here i am

Did 12/23 - run/walk today - 2.5 miles. I laced up tighter and paid attention to my footstrike and form more closely. No knee pain a'tall. There is absolutely no way the weather could be more beautiful today. It's a deep cleansing breath kinda day. I saw my first robin. He looked like a little boy with a faux-hawk hairdo. He was cute and tough and ready for spring. A very tiny puppy chased me heartily for a few blocks, followed by two laughing, apologetic boys. Lucky for that puppy that I run so slow! In other news, I'm weary of people. I don't like it when people call me and rant on about something someone else did but refuse to consider my suggestion that they address their concerns directly to the offending individual in question. I know I'm not the patron saint of interpersonal communication myself, but this kind of shit just wears my soul out. M

This morning I did 11/24 - run/walk - about 2.5 miles. Yeep! The new years resolutionaries have hung up their earmuffbands, so I've got the trails back to myself again. Did you think I'd given up? C'mon - I can't let those $100 shoes go to waste now, can I? It wasn't as excruciating as I feared it might be. I wimped out toward the end, but my knee was bugging me ... plus I didn't want to push myself too hard so soon out of the gate again. I'd like to stick with this, if at all possible. I'm so terrible at sticking with things, generally. Well, some things. Other things I'm quite good at sticking with. Lately I'm into summarily dismissing people from my life who don't treat me with respect. It feels good. Like taking a cold shower after a sauna. I'm also wanting to listen to tiki lounge music and drink more red tea. I've just discovered red tea. I like the other colors of tea quite well - green, white, and even black from t...

I'm on break. Wow do I need a break. I just ate two bowls of my favorite raspberries and cream granola that I get from the co-op and had a cup of green and red tea mixed together. It's rainy and chilly and shiver you to your bones-ish and I'm sneezing and my throat acts like it wants to hurt. So ... I took some nasty tasting Echinacea/Goldenseal tincture and I'm just going to take one guilt free do nothing day and go turn the heat up and snuggle under two (count-em two!) blankets and lay on the couch and see if there is anything on my three channels or maybe read a magazine and try not to get sick because I have a week off and I can't be sick I have STUFF TO DO! Wish me luck! M

Another wacky self-portrait ... 

I would have been back sooner, but I got my head sucked into a bucket and I'm still trying to yank it out. I've been sort of squished and molded into something frighteningly unlike me. Something I don't for the life of me have any way of recognizing. I'm trying to unfold myself and push out the wrinkles and the bends and the sleeves pushed up and back and all wrongway. When I start to get it sorted out - finally begin to see a bit of the me that there was before - something recognizable beginning to take shape, but still damaged, irrevocably altered - I gasp in unprepared shock and horror to see the gaping tattered edged eviscerated hole in the stomach of the sweater that was my self. I'm pissed. I'm not holding it together well. I need ammunition. But I'm soft. And quite fucking alone in it. M

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.