Hello, April

It was downright cold this morning, after a chilly weekend that followed a few days of record-breaking heat. This is all my fault. I took my winter coats out of my closet too early.

But the fresh-cut grass smells beautifully sweet this morning, and the combination of smell and cool freshness felt like a morning at Camp, which is always nice. Made me a little homesick, though.


This past weekend I made two avocados worth of gorgeous, chunky guacamole* and bought two bags of sprouted grain chips by "Simply Sprouted: Way Better" snacks. Both were surprisingly delicious, and I have just run out of guacamole. Really a shame.


In other news, I have temporarily ceased recycling (I'm quite ashamed of this) because our back door (which leads to the recycling bins) is entirely blocked by inchworms and webbing. Also the recycling, which needs to be carried through the house to be taken out, is covered in inchworms and webbing. Gotta love April under the trees.




















*I make it wrong, always, but I love it this way: avocado, minced garlic, salt, and apple cider vinegar to taste.

From Friday

1. Today was the last day of petsitting--I've been taking care of a litter of black lab puppies on weekdays since January, and the last will be sold this weekend. I'll be glad to have my afternoons back, but I'm a little sad to see her go.

2. Here is what I'd write about inchworms if I felt affection for them, rather than revulsion at their mission and massive numbers: I would say something like, everywhere I walk, the air is filled with shining threads of light, strung gently to and fro from tree to car to fence to jungle gym, to the tiny t-shirt of a small boy in my P.E. class on Tuesday.

Also if I liked them I probably wouldn't throw them out the window of moving cars.

But since I do not feel affection for them, and instead feel revulsion, here is what I'll write instead: the fucking things are everywhere. It's like a damn plague of inchworms, and their sticky little threads crisscross everywhere, all over the place, across the driveway, across the doorway, across the playground at work. When I get in my car, if I've left the windows cracked to prevent a little solar oven from forming, there will be an inchworm dangling inside my window. GO AWAY. And if one more child at work comes up to me talking about how great the damn things are or how he can't find any and Jackie won't give him the one she found, it is possible that I will freak out.


3. Today, while I was driving the bus toward an area elementary school, I suddenly realized that I was happy.  Happy. That I had a job and a boyfriend and this new phone, so many friends, this great kindle thing...I'm making it sound like a shallow happiness, and maybe it is in some way, but I don't really think so. It isn't like everything is perfect, or like I have everything I want, or whatever. It's more like, for the moment, I was satisfied. What I had, what I have, was enough. And increasingly often, it is enough. And that is the kind of person I want to be. And the kind of person I've wanted to be for so, so long.

Ruminant

Perhaps it is silly and ill-advised to begin everything I write about the workings of my mind under the assumption that it won't make sense to everyone. Maybe my mind is much like most other people's. Or maybe, even if that is the case, the assumption of misunderstanding helps me to write more clearly. I don't know. I don't know what it was that I had been planning to write about when I thought the above, as I started up my car to come home from tutoring. It needs an oil change. And some stop leak.


Something I was thinking of earlier, though (today? yesterday?) was that when it comes to my having to interact with the emotions of others, I feel like a bull in a china shop. I do. It's fine with me for you to feel whatever way, and I can celebrate with you or hold and comfort you or commiserate, or listen. I have no problem with any of those things. But if I am in some way actually involved in your emotional whatever, I get uncomfortable. And if, God forbid, any part of your emotional well-being is affected in any real way by the state of my emotions, then, though I may hide it fairly well, I'm probably losing my shit over here. So that's been the case somewhat often lately.



I've remembered what I was thinking before, I think. It was about outlook, and attitude I guess. Or about the way depression works. I'm not really depressed, but I am getting my emotions tangled with another person's, lately, and also I am exhausted and also I am sick, and those together can roughly amount to depression if I am not careful about keeping them contained, controlled, and brief.

My life is pretty good right now. I have a job, I have a sweet, sarcastic, funny, and attentive boyfriend, I have great friends and a good support network, I have trips coming up that I'm looking forward to, and soon I'll be moving in with my best friend. But still, on days like today, during weeks like this, everything is dampened by a smoggy haze of negativity and frustration. It's not that the haze can't be broken--today, on the way to tutoring, a man rode past on his motorcycle, and the sound made me grin like a fool, because that motor noise sounds like the beach, and childhood happiness to me--but thirty seconds later my mouth was a thin line again, my eyes were grainy again, and I stared with mild annoyance at the road ahead. On hazy, smoggy days, the film will always seep back and fill the cracks and holes. That's why I felt so blessed yesterday and Monday when I woke up unhappy and phlegmy and hating the world, and, following some brief, silent prayers for assistance, somehow managed to find a way through into a lighter place.

And on light-filled days, metaphorically speaking, almost nothing can stop it. Working ten hours? No problem. Nothing good to eat? No big deal. Pouring down rain? I love rain. What a gorgeous day this is!

I was thinking yesterday about how careful I tend to be about my attitude, and I started to wonder why other people aren't similarly attentive. And then I realized that it's probably because most of them can afford not to be, and the others don't know how to do it. A bad attitude is a trap. There's no two ways about it. A poor outlook is a trap, and the deeper you get, the harder it is to get free. And the more you spread it, the greater the number of people you can pull down with you. I can't allow myself to do that for long. Unless I want to find myself back where I've been before, where I was for so many years, I can't allow myself to wallow in fatigue or anger or frustration for any length of time. I can't allow myself to play the victim.

Of course, I can't just ignore those feelings either--I'm fairly certain that my unconscious habit of ignoring emotions as a matter of course was what got me started on the whole depressive cycle in the first place. Which, if you think about it, may loop back around and explain a little bit of the "bull in the china shop" paragraph above. I'm still working it all out. I guess I probably always will be.


In other news, I saw my first bumblebee of the year this morning. He* made me smile.

































*Technically speaking, all worker bees are female. But I still think of them as hims, because I can, and I do what I want.

May showers

The longer I live here (and I've nearly always lived here) the more I come to understand the comments of some friends who visited from Arizona, years and years ago: "It's like a jungle." I love the cool wet air of springtime in the evenings, and I love the eternally dripping trees during our month of rain. I love the stereophonic chorus of frogs peeping and croaking happily in the wet. I love the green light that fills the space below the trees, and I love the way the branches of some arch up into a glorious and expansive chlorophyll-ceilinged cathedral. I love the evening sun glowing orange-red through the clouds that gather around the Western horizon, and I love its light shining against those in the East. I love the way solid cloud cover seems to pull the world in close--the way, walking in the evening, the soundscape is suddenly so much richer. Sounds that would float up into a clear sky now swirl through the trees. Frogs sing and birds chatter, car doors close and water bubbles down the creek bed, and thunder rumbles in the distance as I leave the house; cracks and splits the sky open as I make my way back home through the thickening rain. As I pass the creek, church bells chime a mile down the road, and the sweet sound wanders down into the valley to meet me.

Spring.

This morning I was informed that the red welt-looking spots around my right eye are likely poison ivy, and shortly thereafter I found a seed tick on my stomach.

A few nights ago, while walking Miley, I heard the trees rustling in the night wind. Do you know what that means? Leaves. When I came home, I found two inchworms in my hair.

Last night I and another person sat out on a curb drinking wine (I from my dino sippy cup*) and talking and watching the moon rise until almost 1 am, and the bats were swooping over the spill pond, and we didn't even freeze.

I'm pretty sure that it's spring.



Also: there is nothing like the smell of calamine lotion. It ranks right up there with sunscreen on the "summer smells" list.



























*who, it occurred to me last evening, is unnamed. How have I allowed this to happen? I think he may be a Harold. Or a Ferdinand. Or perhaps a Harold Ferdinand, which will prevent me from having to make any decisions on the subject. It has a nice ring to it. Harold Ferdinand.

A smorgasbord

Have you seen that Direct TV commercial ("Opulence. I has it.")? The one with the miniature giraffe? Oh, excuse me: the petite lap giraffe. This is ridiculous.

I really have a thing for Star Wars. Possibly I haven't mentioned this, as I haven't been actively obsessive about it in a very long time, but my deep affection remains. And no, no, I do not mean episodes I-III. Those really hardly count as being part of the Star Wars canon. Anyway, I saw these bookends somewhere the other day, and I want them. I want them so bad. Unfortunately, I can't really afford to spend $200 on them. $200 bookends! WTF? They're extremely well-rendered though, so I guess I can sort of understand. And I love the idea of taking a scene from A New Hope where the characters are actually pushing against the walls and transforming it into bookends where they're pushing against the books. The timeline is slightly off, but I will accept this, as messing up the timeline allowed them to include the swamp monster thing (I actually used to know what this was called--that's how obsessed I was--but I've forgotten. Probably it's for the best) and Luke being thrown around by it.

You may have noticed that I've been kind of into Ok Go lately. I mean, more so than usual. Here is the link to their appearances in the NPR archives.

Speaking of Ok Go, there's a song on their album that I didn't really notice the first few times through. It's called "Needing/Getting," and it's awesome. If it had existed when David and I broke up (or at least, if I had been aware of its existence), it would have pretty much been the anthem of my life. Have a listen:

And here are the lyrics, if you're interested:

I've been waiting for months, waiting for years, waiting for you to change*.
Oh, well there ain't much that's dumber, there ain't much that's dumber
than pinning your hopes on change in another.

Oh, yeah I still need you--but what good's that gonna do?
Needing is one thing, but getting? Getting's another.

So I've been sitting around, wasting my time, wondering what you've been doing,
oh it ain't real forgiving, it ain't real forgiving
sitting here picturing someone else living.

And oh, yeah I still need you. But what good's that gonna do?
Needing is one thing, and getting, getting's another.

I've been hoping for months, hoping for years, hoping I might forget.
Oh but it don't get much dumber, it don't get much dumber
than trying to forget a girl when you love her!

And oh, yeah I still need you--but what good's that gonna do?
Oh needing is one thing, and getting
getting's another.

Other things:

Yesterday I was told that I "work like a Jamaican." I don't, really, but it was amusing to hear. I kept remembering that phrase today while I was standing outside pressure washing a tool shed. It's rather wet work, especially when the jet of water hits a corner in the woodwork and throws everything back onto you. It's like standing in your own little private rainstorm. On the upside, rainbows.

Speaking of water jets, Jr and I were driving down my street yesterday, and there was a sprinkler on! A sprinkler! (I just typed "sprinklet" by accident. I like it.)

Something I've been trying to figure out and put into words lately: maybe these aren't warring sides in every person, but they are warring sides in me: stoicism and hedonism/epicurism**. These aren't quite a dichotomy, but that doesn't mean they can't fight. For me, stoicism almost always wins. It's not that my actions are never decided by my hedonistic/epicurean side, but that's in the moment. Hedonism, or my brand anyway, is all in the moment, and in the long run, it doesn't make me happy. Stoicism is long-term: it keeps on walking after hedonism lies down to take a nap--and that's when it turns around, looks at what the hedonist has done, and passes judgment. So. Yeah.

From thefreedictionary.com:

Stoic:

1. One who is seemingly indifferent to or unaffected by joy, grief, pleasure, or pain.

2. Stoic A member of an originally Greek school of philosophy, founded by Zeno about 308 b.c., believing that God determined everything for the best and that virtue is sufficient for happiness. Its later Roman form advocated the calm acceptance of all occurrences as the unavoidable result of divine will or of the natural order.

Hedonism:

1. Pursuit of or devotion to pleasure, especially to the pleasures of the senses.

2. Philosophy The ethical doctrine holding that only what is pleasant or has pleasant consequences is intrinsically good.

Epicurean***:
         1. Devoted to the pursuit of sensual pleasure, especially to the enjoyment of good food and comfort.















*Just to be fair and to be clear, I wasn't just waiting around for David to change. We both needed to change. Things in general needed to change--but they didn't. Or not in the way that we (or I) might have hoped. But they're pretty good now. Things are pretty good.

**I usually work so hard to avoid putting two colons in one sentence. Sometimes though, I just don't feel like rewording the whole thing for the sake of pet peeves. I'm not actually even sure that that's technically incorrect, but it feels like it would be.

***Please forgive the fact that these are different parts of speech. Probably you aren't as much of a perfectionist as I am and didn't even notice, but it's killing me. I'm leaving it because the definition of "stoic" on this particular website is better than the definition of "stoicism."

This post made from 85% post-consumer recycled material.

It's spring, it's spring, it's SPRING, and the staff retreat starts tomorrow. I mean, two days from now in my mind, but technically tomorrow.

Speaking of which, have I mentioned this? The fact that I have many strengths, but that regular sleep is not among them.

Back to the beginning: the staff retreat. It makes me so happy to think about it. I am so looking forward to being there, and for so many reasons. I'll be taking a break from work, I'll be taking a break from everything that is my life in Richmond, I'll be seeing so many people I love and living in a place that is, in so many ways, the home of my heart. I can't begin to explain the logic or the depth or breadth of my love for the place. The air is different. The tone is different. Obviously people are still people there--people still do stupid things, people still have the same personality flaws that they have anywhere else--but still, somehow, sometimes it feels like wings begin to sprout from my shoulder blades when I step into the car to leave for camp, and when I step out into that gravel driveway and I hear the sound of the creek and see the trees stretching up around me, they unfurl. When I think about being there this coming weekend, I literally feel as though I've been breathing stale air, or like I've been holding my breath. I literally look forward to being able to breathe this weekend. That's all.

Regarding my standards:

Firstly, let me say that yogurt plus granola plus banana slices equals a culinary masterpiece. This almost counts as "cooking" for me. Isn't that sad?


Secondly, Miley-the-drama-queen was itching for a walk at 1:30 after I took her at 9:30, so in order to tide her over until her 4pm walk, I took her up the street to the pond. The reason any of this is worthy of note is that there were frog eggs in the water. Pretty awesome. They weren't placed extremely well--clumped around a random stick that was/is stuck into the muck* at the bottom--but still. Awesome. Miley splashed past it and disturbed a frog, actually. I don't think that amphibians particularly guard their eggs, so maybe it was just a random little guy/girl hanging around, but still. Cool.




EDIT: My BestBuy stuff came in the mail! NEW CDS FTW. I haven't bought an album in ages, so it's pretty exciting. It's pretty exciting especially because of the new OkGo cd chillin in the mailer envelope. Want to know what's in the liner notes? Graphs. They did an analysis of the cd and another of the book after which it is named, and presented graphs on comparative sentence length, syllables, parts of speech, and words in common, in that order. From a latter page of the notes:

"The diagrams on pages 2-7 compare the album's lyrics to an excerpt of the book it is named after, General A.J. Pleasonton's The Influence of the Blue Ray of the Sunlight and of the Blue Color of the Sky, published in 1876 by Claxton, Remsen & Haffelfinger, Philadelphia. The graphs on page 8 compare the lyrics with the entirety of Pleasonton's text."

Have I mentioned that this band is great?


Even more intense:

"The front cover displays themes common to the book and the album. Each line represents a sentence, with the album's lyrics (not including the bonus tracks) fanning to the left and the text of the book fanning to the right. Each theme is represented by a color. For sentences dealing with multiple themes, the colors are added together as light is...such that each theme's color both lightens and tints the resultant line."

Themes:
1. Unfounded or Wildly Broad Claims
2. Wonderment
3. Causality/Unavoidable Consequences/ Compelled Behavior
4. Reference to an Individual, or Direct Address to/from One
5. Anecdotal or Expository Context
6. Figuring It All Out
7. Unanswerable/Impossible/Rhetorical Questions
8.  Light/Optics/Color
9. Fire/Combustion/Chemical/Physical Reactions
10. Attraction/Repulsion
11. Things That, in Retrospect, Proved to be Wrong
12. Plants and Animals/Animal Behavior
13. The Sky or Things Falling From It [As I typed this, I heard "and now the sky is falling" play through my speakers. Ha.]
14. Women
15. Optimism/Hope
16. Dissatisfaction
17. Bodies/Body Parts/Bodily Function
18. God/Faith
19. Corruscation
20. Death
21. Magic
22. Global Mechanics
23. Confusion/Curiosity
24. Pride
25. Prescriptions for a Better World

Theme visualization:

*That "stick stuck muck" thing was entirely unintentional. I just couldn't find a more satisfactory way to word it.

The city is blooming. Everything is green and white and pink, and the streets are blowing with flower petals. Spring is great.

ILOVEIT.

I had my first giddy glimpse of new green foliage as I crossed my favorite bridge this afternoon, and as I parked, a spring breeze blew pink flower petals into my open window.

Fifty or so links, and approximately one zillion pictures.

For Mother's Day, my mom said she wants the three of us--me, herself, and Chloe--to record three songs together at my cousin's house in the basement recording studio. She wants the first song to be "Come Thou, Long Expected Jesus" and the second to be "Hard Times," by East Mountain South. I want the third to be "One Voice," by The Wailin Jennys.

Speaking of music, I have fallen in love with WMRN, or WNRN, or whatever is 103.1 in Richmond. They play good music. Almost all the time. Plus, they avoid commercials. At the beginning/end of each hour they say "this hour was supported by" or "this hour will be made possible by" and then mention a few companies, and then go back to playing fantastic music that doesn't get played on any other stations. Today I heard music that as far as I know has never seen airtime on any pop stations from She & Him, Macy Gray, Paolo Nutini, and John Mayer. Yeah, Macy and John have definitely gotten on pop stations, but I hadn't ever heard or heard of the songs of theirs that I heard today. I love, I love, I love this station. Ok, I looked them up. God bless you, WNRN.

Sara sent me a care package today! Or rather, I guess she sent it several days ago. But to me was delivered a care package today via USPS (? I am making that up instead of checking) from Sara. It had a cd in it. Good times. I love cds. I am raking them in this week! Two of Mr Robert Marley from Artimus, and one of aural awesomeness from Sara. Yay. Also included in said care package were two pictures by local (at the time of purchase) Vancouver artists, one "Truffle Pig" candy bar, and maybe some other stuff that I forgot right now. It's in my room. If I get up Chloe will steal my computer. Deal.

And now, fotografias.

That time I took Marina to the park:

On how I think pollen is pretty:

Pictures from Camp, including those I took in order to tell the time whilst caving*:

"Does this thing have a time stamp?"

"What time is it? Hey, look at this flowstone!"

"Ok what time is it now? By the way there are a bunch of bats over here. Keep your head low."

"What about now? Take the picture of Kate--her first trip into Crossroads!"

(There were a few more pictures taken in the cave, but they sucked even worse.)

In which Chloe and I set up her Advanced Art installation, much of which included determining the placement of that one mirror we didn't end up using anyway. Also, in which we go check out other peoples' installations:

When I made hummus and some other stuff and mom made most very delicious strawberry shortcake for dessert:

After the movie, when Kelly gave up shopping before dinner to help me leave Chloe a car, because she is Just That Nice and so accompanied me to Chloe's art opening-type thing:

And then when Kelly and I went shopping the next day instead, and got those fantastic $4 rain coats from Old Navy, and actually I bought a green one, and then we took some pictures at my house:

(Don't tell her I posted that one.)

Oh hey, and here is Chloe as Touchstone in Collegiate's rendition of Shakespeare's "As You Like It." Sorry my camera's video and audio are so bad here:

*As we were about to enter the cave, I realized that I had left my phone in the equipment room when I changed into caving (aka baseball) pants. Soon thereafter followed the realization that Kelly didn't have her phone either, and neither did JP. Kate, being seven years of age, does not possess a phone. Obviously none of us wear watches, because we can just check our phones to see the time. Luckily I had my camera in the car, which I thought might have a time stamp. Indeed, my camera has a time stamp--one which is even close to the correct time! So we took pictures throughout our caving venture in order to ascertain the increasing seriousness of our current lateness for lunch. (Cavers are always late for lunch. It's a rule.)

Really, nothing has changed in my mind's image of me and David except for the colors and the focus. I am the same person and he is the same person, and I still love him, but what I see changes all the time. Largely it changes in the same ways it did while we were together, though I now have a slightly different perspective. Different parts of the picture come into focus or fade out at different times; different colors are highlighted or dulled. Sometimes I can easily see that we aren't very similar, aren't particularly compatible, don't want the same things. Sometimes I see these things and accept that they mean that we probably aren't the best matches for each other. Sometimes I see them and I feel like they don't matter--like I love him enough to work with and around and through our differences. Sometimes I can hardly see our differences at all. Sometimes I don't see anything, and when I think that we might never be together again, I can hardly stand it. Last night I could hardly breathe until I let that door close again.

Remembering the way his cheek felt against mine as I hugged him and he hugged me, or the angle and warmth of his back and shoulders when he napped on his side, and their height as I reached over them, and the way he once held my hand beneath his chest as he drifted off is like a knife sometimes. The hair and skin over the hardness of his shins. His tree climbing, his dirty feet, his water in juice bottles. All those philosophy books and Monk seasons, and his banjo playing, his laughter, his love for animals and for me. His love for his family. His knowledge about so many things. The way he drives his car, with forgiveness and determination and acceptance and affection.  How can I leave those things?





I had hoped that breaking up or taking a break would bring clarity, or at least peace. I guess, in terms of clarity, that the dust in the water has settled a little, but I wouldn't call things "clear." And I only have peace when I'm thinking of other things.





The air of the spring is intoxicating.There is a smell of warm air and another of warm dirt, of hot dirt, of wet dirt. There's a smell of streams and a smell of trees and a smell inside a house with open windows, and in the spring they all swim through everything. Yesterday as I drove to church a part of the road was covered in a swirling carpet of white petals that had fallen from the blossoming trees along the road. I suspect that something similar was the inspiration behind the "dryads" of the new Narnia movies, though I must say that the real thing is far superior.


I have had so much to say, but I keep forgetting so many things before I can write them down.




edit:
I left this unfinished and un-posted for several hours, and there was a spring rain--the kind where the air turns translucent pink-orange and the drops fall lightly and widely spaced onto the new leaves and buds and petals, onto the blanket of treelove pollen, into the windows we left open in the beautifully hot air. And I tell you again, there is no smell better than damp spring dirt smell. If you don't agree, you have to at least admit that it is solidly in the top ten smells ever created. I took pictures.

This is from this afternoon, before the rain:

And this is the spring rain sky.

Showered flowers (which are prettier in larger sizes):

And sweet Faith, who doesn't love the rain as much as I do.

(I promise I didn't wear those shoes all day yesterday or all day today. I just slipped them on to close the car windows and take pictures. Honest.)