My favorite place: an update

This is where I've been spending as much time as possible lately. It's a tiny little beach but because you have to hike a bit to get there, and probably for other reasons too, it's never all that crowded. I've been swimming as much as I can, just floating and diving and letting myself be carried by the waves. We saw dolphins doing the same thing a couple of weeks ago ... probably they were hunting too, I suppose ... anyway, it was cool to see them.

I appear to be entering perimenopause. The infamous fuzzy thinking has definitely taken hold, and I'm considering it one of the blessings of this time of my life that I'm not presently encumbered with a job that would make fuzzy thinking a detriment. When it takes over, I'm mostly able to just go with it. Which is not to say that I'm not getting anything useful done, just that I'm doing it at my own pace and timing rather than feeling bound to work by someone else's guidelines. It's actually pretty great. The hot flashes, not so much. I'm fine tuning my diet this month though and am expecting to be able to continue just riding them out when they happen. So far they've been few and far between, and uncomfortable, but not unbearable.

We missed the window of opportunity to live outdoors for a month or two while redoing the entire house, so have been focusing instead on doing other stuff that doesn't require emptying all the furniture out into the yard. The carpets have been shampooed and re-shampooed to within an inch of their lives, and amazingly, they look almost new again – so much so that I'm a little embarrassed at having waited to so long to do them. I really thought they were beyond hope. We now have the whole winter to look at flooring, cabinets, lighting and fixtures and make some well-considered decisions about what will work for the rest of our lives – since I never want to have to do this again – instead of rushing into a quick choice that may or may not end up making us (meaning, me) happy.

I've been looking at pictures of places I used to live in, and remembering things I liked and didn't like. The good news is, I still like a lot of the same stuff I've always liked, like unpainted solid wood doors, wood floors, checkered tile in the kitchen, certain colors and patterns ... If I've already liked it for 45 years, it's a good bet I will continue to like it. So we'll probably end up going with that. With some variations just for fun, of course.

Yoga is going great. I love, love, love my practice and my teacher. I'm riding my bike a lot more again now too, now that Bea is old enough to be left alone for more than just a few hours at a time. That's been really wonderful. Mr. A took me to test ride a few full-suspension mountain bikes and I'm thinking maybe I'll get into some off-road riding this year, in addition to my usual riding-for-transportation. It was amazing to ride off a curb on a bike so springy I hardly felt the bump. Also, I've started running, very tentatively, and swimming at the gym every once in awhile. And walking the dogs two to four miles a day. For all the work I've been doing, strangely, I haven't lost much weight ... I still look about the same as I always have. I feel good though. The depression seems to be fading too, for which I'm very grateful.

Not much is happening on the job front, though I am starting to look more seriously again. I sent several resumes last week, including one where an old friend is at least partly in charge of hiring (so, fingers crossed for at least an interview), and received a rejection notice from a barista position at Whole Foods. Hrmph. I've been working 10-20 hours a week on various web projects, and starting this week will be working one day a week at my friend's froufy home furnishings shop again, the same one I worked at last time I was grievously underemployed. She is sweet and the shop is beautiful, and I'm looking forward to getting out of the house and interacting with actual human beings on a more regular basis again.

As for school, I'm contemplating whether I want to reapply to that program now or not. I still don't have the experience they want, and not really any prospect of obtaining it, so it seems kind of pointless. There are other programs, though. In the meantime I'm looking for a place to start learning Spanish. Seems like a good thing for anyone living and working in California to know, and I've got the time. And I like languages. So there's that.

The dogs are great. They're a huge part of my life right now. Is that pathetic, or wonderful? I choose to think of it as wonderful. Bea is 45 lbs now and won first prize in the games at her graduation from puppy school, for mastering and demonstrating the most tricks and commands. She has several puppy friends that we meet at the dog park every once in awhile, and is turning out to be a complete and utter sweetie pie. She's still breaking in her big girl teeth on everything she can get a hold of, and she loves to dig in her water bowl, but the incessant frantic barking is finished and she's finally starting to enjoy snuggling and snoozing without constantly chewing on our hands and faces.

Yesterday we found out she's now tall enough to reach things on the kitchen counters – for example, the 3/4 lb steak that was cooling on a plate, waiting to be sliced over salads. I thought Mr. A had put it in the fridge, and he though I had, so it took us awhile to realize that the puppy snoring away on her back in the middle of the floor was not just sleepy from playing all morning, but from the aftereffects of a very large protein snack. I still don't know how she did it without pulling the plate off the counter, or leaving some tell-tale greasy mess somewhere ... But I know it wasn't me who ate it, and it wasn't Mr. A, and Tater can't stand up on his hind legs like that anymore, even if he wanted to – which he never has done in his life, anyway. What with him being the world's most perfect dog and all.

It was actually pretty cool to imagine her enjoying that steak though. I wish I could have seen her. Especially because it will (must) never happen again. I'm working with her now to make sure she understands the counter is not a place for dogs to eat, ever, ever, ever. Kind of sad, in a way, but probably best for everyone.

In other news, I just looked into a little mirror I have here on my desk and saw that I seem to be growing some new little nose hairs I never noticed before. Oh dear.

And finally, fall is time to dream of boots ... I haven't decided yet if I'm going to spend any money on boots this winter. It turns out I don't really love the ones I got last year, and have hardly worn them. Possibly I will sell them on eBay ... they're seriously almost brand new. I even still have the box. Anyway, in closing, here are a few that I've been looking at for 2010-11.




What are you wearing on your feet lately?

What I have been up to (besides not blogging)

1. Working. I have three freelance projects going on right now and am supposed to be starting on my Big Project of the season any day now. While I haven't spent a lot of time actually working on the freelance projects, they always seem to take a lot of brain time for me – this includes things like email time, research time, and project-related down time, in which I'm not exactly producing anything but nevertheless feel myself to be "occupied" with the project.

2. Cleaning. The latest flurry of activity in this category was inspired by my discovery of a dead mouse in one of my panniers. I thought I smelled something funny when I was loading it up for work ... but a quick review of its contents revealed nothing but the smell, which somehow wasn't bad enough to really bother with until I got to work and started to un-load – at which point it became nauseatingly obvious that there was something terribly, horribly wrong going on in there. I took everything out – including the stuff I'd only rummaged through before – and found the culprit tangled up in the dark brown scarf I keep in there in case it turns out to be freezing at my office (which it usually is in the summer, thanks to an erratic AC system that happens to have its sole outlet directly above my desk).

Laundry ensued. And ensued. And ensued again. And once I was in the mode, I started cleaning everything. I love the feeling of knowing that absolutely everything in the house is as clean as it can possibly be. This doesn't mean I always spend this much time cleaning, but when I do feel inspired to do it – it always feels good.

3. Helping a friend take care of her father, who's in his 90s and getting ready to die. It's a difficult and sad situation, frequently unpleasant and not much in anyone's control – not the kind of situation I usually find very attractive – but I've been feeling like I need to make more of an effort to participate in meaningful community life, and to me this kind of participation is a lot more meaningful and satisfying than just meeting for drinks on someone's birthday or sharing a blanket on the lawn at the farmer's market – although I like doing those things too.

So far all I've really done is run errands, bring food, clean the house, and be there when the hospice people came by. I'm also on call for emergency overnight care, so she can get some sleep every once in awhile, although I haven't been needed for that yet.

4. Visited my family in Utah. This was earlier in July. I got there just in time for my niece's 10th birthday and my parents' 45th anniversary. My whole family was there, although never quite all at the same time, and I felt good being with everyone and refilling my stores of happy, healthy, big loving family energy.

Possibly I should write more about these trips when I make them, since they are the highlight of my entire life these days and something I really look forward to and enjoy. Talking about my family feels somehow too personal for this blog though – in fact sometimes the whole blog itself feels too personal – one reason I don't write much anymore. I do want to go on record though as saying that the more time I can spend with my family, the happier I am, and the more balanced and grounded I feel. And the more I wonder what it is exactly that I am doing, living all the way out here so far away from them still.

5. Sewing. I've made six or seven new dresses this summer and stocked up on supplies for other projects, enough to take me through the end of the year at least. A friend sent me pictures and instructions for making your own shoes, which I've always wanted to do, so I'm gradually amassing materials for that as well – most recently a lime green suede skirt that I plan to cut up for platform maryjane espadrilles, using a favorite old worn-out pair as a pattern, once I can figure out how to get the sole just the way I want it.

6. Watching movies. Last night Mr. A brought home the last Batman movie, from last summer ... the really creepy, dark one. Mr. A loves comic book/superhero stuff and I usually hate it, but for some reason I could not tear myself away from this one. Actually I know the reason – it was the Joker. He was just so convincingly awful and insane, the exact kind of villain that interests and disturbs me the most. Maybe the only kind. The totally broken, irredeemable kind who's just so ill and damaged you can't even quite exactly call them "evil" ... because they don't seem to be making a choice as much as they're simply expressing their nature, like an electrical storm or a diseased animal. There's no logic, no humanity there – nothing to appeal to and no way to save yourself except stay out of their way. After I watched it I couldn't even begin to think about going to sleep so I put a Walton's DVD in the machine and ran on the treadmill for an hour to dissipate some of the adrenaline. This one was from season six, not the family's finest year, but good enough to get me through that particular night.

7. Cooking and baking. Just your basic seasonal stuff, as necessary – over the weekend I made a chocolate zucchini sour cream cake to use up a huge zucchini someone gave me, the recipe for which I will post in the next few days (since I have to write it down anyway, to give to some people at work who liked the cake) – and tonight I cleaned and chopped and froze several grocery bags worth of the most delicious furry red peaches from Mr. A's parents' trees. They all get ripe at once and once they're ready they have to be either eaten or stored right away. The best, most perfect ones I set aside to eat fresh, and the rest I'm storing in quart freezer bags, just the right size for a batch of peach ice cream or a half dozen peach tarts. There's also this peach upside-down muffin/cake thing that appears at my favorite local boulangerie very occasionally, which I've always wanted to figure out how to make. Maybe this will be the year for that.

There's also a new kind of white bean and chicken sausage soup that Mr. A invented on Saturday that I've been swooning over ever since, that he's promised to teach me. I'll definitely post that one too – it's the best soup I've had since winter.