I Promise For Real This Time...

I have been saying that there are more posts coming and have alluded to them all over the place. So, where are they?

They're coming.

I don't want to make you sit there and think "Oh great, we sit around and wait for posts that she promises and for all we know the only thing up and coming is a post about her love for walnuts (I like to open the shell with an old school metal nutcracker and try and figure out why I bother digging the meat out when I can buy it shelled- but I enjoy the zen of the process) or why her kids are the bestest and funniest (they are though of course) or how the middle American states are a Republican party ruse meant to garner more electoral college votes but they don't actually exist (this one my older sister came up with in high school and for a while seemed kind of believable, until I had to fly to Kansas City, Missouri- they do exist, Republican or otherwise)."
Is that what you were thinking?

Well- I feel it is only fair that I share with you what some of my forthcoming posts are regarding:
My awesome organic heirloom tomato and fresh picked apple salsa recipe.
Mini-golf.
The trickery of town recycling (I know- you can hardly contain the excitement!)
My (once again awesome) zucchini blueberry bread recipe.
The search for a good primary care doctor in one of the greatest medical communities in the U.S.
How to sew a tutu on the fly.
Good reasons not to tempt fate by saying "My child hasn't really talked about god yet..."
The dangers of apple picking without proper safety equipment.
How to beat Martha Stewart in a centerpiece fight.

Now, not all of these are done so hold your horses. Some are but I haven't attached the pictures so I haven't posted them yet. And of course I will continue to blog without advanced notice, preparation or use of protractors and graphing calculators. I just wanted to put it in writing that I am indeed working on posting more and have a thing or two to say about a thing or two (I like to say that). So consider myself pledged unto thee as a true and faithful blogger to the best of my abilities and at least for the next month. I'm only making promises one month at a time. I'm crazy but not crazy enough to plan that far ahead.

After all- come November, I could be in Missouri cracking walnuts old school and swapping kid pageant pictures and report cards with the head of the GOP.

Here is a picture of me that is badly in need of
photoshop (sleep much?) that
seals unto you my promise to be a better, more faithful blogger.

Backdating

You might notice new posts going up that are back dated and that is simply because I wrote them up but have been slogging around in other projects that distracted me from posting them. So after final edits and picture adding I am posting them with the original dates even though it is today. I'll keep this as the top post until I am caught up.
If you could imagine or knew how far behind I am on FaceBook you would start sending out a search party. There may even be people who assume I have just stopped paying for my FIOS connection. I'm around, just slow and rifling through papers real and virtual.
Thanks for checking in.

Show and Tell Day

I'm not going to show the pictures so don't worry.

I am just setting to keyboard what once would be set to pen that I don't know yet where the line is. I don't know what I want to share and what is only mine. Who do I know is reading? Who will secretly read? Am I seriously convinced I am that important?

I haven't read any Blogging for Dummies type thing and trust me, have NO intentions of doing so. But I wish there was a Big Brother Big Sister program that matched you up based on your life and what you like to talk about and then they help you decide if you are going to bring your new puppy to show and tell or the map to the old puppy's grave. Geez that sounds creepy. See- I'm not actually that creepy. I don't think.

There is almost a need for a person to have one blog for everything they have done, do or will do. Mommy, wife, work, hobbies, medical history, civil war re-en-actor, conspiracy theorist, writer, gamseshow contestant, pie lover, gambling adddict- whatever your category is.

I barely know my categories and I still need to figure out my audience. Hello audience. It's me. How are you? How is all this working out for you? Want more milk and cookies or do you prefer gin and tonics?

Egads but don't this just beat all. Well today for show and tell I am bringing me, my blog as it stands and my willingness to push myself farther. Onward and upward, forward march, small steps for mankind and all that tripe. Enough of the New Year's resolutions in July, I have crazy-ing to do and make. Here is a picture of my little man so he doesn't feel left out after all the pictures of his sister. Enjoy.

It was preschool graduation. Hence the overalls. They are de rigeur for all graduations these days.

I CAN READ!!

I haven't settled on the exact direction of my direction. Does one want to be a niche writer? Settle on writing about mommy-hood or physical and mental health or craft or cooking or just super-crazy nonsense? Does one write a tell all about their childhood? Maybe a daily diary of caloric intake compared to kilowatt hours used by the household? Quandaries, no? So until then this is what we've got: I CAN READ!

Make me a list of 100 writers or books- the best of the best- honest to god greatness. I've read 60. I've heard of 20 of the others, hate 10 and have not a clue on Earth who the remaining 10 are. I have to figure my stats are pretty good (modesty aside). At least comparatively- although to whom I'm comparing I'm not entirely sure I know. I will note here that I am totally incapable of making said or proposed list. My brain doesn't work that way exactly oddly enough.

I think it also bears noting that the proposed list could be compiled by 10 different experts on literature and have 100 different authors thereby obliterating my statistics. So where do I really fall on the continuum? Probably not where I want to or where I think I do.

I covet books and hold them dear. I read "voraciously" as so many people claim. I don't like to borrow books because most of the time I know I won't return them- just ask the head librarian of any town I have ever lived in. I don't like to lend people books either- even to dear friends. Yes, for all the regular reasons: they could lose them, dog-earing, forgetfulness etc. But also because they are MY books.

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. wrote in a commencement speech for students in April of 2007 - a speech he never got to give as a result of dying 16 days before he was meant to deliver it- bleh- run-on and poor grammar. Writing is a process and I do not claim perfection. Let us now correct ourselves.

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. wrote shortly before his death an interesting passage regarding books.

" I consider anybody who borrows a book instead of buying it, or lends one, a twerp. When I was a student at Shortridge High School a million years ago, a twerp was defined as a guy who put a set of false teeth up his rear end and bit the buttons off the back seats of taxicabs."

A vivid description at the least and a valid point at the most.

Don't worry though- I do respect economics and understand both the frugality and green-ness of using libraries, book swaps etc to get your reading material. I don't call people "twerps" nor do I imagine my friends who ask to borrow books grinning gumless-ly in the back seat of a cab. I myself rarely pass up a book that is given to me, no matter from where it came. Still, in the back of my head I always want the new copy, the glossy pretty one that smells like fresh ink and paper and can join my collection and make friends. I think I have made it clear that I am a covet-er of books as objects but I should really get back to the original point. The list, the authors, the literature.

Half of my essays ever written have been not just about authors but about my obsession with them. When I like an author I flip to the inside fly pages to find the list of "Other Books Available by "MOST AWESOMEST EVER WRITER FOLK." Then I set out to match my brain with the list and be sure that I have really done the work of falling for the writer and their material. And sometimes when required of me while I was in school I would follow that with a paper that didn't quite match the assignment mostly because it was written to show my breadth of knowledge on the author and his/her work, life, cat's name etc. Not just why "Catcher In The Rye helped shape an image of disillusioned youth culture" or some such nonsense.

But there is a secret component to me having read so many books and for mastering an author so to speak. I don't want to be the wine guy at the party who says "Oh yes, the boldness of the Bordeaux reminds me of a passage in Dante's blah blah blabbbedy blah..." I don't want to be the girl in the back of the poetry reading who points out the connections to Rilke when the speaker said "god" and "flower" in the same stanza. I do want to keep my statistics steady or rising when it comes to that "top 100" list though. I want to eat the words and love them and thrive on them and let them fuel me. But I also want that one other secret thing.

I want to be in the Red Robins not the Blue Birds. Mrs. Abbott simply didn't believe me in 2nd grade when I said I could read as well as I could and I will be damned if she doesn't let me into the stupid, stupid, stupid Red Robins! Damnit- I CAN READ!

Yeah- I guess I can hold a grudge. I have spent all these years trying to out read and prove to everyone that I can read when I am fairly confident they figured it out a while ago. And when it comes down to it, the Blue Birds were reading too. They just weren't reading what I wanted to. In spite of my relatively petty and pretty neurotic need to prove myself to people who didn't need to see- that push really did push me so far that I can think about that list I mentioned about eight billion gobbledy-gook words ago and be a tad bit proud.

Okay so I have to post it in a blog that I can read and that I have read a lot of books but everybody has something they are desperate for people to know about them. Regardless of everything else about me the fact that I can and do read falls into the top five things I want everyone to know about me. It just says so much and leaves so much room for people to wonder and guess, assume and ask questions. How great is that?

I'll get to the other four.

Paper Boxes

My rainy day garb
has brought me
up from my down

No money in the bank
red hair when I
need to be blond

Nobody's here but me
and my broken down smile
an excuse to leave not soon enough

I'm trying to be better
bolder and wiser
fighting a coward in warrior's armor

Never enough 'til the rain
starts to fall my joints
start to swell and I sink in

I'm deep into my mood
this funk that pulls me out
into summer and somewhere

Words on the pages
like chocolate in a mug
sweet mother's winter relief

I'll pack my books and
then my thoughts
all in one plain paper box

I'll store the blues away
behind the thunder and clouds
step into my boots and walk

Unfettered by time or family
constraints my eyes start to
open and I am awake

Feel me know the power of a
storm as it rises
discover me in the puddles

Oily reflections and a cab's
passing waves
distinguish my greys from yours

The sun sneaks out to gawk
at my varying fabrics
and my grin pulls away*

The date on this is probably around 1997, 1998 somewhere around Boston. I publish it here not for proof of worth or talent- that is not something I want judged by a piece written a decade ago. I just realized that I wanted to include it because it took me so damn long to come up with a silly little name for this here blog that I felt it only right to give the piece the credit. So voila. And yes- I know "grey" is not the way Americans spell the word but my dad is an anglophile above anglophiles and I like to tip my hat to the folks across the pond when I can. Always have- always will. And don't worry- I have no expectation of this blog becoming my personal poetry slam so keep breathing. I think I have a thing or two to say about a thing or two.

Why hello there...

I’m sitting outside and having a coffee while writing for the first time in ages. I feel like I’m playing hooky. My two kids and dearly beloved are miles away at the grocery store and me with spare time before an appointment… indulging and guilty.
This writing effort, this blogging venture is not supposed to be an indulgence. The triple shot latte- yeah that counts as frou-frou indulging. But here I’ve got sunlight, a cool breeze, ambient conversation, surprisingly comfortable metal seating and even silly little birds darting about my feet. Too much!
I feel like I need to wrap it up- back to the car and on your way. Let’s not dilly dally. Who thinks phrases like that? Let’s not “dilly dally?”
Okay then- let’s not.
Paper Boxes. Here it is, here I am- a synopsis of the big bang of the blog and then maybe later a mind-numbing profile of myself. Don’t get too excited. It’s just dilly dallying. Paper Boxes as a title comes from a piece I wrote over a decade ago. * The writing expressed everything I needed to say in that moment of time. I would like to allow this blog to leave some space for inaccurate, ill-advised delirium but mostly I would like it to do the same as that one piece I wrote so long ago.
I would love for each entry to describe the moment, the situation as is: density, core temperature and nutritional value. But I will never expect my writing to be anything that couldn’t be stored away amongst the items in an attic. Now to be obvious and bring it ‘round the front for the folks in the back who may have missed it…
I won’t expect more from myself here than bits of writing that could be put away in a plain paper box. Maybe forgotten for a while, hidden, sometimes treasured or found by the wrong person at the wrong time. Or just simple words that used to go on paper you carried into smoky diners in the wee hours and now go out onto the wires and a highway that is nothing more than metaphor. I am indulging a part of me, the one that wrote “Paper Box” in the middle of the night in a sketchy part of Boston and really felt her hands tingle with the energy and the need to get the words out. And now I wait for the words.