eckhart tolle would love this

Yesterday in town I came across a fancy little sports car
sporting a vanity plate
which said

Egoless

writing group

Not only do my phobias include dates and phones but I literally shake in my flip-flops when I contemplate joining a group, and especially a group where I don't know anyone. And a group where people will be passing judgment - I mean 'critiquing' - my work.

So I can't believe that I actually ventured in to the writers' group that meets at the library. I thought I would go have a drink instead. While perusing the stacks as I waited for the group to assemble I felt flushed and nauseous. I had to sit down in a chair and take deep breaths.

My nerves settled once we were seated around the table but I thought "no way in hell I'm letting these people read my stuff". Man, were they harsh! At last night's meeting there was a core group of three women and two men, and three newbies, all women. A couple of the women shared poetry and one woman passed around the beginning page of her book. Her first sentence was "A hand came over the wall" and one of the guys said that in his twisted mind he pictured a hand with no attendant body being flung over a wall. And later she used 'brutal' as an adjective for 'slavery' and one of the newbies was offended at this because wasn't all slavery brutal?

But as the evening progressed, I was impressed by the knowledge these people possessed and how, in general, they were pretty gentle in their criticisms. They had a lot of insight and made some great suggestions.

Because of the new people, everyone shared a little information about what they were working on. Some people had had work published. Some people were at the point where they were shopping their novels.

By the end of the group I felt great and not at all timid. I liked these people a lot. After the meeting they went to the restaurant next door but I passed, pretending I had a prior engagement.

I went for that drink.

biker chick's blind date

Toward the end of our day-long ride, the man at the controls of the Harley turned to me and said "I never go on blind dates but this was fun" and I said "I pretended we weren't on a date and that made it easier. I'm having a great time".

When my friend set this up, I ignored the part where she said her husband hoped that me and his friend would get along. I viewed it as nothing more than she wanted another female along on their bike rides and there happened to be an empty seat on the back of this guy's Harley.

They got to my place around 9 in the morning and it was warm enough that I was able to decline the use of the chaps. Thank god. My friend is tall and skinny and she wore a set of brown fringed chaps. She looked hot. In comparison, I am short and round and I would have had on a set of black leather chaps. I would've looked like the Pillsbury Dough Boy in a bondage flick.

Just a little about my friends. I met them in Mexico. We were in the same trailer park for about 4 or 5 months. I knew them in their RV disguise which is to say they were people who wore shorts and t-shirts and had a dog. Seeing them in their biker disguise blew me away. They looked totally different - younger and sexier. They are a prime example of not judging books by their covers. It's because of people like them that I now make an effort to go beyond first impressions.

The day was fabulous. This was the longest motorcycle ride I had ever been on. We avoided the freeways and rode over to the Chiricahua National Monument. In my opinion, no state has more treasures than Arizona. Check this out:

To see those rock formations from below, and then to be above them, was amazing. Another friend of mine had suggested that we go hiking there and now I'm even more enthused than before.

An indication that my blind date was going well was that as we approached home he offered to give me a tour of my new town and so when we got back, we waved good-bye to our friends and continued on our way. We ended the day up at his shot-gun shack, a mere 80 steps up from the main street, where we watched the town below and the pretty yellow finches at their feeder and the hummingbirds battling over theirs. My blind date and I have a lot in common. Maybe too much - like the way we like to be alone. When he dropped me off at my place we exchanged phone numbers and hugged good-night.

I tell you, that motorcycle ride, for me, was what Arizona is all about. That was one of the things that drew me to the southwest in the first place: Warm days, helmet-less, on the back of a Harley with my hands resting on a man's waist. That and the image of an Airstream travel trailer traveling down a two lane road with no other vehicles around. I got to enjoy that dream the day I towed from The Home of Dashed Hopes to my new home. I thought: This is it; this is what I wanted all those years ago.

My blind date? He, too, had that Airstream/desert dream and he owned a vintage Airstream travel trailer. See, we have a lot in common. Not only that but in addition to liking our alone time, we both share the same phobias: dates and phones.

the town that shall not be named

I am posting pictures of my new town and I don’t have a problem if people recognize the place because it is quite a distinctive area and if you’ve been here, you will recognize it from the photos. That’s okay. I just don’t what to say its name because what if some people who live here do a search on their town and then my blog shows up and then someone will be pissed because I called them an old hippie or wondered if they were gay? ‘Nuff said.

So here’s where I live. There is all this beautiful countryside surrounding this little trailer park where I would love to walk but I can’t because the mining company who owns the land has posted No Trespassing signs and from what I hear from the locals, the company means it and they will prosecute. What a bummer. The view from up on the land is awesome (I did venture up one day). I was watched by a deer as I picked my way over rocks and picked up rocks I thought were interesting.

I can, however, walk through the cemetery next door which is equally interesting but it’s flat and I can’t see getting much exercise there unless I power walk and that seems like an irreverent thing to do amongst dead people.

Yesterday I went into town. We finally had a lull in the windstorm. Let me tell you how wild the winds were. The other night I was sleeping when I heard the dust devil approaching. That mini-tornado woke me from a sound sleep. As it twisted through my site it deposited sand and grit not only in my bed but in my mouth! I had to rinse out my mouth and change the sheets – and close the window. The thing is that just that night I had thought how nice it was not to go to bed with sheets full of sand.

So yesterday in town everyone was quite happy that the winds had died down. I am still amazed at how friendly everyone is. A woman who owns a gallery/gift shop asked me if I was looking for a job. The librarian remembered my name. I got into a most interesting discussion with a man as I drank an IPA outside the hotel. God, what started our conversation? Oh, music. The Doors were playing on the bar’s stereo. That led us into such a twisty/turvy conversation with so many switch-backs and hills (military, radicalness, love, what it is to be a ‘man’) that I finally said “I’ve got to go. You’re making my head hurt.” “Aw, come on,” he said, “you can follow this, you’re a smart woman. Let me buy you another beer.” I told him that I’d probably run into him again and I’d take him up on his beer offer then.

He reminded me of the Jailbird. Except he didn’t call me ‘opinionated’; he said I was ‘straightforward’.

This is how I'm spending the day today: I have to find an outfit to wear on my motorcycle ride on Sunday. I can’t believe that my friend is bringing me a pair of chaps that are too short for her. Oh my god! Me in chaps. How big do those things make one’s ass look? Spending a whole day fretting over what to wear on a motorcycle ride seems ridiculous. But shit, who wants to look like a dufus on the back of a Harley? Certainly not yours truly.

the moon people

As I ponder this whole “home” issue, I am reminded of my daughter’s Moon People. Because I’m Ms. Shoddy Memory, I may have the details mixed up – like maybe the people didn’t live on the Moon but on some Other Planet – but the gist will be true.

When Stef was 7 or maybe younger, she had a whole slew of friends and family who lived on the Moon. Apparently she conversed with them quite often, not like imaginary friends some kids may talk to at the dinner table, “Henrietta, will you pass me the butter?”, but I think she conversed with the Moon People in a more thoughtful way, like while lying in bed or playing alone on the beach.

We had a neighbor on the Oregon Coast who was pondering a move to Florida. She asked Stef to talk to the Moon People and see what they had to say, like was it a good move or did they have any words of wisdom? The next day Stef said that the Moon People had said you can change where you live but that won’t change you.

Pretty smart for a 7 year old so apparently those Moon People were truly hovering around. And pretty good advice. Not that my daughter or I ever followed it ourselves, both of us having this need to move in order to change, to get out of crappy relationships or to relieve boredom or to kick a cocaine hobby (me, not her; or at least I don’t think she ever moved to kick a drug hobby but what do moms know?).

Now, from this vantage point I can report that a move can change a person if they take advantage of the opportunity. For instance, my move from the Pacific Northwest to the Desert Southwest changed me in many ways. No, wait. The move didn’t change me, I changed me but the move – the clearing water from my ears, the solitude, the starting over – was the springboard to a new life but it was up to me to recognize the changes I wanted to make and then to go about making them. Could I have made these changes in Portland? Probably but I think it would have been a helluva lot harder or taken a lot more discipline.

With this move from the Sea of Cortez back to the Border Badlands I see that, indeed, I feel no different here than I did there. I’m feeling a little bored and lonely, like I did in those summer months when the heat and humidity turned me into a slug. I’m feeling a little lost. A little bit in a holding pattern between this most recent move and starting real life. I believe the psychic when she said I could make my home anywhere, that it doesn’t really matter, just like what the Moon People said about 30 years ago.

Shit. Somewhere on the fringes of my shoddy memory is an interview I heard on NPR’s Fresh Air – I may even have blogged about it but without a wifi connection I can’t go back and check. Anyway, Terry interviewed a singer/songwriter - I think it was Lucinda Williams but maybe not – but whoever it was, this person said if you’re bored with your life, get on a bus and wherever it stops, get off and live there. Like maybe you’ve stopped somewhere for a pee break and you look around and think “okay, I’ll live here for a while”. I love that. (This is especially easy to do when you have your home with you.)

I recently heard another story that I related to. One of the snowbirds said that when she was little, around 7 (apparently a very wise age), she heard her parents talking about a friend who had committed suicide. That night as she lay in bed she thought “if he was so sad, if his life was so bad, why didn’t he just sell everything he owned and get on a bus and start over somewhere new?” Sounds like this woman had her own Moon People. Or shared Lucinda’s Moon People.

I’ve got to walk over to the laundry room to post this. Hopefully it made some sense as I’m not in an editing mood. Tomorrow my DSL modem should arrive. After a year without television, and now having television, I realize that I miss the internets more than I ever did TV. So I have my fingers crossed that the install will go smoothly and then next week I’ll begin my real life search for a real job, one I can do anywhere, with my trailer – and my own Moon People – in tow.

this town wants me

I tried to move to this town about three years ago but my efforts were thwarted when the Minutemen came down here to do their first ever border patrol, busting UDAs (although I’m sure they called them “Illegals”), and maybe lining them up at gun point (‘can we shoot ‘em, huh? huh?’) while waiting for the Border Patrol to arrive. I didn’t want to be in the midst of this insanity. So I stayed at The Home of Dashed Hopes.

Now I’m here and I think this town wants me.

Everyone is just so damn nice. The guy at the post office. The waiter. The woman at the library...where there is an opening (just my cuppa tea). My new hairdresser.

She is my daughter’s age. We share that. Also her mom is a Capricorn (like me). My hairdresser lived on The Big Island (like my daughter). Me and my Hairdresser grew up in the same midwestern town. Can you believe it?

She said “You lived in Mexico by yourself? You towed a trailer? What did you do while there? Did you walk the beach? Did you write?”

Well, yeah, I said, I walked and I wrote. She asked me about “the book” and so I told her the abbreviated version, not wanting to bore her with the musings of a woman twenty years older. She was enthusiastic. We bonded over my book...and my hair.

Next weekend I’m going on a motorcycle ride with a couple I met on the Sea of Cortez and a friend of theirs.

Tonight I’m going to dinner with a gay man I know who knows friends of mine in the Pacific Northwest.

This is the first time in four years where I have fallen into a town where I actually know people – sort of. Friends of friends. The manager of this park. The retired firefighter who is in love with a Hispanic woman who lives on the Sea of Cortez.

And then there’s the psychic who, knowing nothing about me, said “you have an amazing ability to make your home wherever you happen to be; go ahead, get that p.o. box”. So I did. And now I’m home. For now.

i'm trying to write this outdoors, the only place i can pick up the wifi signal. it's not easy, the sun reflecting off the computer screen. oh well...tomorrow i'll order DSL. i'll have DSL and a POB. fuck, my life as an acronym. ttfn.

should i stay or should i go?

I'm not making a decision until my psychic phone consultation on Friday. That's right, I'm leaving it up to some turbanned 1-900 first 10 minutes free psychic line psychic. Not really. This psychic was referred by my friend and I trust her recommendation because my friend is not some goofy new age chick but a responsible, hard-working (until her recent retirement), highly intelligent and well-read woman. I'll let you know how it goes.

Today I donned a semi-respectable looking-for-work outfit - jean skirt and blouse - but still kept my feet in flip-flops because I don't own any other shoes. I picked up an application at the local hospital in the hope that they might need a medical transcriptionist (part-time) of which I was in a former life. I've also looked into getting DSL in case I want to do transcription online.

The local Department of Economic Security closed up due to a lack of jobs (bad sign) but I did get a web address in order to do an online job search.

I went to the town's fabulous library. Because I've just boxed up a bunch of books to sell, I've vowed to be a better library user. Also, this library has a huge supply of DVDs. I really loved the place. I wonder if they have any job openings.

But I can't get a library card until I bring in proof of a local address. The post office is next door to the library but I held off getting a local P.O. Box until....until I talk with that psychic on Friday.

Whatever happens, today I'm feeling good about being here. I like living in a town. I like the local saloons. I like the food co-op. I like the blue skies. I like the bead store owner. I'm still unsure about fitting in, finding a community but, hey, that's what the psychic is for.