Casa Azul

Perhaps God looks like Frida Kahlo or, perhaps God is Frida Kahlo who has knit her eyebrows against us in disapproval, holding her parrots in her lap, on her shoulders.

It's raining today and all sorts of things are going through my head. I had so wanted to walk this morning but I am not going out in that. No way. I took the garbage to the garbage place and ran into the post office but besides that, no. I haven't even taken the grapes to the chickens yet. And the dogs, of course, are stealthily peeing and pooping in the house because they don't want to go out either.
But it's good for the garden, perfect timing in fact. Did you know that here in North Florida Valentine's Day is the day your peas and potatoes should be in the ground?
Well. Now you know.

It's hard to feel anything but God's disapproval on a day like today. If I believed in God. Or a god who cared one damn shit about what I or you do or even Sara Palin. I can barely stand to listen to the news. Even on my beloved NPR they are discussing the Tea Party endlessly. Fuck the Tea Party. I doubt seriously that Frida would give them more than one whisp of a passing thought, except to remember to have tea ready for Trotsky and his wife, and then perhaps to rethink the menu to tequila, the better potion to seduce the old man with.

While all the other painters were painting the huge murals depicting the struggle of the native people against the Capitalists, Frida painted herself. Over and over again. She painted her love and her fear and her hate and her miscarriages and her injuries and her eyebrows, knit with worry and scoffing at the world and its pain and its falseness and unfaithfulness. She painted her eyes, gleaming out from under those brows and she painted flowers in her hands with thorns that made her bleed and parrots who perched cruelly on her shoulders, monkeys who entangled her in their loco-long arms.

I am thinking of Frida today and am seeing her, rising painfully from her bed and going to the kitchen to brew dark coffee and I wonder if she sweetened it with brown, course sugar and thick-creamed milk. I am wondering. I think she would have looked out at the rain and sighed, having known from the dreams she'd had the night before where her bones ached to distraction that the rain was coming. I wonder if she watched it fall on her red geraniums, her hibiscus, her great beds of cactus and run down the walls of her blue, blue house.

Casa Azul, Casa Azul, the rain whispers.

Would she take up her paintbrush or would she, in her white petticoat with her hair streaming down her back return to her bed and lie down on her back and stare up at the ceiling and listen to the rain? And would tears slip down the sides of her face because some days the eyes must wash themselves as does the sky wash itself?

Would she hear roosters crowing in the rain? Would she think of the hens as they huddled against it? Would she mentally count the eggs in her kitchen, even as she silently wept, wondering if there were enough for an omelet because surely, Diego would want his breakfast. A fat man needs his breakfast, even an unfaithful fat husband needs his breakfast.

I don't know. I only know it is raining and I hear roosters crowing and Frida died in Mexico City thirteen days before I was born in El Paso, Texas and sometimes I think of her, those knit brows, those broken limbs, that tortured heart, painted open for us to see into every chamber, every beating, bloody part.

I would rather think of that then the Tea Party, so vapid and silly. I would rather think of peas and potatoes to be put in the ground and wet hens and I would rather think of soup. I would rather think of Frida's eyebrows than of Sara Palin's bangs. I would rather think of hell than those bangs and I beg Frida's forgiveness for even putting those bangs and her eyebrows in the same sentence and it is still raining.

A Day In The Life

It's been a rather glorious day and it's a rather lovely evening. Mr. Moon is out of town and I have no rehearsal and nothing I have to do. Nothing I have to do at all. The dishes are washed, I have leftovers in the refrigerator (thank-you, Kathleen!) and although it is chilly outside, it is warm in here. The frogs are peeping and the heat is on, its sweet soft breath warming me as I write.

I went to yoga this morning and it felt good. And when I got home, I got a call from my old friend, Mary Lane whom I have written about, whom I have missed so much, whose phone number I lost when Owen was born. We had a wonderful catch-up, doing as we always do, starting in right where we left off, all of it right there for us, no need for any sort of background or perspective. Yes, her daddy died and her mother-in-law has too. And her mother has had a stroke but is as determined to live by her own rules as ever and her daughter has given her her second grandchild- a son, born about the same time as Waylon, so a few months younger than Owen. We talked about being grandmothers and I realized once again how lucky I am to have my grandson so close and to be able to take care of him during the week. Mary Lane's daughter lives on NYC, and Mary Lane lives in Maryland (of course) and so she has to travel to see him whereas I don't have to go very far and indeed, my grandson is often delivered right to my door and if that ain't heaven, what is?

But it was so good to talk to her. So very good.

And then....and then....I went to town!
Speaking of Owen I popped by his house to get his mother's library books and Billy was there, dropping off Waylon because Lily takes care of him for a few hours on Monday so I got to see both babies. Here's a picture I took with my phone of Jason holding them.


Waylon is a little man, Owen is a bigger little man and they look at each other and try to figure out what the other one is. I think if we let them, they would chew on each other. Isn't Waylon a serious little guy? But he gives great smiles and talks to me when I put my face down to his and I love him so. I am Aunt Gramma to Waylon. At least, that's how I refer to myself. While I was there, Lily referred to herself as Aunt Mama, which I think is hysterical.
Our beloved little boys!
It was hard to leave the house with two such magnetic forces of nature there, wanting to be held and tickled, but I did. I got in my car and went to the library and I hadn't been in a long time and oh, that was a joy, of course. It's always a joy going to the library, even if I run into someone I don't really care to see and today I did not. I got books on tape for walks and yard work, a book on CD for drives and books to read with my eyes. I am rich! Rich beyond my wildest dreams!

And then on to the New Leaf I went for supplements and Dr. Bronner's Lavender soap for hand-washing and this vegetable and that fruit and some tofu and yogurt. I used to hate going to the New Leaf because I would always run into someone from my past who was now teaching yoga or saving the world through vegetarianism and heirloom vegetables, but today I ran into a couple I have known since home birth days and it was just lovely to see them. We talked about health care and our kids and damn! just being around people my age who have been married for almost forty years makes me happy. They ran away together as teenagers and are still very happily together. They run their own business and are smart and funny and good-looking as hell. A joy to see them. And of course I got to see Billy again because he works at the New Leaf and so I got TWO Billy hugs in one day and well, if that's not a good day, I don't know what is.

And then I went to Goodwill and got a velvet and satin throw- red velvet and pink satin and oh glory! I can't wait to get it washed and cuddle up in it.

And when I got home, I found that Mr. Moon had bought me a new pair of clippers to replace my beloved old ones which look like this:


They have served me well, those clippers although I have chipped the blade and they are not what they used to be. But the new ones look fine and have a great feel in the hand



and they brought to mind a visit once to a local nursery where the woman who ran the place had a belt-holster for her clippers and she was so knowledgeable and so strong-looking and when she pulled her clippers out of that holster to prune a blueberry, I almost swooned from love and envy.

So I unloaded everything from the car into my empty house and then HoneyLuna called to tell me she is going to observe her first surgery tomorrow- a hemorrhoidectomy! and she is not sure whether to be terrified or hysterical. Ah! The joys of nursing school!

And after I hung up with her I went out and took a few pictures. The garden:

which is at that place of perfect promise and also the picture at the top of this post which is the setting sun catching branches on fire.

And there you have it- a lovely, lovely day. I went out in the world and I survived and I enjoyed and tomorrow Owen comes to me and Mr. Moon will be home again.

A life. My own. And a damn good day in it.

The Birds Are Back

We have been neglecting our bird feeder all winter and the bird food, in its bin, had grown moldy and nasty, not fit for any creature but fungi and perhaps bugs.
Two days ago Mr. Moon bought fresh seeds and hung up the bag of thistle seeds for the finches and put out the mixed seeds for the other birds and he asked how long I thought it would take for the birds to discover that the food was back.
"Thirty minutes," I said, optimistically.
Well, I was off by about twenty-three hours but by yesterday morning they were back. The gold finches which I saw on my walk in a huge flock last week and also the cardinals.
Right this second there are a dozen birds on that feeder on this sunny cold morning. The tiny finches cling to the bag and work the seeds out with their clever beaks and the cardinals sit sentinel as they eat.

Here's a female cardinal who visited yesterday. Mr. Moon, who does things the RIGHT way, got out the tripod and set up the camera and took pictures while I was at rehearsal yesterday afternoon. While I was gone, he also got that garden into shape!

Ah. The man puts me to shame.

But I have to say it doesn't take a whole lot to do that these days.

Kathleen came over to watch the Super Bowl last night. She sat and knit and she and Mr. Moon exchanged football theories and football player and coach trivia and information and laughed at the commercials (and what was with all the slapping in those commercials? TOO MUCH SLAPPING!) and I got food ready and we ate and then I cleaned up because no matter how much I try, I cannot sit and watch football. My main observation of the entire evening was that although the player's pants are skin-tight, they somehow do not reveal anything which sort of pisses me off, just as the pants that basketball players wear piss me off- all those beautiful long thighs and they're covered up by those baggy britches that flop and wrang around like parachutes as they run and jump and use those thighs to what would be great viewing advantage if we could but see them.

Well. That's me and sports, folks.

But the birds? Whether finches or chickens, I could watch them all day. And I'd try to make up some great metaphorical reason that old people like birds but I won't. I'll just honestly say that when people get old and simple they like to watch cute things.

Football players' butts and basketball players' thighs being among them as are the tiny finches, the sweet hens, the swaggering rooster, the regal cardinal.

Sunday

Gray and quiet
The ashe magnolia has buds and
Is almost as tall as I am.
Five years ago it was tiny, in a pot
When I planted it for its promise of lush leaves
And purple, floppy blossoms

Growth can be silent
Under gray Sunday skies.

Like today.
When promise has to be remembered
Unless stumbled upon
Camera in my hand.

Can I Just Say

That I think Sarah Palin may be the anti-christ?

My Loves

I got gifted today with a lagniappe visit from Owen. His daddy had him today and brought him out and I took care of him while Jason and Mr. Moon did things outside involving sprinkler heads and car lubrication. Or something like that. I don't know. All I know is that I got to hold that boy and rub my face on his head where his hair is coming in all fuzz-fuzz and thick. I got to give him a bottle and rock him to sleep. I got to change his diaper. And so did his Pop-Pop, which I found so startling I had to take a picture.

Are my men beautiful or what?

What Does This Say About Me?

You have to wonder about your fucking life when you change out of the overalls you are wearing because they are your dress-up overalls and you do not want to mess them up by working in the yard in them. And your dress-up overalls are at least ten years old and have a broken buckle.
But they're black. And velvet.
So you go put on the denim ones before you grab your clippers and the wheelbarrow.

Inside and Out, Saturday, February 6, 2010, Lloyd, Florida

A bird's nest fern, wintering in our mudroom, with a stained glass my friend Lynn made.




Teeny, tiny begonia blossoms.




The camellias are going crazy.



The china berry tree which Mr. Moon would love to cut down but I won't let him because children love to climb it and the owls perch in it on summer nights and make their whistling call.



What chickens can do to collards.



My nice straight row where the spinach is hopefully germinating as we speak.



Herself. Miss Betty. In the chicken coop. With the other chickens.


Betty and Miss Red, her tail feathers growing back nicely.

Allegra's candle.


The buckeye is awake.




The pansies are cheerful.

The hen fruit is abundant.


This post is dedicated to my friend Sue who died magnificently on this date in 1995. I miss her every day.

The Story

It's a rainy day here in North Florida and we were without power for a few hours in Lloyd. I went to the post office and Ms. Joanne had a kerosene lamp lit which seemed about perfect for a post office in a very old train station. We lose our power here just about every time it rains and some people complain, but me? I just wonder, with all the trees we have in this county and all the storms we have, how we manage to ever have power at all.

But anyway, the lights are back on, as they used to say and so is the wireless and I have nothing in the world I have to do so here I am, ready to tell this story. I feel quite intimidated, to tell you the truth. I don't know why. I suppose because it's not MY story and although I have Jan and Jack's full permission to tell it, it still seems odd for me to do so.
But I want to.
I thought maybe I'd use different names. Jack and Jan would become Ben and Betty. Those names would suit them. But so do Jack and Jan and hell, everyone in Monticello knows the story anyway so what the hell? I'll go with Jack and Jan but I still like Ben and Betty. Don't you?

So as you may or may not know, I love to act at the Monticello Opera House. Go to that link and check the pictures if you want. You'll see images of the Opera House itself and some of the people who hang out there, who run the place, who paint the ceilings and clean the bathrooms and chair the boards and tread the boards and build the sets and a lot of those people are people I've come to know and love in the three years I've been a part of it.

The first time I auditioned for a play there I was so shy I had to take my daughter Jessie with me. It was for a terrible play called Girls of the Garden Club and I got a role and Jessie got a main role and we had so much fun, driving to rehearsals and being together and meeting new people. The director was a woman named Lisa, the co-director a guy named Jack. I met Jan, who is the director of the Opera House too and she stepped in to play the part of a garrulous old coot when the original actor had to step out because of health problems.
Jan and Jack hung out together a lot and I assumed they were a couple. I never saw them smooching or anything like that, but they just seemed to fit together. They obviously enjoyed each others company tremendously. They had that ability to know what the other was thinking, they shared smiles that indicated they were both thinking the same thing at the same time. They seemed so happy together.
And then I discovered that no, they were not a couple. They were both married to other people. And I thought, "Well. There you go."
And that was that.
We did that horrible play and despite the crap writing of it, it was fun. I met other people. Most of whom I liked, some of whom I did not. Some of that turned out to be prophetic.

I next tried out for a production of Casa Blanca. I got a role. I hardly had any lines which was terrific. This was two years ago but for some reason, I think I looked about ten years younger then. And I got to wear really beautiful dresses and be all French and dramatic and it was about as much fun as I could imagine. I met Kathleen during that production and she and I became friends, which is a hard thing to do in your fifties. Lots of life behind you to catch each other up on, so many stories to share. But we caught up. We shared. And what I learned from Kathleen about her life put me in awe. And when my friend Lynn died, Kathleen gathered me in and practically forced me to help her with sound effects for one of the old time radio shows the Opera House puts on. I went to rehearsals with my tender grief and I felt enfolded and comforted.

Jack was always especially empathetic. I don't think we ever discussed Lynn's death but I could tell I could have talked to him, if I had wanted to. He was retired from years of counseling and I just felt so comfortable with him. He and Jan had co-directed Casa Blanca and I had fallen in love with both of them during that production because of the gentle, calm way they worked together. No yelling, no screaming, no egos, just...Let's try this. Good! More of that, less of this, okay. You got it.
And I had gotten to know both of them better. I knew they were both practicing Episcopalians. They seemed to be the good kind of Christians- tolerant, open, loving, good people. People I could say FUCK around. (My true test for whether I am comfortable with someone or not.) People who said FUCK themselves. People, like Kathleen and me, who had lived through what we so lovingly call "the sixties". We had shared past experiences. We had shorthand and instant jokes and understandings.
And me, being an observant person, began to realize that Jack and Jan WERE a couple. I had heard rumors which at first I had discounted but as I spent more and more time at the Opera House, I could see that those rumors might very well be true. That my first instincts had been right. And of course part of me wondered how this worked in such a small town. If I knew, if I could see, if everyone seemed to know, how did it work? What about the spouses whom I had also gotten to know and actually liked?

But I didn't judge. I'm too old for that shit. What I saw was two people a bit older than me who had had, between them, two heart attacks and a cancer and who, when they looked at each other, could not even begin to try and hide what they felt in their hearts. Being around them always felt good and I was in more plays with them. And as time went on and politics at the Opera House got sticky because of a new faction in town, I realized that my instincts about whom I had liked and whom I had NOT liked in the production of The Girls of the Garden Club had been correct as well. That new faction had been a woman in the cast and the day I auditioned I noticed her because she brought a portfolio. With head shots. Professionally done head shots. Which got my back up for some reason. And it turned out she was from New York City and had been a professional actor, dancer, accordion player, singer, song-writer, play-writer, crocheter (yes, crocheter), editor, teacher...oh hell. I'm sure I'm forgetting a lot. Model. Yes. A model too. I saw the shots of her hands in ads. I did. She showed us.
And she started out sweet and friendly but I could tell this woman had plans. Big plans for a small town theater and this not only got my back up, it set off alarm bells.

As I grew closer and closer to Jack and Jan, I grew more and more perturbed with Professional Woman. PW pissed me off several times and then an incident occurred with pissed me off so much that I vowed she would be my mortal enemy. I have never said this in my life about anyone. But I gleefully said it about her and as she grew stronger at the Opera House (and she does have vast talents- I'm not kidding you), my alarm bells went off louder and louder.

But I could ignore that. I just didn't get involved in the productions she was in. I kept my distance.
In the meantime, Jack's wife got cancer herself, went through treatment and went into remission.
Jan's very old father came to live in Monticello and Jan had to spend any extra time she had (which is hardly any- sixteen hour days at the Opera House are not unusual for her) making sure he was being taken care of and safe and always loved. Not an easy job. Not easy at all.

And that brings us up, I suppose, to Thursday a week ago. I went to rehearsal that evening for the play I'm in now which is called Sex Please, We're Sixty! Kathleen is directing it and Jack and Jan are playing, respectively, Henry Mitchell and Mrs. Stancliff. In the play, Henry has been courting Mrs. Stancliff for twenty years without result. And my character, a romance novelist, gives Henry the words to propose to Mrs. Stancliff more successfully and oh yes, Henry, a retired chemist, comes up with a pill to help menopausal women with their libido.
Throw in a guy who calls himself Bud the Stud who "dates" every woman who checks into Mrs. Stancliff's bed and breakfast and two more women and hilarity does ensue.
It's been the most fun play I've ever been in and we are a tight, small bunch of actor-friends who, because we trust each other implicitly, are allowing ourselves to really just find tremendous joy in the play.
And there was, I have to say, a great deal of satisfaction in watching Jack and Jan get to say words onstage which they could not say out loud in real life. Jack has a term for acting which he calls fake-believe. There was no way to watch these two people play their roles and not know that what they were doing was not fake believe. No. It was real.

And so when I got to rehearsal on Thursday night a week ago, I noticed that Jack and Jan were not there. Kathleen called to me when I walked into the theater and said, "Sit down. We must discuss Henry Mitchell."
"Where IS Henry Mitchell," I asked. "And Mrs. Stancliff?"
"Well, that's the thing," Kathleen said. "I just got a call from Henry and he and Mrs. Stancliff have run away together to an undisclosed location and they are now officially a couple."

The rest of the cast and crew and I all looked at each other and the first words out of my mouth were, "God. Finally."

And instead of rehearsing that night, we all discussed the situation from every angle. I mean- we're human. We discussed marriages and how no one knows what goes on in anyone's marriage but our own. How we all knew that Jack and Jan had been in love for a very long time. How fiercely angry the spouses would be. How fierce the town's judgement would be upon them. How this could, in fact, affect the Opera House. Not to mention the play. And we all thought about the play and how they had been able to say those words in public and we all secretly wondered if that had had something to do with their decision to go public with their love as well.

But I think that all of us were secretly delighted for them, despite all the possible negative fall-out. I know that for me, the idea of them being able to at last be together, to not have to hide anything, to yes, goddammit, in the stupid romance-novel words of the play to be able to finally and at last, give in to the passion which dwelled within their breasts, to do that which up 'til now they had been afraid to whisper.

Does that make me a hopeless romantic? I don't know.
And I am not unsympathetic to the other spouses. Like I said, I've been there, baby. But, as I also said, where before there were four very unhappy people, there were now two very happy people and two people who could now reevaluate their lives in the light of the truth and make new lives. Easy to say, I know. Hard to do. I am aware of that. Hell, if Mr. Moon left me, I'd probably, well, I'm not even going to say what I'd do. But I'd have to face reality and in a way, isn't that better than living a lie?
I don't know. But I think so.

And these two people were not teenagers. They are fully grown adults who have had severe health problems, who know for a fact that life is short and goes so very fast at the end. And they knew that spending their lives married to other people who did not make them happy was in no way the way to spend the rest of their lives. And they knew too, that they would face what they called "challenges" but they proclaimed they would face them together.

And so they are.
They came back and were at rehearsal on Sunday. They were somewhat giddy, somewhat terrified, I think. But I know they did not regret what they had done. Not for one second.

And then came Monday's rehearsal. Jack and Jan walked in. Jan was crying, Jack looked disturbed. Jan had already been asked to retire from her position as director of the Opera House. The woman I call my mortal enemy and her friends had called all the big Opera House donors and "explained" the situation to them. (And let me just say here that MME is not married to her long-time boyfriend although she sometimes coyly refers to him as her husband and frankly, I think they are in the witness protection program but that's just a theory.) And when the big donors called the chairman of the Opera House board and declared their vast shock at the behavior of the director, the chairman was pretty much obliged to find a replacement for Jan who, for twelve years has worked tirelessly to make the Opera House what it is. Who has spent countless hours there, often working all day, then being there all night for one event or another and then coming back the next morning to clean up before another event. And who, for all of this work, gets paid a pittance with NO insurance or benefits. None.

And Jack is retired. And they actually have no place to live, these two lovers. For awhile they are going to make a very small nest in another undisclosed location (or at least, undisclosed by me) and they are going to figure this shit out. They are going to face the challenges. Together. The other night, as Jack was holding Jan in his arms, she said, "I don't care. As long as this is where I am, I don't care." And she looked up at Jack and he looked down at her and I knew that was true.

And the show will go on. We will get up there on that stage and we will be fifty- and sixty- and seventy-something year old people who love each other and who will be silly and who will say crazy romantic things and throw ourselves into ridiculous fake-believe situations involving a pill that helps menopausal women with their libidos (and WHY hasn't that been invented?) and Jack and Jan will say words of love to each other in public and in front of the public and we have even discussed selling tomatoes at the door for people to throw at us.
Why not? Hell. We were pushing the boundaries with this one before Jack and Jan did what they did.
Monticello will get over this one. They will. Lives will change and the Opera House will change but someone will be caught with someone else's spouse (same-sex, I'm thinking) in a public place and the riptide of public opinion will go flowing out to sea on that wave, leaving Jack and Jan safe on shore.

And we will never forget this play, those of us who are involved in it. Nope. Not a one of us.

Here are the two lovers before I met them, back when they did On Golden Pond together in 2006:

Crazy kids, that Ben and Betty!

Well. It's almost quit raining. The power has stayed on for hours. The spinach I planted yesterday is either germinating or washed away. The chickens are quiet.
I've told you the story.
I wish I could have told it better. But you know, I can only tell it through my eyes. And it's a story that has been told throughout history. Two people who fall in love, even though they shouldn't have. But did. And sometimes that love is never acted on and that's a tragedy and sometimes, it is acted on and well, that's not a tragedy but it sure can upset a lot of people.

Last night when I was talking to Jan and asking her permission to write about them, she started telling me some of the story that I didn't know. How they'd been chaste for so very long. How they hadn't wanted to hurt anyone. How as they've gotten older, they finally realized that life is too short to live one way because you're "supposed" to.

She's right. I think she's right, anyway.

As I said to them in an e-mail, I believe in truth and in love. They are now living their truth and their love. What more is there really to say? Yes, there is pain involved but I don't know how you get around that one in real life. This is not fake-believe. And sometimes, love and truth just have to be fucking lived.

Wish them luck, will you? They read this blog. And they need all the support they can get right now, those two crazy in-love kids. They've got a hard path ahead of them but they both have flashlights. Matching ones. Jan gave one to Jack. They always use them when they turn off the lights and are the last to leave the theater. Because that theater is dark and the steps and floors are not even and you got to have light to prevent yourself from stumbling in the dark.

So if you care to, send them a little more light. If you'd like. Only if you'd like.

And now don't you REALLY wish you could come see this play?

Let me just say this: Love is not just for the young. Sex Please, We're Sixty is not just the name of a play. That's reality. It ain't fake-believe.

And doesn't that sort of give you hope? Doesn't that sort of warm your heart?

It does mine.

And remember- if you HAVE love, cherish the very living daylights out of it. Those of us who do are blessed beyond belief. And if you don't, but you find it, don't be afraid to embrace it.

Happy Friday, y'all.
Love....Ms. Moon

Coming Attractions and Collard-Eatin' Chickens

I got permission tonight at rehearsal to write The Story and so I shall.

But not tonight.

I am deadly tired and I don't know why because I slept forever last night and then took a nap today too. After my walk my legs hurt and I was just...tired...and so I slept. But now I'm tired again. Damn that sleep. It doesn't last the way it used to when I was young.

Mr. Moon's in town at a basketball game and so I am here alone and I've eaten my leftovers and I think I'll go to bed. Project Runway will have to make it work without me. Besides, I still have to wash the dishes and finish up some laundry and make tomorrow's smoothie and just the thought of doing all of that makes me want to tear up.

That and the fact that I sucked at rehearsal tonight. I don't know where my mind was. I know my lines. I do. I can do all of them by memory when I am by myself but get me on the stage and my mind goes blank and I can feel the sympathetic eyes of everyone beaming in on me. "Poor thing. She is losing her mind." That's what I think they are thinking. They are metaphorically shaking their heads and grieving for my mind.

Plus, of all the characters I have played, this one seems the least willing to give herself up to me. Or am I not willing to give myself up to her? I can't fucking tell. I just know I feel like the weakest link, the least interesting person in the play and yes, I know, there are no boring parts, there are only boring actors.

Oh well. I planted a row of spinach today. It's not the right time of year. But hell's bells. I'm giving it a shot. And I realized, while I was out in the garden why my damn collards have not performed well this year.

Chickens.

They love collards. I knew this. I don't know why I haven't been paying more attention. They do not like arugula or mustard greens but the collards are manna to their tongues. Do chickens have tongues? I suppose they do. Anyway, as I pulled weeds and howed up a row and planted it, Miss Betty, Miss Bob, Miss Mable and Miss Sukie were busy nibbling at the collards. "Get off my collards!" I yelled to them.
They completely ignored me.

Chickens.

Either Mr. Moon is going to have to put up a fence around the garden or the chickens are no longer going to get yard privileges and that is THAT.

And so on to the final chores of the day and then to bed.
And perhaps, hopefully, tomorrow I will write The Story which I first talked about a week ago.

It's a sweet one.

Night-night, y'all.

I Find This Funny and Curious

My blog followers keep going from 122 to 123 and then back to 122 and back again to 123 and then back again to 122, etc.
Is it the same person, undecided as to my follow-worthiness, clicking her or himself on and off again as the posts please or do not?

It's A Man's World

When Mr. Moon and I bought this house there was no garage at all. None. No work space for a man. The previous owners had been a writer and a photographer and there was a place to write and there was a dark room. But no place where a man like Mr. Moon could spread out his tools, park his boats, his cars, his...whatever it is that a man like Mr. Moon needs.

And Mr. Moon needs a lot of stuff. Believe me. When he asked me to marry him he told me that he could fix houses and cars and that bottom line- these are the two things that people have the most money invested in and that in being able to fix these things, we would never go hungry.

Since then, he has opened a tire and automotive business which he ran for years and also worked for awhile with his daddy when he was alive, doing house repair and building additions to houses and he has sold cars too. That's what he does now. He works from a bank where people call and say, "Mr. Moon, I need a blah-blah-blah car." And Mr. Moon finds them that car and everyone is very happy because he doesn't sell crap and he knows what he's doing when he looks at cars. And folks- CarFax lies. But Mr. Moon's eyes, hands and paint-meter do not.

So anyway, a man like Mr. Moon needs a garage. And the man who bought our house in town when we moved out here was a builder. We had a few acres behind the house we sold which we were going to hang on to but the builder dude wanted them too so he traded Mr. Moon a garage for those acres. And thus was built and born The GarageMahal.



I don't know who first named it that. Hank, was it you? Perhaps it was Mr. Moon himself. I don't know. But it is truly huge. I think it is bigger than the house and still, it is not quite big enough. If it were as big as the entire world, I doubt it would be big enough because I have come to realize that a garage is not unlike a purse in that the bigger it is, the more you will find to tuck away in it.

Mr. Moon is out there this morning, working on a car. He spent the last few nights working on Hank's car. Last night he finished up the brakes and needed me to come out and help him bleed them. I sat behind the wheel and Mr. Moon would say, "Pump, pump, pump, pump, pump! Hold it!" And I followed his directions and soon enough the brakes were bled and all the lines were cleared of air so that when Hank steps on the brakes, his car will stop.

I do not understand any of this. You'd think after being married to a man who sells and works on cars for twenty-five years that I would know something about cars and their innards and the mysterious ways of their engines and gears and wheels and batteries and alternators and so forth, but I do not.

Right now I hear some power tool running. I think it may be a...shit. I have no idea. But it's hooked up to a big air compressor which lives in one of the corners of the garage. See- I don't really get involved in that world out there. I go there if I need to get venison or fish out of the freezer. I go there if he needs me to bleed a brake line. I go there is I need to find a nail or a hoe or something.

And when Mr. Moon was gleefully planning this garage I walked around saying things like, "Jesus Christ, why does he need such a huge garage?" and I admit I was a bit resentful and I'm not sure why except that this garage was going to alter the landscape of these two acres which I had fallen in love with and I was not happy about that.
But now I am comfortable with that behemoth of a building out there which holds all the toys and necessities of a man like Mr. Moon. He has the big boat for going out to sea in and his daddy's bass boat which he will NEVER give up and he has a jon boat and he has the project car and he has his old truck and he has his old Suburban and the freezer and the beer and bait refrigerator and the air compressor and a ton of projects which I personally doubt will ever be completed and he has a radio and he has his tools and, well, it's sort of hard to imagine that in the almost-six years we've lived here he has filled the GarageMahal to overflowing and when he works on a car he has to pull the project car out and cover it with a tarp.

I can't imagine not being married to a man who can fix things. Who can build things like the place where our chickens live which we have christened the Coop Mahal. And a man like that needs a place to keep all the things he needs to build and to fix. Being married to a man like that is as firmly planted in my genes as is the need to get out in the dirt when it begins to warm. And as I have said before, although Mr. Moon did indeed begin to fall in love with me when he saw me make biscuits, it was when he saw me shoveling horseshit for a garden he'd tilled for me that he truly knew I was meant to be his wife.

We are nothing at all alike, Mr. Moon and I, but we somehow fit together perfectly, despite the fact that he is a foot and a half taller than I, a man who doesn't like to sit and read but who can build a chicken coop, repair a car.

So I have my world here in this house where I cook and do laundry and where we eat and sleep and I write and read and take care of my grandson and he has that world out there where he does mysterious things with tools. I like to think we have the best of both worlds- a man's and a woman's.

And I have a strange feeling that before I know it, my baby Owen will be a big boy who will refuse to stay in the house with his grandmother and who will, instead, want to be out in the GarageMahal with his Pop-Pop, learning to fix and repair and build and probably pee on trees behind the garage.

And that will be okay. I'll go out and take them glasses of ice water on hot days and there they will be, sweaty and wiping their faces with rags I've washed and folded. And I just KNOW that Owen will look up at me as if I were an intruder of sorts and he'll be bonded to that man out there because that man has ALL the good toys. They'll be in the Man's World. But then they'll eventually come back to the Woman's World and eat their dinners and fall asleep on the couch, satisfied and happy and they'll be civilized and pee in the toilet because even men like Mr. Moon need to have a cozy nest to eat and sleep in when they're done with their manly doin's out in the garage.

And the world will be set right again, at least MY world where I am almost loathe to admit how gender-role bound we are, but I'm too old to not admit the truth and there it is.

And by God, I'll teach Owen to make cookies, too. And even biscuits if he'll let me. Because who knows? He may find a woman who likes to work on cars and who will fall in love with him when he makes her biscuits.

You never know how these things will work out. And that's another truth you can take to the bank.

Amen.

A Very Nice Day

Whoa, y'all. I'm a tired old grandmother. Have I told you that I think that Owen should call me gee-gee-ga-ga? I think this because he is certain to start saying those very syllables very soon and when he does, I want everyone to think he is talking about me.
Mr. Moon thinks this is crazy. He wants Owen to call him Pop-Pop which he does not find ridiculous at all.
Well. There you go.

It's been a lovely day and Owen is back in the arms of his daddy and I have not yet made the bed or done the breakfast dishes. Or eaten, for that matter. Well, I did have that yogurt. I believe I am hungry now and so I should go attend to that and other matters such as the bed and the breakfast dishes. I wish I had something of earth-shaking importance to discuss, such as chickens or oh, you know, true love, but in fact, I am thought-less at the moment which is sort of lovely. I will tell you that I saw my first white violet of the year today. Yes. I really did. For some reason, here at least, the white violets come first and then the purple (violet) violets.

Okay. I went out and took its picture. Here it is:


I told you spring was coming.

And right now I have fifty-three unread items in my google reader so if I don't comment on yours today, please forgive me. As I was snuggled up to Owen this morning I had a vision of time as stepping stones which lead through the path of a day.
I skipped down most of today's stones with Owen in my arms and that's all there is to it.

I'm sure you understand.

It's All About The Diapers

I woke up with a new man this morning. He's so sweet and so beautiful and he snuggles like a Yorkie. Of course, when he wakes up he wants to be fed and changed so there is that, but...
How could you not be happy, waking up with this guy?
Lily had to be at work at six, Jason at six thirty, so Lily and Owen spent the night last night and I got up at FIVE FORTY-FIVE AM and got in the bed with the boy. At first I was scared to death I would smush him but then all those years of sleeping with my babies kicked in and all was well, although it's a pain in the ass to have to give a baby a bottle in bed instead of being able to just offer the tit. But Lily had so thoughtfully made a bottle and left it by the bed so it wasn't that bad at all.
And in the two hours we've been up we have not accomplished much, I have to say. I'm just now getting around to eating a yogurt and he's in his little walker, pooping, so there will be a clean-up operation in the next few moments. I have brushed my teeth and washed my face so I feel reasonably on top of the game. The boy really doesn't like to be put down very much so just getting those two things done is fairly huge. I think we need to just go ahead and admit the fact that he is spoiled rotten and glory in the fact that he is.

So anyway, that's me this morning, here in Lloyd where it's a beautiful, sunny day. I think we need to go out and see those chickens and give them some grapes and collect some eggs.

I should report that Jessie's rash is quite probably some fungus she's gotten off her roommate's cat. That's what the doctor, who appeared to be about twelve-years old, felt quite certain of. When he walked into the room I said, "You are kidding me." And poor Jessie almost died of embarrassment and the doctor knew exactly what I was talking about because I'm certain he must hear the same thing about fifty times a day but he was very nice and very cute and as I said, very certain of his diagnosis and let's face it- teenagers know everything so I'm sure he's right.

Time to change the poopy diaper!

Love....Ms. Moon