awakened.

last night i finished re-reading kate chopin's "The Awakening". This book remains to be one of my favorites. I related to the story in a different way this time around. In the book, Edna Pontellier becomes quite disillusioned with her high society husband & the contraints of their marriage..she leaves. I read this book this time & quietly chided Edna to stay & tough it out. Perhaps I was really telling myself to suck it up as of late I've been a little disillusioned myself with handsome randy's rockstar job & the challenges it sometimes causes. This might be a stretch but read on anyway.
Handsome Randy is in the midst of being gone for 2 months working. I have visited him twice (Atlanta & L.A.) during his two month absence and for the most part his being away has been quite a bit easier than tours in the past. However, visits tend to make coming home to our empty house that much harder. And, nearing the end of most long tours of his I have a tendency to walk around with a bit of a chip on my shoulder. needless to say, having returned from L.A. only 4 days ago and approaching the final stretch of the tour..well, there's been a chip on my shoulder lately, maybe even two. okay definately two.
sometimes i feel crazy. just a simple drive has me livid with him by the time I arrive to my destination & I haven't even spoken to him, i've only thought of him and how he's STILL gone. this is when i start to feel a little bit crazy; he hasn't done anything at all, he's just off working.
so i stomp around a while..mad & annoyed. Then the sadness comes and with sadness we all know comes tears. tonight tears came while I was taking a bath. oh i cried and cried. then went back to the mad stomping as I watched the late night replay my soap (yes, I have a soap & shhh). I did things that we often do when we're upset with our significant other but seldom admit. I turned off the ringer on my phone so I wouldn't hear when he called and be tempted to answer only to check my phone every couple minutes to see if he did call. I get madder by the minute that he hasn't called (even though I wasn't going to answer anyway) finally forgetting to become engrossed in daytime drama. When I do remember and check my phone I find out that (gasp) he called 8 minutes ago!
I get a little bit teary and dial him up.
he answers. we talk. My demeanor is initially chilly but warms up when he makes me laugh and now I am completely melted...ah yes, now I'm better. I just needed a nice dose of randy.
In "The Awakening", Edna does some gambling, moves out of her family home & swims into the gulf of mexico never to return (I have done no justice to the lovely story).
I am not edna, I am not pushing away from HR or anything of the like & I certainly have no trips to the gulf planned. But I was awakened to my own reality tonight. It will be okay, he'll be home sooner than later & in the mean time I just have to remember to not stomp but to take a deep breath & remember how great my life is. xoxx

annoying women sitting behind you in restaurants.

so i'm blogging on location in atlanta, georgia at this little bar called The Local. I'm a little drunk.
i've been here for quite a while..maybe an hour and a half. i'm meeting randy here..(in atlanta). But he's a little late; there are a lot of wild fires in florida right now & this caused their 6 hour drive to turn into a 10 or 11 hour drive. so, i'm waiting at the bar down the road from the club brother ali is playing at tonight. drinking pint of bass after pint of bass.
anyway. i arrive at this bar & stake out a great table on the front porch. I sit down, order a beer, some food & I sit back feeling so very relaxed. then she comes. The most annoying woman in the atlanta. She's itty bitty, but her voice is super dooper & she spouts off for moments on end about the most mundane things...how her dog pees when she walks it, why atlanta is better than ANYWHERE in Florida, how her 19 year old sister is dating a man whose five years older than her..i'm over it. But i'm stuck; i have a suitcase, a carry on bag & a purse..and nowhere else to hang out unless I want to carry it all to another bar. and i'm already a little bit drunk so..maybe i'll bum a cigarette from her to pass the time..
xoxx

bats in my bedroom!

early this morning I awoke to a commotion on the stairs leading up to our bedroom. I sat up in bed just in time to see what looks like 3 animals chasing eachother. Well, this is not right; we only have 2 cats.

I turn on the light wondering what this 3rd animal could be..another cat? A rat? I look again and see that it is a bat. I of course scream while running to turn on all the lights. When I return my cat, asha is staked out in front of a closet. Perfect, I think, I'll close the door, lock the bat in the closet & deal with it in the morning.

no such luck.

the bat was hiding on the outside of the closet door; when I closed the door it flew at me.

scream!

scream!!

scream!!!

asha now catches the bat. for an instant i think this might be okay; then I won't have to catch it. But I am overcome with the thoughts of how good bats are (they eat all sorts of insects and they are really cute) & the thought of bat blood all over our bedroom, so I shoo asha away.

did i mention that the time is 5am?

I call randy, waking him up in his North Carolina hotel room and cry about the bat and how much it sucks having a bat in our house. he listens patiently & says all the right things to soothe me. we agree that I should close the bedroom door and sleep on the couch.

I do just this. Only I can't fall asleep. My thoughts are flooded with how I will remove the bat, who can help me or at least stand by for moral support. I decide the daylight hours will be best for bat removal as the bat will be asleep at that time. I then decide that I need a man to assist in the bat removal. I struggled with this, I am confidant that I am quite capable of removing a bat on my own, but I need someone who won't scream if I do even if they really want to. this is likely to be a man.

I decide to go to the rhymesayers office & ask for volunteers and with this thought everything feels sorted out & I fall asleep.

In the morning I avoid the bedroom, putting on dirty clothes from the downstairs bathroom hamper & using my backup toothbrush also in the downstairs bathroom. I run some errands and finally stop by rhymesayers.

sweet, lovely jaybird agrees to come over.

we look all over the bedroom, in closets, behind things..we are clad with towels, gloves & paper bags ready to release the bat back into the wild. we nearly have given up when jaybird spots the sleeping bat in the strap of one of many purses and bags hanging on a closet door. I bite my lip, promising to try really hard not to scream and look on while jaybird gingerly removes the purse and puts it on the roof outside of the nearest window. The bat sleepily climbs into the purse and goes back to sleep. I sigh relief and thank jaybird profusely; the bat has been removed unharmed & I can rest easy tonight. xoxx

mpls' may day.

post college, when i made the decision to move to my lovely hometown of minneapolis there were a number of things luring back to the city of lakes. Among them: going to shows at First Avenue, seeing plays at The Guthrie, winter & snow (I'm serious), hot humid summer nights (I'm still serious), dinner with my grandparents whenever I wanted, & finally the May Day Parade & ceremonies at Powderhorn Park.
Aaah May Day. In a nutshell it's essentially a day of fesitivities for uber liberal hippy dippies. It's put on by the Heart of The Beast Puppet & Mask Theatre (hotb.org). There's a parade that is peppered with themed floats/groups about everything on the liberal agenda, the environment, anti-war, peace, celebrating families & children..the list goes on. Anyone & any group is welcome to march in the parade as well. At May Day, 2002, esteemed Minnesota Senator Paul Wellstone & his wife, Sheila walked the route shaking hands. There are people on stilts all over & the most amazing puppetry & mask work you'll ever see. Words do not do justice..here are some photos of the day...maybe not. photos are not uploading right now. sorry. stay tuned.
xoxx

new york.

i left for new york in the wee hours of monday morning. my lovely aunt pal picked me up at 5:30 for my 7am flight. I arrived & took the train into the city where I was greeted by one of favorite friends, Josh. Josh promptly brought me to this fantasitc restaurant (westwood east) where we were waited on by a very funny young hipster who was from iowa. I had an amazing array of fresh, raosted vegatables from the market: beats with walnuts, green beans & my fav, whole roasted fennel with parmesan. we gossiped & caught up. We then took the subway to central park & spent the afternoon walking through the park and meandering through Time's Square.
After a good nap, I went to Pratt Institute to see my college friend, Ted & his Master's Thesis Exhibit, Articulation. Ultimately, Ted made space gloves as part of a contest for NASA. The exhibit was amazing & I am so impressed with my friend's work & talent - I can hardly wait to see what he does next. I meandered around at Ted's opening for a while & chatted with his mom & lovely girlfriend, Flora. I hadn't seen Teddy in nearly 4 years - crazy. Needless to say, it was great to drop in on him & see his thesis exhibition; it was a terrific excuse for a last minute trip to NY.



I took the train back to the West Village, had a late night pedicure & met up with Josh again. We went to a great hot dog restaurant called Grif's and then wrapped our day up (& my time in NY) over a few pints at a great little Irish Pub. It was a great trip - I am so glad I did it. xoxx