(O I have effortlessly stolen these images from all around the web. . .none of them are mine, you see. . .)
I am in the middle of what I have dubbed "Writing Week". Finn is at his Granpa's with his papa. It's been 4 days, I haven't done any writing, and I miss Finn terribly, it is kind of terrible! But it's also good I know I know! I do need this, also desperately. O contradiction always.
The first three days I had to teach--so that wasn't nice to count it as Writing Week. And on the second evening I got sick with the fever that Finn had on the 4th of July, and so the next day, the last day of the Comp class I've been teaching, I had to cut it short, as I still had a fever. Then, yesterday, came home after that class and stayed in bed all day and night again. But! This morning, 4th day of Writing Week, woke up feeling good finally,unpacked things around the house, unpacked my desk stuff especially, notebooks, washed clothes, hung them out to dry, dug a small garden patch, worried that it might be too close to the house and that the house might have lead paint on it--in essence, I did no writing. I did not write one poem.
I thought alot. I mean, sheesh. This is the longest time I've had to myself in three years. (I think that's probably why I got sick too--like the sickness you get on vacation, right, after finally letting yourself relax after stress, you know?)
And you know what, maybe that's all I need, just to think, that's like the pre-writing, just lying down, thinking. Or walking, gardening, hanging clothes out, whatever.
My friend (and fellow blogger and fellow poet) Melissa once wrote to me, in a snail-mail letter, that, on an evening she had all to herself to write, she started crying as she started writing, because she had been "so strenuously avoiding it". That's a little bit how I feel right now. And that's why I mention it.
I also mention it because I am thinking about the nature of friendships, and community, and blogs. And the ways we share ideas, now. Melissa and I started our blogs (of the same name) at the same time together, shortly after we had both become moms. We weren't sure what our days would look like as our babies grew to toddlers (and beyond), but we were pretty sure we'd have to be satisfied with recording the small things of our days, the small things, like one basil plant starting to grow. One toddler's new dress. A poem or a line we caught on.
Well I mean. I guess you know there are posts like the post in which Melissa announced the birth of Curran, her second baby. Not such a small small thing. . .no not at all. . .!
So here I am, strenuously avoiding writing poems by typing this up for my blog, small indeed, and whatever that can mean, now, in this context. I also,ironically, owe Melissa a letter, since she wrote me way back in January I think. But somehow since this blog is more for the general public it makes it easier to sit down and just type.
But is it for the general public? Really it's just my friends and family who read this, that's who this is for, really. My dears. So we keep up.
But still it is a constructed me, isn't it? It shouldn't be completely bare anyway. . .
And it's not that I'm strenuously avoiding writing to Melissa. It's just that the writing of a letter requires a different tone to the time, you know. One has to prepare and be purposeful and do it right and focus.
Another thing. I am here, in Iowa City, in the new house! Still camera-less, unfortunately. . . (Incidentally, this is Quinn-dog's 13th place of residence and she is 11 years old; Finnegan's 4th, and he's not yet 3--but almost!; I honestly cannot count how many places I have lived--in my adulthood, since leaving the parent-house, let's see, okay, this is my 23rd place since age 18. . .and I,I,I am 34. . .)
This makes me think of my friend Codi, part-owner of the awesome Home Ec--another place that has been a great community-center for me in the last 3 years. It makes me think of her because her thesis project is (and she is still completing it, I believe) that she will make an art piece in which she embroiders all of the houses she has lived in.
Yes awesome.
Also.
Most of you, because you are my friends, know that I have been in a rather stuck and sticky place this past year or so. Kind of crisis-like in ways. No need to get into all of that, except to say things are getting better, on all the levels, & so that is good.
But there's this one lagging level. . . I'm at a stuck place writing, you see. And again again there's no use even getting into that except to say::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::PLEASE EVERYONE LISTEN, EVERYONE WHO EVER READS THIS BLOG LISTEN I HAVE AN IDEA!
My idea is that each of you will give me an assignment to write a certain poem, and write down the instructions for that poem in a comment that you leave here. Kind of like Yoko Ono's assignments in Grapefruit, but with the idea that there's a poem at the end of it. But it's really wide open:::just give me an assignment, an abstract idea or rigid stipulations for a poem that you'd like me to write.
Oh man I would love it if everybody who ever reads this thing commented with a poem assignment, even if you never have commented! Or if you feel shy just email me the poem assignment. That is fine of course and no pressure my little seedlings!
(And since I just called all of you seedlings, why then I just thought of how I would love it if the poem assignment you gave me had something to do with seeds, midwives, babies, mothers, wizards, psychopomps, rivers,love, whales, or fathers. But really anything! anything!)
And all will ultimately be done in the spirit of this blog, small things, friendship, love, astonishment, ideas/projects/dreams, us supporting each other. . .
And then, for awhile, since I am camera-less, I will be posting these poems that you have assigned me to write,after I finish writing them, here on this blog. I will probably also post about other writing things too, a little bit more, as I do this project (in which you are involved! yes you!). O idea, idea, idea. . .
Then who knows what happens next! I do not.
love blue
and i've been painting things i'm grateful for on pieces of sycamore bark. not sure why. may be making mobiles for faraway friends, mobiles that are really too delicate to send in the mail:
finn at the county fair, which was fun but also depressing, since all the animals were so very hot and uncomfortable. . .
