Living In The Sky

Cowboy Logic

2012-01-22T12:35:00.000-08:00

• People who are tough never have to tell you that they are. It’s the same with people who are honest.

• Never miss a chance to shut up. Well-timed silence has more eloquence than speech.

• A bad-tempered man will never make a good-tempered horse.

• The easiest way to eat crow is when it’s still warm. The colder it gets the harder it is to swallow.

• Don’t interfere with somethin’ that ain’t botherin’ you none.

• If it's broke, fix it.

• A man that don't love a horse there is something the matter with him. If he has no sympathy for the man that does love horses then there is something worse the matter with him.

• The quickest way to double your money is to fold it over and put it back in your pocket.

• When you give a personal lesson in meanness to a person or a critter don’t be surprised if they learn it.

• Generally speakin’, you ain’t learnin’ nothing when you’re the one doin’ the talkin.

• It takes a great deal of physical courage to ride a horse. I get it at about forty cents a flask and take it as required.

• Don’t squat with your spurs on.

• Good judgment comes from experience and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.

• There is something about the outside of a horse that is good for the inside of a man.

• If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.

• Never ask a barber if you need a haircut.

• When I hear somebody talking about a horse being stupid, I figure it's a sure sign that it has outfoxed them.

• If you get to thinkin’ you’re a person of some considerable influence, try ordering someone else’s dog around.

• Nothing on four legs is quicker than a horse heading back to the barn.

Will The Real Prairie Rose Please Stand Up

2012-01-20T10:01:00.000-08:00

Day Five of the Big Snowstorm, and this story seemed timely. Discovered it this week, snowed in and running across various and sundry articles about early horsewomen (unfortunately termed "cowgirls," not unlike their male counterparts; I say this only because I think taking care of cattle is not really the same as being a horseperson, but that's my soapbox).

If any of you (and who hasn't) have heard the Michael Martin Murphey song "Wildfire," you know the poignant, haunting story of a woman who died trying to save her pony from a horrible snowstorm. Nothing prepared me for it to be a true story, and from my bit of research I doubt Mr. Murphey knew it either when he wrote it.

You can read about it HERE, where I found these wonderful images, along with other historical and not-so-objective accounts of other early western women, many of whom were apparently named "Prairie Rose," stirring confusion into an already colorful, ever unwinding feminine story.

Stay warm, lovies! But no promises on keeping the eyes dry.

LET IT SNOW!

2012-01-19T16:50:00.000-08:00

Whee!

This is the view from my porch (of course it was taken from inside, hello!) It seems all of Seattle is so BLISSFULLY quiet! The effects the micro-muffler powder has on noise in general compounded with the lack of traffic en masse is underlined by the small town feel of neighbors coming out and talking to each other (and highlighted by the toboggan-hill block-parties on the steepest closed roads).
After days of snow, downtown Seattle is practically closed and some winter storm warnings are in effect. It's been enjoyable just for the crispy crunchiness of it all, and because of condo living, my heater hasn't even been turned on. Socks, slippers, and a wool oversweater keep the ol' metabolism up and immune system healthy! Then I strap on my YakTrax and get to see things like this:

Beautiful bus stop berries! Like Twizzlers for birds... makes beaks happy!

... and on the first day of snow, THIS was happening (now all the buses wear chains, and you can't see any of the road OR sidewalks for all the ice and snow):

But you can't please everybody all the time. I'm snowed in and can't visit my pasture ornaments. I'm just glad they have some old growth trees to hide under and twenty acres to run on to keep warm. Then of course some just want to stay inside and love on Brown Bear. After a couple shots of my favorite whiskey, I think I'll join ye!
(Okay, maybe three shots)

Season's Greetings!! from the four-leggeds

2012-01-06T23:47:00.001-08:00

After dreaming of our years in ARIZONA ... I stumbled on a pic of the boys out at my brother's place during our week of vacationing in CALIFORNIA ...

Such a happy time!!

Now there's just this ...

You said it, buddy!!
Springtime, here we come!!!

Just wanted to remember what Arizona was like...

2011-12-19T20:49:00.000-08:00

Sigh...

It's a-FISH-al!!

2011-12-04T17:52:00.000-08:00

We now have a new member of the family! This is not thee best picture, but the tank at night is queersome, especially with some dark ambient Steve Roach playing in the background. His head is black, and his body kinda shifts from an ultraviolet blue to turquoise. He is still changing, and I hope we did right by his ultra filtered and pH balanced water, complete with a couple Java ferns buried in the fluorite substrate and - something he's not had for over a year, maybe two of his life - a heater!

Welcome to the fam, Betta Buddy! Now do tell us your name.

The Tourist

2011-11-19T10:55:00.000-08:00

Sometimes it's just dandy having a great pair of walking shoes.

From A Veteran

2011-11-11T09:31:00.000-08:00

Recently I watched a film with Tim Robbins called "The Lucky Ones" about a group of wounded soldiers on leave back in the States from Iraq. It reminded me of why I loved serving my country in the Army during Desert Storm and just how much of that confidence has dwindled over the years of being jobless and homeless. No matter how tough I felt and how much my "I'm gonna get through this" attitude I had, getting only a couple hours of sleep at a time and having no real way to afford quelling my injuries from the service got me down.
Bad, sometimes.

Even more, this film showed me how much the civilian populations could benefit from some confidence courses like the ones in basic training. Here is an opinion, I think that loddy doddy everybody (words of the drill sergeants coming out) would be so much more if they only knew what they were capable of, and had to depend on other complete strangers in dire straits. Just riding the bus to my new job, I notice that the guy next to whom I sat suddenly was just looking out the window, like a poodle who'd been caught pissing on something and had his pouty little nose stuffed in the corner. It's not just him, either - I can see the perceived oppression on too many faces as I walk through Seattle. From what? What is so threatening about sharing a seat on a bus?

It was so refreshing to see the medic sergeant in the movie using an absent doctor's office, against the warnings of the attending receptionist/nurse/whoever, to treat his fellow soldier's bleeding leg, because he CAN. We learn that there is a time for protocol, and a time to Get It Done. No professional around? Let the able-bodied people do it. We don't need titles or permission to aid urgent things. After basic, I felt like I could walk from one end of America to the other, and not only could I defend myself, nobody was a stranger. In the military, you can talk to just about anyone about just about anything. The Fear Factor just vanishes.

Well, in the end, the film was poignant in that the poor, homeless and unwanted found that the Army was their home - not because of the camaraderie, which is lacking so much in civilian life, but because there weren't any other perceived options. But that is how it is outside the movies. Those are the men and women trying to serve you. My hopes on this day echo a statement from John Rambo: For our country to love us as much as we love it.
May it happen soon.

Of Leather and Horseflesh

2011-10-26T21:25:00.001-07:00

It's that time of year again! Crispety, crunchety leaves all a-swirl as the chilly wind casts snowfalls of brilliant colors around your feet...

You curry your four-legged friend, using a step stool if you have to, to get all the dust and grit you can from under the saddle blanket. He sidesteps with anticipation as you come around the trailer with his tack, and you let him sniff it and begin to chew out of recognition, signaling he knows what this is and that he is relaxed about it. He doesn't even flinch when a stirrup falls over the side, and is still as you work your way around and under, straightening and attaching and cinching. At last you slide the hack up and around his nose, over the ears, and clasp the cheek strap. Step stool ahoy, you slide your foot in the stirrup and flip a leg over in one graceful move, then nose your other toe in the other stirrup. Smooth pets down the side of his neck tell him thank you for agreeing to do this again. The two of you walk around, doing some drills to see if there is any soreness, stiff limbs, or emotional ghosts hiding in the closet. It's amazing how sometimes the most familiar things can become frightening because of something that happened that day - to the both of you - so we scare them out into the open and watch them vanish.

It doesn't take long for the scent of hot horse hair to begin emanating, mixing with the leather rigging, the neoprene belly band, and the fleecy saddle pad, wafting its way up through your nostrils and out the top of your soul, a giant imaginary flag set to winds unseen. You ride through the wide open spaces, beside the gurgling waters of yesterday's torrent, until the inner darkness between young trees begins to disappear the details of the forest, and vapor breath creates dew on long whiskers. The end of the day is coming, and he walks with the swagger and grace of a half-drunken dancer up to the trailer and stands there after you dismount with no need of being tied as you peel off the sensitive layers that comforted the ride on skin and bones for the both of you. Naked and free, he begins to graze at your feet, and you pick up your brush to whisk his aura clean, walking behind him step for step while you comb through the long, variegated strands of his tail. The last golden rays outline each member of the herd dotting the hill, as they connect again to the ancient rituals of their ancestors.

Let's Get Started!

2011-10-14T10:01:00.000-07:00

Oy VEY, what a couple of weeks this has been!

Travel across country. Interview and get job. Find out the immense training requirements that need fulfilled. Cat diagnosed with unknown tumor. Can't afford pathology so wait and see what happens. Sift through what's left of stuff from not being employed last three years to see what I can bring with me. Move to Seattle. A horse goes lame. VERY lame. Vets want like $500 to find out what's wrong (and then talk about what it would cost to get him better). Can't do that either, so wait and see what happens. Meanwhile the nerve damage from my neck makes my arms tantamount to useless and turns my hands into more like paws. Brain works about 60% of time, and saw fit to just open the pasture gate and let the horses out to run up the driveway. Half a mile later, I recapture... you get the idea.

And Monday is an early day, first day of the rest of my job. Cross your fingers!

Thank you Washington, D.C. !

2011-10-08T17:02:00.000-07:00

Whew! Big trip, lovies! and bigger interview.

Apparently there is this seemingly little-known veteran's organization (to me) although it is 90 years old and the third largest of its kind. The Disabled American Veterans is a private, federally-chartered organization whose mission is to better the lives of all disabled vets and their families. There is SO much they do, one must really check out their website for the variety of services, not to mention the colorful history. As for me, I have begun my long haul of training, which will include doctor-level anatomy and physiology, attorney-level veterans' benefits laws, and also some public speaking and legislative writing.

One week I may find myself interviewing soldiers just returning from the Middle East for any possible claims processing, the next week I may be giving a speech in state or federal Congress proposing yet another new law, while the following week I may be riding with fellow service officers in a mobile office motorhome in the nooks and crannies of our great nation seeking veterans who may still need help.

They say not a day will go by that I won't have helped at least one person better their situation. Most days it will be several. I know this, mine will now be among them.

One Hour Photo

2011-09-16T18:33:00.000-07:00

One hour! maybe more! The "housemates" are grocery shopping... that's an hour of travel time at least, then add the shopping cart paces...

Yippee! I want to run around nekked... I want to dig into the ice cream... I want to cut my hair and see if anyone notices... play loud music... put in a sappy movie... make a mess...

Alas, there is something wrong with the music files (all digital) :o( and I promised myself I wouldn't have ice cream for a couple weeks. And, well... I just did cut my hair a few days ago and they have yet to notice...

It is not enough time. After months of being pinned to other human beings 24/7, an hour is just not enough time. One of those multi-day vacations, maybe. Where you can read your book in the bathtub and nobody comes in to pee next to you. Where not even the cat can reach you when she wants some milk out of the refrigerator. That's more like it.

Maybe I'll set up the tent. :oP

... And We're Back.

2011-09-14T10:58:00.000-07:00

This installation includes a delightful selection of philosophy from Moshe Feldenkrais, from Awareness Through Movement. First published in 1972, it contains timeless snippets of wisdom with that distinctive air as only belongs to our elder, less commercialized predecessors.

But first, the news. I've been wondering if from time to time my random imaginings should again make it to print. Of course it's really great when people acknowledge them, and I love commenting on others' pages too, but I believe there was a time when sending my bottled messages into the aether did spike a feeling of loneliness for me. Little did I realize the messages coming back just weren't the same form in which I sent them. I've missed my blogging buddies and reading their precious insights. So here I am. Now, back to our story.

As many may be aware, the Feldenkrais method teaches that "As verbal abstraction becomes more successful and more efficient, man's thinking and imagination become further estranged from his feelings, senses, and even movements" but can be brought back into touch by certain motions (also poignantly illustrated in The Tao of Equus by Linda Kohanov, another favorite book). Leading to these exercises are a mere 60 pages, replete with stunningly keen observations, some of which follow:

The essential flaw in education as we know it today is that it is based on ancient and often primitive practices whose equalizing purpose was neither conscious nor clear. This flaw has its advantage since, having no defined purpose other than to mold individuals who will not be social misfits, education does not always succeed entirely in suppressing self-education.

Nobody knows the purpose of life, and the education that each generation passes on to the succeeding one is no more than a continuation of the habits of thought of the prevailing generation. Life has been a harsh struggle since the beginning of mankind; nature is not kind to creatures lacking awareness. Under such conditions of strain, education is improved only to the extent that is necessary and possible in order to bring up a new generation able to replace the old one under more or less similar conditions.

Still reading? This blew the stuffing out of me:

The basic biological tendency of any organism to grow and develop to its fullest extent has been largely governed by social and economic revolutions that improved living conditions for the majority and enabled greater numbers to reach a minimum of development (emphasis mine). Under these conditions basic potential development ceased in early adolescence because the demands of society enabled the members of the young generation to be accepted as useful individuals at the minimum stage.

The negative aspect of learning to achieve aims is that we tend to stop learning when we have mastered sufficient skills to attain our immediate objective. Thus, for instance, we improve our speech until we can make ourselves understood. But any person who wishes to speak with the clarity of an actor discovers that he must study speech for several years in order to achieve anything approaching his maximum potential in this direction. An intricate process of limiting ability accustoms man to make do with 5 percent of his potential without realizing that his development has been stunted.

How is such a vicious circle created, which at one and the same time stunts men's powers, yet permits them to feel reasonable self-satisfied for all that they have limited themselves to, a small proportion of their capacities? It is a curious situation.

Curious indeed. 'Til next time, lovies.

Peace and Love are Where We Make Them

2010-11-19T05:09:00.000-08:00

Hello, lovies.

Popping in after a long ol' time.

Admittedly I've had much fun with this blog and come to find more people who resonate with this pea-and-lizard-brained life of mine, sometimes using it as a confessional (see last post) - and by the way, have been riding the horses lately, without incident or hint of trouble, and LOVING IT!! There is nothing like the smell of a warm furry horse on a chilled autumn ride. Happiness.

I have ceased to write about the drama in my life b/c I thought giving it an audience would hasten it's departure. (Did I use that apostrophe correctly? Possessive, right? sheesh) But it keeps happening, and I'm questioning the Taoist principle that focusing on the negative seems to bring more negative...

Have been out of work for over two years, doing everything and anything I can to keep this little family of mine together, the cat and the boys and sometimes Jeremy too... and I can only say that bad things happen. To good people, to bad, in-between, or however we're feeling that day.

Roommie trouble, living with ex-in laws (oh boy!) and getting run off a horse boarding property by a crazy drunk... ahhh, there is too much to tell. A decent friendship just blown off, not ending but not continued... such are the ways of the world, I suppose. Sadness everywhere, on everyone's face from one time to another. How can people constantly choose to live this way? I see joy in sunlight, blessing from rain, love in a chickadee eating berries off the vine. This is also everywhere I look.

I just don't understand why people must endure needless suffering. Or cause it in another.
But I'm letting it go.

Now.

Dashboard Confessional.

2010-06-03T13:43:00.000-07:00

He goes by many names.
Here, especially, he's Wind In His Tail. His registered name is Joe Cool, but due to his bloodline I had redubbed him (quite unofficially) War Dancer (coming from - of all beings - Man O War and another later, lovely beast Native Dancer). Due to his extreme personality at times I have renamed him War Child, and at his worst War Criminal. Ha. Otherwise we just call him Happy.

Yes, literally, he has a smiley on his shoulder. And you've probably already seen the heart on his butt. He does have a LOT of heart, a big one, but that belies his nature to misbehave at any opportunity. Recently I've had an opportunity to take him camping and riding with some friends and, during his refresher courses, he has demonstrated his more apt moniker, Demon Child.

Not only has he fractured one of J's fingers by getting the leadrope tangled and jerking him about, he has many times pounded us on the top of our noggins with his steely chin, shouldered us into walls, posts, and other such, but the last in this string was him beginning to paw the ground (just being haltered in the stall was evidently an outrage) except the top of my hoof - sorry, my VERY human FOOT - directly in the path of the downward forceful strike.

So ONCE AGAIN I had to face the inevitable decision, as I had already thrice before, to keep or to find a home? Four times have I been thrown by this animal. Once resulted in concussion. My foot has looked like this a few times, one or the other. He acts like a racing stallion the minute I walk in the barn. Tearing back and forth from the outside to the inside stall, barely able to contain himself to be haltered, then it's the circus to the field...

Yes, babies, believe me I don't make it easy for him to act like this. He gets LOTS of ground training, backing up, circles, a few lashes of leadrope across his front legs when he strikes out and rears up.. I have had training, he has had training (and been TERRIFIC) we've done the natural horse-person-ship along with a more agressive (ahem..) Cowboy style (not proud, already told you this is a confessional..) with smacks on the snout for biting me on purpose (I know, I know, they say to never do that!) but if ANY of this worked for ONE SINGLE SECOND don't you think it would have in the last three years?? I've even ridden him around this beautiful property a couple times (he is much, much better under saddle.. riddle me that!?!) and yes, loves to have a job - needs to be doing something, for sure. But time after time, he is just. too. much. for me to handle on a daily basis, so he ends up in the field bugging the other horses.

Yes, he doesn't even treat THEM right. Not responsive to typical Leave Me Alone Now cues by others of his like. Keeps taunting like a naughty spoiled child. I have since had him either in stall or out alone where sometimes he can see other horses and sometimes not. He has gone for 3 days at a time in the field not eating, just running, running, looking more like a greyhound than a horse, but in the evening at least he gets hay and water, the only times I think he ingests anything (because his buddy is also in the barn, but not too close).

ALL THIS TO SAY THAT all this time I thought it was ME. That EYE was not a good horseperson. EYE was not confident or knowledgeable or capable. ME. And because Happy was such a drain on me, I ignored the other gentleman in my life (a lot of things in fact, in my life) because I kept trying to understand how I could fail so incredibly miserably. But once I began working with Louie, even though he had some of the same field-lazy habits that any horse seemed to develop, he came around within two days to understanding what I wanted from him. I tried the same behavioural stimuli with the other horses on the property. They all responded well too.

It was then I realized I had been duped, perhaps only by my own mind, but now understood I AM FINE. I AM A GOOD HORSEPERSON. HAVE MANY SKILLS. AM VERY CONFIDENT and capable and respectable by the equine community. Where else has this translated?!? How about in YOUR life? How many times have we banged our heads against the brick wall that is/was our partner/co-human anytime, anywhere, with our child, with some systems that don't seem to work no matter what we do??? Fortunately for me, I had/have another being to tell me "Yes! I get it. I understand your communication" to know that I wasn't just an equinary idiot. When even strangers are nicer to us than our (fill-in-the-blanks: family, lover, friends even) and respond to our very socially clear cues and conversation, then we finally can understand that MAYBE IT ISN'T US!! just the combination of 'usses' at the time. With Happy, I'm investigating the fact he may have been improperly imprinted, on human OR beast, and has a mental state akin to being autistic. I don't hate him or abuse him, but I do demand his concern for my personal safety while we figure it all out. We still have loving moments together.

A big AHA for a small matter. But that's how it works, these fractals. Atoms look like galaxies and systems behave similarly, quantum and universal. All of our answers are right there in front of us, in a drop of water, a flower petal, a puff of wind. Waiting for us to listen, to see. No gurus need be involved, simplicity is where you find it.

I'll leave you with a fave quote of mine, from Kung Fu - "When you cease to strive to understand, then you will know... without understanding."

Peace, honeys
<3

This.

2010-05-10T01:52:00.000-07:00

This little piece of black plastic goes to the back of my phone case, should I want to replace my belt-clip insert with a flat one, so the knob doesn't stick out.

Why is this important? Glad you asked!

Because I had thrown it away after weeks of tossing it from one hiding place to the next, sure that I would never have use for it. And I guess I still don't. But one day it hit me that I wouldn't have the OPTION anymore. After going through my bathroom garbage container like one would go through their computer recycle bin, I realized I had tossed my bath garbage into the curbside container.

Like a second, far more SERIOUS version of the computer recycle bin, yes I unloaded nearly a week's worth of non-recyclables (was only a couple grocery bags, now that I think about it, but still... ew.) - with cotton swabs and produce stickers grossing me out, dust bunnies hopping everywhere on the garage floor, I found it. I decided I was not going to stop rummaging until I did, and so... I did!

Yes, this one seemingly innocuous gesture, as you may have by now guessed by reading ANYTHING I have written in the last year, has led to far greater personal enrichment. Not only did I force myself to endure the yuck that I had to go through, but my hip was out of place, I was hobbling back and forth, the wind was just enough through the door to make a mess to sweep up... all these things I had considered prior to my undertaking, and said hell yeah, it was worth it just to show myself I could accomplish just ONE THING I set my mind to...

That actually led to me accepting a previously turned-down invitation to a dance gathering in the middle of nowhere, at which I had conducted my own baptism, stretched the limits of my compassion to a limitless state, and had a most enlightening time. Many MANY realizations followed that weekend hence, including what it is that I'm doing/not doing that is holding me back from happiness... not just that, but actually trying to FORCE myself into shapes that I just didn't fit.

That was nearly four weeks ago, honeys. As many of you put it, it is good to be out LIVING the life instead of just blogging about it. Not even sure if there are too many of you out there who still read this... I know my most loyal commenters, and thank you SO much, it does really make my day to see you there! And I will continue to check back with you too... but it will be sporadic. I know you understand. Life finally got interesting for me again, and I'm following the bliss where it takes me (with nod to Joseph Campbell).

Some of our mutual bloggers have taken hiates (totally made-up word) hiatuses? or outright changed their pages to begin anew.

Methinks I shall just keep blogging, not every day, or even every week - but once in a blue moon when something like THIS happens.

The Last Bite

2010-04-17T13:03:00.000-07:00

I've never finished my food
and enjoyed it while I sat

I get up as the last bite is chewed
to take care of this n that.

But this annoying habit is cheated
by saving the first bite for last

Thus, I convince myself to stay seated
until all the chewing's passed!

Hot Chicks

2010-04-11T09:27:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year, honeys...

and they are EVERYWHERE! can't go into a store without seeing them. Hearing them. MUST LOOK!!! no matter how hard I try to stay focused... So I took pictures to remember them by.

and in case Leghorns aren't your type, I have more bodacious beauties:

They run around the bins like little bugs, get tired, and fall into each other sleeping. Mostly they sleep propping their heads up on their beaks, and I even saw one fall asleep beak-first on top of another chick's head. LMAO. Some look up at me intelligently, wondering...

and here's one after my own hippie heart - not real, but I drive by it now and again and it always makes me smile!

IF YOU NEED A DOSE OF CUTE AND FURRY

2010-04-07T10:30:00.000-07:00

Yes, my horse wears his heart on his ass. Go figure.

The Grove Girls are OVER

2010-04-04T18:56:00.000-07:00

Well, honeys, all things come to their end... a bicker here, unkind action there, and BOOM! one roommate is asked to leave... a month later, I go away for a week to visit my mom in CA and look for work down there, and BAM! the other one moves out. No warning, to me OR the landlord!

It was hard for a long time. Things haven't been going well since November. And both times, before each roommie moved, it was ME, I had said that in order to let peace reign, I would be the one to leave. So here I am, the last Mohican. Wrong tribe, but you get the idea.

A new day dawns.

The Stuff of Life

2010-03-29T18:41:00.000-07:00

Here it is, honeys...

I unloaded my truck into a big bag, and brought the bag in the house. For a long time it just sat there, then I had a thought... what's in YOUR wallet?? Ha- well, take a look!

From the center, the purple blob you see there is a velvety zip-up hoodie, surrounded by a peach shirt and another grey hoodie. The large blue blob above it is a plush throw, and to the right of that is another blanket.

Going down you'll see my shopping bags (reduce, re-use, recycle!) and to the left of that, the softest towel ever! brown on one side and blue on the other. Going toward the upper left, you'll see a half-drunk bottle of wine, two six-pack carriers, a Round Table Pizza location flyer, and three pairs of shoes... my faux vinyl boots, my suede yellow walkin' shoes, and my blue jellies!!

With a nod to Dena, for once listing items she had in her trunk, I thought this may say something about me if I could only read the items, like tea leaves in the bottom of the mug...

What do you see? I'd like to know!
Thanks!

Greetings from the Farm!

2010-03-15T17:54:00.000-07:00

Oh my goodness, things have been irregular in the household. The whole situation needs an Ex Lax.
Any and all insight and comments would be welcome as I go through yet another change, another trip into the unknown ...

Early February I came back from a much-needed few days away from the Farm to find that one roommate had traded a couple days with me on the schedule - not just without asking, but even without INFORMING that the day after I got back I was expected on duty... and that the other roommate had turned my heat completely off in my room while I was gone. Not a big deal, unless you consider I usually have the heat on about 65 and otherwise it gets to the upper 30's, which not only can damage my CELLO (as all you stringy artisans know these instruments should be kept in a semi-constant environment) but my Army-induced arthritis in my neck and back is HELLA painful at those low temps, and it takes SO LONG to heat a room up 30 degrees with a baseboard heater...

So that was it. I told them peace out and I would find another place. I wasn't getting along with one of them anyway and the other is a manipo-holic, lying, tyrant of a princess. I gave the owner my lowdown, citing irreconcilable differences, and in a twist second only to the ending of REMEMBER ME, the owner told me she would rather kick THEM out and that I should stay. She supposedly gave a 30 day notice the first weekend in February.

Then I thought about being there 24/7 and decided since one of those roommates USED to be a friend, perchance we could solve issues between us (wow! what a concept! working something out instead of running away! but it is SOOO HARD honeys...) and she could stay with me.

I was supposed to go to CA to visit my mom in the care home beginning March, and spend time with my brother, now that he is talking to me again after 3 yrs of having cranial-rectal syndrome (he had his head up his ass). But since one roommie was on vacation and was SUPPOSED to come back, and we hadn't heard from her, I didn't want to leave the other for a week of doing horses herself so I told her I'd put it off til we heard from the other.

Well, it so happens that the vacationing one DID contact the other roommate, who just didn't see fit to inform ME so I could visit my mom(she has a thing about relaying messages, just 'isn't her responsibility'), she just let the other one come back at her leisure after I had J come down to help, since I had been covering the roommie not just on her vacation but the previous 3 weeks when she had hurt her foot and couldn't work on the farm.

...and since the one hadn't talked to the other yet about her needing to leave, and since it was the end of the first week in March, I sat her down and explained the situation to her. It was very amicable despite our previous head-butting (we are actually a lot alike) and both discovered that our roommie and ex-friend x 2 had lied and misled both of us on numerous occasions. Great. I just kicked out THE GOOD ONE. F%#@!!!

The one who is allowed to stay is the lying devious one, and the one who has been hot-headed, but honest and hard working, is out. But to the detriment of the first one, since I put off visiting my mom til next week, when she will have NO help taking care of the horses for 8 days. She doesn't want me to go, but I will not put off my family any longer - especially since she ruined her chance when the 3rd roommie was still around, in her short-sightedness.

ADD to the fact that the orchard people have been spraying in the fields. The first time the owner wanted the horses in for two days, then more sprayers came out - I contacted her and asked if she wanted the horses indoors for this one too but she never got back to me. They were there for two days and I figured if it was dangerous she would have said something. then I began to find dead birds on the property, and began having dizzy spells. over the next week it got so bad I was kneeling in front of the toilet and got so dizzy I would fall to the ground. I contacted her a week later and she said she'd find out what it was from the orchard manager.

ANOTHER week goes by and I'm ready to just pull up stakes, I wasn't even sure I would be able to drive to the store to get more groceries! I called her again to ask what she'd learned and she was upset at me, telling me I should call the guy myself cause she works all day and is busy!

Well that was it! I packed up and headed to WA, and spent a couple days recuperating. My symptoms began to subside and so I asked J to take my shift last weekend. J found the guy's phone number in a drawer at the house so I called him, only to find out they sprayed Lime Sulfur - a completely organic compound (like cyanide gas!), but extremely dangerous and fatal if swallowed, inhaled, or absorbed thru skin. He got a dressing down for not warning us before he sprayed, but he is somehow of the opinion it is safe, so that is what the owner thinks too. I'm pretty sure there is something illegal about spraying chemicals without notice to residents. I'm going to look into it. Peeps are depending on me!

Sunday Morning

2010-02-28T10:10:00.000-08:00

Sunday, and sunny... well, partly. Trying to get into the 50's and so heater still necessary... the boys are happily munching down the grass in the yard (they are still wearing their coats too!) I'm listening to music by Stars of the Lid... ambient and lazy, honeys... a tummy full of peanut-buttered garlic bread (oops, I think I just lost a couple of you), watching cat sleep... and my emotions are like the ocean: waves of one beautiful feeling after another, created from the thin, forever-calm, continuous line at the horizon. Thought I'd share with a pic that KINDA resembles this feeling, if any two-dimensional image can relay the myriad quantum actions inside us...

It Was a Good Day

2010-02-24T19:00:00.000-08:00

Today was one of those normal, albeit punctuated, days, the kind that are nice to have just to laugh and relax a bit and stop WORRYING about every damned thing...

Nevermind that my tax check to the US Treasury bounced, OOPS four days ago... or that I had to borrow money from (here it goes again, hate the term) ex husband to cover the truck payment while I shop for food at the dollar store again til next week's unenjoyment check... ;o)

When I got home from errands, I had barn chores to do, so what else makes the time go faster and more enjoyable than bringing a double dose of the best BLOODY MARY ever... and my cat! Since the berries are coming back from their long winter sleep and apparently 'need' insecticide, we've had to keep all the horses in the stalls for two days. Having gotten the message that the HAY DUDE now wants to spray fertilizer on his fields (and the pastures) tomorrow, we must keep the horses in aNOTHER two days... and they get their feet trimmed Friday so IN AGAIN... that is almost an entire week in the stalls when they are used to traveling across acres every day and they are FRUSTRATED!!

So I let them out in the lower pasture for a couple hours while I scooped the poop and cleaned the barn... only to witness one of the funniest home videos ever. Sans video. Happy was running with a couple other horses around the pasture and came to the gate end, only to find the space running out quickly! So he shored up and tried to pull too short around, ending up slipping onto his side and sliding another couple feet (which would have been embarrassing enough in front of everyone... and in case you didn't know, they DO get embarrassed!) only to bump his beak into the water tub at the last... you KNOW I was laughing my ass off. Which of course meant he hadn't hurt anything but his pride in the process.

It is one thing to describe, it is another to understand how incredibly HILARIOUS it is to watch a horse do something silly, only to be caught ashamed about it, oh honeys I wish I could relay the amount of tears flowing out my eyes from laughing so hard!

The barn eventually became clean enough for the horses to be brought in, and Cat was there at the door surveying each one as I led them through to their awaiting food... she is such a good girl. Finally we walked back up to the house, me stumbling and inebriated, she picking her little pink paws thru the gravel and mud, as the first sparkling stars of twilight appear.

It was a good day.

Tell me, honeys...

2010-02-12T09:46:00.000-08:00

Why is it when I decide to get more organized, things seem to get more complicated? Figuratively AND literally.

I straighten some things in my room; more stuff comes in from seemingly nowhere (when really it's just from the truck, or out of the horse trailer tack room and finding non-horsey items). I straighten things out in my closet, and find more stuff in my room that seems to just have a tangling orgy when I'm not looking!
When I need more light to see what the hell I'm doing, what used to be pleasant (my pink party bulb in my nightstand lamp) is suddenly nowhere NEAR enough.

Buddha might say that it is my WANTING of these things that brings their opposite.

Zen is being at peace with shadow and chaos as much as light and order.

I can see those things. But, BUT I really like finding things I'm looking for, and not pulling out cat's food bag, a sock, and a roll of TP when I'm only fishing out my laptop power cord... I want to be able to depend on things that I spend time and money into maintaining. I guess I really am attached to those expectations. Not knowing if your stove, your car, your PLANS are going to work... we really couldn't function if those things didn't go as expected at least some, or most of the time!

What if you had to? Our worlds get turned upside down all the time. If not us directly, then people we know. What if you lost your mate, then a month later your job, and then one of your cats, and your RV catches on fire... then your brother disowns you, and a longtime friend decides she likes her life better without you in it... and while you are moving you lose what's left of your belongings from the divorce... well, I'm being slightly redundant. That saga needed installations, for any who missed it the first time: parts One, Two, Three, Four, my Awakening and Hell Night.

We don't really OWN anything, do we, darlings!?

That is the test, when our stuff dispossesses US. That's when you know. What would you need for your basic survival? Your friends, family - who can you count on? It's not pleasant (especially in February) but think of it, honeys. Just for a moment.

Because of my experiences, and their proximity to each other, I feel aged, but closer to wisdom; jaded, but free. Free to see things as they really are, because what I wanted would have none of it! I'm not talking about wanting a diamond ring, or a kitten, or a house... I took Sheryl Crow to heart: "It's not getting what you want, it's wanting what you've got!" ~That was me! I was satisfied.

Whether jaded or free (or both?), I know now that the future, much like the silhouettes of those giant trees across the street in the evening fog, is only lovely because it's edges are still fuzzy.

(P.S. ~ I know that sounds fatalistic. It really isn't supposed to be. What needs saying too is that the rest is up to YOU!)

Valengine's Day

2010-02-08T09:34:00.000-08:00

OK, so Valentine’s Day is coming. And it can’t be over soon enough for me!! Now before you go making up your mind that I’m some kind of feminazi, or just someone who doesn’t get anything for this holiday, hear me out!

So every day after New Year’s – and some ways before even – we have to endure commercial after commercial (get the not-so-indirect point there!) on TV and radio, billboards… and if you’re like me, and happen to not own a TV and listen to your own CDs in the truck, and are lucky enough to be spared the billboard scene, you probably still will visit a grocery store and get hit in the face with a million of those floaty heart balloons and more pink flowers than your optic nerves can process.
Shameless, I tell you!

And what are they all hocking? From the side of the road even (in case you are one of the evidently MANY suckers who either forgot—or refuse—to put any thought into the gift or the meaning of this day) where you can find limitless rows of identically stuffed cellophane blobs full of…

And yes, this is my point… Chocolate, flowers, candy, bath foof, even silky robes and fluffy slippers, maybe a cute stuffed animal—are these the ingredients that apply to our population? NO!!

When do you ever see pre-season tickets, beef jerky, baseball caps, magazines, leatherman tools, maybe even fishing poles and bait happily wrapped in camouflage plastic? Do they even make cellophane decorated with camo?
How is this day supposed to be anything other than Make Your Vagina Happy Day? It is completely geared toward the fluffier parts of us.

Think of it—chocolate to elevate that snappish, foul, after-work mood, soft fluffy things to tame the nagging tongue because you know you didn’t take out the beer bottles like she asked you to, and happy bath stuff to keep her occupied for a while so you can actually do what you’ve always wanted after your day at work: to rest in the quiet, maybe sit with your socks on with your pants unzipped on the couch, and nibble on cold pizza while perhaps flipping through the channels with the remote all to yourself… Ahhhh!!!

Well, there it is. Now I guess I can see why it is some people still go for this stuff. If I think about it on that level, how it may actually be more manipulative than I first thought, how maybe it’s all a ruse and WE are actually the suckers—I may even get a bit upset… if I could only muster up the will after using my chocolate-covered fingers to find the faucet through all this foam, and turn off the bath water…

Egads, I've been AWAY!!

2010-02-07T13:02:00.000-08:00

It has been a TERRIFIC year for me so far, honeys, tho a tad chasing my tail it seems... I haven't read you all in such a long while it may take me a WEEK to catch up. But I will.

I have been a bit miserable at home but things are changing. In the meantime, while I concoct a story for you all, I will leave you with this bit of peace:

Wednesday Madness

2010-01-20T14:00:00.000-08:00

Well so much for the Monday regularity. I'd like to say I'll do it when my life is a bit more regular, but sheesh by now I guess it's time to admit, this IS my regular life! Order in Chaos.

So, enjoy. These peaceful moments are fleeting. Think not always what you have to do next. Take a few moments (however long they measure in REAL time) to think of nothing but beauty and peace.

Of course this is me talking to myself, but I just thought I'd let you in on the conversation~

I AM... The OTHER Woman.

2010-01-10T11:55:00.000-08:00

Mid-morning. He comes over, after everyone in the house has gone. We walk for hours, the two of us, ignoring that we are spending time with each other when our own loved ones are missing out. There is beauty, understanding, unspoken feelings that just seem right...

Yes, folks.

We hate them, we shame and shun them, sometimes we may say, You Go Girl, but we always hope she stays away from who belongs to us.

Why, you ask, when I have one at home who I love, and loves me in return? What sense does it make? Is it possible that I need more than just one? They aren't even the same sex.

Well, when you see this face, maybe you will be in love too...

Yes, Meathead.
But Meatie belongs to someone else.
Meatie himself does not even care to go home when he is with me.
He stays for sometimes days, even when I beg him to go home.

We go on our long walks... and this is the only view I get.

When I open the door in the morning, he is there, in the front yard, waiting to escort me on whatever business I have for the day.

Even when I'm cleaning stalls, he sits overlooking the valley where the puma and bear live, and says, No-one is going to harm you on my watch.

He hears the shrill voice of a woman calling him home when she discovers he's out roaming again.

He just turns and asks, Where are we going next?
He loves me better.

Sometimes I feel so torn.
Torn that I have to leave him outside when I eventually finish my duties outside. Torn when he sits at one door after another, knowing I am inside, whining to let him in from the cold. The cold air, the cold cement stoop, the cold woman who will chain him up the moment he goes back home.

Then there is Mew. How can I continue seeing him, spending all my time outside, when she is in here, ready to yell at me for being out... Why so long? she screams, in that crotchety, old-smoker, my-vocal-chords-are-going-out voice of hers. Then again, there are moments like these:
What is a human to do?!?

Resolutions?!? Shmesolutions!

2010-01-07T11:27:00.000-08:00

But. I will say that due to some thoughts and realizations of late, I have decided (coincidentally at the turn of the year) to only purchase groceries that come in no packaging, or recyclable packaging. There are so many options nowadays that I just flat refuse to throw one more thing in the trash. Because I am a very visual person and can see my backyard piling up with teabags, Trader Joe's Moochi packages, the seemingly innocuous plastic wrappers inside the recyclable cardboard... I'm DONE!

I'll use what is in my cupboard, but from now on I'm gonna be that crazy lady you see in the bulk food aisle, wearing the fashionably co-ordinated and colorful clothing, bringing her own bags to pick out fruits and veggies, the glass container that has been weighed at the checkout stand beforehand so the cashier can subtract the weight from the price of the goodies inside... remember in all the westerns how people had boxes to put all their sundries in? How nobody, once proudly astride their steeds, ever just rode around tossing fast-food containers and candy bar wrappers in the streets? Well. Call me .... whatever. Maybe it's living on the farm. Maybe it's the roommates' constant drivel about composting (howabout you EAT what you COOK) and who is going to take the bucket down to the composter by the barn. Maybe it's having vegetarian horses. Maybe it's becoming more aware of living a simpler life. Maybe it's my watching the old episodes of Kung Fu (and writing a book of the great quotes therein).

Whatever it is, honeys, it has got me.

Happy New Year!

2010-01-06T09:09:00.000-08:00

Lots of changes in just the last couple months, some people are beating the big C, some are moving away from the past and going forward with their future (even if it isn't in Florida) and some have loved and lost... others are finding themselves, and continue to explore what it means to be parents. And people. Just plain people.

Dream big, honeys. We all deserve it.

It's just a couple days late...

2009-12-30T13:19:00.000-08:00

But... this week we are in Hawaii!!!

I've put down the drums for a ukulele.

Good Monday!

2009-12-21T08:05:00.000-08:00

Here's your chance to get away to your own private little island. Everything you ordered is waiting just on the other side of it... What are YOU bringing?

Dr. Cheeks is running a little behind...

2009-12-18T12:25:00.000-08:00

I've missed two precious Mondays. Guess it's harder to form these habits than I thought... so, until Monday, here is another dreamscape. Everyone is busy these days (even me!) and trying to catch up on posts, and post themselves... but the big huggy lovin is still present and accounted for. Peace, honeys.

Joyon

2009-12-02T08:31:00.000-08:00

Many of you know, or may have guessed, because (some or most) of my posts are replete with them, that I'm a die-hard wordsmith. And here we go again.

If a moron is so termed due to the fact that whatever else may be true, they just can't help it, they just seem to say and do dumb things... (I may fit into that category myself) (but this was more for comparison) then what can I call someone who keeps triumphing, despite the odds or circumstances, over the hurt feelings, bad luck, and hopeless-looking situations? Yep, a Joyon.

Things have been looking up for me in this last week, thanks all who sent happijoy thoughts and warm hugwishes my way... I finally have some lights ahead, and the tunnel is a lot shorter.

Season's greatings, everyone... I know, I know, I can't help myself. No there are no spelling errors here. Insert clip of old Dr Pepper commercial...

A Case of the Mondays

2009-11-30T11:37:00.000-08:00

Okay, my sweet honeys, because there are SOME people still left in the world working, and because other people may just need a pick-me-up, AND because some of you lovely people have traditions that I LOVE (Thinkin' Thursdays, Windy's old ritual, uh... there are others)

Here is my contribution. I have savored some of these in fantastical mind-wanderings and now you get to share. One each Monday. A new paradise. A beautiful place to dwindle away a few minutes. Because I'm damn tired (already?) of forty degree weather, and because we can dream!!!

So enjoy, and do like I do, picture yourself running around in the blue, lazing away in the shade, and WHATEVER ELSE until that sun sets and the beach party begins... listen to me on those drums! You'd think I was born here!!
What about you??

Where I'd LIKE to Be Right Now

2009-11-28T23:41:00.000-08:00

It's likely I'll not be visiting THERE soon, I forget exactly where this is - Tana Lot - so, I put on some hiking shoes and wandered the hundred acres here again. Here is what it looks like.

The raspberry vines are all cut back and newly tied up for winter. Glum, but the sky was nice.

The strawberry fields, as well, are colorful yet yucky: The berries are taken over by slugs and insects even before they can turn red. Bummer. I'm not one for pesticides, but sheesh...

What can I say? The sky turned back to grey!! Sigh... Cool thing is, if you click on it, you may be able to see what I saw with my naked little eyes, that the tall pines on the coastal mountains were silhouettes against the muted sun. The scene was pretty unreal, and not nearly as depressing as it appears here.

Moss Farm. Only on the western edge of the strawberries, the softest, most exquisite stretch of at least three different types of moss and/or related green things spread out like a fairy carpet.

Meathead. This 100-lb Rottie beast belongs to a neighbor and visits when he wishes. For size comparison, I tried to get him to stand next to a barn, but he sat on it. It is barely visible, sticking out there beneath the lower half of his body.

Some big ol' paw prints. Just for shits n giggles, I had Meathead step beside the gigantic tracks you see here. His normally enormous foot print is visible next to the bottom most print, you can barely make out his smudgy toe prints and claw marks in this mud - making the size and weight of this mystery animal OBSCENE. We got scared and quickly ran back to the house.

Panties

2009-11-24T16:30:00.001-08:00

Someone sent me this in an email recently. Still on the fence about it. Maybe I like the message. Maybe there are things just too complicated to be solved by undergarments. Or maybe I just soiled my last pair of big girl panties.

some poetry while my heart sleeps.

2009-11-20T20:55:00.000-08:00

You stretch your wings across the face of the Earth… everything is motionless before you. You glide, silent; you are the difference between day and night…
You are Shadow.

You watch the People grow gaunt and weary; you make whole villages so thin and dry that even the ground beneath them cracks, and still the rain refuses to visit; now only their caricatures are left in the rock formations of the canyons…
You are Want.

You easily and constantly cover the land; there is always something new. You permeate the oceans, but the liquid must be so heavy, so slow. You’ve been everywhere at least once; they say there are places you’ve forgotten, but these are just places which you simply did not wish to see often…
You are Time.

Your reach is immense; your domain is the outermost to the innermost places… in some you are cold, but in others your fire is unsurpassed. You are the massless expanse of the invisible plasma that binds all things, and if you stretch your arms as wide as you can, your fingertips will touch…
You are Space.

Will Work For Hay

2009-11-19T14:41:00.000-08:00

My "Living in the Sky" is not meant to say that life is fluffy. It often isn't. Nor to say that I'm way UP HERE and everything else is below somewhere... I have gotten calluses from having my face in the dirt, A LOT.

It is only to say that I have given in to the River, the river of life and things that are, were, and things that are yet to pass. After reading the wonderful Eat, Pray, Love (thank you Clare and Dawn for your simultaneous coincidental suggestions) I realize there are others out there who have had the All is One experience and realize humans have so little, and yet so much, to do with the workings all around us. Baffling, it is. Sometimes.

Which leads me to now be able to tell you how scary life in the sky can be. The lowest limits of the bottom of the barrel sank over a week ago for me. OOPS I couldn't find a job before my unenjoyment ran out. Sorry, you had your chance...

Humor, love, hope... all seem so far away right now. I live, it seems, for pictures from Florida, all your stories, poems, watching Ames move halfway across the country... and I have been doing all THAT for a long time, but now I'm avoiding thinking about the bank repo-ing the truck, having to buy food at the Dollar Store, and heaven forbid... look for someone who can take care of The Boys. I dunno what life would be like without my horses. I don't wanna know.

Thank goodness I live in a place rent-free and I get a hundred bucks a month for VA Disability (egads) but my injury continues to worsen, and (I didn't want to tell everyone) looks like I may need surgery (good ol' VA) for either my spinal injury or the carpel tunnel that it is causing so bad that the docs want to schedule me now. Every day of stall mucking and sweeping is murder on my hands and arms, but if all I have to pay for my livelihood, and my life, is pain, I've got that in spades.

There are some nice people at the unemployment and VA places who I've been talking to and who may be able to help me somehow, starting with food stamps. I'm sure I'll feel better next week. When I (gulp) turn 40. If anyone has any smile-makers, now is the time people (I saw the baby and dog on Rocket's blog, and have already cheered for the Big Blue Crab)...

Captcha - Part Deux

2009-11-13T09:58:00.000-08:00

I've been saving these up, but am lacking a certain sense of humor to make a good post of them lately... So I'm just choosing some of my faves, ones that happened to make me laugh today. Which is to say the list would be different each day... but oh well, here goes.

This is cute. Like the plural of CACTUS, to silly people like me.

It just sounded funny cuz it rhymes with Feces. Hey, I never said I didn't enjoy the poop humor. I do.

OK, this one just made me laugh out loud.

There are PLENTY of utilizations for this one...

...and again, with the crude humor. I could begin a new word trend with my friends in L.A.

This is something that may pop out of Mr. Bush's mouth at any given time, given his predilection for such accurate speech and his recently picked-up Texan accent... don't get me started. He didn't have this accent growing up. Oh wait, I got me started. Sorry.

This one is just too damn cute. Still can't think of any use for it. Feel free to help me out with any of these... would love your input. You are all funny and make me laugh, have at it!

Dedicated to the Refocksa Family

2009-11-12T16:24:00.000-08:00

Ah, The Days of SUMMER!!!

2009-11-11T10:59:00.000-08:00

What happens when you mix three girls, costumes, whiskey, and one very compliant gentleman horse?

No, just the picture we put on our housewarming party invite. We took something like 50 photos, all of which I wish I could put up here, there are good ones, bad ones, VERY bad ones... well. I'll see if I can get them from my roommie's camera.

I love looking at them because I can remember getting sweaty in my cowboy shirt and chaps, back when the grass was green in the pastures and there wasn't so much MUD and MUCK to trample through everywhere... the skies were full of big white puffies, we played music a lot in the kitchen -

And now my old bones are bitten from the cold, the grey skies go on forever... I don't even want to get up to feed myself let alone the horses, the cat... I actually sit and think, how long can the litter box go between changes? And is there a way I can unnaturally prolong it? Cat refuses to use the oh-I-wish-I-had-this bed I made for her, an overstuffed-undersized cloud of a bed lined with a heating pad, whose controls I just push, and five minutes later she could be snoozing in her own steamy comfort... but no! she continues to crawl under MY new comforter, the down-alternative 300-thread-count, no-I-don't-wanna-wash-this-each-week comforter. Thusly, I have cat fur EVERYWHERE. Shiaat.

Well, sometimes I get smart (see! it can happen to anyone!) and recently here are some of my smarter ideas: I bought a desk lamp, brushed nickel finish with a 120-watt bulb, for $5 from the Goodwill, and the bright light helps banish my gray days (see, Windy? I don't know what the diff is either so I used one of each for good measure). The heat from the incandescent bulb too keeps my little bedroom from growing icicles. And if I put it next to me, sometimes even resting it on my legs... well, it gives off some heat to these cramping, cold muscles. Also literally shines heat onto my frozen toe-cubes.

I also went shopping at a discount store for some bubble bath, some GREAT smelling soap (I now have enough to last a small army 'til next summer) and the softest, cuddliest two-dollar socks I've ever held in my little hands! Putting one pair on last night, I turned them inside out, and my feet were so happy they spread the joy right up to the corners of my mouth!

After twenty minutes of lolling around in tropical olive-oil and basil-scented heaven that is my steam bath (for which I intentionally do NOT turn on the exhaust fan), closing my eyes to the bright heat lamps shining like an island sun down on me, and opening them again to see streams of their light through the steamy mist... putting my fuzzy socks on, and blow-drying my hair (a treat I hardly ever give myself), I feel the cockles warming up enough - even the sub-cockles - to motivate me to make some stew, or hashed browns, or some other lovely comfort food, and put my blankets and (down-alternative!) comforter in the dryer for a while to de-fur them for the next night's sleep.

I am watching the hurricane, and hope soon our Floridian sisters and brothers will be able to enjoy some peace soon!

Autumn Sky Morning

2009-11-04T10:35:00.000-08:00

Clare took this photo. I'm thinking of replacing my butt-on-a-rock pic but I'm just not committed to it yet.

A Smattering of Stuff...

2009-11-03T09:09:00.000-08:00

The trees around here are all but barren and I still haven't posted the pics I took a month ago. I plan to remedy that today.

And, I'm getting worn ragged, honeys! We've implemented a de-alpha-tization plan for Louie, my 7 yo used-to-be-good equine. Since he thinks he's such the top dog, with all the other horses under his command, we give him some time alone and some time with the old folks (our resident 25 and 37 -year-olds who don't give a honk about alphas) and I used to keep Happy with the young-uns... that lasted about a week til I found some righteous teethmarks in about 5 places on Happy's shoulders. Huge scar-lookin, will-the-hair-really-grow-back marks... and I pulled him outta there. problem is, with four horses together, H + L + the old folks, Lou has a chance to be alpha again, so I usually have to separate him by himself - the rest of the horses are great, but then HE gets in an uproar... and you know that stressed horses can lead to sick horses...

Not to mention that it's harder to bring the old gents in at night like we're supposed to when there are four horses gnashing at the gate... I'm about to pull my hair out. The pasture I COULD keep H & L in would be great, since it's separated from everyone and makes things peaceful... but we've been getting those nasty wind and rainstorms and that pasture has ZERO shelter. I end up rushing out in the middle of the night and putting them in stalls. Yes, twice, at midnight... geez no wonder l'm getting burned out on this...

Sorry to unload like this. last night and this morning were oh so challenging and I'm oh so tired... would be easier to have them in runs with shelters all the time. They'd be happy, I'd be happy... sigh. At present the plan is to wait til the gents have been put in the barn for dinner, then my two go into that pasture cuz it has a shed. Then before the gents come out for breakfast, I put my two in the barn to eat. I have to separate them or stand and wait til they eat cuz Lou is getting fat again and Hap's getting skinny from having his food stolen - he's a slow eater. Then I put them into the no-shelter pasture for the day til dinner. so that is where we're at.

And I had a really weird dream the other night - many nights in fact recently - and I find it interesting that this happened on Hallowe'en, when as they say the veil is the thinnest between worlds... not that I haven't had dreams of my ancestors on many other occasions, they show up in the oddest places, doing their pow-wows, dances, or just telling me things. This was a dream that these old ancestors were dressed in 'western clothing' and laughing about not wearing skins and such this time around... and we were all waiting for Leonard Peltier to give a radio address.
As far as I know he is still imprisoned...

My senile cat is waking me up it seems all hours of the morning, and even when I try something new like leaving my bedroom door open for her to wander about (she spends 99% of her time in my room) she wanders about wailing like a pinched child. I end up taking off one sock at a time and throwing them at her so that if the first one didn't make my point of SHUT THE HELL UP the second one usually does. She ends up running for cover and I get a few more minutes. I don't know how to deal with this w/o giving her tranqs every night... there goes her liver!!

Any thoughts or suggestions on any of the above??

Diaphanous Noodles

2009-10-29T16:38:00.000-07:00

It first became apparent with Denis Leary, in his comedy No Cure For Cancer. Besides that being hella funny, it hit on how different adults are from children in what is acceptable activity in any place at any time. If I were Shane Rocket or someone remotely adept at splicing a piece of that skit here, I would. Find and view when you can.

But to paraphrase, kids can stand in the grocery store and act as if they were on the playground, swinging arms about, thith-puth-puthing unthinkingly, and show joy or anger at a moment's notice, maybe even in the same moment... those of you with children or have been around any know what I'm saying is true... they are not hiding any emotions when their disappointment becomes apparent by throwing a fit on the floor, even as it escalates to rolling on their side and running in circles, "Curly Stooge-style" and embarrassing the funk outta anyone who knows them.

So, as funny as shit as I think that is, it does spill over, in my raucous mind, into the rest of things I've heard, read, and seen about "child-like" behaviour that we adults have stopped appreciating. I've heard many a philosph(er)(y) likening the true awareness of being to the mind of a child, mainly in our view of things as always new, before the cares and burdens jaded us into such structured modes of thought. Before we decided the us-and-them, I-like-this-but-not-that that makes our lives easier by predetermining our actions, and reactions, to the gifts the universe gives us (even when they don't immediately appear as such).

But beyond this, observe in yourself your reactions to many things, and compare them, if you can, to similar stimuli in child-land. In your hands, can mud and rocks really become chocolate pie? That giant piece of kelp, the whip of the Gods and you, Neptune, running down the beach in your invisible chariot? When was the last time you watched clouds? Not, I'm on my way to the car from work, gee that cloud is cool -- uh uh. I'm talking, blanket out, give it half an hour, look at the shapes-kind of watching. Have you word-smithed lately? made one word into a perfectly legitimate cognate that didn't previously exist, using normal rules of grammar? Or on the freeway, in the parking lot, in the park, called someone a dodohead instead of the other colorful things we consider more adult-like? and are they really?

And when you are scared, can you scream without feeling that you are unnecessarily bringing attention to yourself? Jump up and down, wave your hands? What about crying in public? If you become frustrated with someone, how much more readily do you grin, bear it, and stew on it for a completely arbitrary length of time? Rather than tell them that they are behaving badly, and that you may be forced to stop sharing lunch with them, stop being their friend, and not give them candy at Hallowe'en? Because then, the lost art of laying blame at the feet of the problem shows it's mighty magic: the offending situation is addressed right away, letting the responsible party(ies) deal with it as they will, potentially showing their true colors, and potentially highlighting a heretofore-unknown behaviour that they need to address, and the offended party goes home without the shoulder and neck strain that usually occurs when, as they say, the mind overrides the body's urges to choke the shit out of some asshole who desperately needs it. Justice is served, in either case - you find out who your friends are, or who they aren't... surely we can amend this logic and response to apply to situations with our mates, or bosses, our community...? Who would we be if everyone could be completely real?

I have recently begun a new read on a very old book called The Feldenkrais Method, in which movement holds the key to our conscious - both in having it "written" in our muscles and ligaments, and also how moving can help us deal with emotions. To wit: the child, having been caught doing something they oughtn't, is face-to-face with the authority figure (parent, teacher, man driving the car with the egg on windshield) and is looking down, ashamed, swinging arms like Maypole streamers from side to side, body twisting, possibly stepping from one side to the other - moving to help ease the unease created in the body by being strapped under the microscope, dissected and naked in front of another.

Conversely, now imagine (or remember) as an adult, being called into the boss' office at work, or being pulled over for that emergency three-lane change you did to keep from having to go thru that pain-in-the-ass turn around that next exit... one thing or another - and how still you sat; how you wrung your hands under the table til your knuckles were nearly bleeding; how tight you held your lips to keep your mouth shut; how your guts inside squirmed to make up for how you couldn't; what can POSSIBLY happen to all that energy pent up inside? It has to go somewhere, an outlet - into your joints, your myofascia, your jaw, your neck... and how many other, little, smaller upsets do we experience in our day? They have less impact, but add up. No wonder the 'experts' say exercise is key for not just mental health (the cobwebs really do clear fast) but that it forces your tissues to get these pent-up experiences OUT. Literally.

Which brings us back to playing hard, drinking lots of water (try kool-aid! it makes everything better! especially if you get unsweetened and add Stevia!! guilt-free!!) and eating a gazillion times a day. Let our tongues be stained for an afternoon. MAKE FACES. Buy - and use! - crayons and drawing paper. Take that Sharpie at work and make hats and mustaches on faces in the magazines. Everywhere you go. Develop a signature work! And take some time to scream. By yourself, in car, whenever you can - if you feel like it.

I tell you what, I discovered this whole notion of child-like thinking and behaviour (as opposed to child-ish) a couple years ago, and it has freed me of so many things... I believe my overcoming fibroid tumors and polycystic ovarian syndrome and the related insulin resistance syndrome is due to this one, simple thing. I may not have written a blog about it, honeys, but yes I received just a few months ago a clean bill of health, from blood to ultrasound - a lifetime disease, disappeared without a trace.

All due to the joy (I believe, plus the pseudo-regimen I describe in an earlier blog here) that comes from being 100% honest with the world. No more facades. No more taking stress home from not being present or willing to say things that needed sayin when they needed sayin. As in one of my favorite movie lines ever, from Regarding Henry, "Just say when." Well, like Harrison Ford's character, I said when. And haven't turned back.

Just try it on for a day - see how it fits.

Just for Fun

2009-10-24T09:44:00.000-07:00

Here's some shots I've been collecting the last month.

The horses made it into the yard...
I was compelled to rename the place to Spotland Yard in honor of the occasion.

I always love these on my bills. It sometimes seems like an appropriate idea for some people, too. As in, can we make T-shirts?

So whoever thought of chocolate-covered bacon is either a genius, or has a deficiency issue in their olfactory system...

What a comfy dog, Opal!

I call it "Morning Tail." Not nearly as exciting as any other rendition of that term.

And, the sleeping child. Who could resist snapping a pic of an otherwise impossible feat, sleeping at right angles.

What is it?!?

2009-10-21T10:18:00.000-07:00

While having a big education about multi-culturalism during my time at a non-profit, there were so many things to appreciate and enjoy about people we hardly get to see in our institutionalised society. So much so that I have fantasies of going to places like India, Japan, Morocco...

But why is there always a flip side? Don't go there, you'll get AIDS... or there, you'll be kidnapped and sold into the slave market. Oh, they don't view women fairly there, oh and there, they hate that you don't speak their language so everyone is rude. Then there are the conditions in which the inhabitants live. Where poverty makes OUR poverty look not so poor. Where people are maimed by their own governments, or killed, through either crooked/unjust means, or sometimes sanctioned. Why, why, why?!? Does it have to be that way.

My shameful optimism just wants to take all the vivid colors, all the beautiful rituals, all the good things that people of means in those countries enjoy... I think even if I had the chance I'm not sure I could visit all the places of my fantasies, for fear of inadvertently supporting nasty regimes. And so I continue living in the sky. Always looking at the beautiful places from afar.

Our House

2009-10-18T23:47:00.000-07:00

There was a yellow house.

In this house grew a little boy.

He had great times in the backyard, climbing on a boulder and eating the fruit of the pear tree.

Once he ran into a BIG cobweb in the back and nearly bounced off of it, it was so strong.

And across the street there was a lady, she had a dog named Simon. He was a very good dog.

Simon and the little boy played in the lady's backyard too, it was so big, and there was so much to do for a little boy and a dog.

The lady even had a horse which the little boy rode once, except the horse ran under the branch of a little cottonwood tree and knocked him off! And stepped on him, too! But he wasn't hurt.

But now the little yellow house is gone. The backyard has been cleared, the boulder moved. Four new houses now stand in its place. The lady across the street is gone, along with her dog and horse, her house for sale. The lowest branch of the cottonwood tree is 2 stories off the ground.

This is what it looks like now. And the little boy is all grown up.

Lions and Horses and Bears... Oh SHIT!

2009-10-16T20:39:00.000-07:00

1) Lions
So yesterday the Grove Girls - which is what we called ourselves from a party invitation and the moniker stuck - were grooming, blanketing, and turning out some very eager horses back to the pasture from being in for three days. One was due to the weather, the other two days were waiting for the farrier, to give all our beauties their manicures. He ended up not showing up either day. So we were giving them back to the wild... more wild than we anticipated!

Clare says, looking up the road/hill that goes up to the far pasture, "Hey, look - someone's cat is chasing a deer." I jumped out of the barn in time to see, running across the dirt road from the fenceline into the raspberries, a deer indeed... followed by a puma chasing it, swiping its front paws at the hind of the deer in an attempt to knock its legs out from underneath. Just like you see in the Wild Kingdom shows. They generally attack from above by jumping and biting prey, I guess something went wrong with that plan.

There was a second deer, who WAS running along with his buddy until he went and got himself in trouble... but he was confused, ran across the road after the cat, so that it was deer-cat-deer, but something must have seemed wrong about that particular order to him, because he turned and ran back across, but turned again and looked after his buddy, obviously wondering what to do? Yeah, that can get pretty confusing, buddy, chasing the guy who is trying to eat your friends.

We saw the tracks in the mud today, and measured from one set of deer tracks to the next... 20 feet. Someone was in a hurry.

2) Horses
OK, so like I mentioned above, we had to take each horse out one at a time, brush it, pick the poop n stuff out of their hooves, and blanket them before sending them out. It has begun the rainy season in earnest, and there is something called RAIN ROT that happens sometimes up here on the horses, and other livestock I'm sure. Wet coats + mildew and mold in the air + warm bodies to help them grow on fur = lots of itchy skin and multiple baths with medicated shampoo. Great if you can avoid it - bring on the waterproof blankets.

Except Monty decided he didn't want to have his hooves picked clean. Spoiled brat that he is, all 1500 lbs of him - he is a jumper breed and extremely tall, and OH SO full of himself. I lifted the first of his back legs - did I mention he was bred to JUMP? - and the little shit kicked me off of it.

It wasn't the typical HOOF to the BODY and... the ribs are broken. Or collarbone, in most cases. Sometimes face, where plastic surgery comes in handy. No, this was quite the angelic-rescue story (and I have a few). Imagine me, standing with my right side against his rear end facing the opposite way he faces, bent over with his leg in my hands - his hock (flat bony part of the lower leg) caught me under the left ribcage, and just... kinda... lilted me into the air, and back two feet. Now, at three feet, we are talkin' - into the back wall of the barn. No good. Two feet - still on the mat, not on concrete or 2x4 beams... better. And to top it off, I did a 180 somehow, whilst flying through the air, only to land on the mat face first, arms out, kinda on the knees for a split second but immediately pretty flat out, limbs and all.

I didn't feel a thing. I got up, and I think he even surprised himself... but, yes, a little discipline was necessary. Not what you might think though. I was surprisingly not angry, scared, or ruffled in any way. Just took him out of the barn and made him do a few circles using the lead rope. He was still flustered from being inside so much. Later on I ached a lot and needed a hot shower.

I did tell the owner that his back feet are going to be pretty dirty until he gets to the trainer.

3) Bears
The farrier shows up an hour early today to trim feet. A day late and an hour early. So absurd it made us laugh. He had to wait on US to get the horses in. Now THAT was funny. We told him about our wildcat story. He said he was going to report it as a sighting to the fish n game service here. They like to know where the cats are, to keep eyes out for missing livestock etc. I guess they may have something to worry about once the deer run out. Like it evidently has in Eastern Oregon, where hundreds of big cats are reportedly killed by the government for overpopulation. Unresearched stories...

He discloses he is a hunter of many a wild beast. We decided to escort him to the back door of the barn, where not ten feet from the door there are large diggings in the soft soil, which is laced with barn shavings and horse poop from years past. That's no deer, no cat. No, he says. Definitely bear. Digging for ants, grubs, mushrooms... this time of year they 'load up' on anything they can find to prepare for the ultimate nap.

Yeah. Bear. Oh my. What if it tries to come after one of the old horses? they are penned up at night like TV dinners! Well, it happens in the movies! And one night this week, about 10 pm, I went to check on the horses but couldn't make it past our little fenced yard, let alone to the barn. Something was watching me, you all know that feeling I'm talkin' about... it was starin' HARD, too, I got the biggest willies... I had to have an escort, just 25 yards or so to the barn door, but damn, it is dark out there, and so many places to hide... not that it helped when we got back up to the house, let the dog out to pee, and it barked a ferocious little storm up. Geez.

Well, out of the frying pan of desert snakes, into the zoo...

Some Cool Stuff...

2009-10-16T08:16:00.000-07:00

to make up for the last few blogs that have been a bit lacking in the COOL department...

This Conversation Has Been Moved to the Trash.

2009-10-15T16:32:00.000-07:00

How is it some people find it so easy to trash relationships?

Is it that they are unable to trust or be trusted... or unwilling? Why does someone find it easier to lie to a "friend" - maybe it isn't easier, but habitual. Self-serving. Pre-serving.

And how is it one little questionable interruption in a conversation can turn into a full-blown blow-out? Can a relationship actually end over something so slight, like "I have to get off the phone, my food is burning on the stove..." ???

Which turns into:
"Your food isn't really burning, you took another phone call. "
"No, really my soup was burning and I just spent the last 10 minutes scrubbing the muck out of the pan."
"I may be paranoid, but I'm not stupid. I didn't hang up right away and heard nothing on the other end. Don't you think burning beans makes noise?"
"It might if I had taken the phone with me to the kitchen instead of throwing it down on my knit hat on the dresser in the bedroom. I don't imagine you'd hear anything."

Why the hubbub, bub? If you don't want to make a certain effort, don't tell me one thing and do/think another. And worse yet, return to your original story and think I won't remember what you said a week ago. Or manipulate me into spending money just cuz you want something.

I don't even like your furniture. You can keep it.

2009-10-12T09:15:00.000-07:00

I'm tidying up my room, rearranging some pieces. I clear a space for my CD player w/ speakers.

Since the CD player is currently located in the kitchen, I walk in to retrieve it.

While there, I remember it's lunchtime and I haven't made lunch yet, plus getting hungry.

So I get the leftover soup out of the frig to get it started warming up.

But the pan I want to use is dirty. I begin washing it, then move on to the other dishes that need washing.

There were to many dishes in the drying rack, so I had to put some away to make room for the wet ones.

By this time I had water etc on the countertops, and so had to wipe them down.

So about 20 mins later, I got the soup in the pan and turned it on, got my CD player, and went back to my room.

AM I INSANE?!?

I'm painting again!

2009-10-09T09:53:00.000-07:00

Not with the oils I enjoyed so much in University, but a little something I started of my own after that.

It's watercolor. First I start with the big pieces, and fill in color...

... then I use various kinds of markers to make details, like so... (uh, obviously not the same picture, but you get the idea.)

These are beginnings, but I have been thinking to get back into it, for what now, eight or nine years? Jumpin' Jehosephat!! What the hell has happened over the last decade? Where was EYE??

Well. No time like the present.

A Reprieve

2009-10-08T09:59:00.000-07:00

The woman who came out this morning was hit up by me with 20 questions about what was happening to the horses. As it turns out, they are going to another home, yes permanently, but to someone who wanted her grass kept down (!!!! :) :) :)

A save. I wonder if she knows.

Then again, I wonder if she will be able to handle them. They need their feet trimmed, wormed twice a year, their immunizations against icky equine diseases that are traveling around... and from what I heard, she may not be able to get out and catch these ladies once they get hold of some real estate, you hear what I'm sayin?

Alas, unless they get selenium supplements daily, as here in the NW we are deficient in our grasses, they will develop their own set of nutritional issues... why can I never leave well enough alone? I guess because I'm afraid they will not get good care there either. Do I see it as a lose-lose then? Maybe I'm prejudiced that I can take better care of them than most places. So being away from here equals a not-as-good situation.

I think I can be satisfied knowing they may live happy in some little corner of the world that isn't near me.

Vanilla Horses

2009-10-07T20:33:00.000-07:00

Isn't it so that when people see dogs, cats, other common animals, they don't think of them as little beings with character and emotions? ... and horses. Much the same? See one munching on a field of grass, it may seem like a more refined version of a cow, or a large sheep. One is pretty much exchange-able for another. You don't know them. They aren't special to you. If they come or go, not only would you not know, your life would not be affected. They are Vanilla Horses.

But not so with these on the farm. Remember when I introduced you to each one personally? (see The Gang's (Almost) All Here) Living with these beautiful animals day in and out has made it's impression on me. I know them, and each of their little weaknesses, their petty annoyances, their secret preferences. Then how could I betray them by haltering them up and putting them in the stall tonight, knowing tomorrow at 8 am they will be trailered away?

You are looking at one of the two newest contributors-to-be for the OHSU study on equine fertility/DNA something-or-other. Remember Lizzy? and her mother Heart? the former racehorses here on the ranch... Sure, they are a handful, and not tame for the most part... they are THOROUGHBREDS and it takes a crazy bitch to even run in those races, this is what they have been bred for. Of course they need a lot of handling, they have come off the track and need to get used to being HORSES again instead of MACHINES. We were working on that...

Well, the owner has decided, since they evidently have some genetic tendency for being EXTREMELY CRAZY BITCHES, downright dangerous even, and should not continue their genes,that they will be donated to this project. Tomorrow we will be only 7 horses. All of us are feeling the loss. I have been weepy all day.

But wait, you ask- how can they be part of a fertility study if it has been determined that their crazy genes should not carry on?
Seriously, I had to write this because it is affecting the Grove Girls here BIG time. But YOU do not have to read it. Just a severe storm warning for the next paragraph.

Because to be a part of this program is signing their death certificate. The girls are put out to pasture with a stud for a while, and whenever it is that they are found pregnant, they are killed and dissected to study the fetus and the mare's reproductive organs. Along with a number of other mares. Other Vanilla Horses.
Perhaps not a bad way to go, considering that lots of racehorses are throw-aways, (see the Alpha Mare blog link on the right) people literally having such numbers that they put them down in mass graves, whole farms of them are starved to death, or they are sold to the slaughter markets, shipped weak and starving to Mexico and stabbed to death to preserve the meat for overseas consumers. So many... faceless, nameless, Vanilla Horses.

Well I'll say this prayer for them: That the Equine Collective Conscious watches over them, and when the time comes for them to join the Fold, that they will bless their kind with their beautiful presence. Continue running in our dreams. Rejoice in serving no one any longer.
Thank you for touching us, and filling our lives with grace. Farewell, my wild sisters.

I told you they were coming...

2009-10-05T21:49:00.000-07:00

so juicy sweet...

Misty Oregon Morning

2009-10-03T12:09:00.000-07:00

Yes, it is becoming Autumn here, and lookie! Dawning over misty valley...

Then there were some surprises on my way to the barn. See if you can see these:

Egads!!

2009-09-30T12:31:00.001-07:00

Sorry, peeps, I'm having myself a time here... not in a good way.

Been down under the weather for two and a half weeks.

Have had issues with my laptop, getting it configured for the wireless connection.

Now I don't seem to be able to log on at home at all, trying to get it fixed.

At the 'Bucks now, but not able to paste my pics like I used to, by cut n copy - can only drag, for some reason, and the window as you all know for new posts is really SMALL

so forgive me, I have a couple of blogs in the works but can't seem to get them OUT

ARGGGHHHH.

that is all.

The Strawberries are Coming!!

2009-09-22T16:29:00.000-07:00

I didn't know strawberries could bloom in September. Maybe these are super-hybrid monster strawberries or something. But they are blooming, and lots of plants are growing green berries, so we should be swimming in them in a couple weeks.

One leaf caught my eye, it is super cool - one lobe green, one lobe pure white - and the third lobe half green, half white - isn't nature amazing!

These berries sure were delicious ;o)~ Yes, I ate them just after this shot. Juicy sweet. Can't wait.

Leaving

2009-09-09T12:13:00.001-07:00

I've been looking at these and it will be nice to share them with you all. Quite a journey, it was. We spent a couple days on the road with the horses, slow going to Sacramento foothills where we parked for four days visiting family, then spent another couple days to get to Forest Grove, OR.

Here is what it looked like.

Leaving Arizona

Entering California

Reaching my brother's place

And the end result. By a long, crooked road. Happy cats and foggy horses. Click on the second pic to see Mt Adams in the background.

It really is good to live in the sky.

The Gang's (Almost) All Here

2009-09-03T14:12:00.000-07:00

Here we are, it is about 5 AM, looking north at dawn over the sleepy little town of Forest Grove. As providence would have it, once again, on top of one of the tallest hills around, except for the Coastal Mountain range to the west, I still live in the sky. Clouds all around, I see 'em comin' and goin' for miles.

I'm missing one photo of our girl Opal, a cattledog mix who is white with lots of black spots, has her tail, and is a sweeeeeet girl. But I'll add her later, I'm in town for once, dammit, and taking advantage of it to WRITE ONCE AGAIN!!!

We are halfway between Portland and the coast off Highway 26. Here are views out of the back of the barn, one east, one south, one west:

You can see the hill is covered with raspberries. Over that hill are another 50 acres covered in strawberries and orchard grass, the owner leases all this land out to various people who farm the berries and horse hay. Speaking of which, I'll introduce you to the gang. I hope the pics come out in order...

Softie, 37 year-old half-blind man; Davy, 27 year-old ex-racehorse, both gentlemen. Heart, 25 year-old ex-racehorse, and Snoopy, 12, and about 2000 lbs. His brother was an Equine Olympic Champion, and all he got was the free T-shirt.
Lizzy, just came off the racetrack at 5, slightly insane; and the boys, of course, enjoying company.
Gracie, 3 years and full of piss n vinegar; not as much as her 3 y.o. brother Monty, however. He chews with the roundest jaw circles I've ever seen in a horse. Perhaps I'll get a video.

Then of course there are the other HUMANS

Celeste and her over-joyous bowl o' berries, and Clare with her T-man. We think he is 1 yr old.

The ever-colorful Marianne: 17, beautiful, and pissy as ever.

One night, on a long night walk, Clare and I came across a young cat, very friendly. We thought at first she belonged to one of the few country houses we had been passing on this long longely road in the full moonlight. She started to follow us home - I swear she would have gone all the way home with us, but just couldn't keep up. Eventually she left off in a field somewhere along the way. She kept mewing, and as we got more distant my heart began to break... then the howls of the coyotes started up, and all the dogs of the neighborhood began to chime in... I was going to burst for fear. What had we done? A lost cat follows us somewhere out in the middle of nowhere, only to become food because she wanted to be with the humans...

As soon as we stepped foot onto the farm soil, I told Clare... "You know I'm going back, right?" "Yeah." So we hopped in the truck and drove where we last saw her, parked and started calling. Sure as shit she came out of the bushes, mewing and kneading the ground for happiness, it seemed, at being found, and even loved. She didn't like to be picked up. And the claws were needle-sharp... which meant only one thing. take off the hoodie and wrap it around her, and bring her back to the barn. Which is exactly what I did. She has been here a week now, and is the softest, most lovey kitty I have ever seen, and never fails to meet me at the barn even after sleeping in the walnut trees at night (which is how she prolly survived her maybe 8 months of being a stray) - she is Barn Kitty. Til she tells us her real name.

I Live By Buffalo

2009-08-24T11:08:00.001-07:00

OBJECTS IN THIS PICTURE ARE LARGER THAN THEY APPEAR.

I know I have been absent a long while. This is the first I've been able to sit and breathe coffee shop aromas and do something OTHER than check my dwindling bank account and file my unenjoyment without dashing out to attend to some other necessary urgency. There is much to say, and I'll drip one story at a time, and do my best to hold back the flood that wants to pour out my fingers.

Starting with this one. Down the road from me is a field where buffalo are farmed. We may even go to their shop and get some ground meat. Hey, at least we know where it comes from! There is a sign on the fence on which is written, "WILD ANIMALS - DO NOT TOUCH FENCE." What is really should read is " if you even get near them, these docile-looking, grunting, tail-wagging creatures will RAM THE FENCE. which is only made of chicken wire. So keep driving, please." Yes, it happened! J was out marveling at the cows and their calves when a massive wall of meat suddenly appeared, it was the biggest bull buffalo... a prize specimen. One of the cows, evidently to protect her calf, went a-ramming this fence that looked like it was going to either fall over or she was gonna punch thru... either way his pie-eyed ass quickly backed off up to the road and we marveled from inside a running vehicle.

The farmers' market isn't til tomorrow. I have many many things to share with you, honeys, pictures, stories... thank you for not losing interest!! I'll be back soon.

We are almost there!

2009-08-11T08:27:00.000-07:00

Hello, honeys!!

This will be our 7th day of travel, with the Boyz and Cat, and J and me. And all of the ego among us. We have survived - having good times and bad, visiting family and getting bitten by bugs... thought I could take some time this morning while sampling my Super 8 breakfast and in-room coffee - which is surprisingly tasty - while trying not to get drops of Mini-Moo or International Delight Hazelnut on my laptop.

More stories to come, I promise. Meant to blog a bit each day from a different location, how cool would that have been to wake up in time to have YES an English Muffin, Coffee with lots of cream, and let my fingers do the talking each day. Alas, it was not to be.

More like, SHIT it's already 9am, I'm so tired!! Do I even have time for a shower? Louie needs his boots on. Happy needs his fly mask. Phew! need to change Cat's toilet-paper litter box. (This has been a marvelous idea, honeys, everything flushes right down.) And pulling into places at dusk, eating dinner at 10 pm and trying to find an alarm clock that would wake the dead...

My digestive system is/was about to revolt, until dad brought in some fresh local strawberries, tomatoes, and watermelon the night before last... ahh! fiber and simple carbs! Delightful.

Onward we go, spines all outta whack, all of us half dead from being baked in the heat, then feeling dead in the cool of the Siskyous - gimme a couple days to get stuff moved in, maybe even catch up on SOME lost sleep... and I will catch up on all of you, too. Miss you guys!!!

Hualapai Mountain Park

2009-08-04T08:03:00.000-07:00

... And Tina Marie!

Tina's visit pleasantly coincided with a rare weekend of non-work (for her) and the last weekend here (for me). So I took her to see the Hualapai (Who-all-uh-pie) Mtn Park, just half an hour from the valley but a world away. Breezes thru pine needles sound like rushing water; trees with bark that smells like a freshly opened bottle of McCormick's Vanilla; and not the least, it's about ten degrees cooler up there. It was a great 24 hours. We named rocks and trees, squished appy spots, and did the general all-around descriptions as only we can. Here is some proof:

Boulder Holders:

Heart-shaped rock:

Bushwhacker Cabin: (can't take credit for that)

Stone Cabin (you can rent these - cool!)

The highest peak:

More view from the hilltop:

...and another heart-shaped rock:

The Beer Cave at the Gas N Grub:

This huge bear trap is almost 2 feet wide and over 200 years old, someone thought it would be cool to display this torturous weapon, stamped "Grizzly No.6" - I call it the Beer Trap. It seems more fitting, and less depressing that way.

Tina finds Condom Rock: (aka Crystal Point) (it really did look like other quartz rocks we saw) Ew.

Ye Olde Hawg Shoppe, Route 66 in Old Town Kingman:

And, at the end of the day,taking pictures of the Ham and Cheeses on French Toast: (yes, they love to pose)

Cranial-Sacral Therapy Session

2009-08-03T14:18:00.000-07:00

I'm in the Firehouse Coffee Roasting Company coffeehouse awaiting some long-deserved breaks - er, I mean brakes - to be done on the truck. The vibration when braking was finally getting to me, shaking me apart and spilling my tea. Had one estimate of over $700 for both front and back (my drums were warped from towing horses for the last three years without a brake controller... who was supposed to tell me I needed one?!?)

So thought I would share something I wrote after one of my sessions with Lucy from Portland, a very kind soul who practices Cranial-Sacral Therapy and probably other things... enjoy.

The therapist burned sage in the room before I arrived, and the light level was pleasant. She had some music on that sounded Native American in beat but had other elements to it – and it reminded me of Sedona, Arizona for some reason. So at the conclusion of the preliminary chit-chat, she had me lay on the table, pillow under knees, the lights dimmed, and she began just laying her hands on my feet.

I put my superpowers to work, focusing on the drum beat, and imagining I was there in Sedona, drumming alongside musician Nicholas Gunn inside a sacred circle of rocks, perhaps at one of the vortices, overlooking the beautiful red rock canyons with its salmon-coloured hills topped with foresty pines and large boulders. She picked my feet up, gently swaying them a bit, letting their weight rest fully in her hands, as if to say “I’m here to catch you. Rest on me.” So I did.

As she moved around the table, putting hands on various areas, I could feel sparks of energy sometimes make my body twitch and jump. Not a lot, but a small current of energy just enough to be noticeable. I could hear parts of my body talking, like it was an amalgamation of individuals, discussing their feelings! One was commenting on something, another was practically arguing about it, and another was curious about what was going on. I had to put the chatter away, though it was a new and interesting experience. I wanted to get back to the drumming circle, which has been increasingly populating.

Soon the music began to change perceptibly; still it was similar, and I imagined all of the instrumentalists around me phasing in and out of sight and time – and phasing in and out around us were all of the people who lived and died there in that valley in Arizona. They were listening, and began to play and dance with us, all the while fading in and out like mirages.

The music changed again, into something not conducive to my previous imagination, and so I changed with it. This time riding one of my horses, my youngest, red and white spotted, through those same desert sands. Now and again some outlandish scene would flash before me – a snapshot of a South Park episode, chips and salsa, even one brilliant little flash of what I think was me, naked and yelling HEY at myself. I am present enough to gather that I’m having somato-emotional responses to some of the energy work she is performing. I acknowledge the scenes but move on. That is always key to experiencing these energy awakenings, or meditative visualizations, is breathing through one moment to get to the next, not getting stuck in (what are arguably the most interesting) moments. Once that ability is achieved, the mind is free to release LOTS of things, and it will, so that one may experience several flashes of visions in a single second. Without some kind of brain device to capture them all, they may never all be remembered but that is hardly their point. They are only coming up to be digested, or to show your conscious something – and on deeper levels, I swear the images and messages are answers from Jung’s Collective Unconscious. Things you would never even know to ask, things you have never heard of or studied, suddenly will become supernaturally clear. Even if only for a moment! Which is the rub. But the more one exercises their mind to this type of activity, the longer and more one is able to hold on to the really important things.

But alas, this session follows my last Cranio-Sacral session, or even acupuncture (which has a similar effect on me) by 7 years, and I am just happy enough sliding through moments, leaving the remembering for subsequent sessions. At this point, I have imagined that I and my horse are one – not in some freaky bodily part exchange, but as though our bodies had been beamed together in some sort of Star Trek transporter accident. Looking at my horse walking, I can almost see my legs as his front legs, and shadows of my torso show through his chest and neck as he moves through the chapparal.

Again this changes, we exchange positions and now I am walking through the desert, but I see his spotted pattern showing through on my ankles, his mane wafting in and out of my hair in the breeze, his white underbelly is my belly…

And so this goes until I’m phasing in and out again, on the back of this animal, and again followed by other people doing the same, until the people and the animals fill the hillside. Soon I see bits of bark and fur, rock and water, and the energy has lifted me into some realm where it is all I can do, with all my concentration, to stay present and awake, because I could have easily slid into sleep and dreams, tottering on the very edge of consciousness.

So I decide to guide my awareness to simple things. I think of celery. And cheese. And oranges. Soon the food is too hard to remember, and all I know are shapes. The shapes fade away too, and I am left with blobs of color. Brown, chartreuse, teal, and then… it all goes gray. Gray with little bubbles… like the essence of me has been reduced to something that looks like boiling water in a stainless pan. Little, magnificent, consistently sized bubbles. And it occurs to me that I am looking at my atomic self. Funny thing was that once I arrived there, I no longer had to try very hard to concentrate on not falling asleep. I don’t even know if I was conscious. At one point I heard a noise that raised my awareness to room level, and realized my throat was vocalizing a barely audible squeak of some sort.

But beyond that, I reached some state of awareness where I just knew that the bubbles were me – and that there were other, variated bubbles that were probably the table, or the wall—or the practitioner. We were all just bubbles, side by side, not one ended but the other began—and it dawned on me that, like in the Matrix code, once a person’s mind sees things on this scale, it all makes sense that none of us are whole by ourselves. It made sense to see the pieces of fur, rock, and tree because they were pieces of me. That moving around in a crowd of people were like the moving bubbles, all connected. I was aware of where the therapist was, and what she was doing, the whole time, but as seen down a long reflective tunnel. Not in a visible sense, either, if you can wrap your mind around that. More like an astronaut at the end of a life line…

Then the individuals returned. And the big realization of the day. One of the body part bubbles was complaining that it didn’t like always being in this soup swimming around with the other bubbles. Sometimes it wants to be alone. Like me, as an individual. I love being around people – laughing, working, experiencing – but I also need time to myself. Now having gotten the whole “all things are one” philosophy in 3-D, this is what my soma is telling me? Sometimes I just want to be an individual, and not like all the other bubbles. So what do I do with that?

Breathe through it. Like every other moment, every realization. Because on the heels of one comes another. And if you’re ready for it, yet another. So it went on, a few minutes longer, listening to what my psyche had to say, my body parts, what the unconscious collection of information circling the globe had to impart to me next. Too many things and I was worn out from the last 60 minutes.

Zen Cones

2009-07-31T11:23:00.000-07:00

Yep, you heard it here first, people. My own personal ones, just like the pun in the title. Enjoy.

The Zen of Babies - They are comfortable most of the time with the fact that they are subject to powers beyond their control or understanding.
But occasionally an outburst of personal liberation can go far.

All is Illusion - not because it doesn’t exist, but because of how we perceive it. I don’t believe we “see what we want to see,” - but only that which we are capable of seeing. Which can change. Being non-omnipotent, we are only capable of seeing what we perceive individually. But don’t confuse your perception of reality with what it actually is.
This is not the whole truth.

Many blessings fall into the life of one who knows the joys of being loved by a dog.

Everyone, throughout their life, carries baggage. The successful ones have learned how to pack them better. (1997) The transcendent ones have learned how to leave them behind. (2002) The enlightened ones have realized they were just an illusion. (2007)

From the singular, small, triumphant voice of an idea being born
To the joyful cacophony of a thousand thoughts taking flight
From the harmony of desert rocks
To the silence inside the river’s voice
I am always here
Between moments
There is a nothingness which is everything
Can you hear the sun shining?

MUGS

2009-07-30T11:22:00.000-07:00

Here I am inside again, not out of boredom but out of a slight terror... the kind one might experience when they are circling the whirlpool, getting closer to the center, knowing the time is fast approaching when one must close one's eyes and go through the dark, the pitch-black of the event horizon pulling us through, over to the other side of What Will Be.

You see, I've finished pulling all my stuff from the cracks and crevices of dad's place here, and it is but momentarily that I will be on another journey, onward and upward to the great Northwest, where What Will Be is waiting. Like a new mother, like a scientist, like a... human, I think I am prepared for what is next... and promptly put it off until later.

All that, just to say I just wanted to share my mug collection before it goes in the crate.

My first one came from my friend Tina, who went to PA a few years back when her dad died, and she was farting around in NY too, had a lovely interaction with a NYFD hunk... and bought this for me at Starbucks:

So, because I thought it so charming, I began to find these little gems all over the place. We visited J's mom just after that near Vancouver, WA and since we flew into the Portland airport, I picked up one from the 'Bucks in the terminal. The warm fuzzies started in my stomach, and I couldn't stop looking at it. Quickly I realized this was going to be a thing. Since I lived in both Phoenix and Tucson, those were also acquired. There was a trip a while ago to Seattle, so that one joined, too...

And finally on our last trip to see another old Army buddy in LA, J surprised me with my 6th and lastly acquired mug. I broke into tears, at the thoughtfulness of it, and probably also because he and the other dude disappeared, leaving their phones on the kitchen table, for almost two hours. They happened to bring back breakfast from the all-wonderous Whole Foods market, coffee, and my present. My little beauties...

Yes, you can see I have coffee in the Portland mug. A little something to get my butt into gear.

Realizations

2009-07-30T00:41:00.000-07:00

Mine:

Necessity may be the mother of invention, but laziness is the father.

History is full of pregnant crimes and celibate perpetrators.

I never realized how hard it was to be human—until I met some people who were obviously failing at it.

Other people's realizations:

If we are not able to smile, then the world will not have peace. ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Once in a lifetime perhaps, one escapes the actual confines of the flesh. Once in a lifetime, if one is lucky, one so merges with sunlight and air and running water that whole eons, the eons that mountains and deserts know, might pass in a single afternoon without discomfort. The mind has sunk away to its beginnings among old roots and the obscure tricklings and movings that stir inanimate things. ~Loren Eiseley

“We need less luxury and waste in a few countries so there can be less poverty and hunger in a greater part of the world.” ~Fidel Castro

"Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without words and never stops at all" ~Unknown

Verification Words

2009-07-29T12:16:00.000-07:00

Sometimes these make me laugh, and I know they are totally random - but it seems so funny, someone HAS to be making these up. Even so, why does the 'captcha' at my credit union require only half the amount of letters that it takes to verify me as a human, to post on a blog? A bit of a quandary as to the safety of my money, but hell yeah, guard my intellectual nuttery.

So, because it's the hottest part of the day and I'm inside, bored like a little girl on a rainy day - well, except for the fact that as a little girl I used to be out in the rain more than not, building forts, observing puddles, making musical instruments out of dad's ubiquitous paint cans and anything else that made interesting tones when dripped upon by the various roof runoffs...

I digress. Here are some of my imaginings for some of the more interesting variants offered me:

preterim: (PREE-tuh-rim) N. the period of time before a line of succession or event. Occurs before interim.

redcomni: (red-COM-nee) N. A type of grain grown in the USSR, consumed predominantly in China.

fistabli: (fis-tab-LEE) N. A fight on a table, originating in Italy. Predecessor to the art of fisticuffs but requiring much more dexterity of the feet, and then there's the whole 'making a scene in the old country' thing.

demirapl: (DEM-ee-RAP-el) N. A half a noogie (demi = half, rapl = to knock on something)

warkie: (WAR-key) N. thingamajig. doohickey. whatever the hell you want it to mean at the time.

eteedia: (eh-TEE-dee-uh) N. Plural form of 'eteedium.'

fiessimo: (fee-ESS-ee-mo) Adv. Musical term: play it like ya mean it!

dilino: (DILL-ee-no) Adv. Musical term: play it like you haven't practiced.

kabblebo: (COB-bull-boh) N. An exercise originating in Israel, involving boxing and the Mysteries of the Universe.

libulify: (lee-BYOO-lih-figh) V. To make something pleasing - from the Latin *ad libitum* (shortened to *ad lib* = at one's pleasure)

bablogan: (BAB-uh-LOH-gun) N. A male person who tends to talk a lot. female version: bablogu

sworowgu: (suh-WAR-oh-goo) N. A female person who tends to swear a lot. male version: sworowgan

caromidy: (cah-ROM-uh-dee) N. A film that is supposed to contain humor, yet does not have the intended effect upon the audience. Can also apply to blogs, namely this one.

I Learned Something Today...

2009-07-28T23:25:00.000-07:00

At breakfast, I squished my English muffin as I attempted to butter it. Then as I went to put jam on it, a big glob was making its way down the jar and I didn’t get to it before it reached the counter. Finally, I clumsily dropped the knife on the floor.

From this, I saw that if you don’t hold onto something tight enough, it can slip through your fingers. If you hold onto it too tightly, you could change its shape into something unrecognizable. Lastly, if you can seize an opportunity when it presents itself, you can really save yourself a mess later.

Dynamic Stillness

2009-07-27T07:36:00.001-07:00

That is the newest album by one of my favorite, and most prolific artists, Steve Roach. J and I have been waiting for just the right time to hook the splitter up to his IPod and watch the sky while listening to this over 2-hour compilation. And it was last night.

The music, if you can call the ambient paintings such, starts right off, unlike some of the others that volume more slowly. The aural inundation, made complete by the stereo headset I donned, only served to bring the dark sky closer, and at first I felt a type of panic that I sometimes do when listening to certain dark ambient music, in the dark - a feeling of falling into space, with no tether... a loss of footing, gravity. Perhaps you too are one of those people who can ascribe color to sounds, and let them guide you on an inner visual journey. This was different, the first time I'd experienced 'space' this way, and it was eerie.

My eyes wandered over the stars, noticing relationships they had to each other. Funny, I thought, out here, this... cosmos; there is no air for bigotry, hatred; all the room in the world, so to speak, and no sadness, misery; the stuff we are made of, this 'star stuff' - inside each one of us, while out there, in the nebulae, new stars are being born. Beyond jealousy, fear, beyond... emotion even. Just awareness. Before we come here, there is awareness of everything. I'm sure it returns after we leave. Just trying to get back some of that while we're here...

There is Orion, I notice his dagger, and squint to see the end the faint star that makes the binary system there; how blue that little star is, I remember seeing through the U of A telescope, thinking it was so diamond-like sparkly. There is the Big Dipper, just sitting on the horizon. Where is my beloved scorpion? haven't been able to see it in a while. A planet is shining bright; I think I read that it was Mercury, tho Saturn is out too; but the biggest attraction is the formation down the middle of the darkness, what looks like clouds or space dust, split down the center. J, the budding astrophysicist, reminds me that the 'dust' I'm seeing isn't that, but the reflection of the light coming from millions of stars that make up our dear galaxy, of which we are located on the edge. Even further out, more galaxies light up the universe, their little crystal spirals weaving to and fro in space. They put out various colors, like certain stars even - and as I heard it said on NPR once, even different frequencies! Imagine, a space-time orchestra. Concerto for the Eagle's Head Nebula, in G minor. And over here...

What would space smell like? If there were enough particles together to even make a smell? Which I hear there aren't. Not enough particles to reflect the light that is shining everywhere, at all times -the space in between is empty, vacuous. But - not empty. The waves of light/energy are still flowing, in all directions, invisible to our eyes. Our eyes, so limited in picking up frequencies, makes a mockery of our feeble "seeing is believing" crap. Even my Eagle Eyes blue-light blocking sunglasses reveal things to me that are normally obscured, what would a pair of glasses show us, if we could see things to the Nth degree? Would we then believe in miracles? When we can see dark matter, dark energy; even the anti-matter of sci-fi renown. Yes, it exists. Our instruments have been out-recording our eyes for a very long time. Who can say they believe only what they see? Do they understand how limited these ocular devices are?

I soften my eyes to see all within my view at once. Meteors soar through the atmo, sometimes burning out in a faint white line; one larger one left a visible streak for miles, before vanishing in a few seconds. Closer - I pull away my shirt. Naked, raw. Nothing between my skin and the cosmos. The slight breeze whispers across me, forming words I cannot hear, only feel. My breath is the darkness. The stars are my eyes. The womb of the galaxy is my womb, stars within me. How can there be anything else, anything other than this total, complete amazement? Lost connections, humans. No longer recognizing earth mother, sky father, sister and brother, or each other. So lost they strike out, against others, against... themselves. Disconnected. If only they could see. Maybe the "bright light" is really us returning to the star whence we were born.

A Good Day

2009-07-25T06:56:00.000-07:00

Well it just might be the phase of the moon, square Mars at the moment... but frankly, I'm up for a bit of 'folding' too. It's probably the ants. Coming out of nowhere, everywhere... they can fight so much better than me. (I know that isn't correct to say, but 'I' just didn't suit me)

Then there is the nightly 'what is crawling on me' routine, which has been not just spiders over faces, and vinegroons over feet... but one night - a ree-inch forest centipede. Just watching J spring off the couch, flicking it off his foot, and seeing it wriggle awkwardly across the floor... gave me the heebie jeebies. But there was a frailty in its slowness, it's search for shelter and not wanting to die... as much panic and adrenaline as it caused, we cupped it and walked WAY out in the desert in the middle of the night to let it out. I'm sorry, Pedie, that you aren't built for the desert, and I don't know how you came to be with us... but you can't stay in the house, no matter how pretty your blue-lined segments and transparent salmon-colored body... I know we wouldn't die, but we have pains every day, and need no more welts on our bodies or souls if we can help it!

So I get tired... of the bumps and bruises, cat is limping and I think it's more arthritis, scrapes on my arms from trimming horse feet and someone felt a bit rude, waking up with unknown bites on me, an errant fly landing on my face in the morning, over and over, and where's that damned flyswatter? The water that comes out too warm (when turned to the cold side), the hurricane winds that three times have landed our tarped, steel-framed shade on the roof, the daily threat of the searing sun that if I stay out too long, it will make bacon out of me.
But there was a respite yesterday.

After the 6am equine feeding, I noticed the clouds, and even a bit of lightning. It took two hours to arrive, but the rain actually rained instead of the typical 10 minute spit-fest; there was even a slight breeze, dropping the 80-degree warmth to near-chilly. I was so elated, I stood out with the horses at second breakfast (10am) brushing them down, comforted with two of my favorite things. There is something about rain, life falling from the sky, the earth is refreshed, and spirit sighs ahhhh...

I am at last too chilled, and head to the house, where the AC is still on, because the 95 degrees inside hasn't been able to be flushed out since the Boys broke the window screen in the kitchen, where our cross breeze used to flow out the living room. On my way, I see a softball-sized stone in the self-made horse manure compost area, and go to pick it up lest they stumble over it... I often underestimate their attention span, I guess. But as I bend down, grasping it with my left hand, continuing to move my right leg forward in a snatch-and-grab motion, I hear it. Others may have mistaken it for a crackling leaf, or a tiny twig snapping in a couple places at once... but not me. Some innate prickle made me stop mid-motion, let the rock go, and step backward.

If I would have looked up just then, I would have seen her, not two feet from me, coiled and blending in with the oldness of green that happens when road apples oxidize. I would have been able to see up close, and count again the buttons on the end of her tail, that she so caringly raised up for me, and shook, with the slightest softness, saying "We had a deal."

But I did not have to look up, to know what this sound meant.

The former Mojave Jane was slimmer than before, looked smaller in her heart-shaped loops, and even at first we thought maybe it was a different Mojave Green Rattlesnake, maybe a smaller, younger rival... but could it be, that of all the things we've heard about the ferocity and aggressiveness of these snakes is not true? Guess that would not surprise me, most stories get blown out of proportion. And I'm sure somehow that it was a good thing I did NOT make eye contact with any snake two feet from me, if animal behavior has taught me anything. With dogs, horses, probably snakes too, it is a pressure point that seems to goad the look-ee to act in some way. With the Boys I use it to move them, being the Alpha Mare I am supposed to be able to do that. But I'll not be trying that with Gracie. Not when she has the double whammy.

Not only does she possess the typical neurotoxin that makes rattlers so deadly, acting to interrupt synaptic relays in the nervous system, among other effects causing breathing paralysis... she somehow also contains the hemolytic venom found in other types of snakes, that slices open every red blood cell it comes across as it moves throughout one's pulmonary system. There is some debate whether it was nature or men that saw fit to create this snake (dad says they were created from a green mamba, where it gets its base color and hemotoxin, and a diamondback, with its neurotoxin and patterned skin, during WWII to let loose in German foxholes) but nonetheless, she holds the trump card. Unless she is threatening and needs to be removed, we can coexist nicely, I'll hold up my end of the deal by not getting so close, and she won't kill me.

We walked around the rest of the 2 and 1/2 acres to see what kind of life the rain would bring out. On the northern section of the property, we almost literally fell over this little guy. We're calling him George for the moment. He was out in the field, really REALLY hard to see in the dead sticks, rocks, etc. I walked nearly right over him, saw him at the last second (it must have been the snake gods watching out over me again!) and just kept heading straight - I would have walked over him to rejoin J. I told J to KEEP WALKING STRAIGHT, now stop, let me point out the OTHER rattlesnake... and here he was. Coiled in the same fashion, looking like a pile of something, and oh so quiet. By the time we got back with the camera to start photographing our little zoo, he had moved to under a yucca tree, where you see him here.

There is a gigantic iguana-size lizard living underneath our rooftop-patio stairway, too, and since he is so shy I had to look for a pic of something like him, as well. He is almost a foot long to the tip of his tail, a hefty guy, making sure all our camping gear is free of spiders and insects... in spite of his shyness, he hangs out on the stucco wall looking fabulous, we call him The Dude.

It still interested me why they come out in the rain. Maybe I'd heard it said somewhere that snakes in the desert coil up to capture water and drink it off their skin. Wouldn't surprise me. Many more Gentlemen were out and about, which I identified (I think) as skinks and leopard whiptail lizards. The skinks are just fun to watch, their jerky movements and constant quest for the next ant... the whiptails are much less myopic, and keenly aware of anyone approaching them, and fast as lightning when they make their escape! Sometimes they even leave little dust puffs with their feet as they skate over the dirt so quickly. It makes me laugh. Too fast for a pic, so I had to find one on the net.

There also began to appear some smaller Gents, with racing stripes and LONG, we're talkin' ultra long blue tails. In my search for species ID, I did run across something called a Blue Whiptail, and we did get a pic of these little guys. But three out of four times we ran across the leopard whiptails, the blue tails were right there alongside... I then discovered that the striped blue tails are the juvenile of the species! Very exciting.

it was a pretty good day.

All Along the Watchtower

2009-07-23T23:03:00.000-07:00

Well, honeys, I have a friend who has been stricken, by the unfathomable power and hold of an authority that few others can match... unless we are talking about other cults as well as the JW's.

Poor thing, she has already been suffering in the throes of major chronic depression for the years that I've known her, and according to her husband it's been much longer than that, but now how does she escape the hell she calls faith, when her very salvation will be dependent upon her not using the internet, not celebrating her children's birthdays, and witnessing to everyone - lest she not find favor in the eyes of her church, whom she can't see has replaced her God.

Well, there is a positive side. I've moved, and soon the Post Office will stop forwarding me her huge envelopes of tracts. I can't call her to ask not to send them anymore, she gave away her cell phone. I can't email her anymore, covered that part... but for the time being, I have plenty of newsprint to rip up into shreds for kitty litter (recycling tip #45, can still burn or recycle after kitty uses it, and it's much cleaner and more sanitary for the house), but not before I read a couple of exerpts from the back pages...

One in particular, I ask J as we are driving the half-hour home from town, "What evidence is there that Jesus is a historical figure?" To which, without even blinking, he replies: "They have one of his pubic hairs stored at the Vatican."

It took me five minutes before I could start breathing again.

And here is Cat, lookin cute, another daily event.

It's the Farming Life for Me!

2009-07-21T09:03:00.000-07:00

Yes, honeys, Laura has been busy at work reading the weaves of her sister, the Universe, and making fabric of her thoughts...

And out of the still, small distance, a friend breathed, and dared hope a whisper - "I have a friend," she says... the rest is a blur. Now, a few days later, a light sparkles. As being with child, not thinking of the painful or hard times, only the promise of new life - so is it here, now, with me. Thinking only of living on the Farm, tending horses and raising raspberries, watching Cat walk about in the soon-dewy grass, maybe planting a garden of our own... picking berries and making jam, taking pictures of the other girls' berry-smudged faces, breathing mist as the mornings grow chilly, and always with the artwork. Painting, writing, (it would be nice to get published again) crocheting scarves to sell at the farmer's market...

A little suburb of Portland, on the way to the coast, a big farmhouse with two wonderful girls, two dogs, a cat, and maybe, jes' maybe... d'ya hear me Ms Moon? ... CHICKENS!!

Yes honeys, it looks like the farming life for me.

Yay Sundays.

2009-07-19T17:29:00.000-07:00

What a week. After coming back from the Tucson/Phoenix trip last week, some under-the-weather type stuff and a lack of proper internet connection had me in Blogger withdrawals!!

I'm still catching up on everyone's posts. And today, feeling better than I have in a while, making my own. Five days of rolling around feeling sick and passing out from the heat. Five days of I can't even get a comb through my hair-type tangles (and who knows what may have made its home there anyway) so I just whacked it all off. The sink, once a disgusting bilge bowl of non-drainage, is now clean and put back together. For many years now I've used solely deodorant sticks, since anti-perspirants contain aluminum salts and have been suspected of causing bad things to happen to a body, but I may just have to go balls-out and get the fumigator-grade, ozone-depleting spray deodorant (did I mention it was hot here?). We're talking industrial-strength ew, here, honeys. Two more little rabbits met their maker via the horse water. I guess now that I'm not limping around on my (what feels like a) broken foot, I just wanted to sit and ponder about the little things that I appreciate.

Like the way Cat has a little orange splotch on her chin, as if she's just finished slobbering over some yummy sherbet; my faux spaghetti, made of buttery noodles covered in diced italian-style tomatoes and shredded cheese; running around in my favorite boxers; FRIED GREEN TOMATOES; seeing the boys resting in the shade of the house after lunch; smelling the sheets when they've been laundered in vinegar and hung out to dry in the sun and wind; watching, with Cat, the birds and bunnies safely drinking out of the drown-proof water tubs; taking the boys on long walks in the evenings; and today, watching Religulous by Bill Maher. Because what else can incite such a good conversation, as watching a guy ask some questions, confront some issues, and generally make fun of people? Sunday seemed a perfect day for such. Hell, other, richer, people have been doing it on TV for some time...

Oh, and IBC rootbeer - it's the BEST! Mug and Barq's can kiss my little fuzzywink, they don't come near the taste and bite of this stuff. Happily on sale at most Safeway stores. And, watching the incredible, almost edible sunsets through the black mountains.

Happy Birthday Aaron!

2009-07-16T21:37:00.000-07:00

It's a bit late, but thought I'd remind you that I was there with you last year, remember? How could you forget your cake. It was beautiful, and yes, modeled after yours truly. One side was even bigger than the other. Just like they should be. Miss you old man! Visit soon!

Communion

2009-07-16T19:43:00.000-07:00

Not every day is a good day for communion. Sometimes the emotional and physical worlds are at war seeming to target us, and leave us no peace with which to commune. But that was not today.

It all began with Starbucks: coming back to the house and the boys after being gone three days taking care of myself, Cat, and friends... we ran out of our filtered water that we always take on trips (see Survival and Thrival) and so stopped at Starbucks for four... yes, FOUR venti ice waters, and, of course, the requisite Iced Green Tea Latte. The 'Bucks is a trusted source of triple-carbon-filtered, pure, clean, absolutely refreshing water. When I can't drink my own, there's Bucks. On every frickin' corner...

And so, with this foursome of crystalline goodness, came the formed paper tray to hold them. Without which this communion may not have happened today. Because you see, there was a summer lightning/thunder/rainlet storm that passed thru the Valley today, the large wet drops that instantly soak one, while they are rolling up car windows, closing shed doors, and chasing light things that blew out of the back of the truck... and these large wet drops also caused the four-leggeds to get jiggy, running about and bucking like they'z in a rodeo... and rollin' in the blessed powdery dirt.

So after this semi-monsoon, I take this here paper tray, and the boys walk up to me with raindrop-shaped mud spots on top of their own spots, and I just put one and two together. I began rubbing them down with this tray, the fibrous cup-molded lumps pulling loose hair, dirt, grit off (and into the air, my hair, my eyes...) but the boys LOVED it. A gentle massage/scratchy that made them very happy. After this love-fest we just stood watching the rest of the sun setting behind the black mountains, crepuscular rays dancing through the canyons as the world turned... several minutes go by, and I sit down on the ground next to Lou. I hear Happy walk up behind me and feel a soft nose on the top of my head. Nuzzle nuzzle with the Elephant Nose. Lou puts his head down and noses my cheek, like I was his little foal. They towered over me, and we sat in the absolute quiet, the stillness. No doing, just being. No thoughts, just being. No species... just beings.

Manifest Your Symphony

2009-07-16T12:11:00.000-07:00

Talk about manifesting: I'd been thinking of getting a stringed instrument for over a year now, something I wouldn't have to have electricity to play, something low-toned and soothing, not difficult to play and improvise on... and I kept coming back to the cello. Except those are pretty damn large... not to mention expensive. I'd looked into it haphazardly now and again, but last week decided I'd scrape up what I could and just go for it...

About that time, I went to close one of my bank accounts, since WAMU is becoming the demon-child of CHASE - and there was an additional $250 showing up on the cashier's check they sent me... some of you may have noticed my poll about that very real question... then I remembered about the VA stimulus package, where Obama, that generous man, decided to give a chunk of money to all us disabled vets... but funny that they sent it to an old account, not the one I get my VA bennies thru.

anyway, I found ONE craigs-listing in Tucson for a cello, happened to be the half-size I wanted, and in better shape than any of the phoenix ones, and for $225. When I emailed the guy to tell him I was visiting Tucson on Tuesday morning, for (how appropriate) a VA appointment, and could I look at it, he said, wouldn't ya know it, I'm gonna be in Phoenix Monday thru Thursday - otherwise I'd be happy to do it. I say back, great! since I have to go thru Phoenix and stay there overnight to get to Tucson... bring her with you! and he said yes.

Now, you know I've never touched a cello (well maybe you didn't, so I'm sayin it now) and I have NO idea what to expect, or look for. maybe I'll just ask the guy to play it for me... except I think in the ad he mentioned it belonged to his son and he moved up to a full cello, meaning he wouldn't know how to play it either. But I called him anyway. (I'll skip the long shitbag of a story where I had taken my CHASE cashier's check from closing my WAMU account, where I spent 45 MINS in a CHASE bank, cuz they couldn't verify that it was legitimate, and therefore couldn't cash this here CHASE check... and how I finally got it done in about .7 seconds at the WAMU bank... and how much I'm going to miss WAMU).

So J and I were going to meet Richard just before heading out of Phoenix back to the Valley of the Shadow of Death, and I was just riding the serendipity that had already presented itself, not knowing if I should just call it off and save the money, or take the chance of buying a stringed contribution to the burn barrel... so I just decided to keep on keepin' on. We met Richard - he definitely was NOT a Dick as most Richards in my experience have been - and it was a lovely time in a lovely house, with a very lovely man. He was moving from Phoenix to be closer to his daughter, since his wife died a short time ago he had no ties to stay in Tucson. And was selling his son's cello, his son who lives with his own wife in LA and who is in a symphony there, but moving up to Portland soon... there was no end to the connections in this short hour spent with this man.

Not even counting that he was distinguished, his elegant speech betraying his flip-flops and jeans exterior... he spoke of music being just as necessary to proper education as was math and science, and raised his children such... and as we got to the actual reason I was there, he brought out the cello saying he only knows how to tune it, and proceeded to expertly bring these four wonderfully rich tones alive from horsehair and steel. The sound was amazing, I fell instantly in love with it. He proceeded to give a little lesson in holding the bow, dragging it thusly to get the best sound, and thusly to play two strings at once... and to loosen the hair when not playing, do this, remember that...

We concluded the transaction very gracefully, and exited this little urban desert oasis. I was FLYING, sure that the cello was singing to me all the way home from behind my seat, feeling so much richer for having met Richard.

Can the West be One?

2009-07-11T20:50:00.000-07:00

The rugged individualism that characterizes America has its beginning in a group of people considered derelicts and outlaws, not unlike Australia… were the reasons any more or less important, or the political system any more or less different, or crooked?

Having its basis for survival being the individual modes of transportation such as the horse, and soon after, the wagon, what a challenge to now expect present day America to sacrifice that individuality by using public transportation? Is there any hope? Then there is the industrial revolution, where mass production stole the preciousness of each thing.

Add to that the lack of a sense of rooted culture that leaves a people devoid of the significance of everyday things; there is left no demarcation for the children of this time into adulthood, as is so important in other cultures. Jung had much to say on this subject as well. Where is the transition from child to adult? Some are made to assume the duties of an adult even before puberty, for many reasons, and were doomed from a single-digit age; then some never experience the transition, and forever wonder and fight for their identity.

Keep these people occupied with gas prices, threat levels, photo radar – well, that’s for another time; but these are the hungry ghosts in whose unsteady hands our future trembles.

The Sunset Fable

2009-07-10T16:16:00.000-07:00

Once there was a gathering in the Hoh forest that drew many people from the villages all around. They built a fire, sang, played music, danced, and ate lots of food. Even the Sun heard about this great event and joined the festivities.

The ocean also heard about it, but could not attend, lest it put out the great fire that kept everyone warm and cooked the food. It became depressed and turned blue. The Sun, however, was having such a great time it decided to carry the party around the world.
Now because the great trees were rooted, they could not follow, they became envious and turned green.

You can still see the gathering to this day, every evening looking into the West…

The Trip That Lasted a Year-One Day in September

2009-07-09T20:37:00.000-07:00

So Cat and I stayed with J’s mom, it was a beautiful summer with all the trees and river that I could want… the days were PERFECT for boogie-boarding down the Toutle River. Guess you could say I toodled down the Toutle. A lot. After having to leave so much of my stuff, my LIFE, behind in that RV, I couldn’t stop weeding out everything. Each belonging had to have not just a purpose, but be MULTI-functional, or it went. Funny thing is the more I cut loose, the lighter I felt. Quotes from Fight Club came to mind. Really can’t express it, it looks different in writing—the big OMG factor just doesn’t show through. Any Northern Exposure fans out there? You hard-core people will remember the Mastodon episode, where Joel, robbed of his chance at documenting a magnificent Paleolithic discovery, succumbs to the energy that is Cicely, now that someone cut up his frozen ancient elephant for steaks, saying, “I’m one of YOU now.” If you felt something when he said it, in your gut, a feeling that wrenched your stomach in a big knot that would forever stay, then you may not understand the sentiment. If on the other hand, you tilted your head to the right and uttered some variance of “hmm…” as if there were a great eternal mystery about to be revealed to you by taking the middle way, going with the flow, and felt curious to see where you end up… THAT is the beginning of understanding. That was the beginning of me.

Even if I hadn’t decided to move, the coach was a disaster waiting to happen, hell—already caught fire once—and almost nothing worked right, never mind the details. There just isn’t enough room to talk about days like when my door lock broke while I was inside, and I had to hammer the thing off to get out, and from then on had to use an elastic band just to keep it shut, which didn’t work when the wind blew hard; or that my shower bottom was breaking out and leaked under the rig; or that I was missing a cover to an air duct and had to keep a pan under it when it rained (which I could never place just right, water still got everywhere), or what I had to do each time I used the toilet to make it work… there’s just something that steels one’s insides when one repeatedly works that close with their own excretions.

Without a job I couldn’t get my own apartment. Without an internet connection or a decent signal to my cell, I wasn’t having luck getting a job. All things kept pointing to impermanence—everything that defined me seemed to be falling away. Like I was being extinguished. I don’t know if anyone can really, really understand what that’s like, until you go thru it. (Jon lived it with us for a few days on the road, and I’m sure was eager to get back to his own problems ;o)

Eventually I finished all my weeding: I had some good clothes, a few kitchen items, some bedding, a couple footstools, and was getting along swimmingly (there’s that punny girl again) with J’s ma, and her two cats were getting along with Cat. We were a houseful of females and felines, having the time of our nine lives. Staying up late, getting up late, going down to the hamburger stand 5 miles down the road with my laptop… and boarding, boarding, boarding. The memories of the recent Incubus concert in Tucson got me more into their music, which surprised me in their Buddhist-like implications. I began to see the joy in not-having. I began to feel the lightness in it. For once in my life, my future was completely hidden from me, uncertain. For once I did not have anyone depending on me to right the wrongs on the job, or anyone to ascribe any worth to me. Or feel the need for such. Slowly, silently, it was happening...
The horses were expensive, but happy. I paid my way with groceries at the house. Although my unemployment was running out, I feared for nothing.

It was one day in September, I happened to be on the river again, after my umpteenth time down the rapids, belly-first on my board, and I had stopped in the middle of the river against a rock, turned over so that I was laying on my back, and placed myself in the current just so, going nowhere and watching like so many times before the bald eagles, as they flew in their dances... Just then. Just like that. Like the first tiny raindrop of spring falling on your cheek. Like a someone laying a comfy blanket over you half asleep. Has this happened to you? A soft realization. Could it be... happiness? No, not quite. Contentment? I’d already been content for a few weeks. Hmmm.

Then it dawned on me. Funny euphemism, that. Dawned. And it’s just that way, too, like a sun rising, dispersing the darkness. The darkness where I thought I was my job; where I defined myself as wife, sister, daughter, a person with means, before all these things fell away.

Dawn came, and I am suddenly just me. Dawn came, and there is nothing but love left inside. Dawn came, and I am one with all things, in an endless, timeless way of infinite understanding.

I am standing barefoot on the edge of the cliffs overlooking the ocean, wind blowing, head back, arms wide open, smiling and singing “Wish You Were Here.”

SHIIAAAAT!

2009-07-09T13:59:00.000-07:00

I finally got the journey down, and the Blogger put it down on the day I began to write the post, sorry peeps! I thought it would publish the day I posted instead. Live and learn...

So HERE is the link, since it's down below Mojave Jane, for your convenience.

I told you it was an installment story, this one is pretty long so get out your snacks and drinks, folks... and ENJOY!

TOYS

2009-07-09T11:40:00.000-07:00

It puzzled me as I passed by
The toys in the yard at the daycare, why

Not only many, but all
The toys were machines, only small

Dump trucks, fire trucks, buses, and cars
Even mini-traffic jams just like ours.

What are we silently screaming
By valuing just what is gleaming?

I thought our dream was that they would go far
And be all they could be, and not where we are.