Ow

My dentist was right. I did need a crown. It occurred to me that she was right over the weekend. I rubbed rum on my gums all day Sunday. We spent three quality hours together today. We'll spend some more quality time together in a few more weeks. When the rum wears off I'll be back. I hate it when she's right.

Ongoing Tunes

Talia took fantastic pictures of Chris last night at the zoo. There is something other wordly about her when she plays her fiddle. It's not the pure music that sends me; I'm not sure I always hear it. It's watching the players become consumed.

The kids, of course, were beautiful, too. They can hear the music and they have to dance. They just run out there. Kennedy's Kitchen threw away the set list so the kids could keep dancing. That's grace. Amen. I would tell you about the clouds and the trees, but you already know.

Kennedy's Kitchen at Potawatomi Zoo

Another gorgeous day. Jeez. Talia mentioned it, but I wanted to mention it again. Chris O'Brien, our writing pal, of Kennedy's Kitchen fame, is playing tonight from 5-8 at Zoo Fest (or some such title) at Potawatomi Zoo. So pull yourself away from the computer and get out there. I'm coming and bringing Jojo. I think Talia might be there. Like my grandma used to say, go outside and play, or else.

Blue - or Maybe Cerulean

There are days when the temperature is perfect, the sky is blue, etc., etc., etc. Like today, for instance. Who can argue with a day like today? Give it up. The sky is blue. I'm not sure why blue got associated with depression. It can't be because of the sky. I think I could be bleeding to death and happy about it if the sky was blue. Have you ever heard of anyone dying of the ceruleans? No.

The writers' thing was good. I can never hear all the voices I want to, but what can you do? Just being together with everyone infiltrates my skin. I'm porous, it all seeps in. David and Talia have other details on their blogs, if curiosity is killing you. Of course, if curiosity is killing you it means you weren't there and you should have been. Blah, blah, blah.

If it's my fault that you weren't there because I schedule these things during the day, I'm going to try and bend a little. The next one will be in the evening. So there. Maybe by tomorrow I'll decide on a day. The choices seem to be the 24th, 25th, 26th. I will use my trusty dart if no one speaks up.

Playing Chopsticks Again and Again

Out in Vancouver, Washington, recycling is the thing. I'm getting one of these in a few days, a fruit basket made out of recycled chopsticks from the farmers' market. Of course my son said, "How gross is that." I'm sure they sanitize the chopsticks. When you're not using the basket it folds into a fan. Here's a couple of links: Chop Stick Art and Cracked Pots. How funny is that? I think I've found my new home.

A New Mythology

It’s not about the bees.

We dream differently,
faces to the ground listening
for the tremble of the water table
set for who knows who?

It’s flowing through this earth
and that earth, weaving the earths together
into a primordial ooze. This is a mythology.
Who knows what is true?

In my dreams you are naked
and bleeding; you have three children;
you are a black butterfly; we argue.

I am a tree.
Rooted.
Feeling you move.

A Foreign Country

Naoko tagged me after a great post about bringing her basin to America. I'm in awe. How can I even think of what I would bring to a foreign country where I was staying for a year? I'm having an imagination failure big time. First of all, which country? No, that can't even be first of all. First of all I must think, what about my dogs, my cats, my goats, my chicken!!! I want to go, really, but shouldn't I wait for them all to die? This tag is causing me some major anxiety. Jeez. I think I'm going to have to give up tag if things keep going this way.

Hold on - what's that I hear? A cat hacking, puking on my carpet, again. I am throwing her outside, she is fighting me, sticking her claws in the screen. Just a minute. I'm sure I can find something to take to a foreign country for a year.

OC Boys

We were winding up the evening, letting the last of the retold stories slowly unroll. It always turns on who is still living, whose bones are now rotting away. T. tells us K. died of cancer some six months ago. This is news that slipped by us. T. says he was never right anyway. He remembers the fun they had in the old grand piano boxes, thrown out behind the music store turned bar. “Man, we used those boxes. I mean we used them. One day I ducked into one of those boxes and K. was screwing this guy, this kid, M. He wanted me to join him, but I said nah, I gotta go home. He took things too far, K. did. But in the end he got religion. Became a deacon. M.’s been gone a long time, hung himself in the shower.” It wasn’t late, but we downed the last of our beers, made our way home.

Jack Johnson and Ben Harper,

The Monarch

I found this Monarch dying at the parking lot at Lowes today. I know they have short life spans, but it just didn't seem right for something this gorgeous to die in that particular spot. So, I got him home without injury, a miracle, and promptly turned him over to Jojo, who is feeding him sugar water from her hands. He's sleeping now in the fuschias.