vajras

I have a project--it's been on my to do list for ages: get rid of my earrings.  I really can't handle earrings. 

When I was little, I had my ears pierced at age 4.  My mom made me wait till I was 4.  That gives me a smile.

The little holes in my ears got infected multiple times.  Or maybe it was allergic reactions to weird metals?  Maybe I'm allergic to nickel.  The metal button fastening some jeans bothers my skin, sometimes, which has to do with why I almost never wear jeans anymore.

Then I was in college when I got a second piercing in my right earlobe.  My mom got a second piercing in her left at the same time.  We went together.  She wore a diamond in that one, all the time.  I wore a ruby, for a while.

Then my piercings would close, or mostly close.  I might try.  I think I'm just not meant for that.  It was always frustrating and weird, trying to get earrings in.  In some ways I wanted it.  But it was too difficult.

Anyway, it's time for me to give them away.  I used to make jewelry--I guess I still do.  Oh yeah.  I've made a couple necklaces lately.  Usually the jewelry I make is super simple. 

I tried selling some on etsy, ten years ago.  Nothing ever sold.  Maybe I priced it wrong, or it was so simple, no one liked it.

I never know what others will like.  I write a lot of poems, and that's a bad habit I've had since I was a child.  People could really like something I predicted no one would like, or not at all like something I find wonderful.  What's happening in other people's heads is mostly a mystery to me.

I did a cool thing, which was make some vajra earrings, out of these silver beads which are meant as spacers, I think.  Vajras are Buddhist, representing lightning bolt, diamond, or enlightenment.  They're ceremonial.  They're symbolic--I like them. 

I've never been Buddhist, but I was married to a Buddhist for ten years.  He didn't do that kind of Buddhism that likes vajras.  But also I did Hinduism, and some say Buddhism is an offshoot of Hinduism.   How Christianity came from Judaism.

Well, I made these vajra earrings, long ago.  I loved them and wore them a few times.  To the right person, these could be very cool.  But most people are probably having no idea about the significance.

I wanted to get rid of these earrings, and I have one Buddhist friend, but I only saw them wear earrings very small, so I wondered if they might like them, but maybe the earrings are too big.

I realized I still had tons of silver spacer beads I used to make the vajras, so I could make some more, and make a necklace instead.  Did I still know how to do that? 

You take this certain kind of pin, and thread the beads on there how you want them, then hold the pin with this certain tool, and then use another tool (which is just small pliers) to grip the pin-end and bend it around into a certain shape... 

I would have to show you.  You make a loop and then swirl around the rest of it to secure the loop.  It's very easy.  I learned at Wellspring Women's Center at this jewelry making workshop, years ago in Sacramento.

To answer my question, yes, I still could do it.  In fact, I used to mess it up often, which was fine because pins are very inexpensive, and I could just cut it apart with these other sharp cutting plier things, and start over.  This time I made four little vajras, no problem.

I thought maybe I couldn't see well enough up close, anymore.  I have these reading glasses in the bedroom, and I haven't used them yet.  They're waiting for their day.  Tick, tock!

Isn't it funny how a thing can lead to a thing.  Piercings closing, get rid of earrings, look at old earrings, remember vajra beads, make new jewelry.  Probably this friend, I gave them enough jewelry already.  Who knows.

I had this metal thing with my jewelry making materials, like for a keychain I guess, to attach a thing to another thing, with a lever, where you can use your thumb to move the lever and open a loop?  It has a swivel on it.  You probably have seen these a hundred times, but what are they called?  You could attach your keys to your beltloop, maybe.  This is a small one though, slightly mini.

I had some extra-long pins and made a vajra with some beads above it, and then I did the loop thing with the swirlie.  And I'll take this split ring I found, and attach the pin with vajra to the keychain thing. 

I would consider that a zipper pull.  So if my Buddhist friend has a backpack, they could put the vajra on there.  Or who knows.  They could tell me some request, to put the vajra with beads in some other form.

The funny thing is I worry that when I cut the pin, that will leave a sharp bit, and someone will get hurt on it, so I bought these tiny tiny files, which are called diamond files, to file the edge so no one will get hurt.  No one taught me to do this--I just thought of it.  Maybe I'm overly cautious. 

I think they're not really made with diamond dust, as people complained in the online reviews that real diamond files are better somehow. 

But it's funny because I used a diamond file on a vajra, which means diamond.  I don't know.  Maybe not like ha ha funny.  But I get tickled by that sort of thing.

It was a set of ten, and I really only needed one.  So let me know if you need any tiny tiny diamond files.  Or any vajras, also.  (I need some small silver split rings, if you have any of those.)

I like how jewelry, I can usually take it apart and rearrange the components.  That's fun.  Tomorrow I might look at all this and think it's ugly or too weird or whatever, and then I can reconfigure everything.

But this night, I enjoyed it, finding beads and fasteners and this-n-that, listening to music that makes me feel good, creating art.  I felt extra open to my own intuition.  Or the universe or whatever. 

I'm doubting God cares about the jewelry I make--I'd think she had better things to do.  Like watch very smart people play chess, or watch people birth babies?  Maybe all she does is dance, or go swimming.  Who knows what she's up to.  Oh, Mama.  Maybe they're swimming in a river in the sky, somewhere.  Taking a dip in the Milky Way.

I was interviewed

A writer interviewed me as a permaculture woman.  I cried because I wish I could show my mom.  She might have liked it.

https://carlacram.com/2020/02/27/introducing-permaculture-women-a-series

I talk about zines, zones, disability, mental health, learning how to share a garden, garden aesthetics.  The questions were fun to answer.  It turned out good.

joyful girl

"Will you be a punk grrl with me?" I asked Ming.

"Yeah!" he said.  He started dancing around a bit.

"Do you know what punk means?" I asked.

"What's it mean?" he asked, still dancing around.

"Smashing the patriarchy.  Yeah, basically," I said.  "Prettymuch."

He mentioned pamphlets.  I said, "Yeah, we can make pamphlets too."  That's how we're funny when we talk about zines.

I had been trying to find Don't Need You on some free movie streaming website, a favorite movie of mine, a movie about riot grrl.  It was the most empowering thing I'd ever seen.  It made me feel like I could do anything.

The library has the dvd, and the library has The Punk Singer dvd also, about Kathleen Hannah.  But I thought we had no dvd player, but Ming says the computer he got from his kid has a dvd player.  He'll test it.

Another gendery thing was Ming's fantasy that we take P's hot tub.  P's moving and getting rid of almost all his stuff.  I said if we lived in a lesbian intentional community, it could be ok.  I was imagining some advanced amazonian body liberation lesbian separatist nudity fun stuff.

But this place is predominantly dudes.  I don't think my nudity would be a good idea.  Ming and P mentioned putting the hot tub by the laundry machines, where the clotheslines are.  No way in hell would my naked body be ok right there.

I've never been a lesbian, but I have some good fantasies about women's music festivals and conflict between terfy weirdos and the regular weirdos.  All the unshaved vulnerable tough awkward ladies listening to Ani Difrano and hooking up, with me all alone, staring at the moon or something.

One time I had a dream about that.  It was a dystopian lesbian separatist intentional community post-apocalyptic romance dream.  Probably like anarchoprimativism.  How do you say that?  The green offgrid luddite superfeminist anarchists.  Solarpunk? 

I wrote a letter to someone I loved on a tree, right on the bark.  It was hard to read afterward.  I needed to tell her something really important before I left.  But maybe she was an agent.  I guess I'm crazy even in my dreams.

Hey, everyone's crazy in their dreams!  This is still my favorite Ani Difranco song.



i wonder if everything i do i do instead of something i want to do more the question fills my head i know there's no grand plan here this is just the way it goes when everything else seems unclear i guess at least i know
--from "Joyful Girl" by Ani Difranco

idealistic today

I made this meme this morning because this quote speaks to me.  I've experienced the spiritual pain of knowing what I needed to do and not doing it. 

It makes me think of how when I attended my first Sacred Peace Walk, I learned that the community I'd longed for could actually exist.  So I needed to devote my life to that.  Ming and I left a good life in Sacramento to come to Las Vegas and take a gamble on an even better life.  It worked.

This rainbow over Freedom House the other day reminds me of the goodness of the life I have here.  I feel God's blessing, that she put me here for a reason.  I find new small reasons all the time, but there is a big overarching reason: I'm doing the service here that I want to do.  Connecting to people, experiencing soul-nourishing fun, building community.  Healing myself, building a family with Ming, encouraging strength and resilience for adventures to come.

I was so anxious yesterday I could barely live.  Then today I woke up feeling good.  Doing small things to contribute to a bigger dream.  Reaching out to friends, staying connected, making plans.  Feels wonderful.

Hmm, I sound idealistic today.  J asked me to water her seedlings over the weekend.  Sounds good.  I asked for instructions.

orange you glad I didn't say banana

"What's going on with this potato?" Ming asked me, holding up an orange.

"That's an orange," I said.

"Ok," he said.

"It's up for grabs.  Anyone can eat it.  As long as it's an orange.  If it changes into something else, don't eat it."

Ming said he understood and peeled the orange over the sink.  I could see why he was asking because the orange had been bought for a specific fruit salad purpose.  But it had passed.

"It tastes moldy," Ming said.  "Do you want to try it?"

I took an orange slice, inspected it, took a bite, and it tasted good.  "It's good," I said.  "It's not the most delicious orange I ever had, but it's an ok orange."

He tried it some more.  Gave me more.  I was trying to taste some moldiness or problem under the okness, but it was fine.

"Are you sure that orange was ok?" Ming asked five minutes later.

"Yeah!" I said.

"You're coughing a lot," he said.

"I'm coughing because it's morning.  I'm coughing from phlegm.  Not from the orange."

"I'm coughing too," he said.

"Do you think the orange made us sick?" I asked, incredulous.

"Maybe it got stuck in the back of our throats," he said.

"Because it was bad?" I asked.  He was making no sense, to me.  I guess it was just a feeling.

December fell off our calendar again.  Ming was wondering if that meant we would have no December.  We would no longer need calendars because the world was ending or the revolution was coming.  I imagined losing track of the date, and it sounded scary.  He stapled December back on the calendar as a preventative measure.

I have a lot of anxiety.  It feels like unexpressed pain.  This morning I danced for 20 minutes in the kitchen.  It felt really good.

I took the dried up bits of rejected potato off the range that had been sitting there for a long time.  Ming called them his potato dice.  I said something about Las Vegas and gambling.

It's windy outside. The moon last night was the slightest sliver near the horizon as we left home for a pupusaria I found less friendly than our usual, which is closed Mondays.

Now I'll appreciate more our usual place, the scene of a movie shootout.  I love that waitress who seems to moodily accept me as an annoying fact of life.

"Oh, it's those Catholic Workers again," she says in her mind, in Spanish.  Or, "Oh, it's those weird people who always order loroco," she says.  Or, "There's that's fat lady with the sleepy Asian guy again, who always want a piece of foil."

Who knows.  It's been many years.  She I love more than just about anyone who I don't really know.

I could have given her a valentine.  To the lady who I love most of everyone I don't know.  She would probably think it was stupid.  That's cool.

A picture from the prayer room.  I gave my friend this button, and she put it on her hat.

time problem, more time traveling, max vibrant

content warning: a little bit of self-hate pertaining to fatness, age, appearance--sorry about that

Ming invited me to a social event.  He must have known I would be a "hell no!" but invited me anyway, then thought it was funny when I said hell no.  "I'm going to travel back in time, just so I can not go a second time!" I told him, emphatic, which he found funny also.

There was a problem Ming had a long time ago, more than 15 years ago.  We mentioned it yesterday.  I said yeah, I have been trying to solve it the whole time I've known him.  I had been trying to go back in time and fix the situation for him, struggling to find a way he could have not suffered.  I haven't figured it out.

Ps, I have a problem with time.  Perhaps you've noticed.  Sometimes the past seems more real to me than the present.  It's not ideal, really.

I love this chronic pain zine, so well done, and they made it into a book: when language runs dry.  I ordered a copy.  Please consider buying to share with your hurting friends.

https://chronicpainzine.blogspot.com/p/about-book.html

Also I read about some free "don't weigh me" cards you can give to your doctor if you or your kid don't want to be weighed.  I asked for some.

https://more-love.org/free-dont-weigh-me-cards

This statue at Cactus Joe's surprised me.  I don't remember it from last time.  I like the squash on the belly.  Bandana prayer flags--weird.

I downloaded an app to do language exchange with strangers, but then I was supposed to have a user photo and got stuck on that.  I tried taking a fresh selfie and thought I look too old and fat and no one would want to chat with me.  My hair on top is getting grayer and grayer.

I usually love myself really good, but somehow seeing myself through the eyes of imagined young people in other countries made me sad, hopeless, self-loathing.

I wanted a picture that showed me as beautiful but not deceptively so.  If they thought I was super pretty and then over chat I looked way less pretty, what if they didn't want to talk to me.  I was overthinking it, maybe.  Still am.

My friend who visited yesterday made me this beautiful art.  We had great conversation bits, yesterday, in between her caring for her toddler.  It's neat how friends who come over bring their kids, and I learn new ways of being social.

She does elaborate beading stuff, especially on skulls.  She gave us one before, a beaded bird skull I look at every day, with baby pinks.  This one has a whole different color scheme, maximum vibrant.

almost a triple rainbow

We installed a new Quan Yin yesterday.  How beautiful.  I gave her a kiss.

Also there was a rainbow I was watching brighten and brighten, until I couldn't stand it anymore and went outside to take a picture to show R.  Pretty too.

Wish I could show Mama.  She would have liked that one.

We had a tea party.  That was a great idea.  I made delicious vegan dal, rice to go with it, fruit salad with strawberries, too many sandwiches.

I found out Ming didn't know the purpose of a teapot.  I think he learned it, though.

Life is full of emotions.  I want hundreds of hugs--they seem the main comfort.  I guess being understood and known also.  But I feel like such a mammal right now.

hiding ideas in silence, not moderating ideaflow, pair a Docs

1.  reusing post-it notes
2.  drawing mermaids--deciding they're not good enough
3.  valid midnight meals
4.  deconstructing storebought jewelry to make better jewelry
5.  worshiping Quan Yin in my own way

I was holding the statue in my arms kind of like she was a baby, when we left Cactus Joe's.  That was pretty good, for worshiping.  Then I gently handed her to Ming, saying not to drop her.

I had a fantasy about becoming a strawberryetarian.  Fruit is a low-stress food for me, and strawberries are my favorite.

I mentioned strawberryetarianness to my friend, who told me their own fantasy about a DIY strawberryetarian tattoo.  I'm imagining the cutest strawberry tattoo in the world.

That day I went to the dentist, afterward, I was feeling destroyed.  Crumpled and fully exhausted in the passenger seat.  Ming needed to deposit something in person at the credit union because his app couldn't handle it.

There was a Sonic right there.  I remembered ice cream is a classic post-dentist treat.  I was hurting.

We tried to order a butterscotch malt.  The worker said there's no butterscotch, and there's no malt.  Only caramel, only shakes.  So I got a caramel shake.

It was bland on top--then further down, I hit some caramel pockets that were better.  I had a fantasy about bringing my own malt powder to add to a shake.  But the only kind I ever saw was made my Carnation, which was Nestle.  Yuck.

The word "transmaltification" came to me.  Ming and I found that word funny.  I thought there was something important about it and wrote it down in my journal.

I wanted to thank my community after the visioning meeting yesterday.  We were upstairs in the prayer room, holding hands in a circle, right after the meeting, not saying anything.

I was filled with gratitude.  I thought, "Every day I thank God for each of you, that she brought me here, and that you let me live with you."

I felt all that really hard, but I also felt I couldn't handle anyone's reactions.  So I kept all that inside me.  The silence was better than anything.

Maybe I could hide an idea in the silence, invisible, a beautiful easter egg.  Maybe it could be real and present even if I didn't speak it.  I'm the type of guy who wants to believe that my words are in the room, pertinent, whether I speak them or not.

But maybe that's hippie bullshit, wishful thinking of a quiet person, or formerly quiet person.

My friend learned I used to not speak much in groups--they were like, look at you now--now you lead groups!  I considered their idea, that I had changed.

But I can say just about nothing in a group I'm not leading.  It depends which hat I'm wearing.  Awkward, feeling like my ideas don't fit with anyone else's ideas, thinking of my thing to say two minutes after it would make sense to say it.

Or I have so many ideas about a topic, I don't say anything.  I can't figure out how to moderate my own ideaflow.  A thing I've been thinking about for 30 years, on my own.

Am I the same shy girl?  It made me remember right away, my first job, and how I realized I needed to talk to people.  At the software store, 17 years old, wearing a dress, realizing I had to go up to grown men and ask, "Do you needed help finding anything?"

Out of necessity, I developed a persona for work.  Does everyone do that?  Seems common.  Seems like a bad idea, in a way.  But capitalism.  It could be self-protective, but I'd rather be more whole.

When I was a teacher, I did that more, until the anxiety and need to be upbeat and positive turned into something too painful, and that was a factor in why I couldn't teach anymore.  Something too far into mania or hypomania, out of my control, haywire.  My mind doing a thing no longer with my permission.  Or like a horse that gets loose and runs, hurting herself on barbwire.

Well, this is a lot to say, about silence.  I could write a whole book about silence.  Like some German Christians who sing about a Silent Night, making the night no longer silent--a paradox.

A friend bought herself vegan Doc Martens, and I was telling Ming I never had Docs, as I thought they were too good for me.  I could never deserve them.  I could have knock off Docs--that's it.

Ming said we should buy me some.  I laughed and told him I thought they would be too narrow.  The solution isn't to buy something--the solution is to heal my soul.

The caramel shake was buying something, but we have to eat anyway.  Later I was confused, like was the shake my dinner.  It threw me off.

language changes, night illness, searching for slack

content warning: ideas that sound eating disordery, but I'm actually ok

I realized I have all this French inside me, I might as well study French a little bit and see how that goes.  Not sure why I didn't think of that till yesterday, lying in bed, messing around on my phone.  I was studying Spanish for years.  I didn't realize I could do two.

Isn't it funny how the simplest notion can take years to dawn on me.  But that's ok--at least it eventually arrives.  Maybe some people, you know, would never realize it.

I took the French placement quiz and skipped some lessons.  My accent is terrible, but I can read it, and hear it.  I guess being brave enough to try to pronounce stuff is my difficulty.  Maybe a throwback to when I didn't speak.

I was sick in the night.  Eating seems too treacherous and could lead to too much illness.  It was tummy stuff--I was afraid my ulcer was bleeding again and I would need to go to the hospital.  There was pain.

Ming helped me.  I was hurting and afraid mixed with ill and super tired.  A couple hours later, it was over.  But ask me if I want to eat anything, ever again.

I'm up in the night and wanted to finish a couple letters.  I realized I had nothing to say.  It seemed way too complicated.  But I feel happy to have people I can write to.  There's a witch in France who seems really nice--that's what I want to go toward.

Hmm, maybe that's why I realized I could learn French again?  Or maybe it's a coincidence.  It's low commitment.  I didn't even have to tell anybody. 

I guess Ming would have noticed the sound of another language.  But his learning disability is about hearing language.  He might not have realized.

I should give this kindness and slack to myself all the time.  Not just grieving time.

1.  worshipping this Quan Yin on my desk before we install her outside
2.  strawberries exist and will be there for me if and when I'm ready to eat again
3.  effort I make to keep learning and changing is working
4.  my mind is ok (or better)
5.  weird things I did a long time ago can fuel me with provocative memories and odd thoughts even today--yay

peaceful ladiness in the courtyard, penpal chemistry, desert plantpics, rocks inside rocks

I got this beautiful small rock.  It's some kind of opal.  I'm keeping it here with me--it reminds me of a shell--that delicate gorgeousness.  It has these parts that are something else, maybe.  I like when rocks are imbedded in rocks.

We were at Cactus Joe's.  I want a particular kind of hummingbird sage, "forest fire," which is supposed to grow well in Las Vegas.  I hoped I could find some, but I knew it would be fun just to walk around looking at rocks.

We ended up buying a new Quan Yin statue because the old one broke and was glued many times.  Maybe this one will last better.

It's a bunch of dudes living here, then me and Ming, so it seems good to have Quan Yin and a Mary statue in the courtyard, blessing the peaceful space with their compassionate ladiness.

One day I saw two Catholics praying at the Mary statue.  They were Secular Franciscans here for a monthly meeting in the back house.  They left a glass of roses there for her.

And once when tree trimmers were here, they relocated the Mary statue so she wouldn't get clobbered by a falling branch.  Maybe they didn't see the Quan Yin, smaller, by the trunk of a mesquite tree, or recognize her as a goddess also.

Yesterday I walked on Latenight trail by myself.  It was beautiful to be with the joshua trees, other yucca, creosote, glowing cholla, gorgeous rocks, huge sky.  The temperature was good.  I went slow and stopped whenever I felt like it.  Few people were around.  Mostly people use that lot to park and ride their bikes.

I was walking on that nice flat trail, and I had cellphone reception sometimes but not others.  I'd turned my ringer on in case Ming was looking for me.  I took some pictures.  Oh yeah, I forgot.

Pencil cholla is pretty cool, huh.  Maybe this is really branching pencil cholla.  But who ever heard of a branching pencil.  These cholla namers need a vacation or a raise or something.

Joshua trees are amazing.  What do you think?  Strange, seussian, sculpturey.  Dramatic, attractive, easy to stare at for a long time, pleasing the eye.  Just delightful.

I wish the golden glow was easier to photograph.  The gleam is so much more vibrant in real life.  Oh well, I tried.  I think this is teddy bear cholla?  I dunno.  Maybe they hybridize.

This one had such a bright color and beautiful yuccaness I photographed it three times.  It was a more complicated color than this.  Hahahaha!  I didn't know a color could be complicated.

If I had a branching pencil, maybe I could write multiple poems at the same time.  Or I could write multiple poems in multiple universes.  Hmm.  Sounds hard to publish.  Where do they send the royalties check.  Hahahaha!  The universe where poetry pays.

Really, pencils kinda drive me nuts.  I'm a pen person, all the way.  I used to like erasable pens, when I was a kid.  Now I cross shit out, all day, every day.  I think crossed out whatever is lovely.  One line, two lines.  Some penpals like whiteout--I never whiteout.

Penpal love is a special kind of love.  How we can get chemistry on paper, over the years, asynchronously, is pretty amazing.

A penpal's little handwriting, what she says about her breakfast, the article she includes ripped from an unknown magazine, how she signs off.  The x she puts by her name, or how many x-es.  How vulnerable someone will be.  A funniness, the details of her job, travel, pets, relationships, her frustrations.  It's an honor, to be told things.

The stamp she uses on the envelope--pretty stamps of other countries.  Christmas cards with printed words in languages I can't read.  Beach photographs they took on holiday.

It's so leisurely.  If you can keep it up.  If you can manage not to lose everything, or get overwhelmed by a long amazing letter, so long and amazing it never seems like the right time to write back.

A dashed off postcard or notecard can be easier, which doesn't seem fair.  Well, I gotta go back to bed.  Blessings to you and whatever you're doing.

time travel

content warning: dental pain, dental yuck, suicide actually also, sorry about that

A secret of mine is--I love time travel.  I figure we are all time travelers, usually only in one direction.

But there's where our minds go.  Anxiety, fantasizing, prognostication.  Or remembering stuff.  Our minds zoom around from past to future to present, all around.

I did some ecstatic dance recently, and it put me in a weird state.  Toward the end, I was sitting down near the corner of the room, drinking water, and I got a thought that was bizarre.  I realized, wow, I was not my usual self.

My thought was about suicide, that a really difficult way to kill yourself would be to go back in time and cause your parents to break up.  I went so far as to imagine physically attacking my own dad to make him unable to reproduce with my mom.

Right afterward, I was like, where in the world did that thought come from.  Maybe I danced it loose.  It was lodged somewhere weird and fell out, free and strange.

I had some other thing to say about time travel.  Maybe about my time traveling dreams, or something about sci-fi as considered less-than, as fiction.  Genre fiction.  But then sometimes sci-fi is marketed as regular fiction, and we're supposed to pretend it's regular fiction.

I think sci-fi hate is an anti-geek thing.  No fair!  But we can call it speculative fiction and be cooler.  Speculative fiction is sci-fi wearing black sunglasses, smoking a cigarette, and holding a guitar.

At the dentist yesterday, the most painful thing was probably pretending the pain wasn't happening.  He glued my crown back in, and then he had to floss around it to make sure floss would go past the extra glue.

And it was very painful, with force, the floss cutting into my gums, coming up bright red, and we were all supposed to pretend that was ok.

Usually I cry, small tears escaping my eyes, as I grip the arm rests and tell myself to stop gripping the arm rests, but this time, I just had trouble breathing.  I would realize I wasn't breathing, force myself to breathe.  Try to breathe through my nose.  Doing the special dental self-talk in my head.  You're ok.  You're almost done.  These people are good.  These people are trying to help you.

So I don't get up and run away.  Stay in the chair, Laura-Marie.  You can do it.  You're ok.  You're totally almost done now.

I bookmarked this article about dental work being super difficult for people who had certain trauma, but the domain is available.  I guess it's gone.

Apropos to nothing, this song is comforting me tonight.  We're friends with these people.  They like my zines.  I want to be dancing with them in New Mexico by a pretty mural.

learning zone

"You're like the cat that says--why are you torturing me?!  And I say--this is the medicine that saves your life.  Stop biting me," I told Ming.  It was my scathing analysis of his behavior at me, at that moment, and we were laughing.

"Do you know how a dog is barking, and then you hear a new sound, which is chilling, because it's the sound of the dog throwing its body against the thing that's keeping it back, trying to break through the thing that's restraining it.  The thing that's keeping it from killing you." 

Ming said yes.  "Be careful, out there," I cautioned.  There are a lot of dogs in our neighborhood, some more restrained than others.

I have a problematic crown.  It comes loose periodically.  I don't appreciate it.  We tried some storebought cement to glue it back down this time, but it didn't work.  So I'm going to the dentist this afternoon, which prettymuch ruins my day right there.

I changed into a person who can do webinars and watch videos sometimes on youtube.  What do you think?  Do you still like me?

That reminds me of when I was visiting a good friend for the first time, eight years ago.  He asked something about how I deal with being crazy without psych meds.

"I do take psych meds," I told him.  "Do you still like me?"

He said he still liked me.  That was a good trip at the beginning of me and Ming's relationship, when I was without a place to live.  We traveled, camped, couchsurfed, and slept in a house that was being foreclosed, security guards in a way, so no one would steal the copper pipes.  That's where my pinched nerve pain started, as I slept on a yoga mat on a hardwood floor.

I have some saguaro cactus seeds, not sure what to do with them.  I guess the obvious answer is to plant them.  But then I have to tend them.  Sounds like a huge commitment!  I like spikey things only elsewhere.  I guess mohawks are ok.

I'm comfortable with discomfort.  I like awkward.  I think it's a fun kind of learning, if I can stay in the learning zone and not enter the panic zone.

This is as spikey as I get.  My priestess friend gave me these three beautiful agave pups, meaningful pertaining to her mom.  They seem ok in their pot, making me feel happy, but I hope to plant them in the ground soon.

healing our hands

I was explaining my chili to my friend as I heated up leftovers for her.  I put a little water in the pot and heated the chili on the stove, stirring it with a big metal spoon.  I was loving her. 

The beans were white beans I'd cooked in the crockpot.  I told her how the previous batch risked being slightly too salty, so I salted this batch less, and maybe it wasn't as good, but it was still really good.

We talked about tvp, the texture.  It was really nice to put in tomato sauce rather than tomatoes--I like tomatoness, that flavor, but not the chunks of tomato.  I really like eschewing old ways when I realize, oh, I was doing that just because it was more convenient or what other people wanted.  I can make it exactly how I want.

I like zines for that also. Pure freedom.

"Is rye ok?" I asked.

"That's my favorite," she said.  I made toast for her and me and Ming.  We also made her oatstraw tea, and we had juice.  Two kinds of juice.  We had chocolate.  And I gave her some oatstraw tea to go, and the last of my good magnesium.  And zines, you know.  Someone else's and the Permaculture for a Pair.

Looking back, I feel I was like an abuelita.  My hair is starting to gray more.  I'm almost an elder--maybe some young people think I am already.

We went to a birthday party for a beloved kid, and walking to our car, we passed this sushi place, and I asked Ming to take my picture with the avocado rolls, my favorite.  Well, asparagus rolls are good too.

I was on ebay for another purpose and saw this magenta dress for seven dollars, bid on it, and won.  The shipping was more than the dress.  It's a weird synthetic material I don't favor, but I felt cheerful in that color I haven't worn much, lately.  And I could wear that dark red lacy thing with it, so I was overjoyed.  And the purple leggings that are comfortable.

Is the red lacy thing even valid clothes?  Maybe it's lingerie.  Oh well.  It works.

The picture is happy, but I was sad afterward because I would always send my mom a selfie like this, and she would praise it so sweetly--I would take them kind of for her.  A ton of things like that can hurt.  But I send the picture to other people and try to find / create love anew.

This is such a good season.  Ming's hands get terrible in the winter, so dried out from overwashing them and the cold, and this year, the same happened to my left hand, part of it.  That rough texture.  I have faith the spring will bring healing.

crazy, not stupid

"He's missing some parts," Ming said, talking crap about the psyche of a mutual acquaintance.

"What about me?  Am I missing some parts?" I asked.

He thought about it.  I was using a tissue to dust the bottom of a very slightly dusty jar that had been on my desk, using a Sharpie marker to push the tissue to make contact with the glass better.  "Maybe," he said.

"Well, at least I can use simple tools.  I'm as smart as a raven!" I said.  I looked into the jar.  It was now dust-free.

In celebration of 50% Off Cheap Chocolate Day yesterday, we went to the store for cheap chocolate.  There was very little chocolate.  The doorman told me shapes of stuffed animal I could buy.  We have Bunny--Bunny is enough.  But I did see a pretty sea turtle.

Yesterday some things went wrong.  Mail overwhelmed me.  Then i spilled water on my desk including my computer.  Then I ran out of spoons and felt malfunctiony.  Ming came home late.  I was having trouble eating.  Then we had a sad, intense conversation like an argument.  

I realized some things.  I realized maybe we should have said no to everything for the month after Mom died.  We feel ok and agree to stuff, but then it's too much.  

If I get upset then hate myself for it, that's really adding insult to injury.  Need a way to give myself a break.

A mockingbird is singing outside.  Ming came back to bed and slightly wakes up when I cough.  I guess I should find some breakfast.

I'm crazy, not stupid.  I believe if anything is missing from my psyche, it's made up for by something extra that I have.

I read an article years ago about how gay people could make sense evolutionarily.  It said how gay people can strengthen community / humanity by being good aunts and uncles.  So then if the gay people don't have kids physically, they're still caring for their genes less directly.

I think about that a lot.  I don't need to have kids, work for money, or do capitalism right to be a valid person.  I think about how I can help other ways.

I have a godchild.  I was dusting the jar to put twelve colorful dino erasers into for a present.  I'm trying to think of a funny way to label the jar, to improve the present.  Maybe "emergency dinosaurs."

risking post-songness with someone I trust is a pleasure beyond words

Failing math was actually very handy because it taught me how to fail.  Before that, I was a Smart Kid.  I was the kind of smart kid where the teacher said, "Oh, she got that question wrong--there must be a mistake on the test."

Failing was liberating.  Suddenly a field of forked path choices appeared to me.  I could leave the path I was stuck on.  I was surprised by the freedom.

Lately I want to hear this song a lot.  Not sure what it's about, but I understand a few words.  I think it's about a jungle bird.  I hear feelings that I like, though I'm not sure I could name the feelings either.  Maybe a caring interest, and then a specific longing, at times.  Those feelings are familiar to me.



If you were sitting beside me, I could whisper "this is my favorite part" and you could hear the longing with me, and then we could anticipate it being repeated.  I like about songs how they usually have repeated parts, and I can look forward to them.

I think how kids like to hear things over and over again: the comfort of the repetition.  My friend was saying how kids like to have control.  Of course--they're told what to do all day.  Something about being able to predict what will happen and then being right.

I said it was like when I'm at the shore and a kid sees a flock of birds on the sand, and the kid runs up to scare the birds into the air.  Of course if could feel good to have power and make the birds do something. 

Maybe the parent is like, "hey, leave those birds alone!" but the kid is laughing.  Or maybe the parent know the kid is told what to do too much and wants the kid to make the birds go up, up into the air to move together and then resettle somewhere else later.

Something about song structure feels very human to me, that humans need the format of songs, like the song is a small ritual we share together.  Something we get through together.  And it could inspire us to move our bodies and help us a lot.

Sometimes I get concerned Sufjan Stevens is going post-song, so post-modern we drift away from the familiar into a weird scene of confusions.  Can we trust him to take us there and lead us out, back home again?

Yes, I trust him.  I feel safe enough at home and in the world that I can risk going to a weird weird place and believe I can find my way home again.  Risking my well-being with someone I trust is a pleasure beyond words.  I guess that's why people jump out of airplanes together, but I'd rather be a psychonaut.

thanks, Arabic

The internet is pretty amazing--some random pagan chant I repeated over and over again 25 years ago in San Luis Obispo while dancing around a maypole, I can search two words of it, and Bob's my uncle--there it is.  I can get the lyrics right and hear ten different versions of it.  Dang.  Or really, daaaaaang.  Love it.

But then some people think everything's on the internet, which is just not true.  Those strange things, it scares me a little, to lose them.  If it's all electricity, and in twenty years from climate disaster, there is no electricity, and we are left without all this stuff...people didn't realize it was only on the internet for safekeeping?  Yikes.

Hopefully some smart librarians are on it.  I imagine one day happening upon the Secret Repository of All Knowledge in Analog Form.  Somewhere underground in the midwest, as Ming and I work our way across the barely populated superflu-ravaged country on some post-apocalyptic knowledge quest.  Hmm, sounds kind of cool.  But hopefully that will never happen.

In twenty years, I'll be 63, the age my mom died, but Ming will be 73, which is kind of old, yeah.  But his peeps get old, and he's a nurse, so maybe he can stay on top of it, hale.

Youtube thinks I want to hear a bunch of pagan music now.  I can't say I mind.

I watched a documentary about surveillance capitalism the other day, and Ming came home, and I told him several ideas from the movie.  The whole time I was watching it, I was like, why am I watching this.   The scholar has amazing hair, but it must have been more than that.  I guess it was fascinating.  I kind of hope the facts were not real, but I get the feeling of the opposite--in actuality, the scholar was telling us just the tip of the iceberg.



The creepiest part maybe, besides the microphones in the Nests that were not depicted on the schematics, was about the data from photos on facebook being sold, resold, and resold then used for really bad purposes, like to train AIs to do facial recognition to hurt people, imprison people in China and such.  Yuck.

I want to take everything away, but it's already done, and one Laura-Marie taking her photos off facebook or never putting another would really do nothing.  I feel pretty hopeless about it.  I didn't realize.

It's not the photos themselves, or the images, or who's depicted where--it's something I don't understand, about data they can get from the photos, something about how facial muscles work, and what differentiates one person from another.  I don't get it because I don't know what an algorithm is, or how computers really work, and I can't do math.

As far as I'm concerned, an algorithm is the sound that comes from beating a drum made of cotton.  Hmm, guess that'd be algodonrhythm.

Hahahaha, I'm delighted by some Arabic stuff.  Do you know where the word algorithm comes from?  Omg!

I'm so excited--maybe I should have been a linguist.  Oh well.  I'll be a barefoot linguist in my spare time.  Armchair linguist cropping screenshots of google results of scanned old books.  Hahahahaha!

doctor, doctor, my husband thinks he's a chicken

The other day, Ming was looking so cute to me, I thought I must be ovulating.  We were at this lecture hall at a new college, and I took his picture.  He was wearing his Beet the System shirt.

Sunday I picked up some amazing art at the trade rack at a zine event.  It's so gorgeous, and I'm trying to decide if I can look at it every day.  It's weird and amazing, but not sure what I want verymuch in my head.  Thinking about it.

I read this article about schizophrenia and blindness.  It made me think about how one of the reasons I can't drive is a perceptual issue with not knowing the boundaries of my own body, or any vehicle I might try to drive.  I never thought it was a problem with my eyes, just a challenge with my brain.  Another name for it might be extreme clumsiness.  I try to compensate, but it's ok. 

Never seemed like a real problem--any quirk like that, I assume there's some counterbalancing quirk that makes me awesome.  I guess that's optimism for ya.  Nice that I defaulted to something kind to myself, for a change! 

I can't drive, but maybe I can write a beautiful poem.  Maybe the world needs poets more than drivers, at this point.

It also made me think how the way you phrase a question can show your values a lot, and maybe skew things.  One of the studies mentioned, they played two different conversations into two different sides of headphones, and the people which schizophrenia did worse than average at tuning out one of the conversations, while blind people did better than average.

Ever since I was a little kid, I've been able to listen to multiple things at the same time.  My mom would tell a story about me doing that--she found it amazing.  I think being able to pay attention to lots at once is cool, and I could use that for the powers of good.  Or maybe I could combine things in a neat way, in my mind, and output also something neatly combined.  I love genre-bending.

But the study itself seemed to suppose as given that being able to tune stuff out is good.  What if instead of "how well can people tune stuff out?" they asked "how well can people not tune stuff out?" 

It can be very annoying and distressing, in public places with lots of sensory input, trying to focus on something, and the world is flooding in like dangerous dirty water.  It can use up my energy quickly to sort things.  But everyone has challenges, right?

I was talking to Ming about diagnosis--if "debilitating" is in the description, it confuses me how a thing that's supposed to be really bad can also have superpower aspects.  A long time ago someone told me their crazy was like their mind had open windows with no screens, and reality was flying in wildly.  I related deeply to that metaphor, and I know it's hella inconvenient, but maybe I like those birds inside me.  I get extra birds, and maybe I need the eggs.

My mental health stuff is episodic, some of it, but the difficulty in spatial perception is constant.  If I have an issue with my occipital lobe, so be it.  Tradeoffs are everywhere.  I love my brain really hard and trust it to do its things.

I like how a difficulty can have a wonderful aspect.  I was thinking how my friend who carried mirror fragments in his pockets has a hard life, but he's amazing, and I would a hundred times rather talk to him than a random soccer dad who does what he's told.  Anyone can have an aspect that's dazzling, but crazy people are my people.

A long time ago, I asked a crazy bestie if we were romanticising our mental illnesses, and my bestie replied, "That depends on what you mean by romanticising, and what you mean by mental illness."  Touche, friend. 

I was thinking today--why not romanticise it.  If that helps.  It's my beloved problem.  I can do whatever the hell I want with it.  I'd like to be capable of seeing it clearly, but maybe I could hold on to that option, then decide to see it multiple ways, different times, for my benefit or just for fun.  I like wildly differing perspectives, and we see things through our lenses all the time, accidentally, so why not use a lense on purpose, for a good reason.

Another friend told me affirmations are ok because we lie to ourselves all the time anyway--we might as well lie purposefully.  Those weren't her exact words, but maybe we see what I mean.  I am open, I am stable, I have everything I need.

I bought a box of three mint It's-Its at Winco and ate one as a midnight dessert snack--delicious.  I woke up still sleepy but in too much pain to sleep more, from my pinched nerve.  I consider physical therapy and try to think how to fit one more thing in my life.  But maybe it would be fun, in a way, especially considering how embodiedness is a project of mine.

Love to the crazy people, the ex-besties, all idea-givers, the people who work at the It's-It factory.  To Ming snoring in the bedroom.  To you, reader.  To myself, the light, the darkness stars can shine through, the little noise that the light timer makes, quiet quiet ticky grindy noise.  Gnight.

strawberry

When I was a kid, I hated clothes shopping.  It was so painful emotionally, my fatness, being the wrong size.  Shame around that.  I wasn't all that fat, really.  But when there was no Mervyn's yet in Santa Maria, we took the trek to San Luis for back to school clothes, my family and the neighbor family, the other little girl being regular size, and then me.

I had to wear a dress to school every day, and I remember looking through the dresses available, trying things on, shame about my size.  Shoes also.  Money.  Something festive about it, but mostly hell.

Then the traumas I had and the politics I developed changed me, from living in my particular body with its needs and demographics.  I was super-christian as a kid, very religious, experiencing God all the time.  Then I realized I needed the right to choose, my desires were a bit queer, and I didn't have much option of going a regular route. 

I tried Taoism and then some paganism, which stuck, and then you know I went to a sect of Hinduism, and back to paganism now, but with some Hinduism mixed in, especially the goddesses.

Nowadays, if people look at me and Ming--they could think Ming's a man, I'm a woman, and everything's normal here, but that illusion might take some effort to maintain.  We don't need to scratch very deep to see disabled anarchists living in community who might not be doing a standard thing.

For decades I wore jeans every day, couldn't carry a purse, and a dress was funny, for me to wear, a Halloween joke.  Then somehow I heard of Torrid and saw I could get dresses that would fit me and this was not an impossible thing.  I got a dress and it wasn't quite right.  Then I tried again.  The necklines were too low.  Then I tried again and found clothes I like.  [This is where my blogpost diverges from my plan.]

Before, I thought lots of gendery stuff like makeup and dressing up was a royal waste of time, and I saw it in a simplistic way, oppression that I could choose to sidestep by not shaving or buying makeup products.  I was a bit obsessed with soap for a while, the way I might have a lot of stationery now.  I never learned how to put on makeup, and I never learned how to shave with a real razor either.  I had an old electric razor with a cord.

I could never win that game, so I didn't want to play.  I was too fat to be considered beautiful, and fuck all that.  Looking back, I see I was not really fat at certain times, but I thought I was, and I was mostly treated that way, I guess because I was projecting it?  Hard to tell, from here.  I felt like a second or third class citizen all the time, but sometimes I couldn't tell quite why.

I didn't want to have kids, once I realized I didn't have to, and all that got mixed up in my mind, somewhat.  Feminist with a certain gender performance, and thinking my mom's time spent putting on makeup was a waste. 

Then some shadow understanding simultaneously that there was something sacred about it--physical and psychological preparation for facing the world, performance in order to be taken seriously, something about beauty and power too.  Something she had been doing for a long time.  Part of her life, valid.

Somehow that sliver of time, we talked about different things.  She was slightly vulnerable.  I was allowed to see something most people didn't, little child standing in the doorway of her bathroom.  Then later, she sat at the table putting on whatever, the materials spread out before her on the blue tablecloth.

When she started chemo, her hair turned white, and she was embarrassed her eyebrows were white so invisible.  She would draw on eyebrows with dark brown eyeliner, and worry she didn't get them symmetrical.  "Oh crap.  This one is higher than the other one..." she said. 

I always said they looked fine.  "If anyone's looking that hard at your eyebrows, maybe they should do something else," I said. 

I remember the smell of the makeup, her looking in the mirror, then looking at me, evaluating how the thing she just said affected me.  What was I thinking.  Then back to the mirror and mascara.  She only wore lipstick on special occasions. 

She painted her nails, and I like my nails short, but sometimes she painted mine too.  She liked pink and red, but I liked purple and green and those years of black.  I remember the slight pain when she would scrape a little nailpolish away where it got on my skin, at the edge of my nail, and I'd say, "Hey! Hey!"  I wished she wouldn't do that.  But of course, now I'm crying to wish for one more time.

All of this is a partial explanation of why I asked Ming to take my picture yesterday, as I wore a special strawberry tanktop at a college in Henderson.

gorgeous

I think it's amazing how art can speak to us on a heart level or soul level.  I love language, but I also love bypassing language. 

My friend makes amazing collages.  This green postcard is a print of one of her arts.  I like it keeping me company on my bulletin board.  By one of my favorite people, Stacy Russo.

https://www.love-activism.com/stacyrusso

art nourishment

I saw sculptures today that nourished my soul in a really special way.  What a treat, at private tour of Villa Anita near Tecopa, California.  Thanks to R for grieving support in the form of a healing journey to the desert.

tofu witch excited

I was telling Ming that I respect his opinion.  Period.  But that he has his particular experiences that affect the way he sees the world.

"One of the most hippie sentences in the world is, 'I used to live in an intentional community in Oregon,'" I told him.   "Oregon is the most hippie state, and living in an intentional community is the most hippie activity."  We considered this, laughing.

"The only way you could intensify it is, 'I used to live in an intentional community in Oregon... trimming weed.'"  We laughed more.  "Or, 'I used to live in an intentional community in Oregon, hypnotizing dogs,'" I said.  "That sounds kind of fun," I said, imagining hypnotizing dogs.  "And I don't even like dogs."

"Or how about, 'I used to live in an intentional community in Oregon, talking to my tofu,'" I said.

Last night I made tofu scramble, which I hadn't made in years.  It's kind of magical because of some surprises that are involved.  I explained to Ming how the first surprise is toasting the spices with the onions, then letting the tofu brown a bit, the patience involved.  The second surprise is at the end, when you deglaze the pan with lemon juice and add nutritional yeast, which creates a slight sauce for everything, semi-magically.

I realized while I was crumbling the tofu into the pan that I was talking to the tofu in my head, and I was surprised by what I was saying.  I admitted to Ming that I was telling the tofu, "I love you."  It was like a blessing I was giving it, while I added it to the pan.  Feeling the texture of cold, wet tofu in my hands.

The funny thing (if that's not funny enough) is that Ming was talking to the tofu in his head also.  He told me that, and what he was saying to the tofu, and we talked a bit about the difference between talking to tofu and talking about tofu.

I exclaimed, "Oh, we're the same kind of crazy, right now!"

It felt very happy, to be the same kind of crazy, and I knew that we would diverge and be different kinds of crazy, over time, but that moment in our kitchen, there we were, matching.

For a long time I was a non-baker, but I bought a little flour recently, and we have baking powder.  We have maple syrup--I want to make this vegan ginger carrot cake I used to make all the time.  My dad loved carrot cake.

Without frosting, it's almost like a carrot bread, like a dessert bread.  A la banana bread.  So it's pretty exciting.

miracle tomato says life is ok

We had this volunteer tomato plant that grew at the wrong time.  But small yellow flowers bloomed, and then some tomatoes grew.  It was amazing.  It was winter.

I saw the little green tomatoes and thought they would never ripen--they would just rot.  But then they turned this reddish color, and Ming picked the big one.

He washed it and sliced it--it was totally delicious.  The best tomato I ever had, maybe?  It was perfect.  It had a great strong but not over-strong flavor, great texture, nice balance between sweetness and acidity.  The peel was not too thick.  It was the right wetness.  Basically, this tomato lacked nothing.

Ming sliced it up, and he ate most of it, letting me try it.  Wow, I was very happy, somehow we nurtured this fruit though the colder months and could enjoy it as a treat in pre-spring.

Isn't it funny how a little thing can make me feel that life is ok.

can you put corn empowerment in your chilli

I was googling and knew I'd get distracted by the autofill.  I googled "can you" then "can you put."  Some stuff I never would have thought to ask.  Then "can you put c" and the choices made me laugh so hard!

"Come read this," I said to Ming.  "Guess which one made me laugh the most."

"Can you put christmas lights on your car?" Ming guessed.

It was "can you put corn in chilli."  I told Ming, "No!  You cannot put corn in chilli!  That's just wrong!!!"

I was imaging a delicious, spicy, lovely chilli with fake meat and soft, creamy beans.  Onion and garlic, saltiness, maybe some tomatoes.  Nice robust spices.  A comforting hot / warm proteiny treat.  Mmm, sounds good.

Who wants bright yellow corn, with its weird texture, sweetness, and overt vegetableness in there?  A total interruption of the soothing chilli experience, an interloper.  In my opinion, it really does not belong.

Ming thinks it's ok.  He's crazy about corn, but he likes canned corn, which means his opinion is suspect.  I like frozen corn or fresh corn.  That's it.

A minute later, I was saying how it's your own damn chilli--put whatever you want in it.  Who needs permission for putting a certain food in their own food.  Like corn will make a lethal combination with beans, and you will surely die?  It's not like bleach with ammonia or something.  Hmm, people are weird.

Then Ming was telling me I was totally contradicting myself.  A flat out no, then a flat out yes.

Well, these are difficult times.  I'm sorry chilli is complicated, my love.  Makes sense to me.  But thanks for helping me laugh.

The thing I wanted to know was "can you put cpap mask in dishwasher" and I think the answer is no.  Nice try, though.

extended gratitude: the right amount of oxygen, gorgeous spring light, feeling nurtured and considered

1.  Yesterday we went to the nearest YMCA and took a tour.  I walked up the big flight of stairs like a champ.  I think I'm not anemic anymore!  I walked up the big flight of stairs like a chipper, healthy, non-disabled-physically human being who has the right amount of oxygen in her blood.  Wow, amazing!  We liked the tour.  I'm going to do tai chi and chair yoga.

2.  Ming helps me be who I am and get what I need.  Open, generous, flexible, changeable.  Right now I'm thinking how I went to bed just after 6pm and he didn't bat an eye.  He tucked me in and gave me a kiss.  Wow, he is amazing.  Watering the plants, doing dishes, doing laundry.   Taking out the trash.  Being trustworthy.  Doing a ton for NDE.  Treating my desires as important.  Listening, caring, learning.  Praising the food I make, even an everyday sandwich.  What an amazing spouse.

3.  It got cold again, but it's ok.  We learned how to manage with space heaters.  I feel ok about this season, whatever it is--pre-spring turned cold again.  Or second winter but with gorgeous spring light.

4.  Two weeks since my mom died.  It's really terrible.  I miss talking to her, her unique love, her vibrancy.  I miss her shining her light into the world.  I miss knowing she was there, always on my side and willing to hear me and catch me.  I miss her hugs and holding her hand, the softness of her hair.  I thought last summer, I would die soon.  Now I feel so lucky to keep living and carry forward all my good things, but the good things Mom gave me as well.

5.  Meaningful work to do--writing letters, making zines, helping with groups I believe in, caring for people, experiments with friendship, delicious foods to eat, ideas to share.  Caring for myself so I can be healthy enough to be there for myself and others.  Sometimes I feel undersupported and too alone, like people think Ming has me covered and are too hands off.  Other times, I feel really nurtured and considered.  Lotsa nice txts and community feelings, thanking God that I got what I asked for, when Ming and I moved here--all that and more.

I hope you have things to be grateful for also, reader.

will work for zines

Yep, new zine.  My friend Rayven did the cover art.  I did the inside art.  Some ideas are disabled gardening, permaculture and exploitation, favorite plants, my ideal homestead.  Available for trade.

making fun of the thing we're enjoying, the saddest freedom I ever had, permaculture for a pair

We were making fun of our pancakes--we got this paleo pancake mix.  We've been cleaning out the fridge.  Ming was going to move the mix elsewhere, and I said, "I'll just make them now.  Do you want some pancakes?"

I measured and mixed, complaining that the instructions didn't say how well to mix them.  "Do you know what the first ingredient is?" I asked.  It was cassava flour.  I think that's a root from a south american country?

Ming said, "Oh yeah, because the cavemen were good at importing things for thousands of miles."

"Maybe there were cavepeople wherever the cassava comes from?  Yeah, cavemen, I think they're white, usually," I said, flipping pancakes.  "Maybe they had a trucking network of Flintstone trucks."

Wow, they were delicious.  The first pancake, I was not so sure about.  It had a weird sweetness, like stevia.  Then I trusted the pancakes and ate them like crazy, with butter.

Ming excitedly wanted to know where the mix came from.  He was eating his with organic strawberry jam.  I used this bland oil I bought for deep frying the vegan lumpia that was given to us, safflower oil from Natural Grocers.

Then we were looking at a dino valentine I may or may not be giving to my godchild.  And I invited Ming to write it in also, as Ming is the godfather.  "Isn't there a special song for that?" I asked Ming.

Then I was getting the Godfather song mixed up with the theme song for the X-Files, so I played them both on youtube.  Hmm, yeah.  Maybe the melody, but not the accoutrements.

I thought it made no sense that cassava is from South America because is has a double s--I thought the whole deal of Spanish is you don't do the double consonants gratuitously.  Only meaningfully, like rr.  But maybe it's Portuguese or something.  Yep, good guess.  I looked it up--it's from Portuguese.

I used to write this blog for my mom.  She used to read it every day.  She was a tough cookie.  Ming loves everything I write, pretty much.  He's a stickler for clarity, and he wants a lot of balance--if I only show one side of things, he can slightly object.  He wants a lot of perspective.

Otherwise, he loves all of it, laughs at the funny parts, cries at the sad and poignant parts, adores the details.  Likes to read about himself and what we did.

Mom, on the other hand, rarely praised my writing.  I remember after she read A Special Treehouse for Fat People--she came over to me and kissed me and said she was proud of me.  I think the good writing, she just expected.  She knew it would come out of me.

A friend I loved told me language comes out of me like just exhaling.  I just exhale, and the skillful language comes forth.  Also one time I was praising their art and mentioned muscle memory, how I don't have anything like muscle memory, and they said when they read my writing, it seems like I do.  Those compliments I remember.

The freedom that I could say something on my blog and Mom would not read it, that's just about the saddest freedom I ever had.  I really don't recommend losing your most loyal reader.  I told Ming the other day, he's now the person who loves me most in this world, and how does that feel?  What a sad question, Laura-Marie.

That's me, asking the sad questions.  When Mom first died, Ming was crying in the pupusaria, and I asked him if he was scared.  He said no, why would he be scared.  I said because he has to take care of me more, now.  I meant like Mom isn't going to take care of me much, anymore.

I have to hope more family will come, or believe, or imagine.  That I can step up and take care of myself more, or friends.  Yesterday someone txted me that the people who love me are ready to love me.  I've heard that before--friends ready to rush into my life.  Not sure how I hold people at arm's length or say no when I thought I was saying yes.

We photocopied the new zine yesterday, Permaculture for a Pair. It's good, but knowing Mom can't read it, feels a little pointless.  Oh well.  Maybe you can read it, reader.  I'll bind some today.

strawberries are my jam

"It must be a red letter day.  I'm wearing a bra and deodorant!" I said.  "Deodorant is the worst thing I ever heard of.  Or ever smelled of," I added.  I can only wear the unscented kind.  I hate that stuff.

It's so windy tonight, it's too much.  We went to Corn Creek yesterday.  It was good to get some sun and see the water.  Creeks are my favorite.  It was a Worker outing.  It was just us Workers and the granddaughter of a Worker.  The kid who said that when she grows up, she wants to be a ballerina or a saint.

A strawberry was floating in the creek.  Lately strawberries are my favorite fruit.  They grow in my homeland, and they were part of the service for my mom.  I want strawberries really bad, lately.

J said, "Look!  Your mom was here!"  I didn't know how to feel about that.  True, it was odd.  I never really saw a strawberry in a creek before.  It's not like someone dropped a whole fruit basket in the creek.  It was one large strawberry.

J picked mint too, from the bank of the creek, and we put some into my little rainbow pouch.  I guess the show must go on. 

There was a picnic area with six tables.  We were all spread out, after the walking, just quietly sitting--well, R was lying on a table.  There were bits of conversation.  G poured some water on R's pants to make it look like R wet his pants--that was odd.  Impulsive.  I was glad R seemed totally unfazed.

It was nice when we were talking about Aesop's fables.  I mentioned the dog who had the meat in its mouth and saw a dog with more meat, so it dropped its meat to get the other dog's meat, but it was just a reflection.

R said the dog was swimming, and Ming said the dog swimming would be churning up the water and couldn't see its reflection.  So it must have been a dog on a bridge.

I said yes, I thought the dog was on a bridge.  R remembered the dog was swimming.  I said, "Maybe a mermaid swam by and held up a mirror."  No one seemed to like that idea.

That's what I like about Ming, one of the thousand things.  He is always very smart and observational and insightful, and caring, gently pointing out reality to anyone who will listen, between narcoleptic naps.

Then the grandchild saw a lizard.  It was darting around on some railroad ties.  It had a lizard ledge.

Even if I took down all the windchimes, I would still hear the wind in the trees, and this art thing on the wall outside bumps the wall over and over again, quietly, when the wind hits a certain gustiness.

Something in me waned to tell her, "Please don't be a saint!  It doesn't end well, for them!"  You know they get killed by their dad for being Christian or what have you.  Shot with arrows, or carve stuff about Jesus into their own body.  Oh, saints.  Not sure it's really worth it.  I hope she chooses ballerina.

the stage of grief where I daydream about changing everything

Last night was the service for my mom at the Catholic Worker.  Kinda surreal, that happened.  In the prayer room--it's my favorite place in Las Vegas, other than my own bed. 

R played two songs on his guitar.  I sang a Durga song I love.  Some people read some brief things.  There was a go around.  There was a prayer, a candle, flowers, some strawberries.

The funniest part is when R said we were balanced, half men and half women.  I asked, "How do you know?" 

He said, "I counted." 

I said, "Hmm."

Then my friend who is non-binary said to Ming, "Hey Ming, I guess you and I cancel each other out."  It delighted me, as Ming is non-binary also.

I asked my friend B to read a thing, but she was too crying.  But Ming was the designated crier, almost the whole time.  He knew Mom best, other than me.  Mostly those people only heard of my mom, or met her last year when she visited, when I was in the hospital.

Ming is a very nice partner person, and Mom could tell.  She saw me get mixed up with all kinds of people, and she could tell Ming is golden.

Still, we argued yesterday.  He said something that hurt my feelings, and we were rushed out the door to the art workshop B led.  I had asked for things he didn't give to me.  That's fine if he can't give them to me, but I wish he would say no so I could find another way.

It's hard to manage your time when you're falling asleep over and over again, a hundred times a day.  It's hard for people to understand how sleep being thrown off throws off your whole life.  And the ocd is not helpful either, when certain things take a very long time to do. 

Add to that insurance not wanting to pay for meds, and meds that aren't that effective to begin with.   Then the regular stressors of life, and death on top of it.

There are so many things I lost, when I lost my mom.  The particular cuddly love.  A person I could always txt and talk to, who always cared what I had to say.  Someone who watched out for me.  Someone very smart who had insight to share.  Someone who encouraged me to dance and smile.  Someone who knew me well and knew my life in unique ways.  The one who carried me and helped me into the world with her own body.

The particular way she was very beautiful--her unique vibrancy.  A kindness that was unique to her.  The way she could get to the truth so incisively.  I keep remembering when I was in the hospital, and she said, "How do they expect you to poop, if they won't let you eat food?"  She could see straight to the core of a problem and speak the truth very directly.  Then there were other truths also, that were avoided.  She had a lot of feelings.  She really wanted a happy family.  Some moments, she got that.

It's a lot to lose at once.  But I keep feeling how I felt the first day--that she was Shakti energy, took human form to learn human lessons and do human service, accomplished her mission, and returned to Shakti energy.  It's painful, but life ends.  Death is normal.  I wish she had another 20 years--I'm sorry she didn't get to be old.  But I'm happy for what she had.

A lot I thought would happen isn't going to happen.  I'm letting go of predictions, expectations.  There's a lot to wrap my mind around.  Some futures I never even knew I wanted--dreams to let go of I didn't even realize I had.  Something I thought we were working toward that I'll never get, certain kinds of approval I'll never get from her that I didn't even realize I wanted until now.

I can give that approval to myself, though.  Lately I'm doing rituals all the time.  I had a fantasy people could hire me to design rituals for them, design and implement.  I think sometimes about my ideal job.  I thought poet, zinester, barefoot zine librarian.  Now I think ritual designer.  Would you hire me?

Feb 1 2020 6pm prayer rm LVCW

short service for Mama

light candle--5 min meditation

why I wanted to gather

--others will not make it to California, honor my mom, 

help us feel the change, togetherness, love

who Mom was

pass around photos

shawl also

Red--R

reading--poem before Kaddish

reading--golden

reading--Thanksgiving-B

thank everyone for support through her death

why no Kaddish, moment of silence to imagine it--M

one minute speak option go around, passing ok

--a memory of meeting my mom, something about your own mom, thoughts about grieving, thoughts about family, 

a word, an idea, a gratefulness

reading--Thich Nhat Hanh--J

mother song--Durga, LM

ending prayer

hugs