Letters from a Small State

Nothing to Say, No One to Say It To

Tuesday, June 23, 2009

I’m reading Faulkner’s “As I Lay Dying” for my book club, and trying very hard to finish it before Thursday, because after all it is my book club and I should at least be one of the ones who finishes the book.

One of the characters — I am not sure which one, Cora’s husband — ponders on how people need to “do”, beyond the mind. It is the sort of comment that leapt out at me, for two reasons.

One, the book is starkly rural, plain spoken and in the moment. The characters are revealed, however, internally and show to have much more complex internal lives than their “active” life shows. They are acting, and doing very little, except fitting in the death of mother around the never-ending routine of their rural lives.

The second reason is revealing itself to me, everyday, the more I get to know myself, and the nature of life. I plant a garden, I love a garden– a garden is exhausting work. I ponder the desire to do less. I buy a house, I buy things for the house — I have no time, soon, to maintain the house. I ponder leaving the house behind and moving on again.

I am the seasons, or wish I could be more with them. Modern world wants nothing to do with the inherent cyclical nature of our world, of our bodies, of the true desires in embedded in our human nature. Work, enjoy, rest, reflect and get up to work again.

I didn’t sleep tonight. I’ve been stoking myself on caffeine lately and fooling myself that it will somehow compensate for the complete subtraction of ME from my life these last months. But I am confident in the seasons, even when summer hides from us. The doing will come again.

Filed in Writing | Comments (1)

What’s on My Desk Right Now

Thursday, June 18, 2009

Since the recent addition to our life, every single flat surface has been overtaken with objects foreign, plastic and otherwise unnecessary to the progression of life as we’d known it.

Or so I thought. However, small packages come with many bizarre and seemingly useless accessories, not the least of which are naked, anatomically-incorrect bald babies with an unidentified brown sludge on its upper chest. That doesn’t stop them from being appealing to the youngest set, or from somehow ending up on the desk in the office, between the latest (unread and totally irrelevant to our lives now) issue of Golf Digest and a copy of the pre-school behavior guidelines.

Ah irony.

Filed in Family, Home, Humor and Rant, Life in America, Madness, Ponderings, The Old Days, momcentral.com | Comments (0)

One Eye Twitch away From Madness

Sunday, June 14, 2009

My eye has decided to start twitching. It isn’t much .. just a little thing that I hardly should notice– except it us driving me up a duxkog wall.

It is the sleep deprivation version of Chinese water torture..: nothing much to complain about but just enough to take me slowly over the edge.

There is Nothing worse than a tiny malady that you caN do nothing about to correct. In college, I broke my middle toe on gymnastics class. The doctor couldn’t do anything to fix it except to give me crutches and tell me to stay off it. Yeah right . Meanwhile I was supposed to walk all over the ISU campus to class how? Same thing with my minor knee injury skiing when I was working in news in KC. I had a second floor walkup and my job had me up and down steps constantly. I had to just hobble along and deal with it–slowly.

I am not patient. I don’t want to “deal with it”. I want it gone and to be fine. Now.

Eye still twitching. Awesome.

Filed in Deep Knee Bends, Family, Humor and Rant, Life in America, Old Friends | Comments (4)

I never really liked fight club

Monday, June 8, 2009

For some reason, people went bananas over Fight Club. I never thought It was all that great. I am open to influence and convincing of course but to me it was exactly what a good film shouldn’t be– a great idea, tied up in a perfect 107 minute bow.

The Sixth Sense and other films of that style fall into the same category … They are too close-ended. Maybe the fulmmakers took the saying “that’s a wrap!” too seriously because these films are too satisfyingly complete to let you feel satisfied I’m the end.

Good stories anywhere should leave you realit wondering.. And even a Tracy/Hepburn film manages that, with it’s so-called love story between the older man and the fiery woman– undoubtedly this isn’t the end if that story.

So the buddha head in my mailbox today is much more interesting to me than Fight Club itself. I like a good question mark dangling un the air and all the bizarre reasons for how it got there.

Filed in Art, Culture!, Deep Knee Bends, Famous People, Movies | Comments (1)

The End of the Day

Monday, June 1, 2009

By the end of the day, I don’t recognize myself. I feel infected, some viral version of myself that is spreading now slowly in the crawling last seconds of daylight. I don’t recognize myself and I find myself giving in, the way the sun must feel when night is pulling down on it like gravity.

The best hours of the day are lost — twilight has been sacrificed to grinding dinner hour which we hurry through now that he comes home so late.

The end of the day is like a party guest who leaves without saying goodbye– the one guest you really wanted to talk to and never got a moment while refilling the cheeseball platter.

Tonight I think I’ll charge my headphones and go somewhere quiet and sing the songs I love that whisper sweet nothings to twilight.

Filed in Colin Phillips, Details, Family, Home, Life in America | Comments (0)

The Sound of Hula Hoops…

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

… sounds like love and sounds like a long time and sounds like the pause button sticking. It sounds like fear of a day never ending. All the tiny beads falling sound like my inabilities laughing at me.

It sounds like all the projects gone wrong, and all the imagined friends wandering away. It sounds like typewriter keys left unstruck and long beautiful summer evenings, ignored. It sounds like a missed sunset.

The sound of Hula hoops shimmering on the deck sounds like teardrops and longing and the shortest distance away from myself into someplace, I don’t know where.

Filed in Deep Knee Bends, Details, Family, Life in America, Ponderings, Writing | Comments (1)

No Apologies

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

The admin in the English Department thinks I am too hard on my students, I can tell by the look on her face.

I posted a note on mailbox that it is “Closed for portfolio submissions.” This implies, of course, that I haven’t received all of them, and that some of the students (the ones I expected) have not turned them in on time.

The admin in the English Department pouts her bottom lip and says: “And that’s it? If they show up in ten minutes, nothing? Zero?”

That’s right. Nothing. The train has left the station.

It’s raining today. I didn’t get to choose this weather, and it drives me up a wall, that spring is often not what I imagine. That after the initial joyous sensation that 50 degrees is WARM, then, then, it can drag on for months in dreary same-dom. And it rains.

However, I notice that my lawn has unrolled itself luxuriously. The azalea blushes on every cheek. Maples have exploded. The peony that drooped and sighed in the scorching heat last August looks like it might be singing opera.

The admin in the English Department may wrinkle her nose, but I catch the scent of rich compost.

Filed in Culture!, Details, Life in America, Ponderings, Work, Writing | Comments (8)

Making Snickerdoodles

Friday, April 24, 2009

We volunteered to make snacks for our friend’s free concert and I enlisted the very enthusiastic help of three eager assistants.

I love to bake– pretty much in inverse proportion to how much I do not like cooking. I think it has something to do with the outcome. I see food on the table as necessary but not at all interesting– unless it is served to me in a restaurant with a nice cool glass of water by a fancy waiter in a crisp apron. Baked goods, however, are chewy-crisp sweet childhood, the anticipation of dessert we held while we gnawed our way through a dust-dry meatloaf.

Today it was Snickerdoodles… a simple sugar cookie that, like pumpkin pie, is deceptively wonderful. You look at its beige exterior and you think “So?” but the spicy cinnamon coating, and the soft, chewy center make it the perfect treat. And if you overcook them a bit, they are just as good slightly brown and crunchy as they are pale and soft.

We misplaced the family recipe somewhere in the kitchen, so I used this one from All Recipes and I liked it alot, most especially because it called for both butter and shortening, a combination I generally approve of in baked goods.

Meanwhile, if you have any helpers about the house, this is a great recipe to try because they can help roll the doughballs in the cinammon-sugar mixture– and further enjoy the sweet antincipation of waiting waiting waiting for the lovely cookies to cool!

Filed in Consuming Things, Details, Family, Food and Drink, Home, The Old Days | Comments (3)

My American Dream…

Friday, April 17, 2009

… has nothing to do with $$$, and never has, although travel always requires work, which requires money in exchange for goods and services.

… spent 3 years in London, and very much likes the Idea of British.

… is sometimes melancholy, and loves thick lyrics that make me want to sing along.

… eats frozen pizzas alone in front of guilty-pleasure television– occasionally and with abandon.

…writes often and in bursts, with music in my ears.

… involves a bicycle, compost, blue jeans, Frances, used vehicles, and iced tea.

… means never having to say “I told you so” or pay for parking.

… has a quiet place to hide and be alone, but always has access to loving friends.

… is bigger than me, but not so large that I can’t imagine it.

… sounds like birdsong and smells like sheets from the clothesline.

… time-travels through all the love imaginable and would be happy to share.

… doesn’t mind being tired, if only it gets Spoon when its sleeps.

… thinks an East-facing bedroom is best.

… loves twilight and popcorn and cold hefeweizen.

… would love if you could come over.

Filed in Alcohol, Family, Home, Life in America, London, Love-ish-ness, Old Friends, Outdoorsy Things, Ponderings, Writing | Comments (1)

Morning Person

Thursday, April 16, 2009

I am a morning person, definitely. I like night time too, but for me, the most productive time is early, before 11 a.m.

Back in my full-time freelancing days I used to get this feeling of dread whenever 11 a.m. rolled around, as if the day were winding down into the “wasted” hours. I’d start to feel anxious and hurried, frustrated if I hadn’t completed everything I wanted on my to-do list already for the day.

Well. Now things are slightly different. My newly installed alarm clocks go off around 6:15 or so and buzz all day until blessed 8 p.m. I am having to adjust things in order to allow both myself and Colin peace and moments of reflections. Even though I am more than just myself now, I want to hold onto who I am, to give the best of me to all of them.

So if you are wondering, the house is quiet at the moment, except the furnace churning away as the heat just kicked on. (I don’t want to wish the time away, but spring, come on!)

The Western sky out my window is lavendar at its lowest point over Arrowhead Street, rising to a translucent pale blue of sunrise above. Occasionally a runner or walker passes by on the road.

Once it is warmer, perhaps I’ll use the 5:30 hour for a morning bike ride or walk. Or visit you here, a bit more often.

Anyway… ‘morning.

Filed in Writing | Comments (1)

Dinner’s Ready!

Tuesday, March 31, 2009

I had a revelation whilst reading a recipe suggestion from my friend Jeannie today.

Midwestern recipes seem to always involve spraying a pan with Pam and sprinkling Durkee Fried Onions.

We’ve been revamping our eating as you might guess to make things a bit more family friendly. Suggestions for dinners have been very “bake and freeze” in style, even from the East Coast friends. But leave it up to my true, hard core she-South-Dakota, me-Iowa friend to know where the real comfort component comes in.

Durkee Fried Onion on a Tater Tot casserole. Mmmm.

But don’t worry… we’ve mixed in a canned green beans, to make it healthy!

Filed in Consuming Things, Family, Food and Drink, Humor and Rant, Midwest is Best, Old Friends | Comments (2)

Bye-Bye Fit!

Friday, March 27, 2009

Or, The Saddest Day Thus Far

Colin just drove away with our Honda Fit. Honestly, I had NO idea how attached I’d gotten to that car. I truly felt like crying.

It was cute, and peppy, with five on the floor, and the most no-frills, no-nonsense style of any car I’d ever met. Yes, it had cup holders, and a AUX port. But other than that, it was just a car. A great car, with the most amazing folding seats, and great leg and head room. And it almost always got 38-40 miles to a gallon.

Sadly, Colin just could NOT come up with a way to strap car seats to the roof. So, bye-bye 12th greenest car in the world… hello minivan.

Our People Carrier

We made our fastest car shopping experience ever (even topping the overseas Fit purchase) last night with Ted again at the Honda dealership in Westport. One hour and 10 minutes. I had narrowed it down to a Sienna and the Odyssey, but the simplicity of trade made it easy. Besides how can you go wrong with a Honda?

Ours is a 2004 (the old body style, we know!) but by sacrificing a year or two, we made up for in model style… we got the EX-L with leather interior (easier to clean!) and this particular one came with a DVD player and all sorts of gimmicks like when the kids turn on a light in the back, we can turn it off in the front! Definitely not like my Fit.

One owner, 68,000 miles and it’s still Certified. And because the Amazing Wonder Fit held almost All of Its Value (crap!) we got it for almost an even swap.

Colin looked really funny sitting in the driver’s seat of that minivan. It was like looking into the future. The car I met him in was a stylish Infinit, while I was driving my road warrior ‘3 Mazda Protege. Bye bye days of brunching and leisure. Now we are, full on, minivan people.

Filed in Consuming Things, Details, Family, Life in America, On Driving | Comments (4)

Stories Told

Friday, March 20, 2009

Why I Love The Moth
When I was about seven or eight years old, I got fixated on the idea of creating a neighborhood newspaper. I would gather stories, write them, publish them using my parent’s typewriter, and deliver them to my neighbors’ mailboxes.

So I did. I went around interviewing my family, and Mr. Petty across the street, who was building a house. I asked Mrs. Pederson about her Irish Setters Gretchen and Casey, and told other stories about the tiny block I lived on.

It was really tiny… we lived on a dead-end street, a kind of pre-suburban cul de sac, with 8 houses and one “warehouse” — an ancient house used by a neighbor for storage in his upholstery business.

At the end of the street there was a big wild empty field, with tall grass, knotty and untended apple trees, and one tangled mulberry bush that was only real fresh fruit I would ever eat as a kid.

I published two issues of the Adams Street Gazette (the second one was handwritten because the typewriter took too long) before I stopped. The stories I wanted to tell, those which I imagined in my head — drama such that Tom Brokaw conveyed on the Nightly News over dinner– just wasn’t there on my little street. It was BORING to talk about Mr. Osterburg parking in the carport instead of the garage, or reporting on the latest results of Kick the Can.

Where Stories Tread

Recently I discovered a podcast called “The Moth”, where regular people like you or me get up on stage and tell true stories from their lives. It has reminded me about my own desire to tell stories. And it reminds me that not everyone tells them the same way.

The Moth stories are told “live and without notes.” The stories roll out from a single person on stage, into a microphone, and are delivered to a waiting audience. The storytellers, I’m sure, practice before they come to stage, but like any live performance, there are nerves and stage fright that add a delectable tension to the stories. Nervous laughter cuts in and interrupts often.

Then there’s the voices. I have not been to a mainstage live show– I experience The Moth from earbuds, injected directly into my head, with the voices of the storytellers as my only link to their reality. The Moth podcast is radio– not, of course, broadcast over the airwaves as technical “radio” demands. But it is the essence of what good radio always is — resonant voices of humans, disconnected from their corporeal bodies, but as whole and flawed as any soul you will ever meet. There are cracks in the voices, that let you enter in. As a listener, that is when you know you are safe.

Stories selected for The Moth are well-crafted, usually with a fine narrative story arc that includes minor and major climatic moments, thick suspense punctured by sharp wit, or the opposite… a riot of hilarity crushed under heel by some pure and detailed grief.

Some stories are wretchedly rambling– with the teller heaving and panting for breath, gasping for response from his audience.

And yet, they too arrive somehow to that place where the listener pauses hopelessly: stranded at that moment, abandoned and waiting for the storyteller’s promise to carry them home.

Why We Listen

Lately, as I told Ellen, I’ve been listening to stories like those told on the Moth more than I have to the news of the day. I have a deep need, now, to feel and hear the details of human experience– Jon Levin riding a body as a graveyard-shift orderly or Doreen’s smoking Thanksgiving.

It is gulping water in the desert of “reality.”

Filed in Culture!, Details, Life in America, Media, Techno-wonder, The Old Days, Writing | Comments (1)

Knitting – The Anti-Rage Rage

Monday, March 16, 2009

So apparently, I’ve gotten quite hooked on this:

It was a combination of the following influences:

my Mom re-teaching me (about a year ago) to knit, in response to a bandage knitting project
My friend Frisbie, who is a textile artist. She updated my skills as you can see here (though isn’t responsible for the choice of colors!), including the basketweave technique and (gasp!) TWO yarns at once!
Reading Kate Jacobs’ book The Friday Night Knitting Club, which combined my romantic idea of myself as a knitter, with my romantic idea of myself as an independent woman in NYC.
And finally, the influence of fellow writer, Disgruntled Cycle Commuting Town Mouse, who inadvertently set my competitive nature in motion when she not only taught herself to knit, but felted a mug cosy that even had Frisbie humming and hahing.

Colin’s comment: “Oh how nice. A Scarf. Just in time for spring.”

You can tell the knitting is working because I just laughed and stitched on.

Colin’s second comment, after I very nicely didn’t poke him with the needle: “No really it’s good. You can get a jump on your Fall line.

Sigh. No respect.

Filed in Culture!, Details, Family, Life in America, Madness | Comments (4)

Writer’s Block… A Recessionary Guide to Art v. Work

Monday, March 16, 2009

I am a writer. It is my calling and who I am.

That is NOT however, currently my profession.

Currently I am teacher. (I would appreciate any and no one stopping off at the cliche wheel for the “those who can’t..” metaphor.)

So here I am, with a perfectly good STRING of writing credits, heaps of experience, two and and change unpublished novels and an upside-down mortgage. And I’m suddenly overtaken with panic. I am not working as a writer. I am not working as a writer!

I have to say, though it isn’t fair: I am starting to relate to the guy, David, who has now found himself living in the tent city in Sacramento:

“Trying to get back on my feet, you know. Daily, I still go out looking for a job. But the thing I’m running into is when I put the application in they ask me, ‘Where do you live at?’ And I go, ‘Actually, I don’t have a place to live. I’m homeless.’ That’s it. They don’t hire me.” -- David Cutch, quoted on NPR

I wake up everyday to the words of NPR reporters: “downturn” “recession” “struggles” “losses” “foreclosures.” There are “Ponzi”s and “bailouts” with “disgraced” financiers and “outraged” people worrying over whether we’ve been “tricked” by AIG, or “duped” by GM or “wiped out” by Citigroup.

Hey, I can tell you something– I am a writer and I know what words do to you. They take from being a welder, like David Cutch, and living the American Dream (”owning” his own home), working hard and paying his bills, to being NOTHING — a throw-back “Hooverville-ite,” reduced to the status of dog by the sorry term “homeless.”

In case you are worried you’ll miss the apocalyptic bankers leaping out the windows–the way we all read about from the 1929 Black Tuesday– don’t worry. We’ll have plenty of warning. Our newscrews will be poised, with Newschoppers above and all manner of HD and stop-action recording devices below, to ensure we don’t miss the sound of bones cracking and brains smearing on the pavement.

Meanwhile, I can’t imagine why my writing is sputtering through camera-shutter stops. Or why no one is reading the papers. And we don’t want to know what is in the news. And why the world wishes its writers would just shut the hell up, anyhow.

In a rapid and strategic move to tamp down the fallout, Obama also announced Monday that he has instructed Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to “pursue every legal avenue to block these bonuses and make the American taxpayers whole.” Geithner last week had already confronted AIG chief Edward Liddy about the payouts.” –quoted from NPR

It’s a long way to tent city from there.

Filed in Deep Knee Bends, Humor and Rant, Life in America, Madness, Relocation, Writing | Comments (6)

Nothing to Say, No One to Say It To

What’s on My Desk Right Now

One Eye Twitch away From Madness

I never really liked fight club

The End of the Day

The Sound of Hula Hoops…

No Apologies

Making Snickerdoodles

My American Dream…

Morning Person

Dinner’s Ready!

Bye-Bye Fit!

Stories Told

Knitting – The Anti-Rage Rage

Writer’s Block… A Recessionary Guide to Art v. Work

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