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Portrait of August in black and white by Levon. 

After you let the grandchildren have your phone to play a game on, you never know quite what you'll find on it when you get it back. I actually like this picture very much. 

We've gotten in very late. It was a long day from the cardiologist consult to the boys to Mr. Moon getting a vehicle ready to sell which takes far more work and planning than you can imagine. I had to go pick him up after I left Jessie and Vergil's house so he could leave the vehicle in place at the credit union where he used to have an office. They still allow him to put cars out front with "for sale" signs on them which is so very nice of them. By law and to keep his license as a dealer, he has to have at least two (I think) spaces to show cars for sale and the credit union has provided that. 

But it was a good day. The cardiologist was a hoot. That's all I can say. Just a hoot. He wore extremely fancy and pointy black patent leather shoes with pants that were short and tight and a regular sweater over a regular shirt. 
It was a look. 
He was very nice, made sure to shake my hand both coming and going, and was quite personable. A stress test has been arranged at some point for my husband but it won't be for months. The whole tech thing at the hospital has screwed up scheduling like you can't believe. 

After that I ran to the Co-op to get Mr. Moon's leg cramp pills and then to pick up Levon. 
"Hi, guy!" I said to him when he came out of the building. 
"You always say that," he said. 
"I do?"
"Yes."

Well. I shall try to remember to change that up. 

We met Boppy for lunch at Chow Time. This is what Levon got. 

I told him he had to eat some real food before his dessert and he did. And then he wanted red jello cubes in one cup and another cup with strawberry ice cream and chocolate pudding in it which he mixed up and proclaimed to be delicious. 

I took his word. 

And then on to get August at his school and then to gymnastics! 

I loved the teacher. I think they may use the "they" pronouns. Not sure. Anyway, they were completely cool and calm with those little boys who bounced and jumped and ran and skipped and flipped, keeping a sort of control that appeared effortless. The kids listened to every word they said. There were all sorts of different activities and what I realized is that kids their age have no idea what they can't do and so they just do it anyway. It's a sort of magic. I got to talk to two mothers, one of whom is a friend of Jessie's, the mother of one of Levon's best school friends. I enjoyed talking to the ladies and it reminded me of how incredibly valuable these conversations with other women are when you're a young mother. 
Pretty awesome when you're an old grandmother, too, actually. 

And then back home after the lesson and when Vergil got off work, I picked up my husband and now we are home. After such a sturdy lunch at Chow Time (we did not limit ourselves to one piece of pizza and some fruit) I think I'll make us a little bit of what I used to call Samurai soup to serve in our new big white bowls. That sounds good. I bought new ginger root at the coop and just picked some greens from the garden. 

So that was that. A very full day and I did not feel exhausted or flat, just a normal, fine day with lots of joking with the kids and the exquisite joy of listening to James Brown sing "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag" on the radio with Levon. 

"You know a lot of bands," he told me.
"Just the old ones," I said. 
"That's because you're old," he said.

"Exactly right!" I told him. 

And it is. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Will You Be My Valentine?

Well, Happy Valentine's Day, y'all! I do not recommend scheduling a procedure to get a new crown on Valentine's Day. It's just not a very celebratory situation although I suppose it is an excellent form of self-love and self-care and blah, blah, fucking blah because we gotta take care of these teeth, right? 

Before I left to go the appointment, Mr. Moon gave me a little orchid plant and a nice new bird feeder for finches and then we traded boxes of chocolates.

I got his box at Costco, he got mine at Publix. We're so funny. We just finished the box of chocolates I got him for Christmas (at Costco- Kirkland's Finest!) so it was good timing. We should be set until summer now. 

After the kissing and laughing, I got dressed and went to the dentist and this time the new guy in the office did the work and once again, I am not sure that the man is over the age of twelve. But I went into it with a good attitude. I've had crowns before and although I do not enjoy the procedure, it's not painful. So the dentist's assistant, who is fast, efficient, and apparently quite, uh, no-nonesense, got everything set up and then the twelve-year old came in and gave me the Novocain and I had to bite down on various things to make an impression, as they say, and I almost fell asleep in the chair before they began their waterboarding, grinding, waterboarding, and grinding. 
Yep. That was pretty much the way it went. It seemed to go on forever. I kept visualizing a miniature tsunami in my throat with teeny, tiny people being flooded, drowned, and swallowed. 

I know. My imagination is way too active. 

The problem is, I think, that I have some sinus congestion or something and I can indeed breathe in through my nose but the air just wants to come back out through my mouth which of course was filled at the time with hands and dental tools and water. 

Ooh boy.
But hey! I survived! 
I did not order a golden crown because it cost about five hundred more dollars than the other kind. This was vastly disappointing to me but come on- what does it really matter? 

After I left the office I decided to go to Goodwill to reward myself for not dying or anything. And I found some nice things, as a matter of fact. I got one 100% cashmere sweater which is bright red but who cares? I wear them under my overalls. I also got another sweater that is mostly silk, some cotton, and a little cashmere. It is a nice dark olive green. I got Mr. Moon some new rocks glasses for him to drink his bourbon out of. He is pleased with them all. I bought two large, plain white bowls that I envision making noodle soup with dumplings to serve in them in. That will be so pretty with the little chopped green onions on top. 

I was so tempted to buy these. They were in the children's book area. They were quite old and after having just now googled them, I probably should have bought and resold them but I did not. 
Live and learn, baby. Live and learn. 

And one other thing. It was ridiculous but I could not leave it there. 

The little print on the bottom. Another picture that reminds me of Magnolia June. The larger picture I got at the antique store in Monticello where I got Dorothy Anne and that wall is the one that all of the dolls live right next to on the vanity in my bedroom. 

So that was really fun and I finally have some feeling in my face again and although I am feeling some tenderness in that area, it's not bad. 

I am caramelizing onions to make us some French onion soup and peeling and slicing them made me cry and cry but once again- I do believe I will live. 

Tomorrow is going to be a very full day. Mr. Moon has a consultation with a cardiologist because he wants to get a stress test and find out if all is well with his heart. He's so weird. Voluntarily going to a doctor? But I want to go with him and meet the guy. And then I'll be getting Levon and August and taking them to gymnastics as Jessie has work tomorrow. 

And that's it for Valentine's Day, 2023. Crosby, Stills, and Nash said it best, I think- Love the one you're with. And if you're with you, kiss yourself for me. Oh hell. No matter who you're with, kiss yourself for me.

Hearts and Flowers...Ms. Moon

I See The Light!

That is how blue the sky has been today. And the light was somehow more pure than I can ever remember seeing it. When I got up and went into my bathroom and saw what it looked like streaming through the yellow silk cloth I have hanging as a curtain in an east window, I was gobsmacked. It was a golden magnificence! 

I went to Costco and Publix after my walk today. The whole main purpose of my trip was to get some chicken pot pies because I am having a "procedure" done tomorrow and you know how I do love a medical excuse to eat a chicken pot pie. I'm getting a new crown. This appointment has been put off three separate times and all for good reasons and I really have to finally get it done. 
I suppose. 
And I also suppose I can pick up some chicken pot pies on my way home because of course I FORGOT TO BUY THE CHICKEN POT PIES today. My god, my brain is turning into some sort of gloop. I had not put them on my list because my reason for going to the store was to get them and how hard is it to remember that factoid? 

Well, obviously too hard for me. 

I could probably manage to make a chicken pot pie when I get home tomorrow. It's just a crown, not a heart transplant. 

Thank goodness I have not yet begun to lose my ability to cook. 

Here's what the light looked like this afternoon as seen through a newborn fig leaf.

I was outside, just wandering around when that caught my eye. Jewels everywhere! 

I picked some wild violets and a tiny amount of hen bit and made a miniature flower arrangement in a minuscule bottle I found in the yard. I took its picture with some other things I've found in this yard. You have seen them before. 

I do love the little streaks of purple leading into the sweetest part of the violet. I think of them as directional instruction for the bees. 

"This way, this way! Here you go! Oh, yes. Now you have it! Come on in and sip a bit. Be sure to take a grain or two of pollen when you leave." 

I was probably in the seventh grade when I first realized that I was surrounded by miniature orchids and roses and flowers of all kinds that I had been ignoring my entire life, not even seeing them hidden in the grass. We were living in a rental house in Winter Haven- the last house my stepfather abused me in. Yeah, that's a weird detail but it's an important one. I was already learning to seek out things just for me that helped me to focus on something besides fear and anxiety. I had my wooden (I am not kidding you) radio with the Bakelite knobs that I listened to the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Beach Boys on. They carried me to other places, safer spaces. And I started making the tiny bouquets that I would set on my bookshelf that brought me huge pleasure. 

And they still do. 
And of course, I still love the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Beach Boys. 

Well. Here I am, eternally grateful for eternally sweet gifts. 

Hey! Happy almost Valentine's Day! I might get a gold crown just to mark the occasion tomorrow. We shall see.

Love...Ms. Moon

Science Fiction Then And Now

Whenever I have a day like today when I haven't taken any pictures for one reason or another, I can almost always find Jack and take a picture of him because he sleeps about twenty hours a day. In this shot, he's demonstrating his excellent napping skills in the guest room which is where he likes to sleep when he's not sleeping on our bed. 

Today started out sweetly and it's gone that way all day except...

Oh god. 

I went out this morning to take Moana some treats and let her out of the hen house. As you know, we have been shutting her up tight in there every night to keep her safe. I sprinkled some of the fancy bird food with peanuts and sunflower seeds on the ground in the coop after I'd opened the sliding door to the hen house so that she could come out and I waited for a few seconds and when she didn't appear, I opened the big door to the hen house and there she was. Bloodied and dead on the floor. 

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. 

Mr. Moon went out later to deal with her remains and he said that something had managed to dig under a wall where the wire fencing he had buried had deteriorated. It was no doubt wither a possum or a raccoon and I'm betting raccoon. Once again, the only part really missing was her head. 

So. That is it for chickens. If they aren't even safe in the roost at night, there is no way I'm going through this again. And I just have to deal with that reality. 
Bless her heart. Moana- our last hen. 

Mr. Moon tilled part of the garden I'd cleared and planted the potatoes. He was certain I had not bought enough but there were plenty. We have an eternally ongoing joke about my inability to visualize how much of any one thing can fit into another thing. Like leftovers. I'm just terrible at gauging what container to use to put leftovers in. But he is terrible at over-buying seed potatoes. He vowed and declared that the amount I'd bought was not nearly enough but after he planted three good rows, he agreed that I had gotten just the right amount. I kept waiting for a "but..." in there but there wasn't. 
I am so proud of myself. 
I planted the sugar snap peas. A nice long row of them on the east fence. At least we no longer have to worry about the chickens snatching the sweet and tender vines from the other side of the fence as they grow up it. We haven't had a decent crop of peas since we started keeping chickens and it's a trade-off I would gladly keep making forever but that is no longer going to be a problem. 
Sigh. 

I did some more weeding in an area I want to plant onions. No matter how much we weed for the next ten thousand years, there will still be betony and dollar weed coming up in the garden because those two things send out similarly thick roots from the yard around the garden which come up to choke anything they can get those ropey roots on. So it's a ridiculous and fruitless battle but as I have probably said before, there is something quite satisfying to me, troweling up those plants and following the roots and pulling up everything attached to them. You have to be gentle and yet firm, because the roots will easily snap and yet, they go deep. 
This sounds like a metaphor for something, doesn't it? I am not sure what. 
But I knelt in the wet dirt and dug and pulled for quite awhile. As I worked, I listened to a small collection of short stories by Robert A. Heinlein called "All You Zombies."

I have a long and cherished relationship with Heinlein. I often say that there were two kinds of hippies. You had your "Lord of the Rings" hippies and your "Stranger in a Strange Land" hippies. 
I was the latter. I have to say that reading that book in high school absolutely ruined me for a whole lot of what was considered to be socially and culturally correct in the 1970's including not having sex, and religion. 
Yes. Let's blame it all on science fiction. 
Now let me tell you that much of what Heinlein wrote is horribly misogynistic and sexist in some ways but he broke new ground in presenting women with as many rights to physical pleasure and satisfaction as men and as able and competent as men in many regards. And he was without doubt, a genius. Some of the things he wrote about in the 1940's, 50's, and 60's which were completely beyond anything imagined in those times have turned out to be startlingly prescient. Two of the stories I listened to today were way beyond my brain to comprehend, one having to do with time travel (and a trans man!) and the other a story about a man who built a house which was basically an unfolded tesseract. I mean- really? 

Okay. Just writing about all of this is bending my own brain into a fourth dimension which I think is how a tesseract works but do not quote me on this. 
No. My mind cannot go there. I'll take his word for it. 

But the point of all of this is that I did enjoy listening to these stories very much and made me want to seek out more of Heinlein's books available in audio versions. Some of them I know I will have read but it would be nice to revisit them. 

Speaking of things I do not understand- WHAT THE HELL ARE WE SHOOTING FROM THE SKY? Does anyone really know? I'm sure someone does but not me. 
Oh god. More freaky shit to worry about. As if we didn't have enough already. 

I'm going to go air fry some chicken wings for my husband who is watching the Super Bowl. I asked him who was playing. He was not sure. I asked him who was doing the half time show and he didn't know that either. I said, "Well, is it the Rolling Stones or Bruce Springsteen?"

"No," he said. 
"Well then forget it," I said. 

And he knows I mean it. 

Love...Ms. Moon

P.S. I just looked it up. Rhianna is playing the half time show. I bet she's nervous as hell right now. I sure would be. She'll be great. She's a pro. 

Rainy Day Woman

And this is how we eat pizza around here. I don't even know why I bother to make pizza when the arugula isn't in season because arugula is what makes the pizza sing and dance. I pick it, wash it, dry it, cut it up a little bit, and then slosh a tiny bit of olive oil, balsamic vinegar, a smashed garlic clove, some salt and pepper on it, mix it up, stick a little fork in the bowl and set it on the table for our serving pleasure. 

So that's what we had last night. I destroy the kitchen when I make pizza. There's the dough to be dealt with and all the chopping and grating and in this case, the making of an alfredo sauce with mushrooms and artichoke hearts, onions, and leftover chicken. That was one pizza and the other was more traditional with red sauce, ham, black olives, onion, artichoke hearts and (please don't hate me) pineapple because that is what the man loves best. I like it fine. You could put just about anything on a pizza and I would like it. 

Another day of rain. At least a garden-cart full. And it's getting cooler. Sort of dreary, actually. Mr. Moon went to a noon-time basketball game and I'd done all the laundry yesterday and I was both happy to have such down time and also, feeling at loose ends. I did three crosswords, the Wordle (are y'all still Wordleing?) and made up a loaf of bread that is still rising. I have my towel-covered heating pad, proofing situation all perfected which comes in handy when I don't have two days to wait for a loaf to rise. I finally sat down on the couch to do a little crocheting and watch a Mormon-adjacent documentary and glanced over at the table beside me where I keep some of my thread and pins and needles and scissors and so forth to see this guy. 

I just had to laugh. I thought about the eternal question of how many angels can dance on the head of a pin and although I will never know the answer to that, I do now know approximately how many pins an anole needs to dance on. 

Next thing I knew, he was trying to climb the lamp. 

"Little help, here?" he seemed to be saying. But he figured it out on his own. Later, he was climbing the landline phone that we haven't used in at least six months except for that once I needed it to try and locate my iPhone. 

If he's waiting for a call, he's out of luck. That system isn't even plugged in. Look at those little hands of his! They look so clever, so tidy, so...human. Alien-human, perhaps. 

I went outside in a break in the rain to pick more arugula and some kale and mustard greens for tonight's salad and took this picture of bejeweled mulberry babies.

I am really not good at being leisurely. I always think it will make me happy but it rarely does. I need projects. Real projects. I attribute my inability to really start them as stemming from when I had children at home. I would just get something going when a child needed me or it was time to cook dinner or wash diapers or, later on, go do my school volunteer stuff or my part time job or shuttle children to and from lessons and scouts and friends' houses or one or another of the endless things that mothers do. I did manage to make gardens, sew things and occasionally refinish a piece of furniture or, hell, I don't know. Do whatever it was I did. I've never been good at drawing or painting. Writing and cooking are my main creative outlets. I've always read voraciously. 

I look back and think of the fact that I managed to go to nursing school when I had two small children and I realize that was something but millions of women do that. 

On that day last week when we thought, for a few hours at least, about the possibility of buying that house in Roseland, it seemed like such a good idea. Even if the house needed a lot of work, if the kitchen and a bathroom and a bedroom were functional, we could stay there and do things at our own pace. Mr. Moon could have hired help with whatever repairs needed doing and I could have shopped at the myriad of thrift stores and the giant Habitat for Humanity store a few miles down the road for furniture and rugs and lamps and kitchen things. We wouldn't have needed to cram the place full of stuff. In fact, I wouldn't want to do that. I had even thought about planting exotic palms and mangos on the property. It's tropical gardening paradise there. 

And every night that we wanted to, we could have watched the sunset from that dock and we could kayak down the river and take the boat to the islands in the inter-coastal waterway to look for Fossil Island where we used to find mammoth teeth and vertebrae when I was a child. 
We would not have moved there permanently. I could never leave my children and grandchildren. I just couldn't. And I love this house and our garden and life in Lloyd. But we could spend weeks at a time there. We are retired, after all. Despite the fact that we mostly have been since covid began, we are just now really starting to realize that we can go and do in ways that we were never able to before. Even the simplest things like buying a mullet dinner on a Friday at noon is something we need to be more open to. 

Well. 

Saturday night musings as the rain falls, a sweet steady drumbeat. It will stop raining eventually and I will be able to plant my peas, my onions, my potatoes. I'll be able to hang my clothes on the line and take my walks. Maybe I will start sewing dresses for Magnolia again. I look back on the days when August and Levon wanted dresses too and I miss that. I wonder what they'd say if I even suggested it. The age of innocence is beautiful and it is short although August still has no qualms about wearing shoes and shirts in his favorite color, which is pink. And unicorns and rainbows adorn his backpack. 

If only I could accept myself the way August accepts himself which is unique and wonderful and needing no definition or explanation. 

If only all of us could do that, it would be a much better world. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Meds, Mullet, Mormons, Martinis, And Jack

Well, I think I figured out why I felt so funky yesterday and even more so today and you have heard this story before- I forgot to take my meds yesterday. Pretty sure that was it. It's scary how much they affect me or at least the lack of them affect me. But I took them this morning and am hoping that I'll be back tomorrow, bright as a new penny. 

It's been raining most of the day and I have done very little and yet it's been a beautiful day for me. Mr. Moon and I have spent time together, being sweet. Well, even sweeter than usual which is pretty sweet. We even went down to the site of the former truck stop where every weekend an older couple (i.e., our age or younger) sets up their food truck right behind the giant Johnny Appleseed. I have eaten a lunch from them once before but it was a long time ago when they were just under a little canvas awning. Now they've got it fancied up and really going. 

Conch City Catering. 
The lady who took our order was darling and had a gold tooth that made me want one so bad. You may think I am kidding but I am not. Mr. Moon asked her if the mullet was fresh and she assured him it was- her husband caught it. Her husband also cooked it. I ordered a shrimp dinner and it was fine but nothing as fine as that mullet was which my husband shared with me. Would you look at this fish?

 That, my friends, is what we like about the south. Fried mullet and fried okra. And underneath that mullet is a piece of white bread which is the absolute traditional way of serving it. 
Pass the hot sauce and shut up. 

The fisherman/chef talked to Mr. Moon for at least ten minutes about how and where he caught that mullet. And the problems he'd had at the boat ramp. And then they talked about bait. And then they talked about catching stripers. And then they talked about catching sheepshead and how to cook them. 
Ooh boy. The only thing fishermen love to do more than fish is to talk about fishing. And I was all La-Di-Dah'ing over there, thinking, Uh, can we go home and eat this fish now?

Which we eventually did. 

Besides that delightful adventure (no hyperbole there, people- seriously) I've had a little nap, done some laundry, and investigated a major crisis brewing at the Open Stories Foundation which is where my not-so-secret-addiction of Mormon Stories podcasts comes from. I cannot and will not even try to figure out, much less explain why I love listening to those podcasts but it's been years now and I still listen to almost every one of them and some of them are over three hours long. The crisis arose when one of the employees who had been hired as an office manager type person and who had slid into co-hosting occasionally, lost her job. Now I do not know how her office managing skills were, but as a co-host she was a mess. Mostly she just cried. And hell yes! Many of the stories that the interviewees tell are heartbreaking and just plain hard and I can understand becoming emotional but Lord, this woman just wept and wept and wept. 
I kept wondering how long John, the host, would be able to put up with that and how in the world he was going to get out of it. He's such a kind man but I guess she finally provoked him in a way that caused him to get angry and now she's claiming all kinds of shit although none of it is anything more than, "He made me feel unsafe." "He wasn't being empathetic enough about my needs as a mother." Blah, blah, blah.
So she's suing him and the Open Stories Foundation and they're counter-suing her. Another former-Mormon podcaster (yes, I listen to two podcasts about Mormonism) is an attorney and he read the entire transcript of the counter suit on his show and that took awhile to listen to. And today I watched, on Youtube, a meeting with the woman, John, and two members of the board of the Open Stories Foundation that had occurred before the woman lost her job and before she brought a case against them. 
And guess what? She cried and cried and cried. 
Oh, how she cried. 
Look- I cry at the drop of a hat but I'm not a freaking co-host. We're talking Tammy Faye level of crying. 
So that took quite a bit of time. 

Aren't you glad you know all of this? 

Well, to me it's fascinating. 

And I guess that's all I have to talk about. I'm going to make pizzas tonight. I used some of the sourdough starter discard a few days ago to start a dough and we'll see how that goes. 

Just about time to make martinis. And I'm late on the laundry so our clean sheets are still in the dryer. But who cares? It's Friday.

Because I love you I will give you this picture of Jack.  

He's such a weirdo. 
So am I. 

So am I.

Happy Friday, y'all. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Another Day, Another Waller

 

I have just been incredibly low energy today. I did not have my usual MerMer buoyancy, couldn't make my usual inane snappy patter with the boys, didn't crack jokes and sing them songs. 
Ah well. We all have those days. Maybe it's the weather change that's about to happen. Rain is coming and I can feel it in every place in my body that has ever been injured. Maybe I did too much yesterday, both physically and emotionally. 
Maybe I'm just old. 

Once again I did not eat lunch before I picked up Levon and we ended up at the sorta-Tex-Mex place again and please remind me that I really don't like the food there. And then I took him next door to the Goodwill book store and although he really wanted a toy and not a book, we compromised on a book for August and two puzzles. One with a hundred pieces which was superhero thing and one a Melissa and Doug floor puzzle of dinosaurs. Levon and I did the superhero one before we picked up August and it turned out that it was actually a 99 piece puzzle but that was okay. The boys did the dinosaur puzzle together before I left. 

I brought them snack bags with vanilla wafers and six M&M's apiece in them and they were thrilled with that. 

So I did do my grandmotherly duties and I read them the book we got at Goodwill which was a magic school bus book and I hate those books. I mean- yes, it's cool that the kids like them and learn things from them but they're sort of freaky if you ask me and poor Arnold, or whoever that kid is who is always missing the bus just makes me so sad. BUT, the boys like them and they want me to read every word of print on the pages and there are a LOT. 

The book we read today was about how the body works and although the magically-made-microscopic bus with the school children in it got ingested through the mouth of Arnold which I thought would inevitably lead to the bus being pooped out, I was disappointed to discover that no, it was sneezed out via Arnold's nose. 
As August would say, "Oh, come ON!"
Ms. Frizzle does wear some nice dresses though. 

So I tried and now I'm home, hoping to be made magically more energetic tomorrow through a night of sleep. 

I talk about sleep a lot. 
Well, write about what you know. I know food and I know sleep. 

And that is mostly it. 

Love...Ms. Moon