Breathing

There is the sound of Green Tea Ginger inhaling, deeply, filling her body with peace, and just a moment of stillness. I apology for the long silence. Life is insane once again, and I miss my blog but just can't find the time to write except for these brief glimpses and observations.

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My weekend was spent a, cleaning carpets and b, working on an old paper. The carpet washing was hellish. I started at 11 and finished at about six. We celebrated having clean carpets by going out Mexican food. Tasty reward with a cold beer to wash it all down. The paper was also a bit hellish. A professor asked me to submit it for his edited volumne on religion and class. It was a bit to short so I needed to add some bulk. I hate, hate, hate creating filler. But it's done, and I'm very excited to be publishing an essay in a book!

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On the GTA front, I'm loving the job. Of course that might change when I have 40 tests to grade and hand back. The class is quite enauthastic, and I've been making an effort to get to know them. So far so good. SM, the professor I'm TAing for, is a great lecuturer, and I'm making note of how he does his classes. Plus he's just totally cool, and it's fun to hang out with him. I'm also glad that we're repairing the damage done when I switched advisors. My fellow GTAs are also great...maybe too great as we seem to be distracting each other a bit. I bought a fat Buddha for my desk. There was no sugar for my coffee today. I tried Splenda. It was the foulest tasting stuff on the planet.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I was in Target the other day, and sort of walking while looking. I felt this brush on my arm, and felt an surge of lust, I guess for lack of a better word. Looked up to see this kind of alternative guy, looking at me in a way that let me know he had felt the same thing. We just started for a moment before walking off. How strange those moments are. I didn't even see him really, just felt his arm brush mine. I felt and feel this way for H as well but with H it is much more intense. I can feel him from quite a way off.

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Charlotte finally got a Trader Joe's and silly us went Sunday afternoon. It was hideous. The store was tiny, and crowded with tons of snotty, preppy people. They gave us dirty looks which lead to me ranting really loudly about how much I hated fucking republicans, preppy, SUV driving morons. I got even nastier looks but it was so worth it. The store itself...well it's cheap. But it's also a chain. And we felt sort of like we were betraying the local health food stores like the Home Economist by even being there. And then most of the stuff was frozen which we don't buy a lot of...and we ended up deciding to support local. So Home Economist we love you. We love your workers who are cool, knowledable, and funky. We love your customers even the preppy ones because they get that people like us make the whole health food store shopping experience an expereince. And we love that we can buy bulk not just the processed crap.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------We're going to Baltimore for the weekend to hang with Ros. I may have to kick some ass for her! Right now though I'm slowly getting ready for the trip. I packed snacks tonight. We're working on a mixed CD with the theme of guns and drugs. All ideas welcomed and encouraged. I'll post our final play list.

Love you all, dear readers, and I'll try to post something witty, intelligent, and mind blowing sometime soon.

Drunks

Por Ernesto

A Children's Game

Listen to the poet Sanai,
who lived seculuded: "Don't wander out on the road
in your ecstasy. Sleep in the tavern."

When a drunk strays out to the street,
children make fun of him.
He falls down in the mud.
He takes any and every road.
The children follow,
not knowing the taste of wine, or how
his drunkness feels. All people on the planet
are children, except for a very few.
No one is grown up except those free of desire.

....

Gone, inner and outer,
no moon, no ground or sky.
Don't hand me another glass of wine.
Pour it into my mouth.
I've lost the way to my mouth.

The wine we drink is our own blood.
Our bodies ferment in these barrels.
We give everything for a glass of this

Ginger's Emporium

My GTA position started yesterday. It looks like it will be fairly lowkey. I'm not teaching...just going to class, taking attendance, correcting papers and exams, maybe helping to monitor small group discussion. Oh, and some minor photocopying. All in nothing that will interfere too much with thesis work:)

I've begun reading Foucault. No doubt I'll move from my overload of posts on Deleue to an overload of posts on Foucault. Hold onto to your hats...

My dad called last night to wish me happy birthday. He told me this story: Your grandmother always said she was full blooded Native American. Her dad was on the tribal elders of the Passamaquoddy tribe in the North [of Maine].

Who knows if this is true. My family is on the dark side but I doubt if my grandmother was full-blooded as my Dad claims. Someone traced her to the MacArthur's who landed in Nova Scotia from Scotland. Someone married someone name Helen Smith (who is my great grandmother) there but there's no record of her birth, etc. I'm not sure if maybe somehow she moved to Maine and hooked up with the Passamaquoddy tribe? My dad also my grandmother remembers going to the reservation with her father who is listed as an MacAruthur. It's so convulted...these memories and stories.

And finally a wonderful quote about vinyl from the dark mind of John Rebus via Ian Rankin. For a bit of context, Rebus is left his brother's albums after his brother's death.

Rebus had waved him good-bye and stared at the gift. Then he'd eased himself down onteh floor beside the boxes and started going through them: a mono Sergeant Pepper,Let It Bleed with the Ned Kelly poster, a lot of Kinks and Taste and Free...some Van der Graaf and Steve Hillage. There were even a couple of eight-track cartridges--Killer by Alice Cooper; a Beach Boys album. A treasure trove of memories. Rebus placed the sleeves beneath his nose--the very smell of them took his back in time. Warped Hollies singles, left too long on the turntable after a party...a copy of "Silver Machine" with Mickey's writing on it--This Belongs to Michael Rebus--Paws Off!!!

And Quadrophenia, of course, its corners creased, the vinyl scarred but still playable.

35

35 years ago I was born to parents who were too young. I'm not sure if they really wanted me. I suspect my arrival for them was an ambigious arrival. My grandmother assured me that my birth was one meant with anticipation and excitment: "I remember the day you were born. You were the first grandchild. We were so excited." But I wonder who that we included....Still it doesn't matter in some ways. I am here now.

35 years seems like many years, and not enough. I have many stories to tell, and yet there still seems to be so much ahead....so many stories to come, so many new people to meet, to love, to know. It makes me feel anything but old.

The lead up to this birthday was making me feel kind of....I don't know...it wasn't old. It was just felt as if I was at this kind of middle point. How does one act at this age...I end up feeling dread at the thought of my birthday. I think this is why I planned the party. I thought that welcoming the day in with the company of friends would give me strength in the face of the dread. I planned a dinner at one of my favorite resturants, Catina 1511.

It was a lovely dinner, and in the course of being with good friends, good food, and frozen maragrtias, the dread disappeared. Instead, in the hot breeze I felt the future opening up to more...more stories, more love, more fellowship, just more. And after eating we went to drink at a bar, where we laughed, flirted, and celebrated.

Mary and Darren....

Mary, Darren, and his wife Kerri...what a lucky guy:) Kerri made me a beautiful knit carrying bag which will be great for vegetables from the farmer's market.

Martin and Ruthie who brought me a wonderful card and a gift card (which is about to buy me a birthday cake:) It was extra wonderful to see them as we hadn't seen them in awhile.



And I got to dress up!

And best of all, was H. My wonderful husband who took me out, and gave me the best present of all the morning.

Waiting....

Morning after a restless night. The melatonin ceased working a week ago, and was leaving me with a headache. Last night was worst than ususal. I was tired but just couldn't sleep. I would lay awake for a bit, fantasizing about whatever came to mind, the future, imaginary presents, etc but sleep stayed away. Eventually, I drifted into sleep but it was fitful and shallow. I woke up numerous times. And I had mulitple strange dreams that bleed into each other. In one, I had on this beautiful red dress with a full skirt. It reminded me of a dress J bought me years ago. A green 50's vintage cocktail dress.

Mostly I'm worried about money. We normally get our direct deposit refund Friday afternoon. This year they didn't even deposit until late Friday afternoon which means we might not get it until Tuesday. Argh. Of course now we can't order our parking tags which means paying for parking for a while. We have enough for food, and even for me to go out for my birthday so I shouldn't complain. But it also means that we can't go grocery shopping this weekend, and shopping during the first week of school is kind of a nightmare. Of course we'll have to fit it in or we'll end up eating out every night which is expensive and not very healthly. Sigh.

And we did get to take the kids to the movies. It was a perfect movie day; hot, steamy with rain in the air. I forget how wonderful and magical it is to go to the movies. The kids were in love with the whole experience. The dark theater, the soda, the popcorn, that wonderful moment when they curtains move to reveal the full screen, and the lights dim more and more until the music starts and there's your movie. P whispered to H "I'm scared!" She loved watching the line of projection and kept calling out "That's our movie!" We saw Underdog. Not as bad as I thought it would be. Umberto and Camille loved, and Camille almost cried at the end. It was expensive though! 50 for tickets, soda and popcorn! Defintely not a magaical experience for the wallet.

But I am going out tonight to celebrate my birthday! I

Past Lives

When I was younger, I was a Neopagan. This brought me into contact with a variety of interesting, and often odd people as a wide diversity of beliefs and interests. One belief seemed to hold sway over most: reincarnation. It's the one belief from my Neopagan years that I'm not able to quite shake. I have so many memories, and dreams that do not belong to this life. But I can not accept those as evidence, as I wonder if they were brought on by Neopagan years. There is no objectivity to memory, influences, etc. But there is a part of me that sees these moments as not fully belonging to myself.

I have a terrible fear of drowning. I'm not scared of water or even of swimming. I usually don't swim in the ocean but that's not so much out of fear but common sense. I'm not a strong swimmer, and I know the ocean would be hard for me. I have swam in the Carribean though, and felt no fear. What I'm afraid off is the actual act of drowning. It usually manifests itself when I'm on ships or boats. Once as a teen we took a ferry to an island off the coast of Maine, and I was paralyzed with fear. For obvious reasons, I avoid boats. I've had this fear for as long as I can remember, and can't find a cause for it.

One day at a pagan gathering, a woman I barely knew came up to me. She said "I know this is going to sound weird but when I look at you, I see a little boy in a sailor's outfit. You know those outfits you see in pictures of Victorian kids. You're on the deck of a ship." At the time, I thought it was strange and kind of brushed off. But that night, I had a dream that I was that little boy, and the ship sank, and I drowned. It was a horrible dream, and I discovered on waking up that one can actually "wake up in a cold sweat." The next time I saw the woman, she said "I had a dream about you a couple of weeks ago. You were the boy and you were on a ship. The ship sank for some reasons, and you drowned."

A Craving For Pain

Likely this craving is semi-brought on by Ernesto. No he doesn't inspire me to go out and hurt myself but he does seem to be sporting a lovely new tattoo (which he has said nothing about, instead he just leaves a tantalizing photo which leaves us guessing). After viewing the picture, I decided that it was really time to go out and add a few tattoos to join my lonely one.

For a while now I've been planning a black Chinese dragon as both H and U were born in the year of the dragon. And then tonight I found a couple of wonderful Ishtar symbols:

This one really resonates with me. I love that she is not totally "human" with the wings and clawed feet. And I also think that reworked on skin rather than stone it would radiate sexuality (appropriate for someone who has a "thing" for Ishtar). Obviously I'd need to do something to get this on paper, and since I have little artistic talent, I'm not sure I'm up to the task. But I'm going to try, and if I fail, maybe I can find someone who can do it for me. This is going to be a big one. I'm not sure where it would go. Maybe my arm? Any ideas dear readers?

The next one is smaller, and like the tat on my breast is an Ishtar symbol.

I think I'm going to go out next weekend and get this one. I'm not sure again where to put it but I have a couple of ideas....either my upper arm or on the inside of my arm/wrist....the wrist would hurt like hell but look so good...and okay in my sick little world, I'd enjoy the pain a little bit. Sidenote: Umberto

And since I'm in the spirit of decorating my body, I'm going to get my nose pierced when I get the star tattoo. I also have decided that when Piper weans I'll celebrate by getting my nipple pierced. And when I reach my goal weight, I'll do my navel again. Oh, I've missed the needle...now to keep myself from going nuts....

Piper's World

Piper got a hold of the camera today. I didn't know she could run it, but she can. Here's her view of the world...

Piper's Feet


Piper's view of our living room...

Impossible Distances

It was a simple case of misunderstanding. She thought he loved her. He said he loved her. But that was not what he meant. Or so he tried to explain. Explain. Could one really explain a kiss? A body pressed against another body? The rush that began in the stomach and traveled down until one's toes curled in anticipation? He wanted to make those things disappear in words. He wanted to drown them out. Pummel the feelings into dust.

But she remembered. She was on the bed, her hair spread out around her pillow, framing her, and he was above her. She remembered the way his eyes did not flinch from hers. She could feel his weight on her legs but he held himself up and away from her. That impossible distance between their two bodies was insurmountable. She could not lift herself to bridge that gap. He had to come to her. She would make him bend down to her. And with a sigh, soft and hoarse, he lowered his body onto hers, and kissed her. His lips were soft, his breath minty, tasting of toothpaste. He was pushed his hips into her groin, and she arched to meet him. But then he pulled away.

And now he told her that early declarations of love were misunderstood. He loved her, he explained as a friend, as a best friend, almost like a sister but closer than that. Words, useless stupid words came down, and needled her skin. She could still feel him over her, his mouth so soft it was almost weak against her teeth. He talked more and more but all she heard was the rejection. He would take that kiss away from her. He would swallow back into his own body but she refused to give up. It was hers to tuck away into the hidden part of herself.

What it comes down to, he said, is that I'm just not that attracted to you physically. I wish I was. I hate that I just can't feel that way for you.

Liar she thought. I felt how hard your dick got when it pressed into my body. Liar, she cried to herself, I know the feel of desire on lips.

Liar, she whispered the words turned onto herself, your body is gross and wrong and misshapen. You are ugly and smart. All men will love your mind and they will hate your body. Your body is the rotten vessel to something beautiful inside. Something beautiful housed in something vile. And with these dangerous whispers, it felt like something hollow imploded inside her chest.

They lay on the bed. She, blinking hard to keep the tears away. He shamed both by his desire for this ugly girl, and by his rejection of such desire. This time no one walked across those endless waters of such an impossible distance.

The Unreliability of Memory

My mom came to visit me on Saturday. I told her a bit about my blog, and the memoir writing I was doing. She didn't offer to read it and I didn't offer to share it. I'm not sure of her reaction. But it was interesting to place these events on some kind of timeline. She told me that the camp happened right after my burns, and that my dad came less and less often (he had a girlfriend no doubt). She also said that he didn't move us. We lived with some church woman until my mom could get us a place. And I have no memory of this woman.

My memories are not connected to time. They are fragments and glimpses of things that happened coupled with things and times that did not happen. I have a collection of scenes, and moments. They are disembodied though, and the only sequential sense comes when I engage in a narrative. Thus I think that the memoir writing I engage in here is not nonfiction at all but a fiction that draws from the world. So my self-indulgent is really the self-indulgent of all writers.

Bolano does this in The Savage Detectives. He uses the multiple memories of a wide range of characters. Some knew the poets intimately; others did not. They all have different tales to tell, and different perceptions based not just on their personalities but on the times and distances from which they tell. What one character says in 1976 undergoes subtle transformations in 1996. It's a beautiful experiment, and it leaves the reader with a sense that what we know is really just small.

"Repeat A Little"

Virtual objects belong essentially to the past...the virtual object is not a former present, since the quality of of the present and the modality of its passing here affect exclusively the series of hte real as this constituted by active synthesis. However, the pure past as it was defined above does qualify the virtual object; that is, the past the past as contemporaneous with its own present, as pre-existing the passing present and as that which causes the present to pass. Virtual objects are shreds of pure past" Giles Deleuze in Repetition and Difference, 101.

Last night, lying in bed between sleep and dream, drunk on Chilean white wine, and the a heady sultry summer night, I remembered something which I could not quite lay my mind on. Stories, half-formed, from books vaguley remembered. Stories of time lines running beside each other where other lives were lived. I thought about how somewhere there is another Ginger and H who married but have no children. And also a Ginger and H who did not make it. And another who never meet...and on and on...repeat a little.

And my thoughts did not end there because it is more complicated than just simply pararrell lives. There is not just the possibility of parareel lives but of mulitple lives that enfringe and touch upon each other. Those framgents of a pure past in which Ginger and H did not make enrich the lives of the Ginger and H who did make it. They exisit, fragmented, to haunt the lives that live out other possibilities.

It's Just a Movie

History is our lost referential, that is to say our myth. It is by virtue of this fact that it takes the place of myths on the screen."

Jean Baudrillard

in conditions under which the false becomes the mode of exploration of the true, the very space of its essential disguises or its fundamental displacement: the pseudos here becomes the pathos of the True."

Giles Deleuze

I enjoy reading people's responses to books and movies. The amazon readers review provide me endless delight as do the viewers reviews on yahoo movies and IMBD. It's interesting to see how people respond to various media. So when I first saw the trailers for 300 I went to check out what people were saying. The initial buzz was one of excitement. People raved about the special effects, etc. Once the movie was releases the reviewers fell into two camps. One group decried the lack of historical accuracy well the other camp said "Hey chill, it's just a movie." I find, after watching this movie, and being a fan of historical movies, that I fall somewhere between the two camps.

For the most part, I agree with Baudrillard that history is a myth. I don't mean myth as in lie nor do I think does he. Rather history has become the story that we tell ourselves about our origin. It is interesting to me that the arguments which arise over "historical accuracy" are quite similar to the arguments that arise between fundamental Christians and their liberal counterparts over the accuracy of the Bible. We seem to have a lot in stake over "fact." What really happened, and what stories are permissible about what really happened. Yet can we ever really know these answers? Are these answers even achievable? What is a date but a date?

Thus when movie goer begins a critique with "Well it was a good movie but they got this detail all wrong..." I smile a little. How can we possibly KNOW what happened when Leonidas faced the Persian army with 300 men at his back? This story comes to us from a history written thousands of years ago. It has been translated, re-translated, etc, etc. What I want to ask these reviewers is this: Whose detail? Frank Miller's? Herodotus'? This demand for historical accuracy in a movie like 300 strikes me as quite beside the point. There is no historical accuracy to be found in such a tale. Only a myth. And myths are meant to be retold.

On the other hand, I do not agree with the idea that: Hey, it's just a movie." Movies as myths are more than lies. They are the stories that we tell ourselves about ourselves. What a good historical movie does is not give us accurate facts but rather takes lies, falseness, and gives us truth. The truth does not lie in any kind of notion of what really happened. Rather it lies in the virtual as pure past. It retells history in a way that tells us something about modernity, about our world. In 300, we see reflected back at us our attitudes about war and about freedom. The words from the Spartans' mouths have nothing to do with the myth of the Spartans (how can we ever know that) but rather these words reflect our own myths, and our own views on freedom. And I say "our" as in American. A good historical movie gives us what we need from the past. It takes historical myths and reworks them into the myths of the present. The false becomes the true. The reworking in movies like 300 and Elizabeth means that they are not just movies. They are our stories. They use history to create the aura of modernity.

Half Naked Men And Blood Lust

This is going to end up being one of a series of posts about the movie 300. It started off as one post but I ended up trying to cover about 3 different topics. Thus I ended up with one long, nearly incoherent post. And I have to rush off to work soon so I thought...I'll do a series!

Part of my reason for watching this movie was this:

This as in, WOW! Holy Shit look at that body! Look at the glare! Look at spear. And as in: What is wrong with me? I don't normally find guys who are built like this hot? And I'm a pacifist so why is my libido going nuts every time this guy makes a flying leap with his sword? Why in the hell do I have this disturbing sexual response to blood lust?

And then I started thinking...wouldn't it be great if these were the kind of guys who went to night clubs? Wouldn't it be something to see half naked, fierce, well-built men? Wonder if the guys were the ones only wearing underwear? Hell, I'd start going more often. Maybe I need to start going to different night clubs.

Yes 300 was visually stunning, and I'm not just talking about the special effects. The Spartan men were simply beautiful in their brutality, their strength, their blood lust. There was not a man in the group who wasn't rock hard. Hell!

But really I do find my response disturbing. I do consider myself a pacifist, and I find non movie like scenes of violence gross and sickening. But when I'm watching a movie like this, I find myself sexually aroused. Argh. It's not something I'm necessarily proud of but it's an honest response. Why is this so sexy? Nature or nurture?

Good Advice from Sabines

Considering it Carefully
They tell me I ought to eercise to lose weight,
that around 50 it's very dangerous to smoke and be fat,
it's important to keep your figure,
and fight against time and age.

Well-meaning experts and friends who are doctors
recommend diets and systems
for prolonging life for a few more years.

I thank them with all my heart but I have to laugh
at such vain dodges and petty concern.
(Death also laughs at all such things).

The one bit of advice that I consider seriously
is to find a young woman to have in bed
because at this altitude
youth can reach us only by contagion.

Jamie Sabines

And suddenly the behavior of those men at the club makes sense....now does this work in reserve as well? Will those middle aged men suck away the youth and beauty of those young gazelles on their heels? Will they wake up morning, tired and wrinkled? And then the middle aged men filled with the women's vigor will seek out more youth...

One Hundred

At midnight, at the last moment of August, I think
sadly about the leaves that keep falling from the calendars.
I feel that I am the tree of calendars.

Every day, my child, that goes away forever, leaves me
asking: if someone who loses a parent is an orphan, if
someone who has lost a wife is a widower, what is the
word for someone who loses a child? What is the word for
someone who loses time? And if I myself am time, what is
the word for me if I lose myself?

Day and night, not Monday or Tuesday, nor August or
September, day and night are the only measure of our
duration. To exist is to last, to open your eyes and close
them.

Every night at this time, forever, I am the one who has lost
the day. (Even though I may feel, in the heart of this time,
the dawn climbing, like the fruit in the branches of the
peach tree).

Jamie Sabines

My one hundredth post. Wow. It came so suddenly...came approiately enough with the end of summer. This time of year when that familar panic hits. So much to do...so much shelved in favor of the pool, the park, a good book. And now the time is gone...even now I should be doing something else.

And this blog...this simple thing, this untouchable space floating in cyberspace has come to have some importance in my life. It entered me into a net of other writers, other thinkers, some known in body, others not. This blog launched feelings long forgotten. It awakened a certain sadness but also brought the joy that always lingers around sadness.

Ginger Likes to Party All the Time...

My family has suffered these last couple of weeks. My hidden bitch crawled to the surface and wrecked havoc. At one point, it was so bad I called my mom and begged her to take one of my kids. They've endured snappiness, pissiness, and just general bad attitude type shit. I needed a night out. They need me to take a night out. I got dressed up. Well, okay I wore make up and a low cut tank top but it was dressed up for me. Two mommie friends and I headed over to NoDa. Every month they have a gallery crawl. We wandered around the funky neighborhood looking at art and drinking free wine. I am stunned at the cost of original art. I saw a couple of pieces I liked but both were well beyond my meager salary. The free wine wasn't. And as an extra bonus I got to see RenElvis. He was great. I should clarify that I am not an Elvis fan in general. I tend to agree with the accusations that he ripped off a lot of great black singers and song writers. And I just don't care for 50's and early 60s rock as a whole. I like Motown and I like Soul but that's really it. However, I am nuts for the whole Elvis phenomena. And I'm really nuts for the Filipino and Mexican Elvis so it was a real treat for me to see RenElvis.

We discovered soon, however, that our meager money wasn't going to last long in NoDa. Overpriced is an understatement. I paid seven dollars for a glass of Chilean Blanc. I expect bars to be over priced but this was a bit much. We were going to go to one of my favorite bars in another neighborhood. It's crowded on the weekends but it's relaxed, and you can talk and check people out. But one of the mom's decided she needed to go dancing. She had a cute little skirt so we agreed.

Mom2 pointed the minivan downtown (yes minivan), and we drove around trying to figure out where to go. We knew at that point we'd have to pay a cover and we didn't want to pay a cover. Mom1 knew someone who DJed this club, The Alley Cat. He was djing and got us in for free, and got us a free beer. The band sucked. His djing was standard. The crowd was young, half naked, and looking for sex. So not my scene now or ever. The only people close to our age, looked desperate (female) or with young blond things half their age (men). No one was doing much good at picking each other up. There was lots of Jr. High staring across the room. The band sucked. They played a Clash song and I was the only one bouncing. Sigh. Some gross moron tried to bounce like right on top of me, and I had to do some punk moves to get his skinny barely of the teen years ass off me. No I didn't get picked up. Okay one kid, and I do mean kid, said "You don't dance and you have a tattoo on your boob?" I said "Are you staring at my boobs?" and he shrugged and tried to sidled up. Sigh. I used my ice persona sarcasm to make him go away. And I got hit on by the 40 year old bouncer (big bald, likely drives a Harely) who told me in response to my "I'm too old for this club." "No you're not all the young girls here are douche bags."

Basically the experience was totally the same as when I was young. May be why I never went to clubs like this. What's funny is that I am much more confident now then when I was in my 20s. Those girls were so insecure and you could smell it on them. I remember feeling like. For all my insecurities now, it is nothing like it used to be. I realized that for the most part I feel sexy, act sexy, and am pretty confident that I am sexy. I'm healthier, have a better body, and eat better than I ever did in my 20s. And it scares people. I'd watch guys try to catch my eye, and when I looked directly at them they scurried. I don't think that had to do with me looking like some kind of monster. It just scared them that I didn't giggle, or act coy or hug my arms around my body. I like who I am so much more...

And I liked that I got to come home slightly drunk to my husband and my babies. Piper woke up as soon as I walked in and toddled out to me. H woke up soon after and we cuddled while I got Piper back to sleep. Made me glad I'm out of that meat market. But it was fun, and we're already planning our next night out...

The Camp

I am not sure how old I was when we moved to the camp. The camp itself is a vivid memory. It was a three room cabin, shack really, on a smallish lake. In order to get ot the shack, you had to drive down a long, pitted dirt road through the woods. The main road that lead to it the dirt road wasn't that main either. There was a general store on the road though that sold overpriced canned goods on dusty shelves, and bins of penny candy. The cabin itself was tucked into a grove of pine trees just a few feet from the lake. An outhouse stood far off to the right and up further from the lake. A dock extended into the lake which had no beach.

Inside, there was a small kitchen area set up in the front. There was a gas stove, and a sink with a pump. Mom sat up a rickety kitchen table in that area for the adults. We kids would eat most of our meals outside on the junky pinic table. The living room held a fold out couch and a chair. The room furtherest to the pack had two sets of bunkbeads. There were paint by number paintings all over the walls, mostl animals but a few nature scenes. The whole place felt damp and dirty no matter how much cleaning and airing out Mom did. There was no elecricity. We kids didn't mind though as we spent the summer days outside in the lake or in the woods.

The water was so cold that your feet when numb when you waded even in July. But the joy of youth is that cold water means nothing. We would swim until our lips turned blue. Then we would jump onto the dock, lying down on the warm faded wood. We would dangle our heads over the edge looking at the fish through the clear water. The sun would brown our backs, warming us, until we could jump in and freeze all over again. Sometimes we would run through the woods. The boys would want to play cowboys or wars, and for a while I'd play along with them. But soon I'd grow bored with their imaginary violence, and began to serach for fairies and elves. We would only come in when it was dark. My mom would feed us hotdogs and mac and cheese. We would then climb into our bunks, and go to sleep.

During the summer my family would come often. There were always dozens of cousins running around with us. The grown ups would sit outside drinking Tom Collins mix and beer, gossping while us kids ran wild. We were all long lean limbs, brown and covered in brusises, scabs, and cuts. For the most part, the adults would leave us alone. My dad was only home on the weekends, and then he would fish with us. We never caught anything but we liked to sit with him on the edge of the dock. Somtimes he'd bring his younger brothers or sisters home. I noticed that this would make my mom's go tight, and the lines around her eyes would strectch but she never said anything.

Once the fall came the camp wasn't so much fun. There was no heat in the cabin. In September, my mom asked my dad when he was going to move us. He promised soon. We weren't going to school because the bus only came along the main road, and it was too far away to walk too. At night it was cold. We started to all sleep with my mom on the fold out couch. We'd wake to see our breath on the morning air as we scurried to get on warmer clothes. My mom would run the gas stove for a little while at night so we could get warm. She stopped cleaning, and spent most of her time wrapped in a blanket, crying, sometimes reading a book. Our family stopped coming to visit except for my grandmother who would come once or twice a week with food. We'd run like puppies towards her car, sceaming and laughing as she pulled into the driveway.

My dad started to miss weekends which meant that we relied on my grandmother for food. She would tell my mom "You have to insist that he moves you." And finally, "Come with me into Skowhegan, and we'll find you an apartment. We'll sign you up for AFDC and foodstamps." But my mom wouldn't leave. When my dad did come he complained about the state of the house and asked my mother why she couldn't keep things up. They'd began to fight, my mother's rage flowing over the house. My dad would sulk, until my mom's sob brought him to her. Then he would began to promise: "I'll move you soon." "I'll get us a big house with a yard."

He finally moved us at the end of October into a small trailer. It did have a big yard but more importantly it had heat and elecricity.