that's mrs. mediocrity to you

{august break no. 11}

me, today.

I sit here, needing something, but I am speechless.

I have spent another day running around in circles. Some of them were good circles, some of them were too constraining. Some of them weren’t circles at all, they were spirals. I have so much to do that I can’t concentrate on anything, and for some reason,  I am exhausted. I have a show this weekend, I have to work, have to make ready, have to do this, have to do that.

But I sit here. Hoping that if I get the words out, something will change. Hoping it is the words, all jumbled up inside, causing this inability to focus. Hoping.

I am outside, it is almost dusk, the air is still. My mind is not.
My mind is like these mosquitoes that are about to drive me inside. Pesky, buzzing, flittering, fluttering. Annoying.

If I sit here long enough, I wonder if my mind will become as calm as the air. I hear birds. Crickets. Peeping frogs. No grasshoppers just now, perhaps they are already asleep. The fading sunlight filters through the long row of bushes that hides me from my neighbors, my far-away neighbors that I still wish to be hidden from.

At the end of that row is the elderberry bush, bent low to the ground with the weight of its fruit, full and ripe. I feel like that too, just now. Heavy with my own potential.

I should get up and get my camera so I can take a picture of this abstract watercolor sky. But I feel too tired. I don’t have the energy. If I go inside to get my camera, I don’t think I’ll come back out.

Inside, the fans are still going. Outside, the air is perfectly still.

It has been like that since this morning.

I think I just need to sit here for a bit
and enjoy this breeze of silence.

:

p.s. I came back out.

one step at a time is the only way to get anywhere.

good shoes really do make a difference.

don’t sweat the small stuff, just sweat.

you don’t always need a destination
to get where you’re going.

you should say hello to everyone you meet.

there is no winning or losing, there is only doing.

things that are good for you really hurt sometimes.

there will always be someone who can run further
and faster than you, and that is okay.

running in circles can take you to amazing places.

being outdoors is vital, in every season.

whatever path you are on, make it the right one.

watch where you’re going, but don’t forget
to look up every now and then.

you can go farther than you ever thought possible.

you won’t melt if you get rained on.

your toughest competitor will always be you.

climbing hills might be rough, but
the view from the top is always worth it.

some days are better than others.

breathing is the most important thing in life.

blisters eventually become callouses.

when you think you can’t possibly go on,
you can always take one more step.

{august break no. 10}

He had such nice eyes…

but those biceps!

That’s what really did her in.

{august break no. 9}

The 147th time she wore this outfit, he said:

“That’s a pretty look for you.”

She said, “thanks.”

flashing light, blinding flare, this glare that burns. migraine.

pounding, pounding, peck peck pecking away at my sanity.

pain that will not stop, does not cower, will not leave.

pain uninvited, not wanted, not welcome, yet here.

my head in a vice grip. won’t let go.

pain that leaves me wasted, limp, sore,

run over. paralyzed.

i lay on the couch, afraid to move.

i watch from a tiny pinhole of awareness.

i am still, so still, any movement excruciating.

quiet light burns holes in my retina.

tiny sounds detonate bombs in my brain.

i wait and i wait and i think and i think. and i wait.

there is nothing else to do.

it is minutiae, amplified, one million times.

it is crushing fever, knife pain, white hot.

it is brutality, unleashed in my skull.

and then it is gone.

an ugly memory.

.

visit imperfect prose on thursdays, here

{august break no. 8}

is the only thing that matters.

:: :: ::

::

Today I am over at vision & verb
with thoughts on living in the moment.

And so, pickles.

Lots of pickles have been made, 74 jars total, bread and butter last Saturday, dill yesterday. Jars and jars of pickles that aren’t even pickles yet, because you have to wait for pickles to pickle.

With pickles, you learn patience. I like things that teach me patience, I don’t come by it naturally.

Gardening taught me a lot about patience. The cycle of life, the growth and the bloom and the setting of seeds, prepraring for the next generation. This is the life of a flower.

My friend Katie, who is really more than a friend, will be 84 in just a couple of weeks. My mom calls Katie “Blossom.”

84 years is a long time. Long enough to learn about patience. Long enough to come to terms with the cycle of life. Long enough to have lived through the worst thing that can happen, and survive. Long enough to do more than just survive, long enough to relearn how to live. To giggle and to carry on, through endless years of pain, both physical and emotional. To find joy once again.

Katie was born with both hips dislocated, 84 years ago, before they knew how to fix such things. Her son, who is just shy of fifty, was born the same way. But by that time, his time, doctors knew to pop his hips back into place just after he was born. Problem solved.

And that son, the one just shy of fifty, was Katie’s second son. Her first son, if he were alive, would have been 58 this year. She mentioned this while we made pickles. But her first son is not alive, he died when he was six, in the kind of freak accident that could happen to anyone, at anytime, these things just happen.

Only it happened to Katie, who had already, at that point in her life, gone through dozens and dozens of painful surgeries, spent her whole childhood having surgery, her whole life in casts and crutches and wheelchairs. After one of these surgeries, when she was quite young, she was left in a room under lights to dry the cast she was enclosed in from the waist down. But as it turned out, the lights were too hot and the cast started on fire.

Katie, at all of four feet, nine inches tall, has the spirit of a giant.

Many years ago, when I was sixteen, I dated her son, briefly. That didn’t work out, but my friendship with Katie remained. And then it expanded to include my whole family, until essentially, we adopted her as a grandmother. My parents and Katie and her husband spent a lot of time together years ago, before her husband died. Since then, my parents have taken care of Katie in a million small ways. They are like that. Good people. Her son lives out of state now, my parents and myself are her emergency contacts.

But this wasn’t supposed to be a story about Katie, it was supposed to be a story about making pickles. It is hard to tell one without the other. But okay, pickles. My mom and I went to Katie’s and we sliced and we sliced and we sliced some more. Cucumbers, onions, peppers. We put the cucumbers on ice and then we waited three hours for them to crisp. And then later, we simmered but never boiled, and we filled 22 jars, hot jars, hot lids, we wiped their mouths and we tightened down the tops and then, pickles.

During those three hours of waiting, we talked and we laughed and we listened and we admired Katie’s latest doily, which is amazing. She sits there while she watches baseball (Yankees) and crochets these intricate doilies or she knits mittens, dozens of sets each year, just to give them away.

And my mom talked, about her mom and her father, how they used have a huge garden, how they would can everything, even venison. How the smell of the pickles was taking her back to her childhood, which wasn’t the best of times for her, either.

And there we were, three women, 84, 68, 47. Almost two hundred years of living between us. But compared to these two women, my life has been simple, easy, a blessing.

Through all of this slicing and waiting and simmering and chatting, we giggled.

And then I vacuumed Katie’s house and emptied her garbage while she made us egg salad sandwiches for lunch and we ate and talked a little more. The house is getting too hard for her to handle, alone. She is in pain, constant pain, her hip and her spine are literally crumbling. My parent’s house is getting hard for them to navigate, so many stairs. My mom is worried about my dad, her sister, life.

And even through all of that, still, we giggled. Katie, who has a million reasons not to giggle, ever, giggles quite a lot. And it makes me smile and laugh, and at the very same time, it breaks my heart, just a little.

In the end, when we had finished, there were 22 jars of bread and butter pickles sitting on Katie’s counter.

Jars filled with spices, cucumbers, onions and peppers,

love and tears and memories and friendship,

and one whole day’s worth of giggles.

The best pickle recipe, ever.

::  ::

p.s. I will tell you about the 52 jars of dill pickles another day. And if you want the bread and butter pickle recipe, I have posted it here.

{august break no. 7}

times six cats equals 54 lives.

That’s a lot of Karma.

{august break no. 6}

tons of freckles and a couple of wrinkles.