Weblog 37
October 8, 2006~ 2:30am
About to turn in as I usually do, late at night (or early the next morning) on a late, late Saturday, and I just finished stripping away and saving about 40 more poems of mine (and Al's. That's Al Ferber)- and I feel lighter and better than I have in a long, looooong time. A snake sheds its skin and what's underneath is the most impossible shade of new green-- healthier and lovelier--and I feel that way too. I feel resolved.
I am making something new and structuring a quiet place for myself with less noise. I am building a sanctuary with only one way in, and one way out- and I have the door.
I've concluded that there are some who can see only the toxicity around them when mixed in with everyone else, and I am one of them. I cannot be upstoppered and released for very long without there being some kind of 'reaction' that maybe only I notice is happening, but it's very real and very poisonous for me. Having decided to slowly and methodically dismantle what I've built for two years, it's become an exercise in what can only be described as joy. How odd....
It's exhilarating building something. But what I didn't know is that taking it apart, looking closely at the pieces as you do, is a reverse process of self-realization and an educational, thoughtful one at that.
Poem by poem, I watch the last two years fall from me and see their tangles, and see the untangling of it with some understanding of how and why things happened the way they did. I made the mistake of thinking it was community I wanted, but it's not: it was something unrealistically dreamed and therefore doomed to disappoint. I am taking myself farther out of the general stream and hopefully into a quieter place of more fulfilling creative efforts. More print, I hope; less social interaction. Here's to what life holds in store in a new phase of 'limited' internet involvement.
I feel re-born into something mysteriously calling clearly to me across an expanse, and the voice is very certain of itself. So hooray for epiphanies. Hooray for undoing and doing over and the fact that life is change and transformation and always a gift. I must remember to keep open arms, opened ears and eyes, and yes----to keep my distance. For me, that is a basic necessity in my life.
October 8, 2006~ 9:30pm
Let me tell you about my babysitting adventures on Friday. LOL!! I was with the two little rascals for nearly 10 hours. Made grilled (or "grilldon cheese ") as Bill says and watched a few kiddie movies, gave names to all the pumpkins in Bill's room, and in general, marveled at Kay's good GOOD behavior- (having seen her 'hellion' side before) but she was an absolute dreamboat. Just a bit of crying at bedtime-- but she lay staring up at me with the most marveling, happy expression even as I changed her on the changing table before bed. (This can turn into a giggling wresting match, so the angelic, limpid look was much appreciated.)
Holly and Gary had a wedding to attend, and this grandma was in charge- house all decorated for Halloween, down to a half-submerged skeleton in the front yard that Bill insisted I light up once it got dark. Then he dramatized how the 'skelton' was "in his GRAAAAAAAAAAAVE....and wants to climb OUT AGAIN!!" LOL. Bill is by turns fascinated by Halloween, and terrified. He will tell you all about werewolves and the 'Franklinstein' that are pictured on his kiddie yogurt package. I remember my own two at that age and I can tell you, it's pretty fun place to be at 3 1/2- when the world is full of 'spookable' things and there are so many wonderful stories to tell.....
speaking of which....Pap Pap Wayne came on the scene at about 5:00 p.m, bearing tuna fish subways with bacon, on herb rolls (DELICIOUS!)- and Bill commenced to 'act out' one of his own scary stories mentioning what- for all the world- sounded like 'O'Toole'. Wayne was quick to jump on that and howl with laughter. He asked Bill if he was talking about the 'creepy werewolf boy, O'Toole'.....
This lead to a long tale about a creepy boy who (as Bill interpreted) 'the moon fell on' and he became a werewolf who would not eat the pancakes his mother made, but survived on a diet only of 'dog lungs', and lived in a tent in the backyard. LOL!
Bill of course was very much into this story, until I went outside to have a smoke, and he confessed with trembling chin that he was 'scared of O'Toole'. "Wayne, I don't LIKE O'Toole".......so a new ending had to be devised for the story, and this is what we came up with: O'Toole tripped on a rock one day and fell flat onto a tomato, which hit him right in the face. He took a bite and the tomato RELEASED him from being a werewolf-- and he ate pancakes, and he moved back into the house and was a normal, happy boy forevermore.
Bill still seemed a bit skeptical--so Wayne gave him a magic 'spell' to say whenever he became frightened: "Subway....EAT FRESH!" and Ker-POWIE!!! no more scary things. LOL! Bill had seen the most recent Subway commercial and delighted in updating the spell to "Subway....EAT STEAK!"- and then he'd laugh like he was Harry Potter himself, and what did we know anyway.
Still, bedtime after watching and RE-watching a 'Rescue Hero' DVD, was a bit shaky. Terrors about having the door closed (which I did not know was a NO NO) and then sobbing dramatically for "Mummy and Daddy"- (whom you would swear just left on an 8 month round-the-world cruise, not an evening out at a local wedding.) He settled though, and left me unfamiliarly alone with Fox TV. (I watch very little television.) But I lucked into a rerun of an old Seinfeld show, and one of 'Scrubbs'-which I've never watched, but enjoyed immensely- allowed me to relax and savor the hours I'd spent with those tikes while they were still awake, and to have a lovely harvest evening: clocks ticking, decorations gaily applied all around the house-- and gave me time to feel really really grateful for having these grandchildren.
They make the world spin so soothingly. Make everything real- even silly spookable stories about lung-eating werewolves.
October 11, 2006~ 1:45pm
Right now our billing software is down here at work, due to updating. I'd thought I'd pop in here a minute and leave a few words about a book I just finished called, "Complications" by Harvard Medical Center resident, Atul Gawande. This collection of essays is a delightfully crafted series that most of all, hightlight the refreshing humanity of young Dr. Gawande, with one story more eye-opening than the next.
I highly recommend it to those for whom medical science holds a fascination, but are willing to look at the way we're often in all too-fallible hands and there are many, many times when outcomes are nothing more than a roll of the dice-- but humanity and humility are the two most important characteristics of a healer.
Of course, reading this book has reawakened my horrifying fears of something called "necrotizing fasciitis" (aka as 'flesh-eating bacteria"). It is indeed the stuff of nightmares and it's the last chapter of his book, titled, "The Case of the Red Leg". lol...omg......there but for the grace of God, go all of us.
At home these evenings I'm about 3/4 of the way through archiving what looks now to be about 1000 poems written in the last 2 years. Closing down Orphans is much less painful than I thought it would be. I am pursuing this with a deliberate, careful archiving and taking the time to enjoy the poems and their comments once again.
It's certainly not the rash deleting of something, it's the feeling of seeing a child off to college: taking care. Taking steps. It's being done with absolute love and care. Orphans was indeed like a child to me.
***
(Return To Weekly Archives)
About to turn in as I usually do, late at night (or early the next morning) on a late, late Saturday, and I just finished stripping away and saving about 40 more poems of mine (and Al's. That's Al Ferber)- and I feel lighter and better than I have in a long, looooong time. A snake sheds its skin and what's underneath is the most impossible shade of new green-- healthier and lovelier--and I feel that way too. I feel resolved.
I am making something new and structuring a quiet place for myself with less noise. I am building a sanctuary with only one way in, and one way out- and I have the door.
I've concluded that there are some who can see only the toxicity around them when mixed in with everyone else, and I am one of them. I cannot be upstoppered and released for very long without there being some kind of 'reaction' that maybe only I notice is happening, but it's very real and very poisonous for me. Having decided to slowly and methodically dismantle what I've built for two years, it's become an exercise in what can only be described as joy. How odd....
It's exhilarating building something. But what I didn't know is that taking it apart, looking closely at the pieces as you do, is a reverse process of self-realization and an educational, thoughtful one at that.
Poem by poem, I watch the last two years fall from me and see their tangles, and see the untangling of it with some understanding of how and why things happened the way they did. I made the mistake of thinking it was community I wanted, but it's not: it was something unrealistically dreamed and therefore doomed to disappoint. I am taking myself farther out of the general stream and hopefully into a quieter place of more fulfilling creative efforts. More print, I hope; less social interaction. Here's to what life holds in store in a new phase of 'limited' internet involvement.
I feel re-born into something mysteriously calling clearly to me across an expanse, and the voice is very certain of itself. So hooray for epiphanies. Hooray for undoing and doing over and the fact that life is change and transformation and always a gift. I must remember to keep open arms, opened ears and eyes, and yes----to keep my distance. For me, that is a basic necessity in my life.
October 8, 2006~ 9:30pm
Let me tell you about my babysitting adventures on Friday. LOL!! I was with the two little rascals for nearly 10 hours. Made grilled (or "grilldon cheese ") as Bill says and watched a few kiddie movies, gave names to all the pumpkins in Bill's room, and in general, marveled at Kay's good GOOD behavior- (having seen her 'hellion' side before) but she was an absolute dreamboat. Just a bit of crying at bedtime-- but she lay staring up at me with the most marveling, happy expression even as I changed her on the changing table before bed. (This can turn into a giggling wresting match, so the angelic, limpid look was much appreciated.)
Holly and Gary had a wedding to attend, and this grandma was in charge- house all decorated for Halloween, down to a half-submerged skeleton in the front yard that Bill insisted I light up once it got dark. Then he dramatized how the 'skelton' was "in his GRAAAAAAAAAAAVE....and wants to climb OUT AGAIN!!" LOL. Bill is by turns fascinated by Halloween, and terrified. He will tell you all about werewolves and the 'Franklinstein' that are pictured on his kiddie yogurt package. I remember my own two at that age and I can tell you, it's pretty fun place to be at 3 1/2- when the world is full of 'spookable' things and there are so many wonderful stories to tell.....
speaking of which....Pap Pap Wayne came on the scene at about 5:00 p.m, bearing tuna fish subways with bacon, on herb rolls (DELICIOUS!)- and Bill commenced to 'act out' one of his own scary stories mentioning what- for all the world- sounded like 'O'Toole'. Wayne was quick to jump on that and howl with laughter. He asked Bill if he was talking about the 'creepy werewolf boy, O'Toole'.....
This lead to a long tale about a creepy boy who (as Bill interpreted) 'the moon fell on' and he became a werewolf who would not eat the pancakes his mother made, but survived on a diet only of 'dog lungs', and lived in a tent in the backyard. LOL!
Bill of course was very much into this story, until I went outside to have a smoke, and he confessed with trembling chin that he was 'scared of O'Toole'. "Wayne, I don't LIKE O'Toole".......so a new ending had to be devised for the story, and this is what we came up with: O'Toole tripped on a rock one day and fell flat onto a tomato, which hit him right in the face. He took a bite and the tomato RELEASED him from being a werewolf-- and he ate pancakes, and he moved back into the house and was a normal, happy boy forevermore.
Bill still seemed a bit skeptical--so Wayne gave him a magic 'spell' to say whenever he became frightened: "Subway....EAT FRESH!" and Ker-POWIE!!! no more scary things. LOL! Bill had seen the most recent Subway commercial and delighted in updating the spell to "Subway....EAT STEAK!"- and then he'd laugh like he was Harry Potter himself, and what did we know anyway.
Still, bedtime after watching and RE-watching a 'Rescue Hero' DVD, was a bit shaky. Terrors about having the door closed (which I did not know was a NO NO) and then sobbing dramatically for "Mummy and Daddy"- (whom you would swear just left on an 8 month round-the-world cruise, not an evening out at a local wedding.) He settled though, and left me unfamiliarly alone with Fox TV. (I watch very little television.) But I lucked into a rerun of an old Seinfeld show, and one of 'Scrubbs'-which I've never watched, but enjoyed immensely- allowed me to relax and savor the hours I'd spent with those tikes while they were still awake, and to have a lovely harvest evening: clocks ticking, decorations gaily applied all around the house-- and gave me time to feel really really grateful for having these grandchildren.
They make the world spin so soothingly. Make everything real- even silly spookable stories about lung-eating werewolves.
October 11, 2006~ 1:45pm
Right now our billing software is down here at work, due to updating. I'd thought I'd pop in here a minute and leave a few words about a book I just finished called, "Complications" by Harvard Medical Center resident, Atul Gawande. This collection of essays is a delightfully crafted series that most of all, hightlight the refreshing humanity of young Dr. Gawande, with one story more eye-opening than the next.
I highly recommend it to those for whom medical science holds a fascination, but are willing to look at the way we're often in all too-fallible hands and there are many, many times when outcomes are nothing more than a roll of the dice-- but humanity and humility are the two most important characteristics of a healer.
Of course, reading this book has reawakened my horrifying fears of something called "necrotizing fasciitis" (aka as 'flesh-eating bacteria"). It is indeed the stuff of nightmares and it's the last chapter of his book, titled, "The Case of the Red Leg". lol...omg......there but for the grace of God, go all of us.
At home these evenings I'm about 3/4 of the way through archiving what looks now to be about 1000 poems written in the last 2 years. Closing down Orphans is much less painful than I thought it would be. I am pursuing this with a deliberate, careful archiving and taking the time to enjoy the poems and their comments once again.
It's certainly not the rash deleting of something, it's the feeling of seeing a child off to college: taking care. Taking steps. It's being done with absolute love and care. Orphans was indeed like a child to me.
(Return To Weekly Archives)
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