Big Blue Barn

It sounds like a name from Sesame Street. I can hear the television show announcer now: "Today's episode is Big Bird and the Big Blue Barn". Yup.

But the truth is that I now live in the big blue barn. Well, it was at barn, at one point. The barn has been converted into two separate apartments, one upstairs, one downstairs. The outside has been painted sky blue with dark blue trim, the barn doors still visible, although sealed. Kind of strange color for a barn, or building of any kind. But I like the fact that its a bit unusual. Most of the people who live up here in foggy redwood country march to the tune of a slightly different drummer.

My part of the big blue barn, which is upstairs, has a small deck off the living area. The deck is also painted sky blue, with dark blue railings, where I can commune with nature in my pajamas in the morning, drinking my guava juice. Or check my emails in the evening, sitting in a chair on the deck, laptop on my lap, feet up on a footstool, as the sun paints golden colors through the trees.

It may be a Big Blue Barn in the woods, but that's just fine with me.

Joe Wouldn't Like It Here

My sister said that our brother-in-law (my other sister's husband) has mastered his goal of keeping bugs out of his house. As this was an instant message on Facebook, I didn't get details. But it is no secret that Joe is not fond of hiking in the woods, communing with nature and encountering all kinds of nasty little critters.

My new place is in the woods. I see a forest of redwood trees out my back door. The new place is a converted barn and somewhat funky, although everything works. I even have indoor plumbing! (Don't laugh. When I lived out here 25 years ago we had an outhouse for a toilet, and an outdoor shower.) Not all the windows have screens, but I don't really care. I open the windows anyway to let in fresh air. So far, the bugs that have come in have been amenable. A few Daddy Long Legs. No yellow jackets, no misquitoes, no flies, no brown recluse spiders. If it ever gets hot out here this summer, I may resort to closing the two screen-less windows at dusk to keep out misquitoes.

We are fortunate in the Bay Area. Our summer weather is fairly dry. Many insects prefer their weather both hotter and wetter. We rarely have Lyme's disease and only an occasional case of West Nile virus.

Yes, some bugs can be deadly. But I've decided to take my chances. The view out my back door is worth it.

Lions, Tigers and Bears

...Oh My!

They were young and athletic and sometimes graceful. And naieve. The "boys" of All Reasons.

They ran up and down the stairs like teenage boys, complity-complity-clump. And yet when their profession called for amazing grace, they went into slow motion ballet. With furniture.

I asked if they had done this before. "Yeah, we seen it once in a movie."

The four "boys" were from All Reasons Moving. They weren't really boys, but they seemed so to me.

I paid extra to have the four of them. Four is better than two. At the large house in town, ballet as they danced my large and heavy desk around the corner and down the stairs. Packed and loaded in an hour; closed-my-eyes truck manuevering up the treacherous steep narrow and winding driveway; unpacked with amazing speed as they passed the boxes from the back of the pickup, up the stairs and onto the landing.

One after the other they asked me "how did you find this place?" (Craigslist) "Are there animals in the woods?" "Bears?" "Snakes?" No to the bears, yes to the snakes. California rattlers. I have seen a few rattlesnakes, up close and personal. But mostly deer, and an occasional bobcat. And the incredible beauty of the woods. (Yes, I have done this before.)

So now I sit early on a Sunday morning, looking out the patio doors into foggy woods, the only noise collected water dripping from the trees onto the forest floor. The still unpacked boxes sit behind me, some unopened, some with contents scattered about.

It is serene. I am happy. I am home.

I've Been Probed

It reminded me of those abduction scenarios you see in science fiction movies. Bright lights. Steel tables. Having your body physically probed.

I have now been officially probed through every orafice of the human body, without the benefit being lifted up into the belly of a starship. The routine colonoscopy celebrating my 50th birthday occurred several years ago. For the uninitiated, they stick a flexible camera up your colon. I had an endoscopy a few years before that, where they stuck a camera down my throat to see the lower end of my esophogus, which did not turn up anything serious.

Most females endure invasive procedures on regular basis. We are used to having hands and metal instruments shoved up into our "private parts" and I am no exception. The doctors don't need camera to perform this procedure; they have a bird's eye view at eye level. (Maybe they should use a flexible camera; it would certainly make the procedure more comfortable.)

Today, I think I had my last orafice probed - and I'm not even sure what the procedure is officially called. They stuck a tiny camera up my nose and down my throat. I got to see my vocal chords in action, which was actually very interesting. (No, I don't have Lou Gherig's disease, just a tiny polyp on my vocal chords.) He even looked into my ears with the flexible medical marvel.

There is no need to go back to the mother ship. All my inner workings have already been probed and have been captured in glorious living color on some data chip in some computer somewhere. On Earth.

Can't Wait for Saturday

The green pickup truck was gone from its ubiquitous spot in the driveway, my housemate gone for the evening. A few minutes later, I watched as the twenty-something year-olds rattled keys and stumbled out the front door.

Yes! The house was mine for a few hours. The evening air was cool, the house was quiet. The cat had even stopped her incessant whining. A cool summer salad, corn on the cob simmering on the stove. I headed for the dining room.

The dining room table was covered with a corrugated box and packaging material. The living room floor looked like Jeff just turned his gym bag upside-down and dumped his dirty gym clothes on the floor. Dirty plates littered every surface. My plan for eating dinner downstairs had been thwarted.

I headed upstairs to my room, where I usually eat dinner sitting in a chair with my plate on my lap. Plate in hand, I kicked Andrea's shoes, which had been carelessly discarded at the bottom of the stairs, out of the way.

After dinner, I planned to ice my back, injured in a recent minor car accident. I usually lie down on my back on my folded comfortor, which I place on the floor, with an ice pack under my back. However, the cat peed on the comfortor the other day, after getting shut in my room by mistake for the day.

My life with housemates is over, or will be on Saturday. I can't wait.

Not In My Town

In an attempt to stay cool over this swealtering 4th of July weekend, I plopped myself down in front of the downstairs TV, where it is 10 degrees cooler than my upstairs rooms. I turned the TV on; the station was set to KQED, the local public television station. The show that came on when I pushed the button on the remote was called "Not In My Town". And it was filmed at a local bay area high school, Gunn High School, in Palo Alto.

"Not In My Town", or "Not In My School", is a campaign against prejudice and discrimination and about creating an atmostphere where everyone feels accepted whether they are black or Asian, gay or straight, Mormon or Muslim. "Not In My School" has been celebrated at Gunn High School with a week of activities for several years.

As I watched this show while I ate my leftover spaghetti lunch, I was thinking: Here we are, celebrating Independence Day for a country supposedly founded on "freedom" - freedom of thought and of belief and of expression. Any American schoolchild knows those first few familar words from the Declaration itself: "We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal." I suppose your interpetation of those words depends on your defintion of "equality" and "men".

And so, we continue to have "Not In My School" week, until the day arrives when there is no longer a need to have it. And I wonder....if that day will happen in my lifetime.

Moving

I am moving. Again. Fifth time in two years. You would think I get some kind of bizarre pleasure from the experience. But, no.

This time I am moving ostensibly to be closer to my "new" job and to cut my commute time in half. And to be rid of my inconsiderate housemates. I have had many housemates over the years. Quite frankly, we are all inconsiderate some of the time, myself included. But I have been able to work things out with most. This time, I am just tired of the whole dang housemate thing. Maybe I am getting too old and crochety to live with other people. At least, without getting pissed off. And without the occasional accompanying yelling and screaming, on my part and/or theirs.

I am tired of the kitchen looking like a WWII battlefield. I am tired of the bin of Christmas decorations that still graces our back porch and several cardboard boxes of junk that have been sitting on the porch dining table for just about as long. I am tired of coming outside to smashed flowers after someone threw a heavy duty hose on top of my delicate flowers. I am tired of tripping over gym bags in the front hall and garbage waiting to be taken out in the back hall. I am tired of the pile of gravel that has been sitting in the driveway for months. I could go on, but you get my drift...

Mostly, I am tired of housemates who treat you like you are some kind of intruder into their space when both of our names are on the rental agreement. Someone who rearranges the shared space furniture in my absence. Someone who screams at me for parking in the driveway. You might have been here first, but that does not give you the right to make all the rules. Or, in my opinion, it should not give you the right.

Good luck with the next housemate, DonnaLou. I think you are going to need it.