Don't Let the Door Hit You...2013

It's easy to think badly of 2013 because it had some low points, but any year that leaves you still standing on the very last day isn't all bad. Still, I'm glad to have a brand new year in which to continue the good fight. Important things will take place in the 12 months that lie before us. Things like: hiking, camping, writing, family visits, reading, time with friends, and a hundred more things at least. I put hiking and camping first because those activities always improve the mind and the mood which are necessary for all the others that follow.

I'm well-stocked with books and companionship. A nice bit of non-monetary wealth to begin the year. Not so well-stocked with free time. Maybe one of my resolutions will be to quit whining about having time for myself. (You can only hope)

Have a wonderful New Year's Eve and, more importantly, make tomorrow a memorable day. Start off on the right path then stick to it.

Lost in Space

The last time I wrote in my blog was December 8th. I got derailed by the season as its pace became frantic, demanding more time and energy than I could spare. Just before Thanksgiving, a new baby joined our cast of characters. Already tired out from Thanksgiving, I was dealing with a cat who was quite sick. That problem was brought under control, then she was diagnosed with diabetes. My mantra for a few weeks was, "Are you freaking kidding me?" While I was trying to maintain my orbit, my oldest granddaughter turned five. An important birthday for all concerned; a step over the threshold leaving babyish things behind and entering the domain of childhood proper. We had guests for a few days but they stayed in a hotel, making it a different style of visit. Less intimate. The winter solstice arced through our cold and dark psyches and was much-appreciated for all that this short day implies. Winter can never be over with unless it first begins. Christmas happened. I always feel like I've had my head held under in a barrel of water until Christmas arrives. On Christmas morning, the hand holding me down is lifted and I can breathe again. I don't think this is in any way a proper feeling to have about Christmas, but that's my truth. In fact, it occurs to me that the barrel has become part of my holiday ritual. Guess I'd better do something about that. New Year's Eve is tomorrow and I love the arrival of each and every new year. Beats the hell out of the alternative, eh? I'm one of those fools who makes resolutions. It seems like most people think it's a waste of time, or maybe all the people who love making their hopeful lists are too busy fine-tuning that new set of goals to care what the naysayers are nattering on about. I accomplish, in part, most of my resolutions. I've even added a new dimension to my ritual: a condensed history of 2013 to remind  future me what was going on during these years that have started going by so fast.

I don't feel lost in space any longer. My trajectory is improving, getting further from earth's gravity so I can survive getting hit by any number of event-meteors, as long as they aren't too large. Splashdowns happen, and 2013 has brought several of my close friends into the troposphere. I've been there myself. Pretty soon earth's orbit will launch them back into the stratosphere where we all belong.

The newest member of our tribe

Indoctrination

Stay strong.

A Dreary Sky With Perfect Snow

It's another freezing cold day. Snow is falling in a delicate slow descent, and the sky would be unbearably dreary if the tiny flakes weren't so perfect.

The phone rang last night. The caller I.D. showed it was an Ohio number and my heart took a dive. The only person I talk to in Ohio is my old friend who has early-onset Alzheimer's. She hasn't called me in years so my first thought was that her boyfriend was calling because something even worse had happened to her. I was surprised and relieved to hear her voice. She sounded happy and proud of herself for making the call. I couldn't understand her explanation about whatever her father did to "the line" so she could now make a long-distance phone call, but I was thrilled because she sounded so good. She lives in the hills of eastern Ohio by herself. I can't imagine living in the country, facing each day alone, with this horrible disease.

Last January, Kathy had a five hour operation to have the first brain pacemaker ever implanted. She volunteered for the study before the program was even looking for prospective participants. When I look back on our friendship of many years, I can see that she always was brave and independent. I hope she never loses those qualities.

Kathy and Mike canoeing with us in the Boundary Waters

Good Weather for Reindeer

No sunshine to brighten up the morning so far. So much white everywhere I look. I think I'll make Chile Verde for dinner tonight. Nothing like chilies on a cold day.

The ice is on the inside of my bedroom window. 

December's First Friday

Siberia's gift is still lingering in Colorado. It's an arctic blast, the likes of which were last felt here in 1972. The sun is out, making the roads clear and lifting spirits. I should be shoveling the sidewalk, but I'm going out to meet some friends for coffee. (How typical of me.) The cold takes my breath away whenever I go outside. I imagine that this is what Alaska is like. The Norwegians have a saying: There is no bad weather, just bad clothing.

I would love to be a winter bookbinder.

Summer will happen again, but sooner would be better than later.

Roses in December

"God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December." J.M. Barrie

As much as I make use of the plethora of foodstuffs available year-round in the most mundane grocery store, I still miss the way the presence of strawberries and asparagus once enhanced any dinner table simply because they were rare, seasonal treats. It's the same with roses. We can now have roses any time at all. They seldom have the heavy aroma of quality cut roses, but now everyone can have the occasional luxury of fresh flowers if they so desire. So, the J.M. Barrie quote is less than apopros, I still enjoy the sentiment.

We've had unusually warm and sunny weather lately. T'aint natural. Still, anything that makes the winter season more bearable is okay by me. Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday, has come and gone. Our family in Seattle didn't join us this year, and this year's festivities never took off without them here to liven things up. I hope I'll have a chance to have a Thanksgiving-in-August next year. It might be fun to barbecue a turkey. We were fortunate to have friends join us; something we should do more often. One thing I'm thankful for, besides my family and friends, is the opportunity to use the word plethora today. It's an awesome word.

I'm reading the new Jack London biography, and interspersing it with The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt. Both books are good reading, but The Goldfinch is excellent. It's the kind of book that is like a rich dessert. I have to periodically set the book down and savor certain lines because they are so complex, and rich enough to make your teeth hurt.

If I had the opportunity, I would commission an oil painting of red roses to hang on the wall of my dining room. It would have a gold frame. My memory of roses in December could use the jump-start, and it's always a good idea to behold something beautiful every single day of your life. 

A beautiful sunset this evening. Winter isn't all bad. It isn't really bad at all most of the time.

There....I admitted it.

Winter is Coming!

Winter is coming! The end is near...Save yourself. A garage would be such a civilized accoutrement for our house, but it will never come to pass given the historic nature of the property. Old and run-down, yes, but worth preserving. It's twenty degrees and dropping right now.

The roads cleared up by late morning, but the commute for the gainfully employed was bad. Some people coming from Broomfield had their 30 minute drive turn into almost a two-hour commute. Last year at this time I would have been out there on the road with the masses. One thing I liked about today's icy mess was looking out the window, knowing I didn't have to spend hours of my life driving in it. And UPS brought me a shiny new book to read. Life is good even if winter is coming.

Flights are delayed when it snows.

The calm before the snow last night.

Good reading weather.

Life's Transitions

I know several people who are going through difficult transitions right now, and a few who are going through less serious, but life-changing transitions. Different ages and different situations, but all are struggling to get through the process.

At least three are stressed out about employment. Prolonged uncertainty is hard to bear. Finding a new place to live, in a tight market, is a big problem. Having a baby is several kinds of transitions one right after the other. Finding out you have cancer changes who you are just as much as becoming a parent. I have faith that each of these people will get through their problems in their own way, in their own time.

I'm in a transition as I attempt to reconcile how I thought my life would unfold with how it's actually unfolding. In truth, it's not really unfolding (which sounds so delicate), as much as it's a flash flood.
All that mental debris getting carried along, some dangerous boulders of preconceived notions, then (I hope) the desert will bloom. Right?

You have to try to take life's transitions in stride.

 Transition can cause you a little stress, or it can knock you flat. I've been waylaid by different things. All I can suggest is, when this happens, do like I do: don't look around to see if anyone saw what happened (they did),  jump up to your feet, and pretend that the face plant didn't really happen.

Grace under pressure takes a lot of practice but, luckily, life provides plenty of opportunities to stumble.

Transitions are growth. Trust the process.

Quacking Quackcaphony

A mommy group has commandeered the large table at this coffee place. I came here to write, and plan to meet with friends later. They are happily trying to out-shrill each other. Even the babies are sitting in stunned silence. It's like sitting next to a heavy metal band of ducks. I swear my ears are starting to hurt. I'd leave if only other people weren't meeting me here. They aren't even saying anything worth overhearing. A curse on young mommies desperate for adult conversation! If only they wouldn't laugh. The pitch goes up to ice pick in the ear level when someone is funny. 

A Roadside Attraction

I was about 20 when I went with my boyfriend and his mother to the Sacramento Delta region in California to buy asparagus. Asparagus was very much a seasonal treat back in the day and, every summer, his mother would buy and freeze as much of the vegetable as she could. We went to a roadside stand manned by an elderly, blind Japanese man. The mother said his asparagus was the best, and well-worth the drive from Turlock. I found out that the lush agricultural land behind the levees and the house had once belonged to the old man. The present owners were kind enough to let him live on the property when he  had returned. "Returned from where?" I asked. I was horrified to learn of the internment camps that had been created in 1942 for Japanese people living in the United States. Even the children who were born in the country were forced into camps, sometimes with only the clothes on their backs. The more questions I asked, the more annoyed the mother became. I don't know if she was shocked by my ignorance, (no surprise given my family dynamics and the Vallejo school system) or, as I strongly suspect, she was embarrassed by what our government and its citizens had done to our Japanese citizens.

After being locked up, the Japanese weren't given their lands and homes back. Some had been given the chance to sell off their homes and businesses with only a few days to do so. You can imagine how badly they were ripped off.

There are plenty of books that go into the subject. It's an important part of our country's history and shouldn't be hidden away.

 "Farewell to Manzanar" by Jeanne Wakatsuki is usually the first book read by young people.

Camp Amache in Colorado is now a National Historic Site. All that's there now is the cemetery, foundations of some buildings, and a sign.

Wyoming had the Heart Mountain Relocation Center. This camp now has an interpretive center.

Throughout all of this, the men were subject to being drafted into the military to fight for the U.S.

Saturday Grinds to a Start

Woke up at 5:30 with a headache. Not a good way to begin a lovely day. I watched the sky become golden while waiting for the Advil to kick in. I uncovered the parakeets' cage so they could start singing and squawking their homage to the sun. Parakeets are messy little creatures but so damn cheerful.

Going to be a warm day, by November standards. The fence is partially painted with primer and needs to be finished. There will be very few days warm enough to paint outside, so time is of the essence. But, besides the torture of sitting on the cold ground slapping paint on little boards, I hope to do some more writing today. I've been trying to rewrite my crudely finished book, but haven't been able to get enthused about it. A new story has been ricocheting around my brain for a few days, so I got off to a good start on it yesterday. 

My new muse

Such a beautiful fall day will require some time to be spent outside just for sheer pleasure. Plus I need the Vitamin D. Since it's early, I think I'll go out in the chilly morning and resign myself to paint for a couple of hours this afternoon. 

Not bad for November

As I Read at Que's

"But you can't change your nature and mode of consciousness like changing your shoes. It is a gradual shedding. Years must go by, and centuries must elapse before you have finished. Like a son escaping from the domination of his parents. The escape is not just one rupture. It is a long and half-secret process. "

-D. H. Lawrence

Happy Halloween, Y'all!

Putting Myself in Time-Out

I've gotten quite a few inquiries wondering if my trip to Laramie was "successful".  I put that in quotes because success is such a chameleon of a word. My trip was successful in that I wasn't in a car accident, I didn't get food poisoning, or kidnapped, and I even returned home despite having a credit card.

The schism, in my mind, is that I had a dangerous case of expectations, and what the trip was like didn't meet my imagination head-on. Some of it was in the ball park because I certainly know what the drive to Wyoming is like, and I am all too familiar with the inside of a hotel room, but I couldn't settle down and write for hours in the room like I had hoped. Just hated sitting there at that little desk. It also didn't help that hotels use cleaning products that give me an allergic reaction. Benadryl apparently cannot be overpowered by caffeine, but I tried.

My mistake was thinking I could move writing to the forefront, after a lifetime of writing snippets and pages whenever and wherever I could. My writing time has always been so fragmented that it's hard to write anything that requires development. It took this attempt at a writing retreat to clarify the problem. Even in Laramie, I wrote in coffee places, in my car in the parking lots of parks, and while sitting in a picnic ground in a national forest. Occasionally I wrote in the room while on the bed surrounded by books and paper but I read more than I wrote.

Trying to write a novel this way is like trying to row a trawler.

I ended up feeling like I had banished myself to a long time-out. Go to your room, old lady, and think about what you just did. I did my thinking and will do things differently next time. For instance, send the rest of the household to Disneyland while I stay home and write.

A nice place to write.

Cheyenne, Wyoming

Sunday is a quiet day in Laramie, so I started out early with good coffee at the Coal Creek Coffee place in Laramie's historic downtown. After that, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. When life is moving at a slower, less stressful pace, (like a dying turtle) the minutes seem to last longer and there are so many more hours in a day. Laramie could market itself as a town where time is as vast as the valley it inhabits. Or maybe it's not just the reduction in stress, but a touch of boredom mixed in too. Hotel rooms are boring, and not conducive to working even when it's writing disguised as work. I've written, but mostly in coffee places and while sitting at a couple of parks.

I wanted to check out the Happy Jack Road that runs from the summit in the Medicine Bow National Forest, to Cheyenne. It turned out to be a beautiful area. I could see the fabulous rock formations of Vedauwoo, the plains to the southeast, pinon pines and vast meadows. The Curt Dowdy State Park looked like a great place to camp.

It didn't take too long to get to Cheyenne. There are several nice parks with lakes in the town and the downtown has some new construction going on. My overall impression of Cheyenne is that it's much nicer than I previously thought. Not that anyone in Cheyenne ever cared what I believed.

I can't complain about the weather even though the renowned Wyoming wind hit 45 mph gusts today, which ain't nothing for Wyoming wind. However, I'm heading for home tomorrow and there are clouds building up in the north. Rumors of snow are being whispered, but none of the weather people seem to agree on their guessing about tomorrow's atmospheric mood up here. I've had my share of weather surprises in this state so I'm feeling a bit paranoid.

Speaking of weather, it was 16 years ago today that Colorado was hit by the blizzard of 1997. It was a bad one.

Cheyenne, Wyoming

Wyoming

Wyoming is Fossiliferous!

Vedauwoo

After being in the hotel room for several hours, I decided to go out to a coffee place for a break. On the way to the truck, I realized I had already had too much caffeine, and decided to go for a drive instead. I wanted to avoid the freeway but ended up taking I-80 east to Vedauwoo, about 17 miles away. It was balmy in Laramie when I left but, as is often the case in the west, an icy wind was blasting when I arrived at the park. It was pleasant there despite being at 8,000 feet, but I wished I had brought my coat instead of my fleece. (a rookie mistake not to take a selection of outerwear) There were two buses of elementary school students to keep me company as I admired the rock formations.

I had hoped to see beavers and moose but only saw some crows.

I thought the name Vedauwoo must derive from one of the Native American languages, but I was sadly mistaken. Turns out that it's a made-up name from a theatre production that was once put on in the canyon there. Further investigation shows that the word is anglicized from the Arapahoe word "bitto'o'wu", meaning, perhaps, earth, or earthborn, or earthborn spirit. Maybelle Land DeKay is the one who appropriated the word for her play.

About the play:  it "...had a cast of nearly 500 including nymphs, sprites, and a lusty elf, Indians, trappers, cowboys, the university dean and president" The was also a dinosaur with one line: "groan"."
(from an article by Roger Ludwig, September 10th, 2011)

The play, produced three times between 1928 and 1931, sounds like a hoot. Maybe someone should revive it for history's sake.

Going Laissez-faire in Laramie

It started in August around the time of my birthday. Steve arranged for me to have five days for a do-it-yourself writing retreat. Things kept happening that prevented me from taking the Thursday through Monday allotment of time that would mean I could go and do.... anything the hell I want! Woo Hoo! 

Sorry about that. Free time makes me giddy.

The retreat became now or never as the summer whittled away to nothing. This weekend was the only possible weekend left, so I decided to go for it. My budget has dwindled in inverse proportion to the distance my cat puts between herself and the bright light at the end of the tunnel. Stuff happens.

So I'm here in Laramie, Wyoming.

Trying to write.

Seriously. I am.

Good-bye Longmont

Hello Laramie. 

(Does this remind anyone of The Shining?)

Connectedness in a Crazy World

Connectedness is a relevant topic these days. From the overwhelming strands of connectedness through Facebook, to the Christmas letter you occasionally get from a friend who lives on the other side of the world, we sit on an interpersonal spiderweb of our own creation. I have friends and relatives who never get in touch. I wouldn't know if they're dead or alive if I didn't occasionally call them. These aren't people who are trying to dump me. I know that would seem to be the obvious conclusion, but we are interested in each other and there is affection between us in every case. I think old habits die hard and people are overly busy and fundamentally lazy. 

Then there is the connectedness of a different type. Nature, for instance. I feel a reassuring bond with the world (or earth, if you will) when I'm outdoors. Just going outside of my house and looking at the trees, the moon, the bats and birds, gives me a little jolt of connection and I'm better for doing so.

Writing is a connection to something bigger than myself. I'm a groveling neophyte standing before the alter of language, but at least I'm in the sanctuary.

Reading is a common way of feeling like part of a group. I wish we had a secret handshake so it wasn't necessary to always be carrying around a book. People who read see people who don't read as a very large and sad group. 

Family provides so much of your identity and connectedness you couldn't scare away with a shotgun. Entire nonfiction sections of the library seem dedicated to the trauma of family, but fiction is ripe with familial trauma as well as the beauty of a good family. Enough said.

A Rainy Day in Longmont

My titles are seldom interesting at all, but I detest the pun headlines that newspapers, and some bloggers, continue to indulge in. Sometimes my posts have an actual topic, making it easier to invent a title, but usually I'm rambling around inside my head and have to resort to something vague. If I haven't learned to focus on a topic by now, it's not likely to ever happen.

So it's raining today. Knocking the colors off the trees. The clouds are high and stretch as far as the eye can see, except over the foothills, so it's a pleasant enough rain event. (We like to refer to our weather as an "event" here in Colorado: rain event, hail event, snow event, water up to your armpits event)

Longmont's rush hour

I'm taking our sick cat, Emily, back to the vet this morning. If her lab work has improved since Friday, she might not have to have a feeding tube surgically....what is the right word? installed? attached? implanted? She has serious liver problems brought on by stress. I've said it before, people...stress kills!

Since I thought we were going to have to pull the plug on her last Friday, I'm very grateful she has a chance to recover. She's 10 or 11, which is not exactly old and not exactly young. Like me at 61.

Winter Breathing Down My Neck

The trees are turning colors and the leaves are piling up on the lawn. I can look at the calendar and know the time to prepare for snow is short, but it takes several icy mornings to actually kick me into gear. My plan was to start getting ready for winter today.

However, a drive in the country is cheaper than a shrink, so first I went for a drive on the Eastern Plains. I needed a beauty fix but mostly I took in the big sky. There were some pretty things but the flood-damaged land was all too apparent.

A nice blue heron near the river

The mighty South Platte River

Once home, I pruned plants and pulled frost-shriveled pumpkin vines and tomato plants out of the ground. Steve took down the white canopy that shades our side yard, forcing me to accept that the summer of 2013 is indeed just a memory. 

It felt good to do some productive work after a week of worrying about my sick cat who turned out to be very sick indeed, but not as sick as I first feared. It will take a weeks and maybe months to get her back to full health but that's a lot better than the alternative.

Winter is coming!

October's Wheels Grind Slowly Through the Mud

We're dealing with the aftermath of our disastrous flooding here in Colorado, and are handling it as well as can be humanly managed. There are so many stories of what happened to people, places, animals, and things that even a story addict like myself has had to build up a shell just to survive all the heart-wrenching tales. I know the feeling when your reality suddenly changes. Disbelief as your heart skips a beat, then another, then stutters along as you try to come to terms with unreality. It can be caused by the death of a loved one, your cancer diagnosis, a car accident, or economic ruin. And now we can add one I hadn't thought too much about until now: Your home is there, filled with your life's possessions, representing safety. Your beloved refuge from the hard world. The next day, hour, minute, your home is gone.

I just heard the story of someone's house disappearing overnight in the flood. The people had no real worry about losing their lovely three-story dream home. It was above a dry wash on the only level ground on the property, but the heavy rains had filled the gully with water for the first time in over ten years. They went to spend the night at a neighbor's house simply because the unusual sound of the rushing water was keeping them awake. They returned in the morning, planning to get ready to go to work, and the house had vanished. The powerful water had undercut the flat land the house was built upon, taking away both the house and the ground it was built on.

Mushrooms and green grass in abundance now.

Fall is here and winter is breathing down our soggy necks.

Who You Gonna Call?

This car is in the parking lot at my granddaughter's preschool. It might belong to one of the teachers. Makes me wonder exactly what they're being taught there. Maybe it's Longmont's version of Hogswart.

Adventures in Grandmothering

This is what it looks like when your granddaughter gets her head stuck in the cat condo. She was visiting Puck when she realized she couldn't get her head back out of the hole. This is the downside of growing so fast. Surprises. Steve was in town, luckily, or I would have had to call the fire department.  She needed to be pulled upwards, straight out of the opening. I wasn't strong enough to manage the maneuver safely, thus the need for reinforcements. No injuries, just indignation.

Always in motion, unless sound asleep.
(or stuck in the cat condo)

More Freakin' Rain!

I'm pretty shocked to find myself watching a deluge of water coming down, with lots of lightning all around the house. The people living on the evacuated areas must be cursing god right now. 

At 11:00 AM I was getting a sunburn out at the ranch, marveling at the lack of destruction even while hearing the Chinook Helicopters up on the mountains. 

I didn't see this storm coming and it's a doozy.

The Writer Needs to Swim Upstream

I was reading some of Wallace Stegner's thoughts on writing this morning and came across this: "...talent is very common. It's as common as salmon eggs. And for the same reasons that millions of salmon eggs produce only a few salmon, millions of talents, through bad luck, ill health, poverty, bad social conditions, all sorts of causes, simply never come to anything...". From Literary by Accident.

This reminded me of what I find so frustrating in the writing group. I see writers with talent who have the capacity to succeed as writers, and the cause of their failure isn't any of the things that Stegner lists. It's lack of discipline (myself included), laziness (myself included), and poor boundaries (when it comes to putting your own needs first - myself included). I'll oversimplify the matter of motivation by stating that if you are really a writer, you write. If you are a serious writer with aspirations, you write every day, improving your craft and staying in the zone. If writing is a river, you're not a minnow. You need to be cruising the currents as a big, wily trout.

Wallace Stegner also wrote that a writer lives within a cultural matrix. Create your own writing matrix by first placing your ass in your chair. From that vantage point, enter your brain by whatever ritual suits you best, and create something on the page.

Don't end up being like the majority of the salmon.

She's only three but she sits down and types

Weather Event: Day Six

Supposedly, today will be the last major rain for a while. There is a downpour outside of my window right now at 9:55 in the morning. The television news is saying that the last of the heavy rain will be tonight. The news coverage is extensive, to the point of being overwhelming. The aerial videos are fascinating, especially for me. I've always liked weather from the bucolic to the extreme.  As I type, the alarm goes off in the other room as the weather service sends out a warning of flash flooding in the High Park burn area. Go to higher ground. Now. That's where our beleaguered cabin is.

I got a phone call and we were, of course, talking about the flooding. She said a friend saw some kids swimming in the flooded drainage ditch behind their apartment building. Can you say hepatitis?

I try to see some good in most situations and I have to say that our lawn has never looked greener. (Please know that I'm being facetious)

Fun art at our neighbor's house.

Catastrophic Flooding in Colorado 2013

2013 is still careening, wild and crazy, much like a 17-year-old driver in Daddy's SUV. We are watching history being made as Colorado gives itself a makeover with torrential rains, flash floods, and the accompanying destruction. The numerous fire-scarred mountains can't absorb the rain. The debris washes down the drainages and trees are uprooted along the creeks and rivers. Cottonwoods become nature's battering rams.

Longmont has declared a state of emergency. Lyons, next to the mountains, is severely flooded and cut-off. Five dams have been breached outside of Lyons. The National Guard is sending its high-clearance trucks to help out. In Jamestown, some buildings have collapsed as the area tries to absorb over 10 inches of rain, and the list goes on and the rain continues. A wall of water is heading down Four-Mile Canyon and authorities are frantically trying to get people out of harm's way. Boulder is already flooded in many places, filling basements with water, and closing roads. The flash flood watch stretches from Wyoming to New Mexico, and the rain is predicted to continue through Friday, and maybe through the weekend.

At our house, the rain has pretty much stopped for now. We walked down to LaBella Coffee and ran into a pretty lady who turned out to be bonkers. She was very nicely dressed with a smile full of perfect teeth. She seemed to know my daughter but that turned out not to be the case. She said she was a reporter. I asked the owner of LaBella if she had interviewed him and he rolled his eyes. Turns out she has a blog and is very unstable. She is posting on Facebook about every two minutes as she walks around town. A sampling: I'm in the light..The city is being destroyed. Pray that God sends his helicopter to the rescue. And: I will be reporting live from the Bella Vita Coffee House at around 10:00 AM....And: Just met. Man same as Jesus..He believes we can all be saved. He has sent an angel of the lord to deliver this message. Thise (sic) that have ears. Hear the Lord. Fear your fears...Let love prevail.

I kind of think the "Man same as Jesus" was Steve. She posted that as soon as she left the coffee house.

I'm worried about my horse, Cooper, who is boarded right by the foothills. But, despite that, I'm just riding out this weather event, wondering if the cabin will survive one more trauma. When the rain stops, we'll see if there's anything we can do to help out.

As I write this, the skies have darkened again and the trees are stirring in a new breeze. It would seem that another round of rain is about to make its appearance.

We wanted rain. We got it.

Don't ask me....

The Paralyzing To-Do List

I'm a compulsive list-maker, a sure sign that the memory cells have seen better days. Since I've been this way since I left home at 18, I sometimes wonder if the list-making contributed to my poor memory, as in the lack of mental exercise probably resulted in poor muscle-memory. Related to the poor at jokes-syndrome. (and, yes, I know what muscle memory really is)

I've been home with a sick child for the past two days, so I've gotten a lot of work done around the house. (She's not deathly ill, just a bad cold) Of course I'm driving on the road to nowhere known as  "Getting Organized". And it all begins with making a list. Actually, multiple lists. The one that is giving me the most anxiety is the Getting Ready for Winter list. Winter seemed a long way away until Tuesday when Mother Nature flipped the switch and the rains began. Temperatures dropped and summer fled the scene. List-making originates from the amygdala in the "primitive" part of the brain. (as if it all isn't f*ing primitive) Just as this cold spell has caused the leaves on our black walnut tree to yellow, my fingers grip a pen and start the seasonal list. The moving finger writes, and having writ, moves on to the next list. (with apologies to Omar Khayyan)

This is the part of the story where I start getting depressed. The list is long and time is short. I need to finish my winter prep obsessing before I can enjoy Halloween. (Can it only be 7 weeks away?) The day after Halloween is when my annual OCD about Thanksgiving begins. Christmas can't be far behind. It's no wonder that New Year's Eve is such a cathartic evening for me. I make my resolutions for the coming year.... just another kind of to-do list.

So I started the summer is over list:

• pruning
• taking the leaves, branches, and debris to the yard waste place
• winterizing the cars
• buying snow tires
• turning on the radiators
• moving all the plants that can only be moved in the fall...
• ...to the new flower bed that hasn't been created yet
• storm windows need to go up
• sprinkler system needs to be blown out 
• snow blower tuned up
• find all those coats and boots
• get the horse moved closer before the snow flies
• paint the new fence

And what else can I think of? Who really gives a damn?

Winter is Coming!

Saturday Doldrums

I tried to do a good thing last night and offered to sleep with the resident three-year-old on the futon. Her mother is pretty sick and looked like she could use a good night's sleep. The result was that the child got about 5 hours sleep, I got less, and her mother said she was awake most of the night anyway.
Sleep deprivation is never good, but I was dragging like I haven't drug in a long time when I had to get up with said child at 5:30 in the A.M. Steve had a fishing date and was leaving early, and I couldn't talk him into taking her with him to enjoy nature and all that. The good part is that I got a lot of pesky little jobs done around the house before I completely wore out. (I'm hoping that moving the suitcases from one room to another counts as a completed job)

I was fussing around the yard today and noticed the spiders are making those little egg nests all over the place. Could this mean an early fall? Our persistent heat wave may finally be broken next week, and there's even a possibility of rain. I can barely water enough to keep the plants alive, much less make any improvements. I was watering this evening and saw a sphinx moth on the Jupiter's Beard. These moths are often mistaken for hummingbirds.

My main accomplishments today were the preparation of dinner and an afternoon nap. I don't think I'll offer to sleep with the kid tonight. (It sounded so easy)

I started reading my new Wallace Stegner book on the American West today while eating lunch. I love his writing.

As the sun sets and the temperature drops a little bit, I find that I feel very much like taking a shower and climbing into bed with my book. I need some of those noise-cancelling headphones to complete my fantasy.

I hope that whoever reads this had a good Saturday that was just to their liking. May Sunday be even better.

Yay, Sleep!

Bring it on.

Reading That Resonates

 I found a wonderful literary magazine titled West Marin Review that is based in Pt. Reyes Station in California. The quality is excellent, but what I was most attracted to was the cross-section of writers and artists who appeared in the journal. All walks of life were represented, from children to the aged.  This publication is created using 99% volunteer effort.

A personal story, What Would Buddha Do? by resident Elizabeth Whitney, immediately captured my attention.

There are things I read because I need the information, and things I read and think, This is good writing. I'm enjoying it. But the best writing is the kind synchs with something already inside. When this happens, I can forget the act of reading and enter the flow of the story. It's a rare union when the writer and reader can connect on this level.

The nonfiction piece What Would Buddha Do? had that effect on me. Whitney is a concise, clear writer, as she should be as a self-proclaimed "lifelong journalist".

The story is about a house-sitter who seems sane and competent when hired. The two women share an interest in many of the same philosophies and books and seem compatible. All is well when Whitney leaves. She returns to find a delusional house-sitter who believes she is going to continue to live in the house. As the woman descends into "full-on psychological disintegration" Whitney writes, "The right question is: What would a psychiatric nurse do?"

I've had similar encounters and always find it difficult to set up boundaries. It can take some time to find out just who you're really dealing with when it comes to mental illness. I err on the side of compassion then, as the turnips start tumbling off the truck, come to regret my decisions. It took me a long time to realize that a big dose of rational thinking is a ridiculous plan for reaching out to someone whose brain is just not set up to work that way. Professional help is almost always beyond the reach of people who are "sliding down society's flagpole". In short, we've created a mess, devastating to those who can't even take care of themselves on even a basic level.

My complaint with the piece (doesn't every writer know this moment is coming?") is that the story doesn't have much of a conclusion. Whitney surprised me by offering the house-sitter a "reprieve" with "rules and an end date". The last two paragraphs are mostly broad generalizations. What interested me was the personal interaction and the conundrum of not arriving at a resolution to the situation. Sometimes there is no happy ending.

We read fiction and nonfiction alike to learn more about life, and how to approach the challenges both positive and negative.  Sometimes all we learn is that the world can be a grey, screwed-up place.

Pull the Weeds, Pay the Bills

There's a good book titled, "After the Ecstasy, the Laundry" by Jack Kornfield. In it, Kornfield quotes Zen Master Katagiri : "The important point of spiritual practice is not to try to escape your life, but to face it - exactly and completely." This sentiment occupied my mind as I began the transition from a visit to a place I hold deep in my heart, back into non-vacation mode at home. The two-day drive was a transition unto itself...a portal of necessity, and an example of just getting it done - a concept that seems to be woven into the fabric of day-to-day life.

The coastal area of Northern California is as beautiful as it is fragile. It's a spiritual place with an overwhelming number of gifts for the person seeking spiritual restoration. The grand sweep of the beach at Pt. Reyes National Seashore would be enough. The mighty Pacific Ocean always makes me feel like an atom within a speck. Feeling insignificant, while still intensely part of the universe, is a relief you can't understand until you've experienced it. For a brief time, watching the waves roll in, I  forgot all of my foibles and mistakes and could simply be present.

I remember going to Kauai once. I loved it there with the trade winds, beaches, and the exotic beauty of the coastline and river banks. But I also remember coming home and being depressed because my life felt mundane and mechanical. It set me to thinking and, over time, changes were made. Now I live in a house I enjoy, in a neighborhood and town that suits me. Colorado is home and I love its rugged beauty and the good people who inhabit my life. No depression these days, even after coming home from my personal Mecca.

In the town of Inverness

So many enticing roads

The clouds were magnificent 

Even the dreaded salt flats look good in the morning

A California resident