Someone said I should make sure to capture the Veronica cuteness on my blog.

This era, right now – maybe the last week of July and all of August 2012 so far is really the ascendancy of cuteness. I like that she is telling me things.

One night, in the middle of the night, while she would NOT let me leave because I was Mommy and she was awake, she mused “Where does the sun go?”

I LOVE that question. I was leaning back in the dark on the chair in her room trying to think of a way of explaining the horizon of a sphere and orbiting. I didn’t answer because it was time to sleep. I look forward to answering.

But beyond her new curiousity, she is also bossing me. I should probably not encourage this, in the same way you should not let a puppy jump on your legs…because the 5 pound puppy *will* one day be 50 pounds, and that is a lot more meaningful jumping against one’slegs.

But she is bossy. “Be quiet!” she says .

We were at the store yesterday. I had walked away to select some produce…melon? Banana…? No, I think the walnuts were on sale.

But when I returned to the cart where she perched, she took my face in her dimpled hands and said “Mommy! You are not listening to me!”

I like your style, kid. “What do you want to tell me?”

And then she looked around and said a few things in Veronish. It appeared that the issuewas not what she had to say, the main point was that I should listen to whatever it was.

So we are dialoguing. And I like that a lot. Took a while to get here. I think it will last quite a while.

I had a lot of trouble getting Veronica to sleep tonight.

She did not want me to go. SHe wanted me to hold her hand until she fell asleep. Well, she would prefer that I hold her hand and not stop. But she didn’t know what happened after she fell asleep, so I knew when the getting was good.

Anyway, I don’t like to indulge this preference of hers. I was trying to leave. I picked her up, before the meltdown, and took her to daddy in teh living room.

“She’s having a hard time. She could use help.

She said “Very hard”

It’s hard sometimes.

She did not accept the daddy substitute. I had to hold her hand til she slept.

It happens.

So I can’t make mint juleps like in the Great Gatsby. But, that brings up another point:

What is so great about Gatsby?

I dont’ get it.

But I am pretty sure I need some ice

I had reason to be afraid. There was a meeting with someone I did not want to talk to. I had spoken with him times before, and so many of the times had been painful.
I had been accused, judged, misunderstood, harassed and rejected. More than once! It was a reliable thing with this fellow.
And I had to talk with him again.
I was afraid. Trying very hard not to be afraid. Shaking, bravely quaking.

And I found this:

The mechanisms were always exactly the same, whether political, religious, psychological, philosophic. Dragons guarded the entrances and exits of each layer in the spectrum of belief, or opinion; and the dragons were always the same dragon, no matter what names they went under. The dragon was fear

I had a dragon to face. And I was not the only one. Dragons–fear dragons–guard treasure.
I had to face this dragon-conquer this dragon-to achieve my heart’s treasure.

If fear saps passion, then passion trumps fear. I want what the dragon is guarding! And I might not even know for sure what that monster is keeping, but if I’m scared of something as silly as talking to someone…there must be something there.

my life after the greenworld is alright, I suppose. I have given myself some tasks to do.

I am tired of being tired of my life. So I have set up a plan to turn myself nearly completely inside out.

And I will work on this every day.

And I will not finish it. Every day, I will make progress on partially turning myself inside out, and being satisfied and comfortable with the process and progress every day.

no wonder I threw my back out.

My dental hygienist gave me a lecture today after cleaning my teeth.

I felt bad for a while, but then I thought, Hey, take a chill pill. I brush and floss 99% of the time. What more do you want from me? And since I do those things, the rest is pretty much luck.

So get off my back.

The thing is, no one is perfect. These dentist people know that which is why they get to be on their high and mighty.

I am not buying it. Yes, I could get all guilty about that 1% that I don’t floss. OR I could get all worried about how maybe I didn’t brush long enough.

BUT I DON”T BUY IT.

Dentists are in a great position. I cannot look and judge for myself how my teeth are doing. I don’t know how to gauge the health of my gums.

So I don’t know how dire the situation is. I may need to have all my teeth pulled out by the end of the year.

Or I may be guilted into getting my teeth cleaned 3 times a year instead of the perfectly adequate 2.

But because I have no way of knowing, I am powerless. I don’t like that. And I don’t like that I am being taken advantage of, in ways I don’t know.

That is a basic human trait, you know. Knowing whether something is right. My toddler knows whether it is right or not.

“No Mommy! I need a FORK for mac&cheese”

She knows it is meant to be eaten with a fork. That’s the right way.

All of us know, inside ourselves, at a very early age, what is right and what is not.

That must be honored in all human interaction.

Sometimes you have to make your own green world. maybe make a fort out of a blanket and the couch cushions.

But the changed perspective is required.

Listening to a program about colors, the hosts suggested that while colors do objectively exist we cannot ever be certain what color any individual is perceiving at any time.

People see different things. Some people are color blind and don’t see certain colors, or if they do, they see them differently.

This reminds me of something I learned in literature classes. I can write something, and someone else can read it. I cannot really know what that person takes away from what I have written. It is a creation of that reading, a combination of the person who wrote, the person who read and their experiential space and time.

I write things and send them out to my blog readers. Some of you respond in ways that are heartfelt and completely unexpected. I could not have guess that someone would read THAT into what I wrote.

I had no idea.

You and me, reader, can create something together that we could not do individually.

and isn’t that beautiful?

I told the librarian that I published a book. She was suitably impressed. She congratulated me, and asked “When do you find time to write? Do you treat it like a second job and sit down for four hours a day?”

I do not. I can’t say i find time to write. I find time to write like I find time to pee.

I do it when I can, whenever and whereever I find myself.

I have learned to be organized about it, and what I need to write next. And to edit when editing is required.
But I do not treat it so preciously that I have to set aside time.

Maybe one day I will set aside time. But mostly, I just do it in between all the other things.

Is literature the real world?
Maybe it is not the real world.

I took a break from literary books, and grabbed onto the fantasy raft. I need to know that dragons will be slain and heroes win.

BUt i was strong and the water had receded.

Excpet the book was strong too. I could’t handle this one. It is good. But I am not ready.

Don’t read the Bell Jar when you are feeling low.

And, some books are for the strong.