Snugblog

I’m writing valentines. To you! To sunlight on kitten fur, and piles of laundry. Valentines to baby gray whales and lunch pails. Valentines to sunday morning bridge club. To crooning old men and party poopers. Valentines to tiny bottles of oil and ink. To midnight strolls and wrap around porches. To recliner chairs and good, sturdy friends. Valentines to bird-nests, handshakes and small shedding flowers. To buckets full and buckets empty.

…you find yourself saying “you are a butthead” outloud – towards passing thoughts of insurmountable defeat and disappointment…

…Just find a hero, and appreciate that hero!

That said, I dedicate this post to Alan and his vision:

I am sitting on a squish couch in the “quiet” back room of Albina Press. I walked here with my briefcase and didn’t get rained on. This is my new neighborhood, the coffee is warm and stumpy, and the wifi is strong and free.

I found out that I had to move on Tuesday. We moved on Saturday. My housemates and I stayed together. We communicated comprehensively. We laughed and ate tacos. There is a fake outset fire place. My room was designed for gnomes.

I set off every fire alarm in the house trying to burn sage. I think I am done with that ritual for now.

Last night my new neighbors came over to visit. They are in a band called The Oregon Painting Society. They electrify and make music out of plants. I’ve gathered that the process is somewhat analogous to the theramin. I should like to be the conductor of a musical plant.

Others among them build and operate boats. They have a female cat named Robert who, unlike other neighborhood cats, was not eaten by the pitbull that lives on the other side of my house.

Thanks dodger, for this one.

Nutandbee is the blog/doodle gallery of Annette M. Russel. I like to look at some of her drawings before I go to bed. They make me want to hold hands, make me mushy, make my toes a little warmer. If someone were to delight me with a gift, I should like any of these notepads.

January is doodle upload month. These babies have been a long time coming. Get ready. I know I am.

Snactopus

I have a goldfish memory. This applies to dreams. They quickly evaporate. I might remember an image, or maybe a brief vignette. Big houses, endless labyrinths of other people’s things. White planes descending upon me. Other recurring dreams? Big train wreck. Sprinting in the forest. I think the ARCTIC BLAST! has been angering the wood. My house creeks. The trees wrap on the windows. So I am awoken, late night, with silly dreams carved into my memory. I wrote a few down. Let me transcribe:

1. Rosie O’Donald emerges from the ocean like a submarine and jumps into your car. We ride and ride through the wilderness. Rosie gets warm. We pull over into a rest stop. I shower in all my clothes. A support group has formed at the picnic table. They are crying about grad school. No one asks me why I decided not to wash my hair. Rosie is napping when I get back in the car. My toes are cold.

2. I am flying. I can glide horizontally. I can fly downward. I can explore the clouds and pull at them, cotton candy style. I cannot, however, fly upwards. When I do all my limbs start to stretch out, like I am being quartered by four sky horses that are galloping in different directions. Eugene, Oregon is below me. Some lambs, a naked tree, the snowy butte in the distance. It’s not really cold and I’m not really alone.

3. You drive a group of us around the town. I am in the hatchback of some old wagon. Sometimes you sense that I am feeling a bit blue and you pull over the car. From someone’s yard you pick a rose and tear it apart, turning to one side — barely concealing the process, a grin on your face. I pretend not to look. Everyone else in the car thinks it is a dumb thing you are doing. When you get back in the car you shower me with petals. Again and again. It delights me every time!

4. I am walking down the street, feeling a bit blue. Everyone I see tears a rose apart and throws the petals at my face.

5. I am in a liquor store in my home town. I am weighing the cost and benefit of a Twix bar. I am looking at my phone, reading e-mails from my dreamlife’s arch nemesis. I am wearing a sequined dress. Suddenly I realize that a frost has fallen upon the town, that I’ve let Thomas Jefferson, a cat, escape. I sprint out front door of the liquor store, which – as I cross the threshold – becomes the front door of my home. I pursue him down my winter street, through piles of sleet and rotting leaves. I catch him like a football. He stretches in my arms like putty. We roll for a bit. I am still sequined when the two of us walk in the house. Tony has made an olive loaf. I eat it.

Oh, hey, this is Thomas Jefferson:

Thomas Jefferson, this is the internet.