rainy day

tap tap tap on the roof and windows, i pace back and forth. i crochet black roses and pray the sky will clear. i want to get out and run around the lake. i want to sweat and breathe hard and feel my feet pounding against the dirt. i go through my german flashcards (yes, i am totally so nerdy as to have flashcards), and listen to the angles of this beautiful language. the tones and foreign lilts coming out of my own mouth. it adds a new breed of romance to my life. a new shape and desire. and kate's book is here next to me. it came in the mail the other day and i am loving every second of it, every page. all her writing reaches into me and pulls out so many hidden things. her writing makes me write. her work makes me want my own even more than i already do. the work of others has always amplified and accelerated my drive. i go back and forth between reading and writing, turning her pages and turning out my own. tap tap tap on the keys and the rain on the windows.

luxury

.





the rain beats the roof. a storm covers our country. i have stolen the hours of this day for reading, spending the length of this day in bed with the gorgeous thief himself. jean genet is one of the most lyrical, beautiful writers i have ever read. he is not excessive or flowery, but abundant. a skilled lover. no touch is wasted. everything is necessary.


.

quiet and happy

the sky is white and grey. it feels very close.
down low. close to the ground.
like a shamed dog.

i bought a bag of frozen blueberries and also Jiffy blueberry muffin mix. i saw the box and it reminded me of my mother- my mother when i was 5 or 6 years old, giving me the mixing spoon to lick, and me always dreaming so many dreams every single day.

i am reading Jean Genet's The Thief's Journal and, though i am only on page 42, i have already fallen in love with this man. something in his tempo... his temperament, the pacing of his words, his choices, carries an echo back to me. an echo i can't yet place. remnants of old dreams or memories or some kind of low, sad wish that has followed me in the decades since i was the sweet 5 or 6 years old girl. i did in fact wait for the first star every night. i made so many wishes. when i die, it will be interesting to go to wherever they are written down and learn them all again.

all these years later: blueberry muffins baking in my oven. i lick the mixing spoon clean. and the mixing bowl too. i can smell my little yellow darlings rising.


the day drizzles.


did you know tomorrow, we install the show? :) i am deeply myself in this moment, waiting to hang paintings on white walls.

i have yellow rubber rain boots.

cats and dogs cats and dogs coming down down down. too dark too cold for me to run on the street. a car will get me. i did a goofy tv workout instead. sweat on the living room floor. now tea and honey. now i see we are out of blueberries. i want oatmeal. i must venture out after all. i want the frozen blueberries in the white bag in the freezer at the market. where are my jeans and my holey sweater?

it has been raining all weekend. i have been worrying too much as a result and spent a bit of time crying and feeling pitiful. i am worried for more reasons than merely the rain.

we talked about moths and mortality and how they do not carry malt-o-meal in tennessee, only cream-of-wheat, and now there is a note on my refrigerator admonishing me to buy malt-o-meal the next time i go to the grocery store. i will put it in a box with some paper moth ornaments i made and ship it off to the Hog and Hominy State (or Volunteer State, if you are a purest). and i was given a passage from psalms for which i extended a passage of Simone Weil's Gravity & Grace... which was very much an act of mirroring. and emotional but very good. necessary... like a window. prayers floating in from the wide, wet world. bits of light, whiffs of home.

this is how i think of moths. i began printing some more after i got off the phone. there is a necessity in the image, in repeating it... like a favorite phrase of music: a hint of what ascension feels like.

rainy days give you an excuse to be Andy Warhol

i woke to a rainy day. normally, i'd feel a bit sabotaged by that but not today. i instantly welcomed it. there was something unexpectedly beautiful about it. a sort of joyfulness about rain on the roof and windows and blacktop.

a short break in the weather presented itself so i shoved my feet into my running shoes and got going. but midway through the Mighty Run the rain returned, soaking the front of my sweatshirt and pants and turning my swinging ponytail in to a godawful frizzy mess of wet tangles. but it felt good. the cold rain drops on my flushed face, mingling with my sweat, tapping gently at the whites of my eyes was actually very pleasurable. as was the feeling of hey mom, look at me! look at what a total BAD ASS i am, running in the rain like it ain't no thang! :) ha!

and now, with the rain coming down and a roof to hide under and a cup of raspberry tea at my side, i am definitely in the mood to bounce back and forth between my Bedroom Arts: drawing, crocheting, and reading. i had planned to gesso two big canvasses today but that's a project for outside. gesso doesn't come out if you accidentally get it on your couch and don't notice until well after its dry. definitely not an indoor project. can't say that i mind putting it on hold though- a rainy day seems like the perfect way to wind down such a good, productive, busy, happy week.

besides, Andy Warhol insists that you could be doing anything, but if you're doing it in bed... well, it's just that much more glamourous. it's an outlook i tend to agree with. so if the opportunity finds you today to accept a Warholian moment in Bed, take it. luxuriate in the glamour of it. even if it's something as simple as reading a book or folding clothes because watch:

what are you doing?
i'm reading.

vs.

what are you doing?
i'm in bed reading.


see. instant glamour. go with andy. ;)

hello monday!

it was my sweetie's birthday weekend and it was actually really wonderful to unplug from digital life for two days and just be present in the day with him, in celebration, and our dreams and hopes and happy outlook on the future. it was the big THREE OH. 30 years old. and i'm right behind him. i am not at all nervous or weirded out by it. only that it feels so young. i thought i'd have a lot more answers than this by the time i hit 30. ha! who knew! adults don't have all the answers! hahahaha! but we had a lot of fun and a lot of delicious eats and a lot of laughter too. a lot of snuggles and hugs and deep, wonderful, playful conversation. and also a lot of relaxed down-time. he's earned it. he works hard and never complains and is always so gentle with other people. i've not ever really seen stress get the better of him. he's very solid that way. i really appreciate that. the stability of personality and emotion. there is no chaos that exists in him. no chaos he creates. and i love that. tragedy needs no helping hand in life, that's for sure. it will find each and every one of us. it needs no assistance. i admire his ability to remain positive and calm in the face of even the hardest circumstances. he has found balance and i admire that. a warm balance. i'm very proud of the man he is. i hope he is too. :)

and so it is a rainy monday. a built-in excuse to hole up with my oils and scoot around light and shadow. :) i think i'll watch A Clockwork Orange again today too so i can keep rolling with my essay on its importance. it is eerily timely. totally contemporary. brilliant. and i'm so glad i waited this long to watch the film. i think if i had watched it when i was 14, the message of this work would've been totally lost on me. i would not have caught its significance.

i'm even going back and re-reading books i read as a teenager, knowing that my first go-round with the work was almost completely surface. i'm almost finished with Catcher in the Rye- stunned by how simultaneously funny and sad it is. the heart-break inherent to growing up. the struggle of knowing one's self. of feeling separate from the world and its ways. the crazy-making. the confusion. the desperation. the need for love and to feel understood by another human being. the search that we all participate in and undertake...

art and literature are such good friends. :) what windows they are. such hard beauties. my days glow because of them and i feel so so so lucky.

what fun...

childhood memories are funny. i love hearing them. especially what people thought about the world when they were small.

this morning when i stepped outside a big fat drop of rain splatted on my cheek and it knocked a memory loose that totally explains how i became a RAIN HATER.

i stopped jumping in puddles and playing in the rain pretty early in life because, if you remember, in the mid to late 80s (i was born in 1980) all of a sudden every body got FANATICAL about ACID RAIN. and i was told about this in school. and i have NO CLUE why GROWN UPS thought it was a GOOD IDEA to tell LITTLE KIDS about ACID RAIN when the hot movie at the time was "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?", a movie that included the death of sweet little cartoons by way of THE DIP! THE DIP = ACID and then i go to school, sweet and shy and gullible and full of trust, and hear all about ACID falling out of the sky. and when i welled up the courage to raise my hand and ask if the rain could hurt me, my teacher responded "well... just don't get it in your eyes." AHHHHHHHHHHHHH! how stupid are you????? why would you say that to a little kid? hahahahahaha! so then i became afraid that the rain could BLIND ME. geez. this is worse than being told we're in the "Last Days" and Jesus will return any second so you'll never get to grow up and be an adult and get married and blah blah blah. that tid-bit is directly responsible for all sorts of kids having a strange breed of peter pan-ism because LAST DAYS = NO FUTURE. do people really forget what it's like to be a child???? how scary and weird and big the world seems? how confusing? and how magic is real? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU???? hahahaha!

i'm laughing my ass off right now!

good morning. :)

"I get my kicks above the waistline, Sunshine."

rainy days are dancing days.

DANCE, i said!

monday monday monday

i hid from all forms of technology yesterday and lay under a hard rain that is still coming down right now. life-long, i've been a RAIN HATER but suddenly, strangely, the hate i feel toward a wet day is thinning out of me. i was so pleased by the sound of it on the roof all day yesterday, and when i woke up and heard it, still here dancing, it made me feel clean and safe. seems, i have changed my ways. ha!

and my coffee steams. the sound of morning traffic begins. my dog is asleep in the spot on the bed that i rose from, curled up in the warmth i left there, snoring. i am in my black and white striped footie pajamas, hair twisted up in a ballerina bun, sitting cross-legged like a little kid, bad posture and all. my paintings look beautiful to me today and i feel a great hope that everything really will be okay.

a flood of writing has been coming out of me- all trapped in my notebook, things i don't have the stomach to type up now that i'm out of the moment when it first came pouring out. and the more i read, the more i write, the more i care about what writing can be and do... what art can be and do. and it's funny how once i gave myself permission to slow down, the work sped up and just comes searing out on to the page or canvas. the self-imposed constraints have fallen away and i am just chasing chasing chasing this thing, hopeful and flailing and hurting, trying my best to keep up with the heavy rush of all these ideas...

but it was nice to stay away from the computer yesterday. it was even nice to not read anything. have a day of rest. have a silly day, a laundry day, a movie day, a day full of cuddles and hugs and funny memories. and then sunday dinner with our neighbors. it has become a tradition. back and forth, back and forth, and so much loud, happy laughter. it feels like family. normal family stuff. and normalcy has become a great and deep comfort to me. whenever and however it occurs. simple pleasures. the small stuff. sitting down to a home-cooked meal, all together at a table, is something i do not take for granted. it is always wonderful. a big big blessing.

and so as the week wakes up, i wake up too; but i am careful not to put too many things on my TO DO list. the rain helps me out endlessly in that regard.

the world is green and grey outside. and cold, cold, cold. i will stay in my footie pajamas for awhile longer. drink coffee. enjoy. be still. be satisfied. the rain beating down. the traffic sounds. a snoring rottweiler named inga. the click of keys under my finger tips.

good morning.

today, under a hard rain

killing kanoko. the gold cell and the blackest graphite. stained hands. hand to mouth. black lips black tongue Blackland. the title changes. the name of a place. territories and evidences. this land. this type. this time.

a hard rain.

afternoon

it's raining. i have the heater on. i painted a small candle for myself and a lawn of alices completely in silhouette, save for the whiteness of their blocky aprons. i began a portrait of Karen Hadaway. i drew until the muscle that connects my shoulder to my neck burned and then i sat back to look. i looked and looked and i picked up Angela Pneuman's book Home Remedies. i flipped it to the middle and read the story i found there- The Bell Ringer. On the 2nd page, i began reading out loud, all the way to the end. longing and heartbreak and confusion and all the fragments. the fragments. swept up in to a pile. a human.

i see sylvia plath and anne sexton in these pages. little flashes of them. but there are other ghosts in there too. other fragments. other inspirations. unknowable things that catch the light, a swift and sudden glint. as i read, my voice went low and slow. each word picking up more weight as it moved. each word becoming more and more laden with history, with all the fragments that make a person who they are. the heavy collection of individuality. of difference. of dark. of familiar places and memories and lost artifacts. the weight of a single life. sad and beautiful. an evidence room but warmer than that. and so much more complex. beauty twisting around flaws and helplessness. or maybe beauty because of these things. i was lost inside the skill of this story. nebulous like a spell.

and when i finished, i looked up at Karen's portrait. a baby. 9 years old. i saw my candle and i saw that it was still raining and i saw that, even here inside the dismal, there is such fertile land for hope and compassion. the possibility for a reckoning.

good

the rain flew sideways last night and hit the windows so hard that i woke up and couldn't fall asleep again until the wind finally blew in the opposite direction. spooky and magical and not at all unwelcome.

my small drawings have become a haven. new languages float and dive through the grey. i make myself a little nest in the big chair by the big window and listen to the storm and the wealth of birds fighting for the washed up worms. i curl in and get warm.

more and more, i am becoming myself.

more and more, i am letting go of the old hurts and horrors of the past. they suddenly seem so dated, so out of place. i nod at the old ghosts and move on, acknowledging their presence but turning off the haunt.

mmmmmmm...

the hard rain comes down. the kind of rain that makes a person smile. the kind of rain that makes a person feel surprised. an exuberant rain, pounding pounding pounding and thunder and dogs barking. such a chorus, such a whirl, such a racket and i love it. especially here in the big silence of the country. especially here where wind and trees go suddenly, painfully, peculiarly still. the crash boom bang of a healthy storm. the heft of strong weather. unapologetic and dancing all crazy-like.

i am drawing star fields. black and scratchy. twinkling like little bats. and Alice is perched in the corner of the room.

hi

when it's raining outside and you get sick and tired of making pot-holders, have some emo fun with your camera! you know you've done it. we're all guilty. and besides, now you can see who's behind all this crazy bullshit. ;)

rain rain go away...

i am stuck inside today. not that i mind all that much. i'm making pot-holders. yep, pot-holders. and scribbling away and looking forward to an evening spent reading in bed. it's a lazy saturday, aided by the bad weather.

not too bad at all, actually.

the weather man was not wrong...

it is coming down pretty hard out there. definitely not a good day for walking around without an umbrella. and converse are not rain shoes. i am thwarted. lucky for me, i am stocked up on coffee and hot chocolate and yarn. today is the perfect crochet day. warm home, sleeping dog, 2nd pot of coffee brewing, and a nice little nesting instinct toward making scarves and sweaters and beanies. not too bad a plan. besides, i've got to find a way to get things done in spite of winter. i will not lie... it's hard for me. i am not a winter animal. i hate the cold. cold is pain and i'm not a big fan of pain. in fact, the whole idea that hell is fire and brimstone seems like nonsense to me. i'm convinced it's one humongous iceberg.

blah...

drinking coffee and eating raspberries as the RAIN COMES DOWN. my schedule has been thwarted by the weather once again. no good. i did not get to obey The Almighty Jog nearly enough last week due to the TYPHOON and my prayers for a week of sunshine have gone unanswered as of yet. blah. i may have to resign myself to doing the more than slightly embarrassing TV workout this morning. ahhhhh! it's embarrassing even when you're by yourself! ha! they're just so goofy! all the "sexy" moves you're supposed to follow along with usually just leave this girl feeling a bit ridiculous. but it's a good opportunity for laughter, i suppose. geez.

and what's more- i've got some works on paper to ship out today and i do not - repeat DO NOT - like taking art outside when it's raining, no matter how well it's covered and packaged. it's a risk that i just really don't think is worth it. not at all. so i'll be hoping for at least a couple hours break in the rain today so that i can try to keep to my schedule for today and be responsible and all that good stuff. dang drizzle. i live in CALIFORNIA! winter? huh? i forget every year that we actually do have seasons here and i am always so disappointed when winter finally arrives. always. always always always. and yeah... i know... the trees. they need it. uh-huh. yep. got it. doesn't mean i still don't hate it. so there. i'm pouting now. and logic doesn't work when you've got your bottom lip stuck out. :)

and the storm arrives!

oh, it is coming down in SHEETS! it's the tail end of a typhoon! ahhhhhhh! my little rottweiler here is even afraid to go outside! ha! and so no jog today either. we will have to find ways to keep ourselves entertained inside, i guess. good thing i'm stocked up on projects and paint and paper and all the things a person needs to while away a rainy, rainy day. these days are good for silence. no sounds in the house at all. just the rain beating down on the roof and a pile of books next to the bed. in addition to my beloved hazelnut coffee, i've also got a little stash of hot-chocolate that i've been waiting to break out once winter arrived. and here she is, at least for today. i'll pretend i'm some famous, reclusive, so-and-so and do everything from the confines of my bed. ha! like andy warhol said- everything is more glamorous when you do it in bed.

morning...

the weekend went by on an odd foot. not bad, just a strange gait. i've been told by strangers in line at the grocery store that a big storm is on its' way and should be presenting itself any time now. inches will fall, they said. inches. needed. but you know i hate it. ever since i was a child, i only like the rain when it comes down at night. and when the night lifted, i saw that the day is a grey one. little pin-prick drops of moisture falling in the light off the street lamp. softly, unheard, like pine-needles. the storm makes its' signal. any time now. someone said 'tuesday' but they might've been wrong.

drizzle, drizzle, little cloud.
here you are
and there you go. go ahead
and pour down.