Gathering my defenses

It's been so long since I blogged about anything. Nobody's really read my stuff in the meantime, except some porn addict who obviously thought I was extremely attractive. So I don't think I'm gonna make this essay too earth shattering.
Most of last Sunday I don't remember at all. Something happened to me while I was riding my scooter to the beach. The scooter was totalled, and I've been lifeflighted, hospitalized, bandaged, filled full of painkillers, and told to go lay on my futon and process it all. When I find out what happened, that'll be nice. This is my first experience with total amnesia. Stuff's broken. Nothing major. I'm gonna have to go get an ankle operated on the day after tomorrow.
My mother has taken the opportunity to be a monster. She picked a huge fight with me while I was in the hospital, then threatened to find some Facebook posts of mine that would derail my ability to regain custody of my son from foster care (at least that's what my lawyer told me). That's right, she did this just after my near-death car accident. So to all the rest of you out there, I give my energy for a happy mother's day, mothers are heroic, supportive influences in our lives by and large. Mine just happens to be the sort you block from Facebook and consider a restraining order against.
Between the accident, my phone being broken, and the slowly lifting fog I was in, I learned who my closest friends are and aren't, and it was really an eye opener. I was putting way more energy into some relationships than they were worth. And not enough into others.
Well, I'll document my search for a new scooter, my road to recovery... Thanks for reading!
 

An Excerpt From My Future Book

UNEMPLOYMENT, 2005

I was unemployed. I was living in St. Anthony, Idaho. Some twisted part of me wants to make it my fault, as embodied by the meth-addled voice of my ex-wife telling me all about all the mistakes I had made. It started with the union. I was hired after college by a small potato processor that happened to be treating its migrant labor force badly, so, idealist that I am, I set out to do something about it besides bitch about it in the lunchroom. After six months of failing to get a union installed there, I learned that organizing a workplace is harder than launching yourself into fucking orbit. I was promptly drummed out. About this time, I traded my pickup, a complete piece of shit, for my car, which seemed a quality item. Other than it was lowered and rode like a jackhammer. And, unbeknownst to me, after giving me 1000 miles, the water pump would seize on the freeway and melt the engine.

My car had blown its engine at the end of fall, not a good thing to happen in St. Anthony. Fall in St. Anthony means you put away your sturdy jackets and break out the parkas. Growing season there for fucking POTATOES is 90 days.

Plus, according to my contract I had signed with the union's training center in order to become a construction electrician, I needed to be able to get myself to and from work. It worked out for awhile, as the contractor I was working for happened to be on a jobsite that my home was on the way to. But when that ended I was laid off. My coordinator at the union's training center got me a different job I could get rides to from the employer, but it didn't work out. The owner had hired some inbred friend of his from church who thought I was working for HIM. He kicked me off a job and the boss of course sided with his church buddy. The union did too, since I couldn't drive 100 miles in a broken fucking car to go to the appeal hearing.

Jobless, carless, I restarted my unemployment which I had five months left of. I remember using my last meager paycheck from Idiot & Friend Electrical for Christmas presents. I couldn't get a rent subsidy. The wait for that was a year long. I had no food stamps. I didn't qualify cause my income for the last twelve months was too high. This is Idaho, you see. So: I had until May to pay for a replacement car engine on $1200/month (while paying full rent, food, what little daycare I could, and keep heat and lights on), install it, and have a job or I would be homeless. I would lose custody of my four year old son. My “wife” was off scoring meth in a different town. All my family lived hundreds of miles away, and was broke or unsupportive cause they hated my wife. I did too. I promised myself that wherever I ended up, I would go without her. Five years of meth, cheating, taking Kyle and disappearing, it was all I could take. The few friends I had in town helped me out when they could watching Kyle, but all were as penniless as I was or worse.

I had no computer to speak of, let alone internet. There was internet at the town library though, and they would fax and copy for ten cents a sheet. Every day they were open, I'd pack Kyle into his stroller, or on my shoulders, and take the mile hike to the library. It was always either snowing or ten fucking degrees, with that never ending west wind that every southern Idahoan knows and hates. Kyle looked like a little basketball with all the coats I put on him. He was so content at that age, he did so well in the library while I churned out resumes and job applications. As a reward for sitting with me in the library I would take him to the grocery store by the library for a snack, along with however much food I could afford / carry a mile. On the way to the store I had to walk right by Church Buddy's house. Kyle is the only thing that prevented me from carrying out revenge on that motherfucker. Kyle has kept me out of trouble a lot more than he'll ever be aware of, I'm sure.

Anyway, as the snow subsided, and the wind sharpened and brought even lower temperatures (“spring,” they have the nerve to call it there), my outlook brightened just a little. Finally I was able to save enough out of my unemployment to buy a used engine. Using a borrowed hoist, a battered auto repair manual, and the few tools I could buy, I attempted replacement of the engine of a 1996 Geo Prizm by myself on the garage floor of my 2bd 1.5ba townhouse without the landlord getting wind of it. Well, that's not entirely true. Kyle tried to help. I'd ask him for a wrench, and he'd proudly present a screwdriver. I adore that boy. It was the first time I had ever attempted an auto repair more elaborate than a fuel pump replacement.

It took a couple weeks. As the repairs continued on the usual back and forth course of having to run for this or that part (exacerbated by not having a car or so much as a truck stop in town for parts) the tension was mounting. My daily trips to the library were finally bearing fruit. A locomotive overhaul company had called about my application. FINALLY, after four months of at least three job applications per day (a deal I made with myself to avoid insanity, it sorta worked) had a job interview. That was the good news. The bad news was it was 400 miles away, so my new adventures in auto mechanics were about to be put to the ultimate test.

Finally, the big day arrived. The new engine was completely assembled. No matter how hard I looked, I could find no more vital parts lying around that would require yet another minor disassembly and insertion. Kyle waited in anticipation as I turned the key. Even a four year old could sense the importance of this moment. Everything was riding on this. I had less than a month of unemployment to go. Nobody else had asked me to come down for an interview. I couldn't hold the locomotive people off any longer without losing the opportunity. Plus I was trying to escape from my wife with our son, and she could come through the door at any moment.

I turned that key, tears streaming down my face.

It fired. It purred like a kitten.

I packed all the shit I could carry in that car, stuffed Kyle in there too, and abandoned my home and marriage, off to my dad's house, in the small city where my job interview was. They hired me.

Epilogue: The job paid ten bucks an hour. Hey, don't knock it. It got me out of my dad's house in under three months.

Life in Early PNW November

On a grey Saturday afternoon recently I finally got some pictures of these beautiful swans near the Trojan Nuclear Facility. I like to stop there for a picnic when work takes me in that direction.

Apparently they built a nuclear reactor here, then it was decommissioned. Funny how much stuff they left. I'll bet those buildings would be a kick to explore. But the overarching point here is that this place is a really good metaphor for how I tend to feel this time of year.

The sun is lost. The rain comes. The air sharpens. We all, on a deep level, check the condition of the feathers in our nests and begin a spirited phase of destruction and renewal. Most people I know see this as depression, but that depression is a phase of healing. It hurts as we let go of things we thought would weather the winter and now know won't. It bends our backs having to gather forage and shelter, and causes anxiety when there is a lack. We feel more strongly the need to have all our ducks in a row.

They call Spring the time for "Spring cleaning". No doubt there. But we all reap in the Fall. We see glimpses of Truth's transience, It's insubstantiality. All the cardboard boxes full of our reality, well, they do what cardboard boxes do here. We look, with tear-filled eyes, on the sloppy mush that once provided structure and security.

 

My son's back in the emergency ward again. Unstable, suicidal ideation. There are aspects of my life that are very lush, attractive, and fragrant. There are aspects that are chaotic, and extremely, chronically painful. I have to take shelter in the real. I have to house myself under these grey skies, and savor the cold rain when it falls on my changing body and soaks my female bones. I have to find comfort in this chill. I have to be at peace here. There is no shelter from the reap of the Fall.

 

It helps me when I find a support system to be a part of. I can feel protected and beautiful, even in a cold, forgotten place.
See you next trip! Rosalynnda loves youuuuu!!!!



Men Are From Mars, That Does Not Make Women Bitches

For the second time in one month I find myself in the post-retread stage of a quasi-relationship. If relationships were stars, I would be that sad red supergiant getting the life sucked out of her by that stupid little black hole.
My cell phone is driving me crazy. Now when I want space from a guy that's rubbing me the wrong way I can't have it. No, I gotta ignore ten thousand texts and calls, and in so doing keep having the same irritation rubbed in rather than allowed to diminish. No wonder guys think we're so nuts these days.
So maybe if I dish my little slice of heaven out for the internet to digest, I will be one step closer to it rather than the nut hut.

My perfect relationship
---------------------------
I'm tired. I worked my ass off this week. I'd love to have a guy here, rubbing lotion into my back. After that, I'll bathe his feet, because he worked his ass off too, and was enough of a man to suck it up and do something intimate anyway. Then I want him to draw me a bath. Wait, no I don't. I'll do that. I want him to cook while I'm in the tub. Something edible, that didn't require a microwave or the use of our doorbell. Then I want us to eat together, while we have a CONVERSATION that neither of us feel forced to have. Maybe we bitch about stuff that's happening. Maybe we rage out about it. Maybe we gush cause something great happened. Either way, one partner knows how to react appropriately to the other, cause we vibe on the same jive rather than either of us getting all hung up and fixey.
After that, I want us to retire to our respective comfort zones. Maybe he's watching a sport that he likes but is not totally obsessed with. Maybe he's going out with some people, or someone, maybe even a female, and I am so free and clear with him that I don't even feel jealousy. I can freely enjoy whatever I feel like doing. Then later on we can hop into bed together and have wild sex, cause neither of us are too inebriated or saddled with issues not to.

Now I know that won't happen every day. Some days, we'll both be human. That's where these times when I'm single, right now, when I'm sick of men and need my space, are so important. These are the times when I learn about myself, and that I'm not perfect either, and that'll make me that much more tolerable when Mr. Right eats the occasional fucktard sandwich. And vicey versa.
SO LET ME BREATHE GOODDAMMIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
See you next trip! Rosalynda loves you:-)

Kellogg Creek Park

Look at this. No, not the stupid locomotive, I have to look at those ugly things everyday.
No, look at all the cars around me. All of them, every single one, has the same sticker in the back window.
Should I be freaking the fuck out right now?

Sorry I haven't written any blogs lately, but then again, I'm sorta not. See, I started this blog cause I love expressing myself creatively through writing and photography, not cause I like high pageview counts or ad revenue (Do you see an ad on this page? If so tell me, I'll fuck somebody up.) So when I started to care about how many people were reading this shit I knew it was time to stop and reexamine my priorities. I already have a job and do all the good little corporate consumer girl bullshit I can stand, thank you very much. I keep this blog firmly entrenched in reality, where I know that if it entertains me to create it, then the people that jive with my vibe can dig it too.


Look! A thong! Someone just left this here behind these bushes! It fits, but it's so itchy.

 

Besides, I've been busy as hell. A guy I work with failed a whiz quiz, so I'm filling in for him while he's in rehab or whatever. I've been putting in 56 hours a week. Also, I get to see my son on Saturdays as well as Mondays, which is awesome, but another afternoon booked solid. Also, Rebekah and I are in the process of reconciliation. She's stepping up as someone I don't have to make excuses for, so far. Time will tell. She wrecked Calpernia. I mean the adjuster fucking totalled it. She's okay, I just let her try riding it on her own in a parking lot and she crashed. I'd probably be taking it harder if it weren't so easy to replace. I have another Vespa now, newer, with fuel injection. Say hello to Phoenix!

The dealership didn't have a tall windshield for her, so I just used Calpernia's old one, chips, scratches, and all, a good memorial to my beloved red ladybug. It was a tough morning leaving her key in for the tow truck operator before I left for work on Phoenix. Many a tear was shed on the five bridge that morning. Ride on, Calpernia.

...

 

Good news! My cat was caught yesterday! He got lost during a visit with my son. During his week away, he ate all sorts of neat things, so he's tearin' it up in the ol' litterbox (sigh.) So that's another thing that happened.

So: Onward, Ho! Phoenix's maiden voyage for relaxation purposes took us to The Land Of Milwaukie, Oregon. I kept seeing these little riverfront parks on the way to and from the Vespa dealership that doesn't suck, and thought I'd check them out.

First stop, Oaks Park. Lotsa bikes here, lotsa powerwalkers, lotsa joggers, lotsa paved trail, and plenty of trees. That's about all. It connects Milwaukie road with the Springwater Trail here. Not much to see, unless you're on a bicycle.

 

The Springwater trail is one of those rail-to-trail things, so there's looooooong straight stretches, great if you're a railroad fuel purchasing agent, notsa much if you're on foot and it tires you knowing that the next mile is exactly the same as this one was. I turned around and went back to the scooter.

 

This area, victimized by overzealous green activists, was sprouting nearly as many signs as trees. Everywhere I looked, my Friendly Local Government instructed me on various things, such as "clean up your dogshit," "This is a pond where we study frogs," "This is how frogs get nasty," "Warning: don't feed the deer, stay on the trail, blah blah and so on forever."

There are people that think that government-funded signage is the answer to all life's problems. No, some people just need killed. That's right, you heard me. If you traipse off the trail in a wildlife protection area, or leave dogshit or garbage in a park teeming with dogshit bags, recycling bins, disposal stations, and city workers at our beck and call dumping them out all the time, you don't need an interperative sign, you need to die. Or at least stop reproducing. 

But on the other hand, I will not stop feeding popcorn to all the cute little geese and duckies. So I guess I need shot too... Anyway, next park: Kellogg Creek.

Okay, first blush: It sucks. It's gravel and a boat ramp. Let's get closer though.

 

Off to the south looks promising. Plus the guy in that van might have candy. Let's go there.

 

 No candy. Well, the candy he did have tasted terrible. I found a way down to the waterfront. Duckies!

 

 The Wilammette's down a few feet, this is a good time of year to explore here.

 

 Someone put these stones in the mud to get to the water's edge for whatever reason, but now they just lead to a few more feet of muck.

 

 There was a real energy-sucking force in the area today. Even these ducks were feeling it.

 

 

So: Here's SE McLoughlin (in the foreground is a turnout lane from it), at its bridge over Kellogg Creek. But it's more than just a bridge...

 

 The bridge has a fish ladder and a spillway.

 

Here's what we drive over going to Milwaukie. I waited for a fish to pop out, but not that long.

 

Up underneath the bridge is a delightful apocalyptic subterranean concrete bunker

 

And here's the other side. The creek's impounded by all that completely pointless concrete into this little pond.

 

Here's a POV shot of the outlet. Fish ladder, check. Spillway, check. Reason for any of this to be here, none. Another relic of Portland's turn-of-the-century days, back during mankind's love affair with steam power and concrete. I wonder what all this was used for. Probably something that wouldn't require nearly all this crap today. It's not the only concrete extravagance around. In Lake Oswego they built a whole fucking CASTLE TOWER just to hoist logs. Portland's always been weird.

 

Just upriver from that mess, we have this odd round corrugated steel deck, filled to extend the property on the waterfront, jutting out into the water about twenty feet high, whose only purpose today is giving parkgoers a place to park and lovers a place to forget their sexy, itchy thongs behind the blackberries. There are more random concrete thingies scattered about, but I was transfixed by this newspaper machine graveyard.

 

That's right, you heard me. This is the watery grave for I think every Oregonian newspaper vending machine in the Portland metro area. They've been exposed by the low water, down there with Davy Jones. Arrrrr!

 

Can you see them all down there? It's so strange... I mean, come on kids, one or two, that's hilarious, but all of them? You need therapy. Or have I just uncovered some weird insurance kickback scandal or something? I'd try to get my name in the paper, but only the fish are reading it today.

 

And that's not all the delights this place has to offer! There's this... thing, that you can climb straight to the top of now that the water's low enough to walk to the foot of its ladder. And there aren't any signs telling you not to lol! I elected to stay off. What's the point, I have basically the same view from this greenway, and I don't have to worry about falling off a ladder and dying. It's not even a good go-go cage, there's no stripper pole.

 

Here's where a couple guys asked me if I had any weed and said I looked like Pippi Longstocking. I love my socks. Anyway, after smoking a fat bowl and letting them impregnate me (cause that works every time guys, you just have to be bold enough to ask us) I was kinda running out of steam so I called it a day and ended up on NW 21st at the SLOWEST GODDAMNED SUSHI RESTAURANT IN THE WORLD. That's about it really. Wait, no it isn't.

 

I squeezed in a trip to Sock Dreams for a sack o' socks, which is, in the words of one associate, "the best place to be." Indeed, my dear, indeed it is.

...

 

 So, I finally gave myself an extra day off to stop and smell the flowers. These flowers, specifically. If you ever see these by the side of whatever path life puts you on, stop and smell them. They're heavenly. That's today's PSA. What are they? I love'em.

 

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However, Do not smell these, they're impostors, and smell ... well, not horrible... but definitely not worth smelling.

See you next trip! Rosalynda loves youuuuuuu!!!!!!!!

I Become An Astronaut

I got in a huge fight with my mom today. I'm glad I didn't rant on my blog after I got off the phone with her. I don't feel angry about it anymore. I did. That's something it's nice to be able to say to myself: I was pissed off. I have such a hard time owning up to anything besides happiness... and the other stuff's just as valid and important.
Anyway, I don't have any animosity towards mom now. In fact, I forgot what we were fighting about. Maybe I was being stubborn and wrongheaded, maybe she was being overbearing. Maybe all the above. Pretty standard mother/daughter stuff, just turbocharged up with my son (her grandson) being in foster care indefinitely, and me being transsexual. Things can get explosive pretty fast.
Anyway I felt awful about it. She's about all the biofamily left that still reaches out to me at all. (I'm from Idaho.) I'll miss that. It was a door in my transition that was left open just a crack, and has now been shut. Not locked. I could never do that, not to any of my family, not even my poor ol' transphobic dad. I love them all.
So that was a really bad thing, but I created something really great to counterbalance it. See, I'm a firm believer in deserving pleasure in this life in equal measure to the misery I experience. My apartment complex has a smallish peanut shaped pool. During the day there's a lot of rambunctious kids in it, but they're in bed now. And the stars are out. And I can float motionless on my back. As I lay on the water's surface, watching the stars, airplanes, and shooting stars without touching anything solid, I become an astronaut, floating completely freely in the void, off to nowhere. I feel all the entire planet, with all its cares and concerns, behind me.
I still feel like crying. But there's a fundamental peace within me now. I was worth taking that walk to that starlit pool. I deserved that experience.
See you next trip! Rosalynda loves youuuu!!!!!:)

crap that happened today

I don't think I'm gonna make it to Krav Maga class tonight. I went last night. Maybe I'll go tomorrow.
I worked 12 hours today. I mean WORKED. On the way to work I got honked at. Twice. Was it the same car both times? I wonder if it was someone I know? Sorry, if that's the case. I force myself to not pay attention to a honk because 99% of the time if I look, I'll see some dopey guy waving at me. The "please fuck me" wave. Guys are dumb.
Locomotives are usually really nice to me but this one I was on today was a total bastard. I smacked myself in the mouth with a wrench disassembling the bell. I bled a little. My tooth still hurts a little. At least it's still THERE. The bell wouldn't ding because the clapper was gone. Busted in half. Locomotives regularly do things like break things that are cast iron as big around as your thumb. And those rocks that are under the railroad tracks? They get up inside places on the locomotive, under the frame. SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME HOW THIS HAPPENS!!!!
Also,the antenna for the radio transmitter that communicates with the little box on the end of the train had the wrong end, so I needed to go back to the shop AGAIN for one (I had already gone once for some new guts for that stupid bell.) At least the traffic wasn't horrendous, and I avoided Interstate Avenue, which you can't BUY a green light on. I was almost back to the locomotive when one of the guys that works on the railroad cars called to happily tell me that he'd fixed my radio situation. He thought he fixed it when he screwed the wrong antenna fitting into the radio with no adapter because it happened to work. Yes, I'm such a silly girl. I just needed to put on the antenna and it's fixed! No, actually, it needs that adapter I drove halfway across town for because that antenna end has a male fitting that is WAY bigger than the female socket on the radio. Without the adapter it's like a moose raping a burro. It's physically possible, but no good can come of it. Sure enough, when the antenna end was removed, the radio socket looked all assraped and in great emotional trauma. I had to get a new radio.
After that was over it felt like nine million degrees out. It wasn't that hot today, but it felt that way every time I walked into a locomotive that had been broiling away in the middle of a railyard before I could start it to test it and TURN ON THE AIR CONDITIONER. Locomotives these days have pretty good air conditioners installed. Old locomotives have lousy ones, or windows. Locomotives also have bathrooms in the cab. Tiny, tiny bathrooms. I needed to go. Last night's crab salad wanted OUT. And it didn't care that I had just started the locomotive and it was still seven or eight million degrees inside. You ever go twosies in a tiny plastic box that's hot as hell? Like that port a potty at the fair, only 1/8 as big and ten times hotter.
After I got to clock out I looked forward to lying down, blogging awhile, and nursing my fat lip. Which I am now doing. On the way home I had to wait in some traffic because someone on a motorcycle ate shit. I hope it wasn't fatal. People give me shit for riding a scooter, and not dressing like an astronaut when I do. Don't do this please. I drive the speed limit. I wear a helmet. Just stay off the gas, out of my lane, and OFF MY BACK ABOUT IT!!!!!!
Epilogue: My stupid cat's gone again. I let him out since he has a microchip installed. He better not make me start looking for him, the little ingrate.
Anyway, thanks for letting me rant. I really don't have anything to complain about. Well, loudly, anyway. I have a great job, I didn't crash my scooter today, and there's still some crab salad in the fridge.
See you next trip! Rosalynda loves youuuuu!!!!!!:)