Day one at Summer's End

beginning the kitchen

this will be the library with a comfy chair by the window

the cozy spot

master bedroom

So much I want to write but I just got home and I'm so tired my eyebulbs are wiggling

LOVE

For Liv

The Story of the Man Who Didn't Have Dirt to Bury His Lion
~ Ali Karbasi, from I Am A Face Sympathizing With Your Grief

the lion who
looked after me
for years
looked after me in his free time
looked after me in the forest
slept by my head at night
the lion whose mane
I blow-dried
in the evening
the lion who
made me loveable by
and for ...

my lion
died of wounds
that would never heal

"Ah," loudly he said
with a smile
narrow like an Indian's
"Goodbye my friend
Goodbye"
and then
died
and then I
tried to
throw some dirt
on my dead lion's body
tried to
keep a fire alight
at his grave
for a while
tried to plant a few flowers at least
but
there was no fire
there was no flower
and no dirt
there was nothing there
because my lion was dead


*


I Am A Face Sympathizing With Your Grief, Seven Younger Iranian Poets 
Edited and Translated by Alireza Taheri Araghi

*

this book is incredible

Dear Darklings,

thank you for letting me get it out
thank you for reading here
thank you for not being The Kleenix Lady (she is the lady in AA who as soon as you start crying she rushes up with a tissue and a gentle warning to stop crying for fuck sake you're upsetting everyone)
thank you for your blogs your writing your bravery your honesty your hurts your loves your joy

I should have told the man I wrote about below about what happens to mens' genitals when they get old if they are that lucky. I worked in a nursing home and I can tell you. Their penises shrink to baby size and their testicles swell up like mangoes. Big mangoes. Big big mangoes. Hey asshole! Nice mangoes!

I have closed Calling Dr. Bombay for good. I don't know why I feel the need to announce it but I do.  

Prayers to The Animal Gods now that it's getting colder.

today I pretty much stayed in bed and cried this moving is getting to me mostly I'm crying privately saying I DON'T WANT TO BE A GROWN UP hoping someone will come and rescue me but no one will and actually the hard part is done I'm mostly packed our beds will be arriving on December 4th

I am resistant to change
I am resistant to change
I am resistant to change

last night I woke up sick in the blue hour the milk hour and made my way dizzy covered in sweat again with terrible cramps where I passed out again on the toilet then I managed to ease myself to the floor so I wouldn't fall and hoping my son or anyone would rescue me and by then I was shivering naked lying on a towel on the floor

today a person I've known for a long time posted a photo he took of an elderly large breasted African American woman walking down the street in NYC on FaceBook and he was mocking her and his friends all joined in mocking her and I read him straight down he wrote WHAT IS THIS??? and I told him it was an elderly woman minding her own goddamned business and why did she deserve his invasion of her privacy his mocking of her body I told him he was sad then I blocked him from FB and Twitter then he had the balls to text me a nasty message about how everyone in POETRYLAND hates me which yeah maybe some do I tend to speak my mind but this is the kind of behavior that counts as GOODBYE FOREVER as far as I'm concerned I am an elderly woman with large breasts and I have spent my entire life with assholes commenting on them men and women both and it is so invasive and horrible

constant rain the love of a gigantic cat boxes and boxes and boxes of books and kitchen stuff I cleaned out the little bedside table I made three years ago and packed it away

winter is not my favorite season and I have too much to do to collapse

4 days

Hello Darklings hello

When ulcers last in the dooryard bloom'd

Red in my soul not anger just emotional stigmata fake stigmata shot through a squirt gun by beggar orphans at a circus beet-blood shot onto an unsuspecting mark's palms or actual stigmata the ultimate sacrifice real as flagellation or menses I am making a traditional Thanksgiving mulligatawny I am making daal or curried lentil soup whatever it is I am in fact steaming fat carrots with a tiny knob of ginger in the pot and my house smells like winter and I long for Italian Wedding Cookies and of course lemon curd so when life gives you fat carrots and red lentils you make mulligatawny this morning I took all the spices out of my clappboards and lined them up on the counter this will be a soup rich in curry from The Souk and turmeric and cinnamon and garam masala and one granny smith apple peeled and sliced thin and an onion and a can of diced tomatoes and some coconut milk rain storm soup holy soup I am typing quiet today trying not to think not fretting at all but red blood red palms and feet and the hole in my side everything seeping waiting for the storm that is certainly on its way now now hurry.

Happy Almost Winter Darklings

Soon it will be Beethoven's birthday

And I will spend it all brand new

Love.

ps. Also making more traditional sides dressing mashed potatoes pumpkin pie with just a smidge of ancho chili powder (delicious) and etc because maybe tomorrow my stomach will stop screaming at me and also the kid is home.

I have never felt less like cooking in my entire life. All those pumpkin pie makings on my counter just there all unpied. Last night I made a brie and fig en croute with leftover puff pastry that was in the stripper fridge. And figs real ones. I have some crackers. I am happy to just eat the entire en croute and get back to packing. Honestly I can't think beyond next week. I had to go the market for more celery this morning and I got stuck in the Christmas Crap Aisle just truly stuck with my mouth open then drool. When I was checking out the lady who bagged my celery asked me if I had moved yet and I told her almost then she said would I give her my landlord slumlord's name when I leave and I warned her about him but she needs a house close by the store with a large fenced in back yard her daughter has a service dog then she told me she was homeless for two years because she had to leave her husband who was raping her every night. We were both in tears by then right there by the cash register we were hugging and crying and I told her I know I know and again embraced by a stranger for the second time in two weeks another woman who feels in danger in the same store. I am overwhelmed with emotion right now. She allowed it to all swim up. Her name is Dorothy. Her name is Dorothy.

7 days
7 days
7 days

You know how when you’re supposed to have a thunderstorm this afternoon and also tonight and you watch black thunderheads float by like one of Heinlein’s adult Martians and everything feels tight in its skin about to bust right out if you don’t get some kind of sign from the sky and your head burns waiting and you want to eat hot curry to tamp the burn but you’re in the forest and clouds keep piling up and there’s a feeling in the air the sky ionized so strongly it could iron your father’s white cotton shirts in 3 seconds flat if only it would let loose so you start praying to whatever god is handy the god of Wednesday the god of Tuesday Weld the god of Narnia the god of bad art the god of unread books the god of your goddamn too small server the god of the broken printer the god of hospital cafeteria smells the god of loose change the god of one hour martinizing and of course Beethoven that the whole mess would just pop but it doesn't it’s a balloon in your stomach it’s full of helium and it keeps filling with helium and there’s a lot of space on account of you had one strawberry for breakfast and it’s filling quick but none of it does any good because the damned sky won’t open and everything and everyone is waiting?

I bought a sleigh bed for me and a platform bed for The Surfer and two queen size Sealy Posturepedic mattress and box sets and very fancy pillows (the two I bought for me are Black Ice pillows they are guaranteed to cool my brain head when it steams over) and instead of a vacuum cleaner which I still need I bought a set of furniture that looks exactly like this

except I only bought one of the little chairs (I want a brightly colored floral chair instead) and I did not buy the ugly-buggly ottoman which looks like some kind of weird mushroom the color is "smoke" but in the meat world it has a pale blue tint 

Sleep Train™ will deliver the beds and set them up for me!!! but I have to cram the furniture into the U-haul and take it myself I don't mind it is beautiful furniture (OH HOLY NIGHT VELVET YES) and even though it is still a couple days before Thanksgiving I got deep deep discounts on the beds and the furniture set because of the black black Friday sales SCORE!!!

I have never slept on a decent mattress in my life nor have I had a brand new sofa not ever all hand-me-downs all of them my whole life I hope you like this set I think it is spectacular

next week I'll get a vacuum cleaner

I'm too tired to think

Going shopping:
Bed frames 2
Mattress and box springs 2
Vacuum cleaner 1

Seriously fun. My son just drove me to Tacoma for breakfast. I had a cheese and mushroom omelette a horse's serving of hashbrowns and two bites of a cream cheese stuffed waffle with strawberries. I am full even though I brought most everything home in a box for the next two days.

SHOPPING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


I haven't writ that here (here in the flat blue world) very often.



*joydance*


I'll be Bach.


LOVES

I have unfollowed all but about six people on my FB feed because they keep posting photos of Rump and Melanoma his robot wife and I can't look at them any more















that's all there is to say about that except one more thing



I MISS MY BROTHER




hey brother will you come see me around Christmas in my new house?

pee.ess.

I am so close to being completely packed and when I saw DOGNURSE last week I showed her a phone pic of my carefully boxed and labeled and stacked belongings and she said all that labeling is just your OCD kicking into high gear and it was not only a hurtful thing for her to say it was simply not true I am a violinist I have exceptional organization skills (you try to play a Mozart violin concerto without organization ha!) and she can't even admit it! I wanted to slap her I still want to slap her but I have to get well and paint my closet and I'm pretty much ready to go after dinner next Thursday

I am thrilled out of my skull
and I promised my salmon that I will never forget them that I will always be their steward

xo

I have only been getting from two to three hours of sleep a night so last night I went back on the CBD this time Dama capsules and I slept a full eight hours and it is miraculous what a difference that makes

this morning The Surfer is here
this morning my stomach doesn't hurt
this morning I went to urgent care and got my pinky and the next door toe and my flip the bird toes all taped together because it turns out I broke both the pinky and the next door toe
this morning I walked to the creek in my furry furry boots and taped up toes and the salmon are there running copper and silver in the swollen water it made me cry with joy as they always do
this morning I went to the grocery store and managed to buy the rest of my Thanksgiving dinner stuff potatoes and cheese and stuff like that I had already bought most of everything weeks ago and I put it in Sweet Lime's trunk because I knew if I brought it in the house I'd accidentally pack it like I did at least two rolls of aluminium foil so far not to mention my opal ring which I think slipped off my finger when I was packing my boxes at top speed

this morning the guy who checks our water meter came out and I went to the door and called him SIR! HEY SIR! and he came (warily) to the porch (I was in my jammies) and I gave him a large box of Aplets and Cotlets™ I said here I said Happy Thanksgiving! these are for you! and he started crying a young man he said no one has ever given me anything but grief on this job all people do is complain about the price of water here and he thanked me and thanked me and thanked me then he hugged me and I'm just saying it was a $5 box of candy but delicious candy (Turkish Delight in fact if you are a Narnia lover which I have always been) and I always buy boxes for the mail carrier and whomever looks like they need some delicious Narnia confections it made me feel really good and he said I made his day and I believe him I'm not bragging about it which goes against my belief system it's just that right now people need a little extra bit of love

last Thanksgiving we had very little and I had to depend on the kindness of strangers to have even a small disappointing meal we had white blistered beans and cherry tomatoes and crackers last year it was a very very lean year

I have so much to be grateful for to all of you who read here who put up with me in 11 days I move into a gorgeous huge house that was made possible because my mother left me enough money when she kicked the bucket to buy it flat out I am not thankful to her for anything but dying the money she left me does not make up for torturing me throughout my life but I am so grateful for the house and for the crazy house market this year in Seattle that made it possible to buy the house in one week (after months of uncomfortable house hunting) and I won't have to pay rent ever again because I own the house outright and so I will be okay and I am thankful for the okay part and my Social Security and my pension and I am thankful that I am going to be making a spectacular dinner on Thanksgiving and I will have a good Christmas too in my new house that smells like the ocean and the forest

Alice called me when I was asleep and told me she'd be here today I texted her that I'd like to take her to breakfast to let me know when I haven't heard from her yet but I was so relieved to get her call

I've been sick with pancreatitis and Crohn's and my ulcers I've been sick to my stomach for the past two weeks because my body reads even good stress as STRESS but I feel like I'm swimming out of it now I had cottage cheese for breakfast and didn't die then I ate two tangerines and they are still in me and tomorrow night I'm getting my hair cut and Alice will be here and maybe I can see her and give her a hug and tell her I adore her and maybe we'll be okay

I love you all my Darklings you Kings of New England you Princes of Maine I love you all

this morning, Ward encouraged The Beaver to go beat the shit out of the new kid next door which The Beaver did with gusto then I cried a lot and ate half a box of Kraft Mac 'n Cheese the powdered kind with a pull date of March 2016 now I'm rolling around in my broken bed like a manatee caught in a gill net



I'm rather stressed about stuff
















please don't advise

HOLY SMOKES NEXT SUMMER I GET TO PLANT MY OWN GARDEN!







also I confess that I ate seven billion tomato and mayonnaise sandwiches this last summer and they tasted like Jesus Heaven each and every one

my best friend is in town but I fear
I fear
I fear
we are politically at odds

I have yet to hear from her
this makes me incredibly sad because I can't even imagine now what I would say
I don't know

another casualty


maybe in four years

the entire left side of my left foot is bruised and my pinky toe looks like a red red summer grape I packed one box and got real sweary real fast so I'm taking the day off literally off my feets watching wretched network teevee and counting down


13 days


I bought an eleven dollar gravy boat I've never had a gravy boat ever in my life and my vegetarian gravy is spectacular

I feel quite swoony

How proud I am, dancing in the air full of eyes rubbing at me uncovered, unable to look away because of what I am. Those poor hoptoads behind me are silent. I’ve conquered them. They thought to use and shame me but I win out by nature, because a true freak cannot be made. A true freak must be born. 
~ Katherine Dunn, Geek Love

I am sick and happy
sick from stress which causes pancreatitis which knocks me out really truly just fucking snockers me and happy because of the move which is 15 days away now perhaps a day or two sooner and I've been in conversation with The Lady In My House and she has decided to leave me her refrigerator which is GORGEOUS and huge and black and shiny and most fabulous refrigerator I've ever met and it is a sweet relief a true beauty no stripper fridge this she and AND it will save me about $3000 which is what large refrigerators cost these days large enough to fit into the refrigerator sized hole in the kitchen I am well pleased so relieved

packing goes apace this morning I cleared the top shelf in the kitchen and then the two shelves in the bathroom with one box for things to keep and one box for things to toss (haven't used this shampoo in 20 years? toss it)

today is the first time I have eaten in three days and I'm making spaghetti which should surprise no one who reads here regularly and I'm pretty sure I broke my pinkie toe on my left foot again this time by running into my dresser not my piano which is where I usually break it

I went to the little grocery store to buy some eye drops three days ago and I was standing there looking at the selection and another woman was doing the same and I started crying and she started crying and she asked are you okay and I said sort of are you and she said her son is a junkie and she has 20 years of recovery from being a junkie and I told her I was crazy and intensely afraid of losing my insurance and thus my mind and then we were both weeping openly and hugging each other then we talked some more then we hugged each other again right there in the aisle and she said you know men would never do this they can't and I think for a lot of men this is true I have always thought of tears as a magical lubricant for my soul and body when they don't come easily I get worried

my toe is swelling up so I will be wearing UGGS for the next few weeks


ugh

my son has an all day professional photography gig on December 3 which is when I was going to rent the U-Haul truck to move our furniture so that is pushed aside I've decided to send slumlord a certified letter on December 1 to announce officially my 30 day notice even though my contract with him reads I only need a 20 day notice

never trust a snake to be a lamby lamb even if he is woolly and bahbahbahs

my noodles are done

I'll be back Darklings

keep your dukes up and watch your toes especially the wee ones that go all the way home

LOVE

100% full

This is THE TERRIBLE BURNT MOON

Getting to know the woman who lives in my house. She is amazing and that means the house will hold her amazing energy. More on this in a bit. I'm going to the movies with my kid.

LOVE.

RIP Leonard Cohen

Today the entire range of feelings.
Leonard Cohen was really my first poet.
Tonight I opened accounts for electricity and garbage and recycling on the island. Tomorrow water.

Hallelujah.

Dear Darklings,

This morning I took a shower and washed my hair and put my pants on and sprayed myself liberally and horrifyingly with way way too much perfume (DOGNURSE always lets me out early if I stink I used to do the same when I had to meet with THE MINOTAUR) then at 10:00 AM my phone rang and it was DOGNURSE and she yelled REBECCA WE HAD AN APPOINTMENT AT 11:00 AM and I said I know I'm putting my shoes on right now and she screeched WELL THAT'S NOT GOING TO DO US ANY GOOD NOW IS IT??? and I told her it was only 10:00 AM and she said oh then I'll see you at 11 in this tiny little girl princess voice and I got there on time as usual (I am always on time usually early) and she didn't even apologize she just said I haven't set all my clocks back yet kind of like it was my fault then it all went downhill from there as it usually does so I took my prescriptions from her and then I drove to the University Village M-A-DOUBLE-HOCKEY-STICKS and bought a white pumpkin soup tureen because every new home needs a fucking white pumpkin soup tureen right RIGHT??? then I had a panic attack and started sweating which happens every time I buy something completely unnecessary and after half an hour I found my car in the gigantic parking lot and tore off my sweater and my poor elbows which are rather scabby with psoriasis started bleeding and I was sweating like mad even though it was only 60 degrees and I was listening to the Sufjan Stevens song Fourth of July over and over and I cried and cried and cried all the way home with the giant white pumpkin tureen on the car seat beside me and I was singing with the song we're all gonna die we're all gonna die

then I got home and there was an email from the woman now occupying my lovely island house and she assured me that they will be moving out Thanksgiving weekend and I have been so worried and I ran around the house screaming and jumping up and down and giggling and waving my arms in the air like those Inflatable Wacky Waving Tube Men so full of joy was I then I ate a Taco del Mar burrito the size of a medium horse now I feel like I want to puke so full of joy am I still and so excited I cannot sit for more than ten seconds at a time

Fourth of July
~ Sufjan Stevens, from Carrie and Lowell

The evil it spread like a fever ahead
It was night when you died, my firefly
What could I have said to raise you from the dead?
Oh could I be the sky on the Fourth of July?

Well you do enough talk
My little hawk, why do you cry?
Tell me what did you learn from the Tillamook burn?
Or the Fourth of July?
We’re all gonna die

Sitting at the bed with the halo at your head
Was it all a disguise, like Junior High
Where everything was fiction, future, and prediction
Now, where am I? My fading supply

Did you get enough love, my little dove
Why do you cry?
And I’m sorry I left, but it was for the best
Though it never felt right
My little Versailles

The hospital asked should the body be cast
Before I say goodbye, my star in the sky
Such a funny thought to wrap you up in cloth
Do you find it all right, my dragonfly?

Shall we look at the moon, my little loon
Why do you cry?
Make the most of your life, while it is rife
While it is light

Well you do enough talk
My little hawk, why do you cry?
Tell me what did you learn from the Tillamook burn?
Or the Fourth of July?
We’re all gonna die

in other news I fixed my blog
HA HA BLOGGER TAKE THAT!!!

The Surfer is here and we went out to breakfast then I came home and packed another shelf of my gigantic bookshelf and then I packed all my DVDs (in two paper bags not many DVDs) then I packed a box of all the books I have yet to read then I decided to move more already packed boxes onto the empty bookshelf to make room for more boxes and I tripped and wrenched my back and stepped directly into Little Bear's litter box and broke the back end out of it CRACK! my back is fine I hope but the litter box is dead dead dead so to the kitty store I go

carry on as though nothing happened

xo

Good morning Darklings!

now you know why I refuse the selfie
hahahhahahaaaaahahahahahahahaaaa

*morning face*

I have Christmas shopped
you know I have never really had a Christmas I've never been able to afford one I've made my house Christmassy I've had trees almost always and little stuff for The Surfer but never a real true Christmassy Christmas
this year The Surfer who doesn't know about this blog is getting among other things a real true Radio Flyer red wagon (metal not that plastic crap) and an honest to bog brown leather pilot's flight jacket and Gregory Crewdson's new art book and some camping gear and some guitar picks that have Van Gogh paintings on them and a record player an actual turn table!

oh gosh

I have become a woman who says oh gosh

I think it's a good sign

I drove to the island Friday actually I drove all over the island Friday and I got out to walk in the woods and a fox ran across my path and my heart stopped beating there for a second a bushy tailed alert fox right in front of me so close I could and did look into his eye

I was utterly gobsmacked

Welcome to Summer's End!

Dear Darklings,

If you are here then you found me. I will keep both blogs open for a while and I will fix my ucked up template when I feel better. Whomever leaves the first comment wins a fabulous Radish King prize.

24 days!

Love