wideeyedfunk

Category: Life

Always so surprising.

  • Leave the puffer behind.

    70 degrees Fahrenheit. Possibly the most perfect temperature. And friends, I’m incredibly relieved to report that I’m experiencing it today. Experiencing it outside. Because of course inside my second story office in my antique house with antique radiators, it is usually well over 70 degrees when it is 65 degrees downstairs at the thermostat and 15 degrees outside.

    I’m not making sense. Blame it on the 70 degrees.

    On this day, I left my ankle length Patagonia puffer on the coat rack for morning dog walkies for the first time since mid-November. I felt mostly unprotected and I did worry a bit. What if the situation changed around the corner? Ok, now I’m bragging about my own bravery because the truth of the matter is that I had on thinsulate lined Carhartt bib overalls, blundstone boots, my red pompom hat, and a slightly lighter jacket. But not the puffer and that’s something.

    My smile actually ached in my cheeks in the final block, and it is certain any watching neighbors, and in the city there’re always watching neighbors, well, they probably thought the isolation finally sent me off the rails.

    But it wasn’t madness. It was wild joy. And I still feel it. The (nearly) useless dogs feel it. Catticus the Cat feels it. The WideEyedBees in the backyard WideEyedHive are living it. They are living it so robustly that I think we are going to have to suit up and crack that thing open this afternoon to check on food stores and brood. It’s a little scary in the off season because the bees, oddly, do not respect that I am acting out of concern when I allow cold air into their home. They dive bomb our bee suits and leave startlingly large poop splotches in their wake. No one has ever asked my opinion, but I’ll give it now: any given creature should not produce poop splotches nearly as large as themselves. I guess holding it in for a few months will cause that.

    Snow is predicted for the weekend but it won’t stay. I think I’ll step into the backyard and hoot and holler a bit. The sunny warmth is begging for it. Might as well confirm my mad state with the neighbors.

  • November Hoses

    The WideEyedSpouse is lying under the back porch with a heat gun. Miss-Tibbit-the-Useless-Little-Black-Dog is staring in wonderment. Crooked Hank, entering the third winter of his young life, believes it all to be nonsense.

    Tonight it will freeze and freeze hard. The hose stopcock is already frozen open. Probably bad things will happen in the coming arctic blast if it isn’t drained and closed. Boring, expensive things.

    Friends, don’t judge us here in the WideEyedHousehold! We started the snow thrower two days before this morning’s snow labor. I packed the Smooth Ride’s trunk go-bag last evening (winter coat, blanket, fruit leather, water vessel, plastic bag, cat litter, little shovel, and a Wawa Truck Pez pack). The Joan of Arctic Sorels are out and were  deployed this morning. The bomber hats undrawered last week.

    A person can only do so much to prepare before the wretched realization arrives – all that work is simply to endure winter. W I N T E R. I thought about tropical winters as I forcibly shoved the snow thrower through a densely packed mass of slush (bottom three inches) and snow (top several inches) this morning. Sure, the tropical summers are reaaaally hot what with climate change and all. But that snow thrower. It is a two stroke monster that WAAAAH BAP BAP BAPs in an unholy melody of miserableness and exhaust stink.

    I can hear movement downstairs. Perhaps the ClosedShutStopcock has been achieved. Yay.

    Crooked Hank has an opinion
    Crooked Hank. The Doubter.

  • Breathless potentiality

    Breathless potentiality

    The sun angled into the car wash entrance this morning, making the falling bubble curtain into a solid wall of thousands thousands thousands of rainbows.

    I watched the hood of the smooth ride disappear into to rainbow wall as the car wash rails drew us in and held my breath, hair a-prickle and fingers tingling, to learn what was on the other side.

    (Nothing, just the rest of my day, but my heart still pounds with rainbow potential.) 

  • Aggressive decency.

    Most days I tell myself, today feels good. Birds chirp during morning dog walks. Hankie Smalls the Corgi and Miss Tibbit the Useless Little Black Dog – innocent and protected – are untroubled by politics, economics, or impending societal collapse. They are cheerful and hopeful every single morning. Interesting adventures in the confounding universe await. They smile at me and expect love back. So I smile and feel good, breathing deeply in the cold, hydrocarbon scented city air.

    Then comes the newspaper. The morning news on the car radio. The news synopsis emails. The Facebook feeds. From them I learn who died and how. Who was assaulted, harassed, or disempowered. Who has had their legal rights, access to medicine, or control over their own bodies stripped from them in the night as our political leaders sneak sly, lobby-fueled, religion-fired legislation into the system. The senators must be tiring of my letters.

    Ugh. I grit my teeth and work through it, distracting myself with the minutiae of academic program management and research.

    Time is passing and green stuff is sprouting in the garden. I pruned the pear trees and the blackberry canes. When the snow melts, hah, it is blizzarding right now!, when the snow melts I’ll trim the ornamental grasses.

    But it bothers me every day, who am I to take joy in the universe, in the fresh cold morning, and the coming spring? Humans keep on revealing their inherent awfulness, and I feel powerless to mediate the impacts.

    Is being kind enough? Is growing a garden, petting some dogs, and writing to the powerful enough? Here’s what I think: these things aren’t nothing and every positive action, every tiny commitment to decency contributes to the greater good. The plan: grit my teeth, carry on, and smile while I shove decency down the throats of the asshats. Er. I mean that figuratively, of course I do.

    Here, look at the picture of the happy corgi with me and we’ll all feel better…

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  • Be mighty. And don’t bite Miss Tibbit.

    Maintaining productivity in my humor-joy oeuvre proves difficult lately. Sure, I can see the bees in the lavender, the butterflies on the buddleja, the hostas exploding with late summer flower potential. The aromas of the herbs wander through my tiny demesne, especially when it rains after a hot day. City reek, city stress stop at my front walk. The back garden is a place of peace and joy. Except when Crooked Hank the Corgi Puppy latches on to Miss Tibbit’s tail. Not peaceful then. No how.

    But…ugh. Threats of nuclear war. Opioid epidemics. Political machinations. Hatred for people different from yourself. Nasty comments on the social media. Crazed news media. Preaching, proselytizing, vituperation.

    It wears a body down, trammels the mind, saps me.

    I need a plan to keep a daily balance because under the metamorphic existential stresses of each day, my stupid heart keeps breaking through the soot crust and beating hope hope hope-joy joy joy–wonder wonder wonder.

    Why does it do that? It actually hurts.

    So here is my plan – each step to be repeated as needed. Feel free to adapt for your circumstances:

    1. Mix a late summer cocktail and play with the dogs. I recommend the gin sour.
    1. Practice a craft, one that doesn’t drive me bananas, like Chinese watercolors or knitting but not lace knitting because the point is to feel good not incite rage.
    1. Smile. To myself. And not because of any establishment discriminatory nonsense about women should smile etc etc. Smiling relaxes the stress garbage and breaks the mean. For me it does. I smile for myself not for anyone else.
    1. Practice saying in a relaxed, non-confrontational way, “I’m not comfortable with what you are saying, please excuse me,” and also practice my saunter so I ooze implacable, indefatigable confidence of purpose walking away. Deploy my hard-won new skills. Be mighty.
    1. Keep watch for someone who can use my help. Help them.

    There it is. If you hear a bunch of barking and laughing coming from the WideEyedBackyard, well, I care a lot about the troubles of the world, but I can’t help make a strong healthy society if I go numb or break. None of us can. Peace, friends.

  • Provisions

    We ripped through the night in the Mighty Pathfinder, Enrique Iglesias’ Bailando thumping from the speakers, windows open, warm winds blowing. The WideEyedSpouse didn’t slow for a mad-big construction bump and the Mighty P lurched and waggled excitingly. “Bailandoooo!” the Spouse wailed.

    An old man on a porch swing creaked back and forth in time to the song when our crazed journey paused at a traffic light, and a flashing neon sign wanted to be on the beat but couldn’t get there –an electric version of me trying for the rhythm but never finding it. Cracked sidewalks sketchy bus stops stinky gas stations barking dogs blatting broken muffler cars – they are all better in the languid warm of long summer evening.

    I smiled out into the evening air, crumpling my reusable grocery sacks tight to me.  My heart felt full and light and easy. Buoyant. Which was nice because there hasn’t been much joy in the WideEyedHomestead since my pal Hamish the Corgi died a few weeks ago.

    It’s my big question, my conundrum again, from where does this mad joy come? And why do I feel it best when I’m faced with the outrageous complexity of life in this world?

     

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  • Flocks

    Outside the fall rains finally arrive in Buffalo. The vees of honking geese that crowd our skies in October huddle in clusters of grey and white blobs today. Sometimes a vicious hiss leaks out from the mass. I give them a wide pass.

    Inside the campus skyways, I smell wet wool, paint from the constant renovations, and French fries. I stick to the 2nd floor of the buildings, walking windowed bridges from one end of campus to the other. I’m my own parade through the arts, humanities, and law neighborhoods. Rain slashes the skyway windows, making them cozy. I need an armchair, ottoman, and book to set up a comfy encampment. Duty calls and I keep moving: work to do, money to earn.

    I’m on my way back from my cross-campus errand when I hear soft, high singing coming from ahead of me – many small voices not in tune or in sync and the trample of many feet. I guess some of the birds came in out of the rain. I round a corner there they are, wee-birdlets in rain jackets, jeans, leggings, and boots. They are singing a song and holding hands with each other and with their minders and most of them have their arms out, swooping and soaring through the wide skyway outside of the library.

    This is good, that the little birds are warm and dry, and that they learn to soar in the halls of the university.

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  • Kitchen Transcendence

    I meant to take a nap. Sunday afternoons are for napping.  Especially rainy Sunday afternoons. Really especially rainy Sunday afternoons that were preceded by a two-mile morning run in the park during a down pour. Blech in all directions on that little event: run (yuck), run for two miles (yuck), run in the rain (yuck).

    I looked at Hamish the Corgi and he gazed back at me, content laying in a sea of his own shed hair. We sighed at the same moment. Time for the Oreck Fun Police.

    hamish-10-2-2016

    Together, with Miss-Tibbit-the-Useless, we dusted and whirred around the downstairs. Miss Tibbit curled on the red tufted settee in the front parlor. Hamish lounged on the orange passion flower upholstered Victorian settee in the living room. Each dog picking the furniture piece that best set off their shiny, shedding fur. I put away boots, hung up coats, dog towels, and discarded umbrellas.

    I straightened pictures, cleaned up eviscerated dog toys guts. And I vacuumed. And vacuumed. And vacuumed. Tip: dogs shed. You’re welcome.

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    oreck-2

    When it was all over, the last hairy tuft sucked into the Fun Police maw, the Sunday paper and I settled in at the kitchen table. I turned off the loud music, put on some of my new blue lipstick (color name: Frostbite – maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s hypothermia), and tuned into the Amazon Classical for Concentration (or whatever) station.

    It was nice. The legs of the WideEyedSpouse were visible, dangling from under the Mighty Pathfinder in the garage. Dogs were sleeping. The Fun Police was parked back in the municipal garage. And I was clipping coupons. Just the good ones. A dollar off a defrizz serum. Two dollars off hand lotion. Three, three dollars off razors, my goodness, and then…the back of my neck started tingling.

    I looked up, scissors open and ready to clip, and listened. A warm cello sound strand came out of the living room and wrapped around me. My back sparkled, my heart pounded, and something full and wonderful and gloaming rose up from my middle and into my head and down my arms.

    I sat alone in my clean house, at my kitchen table, hair-unbrushed, scissors-poised, lips-a-blue, and I burgeoned with a joy of life too vast, too awesome for me to hold. I could feel it swirl through me and out into the universe, leaving me still in my soul and so glad to be alive in that moment.

    Thank you J.S. Bach for your Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major. Thank you Yo-Yo Ma for your playing.You made a humble moment transcendental. Your gifts are appreciated.

  • 21.

    You would think that the 21 year wedding anniversary gift was paper, since the sticky tab shopping list on my desk today stated clearly, in capitals, with black ink, “toilet paper.”

    We both would’ve missed it if Google calendar hadn’t sent an email. I reminded the Spouse and he paled. “Did you plan anything?” he asked, looking sort of like someone who smelled a storm on the wind. “No,” I said. “Should we have?” he asked still looking kind of squirrelly. I shrugged.

    Some years call for the pomp. Some don’t. The Spouse and I, we’re in it together and counting years is fun but they don’t matter. Not always. Not like the day-to-day love.

    You know what matters? In my rush to get home, to see the Spouse at the end of a day or servitude to The Man, I failed utterly to pick up some toilet paper.

     

  • The Kraken came to Buffalo.

    The Kraken came to Buffalo.

    Hamish the Corgi and Miss Tibbit-the-Useless forced us, absolutely forced us, to go to the land of whale hunters, pirates, beach plums, and Range Rovers. Hamish felt that his territorial expansion needed more activity in the Northeast. Miss Tibbit thought she sniffed something interesting coming from Boston-ish.

    Pirates

    We rented a house, packed ALL of the bikes and some of the wine, and aimed the Mighty Pathfinder at Cape Cod.  Hamish remembered that he cannot swim at Sheep Pond in Brewster. He remembered that a body can’t drink wave water on the beach flats of Crowe’s Pasture in Dennis. Sweet Tibbit watched ants march across the kitchen floor toward her food bowl.

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    WideEyedUncleB graciously hosted the mass of us for an afternoon in Scituate. “Hack!” Miss Tibbit coughed with purpose above his living room rug. We waited, alert and conversation suspended, for more. Later, the Spouse reported that he was prepared to catch pukies in his hands. “Great,’” I said. Later, I found the Spouse swabbing Tibbit-pukies from WideEyedCousinA’s pantry floor in Norwell. “That dog needs a bandana,” WideEyedCousinM stated, looking at Miss Tibbit. “This dog needs a hot dog,” she thought back at him, staring pointedly at the platter on the table.

    Then, on a food and pirate outing, I saw something interesting resting lonely and dusty in a jeweler’s case. The Kraken. Red eyes gleamed from the base of a giant, swollen freshwater pearl. Angry sterling tentacles curled. My hands shook and I tried to stay cool. “May I see that ring, there in the front…” I asked, shoving aside some lady blocking my view.  No really, I physically pushed her giant purse out of my way and being attached to it, she followed. WideEyedLinda wandered over, fascinated I think that I heard the Kraken’s song. “I’ll get that for you,” she said in my ear. The Kraken heard her and tightened on my finger.

    Here I sit back in the Buffalo domicile. My patchy sunburn peels. The smell of sea air fades in memory. Dogs lay sleeping, twitching with happy memories of sandy low tide flats scattered with dead crabs and Cape Cod stinks all over the place. The Kraken is with me, eyeing my world with its gleaming red gaze.

    Why can’t vacation be always?

    Kraken