a picture from the other night, outside the shed.

I just took some cool self-portraits on the outside of the shed.

silhouettes, very low light.

this isn't one of those, it's just a cameraphone picture from some other day in the shed, can't remember which exactly.

the pictures tonight are on my digital camera, the poor beat-up thing. I still haven't printed them. I keep deleting some, taking more, deleting again. I don't want to put the files on the computer, I'll never do anything with them. I want to go in somewhere and just print off all the files, even just regular photo size. though I do think some would be nice blown up (if grainy) and even big on paper I could add details to with pen, that would be fun, doesn't have to be serious glossy photo paper. (plus it's probably cheaper. I hate spending money. at least not until I sell something. I realize people will say well, you have to spend money to make money. I don't care for that argument. I'd like to make money and then spend money, thanks very much. I'm aware this is probably somewhat unrealistic. again, oh dear. I'm stubborn, it's true. sometimes persistent to the point of near-ridiculousness. but I figure at some point in our continuing discussion, the universe and I will come to some sort of understanding as far as art and money are concerned, and I'm hopeful that the universe will see reason at some point and realize that, when I'm a determined woman, I generally get my way, either through charm or through sheer -

oh shut up already, the universe will say at that point. fine, whatever, you win.

just stop talking, okay?

(ha. just like a woman. always wanting the last word.)

yes, I know, it's just isolated bits of nonsense. I comfort myself with the knowledge (the belief? the hope, maybe, yes, the hope, definitely.) that I'm only seemingly incoherent because I'm speaking not only in tongues but in several of them at once.

I still have that novel to write, about the middle-aged woman who leaves everything to live over a bar and sing blues at night and sleep until noon, and the big ruckus between the pentecostal church and the strippers. or not. whatever. ah, the bliss, just the release of the ideas, as they come, as they go, and not a care at all for the sense of them. or the sensibilities that might be so delicately, so pruriently offended.

I did sit down to write something sensible. but this was more fun. I'm too lazy to spellcheck and since I switched to safari and this mac (which I'm growing more fond of, by the day) I don't get the same spellchecking window come up, and I don't like that, so I'm just not using it. so it won't be until later, if at all, that I notice the errors and inconsistencies.

so these are the things I keep forgetting.

that when I don't talk, when I keep all of myself inside myself, I end up sad or angry or hopeless or - oh god, the misery - all three at once.

that when I stop making things, however pointless or temporary, I shrivel my heart up and start to eat it, the bitter, unforgiving taste of it so meanspirited in my mouth that everything I say comes out hard and dry and unloving.

that I'm not alone in any of this, even when I'm completely by myself. that I don't have to bear it alone.

I've just looked up both intention and resolution and am pleased to report it was, indeed, intention that best suited the meaning I was reaching for.

in the response to mark's comment on the previous post.

I love when that happens.

is that very odd? do you ever experience similar word-related thrills? it was the same sort of thing as when the bamboo piece this evening slid perfectly into the rolled painted construction paper I had wired to the box I was making. things moving into place, seemingly without effort or intention.

my bold new year's resolution last year hasn't yet been accomplished, so I've decided to try again this year.

a solo show. perhaps everything I make in a year, or a month, or up until now, or about a particular theme.

no sense getting too detailed at this point of the plan.

at the moment, I'm deciding between green tea and earl grey.

but, if it comes to that, I've got shows ready to hang. this isn't a difficult thing to do, when you make things out of whatever you happen to come across, for whatever odd and solitary particular reasons.

and then there's that whole conversation to be had about what constitutes a show, exactly. or solo. I'm not a rock nor an island, however hard and isolated I feel at times. and communication brushes distance and time aside, learning takes place when the teacher or the student isn't even aware of the passing back and forth of possibility.

anyway. a to-do list, then. or a might-do, could-do list.

waiting.

for snow, for christmas, for grandpa and big sister, caught in the storm. one of the last rooms at the holiday inn, a half hour and yet three long days away.

chains! two sets the right size! and a break in the weather. and my husband, the christmas hero, bringing home the best gift.

snowmen, a melting fort in the shape of a heart, icicles, seemingly endless wet boots and snowpants draped over heat registers or hung over curtain rods. decorated gingerbread from a kit. lavishly, lovingly sprinkled sugar cookies made from scratch and a nice madagascar bourbon vanilla, a tablespoon where a teaspoon was called for.

friends over, lights, candles, more baking, an unexpected parcel from faraway, and underneath it all the sweet pine sighing scent of the tree cut to fit the corner.

small house and six people plus two cats, cold nights with cheerful fires and then rain, melting the snow, and happysad goodbyes, and waiting now, again.

so tonight I didn't tell my daughter the story of persephone.

but as she was asking once again (she loves fruit) for some pomegranate seeds, I mentioned the story, as if in passing, and she said, oh is there a story about pomegranates, how interesting.

the other day my smallest daughter passed the phone (she was talking to her oldest faraway sister) to her middle sister, saying, my sister will be speaking next. very much like an adult, in her tone, though the words made the older sister (my once only daughter) and me laugh.

I had two wire holders a friend gave me. meant to hold the lids from plastic food containers. one holds our saucepan lids and the other holds the boots upside down over the heat register, we've had a few days of snow and melting and today the girls took it into their heads to be snow cheetahs, or that's the story I got, and go barefoot in the snow. they won't do that again. I hate my feet! (screamed the younger of the bootless, sockless, silly creatures) I want them tooken off!

god help me, I laughed. but not openly until later. I expect they've learned their lesson now, and they still have all their toes. so it was a pretty full day. and now bread's been baked (not my own dough, just thawed white bread dough left to rise on the counter and bake while the grinch stole christmas again) and the house is tidy. no school again tomorrow, no school until the first week of january.