In her defense...

...because I'm feeling guilty for saying mean things. I think the best part about Virginia Woolf are those moments when you can connect with her. Tonight, here's the part I like:

"She took one of the books and laid it on the counterpane beside her. Perhaps because she had been traveling, it seemed as if the ship were still padding softly through the sea; as if the train were still swinging from side to side as it rattled across France. She felt as if things were moving past her as she lay stretched on the bed under the single sheet. But it's not the landscape any longer, she thought; it's people's lives, their changing lives" (211) ...

... "Should she travel? Should she go to India, at last? Sir William was getting into bed next door, his life was over; hers was beginning. No, I don't mean to take another house, not another house, she throught, looking at the stain on the ceiling. Again the sense came to her of a ship padding softly through the waves; of a train swinging from side to side down a railway-line. Things can't go on forever, she thought. Things pass, things change, she thought looking up at the ceiling. And where are we going? Where? Where?" (213).


There Virginia--now that we're on good terms again, can I sleep in peace? Good night. I'm going to India.

please ignore this post.

The best part about today was taking the long way home down dirt roads lined with pine trees and lakes, marshes and creeks, past old cabins and miles of nothing but bright blue sky and unadulterated nature...then getting home and tromping out into the woods with a cup of tea (spilled only half of it) and the dogs, getting to the middle of one of my favorite stands of poplars and laying down with sun shining and happy animals to do my Virginia Woolf reading. I was out there for an hour or so and reluctantly returned with my hair full of twigs and leaves. But I could have stayed forever. This time of year I find myself tempted to never return from the woods. I was imagining myself living out there, roaming the ridge, sleeping under sun or stars. Only to return to the house when I need a new book. If it rained my book would get wet and I wouldn't care.

But as for Virginia Woolf, I hate to admit it, but I am sick to death of her. Maybe it is the cause of reading 400 pages in 3 (too short) days. Or maybe it is this particular story, which although I like it very much, is once again depressing. The Years is about a whole bunch of characters whose lives braid in out of one another, each connected by family or society's circles... and everyone of them is (for the most part) miserably unhappy. The years pass until eventually they find themselves old and asking themselves if they ever really lived. Granted, I haven't finished the book yet and maybe there will be an uplifting twist to the story... but after a semester's worth of reading-- I doubt it.

Ok, I'm being unfair. The Years is really an excellent story. I think it's just me. I've moved on. Or at least... I'm ready to move on. The other thing is that I am really irritated by aspects British culture. And unfortunately they are many of the aspects that Woolf focuses on. I think it's safe to say that she was irritated too. But she was so much a part of the society that I speak of that it's hard to forgive her for it. I'm reading The Years and remembering my time spend in England (about 5 years ago). They seemed to me, a nosy, gossipy bunch. Oh, the airs they had about them. No, not all. I don't mean to generalize. There are a few British folks who I am always glad to hear from or see. But all I remember is how glad I was to leave the country. And I have no desire to go back. Everyone was nice on the outside, but it all seemed like such a facade. Needless to say, France was a relief. I remember getting on the bus in London and thinking: good riddens England! Uh. I fell in love with irritable French waiters.

What am I talking about? I don't know. I'm just not as swept away by the romanticism of British culture as some. Virginia is becoming one of those haggard characters in her novel. Has she lost the excitement of writing, of creating worlds with words? Where has the magic gone?

Alright, it's not Virginia. It's me. It's not her fault that I want to rip her books in two and watch the pages go fluttering across the room (or the woods). It's just me. I want to read something else for no other reason than because I want to read something else.

The frogs have hatched. I feel alive. But man, V.W. is bringing me down. She filled her pockets with stones and drowned herself. Meanwhile I am feeling alive and well. I have issues with depression. I get tired of it.
Anyway, high-society England is boring. Yes, I'm starting to feel like I should join the Outsiders Society. I admit, I prefer the more exotic. I prefer third-world. I prefer real problems over emotional ones.

Blah blah blah.... I'm just complaining. Sorry. Please ignore this post. Virginia Woolf is amazing. She's a genius. And I'm not being sarcastic. I truly think she is. But I still just want her to go away. At least for a little while.

Sitting in my dark, windowless office...

wondering how I made it through a whole winter in here. No wonder the sun outside feels so good. Outside where I just came from to find my husband whose not here, but is at home with sleeping dogs. Do we have any chase lounge chairs around here? I need one for out on the lawn of the union. But I'm willing to settle for sitting in the dirt. As for Virginia Woolf, she's coming with. But I'm beginning to wish she'd just go away.

a few vital necessities of existence...

"As we learn to bear the intimacy of scrutiny, and to flourish within it, as we learn to use the products of that scrutiny for power within our living, those fears which rule our lives and form our silences begin to lose their control over us." ~Audre Lorde (excerpt from "Poems Are Not Luxuries")

Laying it bed, I read poems with a cat asleep on my belly, purring, stretching, lolling for attention. A stack of books nestled against my side. Importance given to things other then the next paper. The dog snuffs and sighs, shifts his weight and falls back asleep. A comfortable night... soft-pawed animal love and poetry.

It's still Tuesday, right?

Ok... I haven't yet accomplished anything I set out to do today. But it's still not too late. The windows are open. The cats are laying in the sill pretending that they're outside. For the first time since winter decended on us many months ago, I can hear wind in the popals and pines. The trees have finally thawed and are able to bend in the wind, making a sound that resembles the ocean if you stand still long enough to listen to it.

This afternoon instead of staying on task I went to town to pay bills. Abe sat in the front seat, Anu in the back. Noses poking out of windows. When I asked Abe: "Wanna go see Vinny?" He cocked his head and made a goofy grin. He could hardly sit still until we got to campus and rescued Vinny from his dark office and went for a walk. The dogs went swimming in the open water along the lake. Abe was happy to walk in town (a city dog at heart) while Anu, the wolfie, acted like the wild beast that she is. They turned heads and caused smiles as we walked across the parking lot back to the truck. And then sighed and snored the whole way home. My truck smells like a big dirty wet dog. Oh, the sweet smells of warm weather.

Now they are sleeping. Content with the excursion. And I am now going to accomplish what I set out to do this morning. Homework. With windows open, birds chirping, and cats making clicking sounds in the back of their throats as they listen too.

Thank god for Tuesdays.... or at least, this one.

Today is Tuesday.

I love Tuesdays. It's my day "off" to stay at home and "write." It doesn't always work that way, I shouldn't fool myself. But today I slept in (still foggy-headed). I have a cup of Costa Rican coffee, yum. Strong brewed, nutty flavor... I'm waiting for it to take effect (never mind the bad writing that is about to occur). Careful of too much effect (that will cause even worse writing). Beginning again so that the rest might fall into place.

Today I am going to finish all my work for Contemp. Writers. And even though it is the class I'm furthest behind in, it is the one that I most enjoy the material. Why is it that the things I want to do the most always get pushed back the furthest? The most pressing repeatedly becomes priority. I always try to get those things done first, saving what I'd rather be doing for last. But by that point, the good stuff should have been done a long time ago; it doesn't get the time and attention it deserves; and then stress sets in, my mind goes flat. But today, no stress, no flatness--just a readjustment of priorities-- just to do the "good stuff" and a little bit of class planning. That is all I am going allow myself to do.

Still there is something else I want to dig my hands into... and that is planning my thesis. EEEh! A sense of excitement found me yesterday after meeting with Susan about plans for graduating... which led to a conversation about my thesis (which is the cause of my giddiness). God, I really do love Susan. I think I've known what I REALLY want to do all along... she just made me admit it. I'm not going to write about it here (yet) cuz it is still bubbling/brewing in my mind. It seems stupid now, but the thing I was really afraid of in doing it was failure. But now that I've admitted what I want to do and was given a "talking to," (thank you Susan) I feel like myself again. Not just going through the motions, but truly involved in the ideas rumbling around in my head.

Graduate school has so far been an incredible experience (stress aside). I have learned more in the past several months than I ever anticipated. But to some extent, all this learning has been taking place outside of myself. I've been learning about other peoples' writing and other peoples' theories. It has been good. I feel like I have ideas under my belt that I never would have come across otherwise. But still, it still feels like external knowledge (at this point). Coming to a decision on my thesis has put me back in the center of myself. As though it comes from a place that only I have something to offer. Not just regurgatation of someone else's ideas and creations... but my own. And what amazes me the most is how much I've been holding myself back (creatively). I've been afraid of everything and playing it safe just to get through it all. I can see now how unhappy this has been making me--this living life like half a person.

Playing it safe always works. But god, safe is boring. I've had this long list of ideas to fall back on and in the process have been drifting further and further away from myself. All I can say right now, is thank you to Susan for catching my fall. A solid, warm body, wise mind, to step in the way of a path that was not mine. It feels good to be walking around in my own skin again, to once again be in possession of myself.

Yes, thank you Susan.

Censored once again...

Geez, I can't believe they removed my pig drawing. It was a drawing of myself-- what's rude about that? So much for creativity.

I am beginning to tire of Internet censorship. There is so much worse I could do.

The project: 355 self-portraits to go...

Today's Self-Portrait: Oink Oink!

The exchange rate:

20 schillings = 1 pound
1 guinea = 21 schillings

1 guinea in 1937 = 41 pounds in 2002

41 pounds in 2005 = $78.00 US in 2005

3 guineas = about $234.00 to you and me = the cost of all our Virginia Woolf books for 2 students. But then again, have book prices inflated? Or does it just seem like it?

Maybe I was being too harsh...

30 pages left of the last section of Three Guineas... and I think she is finally clarifying her point... or at least I am coming to a fuller understanding of her connections. I've read 30-some pages without falling asleep. Hurray! Why? Because she is finally starting to make more sense. What were the first two chapters about? They felt like a progressive rant. But now it seems that she is beginning to settle down which makes it much easier to read.

I especially liked the part about "brain prostitution."

But at the moment I am feeling irritable from too much reading. Back to it though... I want to be done. In the process I am starting to feel more stupid (stupider?) every day.

Virginia Woolf is driving me crazy! blah blah blah...

Ok, first let me state that I have absolutely enjoyed the previous umpteen books by one of my, now, favorite authors, Virginia Woolf. That said, I am 84 pages into Three Guineas and about to loose my mind!!! Good god, it is BORING! A woman (Woolf) gets a letter requesting a donation for a women's college building fund... and then, after much thought and deliberations sits down to write a letter. And while I like the parts that are reminiscent of A Room of One's Own, what is this argument about war about? Please Virginia, about war, support with evidence! But not with a separate argument! And on and on she goes repeating herself the whole way. Three letters responding to the same request in the same way. Reading not 3, but 1 of the chapters would have been enough. And while I've read the same argument twice already, I'm still only half way through the book!

I'm lucky if I can make it through a whole paragraph, let alone a whole page, let alone ten before I fall asleep. I nod off and her words keep reading through my head as though I am still awake. Am I writing the book in my sleep, or repeating the same words of hers over and over again? I don't know. It's becoming a horrible blur, a dream that keeps repeating itself and I can't seem to wake from. But I do, and keep reading, and am once again bored to tears until my eyelids after a minute or two grow heavy and I am returned to the repetitious dream.

It is the kind of book that needs to be read standing, or walking, in order to stay alert. God, a whole week down the drain over this 150 page THING.
Yes, I am a woman. Yes, I am a feminist. Yes, I am anti-war. But what is it about this book that bores me to tears?

...And please, when we get to class on Monday night, please lets not have a long, drawn out discussion about her depression. It is so obvious. Let's not talk about it anymore. I am bored bored bored with the topic of depression, of bi-polar, of suicide. I can only hope that Nancy, or SOMEONE, has something enlightening to say about this book. Or better yet, share it with me now, so that I might get through the rest of it.

Maybe I am just spoiled, as a woman of my time, to have had opportunities that Virginia Woolf's time did not have. But even so, I am sickened by the way women were once treated. I am sickened by the thoughts and actions seen and heard even today. I am not oblivious to the fight. I have had to fight it many times myself. Therefore I have come to the conclusion that I am not as spoiled as some-- only because I have challenged the "system" more times than I can count. I am not a "little woman." As a matter of fact, I am better with power tools than most men my age. Yes, I give V.W. credit for her broad, futuristic vision. So what is it then that drives me crazy when I read this?! I am bored. And she is depressing.

Let it be over!

Ok... but one inspiring moment while reading was the thought: what if I won a million dollars? How then would my life be different?

I considered my options. And decided that I would finish school, but then become a full-time artist (at least for awhile). I would write and paint until my heart's content. Yes, I would be a PROFESSIONAL artist--not just one who does art on the side. I imagined my studio with 15 foot ceilings, white walls, large canvases, a space to write in the corner. A spacious place in which to express myself completely. So I continued reading as my thoughts wandered on this topic and for a moment I was enjoying myself. But then back to reality. Back to Three Guineas. Back to my life as it really stands.

And this is where my thoughts stop. Because I am too bored to think clearly. And too busy to forget what needs to be done.

I think what bothers me most about this book is that V.W.'s argument is incomplete. And maybe by Monday night I'll be able to get my head around this thought in order to explain myself better. At the moment, my brain has been stripped dry.

Sometimes other people say it better...

"I woke this morning wrapped in loss. I was caught between sleep and waking, living again is a house that I had once lived in loved, and lost--lost once and for all to a persistent and dangerous prowler whom we could not rout. Lying in my New York bed, in my New York bedroom, in the midst of my busy and productive New York life, I was back in New Mexico in my house full of saltillo tiles with the scratching sound of my pack of dogs as they waited eagerly for me to be up and with them for the day.
I once had five acres, seven horses, and seven dogs. I do not have them now. If I let myself, I miss every ince--apple trees, wooden fences constantly in need of repair, acequias gently sloughing with water and stray twigs on our irrigation days. I miss every twitch, every hair of each of the dogs, given away, one at a time, to loving friends. I miss the silken muzzle of each horse, nuzzling me for an apple or carrot, saying, "That's it? Hay?" when I fed them each morning.
If I let myself, I connot be in the now because I am overcome by the power of the then, the beauty and grace of all that I have left behind. But the prowler could not be cuaght by any known arm of the law, and it was too hard to stay on, sleeping at night with all my dogs banked against danger, with every scratch of a twig at every window sending us all into high alert.
So I cannot let myself linger in the past."

That's how I feel tonight.
I opened up a book and read this page. Earlier Vinny and I went to the gallery opening and then ate dinner together. We got home, I did dishes, went through bills, and picked up the house. I played outside in the spring nightness with the dogs, came back in, lit candles, and made some tea. I sat down with a notebook and for the first time in too long was acutely aware of the silence. It is the kind of silence that is heavy with stars and the smell of spring. In my notebook I made a list of the things I need to pack before putting the house up for sale. Clutter. But the silence made me sad. It was a beautiful silence that makes me question my occassional desire to move back into town. Out here there are no sirens, no loud cars, no street lights, no neighbors. The silence here is peaceful in a way I have never experienced anywhere else.
Granted, my only prowler is money. The only danger is in giving up my dreams and the things I value most.

Sometimes it knocks me harder than other times... the notion of selling and moving. There are times that I just want to move on, to have bills paid, to not have so many worries. But there are other times, like tonight, that I come home and am all too aware of what I will be giving up. I've left other places that were hard to leave, but the difference is that then I knew my stay was temporary to begin with. Did I think I would always have this place? Yes, I think I did. But life hasn't worked out the right way. And I'm afraid I'm going to feel like that woman... in the future always missing this bit of my past. Will I ever find this again?

And perhaps when I get to the next place, I will find beauty and it will create a space big enough to hold both the present and the past. But carrying the past around seems like a heavy load. In the end, it feels like nothing more than loss.

The price we pay for what we most believe in... I can only hope that is worth it. Then again, there's only one way to find out. I've admitted time and time again to myself that I am not happy here. Money has destroyed my ability to find the peace I once had. Now it is only in brief moments. Moments that remind me of what I won't have. Peace, like the silence tonight, is bittersweet.

Damn it. And all I can hope is that where ever I end up in all my tomorrows that it will be worth it. I'm looking for the positive, but... it's hard. Period.

Sunshine walks and the Triple X...

Today was a day that should have been spent outside. And luckily my truck was broken... so I was forced to walk. I say forced, because otherwise I would have driven everywhere due to a heavy load of books that I seem to think I need with me at all times, books that, today, where left behind. I walked this moring from my dad's (where I slept lastnight due to the broken truck), to the coffee shop, to the gallery, later walked to get lunch and back, and again from the gallery to school. Ah, felt good.

But what feels even better is having a show hung in the brand new Triple X Gallery at the BCAC. The Basement Studio artists, myself and 5 others, have hung our work together. And I must say: wow! We look good together! (although I must admit I wish I had better NEW work--an ongoing desire). But it is not often that 6 individuals can come together at the last minute and create a cohesive show. And in a beautiful space to top it off!

A day of art, good company, and warm weather... what more could I ask for?

But now... it is time for bed. If only it were earlier... the day would be made perfect with 8 hours of sleep. ha!

This morning.

This morning I got up to 2 cats and a dog licking my fingers simultanously. Meowing, stretching, and sighing expectantly. I went outside to let Abe out and say good morning to the woolfie when a flock of little song birds flew by, stopped at the empty feeders and flew away while the white tails of 8 healthy deer crashed past not a hundred yards away, down into the swamp. Such a beautiful ruckus it all created, the sound of deer legs swishing through frozen grasses, breaking through brush with loud cracks, brown and grey birds splintering the air in a multitude of wings. I held dog collars and watched, but they sat quietly, watching too. Silence returned.

Filling the bird feeders for the first time in weeks, I wished the birds would come back. But they are gone. Owing nothing to a winters worth of neglect.

And now, I think it is raining out. Today I need to DO without worrying about what needs to be DONE. Otherwise I'm afraid I might run off into the woods chasing deer... and maybe never return.

And I thought I'd get something done today...

hahaha. Maybe I just started out on the wrong foot... making flower bouquets for the funerals in Red Lake. I spent my morning with sweetgrass and cedar and wild flowers sent from somewhere warmer than this still snow-covered climate. It felt good to do something, to create a little bit of beauty for the grieving. But every time I answered the phone to take another order, the person on the other end of the line was crying. They each told their story. It was their sister, their aunt, their god-daughter, their nephew. I kept my voice strong and steady and told them that my heart went out to them, but what they couldn't see were my eyes brimming with tears each time I hung up the phone, then turning back to the work table, taking another drink of coffee, another trip to the cooler, and making yet another bouquet. I left hungry and depressed. Then went to my studio to write, to do homework. But instead I hung out in the gallery with Nina, Tori, and Teresa and talked about art. When I finally sat down alone, I did nothing except look at books and cover a pink canvas yellow.

Nothing done. Just a headache to remind me how far behind I am.

And if I could just muster up the energy I would try to accomplish all the homework that has piled up from Cont. Writers and Theory. But papers and Virginia Woolf and planning class are nagging at me. My energy is spent. If I only had the kind of mind that is able to do one thing at a time, to set everything else aside, the type of mind that has the ability to focus, single-mindedly. Then would I get something done?

 

Maybe this one will go in the show, an old friend who I painted more than a year ago.

Stopping to Watch the Moon Rise.

ah, I've missed writing. Tonight the world feels peaceful. As though there has been just too much pain for one week. So many deaths, not only in Red Lake, but aquiantances too. All young people.
But tonight the moon rises, held just above the horizon as big as I've ever seen it, pale orange. Deer running in herds, another standing quietly out on the frozen swamp. For just a moment--peace. The world around me feels tired. But now it is time to just be. To breath, to listen to silence, to take in the beauty that surrounds. The moon tethered by invisible strings, held close, as if for comfort.

I find myself wanting to do nothing else other than sit deep inside myself. To write, to paint, to think. It was a warm and sunny day this morning in class. With half the students gone, we aborted mission and just talked. For nearly 45 minutes we just talked about writing. I didn't care that people were gone. The small class was nice. It felt good to have a conversation. Not to lecture, not to be separated by my position at the front of the classroom.

Next week I will be meeting with the Voyager highschool students in my studio. They are learning about the creative process and thier teacher decided that the best way for them to learn about it is to talk to artists. So next Wednesday that is what I'll do. I'm looking forward to it and am honored to have been asked. This, and an upcoming show (next week), has made me realize how much I've been away. What is creative process? It means being involved in your art. It is making it a part of your everyday life. I have been away and miss what happens with complete devotion... the way my mind works-- the way thoughts settle, and come naturally. It is an active, yet peaceful state of mind. I look forward to talking to a group of young people about creating art-- especially a group of highschool students whose education supports such notions.

The opportunity to talk and to be part of another show has reopened my eyes to the necessity of creation in my life. I have not allowed myself the space to write creatively or to really involve myself in a painting from beginning to end in many, many months. Yet it is what makes me happy, it is what makes me a better person, and it is what will make me a better teacher. To live from the center. That is the only way I know how to make the world a better place to live.

My monkey mind has begun to eat me up. But my dreams lately have been filled with a need to return to the creative. Like I talked with a friend about the other day... doors open up when you are ready. I've been away from myself-- and now I am ready to return.

I love strong, dark coffee. 

Ode to Barb...

The happy dance:
I'm done.. I'm done... I'm done, I'm done, I'm done!


... and my bags are packed.

coffee, cigarettes, tea, wasa crackers, water, pizza, pretzels, and malia kofta...

... and still only 6 pages. Another full day down the tubes. 10pm...do I continue, or quit and hope for a fresh mind in the morning? I fear that the last page might take me another full day if I put it off. I fear everything that I have is garbage if I continue.

But the best part of today... was picking fights with Vinny about sun-block and vitamins and whether or not a spray-tan would turn me orange. It was nice to focus on something other than my essay. But when we ran out of things to be ridiculous about he sent me back to my room.

Here I sit. Waiting for something good to happen.

97 degrees in Texas today. 50 miles from the airport is the Padre Islands. We'll be there in less than an hour once the plane hits the ground. Bare feet in the sand.

3rd day of spring break...

... and I am still working on that Virginia Woolf paper. I have 3 pages to show for a good, oh, 15 hours of work. Vinny's analogy: Watching me write is like watching ice melt on a cold day.

The question I'm trying to answer: Why does Virginia Woolf use stream of consciousness in her two short stories, "Monday or Tuesday" and "The Mark on the Wall"???? (the first part of my question anyway)

If she were alive I would just ask her. I'd get on a plane, go to England, and bang on her door until she let me in and gave me some answers. Unfortunately I'm left to my own devises. Seems like an easy enough question... ha! that is, until you actually sit down and try to figure out the workings of her mind. I have my theories... and good ones, but trying to explain them in a coherent way is another matter.

So the fuck what, is the question I keep getting hung up on. Every time I try to make it seem important I lose my train of thought. How the hell did Woolf manage to create such strange and wonderful stories... yet still write kick-ass essays? A woman in control of both sides of her brain. I have complete respect.

I'll admit that an entire book could be written on these two very short stories (one is less than a page long)... but somehow I've managed to make quiet a mess of it. I was not prepared for the complexity involved in this task. I've been humbled.

ok... but today, if I am lucky I will write the remaining 4 or so pages and have tomorrow to revise at a more leisurely pace... and have time to grade papers so I don't have to bring them with me to Texas. I am amazed just how long I can spend trying to get each sentence right... and amazed at how much I am capable of getting wrong. I keep telling myself-- just write!! Yeah right, but you should see where that got me. chuckle chuckle.

ok...enough complaining. I'll get to work.

2:30 pm

...I've decided to take a nap instead.

Good for me.

The first day of Spring Break...

...beginning at 9:15 am that is. That's when I left school and headed down to the Spanish grotto to do some writing. Well, that's what I've decided to pretend the back room at Moose-a-Brew to be anyway. I planned on doing some dialectic note taking for my Virginia Woolf paper, but got side-tracked by Poetry Pete's Europe story. Its the part that he's sitting at the back of the bus next to the toilet, then in a purple hostel sewing pants, exchanging gender roles with a Moroccan woman. Afterwards I took a long look at my yellow legal pad and decided that dialectic note taking is only good in theory. I wrote in my journal instead. I wrote until my coffee was gone and I was ready to face the world again. Leaving, I was blinded by white snow; I walked away from the Spanish grotto and across an icy street.

Once home I took a short nap and ate Mac-n-cheese. ick-- it makes me want to take another nap. But it is already after 2pm with nothing accomplished on the V.W. paper. Maybe I'll try an outline...and then work on it in chunks. It's too overwhelming otherwise. Just bite size pieces, maybe that will work better. Anyway, I was given advise today: to give myself time to relax. Good advise. And I think I will. My arms feel floaty... but first I want to get something down on paper, just something.

But instead of working I've been wearing flip-flops around the house and trying on shorts to make sure they still fit. I'll be in Texas in 5 days. I'm hoping to sit down next to a big cactus and write some real poetry. Maybe sun-bathe in the prickly grass outside my grandparent's trailer house, read a book, visit the trailer park hot-tub all afternoon. I'm looking forward to going for late night walks in the warm air with Vinny or my grandma or all of us. I don't care what we do. It'll feel good to be gone. We'll eat challupas with my grandpa, buy cheap bananas and onions and hopefully avoid any old people birthday parties or bridge games. We'll walk to Mexico, drink beer, and maybe, if I can talk everyone into it, drive to San Antonio to visit an art gallery that houses a Gauguin painting.

Oh god... I can't wait. I've never looked forward to visiting an elderly retirement community so much in my life. It will be fun. They might even make me feel like I have a lot of energy.

In the meantime, I just want to get done with everything else... so I can forget about it.

a poem...

You can't read poetry in a hurry. Therefore, I'm in the mood for poetry.

What does this have to do with anything? Well, nothing and everything. I said it because I don't have anything else to say. My feet are cold. But that's not interesting.

Here's a poem instead:

Silence.

*****

yes, that was the poem. It's the first poem I've written in over a year. And it reads best if you sit with it for awhile.

This day is dedicated to V.W.

I woke up with sunshine blanketing my body, my cat at my head and my dog at my feet. I've concocted a brew of greasy French roast coffee with cream and sugar and cinnamon... and today I am going to attempt that seven pager (a good start anyway) on that Virginia Woolf paper. As for my thesis statement, I still need on explanatory metaphor and to change a passive sentence into an active one... but I'm close enough to get started with it.

I have a plan... I'm going to take V.W.'s two short stories and write "between the lines." Her words in black, mine in red. I'm going to try to figure out what she is doing sentence by sentence, thought by thought. I'm going to plant myself smack dab in the middle of her mind and hope that she reveals herself to me. What I'll do with it afterwards is still undecided. I guess I'll just cross my fingers and hope her ghost whispers in my ear, moves my fingers across the keyboard. Fuck epistemic...I'm going all out expressivist... an exorcism will be in order when I'm done. Call the priests.

As for my preoccupation with passive thought (as revealed through word choice)... where did I pick that up from? Do women write more passively than men? If so, why? Oh, but that's a different topic. Today I'm going to stay on task.

Tonight while driving home...

... I saw a shooting star and then a coyote. Both ran across the road. The coyote, the second I've seen 3 days, or maybe the same?

Keeping me from saying: I give up.

Instead I will go to bed and hope that tomorrow works out a little bit better. Light a candle for the muses and hope that a possession takes place. Virginia Woolf... I'm calling you.

And I'm talking about more than just painting here.

Spent the afternoon watching the gallery. It was busy and therefore I didn't get to sit in the X2 and read all day. Usually it's dead around there on Saturdays... but not today. I spent the day talking... first my mom, then Dallas, Monica, Ben, Vinny, Dada, Abbey, an out of town skier.... some good conversations, but no reading, not as much bathing in color as planned. Not surprisingly my mom wasn't as impressed with Natalia's work. I'm glad I'm not her. She has a hard time finding beauty in anything she can't buy.

Then I got home, made tacos, ate, and exhausted, I fell asleep. So much for today. Before coming home I sat in my studio wanting to paint... or something... and instead attempted a photo transfer, painted a page of my "art journal" and decided to call it quits because I had too much to do (not that I got anything else done). Found myself wanting to just sit and daydream ideas, which I did for awhile. It reminded me of those months preparing for my India show... all those long hours of painting, but also of just sitting, thinking of what would come next. That mental down time, such an important aspect of creation. I had forgotten the true necessity of it. Well, actually I am constantly aware of it... I had just forgotten what an absolute luxury it is.

I've recently acquired an approximately 5'x6' framed canvas. An old painting that needs resurrecting. I'll restretch the canvas and start over. Oh the possibilities! I have little wall space in the new studio, but have devised a plan for an impromptu easel. 2"x4"s to the rescue. But what to paint on that big beautiful space?

I was talking to Dada today about how, since starting my master's degree, my painting has changed. I used to be obsessed with realism, always trying for a more expressive form of realism. But in the last year, my brain and body (and the challenge of time) seems only capable of abstract. Abstract, which to be honest, I don't know how to do. I haven't figured out what place it comes from. I've experienced it for moments at a time, but it is fleeting. Like closing your eyes and trying to hold a picture in your mind that keeps disappearing. I find it difficult to know how to finish what I start in terms of artistic vision.

And so on that big canvas, I am trying to decide whether to go realism or abstract. It kind of feels like trying to decide whether I should do a scholarly or creative thesis. Not that I ever consider painting to be "scholarly." But there's a difference in approach.

Today, between visitors, I studied Natalia's paintings. I was trying to memorize them. Trying to find a place inside me that they will hold. Her use of color and texture. Her ability to make a flat surface jump out as though it is 3 dimensional. Her ability to tap into her memory and imagination to create form.

In between these musings and talking with visitors I snuck pages of Orlando. Amber was right. It's hard getting into, but once you're there it sweeps you away. I have an image of Orlando laying on the ice, looking through its clearness at the frozen scene below, a woman with her apples.

There is another part of the book than I marked in ink because it is a scene I'd like to paint.

To the oak tree he tied it (his heart) and as he lay there, gradually the flutter in and about him stilled itself; the little leaves hung; the deer stopped; the pale summer clouds stayed; his limbs grew heavy on the ground; and he lay so still that by degrees the deer stepped nearer and the rooks wheeled round him and the swallows dipped and circled and the dragon-flies shot past, as if all the fertility and amorous activity of a summer;s evening were woven web-like about his body.

Maybe this is what I will paint on that big canvas. To combine reality with imagination. An image to hold in my mind until it finds completion on the canvas. Perhaps the most natural step in my progression as a painter... to find the middle ground between realism and abstraction.

Strange the way life's experiences constantly leads one to the moment. Detours that frustrate and exhaust... and in the end make the rest happen. Ok, fine. Maybe I just need to quit fighting so hard. Every experience lending to the next.

"To write is difficult. To write about art is more difficult." ~Natalia Klyova Himmirska

Tonight I visited an art show at the BCAC that I find hard to write about. Natalia Klyova Himmirska, is an artist from Russia and a professor at BSU. I have met her before-- and thought her an extremely intimidating woman. But tonight I proved myself wrong. I met her again, this time through her paintings.

I felt like I had been away from the sun for a long time, as though I had been in the darkness, a long winter... and the color from her canvases fell on me like the sun itself. Greens, blues, oranges, reds, sienna... my skin instantly became thirsty, so thirsty for that color. It was the teal that I drank in the most. I only wish I could describe it the way it felt; I am failing miserably.

I was so, so thirsty. And I drank, and breathed, and drank. I would have liked to lay down on the floor and bathe in it, except it was an opening and I shared the small 10 foot square room with several others. I had a jacket on, my scarf still wrapped around my neck... but I felt its warmth as though my body was bare.

Her artist statement said something about time. Time being a theme in all her work. The past, the present, the future--a realm melded, transformed, imagined...transcended.

I was instantly glad that I agreed to work at the gallery tomorrow... and greedily made plans to spend the entire afternoon in that room. I will sit there and read. I will soak in those colors until I am no longer thirsty.

Because I am so thirsty for color. Just so thirsty.

Something happened in that little room. But words swim away. Stumbling over language to describe. The sun, those colors... I have missed them dearly. But there they are, I can still feel it, a body memory.

...and I realized just how much there is to learn. Will I ever? Does it matter? Can I really believe that I won't?

Today was a strange and heart-felt day. Intimate, honest conversations about writing with my students during conferences. We sat and talked for a long time, not rushing. The struggle. with writing, with school, with what stunted them in the past-- they poured their heart out. And we talked. and we talked.

Afterwards I went out for lunch with V. and as I told him about my day I was surprised by a welling of tears. I don't know why except that everything today feels so real. so real. on the surface of the skin. we talked and talked.

and like the colors of those paintings... everything feels so real.

Tonight I drove home thinking about that thirst. Thirst for color, for life. Surprised by how deeply I needed to drink, to satisfy that something I've been neglecting.

...as though these words touch any of it. Why is it so hard to explain? That color that exists and does not exist in so many ways.

don't forget to write.

I am feeling restricted in two ways (in terms of writing).
#1 time
#2 self-censorship.

I haven't figured out how to resolve the first one in a reasonable manner. And as for the second, I guess I should just get out my journal made of paper. But my life feels a little disjointed and writing in several places makes it feel even more so. Which means that often I don't write about certain things at all. Mildly important thoughts that I find myself wishing I could write about.

But on another note...Ashleigh is in town. It was good to see her. Yesterday we sat in the art lounge and talked and laughed. I felt more relaxed than I have in a long time. I left feeling incredibly inspired. And this morning we met for coffee. Sat in the sunshine with big mugs, surrounded by a friend's art, and enjoyed each other's company. An alter world in comparison of where I sit now. How nice it was.

But as for the rest that I've been thinking about will have to wait until I someday have time.

Reminder to myself: write about everything. ha!

Monday Night Club

Another good night of Virginia Woolf. How lucky to have a class that, even though it's the most work of all, is enjoyable. So enjoyable that I leave feeling energized. Completely amazed by the insights that fall from the others mouths. There they go... just tumbling out into the middle of the room... these wonderful thoughts that, when voiced, I find myself saying, "Oh yeah..." Connections running further than most of us make on our own come together in silence and in laughter.

Where I've been...

Thanks S. That was fun. But dang, I thought I had lived more places than that. Maybe I just fully inhabited them while visiting

bold the states you've been to, underline the states you've lived in and italicize the state you're in now...

Alabama / Alaska / Arizona / Arkansas / California / Colorado / Connecticut / Delaware / Florida / Georgia / Hawaii / Idaho / Illinois / Indiana / Iowa / Kansas / Kentucky / Louisiana / Maine / Maryland / Massachusetts / Michigan / Minnesota / Mississippi / Missouri / Montana / Nebraska / Nevada / New Hampshire / New Jersey / New Mexico / New York / North Carolina / North Dakota / Ohio / Oklahoma / Oregon / Pennsylvania / Rhode Island / South Carolina / South Dakota / Tennessee / Texas / Utah / Vermont / Virginia / Washington / West Virginia / Wisconsin / Wyoming / Washington D.C /

Go HERE to have a form generate the HTML for you.

Jessie should just go to bed...

It's snowing outside. Big beautiful snow flakes. I'm beginning to feel like winter is almost over-- and it always makes me feel a little bit sad. It's probably a feeling that I don't share with many people. Winter is my favorite season. Call me crazy. I like being able to hibernate without feeling guilty about it. This is why I like rainy days too.

And other than this I have nothing to say. I just finished watching a ridiculous movie and my brain has gone flat.

Or maybe it was trying to write that thesis statement that did this to me. God, to have it all figured out before I even start writing. It is a foreign notion to me. Maybe that's why half the stuff I write is crap. But then again, writing is about the process of discovery. I don't like trying to have it all figured out before I begin. Ugh... I can't believe I asked my students to turn in a thesis also. Due tomorrow. It sounded good in pedagogical discussion, but... well, now I don't know. I hope I haven't done damage to any creative potential. My class and I... we need a break. We need to have some fun. The movie was good and I have a feeling their next papers will be too. But we need to shake things up a little. Writing thesis statements just doesn't seem like the right way to do it. I can think of 2 students that it will help. The rest? I don't know.

Even though it is late and winter... it feels like a rainy day right now. I want to curl up with a good book and a cup of tea. Instead it is time to go to bed. To bed so I can get up early and revive my class from their thesis statements.

Why do we do this to ourselves?

Thesis statements, that is.

Saturday morning

This morning the trees have bloomed with frost. Stems of white bark holding up these delicate flowers to the sky. I got out of bed, put on my boots and jacket and went for a short walk with the dogs. Anu came out of her house stretching and yawning. The trees creaked with a slight wind. I can feel the moisture in the air.

What I really want to do is just go back to sleep. But I don't want to miss out on any of this silver-grey.

An evening alone...

Tonight I am home alone... listening to music and drinking coffee that came from dark, oily beans. The dog is asleep on the bed in the next room. The cats are curled together, their black fur dissolving into each other, only an ear and a tail allowing me to see that they are two, not one. Settling into a relatively relaxing weekend with only Virginia Woolf homework. Homework that doesn't feel like homework. The house has found some order after several hours of cleaning. My clothes are ironed, folded, hung, and stuffed in drawers for the first time in months. I look forward to the next week of being able to find matching socks, of having at least the little things in order. Life so easily flies out of control. I am easily set adrift.

The moon rises big and full in the east. An orange orb tucked behind lines of bare popal. It seems like it was a full moon last week too. Or maybe that was last month? Or two days ago? I don't know... but tonight my wolfie is laying spread out and content in its strange light. The warm days are good for her. She sleeps well. But I look at her and see that she is a little bit sad. A little bit lonely I think. I go out often to hug her and give kiss her nose, to snuggle my face in her fur. She smells like hay and winter. She returns me to center. She is the biggest sweet heart I have ever met. Sometimes I wish people smelled that good... but they never do. Tomorrow I am promising myself and her to take that walk in the woods that we both need.

Today I cleaned house instead of playing outside because my uncle and his wife will be visiting from the cities. I am hoping to get a chance (one that I've been procrastinating) to ask them if they want to buy my house. Sometimes I just don't care anymore. But other times, like today, I feel the weight and pull of this decision. I built this place with my own hands. My hands and my dad's. We built this place together. I love my dad for that. I wonder if he realizes just how hard this is to do. I can only hope that he does. This place is more than a house. It is blood, sweat, tears, memories... and it is beautiful... this place with its elm tree holding up the roof, the windows and more windows, the hand-crafted railings, split log stairs, the open loft, this writing room, the big diamond window that I watch the moon rise through, the porch that I've spent many rainy days enjoying, the winter night's warmed by the woodstove, the open loft where I feel a sense of breathing space, the high ceilings, the warm-colored wood floors. Putting the floors in was my favorite part of building this place. I'll remember that day forever. These little memories that surround me. And such magic outside. The field that mist rolls across every summer morning, the ridge that sparkles with frost in the winter, the swamp filled with tamarack that turns a fiery gold in the fall. These are the things that break my heart to consider leaving.

I told a friend of mine my intentions of selling. She tried every angle to talk me out of it. But the thing is that it is more complicated than can be readily fixed. She suggested boarding horses to pay for what we can't afford. Once upon a time I would have thought that was a wonderful ideas. Who wouldn't want to dedicate their life to horses? But the thing is that I don't want to, as incredible as it might be. I want to teach. In another year or two V. and I will have to move away in order to make that dream happen. It complicates everything. But I am not willing to give it up, or even put it off.

When I was in high school I promised to never sacrifice my life for material possessions. As beautiful as this place is, as much magic as it holds, that is what it is, a material possession. I've seen too many people give up their lives to this. I've seen it ruin too many lives. It used to be easier to live life fully. Now it comes with compromises. Sometimes big compromises.

My life has changed many times in many ways. I would never trade it in for anything else. I remember walking down the cobbled Himilayan streets of Ladhak. After being there only a month and a half, I remember crying for a week straight because it was so hard to leave. I think it might have been then that I realized that if a place makes you cry because it is so hard to leave then it was a good place. A place to be thankful for having found. A place to be thankful for having experienced. This place is like that. Eventually when I have to leave I will cry. I will cry a lot. But I'll know that those tears are because it was a good place. It was a place that gave me supreme happiness. And I'll remind myself that not everyone is lucky enough to have experienced that. Not even people with "enough" money.

Because when it comes down to it, it is never about money. It is about what you are thankful for. It is about what you carry around in your heart.

I'll move forward, but I'll always have this and everything before. Always. Because life has been lived fully. And that is a way of living that I never want to give up.

A poem for happiness.

A poem for living not in the past or the future... but in the center, the present. A place of simplicity. A place that only dogs are wise enough to know of...but willing to share.

This is a poem for my friend Rita. I thought of her when I heard it. It is a poem written by a dog. Well, actually it was written by Mark Doty, but it was his dog Beau that told him what to say.

R., I suggest reading it out loud to the dogs.

Beau: Golden Retrievals
Fetch? Balls and sticks capture my attention
seconds at a time. Catch? I don't think so.
Bunny, tumbling leaf, a squirrel who's—oh
joy—actually scared. Sniff the wind, then

I'm off again, muck, pond, ditch, residue
of any thrillingly dead thing. And you?
Either you're sunk in the past, half our walk,
thinking of what you never can bring back,

or else you're off in some fog concerning
—tomorrow, is that what you call it? My work:
to unsnare time's warp (and woof), retrieving,
my haze-headed friend, you. This shining bark,

a Zen master's bronzy gong, calls you here,
entirely, now: bow-wow, bow-wow, bow-wow.

— Beau

As though I could magically pull TIME out of my ass...

that's all i have to say on the subject.

Reading Mrs. Dalloway...

Page 48... and already I am blown away. Oh, how does she do it?! After writing this, how could she write another word? It is all there. What more is there to say? But then again, this is only the beginning of the lives, the lives, the lives... each one connected to the next to the next to the next... in a glance, a question, an exchange; in love, in jealousy, in comfort, in aloneness.

What is it about Virginia Woolf that makes me feel like I could write the world and at the same time as though I do not dare put down another word again? She inspires me and makes me feel as though I will never even touch the surface of her depths-- all in a single breath. But this is the exhilaration of finding one's voice. And as I read I begin to realize just how far away from that I am. If ever I felt that I was getting there, I feel it flying away from me, further and further away. Maybe when I'm 40 the world will settle itself in my thoughts just long enough for me to capture even a second of it. But that is only ten years away... and I can't imagine how so much could change as to make that possible. Life flying, flying by and me being spun out into space along with it. Then 52...62...72... and I will be an old woman with the same thoughts rattling around in my head. A bird, knowing not what kind. Sometimes a bird with no sky.

My mind haphazard, reckless, flailing with both arms, my nose just above the water while I stand on tip-toes.

I am feeling very dull. Dull indeed.

ramblings...

Today I am wishing for new space. A space that is free of clutter. I was imagining this in my mind perfectly just a moment ago. But the second I started to type it went away. Too bad...I was completely inhabited by these musings. There were lots of windows, a book shelf, an old wooden table to write at, paintings stacked up against each other here and there. But no clutter. It was wonderful. I was writing on clean white paper with a pencil. A whole world perfectly placed. And me sitting perfectly in my mind--not outside it like I am now. But now I am typing and wish I had the energy to show you that space with words... instead you get this... the slop; the left-overs; the oozing, formless goo; the clutter.
*******
I dream of a life without clutter, of a life that I can inhabit fully. To write, to paint... completely...without having to stretch myself so ridiculously thin. To give myself over, as R. and I talked about at last night's "meeting"-- to give myself over 100%.

*******
Earlier today I took the dogs for a walk. Finally, a long one. If it weren't for the sun, the absolute blueness of sky, the large snowflakes laying lightly on the ground reflecting so many dazzled colors... if it weren't for these things I would have been sad. Because one day the loggers came and two days later several hundred acres of trees were gone. I could hear them still working somewhere in the distance, their whine of machinery moving like an invisible vapor through the air. I walked down the trail that used to be forest; the type of forest that encloses you, wraps its arms around you. But today it was just snow and sun. No longer any trees to cast shadows. Just a warm sun and Anu, the wolfie, looking as beautiful as ever as she ran back and forth down the trail. I love watching her run. I love seeing her in her natural environment. She is something else. Beautiful. And Abe, always at my side. Barking. Barking because the three of us were happy. Completely happy. And because of the sun, a new space, leaving me not so sad of what is gone.

thorns, pollen, and dirt...

I have only fifteen minutes before I have to go back. Back to Valentine's Day that is. Back to the flower shop. Of my father's 3 children I am the only sucker to #1: have stuck around; and #2: have learned floral design. It's a good thing that Valentine's Day only happens once a year.

On another note, I do have good things to say about flowers also. But it will have to wait until someday when I have time. For now, I can only say that my eyes have been thirsty for color. It is the hot pink dianthus that is most visually flavorful. The calcinia, wax flower, pink roses, and eucalyptus wins for having the best scent. Yum.

But this entry is making time feel like a hopeless endeavor. A hopeless endeavor indeed.
HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY EVERYONE! xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Please Blog forgive my sins...

...for I have not blogged in 3 days.

Kingdom come, thy will be done
on earth as it is in cyber-space.

My commitment to you has been weak. Please, Blog, forgive me.

I am lame.

There were some things I missed...

...like V. and Abe and Anu and Vico and Moonshadow and dark skies and stars and quiet.

But it felt good, really good, to be away.

I ate Indian and Greek and Middle Eastern and Thai.
I drank coffee and wine and tea and a mango lassi.
I read a book and looked at an art magazine from beginning to end and wrote in my journal.
I walked and drove and watched movies and slept.
I browsed in a bookstore, bought supplies at an art store and purchased frivolous items at a gourmet grocery store.
I hung out with my brother and sister and niece and my 5 year old nephew who fell asleep in my arms because he didn't feel well.
I talked and relaxed and had fun and laughed and talked some more and had wonderful quiet company.

Yes, it was good to be gone and, now, it is good to be back.

I'll write about Woolf later...

I don't remember what I was going to write about this morning, but I was laying in bed thinking about it. Then I got to school and checked my e-mails (one of which was a .gov address) which led to slight panic concerning the web-site I built last semester. Slight panic-- yeah right! I've been paraniod about trouble ever since Catholic school. It was deleted immidiately. Call me a wuss. Something about legal ramifications. I don't want to have anything to do with it.

Update: ******(censored)? me? No, not me... just some nice government official making sure everyone is safe. Thanks Bob.

I won't bother to explain the rest. It's been taken care of. I just hope they let me *** censor censor censor. So much for my career in politics.

Good god. What an interesting morning.

It's Tuesday morning...

... and I am feeling oddly energized. We had, what I would concider, an excellent class. I mean really excellent. Time was up... I could have stayed there talking all night. I am fascinated by Virginia Woolf. I am fascinated by the effect she has on people. I am fascinated by each individual in our class. The comments made were surprising and honest. Oh, sometimes so honest. I noticed that it seems people pull out of Woolf what is most a part of their life. I pull from her words her struggle with time, her love of color. The others... they each had another angle. So many facets, so many angles in her writing.

The fudge was good too.

But good god, I am so frustrated with myself when I try to write. I wish so much that I had the space of mind to give it energy. Remembering sitting in Seattle (was it Seattle?) at an outdoor cafe, a coffee shop, looking upwards to the building across the street, an old building, carved scrollwork around the edges and windows, odd shapes on walls, gargoyles and fruit; a window was open. I lost myself to that moment completely. Not wanting to let go of the laughter dripping, dripping . I sharpened my pencil so as to leave leave imprints of the city on white paper. Laughter echoing-- echoing, from windows in the sky, dripping down leaves
into my coffee...
Silver sidewalks the same as clouds. No petals, perhaps only oysters and pearls.

Instead of being a writer lastnight... after several glasses of wine, I went to the studio. Really, I went there to make sure it still existed. The dark morning hours of night, I knew I should go home cuz V. would be worried, but I could not pull myself away. The next thing I knew I had a piece of board on the easel, my palette knife dipped in greens and blues. What color would the sky be? Night with stars set unbroken. What color would that green be? The green that swept the length of the mantelpiece, an ocean, a mirage, a caravan of camels, a snub-nosed monster, slushing the water, polished pebbles for eyes. What colors would those be? My hands in the paint, caressing it across the canvas. I fell in love with those colors, fell outside of reality, of time, fell into blue and green. Stepped back and forward again to surprise myself with a frustration of red. Bright red, in the corner, a welling up of something that seeped through my veins, weighted only by the cool slipperiness of lily pads and dark sky.

Only half returning from the possession. I went home. I slept. And awoke to today. Feeling purged and alive and aware of the strange silver sky hanging upwards, upside down, making puppets of aspen, invisible string... that faint veil of blue. Virginia Woolf, I love you.

The "to-do" list...

I'll never make one on my blog again because I don't get the satisfaction of crossing anything out. Anyway, can't there be one place where I can pretend that I don't have a list that is a mile long; a list, by the way, that grows longer everyday. complain complain complain. I am wondering how in the hell I am going to accomplish everything this semester. How?

Stop blogging and get to work. ya-da, ya-da, ya-da.

I think I'll put on my woolies today and go go out in the woods and lay in the snow with a thermos of coffee and my Virginia Woolf book. Kew Gardens inspired me to do so.

For the weekend:

• Respond and grade 13 papers (the first half).
• Read 70 pages of Virginia Woolf (plus make a few notes to refresh my memory on everything I already read).
• Then figure out what the hell she means by "blue" and "green" (a worthwhile endeavor). What are these fascinations of hers?
• Then write a 500 word essay explaining it.
• Plan class for next week including writing up the next essay assignment, library exercise and voice/style/persona exercise (this could take some time).

Stop there. That is more than enough. Will bulleted lists help me to accomplish more than I did today? Why do I constantly have to remind myself that it is impossible and unhealthy to be working on things 24 hours a day?

Wanna hear my theory on Blue & Green? Would you ever guess that it is actually very simple? Nice words to describe the simplest things. Virginia Woolf-- you "rock". (that's a hint).

Yeah-- so back to my list.

What's your secret?

Get it off your chest.

Another dark morning...

...and I am one of the first souls in the halls of H-S. My coffee tastes stronger, darker than usual. Hmmmm. Listening to Indian music once again. I could listen forever and never tire of it. Realizing that my mind works better when I let it relax. Been agonizing over how to keep my class going strong, but when I finally let go of trying to figure it out things started falling into place. Quick--write it down before it goes away. Strange-- it feels like an honest to god writing class. Like the kind I'm used to and have been missing. I'm thankful to have such an incredible class. I've been waiting my whole life for this. Thankful also for the fellow GA's and professors that I work alongside. This could be lonely without them. Conversations yesterday were good.

I heard on the radio that there are foreign films played every Sunday at the Reif Center in Grand Rapids--for free. This Sunday is a film called "The Center of the World" (or something like that). A Brazilian film. I'd like to go to it. I'll tell my students about it too. I wish I had more time. Maybe I should go anyway.

The sun began its ascent 2 minutes ago. And now... it is time for class.

I should be planning class...

...but instead I am sitting in my office with the lights a low amber color listening Hans Christian's Capricorn Child and Ichi's Tilopa (a mix of east Indian, cross genre music). I feel warm and with no desire to be a part of the bright coldness of the outside world. The scent of Earl Grey tea softening the edges of file cabinets, desks, and tense, tired muscles.

My mind wanders on the rythme of the music. Like a wave, a magic carpet.

I met three women today. They were in the lounge.
One was named Cynical
One was named Ambiguous
When the third walked in Cynical and Ambiguous turned to her and asked, "And who are you?" She held out her hand to Cynical and replied, "Well, hello. I'm Restless."

Foggy walked away laughing to drink her tea.

Blog thoughts...

I've spent the past hour analyzing the blogs of strangers. An assignment. And although I have nothing to say, here I am--exhausted, but feeling obligated to write having not posted for a couple of days.

Looking at blogs has got me thinking about Walter Ong and his theory on the fictional construct of audience. This blog began, for me, as motivation to write on a regular basis. Actually, I began writing for myself. No one had my address and no one knew I was writing here. Then I gave my link to a friend. I knew it meant my writing would go public. I told myself I would write everyday and since others would be reading it, this was my motivation to keep going with it. Even so, at the time I my only real imagined reader was her. Simple. We were used to writing long winded e-mails to each other. But over time various people told me, "hey I read your blog." My fictitious audience has grown more complicated--grown into a diverse group of people. I find that I censor myself more than I did in the beginning. I think this ties in with the notion that we are a myriad of selves. We are one way with our friends, another with our parents, another with co-workers, ect ect... you get the point. But this is for anyone to see. So what do I include and what do I omit? It gets perplexing at times and I end up not writing anything. Or... I go back to my paper and pen to record those secret little thoughts I sometimes want to express.

My fictional audience has grown slightly out of control. It's frustrating and thought provoking all at the same time. Then you add the comment option and it adds a whole new slant to blog writing. It becomes "conversation" rather than simply personal journaling. hmmm... interesting.

It leads me to wonder what other people think about me, about my writing. Fictionalizing once again. It's one thing to get bored with myself. It's another thing to start worrying if others are too. Oh the tedium of our everyday thoughts. What is this strange fascination we have with it? What have I gotten myself into anyway? My writing has traveled a long way from the guarded notebooks that I filled like a maniac. A private writer gone public. Have I no shame?

So Walter... what do you have to say about blogs? I'm curious. Did you ever imagine such a thing?

Aaaaaaaaaah yes...

I just went for a walk. A real, live, actual walk. Not just to the mailbox and back; not just from my car to my office. Nope, it was the real thing. To the studio, the bank, the post office, the coffee shop, and back again. I was starting to get a little stir-crazy from all the cold and snow. Thank god for legs and feet and boots and weather you can actually breath in. Felt good.

It's been a long day. I needed it.

And now...back to the books. Hour 9.

Where is the time going?

Ouch. No time to blog. I feel bad for neglecting words. This is going to be a busy semester. I can feel it in my bones... my heavy, tired bones. I feel like I've been spinning, stopped, and then got dizzy. But it is all good. I like my classes. I like my students. It's just a matter of getting settled into this strange schedule. I leave home at 6:30am and don't get back until 10pm. My dog is sad and misses me. I've been living in my office and in between classes have been spending time at my dad's or the studio. My existence has been spread thin lately. I'm here, I'm there... but never really anywhere.

Ahhh-- but the snow falls. Eventually I will settle into a groove. For some reason this semester seems more exciting than the last. Maybe it is the lack of sleep that makes my heart flutter.

I think I'm going to start doing yoga again. I miss it. Feeling the need to come back down to earth. Yes, like a snowflake... softly.

The anti-technology...

Yesterday and the day before I was involved in some very serious anti-technology.
The assignment:
Create a writing technology using only things found in nature.

Well, it turns out that in -20 degree weather, this can be more difficult than one might assume. What is there to use? Sticks? Boring. Snow? Vinny's going to. Dog poop? Yuck. Looking out my window, options seem limited.

After racking my brains I decided to take this as an opportunity to do something that I've wanted to try for the last several years, but didn't have time to: make paper. I spent the entire afternoon and evening in my endeavors. I froze my ass off collecting birchbark and pine needles. Then went to the studio to begin my concoctions. The result... a nice wet pile of pulp. I made 7 sheets of paper. One, I must admit, is sprinkled with brightly colored sequence, another I screwed up and is in the garbage. And I must say I enjoyed myself more than I have ever enjoyed any form of technology. Yes, it involoved physical, mental, and creative involvement. Renee knows why this is important to oddballs like us.

But then what to write with? Aha! I knew I collected that iron rich clay from the North Shore for a reason. It's been sitting at the back of my closet for a couple of years now. Collecting dust and waiting for me to make a glaze out of for ceramics. Instead it is being used as an invented writing technology. Mixed with some egg-yolk and water and wallah-- iron rich, red tempera paint.

I am feeling ready to be deposited on a deserted island. If I had a bottle I would make paper and paint and write a note to throw into the sea saying: "Don't bother to come find me. I'm perfectly content." I'd use the solitary time to get some writing done. Luckily I would have the means to do so.

I have a lot more I want to write, but unfortunately I am not on that deserted island with time to do so.

Mental note: write more later.
For now: do everything else that needs to be done.

Yes, Renee, I think you are right. It has something to do with being pulled in too many directions. However, I do suggest trying the paper and paint experiment. It has the effects of making one forget about everything else, wasting a lot of time, and enjoying it.

Rambling thoughts on technology...

Reading other peoples blogs... people I don't know, but feel like I should. What a strange community they create. In my case, a community of mostly strangers. Makes me feel somewhat isolated. Then I read the blogs of people I do know and I wonder why we rarely admit the things we write about to each other-- in person.

This technology has got me thinking. Along with the hundred pages or so that I just finished reading for Teaching With Technology. I have to admit, I like technology to a certain degree. I like blogging. I like reading other peoples blogs. But I can't help but wonder how it changes how we act face to face. Do we still remember how to communicate honestly together? Or do we need computer screens between us as a safety barrier? Once removed. Once removed. Once removed.

The world is changing fast. But then again, it has always been changing fast.

My problem is that I have lived several years of my life without computers, without running water, without even electricity. Maybe it is just my world that has changed fast.

I spent an entire year of my life living in a shack in the middle of the woods. I had to hike in a half mile. I carried my drinking water in jugs; I bathed in a lake (until it froze over); I cooked my meals on an open fire; the only music I had was produced by yours truly; I read books by the light of an oil lamp; I listened to wolves howl outside my door; I ate wild plums plums for breakfast.

I spent another half year living in the high desert of Arizona in a hogan that we built ourselves. Once again, no modern conveniences. We dug a hole in the ground to keep our food fresh; we had a "fireplace" with a chimney made out of old coffee cans; the door was a scavenged piece of plywood pulled across the entrance at night to keep the critters out and the dog in; I slept in my sleeping bag on a dirt floor; I had to check my bed every night for snakes and scorpions; the stars glittered there like nowhere else.

Before all of this I spent 5 months living out of my truck. Sleeping in mountains, side-roads of city streets, on beaches of the Pacific. Every night was a new home, the only conveniences found in gas-station restrooms. But I found a lot of beauty in those 5 months. It was after that that I took up residency in the old shack.

A few years later I hopped freight trains to Alaska, then spent 9 months in India. No running water, no electricity.

While building my house I lived in a camper. I had electricity that time, but my water was clean, fresh rain water collected in buckets from the awning. It was then that I took my first writing class. I wrote on an old 1920's Smith and Corona typewriter. Clackity-clack. I took bucket showers outside, drank tea, and almost froze to death.

And now look at my life. Computers, computers, computers. Lights turned on with a switch, a toilet that flushes, a bathtub with hot water, phone ringing, refrigerator humming, stereo playing, furnace ticking, Christmas lights plugged in, guitar collecting dust, microwave preparing dinner, electric coffeepot gurgling.

And people wonder why I have such a hard time figuring out computers. My head is just not in it. True, I enjoy them. But it is not how I am naturally wired. I still haven't figured out how to put a side-bar link on this damn site! Let alone figure out how to post pictures.

Yes, I feel isolated from the technological community of today. And when I feel lonely or bored I enjoy reading other peoples blogs. But the thing is that once upon a time... I never used to feel lonely or bored. I was too busy building a fire to boil water on.
Back then I cooked dinner--delibrately. I drank tea-- delibrately. I washed dishes and clothes-- delibrately. I bathed-- delibrately. I wrote-- delibrately. I conversed with friends around the dinner table-- delibrately. I was a part of every step of my day. A part of every need. My life was forced to be slower. I wasn't nervous or jumpy around others. I wrote long letters to stay in touch with far-away friends. Friends, many of them, that I no longer know their where-abouts.

So what has changed? And how much does it have to do with this thing I type on and stare at? No wonder my eyes sometimes hurt. Too much time looking at this screen, and not enough time looking up at stars. Maybe I'm overreaciting, maybe I'm generalizing too much, but sometimes it scares me how removed we become from ourselves, our lives, our environment. It's not just technology... it's society. So where's the division? I don't know. But I am reluctant to give up life as I once knew it. I miss knowing about my friends... the old-fashioned way.

Technology connects us. But it also removes us. Will we ever find a happy medium?

Reveling in a 6 hour nap...

What more can I say?

I think I just slept off whatever it was that was trying to take hold of me. Yesterday I survived a 12 hour day at school complete witih 2 migraines and way-too--cold weather. I felt miserable.

Today began once again in darkness and a headache, but then an excellent class. I'm looking forward to working with this group. I wonder if I will always be this amazed by students. I hope so. Wow-ed by not only their writing, but thier insight and willingness to step outside of themselves. I came home feeling good... in time for breakfast even! Hey, that never happens. Then 2 pages of Virginia Woolf in bed before the sunshine put me to sleep. The book dropped and bang, I was out. Didn't wake up until supper. I needed that. Feeling confident that whatever sickness was manifesting itself has been defeated.

And now... maybe I'll do some writing. Some good old-fashioned fiction writing. Oh glory-- it's not rhetoric! :)

But wait. I have to admit something. I learned something in rhetoric. I learned about Peter Elbow. I was listening to myself talk in class today... and I heard his influence in the things I was saying. Thank you Elbow. It might have even been worth the pain and suffering just to learn about you.

Wrapped in a blanket of winter...

Woke up at 5 am this morning to a surreal world of darkness and snow. I decided that I am going to enjoy teaching early, getting up when it still feels like night. When I went outside I was overcome by the sheer silence of snowflakes falling softly from a heavy sky. I felt my feet on the ground, the snow on my face. The darkness of winter felt good. A perfect place from which to emerge for a new semester.

I got to school early and it was so quiet. Snow with no foot prints, I felt each deliberate step. Lights still not turned on in the buildings, I began to wonder if school had been canceled. No, eventually the rest of the world came alive. Eventually the sun reluctantly turned the sky from black to shades of pink and grey.

A surreal day. Ending with a fever. What luck... to get sick at the beginning of it all. But I've got my tea close at hand, the bed calling my name.

So much more I wanted to write about, but not the energy to do so.

Don't flood the gardens!

"Don't run the water until Thursday. You'll flood the gardens in the P13 district."

That's what the large woodchuck like animal said in my dream last night before he fled for cover from the dogs below ground. The dogs where digging up gopher holes because the gophers were making a mess of the yard. I was going to flood them out. But there is a whole civilization below ground that this woodchuck type creature came to warn me about. There are districts, streets, gardens, whole communities. And while the gophers might be making a mess of things, there are others to consider. He spoke in clear English. Looked me straight in the eye. We would have talked more, but Abe was biting at the earth this animal had disappeared into. He sent messages on biscuits. Urgent messages asking me to wait until Thursday. They'd be prepared by then.

Is this what happens when I let my mind relax from studies? Yes, it gets more and more interesting every night. Maybe it's a good thing my blog was lost yesterday. Readers will begin to know the true workings of my mind. I do love dreams though. Always something interesting.

When I was a kid I truly believed that there was an underground world-- just below the bridge that goes over the railroad tracks into Wilton. It was always sunny down there. I never visited, but I would have liked to. There was sun down in the tunnels to. Enough sun for lush gardens, well kept with fuscia and yellow flowers. When I was a kid there were other worlds beyond the back of my closet, in the woods, and on my bookshelf. These days I only notice these places in my sleep.
A very strange place my mind is, yes, indeed.

And today is the last day of break. It has been nice. I could go back to sleep. Not sure what to do next, or first, or to save for last. It's a bottle-neck-- everything I want to do on this last day. Can't it last for just a little bit longer?

It's probably a good thing that I have a job and things to do. Just imagine what I'd be like if my mind was left free to roam. ha! I'd probably be a great artist by now. ok... I'm just kidding. Now I'm daydreaming. I was thinking when I woke up though... that this hedgehog/woodchuck creature could be a children's story. Two summers ago Vinny and I talked about creating a children's book together. He was going to write it, and I was going to illustrate it. The story he came up with was something about anarchy in the garden. The tomatoes got out of hand. There was mutiny. I'm sure something bad would have happened with the string beans and the cucumbers. Anyway, it never became of anything... I'm sure you can see why. And the funny thing is that, yes, life is as strange as the things we make up. Everything is based on a reality within us-- even if we won't admit it.

Anyway, I liked that fat, slothy creature. There was a wiseness about him. It was in his eyes.

Lotus in the snow

I just finished a good and very personal memoir. What is it about being so completely honest that it changes everything? I have read so many words that speak only around the edges. But it is the stuff that breaks beyond that, that goes further, palms open... that is the stuff that matters. It is more than admitting pain; it is also about admitting beauty, love, confusion, loneliness, passion. It is the stuff that we do our best to keep our eyes, our ears, our minds, our bodies, all our senses closed to. We create distances and then are surprised by the loneliness.

I am thinking of the lotus flowers that I used to (and sometimes still do) draw at the end of letters written to friends or family. It is a drawing of curves and lines. Inside it is half empty, the stem swirling out from underneath itself, surrounded by the blankness of paper, and further beyond that, words; words written but barely touching the surface. Anything more: held fully in a simple drawing of a lotus flower. An act of faith to give words life fragile as five petals. Daring to be simple, direct, and honest. Daring to be humble, vulnerable, and a little bit more alive.

A lotus blossoms even in the coldest of winters. Even in incongruity. The landscape of language takes on strange forms. We try so hard to protect.

What the hell?

I just wrote a long and very interesting blog about a dream I had last night and then lost it in the act of trying to publish it. Ah- technology sucks.

snow...

floating
down
softly silently

floating
with a sense
of weightlessness

lost in dreams of lastnight. i think i will convert to the religion of snow. to float gently. to fall from stars. i have been sleeping for a hundred million years. my shape, an abstractrion. spirit traveling far in the night for a conversation. a sacramental landscape. friendship. i drift on...
endlessly.
a moment of reprieve held gently
in a moment. so innocent, harmless. with the ability to change everything.

the snow falls. on heavy eyelids. wrapped in comfort.

Self-portrait # 12.

". . . I knew that a day I took away from the work did not make me too happy. I just feel that I’m in tune with the right vibrations in the universe when I’m in the process of working. I always felt right when I was right here. And even if I didn’t want to compose, so I painted or stacked the pieces or something. In my studio I’m as happy as a cow in her stall. That’s the only place where everything is all right."
~ LOUISE NEVELSON

Last night I painted in my studio until 2 am. I don't know what happened, where time went. I began a self-portrait with the intention of doing it alla-prima. I got it all down on canvas, but I got to a certain point, where I started laying down blue skin-tones that I wasn't sure where I was going with it. In the portrait, it is just me... with no real expression of any kind. The mood dictated simply by color. I was using a lot of turquoise, mint greens, and blues-- colors I rarely (if ever) use. There is a coolness about it, except for the oranger-than-life hair. I felt like it needed something and today I realize it needs fuscia, yellow, purple. I didn't finish it. I decided to let the rest of it sit around inside me for awhile... until I figured out what it is trying to say. And now I know what it is about, but I am having a hard time finding words for it. It's about that hidden part of me. Not hidden-- that's not the right word. It's about that part of me that exists underneath or outside the layers of my life right now. I am realizing that it is hard to write about. I have been limiting myself. hmmmm.... not that's not quite right either. I've been existing in a very small world. Feeling confined in a very small set of thoughts. In my painting there is an energy trying to be expressed. In odd combinations of colors. I find myself wanting to make connections between thoughts that are not available to me... not present in the world existing around me.

I have been thinking a lot about things... about possibilities. With no words for it yet. The painting though... might be my first successful self-portrait. We'll see. It's not finished yet. We'll see where it goes. Then maybe I can say what it is really about. Whatever it is... it's about making connections. That is what I'm working on. In more ways than one.

My first and true love...

I just want to say...that I love writing. I really do.

A secret place among tamarack and spruce trees...

Before supper I took an hour long walk in the swamp. I left the old dog at home because his legs and indoor feet can't go far. It was just me and wolfie. A rarity. It was beautiful down there. I looked up from the tracks I was following to be confronted by a wall of camouflaged. Tamarack, covered in moss and snow, creating a screen that my eyes had to adjust to see through. Most the time that we were down there I couldn't see Anu. Several times I thought she had left me to hunt on her own. But then I would stop, be quiet, and hear the jingle of her collar. I made a game of trying to find her. My eyes scanning the silver greys and greens of the trees and snow. Then she would emerge; standing still, her eyes meeting mine... every time only several feet away. Her grey and white coat blending perfectly with her surroundings. She is beautiful. Especially when I catch glimpses of her so completely in her element.

We found deer beds, three, and snow snuffled up where green shoots of grass poked through. That life hides beneath this cold layer of winter, surprises me every time.

There is something strange and wonderful that I love about the swamp that I am only able to visit in winter. It is another world. A sheltered place that swallows you up and keeps you hidden once you break past the brush that separates it from the rest of the world. I stayed out there much longer than I planned. I couldn't pull myself away. We followed deer and rabbit tracks; looping, criss-crossing, pulling us further from home. I kept feeling this sense of a secret place-- always behind me. I stopped often, turning around to admire where I had just come from. Wanting to back to it, but curious to see what was beyond the next bend, what was beyond a cluster of spruce, heavy and bent with snow.

We follow our paths thinking that we are headed somewhere in particular only to find that we have wound up in a place that we never planned for. Never intended. Always looking back, always pulled forward.

When I finally emerged, reluctantly, from the quiet enclosed world of the swamp, Anu stood waiting for me. Walked easily by my side through the woods and to the field where she took off running to a boulder where she stood, watching me, watching everything. The sky a darkening pink. I trudged through the hard crusted snow behind her effortless sprint back to the house. Slowly. Not wanting to leave any of it behind.

Echo in the woods...

Since beginning to plan my class yesterday... I have called Amtrak, calculated gas costs for a 2,500 mile trip, sought out plane ticket prices, daydreamed about a summer trip to Canada, and searched for travel grants. This is not good. I am inspired! I think I picked out the right topic to revolve the class around-- travel. Pico Iyer's Best American Travel Writing 2004 was a good find. Today I traveled to Patagonia in search of a favorite spot, the West Coast on an eventless family vacation, and visited the tundra, cliffs, and pine forests of Nova Scotia. Good book.
And believe it or not, I'm getting things done. I have the first 3 weeks planned, my syllabus finished (and on the web), and my first assignment written: Why do you travel?... inspired by Pico Iyer's "Why We Travel", a wonderful essay written in 2000.
When Vinny came home I didn't even look up. Lost in space...writing in my journal. It's been a long time since writing has taken me that far away. And it felt good. I eventually returned to greet my husband and serve up some nice minestrone soup... like a good wife (from a can).
But all this traveling, writing, and hot soup made me tired... so I took a nap. I just woke up now... right when I should be going to bed (and maybe I will). The wolfie is asleep downstairs. Safely behind closed doors, away from the cats. It is -26 degrees out there. It's been a cold week. Tasha, you are wise to be in Hawaii right now. It got "warm" out today though (-1)... and so the dogs and I took a walk in the ice and sun. The dogs barked the whole way because they are stir-crazy. I threw snow at them and was yelling too. The neighbors must think we are crazy. Well, yes-- we are. That is why we live out here in the sticks... where the only thing people hear is our echo. We'll have to change our ways if we become city dwellers. Either that or spend lots of time in the state forests. That is one thing I like about living here in this cold tundra forest... the land. There is always somewhere to go to find nature and solitude. I remember when I lived in Madison, WI how I missed the secret places of home. Wisconsin is mostly farmland. No place for dogs and crazy people to yell and bark and run around in the woods without leashes. That's part of the reason I moved back here-- well, that, and sheer misfortune. In many ways a very fortunate misfortune. And for all my dreaming, I must admit, I do love it here... and there is no where else in the world I would rather live. Even if it is DAMN COLD!

birch trees and travel dreams...

oh yeah... I forgot. In 2004, I also graduated. How could I forget? 2 degrees that get me nowhere on their own. Well, add that as #8. But today I don't really care about accomplishments. I would rather lay in bed and read. It's cold, cold, cold outside. My mature friends (and husband) are reluctant to go sledding with me. Come on people. I have a sled. haha!

ok... but today I am going to buckle down and get some class planning done. Last night I began reading the text I chose for my class-- a collection of travel essays. This could be dangerous. I felt myself getting restless and excited to go somewhere. Yesterday I sat in my studio reading about an artist grant that I would like to apply for to travel back to India. I was completely present in my dreaming state of mind. Yes, this is the danger. Because, for now, I am not going anywhere. But maybe after I graduate (again). I am thinking of taking a year off of school before I go for ANOTHER degree-- and taking that trip. I found another grant, offered by the Jerome Foundation that offers big bucks for traveling artists. Although, I'm sure it is much more competitive. R2AC, our local arts supporter, offers grants of $1,000. That would buy more than half the plane ticket. How nice. I want to go back to take more photographs-- of people. I am in love with painting people. There is an energy, an aliveness that does not exist in other subjects. I've been trying to think of ways to bring painting and writing together. Of ways, to meld my life together. It seems easy and obvious to me, but the world outside of myself likes things neatly compartmentalized and planned out. The balance easily is tipped out of proportion. Ah well, why do I care? I do what I do what I do what I do.

But today I need to pull back the reins on my dreamy little head and do some planning for next semester. Why do I all of a sudden feel so sleepy? I am reluctant to leave my shell of vacationhood.

The birch trees shine with cold. I tell myself to stay present. Maybe I'll drink some tea, light a fire. To be honest, I don't want to go anywhere today. It's a good day just to read about travel. And to come up with some writing assignments that I am excited enough about to do myself.

I am a geek a geek a geek. Good morning everyone!

It's a good thing for...

New Year's resolutions. What kind of pathetic shlumps would we be without them? I haven't been inspired myself... until I looked in the mirror. But really, I haven't made a New Year's resolution in 8 years. Because that is when I started making a list of what I ACCOMPLISHED in the past year, rather than a list of things I wish I could change. I like to consider it a positive approach to list making. Unfortunately, this year my list is very short. The first time I did it, it was three pages long. This year:
1. I taught writing, my life-long dream, for the first time-- and loved it!
2. I had my first solo painting exhibition-- and made my life that much more confusing with realizing a second love in life.
3. I survived the hardest semester of college I have ever experienced (barely).
4. I started blogging (lame).
5. I celebrated my first wedding anniversary-- and am still 100% in love.
6. I quit a job that I've hated for 8+ years.
7. um... this is where it gets depressing-- I can't think of anything else.

Ok... so this year I can't boast any world travels or grand adventures. But there are a few things I've waited most of my life for... that happened this year. I can't complain. When I was in high school, a teacher had us write 100 things that we wanted to accomplish in life. I've looked back at that list since. The amazing thing is that I have done almost every single thing on it. From planting a garden, to building a house, to traveling to India, to finding true love, to teaching writing. Yes, life has been good. It has been full and exciting. One of the only things left to do on that list is to write a book. What then? I suppose I will have to write another 100 things to accomplish. Dang-- I can only hope for a long life. I am thinking of my great-grandma... she lived to be 105. When she got old she always said that the reason she was still alive was because she had everything she wanted in life. She lived to be that old because she was happy. I'm glad she was such a big part of my life. She taught me a lot. My grandma (her daughter) is the same way. I can only hope I inherited some of their genes... and their outlook on life.

And anyway, in terms of New Year's resolutions... here's one I like a lot. Yep, another positive approach. The only thing I need for a list like that... is cable. :)

but since I don't... back to Virginia Woolf. I'm in love with a character. Her name is Lily.