I've Been Sick

Well, that's my excuse anyway. For not writing. Not that you missed me or anything.

But of course, there is much more going on than that. I mean, just because I have consistently tried to hack up a lung (today, I coughed so hard for so long that my nose bled) for the last 4 days, have had a piercing headache just above my right eye for the last two, but have still had to do work of some kind for all of those days, not including the Halloween Partying that went on, despite being sick, on Saturday (4 parties in one night, photo post - with captions - soon to come), doesn't mean that it is the only thing going on.

Recently, I have been the poor in spirit. As much as the Kingdom of Heaven is mine, it has come to my attention that there is much question about said Kingdom of Heaven. The kind of questions that my poor, feeble, sickly mind can't handle right now... I mean, the realization that there is more than what the church says, and more that what people say and live, I have to do my soul searching in the form of fiction.

That's right, it's National Novel Writing Month. 50,000 words in 30 days. If I finish, it will be the first time I have carried through on the promise.

I make myself the promise every year to complete my "short story collection" or my "novel" although I haven't written anything longer than 14 pages ever in my life (well, storywise anyway). What is wrong with me. This year, I look forward to this endeavor with much more trepidation, much less hope, and much more determination than I have ever had. I say this is the year that I at least break 25,000. I get half way to all the way done, which is about 15,000 more words than I've ever done. Last year's paltry 6,000 gives me a piercing headache above my left eye.

Wish me luck.

All Things To All People

A few years ago, I started going to a coffee shop called The Vine and I was there every Thursday, Friday and Saturday for nearly a year of my life. Towards the end of that year, I began working for them. I loved my job with them because it gave me the opportunity to know more people and come out of my shell even more.

The Vine was owned by Pam and Glen, a couple that led praise and worship at their church. They also worked with the youth and they realized that kids really had no place to go. They weren't just worried about the kids in their church, but all the youth in Macon and all the youth willing to come down from where ever they were coming from. Pam and Glen were surrogate parents for many of us. They were warm and friendly, open and welcoming. They were Christians that wanted everyone to feel welcomed and to feel loved. We showed up regularly - The truck driver looking for a million ounces of espresso in a large white mocha and a good game of chess; the writer who spent too much of her time reflecting until she actually began to meet others; people who played music regularly; homeless people and people too young to do anything except hang out. Many of the people I am still friends with today I met at The Vine. Jason, who suddenly yelled out lines from The Color Purple and bonded us instantly as friends. Kevin, a jeweler who sat at my table one day just because he wondered what in the world I could be writing every weekend. Mark, the trucker/chess player that looked like he needed a few years of sleep but was so funny in a dry humour sort of way. We got along because we both looked scarier than we actually were.

Pam and Glen ran The Vine like a business and a ministry. I loved it. I could invite anyone to come and know they would have fun. It was a great place to meet, a great place to hear live music, and a great place to just hang out.

One day, Pam and Glen decided to follow their own musical dream, so they saw about selling their equipment and The Vine name. I know they hoped that they would pass along the comfortable feeling they gave the place. The couple they sold it to did not have the same idea of what a Christian owned coffee shop should be. The most memorable difference between their ownership and Pam and Glen's I saw one evening. A couple of Morman guys came in - I assume to talk. They were obvious in their clean, dark suits, bike helmets resting on the table. They got glasses of milk and when the new owners daughters came out, she also brought tracts for the men in the hopes that they might accept Christ... the right way. It was an insult to them and immediately put up a wall. They left shortly afterwards and I never saw them there again. What once had been a place of rest for anyone who visited became a place where you couldn't just rest, but were assaulted with one man's definition of Christianity whether you liked it/agreed with it or not. It ceased to be my coffee shop.

After the Vine, I started going to and working for Joshua Cup Coffee. Also owned by Christians, they wanted the shop to be a place where anyone would be comfortable visiting. From Wiccan to Fundamental, everyone could come in and not feel judged. Blue haired, tattooed punk kids to blue haired Methodists, all shared the same place and they loved it. For more than 6 years, the people worked their hearts out, sometimes without pay, because they believed in what the shop was about. They wanted it to succeed and they worked for it to succeed. About a month ago, a new owner was brought in and with him came a manager. This manager said that only Christian music would play, that only Christian bands could perform. They kicked out the entertainment newspaper because it had bar advertisement. The entertainment newspaper that some people come to the J.Cup for. It was once the only place where I KNEW it was going to be. No longer.

As I see the changes happening, it makes me sad. I remember meeting a friend at the new Vine after I came back from my first stint in California. I met him and his brother, who was wearing a pagan cross, to catch up. The owners called me to the side to warn me about these guys. Guys that had been my friends longer than they'd been business and they thought they had the right to warn me?

Thanks, but no thanks.

I see Joshua Cup moving in that direction. There are some good changes and having real food is one of them. But I am worried about the direction and I am afraid that all the work and all the heart that went into making it a shop worth respecting will be gone.

Finished!

This week has been the most hectic week that I've had since taking a job and still trying to write for pay. It is becoming harder and harder to be fair to my regular paying job when it comes to writing.

I had 6 assignments due this week, all for next month. I need to start paying attention to the business part of this. I mean, I am keeping up with receipts, but I am not trying to figure out how to optimize my time so that I am getting the maximum worth out of the time it takes to write my articles versus what I get paid.

I have been pulled all out of sorts over how hard this week has been trying to get everything done. The Honey asked me if this was not what I wanted and I found myself smiling because this is EXACTLY what I want. I want this struggle to find the right words and put them to page. I want to receive that compliment from my editor, where her touch is barely there because my words match the style of her magazine or matches the tone that he wants in his magazine. It is not getting easier, but if I am right, it is because I am still trying very hard to be better and better. I think it would be easier to write the way I've always written.

Or it could all just be horrible and it's taken me longer than it really should have to get my articles written. But praise be to my good and fluffy Lord that I am done and ready to relax.

This is what relaxing looks like today:
Little Sister is coming to town today. We will drive around town trying to find clothes for an 80s Prom party and for her Cruela DiVille (sp?) halloween costume. Then we will go to IHOP (International House or Prayer - not Pancake) which she is being forced to go to so I agreed to go for morale support. Then we are going to the Prom. I have no clue what we will be doing after that.

Tomorrow is Arts and Jazz and then another birthday party. I like to party all the time, party all the time, party all the time!

But more than that, I am not going to think about any of the things that are really swirling in my mind. I will give myself permission to rest and to have fun. That's the least that I deserve.

Necessity is the Mother of Reinvention

I heard this second hand, but I thought it was funny and a friend's post about bookstores brought this to mind.

A couple of guys I know were at the bookstore, grousing about the prices of books. The one guy says to the other, "Man, wouldn't it be nice if there was a place you could go where you could get any book you wanted without paying for it and then when you're done reading, you'd give it ba..." He stopped himself in the middle of his sentence, laughed and then said, "Fuck! I've reinvented the library!"

I don't know why remember the telling of that conversation always makes me smile, but it does.

Happy Thanksgiving!

There is a local food magazine that asked me to write some things for them, so yesterday, I baked a whole turkey, macaroni and cheese and sweet potato pie for a picture. Everything turned out well, if I do say so myself, because I'm so awesome in the kitchen.

Rock on.

If I get pictures, I'll post them. The surprise, though, was the sweet potato pie. It was custard-y, but so flavourful. I baked the sweet potatoes to softness, mashed them up (after peeling them, of course) and added a bunch of stuff to it, but it was pretty simple as well. The kicker was the maple syrup in equal amounts with the sugar. It turned out delicious. I think the pictures will be good and I hope my story is good and I'm so tired from staying up all night cooking. Fortunately, I will finish everything that's been weighing on my mind tonight and maybe I can actually just sit back and relax this weekend.

Oh, yeah, this impromptu Thanksgiving baking helped me get my kitchen clean and in order. That was a blessing and an up all night curse, but all's well that ends well.

The Bird Is The Word

Sorry about that, but I'm watching Full Metal Jacket and that song was on.

Have you ever had a day where from the moment your feet hit the floor, it's like you're running? The first song on my iPod was by Pavement Placebo featuring Kate Bush. Running Up That Hill. I like that song, but as I listened to it, I just began to get tired.

Then I heard a song from a friend called Crisis of Faith (Part 1) and it made me want to drive fast.

Driving fast and tired do not a good combination make.

Tonight, something made me think about feeling connected to others, letting my mask slip a little and just putting myself out there. I got an email from a friend about being a different person now than in the past. It included a picture of myself I thought had vanished with the time. But it is still out there, floating around, a reminder of the once me, when I would willingly and without any sense of embarrassment call myself crazysexycool - as if I needed to speak it in one breath to make it real. And cool.

I'm not sure quite where to start. Do I start with the huge crush I have on Doctor Who - which is fantasy, or do I start with how my knee, which I hurt at the beginning of this month, still has not healed? Do I talk about how I look better in my jeans or how I keep looking at this story that's due last week and I can not for the life of me put the quotes in? Do I talk about how my hair is finally growing but I still might get braids, or do I talk about how hard it is to make myself put my kitchen in order. See, all these mundane, boring things that clog my mind when there are bigger things knocking around in there.

Like God and church and life and death and irrational fears and overwhelming love and finally letting go of the past. Of losing people so dear to you, you can't breath and like realizing that your friends, the one you truly love and care for, feel like half a world away.

Well, all maudlin aside, I hope it will be nice getting to know me again.

Remembering

Sometimes I forget who I am, or why I write, or why I have blogs.

I started blogging a few years ago because I had been reading blogs for months and there was only so much you could put in a comment. There were things rolling around in my head and I admit those first few posts were more imitative or responsive than revealing. I found that I liked different writing styles and I wanted to write as well or as funny or as introspectively as the people I found delight in reading.

It had more to do with being carried away to the land of those writing and wanting to follow them, on my site, into this imaginary place where I felt at home.

But then, one day, I was revealing; writing about myself and the things going on with me, the thoughts going on in my head, not reacting to what I'd read on my favourite sites. And soon people were reading my words and living in my life. And while it lasted, it was good.

And then, it felt like I grew up. I moved to California for a while and my life has not ever been the same. In ways that I still don't understand, I am closed. That may sound weird, but I found that I could not write about my experiences or put them into any context that wasn't heartrending. And then I got married and in that, the desire to hold something of myself close to my heart and away from the world began to grow.

I guess that is still there, since my marriage is so new and so perfect (even 3 years in) that to talk about it would almost spoil it. I am surprised by how much I want to keep to myself. But as I begin to read other sites again, I have to remember why I am still here, why I take up residence at this url when I could just give it up to someone else who really wants to write. I remember that getting out the things that go on with me, typing about the pains and joys of life, revealing a little bit more than I think is fair, but a little less than everything is the only way that writing will be real for me. I have faked it for a time, slowly chugging along until the words that are jumbled in would come out on their own, but now I realize that won't happen. The words will not find a way, as some say life did. I have to find the words.

Writing is scary only in how revealing it is. Writing is hard only in our fear of telling. Here's to telling.

New Apartment pt. 2

Moving is hard to do, but also exciting. As I nagvigate through boxes, things made of glass haphazardly packed in trash bags and "protected" by sales circulars from Kroger, millions upon millions of feet of wires and clothes, both clean and dirty, I realize I am embarking on a new adventure.

Namely, where to put the dishes.

I don't know if you realize this, but where you place the dishes will affect you for years to come (and like I said, it's possible we'll never move again, not because we don't want to but because it's just easier). Where do the plates go? Cups, silverware, special plates for parties, dessert bakery things, plastics or pots and pans? Where do they go? Choosing wisely will mean the difference between kitchen nirvana or kitchen nightmare. And you'll need more than Chef Ramsey to get you out of a kitchen nightmare. Glasses in the wrong place so that when you have guests, they get in your way when you have them over and they want something to drink, plates that are too high up so that you drop them, bowls out of place making the cereal to bowl to fridge for milk process less ergonomic - so many things could go wrong.

So why don't you just change it?

Because by the time you realize you're in a kitchen nightmare, you've grown used to things where they are. So even though you curse because you hit your knee on the dishwasher every time you grab a pan, it is not enough to change it because we love our habits.

No, you just realize you'll plan your kitchen better next time.

New Apartment

We are now in our new home, a place we will possibly be staying for the rest of our lives because DAMN! that move was hard. Every muscle in my husband body is sore, I twisted my ankle and re-hurt my knee (making me virtually useless on the "moving of big things" side of it) but worse of all, the only person that could help us sprained his wrist and kept re-injuring it throughout the night. After I hurt my knee, I didn't tell anyone about my ankle until after the work was done.

I'm about to take 50 aleve, I sure do hurt.

But it is satisfying to be in this house. It's a bit smaller, but it's nice. We have some things set up, and a ton of boxes to unload. It's going to be crazy here for a few days. But we are in, almost moved out of our old house completely. I have to go back and clean, but that's about it.

We're moving in, downtown! Are you ready for us?