I CANNOT SLEEP

After much yawning, and weeping through the yawns, I finally lay down to sleep, but sleep will not come. The yawns and tears have stopped, but here I am, worn out from pool exercises over at Davies... having to go back tomorrow (today) to see Michelle and do more exercises, yet I cannot sleep. Too late to take one of those lovely sleeping pills some doctor gave me, as I do not want to sleep through my appointment with Michelle... and to add to the nightmare quality of it all, Sylvia is and has been, up, yowling and getting into everything I tell her to stay out of. Going over and sticking her paws into the venetian blinds, climbing down behind the TV, leaping from chair to chair to windowsill, all the while sounding like the worst Siamese in heat. She is neither of those. Perhaps I shall soon be singing a little song similar to Loudon Wainwright III... "Dead Cat In the Middle of the Road..."  Of course, a lot of it is because I had the nerve to go out without her and be gone all afternoon... then come home smelling of pool chemicals to my little darling who now thinks since she slept all day, I should stay up and play with her. I love the night, the quiet, the moon when you can see it, the stars which I wonder if I shall ever see again, the way stories used to flow out of me... ah, will they ever again??? But not when I am expected at a therapy appointment in the early afternoon.

Besides, the night now seems to simply entangle me in all the sad memories of past love... oh, Kirkie-boo, where are you??... and burden me with thoughts of all the things I should be doing... putting together all the S.F. poems and drawing a foggy cover for a book I may never get put together... although I do have a mock-up of it lying around somewhere... or even finishing the long ago set of 35 handmade books of mushy love poems that actually were written in the old, olden days BK... the after ones are much better, less mushy and sometimes quite funny. I guess I really do write a little bit like Billy Collins. Funny that I still haven't lost my sense of humour... and remain true to my English heritage... I love to spell the English way... like the 3-Day Labour Day contest. Always cracks me up, as it is run out of Canada, but done on a U.S. holiday weekend. I wonder if Canada actually has a Labour Day... I know it isn't on ours anyway. Wonder how they will like my 100 page conversation. This year my 'novel' was about 2 people mainly... primarily done in a long conversation, the two of them meeting, getting to know one another, stuck together by circumstance, talking and talking and talking. I was always told that I write conversations well, so I decided to try doing just that in a whole book... well, the size of a novelette, but certainly LONG.

I really should try to send the Cece story out... unfortunately there aren't any of the women's magazines that we had around when I was young, where it might fit well. I can see it being illustrated by that great illustrator who worked for Cosmopolitan when I was a teenager. Funny, I cannot remember  his name, and I adored him when I was a kid. His men were all unbelievably handsome and the women all gorgeous, and I knew his name and his bio... now the only thing I remember is that he loved women who wore BRIGHT red lipstick and nail polish. Of course  he did... he drew them all the time. Should send out a lot of stuff... god knows I could use the money to pay for fixing the slats on the bed and a dozen other little things that need to be done, plus all the mice I am surrounded by and other little jade thingies I should not have been bidding on in the middle of other nights I could not sleep. Don't do it, Peggy... don't look, there will always be something precious you, like little Markie...NEED. (I need it, Ma, I NEED it!) Oh, don't we all, dear one, don't we all.

I need to go and see that adorable new baby, Max. Well, and all the rest of the crew. I do have the most adorable grandchildren anyone ever had. They are bright, beautiful, handsome and funny. If I knew how to do it, I would put the darling little videos Callie sent me on You Tube... one of my friends who saw the ones she sent me said that's where they belong. If I knew how seems to be my eternal cry these days... I have not kept up with the electronic ease one must have these days... I don't know how to do anything with my phone... it has a camera and all sorts of other stuff that I don't know how to use... I haven't hooked up the video/dvd thing Whitney got for me to use with my TV, nor the clock radio, nor the little answering machine for the phone... oh lordy I NEED a grown up GRANDCHILD... or at least a nice man friend who would come over and help me out. But no... I get a Donald, who couldn't do anything but leave a trail of cracker crumbs all over my house. I am still sweeping them up once in awhile. Where are all those engineers I turned down for years... I could use you now guys. No, not really, although .......

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow... ah your Shakespeare..... he should haf been a Russian

To die... to sleep... but in that sleep of death what dreams may come when we have shuffled off our mortal coil......must give us pause....

Today is called the Feast of Crispian... he that stands with me today shall rouse him at the name of Crispian...... and gentlemen in England now abed, shall count their manhood cheap, whilst any speak... who fought with us upon St. Crispin's Daaaaaaay. (I love 'whilst')

oh dear..... I am losing it. I used to know all the great speeches from Henry V... and dozens of others from Shakespeare, by far my favorite writer. Perhaps that is where I learned to write great conversations..... and I should (again!!!) get back to my play for Alec Baldwin... 2 people talking and talking and talking... my idea of fun................... say goodnight, Peggy.................. good night Peggy............................

Get Rid of Professional Politicians

I don't suppose many people will see this, as I don't suppose many people read or even see this blog, but I shall write it anyway. Now that Boehner has finally decided to stop saying he hasn't had a conversation with the president, shut up and stopped listening to the moronic part of his 'party' (the so called 'tea party' group), I just want to weigh in with my feelings. Actually, my only feelings on this are that hopefully, everyone with any brains will vote against ANYONE who has ever supported Boehner, the 'tea party' or anyone in the far right wing of the republican party. Remember, oh ye who have lived through this... who they are! Now and forever, AMEN.

After having to look at the smarmy, shiny faces of Ted Cruz (does he grease it up before he spouts his trash?) and Michelle Bachman for the last couple of days, I am almost ready to drag myself out of the house and run for office. I am not happy with ANYONE in Washington, D.C., and I personally, feel we need to clean Congress out of the building they NEVER seem to have time to go and work in. We have a Congress that is a non-working body... at least for us. They are all working for themselves, palling with the lobbyists and billionaires to make sure that they will keep getting money to keep their miserable jobs until they are able to retire on full pay with free health benefits, and a job waiting as another lobbyist, so they can stay and play in Washington... the party capital of the world. Am I disillusioned with our government and its people......

 I think you might possibly... or certainly, say that I am.

That Must Have Done it...

Here it is around a week later, and I'm fine. Happy as a lark, singing and feeling really happy. Guess getting it out about feeling miserable must work. Well... I'm back to having purple hair, so people see me again. Even had a guy delivering some poor old man into an ambulance, shout out to me, "Hey, I love your hair... nice, goes with the outfit, very pretty," when I was waiting for my cab after my therapy session. And, have had a series of wonderful cab drivers this week and last. Couple of days ago I was going up to Davies in a cab and the driver was playing a wonderful Jobim album. I told him I had been listening to Jobim at home and how much I admired his music. He said he should make me a copy of his CD... I didn't think any more of it, and a couple of days later, Michele and Monet handed me a CD from the little box at my door as they were leaving my apt. It was Jobim... and I couldn't imagine how it got there... so when I was going out to get the mail, I ran into Linda, the girl who handles tenant stuff in the building. She asked me if I had gotten the CD she left at my door... that a young cab driver came in and asked her to give it to a nice older woman with purple hair... and of course she knew it was me. Wish she had just told him where my apt was, so I could have thanked him. He was a darling. 

Then today, I had a darling Hispanic driver who lives out in San Bruno and told me all about his garden and fruit trees, and I told him how to make Hungarian fruit soup... we had a ball driving up to go to see Michelle Spicer, my terrific therapist, who almost killed me exercising. Then... amazing... the same cab driver picked me up to come home and gave me a big hug at the end of the trip. I love the Luxor Cab drivers, they are such fun. Everyone I met today was sweet and kind and interesting... life is good, after all. And Michelle got me in the pool classes for four more sessions... hooray! Now I have to do all the exercises she has given me EVERY DAY... and get out there to the lobby daily and get on the recumbent bike. My poor old back may wear out, but I promised... and I don't want to be like Kirk, and forget half the promises........

And... I have a new correspondent who bodes well to become a friend. All this exercising and letter writing will keep me very busy for some time... and has obviously cheered me up. I guess I do need to get out and see and talk to people... or at least write to someone. I probably should do something about starting a poetry group... and maybe even a social group for older people, as I have discovered a lot of old guys on OKC live in this neighborhood... what a surprize (oh, there I go being English again.) Oh, I am sure they wouldn't like my calling them old... but they are. I have to find out how to put different fonts on here!!

Wasting Away??

Doggone... sometimes I feel I must be getting close to death. First, I hurt all the time... I mean really hurt. Pain in the back, bad, and now the old feet hurt most of the time, there is pain in the hip, even my left breast hurts some of the time; it's like the whole damned left side hates me. And I’m not much good with pain, although I am sure getting a lot better than I used to be... gotta keep moving.

Next: time seems to have speeded up so much that I feel like this should still be around February (pronounced Feb-RUE-ary people!) or March and Spring in full bloom (well, this is California, after all). Amazing that I manage to get my rent and all the other bills paid, as I’m not too good at looking at the day or date, and often must be reminded it is time for same.

Then there’s the horrible fact of life that most of my friends have given up the ghost and left me standing (I know... more like sitting) here all alone and lonely. Or have gone back to live with children all those long, long miles away back East. What are they thinking?  How can they bear to go back to the heat and cold and floods and hurricanes and tornadoes and blizzards... yahhhhhhh! Not for me, if I must live and die alone out here, at least I shall be comfortable.

Last, I am falling again into a sort of lonely depression -- with me in various forms ever since my darling K deserted me, when I asked for so little. A desertion after 10 years, made even worse by the fact that he promised never to do that, but did, saying that he had made promises and had to keep them. So much for ‘what kind of promise... are there good and bad promises?’. Guess so.

With K's desertion and the death of my dear, sweet, kind Al, I have no one left even to write to, so the days lie forgotten as they fly by in the terrible wind now, and I seem merely to waste away... soon to be swept up with the days, the leaves and all the rest of the blowing about trash.......    fade to pale blue

Finally, A Sample From My Memories

Our Own Man Who Came to Dinner

    Jessie had an unending parade of people who came to visit us, particularly when we lived in Pittsburgh. We had, of course, the old school crowd from Michigan State, Daddy’s friends from years of companionship at General Motors, theatre friends from all over, particularly those in the cast of whatever was playing in town, artists, writers and friends from such organizations as AAUW or the League of Women Voters. Everyone who came to town for anything, called Jessie and often came to stay with us for a night or two. I got very used to Jess calling down the stairs, “Tell Helen (or Ruby or Lessie, or whoever was in charge of the kitchen at the moment), to set another place at the table.”

    I was generally the one to set another place, as I was often the sous chef, down there learning all I could about making magnificent dinners for our family and friends. Seldom did we have less than six to eight people for dinner. One frequent dinner guest was a writer friend of Jessie’s named George Lockart, who lived with his brother and worked for the Veteran’s Administration. When his brother moved back to Eastern PA, Jessie invited George to come and stay with us until he found another apartment. He never did find one, and lived with us until we moved to Chicago. He was then inherited by P.B. Burgwin and his family. But that is another story.
 
    George had been drafted into the Army to serve in W.W.II. He was about as good a candidate for soldiering as one would imagine David Sedaris would be. First of all, he was the shape of a cantaloupe, with little arms and legs attached. However, the Army put him in something called the “Timber Wolf Division” with a bunch of hillbillies from Kentucky. But luckily in that group he made friends with the only three other intellectuals who were also privates in that division. One was a famous writer whose name I cannot remember, the next a guy named Joe Schaller (also a writer) and a fourth a young college professor from back East.
 
    After George moved in we were regaled with stories about the adventures of those four men, who landed in France and moved with the armies that fought battles across the country, and actually beat back the Germans to win the war. Not that those four did much toward that win. We were told that they never fired their guns (one of which was constantly jammed), but apparently simply sat on their backpacks or piles of damp army blankets, playing bridge as the army moved across France.
 
    “It always rains during a war,” one of them told me, “so we were never dry.”
 
    “Yes,” would chime in another, “we sat on those damned wet blankets for weeks. Damned things never dried out.”
 
    “I got some kind of foot fungus,” one would say, “Still have it... the miserable stuff never goes away. Wet socks, that’s what did it!”
 
   The only time they were ever comfortable during WWII was one brief stint spent in a captured castle in Germany. It was also the only time any of them had worried about rescuing the ‘souvenirs’ so many of the soldiers were picking up. The hillbillies broke into chests and safes in the castle, looking for money or something valuable, pocketing any souvenirs they thought might get them a little money, tossing out great bunches of clothing and handmade lace. George managed to rescue a few exquisite linen hankies with thick lace borders and embroidered initials that one of the boys was planning to use to clean his gun, and some of the lace yardage, which later was sewn into his sister’s wedding gown, having come back in a pillow case in George’s backpack.
 
    My favorite story about these guys is actually only about Joe Schaller, who was visiting George and so having dinner with us. Our dining room was downstairs, the children’s living room was upstairs and all sound carried easily from it and the piano, down into the dining room. My younger sister had been ‘teaching’ one of her friends to play our battered, out-of-tune upright piano and the friend was practicing, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la (or thumb, up all the fingers, then back down to thumb, up one note, repeat the same. Slowly, obnoxiously. 
     
     Joe finally couldn’t take it any longer and shouted up the stairs, “Hey, jazz it up a little, kid, will ya, the customers don’t go for that classical stuff.”

More Anger

After a long day of reading ALMOST ALL the columnists, both Democratic and republican (well David Brooks agrees with me, Mark Shields is too busy getting married to write of it), and their feelings on the cave-in by Boehner and the rest of the republican party big-wigs, I am shocked and awed that this could happen. What are they thinking? Where are their heads? Are they joining the DoogieBushGang in ignorance? Are they afraid of these ignorant kooks who have very little education (I don’t care if they went to Harvard, they obviously didn’t LISTEN), and less sense. I am further shocked to see that so many of them consider themselves “middle class.” They had better scrape the scales off their eyes and SEE that there is NO middle class anymore. I know, I used to be one of the upper middle class and I am now one of y’all... 90% of the people of the United States are THE POOR. Only the RICH should vote republican... and that’s the 2% who OWN ALL THE MONEY IN THE COUNTRY. Look it up people... it’s all there in Google. They will tell you exactly how POOR and STUPID you are if you vote with the 2%... you’re just handing them your taxes, plus a lot more. So here’s what I wrote in answer to all the nuts arguing about guns, healthcare and money in the New York Times:

What’s the matter with the ‘tea party’ or ‘conservatives’ or any weird non-thinkers, that keeps them unaware that most people in this world live happily and peacefully in countries that have universal health care and laws that forbid ordinary citizens from having any guns. I can’t understand why the poor (that’s 90% of our citizens) are so easily swayed by the 2% with all the money, and constantly vote to make the 2%’s will be done (make sure they keep getting more money) and let gun manufacturers, heads of insurance companies and other corporate heads rule the country.

Go to the Constitution and RE-READ the Second Amendment. It doesn’t say that every nut should have an Army gun and carry it around all the time. It says that we should have a militia with guns (kept at HQ), so we will be protected from intruders or some crazy who thinks he/she can attack others. Police and members of the National Guard (militia in the old days) are the only ones who should have guns - not for personal use, only when on duty. Period.

As long as ‘poor’ people keep allowing guns made to kill a maximum number of people to be bought at gun shows by crazies or relatives of same, you can easily figure out how many children will be killed in the next year. We need to close the gun shows, stop the manufacturers from selling war weapons in this country and impose extremely strict penalties on anyone with weapons excepta one-load-at-a-time weapon, (hunting rifle). I include the wealthy 2% in that, even the Wal-family, John Boehner, Paul Ryan, Ted Cruz and that brilliant speechmaker, Ashton Kutcher.

I Should Lighten Up... but I can't

I cannot seem to write anything positive or pleasant these days. Only one after another... depressing little notes on the terrible greedy, not too bright, professional politicians in Washington. All of them seem to come from the Ronald Raegan/Doogie Bush school of “I-wanna-wreck-the-guvment-and-make-big-bucks-doing-it” school of permanent politicians. The latest seem to belong to the dumb-and-dumber class of people. For example... take the idiot who ran for V.P. in the last election, Paul Ryan (I think I got the name right... hard to remember a non-entity), a congressman who has never had a ‘real’ job, outside of being a ‘gofer’ for an older congressman and a stint at McDonalds. How does that make him capable of ‘running the country?’ Then there is Ted Cruz, thinking of running for president, yet he holds a citizenship in Canada (doesn’t that make him a foreigner?), and quotes the likes of Ashton Kutcher as a great speechmaker. His other examples were as bad also (again, who can remember ignorance). I do love Dr.Seuss, but as a reading to Congress?

If I weren’t so damned OLD, I’d move to Sweden or the Netherlands... they not only have great systems of government, fewer crazies running around and less homeless and starving on their streets, but have learned how to take care of their old and feed the poor. Even better, they have lots of great looking, super tall guys with lots of brains. An old intellectual could have a great time finding a man to talk to over there! Sigh! Blue... blue... blue!!!