The Moon Woke Me Up

The moon is full tonight. It was sitting in the West, light streaming into my window through the slits in the blinds. I had to look twice, then three times because it seemed there were two moons. One was considerably smaller. In my dream-drunk stupor I vaguely recalled that Mars was supposed to be visible this month.

With the greatest excitement and panic I shot out of bed (mistake), dressed for the cold, frantically (another mistake) searched for my camera and dashed outside to be utterly disappointed.

Apparently at any angle of viewing my windows cast two moons. When I went outside there was only the one glorious moon we have and Mars was no where to be seen.

With a bit of grief and much relief that I didn't wake the house for nothing I came back inside to reflect on tonight's dreams and nightmares. And to steady my heart rate. I shall be awake for sometime. My heart is pounding as if the adrenaline has killed what was left of my heart medicine.
I am not safe from any strong emotion it would seem. And since I do not want another stay in the hospital, I am going to have to do something a bit different in life.

Matthias Reim's new album comes out. I will have to consider the wisdom in these new songs quite seriously. To be sure the album is full of fun and life but there is also in this one, some good solid retrospection and some lessons to be learned. Trust me, it is best to learn some things vicariously rather than to go through them yourself. It is a shorter road to travel. That doesn't make your road less difficult and your own accomplishments less valid. It just make the stress of traveling it less to have the roadmap and footnotes that others who have gone before you have left.

Optimism is the key.

Control of one's irrational emotions is also key.

Of course from where I am sitting, being able to sleep through the night would help tremendously.

What I Did on My Christmas Vacation

I didn't really go on vacation. I had four scheduled days off because the tourism industry gets funny like that in the dead of Winter. With the weather being the way it has been, all polar vortex-y and junk, I was stuck away from home for those 4 days.

Stuck carries the connotation of inconvenience, annoyance, and being somewhere you do not want to be. Nothing, however, could have been further from the truth. While it is true that I had not planned to be away from home for more than one of those 4 days, I was in the perfect place for me. When I accepted the invitation to Christmas Eve dinner I had to cancel other plans. The warning was put out that this cancellation was a possibility because the place that I was going was somewhere that I had been asking to be for a very long time. And the person who issued the invitation was a complete and utter surprise to me and the fulfillment of another one of those "Ask and Ye Shall Receive" things I've been doing with the Universe.

Christmas Eve began with the traditional knots and nerves that usually came with all the Christmases Past. We've discussed how in the last three years the day after festivities' major barf-o-rama never materialized because I made the changes to make sure I had stress free holidays. So the pre-event symptoms were a shock. Though, I have to admit, not completely unexpected. After all, I was going to meet a guy that I had only recently met. We hit it off in a grand fashion. So I should not have been worried. Not at all. But I was. And the second that he met me at the door all the nerves disappeared.

I do not even remember when the last time was that I could feel so at ease with someone so quickly. As he is a Scorpio, I have vowed there will be no details of him until he is ready to grant sharing permission. I will only share the experiences.

He lives off the water in my dad's home town. So on an emotional level several things happened all at once. For one, that meant I had to make longer drives than I have been comfortable with since the hamstring incident. Honestly, I don't know why that has been the damper on my activities. I couldn't sit in the seat because  I tore myself a new ass along with the hammie; it's not like I was in a car accident and developed a logical phobia. But I've had a phobia anyway. This from a woman who drove over 1500 miles a week for work. For two, I haven't been in dad's home town since he died. And for three, I haven't gone to sleep with the Bay in my vision, or found myself waking to the light on the waves since grampa died in 1986.

Water is a significant thing to me. I grew up with these waters permeating every aspect of life in my own home town. Dad was from up the Bay on one side and Grampa lived on the other while I grew up in the middle in a city at the delta of a sliver of a greater lake. We spent Christmas Eve at Grampa's house. The harrowing ride out the winding road along Old Mission peninsula, the darkened night lit by Christmas lights, a feast, egg nog and the debilitating & terrifying trip, backwards, down the drive way, aimed at the dark waters of the Bay. If the brakes failed we were in the water. Dark. Cold. Anything-could-be-lurking-in-those-inky-depths water. Then Christmas day we were home. And a day or so after that we were back at Gramma and Grampa's for an overnight.

The water is mesmerizing. I could stare at it for hours, watching wave forms & patterns. I scanned the currents in hopes that we had our own Champ or Nessie until I was about 12 and discovered science fiction. Then I started scanning the skies. Beyond being reminiscent of my childhood Christmases on the Bay, the deep connection to my Grandparents was rekindled. Not the whole German thing that I've been doing on other blogs (as well as here). The personal connection.

The Bay, with its steely grey blue color in Winter was calming. Things were slower at my grandparents house because that is just the way life is with the 70-somethings. But, as the back drop for a gorgeously trimmed tree which required concentration to see through the pine boughs, the bay was one of those things that encouraged a person to stop. To stare. Or to let go. Some how in most of those moments of reflection, one of my grand parents found me. A quite question asked opened a door for expression. As long as I was looking at the bay the turmoil inside of me stilled enough to be communicative and methodic in my answers instead of the hot chaotic mess that I was at home. I reflect my surroundings and the persons in them. And that was always the best atmosphere to reach the heart of me.

Besides their willingness to understand their frequently distraught grand daughter, the opportunities the Bay gave them to catch me when I was calm was their best advantage to helping me. The willingness is the key though. Most everyone gives up because the strength of the feelings that I feel and how deep everything goes is a daunting mountain to climb; or spelunk if I happen to be stuck in a cavernous maze of exquisite dwarven confusion in the heart of said mountain.

Any body of water will do that for me. But it is the Bay that connects me to my grand parents. And now in a way to a new friend with the potential to be someone more than I expected. During my four days I found myself drifting off into that calm state of peace that I haven't felt since my days in Marquette with another body of beautiful water. There were many opportunities for reflection. And I felt my grandparents more keenly than I have in many years. My gramma is never far from me. Grampa, grampa is another matter altogether. He's been a busy lad on the other side. Gone for nearly 27 years, this Christmas Eve was the first time that I have felt him near enough to me in spirit that I could have sworn that he was standing with me looking out the window.

Two week prior to Christmas I had a dream in which Gramma, mom and dad and a set of cousins were present. I normally dream Gramma and parent dreams. And normally dream the setting we were in. In a decade this is the first time that I was able to approach their house to find people in it. It's been empty and abandoned every time I have been there. I have care taken it in those dreams and lamented the lack of persons in the home, worried about them. In one dream a few years ago there was a message on the answering machine (that they did not have in their life time) from Gramma stating that they would be gone a little longer but that they would be back; that I should not worry. I closed up the house and went on again. That is how they usually go anyway.

But in this dream when my new friend and I went around back where the lawn chairs often were, Grampa was tramping across the yard toward the house and met us on the way. His voice boomed a grand "Hallloooo" and I got the sweeping swinging hug that I always missed out on because I wasn't as giddy? as some of the other grand kids. And there, sitting under the birch were mom and dad (who also are never in this dream scape) and a set of cousins who are alive. That was perplexing. I've never been so relieved to see my Grampa in all my life! I woke up from that dream, crying happy tears.

To find myself on the Bay two weeks after that dream with the kind of peace that comes of being still.... my Christmas was perfect.

Pondering

"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one." -Albert Einstein

 

The voices inside our heads are merely echoes of something someone once said, to paraphrase Sting. They are illusory, most likely false and every bit as persistent as reality. If it is true that what you believe determines your life's path, then the illusions that we subscribe to are either the road MAP or the road BLOCK to our destinations. Perhaps success in life is really as simple as changing a subscription, viewpoints, ideas about what is and is not possible.

 

Whatever it is that makes us succeed in our given fields, excel in a chosen area or simply enjoy in the life that we each live must be in the illusions that we chose to accept as real versus imaginary. If the people who have brought us such fanciful and whimsical things to geek over believed the voices in my head, echoes of things that family and not so well meaning friends have said, then we would not have:
Star Trek

Doctor Who

Stargate

Star Wars

Avatar

Warehouse 13

Fringe

most of the animation that we enjoy

Hugo's world would not have given way to the vast cinematic heritage that we enjoy today. There would be no music. There would be nothing but work and sleep and what ever addiction gets a person from one day to the next. There would be nothing on the horizon but the looming Government Shut Down. Dystopia. Anarchy. Desolation.

 

There is a real crisis looming if the information circulating my Facebook feed is even one tenth accurate. And there is nothing more loathsome to contemplate than a future akin to Revolution or the Kurt Russell thriller Escape from L.A. There is hope in imagination. There is little hope in the reality that we are being shown from Congress, our President and most of the media. Who can live under the oppression of such a reality?

 

Today I went seeking imagination. If I need to develop better coping skills, expand my sphere of influence to survive the coming meltdown that our President seems determined to inflict on the rest of us then it is imagination that will see me through. Not chocolate. Not Dr. Pepper. Not the things that get the sheeple through the night. I was never one of them. And I have learned that I can not live like them. There is no reason to.

 

Imagination is everything according to Einstein. Imagination lets you chose your own illusion. It is the only freedom that is left to us. Imagination heals and feeds the soul. And that is the only thing that lives forever.

 

I have to believe it is also the thing that lets us truly withstand the trials and tribulations in the world. Faith and Imagination are close to the same thing. They both involve seeing what isn't smack in front of your face & making things happen when you can not see the outcome. Imagination made the world. Imagination made everything.

 

It all starts with God (however one defines him/her/it) asking "what if...."

 

 

 

 

 

 

Random Adventures About Town

 

 

The Traverse City State Hospital was built in 1911... or established in 1911. The history is almost irrelevant today as I am mainly enthralled by today's adventure. A friend of mine and I went up today to toddle around and take pictures of the patina and decay before the reclamation process makes it all shiny and new again. The place has character in any state of existence, it has a story for almost every resident of our fair city. But today was about the design  and the patterns of life etched across those designs. If anything could stand as a symbol for change this is the place. Since my friend is moving on to other things in her young life it seemed the right way to celebrate her changes.

 

After traveling the exterior footprints of the remaining buildings we arrived back where we started and finished the adventure with a wonderful Italian meal made by authentic Italian transplants here. The various stages of construction flowed from one design aesthetic to the other. Some places bore an Italianate design as is fitting since the developers are Italian. Others had a decidedly Dutch/German/Scandanavian face. In several spots I thought that we were on the grounds of a glorious European castle.... or at least could fake it well for a while.

 

My thoughts kept returning to the Gothic architecture and the things in my art history class that are fading without constant use, my heart kept turning back to the idea that I need to get to Germany. Drawn almost inexplicably, the desire to go does not diminish. And this façade did nothing to ease the desires....

 

For whatever reason this octagonal bay protruding into an almost enclosed courtyard seemed to me the most German face on any of the building. Simple, strong design, clean lines and honestly, one of the best looking of the older buildings and stark in its contrasts just seemed to say Middle Germany. Maybe not middle ages Europe. But Middle Germany. The only thing that is missing here is a couple of swans swimming in a moat or a pond with Willow trees framing the picture. Matthias' Schwanenkönig played in my head while Sarah and I blithely snapped picture after picture.

 

Coming around one corner at the right of this picture we found gables in dire need of restoration but still beautiful in its state of decay...

This reminded me of the canal houses along the rivers and in the ports of just about every country touching the North Sea. I t needs so much care and attention. With its great bones still in tact, and amazingly, with its gingerbread still held aloft, the character and rich tradition of craftsman ship that was once part of our American heritage is evident still. With the weathered textures and crumbling blocks that heritage's European roots show. And knowing that Europe protects and honors its cultural heritage far better than we do here, I think is what made me think of Europe, Germany all night.

As we left we heard parts of an open air concert on the lawn behind Building 50, the State Hospital's most recognized sector. How wonderfully weird it would have been to have had the power to blend all my interests in that moment and have Matthias here on the grounds or put Building 50 in Europe at one of his up coming venues. I would love a time when all of my weird interests could collide in a spectacular revel.

 

Alas... that will have to wait for the dreamscape.

 

I learned a few things about me and my ambitions tonight while talking with Sarah.

I learned about my shortcomings in the skills department. The panoramic setting still escapes me and the composite image about shows me I need to work on those skills.

 

I have plenty of Summer sunlight left to practice.

And plenty of Life to work those ambitions out.

 

But for now I must go to bed. Its' been a long three days and I am overly tired. If I do not dream of dragons, unicorns and rampant lions tonight I will be surprised.

as they say at moo.... Yay!

As they say in Poltergeist: They're heeeeerrrrre! The new cards from moo.com came in today. I was so excited when I picked them up at the desk that I forgot all about the other errands that I had to run today. And thus I let them charge me more for my room than they should have. And the first thing that I did when I got home was tell you guys about it. I can't even begin to tell you how exciting it is to see this printed. I only ordered 25 cards and 25 postcards for this batch. I think that I need to do some more editing. For one the washes came out way more pink in person than I anticipated. But... because it is Christmas and I wanted to get some colors besides blue and green in here that was okay. Aside from telling you guys what the mistake is I don't think that anybody would be able to tell the difference.  It just looks really Christmassy.

I am so EXCITED I just can't stand it!

 

And this is my first post from the Windows 8 platform... I think. I tried this once before and I don't think that I published the post because I hit the wrong button. So Windows 8 definitely does work very differently from the old platform. And it makes all the things that I am used to doing on other people's platforms, i.e. Blogger, very different as well. I feel a lot more like I am a cat with tape on its paws. Moreso than when I just decided to dive into the techno world 5 years ago. Talking with one of the techie/geek pals at work the other day and he said he feels like he is falling behind. And he would be one of the last people that I would suspect of not being able to keep up. No fears...

 

With each success I am more determined to tackle these technological shifts and forge ahead. Having tangible product in my hand is quite an incentive! I've put together some custom pieces on cafepress.com too. Their editor is pretty amazing... for custom pieces. There has to be a way to share the custom pieces with people who want to buy my stuff in a store setting. Perhaps that will become apparent when I actually fork out the cash for a cafepress.com shop.

 

Well I need to get to making some jeweler. Today we have some beautifully bright natural light to work by. And there is a Christmas party at work the end of this week at which it will debut. I can not believe that it is the end of November already. Yikes! 

 

 

 



Harmony

The added sunlight with this season is really helping to ease the blood pressure down without meds. If anything though, I think it is the quality of the light. It is warm while the sun is still low in the sky. In mid afternoon it is right without being over powering. And thus, in the Spring a mid afternoon bath is perfect.

The light in Spring is tranquil. It is a way to build up slowly to the frenzy of Summer when the sunlight is an amped up energy drink. It is energizing and restorative.

I have time to breathe. To think. To come out of the self-protective shell that I crawl into in the Winter when there is no light. The old tired self sloughs off and the new self starts to shine again. Regrouping is key. And somehow, having time to notice how things change around me helps that.

I woke up to a new prospect this morning & a conversation that reflected the thoughts in this post. Tentative but familiar.  There is a change in the quality of communication. But it is too soon to know where it will lead. And honestly, like frost on budding cherry blossoms, if I predict it or try to control it the fruit will be spoiled before it is ever seen. Spring is the time when things unfold and manifest on their own. Patience. You have to wait and see how things will turn out. Just like you can not rush through Spring to get to Summer.

Patience. And positive thoughts. Remaining hopeful and aware and doing the things that must be done...ever onward. That, I think, is what harmony really is.

It's never what anyone expects

or "This probably belongs on the art blog but it is a life issue as well"

I am in a new place. I do not know how long I will be here. But it is mine for the time being and I will spend most of this week making it mine even though I want to make art. I have too much in my head that needs to get made. And now I do not really want to be at work, or with friends of any nature. So today as I am getting my head out of the foggy grey morning air, I am catching up on my blog reading. Martha over at Art du Jour (www.marthalever.blogspot.com) left an update that got me thinking several things.

• It takes a special person to spend 5 hours putting together an easel even with the instructions.
• It takes a special person to spend lifetime living in an artists studio and not be an artist.
• It takes an extremely special person to avoid relegating the artwork and its production to the basement, backroom, loft above the garage, a closet in the spare bedroom or even the spare bedroom.
• To make art one usually ends up living, breathing and expelling art. And in some cases, eating drinking, peeing and pooping art because it is everywhere.
• The production of art is organized chaos and it looks like a mess to the untrained and unintiated eye.

Why does all this matter, my art friends ask. They already know these things. I guess it was just looking at the photos of her easel and seeing the house surrounding it that things sunk in for me. Art is expansive. It broadens (hopefully) the viewers horizons. But in the practical everyday situation of living and working with your art, the art expands its territory. When I think back to all my works and the places that I made it, I recall how it could not be contained in one place. In much the same way that my whole home was dedicated to the day care (with the exception of my bedroom) the studio has been, quite literally, the whole house. The reason that it matters is because not many people can live like that.

When you produce something that needs to dry in stages or cure it needs to be left out where it will not be disturbed. When you have a piece that will not come together no matter what you do to it, it needs to sit out or sit aside while you work on something else. And then you can come back to it when you or the work has mellowed. These things are not predictable. Artists do not paint by numbers. They paint by trial and error. For the most part we know how tools and materials will behave... that is the skill part. It is how the concept behaves that determines ones success or failure on a given day. It can not be said always that you will paint from 2 to 4pm and have a complete work. It is a goal to strive for. But it does not always happen. And sometimes, most often in the case of assemblage or collage, you cull pieces for a series of works on a theme and have to leave them in various piles in semi-completed stages before the end run where several of them can be finished off at once.

Its messy. Its complicated. Its the best metaphor for life that I know. And it is hard for people who llike order and "clean" spaces. Its also hard for people who want to be the only thing in the spaces in your heart. But artwork takes it all. The thing that you are that makes you an artist is in everything that you are. And when you are in the process of creating art, having already distilled the feelings and experiences that are your inspiration, the art percolates through all the spaces in your life and it comes out in a finished product. Or with any luck, in my case, enough pieces for a good show.

I am in full blown art mode. That pretty much means that I am unavailable for everyone else. And I do not know how well that is going to go over. I can garauntee that my friends will be more annoyed with me than ever before. And with the things that I have to do for the people who want to help me with vocational training and get a real job... well they are gonna be pissed at me as well. But it can not be helped. I have many ideas both great and small. And not much time to get them done in.

Sheesh and if its gonna keep raining so that I can not ever go take pics of Traverse then I will have nothing to do BUT art.  At any rate... pop over to Martha's blog to see what I am talking about. it is a place of exuberant expression where I do not believe repression or suppression has ever had a foot hold. Having been in Michelle's studio when she lived close by I can tell you that the best studios for inspiration are some of the messiest places on Earth. But it is a good thing.

Unexpected day off

Today, when I checked into facebook,  I found that my friend Larry had entered the Wayback machine and went to 1984. So, like a good lemming I went too. When I travel back to that year the first stop I like to make is A-ha's house. So I know have a time travel playlist of A-ha's greats. Well, what I call the greats; because even though the physical music has been gone for 25 or more years, I can still remember the words. These were the sentiments that I programmed into my head on purpose because I never dreamed that the future would let us go back in time for real to relive our glory days. I did not want to lose these songs when the cassettes broke. And I knew they would. Though Captain Picard could call up any piece of music from the ships library in the mid 2300s, i did not think it possible to tap into a vast cultural library in my lifetime. So I stored it all in my head for safe keeping.

Granted the videos are newer performances. But the feeling from my first listen are still there, ready to go at the first note. It is comforting. And inspiring. As I listen, I find myself tapping into the fearlessness that I had at 15 when my life was so open before me that there were endless choices. Of course for my personality type that isn't always a good thing. I want to do everything. Can you say daVinci? I knew you could. But it was wonderful because I did not fear the possibility of failure like I do now. I'm not guaranteed to fail at my endeavors. And neither am I guaranteed to succeed. And at this juncture, with fiscal concerns looming like some Sendakian monster in my closet, the lack of a guarantee of success tortures me with immobility.

Last night I spent some time at Borders. I found a book that has given me some hope. It tells me there is a lot of footwork to get where I want to be. But there is hope. I just have to have some support. The best support comes to us when we fight against self doubt and our fears. We have to put on the armor that will protect us. For me that armor comes foremost in the shape of music. Not faith in God, you ask? To which I say who do you think gave these artists the talent to sing, play and perform but most of all to distill our human experiences into 3:05 minutes of back patting and handholding? And why do you think God did that?

Right after music, because it is portable and essentially on-demand, are the people who know that everything can be overcome, who don't try to hold you back out of jealousy and false competition and who won't let you be less than what you could become because you are taking the "safe" route and working a dead-end job.

So as I listen to the music that has always uplifted me and propelled me forward, I sort through the supportive people and the ones who hold me back, I formulate a plan and I write you to tell you that you too can do anything you want to do. Armor yourself, gather your troops and go forward to conquer the enemy at your gate be it self-doubt, jealous co-workers or the fickle finger of finance.

Go! Be! Do! But most of all... enjoy what you love and do what you enjoy.

Target Acquired

CDs have arrived!!!
First thing I did was pop in Kussen order so to here that song and Gib Dein Herz um Keine Krone. Rockin!!!! It is pretty awesome with the crappy youtube sound system. But it is totally phenominal in the car stereo. Now in the visor holder is: Sensationall, Alles Klar, Kussen order so, deja vu, Wolkenreiter, Morgenrot, and Manner sind Krieger. And more than ever, after fighting with the wrappers, I am convince that my next purchase will be a Swiss army Knife. Sheesh who does that with plastic!!!

The first thing that I notice is that three of the CDs are open. No problem. I think that James' fiance really likes him too so he might have taken a listen. Always happy to spread the joy. The other thing that I notice is that the Germans don't seem to worry about theft. None of the CDs have that stupid sticker across the top and bottom of the jewel case that makes it more difficult to get into than a Ferengi wall safe. And the celophane wrappers are a better quality. Only two of them are labled copy protected with any kind of obnoxiousness. My own diatribe against the paranoia will come later.

The second thning that I notice is that I did a poor job of avoiding repeats in song titles. Its okay though. It isn't like I've heard the music all my life and one more Piano Man is going to throw me off the edge of insanity. and I really only managed to repeat the 3 songs that I've already learned.

Thirdly, Europeans do things really differently. Alot of the song titles are whole sentances whereas here we try to keep things simple for the Short Attention Span Theater crowd. The concepts in the songs can be a little weighty despite the pop nature of the music. It is wonderfully geeky!!! :)

When Kev handed over the bag he asked, "So you really like this music?" And Lin asked how I even heard of the guy. So I told the story. And Kevin was surprised that I too kto it so well. "So he sings in German?" Yep. "He has three or four songs in English that I know of. But all German."

So as is my habit with a new CD, I carefully opened then, slid out the liner notes and poured over the information. My German is not good enough to have a conversation. But I can learn what the meaning in the music is with enough time to translate it. So the legible lyrics is a huge bonus. And there are tons of photos that I have seen in the youtube videos. But the surprise is that I found someone who looks like my half sister in one of the fan photos. And I saw another of my Doppleganger. I am so German it isn't even funny.

Monday I have a road trip. So I will have a chance to listen to them uninterrupted. I'm going to see my sweetie. and how silly is this? I'd rather spend the day on the beach listening to and absorbing this music into my soul the way I've done with Sting. I'm still going. It's just that I'd rather have the Summer afternoon to myself under the clouds with Matti and there being no pressure to do anything but exist.

Do you have music that does that to you: opens the doors to your own soul to connect you to something etheric and transcendent?

Kirkegaard

It is as close as a direct quote as I can get. Heard it in a movie.

No suffering is as painful as remembering the future, especially one that can never be.

I think that is what all grief invariably really is. We never miss the past we have with someone special to us so much as all the things that never will come to pass.

Someone told people he was going to ask me out. Some of those people told me his plans. I got excited. Counted the eggs in my basket as chickens and got egg on my face. And now I am left with him insisting that I misread everything, that it was all in my head and I took things more seriously than he meant them. Really? Cause I am not the only one who took him seriously. He told no less than 4 people he was going to ask me out before I ever knew anything of the sort was possible. While he may joke around with a lot of people, his behavior with me was still different. So what I am left with is the following:
a profound mistrust of my own senses
a profound distaste for the concept of dating
a profound sense of embarrassment
deep abiding distrust of anyone who would tell me that I am special
the inability to release my self defense mechanisms


What does this mean?
My sense of embarrassment has lead me to shut down with everyone. I have ignored facebook. I do not engage my coworkers. And my muse and I are having a screaming match the result of which I am begrudgingly putting my pain into a new piece. I don't want to paint. I want to create the perfect monologue which combines a Perry Mason styled list of evidence as to his culpability and Anne Shirley styled insults toward his capacity for humane behavior. But the muse says paint. "Put the pain into something that lets you transform darkness to light." I'd rather throw a lamp at him.
That deep, abiding distrust of anyone who would call me special? That means that I am reliving part of my past that I thought was healed. This isn't the first time I've been yanked around. But I had thought a 50 year old man would be less like the 10, 11 and 12 year old boys who spent three years tormenting me. That story will follow later. The only person who will ever know how awesome I am is me. I saw my future differently. That vision created a memory (dreams and visions repeated become memories). And now I get to grieve that memory.
The way in which I was told to forget any idea caused my senses to shut down. All of my defense mechanisms slammed shut around me. I cannot override them. And yes, I want to override them.Those defense mechanisms protect me from pain, true. But when they slam shut like that they keep out the good things that can happen. He isn't a monster. His past created perceptions and as an empath I know, I think I know, that something in his thinking got twisted around. If I can not find compassion for him I will never find to capacity to participate in my life again. That is the way of the defenses I set up. But I can't override them. Its like being trapped in the engine room on the Enterprise during a containment field breach. The ship slams the doors shut, sucks out the atmosphere to keep the breach form contaminating the rest of engineering and the whole ship. Great. Problem is that when there is a lowly red-shirted yeoman stuck near the containment unit when the breach occurs, the safety protocols end up sacrificing the unlucky schlub. I'm the schlub. I can't get out. And Geordie can't get me out with his superior code authorizations. I've been trying. I've been punching buttons on the Okuda grams, throwing tools at the door and trying to pry open the barriers with my bare hands to no avail. The thing is... the internal sensors are reading a breach. But the containment field is intact. The atmosphere is getting sucked out of the room for no reason and it is going to kill me.

So how does that relate to Kirkegaard? Simple. I have remembered a future where I am not alone and all the cool awesome things about me are used in a partnership. It will not happen now. Not with him. And, if the words given me when I sought comfort from spiritual advisors is any indication, it will not happen with anyone.
I don't have the capacity to hate enough for revenge so all I can do is keep my head down and not get noticed. Since my part in the problem was having ever spoken of a hope, I can do nothing now but remain silent as can be. Cursed as I am as an empath, all I can do is hope that he doesn't keep tossing away opportunities to be with awesome women. Something in him keeps telling him he doesn't deserve anyone cool. And there are enough people who have told me that he is beneath my consideration who reinforce that thought; I cannot bear the idea of being counted among them because I know that they are wrong. He is wrong to think that he deserves only pain and vengence and disappointment.
He has been reprimanded. I do not know to what degree. But he must know I had nothing to do with that. I bear as much responsibility and should shoulder as much of the burden as he. It won't work that way. Whoever told on him made sure to make it seem as though he/she had done it with the best of intentions and made him the sole guilty party with enough plausibility that no one would consider any other options when the quick and easy answer is to punish him and be done with it.

Kids are Naive Part Two

Untamed wildness is dangerous, like a panther stalking the woods. To meet the wild unprepared...it is an adrenaline rush in the first nanaosecond. And then it becomes a mad dash to save life, limb or virtue.
I didn't understand that as a child. As a child who was left to her own musings for the better part of everyday I just wanted someone to steal me. It will come as no surprise to someone who has known me forever to know my first hope was that the aliens on the mothership realized they left me with the wrong people, on the wrong planet and would come back for me. The first time I saw Spock I thought "There's my people." But really, would a Vulcan make that kind of mistake? No. [finger snap] Rats! As we watched soaps and Roger Thorpe made off with Holly I hoped that someone would want me badly enough to take that kind of risk, make that kind of effort. Of course when Roger took of with Holly Ed Bauer and his brother Mike hunted them down and brought Holly back. It was a daring and drawn out rescue. But I didn't really think anyone would have bothered to bring me back. Keep in mind that I was 3 or 4 when that story arc ran on Guiding Light. Naive is an understatement. Roger wanted Holly. Roger loved Holly. It didn't register that Roger was a colossal ass and that his behaivor negated his professions of love. I just looked at it as "wouldn't it be nice if someone wanted me like that?" Naive.
Those ideas sat in my pyche for a while. Mix that with the adventures in the Black Stallion and my absorbtion of the colors and flavors of India and the Middle East and you have the foundations of a huge problem when puberty hits. Namely, that the bland little boys I went to school with were almost completely unappealing as the subject of a crush let alone full blown desire. Add to this my assessment that none of them possessed imagination enough to "run away" with me and you have geek buried in the encyclopedia so that she can make her fantasy as realistic as possible. Naive again.
What is worse is that it took being married and my first encounter for me to realize that what I was hoping for was frought with its own set of frustrations. As an adult I found out what happens to the heroine while someone is waxing rhapsodic over ancient chinese secrets. The part you don't see is the the terror, the frustration and reality: Roger might have loved Holly but what if he was a guy who wouldn't bathe before smothering her body with his? What if he was more of an ass than anyone thought and wouldn't let her pee or eat? What if he didn't care what Holly wanted? Oh right. He DIDN'T care what Holly wanted. She was engaged to Ed. Naive.

Yet even now, 16 years after reality steps all over the fantasy, the fantasy still is there. Of course I realize the whole thing has to be "fake". Personally I'd rip the throat out of a random stranger who would abduct me for the day or a weekend without my explicit consent if given the chance. But it's like I used to tell Matt: I am a work-a-holic, devoted to my employer and the team, to my artwork and thus would have to be tied up and thrown in the trunk to take a vacation cause I just don't think about time for myself. Given my distrust of the human race in general and specifically most of the people that I personally know.... I'm not likely to give anyone permission to do that.
Though I would love to spend a couple of hours sunk into a pile of smooth, cool, silky, satiny, embroidered and wildly colored sheets and pillows, wrapped in the purfume of and Indian spiced musky-hardwood inscense in a room lit with Morroccan lanterns that is as different in feel from this bland Up North kitschie scene as it gets... the pale one among swarthy but jovial natives. Yeah... like that would happen.
Still naive.

Origins

Its nice to have bizarre dream and actually be able to pin point its source. It was definitely a combo of food, media overload and the pain meds. Chinese dragon from the shrimp lo mein. The cat thing from viewing Wil's flikr photos. And the cast of characters came from my wish list of TV friends.
I definitely have to be careful of the things that I program my brain with before bedtime. But at least I got to stretch my writers muscles while getting that down onto "paper".

Today's episode was brought to you by

Facebooks 5 tv characters you wish were real so you can hang out with them poll, too much caffeine before bed, and my inner novelist, and 4 series 3 D&D podcasts from Penny Arcade and Wil's flikr photo of a Felidar Soveriegn super-rare, unreleased player card and one dish of shrimp lo mein.


Dreams are back with a vengence. I am glad that I don't live in a movie world where my dreams come true. Last nights was a doosy. On the upside, my best friends in the movie/dream were Dr. Will Zimmerman*, Henry Foss* and Wil Wheaton** as an anonymous teenage heart throb/geek.


For whatever reason we were on a floating party barge kinda thing with a couple of decks, one below, one topside. Obviously. As we were saying goodbye to some friends before departing on some fateful adventure, there was a decent rocking motion that nearly tumbled everyone down the stairs like dominoes.

Henry looked over the rail and didn't see anything. Since were were so close to shore yet, Will decided that we had probably bumped a sandbar as West Bay is pock marked with them after all the dredging that has been done to keep the luxury boaters happy, natives be damned. We powered up and headed to Marion Island.

As we got further out the shoreline began to morph in to something akin to the Louisiana bayou. The maples became gloomy mangroves, dripping with gypsy moss. When I mentioned the change, Henry told me I was being silly and letting my imagination get the better of me.

"It's just some creeping charlie over the dying maples and oaks. Happens all the time".

True. And the only reason I was creeped out was because some smart as had mentioned the creature from the Black Lagoon with the admonition to wear thick socks. Out near Grampa's old house the bay was deeper than the rest of the shoreline so we were close enough to catch the trees' silhouettes in the fading dusk. It was creepy. And the moon was no where to be found. So of course my mind instantly played the Scooby Doo soundtrack while I scanned for bats.

We skimmed passed Marion Island. Will said that he wanted to have a look at Old Mission light from the water, at night, with a fog rolling in from Lake Michigan because he got a new lens for his camera that Henry recommended. Wil and I elbowed each other and lunged toward Henry. Henry dodged. "It's not my fault. I didn't tell him to come out here." The barge rocked violently. Will chastised us for rough housing and upsetting the balast. But there was no way that we could have done that, so says Wil. So say we all.
Henry dashed below to check the instrument panels to see what was going on. Henry, chief technogeek of our little tribe, had rigged extra sensors so that he had as much information coming in as any ship of Starfleet's line. I was about to go below when Henry did a girl scream and turned on his heels. He caught me in the gut just as the ship rocked again. I made the mistake of looking out a porthole.

Something sea foam green and plastic looking was moving passed the window. It was all muscle and scale with, what one in their right mind would call, dorsal fins regularly spaced across its length. They were a red, coral color. I screamed. Henry started pushing me up the stairs as Will and Wil were headed down. It didn't take much to convince the other two to turn topside.

We congregated at the top just in time to see the head rise from the water, dripping algae from its bearded chin. It looked like the head of a Chinese New Year Dragon come to life. In my head I know they don't breathe fire. In my head I know that a New Year's Parade Dragon head is people powered. In my head I know that the monsters on Scooby Doo always turn out to be human hoaxsters. Unfortunately, my head was not in charge. My bowels and adrenal glands were. The dragon head came down against the hull forcing the barge toward shore. Will and Henry were at the defenses.

Wait. What? Why does a water conservancy barge have defenses?

I looked at Wil. "Well, the Enterprise's main mission is scientific and it has defenses.", he said with that calm cool Wesley Crusher delivery right before he melted down into the Holy Shit I have Jerry's dice on a saving throw in the face of certain doom Wil as we did the Two Coreys scream in each others face. We hugged each other as if we were life saving talismans; or at the very least, to have someone handy to throw in the path of the gaping maw should it hurtle toward either of us.

The head was under water and its body scraping against the hull. Will and Henry were trying to load and aim our meager defenses. I would have given anything for a zat, a staff weapon or to be about eighty light years away on a Hatak bound for Anubis's stronghold than standing there hugging Wil and peeing my pants. As they got the weapon loaded, the tail finally followed the head with a spaghetti slurp sound effect as the water began to calm.

"Where is it?" Will kept asking over and over again.

"I don't know." Was the only thing that Henry could say.

Finally, Will snapped his twig, "You're the damn Werewolf, why can't you smell it?"

"You're the super genius with spooky microscope vision why can't you see it?"

Then the barge rocked wildly again, the head reared up at the bow, letting out a scream so shrill it should have been accompanied with fire just before head butting the forward deck. Will and Henry jumped back. The barge scraped against the lake bottom, knocking Wil and I on our asses. Henry slid in a crazy spiral into the wheel house while Will pitched toward the side. He caught himself before going over. "Henry, do something!"

"Like what?"

The head reared back for another attack. Wil scrambled to get to his feet. Grabbing my hand, he pulled me toward the stern. "Do that incredible hulk thing you do." he yelled at Henry.

"Hey I can't control that!" Henry yelled as he struggled to his feet.

"Well what good is mighty morphing Abnormal power if you can't use it?" Wil snapped with the ferocity of a Mormon Tabernacle Choir boy.

"Yeah, how scared do you have to be to change?" Will asked incredulously, gripping the splintered door jamb on the wheel house.

"Hey, wunderkind," he said to Wil, "why don't you set one of your lab projects loose on it?"

Points taken. We were all FUBARed cause no body's super anything was going to get us out of this mess.

"For the love of Steve the Fruit bat, I am not Wesley Crusher."

"You only play him on TV." I added, most inappropriately. He gave me the withering Captain Picard "shut up Wesley" look.

We were all wondering where Dr. Magnus, Mr. Scott, the Asgaard or even Q was when we needed them. As usual, it was us against certain doom with only our inherent skills to get us out of the situation. And what God-given talents did any of us possess to save our collective assess from the likes of a sea monster of this magnitude? Uhmmmm...

The head smashed through the forward bulkheads. The deck pitched forward under our feet, sending us all skittering toward the dark, turbulent water being churned by the leviathan's constant motion. Will nearly tore his shoulder from its sockets as he snagged a railing. Henry slid unimpeded toward its grinning maw as the transformation finally began to take place. Wil still had my hand as we slid on our backs, smashing into chunks of debris like they were pinball bumpers. Wil was dead weight dragging me down toward the water.

Suddenly transformed, Henry found footing to leap at the head, digging into the scaly jowls and holding on while the head thrashed back and forth, attempting to release its unexpected attacker. Purple clawed talons scratched at the air. Its arms were too short to scrape Henry's lycan form from its face. Panicking, other claws rose from the water. It grabbed for footing on the tattered decking, causing more damage. The barge fed itself under the claws like lumber through a buzz saw. Wil and I slipped closer and closer to the shredding machine. The creature's head flailed back and forth; Henry growled with each violent change of direction. Will had dropped himself closer to Wil and I. He had just about convinced us to throw ourselves over the side and head for shore when a claw came down and separated the three of us.

The water churned with the dragon's panicked thrashing, littered with debris and murky as a swamp. We didn't want to throw ourselves over as there was no way to tell if the thing's body was close enough to crush, smoosh or submerge our mortal selves. Henry bellowed like a demon. I looked at him in time to see him thrown out into the middle of the bay like a soggy stuffed toy. Grinning, dripping algae mixed with drool over the deck, it barred its teeth as it headed for me. Wil was wearing his green lantern shirt and obviously thinking he was safe from the red shirt of doom curse. But he'd obviously worn the red tunic unscathed too many times to escape Fate, who having a bone to pick with the lucky ensign, took it out on my altergeek friend; it scooped Wil up in its teeth.

He screamed. I screamed. Will scrambled to find a weapon while he yelled at the thing to drop its tofu fed snack. From nowhere... okay not literally. It came from the wooded shoreline. But it might as well have come from no where or at the very least pulled from a very shallow literary well... a snarling, roaring arrow of fangs and claws aimed itself at the sea creature's middle. Glittering gold and muscle upon muscle, the feline creature tore into the soft underside of the dragon's neck and upper torso. Wil fell to the deck in a downpour of blood and gore. Will and I pulled him, half mad and half conscious, toward the relative safety of the rudder housing. We could hear the scraping of claw against scale, rending of flesh and the pain filled screams of the leviathan that started to sound like air being let out of a helium balloon as its strength waned. When the sea monster got a good shot in at the cat-thing, those sounds sent chills deeper down my spine. Whereas the leviathan was all pain and frustration, the cat-thing was astonishment and revenge. What are you supposed to be more afraid of in a situation like that?

Henry had swam to us and tried to help us get to shore. Before we could rescue ourselves the clash of the colossi ended. The triumphant feline had torn the head from the body and tossed it skyward. As the head spiraled, it flung bits of blood and tissue like a ghoulish sprinkler head. I thought I was gonna puke on Wil with each splatter that hit me in the face. Will was lowering a semi conscious Wil toward Henry who was shoulder deep in the water. Well, at least we weren't gonna drown, I thought. I won't die in the water; I've always known that. Which, come to think of it would have been a good reason to stay on the boat. I get along great with cats.

The head splashed down, gracelessly showering bay water all over the place. The rampant feline roared as it turned its head toward us, blood stained breath sticking to us like deodorant. Will dropped Wil on Henry and grabbed at me. He missed. I was too far forward as I had been curious to see if the cat face were more Aslan or Cheshire. It wasn't either. The beast may have had a cat's body with tufted lion's tail and flowing mane, but it had the face of a gargoyle straight from Fuseli's nightmare,complete with ginormous antlers. It's whiskers were as stiff as porcupine quills. And it was headed toward me.

Our half sunk barge slipped under the feline's shifting weight, flattening the deck out for a moment before tipping it and me toward the steely claws tearing the boards. It did have a Cheshire grin. But then all cats have that Cheshire grin, which in the vernacular, translates as shit eating. Judging by how tense my tush was clenched, I had no doubt it would be less a figurative description if it got its mouth on me. Will made one last grab for me before the rest of the decking splintered and dropped him into the water. As the barge broke, the cat leaped.

I closed my eyes and screamed like a girl in a B horror movie as hard muscle and tendon wrapped around my shoulders. The smell of warm flesh filled my nostrils just before the wind was sucked out of me. I lost all sensation of any kind of footing, firm or tenuous; I felt almost buoyant... except for the fact that a very large paw held me tight. My short hair flew forward, scraping my eyelids. For an instant I was annoyed enough to try to brush it away from my face. Oh yeah, arms pinned. More annoyed. Suddenly I was falling.


Don't look. Don't look. Don't look.

I looked. Hey nobody else listens to me; why would I?

Henry tried to catch me which is more than Wil one and Will two had done. I landed on the forest floor marbled with gnarled roots. With any luck the spleen was okay. If not then nothing the cat-thing did was going to matter. I nearly passed out when I tried to sit up. It was even darker in the woods than it was on the water. I could hear Henry's monster footfalls as he tried to reach me. Will was shouting something. I heard a breathless "By Riker's beard" from the geek. The only sense I had was of being under a very large table. A hairy table. A hairy table that smelled like wet animal and crushed autumn leaves. When I opened my eyes I could just make out the outline of the thing standing over me. I was lying between its forelegs like a broken Barbie doll. I don't know that "By Riker's beard" really covers this kind of thing. But then, what does?

Wil had hidden himself behind a tree as the thing had come ashore with me in its clutches. As I lay there, praying for a swift devouring, Wil reached for me. "C'mon... grab my hand." He whispered. By the gods, Jerry's dice suck.

Above me, I heard a raspy, snaggle-toothed chuckle. Despite being dazed with terror and numb with pain, I felt the urgent need for inappropriate gallows humor. Cats play with their food. We were four flavors of geek, not even interesting enough as Meow Mix. I reached up to touch the fur swaying mere inches above my face.

"What are you doing?" Wil whisper yelled at me. "Are you nuts?"

It laughed again. I heard something fall near my head. "Hey!" Henry yelped.

Another soft laugh.

"Ho-leeeee" Wil's voice moved away form me. A thud. "Shit."

Of course Will was the first one to gain any sense of... well, his senses. "Thank you."

I sensed the hulking form move away from me enough to let me sit up. When I did, I saw that the beast wasn't quite as large as it had once been. It was 3 times the size of a Bengal tiger instead of the Godzilla size it had been when it came out of the woods. Relieved to already be on my keister, I crab-crawled backwards. Will helped me to stand without taking his eyes off of the creature.

"Will?" Of course the rest of the question needn't be asked. We were all wondering the same thing.

"I don't know."

Henry siddled up to us, smelling of sweaty wet dog. "I got nuthin'."

We looked to Wil who was walking toward us as he brushed forest dander from his jeans. "Anne's gonna kill me", he said poking a finger through a hole in his shirt. He finally noticed us staring at him. The cat folded its forepaws under its chest and waited. "What?"

Really? The next best thing to Data in walking computers and he had no idea what we are waiting for?

"Oh." He tugged the bottom of his t-shirt, squared his shoulders and delivered the goods. "It is a special card from Magic the Gathering's 2009, as yet to be released, set called Zendikar. He is a Felidar Sovereign that garauntees successful completion of a campaign when the player using the card has at least 40 life at the beginning of the maintenance portion of his turn." And in his best Stewie voice, "Game over. We win."

Who needs dice?

Dream over. Footnotes to follow:
* Will Zimmerman and Henry Foss are coworkers of Doctor Helen Magnus of Sanctuary. They help Abnormals (read Mutants in non copyright infringing way) at a place called Sanctuary. Will has a special gift of clear vision while Henry is lycan. ** Wil Wheaton is... well, Wil Wheaton.

funky funky doo

Yes, I am stuck. If you've noticed I've been in the process of moving for like the whole Summer and haven't said anything... thank you. I'm stuck. Right now I am at the point where the things I love most are left to pack. My two studios: art and food.
The Art Studio is rather self explanatory. I love these things. They are an extension of who I am, the soul behind the work. The Food Studio is a bit more difficult. But here goes:
One of the things that I loved most about my gramma Olive was her inability to cook. What? Yes. If it was out of a box it was okay. From scratch? Well she left that kind of cooking to Grampa. But Gramma Olive was the soul of hospitality. Her goulash wasn't the best but it was made with love and served with joy. So from the time I began learning to cook and serve at the age of 5, it was in me that this was a way to show love and affection. This concept rooted itself deeply when I was 14 and Grampa was is the hospital. The sibs had sports things after school and I was left home to cook dinner to be redy when they got home, mom got home from the hospital and to keep my hands and mind busy. Those were not the best roasts of my kitchen career. Then when we moved into the new house and Dad and I started a steady diet of Saturday morning PBS shows, the Frugal Gourmet and Martin Yan took over my education. Surprisingly, this is also where and when I met Martha Stewart for the first time. She wasn't quite a household word yet.
Dad and I started to play with the recipes that he'd begun to teach me. We tried leaf herbs under the skin of our roast chicken with fruit in the middle... WOW! Glory days in the kitchen indeed. And that is all it took for me to think of food as art and another way for me to show people that I care.
I've begun collecting the tools of a food artist. My pride and joy, a 5 qt. Kitchen Aide stand mixer that makes the smoothest batters for my cheesecakes. I have these tools left to pack. And my heart bleeds when I look at it. I know I have to pack it. But it is going into storage and I don't know when I will get to use them again. Just like I don't know when I will get to use my art supplies again.
My heart hurts because I finally have tons of people upon whom I can lavish these gifts. I've been isolated for ten years working 7 days a week and through the long nights. In all that time i practiced and honed my craft. Now... my tools are to be put away indefinately. I don't know how to get passed this and get the move on. I need to before someone decides to pack for me. And yet...
I want to make a cheesecake, Grampa's holiday loaf and roast a chicken. Why is this so hard to do?

For those keeping score...

Last nights nightmare was a surreal conglomeration of no less than 15 aspects of my life as represented by the persons who participated in last nights revel. I don't remember how it began. The middle was my sisters wedding which took place in the yard of a Burtonesque just House collaged with a variety of houses that I have admired. The party lights surrounding the yard that lead down to a Cape Fear kind of picturesque beach were bobbleheads of disgruntled persons from my past in Seth MacFarlane cartoon style. Some of them talked. After the ceremony and the reception, we all decided to go down to the beach... at almost midnight with a full moon rising high in an indigo sky. The waves crashed and seemed to encourage bravado from some of the guests. As we were frolicking on Empire's sandy shore [Empire is a village near TC], Kathy noticed there were fireworks. Laura and the rest of the party gathered and we plopped down to watch. Eric and his kids seemed less mezmerized than the rest of us.
Suddenly the far shore, which in real life would have been Wisconsin, came closer to us. As the fireworks brightened with wild color and frenzied patterns I noticed a skyline... big city type. Then someone said "Ha ha. That's funny." What?
"We're watching fireworks over the Empire state from Empire beach."
I was just about to wake myself with a scream when blazing colors streaked across the moon and it turned a shade of putrid violet red. Patrick Stewart's voice then announced the end of the foolish human race as a fanged mouth envoloped the moon...
Captain Picard the Antichrist? Who knew....
yea all that on Nyquill. I don't even want to know what something stronger would do to my mind but this has to stop.

In a related post...

Why is it that I can have these horribly messed up and delusionally paranoid dreams while I am having halucinogenic fevers but I never get the impossibly hot guy with impossibly hotter intentions intending anything toward me. I mean crap... its fantasy. Its a frakking dreamland and all I ever get is a lousy t-shirt that only makes sense to me! It is sooooo unfa...
uh-oh...
Why do I shuddenly feel as though I have just, completely unintentionally asked my brain to do something completely-not-what-I-wanted horrible to me tonight? The words repression and sublimation come to mind in a faint and totally horrible Austrian accent laid down over ghostly Vincent Price cackling...
I dread sleep tonight. I may not sleep until the fever passes. What horrible things this sci-fi drenched and virally heated mind will wreak...
[gulps] zoinks.

chants: please don't let it be ferengi please don't let it be ferengi please please please please not them. Any thing but them. Well almost. Well no....

Screw it. I'm never sleeping again.

As the sinus drains

I am left pondering the weirdness of the dreams/nightmares I have had in the last few days. In one, KACL ubernerd, Noel Shemsky bites it as a security guard who forgets that he is guarding the very person he is driving mad with incessant questions about the Star Trek set when BLAMO! masked gunment storm the highrise office building. In another dream there are moles in my alphabet soup... I hate the stuff. And last nights wake with terror was a delightful bit of spoofing in which several D&D good guys go up against some Star Trek bad guys with some horrific finger snapping, Westside Story choreography while David Hewlett/Rodney McKay emcees.
One could ask what I was smoking/eating/drinking/shooting/inhaling. One could ask what i hit my head on. One could also ask if there is a Psychiatrist in the house. But largely I think the question should be... how high can your fever go before your brain melts all of the files in your head so that they run together into a huge ass Dalian freakshow and still leave you with any senses?
Yes, that is the question. F 2bornot2b.

foodie emerges

I've finally found a jar of Food For Thought's Blueberry Lavendar preserves.
Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm yummy.
I am currently dreaming of it on a slice of whole wheat honey with blackforest ham and spinach leaves. Sure it sounds weird... It's a very German thing to do with your savory meats.

dream a little dream...

Vivid lucid dreams seem to be de riguer these days. I was talking to a friend about the fact that he can remember his dreams for hours after he wakes up. I've had similar experiences with the dream state. I thought that it had something to do with the fact that I have been meditating and under a lot of stress triggered by the estate thing. As we were talking, it occurred to me that this may not be the case.
My friend has had these dreams since heart transplant surgery put him in a coma. I've been like this since I had my brush with death and staph infections. I've been listening to other people talking about how vivid their dreaming is. It's either some thing that happens because the brain is trying to process everything before the next time it gets close to death (in case no one can pull you out) or because the experience itself changes the wiring.
In either case, like I told my friend, I don't think there is a medical solution for this. I think it is permanent.
Most of the time it isn't too bad. The other morning I had a very disturbing dream. I woke to it the morning of the day I was to meet ACG. I woke at 7:30. I could still see the faces of the people involved at 11:30 when I made myself leave the house. This mornings dreams took on qualities of a set of dreams that began in the early part of 1996. Time alters all things. I saw how TC would be developed and how people who were different would be marginalized and sent off to live in a poor rural part of the county. I saw the bay paved over with the broken stumps of defunct street lights spaced through it at regular intervals. If those dreams start again while I am in this state of lucidity, I may have to go insane.
When I wake from these dreams I can feel the sensations that my body felt during the dream. The TC dreams culminate with a drizzling rain of fire. Dazzling droplets fall from the sky like the little teardrops of fireworks from some of the star burst patterns. When they fall they don't lose their heat. Trees and grass start to burn first. As it rains harder, everything is on fire. I am waist deep in the bay, just passed Greilickville, with a short white haired toy dog. I don't know who's. It takes forever to get to water deep enough to cover me. The rain falls on the dog and he yelps. A drop grazes my shoulder and the pain is beyond searing. I look up at the clouds. There are no clouds. I can see the stars through the fire fall. I know we are dead.
If I have to feel that dream more vividly than I did, I will have to loose my mind.

paintings on the wall and baskets of cards all around

I've had this dream for three years. I went to a show at the home of a local stained glass artist, Brian Strickland. It was amazing. His studio is always open. It is the basement of his home, an old converted church. Immediately I went home to try to figure out how I could make this happen for myself with my artwork.
My home, at the time, had great light despite being on the second story and jutting into a maple tree canopy. The north and westerly light streaming in the windows provided me with all the illumination I required. And the green canopy gave the feeling of being in a tree house. The white walls made a perfect display. Of course, as I started imagining a show for several select invited guests, I mentally painted the walls a soothing color that would set off the colors of my artwork. I had planned for several plant stands, sans greenery, to buttle baskets of my hand stamped cards of a theme similar to the paintings. Pier 1 has very reasonably priced wine flutes. A couple dozen would have served up a nice light wine to go with the whitefish or chicken salad in mini pitas. There was enough work for a show. It would have been smallish, but it was a small apartment.
Now when I daydream about it, I add red pepper humus in celery sticks to the menu. But I can't see the building it is in. I also can't see anyone coming. I have been ousted from that home by circumstance. It was my security blanket. The home I grew up in. It had beautiful energy. These days I am surrounded by so much chaotic energy that I can't see anything permanent in my future here.
Verta says that is why it is time to move. I've been dragging my heels for the two years that she has been saying this. Fortunately my collection has grown. I also have jewelry to add to the product mix. But I can't see taking all of this with me to go somewhere else. Neither do I see myself parting with it. Oh sure, some of this could be leftovers from dealing with my brother. The devil you know v. the one you don't and all. But there is more to this than that codependent enabling label that so many want to slap on my arse.
Very simply, the heart needs to be open to create art. It is never more open than when we are engaged in the care of others in addition to ourselves. The self is nothing to live for. if it is the only thing then it is pointless. I refuse to live a pointless life. But my art demands my heart be open to others. It just refuses to open to those who have designs on its freedom. So for now I am in limbo.