Fishing Dreams

My Sisters on the Fly book came today, and I'm having dreams of finding a vintage RV, some fishing poles, and a dutch oven.

I don't even know what to do with this dream but dream it for the time being and see...

It's so new, and I love it.

I figure I've got two choices:  do it or don't do it.

That simplifies it quite a bit.

Motorcycles, Deer, Birthday

I'm not sure what this is about, but I have a strong urge to rent a motorcycle and one of those little side cars for Nora and drive across the country with an 8 ball black helmet, a red scarf and goggles.  I would probably carry a large supply of fish crackers, too.

Exhaust and exhaustion disappearing behind me.

When I was 4 and lived in Apple Tree Trailer park, my dad would break up hay bales in the front yard during the winter, and the deer would come down.  We'd watch them a long time, our breath on the glass softening the scene, as if it needed to be any softer.  Silent night.  I remember this because my dad had a motorcycle then, and he'd take us up into the hills on it.  There was a stream there, and he'd park the bike, and we'd wade and crawl on our bellies, our legs floating behind us as we pretended to be alligators.   Then back down from this other world to the one we usually lived in.

Nora turns 4 on Friday.  Will there be streamers?  Oh, yes.  Cake.  Absolutely.  Motorcycles.  Not yet.

But I'm still going to wear goggles.

Growing Pains

She is digging with her shoe a tiny, secret spot in the broken land 

And into it, she places a seed she pulled, a glowing tooth

Out of the mouth of a  dream she had about her unborn daughter

Who covered her mother with a sheet of paper and waited

Shy behind the door for the word: Grow.  

Even when it isn't comfortable or convenient.   

Playback

Up early to read more of Matthew and stunned by "At which point did you doubt?"  The feet slipping beneath the surface, the hand extended.

Grading in bed, I wait to open the blinds until well into the morning.

Finally up and showered while playing Arcade Fire as loudly as possible and dancing in the kitchen as a way to summon my strength, warn the enemy that I am stomping and I am dancing, grabbing my keys and out the door to McDonald's because "the Inn at Panama was full" to find Cody and Adam and a large fry and coffee as we discuss their writing, which is inspiring to me.

I get a migraine and have to wait until the sparkly blind spot moves out of my field of vision, so I can drive.

Nora and I return home for an afternoon of pretending to be elves wrapping Christmas presents.

Sitting outside in the dead, yellow grass, singing to the 7 yellow farm cats as I explain to Nora that they are sitting there with their backs to us as a way to test us, see if we'll attack.  Eventually they turn around and watch us through half-closed eyes.  One rolls onto her back, and I figure it will take a few more days of this until one of them finally approaches.  I feel like I'm in a movie called Dances with Farm Cats.

Playing kitties and mommy kitties.  Nora sticking her tummy out.  My fat cat.

Crocheting, eating ice cream and pretzels, watching the game.

And that was the day, beautiful, beautiful day.

Phew.

Ya know, one of the hard things about the 365 blog challenge is that some days are just kind of rough, and when you go to sit down and write--oh, who am I fooling here using the second person--when I go to sit down, I feel that writing about this roughness is somehow bad.  But, because I have to believe that whatever brings me to this point must be a way for me to come around to another point, a better point, then I'll go through it, if that's what He asks of me.  So, I debate about how to write about a day like today, and I think the best way to balance it out here is to include as much of the good with the bad as I can because as James Baldwin writes, "the tale of how we suffer and how we triumph must be told."

1.  Wanting to warm the car up this morning before an impromptu trip to the doctor (Nora is sick again and I am a worried mother), I throw some boots on, a sweater, run out and Lynn is out back working and I hold my hand up high toward the sky, and he holds his up in the sky and we keep them there for a good long time.  It wasn't like one of those flap your hand around kind of waves.  It was a kind of salute, I suppose, one that said, I see you there working and I see you there with your daughter, and we thank you for the fruitcake and I thank you for taking care of the house and here we are and, yeah, it's cold, but here we are.

2.  Words from friends and family saying I am doing okay, making good choices, being a good mother, and I am saved by their encouragement, how they sustain me.  I want to tell them as I told Nora last night, "Did you know, Nora, I am almost always talking to God, even while I'm putting these socks here into the laundry hamper?"

3.  Running around Walmart for medicine, there's a single long, black cardigan hanging on the rack for 15 bucks, the sweater I've been needing for awhile now in order to hide my...uh, assets...so I grab it and continue walking around looking for the Christmas light section and when I finally make it there, I look down and realize I'm just carrying around an empty hanger.  Feeling like someone who forgot to attach the dog to the leash, I have to figure that wasn't the sweater I was looking for after all.

4.  My mom's Christmas open house at her pottery studio in York was a big success.  And I'm proud of her.  If I weren't already sitting so close to her, I would lift my hand up into the sky and hold it there for a long time in her direction and it would say, "I see you there, Mom, working and making things with your hands, and they are beautiful, the same hands that shaped me and this wood burning stove is really hot, don't you think?  Should we open the door?  Man, I love peanut butter cookies with a hershey's kiss on top."

So there, suffering.  Take that.

And then he said,

"You are more than your story," and I had to rewrite everything.  More importantly, everything rewrote me.

Breath:  where the edges meet and fade together.  The light from two passing cars intersects, and we can no longer tell who owns which portion of it.

Lists often help when you can't think of a paragraph

Little Things:

1.  The new faucet in my bathroom.  SO shiny.  SO working.  I like shiny.   I like working.
2.  Nora saying goodbye to Grandma last night:  "Good night!  And a happy new year to you!"
3.  My friends and their adventures both internal and external.  What this inside does to the outside; what the outside does to the inside.  Their courage.
4.  Only 6 essays left to grade.  Alarm set for 5:30 AM.  I feel like I'm running through quicksand and then my mom says, "Don't give up, Lisa."  How did she know I was even thinking about giving up?  Was it because I couldn't remember how many p's are in appreciate?  Did she see the look on my face that said, "You teach at the college level?!  How did that happen?  God, are you sure you want me to teach?  Wouldn't I be safer in sales?  Perhaps you aren't aware of my spelling issues.  Oh, wait.  I suppose you are.  Well, all right, God.  If you're sure."
5.  Two new books in the mail about preserving seeds and feeding your family on a 1/4 acre of land.  (I skipped to the chicken nugget and mac n' cheese section, naturally.  Looks like I'm going to need some chicken seeds.  Eggs.  I mean eggs.)
6.  The saying, "Don't want to waste your time chewing the cabbage twice."
7.  [                                                                                                                          ]