The novel is coming along. I am still at my mom’s house, but things are somewhat less tense, and I’ve been doing a lot of writing and a lot of cooking.

I had a great time cooking. My favorite thing so far was pumpkin soup cooked and served in its own shell. Thanks, Barbara Kingsolver, for the wonderful recipe. Here’s a picture, and then I’m going back to the novel.

It is the middle of the night. I am now the proud owner of:

- a lovely apple pie
- a pumpkin soup cooked in its own shell and which we’ll serve tomorrow in its own shell
- Two pumpkin pies

and, most importantly,
18,713 words put together in mostly sentences, words which run together in a manner of a chicken whose head is parted from its body, but are words none the less. You put the words on the page, you move on. One word, then the next one. This is how they all do it.

Those heroes of mine. That write. They were all here first. I am imagining Neil Gaimann. He’s got his pen, his notebook. Did he have a pumpkin pie in the oven, filling up the room with warmth and spicey goodness.

Baking. Writing. Making Soup. Writing. Washing Dishes. Writing.

Write.

Write.

Write.

I am going to bed as soon as this last pie is out of the dang oven.

Oh and as soon as I get the chance, I’ll upload some pumpkin soup photos that I took along the way and I am sure Barbara Kingsolver won’t mind if I share the recipe, as she has it online as well.

Oh and she’s another writer. I bet she DID have a pie in the oven from time to time while she puts words on the page. One word, then the next.

Oh and then there’s Annie LaMott. She is completely nuts, and I love her. Bird by Bird – that is the book of her I read that was really about putting one word down and then the next one. She also wrote Operating Instructions, which is HILARIOUS.

Words, and then a few more words. I feel like I am cheating on my novel, writing this post. What! Words that aren’t part of the novel? Not right. No! Hehe hehehehehehehe….

Insert exhausted cackling here.

Be afraid, be very afraid.

I am supposed to be adding words to my novel (16,880 right now) but instead I am a bit distracted by the miserable whining sounds that Carla is making upstairs. We are at my mom’s house, and Nonna has decided that Carla’s hair needs a wash.

As a matter of fact, her hair is indeed quite greasy. It has been, ahem, a while since her last shampoo. She does not like getting her hair washed, but Nonna would never let a little thing like someone else’s feelings get in the way of what she thinks should be done.

We arrived here last night, a little before midnight, the girls and I. It was an easy drive, just about 2 hours and 15 minutes, and I was hoping we’d have a really relaxed visit. So far, it is mostly okay, but I am really looking forward to tomorrow when Drob and Cammy arrive. It’s like I’m all alone out here and I need reinforcements. I need to look over at a sympathetic face, and roll my eyes. I need the protection that having my peeps around me will give.

My mom tends to be more snide, more bossy, more annoying when there’s no one around to buffer her. Why do daughters and mothers clash so? I know this isn’t just Her and Me – it’s many mothers and daughters. And as the mother of two daughters myself, I have to say I know that there will be some clashes, have already been some clashes, especially with my little 8 year old pre-teen.

Carla just came downstairs, and announced “Nonna made me take a shower!”

Me: You smell good.

Carla: That’s because Nonna made me put this body wash stuff all over my body! It made me itch all over my back!

Me: You washed your hair?

Carla: I didn’t want to! But yeah. Anyway, I’m going back to my weaving.

That’s another thing that’s annoying as hell. My mom always gives the kids a ton of little fun things — coloring books, hair accessories (2500 hair thingys ! in a bag!), and small toys. Nice, right? Sure, that’s really nice, that’s not a problem. Clutter worries aside, I think it’s perfectly fine. But then the kids trash her living room with all the little things that she gave them, and I have to spend a bunch of time helping them with their new wooden looms, and teaching them basic weaving, and Nonna goes and gets all surprised and annoyed that her house has crap all over it. Yeah! The nerve! These kids, messing up her house with all this stuff!

Carla has short hair these days, and doesn’t use hair accessories. So she decided it would be fun to string the little rubber circles together to make a chain. A long, long, long chain. I could have told her no, sure, but by the time I even noticed (I’m trying to write a novel, you know) she had already had a long chain going. I decided that was okay. It wasn’t technically wasting anything, after all, we can just unhook the loops from one another when we need to. So what?

So, Nonna wasn’t much pleased with that, either. Tough nuggies, really. Feh.

I haven’t been liking the way that she’s been talking to me, or to the kids. It’s not AWFUL or anything, it’s just not that nice. It’s a tone of voice that is ordering, or commanding, rather than asking or inviting. Instead of, “dinner’s ready! C’mon everyone!” — it’s “Pannn, come over here for dinner.” It doesn’t really read clearly when I write it down, it’s the inflection. It is the way my name is spoken. It is the same way my name was spoken throughout my childhood.

You. Do. This. Do. That.

There’s nothing humanistic about my mother. She’s all surface, shallow to the core. It’s like she has zero empathy or something. I don’t know. Maybe I’m just a little sensitive. But that’s how it’s feeling to me.

There’s also the irritability I get from just being in her kitchen. I made pumpkin bread this morning, oh yum! But it took a long time to make it, because as crazy and disorganized as my kitchen is, at least I know where everything is. And I bake. My mother, does not. So she’s got the flour over here, and the baking soda way under there in this other cabinet, and the spices are all in another place, and the mixer is off in this other corner, and I could not find a whisk to save my life. It was frustrating.

On the other hand, the pumpkin bread came out really, really, well. I will be doing more cooking once I get the kids to go to sleep, which is what I must do now.

I just went into wordpress admin to moderate the 93 comments that were pending. 100% of them were spam. It has been 12 days since I blogged at all. My previous post had zero real comments.

The novel that I’m working on for NaNoWriMo.org has 11695 words so far. To “win” I need to write 38305 more words in the next six days.

I have been occupying many hours with cooking pumpkins. I have fallen in love with pumpkin. Pumpkin pie. Pumpkin bread. Pumpkin soup. For Thanksgiving, I am going to attempt Barbara Kingsolver’s Pumpkin Soup served in its own pumpkin shell. I am very excited about this. I have no doubt that we’ll make something yummy, though I worry it may well be a huge mess, especially if I overcook the pumpkin shell and it spills all over my mother’s pristine Thanksgiving table. That is my biggest fear, but eh! Who cares! Pumpkin soup in its own shell! How romantic is that!!! Maybe I should put that in my novel, too.

As for writing 38,305 more words in the next six days, I have some doubts. If I were to receive some encouragement, dear internet friends, that might just do it for me.

Today I sat waiting for a dental cleaning appointment and squeezed out 1000 words or so, just in the 45 minutes while I was waiting to be seen. I think can do this, I just need some motivation.

I’m begging you, oh wide world of internet-addicted souls, please, leave me some comments. Your words will help spur me to write my own.

Pretty please?

And if you do, I’ll put your name on my Thank You page at the front of my book!

Is it the caffeine? I don’t know but I’m feeling hyperactive and jumpy. I need to do this, do that. Mind’s racing.

I just stopped home from school, having spent more time than I meant to at school. A homeless woman has come into our school, asking, please, could she use the bathroom. We said yes. 20 minutes later, she finally comes out, having not made it to the toilet in time, and having tried to clean up the bathroom floor with handsoap and toilet paper. She apologized. I appreciate that she tried to clean up. However, the bathroom reeked of human pee (from her body odor) and the floor was all sudsy from the handsoap. She left. I mopped, and disinfected the whole bathroom.

I can has Gold Star, Please?

This blog is getting neglected along with every damn thing else. Dishes. Laundry. It turns out that I’m 100% responsible for these things at home. Nobody else has to clean. Or cook. Or shop. I have to. Because I’m the one with all the free time. EPIC FAIL.

Why doesn’t this make sense to me, when it makes sense to everyone else?

I am so hyper and jumpy but also not productive.

Great Granny finally decided she’d stop driving and is giving us her car. It’s a 1996 Toyota Corolla with an incredibly low number of miles on it (<50,000). A few bangs here and there (thank god she's stopped driving it before she got hurt or hurt somebody!). So I have to take this car to the shop to have its inspection. We'll be taking over the insurance, registration, etc, pretty soon. Great! now we'll have two cars - which will make life more convenient for those times when the adults all have to have a car.

We’ve gotten by a long time with just the one car. I am proud of all the walking and biking that happened because of the one-car situation, and I hope I won’t stop doing that all together.

Gotta go. Bubblin’ over, and going to drive to the shop, leave the car there … and WALK home.

*EDITED*
Actually it’s a 1997 Toyota Corolla.
And I got to the shop too late to drop it off, and will try again on Wednesday.

Hello world.

It has been slow around here, with the blog, hasn’t it? I hope I haven’t lost too many readers. (Not likely, since I think I’ve got few enough to start with anyway!) I am going to try to blog more frequently, and with brief posts that capture some of what I am going through.

In the spirit of JUST WRITE SOMETHING, I am also planning to participate in NANOWRIMO. Know what that is? It’s the National Novel Writing Month, which is November. I will attempt to write a novel of 50,000 words or more in November. Yeah, that’s a lot of words.

I also want to try to go to the pool twice a week, and swim for 45 minutes.

Which one of these goals is more likely to be acheived, I wonder? Perhaps both??

What is bringing about these ambitions? I don’t honestly know, but I think they are partially attributable to my desire to NOT have this be another autumn in which I get depressed. I also am motivated by my recent weight gains to DO SOMETHING.

I happen to be of the opinion that blogging about weight loss is very, very boring. I could lose 45 pounds, but I still would think that the most interesting parts of what my life is about are entirely unrelated. How I look in a tight fitting dress is really irrelevant. I like being funny, thinking up creative projects, having fun with kids, and eating yummy foods. So who the heck cares what I weigh, and if I lose any weight or gain a few pounds?

Folks, the truth is that it comes down to my health. I am looking around on my family tree and I wince at what I see. My dad, along with his three sisters, are all diabetic, and overweight. They may all have heart problems, too, and at least one of them has had cancer. I am the youngest of the group of first cousins to which I belong. Many, many of them are very overweight. So when I noticed my belly kind of sticking out above my jeans, I was kind of alarmed.

Hello belly? Where’d you come from? Genetically speaking, I don’t have too much of a chance of avoiding getting fat. But I don’t have to take that lying down. I will take that doing laps in the pool instead.

I bought myself a bracelet today, a cute little beaded thing on elastic, which I could have easily made myself. It wasn’t expensive. But I bought it because I decided that wearing something on my wrist would be my visual reminder not to gorge myself on things that will add to The Belly. It will remind me to schedule pool visits into my weeks. It will remind me, in November, to write, write, write.

Meanwhile I’ve been utterly obsessed with the election. If you just asked yourself “What election?” then I would like to know what rock you are living under. Those who’ve been reading this blog for much time at all will know I’m a Swing State Liberal Voter. I keep checking the polls and seeing blue. I am happy about this.

Today I even listened to some conservative talk radio. I was DELIGHTED by what I heard. They were attacking Barack for association with Ayers, a so-called terrorist. Hah! The McCain campaign has NOTHING to stand on, and all they can come up with is lies and distortion. I love that. Then this silly conservative talk show put on some mock campaign commercials in which they hightlighted the issue that Obama is pro-choice. Yup, he sure is. And so is the majority of the citizens of this country, who believe in a woman’s right to access to reproductive healthcare of all kinds. Obama WISELY leaves the decision about when a human life begins to the realm of religious leaders.

Finally, this financial crisis is pretty scary. I hate to admit it, but I don’t really get it. I mean, what I get is that greedy investors overdid it, and made some stupid moves, and now we’ve got an economy that’s really zarked. That much I’ve absorbed. I’ve listened to NPR. I’ve listened to This American Life, and Marketplace. And smart people who get this stuff have talked to me about it. Why doesn’t it stick in my head? I know enough to be scared. My mind keeps coming back to the idea that the day could come when I need to grab my family and head off to live in the country, growing my own food and clobbering Bambi in order to survive. Could I do that? I honestly do not know.

So that’s where I am this lovely October day. With some dirt under my nails from having put some Shooting Stars bulbs in the ground, a plan to write a novel in 30 days, and the hope that I can get my body back under my control, I am smiling at the on-coming season and hoping it treats me well. I think it will, if I will treat myself well. And if the world’s economy utterly fails after Nov. 4, at least I’ll have a novel-in-progress to distract me.

We went to the shore yesterday to celebrate Drob’s birthday. It was gorgeous; a perfect beach day. We were loath to leave because we were having so much fun flying our kites in the strong breeze off the Atlantic. Consequently, it was late when we finally returned home, sandy and sunburnt, and utterly unprepared for the fact that MONDAY was coming, ready or NOT!

In spite of our fatigue, we managed somehow to get to school on time this morning. We even walked there. Our car is still in the shop, and they are still working on repairing it. Apparently the reconditioned radiator that they put in today was leaking, so they need to procure *another* one. Luckily I was able to borrow my MIL’s car, though I am sure I’ll need to get it back to her tonight, or early tomorrow.

I picked up our CSA delivery today, and added a huge variety of squash, some gorgeous yellow tomatoes, kale, chard, a dozen pears, and parsley to the bushel of tomatoes I bought on my way home from the shore. I couldn’t resist — $10.95 for so many juicy, ripe plum tomatoes. I have been wanting to learn how to can. Here, I thought, is my opportunity: I want to make a huge batch of tomato sauce and can it.

I also started making a batch of salsa using tomatillos from my garden, plum tomatoes, and what I thought were relatively mild jalapenos. After cutting up the peppers, I washed my hands thoroughly. I was utterly surprised, therefore, when while I attempted to floss her teeth, poor Carla started screaming that the floss was making her mouth go on fire.

Drob and I looked at each other in utter terror. Was she having another PTSD-type episode? Could it be? Was she freaking out because of the way Drob had held her head as I flossed her teeth? Finally it dawned on me that I must have still had some oil from the jalapeno peppers on my hands, and just touching her mouth caused her to react to it. Immediately I touched my tongue to see if that was it; and sure enough my hands are really, really spicy right now. Poor kid! She is NOT used to such flavors.

Although I felt really bad for making her miserable, I was so, so relieved that it wasn’t, you know, a mental freak out. A glass of milk, some ice, some time, and she will be just fine. As opposed to needing 6 – 8 months of therapeutic play sessions!!!

I’ve been a little reluctant to post a new post after that sweet, sweet letter that D wrote me. I just kept coming back to my blog and re-reading it. I know that I am loved. I will be fine. We’ll get through, it, whatever it may be.

Yet life and its insecurities rage on. I don’t know if it’s safe to write about using illegal drugs on one’s blog, no matter how anonymous it is (and this one’s not all that successful at anonymity!) So I am only going to say this: that if I were to be the sort of gal who enjoys a puff or two of a relaxing kind of smoke from time to time when the kiddos are safely put away on their shelves, then now would be a pretty good time to seek such relaxation.

In fact, D and I are both pretty anxious right now. I hadn’t mentioned this before (probably because of denial, shame, or whatever) but we’re being sued by the lovely city of brotherly love. It’s because apparently our accountant made a mistake on our 2001, or maybe it was our 2002, tax returns. It seems that our city taxes were not filed, or not filed properly.

Since I’m someone whose eyes glaze over and ears seemed stuffed with fluff whenever taxes are discussed, I honestly don’t fully get what happened, or when, or why. I just know that our tax situation requires that a (new) professional accountant deal with it. In order to avoid the $5000 fine and being required to appear at a hearing, the city requires that we file (or re-file, if it was filed) no later than three days before the hearing. If we do, the hearing’s cancelled, the $5000 fine is avoided.

The hearing is August 11. When we’re in upstate NY on vacation. Talking to the accountant’s office today, he said they’d get right to it and work on our taxes. Um… please hurry the fuck up, ok? I mentioned to the clerk I spoke with that there’s this little $5000 fine we’re trying to avoid, and the little lawsuit we’re trying to have dropped… and the best he could say is that they’re going to get started on it right away.

Anxiety much? Now you can understand why I might just be interested in something that might take the edge off. Ease the freak-out a little.

I am also anxious about packing for our vacation (remember my little problem with packing for a ONE NIGHT STAY recently? Well how’s about a two week trip to the middle of nowhere NY where you have to drive 30 miles to get anywhere civilized?) I am perhaps equally anxious about preparing for next year and working as the after school teacher at this wonderful little school. It’s like being pregnant in a way. You get to this point where you suddenly remember OH SHIT! I’M GOING TO GIVE BIRTH! AM I READY FOR THIS?

The fact is I am NOT ready. I am far from ready. I also am not feeling ready for the simple daily life functions of getting my kids up daily, dressed, fed and out the door to go to school on time each day. I am not ready to pay my business bills, either. I really need to do much more, or else face serious consequences.

It’s also 11:52 AM and I am not ready to feed my kids their lunch today. I didn’t get them an adequate breakfast, yet, either, though they both ate something.

And here I am just lolling in anxiety to the point where I wonder if it would be a good idea to take part in some kind of relaxing herbal refreshment (what my pals and I sometimes called it when we were teens).

I need to get my shit together. Perhaps the first thing to do is get dressed and go buy some food. I’ll need some snacks later on if I go with the whole herbal refreshment plan, anyway.

I think cooking with a crock is awesome… even though I don’t know what I am doing, things seem to turn out yummy.

(Hey, kids, this isn’t a restaurant. You’re getting what I cooked for dinner and you’re going to like it.)

That approach isn’t all that successful, but hey, if they’re hungry, they’ll eat, right?

I had an anxiety dream about my job that starts in the fall. In my dream, the school year had begun, and I forgot to show up to work. Instead, I tried just picking up my kids and going home. I was greeted by all the kids there at school, who were all hungry and tired from their first day of school. What’s for snack? was the constant refrain. It was then I realized that I was supposed to be their after school teacher.

And I’d kind of forgotten to prepare for that, as I also forgot to show up to the job. I rooted then through the pantry, trying to find some snacks left over from camp. Then I tried to get the kids to do some kind of activity. The hostility from the older kids was intense. They rolled their eyes at me, walked out of the room, snickering behind their hands. It was awful.

When I woke up from this, my heart was beating kind of fast. I realized with a jolt that the summer is halfway gone. What am I doing this summer, I asked myself? My life is so disorganized. I have no structure. I am not taking care of business, and I’m not getting this place ship-shape. I am not planning ahead for the fall.

That dream was a wake-up call. I need to get myself in order. But I feel really stuck, paralyzed. I don’t know what I can do to get out of this feeling of trying to move a mountain. I am just able to get to OT appointments and provide three meals (sometimes just two) to the kids each day.

This is not an easy place to be, mentally. I feel really stuck.