Can I trust you?

I have a little trust - a snug few to whom I would give a key to my home, a diary to hold in trust, a secret. There are not too many. Few as five, I think.

That makes for a small gate; a narrow space. I wish for less caution, more faith. I have partitioned out sectors of trust. When posed with the question, "Do you trust me?" I always countered, "With what?"

Trust you to pick up the dry cleaning?
Trust you to not embarrass me in front of my friends?
Trust you to give me credit for my work on the proposal?
Trust you to lift me out of the road if I am injured?
Trust , , ,
I make a fool of myself and you keep the story to yourself?
that you will challenge me to not give up?
for forgiveness and acceptance?
that if I hold out my heart, you will not drop it?

Can you trust me?
With what?
You can trust that if I promise something, I will do it.
You can trust that if I tell you something is absolutely true, it is.
But I don't promise lightly and the "truth" is so malleable given the light in this universe.

My Christmas wish this year is to develop an ability to trust and to extend my ability to be trustworthy. What size stocking do you suppose I need for that?

Chinese eloquence

You live at the beginning of the Yangtze River,

I live at the end of the Yangtze River.

I miss you every day, as I cannot see you.

We both drink this water.

When will this water evaporate?

When will this sorrow end?

I hope that your heart is the same as mine

So that we won't lessen this ache of missing each other.

attributed to the Chinese Poet LuPo

Life with Children

Here is what I know about divorce, about children, about life with children. Whatever age.

You show up. That is sometimes 90% of the equation. Showing up may not seem so important - until that moment - when you survey the room seeking the one, the one support, the bit of witness to your life that means you lived. That your life had meaning because those eyes were present, embracing, recording.

You were there. You witnessed or offered a ride, a peppermint, a hug, a nod, a knowing eye, a band-aid in your purse, a credit card - a different route out of town, a simple piece of tape. Because you were present, you were available to offer assistance - sometimes it is a towel, a hair clip, a quarter for the phone, an absolute nod across the pool that says you can win this one, an extra sweater/jacket you brought to wrap them, late nights on the couch with ear pain and a warm compress, hours of listening to lyrics and it all means so much to you and to them - that your hearts are a rainbow or a dark star. But you own them together.

BUT IF you are not there - in the difficult place -because it will be difficult -
the acerbic response - the dropped welcome of disdain - the limp handshake of disregard - I know them well. This is the geography of divorce - but not of children. That is not their geography.

My daughter remembers that I was there - that she smiled - that we hugged - despite the broken sugar bowl, despite the cluster of longings. Today, we know that I would never desert her. Not because I stayed with her father who was brutal, but because, despite the hostility. despite the humiliation, I would post - I would stand and witness and be available - the rest was water on the back of a duck - but that scant moment when she looked at me and we understood one another are testimony - stronger than any scripture.

My son and his father took a different path - we were stronger and more inclined to see the child first. We held Dylan - regardless of our loss or anger or disappointment with one another - so he is the luckiest of the lucky. Embraced. Dylan was embraced by us both and his siblings. So we all held on to this place so much that even in this place of "disaffection" - there is always affection.

I remember my arms around the necks of each of my children - Adam, Sara, Tara, and Dylan. I reached each one into the air. I have been privileged to share childhood with them - born anew. And together we learned so much.

Those moments will be among those when I am dying. I showed up. And I witnessed. And I did not lie to them. I won't lie to them. They can count on that. Steady and true. That is all I have. When I can offer.

Shakespeare in the Park

Mimes are the only truth I understand anymore - where actions speak.

Overcast skies and a tousle of raindrops were welcome for our outing to the Maryland Renaissance Festival on Saturday. Every year, it seems more people are in costume. My first visit was when my daughter, Sara, was only 4 years old. The Renn Fest was a novelty then and many thought it a strange way to spend a day.

Sara, my son, Dylan, Dylan's friend Jessica, and Ken (ex-husband) set off to see Shakespeare Scum, the glassblower, to eat food "on a stick", to shop for Renaissance wear, to see other shows and to people watch.

We started at Ken's house, where he cooked breakfast and presented Sara with her birthday present - Sara, the crafty, is thrilled to have such a wonderful sewing machine.



The glassblower put me in mind to write a story titled, "The Glassblower's Lover." She's a leather maker and sews his leather shorts. He brings her flowers in the vase he made the same color as her eyes.



Ken generously found proper crowns for Sara and me. The last time I had a flower head dresses from the Renn Fest, I had not yet seen 30. I kept it on through the evening.



Sara got her henna tattoo. I was tempted by the tree of life or the Chinese symbol for lucky, but resisted tagging my body, even temporarily. Sara has such lovely hands and her artist was very skilled.


And this lady has her baby in waiting tattooed. She shimmered.





Shakespeare Scum did not disappoint with the bloody drama, Othello, a tightly constructed domestic drama about a blond innocent wife and a husband misguided into suspicion and jealousy by those who pose as his friends.
"Trifles light as air
Are to the jealous confirmations strong
As proofs of holy writ."
Othello, 3. 3

I was offered a stellar assortment of knights to remember. But, though I may blush to admit it, although the courage and honor of these knights be evident, I rejected them all for this shimmering prospect - this awesome display of charm, refinement, and resources as befitting to a woman of my needs.

Then we head off to dinner at the Melting Pot. I had never dined there, so it was a unique experience for me. However, Dylan is a pro and is comfortable in the steam fog of the pots.

Ken and I did love once upon a time, and in this time we still regard all the gifts that union presented with gratitude - and mutual respect and kindness toward one another. What is more remarkable - that a divorced couple could spend happy time together with their family or that traditions from the 1500-1700 would be so popular? What will be the entertainment venue for those in 2500? 3000?

It is the very error of the moon;
She comes more nearer earth than she was wont,
And makes men mad.
Othello, 5. 2

Elsewhere

Your bed has been left undressed
for long enough, the undergarment
exposed, slipping off the shoulder.
elastic clustering up white cotton.

When younger, I troubled that you
would be snatched away; unforeseeable
tragedy everywhere. An empty tricycle
at the curb; foot prints racing into
the surf; a school bus driver with
heroin riddled arms; troubled I
would lose you from neglect.

All the while, loosing was taking
hold; learning karate kicks, mud
encrusted bike and you flying over
the handlebars; "Mad Dog" on the
soccer field, red lacrosse cleats and

fearless encounters. No need for
bedtime stories, hugs, talismans.
All the while, loosening; all the while
your liquid movements were scrattering
mercury; all the while tendons cabled
and untethered the stanchions.

I dressed your bed today, secured the
elastic, butter soft sheets, fleece
for winter chill. I vacuumed the
carpet, dusted the chess set, and
looked out the window. When I walk by
the door, I imagine both of us elsewhere.

Age and Arrogance

All these years, I believed that I was turning into my mother; age spot by age spot, hair a bit thinner, waist a bit wider, even the delicate drop of the fragile flesh along the of jowl line. Then last weekend at the annual family reunion at the Field and Stream Club, I saw my father's sisters and saw my future - at least a portion of the portrait.

Years ago, in my arrogance of indestructible youth, I felt elevated, superior, to see their hair graying, the skin growing delicate as tissue, their female shapes losing their waistlines. In my heart of darkness, I chortled with glee to see the four sisters deposited in the rocking chairs on the porch of the clubhouse while in what I thought to be my superior youth, I ventured down the slope to explore the river, to run with the children, to demonstrate my superior vitality, strength, and spirit.

I berated their outdated fashion; the hairstyle that had not been updated since 1950, the sensible shoes, the fabric that stretches. Their stories were too long, mundane, and too long ago for me to bother. Not to mention my father who carries on and on and on and on -- fathering seven children, going from modest Riveria Beach rancher to Taneytown farm, battling his demons and his disease and not succumbing.

Superior vitality, strength and spirit; I've had role models in my life. I thought I only had my mother and she is still the pinnacle as far as I am concerned. But it is easy to be strong and superior in youth and even in mid-life; the descent of the slope requires the firmest of conviction, Herculean tenacity, and an ego like silly putty that contracts and expands with the every day surprise in the mirror.

"Lost love is still love."

We still feel it. It does not stop.

That moment when your heart floods, swells. It matters not that the beloved is no longer in your aspect or that the beloved has been lost to you. Your heart swells with utter conviction, rounding and full as the day you fell.

So his hand does not brush the hair back from your brow or cup your chin; so she does not place her cool hand on the back of your neck or frame your chin with her soft palms; the loud laughter in an empty living room as if someone else was there - she is there/he is there; in the morning in the crook of your neck, in the small of your back, the space waits. The beloved voice, "You can do this," "Everything the same," "Don't worry," and "I love you. I love you. I love you."

Lost love is still love - still - ever - always.

Careful

Be careful what . . .

If only she were dying
so life would glitter,
so minutia would drift
away with no remorse.

Love would sing in
her veins, without restraint.
She would gather all the
flowers, save one. She
would spill her affection

tenacious as daffodil fronds.
If only the end of her life
slid by in her rear view
mirror, if only this breath

was most treasured. On her
table; lip gloss, nail clipper, text
books, calendar, the Gunniwolf, spent
Beanpod candle.

Missing; your lips,
tender words.

Also a FinePix camera, two
check books, three memory sticks, one
unicorn bookmark, Virgil Cain’s
card, Contemporary American Poets,
Energizer 9 volt.

Better buried. There are things to
ignore. Quiet days. Endless night.
The pink tabs on the pages
of The Little Prince, a bruise that
quickens; dark shadows

under the eye, cornsilk discharge from
her breast, a lost lens cap. We know. We
know before knowing what we
know. Love and loss. Known.

Architectural Digest meets Mad Men

Watching “Mad Men” discuss the architecture of Penn Station; discuss the ruin of Italian beauty to build latrines, of the power of the printed word to change the misguided ambitions of ill-thought forces.

I do not imply that the journalists are right - for if they are really journalists then they report the facts without bias - only that they write the facts; not that they don’t at times overlook some bits of information to focus on the ones that they believe matter.

Evolution means that one species fails while a stronger species survives. Do we abandon survival? Does the evolution of new forms of buildings and structures require the demolition of the foundation upon which they are constructed?

I honestly don’t know. Clearly, some things/species/structures expire. Yet, I am one who loves the rough wood, the glass doorknobs, the wide wood planks of the floor in a house of plaster walls where the insulation is insufficient and the windows panes are watery with age.

I have stood in the Garden of Gethsemane and on the deck of my modern day townhouse. I know which one has substance and staying power. Whatever foundation formed the structure where I now live, I do not think it was sacred, informed, strong, or noteworthy. But I am grateful to stand on the deck, watch the birds, the fox that likes to race through in winter, the budding of the forsythia and the wild dogwoods that thrive just beyond my structure.

If I could build a structure or discover one where I would thrive, the sound of water would be nearby, trees would dress and undress outside my windows, birds would wake me, locking the door would not be a necessity, old buttery wood would rest under my feet, doors would be solid and well-hung, a fireplace or woodstove for winter, and breezes fragrant with pine and jasmine the rest of the seasons. It is most likely impossible to find it all at any given time.

I’ve no care for the size of the closets or cable access or public sewer. I’ve no care for a Starbucks nearby or a shopping mall. When the electricity fails, I am more at home than not.

Sauting my life

Preparing homemade spaghetti sauce; I sauté the ground beef and a bit of ground lamb, chop the garlic (three cloves), chop the beautiful bright orange pepper just purchased today at Super Fresh - but inside the flesh is riddled with black spots and white fuzz. Yes the pepper had looked so healthy and vibrant in the store - three times the size of the itty bitty red pepper dangling from my little pepper plant on my deck. So I put the pretty orange pepper back into the plastic bag and decide to return it tomorrow. So frequently what appears healthy and whole on the exterior can harbor diseased fruit.

On the deck, I snip two deep red peppers - homegrown with soil I selected and roots and growth I attend to daily - and when I cut them open, the are perfect, no imperfections other than they are small, modest.

Basil - the basil on the deck is robust, prolific - so I go back out and snip a whole limb to put into the sauce. My fingertips smell delicious and I think next time I go out, I will rub the basil behind my ears and onto my wrists instead of bottled perfume.

To the sizzling fragrant garlic, sweet red peppers, and basil, I add the ground meat, a can of diced tomatoes, some tomato paste, and oregano. I put on the cover and let the flavors get to know one another. Tomorrow night, I will serve this to Dylan and Sara as we have a final family dinner before Dylan returns to the University of Maryland. So soon, this year of college will end and he will already be halfway through. We are simmering; this family in a state of transition. I am not sure we have ever been anything but transitioning, evolving. The one word that would not be used to describe us is stagnant., but our soil has been rich and we have rained attention when needed.

A bit more routine, some predictability, would not hurt my life. Knowing how much money I will make and when would be welcome. Knowing what courses I might teach next semester and where I might live in a year or so might make my life richer. As I found some stability on the domestic front, the risks could be in my artistic work; with a relief from financial strife, my intellectual resources and attention could be more focused on classes and research and more creative efforts. So as the sauce marries, I wonder at the sauté of my life and how to brew something richer, fuller, meaningful, and delicious.

What do I wait for?

So proud, son working hard all day,
I work hard all day. He lays floor.
I grade and comment on student work.
We are both building a foundation
for someone's future.

I shop for fresh tomatoes,
beefsteak, plump green beans,
red potatoes and slather them with
olive oil, basil, dill, onion,
garlic, thyme and pepper.

Roasting vegetables, grilling
chicken, slowly while my boy
sleeps. He is recovering himself
in sleep, in rest, in quiet.

Just as the scents pour from the oven
and the timer to rescue the breasts
from the grill sounds, our dog
raises her head in excitement.

Dylan is awake, coming downstairs.
He announces, "I'm going to Dan's."
"No." I know I can't keep him. "I
cooked. It's ready now. Just a minute.
Just a few minutes to eat."

"More than a few," he says. "
Then just taste this roasted tomato."
"That's good."

The dish will keep. The food will
wait for him. What do I wait for?

Another late night

In Sophie's Choice, she does not try to commit suicide while she is in the refuge camp. Later, when she is in Sweden, when she sees herself and cannot bear what she sees, that is when she makes the attempt. She meets Nathan; thinks that he saves her as she is passed out on the library floor.

"There are so many things you do not understand and so many things you cannot understand." Sophie says to Stingo. Isn't that the way for most. Either we cannot speak because the words stick in our mouths or we cannot speak because we are certain that no one has been where we have been.

Sometimes two damaged people find one another. They do understand. Each other. And it seems that there will be an answer there - salvation - a beacon - completion. But it doesn't work out that way, does it? Instead, they struggle, hold, push, hold, run, hold, and break down in their own ways. What remains? What?

I don't know. I've never known. I know that Sophie loved her children. That is all I really understand about love.

The rest is only something I imagine. The Heart of Darkness is no darker than this film.

Explain Yourself

House Episode:
"I am attracted to damaged people."
"That explains everything."

Life and Work and Kate and Leopold

So, I've just survived two weeks of proposal hell. Shipped off our response on Friday around 1:00 PM and took the rest of the day off. While I was working on the proposal, several things became evident to me:
I was the only person in the office on Memorial Day weekend.
I was the only person in the office the following weekend.
Of the people who will profit if the proposal succeeds, I profit the least.
A costing dilemma makes the odds of the contract being awarded to us about 3%.
I am sacrificing my personal time with family and loved ones for naught.
I developed an illness during this time, but postponed caring to my own care so I would be able to fulfill my commitment to my employer.
It matters not in the least.

At the end of my life, (or even next week) not one person from that office will be present. Not one person from that office has regard for me as a human being. I am tool. (Not the way one would ever want to be considered a "tool" if one were considered in such a derogatory manner.)

So, this afternoon, as I finally catch up on my laundry, do some dusting, nurse my sinus and bronchial infection, I am watching Kate and Leopold- a not all that well-regarded romantic film of years back, yet I find it charming. And in even this light-hearted environment, I see the mirror and the window. A reflection of my sacrifice to unworthy work and the sacrifice of my better skills.

On the topic of seeing what is invisible to one another, one character, Stuart, explains:
Stuart: It is no more crazy than a dog finding a rainbow. Dogs are colourblind, Gretchen. They don't see colour. Just like we don't see time. We can feel it, we can feel it passing, but we can't see it. It's just like a blur. It's like we're riding in a supersonic train and the world is just blowing by, but imagine if we could stop that train, eh, Gretchen? Imagine if we could stop that train, get out, look around, and see time for what it really is? A universe, a world, a thing as unimaginable as colour to a dog, and as real, as tangible as that chair you're sitting in. Now if we could see it like that, really look at it, then maybe we could see the flaws as well as the form. And that's it; it's that simple. That's all I discovered. I'm just a... a guy who saw a crack in a chair that no one else could see. I'm that dog who saw a rainbow, only none of the other dogs believed me.

I feel as if I was the only dog who could see the rainbow. It is not the first time. It (I hope) will not be the last.

I dream my life, and it is so different from where I reside.But I am here now. One can be misplaced for a time. But eventually, to survive, evolve, we seek our optimum environment.

I have worked day jobs to pay the rent, then the mortgage. It is not dishonerable to earn a living in a manner that does not use of one's best abilities, is it?

Kate: I've been paying dues all of my life. And I'm tired, and I need a rest, and if I have to peddle a little pond scum to get one, then so be it.

Yes, it is exhausting to play out your talents for the beneift of others in missions in which you have no percentage, little faith, and no appreciation of your efforts. It could possibly be debilitating if you do it too long.

So who does Kate find to love in such a world; who but a man of good manners, intelligence, graciousness, and honor. He observes:

Leopold: What has happened to the world? You have every convenience and comfort, yet no time for integrity.

Bring me Leopold and if it mean that I set aside my current life and leap into the realm of an honor from time past, then so be it. I would gladly give up the clothes dryer, internet, dishwasher, vehicles, the rancid stink of the insincere. Oh, I know that that last item exists in every time, but I don't have to accept it, embrace it.

And in the end, Kate says this:
It's wonderful to get what you want. It's really a great thing..unless what you thought you wanted wasn't really what you wanted because what you really want, you couldn't imagine or didn't think it was possible.-What if someone came along who knew exactly what you wanted without even asking? They just knew, like they could hear your heart beating or listen to your thoughts..and what if they were sure of themselves and didn't need to take a poll..and they loved you, and you hestitated?...

What you hear . . .

when you are listening for something else can be exactly what you needed to hear all along.

On Saturday I went to Ramshead to hear Will Hoge perform. However, the warm up performer, Katie Herzig, played music that tugged at my heart and filled my mind with thought. To quote her web site's description of her music, it is "a spellbinding, uniquely immersive listening experience that deftly manages to be at once playful and impassioned - challenging and comfortable - intimate and epic." The cellist that plays with her is part of the magic of this group.

"Hologram" speaks to my psyche and "I hurt too" to my love (for want of the accurate word) life. But it's "Forevermore" and "Wish you well" that makes it all come undone with memories of my childhood and missing people who are irrecoverably lost to us. Forevermore sent me searching for Peggy Bittner but she is not to be found on Twitter or Facebook but as girls we performed the Playmate song with a painted cardboard box as our set. Our houses were caty-corner in St. Petersburg, Florida, and we walked to Blanton Elementary School together most days.

I've moved too many times, shedding best friends all along the map. It's not so much that I want them back, but I want them happy and I wish there was a directory where we could find one another without intruding. Mine would read, "Healthy, thriving, still writing and dancing, still pensive, still has a troubled heart." I think Peggy's would read, "Still laughing everyday, mother to three towhead girls, running a bird sanctuary in Southern Florida, happily married."

On Understanding

The further I travel, the more lost I become. The more I learn, the less I understand. So most of the time, I just trust the process and the random energy of the universe to deliver what I need to know when I need to know it. Sometimes that can be quite uncomfortable.

It is a little like living the life of Alice in Wonderland. On reading Jabberwocky, she responds:

"It seems very pretty," she said when she had finished it, "but it's rather hard to understand!" (You see she didn't like to confess even to herself, that she couldn't make it out at all.) "Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas--only I don't exactly know what they are! However, somebody killed something: that's clear, at any rate---"

Pain and Conflict

"Pain and conflict are, to a large extent, the result of a discrepancy
between the way we think others should treat us, react to us, and
appreciate us, and the way they actually do. Many of our miseries are
thus rooted in self-pity, the most worthless of all human emotions."

--Ann Davies, Qabalist teacher

Cinco de Mary

The most important celebration is only 8 days away. Yes, it's almost Cinco de Mary day! A few months ago, I bought tickets to a show at Ramshead Tavern for this coming Saturday. For the past few years, I plan an event of some sort on or around my birthday so that I can't lament that someone else did not. It turned out particularly well last year as the entire critique group joined me on the Cinco de Mayo cruise out of Annapolis.

I'd forgotten who I was going to see this Saturday, but I was delighted to discover that it is Will Hoge. Now I just have one dilemma - two tickets; one for me and another one as yet unclaimed. So if you are a big fan of Will Hoge, let me know.

The Vagabond Heart

Loves,
I have been untrue. You are betrayed, abandoned:
not for want of some other's heart but
for my failure to ever fully embrace that does not
permit abandonment by lack of possessing.

Possession is not needed. Jealousy is a shadow
by the dumpster that I do not visit.

Dark horse; mad one; butterfly; cinnamon girl;
gypsy; cold-hearted witch, sad case.
Leaving is easier if you attach a label.

Do not mistake this announcement. Your heart
cracks my chest, every day. Because I have never
really held you, never unveiled my eyes, never
took it all in to the tipping point.

I have loved you in the palm of my hand,
in the crook of my neck, in the bend of my knee.
You deserve more than that. Your love is assured,
a debutante of affection, a monument of conviction,
a canyon of generosity, a hummingbird's beat of hope.

Lucky is your heart in my departure. Lucky found and
lucky lost. Like a bead of sweat down your side in the
heat of summer, embrace the chill and delight of the
uncontrollable release. It is natures way of balancing
the heat of the body.

Walk on By

Yes, it is another one of those days when my horoscope is so accurate that I suspect the writer has been folowing my blog, reading my tweets, stalking me on facebook!

Horoscope for today: Saturday, Apr 18th, 2009 -- You want to take care of those you love, yet you might not want them to know how involved you are in their lives. Part of your current dilemma is that you are connected with your friends and family, even though you're motivated now to increase their independence. It's easy to act as if you are emotionally detached. However, it takes a lot more work to truly give others the freedom they need.

Both of my children (28 and 18) have become more independent this year. Dylan at University of Maryland does not ask for money or food or advice. He moves smoothly through his classes this semester, doing the hard work, managing to eat and sleep enough, exercises and spends time with his friends, returns home to share holiday with friends. I resist phoning him, checking up on him, hugging him too much when I do see him.

Sara has a strong ring of friends that have been onher side since she was a child and now she has a man in her life who is her daily witness, so I am not. Lately we find ourselves unavailable to talk when the other is available so that days slip by without speaking. Neither of us minds so much as we recognize that it is different than it was a year ago. She has heard me spin my dreams of moving away, of shedding my life, for enough years to know that although I want to go, I don't want to be distant from her or Dylan.

But those are not the only people that come to mind when I read this horoscope. When you have been close with someone but realize that you are not ultimately going to enrich their lives; then even if you have a selfish desire to hear from them, to know that they are well, you cannot. To contact them at all distracts and delays them from the very place they must go.

So if you see me walking down the street, just walk on by..."

Detours and noise

Late Thursday afternoon, a red car sped off College Parkway, dumping itself into a ditch backwards and somehow losing its roof. I was commuting to my house to gather materials to teach Business Writing in Waldorf that night. Emergency crews and police had blocked the street at both ends denying me access to my community. After an obsequious plea to the local "authority", he deigned to move an orange cone and permit me to my home (which was no where near the actual accident).

The two lane parkway, usually a constant stream of vehicles so that I imagine that I live near the ocean and late at night transform the flow of traffic into a surf landing on the beach that is just feet from my doorstep. This works until a Harley trespasses my illusions, although I transform it into a late night teen escape on a dune buggy digging through the packed sand.

I drove solo down College Parkway to my community. Silent silent. I creep the Prius, running on electric, so that no sound intruded. The stealth was intoxicating. And the silence.

Sally and I took our walk to the sound of birds nesting. I had not noticed them at that time of day despite the visual presence. Now a symphony of nesting of the birds camouflaged on high branches drew up my chin, perked Sally's ears.

By the time I left for class the flood of vehicles had returned. If you don't hear the birds or see the birds, are the birds still there? Does it matter if it doesn't heal your soul?

Then tonight, Friday eve, I start up College Parkway, windows open, sunlight and warmth for the first time this week. Headed west the traffic grew heavy, tight, nose to bumper close that could only mean an accident on Route 50 had detoured everyone onto College Parkway. Had they been headed east, I'd still be on the road. With every inch I traveled closer to home, however,I knew there could be no retreat; no west bound retreat. I could travel further east toward the sea, but no easy return to the society to the west.

At home, Sally and I go out and the rumble of the 16 wheelers and rusted pick-ups. Sally grows nervous, pulls to return home, to the back deck to warn the squirrels away, where she does not hear the squeal of breaks or smell the exhaust. I follow her. I know I am not trapped here. Though there is too much air in this narrow house for one person, there is too much to remind one. So if I stand at the very back of the deck and peer into the woods, imagine there is no end to them, imagine I migh walk until exhaustion sets the clock; I feel my soles on the spring floor and walk until dark and dig a shallow hollow and sleep in the arms of the earth. We bury ourselves, don't we? Isn't everyone mired somehow?

It's just what you need.

For want of a nail. . .

There is no easy way back. My
name is disappearing as I type,
each previous letter fading into
white.

Everyday more rocks in my
pockets, warming in my hand.
Does the water burn inside out?

Knowing Which Way you Want to Go

It is always best to ask an authority

Today, I put in my contacts (green tinted ones - I like to see who is paying attention). However, I happened to put in only the ones for seeing things close. That means the things at a distance are blurry, without refined edges. So I'm having something of a Monet day. Rain on the pavement is a pewter veil. The neon letters shimmer as if buried in a lake. At three feet, no one has wrinkles or acne or scars.


Of course, I could go remedy the error but it is teaching me something, and today seems like a good day for introspection.

So this accident inspires me to think a bit deeper, to consider the limits of perception, as well as the small things that inspire us.

March Progress - too much?

Lucky, lucky, lucky Mary!

Through the recommendation and reaching out of a former colleague, I was contacted regarding a position as a proposal writer (Government RFP writing). Bring it on.

The ability to cull through dense documents packed with extraneous and repetitious verbiage is one of the strengths I possess. Then the ability to analyze needs, desires, wants, and the words that speak to my audience; well, that is the icing. Now I have a position where I can be the substance and the icing (eventually - I mean I just started Monday).

Still, I was unemployed for almost 3 months and the collateral damage is approximately $8-10K. But I'm still teaching and now working full-time once again, and I have learned to live lean (that part doesn't hurt a bit - although I did recently see a pair of shoes and think "Wow. Could I buy those?").

Most surprising is how much of your self-esteem runs down the drain during unemployment. I am still wondering every day if they will want me to come back the next. The night before my first day, I spent hours wondering if I should even start.

However, the owner and principle is a smart, strong, generous, and thoughtful woman who sees my potential and is willing to mentor me to success, to all of our success.

I can promise this much, I will pay it back in kind or pay it forward.

Lucky, lucky, lucky. I am one of the lucky Irish.

Enough Said?

No. 2: Warren Buffett
Net Worth: $37 billion
(Was No. 1 last year, lost $25 billion over the past year.)
Source: Investments/U.S.
Age 78. Widowed, remarried; three children.

Last year America's most beloved investor was the world's richest man. This year he has to settle for second place after losing $25 billion in 12 months. Shares of Berkshire Hathaway are down 45% since last March.

If Uncle Warren is not able to swim this sea, who will?

We will. We, the capitalist Americans who know that work and performance and quality and product matter. If the banks fail, there will be a new way. This is not the first time. This time, though, the value will be tangible. Be tangible. It's March. Let the wind blow.

March is my month

Beware the ides of March.

Or welcome the ides of March. I do.

Tonight it is snowing - finally. Like the apex of the arch, I have been suspended, waiting, waiting, waiting. Now the snow falls, and I descend.

Many months ago, a sooth-sayer spoke to me; she told me that I would meet my true love in March - or rather that I would find true love in March.

Today is March 1st. I am alone. Snowflakes blanketing the apple blossom tree across the street; snowflakes in Sally's hair; snowflakes on my shoulders, my face; snowflakes carpeting the deck; snowflakes shrouding the details, covering the grim, removing the stain. I have waited for snow.

Snow is sacred to me; my metaphor for beginning. I know most prefer spring but I prefer snow. Cover me, bury me, let the ugly decay and fall away and the green stem beneath erupt in the sun.

The crocus are already above ground. Bent yellow heads shaped like closed tulips resting in the snow, what do they say to me?

Here is the quiet night--the pause--before it all begins again. Cherish this moment. Soon the winds of March will knock my socks off!

Red Hot Poker

Tonight, four of the precious members of my creative writing critique group met at an India of Annapolis on West Street. First, let me just say, the food, the wine, the service capture what taste and customer service define: Delicious and attentive.

But the delicacy of the evening is this - I write to them from my heart of hearts. I have been balancing on the high wire of a story for over a decade, balancing on metaphor and simile, sometimes in a sonnet and sometimes in free verse. Tonight, I read the words that were the most difficult.

I thank them but not with words that I can heave into my mouth. They understand the process, the lifeblood, the pulse, of the creative process - the becoming. There are few places where a writer feels like they might undress, knowing there is much, much at fault, and yet knowing, beneath, the bones are solid, strong, and telling. They help me prop the skeleton against the wall and discover the being. I am forever grateful.

Now I just need that red hot poker to keep me writing, writing, writing, the next untold truth (according to me).

Re-incarnated in Unemployment

Unemployment allows me to have shows on during the day that others watched. "Dead Like Me" is a program that comes on in the evenings; I was working days, some nights, and in graduate school and didn't see some series. I have never watched a single episode of "The Sopranos." I don't subscribe to Showtime or Cinemax.

But during daytime programming, they show last seasons episodes. Today, I am becoming acquainted with "Dead Like Me" as I file papers, submit resumes, floss, play with Sally.

"Dead Like Me" features characters who died but did not pass over; rather they exist on earth as grim reapers, escorting the dying through death. I see them as the scores of unemployed, wandering the job market, meeting the newly disenfranchised, sharing secrets and systems of survival in this incarnation.

"The more I try to hold onto my life, the less life I have," says the young protagonist. Indeed. Unemployment creates, well, actually a void. But also unlimited possibility. Actually, not unlimited. I will never be a professional ballerina or ice skater; too late to join the Peace Corp. And it is unlikely that I can even start a new career in medicine or the law, become a horse trainer, pursue an acting career,

"Why do I keep losing all the things and people I care about?" our young protagonist asks. "That what life is," the wizened friend tells her. The viewer is told to try to understand what is left behind.

I cannot decipher the message. Not yet. Most people I meet are in a panic or stumbling into despair about the economy. I cannot. Perhaps it is denial. Perhaps it is because even if everything fails, I get to choose this day, my emotional reaction, my moment, right now. I choose hope, courage, laughter, and a small square of chocolate.

Join me in Creative Journaling

Mary Bargteil is leading a creativity workshop for Anne Arundel Community College.

What is creative journaling? For every student, the creative journal will be a unique, rich reservoir. Through a series of exercises, writers discover the story inside the story, the poem within the poem. For the photographer or painter, discover a new way of seeing the subject, the landscape, the interior.

We will use a variety of prompts and interactive exercises to build a collection of ideas and insights to enrich your creative work.

Dates: Feb. 10, Feb.17, Feb. 24
Hours: 6:30-9:00 PM
Location: Arnold Campus, 101 College Parkway
Course Number: WRG-313-101
Register here!

I encourage you

I have been one of the round robin poets at this event in the past. Not this year. BUT it is a worthwhile event, a unique experience. I encourage you to attend.

Event: Spread the Love, Share the Warmth
Time: Sunday 15 February, Start Time: 19:00 PM
Location: Metro Gallery, 1700 North Charles St., Baltimore, 21201, US

To RSVP or view the invitation, go to MySpace:
http://events.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=events.detail&eventID=486356.7654&hashcode=dfc9c9c8-f8b8-4eb8-b237-ab6c62940b78

Be the change you want to see!

Best advice

Surround yourself with your friends. They will care for you - it is so clear to me how much they love you.

"Lucky"

That evening, she tried to heave her heart
Into her mouth. She said,
“I love your eyes, the way your hair curls
At the back of your neck. I love how you are with
Dogs, like a mate, a pack member. I love how you
Pick up broken things, like me, and don’t throw
Them away.

I love all the blue white of your cornflower eyes,
And the way they wet at joy and sorrow. I love your
Strong hands running over a piece of wood, lifting
a heavy weight or rubbing the small of my back.”

She was lucky, but she wasn’t strong. She was smart,
But she wasn’t disciplined. And she feared the words
“I love you.” Whenever someone said them to her, the
words echoed from a deep, uncharted wood, like distant
French horns through a fog.

And the words would come into her mind when she was
with her lover. The words hummed inside her, in the valley
of her throat, in the hollow of her hips, pricking the back
of her neck. The coveted words were a talisman, a keepsafe.

The words inside were a solid link, heavy metal.

That year, she bought him an id bracelet, fat links
Embracing the heavy center, “Lucky”. She had
Thought them lucky. Last night, the other words hid
Beneath her rib cage, and in the morning she found the
id bracelet frosted in the winter air on her front porch.

She put it on and slowly the heat of her own skin
Warmed the word.

Attainable dreams

Early this morning, maybe 4 AM, I dreamed I was skiing; the snow soft and fresh, uncarved and my body as flexible as a twizzler, my knees soft and giving at just the right moments, leaning over the edge and turning with no effort. All the air silent except for the shush that is like the return of your own heartbeat. It reminded me of how much I really like to ski. Just as when my mother, after a year or maybe only six months, shows up in a dream, and I wake with damp eyes realizing how very much I miss her and everything she gave me.

So I need to go skiing (some dream interpretation is easy). But I have not been working out or doing my walking much since the lay-off. But that is okay. I can do it now. And I'd already started in the last week to awaken my body, to savor the scent of my own perspiration, to happily anticipate the tender muscles the day after. This is one of the ways we know we are alive.

My mother did not spend enough of her life skiing. She did ski (in Austria no less - if Lorraine was going to do something, she was going to do it). But only on one trip and then no more. Her life would have been enhanced by nearby weekly winter skiing outings. So I should learn that lesson and make sure I ski every season, even if it is here in our humble surroundings and not in Austria. And I should prepare my body for it.

Some dreams are more attainable than others. What a day to begin dreaming...

you know there is almost always going to be a piano involved with me. it sounds better on the soundtrack. of course.

The Scholar - this just in

From the College of Computer, Mathematical and Physical Sciences at the University of Maryland

Dylan Bargteil has been listed in the Fall 2008 semester's Associate Dean's Commendation.

As a parent, I understand the difficulties that students face during the first semester of college. So, to my Beamish, who more than survived but thrived! I knew of his struggles (sometimes), his isolation, his connection - as much as a mother can know - which is not near to enough.

So, congratulations, Dylan. This is no easy accomplishment.

Inaguration: I was at the NE corner of the Washington Monument

Sunlight at noon and air crisp enough to remind you that every breath matters; blue skies and human masses; strong, well-organized, poetic language – language that resonates and will resonate for decades; citizens united to succeed, and we, white/black/asian/Indian/and all the tribes in between, stand at command. We cannot fail. We will not fail.

We believe, and because we believe, so it is. That is what faith looks like; that is the power of faith. Not some external force but the absolute conviction within.

I had wanted to be present. I live not far away. But, in an ironic turn of circumstance, I am one of the unemployed to whom President Obama speaks. As fate would have it, I had received a notice that my benefits had been suspended (since the very first week, so I grow a little lean in the bank account at this point) because one of my employers had categorized my leaving as a “voluntary quit.”

The brief story is that it was not a “quit” but rather a contract that had expired. However, the DLLR had scheduled to interview me by phone, home phone, at 11:30AM on January 20th. Despite multiple attempts to reach them to request that my phone number of record be changed to my cell phone, I failed to ever be connected to anyone. The consequences of missing the phone call are that benefits are cancelled.

Benefits are not a lot of money compared to my previous income, but they are the difference between depleting my savings in 60 days rather than six months. Significant. Especially in these times.

Throughout the morning, I wandered past three televisions; one set to CNN, one to Channel 2 (my second family Charlie, Diane, Robin), and the Today show – different networks on each floor of my townhome. Friends had told me they were going, invited me to go; other friends were gathering elsewhere; Annapolis had an event at the State Capital but I had to be within arm’s reach of my telephone, my miniscule shackle. It was nothing.

The interview call came early and the DLLR employee wanted to be on the telephone with me no more than I wanted to be on the phone with him, yet we found common purpose. The matter was quickly resolved.

Sara phoned, whispering into the phone of her plans to find a place where she could witness this moment. She sees it, feels it; Sara is the change. We shared our unbridled enthusiasm in whispers. Another friend tweeted his whereabouts in DC. So when President Obama placed his hand on Lincoln’s bible, I stood in my living room, and pandiculated as if Rip van Winkle himself had just woken. In a syncratic moment I felt Sara beside me and I was transported to the northwest corner of the Washington Monument. I breathed in the press of fleece and wool, the words reverberated, and heartbeats - singular and collective thrummed, and an absolute understanding streamed through us that we were all part of a powerful surge of human spirit, American spirit, relentless even when daunted.

Tomorrow, I will wake, take care of myself and mine, and look around and see what else is possible. Undaunted, determined, and reaching, stretching as far as I can.

If You Were An Anime Character . . .

Who would you be? Yes, I admit that I was intrigued enough to spend the less than five minutes and see me. Here are the results:
1664 other people got this result! That's 10% of total quiz takers.

You are a romantic anime girl and you love and care for a lot of people. There is no evil in you soul or your heart. Though sometimes people don't feel the same way as you do you keep on trying to change their mind. You love to help people out and you are always happy.Keep on trying to make the whole world smile because you know smiles are contagious ^_^. Oh and if it seems like there is nobody who could love you as much as you could love them, it doesn't matter; the thing is that the only thing that matters is that he cares and loves you, and it doesn't matter how much. Well maybe it does matter, but don't set your standards too high cuz then you'll find nobody.

So if you know me at all (and I assume you do if you are reading this post), you may find this surprisingly close to accurate.

In 2009, I resolve to do less . . .

1. I will Not cook the main meal for Christmas Eve dinner or New Year's Eve dinner in 2009. I get anxious in the kitchen, a room that has always intimidated me. In 2009, I will order carryout or let someone else cook or go out.

2. I will Not buy any exercise parafenalia or exercise clothes. I have tapes and videos and a two great tracks near my house and a 15 speed bike and a kayak and plenty of old clothes that are only enhanced by sweat and sunshine.

3. I will Not endure prejudice. I will speak up when I hear it.

4. I will NOT neglect my closest friends and family for the sake of people I hardly know.

5. I will not succumb to emotional manipulation; which is not to say that I am a cold-hearted witch; however, there are moments when someone's reaction doesn't really have anything to do with who we truly are and everything to do with who they are.

6. I will not miss the things I am casting off.

7. I will not hold onto clothes that are a size 2. Size 2!!! (Even a zero or two). If I am ever that thin again (small chance), someone put me in a pen and feed me Fritos and White Russians.

8. I will not deny myself skiing and dancing.

9. I will not be blind to my faults (I hope - okay, I'm going to try to see them/it.)

This list is subject to revision and does not imply that I have completed my assessment of the things I am better off not doing. So it is not complete.