into stillness

There was a huge fog bank in the eastern part of the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Admiralty Inlet today, appearing as a solid wall of smoky whiteness. Whidbey Island disappeared, and only the very peak of Mt. Baker was visible from the beach. I had to drive into town this afternoon to run some errands, and though I could see the ferry emerging from that veil, it still felt as though this was Brigadoon, and our day was over for another 100 years.

I am told, by one who supposedly knows such things, that the salmon are running deep and heading right for the creeks. I guess so, since we haven't seen them jumping about in the baywaters in anything like the numbers we did last season. In any case, I like the image, the metaphor, of what the coho, chinook and chum are doing right now.

So I observe the vine maples turning delicious oranges and reds, the digger bees in their last flurry of mating, and the sun slipping below the tops of trees even in the middle of the day. Another glorious summer is coming to an end up here on the peninsula. The Dall's porpoises have been feeding lazily in the bay, and a solitary common loon skirts the shoreline in the evenings. The eagles have returned after their absence during the dryest part of the season.

My nerve endings have recovered from the last few years of trauma to the point where I'm realizing that tension is moving out of my body, and anxiety is becoming a distant memory. The approach of the rainy season feels timely to me, with the morning fogs and coral sunsets. Friends are gathering again and we have a few trips planned to recharge our batteries together. In a week or so our end-of-the-day walks will involve star-gazing if the nights are clear, as they often are, even in the rainy season. It will seem unlikely that we stood on the beach at 10 p.m. just a few short months ago, in bright daylight, but we'll welcome back the vibrant moon and the nighttime spring tides.

But that's what time it is. End of September. Just about the perfect time to run deep and head straight for the creeks.

uncle!

I have officially given up on my back yard. That monster is way too much for me to handle on my own. So I called in the Big Boys.

Okay, so it's a guy who was in my master gardener class, and who is a landscape designer, and who is pretty well known around here for his beautiful rock work ("natural boulder placement") and who has long been a student of Japanese garden design. He was here yesterday and he's got some wonderful ideas. (hobbitt is really quite excited about it, too. And not just because he won't have to be doing the digging or carting. Really.)

He'll be coming back with a model (not a sketch, but a model) of his plans. They will no doubt require large pieces of machinery to bring in the boulders ("Well, I think a nice three-ton piece would look really good as a focal point over here!") and other materials. So I'll have to move a good deal of this year's plantings from out front, and beg a neighbor to let us destroy a small part of his (neglected, unmown) front lawn.

This means, of course, that there's no boat in my immediate future. I don't know where the money is going to come from for this project, but I do know that getting it done will do everything - and I do mean everything - for my attitude about the yard.

argh!

All I wanted to do was book some flights. Which I did. And when I did that, I noticed that I hadn't been getting my miles on the grocery store club card. Anywhere.

At one time they went to United, but last year, I changed that to Alaska Air.

Nothing. For the whole year.

So this morning I gathered up all the grocery receipts and did battle with customer service at the grocery chain. Well, not battle really. But still.

All's well (or will be, with hope) in that regard at this time. However, sticking my hand in the receipt bin was a mistake.

I spent a good part of the day entering sales tax from all those receipts into our Quicken files. You might think there was some rhyme or reason to how those receipts were in the bin. And you would be wrong.

In any case, I've got over $1080 worth of sales tax payments accounted for, which is quite a bit more than Uncle Sam allows (by default) on the freaking tax forms for our income range. So it's well worth losing an afternoon of late September sunshine, right?

Right?

to be more like my dog

I realize that Inti has something good going on. She's content and happy, her coat is sleek and beautiful, and she still has her girlish figure, even at the ripe age of "somewhere between nine and 10." There are many ways I'd like to be more like her.

She eats her breakfast with gusto and then usually goes right back to sleep.

She lets someone else clean her house and do her nails.

In winter she naps in the sun, and in summer she naps in the shade.

She doesn't mind getting dirty when she plays. She loves her walks even when it's raining.

She has grass every now and then, but not on a regular basis.

She accepts love and affection freely and without guilt or trepidation.

She's not afraid to play with the cat, or suffer the occasional consequences.

I don't want to get all Robert Fulghum on you or anything. So let me reassure you that Inti and I are already quite a lot alike in many ways.

She likes to swim whenever she can, and being in the water is a joy.

She's pretty honest with other dogs. If she doesn't like them, she lets them know immediately to stay the hell away.

She gives affection freely, and is loyal to her loved ones.

She enjoys babies and small children, but is quite content not having them in the family.

She'll take all her toys out of the toybox but is generally incapable of putting them away.

She. Loves. Food.

Pretty much the only person she obeys is hobbitt.

And when she's playing and really frisky, she likes to be lying down.

so is this stupid or what?

Last night I decided to read a bit in bed.

It's always a mistake.

I turned off the light at 4:45 a.m.






And yes, I did enjoy the light read. But still.

sleepless

I am insanely not sleepy.

2 a.m. on the west coast. Waaay to early to start harrassing family out east. I don't know any reprobates closer by that might also be suffering as I am.

Mrs. Pandammy is also having sleep issues. We often find out that we've spent the same nights not sleeping. But we don't dare call each other, just in case. It's stupid. We could be planting something, or pruning. By flashlight. Well?

There's nothing particularly on my mind. No obsessions, no internal dialogues. I'm holding my body tight for some odd reason, as I do from time to time, as if waiting for some kind of attack, yet I'm not anxious. About the only mental activity is the inner narration of my sleeplessness. Well, and blogging.

I'll tell you how this night will end, though. I'll fall asleep somewhere around 4 a.m., and when hobbitt's alarm goes off before 7, I'll be one cranky-ass bitch. I'll get up to pee, slam the bedroom door shut when I hear him on his conference call, and go back to sleep until 11:30, at which point I'll curse the loss of half a day and then wonder why, tomorrow night, I'm insanely not sleepy at 2 a.m.

wrong number

hobbitt got a text message tonight. Which is odd. Nobody has his number but me.

"Hey girl its Kristin Jenn miller friend we hung out at Brodys I was wondering if you had a bag I could buy? -Kristin-"

What's the lesson here kids?




I wanted to reply: "You idiots make it so easy for me to be a drug enforcement officer."

hobbitt wouldn't let me send it, though.

weighing in

Grief grief grief, lots of grief around me for so many reasons. Well, what the hell. Grieving must be done. There's no getting around that. But in my family, grief has always been accompanied by hysterical laughter. If it ain't fun, we ain't doing it. I do believe I peed my pants at my father's funeral, on Friday the 13th of September 1991. My sisters and I got red silky bikini underwear for his long nap. We felt it necessary to tell that story a few times that day. Needless to say, Mom wasn't entirely amused, but she did understand. Believe me, it wasn't all laughter. But laughter was there, and we seized it.

We can't always have fun in our grief, but there is always that hope. Five years ago I longed for the laughter to return, after the unspeakable. The Onion, with their Holy Fucking Shit edition, with headlines such as "President Urges Calm, Restraint Among Nation's Ballad Singers" and "A Shattered Nation Longs To Care About Stupid Bullshit Again", rose up to meet that hope. So did Jon Stewart, when The Daily Show came back on the air on September 20 2001.

Good evening and welcome to "The Daily Show." We are back. This is our first show since the tragedy in New York City. There is no other way really to start this show than to ask you at home the question that we've asked the audience here tonight and that we’ve asked everybody that we know here in New York since September 11th, and that is, "Are you okay?" We pray that you are and that your family is. I’m sorry to do this to you. It’s another entertainment show beginning with an overwrought speech of a shaken host. TV is nothing, if not redundant. So, I apologize for that. It’s something that unfortunately, we do for ourselves so that we can drain whatever abscess is in our hearts and move onto the business of making you laugh, which we really haven’t been able to do very effectively lately. Everyone’s checked in already, I know we’re late. I’m sure we’re getting in right under the wire before the cast of "Survivor" offers their insight into what to do in these situations.

They said to get back to work. There were no jobs available for a man in the fetal position under his desk crying, which I would have gladly taken. So I came back here. Tonight’s show is obviously not a regular show. We looked through the vaults, we found some clips that we thought might make you smile, which is really what’s necessary, I think, right about now. A lot of folks have asked me, "What are you going to do when you get back? What are you going to say?" I mean, what a terrible thing to have to do. I don’t see it as a burden at all. I see it as a privilege. I see it as a privilege and everyone here does see it that way. The show in general, we feel like is a privilege. Just even the idea that we can sit in the back of the country and make wise cracks, which is really what we do. We sit in the back and we throw spitballs, but never forgetting the fact that is a luxury in this country that allows us to do that. This is a country that allows for open satire, and I know that sounds basic and it sounds as though it goes without saying - but that’s really what this whole situation is about. It’s the difference between closed and open. It’s the difference between free and burden and we don’t take that for granted here by any stretch of the imagination and our show has changed. I don’t doubt that. What it’s become, I don’t know. "Subliminable" is not a punch line anymore. One day it will become that again, and Lord willing, it will become that again because that means we have ridden out the storm.

But the main reason that I wanted to speak tonight is not to tell you what the show is going to be. Not to tell you about all the incredibly brave people that are here in New York and in Washington and around the country. But we’ve had an enduring pain here - an endurable pain. I wanted to tell you why I grieve, but why I don’t despair…I’m sorry. Luckily we can edit this. One of my first memories is of Martin Luther King being shot. I was five and you wonder if this feeling will pass…When I was five, he was shot. Here’s what I remember about it. I was in a school in Trenton. They shut the lights off and we got to sit under our desks and we thought that was really cool and they gave us cottage cheese, which was a cold lunch because there was rioting, but we didn’t know that. We just thought that “My god. We get to sit under our desks and eat cottage cheese.” That’s what I remember about it. That was a tremendous test of this country’s fabric and this country’s had many tests before that and after that.

The reason I don’t despair is because this attack happened. It’s not a dream. But the aftermath of it, the recovery is a dream realized. And that is Martin Luther King's dream. Whatever barriers we've put up are gone even if it's momentary. We're judging people by not the color of their skin but the content of their character. You know, all this talk about "These guys are criminal masterminds. They’ve gotten together and their extraordinary guile…and their wit and their skill." It's a lie. Any fool can blow something up. Any fool can destroy. But to see these guys, these firefighters, these policemen and people from all over the country, literally, with buckets rebuilding. That's extraordinary. That's why we've already won. It's light. It's democracy. We've already won. They can't shut that down. They live in chaos and chaos…it can't sustain itself. It never could. It's too easy and it's too unsatisfying.

The view from my apartment was the World Trade Center and now it's gone. They attacked it. This symbol of American ingenuity and strength and labor and imagination and commerce and it is gone. But you know what the view is now? The Statue of Liberty. The view from the south of Manhattan is now the Statue of Liberty. You can't beat that.

daddy

Has it really been fifteen years, today? I miss you like it was just yesterday.




















Those hard-hat liners were a nice touch. We even made Mom laugh.

I was way cuter than you could ever possibly be

It's true. I was three months shy of turning 2. My sister was 4 months shy of turning 4. My hair was that color until I was about 25. Damn.

Ernesto did a bad, bad thing

Sunday morning:















Under that tree in my brother's Neptune City, New Joy Sea yard, is a 2004 Volvo V70 and a slightly older Ford F250, both as shiny as if they had just come out of the showroom. My brother is a car nut. Also a lawn nut. Mostly, just a nut.

Today, this text message from my brother:

Tree gone, $1550.

Volvo, $1640.

Ford, $1620.

Fence, $875.

Martinis.....priceless!

gotta love this place

I took the pooch for a walk and swim on the beach yesterday afternoon. When I first arrived, there were two crews rowing, and they had just left the dock. It was hard to tell if they were experienced or not, as they had just boarded the boats. There is a women's team up here that is widely known for their competitiveness, and I wonder if that was one of the crews. But Inti couldn't wait and the afternoon was pretty warm for a black dog in full sun, so we headed over to the Hadlock side of the point, where I sat on a log and used my Chuck-It Jr. to fling the ball out into the bay for her.

After about a half-hour I noticed two large sailboats headed right towards our point on the beach. One was quite a bit ahead of the other. The front boat tacked 180 degrees, and when the boats were alongside, each fired a cannon at the other. Yes, I said cannon. Okay, I didn't see any cannons, but I heard the boom and I saw the smoke. When they reached the other side of the bay, they did the same thing. Those loons must have been having a blast.

I'm going to have a cannon on my boat.

holiday party check list

Didn't hear from my friends in Wilmington, NC. No power? No cell phone, either. Dammit. Flooding would have been the issue. They weren't particularly worried. Good insurance.

Angela. Call me.

Got a call from some friends partying on Perdido Key on the Gulf. They were half in the bag. I wished I was there - there was some serious fun being had. Serious. I'm sure they're howling at the moon right about now, skinny dipping and enjoying the pure sensual pleasure of being human. I am jealous.

Then I got a call from my friends in Illinois. Also half in the bag. My friend Marjorie is calling it quits with her "sucks the life out of you" job. Lynn, who has been feeling that way about her job for all the years I've known her (and she's had this job for almost 30 years) said Marjorie was a weanie. They were laughing their asses off and I was seriously sorry I wasn't there with them. We were Three Indecisive Pisces and a Scorpio (Me, Barb, Lynn, and Marjorie the Wonder Chimp, aka the Stunt Monkey) and now we're not. I've moved away from them twice. I miss them like something awful.

But no worries. hobbitt and I are planning a serious surprise on her last day at this job (which I am responsible for her getting, by the way). She'll enjoy it.

I also got a call - a message, and by the time I got back here it was way too late to return the call - from my friend Lily34, or Rebecca. She was partying too, with her soon-to-be spouse.

So many of our friends are partying in good company tonight. There's nothing like laughter that eventually hurts the muscles in the belly. There's nothing like the hangover with giggles. You know the feeling. "Ooooh. Ouch. Holy shit. HAH! Did I really? Ouch. Crap."

Angela, all those folks are raising a glass that you might not be able to right now. I know as soon as the power went out you reached for the gin in the freezer first, you excellent girl!

But no worries. You'll be back here soon and we'll get some Brokers and set the night on fire. And let me know if you're getting new carpeting and furniture. I want to help you shop.