here i am

I've needed to do laundry for several days now. Each day I scoop up all the towels in the bathroom and stuff 'em into the bag - all determination and best intentions - then drag one back out when I wake up the next day after AGAIN not having done the laundry and realize that I need to take a shower and must get dry somehow . All because I hate going to the laundromat and I try to avoid at all costs the potential for lurky stares. The laundromat is, in theory, an interesting place. It should be fodder for observation and creativity... But mostly, most of the time - when I sit there alone at night patiently awaiting the sigh of a finished machine, warm and oddly numbed by the droning hum of the dryers and the yellow lights and the yellowed floors and the floating blue bits of hovering lint and wonder how the guy with the greasy grey puffy coat and the bike planted against the folding table in front of him got his laundry here on a bike... and why that guy over there just d...

Running update... I was really off my scarcely established routine while I was sick and recuperating. I'm finally trying to ease back into things now, if only the wind chill would bugger off. I'm not a brave enough soul to go out in anything too much below freezing. But the shoes still feel great and the knee feels great, and running, itself, of course, feels more than excellent. I am taking the babiest baby steps you could possibly imagine... 'Cos I know myself and my tendency to do everything I do with gusto and super big much intensity and best intentions, and the last thing I want to do with this enterprise is burn myself out. So, if you see me out there running, then walking, then running, then walking - don't laugh at me! I'm building up my endurance! It's working, too. What once felt like a burning ripping lung tearing big ol' ball o' STOP IT - YOU'RE KILLING ME! has turned into a body humming c'mon, lets keep goin' and kick...

It's supposed to be five degrees tomorrow. Somehow I can't even comprehend five degrees at this moment. I don't think I'll be out running. Twentysomething degrees was quite enough thank you. The snow is to come Friday. More snow, so they say. Strangely enough I find myself feeling altogether indifferent about impending snow. Everything seems incomprehensible to me today. The 5 degrees. The snow. The fact that you are somewhere across town and may be hurting maybe not and we just don't make the call because the leaden whisper of what now ? looms too large. I have found a sixth gear of living called detached and have sunk down all too comfortably into that groove and appear to be seaming along just fine there. So be it today this. I'm wearing an orange tank top and my shoulders are cold but I don't mind. I also just ate an orange and - instead of cutting it neatly into quarters with a good sharp knife, then safely into eight shimmering, manageable pyrami...

Here I am again. Back where I started with this. With a heart too heavy and a brain too numb to make words out of this abyss. There's no rope and pulley with bucket attached to help me in dredging the depths of it. So... it's just a cold morning after a good run and a glass of water and a handful of almonds and the strange light of what's really real just sitting there on the living room floor stretching a hamstring stretching deep being in it being in the moment the life the pain the wrong the right the seeing of the soft cotton pattern of the weave on the bottom of my sock with Sarah McLachlan on the stereo (what else? c'mon, you'd do it too - admit it) and now the kettle whistling and I think I'll just dump a big scoop of sugar in my tea and take a shower and get on with it... what else is there to do? Okay - I promise I'll find a way to tell the moment of you sitting on the stairs with the hallway light behind your eyes hearing the words that just ...

I should write something. I should. I really, really, really should. But no. I don't. Why? Is it because the D-bomb was finally dropped a week ago today and I've had no idea what to say since then? Probably. I'll think of something soon though, don't worry. M

Here's some music for 'ya, too...

Yo: Estoy enojada. Ana: ¿Por qué? Yo: Porque _____ me llamó antes de que yo llegué aquí para decirme que no iba venir con nostotros a bailar esta noche y se puso muy raro conmigo. Ana: ¿Qué dijo? Yo: Él quería que yo fuera con él a ver una pelea en casa de unos amigos suyos. Ana: ¿Que va? Si ya habíamos planeado ir a bailar. Yo: Digo yo. Estaba enojado que no fuera con él - diciendo que eras tú mi novia y tales cosas. Ana: ¿Qué? Que cosa más loca. Yo: Ademas, él ya me había preguntado si me gusta el boxeo, y yo le dije que no! Ana: ¿Por qué será que se puso asi? Yo: No sé. Estaba actuando como si yo fuera su novia - si solo yo le he hablado dos o tres veces por telefono. Ana: Pero tienes que entender, que en nuestra cultura es asi - si alguien te pretende, es como... Yo: Ya sé - es como si ya fueras suya. Ana: Si. silencio....... Ana: Que necio. Yo: Si. Los hombres son estupidos.

I live on the second floor of this big, old house and often I feel as though I'm living in a treehouse. I have a commanding view of everything around and below me. Perhaps I shouldn't admit it, but I also have a commanding view of the houses around me - and the windows of those houses. I don't peep. No. But sometimes I do observe. How can you not observe? The neighbors on one side of my house are more interesting than the neighbors on the other side of my house. The neighbors on the other side of my house are seemingly of semi-retirement age and have Sunday dinners and a big grown-up style oak dining table and decorate profusely but tastefully for every holiday and change of season. Not too terribly intriguing. But the neighbors on the interesting side are more mysterious, if not as simple to describe. The porch is hauntingly spare - a great antique-ish teal colored bench, stacks of firewood and not much else. Sometimes a paper. Outside the door on the side of the house ...

The human body is truly an amazing machine! For two days I alternately writhed in misery and slept the unlikely sleep of someone in a sauna. I ached and creaked and my head was a hot quiet buzz of discomforting misinformation. At one point all the pain in my body centered in my throat and refused to dislodge itself. I lurked in terrified anticipation of the inferno that would be the next choking, body wracking cough. I'd sooner have had someone hit me on the head with a hammer and put me out of my proverbial misery. Then - just when I thought I could take no more - something happened. I began to sweat. I slept again. I awoke, cool and comfortable. The fever broke and I emerged from it all somehow alive and the birds are twittering and the sun is shining and the day is crisp and expansive and I feel as though I've thrown off a hot, wool, ash covered blanket or emerged from a coma. I've leapt back into the world of the living, and though I probably won't do any waltzin...

I'm fantastically ill and have been existing in a fever-induced haze. I ran across this recently and find it to be disturbingly catchy. The snow is all melty. It's COLD. I hate winter. I haven't been running since I've been fantastically ill. I will run again when I'm all bettah. Spiced apple cider packets are the only thing sufficient to mask the taste of Theraflu. I watched Comedian recently, and found it to be enjoyable and thought provoking. This assessment could be entirely due to aforementioned fever-induced haze. Evening comes on so quickly these days that I find myself taken aback and disoriented. There are no less than three white ceramic mugs on my desk at this moment. The mugs are filled to varying degrees with various liquids. I can't figure out how this came to pass. I think it's time to stop writing now and go to sleep again. M

This fella has been visiting the tree outside my kitchen window for several months now. Today he was alone but usually his vividness is contrasted smack dab in the middle of lots of plain little brown sparrows. He sits there and looks cute and chubby and chews on his twig as I wash the dishes and, every so often, he looks my way. M

The first snow came today. I'd felt the warning cold for a few days, and dreaded. But the first snow is deceiving. Each year, I forget my hatred of all that is winter for those few magical hours. Woke up. Looked out. Big. Soft. Flakes. Falling. Gracefully, quietly, unthreateningly. And all of the everything all around got quiet under it. A sigh of snow. Safe. Cradled. Calm. Nestled. I pull on my hat, drive slowly to the store in the hush of a muffled white cocoon. It's terribly beautiful and romantic for one afternoon. Then soon, the hatred. M

I spent a good part of today lying on my back in my darkened room, just sort of flopped out in the yellowish light of the windowshades, listening to jangly punk rock on the college station and trying to feel my craniosacral rhythm. At one point I wandered to the kitchen to eat too many left-overs. I'm sick and sickly and sort of wandering foggy in that in-between, feeling too yucky to do much and feeling okay enough that I feel guilty for not doing much. I've got that in-your-pjs-too-long-haven't-seen-daylight-all-day kind of cabin-feverish feeling. Ran Wednesday and wanted to run today but figured I'd better rest-up as Wednesday was pushing it with my almost-cold in the cold (see, now it's a full blown cold!) Speaking of which, why do people ask all manner of dumb-ass questions when you're sick? "What do you have?" Well, I don't freakin' know! I'm not a microbiologist. Do you want a shopping list of my past and current symptoms? ...

So, I finally get the shoes, then my @#$% watch has to go in to the shop! Therefore, since I've had to guesstimate my running time, I've only taken the shoes out for little trial runs - Friday and today. But... WOW! They are super-duper comfy, no knee pain - I feel like I'm running on air! Wah-hooooooooo! It's ON !!! This is the first time I've ever done any aerobic exercise for any reason other than to try to lose weight. This is different. If I lose weight it's incidental. I want to run. Go figure. It feels incredible. As usual, I'll keep y'all posted. M

New Balance 765s As requested - the 411 on my new superfast supercool shoes. M

I got them, I got them, I got them! I stopped at the running store tonight and got the shoes. I walked into the store - all sheepish and silly and awkward - and said, as matter of factly as I could, "Hello. I would like to buy some running shoes please. I've never bought running shoes before." And the man behind the counter was very nice (of course, because I had just announced that I would shortly be giving him some money, and what else would you be but nice when someone is about to give you money) and said, "We would like to sell you some running shoes." (smiles all round) And then we commenced to perform a little parade of barefoot walking and foot measuring and shoe trying on and me trucking self-consciously around the little track thingy in the store (but hiding my self-consciousness by studiously concentrating on figuring out how well I liked the various fits). It was a little bit of a blast, to tell you the truth. And then I gave him a wad of cash (a...

our conversation was like swimming under water. your voice muffled and warbled and coming through. one topic after another, floating by - wavy and blurred in the most vivid blues and reds and some other color that I can't quite pin down. you made some mad uncomplicated sense to my sleep drunk mind and that seemed to me to be the makings of the most reasonable conversation I could have had in maybe a decade. but maybe that's making it make too much of itself. it was in any case, a good thing. you get points for that. for simple happiness. M

I'm Brave! I'm Tangerine Boy! What San-X Character Are You?

I cheated on my hairdresser. I can't pronounce Israel Kamakawiwo`ole's name. A bowl of cereal is not enough. My CD Burner is not working. There was a ladybug carcass in the dish water. Blade 's blog has mysteriously disappeared. ( ! ) My heart got broken this week. I'm pretending it didn't. I didn't know that Jennifer Beals is bi-racial. The air is cold and still with chill. My office is never less than a total mess. I'm a salsaholic. I need to re-pot plants. I want to run. I never thought I'd want so badly to run. I'm pissed that I can't run. Trinity makes me smile. I might go to a hockey game tonight. I have an unexplained urge to buy a Dottie West CD. I must be insane. I'm trying not to miss you. It's hard.

For those of you following my marathon training schedule (snicker, snicker) - here is an update... I did week three of my plan probably for a total of three days (more, perhaps - you'd think I'd be keeping better track, eh?) but these days did not actually occur during the space of one week... because my knee is hurting. This is not good. It is not good to be running as slowly as I am for only two minutes at a time and have one's knee be hurting. Not good. Not good at all. So I gave it time to rest, did some strengthening exercises, then gave it another go, with modifications (different shoes, different running surface, more baby steps, icing and ibuprofen, etc.) but it began hurting again. So - I'm back to walking until I figure out the problem. I think its the shoes. Therefore my plans are on hold until the funds appear for a trip to the running store for proper shoes. Maybe on pay day. We'll see. I'll keep you posted. I know you're on the edges...