Hey Good Lookin’

What you got cookin’?

Yeah.

Back to work.

Back to doing the deal.

Back to my routine.

But joyfully so.

Heart full of love and sunshine and spice and all things nice.

I got up and took a nice hot shower and washed the travel out of my hair, though, truly, my hair longs for more travel, it does, you know; ate a lovely breakfast, drank some good coffee, and did some writing before hitting the road and heading into work.

My legs were not as sore as I feared they would be what with not riding my bicycle in over a week and I got to work quite quickly, falling back into the pattern of the traffic as though I had never left.

But I did.

And there would be flurries of memories that would whirl about my head like swallows at dusk swooping through my heart and I would find myself smiling.

“Hey, hey pretty girl!” A homeless man hollered at me.

Thanks sugar.

It’s nice to be acknowledged.

I learned a long time ago to accept a compliment when given one.

I have been complemented so much recently that I feel seen, really seen and that helps me to continue to be myself and well, maybe help some one else be seen, held, touched, heard.

We all want to be heard.

I was happy and the day was off to a good start.

I arrived at work early and stretched and posted up my photographs from this past weekend, not all of them, mind you, but quite a few, and I was pleased to see them.

I wish I had some to put here, I really did get some great shots of art at the MOCA and some fun shots of the ferris wheel out on the Santa Monica Pier, but for whatever reason, my computer is not upgrading properly with my iPhoto and I haven’t been able to download the pictures.

I will have to address this soon.

I actually have a back log of photos on my phone and I would like to have them on my computer, which also backs up to my Crash Plan support and if I should have something happen to my phone I won’t lose them.

The house at work was empty and I set about getting it ready for the return of the family who came into town about an hour and a half before I left for my Monday night commitment in the Inner Sunset.

Even without the boys I had plenty to do.

Striped both beds and washed all the linen and the boys laundry that wasn’t taken care of, cleaned out the humidifiers in both boys rooms and put them away in storage.

I cleaned out the refrigerator and washed it down.

I made a list of market stuff that needed to be bought.

I co-ordinated with the mom and went off to the corner market and then made a really big trip to BiRite.

I washed, prepped, and cleaned all the goodies I brought back and proceeded to make food for the families eminent arrival: pan roasted organic chicken breasts with garlic, sea salt, black pepper, smoked paprika, thyme, and parsley; oven roasted garlic and olive oil brushed cauliflower; sushi rice; and then I prepped all the vegetables that needed to be cut up so the mom can make her favorite beef stew in the morning in the slow cooker.

I put it all together in a couple of containers and all she has to do is dump it in the slow cooker, and voila!

Another meal for the week done.

I ran down to Anthony’s Cookies on Valencia and 25th and bought four chocolate chip cookies for dessert and to celebrate the boys placement in school for the fall.

I re-made the beds, did the compost, tidied up, tallied up my travel expenses from the Sonoma trip and had enough time to sit for a moment and drink some tea before they pulled in.

It was good to see the boys.

Really good.

They are such sweet pies.

I got hugs and the down low on all the things I missed, not that I feel like I missed anything this weekend, I feel like I did just fine, and I showed the boys all my photos from the trip.

Just like I promised them I would.

Dinner got ate.

The dog got more than her fair share.

Cookies got gobbled with milk.

I built the boys a fort using the two high chairs, a blanket, and a bunch of pillows, then happily took my leave with a message about, what are you doing later on my phone.

Why.

I’m hanging out with you, friend.

Which is why I am getting the blog done now.

We do have a tendency to get caught up in conversation and despite having talked and talked and talked over the weekend, I suspect that there might still be more to talk about.

Let the conversation begin.

I am all ears.

And blonde hair.

“Oh!  What happened to the pink?” She asked this evening.

The daily swimming in the pool in Sonoma sucked it right out of my hair, it’s very blonde right now, and to tell the truth, I think I like it better than the pink, in its own way, it’s prettier and beachy and feels sun-kissed.

Which is what my whole day felt like whenever I stopped to contemplate my life and the experiences happening around me.

Sun kissed.

I told the boys they brought the sunshine with them from Sonoma.

But.

I suspect I may have brought a few rays of it from Los Angeles.

Just a teeny tiny bit.

Even though, haha, it rained off and on the first day I was there.

Despite the tears that fell from the sky, the sun shone through again and again.

Just like my life.

The tears may fall, happy and sad, but overall.

It’s a sunshine day.

It’s a sunshine life.

Jesus I feel like the Partridge Family here.

But it is true.

It also made me think that perhaps one day, not until after graduate school of course, I may need to go where the sun shines a little more than it does here, the fog and the grey get me down a little more than I am loathe to let on.

But.

That’s a ways away.

And I don’t want to live in the future.

Especially when I can make it sunny at any time.

In my heart.

What A Ride

In so many iterations I cannot fathom all of the ramifications right now.

I just got home from Los Angeles.

Although technically I just got home from a late night sushi dinner at Raw on 19th and Taraval.

Which was awesome, great company, fresh sushi, fast, good price, and hello, open at 10p.m. on a Sunday, and busy at that.

I know, you’re not supposed to eat sushi on a Sunday, or so the wives’ tale goes, but we were desperate, mostly me, despite not feeling all that hungry, I had a lot of iced coffee today, for food.

I knew better than to come home and not have some dinner in my body and the only other option would have been a late night run on Safeway and then cooking at my house.

I am not in the mood to cook.

I have so much on my mind, in my heart, in my soul, smeared across the windshield with golden light and thoughts and dreams and words, the touch of a hand, the constant conversation, the incessant pressing of love against my face as the sun set in the West as we drove up from the South, watching the roiling clouds of grey teeming over the San Francisco hills.

I have not had my cell phone off for so much time in years, nor, as you, my dear reader, may have notice, my computer.

There was no wifi at the Air BnB we were staying at.

I could catch some service on my iPhone, but sorry folks, there is no way in hell I’m going to write a blog on my phone.

Nope.

So.

Days without a blog.

Although not days without writing.

I did bring my notebook and I did do writing and as I was unpacking my go bag–I am damn skippy proud of how well I packed–I pulled out my new Claire Fontaine notebook, in deep sage green, with creamy lined paper, and taped the effects of the trip in the front page of my journal.

The first class ticket on American Airlines.

Man.

First class.

Thank you friend.

It was so nice.

Even for such a short trip, to have priority at the gate, to have faster check in, to scoot right through security, I felt spoiled and princess like.

So much so and so quickly did I get through that I actually had time to grab a manicure before I boarded.

I have never paid so much for a manicure in my life, but I thought, when someone you dearly adore says, let’s celebrate, I’m flying you down first class to LA, let’s go look at the Rothkos,

(OH MY GOD THE ROTHKO’S)

And I’ll put you up with me at my Air BnB in Santa Monica, it’s ok to splurge on a six-dollar cold pressed organic iced coffee from Equator Coffee and then go sit down and have your nails done.

You are officially on a celebration weekend.

The celebrating.

It was celebratory.

I danced up and down the steps of the Walt Disney Concert Hall designed by Gehry.

I lifted my face to the sky and marveled at the scoops and swoops and the neon lights bouncing off the building.

We walked around it and marveled at the symmetry of the building and talked and talked and talked.

There was much talking.

My friend and I had so much to talk about.

We could be talking right now.

Except.

Well, mama has to get up and go to work tomorrow and he’s got work to do too and the celebration will continue in my heart as I look at the other small pieces of paper taped next to that first class place ticket.

(OH MY GOD THE ROTHKO’S)

Should I ever have a child, a little boy, I would name him Rothko.

I was that overwhelmed, awed, blown away and just enamored with the pieces I saw.

I am speaking of the first day of my two-day party to celebrate (said celebration for the receiving the graduate school scholarships that I have been awarded over the past two weeks) and the trip to the MOCA.

The Museum of Contemporary Art.

It was just intense and overwhelming and amazing.

As before mentioned the Rothko’s were astounding, the humanness of the art, the luminosity of the paint, the spectrum of emotion I felt being in that gallery surrounded by the presence of such love and glory and art.

Art, love, God.

It’s all the same isn’t it?

I got to experience so much of that this weekend, I am still reeling with the love and kindness, the compassion of my friend, the utmost generosity.

I didn’t pay for anything.

I was spoiled and treated like a princess and ate lovely food and got driven all over the city and well, I even got to do that little girl thing that I most wanted to do but was also perhaps most resistant to ask for.

I got to go to the Santa Monica Boardwalk and go for a ride on the roller coaster and the Scrambler.

And.

The ferris wheel.

To be on the top of the circle, with some one so dear to me, to be swung high into the velvet of God’s deep indigo sky with the waves rolling in under the boardwalk and the smell of funnel cake and popcorn, or the happy screams of little kids on the roller coaster and the joy, the joy of being alive, present in the moment, so amazing.

I cannot quite even begin to comprehend all the ramifications of what this weekend has wrought for me.

Next to the MOCA ticket and the first class ticket and the postcard is my Zoltar fortune.

None your business.

Some things too sacred and special to share.

Some love you want to hold against your heart.

For fear that the bottom will drop out like it did that time you were kissed on the couch and you will never be the same again.

I will never be the same again.

And that is just alright with me.

I may have stepped off the ferris wheel, giddy and giggly and wobbly with my heart bouncy and bright and my smile so large it must have lit the sky a small bright star of love on the cusp of the ocean, the edge of the sea, the beginning of a new world view shimmers into sight.

But I am still riding high.

Still celebratory in my joy and the love I was able to bear witness to and receive, in the capacity for honest communication and appreciation of life, art, the heart, opening and breaking and making more space for more feelings and more.

Yes.

More.

And more.

Love.

I’ll buy that ticket any day of the week.

It’s a ride I never want to stop and regardless of what happens next.

I know that ferris wheel in my heart will continue to revolve.

And.

Evolve.

It will go the distance.

Five Ibuprofen

And broken blood vessels in my left eye.

“It was a long day,” I sobbed into the phone earlier to my friend.

I hadn’t realized I was hemorrhaging in my eye until after I had taken a shower and was drying my hair.

First time since I have been in Sonoma that I have dried my hair, I have been in and out of the pool so much that I just resigned to chlorinated pool hair and have kept braiding and re-braiding it.

But in hopes of not actually getting into the pool tomorrow, which I don’t think is going to happen, I feel an uneasy premonition that I will be flying to LA with wet hair, I took a long shower this evening and deep conditioned the hair and dried it off.

I was putting lotion on my face and reconciling how I was going to pack so that when I was ready to go I can just go, but if I should need anything I can also easily access it, when I noticed the blood in my left eye.

Damn it.

I haven’t had that ever.

I have been diagnosed with stress migraines before, but the broken blood vessels showed up on the backs of my eye, this is a first for me.

It doesn’t feel like a migraine, though at one point I could tell something might be coming on, I suspect it was from the sudden outburst of tears on the phone with my friend.

A friend I had to call up earlier and say, um, guess what?

We don’t have reservations to the Self Discovery Center Bed and Breakfast Inn any longer, they’ve been cancelled.

I received an e-mail this morning letting me know that the center had unexpected plumbing problems that were going to take weeks to resolve and they were shutting down the center until said plumbing issues were fixed, my room reservation was cancelled, so very sorry, best of luck finding new accommodations.

Fuck my mother.

Damn it.

I mean, I’m more annoyed now than I was at the time I received the message.

Probably because it was at the beginning of the day, I had just had lovely breakfast poolside–oatmeal with banana and chopped raw almonds, sprouted pumpkin seeds, and blueberries and the perfect hard-boiled egg, along with a couple of cups of coffee before it got too hot to enjoy drinking coffee.

Plus, I was riding high from the lovely time I had in Sonoma yesterday and a nice phone call at the end of the night outlining all the fun that was to be had in LA this upcoming weekend.

I can’t even fathom that right now.

It’s been a long day and I’m struggling to not cry, partially because I am a vain monster and don’t want my eyes to be all blood-shot and partially I don’t really want to be seen as emotionally so off-balance.

But I am off kilter.

The heat and the length of the day today, the visiting family leaving, the high emotions of the boys as they said goodbye and cried because their friends were leaving.

It all took a toll.

But.

There is light at the end of the tunnel.

Not that the tunnel as been all that long or deep or dreary.

It’s just been what it’s been and yes, Virginia, I have had feelings.

And I have one day left and then a first class flight down to LA to see my friend and do the museums and play.

I mean play.

I also have the biggest hugest most gigantic hug to give him.

He’s been my lighthouse in the fog.

An absolute beacon.

A steady thread of sunshine through this week and a cause, in and of himself, for me to celebrate.

Not to mention all the other things that have happened, like you know, getting a full, well almost full, ride go to graduate school.

I sort of keep forgetting that.

My friend has called every night or I have called him and we have talked and down loaded our days and each of us has been there for the other doing what friends do, being vulnerable and saying the words that need to be spoken.

And hearing what the other person is saying.

I don’t feel as though I am speaking to a stone wall, I feel like I am connecting with another human being and that is such a gift that when I stop and see the fog is burning off in the sun I am amazed that I was ever afraid of the fog at all.

It seems that sometimes it will go on forever, the lonely wandering through the mists, but the light was there, is there, and I am not alone and I can do this and hey.

Look.

Tomorrow is Friday.

And it’s going to be a sunny day.

A little perspective.

Kind words and the encouragement to speak my heart and say what is really happening.

More perspective.

Jesus.

Am I ever glad for someone else’s perspective.

I do not see myself very well, through a glass darkly you could say, so when someone, in a matter of seconds can tell me what he sees, what is the truth of the matter comes out and I am made aware that I was again have been looking at smoke and mirrors.

I am lovable and worthy of love.

I am enough.

I do a really good job.

And I work really hard.

I am seeing the fruits of my labor and they frighten me a bit, it is so easy to shy away from the accolades and the abundance and say, “no, no, really, I’m not worthy.”

But I am.

And in my heart.

I know it.

It just gets foggy in there sometimes.

My friend pulled me through and my heart feels so much better and well, thank god for friends.

Thank God.

“Keep it light and bright,” my best girl friend said to me.

Yes ma’am.

Light and bright indeed.

 Inside my empty bottle I was constructing a lighthouse while all the others were making ships.

-Charles Simic

A Full And Grateful Heart

I got off campus!

I was able to scoot out tonight for a much-needed hour of reprieve.

I read some stuff.

Some things were said.

The deal was done.

Then a woman there gave me a great big hug and said, “here, take these, there’s a woman in the fellowship who brings them fresh every day, they’re obviously for you.”

“They” were a big bunch of Shasta daisies and pink freesia and Echinacea, stunning and sweet and my favorite flowers are daisies, I was so pleased, so warmed, so right exactly where I was supposed to be.

Then  a lady bug pulled up in her truck, she splits time between Sonoma and San Francisco and typically we meet in the city on Friday nights after I get done with work at the Church Street Cafe on Church and Market.

The sunset was happening.

The soft evening breeze caressed my face.

I had left the flowers on the hood of the car in parking lot and she had no clue that a gorgeous bouquet was waiting for her after we checked in and did our reading in the last golden rays of the sun setting in the West, just over Sonoma Mountain.

There was also a, I am not kidding, I do not jest, I couldn’t make this up if I had tried to, a choir practicing hymns in the Community Center behind which were we sat at the picnic table and read from the literature.

She underlined sentences.

I tried to not get choked up.

Watching her young face, framed with long sheaves of strawberry blond hair, catch the last drops of sun from the sky and glow ethereally in the light.

I was stunned

My life is stunning.

My joy and love know no bounds.

I can not believe that this is the life I am leading.

I drove back to Stone Tree with the fullest heart and the utmost gratitude for the sky, for the silhouettes of trees against the indigo dusk, for the navigation on my iPhone telling me where to turn in 1.2 miles turn left.

Thank God for navigation.

I would still be out there back tracking.

I kept telling myself that I should not listen to the voices in my head which said, “you just missed the turn!”

Shush voices.

You’ve never done me right and being directionally retarded, I was more than happy to rely on the navigation system on the phone.

I will be relying on it again as I leave Sonoma and drive straight to SFO on Friday.

I will leave here at 3 p.m.

The drive is 1.38 hours according to the navigation app and I shall drop the rental car at the place on 710 McDonnell road, where I was assured it would only take me 15 minutes to drop of the car and for them to revert the deposit of $150 back to my account.

$150 which I had to deposit since I used my debit card.

$150 which may take two weeks to get back to my account.

Whatever.

Small price to pay to have some autonomy here in Sonoma and how fortuitous when I was offered the trip down to LA that I would have a rental car under my care and all I would have to do is drive straight to the airport.

Is it odd?

Or is it God?

That is a rhetorical question, I know what it is.

I can see this beautiful design for living that I have been granted and I am charmed and loved, graced, and so blessed to have the things in my life that I have.

I mean.

I got some huge news with the scholarships.

Plural, remember.

Not one, but two.

I sent a thank you note to the head of the department letting her know how grateful I was that she had referred me to the scholarship opportunity that has been afforded me and was there any further action that I need to do.

She replied how pleased she was that I was awarded the scholarship and how much they are looking forward to working with me and that all I had to do was accept my financial aid package when it is sent to me.

Done and done.

I accept!

Then I have some one amazing and new, but not new, just never quite seen before, there all along, there doing the deal, just on the outskirts, just beyond my periphery, present in my life.

Such a gift.

This person.

Who is flying me down to Los Angeles to celebrate my success and joy and to accompany me about the museums and to look at the art and to do the deal and have some fun and then road trip it back to San Francisco.

He’ll be picking me up at LAX and we’ll be staying at an Air BnB in Santa Monica.

I think I have a date to go down to the boardwalk and ride the ferris wheel.

I have never been to the boardwalk.

I haven’t really been to LA.

I did ride into it on the Aids LifeCycle ride in 2010, but frankly by the time that adventure was done, I couldn’t care less what city I was in, I just wanted to go home.

The next time I went was about six years ago when I was in a production of Jackie B’s and I travelled down to do a show in Santa Monica.

I got done with work at 6:30p.m. on Friday, got picked up by a friend, and we drove through the night to get into Santa Monica and stay at a tiny house with 9 other people.

I got no sleep.

Did the dress rehearsal.

Wandered around in a sleep deprived haze and ate lunch at an old-fashioned diner on Santa Monica Boulevard.

I remember seeing a lot of tourists and being hot.

That’s it.

The show went off and I spent the night back in that same house, cramped, and dirty and tired and then my ride went and hooked up with someone and left me to my own defenses, leaving me to ride around in the back of someone’s camper with no concept of when I would get back to San Francisco.

I feel that this trip will be far different.

And I am so looking forward to it.

The museums.

The company.

To get to share my celebration and joy with another person and go to museums?

Please.

Who am I to say there is no God?

Or love.

If you will.

I am loved.

I am so loved.

My heart is full of daisies.

Sunshine.

And bright sweet love.

And with that.

I am.

Back on the beam.

Full House

At least it’s a gigantic house.

But there’s a lot of us here and today I had a moment of needing to be completely alone.

That is not going to happen, but I did take time to reach out to a few people and check in and do the things that I need to do to keep myself centered and sane.

I didn’t get as much sleep as I would have liked either, one of the boys had night terrors last night and I woke up to a little boy screaming.

Not the best sound to wake up to.

I wasn’t needed to assuage the dreams, but I found it took a moment to drop back off to sleep and the full impact of so many folks in a space, when I am used to my own space has made me desire the silence that I surround myself with in my home.

I am quiet in the morning.

I get up and do my deal and for the first two hours sometimes, two and a half hours of the day, I don’t interact with anyone (granted 45 minutes of that time is devoted to my morning bicycle commute of 6.5 miles through the city).

I read.

I write.

I eat a mindful breakfast.

I check some e-mails and my bank account and make a mental list of any bills that may need to get sorted and the general effluvia of the day that needs addressing.

There is not that same quiet here.

There are four parents, four boys- 2 and 3/4s, a three-year old, and 2 five-year olds, one baby–a five month old baby girl that I just want to squeeze and squish and kiss every time I see her and I cannot help myself, I flirt with her like nobody’s business.

I’m partial to dark-eyed babies with curly brown hair.

Hell.

I am partial to all babies, whatever flavor or color, they all are delicious.

There is also another nanny, a dog, a caretaker that comes by the house every evening without fail right before the boys are being corralled to the dinner table who throws the whole house into complete ruckus as he checks the swimming pool and the garden and waters the plants and does any minor maintenance that needs doing.

That’s a lot of people, personalities, and activity happening around me.

I feel that I have done a pretty damn good job with my self-care, the family has certainly helped with that–accommodating my “strange” food diet, no sugar no flour, and being mindful of keeping the boys out of my room and space.

I have stayed with my current routine, the one that I would do if I was at home, so I get up two and a half hours before my shift starts, which has shifted a bit later here than it is in the city, also keeping me working later in the day than I am used to, but as I said to the mom tonight when I realized I was getting testy, in my brain, not with the family or the boys or the situation (a gentle reminder that I am out of my milieu and my comfort zone and a deep breath) where can I best be of service?

And when I was told, clean up the kitchen.

Ok.

I did it.

I felt a bit like the help.

Then I realized.

Hello.

You are the help.

Then I remembered, I feel best when I am of service.

So I happily scrubbed the kitchen while the boys and baby all went out to the wide swath of green grass behind the house and ran around the verdant paddock, not even realizing until I was half way through, oh, this is nice.

It was quiet.

The noise is not unpleasant, it’s just a balancing act, knowing when I need to engage, when I need to pull back, when I can help the other nanny, when I can help the other family or my family.

I also know that I am not a live in nanny.

I never have been.

I don’t know that I ever could be.

I like the autonomy of my own space.

I love the going home at the end of my day.

And that’s not the case here.

I have not left here since I arrived on Sunday evening and that in and off itself is surreal for me.

Despite the house being large and rambling and the grounds wide, the house is on 13 acres, I haven’t gotten out a whole lot to do exploring.

Mostly I am getting my exercise running up and down the back stairs and hunting down the various swim suits and rash guards for the boys.

I am getting into the pool everyday and that is enjoyable.

I mean, really, how bad is it when I am getting paid to swim in the pool with my charges on a sunny afternoon in Sonoma.

The constant presence of the parents is something I am used to from working in the city, just not the presence of two other parents and another nanny.

I remind myself to take care of myself.

To stay connected with my people.

One of whom is actually going to meet me in Sonoma tomorrow evening.

I cleared it with the parents to go out tomorrow and do that thing I need to do.

The timing has not been great for getting me out to do the deal and I am beginning to feel that, but tomorrow, I get out and I get to meet one of my ladybugs who is going to drive into Sonoma to meet with me.

Thank you Jeebus.

I need it.

I actually called and left her a message telling her I needed her to call and check in with me, because my solutions are sub optimal, but when I hear someone else’s problems, I suddenly have none.

Like really?

I have any problems.

Please.

I found out twenty-four hours ago that I was awarded a second scholarship for $30,000.

Which brings me to my total awards package of $80,000.

Again, who has problems?

I called my mom and she suggested that since things were going so well my way that I should be looking at getting my PhD.

Mom.

Can I please enjoy the moment?

Just let me.

Ugh.

I know better.

And that’s when I knew I was just a little spiritually off kilter, don’t go to the dry well expecting a drink of water.

My mom means well, but I know better.

I wanted something from her, I wanted acknowledgement, love, accolades.

I don’t need to look for validation from outside sources and when I realized I was doing just that I started making the necessary conversations happen to get me out of the full house and off into the world for a sit down in a church basement on a crappy folding chair.

It’s a lot more comfortable place for me to sit then in my head.

The house may be full and I may get overwhelmed at times, but this is a temporary situation and I know I am doing a really good job for the family.

I am grateful for that.

I’ll be grateful for Friday too.

But until then.

I will continue to ask, “where can I best be of service?”

Because when I do that.

I know that I am exactly in the right place.

Full or empty house.

There Are No Words

I mean.

Really.

There are no words.

So.

I’ll let the e-mail speak for itself while I try to catch my breath and let my tea cool off enough to sip on it.

Spontaneous crying may happen at any point in the writing of this blog, FYI.

To wit this is the e-mail I opened an hour ago:

Dear Carmen,

Congratulations!  On behalf of the California Institute of Integral Studies Diversity Leadership Scholarship Committee, I’m happy to inform you that you’ve been selected as a recipient of the J.C. Kellogg Integral Counseling Psychology Scholarship. This scholarship provides recipients with $10,000.00 per school year for the 3 years of the ICP/W Programs.

The Financial Aid office will be sending you a revised Awards Package in which this scholarship will be included.

Wishing you all the best!

With warm regards, Pauline

Pauline E. Reif, MA, MFA

Admissions Counselor

California Institute of Integral Studies

I can barely breathe.

I don’t have to take out student loans.

ANY.

NOT A FREAKING ONE.

The Opportunity Scholarship I was awarded was for tuition solely, nothing to sneeze at, let me remind you–$50,000–basically paying, directly, my first four semesters of six semesters of tuition.

Now.

To get this.

To be recognized again.

I.

Oh.

There’s the tears.

Pause.

Breathe.

This means that I won’t as I said, have to take out any additional student loans, suffice to say I am still paying on my undergraduate student loans, $32,000 left on that.

Anyone feeling like paying those off, you just let me know.

It’s the only debt I have.

No credit cards, no scooter payments, no words, no freaking words.

I called my best friend and relayed the news and she said I should run around barefoot in the grass like Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music.

She, Julie Andrews character, was a nanny too!

Nanny’s be getting it on.

I kicked off my flip-flops, tumbled down the flagstone steps and ran around the paddock of grass that encircles the back of the house here at Stone Tree–laughing, crying, sharing with my friend the news, slightly hysterical, definitely giddy.

Normally I would have read that e-mail much sooner, but I have been busy with the little boy wrangling and the swimming and the black berry picking and the wild plum harvest and the walking the dog and taking pictures and soaking up the sun.

It wasn’t until I was sitting on the back patio, all the boys fed, watching a movie with the parents, that I picked up my phone to check my messages and to have a cup of tea while the sun set, golden spiced and delicious, fingers of shadows blue indigo ripe and full of barn swallows reveling in their dinner at dusk.

I was also texting with a friend, said friend who I get to see on Friday in LA for much museum sightings and plain old celebrations.

Seriously.

I get to celebrate more.

I don’t know how to do that, I am so overwhelmed with it, but I do know how to be grateful, I do know how to humbly accept with thanks the gifts that have been given to me, I get to see how important it is that I walk through these doors and take these gifts and share them with my fellows, my community, my family.

I just.

Whew.

Lost my train of thought.

Trying to breathe and take it all in.

It’s a lot to take in.

And.

Knowing, having the faith that once I started the process that I just had to continue to show up, one day at a time, one moment, giving my best in each moment, being utterly present and myself.

Life is going to happen.

But life without more student loans is also going to happen.

I am so honored.

I’m going to work so hard.

I’m still going to work for my family, of course, I just found out that I won a full ride to school, not a full ride to live in San Francisco.

I make enough working full-time at what I do to live a sweet, comfortable life, with good food in my fridge, a snick of money in my savings account for emergencies and the basics pretty well covered.

My rent and cost of living is below average in San Francisco.

I’m going to have to work, but I won’t have to work as much.

And since the family is going to only need me part-time when the boys are both in matriculation one in pre-school and the other in kindergarten; it works out that I have the right work environment to support my graduates school endeavors.

I won’t have to take out student loans, I won’t have to take out student loans, I won’t have to take out student loans.

Pardon me.

I am crying again.

I spent the day gamboling with the dog, picking blackberries, digging trenches with the boys, playing tag, swimming, it’s a nice pool I felt so happy to be in the water, I even did a few laps and I suspect that I will do a solo swim on my own at some point.

Maybe even tonight when the families get all the boys tucked in for the night.

I will definitely go outside and watch the stars and let the tears fall and though I am alone, I know I am not lonely.

I have friends.

I have family.

I have support and love and kindness immeasurable in my life.

I am the luckiest girl in the world.

And I get to go to LA?

Please.

Who is this woman?

I was talking to my person earlier today as I walked through the garden, checking out if any of the produce was ready to be picked, nothing yet, but some fresh herbs and the berries and plums, which I was happy to just pop into my mouth, and I expressed that I was so astounded by my life.

And this was before I got the second scholarship news.

I saw this arc of my life, this huge parabola of experiences that I have had and marveled, utterly marveled at how I have come this far.

So far.

From being in the back of that VW Bug when I was four, running across country, with my mom and her boyfriend, my little sister and two cats (and let us not forget the large screen television set that took up half of the back seat–which was why I was in the nook between the back seat and the window, my nest of pillows bolstering my view of the passing sky) running away from an eviction, to another uncertain and tenuous beginning for my mom back in Wisconsin.

To now.

The drive up here to Sonoma, the sun, the color of the sky, the dusty grass-covered hills, the spreading oaks and my heart, so full, so open to everything.

And then this?!

Jumping Jesus on a pogo stick.

I really have no words.

Even though I just wrote a 1200 word blog.

Bahahahahaha.

Thank you God.

Thank you friends, family, community, my fellowship, my employers, everyone.

Thank you everyone.

I wouldn’t be where I am without you.

And where I’m going isn’t worth going without you too.

I heart you to the moon and back a 1,000 times.

I love you “this big.”

I mean.

THIS BIG.

SO BIG.

So very big.

There are no words.

Let It Go

Let it all go.

Revel in the sunshine, thick, golden, syrupy sunshine, splayed down the mountains.

The song on the radio.

The blue sky above.

My foot on the pedal and I’m off to Glen Ellen for a week for work.

I was anxious this morning, I find traveling extraordinarily exciting and fulfilling, but there’s always a touch of anxiety around it, what to pack, how to pack, am I taking too much, too little, do I have my toothbrush?

It was also a day of coordination, clean up the house, make sure my ducks were in a row, tidy up the back yard from the bonfire the other night, make the bed, water the plants, do a little grocery shopping so that I was able to eat for the day, but not my typical three market shopping.

Just a run up to Other Avenues–a pint of strawberries, a 1/2 dozen eggs, a travel size box of toothpaste.

I may or may not, the verdict is still out, being going to LA at the end of the week.

I have let go any expectations, I don’t want to force things, I am liking the idea of a friendship and going slow so LA might be off the table.  I haven’t heard either way, but I know, I know without a doubt, that there is nothing wrong.

I mean.

I am working in sunshine all week.

I may get to go to LA at the end of it.

And next week?

Atlanta.

I am going to get to wear summer clothes, no scarves thank you very much, for the next two weeks.

That is such a huge gift.

I love San Francisco, but I love sunshine too.

Having been previously diagnosed with seasonal depression when I was younger (not to mention the clinical anxiety, and depression I was diagnosed with as an adult) sunshine is like medicine to me.

I love Wisconsin, but I don’t think I can ever live there again.

Not enough sunshine.

And I love the Outer Sunset and the beach and I know without any doubt in my mind that I will always live by the ocean, how can I not, it soothes me, it cradles me to sleep, “you can hear the ocean from here!” He said opening up the back door to my studio.

But.

I could really do without the cold summers and fogginess.

I know it’s the tradeoff for having rent I can afford in the city, although the rents in the neighborhood have gone up and if you had told me a couple of years ago that I would be living in the Outer Sunset I would have told you to go fire up your crack pipe.

I yearn for sunshine.

So.

This work trip, a gift.

All travel, really a gift.

I watched the ocean sparkle and glimmer with light this afternoon on the way out to the airport, my employers had me rent a car and Uber out to SFO to pick it up, and was stunned again by the beauty that is just there, right there for me to access.

I enjoyed the ride.

I love car trips.

I like driving.

But I like being a passenger even more.

The watching out the windows, the light moving past, the glamour of road travel.

Yes.

I am a weirdo.

I think road travel has a certain kind of glamour to it.

It also has a certain sound track and I spent a lot of time flipping through the radio stations on the car before I found what I liked.

It should be classic rock and maybe some blues and ballads to sing to.

A little folk is lovely, but classic rock does it for me.

It’s how I grew up, it’s what was playing on the radio when my mom and sister and mom’s boyfriend took the first big road trip of my life from California out to Wisconsin.

I was four and a half?

Five tops.

Riding in the back of the Volkswagen Bug, listening to music, watching the clouds scroll by, and the light, the light always capturing me, doing something magical and alchemic to my soul.

My heart burnished with 70s rock melodies and high bright blue skies and sunshine.

No wonder I wanted to move back out West as soon as I graduated from college.

Once I had made the first initial foray I knew I would never come back.

My mom told me she knew that when I got to San Francisco there was no turning back for me, she had not wanted to buy me the plane ticket, it was a gift, one of the few my mom got right on the nose (I asked for it specifically, it may have been the only time in my life I really asked for what I wanted from my mom and she gave it to me.  Thanks mom.) and I knew she regretted it on some levels, her baby flying the coop at the ripe age of 29.

When I drive in California, those songs come back to me, the sunshine comes back to me, I am overwhelmed with sense memory and the smell of the air, the slight oceanic tinge, the dry grass, the time of day even will envelop me with memory.

Some concrete and tangible.

Some vague, yet, so strong, so filled with meaning and emotion I could feel my tender heart, well, growing more tender.

I teared up driving into the sun under a canopy of spreading oak trees as I turned up Sonoma Mountain Road heading to the house the family has rented for the next week.

There was something about the sun dappling through those branches, the Steve Miller Band on the radio, and the smell of it all that made me so aware of how amazing my life is and how much work and effort it has taken to get back here, having circled back and completed this revolution of change and growth in my life.

To be exactly where I am at.

The still point.

Of.

Perfection.

Hello Sunshine

Good bye fog.

I am actually going to where the sun is, where the clear skies are, where the weather is what most of the rest of the country thinks about when they ponder travel to California.

Not this cold, chilly, overcast, grey, did I mention cold?

Fog.

I tried to go swim suit shopping today.

Epic fail.

I bought a scarf.

Yeah.

I know, its June 20th and all I could do is buy a scarf.

And a bag, and a cute bag at that, I’m looking forward to using it for some travel time adventures.

But I could not muster it to get a swim suit.

I did manage to get my nails done and that was nice and relaxing and a treat, especially as there was no one else in the salon and I was getting all the pampering and attention.

I’m a good tipper and I usually get some solicitous treatment when I come in, and I engage with the woman, we like each other and talk about my hair color, which is rapidly becoming blonde and will likely be blonde for the next two weeks.

I am just not going to go pink again until after I know I won’t be in the pool for a while.

The last time I went swimming at UCSF with the family, the chlorine stripped just about all the Manic Panic Hot, Hot Pink, and Cleo Rose from my hair.

Although there are a few spots underneath the bed of hair that is on my head, that have licks of bright pink in them, I am assuming that a week of working in Glen Ellen and swimming with the boys will leach the rest of the color out.

Yup, that’s right, tomorrow I will head out to Sonoma, land of sunshine and temperatures in the mid 80s to low 90s, and there will be pool time.

I am going to head out to the airport tomorrow, late afternoon, and pick up the rental car from SFO then head back towards the city, I’ll have to go back through San Francisco and cross town to get to the Golden Gate Bridge and over to Sonoma.

I figure I will hit the Sports Basement in the Presidio.

I’ll take a quick detour and grab a real swim suit.

The one I have is more of a lounge by the pool and rub sunblock on yourself will sipping iced tea, swim suit.

Not a “I’m going to be nannying two rambunctious boys and their playmates (another family will be there for three days with their two boys and baby girl) in the pool for hours” swimsuit.

I figure I’ll get a competitive suit like I used to wear on swim team in high school.

I was relating some of my adventures in high school to my new friend last night in front of the fire in the back yard.

Yes.

That’s right, there’s a fire pit in the back yard and the old white-painted Adirondack chairs were pulled up and he started the fire on one wooden match and it burned merry and bright for hours as we talked.

And talked.

And talked.

And decided.

Wait for it.

To be friends.

Sigh.

I knew it was coming at some point.

It was too good to be true.

But.

And this is such a big pause, such huge rearrangement of my inner landscape, I am grateful and feel great joy at having gotten to a place where I can hold a man’s hand and be completely vulnerable, completely myself, and listen to what the other person is saying.

Really be present.

So present that you don’t realize how late it’s getting and it’s 3:30 in the morning and my feet are cold, but my heart, oh it is on fire.

I felt so tender today when I woke up, tender, smitten, sad, full of love, full of the feels.

I didn’t want to get out of bed, the weather was not helping, it may be summer everywhere else, but Ocean Beach, San Francisco?

No.

This is winter time and it’s grey and it reminds me of how I can slide into depression if I’m not cautious and aware.

My disease wanted to harangue me and poke me and for a moment, it might have gotten under my skin.

I picked up my phone and called a girl friend while still in bed, burrowed under the blankets and head snug down in the pillows.

I said my piece to her voicemail.

I sniffled.

I cried.

I felt sorry for myself.

I put on the self-pity party hat and asked to be passed a very small violin, or in my case a junior size cello.

I mean really, I’m not a violin type of girl.

Then I called my person and said some more stuff on the voicemail.

Then I looked at my room.

All the colors, the blues and corals and the postcards and the laughter and stories that I told about them last night, last week, the last few days as I have spun through a metamorphosis of becoming, yet again, a little more my authentic self.

I got up and drank some water and tossed myself in the shower.

What had happened?

We moved too fast.

And the best thing that happened?

We talked about it like grown ups with spiritual words and kindness and compassion and utter vulnerability.

I have not had all that many relationships in my life and I am full well aware as to the whys and whereof’s; however, I will say without much thought, as it is clear and true, that I shared more with this man about myself, how I feel, what I believe, what my dreams have been and where I am going, than I have with any other man (well, any other man other than one other man, who remains anonymous here and will only be alluded to) in my life.

And I dare say, he shared at the same level.

There are no mistakes in Gods world.

I read.

I prayed.

I got on my knees in front of my fresh made bed and felt grateful, felt joy, felt such an overwhelming field of love engulf me that I knew that nothing that happened last night or the days and nights previous had been wrong or hurtful or malicious.

Just warm, bright, as honest in each moment as a person can be with the other.

There is more to come.

It’s just going to be pulled back a bit.

“I can’t be your boyfriend right now,” he said.

I deign to say how it was said or with what emotion, the words suffice, the feeling is mine to have and to cherish inside my wide open heart.

But we can be friends.

So we move forward by backing up and seeing what a friendship looks like and as I look at the void left in my life by the changing of my friendships over the last few years, the loss of some, some to marriage and babies, new careers, new cities, new states, some to relapse into the horrors of drugs and alcohol, I see quite clearly how desperate I am for such a friend.

A companion.

Someone to stand in front of a Rothko and hold hands with while the luminous colors wash over our faces.

We’re still planning on going to LA.

Sonoma is not the only place where I will be getting my fill of sunshine.

The museum adventure is still a plan.

Just with a friend.

Rather than a boyfriend.

And that.

Surprise.

Is just right by me.

My heart grows ever bigger and I know that I am becoming ever more me.

Just one more step towards God’s, not mine, perfect image of me.

Unadulterated Auntie Bubba on tap at a foggy beach near you.

At least for the next 24 hours.

See You In An Hour

What a nice surprise.

I wasn’t expecting to have a date tonight, but things change.

“That was not the plan,” I told my friend tonight outside on the curb across the street from the Safeway in the Castro, “not the plan at all,” then I appropriately blushed.  Thank God it was already dark outside and it could just as well have been the red neon light from the Burger Joint then my face flushing.

He laughed, “nothing ever goes as planned.”

This is true.

I have had a few changes in my schedule, small ones, these last few days and watching how that has happened and the way it has shaped me day is interesting.

Typically, yeah, I know, it’s a Friday, but typically on a Friday, I would be making a cup of tea.

Check.

The teapot is just about to boil.

And writing my blog.

Double check.

Writing the blog.

But I would not be going out further.

When I am writing the blog it is usually indicative of the day being finished and the only thing that I am going to do after I put “pen to paper” is watch a download on my laptop.

I don’t know when tonight will end as the last time I hung out with the man, we were up talking until 5:15 a.m.

Thank God I don’t work tomorrow.

In fact.

My entire day opened up, I have, wait for it, nothing planned.

NOTHING.

I mean I will find an hour to do that thing that I do every day, but since I’m not working and not meeting with the people I usually meet with, I can be flexible with that.

I can go anywhere.

I can do anything.

Tomorrow is a big white clean slate.

In fact.

As of 11:15 pm tonight I have a bunch of big clean open space and time.

That is exciting.

Not nerve-wracking.

I’m wide open to the possibilities, however they present themselves.

I am excited for my life.

I mean, I am excited a lot, all the time.

“Did I read your blog right?”

A friend texted me this afternoon.

“Did you get a full scholarship to grad school?!

Yup.

I did.

And if that’s not exciting enough, I have a date for a Friday night too.

Not bad, Martines, not bad at all.

Pretty fucking awesome, because I have a date with someone I really like and it’s not a blind date with some yahoo off a dating website.

I have not checked Match.com or OkStupid since the night he asked me out.

“You mean, when you asked me out,” he’s teased me a few times.

Sure.

That night.

I don’t care, I don’t have to be right, I can just be happy.

I didn’t ask him out, he asked me (see, I can’t do it!!) but I will acquiesce that position any time) I would rather be happy with him than right.

Being right never makes me happy.

Small or big things.

Being right just makes me an uptight asshole afraid that if someone else is right that there is something wrong with me.

Nothing is wrong here.

Nothing at all.

It’s Friday.

After all.

That in and of itself is a happy thing.

Today was a happy day too.

The boys were a bit wound up when I got to work, there is much excitement for the weekend, the family is leaving for Sonoma tomorrow, Glen Ellen to be exact, for the next ten days.

I will be going there Sunday evening.

I’m not working until Monday, but I figure I’ll grab the rental car from the airport and head up early Sunday evening so that I am settled in and ready to start Monday morning rather than drive up super early on Monday and be off kilter the whole day.

I am not as anxious about spending the week with the family as I thought I would be.

Of course.

My mind has been preoccupied with other things.

Heh.

Oh, that does remind me, I need to buy a swim suit before I head up to Sonoma, the one I have is more of a lounge by the pool suit than a swim laps suit and I suspect I will be in the pool a lot over the week with the boys.

Plus, I may do some lap swimming on my own.

I won’t be riding my bicycle for a week and that means I need to find something else to do for my exercise.

I use my bicycle for transportation, not really for exercise, but it kills two birds with one stone and I need to exercise, I get wonky in the brain if I don’t.

I will foresee swimming laps and long hikes.

That should keep the brain chemistry balanced.

I will also be checking out the fellowship in Sonoma, I haven’t really done so before, I’m curious to see what is there.  I won’t be coming into the city for my regular routine at all.  I’ll be in Sonoma until I fly out to LA on Friday.

I got the thumbs up from the employers to get off a little early on Friday, I’ll zoom the car back to the airport and hop a plane and be heading down the coast.

I googled the LACMA last night.

I can’t wait.

Another museum to add to my list (The Louvre, Musee D’Orsay,  Musee de l’Orangerie, The Dali Museum, Musee de Quai Branly, Musee Carnvalet, Musee Rodin, Centres Georges Pompidou, National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo Palaise, Le Petite Palais, Musee Marmottan Monet, Guimet Museum, Maison de Victor Hugo, I’ve been to a few museums in Paris, heh, The MOMA in San Francisco, The Legion of Honor, the DeYoung, The Cartoon Museum, The Museum of Jewish Diaspora, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, the Metropolitan Museum in New York, National Gallery London, Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Rome and the Davinci Museum, then the old standby’s The Wisconsin Historical Museum, The Milwaukee Art Museum, and The Art Institute of Chicago.  Oh, and the Anchorage Museum when I was up in Anchorage in December taking a break from sitting bed side while my dad was in a coma–God I needed that break.

I am probably forgetting one or two or three, but obviously, I have a special thing for museums.

For art.

“I’m not a Burner,” he said, “I’m probably not ever going to go.”

And that’s ok.

Burning Man is a museum for me too–all the art, that’s what I go for, that and the community that has grown up around me there.  I have made some amazing friends there and have had my heart lit on fire by the art.

I’m ready for the LACMA and maybe the Getty.

I’m ready for more happy.

But then again, I always am ready for more.

More experiences.

More life.

More love.

Bring on the weekend.

I am ready.

Sit Still

And pause.

Sit still, smell the grass, watch the boys gambol about on the fresh sod that was laid over the hillocks of Dolores Park.

The park had a grand re-opening today and it was one of the many stops on my day today.

A very busy day.

A very busy day on two hours of sleep.

I was up until 5:30 a.m. this morning.

That was not expected, but the talking.

There is so much to talk about.

Funny how with one person I have to stretch, to hunt and seek, and search for commonality or even a common language at times.

Then.

Other times, this time, last night, oodles and oodles and oodles of conversation, spools and spirals and tangents and at one point it was said, “wait, you still haven’t told me about the IRS fraud that you almost fell into.”

Side bar.

I saw another post, on Facebook, from a gal here in San Francisco who had the same experience yesterday, but she figured out the scam really fast.

Not I.

Of course, I figured it out when it was appropriate and I was grateful, ever so grateful to not having emptied my bank account, and for also realizing how I am affected by odd things at time and that yes, I can be naive and that ultimately, I am alright with this.

It means I am living a fuller life experience.

I am not jaded is what I am saying.

End side bar.

Sort of.

I re-read my blog from last night while I was sitting on the bench under the tree across from work this morning.

I was jazzed, the sky had broke out from behind the clouds and as I descended across Dolores at 17th the sun shone down on me and continued to pour light all over the Mission while the day unwound in its way, at its pace, despite my giddy girl ways.

Giddy does not last.

In case you were wondering.

Now I am calm.

Serene.

And just doing my thing.

I had many thoughts though when I first re-read what I had written.

Oh dear.

I revealed way too much.

I put it all the fuck out there.

Then I thought, nothing, “absolutely nothing happens in God’s universe for no reason.”

I can’t control myself, yes I can try, but sometimes the feels they just pour out and no one should be held to account when high on happy and pheromones.

Note to self, nice to see me being ok with this, there would have been a time, and not so long ago at that, when I would have been chagrined to have written what I wrote.

Oh girl, don’t put it all out there.

Save some for you.

But that’s me, putting it all out there, being a little larger than life, being me, and I know that I can confuse my own habits of self-denial, self-sabbotage, and self-doubt in a nice little package in this blog, when I am over exuberant and out there and well, over the top.

I have stopped disliking that about myself.

In fact, I sort of find it endearing now.

“You are in fact, hard to miss,” the woman at the park said to me, then asked for the time as I pushed one of the boys in the swing.

She was responding to my friend approaching me in the children’s sand area at Mission Pool and Playground and how he said, “I forget that, when I was looking at all the people here, you’re not hard to miss.”

My hair was very, very, very pink that day.

The pink is fast fading and I am feeling the desire to pull a hair geographic as I sit with my feelings and let them sort themselves and settle into their places.

In case you were wondering, there’s nothing wrong, I am just openly processing some stuff about me, this blog is all about me, there is no special secret there, oh there’s plenty that doesn’t go here, and part of the getting up as early as I did was to stick to my routine and do my morning writing.

I really needed to do my morning writing.

It’s my get right with God time.

So too, my morning routine and I knew that even if I had been tempted to get in another hour of sleep that I would do better in my day if I got up when I normally do, and do the things that are a part of my routine.

It did ground me.

I was a bit intoxicated this morning with feeling and lack of sleep and probably some adrenalin and all the things that surge through the body when experiencing intense emotional connection with someone.

I sat still through it, wrote it out, then zoomed and zipped to work with a silly, happy grin on my face.

It lasted most of the day, once in a while I would feel myself drifting from the present, the gift of the moment, the gift of being in the sun with the boys, their arms draped over me, the voices clamoring for more rolling down the hill at Dolores Park or another strawberry, raspberry, blackberry, peach, from the Farmer’s Market at Bartlet and 22nd.

I would return to the moment, as I just did, right here, right now, sipping hot tea and reminding myself that it is here, in this pocket of self-care and self-examination that I live, that this ultimately, this is my experience and I get to show up for this man and whatever happens, moving forward, that I have again, learned some incredible things about myself.

How very important conversation is to me.

How much I can connect with a person when I am present and allow myself to be seen and how much I can smile and laugh and let loose when I am with someone who I like.

I reminded me quite a bit of all that was lacking in my last relationship and how hard it was to talk, even from the very beginning and how the entire relationship, in my opinion, with my experience, became a battle ground of silent scorn and inability of connecting and communicating.

Having had the communication and the vulnerability of last night, and knowing now that I crave it, I saw in very stark contrast to what I had before missed in my last relationship.

I cannot even express all the gratitude I have for the harrowing two months of self-silencing I went through.

I learned so much.

It hit me while I was riding my bicycle up Lincoln to work. And I thank God out loud as I rode for the experience as it helped bring me to where I am now.

Being able to see that is an enormous gift and even with sleepy perceptions and that just slightly off slant perspective that a day run mostly on adrenalin can give you, I am utterly aware of the difference.

And I want the former, vulnerability, honesty, open communication, deep knowledge of self, and authenticity of person, rather than the later dissolving of my person into a silent blank slate to paint a fantasy on.

I am larger than life.

I am over the top.

But I am a real person.

And being as deeply seen as I have allowed myself to be over the last week has been such a refreshing thing for me.

Just like, I am sure, a deep and full, restful nights sleep will be for me as well.

And knowing that I am going to LA next weekend.

Meep.

Oh.

Did I forget to mention that?

Oops.

Not making any attempt to wipe the smile off my rather sleepy, but very happy face.

And with that.

I am out.

Night all.