travel

today i get ready to go to chicago--tomorrow morning my flight leaves when it's still dark out, and then i return on tuesday when it's dark, too. friday i drive to my girly weekend in western minnesota, and then i have a blessed week to recover, during which i can hopefully:

a) visit and hug friends
b) come up with a halloween costume
c) relaxxxxxxxxxx

but this morning, when i woke and thought i'd bake muffins to munch this morning, i decided after being vertical for an hour that it's time to travel--the short distance, back to bed.

you give me fever...

marlene dietrich growled out that song ages ago, and today, i wish i could sing it to my coworkers. fever isn't that high but i feel all muddled and chilly. will be putting myself down for a nap shortly.

when i get a fever i know it before i take my temp because i feel like i do when i get a migraine--everything is louder, smellier, i can feel every hair on my scalp and every line of my clothing pressing into my skin. it's like having your eyes dilated--the world is too bright to look at.

at the same time, i am lost, distracted by all the glaring minutae, and i want to crawl into bed and sleep, but i know that when i lay down and become comfortable, i will be too hot, and then too cold, back and forth until i give up and sit up on the couch, and wait for whatever this is to pass.

i try to be positive about it--perhaps i will not get the full cold, the one everyone at work has been propogating for weeks. perhaps the fever will burn all those renegade cells to a crisp, yellowstone after the fires, and i will simply wake tomorrow or later today and be clean and ready to move.

it feels, however, at the beginning of the fever when my joints are tender and slightly achy, that my skeleton and assorted fleshy bits are settling in for the long haul.

the week of rude and obnoxious thought

i could begin this post by saying "it's been one of those weeks." but that seems silly at the moment, because EVERY week is "one of those weeks."

honestly this week was bad--an emotional roller coaster, ending with a trip to my parents' house today to literally and figuratively shoot guns. yes, guns: rifles, shotguns, etc. it's quite refreshing to shoot--to hear that loud, loud bang, to feel the gun plunk into your shoulder, to smell the tang of gunpowder and grease. there's a kennel, run by the shooting range, so the day is also punctuated by barks and yelps.

of course all of this will be muffled by ear plugs.

the figurative shots will be taken at the house, where my sisters will be annoyed with me for missing a camping trip. i doubt that my brother will even have noticed. which would be par for the course.

what i keep echoing in my mind is that life is too gods-damned short to be tied up constantly in drama or self-recrimination. if something happens, deal with it. there is no other way to live.

i will freely admit to putting it into practice not as often as i should.

example: i have a car. said vehicle needs either to be overhauled so that i can stop dumping antifreeze into it, or traded in for a new model. i've looked online, sat in a few cars, considered my options. but have a made a decision, and dealt with it?

i'm sure most folks would say i have not dealt with it, and they're partially correct. but filling the antifreeze on a weekly basis is my way of dealing with this situation. i've made a decision. it's just not the decision that everyone else would make.

this week i've been faced with some odd things: one friend loses a child, one friend takes their still-tiny preemie home from the hospital, one friend reveals a stress about a child who is yet to be.

there is no fair. there is only pain--but pain can be sweet and it can be sour. one serves to illuminate the other; that is the only way to view it, in my mind.

the problem i am having this week is that people all too easily forget the beauty of their lives--how their love for one another is beautiful daily, how the frost settling on grass is breathtaking, how having food in their kitchen is a miracle. it is the small things in life that have to balance out the large and ugly ones. one cannot expect that those big ugly things are balanced only by large beautiful ones, because they are not. the balance comes from keeping this in mind.

i cannot always practice what i preach, mind you. but for whatever reason this week i am simply glad to be alive, and i'm feeling quite ungracious to those people who rail against the unfair and ugly on an indifferent planet, where both can quickly become the opposite.

last night i could have come home after work and spent the evening writing, but that would have been in the company of friends, and i was not the most social of women yesterday. instead i shopped, hidden and finding anonymity in the masses, and when my feet were sore enough for me to be thankful, i came home.

yes, sore feet. those two soles reminded me that i was among the lucky to have sore feet from walking in heated comfort, and not from walking over rocks barefoot. that i had a roof over my head, when i wanted and needed it, and a place to lay down in safety.

and if that is not enough for me, then i am too needy, and need reminding again of the lack of fair in the world.

that's my inflamatory post of the year. i'm off to pull triggers.

peanut butter toast and procrastination

i'm a procrastinator. i know very well what that means, and i'm not always that proud of that title. but knowing that i am one sometimes can help me overcome the tendency.

not, however, this morning.

for the past few weeks i've had the worst insomnia. i can fall asleep, but i can't stay there. for whatever reason, the minute i tumble into blissful oblivion, my mind wants to crawl out and move around again. it's something i can combat by taking two benadryl, but i dislike that due to the groggy feeling that overwhelms me the next morning.

so last night i figured i'd go the natural route, so i could be fresh for today. my goal was to get up, get going, and get out the door to do some laundry. however, what happened instead was the nasty state of my kitchen slapping me across the face, and my first instinct to clean it up. which i did.

and then i was hungry. i almost baked muffins for the umpteenth week in a row but then decided against it and slathered peanut butter on my toast while watching a backyard be re-done on home and garden television.

i have a list of things to be done--bills to pay, clothing to wash, places to go, people to see--but i'm lagging behind. right now i'm thinking in terms of my life as my toast--peanut butter sticking my tongue to the roof of my mouth.

a natural phenomenon, but annoying all the same.

dusk

i'm living in one of those between times--the time before the sun makes up its mind about rising or falling. it's gray, it's murky, it's plush and soft, and i'd like to remain insulated thusly forever.

the problem with being in said position is that at some point you have to wade out and face reality.

reality in the form of many, many things: my yowling cats, a car that needs work, bills that probably should be paid, milk before it goes bad--i could continue for weeks on end.

sleeping and waking in the gray is tempting. it's safe here--secure. i can pretend that the rest of the world and its opinions don't matter to me.

i am the ostrich, head stuck in sand.

and i'm comfortable.

i think a lot of the time it's because of this that my life stalls out. it's not that there is not fuel, or that i cannot find the fuel, to keep going. it's because locating fuel takes effort, and living in the gray is effortless, like coasting down a long, sloping hill.

there are always hurdles, and the hurdles and fences of the world are what stop me. there is usually a way around the distraction: i can hop over it, i can look for a way around, i can get pissed and just punch my way through ala the doors and break on through to the other side.

but again, that requires effort. and i am a minimal effort kind of person.

that doesn't mean that my house is a mess--because it's not. it doesn't mean my kitchen is moldy--because it's not--or that my cats are living in filth.

the definition is simply that instead of scaling mount everest, i'm the one cleaning out the pots and pans at base camp. and i'm happy to be there and not proclaiming myself queen of the known universe at the apex of a mountain.

my problem, i am discovering, is that i feel the pressure of the world's expectations of me to be the one at the top of the mountain. i feel pressure to be in as good of shape as my sister, the marathon runner, whose dog can wear me out after two miles. i feel pressure to be as well-dressed as my youngest sister, who is always at the height of fashion and make-up. and i feel the ubiquitous pressure of friends to keep up with the proverbial fucking jones family, whoever they are, blast and damn them to hell.

in the end, however, i keep trying to remind myself that the pressures i feel are all self-inflicted. just because someone says something does not make it so--ie, if i am told the sky is yellow, i've gotta check for myself before agreeing; science needs to back it up with fact.

now, if someone implies that i'm a plump woman, i take it to the next level. when i walk past a mirror, all i can see is my giant ass, crammed into khakis, swaying around like a lost planet. it does not matter that probably half the planet has larger tushes; mine is attached to this body, and this body is what i lug around on a daily basis.

that is just a simplified example of the self-flagellation that i perform on a habitual cycle. all the things i have agreed to--the things other people have said, the things society has mentioned--i have agreed to without pause, without basing my ideals in fact, without using logic. so when i look in the mirror, i can see all those labels pasted on me, as if i were a piece of luggage that's been round the world a few times.

yeah, i can blame the world, but in the end, i was the one who applied the stickers.

and in the gray, i'm too tired to remove them. perhaps tomorrow, when the fog lifts, after i have slept, after i have filled the hours with baking and cleaning and all kinds of things that cloud the between hours with meaningless matter--then, perhaps, i will sit down and begin to clean up my mental decoupage.

i need an interpreter! STAT!

the world is full of languages. there's that great story about the tower of babel, where all the people were together and couldn't understand a word the people around them were saying.

personally, i rarely run into this type of issue. i live in minnesota, and although there is a TON of diversity here (we boast the highest level of hmong-americans in the states) i scarcely ever run into issues with language.

i will freely admit to the exception of my hearing, which really needs to have subtitles at all times. case in point: earlier two teammates were discussing an issue. the comment was made that someone would "back up" soon, in relation to sides of the building and a person. i was really confused because i thought they said that the person had hiccups.

so mis-hearing things is a BIG part of my daily life.

i rely heavily on body language to get through the day--if i do not understand the words, if someone cannot enunciate, etc--then it becomes vital that i am reading their body and face well enough to keep up with the conversation.

emailing, unfortunately, is open to so much interpretation that it's painful, and none of it relies on anything but little ol' me.

long ago i learned the hard way that you cannot read ANYTHING into an email--you have to feel out the sender if you need more explanation.

during the workday, while you're sitting at your desk/cube/in your car/wherever you work, you are already dragging around the stress of work. you're annoyed because you had to leave the warmth and familiarity of your own home, and come in to a chilly office that surrounds you with the soft shade of gray and the gripes of a thousand souls.

so when you get an email that could be taken in a variety of ways, all of a sudden, the outlet appears.

i know this happens because it happens to me all the time, and it happens with everyone i know. my sister sends an email, my aunt, my father, my friends, my coworkers--and i read it and interpret their emotions, their feelings, their opinions, and it swells like high tide. before i know it, all the ugly that i have been schlepping around for the past week--at home and now at work--all of it pours out, and i see those words, and i react in a manner that perhaps i would not if the person were standing in front of me.

i know i have said things in emails that i would probably never say in real life, simply because the object of my anger is not sitting beside me, to remind me that i am speaking to another human being. i'm sitting in my gray cage, being angry, and replying with angry words because it's an angry kind of day.

if it happens, i want to deal with it, which is why email is a boon and at the same time, a horrible, horrible medium.

emailing facts is one thing--"it is 75 degrees outside and sunny here."

emailing opinions--"i really did not like that salad you made for dinner last night"-- is a horse of another color.

yesterday, i had enough of the angry.

it has only been 21 days since that bridge collapsed. years are in between me and the death of dan's brother, of my aunt, of cari's mom. but it all is so sudden, and i need to keep that in mind. i would not want to be gone tomorrow and have the people around me think, "she died hating me" or "i never got the chance to talk to her about that issue."

i am old enough to want to just nip things in the bud and move on, and live life instead of pussy-footing around the issue. it takes up too much time and energy, both of which could be better spent elsewhere--cuddling with my boyfriend, playing catch with my kitty, writing and re-writing the half-assed novel with which i've been noodling.

in the end, the end happens too quickly.

yesterday morning i went and found my copy of epictetus--this is obviously a modernized version of the original. epictetus, if anyone wonders, lived way back in nero's day (the guy who was violining when rome burned). he was born a slave and a cripple--unable to be anything more, in that time. luckily, his owner sent epictetus to school alongside his own son, and eventually emancipated him. he became a well-known philosopher, but eventually was exiled for being a philosopher.

he's one of the original stoics, and taught marcus aurelius at one point. i ought to read "the art of living" more often; the first page alone was so perfect for the situation that i will post a bit of it here:

"Happiness and freedom begin with a clear understanding of one principle: Some things are within our control and some things are not. It is only after you have faced up to this fundamental rule and learned to distinguish between what you can and can't control that inner tranquility and outer effectiveness become possible.

Within our control are our own opinions, aspirations, desires and the things that repel us....

Outside of our control, however, are such things as what kind of body we have, whether we're born into wealth or strike it rich, how we are regarded by others, and our status in society. We must remember that those things are externals and therefore not our concern. Trying to control or to change what we can't only results in torment."

the psychology of a muffin

i will never forget the first time i had dinner with my friend, cari. i knew we would probably be best friends, right then and there, when she was sauteing peppers and asked if i'd mind music, and the living room was filled with alice in chains.

about two weeks later we were sitting at work. one of the younger kids came and sat with us, where we were doing a crossword. (i know, it sounds really staid, but i think that was the day we gave up on the clues and tried just fitting swear words into the puzzle. "will fuck fit there? no? how about fuk? sweet.") tom sat down and we chatted for a few minutes, and then he said, so what kind of music to you guys listen to? dave matthews?

we both grimaced and rattled off a list of bands. as the list grew, so did the size of tom's eyes. he clearly had no clue that two girls working at a grocery store and wearing green aprons could possibly enjoy music that makes moms cringe and dads yell things such as: "will you turn that crap down? for the love of god!"

is it because i don't look like a hard rock chick? i don't wear lots of black, my hair is calm and aqua-net free, and i've retired the combat boot look since it wore out in the nineties.

and yet i love love love metal. my current repeat cd is disturbed, ten thousand fists. it's so cathartic and pleasant.

of course i alternate this with that music that people might expect me to play--the puppini sisters, loreena mckennit, dead can dance, amy winehouse, they might be giants--being that i could win a suburban soccer mom look-alike contest. there are three categories in this, two of which i could pass with flying colors, the third of which i'd fail miserably.

1. enjoys shopping
2. can create dinner (with help of the frozen foods section and betty crocker)
3. has 2.5 children and drives an suv, preferably one that gets less than 13 mpg and sports a "my child is an honor student at (insert name here) middle school."

dan and i were talking about this the other day. in my mind, men can listen to just about anything they want to, without getting weird looks. oh, people might laugh at someone's choice, but they won't look at you as if your third eye is wearing bad mascara.

i have a lot of girlfriends like this--women who like to rock while putting together a pan of berry cobbler, who turn up the music until the windows rattle. you would think that after this many years, the stereotypes would be little broken shards on the floor, but there still seems to be some unspoken rule about the way that you look needing to fit into the cookie cutter section at the crafts store.

why the focus on this? well, my new job position is going to be something wherein i will be meeting the public more often, and therefore must dress up. i think about the small talk that people make during meetings--how was your weekend, what did you do, etc--and i think about what i have in common with an accountant.

for a while this week i was in a panic. yesterday i pled headache and scurried home, feeling the need to hide somewhere until all the wrinkles were ironed out.

this morning i decided to consider my fears in a different manner. the first thing that popped into my head was: here i am, being such a complete hypocrite! i've been stewing on the fact that perhaps i am afraid of this position, and meeting people who might think that i am strange and odd for being who i am.

how can i sit here and be so selfish? the first time i walk into a room, how do i know that the other person will not be feeling the selfsame way? how can i label a cpa as someone who golfs on weekends and wears glasses, when in all actuality, they might be doing the same thing i did this morning--baking oatmeal chocolate chip muffins while listening to three days grace?

i need to let go of the label i have placed on this position and on myself and remember that every person on this planet is just as unique and has the capacity to be just as confused and afraid as i am.

the muffins came out of the oven hot, smelling like warm oatmeal and melted milk chocolate. it's pretty sappy, and well do i know it, but i've gotta just keep thinking of those 12 muffins, each one in its individual cup, made up of the same ingredients as its neighbor, but each shaped separately and by that separation, made different.

shifting ground

i've never been through an earthquake, so i can't say i know how it feels to have the earth actually dancing around beneath my soles. i can say that i have had the rug pulled out from below too many times to count, and i can report that every time is just as surprising as the next.

i suppose that's why every time it takes a while to pick myself back up and move forward.

my feeling is that the rug at this juncture is my job. everyone else at work is getting new job duties--mine. and i'm just handing them out as if my coworkers are trick-or-treaters. it's difficult, and i know that the next job position will be interesting and i'll enjoy it because that's just who i am, but i'm still peeved at the way the entire process has been handled, stem to stern.

the job thing has been affecting all bits of my life. i've always been a cautious person--probably overly cautious, anyone who knows me would venture. and if i withdraw at times like these i can only say it's instinct.

i didn't get the tortoise award in 2nd grade for nothing, folks.

i'm a plodder, and when the going gets rough, i need time to process. that time is spent in my shell, patching up my psyche for the next encounter.

it comes and goes, the depression. i know that there are ways in which i can assist my body in the climb, and i do a good job for the most part. it's only when that rug gets replaced that i find myself sliding down again, into that pit that's always waiting.

in my mind it's an open mouth--a large, gaping red maw, lined with rows of sharks' teeth and the blunt molars of a horse--all the better to eat you with, my dear.

sometimes i can shut it up. or ignore its presence. but other times--these times--it is a precarious act of balance for me to remain vertical for the majority of the day. i just want to sleep--curled up in the afternoon, a siesta, a nap.

i think it's because internally, at the core of my concious, i know that the bed does not move. i feel safe cocooned under comforters, more safe than i can when i am awake and alert. how is it that when i am at my most vulnerable i am most secure?

ignorance, i suppose, is bliss.

ignorance is what keeps me plodding along, every day. it is what keeps me lugging around the shell on my back, ready at a moment's notice to be pulled over my head, so that i might consider the world in silence and darkness. ignorance of my own life.

ignorance bothers me, in a general sense. but in the sense of life, it's necessary. if i am able to be ignorant about the future, if i cannot plan for every contingency, then i will keep on going.

if i dwell on the scary and the shadows and those things that go bump in the night, i will stop altogether.

so i suppose in the end this shifting ground beneath my feet is healthy. it is part and parcel of being alive, and on the planet, and a member of society at large. it is something to which i should be conditioned, by now.

but the fact that i have not--that is what keeps me ticking, in the end.

odd

i've been feeling quite odd since leaving work yesterday. since all my job duties have been divvied up in between about 5 coworkers, i technically should have nothing to be concerned about come Monday.

strange to consider. i don't think i've had a vacation in ten years that has allowed me the comfort of being worry-free in regards to my own desk.

i am, of course, still worried. it's genetic, and despite my best efforts, i still am concerned about my coworkers and how they will handle things. i disliked the way in which my responsibilities were divided, and there was so much grumbling yesterday that i wanted to weep. it's not my fault that my friends are being overburdened with all this work--clearly i would have liked to have kept the position i had--but i still feel responsible, in no small way.

and guilty for having a few days off this week, while they are trying to learn and keep things under control. i told them to call or email if they had questions, but i'm sure that they'll muddle through.

(all right, truth be told, i have no idea if they've called or emailed this morning, because although i've been awake for two hours now, i have yet to examine either media source.)

i also am not looking forward to the next few days. my sister and bro in law are going out of town and their usual dog-sitting duo is awol due to a broken leg on the part of one spouse. i volunteered and while caring for a dog is fairly simple, i am not especially looking forward to it. i like dogs, don't get me wrong. but in the last few years i really feel like i've become a cat person--cats are so much more independent, and mine at least are just about as social as any dog i've met. i don't have to take them outside every few hours, or wake up at ungodly hours of the morning to go for a walk and feed them.

tonight we are finally going to spamalot, though, and that i have been looking forward to since dan purchased the tickets a year ago. so with no further ado, i'll be cleaning up the house, looking up directions to the ordway, and getting myself ready for a night of music and laughter.

in the end, odd as it may feel, i ought to be grateful simply to be feeling.

the muse escapes

a tide, when it rushes in, leaves behind midden--
shells, dead small-mouth bass, tiny crushed blue crabs,
a pencil marked with someone else's teeth. they say
the moon pulls it, sure as you draw thread and correct seams

of late you have waded into this tide, felt the currents
tug closer to swirling middle
where seaweed winds round ankles
and you can feel undefined dark things writhe--sheets
wrapped around your legs at four am, unseen and taut.

ripe and sodden the lake lulls skeleton silent, and numb
you drift, lost in pulsing lake. you cannot feel the sand
under your feet, not any longer, and you should
be afraid--the night is long, and you are chilled.
but instead you tread this water, and you murmur
nothings, over and over,
and when your hands reach for words, they elude you,
the description of drowning
is your only explanation.

the net

if you haven't seen it yet, a bridge collapsed right here in minneapolis today. it looks awful--cars floating in the water, twisted cement and wires, the bones of that structure bent and warped. people have been injured and so far one person has lost their life.

these things always elicit so many feelings all at once--perhaps moreso the closer they are to where you are. when the towers fell, i knew people out there--but it was not here, not something i could point at and say, i drive across that all the time!

the second thing is the sheer horror of it, the fact that death walks close to the river tonight.

and the third thing is joy--joy because humans are such a connected bunch of animals. i am reminded forcibly of the good things that come with being human -- people reaching out to other people, helping, saving, soothing.

the phones are clogged, and the news reminded us to stay off the phones. but it's too hard when you don't know. my sister takes that road all the time. i could not keep off the phone until i knew she was okay.

now i am waiting to hear back from nathan. and from my friend cari, whose brother lives down town.

when my mom called originally i was just happy to hear from her. but now in retrospect, i can see the net that links me and all these other people, miles apart, invisible but strong.

dude...

i've had a busy weekend. but it's only monday night, you say...well, cork it.

saturday i got up, did a few things around the house, and took a nap until about 1. was up for a while and then my friend rene came down, and we sat around chit-chatting until heading over to the MOA for dinner and shopping. of course we ended up at a barnes and noble, because that is how we operate. (:

went to sleep at 1130. got up at 355 to deliver said friend to the airport, where i'll be picking her up next weekend. got home, went back to sleep for a few fitful hours, then got up and lazed around since my eyelids simply would not function correctly. worked on a story that's been brewing for a few days and then took ANOTHER nap, was up for a bit and back to bed.

monday dawned bright, early and icky. work was a mess when i arrived, which was compounded by the fact that i was there for an hour before i had a meeting. then another meeting.

the first meeting was run of the mill--reminders, updates, mainly administrative stuff.

meeting number two was totally different and entirely unexpected. my job is being eliminated.

by the end of the week.

i have four options, and i'm lucky to have those four, since apparently other offices around the country had to do the same thing with this position and they had no where else to put people...so they just got pink slipped.

behind door #1: i can discuss a severance package.
door #2: i can go back to client services, and answer phones from angry people.
door #3: i can go back to conversion, and set up payrolls.
door #4: i can go into a totally new position, in which i would deal only with accountants and actually leave the office to visit them half of the time.

guess which one i'm going for?

yes, #4.

as with any other announcement made in corporate america, i have one night to decide if i want to do this--they were going to talk to me friday but i had to leave early due to overtime. odd how that works, isn't it?

and also, again as with anything done in corporate america, i couldn't breathe a word to anyone else in the building, since this was between me, management, and the human resources lady on speakerphone.

so as soon as i got out of the meeting i called dan and hashed it out. he knows me often better than i know me--i got done babbling like an auctioneer selling off the world's remaining cattle and he said, "are you asking for my approval? because you've already made your decision."

of course i was still in panic mode so my response was, well, what is my decision?

so another new road. since i started at adp five years ago, i've made three job changes--one from client services to conversion, and then from conversion to part of the sales team. now i would be moving back to client services, but would be working more with the sales team.

in the end i hope that it all works out for the best. my only fear right now is who is going to take over all the various and sundry job duties that comprise my current position. just because you eliminate the title does not mean that the rest of the job just disintegrates. i'm not sure that management has considered everything quite yet. but tomorrow morning they're announcing it to the building at large, and i have another meeting to dice up the job i've had for the last year.

in fact, it hasn't even been a full year yet.

i don't mind change--usually i revel in it. i enjoy moving things and rearranging them, making them all new and shiny. i like pioneering, which is what this new job position would be, since it's brand spankin' new, and only 2 other people in the country are doing this, as of now. i'd get to define the job, as it were.

it's just the rug, slipping out from under your feet. the rung of the ladder, splintering as you ascend. the escalator, moving faster than you can keep up with it, each stair disappearing into the next, until you are really not sure where you are going: up? down? sideways?

heroditus said that you can never step into the same river twice--i think that life is handing me this lesson again, as if i have forgotten from the last time it was meted out.

and i suppose that the river itself is familiar--it's just the knowledge, the understanding, that it is no longer the same water it was moments ago.

dude. that's deep, for a monday.

to work or not to work...

to say that i don't want to go to work tomorrow is an absurd understatement. i'm not sure if there is a good way of saying the same thing, without using much harsher language.

and i know i feel this way after all vacations. they begin so slowly and roll along and then they are over, before i can contemplate being comfortable. i feel as if i have finally shrugged off all the stress of employment and now it is sunday eve and i have to get up and return to my gray cubicle tomorrow.

i cannot say it will be all sad. i do enjoy the people with whom i work, and i enjoy the satisfaction of completing a job. but i think that perhaps the stress of said job is from what i cringe.

part of me wishes daily that my bank account was filled to brimming with lottery winnings, and that i could simply remain home, perhaps have children and a big yard with a garden that smelled of fresh turned dirt and green beans.

but it is a wish; to make the wish reality i would need to either win the lottery itself, or just keep working, with my head down. my only problem is that the keep working mentality has driven me for all my life, and i am no where nearer any of those lottery dreams, despite all the hard work.

***

one of the things i love to do is cook. and bake. i like to be in the kitchen, cubing chicken and feeling the handle of my wooden spoon press into my palm as i stir.

yesterday i had the urge to make blueberry muffins. it was the thought of those berries, hot to bursting, oozing in sweet dough, that drove me to turn on the oven and bake. after i dropped dan off at the airport, all i could taste was that tangy-sweet bubble popping open in my mouth. i made six muffins, and over the course of the day, ate 4. this morning i ate the last two, savoring that longed-for taste.

today i longed for silence. i had to leave the house only to go to the grocery store; otherwise i have been reading, sipping lemonade and eating some casserole prepared for this week's lunches. it's been quite relaxing. and the majority of my collective cell mass would prefer to remain here for all of next week, too.

***

i have only a few more days off this year--in a few weeks, the day of and the day after we see "spamalot", and another week in i think october--in which i can indulge this urge to be schedule-less and shiftless and altogether liesurely as i rise and make my way through the day. i know that a month of this would not be enough--i would crave more time, more space.

for many months now i have craved the solitude of this house--silent except for a cat, dreaming and snoring--this solitude that i can usually only find in the wee hours of a sunday morning. it has been so wonderful, this quiet.

perhaps it is that which i will crave, that silence, that i will put away in a box on a shelf for the time that my next days off come upon me. during the week, when dan and eero are here, there is noise, which cannot be avoided and which is a comfort to someone who grew up in a household of six. during the week there are phones ringing and women gossiping and the sound of the copier, thudding along.

i really don't have much choice in the matter--there is no question of working or not working. i enjoy too much having a roof over my head and the funds to purchase blueberries, and pay for the electricity with which to bake them. the mobility of going to the library, where i can find books that soothe my soul and offer balm.

perhaps this is simply my oasis, this week. i can almost feel and see the disruption that work brings, ahead of me--as if the smooth pavement will give way to rocks and gravel and potholes. it is this that pains me, i think, this foreknowledge of what is to come, when the alarm blares monday morning.

lemons

it's friday, the last day of my actual vacation before the weekend, when i'll have to start prepping for actually going back to work next week. my house is very, very clean (yay!) and i was able to get rid of two bags of clothes and two boxes of assorted household crap.

there's lots i never got around to doing: the cedar chest is still untouched, i only called my sister and not my sister and nathan, i haven't written at all...so on and so forth. but i'm trying to stay positive, and for me, i jumped a big hurdle this week.

yesterday i got up the nerve to drop off my car at the mechanic. the coolant hides somewhere (it's not dripping, it's not burning off...) and then of course my poor shiny new radiator has to overheat, and i have to stop, pop the hood and dump in premixed antifreeze.

it's quite the opposite of neat and tidy, and of course there's a horrible smell of toasted almonds to contend with.

anyway, four months ago i had the aforementioned shiny new radiator installed. the month before that it was a radiator plug, and my 62000 mile flush of various fluids. today i was told my water pump is leaking, and there's a bunch of belts that need replacing. the belt thing i knew about, and the leaky water pump explains the consistent lack of coolant.

all that said, i'm not sure i feel like springing for another 700 clamshell fix. despite the fact that there's few miles on it, it is a ten year old machine, and time tends to wear things down. so replace or trade in? that is the question.

today after hearing the verdict i called and spoke to my dad, dan, and my sister. it still took me two hours after that to place a call to the mechanic and let them know i'd pick it up tonight.

reasons for the wait are conflicting. it's hard to explain. i feel like an irresponsible car owner, to say no, don't fix it. i feel like i'm taking away someone's business, someone's paycheck, by not having the car repaired. i feel juvenile to be at this crossroads yet again, just over two years into owning the car. i have this need to pay it off and then look for a new vehicle. however i am tired, sick and tired tired tired, of driving around in a ten mile radius, terrified to go further in case something goes awry. it's exactly what happened with my mazda--it's like life being rewound and replayed, only in a different color choice and shape.

***

i suppose secondary to that is the guilt i feel having to rely on others for transportation, and the guilt i feel at being over three decades into life and still owning a lemon.

but i think of my mom's mantra about said fruit and optional products of this fruit, and i think that perhaps sometimes even if you are expecting a refreshing drink, sometimes you have to be flexible and change your options. perhaps instead of an ade i will have just lemon zest. or perhaps instead of that i'll have lemon bars, or a pie topped with airy, velvety meringue.

either way, i have to keep thinking this. i have to. otherwise i get mired down under the dumptruck load of lemons that life hands out, free of charge, to everyone regardless of race or creed.

morning minus coffee

it's monday morning, and i'm at home, grubby and in my pajamas, because this week is my week off.

today i've got an exciting schedule: clean kitchen, clean living room, clean carpets (this due only to the fact that princess-pukes-a-lot has done her royal hairball duty only too well), clean up the laundry (which is clean but in baskets yet) and probably clean my self.

tomorrow i'm planning on working a bit on the cedar chest in the garage, but only if i wake up early enough and am motivated enough to put on more work-ready clothing. re-finishing a cedar chest in a night-gown might be cooler but it also could be a tad messier.

and then after that...who knows. probably read the books to which i've become addicted--yes, another romance novelist, mary balogh. hers are quite well-written, and remind me a great deal of austen and georgette heyer, with a great deal less fondling and mushy crap, and a great deal more history. i've learned quite a bit about the Battle of Waterloo in the last few days; i think this is in part due to the author being a teacher herself. but it never gets overly instructional, and her characters are just so lovely to read that once i pick up a book i have a very, very difficult time putting it back down.

then again, this happens to me quite often. i get sucked into one thing for a long period of time. in probably two months or so i'll have moved on and be obsessed with a different author.

who knows. it's hard for me to develop habits, and it's hard for me to stick with one passion solidly for more than a month at a time.

i suppose it's cyclic, just like the rest of the planet--seasons, tides, day and night, the whole shebang. sometimes it's just plain frustrating, though, to be so at the whim of your brain.

which i'm sure is the case for everyone, every day, perhaps some moreso than others. dan lately has been swinging about in a mixed state for a few days--days in which i remind myself constantly that it's probably nothing i've done, and it's up to him to fish himself out of the morass. just as this week, left unscheduled and unwritten, it is up to me to create the structure by which i'll pass the days, and not anyone else.

i think about all the things i could do on my vacation, my week off, and i get entirely overwhelmed. i need an oil change, i need to have my car looked at for the millionth time. vice versa i could shop for a new vehicle...also annoying. i've been putting off calling nathan and my sisters and my parents. chores, chores, chores that have been neglected in the last few weeks of mid-year year-end. spending quality time with my lightly snoring cats. reading and writing and walking.

of course this is a july vacation, which for me, anti-heat girl that i am, means that anything that means going out-of-doors and not immediately into the comfort of AC is just plain old disgusting and out of the question. anything over 80 degrees is simply out and out wrong, in the land of kim.

so here i sit, overwhelmed at 1015 am, trying to decide which item to begin first.

i think my lack of motivation is partially based on the title of this diatribe--i'm without my usual brain booster, coffee. so perhaps i'll start there, and brew up something to wake me up, or better yet, dash off scrubby to caribou and have someone there whip up my wake up.

worth

i struggle often with being worthy--of people, of things, of attention. i have a difficult time rationalizing spending money on my self. usually my purchases are the marked down bits, the ones where you spend a good solid hour picking off the orange clearance tag when you get said object home.

it's a habit in my family to do this. we take pride in one-upping each other with "i-got-that-for-less" tales. i'm not sure if it's genetic--my father loves flea markets, and my mom is an inveterate garage-saler--or perhaps just learned. who knows. but it translates into my life and often makes it difficult for me to see things i buy for myself as necessary, with the obvious exception of clothing and shoes, which i still will only shell out when items are half-off.

take, for example, my new bracelet.

at work recently i've notice that i wear rubber bands around my left wrist on a regular basis. they come off of whatever folder is crossing my desk and just remain there, indefinitely. i've considered buying a bracelet, but i'm picky about jewelery. i suppose the devil is in the details, and perhaps my being drawn to shiny things just means that satan is somewhat sparkly.

today i indulged in three (yes, three at one time!) brassieres, which are a necessary evil that need not be too terribly vile, even for those of us who require valkyrie-supported battle garments just to keep the girls in place. after that i spent an astronomical amount of time in the jewelry department, shopping for a birthday gift for a friend. i found the perfect item and then thought, when was the last time i spent any time looking for something for me?

i thought about my ubiquitious rubber bands and decided that i'd look for a bracelet. after half an hour of looking at all things ovoid and stretchy and clingy, i was ready to call it quits. i kept rejecting the ones that are hard and require the dislocation of your thumbs, and the ones that are so tight once on that they leave a dent in flesh.

"can we help you, ma'am?"

usually i say no. usually i decline, figuring that someone else needs assistance more than me. but today, riding high on my handful of hangers, i said, "yes."

she showed me the sterling silver chains and i'm now wearing one, sitting here typing and feeling slightly more elegant.

this is by far the most expensive piece of jewelry i've ever bought. my two rings were gifts--my right hand pinky ring is a spoon ring that was a dollar at a church rummage sale, and the ring on my left ring finger is a small picture of sea, mountains, bird and sun, made of different stones. it's unique and lovely, with a thin band. but it was free.

i have oodles of earrings, purchased on sale, and necklaces from the clearance rack. but nothing new, nothing bought just for me full price. twenty dollars--i am worth that much, i concluded, standing there in bright ceiling lights. i'm worth enough to purchase something just because it's pretty, something that makes me happy simply because it is unnecessary.

cravings

this week has been about cravings--cravings for all kinds of odd bits. randomly yesterday i wanted to sit at my desk and listen to my new amy winehouse cd and eat a package (yes, the whole package) of cherry pull n' peel twizzlers. instead when i was done with work, i was whisked north into the city, to meet an old friend.

teresa was at a conference for the blind; she's a grad assistant to a very well-known professor in the blind community, and they were staffing a game called "power showdown." there's not a lot of games out there for people who are blind; this one is a cross between air hockey and ping-pong, a large, oval table with edges rising about six inches on all sides. in the middle there is a large board, poised over the surface, to block hits that could potentially harm your opponent. players are positioned at each end, with a hard wooden paddle and a protective glove for the hand holding the paddle, protecting a net at their end. the ball has a distinct rattle, and games become quite explosive--the ball shoots off the table, a guide dog jerks to retrieve it, or the ball hits the middle board with a crack.

as i stood there watching two sisters slam the ball back and forth i considered how much fun the game looked, and how, if playing, i'd be at quite the deficit: when you're sighted and playing, you're given a blindfold, so that you are on par with your opponent.

even half-deaf, i can't discern where sounds are--they are everywhere, all at once. sirens in the distance attack from north and south, east and west. someone in a neighboring townhouse shuts a door and i jump, thinking that it is in our own home. when i was a kid and received my very own radio, with ear-buds, i popped them in and immediately wondered what the attraction was: it was a stereo radio, so in my right ear i heard the drums, and in my left ear i felt a rumble, as if all the music was there.

on the way home, i opened the window and shut my eyes, rested my head against the seat as dan drove. i felt the wind brush over my shut eyes and the hot glow of lights as we passed gas stations. i thought about walking through life with my eyes shut, and never really knowing the full depth and breadth of color and beauty.

at once i corrected my own thoughts. my life has been an experience in half-heard noise, in missed jokes and lost sentences.

do i miss those words, those moments? perhaps i would, if it was something i craved daily. but when you live at a different pitch and level than your neighbor, you become comfortable with the place you are in.

one of my ex-coworkers was nearly fully-deaf; she had hearing aids that did help considerably, but despite having them, she always said she forgot to put them in, or would just leave them on the counter on purpose, because it was frustrating to have to listen to the whole world and not just her own small and familiar corner.

i am sure that it would be nice, to fully hear. and i cannot possibly equate my experience with someone who is fully deaf or blind, and cannot pretend to crave the same things they might. i can only say that standing there, watching that ball shuttle and slap against the paddles, i had a depth of understanding about my own cravings--that the craving to taste licorice was transitory, as transitory as breath, while the craving to hear and not feel that i have missed things--that is a craving that perhaps i will never satisfy, but that in itself perhaps is satisfactory.

the crack in my eye

this week i was privy once again to the fact that sometimes my view is skewered by my own paranoia and imagination. i'm one of those kids whose mothers handed her a paper lunch bag when she was seven and said, just keep breathing, or you're going to faint.

what was i so worked up about? no clue. a few years back when i saw my therapist for the first time and described the horrible feeling of trying to suck air in over some invisible wall in my lungs, she said it was a nice way of describing anxiety.

my powers of description abound.

i imagine that most paranoid folks have a vivid sense of imagination. you're always wondering what's around the corner, and whether or not your own invisible monster is going to gobble you up. i imagine these things at the obvious times, like when the floor creaks at night, but even when i'm sitting on the sofa watching television in broad daylight, or shopping for paper toweling at target. the lurking fear creeps around behind me, dogging my heels.

and this is what it's like when it's better.

i've had this constant companion for so long that most of the time i can ignore the red maw waiting to envelop me. i can talk myself into falling back asleep, i can walk without always looking over my shoulder. i don't know what it is in me that imagines these things, but whatever it is, it is probably the strongest muscle in my body, due to its consistent exercise.

***

when i see the world it is through rose colored glasses. rose colored because i enjoy that romantic sense of hope and innocence, but rose-colored too because the world takes on a distinctly bloody overtone. i see carnage around me at times when perhaps it is something simple.

take, for example, my drive into work the other day.

along the highway, where sometimes you'll see the remnants of shredded tire, there was a cardboard box. it was torn up, a large box, perhaps something that had housed a microwave or washing machine. it was plain and brown, warped and ragged.

and when i saw it, at first, i thought it was the body of a doe. i couldn't see the blood yet, or the soft white of her underbelly, but i was certain that it was a carcass.

as i pulled closer i realized that it was just that box.

***

one of the reasons i dislike walking on my own, at least here in the big city, is due to this overactive and shaky view i have. it is as if little red riding hood and the big bad wolf are waiting around each corner, perhaps playing a hand of gin before leaping into character as i round the turn: young and naive and sweet, and large and ferocious and toothy, both of them grinning for different reasons.

perhaps it is why i am reticent to make friends: i am always hoping but consistently waiting for the proverbial other piece of footwear to fall from above. perhaps it is just a story i tell myself, so that i can remain silent and shy, and keep to myself, a hermit wandering the streets. leftovers of a childhood spent on edge? the malfunctions of a brain drenched in unbalanced chemicals?

personally i find it all quite lovely--what is there not beautiful about the shiver of a sob, or the crack of laughter?

***

during my drive home i have to wait in line on the on-ramp, watching the light and the car in front of me, waiting for my turn to speed up and get home. on my right there is a house, next to the wetlands in the middle of the city, that has a large, sloping yard leading to the ditch between the ramp on which i'm parked and their home.

i've seen wild turkeys there, strutting around. but that day, after imagining the worst in a cardboard box, i can perhaps appreciate better the innate grace of the living doe, slender neck bowed to lawn.

perhaps that is my own secret: that to live with the dark on your shoulder, even if it is imagined, makes you more able to wonder at the light.

round trip

so saturday we went camping.

camping was delightful. dan grilled some melt-in-your-mouth steaks, and my mom made cake, and we had a blast just playing bocce and rummikub and tramping around the lake. it rained cats, dogs and farming implements on saturday night, but the tent stayed dry. sunday we had a great breakfast, packed everything up, and went home.

the campsite was 1.5 hours away. i planned a road-less-traveled route, which we discovered was under construction. the detour for that route was, yes, also under construction. it took twice the scheduled time to arrive.

sunday when we were driving home we took the road more traveled, the major highway in the area. the sun beat down and we were warm and tired, so were looking forward to a quick arrival. about half an hour from home i glanced down and my heat needle was buried.

fabulous.

for about five miles we drove on the shoulder, hazard lights flashing. pulled off and filled up the antifreeze, which was nearly empty, and then drove home with the heaters on full blast and windows open. our travel time on the final leg was tripled.

***

it's not the destination, they say, but the journey. and the journey this time was arduous, to say the least.

it got me to thinking about most of the journeys i've taken, alone or with my family. it is the truth--the journey is the long part, and the destination often doesn't hold the glow it did when you began. or else perhaps you've seen something more remarkable during the voyage, and the destination is not the hoped-for miracle.

then again, maybe my definition of destination needs to change, if for no other reason than there is no true stopping point--you are always, always moving, forward or backward. the actual distance, the direction, the place you turn around--those are just markers. even stationary, the human race is just that: a race.

the only destination is when you lay head to soil and end your journey, for good.

***

during the weekend we laughed over memories. i remembered being young, riding on top of my father's shoulders as my parents walked around the lake near my grandparents' home. halfway there, dad stirred up a snapping turtle. this is probably my earliest memory--watching a stick brush leaves over the turtle's beaked snout, hearing the harsh snap of its mouth clamp shut. i can smell the lake and the sweat on my mother's skin, and see the shine over her tan. my father's arm is all i recall, jabbing outward, not hurting the turtle, but showing off the whip-snick crush of its jaws.

i think i was around two years old, then--almost three decades ago. my father's beard is white now. in talking it was made clear to me that, as then, if he came across that turtle now, he would do the same demonstration to some other child--beware, caution, this is a small animal but even it can be vicious, and you must respect it.

that turtle will no doubt outlive my entire family, if it hadn't already by that time. i cannot imagine going through the world so low to the ground, hauling my home around on my back, moving that slowly.

then again, the turtle's journey will end the same way mine will. i suppose it is not so different, then, when it comes to the journey.

things that look like other things

when i was a kid i used to love watching clouds. it was just relaxing and such an easy way to exercise my own imagination--and oh, the things you could see: a pig riding a bike, a ceiling fan, the antlers of a moose.

i enjoy too the words that sound alike but mean entirely different things: pane and pain, there and their.

on my desk today there is a printout dan found for me, a showing of "serenity" at the riverview theater in minneapolis. it's for charity. it reminds me of the word serenity, and how now it has two meanings: the direct, pure, clean-of-soul meaning, and the movie, based on the television show.

this week my word is solitary. i feel the need to insulate my self with emptiness--the absorbing power of the void. empty has two meanings, too--empty and never to be filled, empty and to be filled in the future.

the empty space i crave right now is simply that: empty. it could go either way. sometimes it lingers for a long time. sometimes for just an hour or two, long enough for me to need a hug or a touch from dan, or to hear the voice of a friend, the meow of an insistently hungry feline, the caress of simply seeing humanity all about me.

i think it's the double edge of being human, this need. as a person you are individual, solid and solely of your self. your world is limited by the confines of your flesh, your mind unlimited. it's this mind that ties us all together, something unnamed and invisible. as much as you can understand the depths and meanings of what another person experiences, you cannot walk in their actual shoes. you are connected and yet separate.

on wednesday when i got home i went for a walk, just around the block. i enjoy walking for many reasons--mainly the health benefits, but also because i enjoy being outdoors a great deal, and i haven't had too many run-ins with gnats and mosquitoes yet this season. it won't be long, i know, before i'm swatting as i walk, and sweating in the dusk, and i dislike doing either of them.

anyway, i went for a walk, alone. it felt nice to just be outside, nice to be my self, nice to be separate from the world at large. wednesday it was windy--violently windy, gusts that moved my two-ton car around on the road and had trees flailing like children. i like the wind. when i lived up north, it would call to me. as soon as i was done with work i'd run home, put on my hiking wear, and trek out to the state park. i'd stand on the beach, winter or spring or whenever, until my cheeks were chapped. it was better than taking a shower, just to stand in the wind.

wednesday i remembered how long it has been since i walked in the wind, and savored the feel of it enfolding the limits of me--each and every finger, the small line of hair that i missed shaving on my shin, the bowl of my ankle bone. it was beautiful, plain and simple. while i walked i saw kids riding bikes and parents fetching the mail, all of us experiencing the same blustery atmosphere, all of us alone in our own pockets of life.

i had a silly theory once that the wind is just imagination--you cannot see it, but you can feel it, just like love or anger--and that perhaps the world and our bodies conspire together, bending limbs and follicles, in the pretense of being blown about by the wind.

it does not look like anything, wind. it moves around and tosses gravel to sky, violently strips homes from earth and uproots whatever is in its path--and yet for all this result, there is no hand that you can see, moving it all about. at least if it rains you can see the flood, rising.

something that looks like something else. wind doesn't look like anything. perhaps that is why i enjoy it so.