My mom is staying a few weeks for the holidays as per usual. Except 'per usual' isn't what it used to be. I love her, but still it is a little bit of an off fit, like as if the pipes have been sweated askew now. She's better than most everyone else (well, she is my mother, so she's obliged to roll w the punches as best she can). As my friend Amy puts it, misery loves company and so your company might very well bail if you stray. And so it has been. Sunnie barely talks to me. It's not like a relationship is oo la la easy to make work in real life. It is a lot of simple showing up. It is a lot of laundry. But still, I want to be doing that work, as best I can. I hope it matters. I make soup. Meanwhile, he is sick right now, he is no yogi, he coughs and worries and works long hours (too long) and does not know how to breathe through his ears. Mom says "he is older than you are really, he's too worn down to have kids of his own anyway".

I hide in the bathroom from her.

she&him (aka the delicious zooey daschanel) - please let me (smiths cover)

I’m reading Committed: A Love Story because my lover asked me to marry him, 17 times, then I said yes one night and he stopped asking, which I immediately assumed was the beginning of the end, and a nanosecond later I decided (rightfully, I still believe) that such careening around the mere subject of commitment let alone the practice of it did not bode well some kind of way. I started buying books about it.

I think what he meant, at least in part, if not exactly actually “marry me” was “take me seriously” and I said “I do” – now what?

Taking someone seriously, your commitment to them seriously, the possibility of enduring relation seriously, taking the promise of happiness seriously…that’s not a one-time act, like a leap of faith, and once you leap you fall then land wherever. Then again, it is like that. That, and what’s for dinner (and who will cook it), night after night.

Let’s skip the obvious (for now) – that neither of us is fully legally divorced quite yet. We should both be done with that in January, clearing the psychic and legal decks officially. That neither of us trusts legal decks anymore, after those experiences. That neither of us fully trusts the lack of trust in legal marriage either (even my gay friends want marriage more than not, so don’t get all high and mighty – we are all very conflicted on the subject of long haul relationships that are acknowledged by ourselves [iffily] and others [perforce if necessary, god fucking damn it]). That is he is appreciably younger than I am. That I probably cannot have another child, that he has no biological children (and has wanted that keenly all his life and was the number one reason he married [I can’t throw stones at all on that score – I did that same thing, did the math and could get at least a baby out of the deals I made, yes indeedy]); that except for him, I would not want to risk even thinking about having any more children whatsoever. That he is broke (not poor, which is like a disease you’re born into, but BROKE, as in his career cost him well over 100k in education expenses – his “gina loan” alone is 32K, for the core classes he took almost exclusively with me) and thus I keep the lights on (as I would anyway, so no skin off my nose) and that the disparity is an endless irritant to him, like an existential yeast infection he’s always scratching at. Those last two factors, babies and brokeness = we worry we cost each other too much, and what that means or will/could mean over time….

On the other hand, randomly beginning anywhere in the upsides list to note, I’ll note the fact that the boyz embraced him wholly, with an honestly that only kids (and animals) can bring to judgment; their simple faith in his existence in relation to themselves (“we have a bow shooter in the family now” Bruno says about his JOED archery creds) reads like a cosmic endorsement, as if they turned him over and found a label that reads “suitable for parental ft. dude use”... I start there in the list of upsides because it’s down a ways, past the items of the list that are about his infinite tenderness towards me. I haven’t been writing because to do so would be mostly every day to note instances of that tenderness, like a hot stone on a wrenched twitching muscle.

Right now, he is at traffic court. Several hours ago, I told him to disappear, that to do so is delicious, to have nowhere you’re supposed to be and thus you can wander or drive around and Just Be. I meant that, and God knows I love to disappear and wander myself on a pretty regular basis. Now, a mere 5 hours later, I’m ready for him to come back. That almost watery motion in me like a tide that is not controvertible by any list(s) of how we “match up” or not: I worry that he is dead. The tides of worry come in, love welling up. But/and I know that worrying that he is dead will not keep him from dying (to me) necessarily. Now will it?

What will? (What might?)

I'm losing perspective.


Well I Wonder (Smiths Cover) Sara Lov by americanlaundromatrecords

limerence (I kissed you with the safety off) playlist
death cab for cutie – I will follow you into the dark mp3
iron and wine – love and some verses mp3
bright eyes – first day of my life mp3
rogue wave – California
the black keys – tighten up mp3
the unseen guest – listen my son
chris Bathgate – a flash of light followed by mp3
jose gonzalez – slow moves
kt tunsall – throw me a rope
margot and the nuclear so n so’s – broadripple is burning

Black girls at work call him white chocolate (gigglesnort)..

He's extremely super duper 100% Polish, like w the Polish dancing with outfits and all that (yes, I see the irony - just - shut up), and thus he can go Christmas bonkerinos with me, as if my little cottage house swallowed a tab of ecstasy and is hallucinating that it's in Vegas only different. No fancy car or jewelry in the world could ever please me as a honey-do listing.

clem snide - any way you want it (journey cover)

Nitro paste (a vasodialator) works for penis enlargement. However it also makes you pass out. Then you need one of your coworkers to wipe it off your dick but nobody will, they're too busy laughing while also juggling one girl with lumieres and pnuemonia and an abusive probably incestuous father who you had to have arrested for touching her on your last shift and another girl who drank antifreeze then changed her mind but oh well she's going to die and doesn't get that yet, for instance etc. One of his coworkers proved this, the nitro paste trick, then was at the mercy of the entire unit staff who pissed themselves laughing. It was a gift. He kept their minds off the moment it became 1:00 a.m. again and their 12 hour shifts became 13 hours. They appreciated it, and wiped his dick off finally....

Halloween...some funky vibes been around my place yo, Samhain big time...can't help but think something just changed some kinda way

This is a great time to share some of your deepest and most vulnerable feelings with your close partner Virgo. If you can truly open up instead of telling half-truths or even lies to cover what you think are major faults, then you will also do yourself a really big favor. It will bring you real peace of mind and a feeling of serenity.

Liiiiike??: "Soooo, I have this blog on which mostly I talk to myself about myself and my love life about you without you knowing it...."

Um, I don't think so. I process enough of this in front of him as it is. I talk more about FPH than he does about his exwife, and more about my fear-thinking than I should altogether. The other day, EX hassled me (again, eyeroll) and it was a relief to discuss someone from my past notgreek and about whom I have no lingering ambivalence. I could see the happiness in his face over it, the unequivocality of "we're not friends, I don't miss him and he doesn't miss me".

Meanwhile, Mark Erelli - I'll Follow You Into the Dark, he hummed this to me - beautiful song - I looked up a cover so I won't start hearing Death Cab guy in my head.

The planetary alignment may create a situation in which you find yourself confused as to which lover you would prefer to be with Virgo. Many would call this a wonderful dilemma, but because you have such a strong sense of loyalty, you find it hard to cope with this problem. The answer to this may not be resolved in one day, but you can begin by asking yourself what you really want in a relationship.

I am not confused, but I am still processing, feeling stuff.....

Aaron switched to ICU nights as of last night. Awake for 24 hours, he tends a woman with end organ failure all night long, 42 years old and determined to die, bleeding from everywhere inside herself, shitting blood endlessly like a river of life-into-death. I know nursing is historically a female occupation, but I can’t personally fathom that. Men have such stronger stomachs. He and FPH both have infinitely more patience than I do as well…And I can’t help these uncanny moments of seeing similarities between them. Paralax is the distance between your eyes. Look at something with one eye, then close it and look with the other, and you’ll see that it seems to shift the object left to right. The object is not really shifting, you are measuring its distance from yourself using the distance between your two eyes as a kind of visual sound-bounce, your eyesight literally a think that you are throwing against that object and bouncing it back to imprint on the retina of your other eye. Something similar happens sometimes when I look at Aaron and he reminds me of John and I know that actually I am looking at myself and measuring my distance from the perspective of them-both. I bring in a lamp, put it next to the bed, change the sheets and clean everything up, do laundry and put it away, fresh fluffy socks, and I lay out a local police blotter (omg so boring, but he likes it), the Dick’s ad (I just knew) and Science Illustrated (he loves facts, most of which are way more interesting than useful). Funny shit on youtube. He does not tell me not to do these things. That is a big difference (distance) between my sense of him and any other man I’ve known up close. He neither expects that I will do for him nor does he abjure it. He is neither a tyrant nor a phobe. He simply likes the Dick’s ad. He is thrilled that I’d just know that. He is looking forward to chicken and dumplings later, a lot. He says “you take such gooooood care of me”, and he is pleased. Not gratified as if OF COURSE I would, nor freaked out as if BESET by it. He just….goes to sleep. It is garbage day. I make room in the freezer. I throw out soups I had made which have since gotten freezer burn. For a split second, it feels as if someone has reached through wall of my stomach up under my rib cage to grab my heart in a fist and squeeze as the neglect-wrecked soups hit the garbage can. I "want in a relationship" not to have to hit the garbage can, wasted.

bill withers - use me

I have only one prior experience of a hot tub and it wasn't my experience ft. it wasn't a good one for me (someone I loved banged someone else in one, cementing hot tubs in my mind as something belonging to any other woman but me surely). I never in a million buttgillion years saw this coming. Any of it. And I am at this moment literally exhausted by the emotions of it all. Happy, a lot. Bracing myself for the end of happy too, a LOT, until every muscle is sore from the effort. He says "Never doubt that I love you". I don't doubt it. I just know that sometimes doesn't matter worth a god damn. People hurt you, they hurt themselves, they even kill themselves and/or you passively or actively. They sometimes have to do those things. And on top of all that, pianos fall on us all from time to time. There is no way around it. This will rip my heart out sooner or later. He reads my mind. He says "If you're going to chew me up and spit me out in little bloody pieces, I'd still choose this, like o well then that's what'll have to happen".

A nasty cold makes its way through the house. Aaron brings scary dreck, like a kid going to daycare only bigger and worse. The kids get it, I get it, and then Aaron gets it again. We spend a lot of time simply caring for each other. Comfort foods and hot toddies. Vicks vapor rub.

And we buy a hot tub. A Jacuzzi. The strangest purchase I have ever made by far. I could no more imagine myself doing that than I could imagine myself having a jet boat or a pony dog. But achy and hopeful and tender and embracing the goofy factor (a t-shirt from the gap, “Cougar Bait”, cz he knows that if all else fails and a fear of mine cannot be mastered any other way, humor will probably get the job done as I have no resistance to a good laugh), we go comparison shopping and listen to schpeels about LED lighting and numbers of jets and oxidation. The showrooms smell like chlorine. The smell is the same as the Schaumburg public pool I grew up in until my life exploded forever into a shit splatter pattern of my parents’ manias and economic catastrophes – until it exploded into the person I became. Smelling chlorine again, I walked around the showrooms and watched the cascading LED lights and stuck my hand in the warm water. I can remember the hot sidewalk under my little feet as I ran the 8 blocks or so over to the pool, the pool pass a giant baby pin with my number on it attached to my bathing suit, right hip. My sister’s adorable boingboing curly hair, her polka dot butt bikini bottoms and the halter top forever coming untied and flapping loose around her neck. My best friend Mickey and I would go to the pool every single day, sometimes we’d pick up Sherry, sometimes we’d duck out the north door and go to the strip mall for candy, giant chewy sweet tarts were my favorite. Pixie sticks. Sherry’s cat had kittens on the chair in her living room, and we paused to see the squirmy wet pile of them. Mickey took dares to pull her bathing suit bottoms down in the pool, then dive to up-end her bare ass at the life guard, a maneuver she repeated often and which I found stimulating to contemplate at the safe distance of being me not her. Slightly older boys egging her to flash them her vagina in the stairwell tubes of the giant jungle gyms of the parks with no trees in our squat flat poor new subdivision. She cleaned my room for me and worshiped her older sister. Her mom and dad hated each other and kept the drapes drawn always, her house always dark and over air conditioned. Not mine. My house was awash in sunlight, nothing but flowered valances my mom would sew herself, like fabric bangs across the foreheads of the windows. She liked yellow, and shades of it were everywhere, as on the giant round area rug with long gold tassel fringe at the edge. My father had a component stereo system, box speakers near the real-wood fireplace that had a brass curtain I’d open and close endlessly. Led Zeppelin loud on the weekends. My parents nzling each other next to the sink in the little kitchen while she made the nightly salad, vinegar and olive oil and too much oregano always. They kept bells on the doorknob to the bedroom in case one of us got up in the night and might disturb their fucking. The end tables by their bed and next to the couch were all giant empty wooden wire rolls that my dad hauled home from work and my mom made gingham tablecloths for. My favorite gingham was (is) blue, the same material my grandma used for curtains; everyone was always sewing something, nesting nesting my mom would paint walls colors like “chartreuse”. My dad built me a playhouse on the patio and blasted music out of his van while he tended tomato plants and a little grape arbor. I can see the line of orange day lilies along the garage, happy hippie color splash against the shit brown siding color that my mom said was “earthy”. She took yoga classes at the Slim n’ Trim, which ironically was the storefront between the candy depot and a Baskin Robbins in that strip mall. Before his dissatisfaction with his work and the stress of sole providership broke my father’s will into deadly shards hurting anything close enough to catch their random flying trajectories, before my mother’s fragile mind and strong spirit collided and she disappeared into herself to watch the sparks fly, before I memorized the Book of Ruth to win a stack of white bibles and looked for a Larger Meaning to Suffering, life was good. And now it is good again.

Aaron looks at me worried about my worrying, “You really think I’m going to disappear or something don’t you?” Or something is about right; I worry about what I can’t imagine not so much about anything that I can. I rub his head, press my palm to his mind through his skull, promise to care for it, make bargains like a giraffe caught in quicksand only different, “I’ll do anything, take on anything, just don’t take leave of yourself my man, please be happy….” He has a stuffy nose and snores a little; I like it, that’s how I know he’s still there even if I close my eyes. Then I dream of John who shows me a healing scar on the back of his head where his cranium was pried open like a walnut down the middle. He tells me there was really something wrong with it, his brain, a connection capacity was blocked by something like a recurring tumor. I think it was me, the Recurring Tumor Girlfriend. He tells me no, it wasn’t. “It wasn’t you.” I ask him if he is going to die. He doesn’t answer me. I wake up and listen to the quiet house, breathe in the smell of apple sauce I have slow-cooking overnight in the kitchen.

smells like everything will be okay feist - mushaboom

yesterday was the most contented connected happiest day of my life so far

buckcherry - crazy bitch

bonus track from DmS: (I'm a sucker for funny animal vids)

-----

I wrote all day (again). Now that I'm done with the tantrum, I think Story's return to the exchange could be good, and besides which Aaron is a Reader of mine, coming towards me rather than away when I boil over, then bending patiently over my foot at midnight to remove a tiny blade of glass using my pink eyebrow tweezers, slowly proceeding despite the precious few three hours of sleep he will get before having to go to work for 12 grueling hours. And today was his grievance too, his one chance to have removed from his file a permanent written reprimand he got for using the word 'niggardly' in the OR, the definition of which his surgical support medic did not know but it sounded some kind of bad to her. While funny to me, it was serious to him, for a reprimand in his file means he can be fired without cause, ie he loses his union rights, for two years. Exhausted, having had to call in crisis counseling (again) and paramedics for his bonkers exwife and deal with that all weekend, having wanted to come towards rather than away from me for "our first fight", having been up half the night with the estrogen tsunami of one woman throwing a weepy tantrum ostensibly about having been flirted with (that's a sore spot, being flirted with as if a man of mine doesn't exist cz he's never around) but really about the endless bonkers tantrums of another woman, he kept a man with stage-4 cancer in 5 places alive all morning and then walked into a grievance hearing with a dictionary and walked out with a letter of apology to him from the director of critical care. And through all this, I sat here and wrote, another chapter, this one about John and G-spots and Botox and Seratonin. And although it was about another man I fell in love with repeatedly and once because he smelled like a stag party and called me Golden Griddle, Aaron smiled to read it, said simply "I love your writing"

when I got done laughing, I threw a temper tantrum ... I haven't done that at a man, to and in his face, in a loooooong time, like years ... it felt okay, actually - it felt honest

clear copy (not live)

how come

rosie thomas - this one goes out to the one I left behind

"You must have forgotten how much it costs in efforts, attentions, moves to make the smallest undertaking succeed, to end a lawsuit, to conclude a marriage, to bring off a reconciliation. Think what you like of these details; but I'm going to find them interesting if they're true, if they bring out passions, if they show people's characters.
They're commonplace, you say; they're what one sees every day! You're mistaken; they're what takes place in front of your eyes every day that you never see."

that's Stella (the great dane)

life is a real kick in the head

eef b(clem s) (I still love this guy) - wa wa wa

willie nelsen - a song for you

with very few exceptions I can think of, people are abhorently weak and mercilessly selfish - tiz no wonder I have very few friends and even fewer people I'd care to know any better than that, I'm not missing much unless I could switch species. I'm disgusted to the bone

today sucked so hard I think I might be inside out

stop booming. just bring him your words, how you see, that's all he needs cz that is what he loved

"What lies behind us and lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

update: what lies in me is plenty. I am never ever backing down again. not from a fight like this. cz right is right, and who you want is who you want, and if you ain't quite strong enough for that well yet I got moxi to burn if you got a brain enough to bring a match

All these insensitive men are actually more reactive to emotion than women, so they are genetically programmed to avoid it.

to a degree, okay, fine.....but really when push comes to shove, if you got something to say, say it

my life hung in the balance today literally like a life rarely does so much. I'm fine, repro system in good working order. he is free. I have bouts of WARY that desire almost can't master. almost.

I adore this guy
bonus: new from f eist

I had one of the most brutally honest converstations tonight. Friendship, if it is real and you commit to that, that's the important shit, and everything else is just...everything else.

I do not know how to be writing to Nobody on this blog ... that seems like an important thing to figure but I'm not sure how or why .... I dunno.... here I am this morning, alive inside my life, my mother visiting, my kids around me close each of the three (so far) orbiting at their particular distance, my career clamping down on my time... my reproductive health what it is, whatever that is, who can say?? la la la ... a man nearby to all of that but not here (yet?), stirring feelings and memories and chitchats with Mary, writing which for a change I do not leave here, that for a change I gave to Sunnie, a first between us . . . this is still what I'm listening to because it was the last gift I got, though I am trying not to listen to it over much, just a four times now, trying not to make the same mistakes, letting shit get to me too much down the bone more than it is meant to .. or is the mistake that I don't let it get to me enough? This is what I can say for sure about the last 24 hours: I talked to God; I took my girl with me and I gave the dialogue to my best gf; I told the man who is presenting himself to me that people seem to really love me or they really just do not, that anyone trying to hold a middle ground on that is driven bonkers or disappears, that my kids have been raised by the mafia of me, that you're either in or you're out with me that's how it goes for whatever reason; I took my peeps to see "30 minutes or less" and my mother laughed in that shotgun-burst style she does, like John used to too, that way that makes me laugh more than the joke itself; I listened to the rain alone, and am still doing that right now, hoping for some sleep

fuck

what's up?
nothing good. (tell me a story)
ya know those chin straps?
(headtilt)
like it's a dildo attached to your face.
ok...
I gotta friend, we go out and he wears one to the bar.
hahahahahahah wtf? hahahah that's pretty brilliant. in a really fucked up kinda way.
yeah it's amazing how well it works too.
really?
yeah he wears it with a 'I heart fat chicks' tshirt and everybody wants to talk to him.
hahahahahahahahaha....

heard this while I was waiting for my fish fry togo order tnite - I was watching Shaun White do mute commentary for a bmx competition on the pub tv

http://galleries.buffalonews.com/photo.php?gname=gallery_1311812612.txt&item=8

http://galleries.buffalonews.com/photo.php?gname=gallery_1311812612.txt&item=8

a man who matters

it is hot as hell

back to work today, another mid-summer blowout, siiiigh - faculty are brats, administrators are dickheads, both are arrogant to a fault

that's alex

I didn't want to be here anymore for a while (a stalker can't follow me to WI, presumably) and wanted to see my peeps besides - and what better occasion than a big party at which nobody is getting married?

More later on my relentlessly insane parents, but right now I have to shovel out my house before my head . . .

it's actually very beautiful, I'm ashamed to keep giggling about it cz once I got it home and saw the price and product info on it and Amy's hubby explained to me what it's made of (maple, not veneer, and mother of pearl w abalone along the neck, etc etc), I realized Tony had wanted to be taken seriously at his store by donating a serious instrument . . I have zero idea how to even hold it correctly, I sit on the couch with it and touch it lightly all over and listen to it say whatever

update: going to Black Keys at Artpark tnite

that damn doctor kept me there all damn day, literally, from noon til almost 5, to look at me for o 5 minutes . . he asks, How you feeling? Fine. "Well then you're fine."
>:/

then I picked up my new Transformer (I think the name bodes well - tho I have zero idea how to use this badboy) - it looks like a laptop but it works more like a phone only different <:/

Dave installed the lights - then we had a bit of difficulty over whether I owed him money still on that roof. once upon a time, I'd have swallowed that $1k, but, well - I guess I had a John-moment: No. it's not so much that I'm tired of overpaying for handyman things (which I SO am), or that it was clearly an unfair price for what amounted to 2 half days of sticking flashing on (which it was, especially after a 3 yr wait for this to be friggin done and about $6k altogether in getting f'd by it already), it's more like my skin just went hard. DmS says, "You don't care what I think" and in a way she's right. I feel very alone inside my skin, which maybe lately if you tapped on it you'd feel metal. my ability to get out of it and jump into anyone else's point of view is very low, as is my capacity for anyone else in here then too.

then went to the Wheel with Nunu, whom I have not seen in forever, and Thighs played and tho he's now weird around me a little (I've not known him thru a full cycle, I have a feeling, that goes from 1 you're pretty 2 kissy face 3 omg catholic freak out 4 repeat 2&3 a few times 5 act weird and kiss/hug/talk to everyone BUT me 6 ?? repeat 1-5?? dunno - it's a little irritating, but hey I'm a social retard too in my own ways) he can sure play, whoa man. I talked to her about the gun thing, which I was probably just going to talk about so that people would think I already had one which I do not, and am not sure what the process is of getting one permit-wise, and neither is she, but for her own reasons has been thinking about it as well. so we're going to find out together, which is perfect, there's nobody more rational and systematic in their approach to a task/topic than she is, she won't give a rats ass about pink vs pearl (and neither do I)

then home, which after all that you'd think I'd sleep, but nope - not til the sun starts to come up, till then it's like catnapping w one eye open. NOW I'd love to go back to sleep, I'm going to try not to, this can't keep up forever . .

I like this song

today: the piano tuner is coming at 1, I'm sorting old clothes for a goodwill dropthing down the street, I'm going to HomeDepot for lightbulbs, I'm grading papers til they are done for the summer

slept again most of today, what can I say?, I don't sleep at night anymore way worse than I ever did which was never great. so I walked. I walked the mall. I walked the village. I ran almost 5 miles at the end of the day. then ate as much pasta as I could hold. it's almost 1 a.m., and now finally I think I might sleep awhile, but not bc of all that effort. sometimes, your own self just is not all you need in this life some kinda way, ya know? you need to borrow quarter, like for the meter.

Aaron (ex-student, now friend), helped me pick one (the mosquito) - he's gonna teach me how to shoot it if I want . . did you know ambulance drivers (he hates that term, it's EMT!) carry guns usually cz even when though they're trying to help well people just suck and are often dangerous besides. I gave him an A for a (doomed) wedding present (no, he didn't do that final paper, o well, what the fuck ever), so I guess, well, I dunno, I let him help me a little, let people help me just a little in general >:/

meanwhile, slept most of the day (don't sleep well at night) then went to hear Clyde at Waterstreet, Tony got shitfaced drunk and sounded way better then he ever does sober (what is up w that? a musician universal truth), got hit on a butgillion times til I ran away (him laughing, ha fucking ha), now home to listen for funny noises and watch netflix.

today: cleaning (told ya), then the Lewiston Music fest from 5-6 to hear Thighs (tho lordy his kissy face thing royally pissed me off last, sooo not in the mood for foolishness, fyi via the universe to all those who might think of doing so: DO NOT KISS ME DO NOT EVEN HUG ME UNLESS I HUG YOU DO NOT FUCKING TOUCH ME I DO NOT LIKE IT AND IF I DANCE I WANT TO DO IT ALONE, I'll let you know when/if my mood shifts again) playing w someone I haven't heard before, a woman who plays native percussion. then probably Powertrain, ie Crown Chakra and Jeff singing, at the Lasalle Sportsman Club. there are so many simultaneous music fests and charity benefits happening all at once right now that all the people I know are literally racing from one thing to the next to work, and I take breaks to come home and feel stalked and lonely and awful then just give up and head back out again. could be worse.

The boys drove away, I watched them turn the corner, I wondered how I'm gonna stand it (I'm going to clean, I won't even seem unhappy, the usual, inner clenching of will), and John texts right then, "I'm fine", as if he heard me inner-howl. Well, I'm not so fine, fine maybe but for sure not great, if you could care

talked this morning on the phone w tony for an hour, made me feel better and worse. we swapped stalker stories and controlfreak stories and whatnot, which made me feel better - but he's got more options than I do: he knows his stalker so the police put an end to his situation; he's back w the gf that it never works out with but he knows her and she's a comfort, which I so understand obviously, and I frankly would do that too if I could but my comfortlover is dead; and finally, of course, Tony's a man.

today: we're going to buy flippers and get TJ sized for a bike, get hotdogs and smokingjoe's and ice cream cones in youngstown near the fort. then the boys will be on holiday w their dad's family in WI for 10 days. and I will be alone. tonight, my first night alone, I'll have the option of walking into town at 10ish to hear Clyde (Tony's band) kick off the Lewiston Music Fest, or I could go into nf to the Wagon Wheel for the songwriters open mic (ie Thighs and D Thurman singing w Jeff). probably either would mean I go alone, as Sun has no babysitter. or I could stay home alone.

anywhichway, there is no way I'm getting thru this day without crying so I'm not even gonna try

update: the mail bundle was misplaced/delivered and has been returned to me. ever wonder how you'd ever possibly be happy to see $2k worth of bills? well now ya know

I am literally physically unable to call the electrician/handyman that Amy recommended, or the one who put the dishwasher in cz this whole thing started right around then, etc. I simply do not want anyone in here I don't know. I'm pissed at myself and so pissed off that I have to feel this way altogether. I finally emailed Dave - that's fraught but at least I know for shizzle that he's safe :(

rest of the day: taking the kids out to eat, probably steelheads, maybe back to the pool in youngstown, maybe to buy Cal a new bike at wallyworld. we're also going to the library. we might see Super8 tonight in nf at the regal12. no piano lesson today - guess what? Tony is being stalked too, his whole own rockstar trouble, dealing w the police etc. I wouldn't wish it on anybody so I feel guilty that it's oddly comforting that at this moment he knows exactly how I feel :(

I got a fave pic of my grandpa, I have it where I see it asap when I get up in the morning, his arms open for me cz I'm about to give him a patpat. meanwhile, spent the whole damn day with tech people. Yahoo has spanked and suspended Mr Dick(less). according to tech (and a private investigator who works for Blackhawk [no I'm not kidding] [this is NF, the ghetto, ya know how many dudes go into the military? um all the ones without a guitar, pretty much] [Sunnie knows him]) there is no way to get Mr Dick(less)'s real identity through an email address. anybody could be anybody. BUT the head of the IT dept at work will in the meantime make a website that'd track him to his house if he visits it for when/if he surfaces with a new email, something with a sexy sounding address to tempt him - that's pretty badass, eh? I'll take that solution if I need it. then Sunnie's bro helped me pick a tablet [backordered til the 13th ugh], take back the new laptop, get rid of the old ones after getting the music off, blabla

the bundle of mail which was withheld at the post office while I was away and then delivered in a lump was stolen off my buddha bench

today is the 5th. I was supposed to get my highlites touched up. halfway thru, the boyz didn't answer the phone at home so I went racing out of with my hair quick rinsed and standing on end. FBI guy is unofficially casing me to see who is casing me, and that is a lawyer/judgedude who lives a few blocks away and goes those few blocks out of his way to drive by here as many as 10x a day in his various automobiles to be less obvious about it but if I'm not outside he craaaaaawwwwwwls by waiting to get a glimpse of me, and goes round and round the block if Cal is outside cz then he knows I'm somewhere close. however, he might not be the guy who is emailing me, believe it or not, that person might be a student (or coworker), since although the email is a yahoo acct one of the msgs seems to start via the campus IP so the security people of the college are working on that . . .

fyi, none of this is illegal. it's BORDERLINE harassment, but that's it. until/unless he threatens to hurt me, watching me come and go is perfectly legal. even emailing me your junk, since I'm not a minor, that is no great shakes in the world of cyberstalking.

so I should just go about my business, but wow man it's hard to feel normal. everywhere I go, if a dude looks at me (which um is kinda all the time, just saying, you'd think that would be less and less the older I get but not so much, I dunno, I guess the world has so much milf porn in it now that I'm my own little fetish category or something cz men look at me All The Time) I get utterly completely weirded out. the fireworks last night, omg, we finally retreated to the other end of artpark AWAY from the fireworks so I could look at them and not at the people who might be looking at me. and as for sleep, forget it, I'm going on 48 hours now almost entirely sleepless. ie I'm a freaked out cranky fucking bitch BIG TIME, with fatigue cotton mouth and the urge to slap the shit out of anyone I don't know

rest of the day: eat out (too tired to cook) and nap somehow, maybe at the youngstown pool so the kids have something to do and lifeguards watching while I try to doze off if I can

I'm being cyberstalked. Some idiot is emailing me pics of his dick and I was throwing em out thinking it was spam even though it was weird, how the messages included my name, "I'm under your spell sexy G---" etc. Then I got one last night that referenced lunch I had w Amy (margaritas in nf, a new place she turned me onto, I like tamales) and wondered how my camping trip went . . Nice huh? Uber catholic dude who says he can't talk to me cz I'm 'kryptonite' all of a sudden at whose bday party umpteen mutual friends and ugly polish relatives stare at me like I've got 2 heads while my ride ie my best friend's hubby gets jealous as if there's anything going on w either of them which there is not and on the side I get cyberstalked. And why am I blogging this? Well because I stopped blogging - bc nobody reads this - bc I miss John sometimes and I don't want to cz he doesn't want me to - etc etc etc - but now that I want to know where I was on 6/15, I have no record of it cz I've stopped blogging. So. Um. Today is 4th of July. I will be at a party on Oneida St, at the home of the people who run the belowthefalls magazine, where Tony will be playing his guitar from 4 pm til fireworks. Yesterday I was at home mostly - but I went to the Basilica in Landcaster to light a candle to get grounded - because the day before that was the bday party and that had freaked me out. The bday party was at a park in nf, Oppenheim Park, and most of the people I know where there in addition to Thighs and his weird wife and all his relatives all of whom wear ginormous crucifix necklaces on heavy chains. The week prior to that I was in Letchworth, in cabin c6 with the boyz, and Sunnie's whole extended family had the other cabins. The week before that, all I can remember is the party at the Marina on Grand Island, I found a turtle in the road and freed him in the river, Thighs kissed me (he does that, it's the Guinness goes to his head, he doesn't mean anything by it much and then he goes into tizzies of self-loathing over it and puts a ton of money in the collection plate at mass whatever like a lunatic). The week before that sometime, I can't remember when, I went to Waterstreet w Sun and Jeff and Chris (base player who is in our drum circle - superduper shy, nice guy, only ever says about 10 words - but he made fun of Pete in a good natured way, Pete was singing, and it cracked me up like crazy, and I remember thinking "Chris is ok"). Before that, I can't remember . . . it all blurs by early June, nothing stands out, I don't remember talking to anyone new or special . . the only people I know now that I did not know in May are the Thurman Bros, D and J, songwriters both in their late 50's who helped w Tony's store move. To the best of my knowledge, I do not know anyone who could be that dude in the pic, nobody that skinny and with no tattoos and with the gay tendency to shave his balls. Normally, from the look of that pic, I'd say 'a student', but no student knows anything about my personal life whatsoever, except Story who does not know Amy and who would never EVER do such a thing nooooo waaaaaaay - if anything he's even more reserved than John and Tony, who are both very reserved obviously. That's it. I have no idea who this could be, and/but someone is watching me. So I guess I'll go on about my business and wait for Mr FBI next door to work his magic on tracking email addresses whatever and keep blogging where I am going so that if I disappear someone knows where to start to look.

"The Book of the Grotesque"

THE WRITER, an old man with a white mustache, had some difficulty in getting into bed. The windows of the house in which he lived were high and he wanted to look at the trees when he awoke in the morning. A carpenter came to fix the bed so that it would be on a level with the window. 1
Quite a fuss was made about the matter. The carpenter, who had been a soldier in the Civil War, came into the writer’s room and sat down to talk of building a platform for the purpose of raising the bed. The writer had cigars lying about and the carpenter smoked. 2
For a time the two men talked of the raising of the bed and then they talked of other things. The soldier got on the subject of the war. The writer, in fact, led him to that subject. The carpenter had once been a prisoner in Andersonville prison and had lost a brother. The brother had died of starvation, and whenever the carpenter got upon that subject he cried. He, like the old writer, had a white mustache, and when he cried he puckered up his lips and the mustache bobbed up and down. The weeping old man with the cigar in his mouth was ludicrous. The plan the writer had for the raising of his bed was forgotten and later the carpenter did it in his own way and the writer, who was past sixty, had to help himself with a chair when he went to bed at night. 3
In his bed the writer rolled over on his side and lay quite still. For years he had been beset with notions concerning his heart. He was a hard smoker and his heart fluttered. The idea had got into his mind that he would some time die unexpectedly and always when he got into bed he thought of that. It did not alarm him. The effect in fact was quite a special thing and not easily explained. It made him more alive, there in bed, than at any other time. Perfectly still he lay and his body was old and not of much use any more, but something inside him was altogether young. He was like a pregnant woman, only that the thing inside him was not a baby but a youth. No, it wasn’t a youth, it was a woman, young, and wearing a coat of mail like a knight. It is absurd, you see, to try to tell what was inside the old writer as he lay on his high bed and listened to the fluttering of his heart. The thing to get at is what the writer, or the young thing within the writer, was thinking about. 4
The old writer, like all of the people in the world, had got, during his long fife, a great many notions in his head. He had once been quite handsome and a number of women had been in love with him. And then, of course, he had known people, many people, known them in a peculiarly intimate way that was different from the way in which you and I know people. At least that is what the writer thought and the thought pleased him. Why quarrel with an old man concerning his thoughts? 5
In the bed the writer had a dream that was not a dream. As he grew somewhat sleepy but was still conscious, figures began to appear before his eyes. He imagined the young indescribable thing within himself was driving a long procession of figures before his eyes. 6
You see the interest in all this lies in the figures that went before the eyes of the writer. They were all grotesques. All of the men and women the writer had ever known had become grotesques. 7
The grotesques were not all horrible. Some were amusing, some almost beautiful, and one, a woman all drawn out of shape, hurt the old man by her grotesqueness. When she passed he made a noise like a small dog whimpering. Had you come into the room you might have supposed the old man had unpleasant dreams or perhaps indigestion. 8
For an hour the procession of grotesques passed before the eyes of the old man, and then, although it was a painful thing to do, he crept out of bed and began to write. Some one of the grotesques had made a deep impression on his mind and he wanted to describe it. 9
At his desk the writer worked for an hour. In the end he wrote a book which he called “The Book of the Grotesque.” It was never published, but I saw it once and it made an indelible impression on my mind. The book had one central thought that is very strange and has always remained with me. By remembering it I have been able to understand many people and things that I was never able to understand before. The thought was involved but a simple statement of it would be something like this: 10
That in the beginning when the world was young there were a great many thoughts but no such thing as a truth. Man made the truths himself and each truth was a composite of a great many vague thoughts. All about in the world were the truths and they were all beautiful. 11
The old man had listed hundreds of the truths in his book. I will not try to tell you of all of them. There was the truth of virginity and the truth of passion, the truth of wealth and of poverty, of thrift and of profligacy, of carelessness and abandon. Hundreds and hundreds were the truths and they were all beautiful. 12
And then the people came along. Each as he appeared snatched up one of the truths and some who were quite strong snatched up a dozen of them. 13
It was the truths that made the people grotesques. The old man had quite an elaborate theory concerning the matter. It was his notion that the moment one of the people took one of the truths to himself, called it his truth, and tried to live his life by it, he became a grotesque and the truth he embraced became a falsehood. 14
You can see for yourself how the old man, who had spent all of his life writing and was filled with words, would write hundreds of pages concerning this matter. The subject would become so big in his mind that he himself would be in danger of becoming a grotesque. He didn’t, I suppose, for the same reason that he never published the book. It was the young thing inside him that saved the old man. 15
Concerning the old carpenter who fixed the bed for the writer, I only mentioned him because he, like many of what are called very common people, became the nearest thing to what is understandable and lovable of all the grotesques in the writer’s book. 16

change of perspective

seriously, if you haven't come up with a good healthy happy new insight lately (have you?), then what the hell?

song of the day

this, I remember this. oddly, I remembered it as a short story not a poem at all

Darryl Dawkins played professional basketball from 1975 to 1996. One of the sport's more colorful personalities, he said he lived part-time on the planet Lovetron, a place where he perfected his interplanetary funkmanship. He also liked to give names to his slam dunks. The "Turbo Sexophonic Delight" was a favorite, but the best was his "Chocolate-Thunder-Flying, Teeth-Shaking, Glass-Breaking, Rump-Roasting, Bun-Toasting, Wham-Bam-I-Am Jam." I encourage you to try some Darryl Dawkins-like behavior in your own chosen field, Virgo. Give a name to your signature move or your special play. With playful flair, let people know how much you love what you do and how good you are at what you do.

I'm writing (in the cracks of time I can muster), longish stories (vignettes) of one woman knitted together with flashfictions of another. I'd blog them, but I'm not sure who they're for - sometimes it's you or for ghost-of-you, sometimes it's not, with the intention of giving it, intentions which I then abandon regardless. Sometimes I take one-line pieces of TJ-speak and actually send them to Tony, who is now a big fan of the dictums that TJ carves on stone tablets of air like Moses only different - if TJ had a facebook page called "Moses Only Different", Tony would 'like' it. Sometimes I wonder which of my friends would 'like' the one woman or the other woman, like last night when Ears was reading Chinquee and I realized he'd 'like' the woman of the flashes better than the more solid Etta. The woman of the flashes has no proper name, I just call her "She", like She Ra only different.

I write a little bit every day.

I'm rereading journals (in the attic, I even have an email stack from the Commune, along with a diary I kept in 5th grade). I've been rereading the years between the birth of Ears and when I left. I'm watching my former self go completely down the tubes, from thoughtfully distressed to numb to fragmented utterly writing things like "I am a ridiculous person" over and over and over like Bart Simpson on the blackboard. Just reading it feels again like someone has his hands around my throat and is squeezing a band of loathing into my skin all the way around. I put the journal down, and take deep breaths, visualizing the band being loosened and I smell FPH, as if he really is dead, the way I can smell my grandfather sometimes, that embedded oil smell of his craggy hands. Ghosts of men who smell(ed) like safe places. Maybe there will come a time when I am no longer remixing conscious memory mostly, when I am instead making it all up, and I then won't be tied to reality at all, dead or alive.

Ears LOVES flash fiction, literally mesmerized by the stories that are a sentence long, maybe a paragragh, the ones that stop mid-sentence. He double dogear'd this one actually:

"She watches rolls falling, at a man who looks like a potato. Her stepfather used to come here. He died. He spent millions. There's oxygen and dinging. She gets behind the wheel of a very nice car." _Slot Machine_, Kim Chinquee

Bale is supposed to be coming today - will that f'n roof ever get done? (will I ever get treated decent?) - it's not that I don't love people anymore, it's just that rather than have to choose between loving them and wanting to be treated like I have value, I've separated the two things and the latter I've got locked away now. and maybe the key is locked on the inside of that box, I'm not sure, but I know I don't have it. my heart you can have, my expecting anything much of you not so much.

clem snide - I'll be your mirror

occurs to me that the greek dude w the junk to sell thought I was a little drag queen and his passion is for joe pesche in a dress approximately when not for his rather thick jawed wife

greek fest in the queen city today, right after the pride parade and we trailed the rainbow'd parade-goers from parade to the orthodox church w/ the beer tent w the greek tunes playing. I dunno about your city but in Buffalo drag queens and orthodox greeks hang out peaceably. the 'retail' attractions at the fest amounted to stuff that a greek couple had garbage picked and cleaned back up, basically. the man said something to me I couldn't hear, I leaned in closer, "you you're very pretty, your hair is wow", I lean back again and smile an embarrassed thanks, his blond wife w/greek accent behind him with a picklepuss face shoves newspaper at him, says "someone BOUGHT something, wrap it up", rolls her eyes at me, he smile-shrugs.

daily love horoscope for Virgo: Neptune, planet of dreams and fantasies will spend 4 months in your relationship sector before backing out in early August, but will then return again next February and stay here until 2026. The first 2 months of Neptune's visit were in direct motion but today marks the first full day in the second phase, where your imagination needs to be focused on the past.

I had one shakey patch in the wee hours (god damn email) then I woke up over it and over the skittish both. so there. so help me god.

johnny cash - rusty cage - soundgarden cover

WEEKEND LOVE FORECAST: ARIES: Someone adores you. Your smile is a showstopper to this person. TAURUS: Because you are so comfortable on your own, you can get along with a variety of people. GEMINI: You will eliminate the competition by simply showing up stronger and with more confidence than any of them. CANCER: You'll watch a loved one's eyes and know what he or she really wants. LEO: The one who is not available might seem the most appealing to you, and you are equally appealing when you are unavailable. VIRGO: It will be lucky for you to choose a new song as "your song." LIBRA: Because you are so original, someone keeps coming around to see what you'll do next. SCORPIO: Dating is not a spectator sport -- get in the game! SAGITTARIUS: Your joie de vivre will attract many admirers. CAPRICORN: There are plenty of fish in the sea, but they are not all the kind you want to catch, so be careful where you cast your line. AQUARIUS: Healthy physical outlets connect you with like-minded, upbeat prospects. PISCES: You'll concentrate on your love life and making it the best it can be.

listening to this a lot still, but it's not 'my song'

conclusion: I need more dance/run music

good strong day

gotta be stealthy about this post or I'll get a copyright warning for sure, it's ed (you know the one) from his new cd of just him and his little guitar-thingy - god almighty, he is so hot it's ridiculous

it was missing an adverb (it's always an adverb)

"The great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do," wrote the essayist Walter Bagehot. Personally, I don't think that's the supreme joy possible to a human being; but it definitely has a provocative appeal. May I recommend that you explore it in the coming weeks, Virgo? The astrological omens suggest you're in an excellent position to succeed at an undertaking you've been told is unlikely or even impossible for you to accomplish.

here's one [title was taken from the fray, how to save a life] , I remember FPH and I argued over its interpretation, that was back when he'd respond to content pretty regularly, only when he felt like it of course but he wasn't 'withholding' response either

conclusion: glad I didn't delete this blog after all
conclusion: I would realllly like to avoid the whole psych each other out thing wherein people have responses but won't give them to you, as if, I dunno what, as if they're gonna run out of responses to being alive so they have to conserve, or some crazy shit - I am trying convince myself that ti's something other than screwing somebody that does that, but

time to think

conclusion: as much as anything, I've been bored

remember this? or better, this? in my wa wa wa, I've been focusing on Mr Softee, his random appearances amidst lakes of time spent dealing with The Robot side of FPH like Mr Hyde. all that is fine, and not to be undervalued. I can feel FPH so thoroughly that I know when he withdraws his capacity to understand what I write, both fully comprehending and habitually inert (he is as not-prone to commentary as a highly literate human being ever could be). It's like putting out gifts of carefully made meals, replete with meaning and care, that are consumed overnight by a treasured largely invisible gremlin. My demon lover, materializing according to some moon phase or underworld goings on that I can't fathom, my reading (soft-ish)robot. And he can feel me too; he plays music for me lately, ironically, "remember this one?" he whispers in my ear when I am in public places alone. like I said, human connections are not to be undervalued, probably especially the strange ones in a world that does not admit to being strange (but is, very). however, what has gotten lost (among many other things) and which has been coming back to me more and more lately, especially as I can feel him leave my emails unread for instance, is my desire to write, my need of it, and at him was one of the ways I have been able to do that - until I lost sight of that in my care and concern and desire for Mr Softee himself.

for a while now, some number of years, I keep coming back to this idea of a genre that I call a vignette - it's not a shortshort story, because those have plot (I like those, but they tend to be kitchy). it's not a prose poem, because it makes more sense than that (although the sense breaks down sometimes, when it has to because sense has broken down). they're more like photographs, like Winesburg Ohio only shorter, a photo album, each one a thing in itself that is one thing and another in a series, which can be reordered at will. such a 'book' might end again and again and again. there was one I wrote of a woman who would not decide which chair to sit in because that would confirm the world and she refused, and that was the whole thing (I wrote that one for DmS, and now I can't find it [do you have it?]). I write one every so often, I keep them around, I think 'I should do something with these', but what? every time I start something new, like my recent greatgreatgreatgrandma project for Story, I think of this again and I wonder if it's a genre already. it is. I heard its name today, 'flash fiction'. the woman who named it that works in Buffalo in the poetics department I graduated and fled from. I heard some of her flashes today, one in which a woman takes a selfish lover (he's from Crete) after her bitter marriage ends and she thinks "I am just happy to be able to give" and my heart stopped, but it didn't need to keep beating because that was the whole story. Somewhere, someone is getting married right fucking now.

I need a lover to write about (cz how else would I have captured trying to save Robot from an academic firing squad except by lapsing into absurdist drama? maybe brecht started as a stupified lover of a maniac) and to write at (which is why, as much as I'm stirred and interested and all that, none of the musicians have inspired me to really throw down).

I have my body. I can cook. I have words upon words. And I have precious little reason to cough up all of those 3 things that are all I've got = the entire/global nature of my distress.

taking off for Boston . . Todd sent me that ferns thing so I'd be in a good mood heading out . . of course he doesn't know what associations Will Ferrell has for me. sigh. welp, Will Ferrell is funny, a symbol for all that I got out of it that I'm richer for bla bla bla. on that note, in order to enjoy Boston, I'll have to not care, to not remember, to not think about anything pastwise. I'll have to think of only the present. maybe that's how the future comes. I hope so cz there is nothing I want more than to stop looking back behind me at nothing but my own shadow.

repeat repeat love this song

Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis: Will Ferrell from Will Ferrell

this is a pretty good one

memory (the hidden track), painful

whoa man playing this for me without my having to even ask (just cz I mentioned I loved it one day) was the most romantic thing any five guys have ever done for me (at one time anyway lol hahahhahahahahah)

and I do believe they did a better job of it, as utterly unbelievable as that is, holy shit

trying to be upbeat, there was no music at all playing at the toe ring party, that was NOT an improvement (except of my toes)

"I don't know what I'm looking for," sings Brendan Benson in his bouncy pop song, "What I'm Looking For," "but I know that I just want to look some more." I suspect those words could come out of your mouth these days, Virgo. I worry that you've become so enamored with the endless quest that you've lost sight of what the object of the quest is. You almost seem to prefer the glamour of the restless runaround -- as painful as it sometimes is. That probably means you're at least somewhat out of touch with the evolution of your primal desires. Check back in with the raw, throbbing source, please.

the restless runaround 'it's a journey' stuff has zero appeal anymore. looking, waiting, wanting, trying, all of it utterly sick of it, boring boring boring near frantic motion from one chore to the next one outing to the next one meal to the next, and all the time the funniest jokes are always my own and if I weren't flirting w myself and cracking myself up, cz god knows everyone else is either too lame or too miserable wa wa to be even infintessimally interesing let alone surprising let alone delightful, then neither I nor anyone around me would gigglesnort whatsoever. I was more in synch w the world when I was dying. I'm sick of everything, you're boring my brain til it shits out my of my eyes in a deadpan fuckyou stare 24/7 and boring my heart til it rots away and leaves me empty like django's ballsack

Just as Venus spends her first full day in an adventurous part of your chart a Full Moon falls in your communication sector, giving you a chance to open the communication lines and to walk the talk. Venus is on a mission to bring more romantic adventures into your life, with a chance to have heart and mind on the same page Virgo.

heart and mind on same page. huh. I dunno, would that be good? cz I make up my mind to buy puppies, for instance. seems a bit iffy <:/

meanwhile, I like this phrase
I gotta read the words of the day in the middle of the night cz TJ caught me once and asked 'what's that?' - whoa man, I gotta keep him from finding out about the urbandictionary, that's a disaster waiting to happen.

mine

I can't remember the last time I felt so purely grateful for an embrace as I felt towards that hug of hot water.

people can really treat you like shit. water and flowers never do.

well hmmm . . LMG is moving in down the street from me, that's a transition . . he and Thighs both want this from me (Thighs was just flirting, I think, but of a course he is also actually in pain as most men over 30 are somewhere along their spine) and the more I've talked to LMG about it, the more I understand the specific repetative motion injuries that someone with a heavy strap on one shoulder standing up for hours on end is inflicting on him(her)self. I chitchatted w Animal a little yesterday too (drummer, like from the muppets ya know?) and by the end of the night LMG and I were texting back and forth about a cottage industry I could get going in yoga classes for them all. I mean, friendwise, this has become my 'niche market'. and my home studio will be 3 blocks straight down from his new digs . . welp, I am certain that LMG is not just flirting w me, his back hurts and overall it makes him feel "old and stressed out", which made me want very much to help him, which made me for the first time stop thinking of this home studio as something I need to guard against the invasion of Milk-n-Cookies (with whom I have much more than enough 'together time' as it is!). I'm going to give him my yoga ball today, and order a couple more . . .

my rising sign: In Plato's Republic, Socrates speaks derisively about people who are eu a-mousoi, an ancient Greek term that literally means "happily without muses." These are the plodding materialists who have no hunger for inspiration and no need of spiritual intelligence. According to my reading of the astrological omens, Capricorn, you can't afford to be eu a-mousoi in the coming weeks. Mundane satisfactions won't be nearly enough to feed your head and heart. To even wake up and get out of bed each morning, you've got to be on fire with a shimmering dream or a beautiful prospect. (this one I do understand perfectly, regardless of it being Greeks ft Capricorns)

In his book The Rough Guide to Climate Change, Bob Henson talks about the "five places to go before global warming messes them up." One such beautiful spot is Colorado's Rocky Mountain National Park. Vast swatches of its trees are being ravaged by hordes of pine beetles, whose populations used to be kept under control by frigid winters before the climate began to change. Australia's Great Barrier Reef and Switzerland's Alpine glaciers are among the other natural beauties that are rapidly changing form. I suggest that you apply this line of thought to icons with a more personal meaning, Virgo. Nothing stays the same forever, and it's an apt time in your astrological cycle to get all you can out of useful and wonderful resources that are in the midst of transformation.

I do not understand this horoscope. (shrug)

for VIRGO today: Why you choose one direction instead of another is a mystery. You defy the laws of marketing and laugh in the face of persuasion. You definitely have your own mind. Many will try to predict your next move; none will succeed.

shrug. even I dunno what it's gonna be. I'd usually move (buy a farm), that'd be a 'gina maneuver', and I might but I really just don't feel like it. so I dunno.

but it does feel about time for a something only I would do

stopped at home depot on my way home from yoga, having sweated as much as I possibly could, drinking tons of water so I could sweat more bc my notsick smell is one of my biggest pleasures (as small as that is) at present - asked some dude to help me find grass seed and slug guard and whatnot, him looking familiar vaguely but half of WNY has gotten their grammar corrected by me so whatever, then finally he places me and I place him . . he was just thinking about me the other day he says cz he's going to see The Hip again this summer like we did a couple years ago . . . funny how people can share a moment, who knows how many moments actually, and not share them at all ya know? I tried to do the math but I couldn't cz the night of that concert was either the umpeenth time FPH and I broke up or we never did at all depending on whether he ever 'counted' or not, and honestly I have no idea whatsoever (who's to say? he or I? my mama or his?), I just remember his having to take a pee so bad and FaintedInk yelling his name across the crowd in the dark and us laughing . . then I came back to the moment I was in now, not the first time an ex of Ink's has flirted with me, which as a repeat event must prove she speaks well of me (hahahahha), I register in their minds as desirable some kinda way, and I bit back a smile remembering her driving off with COI wrapped up in the seatbelt still, him running along the side of the car . . it's fine, I'm fine, that's really all that counts given impending mortality and all that, but it made me sad how time gets lost and people with it (all of them sorta actually, each in our own way now that I'm thinking about it) like FPH who simply vanished as if he cut the cord that tied him to the ship and floated out into the weightless black of space (can he breathe? I do not know), and I sang a cappella in the car with all the lungpower I could muster and I prayed my kids won't go missing on me cz some things I can take (barely anymore, but still) and some things I could not

for FPH('s ghost)

Dancing in Forever21, buying a new dress. I am happy to be healthy. Free of.

blue sky

What have you had to relinquish in the past ten months, Virgo? What were you forced to sacrifice or surrender? Whatever it is, I predict you will be compensated for it over the course of the next 12 months. And the process begins soon. It's not likely that the incoming blessing will bring an exact replacement for the dream that got away. Rather, you will be awakened to an unexpected new source of excitement, thereby dissolving the lingering sense of loss and liberating you to rise again.


have you ever fallen down and tried to catch yourself and scraped your palms up? that can't tell if it's hot or cold abrasion ouchy feeling?

my nails have grown a foot in a week and the ridges and white spots are gone, they look like I've been working on them but I haven't at all. I'm stunned kinda by how many little ways your (my) body can complain, can whine for attention with dry patches and slow-healing bruises and a stubborn sandbanking of fat that you don't need and can't get rid of and astringent-smelling hair and puffy eyes and nervous energy ft crash ft nervous energy ft crash ft nervous energy ft crash. that last complaint, an ache for napping between bouts of effort, that remains.

as for FPH, I feel like he chose not to survive, opted to get lopped out of me even though he wasn't what was making me sick. it is very hard, very disillusioning, I feel like calling his mother to make him get a puppy so I know he's okay but an unrenewed magazine subscription can't do that. this blog was one of the featured columns in the magazine. there is no reason for it to exist anymore. but, well, there's no reason for it not to exist either.