Where in the World...

 A friend checked in the other month:  "where are you, what are you doing?" I've stopped blogging and posting to Facebook and that's how most people keep track of me.  So I thought about it.  Why am I not communicating, why am I not connecting?  I glanced through some of my draft blogs (the whiny/sad/exhausted/introspective ones that I did not want to share), and I thought....hmmm.  But, for the sake of people who are wondering.....

I stopped blogging in spring of 2020, and previously had not done much in 2019.  I'm not sure what made me stop.  I had plenty of time and most people were documenting the hell out of Life in the Time of Covid.  But, I didn't want to think about The Former Guy's daily assault on democracy, and I didn't want to think about how circumscribed my life was.  I told people that my 3 years of being a nomad had prepared me for this, and that is sort of true.  While I traveled, my connections were mainly virtual, and my activities solitary.  But, of course, my activities were not pursued in solitude while I was petsitting.  I visited museums, attended performances, checked out towns and countrysides, shopped for food, chatted with neighbors.  Although most of my time was spent reading and knitting and writing, I did get out.  I had something to write home about.

2020 was something else.  I had no housemate and no pets to keep me company.  I visited M once a week when I picked up my veggie share.   Once I was vaccinated in 2021, I played some duets and trios, masked and sitting under the trees, but for a year my music was totally solitary.  I learned some fiddle tunes and attempted some of the Bach unaccompanied sonatas and partitas.  I practised my mini-piano.  And of course I did other things.  I folded 1000 cranes in solidarity with my nephew who was undergoing chemo.  I tried to write, walk, and draw.  I learned a bit of Norwegian on Duolingo.  I did weekly virtual yoga with my Portland friends.  I re-did The Artist's Way and started doing daily Morning Pages while I sipped my coffee.  I also did Tai Chi Chih while I made the coffee and did the dishes.  I posted a daily pic to Blipfoto. I set up a clay studio in the garage and made a LOT of pots.  (They all got fired in the autumn, when Coyote Clay reopened.)  I knitted and listened to books and podcasts.  Mom called me every day.  I lost 50 pounds.  And these routines sufficed and continue to suffice in 2021.  But they are nothing to write home about.

Eventually, things opened up a bit.  In August, 2020, I drove to TX to bring back my housemate and her pets.  In September, 2020, M died from a recurrence of cancer.  I still can't write about it.  In October, 2020, I went to Portland because my aunt had been calling me several times a week; she was not dealing well with isolation.  She had technical problems with her computer and phone and emotional problems that led to medical problems.  So, I car-camped across the West and ended up at B's house in SE Portland.  She had just lost her husband and welcomed me into her guest room for as long as I needed it.  I kept postponing my departure:  I was helping my aunt, driving her to appointments, keeping her company, clearing up technical issues.  I walked with S several days a week and saw several other friends and family, totally masked. I was reveling in B's company; it had been too long. I celebrated my aunt's birthday, Solstice, Christmas, New Year's.  I made wreaths.  I sewed a coffee cozy.  I made jewelry.  I watched spring return.

In March, I returned to NM, via a road trip with V through CA wine countries and various wild-flower spots.  I arrived home in a freak snow storm.  And here I am now.  I've been pet-sitting for pay (a mere $25/day) at the co-op and in Santa Fe, but that's the only scheduled and gainful employment I have had.  In the fall I went back to Portland to catsit for friends, and then to IL to join a sister for a roadtrip through TN to VA, where I met my nephew's fiancee.  Last month I returned to IL for a trip to Branson MO;  it was the sort-of annual Spider Reunion, but C had to bail.  On these trips I saw some family, including two of my grandnieces.

It's all good, but somehow it's not enough. And the horrible politics that I tried to escape in 2017 are still there.  It's been such a relief to have Biden in office:  no more daily news bulletins about crazy and vicious behaviors.  But, on my recent travels, I became sharply aware that the civil war is still in place:  TRUMP WON  and Fuck Biden signs were scattered throughout the Heartland.  I don't know if we'll ever recover, and it makes me sad and anxious.  And  I miss the regular travel and the distraction it provides, although I hate flying in the time of COVID.  I miss having gainful employment, although I don't want to be under someone's scrutiny and I don't want to be living under someone's schedule.  I miss being productive, although I cannot define what I mean by productivity.  None of what I'm feeling now is new, nor is the supportive feedback I'm getting.  And that's why I'm not writing about it.  It's small and boring.

My friend suggests that I look into reframing my inner monolog, which, again, is not new advice.  But how?  I want to run and hide again, instead.  But that won't happen while the pandemic rages and the borders remain closed.  So for now, I'm here in NM.  I take pix, I read, I craft, I make music.  Surely that's enough.  I'll write again when I have something to say.

The Five Senses

As I sit at the brightly colored batik table cloth,
the scents of sweet, pungent spices permeate the air;
I can almost feel them, prickly and penetrating.
(The cinnamon predominates.)

And I can almost feel the gentle plucking of the lute,
today's choice in the daily experiment,
finding a new compoer, A to Z
(Today's is Luys de Narva'ez.)

The mug I made from speckled buff cradles the warm brown of the coffee.
I savor the sip of acrid richness;
it craves a complementary sweetness.
(Is the bread pudding ready?)

Tasting touching, seeing, smelling, hearing:
all present and accounted for, not one missing.
But I float in a sensory deprivation chamber.
(If a tree falls in the wood and no one is there....?)

Not so long ago I sat at a friend's table.
We clinked glasses, we shared smiles.
I can almost feel our voices, rising and falling softly.
(I am comforted.)

Invasion of personal space

The hummingbird showed up at the feeder today.  I'm so relieved.  There was only one day of snow, but it was a long day of solid wind and fall.  The snow piled on the roof and fell with a thump that sometimes shook the house.  I bundled in my sweater, enjoying the soft snowy light, but wondered where the birds were sheltering, how the little hummers with their high metabolism could manage.  I still wonder, but it seems they are fine.  There is comfort in that.  Maybe I cannot travel during this pandemic, but they can.  And they are visiting me in my solitary confinement.  It's nice.

They are not the only travelers.  I hear the constant whoosh and hum of I-40, down below my hilltop home.  Who is out there on a Saturday?  Why are they not sheltering in place?  It's not all trucks by any means.  Clearly, people are out and about.  Not me, though.  I find myself flinching from the very idea of it, rather the way I flinch when I turn the corner to my PO Box and see a person fewer than 6' away.  I have become a recluse, and other people are a source of fear and discomfort, an invasion. 

The crowded and crazy world has been leading me up to this point.  A year ago, I sat in the top row of the Saddle Dome in Calgary, Alberta.  I felt both acrophobic and claustrophobic.  I thought about random shooters and the long crowded hike back down the beer-sticky cement stairs.  Then I thought, no, I'm in Canada, I don't need to worry about gun violence in public places.  I breathed carefully and watched the Flames fall to the Avalanche.  At the end of the game, I followed the crowds into the rain and walked slowly back to the hotel, sympathizing with the low-spirited silence of my fellow walkers, such a contrast to the pre-game exuberance walking in.  The wet streets reflected white and yellow headlights and bright red tail-lights and neon blue streetlights.  People passed me, without a glance.  As I turned away from the crowds, my nighttime caution kicked in, and I watched doorways and approaching pedestrians for signs of danger, walking briskly and attentively in the way the self-defense people taught me:  don't look like a victim, don't look hesitant.  If your spidey sense tingles, cross the street. 

I remember another spring in Portland, 30+ years ago.   A workmate and I were walking down 10th street after a quick Safeway run on my lunch break.  We were talking animatedly when an unkempt man accosted us, asking for money.  I looked at him and said, "Sir, you are invading my personal space."  I was irritated, because he had panhandled us on the way in and I thought that once was enough for one day.  The trees were budding, the sky was blue, the street was clear of litter and this person was an affront to my pleasant day.

Now personal space has a whole new meaning, and the invasion of it is more than an affront:  it is an assault.  But it's an invisible assault, not overt like the guns in the mass shootings or the muggings on the empty streets in the bad neighborhoods.  One doesn't know how to defend from it.  My mom calls me after her food is delivered, panicking because the delivery people aren't wearing masks or gloves or standing 6 ft away.  "They are breathing on my food!"  I tell her that even if she did her own shopping, she could not guarantee that no one has touched or breathed on her food, and she would have even more people standing too close.  "Just wash the items and wash your hands," I say.  You can't live in fear, I think.  The world has always been dangerous.

Meanwhile, I watch the birds, envying their freedom, and flinch away from people at the post office.