Dear Ether,

I had a pet spider. When people saw it for the last couple months I would say, that’s my pet orange spider, Escher. Or Geronimo. I couldn’t ever decide. It was small and orange and he lived in the living room lamp.  I fed him a couple ants and watched him spin like a mad wizard blue flashing thread. At one point his web got messy and he’d remade the entire thing over night. It sparkled in symmetry, undulated slightly with my breath as I bent in to examine it. And then as time went he let it go and it got quite dirty with fuzz and cat hair – leaving carcai, dotted along its landscape,  everywhere, and then one day I saw him dangling a bit out of orbit and then he was gone. And he never came back. And as much as the lamp needs a good vacuuming and the web just reminds me that Tula the small orange spider isn’t there… there is a tunnel spider in the crook of 2 panes in the backdoor… but I cannot say it is quite the same.

I turn from that loss scratching my head and gazing at it occasionally, as if over an hour or two of Blades of Glory- a triumph for figure skating, Tula will reappear and everything will go on as it was. As it is, A Christmas Carol is playing and the web is desolate just like doorways of my house of a certain prescient cat or my tearing up over the sight of tomatoes.  Advent is all about waiting, and loss and sorrow, and more waiting upon deliverance, and expectancy, I could say, but I do not know if mine must be so entirely literal, or Christmas Carole still horrifically timeless. But there it is.

What else besides. Cancelling cable. Learning how to use a kilsaw. Cleaning out Marge’s garage...

This post was interrupted by ill-internet connections....  and of course the Hallmark Channel- deserves a post all its own- what I've learned as it was the only thing for days to watch- compromise, good cheer, perseverance- you always find love, come out ahead... together.

And now The new year is upon us. I was reminded to say we cannot know people through status updates. Especially infrequent ones – dispositions, moods, new haircuts, bit swaths of life- but not the details. Param died- I didn’t post. I didn’t feel I could compound FB with more suffering and loss within my orbit as it was. Poor Kevin. Poor Rachel his wife. That horror unfolding all through FB but via a blog was where the in betweens were all kept. And who is marge? And why am I cancelling cable? And why on earth am I telling trader joe’s people that I learned how to use a kilsaw? And that I felt very clever to use my fake eyeglasses and my kneepads from rollerblading and protective devices. Woeful I didn't get a photo. The great trench work of 2013 completed! Did you know we're banning plastic bags forever and charging people for paper ones in LA? And though tequila makes everything merry and bright photos still lie when I would call the gatherings soulless, even if mother and I are not. Though,

My rosebush Lagerfeld came back to life in very Christmastide like fashion. That’s something too. A sort of Christmas miracle. There’s still time for those- till the 6^th. I was very close to ripping it out of the ground as months have past and it seemed to just be dying or already dead- the greenish limbs a mocking illusion. But no just a couple days ago and poof- little bits of green hope all over it. And a surprise package from one AMRF with delicious lotions and a felty Jesus- spoke also of something distant and lost, and Spring. And just today my dad spent 5 hours trying to fix my internet, poor man. An oft not seen tenacity on my behalf- or technology. And my mom, with me and father, as an anchor of moral support... weeding and patching holes in the ceiling. Another great good gift. Oh and coffee. Taking her to all the lovely places.

I had more to say about subtext too and how my parents trained me for it, modeling silence and the unspoken- and here I thought it was my education- and feeling like we should quit the blog. Of a strain. Of the unsustainable. Unrelated to subtext, and would say it all except I'm watching Great Expectations. It is perhaps because I am tired.

Goodnight.

m.

impossible things

dear non-broken ever-persevering blog, 

I find it impossible that your kitty from the far-off lands so suddenly met a terrible end. After all that - ? Just to - ?  I have no words. 

How are YOU. 

It's impossible to me, on a much more superficial note, that pomegranates exist. These treasure troves of addictive shimmery kernels. We ate them this weekend. They were 58 cents each. 

And my impossible, improbable job. How did I even end up teaching littles, and really caring about it? So much that when my assistant was recently taken away and my classroom that I worked so hard to create was half taken away, I melted down into a frantic puddle. Tears are vexingly effective and I now have some semblance of help (unpaid assistants, bless them), at least through the month's end, so for the moment it's not quite as bad? as originally perceived. But still so many problems with combining ages 2 and 3. One wants to eat buttons and the other really does not want to share. No one wants to hear stories anymore. They run laps and bang the plastic hammers as loud as they possibly can. There is a holiday program to learn and take-home gift-type projects to create, but we are operating with our bare-bones, hoping to keep this ship afloat until it evolves into another type of vessel (full-day operation, details TBD) - 

I want to teach them things, but at the moment, if they can just stay alive. 

And then through all of this, here is me, impossibly as the girl with the tick on her back. Or in my brain. An impossible tick ate my brain. Day 40 of antibiotics approaches with no change. No expulsion or extinction or thorough exorcism as hoped. An acceptance of the new Way Things Are and have been for months - flu-like mornings, lack of short-term memory, weak right arm like I touched a Horcrux or something. All-over arthritis. Not to mention the random twitches and zaps and pains and tingles, whatever the tick at its post commands. Floating through the day as though everything's fine and it mostly is until I pause and then - 

so 

weighed 

down 

by the spirochetes or whatever they are swirling around inside my blood and my muscles and mind. 

Life is a string of impossible things, one after the other, and yet we remain surprised. I wonder why.

much love to you,
penelotick

Part VIIII

Listening to Adele. Playing Gears. Drinking iced-tea. Unsweet. Wearing paintclothes for no particular reason but I'm ready dear friend, for the day.

Happy Anniversary.

It's been 9 years of words exchanged over this enchanted device. And in the midst of having friends that make me think why even bother having enemies, I have you, and I wanted to remind you Narnia is real in the midst of pain and elusive gmail archiving problems. Don't cease to believe. It is the one tragic thing I could not bear in this life, and

If encouraging you is one of my sole purposii in life I am happy to do it. Because you my dear one, are priceless.

It's been a few weeks since I heard from you, and though you can't feel it, there is magic humming at your fingertips- that table is a series of molecules moving at a rate we can't perceive- we run our fingers over the smooth and cool of the surface. It seems so ordinary and we look out- the way the wind whips right now through the sky into the tree, trouncing the leaves they twist shudder and unfurl. They bend but don't break. They fly off and out and the tree won't forget them. The way my cat's whiskers arch and twitch as he yawns. The way the light dances through the eye, the way our muscles move into smiles. The breath, deep in a sigh our whole body responds aching for peace. Rest be with us this day. God be faithful. Bring unity to our hearts and bodies. Bring us to wholeness.

Can I understand the miracle of my hands?
To be silent and let it pass without an exclamation?
To leave you there disbelieving in your extraordinary life?
When look how you are and how much God must love you.
My heart beats fast at the thought.

Let me run into the yard and disappear into space.
And I just went to try but the hose needed to be moved and Twist was mewing at me and I picked her up. That green of her eyes staring wide at me and the pincing of her claws as she wonders why the water is disturbing her rest. She mews. She mews. Her fur a midnight with streaking stars. And the morning glory blooming that ostentatious purple mocking me and the weeds taking over the orderly roses. And the warmth of my flipflops against the sun. And I heard no need to fall away up and out and into because I am right here. You haven't far to go. Sit beside me.

I will, always and forever Penelope,
m.


 

Dear Bruckner,

It's true I don't know if I copyrighted any of this, but you better give us some hefty checks whenever you make good on fame and stardom. Or treat us to lunch at the Ivy in some fitfully ironic turn of fate. We'll grimly order whatever we want. It will however, be delicious. You'll have the generous demeanor of a shoe baron sitting at court. I will not feed you grapes, but look at you wryly across the table plotting revenge in a startling loss of faith. That will be your next greatest work. Time, then will rip past and i'll have died. But you'll still go on occasion to sit there and drink wine and think of us and the blog and the time when the words just one day stopped or Bl/gSp/t closed for business or it all changed- but it was something possibly insignificant seeming but earthshattering all the same. By then you'll be legend. It will be your one dark day that will be little discussed but cryptically referred to by your biographer. There will be rumors and we will merely be a small and obscure footnote on your lengthy wikipage.

How far we wandered from that place. When we sat there- I think I had ravioli. A rockstar passed with his baby in a stroller. We went to the LaBrea Tarpits. We climbed that Hollywood Hill, literally and pondered and walked way past the batman cave entrance.

And today? I had a typically LA. LA lunch off Franklin across from the sci-ti celebritycentre. The server came out and said my friend's hair was glowing and radiating like the sun. A guy came to sit near us with his greyhound rescue. The bartender having heard my friend only wanted 1 shot in her bloodymary thought it was "adorable" and then came outside to hit on her and give her a t-shirt because she was a fellow traveler and though he was American, spoke with a convoluted british accent. When I told the manager I was sad not to have a tshirt she said, I didn't get one because she could tell I was a local. Or she confused me with someone who went there a lot or had in fact remembered that I frequented the place a lot-- 8 years ago. 2 girls walked by us with no bras on, and i'm sure someone famous and not clean shaven walked by. My friend said, it is totally different than SF isn't it. I said oh, yes. It is.

I went back to church to get more organic fair-trade coffee and talk about God.

But besides that, what else.

My mom moved out.




 

Part (XII) Seven

First time I forgot our anniversary and only rememberd a month later while simultaneously hitting another blog low. 7 posts though for 7 years. "winning!" In other news i did muster the strength for a new blogtitlehead, even though the other one hit the struggle so precisely on the head, that was all we needed to say. There was the forces of darkness and light converging upon us, our joy was a weighted statue that was being anchored by time and sinking into an abyss... we'll see what this one does for us. Where's daniel to ask us questions when we need him? Biding his time somewhere and not watching the decline and fall of an unknown blog. Not that we're going to blip ourselves out of existence. Not yet. It's a good sign i'm being so caustic. It almost makes me hopeful.

m.

Dear Grain,

Why are you breaking up with us? We had something good. I mean there were good times weren't there? It's not just that you were one of only 3 people who read the blog, though we noticed you really hadn't been reading much of late. And since november it was true you didnt have much to say longer than a sentence update in that other place we won't mention. I suppose we should've said something then. I'd glance to see if it updated but the days went longer and longer and then well- i guess I always thought you'd pop back on with an apology and renewed vigor. It's my fault for not seeing it sooner. For not reaching out. You never really loved us the way we loved you. Is that fair? No. I know. But I guess its one of those things- we've grown apart. Started living separate lives. And now you don't have anything to say to us. We used to love your stories though. Your thoughts about things and your struggles. With or without work. We're going to miss you. I guess it's the final thread and its good of you to decisively chop it off and not let it linger. Not pretend you're ever going to come back with promises and maybes. You've changed. You've moved on without us and aren't looking back. But it came as a bit of shock. We plead, we say- it's different. It's a different voice these enterprises you've embarked on... but then i stopped writing out of the blue and i suppose you have every right to not blog. But still. It's a blow. One less voice over the wires and plastic keys. A death. let's call it that. We've lost the thread of history. I know it's melodramatic. But it's true. A human story in minuitia wiped out and given way for very important things, only big arcs now and coded language. Blogging used to be a fad and a craze and we've hung on out of lunacy or quirk or maybe we both need to see how long we can last. Until blogspot closes or we die maybe? Until we print all the pages and make a tome of all the priceless words. Until we're the very last ones. Ok, you're right. We can make new friends. Friends come and go though. Like Kurt and Horace who died of old age. We miss them still and it's hard to go on sometimes. To keep saying what you have to say even though no one cares. But anyway. Nevermind.

Goodbye dear blog whom we've known for at least 5 years or more. I would go back to check but it doesn't exist anymore. It was as if... and then... So here's to you, no more to have such insight, you have faded back into time, like a star extinguished, reached us finally only years too late, and then gone.

To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.... WB.

dear blog,

Apologies for my pronounced neglect this week. Am currently vacationing in Book Land with Alice and Charlie Blackwell and the tale of American Wife. My idle mind ponders little else, except maybe the sunshine and flowers that were out all week and then suddenly this morning disappeared. And the looming issue of Exercise, and what to do about it. Nothing appeals anymore. Am stuck in a sort of resentful and unproductive inertia that human beings should even have to exercise to begin with, why can’t we be naturally toned and fit from the comfort of our couches, or even the comfort of outdoors, swinging the children on the swings and pondering what vegetables and herbs will go in the garden. Oh and one more thing: why exactly did the Red Tent ever go out of fashion. Because seriously, in the midst of the rainy, chilly weather that looms for the next six or so days, my mood is an exact reflection and I mainly feel useless, if not detrimental, to societies large and small. Although remembering the past days of sunshine and light, I did purchase a set of four exciting snack bowls to replace the white set I found aesthetically displeasing based on shape alone: the new set is black on the outside with a beautiful shiny red on the inside. They make everything they hold taste better, I don’t know why. And the banana cake in the fridge with the cream cheese frosting remains a daily highlight. And my fa-mii-ly all seems (knock on wood) to be well and happy for the time being. A Smartini cabin retreat in the mountains looms large on the horizon that is April, along with a local herb fair at the end of March, not to mention a potentially exciting secondhand sale tomorrow in which I hope to procure a double stroller that may assist the aforementioned Exercise issue, even if I’m skeptical that walking will really be that effective or efficient, calorie-burning-wise. Maybe it will be so, over time? Lastly, in my even-more-sensitive-than-usual state I am perhaps a little more than vaguely concerned about m and her absence, like what is going on 3000 miles away and I hope she’s not entrenched and spiraling in her dark place, but seizing the free time that lies before her to create and dream and realizing above all that she’s all kinds of awesome and fully worthy and able to accomplish even the most lofty of goals, however unattainable they at times seem. I worry that instead she’s hiding out in a bunker somewhere with access only to Netflix Watch-It-Now and our game of Facebook Scrabble, which inarguably have their value, but what about the art supplies, and let’s not forget the mountains and the sky and the trees.

That is all I have for now, my dear blog... 

xoxo,

penelope

Red Tent, barren landscape. It has a certain appeal.

Weekend Notes

*N.Lo spit up on my head TWICE.

*Had ten tons of leftover lemon ice paint from kitchen, which was most unfortunate, as it cost a lot of money. Turned lemon ice into LEMONADE and painted the backyard playhouse.

*Brought the WHITE paint inside the house and began touching up spots on the kitchen trim that are chipped. Found that touch-up job makes moldings look wonderful and un-touched-up moldings look even more horrible. Have not stopped touching up trim. Found even more white paint in the laundry room, foresee myself painting trim forever.

*K.Lo and N.Lo (dare I speak it out loud) had two very good nights of sleep. Consecutively. As did I. Sort of.

*I've hidden all the candy so my daughter won't ask for chocolate all day long. Or at least so I can answer, "We don't have any" and effectively pretend that's the truth. The candy is now conveniently located in a drawer right next to where I keep the computer in the kitchen. Don't anyone tell her.

*The new Smartini blog is super-cool and you should visit and comment a lot. I personally am a comment whore.

*Two very cool things I read recently are here and here. One is about Neville Longbottom and the other features several favorite movie/TV/book characters including Barney Stinson and Dwight K. Schrute. And Mose. They made me laugh out loud, like genuinely laugh, which startled me.

*The peas and cucumbers and the marigolds in the garden have sprouted. I have yet to grow anything else.

*My To-Do List for this week (prepping for N.Lo's Baptism Sunday) is approximately 10 miles long.

*My hair is falling out, which happens sometimes after being pregnant. Usually (I would imagine) only if your hair grew a bunch while you were pregnant. Which mine did. When I was pregnant with N.Lo.

*J.Lo has been making this ice coffee that is crazy-good. But I'm not really a coffee drinker? Because I get buzzed from one cup? So I've been super-productive the past few days and my toes are really tingly. That is all.

Open for Business

Yes, the rumors are true. I have joined a third blog, and it is now open for business. (Mis)Adventures is my home life, PenelOccupation is my work life, and so obviously, I need a blog for going out on the town. Please stop by our new blog bar, Smartini, where six smart, sassy ladies are serving up all the drinks needed to quench your thirst! For knowledge, that is.

See ya there, I'll save you a seat.

launch

So the other day, I emailed mendacious about my current life status, which inevitably contained a lot of babbling about my children, and I apologized for that, as I always feel inclined to do to my non-parental friends. Because, omg, it's so boring? If Me From a Few Years Ago were talking to Me Now? My eyes would totally be glazing over.

After nearly two years, I feel like I'm still reconciling those sides of myself--The Mom Me, and Just Penelope. I'm realizing, maybe now that I've got two babies, that those sides of me are sort of one in the same, and I shouldn't really deny that? I keep hearing this sentiment from the kinder masses as well.

And then mendacious says, regarding my apology for all the boring mom things relayed in said email, "Well they don’t seem like boring mom things so much as difficult co-workers. I think you should form a mom/blog in that context. It would be hi-larious to me." I still don't even know yet whether she meant just do a post or to actually form a whole new blog in that vein, but the wheels immediately started turning. All night, in between dreams, I'm thinking about this concept. I want to experiment. I want to attempt to de-compartmentalize by compartmentalizing. Would I leave (Mis)Adventures? Um, no. Eegads, no. I couldn't ever, because that would just leave me with the same set of problems, i.e. denying one or more sides of myself, except I wouldn't have mendacious by my side and would therefore be horribly bereft, alone, and so much less cool. But I'm going to try this, for the experiment of it, for the fun of it, and most importantly, for the amusement of mendacious. Because clearly that is the most important thing.

News pertaining to my difficult coworkers will now be found here. For the moment anyway. Please check in and show love by adding me to your sidebars? As K.Lo would say, "Peeeez."

dear penelope,

happy anniversary. it's been like 3 whole years. we made it. we've managed to communicate over the span of 1095 days and this our 1201st post. thus begins our 4th year! we amaze me.

and to think i've known you for almost 8 years. you're the best pen-pal i've ever had. a friendship made of letters. every day(ish), every week, all the while.

today the weather is all cloudy with patches of blue. i hope it rains. i'm in corporate land and i have a slice of a window thru an office. the place kinda creeps me out but its familiar. there's time to study french, watch my tv premieres on line... the VP i'm next to is going on maternity leave today. and i pretty much have 2 very specific things to do. and if it lasts till december, that'll be good enough for me. maybe i'll make it out of the country soon... it's not like nothing good or exciting has happened to me. like hello, new car, hello employment for over a year- even i was stuck at borders for a portion of it- hello waterrafting and chicago, and kayaking, and hiking and beach walking... my whole life a flash of brilliant bluesky photographs.

it feels like fall. coldish. something bright and brief about the light. a closing. dormancy. (that just took me forever to spell) i felt myself forgetting how to say 2200. like uh, 22- 0-0? or oh two, two hundred... maybe this blog will be a record of me going totally insane. all those lifetime movies have to have pointed to something.

yesterday this greekfood place i've been waiting for opened up- had a gyro and fries- sooo good! this weekend i'm suppose to see a movie with my aunt/uncle and amber. but neither of the movies we want to see are at the local theatre- which means driving to unfamiliar territory- so i have no idea if they're up for that. mom and dad are at the avocado festival in carpenteria. which- house to myself. it never seems to be enough though. i wonder how much truly productive alone time i get. and maybe that's part of the twitch- not putting thoughts to the page, no paint to the canvas. what is it about creating things that makes us sane? balances us. makes us breathe?

i think you're right about me feeling out of character. but i don't know how to assert my identity- how did i become out of character? why does yourself suddenly fragment to unrecognizable. i don't get it. or is it because the friendships are so new- i don't know if that's it either. anyway. i feel that after gradschool i am not me. i don't know who i am- why should it take so long to get to know yourself- the same old self but destabilized- different characteristics, older eyes.

i wonder if i'll be sad when i'm no longer mistaken for a post college 23-24yrold. i saw more grey hairs creeping in. which was kind of cool but ominous. like i haven't earned that signifier of age. and i wonder when i'll feel that.

so- i'm staring off into space, so i better go, like my thoughts are lost- would just start circling back themselves- so yah, till next time. till tomorrow. till then. be well.

stay present,
as always and forever yours,
Mendacious, Queen of Asides