http://chicago.craigslist.org/wcl/pet/2115403275.html

An excerpt

"Channeling the goddess Lakshmi or possibly Stevie Nicks, my yoga teacher Lauren once observed that I was too strong for Benedict. My personality of fiery forests and stormy seas was too much for his lump of earth, or desert of sand. In actuality, that wasn't her exact wording, but no doubt she used some metaphor about nature and mud. Lauren was right on some level. To pretend Benedict lacks depth is false, but he never breaks his facade of calm, aloof, vaguely autistic serenity, even when he may be seething inside. He lets his anger escape in a variety of passive aggressive ways whose motivations are denied even by Benedict himself. Even with my fire I could not permeate the wall of earth, and therefore never felt understood. I guess I just singed it. And that unmovable fortress of earth he built around him also permeated stability, permanence, and security. But I could always make him laugh, which I loved. He understood my dark humor even if he couldn't really contribute to it.

I'll be home for Christmas

Tomorrow I will wash out Oskar's ears and replace the towel in his kennel. The stinking ears bare the subtle odor of infection, and I do not know if it is prudent to treat them again by conventional modern veterinary means. A bit of peroxide on a cotton ball, then later we will mix up a homeopathic remedy found on a British website about spaniel's ears. This infection keeps coming back.

After a morning goodbye to J_, I will catch a bus to the car rental store, then Oskar and I will drive across the grey plains to Minneapolis, the frozen tundra of childhood. The signal for public radio will be lost at a dark snow covered point in the afternoon. Perhaps this rental car will have some device to plug in an I-pod. I will pretend this car is mine for a few days, abandoning the memory of the black, salt-coated beast that only starts when it wants to, whose engine lights go on and off at inopportune moments.

Perhaps this drive can rid me of the memories of this difficult year, one that has thrown me for a loop. (Correction, not all memories. There are ones that I want to keep as well.) Selective amnesia would be nice–– a quick procedure, performed by a medical technician, so routine that a doctor isn't necessary––maybe this is the answer. Does it exist? A pill or injection to make you forget?

This drive, done under so many different circumstances over the past seven years, is beautiful and long. Coming into Minnesota at a chilly dusky hour across the Mississippi, at the hilly southern point near LaCrosse, it could take your breath away. One imagines skidding over the edges of these cliffs like a deranged bird. Its dreamlike and cinematic. Characters include truck drivers and heavy set ladies who work at gas stations. Toll booth operators. Families in cars with dogs. Me, looking distant, with a puppy on a leash, shivering while we stop to let him relieve himself. His paws dance across filthy snow to gracefully squat in the ideal spot. He is just like my other girls, the older beagles from a past life. I think about them curled up somewhere and I wonder if they remember me. Especially my Tess, whose fragile skeleton of a body clung to my lap as I drove her home from a shelter years ago.

Oskar makes me forget them some. He brought with him a divine promise of a new life. A canine Messiah whose $500 "adoption fee" and subsequent vet bills were scrounged from the remnants of my scrambled past. Dog, apartment deposit, expensive dinner to thank J_ for putting up with me, and then the money was pretty much dried up. This year life has made some rather startling shifts, from peaceful, to hopeful, to crazy. At one point it was shattered on the floor. In what deformed shape might I reincarnate?

Here I am, an exhausted monster.

This Christmas marks the end of what has been the most horrifyingly insane year of my life. I approach it humbly and with a bowed and solemn head. Gifts were purchased thoughtfully. This year I will not be embarrassed that I did not buy enough for my father, or aunt, or brother. I even contemplating getting something for the woman at Starbucks. I drive home with a heavy heart and heavy suitcase. I will use presents to show my family that I am okay, that I am of sound mind, that I am a functioning and contributing member of society.

At the close of the year I am caught between mourning the life that is over and adapting to the one that is to come. I am trying to find my way home.

Thistle

"The same boiled in wine and drunk, heals the griping pains of the belly, kills and expels worms, causes sweat, provokes urine, and drives out gravel, cleanses the stomach; and is very good against the 4 day fever. The juice of the said Carduus is singular good against all poisons, as Heromenous Boeke witnesses, in whatsoever the medicine is taken, and helps the inflammation of the liver, as reported by Joachimus Camerorius of Noremberg. The powder of the leaves ministered in the quantity of half a dram, is very good against the pestilence, if it is received within 24 hours after the taking of the sickness, and the party sweat upon the same: the like virtue has the wine, wherein the herb has been boiled. The green herb pounded and laid to, is good against all hot swellings, as erysipelas, plague, sores and botches, especially those that proceed of the pestilence, and is also good to be laid upon the bites of mad dogs, serpents, spiders, or any venomous beast whatsoever; and so is it likewise if it is taken inwardly."

-John Gerard, medicianal qualities of the Thistle, 1633


The plant, pulled from the earth, was thrown on urine-scented concrete, a weed that was in our way. Broken and scattered for 38 hours, its roots dried in the pulsing dull wind.

Against the windowpane droplets of water (from the air conditioner) will soak the wood of the ancient casement. Perhaps it is not in the designer clay pot that the plant will grow, but in the rotten crevice of the sash, in the moist dark place of mustiness. This is where a broken fragment of genetics landed after 60 days of dehydration, of being torn around by creatures of carelessness. This bit of stem swallowed the heavy fragrance and sprouted suddenly, a knobby elbow of shocking green.

This plant– prickly with thorns, possessing the sticky venom of defense– revealed a tuft of intense purple and nourishment for us. This plant improved our perception, if nothing else, of ourselves.

It takes more than ill will to destroy the perfection of the Carduus. We remember the sting of its stem but conveniently forget the intensity of its blossom. Pounded into paste, brewed in scathing water, there is an ointment and a tea of peculiar odor that we may never comprehend.

Thank you and good night

A decision has been made to discontinue this blog.  The entries have dwindled and disappeared.  

Original words were replaced with a few carefully selected quotes that are meant to be hopeful, remorseful, reflective.  Camus and Tracy Chapman filled in a few blanks when I was left speechless, a deer in headlights.

Never fear, a cleaner and less personal blog has sprung.  A joint venture, www.studyllc.com will (hopefully) entertain you in a designy way and keep me focused on what I am best at.  Please read and comment freely.  A work in progress, with luck it will evolve and become something extraordinary.  

In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer. 

-Camus

He discovered the cruel paradox by which we always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love– first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

-Camus, from A Happy Death