Beastly Weeding

mind wandering

2009-04-12T15:01:54Z

I am having an imaginary conversation with a health food store clerk about tea.

old man winter

2008-12-21T20:17:22Z

it's a-blizzarding. or a-nor'easter-ing, which is a far less fun word to say, even if it's more accurate.

I'm so glad he's still here to enjoy it.
as twee an expression of sentiment as ever was, to fall woefully, unreasonably, nor'easterly short.

well, I was going to.

2008-12-19T18:11:08Z

maybe later. at work, and the impulse must be put off to attend to what I'm actually being paid to do.

ideas tumbling in waterfalls. flooded brain and wishing for faster typing fingers and more consistently effective working habits.

this morning:
saw a flatbed tow truck with a smaller flatbed tow truck on top, like russian nesting dolls.

vague recollection of a dream of ghosts.

bad habits

2008-12-14T19:03:02Z

a whirlwind in my brain.

hard to hear anything over the detritus.

always too much to do. not knowing where to begin, and no real impetus to sort through it and prioritize. end up wasting time, nervous and bored.

4 hours of obsessive computer addiction. some image experimentation, nothing really new. but I guess it's good to renew my interest in digitization as a tool... I'll need the chops handy when the objects are finished and ready for context.

I guess. or maybe that's an excuse. or maybe it's the fidgeting and fooling around that happens at certain stages in the process of making.

looking forward to extended time off, when completion of certain things must be studiously undertaken.

disrupted sleep patterns

2008-12-12T06:19:55Z

as much as I have to do tomorrow, I'm still kinda hopin' for a snow day. can't all those meetings and appointments wait?

we're in the middle of an ice storm. nothing dramatically frightening, just subtle, insistent, and deceptively dangerous. supposed to be 4 to six inches of ice by morning.

(it is, now, technically morning.)

the only thing keeping me anxious about tomorrow is the need to print out a letter of rec. on letterhead and 2-day mail it. I'm thinking of calling in a favor if need be, having someone forge my name after walking miserably to the office. hate to ask them to do that. but anticipating either the dread of favor asking vs. the dread of driving. when the trek becomes two hours instead of one, white-knuckled at 25 mph into the hilly town. then the possibility of being stuck there, when everyone whose couch I'm welcomed on has moved. then it's more awkward favors.

still, I know I'll be happy to see a weather closing announcement. makes the choice clear.

bbbbrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrRRR.

2008-12-08T16:39:25Z

it's fucking cold.

this, I think, is the first winter I am dreading. thinking of the potential length of it: its inherent Maine recalcitrance. the combination of Canadian and Great Lakes storm fronts, the daily dangerous commuter shift from dry, deep-snowed Round House valley shovel-outs to wet, salt-and-slush Portland. drafts and blankets and bitter fingers. the old dog's arthritis. squirrels in the walls and their insomniac scratching. house bound, with more than enough hot tea to drown all of ancient Persia.

watching the narcissus to keep hope alive.

the fruits of labor

2008-11-24T19:50:52Z

Wheals and boils come forth as testament to your fine sense of haut couture.

(surrealist compliment of the day. explains much, as usual.)

thanksgiving wind-up

2008-11-24T19:03:57Z

today:
take out the turkey to defrost
clean house

tomorrow:
prep stuffing and sausage

wednesday:
pie & MRI

an' all manner o' things be well.

I am stupidly, unreasonably, ridiculously tired.

tired of reaching out to little avail. this is probably only internal perception. no matter; I am too tired to be of good to anyone, and things will come 'round again in their own time. tired of cyclical efforts towards improved surroundings being a one-step-forward-three-steps back process. tired of media and popular culture and repetition of image and message. tired of art and speech and intellectual tap-dancing. too tired to type capital letters. too tired to wonder.

suspicious realization.

2008-11-06T03:02:21Z

I like ideas better than people. This may be one of my big problems.

dragging my feet

2008-10-24T13:36:48Z

so so so tired. must wake up. must pack. must run errands. must drive 6 hours. must go make puppets.

it's cold now that the fire has burned down.

2008-10-06T16:28:34Z

"burning bridges" is a semi-annual party at the Round House where I invite friends to come and ritually purge themselves of stuff by setting it ablaze. The last two have been send-offs for friends moving away... distances long enough to be prohibitive to regular contact.

It's "semi-annual" as of yet, due to a personal fit of pique where I swore off hosting parties. I managed to stick to that rule for 3 years. This week, three friends are taking off. I thought it would be four, but the fourth announced at the party that they're sticking around Portland for a while, so that was an encouraging highlight of the evening.

it was a good night. good friends. a good fire. merriment and lots of mulled cider in mason jars.

this year's purge for me included a bunch of unpaid bills that have been stacking up due to all those household health problems and about 8 old masks that have been sitting in a box, cluttering up my studio, not to mention some portion of my brain that has already relegated them to the naiveté and awful displacement of my 20's. I should have burned them long ago.

anyway, I'd like to make it an annual thing, but I can't see everyone flying to bumfuck maine to get to it. it's enough to make one swear off hosting parties.

uphill

2008-09-29T15:06:56Z

determined to get things in order around here.

there's no storage... no shelves, no closets. the garage is a mess, and it's not not my job to do the dump runs in my little car, that's for the man and the beat-up truck. I can't even drive the truck. hell, I can't even drop off at the dump without a signed permission slip from my husband, because his name is the one on the town register as the homeowner.

how screwed up is that? my legal address and my car registration and voter registration and all that happy legal crap shows this as my legal residence, but I need a signed permission slip to get rid of my trash here.

I refuse. He can do the dump run. it's the only chore on his list.

so, I'm picking manageable projects and working on them. definitely a manic phase. last night, I painted grout.

just doing our jobs

2008-09-22T15:09:17Z

Clyde is playing with a chipmunk in the yard.

I tell him he's a good boy. I alternately watch and look away.

he's doing his job. there's one less rodent eating the herbs in my garden or the last of the tomatoes and green beans or the bulbs I just planted, finding tunnels as I dig in the bed. or running around in my ceiling all winter, eating away at the wiring and insulation. he's a good boy.

every once in a while there's a horrid shriek, after it escapes momentarily and is unexpectedly caught, again.

it runs in circles, disoriented, or employing deception, or both. it climbs in the raspberry bushes dangling upside down amidst the thorns. it finds respite, or what appears to be respite, in the woodpile. bluejays look on and cry out dispassionate warnings. matter-of-fact witness.

Clyde is having a blast. calculating, testing reflexes and speed, practicing climbing techniques. my heart wrenches, not knowing whether wishing it escape or death is the more kind, or appropriate, impulse.

there is some cruel jest in the fight between the will to live and the inexorable, pitiless workings of nature.

surrealist compliment for lunch.

2008-09-21T16:36:14Z

Your dainty nostrils flare with the humblest grandiosity of an ant swallowing a water buffalo.

pushing it.

2008-09-21T15:28:15Z

I think I have fulfilled my quota of cute pet pictures posted to Flickr this weekend alone.

I wish my camera was a little more sophisticated; the best I can do with it thus far is vernacular snapshots. it's what I could afford at the time, and it was cheap then. already 3 years in use... an eternity for digital media. more experimentation necessary. enjoying the step back, looking at things through an impartial filter.

Today is a workday. more heads a must. some house chores. walking with Q. burning party prep. a pressing need to purge.

mmm, pork roll.

2008-09-20T20:43:34Z

the taste of sundays, a day early.

we've got a local shop (overpriced, high-end stuff) whose stock, arrangement, and genteel "rustic farm" aesthetic I (mostly) like. it's not quite enough to save the overall fact that it's a pretty elitist establishment whose employees look at me one way when I'm dressed for weekday work in the gallery and quite another for weekend work in the studio.

but they have taylor ham.
yes, they import it from new jersey.

that sounds so ridiculous for anyone who doesn't know what taylor ham is (pretty much everyone who didn't grow up in new jersey) but it's just about impossible to find it elsewhere. proof that this maine shop caters to its wealthy summer camp clientele.

I hesitate not to stock my fridge. pork roll rules.

the ghosts of language

2008-09-18T23:29:05Z

I need to write in the morning.

The wee hours, before another human voice interrupts and changes my interpretation of my own mind. By the end of the day, it's too full of everyone else to be useful to me anymore.

Lately, I find myself with perfect sentences alone in the car. When it's a work project, I watch the road and repeat the line over and over while reaching (without looking) one hand into my bag (a dangerous proposition itself, aside from the split concentration while driving) to locate a writing implement and random scrap of paper. I'll scratch words sideways on envelopes in the passenger seat.

If I don't, the phrases are gone forever into some twilight and I'm stuck with a lingering dissatisfaction.
Sometimes, if it's not a complete sentence, by the time I get home I can no longer interpret the fragment.

Conversations with Esme

2008-09-16T02:31:24Z

dandemalion: what do i wish to say
Esme: It is already taken care of, it was done last November.

who knows where the carrots go?

2008-09-16T01:44:19Z

actually, that title is from a label I peeled off my person after the "labels" performance piece from forever ago.

it seemed an appropriate question, after this much time. life is bizarre. and moves so erratically.

feeling the journal bug biting again. or maybe just the need to talk to myself. now faced with the page, there is too much to say. trying to avoid trite explanations for so long a silence. trying to get rid of the labels i've placed on myself in the past two years.

nothing quippy to flick back at that last entry, even though this summer it rained for close to 60 days.

yes.

2006-04-25T21:14:46Z

here's that rain.

dandemalion @ 2006-04-25T16:38:00

2006-04-25T21:03:31Z

an amazing, much needed day.

solitude, for one.

gardening... I have planted some gorgeous swan columbines... the verbena and tetra zinnias that have sprouted in my flats... blood meal, bone meal, garden gypsum. looks like rain, hope to have a gentle sprinkle before sun tomorrow.

I hoped to have some blood/bone left to work on some eggs/texts. The body memory of the material sparked studio longings. I need to go to the big nursery 17 miles away to get bulk landscaping supplies, not just the local Loews for 5 lb bags. I need... all kinds of things. Enough of the quotidian. unbegrudgingly cleaning up cat piss. plotting the old boy's grave.

Black dirt under my fingernails. a white owl overhead as I plink on the guitar. crows curious and startled. a good bottle of wine. rolling boulders for another layer of terrace wall, legs and back straining.

no pain.

deja vu. dreams of fish flying, freezing in the air, hippie van, africa.

disturbingly familiar

2006-04-05T22:09:04Z

no one around to have a genuine conversation with.

this morning, running between teaching and giving a tour, I turn on the car. The radio is playing the last few bars of a mournful, gorgeously eastern european contemporary vocal.

the song ends, and an appropriate moment of silence is followed by the dry deadpan voice of the DJ:

"Maybe what you need is just a good polka."

next song, please.

awake, alive, recovering

2006-03-26T00:27:51Z

heavily medicated, and on a sleep for 2-hours-awake for an hour schedule. only one very small stock part now missing, but you'd never notice. no malignancies, thank heaven and earth and all that lives between. important functioning parts still functioning.

JAZ waiting on me hand and foot. not really able to walk well yet, will be a couple more days before normal posture returns, and more after that for regular speed.

back to the couch.

bells, figures, stuff

2006-03-23T18:43:43Z

I didn't think there was anything left there that I wanted. I thought, "the Sandmans, the Hellblazers, the lamps. I hope I can find the diamond ring my mother gave me, because I lost it during the move."

The first box I opened had my Tarot cards and the diamond ring.

The second, some effects pedals for electric music.

I also retrieved some good kitchenware... glass pie pans, the champagne flutes and wineglasses from the Y2K party, my good enameled roasting pan and lobster pot. silver goblets. a 2-pronged silver candelabra. glass bowls. the dragon teaset. the antler-handled cutlery.

the bounty continues! a small wooden bookshelf. all of my gardening books and plant encyclopedias. some interesting posters, including the one for the original Biltmore Theater production of Hair. My softball mitt. skee balls. devil sticks. the large cat (small dog) flight carrier, which I couldn't disassemble due to rusted screws, but still fit in the little car. a 5-gallon bucket of small ceramic tiles.

The most surprising find was a mysterious box labeled "bells, figures, stuff" that was the only thing I didn't open until I got home. the packaging was tight and easier not to mess with, and I had room.

How does stupid useless stuff become so sentimentally appealing?

I opened the box,immediately exclaiming, "bullhorns!"

These have been with me my entire life. They're ridiculous, and I love them.

this box of wonder also included much-loved yet somehow forgotten items such as a wooden ship's wheel, a collection of brass bells in various shapes and sizes, old robots, some lovely Balinese dragons, 4 crystal balls of various sizes and colors, weird little toys, and three tiny wooden folk art cats that matched my three real cats when we moved here... two are dead now and the last is not long for the world.

JAZ and I rejoiced in our own silliness. the Round House somehow feels more like home, even if the stuff is only scattered about on the floor.

dandemalion @ 2006-03-23T12:59:00

2006-03-23T17:59:43Z

surgery tomorrow. terror mounting.