today I bought new spices as many as I had on my list and some apples and some pears and that’s all I could do because I get tired quickly when I opened the spices I was amazed by their fragrance I know we’re supposed to swap out our spices every year but does anybody actually do this I am really curious my son is leaving for what used to be the orchard tomorrow which reminds me I saw a tower of the gleaming new perfectly round Snow White poison apple red non perishable Cosmic Crisp apples the apples that are going to kill us all the the King Monsanto square watermelon of apples the apples that are eating the profits of smaller orchards in my state and maybe yours please don’t buy them

tiny hitler has declared war on SNAP recipients by insisting everyone get a job something that is either impossible for people who are receiving them or people who are just trying to get by on jobs that don’t pay enough as it is and he’s also tightening the reins on people with SSDI now demanding they get interviewed four or five or six times a year instead of every three years to make sure they aren’t faking it for fun because you know poor people are responsible for the financial wasteland that is this shameful country

I did see Nancy Pelosi send fire lightning bolts at a reporter who had the gall to ask her if she was trying to impeach tiny hitler because she “hates him” and it was awe some to see to witness I stood up and saluted her

I have been eyeballing a perfectly shaped baby Douglas fir in the back forest I’d love to string some lights on it maybe fairy lights unless anyone knows about other lights that don’t require an extension cord self powered lights the tree is about 20 tall maybe taller I would just throw the lights up as far as they reach we are at the point where night seems forever out here

Pig and farm report

 

Spring as an ice storm spring as the first watermelon of the year is so blood red and perfectly sweet that your heart breaks a little spring as lilacs that refuse to let down their green knickers to show their purple spring as pale pink tulips in the house in a milk jug nodding their heads

all the tulip tourists have descended upon this quiet island so my coffee shop bakery is now overrun with women wearing bedazzled jeans dragging small children in by their arms to get an ice cream or use the bathroom while their tired cranky husbands wait so the line stretches out the door everyone crammed shoulder to shoulder ignoring the pandemic go away tourists I don’t love you eating my fear and scaring the whales

I spent an obscene amount of money this weekend on an expensive bottle of French perfume eau de parfum in fact from Paris that carries the scent of fig O Fig God's Candy I had a sample which I slathered myself in and my son told me I smelled like wood and it is true fig wood fig bark fig leaf fig fruit with an undertone of pepper I am so utterly fancy haha I am in fact so fancy that I might shave my legs for the first farmer's market or at least one leg

what I really wanted was a haircut but I'm waiting for my son to get his second vaccination he is off now to the orchard where he is tending to those fruit trees that are left standing and fishing with his father and shopping for a new truck because why would he buy a truck in pricey Seattle when he can drive over the mountains and get one for half that price in Spokane that sucking chest wound of a town that I call home

I spent this weekend preparing my garden for more blueberries and raspberries because the blueberries just took off last summer did you know that blueberries thrive in acidic soil therefore they love pine trees and tomatoes and tulips do not these are things you learn the hard way

it has been cold and sunny or rainy which is normal spring weather I keep wearing my summer dresses but with my leggings underneath in order to call forth summer

I'm reading Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five for the fifth or fifteenth or one hundred and fiftieth time I type with Hal draped on my arm as a tiny fierce fur stole my hair is actually long enough to braid so I have been wearing it braided on both sides not a look I have not imagined for myself since I was 30

I have recently been tapering down the amount of Tegretol I take because my doctor said my sodium levels were low and Tegretol is notorious for messing with sodium levels Tegretol for those of you who aren't bipolar is my main medication my number one crazy control my man in Amsterdam for keeping me from spinning off the earth's skin after I bought the parfum this weekend I questioned my sanity for a hot minute because crazy spending is always a sign of creeping mania but all my bills are paid I did not go to the mall and try on clothes or fly to a sparkling city to play I can sleep and read and I haven't been crying or laughing too much and I look okay in the mirror

except for my goddamn hair and there is nothing I can do about that at this point except wait 

Pig and farm report

 

Beneath a marzipan night sky

Have you ever seen a blooming snake plant? The flowers smell exactly like Easter lilies miniature Easter lilies. I was so proud of myself for growing something so unusual so rare until I looked up what causes snake plants to bloom. Sheer neglect apparently. Stress. Anxiety. Fear. Trepidation. I didn't water it enough. I didn't dust its swordy leaves. I probably swore at it a time or two or refused to sing to it altogether. I may have dropped something on it at one point or played it unruly music. Wore my mean face. Maybe I loved my watermelon peperomia more. But there it is. Flowering (or cowering in fear of me probably) smelling altogether lovely and holding us all together. Haha kidding! None of us are held together in this house except perhaps Queen Jupiter.

The last time I was here we were all still reeling from the death of my son's girlfriend. We have not recovered though we are moving forward. My son is here too much though he is going back to the orchard Thursday to work. In a lucky turn of events his best friend from childhood as moved out here to the island. I relish the idea of sheer privacy and time to myself. In the meantime we are both vaxxed and boosted and still wearing masks. I have not reinserted myself back into the world at large. I may never though I go the grocery store and to the doctor when I am forced to. The dentist is another conversation. It turns out my measly 2 thousand dollars isn't enough for dentures and now my teeth are shedding their skins like tree bark. Covid has been a disaster for we the mentally ill we the inverted we the reclusive we the shudderers and shakers we the dreamers beneath a marzipan night sky.

The owls and eagles are molting and are therefore crabbier than usual. I see them giving me the stink eye when I approach them at the state park. The daffodil fields are drenched in yellow. The frogs are frogging the birds are tweet tweeting. On the television a man asks which is bigger a pancake or my head? I have been reading like a fiend now that I know the truth that reading is a joy which can disappear. I have been studying the symptoms of high functioning depression. It makes sense. Listen to my heart pounding here writing through it boomboomboom beneath a marzipan night sky.

movement like water

things that have changed in the last 90 days:

I no longer fear the phone ringing
the forest does not press down on my chest at night the trees do not frighten nor do they oppress now
at dusk I listen to the owls from my deck throating huge echoes back and forth to one another
at dusk I listen to the frogs from my front porch they are noisy and happy
new music (owls frogs)
I have a dog friend Arthur who I adore even though I stepped in his poo in my slippers yesterday
I sleep with my binoculars and in the morning I listen to the wind and watch the sky
a hawk lives in my yard his legs are thick and feathered each time he comes I become entirely still
strangers have been stopping their cars on my dead end road and wandering around with cameras with giant lenses these are birders harmless people with as little interest in me as I have in them and I know this island is a birder's paradise
my smart watch reminds me to breathe mindfully for one minute every hour
there is no longer pain in my stomach
I still weep for my lost LB but I now believe I can someday forgive myself
I have a brand new doctor close by I see him tomorrow for the first time then I can fire the fake doctor doctor nurse and DOGNURSE is next except I need her for another year in order to ease my way through SSDI matters (I have to prove I'm still crazy after all these years to a caseworker this year and I'll need a note from DOGNURSE though I could just have them call the hospital haha)
I think I might become a writer again
my violin is awake
yesterday at the grocers I bought an honestly sweet watermelon four honeycrisp apples yogurt cauliflower an avocado roll cottage cheese provolone cheese and pre-made tomato soup as I don't have the energy to stand long enough to chop veggies to make it myself I almost fainted in the store no pain but no strength either
I dream of my soon to be garden constantly I make lists and have drawn plans
there is a blue spruce in my forest so startling and gorgeous I just found it two days ago
my Japanese maple is growing red leaves
I have such great joy and delight in watching my land open its fists to spring

things that "come right back up" and must be avoided:
wheat anything
eggs (eggs and I have never got along but now my body violently rejects them)

*

none of this is what I wanted to write about though
I got a notice for a class reunion and it got me thinking about the (then) boy who tortured me all through junior high and into high school by grabbing and rubbing my breasts and cupping my vagina pushing me against the wall in the music practice room shoving his tongue down my throat as he groped me and other horrible things I started thinking about him and I did a wee Google search and indeed I found him and now he lives in Texas with his children and grandchildren and he goes to church and plays violin in the church orchestra and of course I never told on him I never told anyone I didn't even speak to anyone until I was 27 and my life then was in grave danger without that asshole who gravitated toward my shy my weak my nearly invisible and the truth is I want to out him here I want to write his name here over and over until he Googles himself one day and finds out that I have done so and this horrifying man in the White House makes me think of being raped I cannot even look at his face without feeling that specific sick without feeling attacked and this (then) boy who made my skin crawl but who was more powerful than I keeps floating around in my brain his sweaty little hands his disregard for human decency up in his church there in Texas playing his violin I wonder if he is still vile still groping still harming I suspect so I wonder if there were others other sad silent wounded girls

that's what I really wanted to write about

*

Good spring morning Darklings it is light now and today I'm going to drive to the next town over to find my new doctor

Love

Pig and farm report

Caveat : both of the links I tried to make for this post are broken but I’m to blarghhh to fix them

I rescued this coleus last year I put one of them outside when I gave up on it because its leaves were falling off and I stuck the other in the window with my Christmas cactus and weird mushroomy orchid where it not only thrives but is now flowering all they needed was for me to stop loving so hard on them clearly this beauty prefers being ignored I didn’t take a pic of the flowering one it’s much more private but this one on the deck greets my coffee and me every morning and we have a little chat and I promise not to touch it not to maul it with my sad human love

here is the peperomia watermelon that I planted to root on June six in the plant hospital of my kitchen the upright leaf hasn’t done much yet but the bigger leaf that slipped down flat sent strong roots out from its bottom and now you can see a baby leaf finally poking up behind it and if I gently lift the adult leaf I can see that baby leaf is coming up with his whole family mom dad the twins the four cats and two dogs grandpa and grandma and the three aunties

not only are these gorgeous plants when they grow up they’re fascinating to watch as long as you don’t mind slowing down and who among us has not slowed down 

here are more pictures but they’re none of them very interesting because I made my brain shut off after a big week of finding out my kid needs two new catalytic converters and two new headers on his truck very pricey stuff over two thousand so his dad and I pitched in to help with half the bill on account of the kid hauls our sorry asses all over the place I took a drive out the old highway to Mount Vernon past the tasseled corn fields in a crazy black storm sky and bought figs at the Co-op and bought a burrito and stood in the Skagit River with my skirts tucked up as we who stand in rivers know how to do 

here are some pink plants I love I am sorry poetry has fled my brain my kid with a broken truck is here so very much so very very much and he wanders in from his half of the house to put the news in my ear in both my ears every few minutes even though I look at him and feel my eyebulbs glaze over plus he wants to drive my car and I let him but I am not comfortable with it 

the last picture is that ginger I planted going berserker behind it my grand attar of rose geranium behind that my pyramid lamp that I bought years ago in Port Townsend my metal Yellow Submarine that the Beatles still pop out of and my Read Hard cup on my desk

I took my library books back I called and canceled LegalZoom’s free legal aid for only 14.99 per month taken directly from your checking account call and cancel any time within the next 14 days! I have my will in hand ready to be notarized I scrubbed my toilets I wandered around in my yard eating blueberries I saw that Figgy Pudding has finally branched up and out so now she is three trunks strong I put away my laundry and I bought some cheechee face stuff something called a moon mask for hydration and some lipstick I love buying makeup and girlie crap almost as much as I love buying books I always have the cheechee-er the better even though I rarely wear it but my face has become very tender where the masks cover it I swap out different masks for different days and use the paper blue masks when I’m caught by surprise (they really hurt) 

I just braided a six strand challah that’s in the oven rising my brain is stupid but my heart is AOkay I took that eagle picture from inside my car this morning it was cool but sunny we had a few days of rain then it was autumn I felt it so strong a shift in the earth’s crust the fragrance of the forest swinging wide and I feel it every morning when I wake up and the owls feel it too their morning and evening calls deeper and closer now as if they’re packing up their camping gear and heading back to their wild nest in my giant hemlock tree we will have a couple warm days but summer is over

In the plant hospital

I spent quiet time in my head this morning talking to my watermelon peperomia as I cut off two leaves one of the cats bit through dipped them in root hormone planted them and put them in a little greenhouse in the sun using my hands this way comforts me the same way baking comforts me the same way practicing Bach comforts me I was only interrupted once when my CSA box was delivered it is quiet here in the zero hour bar and grill and strangely still I can’t tell if it’s Saturday or Thursday it no longer matters


the babies

the mother

Father 

Pig and farm report

 

Yesterday was the first warm day of the season out here I opened all the windows in the house cleaned the spiders off the fans and brought them up from the shed and made cold pasta salad for dinner there is a giant watermelon in my refrigerator right now waiting for the knife I’m writing this on Docs so I have no idea what the spacing will look like once I paste it into persnickety blooger 

It’s difficult to write about anything other than what’s happening here in what used to be the United states it’s difficult to think about anything else really now at what very well may be the end times so I will write here that I live in a free state so far and if you need to come here for a medical procedure you can stay here I can’t do much but I can be part of the vast pipeline that is forming right now an underground army of women who can help who believe that women and men (humans with wombs) are not second class citizens or chattel many of us old enough to remember when abortion was still illegal the patriarchy is gathering strength and speed even now that permit free open carry gun laws have been passed in NY and women’s rights are being stripped away and one church is trying to rule us all

It’s difficult to write of anything else right now so I will work on the poem I’ve been working on for weeks and keep reading and keep baking bread and go to my garden and glare at the cool ground where my tomato seedlings complain about the god awful cold spring the rain and lack of sun I’ve begun driving after a very long period of just never wanting to get behind the wheel again I think my not wanting to drive (or read for that matter) might have been new iterations of my bi-polar disease who knows it seems to evolve all the time my stupid brain and its little fires

Be safe Darklings wherever you are.