I woke up early yesterday to finish reading The Piano Tuner. Mom had the great idea to mail the books I’d already read to SF so I wouldn’t need to carry them on the plane. We went to Hendersonville, passed Wolfe’s angel. Ken needed to get hearing aide batteries. This is something M & K have always done. They will drive miles to get a good price on something. When I was a teenager I remember sitting in the back seat of the car going from strip mall to strip mall because this store had a good price on honey dew and this store had a good price on ground beef. I used to think that the cost of the gas might off set the savings. So we went to Wallmart to get the batteries and then we were going to Fresh Market, a really great grocery store in Hendersonville. I made a wise crack about the dearth of book stores and Mom took the hint. She took me to a nice little book store that I didn’t hold much hope for when driving past but turned out to be quite nice. Mom bought me a copy of the new Annie Proulx, in hard cover no less, and John Henry Days in paper back. We’d parked in front of an antique store that boasted having a coffee shop inside and I went in and got a double cap. I enjoy shopping at Fresh Market and I was able to talk Mom into buying me some triple cream for tonight. So I was in a pretty great mood.
I have gotten better at reading while the TV blares but Mom was also in a good mood and was shouting at the Monday night football game and Ken was reading out loud from the Wall street Journal. Why? I dunno. I wanted to stay in the living room with K because M was going to take a shower but she was waiting for the half. The phrase just three more minutes means nothing in football.
I’m already loving this book. I almost called Kristina after reading the line – “So much depends on a red pickup filled with crackers.” – a line that hearkens to her Red Spider poem that I have here and, of course they both hearken to the WCW poem.
I end the year in a complex stew of emotions. It actually makes me sad that I’m so anxious to leave. As anxious as I am to go that’s how much M wishes I would stay. It’s kind of heart breaking. I am glad I’ve been here. I do all this stupid little stuff. Cut Ken’s fruit in the morning, get the paper, take the trash out, fill the humidifier. I’m worried that all that little stuff is what wears M out.
But.
It was pretty clear within the first week that there isn’t much to nourish me here. And I’m feeling like a plant that needs water looks.
I wish I was better at feeling one thing at a time. You know. Like if I get pissed about something that K or M says I think about the stuff they’re going through. So I can’t just feel my feelings. I’m always seeing things in context. I used to think that was a good thing.
I’m not a resolution kinda grrrl. But I am given to doing critical reassessment on New Years eve and then again in June, on my birthday. Looking back at this year…well…it all seems to have gone by in a haze. I feel lucky that I’ve been able to do school and work on The Book. In six more months, baring floods, famine and pestilence, I’ll have my MFA and I’ll be fifty. It seems like it should be a pinnacle but it feels like a cliff. So I need to finish The Book and find a job and have a plan. I guess.
If there is something I want to try to do better it would be something like finding a way to be more mindful, in a spiritual sense. Maybe meditate more. Er…sumthin.
And.
There is the problem of exactly how crazy the world is and may be.
I’m going to try to go back on line later to catch some blogs as time moves across the planet. I already read one New Years eve blog and Dru may do one.
For tonight I will cook scallops, roasted Yukon Golds and spinach with apricots and pine nuts. And at midnight I’ll enjoy my triple cream and champagne. Mom eats an onion sandwich and drinks buttermilk on New Years eve. I’m going to try to just relax into being with M & K. Feel the love.
Whatever you do tonight I wish you peace. Whatever goals you set for yourself I wish you luck, What ever desires you have I wish them fulfilled.
Kiss.