I feel a road trip coming on

The end of a year inspires me to look past the daily grind of living to the broader panorama of my life. Maybe you could say I'm looking under the hood to see if my engine needs an overhaul. It's barely eight o'clock in the evening here in Tucson, and already I hear fireworks in the distance. Sometimes people like to set off rockets in the wash behind the trailer. If we're really lucky somebody will set something on fire (preferably not this trailer), and the sirens will inspire a coyote chorus. Nothing says you live in the stupid cold desert like hearing a bunch of howling coyotes. 

The drawing you see here is from 1997, when I was in freefall between Los Angeles and Portland. I was trying to look on the bright side. What did I know about being homeless? Clearly nothing, judging by the insipid enthusiasm on my face (yes, that is a self-portrait, and yes, I used to have hair in those days). I was just as prone to magical thinking then as I am now, but my yearnings these days are tempered by cynicism borne of aging. It's hard to conjure much enthusiasm for adventure (or fireworks) when one is worn out from the trials of being alive. 

Oh, woe is me, I'm alive. What a tragedy. 

Being alive beats the alternative, but it's hard sometimes. The air pressure ebbs and flows, which means my vestibular system is swamped at least once per minute. The noise in my right ear is deafening. My neck aches from valiantly trying to hold my head straight, to keep my sightlines steady. When my eyes are closed, I lean to the right, so I try not to close my eyes when I am standing up. Walking in the dark is difficult. Dangerous, probably, but when you gotta go, you gotta go. I don't think this vestibular paroxysmia malady is getting worse, but it's not getting any better. I am waiting impatiently for my visit to the neurologist in February. Maybe she'll have some answers about this downed powerline in my head. It's just as possible she will tell me to quit whining and send me home. 

Home. I still hope such a place exists. I plan to continue my quest. I could give up, surrender to Tucson, admit defeat, tell myself it doesn't matter if I live in a place that doesn't feel right to me. I could just suck it up, along with my physical maladies. But with the housing situation the way it is, I can't afford even the roach-ridden gun-infested sleazebag apartment I rented the first year I came here. My options have dwindled, and I don't think it's my fault. Rents have gone up all over the nation, and low-income seniors are being hit hard. I feel it. It hurts.

I was forty years old when I left Los Angeles to move back to Portland. I had parents then. I had a long-distance relationship that quickly fizzled and morphed into another quasi-committed relationship. In other words, I had multiple safety nets, the lowest and most moldy of which would have been my parents' basement. I never really worried about being homeless. It was kind of a cool bohemian dream, to be a vagabond. The nomad vanlife wasn't a thing yet (because YouTube hadn't been invented yet), although people did travel and live in motorhomes. I remember thinking it would be cool to live in a living room on wheels. I had a vision of selling paintings of mountains and waterfalls from the back window of my peddler's art wagon. My partner at the time was equally enamored of the possibilities of the nomad lifestyle, probably because he hoped to fly under his ex-wife's radar, maybe avoid paying taxes, skip out on child support, that sort of thing. Me, I just wanted freedom. 

Speaking of freedom, I'm headed out to Quartzsite in a week to hang out with the vanlifers, nomads, RVers, and schoolies. It will be crowded. I will not be alone. I will not be lonely. I will find kindred spirits. Or I will enjoy my solitude—just one small minivan among many travelers—cook food on my butane stove, and catch up on my sleep. I'm not sure what the internet situation will be. I don't really care. 

After that desert rendezvous ends, I'm planning on visiting my demented friend in Los Angeles. She's in a place now for nutty seniors. I complain a lot about my cognitive abilities (and I'm sure I'm dropping typos in my blogposts like my mother used to drop used tissues from every pocket), but I can still think and make decisions. Not great ones, sometimes, but I have autonomy. My poor friend has lost her ability to think, just like my mother did over the last few years of her life. But my friend is not even seventy. My heart is broken. 

Well, whose isn't, these days? If you haven't had some heartbreak in the past year, lucky you. I hope 2024 is better for all of us, no matter what kind of year we had. For those of us who struggle, I offer the familiar maxim, so 1970s but still true: not all who wander are lost. 

Geezers gotta get up and go

I'm currently residing in a pretty big mobile home park. I'm not sure how many homes there are here, a few hundred, I think. I got lost the first time I tried to find the exit. Now, after walking this village many times over the past couple years, I know the streets well. I don't know a lot of people, but I wave and smile and chat a moment if they have a cute dog that seems inclined to be friendly. Not all people are friendly, just like not all dogs are friendly. Lexi, for instance, is a poodle from hell, but that is a different story. 

Life in the mobile home park has a rhythm, and lots of things can upset that rhythm. The big upset the past week or so has been a paving project. The management sent around a Google earth map of the village, with streets marked in dingy colors to indicate what part of the park would be paved on what day. Brilliant, right? We were all informed we better move our cars if we needed to go anywhere, because for two days, the streets would be impassable. The first day was for the paving. The second day was for striping. These things take time to dry.

The forecast called for rain, and according to Contractor Google, you aren't supposed to lay down this slurry stuff in the rain. Apparently, these guys didn't get the memo. The contractors roped off the streets, including ours, with flags and cones and put cones in front of everyone's driveways, just in case they got a wild hair to go out for breakfast. The team of guys in their filthy neon green gear got busy with their machines and pretty soon we had a really nice layer of sticky black slurry on our street. 

Just as they finished our street, it rained. The contractors packed up and went away, leaving our street roped off. It was the only street in the whole place that was closed to traffic.

The old folks stuck it out for two days (that was the agreement), but with all the humidity in the air, the black tarry stuff on the street was slow to dry. Pretty soon, the pristine paving job was gouged with tire tracks. Some looked like they might have been left by the mailtruck. The bigger ones were probably FedEx or UPS. But the little ones were definitely left by my neighbors, because you could see the slurry traces in their driveways. Caught you red-handed, Susie. There were plenty of footprints, too, both human and nonhuman. Maybe some were from neighbors walking their dogs, and one little skidmark was mine where I lost my balance as I tried to walk in the concrete gutter, but I bet most of them were rabbits. After all, you can't stop our resident hordes of rascally rabbits from dashing from cactus to driveway and back again. Just like you can't stop Mr. Gimp (the coyote) from giving chase. Fresh paving means nothing to them. 

The management sent around a resentful email chastizing us for wrecking the paving job, yada yada, but here's my take on it. First, everyone knew (or could have known) that it was going to rain, and you can't pave in the rain. Duh. I checked the slurry paving rules, because I'm a meddling researcher, and I checked the radar. When you see a splat of green over Tucson, you know it's raining. So that's the first thing. 

But more important, you cannot trap old folks in their homes and expect them to stay there for long. They have grandkids to see, stores to patronize, pancakes to eat at Denny's. Seniors are like cats. They can't be fully tamed, you can't herd them, and they are mostly untrainable. And why would you expect anything different? Time is a-wastin' when you are old and running out of road. You have to get going now, or risk stroking out before you get to the all-you-can-eat breakfast bar. Fear of missing out (FOMO) is one step below fear of dying before I get there (FODBIGT). 

I can just imagine my wizened neighbors chafing at the bit, staring out the window at the clouds, looking at the slurry mess and wondering when it was ever going to dry. As soon as they saw the mailtruck or whatever it was that made that first long gouge in the asphalt, they were like, lemme outta here. If that guy can do it, so can I. And off they went.

Eventually the street dried. The contractors came back, took down the ropes and cones, and got busy paving other streets in the park, which were soon gouged to the bedrock with tire tracks, human tracks, and animal tracks. I'm guessing the trash truck had a go, judging by the chassis width and tire tread of the most impressive gouge, all splashy and drippy on both sides of the track. I took a photo because it looks like art. 

This whole week, as I've walked the park in the evening, avoiding the freshly glistening asphalt slurry, I wondered what future archaeologists would make of these remants of human existence. The way we marvel at the footprints embedded in a former lakebed, preserved for a million years, would future scientists scratch their heads and propose theories about how we used to live in the olden days? Must have been a religious ritual, they would guess. Or maybe some kind of sacred art? I know, I know! Ley lines, embedded in tar, leading to various spiritual centers, perhaps used for human sacrifice, judging by the many human footprints showing people were running, slipping, and sliding in the muck. 

The contractors are returning tomorrow to redo our street and the rest of this end of the park pushed to the back of the calendar because of the rain. We are expecting good weather. But no matter what, you can't keep old folks trapped in their trailers. Old folks gotta roam. 

By the way, in case you are wondering, I did not get that job. One door closes, the door leading to the vast Arizona desert BLM land opens. More to be revealed.

Another week on the Zoom

I drive so rarely, my car decided it couldn't be bothered to start. I know the feeling. I often feel that way myself, like, what is the point? On Monday I forked over some money to the place up the street for a new battery. When I got my car back, it seemed to exhibit a new resolve, although the clock indicated it had somehow entered a different time zone. Being time-zone-challenged, I plan to use my usual approach: wait and see what happens. Perhaps the clock will reset itself. It's happened before. It's like when socks, or gloves, or keys go missing. They quite often reappear.

Speaking of things disappearing and reappearing, one of my friends has a poltergeist. My friend has had it for years. A thing goes missing. A needle and thread. A document. My friend searches like a mad person, can't find the thing. Eventually my friend gives up. Then the thing mysteriously returns, sometimes days later, suddenly appearing in plain sight. 

I don't have spirits following me around. Far as I know. I am glad about that. If you see a spirit following me, don't tell me.

So Monday's quest was to replace my car battery. Tuesday it rained (with thunder, lightning, and wind). I've already forgotten how that felt. It's a little preview of what comes in July. Wednesday I led a workshop to help artists figure out what art products they should sell. That was fun. A futile endeavor. It's always fun trying to herd cats. Mm, cats. Much rather be herding cats than teaching artists. 

On Thursday I decided I'd better get out of the Bat Cave. I walked to the local Goodwill. It was a twenty minute walk, mostly through a neighborhood of desert houses. Desert houses in the poor part of town are made of cinderblocks. The roofs are flat. Of course I can't see inside, but I imagine everyone is lying on the floor to escape the heat that pools under the low ceilings. Goodwill was small and moderately crowded. I was one of a few shoppers wearing a mask. Every time I go around others, I think, is it my turn? I've been careful, I've been lucky, I've dodged this thing for two years. Is my luck going to run out?

Friday was April 1, another good day for a walk. Does walking help? (Help with what, you might ask.) Who can say. Saturday was a day of phone calls. I praise the TV gods for SNL. Sunday was a day of Zoom meetings. The week is over. I am done.

My life seems to be a frayed slogfest of loose ends. I complete everything on my list, but the outcomes are unknown. For all those Zoom meetings, did I help anyone? I don't know. All that spraying of the insecticide in my kitchen, is it going to keep me safe? I doubt it. The new car battery, will it guarantee my car will start next time I turn the key? Can't be sure. I learned more about time zones last week, namely that Arizona is in its own private Idaho when it comes to time. Does anyone really know what time it is? Today I led a workshop on Zoom. People from multiple time zones attended. I am embarrassed to tell you how many tries it took me to get the correct time zones on the flyer.

I may not know what time it is, but I show up for life, that's the best I can say. I've just about given up on the idea that my life has meaning and purpose. It does if I say it does, but I'm sort of over it. Maybe it's just the vertigo. Maybe it's the high pressure building in, inviting me to get lost in blue sky. Today is over. Tomorrow will bring its own set of tasks and unknown outcomes. Sooner or later, I will be done.

 

Standing still in the stream of time

Yesterday was the day America sprang forward. I'm talking about clocks, of course. People all over the country were waking up and discovering they had forgotten to change their clocks. A few confused souls had no doubt set their clock back one hour (one of those confused souls called me an hour earlier than they were supposed to today, that is how I know). Some other confused souls had confused cell phones (I was one of those souls), phones that failed to update their location and promptly lost their minds.

One of the benefits of moving to Arizona, so I thought, was the luxury of not having to change my clocks twice a year. Most of Arizona remains on Mountain Standard Time, no matter what. Even in the tiny Bat Cave, I have three battery-powered analog clocks, plus one old-fashioned electric digital clock with glowing red numerals. I thought, what a relief, I won't have to go through the tedious task of adjusting my clocks. Woe is me, what a burden. I assumed my phone and two computers would manage the moment successfully, considering nothing needed to change. Standing still, right?

You'd think. 

As I said, my phone lost its mind and required a reboot to reorient itself regarding it's physical location on the planet. Then I discovered Google Calendar tried to update me to the Mountain Time Zone, probably because I had failed to differentiate between Mountain Standard Time and Mountain Daylight Time in the settings. (New to Arizona!) As the day wore on, my brain wore out, overloaded with numbers and well-meaning people trying to set me straight. My friend E said we are the same time zone as Mountain Time. Yes, but E did not say Mountain Standard Time. Apparently my Google Calendar has been on Mountain Daylight Time. That is my guess. 

Stick a fork in me, I'm done. I have spent the entire day trying to understand time. It doesn't help that my caller today set their clock backward rather than forward. Thus, because my phone lost its mind, the caller was calling two hours before our expected call time, which propelled me instantly into a crisis of confidence. (Who am I? Where am I? Does anyone really know what time it is?) That hissing sound you hear is my brain overheating.

I finally figured it out. 

I've been visualizing time as a round thing, like the face of an analog clock, when I should have been visualizing time as a series of rectangles. It's no wonder I'm having trouble. My brain has never been good with analog time. When I was nine years old, I spent a fair part of one afternoon standing in the hall staring at the huge clock on the wall. I was not allowed to reenter the classroom until I could "tell time." Humiliated and ashamed, I stood there staring, until an adult walked by. I cheated, of course, because what nine year old understands that integrity builds character, and I asked the kind adult to tell me what time it was. With the magic formula in hand, I triumphantly reentered the classroom, told my teacher the time, and resumed my seat, still having no clue what made the big hand different from the little hand. 

I eventually caught on, as we often do, we learn to tie our shoes and ride a bike and tell time on a round clock, and since then, time for me has been a round thing. Now, because I moved to Arizona, I know it's a rectangular thing.

Rectangles called time zones divide up the face of the North American continent. You knew this. In the spring, through a magic known as collective agreement (and an illness known as collective inertia), the time zones get off their butts and shift to the right one hour. In the fall, the time zones sigh, heave themselves to their wobbly feet, and move back to the left one hour to settle in for winter.

And what happens to me? I sit still, like a hotspot under the surface of the earth, while the time zones shift above me. Tectonic time zone plates. 

The consequence of standing still as the time zones shift is that I always have to be aware of which time zone is squatting over me. Is it the one to the left of me, or the one to the right? Yesterday it was the time zone to the right of me—those other Mountain Time Zone guys, the ones on Daylight Time, Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, those states have been hunkering over the Bat Cave for the past six months. To my confusion, I wake up this morning and find myself squashed by the weight of California, Oregon, Washington, and Nevada. 

I am awakening to the power of geography! Who knew this would happen from moving to Arizona and gloating about not having to change my clocks. I tell you, I would gladly change my clocks twice a year to avoid having to be hyper-conscious of what the states on either side of me are doing. Yesterday I was on Mountain Daylight Time, now I'm on Pacific Time! All without changing my own clocks. I thought it would be so great to sit still while everyone shifted around me. Instead I discover everyone shifted in unison, like a grand flock of swallows, and I'm the lone scrub quail, grousing in the dust. 

Two minutes or less

Sunday mornings are a good time to drive around Tucson. I like to combine errands, so in addition to learning the city, this morning I planned my trip so I could drop off my recycling. I found the police station at Miracle Mile and discovered they only recycle glass there, not paper and plastic, so I headed east on Grant, which turns into Kolb, then left on Speedway and remembered the address of the East Tucson City Hall from my previous trip a few weeks ago. I dumped the contents of my two little wastebaskets into a humongous dumpster, making my tiny contribution to the delusion that I’m somehow doing my part to keep a few scraps of paper and cardboard out of a landfill.

If I wanted to be in a booming business, I think the trash disposal business would be the place to invest. There won’t be a lack of business for the foreseeable future, and even if the entire marketing machine comes to a standstill because of a global catastrophe, the landfills will be full of useful items, some of which will never disintegrate. If I had some vacant land away from a bunch of neighbors, I would glean useable items from the waste stream, sell them to artists and home decorators now (before the apocalypse), and sock the essential items away for later—I’m thinking of the tools, the sturdy plastic containers, the building materials, all the stuff you would need to survive without electricity, internet, and Starbucks.

You need a lot of space for a landfill and a space to sort and glean. A warehouse. An aircraft hanger, maybe. After the apocalypse, planes won’t be flying. We’ll strip them for parts and use the fuselages for shelter. After we clear out the dead bodies. That’s assuming it was a plague that decimated the population. Ha. I read too much science fiction. This scenario also assumes I will be one of those left standing. Human history repeats until there are no more humans: I’m referring to the continual bloody fight over scarce resources. We think we are so civilized, so polite, but really, the ones with the power and resources want more power and resources and they don’t care much who they trample to get them. There’s never enough when the mission is to safeguard your genes, your tribe, and your way of life. As usual, those of us without will always be struggling to get a little more than our fair share.

Last week, the theme of my life was, where the heck am I, really? No, literally, I mean, what the heck is my address? Apparently I signed a lease to rent an apartment that was already occupied. I remember I questioned the address on the lease, back in August, but the apartment manager swore it was the right address. You’d think they would know their property address, right? It’s the address on the lease and on the payment portal where I sign in to pay my rent. A month and a half later, I now have discovered I’ve been paying rent, utilities, and renter’s insurance on someone else’s apartment. How surreal is that?

Action is the magic word. I got busy to keep from screaming and tearing what little hair I have left out by the roots. As far as utilities go, I think I’ve got the problem straightened out with the power company. I’ve called the insurance company and updated my renter’s insurance. The internet provider might be coming next week to install internet in the actual apartment I’m living in, assuming the modem actually arrives in the mail and I’m able somehow to retrieve it. I’ve sent an email to the property management company advising them of the situation and requesting they update my lease with the proper address. I don’t think that is too much to ask, do you?

Meanwhile, if I recently gave you a street address, please discard that information.

This weekend I’ve been organizing the Bat Cave to suit my lifestyle. I can’t make holes in the walls or ceiling, but I have managed to hang some things using that blue sticky gunk that peels off without leaving a mark. Last night I hung up the plastic strips of photos I made for Mom when she was on lockdown at the retirement home. If you’ll recall, I hung strips of photos outside her window until there was barely room to peer inside to see if she was awake on the couch or dead on the floor. When we moved her to the care home, I transferred all the photostrips to her new room. She enjoyed looking at the pictures of her friends and family, evidence of a long life well lived. She laughed when she spotted Radar and Klinger among the family photos.

Now I have the photostrips on my wall. It’s bittersweet to see the photos and remember how and why they were created. It’s been a tough time, for everyone.

This morning I organized my hokey pokey closet space (put your right foot in and shake it all about). It’s actually pretty good sized, for a studio apartment. Bigger than the bathroom. When I look at the bins, boxes, and hanging clothes (most of which are acrylic fleece), I feel some regret and chagrin that I spent so much sweat and money moving that stuff from Portland to Tucson. Even now, after some rest and reflection, it’s overwhelming to imagine getting rid of anything. Four pillows, crammed in a plastic bin. What if I need them to, I don’t know, make a bigger pillow? Do I need these four sets of flannel sheets? I hear it gets cold here. And that lovely rarely used turquoise polyester “down” comforter given to me by a work friend--what if I have to live in my minivan? I will surely rue the day I gave that comforter to Goodwill when I’m shivering in the trunk.

Nope, stop. Have you heard of the concept of sunk costs? All the time, energy, sweat, angst, and money have already been spent and cannot be retrieved. Keeping stuff I don’t need, won’t need, or might need some unknown day in the future goes against the circulatory nature of good living. Rainy days do come, we can’t deny it, but I have plenty of gear for the downpours, and in a flash flood, the less I have to carry, the better. Four pillows and a plush turquoise comforter won’t float me downstream.

I went through the hanging clothes, boxes, and bins and starting culling. Now I have five small cardboard boxes of stuff to donate to a thrift store. I balked a little when I realized I paid money for those cardboard boxes, but then I reminded myself of the principle of sunk costs and the law of circulation. It’s never too soon to lighten my material burden. Call it Swedish death cleaning.

If you had two minutes or less to evacuate, what would you grab on your way out the door? Last week I had occasion to consider that question for myself. A text appeared on my phone from an unfamiliar number, telling me to evacuate the apartment because of a gas leak in the building. Alarmed, I poked my head out the door and sniffed. I smelled no gas. I didn’t see anyone milling around, and I didn’t hear any voices. Given the apartments are all electric, you can imagine my skepticism. I texted back to the unknown person, “Can you be more specific?”

The texter responded with a street address and range of apartment numbers that included mine. I looked around and wondered what I would be sad to lose if the place suddenly exploded. I put my laptop and gear in my backpack and put it in my car, hoping the car would not blow up along with the building. Then I grabbed my phone and fanny pack and keys and started walking around to see what I could find out.

The apartment property here is divided into two sections. The managers refer to them as “complexes,” although I think that is a pretentious label for eight buildings that look like parts of a Motel 6. Nothing against Motel 6, just saying. Eight units per building, four up, four down, with external staircases. Both “east and “west” complexes have four buildings each. Both have dinky pools in between a couple of the buildings. Each building has its own set of mailboxes. Each has its own trash dumpster, although ours is slightly larger than theirs (and neither side recycles or composts). The parking area wraps across the back of both apartments and surrounds three sides of the west complex. You drive in on the east side of the west complex and are supposed to drive out on the west side, although nobody does. People drive in and out both driveways to get to the street. So far, I’m following the arrows on the pavement, but I’m sure at some point, I will cave and seek the shortest path to the exit. Both entrance and exit are guarded by electronic gates that don’t work.

What’s really odd is that a tall cinderblock wall divides east from west, breached only by the back parking area and a walkway from the parking lot to the west pool. I don’t know how this came to be. The buildings were clearly built at the same time by the same developer. I surmise there was a family feud among the owners at some point, inspiring them to split the entire group of buildings into two compounds, east and west.

After locking my door, I walked along the parking lot in the back, came around the corner of the west complex, and saw a modestly sized truck with the words “So and So Gas Service” on the side door parked outside a laundry room I’ve never used. Ah, gas dryers, I guessed. Some guy was sitting in the truck, looking bored. I didn’t see any tenants milling around. A man and woman came out of Building B and sauntered to their car.

And that, my dear Blog Readers, is how I came to learn that after living in this apartment for a month and a half, I didn’t know my own address.

I have since learned the name of the texter. I’ll call her K. She’s the new manager of this property—both sides, I assume. I wanted to ask her about the weird two-complex thing so I ventured into her tiny air-conditioned office and introduced myself. I didn’t stay to chat. She was clearly harried.

“You aren’t the only tenant this happened to!” she said. Apparently the address error had propagated across other leases signed since this property management company assumed management of this place. Now a lot of things need to be unraveled and repaired.

On the bright side, now I know which meter is mine. I know where the power breaker is. I think I’m reasonably certain now of my street address. I mean, how certain are we, ever, really? I’m glad I didn’t get letterhead printed. Not that I would, but you know.

I’m curious about something. I have yet to meet my alter ego in the west complex. Should I walk over there and introduce myself, ask if they perhaps have seen a modem addressed to me? Should I reassure them that the power company has reinstated their account and express my hope that the temporary disconnect didn’t cause a hit on their credit score?

Life trundles on, until it stops. Meanwhile, I’m giving some serious thought to what I would take with me if I had two minutes or less to evacuate. I encourage you to do the same. Not to make you crazy. Just as an exercise in self-analysis. It's always good to know what we value. 

A talkative passenger gets the Chronic Malcontent thinking

Thinking is something I do a lot of, maybe too much of, considering that thoughts don't necessarily lead to action. Maybe you have figured out how to think and make things happen—think and grow rich? Think and get happy? Think and create success? If so, I applaud you, you dynamic thinker, you. For me, thinking is a convenient way to avoid doing stuff. It's so much easier to think (dream, ponder, ruminate) than it is to take action.

Consider the ritual of setting our clocks back one hour in the fall, such a colossally arrogant manipulation of our ridiculous human perception of time. Wait, what? Sounds like I still haven't caught up on my sleep. The cat, of course, did not set his clock, being a creature of earth rotation, so he's been on me all week at the hint of dawn, not my best time.

This year, I celebrated the clock-changing ritual by flipping my mattress, changing my sheets, and vacuuming the rugs. I like to do that twice a year. No need to be overly ambitious, especially when it comes to vacuuming. Dust mites have to live too, you know. I try to welcome all god's creatures.

My right leg has been falling asleep when I sit at my kitchen table. I looked it up: leg falls asleep while sitting. Lots of exciting possibilities. (How did we survive before Google?) Thanks to multiple web authors of dubious repute, I'm having one long continuous stroke, I've got a pinched nerve (not sure what that is), or I'm enjoying some sciatica.

I attended an event in Salem last weekend. Salem is an hour drive south of Portland. I attend this event every year. I look forward to the hypnotic drive down I-5 to our state's capital. The drive there and back is better than the event itself, mainly because I get to be alone and out of my house. This year, a member of the group texted me to ask if she could ride with me. Caught off guard, I discarded my first thought (no fricking way, eew) and texted back, okay. She gave me her address, which I recognized as being in the heart of what we for many years have disparagingly called Skid Row, long before our entire city has become one heartbreaking Skid Row of houseless, homeless, sad, cold, tired, hungry, messed up people.

“Just cross the Burnside Bridge and turn right,” she texted.

“I'll pick you up at 8:30,” I responded, wondering if I would be able to walk by the time I arrived in Salem.

Despite the fact that the Burnside Bridge was closed for repairs that weekend, I managed to be ten minutes early, because besides being chronically malcontented, I am chronically early. I sat outside a decrepit apartment building in the loading zone, watching men and women shuffle by with backpacks and shopping carts. I perused their attire and demeanor. I saw their social interactions. I'm learning through observation—in my precarious world, homelessness is always lurking around the corner. I'm lucky, though: I have a car.

Eventually, my passenger appeared. Let's call her Lee. Lee hopped into my car and off we went.

From the time we left her door until the time we arrived at the event venue, Lee talked incessantly. I found out she is a poet. She works as a caregiver for an obese woman, often taking her client to the opera. She told me things I would never have dreamed of asking, stories of childhood trauma and abandonment. She shared about unsuccessful marriages and relationships. I heard about her mother, her father, her siblings, and the siblings from her father's multiple extramarital escapades, some of whom she'd recently met.

I kept my eyes on the road, nodding occasionally, grunting a few times, reluctant to say anything substantive. Lee didn't mind. In fact, I don't think she noticed.  The angst in her voice began to grate on my nerves. It took me a while to figure out that she is drama junkie. I cannot match that level of excitement. By the time we reached the event venue, I was thoroughly blockaded behind my personal bubble, determined to ignore her as much as possible during the day until it was time to make the return trek to Portland.

At 4:30, we were on the road home. I was hoping she would be tired, inclined to doze off, maybe, but no, she seemed as energetic as ever. At one point, Lee said, “I know I talk a lot.”

I took the opening. “Are you afraid of silence? Some people don't like too much silence.”

She was silent for a couple breaths. I thought, oh, yay, is she going to finally shut up? Then, oh yay, did I insult her enough to get her to shut up? Less than twenty seconds later, she said, “I wanted to show you that I was thinking about your question.” Oh, no. Thinking too much traps even drama junkie poets. No one is immune to thinking overload. I can claim no superiority: There's nothing special about me falling into the thinking sinkhole.

A less self-obsessed person would have realized my passive aggressive question was really a cry for relief, a desperate plea for silence. I'm the fool. It wasn't worth the battle. I dropped my passenger at her front door, avoided the hugging ritual, and said I'd see her around. I drove slowly home to feed my hungry angry lonely cat.

An hour later, I dragged myself to my mother's and collapsed on her couch.

“What's wrong with you?” she said. “You look beat.”

I told my mother about my passenger from hell. “She never shut up,” I moaned. “She kept staring at me while I was driving. The entire time, she stared at me. And she kept leaning over and tapping me on the arm.”

“Oh, I hate that,” my mother commiserated, and just like that, I felt the heaviness lift. After all these years, a kind word from Mom takes all the pain away.

Compelled by the obsession... or is it, obsessed by the compulsion?

I may have mentioned that I've been editing dissertations to earn money. Although I'm happy to be earning, I am fairly certain this isn't a long-term career gig for me. Editing uses up parts of my brain that have been rapidly deteriorating since menopause while leaving the creative parts of my brain to wither from lack of use. I managed to put three hours into formatting a paper about student retention in online college programs (ho-hum). Then I started going through a box of old mementos my mother gave me as she begins her downward spiral into a retirement community. After looking at photos of myself from elementary school, high school, and college, I felt a bit queasy. So I began my own downward spiral, which tonight consisted of cleaning my egg beater with a toothpick.

I don't see very well anymore, especially not up close, so I don't notice things like detritus on dishes and grimy goop on my egg beater. I admit, possibly I also don't care all that much about squalor at the Love Shack, but that is another topic. The other day, though, while I was beating the crap out of my morning eggs, I noticed little black flecks of... ucky stuff flying into the eggs. Just a couple, not a lot, looked like pepper, but I don't pepper my eggs, so WTF? I looked closer at the egg beater and realized all the grooves on the dang thing were black with grime. The only clean part was the part that went into the eggs.

Thoroughly grossed out and embarrassed (knowing that I would have to blog about this eventually), I set the egg beater into a container of water and dumped in some ammonia. I let it soak overnight. Tonight, when I'd had enough of formatting the 28th Word table of incomprehensible research data, I decided: It's time. I grabbed a small handful of toothpicks and set to work.

While I picked and poked at the crevices in the egg beater, I could hear my neighbors carrying on a conversation outside my open kitchen window. I couldn't see them, and they couldn't see me, but the acoustics in the back are perfect for eavesdropping. Susan and Pat live in the house directly behind the Love Shack. They are musicians. Or at least, Pat is. When the weather is good, I see him perched on his porch, strumming a guitar. He seems to be into a sort of folk rock fusion groove. I just made that up. I have no idea what kind of music he plays. He's got long hair and a beard, though, and he wears tight jeans, pointy black boots, and a black leather vest. Maybe you can figure it out.

Susan was talking with a male visitor about a plant in her yard. A car engine was rumbling. Suddenly, I heard the voice of Roger, the neighbor to the east of Pat and Susan.

“I really liked your music!” he said enthusiastically. “It reminds me of some guys I knew in college.”

Susan's visitor murmured something I couldn't hear. Roger went on, “Yeah, the guitar player quit the band and started growing organic vegetables, or something. You gotta remember, I'm 68 years old. We were all hippies back then.”

Susan must be in her 40s. I imagine to her Roger seems like a decrepit old man. I finished one side of the egg beater and flipped it over. The dishwater was cloudy with gross black specks.

Roger's voice echoed across the driveway. “The drummer, though, the drummer just disappeared. They went to his house and found it was empty, no clothes, no furniture, everything, just gone.”

Susan's visitor said something in response. She lives in a cute little house. I saw the inside once, before she and Pat moved in. Before Roger moved into the next little house in the row. I frequently see him tending to his many potted plants. For some reason, he rarely acknowledges my presence, even when we are within ten feet of one another. I don't understand that.

“But hey, I really liked your music!” Roger repeated loudly. I finished cleaning the egg beater. Susan's visitor got into his car and drove away.

Cleaning my egg beater is a sign. I'm regretting the past and trying to control the future. Some significant endings are bearing down on me: my mother, my car, my apartment, my lifestyle. Nothing stays the same forever, I know. But I'm worried at the prospect of change. I used to think I welcomed change—why else would I be a chronically malcontented pot stirrer? But now I think I'm just like most of the other people on the planet: terrified of losing what I have or not getting what I want. It's just plain old self-centered fear.

It's spring in P-town. Everything is blooming (including my sinuses). I have another paper (18,000 words) to edit after I finish the one I'm working on (32,000 words). I would like to get off this bus, but I don't know how.

Next week, Mom and I are touring another retirement place. Neither one of us thinks it would be a good fit. I think she wants the fancy place on the bluff over the river, the one with the gazillion dollar buy-in. She said, “I can sell the condo.” And she's right, she could sell the condo. On what she has left, she could survive maybe five years, if nothing went wrong. Maybe that is the best option when you reach 85. Put it all on red and let it rip. You don't know how long you have left. Might as well enjoy it while you still can.

Meanwhile, she's offloading the 55 years of crap her four kids gave her...back onto her four kids. Last week, the bed in the spare room was covered with four stacks of photos, homework, and other mementos of childhood. One stack for each kid. I'm lucky, I got to take my bag of old pictures, photos, and poems with me, because I live nearby.

My mother kept just about everything, it seems. There are mementos from just about every milestone in my life: high school graduation, college graduation, letters, long-forgotten photos of me and former boyfriends. She kept a tattered piece of notebook paper on which I had very carefully written in a childish scrawl, “Captain Robert Gray sailed into the mouth of a big river. He named it the Columbia.” There is even a plaster imprint of my kindergartener-sized hand. My mother kept everything. Which is why it is painful to see her letting it all go. I know every ending is followed by a new beginning. But apparently I don't like change.

I do like my shiny clean egg beater, though. Obsessions and compulsions may be underrated.

Dangling by the leg over the abyss of old age

Today the universe presented me with a chance to practice patience and gratitude. Because I spend so much time alone at home, I don't get many opportunities to practice these two important qualities. Well, I practice on my cat occasionally, but the real test is when you practice on a parent, am I right? Today I was aware that I had some choices, although I'm not sure if I learned the lesson. Here is what happened.

I took my mother to the credit union for the second time in two weeks to get some signatures on her account. I always drive when we go someplace, so I don't have first-hand knowledge of my mother's deteriorating driving skills. Unlike my brother, who called me in outrage last week, the day after he met our mother at the credit union.

“Your mother is a crappy driver!” he snarled and proceeded to tell me all about it. The next day my mother called me and said, “Did your brother call you about my driving?” I guess another conversation must happen soon about how much longer Mom can go on terrorizing the neighborhood with her old Toyota Camry. A topic for another blog post.

Today the adventure at the credit union took a bit longer than expected because she had forgotten her wallet (and ID) at home. She was understandably upset. To a young(er) person, forgetting a wallet at home might be attributed to stress or carelessness or just plain laziness. When you are 85, a lapse in attention is a harbinger of impending institutionalization. As we went back out to the car, I tried to help her put her lapse into perspective.

“It could be a whole lot worse,” I said. I went on to say how lucky we were (us privileged white Americans, is what I was thinking) to be born here and now, and not over there, or way back when... it could be a lot worse. “And look, it's not snowing, or even raining. If you have to forget your wallet, today is the perfect day to do it.”

She didn't look convinced, but by the time we drove back to the credit union with her wallet, I suspected it had faded from short-term memory. At last we sat down with a rep at the credit union, who couldn't seem to figure out what we were there for. After much confusion and checking with managers, it seemed that no signatures were needed after all.

Mom was miffed, but I was resigned, not angry. It does no good to get angry over these things, I now know. Anger is the dubious luxury of the so-called normal people. Whoever they are. I have no idea. I'm not normal, I know this... but actually, I don't think I know any normal people. Huh. Maybe I'm just running with the wrong crowd. Or maybe I'm defining normal in some weird way, like people who drive SUVs and own poodles.

With the credit union drama over, my main objective of the day with Mom was to calculate her income, expenses, and assets, so we can go shopping for a retirement community armed with accurate information about her finances. When we got back to the condo, I pulled out my laptop and looked for room at the kitchen table to set it up.

I don't know how your mother's kitchen table looks, but this is what I saw on my mother's table. Not counting the dusty table cloth and stained placemats: two commuter coffee mugs waiting to be donated to the thrift store; a brass teapot filled with loose change; a tired aloe vera plant in a clay pot; a stack of handwritten lists and notes (important items!); various sizes of manila envelopes; a half-used book of stamps; a small stack of plastic clamshell-type packaging items (trash); a pile of kitchen implements, including baking pans and utensils, also bound for the thrift store; her old black cordless telephone; her current library book; a coffee cup with successive black rings around the inside; a small open box of Belgian chocolate (sent by my sister from Europe), a couple pieces looking slightly nibbled; an unruly stack of newspapers; and four white facial tissues, well-used and wadded into balls, clearly set aside to be used again.

I got my laptop set up and got to work. While I struggled to decipher the penciled figures in her tiny notebook (e.g., groc 6.81, gas 20, cigs 47) and enter the numbers into an Excel spreadsheet, my mother prepared her breakfast. I tried not to look, but I couldn't help but hear. She poured a bowl of store-brand Cheerios while two pieces of day-old bread toasted in the toaster oven. Tick, tick, tick, tick. She shook up a box of almond milk, opened it, and poured it over her cereal. Sploosh, crackle. (I guess I should be thankful she wasn't eating store-brand Rice Krispies.) Next I heard her buttering her toast: scratch, scrape, scritch, scritch. She put the bowl on the table next to me and laid two burned pieces of buttered toast directly on the placement where you would normally place a drinking glass. No plate, is what I'm saying.

She ate. Crunch, crunch, gloop, glug, swallow, crunch. Can you tell I'm a misophoniac? I am desperately averse to certain sounds. Eating sounds might as well be fingernails on a blackboard. Meanwhile, I am thinking to myself, thank you for this opportunity to refrain from strangling the woman who gave birth to me. Thank you, thank you, universe, whatever you are.

Finally I wrangled the numbers into the spreadsheet and throttled some formulas into telling us the bottom line. If she doesn't fall down any more stairs or get pneumonia or give her money away to destitute children, she can afford to move into a retirement community and maintain her current lifestyle for at least another ten years. Of course, this means we sell the condo and liquidate all her assets, but it is good news. She seemed greatly relieved.

I had some moments in which I could not identify what I was feeling. One of those moments occurred when I realized that my mother's monthly income, most months, is barely over $1,200. Another odd moment occurred when I entered her expenses: she spends as much on cigarettes as she does on food. Then I thought: Who will do this for me when my turn comes?

I still don't know what I'm feeling. I suppose I should take a nap. This odd freefall feeling will fade, and I'll be back in denial, trusting the universe to catch me as I daily leap off metaphorical cliffs. The cat snores in the chair next to me. I sit staring at this blog post, thinking about suffering and uncertainty at home and abroad, and wonder...am I too self-centered and depressed to acknowledge today's lesson of patience and gratitude? Yeah, probably.

Let them eat cake

It seems like every time I write about an event I attended, I start with “I survived the...” Is that odd? Do you do that? No, probably not. I guess the best I can do these days is survive. Thriving, or succeeding, or seizing the day are all way outside my current zone of expectations. That's okay. I'm clinging to the short branches, breathing the rarefied air of entrepreneurship. I expect things to be challenging. Like camping at the Oregon coast, for example, which I vow never to do again (rain).

I am happy to inform you that I survived my 40th high school reunion, held yesterday at a park situated on Hwy 224 past Estacada, which, if you are familiar with the Clackamas County area, is part of the exurbian hinterlands. It was a lovely drive, though, along winding tree-lined, single-lane roads, I admit.

I left about 9:15 a.m., and got there a little more than an hour later, delayed ten minutes by an overturned panel truck, lying on it's side in the roadway. Luckily for me, a civilian directed traffic around the truck. More relevant, luckily for them, it appeared no one was injured. As I drove by, I got a 5-second look at the underside of a large truck: not something you see every day (unless you are a truck mechanic).

The other three members of the reunion planning committee were already there when I arrived. Everything was in place except the balloons and the easel, which were in my trunk. I unloaded my stuff and took a look at the layout.

“Having the registration table here is going to create a bottleneck at the bottom of the stairs,” I said, hands on my hips.

They looked at me skeptically, but gamely helped me move the table about ten feet away into an L-shaped alcove. Good call. For most of the rest of the day, I manned the table, checking people in, taking money, making change, filling out receipts, and peeling off name tags. I was safely barricaded, with plenty to do, and blessed with limited social interaction. My perfect job. Too bad it didn't pay.

The park was small, perched on a low bluff over the Clackamas River. Tall fir trees provided abundant shade. The picnic structure was partly covered by a barnlike shed with a huge stone fireplace at one end, and partly in the open, where chairs were scattered around the edges of a wide wooden deck. Picnic tables spanned the length of both spaces. The two committee members in charge of the food arranged a staggering selection of fruit and veggie trays, chips, salads, and other dishes neatly on the tables under the shelter. Flies immediately descended on the croissant sandwiches. I snapped photos of the decorated cake, offering a silent prayer to the reunion gods that I might be allowed to avoid eating any of it.

The weather was perfect: the air was warm, just a tiny bit humid, and there was plenty of shade. The sleepy Clackamas River basked below us, accessible by a short but steep trail, at the bottom of which was an unoccupied wooden dock built for boaters and kayakers. We had none of those, and there wasn't much river traffic, so the River provided a silent but picturesque backdrop for the mini social dramas that unfolded on the deck above.

There was a fair amount of squealing among the women, as they stared at and then recognized former classmates and friends. There was no shortage of hugs. I had a ringside seat behind the registration table. I would eyeball each newcomer as they came down the concrete steps from the parking area, trying to guess his or her identity: is this a classmate or a spouse? Even after scanning yearbook photos and printing name tags, I got only about half of their names right and managed to call at least two people by the wrong name. Can I blame early dementia?

Few classmates looked like their high school yearbook photo, which I had thoughtfully provided on their name tags. Most of the women were obese, the men not so much (although for some reason there were many portly male spouses). After 40 years, it's no surprise we all look somewhat haggard. A few, though, seemed especially aged, while a few others seemed untouched by time. Many of the classmates had major health issues: diabetes, pacemakers, knee replacements... not to mention the challenges of dealing with aging or dying parents and adult children who refuse to grow up, hold down jobs, or marry the right partner. I was so glad to be single and childless. And I hereby declare that I'm going to stop complaining about my mustache: Clearly, it could be a lot worse.

On the other hand, many classmates, when asked what they do, replied that they were retired. They put in their 35 years at their electrician jobs and their telecommunications jobs and their healthcare jobs, and then they gracefully bowed out of the workforce. Ouch. Luckily for me, nobody cared about my life: They were far more interested in talking about their children. And their vacations, cruises, and volunteer activities. I didn't have to try to explain my unsettling financial predicament to anyone and in the explaining inadvertently reveal my fear and anxiety. Sometimes I am relieved that other people are so self-obsessed.

Still, I had a great time. I enjoyed seeing people I hadn't seen in 40 years. Seven of them were people I went to elementary school with. We have history. And as I talked with each person, a strange thing happened: The years seemed to fall away from their faces. I saw past the bald heads, puffy skin, and wrinkles to the 18-year-olds they used to be, the people I knew and the people I didn't know, as I endured the long hellish years of high school. I wasn't afraid of any of them. I felt a deep affection for all of them. We had survived a shared experience. Not all of us lived to tell this tale: We lost some along the way. But those of us who are left have figured out how to live. I'd like to think I'm one of those survivors, although it's always one day at a time for me.

The afternoon wafted to a close, and people drifted away with promises to keep in touch. Yeah, let's do this in five years! You bet. I helped clear away, pack up, and wash down, and eventually just the planning committee was left, plus one stalwart helper, whom we will no doubt recruit for the next iteration, should we live that long. I drove home thanking the reunion gods that I escaped without tasting a single crumb of the cake. It wasn't really such a miracle: It wasn't chocolate.

Isn't a lovely day? Too bad I can't let myself enjoy it.

It's spring for another day in Portland, and then we are back to the norm (rain). Rain is our year-round season. The only thing that varies is the temperature and how much wind there might be. We have jokes in Oregon about the rain: Oregonians don't tan; they rust. It's close to the truth. Besides some rust, I have a fine layer of moss on my formerly black Ford Focus. I'm sure if I sat outside for a week, I too would be coated with a patina of green fuzz.

With my windows open, I can hear the season unfolding. Loudly. The intermittent buses might as well be driving through my living room; their roaring drowns out my music, my television, the birds twittering, the cat yowling. On top of that, something new: The modern buses are equipped with an external loudspeaker. From it, a mechanical female voice echoes all day and late into the night: The bus is turning. The bus is turning. I assume this announcement is to warn pedestrians, cyclists, and stray dogs that the driver is blindly turning left, so if you are in the crosswalk, you'd better scoot. Bus drivers are known for running down peds in crosswalks here, so this loud proclamation is probably a good thing. But I think it is influencing my dreams. Run! The bus is turning! 

My sister has been pestering me for a year to turn the Hellish Handbasket blog into an ebook. Now that the dissertation adventure is over, it seems like it might be time. Plus, I don't have any work coming in, my marketing efforts have ground to a standstill, and no potential employers are leaping to snap me up, so what else is there to do? When all else fails, write a book. When I was twelve, that was what I did to feel better. I wrote stories in pencil on notebook paper and bound the pages with yarn. Fun! But I didn't have to earn a living when I was twelve. Just so you know, this ebook will not be bound with yarn or anything else. E means electronic, but hopefully not invisible. Stay tuned.

Also, while I watch for the universe to nudge me in some direction, it's a good time to vacuum my rugs, dust my shelves, and clear the clutter. There's really never a wrong time to clean, is there? I could vacuum daily and never eliminate the dust, detritus, and cat hair. If you have allergy problems, visiting the Love Shack should not be on your bucket list.

Before I close this post, I should update you on the ant situation. I had a chat with my little brother (a grown man of 50-something), who owns a house with occasional ant challenges. When I told him I often find ants on the back of my neck, he was appalled. You know that funny moment where you suddenly realize that the so-called normal life you take for granted is actually completely unacceptable to a so-called normal person? I had one of those moments. All it takes is an outside perspective to shift one from “Sure, I taped my students' mouths shut with duct tape. Can't think why I didn't do it sooner.” to “What, you mean that was wrong? Ohhhhhhh, yeahhh, I guess I see that now.”

So, maybe I've been too lenient on these effing ants, is what I'm saying. I'd already attempted to take the offensive. However, the ant poison I made myself from Borax and honey did not do the trick. Maybe it was the container, maybe it was the concoction, I don't know. Last week, I caved and bought real ant traps at the grocery store. I deployed these fancy store-bought ant traps in various kitchen places and waited to see what would happen. I monitored them closely, hour by hour. At first, I saw nothing, not even a few curious scouts. Then one night last week, I entered the kitchen to refill my water bottle before retiring for the night, and I saw a swarm of ants mobbing one of the ant traps.

Was I gleeful? Actually... not so much. I should have been jumping up and down in a victory dance. But I wasn't. Instead, I felt guilt and sadness. What a reprehensible thing to do, tricking ants into thinking they'd found a viable food source for the queens and babies back in the nest. Instead, they will die a horrible death. And it's all my fault. I don't want to kill anything, not even ants. I feel terrible. But I am leaving the ant traps where they are. I can live with my guilt. But I'm done living with ants.

Doing the time warp... again

My life sure looks different these days. Instead of worrying about grading keyboarding papers and listening to students complain, I am immersed in the hectic puzzling world of self-employment. Every now and then I come to and pinch myself. Is this really happening? Am I caught in a time warp? I may be caught in something. I got busy compiling the results of a survey tonight; when I looked up, three hours had passed. It's time for the news, and I forgot to blog!

I've been sitting on my fancy drafting chair far too long. I'm bound to have clogged a minor artery or two, simply because I haven't moved much today. That is not good, for my veins or my ass. My cat isn't thrilled either.

Everything takes time! Don't get me started on Facebook! I can already tell I hate it. I hated it when it began, and I hate it now. Hmmmm. Hate is such a strong word for a social media tool. Let me rephrase: I would prefer to avoid it, how about that? I got a friend request today from someone I used to work with at the career college. I declined. Should I have done that? I've been told I need more friends. I need more likes. Huh?

Let me get up off my chair for a moment. Hey, what's that sound? Sounds like....

It's just a jump to the left. And then a step to the right. You know what comes next, right? Put your hands on your hips. And bring your knees in tight! 

Come on, you know you want to sing this next part out loud. But it's the pelvic thrust that really drives you in-sa-a-aa-a-ane. Let's do the...

Ok, sorry. I got carried away.

Warm weather is coming. Sunny skies are forecast for Rose Festival weekend. I have no intention of attending the parade or watching the fireworks, but I will bask in the light and the warmth of the season. From the safety of my cave.

Tomorrow I have a call scheduled with my doctoral chairperson. We are trying to figure out how to write my IRB application so it gets approved. I think that is what we are doing. I'm not sure what she will have to say. I've spoken to her only a few times over the past couple years since she became my chairperson. The conversation always begins in a way that makes me think she doesn't remember who I am. Like, uh, what were we talking about? Not promising, but I'm hopeful we will brainstorm a solution. She's got a little more skin in the game now, since she approved my first IRB application. She has to sign off on it before she sends it on to the Graduate School. I hope she sides with me and not against me.

Oh, well. Anything can happen when one is in a time warp. It can be exciting to live at the speed of light, as it were, but I have no control over how it warps me as I dash from one project to another. Today I lost three hours; tomorrow it could be three weeks, or three months.

Oh, here's the cat. Gotta go.

Who am I?.... Who am I now?

I'm embarrassed to say, I'm having a hard time letting go of my former life as a college instructor. Time and emotions are messing with my mind. It's only been three days. Of course I'm still prickly with anger, resentment, and fear. But I think I should be over it by now. I should be moving on to my next adventure. The problem is, I don't know who I am if I'm not a teacher. Am I a graduate student? A job seeker? An aging unemployable person? How about a lady of leisure (WTF?)

I've been keeping myself busy with various projects (mostly dumping every piece of paper related to my former job), but every now and then the reality of my situation washes over me. For a second, I can't breathe. I have to go drink water and pester the cat for comfort. It's all just needless drama, I know. There's no reason to panic. Things are very different now, compared to the last time I was unemployed. The last time I was unemployed, I had no reserves. I was living on a painful edge, one step from homelessness (or my parents' basement, which at the time was even worse than homelessness). But I still fret.

I've heard the antidote for self-obsession is service. With that in mind, yesterday I gave my friend (I'll call her Valentina) a ride to a naturopathic doctor's office, where she was scheduled to have an intravenous drip for a couple hours. It was one of those weird instances where you should be careful what you offer to do for a friend, because you might get to see a needle going into a vein and hear unsettling technical medical terms like... gas, poop, and pee.

We reclined (me not quite relaxed) in too-small brown leather recliners in the naturopath's little office while clear liquid dripped down a long tube through a needle into her elbow vein. The sun was shining outside the big picture windows. Brilliant emerald trees fluttered in a gentle breeze. (I think the trees are greener in Beaverton. Is that possible? All the vegetation on the east side of Portland seems grayer to me, dustier, somehow. Like dust can't settle on the rich people's side of town.) We chatted for a while, while I tried to avoid looking at the little red plastic bucket full of discarded needles that sat on the floor between our two chairs. After about an hour, the naturopathic doctor came in and sat at his desk for the remainder of the treatment time. Conversation was stilted after that. I was facing away from his desk, toward Valentina, so it was difficult for me to include him in a conversation. I wanted to mention my naturopath, but didn't want to get into a contest over which naturopath was more... naturo. Valentina on the other hand, was facing toward him, and probably found it impossible not to include him in conversation. Whenever I craned my neck to look at him, he was always looking at her.

In this strange setting, time both sped up and slowed down. The time Valentina and I spent talking seemed to fly by, as it always does when I'm with her. Her knowledge ranges wide, motivated by a refreshing curiosity about life. We dig for the delicious irony in every topic. I love to hear her laugh. When she laughs, for a brief moment the weariness lifts from around her eyes. But I couldn't be fully present, because I was fretting about time.

The next event on my schedule was a workshop on developing my social profile (I have no social profile, but you can get a pretty good idea of my facial profile from the image of the chronic malcontent to the right of this post. It is surprisingly accurate, I'm told.) I anxiously watched the clock, then the drip, then the clock, concerned about moving on to my next engagement. I confess, I have a phobia about being late to things. After the treatment, we had a stop to make at New Seasons. (Valentina assured me her list was short.) Then I had to get from Valentina's place to a hotel near Portland State University by 1:30 p.m. with no clear idea of how to get there or where to park.

Fretting doesn't actually influence time and outcomes, I know, yet I can't seem to stop fretting without the aid of some serious metaphysical intervention. Yesterday, circumstances seemed to conspire against me. Things could have gone south in a hurry. I got stuck in traffic on my way to Valentina's, and then I got lost and had to navigate the winding back roads by internal GPS (rarely reliable). I'd like to believe I was led to her house by my continual chanting of the mantra of the lost: oh god, oh god, oh god. Somehow the time gods granted me the gift of punctuality, despite my propensity for missing freeway exits. We arrived at the clinic precisely on time.

And I was early to the afternoon event, which perhaps was not the gift from the time gods I assumed it was, as I was too early to get the free parking offered by PSU and thus spent 15 minutes circling the blocks around the campus searching for a parking space. I finally found a space, but the almighty meter granted me only three hours. If I had been late, I would not have had to walk three blocks uphill to the hotel. Nor would I have had to leave the event early to get back to my car before the meter ran out. I probably missed that one critical insight into improving my social profile, simply because I was obsessed about not being late. Because of that, I won't find a job, and soon I'll be begging my mom to put me up in her spare bedroom. Ahhhhhh.

Three days into unemployment and already I'm insane. The future is not looking good.