the finch in the flowers

flew away before I could film him.
I had to go inside to get the camera, and in doing so, was forced to know (as it was Bob's intention to tell me) that there was a car full of bombs found in London's theatre district.
When I came back out into the yard, and the finch was gone, I couldn't properly feel my disappointment,
my head filled as it was, with gratitude for what didn't happen today.
And thoughts and fears, of a mixed future.
I like my days small, my concerns and disappointments akin to whether or not I manage to capture a small yellow bird on film, while it is feeding among the yellow flowers.
Not with harsher realities that invade, threatening both the course of my external future and my internal one.
But something in the internal must be eternal,
for if the future would erupt in bombs,
I must always be able to find solace,
with the finch in the flowers.

something to dream to

I was looking for music the other day (two days ago), on itunes, those pre-packaged groupings, gaypride, workout, one hit wonders of the seventies, and I came across French impressionists. I don't download classical music, I don't listen to it. But for some reason I double clicked on it, and started listening, and it was my favorite. There are no songs on the others I am going back to listen to, but for some reason on that day, I really liked this music, and I have become taken with the notion of downloading some songs and listening to them as I fall asleep at night, under the whir of the fan, in the hum of summer, something to dream to.
I haven't done it yet, because just because an idea appeals to me, it doesn't mean it is something I should do; maybe I wont like doing that at all (but I keep going back and visiting them), and I would have to download at least 10 songs to make a go of it. There is- Daphne et Chloe, suite no2: 1 . The bells, op 351.allegro ma non tanto (silver bells), Jex d'eau, estampes:1 pagodes. The white peacock, et cetera, but maybe it is just a mood, and will pass with my allercold.
Also of interest are bells, they seem more morning-ish though, temple bells, chimes of big ben, chimes go by (lounge) 30's. The regina music box- The blue bells of scotland. Narcissus- song. My enduring fondness for The Wind Forest from "My Neighbor Totoro". I find Castles in the Air, by The French Impressionist to be a bit obnoxious, still I find I keep listening to it, obnoxiously appealing I suppose.


by the bye,
all (8, I think) of the nasty dark yellow-orange flowers are now in Bob's berm- I am grateful God is watering them so much, I hope they wont die.
I haven't set up the beetle lure yet, but I did knock them off into the jug I use for watering (well those that didn't get away I did), and now there are at least 10 of them in there, lid on, floating about in the water, massing atop another, so the bottom ones drown, as they struggle to stay afloat and alive, and I struggle with whether or not it is best to kill them straight away or leave them in this watery prison which is bound ultimately to be their death. I can't set them free, but I don't wish to actively kill them, but that would be better wouldn't it?
french impressionist music dreams, set to bells, tells the deaths of a thousand Japanese beetles, woven together with a ream of dark yellow daisies.

monster bunny cyclops

well, ok, it is just me, waving at you, through a puddle. It was a very windy day, and that is my hair eveywhere. And some white bubbles drifting by on the water.

The rain is pounding down right now, I hope that will mean good news for the plants I transplanted.

I feel ill, but it isn't my allercold, no, it's an enormous amount of Kerrygold butter making my stomach queasy. Nothing tastes good to me right now, except watermelon, cheese and crackers, tortilla chips with lots of coarse salt, and bagels with lots of butter. Same was true yesterday. My stomach hurts and is ginormous (Or is it gianormous? Best to stick with emormous but what's the fun in that?).

I am starting to think, Anderson Cooper must be gay, because I can not imagine there is woman in existence who could date him and not go around telling everybody about it. Or at least one who could keep from telling one or two other people, close dear friends, who then would tell one or two other people, close dear friends, and so on, and so on, till all would know.
But maybe a man could keep from telling, and I assume there is a different code among gay men.
Then I think, well of course people know when he is dating someone, it is just not reported in the media mags, et cetera.
Still though, there aren't even proper pictures about, for one to go all speculation on, for one's imagination to get all rangy and free with. Shouldn't somebody somewhere be walking down the street holding this man's hand?
I think so.
And maybe he or she is.
No, again, I have to go with he.
For why wouldn't he claim her, proclaim her?
But if your hand is in the hand of the same gender, kind, then you may have need to make the world blind, hide your love for fear others would mind. Maybe it would hurt his career or detract from it. It would make more sense then, to be so discreet. Of course then again, even if it were a she, there are those tabloids, and it would forever read "are they engaged?" or "secretly married", or "do you see her bump?" baby on the way, or "is their marriage in trouble?". Actually it might be better to be gay in the tabloids, one great big explosion, "oh my god, you know who, finally out of the closet" but then, you know, what else can they say? um...still gay. (but after the initial bang, so what? Interest can't be maintained without new/more fodder).
me-"um, why are you writing about this?" Taffy "what is it too lowbrow compared to intellectual bunny cyclops topic? Just let me finish"
so anyway- oh it doesn't matter, just...I don't know, oh never mind.

my enemy has returned

errrr..I actually killed one with my bare hands. Traps must be bought today.


what is this? I know it is a caterpillar, but what kind? It is rather nice; I hope it isn't destructive.


Rather large rabbit, who I believe is eating my rose leaves :(. Looking all cute and innocent here, munching on clover, but someone ate all the leaves and trimmed down, one of my rose bushes, cuting everything away but a dried up spent bloom. "Excuse me, but if you are going to cut away all that, you might as well dead-head the plant too!".

I think of it as my yard, but clearly they do not, and could care less. I did have to buy it though, and I do pay taxes on it, and plant the plants, and ( Bob does) mow the lawn, and water the plants, and from time to time weed. They don't care, it is theirs. The bugs were everywhere today while I watered, they kept crawling over me, and trying to fly into my eyes "hello, I am a person here, solid, go around!". The chipmunk spying me watering from within the rose bed, decided to walk toward me, rather than scurry in other direction, walked a foot and a half past me on the little path (as in no cover, out in the open), I turned to look directly at him, when he was directly behind me, so he scooted a bit faster. Some rather showy grey bird, practically flew right into me, going to a small tree, hanging out 3 feet away from where I was watering. And I swear a few bees bounced off me, so busy they were going about their business "yes, everyone, don't mind me".

I did move those flowers

to Bob's berm. You know, the one I am not supposed to do anything with. He was inside eating dinner. And.....he likes them there!! He even helped me dig 3 more holes to move 3 more of them (there are still two left to decide what to do with). He said "when we get the black mulch, they're really gonna pop" and "the berm looks so much better now". And he stopped carrying on so, about the price of dirt, and why oh why are we always buying dirt (and looking at me like I am nuts, when I say we need manure, and peat moss, and...). So I am quite pleased, it was win win. Now if only the flowers will not die. It really was rude of me to dig them up while in full bloom, but they were smothering the roses. And the color doesn't bother me at all now, they were needed where I put them. I wonder how the bees will feel about it? The bees where having a pollen party with these flowers yesterday. Do they fly there today and say "who moved my cheese?" (as per the bee dance directions of yesterday) or do they smell them (or whatever) and already know they've been moved?
I transplanted some Shastas too, and everybody looks very wilty. But still I am optimistic, I moved a verbascum awhile back, and it kept looking like impending doom, ("wwhhhy? wwhhhyy?" it whined and whimpered) no matter how much I watered it, and it did take at least two weeks, but now it looks all happy and has room to grow.
If I make it back outside today (I mean in terms of yard work) I will move two little lavender plants, which decided to appear, all sweet and pretty in a very weedy embankment.
My allercold is still bothering me, but merely a nuisance. But enough so, that I am not even inclined to go on errands and spend Bob's hard earned money on two russian sage plants, I've been eyeing.

who knew

Looking up plants. I had no idea Scotch broom was so hated. I bought and planted three. Of course the ones I bought were culitvers, hybrids, lilac time, not the yellow scourge of the western US, where it is considered a noxious weed.

Cold or allergies?

I don't know, but I feel I have had this experience, and now I would like to move on and experience something else (nothing worse though). The holding pattern, is stuffy in morning (so I wake up early and can't fall back to sleep), and throat feels thick, so eat lots of watermelon. It seems to go like that for two weeks, then once again, become something that involves boxes and boxes of tissues, and the unpleasant knowledge that I am walking around smelling of vicks vapor rub. I don't use it during the day, but...

Since it does keep going on, I suppose logic would dictate that I assume it is allergies. The last round did involve a sore throat though so, in my book that is a cold. And last night my left arm went to sleep, which is something that happens sometimes when I am sick. I was sleeping on my back (so nothing was on it), and I woke up, and it wasn't tingly, it was just gone, I had to rub really hard, over and over, from shoulder to wrist to get it back (this only happens when I am sick).
Then again I have never had allergies, so maybe this stuff can fit into that category too.
(I do not however want allergies)
and, am I allergic to the inside or the outside?
Windows open, windows closed?

Cheese wants to go to the pool, that will involve a box of tissues, a plastic bag (for used tissues), hand santizer, and water. And I will feel gross, and a bit embarassed. (but as Cheese so kindly said to me the other day "oh mom, don't worry, no one ever looks at you. In fact, you could smell disgustingly bad, and have no concern whatsoever that anyone would ever think it was you, because no one ever thinks of you, so how could they think it was you") (seriously, why do I feed this person?)

Yesterday at the pool was good. Bob was along, and I took my laptop, and ipod. The ipod is not to listen to music with, but to block out the music they blast there, which is really distracting. I did my pages while I was there, and was annoyed when my battery ran out, and I had to stop.

Cheese takes after me too much. At the pool, day before yesterday I sat down next to him (about 2 feet away) on a bench, I smiled at him, then went back to reading. Two minutes later, "what are you doing? Why are you encroaching on my personal space?" "I'm not, I am just reading. How could I be bothering you?". A minute more went by. "You are bothering me, you are interfering with my brain waves, my abilty to receive trasmissions". (uhuh, okay. I could think him quite nutty, and rude, but the thing is, I know exactly what he means). Then yesterday, I asked Bob "aren't you going to go back in the water and play with Cheese?". Bob replied "I tried to, and he told me to stop following him around". Cheese was doing laps, and being somewhere else in his head, and didn't like his dad distracting him. (I know because I asked him about it later).

I feel bad for Bob sometimes, but I am not going to write a paragraph to follow that line, instead I am going to get my draggy self up out of this chair, and go.

They have to go

They are the wrong color, and big, and there are, at least six of them, woven throughout my rose bed. I've complained about them before, but I do keep trying to make peace with them, they so happyily and vibrantly thrive. But they are dominating the bed which irritates me so, as they are not pale pink, pale purple, pale yellow, or some such creamy color. But they do fill spaces with bloom, and the little birds, and bees, seem quite fond of them. From where I sit, they are all I see, save for a pulsating fuschia cosmo that planted itself in this bed too. How is it, that such nice flowers irritate me so? (off with their heads!)

Where can I put them? Certainly not in the purple bed. The back bank, I intend to totally change next year, it just isn't working. I could put them all there, but then everytime I sat down at the kitchen table, I would be looking at a vast sea of them. And my intention is to plant low growing things there, and fill in with ground cover, as it is the tallness that isn't working.

I suppose it will be put off again till another day. I must do the hour of writing. Three roses need to be planted. And some plants are crying out that I am not properly protecting them from insects. So much weeding needs to be done, even I, can not pretend I don't notice.

The rash on my knee, that prickled (stung, itched, burned), is almost gone now. I got it earlier out about in the yard. I think I will wear pants when I go out again.

of course I am still not done

I have 23 pages yet to be typed in ( how can that be? I spent the last two hours typing and have 3,292 words from that notebook already). I must stop now and take my son to the pool. My new set up is to do one hour a day of typing, writing work, it sounds chintzy I know. But it eliminates that overwhelmed feeling, and whenever I think this is too much, I can't do this, I check the clock, and see I only have a little bit of time left, and then worry about how much I wont be able to get done in such a small amount of time, so I work harder, and faster (spend less time looking out window), and it seems to go by much quicker. And when the time is up I tend to keep going. Like now, for example, and I still wish to keep going. I don't know why, changing the time frame, changes the energy and enthusiasm I bring to the task, but it does, it really helps.

oh, but right now, I am neither doing the writing, nor taking the boy to the pool. So, enough said.

by the bye,
Cheese made this (tortilla cat) while I made lunch. He seemed pleased when I filmed it for my blog.
And yes, I did take him to the pool.

some evil women took my rose

I was merely doing a loop before I picked it up, heavy you know, and when I went back 3 minutes later, it was gone. I kept staring at the place where it had been, empty space, I walked away a couple of times and came back, as if it would some how magically appear (well I hoped the person who had it would change his/her mind and put it back). I looked at every single other rose bush there, in case it had been moved, and in case there was one other, somewhere, just like it. No to both. It was the perfect shade, pale, cream, with blushing touches of pink and apricot. I don't think it was a Dave Austin rose, but it was in that style, a modern version of old english. I am so upset with myself I can't stand it.
It was a two for the price of one sale.
The rose in the photo is grahm thomas. I bought that and glamis castle. The colors yellow and white, are not at all the same as pale pink. But they are both Austin roses in the english style, and I was pleased to come across them. If only I had picked up that other rose right away, I would be so happy right now, rather than pouty, quite irritated with the thrill of hope, becoming the weight of disappointment. My son says I care too much about it. He is right. But so many times this spring I was on the verge of having a pale pink cupped rose, and each time, it slipped through my grasp.

I'm fairly certain I know which women bought it, I saw them looking at the roses too. I feel dark, and slip into pettiness; they don't look at all to me like the sort of people who would dig a 2 by 2 hole, don't look like they'd be physically able, don't look like would bother with trying. Across the parking lot, I saw that they had two roses in the back seat of their car; I wondered if it would be worth it, to stop soaking in my ill temperament, and run over and beg them for it, make some sort of trade; could it really matter as much to them as it does to crazy me? But of course I didn't do that. I try to limit myself to only feeling crazy, rather than feeling and acting crazy.

3 am

I wish to be sleeping, but not dreaming
stupid Eragon, didn't care for it, too violent, too dark
and I watched it with my son, too close to bedtime
how I wish Bob would come home, I am always unsettled, uneasy when he isn't home. I am hoping to hear him at the door before I finish this.
I hate going to bed with eerie feelings.
I just awoke from a nightmare. And like a child, am seeing dark shadowy figures in the unlit world around me. But this light makes me uneasy too, this bright glaring computer light, revealing only me, telling my location in the dark.
I don't remember the beginning context of the dream, I remember that there was one, blurry images now. I turned the handle to a door, on purpose, and was in a different dimension, an old house, abandoned, floor rotting in places, all shades of grey and black, mostly empty, except for a few items here and there. I know I went to get something, was looking for something, and that someone else, a friend was supposed to follow close behind, but we weren't sure how any of it would work; scared at where I had arrived to alone, I rushed back to the door and turned it again, thinking I could walk back through and be back in the dimension I came from, the one I belonged in, the one I longed to be in. But nothing happened, I was trapped. I heard a sound, desparate, trying to call out to me. I saw an old mirror and grabbed it, and a girl's face appeared in it (haunting image, not everyday image of a girl) telling me I must hurry, I must hide. I was running out of time, "you need to be in something and on something, you need to be on the roof of something (an object), and be the roof for something" (something had to be on me). I rushed about in a closet, I don't remember it too clearly, I know I was under a sheet, and I had part of a vacuum cleamer on top of me, but I don't remember what I was on the roof of. The doors were opened seconds after I did this, I lay very still, I didn't know if following the rules made me invisible, or if it was some sort of game, and following the rules, granted me some sort of permission to go on. I did know, that not following them would result in ( I can't say it, surperstitious, I guess, but you know, it wouldn't be good). ( I just turned the light on. my eyes hurt for I am so tired, but now the room looks less ominous). Whatever it was, and there seemed to be odd children involved, looked in, the scene seemed monitored in some way, they were talking, and it seemed as if following some pre-written lines. I knew I hadn't followed the rules well, but I knew I had passed for the moment. I didn't know if I could just stay like this, or if the second the doors closed, if I would need to scramble again, and find another solution, another way to accomodate the rules. Could they see me between checks? Did I need to hide between checks? What was the timing interval? How would I find the object I had come for? And could it in any way help me get back home? Could I get back home without finding it? Did I wish my friend still to find a way in, to help me find a way out, or was it best if I alone was trapped here?

Oh darn it, he still isn't home. I must go back to sleep, but I do not wish to go back to that dream, or any siblings of it. Nightmares don't always sound awful when you tell them, but the experience of them is so horrible and scary, they have a feeling to them, to everything that happens in them, and even when nothing does, to every object or sight, contained there in. I suppose I will leave a light on, I don't care, well I only mildly care, how pathetic that sounds. It won't be this one though, right beside me, that reveals me. No. I need to be able to see objects through the darkness, but I do not wish to be so easily seen myself, I need a bit less light around me, so I can take some cover and be hidden.
ugh, where is that man? His job has no consideration for the way the house feels at night when he isn't in it, it doesn't feel right, it feels like something, someone, is missing.

4:20- Bob just came home, he will no doubt make fun of me, but I don't care. Maybe I can go back to sleep now, and on to other dreams, or perhaps it would be best not to dream again this night.

3 pages

1,200 words, approx. Not very far with typing up the pages, it did take me an hour and 20 minutes though, I type slow. And I only set the bar, at 1 hour, which I think is better. I am perkier while I work, if I have a one hour, stop if you want to, cut off time. The sun went down, and now I am sitting in the dark. I really liked the story today, I had happier pieces to type in. My only sadness was concern that I will never be able to do the story justice.

(the cat, my writing companion)

I think it funny

that in a story that is supposed to have tones of buddhism in it, but more certainly has many flowers.
I write buddism every time.

I haven't done my pages yet today

Yesterday involved such distractions as setting oven on fire, and impromptu meeting with mom at pet store. (she called with gift for son)
Today I had such easy plans, Bob would be around during the day and take Cheese to the pool, and I would type up the 28 pages ( well most of it) from my current notebook. But the day started with Cheese saying it hurt to pee, and calls to doctors who happened not to be there, as are on vacation. When I reached one, I found out it is unlikely to be urinary tract infection, as Cheese is a boy, but rather pool chlorine irritation. So I ran out to store and bought aveeno oatmeal soak, and also cranberry juice, just for good measure, and there is to be no pool for next couple of days. It seems I woke up, turned around and it was 5:49 pm.

I wish I could talk to Bob about writing. I tried to this morning, about there being more sad parts than I thought there would be, and how hard it is to write them. That it is one thing to write in notebook, he talks about Mai's dying, and to know that it happens, and quite another when actually writing the scene, when you feel it, rather than just tell it. I said it didn't seem like I was the one telling the story (in fact, I think parts were kept from me, just like I keep my ultimate plans for our yard a secret from Bob, till the time when they need to be disclosed, till it is too late to turn back. The story does that with me too, knowing I wouldn't keep walking forward if I saw all the winds in the path, telling me sweet bits, scents of flowers carried down the lane, moving me on.) I thought I was writing fluff, sentimental fluff. My roses have thorns, and so windy it is, no matter how still I stand, they blow into me, but with sweet scented beauty they entice me to stay. What is clear to me, is the therapy in the story, the necessity of my hearing it, knowing it, strugglng to feel all the parts I wish not to feel.

I become more overwhelmed now though, as I see it is a forest, and it feels I have hundreds of trees in my arms, and I must set them up in the exact location they belong. The pink binder is not beginning to end, it is pieces, pieces, pieces, some just toothpicks, that I must stick back in the trees from which they came. Of course I do know, which are the trees at the beginning of the forest, those inhabiting the middle, and the ones at the edge. It isn't so much not knowing, but there being too many pieces within each piece.

I'll feel so much better once I have the first rough draft, beginning to end, a framework, I can lay the work on. (A map of the forest). But being me, I am scared. (I'll get lost, it will be dark, strange noises, blisters on my feet, what sorts of animals live in here?) Once I finish typing up these notebook pages, I won't have any excuse for not taking on the next part. No excuse for not going from tree to creation of forest, but of course I will just focus on one section at a time, from tree to tree, I will lead me, through. Right, then, stop hanging here, and type those pages up...

by the bye,
that sweet little full binder is starting to feel to me like Harry Potter's monster book. The one that was like a giant spider and would try and bite your hand off.

finished that bit

finished the scene, finished off the rest of that notebook. Printed it out, 10 pages, twice, one copy for binder, one for cut and paste.
The other notebook has about 28 pages for me to do tomorrow. I do regret having waited so long to type it up, for it is very challenging reading my own writing.
I find it surprising that stuff that I have written over the years about this story, and pieces I have just added this past year, (and wondered why I was adding them, and if I should be) and the general way I work in bits and pieces, doing a sentence here, and one there, doing whatever part, of whatever scene comes- considering all that, I am surprised at how it does all seem to go together (at least to me it does anyway). It goes together better than that sentence I just wrote.
I found myself asking "is this a metaphor?"
"No, you know it isn't. They are what they say they are and so is the situation"
"yeah, but it reads like a metaphor. It reads like you are really talking about him"
"well, I am not."
"but if it is, or rather, if it also is, then it would make even more sense that this part of the story exists"
"Yes, I guess it could work that way too, but I didn't write it that way, that is just coincidence, I wrote it as I saw it. And I don't like you poking around, saying this is this, and that echoes that, on and on, it makes it all seem like some forced rhyme."
"But I think it is funny that you can be rhyming everywhere and not know it" (writing lines that rhyme and not see it at the time)
"But doesn't that make me the opposite of a poet? It makes me a blind painter, or at least a color blind one. Or is it the form that I miss, and color the only thing I see? When I finally see past each individual tree, to discover I have been traveling all along through a forest; I just feel all the more an idiot. Maybe I wont have to feel bad if the story doesn't turn out well, as it doesn't very much seem that I am the one who is telling it.
oh very late, off to bed

it's about death

it is.
I thought it was about love,
but that is why I can't stand it, why I want to run away and hide, it sings of death, as it reaches to sing of (for) life.
What a horrible scene I am writing. Not so much writing as merely typing it in, how unhappy I am to see it goes on longer, and I must type through another page of this part.
Sh*t! I just looked on ahead to encourage myself with what comes next, and more of this comes next (3 1/2 more pages)
"No, you can't skip ahead and write a different part. Finish it now, then you wont have to make it part of tomorrow"
It's going to give me sad dreams.
"yeah, well, that is why you were supposed to work on it this morning"
I hate this story
I love this story
I hate this story
I love this story
"
"
"
"
I thought this story was full of sugar coated butterflies
it's filled with everything dies
"Yes, but isn't it pretty for that moment in time, when they are here, and you are here, and you get to watch them. As you flutter and fall, and they flutter and fly, a field of butterflies. Now go back to death. It will be worse if you stop here, part way through, it will sing and reverberate through you, finish, so you can move on to the next song."

I'll be here

for the next two hours
(it is a bit over themed, but it was nice of my mom to buy me stuff for this room) (and the little light doesn't belong in here, and the walls need to be a color. And it wants for green plants)
I watered the plants- noticed a desperate need for weeding, and some dead heading, ignored it, came back inside
got some clothes together for Bob to return, he prefers to do it, I do take things back myself, but I have a tendency to then buy other things while I am there. Oh, I do keep some stuff, but I am never sure till I bring it home, what really works on me and with my wardrobe and what doesn't. Things look different (aka worse) on me at home. And something might be cute, but not work with anything I own, so then I am off looking for a particular length of short, or pant, in such a such a color, fitted, but not tight, smooth front, and often I just can't find what I am looking for to make it work, or I do but it isn't a price that works. And then Bob sees all the bags, and says "you are taking this stuff back, right?". Yes, I am just borrowing it from the store, so I can imagine for a few days how it might feel to own it. I notice then how much I do, or don't want something.

I wonder if Bob was serious about my making him lunch? I better ask. Oh, he was. I'll be right back
packed Bob lunch
made me hungry, Cheese is whining he needs pool toys for when I take him to the pool.
The cat is good, he is waiting, to sit next to me in my writing spot (Bob just hissed at him and scared him away. Playfully, but it still annoys me. He just walked out the door. I never get that he will be right here near me, then walk over to the door, then stop and say "well aren't you going to come over and kiss me goodbye?". And I think why the H didn't you kiss me goodbye two seconds ago when you were right here. Ugh.

I'm so behind schedule already.

I woke up early and joted down just a sentence or two pertaining to a scene. Then went back to sleep.
I had a dream inspired by the scene. It was really cool. But wrong ways round as usual. It would make more sense to have a dream, and then use that as inspiration for scene in story, then to see a scene in the story and use it to inspire my own dreams. So many wings. It was beautiful, breathtaking, I kept turning to follow it all with my eyes.

Darn it all, should I eat something first, or start and then take a break, or just be hungry and wait?
either way, off I go

I don't

want to go back there, inbetween those pages, and type it up, and pull more stuff out, and put it down, I don't want to feel those things, go further, deeper in, feel their feelings. It brings them alive in me.
I don't want to feel those words!!

"suck it up baby. If you really want to write, you have to. Now you know, courage is not facing the blank page, but the act of filling one. Going where it takes you."
I feel like I am bleeding, being drained, light headed and pale.
"Don't be so melodramatic (for goodness sakes, there are people in the world starving, and being beaten).
You know the drill. You breathe life into me, and I'll breathe life into you. That is how stories work. Keep going. It sucks more and terrifies you more because you are getting closer".
Closer to what?
"To where you need to go. To that which calls. Now stop hiding here, and go"
I don't want to go
"I hear Nana singing, "You can't go over it, you can't go under it, you've got to go through, you've got to go through." And anyway, who is afraid of words on a page?"
It isn't words on a page. It is an ocean of feelings. That want to drown me, swallow me down
"yeah, an ocean of feelings that you need to go through. You believe you are standing in the shallows, you think you can stand there forever, halfsoaked, at times cold and miserable, but at other times, taken with delight by the sight and sounds around you. You think you can stay there safe, waiting waiting waiting, afraid to go in deeper. But, you know, you can't turn around, you can't, you are already far (miles and miles) from shore, that is the terror that you feel, your feet not touching bottom, not knowing how deep it is under you, and what lies between, you are approaching the heart of its depth, the center of the ocean, you are no longer standing on shore, you let the currents carry you along because it seemed easy, but now are surprised to find you are deep in, treading water, there is no where to hide, it exists wherever you are, insists on being told to you, known to you. Your feet dangling, in the depths of the ocean, the vastness of space as you're falling through, the center core of you, universes overlapping. It would be best to dive in and start swimming, for it is the only way. Through"

"wimpy, whiner, crybaby, weakling, scaredy cat, chicken, wuss."

yeah, well, whatever, it is now time for this wimpy whiner crybaby weakling scaredy-cat chicken wuss to go to bed.
It was just so much easier when I knew what happened in the story, but didn't feel it happening.

creating, touching. Touching, creating.

"go to bed. But tomorrow, you will give two hours"
"P.S. Whining for two hours doesn't count"

sucks

that is why I don't work on it.
makes me sad, pulls something out of me, that I don't know is there, and lately the words make me sad.
I would understand if I modeled him after me, but it is strange, sometimes lately I will be doing something, or feeling something, and I think "oh, this is like how Mikiyoshi felt". I'm not supposed to take after him. I'm not supposed to write things about him, and see things, and then months or years later, discover I am feeling that way.
Yeah maybe I don't really want to go there. Am scared to go there, don't enjoy all the feelings that go along with being there.

the pale poppies are haunting me, making me sad, with context that is not of my own life, but of Mik's. It all crashes upon me, as I look upon them, the beauty and the pain.

Botan's voice so strong, his words, don't feel like mine, the beating of his heart...

We can't all stay suspended in time. I must go on.

I waited too long to type the stuff up, it is very frustrating because I no longer remember what I wrote, hence it is necessary to actually be able to read it, and I can't read all of it, and I spend time guessing different lines, and groups of missing words, and wonder what it is that I have forgotten, if it doesn't matter, or if it changes the essence of that which follows.

usually working on it, having it expand makes me happy, why lately does it make me sad?
It's like walking on your own grave
("I'd rather you didn't say that." " But that is what came, that is what I thought")
Is it not still a fairlytale? I thought it had wings and fluttered and flew.
yeah well, it also seems to have an anvil

Are you serious?

Because I don't think I believe you anymore.
I didn't write today. (Well not yet.)
I downloaded songs onto ipod, you know so I would have some new stuff to listen to while writing.
I over-ate.
I talked to people
I cooked
I cleaned a little
I wandered around, looking for writing blogs to read, and feel inspired by
I did eventually find a couple that might work, but by the time I got there, my head hurt. so I bookmarked and will go back
I didn't write
I didn't write
I didn't write
How can I say I want to do something if I am always not doing it?
Except of course when I am doing other things, I write around, in bits and pieces, while I am doing other things. but to sit down with the sole intention of writing; I'm not doing that. And I will never finish till I do.
I can't wait for inspiration, for mood, I have to sit regardless and do
(And I will tell you what, not this time of day either because the sun is hitting me right in the eyes.)
Ok, so morning, water plants,- eat watermelon, -write.
Every day.
Two hours, to something, you say is your dream.
Is that too much to ask?
Of you who hates to give?
no eating then, no down loading songs, no reading other stuff, for those two hours, those things can happen before or after.
Can you do this?
If not, I wont believe you anymore.
I wont believe you are serious
I wont believe this is your dream

I like sitting here

I watched a little bird hop by. Small white butterflies (or are they moths?) are visiting the purple flowers in the front bed. A bee or two has sailed by. My Husband is running errands, he will be back for a bit before he goes to work. He will not like to see me sitting here, my notebooks around me, a pen, a book, my ipod, peppermint chapstick, Macbook on my lap, all, plunked down in the formal living room. He doesn't think anyone should sit here, should mess this space up, "Why aren't you up in your studio?". And he does have a point for the studio has no such view, and therefore no such distractions. But I am sitting here quite happily watching three butter/moths (oh 5 now), looks like dancing, together, and then apart, then resting on some blooms, and the cat just came in to sit on the window ledge and watch them too, and any passing birds, or chipmunks; I am sitting back on the soft sofa, my feet up on the coffee table; I can hear my son, and his friend talking and playing upstairs; it will take a hell of lot more than an annoyed look, and a dour little speech to make me move from this spot today. (sour dour)

The cat has come over, and seems displeased that a computer is occupying my lap; he keeps looking at it, as if wishing could make it disapear, and I can tell he is considering the unfortunate notion of lying upon it, but I believe is recalling that, that didn't go over well with me the last time he tried it. He doesn't like it when Cheese shuts him out of his room, and I can feel he isn't sure quite what to do with himself. He isn't supposed to be in the formal living room either.

We are finally home, and there are no plans for going anywhere today, and there is no running about worrying about things that must be done right this moment, before this that and the other thing happen, not today.

Today would be a good day for writing.

I still have to set my schedule up, now that summer vacation is officially upon us, for what we will do when, going to the pool, writing, to make sure things happen every day. Bob wants us to have a complete schedule, with all of our time blocked out, Cheese and I feel that is an exceedingly cruel way to view summer. Bob "but then you will get everything done that you should". We don't want to get everything done that we should. We just want to make sure the things that we find the most important get done, and the rest, can just be peppered about whenever, to varying degrees as inspiration strikes.

I miss you

I went to your sister's graduation party today. I saw you, but you weren't there. We avoided talking about you, but we all thought about you, we all missed you, noticed you weren't there. When Cheese played hide and seek with your younger sister and his cousins, I so wanted to see you there running beside them. You would have taken such care, and played with little K. And when it was time to leave, and your little sister ran and grabbed Cheese to hug and try and kiss him goodbye, the way you always did, the way the two of you did, like a tag team of affection, against Cheese's protests, how could I not but miss you so, and picture you there too, hugging my son, as he looked all annoyed (but we always know he likes it).
It seems so odd that time goes on, that there could be a family party without you there (though I guess since we all thought of you, in a way you were there). We seemed to pass so many cemeteries on the way there, the sky all grey, the rain was quiet and peaceful. I refuse to think of you as in a grave
Tomorrow we go to my mom's (Aunt Mary's), to have a get together, and to celebrate Cheese's birthday from last month. I wish I could see you there tomorrow. Remember last year, when we all went fishing for his birthday? That wasn't so long ago was it? Not so far away, I still feel I could reach out through time, and be on that day. I remember it so well. You all smashed the heck out of that SpongeBob pinata...
there, there, there
Tomorrow will be hard, I will look for you, and expect to see you, and when I don't, it will all feel wrong.
Funny sunny girl, it wont be the same without you, it will never be the same.
I miss you

Not so bad

graduation get together today. Hung out, talked, mostly to my brother and sister in-law, who live 6 hours away now, so I don't see them very often. I enjoyed talking with them, I had a good time, I was happy to be where I was (so was Cheese, he was the only boy, he ran and played with his cousins). So, maybe it is just small talk that I don't like, trying to figure out what to say to people. When I already know what the common ground is, when there is a short hand to conversing, and we feel free to tell each other stories, about our kids, our lives, then I can and do enjoy hanging out with people.
so, I'm not so bad

Peace on the side

That is just the name I gave the flower clip, as it is a Peace rose.

It was good to send that little boat off yesterday, I feel better today.

And can connect with the story and the characters once again. The bit that I did write was, sadder than I would have liked, I knew the scene before, and had written parts, but today it came on harder with greater impact, I saw and felt more, it was important to feel it more fully, and express it so, for the conlusion/resolution wont be properly felt, if this other part doesn't reach its pitch (and I do have a tendency to avoid these sorts of spaces in my writing, to glide over them and say, I will go back later. So suddenly there, I knew I had to capture it, before I took flight away from it). But it is odd, to have been in a better mood, and then to feel a bit off balance because of something that a character experienced. And I have things that must be done at home today (continuation of yesterdays cleaning), and then we go to a graduation party (family). So there is no way to continue working on the story. And though I know how the story ends, still, at the moment, I am left, right where the scene I worked on, left off, inside the character at that moment, it is not a space I want to be in all day, feels uncomfortable, if I had nowhere to go, and nothing to do, I would continue on writing it, just to move on and away from that space.

I must go, the things that I need to be doing never get done unless I do them.
(no matter how I wish they would)
( I detest mopping. But someone has dragged dirt all over my kitchen floor. Ok, it was me. But the food messes are all Cheese's)

Applause

We went to a neighborhood swim party today, Cheese and I. I had trouble getting him there. It rained then cleared, but the thunder remained off and on. Just as we arrived, most of the kids got out of the water, because of thunder, and for ice cream. Cheese didn't go in the water, afraid it would lightning. I sat with the women. He ate some stuff, then sat on some rocks near the pool, by himself. After a bit I went and sat with him for a little. The other kids were inside. I then went back and sat with the women, it had felt odd to both sit there apart from everyone else, at another person's house, and Cheese wasn't talking to me, just looking down beat and glum. Also I thought it would be good for me to talk to some women. Cheese just continued looking sad and bored, and kept coming over asking when we would leave. I felt bad, so we did leave. It was awkward for both of us, this attempt at interaction. On the walk back home, Cheese said one of the ladies told him he could go inside too. I thought no one had asked him. I asked him why he didn't go, he said "why bother". I think he felt, he would just be inside not talking to anyone, as opposed to outside not talking to anyone. The women were nice to me, but the whole thing just made me feel, that we are more on the outside, then I felt before.

Cheese isn't very social. I feel bad that I haven't given him skills to help him mingle with other people. But I don't know how to give him what I don't have. I never know what to do or say. Cheese does have two kids now that he hangs around with (which makes me feel so much better, I used to really worry about him). We are not good at bending toward other people. Cheese wont play kickball, as all the other kids do at recess, he digs in the dirt, or makes words with the mulch out on the playscape. He will do what he prefers to do, even if that means he will be doing it alone. (and it usually does mean that).

Fifth grade graduation was this week. I was worried about the applause. (Whenever I am at school, I notice, that the kids all seem to be nice to my son, they let him borrow their books, and crayons, help him find stuff in his desk, and say hi to him, but he often doesn't say anything back.) Different kids did get different amounts of applause, everyone got some, there was always standard clapping, but beyond that, there was quite a range of degree. Well, I thought to myself, I am right here, and so are my husband and my mom, surely we can clap loud. When they called his name, those kids burst into thunderous applause. I didn't need to hoot, or clap hard, there was no space that needed to be filled with sound. They smiled, they looked at him, some kids put their hands up for a high five (but of course my son wouldn't high five them). He just trudged up to get his diploma/ certificate.

Bob and I talked about it later, when Cheese wasn't around, how surprised we were. I mean to us, it seemd he was in the top three, for most/loudest clapping, out of some 96 kids (def. top 10). I'm not sure why they clapped so, I have to assume that they like him. And I am so grateful. (I know he is not popular, earlier this year, he told me all about top tier, popular kids, and second tier, the rest of the kids. And he is one of the rest of the kids. Which is good, as long as he and some of the other second tiers, get along together; as long as he isn't the only one is his tier, some third or fourth one.)

( he does have artistic talent, he is smart, and funny, but I don't know how much the other kids could know about it if he doesn't talk to them. I have heard the kids talk about how shy he is.
My mom joked, that they clapped so because the other kids always helped him find his assignments in his desk, therefore they felt that his graduation directly related to them.
I think it has something to do with his personality, he is just so himself. I don't think many of them covet his friendship, but I do think they enjoy the quirky element that is Cheese. They do seem to care about him)

Today, after he sat alone on those rocks, not talking to anyone, and I felt bad for him, and worried about his self-esteem, from feelings of rejection or disinterst of other kids; I thought about yesterday, and those applause, and I could feel better, I could feel that he is going to be ok. The thought of Middle school makes me nervous, there will be lots of kids there who don't know him, don't understand his ways; but in time, I believe they will find that they do like him, and that his overall experiences there will be alright. (and I am going to force him to pick some club or activity to join toward that end) . About an hour after we got home, a kid he really likes from school, called to set up a day when he could come over and play. The first time outside of school they will be getting together. And I could breath again. Thank you God.

(by the bye, this isn't from today)

I'm not sure about, how I am made

I am reclusive

I like being pulled along within myself, not being pulled out of myself.

I guard my time, and I guard my self.

(this is an overly long post, I know, overly telling too, but these thoughts have been heavy upon me lately, and I wish to set them in this boat, and set it to sail, moving off, so lighter feelings may prevail)

I like to go gorcery shopping, and working on my flower garden, and watching TV (primetime, Oprah, movies), and going to the beach ( being quiet while there, walking the beach and boardwalk, bike riding, reading, staring at the ocean, listening to the birds. Feeling the sunshine and the sand. I love the way the beach smells.), I like to read, I like to paint and sketch, (apparently I also like to blog). I love my ipod; I dance around my bathroom while I brush my teeth. I enjoy singing badly and often. I am a perpetual daydreamer (I still crush on people, much the way I did when I was 14. Anderson C has been holding that spot for a while now). I like zoos, aquariums, botanical gardens. I like sitting in the car, watching the world go by, daydreaming and thinking. I enjoy food, but don't often have any good meals (my cooking isn't good). I like to research. I like art, and ideas, and I love books. I love that books are filled with information and ideas, worlds tucked inside, voices taking you to the past, pulling you into a possible future, or just carrying you along inside someone in a way you wouldn't otherwise be. I like the old dictionaries with pictures. I have a copy of, The Volume Library, first copyright 1911, last 1948 (I got it at a used book sale) it has all kinds of stuff in it, it's cool. I love book stores. I love words. I like to struggle with my writing, rushing ahead then pulling back, feeling empty, feeling overly full; being told things that, hit my soul like the sight of sunset lit clouds hits my eyes. What entertains me would bore most people, and what others find entertaining, I often find boring. I like seeking those moments when something ordinary will reveal itself as extraordinary. I am quiet to listen, so as to hear. No, I don't want to play cards; no I really don't. I do like playing Uno with my son, (he likes to slam me with cards, and I enjoy payback, we are evenly matched). But I don't like most games. I don't know why I don't, part of it I suppose is because I am a poor loser, and often lose (monopoly has brought me to tears more than once, I now refuse to play. I'm always broke and in jail! It's really depressing.); but it isn't the end, so much as the journey, playing itself that I don't enjoy. How can I not enjoy playing games? I don't know, but I don't. I'm more content with other content.

I do however, enjoy being silly. I like nonsense, verbal nonsense, and physically jumping about with my son. The other day Cheese was annoying me for sport, so I threatened him. I said "If you don't cut it out, I'm going to beat you!" He said "No, you wont". I said "Oh, yes I will. I will. I really will!". He rolled his eyes at me. So I jumped up and looked about. I went over to the box of tissues pulled one out, walked over to my son and said "You are really going to want to close your eyes for this honey, because I am going to beat you and you aren't going to want to see it coming". He looked both horrified and amused. He closed his eyes half way, and I proceeded to swat him enthusiastically with the tissue, which brought him to fits of giggles "Close those eyes!" I repeated "Do you want to witness such a gruesome act?". He nearly fell off the sofa, over the ridiculousness of it all. Then I put down the tissue and sat on the sofa "See I told you I would beat you. And I did". That I like, absurdity. Not very good parenting, as it was more of a reinforcer than a punishment. Because neither one of us knows what he will get, I could just say "stop it" a hundred times,or I could get really mad and send him to his room without privileges (right to play video games and watch TV), or I might respond with a bunch of silly nonsense; it seems that it is quite worth it to him, to try again and again to see what might occur on any given day.

When my son and I are in the right mood together it is like riding a perfect wave. We have so much fun. There are plenty of other times, when it feels like being his mom is one long pop quiz, or test, and I am forever getting the answers wrong (frequently I don't even understand the questions). He does like to quiz me on stuff, he knows I don't know, which only adds to this feeling. Cheese and I are alike in temperament, "get" each other, are alike in sense of humor. So I enjoy him, even when he is driving me crazy, and even when I feel I am messing up. I just want tons and tons of chances, because sometimes I do get it right, sometimes I get it wrong, and most of the time I am in the middle, but always, I want to see what today and tomorrow have to offer us.

I don't like gossip, I don't drink, I don't like politics. Getting high for me, is smelling a ripe peach, or strawberries, or concord grapes. I love the way those things smell. I don't like jokes, I don't. I do like bad puns though (the happier the more horrible). I don't like sports, watching or playing. I like walking and exploring on foot, or by car. I like to travel, as long as I have a book, notebook and pen, bottled water, and access to good bathrooms. I don't understand dark comedies, or the three stooges, or Jack*ss, or punk'd. I don't like scary movies. (alien and giant whatever movies are fine). I do enjoy Grey's Anatomy and the like, so I do have some things in common with other people (that is reassuring). I like our annoying cat. There can be no doubt as to why he ended up in the shelter where we bought him, but he fits in here nicely. (by the by, I like Bob too)

Sometimes I feel like I am made wrong. I have no friends (except for holdovers, one from childhood, the other one from college, we send emails), and it feels like a person really should; isn't that part of being human? But I am content with how I spend my time and my days, and never feel I have too much time alone, but often feel instead, that I haven't had enough. That is weird isn't it? Shouldn't everyone have friends? Friends enrich your life, you support each other, share ideas and feelings, and make each other laugh (I know I am missing out on all that. That feeling of connection, involvement). Sometimes it feels like no one likes me, and maybe no one does, that is a sad thought, but I couldn't and wouldn't change me to have other people like me; I wouldn't know how to even if I wanted to, and I wouldn't want to lose my time, to give up time for people (sort of odd, looking at it, there on the page, doesn't everyone want to give up time for people, real people, actual people? But I believe it is a true sentence). I check to see if it is just a symptom of insecurity. Do I feel this way simply because I know I come across as incredibly dull, or as daff- dumb? And there is that, that is part of it. I thought I was much better as I got older, but I still feel exposed and like I said something stupid after I am with people, it is just before it used to happen all the time, because I was around people a lot more (school, and work), now it only happens every once in a while, because I am mostly at home (I don't feel insecure with Bob and Cheese). But as far back as my memory goes, while I have enjoyed people, I have always been content to be alone, to sit and play and daydream. Content in my own head, and not in any rush to be around others; they always change the narrative of games. Other people don't like it when you drift along in your head to somewhere else, they are always calling you back. I have always been my own best companion. So, I know part of it, is just me, the way that I am made. I suppose it would all be ok if I could get over the notion that there is something wrong with the way that I am, ok to be predominantly solitary. I like people, that isn't the problem, but I lean towards being antisocial. It does concern me at times. Bob and Cheese have to ferret me out of my burrow. I feel bad for them. And yet, truth is, I don't want to change. I asked Bob if he felt gypped that I am the way that I am. He said no, except for the whole cooking thing, that he is never going to get any good meals. (yeah, I find that disappointing too. I have tried, and tried. I've tried harder at that than I have at being friendly and still, no good).

Ugh, then and than are driving me nuts, I know I am forever messing them up, I look them up, and still I mix them up.

Summer vacation is just about to start, and I wont really spend time with anyone but Bob and Cheese. I'll go to my mom's a couple of times, but that is it. We will go to the pool, but I won't talk to anyone there, I will take a book, and my writing, and hopefully one of Cheese's friends, so he wont constantly harass me to go into the water. There wont be friends over for cook-outs. It is unlikely we will go out to eat with anyone. Bob will go skateboarding with his friends, and also hang out with them now and then. The last two vacations we were on, other people were along to, extended family, and while I like the people, I actually prefer it when it is just the three of us. I am more relaxed, I have a better time, no one tries to make me join in and do things I don't want to do. I only have two people talking to me, rather than 9 or more. That sentiment just shocks me, I know fair well it is true, but what sort of person feels that way?

It just feels like I am made a bit different, and every now and again (like now), I wonder if that is ok, but I guess it has to be, because that is me.
This is me.

digging holes

2 yesterday and planted 2 roses
2 today and planted 2 roses
I like digging the first foot of the holes, but the second one makes me miserable; right about the time I hit the shale, I stop having a good time.
One more to do, and I am going nowhere near it tomorrow.
I've been a bit melancholy the last two days, which has surprised me.
(I do know why, but it is a perpetual thing, so why be bothered about it now, and I always think it through and reach the same conclusion, so why upset myself over it at all, and force myself to think it through yet agian?) It is probably just the lack of sleep.
My mood has been so pervasive I haven't heard my characters at all.
I think it has broken, the gloomy spell, I sure hope so.
I can never leave me, and I much prefer being with me when I am sunnier.

I don't know

I am blogging but not posting, one yesterday and one today. Maybe I should post them, maybe I shouldn't, I don't know.

chipmunk?

chipmunk

I was watching her the other day while digging and planting, but could never figure out what she was up to, because she would always statue when I looked at her.
She wasn't fooled by my pretending to be interested in digging once more, when I turned to look, she was still unmoving. After I gave up and got back into digging again, forgetting about her for some time, when I would look again, she would be gone. I think they can sense, breathing or heart rate or something, she knew when I was lost in thought and daydreaming, and when I was pretending to be busy but just waiting to track her movements.
I wasn't the only one who was curious though, when I went to answer the phone, she came over, sat on the stump and checked out the hole I had dug. And then later when I went to get water, she came and sat on the stump and checked out the rose I had planted.
I think it rather unfair that she got to see what I was up to, but I still don't know what she was doing.

by the bye,
I will do another chipmunk photo another time, If I can get a clearer picture.

wrong color

Drat.
I thought they would be white, palest yellow, or maybe even light purple. The color scheme is all wrong. I must have planted them from seed, and they didn't bloom at all last year. Now the plants are over 3 feet high, and very full of flowers, that clash, bothering my eyes, and sensibilites. I want to move them, but to where? And it will create empty spaces. Some Shasta daisys are coming up elsewhere so I could put them there, though they are much smaller. And then there will be empty spaces where the shastas are. ( annoying, but what a preferable problem to have. If one must be vexed, by all means vex me with flowers).

Rained, so we ran errands, and didn't dig, for the best I guess, as I'm very tired, and feel as though it would be quite easy to just happen to slip into a coma.

I have a Cheese quote from today "Doing nothing is more fun than doing anything". He does do stuff, but puttering about stuff, like Legos and video games, and drawing.

oh, just had my eyes closed for a bit, better take my contacts out.

Once again not typing in my writing from notebooks (I'm afraid I will start thinking, thinking keeps me up at night, better not to start. I've had this problem in the past.), way behind now, and there is plenty on the schedule for the rest of the week, graduations, a birthdays party, pool party, invite to go make kieffles (sp?) with mom and grandmother (Cheese says no way is he spending the first day of summer vacation doing that), and of course I have to plant 4 more roses (the sooner the better so as they don't die). By Monday things should be cleared up, plants planted, and nothing on the schedule as of yet.

Why does it seem so easy to fall asleep when trying to stay awake, and so easy to stay awake when trying to fall asleep?

at the moment

So very tired, keep falling asleep around 12:30, !:00 am, and keep waking up at 5am and can't fall back to sleep. This might seem like a lot of sleep to Martha Stewart, or Anderson Cooper, but it doesn't to me. 7 1/2 is my bare minimum for function, and 9 is much better. (more than that has ill effect). (this has been my sleeping, or not sleeping, pattern for about 3 weeks now. I guess I am going to have to force myself to get into bed at 10pm and see if I can start falling asleep earlier)
There is nothing Taffyish to eat in this house. I can't find any breakfast. Truly fruitless.
I am supposed to be digging. I didn't dig yesterday because of having trouble walking when I woke up, seems my back is unhappy with my latest project. (and anyway it was my last full day before Cheese gets out of school, so I went to the mall. I'll only go there during the summer, if my son really really makes me mad, as a punishment for him.). To sound perfectly grumpy, whiney, and way old, I'm tired, my throat hurts, my back hurt again this morning, and there is no breakfast. Plus, I have to leave for a school function, a little after 1pm, and it would be best if I didn't go covered in dirt, and smelling like dehydrated cow manure. I could spend the time writing, maybe I will, what I really want to do is nap, but I am not a napper, I can't do it, and the two times I can ever remember succeeding, I didn't fall asleep at all that night. My stomach is making me feel sick, I should go buy watermelon but that would take up all my time.
I did however manage to fill the fountain, feeling quite bad for the little finch, as he wondered where the water had gone to.
That is all, at the moment, I am just stuck in the physical, stuck in my body, and it feels rather lousy, not horribly bad, not like being crushed by something, but certainly not at all good. And my imagination it seems is sleeping, how my body wishes it could too.

Fortune cookie

Yesterday, after dinner,

(not very good by the way, Bob was supposed to call and ask me what I wanted from the Chinese place, instead just brought home whatever. We don't ever go, so there is no "the usual". I prefer Wegman's asian bar, and to pick the food out myself.)

I was looking at my unopened fortune cookie, and thinking, wouldn't it be nice, if they really did tell you something specific to you, like if mine would say "If you keep writing you will be published one day", or "don't bother..do this_____instead", if they were like that, if you really could know something about yourself and your life, and your future from a cookie. That would be kind of neat. (freaky too)
Then I opened it, and it said "Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life's coming attractions." I thought that wasn't bad, probably as close to something that would make me feel my request was answered, as I could get. Cheese's cookie had something to do with, only the prepared person has a right to make their speach with confidence. So mine, was much better, at being something I would like. And mass produced fortunes aside, I'l take my pep talks where I can get them, thank you fortune cookie for telling me to keep writing.

holes

I felt a bit like I was in the movie Holes today, but at least the..well I was going to say the weather was pleasant, instead of the scorching hot of the movie (while they dug their holes) but as it rained on me several times, I am not certain that pleasant is the exact right word. I finished yesterday's hole, and planted a rose (wish they hadn't suggested 2 feet by 2 feet, the two across are easy, but the two down, I can't quite do, I can get to 1 1/2 no problem it is just after that.. I haven't made it deeper than 23), dug another hole, and planted a rose, started two more, but as I have run out of peat moss, and daylight, I am waiting for the rest till tomorrow.

My hands hurt, wearing gloves annoys me, so pretty much so I don't. I should take off my wedding ring, it is giving me a blister.

The space looks much better with the roses planted in it, even though they are super tiny (shocked I was, when they came in the mail). We took up some dying evergreen ground cover, and it left this huge empty space in the middle of my bed. It looked odd with roses and things planted on both sides, and stripped bare in the middle. I could actually feel my breath coming more evenly once I started filling in this space. I also moved some self planted cosmos, that were crowding the roses I planted last year, over into this section. Little by little making progress.

P.S. Bob just dissed me for hole over-kill in my post. "How many pictures of holes do you need?". yeah, yeah, yeah, my blog, I can be as boring and as redundant as I want to be.

meaner demeanor

I think I am past it now.
Yesterday's three rose plants purchased (bushes), and soft serve ice cream cone (the boy's idea not mine), along with digging a 2' by 2' hole, seemed to help.

I have a lot more holes to dig (for plantings) today, so if I start getting snippy, I'll know it is time to get thee outside. I'm not feeling drawn there at the moment, because it is overcast and looks like rain; but that is probably a good reason to go outside and dig, because it isn't unbearably hot. It was pleasant enough outside yesterday, but in the car, I couldn't help but comment that I felt like a baked potato, being forever baked in the intense heat of an oven, all dried out and shriveling up, and still baking baking baking.

The research I was reading, got me interested in reading some Japanese literature from the 1930's on. Which would no doubt be helpful, but if I do all the research things that occur to me, than I shall never get around to writing, for it would take me years and years and years. I am a slow reader, and a rather hop-scotchy one, jumping back and forth from one to another, rather than reading one at a time straight through (unless something grabs me and pulls me in, and wont let me go till it has unfolded completely in my mind). I guess I will attempt some sort of survey thing, where I get a notion of things, ideas covered, and read parts.

I find my mind wanders over to Cricket and Pansy, (Clara and Sarah), and Fresh Oranges, but I wont go there now, I am trying to stay focused and work on one project at a time (when you mix in family, and gardening, and day to day responsibilites), it becomes important to narrow my focus on one thing (project), if I am to get anything done. But I do like to jump back and forth, and now feel the restraint of staying put. Edward Hooper, on CBS Sunday Morning, had me thinking of painting again. I have felt pulled towards it from time to time over the last couple of months, but I won't go. I don't know what is genuine anymore, what creative endeavors should be taken up, to enrich and play off ideas, and help increase each other; and which ones are procrastination, fear disguised as an urge to paint, or work on another writing project. In the past wherever I felt called, I would have gone to, and abandoned whatever I had been working on, for months, for years. Picking up and putting things down, over and over, putting in a sentence, or a scene, and then going off again. For once, I want to finish something, not forever be undone. ( I keep looking at the unfinished painting on my easel, it is about three feet to my left, and my mind starts to flow over its surface, filling in the incomplete places, increasing the focus so I can see the softly blurred areas become clear. From mist to form. I will answer, I will pick up brush and you will be finished, but not today, not today, not today). I have promised Mikiyoshi, I have promised myself, to do this one thing first. I wonder if I did pick up a paint brush and start gliding colored oils across, if Mikiyoshi and Koji would come get me, if I would still hear their voices, and they would tug at me, and pull me back to them, or if this act would completely immerse me, and block them out, and I wouldn't hear them again for weeks or months.

I made myself a promise, it was not to climb Mt. Everest, it was not to end world hunger, or stop war, it was not to be a great incredible wonderful person, it was not even to lose 10 pounds. Nothing of great act, or great sacrifice, nothing impossible, I made myself a promise that I would finish writing this story, that is it, that is all, simple, self-centric, that is what I have asked of me, that is what I have pledged to do.
and as that is all that I ask, all that I ask is, don't let me down.

well I do also ask, that I don't be a horrible person, and that I be a decent wife and mother. Speaking of which, my son has been here about 30 times while I wrote this, showing different lego pieces. He keeps adding and subtracting different hats, and weapons from this lego guy, and showing me each difference. Thank God, I am softer today, and not annoyed, I see that he needs me to be interested in what he is doing, and today I will make sure he feels I am, give him the attention he seeks.
I will have to set up some time for things, a schedule for summer, two hours a day, that is writing time, and we can all agree is not time for people interaction. My husband just came in snapping his fingers again and again and again on the back of my chair, until I asked him to stop, gave him a hug and asked him what he wants to do. Today I will try to be more malleable. I will surrender to family. Cheese keeps coming in now and showing me different Lego pieces and saying "Did they have this piece when you were a kid?". I don't enjoy responding "I don't think so". I feel like we are playing a game titled, Boy You are Old!.

I have to go, I can't even read this over, I can't read more than a sentence without family chatter, so I shall surrender now.

sometimes, it feels as though I can't do

anything without stopping to jot down a few notes.
for while I am not actively creating, lately
I am earnestly listening, to find if i can hear, a bit more, of the story

as I go about my day
I am steeped in voices
fading in and out of time
who and where, am I
Miki is I-Koji is I- I am I
How my mind flutters back and forth between the three
site, sound, smell, promoting an observation or thought, from one of us three
Japanese man, little bobtail cat, American woman
strange company within me, coexisting so serenely,interacting (Koji and Mik), and overlapping, yet each thought separate
so that my notebook is filled with
Mikiyoshi-
Koji-
Me-
over and over, followed by the thoughts of, or words of each, feelings, and what scene, or what time, (for them). So I will be able to go back through and connect the scenes, parts, and beings, with themselves, with others.

me-putting on make-up. I hear- "as he stood by the river..."- and I see Mikiyoshi, and the narrative goes on.

Koji and Mikiyoshi both go back and forth between being I and being he.
I still might tell the story as third person omniscient. But more and more Koji scrambles for I (and Mik is the occasional, I within the I).
I know why the cat wants to tell the story. And I also know why the past needs to be interwoven within the present. As todays actions are releasing them (time, memories) within the character, and both move together...
However both these things, the cat, and the time thing, make it a more complicated tale to tell.

by the bye,
poppies are symbolic in and of the story

P.S Dear Lord, I must sign the boy up for more summer activites, the school year hasn't even ended yet, and he is constantly in my face with, "I am bored". Complained when I was outside, refused to come out with me. Now I am here on my computer next to him, so he can go online on the other one, as he begged and pleaded so to do; and he just talks and talks and talks, "now I am doing this, now I am here, do you know about this, and that, and"...it is all legos, which are cool, but...really this is my idea of too much information.
Bob has a blog now, maybe cheese should have one too, if they are so keen on constantly narrating their lives, they need to expand their audience rather then use just me. They aren't this way with each other, I know because I have tried to pawn them off onto each other. It doesn't work. Yes, yes, I know, am horrible dreadful person. Intently listening for the voices of fictional people and trying rather desperately to drown out the real ones of those around her (people that I do in fact love). But seriously, the fictional ones, say things that I find more interesting.

well not all the time, sometimes Cheese and Bob really talk to me (you know thoughts and feelings, other than "did you see those girls doing yoga on the fitness channel?" and "on level 32, you have to go.."...over this and under that, and buy these and these evolve into those, and this does this, and that does that, and on and on and on. They both like to explain things to me in great detail, and tell me how to play, and do things, I hope to never do, and wouldn't be able to remember any of, at all, even if I wanted to.). They can both be quite funny. But most of the time they aren't really talking to me. And I don't know why I am expected to forever serenely listen to people, who don't even pretend to listen to me? Sorry I am in a bad mood, I was happy outside, and am miffed to be in, and no longer riding a pleasant narrative wave.

and I feel guilty, for being angry, and having such an awful personality.

What a horrid post, all dreamy and happy about the unreal, and showing my stinginess to those real.

time is wrong, it's after 3pm

last two days

Bob around a lot.
Brakes didn't work while we were out and about yesterday, emergency pull over, quite scary. Vacuum hose wore out. Spent a good bit of time sitting in a parking lot, and then at car place, till we got a ride home. I did sketch parts of Mikiyoshi's garden while in the parking lot (this made me more aware, of the importance of getting this set down right, which no I haven't done yet), but chose to read junky magazines at car place. Otherwise, been doing research. Having trouble finding out when works by Jane Austen would have been published in Japan. 1950s are my best guess so far. I know Anne of Green Gables was published there then. And with the American occupation, Faulkner, and Hemingway, et cetera. I spent a lot of time trying to, but didn't find much out. My eyes still hurt from reading this long document, which I am still not done with, that covered some stuff that might help me in other areas but doesn't answer this question. I think I will call my local library tomorrow and see if they have any insights.
This question involves that same character, the one who gets no face time in story anyway, but this was an important detail, so I need to verify it. Through it, I also saw past the end of the story, as I had intended to tell it, and saw into the future of the main character. Which is kind of cool, and kind of, like, well do I go on and tell this part now, or allude to it in some way, or just end the story where I always thought it ended, which is before this part. It might take away from the impact of what I have considered to be the final scene(s).
too tired, talk tomorrow

Who is that peeping from her hole?

Why, it's Mrs. Vole!

what is it really, that I am afraid of?

(in the writng)

I think it is that I don't know what I am doing, where I am going, how to do it. My lack of ability, skill. These vast dark areas of unkowing, in myself, and in the story.

But as I type the words from my notebooks into my computer, they expand, as they always do. I always seem to know more than I thought I did. It unfolds, it tells, it knows, it reveals. So then, how can it be, the not knowing that I am afraid of? Is it the knowing? Knowing the story more fully. Is that part of what I am afraid of?
Why?

I don't understand.
Why am I scared?
I understand fearing the blank page (as I surely do fear it),
but why would I also fear the full page?

It (the story) just echoed again, in/on itself, I didn't expect it. Usually this makes me happy, once again catching sight, of a little thread that is woven through the whole thing creating harmonies (or perhaps redundancies, but I wont ask that question till after the draft is done). But this time, I feel ill. Maybe it is because I saw it through the character's eyes, and this little piece of echo, knocked the air right out of his lungs.
The dread, is it his, mine, ours?
both, all. We both have to go through, to come out the other side.
Maybe I'm seeing too much
maybe his journey tells me too much about mine.
Heart falling straight down, through space, on and on.
yeah, I don't know why, but I am scared.

sighing, as I type parts of story up, yeah it isn't just that one scene, it's the whole thing, feeling the emotional weight of it today.

too much behind

I ended up spending much of last night, downloading music and creating a cd for my son (as I had promised awhile ago to do, and as he insisted I finally come through on)

and now Bob is watching TV in next room, and talking to me about everything he sees. Paris Hilton out of jail,- some tricked out motor vehicle. I had to put ipod on so I wouldn't continue to be distracted by the TV itself. Husband different story. I could go upstairs now, that is where he was, up there, on his computer when I set up camp down here. He has to shower soon, though. By the time I relocate, so will he.

Chipmunks chasing each other in front yard. Driving cat nuts. Are they courting or fighting?

I feel like sketching Mikiyoshi's garden. It would involve some research, (books and net), and probably go on, once layout set, to include drawing paper, and colored pencils (or such), sounds like sneaky procrastination to me. Yes, I will need to do it, but I should type up the pages I was supposed to do yesterday first. Bob just said something, wonder what it was? Turned down ipod, talking about Pink song-now Moby Dick, it wasn't considered a success till author was dead-. I think he is done now, I'll put music back on. Talking again, so I turn it down, this time he was talking to the cat.

speaking of Bob, why didn't he just tell me my capris were too low, or my shirt too high, rather than, film it, call me over, show it to me, and laugh? Oh, because he is a spouse, right. This one (photo/still) isn't so bad, I'm opting not to show the other.

so, off I go

with a longer shirt, and higher denim capris (by the bye)

back for a sec.,
to add, I don't have the best bum glue (it is said, that is who is a writer, the one who can make themselves sit in the chair the longest, and get the writing done). No, I don't have the best bum glue, it is more like I have fire ants in my chair. Ok, must go back to where I just was, in Nisus wrtier express, before the ants got me. Bob watching female kick boxing (really likes it), and saying maybe we should, maybe we shouldn't go to Trader Joes.

counting calories

I took a break while sick, but now I am back to it
boring
and I have a tendency to lie.
either over-estimating or underestimating. I figure in a week, over-all, it will work out.
1,500 when exercising. 1,200 when not.
I walked 3.338 miles today, that isn't a full work-out, but will probably be what I do this summer. I'm only asking for three days a week. I kept the calories lower today, because I can't recall the last time (before today) that I exercised.

I remember when my Nana died, and I found some of her old notebooks. I liked all the writing, poems, and diary stuff I found, but there was also a lot of bible study stuff, which is good, except I could see her constantly struggling on paper to be a better person (not necessary, she was already fabulous), and many days through out the years, of calorie counts, and measured food. It felt like her longest running diary, her life reduced to numbers on a page, struggling against herself, measuring herself, successful or not, good or bad, by how those stupid numbers added up. I hated them, I was looking for more of her, her thoughts, her words, not how much she did or didn't eat in a day. I think of that now, whenever I count, when page after page of a notebook is filled with numbers, measuring my ability, to measure and count, and contain the amount I eat. About how I felt when I saw her numbers, I wanted to scream to her, back through time, "Just enjoy it, your time, your life, it is all gone too soon, be who you are, there is nothing wrong with who you are, right now. Food is not your enemy; please don't you be your own enemy, embrace it, taste it, relax".
But I say to myself, it is just for a short time (and I know that will be true), I just need to see more closely and clearly, what I am consuming, in hopes of dropping a couple of pounds.

My son will look over at me, measuring cup, measuring spoons, ( I should really have a scale for ounces), and shake his head from side to side, "that is so sad, that is just so sad". I agree, pathetic too. It doesn't go with my food philosophy, which is, to eat real food, prepared well, and really enjoy it. ( and if one isn't stressing out about all sorts of stupid stuff all the time, then one isn't that likely to over-eat.

What? No I didn't finish today's writing pages.
Ok, off I go

by the bye,
that is 1,152.5 not 11,525!

The more I have

the more I want.

I would have thought the more flowers I planted, and the more in bloom they became, the more I would be pleased, satiated, and move on. But the farther along it gets, the more I see how far there is to go, the more it kindles within me a desire to be fully saturated. Engulfed in scent and bloom. The more it awakens a plant lust. My poor husband thinks we are nearly done (thinks I am nearly done) for the spaces in the beds will soon be filled. But now I know (understand, see), I have only begun. It is hard for me to wait. I know I must. Years must play a part. But all over the yard, places call to me, I see beds, where now stands grass. I want desparately to pick up the shovel, dig up the sod, create other beds, and go buy flowers to tuck into them. Financially I know I mustn't do it. But there aren't enough flowers, not here in my yard, and certainly not in any of the other yards I drive past. "Where are all the flowers? Why do they just have a few? Why aren't there more?" I ask Bob. He talks of time and money, and maintenance. "Oh pish, takes time to weed and landscape non-flowering plantings". But I forget, I do spend time out in the yard, I do like to dig holes, and plant things, I like to dead-head, and prune, and water. The only thing I find tedious, and don't do like I should, is weeding.

I am hoping to convince Bob that we need some roses tomorrow, for the little planting out by the driveway. He envisioned evergreens, I planted rose of sharon. I have to take small steps, if he sees clearly where I am going, he is bound to try and stop me. I don't know why he would bother though, whatever becomes mine, whatever has little flowering faces planted in it, becomes my responsibility. It is only where I have no interest that I take no care. And those areas are all left to him, and his sparten plantings, and weeds.
Anyway, that wasn't where I was going, I meant to go here- I asked the lady at the gardening center if the roses would continue to be on sale, and she said "yes, they aren't selling well this year". I was surprised, told her how well mine are doing, and how they actually seem to give me more for my effort than my other perennials. She said "Roses. Yes, good, if you don't mind the thorns". I thought she must be joking. What is there to mind? It isn't a sofa, it's a flowering plant. However could I manage to mind? The only trouble with thorns is if you deadhead on a windy day, but even then, not so bad, as to put it off till another day. They are so worth it. Thorns are no deterrent at all, not enough of a bother to earn words like tolerating, certianly no reason to go without the beauty of roses. Fill my fields with roses, thorns and all, come come come. Roses may have been hard to grow in the past, but they aren't now, really truly they aren't, I wish more people would realize that, and the drive down the road I live on, and to my son's school, would be filled with flowers. Fill me with flowers.

I'm even starting to like foliage, straight up; like painted ferns, and wormwood. Some ivy would be nice. I got so disgruntled with Bob last week for scraping some of the moss off the brick walkway. "What are you doing?!!!". I water it and try and encourage it to grow, and he takes a shovel and just scraps it off.

11:30 am, I must be off. (now even later) I can either procrastinate writing by exercising, or exercising by writing, but I can't procrastinate doing both by blogging and looking up roses on the net (which is what I have done thus far).

good day.
I am to finish writing in all the noteook stuff to the computer today. That is what must be done.