I lost my glasses today. Seward Park now has two pairs of my glasses. I was running and they slid out of my jacket. They are the practically invisible kind, I can put them down in the house and lose them so outside in the woods, it was hopeless. Do you know how much nature there is out there? Twigs and mud and dead leaves and new green things coming up. It was all too much. However, I had been looking for trillium and didn't see any. After I started looking for my glasses and going slowly, I saw them, trillium, under bushes and in the shadows. That's how they are, they hide.

Now I am wearing glasses I bought in the 60's at a junk store, round granny glasses, real silver and a prescription that is 10 years old. No wonder I have a headache. And I saw my therapist today and mostly cried the whole hour. I think they should give you a discount if you don't actually say anything. I mean, how much can a handful of kleenix cost? I realize that my brother is really dead and he will stay that way. And I believe that I could have saved him. Right. Even though I am walking 20 miles and raising money for suicide prevention, I don't really think suicide can be prevented, not like cancer or heart attacks. If you want to kill yourself, you will, you just will. But I persist in thinking I could have saved Geoff. By being better, more perfect, gawd. You jump into a hole and while you are falling, you realize the hole goes all the way to China and beyond. Actually, there is no end, you just keep falling. This continues to be not fun. Meanwhile, the cats are still on a diet and look no thinner. I think they are sneaking out at night and taking the car to Mc Donald's for fish 'n chips. They leave the empty wrappers on the lawn. Cat litterers. Then they sleep all day and give you those big round eye looks, 'what, us, we didn't do it, huh?' I'm leaving a camera around to record them, like at the ATMs. That'll show 'em.

I have been called to jury duty. Apparently you can be arrested or fined for not showing up. Totally unfair, I say. I went a year ago, very cranky about it too because I have always been able to dodge it before. Usually, saying I'm a midwife works. They have gotten more strict. They don't care and the guy behind the counter was unmoved, bored even. So was the woman. I got all steamed up, red faced and everything. They did not seem moved by my shenanigans. It was a giant room with a whole bunch of people sitting around, reading, knitting, sleeping. Once in a while, a bit of excitement when the clerk would call a bunch of numbers and people trooped out.

I was in one courtroom and the defendant came in with his lawyer. I thought he looked so guilty. And the charge was that he brained someone with a fire extinguisher, ouch. I told the judge I really couldn't stay, pregnant women were depending on me. He waved me away. Oh, and they confiscated my itty bitty swiss army knife at the door so I got it back when I left. My life of crime.

Why I Exercise

so I can eat cookies, chocolate chip cookies. I did stairs today, about a million of them. Now I can eat cookies and I don't care.

Sunday we weeded the garden in the pouring rain. I had huge clumps of mud on my shoes and mud on my face. All those stupid grape hyacinths came right out, bulb and all, ha!

I will explain about stairs. On Cap Hill there are stairs, serious stairs that go from 10th down to Eastlake. There are numerous stairs. You put on exercise clothing and an ipod , leave a water bottle at the top and pick up a handful of stones or twigs so you can leave one at the top after you finish each round. Like Hansel and Gretel. Stairs kick your butt. You do the first few rounds pretty well and by the 10th you are sweating and swearing. Then you eat cookies so it is all a distant memory.

alfalfa is often confused with atelxtasis which is technically not a word
per se which you have always wanted to find under the couch they are both green so therefore the continuing disorder among thieves spangles fleece sausages are harmless to fauna appropriate evening attire suitable for bed if the participants are both egregious or gregarious I have made this same mistake more often than I care to submit spectacular armpits in aisle four while we marveled beyond the Barcelona a beverage named for a permutation often found in the great sandbox beside a guillotine pity mary queen of scots and the other damsels they did not get a chance to use fluoride so they had bad English teeth however I think beheading is rather severe for poor oral hygiene what about the lack of feminine care products I bet you did not factor this into your calculations haha you loaded a blunderbuss with sharpened ginger snaps as if that would rout the cowards from their usual reception area their superfluous teaspoons and withered flanks pompy batshit fired away thus saith irrelevant monarch buttterflies

there is a guy in the house with a ladder and he is going to clean the windows. so I'm banished from the bedroom and my bed. I was in bed with my ratty tee shirt on, reading a Ngio Marsh murder mystery, perfectly fine and now I have to be downstairs with all the furniture rearranged and my apple computer is NOT WORKING. this is not acceptable. cripes, I've only had it for 2 months. it's supposed to be perfect and behave. back to the apple store AGAIN.

the camillia tree is covered with blossoms. and the magnolia we threatened with death last year has 15 blooms on it and they are open. flowers are an essential part of steady mental health, whatever that is. I might write a flower poem and not show it to anyone.

I am in sawbuck now, edition 2.1. take a look.

I have nothing whatever to say right now. I had therapy today and tonight I went to my suicide support group, not a fun day at all. I feel quite grumpy about spring because it is so beautiful right now with the budlets and daphne so fragrant and there are even slugs already but I am tired just looking at all the weeds.

Going to be on the 'garden tour' in June, the 14th to be exact. Gawd, why did I say yes? The side yard is a mess and everything needs to be pruned and those stupid grape hyacinths are everywhere. They are impossible to get rid of, apparently.

I want to eat a large chocolate cookie. I think that is the answer to all my troubles. Even though I swore off cookies. Maybe there is a cookie substitute in the kitchen. I can't even make toast cuz our toaster oven is busted. And don't tell me to eat almonds and raisins, way too healthy.

Oh dear, I'm watching a docu about the pope. I better go to bed. I'm getting choked up. Cripes.

I just signed up for an overnight 20 mile walk to raise $$ for suicide prevention. Fun! I'll be asking you up for dollars. I have to raise a thousand of them.

I sent poetry in tonight. And I tried recording myself on my MAC. Of course, a plane flew overhead very loud, dogs barked and the guy across the street started his junker, which he revs up EVERY MORNING FOR 20 MINUTES. So once again I went to the apple store for supplies, this time an external mic but they didn't let me in cuz they were closing. I think I can find my way there without looking.

OK, so to be a saint you have to have 2 miracles AFTER you die. Dang. How does that happen?? My friend Negesti was a saint, I'm pretty sure. Oh, wait, a nun was cured of Parkinson's so the pope has one more miracle to go. Wow.

I got rejected by Calyx and they had the nerve to solicit a subscription. What the hey??? I mean, publish me already and I'll maybe buy a subscription. The only mag I get is The Sun and some day Sy Safransky is gonna realize my pure genius and publish me. I can feel it in my vestigial tail bone.

My writing group is so fabulous. We eat cheese and groovy little crackers and drink tea and bask in our collective brilliance. Sigh.

don't see Pan's Labyrinth. It's gross, especially the guy with eyeballs in his hands. EEWW.

I went to a a place called Mr Spots Chai House and while I love chai, there were people using their laptops and eating veggie food and listening to music I couldn't think over. I mean, I go into a record store and the music is so loud I can't think, my brain starts to fizzle and all the sentences come unglued. I become an idiot. Today, I had to leave Mr Spots. There were also several youth with ear plugs that you can see daylight through. The first time I saw daylight through someone's ears, I had a moment. It was great because I am so seldom stalled out like that. Now daylight earlobes are everywhere and I just think about the stretched out lobes if they take out the thingys that are the stretchers. I once worked in the East Village in NYC in a veggie restaurant and Charles Ludlam and his company would come in. Wow. There was one woman who had tattoos all over her face, really all over. I was so impressed. The theater people can get away with anything. It was a macrobiotic restaurant. I was so hip and didn't even know it. All I do know is that I was pregnant at the time and the smell of brown rice made me want to barf. In fact all food that was organic or good for me was gross. I liked jelly beans, except for the black ones.

this week I am going to use something on my computer called 'garage band' which supposedly is easy to use. I have to make recordings of myself guiding people through a body scan, a meditation and yoga movements (since I am an expert now after 4 classes). I'll keep you posted.

I have a confession. I sent in a poem to an anthology a LONG TIME AGO, before Rebecca and the writers in my group. I got accepted and I have no idea what I sent except that the poem is probably really terrible and the anthology is so smaltzy but it's way too late to get out of it. Gawd. They said it is coming out before xmas so it would make a nice gift...double gawd. I am in another anthology that was so poorly edited, the fonts are all different, there are typos and the formatting is all messed up. Ug. But I'm in there, yahoo. I have an expanded appreciation for a journal like Borderlands, beautiful cover, very professional, etc. Oh well, guess what you'll be getting for a nice gift.

last night we rehearsed in the children's choir. They hear a song once and they remember it, even if the words are Swahili. Seriously. I have a bit more trouble remembering a few of those things. And we are singing in several different languages. And the leader made us stand up and sing without the music. This event is supposedly in front of 40,000 people and broadcast. If you see me, I will be mouthing the words and humming along, ok?

children are also more flexible than I am. Yesterday in yoga, the teacher had us do splits. This involved getting on your knees, putting one foot against the wall and sliding the other leg out into a split. Right. I didn't fall over but whatever I was doing was not a split, not even close. I was doing a 'sweating, wobbling, tripod while looking at my leg in front (nice pedicure, Beth) and breathing rapidly and making very small grunting noises' kind of pose. It was swell. Yoga is humbling. As if I needed more. Humbling.

I'm sitting here in my office with my coat on. Too cheap to turn on the heat. We're all going straight to hell, aren't we? Oil prices and little weird looking cars that will be TOAST if a hummer hits 'em. I'm just saying.

I'm going to rehearse in a volunteer choir that will be singing for HHDL (His Holiness the Dalai Lama) and Desmond Tutu. Holy mackerel, don't you think. Together on the same stage!! My writer friend is in a choir called Sparkling Clouds of Heaven Choir or something like that. I think if you're gonna be sappy, go way over the top. It's more entertaining that way.

I'm addicted to a BBC thing called The Duchess of Duke Street. It even has a Jack Russell Terrier in it and a lot of British accents. It's stuffy and silly and I love it. These are my people.

Today in yoga class, our teacher, a very nice person I'm sure, told us to relax our eyebrows. What is that supposed to mean??? Are my eyebrows tense? I had a periodontist once who was South African and his whole waiting room was an African motif, leopard print chairs and pictures of big animals with big teeth on the walls. It was scary. But the dentist had these CRAZY eyebrows, they were like hair wings and they stuck out about an inch from his face at the corners. Yikes and I spent most of my time wondering if he used product while he was doing gruesome things in my mouth. And his staff acted like it was normal to have monster eyebrows intentionally.

I think hair is a confusing subject and has gotten people in all kinds of trouble.

Big Nature

I am in Eastern WA and boy is there a lot of nature here. We are skiing in Winthrop, about a million miles of trails and I have not skied AT ALL this season so I am rather sore. Like crippled. But we are near the Sun Mountain Lodge, which if you have not been here is a gustatory destination, let me tell you. You ski all day until your ass and thighs and arms are going to fall off and then you fall into a coma by the fire and then you go to the lodge up the hill and eat a fabulous dinner while looking out over the whole valley. Oh, and you take a lot of tylenol and drinking wine helps too. We have seen eagles, woodpeckers, little rodent things, a whole bunch of deer and tonight heard an owl as we were staggering back to our 'chalet', an itty bitty cabin with a fireplace and a double bed to become comatose on. The stars are fab too, like I said, a massive amount of nature.

So I am a serviceable skier and there are groomed trails here so I plod along, falling occasionally. Everyone else is a 'skate skier' holy mother of god. They have skis that are about a centimeter wide and very pointy. Then they kinda run along the track. If I tried this, I would be in the hospital even tho I pretend I don't do it because I 'have the wrong equipment'. But there is hardly anyone here except for these white mountains all around and this crazy blue sky.

In the itty bitty chalet, I listen to a new CD a client made me of Tibetan monks singing or what ever you call it and bells and horns and lie on my face on the bed because my whole body hurts.

I brought along a bunch of suicide/trauma books and haven't even opened one. Instead I am catching up on old NYT book reviews. My theory: read the book reviews and pretend you read the book. It's almost as good.

My writing group rocks my world, even when I bring in a poem that 'needs work'. We are going to Burning Word to hear Rebecca read. I think we should make asses of ourselves but I might be alone in this desire. This desire. Ah, desire.