Fiddler Jones
The earth keeps some vibration going.
There in your heart, and that is you,
And if the people find you a fiddle,
Why, fiddle you must, for all your life...

And I never started to plow in my life
That someone did not stop in the road
And take me away to a dance or picnic.
I ended up with forty acres;
I ended up with a broken fiddle—
And a broken laugh,
and a thousand memories,
And not one single regret.
-Edgar Lee Masters

On my way to lunch today I passed a man pacing in front of the Courtyard hotel. He was growling into his cell phone through clenched teeth to whom I can only imagine was his wife. His side of the conversation went like this (in a heavy Long Island accent):

“YA NOT GETTIN A BIG BLOW-UP POOL. YA NOT. IT WILL RUIN THE GRASS, IT CAN’T BE AS EASY TO SET UP AS THEY SAY, AND YA PROBABLY WOULDN’T USE IT ANYWAY. “

I could picture the woman on the other end of the conversation. She’s tired of the heat, the kids are driving her crazy, she knows they can’t afford a real pool, and she just wants some relief. She sees an ad for a blow-up pool. Maybe it’s the one I see in magazines all the time with the elephant stepping on the pool to show how strong it is. There’s also one with a big truck running into the side wall of the pool. Or maybe she saw one in a store, and the first time she passed it she barely gave it a glance. But, the more she passed it, the more the idea took root. She began to imagine herself taking morning swims, relaxing at night in the moonlit water with her husband, and of course, escaping the sweltering mid-day heat. Suddenly it made so much sense! Why spend thousands of dollars, dig up the yard, and make a such a permanent commitment? Even if they could afford it, wouldn’t summer be nearly over by the time it was complete? Why do that when, for under $1,000 you could have a pool set up in 30 minutes?

Even though I could feel her pain, I wanted to scream, "Stick to your guns, man! Don't give in! You are right, it's a giant mistake!" I would know. Two summers ago, sick of visiting pools at apartments where friends lived, where I used to live, or just where it looked like no one might notice me, I fell prey to the inflatable pool. The video showed a man and woman (a tiny little woman, at that), and two children under 12 setting up the pool with ease - in 15 minutes. Within a few hours they were splashing gaily and grinning from ear to ear. We started setting up our pool around 7:30 a.m. one steamy Friday morning in July. Morning came and went. So did afternoon. Sometime after dark, nearly 15 hours after we started, it was finally up. I was exhausted, but thrilled. My very own pool! Nevermind that you couldn't really swim in it (it was 3.5 feet deep and like 12 feet across), it seemed wonderful to me. It was wonderful for about two days. Then it started to lean, slightly at first, and then every day it seemed to tilt a little more. About a week into it, it partially collapsed on one side , spilling gallons and gallons of water over the side and under our privacy fence into our neighbor's garden. I was so sure that it would ruin their garden, but when they returned from out of town they commented on how their squash had grown so much, especially since it hadn't rained. We pulled the side of the pool back into place and replaced the lost water, but it was hard to relax in it after that, for fear it would come crashing down again. About a week later it sprang a small leak. A tiny waterfall spewed from the bottom near the ladder. Determined and desperate I placed a Kroger brand band-aid over the outside of the tiny hole. I tell you the brand, because they must make super duper band-aids at Kroger. That Kroger band-aid held that leak for over three weeks. Talk about the little boy with his finger in the dam. Every time I looked at it, I could not believe it, but it held. And probably would have held longer, but as the pool continued to lean and lean, we finally threw in the towel and drained it. My plan was to put it back in the box and return it. Everyone thought I was insane, but I'm determined, you see. We slowly drained it, took it apart, and crammed every filthy stinking part of it back in the box. The pool had been sitting on top of a big tarp, and apparently when water sits under a tarp for about 6 weeks,it makes a mud that smells exactly like fresh strong cow manure. It was a horrible stench. It took my breath. I gagged. But somehow we got it back in the box, although not as well-packed as when we bought it. Reeking of faux cow manure, hot, sweaty and dirty, we must have looked insane when we rolled the huge box with parts sticking out of the top into the store. Which may have been why the teenage girl at the counter refunded our money without any questions. So, stick to your guns, anonymous Long Island man. You are exactly right.

Wow. 10 days since the last post. That is not good, my friends. And I haven’t even been doing anything that should keep me away, other than trying to go to bed early so I can get up earlier. Which has worked a couple of times. Gotta start somewhere, right? It would be nice if I could be lucid enough in the mornings to post then. I read somewhere once that morning is a good time to write, even if you are not usually a morning person. I know that I usually feel more creative at night, and am more likely then to write or have some nutty idea that I attribute to creativity (although it might just be nuttiness), so I was hesitant to try the morning writing. The idea behind writing shortly after waking was that, having just left slumber, you would be closer to a dreamlike state than at other times in the day and therefore more likely to be creative. I actually tried it a couple of times, but only a couple of times, so I can’t exactly base any results on that. I can’t even remember the results, although I am pretty sure they included being late for work and determining that no theoretical boost in creativity was worth lost sleep. But, I might have to revisit the idea. Up at 5 and to the Y from 5:15-6:00, and write from 6-7? Sounds a little ambitious for the likes of me, but hey, ya never know. Did you ever think about how changing something like the time of day that you get up could alter your whole life? Change who you see on your way into work, how close or far you are to an accident on the interstate, what you hear on the radio, etc., and therefore changing you? It’s so hard to change, even small things like your waking hour. We really are creatures of habit, as badly as I hate to admit it. I like to think of myself as free and unconstrained from routine, but that’s just not true. Oh, I win the fight in some areas - I don’t balance my checkbook, fill my car with gas, buy groceries, renew my tags, or do household cleaning on any discernible schedule. (Now that I look at that list, maybe I should.) But it’s a rare week-day morning that Bob and Sheri do not accompany me on the ride in to work, or that I don’t hit the snooze in the morning one too many times and arrive at work later than I wanted to, leave later than I planned, and watch Fraiser re-reruns at 10:30. And I’m not exactly dashing off mid-week on wild unplanned excursions. But, I’m fighting the fight. Melissa vs. Routine. Today, Melissa -1, Routine-0. Stay tuned.

I am slowly being driven insane by a bird. (“Being?” some of you smarty-pants may ask.) Our living room has 20 foot ceilings and we have one of those palladium windows that so far serves the following useful purposes: (1) Floods the living room with light from the lightning strikes of every storm, which does nothing to quell my lighting phobia; (2) Allows me to see how the very tall and very top-heavy tree in my front yard bends and threatens to crash through the house, which does nothing for my high wind phobia; and (3) Lets in some strange blinking light at night that keeps me awake sometimes. Every day, several times a day while I am home and who knows how many times when I’m not, this bird flies up to the window, lands on the windowsill, mind you, he lands on it – he does not fly into the window by accident, he lands on the windowsill with great grace and purpose and then begins jumping up and kicking the window with his tiny bird feet. Pow. Pow. Pow. Pow. Every now and then he will peck it in frustration. Pow. Pow. Pow. Peck. Peck. Pow. Pow. Pow. Peck. Pow. Pow. In the beginning this would continue until I opened and closed the front door. The first few times I was bewildered. “What is that noise?” The next stage was amusement. “Look at that crazy bird.” Next came the questions. “Why is he doing that?” “Is it always the same bird?” “What does he want?” He doesn’t seem confused, you see. He seems determined. Determined to kill the bird he thinks he sees by kicking it, (kicking not being the m.o. I would think a bird would use to kill another bird, but really, what do I know about birds?) or determined to get in my house. Next stage: mild annoyance. This stage involved stepping quickly out my front door with a broom at the first sound of pecking and waving the broom at the empty window, empty because the bird flew away the minute I opened the door. Still, for effect, I slapped the broom up against the house as close to the window as I could get, hoping that would dissuade him. It did not. I am currently in stage five, which I like to call “Losing It.” I now burst out of my front door like a mad woman at the first sound of pecking, round the corner of my house, and scream things at the bird like, “WHAT DO YOU WANT?” and the most helpful, “GO AWAY!”, and finally the obvious, “YOU ARE MAKING ME CRAZY!” As you have probably predicted, (I am quite certain that my readers are intelligent people. Both of them. Is this reader joke getting old? Too bad, it’s still tickling me.) this has not worked. The bird flies to the tree in my side yard, perches on a branch, glares down at me, and waits for me to go away. Then he returns to kick and peck and kick and peck and kick and peck…Thank goodness for nightfall. Would you believe that yesterday morning when I left for work, this bird was sitting on top of the side mirror on my car, leaning over and pecking at the mirror? Like I said, he’s determined. Determined to drive me mad.

Today's Quote:

Oh, the comfort, the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person; having neither to weigh thoughts nor to measure words but to pour them all out, just as it is, chaff and grain together, knowing that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keeping what is worth keeping, and then, with the breath of kindness, blow the rest away.
-- George Elliot

(Notice that for a wannabe writer I'm doing an awful lot of quoting?? Hey I'm talking to you, my readers. All two of you.)

Isn't it time we met the other half?
And found out what's so great about him?
He's funny. Kind-hearted. Sensitive. Fun-loving. A hard worker. Determined. And a little, ok maybe alot, crazy.
We have fun. And we have really funny fights. Right now there is a tie for first place: There was the fight over a can of corn; the fight where we sat at different tables in a restaurant(we arrived together); and what I like to refer to as our Bi-Lo meltdown. (My favorite line from that one is "I curled my hair to come to Bi-Lo?!?!?")

So, look while you can. If he ever looks at my blog he will probably make me remove the picture. ;)

Quote for the day:

"To me, being cool is just the opposite of living. It's about not getting too worked up about anything, by being 'Nyah, nyah, nyah,' and no big deal. I can't stand that. It's such a jaded, clichéd posture to take. I get real enthusiastic about stuff. It's what I think is life-affirming." -Owen Wilson

On that note...

I'm back! Back to myself, that is. I'm back to starting new blogs(don't worry the other one has a theme and a purpose) and writing childrens' stories and starting a p.i. agency and writing a sitcom. Don't you like me better when I'm enthusiastic? What the hell was wrong with me on Monday? Note to self: Do not post on blog when feeling totally insane.

Oh it's a dark dark day. I've just been unexplicably angry all day.

"I'm a bone white flaxen haired goth of a girl...who breaks out into freckles in the sun....I can't bear the sight of the sun...I claim there's places out west where they still live by the gun.....and I melt like butter in the Florida sun... in between your fingers I run....screaming don't leave me here alone to melt like butter in the sun..........."*

OK, well maybe that was a little over the top.....how about this.....this is more like me...

"It's raining.........hands on the wall don't move. I'm getting crazy now..
The doorbell's broken and I've thrown the telephone across the room.
The TV's on..But I keep the volume down.The blinds are drawn. I like it dark in case the sun comes out"*

Or this,

"I remember a June when each afternoon
She awakened me softly with kisses and coffee
and sat naked on the edge of the bed smoking
Marlboro reds
til the rise of the moon
But I’m too numb now to dream
suspended between the handsome woman she's become
and the
need for the hellcat she used to be
I don’t see why they both can’t be true"*

And, finally,

"And I don't understand, how a girl so much like rain
can breathe so much fire???????????
She breathed so much fire................
How could she see........ through the flames?
How could she see............................................................... through the flames?"*

*Floating Men

99.9% of you that read this won't know what it is, and the other .01% won't read it! ;)

Vacation
Was there ever a word so sweet? Oh the joy, the sheer joy of being on my own schedule, or no schedule at all. Of staying up late, and setting no alarm clock. No traffic jams, no tailgaters, no road rage. No emails. No measuring my day in 6 minute increments. Now it’s over, and I’m back at work. But this year I have vowed to keep a little piece of vacation with me, a little vacation nugget I’m slipping in my pocket until September when the real thing rolls around again. I will try to live in the moment, which sounds so easy, but is so very hard for me. I will have simple meals with easy cleanup. I will work harder than ever to combat the Sunday night blues. I will get up earlier, and enjoy my mornings. I will smile more, nag less. Pet my dogs more, and worry less about bills. Take walks with my husband, and call my grandpa for no reason. I will be more social, and less like a hermit. I will stop reserving fun for the weekend only, and learn how to live 7 days a week instead of 2. We’ve only got one life, right? (unless you’re my friend Pauline :))


Oh, and I found the coolest quote yesterday on someone’s myspace. It’s from Chuck Palahniuk, the guy who wrote the novel “Fight Club” that resulted in the one-two whammy of Brad Pitt and Ed Norton together for my viewing pleasure. WoW! That’s even fun to type, I think I will do that again….Brad Pitt and Ed Norton…. Anyway, so for the quote…

"The first step - especially for young people with energy and drive and talent, but not money - the first step to controlling your world is to control your culture. To model and demonstrate the kind of world you demand to live in. To write the books. Make the music. Shoot the films. Paint the art. “

Is that great or what? I want to write the books! Or at least the short stories! So I will have to add “Go to writers group and try to really get something down on paper” to my list of walking, smiling, petting dogs and getting up early. :)