Update

In our last episode, Brown Shoes turned 50...
and while the vast nothingness recently available
on this blog might make you think otherwise -
I did not curl up and die.
Much has happened since I was last able to sit down and write,
but now that I'm here, attempting to do so,
I feel incapable...
afflicted by a curious combination of - oh hell, you do the math:
guilt + perfectionism x resistance + desire - ability = ...
when I add it all up, I'm left with a peculiar paralysis
that leaves me sitting at my keyboard, feeling like a moron.
So, while it may be a cop-out (heh heh),
I'm going to get a little Robert Stackian here and do a simple update:

Trip to Utah in late August - fabulous.
Highlights: windmill fighting with my sister's beagle,
eating the best mole negro on the planet,
and T and I laughing ourselves sick over boxes of hideous family pictures.

New fridge: check. (and this one works!)
New leather couch and chair: ordered in May, arrived in late September.
They are chocolatey and buttery and a little bit intimidating.
Feels odd, as if someone else with taste and cash moved into the house
while we weren't looking.

The Inferno: I have been solo staff member since the first week of September
(my co-worker abruptly left her position),and while I would usually argue
this statement vociferously - one of me is NOT enough.
Highlights: new baby born late August. Another resident in false labor (twice!).
5279 pieces of paperwork - one set of hands.
The flu.
Somehow pissing off the maintainence guy, which has resulted in him launching
a bizarre vendeta against me. Most recent volleys: writing his name on things in my office that belong to me, removing a poster from the wall because he thinks it's ugly, adding his own passive-aggressive quotes to our soberiety-only quote board.
The flu redux.
The ghost: making creepy hacking and sawing noises directly outside the weird door
that goes nowhere (OLD building, crazy remodels over the years left us with a door
that opens onto a 20 foot drop-off).
The rats.
The tattoo people: they apparently imported several bales of supertough pot and
have been hosting smoke-a-thons in an old van that sits directly ouside our back door.
The smell is UNbelieveable.
The other neighbors: Squatters have moved into a vacant building across the alley from us.
They have become best friends with both the tattoo people and all the regulars from
Methder Rogers place.
Things are going to hell in a fertilzer-lined handbasket. In a hurry.
The vibe is changing from annoying and loud to truly frightening.
Pray for peace.

Home: My 19 daughter has moved back.
D. has begun construction of an art studio for me off the back of the house.
My son spent a week here working on it.
Dysfunction junction, but pretty damn cool.

Me?
Overwhelmed.
Overworked.
Exhausted but strangely happy a good bit of the time.
And, as of September 8th - 3 years sober.

Missing all of you, and hoping you are all well and content.

Off to work - again.


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