The Darkening Journey

. I told Penny that I would not believe Obama won until I saw him sworn in. I'm almost ready to change my position on that.

I voted today via absentee ballot since I will be in Kentucky on 11-4.  I'm still not allowing myself any optimism about this. After Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and the years stumbling through a  weed patch full of bushes how could I be.
After a reminder from jeremytblack</lj> , I also made contributions to the No On 8 in California & another contribution to the No On 2 group in Florida.
Jeremiah went to a Biden rally at the Sun Dome at USF this morning. It wasn't the rally where Biden was introduced as "the next vice president of the united states, John McCain...

( ... )

While looking through the gossip sites, came across a picture of Stephen Bogardus who is in a new production on broadway. As most of these things do, I was swept back in time to when Rodney did "Love Valour Compassion" in lexington. He didn't feel like he had a handle of the character of Gregory, so he tracked down Bogardus,who originated the role & broadway & the film , in NYC to talk about playing the role. He never felt he got the part right. He was nervous about doing the play in Lexington, and he felt uncertain about the stutter. He so wanted to get that right since his brother had such a bad problem with it when he was growing up. He eventually modified so it was less realistic, but more understandable-pretty much what he did with the cockney accent in "An Act of the Imagination".  I thought he nailed the part each of the times I saw him, but he was much less certain. I think he felt it was his worst performance. I never could convince him otherwise.
I moved the camera to J's PC this afternoon. I feel so much better now that I have no visual to deal with on Skype. Talked to Alison a bit while I was setting up the camera and while J was at Gilbert's little league game.
I forced myself to watch Oprah today, with Dr. Oz. I have to start facing up to life, and stop being afraid of my own memories. Someday, they will be all I have left, and I may not have them then either.
I think I may have found the most depressing song sung by the most depressing voice I've ever heard. Goodbye Joe by Pat Keesey, makes Billie Holidays' Gloomy Sunday seem positively uplifting.

watched a program on Logo last night, about elder queers, mostly the generation which preceeded my generation, and the one before that. Such a litany of problems, yet such fantastic outlooks. One of those, "oh god, do I feel guility for not doing anything useful with my life,and  now that I know about all of this, why am I not doing anything about it now" kind of program. Maybe it's really time to restart living a little.
Second installment of True Blood. I'm getting to really enjoy this, especially watching, Ryan Kwanten's sex scenes-great butt. Steven Moyer hasn't had any sex scenes yet, but he exudes sensuality in every scene with Anna Paquin. Hell, I would have given in within the first 30 seconds of meeting him.....nah, i wouldn't have lasted half that long...
 

had no internet service in the morning, so i skipped work. It did return around 11:45, but I was scheduled off at 12, so I didn't bother. watched "Love: Reinvented" . New PC camera arrived. It's mostly for Jeremiah to talk to Alison & his father. I tested it on my laptop, but the pix of me was too scary. I played with it on skype for a while, but I just do not like that old face staring back at me. I look so damned serious, and so damned old. I didn't realize how old looking I've become in the past few months. The dark circles are new, and I could pack for the weekend in the bags under my eyes. I'm afraid the portrait in the attic must be looking younger and younger. And that's not what I wanted. And where the hell did my hair go? I just had it, right here. I'll look around for it again. Overall, very depressing.

Another short work day. a shopping trip to the grocery store, left my wallet at home, left jeremiah with the shopping cart while I drove back to retrieve the wallet. Good thing it's a short drive.

I'm definitely getting the creepies about the election. The obama people don't seem to know how to deal with palin. And from what I'm hearing, just standing in checkout lines or listening to coversations in restaurants, palin has sadly made a difference in McCain's favor. I don't get it, but she seems to be popular.  Very depressing.
 

*pic from thefulcrum.blogspot.com/Dick.jpg

I WIll Follow You

I hear your voice calling out me
Are you happy baby now that you are free
I watch the sky, searching for a sign
but where you've gone, you've fallen out time
I'll follow, I'll follow, I will follow you
Out into the mystery and deep into the blue
I'll follow ,i'll follow, I will follow you
When its my turn baby, I will follow you
I know that you won't look back
This world was so unkind
Dont' turn around, I'll be right behind
I'll follow the sun, to be where you are
I'll follow the moon, keep my eyes on the stars
i'll wait a lifetime baby to be by your side
I know you'll be waiting,
Please say you'll be waiting
I'll follow, I'll follow, I will follow you
Out into the mystery ,deep into the blue
I'll follow, I'll follow, I will follow you
When it's my turn baby, I will follow you
I watched you walking through the open door
As one who waits and one who goes before
I'll follow the sun, to be where you are
I'll follow the moon, keep my eyes on the stars
I wait a lifetime baby to be by your side
I know you'll be waiting
Please say you'll be waiting
I'll follow, I'll follow, I will follow you
Out into the mystery, deep into the blue
--Micah Barnes
 

another day without focus, but at least it seemed like it had (very minor) purpose. J and I finally replaced the curtains in the living room, a somewhat precarious job, which will send me to Home Deport tomorrow. The plaster is either so hard that it can't be drilled into(they must have use steal beams for lathing) or just crumbles away when you do. The usual plastic screw thingies, just got lost in the every widening holes. A half hour job took 3 hours. We rewarded ourselves with delivery from Galley pizza (neither ordered pizza.)

The best part of the day  was itroducing j to "Night of the Hunter". It's is one of those films you either love or hate apparently--at least on IMDB. I knew he would be one those that loved it. And he did, once he focused his attention fully on the film.(during the 1st 3rd of the movie he was skyping with Allison. )Of course, becoming old and rambling, I told the story of meeting Lillian Gish and Divine when the Kentucky Theater in Lexington reopened after the fire. Not really such an odd combination, the theater showed a mixture of indies, foreign films & classics mixed in with a few current hollywood films & the occasional live show. The State theater next door used to show porn films.(I skipped work one day to go with rod to see "Dracula's Bride " (aka "Blacula Sucks" in its softcore format) at  the state).

J referred to Allison as 'my girl', so I'm assuming things are moving along well. She's apparently looking at emigrating to the US, not an easy process I gather. Of course yesterday morning I was in such a mood that I looked at the immigration process for myself for UK, Canada, Australia & NZ. (I already has info o on Switzerland from the time Rod & I looked at moving to Zug. No one seems to want someone who just wants to lounge around. Maybe I'll just visit a lot a places.

 

 

pretty much a repeat of yesterday, except that I took off work 2 hours early.also some experimental cooking, which was successful I suppose: jeremiah ate it. he didn't die, but he did insist on choclate cake and ice cream afterwards.
watched FAQS and Bill Maher tonight.
getting ready to give the cats a midnight treat. now i'm starting to write like i'm on twitter. it certainly concentrates the mind when you try to say something in 140 characters or less.

I sometimes forget the power with which we imbue objects.Today the object was a fragile,threadbare quilt. The quilt was a gift to Rodney from his Aunt Lo, who got it from her mother. Used with 12 children it had been through a lot.  Rodney always used the quilt when he felt uneasy. He had me put it away from his own comfort because he was afraid that as he lost more and more control over his movements he would burn it when he smoked. And by the end, when the asterixis  had taken hold of his body nothing was safe. Janie & I held his final cigarettes for him as he struggled to stay himself. Even the simple things, like smoking with his coffee. First we had to put the coffee in what amounted to an adult sippy cup,then like the cigarettes we had to hold the cup for him as well. I still see the look of frustration-and desparation-in his eyes as he struggled. I saw him give up fighting then. That was late on Wednesday afternoon. We took him to the bed, and he never got up to walk again. Thursday, he had the first heart attack, just as the lifelink transplant organization called to say he had been accepted for the transplant list. Saturday he died
 Today I picked up the quilt for the first time since I put it out of reach-but not out of site.Just touching it brought on a jolt of unwanted emotions, and writing about it brings back more. My emotions have been front and center since the trip ended.The road was freeing, but coming back here has not been. Everything seems to set me off. There has been no progress at all. I suppose I've always thought that things would get better. That has always been the nature of my thought processes. I always assumed things would be better. I expected it. I believed it. It was my religion, my god. I know not a lot of time has passed, yet to me it seems ten thousand years,and ten minutes ago.

god. i miss cigarettes too.

10:44pm, started watching the republican convention on the BBC. got 2 minutes into Fred Thompson's speech & couldn't do it. I found refuge in Dorm Daze 2: College At Sea. infinitely preferable, even tho I'm a firm believer in "know your enemy", this is one enemy I already know.

a quiet day, finally started uploading journal entries from the roadtrip into livejournal. tried to restore the orchid back to life, inspired by the fact that the some of the bulbs from Rod's hospital visit are starting to come to live again. I dread resuming work tomorrow. I'm not sure why this has become so difficult for me. I could if I cut down on extraneious expenses live ok without the job, but I always feel so useless when I'm not doing something.

A surprise from McCain today which probably should not have been that much of a surprise. He shored up his rightwing with a gun toting, anti-choice politican, and since the paragon of non-progressivism is a woman, he taps into the disgruntled working class women who supported hillary. Why they support Hillary who is a non gun-toting,pro-choice, progressive politician is something of a mystery to me since many of them are social conservatives. Plus he stole some of the spot light from Obama. A smart move by his handlers? Palin's first outing was not impressive, but I'm sure the handlers will work on her.It is going to be interesting. I could do with a little less interesting right now.

I watched Obama's speech with great anticipation and trepidation. The trepidation dissipated fairly quickly. He looked and sounded like someone who was in the right place. He looked and sounded presidential, and not tooimperial. He followed the bill clinton model, a lot of specifics mixed with a dose of dreams and hope. in the end, we all live in hope.( Of course,if he had sounded like Donald Duck in one of his little fits, I still would vote for him. The past eight years havebeen a horror show. It's one thing to survive Nixon and Reagan and the first bush. at least you got little breaksof sanity, but 12 years of shit in a row, Can't deal with that.) Truly, this is something I did not ever expect to see in my life time. I thought it would happen eventually, but in 30 years or 50 years. It almost enough to make me optimistic(almost).And to see John Lewis after all the pain he went through was just amazing. He must feel vindicated.
I thought the speeches from 'real' americans which preceded Obama's film was a touch of genius,but Chris Matthews wouldn't shut up, so I switched to PBS. Go Barney Smith. That was too funny and too perfect. 

 Del Martin,a pioneer and a role model, died today. Hilary Clinton moved to nominate obama by acclamation. (She was the last person Rodney voted for.) Because I was working, the two events occurred similtaneously for me when my shift ended. Another one of those emotional moments when heroic events and people fade into the flow of history.
Ads in opposition to Amendment 2 (the anti-gay marriage amendment)have started running here. You would never know that it might impact gay people at all. The ads only showed elderly white couples. In this state probably a good strategy. The elderly (should I start saying 'we' now?)  outnumber gay people by significant numbers. I have no doubt that the amendment will pass.

 

jeremytblack wrote a brilliant piece on political convention memories yesterday. I frequently teared up when I read this morning. He evoked some very precious memories for me, of hot august nights, before cable when all 3 networks carried the conventions in their entirety it seemed, and before remote controls, so I sat in front of the tv, frequently flipping the dial, much to my grandmothers annoyance, to see as much of the  endless committee meetings, the frequent banalities, the sometimes mundane, sometimes soaring speeches as I could. I was nine or ten during the 1960 election, but I understood instinctually the difference between Kennedy & Nixon.(Duh). And I remember being very confused when someone blanketed all of the houses with an overtly racist, anti-catholic pamphlet, full of crudely drawn black men lusting after horrified white women. Again I didn't really understand much of it. The only catholics I knew of were the nuns at Sharon Heights hospital, who moved seemingly without feet(l thought of them when I first saw the "Hush" episode of Buffy, with the creepily smling floating men) , with a scary rustling sound throughout the hospital. I thought they were rather scary. The only black person I knew was Mr. Hutton,(old men didn't have first names then, they are all called 'mister') who like my grandfather, was a 'bootlegger'. They had frequent dealings with each other mostly in the back of my grandfathers grocery store.Now I would suspect that they were conspiring against competitors cutting into their territories--a little mountain version of the mafia. Then I could not have turned him into the vision of a black man in the pamphlet. I don't believe anyone else could have either: he was later elected mayor. Obviously I got sidetracked--again.This started out as a political convention memory, but ended up being a scary nun-bootlegger memory.  I'm old, get over it. That is going to be my excuse for everything.

 

                                                                   severe olympic withdrawal, but my long dormant inner political junkie has been, temporarily, reactivated. Listening to Ted kennedy's speech. (group against group,straight against gay, the dream lives on) oh hell. I'm an old liberal, always have been, always will be. 
The last couple of days have emotionally tough, the emotionality of the trip, and the inevitable letdown, segueing directly into the 6 month anniversary. The worst seems over for the moment (ever the optimist). Thanks to everyone who sent some encouragement my way. It always helps when someone reminds me that I'm still actually alive, or that I don't need to scurry into the shadows to hide. I can actually reach out and perhaps even be useful. I hope you'll remind of these things the next time too.

 

 

 

 I'm back. yeah. 2227 miles. 1700 miles for the round trip from Tampa to Lexington, the rest spent going from restauarant to restaurant in Lexington and several trips to the cemetery. 

I kept the journal off line (since I had internet access 1 day only. I did finally find a use for twitter. At least i felt connected those rare times I had cell phone service.) and will fill in some of the gaps.  The new car has been officially dubbed casper, not so much for the white color as for the ghostly voice the GPS system developed at times. Casper  & I did well together; so well I was reluctant to end the trip.

A few changes on the home front, Jeremiah ripped down the curtains from the living room windows allowing light in for the first time since february. It was admittedy necessary, but I was not prepared for the light or what was revealed by it. He has some time on his hands now, as he has been a casualty of the current economic crisis in the newspaper biz. He seems relieved to a degree. The uncertainty is over and he has been so unhappy with the job for so long. Rodney was miserable too in his last year there. There has always been something wrong there. I remember my first visit when Rodney was working there. I've never seen such a miserable group of people in a texas chainsaw massacre kind of way. I just don't know if they were miserable before they got there or grew miserable in place. Rod certainly  grew miserable in place.

Spent the night in the Griswold Suite sleep was a little easier since I had so much to drink at dinner(& at the cemetery), and since I spent so much energy getting into the bed. I've never understood the reason for making them so high off the ground. The top of the mattress was just a little below armpit level, but it's comfortable once you get there.
fresh grapes & cherries and cantaloups from the farm for breakfast. read the paper, played with Bonnie & Clyde (the farm's german shepherds), then headed out to lunch with Rodney's mother, and his sister Cindy. This was at Ramsey's on Harrodsburg Rd in Lexington. Ramsey's is another lexington institution. there are several scattered around the city. Lunch was pleasant. Mrs. F seemed to in good spirits. I had understood that she was feeble and depressed. She seemed neither. I ended up following her into the restaurant though I didn't know it at the time. I was just following a towncar. More fresh food, but I opted for a vegetarian hot-brown, something I can't get  anywhere outside of kentucky. The non-vegetarian kind are probably illegal in several states. (country ham,a mold and salt laden delicacy so full of microbes that the kentucky version could not until recently can not be shipped across state lines, turkey breast on toast points (usually at least 4 of them),covered in mounds of  bechamel or mornay sauce , which in turn is covered with mounds of cheese, bacon & tomato, and broiled till bubbling. The vegeterian version, only slightly less lethal, has asparagus tips, mushrooms, zucchini and banana peppers, and the usual sauces & cheeses. A lot of time and money is spent on food in Kentucky. Kentuckians love their little odd foods, burgoo(an incredibly thick stew involving a wide and possibly scary variety of meats),bourbon balls, beer cheese (which is cheese  & beer and something very hot) & Cincinnati style chili. The big thing seems to be fresh food. Everyone has a garden of some kind. And the tomatoes alone are worth the 1700 mile round trip. They're frequently eaten like apples or with a tiny bit of salt. after lunch, I came to Penny's. A nice little drive

She & Amy were painting fences. When the painting was finished, and while Penny is frequently tom sawyerish, I'm no fool, I stayed inside in the a/c with the satelitte dish & the big tv. I was happy. Amy went back to her farm (a very large farm owned by the ruling family of Dubai, where she is a manager). Penny & I cleaned up, picked up Amy & met Marcia at Fayette Mall for shoe shopping. Almost bit on the MBT shoes, but a little pricey at the store. Then we loaded up into penny's truck and headed across Lexington to the Hamburg Place area to the Mongolian Grill. The food was good, the atmosphere a little too loud and crowded, the beer was very large and the company was wonderful.An excursion back across town for real ice cream and then home to collapse.
 

up early, chatted with Liz before she went to work, then spent a little time with Janie before she went to work.took a shower before the drain pipes were pulled for work on the septic system. Went down the hill, picked up a large bottle of champagne at R's liquor store in l'burg, then picked up flowers at the florist in lexington. much heavier than expected. arrived at 2pm and stayed till 4ish. I drank some of the champagne, spread some among Rodney & his relatives.A long emotional talk--after all it was our 28th anniversary.  When you come home after a long trip, there is a feeling of relief and happiness, a sense of security becomes enhanced. When I pulled upto the grave, that feeling was there. (8-21-8, I guess 'home' is now a cemetery. Though I was happy to see Jeremiah and the cats, that sense of relief did not happen here, only at the cemetery).

I arrived at Steve's farm (Blackstone Farm) around 5, took a shower & settle into the Griswold suite. I discovered that the DSL wasn't working. And I had been so looking forward to contacting civilization again. Dinner with Rodney's brother Steve,his wife Trish, and Rodney's older sister Brenda. On the patio at Murray's, something of a lexington institution where the rich & the wannabe's go to be seen. The flies were horrendous, but otherwise we had a good time. No business was discussed for once. That will happen tomorrow with lunch with Rodney's mother & sister Cindy.

the second leg of the trip was longer than expected. Started out from Ringgold Georgia, just south of Chattanooga and ran into a 3-4 hour back up on I-75. So I switched my destination from Penny's to Janie's. GPS led me a merry chase thru the middle of tennessee. A little long, but very scenic, the foothills of the appalachians, no interstates so there was not the usual assortment of McD's, Hampton Inns. A lot of places called "Mom's". This was the kind of thing Rodney loved. I was always dubious, but ended up enjoying them, even though there was not much of a selection for vegetarians. I dont think a vegan could find anything to eat. Ended up eating a the home cafe--which made me think of "A home at the end of the world"--it wasn't so upscale as that home cafe, but it was tasty if not exactly good for me. Tennessee route 111 is a great road. long stretches of 4 lanes divided highway, 70 mph limit and no traffic. I zipped along with my big band sound track never going less than 85. There was 1 pickup truck. we played tag for 25-30 miles, but he could have easily left my little casper car in the dust. When he got to his exit, he passed me at about a 100, blew his horn and disappeared  into the distance.
 
At Janie & Liz's now. They have made some progress in the year and a half since I was here last. The new steps down the hillside are almost finished. Liz has incorporated some stained glass artwork  into the landings. A new dog,Alfie,has been added. 2 dogs 2 cats. The ducks are still squawking in the pond, and hummingbirds are everywhere.

Ok a liz dinner (a wondrous thing) is imminent (pasta with pesto sauce  and veggies made from ingredients from her garden). I won't be able to write after this. just moan and maybe have a drink.

We don't know where we're going, but we're going (from the chorus of an Andrews sisters song)

 587 miles down. 386 to go ( a few side trips along the way).It still retains an aura of unreality. It started out the bitch on the GPS system(a 3 month trial) giving me bad directions. I yelled at her a lot. She had street names wrong, and in the middle of the interstate with not an exit in miles, she told me to "Make a hard left now", I'm going to change to the guy voice tomorrow. Maybe he can read directions) i'm traveling with a stuffed bear wearing a budweiser baseball cap. His name is Tazzler (Rodney's name for him). He always travelled with Rodney when R travelled alone. He is one R rescued from the trash in Columbus, OH, when his van was broken into while he was at a play. He confronted the thief who was carrying Rod's leather jacket & his walkman. He punched Rod in face (causing tmj issues that lasted for many years), but the police had to pull Rodney off of the thief. Rod was much stronger than he looked. All physical training for circus class, fencing, ice skating & tennis. (Geez,just talking about that much activity has exhaused be. I'll finish this later.)

Later:
I'm in a Comfort Inn (because free WI-FI access) in Ringgold Georgia,a few miles south of Chattanooga. Didn't want to get caught in the rush hour there again, so I've settled. A little flirting with the desk clerk who looks like a cleaner and less hungry Jeffrey Dahmer.

 Even later:
(ringgold,named after a mexican war heror. An one of those endless cities in the south (actually a little town by I-75) which had a civil war battle (The battle of ringgold). It was also the point where General Sherman started his march to the sea. utterly non-descript. it was the sight of a 125 car pile up in a fog, and Dolly Parton married here husband here.)

I picked up the new car today. As I was fighting Friday traffic on Dale Mabry, a realization came to me. This was the start of a smaller life. Not a better one, just a smaller one. I am now a singularity . Somehow, that sounds slightly better than saying I am alone. It doesn't matter that I still say "we" are "we" will,"we". "I" does not sound natural. I doubt that it ever will.Olympic opening ceremony. My first alone since 1976. every single one winter and summer. I've tried to stay non-emotional, but the silence...the silence. i miss the continual running commentary, the happy snarkiness, the snarling back and forth. The daily companionship, the sense that you are part of something bigger, the comfort of loving and being loved.
Enough already.at least I warned you

The cat walked across my head at 4am on his way to the window, then back again. The walking I could handle, its the claws. He digs in when he uses my head as a launching pad. So I got up,twittered this news to my singular audience and listened to music. In a weird mood so I got out some vinyl, came across Rod McKuen's Jacque Brel LP. That drifted me back to the old apartment on Adams street in bowling green, and an impromptu party with Norman mailer, who had just given a lecture(in the middle of the Vietnam mess, he gave a lecture on volunteerism. We never quite got it). I smoked pot with him, one of my roomates & my writing teacher. Of all the stoner things we talked about, the only thing I remember was a discussion on the pronunciation of 'assiduous'. all 3 of us pronounced it differently. This lead a discussion of words used in writing, but seldom in conversation. I don't remember much beyond the fact that at that point we started searching for food. Everything else will remain in the foggy swamp of memories, until another cat triggers another release of that special swamp gas. 

two things from friends today:
 

And now for something completely different:

 The reason I left responsibility behind was because I wanted to. I worked for 30 years. I was the ultimate responsible live-in-my-[little-box person  and enough was more than enough. I was ready for the 'easy life'. It seems ironic now after all that's happened. And it's always seemed a little ironic. Long long ago in a century and a place far far away. It had to have been 67 or 68. late night, watching TV from Charleston,WV. a movie came on. An italian film, "The Easy Life." One of my best friends was visiting. I was trying to prolong contact, he just didn't want to go home. We started watching. I was drawn in immediately. My spidey sense said there's something important here for you. Maybe it was the opening dash through the deserted sunday street, or the interaction between Bruno & roberto that said 'queer'. (I didn't have the word gay then nor the idea of subtext). And by then I already knew that it wasn't just a phase. My friend lay on the sofa,putting his feet in my lap. It was a phase for him and I understood that. We remained that way through the end of the film. I cried at the end. He  wasn't really affected by it. It was the first subtitled film for both of us. We saw La Dolce Vita not long after that, but it did not resonate with me the way "the easy life" did. (It was a long time before I found out the the film's real title was "Il sorpasso",and it's now considered something of a cult classic.) How the hell it got on a WV tv station in the middle of a winter night? Who knows? This comes up because a friend from Sao Paulo sent me a dvd of the film. It's in italian which I don't speak with portugese subtitles, which I can't read, but I'm very happy though I will cry again at the end which just seems so inevitable now. Hell I cry at the end of commercials now or when a door closes. or opens. I'm a mess and I'm going to have to learn italian. And i'm downloading music from the film to play on the road.--hopefully with a different end result..

I'm turning up my stalled car search. I priced rental cars for the trip to KY. It's seems stupid to $1k for a 16 day rental(about of third of that is Florida's  'tax the tourist' economic system, That is more than I paid for both trips to KY last year).
 I want to be on the road by the 12th at the latest. I do not look forward to this. It's only a 900 mile drive so its no big deal, I drove every day-to work, shopping,etc, but when we were together, Rodney  always drove. All he had to do was roll down my window so I could hang my head out. I'm not sure how I will be able to  drive from the passenger seat.

 

The day started with storms and promise. Both have dissipated. J & I were to meet Pam Y at J Alexanders tonight, but she cancelled via email, pleading illness. We rescheduled for next Monday. (baseball game on Sunday so J was not available).

Another piece of retail therapy arrived, media storage cabinet, which is supposed to hold 770 cds/dvds etc. Now just how long will it take to assemble. My record is 7 days to assemble a desk with an attached filing cabinet. (The still unassembled bookshelf in the storage unit does not count.The box must be opened for the count to begin). The new one promises to be a bitch. There is glass involved, and that never bodes well,especially since my best method of assembly involves a hammer., usually in frustration. Hammering tends not to work well with glass. 
                                                  
Word from Penny's animal world. Sarah's kidneys had finally failed and she was euthanized this afternoon. She was emotionally needy, but incredibly sweet. , And  was after Tanner's death, the only non-crazy animal on the farm. There are 4 more dogs and a cat, 7 or 8 horses, 1 minature pony & a miniature mule and assorted barn cats. (Big Sheep had already gone to the big pasture in the sky before Rodney died.) 

                                                      
Caught up on my journal reading last night and this morning.Being a peeking wayne has become a better alternative to not living my own life. Sometimes it been fun, and sometimes scary. I've come across some very well written traditional type journals, especially here. The blogs on Myspace and facebook tend to be very haphazard and less articulate (reflecting perhaps the relative youth of the writers), but not without interest or charm sometimes.  One such journal I found last night disturbed my dreams and brought out some memories. It fascinating in a bizarro only  in Kentucky or Florida kind of way. It's been a long-standing joke here in tampa, that whenever there are outrageous murders, car chases or giant neighborhood brawls, there is always someone from Kentucky involved.  
and in other happy news: say a report on orangutans disappearing more rapidly than previously thought, so we can produce more palm oil. Another good choice. According to the report at the current rate they are losing habitat,this could be the last generation of orangutans. Too bad we couldn't have done the same for the Bush family.

 
Five months today. 152 days.
 no words to speak the vastness of  the emptiness.


















Rodney Featherston
October 21,1963-February 23, 2008

Estelle Getty died today. Dawahare's started closing yesterday. more little pieces of personal history fall by the wayside. I saw the  pilot episode oF GG, with the gay housekeeper/cook. And R & I(like everyone else we knew) probably have seen every episode 10 times. Dawahare's was a department store chain in eastern KY which started in my home town. It was the only & I do mean only place that did not sell depression era style clothes. Just what a budding queer needed to make life more pleasant in the most unpleasant of places.
 Watched "2 Minutes Later" tonight. R & I always talked about writing a mystery novel involving gay detective and his best friend. We even started plotting it out at one point. The detective was really based on the two of us(or at least our views of ourselves with a little Nick & Nora Charles thrown in), and the best friend was based on Mimi. We always wavered about the best friends sexuality, but were leaning towards bi but butch. We never got beyond the basic plotting though. Rod got distracted working on his one-man show, which he worked on until near the end. The tapes are too painful to watch now, but I haven't come across his notes yet. so many boxes to go through, so little heart to do it.
Heard from Pam Y today. she was just checking in. I bitched about her costing be a $100 because she wasn't at Barnes & Noble which forced me to buy things. I'm grateful I got off so lightly. Promised we would call her & get together very soon.  Damn, this is another one of those rambing nights. time to stop.