.
May - 30
where there's a will
I'm thinking this is some weird shit...tripping this morning on my way into the hospital doing a total wipeout asif over the falls on some bigass wave but instead full face down onto the sidewalk thinking wait wait it was really tomorrow I didn't want to go but thingis I'm homeagain with tomorrow off too...and then I remember the tree falling across the road the last time I didn't want to go and more recently being rear ended so I couldn't
rather than exercising not wanting to go
I mean holyshit & where's the tinfoil
May - 31
what if there was nothing to hide I heard myself say which is not so much about privacy as transparency and I'm beginning to think of the minute and a value a credo to aspire to as a way of being not only with others but with oneself which is not so much about disclosure as it is about truth telling not so much necessarily speaking ones mind as knowing it fact is I am as complex as the wind as single minded as the river relentless as the ocean
but what if there was nothing to hide you know
June - 1
expectations as agenda and the minute is hijacked and que sera is on the wave missed and the miss is as good as a mile expectations as attitude is high alert is better be's is stick up the ass and adjustable&responsive is not part of the vocabulary expectation is competition is contest is fool's gold and les jeux sont faits and you lose
and justthesame it was a highcalifornia sunny with telltale hot inland ambient ocean air aloft drive along route1 and rimming tomales bay we saw standing at nest attention a golden eagle daang we certainly didn't expect that
June - 3
it is what it is and by default ain't what it ain't and I ain't no cando pimp or whore for that matter but it ain't about that is the thing though it has a great ring cause fact is I am a cando whore but I will not be pandered is the deal bought or sold which still by default is neither good or bad it's the pretense that's the baffle damn me if I ain't back again to what if there's nothing to hide
it's the freedom of imperfection
the wealth of if I please
over and out
June - 4
sitting meet and greet at the door I'm reminded of class of upstairs downstairs relegation of selfimportance of falling flat on your face ahyes there it is
sitting meet and greet at the door I'm reminded of how our hospital our sfgh town couldn't wouldn't doesn't work without the aggregate and conglomerate did not start out as a dirty word
sitting meet and greet at the door with the rest of the weary and wounded I think hell if it weren't for us the rest of youall wouldn't have a damn thing to do none of them being allowed in
June - 5
a time of change
one of those well worn epithets flung with the same bantering insouciance as hi how are you but we are talking transformation not california white light beatific new age not neonationalistic johnnygetyourgun rallyaround fervor happening to some flung far them or yourcummy neighbor best friend sister for that matter this is falling on my face don't you get it yet change this is my dog died my cat died change this is moving to the desert change this is packing up and moving west change this is what if there is no place to hide change
June - 6
asif
there's no time to waste as if the next wave won't doesn't wait as if the wind could blow backwards as if I won't is can't as if godly gets you off the hook as if father knows best as if might is right as if I would if I could as if this hurts me more than it hurts you as if there were another way as if when it rains it pours as if clothes make the man
thingis it's a matter of style the glass halfempty the house burned down now I can see the moon
June - 8
falling flat on my face was prelude to the memory of place of possibility of unfolding of surprises of holes in the ground of bumps in the road and she the ohso presbyterian she nodded knowingly just the same when I said asking for the time off would have been much easier and still I tend toward making it all so complicated organizing it fussing with it rearranging it as if it were the furniture in my house as if it were some travel itinerary as if my intervention were divine as if the going weren't part of getting there
June - 9
ahh not waiting for revisited
for the sun behind the fog the perfect wave the perfect love better times vacation lunch you inspiration
which is not translated as settling for or no idea or no backbone or substance
it's the freedom of just the same of anyway of inexorable
the compare&contrast of wishing I would have if only the one that got away
without hesitation she said when I asked her if she was happy yes! I'm too old not to be
the others feeling they still had to time to wrestle with imperfections as if only and waiting for
June - 10
funny how we I get stuck having planned how something will should go how I will manage something asif it were a thing inert no wind no air to be managed leaving out whimsy and weathermen thunder and laughter as if it were just about me and my vision as if I were a lady as if I knew best as if that was the way it had to be as if I were right and didn't know enough to just let it be or had no imagination
as if possibility and between the lines were a minefield
too silly
June - 12
it's the whole thing of being jerked around and getting up into it mad and righteous thing is just like a wave no matter how full of fury on the way in looking like the realdeal slip sliding back down the slope on the way out it's a whole other gig takes on a whole new set of mysteries sometimes the damn things just disappear tricks or gumption traps full of promise and victory and nothing important ah yes the illusion of importance makes a big splash and the principle of it is still just a stick up my ass
June - 13
funny how editing puts a cramp in changes the shape of the soul it's definitely a different pair of shoes so I've been out of step sitting down to write and of course nothing came out right rite I can see there is a resetting of a mark happening here no matter how many metaphors have been put to the task and for all of the clatter the day in day out laundry paying bills feeding the cats watering the garden work being in relation to goes on with grace but goddamn it there's still some thing I'm missing hear(!)
June - 14
so the racket bangson the litany the perseverative the cudchewing the snippets the rattle of non compensatory not industrial as in the my fall was not industrial oh way industrial it was but I wasn't on the clock and it wasn't hospital property anyway I looked at it it came out wanting for common sense wanting for the this happening to common people meanwhile over my shoulder in the flats the orange moon full in a dark blue sky caught up with me and took me the distance to sunrise an unabashed red disc coming up over the bay, glorious
June - 30
so in the common sense not very common department it took Them a month asin the whole damn month to get that my industrial fall was Industrial and that walking in front of the hospital to start work was infact being on hospital property for the express purpose of work(ing) as opposed to with malicious intent driving 70 miles to the city so that I could fall on my face and bilk the citycounty treasury of thousands of dollars in medical bills
talk about pissy prissy & otherwise without class it definitely was behaviour unbecoming of health care(sic) providers
July - 12
it's the undisguised bringing yourself wherever you go and coming as you are this work ethic thing an interesting tag a fine distraction one of those redundancies you know like feeling sad feels sad whiners whine fact is I never leave home without my style my particular élan my class, ah yes money is an easy hook to hang it on but it's transparent, it's the ethic the sensibility the heart the compassion that peg a man, labels a woman
I'd be a well read street corner whore any day of the week rather than prostitute for the company line
July - 14
I sit like an usher at a church door meeting & greeting those who have come to the hospital at a table instead under the auspices of the sheriff's department who offer anynumberof versions of the truth as to why it got started 9/11 is as good as any but our neighborhood the citycounty hospital is gated now
no longer open to the community it serves the tired the poor the misbegotten the shot; a sign of the times
under other circumstances I nurse with different tools
no under other circumstances I nurse on the seventh floor behind a locked door
July - 15
I sit there because I'm disabled one in a club of weary&wounded or the driftergrifters left in the wake
of fiscal turbulence their jobs part&parcel of the bait and switch that went into negotiating the city's budget
looked askance at by those who think to know us recognize us but the context is not quite right
we sit in the margin downclassed fraternizing below our station
and worse goes the clucking wasting our talents
I beg to differ it's another in your face notso humble reminder that anything is what you make of it
it's what I bring with me
July - 16
sitting meet&greet is not so much the task of daypasses it is a mingling getting involvedwith the thesaurus says with the people in our neighborhood in a short but elegant hello may I help you where are you going today relationship that builds accretes day after day after day after day
hey how're ya doing he'd said you look familiar where do I know you from
he'd worn a quebec city t-shirt the last time he'd come to visit his lover and he'd gone on--while I was making out his day pass--about the trip they'd taken there together
July - 17
it's simply about deciphering us allofus about seeing me in you doing if you will unto others but I've been lifted in the mean time above my station to mingle in yet another venue where some would cluck I belong even less and others I'd guess imagine I'm aspiring to or think I should be having been allowed or invited to put my talents skills to better(sic) use & I think of pat underwood who when she accepted me into the masters program made sure to say
this is about having better nurses at the bedside not therapists or administrators
July - 26
unseeable
since no one sees me there metaphorically speaking no one sees me there literally, even looking straight at me, bent over as he was saying I'm the chief of psychiatry thinking he wouldn't need a daypass just the same as the housekeeper who'd left her ID badge upstairs in her other purse or who the hell knows it wasn't until he was all the way through his litany that he saw mejudiwhoheknows looking at him as if I could give a damn about chief of psychiatry because the point is downstairs he's as faceless as the housekeeper is upstairs
July - 29
teaching
because you value what they know she'd said I do but it's also because they tell you what you need to know I mean that's the trick to mind reading isn't it reading someone's mind, daang it's about language, and yes of course falling on my shoulder was an accident but as richard said about astrology it's just another language so when she tried to say that diagnosis is important yes I suppose it is but fact is that's not what most nurses tendto keyoff so it was surelynot helpful in getting them where she wanted them to go
August - 2
we'd just been talking about him the man with his wife whose names we had forgotten whom we'd met some seven months before surfing he 'd been beached his rotator cuff torn I still have his card Solotango had said maybe you could give him a call see how long the getting back into the water took and there he was (sans wife I couldn't help but notice now that he was back in the water but nevertheless) when we pulled in at salmon creek
daaaaang next we'll work on the million dollar gig
about 6 months I think he said
August - 5
I collected some holey odin stones and will refresh The Bundle preparing for this surgery that I'm pretending I'm not having
back to too young not for falling in love but for the sustaining for the depth for the valor nevermind the discretion for having the breadth and the breath the room for two nevermind tea&sympathy or wine&roses
life I must say is so much less complicated without complications...there are times I think I won't write him anymore because she blablabla and then I think holyhell I'll write when I'm so moved
he'll answer or not
the end
music:bennygoodman
August - 6
my aesthetic is changing not in keeping with a season a tide but with the changing shape of bones (dear god) more allowing though not necessarily more tolerant
at a precipice I still see more than choice
love, as metaphor for change, like wind intangible ineffable but you know it when you see it
so I get that I tripped and maybe the shoulder dismantling is just the unequiovacality of having dumped the load and a priori there being nothing to not have noticed that will not be noticed
& to repair is a favorite place as well as a fixing
August - 10
whatdoyoucallit
there I went into The Bundle emptying the bounty the plenty the wisdom blood sweat tears parsley sage rosemary thyme feathers and trees opening it to mischief to the air to today to temptation and just like that the center beading loosed needing repair and once again hands to heart head bowed it seemed a fitting act to rebead the eye of the sun's circle I smiled and was content to be reworking and recentering and reawakening favor and grace and abiding trust in come what may
ha already it's worked some of its wonder, it's just that simple
August - 11
so all the receivers are on the hook the mill has been tread the weights lifted the altars dusted the courtyard swept the books balanced the sheets folded the wine racked books bought The Bundle redone the date confirmed I am impatient
I am tired unused to the amorphous nature that has been my work in the last three months having been unaware of the energy conservation inherent in routine; has nothing to do with self starting or anxiety, just weightlessness has its own weight
imagine mars being the closest it's been in hundreds of thousands of years right now
August - 12
so did you tell maman they wanted to know, yes I did in a lalala by the way I fell a while ago and may need surgery sort of way and then we went on to other parts of the conversation somehow it being important for me to minimize the story the advent and to be settled with the difference between this time&last time and especiallyso since I'd sworn
I'd never get on the table again & here I go anyways she called back a shortwhile afterward saying essentially nice try do you have a date for this surgery: aug18 1stcase
August - 16
down to the wire finally and at the last minute we ran into town to get pull up elastic waist pants sort of like the flood it was is hard to imagine all the different uses one puts her two hands two arms to so embedded is all that day in day out ordinary stuff that in spite of ourselves we take for granted; speaking of binaries indeed buttons zippers and eye goo going to be a definite challenge and driving computing writing making coffee opening jars eating sandwiches ha doing more than one thing at a time oh well
August - 17
totems charms bundles prayers cards but this time it turns out to havebeen a pen with a multi-coloured string that goes around your neck and a barrel that seconds as a flashlight with lights which shine
red green blue
and red&green and blue&red and blue&green and red&blue&green and then as if a lighthouse beacon it cycles through all the colors
a great comfort in the dark and the doubt oh me of little faith
and in the beginning there was the word and the word was the light you gotto love it
goodgod I'm a mess as johnny would say
August - 18
home again home again my fat hen again I marvel at the horrors of modern medicine and how inured we as providers have become you've got to be tough and stupid or maybe dogged and I remember why I said I wouldn't do it again--it's just plain hard yeahyeahyeah of course I will no doubt do it again when the need arises but like many other things it's not for sissies the faint of heart or the wishywashy no matter how relentless
I was well cared for and tended to by nurses doctors and the oneandonly solotango but double daamn
August - 19
depending on the kindness of others strangers ornot is the poetry of humanness&humility of grace&bounty of poverty&community of receiving of needing of solace&the farreaches of goodness
there've been no strangers bearing gifts and gifts none so strange either lime pies burritos baths reassurance folded cleanclothes and a cool breeze riffling the leaves
reminding me that with only one arm everything takes twice as long andthat the nurses at our blessedlynot soouptown hospital knew I'd as likely piss on the floor asnot when I said I need to go pee so it was nowonder they said we'd beglad to help you
August - 21
it being Thursday the Ladies of the PenHouse came having decided ahead of time to hell with missing the meeting even if I was into oblivion hied which I was not I was dressed in receiving clothes and even answered the door and then john called to see if I wanted a burrito brought and micheal called to see if I needed intucking and the good
solotango called to see if I was ok and my other husband and second mother called just to say hey and musette
dropped off fresh roasted coffee what more could a girl ask for
August - 25
so after the post-op visit in the category of having some healing fun we went gay shopping of course stopping in on our way to Dandelion--which sells as they themselves say everything from a glow in the dark st micheal which of course we bought two of to $5000 couches and prompts one to notice aloud how nice, nice things are--at the ribbon store which transports one to another realm altogether putting one in mind of buttons and beads and sugar plums not to mention times gone by
one could see without too much trouble the strings attached
August - 26
so I hear myself having reminded legions before me that everything takes practice and that we're good at our daily life in somuch as we practice it daily it's been only 10 days and I've already forgotten how to go to The City and I find myself feeling shy and country cousinish and get this out of style though I'd guess none have disconnected
today's the first post-op visit and for all of it even yesterday sort of bluish the blush having worn thin I washed my hair in the sink one-handed by myself and needed no extra pain meds
August - 27
true heroes part 10
away I was going to chatter asking about this&that and then all of a sudden realized for the fortyeleventh time how much body sense body wisdom he had and then understood that he was there on the inside knowing just before I would have had to say enough that enough had been reached and that I could should join him dance with him shoulder to shoulder there in the shoulder my shoulder where he was most comfortable most welcome and most honest; it's his hands that give shape to his heart his voice otherwise too loud
August - 28
the oddest part was havinggone to the hospital where usually I work in a less than clear asin drugged state of mind cloaked in woeful self-absorbtion that is so not consistent with being able to do the work we do asin that kind of mindset would get you killt or at the very least trampled hazed scorned and otherwise upended in ways that only those who are not stupid but fox crazy can
so the ohsocute surgeon has given me dispensation for 2handed typing and arm flapping so now as a writer and good EasternEuropean I can start expounding again thanksbetogod
August - 29
today's victory was my arm raised over my head gads if that wasn't like spring cleaning and finally getting the bags out to st vincent's
and I'm back at the thankyou gig and what it feels like thanks for folding the clothes thanks for repairing my shoulder thanks for giving me back my body thanks for filling the hummingbird feeder thanks for driving me to the appointment thanks for getting the groceries thanks for coming thanks for going thanks for asking thanks for being there thanks for your kindness
ah the upstairs downstairs of thanks be to goddess et al
August - 30
so the ten day mark comes and goes and now it's settled by and large into the more ongoing aggravation it will be for a while the surgeon's work done mine just beginning and I begin to remember the stuff they said most likely I would forget the horror the flipside of the wonder of the local block they did on my shoulder to lessen the amount of general anaesthesia I would need from a pain management point of view and I remember waking & asking--having no damn sense of it as in nodamnsenseofit at all--where is my arm
September - 2
impatient I'm impatient which will only fly in the face of the known trajectory of orthopedic recovery and for all of it fact is I'm doing great but my high pain threshold not withstanding I forget how much energy it takes and for reasons I don't understand I'm in a hurry to cut back on the meds and that is just making the amplitude of the peaks and valleys that much more ragged and I know it for the gumption trap it is but...
and for allofit I've already graduated from an 8 oz garbanzo dangle to a full pound
September - 5
sass
so it was a new guy the substitute goodnice enough but distant as one could imagine the role of the perdiem but too wasteful for my dime afterall he has his own wisdom his own touch his own sense to bring --right?-- and I lust greedily after all offerings worth ofcourse their salt but we came together as these things fallout for what I had to offer the wisdom of the crone too old to sass but young enough to dis(sic) it out and can you believe he was soyoung that he'd didn't knowfrom don't sass your elders
September - 10
so I almost made it well I mean I did go to bed actually without having taken any vicodin since the night before but just after midnight I woke to tossing and turning and resistance was futile and I succumbed but, half in twentyfour hours is a victory and I woke this morning absent my own fog ah these small victories and that goes for having enough reach to put the shower cap on myself--never thought of that did you...
and in the background I'm working on well we'll call it a story but you never know
state: abegezundt
September - 11
so I'm back wow--
thinking, poems are like snaphots of a feeling of a state of an instant and stories are movies of an idea ideas of an unfolding...and I remember that better is not waiting to be and that it's not about getting back to the way one was but going forward to a place one has never been and The Youngster said thanks when he had a minute with me alone by the way for my words, they helped--and that scotch neat is a mighty fine substitute at sundown
and that faith, is simply eating breakfast
September - 13
what stopped you there he asked as I was raising my arm over my head try again he said and he was right how'd you know I asked he laughed as is his way to distract at first no no I said how did you know I don't know he said no no I said how did you know I persisted until he answered me and explained the ways I had mispoken one would say had it been about words...I liked watching him--another--mindread as itwere watching him read the beads reaffirming him for the wizard he is
September - 15
sleeping one of those it all depends kind of things on context and how you look at it a telltale a barometer a prognosticator too and all the damn steps going to bed falling asleep staying asleep going back to sleep sleeping and no--princess notwithstanding--it's not the pea thing but right now it's a bitch not that I'm not rested it's just hard work you know ha the proverbial hard night's day well you know what I mean...and I know how many words there are for snow I wonder sometimes how many there might be for pain
September - 16
I think I made a pact with the devil the other night the cats all over the damn bed up and down in and out pet me now and I just wanted to sleep and I just wanted no nagging no disturbance just wanted to lie in the bed and not feel any particular part of my body, no-- not be aware of any particular discomfortaggravationPAIN and especiallynot having to do with my shoulder that the cats were jumping all around on to get their fair share of say hello to me now attention and along came the devil hooya
September - 18
who's the fairest of them all
let's see I was with The Youngster again yesterday the appointments having been skewed in error and I asked not petulantly mindyou why me but feeling truthbetold a little petulant & a funny unbidden proprietary twinge because
it had been 5 days and my shoulder was feeling stiff and lalala ahbut it's the proprietary twinge that's the rub here sotospeak
recognizing it owning&acting on it notmentioning the self-indulgence
and then getting over not so much it but myself and smiling just the same at the ongoing if somewhat quieter
aren't I special too, aren't I
September - 19
the craft is one thing but the art is another and it's the magic the passion of the art which is the precursor the intrinsic nature of the pair-bond that engenders fosters makes possible gives way to healing that sends one headlong down the getting better path and my objection to the perdiem of course is that they don't bring their art, only their craft...but truthbetold TheYoungster&I having worked that out the first time actually did just fine
having no flesh of his own though I must wonder wherein his passion resides and more importantly how it is restored
September - 20
sitting on the porch is not like sitting on the fence and I wonder these days at the many ways there are to be sidelined
fact is sitting in the line-up even if they are just on the porch swatting flies is one leg up...they retain kibitzing rights they receive an honorarium and fact is if they're in the right place at the right time damn if they can't still ride the sucker on the nose into the beach and call it a good day
meanwhile I'm still drydocked on the porch swatting flies, but I got me a pile
September - 21
sitting early morning on the deck with the geranuims the cats vying for lap position the redwoods standing vigil at my flanks hosting squirrels shrieking crows and jays who are mightily about their chores the river just over there and the fog inbound I'm reminded it's September the fall of a new year 5764--the shape of things is what we make it--there are times my arm feels like an arm and others where I lose sight of the imagining
there are times I'm so becalmed as to not be seen but mostly I'm beset by a mighty restlessness
September - 22
solace
man in a blue sweater yearning another one beached I watch him hands animated as he is talks to his wife roped into this wave watching vigil against her better judgement anxious to get back to she's not even sure what but it beatsthe hell outofthis go go go he yells paddle paddle paddle he leans forward helping
for better&worse I've not yet the reach to fold the stinking sheets but they rollup just fine sohey you want'em folded do it your owndamn self on the otherhand
why would you ever fold'em when they canbe stuffed just fine
September - 29
I was reminded of a lesson learned I suppose more than once the last time learned surfing under the guise of if I'm not able to do what I'm supposed to I will do what I can sowhen I said I hadn't done an exercise because it hurt he said do what you can even a little is better than none and we'll take what we can get reminding me that taking what one can get is not always not even necessarily settling for it is sometimes merely along the way and it carries no inherent shame...it's my party
September - 30
I think of keeping the faith--a shared task one in relation to another as friends lovers practitioners of the healing arts
foes just the same and a task a doing an undertaking of another shape altogether in relation to oneself and the ways we come to know and recognize ourselves and the nature of commitment to our passions & I think of the 365 times I did not bow out and the countless ways I was tempted
I think of the 365 times I sat down to write and the 365 gumption traps missed and I think way to go girl
October - 1
a successful trip into the city to see the doctor who anyway I slice it carryingon justlike a schoolgirl notwithstanding is just that kind we used to embarrass ourselves over when we used to do that kind of thing he's got those paulnewman blues and damn who can even listen to what he says though I heard him say loud&clear there are those we need to hurry along and those we need to slow down and he thought canyou imagine that I was being impatient & gave me no quarter to be lifting morethanorequalto 10pounds for another two weeks for cryingoutloud
October - 2
I feel plain odd not happy or unhappy not content nor discontent not at peace nor at this particular moment restless but discomforted disconcerted or perhaps more accurately caught in a perfect libra disappointment in the canyon between is and couldshould be in the chasm of not good enough thankfully though I am not out striving but rather in the company of good friends drinking gentleman jack resetting the mark ha let the righteous winds of libra blow up someone elses skirt
and thankfully I was reminded the good ohsohandsomedoctor notwithstanding that I'm old enough to make my own decisions
October - 3
I don't really even know what he looks like in the same vein that even in the middle of the flood even standing waist deep in water even canoing through the livingroom it was hard to imagine what it was like
I don't know what he looks like but that is simply to say I know instead what he feels like what he sounds like but I can't remember what MyPhysicalTherapist looks like
all ofasudden I understand what she meant when she used to say I always thought you were bigger
there are parts of this I just hate sortof
October - 4
of course it's just those sticky wicket parts that make it work that are the working parts I mean I can carry on as if I have a schoolgirl crush on the todiefor doctor but fact is here I am in the midst of an intimate relationship with My PhysicalTherapist who aside from that of course has a name but that's part of the problem it's one of those intimate relationships that starts fullblown if rather lopsidedly in the middle without ample prelude
one of those intimate relationships balanced precariously on the codified substrates of professionalboundaries trust passion need healingart
October - 5
in relation to a familiar hamish concept my own bread&butter in fact yet it galls me
there it is asif I'm too ha well put together or as if susceptibility is a weakness
it's a flirtation a trick factis I don't want him as a friend I need him oy it's the beholden to gig safeguarding the importance dressing up the I need you to look like act like quack like a duck when infact it's an elephant
of course he likes me and cares...but the intimacy is the currency of purposeful familiarity; selflimiting selfserving andblessedly it's wholly circumscribed
October - 6
walking the beach yesterday fog sockedin wind gathered in bursts brows furrowed arms close-tucked working lines kicking sand felt good felt fine good as a down the line ride
walking the beach yesterday as coach mentor & not just another groupie wife felt fine felt like I'm retaining kibbitzing rights same as the rest of the old farts
walking the beach yesterday I made the distance from faith (ye of little) to suffering, the way back through a different wilderness altogether
vulnerable a second rate california word for doubt
sad not an understudy by any stretch butrather a cheap window dressing
October - 19
so I'm in the shower eyes closed washing my hair shampoo slipping down my forehead and I realize I'm doing three things I'm mastering three things most people take for granted three things hardwon and hard comeby three things I've had to relearn in the last three years 1st and the most difficult&amazing knowing where I am in space with my eyes closed 2nd closing my right eye tight enough to keep soap out of it 3rd having enough reach in my right arm to lather the shampoo on my head
I don't know about you but I'm just lathered
October - 24
so here I am pissed off put out again by My Physical Therapist who all of a sudden without consulting me without discussing it with me ha making the damn decision on his own without even a for your information eye to eye so I found out from the office help for godssake has decreased my weekly visits from three to two as if it isn't about I'm getting better and in his inestimable judgement twice weekly is more than adequate and actually ample yet I'm left feeling argumentative disappointed and not so much putout (maybe) as leftout goddamn it
October - 27
met an interesting woman on the beach today a cross between Janis Joplin and Apt Trat, both in their better days, she too was beached but with a better lighter spirit than mine--I was looking longingly she was glad enough to be looking it may be sucky but it's a good suck she said afterall you could be in oklahoma by which she meant not here not at the ocean beholding the incredible day incredible view incredible air and simply beholding the incredible good to be alive sentiment that was there for the taking and she was right, namaste!
October - 29
so, if I gotto I will...it's been a week since I saw ThePhysicalTherapist (nevermind MyPhysicalTherapist) because the UtilizationReview division the folks who administer Workmen'sComp around here needed more paperwork&bowing&alms&jumping&bending&scraping (notto mention they waited until the last minute&needed extra prodding) before they'd give dispensation for the requested 2X a week for 4weeks...okok so he knew what he was doing and didn't need my 2¢ which wouldn't have covered shit--but when he asked, as he has a wont to do, how are we doing I could only say wellll, as these things go my shoulder missed you, so there
December - 1
so if I got to I got to
it'd been a week since I saw The Physical Therapist because the Utilization Review Division of the insurance company that does Workmen's Compensation needed extra alms for the bowl before they would okay it which they didn't without extra phone calls and until the last minute...the point being maybe he didn't need my 2 cents since it wouldn't have covered shit got to say sheepsihly
mostly I kept the faith, not to mention ahemmmm that at this (novel writing) juncture 2X a week wasn't imminently more convenient ha! I'm so fullofit
December - 2
on my mark get set went and writ a novel for godsake in a month fuckingawesome it was a dimensional world that started with a single character and an idea and an event and then it multiplied and divided and did whatever it is that cells do cleave and cleave to differentiate become hearts and livers and neurons and beget and on the thirtieth day I rested
interesting astimewent on how I learned all I needed to do was show up and transcribe
interesting astimewent on how I learned that I needed to stepback so I could serve the storyline
December - 3
interesting that the process, the write a novel in a month pointed out did exactly what it was meant to do to be the quintessential get overyourself exercise past the wrong pen wrong time can't do this don't know how need to go to the grocery story never did this before & onto the commitment to the willingness to the risk to the fun past tired nothing to say I don't know what the hell is going to happen next this is shit to just showingup and writing and writing and writing and writing and writing and liking it a lot
December - 4
back to work and already there is scuffling&bullying and justmakingsure aligning&herding going on asif I were trying to get one over on asif I were having too much fun asif I might be pulling something off asif I might be a terrorist of the defrauding kind and in this time of no one knows exactly how it will turn out there is vying afoot for who's the fairest of them all who is the best littlegirl in the world, and it is just thisshit that gives grist to the women can't cut it at the top feedingfrenzy goddess help them
December - 7
so home again home again my fat hen I remember I don't mind don't begrudge having gone forward to work don't begrudge the work to be done I'm just sorry not to have the same amount of time at home but I have to say&moreso remember it is the politics that is killing the privilege of power and worse the hiding behind the skirts behind the pretense of powerlessness as if it gets them off the hook...in the face of that I must remember to point out the obvious...the problem is
I don't feel as powerless as you
December - 8
so I was complaining about being tired and cranky and presto bango bam loading wood into the fire fiddlefarting with just the right piece, now that of course I don't need to find just the right pen or paper I upset the pile and fuckin busted the hell out of my toe as in kilt it dead and now the nail is purple and on ice or rather under frozen shelled edamame and I'm into the wind with my second glass of petit sirah too funny but the shopping is done and I'm wide awake as you might imagine daaaaang
December - 9
scuttling keeps coming to mind leadership styles lying in wait to ask as a nurse with thirty + years of experience at the bedside as a teacher an administrator an elder not to mention my own abc's what is it that they expect from their henchmen or in this case more aptly their wenchwomen who godfooledthem seem to be modeling seen but not heard and worse giving over a mind of their own having bent over so far it's their own damn asses they are kissing
they lay down impertinence I raise and call with too old to be in trouble
December - 13
it's a funny thing this offering this offering up and it runs its course
I look at her, staples buried in her arm and like hobo sign they've left marks for one another about cutting tools the paper towel holders have metal springs you can detach and of course the magazines have staples who even bothers with the plastic knives though in a pinch...and I'm most aware of how little it is up to us, aware of providing temporary sanctuary as perhaps the best there is to offer & I see that it could be as empty as offering jesus
December - 14
in relationto comes up at this time of thinkingof and thumbing through address books and lists that stand in for ghosts of xmas past & damn if I still don't look forward to MyXHusband's card that he has steadfastly sent for the last 25 years and damn if it never is what I would've wanted--an obvious&cogent of course reminder--but I was thinking of being back at work: a vast and treacherous shoal the politics there of relating to the feints the layers the traps the mines and I realize that's what paints everyone there that gray color of dearth
December - 15
though really I was thinking about My Physical Therapist who I miss in between times who I see all over the place, that is am put in mind of by the sound of someone's voice or a laugh or a comment, and realize that it, the intimacy, the profound proscribed intimacy that at one time I couldn't imagine how I would live without runs its course has its place takes its place and yet even over is never over and I still struggle with the boundary with the exchange with offering with ohdeargod what it means or how it works
December - 26
so she'd asked if I wanted to be a manager or an administrator and I said I'd done that already and that I was no longer willing or able to put up with the politics of that the co-opting and packaging of things unpalatable and the rendering unto caesar and that I found our particular administrators as a group singularly lacking in courage never mind conviction and that I had much more control and power as just a staff nurse given the coterie as it was now configured
not to mention that my husband is already up their butt sotospeak
December - 30
end of the year posturing: a prelude
going home to maman with two of my brothers & my niece an altogether new constellation of players
I want to take The Novel but it is so heavy I think as in you must be kidding&get over yourself it is about chances not to be missed chapters coming to a close & I already miss him MyPhysicalTherapist though truth be told I wasn't there the last time I was there and he knew it called it called me out and I didn't budge
&the river hosted the bigass rains without overflowing her banks thistime
January - 10
so the how am I story goes on a pace I can carry wood up the stairs but can't yet with certainty put my luggage in the overhead bins I can stoke the fire but not reach sideways and up into the closet nor without a twinge reach across my chest and over my shoulder or too well back behind my head nor when lying on my back lay my arm flush on the ground but I can punch you in the nose and fold the sheets do without MyPhyscialTherapist
and ThetodieforDoctor is no longer as handsome as My Husband
January - 11
I'm in a fine cranky mood this morning, I recognize it for the already not enough time it is and took some time in the face of that to stretch metaphorically & literally, butmoreso as the annoyance of yet again needing to deal with ohmygod whatif the generic they read that and the anticipatory anxiety of showing up to write the last scene of maggie going bad sotospeak not to mention the aggravation of having to make a special trip downtown to deal with TheHealthServiceSystem because Payroll fuckedup and I'm on the runway to lose my benefits if I don't payup
January - 18
so truth be told I had a twinge driving home yesterday thinking of him of MyPhysicalTherapist that I'd never see again who dropped out of my life in just the same way he dropped in as a matter of course eventhough when he askedat my last appointment what now what do you want to do now I said well you know there was a time I didn't think I could survive without you and now I can, there you are he said knowing our work was done
and there I am already missing him like I would an arm
January - 30
in the foreground my father lies dying and again it is hard to imagine
and just like canoeing in the living room made the flood no more real or the pretense of knowing where in the hell we were in the middle of that night on a freight train going the wrong direction would have made getting off at the next stop noeasier the calls the volleys the conversations to triangulate on the polestar of truth make no difference and are not helping me decide it is time to go I wait still as if it were not really happening
February - 14
he was so big in so many ways so immovable so fundamental so much as it turns out instrumental in me not being but becoming me that it is hard to imagine as in it misses the point to say he is gone and closer to the truth--his rolling over in his not soon to be inhabited grave notwithstanding and how I know equally notwithstanding--to say it was only the flesh he gave up and his indomitable spirit in keeping with the spirit (sic) of things did not degrade but became MC2 andso there is light after death
February - 17
and my physical therapist called the follow up call the promised follow up call to see how I was doing to make sure things were going okay and as these things fall out...our work well done... it is, and the twinge was as all good twinges are full fledged but as is their course dissipating
and in the background faux spring just come and gone it is raining again and we those of us who know these things don't need no stinking weatherman or computer models to tell us these rains the river won't host without breaking the bank
February - 21
and as these things went I missed couldn't make the doctor's appointment but it was by that time a mere formality the three months of ttwa temporary transfer of work assignment already up so I got dispensation by phone are you sure are you sure are you sure she kept asking and I was no fuss no muss
and the first week back to work back to real nursing behind me, I'm glad
and after all is said&done what's gone missing is a life'sworth of ambientanxiety that seems to have dissipated with my father's perfect death what a perfect 2ndchance
February - 23
2day rides again
the wonderful irony is that my shoulder ofcourse isnot the strongest part of my get together nor necessarily upto snuff yet but it surely is themost stable thankyouverymuch & bows to the goodohsocutedoctor not to mention The incredblykind&thoughtfulNurse who made it all bearable & myphysicaltherapist
I slept like a rock sinking to the bottom of the sea waves notwithstanding
&since I'd opted not to go atall the day before I think solotango was flaggergasted at my total lackof prevaricating yesterdayit wasn't even about how desparate are you (to get in the water) but simply how perfectly ready I was
February - 24
nine months later tells the whole story
in the end or the beginning the metaphors the lessons the ways there are of interacting with ones passions remain the same, showing up or not with glee or not with ambient anxiety or not with expectations and chatter or not with litany&refrains or not
it was a perfect day as it turns out to get back in the water not that the surf was perfect but it was all perfectly imperfect perfectly not too crowded or too hot not too sunny or too cold not too windy & I was disparately(sic) happy
March - 23
there is something about not overcorrecting going on, something about the elegance of a still mind and taking what one can get like when it's time to stand stand as opposed to missing the beat listening first to a mind and the miss is as good as a mile, the body in relation to the surface of the board on the wave comes to its own feet and now that the anxiety is gone I get tangled instead in my leash
I stood because that was what I could get
ain't that just too elegant and now I'm plenty stoked
