here i am

This is what I would have said to the bitchy Gap girl yesterday when she was all bitchy to me as I tried to return some pants: "Lady, you're a manager at the GAP . Dial it back a few clicks fashionista ." Cue derisive scowl - disgusted exit ... and ... SCENE.

Hellman reminded me that I should show you all my newest kicks. Click on photo for a larger image if you are so inclined. I just had to post this shot (and not a closer-up one) because in it you can also see the fire truck that drove away moments later. The reason for the fire truck sitting outside my window is that there is a house burning down around the corner. I saw all the trucks coming when I pulled up after work... all the neighbors were starting to porchlook and even meander down the sidewalk aways to congregate across the street and watch... what? Watch a house burning down, and the fire guys trying to stop it, I guess. I must admit I got caught up in the hysteria for a moment - but hysteria is the wrong word, 'cos it was wierdly quiet as I gritty crunched across the muddy snowmelty curb and stepped between all the trucks and cop cars with spinning silent lights... over the fat giant firehose in the middle of the street... and paused at the end of the corner, ke...

I should be leaving for work now, but I'm sitting in a towel drinking chai thinking, "I should be leaving for work now..." Last night I had yet another opportunity for a fish burrito (you have to try one, Murph, then you'll understand what I mean), but I declined. I did, however, have some Pad Thai shrimp and subsequently attempt to convince myself after feeling tingly lips (probably the chili sauce) and dizziness (?) that I have developed a shellfish allergy. But I'm okay now. Okay... I'm going to work now. M

I had a dream that someone I care about threw a loosely packed handful of snow in my face because of some perceived insult. My mom was standing there and she was appalled. I couldn't figure out how to explain it or make it right. Shortly thereafter, I had another dream in which my brother called me up at some odd hour sounding sodden, and informed me that he'd taken the school credit card out of my wallet and used it to buy large quantities of ??? something untoward. Again - I couldn't figure out how to explain it or make it right. Wait! Why the hell is it ME that needs to explain or make anything right? In other news - I need to stop eating pizza and fish burritos and drinking horchata and get up and move my ass. Thanks Dana , for this inspiration! M

1 - I just found out about these guys , and got their CD - they kick ass. 2 - My brother is an asshole, and I'm never speaking to him again.

I don't know what the hell happned. I got sucked into some dark place where I forgot myself again. I'm trying to suck my feet out of some evil relationship quicksand and move on again. I don't know where my head is at. But I have to write. I have to do something. Thanks Blade for inspiring me to just keep on keeping on with this blog. Someday I'll have something interesting to say here. Until then... I'm back, for what it's worth. And no, I haven't been running, either. I'm going to start again when all the new years resolution people give up. The trails are just too crowded with their tights and earmuffbands. M

(click on photo for larger image - if you dare!) So I just had to make my way down 2 1/2 blocks of slippy slippy sidewalks this morning to document the horror after seeing it while driving home from work. Anyone care to suggest a title?

New Years was sort of a bust. I almost had to work. Then when I found out I didn't have to work at the last minute, it was too late to do anything cool. So I yanked my brother out of a lame party and we headed downtown only to be standing outside in the cold at midnight waiting to get into a stupid club we didn't end up going to. We went to another club instead, the one where I normally go to dance salsa. Bad idea. The new non-public-smoking-ban-ordinance-thing went into effect on Jan. 1 - so the short fat redneck bouncer kid (sort of a miniature of the fat redneck biker bouncer guy that normally works the door there - I think they might be related) decides to get brave with my shortest littlest Napoleonic complex wielding brother and tries to shove him out after not giving him 3 seconds to put out the cigarette he'd just ordered him to put out - like 45 minutes after said ban-thing went into effect! Needless to say, lots of bravado and "No, don't, it's n...

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