Slow Maelstrom

That silence you've heard for the past week and a half was me resting, sleeping, and surfing on the interwebz. You might have heard some snoring, too, from the sleeping. My mind has kind of been like that empty, static-filled screen you see in the middle of the night on some TV channels.

So I'm here, in the Seattle area, and it's kind of weird. I still feel like I'm visiting, even though I oversaw the movers when they put all my stuff in a storage unit. Part of that is because I'm staying in someone's guest room, I'm sure, and some of it is because those times when I have been here over the last dozen years I have been visiting. I need to change my mental framework.

I'm very glad I'm here. I'm also kind of weirded out by it. Many thoughts and feelings have been swirling around inside of me: happiness, exhaustion, stress, anxiety, surrealism, expectations, trying to not have expectations, positivity, fear, and today I'm having some fibromyalgia pain, which I think is partly a delayed reaction from all the stress I was experiencing just getting ready to move. Everything has been swirling slowly, probably due to the exhaustion, for which I am grateful. I couldn't handle vertigo too right now!

The weather has been quite a bit cooler than I am used to. Colder, really — in the 50s during the day. We had a lot of rain and gray days my first week, but we've been having some simply glorious days recently, with brilliant blue skies, puffy white clouds, spring greens, flowers and flowering trees in all colors. These are the days that almost make you forget about the rain and the gray.

I remember when I first moved to Houston: one of the habits I had to wean myself off from was always taking or wearing a jacket or at least an overshirt with me when I left the apartment. Well, I changed that habit and got very comfortable going outside in just a tank, shorts, and sandals. Now I'm in the position of having to reverse the process! I'm underestimating how much I need to wear to be warm enough, usually by a thin layer (think an undershirt or camisole). And I don't always bring a rain jacket when it looks like rain (which is often). I need more weather-appropriate shoes and probably another jacket or vest or two. My BFF says I can borrow his sweaters until I can buy more of my own, which is nice. I really need an income so I can buy these weather-appropriate clothing items. I'm just hoping that I can make enough of my Houston wardrobe work here in Seattle enough of the time so I don't have to buy an entirely new wardrobe, which is more or less what I did in Houston.

Holiday Quiet

I'm in the living room at my friend's house and it's almost entirely silent. Girl child went to a friend's house. Boy child and dad went to boy child's bagpipe lesson. Mom is taking a nap. And the animals appear to be napping as well. I feel entirely alone and at peace with the lit Christmas tree and the mantel lights and the Santas and nutcrackers and snowmen.

It's been a wonderful holiday so far. Knowing that I am wanted makes me light up inside, even though I am tired (my hips hit right at the middle bar on the cot and I am unused to being around people 24/7). It's gray outside and quite cold and has rained off and on, but I'm handling it. (The silk long underwear helps a lot!)

It is nice being in places that are familiar and knowing that I could get around on my own fairly easily (in spite of all the changes here and there over the past 12 1/2 years). 

The fact that it's in the 70s in Houston is a nice thought, but the extreme heat started there so early this year and has continued so late. I stayed indoors much of this past year because of stress and because I was afraid the weather would hurt me. 

I have been afraid that the local cold weather would hurt me, too, but today, with my silks on underneath my jeans and my thin fleece pullover, with wool-blend socks on my feet and my wool winter coat covering me from shoulder to mid-thigh, with my gloves on my hands, I managed a family walk down the hill to Starbucks and the walk back up the hill and was actually feeling warm before we got to the house. So the cold weather has made me feel cold when I was slightly underdressed, but it has not hurt me. (But I might feel differently if it were snowy or icy.)

I'm feeling peaceful right now. I don't feel the need to make any decisions or to rationalize any potential decisions to myself or others. I am simply relaxing on the couch, drinking hot tea with milk, and typing on my laptop.

I have been having so much fun, have been talking and laughing a great deal, and have listened and observed, all with great joy and contentment. Now I feel the contentment of the peace and quiet of this lull in the holiday and my visit.

Regarding thoughts of moving to Seattle, my friends have assured me they would have or make time for me in their lives. They miss me and would love to have me move back here, as long as I was happy. This is very comforting. I still have a lot of thinking to do, and a lot of research into jobs and rents etc., and a lot of talking with my therapist. But I feel better able to be able to judge the Seattle side of the equation.

Now I think I'm going to watch the lights of the tree and feel the warmth of the encompassing happiness my hosts have shown over having me share this holiday with them.

I hope your holidays were joyous and warm as well.

Rain

Houston has been experiencing a drought for about 3 years. Basically, for as long as I've lived here (even when I was at my mom's for those months). Not so much as a tropical depression has relieved the dryness. Only three rainstorms have provided water (the first of which caused some real flooding) during that whole time. So we get excited when it looks like rain. A bit of thunder and lightning is enough to thrill me.

As I entered the park today, I saw dark clouds. Thunder rumbled from not too near and a cool breeze played around, running through the trees and along the gravel paths. The air grew cooler as I walked my one-mile path. 

On my way out of the park, the wind had grown stronger, the thunder nearer, and I felt a few tiny drops of water. The temperature had dropped at least 5 degrees since I'd entered the park. I texted a friend to share my excitement.

The wind grew stronger and cooler and by the time I got halfway home I saw lightning strike after lightning strike — close by and seeming to strike in the same place over and over again! The thunder was Right. There. I LOVE thunder and lightning storms, so I carried on with my errands.

When I arrived at Panera, the rain had started, enough to make me slightly damp on the way from my car to the bakery. I was wearing a tank top, long shorts, and running shoes, but I still felt warm enough. The cool rain felt good on my skin. The lightning had knocked out the power at Panera just before I got there. It was back on, but their cash registers were out; they were up again when it was time for me to pay.

By the time I got to Lowe's, the rain was real rain; I had to use my wipers on the regular setting, not pulse. But it was still reaonable. Until just before I stepped out of my car. Then the clouds dropped everything — I was soaked less than five feet from my car! When I got inside the store, water was streaming down my hair and body, getting into my eyes and probably washing off my sunscreen moisturizer (which was no longer relevant). My clothing was drenched all the way through; I must have look quite odd to the people who already wandered the superstore, inside before the rain came down. I didn't mind. I felt like a kid who'd been jumping into puddles: gleeful, wet, and cool. A store employee, an older man, told me he'd stepped out to get a bit wet, too, enjoying our small storm.

I bought what I needed and finished my errands without leaving my car, but the big downpour had ended. When I got back to the apartment complex and got out to get my mail, a woman was being tentative about walking out into the light sprinkle; she made her friend unlock the car door before she would even run out from under the shelter of the office's porch. I just laughed and picked up my mail.

At home, I stripped everything off and hung or set it all in the bathroom to dry, replacing my clothes with somewhat warmer things due to the chill.

The storm may have been short — much too short — but I'm still smiling and feeling cozy, still feeling the coolness of the wind and the rain and my rain-soaked clothes.

Semi-Random

I'm finally coming out of the fog of that shock and initial grief. I don't remember much from the first few days after Mom died, and I've spent most of the past three weeks kind of floating, unable to accomplish anything.

But on Thursday, I feel like I woke from a sound sleep. The sun was shining. I accomplished tasks. I went outside. Since then I have felt aware.

I feel desperate for a recent picture of my mom, and for the sound of her voice. I've dialed her phone number just to hear her message. Kind of pathetic, but who cares. I want to find a way to record it so I can listen when I need to.

Insectoid horrors in the woods

Cicadas live here, in Humble, Kingwood, and Atascocita. In all of the south. And parts east and even the Midwest, from what I've. But not the Pacific NW, as far as I know. I'd never heard them before I moved here. I don't like them.

The sound a group of cicadas makes is the sound you would hear if you were in the middle of a horror flick that involved insectoid entities — or maybe electrical ones — just before they caught you and ate your brains. Or maybe ate your internal organs, but without killing you first.

My walks in the woods when I first heard the beasties were eerie at best. I knew I shouldn't run, for two reasons. Firstly, because if they were entities out to have me for lunch, then running would only call attention to me. Secondly, if they weren't, then I would look like a lunatic running through the park. I'm used to looking foolish, but seldom for insects. Except for when Bugzilla was in my apartment, of course.

The cidadas were so loud, I could hear them as I drove down West Lake Houston Parkway, with my windows closed and the AC on. Such a thing seems horribly wrong.

I remember reading a story years ago that featured cicadas. The book said they got louder as it grew hotter, and I believe it. In the book, the heat peaked just as the story peaked and I remember only this, as the tension reached its highest pressure: "The cidadas were screaming."

Not like that would lead me to an association with cicadas and terror, of course.

The cicadas just continued and continued to sing, all summer long, reaching their peak in early to mid-August. Right around the time I ventured back to Oregon. When I returned to Houston, the noise had subsided a great deal. It was not long after one of the infrequent rain storms we've had this summer than I finally got a look at one of the bugs, and I have to agree with a friend of mine: they are ugly creatures. Every bit as scary as their sound suggests. If I were able to see the mass of cicadas it takes to make the amount of noise I heard this summer, I probably would leave the state for cooler wetter climes. Brr. Even imagining the sight is enough to give me chills.

Everyone around here tells me about 17-year cicadas. Certainly that is the kind one hears about. But Wikipedia's table of periodic (13- and 17-year) cicadas doesn't list either 2009 or Texas for them. The rest of the cicadas are annual. And yet, one woman told me that her son asked her what the noise was, and he was 20 years old. So apparently he had not heard these in his memory. I have to assume that Wikipedia doesn't have all its facts. And that everything is flexible. After all, the climate is changing, and both flora and fauna are moving northward in the northern hemisphere. I wouldn't be surprised if the cicadas have been interrupted in their usual cycle by the changes. Or that we were now getting the insectoid horrors from Central and South America.

According to Wikipedia again, the beasties are not a threat to humans or other animals. Just to trees. Then again, who is to say what is more correct: Wikipedia, or a horror story?

Do you really want to find out?

The Texas Skye in Summer

I'm living in the land of summer. The land of sunshine and heat. The land of warmth in temperature and warmth in people.

The land of tropical storms and hurricanes and killing levels of heat and humidity.

I worry about summer here. I worry about August and September, which are supposed to be the killer months, the months that could send me running for the PNW without so much as packing my bags.

I mean, it's not like the temps will faze me. I've been happily roasting (in limited amounts) in 97-degree weather (heat index 101-103). I walk outside from the extremely cold newspaper office, where I have to wear a sweater, and toast myself until I feel warm. Then I walk back into the ice cube of work. And about half the time, I don't turn on my AC in the car, preferring to warm myself as I drive (once the 140-degree heat leaks out thru the open windows, of course).

People are amazed by my tolerance and joy in the heat. They know where I've been. And I've dealt with 100+ degree weather in Eastern Washington (a LONG time ago) and occasionally in Seattle or in the Willamette Valley. Last year May, it hit 103 for a freak weather day in Lincoln City.

But the humidity: I worry about tolerating 110 degrees with 98% humidity for 2 months. I worry about the fact that I have things in my apartment that I want to keep. I worry about the fact that I bought a really nice couch last weekend (to be delivered next week) and would need to move that sucker if I fled.

Then there are the storms; it is now officially storm season.

I worry that maybe I can tolerate neither the NW nor the South, but I cannot afford the northern California coastal or near-coastal areas. (Because that would be the ideal climate for me.) I've made a couple of friends here. I might be on the way to making one or two more: this is so quick for me! :) What if I feel the need to leave?

I worry about money: unemployment ran out and I'm now living on my savings, which represents all the money I have in the world. Well, that and the bit of money I make at The Tribune, which pays for my health insurance, plus a little more. Maybe dinners out.

I don't mind being alone so much anymore. A friend from back "home" asked me how I was when I was a child, what did I do when I was alone. And I remembered that I was mostly solitary as a child, too.

So what did I do? Solitary things, things that occupied me; I rarely felt lonely. I read books. I wrote, I drew, I painted. I rode my bike around and around the cul de sac when my mom wouldn't let me ride out of it. I skated around and around, too. I played with my "dangerous" things: Fun Flowers when I was a child, a toy that could burn you pretty good and that I never had adult supervision when using, never hurt myself with; and my chemistry set when I was a little older, ditto for supervision and never hurting myself (even when I broke a test tube). I climbed a tree and I made my own detective kit to pretend with.

I guess it's time to let myself free of expectations. And just enjoy me, enjoy my life and the sunshine and the heat.

And to create: I've started a creative crochet project (picked up a couple of books); I have a painting sketched out and the supplies ready; I am working on not one, not two, but THREE novel ideas; I have a blog (obviously), and I have a website that desperately needs Search Engine Optimization (SEO) so that potential clients can find me---my site doesn't come up in the first two or three DOZEN pages when you search on "Houston writer/editor" or "Houston freelance writer" or "Houston technical writer." That has to change. And I need to add some other things to my site.

All and all, there is no reason for my solitude to be difficult.

Only the summer heat, and the summer humidity.

Only the expectations and fears floating around in the Texas Skye.