Special Delivery

I never get packages. I hardly get mail.

I walked through my front door this evening and glanced towards the gold mailboxes inlaid on the wall to my left. I can usually see slivers of paper product peaking through the metal slots. I have become so good at this guessing game that I can identify whether the mail inside is worth my time. Chances are it's Time Warner Cable's special offers and I'll let it sit in there for a few days. I consider it corporate punishment.

For some reason I took a second look at the small box wedged in the magazine holder. Mary Phelps? What the hell.

I dislodge the box and the contents are clear. Tampons.

What a unusual piece of promotional mail. A free sample addressed specifically to me. How the hell did Platex get my name? And why the hell have they been talking about my menstrual cycle? I think there is a period conspiracy going on here. You're all in on it, I'm sure... whispering to each other about my flow.

The puzzlement faded away to downright sympathy. My mailman must have had a tough day. Carrying around boxes of tampons for all the ladies of the world. That's farther on the humiliation spectrum than the girlfriend forced visit to the hygiene isle "just because you're out" situation. I feel sorry for any dude that's fell victim to that one. That isle is overwhelming to me and I know what all that stuff does.

Anyway, that is my story about becoming three tampons richer!

I give this guy credit for making tampon dolls and then hugging them.

On Nothing

If you are looking to wax philosophy, I will fail you.

If you are eager for topical debate, I will shrug at your outbursts.

If you are hoping to swap facts and figures, I won’t have much to offer.

I like to talk about nothing. Always have. I would rather start every sentence not knowing how I was going to finish it. I would rather laugh at the crazy rhetoricals which result. I would rather pose questions than spew knowledge.

What’s so great about conversations on nothing is you never know where it will lead you. That unknown path can often times lead to my favorite activity – laughter. With political or topical discussion the route is predetermined. You know the issues that will be breached, because everyone else has laid these conversations out for us. There will be pointless agreement or disagreement that certainly won’t result in laughter. Well, not the fun laughter at least, maybe the awkward one-sided kind.

Maybe I like nothing because starting with nothing needs imagination to become something. Or maybe I just plain don’t got the smarts in me.

This nothingness has been on my mind quite a bit. I realized this vast nothingness has consumed more than just my speech. It has reached into the spirit of my writing and is slowly encroaching on the art my hands produce.

I write about everyday nothingness because I refuse to write about life-isms. I have no right to tell anyone how to live their life and won’t try. I won’t pretend I have things figured out. Along with the life-isms that pepper FAR too many blogs out there, I am also resistant to the life-hard-isms. When it comes down to it, we all have the same problems and I know I don’t want to be reminded of mine through someone’s daily writing. Comfort in relate ability is one thing. Listening to an ongoing internal nagging narrative is another. If I succumb to either of these in my writing on a frequent basis, will someone PLEASE tell me to shut my whining yap! But I will cover my ass here and say, please don’t throw that back into my face as hypocritical if I have the rare bad day blues. I’m having a bad day - be cool, man!

Tangent! What I wanted to get at is that most of my writing is based on a 15 second blip of life that day. They are all freeze frames of my life. They are nothing special. Not weighted with significance. This blog has become a collection of my simple pleasures.

I will say, somewhat off topically, that if I ever write a book (which is something I never, ever considered until recently) I will title it the same as this entry. On Nothing. So don’t go stealing it you thieving bastards!

Lastly, my art has gotten a dose of this nothingness too. The nothing in my drawings has always been apparent in my play with negative space. I like the idea of drawing as little as I can and the emptiness fills in the rest of the lines for me. That nothing becomes something when the brain automatically connects two lines that lay on the same plane. Or maybe I am just lazy and want to draw as little as possible. That is probably best for all observing parties.

Ok, I am sufficiently bored by my own nothing, it has become too much of a something. I am moving onto rousing my sleeping leg with a brief polka interlude towards my dirtied dishes.

Sensitive Soul

It was one of those Sundays where I had to give up an hour of my day to go unload a truck full of instruments. It’s hard to plan your day around such a short shift, but I prefer it to the Saturday nights that I go in at 10:30 at night. Those nights I give up on fun before it can even begin.

Each Sunday, after circling for a parking spot (I swear there are more cars in downtown Saint Paul than there are people), I walk into the main entrance of my building and head straight for the security desk. What I am looking for is the bird’s eye view on the loading dock and whether our big black truck has already lowered its hydraulics.

No truck yet. I run upstairs to grab the road chairs and stands that we had to ditch due to space constraints last week. I take the two loads down the freight and as I’m bailing the cargo I hear the garage door open. Perfect timing.

My co-worker and I can be caught in moments that only siblings know how to have. We can get sassy, snarky and snippy with each other, only to follow it up with a sly sideways smirk. Sometimes we shove. Sometimes we give nuggies. Sometimes we hear “Children! Behave!” The behavior is a direct result of the long hours we spend together and our attempt to keep it entertaining every minute.

Sunday I came through the garage door to see him inside the truck rolling the next trunk onto the lift gate. I take the appropriate place at the lip of the lift and grab hold of the handle that just rolled up to my face. That day it was beyond snarky, that day a nerve was hit.

A new stagehand (well, new to me) was on the ground rolling the carts indoors with me. I was introduced to Don as being the one that does “all the little stuff in SPCO Center”. Nail sufficiently driven through the ego. A pile driver delivering the blow. I shot back with a tongue that mostly my family knows, “Wow, thanks for belittling me”. He caught that nerve because it’s how I’ve been feeling about my job these days, where more and more of the big production has been getting taken away from me (because they suck, not because I suck). This story actually goes somewhere else, not pity-work-party.

Just as quickly as I responded, he shot back, “ Geeze, you’re so sensitive!” I quickly laughed at how caught up in that sentence I got. I shook the serious out and said, “Sensitive is not usually a word people use to describe me.” True. I can recall more times I have been deemed insensitive over its antonym. I remember times when I’ve told whining men to use their big boy voices (which doesn’t go over well in a relationship, FYI). There’s a reason why my sister always says I’m the ‘dude’ in relationships. Now, I’m not trying to sound bad-ass, tough guy. It’s really not about being cool or hard, I just figure life is too short to spend it upset. I have my emotional moments like anyone does. But for being a dainty person, I’m pretty sure my thick skin makes up 70% of my body mass index.

Skip ahead to today. Skip with me now. Left, right, left. That’s right!

Insert another repetitive description of my occupational commute. Almost home with one stop light left to sit through. Brain is wondering again and suddenly my sinuses clear and start to burn. My eyesight gets a little blurry. I slammed into an emotional thought. A car accident in a way. It wasn’t of the self-depreciating variety. It wasn’t traumatic or problematic. It was a simple sadness that struck hard and fast. Before the moisture in my eyes could produce a tear, I snapped back into the reality of my minivan. As fast as it had come, it had gone away. I hadn’t had a moment like that in a long time. A moment where nothing exists but pure emotion. I laughed at myself and likened the experience to getting hit in the face with a basketball.

Then I came home and cooked the shit out of today. Mmmmm…

Hello my name is Simon...

... and I like to do drawings!

I drew this one in six strokes.

Something productive came out of that meeting at work yesterday. Once I gave up faking interest, I started doodling on my post-it notes. I came home and unburied the art supplies I had just days before packed away. I started drawing, unaware of time and forgot to go out on a Saturday night.


Cool Guy High-Five!

Several more worthy doodles came from that meeting. Hopefully, they will be coming along soon.

What the hell am I going to do with all of these?

8:00am Pie

I successfully talked myself out of every routine minute of my morning.

With a quick turn over between last night's shift and this mornings, I still had every ambition to show up to work - clean, fresh faced, fed and cheerful.

I set my alarm for 7:00am. That gives me 40 minutes of prep time and 20 to get to work by the dreadful Saturday morning hour of 8:00.

The first 5 minutes is slotted for lying in bed. It is important that this activity be done without the snooze button. I hate the snooze button. This is usually an easy time allotment to honor. I can always lie in bed for five more minutes. The reason I failed this one is because I went well beyond my limit.

From 7:05 - 7:20 I am usually falling asleep in the shower and forgetting what step I am on in the body cleansing process. I never get out of the shower until the room is properly steamed and the fingers are sufficiently pruned. I managed to excuse myself from this process all together. Sleep sounded more important than smelling nicely for our board members.

Then there is usually 10 minutes for dress and the rest.

The ten minutes before locking my backdoor is always left for breakfast. Something will be in my belly before I touch that doorknob.

I talked myself out of that one with dreams of the food stocked in the fridge at work. I knew there were fruit and pastries left over from last night's event. That seemed like a time saving idea to eat when I got to work. Or perhaps a fruitful idea (lucrative not grapes, well actually lucrative with grapes) to eat on company time.

Content on giving up my morning routine. When the alarm went off at 7:00, I reset it for 7:40.

I will admit that the extra forty minutes did not equate to forty more winks. Instead, I lay in bed analyzing all the sounds around me.

The woman staying in the efficiency on the other side of my bedroom wall woke up at her usual 6:30. I could tell by the sound of her cutlery clinking in the sink that she was washing her morning cereal bowl and spoon. It gave me comfort that she skipped the shower this morning too.

I could hear the long forgotten sound of ice scrapers against a windshield outside. I thought, "Damn, frost." I came to realize how wrong I was as I made my way down the back steps towards my garage. "Awww, snow" replaced my vulgarity. I love the first snow. I love snow in general. But it is weird to see snow covering the tomato plants that are still bearing fruit. I wish I had my camera on my way into work. There were so many flower beds dusted with a white sprinkle. Their vibrant colors poking out underneth. I didn't end up with photographs. I ended up with a slippery drive, gliding across an entire bridge span and dove tailing on black ice. MN better grow its version of sea legs quickly.

Most of the forty minutes were spent thinking about pumpkin pie. I went for the apple last night and regretted it even before I took a bite. I pictured all three pies, stacked in the fridge. I wondered if I'd settle for a pre-cut piece or if I'd be rationing my own portions. Who am I kidding? I'll be cutting my own slice. I can't wait to eat this pie. I have to sit in a 4 hour meeting now. Not having the chance to indulge in my pie fantasy yet... I will be tortured with the thought of that pumpkin pie in the room next door for far too long.

At least they will be sweet dreams over dry conversation...

Fortune Telling

 I walked into my house at exactly 11:30.

30 minutes prior I was chatting up half of the band at the bar.

This brain of mine.

Microwaved Mammals

I bought a tasty artisan bread a few days ago that I haven' had a reason to cut into yet. A while back I learned the trick of keeping good breads in the microwave to prevent them going stale. It is an amazing trick!

A couple days have passed. No memory of grocery stores or time I might have had to do that chore.

Tonight, with a short stop home between work and the concert of my life.... I pop open the box of radiation to quickly warm a bite. The door swung open and I thought there was a mammal in my microwave! I seriously flashbacked my memory to any instances of vermin or pets that may explain a now-dead-usually-living creature. I couldn't think of anything to explain it.

Mmmm... rosemary bread.

This brain of mine.

It is possible I will be writing again from my usual post-show high. Especially with the early show. I love early shows cause I'm an old lady at heart. But.... I do have tomorrow off. I may need to party with the band... in which case I will be home by 11:30.

Hot Air

My cheeks hurt from laughing.

I came home with a balloon sculpted rainbow.

I popped the rainbow.

I don't think I am meant to have happiness.

What a fun night.


***What a terribly lazy writer I have become. Really, what terribly little time I have had to tell my tales***

A birthday Vikings/Packer game had me and my favorite middle aged friends in stitches and on the edge of our bar stools all night.

We pile into Halftime Rec and the night started with a whip. Literally. There were amateur Whip Artists (?) there. I bet there is a name for these whippers. Myself and my other female partner admitted our curiousity to each other, but reluctantly refused to try the whip for it's obvious comments from the grizzly, stage hand crew we were in the company of that night.

The night proceeded with food, laughter, drinks, sports, and balloon creations.

Birthday boy in his birthday hat.

Also photographed, birthday guest in vikings hat.

The only true Packers fan got shamed with a Green and Gold helmet. The downside - she couldn't watch the game, the upside - she couldn't see her own loss.

Somehow I ended up with a rainbow. I thought it would be funny to be sad inside a symbol of happiness. Until this happened:

My happiness is fucked! My happiness is a pile of rainbow vomit spewed all over my marble floors. It still sits there to this day.

Summer Goodbye

Sundresses are hung,
In the closet with care.
Wish I had a reason,
To get them out of there.

Table Talk

Sitting at my kitchen table and eating a tasty falafel, I notice the weird collection of stuff that has come to clutter this marble surface. I wondered what it said about me. The breakdown:


Just beyond my tinfoil crumpling and dill drippings lies my first generation iPod. The battery is dead, of course. Old and unimpressive, sad in battery life and unable to store my full library anymore. It’s the most useless frequently used technology I own.


Next to my left elbow is my Leatherman. That was my attempt at getting it back into my purse where it belongs. It only made it this far.


There is a glass of water because there is always a glass of water within arm’s reach.


Next to that glass of water is a fancy small bottle of Acqua Panna. I wonder if I will ever drink that fancy bottle of water. It seems like special occasion water. Don’t ask how it got to my table.


Straight ahead of me there lies the deflated bladder to my CamelBak. My sister hates when I call it a bladder. She probably cringed and crossed her legs when she read that sentence.


Near the window side of this circular table is a healthy African violet that never blooms.


Towering above the violet is a newly obtained Orchid. Its flowers keep opening. I wonder if I can encourage growth.


A half eaten bar of organic, fair trade chocolate waits there, tempting me.

The center of the table carries a bottle of good old fashioned Elmer’s glue. Nothing but the best.


I have a stolen conch shell sitting here too. Yes, stolen. I am practicing my Caribbean calls. Or at least, trying to get to a point where I can respond to my neighbor’s nightly 9:30 tuba practice.


There is a wooden tray from my travels to Belize that has a few Sharpies and Minnesota Opera post-it notes thrown across its dark grain.


My Canon PowerShot rests inside its red leather case. That battery has also been drained with use.


A banana takes up a few inches of space. A banana that I just bought at a restaurant. Yeah, I’m the sucker that buys bananas at restaurants.




That random sampling of objects somehow sums my life up pretty well. It has my hobbies, my lifestyle, my successes and failures, my pleasures and over indulgences, my work and my play. Or maybe I just need to clean house.