i should be there or they should be here

here is where rich is right now:

some of my favorite music and favorite people from the last 20 years. rich is somehow managing to do this, i guess it is the drive to play music that keeps him connected to his past. a fairly steady stream of sound which easily moves from coast to coast. seems a little surreal. i am here in earthquake land emailing, listening to the strangers downstairs singing karaoke, my kids asleep with stuffy noses, the dishwasher running. i would be so happy in that bar, jameson's and coke in hand, "i love you guys" to everyone. i would be overcome with nostalgia and beautiful rock and roll. i am here though, far removed.

that's all for tonight.

extremely random post, sorry

out at the marina the kids in their red and white shirts in the green grass. some running after the ball, others looking out at the sailboats, some running excited in circles like dogs. afterwards we go and play at the beach, i am an old woman with a sore heel, my son running fast along the water's edge, begging me to race the waves with him, i flash back to begging begging my parents to swim in the ocean at bethany with me, the pure pleasure of holding my dad's hand in the salty spray. i run a little. we pet many dogs and maya walks on edges of things and scratches her leg. we get sunburned.

saturday night i watched a pbs show about how amphibians, who have survived for millions of years and adapted to ice ages and all kinds of habitats, were in swift decline across the globe. some kind of aggressive amphibian virus. plus chemicals and drugs including birth control pills deforming frogs and even changing their gender. a scientist in a berkeley lab, big gold earring dangling from one ear, showed a frog in a tank who used to be a boy mating with a male, having just laid a clutch of eggs.

today maya and i wandered by the brava theater and went in spontaneously to see an amazing ballet folklorico show. a little girl from miles' class sat next to us, her brother in the show. she speaks spanish and english at home and is now learning mandarin at school. she told me she would learn five languages when she grew up. she and maya made whispered jokes about puppies falling from the ceiling into their laps. adorable little girls and boys in traditional costumes danced and stomped onstage in this fine dark theater, a big roomful of people cheering them on, the girls smiling steadily, the little boys in their cowboy and groom outfits more serious. there was fantastic mexican fold music playing, loud and pure.

this is all random writing here. maybe this is how we humans are, able to process and act on just so much. why the heck don't i put sunscreen on my kids and i when our family histories are full of skin cancer? sure i saw a man on tv telling me that the death of amphibians was a sure sign that major things are going wrong, but i just shove that information into the overstuffed the world is fucked file. sorry, that just seems like the right word. then i can go about my day and let in the sensory pleasures of music, sun, birthday cakes, my kids laughing, the sight of a red-tailed hawk chasing a bird around the sky above our deck, a bath while drinking water with spearmint from the garden, the smell of lemon tree blossoms.

this afternoon i went to hide in the garden to make a long-distance call away from my children. as i walked down the steps a robin fluttered clumsily away. i sat down on the bench and was surprised to see a whole blue robin's egg lying alone in the brown mulch. strange. i told miles not to touch it because the robin might try and take care of it, but what can it do? build a nest around it on the ground? can a bird pick up and carry its own egg? it is still lying there, glowing a little in the twilight.

goodnight

why can't i be facebook normal?

my husband is out at band practice, the kids are sleeping, and here i am at home with my dear computer. the weekend will be a swirl of soccer games, birthday parties, picnics, and the ever present background noise of michael jackson singing "abc, 123, etc."--miles' new passion.

i really miss my old friends and the close connections i once had with them.

i wanna know what is wrong with me and why i can't jump into facebook and enjoy myself like everyone else. wouldn't i feel so much more connected and close with all the people i know? wouldn't all the distance (time, miles) between me and these wonderful folks from my past melt away? i just looked through facebook for a while like a super shy guest afraid to go in to a party. or perhaps a stalker. seems like facebook would be my dream come true, but for some reason i am afraid or unable to join in the fun.

i miss you far away guys, and i guess if i went on facebook and said just that i would be a huge dork.

jd

has anyone out there seen my camera?

yes, the blog has been lacking in visuals lately. i have misplaced my camera, which is pretty pathetic.

tonight after school and work we went to the potrero hill neighborhood house to check out a fundraiser for daniel webster school. there was a drum teacher from ( i think) ghana who was full of positivity, young with a huge smile, and had lots of kids up there playing drums with him on stage. there was west african food and drinks reminiscent of the baobab. after a good two hours of kids jumping off the stage, boys attempting to scale chain link fences, binocular spy action, attempts at adult conversation, babies with death wishes careening towards gaps in the balcony railing, and maya sipping innocently on my cocktail maya and i left. it was getting cold and windy, this weather ever-changing. rich and miles stayed a little while, and with most distractions gone, miles got into it and played african drums for a while.

i have been reading alice walker essays: we are the ones we have been waiting for, which i picked up at the library. she is pretty darn radical and i makes me feel a little lazy and guilty but it is hard to not agree with everything she writes. definitely felt some of what she writes about tonight--musicians and mamas working together to make money for schools, food and music for the people there. a little bit of america spending wisely, loving children. we did manage to make it through the evening without a single kid falling off the balcony or breaking an ankle jumping from the stage.

i hear a plane overhead, loud enough to be close by. guinea pigs skittering around their cage. a siren, of course. rich spooning the last of his chicken soup from a bowl. if i try hard i can stay peaceful this evening. maybe sleep the whole night through.

garden

garden update

what is going on in the garden? the potato tower has revived on its own. i have been trying to make little windbreaks out of branches from pruned shrubs. aphids are about. new almost impossibly thin leeks coming up. small lettuces growing under the floating row cover. the giant collard green plants are finally down to two after more than a solid year of production. they have shot up and bolted and i have been trimming the stems with little leaves and eating them. turnips and carrots are small and sweet. there are some purple onions and yummy leeks still happy in the dirt after almost a year. arugula ready to be harvested. some chard, lacinto kale, and brussel sprouts trying to beat the wind and hungry bugs. a few bush beans and two asparagus plants in a bed maya dumped a big packet of wildflower seeds into. the peach tree has tiny peaches and terrible peach leaf curl, the plum tree is looking good. birds seems to have eaten the little beginning blueberries. miles and i pretty much pruned the potato vine to death today and there is a huge pile of cuttings ready to be made into some sort of fort. on the deck is a pineapple guava not doing much, some peas climbing out of a plastic bag full of dirt, a lemon tree full of fragrant star-shaped white flowers and a tomato plant growing upside down out of a green plastic bag planter from walgreens.

yesterday's recipe:

saute in olive oil: 2 very small turnips with their greens, spicy bolted arugula, the big outside spinach leaves from two plants, one purple onion thinly sliced, thin stems/bolted tops from collard plants. add salt and eat with spinach pasta and parmesan cheese.

there is a lot going on with this shady windy spot and i make little lists of garden ideas. i have given up on the fantasy of chickens, but not forever. i sneak out back on the weekends and sometimes during the hectic weeknights until the voices start calling "mommYYY??" from the house. when i close my eyes after gardening my mind fills solid with images of green leaves and brown dirt. it might not be the wisest, most productive, or most beautiful garden in the world, or even on the block, but i love it.

passing

maya was a "typical peer" at an occupational therapist friend's play group for kids on the autism spectrum today. it was fun, if a bit chaotic. this was a bigger play group than i have seen and the kids like maya were vying for turns and attention while the kids with autism were mostly happy doing their own thing and needed to be reeled into turn-taking and attending to what everyone was supposed to be attending to. a lot like work, which i don't feel like i can write about on this blog with anything close to specifics.

after the playgroup we all went to another saturday soccer game game with the starr king shooting starrs down on the marina green. a lovely day with blue skies and white sailboats briskly moving on the green bay. i saw my kid passing to his teammates and the team making some goals that way. amazing! even a few months ago it was all about him getting the ball and getting it to the goal, alone. passing it to a teammate who scored and being happy about that? a big change.

not 100% sure what i am writing about here. just something about the distance between the kids with autism i know, many quite gifted, and seven-year-olds feeling such a part of a whole that they give up their chance to kick the ball into that net willingly, so their team can get it in. a huge distance, and not necessarily one that can and should be travelled by all. it is pretty sweet to see when they get there, though. and believe me, i am not a huge organized sports fan.

maybe i can apply some of these not quite so profound observations made as a soccer mom to my work as a therapist. or maybe the allergy medication i am taking is addling my brain.

see you

i woke up at 4:30 am this morning

went out tonight to meet a newish mom friend and have a drink in the mission.

walking up 24th 6:30. there's singing chen from miles'school. a party of wise worn out looking folks in front of AA. the sounds of a church band. a couple walking by reminiscing about the loss of so many taquerias. i meet a friend of a good friend who moved away--pet his massive dog and lament our friend being across the bay and talk about planning a get-together. my friend and i meet in front of philz and end up talking to a cool older woman about homeless shelters and government and just wanting people to feel like there is hope. all i can think is that while we are capitalists things will be screwed.

we go to the homestead and have a few drinks.

walking down 24th st 9:30. a crowd breaks into applause inside the little cool gallery by the skateboard shop. i smell fir bark, weed, urine, mexican food, a crowd of homeless guys and the smell of malt liquor. three happy dudes saying i haven't seen that little homey in so fucking long! a hip girl with long hair and glasses has a foul mouth, talking about friends and their love affairs, "she shit on his chest and it was a year after they were dating and"--she and her two male friends veer into the sushi bistro which is shockingly packed with hipsters, neon lights on in the window. waiting at the corner of potrero i recall the shooting at papa potrero's just months ago and feel a twinge of nerves as some drunk inside bellows about elvis presley. on my block younger neighbors are unloading bikes from a truck into a garage where i have seen the same paintings hanging for 13 years. i think about walking back and shaking hands, introducing myself, but have not had enough drinks.

at home our good old friend from delaware we moved out here with is over, finished mixing music with rich. the conversation quickly veers to the depressing topic of him being unable to afford an apartment with his girlfriend. thoughts turn automatically to fleeing, but where. our friends scattered everywhere.

every time i walk through the starr king open space i think how pretty it is, how much i love being there. is it the juxtaposition of that open area, the waving grass, rocks, sky, the bay across one hill and the houses all over the others? or just being in nature? maya found a dead butterfly this morning, and a ladybug this afternoon. she always picks and squeezes the pineapple weed to get the scent out.

maybe this is what holds us here, that juxtaposition we can feel almost every day, keeping things new.

lucky day, music

everyone was happy and peaceful this morning. after we dropped miles off maya and i stuck around the starr king cafeteria for an amazing jazz performance from the san francisco symphony. free! in my kid's school! the kids loved it. my daughter said she "wished she lived in her school" (with her family of course) and kissed me goodbye as she out on her silver clothespin ring a little friend gave her. soon i will go get kids and then off to music class and then a school meeting, but i have a half day off to make lentil soup and be alone, listening to herbie hancock on public radio and writing this little post. maybe even a minute to fold and put away laundry, and maybe even one to lie down with my eyes closed in the middle of the day. the sun is doing that illuminating thing it does when it breaks through big grey rain clouds. the scales feeling tipped toward not fleeing on this lucky day.

it has been a rainy weekend. lucky for us there was a lull for soccer, and two birthday parties to keep the kids occupied. here is a glamorous handbag maya and i made from a pair of jeans.

maya and i went to the new potrero hill branch library on friday, and while maya spent a loooonngg time in the spacious and lovely bathroom i actually got a chance to get some books for myself. the view from this library is amazing, i could move in. i just took a bath reading diane di prima's autobiography recollections of my life as a woman, taking care to keep the pages dry.

rich is down the hall recording some eerie atmospheric guitar sounds. i am blogging, my head filled with images from the weekend, my kids, my kids, my kids. i made banana bread and butternut squash soup. maya carrying a notebook around and scribbling things crouched in a corner with sunglasses on, being harriet the spy. miles working for hours at the long table to finish count dooku's ship. the soccer game with kids from all the strands at miles' school.

our friend's six month old quieted down and then fell asleep on my shoulder today it felt so good.

maybe tomorrow there will be time to garden. rain just keeps coming down. a dog is barking, barking, and downstairs someone is learning wii drums. we will find out more about school budgets soon. i can hear faint waves of traffic and smell the freesia we picked out back. maybe someday soon i will get it together to write beyond this blog again. right now these little bits and pieces are all i have in me to share.

ready for bed post

i hitched a ride with a friend of a friend to go to a theater at the university of san francisco and watch speaking in tongues, the documentary about immersion programs in san francisco. you should check it out. definitely a biased perspective, but a very positive and loving one. there was an 8th grade boy who gave me hope about my children still being wonderful in middle school. there was a dad who made me cry--see the film and you will know who i mean. some excellent chinese middle school hip hop dancers and a lot of shots of kids at miles' school, much smaller and i hate to say it cuter.

then my two teacher buddies and i went back to the mission for indian beer and pizza at zante's and traded parent and teaching stories.

at the afterschool program miles opted today to play on the baseball team with the little little kids. i'm talking preschoolers. i am not sure if he is an assistant coach or a ringer. part of me wondered why the heck he was not down the hill with his peers and classmates playing whiffle ball and spy games and who knows what else--doing what everyone else was doing. part of me loved it watching him play ball with a 4-5 ish year old boy, being just gentle enough, and i wish i had a video of maya swinging at the ball on the tee with a metal bat, a big black helmet rattling around on her head. no bb guns in sight today, though miles found some little plastic pellets on the ground. sun shining, kids hitting balls, kids flying kites, how can i be so scared of something bad happening here? our pizza and beer talk brought up some anxiety--my friend works at a school that just had a big shooting nearby, but what i say when we talk about safety is that no, i will not sacrifice my kid's safety as a trade for learning to be around people from different cultures, but what i can do, and am trying to do, is trust people who deserve trust. if the director of the afterschool program with bb guns tells me he knows the kids, and the families, and that it is safe, i can take a leap of faith and believe him. what else can we do and not go crazy?

break

the photo is maya and my shadows, together in the morning in the starr king open space after dropping off big brother
it was a sick spring break. not sick in the good way, just the sick way. despite the assorted germs we did get a good dose of science museums, some quality puttering around time, a day in sonoma with grandma j, and a journey to the always amazing point arena. we slept in the shack, listened to lots of music, used the outhouse, bathed in the bath house, walked in the wet woods, listened to more music, made paper dolls, cooked on the fire and the woodstove, looked at brian's cool collection of books with wierd photos, doted on the dog and cat, saw some stars, got very wet and muddy, and listened to more music. i found a big four leaf clover.

what we did not do while staying at brian's in point arena: drive anywhere, touch a computer, hold anyone's hand while crossing the street, hear any gun shots or sirens.

last night in our warm cozy beds, the usual fan/white noise blasting to block out the white noise of cars, trucks, buses, yelling people walking by, stereos, i could not help thinking of how in point arena we fell asleep just listening to the rain hitting the roof, music floating over from the dome, a few random laughs and dog barks in the night.

at brian's miles was reminded of guns a lot--there was a gun that shot little plastic balls about 10 feet, and an old non-working wooden gun hanging above a door. miles innocently almost shot himself in the face with the plastic pellet and needed lots of reminders not to point at anyone. he was also kind of a general nut, and seemed kind of lost, trying to figure out how to act and not quite getting it right a lot. trying to be a cool big kid, trying to be silly and funny like his little sister.

when it comes down to it, my big worries (two posts ago) about bb guns at the playground are mostly about my kid himself. of course there is the lurking fear that he would be hit by a bullet from a real gun, and there might be a slightly increased chance of that happening in the neighborhood of the latchkey program. that fear is real. but the freak out about bb guns is more--does my boy know how to make choices on his own that are safe and good? many adults don't, so how would he? there does not seem time enough to teach these things. i am afraid he doesn't get chances at school to make important choices.

i tried to tell him tonight how he could be cool and still his funny self. how he didn't have to act like his funny four year old sister for us to laugh. that he didn't have to be a cool guy like the big kids he sees after school. that he could be his own cool and funny guy. i tried to give an example of how he was a conductor at the music class we are taking. how he followed the directions and did a good job. how he made the kids smile but not bust up and go crazy. i think he got it, maybe. he was trying to understand.

hard to grow up, and hard to help! long ago for thousands of year it was just kids following the adults in their families around, or the big big kids who behaved like adults. now the kids are away from their families all day, in some nether world of kidness with not quite enough resources to guide them up. at least that is how it seems from my attached parent perspective.

right now it is time for long bath and then maybe, finally, some procrastinated work.

night night

xo

me