Her hands

Her hands are cracked and the severely cracked spots bleed. Her skin is beyond dry. We cover the skin with olive oil, we cover it with Dream Cream, a product by LUSH made for super dry skin. Her whole body is chapped, daily she is slathered. She feels pain when she walks. I keep gloves on her once I put the lotion on.

Now I see its going to get colder this week. I have the humidifiers and vaporizers going.

I can't help but blame her vegetarian diet. Her Dad is a vegetarian. My Moms hands get cracked but she cleans houses. A person needs Omega oils. Fish is delish!

I will search the internet, ask the vitamin guy at the local granola store, because there are answers to this.

What about your friends?
There are answers to all questions, whether we want to know the truth or not. I am unhappy with where I live, so I want to move. I am unhappy with my lack of local friends, I want to settle in another liberal little town and find people like me. Creative Moms who like music and tattoos and love their kids more then anything.


My closest friend moved when she got married. I have reconnected with high school chums but its been 20 years. What to say? I had a dear friend who simply stopped being a part of my life. We had all kinds of adventures. I don't blame her so much, I think sometimes people come into our lives for a reason. She needed some help getting out of her shell and there I was. We met at a writing group and then spent a year. She had recently divorced and I was going through the same. We wrote and laughed and cried.

The last time I saw her was after my shoulder operation. We went out for Indian food. She had bought a new car and drove us. I was glad she had gotten rid of her mom mobile. She was heavily into her massage therapy classes, surrounded by other women going through the same thing. I asked her if I was being replaced and she said No. It was all very light. She hugged me when we parted.

When my house was on fire, she came over. I sat in my neighbors house with her and she held my hand. We held hands when it got bad, I was always grateful for her hand in mine.

I missed her more then a lover, she was a sister. She straight laced with her sweater vest. She told me often that her parents had always told her never to trust anyone outside the family. She is from Kansas if it matters. I loved her and she loved me, we had good times.

There is a neighbor who is a bit younger then me with tattoos and likes music. She lets her child run wild in a dangerous manner. I see him dressed in thin clothes as the winter wind blows through to his young skin. He seems to get himself ready every morning and take himself home. He is 7. His Dad is a total pothead hippie who didn't comprehend why I would be concerned that his child was mouth kissing the friend of my child who was visiting.

Hey OOOO.

You keep on Sir, keep on getting high.

Whats alot of pot to someone who is home caring for his son? The kid would show up daily for company and snacks this Summer.

Back to friends and my lack of them.

I am a loner. I have few friends but those who are my friends, I've got their back. Body to bury? Shoulder to cry on, money to lend, bars to attend? I am there.

I have a myriad of acquaintances. You can't help but knowing people when you have elementary aged children. Funnily enough, it is my daughters Father who does most of the socializing. I plan and organize.

I will find community in my church, Universalist Unitarians are social people, who sincerely want to help. The womens group looks good, its the first time walking in that causes me such grief. I will go out to coffee shops.

The strangers I see in stores who I converse with do not find me hideous or malformed emotionally. I can shoot the breeze, give sincere compliments and my listening skills are phenomenal. The main thing is, actually leaving my house.

I like to do things by my lonesome. I go out to eat, go to movies, that is how I am. There is no insecurity there. I am self sufficient, but yes, I require community.

There is lots of unconditional love to give and receive. I welcome women folk, men folk, merfolk into my life. I'll apologize in advance for preferring email as my primary form of communication, texting is okay. The phone I look at with great suspicion.

Quirky and witty! I think you can only be eccentric if you are rich.

Winter, Spring, Summer or Fall, all you've got to do is call - and I'll be there, see you again, you've got a friend.

Love,

Rose

Strive

An email got me thinking about greatness.

I genuinely feel that everyone should strive for greatness, whatever their definition of greatness is. If I gave time to the idea that I was destined to be just like everyone else, I would not want to live. I refuse to accept that this is all there is. I am open and ready for new adventures. Positive growth experiences. I have had a dose of the horror, now I am ready for the pleasure. I require pleasure in all my senses.

I have to step it up, step out, make sweeping changes. Tonight, this darkness is the longest of the year. I will not dwell on the past, 2009 is just about over. Focus on the here and now, make your own greatness.

There is this spark in me, since I came to understand that I was a person, when I was very young that I was not like my fellow trailer dwelling neighbors. A tomboy and a reader, I see this child and I want to protect her. But the pain of childhood, loss, terror, no innocence, filth, has brought me here. For something more. Compassion and understanding for others.

I can be put down anywhere and make it a home. I can love even though I sometimes believe thats impossible.

If you take away possibility from someone, if you take away the basic mechanism of hope, then you take someones reason for living.

I look for reasons to continue on everyday. There is something more for me. It may not be my lot in life to win trophies and fuck rockstars but being the best Rose I can be? Absolutely.

I am in a state of transformation. I am gluing some fucking wings on and flying to someplace warm. I am writing and reading by water, my body is healing and I know peace, I know love.

A tenderness exists between two hard exteriors, isn't that a beautiful dream?

If I die before I am published, my writing will be given to my oldest friend Anne, who is a professor and a published author. I hope she can edit the words to something she can get published. I am thinking of that Neil Young song 'Unknown Legend'.

Neil Young to Laurie Anderson:

'Some people walk on water, some people walk on broken glass, some just walk round and round in their heads, some just, keep falling down.'

So you keep striving, keep moving forward, make plans, don't live a small life, live a life as big as you want it. Pack up and move. Don't be afraid to create new things. Someone out there will get it. Blessings occur every moment. We have to look without jaded eyes. If we let the ugliness of humanity cover us, the ugliness wins. Be positive, attract good things.

I am lonely. Thats my statement. My future lover is looking for me, that is so exciting. To connect with a man who likes what he sees and goes with what he feels? Thats another statement. Its been so long since I have known that bright star of romance, its all new. Innocent

.



Live. Love. Create.

Everyday begin again. I write these words for you and to remind myself to keep breathing.

2010: Get over shyness, agoraphobia, embrace new things, open myself to love.
Be close to the ocean as much as possible.

Get properly medicated for ADD so I can finish all this writing.

Get stronger, heal up. If my shoulder is to be a limitation, learn to live with it, adapt. If my knee is to be a limitation, adapt.

Get back into yoga, alternative therapies, love more, be a better Mother, get rid of this excess flesh, let go of what doesn't work, take more classes.

Decide which degree to get next, marine biology or public health administration. Double income, grow hair longer, breathe.

Oranges in winter

We gorge ourselves on clementines. I like the name.

I dreamed about being in a romantic kind funny relationship with my surgeon. He is quite a bit older then me btw. I had come out of surgery saying the names of NPR correspondents and had the nurses laughing. He kept me in his private room at the hospital. There was a pain monitor, he could see when the pain spiked. I wanted him to lay with me, he was really nice. Did I mention that? And completely smitten and I was too. Both grateful for each other.

It was a good dream to wake up from. My slow dog was staring into my eyes when I opened them. She is not right, its not her fault. Probably cut off from oxygen in the womb or some such. My son claimed her when she was a pup.

He contends that she is athletic and yes she does go down the slide on my sons back but I have also seen the dog run straight for the blades of a lawn mower and also attempt to drown herself.

Repeatedly.

A slick ride out to my Moms to drop off my girl. My dog sat on my lap and I navigated the slushy or slick roads while listening to "A Prairie Home Companion." I love Garrison Keillor. We got to see them live a few years ago and I enjoyed the experience.

Im going to eat some Amy's black bean chili, take some dayquil and get in bed. I have a few hours to rest before getting my daughter from my Moms. By that time the slush will have had time to freeze and it will be dark.

Let me also say the house smells really good. The tree, the candles, the nag champa.

A prayer for me and for you that 2010 is bigger and better.

Shepherd

When I worked as a crisis counselor in the bad side of town, near Christmas, in came a drunk woman carrying a baby dressed only in a sleeper (you know those footed pajamas).
After assessing their needs, food, someone to talk to, voucher for a cab, the "Mother" got on the phone we kept out for clients. I held this little boy, whose name is Shepherd and he
smiled up at me with big trusting eyes. I could feel that his diaper was full so I laid him down gently on the couch and unzipped his pj's - he had a scar from the top of his ribcage down. I went about changing him and when I took him to his Mom, I asked about his scar. She told me he had had some kind of heart surgery when he was just a newborn. I saw him from time to time, met his Dad also named Shepherd, an older fellow who had the same eyes as his son. How can someone so tiny be so strong, already? The will to live and thrive.

Going down

Slip and slide

Urge to be something more then me.
Smothered slowly, If I forgot to live.
I would still keep on living.
My heart pumping, lungs breathing in air.
Life is life and we are here to hold onto it.

I try not to think of last Christmas.
How I lost all that mattered.
And ended up in the hospital.
To get meds adjusted and smile.

To escape the hospital, I had to smile.
I never was good with authority figures.
I have so much and it all matters.
I have so much darkness and coldness and that matters.

Alexandra Leaving

A song by Leonard Cohen. Oh My Goddess, drink in these beautiful lyrics, tears and nectar from heaven.

Suddenly the night has grown colder.
The god of love preparing to depart.
Alexandra hoisted on his shoulder,
They slip between the sentries of the heart.

Upheld by the simplicities of pleasure,
They gain the light, they formlessly entwine;
And radiant beyond your widest measure
They fall among the voices and the wine.

It’s not a trick, your senses all deceiving,
A fitful dream, the morning will exhaust –
Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving.
Then say goodbye to Alexandra lost.

Even though she sleeps upon your satin;
Even though she wakes you with a kiss.
Do not say the moment was imagined;
Do not stoop to strategies like this.

As someone long prepared for this to happen,
Go firmly to the window. Drink it in.
Exquisite music. Alexandra laughing.
Your firm commitments tangible again.

And you who had the honor of her evening,
And by the honor had your own restored –
Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving;
Alexandra leaving with her lord.

Even though she sleeps upon your satin;
Even though she wakes you with a kiss.
Do not say the moment was imagined;
Do not stoop to strategies like this.

As someone long prepared for the occasion;
In full command of every plan you wrecked –
Do not choose a coward’s explanation
that hides behind the cause and the effect.

And you who were bewildered by a meaning;
Whose code was broken, crucifix uncrossed –
Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving.
Then say goodbye to Alexandra lost.

Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving.
Then say goodbye to Alexandra lost.

See me safely through the night

Over the past 3 years I have learned some things. I have learned how different levels of pain move through the body. The toll it takes on the body and how burned out a person can get. Burned out on pain. So much pain, so little love. I always seek balance, my positive outlook is that alot of love is coming.

As I limped through this cold cold day, unusually cold. Generally a build up to the bitterness. 25 degrees and I am in a vest, today I was cold like a skinny girl. I bought a thick long sweater. A hat with flaps. I came home and I wanted to hear John Lennons voice.

My foot keeps turning in. I notice this from a distance. My leg from hip to toes is torqued, knee twisted and not quite healed from surgery. Running errands, making Christmas and happiness for others and I look for something anything to keep the darkness from rolling in.

I think of how much California felt like home. Just a few days and I am smitten. Sometimes it is like that.

Right now, I am doing time in a place I don't want to be, in a situation that is less then stellar. Alot of needless stress. A life with less purpose then I want.

Cliff diving, scuba diving, baptism by ocean water, sunset, back in my sundresses, relaxed life, healthy living, healthy loving.

I could be packed and gone within a week, you know. I did the website for our realtors, Sandi and Linda. Just sell it or give it to my sister and get some rent. Pack the car, rent a trailer, we can get beds, we can swap houses with a visiting professor, we could exchange this utter misery for brighter days. I could work somewhere, deal with people, haha. I could finish a book. Get some freelance gigs.

All by myself. I just want to say I can do it. I can do it anytime. I don't have to choose the loneliness and tears and cold nose and spider webs.

Because of all the loss and remorse and fights, I love my town but I can't get forward, I have forgone my own fulfillment for my childrens that I have so little, I have nothing.

I just need books, clothes, dogs, a coupla cats, my daughter. My son is halfway out the door.

I am a nomad at heart, my feet nailed to the floor here. Because kids need consistency.

My needs. A need.

One good thing.

I feel like I got shots in my arms. My braces ache, my scars remind me of the times I went under the knife to repair and never completely healed.

Dear Universe, send me a sign that California is where I belong, omens come to me, I intuitively know this.

I will miss the huge murder of crows that live in my town. I wont miss much else, as long as there are trees and water and interesting good people, a bedroom thats dark and cave like, I am content.

Roses go to sleep in the winter, some flower all year long.

Whats it gonna be my thorny lovely thing?

Realization

I have merely tasted a drop or two of creativity. So much out there to delve into. Dive deep. I always admired the SEALS diving from helicopters into the middle of the ocean (or other troops who do the same) - expected to figure out where they are at and with a pack, get back home.

Thats where I am, waiting to jump. I can smell the ocean and I want it. I don't know how I will react once Im there but I want it.

How many years does a person wait for the miracle of purpose to come? I think you just do something and if it doesn't work, do something else.

A quote from a John Cusack movie I can't remember at the moment but was centered around skiing and Frankie. "You go down the hill, something gets in your way, turn."

Its a full moon. Damn that moon is sensual. I hope where you are at, you can see her. Yea, the moon is female.




The moon is always female but the sun
is female only in lands where females
are let into the sun to run and climb.

Marge Piercy