Watching the Lovely Weather from Inside. Bugs Be Biting.

We had a hideous heat wave and now it is the most perfect temperature you could ever dream of. I was on my chaise lounge trying to read, trying to write, but mostly feeling guilty about my kitty crying from inside. On my list of projects for my home--screened in porch.

I read a few pages of a new book I like, "City of Girls" by Elizabeth Gilbert. I opened my notebook to a blank page, and blank it stayed. I turned my attention to my lovely Drunk Monkey Gardens, admiring the Honey Locust, the giant fern-like umbrella spreading her branches and protections over half the yard. I think of how I love working at my desk on the second story with the window open, right next to the tree, house of many feathered friends. Then I admired my Black-eyed Susans and Purple Cone Flowers and Sombrero Cone Flowers and wild Fleabane I let go because the dragon and damsel flies like it. And my potted flowers that the hummingbirds and hummingbird moths love--dahlia, calendula, lemon drops, snap dragons, candy striped cosmos, 4 o'clocks, marigolds, salvia. 

Looking at my gardens brought me a few degrees less giddiness that it has the past. But now, sitting here writing about it, I feel the giddiness return.

Abby has taken sentry  on her perch, overlooking the tree, cackling at some moony doves. And I am doing the thing that has always reassured me--stringing together words where there was once just a blank page-well, screen. (Note to self: maybe handwritten journals are just not your bag. Can you just accept that? Yes. But can I keep all of my blank journals and admire their intended use?) And now here come the cicadas all wound up and agitated. 

I have a friend, well acquaintance, who is 38 and basically shucked her life. Shucked it like an ear of corn. Those kernels are pearls. I am fascinated by her. She is mostly known for her sex appeal, which gives her tremendous popularity. Earlier she did some non-paid modeling. She's a mother to an 18 year old, possibly a single mother, not sure where the father is. She was an executive assistant or something like that and did lots of theater. And through no fault of her own, men started gushing on her. Even I found them somewhat annoying. A couple of years ago she left the comforts of the corporate world and became a teacher in one of those charter schools in the inner city. She left her comfy apartment in the northern suburbs and bought a fixer upper in the rough part of town. She talked about restoring her home. Then she rented it out and bought another fixer upper. She tore out the grass in front and back and planted gardens. She spent winters knitting scarves for homeless people. She talked about teaching and the kids. Then she kinda disappeared for eight or nine months, reappearing only in bursts. A half-shaved head. Eating everything in sight Barcelona. Then the next week, living rough in Tennessee backwoods, cooking bacon over a fire. Then she started making hints about her life being overwhelming, spending every weekend in bed for eight or nine months from pure mental exhaustion. She changed schools without mentioning why. Then she started dropping hints about leaving it all behind and headed for the unknown. Her kid was grown and would be headed for college the next year. She rented her house on Airbnb. She moved to that creek in Tennessee and she's kinda homesteading. Sometimes the water goes out and she has to bathe in the creek. This woman was a model, but I guess she was never prissy. Also this model loves to eat, and loves to talk about eating, and does not care if she gains weight. She is of course still massively sexy, with weight only half her hair and no make up. She's teaching at an online school and starting community gardens and running a sort of camp ground of sorts that belongs to her family. And she writes about eating four ears of corn, and look out number five. That's why I say she shucked that urbane life for foraging and found some pearls. And I'm pretty mesmerized by what she's doing and what she has to say about it.

And for the record. When she used to post her sexed up modeling photos from when she let her figure get in the way of her love for food, yeah, back then, we're talking hundreds of likes. Now she's posting pics of no make up and sweaty and driving a tractor and being the happiest she's ever been...and...crickets. One or two likes. What happened to her fans? Not that she asked them to be fans. But where are they, now that she's happy? They only like her when she's being sexy, being something for them. Now she's doing something for herself, something truly inspiring and brave and happy, and where are all these people?

Another friend had her life pretty much fall apart, that is a home and a job. She was homeless and nesting here and there for over a year, but then she announced she would move to Nashville after spending a summer in Michigan. Except there's no job and no house in Nashville either. She's taking a journey of faith, and she's scared, but she falls back on her faith. I don't believe much in that sort of thing, but I am mesmerized by the undertaking at age 52.

They're both on journeys albeit very different.

Maybe I am missing a journey of unknowns. I never liked that trip. I was on it for a while as a young adult and swore it off. 

But there's something off. I think I know what it is. It's my job. I think I'm having a midlife crisis. I had one in my late thirties, but that one was more, holy crap I am 37 and haven't ever had a life of my own. And I got it and loved it and succeeded at it! I'm something! But now I've got this well-paying but IMO totally meaningless job, just like everyone else does at that company, and every day there is more and more bullshit piled on. No, not the actual work for the actual customers. All this behind the scenes total bullshit, and it accomplishes nothing but duplication and hours on a ledger, and a ton of effort and on top of that it is so boring. I can't even describe what I do for a living. how is this even a livelihood? I think this part of it is wearing me out. 

I am looking for adventure again, but I don't know what kind.

Maybe I'll figure out tomorrow, right here. 

Go to the Source

A friend of mine from college recently posted on Facebook a few photos of a quaint inn in one of our bedroom towns, a notebook, and a beautiful breakfast. She had said that all she wanted for her birthday was for her kids to not fight and to find some time to write. Her kids went into a war mode, and the frantic day got away from her before she had time to do one simple thing: write. That's all she wanted. Time and quiet to write. The next day her husband surprised her by booking her a room in the sweet inn with a whole night and morning to herself to devote to writing, while he stayed home and dealt appropriate rebuke to the kids.

It was the most beautiful birthday present, the most selfless act of love I've ever witnessed. He knew what she wanted and didn't take offense that it didn't involve him, and he stepped up to make it happen and made all the plans for her so she wouldn't feel guilty about leaving the family over night.

And here I am with almost nothing but time, and I do not write. I have an office, tons of notebooks, pens, peace and quiet, and no one to answer to once I get home from work. And I do not write. I felt awash in guilt, but not just guilt, prodigal. Squandering. Wasteful. 

Why don't I write?

Why do I write? Who is it for? What does it accomplish.

What is it good for?

Absolutely no one: but me

It is for me. What does it do? What good is it? It helps me figure it out. What is it. It is everything. 

I no longer write for public consumption. But I should write for me. I loved writing here. I began to believe that I had nothing to write about. I must have believed that I did all sowing all the gleaning all the treasure hunting I could in this life.

And that is how I realized today that Life Got Me Like...Huh. 

I'm not sad. But I'm not excited.

I'm used to excitement. It was my drug for many years. It was my raison d etre. It was my rationale. It was my excuse. It was shiny plastic medal that no one cared about.

I've been wondering about my life lately. Maybe a few years. I came down from that high horse of living on the edge. I've questioned lately if I'm in a rut now, or if I'm still trying to operate from a baseline level of manageable time lines and interests.

Does writing make me feel guilty? Like, I should be doing something productive instead of spilling thoughts and anxieties with a little rhyme and romance. Or guilty because it's not very good, and that's my fault? Or guilty because I don't have anything to write about? Or guilty about being so lazy that I don't see the things I have to write about? 

Guilt. How about I kick that hitch hiker off my road trip? 

I am still on a road trip. I have to road trip everyday, journey in place everyday. 

I think writing is like exercising. Do it even when you feel you have no energy, no thoughts. Make a list of things that made you happy or sad. Write out things you accomplished or why you didn't accomplish things.

I wait all year for summer to arrive, but days like these, and what is a day like this? A hideous heat index, that's what. 

But now, like the Neko Case song, it feels as if it's passing me by. 

And it should not. I am feeling this, but this is a lie.

I have a yard full of beautiful flowers to show for it!

My shade garden never took off, and it made me sad, but it's not exactly tragic, either.

We went on a trip to Traverse City!

I was a grown up and did a colonoscopy.

We had dinner with Ralf and Jim and a party at Michele's

We went to a baseball game on 4th of July and watched the fireworks.

We spent a long weekend at my parents' lake house.

We saw a sunset on Lake Michigan.

I stained my deck.

I fixed up my mailbox and birdhouses and painted a purple an old ladder I've been dragging around with me since my days in Salt Lake City, and it resides happily in Drunk Monkey Gardens.

I started running again less than a month ago. I saw a picture of myself from ten or so years ago, and that was my inspiration. I inspired me. And I have to let that happen more often. But it can't happen with my damn hitch hikers and hijackers. I became my own source of inspiration. I can do that. I can do that again. I can do that everyday.

I feel great running again, and look forward to running days. I am being smart about it and listening to my body. I am adding distance slowly. I am cross training. I am focusing on the doing not on the result. I am doing something I never thought I'd do again.