meditation

I've never really understood how to get to that zen place, the quiet mind, transcendence. I'm not even sure how to spell it. But yesterday, picking blackberries, I had a moment, in fact moment after moment, where all that mattered was getting the next perfect berry without dragging the soft underside of my forearm across poison thorns. Three gallons later I feel compelled to share my expertise. It doesn't take much.

The pie was okay. It was actually a tart. I guess it tasted fine, but I had just made french onion soup and couldn't wait and ate my first bite too hot and the melted provolone on my tongue diminshed my abiltiy to taste ever-so-slightly. But pie is pie. And as my son was fond of saying throughout his teens: its all good.

So today I am having coffee with asia, grandkids for the afternoon, and working at Obama Headquarters in the evening. It is just around the block, literally, and were it not for this ultimate convenience, it is unlikely that I would get quite so directly involved. I mean, I may ask them if I could just have a line routed from my house. I'm that lazy. Walk two blocks? Don't they know who I am?

Seriously, I'll try this time. This race. Its that important. I'm not sold on Obama, but Michelle seems bright and she likes him. McCain seems to have lost his mind, not that I would have voted for him anyway. Sarah Palen? Okay. I guess she killed a reindeer and has spent time near Russia so qualifies for office. I'm sure she's a nice person, and I don't know much about all this, but it seems like political suicide to me. Which is fine--anything that lessens his chances. I can't imagine that the women of America will rally behind a soccer mom. And if they do... They won't, will they?

I do worry for Obama and the threat of assassination. I grew up in Southern Oregon where the KKK held meetings in the grange until I was in my early teens. I remember Bud Peebler driving his tractor through the orchards up to the grange hall. They didn't wear white caps, but they didn't have to. They were there and we knew it. There are many nameless citizens who would happily give up their lives to stop a black man from holding this office and be known for it. Still.

I hate to blog about politics, but I do love to watch 'em run for office. I may break my rules from time to time, especially if I end up spending much time in Obama Headquarters. I can tell you right now that the signs are awful and its a mess out front. Its a good thing I'm heading over there this evening. But like the sign on my office wall says:

"If things don't get better around here,

I'm going to have to ask you to stop helping me."

So there it is: blackberry meditation and political commentary all in one place. You can't beat that.

day

I am home. I usually go out saturday morning and it was so good to just stay home, get the house in order, start some laundry, fold clothes and eat some oatmeal. It feels much more like a weekend when I start the day this way, sleep in a little.

But the reason I stayed in be is because I didn't sleep because it seems like once again I am on the cusp of bladder despair. Cranberry pills to the rescue.

Just back from a tough morning of yard sales and berry picking. Complusory yard sale items: a Billy Bass and an Ab Lounge. I pointed this out to the man running the sale and he didn't get it or didn't like that I wasn't going to purchase either one.

Then on to pick berries. Urban berry picking is much different than country picking. Urban berries are often found in places where the homeless folks roam, and while I am not so very far removed from the memory of homelessness, I am not a city girl. I could never have survived the streets. So we look the area over and pick away. I think we got about three gallons today. The pies I made last week were the best yet.

My husband always reaches for the furthest berries, the good ones just beyond safety. Me? I stay in one spot until there are no more, and only go in as far as I absolutely have to. I risk my fingers, he risks his life. There seem to be more than one variety of berry, smaller or larger. In the end we wound up in some nice big berries with great flavor. I'll make pie tonight.

Mother in law is in a nursing home after a hip replacement, and I'll make her a nice tart and hope it improves her mood. She's not going with the flow. I tried to explain the nursing home experience to her, but there just isn't any explaining it. It's awful. She's pretty freaked out. But its where they send people after surgery for rehab. Her son, my husband, says things like, How's it goin in the rest home??? I don't think it is helping.

Anyway, I'll bake something for her.

Here's the recipe:
For the bottom crust I use Marie Callendar's frozen. They are so good. Then for the top I use Pillsbury rolled crusts, cut in strips to weave the basket top.

Berries enough to fill the pie pan and a bit more.
3/4 cup sugar
2 Tbsp. flour
1 tsp lemon juice
dabs of butter under the crust top.
a bit of salt.

Bake at 425 for 15 minutes, then 350 until done.

quick camp

We spent the night at Metzler Park, cooked hot dogs and beans over coals and nothing else. Except cantaloupe, and vinegar and sea salt chips, my new obsession. I needed to get out of the city after a long week of decorating. It was not a Martha Stewart camping trip, as it had been a Martha Stewart week, but I found a new bedspread for our room and a big tin-type of Multnomah Falls, which is one of my all time favorite places if all of the tourists would leave.

It is now the end of the week, Thursday, and I haven't finished this lousy post. It was a nice night out of the city, stars in the sky, cool in the morning, smoke in the air. After four days off, back to work wasn't quite suicidal, and really, the cast and crew are all good. Sometimes it seems like a little hospital, and I guess it is, but life coasts downhill predictably to the end.

falling

In the midst of 103 degrees I can feel it: the coming of fall. This final burst of heat, a valiant attempt to forestall autumn's arrival, is futile. Fall will come.

Each year I await the arrival of fall with open arms, black turtlenecks at the ready, levi's and boots waiting for their time. I complain about winter, and I complain about summer -- but fall and spring... mmm. I love those seasons. I'm not sure what it is that gives it away. The first chill morning? It doesn't even need to be cold. It is just different, as if the angle of the sun has passed its prime, waning toward winter and the long cold nap. I long for short days and cold mornings, the coming of big holidays in the warm grasp of my family

oh, wait.

I forgot who I'm related to.

Anyway, while I may indeed dread the holidays, I do love autumn. Believe it.

This weekend I only have one day off. I don't like that very much, but am taking a couple of days off next week to make a long weekend before the long weekend. I want to camp for a couple more nights, or at least go on a picnic. I have spent the not-quite-so-hot day in and out of my new closet, trying to get things arranged to my liking. It is a little less like Christmas than I had imagined, but probably because I only have on day off and don't like to rush through this. I guess there is no need to hurry. It is a small space, but it is mine, and comfortable and finally, I can unpack after nearly five years. Enough.

paint

Let's review: I wasn't going to paint anything that perfect shade of not-quite-white again, was I? Dammit. I just couldn't figure it out, and had all of these partial buckets of leftover paint.What's a girl to do? But I did something absurd and bought blue drapes. Blue. I bought all I could fit in my basket, all they had on the shelf. I love freddy's. You can get anything there. I go to Crate and Barrel and Pottery Barn, and all their stuff has black polka dots, and maybe I'm behind (likely) but I don't want those Go Mod things all over my house again. I did it in the, what? sixties? seventies? I was drunk. I don't remember. I think I was young, so, probably the sixties.

But I had to paint the surfaces or I couldnt' hang the curtains. If I can't hang the curtains I can't hide the shit. If I can't hide the shit, well, I think I've pretty well beaten to death the concept of keeping shit in view. So, the curtains are purely ornamental. Sue me. First, I slapped a layer of joint compound over an old panelled wall to make it look magically like stucco so I can pretend I'm in a new house in Mexico instead of an old house in Portland. It took all of my self restraint (of which I am in notoriously short supply) to let it dry overnight before painting it. And I think I should have washed the panelling first because when I rolled the paint, it pulled the stuff right off the wall, so I had to paint it with a brush, which I have a hundred of, because I always forget where they are and buy new ones. This dilemma of hiding things from myself doesn't only apply to clothes, you see.

So it was an okay day in work land and I came home a little early to work around the house. The painting is pretty much done, but it is also never done. I have miles to go before I am through. I didn't paint the ceiling the last time, and it is glaringly not done. But it is tough to paint the ceiling in an occupied room. I will probably learn not to see it. I'm good at that.

nests

Long time no post. So much has happened since Bozo died it is hard to know where to begin. Every day something happens that I view through my own lens, and think, hey, what a great post this will make when I get home to my computer. But my mind leaks. Memory fails when the dishes and the job and the dog and watering the yard get in front of everything.

Nicole moved away, which left a pretty big space in the house, and made her father sad. But it is a normal sadness, the empty nest. I've been in my own empty nest, sitting alone at night with the loud and insistent unemployment of childlessness, wondering how they can possibly get along without you, but they do. Because Nicole doesn't speak to us, or at least to me, it is hard to know her reasons and motivations, but she wasn't happy here -- that much was clear. I think most kids want to leave. I know I did. Having lived with her for nearly five years, and loving her in that uncomfortable, incomplete, never quite enough but always too much, step-mother way, I still hope for her eventual happiness and comfort in her own life, as it unfolds under her feet one step at a time. It is hard to be young, and easier by far than being old, but still just the same, I am happy to have been on the periphery of her small life for awhile.

So, with Nicole gone, I have created a walk-in closet for my clothing. We live in a small Victorian with tiny rooms and now I have some hope of organization. I have been living on three floors for four years, and it has been challenging. Now, for those of you have have been following the bouncing ball, you will understand that this organization myth is merely a hope, and has as little chance of materializing as, say, the Easter Bunny. I have, however, moved beyond plastic. I am now intstalling things that require drywall and spackle. I am renovating. Oh, did I say I am renovating as though it involved effort on my part? That was a lie. My husband is renovating. He is renovative. So, I have a closet where there was a wall, and shelves and other furniture that will house, but not hide, my many many articles of clothing and accessories and getting-ready supplies, which is another industry and another story.

I mention 'not hiding' because I have learned that putting clothes in opaque drawers and boxes is like sending them to storage. Only the storage is in Europe. I never see them again. And because they are not visible, I forget which item (say, summer capri-length pants) is in which large plastic storage container, and there they sit, years on end. The upside of opaque boxes and drawers is that it is like Christmas when I open them, and for awhile I am releived of the oppressive need to shop because I am wearing all my old clothes that I had cleverly hidden from myself. I blame my job, because I have to look competent every day, and I interpret this to mean I can't wear the same thing twice. How this relates to competence I can't explain. Don't make me try.

I had a dream last night that I had, in my organizational efforts, discovered a whole 'nother room of clothing and had decided to have a yard sale. I had advertised it on craigslist and said something like, "I'm selling some really nice stuff so don't expect to pay a quarter for something that cost me 89 bucks," because as you may know, I think everything at a yard sale should cost a quarter. So, the morning of the yard sale came and I was having it inside my house (which makes it technically not a yard sale). I had this plan to only let three people in at a time to minimize theft -- first come first served and all which is the craigslist m.o. -- but as the doorbell rang, I realized I hadn't even sorted through the clothes yet, or priced anything, and this guy who was first in line (for MY clothes, what's that about???) said there were 147 cars lined up around the block and that I'd better get organized.

Fuck. I have too much shit.

And my husband got a HUGE new motorcycle.

We all handle empty nests in our own ways.

I decorate.

memorial

Bozo the Clown is dead.

I am not alone, I am certain, in admitting he made me a little nervous. Its not that I'm glad he's dead, or that I wished him any ill for being the embodiment of the scary clown, just thought that since I made a big deal about Captain Kangaroo, I should give Bozo his due.

Bozo was the seed of many a cruel remark: what a fucking bozo, etc. And the esoteric firesign theatre album, We're All Bozos On This Bus. Under the right pharmacological conditions, and during the early seventies, I enjoyed that album for a minute.

Anyway, that's that. What a clown.

chewing glass

It is the last day of my 20th year. Tomorrow is 21. Legal. I sat in front of Mulligan's Bar and Grill on Hawthorne last night, considering the days, the years, that have passed. I do that on anniversaries. I sit in or around bars and remember things best forgotten.

This morning I took my scooter down to the meeting place, wind in my hair and all, listened, came home to make oatmeal with walnuts and green apples, wait for my husband to get home from a bike ride, and watch as my day unfolds under the rare Portland sun. I need to have another key made for my scooter and I must go to Freddy's to talk about glass shards in the frozen berries, then off for coffee with a writer in hopes of structuring my fucking book.

I know the part about glass was tucked in there as though just another moment in my always zen-like existence, but seriously. I've been eating broken glass for breakfast. It started last week.

Sunday morning, like any weekend morning, I made oatmeal with frozen blueberries. I prefer frozen to fresh. On weekdays it is yogurt and berries. I usually mix frozen cherries in with the blueberries for the sweet. So there I was, shovelling down the oatmeal when I discovered some broken glass in my mouth. I fished around in the bowl for more glass and finding only a couple of pieces, cautiously ate the rest of my breakfast. The next morning I dumped my yogurt and berries together and headed to work. At about 8:30, I open my pack and take out my breakfast, finding partway through it that again, I have glass in my mouth. Bummer. This time it feels kind of like I may have swallowed some and this concerns me. I fish around and find a little more, and toss the rest of my breakfast, sad and desperate, and eat some cold scrambled eggs. By this time, I'm guessing the blueberries are the culprit rather than the oatmeal, either that or Nicole is trying to murder me, which is entirely possible.

So, next day I open a brand new bag of frozen cherries, both to rule out the blueberries and the murder theory. I am certain it is not the cherries. NOT THE CHERRIES!!!. So I make my breakfast, go to work, sit down after the initial blur of physician's orders and employee complaints as well as one of my patients yelling, "Get away from me you sons of bitches and I don't mean daughters, either!" to eat my breakfast, and begin shovelling the cherries and yogurt down my throat with relative abandon, considering the events fo the past three days.

This raises some questions for me. And I would understand if it also raised some questions for you. Why? You may wonder, does she keep eating this food when she could die a ghastly death bleeding from the inside out?

Its a fair question.

Well, I really like cherries and I have a smallish but significant disability when it comes to, well, living in reality. My behavior would suggest that I believe the laws of physics don't apply to me, such as: glass cannot be digested safely. I don't believe this consciously, I am not an idiot, but my actions do not support my beliefs. I live outside of integrity when it comes to food. Now, I don't think that is such a big deal, really. I've been worse and lived.

So, yes. I'm certain you are hanging on by a thread here, wondering if there was glass in my cherries. Yes. Dammit. There were large shards, kind of flakes of glass, throughout my breakfast for now the fourth day in a row. So, I don't need a brick wall to fall on my head. Again, scrambled eggs.

I got on the phone and called Fred Meyer himself to explain to him that he has a small problem in the frozen food aisle. I saved the glass and the bag the cherries came in and am heading down there today to bring in the evidence, and report that should I, in any way, have gastrointestinal problems due to ingesting glass, Freddy is footin' the bill. Period.

vacation part II

So there we were, all packed up and ready to head inland when my husband stepped on the clutch and nothing happened. Not one thing. Had we been on minimally level land, that would have been one thing, but we were about a mile down a spiraling 14% incline, towing a small but significant U-Haul trailer. Russian Gulch is about a mile north of Mendocino on Hwy 1. A beautiful campground surrounded by ferns and just the minutest bit of stinging nettle, which I managed to steer clear of, but my husband did not. Left up to me I would have unwittingly picked a bouquet to grace our table, but he was the first one out of the truck and into the campsite. I guess it stings--thus, the name.

We are such grown ups now that we have AAA.--Triple A for the unititiated. (I could refer you to previous posts about my 65 Dodge Polara with a plywood back seat and a starter that had to be beaten with a shovel each time I turned it off, but I'll leave that up to you. ) Ah, poverty, that fount of revisionist memory.

So this ranger shows up to see who the flakes are who have broken down in his campsite. He is clearly from Mendocino based on the tan and the 150.00 haircut. To be fair, he was very nice. Rangers are very nice, as a rule, aren't they? Have you noticed? For instance, this one came up to us while we were walking toward the beach to let Sid run around for awhile.
My husband says, cleverly, upon meeting the ranger, "Sid! Where is your six foot leash?"
The ranger says, in perfect tour guide inflection, "Say, Do you know where the Rite Aid is in Fort Bragg?"
I think, What the hell? Does he need bandaids or a prescription filled?
So my husband, knowing we are about 9 miles from Fort Bragg, says, "Sure." And he's thinking, like I am, that this guy needs directions to Rite Aid and has a medical problem of some kind.
The ranger says, "Good. Well, there's an off-leash dog park down toward the water from there." and goes on to explain the directions in minute detail.
We consider admitting to the ranger that Sid is usually on his leash and no one is around anyway, but don't. We just stand there like the guilty campers we are.
The ranger, remaining tour guide-positive, says, "I was just thinking you might want to know where an off leash park was located."
Well, we really didn't at all. We weren't thinking how nice it would be to drive nine miles to walk Sid, who can walk just fine on an empty beach.
Anyway, I was just wondering if all rangers are taught to deal with campers in positive language only. Maybe some campers are a tiny bit unstable and will flip out if a ranger was to, for instance, say something like: "Put your fucking pitbull on a leash, asshole," or something like that. I wonder if there is a ranger school for manners.

We met this other ranger in Jedediah Smith State Park where we camped early. In campgrounds now there is evening entertainment and actual gift shops. It was the first Ranger Talk of the season when we were there. It was called "The Bear Necessities" and talked about bear ettiquette, like not spreading jam on your child's face or something if you happen to run into a bear on the trail. It was for idiots and flat-landers I guess. The plan was to have this blazing bonfire (which I thought questionable in the redwoods) but the guy ranger couldn't build a fire. It took him forever. It was decorative, the way he built this tipi out of wood, but it wouldn't take off for the longest time. At the talk, the ranger-gal handed around this necklace of bear teeth and the next morning, as we checked out of our campsite, there was a note at the entrance that someone had pocketed it and the sign said, "It is MINE."

When we finally made it out of Russian Gulch, we were towed by AAA inland to Willitts. It is a 25 mile winding road and we were in a huge flatbed tow truck driven by Kevin who has three children who have turned out well because they do things together as a family and he married his high school sweetheart and drives the road like he has lived there all his life, which he has, almost without looking. I believe we made better time being towed by Kevin than we would have on our own.

Willetts isn't much. We were pretty much hostage to the auto repair shop, and several hundred dollars later, were on our way up 101 and toward home. I should report that Sid was really happy to finally make it to a hotel room with air conditioning and a bed he could call his own.

We drove straight through to Port Orford and spent the evening with my brother Doug and his wife Joyce. The curry was excellent. The company, even better. It was good to see them.

brother, first and last

I started out with three brothers and now I have one. The eldest, older by about 12 years than I, is the only one left. I could tell a million stories about Doug because he is someone about whom stories are told, and will be told long after he is gone, which won't be long if things keep on the way they are. I love my brothers, not any one the best, and went through life being never myself but always somebody's sister. They were all treacherously handsome and drawn, all but the youngest, to trouble. The youngest (and I think we'd all agree, the best) died first. His heart was like his father's, doomed to beat for only about 35 to 40 years. Doug's has been beating longer, and likely harder, and is beginning to wear down now. The middle boy, silenced his about five years ago with whiskey.


When I was eleven, Doug taught me to play poker so he could beat me out of my babysitting money and play pool at Foss's Pool Hall in Medford. He told me to fold on the only royal flush I've ever been dealt. Lore has it that he painted his Navy commander's face with deck paint and nearly joined the Mafia. I'd believe anything. I have believed anything. I like a story and am a liar, this much we know. I remember people bringing Doug home from long benders, leaning him up against our front door, knocking, then running away. We'd open the door and down would come Doug -- passed out cold. I remember (or I may just be repeating a story I heard a hundred times) my brother hanging out the back window of a station wagon, the old kind with the seat facing backward, bottle of tequila in hand, spinning out of our wide gravel driveway with a carload of Mexicans bound for Tijuana, and this during a time when cars full of Mexicans were something of a rarity. Now, to say it outloud, or rather in print, it sounds rather benign. At the time it was the height of subversion, of rebellion, something he was known for. My mother never gave up on him.


There have been many years of my life when I didn't know him. He captained his own fishing boats and fished the Southcoast of Oregon for the past 40 years or so. When he found out I was shooting heroin he walked into the bar and slugged me, not really very hard, but nearly knocked me off my barstool. I tried to explain to him that it wasn't that big a deal, but he knew better. He knew. When I needed to kick, I went to him and camped inland from his mooring, and felt safer leaving my boy with him on his boat when I was sick and had to drink. He knew that one too. And still does. He is not a gossip.


He finally found a woman who could live alongside him, not exactly a pirate's wife, but something like that, who can't get too far from saltwater without getting nervous. She is a weaver and she has saved him twice now from the foibles of a body that is nearing an early finish. .



What Doug and I have in common is walking away from the rest of the family -- he more than I -- to live lives unapproved of by the Christians. We, me and K, visited him on our way back from this past camping excursion, and I didn't know if my husband would like him, but they seemed to hit it off, and for maybe the first time since I got married, I felt like family all together. Kurt said, "You never told me your brother was a real fisherman." I said, "Oh. Well, he is." I forget to tell him things about my family. I often forget I have one. He is my family now. Our counselor thinks I'm not a great communicator.


I am sad for my brother's failing health. I work in an industry where it is impossible not to know what it means to have a stroke, even if they get you to the hospital in time to bust the clot. I am grateful that he and I have lived long enough into this life to sort of know one another, although I will always feel separate from him, which is not very different than how I always feel.

One of the most significant memories from my very early childhood, maybe even the earliest memory of all, was of being awakened before dawn to hear him saying goodbye to me. I was in the top bunk, and he hugged me and ruffled my curly blonde hair. He still calls me Jude. He was seventeen and leaving for the Navy. It was that or prison I guess. I never did know what he did wrong. Maybe I should ask him. I've always wondered. But I guess he, or my Dad, chose the Navy. As you can tell with the face painting incident mentioned above, it didn't go well. None of my brother's took to the military. Or the military to them, it seems. Rebels, one and all.

vacation: backwards, in two parts

I can't tell where I'm typing. But this is Glass Beach in Fort Bragg. It used to be the city dump and now is literally covered in beach glass. People gather it in five-gallon buckets, so there isn't as much as there used to be. According to K, used to be you could see old Model-T's sticking out of the sidehills where they had been dumped and rusted. They are no longer visible.





Now we are in the Avenue of the Giants, although this happened in reverse. I can never remember to load the pictures in reverse order so they come out front to back. Ah, well. Use your imaginations. The route was this: Portland to Eliot Creek for a night; Jed Smith for 3 nights; Russian Gulch (Mendocino) for two nights; Willitts for a night; Port Orford for a night and home. There is much story to fill these gaps, but because I am a crappy blogger (albiet a decent writer) you will have to wait for your bedtime stories until a little later, kiddies.



More and more trees. I don't know what to say about the redwoods. A cathedral. We drove through Stout Grove across the river from Jed Smith, but the sun hardly came out the whole time we were there, so these shots are all from the Avenue of the Giants, which is somewhere further south along the Eel River.

More and more. The place to the left is where I peed. Just in case you were hoping for some significance. I mark territory like a male dog with prostate problems.

More Avenue of the Giants. And more....

I'm not very good at making the right words go with the right pictures. To the left is a view looking up in the Avenue of the Giants.

Our setup. The trailer has all of our gear and we sleep in the truck. This is from the Avenue of the Giants in California somewhere. (if this photo doesn't post, it is our white ford truck. again, imagination....)

Me and a big tree

The lighthouse at Crescent City


This is a giant redwood on a trail in Jed Smith. The chunks cut into the sides were for platforms for fallers back in the day. Coulda been my uncle or cousins, redwood loggers all.

This is camp #22 in Jedidiah Smith State Park. it was a great camp that they rented us by mistake and we had to move to #12, which was okay, but not as great. Sid, the guard dog, protects us from bears.

camp

Jed Smith to Russian Gulch at Mendocino. Very pretty. More later.

equipped

I am equipped to go camping. I am not as equipped as, say, asha and M. Lee, to trek about the unknown world with one spork and a napsack slung over one shoulder. Not like that. I am a campground camper. Not a trekker. I bring my stuff, a minimalistic version, decorate the redwoods as though that were possible or necessary, and sit there until I want to go home. I like sitting here. I like sitting there. Either is fine. I have my tent and my throw rugs so I don't drag dirt inside the tent. I have my shower bag and my bag of games with travel scrabble and dice and a cribbage board and cards; I finally caved and purchased blue speckle-ware plates. I found a full set of pots and pans at a yard sale for two bucks last year, so felt pretty good about buying 30$ worth of new stuff. I like having the camping gear all tucked away, year after year, so when we pull it out it is like christmas. Having a poor memory is delightful. And with perma-gear, there is less to put away when we get home.

This year, with my utter dependence on Silver Hills Squirrely Bread, I found a camp toaster for 1.93 at Walmart. I hate the W stores. But, as the impact of peak oil begins to affect me personally (ah, acceptance; ah, materialism gone awry; ah, shit) and the marauding zombie hoards begin to branch out from Winco and Walmart and Walgreens onto your front porch and mine, it makes a freakin' good case for camping gear and good locks for those gas caps. They (the zombies) were in rare form at Walmart yesterday. I really expected the biting to begin in earnest.

So I looked online for one of those fold-up kitchens, and, as with anything, you can take out a loan and get the top-o'-the-line, but I found the one I wanted for only 60 bucks. It's just a small aluminum set of folding shelves and a top rack for hanging utensils. Nothing burly like Coleman makes which is so cumbersome you may as well install an actual kitchen sink in the forest. I'm happy with my rubbermaid wash tub and tin pan. Some things are just right the way they are. Heaven knows I can haul water. I happen to know the exact weight of five gallons going uphill pregnant. But that, my friends, is another story for another day.

I have been reading this survivalist guide to packing your gear. This is a guy who is into the weight and volume of things. He's thinkin' about carrying his shit around. Not me. But there is a way to pack meat for the duration. He says you freeze it really good for a couple of days in the deepest part of the freezer, and then use in order: chicken first, then pork, then beef. That is the recommended order. I love to cook in the woods, so we will eat very well. I like to eat ribs and other barbaric things straight outta the fire. The first night, we will have blackened chicken breasts with whole green chilis and jack cheese ala clay's smokehouse. Yum.

We will prepare with rain gear and plenty of rope and tarps, and huddle beneath the redwoods for an early summer nap.

I hesitate to say I have enough, but I think I'm just about ready to go.

This post is

In memory of my brother Marc Dixon Kinney

Who returned from Viet Nam but never came home.

over and done with

Yep, its all gone. I chickened out and didn't sell the blue bouncy chairs. As a woman was prepared to hand me 100.00, I choked and found new resolve to paint them. I'm pretty much over the whole shabby chic thing and they are most definitely shabby. But they are so comfortable, and at some point, function does over-ride form. Doesn't it? Besides, I wander through all of the aisles of all of the stores and there is brown on brown and taupe on beige every friggin place you look. I don't want no fucking menopause-beige lawn chairs. I'm done with beige. You can't make me. I'm keeping my antiques. They will be painted white or red. I'm in a pretty red mood these days. Seems most of my shoes are red. I bought a pair of red pants.

Who cares?

So, I made about 60 bucks. But the important thing is that I got rid of a bunch of stuff I don't love. Impusle buys. And I'm willing to take the hit to learn the lesson. I resolved to only keep the stuff I really really like. And you know me.... I do like my stuff. Remember the old adage:

You can't have everything -- where would you put it?

So, there you have it. I felt really good about pricing things low, and selling to people in my neighborhood who loved what they found. And in the end, the rest went to goodwill and the free chairs left on the street. It was sweet to see this little boy who wanted this idiotic black beanbag chair and ottoman that I HAD TO HAVE at one point. I was certain if I had this certain beanbag chair that I would write more. Well, not only is that a crock of shit, it was so uncomfortable. And because I had made such a thing about getting it, I had a hard time (me!) admitting what a waste of 20 bucks it was. So, I finally drug it down the thin stairs and put a 10$ price tag on it. This kid really wanted it, sat on it, hung out, but his mother wouldn't cough up the cash. When we put the free sign on it, he came back. When we left for dinner, he was camped out waiting for his mom to pick him up.

So, my load is a little lighter, and that always feels good. A trip to the redwoods on a light tank should be nice. I only want one thing: one of those camping kitchens. They're cool.

but before we go...

Gotta do the Yard Sale. I'm tossing things down the staircase, and if you recall, it is a bit narrow. One stuffed chair got stuck and in pushing it through I nearly followed and would have spent my redwood adventure on crutches. But I caught myself in the nick o time and am saved.


Anyway, I am looking forward to selling my shit for money. Please come and buy some. I'm selling the blue bouncy chairs, L. You know you want them. I'm over shabby-chic.

Ginormous Yard Sale. One day only.

redwood bound

We are in the serious planning phase of our May/June vacation. We leave next wednesday and will be in the valley wed nite, then off to Jedediah Smith State Park in the heart of the Redwoods. A cathedral of trees nourished by the pristine Smith River which, by Mighty Columbia standards, barely qualifies as a creek. Its a beauty. Jade pools and dark overhangs of moss and rock and ferns and wild Rhodys and Azalea and Trillium and and and. I love that place. Haven't camped there since I was a girl and it was free.

We will take, along with everything we own, a propane heater because it is looking a little chilly there under the trees. Ah, more fires. More and more and more.

fine dining

I have been looking and looking for a dining room set that will fit in my bay window. Oh such are my struggles. The trials and tribulations of judybluesky in the big city. So many choices and craigslist too. So I finally settled on a nice black set from good ol' Freddy's. I love Freddy's. You can get about anything there. So, I rearranged my junk, made a yard sale pile, and next week, if the blazing spring sun obliges, I'll sell all my shit that I don't want anymore. I may change my mind. I will, no doubt, many times over. My husband finds this behavior curious. He admittedly wouldn't change a thing, inside or out, until the house looks like the set of Psycho, stuffed mothers and all, but not me. I'm for a bi-annual clearing out. You should show up. It'll be a good one. I'm trying to think of a good name for it.

Cheap Crap
Spring Cleaning Extravaganza
The Best Yard Sale Ever
Multi-Family Yard Sale (a white lie)

But whatever the title, it'll be one day only. Period. I'm not one for dragging things out. Either they sell or they don't. And I am usually surprised at what doesn't sell. My treasures usually sit unnoticed and unappreciated until I run in the house to use the bathroom and return to find that my husband has sold my 50.00 crate and barrel oil and vinegar set for two bucks. Usually, you can count on things made of wood selling fairly well. I will not have a christmas table. I will not sell wax items that have been sitting in the sun. I will not purchase things at stores and resell them. I will sell my piles of large clothing. I will finally rid myself of my old primer-rust chairs and a bunch of other shit. I'll probably sell it all too cheap and, as my husband says, "...spend the year buying three thousand dollars of shit and selling it for twenty five bucks." Sounds good.

Ah well, its something to do on a Saturday afternoon.

canby in the mist

So much for forecasters. I never trusted them anyway. I did hope, however, that I'd be able to shop for great plants in dry if not warm weather. Liars.

No worries, though. The Canby Master Gardner plants are there for the taking if you have PLENTY of money. They seemed a little pricey to me. I only spent about twenty bucks, so got off easy.

We bought a wagon (a Gorilla Dump Wagon) to make the trip. I had no intention of going without one. I looked on craigslist for a kiddie wagon cheap, but didn't get the one that was listed. So we went shopping late Friday night and found one at Freddy's. Its great. Too bad we really have no room for it. It is much better than a wheelbarrow, with four fat tires and a dump-able bed for less shoveling. So, K put it together for me and pulled it around the garden party. I do love my flowers.

This year we bought two pale coral bells, a maidenhair fern, three tomato plants and a black viney thing. Now, I can happily go to some other place and buy pony packs of lesser plants for filler.

4

Happy Anniversary to us! Four years. I feel more married this year than I have in the past. I was trying to explain that to my husband over sushi at Todai--nasty salty snow crab, no creme brulee for me--I just feel more like I think other [normal] people feel when they are married. I held my breath for the first two years. I couldn't believe my good fortune. I was afraid I would wake up and find, once again, that I don't get to keep what I have.

I went through life that way for the longest time. I was always sure that the gods would see that I had a wonderful life and eventually, send someone to tap me on the shoulder and say, "We know who you are and we saw what you did." And just like that, in a fingersnap, it would all be gone.

And it could have been, and could still be. But it isn't. And a fabulous life takes maintenance and cooperation and that hardest of all things, the word escapes me... it means to split the difference, to give and take, to... to... COMPROMISE. That's it. Ah. To willingly suspend the need to have it my way. Not my best thing. I spent so many years getting good at making people think it was their idea. Then, just moments later... their fault.

Naw. Not really. I'm not that mean.

Anyway, Happy Day. May Day May Day. Silver heart with wings for me, stargazers for him and a star in heaven.

southland in the springtime

We went down to see Haley and her NW Youthcorps crew in the hills outside of Tiller yesterday. I don't think I've been up to South Umpqua Falls in 20 years. It is a little different, I think. I think the fish ladder is newish. We were looking at campsites for our upcoming vacation the first week of June.

Ah, vacation.

We were planning a trip to Yellowstone and finally got clear about our unwillingness to spend 600.00 on gas. What a pisser. But we did clarify our mission, eventually. I asked my husband what he wanted to do for a vacation, and he said, "Whatever you want, my love," which I must admit has a damn nice ring to it. But that was not the point. Then, he talked about spending time with his father, who isn't getting any younger either, and we agreed to camp in the southlands.

For me, it is agreeing to camp in the southlands again. Since he grew up in the backwoods of Southern Oregon/Northern California, camping is a foreign thing. Live in dirt on purpose? He's pretty new to it. And me, being the queen of camping, owner of all camping things, it is all a vacation is to me. There is nothing else. What do I want to do on vacation? Camp. What do I need? A book and a tree and a chair. That's it. And water tumbling by. And maybe ripe blackberries. That is it. Oh, and no eighties rock music blaring from bad car speakers. That's nice too. So I may be a tiny bit picky.

So, southbound we are. For those of you who know it, we will be at Hutton on Eliot Creek from May 29th until about June 2-3, something like that. C'mon up. Bring a chair and your own damn book. I'm re-reading the Thornbirds for the thousandth time. I love that story. Tortured catholics. Don't know why.

So we spent the day with Haley, who is a burly little thing, with her dreads and rag clothing stitched together with fur and carpet remnants, giant bones stretching her ears into skin hoops, carving trails where there were none, moving boulders from rockslides along the Rogue River. Children guiding children to learn the value of good hard work. I think it is okay. Go NWYC. They work harder than I ever could or have. Or would.

Today, I shopped early to get the Winko trip out of the way. I went to the one on 82nd, and let me tell you, 82nd is a scary place 'long about 7:30 on a Sunday morning. The humans that roll out from under bushes and parked cars and those tiny little hooker motels are a mess. As the sun comes out, so does everybody else.

Then we went yard-sailing, and found some unnecessary shit including a Frank Zappa CD . When we popped it in the CD player, a song came on and I knew the words to it. It was such a strange sensation to know the words to "Hot Rats." Clearly, I was in a coma for way too long. I do know about his logo and what it is. If I knew how to post drawings, I'd show you. If you know it, and can post drawings, WAIT! this is the age of the internet. It MUST be out there somewhere..... be right back... okay, here's the logo. Okay, well obviously it is at the front end of this post. So, return to beginning and look at it. Do you know what it is?

Well I do.

So, apparently I did have some interest in Frank Zappa. I know his children are called Moon Unit and Dweezel. Memory surprises me sometimes--the storage capability of my brain and the absence of recall. But once triggered, a cascade of useless trivia is momentarily available to me. And I make it available to you, my readers.

Anyway, we went for a walk as evening approached and saw a UPS guy walking his dog. We were going to follow him to see if he made only right turns but got bored and went home.