day is done

i'm rootless and wandering
gypsy woman i close my eyes and everywhere
is
home
nowhere is welcoming
and yet i belong
all over.

***

the dr was, to say the least, refreshing. she didn't do a full exam, which was nice. listened to what i had going on and made the astute observation that it really hasn't been long enough to judge, as far as the "female" problems go. so for now, birth control, to keep my cycles in order, and hopefully to cut down both on time of cycle and severity. i'm sick of being sick every other two weeks--cranky, bitchy, whiny, crampy, bloated, all around olympic caliber p.m.s. so that will be nice, once i figure out these pills.

i never went on the pill before. was on depo provera but hated it, except for the fact that i didn't have a cycle at all. that was nice. but i didn't feel right, and there's no way to explain it other than that.

so for now, monitor.

blood pressure was still up, but not as horrible as last time i was in. yay.. the dr said that my depression could be amplified by the meds for the blood pressure...so another wait and see. she did not want to medicate for the depression right away; VERY relieved. i'm on enough meds now. don't need another at the moment. she gave me a referral to the mental health unit, which will ask questions and then set me up with someone who might be able to help me.

so another step in the right direction. i think.

i'm just facing now the work that comes with trying to fix your life. i have to start walking every day. i have to start taking my blood pressure on a regular basis. i have to take more tablets. which doesn't seem like much if you're on them, but when you're just starting...it's a bit much. i have to see a therapist, and see if i can get my life in order.

maybe then, when i am accustomed to being healthier and feeling better, maybe then i can proceed with other areas of my life.

for months now dan has been telling me that i should have gone back to school to be a vet tech. maybe i should. or at least look into what is required. and then make a decision. i think back to when i was in high school and college and think about how much i wanted to be a veterenarian, and how i discounted the whole thing due to math. and then i think about my day to day workload, and how much of it is math, and how perhaps this is life's way of showing me that i've got nothing to fear and nothing to lose.

but sometimes it is hard to see the lessons life is offering, when you're so closed off that you can no longer see them.

i have to admit, i am lonely down here. i seem to have lost my boyfriend, and my best friend, and it feels like it's because i don't have the system requirements to keep up. serena's out west; cari's up north, and cathy goes to bed ten minutes ago. tangee has a child; tish is kind of a tv nut. i miss my girlfriends, and i miss having people to hang out with and communicate with, too. i can't afford a better computer now, so i guess it's just a matter of making do with what i have. just tired of making do. i hear dan and serena talking--the tapping of keys online--behind me, and i feel so far out of the loop that i cannot describe it.

it isn't that i don't have friends; i know i do, and i know, from the outpouring of support lately, that they are there---AND THANK YOU FOR BEING HERE FOR ME, ALL OF YOU! i just wish everyone were closer, so that a cup of coffee didn't have to be planned out two weeks in advance. i guess i need someone else in the area who is a) awake b) cheap and c) easily amused. LOL in retrospect, i moved here, so i guess it's up to me to find this person.

it's just another one of my molehill-mountains.

lucky for me, the shepherd's pie is almost done, and then it' s off to bed. day is done. one step closer, to something.

heavy

my limbs
are weighed down by procrastination
the fear of failure
the lure of temorary insanity

i'd like to bait them free, hang feathery bits
on trees, the car, perhaps even
people
just to get myself out of my gray lake
but it's not going to happen
alone

so i sit typing
each finger, one thousand pounds
sinking into your keyboard
i should be typing
on my own but i can't
move
three feet
west.

***

today is my doctor day. i have an appointment at 1030 am but i'll be leaving around 10 in order that i might arrive early, to be safe. this time i will bring a book; last time i didn't and there was only one parenting magazine.

today i'm very nervous. perhaps that is what is inspiring the feeling of simultaneously being free of everything and weighted down by all of life's generalties.

i'm terrified that there's something wrong that cannot be fixed. with my body, with my brain, with my beloved. who is only my beloved--i'm not exactly beloved by him at the time being. i'm scared that i have poisoned our relationship, but i know that to be in a relationship there has to be two people--two individuals coming together. and right now, we're not two individuals. we're barely one person spread thin between two people.

i'm scared that the doctor won't understand that i'm depressed, and that i don't know how to fix it. i'm scared of crying all the time, of bleeding all the time, of having to just live in limbo forever. i don't know why it takes things like this to wake me up; why can't i wake up on my own and see that there is a need for help?

why does it take such great pain?

i think about that quote from babylon 5, about how the only way to grow is to constantly go through states of pain, in which you are being born. i try to focus and hang onto that quote because it brings me sanity. finding that bit of sanity reminds me of getting water at my grandma altobelli's house, on hot days when i was a kid--it was always in this greenish container with a white spigot in her fridge, and tasted so cold and so crisp and slightly metallic.

maybe it reminds me of easier times, when perhaps whatever it is that is flawed between my brain cells was dormant.

these past few years have been difficult. lots of tumultuous things happening--trying this relationship with dan again, moving to the Cities, being away from friends, dad's heart bypass surgery, my cat slowly wasting away, my car slowly wasting away, more surgery with dad, his imminent retirement, and now my uncle, dying, or clinging to life.

understanding that i'm probably depressed.

despite what the websites say, it does feel like something to be ashamed of. it's like, why can't i deal with the problems i have? why can't i face life? why is joy so fleeting? does it have to be? is it like this for everyone? does everyone feel worth so little? i feel like burdening my problems on someone else is just weakness.

but maybe that's my dad talking, when i was young. "why are you crying? i'll give you something to cry about..." etcetera. i'm afraid of the reprecussions--what if i lose this creative vein that is tapped when i am feeling down? what if i can only write poetry and fiction when i'm depressed? does being depressed open up channels to the creative spoodge of the universe and make my hands move in nouns and verbs?

i'm afraid to find out.

i'm afraid to change my world--despite the fact that it's not what i want, and despite the fact that my relationship is not healthy, i'm terrified to lose what i have. i'm usually not open to change, especially when it's not my choice of change. i don't like not having options. i don't like being forced into one thing or another.

but the other day, thursday, dan made me face a lot of things that i think have been hidden behind my gray veil for a long time, made me be honest about us and me and him. and the thing that i remember thinking, when he said that he would be open to outside help, was that i was so glad because that meant maybe i could have help, too.

i never thought about needing it. i never thought i did. but i think i do. and at this juncture, i'm more afraid of hurting than i am of changing.

so i'm going to the doctor. it's my big day. i'm going to find out what's wrong with my uterus and tell my doctor that i think i'm depressed. and we'll see what i find out.

the part of kim that's afraid of life is curled up in a corner trying not to cry, not to be ashamed, not to be embarrassed.

the part of kim that loves exploring things and learning is keyed up.

heavy and weightless. drowning and reaching for the lifeguard. closing one door and opening another. trying to be born, i guess.

i own a bitchy cat.

yesterday i spent the day shopping w/ corpse and cathy; corpse wanted women to help pick out his wardrobe again, just like 2 years ago when serena and i went out w/ him. dan was along that time too, and i almost wished he were with this time because i think that with only women picking out the clothing, corpse might be in for sore spots later...he may appear a bit "metrosexual." but what can we do now, return things? ha. i laugh in the face of good fashion. (;

dan and i had a good talk yesterday afternoon, and then he went off to spend time with serena, and i went off to drink wine w/ my girlfriends. thought it was going to be a sleepover, but i'm glad i came home because otherwise the cat would have woken up the rest of the household VERY early with her terrorist demands for fresh food.

as it was i'm up and i thought for sure i'd be able to sleep more than 7.5 hrs. not likely. i had some terribly bizarre dreams about being at a school ten years after a bus had crashed into it, and having to help my cousin janelle, who was trying to get a very old rottweiler and something that looked like a large apricot poodle to mate. don't ask me, i have no clue. it's not like i was watching animal planet yesterday, or at the dog park...who knows. there was a spot in the middle of the dream when i was standing in my living room, looking at my huge coffee table, where someone had penned a note in red ink on blue paper: kim, call your parents, very upset. i had a feeling it was about jed, and for a minute i forced myself to wake up, and then fell back asleep and into humping dogs. gah. why, brain, why?

so today we drive to river falls, wi, to help spoon and josh move. i'm glad of the activity because if i'm around the house i just find something to cry over. i'm chalking it up right now to everything that is going on, with the added bonus of being premenstrual and incoherently weepy already. as with all things it takes me forever to understand and wrap my head around them. case in point: dan's a computer gamer. it's taken me a long time, and i'm still working on it, for me to not be jealous of the time he spends on the computer, happily gaming. the better i understand it, the better i feel about it. but it still is time i cannot spend with him, because my computer has been reduced to word processor, just because of changing system requirements. i have to admit that amelia does look tiny and ancient next to dan and eero's modern behemoths. after typing on dan's computer too, i get on amelia and immediately have to put my waiting-in-line skills to use, because she's a bit on the slow side, in comparison.

either way. it'll be good to get out of the house. it'll be good to help someone else. it'll be good to step back for a little bit. i can't get out of my head long enough to make sense of anything right now. and as long as i have my cell phone w/ me, hopefully mom and dad will be able to make contact as needed. which means that jed won't be out of my head, either. it's like walking meditation--i have to force things out to have the silence in my head. shoo out the thousands of milling thoughts; the party's over. ask the emotions to leave, just until morning, just to get through. i suppose i've never applied my yoga stuff to everyday things--or maybe i have. i remember thinking at one point that for me cleaning is like meditation. i don't see why helping someone move cannot be grouped in the same category.

tomorrow we get together w/ my sister and her husband for a later lunch in the afternoon--sounds like burgers and such. i think dan is coming with me. i have no idea, because at the time i accepted, we were not in the situation in which we are now in. it hurts me that i'm not his best friend any longer. or maybe i am? i don't know. serena seems to have taken that place. even though dan says that i'm not being "set aside" i can't help but feel that i am.

i think it's back to the self-worth thing. hopefully a counselor or therapist can help me make sense of that feeling, and get this half-assed, haphazard life i lead turned around. i'd like to have goals, and see them completed. i'd like to not be afraid. my problem is that i turn everything into some insurmountable wall. when i was a kid my mom used to say that i turned molehills into mountains; it's not a far cry from where i am now. i don't know why; it seems like i should have the necessary tools, but they're just absent, or maybe forgotten. maybe i had them but lost them. who knows. it's useless at this point to gripe and whine over what i'm missing, or what i'm perceiving as missing, because someday soon i hope to regain and recoup and recover.

and my totally bitchy cat has now eaten and made a BIG stinky in the back hallway. so i'm off to do menial work like scooping the poop of felines. which, according to my cat, is the very reason i breathe... (;

clean sweep

you ever slipped and fell?

hit your ass on the ground SO hard that the wind just gets knocked out of you?

it's been one of those kind of weeks. i'm at the point where everything makes me cry because i am feeling quite hope-less.

but at the same time, i feel a sense of hope that perhaps is just tempered by it being different than the hope i had before.

i think that this is a turning point. a hard point, but a turning point.

to sum up: i've been having health issues for a bit now, mainly "female" issues that will hopefully be addressed on tuesday when i see the doctor. needless to say it's a bit stressful, as a woman, to just know that something isn't right, but not be able to point at it and say, that's the problem. it's internal. it's icky. that's enough.

my uncle is in the hospital, after suffering strokes again. they don't think it's anything right now but a matter of time. it's hard to think of my dad and his brothers minus number 3, but i know that jed would never want to live unless it was a life he wanted to live, and i know his brothers know that. it just is downright depressing--he's suffered through enough in life that death should not be this horrible hurdle, this pain-filled departure. and in the same breath, it's a release, and sometimes, growth is painful.

case in point: my stress number three: thursday dan had pretty much hit the low point in his life. or maybe this year. who knows. at any rate, there were lots of tears and sobbing involved, and it became something more, something that bared emotions and pared them down to the minimum: he needs help. i need help. we need help.

what was once an emotionally healthy relationship is not that any more. it's stemming from so many things, so many different items, that i can't put into words what they are. it's too much. we're both resenting each other, resenting where we are in life, and worst of all: blaming.

i never wanted it to be like this. i didn't realize that it had gotten so awful, for him. or for me, i suppose. i know that life doesn't hand you happiness on a platter; it's just not like that. but it shouldn't be like this either.

we both agree that we want to try. we want things to work. we have issues with trust, but we are both willing to see a counselor and see if there is a hope. i still love dan. i always will; he's a part of my soul, someone who inspires me and makes me want to do better. the problem is, we're both in the same rut--careers are not what we thought we were going to do, which dribbles over into life being not what we wanted. and then it's back to resenting the other person. mindless, endless loop.

i pray that something good can come of this, that perhaps we can take what we started with and make it into something good again, something healthy and something worth being a part of.

i'm very good at sweeping things under the rug. if i don't like where life is going, i hide. i stick my head in the sand and just wait until i think it's "over." in reality, it doesn't work that way. things happen, people interact, and words are spoken. and with or without you, life moves on.

i think that for a long time i've mistaken my own apathy for patience, and my own depression for someone else's. you often see what you want to see, and hear what you want to hear, whether that's good or bad. i thought that things were going along just fine; i could see that dan was depressed, and thought that i was being patient. in reality, we were both depressed, and i was once again being apathetic--if i wait long enough, it will pass.

but it doesn't. it doesn't ever pass. it comes back. it's karma, it's wishful thinking, it's whatever you want to call it. but it won't go away just by wishing it so. when dan said that he would accept help, i was tearily overjoyed. i was so glad, so glad, so glad--because part of me was thinking that was the only way i could ask for help, if he was going to as well.

in retrospect, it's a curious chain of events that leads you to the point we are at, the impasse that we have been at for years, or months, or days. i just am clinging right now to the hope of all hopes that perhaps we have a chance. is it possible that us, that dan and kim, could be over? do i want it to be? no, i don't. of all people i have met, dan is the one who makes me laugh, makes me smile, and understands me the best. he's like a peice of my own soul.

when i think about it, as a whole, i am so overwhelmed that i cannot see straight. i can't deal with all of it. and that's when my head wants to get popped into the ground. that's when i want to hide. usually, it is when i hide. i take myself into the ground, i bury myself in earth, i remove myself from existence because i have this mistaken belief that i am either not worth as much as i am, and that the world can get on just fine without me, or that when i open my eyes and snow white myself awake, the world will have changed and my prince charming, the one i knew when i was awake before, will be miraculously happy.

today i'm going to go over to tish's house for a night of wine and wise, witty women. i'm going to put my head in the sand about a few issues--just to get to tomorrow, and to get to the day after that, and the day after that, when maybe, just maybe, i can ask for help--and days after that when i can get the help i think i might need. maybe find the help that dan and i need.

so send some good energy this way. i'm not as hard up as others, but i'll take whatever is sent. (:

612 pm at work...

still at work. why, you ask? because modem is dead at home and i'm trying to keep up on bills and email in the interim. dan emailed today from the library to let folks know we were down; i'm sure he's disgruntled as the internet is a HUGE source of jobhunting for him.

so dad's out of the hospital as of last night. we got to the hospital at 11; he went in at 12 for surgery, and was out by 115 or so. in recovery for a bit and then we sat around giggling in his recovery room until about 4. home by 415. all in all, quick and easy. he's off this week, and then has only 2 weeks of work left before the big r: RETIREMENT. he's glad it's a short time, but i think mom is more glad. less stress equals happy family. it's going to be SO weird not to have to worry about dad being on call, missing holidays and family events, having time do just enjoy life. i'm so glad for him i could cry right here at my desk.

in other news, my uncle jed is stabilized. he went in last week w/ mini strokes. the man has no luck, but he has a support system that is awe-inspiring. people are praying for him, visiting him in hospital, doing what they can to keep us apprised of the situation (he's in CA and family is in MN). dad and i actually setup a website on sunday night for him at The Caringbridge. VERY simple and just for folks going through health issues, so that we can update as needed.

that is the last thing i need to do tonight before heading home. i'm tired, it's sunny out and i need to get into my car and head out, but i really want to check and see if there are any other updates. i gave dad a tutorial on how to post, and wrote up directions he can email to family and friends who have updates to post as needed, but i want to make sure that people are checking it. yesterday alone we had about 20 hits!!! which is cool. if anyone feels a need to check it out, drop me a msg and i'll email you the site addy. (:

i'm outtie--see ya'll later. (:

cats, light sabres, and paintball, oh my!

so my cat should be drawn and quartered. here's why.

friday we got the car packed and drove up to free beer weekend, mikey's offering of free beer, turkey, and a place to pop your tent. it's about a 2.5 hour drive, give or take with road construction. had lots of fun friday, ate the owens' wedding reception leftovers, which were quite tasty, and sat around the fire until quite late drinking the proffered free beer. the beer in question was mikey's home brew, and while lacking in carbonation, was quite tasty all the same.

there was talk of bears, wolves, and deer--none of which but the bear were scary sounding, as it sounds as though they're just not too afraid of humans. eep. so friday we go to bed (in the tent! yay! i love my tent!) nice and toasty warm under the new sleeping bags, and comfy on the air mattress. i can't sleep because i keep having to pee because of the beer. yay beer. and the later it gets, the more paranoid and overtired i get about the freaking bear.

i think i got up about six or seven times to pee. dan should be sainted because i kept waking him up to make sure there was no bear. and all through the night, no bear. i HATE outhouses. outhouses in the dark: fifty times worse. you laugh. i weep. (;

so we all are up and off the land by 830 or so to grab breakfast at the buckthorn in gordon proper (which is about 3 miles east of the cabin, has the greasiest breakfast ever, but is cheap and very appetizing...go figure). after breakfast everyone suits up (which takes about an hour) and by 11 we're all running through 5 acres of land with paintball guns.

that was quite theraputic. and warm. the players in this group keep their guns turned up so that it will leave a welt if you get hit. for the most part, that means lots of padding. cathy even wore a type of body armor vest. i just didn't care. i figured, if you're getting shot you should have it hurt. so i wore jeans and a t-shirt, and over that a thick fleece jacket, which eventually got traded out for a camo jacket. despite the fact that at the moment i can't afford a gun for myself, or camo wear, and borrowed a mask as well (thank heavens, because i got pegged twice in the mask!), and add to that that i didn't hit ANYONE but a plastic bottle, and the fact that my borrowed gun kept bursting paintballs when they were chambered and had to be cleaned out not once, not twice, but three times...i had a literal and figurative blast. can't wait to try my luck again. i'm hoping that by next year i will maybe be able to afford my own gear, instead of borrowing. but you never know. those guys all have way too much gear for one person to use anyway. so we'll see.

like i said, i only got hit twice, in the facemask. then i got hit once in the left boob, and once on the hand; neither left a mark. dan's got a couple welts on his arm, but nothing horrible, and nothing life-threatening. none of the ones that hit me broke open except for the ones on my mask. paintballs are water soluble, and apparently just break down when it rains, so the fact that the forest was decorated with sprays of orange, green, smurfy blue--not a problem. especially with the amount of rain we've been getting lately.

anyway. why is my cat going to die. let's get back to this.

so we showered, not at chrissy and mike's cabin, that's an outdoor and mikey didn't want to have to get it going and cleaned out, but at some free beer weekend folks' place down the road. quite possibly the smallest shower i have ever been in. but a shower all the same. it felt good to get rid of the deet and sweat, and check for ticks. i think i found a total of three wandering around, and then when we got back from showering, a teeny tiny one on my right hand that was determined to be one of the "bad" ticks--the lyme disease carrying fellas. once they start feeding you have to get them to back out--usually the only thing that works is a match. you light the match and blow it out, hold it to their hiney and they freak out and move back. of course, no one had a match (yes, camping without matches--everyone has lighters of some type; mikey was using a propane torch.) so darin picks up the torch and says something about me doing it. i was like, you have GOT to be kidding. so we find a little stick and he holds the torch and i try to get this pin-sized bug to back out. of course the stick, just smoldering and not even burning, just killed it--it was too tiny, and the stick was too big.

at the same time, darin's focused on the tick, and all of a sudden i realize that my other hand it hurting--because the propane torch is burning it. luckily we got it moved in time, and nothing serious happened. i have a small divot on my right hand, where the end of the stick was pushed on the teeny tick and burned not only the tick but also my hand. yay hand.

free beer weekend always has a fried turkey, too--which are amazing, if you ever have the chance to taste one. the oil locks in the turkey, so it's almost like it's steamed on the inside. so tender...and probably horrible for me. but at that point i'd had beer, and too many cookies to count, etc. so free beer weekend was definitely not fat free. but what can you do, other than starve? *sigh*

thunderstorms were supposed to move in last night up by gordon, and no one who was tent camping want to be there for them. so corpse, darin and cathy, and dan and i packed up the tents. eero was sleeping in his jeep and also decided to head home. by about 415 we were on the road, and made it home by 7. got almost everything put away right off the bat--food and supplies, mainly. still have to unpack the duffels but that's not as pressing as getting the cheese cooled. (;

dan slept for a while in the car, driving home. i ended up napping around 8 or so. then at 915 darin, cathy and corpse showed up and we went to the 950 showing of the latest installment in star wars...star wars: revenge of the sith.

it's first of all a foregone conclusion that anakin ends up being darth vader, and that the jedi go into exile. you already know that anakin's wife, padme, is going to have two kids, luke and leia. you're supposed to want to see the film to see the downfall. of the three prequel films, this was the best. but that's not saying much because the first two were schlock in my opinion, and the third was just a bit darker but still schlock. hayden christenson and natalie portman had better chemistry when they were offscreen from each other thinking about each other than they did when they were both in the same room. gag me with a spoon. the emperor, darth sidious, had horrible makeup. they spent a fortune on effects, and we end up with the emperor looking like a cross between whorf from star trek and bram stoker's dracula, as imagined by francis ford coppola. either was better defined and more believable than the dude on screen portraying the baddest of the baddies.

the other bothersome bit was anakin's downfall. it just didn't fit. the whine factor was so far off the screen that i could feel my teeth shaking. he's not an intelligent bad guy, and you can definitely see where luke gets his genetic innate whine. but it doesn't make for good movie making. you don't care enough about the good guy before he turns bad--you just want to laugh and tell him to suck it up. the final light sabre duel between obi-wan and darth vader goes on far too long, and is so fantastic that i dozed off.

could have been the drive or the lack of sleep the previous night. not sure. could have been the movie, too. i'm going to blame it on georgie lucas' horribly written dialogue and action scenes that were just plain old ridiculous. have ONE battle, in ONE place, and call it a day.

oh! oh! oh! and darth vader's helmet. i just about burst out laughing when the put the whole thing on--it was a nice sequence and all, but when the helmet actually got put on, there was a small thump, as if air was compressed out of the area between helmet and skull. it sounded for all the world like tupperware, and all i could think was, did they burp the air out of his helmet. and secondly, was that whole suit manufactured by rubbermaid? cause it would explain a lot...

so after the movie we went to perkins to discuss. home by 2 and in bed shortly thereafter, sleeping happily under covers and in the same building as FLUSH TOILET. it's the little things, really...

at some point in the night the door closes. i think i closed it because shiva was being such a pest. this is around 7, i think. dan hears her scratching and whining and lets her back in. she doesn't bother him; only me. i keep pushing her away, but it was a losing battle. the door had shut again, this time because we had the window open and i'm sure the pressure just pulled it shut. at any rate, she was trapped in the room with us, and hungry to boot--so i woke up by degrees for two hours--too tired to get up and just shut her out of the room, or give her the half a tin of wet food she wanted. (i'm not starving my cat, trust me. she's just a bitch about getting the wet food in addition to the dry food in the a.m.)

thus i am awake. unhappily watching my cat, now stuffed on ill-gotten iams turkey and giblets, watch the birds outside on the patio with unconcealed glee.

i should go shower. dad's having surgery tomorrow and i've got the day off, so i might drive up and see if mom wants company tomorrow, or help getting him home. but i'm not driving up until much later, because i'm sure that after i shower and eat lunch, i'm going to want a nap.

the quickest blog ever

this has to be under five sentences. had a great weekend, wore pink and black striped shirt AND a big pink flower in my hair, wedding was lovely, reception was laid back and relaxing, and sunday we watched shaun of the dead before hitting caribou and dropping serena at the airport. so lots of fun compressed into little time! next weekend we're in gordon wi for free beer weekend, camping and all that fun stuff. and i'm on line five so i'm off to work!!!

the fashionista speaketh

so she's not speaking much, but we were on the topic of wedding wear tonight. d and c informed the guests at large that it was casual. but i just cannot see wearing casual wear to a wedding in which the bride and groom are not going to be casually dressed. it just goes against every grain of my inner diva.

i WANT to shop for some strappy shoes. i WANT to get gussied up and flit around, looking nice. and i definitely WANT to look my best because fifteen years from now when we look back in photo format, i do NOT want to look crappy. i don't want to be wearing jeans that make my ass look huge. i don't want to wear shoes that are sloppy. if there's one area of my life in which i enjoy to excercise control, it's my clothing.

the rest of it...meh. whatever. i can live with a dirty house, with cat that poops outside the litterbox, with my bed on the floor. these are all transitory.

but clothing...clothing makes the person.

i had this totally zen moment yesterday at the grocery store. i guess it was actually monday. close enough. anyway. i'm standing in line and the lady in front of me reaches over to take the receipt from the cashier. in the bend of the cashier's arm, i see a scar.

not a big one. nothing life threatening. but a good two inch long, half inch wide scar. the cashier is blonde, and has slightly tanned skin, but the scar is lighter. not new, an old scar. the memory of something that was painful.

it makes me think of flesh, and how transitory it all is. in the end--you become bones, you go back to the earth, you become earth. the flesh and all its memories and sensations, the marvel of nerves knitted together and functioning--this is all forgotten.

that scar stood out to me. it's all passing. it's all a memory, either waiting to be had, or happening now, or already done. printed, set, finished.

all the way out to the car i thought about that scar. today, while we were discussing the merits of wearing clothing and the different levels of clothing, i thought about that scar--about how it would fade, in time. about how the girl whose arm crooked around it--how she probably could go for days without thinking about that scar and how it formed. it becomes a part of you that is so close you cannot see it.

clothing is transitory too. in the end it all falls apart and you're left standing naked. hopefully in a place that cherishes your nudity, and not in a job interview or somesuch that requires a sense of decency. gravity shreds cotton.

i think about the clothing i have. i think about the scars i have. the memories we attach to bodies and the adornments we put on these bodies. i remember the people who go before me--the bog man, the entombed, the people whose living relatives, whose future, packed them into earth with bits and peices of the lives they lead.

are we so attached to materials? i know that i can be. i enjoy them because they remind me of something i cannot quite put words around: immortality. memories are carried and made immortal only by the people who hold them. once you are gone, those immortal memories are gone too, just like the flesh.

but clothing lives on.

upstairs i have my grandfather's belt. it's a story in and of itself--if i remember correctly he did the tooling in the leather, and it's punched over and over by his awl. you can see when he made it, the size of his waist. and then by the time he passed away, how narrow his hips had become. after i'm gone, the memories of why it's punched so many times will also be gone. i can't write down enough on the back of a belt to sum up the soul i have attached to that long strip of leather.

which makes my grandpa and myself and my memories of him--transitory. passing. a breath in time. someone will use that belt in the future and think of it as theirs. they will give it new memories. eventually it will go back to earth too. but it's life will be a bit longer than mine, it's history more varied.

and makes that belt immortal.

so. in that vein. that makes what i wear on saturday quite relevant.

rain drops keep falling on my house

just when yesterday gave me hope that it'd be sunny and bright today, it's raining and wep. the upside is that it's sooooooooooooooo green. which is lovely.

last night was fun--dan's games are always fun. the only downside was that we'd stopped on the way over at dq for dinner--and the grease gave me intestinal distress. note to self: no more fast food. oy.

i had this weird dream this morning about my sister beth. i dreamed she took off to go somewhere, and we were all worried and couldn't reach her by phone. so my sister sbw and i got in the car w/ dad and started driving north. (god only knows where we were--it was nowhere familiar.) about halfway to wherever we thought we were going, dad turned into some other man i didn't know, and insisted that we pull the car over and wait out the traffic. we ended up in this place right next to the highway that had this little hill that was supposed to have been something to someone at some time--maybe like an indian mound or something. it was a dream, okay? (; i climbed the path to the top and looked out over the freeway, and across 4 lanes of traffic, in the ditch going south, there was beth. i yelled until my lungs ached and she looked over, grabbed a bag out of the car, and ran over. she was so surprised to see us there--as if we would have left her behind--and sara, too. the man who wasn't dad turned into dad again and then we had to go through this house and empty it out. i woke up at one point because the phone was ringing, and went back to the dream to finish it--my uncle jed was telling me that i had to turn off this television but i couldn't figure out how, and then mom came in and just unplugged it. i woke up then and came downstairs, only to find that the ringing phone of a few minutes before was none other than my sister beth. weird.

so today nothing much is on the docket. i have to find out how much my car will cost to get the brake pads fixed (bianca's in the shop now) and then go retrieve it. d and c were supposed to call if they needed help w/ stuff at the house today; i know they had things planned for outside but w/ the rain...who knows. we need to clean up the house in prep for serena's visit next weekend too. so we'll see. there are things to be done. but perhaps this weekend will be from inside the house, where there's no rain. (;

at this moment

i should be showered, i should be primped and i should be heading out the door. but in typical kim fashion, it's 826 and i'm in my pajamas sitting downstairs typing in my blog. i'm going to be late for work and i just. don't. care. hee hee hee.

was up late last night finishing charlaine harris' newest, dead as a doornail--which rocked! loved it. need to read them all again because they're just so nice and vampy. yummy books. then i ditzed round w/ dan on world of warcrack for a while, chatted w/ serena, and then read a few chapters of georgette heyers' the masqueraders before falling asleep. there was some poem writing in there too--i'll have to share it eventually because i really liked what i'd written last night. course the light of day may extinguish that. you never know.

today looks like it's going to be nice, too. the grass is all green and the sky's a happy blue. i'm practicing that buddhist ideal of living in the present--trying to not consider too much yesterday or today or tomorrow, but instead, just right now. but i think i better consider it from inside the shower stall. late might be my middle name but a paycheck's nice too. (;