seismic thoughts

the sweeping of US route1

as i travel to and from work everyday i need to find ways to entertain myself during the 3 hours i spend on the road- so today I found myself sighing an AHHHH went i noticed that route 1 had been cleared of debris. One of my favorite things is to take note of highway junk. Route 1 is an archeologists dream and I often wonder what people in the future will make of the buried findings on our abandoned freeways. Some things are natural rubbish; weeds, remnants of a variety of winged creatures, road kill of varying sizes and shapes (recently i was unable to make out the species on one particular carcass? was it a bear cub? it certainly wasn't a dog or cat) - whatever it was, it broke my heart. One day I actually saw a bird fly right into the car in front of me and ping off the front fender like a bullet. very sad.

but the man made artifacts are of most interest to me. A lot of it I totally get, and it makes perfect sense how they came to find themselves on the side of the road; cigarette buts (of which i am a guilty offender), trash bags, grocery bags that often take flight and scare the shit out of me, plastic water bottles, empty energy drink tins no doubt tossed with zeal, endless proof that Dunkin' Donuts still rules or perhaps just evidence that Starbucks drinkers are more environmentally conscious and of course paper, paper, paper. Collision residuals are totally understandable although I don't get why they don't pick up all the bumpers, fenders, headlight casings, hub caps, and shattered glass rather than just sweeping them to the side.

but the really good stuff are those things that make me asked How the hell did that get there?? on the side of a highway? OK so baseball caps- maybe the wind blew them off, but lawn chairs, couch cushions, refrigerators, garden tools, ladders, teady bears, bicycles, childrens toys? The soiled diapers adorned with pink butterflies? - (shame on them for tossing those out the window) and how does the single shoe end up there? i don't understand that. I've seen hundreds of single shoes. Once i actually saw a suit jacket still sheathed in its 2ml plastic dry cleaning cover, wire hanger still in place. the most ridiculous sighting of all however has to be the bald, one armed manikin torso which settled propped upright again the guardrail, eyes looking upward, hand reaching to the skies above. i really wanted to stop and get it but it would have meant my life and since it was a good day, i decided against that option.

anyway, i look forward to the accumulation of new things and will keep you abreast of any noteworthy finds.

to Lola

a second mother's day without her. the day has changed for me. it is now a day of reflection, of remembrance, of honoring who and what she was. the list is too long. i wrote it all down when she died. who she was, what she liked, what she didn't like. she was so many different things all twisted into one huge person that touched so many people in so many different ways. old friends still comment on how they remember her, her laughter, her anger, how she scared them, how loving she was, how she always insisted that you eat even if your weren't hungry. she was bigger than life. and then life happened to her. she suffered in the end. but she still laughed, everyday. it was my sister mission to make her laugh even if she didn't understand what she was laughing at.



i loved her intensely. We loved each other. Too much. I will never be able to understand why we couldn’t tell each other that. We were so afraid of hurting each other, of disrupting the balance we had created between us. It was an unspoken love. We tried to protect each other, but inevitably we hurt each other, by omission, with our words, with our gestures, with our silences. We were too much alike. The intention was never to hurt each other. We saw each other as the same person, in different times and space. She needed to hurt me to free herself of what she held inside. She wanted to free me in order to free herself. She sat before me once at a moment of complete despair and told me I could leave. She thought she was freeing me. she didn’t realize she sentenced me to my death. She told me to go away from her. Was it for her or for me – this freeing? I will never know. Instead she died in a state of unknowing. But she was kind to me. she loved me unconditionally and without regret and without holding back. She loved me openly and freely and with laughter. She held me and touched me and yes ….she told me. she told me .. that she loved me. that’s what I carry with me.

happy mother's day Lola!