Urban Myths and Mich Lights

She told me dozens of times, the colored yarn twined between her fingers, crochet hook zipping up and down...."How you bring in the New Year is how you spend the year"....fingers flying, eyes down.

I laughed.

Smudged out another cigarette, and told more stories.

She meant it.

I brought it in upside down, sideways, sound asleep. I burned up the old year, sent it ashes to ashes into the wind in the middle of the tiny paved street. I buried it in the back yard, stuffed it in a suitcase and set it out for the garbage man. I danced to Stones. Danced with fossils. Danced by myself. I made resolutions, promises, threats to an empty sky. I cha-chinged it, cheered it, clinked it, feared it. I tried it everyway but right.

And then I put on my cowboy boots and that damned dress I had to have and sashayed it right in through the kitchen door...

Sometimes you've gotta put on your kickers to get that dust off of your petticoat....

The butterfly effect.....

It started with the coffee pot. $21.95 at Winn Dixie. I don't even like brewed coffee. I like mine strong, one cup at a time in the microwave, or so hot they could-sue-you at McDonalds, but I was there in the check out line....and it was on display....and the freeze dried bag of beans on display next to it, smelled so good....

I plugged it in, and stuffed the basket with coffee, filled the retainer with water and stared at it. When would I hit the button? 8 cups of coffee registered on the little resovoir reading. Good to go.... In case I ever needed to make coffee for an army....

It was that night, that we hit send. In the kitchen, Chey and the stranger I'd known forever, laughing. That night that it percolated, gurgled, giggled, french toasted us....that night the silly coffee pot and three cups left in the sink told our fortunes....one empty.....two half full.....

It died in November. The countertop brewery that I never wanted in the first place...spit water on the counter and choked on it's own coffee grinds. And I cried. I know it's silly, but I thought in it's going, it was symbolic. I paced. Pined for the taste of my good ole instant Maxwell House. And paced.

Walgreens is open 24 hours. I came home with the only little baby I could afford, a four cup (two at my house) miniature model of all before it.....

Tomorrow I'm throwing it out.

I don't drink alone....

The Day I put my foot down.....

It started out all routine. In my sleep. But then I overslept, Deja pounced on the snooze and she did it again, and I guess again, because when I rolled over and clomped out of bed, I only had thirty minutes before I had to climb in the shower and race down the driveway. I need forever. Not to put on make-up or do my hair or anything like that. To drink my coffee. Stare out the kitchen window. Watch Georgia do round-d-rounds in the backyard. Blog a little. Day dream. And then I put lemon juice in my coffee instead of creamora. But it was all good. Not the coffee, just the fact that it was a new day....

I don't know what happened, but somewhere between Mickey Dolenz belting out "I'm a Believer" and Mick Jagger's throaty reminder that "Tiiiiiiiiiiiime is on my side, yes it is".... I started to stew. A good kind of, growing, gutteral, strengthy, kind of stew.

When I hobbled into the office beltin "Good Mornings" at 9:00 (yes, we have banker's hours) and Chey answered me in her raspy "morning after" voice, I pounded both hand's down on the counter (to get her quick attention) and then I started. "O.K. Enough. Enough of being exhausted, worn out, tired, and spending the day catching up on hell. Enough of being whipped, beat up, and ringered. Enough of growing old. Your boyfriend doesn't love you, he's addicted to you. Like Coke. He's gotta have it, and when he doesn't get it, or get it his way, his mad. Mean. And that's not love. I've thought about it long and hard (And I really hadn't, it happened sometime between just those two songs) and we're just not gonna do it this way anymore. We used to have fun. We used to laugh. We used to raise hell, not live in it"

She stared back at me in silence.

I started again. I ranted and raved and paced, watched the clock and the front door for the first patient.....watched the back door for the good doctor. It took all of seven minutes to convince her. Life was short and we were wasting it.

At lunch we took a cigarette break and lounged in the doorway. We watched the telephone repair man park under a tree for lunch. He ambled out of the van, put his parking cone in front of his right tire, and hiked over to the Dairy Queen for ice cream. It wasn't polite, but we stared. We kinda need a parking cone for Halloween. It's on our list. Chey took her right pointer fingered and motioned for him to come over. He smiled and shook his head.. "Nah".....he was enjoying his ice cream. She did it again. He did it again. She snubbed out her cigarette and started out across the black asphalt. I watched from the doorway. Silent movie conversations. He threw his head back in laughter and she lifted a fluorescent cone off his bumper and started our way. She set it gently in front of her truck, tossed a two fingered peace sign over her shoulder, and walked back into the office.

"Anything else we need?" she whisper smiled as she passed me.

Spinning....

"Stop talking and dance with me".....I fought it, hands perched on my hips....swaying to the music, because I just can't help it, but I wasnt' going to do it. I bit my bottom lip. We had done this a thousand times before....Bob Segar, Eric Clapton, unknown cover bands, Rolling Stones, The Eagles....

Hands perched on my hips..."I'm not doing it".......

But we went anyway, onto the dance floor, my arms crossed, business style, slow dancing with the crowd. Nothing special. Nothing fancy; might as well be another fly on the wall, because I couldn't do it our way, deep and low, throaty and all Aretha Frankliny, like we used to, because we aren't.....or because we just can't, even if we are.... things have changed.

And he so desperately wanted the last dance to be the perfect dance and it sucked and I told him so.....And he remembered our first dance and our first kiss and our first hello and he told me so...And I denied them all.

Because we never had a first date, a first kiss, a first dance...we had been there all along, the coming together all to familiar, homecoming for the soul... And how could we have a last dance, a public display of "The End" when we had no beginning that we could place a name to.....

And he agreed.

And we walked barefoot into the ocean.....out the double doors....into the tomorrows we keep trying on for size.

On Friday night, I pushed the double doors open, and stepped onto the dirty neon dancefloor....Christmas lights dangling from the ceiling beams, flickering on and off without rhythm. Their twisty green wires crooked like chicken bones strung together on a string. I took a deep breath. A long blink. My week-end smile started squiggling, sneaking onto my face. Arms reaching. Octopus arms. My friends... pulling me in. I heard the music in my chest, vibrating, waiting....

And when the gray haired handsome stranger with the Clint Eastwood voice, leaned in and asked me to dance....I muttered "Rolling Stones".....and he nodded. I danced up and down and in circles, in my own little rock and roll world, and smiled occassionally at his feet. "Do you swing?" he asked on the way off the floor, and I threw my head up and laughed at the green chicken bones dangling, sparkling, flashing over head "No!" I'm laughing, "Are you kidding me?" "The Rolling Stones Girl?" And he laughed..... and said....

"Come along for the ride...."

"I can't follow....
petulance creeping into my smile...

"Come along for the ride...."

And I did. Twirling, flying, swirling, dipping, diving, sliding, laughing, seat-belted in by his arms....

Sometimes.
at the fair,
you have to dance with strangers..

The Window Whisperer

"Why are you whispering?" He said, leaning in. I tossed my head back and laughed from the throat, not from the belly, not from that place where he learned to live again. He smiled. It didn't take him long at all to learn to read my lips when mid-syllable the husky, raspy, cigarette lined words disappeared and no sound at all came out. Silence can be very, very loud when you're listening carefully. He listened very carefully.

I perch backwards,balancing on bare feet, on the porch bench. Stare through the wide open walls at the wind sneaking between the houses, at the squirrels changing lanes in 5:00 traffic on the broken fence top. "You're a bird, balancing on a wooden wire" he mumbles. The time has come. He knows it. I smile.

I reach over and push him out. It isn't me that's been caged. Caught in a wire meshed pre-fabricated world. His wings are working now. They were never broken, just taped together, leaving him motionless, toddling in circles, at the bottom of a wallpapered world. He turns and pleads with me, but I nudge him further...down the drive-way, the highway, into the very sunset we fingerpainted in the sky.

"Be free" I whisper. "That's what they made windows for".....

Haunted....

It’s been forever.

Since I had a couch. Well, hell, we bought one when we got married, but then I found that house, the one I had to have, that leaned and squeaked, and had rats in the attic. It wouldn’t fit through the front door so we gave it away. Hauled our new-credit young selves to the Famous Furniture outlet and bought a new one. With cooshy macramé pillows and fringe. Right after I fetched the “isn’t she too cute” half wolf/half shepherd puppy home from animal control. 23 hours and $350.00 later I came home to a living room swimming in shredded foam rubber. I charged an entire new sofa on my “I‘ve got credit” credit card, and only took home the cushions, to keep “him” from knowing……

And then I left him.

Packed up the youngin’s and what would fit in a U-haul, and left. The macramé couch didn’t go. We put a sandbox in the living room instead.

And then bean bag chairs.

And then everyone got big at once, and had friends that came over to “socialize” and I hauled a sofa home from the curb. “Free” it said on the scribbled sign plopped up on the pillows.

It was raining that night. Thunderous storms. No one heard me pull in the driveway. Heard my key in the lock. Or the plop of my purse landing on the kitchen counter. Or the pitter patter of “What the hell’s going on?“ rounding the corner. No one heard me at all.

And there they were. Making out on my couch. Teen-agers!
Damn it!

I hurled the cushions out the front door and we hauled the frame out in the blinding rain. To the curb. Where it came from. Free.

And then we had nothing. “Doesn’t bother me. I’m bendy. I’ll sit on the leopard skin rug. Everyone else, stand if you like. I didn’t want anyone to hang around long enough to get too comfortable anyway ….”

I finally caved in and bought a chair. A brown leather chair with an ottoman. I was tired. Needed a place to rest. Everybody fought over it… “I call this chair”…..Piled in and stacked up, they pretended it was a VW parked in my living room. But it was my chair, and while I rarely sat in it, still preferring the leopard skin rugs for naps, and lazy afternoons, it was mine. Curling up, all bendy ,into it’s thick leather arms was comforting sometimes…..
rebellious.....

I hauled a couch home last night.
The kids are gone and they won’t believe it when I tell them.

But it’s lonely here.
And the chair is haunted…….

Midnight in the garden of good and " I can't believe I'm doing this....."

I have rules. Not very many. I’m bendy when it comes to rules, but still, I do have them. And I break them. Change my mind and tighten the ropes every now and then. Change my will and skip over a few, Chinese jump rope for the soul. Change my direction, without notice, and do back flips.

Now I’ve broken all of them. Wadded them up like 3 hour old Bazooka gum, spit them into a crumpled napkin, and tossed them out the window (Minimum $500 fine for littering and I don’t give a damn!)

I’m not inclined to be wreckless. I’m a scaredy cat. I’ll toy with trouble, put my big toe in and shiver from the icy cold, laugh, and pull it out again. Do The Hokie-Pokie and do it all again. But wreckless…..

This is a little new to me….

Still, this is the year of the slinky snake. Shedding skin that didn’t fit in the first place, replacing it with psychedelic colored rings that go round and round. This is the year I’m alive. This is the year of change. The year of peace and love in neon letters stolen from the corner store. The year of the moment. When collusion is birthed from chaos.

Catch me if you can…..

The Highway Man

“Are you a transient?” I asked, leaning in…..laughing…..

“No, no, I just moved here…” the words spilled out of his Saturday night smile.

I asked to see his driver’s license. You never know. “Hmmmmmmm….” I toyed with it for a moment, scanning the picture for tattle-tales…. “Yeah., it looks like you”….smiling at the obvious tourist, with his polished deck shoes and button down shirt. I slid the laminated ID, face down, into his hand…..and he casually tucked it into his wallet, next to the pictures of his other world. Upside down.

That was a zillion years ago.....

Peace~love, baby.


Everything in between is a roadtrip......

When I run away....

When I run away....I want to live by the sea....

In a salty little shanty....with the night air blowing through the rusty screens. Where the terazza floors are etched by the sands of time and gritty under my feet. Where sandspurs grow in the yard and probably nothing else, but terazza pots of potpourri and spices are lined up like little soldiers, crooked little soldiers, in the window sills....

Where the wind howls at night and wraps her loving arms a thousand times around "my house", threatening to whisp us off into the oceans, but really.....just playing with my mind. Where the sun is tempermental and scorching and she spits her rays onto the rooftop like laughter .....and the tar between the shingles simmers and smokes at noon.

I want to run barefoot to the mailbox.....playing hot potatoe on the driveway....collecting postcards from loved one from the rusty ole box, flag up to the skies....

I want to dive onto clean white sheets at night, too small for the double bed, and too thin to hide the mattress seams, stretched to their limit and fresh from hanging on the line, soaking up the salty air....

I want to walk , heels first, toes scrunching, in the early morning sand.....the moon falling with the tide and the sun peeking her little pink nose over the waves, playing hide and go seek.....

I want to dance under the endless sky. Drinking up laughter and wishing on random stars. I want a rusty ole fridge in the carport, chucked full of Michelob light and watermelons I thumped at the produce stand.

I want to pop jiffy pop late at night and watch black and white re-runs, static and all....feed the neighborhood cats out the back door....

Until then.....
I live here.
In my house.
My little love.

And every now and then I drive to Blakely
and pretend
I'm gonna move to the middle of nowhere
and
sit on the porch
and drink beer
and wave
at
friendly passers-by....

Just give me peace......

"I'll worry about it tomorrow....

It’s not spontaneity, in my world. It’s suddenaity. That’s just me. To the world at large (well, this is a really small town, which makes it a really small world, but)…I’m settled. Snuggled into the ordinary. Comfy Cozy in my couchless house. Predictable really. I drive the same way to work every morning, blasting the same music in the same way….LOUD! My hair has hung in the same direction since I was fourteen, the way it grows. Straight, and trimmed every once in a while at the bathroom sink. I still flip the peace sign at passers-by, toss the mail in the trash, and believe.

And then BAM! The butterfly breeze blows a little lower, and I’m just sitting there minding my own business. And everything
changes. Just like that. Swoooshing in a thousand new directions.

Suddenaity.

An unintentional hurricane. Flipping everything ordinary over onto it’s underbelly. Exposing the pale protected safeness of my every day world to… the scorching sun. And it’s so hot in the aftermath, that the dirt is steamy and fog is rising and for a moment, or maybe forever, I don’t think I can see beyond now. I’m standing in the middle of madness and I can’t blink. Terrified to close my eyes for fear of never waking up again. And I can’t breathe. If I suck this steamy heated air into my lungs, how will I ever exhale hard enough to take the next breath. And I can’t move. I don’t know where the earth ends and I’m afraid, or not afraid, that I’ll just fall off and tumble eternally, floating through the bottom skies…. Weightless. Pieces of life as I knew it, careening past, bumping into me occasionally, close enough to touch, but no longer within my reach…..

Butterfly breeze…..
The tiniest flutter…
And
There’s no turning back.

Just passing through my world......

I saw her this morning. Fluttering…dancing….doing figure 8’s in the morning sun. Free. She tickled by my Sunday morning winter window. Reminding me. Yes, Butterflies are really free. For everything else, there’s Mastercard….