Blue Footprints

No, I don’t really know why I’m up at 7:00 in the morning after being up until nearly midnight. I woke up pretty much wide awake though and so here I am, the only one awake waiting for my coffee to brew, listening to some music and writing this entry.

Of course the drawback of writiing before I have my coffee is that everything I’ve thought of over the past several days to write has left my brain in favor of a quiet caffeineless drone.

I’ve been having a fun time lately setting up activities for Paul and his friends when they come over. Something seems to have lifted and I am no longer reluctant to get a bunch of stuff out and get ourselves all messy. It helps to be able to do it at the table (which we got just before we left for Michigan), or better yet, outside. At one point last week, a painting project outside seemed to be going downhill. Paull didn’t seem to want to keep himself from being painted and so I made a decision then to just let what would happen happen and changed it into a painting footprints project. So the kids all walked on the painting and then on our patio. Not only was it tremendous fun (I did it too), we now have some slowly fading magenta, white and blue footprints that make me think of happy children every time I look at them. Cleanup was a breeze. We had a clean old litterbox which we filled with water and was used as a footbath. Paul, however, needed more than that so I got him into the wading pool and washed him all off and emptied the pool.

So a couple of days ago (Friday, was it?) I woke up both motivated to go to Springfield and at the same time reluctant on a sort of primal level to go. I didn’t listen to my reluctance and so Paul and I headed out and had a blast at the library stocking up on kids books, a few new CDs and three books full of learning activities to do with kids. Then we stopped at a Vietnamese grocery and got a few things – I was captivated by the teas and came back with several kinds as well as a new single-cup stainless steel coffee maker. Oh wait, I have to put some more water in it speaking of that…

Okay, it’s taken care of. Anyway, we headed home and about 12 miles from home I smelled antifreeze and the car started sounding funny. In a few minutes the temperature light came on and we were stranded on the side of the road with an overheated car. It wasn’t long before a woman came to help and in about 45 minutes I’d managed to get in touch with Sage and my mechanic who sent a tow truck. Paul, of course, was thrilled to ride in the big flatbed truck they sent. Amazingly enough, it only turned out to be a blown heater hose and so the tow cost more than the labor itself. It’s still acting a little weird, though – it tried to overheat driving back from the fair a couple of days ago.

We went to the fair on Saturday night. Paul’s first and our first fair here. Wait, I think it was the first one Sage and I ever went to together – we’ve been to amusement parks but never a fair. Anyway, Paul had a ball. We only rode on a couple rides, but he loved them. We were meant to meet some people and a friend of his near the demolition derby but we couldn’t find them. Paul, interestingly enough, didn’t want to watch the demolition derby or even the bucket loaders pushing the mud around there. Must have been something about the atmosphere or something there. He was, however, captivated by the fiddling and dancing at the stage a few hundred feet away so we sat there and watched that. I enjoyed looking at the vegetables, preserves and crafts but Paul wasn’t into it that much so we only spent a few minutes there.

Anyway – I have to figure out what my “lesson plan” will be for today. I’m thinking that we’ll probably make play dough but I’m not sure what beyond that will do and so I’ll take advantage of Paul’s being asleep to figure the rest of that out and start on this cup of coffee.

A Cacophony of Birds

It was a weird day today – not weird bad but weird good, I’d say.

Last night Paul went to sleep at about 6:30 and after dinner, Sage and I played a few video games before Sage tried to go to sleep. I say “tried” because during our video game extravaganza, Sage ate not one, not two, but three candy bars and was pretty wired. I, meanwhile laid down and read some before going to sleep. In order to help Sage go to sleep I took her book, which is also my book that Sage appropriated when she didn’t like her book as much as she’d hoped and started reading in the hopes that Sage, without a book would go to sleep at a reasonable hour instead of staying up all night and being a crabbyhorrid in the morning.

It seemed to work. I went to sleep at about Midnight (amazing what vitamins will do for a person and slept wonderfully until I woke up wide awake at about 4:30 and couldn’t get back to sleep my own self. Meanwhile, in about 5 minutes, Paul woke up and appeared to not just want a drink but was planning on being up for a long haul. What good timing on his part – when I couldn’t sleep anyway.

Now let me interject here and tell you that usually when Paul wakes up in the night, wakes up too early, or stays up too late for that matter, Sage and I are at our worst as parents – we’re crabby to each other, we’re crabby to him and just generally have an unpleasant time. I know, it’s a far cry from the way we used to be when he was first born, reading books to one another while Paul nursed back to sleep or waited to poop and I’m not sure when or how that changed but there you go.

But this morning I really felt good and like I could make this be a good time for us all. The first thing I did was tell Sage that I was happy to stay up alone with him as I was doing really great. Sage said she probably couldn’t sleep but she’d try anyway. Good thing, too, because I guess it was about four minutes before she was sleeping soundly. Meanwhile, Paul and I had a good time. We read some, then Paul was hungry and so was I for that matter so we went to raid the kitchen. There wasn’t much that a person with four and a half hours of sleep felt up to making so it was fortunate that what Paul wanted was toast. So we made several slices of toast and ate them while we read. After our first slice I noticed that it was gettling light outside and it was probably as cool as it was going to get so I suggested a walk. Good idea too, as it was a beautiful morning with a lovely pink sky and a cacophony of birds. We didn’t go far, but went far enough to see an old couple out having their morning fitness walk. They remarked that we were out early this morning – that’s something that I like about living in town that so many people wouldn’t like and that is the way that seemingly perfect strangers know bits of everyone’s business – how one’s car is running, when you wake up, where you work. And I’m not innocent either – I knew full well that they too were fairly early for their walk and that I’d seen them on many occasions and they seemed like a very sweet old couple. We turned back after about ten minutes and sat out on the patio for a couple minutes with the cats just cuddling them and watching the day come. Then Paul wanted to go in. We found our way to the playroom and that’s where it gets a little fuzzy. I made the mistake of sitting in a chair after putting one of my mix CDs on (yes, I broke down and made a few now). While Paul played in the filing cabinet box (still a hit after several days) and looked at books I figured I could just close my eyes for a minute – to rest them, after all. The rest of the morning went something like this:

Eyes open, song by Ranking Roger (of English Beat fame) is playing. Paul is playing in a box and Todd closes eyes. Paul makes little box-burrowing noises. While Todd in a semi-dreamlike state imagines travelling by raft up the St. Lawrence river to Lake Champlain.

Eyes open – Paul still playing in box – oh good, Todd thinks, I can close my eyes again. Todd tries unsuccessfully to return to his raft and instead winds up in a car on an interstate in Vermont.

Todd starts awake – must have fallen asleep at the wheel – “Where’s Paul?” he wonders, looks around and turns to look at the chair next to him (Okay, picture two chairs not unlike the Edith Bunker’s chair in All in the Family placed similarly next to one another with a box to look at in the center of the room instead of a television (camera). There’s Paul popping bubble-wrap and grinning at Todd who he appeared to be watching while he slept. (This story is a new favorite with Paul). “Oh good!” Todd thinks, I can close my eyes again – he’s doing fine.

Todd wakes from an even deeper sleep than before and turns to look at Paul who is still in the chair but has now curled up and has gone to sleep. Todd gets up and moves to a couch and falls asleep. It’s now about 7:30

Sage wakes up and wanders out to the living room (different than the playroom) and finds Todd sleeping on the couch and asks if “The granny-bird came and got Paul.” Todd says “No, he’s asleep in the playroom.” and thinks to himself “Granny bird?” Paul wakes up shortly thereafter and Sage sends Todd to the bedroom and hangs out with Paul while Todd sleeps until 9:00.

The day with Paul went spectacularly. I really think that things have finally come back to normal between us since our time in the Michigan. I don’t know if I mentioned this while i was there but I was seriously on Paul’s s— list while I was there. There were times he wouldn’t talk to me when I first got home, or would get angry and cry when I did. He was seriously upset and weirded out by the arrangement. Anyway, things are better than before and I’m having more fun than ever playing with him these days. Today we played boats – each of us had a box that we pretended was a boat and he directed the play – where we were going, who we were seeing (“Uncle Bed and Uncle Square” are big imaginary friends now along with Grandma (not Kite)) We also had tons of music and dancing and giggling. Then we made bread together. After looking in a “Childcraft Book of Knowlege” about plants and seeing a yeast experiment that we did yesterday he was interested in yeasts. Yesterday we did the experiment – we took a small jar and put 1/4 cup of warm water, 2 tsp (1 pkg) of yeast, and 2 TBSP of sugar and let it sit. The result was that the yeast “woke up” and made a bunch of foam. He wanted to see it again and was disappointed when I wouldn’t do it again because I only had one more package of yeast that I wanted to use for food. So today we did another yeast experiment – making bread. Also a big hit. And while it baked we made a triple-batch of pancakes. Apparently, today’s been a big cooking day with him because while he and Sage were hanging out he made his own scrambled eggs – Sage just cracked them and he mixed them and cooked them. Very cool.

His new interest has been starting a garden. He was very disappointed when I, in my misinformed state, said that it was too late to do anything until later this year when we could plant garlic and flower bulbs. Thankfully Kite gave me some ideas (spinach, kale, maybe lettuce) and so I’m gearing up for that when the heat wave breaks. Anyone have any other ideas? Oh, and she brought by a “garden” for him today – some plants he can work with. She went to the creek and got some watercress – roots and all and we placed them in water. He can water them and change their water frequently and in the meantime we have lovely edible houseplants!

Oh, and I’ve got a sort of dillemma. I got an email today that there’s another job I can do – same money but no travel this time – I can do it all from home and can start soon. Well, not quite the same money as I got a great deal of money for “living expenses” that I won’t get in this case, of course. On the one hand I’d like to take the time off still, and on the other I don’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth. A few months of this and we could
buy a house outright and then no more rent payments. Sage and I are torn, of course. Even if we didn’t buy a house, we could build up a bit more money to last a few more months (about 20 hours work gets over a month’s living expenses). We’re thinking possibly of accepting on the condition that I only do 20 hours/week. That could easily be fit into our current schedule – Paul and I could spend our mornings together while Sage worked then I could work for a few hours then we could spend the evening hours together with him. Anyone have any thoughts? Any suggestions? Send them to me. I appreciate it!

Paul’s now back from his walk with his granny and is probably going to be up for a few hours yet as he had a late nap. So I’ll end it here and hope that I don’t have a late night and an early morning. Or perhaps, if I don’t get that, at least let it be as pleasant as this last late night/early morning combination.

No Special Treatment

Not only did I take my vitamins today but I made a really great nutritious dinner and the result is I feel pretty energetic when normally I would be asleep by now.

I will, however make it pretty short just so that I get to bed on time. Sage told me as she just went to bed “No special treatment, no whining.” In other words if Paul wakes up at 6:00, so do I.

Another wonderful day today despite another really brutally hot day – nearly 100 with heat indices in the 105-110 degree range. But we’re so much better at dealing with it here than we ever were at the yurt. Today when I was outside with Paul and a couple of other kids from the neighborhood we all just got in a huge water fight and all wound up quite soaked and much cooled. Not only that, it was still quite cool inside the house. Once again we didn’t need the air conditioning until the late afternoon though it’s still on now as it’s still stuffy and muggy outside.

Fun kid stuff we did today:

• Painted colorful abstract designs using fabric paints on white t-shirts. Note to self: don’t try to use the fabric pens next time or the kids just squirt it all out at once – next time squirt some on some fabric and use brushes
• More cardboard box play – so far those two cardboard boxes for the filing cabinets have provided two children with easily 8-10 hours of entertainment if not more with all sorts of creative made up games and crafts.
• We had dinner together – not just eating dinner together as usual but like real adults with not just a one-dish meal. We had Macaroni and Nutritional Yeast “cheese” served with broccoli and salad. After all that we cleaned the dishes right away. I know it doesn’t sound like anything spectacular but for us it was really quite a leap from eating dinner together on the yurt floor – or the house floor or couch for that matter.
• While Sage went to the auction, Paul and I worked together to make an extra large batch of pancakes. They’re still a hit in the morning and after an experiment I found out that they freeze well and heat well in the toaster. Move over Eggo.

Is anyone else familiar with “Liar” by the Rollins Band? It was popular about 5 years ago (maybe more now). Sage and I just rediscovered it this evening and once again laughed ourselves sick listening to it. I’ll never do it justice just writing about it here but Henry Rollins (of Black Flag fame), a pretty hardcore musician starts out with sweet music and talks as if he’s talking to us (as his girlfriend) and tells about how she thought she never was going to meet anyone then met this really perfect wonderful guy that said all the right things. And then he makes a brilliant transition – he says something like “And you never questioned why things were going so well – want to know why?” At that point the music turns loud and dark and he, in a nearly screaming voice says “Because I’m a liar”. Anyway, as I figured I am not doing it justice in the least but it’s an absolutely brilliant song that illustrates how so many women are taken in by creepy men. In the middle of the song it goes back to the original sweet music and voice and Rollins says something like “I’m sorry – I’ll never lie to you again” and sings a sweet song of I’ll-never-lie-to-you-ness but you know something’s coming because the music is getting a little more wild and loud and then it happens. Rollins screams “Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! SUCKER!” which sends Sage and I into hysterics every time. Neither of us really get how people can keep going back to the same creepy guys over and over again.

Oh gad – it’s 11:10 and I should get to bed soon. Tomorrow we’re off to the farmer’s market and then spending the afternoon in the town pool I think.

I guess I’ll end it here with a cosmic…

Little Gonkie McWortle and Paul are playing happily when Paul is moved to spontaneously doff his trousers and proceeds to gleefully run through the room in the nude.

“Eek! Eek!” Says Gonkie “You have no shorts – I mustn’t look. Todd – can you fix it?”

Todd proceeds to chase Paul around cheered on by Granny and Gonkie.

Granny encourages Paul to put his clothes on by suggesting an outfit change.

“Yeah really!” says Gonkie “Those flowered shorts are for girls”

Todd rolls his eyes and prays for Paul’s strength in the face of gender stereotyping…

Excessive Heat Warning

Paul is asleep – I think he must have worn himself out. He had a friend over today and the two of them played in his playroom for several hours before she went home for lunch and Paul had lunch then nursed to sleep. It was such a trip, though.

The two of them played so well together (she’s about twice his age so that probably helped some) that I wasn’t needed and instead helped Sage rearrange her office keeping an ear open for the conflicts and mischief that never came. Interestingly enough, I felt guilty despite all that. Here was Paul and his friend having a great time in the box-houses we all made together (Sage got two new filing cabinets and the boxes made great houses that we decorated together) and Sage and I were working and chatting together. But it didn’t matter – there was a discernable feeling that I had to get in there and facilitate the play and that not doing so was a bad idea. I was glad I stayed out of it, though, as they were having such a great time and he really needs time on his own with kids untainted by adult conversation just as much as we need adult conversation untainted by the presence of children. It was actually really beautiful to watch from a distance.

Yesterday despite the “Excessive Heat Warning” we all piled into our car at 7:30 in the morning with a box of pesto pizza and a jug of water and headed for the Springfield library. We took a different way there, avoiding the four lane divided highway and got there quicker and cooler with all the shade from the trees helping us out. What a good thing it was to go there too – we checked out 70 items – books, cds, books on tape and even a few toys for Paul. It felt like everything good about shopping with none of the guilt. We got lots of new stuff to look at and enjoy and didn’t spend a dime (well, we had to pay $35 to renew our annual membership and Sage had about $4 in fines but that isn’t always the case). I got a couple novels, a “Dummies” book about Debian Linux that I got for the CDs in it which turned out to be horribly scratched, a couple of books by Trungpa Rinpoche and several cookbooks as well as a pile of CDs of which so far my favorites are Buckshot Lefonque and The Smiths.

And speaking of the Smiths – it was really odd. This morning I was listening to it outside while watching the kids and there was just something so weird about hearing the music of my angst ridden late teens played while I was almost the age of my parents when I was listening to the music. So it was something like this:

The rain falls down on a humdrum town
Hey Paul! Wanna look for roly-polies?
This town has dragged you down
Daddy! Look at me!

It just is hard to get into the ennui when you’re as happy just sitting and watching your son playing happily. (Of course the 20 year old me would just remind me that someday he’ll be 15 and he too will think that Depeche Mode’s Blasphemous Rumours is the deepest and most apropos song for his life that he’d ever heard.

Despite all that it’s reminding me that I should try to track down Morrissey’s Bona Drag – it was an album that spent most of 1990 in my CD player with a cassette copy in my car. By all rights I shouldn’t like this music – he’s not particularly talented and I’m not fond of the lyrics but all the same I enjoy it.

Of course the other project I’m trying to take on is actually finding new music. For someone as prone to nostalgia as I am, it’s really easy for me to just spend my time listening to and trying to find copies of my CD collection circa 1991 but at the same time I love the feeling of finding a new musician that I like and it’s been a long time since I’ve done that. I think the last find I had was You Were Spiraling and I’m getting sick of the albums I have of theirs – their second album pretty much lived in the rented car’s CD player when we were in Michigan. Does anyone have any suggestions? Woj? Emily? Anyone?

Paul just woke up and I’m going to end it here though he is lying back down with Sage. Why? Because I don’t want Sage to get too swamped writing her column. Sage is pretty busy – maybe someone would like to be a guest contributer?

White Pizza

Well, I meant to have a nap, I really did. In fact I felt like I was dead on my feet a couple hours ago while hanging out with Paul. But wouldn’t you know it? When I tried to sleep just now I couldn’t do it.

Sage is off at the supermarket getting some supplies for pizza making. I’m going to be making some tonight – as we watch Paul’s reaction to various foods it appears that dairy isn’t that much of a problem when he hasn’t a cold so much as corn. So I’ll make the pizzas without the usual cornmeal on the bottom of the crust. I haven’t decided if it’ll be white pizza or not. I’m thinking so.

Had an interesting conversation with a child today who was suggesting we get a satellite dish because then we could watch all different channels. I explained that we didn’t have a TV because of the fact that it wastes lots of our time (we can turn into junkies in a matter of days) and that it is also loaded with commercial messages. She said that she didn’t listen to the commercials so I mentioned how Disney movies themselves, for instance, make the idea of going to Disney World more attractive. She said that yes, that was true. I said that Disney World was in the business of taking money away from parents and kids to which she replied that that wasn’t, in fact the case but that it was run by people who love to watch people have fun. Then came the kicker – she said that without Disney there wouldn’t be vacations. I asked several questions about different kinds of vacations that one might take and she didn’t see them as vacations – they were camping, fishing, etc. But the only real vacation could be had in Disney World. And some people wonder why we are creeped out by Disney and it’s products and by the media in general!

I think tomorrow we’re breaking down and going to the Springfield Library. I just can’t figure out any economical way to feed our love for books. Hmmm, thinks Todd, perhaps we should check into the local bus service that goes up there. Sage, if you’re reading this – remind me to check into that. That could be really fun and cheap. I think it goes up once every 2-3 weeks – just about as often as the books are due. We might also have to figure out the Springfield bus system but it’d be worth it.

Paul seems to have spontaneously grown in the night. In the past couple of days he’s really become so helpful! He helped me pick up the house one evening, has started to pick up his own messes without being asked and his vocabulary has grown in leaps and bounds.

Oh, and I almost forgot – Sage finally got her wish. She now has glasses – pretty gorgeous ones I might add. They really look natural on her too and it’s not just me saying it. Many people we meet are saying that they either think they look natural on her or even that they weren’t sure if they should mention that she had new glasses because they weren’t sure she didn’t always have them.

Interestingly enough I think my beard has reached a socially acceptible point. How do I know? Because people are mentioning that I have a new look. I’m guessing they didn’t mention it last week because then it might be some faux pas of them mentioning it and me just not shaving. Personal hygiene can be a touchy issue with some people, after all.

Seems like it was just 6am and I was just waking up

It felt like quite a busy day today though looking back I didn’t really do more than usual.

Paul and I ran a few errands – Wal Mart, take the knife to get it sharpened (sadly finding out that they don’t sharpen knives anymore), go to the post office, go to the thrift store. There was an unexpected visit from a friend of ours followed by an expected chiropractic/acupuncture treatment for Paul and I. I guess perhaps that its the rapidity with which the day has passed that has me feeling like it was busy. Seems like it was just 6:00 AM and I was reluctantly waking up and now I’m making dinner (tofu curry again – I have to get some new recipes now that we’ve got a fridge).

Our lives really have changed, however, with the addition of the fridge. Leftovers now have become a viable option, as has fresh produce from the Saturday farmers market on any day other than Saturday. I’ve actually got frozen stew and frozen tofu with sweet chili sauce ready for a night when I don’t feel like cooking. In the fridge there’s a ton of Sage-made pesto (one of the only things other than Old El Paso taco dinners she makes) waiting to be frozen or eaten (my money’s on Sage’s eating it – she loves no food more than pesto – well, maybe sushi. And I’m even inspired to have more than one thing at dinner. Sage has complimented me frequently on how she likes the variety we have at dinner – I’m often serving side dishes or salads instead of just making a big vegetable stew to get our veggies. It’s been fun to make more than one thing. The other night I had some fresh green beans from the farmer’s market and I made them stir-fried with garlic and ginger and tamari (that’s basically the recipe for the curious) along with a delicious batch of tofu with fresh tomatoes – a sort of Vietnamese-inspired dish that we like to eat in the summers when the tomatoes are available. It was fun to be rushing around in the kitchen making two simultaneous dishes, plotting to have both dishes and the rice ready at the same time. Okay, I did cheat – the rice I do in a rice-cooker and it keeps it warm so I just start that early and let it wait.

Yesterday Sage, Paul, Kite, and I all went to the town pool and had a lovely time. It was a bit cool – probably only in the 80’s but we braved it nonetheless. And what a great idea – Paul loved the kids’ pool – a 20 x 30 foot (or so) expanse of 18 inch deep water. It was great for us too as he was tired and when he is tired he gets restless and wanders around the house often creating havoc. There in the pool he couldn’t cause any trouble – he still ran about all over the place in the water but it was all channeled into an acceptible form. Sage and I got to play in the big pool too, both of us going on the diving board and realizing how much worse we all were at diving and swimming than when we were young. It was rubbed in further by our watching a really talented pre-teen boy doing flips and great dives seemingly effortlessly.

Where’s Paul, you ask? Oh, just taking advantage of his granny’s availability to him. Since we moved here she has never been this available for him to hang out with. She comes over almost every day and quite often they go for a walk together with or without his (or his granny’s) stroller. Today after his treatment he asked if he and his granny could walk to her house and hang out and then he proceeded to invite the person who gave us our treatments over to hang out with them and have a walk. It’s so interesting to watch him having his own private life (okay, not so private if I’m here watching it but you know what I mean).

Speaking of strollers – I am finding it interesting as I live in this town as a part-time pedestrian and living near Kite who is a full-time pedestrian to think about how pedestrian friendly (or not) this culture is. Just in terms of getting things home. Kite does her shopping and laundry on her own mostly – and has found that a large two-seat stroller works great as a way of carrying things to/from stores, laundromats, etc. Sage joked that she’s glad that we have Paul around so that she’s not “that crazy old lady with the stroller.” So I just thought for a bit. There really isn’t any effective, inexpensive way for a pedestrian to haul large quantities of food or laundry with. The only ideas I came up with were either ineffective or aren’t socially acceptible. There’s the shopping bag carrier thing – kind of like the roll-on luggage carrier thing – not much capacity and not found usually at thrift stores, then there’s the backpack – good to carry but not much capacity but takes too much thought to pack. Then there’s the stroller and of course the ultimate in socially unacceptable old woman accessories – the shopping cart. It’s just weird to think about.

Not much else going on these days – Sage and I are still suffering from Kalamazoo Library withdrawal – the town library only seems to have romances, westerns and cheesy murder mysteries – we’ve been spoiled by good libraries. Springfield is good but a bit of a haul and we’ve been burned twice with fines from when we couldn’t get it together to get there and had like 100 items out. Sage reads too fast to actually buy fiction books even used and feel good about it. So we’re figuring it out. We might just grin and bear it and go to Springfield. We could do interlibrary loans – but at $2.00 each and with our library only allowing 4 books to be checked out per person that doesn’t give Sage, who can read a novel a day on a good run, much help.

Now Sage is offline so I think I’ll connect up and upload this and get my email. Soon this won’t be an issue as we’ve ordered a crossover cable to connect our two computers with network cards – then I’ll set up one or the other of them as an internet gateway and we can share the net again.

Corporate Prostitution Gig

The heat has come despite Sage and I doing what we do every year at about this time – saying “Wow – this summer weather isn’t that bad – it’s almost bearable!” Well, scratch that – it’s in the 90’s with a heat index over 100.

But unlike living at the yurt, we’re dealing with it much better. The house is really wonderful – because it is shaded by several trees and has way better insulation than the yurt did it actually stays bearable (not cool but bearable until about 4:00 PM even on a hot day like today. We just have the windows open, fans on and as little clothes as are socially acceptable. (Note to self: Sage says that I’m no longer allowed to leave the house without a shirt lest I wind up mistaken for someone on “COPS”) To make it further bearable, Kite and a friend just picked up a pool for Paul that is without a doubt the biggest plastic wading pool (complete with water slide) we’ve ever seen. We just set it up in the shade of our mimosa tree and it’s filled up waiting for Paul to awaken from his nap and for his friend to arrive this afternoon. Sage took one look at it when it arrived and turned to me and said “Just so you know – this is how you’ll be spending the rest of the summer.” Good thing too, as Vera Cruz – where we usually swim is still 10 miles away and the town pool full of chlorine and screaming children is a long hot walk away and $2.50/person admission. I do want to visit it sometime, though as it’s been too long since I’ve been on a diving board. Not that I know what I’m doing on it but it is still a good time.

Our fourth of July was pretty sedate with no special plans. The town, however, had other ideas. Loud ones. This is my first summer living in a town where fireworks are legal and it’s amazing to see just how much people spend on them. For those of you still stuck in a place where they are illegal – picture this. You know the way people are in most neighborhoods about their Christmas lights? Just about everyone does them and there are always a handful of people who really do it up. Well, it’s the same thing with fireworks here. Our cat Claire made the mistake of going out just before dusk that night. By dark it sounded like a war zone outside – literally – with small explosions punctuated by the sound of screams – well these whistling fireworks that sound just like someone screaming. Claire must have found herself a good hiding place as I went out to find her and couldn’t track her down. Finally we all went to bed – each of us waking up several times and wandering outside to look for her with no luck. Then mother nature had her own fireworks show – what would have been a lovely thunderstorm with torrential rains and lots of lightning. No way we could find Claire then. Finally at mid-morning after the storm had passed Claire, looking more like a drowned rat than a cat (she’s scrawny when dry!) came yowling to the door. We gave her lots of love and dried her off and I don’t think she’s been outside since.

On a related note – does anyone know the answer to this? I was thinking as the fireworks were all going off – which as I said sounded much like what I imagine small arms fire to sound like, punctuated as I said by screams of whistling fireworks and exuberant children – that perhaps this was a phenomenon of a country that has not really had a war in it’s borders for many years. The celebration of independence with sounds that creeped me out a bit with their similarity to things that actually kill people seems somewhat odd. Is this something that goes on in countries that have recently been or are still at war? Does this happen in Somalia or in the former Yugoslavia? Just curious.

Everyone in town must think I’m crazy now. In the midst of all this heat I’m growing my beard back and letting my hair grow out. Sage, of course, is thrilled. She preferred me that way. Me, I like the ease of care that short hair has but I don’t know – I am really associating that look too much with the pseudo-identity I wear to work. I never thought I’d do anything like this as a political statement and probably aren’t really doing it for that reason exactly but I just don’t know – I guess growing my hair and beard again (which, Sage if you’re reading I reserve the right to cut and shave if it gets too annoying again) is sort of the cosmetological equivalent of taking a long hot shower after going to work as a corporate drone whose looks, behavior and even words were dictated by social protocol in exchange for $40/hour plus expenses. The haircut, Dockers, golf shirt and the right answer (or at least the answer the client wants to hear) are sort of the miniskirt, fishnet hose and tube top of my corporate prostitution gig and I’m just glad to have them off.

Oh Christ, that was a bit to Kerouac or something for me. Forgive me – I got carried away.

Sage and I have switched computers again. She really needed a faster computer with a larger hard drive and me with my simple needs – email, web browsing with lynx, nethack and the like took her slower, P233 in favor of the P366 I had. In order to move all our stuff over and to back up her files as well we bought a CD-RW which has been a lot of fun to have and already something I don’t know what we did without. I also made a few audio CDs at the same time. And I have to ask something else: Are people making mix CD’s these days the way I made mix tapes as a teenager? I still have a number of tapes filled with Art of Noise, Depeche Mode, The Cure, Yello all put together as expressions of my mood at the time. People I know also may still have mix tapes I made for them as a way of expressing my feelings of friendship, love, gratitude or simply a communication of “Here I am, this is what I’m on about.” Anyway – I have really fond memories of sitting in my room (bedroom, dorm room, first shared-house room) scouring my tape and CD collections for the perfect song to make the point I wanted to make. But when I made the CDs for Paul, Sage and I of the MP3s we all had on the computer it felt so cold and unfeeling. Pick a list of files, queue them up, and walk away only to come back in a few minutes to get the CD. Where’s the feeling in that – where’s the romance? Where’s the angst ridden teenager listening to “Blasphemous Rumours” as it is recorded for his best friend he knows will also think it is the most profound thing they’d heard in all their fifteen years on the planet? Was I the only one who did this? What is the experience of making mix CDs like for today’s youth? That’s me – the romantic. Ten years ago I would’ve lamented the passing of the “real” letter arriving by post (if I weren’t so into email at the time). Thirty or forty years ago I probably would’ve lamented the passing of writing (or at least quoting) romantic poetry for one’s love interest in favor of mix tapes or songs dedicated on the radio. That’s me for you.

Now I have to go. I really must go to audiogalaxy and find the perfect songs for a mix CD for Sage – I’ll give it to her as she downloads the e-card I sent her and receives the flowers that I ordered for her online.

Two Pools and Two Jacuzzis

We’re finally home!! While we were gone it seemed like we’d been away forever. Now that we’re back it seems like we’d hardly left.

Sage and I were sitting in the living room last night as the warm breezes blew in and the fireflies winked in the night and talking about how glad we were to be home and how dreamlike the whole experience seemed in retrospect.

“So anyway I had this weird dream last night…You too? Yeah, I went back to work in Kalamazoo – right, I know, nobody actually lives there you only see it on the road atlas. Anyway, I flew up there for ten days and lived there by myself and lots of my old coworkers were there but it was so weird. Most of them were divorced and many of them had already either remarried or found another partner in the interim. Bizarre, huh? Anyway, it gets weirder. So I was in this weird apartment development with two pools and two jacuzzis and actually paying $1,400/month for it. Yeah, I know, I can’t imagine doing that in real life. Wait, wait, it gets better. So I flew home and went to this odd traffic court that was nothing like it is on TV – everyone was so informal and casual. Then we had two days at a festival in town before our friend drove us in our car to the Springfield airport only we didn’t get on the plane we picked up a car. The three of us started driving back to Michigan for some odd reason and stopped at a Cracker Barrel restaurant in Springfield. Weirdly enough the next day in the dream we went to another Cracker Barrel but it was in Springfield Illinois – I must have picked that idea up from that hilarious movie with Mia Farrow where she and this person end up travelling to every Springfield in every state just because. So there were all these tornadoes throughout the dream – sort of a theme for it I guess – four touched down while I was there alone, one touched down while I was on the way with you folks in Illinois and we were actually awakened by the tornado siren by one when we got to Michigan. I think that might have been some metaphor or something – whirlwind life or somesuch. Anyway, stay with me. While we were there Paul was sick the whole time with a cough and would throw up once every day or two and then miraculously was cured by simply coming home. OH right and you were sick too. You were so bad off near the end of the dream that you had the flu, your period and a toothache all of which disappeared the minute we left for home. So anyway there were all these weird images popping up throughout that I vaguely remember. OH right, the store brand at the grocery store was called “home harvest” which I must have picked up from everyone here we know calling this thrift store in town “home harvest”. Oh and it was so weird. Our friends were in the dream too – the ones from just west of here. They were there with their kids and we drove out to see them one day – they were living in a cohousing situation that looked pretty cool. It was so odd I can’t tell you – I am just glad to be awake and know I’m back home.”

Culture shock was really not the word to describe this whole experience. So many people all focused on getting more stuff, many of them all sending their resumes out to other similar companies in the hopes that a new job will give them more money and more stuff as a result. It’s like the eternal carrot on a stick deal. Except in this case you never get the carrot, it just hangs out there until you get too old and tired to chase it and you give up.

The last week we were there was pretty hard. I didn’t get a weekend as things were getting more hectic as I was getting ready to go. Sage got the flu towards the end as I said and was pretty tired so she had the apartment complex people bring over a TV and VCR so she could have a bit of a break. This was a pretty good thing as she and Paul got to watch some nature shows and sit still for a while probably helping both of their colds and I got to see American Beauty with Sage. I took last Thursday (day) off to get ready for a crazy night I was expecting to have on Thursday – I wasn’t due in until 5:00 PM. So after sleeping in as much as I could I woke up and made some food (Tofurky – very tasty I might add) and Sage and I watched the movie. What a fantastic film and so timely for me. It was a great criticism of the American consumerist/careerist lifestyle in my opinion with such a touching end that made that movie like the second movie whose end I cried at. Oh, and did anyone see the cameo appearance of the book “Your Money or Your Life” on the car seat next to the wife (forget her name) near the end of the film? It was either a way of letting people know that this was a thinly veiled criticism or it hinted at a further plot depth and either way it was fascinating. For those who haven’t read the book – I highly recommend it. It’s one of the books that really energized the “voluntary simplicity” movement and talks a lot about practical ways you can get to financial independence well before you are meant to retire.

After the movie I had such a crazy night. I went in at 5:00 PM and worked straight through until noon the next day. I can’t tell you how glad I was that that was my last day and I really felt bad for all the people I left behind. One person who luckily for him was leaving at noon as well had worked for 30 hours straight. Those we left behind had worked only 12 hours (from about midnight) but had also worked all day on Thursday. At one point I was literally falling asleep standing up with my eyes open. As best I can tell this kind of schedule is what people remaining on this job have to look forward to for 3 weeks or so. When I was saying my goodbyes everyone said “see you next year” or “The other machine will be ready in January, see you then, I guess!” to which I replied “Not if I can help it!” They promised that if I did make it back in January they’d be ready to start work (as opposed to the test plan writing) right away. “Oh great!” I thought, “I can look forward to working 12-20 hour days right from the beginning of the six weeks.” I can’t tell you how seriously I am pulling for our success with Nesting Tyrtle. Going back to work there is not really something I look forward to. Not that I can garner much sympathy from lots of people – after all, the pay was good, the accomodations were excellent and we got to dine out several nights a week. But of course I should’ve guessed that I would figure this out: If I am someone who doesn’t care about having lots of money then lots of money really won’t make me feel much better about doing something I don’t believe in – especially that takes so much time away from my family.

Interestingly enough we don’t really miss any of it. Sage and I both thought we’d miss the washer/dryer or the dishwasher or even the swimming pools and when we got home on Sunday and found ourselves not missing those at all we figured we’d miss the new car. So yesterday I took back the rental car and went from the ‘01 Ford Focus to the ‘78 Chevy Malibu again and instead of missing it like I thought I would, I was actually glad to take it back. It felt like giving back the last tie to the business world (actually that’ll come when I send my final invoice in tomorrow). It also felt like giving back the last bits of the costume. When Sage and I were in Kalamazoo we both felt like we were playing house with our development house, new car and in my case even some new clothes (okay – all my outfits combined cost $30 at the thrift store).

I keep expecting to hear some cosmic voice saying “We now return you to our regularly scheduled program…”