.... and finish.

This space sure has been fun but it is time to move on from here.  Don't worry all you late night seekers of 'utah-nudists' you will still find this, nothing is going away but me.  I would invite those of you seeking home school life, gymnastics, & simple family living to join us over at dust fairies and darwin and those of you after something a little more silly sometimes nutty or down right crazy to come along on a new journey with me at housewife....wait, when was I drunk enough to marry a house? 

Thanks for visiting! mlb

a chance of you

a chance of you  mlb

It’s like holding hands in the dark

peering, waiting, wondering
feeling the wind move in

the leafs rise & fall as waves in a broken amber ocean 

chill reaching
the strength of a look dropped half way

the touch stopped before it started

silence is clouds bridging the gap from here to where I stand

the shadows long

the highway drab

watching, waiting, wondering

as the storm crawls nearer

and never comes

standing in the absence of rain

in the quiet of an afternoon

in the middle of nowhere

the sky streaking by without touching the ground

the wind a whimpering  embrace

I could pretend to stand beside you

your shoulder against mine

as if we weren’t at all

I want to whisper in the air is that you?

Are you really there?

Are we really anywhere?

 eyes shut tight, waiting, wondering

a storm blowing by in the night

whispering but never speaking

over the lights not on in a house well lit

turning the pages of a an empty book

pretending not to see what isn’t there

when you rolled your mouth to mine

words falling like snow in lamp light-

If I have never been here, you will never know me to miss me.

the storm blows over in sunset

flame embedded in the bones of the rising dark

followed by a morning that hangs

stark & empty

without the chance of you

on the horizon

feeding the fuel of fear

I was sitting in the passenger seat watching the sand dunes rise and fall then rise again.  Out of the corner of one eye I was watching Colby making sure he was at least watching some of the road as he stared up towards the red cliffs.  Out of the other I was watching something that wasn't there.  Tiny bubbles of memories floating above the van barely formed before vanishing into dry desert air: my sister in the backseat of the station wagon holding a soda & laughing, my sister asleep against the window angry and pouting that I had touched her pillow...there are sounds and smells, a whole childhood spent driving this stretch of highway heading for the cool paradise of Lake Powell. 

At some point it slowly settled in, this may not be normal to linger with the dead like this. 

The van clips a stone in the road it crashes like thunder flashing orange through my mind and I flinch.  In a blink of an eye I can see a hundred other moments falling.  I open my eyes.  And it is all gone, sort of.  We all have these memories and moments that haunt us, perhaps they are failures we forgot to grow from, or Loves lost, or the dark side of man looming over head.  Mine suddenly remind me of a door in a giant flat brick wall flying open in the wind.  Banging against the fame, papers fly out scattering and the door bangs shut as if nothing has happened.

Fact: It takes more energy to ignore than it does to focus. 

More thoughts settle.  I didn’t realize the battle I fight within my mind to keep this door shut was actually this constant.  I thought it was here or there. 

But it’s not. 

It is here and there, and it is all the time.

 

Everyday I stand with my back to the door trying to hold it shut and pretend I'm not.  What if I decide today is the day I stop.  What if today I slide down the wall out of the way and I let her go?  What will happen? 

It is curious, I don't even have the slightest idea if walking from my post will be losing or winning this fight? What I do know is I want yesterday standing in the kitchen of the Boy trying to tell him something important (something really important!) and not being able to get the words out to be the last time that happens to me- EVER.  If I start down that road the one marked 'I don't really talk about this a lot but...' I want to be able to follow it until I have said what needs to be said.

It is strange, when I think about it I see myself step aside and open the door peeking inside.  What I see is my garden, then the waving yellow grasses of the back field, and beyond that the endless desert.  I walk through to the other side. The whole world is silent over there, even the wind.  And the pages of paper are blank. 

Be careful what you wish for the door may swing both ways.  

Perhaps I should have decided which side of the wall I wanted to defend before I walked through it.   

Every day you either see a scar or courage. 

Where you dwell will define your struggle.  ~Dodinsky~

Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear.  ~Ambrose Redmoon~

last night

Here are the fun pic's from last night ladies only, well almost ladies only group W bench happy birthday Misty dinner. 

When you get  this group together it is very loud....and then there are the kids too!

Now I am going to tell you something totally random...Last night I had a dream I was in a plane that crashed and sank into the ocean.  I swam onto a beach with Colby and about 10 other people.  When I looked around I ask Colby about the other 100 or so people on the plane and he explained we could only save as many people as could fit in the nose of the plane.  I looked around again and there was a 500 lb women on the shore...'what about her?'I asked him.  He answered, ' You know how it works, we needed someone to not make it so I figured she was our best bet.'

Ah, the poor home schooled child working on her word search place mat- 'must finish'.   

Thanks to every one who made my turn to 39 so wonderful!

Look out, I'm just getting started!     

simply me

As the school bus pulls away outside in the January rain (not snow) I am listening to Beach and Colby in the warm kitchen making crepes together.  Before I finish this post Colby will be gone, off to work leaving us the whole day, a whole day to discover, a whole day to learn, a whole day alone here. 

It is brave new world on the R&B farm, last night I sent a copy of one of my manuscripts to the man requesting a chance to see it.  This isn’t a true step towards getting published it is more like an indulgence, a rather green editor wanting to see the whole picture of something that caught his eye. 

The day is supposed to be warm and wet which means muddy floors but I am told it is snowing in the mountains.  I have writing to do, some cleaning, a date with the treadmill at the rec. center, three novels (of Beach’s) all so close to the end I’m sure they will be done today, subtraction action, the list with Beach is endless.    

This day asks me: are you sure you know what you are doing?

Yeah, that is a good question.  Right now I’m peaceful content, tittering on the edge of happiness.  Happiness in the grey, unsure, but traveling anyway. 

In my mind there is a cabin in the woods surrounded by miles of mountain running trails, maybe a lake, and no one around for miles.  It is always Autumn, there is always coffee, and blankets and the perfect big chair with the perfect view of nothing but towering trees.  I am a writing there.

I found a truth yesterday I can’t hide from so I’m not going to anymore.  This is who I am.  And that is where you can find me in an imaginary cabin in the woods collecting words to tell stories. 

It is what I want.

I am day dreaming of a trail bathed in sunlight, of a moment in time when I am alone moving under my own power towards what I want for myself. 

Number 1 on that short list of 5 is this: follow your dreams all the way up that mountain, and this time don't let anyone or anything stop you until you reach the summit.         

boo's zoo, the story of a book project

This is a writing project that mixes art, science, and creativity.  

I found the idea in a book designed for adding extra challenges into projects to help children pursue balanced thinking and reasoning skills. 

                                       First we created some wild creatures for Boo's Zoo. 

                         After making their zoo homes/exhibits it is off to writing their stories.

                               Where they live, what they eat, temperaments, etc.

We came up with the idea to write a newspaper article about they day they all got out of the zoo!

Boo's Zoo also has a Thing but that is a whole other story...