(I mean, if you want me to be picky, I prefer the Sumatra or at least a darker roast, black and God, don't give me so much food but) Out loud a warm thank you (and a big tip) is fine.

Gloves hiding my knuckle tattoos with my pale green wool coat and a boughten coffee today in the cold icy sun as we embark on a little business first and then a little breakfast after and I tried to make butternauts but the butter was too soft to carve properly. Lochlan told me I should ask for cold butter but I wasn't about to do that. That's how the butternauts started and maybe this is how they will end, drowning to their deaths in the tiny square graves of my blueberry waffle, screaming silently until their little helmets melt into their little bodies and we'll never know of their myriads of adventures because they can no longer speak. 

Besides, unless something's really wrong I don't ask for extras, favours, substitutions or something different. That's a pretentious thing to do, I think and so I just don't do it. I worked in food service. People like that suck. I mean, of course I'd like double pickles on my MacDonalds hamburger but I'm not going to ask for them because that wastes their time and it messes things up and seriously I can put more on at home and-

You never did want for much. 

Still don't, I point out helpfully. We are tenuously getting along. It's so wonderful. I forgot how well we work when we're not arguing but also I should point out that things always work best when he is the dad and I am the child. That way no one can argue with him. Except I'm not a child and I found my own voice and my place in this world and goddammit, if I see a double-standard, a bluff or a just-plain-wrong, oh, you're going to hear about it. 

Hence, his attempts to distract me with the temperature of the butter and the unfortunate but completely predictable death of an entire platoon of melty little butternauts. 

Huh. 

Maybe we should have just grabbed a burger, after all.

Old standard.

 Since PJ has been cranky lately (a usual this time of year) and Lochlan and I are at odds, Ben has been sent to play fake guardian angel, keeping the true angels away while I flail through life bouncing off a flannel shirt or eight as I go. Better than an electric fence, I suppose as the zap and subsequent bark from the big black bear wandering out of the driveway kept me rapt in the early hours, between waking up and being allowed to actually leave the room long enough to have a shower. Then I had to wait for Ben to be able to go downstairs and get coffee, and now he is my shadow that blocks the sun. I don't exactly mind. I miss him when he's not around and he parked me within reach for two hours already this morning while he did a workout and ran through his morning routine which involves quashing cravings, healing traumatized brains and retraining short-term memory. 

(For both of us, truth be told. Only he makes real, visible progress and I am so jealous I could cry.)

The reward is a walk on the beach, a scream into the wind (still within reach) and a long talk about how I'm feeling. If you're wondering how that's going it's going great. They are forcing me to take the meds, they don't care if I can't think for myself or feel anything and I'm never alone so no privacy, no quiet time, no lunch being just what I wanted to have without either taking it to a vote or having to make enough for two or three people. I get it, I am a horrible little troll who needs to be babysat and also if I'm not I have a tendency to make ghosts my new best friends and in their place the devil, besides and no one is actually mad at me today. Sam thinks by staying I didn't get hurt worse, Lochlan can't even believe I called his bluff and went in the first place. Ben is mildly irritated that I didn't bring him along for kicks protection but at least he says how he feels upfront and doesn't expect me to fix it for him or do anything different, though I pointed out he was right and I should have and I won't do it again (without him, as if I am not tired enough already). He liked the apology even though he said it wasn't necessary and pointed out it's going to be a better year. 

Besides, more daylight, Bee. What does the sun come up at now? Seven?

Seven-fifty-seven. 

And it doesn't set til like six now? Right?

Four-fifty-four.

You still count down to the minute. 

Yes. 

Why, Bee?

I'm afraid of the dark. It's a frank statement. I am. I wasn't, once, but I am now. 

I think you should stay on these meds. 

This is a death sentence. 

Give your brain time to rest. Go off them later. 

I know. I know the logic. I don't want to live like a zombie.

You're not. 

How do you figure?

You're cranky today. That's a feeling. 

Lochlan said it's an attitude. 

He worries for you. Be comforted in that.

Jesus antlers.

He pressed his thumb against my lips, forcing it in gently until it came to rest against my front teeth. A smile spread across his face so slowly it poured like golden molasses in the late-morning hazy sunrise. 

Skip Jesus today. Please, Neamhchiontach.

What's in it for me, I mumble around his fingers. Christ. Hobble me and I'm yours. Easy catch. Fish out of water. Fawn in your highbeams, I'm roadkill before I even knew there was a highway underneath my legs.

Satan. Satan's in you. I mean, in it for you. He laughs softly. He leans forward and kisses my cheek. 

Jesus won't be very happy with me. 

I'll run interference for you, he whispers and pulls the blankets up over our heads.

***

I skid into breakfast late. Bedhead. Uh, bitemarks you can't see and they're not deep but they hurt nonetheless and I am chagrinned. I forgot about this. I forgot what day it was other than Sunday and then I started thinking about knowing Sam's sermon because he wrote it when I was present and then I remembered the late brunch we planned with a whole trunk full of mushrooms we got from a forager down in the valley who said we wouldn't regret it for a second so omelettes and a fritatta were planned and I knew last night's invitation was going to cut it too close and I was right. 

Or should I say, he was right. He is always right. Lochlan has never lost an argument in his life. He's abandoned a few of them but everyone still knew he was right. He isn't less than a hundred percent integrity unless he's stealing out of necessity and then it's still absolved via a good deed or a generous gift. His karma is straight up, level and replenished easily. 

And boy, is he mad. 

I throw myself into my chair. The plates are already on the table.

You're in rough shape-

I'm fine. 

He stabs his eggs with a fork. Sam needs to baptize you again, I bet and then you need a swim to heal those bites. I could see the way you were moving from the second floor landing. Before you checked yourself. 

He didn't mean to-

It doesn't matter what he meant to do. 

I asked for-

BRIDGET. 

I bite my lip. 

Just don't say anything. Do I need to look at the marks? He's not looking at me as he asks. It only serves to make me feel worse. He's never going to ask me to stop. If he did I just might. 

No. They're fine. Nothing's bleeding. (Except my heart. My heart is always the exception here.) 

We eat in stony silence. Jesus does not fill the space. Of course Lochlan didn't go to church. He stays home and works himself into a lather if I'm with Caleb. But he won't tell me not to go these days. Instead he nails himself to the floor and blames me for it. I have nothing to do with this. This is between the three of them: Caleb, Lochlan and Jesus.

La Moldau, though. Damn.

Moved. 

(Plus it's easier to talk about music than anything else. Ben taught me that.)

Something about playing piano before eight in the morning is beautiful. I think I've sat down with my coffee cup at hand every day for the past ten days and tried to bang out something or other. This morning was Merry Go Round of Life from Howl's Moving Castle. A gorgeous, upbeat piece, almost reminiscent of Vivaldi without the freneticism. Like Brahms without the jumpscares. More sophisticated somehow and less jarring. Always and forever flows better, and yet has a simple optimism that keeps you engaged right through to the end. 

It's like going to a museum Hemingway-style. Hungry. 

Half-awake Bridget appreciates things without perspicacity very early, before the day throws itself on me, making me bitter, picky.

It almost cured my headache so now I've moved on to some Debussy with a little of the quieter Dvorak sprinkled throughout. 

Okay, now Dvorak takes the fuck over.

A second cup of coffee, the first long forgotten and ice-cold poured out and replaced with a fresh hot cup and some toast would do me well right now even as the pain in my head is almost drowned out by the trumpets I can hear only on the inside as I play along.  Dvorak is king.  This is beautiful. The resonating strings-

Fuck this. Going to get my violin so I can do that beautiful climb. Maybe I just need a classical soundtrack to give me momentum because holy shit this works. 

(You know you loved it when you grieve at the end, because it's finished.)

No net no net no net no net oh there's the net.

 You know what happens to a candle when you find out it's counterfeit wax as in there's a birthday candle rolled in super-cheap wax. The middle burns down and the rest doesn't budge and eventually it smoothers itself because the melted wax has nowhere to go and so it eats the flame? 

That's me on drugs. 

And I can't do it. I can't write. I can't sing. I can't paint. I can't settle enough to read a book or kayak. I just float around like a shell, a breathing ghost. The cheap wax on the outside. Have you seen the past few weeks? Paralyzed by stationery, indifferent to ghosts and the living alike? It's almost better to feel everything than nothing. It's better to suffer for this art of a life, it's better to not be immune, untouchable and hard. A jar of hearts won't help me like this. Lochlan hates it but feels desperate. Caleb can just buy better. PJ can't even be in the same room with me, he says it's a stranger, but he doesn't say that to me directly, just to them. Ben tells me to shhhh, that it's necessary to stabilize everything and then maybe we can see about trying tiny changes but to leave it for now because they can't have me standing on the edge of a proverbial, figurative cliff 24/7, that they are tired. 

That they worry. 

That they can't control the ghost without the pills. 

It makes me laugh. 

Jacob is not a ghost. He's real and it's my dreams trying to clue me in. It's my intuition, feeling him near. It's some magnificent attempt to drive Lochlan away for good to pay him back for being a scared teenager. It's a wish for a do-over and had Jacob even come near me I would have shouted for him to stop, shielding my eyes, hand up as if I could physically keep him away. 

If I could go back I would and I never would have met him and Caleb can't BUY that but oh what if he could, instead of golden rings and glass houses and other mens' loyalties? 

Thanks to my metabolism for medications this casual, chemical lobotomy isn't going to be enough. My brain is four minutes into Everglow, my brain is down the block screaming so loud you can't even hear it from here. My fingers are back to fluttering and I am not at peace right now, I don't care what your eyes are telling you. 

I look at Sam, sitting at the table writing sermons in his field notebook, his favourite stubby little Kaweco pen glowing warm from overuse and I want to scream in his face but I haven't come back from down the block yet. 

I need my outlets-

Right now you need peace of mind, he says gently. 

Lochlan nods. It will all come back. 

And in the meantime?

Bounce off the walls, Peanut. I'll catch you.

Half alive.

And it took so long just to feel alright
Remember how to put back the light in my eyes
I wish I had missed the first time that we kissed
'Cause you broke all your promises
And now you're back
You don't get to get me back

Caleb has no time for cinema, he's busy. It's spring and this is birthday season. We'll skip right past Valentine's Day and skip past the upcoming but lesser-known Burns Night because those are Lochlan-holidays and he doesn't get those. And he's becoming a lot less regimented and a lot less formal and way more fun the older he gets, but I probably couldn't get him to sit through a Ghibli movie if I tried, though he did offer to watch one if I really needed him to. He's Howl. Super-agreeable. Can provide whatever your imagination spits out and pushes far too hard until things are trepidous but still highly escapable.  

He'll be fifty-eight this year. Still the same age as Tom Cruise but decidedly nothing like Tom Cruise, who doesn't actually age. Caleb has laugh lines and frown lines and is turning light grey around the edges, fully half his beard is white now when he doesn't shave and he lives a practiced, scheduled life, favourites within easy reach, hardly deviating except in that one way and he's as charming as ever, sitting here. 

Choose something else. 

He wants to buy me something..significant, in his words, with an obviously capital S. Since Christmas did not work out the way he planned. Anything. Name it.

But not the thing I ask for. It's okay, I have a list. I want to sing. 

You have a beautiful voice-

I want to hear it. It's so hard to hear it without a half-hour of setup for the monitors and the mix-

I would give you that if I could, Neamhchiontach. 

I turn to the edge of the bench. I've been working on Jar of Hearts all morning. It's a little bit of an easier reach for me, which is encouraging because I sat down to work on Speak to Me and it's a lot harder so I was discouraged and when that happens I'll do anything to make that feeling go away. 

He sits beside me. Whats happening?

I need to nail the piano and then I can work on vocals.

Then play, he orders. 

I start the song and he sings it. 

Now your turn. 

I'm more than surprised. He sounds pretty good. I've never seen so many of his teeth. I'm usually in his mouth.

Now will you play? Until I get this part down. 

Yes. 

He played (he plays! They all play, I know, I tell you nothing as I tell you everything) and I sang and we ran through it three times and I finally was happy with it and took over piano and by then those who like the song were in the doorway and those who hate it had to leave the point, because I play so loud. I'm a smasher, I push against the keys, against the pedals, I pound and flourish and one of my tricks to hit the notes I can't hit as a supremely shitty mezzo-soprano is to go louder as I go higher. 

Luckily I am a Capricorn rising and not the least bit shy which to me is already a freaking superpower as in I am the one who will make the speech/pick up the phone/take charge/make a fool of myself first and then everyone else will feel more comfortable. I've never cared once what anyone thinks of me and so one of my goals for the future is to get my singing to a place where I don't mostly hate it. 

You would think by now I would be there but I am not.

Garden of Words.

 Finally. A main character who shares my super power. 

I went from wondering if we were watching a low-level fetish anime to realizing that boy, everyone is pissed off, and everyone hates Miss Yukino because all men fall in love with her. She feels powerless to control her own life and then she says fuck it and follows her own damn heart. It was short, beautifully done and the music and environment paintovers were just delicious. I finished it alone because PJ bailed to go to sleep early and left me alone in front of the screen. He said he'll finish the half-hour he is lacking right away so we can forge ahead, though we did get Amazon Prime TV or whatever it's called and now I have to get through my immediately long and varied list on it, too. Lochlan took his place and had no idea what was happening but I quickly filled him in and he said it was good.

Last night the wind howled, the house rocked, the dog cowered and the power flicked and disappeared, not returning forEVER for the second time in as many weeks. 

I am almost done with the west coast and I have to admit I laughed so hard when the movie spooled up and the first thing they mentioned was that it's rainy season and it featured a windy, blustery moment that almost marked the absolute change in both characters. 

So maybe I made it happen but whatever. Next up is Spirited Away. I've seen it before but I don't remember much of it so adding it back in.

Overshare, over land.

Today will be a good day. Today we're picking the next movie out of a hat (at least three days a week PJ and I have committed to consuming the entire Studio Ghibli catalogue this season, so we put all of the names in a jar, and pull one out to watch each time. We've watched My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki's Delivery Service, and Howl's Moving Castle so far. Someone pointed out Christian Bale does the voice of Howl and it took me a few hours of wondering around amazed that he can speak fluent Japanese before realizing they meant the dub. 

Never ever watch the dubs, if you can help it.

I have all of Ben's rings on and I'm in leopard print leggings and a long black t-shirt, tattoos on display and my hair...is...well...jesus, it's grown right out from the pixie cut into this flippy shag that just..actually doesn't look so bad, I don't think. PJ's hair is to his waist but he keeps it in a braid. His beard is catching up but he won't braid it even though I have offered to buy him silver beads to put in it. Man, if I had a beard like that I would go full pirate but he says he's afraid if he puts it in a braid that I will be tempted to swing off it like a little monkey and I don't know where he gets that from. That sounds like it would hurt.

PJ is also in a full Seasonal Affective Disorder spectrum right this minute. Like me. He hid it for years but there is a distinct sea-change in this non-pirate, one that little seems to help. Just before Christmas it's almost like the lights go out for him and they don't come back on until late February so we are attempting to surround him and keep him cheered. He takes some low-level meds and he sleeps too much and yet he has stopped drinking as much as he once did (Getting old, Bridge) and at least that's good and he's working on losing a few pounds and finding more purpose and he's really having a go at helping to look after Ben now that his regular role is waning. 

(It's difficult to be a full-time live-in nanny and favourite uncle to a twenty-one and a nineteen-year-old who both work and do university courses all the time. And yet we plan to never formally end the role because in my opinion PJ has been the most consistent father figure of all time, part of their lives since birth and that is worth more than gold. 

Between he and Ben and me and my feral brain our hands are full on yet another rainy Tuesday here in the trees by the sea. 

We pulled The Garden of Words for today.

8:02/4:34

 I am drawing in the gazebo, left along for moments as Lochlan runs in to grab us coffee. He is reading and catching up on news, I'm trying to do a simple storyboard for a short film idea I pitched to someone who wanted to do one and had no ideas and I've never done one before so I struggle and it's overdetailed and almost painful and yet it's the dumbest, most innocent thing. 

Yup, just described myself. I laugh out loud at the thought.

It's nice to hear you laughing, Princess. Jake is sitting on the steps, just beyond the reach of the overhang. getting soaked. I stare at him as his shirt grows dark, from the shoulders and back down. He doesn't seem to mind. I don't think he ever did. He's a Big Feeler. Like me. Maybe not dumb or innocent but definitely overly cognizant of the weather and the moon and the stars and all the feelings to be felt whether you welcomed them (and him) or not. 

I don't think you're supposed to be here. I start packing up. He's just watching now. 

Nice supplies. Who bought you those? 

Don't you have somewhere to be? 

I'm where I need to be. Shadowing my girl. 

I shove everything in the nylon tote I used to carry it all out here. Don't follow me in! 

Piglet, I-

You're not actually here. You're not real. You're not talking to me and I need to call Lochlan back outside-

Peanut who are you talking to? I turn around, clutching up my things, ready to run and Lochlan's back with a cup of hot coffee in each hand. He's been indulging me in self-care where I can't. Lots of breaks. Lots of treats and quiet moments. Lots of time, just doing nothing. Is it working? I thought it was but it isn't if Jacob is here and suddenly three's a crowd. 

I have a headache. I'm trying to talk myself out of it before I talk myself into it. 

You're not crazy, Bridget. 

Tell that to him, I point to the far wall of the gazebo where Jacob leans against it, wet-shirted, concern all over his face. 

Schuyler walks into view, coming across the lawn. Perfect timing. Lochlan thinks I mean Sky and not Jake.

You guys have a disagreement I need to know about? 

No, I'm resigned. I just think I'm still really really tired, Lochlan.

Well then stop carrying that arse around. He points to Jake. He's too big for you anyways.

Fire rush.

Lochlan went downstairs for coffee for us this morning and I fell asleep waiting for him to come back. It took so long and I am so tired. The rain makes me tired, life makes me tired and it dawned on me last night that we have settled into a definite delineation of chores somehow leaving me with the lions share of cooking (AKA Lochlan's). Even last night everyone was too tired to go out for food runs so we cobbled together a wonderful feast of cheese, sausages, peppers, onions, pasta and garlic with raw veggies on the side and it was really good but I ended up cooking. Again. PJ bailed on me too so I told everyone who has this week (bailed, that is) to go pick out a pretty piece of jewellery because I'll never act like your wife for free. Maybe your lover but she's not going to cook, now, is she? So they have until Wednesday next week to produce the goods or make it up to me by catching up on their cooking nights. 

I don't know which way it's going to go but if they are as lazy as I think they're becoming with this one chore should I buy some Tiffany stock or would that be considered insider trading at this point?

(Fun fact, precious metals are still (always) a really good bet. Real estate, banks and farming commodities, not so much, IMO and I haven't been wrong yet.)

(My wishlist is on the group chat. Snort.) 

Lochlan doesn't believe in Tiffany jewellery but figures we can sell it later. Which is interesting given the argument we had two weeks ago. He came back forty minutes later with fresh hot coffee and...Monte Cristos! Okay, I should have asked for sandwiches instead of jewellery because DAMN. This was the best thing I have ever eaten in my life. I ate mine and a quarter of his. He finds them really rich. But I did note that he used my favourite bread for them (rye) and even included a dime-sized drop of ketchup because that's how I eat the last corner, I dip it in ketchup. 

So good. We should have had these last night. 

Every meal. Every day. We need to make a Monte machine that just churns these out. Making french toast is so tedious and if I make these myself they don't taste as good. I know it's the adage of someone else making it but oh my God. So good. 

After we were fed and lying back again against the pillows sipping coffee I asked if he checked on Ben. 

Yes. I took him down a sandwich too. He's really back into it, Bridge.

I know. It's kind of reassuring even though I hate it. 

Yeah. I agree. 

Thanks for taking him breakfast.

I would have anyway. 

I know. 

I do like having you all to myself sometimes though. I live for these moments.

You do? 

I do. 

Aw. Me too. This was my dream. 

Eating sandwiches in our bed? 

Yes, because you never let me eat in bed growing up. 

This bed is big enough that we can move away from the crumbs. That bed just became a huge taco shell with us in it. 

Yeah but it was nice. 

Not with the crumbs but yes, you're right. 

We smile at each other stupidly.

Squares.

Piet Mondrian moved to Paris and threw away his perfectly good art career for some sort of poseur Cubist avant-garde bullshit Abstract movement which is a travesty if you've seen his former work and a walk back into memory lane if you've seen the latter. When I say 'our time' I mean the early nineteen hundreds, of course but just about every second Canadian public library or community college I have ever seen had some version of the red, blue and yellow squares on it and he became famous but miserable because he left behind the love of his life in the netherlands and so of course-

Bridget. He's pinching the bridge of his nose again. Headache, probably. Can't be me. 

You asked what was on my mind!

Seriously? That was on your mind? 

Yes, I saw a museum tote bag on the pen shop site when I was looking for quink.

Oh, does this mean you're going to place that order I asked you to place before Christmas, finally?

Probably. 

Is that a yes or a no?

Depends. 

He looks weary and wary at the same time. I swear, he and Trey (Cole) are the only two men on earth who can pull that off, which mean it's not them it's me.

On? 

If they have the quink. 

Oh, I'll bite. What is quink? 

A very not waterproof ink that's great for painting, as you can go in with bleach and make these crazy sepia drawings on top of the ink layer. It's so cool-

So buy some and get me my order, please. 

Yessir.

Without being belligerent about it, especially since I know you'll tack on four hundred dollars worth of things to it. 

He is a raging minimalist. I mean, I am too except for art supplies and handbags and even the handbags have waned from the time I wanted to fill the top shelf in my closet, carrying a different one every day and now, because I gave them all away and there are five remaining. 

Art supplies take up one rolling cart and....the stables. It's a little out of control but save for the pastels that were handmedowns, I use everything. So adding a bottle of quink to the mix isn't going to mean I have to rearrange or anything, it just means I am adventurous.

No, I think I have my list down to fifty dollars. 

Well then add to it. You never buy anything. 

I don't have to. You do. 

I mean we send you out for a treat and you come home with things for us.

You need things-

Bridget, you're missing the point. 

No, I'm not. I'm pointing out that I have what I need. 

He turns to me abruptly. You do?

The meaning has suddenly changed. 

Yes. 

He smiles. Go place the order then. Add what you want.

Will you draw with me tomorrow?

Maybe. If you like.

Okay maybe just the Horseshoe Baes.

Today is going to be a productive but restful day. 

Today I will start to learn to trust my process.

Today will be good. 

It's not much but it's a start. We also did deep breathing out in the gazebo, in the rain to clear out the negative creeping overnight thoughts and blossom positively into the new day. They're throwing everything at this now, and I humour them while I learn.

Because I am a skeptic.

Because I am difficult.

Because I am afraid.

 I started off right. Coffee. Helping with laundry. Seeing Ruth off to work and Henry out of bed (since his school has going all online he likes to sleep as long as he can and work until dinner. Man, if I were him I'd be up a six and done by noon or one.). Talking to Caleb about some financial things (he is very proud) and ordering a book off Amazon (which I will share if it's good), preordering Jon Foreman's album Departures (so good already) and planning a day of sewing as our mask supply sucks and painting, because I should do more art and less mindless reading and fretting. I want to be a creator, not a consumer. I want to treasure and curate, not collect. 

I want to streamline life and work in things like this, though I daresay being told to breathe while I listen to bells and the rain all around me is a fun way to spend thirty minutes and it probably helped my headache (now on day four #&$#%*@) since I hold my breath when I'm in pain (so always) and I'm trying to learn to be a tea drinker but it's not happening and I always go back to coffee just like I'd probably be a wine drinker but I always go back to bourbon.  I want things that make me think and be surrounded by people who are good for me without being focused on me instead of themselves. 

Okay. So far so good. What's next for today? 

***

Lochlan asks me if I'm ready to get back into hockey. 

Uh. Maybe. It's weird though and I hate the empty arenas. (Who am I kidding? YES.)

That is weird. Usually you hate the noise.

Hockey without noise is just sad.

Right?

HOWEVER. 

Oh no, what are you plotting, Peanut?

If I grab a million from Caleb I can get Chara for next year. Let's start our own team. Seriously. The Horseshoe Bay wavebreakers or something. I'll need time to think of a proper name. 

It's expensive to mount a franchise. 

Yes but Caleb has money so I'll just get more of that.

What position will you play?

Pfft. I'll be the coach, of course.

Joel, you left too soon, dude.

Chara what now? 

I took a hockey break and the Bruins are captainless now and Zdeno Chara's gone to the Capitals for $750k? Seriously? What? No, hahahah. 2021 is not going to be this weird. Too much in six days. Epiphany indeed.

Not a recipe but an ode to my bed.

 Today the boys are making a big breakfast together (Thursday bonding exercise) and I am sewing madly at the machine, making flannel patchwork cloth that can then be made into other things. I got a lot of complaints yesterday for calling myself crazy, by people who don't know me who said I should know better than to use that word because it's a stigma and the boys should know better because it's disrespectful. 

It's hyperbole, and I know what I am and they are nothing of the sort but thanks, I love being corrected about myself and my family by people who have never met us. Look, I can send you a great list of blogs to read if this one doesn't float your boat. Hit me up. 

Jerks. 

But anyway, there are hashbrowns baking and bacon frying and eggs sizzling on the flat top part of the oven and there is toast in shifts and someone set the table and August (I thought he was a coffee snob. I was wrong. Dude's straight up a food snob) is juicing fresh oranges because the big jug of orange juice in the fridge is apparently not good enough for this meal. Caleb's (!) making a fruit salad and Ben is eating as much as he is cooking, as he is in charge of mushrooms and peppers and onions. 

PJ poured me some champagne. God bless all of them.

This makes me want to go to the diner and get a Denver sandwich. I don't even know if the diner does takeout. We only go to the sushi place, the Chinese place, very rarely now McDonalds and that's it. 

No Thai. No Vietnamese. No Mexican on the regular and this is freaking sad. We're all great cooks but it counts when you don't have to cook yourself and no I'm not complaining, for pete's sake stop looking for something to bitch at me about, it's just that I miss certain things. 

I don't miss cooking this morning. I was going to make cheese toast and Lochlan decided we should all cook together. And then he sent me to sit this one out, because I take the lion's share of cooking and it's like running a mess tent most of the time and complaints only get you more of whatever you hate but that's okay too. 

Looking forward to this brunch as it's been almost an hour and breakfast for me is way overdue and my blood sugar goes for a long drive in a too-hot car, facing the wrong way and is already vaguely sick. I wonder if I go back to bed if they'll bring it up to me? Honestly that's where everything tastes best.

It stopped raining for a few hours.

It was a good day. 

PJ and Lochlan and I tackled the bathrooms and the kitchen, doing a big heavy cleaning that hadn't been done since the day before Christmas Eve. I had planned to do a quick cleanup but then never did and this week is catch-up week for sure as we work away at a long list. Spring cleaning here starts at the first of each year. By eleven I was scrubbing at the corners of the windowsills and the undersides of chairs.

Then, black forest ham sandwiches with sauerkraut and oranges on the side. My favourite right now. Henry took a short break from his university work and he and I watched the first episode of season two of The Promised Neverland over lunch.

I should probably wait until all eleven episodes are out so I don't need to wait but I also don't want it to be spoiled so I'm thinking.

I watched it again after dinner (that was steak and cauliflower and Caesar salad) with Sam and Matt. The dog howled the whole time (there are characters he apparently doesn't like) and thank heavens for subtitles. Everyone likes this show, probably because it moves way faster and is far more heartwarming than Attack on Titan, the other show we are slogging through right now, so far behind we'll never catch up. 

The other good news is that Jon Foreman announced his next solo album is coming in February. 

The last piece of good news is that Joel's notes don't cross the line to casual, so I can't figure them out at all, but August took a look and he said he understands it. 

So I'm crazy?

Bridget, we're all a little crazy. That's how we get through life. 

But am I unforgivably crazy? I ask, voice wavering. Rather be eaten by a demon, at this point. 

Never, Sam says with authority, and I figure he should know.

It goes: A Change of Seasons, Apparitions and then Strange Days. That last one's the hardest, by far.

I feel like I'm losing for money
I feel like I'm losing for free
I feel older than the dead angel on my shoulder claims to be

I feel like we're drinking and driving
I feel like we're running into walls
I feel like swimming in your apathy as a kind of parody
For miles and miles, miles 

I feel like somebody's missing
I think that somebody's missing
I think somebody's missing 

Tried the song on this morning, though I'm forced to sing along because I don't know the tab on piano and it's too much of a rollercoaster ride to sing to be able to focus on anything else anyway. My spirit animal looms large today, singing comfortingly into the cavern of my skull, enjoying the acoustics of my pickled brain. The chorus, oh, my heavens this is why God invented music for me, I swear to Him. 

And to Matthew Good, God of my emotional lows because dammit, he's a litmus test for whether or not things are working and clearly I can feel this so bad I guess they're not. Or maybe Lochlan has asked them to back off a little in case my brain doesn't bounce back and he doesn't recognize me here, like this. He can appreciate the late-stage Radiohead-worthy guitar solo but then the final lines ruin him. 

(I feel like somebody's missiiiiiiiiiing.)

Right. That would be Jacob but the spectre of Jacob is still right here and excuse me, I thought someone was going to fix this and did I go through all of that punishment to my liver and my memories for nothing? Please don't tell me I did.

I'm taking this song for a bit, honey.

No you're NOT.

Then skip ahead to the next. I'm not going to let you fall today.

I press the button. 

Apparitions begins and my whole face splits open in a grateful grin as his own face falls apart in response.

Jake leans down and speaks softly into my ear. I think I'm going to give him a break and just take off for a bit. 

I reply without looking at him, my eyes not leaving Lochlan. Don't go. 

Lochlan says evenly, fighting for composure. I'm not going anywhere, Peanut. Why won't you believe me?

A break in the clouds.

Early this morning and I am lying in the Devil's arms, who is up on one elbow with me tucked in against him and he won't stop staring at me and I keep closing my eyes and just drifting away, completely oblivious to everything, the drugs running liquid quicksand through my veins. He loves this. They love fucked-up Bridget. I just love carefree no-worry Bridget. She is so laid back. I'd like to be like her someday. I just have to navigate the side effects which are the ever-present brain fog, no emotions at all (even happiness or contentedness), an exceedingly dry mouth and super harsh dizziness/motion sickness. The moment I feel like I have to throw up I am done with everything and so later, if he lets me go, I will make a plea for the half-dose or whatever's next. This isn't sustainable and that's part of the problem. 

But for right now, if I close my eyes and stay very still I don't feel like I'm moving. I just feel warm and safe and adored. 

He bends his head down and kisses my forehead. Want to go back to sleep? 

No. I need to get going. 

There's nothing you have to do today. 

I laugh. You don't know my schedule. 

Sure I do. At six this morning, you're going to make love to me. At seven, I will make love to you. At eight we can make love to each other, and at nine we will call for some coffee and croissants to be delivered up. Room service. 

Who will bring that? 

PJ, if I give him bribes. 

Good luck with that. 

I'll go make coffee and bring it up, then. 

No, I have to go. It's Monday. 

It's a braincation. Stay. 

I'm calling Joel again. I want my files before he skips town without a word.

We have them. 

Okay, rewind that. You what?

We already have all of his notes. 

What are you talking about? 

August went and got them and spoke with Joel. August will be spending the next several years upgrading his credentials and going back to school. We have an agreement. 

You're creating a live-in psychologist.

Psychoanalyst. He already has his masters. This will just be a top-up of his education and then he has free reign to be your official replacement for Joel. 

Out of the frying pan, don't you think?

No, I think August has proven himself over the years. He is not in love with you. 

Who told you that?

He did. 

He always was a good liar. 

I believe him.

You shouldn't. 

Why not?

Maybe I'm in love with him.

Well of course, or he wouldn't be here. And yes he's in love with you, but it's not in a dangerous way.

My head explodes at Caleb's admission, and this plan. If I could feel happy on these medications, boy would I right now. Does Lochlan know about this plan?

It was his idea. He came to me with it to see if I thought it had legs. 

Does August want to do this? 

Get dressed and go see him, he can answer the rest of your questions. Caleb smiles and leans forward, kisses my bottom lip instead of my forehead, and gets up, heading into the bathroom for a shower, closing the door. Caleb has never once in his life suggest I go to August, let alone considered him an ally. 

But here's the army. Working together. Mounting a strong offensive against the ghosts. I dress quickly and head back up to my room to see Lochlan first. Then I'll go see August. 

What the fuck. Christmas day came so late this year. But it still got here in time.

The value of closure.

Another decent nights sleep. Six hours unbroken and I feel a lot better. I have eaten breakfast. I have had a full-nights hug. Didn't have to look over my shoulder in the dark. Have secured four extra games of checkers with the boys who remained near but stayed out of the firing range just in case they needed to run shifts (spoiler: they didn't). 

I've discovered I really enjoy sitting down on the big wrap-around steps curving down to the back of the house, the ones that are wide and go from the upper hallway down to the patio doors. The overhead light is a yellow-warm  and bright and it's not uncomfortable at all and the board goes on a step by itself and a tall person can sit on the step above it, back against the wall, feet out sideways and still reach down. And I can lean forward and reach up from my step. I might bring the meditation pillows in from the gazebo just for extra comfort but they are big and hold a whole person and it might be worse instead of better. I can open some of the doors to hear the rain if it's not too cold and I can figure out how to beat the boys at a game we've been playing since the treehouse days. That's what it reminds me of, sitting in the hallway taking off snow gear in time for dinner. It's a safe memory and so for now it can linger.

I have won a few games, too. As many games as the number of decades we've been playing. 

I called Joel. I think he's trying to extricate without incident. I think what he's trying to do is ghost me but just so there's no mistake in who's dropping who I left a grownup voicemail detailing our history briefly and thanking him for continuing to help and to try to be a friend long after it was clear we probably never should have met. That shit happens and life isn't pretty and I hope he is happy and has what he needs. I didn't make any offers to be here if he ever needed us or any apologies for being the patient that destroyed his career or even for fighting him tooth and nail for the entirety of our relationship on every single thing. Not all friendships are perfect, especially one built the way we built it. It wasn't supposed to be a friendship and we tried way too hard but now it's done. 

I'm not mourning him. I'm relieved. I almost wish I could call my ghosts and wrap up our relationships and then they would move on as well but at the same time they are woven right through me and so the fight goes on. Maybe I'll fight harder in 2021. Maybe I won't fight at all and move toward acceptance and they will too. 

Maybe those pigs will just fucking fly. 

We'll see. 

For now the drugs are good and plentiful, there's no ghosts around that I can see and Lochlan has taken to becoming my human blanket, including while we made omelettes and plot to conquer this rainy season upon us.

The girl who cried Wolves.

 I don't know how coherent or sense-making this will be today. I'm swimming in an ocean of klonopin-molasses that is my brain today and it feels so nice not to be anxious. I will reply to emails eventually. I watched them roll in while I lay on the kitchen floor behind the woodstove, where you walk into the hall past the kitchen, high traffic so they wouldn't miss me, phone stacked neatly on ipad as I do when I'm about to go somewhere. I figured Lochlan could put them upstairs if I was taken away or put down or whatever you do with your broken pets in this day and age but here I am. 

I already said sorry for wasting their time and for freaking everyone out but I panicked and they all said more than once that it's better to do what I did then yo do what I usually do which is to stop talking altogether and just implode but I don't know if this is better if the result is the same.

Also fun fact for his 2021 New Year resolution Joel gave me up, I guess. He refused to come out. Refused to help Lochlan on the phone. Refused Sam's plea for a little help now and we'll sort out the hurt feelings later and in the background the whole time I am yelling AWESOME. DON'T COME BACK and then August took over and he and Ben and Lochlan sat down on the floor and we played checkers until I couldn't keep my eyes open any more and I slept for twenty hours. I didn't sleep at all New Years Ever. I was passed around and then fought over and by the time dawn broke I hadn't eaten, hadn't closed my eyes except in ecstasy and was playing with a fire I didn't know how to control and it caught up with me. 

Had a facetime with the Russian doctor who was very kind but due to covid he did not come out but he called the pharmacy. And he's called back twice since. He knows damn well I can turn him way up on my phone but I can't understand him or turn him up in person, with a mask. With that accent. It's impossible.

I wasn't going to hurt myself but I was hurting so badly I sounded my own alarm. I keep dodging pills. I hate taking things. And then I see what happens when I don't, like yesterday, but as I said I missed my pills, two whole nights sleep and a solid meal at any point in there and it caught up so fast I swear to God if I look behind me now it's right there, matching my pace, reaching out with both hands to grab me and I hate it and I wish it would go away. 

(And Lochlan is not a jerk. Gosh. He tries so hard and I give him nothing but shit for it. I'm sorry to him too. We make jokes about me having to request things like scissors, the can opener, tylenol, trips down to the beach, I don't know, anything that should be childproofed and yet it's not a joke and it's not funny at all and I understand how lucky I am to have someone like him to be here because he told me Thursday afternoon to fucking cool it and, as always, I didn't listen.)

(For those saying it's impossible to write on heavy drugs. HAHAHAHA You haven't met me. I have the world's greatest drug-metabolism ever and this has been part of the problem forever. I can run a marathon on this shit and I wouldn't wish that on anyone.)

(For those saying I need therapy. Yes, I have it. It doesn't do much and it isn't them, it's me.)

(For those hating, you can take a fucking day off please.)

You're all the things I've got to remember.

When I was fourteen, sometime long before Lochlan decided he couldn't carry history for us and sometime before Caleb decided he now had an open door to continue the abuse he started when I was ten years old Aha released their number one smash hit that still sees people stop and smile when they hear it even now. 

But today was the first time I heard it (I don't have the original, I have an unplugged version from a couple of years ago) and it made me cry, here as I wake up early and start laundry and un-decorating, drinking coffee and playing music before the whole house wakes up as is my favorite time of day because it's the only time I can let go in the music and my brain takes a break and lets my heart drive for a while and no one expects or needs anything at all. 

And then I realized what I need and the music hurts all the more. 

Happy New Year. 

Wait:

! 

There. Almost forgot the false enthusiasm.

It feels sad this year. It feels like it's full of too much wishful thinking and frightening unknowns. It feels like it might be more of the same and yet less of everything. It feels weird and alien and I took down the 2020 calendar and I dearly loved that year, because my children were home and safe, my boys were home and safe and everyone in the greater universe backed the fuck off so I could catch my breath but then I still couldn't keep up and I feel completely helpless when I watch people flout the rules and then completely despondent when they don't and I worry it will be like this forever. 

Only once or twice did I worry that we might get sick. Only once or twice did I need to drop what I was doing and leave an area. Once in Canadian Tire and once in IKEA. I never returned to either place. I have a tendency to go out and run my errands the moment the stores open. I do the grocery shopping at seven in the morning. I go without and I wait and I figure out other ways and I've cooked so much and we've dropped even takeout for the most part just because of the traffic. I drink too much and pass it off as nerves and I think too much and pass it off as grief and no one can fix it. 

No one. 

Jake could have and I don't know why. I don't understand why no one else can help me, why no one else can make me feel safe and secure now and even if he walked through the door he wouldn't be able to pull that off these days because I don't trust anybody anymore and that's weirdly his fault and not Caleb's, not Lochlan's, not Trey's by any means (Cole, that's Cole. His nickname returned in a fond wistfulness and won't go away now with the boys and it sort of freaks me out) and not Ben's. I never trusted Ben, he made sure to be the crazy friend my whole life and even that was a lie as he turned out to be the most sturdy, trusted foundation I think I ever had at any point in my life and it's hard to separate us now for completely different reasons than it used to be.

This is why they say stay, wait for me to get up, wait and we'll go down and have coffee. Don't go in there, Bridget. Remember the blast? There's nothing left that's safe in your head and so just stick with us. And I do but then in the dark they go digging through the papers that coat the landscape and dig up the smallest things and rip them out of my arms, changing them into something else and I have to write it down on a new piece but there's nowhere to put it, no way to organize it into a system because all of that is gone. 

In the dark they turn me into a little monster and if I fight they gaslight me all to hell and back.

It's okay, Bridge, they'll tell me, a reassurance pouring all over the floor but for the holes. I watch them and it looks ridiculous.

No it's not okay. None of this is okay. 

I can't do this without them, Bridge. This is your army for a reason.

Then you can't be mad that they're here, Lochlan. 

I don't know what to feel anymore. What can I give you? What can we do? 

Bring him back because I need to talk to him. 

He's not coming back, Sweetheart. He's gone. 

I don't think he's gone. 

If he wasn't gone do you think he would be able to stay away from you? 

Sure. I would. I would run so fast. 

It doesn't work. I think we've all tried that. 

Worked for him, then, didn't it? 

I don't know what you want me to say here. 

Nothing, I don't want you to say anything. 

Why don't you listen to some music, and then we'll have a nap later.

And so here I am. What a GREAT idea.

***

I didn't think it was such a huge disintegration, at first.

 I know it's a feature of very big holidays when you have lost someone in a violent way, that they are harder and there's more baggage to lug around as you make your way through the world and maybe tomorrow I won't be so sad but it's striking to me to mark these days passing like everything is going to be great and wonderful because you don't know. We never know what time we have and that's what I don't trust. That's what sends me running, screaming, and I feel like that fear isn't something that can be contained in my brain or my heart, as it tries to help out but is mostly useless, chasing after love and affection like a blind stupid fool. I am afraid of everything and they promised I'd be so much better by now but Jesus the hard parts were in the single digits and now it's 2021 and I feel like it isn't. Not yet. I'm still here and they don't want to wait and I don't want to be alone and

I don't want to write anymore of this. Not now. Just know that I called Sam first and he's coming and I called Joel and then I called everyone else and they're calling others and everyone's coming in to celebrate 2021 without quarantining Jesus fuck because emergencies are somehow like that. Take on me, indeed. God my brain is fucking fucked. I'm sorry.

 

(She's a she's a lady and I am just a line without a hook.)

I am drinking the good coffee that Schuyler dropped off yesterday and watching Hardy Boys reruns on my ipad on the big circle couch by the woodstove. If I sit in 'my' spot you can't see me from any door. The stove is too big and it sits in the centre of the room but the only thing in this room is the couch and the stove and the rest is windows and the big patio doors that open all the way across and it's pouring right now so it's perfect.

I had a mad ridiculous crush on Shaun Cassidy which ended simultaneously as the show went off the air and I met Lochlan and the others all in the same period and suddenly I had the real life Hardy Boys to follow around. 

(Nothing has changed since, except I drink coffee now, I didn't until I went to University and then I had one every morning with classmates when I arrived. Cream and sugar and then I dropped the sugar later, only bringing it back briefly when we moved here and I discovered English toffee syrup but I weaned myself off that again because my sugar consumption is rather legendary as it is without physically adding it to regular things.)

My feet are comfortable propped up in the lap of the Devil, who is drinking coffee (also the good stuff) and reading on his own ipad or whatever he does online, I don't know. Maybe stare at the markets until they bloom or shrivel under his medium-blue gaze. 

Hard to believe he's one of the original Hardy Boys, the Frank to Lochlan's inevitably younger, more impulsive, passionate and far shorter Joe. Frank is so irritated with me right now. I wouldn't accept his Christmas gift, wouldn't make any plans with him, have (in his words) left him hanging out to dry, throwing water on his sails, he is now floating in the doldrums, directionless, rudderless, no line on the horizon-

Jesus Christ. I love a New Year's Eve arguments that's just all angst and sailing metaphors. I try not to laugh because it seems cruel but then again he put me in this position and godfuckingdammit if I'm not going to fight my way out with my words, for they're the only weapons I can truly wield that will fatally impact him. I don't have anything else against him. Heck, if I even look at him straight on I'm probably doomed.

So this is better, trust me. 

Why don't you join the guys next door at their fondue?

And fifth-wheel it? No thank you. 

I believe the kids are going, and Batman and Jake. No wheels. Just nerds.

My teeth hurt on the name but to cover my expression I move my feet and sit up, putting my ipad on the table. I can't concentrate on my show when the albatross is spooling up here, blocking the flames. 

He thinks and then says casually that he might stop over for a few. 

I nod and get up. More coffee would be good. 

Want to do resolutions later?

I don't know if I have any this year. I just want to find ways to make Ben's life easier and keep him moving towards one hundred percent. I turn and stare directly into the dark at the Devil who returns it too easily. That stare that sets people on fire and it doesn't touch me right now. I can deflect if I'm focused elsewhere and right now it's Ben. 

I'll do everything I can to help. 

I know. 

Bridget, this is going to be a better year. 

I hope so. 

I promise you. 

I don't think you have that kind of power. You can only control your own actions and I really hope you don't plan on hurting anyone in 2021. 

It was an accident. 

A surprise punch on a concrete ledge is not an accident, it's an evil I didn't think even you had in you and you're the very definition of it, especially to her.

Bridget-

I think I'm going to go see if Ben is awake yet. It's getting late. 

When I got upstairs I bit my tongue, realizing that those are the kinds of words which bring nothing but despair and while I like to stick it to Caleb every chance I get, matching his cruelty is not who I am and I turn and go back down but he is gone. So I call him and it answers to the sound of wind. He is driving. Speakerphone.

Change your mind? 

Where are you off to? 

Just picking up some things off the list since the weekend will be busy and I figured you could use the help. 

I'm sorry, Caleb. I didn't mean to make you feel worse for Ben's-

Bridget, I'm thrilled that you stand up to me now. Call me on my bullshit. You're getting so much stronger and I love every second of it. Keeps me accountable. I'll see you in a bit. Be home by twelve and we'll talk.

He ends the call but I don't feel better.

There's a heaven above me, baby.

Twenty years old and I screwed up. I borrowed some quarters for the cost of a smile and I called Caleb. I pushed too far and now we're fighting and I don't know where Lochlan went or if he's coming back and I can't pay for a room because he has all our money and I can't do our act by myself and he always said not to go it alone if anything ever went wrong, just to call home and get somewhere safe and we'd figure the rest out later. I've got my clothes and my makeup in my backpack and I figured the bar was safer but maybe it's not and no one's going to ID me, too pretty to turn away so I go all the way down to the corner and sit by the phone. I put the backpack on (not leaving it on a chair right next to me, wolves are circling and I don't know these ones) and dial the number. He picks up on the first ring. 

Hello? 

I take a breath. Hi, Caleb.

Bridget? Is everything okay? 

I bite my lip. Guns and Roses is ordering me not to ever cry over the sound system and I'm trying to obey them. I'm trying to be tough but I won't win any battles. If I could Lochlan would still be here.

Bridget. Say something. Where are you?

I shake out a smoke and a match. Bartender won't stop staring. 

Uh. I have to think. In a bar. They have a payphone. We had a fight-

What city, Bridget? I can come to you. I can get a plane right now. (I made the right call. Caleb is twenty-nine now and already has a lawyer job at a really nice firm with so many perks my head spins.)

I don't know-

The receiver is taken from me and hung up. Lochlan's back. Looking fierce, angry and scared all at the same time. Christ, Peanut. I turned around and you were gone. This was the last place I went in. Don't they know you're underage? He says the last part loudly, like anyone's going to give a shit in here if I'm of age. Probably like it more that I'm not. Wouldn't surprise me. I take a drag off the cigarette. I'm shaky and I have a laugh at how relieved I am to see him, even though he hates me. I don't know why I came out with him. We're never going to get along. We have moments where I think I'm going to tell Cole that's enough, I'm going back to Lochlan, but then Lochlan is Lochlan and I remember his incredible contempt for me and his inability to deal with the guilt or the carnage from our past and so yeah, it won't work. I am too strong for him. 

The phone begins to ring and ring and Lochlan just gets louder to compensate. He's giving me a lecture here in a shitty eastern seaboard bar while I suck on a stale cigarette, tears rolling down my face. I don't look twenty but no one steps in to see if everything is okay. Everyone loves a tragedy. Everyone wants to fix a broken girl. None of this shit matters.  

The bartender reaches between us and picks up the receiver, hanging it up again and then taking it off the hook. Not his first rodeo but a strange lovers quarrel nonetheless. Finally he shows a shred of decency. 

Need a cab or something, miss?

I'm good now, thank you. I take another shaky drag while he stares at me. I nod at him and then he gives a long slow gaze to Lochlan, who nods and meets his eyes and finally he turns away to go back to keeping his napping bar. No one in here has enough energy to do anything else, it seems. 

I'm not the bad guy here, Bridge. But you didn't have to agree to come out. 

He's angry about my earrings. They are tiny diamond studs, round ones. Lochlan frowned and asked me why I was wearing them when we got here, when I put my hair up. When we stopped moving and started looking for a crashpad. 

I don't take them off. 

When did you buy those?

Caleb gave them to me for my birthday. He said twenty was such a huge milestone, I should have something almost as beautiful as me to celebrate. He made me promise to never take them off. 

Are they real?

Yeah, we can sell them if we need to. Back up plan, right, Lochlan? 

Sure. Yeah. He's fighting to not look angry as he nods at me.

He said they were half a carat each so that's something, right?

Mmm hmmm. 

What's wrong?

What did Cole say when Caleb gave you those?

Nothing.

Why not?

It's like a pattern.

What's a pattern?

Caleb comes over and then after he leaves he comes back with a present. 

What do you mean? Why doesn't he just bring the present when he arrives the first time?

Guilt. 

For what?

Not....visiting more often, I lie. 

Then he would bring it the first time. What are they really for, Bridget?

I told you. 

No, you haven't. And now you've sounded the alarm and you have to call back and tell him you're fine, we're fine, you made a mistake and I'll talk to him too. I don't want him to come and get you, Bridget but if you want to go we'll leave. 

I want to go. Anywhere else. Also I want half the money. I had to borrow money for the call. 

You're right. I'll make sure you have more. 

Lochlan.

What?

Do you know I'm four years older now than you were the first time we went out on the fair? I'm a lifer. This is my ten-year anniversary and we're on a better gig now. You can let me help make decisions. 

If everyone's in charge no one's in charge, Bridge. 

I didn't say anymore. He's right. I never heard that one before, I tell him. 

I just said it. It's from me.

Oh. 

He wipes the tears from my eyes and replaces my crushed week-old cigarette pack with a fresh sealed one and then for good measure he takes a wad of bills out of his pocket and divides it, giving me half without counting. Granted, I'm not dumb, he gave me the small bills. He kept the big ones. The fifties. The hundreds. I get ones, fives and tens. 

Thanks. I roll it up and put it in my bra. The cigarettes go in the pocket of my green hoodie. It goes all the way across the front of the shirt. He takes the backpack from me and carries it in one hand, taking my hand in his own free hand. 

You don't need him to rescue you, Peanut. 

You left me on the sidewalk. 

I walked ten feet away and when I turned back you were gone. Jesus. I was so scared. I wouldn't just abandon you on the sidewalk. If you don't trust me by now, after everything, then tell me what else I can do? 

****

What city was that, Lochlan? The one where we took the ten-week contract and had the fight about the earrings?

Jesus, Bridge. Why?

I'm curious. 

New Haven. I think. Not one hundred percent on that, though.

Thank you.

Don't write about it. Please. 

Might be too late.

These are not in order. Sorry.

We're going to light it up, Peanut. 

I nod, too terrified to speak. 

Just trust me, like you know you do. Have faith that it'll be fine. I'll keep you safe. 

I nod again. 

Say something, Bridget. Please.

I think this would be a beautiful show at Christmas. With the snow falling outside. 

It sure would. Maybe we should come back and do our own. 

But that's fantasy-talk as pies float through the sky because we can't do this on our own. The backers are shadowy men from other countries with point men here. This operation is huge with almost one hundred performers and another two hundred behind the scenes. We have contracts that don't benefit or protect us, codes of conduct and people who sew our costumes, and I don't have to anymore which got difficult as Lochlan kept growing, and kept getting bigger and stronger and I didn't grow at all. 

Les nuits ne changeras pas

Les soirs quand tes plus la
Même si ca fait mal
Sois mon animals
Sentiments brutal
Les nuits ne changeras pas

And it would have been better at Christmas. In summer people are hot, bored and impatient. At Christmas they are warm, emotional, generous and ready to suspend belief for things that defy reality so tenuously. They're looking for magic, and they'll pay whatever the cost.

***

You remember that? 

Of course. It's the last time you said we'd light it up. Exactly that same way. 

And we are. 

We are. I nod. Hell yes, we are. This summer we'll mark five whole years married to each other and it seems sort of a small, ridiculous number when you factor in our history, that I haven't gone a moment without thinking about him since I met him at eight years old. 

We should be on year thirty at least but no one said trips don't have rocky sections, where you're not having a good time or maybe you even find a better destination and sometimes you get lost and you end up doubling back and you get back on the right road and continue on your way. 

We don't celebrate the number, in any case. We kind of tried but it seems disheartening and disingenuous to be all Happy Third! Or whatever. Like an excuse when this is nothing like that. Nothing about our love has been normal or average or predictable. Not a goddamn thing and I love him even more for that. He never tried to make up for Cole, or one-up Jacob, or assert dominance over Ben, or even shut out Caleb, who watches us now from the fringe, just inside the darkness of the night. 

Hell, yes, you are, Caleb agrees with us without even catching that huge mental paragraph of history that spans over forty years at this point, a history he can't buy, no matter how much money he has and so we did things differently and it works, goddamn it and we're not apologizing anymore. Lochlan has no jealousy left. He burnt it all up, spent it wildly, let it die down and smoke out. 

He trusts me here and so we have a guest for Christmas because my heart has these defects now from being put back together in a hurry, huge holes that are empty spaces and there's one that can't stand it when anyone is alone.Which isn't exactly true but some people being alone upset me more than others, the Devil more than anyone.

Light it up, Neamhchiontach. 

I nod, speechless again. That's the plan.

If I go crazy then will you still call me Superman?
If I'm alive and well, will you be there holding my hand? 

I finally found a comfortable spot and he ruined it within minutes, waking up, shoving me underneath his weight, crushing my mouth against his with a kiss in the dark followed by his hand wrapping around the back of my head to keep me there, his other hand sliding down around my body to bring me up close. That kiss was it and then he was inside me, every thrust so fierce I would let out an uncomfortable cry. Jesus Christ. This is too hard, too deep, too fast. I try to give him a safe word but I don't want to wake up the others, sleeping soundly all around me. The cries wake them up anyway and they move in to block, to comfort and to join. The wolf pack. Different in the dark as they devour their prey. Content to leave whatever's left and hunt again, night after night while the sheep has a thousand lives, her flesh matted with sweat, with the cloying residue of one love gone right and one missed altogether. This one, the one with the medium blue eyes never does let up, save to move his hand from the back of my head to around my throat, and I miss the chance to breathe but I never had it. He squeezes his fingers tighter, he pounds me harder still and my cries vanish into the night as he peaks into an explosion, mercifully letting go as soon as it's over. I don't want to be a bystander, I want to be a participant but he leaves and the spot is cold suddenly. 

It's shame that drives him away. It's me that will bring him back. I'm not concerned. I couldn't leave him to sleep alone, apart from us and this is what it cost.

Besides, his place is immediately taken by the favourite. The one with the striking colouring, telltale freckles and the most tender heart, after mine. The one who makes a huge effort to make it fun, make it good, make me come before he gets going and then again right as he does too. His arms are a safe haven, a gift and I unclench my whole body, suddenly racked by a bliss I can't describe as he moves surely over me. His cheek rests against my temple, his kisses taste sweet, we have a practised, subliminal response to each other, our bodies fitting perfectly. Nothing hurts but nothing is too light, everything so hot and intense we simulate daylight there, for a moment, blink and you've missed it. When he finds his own bliss within me he makes that sound I love more than anything, that sound of pure euphoria and contentment, the signal that everything is okay and he remains, he won't leave, settling in against me, pulling me in tight against his chest, putting his hands up around my head again, this time in protection instead of lust. Within the hierarchy of the wolves it isn't the largest that it is the leader, it is the one I love most.

He said I could be a little soaked sheep in wolf's clothing and he's not all that wrong.

 I've been enjoying the heat, truth be told. Usually I am too hot, blankets thrown off, one single layer under a coat because if there's two I will die, far away from the fire, honestly moving after ten minutes of snuggling because I can no longer breathe, bare feet in January sort of deal and now since I actually got cold I've been changing my tune and wearing wool and I did indeed advocate for that bathtub by the woodstove but due to privacy concerns it was quickly vetoed. 

But we could put up a curtain? I mean ma and pa never minded-

Ma and Pa Ingalls did not live in a commune. 

That's it. I'm writing the early years. Little Commune on The Prairie. Ma and Pa in their wild years before they had Mary. 

Perfect. 

Oh, just you wait. 

Ben offered to draw me a bath upstairs in my big bathtub. That's where I swim. He can have the lukewarm pools. I need the scalding water or ice cold, no in between. Ocean Bath Ocean Bath Bath Ocean. I only have two modes and the switch can't get stuck in the middle. It's just not possible. 

We're about to go dark, I think, for a few days. Not lights (GOD I HOPE NOT) but connectivity. We take life offline for big holidays and reconnect with each other instead. Wrap up the year and oh what a year it was. The rounds of presents and sitting by the tree and the big fireplace talking long into the night, taking long walks around the neighborhood and sleeping criminally late (GOD I HOPE SO) is about to begin. 

Also my bath. It's about to begin. So bye. Merry Christmas!

Wild Pacific Solstice.

 The power was out for an extended period from yesterday afternoon to sometime in the wee hours of the morning which means I woke up to four thousand blazing lights and a hundred beeps and boops from all of the technology kicking back up and we're still getting things back online. We're still cutting down trees and finding broken things in the garden. This was a quick and dirty doozy of a storm and I saw it coming and got dinner on the table as fast as I could and just as we were finishing up the power went out and after a few minutes we had all of the auxiliary power things back on. Not enough things. Ever. I worry about the furnace, water heater, freezers, fridge. This is mostly  for lights and wifi and charging. We deployed the lantern cupboard. We dug out the chessboard and Jenga and the boys eviscerated the brand new box of Quality Street chocolates with Henry coming on board to enjoy. I figured out the one flavour no one could place and then THEN we found the chocolate legend so we knew what was what. 

It was hazelnut, for the record. 

I'm currently not allowed outside to see if there is any more property damage. I'm a little worried about my studio as sometimes the heat isn't reliable in there and if my paints freeze I'm not sure if they'll still be good to use when they thaw. Also the trees on that side are plentiful. Lochlan said my grotto in front is basically caved in. Everything is coated in a thick layer of ice over heavy snow that I hope goes away soon. 

My phone is back at one hundred percent. I've had coffee and a pear and a hot shower and my period kicked in at last which means I can do everything the boys do but I do it while bleeding. That's the joke and there I was in my boots and parka hauling trees along with them last evening. I may have to go suck on an anchor or take a vitamin though because now I am down for the count.

I didn't sleep. All I could think of was Revolution. The show that came on when we lived in the prairies where the power went out and just never came back on and it's a frightening thought how much I like easy lights, easy heat and endless hot water. 

(I can boil water on the woodstove yes but it takes a long time and eight feet away from the stove it's like you're standing outside. But yes, I will go get a bathtub and put it right in the kitchen just in case. Just for next time.)

I was out on the patio steps checking cameras and window glass and seeing if the gazebo made it through when I realized too late how fucking slippery it was with a straight path down to solid concrete and so I came back in. I can finish later. Everything seems intact. But I got cold and now all I can think about is being warm. I put on my beaded fur-trimmed mukluks (also from the Prairies, Metis specifically) and a big sweater and my merino leggings and I'll nurse a second cup of coffee while the sun works hard to boot up too. 

Everyone can tell me I've gone soft and that I wouldn't last an hour after the apocalypse but when I rough it everyone tells me to enjoy some luxury and relax. Make up your damn minds.

But that was it. The shortest day is now over, along with the longest night, and now we get to tick the minutes back toward those ten pm sunsets again. I can't wait.

Glass houses.

The temperature is starting to drop and we've had to empty the pool anyway since it's still open. Luckily we did it  a while back after the work got pushed to the new year for the glass room because of some serious communication issues between um...me and everyone else but they came around quickly and so we'll resume sometime toward the end of January with getting the pool a room of it's own. My not-snowglobe will be rustic and natural and probably in full force by dinnertime, at this rate, as it's supposed to snow a ton and it's been raining forever so it'll be an avalanche Christmas and messy and awful and we've locked the gate and no one's going out for a few days and so perfect storm indeed. 

Don't worry. Ben has been making full use of Batman's pool in the interim, until ours is ready again. Batman has an actual indoor pool but it's a very small lap pool so Ben swims back and forth and does his water workout and someone sits in one of the big chairs nearby and keeps him company. The pool is a small rectangle in a room surrounded by huge plants and windows that slide all the way open in the nice weather, much like my kitchen windows to the patio side. It's not really big enough for more than one person though and Batman doesn't care for it all that much but boy am I happy to have a backup pool right now so I didn't have to back down. 

The ceiling wasn't tall enough on the enclosure for the other pool and I hated it so much. I hated the glass too. The whole thing was ugly and terrible and I had a vision of a Victorian greenhouse and they had a vision of a utilitarian....pool enclosure. I pointed out that for resale value and to always make something extra special if one has the chance we should make this spectacular and now we need more permits and had to order special materials and it adds a lot of time and waiting (and money) and I had to bring Emmett back in to run interference with the company because they don't like me. I tried to be nice and sweet but I wasn't going to 'wait and let it grow on me' when it was so ugly. 

(They again assumed, as all the workmen do, that I was someone's temporary girlfriend and tried to talk over and under me, which pissed me off even more but I really want the job done and so I asked if we could all just start on a fresh page but they remain bitchy and moody.

Oh, geez, guys, you have not SEEN bitchy and moody.)

In the meantime It's Christmas and there's Batman and you know how this goes. I tried to blow him off a bit and it didn't work at all. He is very happy to have all this company and the very deep very small pool is finally getting more use than ever before.

These even colder skies.

This morning I woke up with my favourite Christmas song in my head, which isn't actually Where Are You, Christmas? to everyone's surprise. It's In Like a Lion (Always Winter) which I love to sing and Lochlan says it's like going back in time and he doesn't really want to hear it but singing is better than silence and frankly I need all the help I can get. The third favourite is I Celebrate the Day but it's a little bit crushingly Jesus, even for me. Then Walking in the Air. I could go on but no one cares.

And the rumours are false. I'm not a great singer, especially without the in-ear monitors because I can't hear myself. Maybe good if I push for compliments but only with Ben's endless coaching over the past twenty years can I even get the courage at all to feel as though anyone would want to hear it. 

I'm not going to go up under the viaduct and belt out anything from Titanic, though I desperately, absolutely want to, with all my heart. 

Instead I am the secret-starlet, content in my postage-stamp fame on a zoom screen or in someone's memories from twenty-five years removed, hazy and sped-up ever so slightly, a moment captured with a series of photographs using a flip flash on a drugstore camera, half buried in the sand and forgotten at the end of a twentieth century summer.

***

People want me to say things. I don't know what you want me to say? We've hunkered down quite nicely. I have a cold but truly it's been a runny nose and a dry-air slight cough for almost two weeks now and it's one-hundred-percent dependant on the humidity in the house, going away completely when it's good or I've had a long hot shower. When it gets super-dry it's worse. I need to drink more tea, find a way to sleep without being taken down at three hundred yards, a moving target with a sight on my back for their tranquilizing, killer dreams. I need to learn how to relax. Maybe that's why I love singing so much. It's a time, like when I treasure-hunt on the beach, where I stop thinking at all and just focus on the task at hand. 

I hope everyone enjoyed the service today. Fourth candle, bitches. I'm afraid to look.

Two minutes of terror (like seven minutes in heaven without the closet).

Sam made a last minute addition to tomorrow's podcast/zoom in that he's opted to insert a hymn by some special guests (snort) and he decided I would sing it and Ben would play his acoustic and...not sing at all which wasn't entirely fair. Instead of Ben doing everything because Ben is a trained professional and I'm a decided stage-frighty hack suddenly. 

We put on our Christmas best, lit a hundred candles in the big booth and strung tiny green lights everywhere. Christian filmed it. We took eleven tries to get through it this morning because Ben assured me we could one-take it, almost clearing it in eight but then Ben decided to burst out laughing at my hand gestures and then for the next two takes we kept cracking up in the same spot. 

We performed Oh Come Oh Come Emmanuel. Thank God it's short. And then I was actually ready to sing so we also recorded a lovely and fun version of Baby It's Cold Outside (which we've done many, many times live, if you can even but now it's committed to all eternity) which I don't know what we're going to do with. Perhaps there's an album in the works and in the future everyone will have a faded green record in the stack by the hi-fi that looks dated as fuck. Holiday Classics by The Collective. And when you play it-surprise! It's half doom metal. 

I mean, it could work. 

And now it's seven already and I'm still in my Valentino and stilettos (and false lashes shhhhHHHHH) because I have a theory that I'm louder when I'm tall. Lochlan points out it's actually the opposite and since he started picking on me for zero reason Sam has tagged him to do his own number later today and wants to stream a church variety show now. We're fucking doomed. This is awesome. His congregation is never going to appreciate the sheer amount of talent he has around him, but frankly that's okay.

God, I hope Lochlan picks something Elvis. We're already calling him the Red King, a term I haven't heard for a really long time.

Laundry lists and sleepy men.

 I have to start from scratch. Probably locally. I'll have to call around and he can figure it out if he wants to go around and get his things, for when I went to pull the trigger the shipping was only FedEx and it was $85 Canadian and that's freaking bullshit for what I ordered, which amounted to half a shoebox sizewise and would have cost me $30 to ship with tracking and insurance. And I emailed and they can't do any other shipping methods so oh well. 

It's fine. I don't care if he gets his pen, he has others and he has a whole pack of field notes in the drawer but he likes the Yamamoto ones so much better. Stuff it, I tell him. Use what you have! 

I'll do it myself. Is the cart still there.

No. I emptied it in protest. 

Cale sighs for a long time and then doesn't say anymore and I go back to going through receipts. Silence reigns for the better part of the afternoon and I finally stand up to leave and he startles so hard I am shaken. 

Sorry, was daydreaming, I guess. 

You know what they say about disassociati-

Neamhchiontach, don't. I just haven't slept. 

Ooh, come join my club. We meet every day behind the treehouse. Though you'll have to learn the secret handshake and we have badges to pin on your shirt and-

He pinches the bridge of his nose with one hand. There's a fix for this. Stay tonight. 

What's in it for me? 

He stares at me. It was a joke and he took it as a challenge. Anything, everything. Name it. 

I want things to cost less and get here faster. 

I know you're minding not being able to shop properly. 

It's tactile-

I know, Bridget. And no one can help that right now. So what can we do to help that? 

I have no idea. 

I do. How about a sleeping pill for two and we tuck in at eight and watch shows until we can't keep our eyes open? 

Each other's or our own? 

He was out like a lightbulb at ten and I read long into the night, travelling through brief sleepiness into wakefulness, then homesickness, followed by the inevitable strange contentment. I finally turned the light off in the single-digit morning hours and got about three hours of rest, his arms a vise around my back, breathing so soundly I knew he was really out and not just hoping I would think he was asleep so I would fall asleep too (both he and Lochlan do that independently) and when I woke up again I untangled myself from him and he woke up. 

What time is it? 

Five. 

You going home?

Yes. 

Dammit. 

Sleep. 

Kay. Go straight up. 

I will. 

And I did as promised. Lochlan was still asleep, spooning against Ben, and I ducked into the shower and slept with my face against the wall for another fifteen minutes, dreaming of stationery before getting my morning sea legs and rinsing myself clean. Fresh and blowdried and perfumed, I come out and they are both awake. 

Sleep? 

Yeah, I lie. Caleb's really tired so we watched some dumb crime show and he was out almost instantly. 

Lochlan nods. I do a few twirls on purpose as I put on my underthings, just so he can be sure I am fine. No bites. No scratches. No mental distress. I'm good. Just unsettled, as always. 

Come back for a snooze and we'll get up later?

I'm almost dressed. Come with me, let's have a picnic. 

It's still pouring, Bridge. 

We can take umbrellas to the gazebo.

What if we had breakfast in bed? 

Okay. 

Seriously?

Who's cooking?

I will. Take off your stuff and crawl in. I'll be back in twenty minutes. 

Loch jumps up, pulling on pajama pants and a green t-shirt. I get a hard kiss on the forehead that almost knocks me over and he is gone, down to find the coffee and the eggs, not nearly as tired as he seemed a minute ago. I think the rain is heavy. I think it weighs us down. 

I tell this to Ben and he nods. I think you're right. 

(I ended up making breakfast and we ate in by the stove Lochlan cut his finger not insignificantly and so Ben nursed him through getting sufficient bandaids and antibiotic ointment while I made the eggs. He's okay though. It doesn't require stitches but I was able to convince him to use one of the butterfly bandages I keep on hand just to keep everything together while it heals.)

(And yet Lochlan's been using the same chewed-on stub of a wooden yellow Dixon pencil I believe since I was fourteen.)

(If anyone has any insight into the weird gene that makes one adore stationery supplies to this extent please remove it from me, I waste a lot of time on it, thank you.)

 I ran downstairs to give the loaves of bread a knead in order to facilitate their second rise and now I'm back upstairs in Caleb's wing trying to knock off an end-of-year stationery order from an online shop that has far too much neat stuff including shimmering ink with glitter and so many beautiful pens and notebooks I've been working on this for days and am no closer to deciding because Caleb, in his infinite, generous wisdom, told me to order whatever I wanted for myself and now I'm paralyzed with too many choices and so this is probably never going to happen. I even tried to narrow it down to just getting what I need but then I think fuck it, I'll get what I want and then they add even more nice things and I keep filling a cart and then unfilling it again. 

Of course I know exactly what I want. I like shimming inks and broad-tipped fountain pens with inlays and retractable medium ballpoints too but not the slimline metal ones. I love copper and brass housings but not translucent plastics. I have mechanical pencils by the dozen so I don't need any of those and already have paperclips on order from another place so I won't get those and I did a notebook inventory so no more paper and my planners arrived even after I balked at the cost of the hobonichis and decided on a couple of good Leuchtturms instead (one yearly planner, one bullet unlabelled) and if I stick it through then I will get a Hobonichi for 2022 (and probably a Midori 1 day 1 page to accompany) and I'm fairly certain my custom planner won't be here until February but it's a For Life kind of purchase so that's okay too. Planner starts on the 28th of December and I will muddle along for the first month or two just fine. 

If only I could figure out what to get because honestly I actually want a whole heaping load of stuff.

Get all of it. Please, Neamhchiontach. Just buy the pens already. He needs ink and wants a new Visconti pen and a couple of Japanese notebooks for his EDC and goddamn, why he waits until he is out of everything to do this, as always but he pointed out he depends on his assistant to think ahead and keep everything well-stocked and read his goddamned mind.

If only, I think to myself. 

Indeed, he says out loud.

Crazy stupid early.

The best part about Wednesdays are that we're all up at such an early hour it promotes a loose kind of insanity and so Ben and Lochlan have adopted their best falsettos and are trading off on Emotion. I swear to God this is my guilty pleasure song, I've written about it before, one of many, hilariously. I wore out the Samantha Sang original when I was seven, literally wearing the song off the vinyl 45 and then got hella confused in my twenties when the Bee Gees released their own cover and I'm never one percent sure I got it right. Of course on that playlist it's followed by a raft of Belinda Carlisle's greatest hits and I make no excuses and I plan to spend Christmas torturing PJ with the help of these two and their high cracking notes and inevitable bursts of laughter. 

I'm a broken record, truth be told but I maintain it's so nice to see Ben laugh. It's nice to see him able to remember songs we pull out of thin air and it's amazing that he has very little lasting damage here. Maybe I can't stress enough how much of the day is taken up with rehabilitation, with an all hands on deck kind of participation only this Collective could pull off. It's like this is why we're here, together. If ever we were looking for reason or purpose or answers maybe it was this and not me, specifically and I'll insist on that for the rest of my life now. 

You know, when I'm not being teased for my ludicrous taste in music as of late. Jesus. I hit all my marks all fall. When something that comes out that is super heavy tugs my listening ears I'll let you know and in the meantime this is the way. 

 

Nevermind.

It's National Cupcake Day and I sit here and wait. Where is my cupcake? Are they hand-delivered? Is it a virtual email thing? Will someone show up and hand one to me, sitting beside me to devour their own? What nation are we talking about specifically? Does this mean there is a Cake Day too? (Oh, there is! But not in my nation but I still missed it, or did I? I eat cake a lot so I don't remember, exactly. It's my favourite thing. A cake means a celebration or an event. I don't think there's anything much better on earth than a forkful of chocolate cake. I don't even care if there's icing but frankly every day should be cake day. In every nation. 

What are you doing? Lochlan comes in and I am just sitting. Hands on either side of my coffee cup, waiting for my pretty-muffin.

It's National Cupcake Day. 

Which nation? He asks. God, we share a brain. I should go rewire a compute while I'm on the inside. 

Not sure. Probably America. 

Oh. I don't think he has anything else to say, and so he heads to the Keurig. Did I tell you I discovered Sumatra beans for the thing and now I like it again? Yes. I am ridiculously picky and not at all picky with coffee. Literally the greatest coffees in the world are the ones in tiny white styrofoam cups that people hand you when you're cold. Don't ask me why and I've had coffee in France AND Italy. But yes, my standards are low. But not so low that I will get coffee from a chain from a window or anything. That's not coffee, I don't know what that is, but you go ahead if you like it. 

I need a cupcake window, that's what I need. 

No, not muffins. Pretty-muffins is just another way to describe them. Muffins with hats is another thing we say sometimes. Does it matter?

Are you cranky?

Maybe. 

Not enough sugar?

Never enough sugar. 

Are we being literal? 

I don't know, I've lost track of the conversation. 

Want some toast?

Yes. 

I can put cinnamon sugar on it-

Oh, lord no. Cheese will be fine. 

We can go get cupcakes later. 

This house is full of fancy Christmas desserts and baked goods. I think the cupcakes can wait. 

But what about the day? 

It's not Cupcake day in Canada. 

What is it?

It's Tuesday.

Not zombies because I'm so zombied-out.

 I'm really struggling with blogger. Holy. Every time I start a post I have to go out and remove all of the weird formatting that's already in place when I start. My header is now a decade old and I don't know how to change it anymore. I'm so sorry. I'm not a web person. I'm not a tech person nor am I a smart person and I feel like any attempt to change anything breaks everything so I may as well leave it alone. 

That's a metaphor for life right there. 

The dog and the cat are laying together at my feet. There's a huge fire crackling in the woodstove and it's still dark, now ten to nine and this blows my mind. The rain's pouring in sheets down the glass outside. I wanted to have my coffee and do my writing in the gazebo but truly it's terrible out there. 

It's December fourteenth. Holy. I snapped my fingers and two weeks flew by. It feels as if Ben's birthday was a thousand years ago. It feels like ages. I've been baking and wrapping and organizing too, something I like to do before Christmas, clearing out stuff that just sits, stuff we haven't touched, old clothes, ill-fitting things, surplus bedding and dishes, coats and boots and tools and I get a truckload and donate it to one of the charities that actually puts it into the hands of people who need it without them having to pay for it. And then I still feel bad. Not sure about the guilt. I guess it comes from being exceedingly poor and hungry too and I will never ever get used to this. 

Maybe it was the raincoat finally wearing-through that triggered this. Maybe it was something else. Maybe it was because this weekend we finished To The Lake/Epidemiya (after a gap where we just couldn't seem to get through the last three episodes, because we had to watch other things)

And wow.

Honestly. It's sort of somewhat hilarious. We went into knowing it was a Cannes selection, and that it was a Russian zombie series. Well, yes but no it isn't. Aside from the hilarity and the absolute horror (CHRIST) it's a great piece on the human condition, human psychology when everything is stripped away. Just, damn, it was fucking weird and I loved it and there better be a second season though I don't know if I can get up the nerve to watch it. 

Then we caught up on The Mandalorian. Then we started Alice in Borderland. We also have to finish The Expanse and I still want to go watch the last episode of Salvation because we abandoned it and I hate doing that. 

I tried to read a Kurt Vonnegut book and failed miserably. The one I started in JULY and absolutely HATE so I'll read the last page and stick it on the shelf and pick up the second in that now-years-old detective series from Stephen King so I can clear those maybe over Christmas. 

I also promised myself I would paint more and sing more and draw way more so I'm going to do that too. 

Gosh, in that case, I definitely have a busy day ahead. I'm glad it's raining though. Makes it more magical somehow altogether. I used to live for sunny days but that's a fools errand here on the coast.