Backyard Bloom

The Day that Finally Came

So, today, come 1:50, I'll be sitting (in between two very dear girlfriends) at a little Manhattan theater with a sneaked-in bottle of Caffeine Free Diet Coke and a bucket of popcorn the size of the Empire State Building, watching the long awaited Sex and the City movie. Yes, it's true: I'm a total (moved to New York 'cause I wanna be a writer) cliché, but I sweat this stuff.

I've watched every single episode--have watched on Christmas, my birthday; when I'm sad, happy, need to be writing, grading, working out; was watching, obliviously, on the morning of September 11; want, right now actually, not to be posting but instead to be sitting eating a Fudgsicle and watching some more.

Anyway, even though I already know the ending, I couldn't be happier. The thing is: Carrie has to marry Big. The entire show (if dissected from Episode 1 to infinitum for, say, "writing research") is a narrative arc of their love story. I'm glad I have pregnancy to blame, because I have a feeling it's going to be one of those weddings where I ball uncontrollably.

Okay, that's it. I'll try to spare you the popculture references from here on out...though I did hear that Jamie Lynn and Casey are expecting a girl. I bet when she grows up she'll wanna watch Sex and the City too!

Week 13

Your baby is now the size of a ripe peach:

You have much to look forward to:

This One

There are some mornings when I want nothing more than a Mary Oliver poem...

Reckless Poem
by Mary Oliver

Today again I am hardly myself.
It happens over and over.
It is heaven-sent.

It flows through me
like the blue wave.
Green leaves – you may believe this or not –
have once or twice
emerged from the tips of my fingers

somewhere
deep in the woods,
in the reckless seizure of spring.

Though, of course, I also know that other song,
the sweet passion of one-ness.

Just yesterday I watched an ant crossing a path, through the
tumbled pine needles she toiled.
And I thought: she will never live another life but this one.
And I thought: if she lives her life with all her strength
is she not wonderful and wise?
And I continued this up the miraculous pyramid of everything
until I came to myself.

And still, even in these northern woods, on these hills of sand,
I have flown from the other window of myself
to become white heron, blue whale,
red fox, hedgehog.
Oh, sometimes already my body has felt like the body of a flower!
Sometimes already my heart is a red parrot, perched
among strange, dark trees, flapping and screaming.

To Be Read after 'A Loon in June'

And then she realized it was still May...

And the rhymes seemed even sillier...

and the heart more ridiculous...

and the balloon, oh the balloon,

it was more of a laughing bobbing head

yuk-yuk-yoing its way

across the pretty blue sky.

A Loon in June

My spoon as big as a springtime moon, I sit at this old table, my cereal so cold and able, and I think, oh, if only the sink were empty, the dishes done, oh then, I think, there would be sun. In the background, some singer croons, love will come, she tells me, soon. Outside, I look, it's far from noon(!!!), but there on the horizon--at its very start--what first appears to be a stray balloon is, in fact, a big fat heart!

Note to Self

An ice cream sandwich does not a meal make;

neither do three ice cream sandwiches.

(This is what I write about when I don't want to write about

the dream and how the doctor told me she was worried

that the baby would be born blind.)

What Settles

This afternoon, I walked
along the Oregon coast
until my legs grew tired;
saw blue herons, daisies, bald eagles;
sat on a bleached-out tree
singing off-key
to a baby that's not even born
while the seals beached on the sand.

When the rain blew in--
as it does--
I sang louder,

not knowing what gets heard,
what stays, what settles
into heart and bone and--after all
those long months--finally, becomes.

The Pear Seed

"The secrets that sweep me away" writes Cynthia Ozick, "are generally secrets of inheritance: how the pear seed becomes a pear tree, for instance, rather than a polar bear."

I was reminded of this yesterday when after having sat rain-soaked in an admitting room for an hour and a half, fearing that C. would miss the whole thing because of a meeting, I was finally led back to the ultrasound room.

"This will be warm," the technician said and squeezed cold gel onto my belly. She pressed. The screen looked as empty as an unmade bed. "Hmm, fibroid."

"Is that bad?"

"It's fine," and pressed again. Then, finally: the baby. Two arms, two legs, a tiny profile, doing flips. It wasn't a plum or a lilac bush or a polar bear, it was, indeed a baby.

"Is that the head?" C. asked, and he stood there holding my hand as we marveled at what is and what will be.

At the Wake

The woman places her hands in her hair.

She has lost her husband of thirty-five years.

"He had such an awkward-shaped head," she says, "and I had just bought him two new hats for the summer."

The room reeks of lilies and old coffee.

"What on earth am I supposed to do with those hats?"

Sam Samman died on May 18, 2008.
May he rest in peace...
I like to think the sun's so soft in heaven
that there's no need for hats.

One Letter Shy of Bliss

It has been brought to my attention that this is Nicole Callahan
(with an a),
aka, Bliss:

She has many powers but my favorite
is her ability to stimulate a person's neural system
to an incredible state of ecstasy or agony,
even to the point of cardiac arrest.
How nice to know that are alter egos
are just a Google away.

Pregnancy Epiphany 1

Being pregnant is like being a teenager: your boobs get really big; you can't have wine with dinner; you don't know whether to laugh or cry, and your idea of a really good time is hitting the bagel shop and ordering extra cream cheese.

One Year Blogiversary

It's been a year since I started this thing, and I haven't even posted a photo of a winged plastic man hanging off the side of the building or told the story of the woman who used to work at the Diner in Norman and how she had her own wings made of feathers and chewing gum and tinfoil; I haven't mentioned that when I was little I wanted a tail; I haven't told you that I'm feeling a little blue today or that it's raining (again) or that sometimes I feel guilty for what I have; I haven't said I'm sorry; I haven't gone really crazy and abandoned punctuation OR USED ALL CAPS or gone a week without writing anything or decided to take a really friggin' long walk instead of staring at the screen; I haven't mentioned that I'm sometimes scared I'll just become some half-rate blogger and never publish any of my other stuff or that there are days when I just wanna stand at the sink eating chips and french onion dip in a blind daze; I haven't had any onscreen breakdowns or documented how to make a daisy chain or told you how when I was young I always thought I'd be a single mother and how now I'm a little like, whoa...love, whoa...marriage, whoa...baby, whoa...life, whoaaaaa is this pretty-little-oh-so-pretty thing my life? Whoa.But it is. And even if I'm feeling a little sad today and enjoying staring out at the rain a little too much, I want to thank you for reading: so, thank you. And thanks pappy, too, for giving me this here blue pitcher all those years ago for my birthday and for getting me to start this thing last year, and now today, for my brand spanking new banner. This past year's been such a trip to Coney Island, I can hardly imagine what the next year will hold.

Other Things (Not) Blue

Week 11:
Your baby is now the size of a large lime.

It seems I came clean at just the right time.
A blueberry was easy; the blue grape, not hard;
the rare blue plum, only slightly more difficult.
Try to find a blue lime in this town,
and you're attacked by oh-so-pretty margaritas.
I am, of course, off those (for now!).

Dawn

My favorite time of day is when the sun's just rising. It reminds me of low voices, cars being warmed up, gravel roads. There was a stretch of time when I was young that my mom had to work so early in the mornings she'd drop me off at school well before it was open. I remember sitting in the breezeway and reading my book, how peaceful it was.

The world seemed to break a little when the guard finally arrived with all those keys to unlock the heavy chain that hung from the door. By the time a handful of other students wandered in to sit in the cafeteria light and dip our plastic spoons in plastic bowls, it seemed another world entirely.

The Conscientous Graffiti Artist

Dave Ramsey coming to a 'hood near you:

All Seemed to Be Going Swimmingly...

birds chirped; the man arrived with flowers (daisies); there was indeed enough strawberry jam(!) at the bottom of the jar to sweeten up the sandwich, but then suddenly...an avalanche of essays. The woman was buried. She suspected it might be a very long time before she could again breathe without the impediment of a semicolon.

Mother's Day

Sitting on the stoop this morning, I watched father after father sneak by with deli flowers. Their wives, I'm guessing, were still sleeping. Hey, I wanted to yell, I'm a mother too!!!

But I guess I'm not quite yet or I am quite yet or what I am a mother to is quite small: the size of a plum. I'm a mother to something the size of a plum, and I already love it more than I ever imagined loving.

By the time I went to grab milk, the deli had nearly been emptied of its flowers; surely there are more where those came from. Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers (Hi mom!) out there. Enjoy this year's flowers because--come next year--I'll be vying for my share of corner store lilies.

Play with Your Vegetables!

Or...what my father might do if you gave him a head of broccoli:

Other Blue Things

The Rare Blue Plum

As in, I'm just plum tickled to know you.

P.S.A.

Transitions

It's funny: I yap all day about working on transitions--You gotta make 'em so smooth they're nearly undetectable, I tell my students--but why all the hulabaloo? Why not embrace the time of change?

Anyway, I'm going People-style on Transitions this morning.

Births:
Yesterday, my far flung niece, Alexis, gave birth to a 6 lb. 9 oz.
as yet unnamed baby girl.
Welcome to the world, little one.
Some say this makes my dad the youngest great grandfather
in the free world.

Birthdays:
My dear friend, Jennifer, celebrates another one today.

This is the woman that taught me freedom can be found anywhere--
even in a can o' nuts.
Happy birthday, my Friend!!!

Deaths:
And finally, my uncle Gene's dog, Sammy,
went the way we'll all go yesterday afternoon.
A burial is pending;
he'll be much missed.

Hope you're embracing your own transitions. Looks like I gotta transition away from the computer and into the shower...

Wednesday Night Reading

Going to be wandering aimlessly around midtown Manhattan
this Wednesday evening?
Come hear me read in this building:

Teachers & Writers Collaborative, 520 8th Ave
Suite 2020
7 p.m.

Read more about it: here.

Sunday Morning

bacon frying
cold orange juice in a pretty pink glass
fresh bread waiting to be dunked
in a silver bowl of egg and cinnamon
sweet talk with my love
and a poem

There may be better lives lived
but this morning I certainly can't imagine them.

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We interrupt this idyllic moment with a reality check: two hours later, standing in Lowe's, feeling fat with french toast and staring at multi-packs of drill bits, Lionel Ritchie blares Easy like Sunday Morning from the overhead speakers. I've got to pee; I'm late for spin; I left my water bottle at home; Just five more minutes, babe, C. says; Please, I say; Babe, he says, relax; Relax? I am relaxed. Don't I seem relaxed!?!?

Peaks and valleys, folks, peaks and valleys.

Cup o' Joe for the Little Woman

Need a little something-something for the mother in your life?Margot who guest blogged for me back when I was tying the knot
designed this most adorable gift card in the world.
Click here to buy it!

Other Blue Things

Cultivated in Europe 6000 years ago
and weighing in at nearly 3 grams each,
grapes may be enjoyed frozen
or stomped on Lucy-style
to create a little something I like to call yum.

Thursday

Extended weather analogies to depict emotional/physical states rarely work, I wrote on one student paper. I underlined rarely three times.

Chronological ordering (i.e. Mon., Tues., etc.) makes for a weak organizing principle, I wrote on another. Can you find something more compelling?

It feels like you're hiding something, I wrote on a third. Spit it out! Coyness is not a very flattering trait for an essayist.

Hmm...maybe I should stop reading now...who knows which of my other dirty habits I'll unveil?