We're here. We got here just in time to make a martini and walk out to the dock to see that.
The wind is blowing and as we sat on the dock I said, "This'll blow your ya-ya's out.
The lion pool is emerald lit, it is my childhood fantasy come true.
The lions are standing guard at each corner, the bamboo is knocking and squeaking and rustling in the wind.
The appliances are pink.
And so is the bathroom sink.
Even though I live in Florida, I feel like right this moment, I am truly IN Florida.
All the way down here I read "South Moon Under" to Mr. Moon. Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings' first important book. Somehow, I've never read it before. It was perfect.
It's one of those mornings so very beautiful that you think, "Why would I leave this?" but we are going to and I need to finish packing and I can't wait to get on the road and let the worries and cares of this beloved home fade away with every mile we travel.
Here's my guys standing by the world's comfiest couch. Owen didn't want to have his picture taken but he told me that because he knows how much I love him and because I'm pretty, he would do it.
He's going to go far in this world, that boy.
We had to go back to Japanica again. It's our favorite. Owen is in one of those stages where he just doesn't like to eat much of anything. His favorite snack is iceberg lettuce, cut up into a bowl. With nothing on it. BUT, the salad they serve at Japanica and the miso soup make him happy.
Strange child.
As soon as we got there Gibson demanded "beans!" Last time we went Uncle Hank showed him how to eat edamame in the pod and he wanted some more of that. When they brought the bowl out, he wanted it right in front of him and he ate about 90% of them. He, too, likes miso soup, as well as sushi, salad AND white rice. A lot. No problems with his appetite.
Before we picked up Owen and went to lunch, though, Lily and I went to Goodwill where I struck up a conversation with a woman in the middle of the dress rack. Turned out we both live in old houses in the country and so we neither one of us have much need for fancy clothes and I said something like, "Can I feed the chickens in it?" being my criteria and she said, "Oh, I don't have chickens anymore. Thank God!"
She then proceeded to tell me that chickens are the stupidest creatures on God's green earth so you know she could never be my friend. I just can't even imagine how anyone could spend twenty minutes watching chickens and think they were stupid. Maybe if they're in a cage...
But hell, how smart does anything in a cage look?
I told her I disagreed with her on that point and that I find them fascinating and then we parted ways.
And I'm tired tonight. I've begun packing which means I've filled a suitcase with a bunch of stuff I won't wear and nothing I probably will wear but it'll all work out. I've also packed (but not in my suitcase) olive oil and vinegar and coffee and stuff like that and tomorrow I'll pack a cooler with eggs and cheese. I promised one of our landlord guys that I'd bring them eggs and we'll want our own too. Might as well. I'm drowning in eggs.
And so it goes and tomorrow we shall go and I'm finishing up laundry and need to get a supper ready for Mr. Moon and there's another damn Scott/Crist debate happening and I could listen on the radio while I'm cooking but I might just wait for Stephen Colbert to tell me the good parts at a later date.
Let's all sleep well tonight, okay? Sweet dreams and all of that, and please believe me- chickens are NOT stupid. Humans frequently are, but chickens are wise in their ways.
Good morning!
Here I am. Where are you?
Another nice day in Lloyd and the requisite Early Morning Angst is dissipating and I am going to town to do a few things with Lily and Gibson and then go with them to pick up Owen from school.
Maybe we'll go have some noodles. We are Lunch Monsters, aren't we?
This IS my social life. And that's fine by me.
When Lily and the boys got here today I said, "Hey, you want to go to Monticello and get lunch and I'll early-vote?"
"Can we go to the Mexican restaurant?" Lily asked.
"The best Mexican restaurant in Monticello!" I said.
Of course the joke of it is that there is only one Mexican restaurant in Monticello and we did go there and it was good. As we were walking in an old friend of mine was walking in at the same time and she ate lunch with us. It was good to see her and she's a former reporter, a, writer, an author, and works for environmental agencies and we talked a bit about politics and she assured me that Charlie Christ, the man running against Prick Scott (A Python On Ecstasy, as Stephen Colbert called him in THIS clip, which, if you haven't seen it, you really should just for the hilariousness of it) is actually very strong on the environment which was reassuring. I mean, I'd vote for a DEAD yellow dog against Rick Scott so I was already planning on voting for the preternaturally tanned former Republican, Christ, but it made me feel better about all of it. Plus, Christ is on the side of legalizing gay marriage (which, okay, I could make so many cheap jokes about but I will not) whereas The Python, of course is not.
Oh, Florida. How I do adore you!
So lunch was fun although the boys did not eat any. They did, however, find a little boy playing in the restaurant with some toys and they played with him. I think he must have been the child of one of the employees because he had his own little play area set up and that was fun. He was a very well-behaved little boy and I hope that Owen and Gibson took notes but I fear they did not.
I went to the place where you early-vote and Owen went with me and it was his first voting experience which he can remember. The man at the door asked Owen if he had his driver's license and the lady behind the desk grilled him as to his knowledge of politics, specifically, "Do you know who the President of the United States is?" and he did not but I whispered the answer to him. "President Obama."
"President Obama!" he announced, and the lady was happy with that and she gave him an I Voted sticker and he asked for one for his brother and she also gave him two plastic cards with all of the presidents on it and told him to study it and that next time there would be a test.
I filled out my ballot, voting for Christ and for George Sheldon who is running against our asshole attorney general who believes in the sanctity of marriage so much that she is currently shacked up with a guy who is supposedly going to be her third husband very soon. I voted for medical marijuana and for the environment and some other stuff and then Owen fed my ballot into the machine and that was that.
Then we went to the Mexican import place. It was closed up but they have thousands of things outside that we explored at our leisure. Pots and folk art roosters and turtles and peacocks (like the one above) and iron furniture and pottery bird baths. I was enchanted with this one.
But the real reason we went was to let the boys play on the little carousel that I love and they did.
Right after I took this, Owen figured out how to not only make it go forwards but how to make it go really fast. He grasped the metal wheel in his hands and held them still and ran his feet like crazy. He got that thing spinning so fast that it flung Gibson right off his elephant and Lily and I both gasped and she ran to him and although his face had literally bounced off the dirt, he raised up and said, "I do that one more time?"
She and I laughed and laughed with the relief of him being okay and his strong Gibson spirit.
And so it went and it was all very good except for the part where the boys yelled all the way home from joy and boy-juice and I thought I'd need a nap after they left but I managed to forge on without one.
Mr. Moon has gone to auction. I have most of the chicken-and-Maurice-care arranged (thank you, Hank!) and I am hungry and will go heat up some leftovers.
I am a most grateful grandmother tonight, a most grateful wife, a most grateful mother. And two nights from tonight I'll be in Roseland.
One more thing. I read an online article about how Viagra can actually help with heart disease and the part that cracked me up was this:
"The analysis shows that PDE5i prevented the heart increasing in size and changing shape in patients suffering from left ventricular hypertrophy, a condition which causes thickening of the muscles in the left ventricle."
So Viagra does increase penis size and thickening but prevents all of that in the heart?
Shit. It's like the perfect drug!
Please consult your physician if you have a painful or prolonged erection lasting longer than four hours. I've always wondered- do you really need to wait four hours? Wouldn't two and a half hours of having a painful erection be long enough to cause you to reach out for medical help?
We leave in two days for Roseland so of course I'm a perfect mess and we don't have anyone to watch the chickens and Maurice except maybe Hank on Friday and Saturday and so I woke up about fifty times to worry about that last night and also some other things that don't even need talking about and my dreams were horrible. Again.
And I have nothing to wear.
Oh. That is such a lie. But it does feel like the truth.
Things feel like certainty, like carved-in-stone.
And yet, generally they are not.
I just got back from a good walk. I strode my miles, twirling my stick of dog fennel, I felt a bit creeped out in one section of the woods and did not return that way but took another route home.
Feelings.
Here's how I feel about Maurice- like I don't want to leave her alone and no, I am not taking her with me. She has stolen my very heart although we both pretend to a certain distance. She follows me around like a little dog as I go about my days, both in the house and out. Not every moment, but many of them. She is like that with Mr. Moon, too. She greets him when he comes in, she meows her hellos. We have become her humans. This has become her house. She is growing bigger and fatter and her winter coat is thick and luxurious. She is not a long-haired cat but she is not a short-haired cat either. I love to slip my fingers into the softness of that fur and she seems to like it too. One night she was so insistent that every time I'd fall asleep while stroking her, she'd nip my finger to wake me up. This, I do not appreciate so much.
Lily and the boys are coming out in a little while just to play. Lily is off work this week and Jason is in Jacksonville, going to manager's classes. It will be great fun to have them all here. I have missed them these last few days.
Jessie is at her first day of work. Orientation this week. I hope it is going well for her. One part of me wants to be with her every second that I can be, another part of me knows to step back and let her and Vergil work their way into life in Tallahassee with us as a part of that life but with so much beyond us. I've never really been a in-your-face mama with my grown kids. I tend to watch and wait for my presence to be requested. I was talking to another woman once and she said that she was the sort of mother who is constantly throwing herself in front of her children, arms out, saying, "This is the wrong path!"
I told her that I was the sort who says, "Well, that path sounds interesting. Send me postcards. Call if you need me."
I don't know that either type is the way to be. We just are who we are.
And somehow, it all works out.
As it will with the chickens and Maurice. Somehow it will. Or at least, I feel that it will.
They're singing next door at the church and playing drums. I like that this is their worship. I like hearing their worship floating in through my windows and doors, around my trees, and up into the sky above all of us.
I love finding the light. I love this peace and contentment. I love that the preacher next door is now wailing his message in call and response and the drummer is adding his own bass-beat emphasis. I love that my own sermons are the ones I see and hear and feel everywhere I look and that there are secret messages in every beam of light, every cell of plant and animal, every chitter of squirrel and song of bird, every piece of art, every note of song. Every beating of my own heart.
I love being here alone.
I love that this man will be home today.
I love that there is love. And that I am allowed to dip into the pure deep well of it with all of my heart and soul and ears and eyes until I am restored and made whole, and yet left open for more.
Ms. Jessie and I went shopping today. We thought we were going to Goodwill but we wanted to go see Billy first who is already back at work. It was such a sweet sight to see him there. Doesn't he look fabulous? Some people on this earth were just put here to make it a better place.
There's two of them, right there. We hugged Billy because you HAVE to hug Billy, but we were very, very gentle.
Then we decided to go into Ross which was right next door. Jessie tried on some dresses but didn't get any. I bought two things. I don't even know what to call them. Tunic-y things? One of them has fringe. One is more sweater-like. Then we decided to eat. We went down to another place in the same strip mall, an Indian place where we were surprised to see that they've begun having a lunch buffet on weekends, no doubt due to the fact that another Indian restaurant opened up just a few blocks away which always has a buffet.
It was awesome. It was so awesome that I'm still full as a dang tick. They kept putting things away while we were there (we barely made it in time) and we were like, "Uh, we want some of that rice pudding, okay?"
And we got it.
Oh, it was all so good.
Then, in the SAME strip mall, we went to Beall's and Jessie bought a rug and the most darling ceramic Buddha baby lying on an elephant's back and I bought a picture frame for the picture I forced her to give me.
Remember that picture? Wouldn't YOU have forced your kid to give it to you?
I had really hoped that it would fit into a frame I bought a long time ago at the thrift store they run for the Bad Girls Who Get Saved By Jesus place. I payed $2.39 for this beautiful thing.
I'm not a big Jesus person, as you may know. Especially as portrayed in Western art. I call that one a Hippie Jesus. A hippie white-boy Jesus. And you know, I loved those hippie boys who looked like Jesus (and honey, there were a lot of 'em!) when I was a young hippie but somehow, I don't think that if Jesus did actually live and die on the planet, he looked anything like that.
Which, duh.
But I love that frame. Some day I'll put something worthy in it. And I love the way Jessie's picture looks in the green frame. Rather perfect.
After lunch and Beall's, I was fading fast. I either needed a nap or a cup of coffee and there was not room in my belly for a cup of anything but Jessie had a coupon for a free rotisserie chicken at Whole Foods if we bought $50 worth of stuff so we drove over there and wandered around and ran into Melissa! Which was such a sweet little lagniappe. We didn't quite buy $50 dollars worth of stuff but the very cool lady at the cash register just threw the rules away and gave it to Jessie anyway.
Then I took Jessie home and drove back to Lloyd and here I am.
I never did clean out the hen house but my sweet hens gave me five eggs anyway. It's driving me crazy that I don't know where Missy and Eggy Tina are laying. I went out with the flashlight and got down on my belly and looked under the old photo lab to see if they were laying under there but I didn't see one egg. I just keep visualizing a mound of eggs about four feet high. Somewhere. I've looked in the Nandina and Pyracantha bordering the yard and under my office, the old detached kitchen, and under the deck and I just don't know where else to look. It would probably be an interesting thing to do to follow them around one day, all day, until I figure it out.
Yeah. Maybe.
In the meantime, I hope that at least coons and possums are getting the good of those eggs and we have plenty, even without them.
It was a good day and I was passing out compliments left and right to total strangers about dimples and earrings and I really wanted to tell the guy at Whole Foods that his afro made me sort of want to swoon but I restrained myself.
I have no idea why.
That was my day. And I still love my new phone and let me just say that the ear buds they include when you buy it are redesigned and it would appear that someone at Apple actually looked at a human ear canal and I love those too.
Maurice is meowing at me like I need to cook supper now but I'm still so full and so is her bowl so she needs to calm down and go with the flow but you know how cats love to stick to their schedule.
Now she's hunting flies. I hope she catches all of them. I have spoken to Owen on the phone who asked me, "What did you need to do today?" and I told him that I really hadn't needed to do much but that I had gone shopping with Aunt Jessie.
I wonder if he thinks that the only reason he doesn't come to my house every day is that I have things I need to do.
I would not be surprised. When I talk to him on the phone I always say, "You know you're my sweet little prince?" and he says, "Yes."
Fact of life, just like the sun comes up in the east and sets in the west. He and I have made our plans for this week. Lunch with sushi and noodles may be involved.
Oh god. The hog dogs have just started barking again.
I'm really digging this new phone. I like the camera.
This is what it looks like here every morning when I go to let the chickens out. Maurice has to assist me. I wonder if she does a head count to make sure they're all safe.
Here she is transmitting her report to me with her powerful Cat Powers of ESP.
I wish she'd clean out the hen house. Let me just tell you- thirteen chickens can create a lot of poop. Poor Miss Chi-Cha was obviously roosting below someone last night. Her usually pristine white feathers are not pristine this morning. She needs a good dirt bath.
So I was talking to my neighbor on the phone yesterday about the continual howling of the hog dogs next door to her. It's sort of driving me mad although they are not barking this very moment which is a huge relief. My neighbor said the the dogs' owners had been away all week and that someone was supposed to be taking care of them and she also said that the two indoor dogs have also been outside this week, possibly adding to the barking situation. She knew their names. The indoor dogs, that is.
I told her that was well and good but that those dogs bark all day long every day anyway. Since I'm at home during the day, generally, I am aware of this whereas others may not be.
This is a tricky and sticky situation. Part of my problem with the dogs is that I know they're in a little pen and miserable and so of course they bark all day. So...do I just ignore them and the situation and live and let live which is sort of the way it goes around here or do I do something?
I have no idea what that would be. I don't know these neighbors at all. I couldn't pick them out of a line-up of two. If I called the sheriffs' office, they'd probably laugh at me. I don't even know if Jefferson County has an animal control office. I know they have a humane society. Their thrift store is awesome and I know they try to do good work. But it's probably not illegal in the least to keep dogs penned up around here.
Ah. Country living.
Anyway, as you can see, it's another beautiful day. I've just spoken to Ms. Jessie on the phone. She'd been watching "Call The Midwife" and was having a little bit of a cry. She is such a sensitive girl. I can't believe she's so close now. I told her that if I come to town I'll call her. I have been thinking about buying a new dress to wear on my anniversary night but somehow that seems quite impossible. Where would I go to buy it? I can't fathom going to the mall.
Perhaps the Jefferson County Humane Society Thrift Store. Which is called "Wag The Dog."
Probably not.
Well, all shall be revealed.
Good morning, every one. May all be well where you are. May there be peace and all of your chickens always come home to roost.
I've got a little touch of the melancholy tonight. Sun going down earlier every day, no man coming home this evening to give me an excuse to make something with buttermilk and a grain and a fat. I don't know what, just anything. Biscuits, cornbread, chicken pot-pie. No reason to chop or simmer or cut or slice or grate or bake or mix with my hands or a spoon or taste as it simmers or brown or broil or poach or poke with a fork.
"Or" is one of those words that if you use it a lot, it starts to look really weird and wrong. Just saying. And no, I'm not stoned.
I feel useless. Didn't get much of the garden hoed. Let me tell you something- hoeing is hard work. I don't know how those people used to do it. And plenty still do it- you know, those illegal immigrants who come here and get a brand new Cadillac, food stamps, free education, and premium health care at absolutely no cost just because they cross the border? People who labored and who do labor in the fields for fourteen hours a day or from-can-to-can't, as they said. Can seeuntil can't see.
If I had to work like that to make my bread I'd just flat-out die.
I do have clean sheets on the bed. I held them to my face, folded up from the line and their silken crispness smelled exactly like sheets dried on the line should smell. I hope Maurice appreciates them.
I took the trash down to the trash place and Lord, a candidate for a local office was standing on the corner in Mr. Lawrence's old parking lot (did they get permission from Mr. Lawrence?) with his wife and about four hangers-on, waving signs and their hands and grinning like crazy and there was a fucking Elvis impersonator. If that's what it takes to get elected in this county then we deserve what we get. I've gotten about fifteen mailings from this guy. He wears a pilot's outfit in his picture and he, like everyone, claims to be Christian and is all about lowering taxes and doing something to encourage business growth in Jefferson County. I was in a play with his wife once. They own a B&B nearby and I remember Colin once describing it as a place that looked "like a doily factory exploded in it."
Well, what B&B doesn't? Add that to all the fucking potpourri and having to eat breakfast in a room with strangers who probably want to make conversation and I avoid those things like the plague.
Anyway, he's not the person I'm personally voting for and I seriously doubt that Mr. Lawrence did give them permission because when we talked last he referred to the man's opponent by her first name and called her a "sweetheart."
Well, y'all. This is what local politics are like and I may have just made about fifty-eight new enemies and so what?
No one's paying me for anything and this is America, home of the free, land of the brave, where you can carry a gun because it's your god-given right, and say what you want, no matter how idiotic you sound.
Thank you very much. And for my next song...
Well, hell. The chickens are putting themselves to bed. There's always some squabble going on as they choose their roosts for the night. The hens fuss and work it out but Elvis always gets his own Most Special Employee Of The Forever nest-roost. It all reminds me so much of the court of the Tudor Royalty. I'm not even kidding you.
So. Yeah. Melancholy. This might be an evening of solo Tito drinking and Youtube Rolling Stones watching.
I just found this one a few minutes ago and I love it for the Old Ronnie/Old Keith guitar communication work. It's from a concert filmed last June and if you watch the whole thing, you can see Keith and Ronnie literally getting down and sometimes, when the melancholy overtakes you, you can't do shit but watch a little Rolling Stones.
Maurice brought home another squirrel tail today, this one totally attached to the squirrel. I heard her bell tinkling in the kitchen bathroom and went to investigate and there she was, working over a perfect, unbleeding corpse of a teenaged squirrel.
"Sigh," I said, Mr. Moon being nowhere in sight.
I got the broom and swept the poor creature onto the dustpan and walked it out to the woods behind the chicken coop and threw it over the fence.
"I'm sorry," I said, as I heaved it.
And I am.
A week from tonight I'll be in Roseland, watching the sunset over the Sebastian River. We might end up in the lion pool.
Who knows? Not me. But if history tells us anything, it could very possibly happen. The pool I discovered as a child which seemed as mysterious as an Egyptian pyramid to my little eight-year old self. Last night I dreamed that I was staying in Roseland and somehow had to take a child back to the house where my best friend, Lucille Ferger lived. In my dream I had a very strong olfactory sense of what that house had smelled like. I've never done that before that I can recall. It smelled of urine and rodents and old linoleum, which in my dream, I saw peeled up in the corners. That house is still there. I don't know if my dream-memory-smell was anything like what Lucille's house really smelled like but I'll never forget the night she and I camped out under a tent made of a blanket spread between their garage and chicken coop with our little mosquito repellent burner and the millions of stars which shone above us in the night time sky.
Well.
If you can't have sweet dreams, then have some damn interesting ones. Okay?
From my walk this morning and oh god, aren't I lucky? And let me admit something to you- I am listening to yet another Philipa Gregory book on CD's. What is this? Like the fourth one? The woman has written dozens of these tomes. And I am finally getting burnt out. I am spending way too much time in my mind trying to figure out who is who. Not within the book itself but as linked to the other ones I've listened to. A big part of the problem is that ALL of the women are named either Elizabeth or Anne and ALL of the men are named either Henry, Edward, or Richard. I think those were the only name-choices at that time. If you were in any way related to the throne, at least.
Occasionally there's a Margaret thrown in or a Mary but for the most part, nah.
But who cares? Just go along with it and be glad I'm not a woman back in those days because it just doesn't seem like much fun and if you're a woman of royal blood, you don't get to nurse your own baby because you have to get yourself whipped back into shape and return to the marriage bed ASAP to breed another boy and frankly, it doesn't sound like any of the royal fucking was of a great deal of pleasure to anyone.
So. Here's another picture I took of Jessie and Vergil in their new house yesterday.
Vergil's already set up his home office and is working from there. When he saw my new phone he said, "Now THAT'S a Phablet!" A phone tablet! And he is correct. I actually like the humongous size of this new phone and since I usually wear cargo shorts or overalls my pockets are plenty large enough and on the few occasions when I am not wearing either of those I am carrying one of my million purses so it's all good. I hadn't wanted one of the big ones but Mr. Moon, not knowing that, ordered the Extra Large Edition, assuming what all men seem to assume which is that bigger is always better.
In some cases, this is quite true. I shall not go deeper into that conversation.
Speaking of Mr. Moon, he has taken off to Georgia again and that is fine. I have finally reached the point in my life where I do truly understand the acceptance of that which cannot be changed and there is no changing this man and when the weather turns chilly he is going to be hunting and because of the tiny bit of guilt he may feel for leaving me so frequently he is as sweet as pie when he's home, even sweeter than usual, which is very, very sweet already.
La-di-dah and praise the day which is beautiful as can be again although it was cold when I got up and when I say cold, I mean below sixty. Laugh all you want. I live in Florida for a reason.
It took over half the morning, though, to get him out of the house, loaded up and on the road. It's like cramming all the circus monkeys into the truck every time. I really don't have a lot to do in the process except to make sure he has his pillows and to make him a breakfast and to kiss him good-bye but I didn't get out for my walk until late and now it's already afternoon. I do have the sheets hung out on the line.
Aren't they pretty, hanging in the dappled light?
When I was on the last bit of my walk, I saw a man who lives down the road from me and he had, as he usually does, his child jogging stroller and in it he had three fence posts and his Holy Bible which is quite large and looks to be well-read. His property is in constant flux although his No Man Lord sign on the cross in front of whatever he is dwelling in is a constant. The dwellings may change but the sign does not. He is always busy and is currently building a fence and I don't know where he is getting the materials but every day I see him walk by with that stroller and some sort of wood or wire that he needs.
I said a cheerful "Good morning!" to him and he smiled and returned my greeting. He was just standing at the corner with his loaded vehicle and rolling a cigarette with paper and tobacco and I was glad to see him.
"How you doing?" I asked him.
"Busy," he said.
"You're always busy," I told him, and he is, even when he is taking a break. The man is no spring chicken.
Anyway, here I am, home again, with the sheets on the line and if this isn't a perfect day to go and hoe the garden, then I've never seen one that is.
Oh Jesus. Well, it's really been a swell day but right now I'm having a bit of agita (as Elizabeth would say) and am feeling agitato as Kinky Friedman would say and it's all due to the damn technology which rules our worlds.
So we got our new iPhones, as I said, and because we, being the Elderly, Jr.'s, had to go to Verizon to get all that shit squared away from one phone to another. Right? And to my vast delight, the woman who helped us was the same woman that I wrote about months ago whom I told, to her face, that she was a perfect example of a beautiful human being.
Which she is.
So anyway, I thought my phone was all iCloud-transferred and shit that I don't begin to understand although I do know that I can't take naked pictures of myself or my lover and not expect to see them on TMZ at some point, and yeah, I'm clear on that. But it seems that maybe it's not quite? All downloaded? And I took a picture of Ms. Brittany, the perfect example of a beautiful human being, but now it won't send to me and look- there's a lot of stuff about this new phone that I'm really not sure about.
I have a feeling that I may have to go visit Ms. Brittany again tomorrow and she's going to think I'm stalking her which is very sad and not at all true although if I were going to stalk a human being, why not a perfect example of a beautiful one? And if she doesn't think I'm stalking her she's just going to think I'm an idiot and that's even worse although painfully true.
And so forth.
Like I said this morning, First World Problems, for sure.
In some ways, however, I do feel that it's been a completely successful day in that Jessie texted me and asked if I had her birth certificate which she needs to get a Florida driver's license. I was able to put my hands on it within minutes and have taken it to her. So that's good. She Vergil have done a ton of work and unpacked hundreds of boxes and I'm very proud of them and their house is really starting to look like a home. And also, my beans should be ready by supper time.
Well. You can't ask for much more than that.
Life continues apace and I'm going to go make squash croquettes. Isn't it funny that croquettes and coquettes are such similar words? Have I spelled those right? Can you imagine a salmon coquette? Would she be winking at you? Would you be able to see her decolletage? I can imagine that but I can't really picture a squash coquette and you wouldn't want to put ketchup on any kind of coquette unless you had proclivities in that direction and if you do, don't tell me about it.
The butterfly ginger is starting to bloom and what could be more beautiful, more fragrant? It is chilly this morning and I've made a big bowl of oat bran cereal with raisins and I am letting it cool. I have beans on, simmering for our supper tonight. I have a husband who left me little hearts drawn on the newspaper for me to find. I have woods and fields to walk in. I have four children who love each other and their parents. All of their parents. I have two beloved sons-in-law. I have two brilliant grandsons. I have one cat and I have thirteen chickens.
I live in my dream house.
I am on a good dose of a proper medication which means that although as a child I was raised in a house where everything (almost everything, at least) was a lie, a sham, a shame, a fear, I can now almost believe in the goodness of my own real life and function as such.
I have a good sense of humor and oh, what a good dancer I used to be!
Almost all of my problems are of the First-World variety, meaning, pfffft.
And the main one this morning is the transferring of old iPhone to new and my only care is that I save my pictures.
Ah lah.
I think professionals must be utilized.
Or a fifth-grader.
Sorry to be so damn cheerful. Trust me- the crusty old curmudgeon with ridiculous fears and complaining shall return at some point. The whining, the existential angst, the despair. I feel certain they are all still just waiting for some butterfly to sip from an exotic flower somewhere far across the world, flutter its wings and change everything.
Well, there's some of us. Lily, Hank, Gibson, Mark, Jessie, Vergil, and Melissa.
May was running her ass off trying to serve about fifty people who had decided to come out to eat at Fanny's today and Owen was playing on the old tennis courts where he was figuring out mysteries and Mr. Moon was stuck in the office, dealing with what he called "elderly people" and then he said, "They're about sixty-five," and we both laughed our asses off because...we're Elderly, Junior, I guess.
I did not give birth to Mark or Melissa but they are both mine, in a way. Mark calls me "Mama" and Melissa and Jessie have been best friends since they were little girls and Melissa told the story today of how the first time she ever spent the night at our house, she woke up and was a bit confused and she wandered into my room. I remember this. Glen was out of town and so I said, "Honey, do you want to get in bed with me?" and she did, and so in a way I guess we bonded. She's a pistol, that one. Working on her Master's at FSU, thinking about getting her PhD.
Mark is just mine because he is. I've known him for yonks too. He and Hank have been friends for many years and well, he's just ours.
We talked today about hugging and kissing. Mark and Melissa both said that they've gotten more hugs from our family than they ever got from their own. And they both have very loving, wonderful families. I guess we just hug and kiss a lot. While sharing memories at lunch today, Mark even said that the first time he met me I hugged him and he was a little freaked out. But today when it was time for me to leave to go to the dentist, he said, "Is it hugging time?"
And indeed it was.
Mark's been doing a lot of Legos for range of motion therapy for his arm and his hand since he got his surgery and yesterday, he gave Owen a set and now Owen is entranced. Here's a picture of Owen last night after he put together a Crock thing Lego thing ALL BY HIMSELF!
He was so proud. He did not think he could do it but he did and he's sort of in love with Mark now.
Before lunch, Lily and Jessie and I went to Costco. Jessie was so excited to join us on one of our Costco trips. We introduced her to our rituals which we've developed over the years, our Costco Traditions. They are few and silly but we love them. Lord but it's nice to have Jessie and Vergil here. I hope they don't get sick of us too quickly.
My follow-up dentist appointment went fine. Healing proceeding normally. Stitches taken out. Going back in two weeks. The nurse showed me the pictures of the implant on the computer and all I could say was, "God. That is gnarly."
I am SO glad I don't remember any of that whole procedure except for what I've reported here. Jesus.
Stay awake to have a baby, go to sleep to have a dental procedure, that's my advice.
So. That's pretty much it. Costco, lunch, dentist. Oh, I went to the library!
God, it was a huge day for me.
And then I came home and did some yard stuff and potted plants stuff and tomorrow I really need to hoe the weeds up in the garden or I might as well just kiss all that work good-bye.
My god it is beautiful today and such a relief from yesterday when the weather got so freaky that I pulled things out of the tiny closet under the stairs and put a flashlight in there in case Maurice and I had to go to shelter. There were tornado watches and warnings and flood warnings and Jesus, it was weird and at one point it did start blowing so fiercely that I grabbed Maurice and brought her in the house and shut all the doors. The wind was whipping through the house and blowing things off the refrigerator door, pictures and phone lists and magnets were flying the air and oh, boy, it was exciting but not fun. All I did all day was eat (I texted May that I had all of my caloric needs covered for up to and including Friday and I wanted a pie) and sleep and I did mop the floor in the library with some sort of hardwood floor cleaner and it looks better in there. I did not make a pie but did make banana bread which was totally unnecessary and I now have my caloric needs covered through the weekend.
Maurice was playing in the hallway last night which is NOT like her and I went to check and see what the hell she was playing with and it was a perfect squirrel tail, clean and fine in every detail. Where the squirrel may be is a mystery. She couldn't have eaten the entire thing. I was a bit horrified but not shocked while Mr. Moon thought it was charming. "I think we should tie a string on it to make a toy for her," he said, and I said, "If she brings that thing into the bed tonight you are not going to believe the reaction I'm going to have."
But today is a new day and as far as I know, there is no squirrel tail in the bed and in very fine news indeed, Billy got his bandages off yesterday and he is SO happy with his new manly chest and he'll be flying home tonight.
I'm going to town to Costco shop with at least one of my kids and also go to lunch with Lily and the boys and hopefully Jessie and maybe Hank- who knows? And I have a dentist follow-up at 2:30 and I want that to be OVER WITH and I need to go to the library and so it's a busy, beautiful day, the rain water still dripping off the leaves, the birds at the feeder, the chickens ready to come out of the run to begin their day's work of pooping on my porches and hopefully laying a few eggs, and here we are, here we are, not blown away or floated away but with our feet on the ground and our eyes directed upwards by the trees whose very presence require us to look up, look up, look up! and it is cool and I am looking up and things are fine and good morning.
It stormed all night long. Great house-rattling blasts of thunder and lightening, rain pouring throughout. Maurice was fearful and wanted head-petting until she didn't and then she grabbed my hand with her claws, biting in her version of love. She cuddled up next to me the entire night, leaning on me in worry, I think.
When I finally got up this morning it had stopped raining but thunder still rumbled to the west. I went to let the chickens out to their run, trying to shake off the damn dream I'd had which ended with me going into a room thinking I was going to finally find my husband whom I'd been looking for but instead, was greeted by my mother who was crying and grabbed me and was rubbing me all over and she looked a little like Queen Elizabeth and I kept saying, "No. No! You're dead! Get away from me!" and she was so happy and I was so scared and I finally said, "This has to be a dream. Dead people don't come back and I need to wake up right NOW!" and I woke up and it was a dream but shitfire.
Brain- don't be doing that shit to me anymore. Okay?
Such a strange time of year and all of the spiders are dying, their once-so well-kept webs now in tatters, still strong enough to catch the falling pecan leaves making strange Halloween mobiles with invisible strings.
It's all a little creepy if you ask me. The gray sky, the distant thunder, the rain which comes and goes, the dangling brown leaves hanging in space. Or maybe that's just me and the dregs of the dream.
Maurice isn't very happy about it either.
She seems to think she could perhaps do something about it, but what?
I drank some leftover smoothie but now I think I need an egg. God knows I have plenty and it sounds like I just got another from Miss Nicey. Perhaps Maurice would like one too. I think I'll read today. This world is freaking me out a little. It would be a good thing to slip into another.
I wanted to start with a picture I took today of Owen on the swing, doing that thing kids do which is to twist and twist and twist the chains and then ride out the swift untwisting of them, making themselves dizzy with the whirling, then trying to walk and finding out that sometimes the earth rises up and smacks you, right out of nowhere. Every child's first experience with an altered state of mind. And damn- guess what? It's really fun.
Boppy had helped him in this particular twisting and I snapped a picture but my phone isn't sending and my internet is being on/off, on/off, on/off.
La-di-dah and if it ever successfully sends, I'll show the picture.
The boys were extra-special great today. For whatever reason, Gibson was in an extremely snuggly, kissy sort of mood. Not clingy and fussy, just full on exuberantly hugging and kissing. And Owen was full of Owen juice and when he got here I didn't say a word to him but just hugged him tight with all my body and whistled a funny little tune over and over and swayed with him, right there in the kitchen and he let me and he laughed. I finally released him and said, "Hey guy! How you doin'?" and he said, "Great!"
Okay. Picture finally arrived. Here you go.
How I love those long skinny legs and hey! wonder where he got 'em?
So it was a good day and Mr. Moon went to auction, is still driving there now. I got to talk to May and see Lily and I texted with Jessie some who said she had to take a nap this afternoon and she loves her house and May brought her food. I'll probably barge in on her tomorrow, take some rooting plants for her to put on the wide tile window shelf in the pink bathroom which is a perfect place for them with all the humidity and the diffused light from the wavery window.
May reported that the avocado seed I gave her last week is already growing leaves and that made me so very happy. She and I laughed a lot. God, my kids crack me up.
And in other news, Mr. Moon and I have finally decided where to spend our thirtieth anniversary honeymoon and we're going back to Roseland. We'll be staying in the cabana house again with the pool with the spitting lions at all four corners and the beautiful pink vintage appliances and the dock where we can watch the sunset from over the Sebastian River.
Have you noticed that my favorite places in the world are the ones where I can watch a sunset over the water?
Hmmmmm....
I am so excited. Here's what the entrance to this magical place looks like.
For the ones and ones of you who do not know about Roseland and what this place means to me, just do a search at the top of the blog for "Roseland" and you'll be presented with more than you will ever need to know.
Or. Just know this- it is magic.
Complete and utter fucking magic. And sure, we could go to Greece or Italy or even Australia where the Rolling Stones will be playing the exact same night of our anniversary but you know me- it's hard to creep too far outside the lines. And Roseland has everything. The river I grew up on and in, the beautiful pool, the Atlantic ocean just down the road, the Sebastian Inlet which I remember from before a bridge spanned it,
the islands in the Indian River, one of which I was taken to as a child and found the vertebra and teeth of mammoths, scattered on the sand, the white sand roads where I learned to ride a bike, the Ocean Grill restaurant a few miles south in Vero where I hope we'll have our anniversary dinner. And the thrift stores! MY GOD! The thrift stores. Where I have found so many treasures.
So I'm excited.
We're supposed to get storms tonight and damn if I didn't just hear thunder rumbling. Well, the chickens are put up, all safe and cozy in their house, Maurice and I are here and fine in the house. Rain is just starting to patter. And speaking of chickens- we had a moment of extreme excitement here today. I was outside with the boys on the swings and we heard a chicken in obvious horrible distress and I ran towards the sound, thinking that surely Maurice had one of the hens in her grasp and I was yelling, "Stop it! Stop it!" but then I realized that Ms. Bob, one of our oldest chickens, had fallen in the little pond and was struggling to get out.
And before I could do a damn thing, she did. She is fine.
And Maurice was nowhere to be found so she was not suspect in the accident.
More thunder. Rolling, rolling across the sky, the gods play at nine-pins, the sound of the stone deep throne of Chac Mool, who holds my heart in his hands.
I've been there. I've done that. It was wonderful. And if I can't go there, to the Yucatan where Chac Mool lives, then Roseland will do just fine and I will dive deep in the water of the pool which I saw as a child, a totem then and now of rebirth and wonder.
Good night, y'all.
See you tomorrow if the creek don't rise and the internet doesn't go out.
A perfectly beautiful morning with the clearest blue skies and gusty breezes scattering the leaves of the sycamores, gaudy yellow, a momentary confetti against the sky.
Trees rustle like starched skirts, they swirl as they dance in the wind.
I got a little walk in, thankful every step for this place where I live.
Now to go drop off things at the library and go to the grocery and get ready for my boys. I finished listening to the Wally Lamb book and I did like it a great deal.
Mr. Lamb has run a writing program in a woman's prison for over fourteen years. I find that remarkable. That has nothing to do with the book or perhaps it does.
As Bruce Springsteen says in his beautiful song, "You're Missing," everything is everything.
The shadow of a spider working on her web crawls up the screen of the porch, the chickens are clucking as they eat the seeds the wild birds scatter. The cat lays in the sun, a puddle of orange in a puddle of silver.
Whoa. Jessie and Vergil have had a day of it. They've been here for less than twenty-four hours and in that time they've unloaded that truck (and I swear- I have never seen a better-loaded or more organized packing job in my life), picked up an appliance- not sure which one, Vergil's played a game of Ultimate Frisbee with his new team (Go Light Blue!) and they've come here and gotten the big leather couch which Mr. Moon's sister gave us which was taking up half my library room and which will now go into their basement where they plan to have their entertainment stuff set up, an iron headboard we haven't used in years, and their dog Greta and cat, Ceilo (I probably spelled that wrong) who have been hanging out here all day.
And Jessie took a friend to the ER who got cleated at the frisbee game in the Achilles tendon.
So. They sure as hell hit the ground running.
I still can't believe it. That they're here.
Shayla and Waylon came by the new house to welcome them with fresh fruit, hugs and kisses. Waylon loved the truck ramp and the "truck house." Hank came by to say hello. The big festival he's been a part of organizing, planning and implementing for the past four months or more happened yesterday and he has Post-Festival-Let-Down. He said he has a pizza and a bottle of whiskey and he's NOT doing trivia tonight and tomorrow he will wake up in a brand-new world.
I can't wait to help him move.
Speaking of which, I hardly did a damn thing today except go get things. Gatorade, iced tea (Publix- buy one, get one free!), ice, pizza for our lunch, and finally Liquid Bandage, a splint and tape for Mr. Moon who sliced his thumb pretty good with a putty knife. I think it was a putty knife.
I'm not really sure of anything, am I?
I tell you what I AM sure of.
This morning, after I posted, a friend of mine came by to bring me some soup she'd made and an egg carton that I'd taken her some eggs in. She was having an emotional morning and this is a woman who is strong and sure but as we talked, she told me about a misunderstanding which had occurred between her and a special needs kid that she is a friend of who helps her out at her business sometime and now the mother of the guy is involved and she just felt like shit. Like she'd done something wrong and really, she didn't, but she was hurting from it all. People have failures to communicate all the time and throw in a little disability and mother-protectiveness and shit can go south real fast.
But then she told me that she hasn't spoken to her own son in almost two years by his refusal to see her or talk to her and he's her only son and they used to be so close, always were so close, and she just broke down and I felt so much pain for her and for all of us whose love has been, for whatever reason, blocked, and goddam it. Life is too short.
Sometimes it can't be worked out.
But Lord, if there is love (and there is not always- I give you that caveat with my full, aware heart), mostly it can be.
A bit of a strange video in that the boys in the band were obviously goofing but...they wrote those words, they sang that song.
The Beatles were not of this planet, exactly. But they showed up right on time and my god- I was here when they did.
Jessie and Vergil and Greta and Ceilo, heading out of Lloyd with a leather couch and a white iron headboard, heading towards town, to where they live, and the sun was going down and they'll sleep in their new house tonight.
Harumph.
I got up a few minutes after eight this morning to find that my husband and my daughter and her husband had just left for a Waffle House breakfast before starting the great unloading.
Well.
Maurice is sharing my breakfast. I let her lick the yogurt cup when I was done.
No damn fried eggs and bacon and hash browns for me.
Again I say, Harumph.
It sure was wonderful having them get here last night. They were flat-out exhausted and I fed them their dinner and they went to bed.
Guess I'll put on my overalls and head into town, carry some lamps and stuff.
