the electramagnetic complex

having way too much fun

tracing my own hand

I do it again...

I noticed a typo in my blog alternative yesterday & it was too juicy & delicious to change. Electramagnetic spectrum. (That means you might kinda sorta have an electra complex, but whoever it is you're attracted to, be it father or father figure, it's pretty magnetic.)

Our 6 to 8 inches of snow yesterday pretty much melted into the ground as it fell. That means our girls' poker night is still on. Years ago I had my heart set on a 54 inch round pedestal table, reasoning--correctly--that 54 inches is the absolute best size for cards. With a 60 inch it's hard to reach the middle to rake in cards, if you take a trick in pinochle, or a pot, if you win one in poker. With a 48 inch, you can't seat enough peeps. Pedestal because then no one is bumping knees on table legs. Then, voila, cold frozy day in Minneapolis & my poetry buds & I were early to something & walking around a block & the only thing open was an antique/consignment store. 54 inch round pedestal table just waiting for me. & now Tiffany, daughter-in-law-to-be, likes to play hold 'em & doesn't get an opportunity to do so very often, so my poker buddies & her poker buddy are coming over. Zach will hang out in the garage...

Another event for today is a trip to the Crossings Gallery in Zumbrota to see the poet/artist collaboration show, always one of my favorites.

Blog alternative:

201. Venture into an art gallery. Write a poem about one of the paintings.

No one here but us brainwaves: nothing to read here. move along. move along.

when you put your hand up

the stars reach for themselves

reborn as flesh

I have blogged so much over the last few years. You just wouldn't be able to keep up with it. Literally. Or, rather, fictively. Imaginally. Brain-wavery. This is to say that I keep coming up with topics to blog about & even phrases, sentence, paragraphs, as I'm driving, walking, eating, etcetera-ing. Be glad you don't have to read all that!

Blogging about blogging means I have reached a new low, given that I am a bit of an anti-blogger. Groan. Grin. Bear it. My biggest consolation in all this is that, since I blog (in a form that you can access) so infrequently that you are more likely to be doing some of the things I consider "real life" (as expounded in my blog alternatives) like building a little (or big) snowbeing, or walking a dog or writing an essay about your sister that she may be considered for the title "farm wife of america."

It is snowing in Rochester, Minnesota. My son Zach is studying & doing homework. Tiffany is bustling around emptying the garbage. Quote for the day, as she re-entered the house. "How craptastik is it out there. Jeez." Later in the week we will hardboil a dozen eggs & decorate them. Maybe two dozen. I will dedicated mine to "egg horror poem" which has garnered me well over a thousand dollars so far. maybe two thousand.

I am coming up (friday) on my 52nd birthday. Finally, I will be a full deck!

Blog alternative:

200. ding ding ding, you win! Consider everything that you win just by being here as this starstuff: air to breathe. horizons. the energy of the sun, feeding you & the planet & everything between & beyond so much energy we shade ourselves from it. water. tequila. the ability to create anything you want inside your mind. dog tails wagging. the difference between silence & sound. the electramagnetic spectrum.

A day well seized: celebration in hand-me-downs

dancing with the sun and sky

earth heart smiling

I wrote some poems at my cousin's concert at the Alberta Bair Theater in Billings, Montana. (Yes, I am still in Montana, where my dad is recovering from his third surgery.) (Third? you ask, quizzically, thinking--correctly--that he has but 2 carotid arteries. More on that later...) Meanwhile, back at the poem. My cousin Korine Fujiwara is a founding member of the Carpe Diem String Quartet, & omigosh, a concert with them is a day well seized. Korine has composed "Montana," which is so amazing. (Check them out on youtube. Anyway, here is a poem I wrote near the beginning of the concert. (The concert (& the newly-renamed Grandmaster Karlo Fujiwara Memorial Taekwondo Tournament) were dedicated to her father (my uncle) who died last summer.)

I Swear

I will get my cello strung & tuned

& learn to play at least one song

I will hug my father extra tight

when next I see him

(avoiding his neck, which is sore)

I will perform the music of my heart

which is peace & love & joy incarnate

I will go home

right now

a one-inch journey

to the center of my heart

I will melt into the music

of this moment

So, how do you have 3 surgeries when you only have 2 carotid arteries? Swell up like crazy one day & confuse the doctors & (after 4 days of not getting better quickly or consistently enough) have them reopen the incision to discover a big old hematoma that would have dissolved in 8 or 9 months on its own but in the meantime was painful & causing a deviated trachea & ear pain & such. He seems to be doing better & should be out of the hospital soon. About time--at the cafeteria today the cashier asked if I worked there since she'd seen me so often for so long. Dad & my cousin Aeron beat Mom & I twice in a row at 4-handed cribbage. We told the doctors he really didn't need extra blood flow to his brain...

I did a really good job of packing for this trip, which means I have worn everything I brought--even 2 long dresses, blue & green, which I wear as a reversible other-color-peeking-out-from-under duo--numerous times & I'm not sick of any of my clothes yet. I did get some hand-me-down jeans from my mom, & a shiny ruffly teal shirt & a pair of black sweatpants from my (R.I.P.) Great-aunt Lila, & 3 undershirts from (R.I.P.) Grandma Arla. Wardrobed!

Blog alternative:

199. Swear. &--after you're done with the profanity--swear to (fill-in-the-blank). Above poem may be used for exampling.

Carotid clippings

News from the waiting room.

My daddy is out of his surgery & looking good. Of course, after getting a carotid artery clipped & reamed out & reattached & having various tubes in arteries & throats (okay, one throat) & such, he's not extremely comfortable, but, hey--he's breathing & talking & able to wiggle everything the doctor thought he oughta be able to. Yay! His first incision has practically disappeared already in 3 weeks (my brother says he has miraculous healing properties) so we expect much the same.

Okay, so now I'm going to hand my computer back to my cousin's daughter, Samadhi. She's art-ing.

Blog alternative:

198. Samadhi suggests going to a waterpark. It may or may not be the weather for that, depending on where you live, so maybe just take a bath. Or drink a tall glass of water (I like mine without ice) with a sprig of mint or a splash of lime.

My peeps...

So here I am, in Montana again. 'tis been a while since I've posted. January. Good grief, as Charlie Brown would say. Perhaps 750words.com is a good thing, but I do know there have been times I would have blogged had I not been doing that. Oh, well.

Why Montana, you ask? (Didn't know I could hear you, did you?) Well, I was going to be taking off on Sunday the sixth of March for Rochester, Minnesota, to take a SMART class (Stress Management & Resiliency Training, taught by Amit Sood, Md, head of complementary & integrative medicine at the Mayo Clinic, in case you're looking to enroll in same) when I got news from my parents that my dad had found out (at a Lifeline screening, which was not typically the sort of thing they'd opt for) that his carotid arteries (both of them) were 95% or so blocked & he was on his way to the emergency room.

I printed out the novel I was ready to send out (cross your fingers for The Secret Life of Suzuki England) & took off for Montana instead. 1044 miles the first day. 900plus the second. A new 2 day record. (My 1 day record is Memphis to Albuquerque, which is 1142, but the following day I only had to get as far as Phoenix.) He had the first surgery 3 weeks ago & is out with my mom delivering seed corn today. Second surgery scheduled for tomorrow. Complicated & dangerous but, hey, the first one was too & he did great with that. Definitely cross your fingers for my daddy...

After the first surgery, the vascular surgeon asked my mom to gather her peeps (not his words) in the small waiting room so he could report to us, as the entire surgery waiting room was full. She said everyone was here for my dad. "Is there anyone not here for John Hjelvik?" he asked. Not a single hand was raised. At the followup appointment he asked my dad if his support team was coming again & said he'd seen the waiting room full (30 or 40 people) but it was usually 10 families... My dad is well loved & he deserves every bit of it. (& my mom as well, I should say.)

I've played a bunch of cards, helped sort new baby calves & their mamas from the mamas-to-be in muddy corrals with my sister & her husband, visited with my ex-inlaws, helped mom move a bunch of my (r.i.p.) great aunt Lila's clothes out of a closet & on to Goodwill, where I hope someone will get some good use out of them. Sundry & various other things. Now I'm about ready to be home, after this surgery & a visit to my son & his fiancee & a bunch of friends in Minnesota. Funny, how you can be just fine with being away from home & some little internal switch toggles & you're ready to be back yesterday. It has been a really wonderful time with my folks. I can hardly imagine anyone having more fun with their parents than I just did, for several weeks & lots of hours.

Blog alternative:

197. Consider the mortality of someone you love deeply. Get as okay with it as you can. Consider that we all go out feet first & our job (until we're the ones feet-firsting-it) is to continue living & loving.

little winter flower grass seeks lightning bug for illuminating conversation

little winter flower grass

stillwater river gorge

nye, montana

christmas day

I am sitting in a comfy chair in the window at Barnes & Noble. I finished my 750words & drank a green tea latte with whipped cream (the extra super giant size, whatever starbucks italian is for that. grin) & now I am writing to you.

My scottevest GoTo jacket is sitting in another comfy chair. Actually, it is rather sleepily reclining on this rainy day. My umbrella is at my feet, at the ready, bored by the dry weather in here. Someone asked if the chair was available & I said no. Not for scottevest's sake, but my friend Elizabeth will join me soon. My scottevest is just saving the seat for her. (But don't worry, scottevest, I will let you drape gracefully on the back of my chair when she arrives.) [a postscript to this section of the post: the woman who asked if my chair was available rather crankily (but kudos to her for asking for what she wanted) questioned whether the chair was actually being used. "It's been half an hour!" When I explained that my friend was indeed coming she said it wasn't fair to "hog the chair." I told her I wanted it back when my friend arrived & asked if she would like it. She said (even more snippily) "Yes, I would." So I gave it to her, with the caveat that I got it back when my friend arrived. grin.]

Did I tell you I got carded in Corydon, Indiana, on my way to Montana? That was fun. I can't even say it was just because they card everyone, because another table ordered alcohol after I did, & they didn't get carded.

Five days until the end of the two-faced month: forward & backward, outward & inward, past & future, present & accounting, now & zero, ephemera & infinite, etcetera & whatever is the opposite of etcetera.

I've been straightening up my space lately, both exterior & interior. Not a resolution but the next logical step. That reminds me that I usually write a letter to myself about the year just past & the year to come & here it is 26 days into the year to come & the letter is still in the mail. (or, perhaps more appropriately, in the female. I believe Mark Twain would agree that that is the lightning, rather than the lightning bug.)

I shall bid you ah-be, rather than ah-do, or even adieu.

Blog alternative:

196. Take 3 unrelated books that interest you (rather than 3 books on the same topic) & come up with an exercise that relates them--& you.

(Currently I have Train Your Brain Engage Your Heart Transform Your Life: A Two Step Program to Enhance Attention; Decrease Stress; Cultivate Peace, Joy and Resilience, and Practice Presence with Love by Amit Sood, MD MSc & Architectural Drawing Course: Tools and Techniques for 2D and 3D representation by Mo Zell & A Guide to Small Business Management by Hollingsworth & Hand)

Iowa didn't lie...

the chaos that is dogs

(title by Tiffany)

This little swirl is Mac & Cheese. Zach & Tiffany, my son & his fiancee, belong to these dogs. I recently belonged to them too, for one week. I did have good job security as a doggie pillow. The benefits were unique: besides a nice warm lap &/or legs &/or shoulders, I had my fingers licked clean, kind of an automated finger bowl. Cheese would have licked my mouth too, but I declined that particular "benefit."

I left Rochester this afternoon after a lovely visit with Zach. Tiffany was up at her apprenticeship training, but I got to hang with her yesterday. Zach & I went to breakfast at Cheap Charlie's, always a splendid thing. Trinh (could be spelling that wrong) practically picked me up when she saw me. I had the grilled ham & cheese with extra pickles! I had a couple bites of Zach's chicken noodle soup & he has some of my fries.

I won't bore you with everything I've eaten since I last posted, because that would include my entire Montana/Minnesota vacation. Suffice it to say that foods were eaten & drinks were drinked. Grin.

Highlights, in nonchronological order: Getting stuck for an extra day in Sioux Falls, South Dakota (the roads around Mitchell were nasty) & Jamestown, North Dakota. In Jamestown I had coffee at Babb's with my friend Debbie's daughter-in-law & hung at the public library, reading E=Einstein & some pop-quantum-physics. Hanging with many relatives & friends. Playing poker on Christmas day. Put in $5 & came out with $12! (Some baby games like 7 card no peek, but also a bunch of 7 card stud, sometimes with variations like roll your own little chicago & some texas hold 'em.) Sit down Christmas dinner for 22. Seeing Nick & his girlfriend Chloe for the second time in a month! Playing pitch with my parents. Playing pinochle with my parents & Nick &/or Chloe. I got both 1000 aces & 1500 trump while playing as my mom's partner & Nick & my dad finished off the pinochle games with 800 kings.

I came down south of Rochester on highway 63 through Waterloo, Iowa. Zach was very skeptical of my route, since that's a 2 lane road with usually lots of trucks, but 90 through Wisconsin was reporting snow & slick stuff & Iowa said, come on down, the roads are fine. Zach darkly suggested Iowa was lying, but his cynicism was not warranted. Fabulous roads. I made 348 miles (even though I did not leave until 2--& even got my tires checked & gas after that.) All the way to Hannibal, Missouri, boyhood home of Mark Twain.

The other fun thing was seeing the temperature go up up up as I drove into the winter night. Started off at 11 degrees & it was 22 by the time I reached Hannibal, some 6 or so hours later.

Blog alternative:

195. Provide a lap for a dog. Or a cat. Or a baby. Or just sit & hold your own inner child for a little while. Maybe tell a story. Maybe sing a lullabye.