nina turns 60

endless

It's been tough, these weeks in isolation. Endless time alone. The same routine over and over, I feel like I'm spinning in place. No touch, no affection, no sex, not even any face-to-face conversations. There have been some walks with friends, each of us awkwardly keeping our distance. There have been trips to the coffee shop for take out espresso and kind, funny baristas. Visits to see my parents.

In the Before Time I signed up for a writing workshop that I haven't been able to finish. I wrote poems in April, but not a full 30/30. I took a workshop with one of the poets who publishes with the Press. I am writing in my journal. Every once in awhile I draw. I do my job and zoom with my colleagues. I zoom with my friends. I talk with my boyfriend and count the weeks since I had a date with him (10). I text with my son. I try to keep up with my exercises; I try to walk. I cook and I eat. I am fortunate to be able to complain that I am bored. I try not to worry about my parents, about my son, about myself. I try not to drink too much. I drink too much. 

It's an endless Zen retreat that I don't remember signing up for. It's breathing in and out. It's crying. It's watering the plants, and talking to them. It's walking into the back yard to smell the lilacs. It's looking up through the branches of the white pine. It's walking out after sunset and seeing Venus, the only thing that ever seems to give me hope. 

Anniversary

I made it to my year anniversary of not eating sugar. Or really, not overtly bingeing on sugar. There is sugar in the salad dressing that I buy. And every once in awhile I buy some packaged naan, and it has sugar in it. I've had some candied nuts that I pretended weren't really candied because they weren't that sweet. I even had a small square of dark chocolate when I was sitting in a backup caused by a horrible car accident.

But I haven't had ice cream every night after dinner. I haven't eaten cinnamon bears until I felt sick. I'm not buying Cadbury chocolate caramel eggs and whatever other Easter candy I can get away with. I'm not making a batch of hot fudge sauce to eat with a spoon nor eating a pan of brownies one narrow row at a time.

This feels like less of a triumph than I want it to. I still feel as flawed as ever, still feel like there are endless things to do and not enough time and energy to do them. Like most of us now, I am frightened for this world and chilled to the bone by the suggestion that we should be willing to sacrifice people for the good of the economy. No. 

Absolutely no.

 

California

I didn't go to Texas, but I did go to California because my parents and sister were there. They were staying at a nice resort in the desert, but it was not a vacation. My parents are having a hard time resigning themselves to their limitations. I can't blame them, so am I. My sister and I were happy to be there to help them, and glad to have the chance to observe them at the same time in the same circumstances. We gave each other breaks, she to play tennis; I drove to a coffee shop in a nearby town. My parents had a three week trip planned, with visits to friends and other resorts, but instead they flew home with me. I stayed with them until the shuttle van came to bring them to their car. I headed back toward the baggage claim area to use the bathroom and buy a coffee. As I passed over the skybridge to the terminal, I looked down and could see them boarding the van with the other passengers, who helped them with their luggage. It is very like taking care of your child in the world, but the destination is so very different.

alive || not alive

I've been setting metal type in the physical world rather than typing in the digital one, and it feels really good. The meticulous care with which one must operate to make a beautiful page (or even just a clear, easy to read page) is impressive. The feel of the type in my fingers makes me grounded. The presses themselves, so beautiful and heavy, still doing their work after 100 years, give me joy. I marvel at their ingeniousness, their various parts working together just so. They don't seem alive, but they don't seem entirely not alive either. 

Next week I will go to Texas with 10,000 or so other people who care very much about words and language, about fitting it together just so, both by meaning and by its physical properties. I will get to eat and work with beloved colleagues whom I normally only interact with digitally. It will be warm, at least outside. 

My parents are flying out to California on the same day and same airline that I am flying to Texas. I hope I will see them at the airport. The last time my father fell down was at an airport. The helplessness of watching your parents grow old and start to falter—

my parents have grown old

Spent the weekend with my folks. It was their 62nd anniversary. They didn't know I was coming, and they were happy at the surprise. I sometimes find it hard to be patient with them in this new iteration of themselves, these old people who have taken over where my parents used to be. I want to be better. I work consciously toward being better. But the dynamic shift has thrown me. I had underestimated how much I still depended on them in my mental world. That sense that they would always be there for me. It's been true my whole life. And now it's not. They can't be anymore. It's my turn to be there for them. And I am happy to do it. But really, it's much harder than I am prepared for. 

It's not unlike when you become a parent and you have no friggin' idea what you are doing, but you have to figure it out because you've got that baby and that baby needs you. Except now you are much older and even more tired and you aren't as desperately in love with those in your care. Oh, you love them deeply. But the mama bear thing does not drive you. There is a tenderness. There is also mourning. You miss your parents the way they were even just a few years ago. You worry about them—so much worry. So many questions about what is the right thing to do. Instead of leading them toward independence, as with a child, you must start to take their independence away from them. Everybody is a little bit afraid. 

 

this & that

I saw some coffee described as having flavor notes of Fuji apple. Not just apple, but Fuji apple. I want to know who has a palate that sensitive that they can get down to that level of specificity when they are tasting a friggin cup of coffee. I'm the biggest dorkiest coffee snob anywhere, but even I must apply the eyeroll emoji to that one. (Hey, why doesn't typepad have emojis? This really is an old school operation.)

I made a notebook!! As in, I folded the sheets into a folios and nested the folios into a signature and I punched holes into the fold and sewed that baby up into a notebook. I'm taking a class with Myrna at Expedition Press and we ended up spontaneously making notebooks at the end of the evening last night. Such a delight to be in a print shop with a group of women who care deeply about words and art. 

I'm the oldest person in the class (including the instructor) by at least 20 years. 

Alejandro is turning 21 in a couple of weeks, and I can't even.

 

gift

Look at the beautiful broadside sent to me by one of my favorite CCP poets, Alison C. Rollins! A sweet surprise on a day I was feeling very low. I can not recommend her book, Library of Small Catastrophes, highly enough. I spotted the manuscript in our submittable queue a couple of years ago and immediately read it through twice, something I've never done before or since. It is not my job to read manuscripts, but I get the opportunity to poke around from time to time. Usually my other tasks pull me quickly away. Not with this one. 

The editor rather jokingly calls this book my first acquisition, though I know that whoever would have come across the ms first would have advocated for it just as hard as I did. I find it nothing short of brilliant.

Poets and librarians and poet-librarians. My kind of people. Thank you, Alison!

easy and obvious

Just read an article stating that Seattle hasn't had an official sunny day since November 30. That explains a few things. We're used to cloudy weather, of course. We live it constantly. But there are usually a couple of days of respite even in winter. With the holidays, and being sick, and the early dark, it's no wonder everything feels like a big slog. But the paperwhite bulbs that I brought out from their winter home, watered, and put by the window are starting to send up some green shoots. An easy and obvious metaphor, but I don't need anything more complicated than that right now. 

single/married

When you're a single woman on the internet, you get a lot of attention from dudes, whether you want it or not. A fair percentage of that attention will be from married dudes. Lonely married dudes, married dudes who haven't had sex with their wives for years, married dudes who just want to talk to pretty strangers. Over the years I interacted with more of them than I probably should have. I got crushes on some of them. I made friends with others. 

Then there are the married dudes in open relationships. I started coming across poly dudes on OKCupid. I seemed to always match highly with them, and much about a poly lifestyle appealed to me, particularly the need for lots of open, honest communication. The thing about being a single woman dating a married man is that she is always vulnerable in a different way than if there are only two people involved. I lost one boyfriend a few years ago because his wife decided she didn't want them to be open any longer. I say "I lost" but what happened is I got dropped like a hot potato. It sucked.

Then there are guys who think your being non-monogamous means that you just want to have sex with lots of different people and have no feelings invested in anything and they treat you like a living toy. And don't get me started on the ones who say they are in open relationships, but their wives have other ideas about that. You must tread very cautiously.

But then maybe one day you get lucky...

 

 

melancholy

I spend a lot of time being sad. I used to feel bad about it, feel pressure to work toward feeling happy all the time, but I've learned to embrace it. It's how I am. It doesn't preclude me being joyful or grateful or resilient or a lot of other things. I am fortunate that for the most part, my sadness does not pull me down too far. Sometimes it feels like a weight. Sometimes it blows by like clouds. It often feels like a logical response to the world. 

As I was typing this, Lizzo's "Good As Hell" came on my Pandora and I started smiling. Yes, I feel very fortunate.