Squirrelly

On the day that I bought my couch (yes! I did finally find one that is uber comfy), something really unfortunate happened. I was on my way home, and feeling really good about life, when something not so nice happened. A squirrel darted in front of my car and I squished it. At first I thought either I had gone too fast or it had been too slow, and it was safe, but that was not the case. I looked at it in the rear view mirror. I was sad! I hadn't done it on purpose! Ending a life, even a squirrelly one, on accident, was not in the plan for that day.

I hoped that its family would be ok, and that it would had a quick death and did not feel the pain. In almost 15 years of driving, this is the first time something like this has happened to me. I hoped the cars behind me would be able to navigate around it. I was really just sad and felt sticky. "But it was an accident!" I thought. Accidents happen, but the consequences really just aren't good anyway. But at least they aren't on purpose. Then I would feel so much worse!!! I'm glad I don't have that kind of personality.


Then the voting part of me wondered if the city had a squirrel or other patrol to take care of the poor little remains. I hoped so...didn't want the indignity to last any longer than it had to.

Goodbye, squirrel. I did not mean you harm. I hope you are in squirrel heaven...with a tree full of nuts and some other squirrels to squeak with.

No Outlet

Outlets:
1. Electrical: It's really frustrating when you go somewhere, say, a hotel room, and there isn't an electrical outlet in a convenient place, so you can both look at your phone and charge it at the same time. Or if there's a bathroom that doesn't have an electrical socket.
2. Verbal: Sometimes your brain just gets too full of stuff so it has to overflow, and sometimes it does by what is known in Mean Girls  as "word vomit." It just bubbles up. Uncontrollably. You can't stop yourself from saying something even if it's terrible horrible and/or inappropriate. Finding ways to stem the verbal tide before you turn into that one lady villain in that one folk tale is really important.
3. Physical: Being able to move and wear yourself out physically so you are tired and want to go to bed is genius. Having a way to use your energy so you don't have to keep all the stress bottled up inside of you definitely counts as an outlet.

I have enough electrical outlets in my life right now. And I am grateful that I have some verbal outlets, too...but right now, because I had an ankle wrench, I don't have a physical outlet. I'm pretty much a boring blah on the couch. I really don't like it at all. Especially when I have a lot of stress built up and I literally feel the need to go *do* something. Anything, just to make my body as tired as my mind is. Keep in mind, I'm really not one to go to the gym, and I'm naturally a pretty sedentary person. All of my hobbies are indoor and fairly stationary: reading, quilting, guitaring, writing, even gaming. Cooking, too. So when I feel the need to go wandering, it's pretty bad. But because of my ankle, I can't exercise. It makes me feel jittery to sit around inside with comparatively so much more physical energy than emotional energy. Not having an outlet for the physical needs I have is really frustrating, and I'm not sure I can take it for much longer. I hope my monkey-wrenched ankle heals soon so I can be walking, not hobbling, soon.

Mike Teavee wants couch privileges

I bought a TV yesterday. And a laptop. It wasn't my first time buying a laptop, but it was my first time buying a tv. I don't know how I survived. Normally I am a basket case when I need to buy anything over $100. My brain just goes into shorted fritzed fried frizzled mode and I can't really function and it's difficult for me to actually "pull the trigger." Just ask K, who actually had to leave me at the car dealership so I would buy a car.

It's probably more TV than I need, but I got it on a very good deal and it was actually cheaper than the one I actually wanted, and even bigger, too. (!) I am now the owner of a 50" television. 3D glasses came with it. I'll never use them; they'll make me sick.

I tried to buy a couch, too, but I just couldn't find one that was comfy. If any of you have suggestions, please let me know. It turns out when you only have one couch, it needs to do a lot of different kinds of things. It needs to be tall enough to rest your head on, wide enough and long enough that you can lay down on it, have a comfy arm for sleeping on, be wide enough that you can fold your legs without feeling like you'll fall off, and be a good color. And it has to have no plastic cup holders. Because plastic cup holders imply that a cup will be used on the couch on a regular basis, which I don't really like the idea of. So, do I recline, or do I not recline? I find that usually if i have a recliner, if there's room, I usually end up spreading sideways anyway. So maybe that's not so important. Unless there's more than 2 people sitting on the couch, in which case that is important. I don't have people over often, so that situation likely won't come up often.

Couch shopping is hard work. :(

So yes, I have a TV, and yes, I want to buy a comfy couch privilege, but no, I do not want to be minimized into a three inch tall person like Mike. Oh, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory...how I love you. So many life lessons learned from one book. But that's another post for another day.

Good Monday to all, and Good Night!

Fresh Sheet Ode

oh, sweet-smelling, static-filled, still-warm sheets!
the moment after the dryer has announced in audible fashion it's through with you,
indicating that the only thing standing between me and you
is a closed door and the lint trap crying to be emptied before the next load
is the springboard into bliss.

You are worth a two-handed grab out of the dryer.
Our weekly ritual of determining long-side/short-side is soothing.
Sometimes you wrinkle. I guess everybody has bad wash days.
When you try to eat socks, I am dismayed: I think you should leave that to the UndieSock gnome.
The worst is when I have to put you back in because you're still wet.

But after you're dry, wrinkly or not, after I've wrestled your fourth corner to its proper place,
I still love the snap of the top sheet as I flick my wrists, watching you drift down atop the mattress.
You like to be mitered, but you don't like to stay that way.
You'd rather be soft than crisp, because you like to please me.
And when the quilts go on top of you, you carry their weight with pride. :)

Rock On, Goldilocks

Hey kid, rock and roll / Rock on, ooh, my soul
Hey kid, boogey too, did ya / Hey shout, summertime blues
Jump up and down in them blue suede shoes
Hey kid, rock and roll, rock on

And where do we go from here / Which is the way that's clear

Still looking for that blue jean, baby queen / Prettiest girl I ever seen See her shake on the movie screen, Jimmy Dean / James Dean
etc.

-"Rock On," David Essex, 1973

Sometimes I hear that song on the radio. The only lines I know are the bridge, the endless "rock on" litany at the end of the song, and the two lines I've bolded. For some irrational reason, this song has always made me want to have a pair of blue suede shoes to jump up and down in. And so for some irrational reason,when I had a gift card I needed to use up, and I found these blue jean baby queens on the almighty Amazon, I could not resist.

I have considered buying frivolous shoes before. Once, I even came very close. I was in high school and for some reason I wanted a pair of 4" high silver shoes that were basically only held on to my feet by a band of clear plastic over my toes. I really wanted those shoes, but my practicality won out. I have to say, I'm kind of glad, as they really weren't "me" and as you can really only buy one pair of absolutely frivol shoes in your lifetime, I'm really glad I didn't waste mine on that.

These are much, much better. Heels just the right height, toes with just the right amount of point, suede that's just the right color of blue. It's like I was Goldilocks, but instead of eating porridge, I was searching for just the right shoes. (Anyone who has been shoe shopping with me knows that sometimes there aren't just three bears in the story...it's more like six or seven, with lots of side trips and suitable distractions thrown in for good measure.)

Having found the perfect fit, I waited impatiently for them to arrive, and as soon as they did, I slipped them on, and did, indeed, jump up and down in them, and had a dance party.

For those interested, neither David Essex nor Jimmy Dean attended.

Cubism

This Is Not A Cubicle
Photograph
2014

The literal-mindedness of the artist is captured through the realistic shape depicted. The dynamic layers within the piece show that a cube is perhaps not as simple as something with six sides. Indeed, the shape shown does, in fact, not meet the specifications to be a cube, which lends a sense of whimsy to the piece, and serves to underscore the title.
 








I make myself laugh. Sisters who say I do not have a sense of humor, I respectfully disagree.

Mt. Sidewalk

It doesn't snow very often where I live. But recently, we had what was considered a doozy of a storm. The news (which I was watching [on accident] due to watching the Olympics while quilting) dubbed the weather cycle the "winter blast." I'm not sure I would agree, but it is the first time I have been snowed in like this. Didn't know it just took six inches to do me in, but it did.

First, it was cold. Really cold. Then I flew to LA while it started to snow, and had a "Winter Blast" of an interview, but that is another story for another day. My flight landed smoothly - a miracle, considering that there was already four inches. Several flights were canceled, but mine got in safely. Huzzah! Being without a coat because you weren't watching the news and you figured you would be fine in the few feet from the terminal to the shuttle bus and fine from the shuttle bus to the car is really silly, by the way. Then came the de-snowing of the windshield, and the fun trip through the winter wonderland that was the parking lot, and then onto the big main drag which had lots of traffic on it, and then to the freeway. Only once do I remember driving when the freeway was white. Dad had taken us to see LoTR in the stadium seating, so we had gone downtown. It was a little dicey, but we made it. Here, there was not a snowplow in sight, although it was clear that there had been one about an hour ago...on one lane of the freeway. The temperature had risen to about 25, but there the Ice-Wind Gnomes were marching from their Norway, and there were ghostly swirls of white headed every which direction. They were beguiling and suspiciously fractal-esque in their iterations, and I'm sure many a driver would have focused on the swirls in front of him and been lost, falling to the sirens, and failing Lesson #1 of Driving 101: Look as far ahead of you as you can, always.

It took almost two hours from when I got off the plane to when I got home, but I did make it safely. Only a few spinning spots. I took some extra precautions and I was really grateful...I saw a few accidents and several cars on the side of the road, but I was able to get home. Having no lanes while driving makes "passing" a little difficult. But I managed not to get hit, or hit anyone else, on the drive home.

It continued snowing and blowing all night, and when I woke up and started quilting, <--it looked like this.
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Then more snow came...and then freezing rain...and in the meantime I quilted and watched Olympics and was a little worried that I would run out of food, but kept warm and dry and mostly scare-free. I did do the prudent thing and make sure I knew where my flashlight was in case the power went out. There was one moment when the entire ice chunk that was the awning over the deck slid 8" down the roof, making a wrenching noise that scared me silly, but other than that I was scare-free...mostly because I didn't leave the house. At all.

On Monday, I was getting stir-crazy and so I went to shovel. This is the leavings of the sidewalk, piled up...drumroll, please: Here is Mt. Sidewalk! Looks suspiciously like Rainier to me, but whatever. Thank goodness S&J keep a snow shovel. It actually was a good thing I hadn't shoveled before, because the snow underneath the ice crust was still powdery...but if I had shoveled, it would have gotten iced and been at least 3x as hard to shovel.

Here's my handiwork. I sent this picture to a friend, with the caption, "Where I come from, we don't just shovel two little lines down the driveway so the car can get out. We shovel the whole driveway." It made me glad for all those hours we spent together as a family shoveling snow. Turns out shoveling is like riding a bike...once you know how, you never forget. I'm glad I learned how to do the job good and proper-like.

The next day, the streets were a bit slushy, but maneuverable. The day after that, the snow was gone. Mt. Sidewalk is no more, but there is a lot of green moss left behind in memoriam.

Career Choices

Recently I took one of those quizzes that has been floating around on facebook. This one was about what your career really should be. I don't know what the choices were, but most of the people I know who bothered to post their results got "writer." For my own part, I would have expected to be a writer, or a man-of-all-work. But no. Instead, I got "athlete."

Yep. The girl who consistently got "needs more coordination," and "she's very smart but needs to improve on her physical skills" got the one career she would be doomed in.

It occurred to me that although I would love to be a gardener, quilter, photographer, organizer, assistant, consultant, teacher, singer, or analyst. Or writer. I could be a blogger or a short story writer or a memoir maker or a fantasy saga extraordinaire writer. I could write speeches, news articles, or historical fiction. Or even poems! But one thing I couldn't do is write mysteries. I was thinking today, after watching one of the Cadfael disks my mom sent me...how do they do it? How do mystery writers formulate the story? How do they leave clues? Is it really just that your brain knows the formula but knows the enjoyment of "discovering" the answer again, so you can just read mysteries over and over? How do they decide the sequence? The weapon, the circumstances? How do they keep enough suspense to keep you interested, but keep the story believable? I could never write mystery. I have no secrets. My face shows everything I am thinking or feeling. I am incapable of throwing people off the scent. I spoil all surprises for people I am trying to surprise.

So I guess I might not be cut out to be an athlete, but I'm not ready for the mystery world either.

I do have some career choices coming up. Wonder what I'll really end up being when I grow up?

Steady as the Sun

I listened to a song that had a chorus with lyrics talking about what makes a man strong. (Incidentally, "Strong" is the name of the song; Will Hoge sings it.) It's a country song, and today was the first time I heard it. I didn't hear the whole song, but what I did hear went like this:

He'll pick you up and won't let you down
Rock solid inside out
Somebody you can trust
Steady as the sun
Ain't nothing gonna knock him off the road he's rollin on
He's strong



There is more than one way to interpret some of these lines.

He'll pick you up and won't let you down
The first is negative: He'll pick you up like a sack of potatoes, throw you over his shoulder, and won't let you down even if you pummel him half to death and kick and scream.
The second is positive: He'll pick you up, emotionally, and you can always count on him to do what he says he's going to do, when he says he will do it.

For the record, I prefer the second interpretation.

  Rock solid inside out

First: he has a stomach of iron and is super chiseled.
Second, he's immovable in his opinions, only slightly worn down by weather and elements.

(I'm not sure I like either of these.)

Somebody you can trust
This one, there aren't two ways, so I like the only interpretation there is.

Steady as the sun
I view this as being "steady as the sunshine," which, if you live where I live, can really only be called "steady" about two and a half months out of every year, and I don't exactly call that steady, especially since only one of those months is guaranteed, and everything else kind of fluctuates. I get that the sun is burning up there in the sky in its happy gassy way, but if I can't see it, sometimes it's hard to remember it exists. Especially around December the twenty-first. I turned to my friend and said to her, "I don't want a man who's steady as a Northwest sun." Indeed, the first thing I thought of was that I would rather have a man who's like a neap tide...slow, inexorable, his love washing over me. Of

Ain't nothing gonna knock him off the road he's rollin on
Either he's opinionated and you can't get him to think beyond the idealistic road he has been "rolling on," meaning that he's completely narrowminded and never seems to think of even looking out the window to see if he missed something.

Or he is steadfast in purpose and he overcomes adversity and keeps going, rolling with the punches and always stands up for his moral principles, and values things like truth and justice.

Either way, he's strong.

S-I-C-K

S is for the way you sap my strength

I is for the Ick I feel at length

C is coughs and chills and cherry carbonation 

K is killing more bacteria than I can mention

Sick, stay far away from me...

Love it when you're feeling so out of it you feel like you can parody anything without repercussion and have it make sense. Kudos to anyone who can get which song I chose.

Blood and Water -- Naturally

There's a saying that blood's thicker than water. I don't know if it actually is thicker, but I had an experience lately that made me think about it.

First, if you don't like blood, don't read this.

Second, I apologize in advance to the other party in this blog post. I hope she can forgive me for talking about something that is very personal, and not generally talked about in public. If she reads it and doesn't like it, I might take it down. But I believe the point will come clear, and perhaps she will not be mad.

Awhile ago I was visiting a sister of mine. (She's my blood. We used to tease her that her legs were painted on because she used to ask us to go get water for her when she was thirsty, instead of getting her water for herself:::Blood. Water. Blood was thicker, so we always ended up getting her water for her, even if sometimes it was with some grumbling.)

I was in the middle of my period. Sometimes, accidents happen, and things get bled on. I bled on her sheets. It's the kind of thing that if it has to happen away from home, I suppose it's best to have it happen at a sister's house, because hopefully, she's understanding, and it's slightly less embarrassing to go tell her, "Hey! I'm trying to take care of this problem, but we need to do laundry. Now." than it is to tell a stranger or an acquaintance.

I woke up and rolled over and realized what had happened and inwardly groaned. Great! How embarrassing. I went to tell her what had happened. She was very understanding and wasn't mad at all or impatient. I was really grateful, as I felt a little silly. I told her as much, and she told me a story I had completely forgotten about.

A long time ago, when I was a pretty young teenager, we went to visit somebody. I want to say Aunt M was part of it, but I don't remember that for sure. I do remember I had recently been through puberty, and I was having a rough go of it. (Most people do, so I don't really feel too sorry for myself about it.) My sister was sitting on my lap. My lap was bigger than her lap, and there weren't enough seats, and I was not yet old enough to care about having no leg circulation. She sat on my lap and I put my arms around her, and we chatted with our relatives (or whoever it was) for awhile. It was summertime, because I was wearing shorts.

When she stood up, I realized that she had bled through her clothes onto my lap, and there was a rusty stain on the fabric of my shorts. She must have been perched at the end of my lap, because even though my shorts were pretty long, it was close to the hemline. I remember thinking, "Oh no. How embarrassing for her!" and I wanted to let her know that she needed to change her clothes, but I didn't want to make a big deal out of it and embarrass her any more than was absolutely necessary. Mentioning it in front of all our relatives (probably not everybody in the room was female, and it would have greatly mortified me to point it out in mixed company) would have been really rude, I felt, and embarrassed her.

It never occurred to me to get mad or cause a scene. I was just anxious for her to get full understanding of the situation so she could take steps accordingly. So when she stood up, I tugged on her hand to get her attention, pointed to the stain to let her know what had happened, and then rolled the hem of my shorts up in a little cuff in order to cover the stain. It wasn't a natural place for a bloodstain to be, and I didn't want anyone else to notice. For once in my life, I believe I actually acted nonchalant!

She said she was so grateful that I didn't make a big deal of it. I guess I could have squealed and been like, "Eeeew, she bled on me!" and made a fuss. But really...I just rationalized it: Everybody has things about their bodies they can't control. She couldn't control that, and besides, it's not like any damage was done, so I just went about my day and changed my shorts later.

She told me this story as she put hydrogen peroxide on the stain I had just made, and kind of made the point that I could bleed on anything I wanted, because she was really grateful that I hadn't freaked out on that day. It made me think. To me, it wasn't a big deal at all, but to her, she was grateful to be spared mortification.

We need both blood and water. We need people--our "blood"--to take care of us and get us out of sticky wickets, and we need water to get rid of the residue. When we have waterworks, it's our blood who take care of us. When we bleed, it's sometimes the water of acceptance -- which sometimes we do not offer freely enough to our blood -- that we need to flow around us and clean us up.

So, my dear sister, blood and water go together -- naturally. And so next time you ask me for a glass of water, I'll get it for you without complaining. Because I'm your sister -- your blood. And that's just one of the things sisters do for each other.

Flying Geese

The house where I live is directly in the migratory path of several hundred Canadian geese. They honk. Loudly. Madly. Daily. Lots.

I took a picture of a V of them flying very low a few months ago. I thought, gee, it's amazing how they choose who is the leader, etc.

I walk by a field sometimes. Once, last year, I took some family members walking. There were little greenish brown things everywhere that looked like the aeration cork leavings. Some of them looked like they were growing mold. I was trying to figure out what they were, and we discussed amongst ourselves and came to the determination that what we were looking at were goose droppings. They were EVERYWHERE. You couldn't just walk normally, you had to pick and choose your steps carefully. The rain would come away and wash them, but you just had to think....man. There were a lot of geese here, really recently.

This is important because I had never seen the makers of these two and a half inch long squiggles in all their flock-y glory.

I'm also into quilts. Something I learned this winter is how to make "flying geese" to make piecing easier. An example, courtesy of blockcrazy.com:

The point is to be able to sew the bigger triangles to the smaller triangles, keeping the bigger triangles intact.

Today, I saw the flock. There were about three hundred of them. I was amazed that several people walked by and didn't even notice that they were squawking. I guess that's what happens when you've lived in the flight path for awhile...you don't even notice they're there. But I noticed. I was enthralled. So many birds! (I don't really generally like birds. But en masse, they're pretty cool.) I wanted a picture, so I took one.  You can't really see it here, but their heads are bobbing, and it looked like they were eating grass as fast as they could. It was as if they were honking, "Hurry, hurry, we need to eat." Every once in awhile, they would get really quiet and one geese would honk out the same note in intervals, eight or ten times. Then they'd all get loud again.

Clearly, I was distracted from my walk. Right before I had spied them, I was thinking, "Self, it was very foolish to come out without a coat. You are cold. Maybe you should turn around. Your hands are gonna freeze soon."

Key: green = field; brown spots = tree; grey line = chain link fence, white line = soccer nets, orange = the geometric shape they were making; little black dots = an approximation of a goose (as best as I can do in knockoff Paint with my limited skills and patience.)

They ranged about. This is their progression. It's unnatural, because there was something that happened to instigate steps two and three: I decided since they weren't marine mammals, it was ok to creep a little closer to take a picture. I actually did more than that. I took a video. I didn't post it here because it's a little shaky and I didn't want to make y'all sick. But it was amazing how they just kept eating, but fanning out a little further. I confess, I had never in almost twenty years wanted to run so much as I wanted to run right then. I wanted to see them all flap away because of me. I wanted to see the glory of the huge cloud of them rising up in the air. I do not recall an instance where I ever remember feeling more felt like a wannabe lioness than I did in that moment.

I didn't want to disturb them, though. I didn't know how long they had been there, or how long they usually give themselves breaks for. Cold forgotten, I decided there was still some light left in the sky, and I wanted to observe, so I hid by a tree and sat and watched them for awhile. My hands started to freeze. They honked and honked. I was beginning to inwardly lament my choice: I needed to get some cardio, but I also wanted to be present in case they decided to take off. After about ten minutes of tree-spying, I decided that I could just walk around the field. There is a fence around most of it, so I didn't think they'd feel too threatened. During the time I watched them by the tree, this is how they spread out and contracted.

I walked about and walked about, patiently. I kept waiting for them to take off. Now, it seemed that a few of them were playing...they weren't as earnestly eating. It had been approximately forty minutes since I had originally spied them. On my next rotation, I cautiously approached. I decided I wanted one more picture. This is what they did in response....all facing away from me.

And my inner lioness roared. I knew the geese were tired, but readers, I simply could not help it. I ran at them, full speed ahead. I felt free. I felt wild. I felt large and bold and powerful. This feeling was intensified, as there was a huge thunderclap and I spied three hundred white bands as they lifted their wings, exposing their hind markings, and flew away in two separate groups, wheeling in the sky, honking louder than ever. I was right in the middle of them. The air whooshed around me.

And then, in the space of less than a second, the field looked like this:


I felt awed, triumphant, and, yes, I did feel abashed and guilty soon after for disturbing them. But I don't really regret it. Sorry, geese. I knew I'd probably never have another opportunity like it, and I just wanted so badly to watch their wings beat madly as they all rose up in unison. I will never forget how it looked, or how I felt.

Good Love

I wanna know what love is / I want you to show me / 
I wanna feel what love is / I know you can show me / 
Here I go again / Here I go again 

I went to Texas for a glorious week and a half. I had such a good time. There was:

good food :: for Outings, the peach donut was probably my favorite, although the salted caramel shake at the Alamo Draft House is really hard to beat. For Innings, hands down, it was the Beef Book!! Sooooo yummy.
good movies :: I saw A Christmas Story for the first time, and although I'm not sure this can qualify as truly "good," I now get the leg lamp references. I also saw The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug, Muppet Christmas Carol,  and Better Off Dead, as well as the Christmas episode of ISWAK. 
good games :: Whoowasit? was my favorite new game. I think I played it five times. (!) We had an entire game marathon, playing classics like Monopoly and Labyrinth, and oldies like Apples to Apples and Ticket to Ride: Europe. I also like Make n Break, and the addition of Enchanted Forest was good, too.
good conversations :: like only sisters can have. Of course, those devolved into random memory remembrances and also a lip sync contest. Which turned into a next-day karaoke contest. Apparently I have more rocker in me than W thought. Hehe. Just remember, W, that the louder I sing, the more comfy I am.
good books :: I read Murphy's Boy on the plane, and it was good. I also read the entirety of James and the Giant Peach to the kids in less than three days. There were also some forgettable books, but we won't mention them here (although one of them was a misbegotten choice of a Dan Brown book), so they will be forgotten.
good love :: I got hundreds of kisses, and hundreds of hugs, and hundreds of "I love you's."
Life really does not get much better than that.

When I was in the car, on the way to the airport, IGPM reached over and just held my hand. It almost made me cry. I thought to myself, "this is what love is. Love is reaching out for another person and knowing that they will welcome your touch...whether they need reassurance, or they are the one doing the reassuring."

He knew he could reach for my hand and that I would let him lace my fingers between my own. He didn't have to say anything. No explanations were necessary. My niece knows she can kiss my cheek any time and I will be happy to receive it. She is confident that if she extends her graceful neck toward me, I will meet her.

Love is mostly knowing that the other person will be there...that they'll meet you in the middle, that they'll reach out to you when you're scared or hurt, that they'll let you reach out to them when they're in a pickle or need some help.

My Christmas present was good love. Can't ask Santa Claus for a much better present than that!!