Sand and Water

McBeth.

All alone, I didn't like the feeling
All alone, I sat and cried
All alone, I had to find some meaning
In the center of the pain I felt inside

All alone, I came into the world
All alone, I will someday die
Solid stone is just sand and water, baby
Sand and water, and a million years gone by

I will see you in the light of a thousand suns
I will hear you in the sound of the waves
I will know you when I come, as we all will come,
Through the doors, beyond the grave

All alone, I heal this heart of sorrow
All alone, I raise this child
Flesh and bone, he's just
Bursting towards tomorrow
And his laughter fills my world, and wears your smile

All alone, I came into the world
All alone, I will someday die
Solid stone is just sand and water, baby
Sand and water, and a million years gone by
-Beth Nielsen Chapman
(to hear realstream, follow this link: http://bethnielsenchapman.com/?inc=albums&alb_id=348#2807)

dats the fact

when you wish upon a star...

McBeth.

...makes no difference who you are
anything your heart desires will come to you

Sometimes wishing is enough. A wish can be a powerful tool to guide and point a person toward some ultimate place of being.

There is a bumper sticker I came to hate - and then, to slowly deeply appreciate - after the end of my most recent romantic relationship.

The sticker read: "Hope is a good companion but a poor guide."

There is a personal accountability missing in wishes and dreams. Wishes don't generally include thoughts like 'I wish I would work my ass off to create a successful business (or relationship or outcome)'. Wishes usually come in the I Dream of Jeanie form where some empowered Other Being blinks, wiggles a nose and makes it so.

I'm a usefully lazy person. I do lots of creative things with my nonmoving time. I have pages full of wishes and hopes and dreams. I am more and more aware of the unlikeliness of any of those coming to fruition unless I do my own blinking, wiggling my own nose, making my own wishes so.

I'm an excellent blamer. As many pages of dream lists, I have pages full of excuses, reasons why some particular thing just didn't couldn't hasn't worked. Boo hoo for me. My life is so hard so sad so complicated too tiring. I'm the High Priestess of Rationalization. (Try me sometime. I dare you.)

I get what I expect in the end, and if I continue to make excuses, if I continue to pardon my own choices I'll be right where I'm sitting in another 20 years. I don't plan to let that happen. But scared? You bet. Afraid of risking? Hell yeah.

What do you wish for?

They grow up so fast

McBeth.

A family of knives once lived on the pleasant side of town. Mother knife had her child's tip corked at a very early age, as all the other mothers had done with their own offspring, to keep the wee lad safe. After all , the world was rife with fearsom dangers: pointy toothpicks ready at a second's notice to plunge into an eye; rusty nails coated with disease begging to implant themselves into the freshest barest foot. Mother knife couldn't bear the idea that her child, unaware of his own potential, may inadvertently bring harm to himself.

One evening, after dinner had been cleared from the table and the boy had been given his sink bath, Mother attended to his bedtime needs, lovingly wrapping him into his sheath.

While she dried him the boy looked up into his mother's eyes, studying their shine. He did love her so -- She was greater to him than Venus rising from that goofy shell. Nobody was as luminescent, as brilliant, as sharp-witted as his mother. And nobody loved him as much as she did.

"Momma, can I ask you something?"

"Yes, of course", his mother replied as she adjusted the last tie on the bow she'd wrapped around his waist.

"Um.. well, first you have to promise to not get mad."

Mother knife laughed warmly, "of course I won't be mad darling, you can ask me ANYTHING".

"Well, um, all..", he stammered and fidgeted. "All my friends are starting to make fun of me. They're calling me baby-slingblade. But I'm NOT a baby! So ummm, what I want to know is umm ... can I get my cork removed?"

Sleepover Party

McBeth.

They begged and begged. They wheedled.

Finally, finally - their parents caved.

That Friday night the knives slept overnight at their friend Winey's place. The little ones bunked up together for security (even though they told the bigger blades they weren't scared).

Of course, there were a few problems. That pampered primadonna Pamela Chef brought her own sheath, just to remind the rest how much better she was than any of them. They all stayed up far too late watching a fabulous slasher film, leaving them feeling rusty and worn the next morning.

But they really did have a fabulous time.

Sharp Gals

McBeth.

Even knife girls go in pairs to check their makeup.

And sometimes they'll share their secrets with one another out of earshot of the boys.

Edgy

McBeth.

Pippa had suggested a photo of cutlery. You ask, I deliver.

After giving it a few days' worth of brainstorming I had good clean fun playing with knives and I'll add a few of the picture results as I go.

Thanks for the idea, Pippa. I'm simmering a few ideas wrt how I want to try to snap the next few subjects. Stay tuned.

Gentlewomen, start your SAD lights

McBeth.

I think it's safe to say you're a real Wisconsinite when you confidently drive with car windows and sunroof open on October nights. The cool weather isn't the least bit affecting if one wears her warm woolen cap and she turns the heater just slightly up past 'low'.

I was lucky enough to find a local gentleman selling his few-year-old SAD light recently. He'd placed the ad online back in August, heard from a smattering of interested takers but nobody did that final (and somewhat important) 'show up and pay for it' step. I came across the ad a few weeks back. Thinking I was far too late and far more than a dollar short, I emailed the gent anyway figuring 'hell, the worst that'll happen is that I'll get an email from a fellow down in the dumps person emanating some charming Eeoreyish 'ooOOhhhhwell, the light's gone, the same thing that happens to all the good ones, they just up n'leave you, sigh'.

Turns out the fellow was a former coworker. Though the term is used loosely we both were paid by the same employer. I have to wonder if it wasn't just the workplace. ooOOhhhwelllll.

He told me the lamp never seemed to help him a whole lot, so I asked why he'd kept it for so long. Turned out his cat loved the thing and he felt good about making his cat happy so the light stayed. For the cat.

I think that's a story about a therapy modality having positive results despite the formal application of close-minded rules.

So I am the new owner of a used and alternately-effective SAD light. YAY. Yay? ahem. YAY!

This might sound stupid but uh, this is one damn bright light. I've been sitting in front of it for 1/2 hr. to 45 mins. the past two days. I believe it's too early to start peeking for signs of change after so short a time, but I sure the hell need to turn up a few other lights after I turn the SAD light off or I can't see ANYTHING after the room returns to its former darkness.

So as the autumn skies begin to drift us into sleepy winter snowflakey hibernation, my SAD light and I will be keeping one another company here at the desk.

Your task: Think --> Respond

Think of three photos you would like to see me try to capture.
Tell me your ideas.

Then. And then. then.

Watch and wait.

Sheriff, Judge and Jury

The judge adjusted her pigtails while the jury remains hopelessly deadlocked between the bustier and the chainsaw accessorization.

Tonight's bla-- uhm, credit goes directly to Bakerina in gladness for these past 20 minutes during which I have not accomplished the anticipated evening dish-doing or paper shredding. Nothing else happened either, which could be either a cosmic coincidence or (more likely) a testament to the power of mindfully ignoring what can be put off when one cannot bear to figure out what is supposed to come next.

My alter-ego image shall appear in the coming days, unless someone permits the jury to call it hung and they all disburse for lunch. Then? Alter-ego better run like a scaredy cat cuz that thar is the sound of trouble a'brewin.

Sunday, Bloody Sunday

McBeth.

With my faulty gynocological system it is never clear what is going to happen or when it is going to happen. My family herstory has left all my female siblings (and perhaps some of the long-dead women too) with a colorful variety of 'IT'S NOT WORKING' symptoms, growths and scares.

After three weeks of waiting and wondering, the gears started up. Like a lumbering behemoth just woke from a dead sleep the system attempts to reestablish itself, taking me along for the ride.

Yesterday I bled through handfuls of tampons, sanitary pads, two sets of underwear and two pairs of pants. Before bedtime I resignedly cleaned up the last surprise attack. Left my shirt on and stepped into the shower ~ essentially to hose down my lower half with the hope that I could be clean and dry for a few sleeping hours. Ha! I woke to another bloody mess ... sheets, pjs, underwear ... right though everything, again.

This amazing capability, this natural world gift I've been given to grow and bear children is, hmm, how to say it... it's overkill. Really. It has served me well and it's been greatly appreciated but right now I wouldn't mind having also been given a switch to flip at the time I was done bearing my live young to turn the bloodworks off at will.

It was because I was curious about exactly what shedule my body thinks it should be on that I went through old calendars and archives, searching for the few, the proud, the actual cycles.

Lesse... In 2000 there was January (noted as 'overdue'), November (the last week), December (started the first week, just having finished the Nov. cycle).

I haven't found complete 2001 information so those details remain sketchy, but onward and upward to 2002: June (I bled for a full month), July (my notes indicated PMS symptoms but no flow). That's about it for that year.

Then 2003 rolled around: February, May, June (at the time I made a note I'd been bleeding for three weeks), September (noted as a superflow making it impossible to leave the house). Aah, what a year.

And then we rang in New Year's Day 2004: January (emotionally whacked, no bleeding at the time I made notes), July, and here we are in October (yep, definitely another gusher).

Next step is to take this information I've gathered, go back to the doc (again), explain that I want thus-and-so tests run, see what happens.

My body is not unlike my vehicle - if I'm hearing a rattle or hum when I'm driving my car I have the full attention of my mechanic when I drive Scarletta up onto the lift and say 'it's not working'. I think I should be able to get the same service on my body from the body fix-it folks.

Can't bring myself to make that appointment just yet. Maybe after waking up and checking to see if I have a renewed source of income transferred to my bank account. Maybe then.

It's not so black and white

McBeth.

Last year I began noticing significant changes in my skin, the texture and sensitivity of my casing, and the obvious wrinkles that seem to be so comfortably settling in whereever they feel like settling in.

This past year I have been attitudinally strident about permitting gravity and age to claim me. I can't wrap my head around these subtle alterations in what I have always assumed was me. It is upsetting. It is me - I am me - changing before my own eyes but the action is not of me, it is all about me.

I will be 39 next month and, while I have never been partial to Big Year Markers (puhleeze, got better things to do with my idleness like .. um, well like OTHER stuff), this one is not going to slip by unnoticed, not by me.

Upon reflection ...

McBeth.

It was while crying over spilt grounds (not milk like those simple-minded sissies) grounds, no, a whole different spilt mess altogether, that Bob Marley came to me as an audiocast vision.

Bob squatted to my right, wrapping my shoulders with his long arms, humming something I couldn't hear. My own baleful sobs were preventing me from hearing what he was singing to me but he continued humming, holding me, rocking me, gently pulling me into his left side.



'YOU'RE A GODDAMNED MAKE-BELIEVE NON- HALLUCINATORY MOTHERFUCKING HALLUCINATED EXPERIENCE! GO AWAY! FUCK OFF!', I rasped at him. He hummed back. Few things are more annoying than telling someone to leave you alone and have the venom sucked off, cast aside, ignored. Few things are as difficult... as kind a gesture to receive, for with the venom acknowledged all you're left with is what really was there to begin with, the stuff hiding underneath, the stuff buried to prevent revelation.



I mopped my face between swipes at the floor, the walls, the appliances. Stupid stupid stupid. But... but... but... how could I possibly have foreseen the garbage can trajectories? And that moment of question - the millisecond I had a counter-stupid doubt - that's when Three Little Birds fluttered in. That's what Bob was humming to me in the background, and only when my own noise quieted I could hear Bob, I could hear what he was trying to tell me in his reassurance, in his relaxed embrace.



Every little thing is gonna be alright

Time Flies

McBeth.

... and soon enough the snowflakes will flutter down, being wished on by small and not so small children alike.

The smell and feel of autumn is settling down upon my part of the universe, changing the colors of leaves, browning the marigolds, slowly freezing the bees to an arthritic crawl.

Nighttime brings an honest to goodness chill that playing kids ignore just as long as they can until, eventually, their mothers bring them light jackets, feeding arms into sleeves, zipping sweaty busy bodies into an extra layer of I Love You.

Empty or Preparing

McBeth.

It occurred to me this morning that I need to do some thinking about what feels like emptiness.

I aimlessly scratched non-itches as I sleepily walked into the kitchen to do what I do every time it is breakfast time. At breakfast time I clean out yesterday's grinds from inside the press pot, I load in two fresh measures of coffee grounds, I fill the electric kettle with fresh water and set that to boil. I poke around in the pantry or the refrigerator to decide what food item I will eat. Once I pick that thing, whatever it is, I prepare it (toast it or add milk or scramble mix cut bake it) while the coffee making runs tandem over there.

The schedule has been bungled recently and I am angry and frightened about that. The refrigerator is nearly empty, the pantry filled with rice - and pastas covering about every bendability need: elbows, corkscrews, straight thin spaghetti, it's all there. The local food pantry seems to have a lot of rice and pasta, and while I'm grateful that they're willing to share it with me, I'm not quite sure how many consecutive days of rice and pasta I'll be facing until I can sing praises to the boring bland chicken breasts I hadn't even realized I'd taken for granted until they didn't exist in the fridge anymore.

The coffee doesn't exist either. How can that be possible? NO COFFEE?? It's wrong, it's ridiculous and unjust and wrong wrong wrong.

I caught myself shrieking at one of the Stooges (poor puppy, she only wanted a quick cheek rub and an ear scratch), frustrated with the situation and even more frustrated with me. How the fuck did I get here? Two years ago I was working full-time, single parenting, owning this house and being a regular person like every other regular person. These days I feel very regularly breakable, receiving government benefits while I am unemployed. I'm far from a shrinking violet, but I have to think longer and harder about the choices I make before they can get made. I am not who I was. But I suppose that's true of each of us.

What I did wonder was how I could take this crappy cruddy noxious alone-on-an-island desperation, spin it just right and somehow make it less crappy cruddy noxious alone-on-an-island desperate. And as I moved a Tupperware container of rice from fridge to microwave I had to laugh at how pathetic my worries must seem like to someone facing bigger uglier shit. The empty fridge? Perfect. I have been putting off cleaning that muthah off for MONTHS because, well, fill in the blank with any number of ridiculous reasons that all meandered their way back to my own sheer laziness. I was too busy, I was too tired. There were too many things in there and it would have been a hassle to unshelve it all just to swipe a steaming dishcloth across. Who is really looking at the crumbs and sticky spots anyway?

Coffee? Hmm... okay. There really isn't a way to talk myself out of the joy of a good cup of coffee, just no way that's gonna happen. But - but wait! There are pouches of green tea (yum, minty even!) that I've been ignoring since last spring's last big tea buying bonanza. Today can be a most excellent green tea party. It will be fine.

Rice and pasta, pasta and rice. Sick.To.Pieces.Of.Rice. I can't help it, that's just the way it is. But it is also true that J, who refused to eat cinnamon/sugared rice the last time (a year? two years ago?) that I made it for us, is now finding it a treat. His big growing self is easily capable of sucking down 2/3 an 18 oz. box of cereal in one sitting but one sturdy bowl of rice sprinkled with a little sugar and cinnamon has his belly warm, full, and ready to power the rest of him for a few hours. What isn't good about that?

Perhaps my difficulty in accepting the situation where I find myself is my reluctance to give up my preconceived notions of who I am or what I am supposed to be based on the pattern of who and what I have been before now. Maybe I am not as empty as I think I am; maybe I'm just in the preparatory stages of readying for refill.

For Sale

for sale by owner
Originally uploaded by McBeth.

Going ... going ... gone.

Just like that.

You think I'm kidding?

The Giving In To of Peer Pressure

The only stupid question is the one that isn't asked.

The most frightening time for anyone is the first- .

Yeah, okay, I get it. Try it. DO something. I'm there. It wasn't without a good stubborn fight, but I'm there. And there is here so here we are and there ya go.

Day One.
The bread is baking downstairs, sending up wafts of mouth-watering memory-jarring goodness. It will be a good olive oil and basil loaf if all works the intended way, if I measured it correctly. And, I suppose, if that veiled threat on the yeast jar was serious or just having a go at me when it demanded that I 'use this within four months or you can kiss your happy dreams of great homemade bread goodbye'.

Please, little loaf of liquids mixed hastily ... pastily ... make of yourself something good.

childhood comforts

childhood comforts
Originally uploaded by McBeth.

Before the world went crazy, there was a small girl whose favorite things in the universe (besides her parents and her sister) were the special stoplight dress and the Baby Tenderlove that Santa brought her the previous December for being such a good girl.

ticklish tiger belly

ticklish tiger belly
Originally uploaded by McBeth.

It might not be the best idea to cozy up to a fully grown Bengal, but if there's something between you (trust? six-inch-thick safety glass? a wink?) it is a remarkable moment