Wild Pony

S

Probably not what you had in mind, but...these were begging to be posted--garish pony with bad hair meets New Hampshire wilds. If you want to see more--prettier ones--click on the Flickr link to the right.

J

A Few Words about Whim

I like whims. Mostly always have. And now that I care for two small children and a husband, whims have become a necessary part of existence. Though I have found that some days, when things NEED to get done, the whim may be somewhat underappreciated--which is why I feel a need to explain the why. The why of the whim.

But first. In an effort to NOT sound like a whiney, ungrateful stay at home mother who is whining about nothing, I'll say that I am a go-out-of-the-house-mother trying to perform the duties of a SAHM with the help of her sensitive, new age (without the hairdo) husband who does things around the house and likes children and cooks. We own a house--or at least a mortgage. We have a couple of cars. Computer, television, telephone, running water, electricity. I have choices. I have money, more than some, less than some, but enough. People, besides me, love my children and help me with them. My children are healthy. I am healthy. Tad is healthy. Did I say that I have choices?

Choices. There are choices. And then there are choices. This is where whim figures into the discussion. The one that I have with myself while executing duties of motherhood. It goes something like--I am in the mood for something. I don't know what it is, but I know it's something. And then I wait and see. Look and find. Let the whim come to me--so that when both children scream at each other, scream at me and I, unsuccessfully try not to scream at them, all of us loud enough so that the neighbor out for a smoke asks if everything is o.k. I say, "We're going to the art store to buy a canvas." Whim.

The whim says, "Choose me," when faced with screaming or a pile of dishes and a dishwasher (I bow down to it), or a pile of laundry and a washing machine (on knees in worship). The whim says, "Go ahead and do what wants to be done instead of what should be done." And finally, the whim says, "Do it later." Or at least make it interesting when you do get around to doing it. The wiping. The picking. The paying. The cleaning. Choosing to whim is a way of exerting control, I guess, over that which must be done, the predictable. Doing laundry when I want to do it is better than doing laundry when I don't want to do it. So the whim and the conscious, unconscious decision making become a way of not hating what I do, of honoring what I do--honoring the sporadic moments of unfettered love and joy and wonder that do not involve cleaning or water or wiping or spit out food or poop.

I say whim, not folly, when describing why I buy canvases and buy paint and try to create. Something. Anything. Taking pictures--whimmish. The whim--responsible for a rainbow of yarn bought to knit a vest for Aidan. I blame whim for my saying that I'm going to stay in and then later, deciding to go out and whim is the reason for my leaving the house simply to see what will happen, to see who will happen. The whim is the reason my child, sitting next to me as I write, drops a bowl from the table and breaks it. Whim, of course, an explanation for my spotlessly unclean house (no white glove test here).

And whim, if misinterpreted, misdirected, can become the equivalent of irresponsiblity. But the whim is not irresponsible. The whim is the whim. It is pure. And it is free. It gets the job done. And the follower of the whim, if engaged correctly, doesn't feel guilty or worried or sad about his or her decision to have a whim, but rather feels that this decision, the decision to whim, is the rightest thing. If the whim is irresponsible, the whim follower will suffer the consequences. Don't you worry. Don't you worry.

It doesn't help to worry. Whims get worried by worrying. And the problem is--I need the whim and the whim needs me. It's what keeps me participating. It's what makes me remember. It's what keeps me interested. And it's what makes me forget. It's the whim, the promise of the whim. That keeps me. Here and able and willing.

More than a Debate

Been thinking about Roe v. Wade, lately, thinking about who would be most affected by a decision to let states make their own decisions about abortion (legality). Then I came across this NYT article. I was struck by the realness of it, what you don't hear from the extremists--either side of the debate, enough so that I felt like posting a link.

Like Flynn

John Roberts, g'dammit, stop sounding smart.

Looks like you're in.

But please, for the sake of women living in the red, leave Roe v. Wade alone.

Another Thing

One thing leading to another (The Fixx???*#**)

An experiment in resistance
leads to an exercise
in numbness
leads to a poem about
knitting
leads to
numb fingers.
Whiskey.
And James Joyce.

Upstairs they're buying a stairway to Heaven
Down in the Garden they're changing sticks into snakes
And the jangle of religious medals would put
The Fear of God into an angel
Come all ye faithful

from king james version
Billy Bragg: guitar and vocals

If I try an Experiment

If I try an experiment
in resistance
will you love me
then?

We say that
the argument
is an old one

How to eat sand
without
it killing us.

It means
for you
that grains
they become bearings
grease
less.

Then the machine
it goes
if we make it.
Goes this way
in love
and that way
it goes.

Charles and Frances

I read ahead because I wanted to see. But first reading a draft of Projective Verse. As sent to Frances.

Is this a love story? Introduction--through letters. More letters. Changing letters--in intensity and salutation. A meeting. Infatuation. Adoration. Coupling. Resistance. And on and on. Until one gives up. And one arrives by train. 1950.

Projective enough?

And I don't care what Tom Clark says. Most of it is in the letters. Read them.

Note to Cole

A couple of weeks after your second birthday, in honor of your second birthday

Dear Cole--

I admire your sweetness, your exuberance, your determination. And I slightly envy the love you have for people and things--no need to discriminate now--they are all worthy.

Loaders. Backhoes. Excavators. Tractors. Meat. Olives--like your grandfather. Blueberries and blueberry bushes. Busy People. Boats. Books. Kids and people. Your sister. Babies. Nakedness. Blankies and ice cream. Words--such as "Whatzitmean?" and bike trailer. Screaming and flinging your body to the floor (added after today, particularly grumpy). These things are important to you.

Oh. And keys and electricity. You started a small electrical fire the other day--maybe I should keep this information to myself. But some day you might appreciate it.

I love you Cole. Happy second year of life. Also, please forgive me for not cutting your hair.

the guy with the tie (for Susan)

Susan wrote--

It is really sad that the people who were the most devastated by the storm were also the poorest and most unable to help themselves. The fault lies in community and the lack thereof. It was the inability of the wealthy, educated and clearly ignorant people to look around and say, "I know I'm going to be safe but what about my neighbor." It's the people who live and interact, or should interact with their fellowman, their grocers, bankers, bikers, commuters, plumbers, fireman, policemen, shoe-shiners, bee-keepers, janitors, McDonalds food-servers, etc... Honestly, what would you do if you knew a hurricane was coming? Would you get in your car and drive away or would you go round up all your neighbors and give rides to everyone who couldn't get out. That is why community is so important. In times of need, you have to be able to pull everyone together and save everyone, not just the lucky few.

As cheesy as it sounds, it is the lack of willingness of those who were nearest to help out, for those who were educated and able to step up and say, let's do something. The responsibility is for the people closest to the situation to rise to the occasion, not some guy in a tie in some office, nor his administration. Yes, they could have responded in a timelier fashion, yes, they could have spent less on the war, yes, they could have lost the election, but they DIDN'T. So it is up to us, the people, the ones who live with and around each other to help out. It is our responsibility to look around and lift up our own people. I don’t want some ego-maniac who doesn’t know “my people” to have the honor and privilege of doing it.


And to Susan I say.........yes. I agree with the points about community and responsibility. Nicely said, I might add. But here comes the but..............

We have to ask questions of the people who lead this country. Difficult questions. Would this administration have acted differently for a different segment of the population? It does matter. Because though some of the immediate problems may trace back to the local level and people unwilling to help, federal acts matter. Money spent on a personal and holy war rather than war on poverty, a real and visible threat to this country--this money matters. Making it easier for rich folks to become richer--part of the problem, not just on a local scale, but a larger, international one when one thinks about how American greed affects global politics. The sharp divide between the working class and the upper classes of this society--a problem. It seems that material, lifestyle needs (or rather entitlements--as we've come to know them) overshadow basic human needs--and that this administration is not going to go out of its way to change this. And the irony--oh the irony--in the messages of this administration. "Promote culture of life." "Promote family values." The guy with the tie, if nothing else, is going to have to try to explain. And make a fool of himself in front of enough people, in doing so.

Angry and Sad

Slow response to hurricane and people devastated by it. This fucking president and this administration. And I wonder, wonder, wonder what this has to to with it? Why don't we take care? Of people.

Olson and the Motz

I am reading Charles Olson and Frances Boldereff--A Modern Correspondence. And I feel fucked with.

Maybe because I am reading letters--personal and private, or so they thought. But I like letters. Receiving them. Writing them. Reading them.

Or maybe because of reference to DHL, Shakespeare's "dryness," Blake, Joyce, Melville (he who started the conversation--Boldereff's reading of Call Me Ishmael), a little Whitman, some others--letters literary, literate. The coming back to DHL. Or the exuberance, a bit much, but exuberant.

There is passion. And person to person meetings are few, but relevant.

It adds up to a couple of lines. So far.

ONE OF OLSON'S
& i need no bait but you, lady!

SOME OF MOTZ'S
Cancel blood

Fr unsought, add
And the eyes
which should burst
do not.

48. This emendation to the draft of the previous day appears in the poem as sent to Edward Dahlberg a few days later (see "Dura" in Collected Poems, p. 85).

Today

Being able to hear all of the sounds through speakers that work. This makes me want to weep. Somebody said this once, about Radiohead. And I sit here listening to the noise, thinking. About people. And why they do the things that they do. And I weep for them. And I weep for myself.

Baby Girl

Four years ago today I was giving birth. To a baby girl. 36 hours plus of labor--so they call it--and delivery. And this is what I want to remember--Kathleen, our midwife, and the nurse whose name I have forgotten who stayed into vacation time to see my strong-willed (not stubborn) child finally agree to leave the comforts of the womb. Operating room, scrubs, bright lights, at least 10 bodies standing over me and one standing next to me head pressed to cheek as I screamed and with the aid of forceps pushed my baby across the table, the doctor moving quickly, but almost not quickly enough, to catch her. And then the sound of my baby's cry. Tiny fury. Pink skin. Alert eyes. More wails. Her father's announcement that we had a boy, and a few minutes later, a girl because sometimes a penis is really umbilical cord. Holding her small, wrinkled body and thinking that she's mine, ours, and feeling responsibility in bringing a child to this world--momentary fast forward to joy, love. Knowing, too, that there will be sadness. An ache, the rawness of emotion and crying when my father-in-law cried. Asshole doctor who wanted a c-section early on and the pain of my tailbone after giving birth, the time that I took to heal. At last, baby to breast to do what babies do.

In four years my baby has grown into an inquisitive, fiery and loving little girl. And, as they say, it happened quickly. Quickly. And what I saw in the operating room is real because I have watched her experience joy and love and react as I might expect. Eyes wide, sparkly. Mouth open. Arms stretched. "I love you," she says and means it. I have also seen her sad, unsure, awkward in a new situation, screeching and hitting because she doesn't know what else to do, uncomfortable and frustrated, unable to negotiate the social waters and hanging back, clinging. I have seen her angry, "I don't like what you're telling me." Or, "I want people to do things MY way and no one else's way." And I have seen her curious--about a caterpillar eating milkweed, about where germs come from and why people get sick (after particularly annoying stomach bug), about the creation of stories and characters, saying with confidence, "If the story is from imagination then the people in the stories must be from real life, at least a little bit."

That's my girl. My itty, bitty girl. I love you baby girl. Happy Birthday.

It's a Girl

ppppppppppppp;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;///////////////0000000000?????????????????)))))))))::::::::::::::::::::

Yessssssssssssssssss.

New keyboard. Apple even. Apple. Apple. Apple.

pppppppppppppppppppppp. I missed you.

She's so white. But not for long. And sounds different, too.

I'm in love.

You Decide

Where have all the flowers gone?
Where have all the hippies gone?
Where have all the protesters gone?

















Click on image for larger image.

Not a Choice

Disappointment. Even if it has been this way for, well, 15 years. Waiting, interminable. Wanting him to show. Or at least to return a call. Trying to act like it doesn't matter. Knowing that it does. And I thought it was different now, what with us talking through. "Allies," he said.

When you love someone you have expectations, even if you try not to. And expectations lead to hurt and hurt is not what most people want. What does anyone want but to be noticed, cared for, loved? Really loved. And wholly loved, on all of the levels that love exists, despite tragic flaw.

I will continue to love through the disappointment because I don't have a choice. It's what I know how to do. It's what I do. And there is hope, always, for us humans. Hope that circumstances will change, even when there is overwhelming evidence indicating that things mostly do and will stay the same.







Oh, and if interested click on image to view larger image. Seems like this is how they should be viewed.

The Card

Birth Day

Birth day. Day to celebrate being born. I think it a little ridiculous--this celebrating of one's birth--celebrate my mother instead [appropriately we toasted her with margaritas]. She's the one who laboured and pushed me through the birth canal and witnessed my first breaths, my father waiting outside the delivery room this being the hospital way in 1970. But in a small sense a birthday does please my inner socialist and me. Everyone has one--a birthday, that is. The great leveler no matter the tricky circumstances later--the ones involving money, love, opportunity. Money and love. All born.

As far as birthdays go, I had a good one this year. People I love rung me or wrote to me. My sister sent a gift via FedEx, an unusual action for her, and I found it waiting next to cartons of milk at my back door. My dad left a singing message. He has not sung to me before in any capacity as far as I can remember. 35 years to realize that my dad can carry a tune. Actually, he can more than carry a tune.

Gifts embarrass me, but who doesn't like them? Especially good ones--like hand-knit striped socks, which I am wearing right now as the thermometer reads 81. They fit like a glove, like gloves for feet. And I am pleased to now own a woman and her savages, along with swimming tiger and bear--in technicolor. And reading material, lots of it, read and passed along because she thought that I would enjoy it. And how could I not with titles such as Bitch and Bust and Ms. and A Bell Ringing in the Empty Sky? Another book--A Shadow Born of Earth--from the givers of the socks. Because I like photography. And the possibility of reading in English or Spanish. I received hugs, and I mean real hugs, from a baby. Uncommon flowers at table--sent to surprise. A pen and ink sketch from a sketchbook and a handmade card that shows girl celebrating in a dotted skirt very much like one that I own. Also good--a husband's flower arrangement from garden and secured babysitting. Visit from baby and aunt and more flowers. Flowers from gardens. Looking forward to breakfast on Saturday morning. Sitting next to my four-year-old, our bedroom in late afternoon where the light is best and talking about the day of her birth, what it was like and why. Sweet Jane being sung by DK, a sweet thing.

As long as people celebrate days of birth. And they always will, I think, I am going to try to see it from his point of view. Why not let it be the coming together of people to celebrate a person, whatever it is that those people find worth celebrating? Maybe it's not much or maybe it's a lot. Depends on whom you ask and when you ask them. But I do know this. It feels good that people made time and effort to celebrate my mother's labours and me--in all of the ways that I have described. These things matter.

To all of you. I take notice. All of it matters. Even you who might not want it to matter, two, namely. You matter. All of you. It all matters. And the love that I have for the people I love.