Springtime Flux

I've always gotten Spring Fever.

Every year.  It's a little embarrassing. For me this manifests as nervous energy, forgetfullness, preoccupation with pretty things, falling in love with every other person who walks down the street or sits next to me in the cafe, rushing more, napping more and eating ice cream. We're nearly through it this year, and it has passed quickly, perhaps because of how satisfying this spring has been.  I know it's boring to talk about the weather, but really it has affected this whole relocation so much and so postively that I can't stop talking about it yet.

I loved seeing flowers pop out of the snow, people poking out of their heavy overcoats, leaving a scarf or mittens home one day or the next, challenging winter as it faded away.  Spring seemed so brave and hopeful.  Last week we had a legitimately hot day, and it showed us what summer will be.  In Seattle somehow, the weather seemed more distant, unassailable, and here, it feels as though the bravery of a few hatless souls may have been responsible for the whole damn thing.  In Seattle the trees would suddenly be abloom, but here there was a nice, long, smooth budding phase that allowed us to prepare our hearts and our bodies for spring.

At work, it's a whole other type of adjustment. Now instead of the parade of snowsuits, hats, scarves and mittens, it's the process of sunhats, sandal straps, water bottles and sunscreen.  The kids are happy to just sit in the grass and stare, to swing, swing, swing to hold hands and run one way and then another.  They have each mastered something brand new on the playground in the last week; the rings, pumping on a swing, flying on their bellies on the swing, climbing to the top of a tall, tall ladder, sliding down on their bellies.  Like little spring animals learning how to walk, to run, to fly or hunt.

At home I'm trying to keep some of this energy with me as I ride my bike back.  I'm still having a hard time with so many hours of my life given away to my job and commute, but the bike is faster than the train, now, and getting faster every day.  I'm still practicing my unicycle every week or so, it's still difficult to go more than five feet or so.  Maybe I'll practice again today as I clean the house before houseguests arrive.  I finally found a yoga studio that I'm crazy about which is a few less free hours in my week, but more than worth it.  It's also local soccer season, so Z and I have attended one Revolution game, and one Boston breakers game.  We'll return to ther fort this weekend with friends this time to see another Rev's game.

This is one of the most boring posts I've ever written, but, it's what I'm thinking about.

Next time, I'll have something hilarious, thoughtful and shocking for you.

I wanted inspiration, but all I got was this adult diaper commercial with a woman doing tai chi.

Wednesday night, the email went out "Obama will be making an appearance in Seattle on Friday!" Lots of folks at work invited me (I wear an Obama button on my purse) and I carefully invited lots of people. (It goes w/o saying that most of the folks at a progressive hippy-dippy preschool will be voting for Obama or Clinton, and most of us are gentle enough with one another to not be unkind about choosing one or the other, but one must'nt offend.) I had an appointment that morning that I couldn't reschedule (Everything's fine, thanks for asking.) but I thought I could make it in. Door's were scheduled to open at 11 and I could get there by 11:15... he wasn't going to sell out Key Arena by THEN.

WRONG. It was awesome, like a big circus. The doors had already closed by the time I got there, and there were still thousands of us hanging around wondering what was next. Nobody was sure. We'd see a crowd near a door and line up behind them as easily as possible, alternately calling other people for more information or straining to hear the people around us guess about what was happening. I wandered from one door to the next pretty comfortable already with the idea that I wouldn't get in, just enjoying the mass of people. It was gorgeous.

I've been to a lot of rallies and marches since I moved to Seattle, and often there's a sense of... agency, or entitelment or something. The guy dressed like the statue of liberty knows EXACTLY what he's doing here and why it's right, and makes sure that as many people as possible can be enlightened by him as possible. The hippie family with the dirty faced toddlers carrying home made signs that say "Please Mr. Bush, use your words." are certain that the statue of liberty guy is just a Fremont freak who probably eats refined sugar and has never called his senators. The clog-ged folks from the Service Committee of Friends are tired of carrying their huge banner and wish all these johnny-come-lately folks would start donating to the people who are actually doing the work to end the war. Almost all of these folks are white, unless you're at the Black Dollar Days or the Martin Luther King Day March.

But here, at Key Arena, everyone had a look on their faces like they were the luckiest people on the planet to be here. (I didn't bring my camera. Ours is big and clunky... I've got to get a cool little one.) There were teenagers, and grandmothers, and none of us were showing off for one another (ok, the teenagers were, but it's not their fault). We were proud of each other and grateful that together we made a tremendous crowd. Our caucus was the next day, and we could look over a sea of people and feel sure that most of us (and our friends and families) would turn out to vote for Obama. A caucus is an elitist, activist way to vote and is NOT democratic but it's really inspiring, and for us all to have a little taste of what Saturday looked like made the trip worth it before Senator Obama even took the stage.

After awhile a voice came on the loudspeaker, asking us to slowly and calmly back away from the doors because there was no room inside. Again, I felt a surge of camaraderie as thousands of Seattlites turned (slowly AND calmly) and put our cellphones to our ears to check in with someone else about what comes next. They made plans about work, and transportation and who knows what else. Lots of people stayed outside and waited and hours later heard the speech through loudspeakers. I rode the bus up the hill with them later. I heard that Senator Obama even came outside to talk with them and thank them. My pal Stevie T was inside, but I had already tried to call him and had learned that it was too loud there for him to hear me. I texted him and Z that I couldn't get in. They both asked the same thing: if I was finding a nearby bar to watch in.

By the time I got their messages, I was standing outside of "Floyd's place" a barbeque joint and sports bar. I had already watched two groups of folks peer inside, say "They have tv's" then say "There's a bunch of us, I bet if we asked them to, they'd change the channel." then walk in. I looked at the menu (there is a sculpture of a pig dancing with a cow spinning above the front door, an omen "Vegetarians stay away!") and did not feel the hope of moments before. Eventually, though I went in, sat next to two dudes in Obama t-shirts, double checked and found that I could eat macaroni and cheese or nachos. I chose nachos. The place was a mad house. I am sure that they are no busier or rowdier on a Friday night at midnight than they were on that Friday afternoon at 11:30. There was only one barstaff, one floor person, one barback and one cook and EVERYONE wanted food and beer now. (Except for me, who had foolishly skipped breakfast. I didn't want beer.)

It was a tricky and exhausting thing because we all still felt this great thing about each other, but we were also waiting forever for food, and beer and our candidate. We'd heard that he'd be on at noon, so we hurried to discover what channel to watch. Everyone was nervous because most of the tv's were showing college basketball and one was on Cnn. I don't watch the news, so I was surprised to find that CNN was so ... sordid and yechy. We were all sure it'd be on KING 5, so at one point I was charmed to be sitting in a bar, watching Days of our Lives against our will. I kept thinking of how much we all said we wanted change, and yet, I recognized the "mom" as the "rebellious teenager with an evil twin" from when I was an adolescent watching the show.

Of course, folks chanted from time to time, which just wasn't nice (the Man hadn't showed up to keep us down. We were kept down by tv networks.) but felt just perfect and perfectly awful. The one guy who could reach a television kept changing the channel based on tips from his neighbors until the bartender told him to keep his hands to himself. We ended up getting the same 5 minutes of the speech from MSNBC and CNN(weirdly not the FIRST 5, or the last just a 5 minute chunk from the middle).
When they showed part of Clinton's speech in Seattle from the day before the bartender said "Because what we really need is a Mom... the founding fathers have left us!"

(The estimates say there were about 21,000 people there... 18,000 inside and 3,000 listening outside, but there were more. There were at least 5,000 people who descended upon lower Queen Anne's bars, restaurants and stores.) I went to work late, of course, and then had to describe that no, I wasn't really AT the rally, but it was worthwhile somehow.

winter storm warning...

It snowed on Saturday and then rained all day today. I helped paint our new building this morning and then took off to go to the farmer's market. The farmer's market has become such a big part of how we eat, that I've learned that I have a rough time making food all week when I can't get there, so I went even thought I signed up to help paint. (I took an extra long time, though and when I got back... they were all done! I've got to say I was happy about that.)

It was raining HARD by the time I made it, and all the vendors were huddled in he center of their awnings or tents. Everyone had the cleanest carrots and parnsips ever, because they'd been rained on all the way to Ballard! (I went to a farmer I didn't recognize, and just as he handed me my bag of food, he grabbed a parsnip off of the pile, and tossed it in, then gave me a meaningful look that I found very difficult to interpret through his beard and rain gear. I gave him a meaningful look back that was meant to communicate "Gee, thanks! What a treat!" and headed back into the rain.

I walked past the fisherman and sighed. There are these great guys who sell wild, troll caught salmon and halibut and cod and other things. I stopped eating animals, though, including fish, and I wondered if they'd notice that I haven't been buying from them in months. I walked by and one of the fishermen's friends who was standing beneath a big green umbrella remarked "There goes a real northwesterner; no umbrella or hat!" The fisherman (they all are Italian, and therefore remind me of home. They smile and are charming and have big fat fingers. I wish they sold seaweed or something!) said "where" and the friends said "She just walked on by."

I smiled, and asserted to myself that I'm a real NorthEASTerner, but at this point who can tell.

Only in Seattle

I was standing in the produce section in the Ballard Market, which is near the front door. This summer I think they hired a new produce display person because the mountains of vegetables and fruits (often paired with wine or cheese or something) have just blown me away. In any case... there's a pair of blonde brothers, struck senseless with desire. Think about how some kids who suddenly have come across an unexpected chocolate mousse cake, covered in whipped cream and carmel. The boys are probably 7 and 9. They stare at a beautiful array in front of the door. Their fathers hands are full of canvas bags about to burst.

Taller Brother: (moans softly)
Shorter Brother and Taller Brother together: Chantrelles!
Shorter Brother: (begging)Dad! Chantrelles!
Taller Brother: (whining) Dad!
Dad: I know. I see them. I'm sure grandma is bringing some chantrelles. C'mon! Let's go!

For the uninitiated. THIS is the chantrelle.

The Red Sox Won Last Night

and despite not caring a whit about baseball I'm completely thrilled.

Last night I went with some friends who actually own Red Sox shirts and hats (because of where I'm from, I have a default love for the Red Sox, but no actual interest in the American pastime) to watch the Red Sox beat the Mariners in a very dramatic game.

There was a heightened amount of "Security" going on at this game that really threw me. I watched someone's sharpie get confiscated (even though the 3 or 4 in my purse were ignored... it was enough to make me want to develop a tag while I was in the ladies room "Paste" or "Play-Doh" or something....) and then my pal got BOOTED for putting booze in his soda, (he was a kind of a folk hero to all the people in our section after a while) and the "Alcohol enforcement" people came back and officously carded two (very beautiful and youthful) women in their FORTIES which was pretty comical for all of us watching. When I worked in shelters, part of my job was a bouner-type roll, making sure folks weren't shooting up in the bathroom, or drinking beer out of a gatorade bottle, or selling drugs. I learned a lot about how to follow rules that are unpopular, but keep people safe, and the "Profit Enforcement" people brought out a sort of adolescent indignance and obstinance in me that folks who do that work should really try to avoid.

I haven't been to Safeco for 6 years, when I watched the Mariners beat the Red Sox. At that time, my pal Al almost got his ass kicked for wearing Sox gear to the game and we were the ONLY people in earshot chearing for the Sox. This time, though, you could see the bold red and blue contrasting with the kind of sissy pastel teal and purple throughout the stadium, and there was a large contingent of Sox fans in our nosebleed section. There was one dude wearing a newish Sox jersey who kept forgetting and cheering when the Mariners would score. After numerous reminders the poor bastard just stopped cheering altogether and let his ladyfriend in a tasteful white Mariners hat do all the work.

These were not all "since the world series" fans either... you could hear in the way people cheered "Sawks" that they were hahd-co-ah fans from back east. I adore being in a crowd. (Z hates them, and often feels anxious and exhausted at events like that one, but the buoyancy of the rest of us was enough to protect him from the throng.) Being in a crowd full of people all doing the same things together is so energizing to me, and to see have fans for both teams screaming their heads off, because, who knows you're clapping and jumping MIGHT make the difference.... what a rush. Anothter rush was paying $40 for a burger, fries and a beer. Wow, ouch. And then the sox one at the very last minute. It was freakin' awesome.

Radio 8ball

Last night I went to see Radio 8ball... it's a live version of a radio show. On the radio show, the host, a guy name Andras, listens to a caller's questions and then picks a Cd and song at random to answer the question and then he and the caller interpret the answer. This process has also been called the "Ipod Tarot"... tonight though, it was a live show for an audience full of barefoot women, men with facial hair, mood lighting and a DJ and the songs all came from one Jim Page.

(Jim Page is a busker/folk musician here in Seattle who has played really revolutionary and musically solid songs for longer than he cares usually to talk about.)

Everyone submits a question, and then a person's question is picked out of a box and they are invited onstage to read their question, spin a dial that is marked with signs of the zodiac. There's this big sign with the signs next to names of Jim's songs, and then he plays that song to you. Everyone else's job is to hold their own interpretation, their own intention for each question. Jim Page's songs are sometimes political... tonight the owner creator of Fishtales Organic Beers in Olympia got up and asked when she should move to New Orleans, and if she does if she should open a floating brewery there. The wheel turned to jim's song "Petroleum Bonaparte" which is an angry/funny diatribe about Oil and George Bush. Afterwards there were different interpretations... clearly New Orleans is a part of "Big Oil" and the song was saying not to participate in what's happening there... or perhaps the song was saying to wait until George Bush is out of office, or that New Orleans desperately needs more beer right away. (Did I mention that after you ask your question, you're given raw chocolate and an "Herbal Brew" filled with kava kava and yohimbe and raw honey and other herbally stuff?)

One young man (17?) asked "How do I know if I am a good person or a bad person?" his answer was called "More than anything else in the world" and the rest of the chorus was "I'm never gonna let you down". Jim Page is probably in his sfifties or sixties, and his own interpretation of this answer is that one makes a decision to be a good person. I took it a different way, but enjoyed that idea. The young man's friend's question was also picked. His was "How do you go from surviving to thriving?" The dial landed on the special "Radio 8ball" song which was sung (and written) by this Andras fellow, and it was called "I fucked a pumpkin". It was painful to watch as this young man's serious question ( I hear the word "survive" and assume some heavy shit, though maybe he was just talking about how shitty it is to have curfew or something) answered by an obscene Halloween comedy bit. People took the guy with the lost cat and the woman doubting her path of yoga WAY more seriously than this person's youthful angst, which was hard for me personally to take, because I'm crazy about young people who share their angst. I guess the Pop Oracle decided that humor and pumpkin fucking is what he needed... who am I to argue?

Another woman asked if she had a guardian angel, and the song that answered here was "Jesus and the Laughing Deity" a song about a jester-god who jokes with Christ until he finds himself off his cross, leaving behind his suffering. The guy who's cat Fargel had wandered off three weeks before got a song about Julia Butterfly and Taoism and activisim which was confusing for some of us. All the pet owner heard were the words "Jack the Ripper" which didn't bode well for him.

It was such a fascinating evening... my good friend asked her question onstage. I'd told her when we arrived that I was certain one of us would get selected... she was the last one. She asked "In what direction is my vision going?" because sometimes it gets better, but for the last three years it's gotten steadily worse. The song that she spun was about Rachel Corrie, and about not ignoring the suffering in the world. The first four lines or so were about being a really decent, loving person who changes what needs to be changed which reminded me of her partner, a great guy who I think has been the difference between "surviving and thriving" for her. I cried through the whole thing.

Afterwards, there was a great party. Jim Page was wandering around with a huge piece of cake (his birthday was last week) and looking for a place to sit, so I invited him to join us. We had a great talk. I told him I thought it'd be had to play his own music without being in charge of the show. He said that ordinarily, he had to manufacture his conversation with the audience, but in this venue it was understood, impossible to avoid and that he liked that, said it was easier. It was a fantastic thing to behold, and I can't wait to go again.

Sad News And/But I love Ballard

The sad news is this: my beautiful and loveable young cat Trinity was hit by a car and killed last week. Zak dug a big ass hole, and we put in a beautiful and edible garden (although Z says that because her body is decomposing down there we shouldn't eat them... anyone want to weigh in on this?) We spent the day crying and digging (I did almost no digging, for the record). Some dear friends (the ones who really cared about Trinity AND with whom we felt comfortable crying) came over and helped us put her in the ground. The garden is really lovely, and since trinity was THE most social and friendly cat in the universe, it has torches and benches so that we could all sit there together and drink beer and eat pizza after/while we cried our eyes out.

Also, I got some very sweet cards/letters from the Big Kids since I took the day off work. Some girls were obviously working together because they each drew a round little black cat with wings and a halo. (They obviously never met my tricky, shameless, cat, but that's ok.)

In other news, today was so lovely that I'd like to tell you how it went.
I woke up late, got a lot of coffee (a party last night left me a little delicate) and then went downtown to see Lawrence of Arabia in dazzling 70mm at the Cinerama which was tremendous, and lovely and a whole different movie because of all the immensity and vastness that is not possible on a television.
Next I had Corn Beef Hash at the Five Point. I took a nap and got up with some daylight left for a bike ride (this is the cool part). As I cruised around Ballard, I saw so many happy people. There were folks who were waiting in line at the Tractor to see some Gaelic band, and folks who were eating ice cream cones outside of Ben and Jerry's (The make Stephen-Colbert flavored icecream now!) I felt really contented and hopeful just then, all the way to my toe clips, when I heard a *really* loud and funky bassline. There was a teenage jam band (a very good one, actually) playing on the sidewalk, and a whole bunch of local homeless guys were rocking out, having the best time! I sat down behind them and took it all in.

I used to frequent the Chaihouse more, ah, frequently than I do now, because now my heart belongs to Nervous Nellies. The Chai house, however is so tenderly tie-dyed, so openly open-mic, so unabashedly idealistic and wierd that it holds a warm place in my heart. They've got this new woman there, Reverend Betty, who is all about "community". I read some of her missives, and felt pretty cynicallly that her idea of "community" was about folks buying into her big ideas. She had this idea of "Chaistock" where they'd have live music all week to raise money to get a better sound system. I'd read the posters, and rolled my eyes when I saw the pinnacle event, which was "improvisational collaborative mayhem"; my inner adolescent poet shuddered with shame.

There I sat,today, watching these really young, talented kids being treated like rock gods by some homeless guys, and some homeless guys being treated to their first front row seat in a long while I imagine. This dad and his little kid came by and sat with us, and the toddler could NOT be restrained from gently resting his little sticky hand on the snare. More and more folks showed up with coffee and sandwiches, and curry in stryrofoam and, with astonished looks on their faces sat upwind from the rabble nodding their heads to the beat. One dude with a bedroll under his arm, walked up to the chubby, dorky-looking guitarist and got really close, and then closed his eyes and started singing with his mouth wide open... no words just screamy melody that perfectly completed the music. He went along for a minute or so without a single error... this was exactly as advertised "improvisational collaborative mayhem" but REALLY. Dudes were dancing that wierd ass hippie dance, and looking like they were at a Rush concert. Men I walk by every day, who have never smiled at me, never met my eye grinned and nodded with me, let me in, shared this with me. After awhile the guitarist and bassist went in for a pop (I assume, although, really they were funky enough for a beer in my esteem...) and another pair came on up to join the drummer.
The corner/park where they had set up is at a 5 or 6 way intersection with a really long and thorough light, so folks in cars and on motorcycles got a listen too. There was this woman in her 60's perhaps in a blue sedan all alone, stopped at the light about 15 yards away from the band. She peered and squinted so intently at them, that I imagined for a moment that she might be jealous. I imagined her seeing these homeless guys all dancing and bellowing cheers on the sidewalk, these kids just tickled pink to be adored, the rest of us thrilled to be allowed a place in this meeting, and wanting.... something. I'm not sure exactly what it could be, or where she went when the light turned, but she was thinking some thoughts, I could tell that much.

I was too. I was thinking "I love you, Ballard!"

k