Rearranging the furniture (part 2)

I thought everyone rearranged the furniture frequently until I met Tony, the man who is now my husband. His experience growing up could not have been more different.

When his mom and dad moved into their first (and only) house, they picked out their furniture, moved it into place and there it stayed. They chose a heavy Spanish-style living room set, a low couch in olive green chenille, which faced two squat chairs upholstered in blue stripes.

The first time I visited Tony’s childhood home, I noticed they were in mint condition despite the fact they were more than 30 years old. “That’s because no one was allowed to sit on them,” he told me.

“Not even your mom and dad?” I asked.

“Nope.”

“Not even when company came over?” I couldn’t believe it.

“We didn’t have company,” he said.

It wasn’t just the living room. The family room still had orange shag carpet, and you could see the deep impressions the ancient plaid sofa had left from years of pressing down the pile. Tony and his younger brother’s bedrooms were both decked in orange and brown—twin beds, a small wooden desk for doing homework, a dresser each. The only difference was that his brother had a few posters tacked to the wall. Charles Barkley. Shaquille O’Neil. “He got away with more than I did,” Tony explained.

I think it’s this difference in how we grew up—the fact that in his house, nothing ever moved, and in mine, everything was always in motion—that explains how we react to change. Tony is immediately suspicious, on alert for risk, while I am thinking of the possibilities. I am a daydreamer, ready to fantasize about a month’s vacation in Italy or Australia, and Tony rarely plans a long weekend away.

Once, I told him, “Tone, I want to quit my job and write a book!” That didn’t go over well.

I have learned that any change, even something as insignificant as rearranging the furniture (you can always put it back, after all) will take serious convincing on my part. Perhaps this is why for more than three years, my living room was configured in a such a way that it annoyed me every time I set foot in there.

I was four months pregnant when we moved in, and I can only guess that I was tired, or distracted, but I must have left the living room set up in Tony’s hands and taken a nap instead. True to his techno-geek, audiophile nature, he chose to place the stereo where any reasonable person would put the couch. Oh, he had his reasons. Acoustics, room resonance modes, blah, blah. But the result was that the couch had to be pushed to one side of the room or the other, totally off balance and not taking advantage of the fire place as the room’s focal point. You cannot, as you know, sit on the stereo and gaze at the fire.

Three years of sitting in that room wondering “Why the hell is stereo in the middle of the room?” feeling like every time we had friends over, they would sit on the couch at one end of the room, and we’d shout at them all the way from the chairs at other end.

So today, I just couldn’t stand it, and announced that we’d be moving the furniture into a configuration that works for me, either with his help and agreement, or if not—I’d just do it myself one day when he was out. And I must have had a little bit of crazy in my eyes because he didn’t even try to resist.

And now, with the couch across from the fireplace, a comfortable, yet close cluster of chairs to encourage conversation, and the stereo in a more appropriate place, I am satisfied, in fact, gleeful with the change. It is like a weight has been lifted from my soul and I wonder if this is how my mom felt after she’d reordered the living room furniture again.

Light.

Free.

Like the change had suddenly opened possibilities that had never been there before. She could see them now and she could go after her dreams, with the couch pointed in the right direction.

Rearranging the furniture

Growing, up, my mother rearranged the furniture at least every six months.

Not every room. The kitchen, for example, was too small for anything but a small table pushed against the one wall without a counter. Or the dining room with windows on two sides and doors on the others meant the glossy, Ethan Allen table must sit in the center of the room.

But the living room provided my mother with a seemingly endless set of combinations. Sometimes, she pushed the couch against the west wall, sometimes the south, or sometimes she pulled it out to the middle of the room to face the two wing-back chairs, forming a seating area that floated away from the walls.

Her bedroom too. She'd push her bed flush against the wall one month, only to pull it out at an angle from the corner the next.

I hated it. Not that she moved the furniture, but that she often enlisted me. "Just help me swing the couch around," she'd say. Which meant then repositioning the coffee table and end tables, which meant clearing them of lamps and knick-knacks first, then giving them a good polish with some Endust and a rag before putting it all back together. But if I didn't help her, my mom--all five-foot four of her--would just end up pushing things around herself and throwing out her back.

Clearly, rearranging the furniture was something that energized her. She'd stand back to examine the space like a painter inspecting her canvas, then move in with quick, decisive steps. My mom was a master at spatial relationships. She could eyeball any nook, no problem, as tell you if that desk would fit.

For my mom, a single mother of two, who was going to school full time, working a part time job and keeping a house running--I think rearranging the furniture was her version of a vacation. She couldn't afford a week in Hilton Head, but she could change the scenery just by changing the position of the couch. I suppose it was when she was feeling most low--her most lonely, unhappy moments--that was when she got the urge to rearrange.

When I moved out on my own, I carried my mother's restlessness with me. I moved into an old farmhouse that had been converted into apartments. I had one half of the first floor, three rooms all in a row, shotgun-style, from the front to the back of the house. The kitchen was at the rear. I not only moved the furniture around several times during the two years I lived there, but switched my bedroom and living room between the middle and front rooms and back again at least once or twice. No matter how I arranged things, the setup just didn't feel right! It made sense to have the living room in the middle. That way if I had guests they didn't have to tromp through my bedroom to get to the bathroom or kitchen. But having my bedroom in the front was unsettling, since I was sleeping next to the front door.

I thought everyone rearranged the furniture frequently until I met Tony, the man who is now my husband.

(To be continued...)

100 haiku challenge, 25, 26, 27

#25
Go, Diego, Go!
Vamos Diego, vamos Diego!
Immortal earworm.

#26
It's dark and quiet.
Early morning, New Year's eve.
Much to put to bed.

#27
Christmas lights come down.
Nights are just dark and cold now.
January dull.

100 haiku challenge, 23 and 24

#23
We watch the wind blow
puddles into running streams.
A northwest pastime.

#24
Perhaps not, because
of your [dog] friend, she said, but
have you seen my cat?

I like #23 a lot. It came to me one blustery, winter day when D and I headed outside despite the crappy weather and headed to the covered basketball court at the local school. We brought along a basketball and scooter, but found ourselves most entertained by the wind and the water working their way across the blacktop.

What I really enjoy about this challenge, is that it forces me to treat the poems like a photographer treats the photo. Just keep snapping frames, and eventually you'll get a winner. Don't worry about the ones where the composition's not quite right.

100 haiku challenge, 19, 20, 21, 22

Priorities
As long as the cat
is happy, he said. I laughed.
He rolled his eyes, sighed.

I'd rather bike to work
Cross the I-5 bridge.
Red tail-lights blur in an arc
past a man on bike.

Two wheels go faster than three
My little one rides
a blue bicycle, followed by
Dad, scooting fast.

Missing my family
Christmas day makes me
want to do something crazy
like move to Pittsburg.

100 haiku challenge, 16 , 17, 18

Boys dig fire
My boy pouts and says,
Daddy, can we make fire?
Drags the logs inside.

Hanging out with E.
Drinking hot tea while
talking about coffee is
a fine thing to do.

I'm talking to myself here
Dear friend, exactly
what are you waiting for if
this is all you've got?

100 haiku challenge, 13, 14, 15

What the neighborhood looks like in December
String of Christmas lights
Glows bright in the winter night.
Glitter, flash, twinkle.

What does my dream mean?
I dreamed of a horse
covered--buried in deep snow
surfacing, dancing.

Repetition
Thank you for the tips
is something my husband says
all the goddamn time.

100 haiku challenge, 11 and 12

I've enjoyed just listening and finding haikus--as I listen to NPR, to two people talking in the grocery store, or in the case of #10, to something D. was repeating one evening.

Dante's haiku
This is a red light.
This light is a yellow light.
This is a green light.

Shedding season
The dog hair drifts down
falling like an autumn leaf.
I sweep it again.

100 haiku challenge, 10

The holiday is incidental, part 2
Advent calendar.
We are not even Christian.
We eat the chocolate.

100 haiku challenge, 8 and 9

I composed these while sitting with D in our local pizza place. I had one of those little stubby pencils from IKEA in my purse, and used the back of a deposit slip to write these down. I realize I'm not being very traditional, (or sometimes, very coherent) with these.

Economy versus ecology
The smokestack spews black.
Factory on the river.
Paper, scissors, rock.

Writing haiku at the pizza shop
Number two pencil
scrawls on the back of a check.
Subtotal, nine haikus.

100 haiku challenge, 4, 5, 6, 7

The holiday is incidental
Thanksgiving dinner
is now just a precursor
to Black Friday. Thanks.

Wake up
Sunrise. Coffee cup.
Steaming. Lift the cup. Inhale.
Sip. My eyes open.

What I see from my window in fall
Figs cling to branches.
No leaves for hiding green knots.
A bird's autumn feast.

The challenge of writing 100 haiku
Five, seven, five is
both much too long and too short
to say anything.

100 haiku challenge, #2 and #3

Reading Eckhart Tolle
This moment. Right now.
It's the only thing we have.
Raindrops on rooftops.

Should we trust the results?
Tony's MRI
Showed nothing problematic.
He scratches his head.

100 haiku challenge, #1

I'm taking the 100 haiku challenge. One hundred haikius in 100 days (more or less). Here's my first.

Sleepless
Insomnia. Fuck.
Four AM and I'm awake.
A cat yeowls outside.

What now?

So Friday was cathartic. I left the leadership session feeling cleansed of all my impurities. Clear headed and strong hearted. Saturday was good. But on Sunday, the old anxieties crept back. I felt like the day was not my own. It belonged to D, the house, work that needed to get done before Monday. By 9 am I just wanted to get away. I fled to the shower. Afterward, I sat on the bathroom floor and meditated. Just for like 5 minutes. Did it help? I don't know. Maybe. Or maybe it was getting out of the house and going to the park with D that did it. Either way, I was able to chill out and just take the day as it came.

I'm supposed to do this meditating thing for 30 minutes every day. As I sit there, my mind races. I try to calm it by bringing it back to the now. Tonight, I kept asking, "what now?" and something answered, "go write in your blog." So I did.

If all of this isn't too woo-woo for you, here's something else I've been thinking lately. My house has bad feng shui. It's because of the super tall, skinny house next door. It over-shadows our house and blocks the light. And it's so close (literally about 5 feet away) that it feels oppressive. If my house were a person, it would be unable to turn its head, doomed to look forward forever. Do I need to get over myself, or move?

Perhaps another symptom that I'm on the crazy train (or having a mid-life crisis) is that I ordered two books by Eckhard Tolle.

So glad I have this blog!

I was just scrolling through old entries, laughing at myself, remembering how it felt to be a new mom, and just generally feeling so glad I took the time to write down some of my thoughts and feelings.

Why don't I write here more often? It's so good for me.

Well, so I don't just leave it at that, I'll talk about today. Or maybe I'll start with yesterday, which was like just about every other work day where I run from meeting to meeting, try to keep up with the dozens of emails I get each day in between, run home to spend a little time with D before he crashes, and then work some more. I'm seriously depleted, friends. If you haven't heard from me, this is why.

I know it's not sustainable. For the first time in my life I've found myself questioning whether I am depressed (I kind of think I am) and need drugs. I've been reading Eat, Pray, Love like it is medicine. I crave silence, stillness, peace, solitude. I've been substituting beer, wine, sugar, and coffee.

But today, I didn't go into the office. Instead I went to the first session of a year-long leadership program. My company is paying for me to go. Normally, a business-y "leadership" thing would sound bad. But this wasn't bad at all. It felt a little like therapy. We meditated. We talked about our hearts. I went in feeling all knotted up on my shoulders and left feeling fairly normal.

Tonight I was searching this blog for a poem or photo that defines the essence of me. It's homework for our second session tomorrow. Here's what I've landed on. What do you think? Is this what you think of, when you think of me?

Something new

Julie felt the air change as soon as she drove over the fill—the land bridge that separated the mainland from the island. There were the fisherman, casting off its rocky sides. As if she’d gone away all this time and they’d just stayed here fishing.

She made the familiar turns, off the wider unmarked gravel road on to the dirt road where the pines crowded in. There was just enough traffic here to keep the track from growing over. She remembered plenty of times as a child where her father would have to stop the car and drag a fallen tree limb out of the way before they could make their way through. Finally, she turned the car down the long driveway that ended at the cottage. It appeared before she was quite ready—she remembered it taking so much longer.

As she parked the car and turned off the ignition, she found her heart pounding. She was here again, finally. And though she’d tried to prepare herself during long drive for the way things might have changed, she was unnerved to see it largely the same as ever.

The line of trees that used to separate the cottage from the river had been cleared, but other than that, there was the small wooden stoop where she used to leave peanuts for the chipmunks, the outhouse about 20 paces from the back door where the clearing met the woods. Here was the silty earth that absorbed her step underneath her feet.

Julie smoothed her dirty blond hair with her hand.

“Grandma?” she called through the screen door. She knocked softly, which felt a little odd. As a girl, she would have flung it open and run inside to find her grandparents, no matter whether they were in the bedroom or kitchen.

She saw the woman emerge from around the corner. Her gray hair was still cropped close, she still wore the elegant pendant earrings that most women would wear only on a special occasion.

Julie had to lean down to embrace her. The last time she’d seen her grandmother, she barely reached her shoulder. Now she towered over the woman.

“I move a little slower now, you can see,” her grandmother laughed, her warm voice a little rougher than she recalled.

“It’s been a long time,” Julie said. “But you know, this place looks almost the same.”

Her grandmother showed her around the tiny cottage, pointing out what was new. The floor had been replaced with new, shiny linoleum. There was a new sofa in the sitting room and a different table and chairs, but that was it.

“You can sleep here,” her grandmother said when they entered the bedroom.

“Oh, I wouldn’t feel right about that.”

“No, no.” The woman countered. “Half the time, I just fall asleep on the sofa anyway. It’s pretty comfortable, you know.”

Julie remembered her doing the same for her parents. Her grandma and grandpa would sleep on the pull out couch in the sitting room, which meant that she got to sleep on the floor next to them. She’d often fall asleep to the sound of her grandfather snoring, mixed in with the calling of the frogs outside.

Her grandmother left her alone to unpack. Julie could hear her fixing lunch through the thin curtain that served as a door. She sat on the bed and looked out the window toward the river. As a girl, the first thing she would do was head down to the dock with a crust of bread to feed the seagulls and dip her feet in the water. She’d wait until the second day to swim—like getting reacquainted with river required a slow approach.

She loved that river, and now instead of a vision in her head, it was real and right before her eyes. She realized how many times she’s relied on her memory of it over the years she’d been away. This is the place she’d some in her mind, when she needed to feel calm.

She would often say the names of the places and things here, like a sort of noun therapy. Swimming rock. Puddingstone. Bruce Mines. This was her place, her heritage—the cottage was built by her great grandfather, it was the place where her father had spent his summer boyhood, jumping into the lake, climbing the rocks. It was the place where her parents had honeymooned where they were young and penniless.

It has all been taken from her. She’d spent these past years like an exile from her homeland, thinking of the place, going over the landscape in her memory, daydreaming of the sound of the gulls, the slap of the water against the hull of a boat, the feel of the worn dock underneath her bare feet. In the absence of her parents, this place would have provided a connection, a link.

Julie shook her head. She’d never even been invited. A flicker of anger lept up in her.

As a teenager, her grandmother was prompt with birthday cards and Christmas gifts. She sent the occasional letter. But Julie had learned to stop expecting an invitation to visit here.

Finally, all grown up and out on her own, she stopped waiting and resolved to take matters into her own hands. She smiled to herself, wondering how her grandmother must have reacted to her letter. It was bold, she knew that. But she was tired of waiting for the woman’s permission.

She’d just quit her job—a 70 to 80-hour a week sales job that kept her on the road, away from her fiancé, James. She’d just walked in one day, handed her resignation to her boss, and walked back out, high on the adrenaline she’d needed to be so daring.
That night, she and James cooked a big dinner and opened a bottle of wine to celebrate her new-found freedom. Never mind she was going to be eating away they the money she’d saved for their honeymoon.

“So what are you going to do now?” he asked her.

Before she could even stop herself, the words came falling out.

“What I really want to do is go to Pine Island.” And there it was. So Julie had written her grandmother the next day.

This is now

...Laura lay awake a little while, listening to Pa's fiddle softly playing and to the lonely sound of the wind in the Big Woods. She looked at Pa sitting on the bench by the hearth, the firelight gleaming on his brown hair and beard and glistening on the honey-brown fiddle. She looked at Ma, gently rocking and knitting.

She thought to herself, "This is now."

She was glad that the cosy house, and Pa and Ma and the firelight and the music, were now. They could not be forgotten, she thought, because now is now. It can never be a long time ago.

-Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little House in the Big Woods

Untitled

In the dark
the pale cherry blossoms
are a ghost.
I hardly know them,
but for their scent.

Bright lights
have made me blind.
I see through
my other senses--
the smell of spring,
the cool rain on my skin,
the rush of rain through the fir trees.

The mailman delivers
a neighbor's package to my door.
I relish the thought
of ringing their doorbell.
Delivering the box--
a chance to say hello.

Nerds!

If you want to start from the beginning, go here.

Or my favorite...

If you want to start from the beginning, go here.

Candy and old women

If you want to start from the beginning, go here.

That's the thing about candy

The beginning

New! New! New!

Wow. It's been ages since I've posted. I'm afraid I've been cheating on my trusty friend blog, with the very intoxicating Facebook. Facebook, combined with Flickr are chewing up most of my online time these days.

Well, I did make my Praxis deadline, and "Thoughts about Candy" came out with its release in December. I'm still trying to figure out how to post the frames here, in a size that's readable. I have been getting all sorts of feedback from people who've read the print version--much more than my other stories have received. Maybe it's the images plus text that generates a strong reaction, but it's also the subject matter. I've been hearing lots of candy memories from people. And candy confessions.

One of my favorite x-mas gifts was a Bamboo tablet (thanks, T!). I plan to use it to do a revision of "Thoughts about Candy" digitally. Yay! I have had lots of thoughts already about little things I want to add. I am also considering self-publishing an extended version of it. I also have been thinking about making my four girls/River/Stand by Me piece into a graphic novel. So that's something I'll be experimenting with this year. I can imagine the Glowy Man part really coming to life in a graphic format. I'm itching to start.

WTF, indeed

This morning, we are ordering breakfast at Autentica. My father-in-law points to something on the menu and asks the waitress, "Can I get this with potatoes instead of eggs?"

"We don't have potatoes," she answers.

"Okay, well just give me this without the eggs."

Maybe she did a double-take, but I didn't notice. Twenty minutes or so later, she is back with our food. She places a plate with a thin slice of ham covered in red sauce in front of my father-in-law and says, "huevos rancheros," amazingly, with a straight face.

"You ordered huevos rancheros without the eggs?" I said. "But huevos means egg."

It was kind of funny, until I realized I was going to pay 12 dollars for his plate of sauce.

It's not his fault. I don't think he knew what he was going to get. But the waitress--she couldn't have asked "Are you sure you want that?" Had I known what he was pointing at, I would have stopped him. I consider it supremely bad service to fill ridiculous orders without at least asking, "You're sure about that?"

I felt really bad that he only had a slice of ham for breakfast, so I made sure we swung into the doughnut shop on the way home.

Morning walk

The day started early because of the time change. So we went for an early morning walk. D is big enough to sit in the Ergo now, which makes walking much more fun for the both of us. D can see more than just tree tops and sky, and we both get some snuggle time.

We got all the way to the park and back, and it was only 9:15. Sigh. It's going to be a long day. We will probably take another stroll before the day is done, as long as it's not pouring rain.

Another thing that makes it a long day--the election is only two days away. (You didn't need me to tell you that.) I can't wait for it to be over. I'm exhausted by waiting. At least there are moments like this that give me that hope:














Of course, this is Oregon, and there are many parts of the country where Republicans are going to vote the party line.

Oh, Oregon. How I love you. I wish the rest of the country were as great as you.

Work in progress

So there's a sneak-preview of my work in progress. The draft is on the left, and you can see what should be the final (or at least final for now) on the right. The goal is to have everything done before Thanksgiving, which is the deadline for this year's Praxis. I should just make it.

No tolerance for death

I've always really liked Halloween. That's partly because it's candy-centric (I like Valentine's day for the same reason. No boy in the picture? Who cares! There's always chocolate!). I also really like dressing up in costumes.

This year, I feel a little differently. Last night, as I was walking past a house all decked-out with ghosts and a fake graveyard, I thought "Egh. How morbid." My reaction took me by surprise. I usually love this stuff! The skeleton bones just seemed so sad. It was just for fun, but it reminded me too much of real bones resting in the cemetery.

I get the same sinking feeling whenever I see a really violent movie these days. I have no tolerance for gore and death. In Bruge was an excellent film, and thank goodness all the blood and guts came at the end, otherwise I would have never seen it.

I guess that now that I've brought life into the world, I just see no point in focusing on death. Not to get lecture-y or anything, but there's so much to appreciate about life, so much to live for, why do we have to have all this stuff where killing people is the focus?

Anyway, I hope that's not the end for Halloween for me. There are still the costumes, the pumpkins, the apple cider and the candy.

Guarding time

Now that I have much less of it, I've been extremely selective about how I spend my free time. Some of it's necessarily spent on things like shopping and cleaning (though my standards have gone waaaay down these days...the toilet doesn't get scrubbed until it gets that gross ring at the water line, and that would NEVER have happened in my pre-baby days). Beyond that, I get to choose, and sure as hell, I am not going to waste my time on mediocre movies or outings that aren't fun for me. A few weeks ago, I sat down to watch This is Spinal Tap, which I had never seen, and a third of the way through, I turned it off and headed to bed. Sorry...maybe it would haven been funny if I were 25, or a man, but it just wasn't doing it for me. Sleep was much more interesting.

Yesterday, I did haul 10 dead six-foot arborvitae out of the ground, which seems like it might be a waste of time, but I felt very satisfied afterward. My hard work means I get to plant something there next week. I have been itching to get my fingers into the soil, and all that shoveling did the trick.

That's the thing about motherhood...it makes you much more focused. I really do think about who I want to spend time with, and what I want to be doing. I want to take a walk in the autumn sunlight, I want to watch D. sleeping, I want to do a bit of writing, I want to pour myself a nice glass of wine then drink it while I cook Sunday dinner. All these things are worth it.

Plugs

My creative writing life has been subsumed by the creation of the second draft of my graphic story, which I can't show you just yet. But my professional writing life, I can share. Here are the highlights:

From time to time, I contribute to my company's blog, Shiny Green Button, which focuses on issues of brands, communications and sustainability. My recent contribution is titled Magritte's paper cup, which I think is a very clever title if I do say so myself.

I also have a new article in IN|UR. It's their "Happiness" issue, and this time I've written about my HypnoBirthing experience. I'm so glad they went with my original title, even though it's a little plain-jane. They had suggested "HypnoBirthing the Night Away," which I thought was corny. But whatever...it's their magazine.

Buh.

There's this scene in Overboard--that's right--Overboard with Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn, where Goldie's at home with the four out-of-control boys, doing wifely things like cleaning and cooking and ... using a chain saw to cut down a tree??? And then at the end of the scene she's shown sitting in a chair, sort of shell shocked, muttering "buh buh buh buh buh." I always laugh at that scene. And today I feel a little bit buh buh buh myself.

The weekend started out with a bout of food poisoning. I barfed midway through the presidental debate (highly apt) and spent the night tossing and turning with nausea. Then last night, D. awoke, just as I was about to go to bed, and he was burning like a hot potato. His temp was somewhere around 102, and he was inconsolable. I spent the night nursing him off and on, and then boing! 6 am he is better and ready to go and I am feeling fried. Then T. came down with some sort of bug, which meant that I was pretty much on my own taking care of D. today. Gah. And it was one of those days where I'm constantly changing my shirt because I get spit up on, except once it wasn't spit-up but poop.

I should be in bed, since D. is finally down for the night (let's hope his temp doesn't spike again) but I am insane enough to be staying up to watch Mad Men. But you know, I've been sleep deprived for the last three months, so what's a little more lost sleep?

Have you seen this?

Brilliant!

A room with a view

The view from my office.

I was wrong. I thought the first day leaving D. at daycare would be the hardest, and every day after that would get easier. But yesterday, I skipped out after leaving him in the arms of a caregiver, turned up the radio in my car and blissed out to a Pixies tune at full blast on the way to the office.

The first day was nothing. But every subsequent day, it's getting harder. I closed my eyes tight this morning to keep the tears from spilling out.

The view from my office is stunning. On sunny days, the light pocks the surface of the Columbia River with white. I watch trains pass over the bridge on their way to Seattle or Spokane. But it turns out the limited, never-changing view from D's room, is more interesting to me.

Danny Elfman lives here?

It looks like your average house. But every time I walk past this place--it doesn't matter what time of day it is--a very creepy music emanates from within. It's like someone has raided the silverware drawer and is using the spoons to tap glasses of water. Clink clink clink, in a random succession of notes. I've looked for some sort of metal mobile that's clinking in the wind, but in vain. So I've been imagining someone inside making a weird, Edward Scissorhands-tune all day and all night long.

Today is my last day before heading back to work. The last day to take long walks with D. past all sorts of creepy houses, and creepy mannequins, and pirate flags and countless lovely gardens. I guess we'll have weekends, but it won't be quite the same.

It's been such a good summer.

Good thing there's pumpkin picking, apple cider and Halloween to look forward to, otherwise I just couldn't bear it.

Polar pleasure

I watched a polar bear swimming yesterday during a trip to the Oregon Zoo. Absolutely massive--he pushed off one end of the pool and paddled to the other side, then pushed off like a Olympic backstroker, belly up, back to where he started. Back and forth he swam. From the other side of a wall of glass, I could see his powerful body move underwater. His white fur moved like waves of grain in the water. Giant air bubbles danced in his wake. He pushed off the glass with his enormous black paws and turned his snout to the sky, making it easy to see his long, yellowing incisors. God, he was beautiful.

Generations

There's a certain face that D. makes, where I can see my dad in him. It's usually when I'm pushing him in the stroller, and he gets really intense. His lips purse and his eyes go wide. I was surprised the first time I noticed it. I shouldn't have been though. I think D. looks a lot like my brother, and my brother looks a lot like my dad, so sure...it makes sense. I guess it wasn't something I wanted to see though.

I haven't spoken to my dad in more than ten years. In that time, I've only written him twice. The first time was to tell him I got married. He sent me a $150 check as a wedding present, and I shredded it. I didn't want his money in lieu of a relationship, and I didn't want him to think I was just writing him to get money either. More recently, I wrote to let him know he had a grandson.

This estrangement began after many years of my reaching out, having some sort of unfulfilling interaction with him where I came away feeling rejected and hurt. Now, as an adult, I can see he probably didn't mean any of it. He is a poor communicator, he's emotionally unavailable, but not a bad person. He had extraordinarily bad judgment when he got married without telling me, when he moved to Chicago without letting me know. The former probably happened because he didn't know how to tell me that he had a new wife. He felt he was sparing my feelings by not telling me. The latter? I have no idea. Maybe he justified it by telling himself he was busy, he'd get around to writing me, or perhaps he thought I didn't really care anyway. But as a newly independent 20-something, after many years of this tense dance, I told myself I couldn't take the rejection anymore, and I cut all ties.

Of course, I've wondered every now and then if I did the right thing. It's helped me heal a bit, but I always imagine my dad getting old and dying, this rift still between us. I don't want that. But I also don't want to start the old cycle of reaching out, feeling hurt, reaching out again. What I want is for him to reach out to me this time. But I don't know if that will ever happen.

And now I have this new little person in my life. He's a physical reminder of my dad. And a I can't help but think, in some superstitious way, that the resemblance is for a reason. Is the universe telling me I can't just turn away?

What I am is what I am

D. is blissfully asleep for the first time today--well, sort of if you don't count his passing out in the stroller during our morning walk. He's snuggled into the inside of my Boppy pillow on the couch next to me. It's not standard napping procedure, but I'll take it. And I feel like I don't have much to write, but still, I want to claim this time as my own and put some words on the page...any words will do!

I was telling T. last night that being a mom is one big mindfuck. You spend a lot of time craving the company of adults, wishing you could just have an hour of your old, unencumbered life back, and then when you do get a break all you want to do is go spend time with your kid. "Huh," he said, "I don't feel that way at all." I don't know whether he's lucky or I am.

I'm recovering from a weekend with a house guest. A old friend came all the way from New York to visit, and by the time she left I was totally drained for trying to balance everyone's needs, including my own need to be a good mom/host/friend/etc. Maybe that's it. I just have to give up the idea of being a good anything, and just be what I am.

Outside world

D. is getting interested in the outside world. Favorite things so far: windows, mirrors, faces and voices. AND the four paintings I created for him, which now hang above his changing table. He is most enamored of Cosmic Dog and Cat, and Space Bee.

Are you in there, god?

Just a few thoughts to post in a moment in between ...

Watching D's face is fascinating. I never get tired of it, even when he's cranky and showing all his gums in a wide-mouthed cry. It's like his face has all the pre-sets for emotions, even though he doesn't really know what those emotions are yet. His expressions cycle through happy, perplexed, disgusted, one after the other. I can't wait until he genuinely is smiling back at me.

And though I've never been a religious person (except when I was 12 and scared of Satan and ghosts, and so slept with a crucifix under my pillow), there are moments with D. that convince me god is really is some old guy sitting up on a cloud watching all us silly people. Like when I was rushing to get out of the house to run some errands the other day. D was full of breastmilk, and each time I tried to buckle him into his carseat, the pressure on his tummy made him projectile vomit all over himself. After two clothing changes, I decided I just needed to wait a few minutes. If god really is an old dude on a cloud, he really thinks projectile vomit stunts are hilarious.

Sleep or write?

I'm having a little trouble managing my time these days. Out of every three hours, approximately one of them is devoted to nursing, supplemental feeding and using the breast pump to prepare for the next feeding. I spend a large part of my day with my boobs hanging out. (If there were ever a time to get comfortable with my body, this is it!) But that means I have to decide what to do with the rest. Lots of times it's eat, shower, change D's diapers, soothe him, talk to him, etc. But at least once a day, gloriously, he slips off into a two hour nap, and I am faced with the dilemma: sleep or write?

The logical person in me screams, "Sleep! You idiot!" But I've got stuff buzzing through my head, and it wants to come out. I also crave gardening--what there is of it this year. I just want to get outside with my watering can and tend to my pathetic little basil shoots.

It's the same thing in the evenings. D gets really sleepy around 10 pm (for now, at least) and it provides T. and I a chance to watch a movie and have some 1:1 time, but I know that the darkest hours are just around the corner, and I'm going to be awake for some of them.

Someone stole my legs

The exhaustion set in yesterday. Funny, because just the day before, T. and I had managed to get out for a walk and lunch at a local cafe, and we sat there gloating about how we didn't think this was all that bad. Tiring, sure. But we could deal. But yesterday, I woke up feeling like a truck had hit me. Sore from my shoulders to my toes.

And someone stole my legs. They took my nice legs and slender feet (one part of my body I've never had an issue with) and have given me the legs of Fat Bastard from the Austin Powers movies.

Good thing this baby is just so damn beautiful. I can't keep my eyes off him. He does what I call "bird faces," where he will look up at me with his beautiful blue eyes and make little hooting lip gestures. Before he was born, I imagined all sorts of things about the way things would be. I could imagine the tiredness, the sore boobs, all that. And I knew I would love him, but I knew it in this intellectual sort of way. I just couldn't imagine how it would feel. He's a mere a week old, and I feel like I want time to stop for a bit so I can make sure I get my fill of bird faces and soft baby skin. I am absolutely weepy with love and the need to make every moment count.

He was born on July 2, more than two weeks late. I'll save his dramatic birth story for another post. But that means he's having his first week birthday today!

I've been reading Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions, mostly while pumping breastmilk. I do this every three hours or so, so that's a lot of reading time. Thank god for her book, because pumping sucks, and her book is so funny and she writes about everything I am dealing with right now, that I can actually make it a whole 15 minutes without tearing my hair out. I personally credit Ms. Lamott for my ability to pump enough so that I don't have to resort to formula.

But as I'm reading, I'm thinking that even though I have some higher aspirations for this blog (I dunno why) I should do what she's done, and use it to document this time. So I'm gonna. Sorry to those who want to read about something other than baby. But that's what's goin' on around here. As T. says, "All we hear is radio ga-ga."

So here's a funny picture for you. This was maybe our first night home from the hospital, and I'd asked T. to pick up one bottle of IPA on his trip to the store. I was so pleased with the idea of an hour or two in my own bed, with a bottle of long-dreamed about beer, that I completly forgot I was already completely high on pain killers. A sip or two later and the realization kicked in. T. finished the beer. Sigh.

All is not quiet on the Tchotchka front

It’s been quiet here at Tchotchka Palace, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been busy. There’s been behind the scenes action. Here’s just a little update on what’s been filling my time.

Drawing. That’s right. I’ve always enjoyed doing little cartoons and doodles, mostly for handmade birthday cards. A few years ago, when I was working for a big four accounting firm, I attempted a series of Dilbert-eqsue comics called “Adventures of a Pinhead.” (No one saw them except T., but I thought they were damn funny.) Now I’m revisiting the art form, turning my “Thoughts on Candy” into a graphic story. Hell, it’s a lot of work! Every frame takes several sketches before I can get it right. I’m through the first three or four paragraphs so far, and that’s just a first draft of what I imagine the final story will look like. I anticipate re-drawing them all over again. But it’s pretty satisfying, because I can do all these little asides, and draw funny things that would be overkill in typical written form. Maybe I’ll post a few frames up here for your reading pleasure.

Commercial writing. I’ve started writing for a new online magazine called INUR (pronounced “in-yer”) aimed at urban-dwelling folks who are interested in living the good life in a sustainable way. The subject of my first article? Organic personal lubricants. Yep. That’s right. My good friend C. is the editor of the INUR Pants (sex and relationships) section, and I just couldn’t turn her down when she asked me to write an article on that subject. That’s the good thing about being a writer…I can get interested in writing about almost anything. Accounting, for example. Anyway…look for my article in the first issue, due to launch sometime in June.

Gestating. No big surprise for most readers of this blog. Remember this entry? It was like foreshadowing from my subconscious. I found out I was pregnant shortly after I wrote it. So far, I’ve continued to make art, which makes me feel good. Mommy brain hasn’t completely taken over! (Though those early morning weekend writing sessions have gone by the wayside lately. Too tired!) One resolution I’ve made to myself, is that my kid is going to grow up seeing me writing.

Chicken

Popeye's Chicken sits at the corner of MLK and Ainsworth, and I always hit a red light there. For a full minute and ten seconds, I am bathed in the odor of chicken fat and breading. It hunches down in my nostrils and pushes its way down my throat. I try to see in through the glare on the windows, but I can't tell if anyone is actually eating in there.

I really want to like the smell of fried chicken. The crunchy outside, the juicy meat inside. The memories it dredges up. It was the only thing I'd order in restaurants until the age of seven, and especially good at the Tin Cup, a restaurant made to look like an old West saloon complete with wide, creaky floorboards and a circular staircase with a chain link railing. They called it the Tin Cup because you could order sarsaparilla in a take-home, souvenir tin cup, which I only got to do once, but I got to order the chicken and mashed potatoes lots of times.

I liked fried chicken so much that I even ate the Hungry Man T.V. dinner version, with their dried out corn niblets, pasty potatoes, burned brownie and stringy chicken. Because really, it hardly matters that there's chicken under that crunchy breading. That's what I was really after: salty bread crumbs infused with chicken fat. I haven't eaten meat in more than ten years, but every KFC commercial has me leaning forward, wondering whether I'd ever break my meat celibacy to experience that crunch again.

In fact, I've often thought that if I were on death row, and it was my last night on earth, I'd ask for fried chicken as my last meal. And then I think, "Well, if that's true, then why aren't I eating it now? Is this living then?" After all, I'm not on death row and I can have anything I want. I could even buy organic, vegetarian-fed, free-range chickens so I can feel good about eating them.

But what is this fantasy about eating chicken, especially since the smell of Popeye's chicken makes me queasy, makes me want to run the red light and make a left turn into oncoming traffic, just to get away from its oily haze? Maybe it's just a fantasy about breaking boundaries. Exploring the taboo. Maybe I wouldn't even like the taste, and then where would I be? I'd have to choose another death-row last meal. Organic beets and goat cheese? Caprese sandwiches on fresh baguette? I just don't know how that'd fly in prison.

Ocean poems

I.
I'm terrified by the sound of the waves.
They won't stop.
Inhuman roar, overwhelming boom.
No fear, no desire--nothing.
They just keep coming without a reason.

That's the way I feel about you.
You simply are, for the moment.
Rolling over inside me,
making my blood surge.
An unknowable force.
And I'm going under.

II.
My shoe is a sieve--
a fine mesh that filers sand through
to collect in the space under my toes.
"I should pan for gold in these,"
I joke to myself, imagining treasure
at the bottom of my sneaker.

The ocean's not a graveyard, but a storehouse.
It catalogs and re-displays
glass floats from Japan,
seaweed exquisite enough to be worn as jewelry.
Beachcombers unearthed--unoceaned
two civil war canons, crusted
with a hundred years of underwater history.

In the crash of the waves we find answers too.
Some--the ones who aren't ready--keep their
eyes on land, distracted by the pebbles and shells.
But some look out to the place where water meets air,
and there's nothing there to distract from the truth.

Thoughts about candy

My grandma always had a dish of them—spherical gems wrapped in sparkly cellophane. I wanted them all, but I didn’t want to appear greedy, so I’d choose just one, red or white, never green or yellow, twist off the squeaky wrapper and pop it into my mouth. They were smooth on my tongue and rattled around against my teeth. That’s the thing about candy—it’s not just a taste, it’s an activity. I would hold those candies on my tongue, flip them around as if each turn might somehow yield more sugar. Candy brightens moments of children’s boredom and soothes the tension of the smoker who just quit cold turkey.

Always performing the “good child,” that dish of candy was a challenge for me. We never had candy at home. And so during the weeks I’d spend with Grandma, I’d constantly have that dish in the corner of my eye. I’d be thinking about when I could next sneak one without anyone noticing.

It’s like candy and old women go together. When I was four maybe, I was always climbing up the narrow concrete steps to Florence’s back door. She always had strips of candy buttons on hand, which is probably the cheapest candy ever invented. Pastel blobs of sugar dropped onto cheap paper that always remains just a little bit when you rip the candy off of it. In my four year old bravado, I had no shame knocking on her door and without preamble, asking, “Can I have some candy?”

When I was older, I’d ride my bike to Convenient after every dime I’d pocketed, where I would get Alexander the Grapes, Lemonheads, Boston Baked Beans, or, my favorite—Now & Laters. Ten individually wrapped squares of chewy tart waxy candy. Chocolate was too expensive. Even a plain Hershey bar was out of my price range.

But there were those kids who had enough money to buy Nerds. They would show them off and hide them at the same time, like a status symbol, the same way a fifty five year old man might wax his Porsche all day in the driveway, only to pull it into the garage without driving it anywhere. But for sure the Nerds would come out when they needed leverage: “I’ll give you some of my Nerds of you let me be on your team, but only the pink kind, okay?” I never had Nerds. Must be why I’m not so great at negotiation. I bet all the kids with Nerds are now wheeling heads of cattle, or they’re hedge fund managers or con-artists. Or real estate agents. Candy makes other people pay attention to us. Before we have beauty, strength, wealth, we have candy.

The first story I ever wrote was about candy. It began at a carnival, and as I entered the fun house, I fell through a trap door an spilled into a world entirely made from candy. The houses, roads. The chocolate river. This world was controlled by an evil witch who kidnapped little children and kept them there, haunted by all the sweets, but not allowed to eat them.

It was a Hansel and Gretel, meets Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz, meets Alice in Wonderland daydream, and so revealing that I’d let myself be dazzled by the candy but not eat it. In the end, I escaped this candy land, but what I should have written—what I really wanted was to live in that world without the witch, not escape from it to a less sweet world with equally restrictive parent. Maybe that’s what candy is … the anti-parent.

Candy is a lesson is self versus others. It’s public and private. It’s who you are when you’re alone and who you are in a crowd. Do you eat the whole bag of M&Ms or save half for later? Do you wish your friend would get her own, because you feel obligated to share otherwise? Candy forces us to reveal our inner workings to the world.

I’m a hoarder, I’ll admit it. Here’s one of my earliest memories to prove it. My friend Amy has two rolls of Sweet Tarts, and there are three of us: me, her and Melissa, her neighbor that always seems to have green boogers running out of her nose. Amy takes a whole roll for herself, and tells Melissa and me we have to share. I’m outraged. I declare that I’d rather go home than share, and I do. In fact, I stop being friends with Amy altogether over the Sweet Tart incident.

I still get worked up over candy and sweets. I hate it when Tony scarfs all the ice cream before I get any. Once, he proposed taking my newly purchased Girl Scout Cookies to share with friends. I looked him straight in the eye and growled, “These boxes aren’t even open yet! There’s no way in hell you’re taking my cookies!”

At six months pregnant, I can only imagine what it’s going to be like when my child discovers sweets. A battle of wills. An 18 year long game of subterfuge. My friend Gwen told me a story about her mother—how she would hide Almond Roca in her sewing kit and jewelry box, but Gwen and her brothers would always sniff it out and steal it. The disappointment her mother must have felt at opening her drawer and then finding her treasure gone. I imagine myself the same way, hiding M&Ms in the glove box, opening it up in a sacred moment of solitude. I’m anticipating eating the whole package, savoring each round chocolate one by one. But they’re gone.

Gwen’s mom might have smiled to herself, felt resigned to the fact that as a mother, nothing is truly her own. She’d see it as a illustration of the self-sacrifice of parenthood and feel good about that. But me? Is that what I’ll do? Or will I slam the car door and storm into the house stark raving mad demanding to know who ate my candy?

At a Las Vegas gun store

What would it be like to work at the gun store, where tourists, in their khaki shorts, fanny packs and big white sneakers arrive to try out the weapons? The wives stand silently aside, while their husbands ask questions about ammo, load time, never safety.

Anna, who is an army brat, and grew up hunting every fall with her father, works there. She sees the men come through the door and look surprised to see her behind the counter. If one of the male associates is there--even Nate, the gun store owner's pimply son, who doesn't know squat about how to handle a weapon--they will head straight to him.

The coupon idea was hers. She made a deal with the owner: she'd finance the ad, and anyone coming in with that coupon was her customer. The first few weeks they trickled in, one or two over the course of a few days. But then it was one or two a day. They came in for all sorts of reasons--some just because they'd never squeezed off a round on a full automatic before and were looking to add it to their list of Las Vegas thrills, some serious gun buyers, some who didn't even care about the guns, but just couldn't resist a coupon for anything.

She started to find her niche. She was good with the couples. Anna would engage the timid wives, get them to put on the goggles and fire off a few rounds in the back. She'd see the fire come into their eyes, the adrenaline surge, watch their husbands get turned on--sometimes embarrassingly so. She knew if that happened, she's have a sure-fire sale.

Just by watching out for the couples, she increased the gun store's sales by eight percent over the last three months and her own commission had gone through the roof. All the sales men--even the guys who'd mocked Anna for her gimmick--were now trying to get the owner to let them do their own coupon too, thinking it was a magic trick. But only she got it. It was looking out for that special American combination of sex and violence that was bringing in the cash.

In memoriam

It's 8:34 AM on Monday, February 4. As I type this, Domi lays about five feet behind me. He's finally settled down, which takes him some time because his back end is so sore, and he's licking his right paw, probably as a self-soothing gesture.

In about three hours, our vet will arrive at the house, and she'll administer a drug to Domi that will put him to sleep forever.

We finally made the decision to put Domi down last week, but I was traveling, so we waited until I got home to do it. I wanted to be here for him and for T, who has been a nervous wreck all weekend. Well, we both have. I've waxed and waned between feeding Domi treats and bursting into tears. I don't know what good I'll be when the vet arrives. A big blubbery mess. But it's the right thing to do. Domi's been a big part of my life too.

Lately, I've taken to complaining about his stench and incontinence. I've been thinking about that this weekend. We haven't had the real Domi in our lives for a few years--the bubble loving, radish stealing Domi. We've had some other dog, and we've grown resentful of him. And it's a shame to feel that resentment at the end of his life. It was a shame to not be able to take him for a walk yesterday or do any of the things he used to love. On the last full day of his life, most of what we could do was wait for today. When my other animals get to this point, when my parents get to this point, when I get to this point--I don't want to turn to complaint and resentment. I want the joy remain more than just a hazy memory.

So Mr. Doms, who used to do 180 degree jumps in anticipation of a walk, who once stole a bagel with cream cheese right off my lap, who would chase soap bubbles around the yard endlessly, who forced me to be creative with my garden fencing techniques if I ever wanted a carrot, radish or green bean for myself, who bravely weathered the attacks of an insane german shepherd named Laika, who ferociously ate Domi-sized pancakes, who hoovered up clumps of freshly mown grass in the springtime, who made lots of Doms-sized friends at the dog park ... we love you.

Feeling better

Bela steals the bone from her doggie Get Well Soon bouquet.

Stupid people, cars and dogs

Last night, a stupid person came to my house, opened the back door and let Bela out onto the driveway to do the meet-and-greet with his dog. Bela was more interested in running out into the middle of the street apparently, and was struck by a car. I heard it--the whack, the cry, and ran out screaming to see her lying in the middle of the street. The car did not stop.

T. and I rushed her to the animal hospital. I sat in the back of the car trying to keep her calm and quiet, though I was probably doing a pretty bad job of it. Thick drops of blood were falling from her head onto my hands, clothes and the floor of the car, and her eye looked bloody and swollen. It was dark and hard to tell where the blood was coming from.

After several hours at the hospital, we learned Bela had a puncture wound under her jaw, and swelling that had caused her third eyelid to pop up over her eye. Preliminary X-rays showed no broken bones or fractures, but they wanted to keep her overnight. We left, hopeful that we could bring her home in the morning.

As of just a few minutes ago, she's eating and walking. But the hospital is keeping her a bit longer. She might come home this afternoon.

I've never wanted to hurt someone so badly as I wanted to hurt stupid person last night. I can picture myself hitting him, screaming at him. To make matters worse for himelf, we asked him to stay until we returned home, but when we got here, he was gone and our doors were unlocked.

But more importantly . . . I almost lost my best buddy last night. I'm thankful that she's still here and that perhaps after a few quiet days of healing, she'll be back to her old, silly self.

Me? I don't know if I'll ever go back to my old self.

An everyday moment of joy

Know what this is? It's the best kitchen appliance ever. So much better than a microwave or perhaps even a dishwasher. It's an egg and muffin maker. See the steam? It's steaming an egg and a veggie sausage at the same time it is toasting an english muffin

















And it makes these in about 5 minutes time:

It's the little things that make life good.

Convenient New Year's resolutions

Why make resolutions that you can't keep? This year, I'm making ones that are easy to achieve.

1. Write more letters and keep in better touch with friends. I'm terrible about this. I let e-mails sit in my inbox, unanswered, for months. I guess with the amount of e-mail I have to deal with at work, I'm on e-mail overload most of the time. I do like writing letters though. Real letters on nice paper that you place into an envelope. And S. and J. have so thoughtfully set me up to be successful with a membership to and stationary from the Letter Writers Alliance.

(Note: I've said nothing about answering my cell phone.)

2. I'm going to keep better track of snail-mail addresses. Each holiday season I frustrate myself because half my addresses are in my yahoo address book, the other are on envelopes and scraps of paper in various drawers. Most of them are out of date. This year, I sent three bottles of wine to my brother's old address. I spent days harassing the UPS and Wine.com people, then calling my bro to ask if he'd received the wine yet. Never again. I've already purchased a new address book. My brother's correct address is already in there!

3. Another convenient resolution: I'm going to the art museum more often. T. and I got memberships as a gift this year. I love gifts like that! There's a great Chuck Close exhibit there that's about to close. I've already seen it, but T. hasn't. It's worth seeing again.

4. Less convenient, but still not too hard: I'm going to the damn Portland International Film Festival this year! Every year, I hear about it after it's started, and half the films I want to see have already run. I vow to get the flyer that lists all the films, sit down with a big mug of tea, and make a plan for the ones I want to see.

So what are your resolutions?

Random tchotchka

It is a good thing "tchotchka" is in the title of this blog, otherwise, I would forget how to spell it every time I wanted to post a random smattering of updates.

1. I don't believe in apologizing for not posting to the blog, or making excuses either. It's kind of like when you were 14 and didn't write in your diary for a long time, and then the next time you sat down to write you started out, "Dear Diary, I am so so so so sorry for not writing in you for so long." I mean, who cares?

But I have been thinking again about the blog, and what I'm doing it for. Then, a few weeks ago, my daily horoscope (which you know is a valid source of information on which very important decisions can be based) said this:

December 20, 2007
Aquarius (1/20-2/18)
If you find yourself bored today, it is a sign that you need to make a few changes in your life. These could be simple changes in your routine, but it is probably more effective to make some complex changes in one of your closest relationships. Some strange cross-communication has been going on, and it might be time for you and this person to figure out what exactly you are doing in each other's lives. Do you two really have enough in common to continue? All relationships don't last forever.

And I thought, "Yes, I am bored." But not with the people in my life, with my writing, and with this blog. Our relationship is strained, I have to admit. It was going so swimmingly too. Maybe it's just that we needed a break, or maybe it's that we need to make some real changes. Or maybe I just need to do what I always tell other writers, and just force myself to sit down with a notebook and a pen in my hand and just write. I don't know. But I need to get my writing mojo or juju or whatever it is back.

2. My dog smells. He's 16 years old, and suffering from a panoply of old-age illnesses including senility, arthritis, hair loss, incontinence, general crotchetiness and advanced dental decay. His mouth has always been a cesspool, given that he has a thing for eating excrement, but now it has bloomed into a full-blown sewer. You know in cartoons, how they draw someone with bad breath? There's this slow-moving brownish stream of nasty eggshells, bubbly goo and fish bones floating in the air over the person's head? That's exactly what it's like. I can smell him from across the room. I'll just be sitting there and suddenly get a waft of it, and I'll think "Oh no, he's close." And yep...he's just entered the room. And so, I hate to admit it, but he's been getting the treatment that so many elderly people get: I'm ignoring him as much as possible.

3. I've been asked to write an article for a new e-zine that celebrates urban living. The topic? Organic personal lubricants. The weird thing is that one of the first people T. and I met when we moved here is the owner of a personal lubricant company. I don't think his stuff is organic, but it's made with natural ingredients, so I'm hoping he might be up for an interview. He used to tell all sorts of stories about the weird things people would call in to the customer service line about, like "My [body part] turned green, what should I do?" And he's like, "Umm, that's not the lube dude, sorry." That could be kind of fascinating. And then I'm recruiting a few friends to do "reviews." I keep feeling like I should feel weirder about writing about lube, but I don't. I do, however, feel weird that Benazir Bhutto was assassinated this past week. I guess that just means I'm grown up.

The word for Portland

In Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love, she writes that every city has a word that perfectly describes it. For Rome, she says, it's "sex." Here's my thoughts on what Portland's word might be.

The word for Portland is ... something that glows emerald green and is moist, like an amphibian. Cool to the touch. An enveloping mist of clear water and plant breath.

The sound of the tires on the pavement in the rain sound like the exhaling and inhaling of the city. The roar of respiration. An expanding pink lung.

Portland is calm and practical. Not easily ruffled. A place where people sing along to the radio to pass the time in a traffic jam rather than lay on the horns, raise the blood pressure. They catch up on OPB. April Behr purrs the weather forecast. She says, "Blue Mountains," "Cascades," "the Valley."

She calls this "the Valley!" Like the original California one, but so unlike it because this Valley winks and nods half-asleep while its southern cousin takes Vivarin to stay up all night. This Valley layers in blankets of forest and fern, while the other throws off the cover to lay naked under the stars.

Is the word "dreamy"? Or is the word "sleepwalk"? Are we really here? Or are we somewhere else wishing we were here? Are we sitting next to a fat man yammering into his Bluetooth headset, dreaming we are walking in the rain instead? Dreaming we are tossing off our wet clothes before a roaring fire? Dreaming we are sipping hot coffee with cream? We'll never know. Our dreams are constantly invaded, but we persist in dreaming on.

Maybe the word is "soft." Like the petals of the ubiquitous rose bush that erupts from the most wretched earth to twine around telephone poles. Or soft like the sun's summer rays--never overbearing--just a pale yellow glow of buttery heat. Or soft like a dog's coat--for all those canines who wait patiently outside cafes and pubs. They rise, stretch and settle in again, tucking their tender paws under to protect them from the chill.

Of maybe it is "dark," like the rain clouds that hover over the city. Like the strong earthy smell of coffee. Like the magical bitterness of beer. We rise in the dark and return to sleep in the dark--our skins Golem-like, pale mushroom epidermis.

I wouldn't dare say "cool" is the word. For all the temperature-associated meanings feel right, but all the style and social connotations are wrong. This city is not cool. This city understands the irony in proclaiming itself cool, it automatically becomes uncool.

And with the word "irony," maybe we get closer. Or "Unexpected." Or "hidden." A little treasure buried deep, locked with a magical password. Only the gifted and true can see what's inside. Though many think they know, what they see is merely a mirage.