why I stayed home this weekend

It all started innocently enough. Every year we empty the truck and head down to the Jacksonville yard sales. Always the same time of year, always the same plan. We spend friday night near town, wake up, hit the yard sales (see previous posts) have breakfast with friends and family at the Mustard Seed, and after it is all said and done, head up-river to have Bob's birthday dinner at his place. A five or six or seven year tradition, and given that he's seventy two or three, its been going on for some time.

This year, it didn't go off as planned.

The first thing that changed was that there was nowhere for us to stay.

One: My mother-in-law's daughter reserved the cabin for that weekend, the only weekend we always stay there. Pick one of fifty-two.

Two: Kurt's son decided to cook a pig in the ground for the birthday,

Three: and invite a billion people. Well, fifty. He is working to organize this, but my outlaws have no faith in David's ability to roast a pig in an imu without burning down the forest and the adjacent crop, so

Four: my husband is asked to get involved. He cannot say no to his father. So he goes online and finds out how to roast a pig, and shares this with Dave, who seems to have done the same thing. He's got a plan for getting the right kind of rocks (lava) and cornstalks instead of banana leaves, and a chef to help him with the cooking, and all the kids to bring different food for the luau. David isn't the problem. Neither is his grandfather. From my POV its his wife. No love lost there. So, as David is trying to get this thing together for his grandfather, she is running ahead of him mucking it up, telling people to bring different things, planning a big breakfast and a dinner the night before, but she'll have her daughter to help her out. Like martyr like dartyr.

Five: Johann says we can use his cabin. Johann builds huge temporary shelters for raves and for Burning Man and lives next door. But there are no cooking facilities and I can't find out if the dogs can stay there, so

Six: My husband says we'll just stay in the back of the pickup. Johann is a german hippie who usually has three or four naked young women hanging around.

Seven: The girls are going with us, (a happy thing) and David's best friend Cody is hitching a ride, but we have to wait for him to get off work until about six, which will put us there at eleven at night. He has AIDS, which is sad but fine with us, but bringing him around the clan is like bringing a vial of live ebola virus. He won't be welcome and we'll be the assholes who brought him.

So by Thursday night, here's how its looking to me: Its 100 degrees in the Rogue Valley, we have nowhere to stay except with Johann and the naked girls or in the back of our truck with two dogs, Nicole, Haley and Cody, which will be fine becasue my husband will be up all night either a.) building and guarding the bonfire, or b.) putting out a forest fire, or c.) explaining to the rangers who are taking us all to jail why we shouldn't be arrested for growing marijuana and burning down the forest, all the while we listen to Patricia cackle about why David should never have tried to roast a pig.

So, you may ask, what about the yard sales?

Well that's what I said.

So I stayed home.

labor

Today we went to yard sales and I bought this tea set. It is like Fiestaware, bright oranges and blues and greens and yellows, incomplete, but a little girl would never know that. I'm not sure why I bought it. We use these toys to teach women to be servile and domestic, both of which evade me still. I like to buy things and decorate my house, but I don't think that qualifies as domesticity. I still think I should have a maid to pick up after me. My husband would agree that I need it. I'm kind of like Pigpen only with Pottery Barn and Crate & Barrel shit gathering at my feet. Ah, the curse of good taste and a steady job.

It is Labor Day tomorrow, and I may labor through it. Because there have been so many passings (Goodnight Rose, goodnight Charlie, Goodnight Willie) I am bracing for the unrelenting flood of new ones that press against the locked doors, seeking shelter from the storm that is Alzheimer's Disease.

reunionish

As fewer and fewer of my immediate clan remain above ground, family reunions become increasingly extended. It was good to see my first cousins, but I didn't know anyone else, and thank God for Vali, my treasured cousin. We, with our men, drove together and escaped together, and ate and talked and looked at a wonderful scrapbook of sweet memories from a time when the only way to preserve paper was in a scrap book, not digitized, not youtubed.

My aunt (of whom these children were born) was meticulous about every area of her life, her scrapbook a reflection of her genealogist-librarian mind. I will never be like that, and sometimes my personal unravelling is a source of unrest for me. We are the black sheep -- my immediates and I, but we are beloved -- there is never any doubt -- and as I spoke to one dying man who was hooked up to a power pack of some sort that was keeping him somewhat alive, our similarities and differences were in an odd balance. He hears that I am a writer. Yes, I admit. That's true. His family has a publishing company. Oh, my ears perk up, really? My husband whispers, this could be a good thing. I listen. The dying man says he is trained in theology and publishes theological books. Oh. Maybe his is not the publishing house for me. What kind of novel? he inevitably asks. Oh, darkish women's literary fiction. An autobiography? No, I tell him, although parts are emotionally true-ish. Ah. He knows what I mean. I wonder if he does. His face is gray and his feet are black. Whatever he knows, he needs to get it said and quick if anyone on this side of the veil is to hear it.

We ate burgers and potato salad and red velvet cake and went home, our names and photographs captured for ancestry.com and posterity. I guess photos are inaccessible as long as you are living. When a death date is entered, you become public domain.

Back at the office Rose is dying slowly. It is hard to explain to the living how hard it is to die, that dying is a process. Even you, my readers, will think I mean a spiritual process. I mean it is physical work. Something to attend to. Something to do. And your body knows just how to do this thing, this ending. It stops getting hungry and thirsty, it stops eating. If it is an indian back in the day it wanders away from the tribe where it can die unobstructed by the living and the loving. It is hard for families to stop feeding the dying. They think they are helping. But the person who is doing their level best to leave is sidetracked from the serious business of getting it over with, and made to digest another small container of yogurt or ensure, as though those small bites could somehow sidestep death. And they are so sweet, the dying are. They open little bird mouths and take another sip so as not to hurt anyone's feelings, making yet another detour on the way home. But we all make it home eventually.

Ah, life.

annual blackberry post

I just want to go on record as saying that if you live in Oregon and you don't pick blackberries, it is a sin. Conversely, if you live in Oregon and you plant blackberries, it is a sin. I think its pretty much like any sin-not sin determination: you're damned if you do and damned if you don't. Also, I'm sure I've said, but will repeat myself, that cockroaches and blackberries will be the last ones standing. (see previous posts, turns out there is only so much to be said for blackberry picking and I say it once a year.)

There. I've said my piece.

Today we (he) got up early and (he) made coffee and we went to pick blackberries. As I pick, I think of this post, this yearly pilgrimage to the vines, wearing a long sleeved shirt not becasue I shoot heroin, but to protect my lily-white arms. (ghosts of summers past) And real shoes. Even my bzillion dollar keens can't keep the thorns away. And my overalls, which are now museum-quality. I'll take a picture. I actually order upholstery samples online to patch them with. A thing of beauty, depending on the beholder.

So, I pick - and this summer it is all low hanging fruit, easy pickin' - thanks to the endless spring of Portland. We picked for 45 minutes and filled a five-gallon bucket. Now, two pies are in the smoker (what?) and 4 racks of berries in the freezer for pies to come. Enough left for a smoothie. Yum.

This isn't blackberry 101, but there is a trick to it. Like any fruit, if it doesn't want to come off the vine, it isn't ready. You have to respect that or you'll have a sour pie and use a ton of sugar. Ripe berries have a shine to them, a fullness. If they've lost the shine and are a bit dull, they are still great for jam or juice, but will fall apart in your hand. So I just pop those in my mouth and call them breakfast. Then come home and make a smoothie and call it breakfast too. Then an egg sandwich on sourdough, but I'm getting into a problem area.

So, Kurt made the pies and is trying out the smoker instead of heating up the house with the oven. I appreciate the heat consciousness, but am tentative in my support of the smoker.

Okay. I've been busily editing the f**king manuscript and am making real progress. I should be finished in time to send it to the publisher of my dreams. Back to work.

Oh, this might surprise you, but I want to put in a pitch for french manicures. I'm a gardener and I work in health care and my hands always look like crap. A french manicure is the fix for that. Just sayin'.

kim's sauce

If you are from Southern Oregon and dined on the bad chinese food at Kim's restaurant (now defunct) I was given the recipe for the pink sauce, shrimp sauce, Kim's sauce they were famous for. Posting it on the internet is piracy, I'm sure. It was a best-kept secret until somebody got as drunk as the after-hours patrons and spilled the beans.

Kim's Sauce

Mix all ingredients in order, stirring each time.

1 egg
2 1/2 c. salad oil
7 oz. catsup
1 c. sugar
2 tsp. Chinese hot mustard
1/2 tsp. salt
2/3 c. apple cider vinegar

Blend until smooth
makes about a quart.
Store in refrigerator.

requiem for a neighbor

John Spates died. One more of the Applegate boys is gone. We were neighbors up on Yale Creek. He lived one hill over on Shump Gulch with my running buddy, Helen, and her son Shannon. He's the one, if you remember, who killed the goat we bar-b-qued. He was beautiful.

I lived in a cabin of hand-peeled logs, built by John and Kenny Powers. That was what they did. They built log things: fences, houses, barns. My house was constructed of logs graduated in size from large at the bottom to small at the top. A half-loft had a notched pole to climb to sleep, and I did. A front porch, enclosed with a rail, all of peeled poles.

It was so beautiful. I hung snake grass and pressed leaves in the windows to rattle in the wind. These were my curtains. I had no close neighbors but John and Helen, and Topar when he was around.

But they're all gone now, Topar, Kenny, now John. And so many more.

Rest in peace.

my summer vacation

Lewis and Clark got nothin' on us.

This will probably turn into a series of shorter posts rather than one boring travel journal. We travelled many miles in not so many days, stayed in awful RV parks and worse motels and I have the pictures to prove it.

This blue haired troll followed us. Sometimes he rode the motorcycle. But he always seemed pretty happy.

Here he is in the Tetons. As you can see, he hogged the photograph.

We took off on Friday and spent the first night in our first RV park. These are strange places, in the event you find yourself wondering. We are campers, and we are country folk -- in a way -- but not like these people. They are very friendly and they make everything out of wood and rope and barbed wire and from the looks of things they worship cowboys and Jesus, in that order. My favorite sign: "I'm so confused I don't know if I found a rope or lost my horse."

We pulled into the Mountain View Park in Baker City, Oregon at about 8:30 in the evening, hotter than blazes. A Lorretta Lynn or some country chick other than Patsy Cline, CD was playing on speakers loud enough to entertain the entire park, and it was skipping, and the woman at the counter, Barb, told us she hadn't had much luck using toothpaste to clean her CDs.

Really? No luck at all?

Yep, she nodded, "and that's such a good CD."

We dove in the pool and tried to forget where we were. At 18 bucks for a spot to sleep, a pool and a hot tub, it seemed like a good deal even though we rented the scenic basketball court because it was th only place left because the entire park had been reserved by Shriners, even the clowns in the tiny cars. But they have full size RVs let me tell you. Next morning off we went after I scrambled some eggs on the free-throw line.

Not really. You should know by now how I exaggerate.

So, our destination at this point was Yellowstone. Well, not actually Yellowstone, but a spot beyond it, Shell Canyon, in the Bighorn mountains. It is a place Kurt passed through on his way to Sturgis and one he has tried to show me for years. And believe me, if you're hauling a big black bike, everybody asks if you're headed for Sturgis. We were not. I'm pretty sure I'd never go unless he bought me a sidecar. One with a/c and a pool. The thought of Sturgis irritates me. I love motorcycles but can't stand bikers. I speak from an informed point of view. I can't imagine standing six bikers deep to use one of sixty outhouses.

But I digress.

One of the education points of this vacation, and there were a few, was the unreliability of memory. Not just his, mine as well. He had blown through the prior trip at 90 mph, eyes forever on the center line until it turned to one long white stripe, on a mission to complete the male right of passage that is Sturgis. Turns out he missed some scenery along the way.

Shell Canyon made quite an impression.
So many birds: swallows and wrens and hummingbirds darting in and out of juniper and

sagebrush. I'm getting the order of things mixed up, but as we left Yellowstone, we came through the beautiful Shoshone River Valley lined on either side with red rock formations that went on for miles and miles into Cody, Wyoming. He hadn't remembered seeing this at all. In his memory, Shell Canyon went on for miles when in fact, the canyon is a blink, a mile at most.

I realize I have said nothing about Yellowstone. I know I was supposed to love it but it just made me sad. The forest there is dying of pine beetle infestation, caused, I have no doubt, by something we did to help it along, as though it wasn't doing fine in the first place. And what isn't infested was burned in the 1988 fire. And I'm thinking another big ol' burn would be really good for the problem in general. Start over. We saw pine beetle damage far up into Montana and across much of Idaho.

So, we went through Yellowstone and saw animals and paint pots and the black toothpick forest.

and then we went to the Tetons, but that's another story for another day.... In case you're wondering, I took the last photo. I'm not great at it.

late friday

I should be writing. This is always true. You may say: you are writing. And you would be correct, in a wrong sort of way.

It was a long day, it has been a long life. I don't know any 90 year olds who are looking to extend their warranty. None who would go longer, given the option. Maybe with a new body, maybe then. But as is? Nope. When there is a rare open apartment in my unit, I spend the day touring people, doing my dog and pony show, being the expert on dementia. Which I am, in case you were wondering. Even so, it is hard to be the cheerleader and the angel of death in the same breath.

I should retire.

Ah, now back from a friday supper of grilled salmon, garlic sauce and home fries, collards with pecans and corn salsa, at Clay's, I am refreshed, ready for the weekend.

not duffy

Enough about Duffy the little white dog.

We've lost seven souls on the unit since February 26th. I'd say seven souls from seven seas to wax poetic and be a little bit like Janis Joplin, but this is serious. Its been a bit heavy, a lot hectic, and they are dropping like flies in August and its only July. And it isn't even like July almost at all. It is rainy rainy rainy, sky pressing down like a flat sweaty hand, clouds as dark as nightfall. I had to turn my headlights on a four o'clock. Its the end of the world.

Oh, they come to die. I don't mean to seem surprised. I'm not. Its just that each life leaves a bit of a vacuum, a space to fill, and they come to fill it. There is a queue like a movie theatre of people who need what I provide: a nice safe place to lose it completely. Heck, I need that.

Anyway, today, Delphinium's daughter came by. She's a world famous musician and can only come once a year, so we had to have the sit-down talk. The end-of-life talk. I had to tell her that, from my point of view, Del probably had a year or less left in her. Now, I don't have a crystal ball, but I've been keeping my eyes open, and I know what the end of this path looks like. I never promise anything -- I've learned my lesson there. But Del's daughter had spoken with another family member, and she told her this story: judybluesky said my mother would die in less than a year, then she said she'd be gone in less than a week, then she said she'd be gone by the end of the day, then she said she had about twenty minutes left and she was right about each one of those things for my mom.

Its wierd what you can get good at.

two

Duffy's first haircut

exorcism

I composed a post three pages long describing the past four days of projectile vomitting and other niceties, but pulled it in a rare act of humanity. I felt like a parentless child in need of someone to hold my hair and tell me I'd be okay, but my husband, who is not a nurse, was away at work and school, and I had only yapping dogs to comfort me. It was really hard. It was norovirus. I think its about over. Whew.

But while waiting for my head to spin around on my shoulders ala Linda Blair, I managed a good deal of editing. Managing, for example, a 393 page find/search of the following: all "ly" words (I think they're called adverbs: morosely, fanatically, tragically, joyously, frankly,); the word 'had'; the action 'nodded,' as in: 'she nodded.' (Turns out people don't nod that much really. But in my manuscript, the characters are nodding fools); the words 'that,' then', and 'when.'

I hate my manuscript. But press on.

So, in rebellion, I offer the following sentences:
(original)"Yes," I had nodded enthusiastically. "She had been vigorously vomitting."
(eidted) She puked.

hillsboro day

We picked Rainier cherries this morning, alot of them, so now I have to can cherries. I think I'll make pints, and this time, use a cherry pitter. I've hand-pitted cherries, but it was labor-intensive and I'm not. These are not my favorite cherries, but they are Kurt's, so a-canning I will go. I prefer bings. mmmmmmmmmmm. The sun is out, Saturday market busy with shoppers. We found a few good yard sales and then went out to lunch at a terrible hamburger place called "Five Guys Burgers." It was just what it sounded like, a greast nasty mess, except for the hand-cut-double-fried-fries. Those were tasty. But I don't like burgers, so no surprise. I fed mine to the dogs. Poor dogs.

Latersameday: The cherries are pitted and canned. One dozen pint jars of floating yellow orbs of deliciousness. You will get one for Christmas. Or maybe a jar of the real strawberry jam I canned last weekend. When I lay my head on my down pillow tonight, I may utter something like "Goodnight, Maryellen. Goodnight, Johnboy." That's how domestic I feel right about now. I could go for a barn raising. I may be Amish.

Naw.

sins and decisions

Gluttony. One of the seven deadlies. In my job, which has recently become bigger because my boss retired and the new boss isn't here yet, and the nurse, the second in command, is on vacations, so I am pretty much everybody, well, in my job, I meet people. They are typically in need, in crisis, at the end of their life or their rope or both, and I have to interview them for placement. Placement. What a word. In its wisdom, the Great State of Oregon has contrived a new language to make what I do a little more palatable. For example, folks are no longer admitted, they move in. They are never discharged, they (you guessed it) move out. They get move out notices, not evictions. But placement is still placement. There really isn't another word for it.


Jesus.


What I am getting at is not the language of long term care, but this fat fat woman I met today. I am working on placing her. And, as you might imagine, placing a 350 pound woman has its own set of concerns. You would want to consider, for example, where to place her, and on what? And for how long, and can she get up from there? And I was taking someone else's word for it, and I needed to see for myself that she could move because if she couldn't and we had to call the fire department because she was stuck, they'd get mad at us, and I hate that. But shit, sometimes, like a kitten in a tree, people have trouble getting out of places.


So I went to her house. "I need to see you move," I said.

She started struggling around with her robes and blankets and stuff, and I was a little concerned that she wasn't decent, so I just turned my head.

I asked her if she'd checked out the apartment she was going to be renting. I never go anywhere," she said. Never.

She has opted to eat rather than, well, anything else.

It made an impression is all.

noturpathic

I never did follow up on the naturpathic business. Well, to no one's surprise, I am not Noah. I could not hang with the HCG 500 calorie a day diet. I lost 18 pounds in 14 days and was so sick at that point that I bailed. She said I'm not the biggest loser, but the fastest. But then I quit.

Here's the problem. She was so nice. She put nice oils on cotton balls and taped them to my feet and playes swishy water music while I lay in the dark with needles poked here and there and that was fine. But really, who wouldn't lose weight like that?

And the cost was obscene. At each visit there were more and more supplements, more and more drops and oils and it all just makes me sick. Nauseous. I can't take multi-vitamins, let alone forty different things. I can't take ibuprofen or anything in that family. So, I got pretty sick.

I went to my knee/shoulder MD and told him the naturpathic thing was a flop. I told him I think you have to believe it for it to work and I just don't. I wish I did.

He said, fingers making the twinkly, do-wah sign: "You are not the Jedi they seek."

I love that guy.

random acts

I am in Cannon Beach, a swanky town by my standards, for a writing conference. I have my fluffy little white dog with me and we have a lovely room with a fireplace and a view of the beach.

I like this conference. It gets better each year: good faculty, interesting information. For instance, I found a way to organize my book that I have been lacking, given my general, habitual, genetic lack of organization. Excellent.

And, one of the presenters was/is a senior editor at a good publishing house and he offered to look at agent queries and first pages for critique. What I didn't realize is that this would be done in front of the entire conference.

He critiqued five submissions, each one worse than the one before it, saving mine for last. I was, understatedly, anxious. Sweating bullets. Was mine to be the final straw, so flawed as to hold a special last place?

I waited.

I had included in my query letter, by way of bio, my alma mater, a short story publication in an obscure literary journal, and having received the 2004 award for fiction. You do that in queries. You tell on yourself that way. It builds cred.

So he begins his critique of my piece by mentioning the fact that there are no page numbers. This irritates him. (Well, I think to myself, if it was a REAL submission, I'd include them.) Then he talks generally about the query, which was pretty good. Then..... then he talks about the bio. He says, "Now this bio shows us exactly why it is a good idea to include a bio."

Drumroll...................

"Turns out," he says, "I went to THAT alma mater, was the editor for THAT obscure literary journal and won precisely THAT award for fiction -- only in 2003."

I wasn't exactly listening, but when he got to the end of that last sentence, I realized he wasn't joking. I blurted from the rear of the audience, "Are you fucking serious?" But I didn't say fucking out loud.

He was serious. So, after the thing, I approached him and asked if I could send him a manuscript. He said, of course. I'm interested.

I means nothing, really. Not in the scope of getting this thing published. But each little push makes the work seem worthwhile.

Random? I think yes.

delilah

Well, after a very long haul, Delilah finally passed. Her funeral was a Catholic mass, which is always confusing for me, all of the standing and sitting and kneeling and drinking and repeating phrases that everyone but me knows about. I felt like the only heathen in the room, but my mother always told us that the pope is the anti-christ, so who's heathen now?

Anyway, it takes a really long time to die of just Alzheimer's and Delilah was otherwise healthy. She was a teacher, and she thought, because of my desk (and my commanding presence) that I was her principal. If we had a party -- christmas, you name it -- it would make her anxious. Parties make most people with dementia anxious, which begs the question: why? But I digress. When anxious, she would march into my office and say, "If you can't get these kids to quiet down, I'm getting the nuns."

Okay, Delilah. I'll deal with the kids.

She wore a wig, kicked the cats, chased my dog, tore down bulletin boards each night, and didn't sleep for years. Years. She made up anything you wanted to know. She wasn't a liar, but she didn't want to seem uninformed, so she'd just confabulate.

In the end, she went for a long sleep. Finally. At last. Her daughter was a wonderful advocate. She kept her wig washed and set long after Delilah had forgotten about hair. She understood the ravages of dementia and never missed an opportunity to speak for her mother. She cared what was important to her, not just what was important for her. Often those of us in the helping industry forget the difference.

noah

If he can do it, I can do it. I'm on day 7 of 40. Fifteen pounds and counting.

As much as I detest using my blog as a diet diary, I'm a bit consumed by what is happening to my body. I feel better most of the time, am not so much hungry as weak, and had accupuncture yesterday for the first time. It didn't hurt, and may have helped. The only lingering problem is leg cramps. I was having them prior to the cleanse/diet, and am trying some natural measures to stop them. Thanks to asia for her wisdom, and for running until she cramps so she knew what to tell me. There is always someone in front of me on whatever path I find myself on.

My conclusion at this point is that naturpathic medicine is still medicine, is pricey, and there is still alot to do about my once-failing self. I do feel better, lighter, and hopeful. Diets are for fools. Call them cleanses, call them what you will. I know this. But my knees hurt and I was so sick. I just wanted something like a zipper that I could unzip the last 5 years of stress and cortisol and fast food and step out of the fat suit I've acquired. The only lasting solution is movement, something I don't get with my current set of hobbies. Change. Ah. I remember change.

This weekend we will observe Memorial Day, or Decoration Day as we used to call it in the nursing home. We used to load all of the old women, they usually outlived and outnumbered the men, on the bus and take them around to local cemeteries because everybody pretty much lived and died in the same place. Most men went to war and were buried out at the Veteran's cemetery. My family did, and is. Women grew gardens specifically for Decoration Day, tulips and lilacs and daffodils and iris. Things that would bloom by May. My father is buried on the coast and he said he only wanted flowers from our own gardens. Never store-bought. I wish I'd known him better.

My former mother-out-law turns eighty today. We will celebrate her with a big party at Jackson Park on the Applegate River. She is a remarkable woman, the most influential in my life. She loves my son and I without reservation, even though his father and I never married except in a biker-sort-of-way. Her dignity surpasses anyone I've known. Her advice is sound and never given without asking and I've never heard her say a bad word about anyone -- and I can't say that about anyone else except my brother Doug. She is equally comfortable in a remote cabin cooking for a pack of men and mules or bringing out the fine china. I am blessed to be counted among her daughters.

Well, my wax is melting and I am working on a small piece for her birthday gift. Wish me luck. I'll put a bird on it.

elixer

Don't misunderstand. I'm still all for the natural way, however, I have now signed up for the diet program. Why, I'm wondering, are all nutritional specialists tiny? What do they know? Do they understand the intrinsic mistrust of the fat for the thin? Seriously.

Naw. She was nice. Just in a tiny way.

So I feel much like Jack in the hours just after he purchased the magic beans. I am hoping for a beanstalk outside my window tomorrow morning. I have purchased many magic beans in my lifetime, but, as usual, that's another story for another day.

So don't come for dinner for 40 days and 40 nights. I won't be cooking except for 100 gm. portions of meat and a plain vegetable. one. at. a .time.

cold feet

I'm complaining, formally, about the weather. I'm not complaining about the luscious lilacs in my back yard, or the sprouting baby grass where the dogs used to poop. I'm cold. I'm tired of being cold. I want to be warm now. I'm done. I am, to quote any teenager, over it. My feet are cold. They've been cold for months. I am grateful not to be in Mississippi right now. I'll give you that much.

So, anyway, back to my life on Clinton Steet on a cold and rainy sunday morning. The trucks were out today, two big metro vans of men on overtime hanging our new street art above our streetsigns, on our dime. I think the art is nice, bicycles, to indicate that Clinton is indeed a "bicycle boulevard" as if you couldn't tell from the volume of bicycles. Its part of the Clinton Street Bicycle Boulevard Street Art Project and costs 70,000 dollars. My husband had to set them straight, sign-maker that he is, and offer his opinion. I told them to ignore him. He's grumpy.

Speaking of grumpy, Duffy is guarding my bay window, warning of cats and wire-walking squirrels and crows that threaten our airspace. Kurt calls him Dick Cheney because of his continual grumbling. He still doesn't understand birds. He doesn't yet grasp the impossibility of catching something capable of spontaneous flight. Oh! to be so simple again, to cover my eyes with tiny hands and believe that what was there is gone simply because I can't see it. I hated learning the name for that: Conservation of Mass. I think there should be a better name for that kind of magic.

As summer approaches, sneaking up behind this vicious spring, I am not prepared for the heat that is sure to follow, but will welcome it with open, if sunburned, arms.