Nearly officially Friday

It's close enough to Friday again as makes no difference. Let the weekend mode begin! Still much cleaning and little projects around the house, and shopping, to be done before we have a get together here Sunday. But I have hope that we'll make it.

With the exception of me finishing my father-in-law's book.

Bleak, bleak stuff. How the Communists tortured the Legionnaires like the author after WWII. The author is a nationalist, and anti-Semitic, and given to philosophical rants that last for paragraphs. Changing most (but not all) sentences from present to a real narrative past has been especially difficult.

...back to it!

Sometimes you just need a day

Honoring the thought that no one dies wishing they'd spent more time at work, I took a personal day today. It was sorely needed.

I caught up a tiny bit on my sleep and worked very hard on editing the book.
D generally lets me do whatever I want in life, but he has now instructed me to say "NO!" if asked to copy edit a full manuscript again. Unless it is my own.

Now there's an idea...

Carry wood, chop water

I moved about a cord of split oak and bay to a wood pile behind the house yesterday and today, in between digging in the adobe, supervising kids, editing the book, blah blah blah.

I've looked back on June and it's been a whole month of me doing too much, passive-aggressively complaining or reflecting about it but still doing too much with some kind of "this is just short-term, folks" lip service to any members of the reading audience who are still there but rolling their eyes in exasperation at me.

I could just have written today "more of the same" or "see above" and added to that Ibid. Don't ya love "Ibid"? I remember reading books of quotations and Welsh reference stuff and seeing little ibids all over the place. It's like Anon. I think there's a poem in there, somewhere. Or a children's story - about Ibid and Anon and their trip to the seaside, maybe.

Or even, with their friends (like a gang of super heroes) "The Continuing Adventures of Ibid & Anon, et al."

Or maybe, eg., something even more cryptic, ie. more mysterious: "The Misc. Etc. Ibid, Anon, et. al."

Ok. Enough of that silliness.

Monday night wipe out

Have been editing, folding laundry, doing dishes, editing more, slapping myself awake, etc. for the past 45 minutes. Before that was the hour-long getting the kids to bed thang, and before that, lots of household chores like 3 HOURS cleaning S's room with her "helping."

"Helping" when you're almost six years old usually means saying, "Oh I remember that!" and playing with whatever item has just been pulled out of the dusty under-the-bed lair where it had been hiding until retrieved by a mom who didn't realize, until just then, that it is possible to crawl on one's head under furniture.

Amd a mom who can't even stay awake at the keyboard long enough to edit a web log post!

Pathetic.
Did I spell that right?

Post while you can!

Once again, our router or DHL connection or something (we have yet to troubleshoot & fix) is acting up, and the result is that the web connection is not guaranteed.

So this is a quick post to say "I was here."

The front yard is starting to come together even more, thanks to D's back-breaking dedication to moving the dirt.

I can't take credit for doing much of anything to help him this weekend except emptying his truck bed of about a cord of dried oak (already split) that his coworker's grandfather was getting rid of.

But there was a long run this morning, and wine tasting in a Lima in between the run and the wood moving; so it's been a full day, a full weekend, and a full week to come.

Digging In The Dirt.

Well, I've little all day but drive kids around and run errands while D practically broke himself moving adobe. He did get smart and hire a neighbor teen and his two friends to help.

It was an amazing sight. These boys are not much more than stark white skin and bones, with artificially blackened hair, piercings and an assortment of tattoos. At first I was afraid that they wouldn't be strong enough to lift a shovel, individually or collectively, but apparently they've built up quite a bit of muscle (or at least endurance) by slinking about, playing in their garage band and suffering from profound bouts of angst.

They did a great job nearly filling the dumpster in the driveway, and D worked further on clearing the area that will be a pathway to the courtyard.

R has a friend over, S had a playdate earlier, and tomorrow, I'll get to play for a bit myself. After an 8 mile run and a few chores. I'm concentrating on a delayed pre-race training schedule so I don't have to stop and lie down on the road somewhere between Napa and Sonoma.


And by the way, I just don't know why the posts are doing this great space between title and body. If you have suggestions, I'll welcome them.

And thank God for the Blogspot recover post option. It just saved me from rewriting this little postling!

TGIF

Nine thirty Friday but it feels like midnight.

I just realized that the version of the Romanian memoir I've been painstakingly copy editing is not the full draft. This at least explains what I had thought was a very abrupt ending. But it also means that although I figured I had about 30 more pages to edit, I actually have over 130.

Words fail me.

The Dumpster

We've ordered a dumpster. It will arrive tomorrow.
Into it we will put many, many shovelfulls of adobe dirt from the piles in our front yard.

I am really looking forward to the dumpster. I mean, really. I'm giddy like a schoolgirl. Even though I was never actually giddy as a schoolgirl. The thing is, when that dirt goes away, it's not coming back. It's gone, gone, gone baby! Whoo-eeee!! See, I'm just all a flutter with excitement. Bye-bye nasty dirt that nothing grows in. Ta-ta! See ya...never again!

It makes me think of a poem I've been messing with for years. The latest incarnation goes like this:

***

Rain on Fresh Concrete

The sound draws us to the window like the circus come to town.
All that we had left outside is now initiated by rain. It’s true that much
had been well on the road to molds and rust, anyhow. But the concrete,
newly poured, was not yet set in its ways. We rush the storm:
wheel in the mixer, toss empty bags, fling tarps over the new path.
The rain never pauses for breath. We are alone in our remorse.

We, who celebrate every square inch of adobe we bury with bricks and cement:
that much less mud the next time it pours. Cover it in lining, rebar, gravel, concrete. Planter boxes on top filled with dirt.
Dirt in boxes over concrete over dirt.
The strata we make of our lives.


***


Okay, but that's way to somber for my Getting-a-Dumpster-Eve mood. So how about this:


Adobe is sticky, adobe is dark
Moving adobe ain't a walk in the park
Instead of adobe, I'd rather shovel rocks
but we're putting that adobe in a BIG METAL BOX.

Uh.
Maybe I should go to bed now.

G'night.

Superstitions

When I was a teenager and I wrote little self-critical journal entries in books (as opposed to here, in the blogosphere), I had a short-lived superstition that something very good or very bad would happen to me when I filled up a book. I wanted to write a story about someone who died when they finished a book, but you can see how predictable that idea would be.

So what would happen if I didn't finish my I-will-blog daily goal/dare-response? Would it kill me? No. Would it diminish my view of myself, give me one more reason to believe that I'm a quitter or loser at some deep level? It might, instead, mean that I have finally learned when to gag my pride and be sensible and protective of my time and energy. But that's the rationalization of a lazy person.

Hmm. I think I need to see how much Libra I have in my astrological chart.

Along those lines, here's a brief reading from Astrology.com. (warning: it's nothing but narcissism tonight, folks):

How You Approach Life and How You Appear To Others
Cautious, prudent, and rather self-contained, you are a person who approaches life realistically and who is not inclined to take foolish chances or get carried away by the overly optimistic or idealistic schemes of starry-eyed dreamers. In fact, you frequently have a jaundiced view of such things. You are rather worldly-wise at a fairly young age, even something of a cynic. Often the world doesn't seem like a safe, friendly place to you, and you tend to approach life in a guarded, conservative manner. You are generally calculating and careful, and are rarely spontaneous, fluid, open, and childlike.

The Inner You: Your Real Motivation
At heart you are modest and humble, and you rarely strive to be in the limelight or in a position of power. You have a sharp analytical mind, a keen eye for detail, and you prefer to observe, dissect, and study life from a distance. Conscientious and conservative, you can be relied upon to be careful, efficient, and thorough in your work and you take pride in doing a job well. What you may lack in self-confidence you often make up for in skill - developing expertise, technical knowledge, and competency in some specialized area. You are adept at using your hands to create or fix things, and meticulous attention to detail and careful craftsmanship are your forte. Some would say you are a little TOO meticulous, for you can be extremely critical and petty if everything is not done exactly as you think it should be, and you worry about things that other people consider trivial and unimportant. You like to organize, categorize, and arrange everything into a logical system, and you are often distinctly uncomfortable when something does not fit into a neat category. Disorganization vexes you. You probably wish that you were not such a perfectionist, for besides being a stickler for details, you can be mercilessly self-critical as well. Whether in your environment or in yourself, you tend to focus on the flaws, with a desire to improve, refine, and perfect. You are strictly factual, truthful, and scrupulously honest in your self-estimation, and you often do not give yourself enough praise or credit.

Okay. I think that says enough. (And I'm not going to pay for the "upgrade" that tells me more.)

Hey. I didn't make this stuff up. I'm just reporting it.

Solstice

On my way home from the gym tonight, the moon looked huge, yellow and portentous. I was happy to see it, because it spoke to me of things larger than my life and my niggling problems of when the next dentist appointment is and whether we are out of milk.

The moon draws us all; it draws the sea, and it draws the moths to the midnight sky, a celestial porch light. It pulls and tugs at lovers; it calls babies from wombs and madmen from secret hiding places. As Dar says,

Calling the moon
’cause I know what it’s worth
To tug at the seas and illumine the earth


There are, no doubt, many cultures throughout history that have had with rituals around the summer solstice moon.

Mine, tonight, was just to admire it, and be grateful for its glow.

DSL delays

Whew! It's taken me 45 minutes of DSL troubleshooting to get online and blog. A test of my daily-posting resolve, because technically it's now (*ahem*) long after midnight.

Why We're Always Late:
Simple.
We GROSSLY underestimate how long it will take to do pretty much anything. It's like a version of Name That Tune. "I can paint the house in ninety minutes, Dennis!" "Well, I can pack for our week-long trip in fifteen minutes!" And, as is the case with procrastinators, just because it sometimes pays off in a spectacular way, we keep doing it. It's conditioning where the reinforcement is intermittent and therefore more effective. But it doesn't mean it's the way to go, especially if (like me) you're (ironically) someone who hates to be late. Hmmm. Hates to be late, yet doesn't give herself enough time to prepare.... Food for thought.

Something About Fathers:
It's not an easy job, I don't think. Really. And I'd say some of that has to do with the fact that I don't think boys are (in general) taught to be fathers the way girls are taught to be mothers, to mother. Still. Even today. Except insofar that it's the wives or girlfriends or men themselves doing the teaching. I mean, the verbs "to mother" or "to parent" are still much more common than "to father." There is so much more to say about all this, but with my internet connection as flaky as it is and the morning alarm now four hours away, I'm done.

Except to add that I'm seriously impressed by some of the men who are my contemporaries and fathers. And even more impressed by those who are older than 50 and are there for their kids or are just fatherly role-models. You know who you are. As they would say in Australia, "Good on ya" guys.

Father's Day

Happy end=of-Father's Day to the dads out there who might be reading this!

That's all. Just Happy Father's Day, and thanks for all you have done, do, and will do for your kids.

Another case of so much more to say lost to absolute fatigue.

I dare myself to post tomorrow about The Secret of Why We're Always Late and Something About Fathers. The first one, anyway, is related to today's sparse entry.

Domestic business

D is still painting and the girls are packing for the camping trip. I'm editing the Romanian memoir until I get too sleepy, then switching to another task, then back to the book.

I see that in the midst of so much to do, the blog becomes a repository of "what I did today-ness," but I'd rather write this kind of entry than no entry at all. I was ticking off to-do lists with a friend yesterday and explained (and I believe this to be true) that I was not complaining or even playing the common 'how I'm busier than you" card - I was really just naming items as a way of putting it in order out loud.

I have about another hour before we're due to leave for the camping trip.
The weather may hold. I'm sure the overnight will be a blast for the kids. It'll be a test, for me, of letting go of all the stuff I'll feel that I'd much rather be doing at home in the interest of being present and - God forbid! - enjoying myself.

Sleep is for wimps

And coffee is the nectar of the gods.

Or at least, it's handy in a pre-party pinch. Since tomorrow afternoon, I'm scheduled to take the kids to a camping sleepover birthday party (in the rain! at the KOA!) tomorrow afternoon, my time is limited in which to clean the house & finish copy editing my father-in-law's translation of his friends post-WWII Romanian memoir. Only 100 pages to go!

D has had a once-a-year mocha and is painting the livingroom. Aren't we the crazy kids?

The midnight oil multiple candle-end burning fest should wind down Sunday night. Yes indeedy. It's fun until then, though!

Ah....

I'm giving a big "aaahhhh" sigh for the day, and all that came with it, being behind me.

Ready for what comes next and have a sense that all is well.

Just before Midnight

...on a day that has lasted forever.
visitors tomorrow at work from a major Japanese corporation, and I spent the night(after all of the other work of the day was done) shopping for something appropriate to give them as a gift, and then trying to figure out how to wrap it and present it.

I hate shopping.
I waited until too late to go anywhere except, pretty much, Safeway or the QuickMart.
I suck at gift wrapping.
I bought things that are not shaped to be wrapped easily. How clever of me.
And yet, I want more than anything to please and make a good impression on our Important Corporate Visitors from Japan.

Today has been a character building day.

Taken moment by moment, however, it's all perfectly manageable.

As long as my eyes don't fall out of their sockets, I'll be fine.

D is quarantining the tiger barbs he'd bought out of the Big Tank because they were ganging up like Chihuahuas against Lao Tsu, the English Mastiff of the freshwater sea. Actually, D's got the barbs in a little holding pen like a group of prisoners with their stripes and their vicious habits.

He's wondering WHAT he was thinking, putting 19 nasty little territorial fish in the tank.

Me? I'm sitting here being grateful that I was resourceful enough to avoid Slurpies and jerkey sticks as the gifts for our business guests tomorrow.

A poem, but not the one you thought

So, I told Lisa that I had written a poem (on a dare. Of course.) about using a fire extinguisher as a sex toy. If you really must see a copy (it's more humorous than it sounds), I will email it by request.

But because this is sort of a family-oriented blog, I'm going to censor myself and instead just share the first poem-not-a-poem that I wrote at the retreat, pretty much as I wrote it. (We had an hour to do this). I don't consider it finished, and it may not even be worth finishing. But anyway:


I Have No Poem To Give You

I cannot tell you with a few odd trochees
how many toes a crow has, or divulge
the secret waiting silent in the papyrus' stalk.
I don't have a stanza revealing the answers
that swirl in a chambered nautilus' shell.
Don't ask me to tell you in blank verse or sestina
about the best that mankind has to offer, or the worst
moment of a childhood I once thought fine.
None of that is mine or biddable, none of that is near.
No. Here's the truth:
it's not that the heavens wrapped up
in couplets won't come to my call, and throw themselves
like obedient slaves under the wheels of my ball point,
crushed between lines on the page. The truth is, I don't call.
It seems so like hubris, and besides, I can't pronounce their names.
I cannot offer you anything, let alone poetry.
And it's been that way for years.
I might look under the toppling stacks of paper,
listing sideways like guilt with unread tips
on saving for retirement or pruning roses -
look there for the lines that will make you catch your breath
the way a half-trained trapeze artist's sway
draws your hand to your heart, make you drop your popcorn.
But more paper is in the way. And under the bed, where
I thought I'd placed them, next to the pictures I'll
someday organize, I've lost the words
that would change your life. I apologize.
I did find this while looking at home and through my purse
beside the bills: I found that I am afraid of nothing.
Of being nothing, becoming nil, having been
only a soft body held together by ticks and worries and fear.
I hear you. Ah, you're saying,
there's the heart of the matter. The part excavated
from under the dry, packed dirt, beneath the top
of the earth burned hard by the sun and trampled down
by habit, and laundry and the daily commute.
Here's the little hot detail of a heart
pumping pomegranate red. Oh, let there be a poem
in the blood on the page. Let that, at least flow.
But even this, the ruby from my chest, is on display
behind glass, with a sign giving you a Latinate name and a few
lesser known facts. And you can't touch it, I've labeled it mine.
And I won't give it away, anymore than I'd bequeath you
the quick high quips of the swallows flying over the sea this morning,
the water's pushing murmur, the smell of the dirt here.
What would you do with a poem about all that, anyway?
Watch it lie on a desk, a bird that has fallen from its nest,
lizard-like, bald and blind and flightless, and too young
to put back, destined for the trash with a lie to the children
about what really happened? No, better to confess
that I have nothing to share. I remain poemless.
I have nothing inspired to say, nothing
to put a lit taper to the tallow of your bones,
transmute the crescent moon on the waves.
Nothing to slip the cypress-spotted hillside out
from under your sacred feet, or shatter the glass display.

Full plate

No more, thank you.

I hope to dig out a bit tomorrow - from the heavy work load, the lack of sleep, the father-in-law's book still being edited (slowly). I enjoy the work, but it takes A LOT of time. Then there's the repaint-the-livingroom-before company this weekend deal.

Sigh.

All I have the energy to say right now. Sad but true. Except that I found a whole slew of blog sites in Welsh, like this one. Ydych chi'n gallu darllen e? (Boy, I had to reach for that one, and I'm not even sure it's right for "Are you able to read it?")

Back to the editing of the English translation of the Romanian memoir that the author wants to translate into French. And that's the least of the unusualness of the author, judging from his contents. Only a couple hundred more pages to go!

Home

I highly recommend a weekend at a retreat and conference center overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Highly. For everybody. All of you, one after another or together. Bathing suits optional.

So you know how, in *most* situations, you would have to gather together some wild and reckless rule-breaking friends to work up the nerve to go skinny dipping? I actually found myself in a position this weekend of trying (unsuccessfully, I might add) to find someone who was going to the baths with a suit. Okay. So not all parts of the place are ideal for everyone.

But the food was incredible, and so organic and healthy, it made Whole Foods seem like a junk-food grocer. And the poetry workshop was awesome. Good people, a very encouraging atmosphere, and I wrote 3 (count 'em - 3!) new pieces. The teacher gave me a personal nod regarding the work I was doing, which did wonders for my fragile poet's ego. I came back rested, renewed and feeling a re-birth with my writing.

And my family and home were so nice to return to. Not only did nothing blow up while I was gone, D. made it look easy. The girls had fun, the house was clean, there were new grasses in the front yard and new tiger barbs in the tank - and tonight the BIG fishies were moved to their new BIG home. So much good stuff in one weekend. I can hardly stand it.

Look kids! Tomorrow's post - today!

So by the time this post officially will have been written (that's the Future Perfect tense), I will have been (Future Perfect Continuous) in Big Sur for about 20 hours.

You gotta love the idea of a "Future Perfect" state, especially if you feel you had missed out on the "Past Perfect" or if you are not okay with this, which is the "Simple Present."

Oh, the joys that grammar can bring!

I hope this qualifies for my write-every-day deal. I hadn't planned to be out of the range of pretty much all advanced technology for a full 24-hour period when I agreed to the silly daily blog dare.

And a shout out to D who is holding down the fort (and painting the livingroom, and prepping the fish tank, and caring for the kids) while I am gone. Happy anniversary, dear. Who would have thought, 22 years ago when you asked me to be your girlfriend in the driveway of Clare's family's house, that you'd still be stuck with me now? Ha! That'll learn you to be careful what you wish for!

Pack it up, move it out

I hope to leave town within an hour for the workshop. I just need to run a few micro-errands first, and then it's a 3+ hour drive (alone! listening to whatever music I want!), and a three days of incredibly decadent time writing and workshopping poetry on the California coast. (My blogger spell chedk for "workshopping" prompted me for "worshipping." Hmm.) I know how very fortunate I am to have the funds to pay for this, and a husband who supports whatever I do, even if it means he has to single-parent for days. I don't take any of it for granted. I just hope to relax and go deeper into the moment (whatever the moment brings) and to write. And write. Not just blog, mind you.

Closer to quiet

Another full day. Hard to find space and quiet when activities are one after another: work, dr appointment, work, pick up girls, go home for 2 minutes to grab stuff, out to 4th grade play & potluck, home to do bed-time routine. I have a list of to-do's before I head out of town for the weekend, which means that I'm sleepy and suddenly feel that there's nothing more important than sleep.

So maybe there isn't!

Last push before a weekend away

The last few days of school are hectic, and in this case, more so because I'll be leaving town (just me!) on Friday for a writer's weekend away and I'm trying to get it all together before I go. The girls have parties and performances and potlucks. I have a pre-migraine headache. But the end is in sight! And so is sleep...

Family time

This evening, I spent about 3 hours on the phone with family members, sometimes talking about other family members. This is a unusual, especially the long conversation I had with my brother in Denver and his wife. We typically speak to one another only on holidays and birthdays or if someone is very ill. But he had just watched the video he'd made about 5 years ago from old family slides and Super 8 footage, and it prompted him to think about how, way back when before 1975, we'd been a family that did things together. He called to remind me. This coming from someone who'd once said he had next to no memories of his childhood. It was strange, and sweet too.

My dad had outpatient surgery today - the day after his 69th birthday - & is apparently doing very well. After the surgery (which took place while my brother was watching this family video with my father's mother), my dad took my brother out to lunch. My dad had a hamburger and two beers. What's odd about that is not the post-surgery beers (he'd had a urinary external catheter inserted). That's not odd at all. What's odd about the lunch that he had appetite for hamburgers and that he had (apparently) money to pay for it. After lunch, my dad went back to the van where he now lives with his dog. By choice. How do I feel about this? Detached. Of course. Detachment is my tool of choice around dad. It's one of the skills I honed as a child (along with minimalizing danger and second-guessing everyone) as a coping mechanism for living with him and his skewed way of interacting with people.

My sister called between calls from my brother to talk to me about summer plans, and my father-in-law called after that to talk about a get-together with D's aunt from Bulgaria and D's sister and her fiance. (A fiance we haven't even met yet!)


* warning - neurotic Rambling follows. Feel free to cut & run now. *

It's family time. I'm not sure how that feels. Which is, itself, a strange feeling.

I am comfortable with these people, but again, a large percentage of me is very detached. I hold back. I say the right words. I even know what a healthy response to them might be, but I seldom reveal all or even represent most of my truest self to anyone - among my siblings especially - for fear that they'll only use that integrity against me. How sad is that? They're not even manipulative or cruel people. I just feel like they might be. After all, we were all four shown examples of cruelty and manipulation on a regular basis by the same father. They might have picked up some of his tricks. I might have. One can't be sure.


Bleh.

Stoopid coping mechanism.

The hours I keep

Last night at around 1am, S came to the bed crying but not, apparently, from a nightmare. She was soon comforted and sleeping in bed again, but she'd reminded me that I'd completely forgotten (for 2 days) the project I'd agreed to do for her Kindergarten teacher - printing about 75 digital pictures for an end-of-year project. So I got up around 4am and worked on it until I had to leave for work. D gave the news that he'd bring the finished photos tomorrow, and tonight, after getting the girls to bed and napping myself, I got up again at around 10:30 and have been working on it since.

This means less than 6 hours of sleep again, followed by what promises to be another challenging day at work. It's the most intentionally I've burned both ends of the candle in a while - I even had a home-made latte earlier in the evening to make this awake-time possible - but it's short term, and I honestly can't see around it right now, so I'll make do!

The advantages to downtime

Today was as close to a perfect day as makes no nevermind.

I slept in - past eight! D. got up before me, which almost never happens.
I got up, lazed around a bit, then went for an hour run. Nice.
Got back, & D. had fed the girls breakfast & was working on setting up the Massive Fish Tank. I'd left them all happy, with the soundtrack to Oklahoma playing. And I returned to them all happy as well.

Puttered around, talked about summer plans, had a very late breakfast with D. while the girls giggled & played make-believe that S was a wild mustang that granted wishes (sometimes "opposite wishes") to people.

D. went to work & I painted one of the walls in the livingroom, which took hours because I was careful with the prep-time and the actual painting. I am notorious for getting paint everywhere when I paint, and for missing spots on the walls (I think the technical term is "holidays"). But this time, I did all right. I cleaned up, D. got home from work, and we headed south for dinner with Julia and family. I think it's safe to say that a good time was had by all. We had to drag the girls and ourselves away.

All Funned Out

The girls had a gymnastics show tonight. They both did their group routines very well. They are at a beginner's level; no backflips or handsprings or anything that would pose a safety issue (now that R has learned to tuck her chin when doing a forward roll). R's teacher and her partner came to the show too, which made R's day. I thought this was above and beyond. This particular teacher doesn't live in town, and has only taught R's class for about 8 weeks. I was grateful for her willingness to be there.

Before the gymnastics show, we had about an hour of rest - which meant a nap for D and S, computer time for R, and gardening for me.

Before that down time, we had all gone to a birthday party at a place that had a room full of giant jumpy slides and a jumpy obstacle course and a jumpy boxing ring. The kids wore themselves out. I showed my car to the birthday boy's grandfather, who had expressed an interest in buying it. He and his wife will think about it this week. I can't tell whether he'll get it. On the one hand, he didn't seem too keen. On the other hand, he mentioned that maybe he'd want to test drive it again next weekend, if that would be possible.

Before the birthday party, R had her riding lesson (and S tagged along), and before that, S had her dance class - only one more class/practice before that recital!

Before the riding & dance lessons, before breakfast in fact, I spent an hour in line at the local pool, signing the girls up for their first session of swim lessons for the summer. The city's Parks & Rec Department still hasn't come up with a better system for residents of the east side of town to register for swim lessons. There are obvious disadvantages of this go-in-person, get-in-line method. But the advantage is that it provides a community tradition. It's like having a Star Wars movie open every year a mile from our house; people wait and wait, with their lawn chairs and coffee - some people even get there an hour or more before the signups open - and there's this great opportunity to meet and greet friends and strangers alike.

If there were more things in life like the swim lesson signups, maybe we'd all slow down and get to know one another better. I think about parts of the world where one must stand in line for food, or water. I think of women washing clothes at a communal water source, or men gathering at a worksite. There isn't much of an equivalent in our society; even at activities where children are doing their thing like sports, the parents are often not there - they're running errands,taking another kid somewhere else. Or if they are there, they're not present.

Is this why I like public transportation, and Laundromats, and airports? Because they are places where one must wait with others who are waiting? Maybe I need places where waiting is forced upon me. What would happen if I thought of meditation as a type of waiting? The type of waiting that is accompanied by listening, watching, paying attention - without thinking. Just being.

The End of a Long Week

Just glad to have made it this far. Am fighting off a very mild depression that I know is sleep deprivation in disguise. Tomorrow will be extremely busy, but I'll feel better after 8 hours of shuteye.

Ever want to know more about Margaritas?
Here's a link that lists a few of the stories behind when/why the drink came into being.

And in the interest of balanced air time, here's a link to California Alcohol Treatment facilities.

Please note that I have not had anything to drink. But I'm considering going just crazy and having a margarita sometime this month. Whoa. Look out, folks.

The circus

The girls and I went to Circus Chimera between rehearsals for their gymnastics show.

I don't like circuses. There it is.

I can admire the incredible skill and training and hard work that goes into a circus. I don't mean to slight the performers and staff.

But I think watching this thing took a year off my life.

I used to think I didn't like circuses because of the bright lights and noise and all the people, and because I felt the pressure of Past Expectations working against me. For my fifth birthday, my mother got tickets for us to go to the Ringling Brothers & Barnam and Bailey circus. I remember completely falling apart there - hating it so much and crying so hard that we had to leave early. Poor mom. The next item on our party agenda was a post-circus trip to Farrell's ice cream parlor - the kind of place where they make the birthday girl or boy stand on a table while a hoard of underpaid, acne-faced waiters and waitresses, armed with drums and whistles, rush the party in a manic parade, singing loudly and in what I, as a five year old, found to be a very threatening manner. By comparison, the circus was a sea of calm.

Poor mom. She tried to plan a few more birthday parties, but there was always something about being the center of attention at a party that literally destroyed me. I couldn't wait for the thing to be over. And so, I often didn't wait. I have vivid memories of ditching my own birthday celebration more than once when I was little. I understand now why I hated it so much. But that's another story.

And about this hating the circus? I think there are a couple of another, more real reasons I feel this way about the circus, reasons that came rushing loudly and clearly back to me as I sat, palms sweating, between the girls. It's two-parted. One part is that so much of many circuses consists of people risking their necks just to entertain us. I mean, these people could die. Yes, they had a few safety nets and harnesses and ropes, and yes, they've practiced this stuff incessantly. But still. When one daredevil asked the audience (from on top of a Wheel of Destiny) if he should do more feats of derring-do, while everyone clapped and cheered him on, I was sitting there thinking "No! No! Stop! Don't encourage him!"

The other reason I think I dislike the circus is the tension that the audience and performers emote. The air is thick with all the feelings, and (not that I'm some magical empath or anything), the emotions around me can be overwhelming.

But hey - we survived, and the clown in this particular show was good, and no one died. So I think my daughters' circus experiences are already better than mine were.

Breaking the cycle, again.

Early to bed

I'm working a 5:30-1:30 shift tomorrow, so am determined to get to bed early.

The poem I worked on last night (a significant revision of / different take on the ants piece) had me concentrating hard enough that I snapped at both the dog and D when they poked their heads into the room. Maybe being irritable while writing isn't the best sign in the world, but where I am now, that's a sign that I'm focusing.

I mean, it's not like I'm writing Kubla Khan or anything, but I am guarding that concentration when I can get it.

There are so many activities with the kids this week and next week that I don't even want to write them all down. It's one thing after another. All good, and manageable (just), but a lot all the same. Not a good time to be sleep deprived. To bed, now.