Just Checking In

I've been neglecting my blog.

The last couple days have been a bad B movie.  I opened the door to the basement, knowing full-well there were monsters in it and I went down anyway.

As far as an excuse for the rest of the time there's been no update?  Just didn't feel like it. 

I will allow that recent events, and my usual lack of seratonin account for a little too.

However,  the monsters are gone for the time-being. yaaaaaaaaay  They left a nasty mess though.

And get THIS, I  ordered another fucking bottle of a "Dr.Oz sure-fire remedy."

Step Right Up Ladies and Gentlemen [Read SUCKERS] for this time we really do have the ultimate cure-all.  REALLY.  It's called Garcina Cambogia Extract.  It will totally get rid of your belly fat! ****with diet and exersise***

As I approach 173 pounds, (even after trying every sure thing the wizard behind the gray curtain has touted, given aire to, BUT HAS NOT OFFICIALLY ENDORCED,) I considered having a huge, black "L" tattooed on my forhead.

Also.  If there is anyone who actually visits the chute now and then, you may have noticed that I've been trying my hand at poetry.  I NEVER thought I would EVER be attempting poetry.  But there you are.  Never say never.  I really hate cliches. 

I have an enormous stash of really OLD stuff in the archives that await visitors ...like Puff the Magic Dragon, they've been alone and forgotten.  Please pop your head in and read one or two.


Hope all is well.   D.

Winter Wedding

We’ll marry when we’re old.   Or not.

You wanted me for life when you were twenty, and I was seventeen.

But there were things I didn’t know I needed from the world.

The world had never gone beyond the shoreline,

but it offered other boys … a baby girl.

And the years went by like a flash flood in a dry canyon.

We’ll marry when we’re old.  Or not.

We’ll move to Eugene and live in a cabin in a hazelnut grove.

You’ll stitch cotton prairie dresses for me and bring ginger tea

out to the porch. We'll smile our eyes at each other,

still finding it hard to believe we’d made our way back.

We’ll marry when we’re old.   Or not.

I’ll work the gnarls out of your shoulders and we’ll laugh about

the basement and the four-way stop at Stars Corners

where you taught me to kiss.

A cool breeze will lift my skirt and tufts of your grey hair that

you’ll keep long around your ears.

We’ll have a dog and a cat, when we marry when we’re old.   Or not. 

But I’ve heard you love your dogs.  And me, I love my cats.

We’ll watch them play from the porch in the hazelnut grove.

I’ll remind you how we fit together so well. You'll tell me you

never forgot.  Your mother had my birthstone added to her ring.

Did she keep it there?  I’ll ask.

We probably won’t marry when we’re old

in the way that people do.

You’ll write a song and sing it in your sweet old voice. You’ll play your guitar

and I’ll make you a bolo tie of aspen wood.

We’ll promise ourselves to each  other forever, which won’t be very long. 

And if you die first I’ll wrap you in lavender-scented linen

and find a patch in the hazelnut grove.  The people from town

will help.  I’ll wrap myself in quilts and sleep there with you until I’m

sure you’ve found your way.

 And you would do the same for me. Because you’ve loved

me since I walked away .

Two Sheets and Books From a Bin

I’m reading a book I bought at the Dollar Store. Everything’s a dollar…can you imagine? Do you suppose the Real Housewives Of Any County shop at Dollar Stores?

I’ve scored really good books at Dollar Stores and I feel bad every time I buy them. Someone put a lot of sweat, time, and probably (PROLLY as they say on Facebook and Twitter) they paid with their own money to get published.

Writers don’t get much credit for working hard. But it’s not easy to research and write for hours…even badly.

I bought a book by an author named Paula K.Grover. White Boys and River Girls was a surprisingly good read. I’ve kept it for years. There it was under a pile of books in a bin at the dollar store. Art, even bad art, hangs in places with better street cred, and probably [prolly] didn’t take as much work and time to create. Even if no one buys it before it’s marked down … it’s visible. At least visible. And it prolly fetches more than a dollar.

Now books can be high-jacked like music. Books will be like the old eight tracks someday, if they aren‘t already. They will be totally irrelevant. Only authors on best seller lists will make money. It’s very depressing. You can’t heist works of art online. Art is still tangibly displayed in homes, offices, and wherever. But books? Not so much. You have a Kindle or a Nook? You have an I-Pad? Read the book for ninety nine cents then delete it.

So I got a book last week, being the thrifty sonofabitch that I am. When I started reading it, it was about two old Portuguese men from around the 1950s who are gay. One finds the other hung in a tree and holds him like a baby after cutting him down. He reminisces about when they first met. It’s kind of a Portuguese Brokeback Mountain, if you will.

Tonight I began to read where I left off and it is about a guy who drinks too much, in present day, and lives in a poverty-stricken village in Portugal. The characters are straight out of a Tom Waits song. The guy has writer’s block so he drinks and hangs with ner-do-wells. It’s the same country, but a totally different story.

What?? Did I miss something? Did I black out? I’ve been too afraid to go back to the beginning of the book. Because if it’s NOT about two old gay men I am totally fucked. What an irony, eh? The universe is playing games with me.

So here I am, drunk with writer’s block, reading about, well…I don’t have to be repetitive here for you to get the picture.
I’ve been passing the time trying my hand at poetry. I will completely freak out if I open the above mentioned book and it’s about a drunken woman who writes poetry and lives in a strange little Portuguese town.
This whole thing seems like one of my complicated dreams. Indeed…maybe I’m not reading anything at all in real life.

I have to get stuff done. I’m going to San Francisco with flowers in my hair. I’ve never been West of West Virginia. Time goes way too fast and four overdrafts don’t help one do Christmas-type things in a shortened amount of time. Most people would never admit to such mistakes in bookkeeping. Truth is, I’m excellent at my job, but as soon as I clock out my brain shuts down. There just isn’t anything left. I’m more comfortable talking about being broke than I would be telling people that I bought a pair of shoes for a thousand dollars. Not that I ever would, even if I were rich. That's just stupid.

Yet there are people on "reality shows" who tell the whole world that they’ve spent 35,000 on a watch.  I’d be highly mortified just to climb out of a limo in public. Just sayin. The whole time I was on a cruise [that my brother paid for] a few years ago I told anyone who would listen that there was NO way I would have ever been able to go on a cruise had someone not paid for it. I didn’t want the cabin boy to think I was another rich American. I even apologized to him for getting sand on the floor and offered to help him sweep. I apologized to everyone I encountered who worked on the ship and on the islands.

Dear Lord, I’m thankful for my twelve dollar shoes and four overdrafts. I’m thankful that I can write. There. I’m thankful for six things tonight.