Writing poems is a fire, blue and hotter than anything else. Writing poems is a kind of violence, a taking over, a spinning and dropping and flying thing that possesses. And consumes. And refines. Words are the flame under the kettle. I am the kettle. I am the little tea pot. I steam up and the water comes pouring out, scalding, poem after poem after poem, hot off the presses. I will be famous, I will be remembered, I am genius…
turns out the “pause” is everything everything
The hardest thing about learning to be mindful is slowing down, is learning to pause. I do meditation using the CALM app every day. Even though it is very difficult for me to make new habits I have made this one. Am I good at it? Do I do it “properly?” Do I sometimes fall asleep? I've learned to ignore these questions and to simply concentrate on showing up and breathing. The bonus is the daily lesson that is almost like…
happiest almost
My birthday is tomorrow I will be 60. This stretches my credulity. And yet….of course I am 60. Today I will make myself a coconut cake, trying to recreate my granny's coconut cake. Or I will make MAGIC bars and shoot for very-low sugar can she do it? I have begun pulmonary rehab and I'm having so much fun exercising. I get tons of attention and as far as I can tell I am never really short of breath so I…
a very weird almost-terrible morning at the surgery center
Today I went to a local surgery center for an epidural in my C Spine. This is routine, I’ve done it 3 times before. No biggie. The nurse who took me back was a little flaky, but I just thought, okay she’s a little flaky. She was asking routine questions and I told her I wanted to be clear that I had had COVID 2 weeks ago. She then began a sort of mini tirade about how COVID is the FLU…
fall is here. with apples.
It's fall, though not as much fall as I would like. But it’s apple season and I need to get out and hand pick some apples. Sumo (orange) season is my favorite fruit season and that is in January, but a close second is apple season– when the apples are good. I want to drive over to Ellijay and get some apples there. I would like a Big Mutsu, some really good Winesaps or Romes. But every year is different. The…
learning to lean, as a sapling does during a storm
I have begun a meditation practice. I'm reluctant to call it a “ practice” because I don't want to jinx myself. I want this pattern to continue. I've been trying to begin a meditation practice for quite a while, years actually, but these last few days I have found myself actually doing the “daily calm” on the Calm app. It's interesting because in a way I think of this particular meditation as a kind of daily “devotion” with a lot of…
the art of losing isn’t easy to master
I have been hankering for a change, some sort of fundamental change maybe, something life-altering like moving away from here to a place that is so different that the corner stores are unrecognizable. Moving away somewhere where no one knows us and we have to start all over. Or running away by myself to live in Europe all by myself where no one knows me. I suppose this is a kind of escapism, or an attempt at escapism. There has been…
the perpetual fly in the ointment
The things we discover about ourselves. I will be 60 November 15th, but it is at this late point in my long long therapy journey that I am beginning to accept.. to realize yes.. but to also accept the fact that I am so hard on myself. All of the time. I drive myself just as relentlessly as if my mother were still in the house with me as if she were still living and could call me on the phone…
mindfulness and the evil baby
If I had known how difficult it would be to live as a bipolar person, to keep myself grounded, to keep myself inside the white lines going down the road that I'm living on, I would not have had children. When my keel is even and I am able to interact with people pleasantly, it's not so bad. But this morning I found myself practically yelling at my poor son, my autistic adult child, who had just awakened. I started ragging…
father’s day
i drove us backroads-all-the-way down to the farm. such lovely places spaces views what an enormous and glorious country. what a pleasant time with my father. and my brother who i was not expecting. i rewrote/updated an old essay for my father and i read it aloud to him. he did not know that this is what i do. he did not remember that my brother and i played the hell out of the old piano Patches had given us. he…