The solution:

I've come to dread reading/writing this blog. It's soo draggy and terrible. ("If I didn't know you," Annie said last night "I would think you were very dark and sad." Too true.) So I'm moving here. I may occasionally come back to Winterberry because, let's be honest, there's something super therapeutic about venting online, but hopefully those dark and sad posts will be few and far between. If I were you I would unsubscribe right now and save yourself the drama.

Thanks for following, it's been a party.

Loves,

ke

True Story

I think I'm going to take a break from blogging.

Hasta.

ke

Melissa-issa-issa

The part of this post that's about me: I convinced myself last week that I wanted to take up audio editing, and that it was as good a time as any...not like I was having a hard time finding time to sleep, not like I was complaining about how busy I was to anyone who'd listen. I checked out a voice-recorder from the library and recruited my family to put together an audio birthday card for Melissa. My little sister. Whose birthday is today! After collecting anecdotes and well wishes and "I love Melissa because...," I realized that it wasn't latent interest or good will toward my sister that drove me to this project, but a very complicated and subtle mind trying to avoid the business at hand and so I ditched the project. To all of you who helped: thanks. And sorry. To Melissa:

The part of this post that's about Melissa:

Melissa was born during an episode of Heart to Heart in a delivery room that overlooked Biscayne Bay. She spent her babyhood running around blonde and naked and nearly drowning. All day every day. In Kindergarten she would only wear the color purple. In first grade she insisted on wearing her Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Halloween costume/pajamas constantly. I'm not sure if Connie was able to get them off her when she went to school. She was the athletic one: swam like a fish (you know, out of necessity), an early Varsity soccer and softball player.

Melissa is softspoken and unselfish and funny. She loves animals (she and Jill just found and adopted a tiny baby kitten which they named Guy Oliver and feed from a bottle) and kids and art. I haven't seen her sit still for years: she's always sketching or carving, and she keeps getting better and better (I, a dabbler, was taken by surprise by this: "You mean, if you spend hours and hours on a thing, you turn master?") She did, she's so great.

And this thing I've realized: Melissa is the baby of a family stocked gills-high in strong personalities. She might be the most stubborn/determined of us all, for all her quiet solitary ways. Melissa knows what's important to her and she does it and keeps doing it. And so she's an amazing friend. And an impressive artist. And a better-than-natural athlete. And an incredible person.

Anyway. Happy Birthday Melis!

Mercy Killing

Today I killed a mouse. I noticed him in the shed at one of my parks (breathing heavily, still, tiny and adorable and nearly perfect, caught only, I saw later on, by the toes on his right foot). I stalled. I questioned my logic (maybe he doesn't feel enough to merit a mercy killing? Why does this bother me so much? What would Tom Guthrie do?). I texted a friend who tried to make me feel better by comparing me, I think, to God. I filled up a bucket of water then went to my other park to grab the garbage picker-upper the better to maneuver with then moved the dewy-eyed beast into a shovel and into the water where I learned mice can swim. Just not for long dragging a trap with them and with a foot all broke to pieces.

Coming to terms

In my head I know that when fellows spout off random (well known) facts in a tone that suggests that they're experts on the subject ("People nowadays use whitewash to paint furniture, then rub it off with a rag or sandpaper to make it look old." Really? Are you referring to a decade-old trend which I may have more access to than you on account of my fulfilling societally imposed gender norms, love loving HGTV, and actually having distressed furniture...) they don't mean harm. They're not, probably, trying to imply that I'm uninformed or unintelligent. They are, probably, trying to be friendly and make conversation. In every nerve and cell and bone, however, I want to punch them in the nose and run the other way.

On the other hand: those of you to whom I've pretended to be expert (and there are a lot of you), gross, and to whom I've condescended (there's no other way to write this! I love apologizing for being a myopic, unfounded, elitist using whom.) I'm so sorry. Thanks for not punching me in the nose? Blech.