Fare Well?

If you've been reading this blog, you've watched me go from being unreasonably involved with someone and trying not to talk about it. You've seen me find my way, meet my husband and now, settle into my new life in New England with this wonderful man.

Some people have come here to read this blog out of jealousy or a feeling of entitlement to the details of his life. I was offended by that but everything I've said here was true. Sometimes it was only true at the time, but true nonetheless.

I'm proud of most of it and at my ease with the rest. If you are a "mermaid" from Burma who assumed you had a romantic future with my husband, I'm sorry your dream didn't work out but I can tell you this; a better dream awaits you.

When I had to give up Austin, I assumed my life would be unhappy forever. Sounds dramatic and silly now but that thought, under those circumstances was still very real to me.

I do think it possible that some people get stuck in an unhappy life and never find their way out. I've seen it happen and I assumed it would happen to me. Through the benevolence of circumstance or the grace of the Creator, I found another way. I am grateful every day.

But I am also learning to be compassionate about those who stay rooted in misery. I know a few, although I hope I am wrong, I often suspect my mother and sister are two of those people. It's not clear to me, given the choices they've made in life, that getting out of that habit would be easy but I hope something changes to heal them. Souls cannot endure an unending stream of misery and misfortune without becoming permanently damaged. Maybe if we could all remember that, we'd be kinder to each other.

As a child, my mother was indifferent to me; as an adolescent, she was hostile; as an adult she is baffled as to why our relationship is so difficult. On an extended visit, I asserted my right to a full airing of our grievances (very "Festivus" of me) too forcefully and she resorted to violence. She threw dishes to the floor on one occasion and on another, threw things at me and flew at me, fists balled in rage.

Now she is blind and she suffers at the hands of my sister's neglect. While I cannot sit silently by and do nothing at all, neither do I feel compelled to rush to her side. She was cruel to me and now she bears the cost of that. I would say I wish it were otherwise but I am happy in my life now and while I hope her suffering is truncated and have taken steps to help, I can and will only go so far. I am kind but just as she left me without a protector, she is left.

If I had money, I would send it. If having her visit my home would help, I would try to arrange it. As it is, she loves my sister and her children and wishes only to be with them. All I can do is alert her support network in Victoria, as I know it to exist, and hope someone will visit her. She needs to sell her house and move into something bright and cheerful by herself but that would result in my sister having nowhere to go and so it will never happen. They are bolted together, the two of them. My sister, angry at her dependence on my mother and my mother, frightened to be alone.

Karma, when it really plays out, is difficult to observe. Worst of all when it effects someone you love on your own behalf. My friends all say my mother is finally getting her comeuppance and that the time will soon come for my sister to have hers but I don't think I believe in comeuppance. I would wish gentleness on everyone. Surely it's only through gentleness that any good and lasting change is ever accomplished. I would like to see my sister happily employed and housed in her own two bedroom apartment. I would like to see my niece with a place of her own. I would like to see my mother ensconced in a condo she could love. One where everything works well and where there are no rats or other vermin, one close to everything she needs, with a social support network that brings feelings of security and some pleasure with it. These are the things I wish for these people. They are small things, nothing so miraculous as what I've been blessed to be given this year but I think they are the things that will give them the most room to grow and the most cause for happiness.

I don't know but I think it takes something away from a "victim" when they have to witness the suffering of those who hurt them, especially when it's framed as "poetic justice" or "karma" for past misdeeds. It's true, I think, that only the devil could think up punishments, God, surely, must be a good and forgiving place to lay one's heart - "a safety", as I once heard an Inuit child put it.

Anyway - having felt the sting of having someone else use this blog used as a tool of "girlfriend intelligence" (however misguided) I feel pretty alienated from it and I wanted any readers to know I am carrying on the arc of this blog in another blog on Word Press called, New to North Adams. I'm reluctant to make any predictions about how this all will go but it seemed to me that without saying what needed to be said there was little to no hope of my every returning to write here.

Unless you are married to a man, you have no right to intrude on his relationships. If you have victimized someone, you lose the right of the normal expectations that accompany whatever relationship you poisoned that way.

Lord knows I love my mother and I respect her for what she's done for me and the efforts she has made to grow over her lifetime. I'm grateful that we've made our peace and I will always defend her dignity. I mourn for the wounds she suffered and wish her life had been easier. I'm sure there is even some love left stashed somewhere for my sister but after decades of unkindness, it is only natural that my feelings for them are somewhat weak. No matter what, having been betrayed by my own kindness so many times with them, I would be a fool to let it put my life at risk now. And regardless of what happens in Victoria, I will stay in New England with my husband. Also regardless of what ex-girlfriends or extended family may think, do or say, the debts of past relationships are irrelevant now. I release it all.

I may be back to write - it may dwindle away. Life is full of surprises. No matter which way it goes, I want you to know I have enjoyed writing to you and wish you a life full of comfort and joy. Most of all, I wish for you the kind of marriage that makes forming a true family possible - a solid and enduring love to make a safe and welcoming place in the world for your heart and soul. Having finally found that love in my own life - it seems anything but ordinary.

Home.

Some years ago, in my sophomore year of college, I took a class on myth. For one assignment, we were asked to write about a classical myth that had parallels in our own lives. At the time, I was still in the final stages of a serious, live-in relationship with the man in Victoria whom, I assumed, I would one day marry. I was dividing my time between Victoria, where he lived with my things, and Ottawa, where I rented a room and shared a house with a woman and her 10 year-old son and went to school. It was a pretty long commute. For that particular class assignment, I chose to write about Persephone. I wrote about how, when the seasons changed, I would return to the darkness of the Pacific Northwest and the rainforest, then - when they changed again, I would be free to come home to myself and my education. As the year turned, circumstance removed my from my home, plunged me into darkness and then, in due time, allowed me to return to my home again - but never forever. Of course, I knew Persephone was longing to return to the home where her mother lived and where her house and goods were stored. My mother, my family and my material possessions were all in Victoria. I knew her Persephone’s husband had abducted her and taken her to live far away from anything familiar but to me, so in that way, we were more a mirror than a parallel but for me, having to leave my independent life and go back to the life of material privilege, family, old friends and familiar places all rooted in that dark, wet, grey and green setting, was like having to return to the underworld. This was so because in Victoria, I was not respected for my intellect. I was not a writer but rather the eccentric partner of a man from the old boy network. I was an active volunteer at the local contemporary gallery, a singer in a chamber choir, a shopper, a patron of the nicer restaurants in town, my mother’s driver, my sister’s babysitter, my friend’s confident. I could walk along the ocean and drive my car up island to see the forests, but I could not be myself. I was a dilettante, not a whole person - I felt like I had my whole family and all their expectations, (which were mostly negative) strapped to my back. In my senior year of college, I left for school as usual but when the summer came, I looked at the horizon and said no. I never went back, I abandoned my belongings, said goodbye to the man and started over. The spell had been broken and, beginning a life I could lead myself, as myself, I was “home.” It didn’t matter that I had nothing to my name and nobody who had known me for more than a few years, half-time. It didn’t matter that I was poor and would need to struggle to make a living for the next ten years, (Even though, I admit, it was much worse than I anticipated, I expected it and chose the path deliberately.) What mattered was I was fully able to be my whole self and not the parcel of expectations and stereotypical roles doled out to me in my “home town.” Despite the fact that I grew up there, Victoria had always felt like a place to which I had been carried off against my will, abducted into the darkness of a long, rain forest winter with no snow and no sun, entirely without my consent. To some degree it was true, my family moved to Victoria when I was ten years old. We moved from the East, Fredericton and then Montreal, where it snows in winter and the sun reflects off the snow turning everything blue, white and gold and where it is hot in the summer, which rarely happens in Victoria. But the people were different in both places as well. Somber and soft spoken in the west, they were serene on the surface but chilly underneath. Compared to the outspoken warmth (for good or ill) in the east, it was alienating to be amongst them. I was never quiet enough, never discreet enough, never unruffled enough about anything to really fit in. People I knew, thinking they were helping me, applied a slow and steady pressure, trying to get me to be quieter, more acquiescent, more accepting of life as it was and less likely to make waves. They were crushing the life out of me. What I found in Ottawa was the edge of myself. Foolishly, I became attached to a man who had similar traits to those of Victorians and spent the next seven years working that out. In part, at the time, I had the words of a friend in Victoria ringing in my head. She told me, whatever I had done, whatever I felt I had done wrong or whomever I had hurt, it would take me an equal number of years of my life to get over it - to repay it. I went from one bad spouse to the other, the latter in the throes of a serious chronic disease, and cared for him until my penance was done. At the end of that time, I began living a life of my own. The money still wasn’t there but if I paid careful attention to the details, lived very frugally and made use of all my resources, I found I could make a modest living as a writer and travel for part of the year, every year. I allowed myself to like what I liked, to do what I wanted to do and just to breathe. It felt like someone had removed tight iron bands from around my body. Then there was Austin. I found a place I thought could be the home of my heart and began another Persephone cycle. Thank goodness for a bad lover. Had the man I thought I cared for in Austin, turned out to be true, I would still be living Persephone’s story. As it was, Austin was a lovely place where I was miserably unhappy in my personal life. It could have been worked out, like so many Canadians, I might have become a snowbird, spending half the year in Canada and half in Texas but I thought my heart was broken and spent the latter quarter of 2011 figuring out what I could do to mend it. My friends advised flirtation. All of them did. I immersed myself in Ottawa, determined to make the city work for me, and flirted online. I restricted myself to men from Ottawa or Austin (so I wouldn’t feel so heartbroken at the loss) but, life intervened, as it so often does, and I found myself talking to a man from Massachusetts. At first, I assumed I could control the situation. After all, it might be nice to have a short-term relationship with someone who was at least within driving distance. We exchanged hundreds of emails. We spent time on the phone, we planned a visit. It was pleasant and I felt fairly certain it would consolidate the life I had planned, as planned. I thought I could manage it under my own terms. I thought it would be a light affair, something fun while I was working things out. I looked forward to visits and letters and romantic weekends. I thought I could keep it casual. Four months later, I knew I needed to spend the rest of my life with this man, I agonized over what to do, thinking it unlikely that he felt the same way. Seven months later, in the town where he lives, we wed. Just a few weeks ago, I was looking out the window toward some of the hills in the Berkshires and thinking about how unfamiliar the place still feels on many levels. The weather is different. All of my things are still in storage. There are plenty of adjustments to be made. I looked at the sun coming over the mountains and tried to take it in as home. It didn’t really settle. I love our loft and now, this morning, when I look out the window at the cloud and the rain settling in for the day, I see the ordinariness that has become my home, I have been gone long enough now that anything else is unfamiliar. Home, for me, is rooted in the man sleeping in the bedroom, waiting for me to awaken him to another day. Home is his smile in the morning. It is our conversations in the car. Home is dinner cooked for both of us together. In the feeling of his arms around me, the scent of his shirts, the way he takes my hand right before we eat dinner every night and says something sweet - without fail. Home is the two of us, alone. My marriage has changed and deepened my definition of home. Home is where I am loved for myself and left as myself. He makes no effort to change me. Home is where he understands my needs and struggles without my saying so, it is our marriage bed, it is our kitchen, it is moving the furniture and shopping for a washer and dryer, it is the perfunctory phone call and people from the community invited over for tea. And I ask myself, “would I be as happy with him if we were in Victoria?” I cannot imagine I would, but that is only partly based on location. He and I would never choose to live on an island with no way off. He could not live the life demanded of him there any more than I could. Then again, it doesn’t have to be here. I would be with him anywhere he truly wanted to be. We would arrive, I would look around me and I would begin the process of making “home” because of course, as long as he is there, it would be home. It would be an adventure and welcome because it is the two of us together. It is always the two of us together, seeing the world as it turns. I am astonished at how deep the connection has become, I am grateful every day for this union of souls and more grateful for how interesting he is, how everything about him is deep and rich and new to me in so many ways and yet entirely familiar, exactly as it should be. He is everything I hoped for in a mate and those things I had forgotten to hope for but always wanted anyway? He is all of them too. Geography is dependent on him. The world is home, as long as he is in it.

Sea Change

Time has wrought it's wear on me and I have changed. Like most people, Steven thinks the phrase, "Sea Change" refers to a dramatic change. It doesn't. The phrase is drawn from a poem by Shakespeare, written as a song for Ariel in the Tempest, the relevant stanza goes like this: Full fathom five thy father lies; Of his bones are coral made; Those are pearls that were his eyes: Nothing of him that doth fade, But doth suffer a sea-change Into something rich and strange. Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell: Ding-dong. Hark! now I hear them—Ding-dong, bell. See? He has not changed and yet he has. Where he was flesh and blood and bone, he is now made of treasures of the sea, coral, pearls - nothing faded, he is recognizable but he is now made of different stuff, valuable stuff, stuff wrought not by the man himself but by the sea. His body has become something different altogether and his soul? Who knows where that is, it is not the point. We look at others from the outside in. We see the value in them as people or we don't see. The thing is, nothing from the outside in, can be lost, only altered in perception or value or substance even - changed but not changed. Sometimes I feel as though I am living in a kind of afterlife. Stephanie-then resembles Stephanie-now. Lord knows she's built on the same scaffolding, the same foundation but she is not as she was. I am something new. I am something new that would be strange to those who knew me before. I look like a model of myself with silver hair instead of brown. I lapse into the same faults and foibles often enough but I am altered. Stephanie-then has been eaten away by a soft yet persistent tide and in her place is Stephanie-now. Made of the stuff of this place, no longer from the places that came before. I loved before, as I could love. My capacity for it was different than it is now. I wanted escape, wanted some ease and some beauty to take in and indulge myself with its wonders. Now, I want something else - connection, endurance, belonging. I want to know a person and a place completely. And I want to live in the midst of it, even when I find it ugly, alien or cold. I want to be clear, transparent, I want to be known and seen - no longer only an observer. And I am married. My husband's life is my own. He is, whether he likes it or not, the center of my world and I know he will remain in that place for the rest of my life. I have changed. Changed from angry, solitary, defensive and impulsive to a reflective, responsive, if strong willed, wife. I am Steven's wife. And I feel as though it is what I always yearned to be. (even when I didn't know he was there.) I have undergone a sea change. Single woman, daughter, maiden, friend and sometime lover to Wife. Anyone who has been there understands exactly what I mean. Meaning has come into my life and now, I am made of different stuff, pearls and coral, honey and amber, perfume and detergent - I am no longer only Stephanie, I am Steven's wife.

Reposted from just after my husband's first visit. (When we were first courting.)

It's late or it's early, take your pick. The neighbor decided to have a 4 am heart to heart on her balcony and woke me up. She's gone to sleep now and I'm still awake. So my thoughts turn to all the unresolved aspects of life on the table in front of me right now.

Basically all of it.

Work has been busy and people have been slow to pay, it makes my life hard. I've been thinking about conventional jobs more and more lately but maybe more to the point, thinking about how it would be nice to have all the pieces in the same place for a change.

My personal life and my work life is now almost all in the same time zone, having it within daily commuting distance would be a significant improvement. It hasn't been that way for the last four years.

I guess I'm living an increasingly typical conundrum. You meet someone online and things develop. I suppose it would be nice if you could contain that to one place, nice if you can keep the job in the same place as the beloved but life goes where it will and in my experience, since 1995 anyway, it has seldom settled that easily.

So this year, fresh on the heels of having my heart broken, I decided to take charge of that issue for myself and to at least make it clear that if I were open to starting something with a new man in my life he would have to be living in one of two places before he so much as talked to me. Those places were, Austin or Ottawa - that's it, that's all. No more stretching myself into another time zone for another job or another person, enough is enough. If you don't live where I live or at the very least, I decided, in the city I love enough to make an effort to get to for at least four months a year, don't talk to me. Just don't. And while I'm on the subject, no motorcycles and no smokers.

I should have been warned by the first two guys who contacted me, a guy with a motorcycle and one who was quitting smoking. Anyway - I didn't notice a trend and for whatever reason, it didn't work.

By the way, I did not willingly stop caring about the original Texan, in fact part of this was to force myself to stop thinking about him. He committed to another woman and cheated with a third, there was no way I could stay. He made it impossible to be with him but I thought I still loved him so I also made it clear that whatever might happen, would happen very slowly, it would not be likely to be a passionate union but rather the companionable type of affair two people have when they are dealing with life, have had their great big love and now just want to be sane and sensible, have a pleasant companion and keep everything in proportion.

A moderate, quiet, friendly dating relationship was what I was after. Seemed reasonable at the time. All of this is possible because, if you are feeling blue and think dating might be an answer, you can go to a site like OK Cupid and set up a profile that is absolutely specific in your needs, wants and expectations, right down to the most minute detail, including neighborhood, favorite color, and specific sexual tastes, if you're so inclined. My friends have done it, I decided to give it a try. Thought it might cheer me up. What they don't tell you is that if you are curious about the random matches their program throws your way and you open up the profile attached to them, it is possible for the person whose profile you peruse, just out of curiosity, to see that you looked at it and then look at yours in return. I was unaware of this aspect of the site and amused myself with looking at every really good match they threw my way regardless of location.

There are a lot of interesting people out there and looking is fun. Anyway, that turned out to be either a really good idea or a really bad one depending on your perspective.

One of my random matches, one I thought was interesting, one whose profile I had explored and then left without saying a word to him? Well, he saw me and he talked to me and everything changed from there. I dismissed him as soon as I realized he was from the states and not from Austin. Granted, he's within a day's drive, much closer to me than the Austin man ever was but not in my preferred environment, not in either one of them. But he was smart, funny, charming and really beguiling, there's no other word for it and whenever I spoke with him, I felt much better about everything in life afterwards, consistently better - happy even.

So here I am. It's 5:30 in the morning and I am lying awake when I really need to be asleep, thinking about whether or not I can apply for the perfect job in a a place I never even considered as an option because there is a perfect job for me there that just happened to open up last week and there is this man and in case you haven't already guessed it, my heart's center of gravity that way has quite unexpectedly shifted from Austin to the Berkshires.

I suppose this proves that anything is possible. And yes, he's been to visit me here, the chemistry is real and intense, more intense in person than remotely. I'm planning to visit him there and it's fair to say, if we haven't already fallen in love, we are well on our way.

How did it happen? I was careful, I thought I covered all possibilities, I thought my case was air tight and my intentions firm but life slips in. It doesn't matter how much you try to seal up all the cracks and openings, life gets through anyhow and as cliched as it is to say this, people are unique. I'm in Ottawa and still love Texas very much but two things matter more than Texas, meaningful work (which can be done anywhere, I'm learning that) and the right person with whom to share a life, they can only be found wherever they are.

Maybe that right person isn't where I expected to find them but it does feel to me, a little more each day that he is exactly who I always wanted him to be. He found me, he followed his feelings and he listened to me, to who I am not to an image of something he was trying to make up - I guess that makes more of a difference than I thought. And he didn't change himself to suit me, his experience, his beliefs, he knew they matched mine before he ever said a word. (I was pretty explicit and not surprisingly, exhaustive in the details of what I felt I needed in a relationship, what was important to me and furthermore, when there was any doubt, he asked.) I sleep better when he's around So it turns out my right person might have been someone I never expected living somewhere somewhere completely unknown, unexplored, unsuspected, I guess it's lucky for me he had his priorities straight even if mine were still a little jumbled. I'm happier when he's around. Now I just need to learn to go with the flow. More yoga please. 4/17/11

Added January 6, 2012:
I went to visit him on May 13, 2011 - never left.
We married on September 21, 2011.
Every day since has been happier than any day before.

This is how real love finds you, effortlessly, when you're not expecting it and so powerfully, you don't need to pull toward it. It pulls you.

moving day.

In the time between now and when I began this blog so much has changed, if I read it in a novel, I'm not sure I'd have believed it. Just goes to show you, anything can happen. I live in Massachusetts with my husband now. He's not the same man I thought I loved at this time last year. He's a better man in every way that counts. He tells me the truth and seems to be interested in understanding and supporting me more than using me for fun. There's no point going on and on about it, I've posted about him before and was busted for it by his sister and a former girlfriend. But I like to be candid here and since I've shut this blog up tight (you have to have asked me to read it if you're seeing this) I can repost the original post about him. I wrote the next post when I knew we were falling in love. Now that we're married, I no longer have to be ashamed for being presumptuous. I knew from very early on that Steven was "The One." I had hoped others were but where there was hope in the past, this was inevitable. It felt as though it had a life of its own. I am only a part of this love, a part of this marriage. I am not constructing it as I go, I'm not in control and finally, I've discovered, that is the difference between real love and plain old desire.

How to show restraint

Right now, right this very minute, I am fighting the impulse to gush publicly about my new husband. I want to tell everyone how fantastic he is, how smart, how kind, how surprising, how talented, how tasteful, how funny, how considerate, how sweet, how tender, how strong and how handsome he is - all the things that make me happier by the day.

 I find myself caught by surprise by the sight of his broad shoulders or a glimpse of his hand on my arm in bed and how it's made a hundred times better by seeing the wedding ring on his finger and remembering how it was something he wanted more than I did. I didn't care if we had rings or not but it mattered to him, his ring matters to him.

 It makes me pause and catch my breath to realize this wonderful man is, as much as this is true of anyone with anyone else, mine. He belongs with me - by choice. I am the luckiest woman in the world and the rash and crazy thing I did a few months back? Getting on that train a month early, on a day's notice, without any idea of how I'd manage the trip?

Smartest thing I ever, ever did.

By far, hands down, no question, the single smartest decision of my entire life.

If I have learned anything in my life it's this: FOLLOW YOUR HEART.

 Forget money, forget convention, forget common sense and do what your heart tells you to do, it's right.

 It's surprisingly hard to keep this stuff to myself. My husband is easily embarrassed by too much attention so he doesn't want to hear me trumpeting to anyone and everyone about how wonderful he is and how happy we are and let's face it, nobody's friends want to hear anyone going on about being crazy in love. At best, it's boring and at worst, it rubs salt into the wounds of those who aren't so happy in their love lives or their lives in general.

 It's also pretty interesting to see people react to this change in my life. I have a cousin who has, since she reached adulthood, been pretty horrible to me behind my back. Generally speaking, I've ignored it. She's made up crazy stories and generally done all she can to alienate me from my Mother's family. Not that alienating me from my mother's family required a lot of effort - I was already more than halfway there.

Anyway, the reasons for this are unimportant I suppose, water under the bridge - who cares? Actually, I'm not even sure I know but it is what it is. Apparently she has been diagnosed with some kind of mental illness - that can't be easy and I am grateful my life path hasn't taken me down that road.

 To my great surprise, one day on Facebook I came across a comment she made about my marriage. She commented to another Aunt that she had found out about my marriage and wondered if my mother knew. She then said "I guess I'm the cougar now." That was pretty insulting, especially since I've never pursued younger men, and I have turned all of them down based on age but for one big mistake - and that's long over.

(My husband, although you'd never know it, is ten years my senior - the only reason I have ever wished he was younger was when I realized the human lifespan is limited and women tend to live longer than men. Now that I've finally found him, the thought of a day without him is unbearable.)

Last night I had to comment on my cousin's actions, I couldn't help myself. It's one thing to be unkind about me behind my back but to take my mother's hard-won dignity, which is already in pretty short supply and fairly fragile - well, I couldn't stay silent about that.

 Marriage has changed me. It has changed me more than love ever did, maybe more than love ever could. It has enabled me to feel secure enough to be emotionally brave. It has taken the fear away. I'm stronger, happier, more secure. It's changed my life. Now if I could only figure out how to stop wanting to talk about it.

More Changes

It's surprising to me how much changes after marriage. Feeling more secure in one's relationship can't help but have a positive effect. I wake up happy every morning. Even if I've had a night full of nightmares, which sometimes still happens, (I'm making some pretty big adjustments after all) I'm happy to see his face, happy to know his affection is not up for negotiation, just basically happy. There are some other things though, things that surprise me and not always happily. Adjusting to a new kitchen, new methods of cooking and new supplies of food - I'm not much liking that at all. I just finished a dinner that was entirely unsatisfying. Makes me grumpy to think I spent all that time cooking and eating this stuff with no dessert to make up for how entirely uninspired and unpalatable (to me) it was. I ate it because it was fuel, nothing more, nothing less. I tried to cook pork in a way that would have rendered it delicious in Ottawa. I put it in the oven and slow-cooked it for nearly two hours. Slashed the fatty areas and threaded them with garlic, put it on a bed of mushrooms and onions, threw in some peppers and sweet potatoes and covered the whole thing with tomatoes, added some cider vinegar to cook things down and a little olive oil in case the pork wasn't fatty enough (which is often the case these days unless you buy a heritage breed) it should have all melted together and gotten delicious. It didn't. I don't know if it's because of the convection oven or just because whatever took me two hours in Ottawa takes four hours here but it was undercooked, the flavors did not blend and it was just plain - yuck. I used to be good at this. People think I'm still good at this and that's one of the worst parts; everything I make smells delicious and it is usually such a huge disappointment when I taste it - it's just frustrating and embarrassing too. How is it possible that I'm going through this stage? It's like I've never cooked before and that's just not so. My husband, Gd bless him, ate it anyway and said it was just fine. I ate it and ate the salad, made with bitter lettuce that I do not like and am now resentful because I've nourished myself with stuff that was a waste of the calories if you ask me and there's nothing to show for it and nothing to make up for it either. And it instantly gave me gas. This seems to be the case on a fairly regular basis. I am making my way through organic, local foodstuffs. I am very pleased to shop local. I am happy to be able to provide nourishing meals to my husband and save him some time in the process but if you'd asked me to trade every bite of tonight's substandard meal for one decent piece of chocolate cake? No contest. Now the rest of the bitter little salad sits at my elbow waiting to be consumed. I've had my quinoa, I've eaten my vegetables - what did I do to deserve this? Granted, I've lost weight and I feel better for eating healthy and I suppose I will eventually learn how to use all these things - gluten free this, whole grain everything, quinoa and millet (which, granted, I like when he makes it) but I am never going to like this bitter lettuce and right now - well, I'm just grumpy. I wonder if all brides go through this? Seems as though everything domestic that came so easily to me on my own needs to be reassessed and tailored to fit a new reality. I know it's all good but it's not always a pleasure. I love my new life but I do miss the pleasure I used to get from cooking and eating delicious food. I miss my identity as a good cook, I miss chocolate chip cookies (yes, made with white flour) and I miss knowing for sure that anything I put on the table is going to taste just as good as it smells.

The New Normal

I've closed this blog to anyone who isn't invited to read it. At first, I thought doing this would feel limiting. In fact, it has made me feel like writing more regularly. In the time since I last wrote, one of my boyfriend's former girlfriends, sought out this blog and used it to embarrass me. Truth is, I was forming a habit of saying too much. The way I saw it, online I am nobody - a random entity with a random name that would not arouse interest from anyone unless I specifically directed them here. The truth is, people are curious and will use whatever they find, whenever they find it if they feel wounded by circumstance or by someone else - anyway, it's just better not to have my life open to those who would do me harm. (and shockingly, they are out there. Wish I'd never learned that.) So, there's news and plenty of it. I've married a man in New England and so, I suppose, everything has changed. I wake up in the morning every day now with this new and precious aspect of my life firmly in place. I know, private or not, he doesn't want me to elaborate on our relationship in print but marriage is what it is and we have married. Maybe that's enough said, right there. So from here on, this blog is private. If I don't know you, you're not here and I am not a random cipher. That's going to take a bit of getting used to. For now, I think I'll go back to the bedroom and wake my new husband to start our day.

Ten Years After

Here we are, September 11, 2011. It's funny how we think not very much in our lives changes from day to day and yet when you look back over a decade, everything changes. Nothing is the same at all. Ten years ago I was living in Toronto. I was just starting mt second year of grad school and was still involved with Jesse, who still had his original kidney transplant. I was volunteering for the Toronto International Film Festival. I had never been to Texas, had never written a blog, never heard of Facebook and as far as I knew North Adams did not exist. I was on the verge of a lot of unhappiness but I didn't know that then. I was in an abusive relationship, that was becoming clear. We seem to think waking up is something we do suddenly and irrevocably. But it's not. Life seems to me to be a series of times when we are awake and times when we fall back into a deep and dangerous slumber. The lessons I learned from 9/11? Everything can change in a heartbeat - and it often does. I have a limited time on earth. Love should not be a chore. Leaving a place when things get difficult is about the worst thing you can do. Staying with a person after you know things have gone sour may be the only thing that is more destructive. I am tougher than I think. As I listen to the water in the flood channel behind the mill and watch the sky brighten, I can't help but think of all the people who have come and gone from my life and be grateful for those who are here and those who have passed through. I hope someday to be remembered fondly - I think that's about all you can ask.

Predictable horrors.

The LA Times published a piece this morning stating that terrorist organizations are now considering the surgical implantation of explosive devices into their agents in order to thwart the increasingly stringent security measures employed in American airports.

While I know, logically, that all terrorist bombers are, by definition, disposable people and that their intention is to destroy whatever they can and die in the process, it still creates a visceral disgust in me to hear that anyone would consider degrading human life to such a degree.

It's stomach turning.

Once the nausea passes though, you have to ask yourself what all of this means. In my lifetime I've watched the attitude of nations change from a sensible assumption that most people are relatively innocuous and those that aren't benefit by being treated with respect and kindness when they cross the border into a "civilized" nation to an attitude of absolute terror based on the assumption that most people are monsters just waiting to pounce and we should all be suspicious and terrified of each other at all times, in all ways and do whatever we can to be sure that we stamp hard on everyone we meet to be sure all the spine is squished right out of them just in case they might decide to act on what we assume is their natural, evil disposition.

Am I the only one who finds this discouraging?

Am I the only one who notices that it seems to be making things much, much worse?

The thing is, there are people, like me, who feel so wounded and offended by negative assumptions and false allegations that they will live up to those assumptions just to prove a point.

When I was a teenager, my father told everyone I was stupid. They believed it, I believed it and I acted on it. I was Queen Airhead, I was frivolous, mindless and devoid of ambition, then one day I woke up. I went away to school and came back to town loaded down with accolades and awards, nationally published, on the Dean's list, you name it.

It gave me nothing but pleasure to see how stupid people felt to have misjudged me as they did. Of course, I never bothered with them again, why would I? But it was nice to be right for that moment.

However, a terrorist is not a misjudged teenaged girl. When you put a terrorist in that position, they'll prove you right and die doing it - that article in today's LA Times proves that just as it proves one other critically important thing: the object of terrorism is to waste the time, resources and energy of your enemy on fear. They're succeeding.

Canada Day

Been a while since I've posted. Of course there are reasons, there are always reasons but it's Canada Day and it seems to me that even if I weren't revving up the creative engines again, the day would call for an entry.

Somewhere around 200 years ago, a bunch of Americans decided the independence thing wasn't going so well. They looked north and saw a vast open expanse of rocks and trees and snow they could reclaim for England and there, they could live as the English did with a class system and a King and the force of the British Empire behind them both economically and militarily. For a while there were struggles about it between the "sensible" Canadians who knew Democracy could never work and the upstart revolutionaries living out their nutso ideas of equality and civil rights in the south. Maybe some of them thought they'd take the south back. They were wrong about that but I hear they made a pretty good stab at it, even managing to burn down the Capitol and the White House - they were that pissed off.

If you don't believe me about that, look here or, if you'd like to hear about it in song, here

Really. Canadians did that - cause they weren't too big on the whole freedom thing. Still aren't.

Anyhow. Canada is my country and today is its day so - what to say about that?

We have lots of open space, lots of water and ice. If you want to experiment with mixed drinks, Canada seems like a pretty good place to do that.

We're polite but not actually friendly, we'd appreciate it if you'd keep the friendly stuff below the 49th parallel. As a group, we seem to have thought George Bush (both incarnations) was a pretty good idea since we've re-elected Robo-George three or four times now and in Canada that gives him as much power as the Queen in 1800. (he's about that weird too) What makes that safe is the fact that the population of Canada is about the same as Texas and with a population that size you can be completely out-of your-mind-Conservative and it doesn't change much in the scheme of things.

We make pretty good music. Arcade Fire and The New Pornographers are from Canada, so are Stars, Final Fantasy and, to be fair, Celine Dion and Justin Bieber (sorry about that, really.)

We produce terrible, inscrutable films that make people feel smart and superior (see Atom Egoyan) and endure six month winters and more cowboy hats than Texas, Colorado and Wyoming put together. We have chuck wagon races and Vancouver (which pretends the rest of the country does not exist) we also have creton (look it up - too gross to describe) and poutine, (similarly disgusting but mandatory) and tourtiere which is actually pretty good and makes salad much more desirable than usual.

Some of us have British accents, even after 6 generations or more. Really. We are stubborn and slow slow slow. Daily newspapers feel they need a two or three week lead, at least to produce a feature.

We don't like enthusiasm and we think the internet is moving way too fast.

So happy birthday Canada. Hope everyone there is enjoying the day. I'll raise a glass of sparkling water to the great white north and plan to see a baseball game and fireworks in small town America while I think about degrees of liberty and freedom from creton.

River

The river here is encased in concrete. At first I thought it was just the river near the mills but it's not. It's the whole thing all the way through town and into the next town. The result is, Adams and North Adams don't suffer from flooding. There's just no way the river can get out of the chute.

But it feels odd. It makes me feel like I want to take a sledgehammer and hammer it free.

Pity for deadly things - a common enough flaw and right now, certainly one I am at risk of adopting.

Stories to tell that can't be told. Always the hardest thing.

Morning

Still raining in Massachusetts. Looks like it might be another of those summers like the first time I visited when it just doesn't stop raining at all. Cold all the time too.

He asked me this morning, if I was homesick. Lord, how I hate questions like that. They never mean what they ask. I know I'm difficult, I wake up alert and he hasn't seen the half of it -

Sometimes I really do think I am just way too much of everything for anyone, ever.

Supper

Here I am in a small town in Massachusetts. Seems like it will never stop raining. Doesn't bother me as it would in Victoria or Ottawa, probably because I'm not alone.

There's been very little work done on family dynamics as they apply to the eldest daughter in a dysfunctional family. Many of us, it seems to me, end up alone. There's a certain amount of unspoken pressure to take on the role of family matriarch and carry the load.

It's a tradition in my family, one I've bucked and not entirely successfully.

Arriving here was a shock, now settling in for a while, I'm noticing things about myself I never noticed before; some of them pretty alarming.

I've been groomed to be alone and to be the adjunct member of a family circle, trained to help, to be the extra maternal figure who steps in with the kids but who has no real life of her own. Ok, I'm a writer, mostly, and I do have my own identity but that identity is a little hollowed out when I'm by myself and by myself is what I've been for a long time now. (with obvious and prolonged breaks to take on mostly sacrificial roles with men)

Now I'm here. Things are different. This man is self-sufficient and I have work to do so I get down to doing it but at the same time I find myself drawn to the kitchen to cook.

There's a chicken in the oven, rubbed with garlic and butter, stuffed with millet,onions and garlic, flavored with unfamiliar spices and as soon as the tastes started coming together, side dishes started suggesting themselves; mashed potatoes, of course because that's what one eats with roast chicken but there are apples in balsamic vinegar in the oven too - to echo the french idea of heaven and earth, there's a small, simple green salad in the offing - all it needs is a bottle of dry, white wine and you have an actual meal - one I would order in a restaurant. Way too much food and too elaborate for a Tuesday.

But I'm a different person here. I wake up at 5:30 and write for an hour or more before getting on with the day and there is this other person....

I hardly know what to make of it but one thing I do know - we're not in maiden Aunt territory anymore.

Privacy and Life

Where does one end and the other begin?

There is someone new in my life. He takes up a pretty big space in my thoughts. It's hard to write around him but he is much more private than I am and wishes to maintain it.

In the past that has meant I have not written. It cannot mean that anymore.

Being involved with a writer means, to a certain extent, living with some public edge. It's like a live/work space. Sure there are private areas but there is overlap. Fact is, I write about intimate, domestic things here and for the moment anyway, my intimate domestic situation has changed.

In Ottawa, I'm alone. I live in my little space, do my little work and carry on. It was getting to the point where it was a little crazy making. Here was this person, 6 hours away, I could talk to him, sure, but it's not the same as spending time together, seeing if you're compatible in day to day life.

So I went to him.

He's got his own stuff going on. But it's not the same as my stuff. Anyway, I need to be out of the closet about this - about him, cause at the moment, he's at the center of my life. I'm at his house and it will be that way for a month, more or less.

Chances are good, the next few entries will be about things I notice in resuming the day to day routine of a relationship.

This morning I told him he was "my mother's revenge." It's true. He reminds me, gently and kindly, to do all the things my mother reminds me to do. Put the iron pills where you'll remember to take them, where you'll see them every day, make lists, put the keys on a hook by the door - all that stuff. And because it's coming from him and not from my mother, I really can't roll my eyes and sigh and say, "whatever." I have to give it space and respect and nine times out of ten, he's right.

My mother already loves him and they've never even met.

Now if I could only figure out how to get enough sleep.

Morning

The sun woke up and so did I.

Getting my bearings in a new place means inviting light in, almost invariably, and this is no different. Here I am in a new place, trying to maintain someone else's privacy and, if anything, even more aware of the need and the value of being as true to myself and as honest on the page as possible.

After all, if I can't do it in this limited forum then what chance does my poetry have? It suffered so much for that while I was in another relationship - won't go there again.

It is just after 6:00 am. I've made a little spot in the wide, brick sill of one of these windows so I can sit and write and look out at the river, such as it is.

The river here has been lined in concrete, walls raised, 400 per cent over its natural walls, it is a wide, shallow basin, like a drain for the water of the river that really should be touching the soil. But it still does make that lovely sound.

It's interesting to me how two people can be so dissimilar and yet so complimentary. I'm very glad to be here, there's lots to do, lots that needs my doing it.

In all likelihood, I should leave it at that for now and go back to bed for a while which is what I'll do.

Then Again....

In my last entry, I said if an invoice or two didn't come through, I would have to cancel my plans.

Well. I decided to examine my premise and change that instead.

This morning I got on a train and went away.

Tonight, I am somewhere else, and very glad of it.

What I learned in doing this is pretty simple; nothing is contingent on anything else until you decide it is.

And even then, you can change your mind if you want to.

More later.

Climbing Out

Dark day, passed.

If anyone reading this has a sense of narrative suspense, here's something I'm doing right now.

I'm invited to visit Massachusetts this summer. Since my work is rooted in the computer, that's pretty easy for me to do. Provided, that is, my employers pay me on time. This year they've found it nearly impossible to do that. I've felt shame about that and I know a lot of other freelancers/independent consultants take that shame on themselves too. In the last few days I've realized, this is not my fault.

I've kept my word, I've delivered and I've kept my rates low and my deadlines incredibly flexible. People seem to think that means they're more important to me than - well, more important to me than me.

This is where that ends.

On Saturday, May 14, the lodge at Mt. Greylock is opening for the season. Someone I care about has suggested we go. They will be having a number of traditional Mohawk activities, a blessing, storytelling, dancing and I'd like to be there. I have Mohawk roots and I've never seen a Mohawk ceremony despite having been to numerous sweatlodges, pipe ceremonies, blessings and even a potlatch.

If two overdue payments don't come in today. I can't go.

Money has always bothered me. I am ashamed of the need for it, I'm uncomfortable with it, I don't value it. It's done too much damage in my life to have any place of honor with me. But the fact is, we all need it and it's past time I came to terms with that reality.

My ability to do what I need to do in the time I need to do it depends on my ability to be confrontational over the next 24 hours about money.

I can hardly describe what utter revulsion and fury I feel at that fact.

We all have these issues, I think. The things we would rather die than deal with. But the problem is, we can choose to avoid them and we don't die - that's not the choice. We choose to avoid them and they press closer, they begin to rule our lives, they stay with us and like a guard in a basketball game, they block us from doing the things we need, want and deserve to do.

So here's the choice - play hard against that guard, confront him and shove him back where he belongs, or lose.

I'll keep you posted.

Cycles

It's my dark day.

For the most part, women will not tell you this. In fact, we usually keep it to ourselves. Still, every woman I know, if you ask them, will admit there is one day at the end of the monthly cycle where nothing is ok. It's odd because people refer to PMS as a moody time and there is that, yes. Hormonal cocktails are potent stuff and the week leading into the whole event can be pretty stormy but it's nothing compared to the dark day at the end.

On the dark day you can't do yoga. You discuss important things with people you love at your peril. You can't be considerate. You have a messy house. As far as you're concerned, nothing will ever work out and more often than not, indifference is the most enthusiasm you can muster for anything. All your dreams are swirling around the drain, your life is ebbing away - nothing works and never has and never will.

If you've given birth, the dark day is very much like a diluted version of the transition stage of labor - it stretches out for a whole day and feels like it will be there forever. It's bleak. Nobody can change it. Right?

On my dark day, I can't write and yet must write. I resent everything.

My way of coping with it is to avoid people and try to get a lot done. But my nature is to be expressive. It's a quagmire, it's a mess. It's dark.

This morning I listened to two women arguing about whether the word "slut" could ever be reclaimed.

On the one hand, other, worse words, have been reclaimed and rebranded (like words in gangsta rap music) and I think, slut is a lot easier and more fun to reclaim than many other words. It also carries a smack of restoring sex and sexuality to the positive spectrum and I am all for that. On the other hand, as this much older and more staid academic argued, women are the only group of oppressed people who must be intimate with their oppressors.

I think I disagree with that, and not only because lesbianism is an option.

The urge to objectify, dismiss or oppress is not rooted in group identity, it is a personal impulse. When someone, male or female, tries to tie me down, possess me or make me feel terrible about my appearance, my sexuality, my expression of gender or just my somewhat unorthodox lifestyle choices, they're not doing it because they're male or female or from one ethnicity or another. They're not doing it because I have to be intimate with them. They're doing it because they are personally threatened by me.

Women have been as possessive over me as men and not (that I know of) for sexual reasons. Women have tried to exert the same levels of control as men and have acted out of jealousy as much as men. Some men have been free of these traits but you know, if I'm honest? In my own life, I've experienced more judgement, more jealousy and more possessive behaviors from the women in my life than the men - to the point where I have avoided most close associations with women. (which was wrong of me because those women were representing themselves, not women in general.)

People don't do anything as a group. We all act as individuals and we act from impulses that protect, benefit or even damage us personally - not as a flock of sheep.

Countries are made up of people and governed by individuals with individual agendas and physical realities that influence their emotional states. Be wary of an insecure leader, he'll be a tyrant and his political party has nothing whatever to do with it.

So today, I am feeling discouraged and frustrated. I'm listening to women argue on the radio and staring down the barrel of a Conservative majority that has cut funding to most women's organizations while they were still a minority and had to get those cuts past a supposedly compassionate opposition. I'm listening to a woman journalist talking about the prevalence of sexual assault while working as foreign correspondents. I'm realizing we haven't come a very long way at all, Baby.

I'm feeling trapped and smothered and it has nothing to do with the word "slut." The people who make my life hard are probably just like the people who make your life hard. They're just like the people who perpetuate sexual assaults or the insult of the word "slut." They're individuals acting on individual impulses and infusing their actions with individual meanings, many of which have little or nothing to do with any group and everything to do with their interior drama. And the same is true for the people who do this stuff to you - I guarantee it. They just use the social-communal stuff as an excuse. It's a comfortable place to rest their neurosis.

And - we are all held hostage to one degree or another by these things. I think the secret is to know it, even when you don't feel it (and today I certainly don't) even when you don't believe it, you have to tell yourself; "My actions and reactions originate inside me." You have to remind yourself of that and hang on to it until you can believe it because it's the truth.

When my body progresses past this stage, I'll start seeing hope again, I'll be grateful and happy and write about better things but this is a part of life. It's a part of life for most, maybe all women - and I want to acknowledge it.

Especially since it's possible that I will feel as though I have accomplished absolutely nothing else for the day.

Cycles are a bitch.
It's hard to be human if you want to do it consciously.

Candor

Suddenly, in the last few days, people have started paying attention to this little blog.

Up until now, except for the six of you, I assumed it was going completely unnoticed. I have used this blog as a diary, a place to rant, a place to think - generally speaking I think of it as singing scales into a cave. It's an exercise that benefits me by the practice because it goes somewhere but it hasn't felt real.

So I apologize to the six who have followed it and introduce myself anew to those who have just found it.

My last entry mentioned a lot of uncertainty around work - all of that turned out to be a coincidence. The interwebs were acting up and everything went down at once. That very same night I was taken to dinner by that very same employer and asked to recommit.

Things change every day. I think that is true for everyone.

So the question becomes, how does one write and reach down into that deep well of honesty that is supposed to make the work strong and resonant and good?

I am trying to bring some music, however plodding, to the mundane details of life in this blog. I am trying to dig up as much honesty as I can. I am trying to be brave enough about it to understand I am not heroic or even sensible all the time. Who is?

Spring has started to edge its way into the city. The trees are netted with a transparent haze of green, in a week, there will be leaves but not yet. The reason I called this blog ice lolly is way back in the first entry if you want to know. It has a lot to do with the weather and a little to do with humor.

There are some new realities that will doubtless be coming up in this blog - the Conservative majority government is one, my ambivalence about Ottawa is another. Travel does seem to be a constant theme and I do not expect that to change much. Without a doubt, the people in my life will turn up from time to time, how can they not? But I should say, the new guy, he's asked for some discretion and so I will try to comply with that request where I can.

For the most part this blog is about the world reflected through an ordinary life in an ordinary place by an ordinary woman. Maybe it's like your life. Maybe there are some differences. Please feel free to comment on anything you wish. I always do.

yoga diary - entry 23

New Day, new lesson.

I tried to use my usual yoga class DVD this morning, only to find it would not work. At first I was disappointed and wondered what to do, then I decided to change my routine and try a class online.

Learned a lot.

The class I do is fairly rigorous but doesn't have much in the way of core development. The instructor is really gentle and calm and easy to follow but there are things I benefit from that are not in her style of teaching.

Trying a new class was easy. It made me feel good in a different way, it made me aware that I am getting good at that one class, not at yoga in general and I need to branch out.

Coincidentally, things seem kind of screwy with work today. I can't find the company website online at all which makes me think something odd is going on. One must always guard against becoming paranoid so, ok - no paranoia but after I cleared my history I found I was no longer on the Linkedin group either. Is this because I expressed my lack of expertise in the discussion about establishing a green waste standard yesterday? Is the fact that my very modest paycheck seems not to be forthcoming after all tied into this? Or is it all part of the usual one-day-after-red-tide gloom interpretation that I've noticed is a fact of life for me as of about six months ago?

It's awfully difficult to function without a net.

When things go wrong, it's important to always have the means to turn to something else and benefit from that.

I need to learn not to attach to one project but to remember that I am a writer, that's what I am. And I need to develop that because ultimately, that is what is going to make me good at what I do, that is what will carry me where I need to go and that is who I am.

Lesson? Expect change. Be mindful, adaptable and have a core that is not broken by the removal of any one piece of life.

Yoga diary - entry 22

Here's a new challenge.

Things are going well. Seems I can accomplish anything I choose to do with ease. That makes it a little harder to get down to my practice every day.

I've started sending up a prayer to keep me on track after I'm done and find it helps.

Must keep reminding myself, yoga doesn't take time - it buys me extra time through the day. My writing is better, my ability to communicate gets stronger every day.

The issue is, once you have something it is easy to forget it must be nourished, continued, cherished and pursued with as much ardor as when you didn't have it at all, maybe more.

It's like love that way.

And like love, it also requires, space, balance, room to breathe and silence.

Namaste.

Settling

People I know have observed and remarked that one distinctive fact of my life is my inability, through choice or circumstance, to settle down.

I used to have some fairly predictable responses to this observation; denial was one, defensiveness and shame was another and a third was a feeling of having been deprived by fate.

After many years, I have reached a point in life where the things I want are mostly manifested in my day to day reality. I have work I love, I have my freedom. And now that these things seem finally to be within my grasp, I feel ready and able to "settle down."

However, I should probably point out that my version of settling down doesn't read much like anyone else's.

It doesn't even resemble my own idea of where I was headed when I started out on this life. When I started, I thought I wanted to live in New York City, marry an artist before the age of 30, and be supported by him. At least, I think that's what I had in mind,

My family made it pretty clear to me that my only means of support would be through marriage and so I made finding the man a priority for a long time.

When I went to University, I wanted not to want to be married and so I pushed that aside. It never really went away and a really destructive relationship with a man who needed me on every level when I did not need him ensued.

Then there was the Big Impossible Love.

All the while I kept on quietly working away, much more slowly than I would have if I had understood what I was doing but working anyway.

Now, really and truly on my own and coming into my own with professional respect and the promise of the freedom to come and go as I choose internationally attendant to that respect, (and accomplishment) I wake up in my tiny apartment, look out over the blue sky and the rooftops of my urban neighborhood and I feel a deep sense of calm.

I'm not planning to stay here. The truth is, I think it likely that I will, from now on, always divide my life between at least two cities and, if things go one possible way, maybe between three. There will be a partner, as close as I am likely to get to a husband, in one of them. In the others I will be solitary but not unhappy. There will be travel. Work will command a big place in my heart.

I never knew it when I started and I felt as though there was something wrong with me because I couldn't seem to fix my life but I realize now, for me, this is settling down.

I am making a clear space where I can be fully myself. I am making room to write in my daily life. I'm loving more carefully but more fully. I didn't have the lovely ceremony or the three beautiful children or the house that filled with cherished memories and family treasures over years but I could not have understood those things without the life I've led so far behind me. If they never happen now (and really, chances are they never will - the math just doesn't bear that scenario out anymore) then it's still good. My life is still better than it would have been if I had settled in my body before I settled in my heart and in my spirit.

So I'm settling down. And that's a good thing. It probably doesn't look much like settling would to most people but it is settling to me and for the time being - that's very fine.

How to Read.

U.S. will do new studies on Keystone XL tar sands pipeline

March 15, 2011 | 7:53 pm LA Times


The U.S. State Department will require additional environmental studies before granting a permit for the 1,660-mile Keystone XL pipeline, proposed to carry oil from the tar sands of northern Canada through the U.S. heartland and on to south Texas.

This is the issue stated in the broadest possible terms. It has to be simple because otherwise most people will not read on. In this case, the word "oil" stands in for bitumen which is not exactly oil since it has a lot of other stuff mixed in with it but will be refined into oil once it reaches its destination.

The reporter uses the word "oil" partly because this is how the business people involved in the process have referred to it from the outset but also because to list the details about what is actually traveling through that pipeline would take another paragraph. After they were listed, you'd have to explain why they matter. This article is written by a senior journalist or it wouldn't be even this long. Word count matters more than detail.

In an announcement Tuesday, department officials said they would open a new round of public comments on a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement, to be released in mid-April, with a decision on whether to grant a permit for the controversial pipeline now expected by the end of the year.

A copy of the announcement may be found here.

There is also commentary from all sides on the same blog.

Here, you need to see the announcement to understand that the government will be inviting comments. This could mean a number of things but one thing it means almost certainly is that you will need to make an effort and stay on top of this in order to make your comment to the people charged with making this decision. The people who care about this issue might be notified - probably not. If this statement puts your mind at ease? It probably shouldn't. It doesn't mean a coherent, comprehensive review of the situation will take place before making a decision, it means that the people in power recognize that they need to respect the American Constitution, consult with the American people and raise the issue in a forum that permits freedom of speech before they go ahead.

You can keep your rights and use them but nobody is likely to make it easy for you to do so.

Pipeline opponents have long called for new environmental reviews, looking especially at the ability of a standard oil pipeline to safely carry the diluted bitumen found in the tar sands of northern Alberta.

Here, the author does refer to bitumen but does not explain what it is. It's used as a synonym for oil and you might be forgiven for assuming that is the case. It kind of is but mostly, it's not. The author has, however, given you enough clues that you can look it up for yourself and in cases like this, you should because otherwise, you really cannot understand the rest of the article.

A study last month by three of the nation's biggest environmental organizations and the Pipeline Safety Trust warned of a higher risk of corrosion-related spills linked to higher levels of abrasives, temperature and acidity in tar sands oil -- claims that TransCanada, the pipeline builder, has rebutted.

Again, not exactly. It's not "tar sands oil" it's the raw material that comes out of the tar sands. It won't be oil until it's been steam treated and separated. Steam requires water. If you do the research on bitumen, that is clear. (then you might question why a water-rich area of the continent is sending something that requires steam treating to a water-poor part of the continent. They're not sending water to go along with it.)

Ranchers in Nebraska and surrounding states are also calling on the State Department to look at the possibility of a new pipeline route that would avoid a sandy, vulnerable area above the Ogallala Aquifer, a key source of farmland irrigation and drinking water that underlies eight states in the Great Plains.

Water is the central issue here. This is your clue about that.


Now that the State Department has announced the new studies, opponents are worried whether the month before release of the new draft EIS will be enough to do them right.

In order to meet the requirement to be objective, reporters sometimes veer sideways on the road to the point. This is one of those instances. Environmental groups want this pipeline stopped but saying that doesn't lend any extra weight to the story and doesn't give them much of a chance to give a complex quote on the subject. Since business interests are well coached on giving complex, articulate, easily digested quotes, most reporters reach for some kind of parity from less well coached and well funded sources who speak in opposition to corporate interests. This is one of those situations. The quote is true - it's just kind of beside the point and as a result, it makes "opponents" look a bit vague and shrill.

"I hope this is not a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement in name only. To do this job right, the State Department must analyze the air pollution and oil spills that can be expected from this pipeline, as well as explore alternative routes that avoid the Ogallala Aquifer. If they don’t, they will have a lot of angry ranchers to deal with," said Alex Moore, dirty fuels campaigner for Friends of the Earth.

See? Vague and Shrill - and he is a campaigner, not exactly a label that carries a whole lot of respect in the mainstream.

Moore said a spill last July of tar sands oil from a pipeline on the Kalamazoo River in Michigan provided evidence of the difficulty of cleaning up the thick, heavy material, especially in water. "The lesson we learned in the Kalamazoo River is that even six months later, they're nowhere near close to completing cleanup of that oil spill," he said.

This is absolutely true. Here's a link to prove it. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-08-02/enbridge-says-no-oil-remains-in-michigan-river-following-pipeline-rupture.html But by now, you probably doubt this source a little bit and are more likely to ask yourself what the other side of this story might have to say. There is also the question raised here, although unacknowledged, that if the State Department is considering granting permission for this project to come across the Canada/US border, why is it already in Michigan? Last time I checked, Michigan was part of the U.S. not Canada. (please note, I used the most conservative new report I could find as a citation here.)

Officials at TransCanada have insisted that similar oil has long been safely transported to U.S. markets.
"This oil product has been shipped into the U.S. for decades," TransCanada spokesman Shawn Howard said. "It's very similar in its chemical properties to some of the heavier crudes being moved around the U.S. on a daily basis."

True. In tanker trucks. He doesn't say that.

Contrary to the study prepared by the Natural Resources Defense Council and other environmental groups, he said, "the continued claims about this being some kind of highly corrosive product just aren't true."
"We're prepared to invest $13 billion in a pipeline to carry oil from Canadian and American oil fields, and these groups continue to claim that we're going to put something in it that will destroy and eat away at the pipeline? Does that make sense from a business standpoint?"

Well, sometimes they actually lie. He can do this because he can claim it's opinion. But you need to pay close attention to the last part of what he says, where he asks if they would do this and asks if it makes sense form a business standpoint. When a corporate spokesperson says that, the answer is almost always "Yes, it does." This is because their lawyers and actuaries have done the research, crunched the numbers and come up with a balance sheet and the $$$ value to the company of being able to do this exceeds the cost of any potential disasters. This does not mean there is no risk. It means they've weighed the risk and decided it makes financial sense for them to take it. The same is true of the Gulf Oil spill and Union Carbide's Indian subsidiary in Bhopal. You may have noticed that BP and Dow are still in business and still profitable. Disaster scenarios are calculated risks and they refer to them as calculated risks because they involve profit/loss projections.

He said about a quarter of Keystone XL's oil would be domestic U.S. production of lighter conventional crude from oil fields in North Dakota, South Dakota and Montana.

This statement is doubtless also true. It's a little shady to put it in here because it throws the bait of well-paid jobs into the pool during a time of real economic crisis. Note, they don't dwell on this but it's thrown out there and people concerned with the economy will notice it.

Howard said demands for rerouting the pipeline around parts of the Ogallala Aquifer fail to consider that "hundreds" of pipelines already cross above the underground waterway. Restudying the route now, he added, would mean forfeiting a large amount of money the company has spent for easements on the present proposed right-of-way and ultimately lead to new environmental problems by making the pipeline longer.

Here, you should ask yourself, "hundreds of pipelines carrying what?" If they're carrying non-toxic substances, this is not a fair comparison, in fact, if they're carrying anything less toxic than bitumen (and that would be pretty hard to do) then it's just a distraction.

The Texas-based Consumer Energy Alliance, a group which promotes greater domestic energy security, questioned the need for more environmental reviews, saying the pipeline has already been thoroughly studied. "It’s good that we can finally see the goal posts, but at the same time it’s frustrating that they have been moved again," spokesman Michael Whatley said.

This is for balance. Put in quite innocently. Here it bears mentioning that it's all written by the reporter in good faith. It's an important article that shares important information but you need to know how to read it in order to sort the wheat from the chaff Corporations spend a lot of money preparing for statements like these and also encouraging groups like this to carry on with their work. It makes everyone look reasonable and gives the impression that all sides are cooperating. Sometimes these organizations are - well, let's not get into that. It's nice that people are talking and it's good that a group in Texas is quoted with clarity and sympathy here but you need to remember Corporate spokespeople are trained to derail this kind of statement before it's even made and one of the best ways to do that is to be sane and reasonable and cooperative with environmental groups from the outset - at least, in conversation.

In addition to looking at corrosion and routing issues, the State Department should be examining the impact of boosting reliance on tar sands oil, the production of which results in the emission of a much larger proportion of greenhouse gases than conventional oil, along with the impact of the pipeline on air pollution in Gulf Coast refining communities, said Liz Barratt-Brown, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

"We think that an honest review will show that the Keystone XL pipeline is not needed and is too risky to permit,” she said.

There's the meat of the case being made against this project. Did you get this far? A lot of readers wouldn't. You always should.

The State Department in its announcement said the public would have an additional 45 days to comment on the new Supplemental EIS. The department will hold a public meeting in Washington, D.C., before making a final decision, required before any pipeline can cross into the U.S. from a foreign country.

-- Kim Murphy
LA Times, March 15, 2011

Here's a link to the article as it appears in its original form:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/greenspace/2011/03/tar-sands-oil-keystone-xl-state-dept.html

Yoga diary - entry 21

Here it is March 11, and I haven't been here since the first. I suppose one thing that tells you is that my practice has become part of my day. It's regular and so "normal" to me that writing about it daily would be like writing about brushing my teeth or how I slept the night previous.

But it is in these moments, I think, that we are most at risk of losing what we value.

I reminded myself as I was in the midst of a sun salutation today, that reaching as hard and as far as I can in this routine, stretching myself and making it into a deep, sweaty workout is something I do for my own benefit. Yoga allows me to eat more or less what I want and still see my body becoming stronger, fitter and leaner on a day by day basis. Doing yoga means I am not out of breath when I take the stairs, it gives me back the ability to go on walks for as long as I want. It makes sex better, much better, it frees me of the guilt I used to feel about getting exercise or not getting it. It makes me calmer and improves my balance, it insures against aches, pains and stiffness and after yoga, like after orgasm, my lips are full and red, my cheeks are rosy and my eyes are bright.

These are things I value - this is life. Yoga gives me life. It's not a chore.

So today, I was reminded to enjoy the things that make everything else possible. Enjoy work, enjoy writing, enjoy showering and sleeping and cultivating caring relationships, enjoy time alone to think, enjoy the cool of spring, the slow passage of time (as well as the swift) because these are the things that make anything exciting possible.

I have let go of regret and of bitterness too and maybe I'll mention here, I've started talking to someone who interests me and challenges and comforts me all at the same time.

It's all good.

Live in it.

That's my lesson for today.

Yoga diary - entry 20

Ok, it's been a while.

For one thing I thought if all I was doing was struggling, I should not bore anyone with the repetition of it. Even myself - and yoga has been nothing but struggling until my monthly break. Then there was guilt, cause that break went on for six days this month, then there was more guilt cause I didn't do my morning practice, instead I chose to try a new DVD and did two evening routines instead.

The evening routines were good and I will incorporate them into a regular thing doing my morning practice on weekdays and evening practice (well, late afternoon) on weekends. I think this will suit me better because it means I'm not getting resentful about doing exactly the same thing every single day, which I think would be drudgery even if it were something like eating chocolate, and it allows me to use one practice to boost the other. And that has been the net effect of falling into disorganization and then coming back into personal organization.

This morning's practice was bliss. I understood why I was doing it. I worked hard at it, I enjoyed it and I thought about very little else while I was doing it. This, I understand, is desirable so I'm glad.

As a result, I feel blissful, peaceful, self-confident and (although this still defies objective logic) svelte.

In fact, I feel so much better, so balanced and restored compared to the struggling creature I have been that when the ex called ot say he missed me, I answered - "of course you do. You love me." Instead of getting all limp and tearful with him. Yay for that.

And now - I have a bazilion things to get done and the energy to do them.

Lesson for today? Let yourself fall apart, let yourself become unglued and get reorganized to your own standards. It's got to be on your terms. This is my practice, I'm not doing it for the benefit of anybody else.

Yoga diary - entry 19

This morning I rose an hour earlier than usual. Went through the routine, as usual and felt an immediate benefit.

I may not be slim (yet) but I am much calmer than before.

The passage of time is what I'm learning now. It has been nearly seven weeks since I left Austin. Never mind that I have four times that distance to go before I can return, the time is beginning to pass swiftly. I am beginning to accept that I am passing time here and just like my practice, which seems unbearably long when I start, the progression is beginning to seem fluid and inevitable.

By the end maybe it will even be pleasant. It always is with yoga. There are times when I am even reluctant (a little) to be done.

The most interesting thing happened last night. At the Writers' Trust gala, I ran into a young woman who recognized me as my former partner's former spouse. She is a reporter now, when I knew her she was in high school, the best friend of my partner's little sister who was like a little sister to me too. I was thrilled to hear about her life now and even happier to hear that all is well with my former partner's sister. She has the life I would have wished for her.

On the other hand, the young man I left behind? More than a decade my junior and the recipient of a kidney from his best friend a year before I left - he has done nothing.

He sits in his parents' house waiting for life to take hold of him as though he had nothing to do with it. Even his little sister can only say, it's in his hands now.

And while this may not seem like a yoga lesson, it certainly is. Time passes second by second, nothing you can ever do will bring it back that's true. But you can step into the flow of it at any time and you can move forward too, second by second, sliver by sliver, ounce by ounce. I may not see any progress from yoga. I may be utterly discontented and sometimes even anguished by how my life has gone to this point. I may feel I've had every loss a human being can sustain and still remain upright but I tell you this - I have not stopped trying. I have not given up. Even if I move forward by the breadth of an eyelash, I move forward and after a few years, it accumulates. I have changed a lot since I left that boy. He has changed not at all.

I am grateful for the path of my life today and yoga taught me that.

yoga diary - entry 18

Did you know 18 is a homophone for life in Hebrew? That's why it's considered an auspicious number. Very often gifts of money will be given for a wedding, a graduation, a birthday or a Bar/Bat Mitzvah in multiples of 18 for that reason.

My birthday falls on the 18th, it may be simply ego but that feels a little blessed, I admit.

Today I let myself off the hook. I still did my regular practice but allowed myself to take the breaks I wanted and modify the poses I wanted as much as I wanted.

The thing is, I really want to be perfect at this. I want to be able to fold my chest right down to touch my knees and place my hands securely on the floor when I do. I want to be able to lift into Goddess Warrior with a lot of strength and not much effort and I want to progress to the most advanced poses too.

I pulled my left hamstring so as much as I may want to go speeding toward all of that, it's not happening right now and so today I decided rather than resent everything, I would just do the sequence from where I am (rather than where I want to be.)

Taught me a lot. For one thing it pushed out the anger at the man in question and replaced it with real forgiveness. Something that has, heretofore been foreign to me. I thought of two things: first, if I love him in any way, even as a wonderful experience I had once or a good friend or an interesting person, then why would I want rancor and bitterness to accompany him through life? And second, as long as I hang on to the heat of that anger and the pain, he is foremost in my mind.

That may be one of the reasons I was hanging on to it. Sad is much harder for me to bear than furious but I can say honestly, I love him because I loved him and I forgive him because we want happiness for those we love. We want to be good to them, not a scourge.

Big lesson. If I get nothing more out of yoga, that one makes it worth it for the long haul. Maybe I'll even be able to apply it to my father someday. Not going there today, not feeling the Freud vibe at all except in the Beethovenesque sense.

So I learned forgiveness. I know I'll forget it again but today, I know it.

The other thing I learned is that it's fine for me to do what I want and I don't have to be rigid and linear about it for it to be fine, useful or productive. Today, I pushed out some fear. Big time. That makes me happy. The practice was all about modifications.

I have also realized over the past week or so that my arms are a little shorter than they should be for my height. That sounds strange but I think it's true, all too often the sleeves on clothes are too long and when I am doing yoga and look at myself in the mirror compared to the instructor? That seems very apparent.

I need to modify some stances just to make them work without hurting myself. And the thing is this; when I accept that and work with it, I can do everything and reach whatever I aim for. When I don't? Everything is just that little bit out of reach and it is difficult, discouraging and maybe would never be possible for me to get what I am grasping at.

These are all good metaphors for my mental processes today.

Things are a bit busy this week. Will return to a more articulate, thorough flow of writing by friday, promise. (I feel like I have to use a little direct address these days as a few people have told me they are actually reading this thing. - the world is full of wonders...)

yoga diary - entry 17

Suddenly I am noticeably thinner.

The sun has made its way beyond the block of apartments that obscures my view of the whole sunset and is moving north now, a little more every day. Actually, we are, the earth is moving but I was raised to think of the sun rising and setting and sometimes it's hard to remember how we spin toward and away from it every day and change our angle through the year.

Yoga has been good for the last two days. Good enough that I considered altering or adding to it. I don't think it's time for that yet but it will be. I'm just not ready to alter a good thing, I want a more solid foundation first.

It occurs to me that the passage of time and my own observance of it might have been one of the things that made staying with the man in Texas so appealing.

Whether I understood it or not, when I was with him, waiting for our life together to begin and trusting him, I could hang on to the illusion of time standing still. It felt like he and I were the only things determining the movement of time. He said time had to wait, so it waited and I waited with it.

Of course that's absurd but think of how we're all raised to see Sunrise and Sunset - something big moves around us, we don't think that we could be moving around it. After all, aren't we always in the same place? Anyway, he wasn't really waiting, he was auditioning, tasting, feeding what needed to be fed and getting ready to move on. Maybe that's my fault. I'm not sure he understood how much of my life I allowed to hang in the balance waiting for the time when I could be open about everything and live in one place, fully belonging there.

It was a lovely dream and I have been interested to observe it's something of a family pattern. We bloom late and we only seem to bloom when we are married, if I'm honest I have to admit, I really don't want to succeed alone. That's one of the reasons I have done such a strange little dance with my own success. Success alone, to me, is condemnation to a life of solitude and that, honestly, is the very last thing I want - so here I am, living it. Irony = life I suppose.

We are moving from life to death. That's true every minute of every day. It's not a terrible thing, it is the nature of life and nature itself - we're part of that, it has to be ok.

So here I am, back in the flow of time, life spilling past the rocks and over the sluice gate and on to the ocean somewhere in the distance.

Here I am with the earth turning beneath me and the sun fixed overhead, we spin away and then turn back and each time we do it's just a little different from the last time. The pattern is called an analemma, there is an excellent explanation of it here at a blog called Field Notebook, written by Curtiss Clark, whom I do not know but who seems like a pretty smart guy.

So the weather changes, the sun has its arc and I have mine. And today I didn't think of anything but yoga while I was doing yoga. They call that being "in the moment", I suppose.

I'm doing it right.

That's the conclusion I've come to today. I'm doing it right and that's fine but coming out of years of doing it wrong, years that were then iced over with a layer of four years of being lied to, sometimes it feels like too little too late.

Here I am in frozen tundra-land trying to make some meaning of it all and I guess today the meaning is this. Look at what you're doing as you do it and do that thing right. It will have results but you might not see them for a while. In the meantime, it's not going to be fun and it's not going to be exciting, it's just going to be going through the motions and trying to remember, every step is a step toward the end and you are always moving.

Even when you're standing still.

yoga diary - entry 16

On the wall in my kitchen is a calendar from Austin's Half-price books. It's about dogs and books. It's not pretty and not particularly clever (in my opinion) either but it is rooted in Austin and it is a calendar.

Every day, when I finish yoga, I take a sharpie that I keep right under it, and make a big X in the square for the day. No yoga, no X.
When I left Austin with this calendar in my suitcase, I thought I would be marking off 153 sequential days, the amount of time I must spend in the province before I can travel again. I thought I would be marking off time between my departure and reuniting with the man in my life. That turned out to be wrong and it looks like I might be marking off more than 153 days as well.

From the looks of it, I have a project here that will keep me until at least October. That's ok, I can manage but what really was hard to accept was that the calendar and those X's have nothing to do with reunion.

For me, he was my mate. For him, I was a friend with benefits.

One of the things he insisted on throughout the four years we were together was "discretion." This was exercised to suit his tastes of course, in some circles we were a couple, in others, just friends, in still others, very affectionate friends. At the end of it all, I discovered I was not the only "friend" in his life. Hell, the others received formal Christmas presents, I didn't.

All this is to say, I am not only doing a daily yoga practice for the exercise and the mental clarity, I am also doing it to expunge anger and hurt from my life. Every memory I have of him is tainted by his actions, the things he was doing when he left, the things he must have been thinking when he was with me - it all has this undertaste of bitterness and I am trying to rid myself of it so that I can remember only the good because I truly did love this man. With all my heart.

I am having terrible trouble learning to do the lizard poses. Those poses where you have one leg stretched behind you with the knee resting on the floor and the other leg bent between your hands? That seems nearly impossible to me and it hurts. I have different strategies to deal with it every day. Sometimes I let myself modify it sometimes I only do it for a breath or two and then revert to child's pose, sometimes I just promise myself I won't do it if I don't want to and then I find I move around in it a lot but I still tend to give it my all.

I don't know what I learned today. My practice was middling to good, I prayed for compassion afterward, to have my heart washed clean of anger and soothed, to be gifted with some small taste of compassion for that man, for every person, for the world and for myself - to both give it and receive it. (I miss Austin terribly.)

Right now it's all I can do.

yoga diary - Day 14 & 15

Downward facing dog is becoming a resting pose for me. That's a good sign.

My mind is always wandering during my practice that's not so good. I am still wondering if this is ever going to make a real difference. I'm up to 28 days interrupted only by my body's non-negotiable demands and I feel less sure that I understand the benefits of this every day.

I think that might be natural. Human beings seem uniquely capable of finding something good, making it part of their lives and then looking around for a bigger thrill, a better thing - more. I think that's why some people reach a point in a love relationship where they just can't help but start flirting and/or cheating or at least getting close to it. There's no excitement in something that is consistently good, it becomes nearly invisible. The sizzle, the zing, the thrill - all that comes from starting something new and seeing the potential in it from the first try.

So this is a lull. To add to it, it reflects a lull in my own life as things move slowly toward a resolution. I am trying to understand that while I might be doing all of this for a resolution and hoping to launch into a new phase of life, that phase will also level off and become familiar.

The sequence is still challenging, I still break into a sweat by the halfway point, warrior pose and goddess warrior still challenge me to the point where I feel I can't hold the pose for even one more breath. The work is being done and that must mean the benefit follows but maybe that's it - the benefit follows the work and that makes the work harder.

There are people in my life, some of them very close, who would really benefit themselves and me too if they could grasp this simple lesson but for the moment, I am only capable of learning it for myself.

So I did my practice, put the X on the calendar, had my shower and went on with the day.