I Will Live

There's the plow point I found yesterday in the garden. You'd think by now I would have uncovered everything of interest in that garden but no, I have not. I sink my trowel into the dirt and it hits something and usually it's an oyster shell or a bit of old brick or bottle but sometimes, it's more interesting.

Phew. I'm breathing again. Not sure why. I haven't actually CALLED my NP's office although I did send an email via their website. Have they answered? No. They have not.
I swear. I need to change practitioners.
Like that's going to help.
The last two doctors that I felt vaguely comfortable with were, strangely enough, men.
One was the resident I went to when I was going to a Family Practice Residency program for my physical to get into nursing school. Why did we have to have a medical exam to get into nursing school? Who knows? But he was a great big warm bear of a man and he joked with me and made me feel comfortable. Of course he left Tallahassee when he graduated and is now the beloved community doctor of my favorite people over in St. Augustine. I've seen him since at parties that Lon and Lis have had and after Lis got her surgery, he called her EVERY DAY to see how she was doing. No bullshit, just caring and concern and good, sensible advice.
I swear to you, I'd see if he'd be my doctor again if St. Augustine wasn't three hours away.
The other doctor who didn't give me the complete willies was a doc in Tallahassee. I don't even know why I quit going to him. Maybe because I had a suspicion that he was getting a bit too friendly with the cocaine. But fuck! Who cares? He diagnosed a situation with Mr. Moon that saved his life. He's still practicing but only under the auspices of a health plan which we do not belong to.
And there you go.
I started going to the woman I'm seeing now because I heard she was open to alternative medicine, which she is. But goddam it, don't suggest to me that I might need triptophan for life-crippling/suicide-thinking anxiety and depression. Just don't. Yeah. I'll take triptophan and whatever else you recommend (and sell). Along with whatever the fuck pharmaceutical will rearrange my brain in ways that exercise and meditation and supplements and so forth and so on will not and can not.
Oh Jeez. It's overwhelming.

Anyway, I did have my boys today. When I was with just Gibson at their house, he crawled up in my lap and clung to me like a baby chimp and pulled my head to him so that I could kiss him and kiss him on his cheek and neck. He fell asleep on our ride to go pick up Owen as he so often does. When we got home and settled in, we walked down to the Post Office and then to Papa Jay's and once again, it was closed. Is Papa Jay's closed on Monday? If so, POST YOUR GODDAM HOURS, PAPA JAY. The boys were so disappointed. We came home to the MerMer restaurant and they ordered chips and pickles and Cheerios. Then Owen did some Rolling Stones hallway dancing and I got some good videos but they're too long and I'm so damn stupid (anxiety brain plus age) that I can't figure out how to give you the part I love the most when he did a move to a slow part that he called, "Releasing a bird," which was so graceful but which he sort of hated when he watched the video.
"It was like I was doing ballet!"
"Yes!" I told him. "You let the music tell you what to do. And Mick Jagger does ballet."

Hell. I just tried to download the full thing and it's too long. I've tried to edit via my phone, Quicktime and iPhoto and I can't do it.
Well, trust me.
It was beautiful.

Mr. Moon has gone to auction and so it's just me and Maurice again. Tomorrow I'm going to go to Costco and lunch with Lily and Jessie and Gibson and who knows what all?
And goddam it. I guess I'll call my nurse practitioner's office.

Here's one of the watermelons growing in my garden.

I would say it's probably about the same size as Jessie's baby WHICH IS GOING TO BE BORN IN LESS THAN A MONTH!

I swear to you- I still don't believe it. And yet, it is true as true and soon, once again, life will be redefined and refined and made finer and the world will microscopically shift and change to welcome another baby. A baby born of love and intention and joy.

I breathe out again. I let out the worry and the illogical, ridiculous fear. I try to take in the reality of all that is good in my life which is more than anyone could ever ask for.

I am just one tiny, minuscule particle of energy in this universe which is so vast that the biggest and best of our human minds can't really explain it.
Which I find incredibly comforting.

And soon, there will be sleep, even with its crazy dreams.

All is well-ish.

Love...Ms. Moon

Can't I Just Find A Shaman To Throw Some Chicken Bones?

Well, here it is Monday and I am bathing in the hot red juices of anxiety.
Been awhile since that happened but there you go. Just like a bad penny, it turns up.

I know why this is  happening. The simple fact that I have to get my whatever-they-are hormones renewed. There will be blood work but that doesn't bother me except that when they get into my blood they're going to find something horrible.
That is how I think.
And maybe this is the basis of all of my doctor fears. Letting someone have access to that deep part of me which is covered up by skin and should, according to the most superstitious and reptile parts of me, be left secret and private and unknown.

I don't know. I just know that the idea of sitting in the doctor's office (or in my case, the nurse-practitioner's office) is beyond frightening to me. I have changed care providers so many times, thinking that this next one will surely not be as scary to me. But they all are. They can't help it and it's not their fault. I can remember feeling this exact same way when I was a little child. And remember when I went to the hypnotist to try and get over this?
He freaked me the fuck out and I never went back.

So that's me today. I am grateful that I have the boys later on because they will be a distraction, a grounding to reality.

Meanwhile, I vibrate, I panic in my belly, I marinate in those hot, red juices.

WTF?

I've done it again. I've almost killed myself, weeding in the hot sun. I took plenty of breaks and drank lots of water but fuck if I don't feel like I might die.
Why do I do this? Why do I get so OCD about things that I lose my mind?
My hands are completely worn out. I have the grip strength of a newborn kitten. My forearms are burning from the twisting, pulling. When I close my eyes, I see nutgrass. My knees hurt, my legs hurt, I'm sunburnt.
I'm crazy. That's all there is to it. Just crazy as a betsy bug, crazy as a loon, crazy as an old southern woman who is crazy.
Cue up the gin bottle and nylon slip with the yellowed underarms.
I'm walking around whimpering and here's the stupidest thing- two days ago I was walking around whimpering because I ached so much and felt so shitty. So then I feel better and I seem determined to make myself sick again.
It's not even time to put in the fall garden yet. The watermelons are still going crazy.
I will say this- all that mulching I did earlier in the year sure does make the weeding easier. That is the truth and I want to do it again. I want to have the prettiest fall and winter garden in the world!
I won't.
It'll look just like it always does with some collards and arugula and a few weird looking lettuces.
I sure would like to grow some more of those purple carrots this year though, along with some beets.

I found an old, rusted plow point in the garden today. I always get a bit of a thrill when I find relics from the past around here. I'm not the first person to sweat on this dirt. I also found a few potatoes sprouting from some we missed when we dug them up. I let them be.

I'm going to go make some supper. I'm going to have to drag Mr. Moon in from the garage. He's been out there all day building deer stands. Yes. Deer stands.
He came to check on me at one point and said, "I love to build things."
"I wish you'd build me a table," I said. "Or an outdoor sink."
"I will," he said. "Some day."

Harrumph.

Love...Ms. Moon

Sunday

It's Sunday therefore I sort of hate everything. Especially the internet. No, wait. I hate ME on the internet. Also my knee. I hate my knee. I think it's about to fall out again. It feels like there's no structural integrity in it. I rolled over last night and it went whompy.
Not good. Not good at all.
I sort of hate Maurice who is still in bed, snuggled UNDER the covers.
I hate that Mr. Moon's about to mow which will be noisy as hell.
I hate that Oliver Sachs died.
I hate that Donald Trump is even a thing.
I hate the cereal I bought in a fit of trying-to-eat-all-healthy-and-shit. Fucking twigs. Do I look like a chimpanzee?
Don't answer that.
I hate that I have to call my NP this week to get my biodenticals renewed. I REALLY hate that.
Etc.

But damn you, Sunday. You have to look like this today.

And give me this:

The first hurricane lily.

Why you have to be so pretty and not too hot? Why you have to give me merry chirping crickets and silly quacking duck? Why you have to make me want to go outside and weed?

Fuck you, Sunday. I will not love you no matter what you do or how you look or smell or sound. I will not. No. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Romance And Time Travel

It's Saturday night and all is well and all is right, right here in Lloyd. The rain has ceased but the sky's still gray, gentle silver with the setting sun behind the clouds.
It's been a fine and cozy day and there was a nap on clean sheets and I'm thinking my sweetheart is just about all rested up.

The beautiful roses he gave me before he left finally bowed their heads in defeat today and I gathered them and the zinnias that were with them in vases on the hallway altar and took them outside to become one with the earth again. The chickens, who were sitting on the kitchen porch

followed me out to the flower graveyard and petals dropped as we walked. They thought that perhaps I was carrying them a treat, although sadly, I was not.

Perhaps, though, the rose petals inspired thoughts of romance in Mick because he jumped on Camellia and for once, I had the phone-camera at the ready and took this picture.

Breathe in, breathe out. It is done. Luna looks on. 

The way roosters take their hens with their wings spread over all reminds me so much of Dracula, spreading his cloak over himself and his victim. 

The rooster even bites the neck of the hen as he fucks her and no, it is not pretty but as I have said, it is quick. I have a strong feeling that the early directors of the Dracula films grew up around chickens and as a child was terrified and haunted by their sex. 

At least the rooster does not take the hens' souls nor does he leave them as the undead. They merely ruffle and rearrange their feathers and get on with life. 

And so it goes. I hear a hawk calling and Mick has responded with a warning to the ladies to watch out for predators in the sky. I have the soup warming up and have cut new zinnias to replace the dead flowers. 

I will be so sad when they are all gone. There is absolutely nothing that says happy in a visual way like zinnias. When I was cutting them, I noticed that there are even more purple hull peas to pick. Perhaps we have not eaten the last of them quite yet after all. I have a huge yearning to get out in that garden and weed. If tomorrow affords me the possibility, I will do that. 

One more picture. 

The two old sisters, Mabel and Trixie, sitting together in a pot of split-leaf philodendron. How I love their dinosaur eyes, their dinosaur feet, their dinosaur gait, their soft black feathers. If dinosaurs really did have feathers then there is nothing I would love more than to be able to go back, back, back in time to see one, glinting and shimmering and iridescent in the sun which still rises every day on this planet which has seen so much. 

Another wild Saturday night here in North Florida. 

Much love...Ms. Moon

The Miracle Of The Rain

Mr. Moon got home last night and I'm not sure I've ever seen a wearier man. I asked him if he was going to be able to switch back to night-sleep and he said, "Oh yes."
And he did. He slept for ten hours.
This is obviously the sleeping house.
I am so glad to have him home. I think he is glad to be here. He is unpacking and being domestic, fitting himself back into his life in this house with me. It is good to have him here to go and find and get a kiss from. He and Maurice have greeted each other and Maurice is glad to have him back too. She slept between us last night after crunching a frog or a lizard in the corner. I am grateful she did not try to share.

He had planned to cut the grass today. I had wanted to get in the garden to weed.
However, this is happening.

Except that in the time it took me to upload the video, it has started raining harder. Perhaps we are already getting bands of rain from Erika which overnight, became a "remnant" as they say.
I imagine the chickens are huddled somewhere dry. This is a bit much, even for the duck.

I keep thinking it's Sunday but it is not. A good day, however, to stay inside, or at least on the porch. I feel better but my hips, which seem to hold all of my illnesses, still hurt but that may be this weather. I am not complaining. I am quite content to stay here on this side of the rain curtains, letting all the doings of the world stay on the other side, my man and my cat close at hand in our cozy world.
For today, at least.
It is good.

Thinking About This Lady

Alice Carlisle. She died on Wednesday, two days after her one-hundredth birthday.
Her daughter, Andrea, has been blogging about Alice for several years now at Go Ask Alice. 

Over those years I feel as if Alice had become a part of my own family, a matriarch of sorts whose life and adventures, as reported by Andrea, since childhood to the present have inspired and entertained me, made me laugh, made me think, made me remember how strong women are, how amazing the human spirit is.
Have reminded me what a mother can be. Have taught me how the bond between a mother and daughter can be one of great and good love.

I am hoping that Andrea can hold the memories of her mother close, that she can know that she did the very best for her mother than any daughter could do. And that she knows how very much we who have been fortunate enough to follow her blog are grateful to her for this incredibly real and loving window into the relationship she had with Alice and how much we have enjoyed our time spent with them.

We will miss Alice so much.

I hope that Andrea continues to write on her blog because I don't want her presence in my life to disappear. Of course, that is selfish and she will do what she wants and needs to do.
But whatever happens, I wish her all the love in the world and great peace.

And all of the stolen flowers in the world to Alice.

Love...Mary

Who Knows?

It's starting to rain and I've got soup simmering on the stove and the man is coming home tonight. I'm not sure why they decided to come home a day early. Weather, perhaps.

I keep thinking I'm making this being-sick thing up in my head. I mean, I can do things. I took the trash and did some laundry and made the soup. But I tell you what- every time I lay down it feels so good.

So what's going on with Tropical Storm Erika?
Here's the computer models.

Don't you love that?

I'm going to go lay down again. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Where Am I?

Ugh. I feel like shit.
I slept eleven hours. I woke up, looked at my phone to check the time and almost passed out to see it was after ten. It's all Maurice's fault. She didn't wake me up. She just laid there with me, cuddled up and asleep.
Anyway, the universe is abundant and I have absolutely no obligations today. But it's so weird- it's already noon and where is the day going and it's growing dark outside and there may be rain or there may not be and we may get a hurricane next week and we may not and I'm too old to waste an entire day of doing nothing.
I swear. I feel that way. But the walk out to the hen house about did me in.

Mr. Moon will be home tomorrow. There does not look to be a pair of gator-hide boots in my near future which is fine with me. I hope he's had a good time anyway. I keep thinking of how it must have looked last night with that moon shining down through the moss-draped cypress trees, shining off the black night time waters of the creeks and rivers. Another world entirely, and a beautiful one. We talk about parallel universes but all you have to do is trade day for night or slip underneath a few inches of water with a snorkel and a mask and you are in a completely different universe, right here, right now.
I ponder that.
It pleases me.

All right. That's all I have in me. I suppose I will finish up "Go Set A Watchman."
I am sorry, I do not recommend it.
That's all I have to say about that.
I wanted to like it.
I could not. Maybe because it cuts too close to the bone of what I remember as the attitude of so many whites about people of color in the early sixties.
And now, for that fucking matter.

Happy Friday, y'all.

Love...Ms. Moon

Musing On Love

Well, I don't know if old Mer is coming down with what the boys have or if she's just flat-out tired but either way, I'm not going to that meeting tonight. They can figure it all out by themselves, the Village of Lloyd, the county commissioner, the owner of the truck stop and whoever else is involved. Whatever's going on, I ache and my skin hurts and my eyes are burning but I think that's due to the skin cream I've been using for daytime which has sunscreen in it which is not gentle to the eyes when it leaks in.

We had a lot of fun at lunch. I gave Jessie her quilt, as you can see above. I'm sure you can hardly tell that I didn't use a tape measure at all to make it. Rip, tear, sew. Rip, tear, sew.
I love the colors. Royal colors for a royal baby. When we said good-bye after lunch, I just laid my head on that beautiful belly of Jessie's and kept it there for a long time, beaming my love thoughts into the little boy's heart.
I probably annoyed the shit out of his mother.
But she patiently tolerated me. All of my children are so very kind.

Lily and the boys and I drove in the exact wrong direction to find the place where we were buying the kitchen. Strangely enough, the intersection of the two roads we were looking for ends up happening both east and west in Tallahassee. One of the roads is a circle and it crosses the other road twice. Still, we managed.
Here's Gibson playing with his new kitchen.

It's so cute. Heavy sturdy wood. And red!!!

Who doesn't want a red kitchen?

Owen's going to play with it too but when I left, he was busy eating his miso soup and salad with ginger dressing and sushi that his daddy picked him up at Japanica! because he didn't want any of the Indian food. He's the sickie boy now but he's doing okay and he was so happy about that soup and salad and sushi. How I love those boys. How many times have I said that? I'll never get over the way I love my grandchildren. It's just such an unexpected miracle in my life. I was holding Owen's hand as we were walking into the restaurant today and I said, "I'm so glad I know you."

And that's it, you know. 

I get to know these precious people and watch them grow and even be a part of it and love them so much and be loved in return. It's different than being a parent. I mean, kids, especially young kids, sort of have to love their parents because they are the source of life and sustenance. But grandparents? That's just free joy there. Pure, free joy. And I can't help but think that my love for them is a joy in their life, too. They may not think of it as such right now, but eventually, maybe they will. I hope they will. 

I think they will. I surely do.

I kissed Owen before I left, gently, on the head and he said, "That was nice of you to kiss me on my head, Mer."

He said that. He did. 

And soon there will be two more to love. And once again I will be reminded that there is no limit to the love a heart can hold. More love means more love. 

As I've said before, I think that love is truly the current that propels and powers this universe and what we know and define as love is only the merest shadow of a molecule of that, as powerful as we think it is. Somehow it all has to do with quantum physics. 

Trust me. 

"And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make," said the Beatles. 

And it's no flaw in the language that causes us to say with equal fervor that we love our friends, our lovers, our children, our grandchildren, our pets, the sunset, the mountains, the water, cornbread with cane syrup on it. Of course the range of our love is vast but whenever it's real, it's a force for good. The artist loves her paints and her canvas. The poet loves his paper, pen and the words. The sculptor loves the stone and the chisel, the potter loves the clay and the wheel. The cook loves the oil and the garlic, the gardener loves the dirt and the seed. The lover loves the touch and the heart. The baby loves the milk and the warmth. The scholar loves the book and the teacher. The sailor loves the wind and the canvas. The carpenter loves the wood and his tools. The musician loves the instrument and the notes. The scientist loves the question and the answers. The mathematician loves the numbers and the proofs. The dancer loves the effort and the bending of the body to perfection. 

The motion loves the motion, the inertia loves the inertia. The hips love the music and the heart loves what it loves. 

The flower loves the sun, the cat loves the hunt, the bird loves the seed, the water loves the moon, the fern loves the shade, the moon loves the earth and the earth loves the sun and thus, we are bound together in life.

Call it what you will, it is the love which is the source of creation and of art and of gravity and of all life as we know it. 

That's what I think. I could just be having fever dreams. 

We may not always understand where this love comes from and sometimes it gets perverted and ends up badly (the politician loves the power, the wealthy love the wealth, the cruel love the giving of pain, the junkie loves the needle, the liar loves the lie) but it's what we have and we may not understand it all nor may we ever, but there has to be something to balance it all out whether we are talking shadow and light or yin and yang or god and devil or north and south or positive or negative, from the cells in our body on up. 

Well. That's about as profound as I know how to be. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Another Day, Another Adventure

Maurice is enjoying the cool morning air, waiting on the chickens to be let out because that's one of her favorite things to do- watching them explode forth from the hen house. She's been sleeping with me all night, every night since Mr. Moon's been away. I've been sleeping so hard that I barely have to make the bed. Just pull up the corner of the sheets and quilt and resettle the pillows.
We are good bed mates, Maurice and I.

Last night was so perfect and I read way too late but I feel good today. Going to town to have lunch with Hank and Jessie and Lily and both of the boys. Owen has what Gibson had so he's not in school today and we wouldn't drag him around except that after lunch we're going to go pick up a play kitchen that Lily found on Craig's List and so hey! We're going. She said he doesn't seem to feel that bad right now. And it's no problem if he doesn't feel like eating because we're going to the Indian restaurant and he doesn't like that food anyway, unlike his brother whom I hear had about twenty pieces of butter chicken last time they visited the restaurant.

And so it goes.
Tonight I may be going to a community meeting at the truck stop. They're going to be discussing possible brown field clean up around the truck stop and also possible development.
Do I have any idea what brown fields are?
No.
The woman who came by yesterday with a map of this proposed whatever-it-is was quite sure that we don't need possible development in Lloyd and I found her presence so odd that I immediately jumped into devil's advocate mode and I'd really like to just find out what's going on.
Of course, this being Lloyd, probably not much for a long time.
I mean, it took two years to get sidewalks in.
But at the very least, perhaps I'll be able to check out the menu at The Bone.

It's all about food for me, isn't it?

All right. I better take a shower.

And let the chickens out.

Love...Ms. Moon

We Have No Need To Explain

Three ladies, old enough to know better, old enough to laugh at ourselves, old enough to not have a whole lot of fucks left to give about things that really don't matter.

We wear earrings and overalls, we laugh a lot. We sit on the porch
On the first day of perceived fall

Southern women

We ate homemade pickles, crab dip and crackers, slices of green apples
Fried ham with fig preserves and mustard
The last peas from the garden, cooked with some white rice
Beets with carrots and onions, vinegars, sweet and sour,
Rubies, rubies, rubies
Garnets
Cornbread with cane syrup on it, best goddammed dessert in the world
(Sorry, creme brulee)

We had drinks and talked about everything
Divorces, children, grandchildren, gardens, pig-raising, parents falling down and breaking bones
Men and dishwashers, dogs, bears, cats, kinfolk, Keith Richards, boys with blue, blue eyes.

We ate until we had baby-bellies.
We loved every bite.
We might have moaned a time or two.

We hugged tight like good-bye/hello/I love you.

I feel so damn blessed I could cry.

Silver fattening moon rising up over the pecan trees.
Chickens put to bed.
Baby blanket finished.

Bed waiting. Book waiting.

Life sweetness.
All goodness.

Thank my lucky stars for ladies
Southern women
Who bring me joy by the basket

Fuck me.
I'm lucky.

Weather and The Bone

The old hidden cemetery in the woods.

When I got up this morning and walked outside I could hardly believe I was in the same world as the one I went to sleep in last night. The temperature had dropped quite a bit and the crickets were silent. Everything was so still and quiet, not one hint of a breeze. It felt almost ominous. 

It's hurricane season and that has us all on edge at least a tiny bit. Danny fizzled out but Erika is right behind him and they are saying that conditions are more favorable for the building of her strength and longevity.

Oh! The dreaded cone. Which we know means nothing and yet, we all pay attention. 

And if you want to know how confusing the information on hurricane prediction is, how one model completely disagrees with another, check out this website.

It is an inexact science, to say the very least. 

Perhaps it will just be a nice tropical storm which brings some much needed water to Puerto Rico and Cuba. 

Only time will tell. 

As with all things.

But in the meantime, it feels so nice. There is still no breeze but the temperature is barely above eighty. A virtual cold wave for us! The crickets are quieter but that is because their chorus registers the temperature- the higher the temperature, the more rapid their chirping. 

Here is the formula given by The Old Farmer's Almanac to calculate temperature by counting cricket chirps:

To convert cricket chirps to degrees Fahrenheit, count number of chirps in 14 seconds then add 40 to get temperature.

Example: 30 chirps + 40 = 70° F

To convert cricket chirps to degrees Celsius, count number of chirps in 25 seconds, divide by 3, then add 4 to get temperature.

Example: 48 chirps /(divided by) 3 + 4 = 20° C

I love shit like that. We can not only feel the temperature, we can hear it. And all of this data which our senses record is actually quite powerful, whether we are paying attention or not. 

And so it goes. 

I must correct something I wrote yesterday. The name of the new restaurant at the truck stop is not "Bones" but "The Bone."

Which makes me laugh and makes me think of this.

Which is my song, of course. Worst video ever made, quite possibly, but the song always makes me smile.

Have a lovely day.

Much Love To All...Mary Moon
(Not a vegetarian. But my long skirts do blow in a transcendental wind.)

If The Word "Fuck" Offends You, Don't Fucking Read This

That cracks me up. And frankly, it may well HAVE felt like 117 degrees today. I don't know. But it sure was hot. The whole time I was outside picking peas and cleaning the hen house, I kept thinking about the signs at a local gym/workout place advertising their new hot yoga classes, heated by green heaters! 
Are you fucking kidding me? Just open the damn doors and windows and shut off the AC. You won't get through three warrior poses without the toxins flowing out of your body like a river! You'll get stuck in child's pose because you won't be able to peel your body off that mat.
I guarandamntee ya.
Better yet- go outside and do your yoga! Yeah, baby. Now we're talking some HOT YOGA! That would be some REAL motherfucking hot yoga there.
Whatever. What do I know? Not one damn thing.
But I'm pretty sure that I'm toxin free now.

I've had the most beautiful day. It's been just what I needed. I did talk to Billy on the phone and that was wonderful. Also to Lis and we giggled like Betty Rubble and Wilma Flintstone. And to Lily. Lily and I can't seem to go a day without talking to each other.
We are like Gibson.
"I need you!"

Hey. Look what I found in the garden.

I found at least half a dozen real live watermelons of decent size. I'm shocked! Shocked, I tell you! I'm glad they're growing something besides vines. Those vines have swallowed the zinnias and most of the peas although I did pick enough to fill a nice sized bowl, once shelled. And I had a good time, sitting there on the couch in the air conditioning, watching "Real Time" with Bill Maher. Of course it was a rerun but I enjoyed it anyway. 

You know what I want to be in my next lifetime? 

No. Not a unicorn or a dolphin or even a princess. 

I want to be a comedian who gets paid to speak her mind using a buttload of profanity. 

Yep. That's what I want to be. 

Roseanne. St. George Carlin. St. Richard Pryor. 

Hey. Speaking of St. Richard- remember when Bill Cosby chastised him for all the profanity?

FUCK YOU, BILL COSBY!

I don't know why I love to curse so much. I certainly wasn't raised that way. My granny was so pure of mouth that she would spell D.A.R.N. when she was absolutely the most frustrated or upset. 

I remember being shocked (and somewhat thrilled) when my mother would say, "Hell's bells." 

Reading "Gone With The Wind" was completely liberating to me because sometimes they said, "Damn!" in it. 

And then I read Abbie Hoffman's "Steal This Book" which advocated that we all say the word "fuck" as often as possible because it was the one word absolutely guaranteed to shock and offend. 

I did know the word, having heard it from a boy named Lee Grant who was in my grade in elementary school. Lee's father was a fisherman and a bad drinker who would beat his wife on Friday nights and then she would chase him around the house with a knife so yeah, he had definitely heard the word. He also brought a condom to school. Not for official show-and-tell but for the real thing, out on the playground. 

Oh, Lee. Thanks for the memories. 

Anyway, I fell in love with that word. "Fuck." It's just so satisfying. The way you almost bite your lip with the beginning f, and end the word with that tongue-clicking ck, that dirty-sounding short-u in the middle of it all. 

You can say it slow and easy, too. 

Aw, fuuuuck. 

It's just the most useful, multi-purpose word I've ever run across. 

Fuck this.

Fuck that. 

Fuck me. 

Fuck you.

Fuckin' A! 

Fuck alla y'all. 

What the fuck?

Fuck YAH! 

Fuck NO!

Can you fucking believe this? 

No fucking way. 

Are you fucking kidding me?

Jesus Fucking Christ. 

That fucking sucks. 

Fucking awesome.

And so forth. 

Add the word "mother" to it and baby, you got a curse thing going! 

There is also, of course, the main definition. 

"Hey baby. Wanna fuck?"

It's noun, it's adjective, it's adverb, it's verb. It's probably some of those other grammar things I don't remember. 

I try to be judicious with my use of it. I don't say it around the boys. I don't say it around little old ladies. I don't say it around people whom I think would get the wrong I idea about me. I don't think I ever said it around my former yoga teacher who was extremely religious in the Catholic sense. 

And I never grow tired of it. I think Abbie Hoffman was right. It's The Bad Word. 

And I guess that The Bad Girl in me just loves to say it. 

All right. From the garden and watermelons and shelling peas and hot yoga to my favorite word. 

Which I would absolutely love to be paid for saying onstage. 

I'm going to go cook some fucking dinner. 

It's been a great fucking day. 

I fucking love you...Ms. Moon

Tranquility

I feel a great need today to be at home. To stay in Lloyd. To be quiet and listen to not much at all. My life has been so busy lately and sometimes I have to simply stop and retreat into this womb of green and light and shadow.
I started my walk late and it is so very hot so I walked slowly and stuck to the shade as much as possible and it was fine and I was fine. The butterflies are out in full. The yellow Sulfurs which always seem to go in pairs were in abundance as were the Gulf Fritillaries.

The undersides of their wings shine silver in the sunlight. They are feeding greedily in the late August heat. 

This is naught but a run-off pond but it is always a joy to see it, the green ferns and trees around it. It gives the image of coolness and today when I stopped to take this picture, a cooler breeze actually blessed me. It is right behind the abandoned gas station where the concrete ends and the dirt path takes over. When I was on my way home, crossing that pavement was a torture. I stopped at the little Mount Zion church and went around to the back where I know there is a spigot. 

I thirsted and was given water. 

Okay, I stole water. Not much. I surely was grateful.

I went on to the Post Office, noted that Papa Jay's is open again today. I also noted, when I went by the truck stop, that someone has taken over the restaurant there. This happens at least once or twice a year. It's always someone's dream to open a truck stop restaurant but it never seems to pan out. It's so close to Tallahassee where there are better places to stop and eat, even for truckers, and there's a Subway at that exit too. Well, we shall see how this one goes. It is called "Bones" and bills itself as a family restaurant. I might have to check it out.

And home. Open the gate, shut it behind me. Home. 

Maurice is my company today. She is napping on the table where I type. 

We have a fan on us and the breeze from it ruffles her fur and her belly rises and falls with her breath. The chickens are scratching outside the porch and rustling in the downed magnolia leaves.

I am going to clean out the hen house today, pick the rest of the peas, shell them, and work on Jessie's blanket. That is my entire plan. 

You have no idea how excited I am about this. 

If the river was a little closer, I'd probably jump in the car and drive down there to really and truly cool off but it seems like such a waste of gas and besides that, the idea of putting on a woman's swimsuit with its nylon and spandex makes me want to die a little. We laugh at what women used to have to wear to swim in- those bathing costumes with bloomers and skirts- but truly, unless you wear a bikini, which I am certainly not going to do, the suits we wear now are cruel as well. 

I am not interested in any cruelty whatsoever today. I want softness and breezes, bird call and Trixie song. I want peace. 

Love...Ms. Moon

We Are Stardust, We Are Golden. And Then We Clean Up Dead Animals Because Some Of Us Think We Got To Get Ourselves Back To The Garden

That's me after today's make-over.
It's been some day.
What occurs to me is that my ability to make-believe (act) has stood me well over my years of child-rearing and child-tending. Give me a role and I'll play it. I surely did enjoy my years of using this skill onstage but now I have slipped back into using it entirely with children. And as with the onstage thing, make-up is often involved.

My boys are very much into role-playing and imagination. Gibson creates little scenarios with anything and everything. He plays all of the roles, using whatever is at hand to stand in as actors. Owen's imagination touches everything he does, at least with me.
He is going through a thing where he does not like to be alone in a room in my house. "The monsters follow me around," he says. This is not worrisome to me. It is amazing. He assigns me my parts in his narrative many times a day.
When I was being made-over, I was the Queen of Harvard (!?)  and that somehow involved pyramids, as well as the tried and true role of being a woman who was going to go to a party.
"You will be the most golden woman at the party!" he proclaimed.
He was right. If I were going to a party, I most certainly would be. The theme from "Goldfinger" is looping my brain as we speak.

We also walked down to Papa Jay's for a lollipop and a drink, only to find that it was closed. This does not bode well but I'm not certain that Papa Jay is making his rent which is sad as hell but there you go.
Lloyd.
Anyway, on the way home, Owen decided that when we got back we would play restaurant.
Fine.
And so we did.
I was the server/owner of the restaurant.
He and Gibson sat up at the kitchen island and I gave them menus, which were books.
"May I take your drink order?" I asked.
"We'll have two waters," Owen said.
Their entire order looked like this.

Of course I had to write it down! That's his signature at the bottom where he signed for the check. 

As the dining experience continued and they ate their meal, it was discovered that I was his grandmother and that he and his brother's parents had been killed and how fortunate was it that they had stumbled, entirely by chance, into their grandmother's restaurant! I offered them to live with me now and they accepted. I showed them their room and they were happy with it. 

It was just joyous! And I had to promise to take in their fish and two cats as well. 

No problem.

And there's this:

Elephant ear salads. 

Don't they look delicious? 

They were gathered here:

Oh well. They're about to die back anyway. They'll be back next spring. 

Elephant ears are slightly toxic and I made Owen wash his hands well after his adventures in jungle cuisine. I think he'll live. I asked Gibson if he had touched them and he assured me that he had not. You know what? I took him at his word. 

All of this and so much more occurred in the space of three hours. 

Three hours. 

One more thing- when we were in the bathroom while I was getting my make-over, Owen said something about, "That looks like blood!" and I ignored him, thinking that yet again, his imagination was cooking up something good and gory. 

Then I actually looked at the place he was talking about. 

Oh. Sweet baby Jesus. No. 

I have no idea what happened there but my best guess is that Maurice slew a giant rat. There WAS blood, and organs and teeth. And...undefinable gore. 

And it had been there for awhile.
I thought of Lis using that bathroom. I freaked. I texted her to ask if she had noticed a murder massacre scene. She texted me back just now saying, "Um...No. What bloody massacre scene was that?"

I'm glad she didn't have to see it but I know if she had, she would not have freaked out. She, too, lives in the country. These things happen. 

And frankly, if that, uh, creature, was in my house, I'm mighty grateful to Maurice for slaying it. 

My sweet little kitty. Whom I love to sleep with, who calms and comforts me as I fall asleep, petting her soft, clean, warm fur. 

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Time to go put the chickens up. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Sweet Santa Joni Mitchell:

Understanding

When I woke up this morning and went out to let the duck and chickens into the run and get the paper, a poem almost came to me. I remember when I did, in fact, take the time to stop and write when this happened and it was so wonderful and mysterious and frustrating and all of the emotions. But what I was thinking about was that it seems to me that as I grow older I am more and more satisfied with being outside. That it becomes increasingly important and absolutely necessary for me.
And that perhaps, just perhaps, this is because as I grow older death becomes more of a reality than a less-than concrete possibility and I can almost feel the need to merge now with nature, to really know my place in it and all of the cycles of all of the living things within it.

The phrase which came to my mind as I walked out into this beautiful day where the trees led my eyes to the sky and I could feel the life all around me, churning and growing and breathing and dying was, "I am practicing the Buddhist art of disappearing."
Which makes no sense. I seriously doubt that Buddha espoused disappearing although what do I know?
Not much.
And that is true. I don't know much and the older I get, the less I understand the ways of men and women but the ways of nature may sometimes be incredibly baffling and mysterious but the cycle of it all, that death and rebirth, that response to air and to sun and to water- these things are more and more clear to me daily and I can positively feel that the hurricane lilies are about to shoot up and I look for the camellia buds and there they are, beginning to swell for this winter's opening and I know it is almost time to get the garden ready for greens and onions and carrots. I feel these things in my blood and they are real. I know them and I see the way the light falls, shadow and shade, I feel the way the air feels, I hear the way the crickets chirp, I can see the way the fungus and ferns take the downed branches and trees back to dirt and when it rains, I can smell the clean, good rot of it and it smells like renewal as well as death.
Nature doesn't waste much.
Nor do I believe it will waste me either. Not in flesh matter or soul matter. I see the fact of that all around me, I take great comfort.

Lon and Lis left this morning and yes, I did cry. These people have been a part of my life for so long now. I remember they were here when Katrina was heading towards New Orleans and Lon said, "New Orleans is not going to be all right."
They were with us when Princess Diana died and I was with them when the Twin Towers fell. Weddings and births and deaths- we have been through all of these together. These are the big events, or at least some of them that we have shared but oh- the small ones!
The giggles until we are breathless. The rides to the coast in the convertible. The music, the food made and taken together, the toasts, the jokes, the smiles and the tears. They know me and they love me. I know them and I love them. We understand each other.
I asked my husband this morning when I talked to him on the phone if we could marry them.
He said we could.

I tear up and smile at the same time, thinking of that.

I do not want to disappear entirely. Eventually, it will appear that I have, as it will for all of us.
And even as I begin to merge more and more with the natural cycle of it all, I do still feel rooted by the love I have for people. My husband, my children and my grandchildren.
The people who I love and am loved by.

Not just rooted but made visible.

This is some of what I wanted to write in a poem but poetry takes a fine blade and a sharp one and right now it seems as if my blade, though serviceable, is a bit clumsy and dull.

Still, I use it. The knife I have.

Hello. How are you? I am glad you are here, part of it all. Not just for me, but for this entire universe. Go outside today, if you can and take a moment to feel your place in it all. It's there. I promise. And it is splendid.

All love...Ms. Moon

I'm The Luckiest Woman In The World, Part 10,000

It has been a lazy, lazy day. Right after I described the scene from the back porch this morning, Lis handed the mandolin to Lon (who was the maker of that instrument) and Greta leapt through the dog door to go scare the chickens and Maurice was roused from her slumber to see what the bawking was all about.

That was pretty much the most excitement we've had all day, to tell you the truth.
Okay, actually, the bottle tree, which is a redbud tree, did crack in half and fall to the ground with all of its bottles. It was inevitable. But no one heard it (and yet, still it fell which seems to answer at least one of the eternal questions) and we just realized it happened when we went out to get eggs. And don't ask me which came first, the chicken or the egg because that has yet to be determined.

While I was out taking this picture, I took the annual requisite picture of one of the four o'clocks because I think they are just the most charming flowers. Look at those red pistols and stamens!

If I was a bee, I'd make love to those flowers all day long. 

See the rain drops? We've had some rain, but not a lot. Gray skies and rollin' and tumblin' in the celestial percussion section but enough rain to damp the ground, to smell so good that you just want to snap the air and eat it. 

Speaking of eating, we have done that. When Jessie and Vergil got back from kayaking, Lis set out a snack buffet of cheese and crackers and strawberries and I got out the chicken and sliced it. Then the beets and carrots. 

Mmmmm....

My friend Liz Sparks drove up to Plains, Georgia today to hear Jimmy Carter teach his Sunday school class. I have no idea how many times she's done that. She's the kind of person who thinks of things that would be cool or good or fun or important to do and she just does them. She doesn't dither on about all the reasons she shouldn't do these things, she just does them. I admire that in her so much and I so wish I was at least a little more like she is. Yesterday she brought me two presents from her summer away in the cooler climes where she house-sat and was the nurse for a boy's camp. (See what I mean? And the whole time she was able to do her "real" job via the internet.)

Here's what she brought me.

A tea towel and a six pack. 

I can't wait to taste that porter but I really don't want to use the towel. It's too good to mess up. 

Lon and Lis have gone over to Lon's sister's house for some supper and Maurice and I are holding down the fort. They'll be back a little later but they have to leave tomorrow. Golly, but it's been wonderful having them here. I'll probably cry like a little girl when they leave tomorrow. I won't be able to grieve too long though because I'll be hanging out with the boys in the afternoon. 

I heard from my man today. They saw a shit ton of gators last night but no big ones. But they're having fun. This all must seem like an adventure on a different planet for him. Sleeping all day and spending the nights roaming the gnarly branches and creeks of the Apalachicola River. I keep thinking about that monster gator we saw down in Roseland and it gives me the shivers. But you know- my first love was Tarzan and I guess I married the most reasonable facsimile I could find. The roses he brought me before he left are opening like the pink velvet faces of a maiden, freshly falling in love. 

He thanked me today for taking care of things while he was gone. 

Lord, did I win the lottery with that man. 

I think I'll go eat some more beets. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Sunday Services

Could these beautiful people care a little less about having their picture taken?
I think not.
Still. There you are. We had sweet potato, peach and raspberry pancakes this morning. And bacon. With honey and maple syrup and fig preserves.
Could it get any sweeter?
Again, I think not.

Jessie and Vergil have taken off to the river to do a little kayaking and Greta is here, wondering where her humans have gone and sniffing about, wishing the little boys were here to play with her. Gibson is still sick. I think he may have this thing that's going around which is sort of cold/flu. Fever, headache. I feel so sorry for him. This is what he looked like last night.

Lily says he's had a bath and some Advil this morning and feels a little better.
When that boy's sick, he wants his mama. Don't we all?

I'm having such a good time with Lis and Lon here. Last night we baked a chicken and Lis made the most spectacular beets with carrots you can imagine. She peeled the beets and chunked them into nice-size pieces and simmered them in some vegetable broth and then added peeled and cut-up carrots and cooked them for quite awhile until the broth was the color of rubies and a bit thickened and then she threw in a few raspberries and cooled them for a bit and added a bit of Old Dutch salad dressing. She usually uses a raspberry vinaigrette which I did not have but I couldn't imagine them tasting any better than these did. We ate those and the chicken and a baked potato and it was simply delicious, so beautiful.
Every time I woke up in the night I thought about those beets.
Beets are one of the only things that Mr. Moon really does not like to eat. Good thing he's out of town, eh? Because I'm going to be eating beets all week long.

So I really don't have much to talk about today. We're just moving along slowly, doing a little of this, a little of that. We had a bit of excitement last night in that Lon and I were talking on the back porch when all of a sudden, I heard Miss Lily the duck, just quacking her head off. I hadn't shut them up yet and I knew something was wrong. Lon and Lis and I all raced out with a flashlight and Lily was out of the hen house, just waddling and quacking and freaked out. We checked out the hen house and there were no critters in it but the hens and Mick were agitated so I feel sure something had been. We herded Lily back in and shut them up all safe and sound and they are all fine this morning.

I keep thinking about yesterday's shower. It was so perfect and May worked so hard to make it all happen. Lily and I helped a little with the food prep and Liz Sparks came in with her collection of full-on English tea regalia. Tea pots, cups, saucers. She set that all up and it was so lovely. She amazes me. She's your go-to woman if you need to do primitive camping via kayak and ALSO, the one who owns the formal English tea equipment.
It truly was the best baby shower I've ever attended. I'm not a woo-woo person so the blessing-way concept is a bit much for me but I also think that most baby showers are insulting to adult women but this shower had all the blessings and all the silliness and all the fun and all of the love without any of the bullshit. And there was something just so soul-pleasing about us all sitting around and using paint and paper and colored pencils and crayons and muslin to make sweet things for Jessie to take home. The alphabet pictures will be made into a book, the painted muslin into a prayer flag to hang when the baby comes with all good wishes on it. We laughed at our attempts to "make art" and encouraged each other and gossiped and shot the shit and ate cucumber sandwiches and cupcakes which were works of art in themselves. And drank tea. And then we watched Jessie open her presents and drank sparkling lemonade with elderflower flavoring. My ex's wife, my co-mama, came and brought Jessie's baby a beautiful little ukulele. Lis gave Jessie, along with some baby things, the first gift I ever gave to her which is a heart necklace. I've been wearing the twin to it in my most recent pictures. She asked my permission before she gave it to Jessie and I almost cried with the sweetness. She got books and clothes and her best friend from baby-childhood who is the niece of my darling Lynn whose birthday would have been yesterday, gave her a whole box full of things she'll need including a little kid tie-dye t-shirt that Lynn had made. So she was there too.

And now I'm sitting on the porch with Lon and Lis, who is playing the mandolin, and Maurice who is stretched out on the table, taking her ease, and Greta who is lying in front of the fan.

Ease and heat and summer time and music and here we are.

Love...Ms. Moon

She Was Loved Up Real Good

It was a most beautiful day. And the very best baby shower.
There was so much delicious food and so many loving people and so much fun and so much laughter and a few tears. There were presents both practical and magical. There was prayer-flag-painting and there was alphabet book illustrating. There were all of my children. And my dearest friends. Jessie's friends and her fairy godmothers and a fairy godfather and her fairy god aunts and I can't imagine anything better.

And then the very best supper with the sweetest people in the world after martinis. We miss Mr. Moon but he is happy, I am sure, out in the swamps and on the rivers. 

Honestly. The sweet goodness of it all has been just swoony. A precious gift, you might even say.

(And I swear I had no idea that paper with the headline was there when I took the picture. It just was.)

And it's almost ten o'clock and this old lady, this old MerMer, is just about to get in bed. 

Night, y'all. See you tomorrow. Jessie and Vergil are coming out for breakfast. 

There will be bacon.

All love...Ms. Moon

Waking Up In This World

I'm up. Duh. Not like I'd be writing this in my sleep, huh?
I was pretty busy in my sleep, though. I helped deliver Lily's baby which turned out to be twins. No, y'all, no indication she's having twins. That was just in my dream. I was also gardening.
No wonder I'm still exhausted.
Babies and gardens.
Yep. Sounds about right.

It's quiet in Lloyd this morning. Summer's full green is still upon us, even though the pecans are beginning to drop. The heat yesterday was powerful, painful almost. It should be the same today. It rains almost every day. A blessing, a relief for a moment or two.

Today would have been my friend Lynn's birthday, had she not died. She was with me when Jessie was born. I am thinking of how very, very proud and happy she would have been to see this girl grown up and having her own baby. How she would have made banana bread and egg salad and hung banners and sung songs and laughed and laughed.

Well, no time to dwell on the past or a different present. It is this day and it is time to start making the most of it. Time to let the chickens out, pick zinnias, take a shower, get to town, throw a shower.

In one part of my dream, I was hanging out with many babies. It was a sort of heaven.

And so is this, this real, green, hot, humid world and soon there will be babies.

Love...Ms. Moon