Pig and farm report

yesterday I woke and my depression was gone just like that like that like that though last night I dreamed people had kidnapped me and were piercing me with foot long needles and my body still aches it is hard to tell the uninitiated how powerful depression is on my body the actual physical exhaustion the aches the diminishment of joy is a terrible strain and fog

today I woke and ate an apple and went to the store and saw a deer leap across the road and saw a flock of snow geese fill a field with their white

I am tired through and in and in my spirit

I baked a beautiful complicated bread with sun dried tomatoes and gouda from a farm nearby and basil I made brown rice I folded the clothes that were all over my bedroom and put them away I changed my sheets

one important thing happened

as I was coming back from the store I saw my neighbor who lives a country block away walking near my house my son knows her (he knows everyone his ease with people astounds me) she was recently in a bad car accident was wearing a neck brace she lives in a small trailer in the lot of a big fancy house I can tell that they are poor and I understand poor deeply I suspect her husband or boyfriend drinks as his car has new dents on it every week and also the bad car accident I pulled over and got out of my car to say hi because after all next month it will have been two years I said hi I introduced myself she said she knew who I was that she was waiting for me to come out of my house my son told her I am reclusive she said she wanted to bring cookies she said she wanted some cuttings of some of my plants and came over once and knocked on the back door and my heart broke wide open and I wondered if she saw me sobbing on my soft gray sofa I wonder if she saw me ghost wandering in my holly and ivy nightgown

a stray black cat walked between us I asked if it was hers and she said no that it was her mouser though she said I'm a dog person and I said one of the best of the Animal Gods and she made a sound with her breath and she hugged me hard and said yes and yes some people know the Animal Gods instantly be they cats or dogs or chickens

then we talked a bit about books about how the plants grow so strangely big here in the forest where it seems shady so often and my heart broke wide open and I told her to come over any time that I might be ghost wandering in my nightgown if she doesn't mind and she said she'd wear her jammies over

tonight I watched the final episode of Parts Unknown with my son watched Anthony Bourdain thin and drawn and worried and beautiful as he and his most amazing film crew explored the lower east side the section of New York I am hardest in love with and both of us wept seeing the end of Anthony and that's all I can say about it right now

writing this has exhausted me all of it exhausted me I am weak but hopefully I'll get an even stretch at least through the holidays which arrive faster and faster and hopefully when I come back here I'll be a writer again

love from the blacktail forest