#sbpamelia

Back from some travels and I'm tired and happy. I visited some family in the Florida panhandle, then spent a week helping renovate a house in New Orleans. St Bernard Project is close to my heart, helping families 10 years post-Katrina to get back home. A buddy went with me and we shared an Airbnb shotgun house, complete with an early-morning wakeup call from the rooster next door. We installed drywall and cement board, painted and spackled and mudded, cut baseboards and learned to use a nail gun. Green Corps students came in twice, upping the energy and noise levels. The SBP site supervisors, serving through Americorps, were bright, funny and skillful twenty-somethings. Most days there was some impromptu dancing and a long line of running jokes by the end of the week.  And always, we kept in mind the goal of returning the Hendersons home by the end of October.
Evenings, my buddy and dined like royalty and listened to stellar jazz, on the outdoor courtyard at Bacchanal, then on Frenchmen Street at Maison, dba, 3 Muses, and Vaso. We drank Sazeracs and Abita beer and sobered up with street pizza and beignets and groceries from the Mardi Gras Zone Supermarket.
I don't quite know how to wrap up my thoughts quite yet.
There's more to come.

inque

My new ink is finished, I think. Me likes, and am already thinking about the next one. Thanks Ashley at 522 Tatoo.

words

I got some writing advice last weekend.
From non-writers. A fair amount of whiskey was involved. And, I asked for it. I was feeling stuck on a particular story ending and decided to solicit some help.
For me, talking about a story in progress ranks pretty high on the discomfort list, right up there with dental work and public speaking. It's hard to talk about writing and I don't want what I'm working on to sound trivial or unimaginative.
But, I asked, they answered, and I took mental notes. I made revisions this week, and now I'm letting them settle. When I go back in a week or two, we'll see how it feels.
*
Trying to find the thread, man. It's a lifelong quest.

tentglow

Finally had some time to get out to the coast last weekend. Even though the weather has turned mercifully cooler, there's still a burn ban, so the only fire possible was the candles I posted outside the day tent. I enjoyed a day of outdoor work: finishing the driveway gate, pulling out brambles, clearing the septic field, sweeping and scrubbing. Then, a gentle hit from the pipe, and it was beer o'clock. Birds rustled blissfully in the misty alders, and nearby, a frog croaked.
*
Scroll down for today's writing soundtrack, dj Shmeejay.

looking for patterns

I broke a necklace and a bracelet over the weekend.
My rental car got a flat tire.
My alarm didn't go off this morning.
And as I waited for the bus, a man boarding the D-line got his foot caught in the disabled ramp and screamed like a stuck pig.
A pattern of unfortunate events?
Who knows?
Good things happened too: I saw pink-glazed clouds at sunset on Sunday, I went dancing and played a card game with friends, I heard frogs croaking on a coastal visit, and yet all I remember is the broken chain, the mad rush to shower and get to work, the screams of an agitated rider.
C'mon now. The pattern is life.
*

my shrink, the ceo

My shrink runs our sessions in a very businesslike manner.
We meet at the same time each week. We work through the same agenda: ritual breathing to relax, recap of last visit, any new business, then on to the topics at hand.
She wears variations on the same outfits--1970's Mary Tyler Moore chic, loose slacks with matching vests, long-sleeved stretchy shirts, no prints.
Once a month we analyze where I'm at, with 3 separate measures.
And for gnarly problems, she busts out the white board.
It's a lot like work, only the project is me.
*
For so many of the situations I bring to her, the answers are the same, too.
You have little to no influence here.
You can choose understanding, acceptance.
*
I've been discovering the photos of Saul Leiter. Snapshots of mid-century NYC. I'm drawn to the layers, the filters--windows of a shop or a taxicab, rain or snow, half-glimpses of a face or a hat or a breast. He evokes such  feelings of recognition and longing.

"you're"