories to cherish, moments that are, in their own way, a blessed eternity.

But here where I stand now, the wind rushes past me over a vast expanse, featureless and remote. The wind pushes me, stumbling blindly, forward, across the time from now to then.

Lost Socks and Other Slips Betwixt the Cup and Lip

2008-11-09T19:58:00.006-06:00

There's been a pattern emerging in my life just lately. A leitmotif, if you will. I've been losing my grip.

No, no, literally, not figuratively. :-)

Things have been slipping through my fingers, falling out of my hands, I've been even more clumsy than usual, and I'm not sure why, or if there's even a reason. The funny thing is, I haven't dropped anything.

In the grocery store the other day, I pulled a bag of chips from the shelf. The one next to it came out, too, and in reaching to catch the second bag, I lost my hold on the first. After a fraction of a second of bobbling chip bags, things came to a stop and I was standing slightly crouched, but with both bags of chips cupped lightly and safely in my arms. A few days later I was measuring spices for a spread I was making, and as I picked up a teaspoon measure, it slid out of my grip. As it fell towards the counter, I caught it up in my other hand. It seems like something similar has happened five or six more times in the past few days, but I can't clearly recollect.

Each time it happens, it makes me think. Think about things in my life that I've lost my hold on. Things that seem to be getting away from me. Things I don't have in hand, and don't have under control. Things I'm afraid I'll lose. This reminds me that even when my grip is tenuous, I can still hang on, and even when I can't hang on, I can reach out again as they fly from me, and grasp them with a grip even stronger. I just have make the effort with confidence and without hesitation. After all, I stumble all the time, but I very rarely fall to the ground.

In the past it's been my habit to jerk away when I drop something. To raise my hands clear and watch it fall. This is because I used to work with soldering irons, when reaching out to catch a falling object could mean a serious burn. I think I've done the same thing on a metaphoric level as well. When I lose control of things and they began to slide away from me, there are times when I've just jumped clear. And there are times when that's appropriate. But there are other times when a quick, deft action can save a situation that seemed lost.

Anyhow, it's something to think about, and maybe an example of the still, small voice that doesn't speak in the tempest, the earthquake, or the fire, but instead through the little things we take to heart. And while we're on the subject of things that seemed lost, but are unexpectedly recovered, I found one of those socks that disappear in the laundry, half of my favorite pair. It's been missing for over a year. I feel like the woman who has twenty pieces of silver and loses one, how happy she is when she finds it, and how she calls out to her friends to be joyful with her. Rejoice with me, for the favorite sock, which I'd lost, has been found!

I think it's a sign. I don't know of what. Presaging other things I think I'll never see again, that may reappear in unexpected places? I don't know.

But I think it's a sign.

City of New Orleans

2008-10-28T22:30:00.000-05:00

Do I give over heart and dreams?
Do I sink them in the river
Baptize them, watch them come up new.
Do I call this home
And wrap it around my soul?
A quick flip of fin or feather
A dark shape slides into the depths
Slipping into narrow streets
I offer heart and soul and dreams.
I lose myself.
I always do.

I landed in New Orleans after dark, cabbed to the hotel and settled in. The Quarter called to me, but I shied at first. I got as far as the Walgreen's on Canal Street and Baronne, and chatted and laughed with the cashier over my purchases (cookies, pencils, chips, and a map).

I'd planned at first to scout apartments, but I didn't do enough research to be ready for that. Ditto on my second plan, to ride all of the streetcar routes. I finally decided to do the things I'd always wanted to do, but hadn't done.

I'd never visited the Riverwalk Mall. I went there and found the most amazing food court, with pizzas and calzones and a tray of enormous turkey legs. I walked down the river longer than ever before, from the mall to Governor Nicholls wharf. The sky was as gray as the river below and I watched the waves as the Natchez steam calliope began to warm up. I leaned on the railing and watched a snail, a strange little jewel against the steel, as it pushed out into a rain drop, then pulled back into its home. I turned my back on the water and looked down into the streets. Could this be home for me?

Up and down the streets in a fairly aimless wander, I found myself beneath the convent walls. It had just run through my mind how I'd always wanted to go on the tour, and they'd never been running them, when I passed an open doorway and a sign announcing tours from 10am to 4pm. I nearly fell sideways into the archway out of surprise. Two ladies were standing in a little giftshop. I took the tour and asked the poor docent all sorts of questions she didn't know answers to. Then I chatted for several minutes with the lady in the gift shop. When I told her I'd be moving there, she was so excited for me, and made me promise to stop by and see her sometime. I made a friend. :-)

Fried chicken at Fiorella's, then I took a bus tour, something else I've never done. I saw some of Frenchman's Street, St. Louis Cemetery number 3, the spot where the 17th Street Canal failed, the Garden District, and the house Payton and Eli Manning grew up in.

Later that night I decided that while it wasn't something new, I'd like to take the Haunted History vampire tour again. The tour guide last December, Jonathan, had been a great story teller, and had been quite nice to look at, too. I walked to the cathedral where the tour gathered, and saw none other than Jonathan himself. I paid for my tour, and after glancing at me a few times as I milled around, he turned to me and said, "You've been on my tour before." I agreed that I had! "Towards the end of last year?" Yes!

Now, I know exactly why I remember him, and at any rate, I'd only had one vampire tour guide. But he gives these tours all the time, and I have to say I'm pretty flattered that ten months after giving me that one tour, he recognized me. I might have to look him up when I move. It's nice to think a good-looking guy finds me, if nothing else, memorable. :-)

Oh. The next day there was a football game. Rice won. Yay!

I took the ghost tour after dinner on Saturday. My tour guide had a black German Shepherd named Sarah, and I made friends with her. Then I did something else I'd never done. I had my palm read in Jackson Square. I watched Jerik read four other people while I was waiting. They were all so similar that I wondered if he just always said the same things. But he seemed to be indicating the right parts of their hands as he spoke, from what I know about palmistry.

Then he got to my hand, and I was pretty different from all of them. Let's see. I have an earth hand, meaning I am a practical and down to earth person. (That I'm not so sure of.) My intellect line is a full six out of six. "My dear, you are *very* bright, with incredibly good reasoning skills." I have artistic fingers, tapered from base to tip, with a managerial spread to my four fingers, "and about as independent a thumb as you can have and still function when working with others." Some part of my hand indicates that I'm as stubborn as "two Missouri mules, a wooly mammoth, and a house cat, for good measure." Unlike all of the indented mounds of Saturn before me, indicating people who never want to grow up, my mound of Saturn is flat. "You, my dear, really are an adult, though indicates that you will age only slowly, and will probably always look ten years younger than you really are." I have an extensive heart line, and will maintain friendships for a lifetime. I have good triangulation of Neptune, indicating strong people skills. My fertility line is pretty productive, "My dear, you could people a small village if you wanted to. You have the potential for seven children if you care to have that many." And as for my life line, I had the longest one he'd seen all evening, and could easily live into my nineties with none of the serious ailments attending age, like Alzheimers. Of course, I don't believe any of it, but it's kinda fun!

After that, I met up with Chuck and we walked up and down Bourbon Street a bit. A woman with a cooler actually offered to sell Chuck a Miller Lite. One can't really expect her to understand why I doubled over laughing. Chuck got himself a real beer and we wound our way through the crowd. At the Halloween party inside and outside of a GLBT bar, we saw a six-foot Dorothy in ruby combat boots. AWESOME.

The next morning I had the pleasure of introducing Chuck to my favorite bakery, the Croissant D'Or. He quite approved. When he headed back to the hotel to load the buses, I took myself back to Jackson Square. Something else I've always wanted to do but hadn't was go through the history museum in the Cabildo, next to the cathedral, so I did that, wandering through the exhibits and reading the placards while a solo trumpet played full and rich out in the sunlit square.

On the way back to the hotel to pick up my bags and catch a cab to the airport, I stepped into the Jesuit church on Baronne. It was dim and cool inside, adorned with a heavier intricacy than St. Louis Cathedral in the square. It was still and empty and lovely, with the hum from the traffic outside like the sound of whispered prayers, like the hum of an ocean shell. In that church I prayed that I'd find a home here, and also find a great adventure. I had some hours in the airport ahead of me, but here I said good bye to New Orleans, for now.

And that night, landing in Houston, somehow it didn't feel like the homecoming it's always been before.

A Case for Literature

2008-10-20T19:43:00.002-05:00

I have a friend who asked me an interesting question once, sitting at my dining table with his back to my (now even more full) bookshelves. He looked back over his shoulder, waved a hand, and said, "I've never understood, what's the point of... all this?"

I asked him if he meant... books? But it turns out he gets books. He reads plenty, but it's literature, fiction, that he doesn't get. To explain something that happened, to cast history in a new light, sure, but why spend as much time and money as I've obviously spent on... stories.

I'm not sure how well I explained it, but memoirs, histories... they can only shed light on what was. Fiction, stories, can explore what could be. Not just actualities. Not even probabilities. All the possibilities. Maybe it's just me, or people like me. Maybe that's why I'm such a reader and why I became a writer. Maybe that's why all writers are writers, and something not everyone can understand. I've read accounts of history that deepened my understanding and broadened my mind. But I've read novels that completely changed my life.

I wouldn't be the person I am if Charlotte Brontë hadn't written Jane Eyre. I read it when I was something like thirteen. I guess I fell in love with Victorian England, but more to the point, I met a young woman who was intelligent and intensely rational, but at the same time deeply passionate and loving. Incredibly gentle, and incredibly strong. Young, alone, poor, and a woman when a woman had so little power for self-determination, she was offered everything she loved on terms she considered dishonorable, and offered everything honorable without love. She demanded life on her own terms, and she made that life for herself because no one else could give it to her. Of course, the story ends happy, and that's because it's a story. In life it needn't have, but still it might.

More recently I've been changed again. I always meant to read Jean M. Auel's Clan of the Cave Bear, but I only got around to it this year. And after that I had to read the sequel, Valley of the Horses. Then the next book and the next. I devoured all five of the novels in the Earth's Children series. They present an incredibly deft portrait of civilizations like nothing I'd imagined. Of course, there's very little we know about those who really peopled those times and places, but it doesn't really matter that they may not have existed. They are evokative not because of strict factuality, but because of the possibility. If they don't show us what was, they show us what very well could have been, and by doing so, show us a surprising amount about what is and what could be, even now. These novels have made me feel and think in ways I never have before. I've changed in ways difficult to describe right now, because I continue to think on them, and to change.

So that's why. That's the point of literature, for me at least. It can change a person. It can change an ethos. Don't ask me to prove that in a blog. It's more of a doctoral thesis topic. And like I said, maybe that's just me.

But I wanted to ask you. Have you ever read a book that made you who you are today?

Alaska Photos Up!

2008-10-06T11:24:00.001-05:00

http://leberwick.smugmug.com/Travel/606006

It's My Move...

2008-10-03T15:35:00.003-05:00

I've been talking about moving for almost a year now. I came to Houston at eighteen for college, and going to school here and living here with the wonderful friends I made then and continue to make has been an amazing experience for me. I've lived here now longer than I have in any other place, but this has never been where I wanted to spend my life.

I've chickened out on moving this year, because it would mean finding a new home and packing up this one in the next two months (my current lease is up on December 1). I don't want to spend Thanksgiving that busy, and I want one last Christmas playing with my band. So I've signed a six month lease, which puts me moving at the end of May. This gives me another basketball season and six more months to watch Dylan grow. This should also be a better time for finding a new place to live.

Last year in December I took a short vacation in New Orleans. I had business in the Big Easy, and decided since my flight was paid for, I'd tack on the weekend. I had borrowed Interview with a Vampire from a friend, and my goal was to read it while I was there, in the midst of its initial setting.

I fell in love.

Not with Bourbon Street, of course. And not even with Cafe du Monde or the touristy ghost, vampire, and voodoo tours, even though I love taking them.

I fell in love with the Mississippi River. With quiet courtyards behind wrought-iron gates. With the narrow old streets, steeped in history. With the pork chops at Fiorella's. With a ham and cheese croissant and a mille fois at Croissant D'Or. With beignets for breakfast on a bench in Jackson Square. With St. Louis cathedral, its choir, and the bishop who welcomed all the people in town for the St. Louis football game, but pointed out with a mischeivous, beatific smile, that God does love cardinals, but saints are even better.

I fell in love with the way this city haunts my heart and pulls at the edges of my mind like a memory out of a dream. I don't know if it's a call from the past or the future. I don't know if there's anything there for me but the adventure of starting out somewhere new completely on my own. But I'm ready for adventure. I know what is there for me. A town I'm eager to explore, and the security of a job I already hold.

There are downsides, of course, but Ike has reminded me that Houston isn't any safer as far as hurricanes go. I'll need to talk to my boss. I'll need to plan out a great apartment hunt. I'll need to remember, when fear makes me think maybe I should just stay put, that I can always come back, or move elsewhere if things don't work out. And I'll need to remember that I can't escape the things I want to leave behind just by moving. They'll follow me, and it's up to me to be stronger than they are, but I can hope that adventure and new experiences can weaken them, make them easier to shake. There are a lot of questions I still have, a lot of doubts.

I have eight months to hash them out, so here goes!

Home Safe

2008-09-22T00:45:00.000-05:00

After beginning with a logistics tangle of nightmare proportions due to the impending hurricane, my vacation was lovely and I arrived home about half an hour ago, a day before I'd planned, but then, I'd left two days before I'd planned, and I was ready to be back and see for myself that all was well in my own little den.

It's not that I didn't trust Tim's reports on the exceptionally untouched state of my abode and the return of electricity. But after hearing the news and seeing the pictures, I just needed to be home to feel that it was over and to really understand that I'd dodged that bullet, and everything was going to be okay.

And I did. And it is. And I'm sitting here crying, out of exhaustion after a long day of traveling, yes (at midnight Sunday I was in Canada), but also out of an overwhelmingly humbled sense of gratitude.

I am all the more amazed at how untouched my life was by the storm buy seeing how much of Houston was violently touched. It's visible on an enormous scale, and in tiny details. As we approached Hobby and were descending over the city, I was sobered at how dark Houston still was. So many unlit patches. So many broad areas without power.

I had to pay in the lobby of the garage I parked in instead of the exit booths because of the skeletal power system they were running on, and even in the lobby the employees were all fanning themselves in the dank, heavy air. Hobby isn't in the best neighborhood, but now the place looks deserted, like a ruin, with traffic lights dark, some hanging by wires still, store fronts unlit, street lights off. I had to stop at all three of the intersections you go through at Broadway and I-45 to get on 45 northbound. The signal lights weren't flashing. They were completely dark. It scared me.

The enormous light poles over the freeways are running, but again I was bothered by a difference. There's light, but nowhere near the level of illumination of surface, of underpass, of signage, as I'm used to. And it may be hypersensitivity on my part, after my time in the more pristine air of the Pacific Northwest, but the city, the entire city, smells like a stale drain. It's not rank, but it's pervasive and ubiquitous.

As I got to my street (the exit ramps to which are no longer under water, thank goodness), there were signs blown away, small trees and some tree limbs down, and one building severely damaged, but the general infrastructure seemed sound and lights were lit, traffic signals functioning. Still, the smallest things seem to glare at me. All the street light poles used to be straight. Now each of them leans at a slight, and slightly different, angle. It's a tiny thing, like I said, but it adds to the unsettlement I feel after seeing all of the large things. There is no haven of perfection. No place untouched.

Until I drag my luggage across my complex and up the stairs to my own unit. Open the door. Flip the switch, which actually turns on the lights. I go over and turn the thermostat back on and the air conditioner kicks in. I look around at all the things I left behind, and left in God's hands, because there was no way I could take care of them before leaving town. I open my refrigerator which doesn't reek because Tim cleaned the perishables out for me. I open my freezer and find the popsicles that have been in my freezer forever, and all of a sudden seem perfect.

I guess it's not untouched and perfect. I lost some food. My network seems to have forgotten that I named and secured it. What preparations I did make are still in place. But it's SO much better than it could have been. Nothing I own was damaged. My friends are all okay, and none of them suffered irreparable losses. Oh, God. I'm so overwhelmingly, unbelievable grateful, and at the same time I hurt to see that so many people were so hurt when I haven't been at all. I'm tired, like I said, so just about anything is going to make me weepy. But it does all make me cry all kinds of tears.

I have journals from my trip that I will post at some point, but now doesn't feel like the right time.

I'm just so glad to be home. I'm just so glad you guys are all okay.

Thank God.

Letter Home

2008-09-15T00:56:00.001-05:00

I wish I could send this home to you

Salt in a breeze that snaps the sails

Stinging tang of spray from a wave

Shy head of smoke as a harbor seal looks back at me

Blue, blue, living, heaving, swirled with white, blue all around

Gull cries and ship horns and the rustle of air and water

Gleaming gold sun setting in pure sky behind mountains, dancing on waves

Shivering silver of the full moon on still waters

Lights of the port towns twinkling and the DASH… dot flash of a lighthouse

The Big Dipper pointing to the North Star and a north by northwest path of light thought the darkness

Clean

Cool

Calm

Stasis

Security

Serenity

I wish I could send this home to you
With all my love

Balm in Gilead

2008-08-18T21:39:00.001-05:00

4 new tires on the pavement, a full tank of gas, and a well-maintained engine in a car that's comfortable like an old friend, and loves the road

a full moon banked in cobweb clouds, etched in light like a fine engraving and ringed in rainbow

a warm light in a stranger's eyes, a smile returned, a joke, and shared laughter between people who've never shared before

the diamond ring my father gave my mother shining on my little sister's hand, and still dimmer than her smile

trial seems to be the cost of joy, but joy comes easy when it comes, and there is no healing without wounding and no wounding without healing

After the Storm

2008-08-05T20:10:00.004-05:00

I watched the rain all day. Gray curtaining a gray sky, behind young leaves and slender, writhing limbs. Leaves brought to peridot brilliance, stamped against the dull dim white of a million falling drops. When it ended, I couldn't stay in, flushed out into the clearing air under a sky still heavy and damp.

The smell of woodsmoke filled the air, it seemed to drift up from the coppery pine needles that laced the path. A swirling breeze brought water smells from the muddy surge of the swollen bayou, and, passing drooping, dripping sunflowers, glaring golden against the thick brown billows, a hint of summer honey sweetened the air. Fitful gusts flung the cold sharp spray of a few last drops. And glimmering on the soft green ground, caught along each blade like beads of sliver, raindrops lingered, perched trembling on the shivering strands, as if the soft gray sky itself had settled, sifting through grass fingers.

Caught and held captive by each small crystal, I slowed and stopped and wanted nothing more than to be some small animal so I could bend and drink my fill. A bird, maybe, flitting down from my sodden branch with a beak like smooth glass, dipping up a shimmering sip and with back-tilted head, take in the rain. Or a mouse with deft and delicate paws pulling a blade to sniff this bit of fallen sky with whiskers wet, and then with tiny tongue, explore the shining, cool and cleansing wetness down the center.

I wanted to be something small, to look around and find myself amid a field of silver treasure. I knelt and touched my finger to one drop, poised atop one small, arching blade. The globe of dampness bulged unbroken, until I drew my hand away, then split in two, I held a tiny round of cloudy sky, then brought my finger to my lips, and tasted the rare, pure sweetness of new fallen rain.

Exciting News!

2008-08-02T22:51:00.001-05:00

My little sister is now engaged! Scary. Kind of hard to wrap my head around the fact that she's an adult.

So anyway, if you see her on Facebook, give her a shout. She's very happy, and we're all very happy for her!

Success!

2008-07-15T19:29:00.001-05:00

Mom's surgery went even more smoothly than the surgeon anticipated. Got to see her for a bit while she had a drink of water and settled into her room. Then she zonked out again, and I left her snoozing. Brooke'll be staying with her tonight, and all's well. I'm back home, relieved, exhausted, and gotta pack!

Thanks for all the well wishes!

The Sun'll Come out...

2008-07-14T20:03:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow, I'm a little nervous about. Mom's scheduled for surgery at 11am. I'm going to try to meet them at the hospital before she's admitted. I'll be working on my laptop, so I'll stay occupied. I'm not *really* worried about how things will go. It's a routine thing to fix herniated discs. And it's not like Mom hasn't had a surgical procedure, like, when I was born. Still, I get nervous. And I don't much care for hospitals.

Still, I want to be there in case the doctor needs to anything. And because I want to know the score. When she'll get out, what she'll need. My sister's got class, then work, and, I dunno, I just don't want my mom dropped off at the hospital and left there until the next day. It's not likely anything will go wrong, but it could, and someone should be there. Family. I hate that my mom lives alone, and I'm just so glad my godparents are letting her stay with them in Bryan while she recovers, and that my sister will be in the same town if Mom needs anything.

And, well, I'll be there tomorrow, it's the least I can do. But I have to come back tomorrow night so I can fly out to Louisiana tomorrow. And I'll visit on Saturday. But... I feel bad I can't do more. I mean, she's my mom.

So, anyways, thoughts, prayers, fingers crossed. Here's to a safe, successful surgery and a quick recovery! It's going to be a long day.

Projects Beget Projects

2008-07-05T21:25:00.002-05:00

My project for today was to get ready to do a painting. I've been tired of the canvas over my couch for a while, but it's better than blank wall. Still, it's an unfinished seaside landscape from Big Sur. I haven't touched it in years, and now I realize I never will. I've lost interest in the project, and I don't see a way forward.

Still, I need something over the couch, and it's a $65 canvas.

I decided on something that would pull together elements of the Tuscan countryside, the architecture of Siena, and the colors of the contrada flags I brought home. I've been working all day on some ideas. I've been working with Photo Shop and a picture I took through an archway at San Bernardino. I cropped and moved and scaled and copied and pasted to get something that looked right. Then I used Visio to work out a technique I learned in drawing class, superimposing a grid and cross-hatch over the image, to give me landmarks to work with when I begin painting, to get proportions and spacing right. I still have to piece together my print out, which will end up being the same size as my canvas. Still a lot of work to do, but I feel better about being able to finish this one.

I do need to get some photographs to figure out how to do the draping on a contrada flag I want to include. I've had them hanging above my patio doors, folded and fastened with hem tape. I need this one to hang differently for my studies, and I've been wondering if the tape was the best idea anyway. Thus a new project is born.

I've discovered that pulling at the tape doesn't rip the fabric, but it does distort the weave. And it's hard to detach. It turns out, Goo Gone is my friend. Which then washes out fairly well without bleeding the color. So the next project is to pull them all down, remove the tape, wash them out, and press them. After I get my photos to help with my painting, I plan to fold them the way I want to hang them, press them into that shape, then hem them with a minimal amount of stitching. Then I'll need help hanging them again.

I think when I finish my painting, I'll post pictures of all the things I've done in the process. But for now it's a surprise. :-)

Mending

2008-06-24T21:02:00.002-05:00

A long time ago, we visited Grandma and Grandpa, and Grandpa showed us the new carvings he'd been working on. Visiting Grandpa's shop was always memorable for me, and as he showed us the bigger, more sophisticated pieces, my unsophisticated eye was caught by a small carving, maybe three inches tall, a little blue jay. More stylized than realistic, and painted, unlike most of his pieces. A simple little thing, but I fell in love.

I asked Grandpa what he was going to do with it, and he smiled and said he didn't know, and I could tell he knew I wanted it. I didn't want him to think I was greedy, and I don't think I could ever ask an artist to give me even the smallest work of his hands. We went home, and I put it out of my mind. When I unwrapped my present from Grandpa the next Christmas, and I saw that little blue jay carving, I don't think I've ever had a gift that made me happier.

Grandpa died back in 1998. When I got the news, time stopped. I hung up the phone and walked to the window. They were unremarkable moments, everything my eyes fell upon were things I'd seen every day. I looked out of my apartment into the courtyard, and heard the call of a blue jay. I stared blankly into the sunlight, my mind empty, and the jay fluttered down onto the sidewalk, the sunlight irridescent on wings like lapus lazuli. He looked at me looking at him, and cocked his head, hopping a bit, then he flew away as my eyes filled with tears.

Ever since then, blue jays bring Grandpa to mind. Daddy died on the same day, four years later. The pair of jays that nest outside my window at work give me pause every time I see them.

A few years ago, when Mom was moving to Schertz, one of the dogs got into one of the cardboard boxes, and one of the things in that box was my blue jay. Mom tried to glue some of the broken off splinters back, but finally asked if I just wanted her to send it to me. I said that would probably be best, but when I saw it, all I could do was cry and put it back in it's wrappings.

The second and third times weren't much better. But finally I was able to take a look at the damage and Mom's repair. Most of what she'd done I decided I'd need to undo, so I started in with an exacto-knife. I cut away the glue and shaved some slivers off some of the edges so they'd fit better. I glued the tail back together, and set it aside. I wasn't sure how to proceed, and it was still pretty emotionally draining work.

Yesterday I was putting some things back in the tool box that we'd used in setting up the new TV. And I saw the wood glue. And I got an idea.

I pulled out some tooth picks, put down a paper towel, and started dripping wood glue into the cracks where things had to be glue back, and to fill the pits where Ollie's teeth crushed in the wood. The glue softened the wood some and I was able to push some things back into place. Today I pulled down my acryllics and my brushes and began to paint over the glue.

I'm not the artist he was; I haven't put in the time. And I don't have the paints he used so I couldn't match the colors just right. But you'd have to look a lot closer to see the damage now. It's fixed, and I can display it with his other carvings. It means so much to me, and I'm so happy I'm crying. :-P

I was talking to Tim last night about my repairs, and I asked him, at what point, as I poke and prod and glue and paint, does it cease to be my grandfather's work?

Tim answered, "It's a collaborative art project between your grandfather, you...

"and your mother's dog."

Quick Update

2008-06-21T23:50:00.000-05:00

In as few words as possible. Details available upon request.

* Mom's having her surgery on July 2.
* I'm getting a new TV tomorrow.
* Danny asked if I still wanted to move to New Orleans. Maybe in December...
* I've now held a job for 2 years.
* I switched to Green Mountain Energy and have started drinking herbal teas.

Other than all of that, life is pretty much what it's been for the past few years.

Through a Glass

2008-06-14T01:42:00.002-05:00

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. - 1 Corinthians 13:12

Lately it’s occurred to me that while I have been successful in preserving a certain innocence and wonder in my life, I have, in some of the best ways, become a grown up. It’s not the fact that I use adult language at times (especially on the freeway), or that I’ve learned to enjoy certain alcoholic beverages (only very sweet ones). It’s not that I have a job, pay my bills, or even that, well, I was married.

When I was a child, dad would joke about me becoming a doctor or a lawyer, so I could afford the best old folks home there was for him. It made me uncomfortable, the thought of taking care of my folks some day. Of being the one in charge, instead of being the one they cared for. It was before my sister was born. I felt like it would of course be my duty, and that I loved these people and would certainly do the best for them, but it felt like it would be a weight, and I was so little, I couldn’t imagine ever being old enough to bear it. But now I do have a job and pay my bills, and can take care of myself, and I find myself feeling protective of my mother. She doesn’t need my care yet, of course, but I do care. I like giving gifts, things that people would like, but my mom… there’s no way I can ever pay her back for what she’s given me. She’s an amazing woman whom I respect more and more as time passes, and if I could buy the world I’d give it to her in a golden bowl. She will never be a burden. I know what I owe her, and I will give her nothing less.

A big part of this, of course, is that I’ve learned to take care of myself. When I was a child, adults seemed to me… capable, competent, confident. I was unsure of myself, wasn’t sure of my place, or if I found a place, if I could fill it. But over the past few years I’ve realized that wherever I am, I can make a place for myself and fill it with ease and grace and joy. Not because I’m perfect and never make mistakes. But because I know what my failings are, I know my limits. And I’ve had PLENTY of experience cleaning up my mistakes. Knowing I can fix what I don’t do right takes a lot of the fear out of just living, and I think that maybe not all grown ups are lucky enough to have found that place for themselves, I know that in that sense, I am a grown up by the definition I always held. I’m capable, competent, and confident!

There are many childish things I will never put aside. I am not ashamed of the magic I find in a world hemmed in by the prosaic machinations of mundane minds. I’m not ashamed to be awed by a dew drop or babble with a baby, or event to blush and refuse to participate when things that are private and powerful to me are joked about crudely. I’ve never gotten plastered, or had a one-night stand, or gone crazy the way some people did when they wanted to grow up faster. I never wanted to grow up, and certainly wasn’t about to speed up the process. It happened, of course, but in a different way, and it’s hard in some ways, but it’s made me who I am, and I’m very happy with that.

When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. 1 Corinthians 13:11

When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up. – C S Lewis

We Won't Forget

2008-05-26T11:49:00.002-05:00

Who I'm remembering and am thankful for today:

Uncle Earl, WWII, fought in the Pacific on a submarine crew, who can't remember much any more
Grandpa, WWII, ship's cook on a naval sub, died of cancer in 1998
Popo, WWII, served in the army in North Africa, died in an accident in 2001
Daddy, navy submarines, died of a heart attack in 2002
Bud, my godfather, who was stationed all over before going back and getting his degree at A&M, and who still loves his country, and would probably serve if he could
Mr. Butler, Korea, my old English teacher I haven't talked to since I graduated high school, but who would tell stories about the trenches and the rations
Marvin, whose navy tattoos were the first tattoos I remember seeing on a person :-P
Em's Brad, Iraq, who came home injured, but is doing okay, thank God

And those are just the people I can name. I'm so thankful for everyone who has fought or is fighting. Who are you remembering today?

Homemade Soup and Other Warm Thoughts

2008-05-20T21:24:00.000-05:00

After last night's soup stock disaster, I wasn't sure it would work out. I left work and went straight to the store. I got home an hour later with a five pound boneless ham (ever hopeful), a better masher for the beans, and a serious scrub brush.

Between the scrub brush, a rough sponge, and about a cup of baking soda as an abrasive, the 16 quart stainless steel stock pot nearly ruined by the catastrophe that still laces the air of my apartment with the lingering oder of burnt beans, rose from the literal ashes and now shines *almost* like new.

I boiled up that ham, mashed those beans, added the already cooked venison sausage bits, and after two hours of simmering, mashed up the beans and ham cubes some more (I really like my masher, it gets the grrrs out). I skim it every so often as it cools, and I've already had my first bowl. It's delicious and rich and warm and filling. My stomach feels hugged. I am now faced with the ubiquitous soup quandry of, "NOW what do I do with 6 to 8 quarts of soup?"

It's a comfortable sort of evening. I've been trying so hard to get to a better place in my life that I have probably missed numerous opportunities to make *this* a better place (though to be fair, I've siezed a fair number as well). A few days ago I felt like Iwas in a circling eddy current I couldn't get out of. Now I feel like maybe I've found a sheltered cove to drowse and dream in. A time to stop, to sit down in this little furrow with my back to a bank of tilled earth, with the honey smell of summer grasses and the scent of fresh moist soil in my mind. I have sown. I will harvest. Now is a time of waiting. A time of rest. And after I reap the bounty of my patience and peace...

I'll make more soup.

First Harvest

2008-05-16T23:21:00.003-05:00

Bit of a meager harvest. I can't really seem to find the right balance for watering. Some more beans out there, just not very big yet.

Personal Victory

2008-05-16T09:29:00.001-05:00

I am proud to announce that the Onshore Piping document that I began about a year and a half ago, as one of my first big projects for Shell and IDI went live last week, and all of the old redundant and out-dated documentation it replaces has been archived and obsoleted.

I thought that thing would *never* die.

Bean Progress

2008-05-04T15:46:00.002-05:00

More photos are up in my Beans! album, but in spite of some problems we're having, we've started to produce!

Work of my hands

2008-04-28T22:22:00.003-05:00

Tomorrow is the last class for the beginning drawing class I'm taking. I just finished my homework drawing, and I'm very proud of it, so here's me showing off. My scanner wasn't big enough, so the top and bottom curves are cropped, but you get the idea. I've posted other homework drawings here, and will probably post the other projects I've been working on inspired by this class later.

This last one, though, I think I'll frame.

But something makes paths.

2008-04-13T19:25:00.005-05:00

I found a secret, hidden in plain sight.

The signs that say Stonewood Nature Trail lead to a gate in the fence around this place. The gate opens into a path down into the bed of the small stream that drains into the bayou. You can see it's mouth from my patio.

The steps are beginning to crumble. Two picnic tables are covered with last autumn's dry leaves. The debris of human traffic lies half buried in the dust, and it seems as probable that it was washed here by the last high water as that it was discarded directly by human hands. Beyond one forgotten table, surging mounds of green rustle knee deep on either side of a narrow crease, some lost path, studded with tricornered white flowers no bigger than dimes.

Carefully threading my steps into the void between the ground cover, I walk only ten or fifteen paces into a world that's almost natural forest. With my back to the chain-link fence on the other side of the stream, and to the power lines that run along the opposite ridge, I stare up into a fold of land pillared by tall trees and draped in greenery. Grape vines hang down from the branches, with younger tendrils winding their way up thicker, older vines. A house sparrow, one of the birds that looks ragged and sooty pecking motes out of the asphalt in a parking lot, flits by, and seems transformed from a tattered scavenger to a crisp, alert little wood spirit, eying me not with the skittish edginess it shows in people's world, but with a friendly, if aloof, sort of welcome.

You'd think that the fence and the power lines and the sudden click and whir of an air conditioning unit on the bank across the creek is more than enough to account for my "almost natural" bit above. But those are large, obvious things. And blatantly obvious things are the things that can sometimes be most easily ignored.

The reasons I say almost natural are the things that nag at my mind, that it takes me a moment to pin down. Those broad leaves on the other side of the pooled and trickling water, those aren't native. They're elephant ear plants run wild from some one's yard. The same goes for the huge clover leaves and purple flowers running at the edges of the white-flowered plant that seems to have taken over most of the cleared ground. I've seen them along manicured lawns, never in the wild. There's a smell in the air, pulsing through the earth and water and tree smells, warm on gusts of a high wind that does little more than gently breath down this gully. Then I have it. Rose bushes. From a neighboring yard.

And I wonder what makes the paths. They remind me most of deer trails, but there can't be any deer here. I suppose these could just be very old and almost overgrown man-made trails. Or maybe even water runoff. It's a bit of a mystery, here where people don't seem to have been for a long time. But perhaps the visitors come briefly like me, and leave little behind, not even bothering to sweep the debris from the tables.

I stand in stillness, move only my eyes towards any sound that doesn't seem wind-made. I watch a speck float in the pool below me, cradled in brown banks. I watch my speck speed up as it heads towards silent ripples over ivory colored gravel and fine brown sand. I watch it float into a broader pool. I turn slowly, soaking in sights and smells and sounds from all around.

Then I walk back, so intent on trying to see if any of those itchy little leaflets three are around that I almost walk face first into grapevines. I should come back down in late summer to see if there are any grapes. The idea of picking grapes from wild vines to make jelly takes me back years and miles to Momo's house outside of La Grange. Picking dewberries from the thorny brambles that hide rusting metal in an old scrap yard. Driving up and down the dirt roads, stopping by clumps of trees covered over in broad green leaves to search out the small, dark, sweet mustang grapes.

In spite of the exotic garden plants, in spite of the power lines and leaf-blanketed benches, suddenly this feels like home.

Pompei

2008-04-05T11:23:00.004-05:00

A week ago I visited the Pompei exhibit at the HMFA. I promised Kerri I'd let her know what I thought, so I took a few notes while I was there, and I've let it settle for a while, so here's what I thought.

First, I probably would have enjoyed the experience a lot more if it had been less crowded, so Kerri, if you can go during the week, maybe a morning, and avoid any sort of school field trip, you might like it a lot more than I did. They also had free audio tour headsets, but I didn't want one, so I don't really know what I missed with that, but I'm kind of grumpy that I would need one. And it made me grumpy how people would talk to each other (somewhat loudly) about what they were hearing in their headsets. I guess I would have just liked a little more quiet to contemplate in.

So, what's in the exhibit? I mean, a chronicle of the explosion would seem more fitting for the HMNS, really, so why the art museum? Well, the feature pieces are the wall frescos, the statues, the amphorae and urns and jewelry. Not the people who were caught, or the architecture buried under the rubble, but the precious and beautiful possessions the wealthy returned to recover. Of these I was most caught by the rings that held polished precious stones carved with tiny pictures of hens and chicks, gods and godesses, and other tiny icons. They were lovely, intricate, meticulously and delicately carved.

Most of the labels and descriptions were well done. There would be a portion describing the piece itself, possibly where it was found or with whom, and then another paragraph describing the significans or prevalence of that form of art or object in general. Those paragraphs were somewhat redundantly scattered across the exhibit, but if you didn't read and retain it at one piece, I guess it needs to be with all of the applicable pieces. I just would have like a little more detail, but I guess that's what the headsets were for.

One inscription in particular was noticably poor. I mean, bracelets that were very obviously snakes were quite particularly labeled "realistic snake bracelet in gold" and huge gold necklaces from which a tiny crescent pendant dangled were inscribed with care to make sure you noticed the crescent. But one small object, about a half an inch long, was only labeled, "Silver pendant."

Well, it was a silver pendant of male genetalia. I would have liked to know what the significance might have been, or with what sort of person it had been found, but no cultural or anthropological insight here. I suppose it was too embarassing.

It seemed a strange sort of prudishness, though, in light of what I found most disturbing about the exhibit. In each room, as a sort of center piece drawing more people than the objets d'art, were single or grouped casted bodies. Most were the older plaster casts, one was a newer resin cast, showing both shape and, through the translucent medium, bone structure.

I suppose there was a gritty realism in the way they sprawled on the floor, trapped in death and clear protective walls like insects in amber. And I've seen mummies and such in museums. But this in some ways sickened me. On entry there's a sculpted replica of a group of skeletons huddled and slumped in death, as found, along the quay of a port where they tried to shelter and escape. It was powerful and moving, but it wasn't real. It was a re-creation. The casts, those are real. All that is left of people that died in terror and hopelessness. Covering their faces with veils. Children cringing into the sides of their parents. A child, laid down beside his family, tiny face almost like life, like sleep, full lips and the trembling shell-like eyelids that, even in plaster, seemed like they could blink and slowly, sleepily open. I stood by that child and wept.

It's different from mummies, from burial relics. No one but death closed these eyes. No friend or mourning loved-one arranged these limbs for the last sleep. These people are held in the moments of their greatest horror, fears, supplications, dispair, all fixed forever. No funeral, no parting, just the unceremonious, unfeeling dump of natural disaster. And now here they are on display. The false skeletons at the front are cast in false soil, with images around and behind them, giving them some semblance of archeological significance. They are placed in a setting of ruin and the slow decay of time, and partially unearthed by the artist in the same way they would have been gently uncovered by the scientist. But the bodies in the exhibit halls lie on the floor, against the deep red paint and carpet that so effectively sets off the gold and gems of their goods. One cast reveals a man crouched against a wall with his hands covering his face, the grief of catastrophic loss and the knowledge of inescapable death in every line. And something in me rebelled. No one should be looking at that, under brilliant lights and flamboyant paint, wearing our polo shirts and torn jeans and our informative little head sets. There was a twisted figure of a dog that the inscription said had tried to escape by climbing on top of his dog house. Now body wrapped around agony and mouth open, it lies on a slightly raised platform surrounded by bronze statues and golden jewelry, and the man beside me looked at it and laughed.

There were things I enjoyed about the exhibit. I did like that many of the objects were described in terms of the places and people they were recovered near. Goods from a goldsmith's shop. Lamps held up against the gathering midday gloom. Treasures of the rich and treasures of the workers. Small statuettes of the god Mercury in silver, intended to protect travelers. Places named by the finds within, like Alley of the Skeletons or House of the Gold Bracelet. The powerful reminder that we will be identified by those who come after us not by the people we are so much as the things we owned, because this will be the only thing that remains of who we are. And the things these people left behind paint a rich and fascinating picture.

Not only adopted Greek gods are given artistic significance. Egyptian gods and goddeses cover small shrines and cups. A lamp is carved with a face bearing features of deeper Africa. A picture of a people both sophisticated and cosmopolitan, yet still identifiably Roman emerges. Powerful women, who owned land in their own right and influenced the politics of their world. Gladiators once slaves fighting for the entertainment of the rich, but with such skill and bravery that they have been freed and given a place in the world that they were once only a spectacle for. Paintings from a tavern wall showing seduction, gambling, comeradery, conflict, and the publican evicting his rowdier clients. Doesn't sound very different from today's bars.

It was in some ways a fascinating, informative, and moving exhibit. It was in other ways lurid and, in my opinion, degrading. I watched the film on the way out, however, that described the destruction of Pompei as a moral for "careful, respectful use of the land." It was the last impression I took away from an exhibit I was already not sure I liked. The idea that by farming in rich volcanic soil, these people brought down this destruction upon themselves is untenable and gratuitously neo-eco-evangelistic without even being apt. I left the exhibit frustrated and angry.

My verdict on Pompei? It was okay, but it could have been so much more.

Good Balconies Make Good Neighbors

2008-03-31T21:33:00.001-05:00

Today was moving day for the beans. Many hugs and thanks to Kevin for meeting me at Lowes after work and helping me haul dirt. I still need another bag, though. But I think I can handle it on my own, Kevin, don't worry.

Wrist deep, sometimes elbow deep in moist soil. Gently teasing apart the delicate root webs. Snugging the transplanted sprouts down into new beds and pulling and patting the soil around their new homes. Sweat beads rolling down my neck and dripping off of strands of my hair. Crumbling clods in my hands. Stooping. Standing. Stretching. Pushing hair off my forehead, smudging dirt on my nose. The smell, the feel, the rich brown and fresh green.

About half-way done, my new neighbor across the corridor came out onto her balcony and called out to me. We introduced ourselves and chatted about some problems she's having with the unit (due to poor housekeeping on the part of the previous tenants). She and her husband moved here from Ohio, and she's glad to be away from the snow.

Between the agriculture and the neighborly conversation, I felt like I was home again.

Streeeetchy Sprouts!

2008-03-30T18:29:00.007-05:00

So, I took some photos of my brand new sprouts yesterday when I first met them. I've posted two below.
So I went out today, one day later, expecting a little progress. Well.... There's been... A little progress! Check it out!

I've uploaded more photos here.

I really need to thin them SOON. I didn't really expect them... ALL... to come up. But I don't want to lose any of them. Yes, yes, I've become attached to my bean plants. Sigh. I think I'll need more than two planters for decent cross pollination anyway, so I may bet two more planters on my way home tomorrow, and some more soil, and just transplant them.

Sprouts!

2008-03-29T11:40:00.001-05:00

Sprouts Sprouts Sprouts!

Little green tubulets poking little arched necks out of the soil, about to lift their little green beany heads!

Sprouts!

Seeds

2008-03-16T13:01:00.001-05:00

I have three packets of green bean seeds. I borrowed a nickel from my mother and paid for them in exact change. $0.65.

I bought a watering can and two long rectangular planters that are sitting by the door to my back porch.

I also bought two bags of organic potting soil specially for potted vegetables that are sitting in the trunk of my car because they’re heavyish and bulkyish, and I can only handle one of them at a time.

Eddie has a note to make sure I keep Easter Saturday clear, because on that day, I will plant my little seeds.

Then I will have green beans a plenty, and hopefully enough during the summer to eat fresh, and then some to freeze for the rest of the year.

Mostly I can’t wait to have tiny sprouts to tend.

A leeetle too close to home...

2008-03-08T11:06:00.004-06:00

You've seen my wall of books. Or perhaps you can just imagine...

That's got to be one of the most common questions anyone who sees it asks. Have I read them all. Well, no, I haven't, but... most of them...

Oh well. As I told Willie yesterday. I can only be myself. And if that's off putting, so be it. Being what they want will make me unhappy until I stop, and at that point, being who I am will make them unhappy. Not going there. Ever again.

Oh, and still no word on the project that might lead me half-way around the world. When I do, be sure I'll let you know!

Au... Au... WHERE???

2008-02-21T12:33:00.001-06:00

Subject line of the boss-lady's e-mail:

Australia

*Meep* Must read deeper...

As a remote possibility someone may be interested....this note is to extend a project invitation to one of the three of you. It would require being pulled off , obviously, for several months.

We're about to start a large desk procedure/process project for ...

As a separate project, asked if we could find a writer who would be willing to go to their HQ in Australia and then possibly to Costa Rica for a couple of weeks to help get the processes in place. This would take place probably midsummer after we've completed the desk procedures.

The overseas stuff is a bit open-ended: dates, locations, formal amount of travel have yet to be discussed.

Thought I'd check with you first - if there is any interest, please let me know.

Now, the other two folks aren't quite as portable as single little me, so...

Well, I'm interested. I have personal travel plans in September, though, that would need to be accommodated (i.e. I've already paid a bunch of money for the trip), so if that's a problem, I won't be able to do it. Aside from that, sounds like a good opportunity.

Additional boss-lady e-mails have been forthcoming...

Good! I had a feeling you might be interested.

Am not sure what Sept will be like but most probably can work around your vacation....

and...

It's actually, Melbourne (sp?; primarily), Santiago, and West Africa, based on my notes I re-read.

If this changes anything for you, let me know.

and finally, my response...

That only changes the immunizations I might have to get. I'll have to look into that. I checked my passport last night, and it's good through 2016.

So, um, THREE DIFFERENT CONTINENTS???

Wow.

Just...

Wow.

Makayla's 1, and Her Mom's a Genius

2008-02-10T20:54:00.000-06:00

Edit: For those who were amused that all the pictures are of decorations, and not the birthday girl, all I can say is that *I* barely saw her, she was so popular and was being handed around so fast. :-) I’m sure someone got pictures.

My cousin Stephanie's little girl Makayla turned 1, and we all celebrated her birthday at Momo's this past weekend. Stephanie had food and decorations like you wouldn't believe!

I helped fill balloons with helium, and put together the arrangement below.

The kitchen was bestrewn with hors d'ouerves and hanging decorations.

The dining room was all done up, and that's where the desserts were.

Check out the dragonfly treats made from pretzels!

And of course, all the sugar cookies hand decorated by Stephanie herself. Geez.

And of course, a throne for the birthday princess. :-)

A birthday cake worthy of the food network...

And the birthday girl's own special birthday cake, all for her own. Ladybugs were the theme for the day. My invitation was a hand made ladybug whose wings spread open to show the invitation info.

The most *amazing* fruit bouquet. Not only was it gorgeous and full of color, it smelled amazing; filled the whole kitchen with the smell of fresh fruit.

Oh, and check out the strawberries. What did I tell you about ladybugs? This was perhaps the coolest thing, to me.

Uncle Steve made ribs, which I got to get a sneak preview of, because Ihad to leave before everything was ready to serve. But it was really great to get out there and see the family. My cousin Shane was there with his kids, and had some remote-controlled cars he and his boy Jeffrey were tinkering with. Abby ran around and barked at them, keeping a safe distance, of course. All in all, it's a bit of a long day when you drive out there and back all in one afternoon, but it was a gorgeous day yesterday, and a nice drive, and I'm glad I got to be there with everyone.

Happy birthday, Makayla!

Thou Art Beautiful

2008-01-27T18:24:00.000-06:00

When I first learned of her, I couldn’t have been any older than seven years old. The book was part of an encyclopedia of science for young people. I forget what technical question sparked this gift from my parents, but there was a set of narrow books from A to Z and there were the extra, “bonus” books that truly fascinated me. Fish, Mammals, Birds… and Primates.

Somewhere in the lucid text and glossy photos there it was: an evolutionary tree showing the relationship between man and ape. In the pages around this chart I found and was enchanted by her story. The discovery of a few scattered bones fossilized in an African dessert valley. Their amazing scientific significance and the astounding depths of time my young mind now had to comprehend. My first lesson on evolution.

This wasn’t Eve. This was Lucy.

I had seen my family tree, with my name (appropriately, it seemed to me) at the apex of a branching sprawl of other names, some so old they belonged to people that died before I was even born, but still recognizably a part of myself. So I knew what I was looking at when I found this particular picture and poured over it, lying on my stomach on the living room floor. I was related to gorillas and chimpanzees? I was a part of a tree with roots going back more years than I could in any way comprehend? I came from beings with names Mom and Dad couldn’t even pronounce? I was confused.

I had already asked Mom about the dinosaurs. If God had created all the animals and then us in six days, and put us in Eden to live until we were foolish enough to get ourselves kicked out, well, how did dinosaurs fit in? How could they possibly have existed thousands of years before people (in spite of what the Flintstones would have you believe) the way my books said? This was science, but what about Genesis?

Mom put forward the theory that God created fossils to test our faith in His Word. I pondered this, but even then it didn’t sit well with me. My book spoke of “missing link” hoaxes since the days of Darwin, and the idea of God basically perpetrating the perfect hoax bothered me. No doubt He could if He wanted. He is all-powerful. I do think that this dichotomy of science and religion is a test, just nothing so simplistic. But dinosaurs were a mental exercise to me. Lucy was more personal. She made me question not just how God works, but what He might intend for me. I came up with my own theories and feelings, and I’ve worked on them all my life as I learn more from without and within about my world and myself. For me, God is still wondrous and mysterious and no matter how He created the earth, I feel that greatness in my heart. That doesn’t mean it’s easy for me as a rational and analytical person. Without limiting God’s power, without disputing the veracity of His Word in the Bible, and without discounting powerfully compelling scientific evidence, account for the universe. Ready, set, go.

And in my mother’s defense, she continued to buy me dinosaur books.

Ever since I first read about her, then, Lucy has had this incredible impact on me. Meeting her and learning of her connection with me began a personal spiritual and mental dialogue that has strengthened my faith even as it has challenged the views that I accepted freely in my childhood. When I learned that she would be coming to the Houston Museum of Natural Science, I was floored. I’ve seen pictures of her bones and artists’ renderings of her face, but I never thought I’d get the chance to see her remains myself, in person. This was an opportunity I just couldn’t miss.

I went to visit Lucy yesterday. In Ethiopia, her home, she’s known as Dinkenesh, which means, according to one of the educational videos, “Thou art beautiful,” or to another, “You are wonderful.” Either is perfectly appropriate.

She is wonderful. I wanted to approach her with reverence. I read carefully all the accounts of the prehistory she was a part of and the history in which she was rediscovered. I watched the videos about her country today and the video in which her discoverer was interviewed. I took all of these things into my heart, along with the child’s awe undimmed from my first acquaintance with her. I still can’t remember all the long Latinate names, but I tried hard to focus on the story of human evolution that was beautifully displayed in a mural around the walls of the room she lies in. A mural flanked by mirrors.

Then I approached the case that holds her bones.

I was moved nearly to tears. Her bones are so small, her remains so scant. Barely an outline of a form, and yet these few fossilized bones mean so much. They had an enormous scientific impact at the time she was found. For me they have had an enormous personal impact for years.

Her tiny hip joint is like ours in miniature in features that show that she walked like we do. Her pelvis is marked, they say, in ways that show she might have borne a child. Her tiny toe bone, so small and so perfect. A vein of minerals glistens in a bone of her foot, and the marrow of her thigh is fossilized in darker stone than the surrounding bone. Splinters at the end of her humerus, even in stone, make her arm look so fragile, so delicate, like a child’s bones, and this made her more real to me than I can really describe. She has gone from being an image in my head to being someone I feel like I know. Someone I’ve had the privilege to meet.

She makes me question my own place, not only in my world today, but in evolutionary history/God’s plan. We aren’t descendent from Lucy per se, but perhaps from a contemporary. This makes me wonder, if gorillas and chimps aren’t driven to extinction or to the brink, where their genetic pool no longer has enough depth, what might they evolve into alongside ourselves? Yes, I’ve seen Planet of the Apes, but I’m serious. What could they become? What could we become? How strange might we look to someone so distant from us as we are from Lucy? (Supposing, of course, that anyone was around that far into the future, which is, as it was when I was seven, more than I can really comprehend.)

I hope we are as beautiful, as meaningful, as wonderful to them as she is to me.

Happy New Year, 2008!

2008-01-01T01:37:00.000-06:00

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And days o' auld lang syne?

I need to go to bed soon, but first I wanted to share my pictures of my busy and fun filled New Year's Eve party.

I got my candles all burned, with only one minor setback. I got some great pictures. For those of you who know about my pyrophobia, you should be proud of me, though mostly my fingers never got anywhere near the fire, and I *was* pretty nervous. But I managed.

I watched my Mythbusters, chatted with Katy after she texted me at midnight her time, drank and ate my yummies, and had fun melting my candles. I wrote in a journal for the first time in a long time, and now I'm ready to call it a night. Tomorrow I start the new year in earnest. Happy New Year, my loves!

Shall Old Acquaintance Be Forgot?

2007-12-31T17:13:00.000-06:00

New Years Eve is a celebration of “out with the old, in with the new!” At midnight the day, the month, and the year flip over to the next notch. In one discrete and infinitesimally small point in time, 2007 will be over and a new year will begin. But that’s just how we measure time. Time itself and how we live through it is a continuum that we simply tick off as it flows by, and one moment, in general, is very much like the one right after it, barring cataclysmic shocks of any sort.

People are also analog. I can make a decision at one point in time, but it’s not so much a particle as the peak of a wave, with a build up of thought and feeling and sensing and observing all going into informing the decision I’m about to make, then all the work I have to do to put that decision into action and achieve an actual change.

Psychologically, the end of the year seems like a perfect time to say good bye to the bad habits of mind or body that have kept me from progressing and growing this year. And I do feel like I’ve been kept from growing in many ways. I’ve learned a lot, and I’ve done a lot, but I don’t feel like I’ve achieved anything. I’m still in very much the same place I was at the beginning of the year, if not even farther behind. And I didn’t want to be there this long.

Blogs are a wonderful thing. I just looked back to see if there were any New Year’s Resolutions I’d made, and maybe forgotten. I don’t see any. But I see a sort of optimism about this year in some of my posts and I just don’t feel like 2007 was what I hoped it would be, and maybe it’s being sick right now, but I don’t feel great about next year. I’ve got such a long way to go, and I don’t feel like I got anywhere this year.

I’m doing a few little things that may seem silly. I washed all the dishes left in my sink and have started the dishwasher. I’ve done a lot of laundry lately. So I’ll start the New Year with lots of clean clothes and dishes. There are other things I need to do for spring-cleaning, but those will have to wait until I purchase some organizing equipment. I’m taking Kevin’s suggestion, to, and I plan to burn some candles and watch this year melt away.

More profoundly, I’ve made some decisions, and I’m hoping that the time that has passed this year, while it hasn’t propelled me onward and upward, has been the slow building of a wave in which I’ve finally come to the point that these decisions are ready to be made, and that this next year will be a year of hard work to carry them out.

It’s a process, a continuum of constant assessment and growing conviction and steady effort. It’s analog. And it’s hard. I have a lot of bad habits, and I’m not going to get rid of them all at once, all in one moment. I’ve picked a few very personal hang-ups to try to overcome. I wish it were as simple as turning the page of the calendar. I wish that the old ways that I’m so well acquainted with were that easy to leave behind. That the past could be completely separated from the future at that tiny point in time, instead of always being connected to it and coloring it.

This New Year’s Eve, my hopes for the next few weeks, even months, are pretty modest. I already see ways in which the things I wanted to leave behind back in this year are going to bleed over into the next. Hopefully, though, I’ll get past that quickly. My real hope is that some New Year’s Eve years from now, this will seem far away and time long since gone by. That I’ll be so far away that I’ll have to work to remember the things holding me back, instead of having to work so hard to get away.

My Christmas Vacation 2007

2007-12-25T17:36:00.001-06:00

Was just drifting awake on the morning of Thursday, December 20 when my cell phone rang. It was Kid wishing me happy birthday.

"Are you at work?"

"No, I took the day off."

"Oh no! I woke you up, didn't I?"

She hadn't, really, and it was time to get going. Two hours of tossing stuff into bags and checking stuff off of impromptu packing lists, and I was on the road. Was eating lunch at Frank's in Schulenburg when Uncle John called to wish me happy birthday.

Got to Biscuit Hill Bed and Breakfast a little after 3pm. Was greeted by Deana, who runs the place. She showed me around, we settled my bill in advance, and she said I'd have the house to myself until the other couple got in the next day, and breakfast would be at 9:30. Seemed silly for her to expect me for breakfast, since I'd much rather sleep in at least the first day, and when I said this she said that was fine! And she sent me up to my room with these amazing cinnamon crumb muffins and apple juice. I ran out that night for crackers, cream cheese, salami, and wine for my dinner. I took a walk down the creek bed under the wary gaze of the four whitetail does had come up for the corn that I'd tossed out for them. The rest of the evening I spent curled up in my room or soaking in the huge jacuzzi tub, eating my crackers and cheese and such and reading. And reading. And reading.

The next day I went driving around the hills. I drove by my old home, but everything was changed. The trees had grown up and blocked the views I remember, and it didn't feel like home any more. But I saw Mrs. Schultze in her driveway as I drove by, so I pulled in and talked with her for a while, and it was great to see her.

Drove back up by the lake and stopped to take some pictures, then came back to the B&B. Was once again a lazy bum with a stack of good books. The next day I did go down for breakfast, chatted with Josh and Marlena from Katy, checked with Deana that I was good to leave when I was packed, then headed out just before 11am.

Got to Mom's and we finished cleaning and setting up the Christmas decor. That night we had Kid's boyfriend and his parents and younger sister over to join Mom and Kid and Grandma and me for dinner in honor of my birthday. It was fun. The next day Kid's boyfriend installed a new back door with a little doggie door for Abby, and I wrapped presents. Yes it took me most of the day to do that. We had the food network on, too, and then after dinner we opened Christmas presents by the tree. I don't know what's going to run out first... red kitchen gadgetry for Mom to buy me, or kitchen for me to put red gadgetry in. :-P

Christmas Eve Grandma headed on to Kerrville and we headed to La Grange. I left first, but I took my time, and I stopped to visit Dad's grave. A lot has been going on, and I miss him, but crying with my cheek against his headstone for a while felt as close as I'm ever going to come again to crying in his arms. I got tears all over the stone, and felt the way I would if it had been his shirt I'd soaked. I wish I could tell him everything, just to hear him say how proud he still was of me, and that of course I've never disappointed him. It's what I know he'd say, deep down, but never hearing it leaves me still doubting sometimes.

Kid and her boyfriend beat me to Momo's, and Mom got there a little afterwards. That evening, like always, we went to the Christmas pageant mass. Don't get me wrong, I think it's great for the kids to be the ones to celebrate the Word, but I think I need to find a new way to worship Christmas. It's too much spectacle. And choir is just horrible. No, really. And the congregation doesn't join in very loudly, even though everyone knows the words. So it just kind of hurts. I guess I shouldn't be such a snob; it's about worship, not performance. But kids reading through the scripture as fast as they can and a choir that never starts at the right time and parents snapping pictures... I needed something more this year. Something deeper. Oh well. I'm also going to start booking a hotel room. With all the kids and grandkids and spouses and great grandkids and significant owners, the house is getting kind of crowded. And kind of noisy.

We had Chinese Christmas that night like always. The Crown Royal was a popular item, and my cousin Shane and another cousin's boyfriend worked out a strategy where they both managed to get and freeze the two bottles up for grabs. It was highly amusing. And fairly brilliant. I'm ashamed to say the only miffed feelings this time were mine when Brooke stole the neat faux leather storage footstool I'd got, but most of that was for show. Still, Greg stole a tool set from Mom to freeze it for her, and then Mom stole the footstool back for me, and Brooke ended up with colored cordial glasses that she really likes, so it all turned out okay.

Anyway, today we had a big dinner, and I drove home, and so now I'm watching my new CSI Las Vegas videos. No more red wine in the apartment, though. I spilled my glass, which wouldn't be so bad, only then I mopped it up with a green wash cloth that bleeds. Red and green. Merry Christmas!

Weekend in Nawlins

2007-12-16T13:39:00.000-06:00

I'm sitting in the airport waiting for my flight home. I have a LOT of time here, owing to the fact that I couldn't check out much later than 1pm, my flight isn't until 3:40pm, and there was no traffic on the way to the airport. So I'll take this time to recount my adventures.

Saturday
December 15, 2007

I sleep in as late as I can. Why would you spend so much time sleeping when you're in NEW ORLEANS??? Because you need the sleep. Desperately.

Up and out and around the French Quarter before 1pm. Wonder where I can get a cheap lunch that isn't an absolute tourist hole. Wander up Royal Street. Wonder if I can find Croissant D'Or, a patisserie that Jonathan had recommended as we passed by on the Vampire Tour, and which I have a vague feeling is between Royal and the convent on Ursalines. Wander in that direction, resisting the temptation to look at my map. Find it right where instinct said it would be. I'm just that good. :-P

Eat a quiche Lorraine and a chocolate eclaire for lunch. I love this city. Read my book sitting at a counter in the window. Finish eating and meander down toward Jackson Square. Three weddings in the cathedral, so interior inspection has to wait until I attend mass on the morrow.

Wander down and across the windy streets to the riverfront. Sit in the sunshine as the barges slide by and read. Lock eyes with a young man walking slowly down the sidewalk, stopping now and then to gaze at the river. Watch him covertly over the pages of my book, turning my head to watch him watch the river, and every so often look my way. He knows I'm watching him and knows I know he's watching me as I sit still and he drifts past and we both gaze across to the other shore. It's a moment of human connection that dispenses with introductions and awkward courtesies, the connection of parallel sights and sounds, thoughts and feelings akin that would recognize each other at the first meeting. Then we turn away completely and I read.

And read.

And read.

Stop to watch the sunlight on the blue and brown ripples, and to watch a freighter pass under the highway bridge. Feel the rising wind and the dimming sun, and glance back west to see the gray clouds creeping over the city.

Get up and drift back into the Vieux Carré. Find my way to Pat O'Brien's and snag a Kier Royal and a Diet Coke just as the rain began. Wind my way upstairs to a quiet table and chairs outside of the ladies' powder room, and sip my drink and read my book, reading faster and faster as the rain falls and passes and the sky clears to darkening twilight, and the tale spins out in the last pages, cut off at the end like the Fates' thread.

Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
Fled is that music:-- Do I wake or sleep?
~Keats, "Ode to a Nightingale"

This is how I always feel when I lift myself out of the pages of a good book at its finish. Floating, disoriented. Still drifting between the world around me and the world in the pages. My goal for the weekend is accomplished.

I decide to take a Haunted History ghost tour, now that the rain has stopped. My drinks finished with my book, I pop across the way to Reverend Zombie's Voodoo Shop, and for once see through the door someone I do actually know, not just a revenant wreathing a stranger in familiarity. I rush in to say hi to a friend as surprised to see me as I am to see him, who has met some friends of his from Florida at this best of half-way meeting places. We part ways after a few words. We'll meet again Wednesday at my birthday party.

The tour is fun and this time I have the cash to buy the book. Perfect timing, too, since now I need another book to read. I head to Fiorella's, because it wouldn't be a visit to New Orleans without fried chicken from Fiorella's. This has become more integral to me than Cafe du Monde. I suppose I do like fried chicken more than I like beignets.

I sit in the dim restaurant eating my chicken, absorbed in ghost tales, until I decide that this is VAMPIRE weekend, and I'll read the ghost stories later. I flip to the vampire section and begin working my way through that, until my meal is done. With chills running down my spine that have nothing to do with the cold north wind, I leave the restaurant resolved to get to my warm and well-lit hotel room as quickly as possible.

And I find myself in a deserted, if brightly-lit side street with no open shops heading towards the Ursaline convent, where they say vampires are boarded up in the attic. Lovely. I walk faster until, panting with my speed, and not a little self-induced terror, and relief at the people once again all around me, I turn into Royal Street and head to my hotel. But those two blocks have changed the color of the evening, and when I get back to my room, I can't shake the urge to look over my shoulder, or NOT look out my window, for fear of seeing a ghastly pale face hovering on the other side of the glass. Great.

Fortunately for my night's repose, there are friends on line to chat with, and LOLKatz at icanhazcheezburger.com I haven't creeped myself out that thoroughly since I watched X-Files by myself for the first time. Geez. Finally, sleep.

Sunday
December 16, 2007

Up before my alarm goes off and out on the streets before many of the shops open. Down to my new favorite place, the Croissant D'Or for breakfast. Eat my way through a delicious croissant filled with ham and cream cheese and an almost-as-delicious croissant filled with chocolate. Wander around a bit more, and find myself at 11am mass in St. Louis Cathedral.

Notes from the organ float amid the columns, drifting from one hymn to the next fluid and clear until voices begin singing "Wake, O wake and sleep no longer." Then "O come, O come Emmanuel" as the archbishop and his priests ascend the aisle. He welcomes us all, even, perhaps, some people from Arizona, come to support the Cardinals. He reminds them with sweet pastoral slyness that while we in the Roman Catholic church certainly have much respect for Cardinals, God considers it much better to be a Saint. It's a lovely mass in a beautiful church, not so grand or ornate as those in Europe, but full of light and richness and color. He ends his homily with words he treasures from a freeborn black woman who began to teach the coloreds and founded a religious house for them in the early part of the century.

"God, I believe in you. I hope in you. I love you. I want to live and die in you."

He calls these words his guide as he continues his ministry of 50 years, when his human weakness and failing strength would have him retire, but his church and his God call him to carry on where he's needed.

Only time to do some quick Christmas shopping in a shop I spotted earlier, then back to the hotel to check out. I hop a cab to the airport, and the Saint's game is on the radio. As we pass the Superdome, I'm struck by the thought that all that I'm listening to is going on just behind those curved walls. The commentators begin to gossip, as we exit I-10, about a large bird that just flew in front of them. "Was it a pigeon?" one asks. "No, those hang around your house," the other responds. "An albatross?" "No, those hang around your neck!"

I laugh out loud to hear a sports commentator referencing Coleridge.

Then it's the airport and paying the cabby and settling at a bistro table to fire up my laptop, and here we are!

I'll be home soon.

Interview with the Hair Stylist OR My Date with the Big Easy

2007-12-15T00:22:00.000-06:00

This weekend’s theme is vampires. My whole reason for staying in New Orleans is to read Interview with the Vampire in its setting. That and I’m in love the French Quarter.

Got my hair dyed on the first floor of One Shell Square by a stylist who was once personal assistant to Anne Rice. He had several of her books at his station, and when he offered me a magazine while I waited for my hair to finish turning Warm Celtic Copper, I explained my weekend project and asked if instead I could... He took his copy from the shelf and said, “Do you know where you left off?” <3

I was the first patron for dinner at Petunia’s. I don’t recommend. The food, for the price, not so much. My waiter… Okay, a very few men may call me “Babe” and not raise my hackles. ONLY my father could ever call me “Baby” without incurring the icy glare of doom. A waiter who calls me “Baby” on multiple occasions, and continuously bugs me about what I’m reading while I’m very obviously… busy reading… does not win points. The finishing touch was when he brought the check and said, “I’d love to talk with you more, but that book must be really good.” Grrr.

Next, the Haunted History vampire tour of the French Quarter. VERY fun. Lots of spine tingles, and not just because of the cute tour guide. :-) I love a creepy story, even if it does make me walk really fast back to my hotel. And I love the history of this city, the lore and the legend. I love to lose myself in it. To stare, eyes wide, ears focused on the tales the guide is spinning, breathing in deeply and soaking up everything I can as it swirls around me. I’ve been happy with both my Haunted History tours through the French Quarter, and I highly recommend that company.

I’m more than halfway done with the book, so I expect I’ll finish tomorrow. I intend to buy the book of New Orleans ghost and vampire stories that Jonathan (the guide) recommended.

The witching hour has come. Back to my dreams.

Hi Dad, it’s Me

2007-12-02T23:28:00.001-06:00

I tried to go to bed. But I couldn’t sleep. Then I was revisited by a thought I had shuffled away earlier. Earlier today, earlier this weekend, I can’t really remember when I had it, but it came back. When I think about my dad, I think of having him back that one last time, to pour out all of the things I wanted to say. Or I think of how I had him and never really… had him. Didn’t spend time with him the way I should have. Which is not to say we didn’t spend time together. But I’ve changed so much and grown so much, and I feel like I’m a different person, and this person, he didn’t know her the way I want him to.

I spend so much time thinking of having him back just one last time. But earlier, and now, I’m struck with the thought of having him back for life. Not one intense, emotional and meaning-packed capsule of time. For days. Months. Years. The years we could have had. I want to call home this weekend and hear him answer. To hear him say, “Hi, Lady!” with the warm every day sort of joy in his voice that says, “This isn’t a special occasion, but it’s special all the same, because I love you.” The next words would be, “You want to talk to Mom?” not because I didn’t want to talk to Dad, but because of course it was Mom I needed to talk to. She’d be the one to help hammer out logistics for my next trip home. She’d be the one to have all the family and neighborhood gossip. Dad would plunk himself back down in front of the television, secure in the knowledge that his baby girl had put in her weekly phone call, was alive and sounded happy, and would call again next week. Would be home a few weekends from now. And that was time enough for everything. I want that back.

But I do want more. I do want the chance to spend time getting to know him like I never did, and letting him get to know the person I’ve become. He loved to shock me with his profanity and his off-color jokes. How would he react if I spun some of it back to him? What would he think of this me who doesn’t mind admitting to being the most fabulous person in the room? Daddy and I, we had good banter. It would be even better now, now that I’ve found my feet, gotten a little cocky, and am no longer afraid to be unrestrainedly… myself. I feel like he’d see the woman he always knew I could be, and that as proud as he always was of me, he’d be even more proud, and happy in my happiness.

I want to feel like I belong again. Going to Momo’s for Thanksgiving Sunday, it was great to see them all, but I feel so out of place among them. The women, they’re all married, domestic, settled, except for my sister, and I actually spent the most time with her and her boyfriend. Different as they are from me, I felt most at home with them. And with my mom. The truth is, I know I belong, but I’m not sure where I fit, so I ended up following Mom and Brooke around a bit, and trying to hide my being awkward. At one point I even wandered into the room where the men were shooting the breeze, but I didn’t fit there either. But that’s where Daddy would have been. And if he’d been there, I would have fit where he was. I would have walked over and pulled up the chair next to his, and he would have said, “Hey, Baby-doll!” and put his arm across the back of my chair, and I could have sat and said nothing. Just listened to them talk, and not felt out of place. I would have felt more fit in than ever, with the new knowing myself and the old sitting at Daddy’s side. Because after all, knowing myself has been mostly realizing how much like him I am. Sure maybe I wouldn’t see him any more often than I did back then. But I want those every-so-oftens back. I want back not heart-wrenching moments of making the most of time, but the comfortable assumption that the time will always be there to be made the most of.

I so want to just spend that sort of time with him, slowly continuing to grow up and grow and grow old together as father and daughter, slowly sharing with him who I am now. But who I am now… When I look back, I know I am who I am now because he died. That his leaving us was the kick in the stomach that jolted me out of the self-defeating, self-effacing, self-denying rut I was in. I hate that it took that, but I have to admit I might not have gotten my act together without his death. And while I know that he would have given everything for my happiness, it sucks so bad that he would have been so thrilled to have stayed around and seen the gift he gave me by his leaving.

Perhaps that should have been my first clue that the Fates had begun to weave this tremendous, sticky, stifling web of irony that seems to have engulfed my life. Daddy helped me get it together, and would be so proud of the person I am now, only the only reason I’m this person I am now is because he died. I was married for four years and only wanted kids in the theoretical sense, and now that I’m divorced, the hormones have kicked over and make that far off wish a physical demand that I have no way of appeasing. I finally love myself completely, am thrilled about who I am, after years of trying to be someone I wasn’t, but thought I should be, and all those years it was easy to find guys interested in that person I was trying to be. Now that I’m someone I love completely, and I feel like I can give my heart more fully than ever before, I can’t for the life of me find a real relationship.

There are things I don’t want to go back to. I can say I wish my father hadn’t died, but I don’t have it in me to wish I was still the person I was before his death. I can only say I wish I’d learned it some other way, but would I have? Existential paradox aside, though, I want my father back. And for once I’m not asking for that “just one more day” crap. I can’t have him. I can’t. But if I’m going to beg for the impossible, I’m going to be unabashedly greedy. I don’t want one more day. I want years and years, wrinkles and gray hair, decades, the rest of a real, not-cut-off-short, long healthy life.

Not so I can squeeze every last drop out of every minute. But so I can let every minute ripen in its own time and fall into my hand like a blessing freely given, not clutched at and wrung dry. I want to call home this weekend for Mom, like I try to do every week, and hear his voice like it used to be. To say, just like I’d said it the week before, and would say it the next week, and for all the weeks of my life, the weeks I always thought I’d have…

“Hi, Dad! It’s me!”

First Frost

2007-11-25T17:05:00.000-06:00

I looked in the mirror after washing my hands for dinner at Momo's, ran my fingers through my hair, then stopped, and looked closer. I leaned forward, lifted a hand, and gently sifted a single strand of silver out from the rest of my hair. I called Brooke to come with me into the bathroom light, and looked again, and asked, "Is that really...?"

"A gray hair? Do you have a gray hair?" she asked.

"I think I do!" I replied, and I laughed. I must be the first woman who noticed her first gray hair, and thought about *not* dying her hair any more. I probably will keep it up, because I do like being a red head. But honestly, I remember seeing the strands of silver at Michael's temples, and thinking how pretty they were against the dark of his hair. This one strand on my head shines against the rest and glitters in the light, and for all it might mean in terms of my surrendered youth and the inexorable march of time, it is beautiful to me, and precious in a way I don't really understand.

I laughed, and rushed out to tell my mother, and they probably all think I'm insane. How can I explain to anyone who clings to their own youth as a golden age that my twenties have been the hardest time of my life, and I can only hope to rise out of them into the rest of my life like a phoenix. I know in my soul that I have the strength and grace for this. That in fact this is what I do every day that I get up and greet the world with an open heart full of faith and hope and love. This is what I intend to do all my life, and I hope that life is a long one. Long enough for every hair on my head to turn.

So bring it on, gray hair! I'm ready!

New blog, new blog, lah lah lah lah laaaaah lah

2007-11-18T18:52:00.000-06:00

I have a new blog at

lauraforpresident.blogspot.com

Give me some time, I'll start posting good stuff.

The List

2007-11-03T13:44:00.001-05:00

I haven't ever had this sort of list before, and I didn't really think to sit down to make one, but slowly I've been thinking of things. The world is so big, and I'm so small. This year I'm going to travel, and hopefully see a lot of things I've never seen. Daddy was so alive, and then he was gone. I'm not sure when I'll reach the bottom of my glass, but I hope to drink deep and savor every drop. So here's my list of things I want to do before I die.

See the Northern Lights
Hear a nightingale
See New England in the fall
Write a novel
See Times Square
Visit the Grand Canyon
Take the tour at Alcatraz
Make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land
Visit Gettysburg
Go into the catacombs
Visit Ellis Island
Read every Agatha Christie mystery novel
See the Anne Frank house in Amsterdam
Eat Chicago deep dish in Chicago
Visit the Guggenheim
Relax on a black sand beach
Stand in the middle of Stonehenge
Visit Delphi
Drink tea and eat fish and chips in London
Ride a paddle boat on the Mississippi
See the St. Louis Arch
Visit Death Valley
See the sun set over the Everglades
Sing a solo on stage in Jones Hall (Done)
See Paris from the top of the Eiffel Tower (Done)
Watch elephant seals on a beach in Big Sur (Done)
Play the slots in Vegas (Done)
Eat beignets in Cafe du Monde after drinks on Bourbon Street (Done)
Pray in St. Peter's Basilica (Done)
Listen to blues on Beale Street (Done)
Wine tasting in Napa Valley (Done)
Watch Old Faithful erupt (Done)
Visit the Monterrey Bay Aquarium (Done)

Thankfully I've got some of them out of the way. I hope I have enough time for the rest...

I Recommend Fiori

2007-10-29T21:37:00.000-05:00

I was telling my friend Kevin last week about how I’d pulled something and my neck and shoulders were sore. Kevin told me in no uncertain terms that what I needed was a massage. He sent me the link to Fiori, a spa near the Galleria, that he had visited with Kari. I was impressed by the website, thought the prices were reasonable, and was thrilled to learn that they had Sunday appointments. I made one for this past Sunday, between lunch and the HCB concert. Granted, a relaxing afternoon at the spa isn’t something you should squeeze into your calendar with a shoehorn, but I had no choice if I wanted to do something about my neck any time in the foreseeable future.

This

Place

Is

Amazing.

I got there early for my appointment, as requested, filled out a form that asked me some very pertinent questions, such as my gender preference for people providing my services, whether or not I bruise easily, allergies to foods or herbs, etc. Then I was shown to the ladies locker room. Which was palatial. It had wood paneled lockers with key pad combination locks, sinks made to look like basins of glass on top of marble counters, two large showers, two large toilet stalls, a steam room, bottles of chilled water, towels, towels, and more towels, and in my locker, a stack of towels, some washcloths, and a soft, fluffy, chocolate brown robe. The attendant brought me my spa slippers, and told me to find her in the shop when I was done changing, and she’d show me around.

I put on my swimsuit, just in case, wrapped myself up in that warm, thick robe, and padded off to the shop for my tour. The attendant showed me the pool (too cold), the underground mineral bath (YES in HOUSTON!), and the Jacuzzi hot tub. That’s about as far as I made it. She said she’d send someone down to get me when it was time for my manicure and pedicure (after wandering over Italian cobblestones in the dust of Rome and Tuscany wearing sandals, my feet needed some pampering). I soaked in the warm, foamy water, relaxed by the sound of water flowing all around me in the small, rock-walled room. I had the place entirely to myself at the time. I closed my eyes and cupped my hands along the water’s tumbling surface, feeling the fizz of the bubbles as I trapped them in my hands. It reminded me of a dream I had where I lay along the hill side of my old home as clouds skimmed along the ground, and I reached out to catch them as they raced by.

I kinda got bored of sitting around after a while, so before anyone came for me, I went back to the locker room to towel off and put on dry things again before padding along in my robe to the shop again to figure out where to go for my nails. The attendant sent me to the top of the stairs to find the quiet room and wait for the manicurist to collect me. I went up and found some soft comfy couches and chairs, and sank down into an armchair to wait.

In a bit Tracie came to get me, and took me to the manicure and pedicure room. She told me to pick out an enamel, but I asked if I could get a buff shine instead, and she said of course. (I really don’t like nail polish much. It’s fun, but it chips too easily, and I don’t have the patience to let it dry properly.) We started with my hands, and while I was quiet, she just let me be quiet. Eventually I got over my usual shyness, and asked how long she’d been a manicurist. She laughed and said too long, since high school, but that she’d always worked with people, and was glad she had this to fall back on. After a number of other jobs, all requiring more patience than I certainly have, she had come back to this, and enjoyed her job very much.

We talked about how beautiful the building was, and the attention to detail in its décor. I haven’t really mentioned this, but the spa is a rock and timber building with slate floors, for the most part, or warm tile, covered with sisal mats or rugs. The walls are painted warm colors in some rooms, or a soft ivory, with decorative patterns painted inside the archways or around the wooden doors and wooden doorposts and lintels. The windows are shuttered with thick wooden blinds, and the lighting is soft and indirect. As Tracie gave me my pedicure, I could look alternately into a small, sunny courtyard, or at the bronze and amber chandelier hanging from the ceiling. The room with the mineral pool had a blue ceiling and red ceiling painted over with beige lattice that reminded me of a ceiling in the Vatican museum. Warm woods and leathers and ceramics were everywhere, and the whole looked quite a bit like the pictures Summer showed me of the villa they visited near Siena for a stargazing trip.

After Tracie told me what not to do to my nails in the future (I did rather hack at my toenails recently, since it had been so long since my last pedicure), and buffing all my nails to a lovely shine, she released me for my massage. I went back up to the top level, and finally found the quiet room, though all the ottomans were taken, so I didn’t go in, but instead sat on another plump armchair just beside the curtains that separated it from the corridor to the massage rooms.

My masseuse, Maziel, came and led me to a dim, wood-floored room and a soft massage bed. She asked if there was anything in particular I needed her to work on, so I told her about my shoulder. She let me choose between eucalyptus, orange, or lavender oils (I chose orange) and left so I could get myself situated. The massage bed was warm (I think there was an electric blanket somewhere in there), and the sheets covering me were a cotton so rich it felt almost like silk. She came back in and started my massage. She was pretty shocked at how tight my shoulders were. I think at least 30 of the 50 minutes I got were spent working out the tension there.

The knot in my right shoulder felt like a golf ball-sized lump of pain that she kneaded and kneaded at until it finally broke up and dispersed back into the muscles of my shoulder. She did my legs and arms, and kept coming back to that shoulder to work it around some more, stretch out the muscles, loosen the joints. It hurt pretty bad, at times, but it’s the sort of pain you grit your teeth through because you know it will only get better by getting worse. She told me I’d be sore today, and I was this morning, but I also have full mobility in my neck and head again, in spite of slight bruising over everything between my shoulder blades. I did check off on the form that I bruise easily. Still, it was worth it.

She finished off by massaging my neck, my temples, and all through my scalp, then waited outside while I robed and slippered up, to take me to the quiet room. She handed me a glass of water with a hint of lemon and lime, and settled me into one of the tan, micro-fiber covered ottomans in the dim room behind a chocolate velvet curtain. There was a rich brown blanket to cover up my legs, and two huge candles on the center table, melting into soft golden curves beside a bunch of stargazer lilies. The lamps were dimmed, and I didn’t bother with the books on the tables, but closed my eyes and let my mind drift along with the music playing softly from somewhere.

After some number of minutes, I began to hope that the music was computer generated, and that no real musicians had been forced to sit in a studio for hours playing subtly shifting chords. I don’t care how celestial the sounds are, pages full of whole notes would just be cruel and unusual. I think it was mostly synthesized, at least, but still, if a person had to sit there and push the keys, I pity them, and hope it paid well. It was just background music, and thoroughly innocuous, but still!

By the time I’d gotten completely lost in the sounds, found myself again, and finished my glass of water, I decided it was time to refill the glass (“Drink LOTS of water, okay?” Maziel had said) and go sit in the steam room for at least ten minutes, like she’d recommended (“Otherwise you’ll be really sore tomorrow”).

So I slipped back down to the locker room with a fresh glass of ice water, wrapped myself in a humongous towel grabbed a chilled, damp, lavender-scented washcloth, turned the steam room dial to ten minutes, and went in. I sat on the caramel colored stone-tiled bench listening to the dial outside tick, which fortunately drowned out the sound of those interminable major chords, until a strange rumbling gurgle in the wall made me open my eyes to watch this new novelty: steam pouring from a spigot near the floor, filling the little room, clouding the air until I couldn’t see my own hands on my towel-covered lap, and the light above and the light from the door were just a gentle glow through the haze. I shut my eyes and breathed deeply in and out through my nose. Breathing through my mouth made me cough on the warm dampness in the air. My nose filtered most of it out, and (forgive me for reporting a less than graceful and sophisticated detail) the steam made my nose drip like a faucet. I found this amusing, intriguing, and thoroughly predictable, once I thought about it, but still, it surprised me.

Ten minutes wasn’t enough in the steam room. When all my lovely humidity had seeped away, I went out and reset for another 10 minutes. This time was better because the steam was warmer to start with and I found the spray bottle of eucalyptus and citrus scented something or other that made my nose tingle. I decided after 20 minutes of steam that I shouldn’t push things, because I still needed to shower and go change into a black formal for my concert.

I don’t think I got any more than half of my massage oil off in the shower, but didn’t mind going to the concert smelling slightly fruity, so I dried off, dressed, and paid my tab. The entire afternoon, gratuity included, cost me $188.80. Not bad at all for 3.5 solid hours of luxury!

Now, how do I get rid of thing lingering pain in my trumpet playing muscles that made me have to come home early from jazz band, and how do I get rid of the lingering guilt for spending so much money on luxury and not on feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and defending the widow and orphan? I think that's another blog for another day.

Regrets

2007-10-20T18:11:00.000-05:00

You know, there's not really a lot that I've done or not done that I look back on these days with regret. I've made some mistakes that have had a pretty significant impact on my life, and it's taken a lot, but I've learned to live with them, knowing that I made the best decisions I could based on what I knew and felt at the time, and I've come to realize that 1) it's not my fault I didn't know everything I ended up needing to know, 2) all I can do, any given day of my life, is my best. If I do my best, and it doesn't work out, that may be cause for frustration, sadness, even grief. But not regret.

I can live with the things I've done, for the most part, without regret. There's just this one thing. What bothers me isn't missing out on the chance I had. I wish I had done things differently now, but it's a pretty fair chance that things happened for the best. What bothers me is *why* i missed the chance. I could have decided to stand back because of a million reasons why it was the smart thing to do. Not that the smart thing to do has much pull with me. After all, the smart thing, as I've found, isn't always the best thing. But I didn't decide to pass. I missed my chance because I was... afraid.

By the time I got things sorted out in my own head, and realized that I was stalling, not deciding, and that I might decide to do things differently, well, my chance was gone. Or at least greatly reduced. Or just much more complicated. I don't know. I'm back to sorting, because things changed. Life didn't wait for me to make up my mind. It moved on without me. I understand that happens. It's my job to keep up, not the world's job to wait.

So this time, I'll stay on the sidelines, I guess. And I imagine it's for the best. Things tend to work out the way they're supposed to, whether I'm out there trying to make them, or just letting them make themselves. But I hate that it was fear, uncertainty, insecurity, and lack of confidence and self-knowledge that made me miss my chance.

If I'd made an actual decision, I'd be better with living with it. The fact that I pretty much just dithered and waffled away my chance...

That's what I regret.

Du Jour

2007-10-16T22:23:00.000-05:00

Soup! Of course!

It would be a pretty silly idea, since I'm singing in a huge concert on Tuesday next, to go to the Rice football game on Saturday. I don't feel like anywhere near half a fan if I'm not yelling my guts out, and face it, that's just a baaaaad idea at this point.

So instead, I've decided I will make soup. Yesterday's (rather ephemeral) cool snap put me in the mood for thick rich hearty soupy goodness. The question becomes, what kind of soup?

I have a bag of navy beans in the pantry and ham and venison sausage in the freezer. That has worked well for me in the past. But I'd really like to make chicken noodle. I can't get my egg noodles from Weikel's, though. Well, you know, I could. I could get up early on Saturday, pack a cooler, drive out to La Grange, grab some noodles, and while I'm there, really I ought to buy the chicken from the city market. Because it will be about 20 times as fresh as anything I'll get here.

But that involves getting up Saturday morning. Hah, sooooo not happening. I bet I can find egg noodles and a reasonably fresh fowl this side of Highway 6. Then some cheese cloth. A large onion. Carrots. I have spinach leaves. I like to boil them in, then pull them out. I don't really like spinach, but it adds something.

Yeah. Chicken noodle soup. That sounds like a good sort of day.

Always an Adventure

2007-10-11T21:02:00.000-05:00

I clomped down the stairs of my apartment this morning at 0-too-early and out onto the sidewalk. I glanced up and was stopped dead in my tracks by the brilliance of the stars. In Houston, you don't normally see stars. The air was crisp and clear, and the sky was dark. All the defining points of Orion were visible, my favorite constellation. He rises high in the sky for the autumn and early winter, my favorite part of the year, with Canis Major and the Dog Star. The brightest star in the sky. Venus blazed in the east with two other planets. I haven't been following my astronomy reports, so I don't know which one, but they were like diamonds. I was floored.

Of course, I still had that flight to New Orleans to catch. I got to the airport in plenty of time, and decided that a breakfast taco from the Pappasito's in the airport sounded good. Better than one of the bagel sandwiches from the counter in the Hudson News. So I got one and wandered down to my gate. I sat down to eat it. It tasted really good, but about halfway through, the foil at the bottom got really hot, then my knee felt hot. The eggs were... a bit runny. :-(

So I set some stuff down and grabbed some napkins. I had my computer bag on my shoulder, and when I picked my taco up and put it on the bag it came in to contain the dribble, my bag slipped down, jerked my arm, and bag and taco went flying, and, I kid you not, they did a 360 degree flip together, and the taco landed on top of the bag on the ground.

Splattering my shoe, pants cuffs, and computer bag with egg water. I sat down laughing with my head in my hands. What else ya gunna do? I mopped up, and since my taco landed face-up, so to speak, I finished eating.

I got on the plane right on time (i.e. way too early), got all settled, and looked around me, and noticed something funny about the overhead bins. They were blue, and had... pictures of... Shamu... and... the Sea World logo... and... one of them *said* Shamu!!! Was it really....???

I looked out my window at the rotor.

Which was encased in a smooth cylinder panted in black and white! I was on a Shamu plane! Eeeeee!!!!

I was in the sky before the sun was. That's a hard way to start the day. But the sun was bright in a blue sky when we landed. And the traffic on I-10 was a swamp. And my cabbie was *nuts*. It was like that scene in Office Space when the lane the guy isn't in is always the faster one. But my cabbie was undeterred. At one point he went across all three lanes, then went right back. At some point I started pondering why on earth I would feel complicit in his insanity, just because I was paying for the transit. Huh.

Another thought to ponder came from a bumper sticker I saw on a flatbed. "Our trucks don't run on Citgo" it read. Anyone know what's up with that? Is there something I should know about Citgo?

My meeting went well. My mission to get us set up with an application the Shell folks keep wanting us to use turned out to be a wild goose chase. Ugh. Spun my wheels on that all afternoon, then dragged myself out the door, into another cab, slightly more sanely driven through a similar traffic tangle, and into the airport, where I walked calmly and quietly to the nearest Popeye's. Did I mention that I was chasing geese so intently that I didn't eat or drink anything at all the entire day after my breakfast taco and diet coke? Oy.

At some point during my morning meeting my phone had gone off and I'd quickly shut it up. I finally remembered to check my voice mail, and the message was from Kid saying she'd be coming to my concert so to save her a ticket!!! Yay!

I'd IMed Frank during the day and found out he was in New Orleans, and would be coming home in the evening too, so I agreed to meet up with him at the airport for a drink. It was fun to chat with him, though I hate it when he starts razzing me about going home early after HCB. Just because *he* doesn't get sick when he doesn't get sleep... grmblgrmblgrmbl pout.

Frank had to leave earlier than I did. And then my flight was late. The 6:30pm to Houston is ALWAYS late. Ugh. So I was up in the sky after the sun had left for the day. The stars were faint in a dark hazy sky when I got back to my apartment. And I'm home and I'm tired and my throat hurts. Not a good sign. Done with adventures. I'm going to bed.

October Sky

2007-10-07T19:49:00.000-05:00

I decided this evening that I didn't need enough in the grocery department to justify getting in my car and driving to the Krogers. I only needed a few things I could get from Walgreens. And Walgreens is not but a mile away. I could just walk. And for good measure, I took a shoulder bag to carry my groceries home in.

Of course, when I stepped outside of my apartment building, it was raining. But not all that hard. No big deal. So, I just kept walking. There was a tree on the far side of the bridge near my apartment dropping thousands of tiny yellow flowers that smelled like clover honey from a late summer harvest. The bayou looked like it was covered in embroidered lace, with light dimpling off of the surface as the water rippled by. It was such a calm and peaceful evening. It took me about half an hour to get up to 18th Street, then I got my groceries and headed home.

And started wishing I had a real camera with me. A scrap of rainbow floated in the southern sky.

The sunset over the pine trees in the White Oak Bayou park started out radiantly beautiful...

...and only got more glorious.

So my cell phone doesn't take the best pictures. Some of the houses in the neighborhood north of my apartment have started putting out Halloween decorations, and in spite of the heavy damp warmth of the evening air, they made it feel like autumn. Especially when I stopped to watch a bat, fluttering like a black rag through the air, swooping and leaping after it's tiny prey against the stone gray clouds.

One of the things I got was popcorn, which is such an autumnal, after-harvest sort of thing, that I think I'll go pop some and settle in for the rest of the evening.

Fall is my favorite time of year.

Happy (Early) Birthday to Me!

2007-10-05T21:11:00.000-05:00

So, I know it's more than two months off, but I got the idea, and it seemed like a really good one, so I acted on it. I have tentatively bought myself a birthday present. The tentative part is because my boss hasn't said yea or nay to my request for vacation Thursday, December 20, and Friday, December 21.

Provided I get those days off, here's the plan. Party Wednesday night, yo. My last night of being a 20-something. I don't plan on getting wasted, so sorry, but I want to be surrounded by all sorts of friends and well wishers and fun folk.

Then, the next morning, I do what I pretty much always want to do (no, besides that). I drive west. I head for the hills. I bury myself in the Hill Country for two days. Two days stolen away from the weekly routine of work and band. Two nights hidden away, quietly recharging before for a whirlwind holiday season with family and friends and travel and celebration. My soul is tired in ways it never has been, and I haven't been out to my hills nearly enough. My birthday present to myself is two nights in a bed and breakfast near Canyon Lake. This B&B, to be precise. This room, to be very precise.

No concrete plan yet for those days, of course, but I'd like to spend some time doing a little family Christmas shopping in Medina, Boerne, Fredericksburg, and circle back to Canyon Lake in time to check in between 3PM and 5PM. I'll take some books. My laptop. I'll do some writing. I'll walk out at night into the cold crystal air to bask in the starlight, provided it isn't cloudy. I'll eat German food and explore little nooks and crannies. I will REST. Really and truly rest.

Then it will be off to Mom's house, not really so far away, where I can celebrate my birthday with the incredibly woman who was there before they started, and the amazing young lady she gave me as a sister. Then on to La Grange for Christmas with Momo and aunts and uncles and cousins, then back to Houston for work, ugh, and in a few weeks a couple of weddings, yay!

It's so far away, unfortunately. But it will come. I'll tell Mom and Kid and Grandma that instead of a birthday present (I always get more than enough for Christmas anyway) they can help send me off for these two days of peace. Or welcome me when I get there with some of the extras I could request. Would you look at this list from my confirmation e-mail!!!

Vintner Dinner Basket: Basket filled with smoked salmon, assorted hard cheeses, and cheese spread, assorted seasonal fruit, artisan bread, olives, and cheese cake for dessert. A bottle of wine from our local vineyard, Dry Comal Creek is also in the basket for your enjoyment. $95
Sweetheart Tray: Cheddar Cheese, Cream Cheese with Raspberry Chipotle Sauce, Seasonal Fresh Fruit, Box of Chocolates, Gourmet Crackers, and your choice of sparkling grape juice, or champagne. All served on a sliver tray with flowers. $75
Romance Tray: (same as above, but in smaller quantities and no flowers. You can not keep the glasses as well) $55
Hot Tub/Jacuzzi Tub Spa Pack: Your spa tote is filled with bath pearls, Safe Liquid Aroma Therapy for the spa, After Spa Lotion & Body Mist, an acrylic body massager, and jell candle. $45
Fun Spa Pack: Your spa tote is filled with 2 bottles of Safe Liquid Aroma Therapy for the spa, Soy Candle Travel Tin, Bath Spa Pearls, and acrylic body massager. $35
Cosy Bath Robe & Slippers: Take your experience here at Biscuit Hill home with you when you order our robe and slippers. Our robes are so soft you don't want to take them off. $75 for robe & $10 for slippers.
Guy Goody Package: Your special guy will love this one, a thermal 6 pack tote stocked with all the goodies a guy loves, beef jerky, mixed nuts, 6 pack of his favorite beverage, popcorn, and much more, you can see all the details on our Celebrations Page of our web site. $65
Bubbles & Berries Package: Great way to kick start your romantic stay at Biscuit Hill. The service is light and refreshing after your drive. Sit back enjoy your Champagne or Sparkling Grape Juice and a plate of Fresh Strawberries and Sweet Dipping Cream. $25 Add flowers & vase - Total $45
6" Mini Cake: Just the right size for your stay with us. Make this Birthday, Anniversary, or Proposal very special with this cake. See our Cake Page on our Celebrations Tab at the web site for details. $15
King Cup Cakes: These are the size of 2 cup cakes in one. $5 each

Shame I wouldn't have any way of really using one of those acrylic body massagers all by myself, but even if I had someone to take, taking someone would kind of defeat the purpose of a luxurious, restful, just-me getaway. Still, the aroma therapy for the spa and the floofy soft robe and slippers do sound incredibly tempting. I think at the very least I owe myself a birthday cake, no? :-)

Sigh. It's blissful just to think about!

Quality of Life

2007-10-02T17:55:00.000-05:00

I’m sitting here curled up on my couch. I called in sick because I woke up feeling like I’d been run over by an old Chrysler with its muffler dragging. In the back of my mind for the past few weeks I’ve known that something has got to give, and I was just hoping it wouldn’t be me. Well, I guess we’ve found the weakest link. Now it’s something else’s turn.

By all typical standards used to define quality of life, I’ve got it made. I have no chronic or incurable illnesses. My income exceeds my expenditures, and my expenditures are enough to put me in a very comfortable apartment. To surround myself with a sufficient number of beautiful, entertaining, and educational objects. I have plenty of clothing, much of it fairly expensive (which wouldn’t be the case if I could wear jeans to work every day). I have plenty of food. I have clean hot water to shower in and clean cold water to drink. I have a car that isn’t in the habit of breaking down. I can afford to put gas in it, and I drive it down the street to work or across state lines to New Orleans with the same lack of concern or consideration about whether or not the car can make the trip. I’ve traveled to Europe twice now, and have the luxury of enough time off from work to make several trips a year. And to call in sick when I need to. I have enough and more than enough to the extent that I’m currently examining ways in which my more-than-enough can help shift someone else’s not-quite-enough into at least just-enough. I have wonderful friends. I am blessed with more than the average share of brains and talent. For all this, if you asked me right now if I have a good life, I’d have to say that while it sure looks like it, it sure doesn’t feel like it.

I am officially the poster child for Over-committers Anonymous. I play trumpet for three bands, sing in my church choir, and now in a performance chorus. I have one night during the work week that I’m not committed to be somewhere. Leaving out my actual full time job, which might occasionally require overnight travel, my schedule looks a little bit like this:

Monday: Jazz Band Rehearsal 7-10pm
Tuesday: Choral Rehearsal 6:30-9:30pm
Wednesday: Dinner 5:30-6:30pm
Wednesday: MOB Rehearsal 7-8pm
Wednesday: HCB Rehearsal 8:30-10pm
Thursday: NOTHING! WOOHOO (Oh, but I could be at MOB rehearsal 7-8:30pm if I were actually going to be at a game)
Friday: Valhalla and Dinner 5pm-whenever
Saturday: Probably dinner with folks, and maybe a football game, and maybe a chorus retreat
Sunday: Choir Practice and Mass 9-11pm, maybe a chorus rehearsal, maybe an HCB concert

It’s just a little bit insane. It’s not that I feel obligated to see my friends, but I like to see my friends, you know? So I put them on the schedule. Those are the things I do because they’re fun! So, I’m thinking, maybe I should make a matrix, and rank all of my activities based on three factors:

How fun they are
How they help me grow
How obligated I feel to be there

Then I think I need to pick at least one thing to quit. It’s hard, because I do all of these things for good reasons. But there are so many things outside of my control that could lower the quality of my life, why on earth am I doing this to myself? Not only do I not get enough sleep, to the point that I start to get sick, I’m constant feeling like I have somewhere to be and something to do. And that kind of stress, that feeling of being put upon (by myself, ultimately), has started giving me heartburn and frantic dreams and emotional spazing that are keeping what sleep I do get from being restful.

I don’t have enough time for just me. I don’t have any time for anyone but me. Even when I start feeling like meeting new people, going on dates, I really can't at this rate. I won’t ever have time. I mean, I could try to squeeze a date into, like, Thursday. But it’s hard enough for me to meet new people. It takes so much out of me. I’m so painfully shy. If I start shoehorning people into my last ME evening, I know I'll just start resenting the intrusion. And resenting some poor guy for just being there? Yeah, that sounds healthy. That doesn’t sound self-defeating at all.

So I need to cut back. To simplify, let's say there's:

Jazz Band
Chorus
HCB
MOB
Friend time (including Wednesday dinner and Friday celebration)

All of these are high on the fun list, probably in this order: Friend time, MOB, HCB, Jazz Band, Chorus

The growth as a person list goes: Jazz Band, Chorus, HCB, MOB, Friend time

The obligation list is: HCB (I feel a loyalty to my section), Chorus (I've got a solo, after all), Jazz Band, MOB, Friend time (the last three kind of tie for last)

Hmm, so if we do a straight vote from 1 to 5, Friend time gets 7, MOB gets 8, HCB gets 11, Jazz Band gets 10, and Chorus gets 9. Friend time is NOT going out the window. (I'll need to do this more scientifically, weighting fun more heavily and maybe refining my definition of "obligation" to differentiate feeling involved vs. feeling put upon.) MOB is pretty much already almost not on my radar. That leaves Chorus. But in Chorus I get to sing a solo in Jones Hall, and might get more if I stay with it! I've also been looking for a singing group for ever. This is not going to be easy. :-(

But I have to do something. When it comes to life, it really needs to be Quality. Not Quantity.

Apologia

2007-09-22T22:08:00.000-05:00

I've really been meaning to post before this. I wanted my next blog to be some sort of trip journal, but I've been too busy! I figured pictures would be worth my usual thousand words, so I've spent my time on those, and I think I'll post my trip journal on my actual web page, anyway.

So let's see, while I'm apologizing, what are my other excuses? Pretty much ever since I stepped off the plane life has been nuts. First I had to put my place back together, of course.

It kinda looked a lot like this...

And the bed I really wanted to sleep in, and the path to the bathroom I really wanted to use looked something like this...

But at least the new floor they put in after creating this chaos looks really really nice...

So, anyway, putting the place back together took a few days, and once I got back, it was back to work, back to band, back to choir. I had given up on the idea of auditioning for a solo for the Sing for the Cure concert, only the newsletter that went out on Monday said auditions were still going, so I sent the director an e-mail and started working up the bit I wanted.

I auditioned Tuesday, and then on Wednesday Amy and Katy hit town, and I ate dinner with them and the HCB crew. Then rehearsal.

Then on THURSDAY after I got back, September 13, 2007, the really really big event took place. Kerri IMed me in the morning and said she might have gone into labor! (She wasn't sure. As she pointed out, she's never done this before.) :-)

Well, it was labor, and at 3:20 that afternoon Dylan was born! Hooray!!! Ever since then it's been seeing friends, rehearsing, and seeing the new baby! And unpacking. And doing laundry. And cleaning my apartment for this past week when my buddy Dave got into town, and I've been giving him house room. (He let me drive his sweet little silver BMW convertible, yay!)

Dylan had his first Friday celebration on September 21. It was great to see him, and even better to see Kerri out and about! I've missed her! I got to hold Dylan on Friday...

And again today when I went over to watch the UT game at their place...

So, yeah, I haven't had just a ton of free time, so no travel blog yet. Soon. At least there are pictures. Check them out! I'll be posting more as events warrant. You know, my free time being what it is. Life does just seem to be getting in the way these days.

God, I'm loving this ride!

Welcome back, Laura!

2007-09-08T19:45:00.000-05:00

Welcome back, Laura! I got back from Italy about, ohhh, an hour ago. I haven't slept since 9pm last night, local time. (Got up at 4am this morning, Roman time, and been chasing the sun all day. I think it's finally about to set.)

I had a fabulous trip, and none of my five jars of pesto, two jars of salsa di rucola, one jar of olive pesto, or bottle of olive oil were broken! (I pretty much expected to open my suit case and be regaled by a tantalizing/demoralizing aroma of basil.)

Tim carried my suitcase up, such a nice boy. I unlock my door, and it smells kinda funny, but then I've been away a week with the A/C set higher than normal, so maybe just stuffy?

Hmmm. My kitchen light is off, but maybe when Tim checked on the place Tuesday...

Wait... why the HELL is every book I own piled in front of or on top of my couch?

Wait... where the hell's my coffee table? Why...

Okay, good, laptop, television, all in their normal places, but why... did someone steal my BOOKCASES???

No.... They're still ther-- HOLY CRAP! NEW FLOOR! WTF???

Tim indicates the folded note, marked with my complex number, that I barely noticed stepping over as I came in. "Maybe it says something in there?"

It does. Okay, well, new floor. Tim opines that I shouldn't worry about it until after I've had plenty of rest. Smart guy, that Tim. I peek into my bedroom.

And wail.

My bed is covered with various contents of closet and washer dryer alcove, not to mention a pile of clean underwear I'd left on my couch. Great. The flooring crew was kind enough to move my pile of underwear... That's... disconcerting.

Then another wail, "I can't even get to my bathroom!"

Tim is much better mentally equipped to deal with this than I am at this point. He clears off my bed, forges a path to my bathroom, then leaves to fulfill some prior engagements, but not before giving me a hug and telling me again not to mess with it tonight.

Like I said. Smart guy, that Tim.

So, I'm home, I'm safe, I'm exhausted, I had a blast, I'm now highly amused at the state of my apartment, and I'm going to bed.

I'll post links to travelblogs and photo albums when I get them up and running.

There's no place like home!

P.S. (Added Sunday, September 9) -- I'll say this for the flooring people. Upon closer inspection, they've added a quarter-round wooden molding around the baseboards, BUT... they were incredibly nice and cut it away where they put my bookshelves back in, so the shelves all still fit. That's quality work.

Last Blog Stateside for a Bit

2007-08-31T11:45:00.001-05:00

I may write briefly once I get to Italy, just to say I got there, but I'm going to try to avoid computers and give my wrists a break. Know that I will miss all of you at least a little, and I hope everyone has a great week!

To those who have demanded I take lots of pictures... Well, I intend to take a few, it's true, but don't be surprised if my photographic record is sparse. I'm not a fan of seeing life through a camera lens, so I may opt to simply gaze and bask and absorb and not record the unprocessed visual data. I can almost guarantee, though, that there will be a series of journal entries to blog when I get back. That will be my way of taking you there, not just letting you see through my eyes, but think with my thoughts, feel with my heart.

I'm still not quite packed. That spell Hermione does on her little beaded bag would be *so* useful. Even being minimal it looks like a lot of stuff. I think I will eat lunch, and get back to it.

I love you all! I'm so excited! If I could pack you in my luggage, I would!

Arrivederci!

Rude Awakening, but Things Got Better

2007-08-23T19:22:00.001-05:00

So. Interesting day.

Flew to New Orleans for a meeting. The morning did NOT go well.

Of course, no morning goes well when one has to wake up at 5:30am. I dunno, maybe some of you people are early riser morning people. Yeah. Not me.

Just as I was about to head out, it comes to my mind to check and see if my badge is in my computer bag.

Can't find it. I rummage all the pockets again. Nope.

I start pulling things off the coffee table to check beneath the clutter. Nada.

Under the couch. No.

In my backpack. No.

End table.
Other end table.
Desk drawers.

No.

For the heck of it, I stick my hand in my shoulder bag I bought for my trip. No badge, but something soft... small... almost silky... and... crunchy... and... and... smelly...

Oh God, COCKROACH.

I sort of threw the whole thing across the room and went to wash my hands.

Yeah, yeah, I'm *awake* already.

I search the car. No badge. I drive to work. No badge. Thank goodness the office is close to home, but if I put off driving to the airport much longer, I'll be late. Come back home. Look all over again. Grab some granola bars for good measure. Hurry nervously to the car. Get in, one last check in my computer bag.

After a cockroach, a drive to the office and two trips on the office's abysmally slow elevators, after adding twenty minutes to my estimated head-to-the-airport time...

There's the badge in a front pocket I hadn't checked because I never put anything in it.

Sigh.

Get on I-10.

Traffic skids to a halt. Nice. Now I'm *really* nervous.

Turns out there was a wreck in the dead-center lane. It cleared up after that, though, and the rest of the morning's travel was completely uneventful.

I'd just cleared the security turnstile in One Shell Square when in walked Frank. Greeted him, pointed out my colleague, was pointed out to his people. Went upstairs, got set up, worked for a while, then got an IM from Frank and went down to meet him on the 11th floor for popcorn. Now I know where to find the lounge with popcorn, free coffee and soda and water, and chairs and TV. Yay!

Meeting was a non-event. Everything as expected. Though I managed to be asked about my academic history and to thoroughly impress one of the engineers with my multi-talented-ness. W00t. Evening travels were routine. Got to fly in over Rice and see Reckling Field with the grass all gone and the new sand.

Land, drive home. Big fire just south of downtown. Drive through a bunch of smoke. Get home to see a cop talking to a guy over by building 3. I assume if it's something I should worry about, someone will tell me. Unlock the pad, grab the shoulder bag, take it outside and shake out the cockroach. It comes out in two pieces. Nice.

I call the building management. This is, after all, the second roach in 3 days.

And now I'm writing a blog! Yay!

Thy will be done.

2007-08-12T12:40:00.001-05:00

Lately it seems, sometimes, that the things I’ve felt most sure of are the things I seem most likely to be wrong about. The dreams that feel the most right, so many things point to them being wrong, impossible, not for me. Do I trust my heart and the feelings inside, or do I trust the outward signs that speak to my mind. I know I act with confidence. I probably look like I know what I’m doing and where I’m going. But in truth, I’m pretty much winging it. I’m doing what I’m doing and I’m exactly where I’m at. And I’m trying to trust the tides that move around me for where I’ll be and what I’ll do next.

You see, something in me is letting go, I think. Dreams I’ve cherished are fading, and other dreams are new, but they aren’t as clear and strong as what I’m letting go. I pray to God to guide me, to give me a direction, and to thank Him for at least giving me this renewed trust in His will, so that I haven’t been as frustrated lately with the dreams I want but can’t act on.

And I’ve prayed to God that if the dream is not to be, that He will take away my longing for it. That He will gift me with resignation and acceptance, and finally, peace. I think it might be happening. I think I might be learning to let go. And there’s something comforting in that, but there’s also something so sad. Am I growing and accepting and moving on, or am I giving up?

There are still many things that I know are right, even when they seem wrong. Even when there are signs that might have made me refuse the path years ago, before I grew in some of the ways that I’ve grown, I see them, and I accept that they change my path a bit, but they aren’t road blocks, and while I have a road open before me, I will take it to see where it leads, and trust the feeling in my soul that here, at least, is where I need to be. That there’s some meaning to my presence on this path at this time. I have something to learn. I have something to teach. There’s a reason.

But other things that seemed so certain once… That still seem right to my mind, I feel gently leaving my soul. Maybe I’ll never be married again. Maybe I’ll never have the family that I know I could love and nurture with all my heart. I don’t feel like I’m giving up. I’m trying in the ways that I see to meet the person that will make that possible. But for the most part, it’s completely out of my hands, and I feel like I have to be prepared for the worst.

More than prepared. The worst will need to become the best. The path I never thought I’d be able to bear taking could become the road I take with more than resignation. With joy and with triumph, with more giving and sharing than seem possible right now.

I still want so badly to be a mother. I’d be such a good mother. And I’ve been reminded that technically I don’t need to meet someone to love and spend my life with for that to happen. I’m keeping an open mind about that, I guess, but all the same, my children deserve the absolute best, in my opinion, and that includes me making the choice to give them the very best father I can find for them. I want that for them as much as for myself.

Everyone says he’s out there somewhere. I trust God that when the time is right, if he is, I will find him. And if I haven’t found him yet, that simply means the time isn’t right.

But there’s a still small voice inside me saying he might not be out there. That I might have been born to stand alone, and in the strength that will take, and that God’s Spirit will surely give me when I need it, in that strength I will be able to become most fully who I am supposed to be, and give the gift of myself most fully to this life and this world.

There is comfort in that. But the dreams I’d have to give up are so beautiful. To watch them fade… It’s a grief just like the grief of slowly losing a friend to time and change and distance. More than that, it’s the grief of watching someone I love die by inches.

The two constant prayers in my heart and mind and soul, the words that well up from within me daily are, with a burning longing, “Please, God,” and then, with sorrow and with trust, “Thy will be done.”

Proving Herrick Right the Hard Way

2007-08-05T20:47:00.000-05:00

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
I left one rosebud on the vine.
Old Time is still a-flying;
I thought we had world enough, and time.
And this same flower that smiles today
I wasted today in fear and pride.
Tomorrow will be dying.
I waited too long and my rosebud died.

My Day in the Sun: Thought without Analysis

2007-08-05T14:48:00.001-05:00

Clear the wide belt of stop-and-stop traffic surrounding Houston. Wind through small town coastal flat Texas as the sun sets. Is the Navidad River is supposed to be that wide. Fields of cotton and sorghum, green and scarlet under a blue sky as far as eye can see.

Sleep and then sand and sun. Watching the waves skim around my ankles, mesmerized by the glimmering ripples and the small fish darting in and out. Digging my toes into the sand to unearth the clams under their little sand-blowing stacks. Sinking to my ankles as I gaze over the blue waves to the horizon. Wading into green swells half-hiding golden sands and fish and rich brown seaweed. Catching my breath as an incoming wave splashes to my waist. Large pipers and small pipers huddle apart from each other on a stretch of empty sand.

Rinsing off and floating in the pool surrounded by the voices of people I love. Drip drying on the edge, then curling under a towel on a chaise-lounge to read a book under palm shade. Wandering souvenir shop shelves that hold the same shells and plastic animals and cheap picture frames they’ve held every year I come. Carrying corn on the cob and potatoes and fajita steaks up from the barbecue pits to the suite. Eating and laughing and eating and laughing.

Sleep and sun and the smell of bacon. Breakfast and packing and waiting for the ferry. A long drive home through bright skies into a storm and back out again. Drop the bags on the apartment floor, call Mom to say I got home safe, and back to laundry, housework, and life as usual.

Galleria Adventures

2007-07-31T22:41:00.001-05:00

So my Italian classes are every Tuesday night in the Galleria. In the hidden corner between the old Macy's and Sacks Fifth Avenue. So today and last week, I decided to go explore the mall a bit. Have some grand adventures.

Get my watch batteries changed.

Buy a few things I need.

There are so many beautiful things in the shops. Rich fabrics, sparkling jewels, fragrant perfumes. And so many beautiful people walking around wearing what they've bought shops like these. I'm easily the least expensively turned out person I saw the entire time. I think even the girl in a tank top and running shorts spent more on those clothes, the sandals, and the make up and styling products than I did on my ensemble.

And the shop people can see that about me. I was looking for a pair of Ecco sandals I've seen on line, and would like to buy. Funny how busy all the sales people are when I walk by. If I stop and ask directly, "Excuse me, do you carry Ecco shoes?" They answer me, but it seems to be a great condescension on their part to do so.

Empty, futile, pointless little snobs.

I know it shouldn't bother me, but it's disheartening, a bit. I want to wear soft, luxurious, beautiful clothing, but I can't afford the quality my tastes lean towards, and a lot of that stuff only looks good on sticks. I am not a stick, and I've always been given reason to be happy with my, ahem, shape. :-P

I feel like screaming that the emperor has no clothes. The only person who I think would have understood was the hired pianist in the Nordstrom's, who played beautifully and seemed bored out of his skull. Bored enough to start his next song in tempo with the service phone ringing over the intercom. I was the only one who noticed, and he noticed my noticing, as I almost stopped dead and laughed aloud, moving on with just a stutter-step and a silent chuckle. Nordstrom's doesn't seem to be the place to laugh aloud.

I was even more unsettled as I wandered into the corner between the Ninfa's Express and the Coldstone. I was overcome by the memory of standing in just this spot watching a CNN report on il conclavo, the conclave, after the death of John Paul II. I remember crying a little for the Pope familiar to me from childhood. A man who, in spite of his authority, seemed gentle, thoughful, loving, and open. Deeply prayerful, quietly wise. I didn't know him personally, but he seemed so much warmer and more fatherly than Pope Benedict seems to me now. Tonight I wept again a little inside.

After a while I got sick of the whole charade, and found a quiet corner to read in before my class started. And I wept a little externally for the unfairness of it all. Have you BEEN to the Galleria lately? Versaci, Armani, Kenneth Cole. There are people in this world who go hungry while these beautiful people buy their beautiful clothes, and the shoe sales man in the casual shoe section, who seems lower in the totem pole than the man selling women's dress shoes, sneers at my request for a $70 pair of sandals.

I'm not an ascetic, and I'm not an activist, and I don't think any of the people in the Galleria are evil heartless bastards.

There's just so much I don't understand, and it doesn't seem right, and it overwhelms me sometimes.

Andy Roony is Always Spot On

2007-07-30T08:05:00.000-05:00

I'm horking this from someone elses blog because it made me feel good this morning.

~~~~~

If you will take the time to read these. I promise you'll come away with n enlightened perspective. The subjects covered affect us all on a daily basis! They're written by Andy Rooney, a man who has the gift of saying so much with so few words. Enjoy.......

I've learned.... That the best classroom in the world is at the feet of an elderly person.

I've learned.... That when you're in love, it shows.

I've learned.... That just one person saying to me, 'You've made my day!' makes my day.

I've learned.... That having a child fall asleep in your arms is one of the most peaceful feelings in the world.

I've learned.... That being kind is more important than being right.

I've learned.... That you should never say no to a gift from a child.

I've learned.... That I can always pray for someone when I don't have the strength to help him in some other way.

I've learned.... That no matter how serious your life requires you to be, everyone needs a friend to act goofy with.

I've learned.... That sometimes all a person needs is a hand to hold and a heart to understand.

I've learned.... That simple walks with my father around the block on summer nights when I was a child did wonders for me as an adult.

I've learned.... That life is like a roll of toilet paper. The closer it gets to the end, the faster it goes.

I've learned.... That we should be glad God doesn't give us everything we ask for.

I've learned.... That money doesn't buy class.

I've learned.... That it's those small daily happenings that make life so spectacular.

I've learned... That under everyone's hard shell is someone who wants to be appreciated and loved.

I've learned.... That to ignore the facts does not change the facts.

I've learned.... That when you plan to get even with someone, you are only letting that person continue to hurt you.

I've learned.... That love, not time, heals all wounds.

I've learned.... That the easiest way for me to grow as a person is to surround myself with people smarter than I am.

I've learned.... That everyone you meet deserves to be greeted with a smile.

I've learned.... That no one is perfect until you fall in love with them.

I've learned... That life is tough, but I'm tougher.

I've learned.... That opportunities are never lost; someone will take the ones you miss.

I've learned.... That when you harbor bitterness, happiness will dock elsewhere.

I've learned.... That I wish I could have told my Mom that I love her one more time before she passed away.

I've learned.... That one should keep his words both soft and tender, because tomorrow he may have to eat them.

I've learned.... That a smile is an inexpensive way to improve your looks.

I've learned.... That when your newly born grandchild holds your little finger in his little fist, that you're hooked for life.

I've learned.... That everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you're climbing it.

I've learned.... That the less time I have to work with, the more things I get done.

Soul-Making

2007-07-23T22:03:00.000-05:00

I just finished reading Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. And just finished with the requisite sobbing my heart out. Oh, wait, not *quite* finished with that, apparently.

Book seven came in the mail today. I haven't even opened it. I didn't sleep well last night, and I promised myself I'd go to bed at a decent time tonight. Meaning, of course, right after I finish this blog. So I should probably leave it in its package.

Tomorrow I have my first Italian lesson, so I might take my book with me to read while I get myself some dinner in the Galeria food court and wait for my class to start.

Or, well, I still haven't seen the new movie. Didn't manage it this weekend. Maybe on Wednesday I'll go do that instead of hanging out at the Volcano. Even though I haven't played pool in forever. Who knows.

Somehow, this time as I read, Dumbledore's blue eyes became my father's. I saw Ruddygore on Sunday, and there's a song about a little flower that shelters under an oak tree until the tree is torn away.

That's how I feel right now. Five years after his death, these things remind me of him, and how he taught me and sheltered me and loved me.

And left me.

I'll be fine. Really I will. It's just... It never goes away.

A thought came to mind recently. Probably not original, but somehow it made sense. I was thinking about how this will never go away. It may smooth itself out, and become less jarring as the years continue to pass. It's already less acutely painful than it was. At least most of the time.

But it's not something I can eject from myself. I can't leave it behind, because it's now part of who I am. I can't live away from it. I can't live apart from it. I have to live through it, with it, around it.

And the image that came to mind was the grain of sand that becomes a pearl. How painful it must be at first. Sharp, jagged, a focused little dot of agony. And slowly time and faith and love and life begin to smooth it over, round it out. Sometimes it remains knobby and awkward, but maybe it can grow into a soft brilliance of perfection. Always lodged inside of me. It can't ever be comfortable.

But maybe it becomes a thing of incredible value and beauty. I've felt for a long time that Daddy's death wasn't something that had some absolute message, given to me from outside. I do believe in God, and I do believe he is here with me, and has a plan for me. But I do NOT believe that my God killed my father to open my blinded eyes, or to test my faith.

I do believe that God calls to me through this pain, though. And helps me to create my own meaning, gives me the strength and patience to slowly make my grief, and my father's death, something of worth. Something that happened not in vain. I'd still have rather it hadn't happened, of course.

But it did. And these things will happen. Life is as much about losing as it is about gaining. But you can turn the tables, gain a little with the loss, and you *can* beat the house, I believe.

And thinking of this brought me to one of those recurring ideas I have sometimes, and tend to bring here when I'm ready. The idea from John Keats' letter to George and Georgina Keats from February 14th to May 3rd of 1819. (You can tell I'm an English major. I always cite my source.) Keats' presents his ideas as an alternative to the Christian view, though the two aren't mutually exclusive. I've linked the entire letter above for anyone who's really curious, but I'll end with the essential passage, and leave you to ponder how this fits in with my pearls:

The common cognomen of this world among the misguided and superstitious is 'a vale of tears' from which we are to be redeemed by a certain arbitary interposition of God and taken to Heaven-What a little circumscribed straightened notion! Call the world if you Please "The vale of Soul-making". Then you will find out the use of the world (I am speaking now in the highest terms for human nature admitting it to be immortal which I will here take for granted for the purpose of showing a thought which has struck me concerning it) I say 'Soul making' Soul as distinguished from an Intelligence- There may be intelligences or sparks of the divinity in millions-but they are not Souls till they acquire identities, till each one is personally itself. I[n]telligences are atoms of perception-they know and they see and they are pure, in short they are God-How then are Souls to be made? How then arc these sparks which are God to have identity given them-so as ever to possess a bliss peculiar to each one's individual existence? How, but by the medium of a world like this?

A Smaller Magic

2007-07-15T20:50:00.001-05:00

I took a walk this evening, and on the way back I saw beautiful things.

A rainbow, brilliant, lurid, like a heavy brushstroke across the gray sky, with a secondary bow, fainter outside the arc like an accidental smudge.

Clouds, bulbous and creamy, dipping down from the sky like giant fingers dimpling the air below.

Quieter enchantments after the storm has torn the sky with dazzling forked light.

But that was on my way home, with my heart already thrilled by a beauty closer and smaller. Granted, I do see beauty in the strangest things.

The sun hung low in the sky as I walked along the bayou. A lone sunflower stood beside the path like an unabashed eye staring down passers-by like myself. I stopped to admire it, stooped to put my eyes on its level. The sunlight shone warm and golden on the tall grass, rising off of it in a scent of hay and honey. I shaded my eyes and looked out over the gleam of tall blades and slender stalks gilded by the sun’s midas touch.

And everywhere I caught more brilliant glints, like diamonds stretched to silken strands, woven amongst the grass. And everywhere, suspended in the grass, were small movements, scurryings, dippings and dancings. I stood up and leaned closer, examining the minute perfection of a spider’s web, with the spider still working furiously, rebuilding after the storm. I took a few more steps gazing across the grass into the sunlight, as it sparkled and waved over more webs, and more, and more.

Everywhere, as far as I could see, dime-sized, narrow, pale green spiders were spinning webs no bigger than dessert plates between the grass stalks. Everything glimmered and trembled, shaking in the slightest breeze, and shuddering under the lightest little eight-legged touch. For a quarter of a mile I walked, and never saw an end of those webs and weavers, glistening in the light of the setting sun.

I’ve never seen so many. It reminded me of fireflies in the evenings back home, when they’d light the brush and the trees like strands of sparkling lights. But this was a warmer, homier magic. A labor of survival made beautiful in the minute and fragile symmetry of every close-woven web.

Breath-taking.

And humbling.

Evening

2007-07-14T20:28:00.001-05:00

The frogs are clacking
In the bayou
As the light fades.

The sparrows are done
Puffing and scuffling
In the dust by the road,
Shuffling their feathers
Into a deeper gray.

The sun has set,
The air is smooth and warm.

Evening has lain down
Beside the land.
Her head rests on the west,
Drifting softly into night.

Like a Peach, Still

2007-07-12T20:21:00.001-05:00

Still bruised. Got the blood work back, and Doc looked at my X-Rays.

X-Rays look good. Blood negative for indications of arthritis.

But my white blood cell count is high.

"Looks like you have an infection. Does your throat hurt again?"

"No. I don't feel bad at all."

"What's that on your face?"

"Um... Acne."

"What do you take for it?"

"Uh... I wash my face."

"Okay, well, I'm going to give you an antibiotic for the infection. It should help clear that up too."

(Yeah, right, for the two weeks I take it, *maybe*. I'll have gray hair before I shake this acne.)

"And we'll see you in two weeks. We'll take some more blood and..."

"Oh NO! Not again!"

"Well sweety I have to check..."

"Look!"

I rolled up my sleeve and showed the fairly entact remains of my 2" across bruise from LAST time.

"Oh, Lord. Well we'll... then... we'll just see how your doing in two weeks."

Sigh. So I have antibiotics and no answers. And an ergonomic keyboard.

And Firefly and Serenity DVDs.