It is I, Mo-Dean! (The "Fight Back Fun Martina" mix)

Where have I been, you ask? Funny story...

So, there I was out on the Ave, waiting for the number 99 bus. It was Friday (a payday) and, as I am wont to do, I was making a run to the store to pick up a celebratory repast of veggie hot dogs and cheap wine. Anyway, I'm waiting there, kinda pissed off, because Tri-Met is always late, when suddenly the wind kicks up something fierce and I am blinded by a bright light. Long story short, the next thing you know, there I am in the belly of a big old UFO!

What? Those are the lyrics to a B-52's song? The hell you say! It all seemed so real...

Okay. So, really, the month of July has been really rough. Work has been insanely busy, my old lady cat was diagnosed with kidney failure, I've been broke, and (worst of all) grossly neglecting all of my friends. I'm surprised I have any left. Crap, I hope I have some left! To cap it off, somewhere around the middle of last week I came down with the mother of all bronchial infections. It is finally starting to ease, but the husky voiced viral residue is still skulking about like a thug under one of those creepy, yellow Long Beach street lights. I've managed to share the "love" with a family member who is now sick too. Like I don't find enough things to feel guilty about. Suffice it to say that things have not been going well. If I had balls, I'm sure someone would have delivered a swift kick to them.

More insidious, however, is the rut I've felt stuck in even before the frightful fortnight began. I know I'm not alone. This feeling seems to hit everyone somewhere around my age. When I look into my heart (and, most days, even in the mirror), I don't feel so old. Then, I look at my birth certificate and think "Crap, what the hell have I been doing all this time? What do I have to show for it? Where did the two roads in the wood diverge to become this dead end???"

Don't get me wrong. I have a good life. I have incredible family and friends, a good job, a nice enough place to live, and I am now (almost) debt-free. But what mark have I made? What will the world remember of me when I am nothing but a pile of dust? What will I remember when I am old and looking back at my life? What kinds of fabulous stories will I have to tell? I know they won't be all about work deadlines I've met or how I saved my company a gajillion dollars in temp costs by designing a (if I do say so myself) kickass new system of book distribution that involves uploading and auditing macros, but very little actual manpower. God, I hope not!

I want to remember that I was happy, that I had fun, and (as pollyanaish as it sounds) that I contributed something that in some way left the world better than it was when my short life found it. It's not going to matter how skillfully I climbed some corporate ladder I never really cared about anyway. I may be too old to be trustworthy, but I'm not too old want more. And, so, I have made a resolution to make the rest of the year my own personal happiness project.

I've been thinking for a while that this blog needs some kind of overhaul or structure or something. I'm not yet sure what that will ultimately mean. Maybe it just means writing about the things that make me happy, but I really do think that (for a while at least) that may mean exploring what it really means to be fulfilled and focusing on the positive sorts of things that foster growth, creativity, play, gratitude, well-roundedness and (as hokey as it sounds) joy. Maybe I'm just still high from an earlier Yoga Bootie Ballet sesion, but the time has come for fun Martina to fight back. So, from here on out, it's all sunshine and unicorns. Oh, and rainbows. And butterflies and kittens. And probably candy (but not from strangers - unless it's Halloween - on Halloween all bets are off). And, just so you know, I will begin dotting the "i" in my name with a smiley face, which of course, you won't be able to see, because everything here is typed. But don't worry, you can still picture it that way in your head. See, imagination! We're getting creative already and a creative brain is a happy brain, right?

Lily Strikes Again

The avian killing spree continues. After ten days of quiet, tonight I found half a beak on the couch - a BEAK. Do you know how disconcerting it is to find bird parts laying around your home? Sadly, it wasn't completely unexpected. The only real surpise was that I found it out in the open instead of stuck under the pillow where my little furry friend usually hides her booty.

We were all out on the back porch enjoying a delicious dessert of sweet buttermilk biscuits with lemon curd, berries and cream after a belated birthday dinner with a friend, when I heard Lily at the door. Because I will apparently never learn, I forgot to do the all important poultry check before opening the door. Before I knew it, she had rushed into the house with a newly dead sparrow. Then, after much running, hiding and making it abundantly clear that she was not going to give it up without a fight, she proceeded to eat half of it (the top half, to be exact). Eventually, all that was left were some feathers, the aforementioned beak half and my growing disgust. I don't know what is worse - that my dog is a super gross or that I can love her as much as I do despite her deviance.

The Furry Face of Death

Lily Dog
Originally uploaded by Martina

Pets can be really delightful. It's one of the reasons I seem to get suckered into adopting every stray that lands on my doorstep. They are good company, they love unconditionally. Studies have even shown that they lower blood pressure (though I always have to think that actually enjoying animals has to play a required role in there somewhere for it to work - otherwise they'd just be an annoyance). Sure, they sometimes lose their furry little minds and chew up a favorite pair of shoes and lord knows they can drive a person up a wall with their innate ability to somehow make their ten pound frames take up 2/3 of a queen sized bed. Over all, though, they are on my short list of things in life that make me happiest.

But, then, there are those times when they are just plain gross.For example, this morning, when I heard a muffled bark outside the screen door and found Lily standing there bright eyed, ears erect, carriage proud as she begged to be let in with the special prize she found in the garden. Upon closer inspection, it became clear that she was brandishing not a chew toy, but a dead sparrow.

After being denied entry to the family manor and turning down a trade of some barbequed pork that came with last night's traditional Independence Day Chinese takeout, she took to wandering the garden with her precious. At some point, just carrying the bird somehow morphed into chewing. The precious had been deemed delicious enough to eat. Lily and the precious are now one.

So now, I not only share my home with a killer, but one with the foul stench of house sparrow on her breath. This is doubly disturbing after having hand raised Nelson, Jimbo and Johnny (may he rest in peace) a couple of summers ago. I can only hope this sparrow was not a relative.

The American Kennel Club describes the papillon as "a small, friendly, elegant toy dog of fine-boned structure, light, dainty and of lively action; distinguished from other breeds by its beautiful butterfly-like ears.". NOWHERE do they mention "murderer of sparrows" or "enjoys eating young birds' livers with some fava beans and a nice chianti".

Technically, papillons are a kind of miniature spaniel and spaniels were bred as hunting dogs, so I guess it can't be completely unexpected. That still doesn't remove the "ewww" factor, though. Now she has acquired a taste for feathers, I fear the killing will not end here. No more wearing my purple feather boa and plumed showgirl headdress to bed. I will sleep with one eye open. The worst part is that she is probably just charming enough to get away with it, because in the immortal words of Bart Simpson: "No one suspects the butterfly."

How fun is this?

Whose photo could that be on the upper left? Could it be...
MINE? (It is aptly titled "Starfish with White Thing", because I did so well in Marine Biology back in college.)

Because it's hotter than a mofo out there!

It's one of the handful of summer days where it is HOT here in Portland. While love the sun on a breezy day, I don't tend to love the heat. Normally, I would probably be complaining like everyone else, but it's been such a nice weekend - dinners out (shrimp tacos you and are delicious and if I could find you, oh inventor of the mojito, I would kiss you right now! I really must add making mojitos more often to my list of important things to do!), BBQs (how sweet is it that my supermeateating friend, Jala actually prepared some BOCA burgers, despite the obvious affront they pose to her carnivorous, Southern barbequeing ways?!), sleepover guests, and dinner plans later tonight. With such good times, I don't seem to have much right complaining about anything!

My long-anticipated (I even pre-ordered it before it was available!) Phillip DePoy mystery arrived in the mail from Amazon on Friday. His Fever Develin (mystery solving, mountain folklorist) novels are SO much fun! They are the sort of books that leave a book nerd wanting more. It's because of the feeling such books gave me that I got interested in writing as a kid. I can't tell you how excited my dorky, little heart was the day I discovered that The Devil's Hearth was the first in a series and not just a one off! Now that the house guests have gone home, there is plenty of time to lounge on the back deck with a frosty beverage and some fresh, sweet cherries. There I will read to my heart's content until it is time to leave for dinner.

Meanwhile, here are some cooling pictures from my fabulous June road trip (more on that later!)

What I believe...

From my Tarot.com horoscope today:
Regardless of your religious affiliation, today can be a profound day of spiritual renewal for you. But this may not involve church or even a formal service. The magic of creation speaks directly to you now through the beauty of nature, the contemplation of silence and the appreciation of the abundance in your life.

Oddly enough, today I had planned to wake up early to go to church. I haven't been going regularly lately and I have never been a Churchy McChurcherson. In fact, I've had some really bad experiences with religion (like the time a seminary student informed me when my father died that it was a shame that I wasn't saved, because instead of a reunion with him in heaven, I could look forward to an afterlife of eternal hellfire and damnation). Sorry, but that is not my God and if I wanted to join the Church of the Quivering Brethren ("There'll be no butter in hell!"), I'd catch a ride in Amos Starkadder's Ford van.

The church I go to, Bridgeport UCC is a special place. It is open, socially conscious and politically progressive. I find it comfortable, because it is a place that offers a warm welcome to anyone - die hard believer, spiritual wayfarer, gay, lesbian, straight, transgender, black, white, green, you name it. You don't need to be able to speak English, only kindness and love. While the denomination is decidedly Christian, it (or at least the church I go to) tolerates the notion that there are various paths and that they have validity. This goes a long way in dispelling some of my long held prejudices about organized religion and "how churches (and church people) are".

Truth be known, I always feel somewhat ambivalent about religion as an organized body. Evangelists will disagree, but to me faith is a very personal thing. I'm not even sure that I have faith - at least not in the way that I am "supposed" to. The overarching messages of kindness and goodness that span through most religions speak to me - dogma and perscriptivism not so much. I am still ambivalent about calling myself a Christian, but I am not ambivalent about seeking for greater meaning or doing it via various auspices.

I found Bridgeport one Christmas Eve when I was longing for some ritual, something to add a specialness to a holiday that was seeming kind of meaningless. As much as I enjoy my Santa mythology and a good gift, there has to be something more out there. I had wanted to go to the big, old UCC downtown (despite my ambivalence about religion, I've always enjoyed the architecture of a nice, old church), but was diverted to a smaller outpost in SE Portland when I started having second thoughts about the potential parking situation. (Yes, that's how devout I am. I can be put off by inconvenient parking.) So, instead, I found myself spending Christmas Eve in the smaller, more intimate setting of Bridgeport.

A few years later, I still remember my first impression of it as a place permeated with warmth. It was in the honeygold color of the wood fixtures, the friendliness of the reverend and the feeling that washed over me as I sang Dona nobis pacem with a bunch of strangers by candlelight. That is what made it feel like home. It is still my favorite part of the Christmas service there. Although the reverend there delivers a lovely (deep yet accessible) and well composed sermon, it is the music that makes even the regular services come alive for me. It is in it that sound community that I find something approaching God, joy.

When I first started going to Bridgeport, I felt like a bit of a fraud. When I looked around I naively assumed that the others were all so sure in their faith. And then there was me, the girl who is not even sure of what her faith is.

Do I believe in the Divine? Check.

Do I think S/He is necessarily what we think of as God? No. As near as I can figure, God is like the blaue Blume of Romantic literature - something we seek to find, but never completely know or understand. The Ding an sich that is commonly called God can't be known completely. It can only be known via our limited human perspective. If I'm looking at God's front, I can't see her back and vice versa. There is always going to be some "angle" that I can't see from my vantage point, some angle that I have to take on faith. The best I can do is keep searching for pieces until I can put the puzzle together. As a result, I think the most we can do is try to be the best we can be and know that if in making a good faith effort we fail, the Universe will forgive us.

Do I believe in The Bible? If I'm going to be honest, not literally. I believe the "red letter" parts about kindness and doing unto others, but I can find those in other religious systems and even just my own value system as well.

In contrast to my early days at Bridgeport, I now realize that we are all on our own journeys. We might sometimes walk together and share community, but our individual paths are our own. There is more than one way to get to the apex of a mountain. The only thing that I am really sure about is that my relationship to God is experiential. I don't want someone telling me how to how to think and that is one thing I love about Bridgeport. There, I can enjoy walking with a community of travellers without feeling pressured by them. Like a stubborn toddler, I don't want to be carried. I want to feel the Divine for myself. I want to learn for myself even if doing it means that I might sometimes fall and scratch my knee.

It is funny, but in writing this post, I now better understand what I meant when the following poured out in response to one of Wendy's lovely writing prompts. Maybe I am not so ambivalent after all.

Do not tell me what to think about God.
When you talk so much,
I cannot hear her breath
caress the strings of the universe.
Don't tell me who she is, but let me feel her in the quiet.
I don't want your books or your sermons
and, please, no shrill proclamations.
Her symphony echos not in the dry crackling pages
of dusty voiced prophets and old men.
It whispers through the soft rustle of the leaves,
the silent shimmer of blossoms
beneath the glow of a new spring moon.
I hear her as I breathe - quietly, deeply
hoping to match the cadence of her breath
as I listen for the song beneath the silence.

Roadside Lessons and Epiphanies

Even when gas prices have soared higher than the eye of an elephant on stilts, there is no denying that road trips are fun (as long as you don't have to hawk a kidney for fuel). As I work through uploading all my pictures from my last two trips and compiling a travelogue of sorts, here are some things I have learned on my last two road extravaganzas:

1. If you want to make a three year old smile, invite him on an elephant ride.

2. Now that the guy who whistled the Andy Griffith Theme has died, if only I could whistle, there would be a niche for my kickass skills. My inevitable TV variety show would be called "Look who's whistling now". Its spin-off "So you think you can whistle", would pit other whistlers against each other for the prize of a guest duet with me on my upcoming album "These lips are made for whistling".

3. Toppenish is the City of Murals. Its best mural (and possibly the best mural ever!) is the one of someone called Irish Dick being mauled by a bear.

4. I like Cumbia.

5. I like Beyoncé better in Spanish than in English, because I don't have to understand it when she exhorts me to shake my derriere in Deréon and then wonder if there is anything that woman will not shill.

6. In a pinch, it is possible to transform a yurt in to a DIY disco if someone in your party is in possession of a sparkly bag, a flashlight, and a cell phone that plays MP3's - and I was! P.s. Be sure to learn all the words to "I will survive". That way when your phone battery dies, you can teach them to everyone else and the party will go on.

7. If I am ever lost in the wilderness, I will probably wander in circles before ultimately being eaten by a bear. (And if I make it through the night, I will be cold, because I cannot build a fire to save my life.)

8. Even though I always thought ATV's were for rednecks, it turns out that a Dune Buggy + Sand Dunes + High Speed = Fun. I am, however, not going to act on my friend Mike's suggestion that I try out other redneck pasttimes like Nascar and meth. (P.s. Dear Mike - Remember that time we played Scrabble and I got almost ALL the tripple word scores? Those were good times - almost as good as that time I beat you! Love, Martina)

9. Food make with fresh seafood - especially clam chowder - should be eaten as often as possible.

10. KOA "Kabins" (their "K", not mine!) have VCR's/DVD players in case you want to watch a movie while you are roughing it.

11. A group of what I like to think are Wenatchee stoners in possession of some doobies, a bag of apples, a syringe, and some Welches grape juice have invented a wonderous new fruit called a "Grapple" (pronounced so the first syllable sounds like "grape", because they are tricksy stoners). I myself am waiting for someone in Tillamook to invent the crapple (a cranberry apple hybrid, pronounced just as you'd expect!) But for now, here is a box of half eaten Grapples, resting on a disco bag: