come back in one

pennying again. "come back in one. not one minute, but ONE." i'm pretty sure this means one second but i am purposefully holding this vocabulary word from miles, as he says it a lot on needy nights and i don't want to hear "come back in one second" too many times.

dark with a full moon. there are white christmas lights on the 20-something neighbors' deck that i never noticed before. decorating the dark when night time was more a part of life.

i am feeling a little wierd about being on my computer so much. computer and car. we are interacting so often with our own creations--our houses, streets, electronics,our clothes and fibers and machines and coffee shops and even play structures made of metal and plastic it leaves very little time to do what people did to evolve for most of time--interact with the natural world. there is a big difference, interacting with our own creations. it is kind of incestual. i know i didn't exactly come up with this concept, but i read this idea so long ago i can't remember whose it is. anybody out there know? is there anyone out there? and now for me it has gone a step farther and the thing that i used to crave and require, talk with friends has morphed into writing into the ether. little squiggles and lines black on white emails and blogs. even the phone can be a little painful when some i love are so hopelessly far away. so i am computing. me and my little keys. i know there are big big things going on out there in the world. my friends gradiva and i were talking about the catastrophic future our kids surely will inherit and the wierd apathy that surrounds it. she said her father thought the best defense against global warming would be to build giant reflectors for the sun. should i be up there in the dark gluing mirrors to our roof by moonlight? hammering together my urban garden?

oh no the baby is crying out for me again. mommy. she wants me warm against her in the bed. and i have lots to worry about and say but i will gladly go to keep her company instead.

howdy people.

i am starting to see a pattern in this blog--the images are only loosely connected to the print. but juxtaposition is what makes things interesting, right? this was a song-writing staple for the bands i was in. cute sounding melody, deeply evil lyrics. and somewhat vice versa. i probably spelled that wrong. these photos are from a day about 2 weeks ago. the very posed one is miles by some garbage we passed. we even posed the garbage a little. and don't worry, it is a bag of cherries, not something more, um, brown. lovely, wonderful. and the adorable one is julia babiarz of delaware and her second boy calvin. more about those curtises and babiarzes later, if julia will allow.

we headed to sonoma this weekend because maya's babysitter was coming to paint our incredibly dirty punched up walls with his crew. i have been talking about doing this for about 6 years now and thought that when we returned to fresh smooth walls my life would be better. unfortunately i am having trouble accepting the new color of our hallway and walls and had the sudden realization upon seeing them that i picked a color i THOUGHT would be the right color versus a color i actually like (disregarding kim wiseman's advice, oops). i am trying not to obsess about this new color. i will give it a few weeks,then if i am still looking at it sadly as i pee (maya keeps the door open for me so i can see out) we are going a pale maybe semigloss violet or purple.

i really am an obsessive thinker. i have a DIAGNOSIS. and i know the futility of it, especially when the obsessive thoughts are about paint. more about truly obsessive thoughts later. it helps to talk about it.

sonoma is where my mom and david bought a condo. they may retire there someday but for now only stay a few months each year. the condo is sweet and small, with nice landscaping and right now surrounded by blooming bottlebrush and oleander. it is very quiet there. no sirens. barely a truck honking. no hissing airbrakes. no wierdos moaning about their 40 ouncers spilling on the ground. our friends little jonah, gradiva, lowell and zehara came up for the day. we swam a little in the too cold pool and then went to the square. the square is idlyllic, with 2 playgrounds, big old trees, fountains, grass, shade, sun, even a duck pond with 2 ducks. children are friendly and their parents usually say (and i ask most of them) that they think this is a good place to raise kids. we get a bottle of speedy creek red wine and drink it with some cheese while supervising children who are darting in front of moving swings, dipping pacifiers in the sand, looking for snacks on the ground near the garbage can, scuffling for toys, etc. the wine makes me feel a little expansive but unfortunately it is hard to chat with so much action. i eat a lot of cheese and salami, from the vella cheese factory, an old-fashioned cheesery (i know i made this one up) right next to my folks' place. it is hot hot hot. we get ice cream to keep one child from crying. very wealthy tan looking ladies are shopping at the boutiques around the square. there are restaurants all around and expensive home furnishings for sale. i think people are bad drivers up here from all the wine tasting. the man at the sonoma wine shop is funny and friendly and gives us free tastes. our friends need to head back to the city and as we head home on the bike path we meet rich and miles who is bounding around post-nap. we play a little more, the kids finally running together and having fun, it cools a little, there are a few people of color at this park by the train museum. the ice cream truck goes by. a real one, playing ceecee my playmate. time for me to take maya home for bed. rich stays out on the town with miles (out until 9!) and says there were gangs of happy teens and preteens milling about, climbing big trees, hitting balls, drinking bottles of something.

so sonoma is the perfect place to have grandparents. why aren't i interested in living here? why am i so hooked on all this noise and diversity and congestion? i like the people i meet at the park but somehow don't click with them like i do in the city. we can see a beautiful moon at night and maya smiles at it so happily, mommy muh, moo. when we come the kids are pretty happy. the teens seem happy too. maybe later we will head to a place like this? where we know what will happen. the baseball game in the park in front of the mountain/hills. the ice cream at the chocolate cow. looking for bugs and ducks by the pond. climbing the little tree to be an eagle or a pirate. trying to be quiet in the early morning knowing the sleeping neighbors don't want to hear our sweet boy pretending to shoot bees at 6:45 am.


the day after sonoma we take our visiting cousins to chrissy field and the kids run wet and wild by and in the bay, maya gets in another child's hole and won't get out. it is a blue sky day, so warm, and my cousin wanted to see the golden gate bridge from below. he explains to miles that the secret cave i have told him about is actually a bunker for when airplanes drop bombs. i see a familiar woman and it is a mom of an old student, a little girl with a great laugh and golden long curly hair and rett's syndrome. she says sarah is doing great and will be going to kindergarten in the fall. she says (and yes i ask) that she thinks the city is a great place to raise her 3 girls, though they did think about moving as their girls approached school age. i know they have $ and don't ask if they went private. she looks like the daughter i worked with and is a smiling optimistic person. sarah can't walk or talk but she is doing great. the mom has a white hat and a white dress blowing in the wind. maya likes her. time to go again.

a little green

tonight for the third time i took the full container of food scraps and took it down into the green bin in the yard for recycling. now all you hippies out there have probably been doing this for years but it took me a long time to get ready for this big change. we no longer throw our food scraps in the trash can and we are never going to again, gosh darn it. it made me proud to see the fruit flies flitting around that stinky stuff and know it was going to be recycled somehow by
sunset scavenger our multi-talented waste disposal company. that is them above, well just the most handsome and manly, performing their garbage can dance at carnaval. it's my mom's favorite part of a parade full of sexiness, cuteness, asian boys playing latin drums, low riders, very big ladies in very small bikinis, etc. they spin those cans around and run down the street weaving around each other, very inspiring and hilarious at the same time.

i bought some ecobulbs--on a huge sale at cole hardware on mission. $2.99 a four-pack, get em while they last.

also read an article i liked in harper's magazine
called "letter from michigan, detroit arcadia, exloring the post-american landscape". this is not my favorite magazine because somehow the writers mostly seem to have an annoying atttitude, but this article had good photos and was about how detroit is in such bad shape economically it has the potential to be an example for other cities as they go downhill too. some of it is a little vague, but basically it is about how nature is reclaiming detroit and how there could be the potential there of a city where people grow their own food. "urban farming, dollar for dollar, is the most effective change agent you can have in a community" is one quote. this directed my attention to imagining huge mclaren park, the dogbowl down the street, parts of golden gate, our little parque-- all full of intensive gardening, little healthy greens everywhere, chickens and vegetables at all the schools. this is already happening in san francisco, but in such a idealistic way, like an idea or dream for the future. i guess in detroit many people are in such dire strats they really need the food. if it was important to us here it could be something that brought people much closer together than standing behind a stranger in trader ho's.

it made me want to check out the san francisco league of urban gardeners more closely but they have no website, the phone # is not working and when i drove down oakdale i didn't see the storefront. slug, i hope you are alive does anyone know? i miss the community garden plot i had b.k. i wasn't the best, but i grew lots of greens and zucchini and flowers and the old italian gardeners next to me had amazing plots of pole beans, fennel, tomatoes. the old man told me they kept chickens in their backyard in folsom street and grew most of their vegetables in the potrero del sol garden. he shared fennel bulbs with me and i grew them and learned to cook fennel and it was delicious.

i read another article while wasting money in a cafe drinking a big iced mocha. it was in the n.y. times on may 10 and the article was called it takes a hammer to make a salad. it was about making a simple portable salad table to grow shallow rooted plants in basically year-round (lettuces, greens, basil,parsley, amaranth, others. i will make one of these before the end of the summer if i have to hammer it together with maya on my back (or maya watching "deebee" with her brother--no, no i won't let her little neurons be warped yet!) directions are online at hgic.umd.edu on growing greens with salad tables and salad boxes.

i brought miles to school today after a night of confused racing thoughts about where he should go and it was a sweet morning. he asked if his teacher could come visit our home today (the one who is leaving) and then sat down with a big cool kid to show him the photo book of a ferry trip on the bay we took together. and this is my grandma josy and this is grandpa david he informed. a little girl was putting wooden shapes together,it was kind of quiet, and sun was coming in the window. the teachers were all concerned about little maya's cold and pinkeye. after miles bounded out to the backyard i went to teacher marianne and wanted to ask her do you think things will be fine here when the lead teacher leaves? but tears welled up in my eyes as i asked and i couldn't speak. sorry, i said, i'm just feeling anxious. it was an intense but somehow not embarrassing moment. "i think it's going to be fine" she said. and i guess if community is what i want then maybe we should stick with this school, flaws and crazy cost and all, because miles (and i) have started to build a little community here, and though many are going if we move to another place just because it seems a little better maybe this is what causes the bulk of the heartbreaking (to me) community dissolution. is dissolution a word? will i change my mind tomorrow? are most of this society's problems caused by always wanting better? i don't know. right now i am going to drink a tiny bit of caffeine so i can watch the squid and the whale with my husband.

oh, and there was some HUMAN POOP right near my car this morning. miles, who is just learning some primitive sarcasm (he only uses it for litter) said just what his mama was thinking "oh that's GREAT, that's WONDERFUL." at least it was on a piece of newspaper, and on the street not the sidewalk

nighty night

is there a no place that no one knows you?

well, here is a picture of dearly departed chicken dog, who was born to a small brown mama dog right around this time in 1990. it's hard to believe how huge this guy was in my life for many years. i took hundreds of photos of him, brought him with me many places, pain in the @#$%^ as he often was, discussed him at great lengths with other dog owners. when i was in the hospital with newborn miles i thought of chicken and in my mind he had suddenly become huge and hairy with giant dirty teeth. terrible, i know, but the truth. his final years were tough, with a loud toddler invading his space (though providing MANY tasty tidbits), arthritis, and elimination problems that we could not rise above. he was with me for 16 years, from puppyhood devouring books and shoes and linoleum floors, barking outside for hours, lapping up boone's farm and beer in newark to being a doggie hipster in a warehouse in philly, and finally travelling across the country with a rock band to spend his golden years
eating burritos (tinfoil wrappers and all) and camping in the mendocino countryside in northern california. he is buried up at brian's by the graveyard path. he was a good good boy.

driving around today touring 2 preschools and then going to a parent conference later, feeling
so confused by all the options (the cheaper, huge, kind of wild but basically feel good and would teach miles some pre-academics school?--miles said he didn't want to go there because the wood chips in the play area pointed into him) ??? (the tidy, not so cheap school with a homey feel and high teacher kid ratio with kids in a neat circle for circle time, some pre-academics and only 15 kids? miles liked this one because they had a swing and a boy named jack who showed him around)???????? or stay at his present school and pay for familiarity, plus some pretty smart staff and his last chance to really be a wild man and make messy cakes and play the screeching game and be a superhero or pirate much of the day?????
does it matter at all? so we are feeling confused and kind of stressed and miles starts asking if there is a nobody that nobody knows you and you are no place, along these lines and i am asking clarifying questions (dumb ones of course, you dumb mom you) and finally figure out he is asking about not existing. like before you were born. or the dinosaurs now. not death or birth, but not existing. how to explain this one i don't know but it is the beginning i think of our son heading down a deep road that we will have to help him navigate.

the trees are waving wildly outside now, i am seated at the kitchen counter looking out of the window. i hear raucous laughter from a hidden yard, aircraft, old window frames clunking with the wind, some birds chirping and tweeting. no sirens right now. a little boy yelling no. a second of silence. my own fingers tapping on these keys. maya crying out mommy with her sore little pink eyes but i think rich goes in to pat her because now she is quiet again.

well, these are from, umm, what day? i'm not sure. isn't that sad?? not much sleep lately. we spent 5 hours sometime this week at the san francisco zoo. the big excitement was that we did not ride the little puffer train (i ran out of cash) and miles did not freak out about it. we actually spent some time looking at animals and not just steam coming out of various holes in a tiny old steam train. we did not ride the carousel or eat cotton candy either! maya decided every animal was a tee tat or a deebuh.

the big news for today is that i took a one-hour nap. also our house was appraised and has more than doubled in value since we bought it seven years ago. this puts us in a wierd position--though i am not complaining. there is really nowhere in the city we could rent a place this size for an amount similar to or less than our mortgage, and there is nowhere in the bay area we could buy and not pay a much bigger mortgage. so, should we stay here for that reason? or should we sell this place and go rent in idaho somewhere and invest our cash in something for the kids, like survivalist school or a house with well and place to raise food?

the preschool my son attends has raised rates so that in the fall it will be $1100 dollars for four days a week with early drop off. is he eating lobster for lunch? taking field trips in limousines to resorts in big sur? are they beading necklaces with gold and seed pearls? no, he is mostly running around yelling and laughing and roughousing with his friends, doing some cool little projects with nice teachers and learning to get along with a fairly big group of kids in a fairly small space. we had decided to bite the bullet and keep him there when the rates changed because it took him a while to make friends, but now almost all the kids he has befriended are leaving. many to kindergarten, but many to less expensive. darby to the east bay. lee and liam to a parochial pre-k bc it is so cheap. eitan to a montessori that is cheaper. opal jane to a co-op, cheap. nate moving to sacramento, cheap. audrey to southern california for her dad's new job, more $. you get the idea. and then last week a letter came that the lead teacher is quitting. so now we are once again preparing for the nerve-wracking experience of finding a new school for miles. poor guy, 3 preschools. but it is all part of the big picture here. we are here but we don't have much cash. and ELEVEN HUNDRED DOLLARS A MONTH for preschool is just insane, especially when they don't even have a teacher as of july. but what if we pick a new school and it doesn't work out? at least right now he is pretty eager to go in the morning.

i have noticed that usually change is good. it is very difficult for me to anticipate, though. we have met so many cool people through miles' school and now all these children are being blown out through the city like little leaves (it is windy as i type if you wonder where this lame simile comes from). i will miss them and their parents. if we can't find another school we will just have to suck it up. if we do find a new place i hope we will adapt as quickly as our son. he met a friend recently at a bbq and they played for maybe 30 minutes. this new friend accidentally smashed him in the face with a wooden paddle, and as i put miles to bed that night i looked at his boo boo covered face and asked him if he had liked meeting enzo at the party. "enzo" he told me very seriously, "is my best friend in the world." it is so hard for me to meet and lose so many people (and the meerkats aren't the only ones who miss nina and cassie) but there are probably some enzos out there for me too. (and don't worry rich, i just mean new friends)

hot day in the city

it's really hot today. stinging your nostrils hot. rich took miles to school this morning, ahh, none of that ordeal mentioned in previous post. maya put a pair of her brother's shoes on and was climbing on the baby gate yelling "doe" so we went out for a walk. outside she insisted on "dow" (note how these 2 similar sounding syllables have very different meanings) so i let her walk holding my hand. i have to say i am proud of my daughter, who says "ewwo" to most people we pass, and flashes her huge smile. even a "ewwo" to the resident group of alcoholics and speed freaks who are well into their daily party at 9 a.m. at the walgreen's bus stop (i'll get a photo of this fun crew someday soon. miles likes to announce loudly that "smoking will make you very very sick" when we walk by them). "ewwo" to the daddy at the produce store. "waewuh" to the flowers at the wierd place that used to be a butcher shop and is now a halfway home for plants from closed businesses . a new speed freaky looking dude asks if we want to buy a movie, something with a plane and guns on the cover, and maya tells him "nooooooooooooo." good for you baby. we go to st francis for iced coffee and an egg breakfast to share, and order it to go. all the cool tattooed wait staff are here, and Sun Ra
is playing on the stereo. yay, i love sun ra. while the eggs are a cookin we walk across the street to to the park, which is locked. maya climbs on the gate crying "oboool" (this one is hard--"open") and more people go by and make me feel proud as they smile at her shaking the bars like a little convict. we go up the block and cross, and then maya befriends a cute couple of hipsters at the busstop by pounding on the glass as hard as she can. i used to be kind of like you i want to tell these twenty-somethings, but they are all eyes for the friendly child, not her old mama. we go back to eat our eggs at st francis since the park is padlocked and end up chitchatting with a couple i know from the neighborhood, their daughter has telescoped overnight to a big 7. maya chows down, blowing on her eggs and using a fork like the mature girl she is. everything feels good right now, but then i ask where the couple's daughter is going to 2nd grade, wanting to hear a good tip about a public school, and they smile and say "waldorf, it's a haul but worth it." suddenly i am not a proud mama but a worried one, and a jealous one, how can this scruffy twosome afford the waldorf school and why am i too poor, and why did i marry a rocker ( a great and hard-working rocker, but a rocker, not a doctor, lawyer or computer dude), what not as good as their kid future will mine have? it's ridiculous!

then as we walk home we pass a mom and 8 year old daughter holding hands and i comment "school's out, huh?" the mom gives me a smile that says she doesn't speak english. i recognize the girl from buena vista around the corner and she says "yes we are." it is very sweet, i'm pretty sure she means she and her mom are off for the summer together, and somehow i feel fine again.

there is a lot of stimuli around here. keeps things interesting, but also drags your heart up and down quickly. later i go to my first expensive pilates class. i am so crooked, and my left side has become shorter than my right, but a teacher named tamar carefully helps me move muscles and bones in little directions until i am in greater alignment. i can see that this new class will be all about being mindful. i feel mindful as i walk to my car and mindful as i kneel to clean the house, i arch my sitting bones and push my ribs out and back and try to keep my body stabilized. now off to get my kids and go to a bbq at deb caperton's. she is the one who made our wedding rings. she is setting up a kiddie pool to fight the heat wave and john is marinating some type of meat. we will play pirates with ella rose.

deep down i know we are a lucky lucky family. i'm not sure about this entry but i will press the publish button anyway.

school's out for summer

so, this morning was my last annoying morning commute for a while (entice miles out of bed, keep maya from eliciting screams of "noooo" as she attempts to put on clothes laid out for brother, come up with creative arguments why we don't need a sugary muffin today, check pockets for car gum, carry giant squirming 16-month-old, briefcase loaded with work i carry to and from my job for no apparent reason, diaper bag, and miles' lunch down steep stairway while keeping eye on boy who is trying to skip every other step as he descends the obstacle course of junk mail, sand, shoes, a case of bottled water, and 3 toothbrushes maya hurled through the baby gate while we were busy[and i did fall down these steps once with maya and we ended up in the ER but we are obviously slow learners]. then take kids to miles' preschool, all out of carseats, grab maya before she grabs glass or other trinket off the sidewalk, read a story, extract paintbrush from maya's iron grip several times, maya back in the carseat, drive to kika's, out of carseat again, find lost pacifier in backseat junkyard, say goodbye. Then drive 30 minutes through the city to Argonne Child Development Center (check it out, my school is solar powered--sort of) and try and find parking. so maybe it would be nice to be my friend laura lee who just moved to Albany and can stroll both her little boys a few blocks to the neighborhood preschool). that was a lot of words to put in parentheses. anyway, we had our goodbye party, all the parents came and i will miss my little students but new babies will come in in the fall to take the kindergarten bound kids spots.

and now i am free! i can just sleep all day, and travel, and read big fat books and stay up late watching movies. well, maybe not, but i will be able to take a yoga class, maybe see a dentist, and possibly clean all those hazards off the steps. oh yes, and today miles and i went to our first swimming class at the Janet Pomeroy Center, formerly known as the rec center for the handicapped. yes, it entailed another drive across the city. this is a trippy place behind the zoo. it is a complex of a few buildings, and we took a while to find the pool, giving us a chance to mingle with a whole bunch of cognitively impaired, autistic, and physically disabled adults, all of whom seemed to be having a good time just kind of hanging out, especially one couple who were snuggling in the sun out front. no one there was obviously a staff member. the pool is mostly 3 ft deep and is about 92 degrees. miles did a lot of jumping and kicking and splashing one especially tense mother in the face, pretty much ignoring the instructor but we had a good time.

last night for a little light reading when unable to sleep i skimmed a little bit of jared diamond's Collapse. this is one of those books that explains in great detail how and why things are going downhill fast and can actually calm an anxious mother down in some ways. forget worries about public schools, paying for childcare, should we live in san francisco, pacifica, albany, fairfax, a treehouse, russian river, all these petty concerns are swept aside by images of miles and maya, strong and beautiful young folks, defending their last chicken and tiny well from a horde of starving people. should we be taking the kids somewhere they can survive global warming and societal collapse and chaos? should we be teaching them survival skills? how to desalinate water? i'm not kidding. does anyone out there know the best place to survive these upcoming events? are there communies that are preparing for big changes? this book did not help me sleep but did at least get me focussed in one direction for a few minutes. tomorrow i am going to research a little (by this i mean call my brother and suling who have already done the research) and find out where to buy the energy saving lightbulbs.

love to anyone who is reading this garbled mess. goodnight.

pennying

just took this picture while pennying my son to sleep. pennying? you may ask. well, it may seem like some kind of sick materialistic bribe, but it works for us. after being nursed or cuddled to sleep for years it was hard for miles to go to sleep alone. we tried many things--sticker charts, threats, guilt trips, some book and cd called the floppy sleep game, tying him to his bed. my friend suggested the pennies. you say goodnight, leave the room, then before he can get out of bed you come back and put a penny in a little cup and say i love you and leave
again. you do this until your little angel is asleep. for us it has evolved to a lovey dovey time. each penny miles and i say nice things to each other, you're the best, sweet dreams, sleep tight, love you forever etc etc. of course there are off nights, like tonight, when miles says he sees things when he has his eyes open (yikes), he sees a big wooden thing with rocks on the side and me and daddy and him falling down it. double yikes. so to relax miles is reminiscing in there about his childhood by looking at his baby book and i am typing into my exciting new blog. now he is curling up to sleep picturing a happy thing, in his case tonight a bow and arrow. yikes yikes yikes yikes. so will he learn to equate money with rest, love? he doesn't seem to care that much about the pennies, but now he can buy a 1$ item every monday. often he forgets.

anyway, the photo is the view from our back deck, try and hear this--many songbirds, someone yelling from the walgreen's parking lot, and, surprise another siren. our downstairs neighbor strongly urging her pug to pee in the grass so she can go inside and paint dungeons and dragons figurines. it's actually kind of beautiful in a way, all the yards and trees and backs of houses together. we have lots of hummingbirds, and a fully loaded peach tree. the weather is lovely.

hmm, i thought the photo with all the kids would go to the middle of the blog, assumed blogger had some kind of mind-reading layout person, but it went to the top. this photo is a bunch of zoned-out birthday caked children watching talking cars. at one point my son and his two buddies jonah were all touching, arms around necks, a little hand on a little thigh, as they watched lightning mcqueen work his magic. i posted it because of the 2 little girls closest to the window. eva and margo. we visited them and their parents dear angelica and james in fairfax today, for a goodbye brunch. in nine days they are moving to oxnard. in fairfax they live in a beautiful little house james totally restored (on rough weekends while angelica watched the girls) and added to, up on a crazy windy hill with fruit trees and big lit windows and a hot tub. a view of just trees and hills and no sirens to be heard. in oxnard they will be near grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins and second cousins, and will have a big house with a pool and guest cottage and learn to be little surfers. i will miss them all a lot. angelica and i had some good nights drinking together and lots to gossip about. she said i was a good mom which flattered me. james worked with rich a little bit landscaping wealthy people's yards, gave us free gardening advice, and has great rosy cheeks. they both have good travel stories. hope we will be able to visit and they won't just disappear forever. i cried after hugging goodbye today as a german wizard/magician made hula hoops into butterflies and accordions for the kids at the fairfax festival. miles asked if i was crying because i loved my friend and she was moving far away. maybe the rocks and the bow and arrow and all the little boy fears and fierceness are related somehow to seeing mommies cry about lost love. i dunno.

today in the parque unidos del ninos

we load up the fabulous new sit and stand stroller and push and walk down 23rd street to the park. the sky is blue. hello to ulysses our friendly and handsome neighbor mechanic. past the hansel and gretel house, a little house with a front yard full of flowers and plastic toys. we stop and see what is new--miles notices what he is interested in now though most of these toys have been collecting black city dust outside for years. look, a pirate flag , and there it is, a little black flag, faded, with a skull and crossbones. next past the deli with the gooey hands for sale in the gumball machine, not today dear. we ring opal jane's bell and her mother comes out with luther the beautiful black standard poodle, sporting a sleek new buzz with poofy head and feet. opal jane is snoozing, lucky them.

on the sad grass at the park is a play structure built by the black rock arts foundation. yes, burning man people. it is made from recycled materials--old tires, sticks, palm leaves, string. there is a little kitchen counter and tin can telephones but today a lovely lady who looks fresh from the playa with her gingham dress and cowgirl hat serves us fresh free lemonade and fruit from inside. cool people are milling around, i call them cool because they are people i like to to talk to, it's easy, and although we are not exactly friends we have been seeing each other here for four years or so on and off, from when the kids were innocent babies 'til now. miles and eitan immediately run together--chasing pigeons, hammering trees to make them grow better, making poop jokes. in the community garden i meet a nice couple who say they are going to try and stay in this neighborhood, it's their community. i start to go into my everyone has left routine but don't want to bum them out. they are smart and gentle and growing little vegetables. their little boy is watering plants very very carefully.

this park also has--soccer, a super loud block party once a year, a room to rent which mostly latino and chinese familes seem to do, and who offer to share the huge platters of food, and two sad stories. the old park caretaker was pistol-whipped early one morning while opening the park and suffered a badly broken jaw. and a little friend we knew from here died a month ago, a freak thing. this park has mexican ice cream men carts, "pushers" to the little sugar junkies. a wierd but pretty view of two privileged hills rising growing into the blue sky from the flats of the mission. a place to be a spider. a place to be a pirate. little metal bikes for these bikeless city kids to share. today a chihuahus is taking lap rides on the slide

time to go, we roll home.

peer pressure

well, i'm going to try and write a blog about living in the city, a city from which my friends with children are disappearing into the distance almost weekly. vroom, my best friend in the world is in the midwest. whoosh, two more friends to the distant planet of the east bay. zing, to portland. whiz, to seattle. a-OOO-ga, packing the car and heading down to a new home in southern califonia near a tribe of cousins and aunts and uncles. there are lots of people left, i know this because it is often hard to park. but i have a potent inner child, one who hated to be left alone and behind, and she wants to understand what we should do about the exodus. my old band hazy had a song "where should we live" and i shouted those lyrics so many times they have become burned in my seratonin deprived brain. as well as should i stay or should i go. instead of ruining good life hours browsing websites for bay area town demographics and rentals or torturing my husband with my circluar thinking i will write this blog and focus on what this city life gives us, and takes away. right now the little underpants heads are slumbering, the big one probably dreaming of the green electric guitar with green strap he needs (he is four and 3 months), the little one possibly dreaming of the handfuls of mud she moved across the garden today, both of their sleep background noised by pounding mexican polka like music that has been blasting all day from somewhere in the jungle of our block's connected backyards. i hear a siren go by, and a man i don't know laughing. i'm feeling already that there is a lot to write about.

my underpants heads