Year, in Review….

So there it is.   And there it was.

And here it is: the year in summation.   For those of you who aren’t familiar with this little exercise, basically it’s just the first sentence from the first entry of every month.   Last year’s seemed to be a bit more accurate and relevant, but hell.  My life is nothing if not inaccurate and irrelevant!

JANUARY:  "i found an amazing resource today. it spoke to me in a way that nothing has for a long time."

FEBRUARY: "part of me wants to write, and part of me does not."

MARCH: "i went to new york for five days and got to see the city all by myself."

APRIL:  "one of my major stressors lately has been work."

MAY: " the jazz festival was awesome, as always. it’s so funny the range of emotions that occur during this weekend…everything from "OMG i can’t believe it’s here" to "why do i do this again?!?!?!""

JUNE: "i am sad for people that i have read here for a very long time who have just experienced a tremendous loss."

JULY:  " i feel kind of bad for my poor son."

AUGUST:  " another weekend is gone by and wow, am i tired =)"

SEPTEMBER:  " burning man was as amazing as it ever is, this year. this was a very good and cool year for me, personally, professionally/volunteer-wise, and relationship-wise also."

OCTOBER:  "i spent my ENTIRE WEEKEND cleaning my house."

NOVEMBER:  "i knew my mom was sick, and i knew she had a lot of issues."

DECEMBER: "so, yesterday i got up and went to get my mom up to go to the bathroom in the morning."

so there it is. and there it was. and now i have to figure out how to continue to exist. i have to be responsible. i have to be a grown up.

i don’t have a mom anymore.

i feel somewhat adrift.

peace….i write as in my town, the 3000 american soldier killed in iraq is being protested in my town.

2007…

i have been off from work for the past ten days.

i should have been finishing and settling my mom’s affairs, but neither my sister and i have been able to bring ourselves to do it. it’s like, we are trying to learn how to exist without my mom. maybe we have been hiding, but tomorrow the hidind stops because i have to return to the world, to my life. there’s a part of me that’s afraid to do that, that is telling me that i am not ready to reenter my life, that i need more time. that i am not ready to face the world without my mom, but the bottom line is that i have no choice. now is when the tough stuff starts.

my mom didn’t do a will before she died. the good news is that we are on the deed. the perhaps not-so-good news is that i don’t remember if we did right of survivorship on the deed…if we did not, then i might have to go through probate, which will drag everything out.

my mom has been cremated and tomorrow i have to pick up her ashes from the mortuary. how morbid and depressing! i bought some small urns to split up some of the ashes amongst all the kids and grandkids. and we will scatter some, and i will keep some. i want to do an ancestors altar for my mom. we are also thinking of changing some things up around the house. now i have to wait for the death certificates to come in the mail to take around to different places to get things settled. we also need to go through all my mom’s things and decide what my sister wants to keep and what we will give to charity. as it is, though, neither one of us has been able to spend much time yet in my mom’s room without doing a lot of crying. we know we have to do it and do it soon, it will be better once it’s done, but it brings about finality, which is good and which is not so good. what it definately is is sad.

new year’s was quiet. i did safety for a fire show at one of the ski lodges last night, and it was fun. i got to spin some poi during the free burn, which was way cool. and it was a great time. one of the guys who safeties with me and his wife had an after party. they have a house that overlooks the city, so we got to stand on his deck and watch the fireworks downtown. it was sort of lame after being to burning man, but i suppose they were okay as city fireworks shows go =)

that’s life. i have to get back to it tomorrow and i am feeling anxious about that. like i can’t hide anymore after tomorrow.

today there was a peace vigil/protest at the federal building in my town to memorate the 3000 american service person death in iraq in this crazy war. my son tells me they are voting on the draft this week and i am afraid for the young men in my household and in my life. i have heard that this draft does not exempt women or college students. i am afraid for them all. i hope this ends soon before many more of our young people are killed or maimed.

peace….a good goal for 2007. 

happy yule….

okay, so technically, it’s not until tonight at 22 minutes after midnight, but it’s almost yule then. yule eve? there we go. i got my pathetic, fake, three foot christmas tree out yesterday.

i had an okay day yesterday.

it still seems very surreal not to have my mom around at home. my sis has been doing great keeping the house in order. she cleaned again yesterday, which was very cool of her, but then again, she isn’t working right now, either. that will have to change for sure, but if she needs some time too, i can understand that. for me, work has been an amazing comfort.

so many people have been so nice to me, it ALMOST gives me hope for humanity. seriously. so many people gave of themselves and their own personal pain in order to share with me…to let me know i wasn’t alone and that others have had to make the same awful choices and live with them. i have been truly blown away by the kindness i have received from people i didn’t consider myself that close to when this whole weird thing began.

i am not sure what else to say, except that i miss my mom. i am sure that i will miss her for a long time. i don’t think i can ever stop missing her. but i don’t want this entry to sound like nothing but sadness because that’s not how i am right now either. i guess surviving would be a good way to put it. i am making it through the days, trying to keep myself distracted, and doing a pretty good job of it too =)

in general, life is still good for me and i have many blessings for which to be thankful. and in other ways, there’s just an underlying feeling of sadness.

i can’t believe christmas is in a few days.

take care, everyone…..tell those close to you that you love them.

peace.

the obituary….

"On December 15, 2006, BR’s mom was released to eternal light. Born September 29, 1929, she spent 77 years being one of the most beautiful people known to those she encountered. She was preceded in death by her husband. She is survived by children oldest brother of Vacaville, Ca., second brother of Silver Springs, third brother of Cold Springs, fourth brother of Sparks, BR of Reno and BR’s sister of Reno as well as grand children BR’s son of Reno, BR’s nephew of Reno and BR’s daughter of Reno, third brother’s son of Reno, third brother’s daughter of Moraga Ca., and third brothers other son of Bakersfield, Ca., sisters younger sister of Fountain Hills, Az. and older sister of Sparks. BR’s mom was a waitress for over 50 years and prided herself on giving the best service she knew how. She adored penny slot machines and the San Francisco Giants and 49ers and will be missed by all that knew and loved her. She was best friends with her two daughters and leaves a void that can never be filled. We will miss you, Mama. Private family services will be held after the holidays."

I wrote it….what do you think?

i now alternate between everything seeming very surreal, anxious that i now have to get back to my life, even though it will never be the same, and relief that it’s over.

what i know is that i was with her when she passed and she seemed peaceful. i feel honored that she felt safe and loved enough by me to pass while i was there.

i had felt the heaviness of her spirit hanging on, waiting, but not really being there. i think the essence of who she was left when she had the stroke, but had to stay close to the body until it finally failed….but it wasn’t in her body, her body had been damaged. within a couple of minutes of her passing, i felt nothing of her essence still in the room. i was utterly alone.

i had to sit with her body for a few hours to wait for those who wanted to see her to be able to see her before she went to the funeral home because she is to be cremated. one brother had a pretty long drive, so we pushed the deadline a bit.

i am proud, though, that i gave my children the opportunity to see her, if they wanted. one did, one did not. at least it was their choice….at least they were given that choice.

i thought i was doing pretty good, and yesterday i had to go to the store. crossing the threshold, i thought of all the times i had gone there with my mother. all the bargains we’d hunted in our neighborhood store, all the ten items for ten dollar things we had bought, all the meds we had filled, and how we would never do those things again and there i stood, at the entrance of the grocery store, crying my eyes out. that wasn’t supposed to happen, but it did. i suppose that life will be like that for awhile.

that’s really all i can say right now….

and so, life carries on….

peace. 

and now, the end is near….

tonight, my siblings and i removed my mom from all but comfort treatments and as i write this from her hospital room, she seems more at peace than she has at any other time during this entire saga.

i still maintain that this was the hardest thing i’ve ever done in my life. how does one let go of the only person in existence who ever loves one as unconditionally as humans can? she’s always been there for me, always supported me, even if she didn’t agree with me, and always will be.

i carry such beautiful memories of this beautiful woman with me. but now, it’s time to let her go. i owe that to her, it’s what she wanted.

just when i think that i cannot cry any more, i imagine a world without her in it and the tears flow again freshly, making my head hurt and my face all poofy. how does one move on from something like this? right now it seems inconceivable.

i hope her transition is peaceful and without pain. i hope that she knows that she is not alone and that there are many people here who love her. i don’t know what else to say. life will never be the same. in some respects, i feel utterly alone, even though i know i will always carry her in my heart. she’s been the best of friends to me, she’s been such an awesome person who taught me so much about love, forgiveness, relationships, you name it.

i love you, momma.

keeping on….

without a doubt, this is the hardest thing i have ever had to deal with in my entire life. no, seriously.

my mom’s body seems to be hanging on, and that has serious, long-term implications that i had not considered. if she stays vegetative, i don’t know how we are supposed to care for her. we told her we would never put her in a nursing home, but i know i don’t currently have the capacity to take on her full care at my house. so, i want to honor her wishes, but i also don’t want to quit my job to provide her full-time care.

now’s when the work begins. i have to talk to the hospital social worker today to see about getting a durable power of attorney, dnr, and other legal stuff taken care of. mom was one of those people who always wanted to do this sort of stuff "tomorrow" because that didn’t make her acknowledge her own mortality.

i want to honor what she wants, but i also want her to have a decent quality of life. it’s going to be very hard to see her every day if she’s in a coma and lasts for another ten years. i don’t think that’s a positive or good way to live.

i am at the hospital and doing research now on long term care options and seeing what to do. we still probably have a couple of weeks in the hospital, and that seems like an impossibly long time. that probably seems very, very selfish and it isn’t intended that way at all. i am sure i will be thankful for this if these are the last times i spend with her, but in a way, i’d almost rather remember her when she LIVED, and not like this.

i’ve never, however, seen a stronger commercial for taking care of oneself. this need never have happened if she had managed her diabetes and high blood pressure. i think that’s probably the most frustrating part. but, then again, she could have done everything right and had a stroke anyway.

there are no easy answers and nothing is easy right now, except sitting in this chair and surfing the internet to pass the time.

i love my mama and i hate seeing her this way, but i can’t be completely not-okay with her still being alive. what a walking contradiction i am!

i will post as i can….

peace. 

family first…..

so, yesterday i got up and went to get my mom up to go to the bathroom in the morning. and she wouldn’t get up. i couldn’t wake her up, it’s like she was sleeping really deep and didn’t want to get up. i had to call the paramedics and have her transported to the hospital. 

they think she had a stroke. as i type this, they are taking her for an MRI so they can tell what sort of damage she has from the stroke.

no matter how much you think you prepare for something like this, you can’t. it’s still traumatic, even if you knew it might happen. how do you say goodbye to the only person who’s ever loved you truly unconditionally? i don’t know, but it’s damn hard.

peace.  

life, going on….

well, it’s been awhile since i updated, so i suppose that it’s time.

my mom had her procedure on monday. sometimes, she seems so frail, it just really makes me cry. she is so very strong though, and an amazing trooper and such a beautiful woman, though, it also makes me very proud that i come from such a wonderful woman.

with this procedure, they were again to look at the artery supplying blood to her leg and see if it had closed down again. the difference this time is that there is a new device the doctor is using that actually excises the plaque from the artery and removes it using suction. so, almost a literal roto rooter for the pipes, because in normal angioplasty, they just push the plaque against the vessel walls with the balloon and try to keep it there with the shunt. because of my mom’s medication snafu with the plavix, hers was completely closed down again. the doctor had to have the representative from the medical technology company who makes the device there because it’s a new device she’s only used about four times before. they were very impressed with the amount of plaque that came from my mom’s artery and she said the device functioned very well and they didn’t know they could excise that much using the device. that makes me happy that they got it out, but sad that my mom’s arteries were in such bad shape to begin with. have another cookie, mom =)

at any rate, she’s been pretty spunky since the procedure. we have another appointment with the vascular surgeon next week for her to evaluate my mom’s foot. i need to give her foot soaks and try to get the thing to heal. there are still two black spots on her toes that concern me greatly, but what will be will be and this is the result of events that have been going on for a very long time. it does make me sad, though, to think of my mom losing mobility.

my sis has stayed home the last couple of days because she had a cold and didn’t feel well, but today is the first day my mom is alone at home. we made sure she had food and all that, and i asked her not to go down the stairs. i told her to call me if she needed anything, i am ten minutes away from home and my work totally understands what’s happening.

i had to take her to the lab yesterday and we went out to lunch. it’s really the first time she’s been out in a long time. she did great and even has been a bit honery since the procedure. i think she enjoyed being out and she did really well. it was hard to be around her and help her so heavily with walking. i think regardless of whether or not she loses her foot, she’s going to need some sort of walker, because it isn’t realistic for me to support her to that degree always. and she’s not very steady on her feet.

so, we are maintaining. i love my mama more than anything, this i know. i don’t want her to die, but i also don’t want her to be miserable and in pain. i am still struggling with that. when is it okay for one to be okay with someone they love dying? i don’t know the answer to that….

next week we have to go back to the vascular surgeon, and she will look at mom’s toes. i will try this weekend to help them convalesce, but i am unsure what more i can do. the skin is peeling off of them and although it looks like it’s getting blood now, the cracking and peeling makes me nervous in addition to the black spots.

i am trying to catch up at work, and it’s an interesting odyssey. my new database project is continuing, and i got my first web registration yesterday, which was very exciting for me.

had a great dance class this week that i sort of taught or at least led. it’s much harder to teach than i thought it would be. aside from the fact that it’s hard to be winded and talk at the same time, it’s also hard to explain how the moves are supposed to look. interesting stuff that. i had called and said i wasn’t going to be there, but i am really glad that i did it…it made me feel better and more accomplished. yay, me!

i think that’s about it for an update for me, right now.

life goes on….

peace. 

the good stuff, pre-holiday…..

i want to say that there is definately good stuff happening in my life too, and some of it happened today. the universe is truly an amazing place, let me tell you.

in between all this other stuff that has been happening, i’ve also been continuing to see my girl, trying for once a week….sometimes more and sometimes less successful than that =)

i have a friend who put on an amazing variety type show last week called "innocent when you dream" that had to do with all the different avenues one’s desires can take. she’s going to do the show again, so i might participate more in the future. that’s good. it was a really good show.

then friday, i went to dance class, which is always amazing, then went to see some maori dancers from new zealand. they were awesome and i adored their humor. very cool folks and got to see them use poi as percussive instruments, which is amazing too.

saturday, i spent the day taking care of my mom and my aunt, then went and got some wine for the inaugural meeting of a wine club two friends have started. it was a blast, even if the wine we had was pinot noir, which is not one of my favorites. next month we get to do a hodgepodge, which is more my style =) that was a blast though….good food and good company, even if i got 75 calls from my aunt and my sister in between there. it’s kind of hard to enjoy wine with your friends when your sis calls and freaks out because mom has said she thinks she’s going to die that night and not make it through the night. but i managed.

after the wine party, i was pretty emotionally drained, but i had promised a friend from the fire group that i was going to stop by a party she was having. i didn’t stay there long, but i am glad that i went. the energy there was so good and loving and positive, it made me wish that i had more energy left to give and stay longer. i was home by 11pm.

sunday was spent cleaning my house…and then getting my aunt and my mom from my aunt’s house to our house because my aunt had to leave monday morning and i was going to be taking her. i wouldn’t have felt right leaving her by herself in her apartment.

so, there’s some of the fun and good stuff i have been doing too. monday night, we started a fire fan and finger and bellydance class, which was also festive and i felt somewhat competent on the dancing part, so that was good.

will write more when i can. 

my life is not the same……

 wow.

my life has changed drastically in the last week or so, and it’s not been an entirely good change.

i knew my mom was sick, and i knew she had a lot of issues. but, i didn’t understand, i don’t think, just how sick she’s been, or how much it’s going to take to continue to take care of her.

when my aunt had her stroke, my mom went to stay with her to "take care of her". by the time we brought my mom home this weekend, it was my aunt who was taking more care of my mom and to say that was the blind leading the blind would be a gross understatement….

as near as i can figure it, when my mom went to my aunt’s, she didn’t take the proper medication with her. she didn’t say anything about not having the proper medication, she just didn’t take them. this caused her foot, the one with all the circulation problems, to get really bad again, where she has open sores all over them and her toes are starting to turn funny colors that are generally the pre-cursors to black….which would mean amputation and no more toes. as this has been happening, she’s experiencing more pain, and less willingness to walk. they gave her morphine, and vicodin, that she said that wasn’t even touching her pain. i talked to the health plan phone nurse and she asked me if i thought my mom understood the corollation between the successful management of her diabetes and her bodies healing process. no, no, i don’t think she does at all.

add into that the fact that my aunt, before her stroke was a raging alcoholic and had to stop cold turkey when she had her stroke. this sent her back to the hospital shortly after her stroke, for what i think were the dt’s. since then, she’s still somewhat able to function, but is very unsteady on her feet and also falls a lot. talk about the blind leading the blind….her and my mom were supposed to be taking care of each other. right.

so, this took us to this weekend. i went over there about thursday to see them, and my mom was in really bad shape, but still mostly coherent. by saturday, my aunt called me and told me that we needed to get some sort of toilet chair for my mom because she was falling every time she went to the bathroom. when i got there to help them do laundry and deliver said chair, the house was in complete disarray and my mom was laid out on the floor in nothing but her underwear, with paper towels all around her. her hair was all disheveled, and she was gone, man….i mean she was still alive and all, but she was so incoherant she couldn’t even support her own weight. i had to get her off the floor, and i mean pick her up, bearing her whole weight. her arms and legs were like a rag doll. i thought she was taking too much morphine, but it turns out that her own meds weren’t working, so she decided to supplement with some of her sisters that were given to help her muscle twitches. yeah, that’s called lorazepam, which was the topper that was making her a zombie. take into consideration how many times she asked for more pills while my sister was with her on saturday, and i have no idea how much she took. but she wasn’t taking or even aware enough to take her regular meds. so, this needed to stop.

on my way over on saturday, i had to get the potty chair, thankful that there was a nice home health lady who opened her store and waited for me to get there so i could get it on a weekend, then went and got them food, and i knew i needed to find a way to manage my mom’s meds. those little plastic things are cool, but i could see her trying to open one slot and sending the rest of the meds flying across the room, so i opted for some little plastic baggies and a sharpie to keep all the meds from particular times together.

when i got there, they were in really bad shape, we got my mom up and cleaned up, but she couldn’t even sit up by herself. when i tried to feed her, she drooled all over everything, and she kept falling forward on the chair. then i took my aunt to go do laundry and she fell on the sidewalk right outside her apartment. oh my.

i got them quasi-situated and left, only to be called a few hours later to say they were having issues again. i needed some time to myself by this time, so i called my sister and told her it was time to step up to the plate. to her credit, she’s done a great job. she’s never been real responsible and she’s pretty narcisistic, but she’s really stepped up.

today, i am feeling almost hopeful. i have been on the phone to mom’s doctors and they are at least trying to help me. now that my mom’s taking the right medication, her foot is drying up and starting to heal. before, it just looked like it was festering, but now, it’s drying out and scabbing, which means the healing has begun. amazing what the right meds will do, eh?

i feel so many things i can’t even express. i feel guilt that i didn’t see sooner that she was in such bad shape….my sis was freaking out the other day because she was saying she didn’t think she was going to live through the night, and she didn’t want to be with her when she died. i told my sis to tell her she loved her, that we hope she doesn’t die, but if she needs to, then go ahead and we hope it happens without pain and quickly for her and not to feel bad for us, we will be okay. who has that sort of conversation?!?!?!

in the midst of all this, we had tree roots growing into our septic, so drain water was backing up into the basement, and i was also trying to get my aunt ready to go visit her sister in arizona. we got her on the plane yesterday via wheelchair, with the southwest guys being given directions how to take care of her and i made sure there would be a wheelchair on the other end waiting for her.

last night, i got an angry phone call from my rich bastard uncle yelling at me about how poor of care she’s received. i actually hung up on him and told him he had no right to judge us…say what he will, i have BEEN THERE, which is more than i can say for any other asshole in my family. i was so angry i was shaking. i never asked for any of this, but it found me.

today i am thankful to be at work, where it’s at least quiet, and there is some peace, everything is familiar and the expectations here are something i can handle because they don’t involve death. when did i become the grown up? ack!

my spirits are okay. i might be writing a lot more =) my mom is supposed to have another procedure this coming monday and i don’t know how long i will need to take care of her after that.

i am considering calling her insurance company and asking for some sort of home care, but i don’t know if they will approve it. i just need someone to help out while we are working. goddess, this is my life now…..

my spirits are generally high, but when i crash, i am going to crash hard. i cry when i am alone in my car, going from place to place. this all seems so fucking surreal, i can’t even express. i always knew there was potential for me to be in this place, i guess i just didn’t think it would happen so soon. right now is survival, crisis mode.

and that’s what our intrepid heroine is up to today, and for the past several days….

will check in as i can….

peace.

p.s. in good news, the man who lives in my state and was kia in afghanistan but was denied his religious symbol on his veteran’s headstone plaque because he’s pagan? well, the STATE veteran’s wall where it was to be decided to go ahead and give the poor man and his family their wish, so his plaque was hung this weekend….with the pentacle on it. yay, us!

quick update….

things have been very crazy here. i spent my ENTIRE WEEKEND cleaning my house. it was pretty nasty, i am here to tell you. i was marginally annoyed because some of the other people who live there decided my cleaning was a spectator sport and watched me. that was frustrating considering i am one of the people who actually spends the least amount of time at home. i am over it though….we, too, have done some things that have needed to be done for a long time and it feels pretty damn good. there was a gnarly double-blind that we had in the living room window that’s needed to be replaced for a long time. at some point, one of the kids had exploded a ketchup packet or something all over my walls and ceiling, and that finally got cleaned up too, and the floors in the living and dining rooms and kitchens finally cleaned real well.

my sis starts a new job today. keep your fingers crossed that she can handle this one. i know that sounds mean to say, but that airline job seems like it was total gravy and she didn’t last there, although she did last for more than a year =) i am just bitter because i can’t fly for free anymore. at any rate, i think i am the person who benefitted the most when she DID have that benefit, so i suppose i can deal with that =) i hope she does well for her own sake. she caused us a bit of drama this weekend surrounding a stupid man in her life and wanting to kill herself. it was annoying. i never understood how people could tie their entire sense of self-worth up into another person. gah! enough.

kids are doing good. i think i have seen more of my son in the last few weeks than i did the last two years he lived at home =) he lives very near where i work, so he often drops by, we have eaten lunch several times together, and we are working on forming that adult relationship. he still has a lot to learn, but i love him, he’s my baby.

my daughter is home sick today. she got a head cold this weekend and it’s kicking her butt. she feels yucky…i bought her medicine and told her to stay home! she is home from school today, she is supposed to work, but she works with food, so if she isn’t feeling better, i am going to encourage her to stay home from there too.

me and my girl are doing good. we went to a movie on campus here last week, to see two parts of "if these walls could talk 2". what the hell is that, where you only show half a movie? hahahaha…we were marvelling about that. we also saw an episode of "30 days" where they stuck some redneck bible-thumping kid from a small town in michigan with a gay man in the castro in san fran for 30 days to see if they could alter his world view at all =) that was a good show, the young man learned a lot, and the experience i am sure changed him forever.

enough of an update from me, for now. i will write more as i can =)

peace.

interlude….

i have more to say about burning man. i will get it out, oh yes i will because i want to chronicle it before i forget. we will see….

i have been sad this last week, thinking of and dealing with things with my mom. i saw a friend on monday night and he was asking me some questions and i just started crying and realize that i have been keeping a ton of energy inside regarding the eventual loss of my mom. i had a dream last weekend that we were connecting in our dreams and i told her that if she was done with this life and was tired and wanted to move on, that it was okay to go. i love her, she is one of my best friends, and i will miss her terribly, but i also don’t want her to suffer or be in pain. it makes me so sad to think of this, but i mean it. she is suffering now as the pain in her feet and legs gets bad again and it kills me. this acceptance of her not being here anymore comes slowly for me. five years ago, i couldn’t even think about it without crying. now, the thought is there, and it will all be okay, i just want her to be good and happy for however much longer she is here. and i want her to die peacefully in her sleep and not being cut open on an operating table or because of some perceived failed medical procedure.

goddess this is hard.

i needed to get that out.

there is so much more there, and right now i just need to stop here.

have a great weekend everyone. i am not sad. i am, but not like inconsolable, just sad because this is. it is existence and it happens to everyone and it sucks.

i love my mom. today she is 77.

peace. 

okay, okay…burning man, phase one…

so, this phase runs roughly from friday, august 25 thru sunday, august 27, as it represents the time before the event actually started. i will say, though, that this year, it seemed like, on monday, BAM, the entire city was there, and it happened fast. maybe it’s because i was busy…..

when we got there on thursday, longpig and aspen and cody were there already and they were all working. longpig was at camp with juju, we said hello and then they said they had to get back to work. this year, before we headed out, there were a slew of emails from the org and from other volunteer departments stating that people who were on the early arrival list were there to ensure that the infrastructure of the city went up before the city opened. it went so far as to say that no personal shade structures would be allowed, and that people should put up the minimum allowable to live until the event started because, essentially, we were there for them early and we could take care of ourselves after the event started. part of me thinks "this is not the way to treat volunteers"….but then again, when you have already given many of these volunteers free tickets to what is becoming an expensive event and now granted them early entry, i do understand it. but it still made me sort of feel like big brother was standing over me. yikes!

when we arrived, there was precious little around, but we were advised to take this day to rest up, take care of basic needs, and get situated because the expectation was going to be that the next day, the work would begin. we had been through a major trauma already because when we requested early entry into the event for daughter, we weren’t sure until a few days before we left whether or not we were going to be allowed to get her in and what we would do with her as far as volunteering went once she was in. we didn’t want to take more resources than we were entitled to or burden said infrastructure, we wanted to contribute and feel like we were doing our share. this issue would surface again at the end of the event, but in the end, it was all a pleasant thing.

the large shade structure wasn’t up yet because of the aforementioned directive, but we did manage to get situated in a way that seemed like it would work for the camp in general and us specifically.

for the last few years, i have wanted to get into the technical side of the ranger org, but this ended up being my year. i think they are distrustful because they want to make sure that dedicated volunteers are going to stick around, not just be a flash in the pan and get bored with rangering and move on to other stuff. i can’t actually remember if this happened to first day or the second day, but at some point….hmmm, i am going to clarify this, i will come back and finish this later….

we went over to ranger outpost tokyo and discovered that some of our friends and favorite people were already there. dirtwitch is one of them, and she and her camping mate feline invited us near their place for dinner. this was very cool. 

burning man, the intro…

 so, this year, it seems, burning man was broken up into at least four distinct "phases" for me, if you will. when we got there, we had been told there was increasing emphasis this year on "contributing to the creation of the infrastructure" if one was on the early arrival list, which we were, so that was one phase.

the second phase was the beginning of the event, watching the city take shape, and working normal shifts, or what passed for them…this year saw many changes for me….

the third phase was mid-week, where i took some time off, got to explore the city, see the sites, spend time with some folks, and play around, having a good time….and really, this extended through the rest of the event up to the big burn, because it all sort of seemed to blur for me after awhile…that seems to happen on the playa.

finally, there was the post-event phase….after the big burn, as people begin to leave, to return to normalcy, and this extends all the way until we are back into reality camp, which is generally met with much malaise, a general feeling of let-down, and disappointment that life can’t be more like it is in black rock city.

so, leading up to leaving for the event, it got scary early. the good thing is that we seem to have been more organized than we have been in the last few years. a lot of this is because of me. last year, my software consultant from work was here RIGHT before we had to leave. this made things quite uncomfortable, because dealing with his being here takes about every brain cell i have, which left precious little time or energy for much of anything else. i am sure that this made my husband panic because i generally take care of the finer details and didn’t last year, which made us seem hurried and unorganized at the end. that’s all in the past, though….and this year, we didn’t have any of that additionaly stress, so it seemed like things were pretty smoooooth sailing….mostly.

we had put off doing some maintenance things with the motor home and the truck, and it turned out these things came up to bite us and make money very tight for the burn because they HAD to be done, but had they been done sooner, it would have made life much better for us heading out.

i got most of the shopping done WAY early this year, so that the night before we left, all i had to do was buy fresh produce, most of which went bad anyway (hahahaha) and it was a much smaller trip than trying to think of what to buy for two weeks right before going. there was a combination of pre-cooked and prepared meals, fresh meat and frozen veggies, and various snack foods and salty/sweet stuff to just munch on as we went. i had gotten a HUGE jar of pepperocini peppers for the playa and those suckers were good! i ate them ALL while we were out there. must have been the combination of salty and hot that did me good….

for next year, i need to remember to take more soda….d said that he was going to take care of drinks but what that really means in d language is that he’s going to take care of ensuring that HE has cold beer the whole time out there and we can piss off. that irritated me a few times over the trip, but was a reasonably small thing, really. it just kind of annoys me that i am expected to anticipate and provide for his needs, but he doesn’t have to think of anyone but himself or his own needs. this is an ongoing battle that i have with him, nothing new, so moving along now….

the other reasonably unknown factor that we weren’t sure of until the end was the status of my daughter. i started talking to her almost a month before the event and stating that she needed to do some shopping, that she needed to be home to help me plan for food that she wanted to eat, etc. she ignored all of this, but she heard what i was saying. she took her own money and went and spent a ton of money on clothes/costumes for the event and the little bugger did a really good job, too!! she finally came home about three days before we left and then the night before we left, she kept pushing her luck and saying that she wanted to stay out just a little bit longer. teenagers!! oh my….in the end, though, she listened, she was there, and we all left together. i had planned for enough food for the extra person, and things were ready to go….

we departed (reasonably) early on thursday, august 24th, happy, well-organized, and anxious to start a grand adventure!! the kid road with me, and d drove the motor home. buying gas for the motor home was no easy task…i think we spent about $300 on gas and we only live two hours away!! that was INSANE, with gas over $3.00/gallon. i wonder how much that increased burning man budgets throughout the land?!?!?! exponentially, i am betting.

i was very excited, but also somewhat anxious and had some trepidation. i’ve never had one of my kids out on the playa before and i wasn’t sure how it was going to go. i wasn’t sure if she was going to take off and we’d not see her again until she came back mid-week, drug crazed, dirty, with dreadlocks and blazed out of her mind, dehydrated and half-dead, or if she’d hang out with us all week, be resentful of us having to work, and be pouty and miserable. i wanted her to enjoy it as much as i do. i didn’t want her to be disappointed and she is her own person now, and i sometimes wonder how well i know her.

the drive was uneventful. i was pleased because i got to show my daughter the snoopy rock.  i was pretty wrecked because at the playa rom, no one had repainted it yet, so i was afraid it wouldn’t be done, but sure enough, when we passed it outside of empire, there he was, painted and smiling, like always. daughter slept most of the way, which was cool because that gave me the chance to sing my little heart out most of the way there, good times =) we got there before the signs were up, and the box office was barely there, so she missed that whole experience, but she gained an even greater one….getting to see the city come to life before her eyes.

as we motored into the city, and towards our camp, her comments involved something like "wow, this really IS in the middle of nowhere…" and "why are we camped so far back?"….oh, just wait little one….we are going to be in the thick of things by monday……

i have returned….

burning man was as amazing as it ever is, this year. this was a very good and cool year for me, personally, professionally/volunteer-wise, and relationship-wise also.

the first good news is that my daughter did show up and came with us. she hadn’t been home much in the weeks prior to burning man, so i wasn’t sure if she had decided it wasn’t worth her time or not, but about a week before we left, she did actually show up, had taken a lot of responsibility for getting herself prepared, and it was a good thing. she had an amazing time at the event, is anxious to go back, and is now, as i write, in her first day back at school at one of the local charter schools. she did really well at the event. she was careful, but still managed to have an insane amount of fun, find her groove, her own transformation, and make it a great experience for her.

we had another friend who came out this year, flew in from texas, rented a car with another guy, and came out to brc. i am not sure what he was searching for or if he found it….he states that it will take him months to process all that he saw and did and experienced, but he views it as a positive thing. this is good.

i will post more when i can. i am processing too.

in some ways, everything happened, and in some ways it seems nothing happened.

i am, though, again, forever changed for having been there.

riding the edge of chaos is fun, it makes you expand your borders and your sense of what is "right", "good", "acceptable" and also what those things are for other people.

this year our camp was harmonious, there was a little drama, but thankfully this year it did not involve me.

i see my girl tonight for the first time since returning home. she was sick last week, so we didn’t get a chance to hook up but i am looking forward to it a lot.

that’s about it for now. i wanted to write something, since my last entry was seventeen days pre-event and now it’s almost that many days since it ended.

work continues to be what it is, and i wonder if i am losing patience for dealing with a lot of this stuff. it seems i am, but i have to endure…it’s worth it in the end, to continue to be here and to build what is being built here.

hope everyone is well. i have some cool pictures to post =)

peace.

a weekend approaches….

 and is full of promise….

have i mentioned lately how nice it is to have ac? everyone in the house says we should have done this ages ago. i tend to agree, i guess i just thought it was too expensive before. it wasn’t that bad though, with the window units. we still need to do something about the top floor of the house, but i think if we put ventilation fans in the attic and do a larger evaporative cooler for the upstairs rooms, we should be able to cool the whole house. next summer for that one….don’t have the money for it right now and i think it’s going to take a bit more skill than we have between us as i think we have to cut holes in our house to get the ventilation fan’s done =) if the little energy star thing is correct, the average annual operating cost is only $45. i think i was most worried about increased energy bills, but running the small ac units couldn’t be much more expensive than running fans 24/7. i will let you know when i get my bill, which is generally always over $200/month anyway because of the sheer number of people in our house (7).

saw my girl last night and everything is good there. i know this is stupid, but i wanted to see if anything would change in her behavior towards me after we were intimate. i was cautious because i didn’t need her to suddenly become demanding or clingy. she’s done fabulous though, and it’s been really nice. we have sort of naturally wanted to be together a little more, but we seem to have come to a good place in our relationship and boundaries and life is good. she asked me to take her downtown for hot august nights, which is this huge classic car show. to be honest, i abhor being anywhere near town when this event is going on because there are just so many people, traffic is a nightmare, and there are so many street closures that going anywhere is hideous, but i will overcome to show her what it’s like. a couple of years ago, we went to the free concert in sparks, the town next to us and saw the village people. THAT was a good time! maybe there’s something that like which will be fun we can do.

i did something kind of mean, though. i had asked her if she was interested in having a kitty from our litter and she said she just wasn’t sure. then i asked her if she wanted one that was black and white or tiger striped and she said she couldn’t decide. well, i thought maybe if she saw them, she would be able to choose. i never dreamed that she would keep them both, i thought maybe her best friend would take one, but last night, i took them both to her house and she fell in love with them. she already has two cats who are siamese cross kitties and she spoils them rotten. i know they will have a great home with her and i will get to see them still, often. i think it’s kind of mean because i had a feeling if she saw how cute they were, she wouldn’t be able to resist and i was right =) but at least my kitties have a good home, now =) and they are with my girl.

i am feeling at a good place now. in some respects, i am going "wow, i am there. i have what i have always wanted"….but of course, i still cause myself anxiety worrying about how she’s processing things or whether or not her behavior is gong to change, seeing if d is okay…making sure i am being sensitive to him because i know how much it hurt me when i didn’t think he was being that way towards me. but i have decided that if someone i am involved with’s needs aren’t being met, it’s their responsibility to tell me, not my responsibility to spend my life walking on egg shells trying to anticipate everyone else’s needs and act accordingly to try to save anyone else from pain. that takes A LOT of work and a lot of energy. i didn’t even really realize i was doing that until i was typing all this out, but that’s been it. it’s almost sapped the joy out of it worrying where everyone else was with this. no more! i need to enjoy things more! shit, this is my life!

i have more to write, but think that i will do it a little later. my weekend is going to be heinously busy as i seem to have gotten myself wrapped up in yet another community project where i am needed, and it’s a blast, but it makes for busy times for the next few weeks.

take care all, have a great weekend, and remember to see the beauty. it’s there, you just have to look for it.

peace.

what a tangled web we weave….

so the confusion of the last entry is largely over, and much has happened since that time.

the basic crux of the situation is as follows:

i am sometimes a flaky, judgmental bitch. there’s no other conclusion that i can come to, and recent events have proven it. it’s time for brutal honesty, and the only place left that i can hide from people that know me in the real world, with very few exceptions is here =)

there i was, living my little existence on this message board for married women who love women. pretty cool, right? everyone who’s read me for any length of time knows how i frequently whine about the absence of the presence of a lady in my life. i long, i commiserate, i pontificate, what must seem like endlessly to some of you =)

so, in a truly bizarre twist of events, i ended up on yahoo personals, where i made an add probably two years ago. the thing is, i assumed if someone sent you a message, it went to your yahoo email. well, no, that would be too easy. and too clean and nice and neat. so there’s this whole other messaging thing that you do with yahoo, which is, like, a personal message or something. at any rate, it has a different inbox and is attached to your personals account, i guess. so waaaay back in march, i noticed that i had a message there, but i never knew how to get to it. i finally get to it, and it’s from this woman who’s a single lesbian. red flags immediately go up for me because i don’t want to meet or fall in love with anyone who’s going to try to convince me to leave my husband. we exchange a few emails, and that’s about it. between her busy life and my busy life, we never really hook up.

then, out of the blue, i hear from her again. seems she had some similar communication issue with yahoo, was in the process of moving and had her own life drama going on, but she was interested in us talking more. we chat on yahoo for a few days, and before we decide to meet, i need to tell her that i am married. i do, and she says something about still wanting to be friends and i sort of write her off as a romantic possibility because she basically gives me the impression that as soon as she finds a "real" girlfriend, even if she’s sleeping with me, she will break up with me for this chance at "permanent happiness". we do meet, and there are some things about her that are somewhat off-putting, but not absolute deal-breakers.

at the same time that this is happening, i had been toying with the idea of someone on the message board and had recently expressed an interest there too. that interest was returned, and another dialogue started up. she lives in the bay area of california, and she is educated, has small children and a husband too, which she doesn’t want to divorce either. my first thought is that i should be more serious about pursuing the person from the message board because she’s educated, she belongs to the same support system i do, she’s smart, and fun, and it would just be better. there are a million other reasons this was a REALLY BAD IDEA, but i just ignored those, because it wasn’t convenient to see them at the time =)

then, i go to california, near this person, for another reason, and she says she wants to meet up with me. we make a plan to have lunch and we are all flirty and everything, but then when we meet up, she is, like painfully shy. like, not just shy, but afraid to say anything, long spans of awkward silence shy. i think "okay, no big deal, no connection there." but then, when i get home, she’s all "i can’t believe what an idiot i was! i should have been more talkative, i should have told you more, we should have laughed more, blah de blah"

enter this opportunity to go to the midwest for a gathering of this message board. well, i have never been to the midwest and it’s something i should experience. i decide i am going to go for it, and ask this person if she wants to room with me. she says that she does, and i tell her that we can go as friends with no expectations. very cool, right?

the 13-18th of july was that trip, about which i posted previously regarding humidity, etc. except that the drama abounded. while we were in illinois, i knew the board person had an ex, but she was singing the "woe is me" about how she was so jilted and felt so used by this person and didn’t want to be part of her harem because she is like a poly slut and had intended to meet up with at least one other person at this retreat. funny thing, though, when we all got there, she totally was falling all over this chick. now, i am not the jealous type and we were just friends right? it was just kind of icky and a not-so-nice display considering she had been flirting and whispering sweet nothings to me prior to the trip. at one point, someone else who liked the ex came to the gathering, and essentially propositioned her, but the ex got freaked out, i guess and said she was icky or that didn’t happen or something. i confronted my friend and she completely came to the defense of her ex and i was like "oh man, i can see the writing on the wall with this one…this will not be good for me to continue at all" and i basically stopped any but the most courteous interactions with her. add to this that the lady i am rooming with finds out THE DAY that she is leaving that she is diabetic, and has to deal with that the first few days of the trip, too. gak!

in one of the most bizarre twists of this whole weekend and adventure, while i was in our room, laying on my bed enjoying the nice air-conditioning, i get a phone call. someone says "hi" i say, "hi" she says "you don’t know who this is, do you?" i say "not a fucking clue" she says "it’ s!" oh great…my ex who moved away to the extreme southern part of the state and your moving back and want to get together?!?! WONDERFUL……ugggh.

i come back home. since my roomie had been falling all over her ex, i basically stopped all but the most polite interacting with her, and when she leaves, a day before me, i hear not a word from her. no "how are you managing?" no "i made it home safe" or "i am in my connecting city"….none of that…dead silence, when before the trip, we had kept in almost constant contact with each other. i finally texted her just because it’s polite to ask someone you were travelling with if they got home okay and i get a response that’s curt and indicates she has.

fast forward about four or five days and i have heard nothing from her. not a single word. she finally sends this lame ass email saying she’s sorry if she frustrated me in any way, but it was a really emotional weekend for her. in the mean time, the drama with the local lady has severely lessened, we have continued to see each other casually, but hadn’t slept with each other yet, and she is not respecting my boundaries and my other relationship. life is good with her and i am beginning to think to myself "what an ass you are…..to think that someone who is educated would be someone better for you because they have that education. it doesn’t matter that they are also socially catatonic, have small children that you don’t really want to deal with and are seriously rebounding from a one-sided relationship, you ignored all that" and i did.

andnow i’m not.

saw the local lady last friday, but in the days before that, i let her know how much i appreciated her changes in behavior for me, her patience, and how sweet she has been to me.

gave her a present.

and now, we are together.

and life is feeling more good.

more balanced.

gentle, soft, and fabulous.

i am fond of her.

and that’s all for now.

*whew* what a ride this has been. can’t wait to see where we go next =P

peace. 

midwest humidity….

what an enigma. i never understood until being here that air could be oppressive. i have seen it be oppressive with heat before, but even that is not the soaking oppression of the moisture that is in the air here. i am in galena illinois for another night, then chicago for a day and then home. i came here to go to a retreat for the board that i am involved in. i came with someone i thought might be a relationship possibility, but that’s not going to happen. they say that when one door closes, another opens, and so, of course, still on this trip, me ex from last year called me. what a strange odyssey this whole, strange trip has been =) it’s also made me look differently at the local woman. feast or famine, my cup runneth over and what the hell do i want, anyway?

right now, i have no earthly idea.

peace.

playa-fied

 wow, what an amazing weekend i had! it was SO COOL to be around people that i haven’t seen for almost a year. the more i think about the entire "burning man" experience, the more i believe what a unique and amazing event it is and to be a part of it makes me proud, humble, and awed. it’s so odd not to see someone for a year, and then just come together around this commonality called rangering, and get to catch up on all of the last year, pick up a friendship as though no time has passed…because with burning man, time seems to pass based on what happens between events =)

i had an interview with the director for a sub-team of the rangers that i want to be a part of. it went well, i think. they have a lot of attorney’s who work as part of the team, and they are moving towards having fewer attorney’s and more laypeople. that would be me =) i guess they have some more interviews to do, then will all get together and let us know who the selectees are. i am hopeful, but won’t be crushed if it doesn’t happen. it doesn’t hurt to try =)

there were some communication issues with d and i, which always seems to be the case. i guess if we lived in isolation where we only interacted with each other it might not happen, but when you add other people into the mix, things always get messed up. i know this whole process i have been going through is part of the mercury retrograde thing, and in some ways that makes it easier, but in some ways, it does not. it’s mostly my own stuff that i am still working through. he is inifinitely patient with me and for that i am grateful. i guess we put up with each other’s shit well. i really do need to get over myself, somewhat.

saturday night, we went to the hot springs and it was really cool. i think there were about a baker’s dozen of us at the springs, laughing and playing and being drunk (some of us, i was not one, although i did have some yummy plum wine), swimming and generally being together. the hot springs are near railroad tracks and when a train goes by, it ramps up the geothermal activity that makes the water warm there, making it more bubbly and hot, closer to the tracks. then, if you don’t want super hot water, you just move farther from the tracks, and it gets cooler. neat place, anyway.

also true to mercury being retrograde, the ride home last night turned into a bizarre odyssey of mishaps that i hope are all done now and not the harbinger of things to come. not far after leaving the playa, we blew a tire on the motor home. when the tire blew, it knocked the cap off one of the water holding tanks so we had to stop and empty the tanks the rest of the way and then decide what to do. i guess the person who remodeled the motor home couldn’t have done much testing with it because the boards they had over the wheel wells rub the tires if you go over a large bump or something. this is what tore the tire apart. we probably spent an hour on the side of the road there, then we got on our way again, now going very slow because of the bad tire (there are two on that side) and a little farther down the road, the motor home started to run out of gas. i told d that i thought the generator took more energy than he though in terms of fuel, i suppose now he believes me =) so, what we had to do was take part of the gas tank on the truck apart so that we could access it directly in order to siphon gas from it to put in the motor home =) we eventually made it home, short one tire and rolling in on fumes from the gas tank, but we made it =) i think that d was pretty stressed, but i just kept my mouth shut and waited for him to tell me what he needed in order to make some decisions about how we were going to deal with our situation. i can help, but he is the mechanically inclined one, so i generally defer to him in these types of things.

i got to connect with the lady who helped me braid my hair last year, and she is going to talk to her so to see if they can come a day or two early and we can do hair. yay, hair!! i am still thinking of a color scheme i want. i need to order hair. i can’t believe it’s only six weeks to burning man!!!

peace.

another weekend, son, and “munich”

i feel kind of bad for my poor son. he’s not having a very good time in alaska at all. i spoke to him several times on the phone yesterday and he has come to the conclusion that it would have served him better to have stayed home and done survey work here with the job he normally has. when he talked to the guys who did it before, it sounds like they had really cool guys to hang out with, and chris doesn’t really get along with the guys he’s with. i mean, they don’t NOT get along, but they all know each other already and so he’s sort of like the perpetual outsider. this is an odd place for him to be because he’s used to being the center of attention and being surrounded by people who love him for who he is. he hasn’t been the outsider for a long time. but, he is finding good ways of dealing with things. he called his uncle, d’s brother and he works all weekend, and then there’s another friend in alaska, but when he tried to call them, they are out of town for the holiday. so, basically, he’s really lonely. i feel for him. but i have also been there for him, too. i am unsure what he would do if he didn’t have me to talk to. i can look stuff up on the internet for him….yesterday we sent him to the alaska zoo, which he said was kind of sad, but at least it was something to do. he will be home in another six weeks, though, so it’s all good.

i am at work right now, and it’s looking pretty deserted here about now. i actually work in a converted apartment in the back from the main building where everyone else works, and i am the only one here. it’s quiet and a little creepy, but not too bad. i could be getting lots done, but why would i do that when i can be here?!?!?! hahaha

this weekend was quiet in the extreme. i even cooked this weekend, which is a rarity these days. we have bbq’d the last few days and it’s been fun. it doesn’t heat the house up, and i get to have fun cooking. it’s funny, when you have to do it all the time, it’s drudgery, but when you don’t, it sort of becomes an adventure.

last night d and i watched the movie "munich" about the killing of the israeli athletes at the 1972 munich olympics and the subsequent response by the israeli government to eliminate those suspected of being involved in planning the attack. i studied this situation in a "political violence and terrorism" class i took, unique in it’s own right because it was taught by a jewish man who has been a visiting scholar at the university of jerusalem. it brought up many questions for me. do oppressed people know they are oppressed? what is the human obsession with having a "place"? what is a country really, except a geographical area governed by a collective of people who all live there at the time the country is formed. i can’t really understand the plight of either the palestinian people or the israeli people because i have never been either of those things. my country is a melting pot and i have chosen to take on it’s more liberal aspects in my own values in thinking people should be valued based on their character, but that becomes more and more muddied if you look at the characters from this film. was the israeli musad who did the killing a counter-terrorrist or a hero? it ruined his life, that is safe to say…killing those people. i think looking at these situations doesn’t really present any solid answers, it just brings up more questions for me. i don’t understand how people can do those things to other human beings. interesting times we live in…..

i think that’s all for right now.

peace. 

the weekend

 i had a pretty internally and family focused weekend and it was good. i mostly stayed around the house and such this weekend.

saturday night i went and had dinner with my auntie, who is resplendent in her new abode. she moved back to the same complex she was in before, but the nicer model of 1 bedroom, it’s much larger and she is very happy. some people just can’t live with other people and i think she is in that place. two of my brothers that live locally were there too, along with their women. my mom, my sis and i were there. it was sort of crowded, but fun =) we all talked and sort of caught up with each other. i actually sort of bellydanced for them….i showed them my bellyroll which made them all go "ewwwww" it’s quite odd looking if you’ve never seen one….especially on a plus-sized dancer =) let me tell ya, i got some belly to roll…..i always joke that the goddess just gave me an extra ass on the front in case mine ever got completely chewed off.

daughter is doing most excellent. this week represented the first week in which she was no longer considered training and SHE MADE TIPS!! to the tune of $65!! not bad….their store is small and people are still learning that it’s there, i don’t think they advertised that one at all. so, they pool all the tips for the entire week, then on friday night, based on how many hours you work determines how large a percentage of the tips you get. well, that was her share. she actually got mad at me that i made her buy her own food this weekend, but that’s okay, she can be mad…she needs to begin to understand that all she wants in life is not free and how to be frugal with her money =)

sunday, i was really tired. slept in, and then i absolutely HAD to do something with my room. i am not generally a very organized person, but something has to give. with d and i living in the same room, i have a whole lot of crap and it was everywhere. this really frustrates me and i think the room being so dirty was also really doing a number on my sinuses. so, i got down and cleaned yesterday. i hadn’t taken the time in a long time to go through and organize things. i had piles of stuff everywhere! funny enough, i found all the stuff i had brought back from the philadelphia gathering for the old MWWLW board. gosh what an awesome time we had in philly! i had a moment of laughter as i found the schedule and callie had the entire time scheduled, which truly amused me. down to the point of "1:30-3:3:30…free time". that makes me laugh. it was great to get all those memories put away safely though. also did pantheacon the last few years, my trip to new york, and some stuff for my kids that i had lying around.

so, soon i am going to break out the sewing machine, to do some sewing for burning man and some magickal sewing. i want to make an altar cloth because i found where i want to put a small altar that shouldn’t interfere much with anything else. it’s amazing what you find when you go through all your shit! i found gifts i had bought for people on my adventures that i had never given them because i couldn’t find them again =) i am still missing a few things that i thought i had, but i am hopeful that they will turn up again. i also need to make a bag for some jewelry and for my rider-waite tarot deck. i made some cool bags last year, and i’d like to repeat that. i have some raw silk i found again that i am anxious to utilize for these smaller projects and want to get a gold glitter fabric pen to make some decorations on them, perhaps find some simple jewels. my creative wheels are turning, now =)

because i write so seldom, it seems that short and sweet journal entries are not in the cards for me lately.

i will make a conscious effort to update more often so that when i do write, it doesn’t turn into a novella, as is my habit =)

have a great day, everyone.

peace.

small town americana……

this is the last from my trip to central nevada. there are a few more unique things about austin that i wanted to share because i was highly amused….

on a "map of historic austin", there was a listing of businesses, and i swear, on this list, it says "austin baptist church & rv park".

oh.

no.

you.

didn’t.

so, of course, we had to investigate. and no, lie, there they are:

and then, on the building, we saw a sign that left no doubt:

please notice that on the wall, it does, in fact, say "sanctuary" and below that "restrooms" and "showers".

i do believe, that’s my kind of church, if i went to church =)

this intends no disrespect to anyone’s beliefs. this is more to revel in the marvel of small towns and the things they sometimes do to make themselves remain viable.

this was a lot of fun =)

good weekend….

 well, i had a really good weekend.

now, not only do i know what a gridley days is, but i know a lot more about my state’s history than i did, and at the same time, got to hang out with some really cool women, have fun, relax, dance, hike, see people from my own town that convince me yet again that the world is too small, and see some of the most disgusting, prehistoric mutant ninja bugs from hell there ever were, to be sure =)

so, who knew that austin, nevada, was so integral to our state’s and our countries history? not me….considering it almost looks like a ghost town. turns out the gridley days were named for someone named, you guessed it, gridley. seems this man lost an election bet and had to carry a 50lb sack of flour from one town to the next on his back. he did this, and then auctioned off the flour to raise money for the Sanitary Commission, which was a relief organization for Union soldiers and also the precursor of the American Red Cross. He auctioned off the same sack of flour all over the place, eventually raising $275,000 for this organization. cool, i can celebrate that =)

as we were driving into town, we passed a few brown smears on the road. our biggest fear was that we would have to experience mormon crickets, some infestation of these disgusting bugs that happens here in different places each year. i see how folks could truly consider this a scourge of biblical proportions. they are absolutely disgusting and they come in such numbers that they swarm over everything. *shudder* the arrived in the town just as we were leaving. yuck!! i am very much a "live and let live" kind of girl, but these things are just gross, truly. this is what they look like on the side of a building:

on the road:

nasty, i am telling you. it makes my skin crawl just to think of going through them, stepping on them and they crunch. just, ew.

overall, however, the weekend was a roaring success. we were there to cheer our friend on in the parade. we think we were definately the loudest of anyone in the crowd watching the parade, which probably numbered less than 50 people. in fact, i daresay that the number of people IN the parade was greater than the number of people watching the parade =) ahhhh, small town americana, to be sure.

the cool thing, though, is that we did learn an awful lot about nevada history, got some really cool resources that applied to the whole state and this little town might have had only two restaurants, no viable store, and more bars and churches than anything else, but they had some damn fine shopping =) nevada is like a geologists wet dream apparently, and there were crystals and gems and native turquoise that was awesome.

we had take a lot of booze with us, but really, our paltry offerings were nothing compared to the level of seasoned professionalism we experienced in the drinkers that were there for the festivities. we saw a man vomit his way down the main street, and it honestly made us wonder if this is the real reason they once made sidewalks from wood planks….because the vomit just sort of runs through the cracks, no mess cleanup =) we had a bucket of margaritas and some home brew. it made things a lot cheaper for us, but really, we were no match.

there were two restaurants in the town, and apparently neither of them were ready for the influx of about 100 people into their normally 20 person town =) the one cafe, we waited over an hour for our food. apparently they needed to keep the cow alive until the last second and only cut off a piece at a time so they could use it for other stuff as long as possible. this was surrounding my friends request for a chicken fried steak =) or, it could be that we are just spoiled city folk who are used to immediate gratification and smaller town folk just don’t respond well to that, which is more likely the case =)

the town is sort of like virginia city, without all the touristy trap stuff. this is kind of laughable if you’ve ever been to virginia city, that might have a population of 500. when i think of the fact that i saw that many people on a single subway train in new york city, it puts things in perspective rather nicely for me =) i may post more pictures when my friend posts them.

on the way home sunday morning though, we had a really good time. every time we saw a historic marker, we stopped and read what everything was about. we learned about nevada’s pony express, early settlements, and mining towns. it’s pretty amazing that a hundred years ago, there was a booming town in the spot of the marker and now, there’s just nothing. sometimes not even a rock or a part of a foundation. just emptiness.

we also came across a petroglyph site that was pretty amazing. they estimate the glyphs are between 5,000 and 10,000 years old. pretty cool stuff and a very, very easy hike. there are some hidden caves around that sound pretty cool too. so, we found lots of stuff to do on future forays, also.

i talked to my son for about an hour on the phone last night. the life lessons are coming hard and fast now. he totally blew me away last night. he called my husband, who he’s always had an adversarial relationship with. he’s always looked down on my husband in that "know-it-all" way that is so charming with teenagers like he was a washed-up old man. now that he’s kind of doing stuff on his own, he sees that d has always been there for him and he’s had a pretty nice life. d has proveded for him, and we’ve always allowed him to be his own person and supported him in whatever he wanted to do. the competition and discension between them has been something that has hurt me forever. to have two of the people i love the most in the world act like they hate each other just tore me up.

so my son called d yesterday and told him that he loved him, thanked him for being a good dad, told him he was proud to call him dad, and apologized for not being the greatest kid in the world. this made me cry to think that he’s finally seeing these things. you can’t force a young person to see stuff like this, they have to come to it on their own. he wasn’t a bad kid, but he did always treat us like we were inferior or something. it was an attitude thing. it’s good to see that he’s seeing life a little different these days….

as soon as they finish up where they are in petersburg alaska, they are headed to nome, alaska, where he hopes to do a bit more technical stuff. he’s doing good, no more near-death experiences, which is good.

daughter did good all weekend, she worked and to hear her tell it is a rising star at one of the ice cream shops where they make your combinations by hand on cold slabs and sing you songs when you tip them. it amazes me that this is fun to her, but more power to her if she enjoys it.

i better end this novella for now. good to get it all out, though.

peace.