What was and what will be

When I heard about the protests against a retirement condo replacing this community garden I knew I needed to take a picture of it. Then, for many months, nothing happened. The garden was still there, the old folk were tucked away in the condos they'd already built half a block away. Now, everything is gone. I think they left one tree, probably because it's actually on somebody else's property. I thought some compromise had happened, that the developer had agreed to keep a portion of the garden there, but clearly they have killed and trampled everything. Our ever-increasing elderly population need places to live, yes. But this just makes me horribly sad.

Why I love my neighborhood

Winter 2005/2006

Winter 2006/2007

I'm missing a pic of the summertime mummy which sported a yoda mask.

These are two of the ghost bikes in Portland, memorial sites set up to mark the place where cyclists were killed by cars. They are both within a handful of blocks from my house and I pass by them on a regular basis. This being the little town it is, I knew one of the people who was hit, Noah, who worked the door at Biddy's where Sean regularly plays. I can't pass either site without thinking about the stupidity of such accidents and their astounding regularity.

While I acknowledge the usefulness of cars and trucks, mostly the way they bring me food and books and the way they get me to the beach, I still loathe the things. Along with wishing for giant foodstuffs rotating on the tops of buildings (see yesterday's post) I wish cars only existed in suburbs. At city limits you'd have to change over to bike or foot or light rail. That way all the car-crazy people would be banished to Beaverton where they could go ahead and crash their cars into each other instead of into the soft bodies of boys riding their bikes.

This giant milk compliments the giant loaf of bread stuck to the top of the factory down the street. I would like it if all businesses had monster-sized versions of their products rotating from their rooftops.

The big storm of '07. About ten minutes of last night's local news broadcast was dedicated to this storm, how the plows and de-icers were ready, the bus tires were chained up, the schools were on standby. Well, it was beautiful and sunny most of the day and then it hailed for five minutes this afternoon. Thank god I stocked up on canned goods, batteries and candles before the drifts blew in.

Last January, Joe and I were the first ones on this beach one morning. It's a small spot at the base of the Mayan Ruins in Tulum. It was early enough that the water was a bit warmer than the air. The OCEAN was warmer than the air. I often forget that oceans can be for swimming. It was something I once knew and have forgotten. Sometimes I see people in the water on the Oregon coast and I think they must have a disease that prevents them from feeling the bitter pins and heart-stopping pain. That is, I used to think that until I saw a story about this woman who swam for 30 minutes in the waters of Antarctica. I find this form of extremism interesting. What kind of person craves an identity as "the only person to . . ." especially when the thing they are doing benefits nobody and brings them close to death? It's all very interesting.

If I can't have seaweed floating in a pretty blue sea then I'll take a spiraled fern and some moss-soft rocks.

This is one of the "Marine Series" prints on canvas from my friend, Joe, at jefdesigns. It makes me think of Mexico which is always a good thing. The whole series is very cool. The man also makes beautiful lamps. And what is more important in these dark, soggy days than good lighting and thoughts of swimming in a warm ocean? It may not make the months FLY by, but it sure does help.

I always wanted to live on this street. It's just a few blocks from the first house I lived in here and, though it's hard to tell in the blahness of winter, it has a charm that the already charming streets around it don't have. It's very narrow and the houses are close together. The trees arch over the road and everything feels very cozy. In the summer it always reminds me of a street in a beach town. I always imagined that I would actually be friends with my neighbors if I lived on this street.
And now I do live on this street, only not on this block. The charm here only runs a few blocks before emptying out onto a busier, broader, double yellow lined section of the street. Really, I'm lucky to live in the neighborhood at all, so I'm not complaining. I'm just saying that when you wish for something, be very very specific. I was supposed to learn that from some fairy tale or Bewitched episode or something, right? Well, lesson learned.

Everything is so quiet this morning. So few cars, so few people. Did I forget a holiday? Did I miss the warning to STAY INDOORS? It's one of those ugly flat days anyway. I don't blame the city for trying their best to ignore it.

Tonight I did my first volunteer training to become a facilitator for Write Around Portland. They are an amazing group that runs dozens of writing workshops every year, along with running readings and publishing anthologies of the participants' work all for a diverse group of folks who wouldn't otherwise have access to such things.

Tonight I did my first ten-minute writing from a prompt. You'd think I'd come across this sort of thing in my writing life, but no. I've always avoided any kind of "free write" scenario. The workshops this group runs makes heavy use of the prompt, write and read lay out, so I'm going to have to get use to it. I wanted a challenge for myself and now I've done gone and gotten it. I let my heart bang against my ribs and did it. There was a fair amount of panic in having to be there, in a circle of strangers, writing without thinking too much and then reading what I'd written without shaking too much, but I did it. And honestly, what I wrote was better than I expected it could be. And I participated more than I thought I would. And I liked the other volunteers. Maybe this is the leaf. Watch me turn it over.

Not long ago I finished reading Jeffrey Eugenides' Middlesex which is set in Detroit. It reminded me of one of my favorite procrastination techniques: Looking up pics of abandoned Detroit buildings. I've only been to Detroit once many many years ago but in my few hours there I was instantly awed by the beauty and pathos of what I saw. It's just all so weird. I got this particular pic from The Fabulous Ruins of Detroit site. I could easily do without ever seeing another photo of a band standing in a run down building or on some forgotten train tracks, but I find these unpeopled photos amazing. I can't help but be fascinated by the enormous scope of the neglect and all the history it entails.

I've been the tall girl since seventh grade. Or so I thought. I remember there were these twin boys who were taller than me in junior high and my equally tall friend, Theresa, who moved away in eighth grade. And yet, when I look back at the few pictures I have of that time, I don't seem so huge. Of course, comparing myself to my 5'9" sister (on the right) isn'exactly a fair display of what it felt like to be surrounded by boys who were struggling to reach past 5'2". I was probably 5'7" then, inching steadily up another three inches, hovering over my friends and enemies until ninth grade when a few more of the boys finally caught up. It's hard to choose which of the various ills was the truly defining trauma of those years. There were bad haircuts, acne, glasses, braces, bad fashion sense (even for 1982), being the new kid, being insanely shy and insanely tall. I feel bad for that girl as if she wasn't me.

Even back then, I wasn't entirely aware of my height. Of course, every now and then some wit would ask me about the weather up there and the full burden of it would climb onto my shoulders. That's when I started the tall girl slump. Of course there was also the big boob slump, the fuck you slump and the tissue paper heart slump. Do seventh grade girls still do this? Or has the teenage slut look made them all falsely bold?

Nowadays, when a really tall woman is in the same room as me I feel a ridiculous flash of competitiveness. You think you're tall, bitch. . .why don't you take off those heels and we'll really see what we're looking at? Every day I work to erase the muscle memory of those junior high hallways and untie the knots in my shoulders that feel like bone. But still, on a night like this New Year's Eve, when I looked around the dance floor, I couldn't help but notice that I was the tallest girl there, tallest person around practically. I love being tall, especially on dance floors. It scares off a certain kind of unwanted attention. And yet, I can't help but wish that, just once, I was that cute little petite woman who knows how to shake it even in stilleto heeled boots. A little bit of that twelve-year old longing snaps across my skin.

Kitty Mao greets the new year with suspicion

Learn more. Listen more. Laugh more. And put the cat on a diet.

Do you remember? Do you remember the New Year's Eve when the clock actually mattered because something slightly magical was happening? Do you remember the New Year's Eve you wished you were anywhere but where you were? Remember the kisses and the standing alone pretending you didn't care. Remember the toasts with friends at that bar that's no longer there and the toast with jam you made while babysitting. Remember to enjoy yourself if you can.

Portland can give a person a false sense of anonymity. There are vast portions of this city that I never get to. Driving over to my friend's house in North Portland for Christmas was like going to another city. Southwest Portland (except for the downtown portion of it that doesn't really count) is a complete unknown full of neighborhoods that I've heard of but never seen. And yet, no one who lives here can go long without running into an old neighbor, an ex-wife, a former bandmate. I'm thinking that, maybe, there are only about five-hundred people actually living in this city.

Personally, I'm having an increasing problem running into clients. This fall, a client who lives in the neigborhood walked by as I was outside pulling weeds with a cigarette dangling out of my mouth. A few days ago, at the grocery store, I ran into some clients I see regularly. They had their two year old son with them. I had a basket with hair dye and condoms in it. You see the problem? There are certain things I don't want to know about my health care professionals. The brand of lube they use, would definitely be one of those things.

My clientelle are often neighborhood folk and I love my neighborhood. I guess this is yet another opportunity to give free reign to my personality and let the cards fall where they may.

Somewhere early on in my independent life, the refrigerator became not only a place to store food, but a place to display all the shameful photographs of the past and present. This is what happens when there aren't kids around cluttering things up with their drawings and report cards. The Fridge of Shame has gone through many mutations. Some friends have willingly donated old photos to it, bless them. Some more charming than shameful pics have slipped into the mix. But today I came face to face with the fact that the shame was not only to be found in the photos of my untameable adolescent hair but also inside the refrigerator as well. I couldn't show you the whole thing. The moldy squash and wilted cabbage says it all.

The approach of the new year makes me anxious for a clean and tidy place. It took me so long to clean out the fridge that I didn't get to much else today. But at least all that shame is back where it belongs, clinging to some cheap magnates.

Jack LaLanne's Exercises for Librarians and Other Bookish Types

Oh yes, the sloth is off as I suspected it would be. I guess I usually don't make much of the beige malaise because when I'm holiday-ing with family (particularly the less familiar extended variety) I automatically turn off most of my personality. For some reason I've have the idea that being as unobtrusive and inoffensive as possible makes the time go faster or at least easier. It's not really true. It only makes the time less confrontational. Maybe next year, when my cousin toasts the troops because they are fighting for our freedom I will, in turn, toast Dennis Kucinich or some other fine liberal for not buying the bullshit. Maybe I'll politely ask my sister what it is about the bible that she actually believes and why. And maybe I'll scare my uncle with a little joke involving a rusty trombone and a dirty sanchez. Holiday madness would ensue and I might never be asked back again. Hmmm.

The beige malaise continues. I did a small amount of mediocre writing this morning. One of my clients was really interesting, the rest weren't. My neck is hurting a little, but it's not too bad. Is this what it feels like to be on lithium, everything made bland? I even know that it will go away, probably soon, as the holidays dissipate. blah . . .blah. . .blah . . .