Ah Yes

Funny thing, how gratitude seems to work.

I am thinking through the lens of gratitude more and more; thankful for what is and not spending a lot of time lamenting or worrying. It is definitely an easier way to be.

This is my approach for the holidays. So far so good.

Love
kj

Weekend Mish Mash

I am back in Provincetown. JB and I pass this scene merely driving from one place to another. I don't know why the gulls and ducks were so active today: I don't know this because I have ALOT to learn about the sea. 

I do know that light bounces off the water in the most stunning ways here at the land's end, and the skies are almost always spectacular. I always think of my Mother when I look up because she never fails to comment on the sky and the clouds. 

The only time she ever flew with me, probably only the second time she ever flew anywhere, she looked out the plane window to the clouds below us. In total innocence and amazement she said,

"I never knew they were two skies."

Several people nearby on the plane smiled at us so sweetly. I remember that so clearly.

  This little girl named Reese will be in my life for the rest of my life. There is not a word for how delighted I am every time I see her again. She is now four months old and I still think she is an old soul. And as happy as I've ever seen a human being be. Her brothers crawl over her, kiss her sometimes even roughly, hold her on the couch while they eat popcorn and watch tv. She has great parents and great brothers, just for starts in life. All the difference….

And finally, tonight, I am officially into the holiday season. Be prepared when you visit here that I might be talkin' holiday. The last two days JB and I have been shopping. I am not normally a shopper, not one bit. We went to Target and made very fun choices in the toy department. Got my mother a soft sweater. Bought some shiny fake christmas branches and berries and leaves to put in the window boxes in in Ptown. That will happen tomorrow. Instant decorating: my favorite kind. 

I would like to have a gift away. But I don't know what I have to give away. Please help me with suggestions. I am serious. :^) Heck, I might give you something just because you helped me give something away.

What I really think of the holiday season is as always I am concentrating extra hard for a month to reach out, love out loud, count blessings, and bake cookies. 

You are each certainly invited along.

love

kj

Ready or Not

I love Christmas even when I can't.

I love the music, the scents, the lights, the gift giving (more than the getting), the baking and cooking, the get togethers, and an internal satisfied feeling inside me that switches on every year just before Thanksgiving.

Last May I stopped my work of five years; for the first time in my adult life, I would rely on a government social security check and no longer let income factor into most things I might choose.

In July I had knee surgery and all summer into fall I've been (re)learning to no longer hobble.

This week I went back to work, of sorts. I will consult for an industry where I feel at home and am regarded and respected. And in minutes I will leave for a board of directors meeting whee I have been invited to serve for the rest home where my mother lived for five years.

I am toying with developing personal growth workshops (again), maybe held in Provincetown with JB and I arranging accompanying meals for 8-10 people at a time.

I am well behind finishing my second book but it must not yet be time.

I now have four grandchildren ages six and under and I find that a blessing and a responsibility.  I am indescribably grateful for each of them. And for my Jess. And for her happy marriage to a good man.

Tonight I will write out a list of people I want to see during the Christmas holidays and experiences I wish to have. I am more ambitious this time of year: I design our holiday cards, I bake and decorate cookies and miniature cakes, I write, I shop, I putter, I straighten out my desk. 

Picture that my current life became a blank canvass early this summer. All of the above is filling that canvass with color and form and placement. Don't get me wrong: I'm unsure as much as I'm hopeful. I'm sixty six years old; I feel much younger; I feel wise and sure footed; and I know things could go very wrong in a flash. I know good people get sick and sometimes die. 

These nights I am falling asleep with reason to worry and reason to exalt. That's the way it is. And unlike my past selfs, I am thinking less and ambivilizing (my own made up word!) less. I have time to use in a different way, without a fixed schedule and with advance thoughtfulness.

So not tonight after all, but tomorrow, I will write out my hopes and plans for my holiday. I'll start with cooking a turkey and making an apple pie for Thanksgiving. 

I'll remind myself to think less and live more. I will say thank you even if that simple act is in reality not quite so simple.

love

kj

Chase & Us

I haven't been able to write about this.

This is the last photo I took of Chase, before we turned him over to a very kind man and his wife and their three greyhounds and one son, in a process called 'surrender.' They will foster Chase until another family wants him. They may end up keeping him as their own. We hope so.

That is what we did: we stopped trying and surrendered. My ego wants you to know I have never given up on a dog and never returned one.  We did try. 

Too many things didn't work: Chase began to howl several times a night. JB does not do well woken up like that every night. He hated going to Provincetown: he willed himself not to leave the house for up to 24-30 hours and he was traumatized being there even days afterward. Most days he slept most of the time and rarely got us to greet us. We weren't sure how much we mattered to him. His teeth are in bad shape and sometimes he wouldn't eat. 

We got his seizures under control but sometimes he would startle or freeze and we sometimes noticed a thick siliva from his mouth. We really questioned, and maybe still do, a head injury as a result of a known collision on the racetrack. He needed five pills two times a day, we arranged an animal communicator to 'talk' with Chase; she told us he is in too much pain to care much about us. 

He stopped going on walks. He was not happy. Nor were we. 

We are relieved. That's the truth. I try not to think about Chase too much right now. We've talked to the very nice man about once a week and he tells us Chase is doing great. He says and we agree that he needs to be with other dogs. A highlight of life at the track was greyhounds together as a family, even though they were probably in crates a good deal of the time. 

He told us last week that Chase has just been diagnosed with Cups disease; horrible inflamation and infection in his mouth. All his teeth will be removed next week. 

We feel terrible about that. The very nice man says he has seen greyhounds without teeth before and that Chase will be fine. 

JB is not ready for another dog. Probably I'm not either. In time, that will change. I have vowed to do my part in rescuing dogs as much as I can in life. It's tough to admit that we were not able or willing to do what Chase needed. But it's the truth. He is back with his greyhound family and we are glad for that.

Love

kj

Mish Mash

I am back on my feet: no cane, no pain, more walking. Feeling more like myself and looking ahead.

Thank you for every comment on my book excerpts. I will keep posting snippets until the darn book is finally in publication.

Here in New England the leaves are falling and the temperature has dropped. I am preparing for winter and thinking of holidays. Here are a few suggestions if/when you are in the market for gifts:

1. My friend Tracie's new CD, The Dream. Hopefully this link will take you to the first song on her CD. At $10, with a gorgeous enclosure, it's so worth it for yourself or for somebody's holiday stocking :^)

http://traciepotochnik.bandcamp.com/album/the-dream

2. My friend Joss at www.etsy.com/shop/soulbrushart : Her African inspired cards are sold in sets of 8 and are just fantastic. There are four different sets on her Etsy site, along with her original art at affordable prices.

3. My first book: an adult love story. I'll sign it and send it where and when you'd like. It's available on Amazon but if you prefer to order directly from me, you'll pay a sale price of $ 8 plus shipping. 

4. Fall is a most beautiful time of year here in New England.  JB and I drive the back roads and scenes like this are common.

5. Look what JB and I made for our grandkids! I got the idea from Lo on Facebook (thank you lo) and this weekend they were a huge hit with the under six crowd-- all kinds of candy stuffed into thin gloves I pilfered from my Mother's nursing home :^)

6. I am catching up on so many people and events I've neglected since my surgery. Among this was my 97 year old Godmother's birthday. We took her out for lunch and darling 4 year old Drew wanted to sit beside her. It was all special and I felt great joy.

7. JB took this photo of 14 week old baby Reese. I think this child is an old soul. She is quick to smile and does not cry. My daughter and son-in-law are wonderful parents and it shows.  

8. Drew ready for Halloween...

9. The decoration and upgrades in a new beach house in Provincetown continue. We've installed this light over the dining room table. The table and chairs will soon be painted distressed ivory white and we are adding bead board to the wall around the table. What utter fun to make these changes and be able to pay someone else to do the work! We're on a budget but we have enough to put up a fence, fix the brick steps, add railings, paint a room or two. I am feeling very very very very lucky.

10. How to say this? We have returned Chase to the greyhound adoption agency for his placement with a different family: one that has other greyhounds. JB and I have tried everything we could think of but Chase has not been happy with us. He has been inactive and mostly unresponsive almost 23 hours a day, has howled through the night, has seemed lonely and sad. And taking him to Provincetown has been visibly traumatic for him. We know we are not the right family for his needs. So sad but relieved too. He will be placed in a family with at least one or two or three other greyhounds and where his inactivity and history can be supported without making things worse. 

We are visiting him on Friday.... :^(

That's my news. Thanks for stopping by. If you don't know already, your visits and comments are Hersey kisses to my grateful soul.

love

kj

The Lost Manuscript: part two :^)

        

My writing teacher, who is also my current editor, has advised me many times not to post any part of my second novel on my blog. "It will influence you when it's not good to be influenced," she says.

I'm not sure about that. Perhaps because 500 double spaced unedited pages have already been written. And perhaps because for me my blog is a safe haven where people I respect can say whatever and I appreciate that.

So.

Here is another excerpt from the found manuscript of the book that's taking its own sweet time. This is the first person story of Casey Mango, a middle aged, intelligent, confused, at least slightly attractive woman with an equal capacity to soar and sink, sometimes simultaneously:

Joyce was an imposing woman: six feet tall with soft chocolate skin and body language that said, ‘proceed at your own risk.’ The only person of color in the office, she was extremely bright and clearly guarded. Her laugh was rare but deep and infectious and I got a kick from the challenge of wearing down her wall of resistance.

“Come on, Joyce! Be my friend!” I’d tease her. 

We met in late August at Brant Rock in Marshfield at a casual restaurant on the beach. My marriage was rocky. It was dusk when we began our shared appetizer of cheese fondue and jet black when we finished our shared chocolate cake. 

“How about we walk on the beach?” Joyce asked me. I remember how the moon bounced off the incoming waves, one string of light after another, silver ribbons. We walked to the shoreline and sat beside each other in the sand, the tide stopping just inches in front of us. At that moment and not until that moment, I knew this was a date.

We saw each other two times the following week and the next time after that, at Joyce’s apartment, sitting on her bed, she tossed her fists in the air.

“I can’t control myself any longer,” she said. I knew what she meant.

 That first time Joyce and I made love I experienced the first real orgasm of my life. I’d had no idea. It was a rush and ecstasy that carried me out of my body and straight into the cosmos. Shortly afterwards I understood that my passion was apparently triggered by women and knew I was in love with Joyce, who was also in love with me. I stayed with my husband for another six months, carrying on a deeply satisfying and often guilt ridden affair with Joyce, until one evening, buckling under the weight of boredom, I asked him for a separation and he reluctantly moved out the next day. 

Joyce and I would continue to shake the planets for the next two years, sometimes two, sometimes three times a day, everyday, until it became clear that I had not removed my husband’s clothes from the bedroom closet and I could not bring myself to ask him for a divorce. Joyce hung in with me through my short lived affair with a young blond California surfer guy; she patiently moved in with Grace and me for several months, and then, just after Jimmy Carter lost the election, she left me for a woman she had met at work.  I never saw it coming and I was in full disbelief for weeks and months and then years. I’d never doubted Joyce, not for a second. 

That’s what happens, I think, when you grow up believing you can bend your will. 

Your comments and feedback are welcomed and appreciated. But don't tell my writing teacher. 

:^)

love

kj

The Lost Manuscript...

I cannot believe that I somehow lost the working manuscript of my second book, including the first hundred pages of the most recent second revision. It just disappeared from my laptop. I had a paper copy of some of those 100 pages but not enough to easily reconstruct, rewrite really, all over again.

It was very unlike me not to have a backup. I know I wasn't careless about saving the manuscript with these recent edits. I looked in every file and every program for it. I wondered if it was meant for me to give up and move on. 

This will be a more difficult book to publish than it is to write. It is often too close to home, and it could/may/will be hurtful to some people I love. I told myself I would not decide what to do until I finished the book. 

Then: two nights ago, while playing Words with Friends on my iPhone, the manuscript popped up. I swear this is true. It just appeared. I immediately sent myself an email copy and guess what? When I opened it, the copy I received was an older version. I can't explain any of it. I will only say that from my iphone I managed to copy-paste pages 60-100 and they were the most important. The next day, on my iPhone, the updated copy was no longer there. 

Anyway, here is a chapter, where sometimes pathetic Casey Mango and her partner Bee vacation in Italy. 

Chapter

Bee and I and the tour gang are traveling to Pompeii.

Considering that the city was partially destroyed and buried under up to twenty feet feet of ash and pumice when Mount Vesuvius erupted in AD 79 what we see is remarkably intact: it is the bones of a mud crusted bombed out city with roads and marked lots and some standing buildings. Pompeii was lost for nearly seventeen hundred years before its accidental rediscovery in 1749 and since then, excavation has provided extraordinary details into the life of an ancient city.  

Because the Roman legal system that govenerned Pompeii unified the administration of justice throughout the provinces, the empire was largely free of large-scale power disputes. This alllowed art and architecture to flourish along with commerce and economic prosperity. This is not to say, however, that women and slaves benefitted; not even. From our first step into Pompeii, now one of the most popular tourist attractions of Italy with approximately 2,500,000 visitors every year, the ‘power over’ male aristocracy is apparent. Bee and I are fascinated and then appalled by the cave like entrance to the sex rooms frequented by the city’s wealthy men. Upon entering we see mud calcified walls creating separate spaces for makeshift straw mattresses and with explicit diagrams of various sexual positions etched on many of the interior walls. 

“The merchants and governors visited the sex rooms often, then gorged themselves with food and drink, and then, on their way home to their wives and families, they would stop to relieve their indulgences at one of several vomitoriums.” Our tour guide describes this quite matter of factly. “Then,” she says, “the slaves would clean and maintain the vomitoriums every day. Being a slave was very difficult: their average life expectancy was barely twenty one years.” 

Bee and I are disgusted. When we look at a the petrified body of a young male, now encased in a glass enclosure, his arms in the air in his last moments to protect himself from volcanic lava, we are speechless. We are looking at a young man who had a literal shit life. Covered by nine feet of ash, as his body decomposed, he and others apparently left a perfectly formed hollow in the ash. Historians injected the hollow with plaster, thereby recreating the position of his body, including his terrified facial expression.

“Jesus Christ, Bee, can you imagine being so misused that he would have probably died before he was even an adult?”

Bee looks very serious. “We are so lucky, Casey. Sometimes we don’t know how lucky we are.”

Pompeii is now a calcified city. Although the roads are crusted mud it’s clear they were impressively organized, leading to separate areas of banks, merchants, and elaborate homes for the privileged ruling class. There are few physical structures, of course, but it is not hard to have a sense of how the city operated.

At the time of the eruption, this was a wealthy Roman trading town, famous for its fish sauce and grand villas.  Although there was a day’s warning and many residents had time to flee, many did not. The eruption came fast and furious, lasting nineteen hours. Pliny the Younger, circa A.D. 97 to 109, documented the terror: 

"You could hear women lamenting, children crying, men shouting. There were some so afraid that they prayed for death. Many raised their hands to the gods, and even more believed that there were no gods any longer and that this was one unending night for the world."

Mt. Vesuvius erupted with superheated ash that also rained a fiery death on several Roman cities nearby. But none was hit harder than Pompeii, which was buried in a thick layer of broiling ash in a matter of seconds. The ash killed over a thousand people instantly and buried the town nine feet deep.

Wealthy Pompeians had poured their savings into their houses.  The sophisication defied belief: rooms heated by hot air running through cavity walls and spaces under the floors,  hydraulic pumps providing running water.  From a great reservoir, water flowed invisibly through underground pipelines into drainage systems and into aqueducts supported by arches. 

Now, beneath the layers of the muddy ash  a snapshot of everyday life emerges, complete with bank receipts, graffiti, "for rent" signs, public mosaics depicting extremely graphic sex, and penis decorations on street corners.  Outside one shapely building on a main street in Pompeii, Bee and I see this piece of graffiti: "Hic bene futui," or "Here you'll get a good fuck.”

I motion to Bee to look at our tour mates, Roberta and Ellen, who have also just come across this translation. They are almost doubled over. Ellen winks at me and I know we will have a good laugh at Maria and Eddie’s kitchen later that night. 

If you've made it this far, thank you very much.

Love kj

WTF?

Crazy times, crazy world. I will never understand how this human planet can so advance scientifically and technologically and not learn or grow an inch when it comes to resolving conflicts and respecting differences. 

Here at my blog I am having a bit of an identity crisis. I am a counselor and a writer and a teacher. All of that is what I want my blog to be. But I am a daughter and a mother and a partner and a friend too, and surely there's room here too for my personal large and small triumphs and troubles. 

Surely I want to tell more stories and write more poems. 

The last few months have been a whirlwind of surgery and high finance and worries and (thank god) simple joys. My blog and my writing has taken a back seat:

What can I tell you?

Of course the world is turned upside down:

Wars and worries wear thin

Even though the seams.

But the sweater of my years is knitted tight,

Weathered wool that softens and warms 

The prickliest skin.

I’ve worn this sweater at every turn,

Even through the nighttime shakes;

Until then, never did the chill

Overtake me.

But lately until then is too often still now

Although I am better. 

And this I know:

with better comes hope

And hope is the earned warmth

Of days to come.

With love

& together strong,

kj

Intense

 I don't know where to start. Probably the breakdown. 

1. Jess was sick and I was driving to her house to help out. At 7:30 am with no warning, on the Massachusetts Turnpike, with a speed limit of 65 mph my car died. By died I mean the steering wheel locked, the brakes locked, I had no flashers or tail lights. Thank god the traffic was just starting to down because of a backup into Boston. 

I could have been slammed from behind. Easily. Some guy appeared at my window and with a screwdriver in hand, he opened a small shift box that unlocked my steering wheel and allowed him to push me to the break down lane, where I waited for 45 minutes for the Turnpike Authority to send a tow truck. I waited while cars sped by me on two sides. 

I could have been slammed. Easily.

I'll condense the rest: I had to pull myself up to and down from the high tow truck cab six times. I am recovering from knee surgery and still using a cane, still in physical therapy, still stiff and still sore. It was a bitch. My car was taken to a Toyota dealership not near my home and they told me my battery died because a cable line to the battery had corroded. They told me it should have been caught during my regular servicing. I still have to deal with that.

I could have been killed. That's what I think.

I picked my car up late afternoon, paid and turned the starter. Dead. 

I'll condense the rest again. Rental car. Two more days. Defective NEW battery. Replacement. Driving cautiously.

2. I spent two heartwarming days this week with my daughter Jess, baby Reese, Mike and the boys. Lovely though still limping. Damn that. This recovery is two steps forward, one step back. I have another month of physical therapy and I hope hope I walk better and further every day. I hope no more tow trucks. I hope Jessica's return to work this week, after 12 weeks of maternity leave, goes well. 

3. This is a view from the couch of our modest lovely new house in Provincetown by the sea; currently a vacation home but one day...maybe a move there. We have sold the condo in town that we needed to sell in order to buy this house without losing our financial shirts, and we finally sold in the nick of time. We close this Friday. Friday night JB and I will have dinner at the Mews, heartily toast and appreciate, and then we will hang pictures in our new place. 

3. I have a good friend--her name is Lori--many of your know her and adore her many talents. She knitted this for Baby Reese. I wanted to cry when I opened this gift. I have great friends. 

4. Ah Mohegan Sun Casino. I am a slot machine addict. I don't know why that is. If I break even I think I won. JB patiently came with me to unwind for a day. Why unwind? Did I mention my knee rehab has been challenging and limiting and my sleep is most nights disrupted and we're not sure we're going to be able to help our dog Chase be healthy and happy and I'm so shocked by the violence and uncivility in the world?

5. There's more. But there is also good. My family. My daughter and her husband. My darling grands. The sea. Fall in New England. Good friends. A yard that's been neglected all summer but is still fertile and loyal. 

6. BTW: I found this on Facebook. A rubber hand filled with Halloween goodies. JB and I are going to make these for our little guys. Steal the idea: isn't it cool?

7. The new house: nothing fancy, right? And yet JB and I are giddy about it. This week the brick steps are being repaired and restored, the shutters and flower boxes are being painted Ben's gorgeous Nova Scotia Blue, and the overgrown rose bushes and giant neglected shrubs will be cut back and pruned. Every small repair is a dopamine rush.

8. I so rarely talk about Logan. Mr. Ryan and no-longer-baby-Drew and now sister Reese get a lot of my attention and words. Logan quietly observes. He is now two and is stringing three or four words together--sentences. Logan is a happy boy. I love him. 

9. As I write this, the United States government is readying to shut down. Disgusting, this congress. I am thinking about what I want to do, can do, should do, might do, to make the world more to my liking. I believe many many of us need to find one another and support one another as a modern day underground railroad. Surely peace becomes us.* 

* from social justice singer Holly Near

10. My friend Anne has died. I am so very sad. She handled her illness and life incredibly. I will write about Anne and my loss, but not now. 

I still hope I blog more regularly. I want to. I also hope you are each well. Happy new season.

love

kj

Where (How) I Live: Western Massachusetts

morning coffee

the park next door

downtown

the farms

Stella: rescued, loved, missed

when there were just two.. 

health costs: the most expensive dog we will ever love 

Please don't misunderstand. My life is not as lovely as the people and animals and space around me. I complain as much as I appreciate. 

But....

Where (how) I live is beautiful and peaceful and full. One day I will not live here anymore. Then I hope I will look back on this farmland and college town with abundance. And if I'm smart enough by then, I will know that my ability to be happy comes not from these gifts that surround me, but from within me.

I am every age I've ever been and every place I've ever been.

love

kj

Pondering Time

 I am clearly in transition. 

Nine weeks after knee surgery with several months of rehabilitation ahead, twelve weeks after leaving my structured (and loved) job of five years, ten weeks after the birth of an unexpected girl granddaughter named reese, six months after incredulously and miraculously buying a real house in provincetown, five months after putting our condo on the market thinking it would sell in a week, and two weeks after finally getting a offer, therefore plugging a scary financial hole...

After all this, I seem to be settling down: the knee pain is less, I'm moving better and more, I'm not so tired, and I'll be damned: I'm not working! I have some time. 

Here is a quick tour of my summer to now:

I took this tonight driving home at night. This is my town center. To me it might as well be the 1950's. There's an easy pace to living here: a college vibe but this is farmland.

On the other hand, this is the new house in provincetown. A HOUSE! For years we have been in a condominium situation with difficult neighbors, so to have our own place one block from the bay is very incredible. But look at this crazy driveway; even one car cannot fit straight into it.

I could not be at the beach all summer. But one day in late august, I opened the hatchback of my toyota rav, while JB sat in the sand, and i took this in. Right in front of me...

There is a place on the back road in Sandwich on Cape Cod called the Jam Kitchen, a part of a nature center.  There are 20 burners that make dozens of different kinds of jam that then sell in the gift store. We bought raspberry.   It was great. 

And what am i doing these days? I'm not sure, but I seem to be thinking about how to do this gently. 

I hope many of my friends and visitors will be back on the blogs. I've been a bit absent and I hope I post more often. 

Because facebook be damned; I love it here. :^)

love

kj

My Favorite Poem I've Ever Written

I am surprised but I just about if not actually cry every time I read this. I am pretty proud of this poem. 

love

kj

Astonishment:

If I were dying tonight,

Lying in my bed with plastic tubes and half-filled bottles

on the small table nearby 

and bedpans and oxygen there to diminish any shame, 

Perhaps forcing my breaths

with the strength of a desperate parent

who implausibly and frantically lifts two tons 

of mangled steel off a broken daughter—

If I were dying tonight and I wished to tell you

What will astonish you,

I would tell you this:

Be sure to notice white flowers in the moonlight, 

Because the softened glow is like no other.

Appreciate the lingering scent of garlic on your fingers, 

Because healing is possible from that alone.

Tell the truth when it matters least

Because then you will be sure there is another honest person in the world.

Always spend the extra money for dimmers

Because light that builds in intensity and then gently fades is 

 good for your spirit.

Over and over, ask yourself, “What is the lesson here?”

Because then you will forever be a student and never a victim

Never believe for a moment that the world is going to hell

Because you only need to love outside yourself to know better. 

If I were dying tonight, I would tell you all this

Because astonishment is brethren to curiosity,

Which leads to observation,

And dedication,

And finally appreciation.

If I were dying tonight, perhaps there would only be minutes,

Perhaps only seconds, 

To tell you that I will leave with all the love

I have ever felt, and ever given.

I will take it all with me, tucked under my angel wing—

The accumulation of grace from every breath I have ever taken.

Here’s what’s astonishing:  I will also leave all that love behind, 

It will be imbedded in my daughter’s stunning light and my partner’s quiet 

courage,

It will guide my friends and coworkers when the layoff comes. 

My brother will remember how I tried to do my share

And Joey will find someone else like me to help him tame his fears.

Even the woman at the grocery store that day I let her go ahead of me—

will remember how we were both comforted from that simple act.

If I were dying tonight, I would also tell you

That within, under, because of, and from the little moments 

Comes all the wonder and astonishment you could ever hope for.

The little moments that aren’t so little.

I would tell you to let those moments astonish you.

I would tell you this because it is all you need to know.

Vacation Time

I am finally back in Provincetown. With JB and Chase. In our new sweet house. I'm walking with canes. But walking better. And the ocean is everywhere.

JB and I are here for one week and a day or two. We got an offer on our condo and my surgery is behind us, so we are trying to get back to  relaxing--not always easy. Boy the world is a mess. Syria and Egypt and Miley Cyrus on stage in her underwear, and racially, even worse. 

This is not a typical  time in Provincetown. We have moved from a quiet location one block from all the action to the quiet East End on a busy street. That, and I cannot walk far. I should say that the folks at physical therapy say I need more patience because I am doing really well for 7 weeks after major surgery, but I don't like being impaired walking. And I'm uncomfortable with some degree of pain most of the time. Maybe so for another month or two. 

Tonight lounged on the couch we passed JB's IPad back and forth, resulting in this drawing. This is an app called Making Paper 53.  I learned about it from Silke's blog. It has paint colors and different sizes and functions of pens and pencils and paint brushes. And an eraser. All easy peasy to use and fun to create drawings and doodads. And then to store them.

Plans for tomorrow:   breakfast

                                  read two chapters of my book aloud to JB (could be difficult)

                                  work in the little yard weeding and pruning

                                  go to the provincetown pool and lounge and bob

For me, it's been a quiet summer on the blogs. I have an unsettled feeling that Facebook has made the blogs less essential, and I hope that is not true because I love blogging. 

Best wishes with love

kj

Moist

Some time ago I stopped writing poetry. I am not happy about that so this is about that.
love 
kj

Where is that well of words;

gurgled streams moving

through the right and best place,

a channel for my brand

of perplexity and observation?

Those words used to flow

 sputter and drip too;

they'd drench me with the chance

to rightly see--

A waterfall it was, 

no effort just gravity; 

just my keyboard,

and feeling fingers.

I stopped writing water words:

now I think but don't record

and I don't know why. 

But I still turn to the the waves and trees.

and I still try.

I know this much: what yearns

Is just the whether

of a waiting sky.