I do buy shampoo.

Today Helen called. One piece of her agenda was to mention something she had noticed recently. Jeff’s hair is not always washed adequately. I know, I said. I’ve been aware. Sometimes he wears the same t-shirt for what seems like a week at a time. I already know that attention to grooming is a skill that tends to dwindle in people with Jeff’s condition, but...um...I wasn’t ready for it yet? I am grateful to Helen for sharing her impressions with me. Sometimes I don’t quite want to believe myself when my own observations point to signs I’m not, as I said, ready for yet. He can wash, and that, I allow, is a good thing. How well he will take to me prompting him on one more subject--that I can’t predict. Yikes-a-hootie, as someone I know says.

We took the Odyssey to get a tire replaced today. I followed Jeff in my Soobie. He appropriately assessed and skirted the 9 a.m. elementary school traffic choke, but pulled into Goodyear instead of Mr. Tire. I pulled alongside him. “Did you mean to come here?” I asked. No, he had not. He couldn’t remember how to get to Mr. Tire. He followed me out the back entrance from Goodyear, around the traffic circle, and into Mr. Tire’s lot. 2 blocks in all.

Later, we had a flare-up of the usual discussion. “What am I supposed to do, now that I’m retired? What do you think about buying a house to renovate?” I pulled out my one-trick pony. All the unvarnished woodwork, all the unpainted walls--see them? Just waiting for you? Jeff did see them. He decided to start by getting a piece of plywood he could wrap with oak to build a short door for the short closet in our bedroom. I am good with that idea, because it doesn’t involve applying sharp tools to anything that’s already in place. He set out in his Odyssey with its new tire and proper alignment. He couldn’t find any of the 3 area Home Depots and came home. He says he will go to Johnson Lumber tomorrow.

Jeff has been on his full complement of meds since last February. I know they work for a time, then they stop. I don’t know when they will start stopping, but I’m beginning to wonder.

I’m already bad at enforcing hygiene practices with the intractable adolescent boy who lives here. Who thought it would be a good idea to give me this job? So, more opportunities to play “control freak.” It is impossible to explain that I neither enjoy nor wish to control anybody. That the flip side of the 45 is negligence. I would say I already list a little too far in that direction.

Can we fix it? Yes we can.

Gripe du jour: Why are there 3 random pairs of scissors hanging around when I don’t need them, and not a one to be found in any logical location when I do?

Meanwhile, Olivia and I have both earned extra stripes for our Rosie the Riveter badges. Last week practically-useless electrician #2 verified the wiring from the thermostat to the relay box to radiant heat pump #3 (installed, but as of yet inactive,) but declared that is was not within his purview to troubleshoot further. So I felt good and stuck. I visited Radiantec’s website where they promise they’ll stand behind you forever and ever, then gave them a call. Help, says I, whatintheheck to I do next?

Inasmuch as I was able to follow Darryl-the-tech’s instructions, I am proud. Undo pump #1. Hook #3’s wiring to that spot in the relay box. (Surprise--pump #3 whirred into action for the first time ever. Darryl thought it wouldn’t.) Ok, so it’s not the pump. Switch the little boxy relay plug-in thingies around. (No dice.) “Jump” the thermostat input thingy by inserting stripped wire (e.g. paper clips) in the holes. (Surprise again--the constant flickering of indicator light #3 stopped dead to nothing. Darryl thought it would light and stay lit.) So, the relay for pump #3 is just bad and we need a new box. $192 later this thing should be fixed. I will earn another stripe by hooking up the wires correctly. Not once did I have to say what the heck you talking about Darryl? Because I had studied the system. And, remarkably, I’m getting the hang of it. And why practically-useless electrician #2 had not bothered to check to see if the pump works, I’ll never know, because I’ll never call him again.

Then, Olivia came home with two flat rear tires. We jacked, we de-lugged, and we put the spare on the flattest one. Olivia did it, with me as coach, and should be able to do it again when the need arises. As Mr. Tire has now outfitted us with an entirely new set, I trust the need won’t arise any time soon.

We drive Jeff around with us and ask him questions which he very often knows the answer to...it’s just that for him knowing and doing are in two different parts of the brain which are quite unequal in neuronal supply. It has been quite a freaky thing to go from just-not-worrying-about-that-stuff (because I had a handyman onboard,) to needing to comprehend the ins and outs of an entire, somewhat obscure and specialized, house. Sometimes life is just about fixing stuff.

Sometimes I look around, and I think can someone who knows what’s going on and how things work just help me with this? And I know that I’m in that position you’re in when you realize that you’re on your own and your daddy can’t save you anymore so you’re just going to have to figure out how the hell to work it out. So far I have. So far.

declutterator

I’m cleaning out drawers. Drawers and closets and medicine cabinets. All those places where you find tiny butterfly hair clips that your daughters didn’t like very much even when they were 10, and carry out menus from places that closed 2 years ago, and packets labeled “Your Bicycle Papers.” (Who goes back and reads documentation about a bike? Who?) I’ve already done the basement, which was the worst of it. It’s pared down to objects whose existence I can justify without having to think very hard. My side of the basement, that is. Jeff’s side...well, that is for a phase of life I haven’t gotten to yet.

We’ve just cleared out my mother-in-law’s apartment (well, at least I helped,) and--though it’s interesting to see the things she found worth hanging onto--I’m determined that my children will have a very boring time picking up after me. I don’t know whether that’s good or bad, but--more importantly, and more immediately--when and if I ever move, it’ll just be a matter of throwing a few things (really. a few.) into boxes, and leaving the furniture for the moving people to deal with.

But there’s a lot. Despite my having launched major decluttering initiatives on several occasions over the past decade, there’s always more than you think. I have a digital post-it note on my MacBook desktop where I can check off the clutter repositories as I address them. Very satisfying to see the little check-marks line up. Even though I only have one, so far. There will be more soon. Don’t worry.

du jour

Tomorrow. The Assault on Georgetown University Hospital: Take 2. This time we mean business. Well, at least we mean to get in on the Wyeth vaccine trial, if all goes well with the screening. I’ve been diligent in recording Jeff’s blood pressure once or twice a day so we can demonstrate that he does indeed suffer from white-coat syndrome, and that his normal bp is pretty much under control. Will he get the Magic Juice? + Booster? or just one or the other? Or nothing? Who knows? It’s all a part of the game called Contributing the the General Pool of Knowledge. I have the avoid-the-Washington-beltway-at-all-costs route all mapped out. I better not hate Piney Branch Road.

Today I ate chicken. For the first time in roughly 15 years. Just a bite actually. Enough to determine that it was not tofu (as ordered) after all. The striations were the real give away. Happily the chef at Pad Thai was quick to send a replacement, um, pad thai, and I finished roughly at the same time as Jeff, which was remarkable.

Olivia is downloading Christmas songs to her iPod. I can hear Perry Como singing Santa Claus is Coming to Town upstairs. Gabe is ensconced in the computer room. Tomorrow he gets to take a bike to carpool, just in case I can’t pick him up on time. Not a bad thing for a kid of his ilk.

Rachel wants a send-a-sheep to a wool-weaving lady, sponsored by Oxfam, for Christmas. I’m good with that.

Today, in Annapolis, I realized how I’m not going to bother to live there unless they can put in and sustain a good walking-distance grocery store.

I'm cool.

Yesterday we got a catalog called Free People. I’ve seen clothes with that label before--kind of a fusion of Sundance chic, bohemian, and Himalayan socio-eco-consciousness. And here's the collection all in one place. I almost like them but can’t quite get beyond my impression that the garments appear designed to fit something other than a human form. Even on the models the bodices cinch at mid-boob, or sport sleeves that end awkwardly at the elbow joint. One striking image features a model posed pigeon-toed in front of a temple. She seems to be wearing hip-waders, a disco-ball dress, and oven mitts.

I feel certain the prices are high, but I can’t tell you for sure as the text is printed in a tiny wispy white font against mottled backdrops of anything from busy tapestries to rocky deserts. There should be a disclaimer printed largely somewhere on the catalog: If you can’t read this then get the heck out of here you old fart. This stuff’s not for you!

I guess the warning should be self-evident. Though not spelled out explicitly, that’s the clear message I get when I walk into any number of contemporary Annapolis Mall boutiques. If you cannot make informed clothing choices by the light of three 20 watt bulbs, go away. If angst-ridden background music blasting at 100 decibels scrambles your ability to remember where you are, go away. In general I handle this confusion by going away. But as long as you have no particular agenda--you are, for example, merely accompanying your 17 year old--modern marketing can be an interesting thing to observe.

There’s a new wing in the Annapolis Mall full of all sorts of new design schemes. The UnderArmour Store sucks you down a cavernous gray tunnel toward steps glowing with cobalt blue floor lights. Inside you’re greeted by the hulking form of a gargantuan athlete about to drop dead of a ruptured vessel. You hope he won’t topple on you as you look around for the rollercoaster you’re almost certainly supposed to get on next. But there isn’t one. Just athletic clothing.

Further down the mall corridor you come across a brick facade suggesting a London gentlemen’s club in the time of Jack the Ripper. Tiny windows, wrought iron grillwork...and a barely discernible brass plaque from which you might conclude that the name of the store is Ruehl. A saleslady stands just inside. You expect her to lead you discreetly to the private card game in the back room, but instead she points through the barely lit gloom to several strangely subdivided areas containing $200 handbags, and tissue-thin camisoles at $90 a pop. You say “thank you,” and back out, fearful that you might lose your husband who almost certainly will not remember how to find his way back to the mall entrance next to the McCormick & Schmick Seafood Restaurant--the one with the the giant inflatable tick on the roof. Well, it’s supposed to be a crab, but it looks like an engorged tick.

I may have given the impression that I really don’t like the mall so much. And you’re right, I really don’t. Not so much. But it is interesting in its own way. And I did succeed in tracking down a couple of acceptable pairs of blue jeans--as had been my goal. I did not try on the jeans at the Lucky Brand store, despite the saleslady’s assurances that they were expertly made by a factory right in the United States. At $120 a pair I would want them to be made at the lunar station, with moon-metal rivets, and shipped back to Earth via shuttle. No, I bought some at J. Crew who--several years ago--I would have lumped with the trend to try to scrape me off as yesterday’s news. But it seems they’ve been trumped by the next generation of über-hot shops. The jeans were $73. On sale from $98. It’s still a little hard to swallow.

what I do.

Ok. So I am plodding along at my 4th book--this one about a kid mixed up in the world of corporate research tampering, and....sheesh. Well, yeah, that sounds pretty ponderous, I have to admit, but plow on I must in hopes of injecting enough froth that it will make soufflé.

Meanwhile, I’ve realized with definity (is that a word? no. but it should be.) that I absolutely cannot write after 7pm. Hence this blog dross. Because it doesn’t count. I did not click the link for you, now did I?

Olivia is eating apple pie out of the pan. I would not let Jeff do that. In fact, I would try to prevent his cutting the pie with a spoon, which is his preferred style. Cut (well, dig,) with a spoon and plop it in a coffee cup. If anyone ever wonders why I didn’t turn out to be a traditional kitchen mom, well...here is but one clue. Some ducks line up in a row. Some don’t.

Gabe is watching anime cartoons. The computer, running XP, had its regularly scheduled conniption yesterday, refusing to play videos. I asked it to please forget everything it had learned after October 1, and it worked again. I reset the PC while helping Jeff get logged onto Investors Business Daily on the Mac so he could agonize over a recent Lululemon/Athletica stock acquisition. Periodically I utter the following line: One moment please...another customer filed a complaint ahead of you...

But, most happily, I got roughly 2 paragraphs completed on the work of great ponderosity today. It does move like a slug, sometimes not even leaving something as interesting as a trail of shimmering slime behind, but I know from experience that even at such a pace, a book gets written.

Oktobersmalltalking

It’s a great Oktoberfest. Our neighbors, 3 doors down, host it every couple of years, and do a phenomenal job of it at that. Yesterday I felt more than ever like I was reconnecting with people whom I’d almost completely lost contact with as our children have grown and done their own things--no more swim team, no scouts, no school activity gatherings--and we’re missing the socializing that such regimented schedules forced us into.

One person-whom-I-never-see characterized this time in our lives as “weird.” Things begin, more than before, to change in ways that we knew might be coming but didn’t really have to think about before.

And this is what I noticed--that there’s much that goes unsaid at a social gathering of this sort. Maybe, 10 years before, most of what impacted our lives in turning-point ways were things that were easy to throw out in casual conversation--I’m expecting my 3rd kid, Frank got a new job, we’re buying a house in Round Bay. Now, a lot of it isn’t that banterable. I wondered just how many people are holding secrets that they won’t so casually toss around. One long-time acquaintance is expecting a 10th child. (I know...wow.) It wasn’t until I saw her interacting with a friend who knows her better that I began to suspect that maybe something about this pregnancy is not as expected. Maybe something you wouldn’t just toss out there at an Oktoberfest. I can’t be the only one presenting a pretty, but slightly inaccurate, picture.

Much of what we talked about went like this: Person to Jeff: “How’s the hardware business?” Jeff: “Actually I’m out. I sold my half to my brother.” Person: “Retired? You lucky dog. Let me shake your hand.” I suppose it’s fortunate that that’s as far as Jeff tends to think of it these days. Sometimes I think that, as far as he can recall, that is all there is to the story. Certainly I would be unlikely to volunteer more. “What’s new with us? You mean besides the degenerative neurocognitive disorder? Not much!” Hardly peppy Oktoberfest banter, and I’m sure that anyone else whose lives hold darker aspects--not known by all--would probably, smile and nod along with the assumption that retirement was a lark and a luxury as I do.

Where slasher directors get their inspiration...

It was our typical circuit--down the sylvan lane to the bog...through the bog-hemmed nature trail (a frequent spot for bunny sitings, and yesterday a snake...) and today, a brief stopover on one of the beach benches. (One assembled by myself, no less.)

It was one-third of the way up the heavily wooded beach road that something went plop five feet in front of us. And a rather heavy and sudden plop it was, from the treetops high above to the road at our feet. Freddi the hound took an instant interest though I instinctively pulled her back from that which had plopped.

It was breakfast. Not for us, and (sadly for her) not for Freddi, but that which lay sprawled before us was the scrawny legs and the carcass, roughly from the wings down, of a bird, stripped of feathers and skin.

I am not among those who like to examine such things too closely and diligently, but Jeff and I speculated as to what might have dropped a carcass on what would have been, five seconds later, our heads.

A further clue emerged another 15 feet up the hill. Bunches of white and gray feathers, pulled out in tufts, and a major wing bone still attached to a few. Clearly, much of the early damage had occurred here before the winner--it had to be a bird of prey--had flown the remainder into the treetops before deliberately or accidentally dropping half in our path. Sharing, I guess. We declined, with gratitude, but never caught a glimpse of the raptor.

please pass me the burnt sienna...

I liked when my kids were little. Sometimes, the only thing to do was color in coloring books with them. (I do like crayons. Really.) Sometimes the only thing to do was work on a block stacking project.

Those times do change. Soon you get to the crazy years of school events, sports, birthday parties--a schedule that can drive the most energetic of us utterly wacko.

And now, in that way life has of giving you another appetizer when you thought it was time for dessert, I’m back to coloring books. Well, not exactly. But I am back to having a helper at the grocery store, gearing my plans toward being there to help someone else with the basics, and just sitting around--not quite coloring, but we might as well be--because we’re back to a season of someone else’s agenda being hitched to my own, regardless of who’s the pony and who’s the cart.

There is an upside: This type of phase shoehorns me into putting serious effort into my writing projects, and that is good. At least there’s sure no point in arguing with it.

katzenjammered plumbing.

Project #1 du jour: Get a 2 x 4 for the cat. No, we’re not going to swing it at her, though sometimes something needs to be done, and that’s where the 2 x 4 comes in.

Hazel likes to prick at window mouldings, and she (being a standard issue cat) loves to claw. Her favorite house construction phase was before all the oak trim went up and there was plenty of exposed pine to sink her nails into.

It is likely that the 2 x 4 segments we are about to affix to the corner by the basement door, and to a wall accessible from Jeff’s dresser would not be everyone’s idea of cutting edge decor, but I’d prefer that Hazel never have to decide that hardwood is better than nothing.

Meanwhile, the new laundry tub, of pristine poly, has acquired its first layer of sewer-line back up sediment--an unidentifiable collection of black crunchy stuff which washes in with the water the drain line has rejected, and settles evenly across the tub’s surface. Somewhere below the tub, in the fittings I mucked around with in installing it, is a connection that is allowing some of that rejected water to squish its way through and form geographic patterns on the basement concrete. Fortunately (I guess) the crunch is filtered out by the pvc and makes it to the tub. I have tightened the connections as much as I can by hand, but I’m afraid the time has come to replace the 60 year old cast iron with pvc so that, henceforth, we can try to blame all ensuing back-ups on the county. We are awaiting a quote and a commitment from the plumbing guy.

With a name like Potash, it has to be good.

Jeff asks for a colored pencil.

”Do you want orange or green?” I ask, rummaging through the drawer that holds compasses, cell phone chargers, and 1/4” scale house plan templates, in addition to numerous semi-functional writing implements.

He picks green, and proceeds to draw indecipherable markings on the pages of a book called Stikky Stock Charts. When he picked up the book at Barnes & Noble, I assumed the word “stikky” had some arcane link to stock chart interpretation, but in fact it is merely the name for a brand of books--like The Idiot’s Guide to [whatever makes you feel idiotic.] There’s the Stikky Guide to Trees, the Stikky Guide to Rock Formations, and very possibly the Stikky Guide to Scraping Gum off Your Shoe.

Jeff is trying to learn how to interpret recent performance stock graphs, and thusly buy and sell prudently. He’s taken an interest in anything that is both doing well (according to the chart gurus,) and has an unglamourous, and unlikely niche, such as scouring powders for subway tunnels, or commercial ash-tray sand embossers. I must confess, he did rather well with his small pot in the course of a week with a company that makes oil-drilling equipment. He then sold it on cue as advised by one of his book authors. Then floundering about the question of how to reinvest, he rejected an early favorite with a name that sounded like Bigfoot’s hearth-sweepings, and instead--with my backing--settled on Apple. For now. With luck I won’t be the only one waiting to make my move when they release the new Leopard operating system in October.

Due in small part to uncertainty, and large part to the capriciousness of a faulty memory, Jeff will assuredly announce a wish to sell Apple before I think the plan has had time to work. But I do serve, fortunately or not, as the gatekeeper here. We review the steps for logging onto the stock-trading website daily, but it is, for him, an utterly unacquirable skill. In truth, it would worry me if he could do it himself. I seem to have broken him of the habit of phoning the company headquarters every time--because it’s resulted, more than once, in their resetting his password to something new of his choosing which he invariably can’t remember when I go to help him the next day.

“Hey Gabe-O!” I say. (I’ve just noticed it’s 10 pm.) “I KNOW” he bellows. “Make sure you...” I say. “I KNOW” he bellows. “Brush your...” I say. “I KNOW” he bellows. “And wear rubber bands,” I say.

No Robin Hood

Today we sat in the window seats at Yin Yankee Café, eating a Panang Tofu noodle bowl and a tahini chicken wrap for lunch. A young man strode into view--clean cut, in a t-shirt and shorts. If anything, you’d have expected him to accessorize himself with a lacrosse stick, or maybe an iPod. But as he sat on the bench on the sidewalk in front of Yin Yankee, what he pulled out was a pipe. A regular old smoking pipe with a curvy stem, and a pipe cleaner to start things off. He sat on the bench, the whole time we ate lunch, casually puffing away while reading Moby Dick. He also had a Langenscheidt pocket dictionary. I recognized its yellow vinyl cover, and the way the center front edge of the white pages gets smudged to a dull gray with frequent use, just like my Langenscheidt French and Spanish dictionaries. So what language, I wondered, in addition to reading Moby Dick and smoking a pipe, might the kid be studying? When we left, I peeked over his shoulder. It was just an English dictionary.

As for Annapolis--Yin Yankee and everything else--it will be fine to just visit downtown for now. My urge to flee has subsided for the moment. I keep thinking of Olivia, as a toddler. Here is what would happen when she fell down and scraped her knee: She’d run shrieking in the opposite direction--away from the house, away from me or anyone else who might provide comfort. And I’m seeing myself in that vignette. Stress or pain=urge to flee. Run away from the dang bad thing, bad place, bad whatever it is. Maybe it doesn’t hurt over there. Funny--after 3 undergraduate schools and a couple decades of childrearing, you’d have thought I would have lost that impulse, but evidently I did not. Still, and fortunately, the itch has subsided and I’m able to view here as okay.

Drat. I’m ready to watch Robin Hood--the Errol Flynn version--and Netflix had to have it sent from Cleveland instead of locally. Sometimes it doesn’t pay to be eccentric. It’ll be here Thursday.

Tights & other tuffstuff

A peppy saleslady came to the door today.

“You’ll remember me from last year! I bring the TuffStuff", she said, pulling an unidentifiable spray bottle out of an unidentifiable pouch.

”Actually, I don’t,” I replied honestly.

”That’s ok,” she continued, without missing a beat as she segued into a demo of how she could scribble blue ink onto her washcloth, then spray it clean with nothing more than TuffStuff and a toothbrush.

Of course I should have run in to fetch my washcloth and my ink--just to remove any possible sleight of hand that may have been occurring. But I didn’t. I didn’t want to waste her time. I especially didn’t want to waste my time.

She persisted.

”What’s your most difficult cleaning job?” she demanded.

Naturally I thought of the right answer two minutes after we parted company.

Blood, of course. We try to keep the salespeople on the front porch...but sometimes you get this awful splattering...

But instead I tried, as tactfully and pleasantly as possible to explain that I just didn’t buy my products door to door.

”Why not?” she demanded peppily, in her valiant but futile effort to keep the lines of communication open. And I can’t even remember what I replied, but I went in grumbling about fire-bombing the “Keep the Customer Feeling Like a Clod School of Peppiness.”

Last night I watched the ending two-thirds of Captain Blood on Turner Classic Movies. Errol Flynn sure was pretty. I was especially impressed with Captain Blood’s way of dispatching the sleazy Captain Lavasseur without mussing his pretty hair. I wasn’t worried about Lavasseur’s cheveux, as I was too impressed about his abysmal french accent to mind his hair.

Now there is no getting around it. I must put Robin Hood in my Netflix queue to see if Errol always looks pretty in tights, and if Olivia deHavilland always looks like a cute little muffin-face.

Specs

I picked up my “progressive lens” glasses today. At my optometry appointment last week the optometrist, who was roughly 14, told me that 45 is the “magic age” in Severna Park--meaning that even though “progressive lens” really means bifocals, at least I have lots of company.

Jeff said, “You look straight out of the 50’s,” and I said, “Well...that’s good. I always wanted to look like Mary Sue Higginshaw, the ‘smart girl’ in your junior high math class.” Although, to be fair, I’m Mary Sue with a little mileage on her. Although, to be really fair, Mary Sue managed to have that middle-aged air even at twelve, so maybe I’m not that far off.

My observations about the specs so far: They’re trying to cram way too many corrections into a couple little lenses. In particular, the part that's supposed to fix my astigmatisms tends to make everything I look at go from square to rhombus with a slight turn of the head. It’s a trip. The techician lady said “your eyes have to learn all over again. Fine. I hope my eyes are smarter than the rest of my head, if not as smart as Mary Sue.
I wonder though...would I have been just as well off with homemade pipe cleaner glasses?

Bryn Mawr College. July. Those are the magic parameters. So to speak. Yes...for one week in July, Tannen’s Magic (some outfit in NY...no connection to Biff as far as I know) holds its magic camp for 11 to 20 year olds on the campus of beautiful Bryn Mawr, and Gabe is actually interested. Not that I really thought he wouldn’t be now that he’s in the mode of ambushing random people to show them card tricks. Every conversation this week, on the ride home from carpool has been about how easy David (one of the other riders) is to hypnotize. Apparently several kids at school are too. I’m waiting for the call: “Would you please ask Gabe to stop hypnotizing everyone during social studies?”

But this means 2 good things: 1)Gabe doesn’t watch anime all day that week, and 2)Jeff and I can go somewhere. I’m thinking about Maine. Maybe Acadia. Maybe a quick trip to Nova Scotia. It’s a small segment from the middle of our 2 week honeymoon in 1984. I may skip L.L.Bean this go-round. And I will insist the snobby lady at the Asticou Inn in Northeast Harbor acknowledge my presence instead of addressing the pair of us as “Mr. Clement.” “Please show Mr. Clement his room. Please take Mr. Clement’s bag.” I’m not sure where I got the invisibility cloak that day. Maybe this time, if I wear my Mary Sue Higginshaw glasses, she’ll pay attention to me.

Like Elwood P. Dowd, I'll just keep Harvey.

Just for today, I’ve hit a quarter-note rest in the staccato rhythm that the writing project mamba has been thumping along in recently. Scallywags has gone to NYC for what will certainly be its 14th “thank you very much.” Remarkably though, 2 of the 13 publishers requested second, then third looks, and dialogued with me to the extent that I can’t convince myself it’s a waste of time to keep shipping it off (with the latest round of revisions.)

Meanwhile, Dewey (whose real name--for the moment anyway--is Hunting the Rose) has left the building on its maiden voyage in the hopes that one of the aforementioned dialoguers will take a gander at it.

And in that moment where I have shipped and can now do little but wait for the SASEs to find their way back to me, it’s time to pull out another blank slate, so to speak. It’s a banana paper, eco-friendly spiral notebook with a parrot on the cover--a cover which came slightly pre-mangled from Office Depot, but which I bought anyway because it was the only one, and it’s my personal idiosyncrasy that I must plan in a notebook that in some way inspires me. Plus, the mangled edge strikes me somehow as a karmic advantage, or a positive omen. Dang, anything to stay inspired. The parrot notebook is blank today, and will stay that way while I breathe for a bit. Then I must brainstorm in the way that I always do, and gradually patch together something--whether good or bad--from the strings of nonsense which float around, completely undisciplined, in my cranium.

There are times--many time actually--when I wonder by what ridiculous conceit I consider this continued pursuit of publication a calling. Because, in truth, the only conviction I have is that I must continue to write and continue to present the finished products to publishers. I feel no conviction whatsoever that I will succeed in the classic sense. So, yes, if I die having spent the rest of my life trying, I suppose I will have answered the call.

I may be every bit as deluded as the tone-deaf auditioners on American Idol who wail, upon rejection, that singing is the only thing they could possibly do in life. And if so, so be it.

I am particularly conscious of this possibility when I think about my sister and sister-in-law who rightfully should not have tushes at all if one considers how hard they work. I have voiced this, and been kindly reminded that “nobody would want my gig, anyway”(not referring to the writing life.) And I’m sure that’s true. So, perversely, I take a swig of comfort from that thought.

And anyway, I have a date with a banana paper notebook.

not Eleanor

Yesterday the i’s were dotted and the t’s were crossed. We no longer have a proprietary connection to Clement Hardware. Oh, we have a connection to be sure, and will continue to for some years. In fact, I’m now a director on the Board (rather small board though it is--3, I think,) and we certainly have a vested interest in the business continuing to prosper.

So, all in all I guess I should feel good about getting that ironed out, particularly in light of the fact that the settlements which should wrap up the last of our landlording obligations are just around the corner. Actually, what I felt yesterday--and continue to feel (and, as a matter of fact have felt from the moment we put the houses on the market, and began the divestment from the store process) is a little queasy.

Of course I’m glad, in the sense that I’m glad it has gone reasonably efficiently (though hardly cheaply in terms of legal and professional fees to hammer out the store details,) but Jeff’s passivity is sometimes hard to read, and I’m not sure he could explain it even if he wanted to. It’s part resignation, part a peaceful letting go, and part the usual fog of not being able to sort it all out anyway. My ambivalence stems from realizing that none of this is what he would want, were he in a position to carry out what he would want, were things not what they are. (gads. I sound like Jack Sparrow.)

If I were Eleanor Roosevelt maybe I could have carried the store and real estate jobs out on my own power, and Jeff would not have had to see himself as having to give them up. Ok, so I’m not Eleanor Roosevelt.

96

I now have, as of 3:15 this afternoon, clipped into a blue binder, the 96 page first draft of a manuscript which still--most unfortunately--goes by the working name of Dewey.

Dewey is, by no means, a suitable title for the story. It’s merely the name of a minor, if pivotal, character, and for some reason is how I’ve been filing the work on my Mac all this time. Dewey.cwk in Appleworks, and Dewey.doc in Word.

On a bright note, I can now switch working formats--from trudging through the story on the iBook to trudging through the story in hard copy, scribbling what notes and changes I can fit in the margins. It’s good for people with short attention spans to switch. Helps keep us stoked.

Trudging may be a poor choice of words there. I certainly hope the reading of it would not be as slow a process as the writing, but sometimes it’s hard to get a sense of that at any given point along the creation of a 24,000 word piece. Imagine if I were Leo Tolstoy. No. Let’s not imagine that after all.

Of course, I may have nothing more than another unmarketable white elephant on my hands, but as I’ve mentioned before--these efforts are an offering to the universe. The universe does not, as far as I know, have an editorial staff, and I’m sure will absorb my offering with the appropriate graciousness. Whether or not any editors, or sub-editors, will feel similarly is still an unknown longshot.

And I’ve still got much tweaking to do.

But now, on the eve of the release of Harry Potter 7, I’ve plunked the period at the end of page 96, and I can immerse myself in Harry’s world for a few days without feeling negligent.

bad bad lights

I’d like to narrow myself down to one grocery store. At the moment I have 3 1/2, which include Giant, Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, and sometimes Safeway.

Today I went to Giant. We sorely needed cereal. Why, I wondered as I pushed along from cat food to Lactaid, do I always discover, halfway through Giant, that I’m feeling sorry for myself? And, I’ll tell you what, I really hate that feeling. Not so much because--well, who wants to feel that way?--but because I neither admire nor aspire to moods of that sort. It occurred to me that it doesn’t happen in Whole Foods. It doesn’t happen in Trader Joe’s. In fact, I usually leave those venues feeling pretty good about life and how I’m doing with it.

I think it’s the light. I think it’s all the nasty fluorescent lights which gives the place an overly-bright, garish feel.

The Holiday Inn Express we stayed in in Abingdon was fully lit with compact fluorescents. It looked bright. It looked clean. But it still gave me the unsettling sense that I was in a weird place between asleep and awake where images are stark and soap opera characters wielding brightly-colored, cheaply made, carnival prize stuffed animals might charge into the room at any moment just to weird me out. I don’t like that feeling. Animals that rip at the seams after you whack your brother one mere time should not be.

But Giant and its ilk have that affect on me. Icky seasonal yard figurines--bleck. Endcaps of blue and pink cereal--bleck. Circular racks of books with titles like He Has Long Hair and My Blouse is Too Small or Word Search Fun for Christian Wives--bleck.

It may be true that Whole Foods is overpriced and--at least around here--peopled with well-coiffed women Doing the Right Thing for their families. But there are at least enough Earth-mothers to keep it almost in balance. As for Trader Joe’s...Sure, you have to watch those expiration dates. If you buy a pie with a last-sale date of 3 days ago, well caveat emptor, and if you can’t tell that those cherries are past their prime then you probably should stick to frozen. But, when they’re good, they’re good, cheap, interesting, and not horrifically illuminated. But watch out for that place in the frozen aisle where you can so easily get wedged between a structural column and the taquitos. And watch out for the lady who shops in pantyhose, thinking that they’re leggings. And try not to be standing next to the ship’s bell when someone calls for a price check. Otherwise...I think I may be due for a trip there.

jetsam

In a weird process that kicks in unexpectedly, the few remaining chapters of my current project are begging to be written. I covered more ground today than I probably have in the last 3 months. In fact, I’d be working on it right now, but it’s 9:30 p.m., and I only dare approach the job with a fresh brain.

Current bathroom reading material includes a “Select Registry” book of Inns and B&B’s bestowed on us by the hosts of the WhiteGate Inn in Asheville. It is easy to want to travel when such delicious looking lodgings are featured for anywhere on the continent. On the other hand, my teardrop travel trailer (well, the one I’m imagining,) is waiting anxiously to take me on a more rustic voyage from town to town and I’m not sure how I’ll resolve the conflict.

tune in next season

I was set to truck to Georgetown U. for Jeff's MRI in prep for his first dose of V490, aka Merck's new Phase I Alzheimer's vaccine. I was determined to try heading south on Wisconsin Avenue. Downtown D.C., even not at rush hour, is harrying, and there must be a better way.

But it will wait until November. Evidently, a bungled communication between Merck and the testing sites (ours, of course, being GU,) has resulted in there not being a slot for Jeff in the "first dosing." In November though, we will be choosing between "second dosing" of the Merck, and Phase II of a Wyeth vaccine which has already done the rounds in Europe. I am inclined toward the Wyeth. If you don't have to be one of the first 70 humans to serve as test subject, then why be one?

So off we'll go again--in the Fall I guess. Yikes. There'll be the whole school schedule parameter problem. Maybe Gabe will have to take a bike, and ride home from his carpool dropoff point...

road trip

I remember what a fine thing it used to be to either drive (with a navigator riding shotgun,) or navigate (with a driver.) If there’s an advantage to doing both--the current necessity--it’s that I get plenty of photographic memory practice. At any convenient (or at times sketchy) roadway stop, the technique is this: Scan the map and lock the current location, destination, and directional trajectories into visual memory. Then, as we pass the exit for Oopsie Caverns I will be able to reassure myself that Oopsieville is 2/5 of the way from exit 731 to the Tasty-Snooz Inn where (you’ll soon learn) they’ve switched all the room lighting to compact fluorescent, and your eyes will go bonkers accordingly.

Trucking south on highway 81, you pass a sign promoting some Cavern or other every 5 minutes or so. Although I don’t think I’ve succumbed since an official girl scout trip in the late 60’s, I felt it was high time to expose Gabe to the tourist kitsch that surrounds these geologic marvels. “Why do they have so much weird stuff made out of wood,” he asks naively. I am somewhat chagrined to realize that all the parks and playgrounds we stopped at when our children were small deprived them of the sensuous delights of hundreds of cedarwood knickknacks stamped with the words Shenandoah Caverns. Still, he is not tempted, being more interested in the “lab-manufactured” unrealistically-hued polished stones. I buy him a tee-shirt.

We do not try to lose Jeff on the Cavern tour, but I know what happened. It was right at the entrance to the “Short-man’s Revenge Grotto,” when we pass another tourgroup. Gabe and I notice a couple of rooms (caves) later. While I’m fairly certain Jeff will find his way out with the other group, our teenage tourguide, who generally exhibits the enthusiasm of a sedated turtle, is concerned that it will not look good on her resume to lose a person in the cavern, so she and I scamper back a ways to retrieve Jeff while our group waits. And I am glad, when I see his befuddled expression, that we did.

We manage two days in lovely, hippie-chic Asheville without major incident. Gabe allows as how a tour of the Biltmore Estate could be much more fun if it occurred in a post-apocalyptic world and involved periodic battles with zombies.

But we collect Becca from her 6-week counselor stint at Camp Cheerio, and only get vaguely lost in Roanoke looking for dinner.

Of greater importance is that I successfully nab several bottles of Cheerwine at a roadside gas station/grocery store where the proprietress sits in a rocking-chair surrounded by cases of beer, and the young man cashiering addresses me as “mai-yim.” The Cheerwine was requested by Olivia, who got a taste of this North Carolina specialty on last month’s church-youth Habitat for Humanity, house-building trip to Iredell County, N.C. Based on one sip of the stuff I’d say that you could make your own by adding soda-water to cherry cough syrup. As we leave the convenience store I shush Gabe, who I believe is about to say something tactless. Instead, once we seal ourselves into the car, he says “that was the smallest gas station bathroom I’ve ever seen. It was also the cleanest.” And I am surprised. Not by the small part.

I love this

At the moment my mac’s desktop wallpaper features a teardrop travel trailer by Camp-Inn of Necedah, Wisconsin. I want one, you see.

People think I’m a little crazy. “Where’s the bathroom?” they ask. “Where’s the shower?” Jeff says, “does that thing have air conditioning?” (Answer: If you buy a special ac unit for it. Or you can opt for the ceiling fan/vent.)

Now I’m not supposing that just everyone would relish the notion of hitching one of these cuties to the back of her Subaru and hitting the blue highways, but I do. Oh, in case you didn’t know, it has a queen-size bed in the main compartment, built in birch cabinets, and then--around the back--once you pop up the hood, is your traveling kitchen. I’d plan on tossing a couple of pop-up chairs, a shade, and a folding table into the back of the Soobie, and I’d be ready to roll.

The shower, you see, is conveniently located at the campground, so you would want a nice thorough ready reference to good camp parks en route. The other place the shower is located is in the occasional hotel when you’d decided to splurge for the night and stay at the cute historic inn in town.

Many afficionados, as I understand it, get a kit, or directions, and make one of these things themselves. But I do not know that I will ever want to make my own dwelling, of any sort, again. I’ve pretty much gotten that out of my system, so when it’s time for my trip to Necedah, I will be buying my teardrop pre-made and pre-outfitted with all the niceties that I want.

Do not ask when this trip to Necedah will take place. The answer to that question is as nebulous as the answer to this one: When will you sell a book and actually start making money Em? Answer: When the time is right.

degunkification

Surfaces collect junk. Junk collects dust. Both are natural functions of entropy. My aversion to entropy and all its insidious functions grows in steady increments each year. People are the right hand of the demi-god Entropopo, and my people in particular make strewing things about a daily ritual.

But I’m decluttering on many levels right now. It seems to be one of the karmic features of the year and, as inpenetrable as the job looked, I’m making gratifying progress.

Houses are clutter. Mortgages are clutter. Tenants who call you on Christmas Eve because the furnace broke? Clutter. Two down, two to go in that department.

Jeff chops up miscellaneous lumber scraps in the back yard, then hauls them to the dumpster. He leaves a random, unused window in the kitchen. One step back, but two steps forward. No complaints from me. I can reassign the window myself.

By now, the basement has burped up sacks of decent used books, and numerous outgrown clothing to the Salvation Army. A second burp sends moldy, water-damaged books, and an amazing assortment of “why-was-I-keeping-that?” to the dumpster. And now it’s time to deal with the couch. We’ll chop it in half with a sawzall if necessary to fit around the basement door, but out it will go. This week. Katherine? You want that sewing machine? Best come soon. No, I’m kidding. It can stay ‘til you fetch it.

Someday--reasonably soon--I will look around this joint with the confidence that if and when the time comes to abandon ship...or house, that is...I can do it without the hours of agonizing flotsam sorting that so often characterize an empty-nester coop fly.

Oh, to be sure, more stuff will attempt to creep in. Entropopo is a demanding demi-god, and will prod his minions to collect far more than will fit in a standard dorm room. And then they will leave it on their bedroom floors. But, as long as they keep it there, I can view the future as a dumpster run here, and a dumpster run there. But a run. Not a year’s worth of shoveling out from the aftermath of an Entropopian bacchanal.

Now, it may be a while before I can realize my ideal of a trim Scandinavian cottage with a stick of furniture per room, but I do believe that--with a lot less goonk around here--I can shoulder life with more aplomb.

I got the fly out of the kitchen.

this feels like a yes

I think we’ll be participating in Phase I of the trial for Merck’s kinder and gentler so maybe you won’t die of encephalitis new version of an anti amyloid plaque Alzheimer’s vaccine. I have no reason to get excited about this. I have no reason to assume we’d even be among the 80% who get the vaccine at some strength versus the placebo. I have no reason to keep using the word “we” since they aren’t going to be sticking anything in me. But I am going to be the one navigating D.C. traffic to get to Georgetown University 17 times over the next 3 years. This may not happen. There may be a reason we’re unsuitable. And I’m keeping this in mind: It is a mission. The primary reason is to advance the research which will, somewhere down the pike, help my children just in case there is any sort of genetic proclivity involved here. And other people’s children. The secondary reason can be some good lunches in Georgetown.

grab bag. and just as valuable.

I sure wish my emotional wagon weren’t so tightly hitched to how Jeff’s doing from one week to the next. Disengagement by choice. Wouldn’t that be a handy tool to pull out of one’s pocket when needed? I guess. But at this point we’ve tripped the inseparability clause. Too late. Relationship tenure.

A fly’s been zipping around the kitchen for roughly 4 days. Always where it can annoy you, but never where you could open the door for it. I’ve taken to saying, in my best Biff Tannen voice, “McFly! I thought I told you never to come in here!"

Rachel is back from the world of Poison Dart frogs in Bocas del Draga, Panama. We have enjoyed a brief powerpoint which she compiled to show the other students at the estación what all the frog data is designed to determine. One more in my series of digital cameras is donated to a fine cause.

Clement Hardware won the best hardware store category in the What’s Up Annapolis “best of” awards. Which meant that Jeff and I got to elbow our way through a multitude of people at the Loew’s Annapolis Hotel to nosh on samplings from another multitude of area restaurants. Actually, I did the elbowing in both directions as I’d make my way to the crab cakes, then work my way back to Jeff who’d be looking around to see where I’d gone. Then I’d say “ice cream--thataway,” and nudge him toward the mint chocolate chip samples. Easy to fill up, all in all. The chocolate soup was easily the best thing.

thoughts del día

There are times when I’d be less bothered by the old Kohl’s guy wandering around asking people if they want to open Kohl’s charge accounts, but right when I’m fondling the bras to see which ones have the right type of push-up pads is not what I’d call the opportune moment, and I doubt if it was for the other 6 women in the bra department either.

Jeff bought 4 pepper sprays, and attached little cards to them with hints about gouging assailants’ eyes and whatnot. I said “well...I’ll put it in the car.” Olivia said “EWWW! I’m not carrying that! Then she demonstrated how she holds her car key ready to take a creep’s eye out with an over-the-shoulder swipe. But she put the pepper spray in her glove drawer. I gently explained that it will not be practical to send one to Rachel in Panama, and Becca probably ought not to have one in a cabin full of young campers, so they’ll just have to wait ‘til they get home to register their opinions of their dad’s concern du jour.

What is it about a rabbit that says “eat me?” Freddi is blasé about squirrels and barely attentive to birds, even if they flitter off right in front of her. But rabbits? Now there’s some excitement. Well, to be fair, ducks generate a little interest too.

I tried to wrestle the canoe onto the car roof rack myself yesterday. Of course Doris Dunker across the street said "wait, wait, I'll go get Don!" and I said "No no! I'm conducting an experiment." Of course Gordon drove by from admiring a house (with no waterfront and less grounds) which he secretly wants and offered to help, and I again pleaded "experiment." But finally, I had to abort the experiment and wait 'til Jeff could come out and hoist an end. If I didn't mind removing a goodly bit of car paint and adding a few dents I could probably do it, but as it is, I'm merely left with a pulled muscle in my ribcage. So I bought a wheeled canoe/kayak dolly. You put it under the canoe, about 2/3 of the way back, and pull the other end. Easy. I think. We've yet to truck it down to the beach by that method, but I think it'll be good.

Progress, plateaus

I’m doing a little better, very lately, of applying myself rigorously to the discipline of cranking out the next paragraph...the next snippet of dialogue...the next implausible situation that my story people must, as products of my imagination, carry out whether they like it or not. I vastly prefer my world with them in it, but they can fade into such ephemeral wisps if I don’t keep them front and center.

The Scallywags crew meanwhile, or at least their first three chapters, are on another slush pile vacation to NYC. I hope they will return refreshed and ready to give it another go.

In the realm of people who live outside my head and hard drive, one in particular is doing so reasonably well these days that I scarcely know what to make of it. So the trick, I think, is not to make anything of it. Except hay. Which you make while the sun shines.

Useful hint: If you have one of those vacuum thingies for sucking air out of wine bottles so that the wine stays fresher, do not apply it to your chin like Gabe did. Chin hickies are hard to explain. Well, the truth works. And then you’ll find out that your art teacher’s 30 year old brother did the same thing.

Today’s weather has been so balmy and buoying that it doesn’t feel like 9:50 p.m. But it will feel like 5:15 a.m. tomorrow when the alarm goes off regardless.

relax

I feel in a daze of paperwork and confounding budgetary configurations. I don’t know what to make of having our social security disability claim approved. I was led to expect a couple of appeals, and at least as many years. Now I’m kind of freaked out about the whole thing. You mean the evidence really was that irrefutable? Even to the U.S. Government? It was irrefutable enough for me, but somehow having Uncle Sam’s stamp of approval has heightened my anxiety in ways that I don’t understand.(Maybe because I don't want handouts so much as health insurance for Jeff, and this is the only way to get it?) And this, shortly on the heels of the obnoxious insurance company reaching the same conclusion. Sheesh.

And then there is the ongoing logic puzzle that is the Concert Association database. My respect for Mel’s (its creator’s) multi-layered confabulation grows as I think of ways to, oh for instance, generate a list of all members who drive Buicks and prefer to wear straw hats to performances...but only on days when their mail was delivered before 11 a.m. Sort it by hat size, secondary to dog’s name...find all members whose house numbers are prime, then exclude the records of those who aren’t before switching to the Stonehenge layout. I’m getting the hang of this. But I’m still getting Filemaker Pro when Apple deigns to release the new Leopard OS.

Jeff’s mom called at 1:35 a.m. Tell Jeff he has to go see Al Gore right away! she says.

Jeff needs to go see Al Gore? I repeat.

Don’t you know? she says, the meeting is going on right now!

You’re with Al Gore? I say.

Jesus! she says, hanging up on me.

Which was another surprise. Both Al Gore and Jesus were at that meeting and we missed it.

I'll be inspired later. For now...

Thoughts, disjointed...

We did the Wendy’s drive-thru window yesterday. Jeff wanted a crispy chicken and a coke. I just wanted a coke. I sort of giggled out the order, and all because the box crackled, as usual, then said tryacombo? It’s apparently a fundamental principle in which all Wendy’s order takers are drilled. You don’t say may I take your order or what can I get you or even what? You say Try a Combo, And the words just sit there, until they flatly plop to the ground ignored, because what do you say in response to that? I guess no thank you, but then you’d be trying to transmit more sound through the crackling box portal than is absolutely necessary, and this is not recommended.

I am so behind on Anne Arundel County Concert Association database entries. They will be sorry they gave me this job.

It is a nice thing when your daughters wait until they’re in college to have boyfriends. Easier on me, I think.

Gordon just picked Jeff up to go see their mom who’s having her regularly scheduled Spring crisis. Perhaps this one will resolve more neatly than last year’s coumadin disaster.

I got the second to last Wii in EB Games this morning. Nobody looks for video game consoles on Tuesday morning. Except for me, the lady in front of me, and the guy before her. And maybe one more person. So Gabe got his birthday present 6 weeks late.

I am waiting for further word, by text, email, or phone, from the Panamanian treetops. None yet, except the one letting me know she got there.

the pyramidal nebusphere

I live at some nebulous latitude in a pyramid of reality.

Jeff’s mom thinks we (and most of the rest of the world) can drop everything and sit in attendance as she makes her nobel prize-winning call to Lou Dobbs at CNN this afternoon. I try to avoid any pointless effort to convey my disbelief or re-orient her to the plane I’m living on, and I give her a noncommital “ok. sounds good. let us know what happens...” But I can hear it in her voice as we hang up...she may be living in a mental sphere in which she holds the solution to all problems, but she still knows when she’s being blown off.

Jeff doesn’t want to take his meds. “What are these for anyway?” “Your condition,” I say. “And what exactly is my condition?” Should I even remind him? Why? But I do. He says, “there wasn’t any real evidence of that, was there? Just some DNA test?” There was no DNA test involved, and I have the tell-tale PET scan in irrefutable hard-copy. I have never shown it to him. He’s never asked. Why should I?

“You should take your pills,” I say. He takes them. Why would I even entertain the thought of giving him a choice in the matter? He doesn’t even know what they’re for. I know why I would. It’s because there is one floor in the reality pyramid on which we stand together to observe and respond to his mother who’s floating around on the LaLa Mezzanine.

But we can’t both return to the rez-de-chaussée where I think I live. As the elevator descends Jeff says “Where’s Becca?” This will be the 5th time I’ve answered the question since she left yesterday morning. “She’s in Frederick, visiting Tyler,” I say. “Right,” he replies, and putters off to move tools around in the basement.

I don’t know where I live, and I have a slight, incipient headache. Eating might help, and then I will look into hot air balloons.

Fog and coffee

I came in from a dank, too-chilly morning. The kitchen was warm, and smelled like the fresh coffee gurgling in the pot. Momentarily sublime. And you might as well notice these things.

Kicking a cashew across the floor, and wondering if there are any more. Not quite as great.

Fleeting flashes of wondering what the heck Gabe's doing have zipped through my cerebrum at regular intervals this weekend. Then I remind myself that he's at his confirmation retreat, and I must go pick him up later this morning. He will say it was "ok." Then he'll tell me he slept through most of it. I do believe that to the largest extent I'm sending my final child through the program just so no one can accuse me of neglect. There will very possibly be some sort of cosmic benefit to the world that comes from Gabe having at least been introduced--however sleepily--to the concepts which form Presbyterianism, but that part doesn't have to be my problem.

It has to come up every so often. Jeff saying, "do you think you're addicted to that thing?" He means the computer. And I've kind of reached the "well, yes...but...whatever," state of response. Because here is the truth. I seek contact for brain stimulation. Before personal computers I checked the mailbox relentlessly. If I worked for SETI I would aim my little receiver at every point in the sky, and then go around and do it again just in case. I'm always looking for something to tune into to keep my brain from drifting back into that hazy and static-filled place two inches behind my frontal lobe where I get tweaked by shadowy specters demanding to know why I can't focus on the book I'm supposed to be writing. I don't want to have to wonder why I'm not accomplished enough for me. I don't even want to look at that. I hate that. It's a distraction and a relief to search for extra-terrestrials.

Ok...I'm lifting this from Rachel's livejournal, because I feel it's important:

"dialogue of the night... beginning with a nonsequiter from gabe, as usual:

Gabe: If i had a son, I would want to name him Yellow Streaming Madness.
Becca: That sounds like pee.
Gabe: Okay, how about Blue Motion?"

Well, I wasn't there. All 4 kids took an after-dark stroll to the beach, and that was a snippet.

I'm waiting for Jeff to get back from his class on "Stock Market Basics." There is a slightly smelly kitty on my legs, and the iBook must sit off to the right--on the chair arm. We took a practice run over to Annapolis High School (where the class is) today and I think he knew where he was going, but it's still a slight worry until the Honda van reappears in the driveway.

You know how sometimes you have a really busy weekend, and get behind on stuff? And then, the first day that you think you might be able to catch up, 4 urgent phone calls come in, all of which plop requirements right on the top of the priority pile? I'm having that.

I like my kids. It's fun when they're all home. The mess is not worth worrying about.

not quite Gitchee Gumee

Hint: If you’re like me and haven’t had a boat to paddle around in for roughly 30 years, do more than check for sun vs. rain before you take your canoe out. Also log onto weather.com and see what the winds speeds might be.

I did not do that today. Nonetheless, we battled our way through the choppy and noncompliant 2 footers that splooshed and slapped me (in the bow) all the way across Round Bay. I did feel a little like I was on the log flume ride at Dutch Wonderland, but we persisted, and were rewarded with a lovely, serene, and quiet paddle around the shores of Sherwood Forest across the river. (yes. It’s really called that. Furthermore, every house there must be painted forest green or brown. No joke.) Well, we made it around St. Helena’s island, heeding the warning not to trespass (and noting the abandoned chair at the top of the bluff. A sharpshooter sentinal’s perch?) It was the return trip that got dicey. The wind could have kept blowing in the same direction and been at our backs. But it didn’t. Instead, we forged our way through 3 footers, at about half a mile per hour. No, probably slower. By the time we reached the north shore, about 3 neighborhoods down from our beach, the conditions had become so ridiculous that if we didn’t both work our paddling muscles into lactic acidosis, the tide would simply slap us around into the opposite direction. Fun indeed. So we gave up and hauled ashore a couple beaches too far east. Oh...first we had to wade the canoe along 50 feet of shore to even reach the beach. We were soaked. We thanked the nice ladies who were chatting under the gazebo for tolerating our intrusion while we went to fetch our car. They very kindly offered us a lift, but we walked.

At this point I will have to confess to not maintaining the patient composure with which I try to handle Jeff’s not-always-perfect comprehension. But then, to reach our point of disembarkment I’d had to shout “paddle right!” or “paddle left!” over the wind, the water sloshing against docks and boats, and my patience was worn thinner than Paris Hilton, what with Jeff’s tendency to um...fail to maintain a straight course under the best of conditions. But here is the good thing. He remembers today as a fine adventure. And it was.

I am grateful that we have life vests on board. Because, you never know. After all, look what happened to the Edmund Fitzgerald. (I mean the legend lives on from the Chippewa on down, you know?) Granted, the Severn River at its widest doesn’t hold a candle to Lake Superior, but I’m sure checking on the wind speed before we go out again.

There is no way this is my 80th post

Sometimes when I walk up the stairs, I rub my fingers extra hard over the handrail--feeling the edges, gliding smoothly along the top. It’s nice to really notice that it’s there. Now that it’s there. I don’t want to ever take the house’s details for granted, now that they’re there. The doors bear looking at. So do the floors. So does the porch railing.

Yesterday, at Spring cleanup day at our beach, Jeff and I got bench duty. We’ve got a whole fleet of benches at the beach, and I have no idea how old they are, but they’re comprised of two concrete frame/leg pieces--one for each end--straddled by seven bolted-on 2x4s. A couple years ago, when several needed new slats, someone decided to try the new plastic lumber. The recycled coke bottle, or plastic bag, stuff. It warped within the first season. So, armed with a drill, a tape measure, and our circular saw, we set to work on the fresh, pressure-treated pile of lumber. We were into the cutting to length part when Jeff had to leave for his sax lesson. Then, forgetting I suppose, that it might be useful to come back, he spent the rest of the day puttering in the basement. As for me--I was intensely grateful not to be doing mulching or beach-raking, and it was quite interesting to field the reactions of neighbors who weren’t used to group efforts of this sort where a woman got the power tool job. But I cut, measured, drilled, and bolted--tweaking a hole here or there where the fit wasn’t exact--and now I am dang proud of those three benches with the fresh green, newly installed lumber. I hope everyone will sit on them at least once.

I think I’m learning to appreciate Namenda. Surely we are living on borrowed time--and time still marked by patchy memory function--but things are pretty good, and who can argue with that?

Jeff’s mom is 85. She called us with “the best news” two nights ago. One always worries when she calls with the best news. Sometimes it means that we are as rich as the Rockefellers--something she has just realized, and sometimes it means that she’s buying her entire 2000+ resident retirement complex where she will reign as queen. This time it was because she’d had the revelation that her dysfunctional, emphysemic lungs need trouble her no longer. She’ll simply have a lung transplant. After all, lung transplants are as common as pulling teeth these days, right? What could I say but “I guess you can ask your doctor about that.” Oh, she would, she assured me.

Tomorrow looks like a good canoe day. I will wear sunscreen.

paddling

Finally the weather accommodated my itch to take the red canoe out on its maiden voyage. Since we did not declare it unsinkable, karma felt no need to subject us to icebergs or other unexpected hazards, though we did hit one rubber buoy and veer closer to a hawk's nest than she would have preferred judging from her posture as she squawked at us.

I do believe we need a captain's hat we can pass back and forth. I'm unsure whether it should be a black one with a jolly roger, or an Indian chief headdress, but in either case the wearer would be eligible to call the directional shots without being considered a control freak. When it's Jeff's turn we could steer relentlessly into piers or moored sailboats. During my turn I would be able to say “Hey, maybe we should paddle on the left a few strokes just until we clear those pilings.”

Instead, and most unfortunately, I felt compelled to continuously suggest a directional change or point straight ahead and say “we're going that way!” knowing full well that at least one of the two people in the canoe believed I was being my usual bossy self. It didn't help that to start today's adventure the canoe needed to be lashed to the Soobie roof rack with two cinch straps which worked by a simple pinch and thread (as in thread it through once) mechanism. Jeff was clearly struggling a bit with the buckle but would not let me take over even though I asked very nicely several times throughout the ten minutes it took him to secure it convolutedly enough for his satisfaction. My toes were curling, oh yes they were. So when it came time to release the straps at the beach I undid mine and resorted to the subterfuge of pulling the buckle to the other side of the car, running around, and undoing his before he could get around to start messing with it. There are probably some excellent reasons why I am not a kindergarten teacher.

But what a great outing it was, despite our conflicting navigational styles (that is, picking a direction and going in it versus picking a seawall and running into it.) We saw an assortment of large birds which I should be able to identify but can't. We saw just how much stuff wealthy waterfront landowners have to maintain. (Including, I believe, Pat Sajak, but I cannot vouch for the fact that the spread with the brick stairs widening voluptuously toward the boathouse was his.) And we got a mighty fine upper body workout which I'm going to feel like crazy tomorrow.

how are you doing?

This is how Jeff phrases the question. It's a kind of random, out of the blue inquiry and my typical response is something along the lines of “I'm fine thanks. How are you?” He may ask several times a day, and his intentions are the very best, but it's been clear for a long time, even a long time pre-diagnosis, that even if my standard response is not always entirely honest, there is nothing to be gained by answering any other way.

As an interesting parallel, many who know of Jeff's situation will ask me the same question--the variation being that they put a heavier emphasis on the word you. “How are you doing?” They understand, wisely, that no one in a similar chapter of life could be completely “fine thanks,” and asking is a way to demonstrate that recognition. But pardon me, if you ever find yourself asking. I'm still most likely to say “fine thanks.”

And why wouldn't I? Because I am fine. (thanks!) Now it is undeniably true that my status quo boat is floating with its keel a little lower than it was a few years ago, but so are lots of peoples' for lots of reasons. I have swell kids. Four of 'em. (Well…we do wonder what the heck might become of a 15 year old boy who apart from a keen fondness for anime dramas and fantasy novels is a bit of a slug. But he's a good person. Gotta trust it'll add up to something.) My house is--for the first time in a decade plus--a very nice, and comfortable, place to dwell. And the odds are that if I manage well and frugally, I will not need to get a job at Trader Joe's at the exact moment that Jeff becomes most in need of my availability. So, while Jeff's diagnosis is inarguably horrendous, I find that I'm set up to manage it as well as anyone could.

But…in the interest of disclosure for those who'd really want to know: The most difficult thing about this is the reason I will almost always say “fine thanks,” to Jeff's regularly scheduled question. An early loss among the many faculties that diminish in a person with his illness is an ability to empathize. I don't mean that they have to become mean or unpleasant. Jeff is, as always, a fine person who asks how I'm doing because he wants me to be doing well. But, there is a quality to interacting with another person--particularly one with whom you are very close--which I will call “being on the same page.” That is, you can share things with that person and you know, that at least for that moment, he understands you. He is on the same wavelength. You are vibing. You are communicating at a deeper level. This can be what makes a relationship great, and nurturing, even if you have your bad moments. This is something that requires the higher cognitive function called empathy. This is something that people with Jeff's condition can't do. It is a huge, completely unquantifiable, loss.

And other than that, I am fine thanks.

It helps. I think. (maybe)

I’m trying to write, but the words don’t flow. They more like splutter out in a barely usable mess, as if from an almost-empty shampoo bottle. For want of a back up supply, I keep banging that upside-down bottle, to get the dregs out. I have my story, and it wants to be told--but for fear of failure, or ADD, or constant supply of more pressing needs--it is being coughed out in fractured bits. Oh heck...that’s better than nothing.

Jeff is rambling around with an iPod in his pocket, and earbuds in his ears. I was unaccountably enraged when he came home from his sax lesson Saturday with Sinatra, The Beatles, and all the jazz eradicated by Lou the music teacher in favor of healing words from Andrew Weil. Not that I have a problem with Andrew Weil or healing words, but after the iPod inexplicably decided to start communicating exclusively in Korean, and I got it to cut that the heck out, I was unthrilled to find that a day’s worth of downloads had been nuked. So I nuked right back. Jeff was characteristically willing to let others decide what he should listen to, and I decided with him in mind, but I’ll be danged if that iPod’s ever going back to Lou’s house.

Here’s what you get when you read the drug information for Namenda, paraphrased: How it works: We don’t really know but Frankie in the mailroom says that it has to do with Froggy plucking his magic twanger. When to use it: Late in the game. Unless you decide to use it in the middle of the game. OTOH, you might use it early in the game. How to tell if it even is working: It might be, if one of the following is true--a)you feel better. b)you feel the same. (because you might have felt worse.) c)you feel worse. (because you might have felt even worse than worse.) If one of these is true, you can assume it’s working even though statistics suggest it doesn’t work for everyone. How we derive our statistics: We rrlllllm diczzzz. WHAT? I said we assxk rrrrdggg. WHAT? Um. We ask Frankie.

Seriously. That’s actually more info than you really get. In spite of which I think it helps some in our case.

The Invisible Man

A poem, by Gabe Clement:

Look! It’s the Invisible Man!
Can’t you see him?
With his dark brown coat
and long black hair.
Don’t look him in the eyes--
He has the creepiest stare.
If you give him a hug, he’ll give you a toy.
But you didn’t hear this from me,
‘Cause I’m the inaudible boy.

J

If I could change one of my Meyers-Briggs components, I would be a P, not a J. J is a nuisance. I would not have posted that last annoying post if I were a P, not a J, because I would not feel that way. How nice it would be not to feel a need to always have to categorize and catalog an organic, amorphous world. Cultivate let it be-ness.

hush little voice

There is the slightest chance that med #2 may be having the most slight of positive effects. I feel rather glumly certain that med #1 has had no such benefit. (so do we keep buying it at ridiculous name-brand drug expense? Why?) But as for #2...could it be responsible for the reduction in backyard flotsam...the steady progress on door refinishing...the near-completion of a chapter book (ok...Robert B. Parker, but what the heck.)?

How does one even know? What if it is helping? Of course I am glad if it is. Of course I must be glad if it is. Of course I want to see the best things I can see. Of course. It is best to smile and ignore the second little voice screaming from the back of my brain “Why don’t you just kill me now and get it over with?? What? You think I want to go through this again?

Of course we will ignore that little voice. And of course, we know that any benefit derived from med #2 will be temporary, and will not change the timing or the direction of the eventual trajectory. But of course--if one more Spenser book can be read...if one more decent conversation can be had--who would turn that down? And we can ignore the little screaming voice. Or at least pat it, and say “there there,” as it shrieks “you’re teasing me! Don’t give me a warm fuzzy if you’re not going to let me keep it!”

rings

Once, when I was 15, I had a ring. (I was not a cute and nubile sort of 15. I was more of the gangly and awkward type of 15. The picture of the aphorism: It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.) I don’t remember where I got the ring. It was sterling silver, and basically a continuous strand, the diameter of string, which looped into a pretzel shaped knot. That was its decoration. I liked it.

One day--a nice day I think--I was sitting in the front yard with Duane. Duane was our exchange student from South Africa. Duane did not worry about being thought a fool. She was not. She was 2.5 years older, and several decades more mature, than I. We were sitting in the front yard, and Jeff came over from across the street. He was 29. I knew him as one of Corky’s older brothers whom I didn’t know other than to know him as one of Corky’s older brothers. But he was in our front yard to meet Duane. They chatted. I remained silent, as was the wisest move in my view, and stayed at a safe 10 or so feet away in the grass. I was playing with my ring. Fiddling with it. Taking it on and off. Duane was sitting in the grass, and Jeff was standing, in a spread-leg posture so that he would be lower to the ground, talking with her. I kept playing with my ring. I dropped it.

Then, I couldn’t find my ring. I was looking for it, but most discreetly, because the last thing I wanted to do was draw attention to the fact that I’d lost something. Because then I might have to talk. Well, Jeff was still standing there, spread-legs, and without a word he flung something at me. My ring. He was 10 feet away, and I’d merely dropped it.

For the past 2 years or so, when I’m in that weird state between awake and asleep, I am seized with the notion that someone/something is trying to take my rings. Not the silver knot ring. I don’t have that. It disappeared in the transitional college years. My current rings are my gold wedding ring which is too big, and my enagement ring which is not too big and holds the wedding band on. So, typically, I’m lying in bed not-quite-asleep and I feel a little panic. I can’t articulate who or what is trying to take my rings, but it’s something. Sometimes I take them off. Sometimes I put them on my bedside table, and occasionally I get up and carry them over to my earring box and put them in it. But I’m not quite awake. Just aware enough that, when I get up in the morning, I know what I did and can find the rings.

I don’t know why I do that. I don’t have any other freaky sleep, or almost-sleep, disorders. Maybe I just know something is taking something important away from me.

no knots required

Our basement needs work. While I’ve attacked it in the past, even 5 years of clutter can seem impossible. Jeff has been working at getting some of his lumber flotsam up and out, but he tends to rummage in the non-lumber areas as well, and it is not uncommon for the basement to belch up several books, or another oddment which I’m just not ready to deal with yet.

Let’s leave that in the basement, I say. I’m just not ready to sort it yet. So back down it goes. Usually with me.

Today’s surprise basement burpage was a batch of semi-unrolled blueprint packets, strewn copiously across the kitchen counter. I recognized them. 228 Otterbein St--the first place we lived together.

Iiiiiigg I splutter, my clutter-aversion anxiety beginning to knot up my innards. What’s this doing here?

I did this, says Jeff, spreading out one of the rolls. I planned this, and drew it, and built it. Me and [cousin] Robin.

My knot unknots. My angst unangsts. I look at the drawing. A detailed rendering of a house--carefully measured, intricately marked, detailed features neatly sketched in. Look, Jeff says, I used to be able to do this stuff.

Yes, I say. You did do it. And it’s good. You pretty much designed and built the house we’re in right now too. Smile. Hug. The blueprints disappear later without my asking.

not much

My right thumb is bundled up in a band-aid like a little peasant char-woman in winter. Constant wrappage seems the only way to convince the tiny crack--born of cold, dry air--that it is, in fact, appropriate to heal. It may be healing. But it resembles the fissure it was closely enough that I’m reluctant to unwrap it yet. 2 more days maybe.

Here is my goal and job for now. Preparing. One of the necessities being to create as manageable, unconfusing, and clutter free house as possible under the circumstances. I’m happy to get rid of stuff. Contact me if you want stuff. Personally, I don’t want stuff.

We’ve had an ongoing discussion about the lyrics to A Whole New World, from Aladdin. I was sure--really really sure--that Aladdin says “shining shimmering splendor.” It only makes sense, after all, to follow up two adjectives with a noun if you want a well-rounded phrase. But Olivia--who should know, as it is on her iPod--insisted that he says “shining, shimmering, splendid.” I had to look it up. It is “splendid.” As Gabe pointed out based on a lyrical analysis--”If it said ‘splendor’ instead of ‘splendid’ then you’d have to change the next line--’Tell me princess, now when did you last let your heart decide’ to ‘tell me princess now when/or did you let your heart decide.’ Makes no sense Mom, now does it?” The kid is correct. When you’re wrong, you’re wrong.

Not Lyme

No, not Lyme. It was a nice thought though.

being amphibious

I wonder sometimes, if I allow myself to sink into this quiet world where overstimulation is to be avoided, and communication depends on a true ability to live in the moment...will I be there forever? Will that become my permanent world? But I trust that it is a groundless fear. I should be able to segue, like an amphibian living half in the water, half on land. Both worlds have their particular beauty and a healthy creature, designed for such, can interface with either.

At times I’ve thought about what I would do if I were in jail. Just a plain, dank, standard jail cell. Colorless. Not much, it would seem, to offer. What would I do? But most jails--at least around here--have a library, have ways to access learning, and have people to interact with. One can write, one can study. There is never nothing to do. Even if you’ve got no resource to draw on but the creativity of your own mind and a piece of chalk to scratch on the wall with, there are means to create in vivid color.

When you’re bummed, he’s bummed, and it soon becomes obvious that your entire support network is likewise bummed, it’s time to say, “Cool. We’re all bummed! Time to move on.”
People probably wonder how you can possibly live in hell. But to some people, bugs are hell. To others, shoveling snow is hell. To others, 95°F in the shade is hell. So you say, “It’s not hell. You just plan differently. And do things differently, at different times. And enjoy the heat. Ok?"

Just a normal month

This is a most interesting chunk of weeks. When we are home I’m trying to locate myself just ahead of, or just behind, the work crew who may be doing anything from spackling the hall ceiling to applying window trim in a bedroom. While I’m completely accustomed to stepping over dropcloths or pneumatic nailers as a matter of daily routine, tripping over guys who barely know me hasn’t been a regular thing since a couple years ago.

It is also a time speckled liberally with unnerving visits to a stunning array of docs and diagnostic venues. Jeff’s default tendency to live in the moment is serving him well from the standpoint of his nerves, but mine are running a bit on edge as I can’t really turn off my mental map of the overall diagnostic schema and where it may be leading. The advantage to this coinciding with having contractors is that they usually park Jeff in, lessening the odds that he’ll duck out for a Wendy’s chicken sandwich and I’ll lose him at a critical moment.

Hazel has picked now to exhibit a flare-up of pink belly. Maybe it’s just the season, or maybe it’s that she got into the other cats’ food which is causing her immune system to complain about the onslaught of proteins other than duck and pea, but whatever the case--she’s just going to have to hang in there, or drive me to desperation before she gets hauled in for a steroid injection. Freddi meanwhile, is getting more walks than usual, but otherwise having to tolerate the one finished room with a closeable door--Gabe’s bedroom. Had she not attempted to eat the contractors’ dog (twice her size) a few days ago, she might have more liberty, but you just can’t turn that terrier tenacity off with a switch.

Jeff’s old college mate, French, is in town for an ecumenical ministry conference in D.C. We got him from the airport to his hotel with a brief diner lunch yesterday, and will retrieve him for a two-night stay chez nous on Thursday before redelivering him to the airport. And in a way, this might be the perfect time for such a visit. Who could possibly present the expert hostess façade under present conditions? I’m sure he’ll be quite happy, once he’s dodged several stepladders en route to the room I’ll put him in, to join us for two days of meals away from what my friend Katherine has dubbed “topsy-turvy land.”

Sadly, I am inescapably low on lunchbox whatnots, and must fit a trip to the grocery store in somewhere today. That will be after today’s doctor thing.

wintry mix

Gabe is showing Jeff a card trick. He shuffles, and says “tell me when to stop.” Jeff stares diligently at the flipping cards and says, “King of spades?” Gabe says “no, just tell me when to stop shuffling.”

There are some not-half-bad Whole Foods brand pizzas in the freezer. That’s what’s for dinner. I do not feel so ambitious as to cook something tonight. Even dessert. So the oven is preheating to 390° F. (What kind of a weird setting is 390°?)

Gabe says “watch closely and try to guess how I know which card to stop at.” Jeff stares intently. “You bent a corner back?” (Bravo, I think. That is in fact a trick I’ve known Gabe to use. But it’s not right this time.)

I will need to remember to go to the wine store tomorrow. Jeff keeps bringing home this stuff called “Black Box.” It is, in fact, housed within a box. But within the box is a plastic bag with an attached spigot with which you dispense the Chardonnay. It is not bad as wines for cheap people go, but it kind of somewhere between annoys and amuses me that the only way to dispense the last glass is to remove the plastic bag from the black box, unsquish it, snip a hole in it for good air flow, and dispense. Somehow I feel like I’m drinking wine from an IV bag. It is not sufficiently cheaper for me to tolerate that strange aesthetic. Tomorrow I’ll look for a nice cheap French bottle.

Tonight we got about .25 inches of snow. They’re calling for “wintry mix” later. (That should either be a form of Chex cereal based snack containing chestnuts, or a cd compilation featuring Christmas classics.) At any rate, the question remains: will the wintry mix delay school tomorrow morning? Will my intentions of getting Jeff to the new neurologist with plenty of time to spare be impeded by school shuttling concerns? Only Mr. Cold Miser knows.

Olivia calls to find out what’s for dinner, or more specifically, whether it’s something “good.” Whole Foods frozen pizzas do not qualify, so we negotiate as to whether I will subsidize her stopping at Ledo’s on the way home from work. I concede up to $5. Deal.

Jeff is standing next to my computer stool at the counter. In one hand he holds a glass of IV bag wine, and in the other, a slice of Whole Food pizza. I can’t help but note the vast departure in dining styles from my childhood of setting the table, and serving each plate with a well-balanced combination of salad, meat, vegetable, and starch. I think two things: One--It’s nice to re-experience that delicacy when we eat with my mom (except in that few of us eat the meat portion anymore,) and two--Don’t worry. I know better than to try this at home.

Wintry mix update: Liva calls. On the way home from work she hit an icy patch and does several total 360’s. Fortunately there were no cars around, and she pulled into a lot. I offer to hike 1/2 mile and drive her car home, but assure her that it should be ok if she does it slowly. I don’t know how slowly she went, but she’s home without incident in what seems like 3 minutes.

Time to become a wealthy Georgian.

There just aren’t enough people here. The girls are gone, and Liva, though technically in residence, is trying to condition me to her eventual flight by having a 24 hour social life. I do actually appreciate Gabe’s occasional card trick.

I had a sneaking suspicion about the calendula ointment on Jeff’s bathroom sink. I was not aware of any burns or rashes he needed to treat, yet there it was, conveniently stashed behind the cold water handle. I asked. He allowed as how the toothpaste has had a funny taste this week. I couldn’t help but note that the tube design bears no resemblance to Tom’s of Maine, nor have we ever tried a flavor that comes in a clear yellow gel, but you know, I guess they could make one.

Agua Clara is on the touchy cd player. For now. Once I shut a drawer over there a little too hard it will stop, protesting that its cd insertion door is OPEN. Silly thing. Years ago, Gabe made what is meant to be some sort of ball shaped vase in school, shiny with brown glaze. It is a useful wad of ceramic to place on top of the cd player's lid to fool it into thinking it’s closed, but it’s still a touchy thing, and reacts to the slightest bumps. Agua Clara is a Peruvian group. They were playing in Penn Station a couple weeks ago, and so pleased me in a mere 5 minutes that I bought their cd. Lots of hooty bamboo flute type instruments, with guitar and percussion.

This has been Pride and Prejudice immersion week. In addition to watching the ‘06 movie for the 4th time, I read the book, and watched the film once again with the director’s commentary running. Now I am very much wishing we had house guests, staying for 10 days, or 6 weeks or so, who would be keeping company with me in the drawing room where we’d play cards or engage in clever conversation. A prerequisite, of course, is that this whole fantasy would come with a cook and housekeepers. I do not require the fully outfitted guys who, one per chair, would push each diner’s chair in as we sit.

The Big Apple & some small worms

Our quick NYC get-away was, as usual, all in all a good thing. There is a remarkably endless array of places to eat. I really like places to eat, so it grieves me slightly to pick one in the sense that I must forego numerous others in the same neighborhood. Other times, other times.

Among the more discordant notes, there is nothing like a trip to exacerbate the noticeable neuropsychiatric deficits of chronic Lyme. Sometimes it means you fiddle around with your continental breakfast uncertain whether you need to pick up a fork, move your coffee cup, or get the muffin out of the way before you can eat your fruit. Your partner will almost certainly have to stop frequently, when walking in crowds, to make sure you haven’t lost sight of her, which you will do. A lot. You will not understand, or be able to keep track of, the day’s agenda even if your partner has discussed it with you several times. It is highly likely that if there are several blocks to go before you get to the subway stop (from which you will take a 30 minute ride across Queens to Forest Hills,) that you will forget that you haven’t done the subway part yet and ask a random stranger, in Greenwich Village, if he knows how to get to Forest Hills. This will chagrin your partner more than it does the random stranger who will merely look confused. It is also highly probable that, once on the subway, you may forget to sit down or grab the pole, and you will fall into the lap of yet another random stranger. Most random strangers, in my experience, are fairly good-humored.

The Hotel Gansevoort is a great place to stay if it entertains you to watch (from eight floors above) an endless processional of yellow taxis circling the block as they drop off and retrieve the hip in-crowd. I found it entertaining at midnight, and still so at 2 a.m. when my bladder called. By 7 a.m there was only a cab or two on the street, but there was a NY Times on our room door in a gray cloth bag.

The girls are all out. Somebody got Clunkola the Jeffmobile. I suspect it was Becca. It must be one of the pitfalls of middle child-dom. You get the yucky car. I feel strongly that I would like to go to bed tonight. Last night I got to feeling yucky on the train, and still did when we retrieved our car which was sadly low on fuel. We found a non-functioning BP station where Jeff failed to notice that he was not filling the car with gas while I discreetly barfed in the empty stretch of grass next door. Fortunately it was after midnight and no one was about. Fortunately no cop stopped to question whether I was fit to drive. Fortunately I was, as it had nothing to do with alcohol. And the next gas station had gas. But I just don’t think I can do the wait-up-for-the-girls thing tonight.

Today we discussed how there was no way for me to help Jeff with his activities of daily living without being--at various times--annoyingly solicitous, annoyingly impatient, or just plain annoying. He assured me that it is not a focused irritation he displays, and I must not take it personally. He is mad, he is frustrated, he is irked. But then, who wouldn’t be?

HNY

I do not, just because it’s New Year’s Day, have any particularly meaningful comments to make. The word observations, in this context, would mean pretty much the same thing as comments and I don’t have any good ones of those either, so I’ll make some stupid ones.

I really ought to go turn off the coffee pot so its little red light will stop reminding me to drink more. Even though it’s half-caf. Enough is enough.

This is the first New Year’s Eve in three years that I haven’t been hit by a surprise wave of melancholy while deciding whether to go to bed early or watch dumb tv. A distant friend in Scunthorpe sent me cheering words each of those times, and greatly appreciated those words were, but somehow I dodged the wave this year.

One apple pie does not go far in a house with Jeff and Gabe. If I’m going to bother, I may as well make two.

A kind and clever neighbor has a niece who lives in Paris. He responded to my expressed twinge of envy the following way: “The way I see it, you’ve got sky, you’ve got ground, you’ve got shelter and a warm bed pretty much anywhere you go, if you’re lucky.” Very true. Dandelions could be quite charming if all you’ve got is bougainvillea.