be like the ballerina in "Na Ponta dos Pes"

Don’t worry, I don’t have a dog.
I’m really feeling stressed and I’m taking it out on my poor little part time job. I love the work but the people!

I didn’t used to be like this. Maybe menopause. Maybe it’s a sort of physically and mentally exhausting . I’m getting old, so you should too.

There is a commercial for a car insurance on TV these days where the gecko in places and he explains that he occasionally finds himself in places that he can’t explain how he got there. I had a similar moment today. I was spouse to relieve a coworker at 11:30 for a lunch break. After working a while I checked my watch but it was 10:30 and not 11:30 as I expected. I even compaired times with a customer. Turned out I forgot it was Friday not Saturday and I started work an hour earlier. Just struck me as odd that a brain could so closely track the passage of 1.5 hours but block the day of the week. Oh well, at least I knew where I was.

One great thing about aging is that you just don’t look that great anymore and people let you know. Its just so wrong that you want to give them a sticker they can walk around with that says, “Made a rude comment today. Boy am I a jerk”. I had a really great and restful meditative morning and got to work a couple minutes late but in an especially good place emotionally. So then I got to hear that and it was kinda like getting offered the senior discount for my coffee at McDonalds when I still have a few years until I qualify, it was just like water rolling off a ducks back. I am capable of looking even worse than I did today! Hard to imagine I guess, but I’ve seen it myself. So, aside from being awakened by an amazing rainstorm, I slept really well. I actually worked really hard making these bags under my eyes look like this today, glad you noticed. Do I also have bad breath?

I’m learning new things at work. I really shouldn’t be having any trouble with them, I thought. but its harder than I expected:(

Not my best day.

I asked a friend the other day about what has happened to the roles of men and women in the last 50 years. She said we are tied to our biology, so the guys with the most mates and toys still win. Its in our biology. She reminded me that we are like goats. Whichever pushes hardest and longest gets to stand on the top of the hill or goat house if they are penned in.
So as I rode home the other day on the bus, it stopped to pick up the kids that were leaving school for the day. All the adults dread it. The junior and high school kids are loud, rude, swear and don’t give up their seats properly.
I sort of started to think of them as goats. They make lots of noise. They have afterschool snacks, starbucks and whatever else they can get to the stop with. They smell like, not quite like goats, but bad. They move around and push each other off the seats while glancing at the girls.
Goats riding the bus after school, sharing ipod ear plugs, texting people 2 seats away, engrossed in portable electronic games.

Went to a church dance with my neighbors and their kids this evening. Laughed harder than I had in a long time when a wildly uninhibited teenager lead the whole group in a circle to “Hand Jive” and was so inspiring that people waved, shimmies, flipped, do-se-do’d and the grand finale was him flopping like a fish in attemped breakdance. We did the macarena, the electric slide, that cha-cha thing, one twist too many, and an entire room of about 500 people did the bunny hop, laughing hysterically as we passed each other. Just the most wholesome fun you could ever have on a Saturday night and really laugh. LIttle kids did crazy fun interpretive dance, teens hung in a circle and dorked around, couples did their partner dances, women dance together, and everyone cleared the floor when they put on the slow dance. I did the swim with 3 11 year old girls and also the mashed potatoe.

The only downside was realizing that I had nobody to slow dance with. That and nobody to ballroom dance with either for that matter. Must join a ballroom dance group or I may shrivel up and die like a dead hard raisin.

We were promised a terrible storm. Trees were suppose to fall. I was hoping the Strawberry Guava trees that are already tilted low enough for me to constantly harshly
censure children not to hang on would finally drop to the ground. Then new trees could replace those old gals. Branches were suppose to fly dangerously close to the windows and crush car hoods. All things not tied down on my porch were to be blown to the “back grass area” of our townhouse complex. That would save me the agony of making decisions about what to keep or toss in my eventual spring cleaning drama. I kept visualizing the blue Rubbermaid ice chest spinning upward into the sky, ala the little farmhouse of “The Wizard of Oz” fame. Fences, roofs, power poles, and other things manmade were to fall at the whim of mother nature in her glory. There would be pictures from readers posted on the newspapers’ online photo galleries. Rain would then drench us and the branches would clog storm drains, causing water to go where it wasn’t meant to go. The best-laid plans of civil engineers were to fall by the wayside as the power of water reminded us we are powerless to predict its ways or needs.

Even the state believed it would happen. All schools and the university system are closed. State and city workers told to stay home and be safe. Homeless families were evacuated from the beaches and driven to shelters in buses. Beach parking lots are blocked from entry and tourists in Aloha shirts and shorts, 80 degrees you know, are on the news watching in amazement and commenting that they don’t do things the same on the mainland. A holdout wheelchair riding double amputee elderly vet held his ground and made news by refusing to leave his tent. It’s unprecedented. They never plan for anything in Hawaii. Even when we have been threatened with Hurricanes, nobody reacts. I sense that this is a replay of the infamous 1991 or so tsunami evacuation false alarm. It took years for people to believe in civil defense. Again, they put the nail in place and took a swing but sadly missed their mark. The wind warning has been cancelled. The state loses credibility and for years, the damage will remain.

It is raining, lightly for my neighborhood, but raining slightly. It is breezy and the trees are happy. The birds are probably relieved. Firemen, happy. The radio reported that a beagle had run from its home and been found in town, and as I write, I hear that radio listening neighbors who are familiar with the little guy have called in to identify it. One lost beagle and damaged roofs already repaired yesterday. It was actually really windy yesterday.

It was so ominous. Knowing that I live in a state with a culture that will never plan for an impending disaster. Knowing that it was really pretty bad conditions yesterday. Knowing the expense to everyone that an unplanned childcare and employment emergency was to cause, they made the call. I was a little worried but still not quite convinced. Mostly I was wondering whether the state knew something that they weren’t telling and it was sort of scary.

So my boss called it right. He sent the message that the state had lost its mind. If you were truly worried about life, limbs, and had to deal with kids with a surprise 4 day weekend, then don’t bother to come to work, but he was going in anyway. I desperately wanted to go today. I have so much to do and it has to be done. I have 3 grandkids with no backup childcare. My daughter and their dad have jobs with no available time off. I have no time off either and work hourly so each minute come out of my pocket. My new hard won job is slowly sliding away with each family health and weather emergency. My heart is heavy. This is the second day I had to take off this week as Monday was still vacation. Every week there is an emergency. I’m emergency worn out and my employer is too.

The kids are even disappointed by the lack of a power outage. My grandson says they get to do stuff they don’t usually get to do when the power goes out like use the flashlights.

OK, so now its starting. The radio is reporting that the wind has hit Kaneohe Safeway parking lot. Shopping carts are flying all around. In the call-in listeners own words, “an elderly guy pulled in with his Lexus and he was like a magnet, 3 carts hit his door”. Thank goodness for radio KSSK and their policy of using reports from the public to keep us all informed. The storm may have arrived. The beagle is home. The state is vindicated. I have had electricity just long enough to record this brief moment of doubt and update my blog.

I’ll stay by the radio. If the power goes out, I have a crank radio. If the wind starts blowing, we’ll know. I bought batteries for the flashlight yesterday.

My car died a sad death today. I know, its just transportation. One friend said, “don’t take it personally, its a machine”. Another said, “It really isn’t a car, its a pile of money, so don’t let it upset you.” All these things are true. It just kinda sucks.

So, insomnia inducing phone tag is just the pits. I want sleep. I want peace. I want to know what I want again.

Sometimes, you just have to open your mouth and say that what is happening is wrong and that you won’t be walked over. You just have to. Hugs are better than being ignored and pushed away. Too bad.