Polyglot

Monstrous Monsters

2011-06-19T23:40:00.000-07:00

What exactly is a monster? Is he (or she?) an ogre that drools and slobbers all over his victim? Does he speak in garbled mouthfuls like the Tasmanian Devil on Bugs Bunny cartoons? He is a molester that looks like your Average Joe, not monstrous at all but a horror to those who've experienced his filthy thoughts, advances, and touches? Is he a rabid dog, frothing at the mouth ready to rip your throat apart? Is it a garden spider whose web you've just walked into and now, from a distance, we see you doing that universally common 'spider web on the face-neck-and-head' swipe-dance? Is she an evil teacher who scared the bejesus out of you day after day in grammar school?

Mine was my cousin. A monster. A schizophrenic psychotic monster who lived in our house with our family. A child-monster who was not medicated for his mental disease probably because it was not an option as it is today. He lived with us and his two younger brothers under our roof mostly because our grandparents couldn't handle him and his own mother was incapable at the time.

This occurred eons ago, during the Viet Nam war. This was years before psychiatric medicine made clearer determinations that many schizophrenics begin experiencing their 'break' when they hit adolescence or early teens. He was 12. I was three and a half. Everyone else was in-between those ages.

When he arrived, rather, dropped off with his two brothers at our beach house, I felt uneasy. Not one to shy away from most events, I actually watched him with my head gently turned as if to gaze peripherally, like a full-on frontal view was impossible; side-view must've indicated the truth. I stood near my mom who was equally as surprised at my grandparents unexpected visit to our beach house and the arrival of the three boys -- and their suitcases.

Immediately, they hollered and begged to go down the stairs to the beach where my brothers and sister were busy busting waves or digging tunnel cities in the sand. From the ocean front window, I watched them run down to the water's edge. My chin rested on the sill, finger tips tucked over the edge as if gripping onto the situation: not a movie, but real life. All three ran through the ankle deep waves near my brothers, stopped, hurled their shoes up the beach toward the house, rolled their pant cuffs up, then went deeper. Stomping, splashing; the middle one backed out when the Monster scooped up water in his hand and hurled it towards him.

My mom turned to my Grandparents and inquired of their visit. It was their beach house, after all. Grandpa built it thirty feet back from the sea wall in the 1930s at a time when only flowing strands of long sea grass reached to the ocean. Now this same multi-mile, west-facing stretch was lined with weathered houses and motels, all faded from the salty air and wretched Pacific storms and blinding western sunlight.

Grammy and Grandpa thought it would be good for the boys to get some fresh air. I loved my grandparents and stood near them; they warmed me. Grammy protectively, instinctively put her hands on my shoulders. Over the crashing waves, we all heard a whoop and yell out on the beach. Back to the window we directed our attention stared out and saw the source of the cacophony: in his hands like a rodeo cowboy, the Monster whirled a long lariat strand of kelp towards his middle brother and my second-eldest brother. The Monster held in his hands the golden yellow bulb and with a clean whip of his arm, he snapped the kelp back in a quick S-shape then zinged it at my brother. He made contact and whether it smarted or not my brother retaliated and charged at the monster who leap-frogged over the knee-high waves while howling with laughter and snapping his whip into the water as he attempted to escape.

This was only the beginning. Before Mom could ask them to take him back home, Grammy and Grandpa had already zoomed out of the driveway in their white Ford station wagon leaving a sandy skid mark and the three boys under my Mom's parentage, as if taking care of five children wasn't already enough.

The Monster's perspective was appropriately skewed. The next morning, she awoke to the scraping sound of match sticks on rock. The beach house's fireplace was built of various melon-sized river rocks. The house's interior was a sheen of shellacked knotty pine walls and a more modern addition with walls of unfinished plywood. It was built of wood inside and out, even the garage floor was oil-stained wood plank.

The Monster was busily lighting wooden matches then tossing them into the wood bin, another shellacked cupboard alongside the hearth that contained inches and inches of twigs and sawdust and dried firewood. He would ignite a match, stare at it as its flame burned down the stick's fueled shaft, then drop it into the wood bin and watch it burn, catch a few errant wood bits, and fortunately, die.

Over and over he did this, his eyes wide with irrational excitement showing my Mom how incredible it was that sometimes the sawdust or tinder caught fire and lit other little pieces.

Thanks in part to her working on her Master's degree and a recent psychiatric disorders class, Mom quickly realized he was obsessed with fire and, immediately applying some semblance of educational application, gave him a box of matches and reinforced his pyromania by sending him down the beach. "Go make as many fires as you want on the beach! Come back when you're done.' Hours later, he returned, 11 fires he showed her. 11 bonfires, some large, some small.

His obsessions continued once we arrived at home: with a bus pass, he rode the bus all over the city, taking one, then another, then another. Somehow, he returned home. He picked and picked on his middle brother to the point that the latter began to tug out little clumps of his hair: a half-dollar bald spot formed above his right forehead that made his hair stick up like a frontal cowlick.

He tormented my father, his biological uncle until Dad exploded and chased him like an Olympic hurdler over the front laurel hedge. He ripped off Santa Claus's spirit gummed-beard after berating him and pestering him with machine gun questions. He hammered interrogations at our live-in babysitter about money, her boyfriend, her breasts, and her promiscuity.

At some point, he directed his obsession on me. The worst of the monstrous behavior caustically seeped out and contaminated our home, endangered our lives.

Because I was so young, it was expected that I'd take a nap each day. I was never really fond of naps already, since it seemed that all the best parts of the day -- swing set time, kickball, pill bug searching -- occurred during that hour. No matter, it was expected. And, as a result, the Monster learned of this daily standard.

It happened unexpectedly. Because it was still summer, Mom was home. She happened to our live-in sitter, a heavily mascaraed, black-bouffanted nineteen year old where the Monster was. A shoulder shrug indicated he was not favored nor someone she opted to keep an eye on. Mom began the search, noticing in part that our neighborhood was far too quiet for him to be around. He was a whooper, his questions poured out in repetitious, staccato, slightly-tenored rapid fire. Nothing was subtle. He badgered the Special Needs boy who lived up the street with the same animosity and non-sequitor, breathless questioning as he did my father.

Mom scoured the house from dark basement to back yard to main floor then to the upstairs. It was there that she saw the beginnings of an unusual scene: my bedroom door was closed. My sister's and my bedroom door was never closed. None of us ever closed our bedroom doors.

She turned the loose glass knob, swung the door open wide, and there, sitting on the edge of my baby blue framed bed, she found the Monster leaning over my prone body with a pillow across my face. My legs and feet kicked from underneath my Winnie-the-Pooh blanket. "What are you doing?!" she screamed. "Geoff! What?! Are?! You?! Doing?!" Despite my Mom's horrored yell, he didn't look up, he didn't pause, he maintained his suffocating position.

The Sitter rushed into the room just behind Mom, perhaps because she heard her shriek. The two of them wrestled and peeled the monster and the pillow clutched in his hands off of me and spun him out of the room. The door slammed. He stood in the hallway, pillow in-hand.

Mom scooped me into her arms but I didn't want to be held. I just wanted to be away. She kissed my sweaty, reddened forehead and clutched me as I hyperventilated. She rocked me back and forth, then turned to the Sitter. "Go get him. Put him in the t.v. room and shut the door. Do not let him out. Take the pillow away from him."
Our t.v. room was a bare-bones room adjacent to the kitchen. It was decorated with a wavering bookshelf, brown davenport, a wall-sized print of painted subway scene, a simple, one-drawered maple desk that held our massive black and white television, and a rolling crate that held wood blocks. One door, two windows that were 12 feet above ground.

Mom interrogated him. Reamed him for his actions. Livid. Scared. She yelled at him. He was unemotional. Unattached. Unfazed by her outrage, her explosion. He did not understand. He'd already moved on to the next thought process in his mind -- the birds outside, life beyond our house. 'Do you think they make all that noise when they go to other neighborhoods? How old is Mrs. Pritchard? She looks old. Where's Uncle Wayne?'

He tried again the next day and the next and for weeks to follow. Obviously, he either got caught or outsmarted. He failed to satisfy this homicidal need in his psyche.

During the week, when all of us were playing outside, he tried to grab me and pull me down. I squirmed away numerous times. I learned how and where to run in the woods behind our house if he was following me. When Mom took us to the public pool for swimming, he'd find me in the shallow end and hold my head under water. I learned to pinch his pudgy gut as my only defense. I quickly learned how to swim and if I saw his blurry face or body headed in my directions, I went in the other.
Once, when all of us were with Dad at our family grocery store on a Sunday, the day it was closed, the Monster followed me downstairs to the basement where all of us were playing hide-and-go-seek among the dim-bulbed aisles and aisles of crates and boxes.

He grabbed me and shoved me down the aisle that towered with cases of ice cream cones, Halloween candy, and school supplies and pushed me into the deep freezer. This was a sub-zero freezer an eight inch wooden door sealed it with a palm-sized steel plunger opening. He slammed the door shut and held the lever on the other side: the plunger wouldn't depress from my side. My voice melted into the frost.
Doug, the freezer guy, always kept a pair of gloves inside and I put them on, rubbed my ears, and jumped up and down. I repeatedly hurled my body against the door, leaned my back against the plunger pushing the toes of my blue Keds into a stack of gallon ice cream tubs for resistance. At some point, I gave up and stared at the door, not knowing what to do.

I never thought the worst, whatever that could have been. I only thought that I hated the Monster. That he was incredibly mean.

During nap time, Mom began to scan my room before putting me down. She opened the closet I shared with my sister and, occasionally found the Monster hiding behind skirts and dresses, his dirty PF Flyers squashing my sister's fancy shoes. She found him under my bed, his head resting on top of his hands as if he was taking a nap himself. She found him in the next room, leaning against the wall like a cat burglar ready to pounce. Every ten minutes, she would send someone up to check on me. The Sitter discovered him holding a pair of my socks over my eyes and mouth and nose.

Outside our house one Autumn day, he again tried to grab me. Fortunately, all of us neighborhood kids had been playing whiffle ball that day and, per usual, left our equipment out on the sidewalk and grassy strip. Again, I squirted out of his clutches, spun around and grabbed the yellow plastic bat we'd used earlier then took a home run swing at his head. I clobbered him with full power as best I could, then said, "Yea! I got him!" He was stunned and didn't move. I ran away, bat in hand. For once, he didn't follow.

The Monster and my cousins lived with us for two plus years.

When I was about nine, at my Grandparents 50th Wedding Anniversary party, all of us headed down the block to the our store to pick up more party supplies. The Monster tried again to shove me into the cooler upstairs in an attempt to suffocate or freeze me to death once more. Fortunately, I knew enough about this one -- it was the soda and dairy cooler. On the other - internal - side of the cooler's plunger door that he leaned upon, a thick wall and inner door separated the back stock portion from the shelf or retail portion, the stood a wall of glass doors where customers grabbed their six-packs and sodas. I crawled out over the Pepsi and Coke bottles, pushed the heavy glass door open and found warm air and safety. I left the store through the basement door and jogged back up to Grammy and Grandpa's.

When the Monster died a few years ago from a combination of prescription narcotics, alcohol and asphyxiation from his own spit, I was finally relieved. For years, I've not napped. I've slept on my stomach. I have nightmares. I don't wear turtlenecks. At times, as much of a swimmer I've always been, I've hesitated getting into a pool. I never stepped into the deep freeze at our store even if I was asked to retrieve something for a customer.

A Monster was hidden behind a boy's face, within a 12 year old's mind. He was academically brilliant therefore coveted. Yet he was diabolical and evil. He felt no morality, no shame, no sense of right and wrong. He attempted murder on numerous occasions that I know of and was never held accountable other than admonishment or a sentry on guard.

A Monster lived in our house, under our roof. Worse, a Monster was in my family.

Mom - May 22.

2011-05-22T21:38:00.000-07:00

Today is Mom's birthday. She would've been 86. She died in 2005, age 80. She had a brilliant mind and huge heart. Although we had some differences of opinion, I think of her daily and miss her still. A bouquet of yellow roses rests beneath some redwoods on a trail she and I hiked together in the East Bay Regional Parks. Some tears mark my presence but I felt her there, too; she often is.

It never gets easier.

Recently, I was given a prompt for writing -- "Tell me where you will never be again" -- and the following is what poured out, unedited, unrevised.

I will never be in Portland in the fall after returning from a fantastic ten-day trip to Paris with my partner. I will never be there, in Portland, in September, after that trip watching my mother die in her bed. I will never visit her every day and hold her hand and caress her thin graying hair. nor smell that acrid scent of age and life that's slipping away. I will never be in that dimly lit room in Portland, during the first week of September, covering up my Mom's frail body as she does uncontrollable, brain-forced abdominal crunches in her bed.

These are half-crunches she relentlessly does that I could never do for the prolonged up-and-hold pauses. I tried in my hotel room the first day after returning to Portland and returning to my Mom's bedside, just a few days from my Paris trip. I collapsed into a sobbing puddle of loss and departure.

I will never be in Portland during those beautiful end-of-summer days rushing over to spend the final barren minutes with my Mom, recalling, even briefly that just days before I was surrounded by lush flower shops swarming with colorful, fresh-cut flowers. Where we and other people around us leaned on round, marble-topped tables, sipped luscious, frothy cafe au laits, nibbled on delicate, buttery croissants, and the Parisians endlessly smoked French cigarettes, the deathly trail of blue smoke weaving through their V'd Franco fingers. Mom loved Paris; she loved the history of Van Gogh's life there and followed it backwards, per se, to The Netherlands. I will never have those thoughts of Paris, of Mom, with Mom as her life slipped away beside me in that room again.

I know that I will never again be in Portland during those sweltering days, holding my mother's chilled hand and watching her squint and grimace at something high over the foot of her bed, when I felt the chill of death's scythe above me. I know that I will never be there in that place in Portland, sensing a final goodbye and the reality that her birthday will never be celebrated again.

Enlightenment

2011-04-19T08:30:00.000-07:00

Rather than post this as a "status" on fb, I thought I'd write it here. Reasoning, that it's quasi-permanent, and worthy of returning to.

"No matter how plain a woman may be, if truth and loyalty are stamped on her face all will be attracted to her." --Eleanor Roosevelt

I have a certain affection for the First Lady, niece of Teddy, and fifth cousin, once removed of her husband, FDR. She was stolid, not a 'looker,' per se, but definitely had presence, largely because of her personality, her viewpoint towards human rights, equality, and her goodness. Of course, she was born into loads of dough, but her character spurred her to look and support those who weren't.

This comment struck me as something to which I aspire. Loyalty comes without hesitation, even in the face of adversity and unkindness. I believe in my friends, in my family, and those I love and have loved. Unwavering.

The truth part is an element that I recently diminished and now must rebuild and reestablish. This isn't as easy as my words indicate. No mortar and brick, no boards and nails. It's a time-tested lifestyle and belief that can be pummeled and toppled into a crumbled pile and scaffolded together with the twigs and branches of consistency, hope, love, and belief.

"In the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility." -ER

I've seen and experienced deception, lies, the whole smoke-and-mirrors aspect has emerged on many fronts, not just from me but from those around me and, of course in society as a whole. Boy oh boy is it ever ugly, worth retching over -- painful on the inside and out. It, this or these character flaws are hideous on anyone, including me. They leave and/or create a mottled, potholed trail of bruises, defeat, misunderstandings, doubt, and sadness where once joy, awareness, appreciation, love, and openness thrived and blushed.

It's my job to demonstrate, yes, my loyalty, and my commitment to the restructuring process, to the love that created the sincerity in the first place and, over each day, each hour, create a muddy, albeit slightly stronger sense of truth, forgiveness, and honesty that will, ideally, become a bridge a reconnection, an embrace on one level or another. At some point, mud and straw will give way to a stronger bond.

I am not the most attractive person in the world, but in my simplicity, my plainness, my love for others, I strive for Ms. Roosevelt's statement: truth and loyalty.

"The giving of love is an education in itself." - ER

Finality

2011-04-16T13:22:00.000-07:00

When the choice is made, the papers are signed, and the check endorsed, the final step is to turn it all in and get it verified.
By mail. Via FedEx. Through e-mail. In person.

A couple months ago, I made the decision to run a half marathon. I'd thought about this for a while, a bunch of years, actually, but never took the proverbial steps beyond picking up a brochure. An opportunity arose, I slipped a brochure in my pocket, then later received a company-wide announcement. A second reinforcement. I thought about it, not having trained before and, with only a month prior to this event, not feeling ready.

However, I decided I had nothing to lose. So what, if I had to walk it? So what, if I finished in 4 hours after the street cleaners have passed by? So what, if I ran part and walked part? It was the end result, the committment to the next step, the accomplishment, or, rather, to the turned page: done. I filled out the papers, signed my name, wrote the check, then, at last, mailed it. That final step sealed the deal.

Yea, I finished the half, not by the time I'd hoped for, rather 13 minutes slower, but hey, that's okay.

Recently, I took the steps towards another paper-signing venture. Downloaded everything from the internet, read it through, consulted with someone, read more, consulted again, then, after a bit of urging, I filled them out. Yes, them. Multiple pages.
This took about three hours -- disturbed my sleep that night and for nights to follow until I could take the next steps: copying and filing.

It's a weird process all of this. Making a decision then following through with it, then following through with it on an entirely objective level. It's a committment of a different kind: committing to a major turn in life, a drastic change, a road untraveled and, yea, a bit bumpy.

I took the multiple pages to one place then was told to take them elsewhere, miles from where I stood. Place number one no longer accepted them even though the website says otherwise. Aaargh. A major hurdle in my efforts to trepidatiously take this step.

When I arrived at Place #2, I had less than 15 minutes until closing and there was a short line before me. I rationalized that I'd have to return the following week, not enough time, a pause beyond my control settled in. A clock slowly ticked, the minute hand swung upward to the top of the hour with a slow thud. I could hear every sound, each footstep on the shiny floor, each whining door that opened and closed with an echo. The conversation between the security folks behind me regarding days off and whose day today was his 'Friday.'

The people in front of me stepped forward, presented their documents then tsked when the receiver asked for supplementary information. The male paper-hander justified his presence there and why he didn't have further information; the woman beside him shuffled papers in a thick, plasticine folder and tsked again.

"Next."
I stepped forward and stated my reason for being here in front of her, Diana. I handed her my packet of papers which she sorted through like a disordered deck of cards. No casino bow tie, though, she wore a flower patterned t-shirt and jeans. Her black hair hung unremarkably around her ears to her shoulders. She tucked the right strand behind her ear as she looked at me, then back down at the papers.

"Do you have the ...?"
'No,' I said, 'I wasn't sure if I needed that. I thought it had to do with...' She sighed, explained to me its purpose, then sighed again. She glanced at the clock on the wall to her left. We both spied it was five minutes until the hour.
'Can you duplicate it? I mean, don't you have a copy of that here? Or do I have to come back another time and do all this?'
She said nothing in response. Instead, she typed away at her computer keyboard, scribbled something on one of my papers, then stepped away. When she returned, she picked up a massive stamper, not unlike the type a librarian uses, or, in the old days, that a grocer might use to punch purple-inked prices onto cans of soup or jars of pickles.

She flipped it over,slid the cage down, stared at her computer monitor, spun some dials on the stamper, checked the monitor again, looked at the stamper's reverse image, then released the shiny metal cage. She gave it a practice stamp on a blank notepad, checked the notation, then slid my papers over.

Ker-chunk, ker-chunk, ker-chunk, heavy, ancient processing that verified my presence, that demonstrated the seriousness of this bundle of papers. Ker-chunk, ker-chunk. Page after page, corner after corner was emblazoned in a square of purple block print and a number.

At last, she finished stamping. Put device aside on her counter where purple markings from unintended stamping occured. The area looked like a dried up grape lake. She picked up a yellow highlighter, squeaked it across certain areas, then spun these sheets around to me. "Fill out here, here, here, and here. Sign here." Her finger jabbed at each yellow spot. This was the forgotten sheet.

I did so and spun it back to her. My hand was shaking as I tucked my pen back into my pocket. I was slipping into that zone of final-stepness.
"The fee is... dollars."
'Okay. Can I use my debit card?'
She reached her hand out and took my card with only a nod, no comment, and stepped away from her counter, my papers in hand.

The clock ticked upward. Behind me, I heard the security gentlemen's heavy gait as they secured with a bang the glass doors. It was 30 seconds until closing. I sighed.

Diana returned and handed me my card. She stapled my receipt to the top left corner, reached again for her tool, ker-chunk, ker-chunk: an original and a copy. Her cuticles were unintended purple half moons. She snapped a black paper clip around the originals, half-tossed them into a box marked, "To File, Room 151, April 6, 2011 then slid the copies across the sheened countertop towards me.

It was finalized.
'Do I need to mail these or ...?'
"You'll need to use ... or if you want, at the US Post Office you'll need to pay for Certified Delivery. That's cheaper." She gave me a broken smile.
'Thank you.'

As I walked out, I looked down at the packet. The purple ink fluttered in the bay's wind, unhelped by my shaky hands. A weird hole formed within me. As I crammed the papers into my bag, it felt just the opposite: rather than tucking something in, I was letting something go.

It's an interesting process, decision making. Well-thought out, the end result should be positive, or so we hope. Right now, smack in the middle of the post-decision process, it's difficlt to sense the end-of-tunnel light. However, these steps would not have been taken if some aspect of betterment, some tiny essence that there will be something positive was not thought to be on the road ahead.

A fork in the road and neither turn leads to a Dead End. However taking one route over the other is Final. Taking the alternative is Not an Option. There's no turning back.

See Through

2011-04-13T16:49:00.000-07:00

To look into the eye, straight into the eye, what does one see?

The iris, that multi-hued perimeter that tells us, 'Oh, she's got sky blue eyes!' Or, do we notice the white with the veiny redness that demonstrates dry eye or fatigue or allergies, or, in some cases, a blown vessel? How about those lashes, long like spider legs or short serving a minimal purpose of keeping crud out? Are they dark and mysterious or lighter and accentuating to the brow, mascara'd or plain?
What about the pupil all roundish, black, peppercorn or marble-sized?

Or, do we not notice the physical structure at all and simply go for the metaphysical aspect? For example, the 'I can tell by your eyes you're lying.' Or, 'You look straight into my soul when you look at me.' Or, 'When our eyes meet, I feel loved.'

It's interesting to ponder -- the physical versus the emotional and impalpable sensory.

I've a bit of focus, no pun intended, on this right now. Just got off the phone with my ophthalmologist/surgeon who suggested that I exist nearly a month without my contacts prior to the first, upcoming surgery. This is due, in part, to my contact lenses and how they tend to misshape the eyes. Also, since I'm prone to constant retinal disease -- even post-surgically -- my eyes are constantly altering themselves. Yea, despite two full days of measurements and drops, I get to have one more pleasurable day of dark rooms and funky machinery! Yea for me!!

The irony is profound: I'm rather smart. That is, I know a lot of stuff and can appropriately apply most of the arbitrary information to something, be it Jeopardy!, cocktail party conversation, or just random spewing among friends. However, when I was recently in the situation of wearing my thick, Coke-bottley glasses for a week, people not only treated and looked at me differently, they spoke to me differently. Yes, truly as if I were, say a Special Olympics candidate. Kind of cracked me up, actually, especially after I was given the slow, albeit slightly louder (because when there's one impairment, then deafness MUST also be a factor, too) commentary or offer.
"DO YOU NEED HELP CARRYING THIS OUT TO THE BUS STOP?!!" Yes, in nearly yelling tone, hence the uppercase lettering.
"IT'S NICE THAT YOU HAVE A JOB. WHAT DO THEY LET YOU DO THERE?" Someone actually asked if I help with copying or stuffing envelopes. No lie.

So, as I've said before, I am special. Very special, indeed.

The surg. is fast coming down the pipe. There's a bit of concern by my surgeon because of my severe myopia, but she's confident that, given no complications, a new lens will work out well for me. Again, even today, no promises on the double vision. "Let's just cross one bridge at a time," she said today. Hmmm. Okay.

I have to admit, as I've said before, I have a strange nervousness about this. It's not that eye surgeries aren't done all the time. I know that. And I know that most have no complications. Criminy Sakes, I'm rather healthy so, if you ask me, I'm a good candidate for any sort of procedure. It's just an irrational unease, not quite worry, just ill-at-ease.

Yes, I know the odds are in my favor. Yea yea yea. It's hard to explain and paradoxically, despite all the words in my head, I've very few here on this sensation: Somewhere between a tightrope and an imbalanced stair step. That is, very unsettling and not quite well-footed. Wearing my glasses for a month doesn't help me feel better about any of it either. Don't ask why, it just doesn't.

Trust, I suppose is a major key. When entering such an unknown territory - no matter what it involves (new job, conversation, a date, an exam, a confrontation, a food that many enjoy but looks like vomit) - there's always a bit of dis-ease, uneasiness, an ill-at-ease feeling. To assuage this, there needs to be a release of the guard and a flow of trust. Back to the ole, Breathe and Release. Not unlike Superman, but slightly skewed I beleve we, or I must see through the walls and Trust.

So, when I look into my eye, when I look at my contact lens floating around, what do I see? Do I see nervousness or plastic? Do I see four eyes or hope? Is there a window in or a reflection out?

When I look deep or when you look deep - far beyond just the sleepy bags and the allergy soreness, what do you see? What do you want to see? What do we see in and through the lens of our mind's eye or the eye that leads to and from our heart soul?

Clarity? Hope. Trust.

Fear or Relief?

2011-03-29T12:43:00.000-07:00

The dates are set and the eyes are apprehensively ready. It's a funny thing - a sense of relief melded into a wad of fear about the repairs.

One thing's for certain - I will either continue to see double or I will not. How absolute is that? Medicine and the human body are interesting in what's predicted and known by repetitive procedure and what this variable, this completely adaptable, ever-changing dynamic system we call our body is capable of doing. It's like algebra: the integer + the X variable = some sort of outcome, hopefully the one that is supposed and known.

I thought it ironic that the day after I return from a writing retreat I will have my left eye sliced open. I'm hoping that this first surgery will give me a bit of fodder from which to grow my writing brain. As it stands, the sigh imbued with the angst is enough for me to scrawl something here.

Right eye will be three and a half weeks later: plenty of time to adjust, get rid of my left eye patch and resume the right eye pirated look for Gay Pride! Now that's a look most people won't have! Aaaarr!

It's scary, though, just thinking about having my eyes operated on. I know it's for the better, and I know that I'll garner relief at some point, but, honestly, I have some fear of these procedures. No, not that a mistake will be made and I'll end up blind in one eye. For some reason, I've made amends with this option, or so I think; my rational mind knows that all will be okay, my not-so-rational mind keeps jerking those thoughts around not unlike when we jolt a pinball machine to thwart the gravitied roll of the ball. It's difficult to explain. And it exists probably, in part, because I've no one with whom to share this gelatinous sense of stability. Despite the likelihood of a positive outcome, the jitters remain.

Ideally, my headaches will subside. Ideally, the double vision will ease up. Ideally, the dizziness and lightheadedness will fade into the sunset. Ideally, my vision will improve to the level of the average person and I will, at last, release my clutches on my severe myopia, although still have to wear some sort of lenses for clear vision. Ideally, all will sail through under the laser's incision, the opthalmologists hands, and the new lens(es) with the same ease and swiftness that the average senior citizen receives when they have a simpler, shaved-down cataract surgery. Ideally, all will be better.

I think I need to reflect upon a blog I posted a while back and truly partake: breathe and release. Breathe and release. I have had to let go of so much that I believed in and hoped for this past year, I suppose that I need to let go of some of this unstable uncertainty, too.

Breathe in relief, release the fear. Breathe and release.

Why Be Nice?

2011-03-28T22:11:00.000-07:00

In light of so much loss, so much back-biting, so many dismissive comments and acts of divisiveness in our society, I began to wonder why be nice?

Here, in the Bay Area, I pondered, Why put myself out there time and time again, trusting people, thinking better of people than what [periodical/occasional] circumstances dictate, why constantly be the one who gives the Benefit of Doubt to those around me? Why help out, reach out, give a hand, or a kind word or attentive ear and expect nothing in return? I'm what many would consider to be a kind person, I give of myself, I ask questions, I am loyal to a fault, I have left myself exposed, per se, and attempted to 'show my cards.' And yet, among the many wonderful friends & family who are sincere and supportive, it never ceases to amaze me how frequently I am on the rancid end as recipient (or would it be considered a victim?) of squelchings, snubbings, rumors, lies, and underminings. Do I ask for this? I think not. Who would?

Why, oh why, some might ask, do I not simply look out for me and say 'fuck you' to those around me who step upon or turn their back to me? Why not venture down that scientific path of Survival of the Fittest, Only the Strong Survive, Keep your Friends Close and your Enemies Closer, Be Number One Because Nobody Remembers Number Two, Cooperation is Only for the Weak and all those other signs along the way? Why not follow the Origin of the Species to the nth degree? In living and adaptating to my family, this was the way of survival, sure, but as an adult, it's an entirely different environment.

Hmmm. I proposed this question on my fb status page and discovered that many of those with whom I associate found that niceness is the way to survival. That this, indeed is the way to continue our species in life. Because helping out another altruistically, opening a hand for another, turning a blind eye, letting go of mistakes, accepting forgiveness and all that stuff is what brings our society out from a bunch of egomaniacal self-serving, self-centered, myway/highway, compartmentalized beings to a bonded, reliable, scaffolded community.

Some British scientists proposed the questionable idea in a free lecture, "Why Be Nice? Understanding Co-operative Behaviour in Humans and Other Animals" at the Zoological Society London (ZSL). One lecturer pointed out the basic picnicking friend we're all too familiar with: the ant. Ants share their hoards. When they discover an open soda can or forgotten mound of potato salad, an alert is sent via their funky little ant saliva. If ants didn't share this lovely meal with their million other brethren, their massive ant colony and their beloved queen would die. That's a bit of pressure to play the telephone game, I tell you.

In the primate world, it was pointed out that when monkeys, (the example given), a vervet monkey discovered a food fest, say, a tree or the ground underneath dotted with luscious fruits it was expected that he share and holler out a 'food call,' with his troop. Not unlike a cowpoke's banged-upon triangle for vittles & grits, I suppose. When the troop discovered the monkey hoarding away his sweetened treasure, he received a beating. Wild dogs or wolves tended to share their banquets too. It's for the betterment of the pack; "dogs and monkeys favour co-operation and refuse to participaate in unfair social exchanges."

Redouan Bshary of Neuchatel University in Switzerland discovered that certain fish are cleaners (wrasse) and others are clients (grouper fish). Cleaners eat the parasites off of, crazily, much larger predator fish. Sort of the 'keep your enemies close' notion, I suppose. There's a certain respect from the client fish for the cleaners who could easily bite their own predatory customers, and these predatory clients could easily make a meal of the cleaner, but opt not to especially when there are other cleaners around -- like it's frowned upon in fish society to eat the not-s0-hired help. Of course, there's a bit of misogyny in all this too: male cleaner fish attack female cleaners if the little lady gets fed up with the whole parasitical meal thing and decides to swim away. This keeps the females more cooperative and more likely to give an excellent grooming service. Sounds a bit pimpish to me, but that's just my point of view.

However, when it comes to humans, it's a different level of cooperation. With no chance of punishment to selfish behavior, helpfulness, altruism and all that 'love one another' bizness quickly failed. A Danish scientist deduced that if punishment is wielded upon cheaters and malfeasants, then behavior is likely to change for the better (not always, of course, but more likely). And, what did I draw from this? That humans are not nice unless we're forced to by fear of punishment. Of course, social contracts, location of your home/community and quite a bit of that Nature vs. Nurture stuff plays a heavy role.

A University of Amsterdam scientist found that the impact of a single female in a pack of snarly, drooling males also makes a significant difference in terms of cooperative action; just a single female on a board of directors demonstrates that a company is 20% less likely to go bankrupt.

Yet, I will take this one step further because I can: we will be nice because the impending punishment might be solitude, and not necessarily the good kind that we seek when on a meditative journey. No, we will be isolated, then become curmudgeonly or marmish or mean or simply put aside by our peers and colleagues and, well, our friends. We need each other. We need forgiveness and the ability to accept our misgivings and shortcomings and errors and to rely on one another in ways that draw us into a sense of community rather than arms-length distance of individuals.

I'm not saying that individualism is a bad thing and competition is horrid. Not in the least. I think both are healthy, they bring out the best in who we are and also allow us to see where we can improve: it's in that latter element that we can lean on those around us, and in the former, we become better at what we know. It's in the asking for a hand, taking the risk of exposure and believing that the other will respond in kind. Even the gift of a genuine smile, a passing hello, making a phone call to a friend, an up-nod to someone you see every day but don't know her name, the burying the hatchet, release of an unnecessary grudge, or even offering to carry some groceries to the car for someone who's struggling can is a simple gesture of niceness, cooperation in our society. Doing something that is uncharacteristic, I think is what I'm suggesting here: extend beyond our normed behavior and make a change for the better.

Yea, I know, if we're too nice, people look at us like we're o-d-d or trying to rob them or murder them and steal their organs. It's a fine line, I know. It's because we don't live in a Brady Bunch or Beaver Cleaver world. It's closer to Yosemite Sam's rootin' tootin tarnation town than anything.

Recently, I was standing in line at TJ's, my red basket overloaded with heavy stuff; I was hoisting a jug of juice under my arm and doing the TJ's kick-the-handbasket along the line routine. The couple behind me, utilizing a regular cart said, "Do you want to put your basket on ours? We've got space." I was dumbfounded. Initially, I didn't respond, not believing that they were gesturing towards me. The woman repeated the offer as her male partner tapped my lopsided shoulder. I thanked them graciously and took up the offer. For the next 15 minutes, as we shuffled snail-pace along in the line, we carried on excellent light convo. Very funny all of us were.

When it came time to part, when a check stand opened, that is, I thanked them again for their goodwill and kindness. They looked at me like I was crazy -- it was simply putting my basket under their wheelie basket -- because I expressed so much gratitude. Alas, we wished each other off to a pleasant evening.

Mind you, I'm of the ilk that gratitude and true compliments can never be stated enough in oue under-appreciated, epically condescending and cruel society. One month ago this TJ's event occurred and the impact is still profound -- a tiny act of kindness. It's like the monkey sharing his guavas: it's simply something 'you do' and not think twice about it.

Recently, I had to deal with a rather significant loss. An acquaintance of mine, a woman with whom I work came up and simply hugged me and expressed her sympathy and support. It was so unexpected, so real, genuine and loving. All I could do was tear up and get all weepy-eyed -- partly for what I was already feeling but also because her action was simply that: nice and simple and unexpectedly supportive and kind.

No, I'm not a fan of the bumper sticker that proclaims and demands of us to Commit Random Acts of Kindness, blah blah blah. I roll my eyes every time I see that. It's the unstated, unexpected event that needs no car-rear reminder. It simply is Nice to be Nice. We do it to make a community versus continuing as a bunch of brainwashed, sweaty heathens vying for a betterment of the single self, the survival-of-the-fittest society, essentially like the poke-a-fork-in-my-eye movie, Soylent Green.

I'd offer my cart space to another, a hand to a person who needed a lift up, I'd forgive, honor, and continue to love someone despite some difficulties because that's the kind of person I am. I guess it's what works with me - some CM Strohecker sense of betterment. In my perspective, that to be nice versus contemptible, is easier, more pleasant, and draws in a sense of wellness in our -- or my -- otherwise difficult society.

Also, I think it's simpler in my own psyche to be nice, no matter the W.i.i.F.M. sense of entitlement; I suppose that What's in it For Me is this: I'd rather give back to others because in doing so, I'm giving back -- forgiveness, a warm gesture, a kind word, some love -- to myself. Spreading the wealth without being creepy.

Share your guavas, eat an other's skin-based parasites, or, just reach out to someone you care for and demonstrate an act of niceness and kindness that is true and loving. That's how our fittest will Survive: giving back, making amends, relying on each other, and, quite simply, being gracious and Nice humans. And, as I've said repeatedly here, forgive and remember what draws or drew us together in the first place.

Searching - for a home - where the heart is

2011-03-14T23:50:00.000-07:00

Looking for...
Seeking...
Searching out a...

Although these sound like openings to personal ads, these are all beginnings for roommate searches. The housing search is on. Even though the roomates want someone with a good 'feel' the posts indicate otherwise: It's a visual thing, at least this is what the Craigslist ads tell me.
Cozy, quaint, nestled. Indications that the room (shared housing) is tiny, tiny, tiny. Some are cryptic: fully updated. What exactly does that mean? Indoor plumbing? Electricity that's no longer knob & tube?

Dog-friendly. Many I've seen say this yet it's a ploy: there's a $350 dog deposit. $350? Really? Not so friendly "deposit." That is a lot of damage, far beyond the cost of replacing dry wall or some grass. Or, dog must be under 25 pounds, which is kind if funny since I've seen quite a few hefty Dachsunds, Shih tzus, and Poodles at work, not counting the cats who tip the scale above mid-20s and have offered to draw blood from my forearms and face at no extra charge.

Easy going. This is something I look for then discover that the Easy Going roommates have a bunch of rules around community-building and food interests.
Vegan, meat-eater, Ethical hedonist, Green, Conscious, male attorney seeks other professional, no professionals - please! artists only!, dogs, no dogs, no cats, hypoallergenic couple, non-smoker, smoker, drink-okay, no drugs, 420 okay, one day at a time, must like children, day-work schedule works best, no parties, community life and music in the house makes it all come together, section 8 okay, No section 8, descent [sic] credit, "patio overlooks plush court yard where you'll ...enjoy your morning coffee on... plus it has a closet." Yes, that was all one sentence.

I couldn't wrap my brain around the closet on the patio, but that's just me. I haven't had to be in the throes of major shared housing in a while, so I suppose that there are now closets on the patio because the others inside are now little bedrooms? I dunno.

So, I switched to houses or apartments (as a solo and not a shared) and immediately found that my price range set me far beyond the Bay Area's galaxy. I actually considered a place that offered multiple bedrooms, bathrooms, garages (yes, plural), and an enclosed backyard, AND an option to buy this house cheaply. It also came with a complimentary, miniscule one-hour, eight-minute commute to my present abode. One hour ++. That's 68 minutes in good traffic. I get frustrated on my bicycle if I miss a couple stop lights and arrive at work in 20 minutes instead of 15. could I handle sitting on a train and/or bus and/or Bart for 1 1/2 hours? Could I? I'm not so sure. Yet there's a nagging at my brain: the yard, the yard. Big enough for one or two or three furry buddies.

Searching for housing is a pain, no doubt about it. I'm trying to piece-meal my health together and also consider a big ass move .... again. It seems that I have finally received most of my forwarded, non-yellow address mailer postal mail.

Not long ago, I searched for the abode in which I presently reside -- by the way, thankfully, kindly, and graciously made possible by hired movers. It was arduous, to say the least, to finally settle on this place. Fifteen places caught my fancy and all were in varied geographical coordinates. Now, today, I'm looking both at location and price. I've ruled out ground-floor anythings, north-facing buildings, and buildings that appear to have pink as their typical exterior color. This latter descriptor is hard to explain; pink simply doesn't suit me as a building's color. North? Well, it's dark. I lived in a north-facing apartment and we discovered mushrooms growing in our always-damp shag carpeting. 'Nuf said there.

Price, though is tough. The market seems to be jacking up the cost of rentals even though many people are unemployed and unable to pay their skyrocketed rent. The Tenant's Union declared, as per California statute, that a move-in cost can be no more than twice the cost of the first month's rent (that's the deposit), or three times that if the place is furnished. Criminy! That is one chunk o' change. And still, the management company or the owners or the other roommates request the cash bags.

One shared place I perused offered an 'easy-going' space in a 1900s house, complete with a meditation person, a writer, some furniture (dresser, chairs), a bed (eeww, bedbugs) and requested nearly a thousand bucks for rent since the dwelling was located near the Berkeley Bowl and not far from the University. Yep, all for the low low price of $950/month + first, last, And deposit -- a person could have a ROOM! Yes, a Room, oh, with cupboard space (of course, water is included) and two laid-back dudes. I have to admit, I actually Googled-earthed it just to see what the house looked like: not so bad for a bedroom with potential bedbugs (that's my input).

Rentals. I searched beyond my frontiers when I rather recently (6 months ago) settled into my chilled upstairs apartment space. I wonder, after all the address changes I plugged in to my creditors and magazine subscriptions, could my mail locate me, moreso, could my own persona pinpoint me once again if I skedaddled for the fourth time in 11 years, seventh in 15?

I hate moving. Did I say that yet? I hate moving. And yet, I am seriously considering this sojourn of my being once again. I hate moving. I can handle public speaking, let alone the fright of a shortened life, but moving, or losing my vision? No, not so much on my list of favorite things.

Could it, the mail, my inner foundation find me again if I hopscotched to another town, another zipcode, another dwelling shared or unshared, communal or solo, in the woods or out in the burbs, along the water, on the Peninsula, in Sonoma, somewhere in the 925 or in the Presidio in what was once an Officer's housing? Could I handle bonking my head on the Potrero Hill top floor (it's complete with its own, private bathroom!) attic-converted-to slanty ceilinged bedroom/live-in space, or perhaps in a massive 3-story Jingletown loft that reminds me of the one Kevin Bacon rode his bicycle around in that 1980s broker-turned-bike messenger movie, or, perhaps abutting some farmland with acres and acres to roam and grow stuff or throw pinecones and balls for Gracie and Basco and ...?

Uprooting for trees is traumatic at any point. Often kills off part of its cell structure and definitely jerks its growth patterns around, occasionally to the point of death or near-death if not handled correctly. No certainty, though, on its survival even if it does seek and receive ample nourishment, sunlight, and fresh air later. Moving is difficult.

One thing is certain: at this point, I am solid where I am but aware that a foundation can be borne elsewhere. Only downfalls here in this funky apartment are no dogs and the windows are made from rice paper and imaginary glass.

In search of...
Seeking...
Looking for...

I suppose that this, all of the shared-dwelling, solo-resident thing, and/or this search-for-housing bizness is a different way to move forward, move on, or simply move again. Or it's the process of creating a space again where 'the heart' can reside. Find a home where my heart will be. Or, maybe simpler, it's just living in a dwelling where I can have dogs, which, quite frankly, is pretty much the same as the previous sentence.

Sideways Glance?

2011-03-06T22:01:00.000-08:00

Fear. To be afraid. Dread. Apprehensive.

I don't feel fear too often. I am not afraid of heights, the dark, blood, dentists or dental procedures, or public speaking. Yea, rattlesnakes have me quaking in my boots, no doubt about that; I'll amend this: snakes, in general, make my skin crawl. Yuck.

In less than two days, I will have a few more opthalmic appointments: labs, exams, more eye pictures, and an exam with a Retina Specialist. Apparently my retinas are extremely thin, one is torn and has crud near the tear. If my retinas are too thin, then surgery to repair the rapid vision loss is not an option. Ideally, since I've not been wearing my contacts (apparently they cause the eye or retina to misshape itself) for six days, the specialist will be able to determine if I am a surgical candidate.

So what's with the dread, the fear? I decided to look up the meaning to determine if my trepidation fell, indeed, under fear's meaning. Yes, but I don't have the fright as in terror or scaredy-catishness (yes, this is a word in my book), moreso the dis-ease, tenseness, unquiet within my system.

However, I found, among many definitions, "to eye askance." I thought this ironic, you know, given the exams I have on Tuesday. A sideways view. With my glasses on, I can't see sideways, there's nothing there but blurriness or lens-edge. And, given my freshly wandering eye and double vision, to do so makes my head ache. Eye askance - no can do. I'll settle for pusillanimity (good word, eh? gotta look it up, ya big pussy... which, I believe is from whence this derivation came.).

Still, the dread. I think that when I had the first exam regarding the double vision and was told to return for more tests, I felt afraid, uncertain, a bit off. Startled. I mentioned this before. The second day of exams, consults, labs, surgical consultation teetered and uprooted me from my already shaky foundation. Rather, it threw me: the rapid changes, the funked up eye photos, the failed tests (peripheral, acuity, diplopia) that occurred; the fact that my vision is elderly but my chronological age says otherwise. My head was Linda Blairing, sans the green vomit.

So, why the rabbity sensation? Is it the notion of eye surgery as a possibility, going under the proverbial knife? Seems that I should want this - or these - problem(s) perhaps even a portion of them to be rectified and repaired. I do. There are always risks, but I have faith in the thoroughly educated and practiced KP professionals who do this for a living -- carefully and quite well.

Or, does the skittishness stem from the chance that I won't be a candidate because of the massive alteration in my left eye and because my degenerative retina(s) will not tolerate surgery? That I'll have to live with the two-of-everything perspective and cover my eye, as I did at a comedy show and at the movies last night when I desire only one focal point. Hmmm.

As I've contemplated this uneasiness within me, I've taken on meditation as a means of release and/or acceptance of the situation and other quirky dealings. During those meditative times, my eyes are closed and I see a blue oval film marked with blotches. Can't say if this is actually my lens seeing something or my mind creating something. Either way, when I get into the 'mode,' I feel all the temblor and attempt to push it out of my mind, release it to another space. It creeps back in and I encircle myself again, nudging it away. This mind-over-mind situation recurs. Strange how strong the mind is in its own battles and wills.

I want something to change for the better, no doubt about it. Headaches for months - probably caused by the double vision - are one of the symptoms that this body could do without. At times, I think I look like a Bayer or Excedrin commercial with my furrowed brow and fingertips encircling my temples or frontal lobe in a valiant attempt to assuage the sirened ache. There's only so much Ibu, Tylenol, and migraine Rx that a system can handle. Hate taking pills - hence the meditation. On top of it, I'd like to not think about this any more.

Interestingly, perhaps as a sidebar, often, when I electronically scribble out my fb status, these are visual observations of my surroundings. My mind draws a word picture from what I see. Yea, see with these blurry eyes, not eye askance of course, but eyes forward, body turning, senses alive. I see and write. I see, feel, and write. Given that my vision is the worst of my senses, it's peculiar that my observations are more visual, nearly tactile, than aural or olfactorial.

One and a half days. I'm a bit nervous. Not butterflies - - those are usually good nerves: happily anxious. This is flippy-floppy, Tums-like.

Visualize a beneficial exam with Dr. Lam in KP's Union City Ophthalmology office. Picture. Conjure. See.

Dog Eared and Possum Eyed

2011-02-19T14:14:00.001-08:00

Taking care of Gracie and Basco, my two 65+ pound doggies this weekend. Their other human is away, so, for three wonderful days they are in my care. It's canine contentment.

Even better, I have a buddy visiting me from Portland this weekend. Marykate, or Kate as most call her. I've known her since highschool. She knows me all too well.

At some point between playing with the pups and eating too many Gummi Bears, I commented on a painting hanging in the house. Said it was crooked, hanging with left side way up, right side down. I thought she bumped into it. She looked at me like I had forks growing out of my ears.

"It's not crooked."
"Yes it is. It's all askew. Just lean over and push it up on the right."
"It's not crooked. Do I need to take you to the hospital? Your perception is all off."
"No it's not. Yours is." (Good comeback).

Later this morning, I moved a couch about six inches in one direction. She saw this and asked me why I did so. Repeat above interchange. She grabbed a tape measure to show me how wrong my view was.

I laid down on the floor with Gracie and Basco and sighed. I listened to them gently snore and thought about how soft their ears were. Their hearing and their sense of smell are the core of their perception. Basco is totally blind. Yet he's completely adjusted to a non-visual life: sniffs & smells the cool air more, can hear the snap of a deer's hoof on a twig outside the house at night, feels the vibrations of Gracie's thundering paws racing on the floor as she bounds up to greet him -- he wags and barks at her.

We are not at the hospital nor are we planning on going. This whole visual meltdown is grating on my nerves, obviously. On top of it all, if we go anywhere, MK's insisting on driving my car because my acuity is off. Worried I might drive into something or perceive that a vehicle or object is actually farther than it actually is. I think she may be on to something and I might have to consider this option while she's here.

At least I can see the snow falling outside. Beautiful even if it is mixed with rain and not sticking to the ground. Hard to believe I'm seeing all of this during the day from my Oakland home. At least, with my double vision, I get to see twice as much of it.

Eye See

2011-02-16T23:13:00.000-08:00

Second eye appointment in as many days.
I'm nervous, sad, confused. For the multitude of years I've dealt with my rancid vision, I am a bit distressed that I've had a sudden onset of visual acuity loss (more than I normally felt that is "usual") and double vision -- well, I've had it for about 5 -6 months, but tried to ignore it. At last, four days ago, after struggling with picking up a pen, that is, trying to locate 'which' was the correct implement of the two I saw, I called for an appointment. To give an idea, it's not unlike in the movies when the camera pans into the spy's binoculars and we see two images. However, as 007 adjusts the lens in the center of the field glasses to create one sharp image, I still remain at two, not having been born with a dial resting upon my nose.

It had been about a year since I was last in to see my eye doc so I was due anyway. Because I tend to lose (myopia//nearsightedness) about -.25 to -.75 in my eyes each year, I have to follow up with the optho peops. I love my Kaiser Permanente docs; my sight is awful, not unlike that of, say, an 80 year old, yet I receive full, comprehensive treatment until I can see with finite acuity, or at least to a level that, physiologically, my eyes can manage. Not perfectly with my contacts, but well enough (to what we consider 20/40 or 20/50?).

Now, however, I'm in the waiting area. I'm wearing my glasses. They are thick: Coke bottle thick. I cannot read anything without lenses of any sort unless the text is within a quarter inch of my face. Even then, no promises. I'm dilated. So these words I'm scribbling down are up and down over the line. It's like seeing under water, or so I assume, as I've never had the opportunity to see quasi-clearly underwater like the rest of you folks.

The older couple sitting shoulder-to-shoulder across from me, they're in their 70s, I'd guess, he's a Sikh, and she's in some type of sari. They're staring at me like I'm some sort of car wreck. As if they know it's not right to stare, but they simply cannot peel their eyes away from the young woman with the incredibly bad, bad vision. It's a little peculiar, actually, given that I am in the waiting area of the Ophthamology department. I mean, most people sitting here have some sort of ocular issue. Perhaps it's my age? Am I too young to have these 1/2 centimeter thick glasses? Are the frames not fashionable enough? Is my zipper open? No, just checked. Then I wonder, Who Cares? So, I write.

I've been in and out of this department's doors three times already today: different tests, different exams. On Wednesday, when I first saw my fabulous eye doc, he joked that because of the severity of my eye issues, he truly felt he was earning his salary that day. Today is no different.

When the ophthamology tech called my name for the peripheral test, she looked at the huddle of white-haired people, not me. When the next tech hollered my name for the intra-ocular photos, she too, looked towards the clustered seats filled with seniors. She appeared to be surprised when I popped up and greeted her. "CCCatherine?" Yes, I replied. "Oh, I thought we were going to take some photos for a possible lens replacement." Yes, that's right. "Oh, okay. I figured you were.... please follow me." I understood. I'm younger than the average person with such severe myopia.

My eyes are fully dilated. The Retinal photos of my eyes look similar to a de-shelled and illuminated chicken egg with a vascular embryo still inside. The lens focuses beyond my pupil and shoots images of the macula, nerve, and all parts within, leading to the back side where the retina attaches.

The image is round, not unlike the spherical nature of a standard eye ball. It is glazed in a yellowy hue filled with a mass of interconnected red, spidery vines. There's no real shape, they branch and spread from one tributary to the next. It seems random. the only real form is the photographer's mechanical circumference which is perfect, like a ping pong ball.

Within the right eye -- the still images pop up onto an adjacent computer monitor available for the patients to view -- there is a large messy glob, like gristle or something floating in our soup that we spoon past in order to get to the good stuff below. This whitish dumpling is the macula. It stretches a tiny jet stream finger out to the rear of the eye.

The left eye is not quite the same. It has a similar mushy blob that stretches out into a bumpy jetty towards the rear of the eye as well. However, instead of finding a connection in a thin outer layer, its gnarled line tethers into a granular, peppery pillow.

In the world of clocks and geometry, we would consider the lumpy schmalz - the macula - the central portion, say, from where the hands would pivot. If you imagine looking through the pupil and into the eye, you'd see its girth that spreads out like a fist from approximately eleven to just past five o'clock, or 80 degrees to 260 degrees, (fist-wise, forefinger to pinkie).

The thin white jetty, the ocular nerve, rests on the horizon, or at 180 degrees, and stretches back towards the rear of the eye from the cloudy white mass. In my left eye, it stops abruptly, as if unwilling to collide with this grey boulder - an impendiment to time or movement in my sight; blocking my view of life ahead.

Although both eyes have the bulbous, mashed lump in the center and fairly similar ocular nerves, the left's mirroring of the right's similarity ends there. The left has this alien counter-balance, potentially a cause to my newly formed horrid and double vision. I have lost 25% (-6) vision in the left in one year. Not so good. Viewing this grainy pebble in my eye set me back. I suddenly felt like I was a token in the Parker Bros. game of Sorry: Go Back 6 Paces, back to the ugly gravel that rests near the back row of my eye. Too bad I don't get to start over again all fresh and new.

We're discussing surgery. The opthamology surgeon said that I was "special" -- not as in low I.Q. special, either -- but because of the migraines, severe vision loss, severe myopia, the sudden diplopia (double vision) ,lazy eye (Amblyopia), and bilateral cataracts. (I think the cataracts are the least of my problems.) My eyes are old and rapidly aging. I've been referred to a retinal specialist because of the unknown mass which rests near what she thought was a tiny tear.

Because I wear contact lenses ALL the time, my eyes need to relax, take a natural shape without them. I walked into today's appointment with them on. For the retinal specialist I'll be sans contacts for a week and she will be able to ascertain and determine all the crud within my eye. Yippee!! She may even do the surgery, if need be.

I asked about the lazy eye because I'm vain. Can it be fixed? Yes. Will such a surgery (on the ocular muscles) rectify the double vision? No.

The day threw me off. What I thought would take an hour bled into nearly four. Although I've known that this day would come, I expected it to arrive when I was in my 60s or 70s, not my 40s. I did not anticipate the severity of diplopia, the severe vision loss in a year, the sandy rock near my retina.

And to my friends who know me, do I tell them, 'Hey, you know I can't see, right? Well, it's worse than usual: I can barely see the two of you, and with what I've just learned, I feel like I've just been broad-sided.'

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This weekend I met a man, aged 81, who had ocular muscle surgery to correct his amblyopia. He knew going in that it wouldn't make his vision perfectly aligned, but just two days out, he felt that the two views were closer, not perfect, not one (he knew this would not occur), but closer.

I'd like to say that I feel as if I'm ten times more shaken up than when I learned I'd torn my shoulder apart...again. Most of this, I imagine, is because I have absolutely no control over any of what's happened physiologically. Until I see the retinal specialist (it's funny to say this, since I'll be wearing my glasses which don't give me the best acuity!), most is speculation. My vision has always been my proverbial Achilles Heel and now it's finally kicked my feet out from under my being.

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Today, now five days after my eye appointment, I met again with my doctor in SF and had another battery of lab tests and X-rays to rule out or determine one thing or another. Soon, right? Soon we will find out something. Some thing or cause or reason or idea as to why certain things that I feel shouldn't be happening are. It can only get better from here, right?

I see two sunrises and two sunsets which rise and fall side-by-side. There are two trees budding cherry blossoms, twice as many geese and ducks in the lake, and twice as much rain in my blurry view. But I love the rain, the water, and the sunrises and sunsets really do bring me a lot of peace and joy.

I breathe but one deep breath. It's pouring outside and the wind is gusting cold blasts through my thin windows and blinds. I don't see as much but hear and feel it all. Other senses heightened.

If you can, think positively, visualize, per se, clear vision for me. I'm trying to. Power of positive thinking, right? It can only get better from here. It must. Shoulders down, back straight, Breathe one more breath.

Breathe and Release

2011-01-31T10:40:00.000-08:00

Breathe and Release.

Seems easy but the diaphragm struggles.

The Cure is time.

Yet how can time be a cure when we talk about Time in a Bottle? Aren't bottles a bit confining?

Breathe and Release. Even the best of everything will settle where it's meant to be.

Sew up the heart, stitch by stitch, breathe, gently, release slowly. Grieve, breathe, release, believe.

Stars and the General Masses

2011-01-07T23:34:00.000-08:00

Stars. I love stars. I enjoy watching clouds, big masses of nothingness floating by in my view. They move, change shape, stretch out into elongated fingers that stretch into other white masses. With the right climate, those wispy fingers form into other shapes, stretching far beyond the eye can see. A bird, running dog, bull's head, or Wile E. Coyote in hot pursuit of the ever-changing Road Runner. Comical in the moment, a delight to see and feel the release from within as the imagination releases, the tension melts away.

I saw such clouds the other day. Outside the sun shone brightly, blue sky. It was a sunglasses day.

Inside, the clouds had already formed - unmoving, they were blobby but not, with stringy hairs poking out, reaching out towards other whitishy, hairy brethren. This was white on black, a still image. A side view. Hardly noticeable, no Mickey Mouse or Flintstone character. A mossy looking cloud resting deep, hiding, actually below the breast close to my chest. Like a coveted treasure - it looked like a spoonful of yogurt that was sliding apart, gravity or centrifugal force drawing it away from its core. Just the one, about a quarter's breadth, maybe a little thicker, but wide enough for a thumb to rest upon.

What is this, this cloud, this deviant from my imagination? Why is this not shape-shifting into something I like, a tree, a moon, or a heart that denotes the love I feel for someone? It's stretching alright, but into what? More of itself or, worse, is it reaching out into other areas , creating toxic clouds that don't belong?

I don't want this here. I don't want to know that my right side has this misplaced postage stamp of unwelcomness that hides beneath my breast tissue like some sort of evil nymph or ogre under a mass of morning glory or outstretched fern.

I am healthy. I have no risk factors. I have nothing that calls attention to this cloudiness that has decided to stay with me rather than move on to the next environment. It does not enlighten my imagination nor release my stressors.

This cloud, this stellate cluster, this little mass, its presence is not welcome.

The Windblown Rental

2011-01-02T17:15:00.000-08:00

Life in a rental.
Not unlike life in a rental car, I might add: restrictions, limitations and, in the case of a Plymouth Neon I once rented (purple, at that), drafty and somewhat leaky. The car's trunk leaked, only discovered after two days of driving through a massive Washington rainstorm. Fortunately, a dryer was near the destination, otherwise it would've been a miserable trip.

This rental unit, though, aka, my 1935-era apartment defintiely has charm. It's an upstairs unit in a four-apartment building located in a very quiet neighborhood. Rooms are square, well-painted, and southeastern light pours in, which I love. This is quite obvious by my multitude of sunrise phone pix I've posted on facebook. Can't get enough of those colors.

All door handles are original glass, and crazily, all doors close with ease, no stickiness over the shiny hardwood floors. The selling feature, other than the upstairs location was not the view of the Mormon Temple in the distance as pointed out by my landlord. I controlled my commentary and chortle in that unexpected closing deal point. I'd like to point out that despite their 10 million holiday bulb and display this year, not a single red, blue, or orange light could be seen from where I stand right now. Sad. I had to drive by and get blinded by the massive electrical display the Temple is widely known for. If you've not seen it, hurry and swing by: in Oakland, just off Highway 13. You'll see the sky lit up like a fireworks display just over its peaked tower. Can't miss it; I think airline pilots use it as a guide in heavy fog.

No, the selling feature was the closet hidden behind a flush wall. Very Batman, if you ask me. The wall swivels out; in its prime, it once held a Murphy bed and built-in dressers were tucked in behind. Now, it's just a virtually unnoticeable walk-in closet with a swing-out single paned window for daytime illumination. Love it!

Besides these fine features and the olive green gas stove, circa 1971 of which it's four burners are either on High or Off (makes for some very interesting cooking, I tell you), the downside is where the rental becomes a true rental. I'm sitting here at my desk, facing south a window nary 12 inches from me. As I type these very letters, a cold draft sweeps down over the Levoloar slats and chills my fingers. The string that's used to draw up these blinds sways not from my fast typing but from the wind that's gusting through the 75 year-old, single-paned windows. I hear wind whistling here.

I have a heater, oh yes, of course I do. However it's a single wall unit located two rooms away. It effectively heats that space dirctly in front of it, which is where I often stand to scald my skin and warm up.

My landlord maintains that the windows add character, not unlike the ancient galvanized pipes with little to no water pressure do too. I think he's got stock options with PG & E, as my gas bill has been climbing steadily since moving in: showers take an extra 20 minutes since a trickle makes for some slow shampoo rinsing. Yes, I'm bound up in a hat, extra sweater, down booties and finger-cut gloves. Finger tips are bluish ice cubes. Ear lobes are rounded icicles.

For charm, I freeze. Could I move? I'm bound by a lease for another 10 months. I suppose I could plasticize my windows with that funky clear insulation, aka, dry cleaner packaging. Dare I? Then my lovely rental would lose some of the charm that makes it so inviting. That devine secret closet wouldn't have its clear, southerly light casting a pale glow upon my clothes - they'd be shrouded by an opaque plastique hue.

Life in a rental. We must accept so many of the benefits in the face of the pitfalls. Like that Dodge Neon, I got great mileage but paid a ton for extra trash bags and laundromat usage. Here, I'm in an optimal locale, but feel like I'd get a different kind of trash bag on my windows that might chip away at that convenience discount significantly. I heard the windchime tinkle outside and noticed that the blinds just clacked against each other as another gust blew through.

I need to go stand in front of my heater and defrost.

Love & Life Drifts Upon an Open Sea

2011-01-01T23:19:00.000-08:00

We give. We take. It's often a school of hard knocks because it seems that we're experiencing the take more than the give part.

If I look at the big picture, I'd have to say that I'm a giver. Not like a giver in the sense that I'm one of the Chosen. Rather, that I give of myself, my assistance, or my generosity, my heart, or an ear, or a present or two or three or four for a holiday or birthday. I probably 'shouldn't' as it often makes the receiver uncomfortable to receive a pile of gifts. Yet, when it comes down to it, I'm really thinking of her and what she actually gives to me without really knowing it.

Life is a gift and it seems we take so much for granted -- or is it that we take love, affection, interaction, patience, kindness, thoughtfulness, time, effort, desire to overcome adversity, peace to such an extent -- that we often only see what doesn't occur or the difficulty in the moment. We let go of the fact that more often it is laughable, engaging and simple such that when the hard shit arises, that's all we hold onto: the impenetrability and extremity of it all.

A ship sails the sea. Days and days it glides over the ripples. The sun shines, fish and dolphins leap and dive. Clouds form and dissipate, wind blows and fades. All is gentle, manageable, we are flowing over time, taking in all the rays, the moon, the clear and opaque life and beauty that surrounds as it should be.

Then, seemingly out of nowhere, high seas wall up, water pounds and plunges the deck, sails flap and tear. The rudder trips port, then starboard, then port, then starboard, completely out of control. Fore and aft we lose ballast. We try to right ourselves, yet minimally, only seeing the darkness in that moment ahead instead of the placidity that preceded. The moments become hours, darkness overtakes and we lose our way -- stars, our once coveted guiding lights are obscured or forgotten.

We let go, fall to this temporary force by feigning ignorance, inability to guide through, or lack of desire to bond and labor a bit through this unseemly power. It's too much. It's too vast, overwhelming (because of its newness or distant familiarity from storms past?), as it seemingly instigated and pushed us to a level of instability that's determined to be too far; we cannot come back, recover, settle down. This surge is too foreign; it is scary.

When the squall moves on, all we see is the destruction, the bent floorboards, the lack of direction, the loss of movement, the tattered sails, the difficulty. The thrashing. The absolute defeat. Nothing is what it was before. What's worse, though, is that we see only this - the pummeling, the lack of forward movement. We don't see that we can suture taut the canvas, that we can counterbalance this temporary disruption. Overlook the pummeling as what it was: a transitory incident. It is deduced that more will come thus it is better to abandon ship altogether. No sense in learning during the calm, during the blue sky moments.

We take for granted what such natural phenoma can offer: the struggle that presents us with the gift of growth, awareness, the ability to come together, fresher, more alive, more connected . We disengage because it's easier. Let go of the rope, don't bail its water that might appreciate its strength. Just leave it adrift and never look back or reflect on what happened.

I've lost a lot this year. More than I could ever say here. Much is my own doing (or undoing?), my own unraveling and allowing for an unsteered course. However I've discovered that 50% of which I'm responsible and for which I've repeatedly apologized has been countered by an even stronger 50% to abandon ship. And though my confidence wavered in these hammering storms, not having had any experience from which to draw any skill over these tides, I'm willing to find an emotional sextant and learn and try to locate a path, something that charts us towards tranquility and not torrent.

Sadly, this simple, yet ancient tool is seen as beyond difficult to comprehend as it is far too new or different to conquer another possible rough sea ahead. It is tossed overboard, and again, that which housed so much life and potential is abandoned without any regard. We took for granted all that we learned, the stillness and harmony and only give this life, this experience a half-hearted nod and headshake; no sense of bailing out water (overlooking the fact that it's worth the effort especially as time and sun will dry out that which remains).

Gave some, took a lot. Unwilling to give more and take less.

I gave a lot, received even more. I am willing and already do provide an open heart and hand so that part of the ballast is restored, strength in the steerage is coordinated such that a passageway is sought but needs another's sail, another's hand and heart to see us through.

Instead, love remains adrift, floating and abandoned.

Given this, I wished that the other would recall and believe and embrace what Maya Angelou wrote, "Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leaps fences, penetrates walls to arrive at its destination full of hope."

A rather rare, albeit workable, rough sea - even those which may seem unexpectantly horrid - should not be a barrier or wall or reason to walk away from love. Truth, patience, willingness to examine and change and hope are reasons to sail through. There have always been other rough seas, but now there's something better, a port to which we may reach and find safety and comfort: love. There is always hope.

Last Call Laundromat with the People

2010-12-16T07:21:00.001-08:00

At the laundromat on a late Saturday afternoon. This is what 'people' do. I realize as these words topple and tumble onto the page that, indeed, I am now officially part of this group so many of us scorn: People.

People. People suck. Why? While driving, it's the people who get in our way, the slow drivers, or 'those people' who drive aggressively and fast. It is those 'people' who speak on their cell phones while riding mass transit such that we non-people hear one-half of the conversation, although the phone's often on speaker due to the squealing brakes and noise; we're hearing the people on the other end of the phone too.

It is 'people' who use the term "people" when they are attempting to get our attention. For example, "People please. Pee-puhl, pleeeze listen to me." These unheard leaders raise their hand into the air and attempt to address the multitude of us muttering non-listeners. All of us chatting together, all of us, um, people. Mr. Meek, my seventh grade social studies teacher referred to us adolescents as People. That was 35 years ago, far ahead of his time.

We are called "people" because it's socially acceptable to do so rather than the age-old, quasi-sexist "Ladies and Gentlemen." This has gone to the wayside probably because more and more men rarely act gently, let alone as a gentleman might, which may be known as chivalrous. You know, holding open a door or laying down a trench coat over a curb-cut's puddle. Who would do that latter act anyway, other than, say, Popeye for Olive Oyl (skittle-lee-doo!)?

And ladies? Well, hard-fought (thank you Phyllis Schafly of Nancy Reagan era, who headed up Ladies Against Women), but this has held on much moreso than the gentleman thing. The feminist movement has keenly nudged the Lady title towards the door, though. Yet, even among my contemporaries, we women, that is, I still hear referrals to our gender as, "That lady over there," or, "Some lady nearly drove her shopping cart into me." We struggle to use the term 'woman,' and 'young woman,' and know well enough to occasionally not refer to our female sistahs as 'girls.' Alas, we fall back to the 'lady.'

At the very least, it's sad I know, since I am, I can honestly say, no lady. A woman yes, but definitely not a lady. Sure, I can don the heels-and-hose, wear the dangly earrings, and hand over an unopened jar of preserves to some guy to twist open. However, when an errant youth hollers out, "Hey lady!" when trying to get me to move off the sidewalk, my head does not turn towards his voice. Ladies have poise and . I lumber and work terribly hard not to knock things over. As my mom once said to us as she took us into an overpriced crystal and finery shop, "Hands By Sides." To this day, I try to adhere my elbows to my ribs when walking near someone's China hutch. And as such, as a loose deduction of not being a lady, and not being part of Tom Jones' iconic tune, "She's a lady, whoa-oh-oh!..." I am officially people.

People in laundromats -- we're all doing a cleaning job with our most intimate clothing and our basic outer wear. When people fold clothes, they hold them up, find the seam, gather the fabric together in a cloth-form of origami. This is true for every article but underwear. Men who fold boxers, or those male people, yes, they hold them up for all to see the snappy plaid or Garfield and Odie pattern. When it comes to their briefs? No. We don't see them at all.

Women with bras and "panties," (I've never been fond of that term), me included, do a quick grab-and-clasp fold, like it's a taco shell snapping in half. There the undies are on top of the wheelie-basket pile. We grab them by the waist band, quickly pull taut along the hips (holding them low, near our own hips, away from the general public's eye), snap them shut, and jam them into a mound of other undies. It's as if nobody has ever seen a pair of undies held up in the air or tossed to the side in a mad fit of passion. Underwear folding is personal, though.

And it's a horror movie if any of them should flit and flutter off the pile and onto the floor. Then what? Make a mental note to wash them at home or do we assume that mythical food-on-the-floor five-second rule? That is, we speculate that no cooties scampered across the linoleum and into the waistband if scooped up within five seconds? Uh huh. Scientists have proven that it could be on the floor for two seconds or ten: the outcome's still the same. Snatch those panties up, shake them out, roll them up, plunge into the pile, and move on.

When the sun drops, as it does earlier and earlier on these winter days, the laundromat lights illuminate us in a way that parallels the piercing lights of a darkened disco bar after Last Call. We appear less appealing, we're here, alone in a barren place, on a Saturday, doing something we'd rather not do, and, worse, we're not necessarily going home with someone savory and lusty. Instead, our arms are filled with folded towels and rolled socks all stacked into a basket, rolling cart, or wheeled luggage.

We here in the end-of-day Laundromat are the post-Last Call people without a Saturday night date - we are the ones glancing around the room, reading skewed flyers on the walls, staring at our unringing cell phones, or sucking down the final droplets of our over-priced melted ice drinks. We are the pale ones under the blaring lights who've not danced or moved much during the past couple hours. We, us Saturday evening laundromatters are the post-Last Call singlets and instead of smelling like sloshed gin and dancefloor sweat, we smell fresh and clean like Bounce.

No ladies or gentlemen here, I have become, as a result of incidences and unexpected disconnections am one of them, a member of the group known as The Evening Laundromat People. As a sidebar, I'd like to request that nobody think of that famous Charlton Heston phrase, "Soylent Green is People!" Instead, think of it simply, as Mr. Meek hollered in advance of us really understaning his meaning, that I am people.

chix again

2010-11-24T00:46:00.001-08:00

I recently moved to a neighborhood with many apartment buildings, a bit of outdoor recreation, and plenty of shopping opportunity. I thought I'd blend in with the woodwork, not really be seen as I toodle around hither and tither. Just another Common Man, apple in the face and all, walking and shopping among the masses, unremarkable, nondistinct. Who would've thunk that they'd be hanging around Trader Joe's, milling in hair product stores, or sitting idly on park benches heads up, watching?

There they are: the singlets, the women who shop while scanning who's behind them, the ones with eyes seemingly on the backs of their heads, or maybe concealed in their oversized watches or Timbuktu biker bags.

I've been walking around my neighborhood lately, occasionally purchasing products, often pawing a cup of Peet's that ignites my system. Once in a while, I find an open stool there upon which I place my watchful self, and there I plop and view the world that strolls by on the sidewalk. The families are plenty, single dads and moms, buddies who yammer over a slice of pizza across the street, or the homeless dudes who hold out mottled Street Sheets and an empty donation Starbucks cup. Even the occasional EMTs or police officers all hot and confident in their deep blue wool and shiny leather uniforms saunter the street and nearby cafes embuing us with that sense of protectiveness and precautionary safety. Those who are women in uniform are often ensconced in conversation with their uniformed brethren. They are not the ones with the eyes.

It's the women, the chix, the bespectacled woman with the wandering eye who I see scanning the crowds, the aisles of cereal, the card shop's humor section, the rows of hair products before me. They are the watchers. I know this sounds paranoid, but it's happened on a number of different occasions.
It's like a porn movie without the cheesy chika-bow-wow music: she's taller than I, a page-boy cut brunette clad in a navy waist coat, hipster jeans and cool Adidas shoes. Her skin tells me she's younger too, none of the crows feet age lines that carve up my eyes. She reaches up, over her head for a 24 ounce bottle of Biolage spray and examines its contents like it's a nutritional chart. Then, as she replaces it, she tilts her head slightly in my direction; is she wondering if I need to pass by, is she really reading labels, or she peering in my direction?

I'm searching for a mousse, preferably Paul Mitchell; all the white bottles look alike to me and because I'm officially in the reading glasses age, I squint to read what each 12 point font indicates upon the labels. As I see her cocked head, I worry the product I seek will be near her and I'll have to interact. I sniffle from unease. From my sketchy peripheral vision, I see that she's reached towards a hip-level shelf and withdraws some other brand, some other type of bottle, this time it looks like a molding gel. Far from the spray she originally sought.
I find my product, look in her direction and see that she's smiling. I give the ole 'up nod, sniffle and turn. She smiles again. I'm uncomfortable. This is a hair product store. I pay and leave. About eight paces beyond I hear the tinkling bell of the shop; she's leaving too.

I went for a run the other day and saw in the near distance sitting on a park bench a solo chik. She was cool too, with her dark her pushed up into a peak - she needed a haircut - oversized jeans, boarder sneakers, and a black leather jacket with yellow hoodie poking out behind her neck. Her eyes were partially concealed by sun-shade glasses; nerd glasses I like to call them (only the nerdy kids wore them, even if I do understand their practicality). Beside her was her reusable TJ's bag and in her hand some sort of multi-purpose phone, perhaps a Droid, maybe an iPhone. She stared at its shiny, black face; her own bland, sealed lip expression demonstrated her boredom or dismay with it. It appeared as if she wanted it to ring or do something significant like expand into a tool, a skateboard, or a piece of cake. Young enough, cake would not affect her metabolism or weight. She glanced up as I rhythmically huffed towards her. She watched me plod by.

As I passed by, I hoped that she didn't call someone to report that she'd spied a lezzie sporting tights and a mismatched long-sleeved shirt jogging around the lake or that she wanted to hang and see if I'd return. I didn't want to know that the glance she gave me as I approached followed me as I curved the edge of the lake. About 30 minutes later, when I rounded the final corner, she was walking opposite me. She looked up, gave me the up nod and smiled. I breathed a 'hi' and kept going. Despite my fatigue, I actually quickened my pace.

Tonight, I encountered one outside my building. I haven't lived here long, but in the short time I've never seen anyone but my landlord hover in the perimeter of my building; he lives in Fresno, a land far, far away from this dwelling. I worked late and approached my walkway with the same nonchalance as always: I never see anyone so I'm not usually on alert. The sensor lights illuminated before I approached my door's steps which I thought odd. They're sensitive but not that sensitive. As I plodded up the walkway, I was mildly startled by the presence of a tallish blond, wrapped in a thick, western leather, sheepskin coat, the kind the Marlboro man would wear. Sky blue scrubs and clogs covered her legs and feet. She appeared as surprised as I to see someone approaching; she croaked into her cell phone, "Hey, it's me. What's up? You okay?" I didn't know if I should've said hello in that moment or ignore her. Seemed an odd place to be having a rather personal phone conversation, unless of course she was really speaking to me. She stood, head downcast on the walkway just beyond my front steps, between the two rose bushes where the pathway light shone upon her plastine shoes and cast a eery glow upon her face. She lifted her head as I stepped up the steps. Ill at ease again, I of course pulled out my key which unlocks my office door. This does not fit into my lock. After taking a moment to stare at its incapacity to open my door, I swung the appropriate key around my finger, slid it into the lock and entered.

I didn't know what amazed me more, that there was another human who lived here in this building or that she's a chik, like me, or so my gaydar tells me.

These women, these ogling singlets with their sidelong gazes imbalance me. It's not the same nervousness I get, those crazy swarming butterflies when there's whoosh! beauty before me. Oh, no, that's one of those blushing sensations and I do my best not to stumble and fall all over myself with an introduction. That's an okay feeling.

These are different, like a visual Craigslist Personal ad, without the aggravating text script ("U r 1 hot bayb") or self-aggrandizing descriptions that often result in a well worn self-help book summary or an external appearance not unlike those wacky, wobbly fun house mirrors. These are the ads on the sleeves by way of the furtive, coy glances, the pawing of same-brand products ("I like peanut butter stuffed pretzels too!"), and cupped hands around half empty containers of chai tea while peeking through their mod glasses. These are singlet chiks, singlet women and they are everywhere - as I discovered before - but now I'm noticing that they are in places I least expected: where I shop and live. And I feel funny around them, awkward.

It's funny, but now that one has spotted where I live, not that I'm famous or anything, but just that I'm another in the statistic of a few, I feel like I'm going to have a little Yelp numbered pin poking out of my building that denotes An Older Chik Lives Here! Marked for all to see and discover.

And I thought I was anonymous among the masses.

Surgerical Removal and Loss

2010-08-30T13:25:00.000-07:00

We're always talking about surgical removal of wrinkles, bunions, tumors, warts, and extractions of impacted teeth. I'd like to discuss the surgical removal of space.
Not as in Space, The Final Frontier, but space, as in the gap between bone and tendon,the crevasse between at-rest and forward movement.

Last week, I subjected myself to the closing of a 3.5cm gap between my right humerus and my supra- and infraspinatus tendons and muscles. Shorn right off they were, nary a tab hung in the wind to which my surgeon could reattach. He opted for four titanium - Super Power I like to call them - screws and a bunch of Kevlar suture by which to lasso these muscles to their metallic pier. Second time I've had some Kevlar sewn into this shoulder. I should, essentially be bullet proof by now.

But it's the gap to which I refer here. The gap that allowed so much to occur and fall to the wayside. The cavern of air in which energy was lost and desired outcomes not completed. I had no idea how large this was until I was told recently, and by then, it seemed that there was so much damage, a repair seemed delayed, essentially late. Like wanting to see the tide roll in at dawn but waking up after the sunrise and discovering the beach and all cool shells are already swimming under water.

It has been repaired, though. And now, the pain ensues. The sutures have closed the gap, healing must follow, but not before so much damage has already occurred behind it. Closing the trench only seals a part of the wound that ripped apart long ago, little by little until, at last, it laid, open-mouthed, untethered, and basically ignored or unnoticed. Loss of life in this forward moving structure during these past couple years has made the recovery and rehabilitation a little more painful.

Look ahead, don't forget what occurred in the past to make this injury come about, learn from it, grow from it, and renew. It hurts, yes, but, ideally, it will get better and ultimately, the ache, loss, and pain will subside. Like a surgical removal of loss, perhaps now I can have a surgical removal and replacement of what disappeared in this vacuous gully.

I want to heal this wound and recover and grow from what still remains.

Birthdays

2010-04-25T21:47:00.000-07:00

Friends, siblings, doggies are aging. Even I'm getting older. Of course, I'm thinking of all the peops I know who celebrate -- or don't -- this annual step towards maturity or Medicare.

I wanted to say that the collective birthdayers -- or 'we' -- are headed towards graying, but many of my friends aren't gray, or, perhaps those melanin-lacking hairs don't show for one reason or another. I need to mention the unintended step towards wrinkling, not in a bad, but because this is what age brings us. Most of my shriveling posse leans towards the contented side, which usually means they're not knitting their eyebrows together in typical angry fashion to earn those forehead wrinkles. They're a pleasant crew, aging well, aging steadily. I, too have discovered the facial caverns on myself: Crows feet from too much laughter may crevasse on the outer perimeter of eyes, but again, this results from smiling, not bitterness nor a history of (ew, yuck!) smoking, although I may admit I am headed toward a juvenile version of elderhood.

Basco's ten years old. A good age for a doggie. I'd say a great age for a dog who went blind three years ago. He's graying a bit, mostly on his hind legs, just over his knees. He's always been an old soul, even when he was a puppy he had a gently whitened, muzzle. He seemed okay with whatever life presented to him. I'd like to age gracefully like him.

Mom made sure that each of us celebrated our birthday, one way or another. My brother John was usually shafted: his day fell in mid-December when most of us had school plays, concerts, and other events that trumped his special day.

Mom's birthday was one never to be missed. She wasn't the biggest fan of Mother's Day, thinking it a useless reminder of her motherhood. But her birthday? Never Forget her day. Never. Call, send a card (in advance), order flowers or a gift to arrive early or on the day of. She loved yellow roses, but as an 8 y/o, I stole her heart when I gave her a bouquet of 3 dozen pink carnations which the florist sold me for a wrinkled dollar. I'm certain I looked like a street urching and he simply wanted me out of his boutiquey store.

She once said to me that celebrating her birthday was a way to show her she mattered, that she was loved, that we honored her presence. Her day is coming up and believe me, even at rest, I know that she's hoping for us to toast her on May 22nd. I will. I always do.

Alas, the birthday is unavoidable. It arrives a mere 12 months just after the last one. Even if those around us do so, it's one of those dates that we simply cannott forget, unlike Jury Duty obligations or the semi-annual dental appointment.

Thus, I suggest we toast the day of aging. Raise a glass to those who are avoiding another year and to those who embrace the day (or month) of their birth. Glad you're here getting old with me. I raise a tasty, frothy beer to each of you and to those whose birthdays are upcoming. Many good wishes and best of luck during your year.

Atrocious Acts

2010-03-26T14:20:00.000-07:00

Unreported in Alameda County:

An evil cat hoarder had three -of 15- cats (that I know of) taken from her home. Basic abuse of innocent animals, this is a recurring legal and, obviously, ethical issue with her. She's been previously cited by Animal Protective Services numerous times yet finds a way to scoop up more felines and destroy their simple, unsullied short lives.

The cats were ill: one whose face bore a huge,uncared for mass that extended from nose tip to lacrimal corner of the eye. Another sported matted, clumpy fur and appeared malnourished, and an essential flea haven. Fluid poured from the third's nose. If they survive, how long will it take for their feral, survival instincts to soften before they're willing to trust another human?

Sadly, this isn't one of those Animal Planet/Animal Cops shows. Real life, real abuse, real sickness for the kitties and resulting from a reproachful, poisonous woman. She lives alone - is that a surprise?

It leads me to wonder what drives the human mind to such measure? Why don't we protect the innocent a little more and burn more fire under the offenders, especially repeat offenders? We let rapists out of prison in 7 years or less ("good behavior") only to find them lurking and assaulting women again; it's up to her to prove that she didn't provoke him. We move molesting priests around from parish to parish to hide their heinous, life-damaging acts. A college professor molested a baby --yes, a baby--with the approval of its mother. I don't know what's worse here: the molestation or the mother who allowed this to happen. A woman who takes in kittens and roving cats only to kick them, snap their legs, and/or ignore their medical & physical needs? What kind of people do this?

We say that the laws to protect animals are 'good enough' because, well, 'they're just dumb animals.' I have to say that sexual predatory laws are equally as ineffective. Who upholds these lame laws, these sweep-under-the-carpet molestations, these 'good behavior' gives you freedom options? Obviously 'prayer' and a good chastisizing waggly finger does not make the priest change his ways. I can't help but wonder, if it make the defendant/offender/convict feel better to know that he/she has gotten away with something and will only receive a slap on the wrist?

Oh, it just irks me. And then there's the Tea Party idiots.

Olympic Reflections: 2 tiny similarities

2010-03-05T11:07:00.000-08:00

I watched some of the events of the Winter Olympics this year with great zeal, others with mild curiosity.

The bobsled, skeleton, and luge are all engaging 45 second runs. However, after seeing three in-a-row, I was bored. The focus of the boring NBC commentators was on Curve 16, the deadly, rupturing curve that cast a dark shadow on the Games before they began. I was reminded, though, why I do enjoy watching some of these sledding events.

In my childhood neighborhood, during the worst of snowy-icy snowstorms, many of us took to the 10% grade hills for Skeleton-like sledding. As we all know, the best time for Mach 5 sledding is at night, when the temperature drops, the ground hardens, and, of course visibility decreases (especially if it's snowing or foggy). Toss these latter factors in and multiply times 20 if a passing car travels along the sledding route. At that point, there's a bit of quick-action decision making, given the fact that most cars have little control under such wintry conditions.

My sister owned the best sled: light, small, and always waxed on the rails, it tore down Council Crest Drive and with intensive full-body steerage elbowed into a right turn down Beaverton Avenue. Major ice, velocity, and non-stop leg-pumping (just like on a swing) enabled the sledder to continue down the 100 yard, 12% grade Himes Street. This was a true vertical slope, similar to the ski-jumping hill, but without the open space at the bottom: a road, a guard rail, a bunch of icicle-laden ivy that crept out underneath the metal barrier, and a grove of barren maples and firs just beyond.

And if the thrill of zooming down Himes wasn't enough, there was always the thrill of the curb on one side (often with parked cars) and the 15-foot cement wall on the other. Due to the laws of physics, motion, and gravity, these hazards presented themselves as reasons to Bail Out. Take the Tumble. Let the unmanned sled plow into the asphalt while the rider rolled and Supermanned down the hill, coat zippers and boot toes serving as the only frictional tools towards reduced speed.

At the bottom of Himes, once the sled was retrieved or the ride savored a choice was made. Take Chesapeake or trudge back up the 1/2 mile and repeat. Chesapeake was a snaking, 10-foot wide, potholed, sparsely-lit road that simply tore down hill. In the multiple I took the hill, (with an Olympiad's running start, legs pumping, and knuckles clawing at the ground) twice I made it to a point far enough to not know where I was and rather than take some road to a neighborhood unknown, I plodded back up in the blackness of the night. Most times I spilled off the right edge on a maniacal left turn that dumped me into hill of ivy and ferns.
I suppose that it's here in these wild-night memories that I find myself drawn to the luge track.

On another note, I would like to point out that I watched some of the snowboarder events. And each time Shaun White's face appeared, I kept thinking, "Who does he remind me of? Who is this person?" Well, there are those internet 'similarity' photos between people and dogs: Carol Channing and a pug, Joe Lieberman and (Deputy) Droopy Dog, Wilfrd Brimley and some grouchy-faced fat cat.

Shaun White rang a similarity in me that was equated with a human, not a 4-legged. Today, it came to fruition with the article and adjacent regarding a potential inter-denominational marriage. Shaun White and, yes, Chelsea Clinton are veritable twins. Same hair, same face (hers appears a bit cheekier), same height. Sure, she might be a Rhodes Scholar with some sort of intellectual awards and he a two-time gold medal Olympian, but one could easily step in for the other if the paparazzi aren't sharpening their focus.

And there, my friends, sans the fire place and snowflake-patterned turtleneck are my Olympic reflective moments. Shaun White doubles for Chelsea Clinton, and vice versa. And skeleton and two-man toboggan syncs with nighttime, streetlamp sledding (and pigpile sledding) on Portland's west hills' icy streets.

The Walk

2010-02-05T12:37:00.000-08:00

When I stepped into the unit, I found Mom walking down the wide, 25 yard-long hallway. As if blind, she bumped against the right wall which caused her to straighten her inner steering mechanism and veer back towards the center. Her gait was driven, forceful, not fast but definitely furtive, her head bent slightly forward like when we're drunk and our bodies are drawn by some green exit sign to the world beyond or a faraway lavatory's magnetic pull towards relief. The difference being that she didn't stagger. She wasn't inibriated.

Lacking shoes, I saw that a flap of extra blue sock hung out beyond her right toe like a tiny, cozy flipper while a thick red sock snuggled around her foot perfectly. Her definitive step thumped out a clear drum beat across the carpeted plywood flooring. I worried in that moment that walking without foot support would hurt her, cause the bone spurs in her heels and the bunions on the lateral left to scream out. She only grimaced slightly, perhaps because when I caught up with her, she'd reached the end of the hall, the locked exit door, the closure of any escape her mind might have conjured in some single, or, perhaps repetitive moment.

Was she trying to get out? Or, was she trying to get out of the disease that seeped into her intelligent mind? She'd tried on numerous occasions to escape: once she saddled up next to the nutrition staff who carted in an 8-foot metal box filled with hot food trays for the residents. As he wheeled out, Mom stepped in line with his cart and slipped out the door to freedom, to the unlocked, assisted living area where the senior aged front desk woman caught her heading out the front door. "Mary! Are you going out for a walk?" She knew that Mom was a Houdini of sorts. "You'll need a coat. It's quite cold outside." And from there, she escorted Mom back into the locked Alzheimer's unit where she could take a stroll within the confines of the locked courtyard and gardens.

Walking kept her going. She wasn't idle until the disease began to affect her balance -- about a year later. Her muscles and tendons stiffened and she spent a lot of time in a love seat rocking up and back in ab-killing half-crunches. I tried these at home and couldn't accomplish even half the amount she did during one visit.

Who needs an Ab-Cruncher (for three payments of just $19.95 + shipping & handling if you act now!) when you could simply try following the Mary Strohecker exercise regimen? She did half-crunches from the cushiony couch, like a rusty bear trap's jaws that opened only slightly before slamming shut again. She was a Jack LaLanne fan forever, starting many mornings with his 5am televised exercise routine before she headed off to work. While I sat beside her in the over stuffed couch, I wondered if this was one of the episodes he recorded: non stop crunches during a cocktail party.

Mom walked. She walked endless laps in the hallways, she once told me 'to keep her muscles loose. Everyone here is so staid and stale! Nobody moves!' She'd windmill her arms then tuck her elbows in and ante-up her velocity in a power-walker mode. For as long as possible, she walked away from, or perhaps, tried to escape the Alzheimer's that crept up on her and nibbled away at her life, intellect, love, and energy.

That green EXIT sign never allowed her to get away from it.

Dead Stuff

2010-01-23T13:35:00.000-08:00

In order to break through 'writer's block,' one guidebook suggests to open a drawer and write about the contents inside.

I haven't had the block for a while now, but I did open my lil' desk drawer today to withdraw a pen. My desk only has one, slim drawer, in which I've packed in a standard, black desk tray complete with three small divots that hold paperclips, clickster pencil refills, and other sundries, and a longer, scallop that's filled with writing implements. I have another, undivided white plastic tray that's filled to the one-inch brim (the drawer's height is only 2 inches so I need to be a good packer) with important items including white-out (important while working on a computer), an unpeeled Bandelier National Monument sticker with Kokopelli figurines, a tiny, jawbreaker-sized orange iMac computer screen with "hello (again)"

Back to the sectionalized tray. Funny, it's really a black, plasticine version of our old school lunch trays, minus the rails on the bottem used to slide along the lunchroom's stainless steel bars when selecting a square of overcooked spinach mush or salisbury steak & an icecream scoop of mashed po's. Intelligent design, I suppose, using all those long lost trays as tool and trinket holders in our desks. Portion sizes prob became too small for the American appetite, just the same.

Inside my drawer, beyond the moat of unused wallet, memory sticks, and broken-armed reading glasses, the left, corner tray cup draws my attention. Life forms, or items that once were life forms lay upon each other like ancient carcasses. A sickle-shaped tooth, capped on the root end with silver intended for a key ring or necklace with a silver tip covering the point. It's smooth, like a polished stone yet without the polish. Years of pocket time or endless nights spent beneath a handkerchief in my mom's jewelry drawer wore it to a sheen.
Beneath it rests a tubular antler piece, calamari-sized, sans the breaded edges. It, too is smooth, but the grooves of time and age are darkened, like rings on a tree. Two opposite holes bored through it, ideal for a string tie or a very eager worm working in one direction. It peaks on one side, such that when it's resting on my desk like a standard ring, and I look down at it, the pointy edge becomes a nose a beneath it, the gaping hole a mouth. Behind the mouth, of course, is that cavernous ring, then on the backside, the opposing hole or mirrored mouth: the backdoor for that hungry worm.
To its immediate left is a postage stamp sized square of what I'm assuming is tusk. It's wafer thin and yellowed from at least 75 years of ownership in Mom's jewelry drawer. She showed it to me once when I was a curious little first-grader digging through her strings of artsy necklaces and clangy bracelets. "Alaska" sweeps across the top of a single-line mountain ridge in 10-pt cursive engraved font. Beneath is an etched caricature of a hooded musher - his back to my eye - leading a packed sled with distinct rail lines which slices across the curved, ivoried snow. A perfect hole, just wide enough for a b-b sized brass ball keyring punctures through the upper left corner above musher's head. It's smooth on its underbelly in the small concave arch. The etching, though, is rough like an Alaskan winter. The chiseling is deep and time-defying.

Mom told me once that her Uncle Charles gave this to her when he traveled up to Alaska. She loved her Uncle Charles and he doted upon her even from across the country.

Sand-blasted snail and clam shells and a miniscule, urn-shaped seed small enough to fit through a buttonhole round out my drawer of non-living items. The seed's gradation in color from desert tan at its round base to its rich mahogany tip shows how time and change affects even the tiniest of life forces such as a seed.

There's a certain comforting strangeness to all these dead things, these bony relics that fill my little square cup in the corner of my desk drawer. This is especially odd when I contrast those once-livings with the tiny broken string of baby blue beads, some the size of tapioca and others a slightly larger, say, blanched papaya seeds. An embossed 'W' on a pearly papaya bead separated by single blue tapioca, then ten more pasty whites spells out my last name and reaches out to the tail of five baby blues again. This was my father's i.d. bracelet when he lay in the maternity ward just after his birth. His name, his life denoted by this tiny 10-inch bracelet which wrapped around his pudgy infant wrist two times showed passersby and the nursing staff who he was, who he'd become.
Now, it's a simple sign of life that snakes around these little momentos of once-life in my drawer and reminds me of how the past steps into the present and back again.

Curtains

2009-12-09T11:46:00.001-08:00

I slipped inside the oak phone booth and picked up the handle of the payphone with my thumb and forefinger. It's a public phonebooth afterall, no matter the location be it an urban sidewalk or an esteemed private womens' college, these things are still scummy. When I unfolded the glass and wooden door into place, the bare bulb overhead did not automatically illuminate. Dark wood, a tiny, cornered slat for sitting worn to a darkened, graffitti-engraved sheen, a black metal phone and dismal sunlight sneaked through the scratched, personally, and unprofessionally etched glass which made it nearly impossible to see the vacant plasti cover where a phone book once hung.

I held the receiver in my left and tugged on the broken handle with my right to accordian the door once again. Lacking a good caulking since 1947 and suffering from far too many angry, door-slamming conversations, the glass rattled when I banged the two sides of the door into its closed glass-to-glass position. Air and diffused light from the ancient hallway poured in.

I punched in the numbers, checked my watch, and knew that my 20 minute break would be taken in entireity. I added tall-man finger to my receiver grip for strength while holding the ear piece just on the edge of my ear cuff. Two rings and a giggly "Hello?"

"Hi mom, it's me, Cass."

"Honeylamb! I've been trying and trying and trying to get in touch with you. Where are you?!"

"Well, I'm still down here in California. Remember, I told you that I had this two-week seminar and I'd be rather busy during the suummer months?"

"Oh. What's the seminar about? And what about your 4-legged friend?"

"He's at home watching squirrels in the trees. It's a science seminar. I get to learn different methodologies for developing some life science techniques in the classroom and I get paid for it too."

"How much?"

"About $400. Not a lot, but enough to put away for a rainy day."

"Oh, that's a lot of money! Is it raining down there? It's lovely here. I've got to finish putting the mulch on the flower beds. The Dahlias are just coming up now. You know Bud has cancer."

"Well, there's not much rain here in July" I wiped my ear and the phone receiver with my shirt tail and readjusted my grip: elbow on wall just below an I LUV CINDY 18 point carving. "Yea, I know he has cancer. You told me when I talked to you two weeks ago. Remember, I was up there for his oncologist's appointment with you. We talked about his options and all that."

"Options? Is it snowing then? Remember it was soooo cold during your graduation. There was snow on the ground and then there was that asterix next to your name. I almost died when Elizabeth told me what that was for."

"Mom I'm not in Montana and I did finally graduate two months later. That was four years ago. Remember? I graduated?"

"[Giggle-snort]No, not exactly. I keep getting these curtains that come down, like a sudden darkness then it seems like it's gone. I forget things."

"Huh. You seem to remember the stuff that I'd prefer you forget. So, when does these happen? At night? In the morning? When? Do they hurt like a headache?"

"[Giggle] Oh, I don't know. Why does it matter? They just happen, like a curtain, then it's dark."

"Are you standing or just waking up? Does it make you fall down or lose your balance?"

"Does what make me fall down? Honeylamb how come you sound so worked up?"

"I'm not worked up, I'm worried about you. The curtains. The shroud of darkness that you feel does it make you dizzy or anything like that?"

"How'd you know about those?"

"Mom, you just told me. You just said that sometimes you can't remember something, and it's like a curtain comes down, like a darkness falls over you."

"Oh."

"Mom, you need to make an appointment to see your doctor."

"Why? I feel okay except for these darned sniffles."

"Mom, you need to get these curtains checked. It could be more serious like mini-strokes or something like that."

"What are you talking about? I feel fine."

I checked my watch. Three minutes remained during my break and people were already filing back into the classroom. I still needed to use the bathroom before returning.

"Mom, these little blackouts. You need to talk to Dr. Naito and have them checked out. Maybe he could do some tests or something."

"Dr. Naito? How'd you know about him? Gosh, you're a smart little cookie! Now, tell me about your 4-legged friend. How is he? How's Nancy?"

"Mom, please. I have to get back to my class. Will you please call Dr. Naito and make an appointment to get these mini blackouts checked?" One minute.

"What class are you in? I thought you had a break from your students. How are they this year?"

"It's an adult class, mom, for me. A seminar. Mom, I have to go. Please call Dr. Naito and make an appointment. Please."

"For what?"

"Mom, get a pen out and write this down." A colleague walked by and mouthed an 'Are you okay?' I shrugged and turned inward towards the dark wall. I ran my finger over the various LUV and FUCK carvings on the wall. Gum wads filled the holes where other carvings expanded into giant zeroes.

"Okay, I have a pen and some paper." Paper ruffled in the background.

"Not the newspaper or the margin of some magazine. You need to get a blank piece of paper. I know there's a yellow post-it pad in the drawer right in front of you."

"How do you know where I'm standing?" A drawer opens and more ruffling. "How'd you know this pad was here?"

"I'm smart. Okay, write this down on the pad. Call Dr. Naito make appointment to have blackouts checked."

"[Giggle] This is quite funny, you telling me what to do. It's just like skiing: there was no time to admire the view. You made me keep heading downhill! [Giggle] Such a Bossybeehive you are!"

"Yep. Sassy Cassy too. Can you read the note back to me?"

"Uh, oh, I need my glasses. Okay. 'Call Dr. Naito appointment for blackouts.' What's this for, anyway? Who needs to call Dr. Naito?"

"Mom, you do! Is Bud there or around where you are?"

"He's in the basement. He's got that Rush blaring on the radio. He gets so angry when he listens to him. I don't even go near him."

"Okay, well Rush will do that. Can you call him please? Tell him I need to talk with him?"

"[Giggle] Okay honeylamb. Bud! Bud!" Pause. Footsteps fill the void as she headed towards the top of the basement stairs. A tinkling of metal on metal syncopated with a flap-flap of
giant ears that whap together. "Oh, hello Mabel! Good girl. Bud!" Mabel is a basset hound.

"What?!" a distant voice snapped.

"Cass wants to talk to you. She's on the phone." Mabel shook her head again. Probably rubbed up against mom's leg to get petted. "Yes, now!" Stomping feet.

"Where?"

"On the phone. Here."

"Hello?" He was panting. His shallow voice grabbed for bits of air.

"Hi Bud, it's me, Cass."

"Oh, hey there Cass. How are you?"

"I'm alright. Hey, I only have a second. But I need you to do me a favor. I asked mom to write
down on a yellow pad that she needs to call Dr. Naito and make an appointment. The pad should be there on the kitchen counter."

"Yes, I see it. It says 'Call Dr. Naito appointment for blackouts.' Is this it?"

"Yea. Mom seems to be having interludes of forgetfulness and these mini blackouts. I think she needs to get checked by Naito."

"She does?"

"Um, yea she's been having them for a while. So, can you call and make an appointment for her?"

"Yea, sure.
Gosh, I didn't know that she was having these. Mary, have you been having little blackouts?"

Water ran from the tap. "How'd you know?" I heard a toothy crunch. Her mouth was full of some raw vegetable. "Did I tell you this?" She snort-giggled again.

"Okay Cass, I'll make the appointment. You know, she parked the car down the street the other day then walked home. I had to go out and look for the car."

"It was a beautiful day. I just wanted to go for a walk!" She laughed in the background. "Mabel, do you want to go for a walk?" Mabel shook her head again and her collar and tags clinked together like bells. Toe nails happily clicked across mom's kitchen floor and a door creaked then slammed.

"That'd be great Bud. Let me know and I'll come up and go with you."

"Okay. Is that all?"

"Yea, I have to go. Take care of yourself. Tell mom I love her and I'll talk to you soon." I hung up the phone and heaved a diaphragm-filling breath. Outside the wall of windows, bees crashed-landed into the camelia blossoms that adorned the building. A hammocked spider's web extended between four twigs that appeared vacant of passing insects and the spider. She was probably waiting on the outskirts for her supper.

Another deep breath lifted my shoulders to my earlobes. I wiped my left ear with my shirt collar, just in case phone cooties jumped ship and walked back into the classroom where everyone was delving into shallow basins filled with crawfish. I was 10 minutes late.

Alzheimer's in the Atomic Age

2009-11-06T17:20:00.001-08:00

Alzheimer's. There, I said it. Some people actually pronounce it, "Old-timer's," perhaps because many seniors are afflicted with this awful disease. Old Timer's makes me think of whiskey and old, surly men sitting on porches and spitting over their sleeping coon hounds. Old Timer's, like bony-faced, sallow-eyed Okies wearing suspenders and carrying castiron skillets; these are survivors in my mind. Survivors who listen to scratchy Hank Williams LPs on the phonograph and write letters on 5"x8" paper to their moved-away offspring. These are Old Timer's. These are the survivors of the times.

Those afflicted by or diagnosed with Alzheimer's are not survivors. They don't survive. They die from it. This is a disease that is literally an alien in the brain: it corrodes the brain, eats away at all the good parts, the memories, the speech, the joy, the springy step and the ability to smile.

Alzheimer's leaves no surivors. Rather, it is the A-Bomb of the soul, mind, and body of those whom we love and adore. A vacuum of life is sucked into the arsenal of this disease leaving only the dregs of a person behind. A shell, if you will, of the person we always knew and who always knew us. Not unlike The Bomb, which rips at the junctions in a victim's body, Alzheimer's tears away at the connections and synapses in the brain, damaging the tissue around it and, like the lingering radiation, continuing on its destructive path towards other healthy brain cells.

It doesn't care who it attacks. Esteemed teachers, mechanics, and physicians all fall prey to the Alzheimer's seeping annihilation. The stricken die, their bodies give up since there brain can no longer fire off the impulses to do the basic functions like breathe or swallow.

The scars that remain are left upon those of us who stood by. The caretakers. The children. The friends, neighbors, and colleagues. We witnessed the demise, we denied it, grew frustrated with this neuro scorching, then -- ideally -- dealt with it. We are left with the memory of once was the wholeness, a life, a mother, father, brother, sister who we adored.

My mother, Mary died from Alzheimer's. It was awful. It was painful to see and feel. As the disease cored out the impulses in her brain leaving vacant plaque, it also cored out me, leaving a hole where so much of who she was once thrived.

Initially, Alzheimer's, unlike, say, Cancer or Liver Disease in which we can SEE the physical destruction of the patient -- weight loss, skin discoloration, fatigue, hair loss -- does its damage internally without us SEEING a physical change. Mom Appeared the same: her stature remained constant, her laughter, her zippy step, her outward affection. Internally, though, the disease was laying claim to parts of her brain, beginning with the area the controls vocabulary. Fortunately for Mom, she had a veritable Oxford Dictionary going on in there --proof in our incomprehensible Easter Bunny notes that used Shakespearean quotations and polysyllabic words that even my oldest brother, John, then 12 didn't understand. The disease chewed away that area, but it was a slow process, not unlike how radiation crept and poisoned the lymphatic systems of Hiroshima & Nagasaki victims.

The disease moved on to other areas. Trust, wherever that's stored in the brain was immediately pummeled by the A-Bomb arsenal. What remained were thoughts of deception, lies, and thievery. Mom hid her purse in various parts of the house. We discovered newly-mailed credit cards not in drawers or in zipped up pockets in her book bags, but in soap boxes under a fresh bar of Yardley, or in a tennis ball can tucked alongside a Wilson #2. Given that Alzheimer's also chips away at the short term memory, the fact that she hid her purse -- from her husband, aka, the philandering thief -- in a different location each day made it nearly impossible to locate if she was going to leave the house.

Whenever new credit cards arrived in the mail, she'd nab them - I've no idea if she did that call-in activation we all must do from our "home phone." They would show up in sock drawers, tucked inside the folds of bar soap boxes, edged into tennis ball cans. I found one behind four cans of dog food in their pantry once when I was searching for a flavor to feed Mabel, their waggy Basset hound. She hid them because she was certain "Bud was out spending money on some woman."

One day, when she was still rather functional, she drove home and simply parked her car a few blocks away from the house. She got out, keys in hand, and walked home. There was no friend in the vicinity of her car, no construction zone that obscurred her drive, she didn't run out of gas. In her mind, it was time to park the car, and she did. When she walked in the front door - an unusual event given that always parked in the rear of the house and used the back door - Bud, her husband asked where the car was. "The car?" she inquired not knowing what he was talking about. She looked at the keys in her hand, "Don't you have your own car?"

He looked out the front window, saw only grass and an empty street, then strolled out to the curb to find a vacant road. He spent the better part of two hours walking around the neighborhood searching for her car. She didn't know why he was out there let alone why he seemed so angry. "He's probably out on a picnic with that woman."

"What woman, Mom?" I asked.

"Oh that Melissa woman. He writes her name all over the place."

"Mom, he's tutoring Melissa for math. She's in high school."

"Are you sure? Melissa? Didn't I work with a Melissa?"

"Yes. The very same. Is her name all over the calendar and on pieces of notebook paper?"

"How'd you know? I thought he had lunch dates with her."
Mom continued to hide the credit cards, her purse, bills, cash, and even some pieces of flatware silver despite this explanation. It's just the disease. It eats away at Trust, at Rational Thinking, at all Complex Problem Solving, at Communication capacities, at basic mental processes, including the simplest to help one survive, such as the ability to clean and feed oneself. Strangely, it forces the rest of us to release our years-held frustrations, disappointments, and hoped-for acknowledgments because they just aren't going to resolve themselves or happen once this disease strikes. It eats away at all those pent-up everythings that have been festering and simmering since childhood. It forces an unravelling and cooling off. Relinquish, let them go, and close that wound. This corrosive disease won't help the healing of any wound still gaping and dripping with unsettled emotion.

Alzheimer's, like the A-Bomb, it leaves behind a blistered trail of nothingness, hardly a shadow of who the person once was. And, for those of us who remain, our hands, our minds, our hearts are left with shredded images of who the person eroded to and became in this recessive process all messed into the fond memories of who she once was before the acidic explosion seeped into her mind. It's a catastrophe that even a thousand paper cranes cannot thwart, nor can a child's heartfelt love stave off the destruction.

Age for the Not-so-Aged: XLVI

2009-10-01T23:50:00.000-07:00

XLVI

This does not stand for X-tra Large Very Important. Rather, it's our friendly Roman Numeral indication for a number not widely used in crossword puzzles, número cuarenta-seis.

Mid-40s. I hit the upper edge of the Mid-40s yesterday, September 30. Not a remarkable age, the 46. The number itself is twice a prime number, and other than 2 and 23, it's out there with no other factors, besides 1 and itself.
Kind of isolating, the number 46 - makes me wonder about all those other funky numbers and ages, like next years solid prime, La 47. Live for the now and don't contemplate that far ahead. I'm not much of a planner anyway, so 364 days off is just a ludicrous notion.

Changes so far? Things to contemplate? Given that Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah just passed, it only seems appropriate to settle in and take some sort of inventory of my life this past year: accomplishments, sins, failures, desires, and chocolate. The latter, I'm certain is worthy of its own self-reflective category, since it is a fave. Including Jujubes and Jujyfruits seems right, seeing as I spend oodles of time trying to nudge these from the recesses of my natural dental work in lieu of listening to a dear friend's divorce calamity, financial woes, or health scares. When my tongue is working that hard to chisel these syrupy nuggets from my teeth and gums, how could one expect me to donate 95% attention to another's tribulations. It's not much different than trying to maintain a conversation with someone who's "busy" surfing the internet for something, anything, anywhere more intriguing than this discussion.

Reflections on the year or what's new & different in the sub-semi-century age:
>Still searching for a job. Ugh.
>Writing more now that I have a p/t job. Discovering how much I enjoy this action when I've whittled away my free time.
>In combat with one, yes one, particular gray hair that resembles a RR crossing arm, including the shiny reflective paint, moreso than a blended-in brown hair. This one defies gravity and tends to point the way for lost tourists to head east or north, depending upon which direction I face; it's perpendicular to my spine.
>The gold nuggets I discovered in the Stanislaus River, making me an imaginary millionaire, have turned out to be a medley of pyrite & mica. Still pretty, shiny, and goldy, just not worth much. Fool.
>John F. Kennedy was assassinated at age 46, just one month & 22 days after I was born. Now that's freaky.
>I'm in a double-prime year. 45 was a good number, with lots of factors: 3,5, 9, 15. Seemed powerful: the year WW2 ended. 45th parallel is the 'halfway' point between the Equator and the N. Pole. My home state of Oregon lies on the 45th parallel, a state of which I'm quite proud and fond. 45 rpms were the standard record that we played on our little record player, when Capitol records' label was a meld of orange-yellow swoops, kind of like Yin-Yang, or interlocking Nike swooshes, only better. 45th wedding anniversary is the sapphire wedding (25: silver, 50: gold). Sapphire happens to be my birthstone too.

To make amends with this new age of 46, I'd like to point out that that solo crossing guard hair makes me just that much more unique. It's truly a glistening, follicled lightsaber by which my friends can locate me on a moonless night.

46 is the sum of the number of human chromosomes (23 pairs, in case you were a little foggy during that Biology class chapter on genetics). I'm the proud owner of all 46, no less, no more, despite what my siblings might occasionally say.

And, to mark the day on a positive note, I chewed a piece of slurpy Juicy Fruit gum, the very same (yellow pack) gum that my maternal grandmother honored each of the five of us with every time she visited, or on my birthday. Hers fell on September 5, so we oft shared a 9th month celebration. We grew old together: the wise chain smoker carved from tenacity, "Old Kentucky Blood," and 5pm High Balls and me the youthful, tomboy, baseball-loving, pyro-sprite.

Juicy Fruit still has that burn-the-back-of-your-throat spicy sugary sensation, not unlike Beeman's, or Clove, or BlackJack, without the red or black tongue after effect. It's just enough to make the silver fillings in my teeth erode just a smidge, yet antagonizes my salivary glands to the point my jowls are flooded and I slaver over my lips like a broken levee. It's a stick gum with a jagged, Charlie Brown embossed print on each end. It's still wrapped in that serrated edge metallic wrapper, such that a tiny speck of said paper (invisibly glued to the stick) still has the capacity to fire off an electrical jolt through my brain when my fillings make contact. There's no way to get that particle out of the dental canal without a mirror, a good toothbrush, and a rinse. Or, when such amenities aren't available, withdraw that syrupy wad of ABC Juicy Fruit and utilize it's under-desk sticky factor to suction it away.

Toss that wad, btw. It's an electrical hazard now. Fold another piece across those central incisors and start fresh, like a new age, or a brighter outlook.

Despite it all, it's a happy gum, written in joyful black print with a slim, vaguely present red outline that borders each letter. With an oral and aromatic wave of secret-spiced gummy lusciousness Who wouldn't want to etch away their tooth enamel?

Given the Juicy Fruit, the birthday brunch and dinner with my family and pals, and the crisp, clean, gently-warm air and azure sky that marks the skin-tingling Autumnal kickoff, I admit this celebration of my birth day has been darned good. So long ole 45! Forty-six?! Here I come!

XLVI:

Xenogenesis, Lucky, Verve, and Iridescence

It's Not Nice to Toy with Mother Nature

2009-07-14T14:13:00.001-07:00

There's something to be said for Respecting Nature. I do. Always have. Don't turn your back on the ocean. Wear bear-bells in bear country. Wasps and hornets prefer not to be swatted (and missed), as it only pisses them off. Wool warms, cotton kills.

We humans, for the most part, are predictable animals. We eat in certain places, tend to nap in soft zones, we lash out at others who annoy us, including the errant ear-hovering mosquito who circles the earlobe at 3am.

Animals, however, are not as predictable with their behavior. For example, the deer that feed along the shrub-and-grass lot behind my house simply stand and stare at Gracie and Basco as they bark madly at them. These same hooved animals react similarly when they're just outside my front door as the dogs and I head out for nighttime pees. Stand, blink, immobile. They wait for these barking irritants, these long-lineage offspring of ancestral predators to quiet themselves with a silly assumption that Basco, who's blind, and Gracie, who's not would not chase after and nibble on their heels given the unleashed opportunity.

Birds do in fact, fly off when a stranger approaches. However, their unpredictability lies in that strange moment with the overly optimistic and confident middle-of-the-road bird, who's made the choice that his toothpick legs are much faster at running across the road in order to avoid an on-coming vehicle than to quickly gain flight in a simple up-down flap of its eight-inch airbound wings. Go figure.

Today, on the southside trail of Round Top Mtn in the Sibley Volc. Preserve in the E.Bay Reg. Parks, not far from the sign that states "Do Not Enter, Rehabitation Area", beneath the leafy shade of the Eucalyptus grove, an angry, coiled, fang-bearing rattlesnake decided to become Sergeant-at-Arms (as decided by whom, its forest brethren?) of the trail. Anyhoo, it laid there in partial sun and shade, not under or on top of a warm rock or near a bunny warren where most textbooks state we can find them. From my heart-thumping, 10 yard distance, I spied his coiled his body -- approx two-inch diameter -- while he hissed his poisonous tongue and rattled his 4" shaker posted just centimeters from his slit-eye head. Gracie cocked her head to the side and stood motionless. Fortunately, she did not step forward to within 5' from this reptile, but stood in awe, cranking her head towards the other shoulder.

Frightened does no justice as an emotional description here. Jarred. Jolted. Cautiously freaked.

It was all I could do to summon her back with a "Gracie! Come! Here! Gracie! Come!! Basco! Stay!" Mind you, Basco, the good little guy was already standing at my shins and simply sat down, not knowing why I was yelling at him. Good boy.

She returned to me, with her head craned backwards at the sputtering rattler, its jaw wide open, fangs dripping with venom that glistened in the sun's rays and ready to plunge into soft, pliable skin. I re-leashed both of them -- Basco's so good, I don't really know why I bothered, since he'd simply follow me wherever I walked. But, in the event Gracie thought of Mr. Venomous Ready Bite as a crinkly rattly toy and needed some outdoor play time, I hedged my bet on cautiousness. She has a thing for disemboweling all her toys, often ripping their heads off first then chewing apart the area that crinkles, squeaks, or, of course, rattles. I could only imagine that this "live" toy appeared the same to ther, minus the chenille fabric, fluffy stuffing, and kidney bean-plastic containered rattle.

I felt bad for the puppies since we'd just walked up hill in the sun for about 30 minutes, and I chose this particular path and route as a means to cool them down. That's what we usually do. But there was no choice but to backtrack up the mountain trail, into the searing sun, and back along the ridge. At least I brought two water bottles for the little guys.

In those brief rattling moments on the trail my mind raced: What should I do, thrown rocks at Mr. VRB in hopes that he'd uncoil and slither down the hill towards the feral cats and hopping rabbits? Make myself big as suggested for mountain lions and coyotes? I don't think so. This sputtering reptile was not going to budge. For all I know, today was eat-anything day. Even the birds weren't flying around that part of the trail, opting to leave the seeds, worms, and insects for another time.

Mother Nature's Animals are not as predictable as we'd sometimes like them to be. Sure, raccoons and bears will take the easy route and head straight for the untethered trash cans and tents filled with yummy food rather than hunt and forage. Who wouldn't? I mean, even we humans do that, don't we? That's why we open the refrigerator and stare at whatever's inside imagining a meal, a la George Jetson-style to materialize rather than put something together. Hence, the success of that well-known business, the restaurant.

The rattlesnake is no different. If a meal will cross its path, well, then so be it, it's like a drive-thru, hot-n-ready treat for him. If I tossed rocks County Fair style at his head in hopes of ensuring passage on this trail, I'm sure PETA would be all over me, I'd piss him off and he'd probably S-curve and slither-sprint his way towards my calf in retaliation. But, I have to remember, that this path, these woods, these trails, rocks, ravines, and arroyos are actually his turf, not mine. I'd like to think otherwise, but, you know, Nature is where these types live and exist. If he opted to enter my house, well, we know that's another matter. In his house, though? Just like the elk, moose, and bears I encountered when I hiked around Montana: let them be.

When I was little, my mom invited an old college friend of hers to our house. She brought her two children, a boy & girl, both of my elder sister, Elizabeth's and brother Tommy's ages. The girl dumped perfume -- part of a perfume-making kit -- all over Lizzy's bed. She broke my Baby Magic doll and somehow tossed the wand into the fire. The boy stepped on Tommy's Hot Wheels Sizzler car and snapped the track into pieces. They did not finish their Dixie-Riddle Cups of Kool-Aid that mom made for them, a drink we never were allowed, but even moreso, if we were (Birthday parties), a drop was never lost or wasted. They did not apologize. They did not display shame for their rancid, destructive behavior.

These were not children we liked. They were not welcome in our home. They did not make an attempt to replace or wash or repair any of the destroyed items. We reminded our mother every time she mentioned her college pal's name that her children were animals. Unpredictable. Feral. They should have backed away from our house before even stepping across the threshold. Urchins.

This is not a grudge but merely a point: some people are lower in the animal kingdom organizational pyramid. They diverged at the Class level (Mammal), jutting off towards something of a lower-thinking level. Hardly made the resemblance to the Primates (Order), who actually have some rational thinking processes. These two were not unlike the Sloth, which is of a subclass of the mammal; they don't even make it to Primate order. Seems about right. Subclass. Yep.

Back to the snake. Obviously, I won't enter the 'house' of Mr. Venomous Ready Bite for quite a while now, at least until I'm certain that the ranger has removed all those Rattlesnake In Area signs. Maybe some curious coyote and Mr. VRB will exchange moonlit words and, hopefully, the coyote will win. Until then, I'll just have to respect Mother Nature's Sibley Volcanic Round Top Mtn trail and let Nature take its course. I discovered a video that showed a red tail hawk & rattler dueling. Spoiler Alert!:::: The Hawk wins. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CeskXKz765g)

There are lots of hawks in the area and this viper was in plain view to any hungry bird of prey that circled the area. I'm counting on one Red Tail or Cooper's hawk having a craving for some fresh rattlesnake meat. Perhaps it needs a new belt or boots for its taloned claws. Mr. VRB would make a nice meal for a hungry hawk, coyote, or (recently spotted!) fox in the area.

Rattlesnakes are scarier than bears, mountain lions, and coyotes, and don't care if you make yourself noisy, big, or 'dead'. While the mammals will avoid us given most opportunites (with the exception of the two undomesticated, brackish gremlins who came w/my mom's friend),those diamondbacks will still coil, rattle, lunge, and bite and attack, even if the trail they're (and we're) on is well-traveled and habited by many.

Exercise caution when you're out on those trails. Or, carry some antivenom, or, wield a big stick, or, perhaps best of all, have somebody else walk ahead of you (and your dogs) so he can be the discoverer and distractor of the pit viper. You'll thank me later.

2009 SF Dyke March

2009-06-30T00:00:00.000-07:00

Tons and tons, no, hoards and hoards, no, gaggles, groups, pods, packs, and a plethora of dykes, lezzies, newby-dykes, tranny-dykes, mod-lez', old, wide, squat, tiny, lean, butch, femme, andro, sporty, mulleted, buzzed, wavy'd, permed, dyed, bespectacled, wheelchaired, caned, walkered, and of course, motorcycled dykes hovered, sat, strolled, gazed, walked, sauntered, scammed, pawed, scoured, moshed, humped, and ambled the grounds in and around San Francisco's Dolores Park.

The 39th Annual Dyke March kicked off with a rally sporting notions of dyke equality, funky music, and, among other notables, the scratchy-voiced, kick-ass keynote speaker Sharon Gless (famed for her role as Christine Cagney in Cagney & Lacey, bit parts in Nip/Tuck, and of course as Debbie Novotny, the smart-mouthed mom in Queer as Folk). She's in a new low-budget film, Hannah Free which closed out the film fest. Yea for her doing a lez part and being proud of it to boot!.

I missed 98% of that rally, opting to arrive later and wander the grounds, absorbing all the estrogen and lezzie aura in the air. Man, it was AWESOME. I realized, near the end of the Dyke March -- which started (typically) late, wound its way down 18th Street to Valencia, Valencia to 16th, then west on 16th to Castro towards the magnificent party and gargantuan disco ball -- that I could have easily made myself into one of those iconic rock stars and had the burly, bare-chested chix who were whooping nearby hoist me up over their shoulders and let the crowd of female fingers just pass me along over the heads of the 40,000 hot & hollering lez-positive women that filled 16th. It was that kind of night. Absolutely remarkable.

So awesome it was, that I actually Missed the dyke drama just a mere first-down measure from my feet. I happened to be in line for a scummy port-a-potty, and, beyond my vision, perhaps a few steps farther down the line, a pair of prickly dykes got into fisticuffs with each other. Haven't been witness to a good 'you slept w/my girlfriend' fight in soooo long. Lunging for each other, fists flying, long hair snarling and getting yanked, kicking, cussing, all while each person's little posse attempted to unsuccessfully pry these angry pheromone-laden women apart. Like angry magnets they were, just when the iron ore seemed to be far enough from its attractant, the raging, jealous energy sucked them back together in a fiery, female, snarling fight. But for the lack of folding chairs and monstrous & bald security personnel that are oft found on stage, Jerry Springer would have been proud. The two feral females ultimately stomped off in opposite directions with their cadres, both tomato faced and tearful. One of them, fists still clenched, was screaming at her good pals, "Goddammit, I just fucking love her so much I could kill her!" Aaah, now that's good dyke drama love. Nearly a sonnet.

Alas, it was all-chik energy from curb to curb, corner to corner with boys, women, tourists, heteros & homos on the sides, cheering from their windows, dancing on the rooftops, applauding from fire escapes, and beeping their horns while stuck in their cars because of our traffic stopping busts and shouts. Of course, there were quite a few men in the crowd of marchers too, which makes me wonder why since it's a lezzie thing and dudes can hang on the edges to support. Still, the air was sizzling, with melodious, lavender-laden, alto soprano tones and ear-thumping decibel levels from the revving D.o.B. motorcycles, political statement megaphones, Sistah Boom's percussive poundings, and the feet stomping, hip-grinding pulsating rhythms of Madonna, Pink, and Sister Sledge blaring from upper floor apartments.

Because of the sunshiney, 80 degree day, skin shone throughout. Bare arms dangled and pulsed to the beats, draped around wifely shoulders, or clenched the muscles as the wrists cocked the throttle on their Harleys. Breasts of all shapes, sizes, and adornments flopped to and fro for Dyke Freedom. Some women were so bold to actually place Human Rights campaign stickers on their nipples. I suppose because of the higher temperature and sweat-bead factor, peeling them off wouldn't hurt as much as they normally would, but still. I can think of less painful ways to be slightly modest, and even make a tiny political message. Nonetheless, bare butts, breasts, and a smattering of all-nude women (and quite a few nude men in the Castro) staked their claim to the message: we're dykes, we're sexy, fun, shapely, and ready to take on the world - one march at a time!

What impressed me this year moreso than most other years was the number of younger women present at the march. By younger, I mean 18+ year olds who are aware, participating in and celebrating their lives, their sexual explorations and identities. Some were a bit shy, hiding behind or clinging to their female pals while nursing drinks and gazing at passing cuties. Others hung onto their gal pals, making out or dancing to the music that filled the air. Still, others blew whistles, pounded bongos, and hoisted pink cardboard/black markered Dyke Equality signs overhead to establish their political perspectives on the ridiculous inequalities that surround them, or us. The youth are here and boy oh boy do they share a strong voice to be heard.

When it comes down to it, though, the crowd consisted of women from all parts of the U.S. and abroad. Women from Fresno, Salt Lake City, Tampa, NYC, Buffalo, Austin, Calgary, Toronto, Paris, Sydney, Tokyo, and even my hometown of Portland, Oregon danced, drank, and celebrated their lezzie-dom one way or another. We were senior citizens, midlifers, teenagers, 20-and 30-somethings, and the somewhere-in-betweeners. We sported shoulder length, Prince Valiant, shaves, mullets, short-sporty (that'd be "my" hairstyle), and spiked hair of all natural and unnatural colors.

Most of all, though, we were there in sync, laughing, dancing, cheering, and having some of that fab female camraderie that is oft found at this event (besides the dyke drama brawl mentioned earlier).
Of course we, the multi-thousand group of us, the Wake, Caravan, Herd, Intrigue, Colony, Drove, Peck, Kettle, Bevy, Cohorts, Fold, Farrow, Memory, Wisdom, Tower, Pandemonium, and Pride (peacocks, how appropos!) poured our fab energy into the Pink Saturday festivities in the Castro afterward.

Honestly, considering how well we put on a party, it's quite obvious it's great to be gay (or GLBTQ, if you will). It's even better to have a strong community of friends, comrades, colleagues, and acquaintances (both gay & straight) who accept & support us. Gay (GLBTQ) Pride week is our pre-holiday week warming up to the big shebang celebration on the weekend. The difference being that unlike the standard end-of-year holiday season, I didn't spend a ton of cash but I did have a fucking great time scanning the crowd for chiks, whooping, dancing, oogling, flirting, and celebrating with my peops.

Check it out! A tiny taste (not as much skin as I'd like: my battery was dying) of the 2009 SF Dyke March (by yours truly):
http://www.mydeo.com/videorequest.asp?XID=28518&CID=272721

Perspectives on a Communication Gap

2009-05-23T01:25:00.000-07:00

I realized that I needed to spell out a few 'generic' perspectives on a relationship that's become a bit jagged, distorted, pained, and is now fraying along its once taut fringe.

We censor. We mince. We bite our tongues. We hold back. We share, then sweat, then wait for the onslaught.

It's the risk of communication, it's the chance of acceptance, it's the open road of clarity, it's the shred of what remains between we imperfect humans -- friends, relatives, others -- that allows honesty and a turned-back. The question of what lies 'on our minds' or 'in our hearts' is what we lay out on the table before these Homo sapiens. And then we stall, kill time, hold our breath in that dead air of wonder, 'will I be shunned, shot down, accepted with reluctance, or enveloped with a verbal embrace?'

Dialoguing, among many other definitions includes the frank discussion "of areas of disagreement...in order to resolve them."
Avoidance is a natural way to undertake disagreement: just sidestep the issue or simply ignore its presence. Is she leaving? Are they gay? She quit and walked out? Did he really say that? Mmm, let's simply not talk about it, it's a bit touchy you know.
Confrontation is the scary way to look these uncomfortable situations in the face. Make the call. Look the other in the eye. Open the conversation with the tell-tale, "So, I hear that ...." Write a letter and establish one's own concerns or feelings.

Tip-toe in and out of the issue is an alternative manner to deal with an imbroglio. The age-old toe-dip into the pool idea is essentially the same notion. As a side note, this literal process is quite impressive to me, as it takes quite a bit of leg strength to flex down, maintain balance, and dip the alternate toe into the water simply to determine if the agua is suitable for plunging. I suppose that it defrays from committing to the process. Rather, taking a bit of inner -- perhaps muscular -- strength to contract the leg a few degrees and test the situation.
This is not unlike the visual gauge-measurement of monitoring body language of the friend (in the dialogue) when a simple blanket statement or question, 'Do you want to talk about it?' is blurted. This tippie-toe/toe-dip is gently risky, but truly not a dive into the unmarked pool; it's non-committal, not unlike asking, "You don't want to talk about it, do you?" Umm, no, I don't think so any more.

Somewhere in the middle of this Obtuse Dialogue is the process of Questioning. This lies between tip-toe, confrontation, and avoidance. For example, 'What is it I said that made you...', or 'Do you even hear what I'm saying?', or 'Why can't you...?', 'Do I look like an idiot (Often this is followed by the statement, 'I'm not blind, you know')?' Occasionally, 'Is there anything I can do to help/clarify/show/be a better _____?'
I've found that this Interrogative technique is aggravating to the other, even if it's less obtrusive. It shows support or desire to be involved, but in the same vein, it's oft perceived by the interoggatee as pinpointing or, perhaps pin-pricking in its inquiry. That is, the question(s) really tap dance on what's raw and ruptured between or around the parties involved. As much as the questioner's furrowed brow might display concern, she is doomed, will be shot down, and reminded to 'just back off', 'stop prying,' that 'you just don't get it, do you?'

Mind you, there is the occasional glimmer of the appreciative questionee who responds, 'gosh, thanks for asking. I've been wanting to talk about this for a while and I've not known how to broach the subject.' This response is always nice.

Rough, painful, difficult, or unsavory communication between friends & lovers is often -- not always -- the easiest. Friends, true friends, or true lovers are usually willing to forgive even if one of the bipeds is an ass. Time may be involved, you know, to let that Pig Pen dust settle, but that clock or sundial generally lends itself to the perspective, to the breath of clarity, to the realization that malice was not intended.
I'm not saying that there aren't tears, crumpled letters, and slammed phone receivers. Oh, quite the contrary. However, there's often a span to reflect and realize that the words stated, the body language displayed, the unstated words, the silence, and the long exercise routines were manners in which the other needed to exemplify the depth of position, the obviousness of message, the simplicity of emotion and desire. Ideally, this day-night-day-night (repeat as needed) period brings peops together moreso than apart. I think maturity (desire & hope, too) weighs heavily in this process.

The same type of communication between relatives, that is, the "biological" (not chosen) family can sometimes lead to resentment, anger, and back-stabbing.
Mind you, I've discovered the same results between friends, which is sad, since we choose our friends because of the character they've shared with us. Our relatives are who they are, and we find that when animosity spins like a sword-wielding whirling dervish, mean spiteful words spit out daggers and shards at us. We duck, cover, we hide, we face it and are slashed.
Yet, we remain, suffer a bit, attempt to pluck the blades from our skin and souls, forgive, and sometimes bury the hatchets. Scarred, we step away and kind of move on, but that darned vexing, [non] communicative baggage keeps tagging along. So, we spin around and re-examine what's still knicking our heels.

Hope and Avoidance then comes into play once again. An oppressive silence surrounds the topic of difficulty as the best means of clearing the air.

So, is this a Confrontational Proposition? Not in the least. Merely an observation of a crevasse that's developed between a few sensitive mortals. These are creatures who mean well, have loved truly and deeply, yet are unable to bridge the gap of misunderstanding, jealousy, and new love.

Can't say that I know how those Canadian guys got the rope from one side of the Capilano chasm to the other, but I do know that it ultimately occurred from undertaking the struggle rather than simply eschewing the endeavor. Eventually, they had a wood-slat rope bridge. Unsteady, yes, but a true connection between two sides just the same.

Life's too short to let a good friend fall to the wayside and be lost. Let's be frank here: resolve the disagreement, the misunderstanding, the whatever which wedges deeper and broader between. Bridge the abyss and allow the energy & life flow.

Found. Art.

2009-05-14T13:11:00.000-07:00

"One man's trash is another man's treasure."

Found Art.

The homeless people who haul around single go-go boots, plastic hangers, computer monitors, 8-track tapes, and random pieces of lumber are cutting-edge artists. At least that's what I've discovered by way of my MFA from an esteemed San Francisco art & architecture school. I always thought it was trash, those plastic milk & juice drink rings, expired bus passes, shoe laces, and combs. My bad. They were figures or unclaimed pieces for a "collage" or "sculpture" or "weaving".

There's actually a published, glossy-paged book (or books?) on Found Art. Who knew? Found. Not lost, not dropped, discarded, or tossed, but found.

The other day, along side the retaining wall against my abode, I swept up a bunch of wind blown leaves that expanded into its own bottomless pond of autumnal detritus. Somehow they never found their way into the nearby storm drain or city-owned shrubbery that lined the road. No big deal, I like doing my civic duty. Besides, dead leaves and twigs always smell so autumny.

Among the yellows, browns, greens, and glossy black beetles, a glint of something shiny caught my eye. There are many raccoons that roam the streets on the Eve of Trash Day, so I assumed it was a lost scrap of foil hoarded from a nearby knocked-over trash can. Instead, it was a mangled set of dentures or a bridge with little clusters of teeth and faux pink gums clinging to the metal arc.

Eeeuuuw! Someone's teeth!

Immediately, I stepped back, thinking that a serpent, monster, or some such horror film icon would jump on me. I don't know why I stepped back, but the sight of these fake chompers shivered me timbers. My parents both sport the same style: little white nubs molded into pink blobs welded into the curved monorail so I was vaguely familiar with the sight.

I vaguely scanned the roadside in case other body parts snagged on the spiny blackberry shrubs or under the guardrail --by then I thought that these ivories were part of a Mafia 'cleaning.' The street was vacant of toes or clumps of hair. I swept the fangs into the dust pan and let them slide onto the top of the wall. They sat there like some family heirloom.

My thought process was simple: if these fake tusks were not lying here as the result of foul play, then perhaps somebody lost them and I happened to find them, you know, like a key or a pacifier or a bus schedule.

It's been a few days and they're still there.

It's funny, but from a distance or even close-up, they remind me of a morphed scorpion. The thin metal track curved and divoted from passing cars or the nearby family of raccoons who, much like I did with a paper clip in 3rd grade, probably passed it around and put it in their mouths like a Halloween vampire prop before realizing they had to get on with their nightly trash-dumping schedule. The wire pokes upward and out towards the imaginary pallet, ready to jab and sting. The gaps between the clumps of pink and white stones are articulated body parts held together by an evil, metallic wasp-waisted petiole.

Given the gap of time and my association with my recent Alma Mater, I'm now wondering how I can attach this imperfect body part to a canvas to follow in suit with the Found Art phenom. Ideally, I'd use dental floss and lasso it up, just to keep it aligned with the oral theme. However, I've discovered a few "natural" cigarette pack wrappers, a flexi-straw, a beer bottle cap, and a fast food restaurant's cold drink lid (size medium) clumped into a cyclone fence's corner at a local produce store I visit. Obviously, these are art pieces in the waiting.

+*+*+*+

I know some people use Found Objects in their own artwork. Often this is called Recycled Art or some such title.

I understand this is quite a profitable venture, especially if the art of welding is involved. I've seen old truck cogs, hubs, and axels melted together into quirky figurines and images. People find old metal signs and keenly place them in their backyards where magenta sweet peas and bright sunflowers soften the rusty edges. Others create tinkling chimes from mangled cafeteria silverware and fishing lines found along sandy beaches.

At NYC's MOMA, I viewed a small art exhibit of 7 flourescent light tubes leaning against each other in a corner. I wanted to believe that these were waiting for overhead replacement by the museums the maintenance people, but I was wrong. I cannot imagine how much someone would pay for this.

The most difficult Found Recycled Art for me to accept and appreciate is the toilet garden. Yes, it's a perfect bowl, but when it comes down to it, I have no interest in approaching this display, let alone sniffing the fragrant buds that bob their multi-hued heads, knowing that their stems and roots reach out along the edge of the porcelain and stretch down the oft-plunged hole which once housed, well you know. Too much prior knowledge on that planter's usage, thank you very much.

So go ahead, make your Recycled Art. But please explain to me how gum wrappers, a dirty yellow shower curtain ring, coffee cup handle, deflated mylar balloon (purple and red ribbons still knotted onto the nipple), a bread loaf's wrapper and its twistie, and a library book's crinkly cover all glued onto a canvas, or "woven together" with the other above-noted items are Found "Art." It just seems like garbage to me, not some cool sculpture, drawing, or figurine found at a garage sale or in the back of somebody's dusty, forgotten attic.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to get back to my multi-textured mouthy collage, begin gluing a chewed-tip pen cap, a boot's tongue, a single jigsaw puzzle piece, and a Reese's PB wrapper onto a cheap canvas. It shall be titled, "Oral Life" and I will offer it for sale at the artistic price of $500.

Found. Art. Canvassed trash for sale. Yet, I must say, the streets are a little cleaner for it.

HP Customer Service-Finale: Simple is too Simple

2009-05-01T17:55:00.001-07:00

A computer, to the best of my knowledge runs on some sort of electrical power.
This power can be stored, as in solar power, transferred as in wind or hydro-electric power (harnassing the strength of the underground aquifer), generated by way of movement, you know, Gilligan style on a bamboo bicycle, or, the common method, the power cord. My sister reminded me that it's referred to in the techy world as a Cable. Thus, electricity shooting out of the wall socket or power strip into the 3-prongs along the insulated black cord, er, cable and into the computer by way of the recessed 3-prong innie.

HP Customer Service center folks struggled with some aspect of this new-fangled transference of energy when calls were made to their remote, secret centers.
Twice I received $xx credit for the mishandling and "inconvenience" that was suffered. Haven't seen the credit card bill yet, so I cannot verify this purported credit as of this posting. However, the true suffering wasn't as much a 'pain & suffering' as is often rewarded in civil court, but an insufferable lack of comprehension by the HP Customer Service phone staff.
Nonetheless, to close this post such that we can finally exhale with the knowledge that a wire hanger and a pair of jimmied forks are no longer serving as conductors of Hot electricity from wall to computer, a "North American cable" (again, tech-speak clarification from my schwester) arrived, sans paperwork, sans apology, in an unmarked FedEx padded envelope three days after my last phone conversation. The return address: Tennessee.
Strange that it took three days. I know for a fact that TN is, indeed a FedEx hub, and has been since its inception. Still, it arrived: the correct cable, the true embodiment of an electrically charged, 3-outie, 3-innie, shiny, black, snake.
At last, the sooped-up HP Pavilion is now ready for action. Now, if I can just shut off the Main switch to the house, I can finally detach the tinfoil-coat hanger-fork from the socket and we're ready to roll.

HP Customer Service: Simple is too Simple Part II

2009-04-15T19:34:00.000-07:00

Sleek, glistening computer and monitor sit quietly. The beginnings of dust particulate matter forms on the edges of the keyboard's space bar and the jutting lip beneath the cd-rom insert. The four-day old computer with its extra Power Supply Box still lacks a power supply cord.

I made the call - again- to customer service. Because I had a p.t. appointment for an injury, I was a bit cranky from some residual inflammation and not willing to be so, how you say, patient with the lack of electrical comprehension. No more Miss Nice Gal.

HPSC: HPSC, my name is ***, will you be willing to take a short customer service survey at the close of this phone call?

HOME: Sure.
HPSC: Is this Miss Bossybeehive?
HOME: Yes.
HPSC: How may I help you Miss BBH?
HOME: Well, you should see in your records that a call was made to your customer service center on Saturday, April 11.
HPSC: Yes. Yes I see that you called. How may I help you?
HOME: If you notice in the notes, there was a problem in our shipment.
HPSC: I see that you purchased a shiny new computer which is a fine computer.
HOME: I don't know about that because You People (I never refer to anyone as You People, but this just fell out so appropriately) failed to send an electrical cord with the computer, and then today failed to send me an electrical cord as a replacement part.
HPSC: I see that we ordered you a Power Supply Box and...
HOME: Yes. A Power Supply Box does not satisfy the problem because we have no power.
HPSC: I'll transfer you to Technical Support.
HOME: No. Technical Support won't help with this problem because it's not related to anything technical. It's a power cord. You know, like the thing that connects to the wall and to the computer. That is what you didn't send.
HPSC: I see that a power supply cord is not listed in the accessories that you ordered.
HOME: It shouldn't be! It's a cord. It's not an extra. The cords aren't noted for the speakers that hook to the computer, the cords aren't noted for the woofer that hooks to the computer, the cords aren't noted for the monitor that hooks to the computer. It's not an accessory! It's just a standard part of the computer.
HPSC: I'm sorry ma'am. I don't have a power cord listed here. Can you read me the inventory list that came with your computer?
HOME: Sure. But I'm telling you that it's not going to be listed because it shouldn't have to be. It's like doors on a new car. There're not listed in the inventory because they're standard!
HPSC: Yes ma'am.
HOME: (I read the inventory list).
HPSC: The power cord is not on your list, ma'am.
HOME: I know it's not on the list. It's something that's expected to be in the box! If I lived in the middle of Antarctica and ordered this computer, I wouldn't have a local hardware store or BestBuy to drive to in order to purchase a power cord because it should've been in the box with the new computer. It's not an extra.
HPSC: Yes ma'am. Let me look for a part number.
HOME: There shouldn't Be a part number because it's just a fucking cord. It's a cord, like a snake, only rubberized with a girl-part on one end and a boy-part on the other. You know, three-prongs?
HPSC: Yes ma'am. Do you have the original list of items that you ordered to be included in the design of your computer? Perhaps it's on there and you did not check the box.
HOME: It's a cord! The computer is an electrical tool. It's a cord that connects the computer to the wall outlet, you know, to transfer electricity. You know, like the same kind that you have with a lamp, or a hair dryer or a radio. They run on electricity.
HPSC: Yes ma'am.
HOME: You don't know what I'm talking about do you?
HPSC: (Silence)
HOME: It looks like a rubber snake with gold pokey things near its tail that plug into the wall. I don't know how else to describe this. They're called electrical cords and there isn't one with this computer that I just purchased!
HPSC: Yes ma'am. Okay ma'am.
HOME: You still don't understand what I'm talking about do you?

HPSC: (silence)

HOME: Look, if I don't have the electrical cord, that black rubberized thing that hooks into the 3-prong portal at the back of my computer while the other end hooks into an electrical outlet, what do you expect me to use to move the electricity, tin foil and a couple forks? It's a cord. It's part of the computer. Yes, it's an electrical cord, but not a Power Supply Box, but rope-like, or a big fat worm.
If you just lean over and look behind your computer or any computer in your customer service center you'll see that there's a black cord, like licorice that connects your computer to some sort of electrical outlet or power strip. Do you see what I'm saying?
HPSC: Yes ma'am. Please hold.

(12 minutes later)

HPSC Supv: Hello Ms. BBH, this is floor supervisor ###. How may I help you?
HOME: (I repeat the same yell-a-thon schpiel I just ranted at cust svc rep ***). I don't get why this is so difficult to understand. It's like something from Kindergarten it's so fucking simple! It's an electrical cord. Not an accessory. Not a power strip. Not a Power Supply Box. Not a cosmetic case or a calculator. It's a cord. We use them to plug in things that need electricity, like, oh, this computer, which doesn't have one!
HPSC Supv: I understand.
HOME: Do you? Because it seems like it's over-simplified and the fact that all I need is a power cord to solve my new computer's problem isn't listed in the HP customer service script of how-tos.
HPSC Supv: Yes. I understand. For your inconvenience, we'll credit you $xx.
HOME: Well, thank you, but that still doesn't get me any electricity between my wall and the computer. What do you want me to do put my finger in the socket and simply hover over the computer and create static electricity?
HPSC Supv: No ma'am. I understand your frustration. We'll order you another Power Supp...
HOME: No. I don't need a box. I need a cord. A cord. Please. Just stand up and lean over your computer and see what I'm talking about. It's the same thing as what we use to turn on our refrigerators and toasters. That black ropey looking thing. It's a power cord. It has 3 prongs on one end and hooks into the wall, and 3 receding prongs on the other that hook into the back of the computer.
HPSC Supv: Okay. I'm leaning over my computer and I see a cord that attaches to the computer.
HOME: Is it 3-pronged? (I can't believe she's actually looking at the back of her computer)
HPSC Supv: Yes. And it connects to the surge protector.
HOME: I don't want a surge protector. I want that first cord you mentioned. The 3-prong to 3-prong cord.
HPSC Supv: It's 3-prong to 2-prong.
HOME: Yea, okay, I don't have one so I can't tell you if that's how it should be. But it's a power cord. It sends electricity to the computer from the outlet.
HPSC Supv: Yes ma'am. I understood you needed a Power Supply Box. This is what you need?
HOME: That's what I've been screaming about.
HPSC Supv: Please hold on one moment.
(3 minutes later...)
Okay we'll send you this replacement part in a few days?
HOME: That is absolutely unacceptable. Next day air or overnight. I live an hour from HP headquarters why can't one of these people just drop one off at my house? (Can't believe I said 'these people'). I'm sure one of the HP board members lives near me.
HPSC Supv: Yes ma'am. We'll send this overnight. I'll give you the replacement part number.
HOME: A part number for a cord? Okay.
HPSC Supv: We'll send this overnight.

*+*+*+*
I realized when the phone call ended that I wasn't transferred to the customer service survey people.

HP Customer Service: Simple is too Simple

2009-04-14T19:57:00.000-07:00

Bought an HP desktop computer the other day. Did the whole thing online, you know, to customize it like some sort of sooped up car. Shiny, fast, a few whistles, a couple bells, silent, though, not all revved up with massive exhaust pipes and fans.

Took 7 days from order to front door FedEx delivery. Very exciting, getting a huge box - let alone any box - delivered via FedEx to the door. The doorbell Ding-donged! Cute guy in FedEx midnight blue shorts and shirt hauls up this coffin-sized box. Couldn't just leave it at the door like everything else; had to actually have a live human sign for it. Box was unmarked save for the white upc stickers. It could've been a dead body (or a bunch of fishes in newspaper)sent from Uncle Vinny, for all I knew. Heavy too.

Handle holes on the side allowed me to shoosh it inside the door and scare Basco and Gracie into a major sniff-a-thon. Dead body still scored high on the list, although if it were, I think both dogs would have rubbed their bodies all over the cardboard, just like the allure of a very post-mortem seagull or other maimed mammal in the woods. I bent down next to them and, yes, sniffed too. No pronounceable or obvious scents to alert Horatio & the Miami CSI folks about.

Dragged the boxes (monitor came separately) up to the kitchen where I'd already disassembled the archaic 5 year old computer. Opened the giant box and found, of course, the sleek black computer and its sidecar box of accessories: speakers, keyboard, mouse, you know all the goodies.

Pulled everything out, laid it onto the floor and followed the simple 6-step pictograph poster for Installing Your New HP Computer. Easy peezy. Monitor-check. Speakers-check. Keyboard & mouse wireless usb thing-check.

Finally, "Step 5: Connect Power. Connect computer to electrical outlet." Seems easy enough. Hmm. Where's the 3-prong power cord? Searched through the casket box. Nothing. Scanned the styro-packing. Nothing. Dug through the keyboard, monitor, and accoutrement packaging. Nothing but black twist-ties and empty plastic bags. Foraged under the desk and in Gracie's toy basket (just in case). Nothing. Nowhere.

A brand spankin' new HP computer with snappy little speakers - and shoebox sized woofer, too!- a glossy monitor and only air to draw the electricity from the wall to the computer. This seemed strange to me: was this one of those 'accessories not included' things like Malibu Barbie's van and yellow polka-dotted bikini?

From the home phone, called HP Customer Svc. and explained the situation, in short, 'There's no power cord in the box.'
HPSC: Ma'am, what's the part number for this?
Home: What part number? It's a power cord.
HPSC: On your inventory list, it should have a part number.
Home: (Review inventory list) There's no part number because it's a power card. It connects the computer to the electrical outlet in the wall.
HPSC: If it's not listed in your inventory list then it must be sold separately.
Home: It's a power cord, it's not an accessory. It gives the computer the electrical energy.
HPSC: Let me transfer you to I.T. Perhaps they can help you with this.
Home: There's nothing for I.T. to do because there's no power. There's no technical assistance I need because there's no electricity running to the computer. I just need the power cord.
HPSC: I understand what you're saying ma'am, but if it's not listed in your inventory and you didn't add it in to your computer purchase then it's not included.
Home: It's a computer! It needs electricity! It doesn't run on batteries. All I need is the electrical cord that attaches to the computer and the electrical outlet.
HPSC: It sounds like you need a Power Supply Box.
Home: Fine, if that's what you call an electrical cord, then yes, I suppose a Power Supply Box is needed.
HPSC: I'm sorry for your inconvenience in all this. We will credit you $x for this inconvenience.
Home: Thank you. So you're sending a power cord?
HPSC: Yes ma'am. We'll be sending you a Power Supply Box soon.
Home: Soon? No. I've spent $xx on this computer and because of HP's mistake, I can't turn it on. You'll be sending it to me via FedEx next day or overnight.
HPSC: Yes ma'am. Again, I'm sorry for your inconvenience. We'll send you the Power Supply Box overnight.
Home: Thank you.
--click--
That was Saturday.
On Tuesday, a heavy package arrived via FedEx on the doorstep. Surprised at the box's girth and weightiness, I opened it immediately, thinking that they must have included the inconvenience $$ credit inside as a sack of coins.

I withdrew the double-layer bubble-wrapped contents. Indeed, it was a Power Supply Box. This, btw, is a 3"x 5" x 5" metal box with the (innie) outlet on one side and about 50 multi-colored wires poking out the other. At the terminal end of said wires are plastic things, meant for plugging into some other matched-up pokey things within the bowels of the computer, not unlike the serial port attachments, only way smaller and more of them.

I checked the box. I checked the bubble wrap. I checked the packing slip which said "Please find the enclosed replacement part sent to you by HP Express Parts Program....Your product is ready for installation..."
I looked outside the front door just in case I missed something, like, oh, another package containing a Power Cord.
There was none.

Gen-X Solo-Travel: Will She Make it to the Airport?

2009-04-09T15:11:00.001-07:00

A few months ago, my 22 y/o niece, Keisha, decided that she wanted to travel to Europe. She'd just quit her job in a grocery store, prior to that she'd quit her job in a cafe, and prior to that, she'd quit her job working at a theater box office. She stopped attending classes at the local community college because she didn't think it was worthwhile. And why not? She was active in her high school's drama department and hoped to move to L.A. or NY to get discovered (or rich?), a lá Lana Turner at Schwab's soda shop or like J-Lo bumping into the senatorial candidate in Maid in Manhattan.

Her grandmother decided that there was not enough room in her Malibu home for granddaughter Keisha, aka Juliet Marks, or Lily White (stage names) to live while her budding acting career launched itself into Hollywood's open arms.

Because she lacked income, her boyfriend booted her from their shared apartment. She moved back in with my brother, Tommy the single father.

Then she decided to travel. She'd ventured with Tommy --who made all arrangements and studied the guides-- to Seattle, Chicago, the Oregon Coast, and Las Vegas. It was this latter point of interest that spurred her Big Trip.
They tip-toed through the Wynn, open-mouth awed the Chihuly jellyfish glass beauties at the Bellagio, admired the sultry legs of the Pharaoh-clad employees at the Luxor, and dreamed of 5th Avenue at NY-NY. Around 10pm, they leaned over the canal at the ever-daylight Venetian boat launch area and Keisha was bitten. "I love this!" she said to Tommy. He wasn't sure if it was the dusky lighting, the gondola or the striped gondolier, or the $8 she just won in the Wheel-of-Fortune slot machine, or even M&M World which they strolled to earlier in the day that she adored. It didn't matter anyway.

Three months later, she's in Venice, Italy for a solid week of travel. The real Venice, not the Venetian, which may have been a better, English-speaking option given her travel-saaviness. She's traveling alone this time, not with Tommy, though. At present, following two-and-a-half days of Venice, she's holed up in her hotel room with a dead cell phone and a credit card that's mounting in debt.

One week ago, she arrived in Venice with two outfits. Once she leaves Italy, she's planning on spending a week in London. She had no hotel reservation, nor a hostel reservation. She's knows nary a lick of Italian language other than a few entrées and Peregrino. She has not a map of Venice. And, despite my brother's urging to purchase an adapter, "Dad, quit telling me what to do! I know what I need!" she has no means for communication other than the $1000/minute hotel phone. She purchased a phone card in the airport when she landed, she's already used it up. Since she doesn't know any Italian, she doesn't know where to buy another.

She took a cab from the airport to a hotel recommended by an [employed attorney] family friend. Her room overlooks a canal. I wonder if this is a good thing or bad thing given ambient temperature and wind direction.
Day one in Venice: Step outside the hotel, walk two cobblestone blocks (again, no map or guidebook) and she's lost. Can't ask for directions because it's Off Season, so the major English-speaking touristy peops aren't there. Lost. In Venice. Three hours later, return to hotel.
Day two in Venice: She asked the hotel's front desk person for assistance in finding a cafe and a couple sites. Cobblestone turn, cobblestone straight, cobblestone turn, a canal, a turn, an old building, and, voila! Lost again. Four hours later, return to hotel. Call father and cry during expensive phone call. "I hate it here! It all looks the same and I keep getting lost. I'm not leaving my hotel room again."

Prior to this whole trip, while my brother was in Reno, he received a desperate phone call from Keisha. She bawled on the phone, gasping for air between sobs. "Slow down," he said, "tell me what's going on." Again, I'd like to point out she's 22 years old.

"It's ONE WAY! I'm stuck there. It's only One Way!" sob sob sob.

Tommy sat down and pressed the phone to his ear, as if this would help him comprehend the situation better. "What's one way? What are you talking about?"

"The ticket. It's One Way. I'm stuck there. I'm just going to let it go and forget about this whole stupid trip thing. How was I supposed to know?"
Apparently, in her independent state of mind, she failed to notice that her online purchase of said ticket to Venice from Portland, via Washington, DC was one-way versus roundtrip. $600.

I decided to try doing this myself, to go through the very confusing process of purchasing a one-way vs. roundtrip ticket from Portland-Venice, Italy-Portland.
First, I googled Flights to Venice, Italy. Seemed clear enough. Lots of choices. I went with Cheap Flights, then plunked in the information, you know, starting point, end point, list by price etc. Right there, all neon and clear it defaulted to Round Trip. I had to physically click One Way. Found a RT for $629. About ten minutes with distractions.
I'm still trying to figure out how she managed this minor oversight.
Because she was debilitated and he was out of town, Tommy's friends helped her out. Got her back stateside by way of London, through Dublin. Another $600. Cha-ching! Said atty's son/family friend suggested that as long as she was flying out of London, she might as well stay a few days, hence the 5 days there beginning this Friday.
Little problem: how oh how is Keisha going to get from way-south Italy to way north England? Oh my oh my. Just a detail that's a bit overlooked and she has no Eurail pass, nor enuf for a bumpy 3-day taxi or busride. I'm thinking mule. Anyone else agree on this?

So, there's my neice, someone who would be eaten alive in NYC (although she loved the NY-NY hotel in Vegas). Someone who would openly sit at a romantic Venezia cafe and tell some handsome English-speaking Italian hotty that she 'can't believe how hard it is to get around Venice! It's a good thing I'm carrying my cell phone, passport, plane tix, and all my cash right here (points to belly) in my money belt! Don't know if I'll ever get back to my hotel room!'
And with that, Hotty Italiano will wink at his buddies across the cobbled road and they'll offer to walk her back to her hotel, the name of which she's butchered to "L'Hotelio Venezia, or something like that." And somehow she'll find a way to help them out financially with their broken down Fiat or ailing mother's health or some taxicab-hydroplane scheme that will help her get up to the island London.

I told Tommy to locate his local Western Union office, and that the next time he speaks with Keisha (via costly hotel phone) he should tell her to do the same as I foresee a financial deficit in the near future of my wise-cracking crystal ball. If she's not pick-pocketed or scammed of all her low-value American dollars in Venice, I wonder what will happen in London where they speak English and she, naive and all, still has no idea where she's not going.

Mind you, some people are really good fly-by-the-seat-of-yer-pants travelers. Keisha is not one of these people..... yet.

In the meantime, I'm hoping that she can simply bump into another English-speaking traveler in the hotel lobby who can help her get a good meal or cup of espresso, or at least a regular route out-and-back from her hotel.

Barnrazers: Energized by bacon, driven by camraderie

2009-03-24T14:35:00.000-07:00

Barnrazing by the Bitchtits

Okay, so Laurence and Gordon don't exactly have the tits to be officially part of the Bitchtits, but their nelly ways make them honorary members, if you know what I mean.

Barnrazing at the Aitken house was fabulous. For those who are unfamiliar, the Barnrazing Troupe is a group of us pals who get together one Saturday each month at someone's house and do whatever projects they need to have done. This ranges from weeding to painting, from creating shelving units to laying down flagstone, from replacing deck boards to hacking back poison oak infused shrubbery. Breakfast, water/sodas, and lunch are supplied by the homer, and in this case, after-razing drinks. We get a lot done, laugh a ton, and learn a bit.

As the homer, I think I've adjusted to my ideas becoming something other than what my mental imagery created, such as where or how things are hung on walls.

Alas, the cadre of industrious folks including, of course, Gordon, Laurence, Nancy, Terry, Joni, Kay, Anne, Karen, Vicki, Sue, and Sue downed 3 pounds, yes THREE pounds of bacon, a gallon of coffee, a couple bags of tea, nearly a dozen eggs, and some tasty pop-n-fresh eggs before spreading out like ants around the homestead.
<>100 pounds of rocks were spread along a path, ice plants found soily homes, and burlap & weedblock unrolled and adhered their flapping edges to a hillside.
<>Outside lights removed and new ones hung, a giant particle board cabinet found a home off the ground with all of its shelves shiny and clean, and two bikes were hoisted into the air by way of a wacky pulley system and a simple rubberized hook.
<>One room with funky angles and vaulted ceilings transformed itself into a new, non-mental hospital color (now it's November Rain), with an exceptional tape job and two, count 'em TWO coats of paint. Another room received an up-in-the-air t.v. stand thing (just like in a hospital!).
<>Moss, leaves, sticks, and crud found themselves dug out and hoisted off the nooks and crannies of the roof and gutters.

Lots of projects completed by a close-knit group of able friends. Really, it's an awesome day, a great time to laugh and tell dirty jokes, or talk about politics, or family, or our animals, and occasionally learn a new trade. A bunch of neighbors-cum-friends who don't sleep together but we do work well together.

The Forest Hill/Bitch Tits Barnrazers. We're quite a group of pals. Maybe other readers/friends will tether this notion and start something like this in their own neighborhood.

Next month: Gordon's place.

Episode 2: In Search Of.... Over 40 (singlet) Lesbians in N. California

2009-03-19T01:12:00.000-07:00

During the late 1970s and early 1980s, a tv show hosted by one Leonard Nimoy titled In Search Of filled the sci-fi/quirky wonderment stuff niche that The Twilight Zone truly created. The stuff which makes us wonder 'what if...?' or 'where are...?' I believe this show was originally hosted by Rod Serling until he died, but I may be mistaken on that. It was the Bicentennial year, after all, and so much red-white-blue-Paul Revere-Boston Tea Party-Bicentennial Minute (remember those?) filled the airwaves and my nubile adolescent mind, I may be mistaken on the hosting thing.

At any rate, Nimoy's show searched out the para-normal: Aliens, the Bermuda Triangle, Easter Island, the Devil, and so on. There was always a disclaimer at the beginning about the nature of the evidence used to demonstrate and back up their "theories."

I too am in Search Of...the odd, the para-normal, the pondered but not often discoverable, the lost, wandering, or meld-into-the woodwork O-40 Single Lesbians. Do they exist, these singlets, these lawyers, graphic designers, these librarians, truck drivers, cashiers, and non-profiteers? Are they clustering in some underground organic root-vegetable cellar or saddling up to a wine bar in Sonoma? Nibbling crumpets under a string quartet or digging ditches under the leering eyes of male, shovel-leaning co-workers? Where art thou? Or, do they exist at all? In octets, duos, or on uni-cycles?

I decided, for the sake of my singlet pal, Terry, whose online match-up adventures have gone horribly south as a result of basic Lame-o, Lackluster, Lesbo-ball-dropping (not hers, by the way), to do a bit of "field research" and attempt to locate some. Just as a little insight, this was about as successful as locating a bison in Golden Gate Park. Oh! There are bison in GG Park, but one cannot see them unless you know where to find that diminishing herd. The forest through the trees, needle in a haystack, contact lens in a pool. You get the idea. Not impossible, just not obvious.

Time of day: after 11:30am, Thursday. Grocery stores: I started with mainstream stores like Safeway & Lucky's. I spotted two in each. Safeway's was a couple of dykes, paired up, wandering around the pasta & ethnic food aisle in search of tomatoes, tomato sauces. Lucky's: luckier, actually. Two separate citings of singlets, slightly grayed. One fondling cucumbers (hello!) and carrots (mmm-hmmm), the other reading nutritional labels in the cracker section. Neither of the missies in Produce gave me a glint of the upward head nod, the 'yea, I'm one too.' Or the scan-my-basket-eyebrow-raise 'I see you have a soymilk drink', which I suppose would imply I'm lactose intolerant or just a fan of natural, sweetened, thirst-quenching hormones. Nonetheless, it didn't happen. On to starches.

Where Ms. Cracker and I -- I decided to ponder the merits of the TLC vs. Triscuit Low-fat, for conversation sake -- engaged in a humorous banter about the trade-offs between more crackers, but less taste, or fewer crackers, more taste, but less fat and, of course, more salt. Back and forth between the Wheat Thin or the Breton, the Kavli versus the Sociables. I told her that Chicken in a Biscuit still were a hands-down favorite, followed immediately by the two-flavored "Duoz" Cheese Nips. She bumped the latter to first place without even considering a C.i.a.B. but clearly felt that the Waverly Wafer was in contention. For calorie sake, though, she settled on a low-fat Wheat Thin, preferring small, palette-ripping squares to any other. We bid each other well.

Field Research Part Deux. Coffee. We love coffee, the scent, the warmy-ness, the cartoony steam that rises from each luscious cup and into our nostrils like a roast turkey with those papered feet to Foghorn Leghorn's black and white dog buddy. Coffee has that cobra-in-the-basket allure not only to me, but to so many lezzies out there. It's the wooden flute to my hooded nose, you know, all taken by the hypnotic tune or scent that I'll just rise from a deep, pillowed slumber and walk my zombied self to the nearest mug o' joe. Most of my gal pals are this way; I know a few tea drinkers, though, and I've opted to maintain an open mind about their, mmm, 'choice.' I forgive them for this gastronomical life-path divergence.

Coffee houses and cafes. This is where I was certain I'd spy a few wandering O-40L-eyes. 9:45am I ventured off towards Berkeley. College town, hip, youngish, and foggy and a little drizzly. Mist and fog are good. It means that people are a little chilled and need warm liquids to ward off Nature's perspiration resting on their Gore-tex and the cloudiness settling into their minds.

I started at Peet's, mostly because this is the only liquid beanery that I consume. I'm costumed in my usual moist weather garb: old LLBean rainboots, jeans, t-shirt, and a long, mid-shin raincoat. I'm identifiably gay by such equipment and the short hair doesn't hurt either. I get my joe, settle into a tiny table and chair with my back against the wall, and casually open my Sun magazine. It's a literary thing, sure to draw a lurking O-40 literate eye for sure.

30 minutes into this little survey, and I've shared not much more than a couple half-mouthed grins to some 20-something, backpacked dykes (prob undergrads), cute, for sure. One grandmotherly Berkeley woman who just seemed solid, strong, and, well, a smart yet straight grandmother (I'm guessing 80s, btw) who simply needed a little help with the door as she juggled her umbrella and two coffees. One very straight woman clad in heels, slacks, and a sparkling boulder on her left ring finger who I'm assuming fit the 'literate lurker' but not gay bill. And one toothless homeless woman seeking change. My cup was dry and my research proved little. Strike one.

A little buzzed, I move onto Cafe Numero dos: the side tables at noneother than The Berkeley Bowl, the awesome super-produce, super vegged, super-organic, super-selection of deli and bakery foods, and just plain, super-market in, duh, Berkeley.

When I'm not doing "research" I bump into hoards of lezzies fondling bottles of strawberry kefir, scooping almond-stuffed olives, pondering 'green' lotions in cobalt plastic bottles, or digging into the bulk granola. They're always strolling every aisle, making eye contact over egg plants, colliding their carts into my overflowing handbasket, and pawing every food on the pyramid. It's a great store.

The O-40s should be there, as should everybody else..... I mean, the store's always busy. Even at 10:30am. Except today.

I actually bought a Powerbar and a banana: something to soak up the yummy, carmel-colored coffee (I always add a little milk to cool it and skim some of the bitterness). I took a seat and, magazine in hand, peered over the pages for research purposes.

20 minutes and many pages actually read, because the Lesbians were not shopping this aisles. Baked goods and hot deli items clearly not on the cuisine radar today. Not even a lez-mom w/child-in-stroller sauntered by. What's with that? A little drizzle gettin' you down? Get outside, people! Strike two.

What will come of my research?

Pupsters- our buddies and their abbreviated lives

2009-03-13T10:51:00.000-07:00

I've had many dogs in my life. In the early formative years, we were a Basset hound family, starting with Wadsworth (mom named her thus because she was such "a Longfellow"), aka, Wadsy, Melvin her disinterested mate and a rather cranky sleeper, Myron (my buddy), Jesse, Snerd, Smedley, Eustace, and Mabel. In between a few of those floor-cleaners were some taller pooches, Clifford, or 'Cluff-a-dawdle-doodle', Maggie, a loyal, smart, and joyful lab-springer mix. My parents had a Dachsund named Heiste Von Hund long before any of us were born. Lots of cats, a bunch of ducks, geese, three tortoises, all bearing the name Yertle (I, II, and III), a handful of rabbits, various county fair goldfish, and, of course, one pony appropriately named Eeyore fit themselves in there too, but it was the dogs, our lovable barking buddies who I really connected with, and subsequently felt the greatest loss when they died.

Cliff's & Maggie's lives were cut short by car wheels, while the others met their untimely fate from the basic end-of-life system.

Mabel, the last Basset my mom had lived her final year down here in Oakland. Mom moved into an Assisted Living facility and couldn't take her with, so I adopted her. Initially, she could hardly walk the entire block around my house from basic lethargy from the lack of exercise living with my mom and her lung-cancered husband. Within a couple months, though, Mabel's ears were flopping and flying over the dirt paths in the East Bay hills, her shoestrings of slobber picking up stray insects and dried pine needles. She died of a bladder cancer, but at least she was happy in the end. On her last earthly day, she rolled on some worms and chased the mailman across the street, wagging the entire time. Her eyes glistened with complete happiness as did mine even during her last moments here.
Dogs have a way of conveying that love and trust of us, especially when they finally turn and make that decision to allow Us to make That decision. It's like they know that we won't make it at the right time. Sometimes, because of all that pure contendedness they've brought us, we humans just aren't ready to let them go, and perhaps this is when our canine pals take that step, get a little sicker, or just go to sleep forever, and make it a hair easier for us because they know we can't always make the right decision about ending their soulful lives which have added so much zest and vitality to our own. Dogs know and they try to make it a little easier for we bi-peds.

Other than Myron, the black and white spotted and pudgy Basset who was my best pal during adolescence, Abby was my girl. A 21st Birthday Gift, she was a black lab (shimmering with natural gold highlights) with one black and three pedi-dipped white paws and a tiny white star on her chest. Brilliant dog, she and I were inseparable. Pure heart and affection, she knew me better than any human could, or should I say any that I allowed. She grounded me with her solemn presence and thumping tail. An old soul in a youthful body.

She had a certain affinity for finding a ball anywhere. Anywhere. Sure she could swim in the rapids of a spring run-off river, and, she ruled the house, chased after cats, squirrels, fish, and ducks on any pond or lake (even wanting to chase after some migrating fowl on the frozen Clark Fork River) but it was her ball sense that really set her apart.

Once, we went camping in the Mendocino Nat'l Forest. Never been there before, so the adventure was fresh, engaging, and each duel with all the gargantuan biting horseflies became regular, human vs. nature comedy acts. Abby was happy as a lark, running along the trails with her buddy, Ren, a shepherd-pit mix with a sensitive heart and endless energy. They chased scents and, of course Abbers endlessly chased down pinecones until she disappeared in the thicket. I couldn't even see her wagging tail, usually an indication of something fabulous to roll in, poke, or dig for. Ren stood on the trail, perplexed at his sister's disappearance.

Five minutes later, my little black, 4-legged ground-force returned all wags and happy amber eyes. Leaves, burrs, thistles, and a few ticks covered her gold-flecked fur. Dust clouds wafted from her allegro-metronome tail for one and only one reason: in her mouth was a musty, hardly-yellow, mottled tennis ball. No bounce remained in its rubber. It hit the ground with the same buoyancy of a stick. That didn't matter to her, though, because it was all about the ball, the true hunt, the spherical objet d'arte that enhanced her daily life there. This made the camping trip beyond worthwhile, not only for her, but for me, the proud, beaming human who brought her here.

Abby was a life force for me. She grounded me with her placid nature, she energized me with her joy and her ball chases. She astounded me with her intelligence, able to cross the street with enough knowledge and awareness of approaching car proximity. Often she'd step out into the street, heading for the other side, and I'd call her back. She'd just stand there and look at me, then up the street, where the car was slowly rolling. It was like she did a mathematical story problem in her head, figuring the rate x time = distance, and solved how long it would take pokey-joe driver to arrive at our location. It was clear that we humans were the uninformed and unlike her, didn't do many math story problems in our dreams.
Abby was the Alpha, no doubt about that. During rainstorms, she chose the hike or walk route, which usually indicated a longer distance than what I, or any other human wanted. Soon, I learned to appreciate the rain as much as she. Loved the water, being in or near it just as I did.

When I moved to Montana, I actually drove out of my way because she woke up, stuck her nose out the passenger window and started whining. The highway sign indicated there was a lake nearby. Abby being Abby, and me being me, I obeyed (hmm, now we really see who was Alpha here!) and drove 10 miles out of my way to get her to the water. Was it an inconvenience? Well, when we see our puppies romping, swimming, smiling, and wagging rib-to-rib as they stand in the water, can we count this as annoying or bothersome? Horseflies, yes, but Pure-doggie-joy is never, no never an annoyance. A couple of her front teeth were a bit chipped from her other fave game: chase the rock! Streams, ponds, and rivers bore out this delightful game: she'd dig up a rock, then I'd toss it into shallow water where she'd blow bubbles and waggily dig it out again. Whenever I drove from the Bay Area up to Oregon, we always stopped at a mountain stream near Mt. Shasta. Not only was she content to wade and swim in the water (btw, the season didn't matter) but this Abby-reinforced rest stop settled my nerves a bit. She took care of both of us, as most dogs tend to do.

Abby died at home in 1996 at 12 years of age. She'd developed a large mass on her spleen and despite surgery, the complications that resulted were too much. Her normally Wide-Load body (she always carried a bit of that "puppy fat") was thin from not eating for more than a week and what the i.v. fed her before and during her surgery. When she died, she turned away from me, faced the wall. Part of me turned away too, unable to face the loss of her, the loss of a friend, and a little loss of me.

HILLARY
About 15 years ago, Hillary, Karen & Kim's lab was born from her yellow lab mother, Bonnie (Karen's family pooch). Hillary popped out chocolate brown and wagging. She, like Abberoni had velveteen ears, an ever-moving tail, and a warm, nuzzling demeanor. She'd lie in the sun and, with her cat buddy, May, two years her senior and lying next to her, they'd watch hummingbirds, starlings, finches, and butterflies flit about their flowered yard. Peace between the factions, a kinship between old friends. They appreciated life, probably had those Far Side conversations about The good ole days when they'd chase after these critters, but the ole bones reminded them to just watch and reflect. The two pals were Zen masters in their own rights. Mind you, just a couple months ago, she tussled with a marauding raccoon. Because Karen & Kim live near the ocean, the beach became her favorite weekend romping ground: what could be better than soft, diggable sand, lapping waves, and flocks of just-out-of-range birds skimming the water's edge? Again, like Abbers' river-rock game, the beach was pure joy for Hill. This will be where some of Hillary will be released.
On Tuesday, March 10, age and pain got the best of Hillary. She thumped her tail, stretched her body out, and with the help of K & K's vet friend, Hillary joined Abby in the land of endless water and limitless chases.
Her velvet ears, snuffling snout, and adoring eyes will be missed. She, like so many of our little four-legged buddies, these beings that give us so much and ask so little other than kindness and dependability was cheated out of more years on this planet. At least now, up in Doggie Nirvana, all is painfree and pleasant.

A dog's life is such a cheat by Mother Nature. Most don't live beyond 12, some make it to 14, a few hardies stretch it out to 17, still these are mere portions of our lives: sometimes only a third, maybe even half, for some of us, these buddies live our entire (aware) lives then let go when we move away, or as we prepare to. Their purpose on earth served: to share goodness, to push our tolerance buttons (those "rare" chewing, digging, tearing-up moments), and to help us heal whatever wounds us. Dogs understand that loss of love, that failure, the anger and unjustness we feel from life's wrongdoings. But they're always there, lending a lick, a paw, or just a heavy sigh to let us know that we can rely on them. So why, oh why, Mother Nature must you mock us and keep their lives so short when these little guys give so very much? Parrots live 65-75 years. Why can't our pupsters have their abbreviated life-spurring presences extended a healthy decade or so? Only seems fair.

Alas, I must accept these losses in the face of the extraordinary gains.

Adios Hillary. You are and will be missed. Say hello to Abbers for me and give her a little nuzzle behind the ears. She always liked that. Please check in with Patch and Poppy, they'll help you out. The Sophster is a lot like Abbers, I'm sure you'll get along. Pahtu will show you what being a real Bernese lap dog is all about. Janie and Dylan will be wandering around too, hanging out in the sunny grass. Aspen might act like she wants you to stop playing, but she really wants to join in the fun. Look out for Bijoux, she's got a thing about being an alpha, but she'll probably share the buffet litter box -- and Beau will too, since that's one his faves -- or various discarded Kleenex's with you. Woody and Pete, will hopefully share some tennis balls and a comfy bed with you. Daisy, Duncan, Oscar, Lucky and Rags will be guarding your shins and shoulder blades from any unwanted marauders. Mabel might drool on you, but both she and Myron only do it out of kindness.
As with all our little buddies, many not even mentioned here, we'll miss you, your bark and your wag, miss cuddling with you, and really miss seeing your reliable, dependable, loving self every day.

A Big Deflated L-Balloon: The L Word's Finale

2009-03-11T12:22:00.000-07:00

The L Word. Or, should I say, The L-not Word? Such a let down, this final episode.
At the beginning of this final 6th season, I hoped that when Jenny was finally killed off, we would be done done done with her whiny, icky character. Ever since those initial season, grainy, b/w scenes at the amusement park I wondered her relevance. Straight girl becomes gay? No biggie. I'm good with that story line. We always need more on our team anyway.

It would have been more intriguing if one of the Ilene Chaiken crew decided to do a switcheroo, you know, the ole AC/DC/AC thing and vacilate between both sexes/genders (more than Alice or Tina did), and beyond Max's People Magazine predictable, 'surprise' child-bearing state.

Still, to keep all the focus on Jenny who's MaryAnn (from Gilligan's Isle) innocence turned to darkened-cutter-cutthroat super rich (really? really?) writer lesbian? Don't think so. Not believable even in the fairly unbelievable LA-LA setting of this show.

How did she become such a central figure anyway? I mean, when the show kicked off with all of its random story snippets, Jenny was straight and struggling. Did I simply dislike her that early on to miss that Bette and Jenny would be the focus? In 6 years she becomes the hub to this whole unreal L.A. lesbo mess? It made no sense that the writers/directors/producers thought her character, the evil, undermining, pity-me disengenuous author was the key to this whole show? Pathetic. I would have preferred more of a typical lezzie scene each seasonal episode, perhaps Alice sleeping w/the cluster of friends (recall that cool, so-lezzie web thing?) and constantly saying, "Oh yea, I remember when you liked it when I ...." while chomping a croissant or slurping a brewski at an art opening, brunch, or womens' basketball game among throngs of acquaintances and other past discards.

Here are some thoughts about the poor writing of this show:
<> Killing off Dana, the tennis player. Why not make her a Breast Cancer Survivor rather than pure mortal victim? More women are living & surviving this cancer. Lame.
<> Ivan the FtM transgender King. Lots of potential to infuse into the lez world, especially since Max was brought in later. Acceptance? Denial? Where do these f-ms fit in, esp when we think of the still-in-transitions who would like to march in the Dyke Marches during Gay Pride celebrations?
<>Why no MtFs other than season 6's Sunset Boulevard who is really just a guy who likes to drag, spin tunes, and meddle with Kit's doo-dad? He's so gay and queenie, it's hard to believe that he's a straight queen, you know? MtFs fitting into a lezzie world? I think it might be a tight squeeze.
<>Given all the chix that Shane fucked, why didn't she once turn up at a clinic with all sorts of lesions, warts, or any sort of painful STD? Why didn't any of the chix she popped either? Not once did I see a dental dam, let alone a lone piece of latex. Mmm, bad bad bad on the Safe Sex Scenes. Remember, everyone gets a hang nail or flosses too heavily once in a while.
<>Although not impossible for Max to get pregnant -- although I was wondering where Tom thought he was poking his thinger -- I wonder why Max never bothered to talk w/his M.D. about the eggs still floating around his body, let alone discuss, uh, safe sex w/Tom? Huh. Even Queer As Folks' fave little fuckaroo, Brian always condomed up.
<>How did Helena go from broke to partner of Kit & the Planet cum 'Hit'? I missed that cash cow since Mrs. Mommy Peabody said she cut her off after Helena's sex-hrss suit by sultry Dylan. Was it the $$ Helena absconded with from that evil gamblertrix' safe (that Helena, of course, won in cards)? Or was it a little something from her prison cell bitch's stash? Like many of the others, I think I must have slept through the show that explained Helena's $$ influx.
<>Given this little issue, why oh why, in all of Helena's 'inability to trust anybody' did she not ever muster up the 'I can't trust you because you sued my ass all the way to the po'house and now, in my Malibu mans I have a shoestring of a budget and a liquor store's worth of fine scotch' to the revisiting Dylan, the famed docu-editor of season 4? Just wondering why the lawsuit never crawled from Helena's Britlips. Of course Dylan did return the $ she extorted, but still, damage done.
<>What was the signif. of Shane taking temp fosterhood of her little brother? To show us she was not just a skinny, slutty, junkie-appearing hair designer but a sensitive pseudo-partial mom?
<>Were there any characters who actually seemed just like everyday lezzies other than Jane Lynch's lawyerly character (love her!)? You know, stocky, pants-wearin' (not pressed slacks, thank you), funny, intellectual teachers, fire fighters, graphic artists, or coffee jockeys ? Alice was a smarty but .... and Bette was just too Flashdancey, Max still seems too scrawny, and Tasha, tho hot and scruffy-voiced, still has that pony'. Or, was this just the whole L.A. scene in which everyone appears long-haired, make-upped, and skinny? The pudgiest person was prob Cybil Shepherd, and I simply wouldn't think of her as pudgy but breastly and shapely. Just wondered what happened to the standard dyke-lesbian. Maybe they were all the extras at the Planet, Dana's tennis tournaments, or the other chikky disco place.
<>Why oh why wasn't that teenager that Alice 'saved' from suicide committed to a 51/50? Helloo? The gal needed a bit more (professional) support than a rooftop rap-n'-hug session w/freshly fired Alice and the director of the LA Gay/Lez Ctr.

Alas, The L was a good run, even if most episodes lacked good writing, were dullish, scattered, and lacking in realia. There were some hot sex scenes including Bette in prison w/the overalls-wearing carpenter, Shane [for good measure, replace Shane's head w/any other fantasy face] in just about every location possible (car, kitchen counter, bathroom, windowed studio door), Jodi,(Marlee Matlin),Nikki Stevens, and many peops fave 1st season elusive, cafe-owning, exotica, Marina -- ooo la la! that gap-toothed alluring accent! Many shows spit out at least one good line (the Sh-enny moshing w/Alice as gawk-texting witness), and the eye rolls from the killed off Dana to Kit's eyelashed lids to Angus/the Manny's queerish hair-head flicking, all the way back to the dark-eyed Carmen's lusty, smiling dark eyes made some of the shows tolerable.

I think Ms. Chaiken, et al could have taken a few hints from the writers of Qr As Flk, who had a good Showtime run and didn't make many of the characters and their mini-ecosystems seem so bizarre. How many dykes hang at a cafe for hours on end each day, a la, Friends at Central Perk? Makes no sense.

At any rate, it's good to see that The L maintained some semblance of popularity despite its delapidated story line and writing. At least the queers weren't sequestered off the stage & screen like some sort of unthinkable equal rights legislation.

Thanks for the flash dance, JB, the laughs and depth from CS and JL, and Katherine Moenning, since you are, indeed the cousin of Gwyneth Paltrow, maybe you could borrow a bit of her dwindling post-partum flesh to put a touch more meat on them bones of yours?

In Search Of .... Over-40 [singlet] Lesbians

2009-03-06T15:15:00.000-08:00

Where are they?

What do they do all day?

Not all are busy in offices, behind monitors, catching criminals, scaling up mountains, and walking sandy shores. Many do what I do, what you do, what we all do, right? We call in sick, we grocery shop, we do laundry, we walk our dogs.

I am in SEARCH OF...
The O-40Ls.

Stay tuned.

Tea, Cookies, and the Aging Lesbian's Hair Color

2009-02-23T18:23:00.000-08:00

"What exactly do all those people do during the day?" I always wondered this whenever I sauntered around the streets sporting walls of windowed coffee shops on my days off or during lunch hours when I worked @ UCSF. People filled tiny singlet tables with newspapers, books, partially consumed creamy-colored drinks and plates of flaky pastries.

Now that I'm unsatisfactorily unemployed, I, too could be one of those cookie-crumble types, typing on a laptop all day and reading Penguin published books. However, my laptop's battery dies after about 17 minutes and most books published by that Antarctic animal house are too educational for my brain (DH Lawrence, Stegner, JM Coetzee, etc). And, perhaps most importantly, I find that whenever I eat cookies and pastries in a shop they turn stale faster as well as the fact that the clear glass edges from which I drink my coffee tends to have a residual of some past languishers' Adore U, Burning Desire, or Hot Raspberry Ceramic Dreams lipstick imprint.

I wonder, though, where are all the O-40Ls? When did I get so old that I wear baggy, tuck-in clothes and not the hipster, snug, below- and way above-ass tight pants/tops?

When did this happen? I've germinated a few unsavory gray, wiry hairs, and one in particular that chooses a path all its own rather than lying with its brown brethren. Shall I color them or let myself turn bristly and S.O.S. paddish? What do we do now that we've hit this 4th decade of life? My sister's highlights have changed periodically such that I've had to check my scrapbook photos to recall what naturally sprouted from her scalp. Good thing Polaroid created such fantastic yellowy film/instant photo papers. She always had some blond streaks. They've somehow become reddish, like mine, which are natural, btw.

I wonder: How many of us gay chix (O-40 Ls) color our hair? I know of three. Yep, three, including Nancy, Karen, and Sue. Of course, given the secretive nature of all this, I won't divulge their last names in case Others want to point fingers and state that this is some sort of defamation to the Lesbian cause.

Natural hair color. Is it something that we dykstras, we Tribaters, we lesbos clutch, or are we willing to step over to Miss Clairol's house for tea and cookies and spend a few hours sharing our thoughts? Is it a betrayal if we color then participate in some odd slow-mo "speed dating" event and not divulge in a "single word only!" to potential courtees that it's no longer the same lovely hue that we combed out in third grade?

Or, could we be like one of my many past roommates who heard that rinsing ones' hair in coffee & coffee grounds helped to add languid, brunette highlights? One scorching, hot summer day, Owen (a girl) and her gal-pal, Patrice sat outside my house in Denver, their heads covered with produce bags attempting to contain the clumps of Sumatra coffee grounds that hung like mobs of spider nests from their golden locks. The knots tied in the plastic bags hardly dammed up the streams of muddy cups of Joe that poured down their cheeks and into the divots of their necks. I suggested that they use some raw egg since I heard that eggs or mayonnaise add luster. "Oh. Right! Come on' Patrice," Owen said, and the two leapt from their lounge chairs into the refrigerator.
They returned to their leave-in posts, hair shiny with scrambled yolks and whites and the clusters of grinds. Had they left the shells on, tossed a couple melon rinds and wriggling worms into their bagged coiffs they would have become live, organic fertilizer art. Flies and stench hovered around them as they chatted, legs crossed, and flipped through fashion magazines a lá Salon-style.

They sat in the sun stinking of compost and sweat. One hour later, they showered -- of course the yolk-coffee grinds hung on the edges of the tub like the Cat in the Hat's pink ring-- and reappeared unsmelly and clean. I admired their new fashions, but noted that despite their finest sun-soaking, coffee & egg rinsing efforts, their lush heads of hair seemed neither shiny nor highlighted towards any other shade than what popped from the follicles that morning.

Owen and Patrice's faces, however, were both stained with brownish dripmarks that spilled down their foreheads, temples, chin lines, over their larynxes and onto their clavicles where a shade of mud puddle settled. Ochre rivulets were tattooed all over their faces similar to the pasted-on (washable) make-up of 1980s Boy George. Skin darker.... or in unsightly, brown streaks. Hair same.

They ended up at the local drugstore and returned home w/two boxes, of course, of the lovely Miss C.'s Autumnal Chestnut and Hazel. The stripes finally faded away four days later.

So, even for the organic dykes, is chemi-hair coloring verboten? My 20-something pals, organic that they might be (they rolled their own ciggs), appeared in class with shades of red, purple, and ghost white weaves. Obviously, Gen-Xers have no trouble with chemicals, but what about we O-40 Ls? Shame or no shame? Do we hide the Miss C boxes deep within our recycling or enter the salons wearing large Aretha Franklin sattellite dish hats and Jackie-O glasses only to step away 2 hours later, boasting with newfound youth and a subtle blond, brunette, or auburn-highlighted wash and fashionable trim?

I think I'm going to need a crumbly vegan ginger cookie and a tall, all organic latte please if I plan on pondering this much more.

O-40 Lesbian Dating Final Thoughts

2009-02-19T14:23:00.000-08:00

Two women --one about refrigerator height, the other's eyes were even with the former's shoulders -- walked together along the tree-lined trail, small streams of rainwater erased each footstep their sensible hiking boots created on the muddy path. This was a planned "date," to Go For a Hike. Their online matchmaker determined that they both liked Fresh Air, Laughing, and Open, Honest Communication. It was the first time they'd ever been together.
Shoulder-length brunette wore a crinkly, azure Gore-Tex jacket, faded jeans, and black gloves. Her wooly socks crested the tops of her boots and folded to the second eyelet. Shorty wore her soft, curly black hair to mid-neck, a thick orange scarf surrounded her throat and hung over her thick blue sweater. It was one of those hand-knitted types with a melding of autumnal colors, blues, browns, and yellow speckles which hung over her small hips. She also wore sensible low-cut hiking boots with green socks. Her mud brown pants were a bit too short, like they'd been in the dryer far too many minutes and far too many times.

They walked along maintaining a 'safe' distance between each other, you know, about 6 inches, careful to not touch, but close enough to demonstrate that simple 'You'll do,' attraction to the other. More than six inches often implies platonic desire. Of course, in the world of women-seeking-women, this is how the fire is flamed.

Each inquisitive sentence began with a look at the boots, the path, and a sideways peek, "So, do you...?" Their responses, equally as tentative and repetitive started with a quick glance at the other, a search towards the clouds for an answer, eyes forward to trail ahead, then "Well, I usually...." Boots, path, peek, "So do you...?" Glance, clouds, trail, "Well, I usually..."
Shorty dug her hands into her pants, withdrew a tissue (the air was indeed, nose-dripping cold) and took care of business. This little action prompted a change in conversation. "Do you have allergies? I mean everything's in bloom," Refrig asked, sweeping her arm in the air to show her awareness of all the budding shrubs, flowers, and trees. "Oh, a little," Shorty said, "I just got a little chilled." Before I knew it, not 200 yards into our first date, Refrig put her lanky arm around Shorty's shoulders and rubbed Shorty's left arm in one of those comfy, warm-up moves.

Smooth move. Very subtle.

Gracie, Basco (see his cute pix in the margin), and I followed them for about 1/4 mile, until I couldn't handle the eaves-dropping any more. Besides, Gracie was about to explode from not running hither and dither and Basco just wanted to run up and meet the women ahead of him. He's blind, so he tends to bump into people as a means of introduction.

The dating scene. I applaud you who've ventured beyond the Over-40 Lesbian Speed Dating scene. I mean, talk about cut-throat! Of course, these two could have written down each other's number on their 3x5 cards and this is their official First Date after the "O-40LSD".

Sounds like an illicit drug, doesn't it? (Chamomile, mint, chai, and non-caffeinated teas don't count in this category).
****
Terry's been through a bit of the online flaky-dyke scene these past few months. She took the big step of putting her photos, profile, and ideal-match desires up for all girl-to-girl searchers to peruse. She's poked, elbowed, or nudged a few Lookers, and a few have nodded in her direction.
E-mails have exchanged, phone calls dialed with elongated discussions, even a couple coffee dates with eye-to-eye dialogues, and one movie. (I wouldn't suggest Marley & Me as a 1st date flick, btw). She's discovered, though that there are a lot of tentative women out there, not really wanting to respond to e-mails or make the plunge and get together, or as she discovered from one woman, She Just Wasn't Ready. Some women just aren't aware of themselves enough to get to know or accept another.

Aren't the early stages of dating, i.e., the first few months supposed to be those moments of putting the Best of Ourselves out there? By this chronological point, I'd expect that many women have a good idea of Who she is, What she wants, and How to achieve happiness in her life which, when she shows her great side(s) obviously includes mating/dating another.

Suggestions for you potential dates:
<>Learn to not spit (at least not while on a date).
<> wipe your mouths when eating red sauces.
<> to show up on time (or just show up).
<> to call when it's stated a call will be made, to not wear tooooo much perfume or extra scent,
<> and to be quasi-honest and, well, nice (aka, friendly, ) to the other. Generally speaking, being snarky and mean are a bit of a turn-off whether you're on a 1st,2nd, 5th, or even 10th date, or happen to be long-time friends and/or lovers/wives/mates.

Maybe the slow-mo, chain throwing, let's-get-our-energy-in-sync, O-40 Lesbian Dating Scenesters (not to be confused w/O40LSD) want this to be the penultimate One. Not a scene, per se, but a series of single events with just one person who's going to be la última for the remaining rounds of life. Hence, Coorda's touchy-feely, deep breathing sensory introduction serves some sort of purpose for the non-first impressionists out there.

It's tough, I tell you that much. Since we've all been through enough of life to know what does/doesn't work, let alone a greater awareness of those toreador red flags, when it comes to hooking up with the 'right' (or better?) someone the bar has been set far higher than the early 20s-discovering-who-we-are, 'you'll do in a pinch' limbo bar. Then there's a lot of horizontaling and drama. Now, in this O-40LDS (no religious affiliation, of course) there's quite a bit of horizontaling but it tends to show up after a few hiking, biking, coffeeing, yogaing, motorcycling, hand-holding, book-reading, kayaking, art museuming dates. Gawd, what happened to that First Kiss, that total connection and all that wild, real energy there? Lost to the Goddess of Process.

It's all a big ass process. Ugh. I suppose it's -- as they say in all the 12-step groups -- Process, not Perfection; or on a more Zen-ish plane, the Path not the Prize. Or, in a BossyBeeHive world, you have to dig through the weeds to find the flowers. Still, any flower that's technically a weed is really just a wild flower, right? And, many weeds are quite pretty (except Oxalis) so where does that leave the O-40 Lesbian Daters? I'm quite fond of the Prize, if you must know. Probably started when that awesome Black History television series Eyes on the Prize came out. No, it has nothing to do w/O-40 LDS, but the title certainly suited me

For all you O-40LDS chix, enjoy the discovery and steer clear of that glossy, lush Poison Oak while you gather and discard the pretty, the contrasting, and the coordinating colors of your dates & mates.
Who knows? Maybe there'll be a 4-leaf clover in the mix (and not just the blue clovers found in a box of Lucky Charms).

I think Shorty and Refrig are busy plucking flowers at this very moment.

Lesbian Speed Dating?

2009-02-18T14:32:00.000-08:00

Speed Dating for 40+/year-old Lesbians? Isn't all of this a simple oxymoron? I mean, MOST over-40 lesbians don't do anything speedy, except for drive. And even then, with our doggies, adopted, shared, and birthed children on board our Subaru wagons, the 'speeding' really is just what's in our minds, right? Subarus really aren't noted for their velocity, after all.

So my buddy, Terry does this Over-40 Lesbian Speed Dating. The name alone is a bit of a red flag, right? Okay, so it's scheduled for the Day of Love: Valentine's Day. Ooooo, cupid's in the air! Arrows flying, chocolate, oysters, and lube. Maybe there's something to be said for planning this on such a fabulously love-ly day.

Starts at 4:00pm. 4 o'clock in the AFTERNOON! What date, other than coffee or sex actually begins at 4pm? Oh, my. Lesbians and our early evenings. Stay tuned.

She arrives at the appropriate early bird hour, ready to do the number, card, 3-minute Q & A and hopefully meet up with some chix. A dance is scheduled to follow, so there's great potential for her to write down a few numbers (you know, it's all anonymous, each person's known by their positive integer only) and jig a bit with the lovelies afterward.

Terry's plan and the Coordinator's --we'll call her Coorda -- ideals do not mesh. Lesbians being lesbians and all, Coorda gathers the group of 60-70 dykes together and directs them to gather in two circles, one inner, one outer (like opposing games of duck-duck-goose or a slowed, lesbian, not-very-fun version of the Virginia Reel) and decides to steer this Lesbian Speed Dating vehicle onto the road of Everyone Feels O.K. Way. See where this is going?

Coorda says, Gaze into the eyes of the woman opposite you. Hold it for at least a minute.
What? Okay. I'll let this go.
Now, Coorda says, hold the hand, shake the hand, hug, or place your hands on the shoulders of the woman in front of you. Feel the connection. We're all nervous, she says, so let's all ease into this discomfort and share the energy. Keep gazing. No speaking! This is all about our energy not our voices. Let our breath, our touch, our energy be our speech!

omg. lesbians and energy. I digress. Did I mention that there is no alcohol served at this sunset special? By this time I'd be fermenting fruit in my coat pocket if I could.

Coorda then directs the group to release hands or hugs or breast holds. Inner circle, she says, turn your back to the outer group. How do you think this makes your partner in the outer group feel now that you've directed your attention away from her? Turn back and face her, now outer group you turn your back to the inner group. Do we all feel the discomfort? The sense of being shunned or ignored? Coorda directs them to face each other again, then Terry's circle rotates one-step right and the whole thing repeats. After a while, which is "about an eternity too long," my buddy says, Coorda directs the group again. Let's all take a deep breath and release all those toxic insensitivities, she says. Let's shake out our nervousness and have a peacefully good time, Thank Goddess.

Terry rolled her eyes and muttered to her inner circle elbow mate, "this is so screwy." At the least. Touchy-feely? Sensitive to each others' feelings and needs? Grounding? Breathing?

Come on. It's Speed Dating! It's all about first impressions in 3 minutes. You've either got good breath or bad breath. Your number is marked on a 3x5 card or not. Move on. Someone might like you or not. Everyone should be nervous and sweaty palmed. But hugging, holding hands, breathing deeply? Come on. It's Speed Dating. It's Shallow Hal and all about picking and choosing, like tomatoes, autumn leaves, or scraps of ribbon. You either want it in that moment or you don't.

When the Official Speed Dating finally commenced -- btw, the venue was too small for the number of women who showed up: not enough chairs/tables -- it wasn't a one-on-one deal, 3 minutes, talk, leave. It was a group of three women, much like a panel who sat on the outside and fired off questions to the passing babes. That's not an uncomfortable feeling, getting interviewed by a small posse of women.
However, it wasn't a dialogue. Oh no. Coorda kept hollering over the excited women There's No Talking! Give only One-Word answers! If you're asked what you do for a living, like you work for UPS, then you say "Driver," and that's all.

Again, Terry rolled her eyes. Fuck that, she said to her two other panelists, we'll call them L and T, who Terry did not know prior to this event.
Down the circle way, two women got up and left. On the way out the door one said to the other, "This blows." Even 40+ lesbians know when something like overly controlled Speed Dating is lame.
The single-word dialogue was not working for Coorda, though. The women were talking, laughing, having a good time.

After about 15 minutes, the conversations rumbled to a small, multi-worded din and Coorda couldn't yell over the voices to get the women to rotate right. She solved that problem by throwing a two-foot piece of chain onto the stage. The contented crowd silenced from the thundering clatter. Coorda hollered, One-word conversations only! Now, switch!
No gentle bell tinkling. No four-toned wind chime or wooden train whistle. A chain. Coorda used a chain to lasso their peri-menopausal attention. The same kind of linkage used to lock up 8-foot fences or tithe trailers to semi-trucks.

The afternoon-evening continued like this, the pleasantly hurled chain marked the time to rotate to the next panel of interviewers. A cluster of three to four women side-step in front of Terry, L and T. T asks a question of the cluster. Each woman answers. L asks a question. Each woman answers. Terry gets to ask a question. Each woman answers. The chain is thrown down. Time's up! Rotate right and the next clump of women saddles up. T questions, gaggle answers, L questions, the blob answers -individually, of course - and Terry questions, the lump responds. Metal pounds the hollow wooden stage. Rotate!

By the second hour, Terry's panel mates began to change their occupations and residences. Not out of spite, moreso because it meant that they weren't following Coorda's litany of lesbian speed dating rules. These rule-breakers were admonished; Coorda lurked around Terry's panel as they frequently broke out into laughter and allowed the passers by to give three-word responses, such as, 'I am tall,' or 'I like movies.' They were frequently chastised: One Word ONLY. Terry was raised in Catholic schools. This was not unfamiliar.

Alas, Terry wrote down only a few numbers of passing women, since the one-word, panel-interview session didn't allow for much exchange of a person's first impression opportunity.

The Chain was thrown three times, not unlike when a whistle is tooted three times when we're lost in the wilderness. Here it meant to stop this fabulous Speed Dating opportunity. Chain drags again off the floor, it is about 10 pounds, after all, and thrown down again. It's time for a short break, Coorda declares. Terry scoots off to the restroom.

When she returns, the inner circle is no longer in the room -- they've been sequestered elsewhere -- and the outer circle remains. However, the roundish formation is gone. It's now a free-for-all, essentially everyone's in a big crowded, elbow-bumping gaggle, with the notion that the specific circles can now intertwine with their own. Women are just yelling out random questions and anyone can answer from anywhere in the room. Good luck getting her number.
They were finished by 7:00pm: just in time for the dance to start (and finish by 10pm when everyone could go home and cuddle up!). Cards lableled with the interviewers own headlining number and noted desired numbers were thrown into a box.

Terry and I are going to create our own, not-just-single-word- answer Lesbian Speed Dating opportunities. We may throw in some patchouli oil deep breathing exercises just to let everyone feel comfortable, in the event they enjoyed Coorda's techniques. However, our plan is to actually do a real 3-minute speed dating thing without all the Lesbian Processing of Feelings and Emotions.

I'll post more here when this launches.
-BBH

Dear Prospective Employers:

2009-02-13T16:12:00.000-08:00

Dear Prospective Employers:

I'm smart. During my life, I've participated in a number of vocations, including a lifetime of grocery work (thanks to Strohecker's Fine Foods in Portland, Oregon), telemarketing, law firm temp work, juice delivery, collections, car sales, carpet cleaning, bagel-deli/sandwich maker, financial counseling in healthcare, and many years as an educator.

It's obvious that I'm skilled. It's fairly apparent I'm a "people person" given that 99% of my vocations have worked with the public. The carpet cleaning gig was short-lived and I interacted with clunky machines and the usage/dumpage of toxic chemicals (imagine the scene in Nat'l Lampoon's Xmas Vacation when Cousin Eddie --Randy Quaid-- cleans out the dumper into the storm drain... high-larious!) and one rather avoidable lesbian named Jess.

I'm funny. Obviously, I can type. I know how to file both numerically and alphabetically and can train people how to file, or to make coffee, or teach them how to drive a forklift,to read and multiply numbers, or steam up a pot of milk for a cappuccino. Oh, and I have a Master's of Fine Arts in Writing. So, I'm oedjakayded enough to know how to edit, revise, and listen to & apply others' opinions regarding improvement or depletion/deletion.

What up, employers? Why no job offers? Why no pounding on my door with multi-year contracts and sacks of cash in your outstretched hands?
If my talented friends are getting laid off, then why not hire someone like me who's capable in all areas but not a threat to any of those upper -management, single-minded MBA peops who only think within the box whereas I am and out-of-box doer and multi-faceted multi-tasker? Just think of me as the model octopus employee with two eyes and an endoskeleton.

Pick me! Pick me!

Thank you.

I look forward to hearing from you regarding these positions. I can interview for nearly any opportunity at any time.

BossyBeeHive/CMS

Polyglot

2009-02-13T11:40:00.000-08:00

All hail!

What's worse than raining cats and dogs?

Hailing taxicabs.
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Polyglot-Letters

Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 5th Ed. (1937)
pol'y-glot: adj. 1. Speaking, or writing many languages. 2. Containing, or made up of, several languages. --n. 1. One who speaks or writes several languages. 2. A book containing versions of the same text in several languages. 3. A confusion of languages; a polyglot jargon.

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Wikipedia (a favored spot for info) states that Polyglot has more to do with multilingualism than what I prefer: the confusion of languages or jargon. However, for literary purposes, my polyglot is, indeed about language, written, spoken, read, perceived, and shared. No, I'm not talking about the famed Speaking in Tongues -- although I do like that Talking Heads album -- of which we imagine spirtitually possessed peoploids girating, eyes rolled back, arms outstretched at 75º angles, and squirming on the floor while they blather unintelligibly,but you're welcome to do so before, during, or after reading or posting here.

Letters. I write letters, not just the ones here, you know, the alphabet parts that, when clustered together form words, which plunked in a systematic formation create sentences, then paragraphs, blah blah blah. I write letters to friends, family, to acquaintances about life, my pens, weather, emotions, clothing, dogs, trees, stars, growth and loss.

"Dear John...", gosh, haven't had to do that for years. The last version of this was actually a phone msg on Phil's home phone after a particularly unpleasant discovery. An actual written letter would have taken far too long to get into his thick, shagged head.

Polyglot a la BossyBeeHive: A mishmash of stuff, letters, ideas, book suggestions/avoidances. A conglomeration of Camp Fire, grocery, teacherish, GLBTQ, mfa-isms, and skewed findings all clumped together like cookie dough or kitty litter (without the stench) onto the page.
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