Happy Holiday each and every one of you slap-happy bloggers!

the pictures i held

it was, or could have been,
the late 80s, at best,
after sex, my back,
hard-pressed against the cold,
crumbling stucco wall
of our first apartment.

i'd risen for some reason
and backed away,
grabbing a red shirt
to cover myself,
your camera catching me
dead to track.

you love me, right?!
and i surely did,
the best i could
which was never
enough to quiet
the loudest demons.

did you think
for a minute
or not think at all,
that pictures could
capture the me
you desired?

now, forgone,
far gone to future,
our conclusion
never reached,
so over-developed,
these negatives.

and i haven't been
thinking of you,
or us, at all,
i'm sorry, but
in order to go on,
okay, so not so much.

until now, when,
you randomly drive by,
this time no shooting,
just dropping off a shoebox
full of photos and this note,
"these belong to you, now."

Addendum to My Headless Horseman Snow Rant!

Wow, and so around 1:30 a.m. it began to snow, something like 2.5 inches per hour! By 6 a.m. we had an additional, solid, heavy, staying power FOOT plus!

Yeah, so I like snow, sue me!

But my perspective on this took a little bit of a twist this morning, when I read my campus email. When January hits, it will be two solid semesters since I've taken any classes, but still you are locked in and logged into campus life, while you decide if you are going to go back again, here and there, or not at all, or?!?!?!

Well the campus email that was in all caps this morning in the subject line was "FINAL EXAMS CANCELLED TODAY!"

Can you imagine?

I was thinking, how I hadn't even been considering that side of things for almost a year, and I so would not have wanted to be the student reading that email this morning, you know?!?!?! Or seeing the campus closure fly across the screen on the morning news!

During Xam time prior to Xmas, I mean really ... the week prior, and the night prior I would normally have no less than three papers spitting out of my printer, and would simultaneously be studying for additional exams! Come heck or highwater, you keep studying, because in college, there are no snow days on exam days! Unreal!

And because I had real life on the side, I would be making roll out cookies and wrapping presents, and also doing my "day job" at my desk. Yes, all this at once!

I think if that had been me, the student this morning, bleary-eyed, but dancing around the room going, "Oh, my aching ass these papers rock! I can't believe I finished! Now just let me put eyedrops in and drive off with no sleep to deliver these and take just two exams! Just two and then I'm sooooooooooo done until after break" ... well, the college student me, might have dropped over this morning! I might have been all What?!??!??! just before the room spun on its axis and my teeth fell out!

I mean what do you do with exam-prep and all that MY PAPERS ARE DONE energy when they cancel exams and close the campus?

It would be very Langston Hughes-ish, and what is a dream deferred, and all that ... yeah, my head totally would have exploded!

The room would have been splattered with syrupy rotted meat!

And after that icko image ... I leave you Langston, baby!

A Dream Deferred

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

3:43p.m. and these flowers j
ust arrived and the card said,
"for those who love the snowman!" life rocks!

In An Attempt to Explain Things Not Going My Way ...

I feel like a split between Jeannie from "I Dream of Jeanie" or Samantha Stevens from "Bewitched" when they were betwixt and between themselves over their powers not working. Or, worse yet when they were giving themselves headaches over their strict promises to their Master Nelsons and Derwoods, respectively, that they would stop all their magic!

I've had a buggy-wuggy head since Sunday. Coming off a head cold I went straight into the series of unfortunate events that are my head some days. Since Sunday, I have been fighting that 'iffy' feeling my brain gives me every once in a while when the stroked-out sore spot in my skull starts to feel soft and a bit squishy at best. Where it likes to remind me, Hey, remember that time I scared the living daylights out of the rest of your body?!!?

During these particular trying times of my mind, in the beginning stages I have to struggle at points to stay on task, and/or complete my sentences. Bekah experienced the Mom-interruptus sentences on Sunday, which didn’t matter because she was at the helm of the vehicle and I could spill out as many partial ideas about where we should go next or what we should look for, because we were Xmas shopping, which is always a delight and kind of disjointed and over-excitable!

By Monday, I was just “goofy” and aware of the brain dys-ease which Ali and I always find loads of fun because it usually falls on a day such as Monday which just makes them ten-times that more interesting and fun!

By Tuesday it was just me and old brain hat as I continued to ride the storm out!

By Wednesday (yesterday), I was to the stage where I had a “funny headache” (the end of the cycle, woot!) and I was rambling and talking nonstop as well as also acting goofy and okay maybe it was slightly concerning when I ordered coffee at one drive-through window, but then nearly drove off with out retrieving it from the second window. It's a time for making up for as much lost time as possible while all my inner marbles reallign with the planets.

Carol and I were also Xmas shopping and grocery shopping and other shopping by this point, as is our usual routine every week or so. So, she got the brunt of the end-stage, which again factoring in the holiday spirit, we really had a blast. And as we so duly noted, it's nice to be around each other (all of us) if my head is having "one of those series of days." It is both scary and nerve-wracking for all of us, right up to the closing and the "funny headache," but the comfort of being together wins out.

And where does Walter fit in?. Well, he remains very Walter-ish and doesn't seem to notice, which is the great thing about dogs, because they are your best friend no matter what.

And what of my best friend?!!?! I'm pretty sure he was glad he traveled all week (not really, but I'm just saying ... it's difficult to watch someone you love be a head case, so to speak. And it's difficult for me to watch him watch me, if that makes sense!)

And where do I fit in? Well, I'm in, under and through all the very distorted edges, and I'm still learning over five years later to accept these parts of my self that sometimes leak out of my ears and roll around on the floor!

And to Ru, Rae and Lili, well, Granny Princess Annie can do no wrong in their eyes and hearts, and they provide the wind that always resets my sails.

I like to say this doesn't affect my work, but I have to say (despite my high standings) that it did cause problems when I returned to college and that entire juggling act (though I persevered to keep my high standings before ultimately pulling the plug to continue with my work), but it never affects my writing.

As far as any of my art is concerned, since I went all torn paper and mixed media collage after the fact, and no longer do actual cohesive one application projects, my art might in fact be imitating my brain on its best and worst days, or maybe it's the other way around?!?!?!

In the above areas, I dive deep and problems are varying ripples and glitches that I can weather with determination. My determination station hasn't been affected, thankfully, though it can be taxed during certain rough and/or unexpected landings over water!

Same with relationships and parenting. The people who really know and love me ... well, they really know and love me, pre and post stroke. Love rocks, don't it!?!?!

However, the last week or so there have been wonky things going on with the internet which have come to a head after a month of iffy connects and cable problems, which were cured finally yesterday by the service guys … or so they said, but I still feel all “prognosis guarded” in varying respects.

As late as yesterday evening, I still had wonky activities with video, sound and data files to the point where I felt an extreme sage-ing and pseudo sweat tent session might be merited in my lovely home office. I even considered throwing out a new PURPLE Lavender-scented soy candle I had been using thinking maybe, just maybe it was conjuring up odd or difficult spirits.

Things were failing to load, were loading all disjointed, not loading at all or just buggy all together. It was maddening. And today, tasks that should have taken minutes at best stretched on for hours and yet the day seemed to disappear in less than seconds. What?!!?!

In response to all that has been going on since Sunday, I've fed the dead and slept like the dead. I have even dreamt about the dead! I've also had bouts of insomnia and nonstop thoughts into the wee hours, at which point I then get up and start things all over again, which leads me around this current circle, right here tonight, wherein at this late hour on the clock (yes, that circle!), over the edge and into the new tomorrow (well past midnight!), I am now experiencing the ultimate wonkiness of all time!

After the final success of Thursday, which has thusly now passed, after I burned the candle at both ends and right up through the middle! Yes, and that meant the lavender-scented candle because I'm just that brave! ... well, after all that, there's no snow!

You heard me, no new snow! Usually, this is when I most want it and most get it, right before I toddle off to bed to await my new snow blanket. By this time, I have wished for it to such a point that we get BURIED! All-encompassing snow bunny blanket!

It's been promised, and even if I scale off a few inches from the top of the usual hype which started out at something like two feet, there is no visible appearance of anything close to what is supposed to accumulate to the 4- to 6-inch mark by 6 a.m. in order to close schools, block up driveways and thoroughfares and basically make for a yummy, comfy cozy cave-like atmosphere in our little snow globe in our wintery village cove!

We were to be reveling in snow splendor by daylight, falling back into our own soft blankets and tipping over the alarm clocks in order to sleep in!

But right now ... past midnight ... the bewitching hour to which I clearly have no powers,I see nothing whatsoever of a six-sided nature falling from the sky.

We are in serious no-snow-show trouble folks!

Yeah, so I feel like Jeannie or Samantha and I'm crossing my arms and bobbing my head and twitching my nose, respectively, and all that happens is this off-beat doink!!! sound and a great big white NOTHING!!!!!!!

I’m beating my magic powers against a brick wall!

I don't get it!

Okay, so what happened to my refill-the-snow globe powers? I'm serious, people! I can take the wonky internet. I can take the occasional days where the inside of my skull gets squishy and sore at me, I can take disrupted data, sound and video files with no rhyme or real reason for their glitches!

But this?!!??! I can’t take this!

Those who normally call after a snowstorm and say, 'You did this didn't you?!!?' will be calling tomorrow going, 'Oh, my gosh, what happened is your head broken?!?!?'

I feel like stomping my feet like Rumplestiltskin which would be very much like mixing my metaphors and fairy tales with 60s TV show comparisons, and I'm really not at all sure if testing the snow gods like that tonight truly behooves me!

But, really, where is my snow?!?!?!?!....

Let it snow, darn it! Nerve-wracking ....

I am off to bed wrapped in my new purple flouncy yarn wrap that arrived in the mail today, and I'm still holding out hope for snow, becuase I'm that big of a dope!

Air Active Minds

My fortune cookie tonight: You have air active mind and a keen imagination.

Now, that means either I'm officially an airhead, and/or the proofreader at the fortune cookie factory was on break when they made this cookie!

December Second, Nineteen-Ninety-Something

December Second, Nineteen-Ninety-Something


Week-ending,
bone-tired,
brain-sore,
multiple hour week,
rendering my thoughts,
bloodying the page,
coagulated efforts,
transcribed in mud,
fingers seizing up,
strained, fatigued,
head full to the top,
eardrums missing the beat
until the doorbell rings.

The tree arrives,
shouldered by a strong,
competent woodsman,
so said the Yellow Pages,
delivering as promised,
a beauty, in and of itself,
without decoration,
standing on its own, fir
falling out into the room,
exactly where he left it,
exploding in pine scent,
as the door hits his ass,
on his return to the woods.

I don’t recall ordering up
this full frontal ache,
the renewed desire,
once sought after dreams
of what it must be like
to turn, turn, turn
towards someone special
at the end of a wintery day,
eyes blurred, mind shutting down,
ears having heard enough,
mouth paused, a sigh escaping
in the shape of your name,
if only I knew who you were.

Hard-pressed,
I force the words out;
it could be longing
if I must choose a feeling,
put a finger to heart’s desire,
measuring for a form-fit,
eyes that meet halfway,
lips to match thoughts,
without speaking,
arms through arms
and leg woven to leg,
keeping everything good in
while the bad stuff strays.

Turn, turning into, against,
around and through,
nearer to me than thee,
another person, fresh blood,
the Mr. Right for Mrs. Me,
our day complete,
completeness;
can this be
a forgotten memory?
a lost dream?
a still deep desire?
or just another cold
December night?

art: Adrirondack Pine II by Peggy Abrams

The Art of Timing

The Art of Timing

Why when I had left
this front-most room,
off to bed in solitude,
the embers in the fire,
long-gone cold and ashen;
why have you entered now
through the far-most door,
the lock I’d long since thrown,
rusted out and worn clear through,
crashing to bits and pieces,
when you said hello?

the poem is a fresh wound, the picture i took and tweaked a bit 2004; lived in that house '81-86, cold, cold winds ... wyoming.

Feeding the Dead

feeding the dead

the grand mothers
have all gone on
and i find
my
self
empowered
yes
wearing their love
boldly
and yet
orphaned
at best
hungry from this side
a scaphoid belly
turned inside-out
as i drop the crumbs
to feed them
in-between
here to there
too weary
my own self
to begin again
the fruitless search
for a mother's love

"Everyone goes through life dropping crumbs. If you can recognize the crumbs, you can trace a path all the way back from your death certificate to the dinner and a movie that resulted in you in the first place." (Daryl Zero in "Zero Effect")

Just Kill Me Now ...

... As if our new pillowtop mattress and dual control mattress pad heating system isn't comfortable enough, I bought a new pillow yesterday! It's called the "Grandma" pillow, and it's goose down surrounded by just enough polyfill not to keep the feathers from leaking out and poking me in the eye! It's like sleeping on a cloud. And now, as if, I wasn't already sleeping like the dead, I sleep deader than a f'ing doornail, and I dream about dead people!

It was absolute bliss through the last night, I'm not kidding. I talked to dead people throughout, so much so, that I never wanted to wake up this morning. Several no-longer-breathing souls came to see me. One such dead person had died very young, and so of course I had not seen him in years, and I was still talking to him at the end of my sleep-dreamy time this morning (okay, and we might have been on the verge of making out), when Mark tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Don't you have to get up?"

I dunno what I'm saying here, but I urge you all to go out and buy a real goose down feather pillow with polyfill wrap, because you won't get poked by the feathers when they pop through the ticking, but you just might get "poked" by a dead person who is really, really happy to see you!

That's not exactly what I'm saying, but I think you get the point!