Well, so much for today being my first full day back on the farm.
My uncle's tantrums and unstable mental state led to us turning around and driving all the way back. It just isn't safe there. I'll have to go back this weekend to pick up the previous loads and take them to a rented storage unit, where I can at least be sure they're safe from his fits of pique.
From that point, I have to discuss with my mother what's to be done. I can't live out there while he's living there, I can't afford the rent on a house in the same town, and I feel pretty damn put out that HE is preventing me from living on my grandfather's and son's property.
For now, I'm done fighting it. I spent money I didn't want to part with buying myself new clothes, new work boots, and a new haircut for my new life. I should have waited. I'm not taking the clothes or boots back, my hair is still going to Locks of Love, but I'm through planning and scheduling. Until I know that property is safe for me to live on, I'm not going back.
Showing posts with label beginning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label beginning. Show all posts
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Moving..
Moving is like a mission in a weird game; but you aren't just collecting things, you're collecting things and putting them in various sized boxes. Then, you put the smaller boxes into bigger boxes, until you're nauseous at the mere sight of a piece of cardboard.
Then, you find out all those BOXES have to go in a CAR and be DRIVEN to a new place, where you aren't sure you'll have power, and you KNOW you won't have internet, and you start looking at your iPhone like it is The Holy Grail of Life Giving Connectivity and realize you're soon going to have to take things to a whole new level of Boxdom. Why?
Well...
You still haven't bought a toaster. Or a plug-in counter top burner. Or a microwave. Or a tea kettle. Or important things like one of every single thing that belongs in a kitchen. Also, you still don't have pans yet, and the whole of your dining capabilities rest in the hands of a fistful of forks you nabbed from your soon-to-be-former housemates (because how awesome is it to have a fork with tines THAT LONG?) and a partial set of dishes from said housemates. You also don't have a cat crate to house the soon-to-be-neurotic cat that's only just gotten over the fact that you disappeared for a week and left him to watch furniture move and his little friend die.
You sit in a corner for a while, babbling incessantly to yourself about Lists and Boxes and Panic Attacks and Where Are The Meds, Again, and Why Did I Ever Decide It'd Be Easier To Wait Another Month.
Then you find out the trip you were going to take to get the bulk of the stuff to New Place is canceled. Just when you organized your brain enough to throw Panic in a dark cell with a ball gag and straight jacket on.
Suddenly, like The Joker, there it is again, cackling at you.
So you walk around high-strung, which starts a fight about how your part of Moving is "easy" and all you can think is "What the fuck EASY. YOU get to leave me there and go home to a house that has everything right where you left it and people are happy and there's internet and cable and a working, clean kitchen and people who aren't entirely CRAZY. I have to deal with unpacking all these damn BOXXEN and try to keep a cat from dying of a heart attack and find out at three a.m. that I FORGOT TO BUY MUSTARD AND DAMMIT I NEED MUSTARD RIGHT NOW and there's no handy person with a car right there saying 'hey, it's right down the street, let's go pick some up and maybe a little drive-thru food, too since we're passing eleven hundred places that sell hot food convenience' because there's only an aunt and crazy uncle and I can't drive and the nearest store that's open after midnight is FIVE TOWNS OVER and there isn't even a goddamn TOWN for thirty fucking miles!"
Pretty soon, you've got high enough stress levels that you're sure you've lost at least a dozen years from your optimal parts usage and you've cleaned most of the kitchen.
So, hours later, we've moved all but one giant box and a few small boxes (plus one cat and one suitcase) in one load, dealt with several bouts of crying, , deposited BOXXEN, drove most of the way back, stopped for a drink, and came home to a cranky mama that was supposed to be asleep for all the hours it took to drive out. Silly opens the door and out bursts a massive smile and streak of curls, who dances on seeing Daddy is home, but is NOT coming inside till she sees Lala is home, too. And all you can think is... it's going to break her heart when Daddy drives off for all day again in a week and comes home alone.
As important as it is... I find myself wanting to say "Nevermind, I don't want to go, I want to go back to having my safe space and playing with my girl and watching her grow up and never missing a minute of it and god dammit, why did I choose to move so far away?"
Then, you find out all those BOXES have to go in a CAR and be DRIVEN to a new place, where you aren't sure you'll have power, and you KNOW you won't have internet, and you start looking at your iPhone like it is The Holy Grail of Life Giving Connectivity and realize you're soon going to have to take things to a whole new level of Boxdom. Why?
Well...
You still haven't bought a toaster. Or a plug-in counter top burner. Or a microwave. Or a tea kettle. Or important things like one of every single thing that belongs in a kitchen. Also, you still don't have pans yet, and the whole of your dining capabilities rest in the hands of a fistful of forks you nabbed from your soon-to-be-former housemates (because how awesome is it to have a fork with tines THAT LONG?) and a partial set of dishes from said housemates. You also don't have a cat crate to house the soon-to-be-neurotic cat that's only just gotten over the fact that you disappeared for a week and left him to watch furniture move and his little friend die.
You sit in a corner for a while, babbling incessantly to yourself about Lists and Boxes and Panic Attacks and Where Are The Meds, Again, and Why Did I Ever Decide It'd Be Easier To Wait Another Month.
Then you find out the trip you were going to take to get the bulk of the stuff to New Place is canceled. Just when you organized your brain enough to throw Panic in a dark cell with a ball gag and straight jacket on.
Suddenly, like The Joker, there it is again, cackling at you.
So you walk around high-strung, which starts a fight about how your part of Moving is "easy" and all you can think is "What the fuck EASY. YOU get to leave me there and go home to a house that has everything right where you left it and people are happy and there's internet and cable and a working, clean kitchen and people who aren't entirely CRAZY. I have to deal with unpacking all these damn BOXXEN and try to keep a cat from dying of a heart attack and find out at three a.m. that I FORGOT TO BUY MUSTARD AND DAMMIT I NEED MUSTARD RIGHT NOW and there's no handy person with a car right there saying 'hey, it's right down the street, let's go pick some up and maybe a little drive-thru food, too since we're passing eleven hundred places that sell hot food convenience' because there's only an aunt and crazy uncle and I can't drive and the nearest store that's open after midnight is FIVE TOWNS OVER and there isn't even a goddamn TOWN for thirty fucking miles!"
Pretty soon, you've got high enough stress levels that you're sure you've lost at least a dozen years from your optimal parts usage and you've cleaned most of the kitchen.
So, hours later, we've moved all but one giant box and a few small boxes (plus one cat and one suitcase) in one load, dealt with several bouts of crying, , deposited BOXXEN, drove most of the way back, stopped for a drink, and came home to a cranky mama that was supposed to be asleep for all the hours it took to drive out. Silly opens the door and out bursts a massive smile and streak of curls, who dances on seeing Daddy is home, but is NOT coming inside till she sees Lala is home, too. And all you can think is... it's going to break her heart when Daddy drives off for all day again in a week and comes home alone.
As important as it is... I find myself wanting to say "Nevermind, I don't want to go, I want to go back to having my safe space and playing with my girl and watching her grow up and never missing a minute of it and god dammit, why did I choose to move so far away?"
Friday, June 19, 2009
Gardening Dreams
I've wanted a garden for years.
Growing up, I had several grandparents inspire in me the urge to grow. My grandpa Ray had a huge amount of land behind his house, to us city dwellers. He'd go out every year and till a good, wide patch for peppers, tomatoes, melons, and god knows what else. My grandpa Jim lived out of the way, in a tiny "blink and ya passed it" town called Princeton. His two acres sat between the local post office and the hardware store/mechanic. Across the way was public works (open only by appointment) and behind him, the Sacramento River. With his sandy soil and the town's "valley" cupping the scorching heat each summer, he grew tomatoes by the bushel and anything else he fancied. He would trade produce with a woman down the street for her chicken's eggs, bring ducklings to his window to show me, and always demanded I eat at least a tiny bite of onion with my country breakfast. My Texas grandparents, Evelyn and Miles, had a peach tree in their back yard and flowers in the front. Occasionally, my grandpa Miles would get an urge and we'd all head to the garden supply. I was always allowed to pick out at least one flower and, if it were a garden year, some seeds or starter plants. The ground was good for a couple of inches, and nothing but hard-pack clay below. Still, we managed to play around with our new babies throughout the seasons.
I still hear stories about my early escapades in the garden. How Ray told my mom there was "nothing out there" I could hurt and to let me be. A while later, I came in, beaming at him as every tiny pepper and tomato his plants had held rolled around in my cupped-up skirt. How I would crawl under the canopy of twining indeterminate tomato vines at Jim's place, playing with his chickens and ducks. The way I'd listen so carefully to Miles as he patiently explained for the tenth time that my plants won't have grown another inch since the day before and nod my agreement, only to run outside with the ruler, yet again.
I've dug tiny garden plots in every property my mother moved to, including her last. I'm still embarassed to see the dip in the exact center of the left half of her lawn, when I go to visit. Why couldn't I have done it in the back yard, or maybe off along the side of the house, why did I have to scar her lawn - her landlord's lawn? She still jokes about it and I still defend my reasoning. The other spots wouldn't have had enough sun, and besides she sure seemed to enjoy the hell out of the garlic, onions, peppers, and tomatoes I'd brought in. Years later, when my grandpa would be moved into the little "in-law cottage" behind my mother's house, I'd plant an apple sapling in a giant plastic "drinks" tub and bury cut-off sprouts from her russets in back, where my grandpa could watch them from his chair by the window. My aunt and I would dig up little potatoes and cut down swathes of white and yellow iris to bring in and marvel over with him.
Over a year after his passing, years after I'd planted my potatoes and moved away, my mom still finds tiny ones in the dirt, dug up by the new "back neighbor's" dog.
These men taught me something more important than being outside or risk/reward behaviour.. They taught me to respect my land, to respect my food, and to know the pleasure of growing something with your own labor.
I haven't had a garden - even a plant - in years. I moved out of Jim's place, away from owned land and wide spaces. I met and fell in love. I marveled at living in an apartment for the first time since my very first years. I was ecstatic over hot, running water that was safe to drink. A toilet that didn't lead to a septic tank. Showering inside. Walking down the street for cigarettes or a gallon of milk. Pizza delivery, having access to a phone and a car. Internet! I didn't need a plant; I could hang over our tiny, ground-level patio and look at the bushes and grass of the apartment complex.
We would move many times, after that. Renting half a house owned by out of state family, with in-laws as roommates, sharing a rented house with other in-laws, struggling to maintain rent on the same house alone, downgrading to one side of a duplex. At each place, a familiar refrain: "Can I have a garden?"
And then... the housing market was dealt a set of terrible blows. Prices had gone up from 'expensive' to 'unreasonable' and then 'you're kidding me!' The bottom fell out. Those that had taken out loans and mortgages on such high values couldn't keep up. Banks reclaimed, real estate officials donned sackcloth and ash, proclaiming "the end is nigh". And off in a little room, our little GRIM cried. Soon, grandparents were thinking about the tiny, wriggling bundle's future as well as their own.
We call what we do here "renting", but really.. we're paying back a long-term loan. We have a house. We have a pair of yards - front and back. We're in a safe, quiet neighborhood. There's a park just down the street, and the elementary school GRIM will one day attend is just beyond our fence. We. Own. A. Yard.
"Can I have a garden?"
"Well, it'd take a lot of work..."
"Duh. Can I have a garden?"
"There's still a lot that needs to be done *inside* the house."
"Noted. Can I have a garden?"
"...If you help, yes. You can have a garden."
This.. is my sandbox. I will take all I have learned at the knee of my elders, and make it something they would be proud of.
Growing up, I had several grandparents inspire in me the urge to grow. My grandpa Ray had a huge amount of land behind his house, to us city dwellers. He'd go out every year and till a good, wide patch for peppers, tomatoes, melons, and god knows what else. My grandpa Jim lived out of the way, in a tiny "blink and ya passed it" town called Princeton. His two acres sat between the local post office and the hardware store/mechanic. Across the way was public works (open only by appointment) and behind him, the Sacramento River. With his sandy soil and the town's "valley" cupping the scorching heat each summer, he grew tomatoes by the bushel and anything else he fancied. He would trade produce with a woman down the street for her chicken's eggs, bring ducklings to his window to show me, and always demanded I eat at least a tiny bite of onion with my country breakfast. My Texas grandparents, Evelyn and Miles, had a peach tree in their back yard and flowers in the front. Occasionally, my grandpa Miles would get an urge and we'd all head to the garden supply. I was always allowed to pick out at least one flower and, if it were a garden year, some seeds or starter plants. The ground was good for a couple of inches, and nothing but hard-pack clay below. Still, we managed to play around with our new babies throughout the seasons.
I still hear stories about my early escapades in the garden. How Ray told my mom there was "nothing out there" I could hurt and to let me be. A while later, I came in, beaming at him as every tiny pepper and tomato his plants had held rolled around in my cupped-up skirt. How I would crawl under the canopy of twining indeterminate tomato vines at Jim's place, playing with his chickens and ducks. The way I'd listen so carefully to Miles as he patiently explained for the tenth time that my plants won't have grown another inch since the day before and nod my agreement, only to run outside with the ruler, yet again.
I've dug tiny garden plots in every property my mother moved to, including her last. I'm still embarassed to see the dip in the exact center of the left half of her lawn, when I go to visit. Why couldn't I have done it in the back yard, or maybe off along the side of the house, why did I have to scar her lawn - her landlord's lawn? She still jokes about it and I still defend my reasoning. The other spots wouldn't have had enough sun, and besides she sure seemed to enjoy the hell out of the garlic, onions, peppers, and tomatoes I'd brought in. Years later, when my grandpa would be moved into the little "in-law cottage" behind my mother's house, I'd plant an apple sapling in a giant plastic "drinks" tub and bury cut-off sprouts from her russets in back, where my grandpa could watch them from his chair by the window. My aunt and I would dig up little potatoes and cut down swathes of white and yellow iris to bring in and marvel over with him.
Over a year after his passing, years after I'd planted my potatoes and moved away, my mom still finds tiny ones in the dirt, dug up by the new "back neighbor's" dog.
These men taught me something more important than being outside or risk/reward behaviour.. They taught me to respect my land, to respect my food, and to know the pleasure of growing something with your own labor.
I haven't had a garden - even a plant - in years. I moved out of Jim's place, away from owned land and wide spaces. I met and fell in love. I marveled at living in an apartment for the first time since my very first years. I was ecstatic over hot, running water that was safe to drink. A toilet that didn't lead to a septic tank. Showering inside. Walking down the street for cigarettes or a gallon of milk. Pizza delivery, having access to a phone and a car. Internet! I didn't need a plant; I could hang over our tiny, ground-level patio and look at the bushes and grass of the apartment complex.
We would move many times, after that. Renting half a house owned by out of state family, with in-laws as roommates, sharing a rented house with other in-laws, struggling to maintain rent on the same house alone, downgrading to one side of a duplex. At each place, a familiar refrain: "Can I have a garden?"
And then... the housing market was dealt a set of terrible blows. Prices had gone up from 'expensive' to 'unreasonable' and then 'you're kidding me!' The bottom fell out. Those that had taken out loans and mortgages on such high values couldn't keep up. Banks reclaimed, real estate officials donned sackcloth and ash, proclaiming "the end is nigh". And off in a little room, our little GRIM cried. Soon, grandparents were thinking about the tiny, wriggling bundle's future as well as their own.
We call what we do here "renting", but really.. we're paying back a long-term loan. We have a house. We have a pair of yards - front and back. We're in a safe, quiet neighborhood. There's a park just down the street, and the elementary school GRIM will one day attend is just beyond our fence. We. Own. A. Yard.
"Can I have a garden?"
"Well, it'd take a lot of work..."
"Duh. Can I have a garden?"
"There's still a lot that needs to be done *inside* the house."
"Noted. Can I have a garden?"
"...If you help, yes. You can have a garden."
This.. is my sandbox. I will take all I have learned at the knee of my elders, and make it something they would be proud of.
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