something invisible can make so much music.

Is it wrong for me to not want my husband away from home for five days at a time? I have a full-time job. I'm lucky enough to be working from home, but when S is not here I'm working and taking full care of little Rowan too. It's after 10 p.m., and I'm just barely eating dinner. It's been eight hours since I last ate.

To intensify matters, this bundle of sweetness puts on the saddest face--quivering lip and all--when it's time for any kind of sleep. I've given up trying to do the whole nighttime routine. Then put him in his crib half awake and leave the room hoping he falls asleep without a fuss, because he stopped doing that.
He fights it so much, I just end nursing him to sleep in our bed.

We all share a room anyway and R has yet to spend a whole night outside of our bed. He's one of those babies who wakes up a lot. And I'm one of those mommies who just really wants to sleep for one more session between feedings. I talk to him like I would talk to my alarm clock back when I needed one: Just 10 more minutes. C'mon. Mama just needs 10 more minutes. 10 more. Just 10 more. (This could go on for hours.) When S is here, he takes Rowan in the morning, and it's a huge help. S gets his deepest sleep at night, and I get my deepest sleep in the morning, so it works out well. OK. That's enough about our sleeping habits.

{the old days}

I work during the week, and S mostly works on weekends, guiding white-water rafting trips. This means a lot of me never leaving the house, because--here's the kicker--we only have one car. And driving six hours with a baby, three of which find me driving a screaming baby by myself and stopping a whole bunch just isn't my cup of tea. We tried it once.

So today after I got the news that S won't be returning for another two nights, I asked myself that opening question. Is it wrong to want my husband to come home every day? I mean I want to be that wife who can just handle anything and that mom who just doesn't need help. But I'm feeling a little desperate here, you guys. I thought moving here was going to be easier. I knew some things would be difficult, but I wasn't prepared for just how much. And even as I write this, I hang my head in shame, because I know we have it so much easier than many couples. Not to mention you single mamas. I'm in awe of you. (If I was writing in a place that is not this blog, I would totally delete all the smaller text. And I wouldn't talk about having deleted it either. But this doesn't change the fact that I am in awe of single mamas.)

Sorry for being dark. This has digressed so much more than I planned. I wanted to write one thought cleanly, simply: Is it wrong to want to sleep with my husband every night? And then move on to what I did while this thought was knocking around in my mind like an ugly marble. Rowan took me for a walk. He led the way in the ergo, like he always does. He lets me choose the route, and I decided to do something different than yesterday. I like to mix it up.

{wind chimes by supersassafras}

As we circled back toward the house, we decided it was so windy we should walk a bit longer to visit yesterday's wind chimes.

Enter my favorite house in this neighborhood. It's an unassuming corner lot with an old sky-blue pickup on one street and a yellow VW bus on the other. The place has tranquil landscaping, old trees, roses, jasmine, wisteria, a gazebo haloed by potted basil and tomatoes. And large guttural wind chimes sing beneath a canopy tree. Benches everywhere. And a white Alice-in-Wonderland-type gate opens into it all. The only other fence is a squat wavy row of ivy, which you could easily step over.

Rowan and I walk toward the music and stop to listen to it. Everything changes in that little space of sidewalk. We step into a bubble surrounded by a field of light. We listen to the chimes' music, and it is so quiet. We hear a car start and pull out of (what I thought was the neighbor's) driveway. A man is driving an old woman--his mother I think--somewhere, and they stop. I look up, and then back down at Rowan to ask if we should be heading home. The man gets out of his car and says that if I like it, I can get closer. This is his house. He opens the magic gate for us and tells us we are welcome whenever we want. I walk into wonderland as they drive off. Rowan and I sidle up close to the chimes, listening to several gusts of song.

On the way home I tell Rowan how much better I feel. That I could have stayed there all day. That I could do my work there. That I could become a zen monk there. That we need to have a house and a garden someday. And that we definitely need some of these wind chimes.

elephants.

I don't mean to be self-conscious here (in a literary/author sense), but not talking about how much blogger sucked these last few days is like not talking about the elephant--wearing a sparkling bright pink saddle with little sparkling men dancing atop it--in the room.

{I searched for photos of Shakespeare in action, but they do not exist.}

Wishing you a lovely weekend!

on moving.

After being here four months, we finally found an apartment and moved into it. This meant rediscovering everything that had been in boxes in my aunt’s garage for the past 3.5 years. And the stuff we’d carried with us from Chile. Not to mention packing and unpacking the stuff we’d accumulated since (re)arriving to California. 

{image}

Anyway. During all this unpacking, I opened several old journals. Many starts lasting fewer than days with some tome-like miracles thrown in. I flipped through and read an entry here, a soppy digression there. At every new journal beginning and often in between, I lament the lack of storyline. What happened after August 23, 2005, and before January 7, 2009? Even though huge gaps glare at me from my past, I’m generally, momentarily, fascinated by what’s been noted. I feel like I’m snooping a peek into somebody else’s life. Have you ever felt like this looking back at your own writing?  

So, what’s happened since December 2, 2010, since we entered the States. Even though I feel the urge to somehow fill in the blanks, I know the blanks aren’t all that interesting. A bulleted list can’t penetrate the psychology of a timeline. So, I start here. We are now three in our own place, and it feels good. 

We have internet now, and that feels great. Let’s just say I’ve missed you all so much. Thank you for your lovely notes, comments and mail. I so look forward to catching up in the coming weeks. 

Do you keep a journal? Regularly? And how do you manage it?

a room of one's own.

First I want to say, thank you so much for all your fun and lovely moving wishes! We're reaching the home stretch, and tonight we'll be sleeping in our new digs!

{more milk here}

But sometimes I just don't know when to quit. Times when my whole being is rung out yet I'm still so high strung I can't actually stop. I've had pretty gnarly insomnia lately, something I haven't even had a wink of since, say, 2006. Last night, for example, a quarter after 3 in the morning and I'm glugging hot milk and honey. (No, this isn't a normal drink for me. This is my first milk&honey experience.) 

                            {honey by kristyn shobert} 

Serkan and I scurried around together all day: packing, moving, errand running and eventual painting with the help of one of Serkan's friends. I confess, all in all I was not a happy camper nor honey company. But in the end I was able to say yes to going out to eat instead of cooking with what odds and ends we could muster in the nearly emptied house. Not only was our meal delicious, but we shared some great conversation as well. 

It was a kind of family and funerals talk. And suddenly I was talking about Norman, this stuffed moose that must be tucked away in one of the boxes stacked in my aunt's garage. How I'd written a letter to my grandpa after Grandma passed away. It's gist was this:  

Dear Grandpa, Dad gave me this (Northern Exposure) moose the Christmas after Mom died. Now I'm passing it on to you, so he can keep you company too. 

I ended up with the moose again once Grandpa, too, passed away. I've been thinking about that moose a lot lately. 

{girl&bear by dim baidachnyi}

So, naturally, Norman the moose surfaced during the conversation about my family. You see, my husband has yet to meet the fam. We were married in Turkey (where he's from) about a year ago, we live in Chile, and the immigration process to get into the States is a pain in the ass arduous.

But right now I'm not thinking of Norman so much as I'm thinking about letters. For some reason, thinking about the letter that I wrote to my grandpa jostles me open a little. Looking back at it, I cringe. Something inside me (the editor? some icky authoritarian voice?) winces at the naivete. It's not just this letter, though. It's poems, it's stories. It's many. other. letters--several as yet undelivered. Raw, impale-your-vital-organ type post-its. Asking for mercy, wishing for grace, expressing pure love and, at their heart, asking to be loved. 

 {letters found here}

In my mind's eye looking back, there's something so (violently) innocent about these pieces of writing that remembering them makes me flinch. Of course, I'm likely the only one looking back with such a look on my face. But let's not confuse this look with something of regret. I don't regret anything I've written and delivered. Well, not deep down at least. Mostly the cringe is followed by a shudder of awe. That I had the courage to share that starkly honest & pulsing bit of me.

...

Recently I was on a roll creating postcards. The roll halted for several reasons. But now I'm looking forward to letter writing and postcard making at the sunny table in our new abode. For a while I had a writing desk set up in our soon to be old house with a collage of family photos beneath a piece of glass. Once winter set in, the room dimmed, and the desk was overrun by dust and discard piles. So I'm really looking forward to rediscovering a comfortable, bright workspace. 

              {of course, outside is nice too.}

What is your creative/workscape look like? Is it a special place? Have you ever created something that's given you goosebumps at some later stage? What is another word for that feeling, since it's not regret? So many questions, but I'm curious.

{photos 5&6: unknown, please let me know if they're yours.}

projects.

postcards.
I've been making postcards with what little material I have on hand. Trying not to buy anything, and so the magazine clipping possibilities steadily diminish. Still, I'll soldier on and the first batch will be mailed within the next few days. Let's see how they'll hold up crossing the continents. It's never too late to add more, so send me your address to receive something via post!

mail.
Send and receive correspondences by post. This kinda goes with the postcards, but it's bigger than they are. Like letters big. Someday I would love to make my own paper to go along with this.

photos.
Playing with old pictures on the computer and removing them from their contexts. The context of a picture is completely different for the photographer and viewer anyway, since the photog remembers where she took the picture, the day, the place, the emotion, the recent kiss, the breeze. Now to take more shots.

blog.
Breathing new life into this space and deciding what it should be. I'm hoping this evolves naturally, as does the human question: Why am I here? 

turkish.
Inşallah! This is (one of my) sadly neglected, should-be first priorities.

sew.
My jeans that I dried too close to the Magellanic stove. Brittled the next time I wore them and bent down, the bottom tore (over a year ago). Reinforce the big teal buttons on one of my favorite coats, currently unwearable because it's too darn cold. But it's a nice change from my puffy jacket in the summer.


notice i didn't write write.
More sadly than my Turkish. I just don't want to jinx it.

old printing machine at the national center for handmade paper 

in ohrid, macedonia

postcards fade to blue.

This afternoon I'm in a tall hot pink hostel, two stories of corrugated tin siding, typical of most buildings in Natales. I'm waiting for my students to show up. Well, not waiting, enjoying. Sitting in a plush velvety seat to take a wee rest while I scan, again, the huge postcard collection here.

Perhaps there are hundreds of postcards here, rows hanging from ceiling to floor, shoddily stapled together. They dangle against a backdrop of a blue and yellow painted wall, the colors split by a strip of wallpaper border. Giant full-lipped suns intersperse cherub-faced crescent moons looking down beatifically at the yellow stars and one audaciously ringed Saturn, patterned over and over.

Over and over the past few weeks, I've come to realize the blueness of postcards. Predominantly. I'm not sure if it's due to sun bleaching, time, an obsession with sky, the lasting nature of blue or something about the postcard industry's azure draw.

Sure, there's the odd red and white Canadian flag; an Ohio triptych within a red & white frame flaunting old barns; the mauve-blue of D.C. lit up at dusk; a rainbowed 1980s thank you!; one of the royal couples wearing red and black; citrus sunsets; a concrete Hamburg from above (framed again in red & white); Holland: red poppies, orange horizons, blue-green A frames, white & black windmills, yellow "traditional dress," and happy cows chewing their cud in green pastures; Vienese gothic cathedrals and brown bakery goods. Grenoble, San Francisco, Australian koalas, so many Patagonias and Antarcticas, Berlins, Brazils, Wales, La Paz & Hong Kong, the Blue Angels, Stockholm, the Taj Majal and Catalina Island--all doused in a prevailing blue.

It's been about 40 minutes, today's class a no-go. But I sense a postcard exchange on the horizon. Mail here is slow and has been unreliable in the past. But nothing's been lost for a while, and the idea of sending and receiving mail throughout this bitter cold (for me!) winter warms my heart. Funny, just today I also stumbled across The Benevolent Postcard Society, a little too late, but what a beautiful idea!

So, send me your address, even if you think I already have it! xoxo

Arbitrarily speaking

The truth is so many interesting things are happening every moment. Right now: The wind whipping loose cables against the house, pushing the clouds at such speed. Within one minute sun turns to shadow; it rains; returns sun. The windows shutter. A cieling board leading up to an uncrawlable crawlspace lifts up and lands back askew on the rafters. The swinging door in the kitchen sways and creaks. Gusts lash through the tin chimenys; the stoves inside vibrate a little.

Unfortunate plastic bags tatter through the streets, sticking to trees and fenceposts. A red bug, tinier than a pinpoint, hurries down the white wall, tracing loose esses. These must be the types of bugs--in large quantities--they used to dye wool, anciently. Someone writes all this down, abritrarily.

Elsewhere a couple commences their first kiss. Someone is on fire or dreaming of flying salmon. Looks up phoenix in the dictionary. Cries for loneliness or a wedding. Hides under the bed. Gives birth. Is born. Dies. Looks in the mirror and sees a stranger. Starts their first day of work. Avoids an accident on the road. Saves a life on the river. Writes a difficult letter to a friend. Stares out the window instead of the hard monitor. An orange striped cat stares back--halted. Takes a few steps, looks back, locks eyes. Continues this along an entire fenceline, so that one cannot even leave her future gaze.