katecontinued shared her 2008 challenge to live a sustainable life with austerity, authority and artistry. 2009 . . . let the sun shine! . . . redirection of energy to the outside.
I found an apt response to the above question in a post by Fred Branfman about Noam Chompsky's new book, "Hopes and Prospects".
It was not by making yourself heard but by staying sane that you carried on the human heritage. ... [Doublethink is] to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it. ... [Continuous] war involves very small numbers of people, mostly highly trained specialists. … The fighting … takes place on the vague frontiers whose whereabouts the average man can only guess at. …
—George Orwell, “1984”
[The treatment of the] hapless race of native Americans, which we are exterminating with such merciless and perfidious cruelty, [is] among the heinous sins of this nation, for which I believe God will one day bring [it] to judgment.
—John Quincy Adams, cited in Noam Chomsky’s new book, “Hopes and Prospects”
The really strong response to the charge of hating America for me (a fierce critic of the USofA and Myths America) come with these lines from the Banfman piece:
Chomsky’s explanation of the American system’s imperial mentality also illuminates a seeming mystery: How could decent people like Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama commit so much evil? Our concept of evil is shaped by such paranoid psychotics as Hitler, Stalin and Mao, who all hated their victims and openly lusted for power. We do not yet understand that in today’s American system the problem we face is not so much inhumanity from the mad and evil as “ahumanity” from the sane and decent.
U.S. leaders have nothing against those they regularly kill and impoverish. On the contrary, they often exhibit compassion for them, as when Jimmy Carter supported human rights. But they are products of a system that is indifferent to the fate of the unpeople, whether in the shah’s Iran, Somoza’s Nicaragua, Suharto’s Indonesia or the many other dictatorial regimes that enjoyed President Carter’s support.
Chomsky denies the oft-heard charge that he is “anti-American,” noting his criticism of the crimes of many other nations’ leaders, and saying he focuses on U.S. leaders because, as a U.S. citizen, it is the government he can most affect; because it is the government that has done more harm than any other since 1945; and because the United States’ behavior today poses so much danger to human survival. He might also add that there are so many others eager to catalog the crimes of America’s enemies, yet relatively few Americans willing to document their own leaders’ misdeeds.
This is a really good read at Truthdig.com. Check it out. Really.
"I'm worried that students will take their obedient place in society and look to become successful cogs in the wheel - let the wheel spin them around as it wants without taking a look at what they're doing. I'm concerned that students not become passive acceptors of the official doctrine that's handed down to them from the White House, the media, textbooks, teachers and preachers"
--Howard Zinn
If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest, or some guy on tv telling you how to do your shit, then you deserve it — Frank Zappa
The sun-seeking know to avoid southern California beaches in the late spring. A period known to the locals as May Gray and/or June Gloom often darkens the coastal skies of sunny southern California with a layer of marine stratus. During this time, the coastal clouds may remain all day but often give way to some hazy afternoon sunshine. The number of days during this two month period that are gloomy vary from year to year. Cooler ocean temperatures (La Nina conditions) usually foretell a gloomier period.
The Climate Research Division at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography is currently in the throws of a May Gray / June Gloom contest. Employees are invited to forecast the number of days from May 1 to June 30 that will be gloomy.
A Gray / Gloom day is defined as one with a ceiling (broken [BKN] or overcast [OVC] cloud layer) at or below 2,000 feet above ground level at Lindbergh Field (KSAN) for at least 2 out of the 8 hourly weather observations between 9:00 AM and 4:00 PM.
On a typical May Gray / June Gloom day, the visible satellite imagery will show marine stratus hugging the coast of southern California. June 16, 2004, was such a day and the visible satellite image from that day is show below.
I never go out. Almost. Never. Ever. I am going into San Diego for a party tomorrow at the new digs for Beany and Mr. Beany. Because of settling deeper and deeper into having no car, reluctance to spend money and generally not traveling or anything else at night; this is a big deal. So I have been teasing myself this week about what a big baby I have become. I have driven all across this country bunches of times in my life. I spent years partying and often through to breakfast in Syracuse and in after hours clubs in New York, when we'd see people going to work when we left the club. Those days are over, but I am trying to pry myself from my comfort zone nonetheless.
The only thing threatening my little adventure is a wicked cold that keeps acting like it is clearing and then it gets worse. Because of congestion, I suspect it might be some alergy. That would suck big time for a garden coordinator - I don't mind saying. But, I feel feverish too.
Meanwhile, the happy part after too much background. I made grape leaves today with the son. M actually did most of the preparation with me just giving directions from my comfortable seat. Today we experimented with a kind of dessert version of the grape leaves recipe. I found a great website last week or so called Honest Fare and stumbled on this fig, walnut and goat feta filled grape leaf. Had to try it. I added some dried cranberries, yogurt cheese ( lubany) and a hit of Vietnamese pepper sauce. Please explore this site, this recipe for yourself. It is a treat.
Rather than the regular lamb and rice grape leaves we fixed a vegetarian version and we modified it from the past recipes. For the filling I used brown rice, chickpeas, mushrooms, eggplant, onion, lemon, pine nuts, yellow curry and dried barberries (Zereshk). The last was to give it a bit of a Persian twist. My only complaint was that I used bottled grape leaves as usual and they seemed a bit tough. With the Lebanese version I could count on slow simmering in a pot with lemon water and chicken parts in the bottom. After 45 or 60 minutes the filling cooked and the leaves softened. My recipe will merely be heated through as all of the ingredients were precooked and assembled. Maybe Beany will have an idea prior to serving.
So, the food is ready. I am also taking an overhead projector to them for a painting project. Maybe I can call it a house warming gift. I got it free from the school district - where there are more available. I will take a change of grubby clothes in case I can help paint something.
Sat. am Update: Woke without much congestion and no fever. Yea!
Sun. Update: Had a wonderful time with rich conversations and connections. The food was utterly delicious. My grape leaves were not much of a hit, but that was okay because it left a bunch for my gracious hosts. Their home captivated me. It's a California bungalow built for military wives during the war years. I loved the fixtures and design details. Space planning is clunky - as it was in those years, but a good place to settle into and put one's personal imprint.
I went with my son to a discount store to buy some pants for his work place. I spotted two little kids sitting on the floor having a great time looking at a game or big package. Up close I was really grossed out with what they were engrossed with studying. Fake Food. Tell me advertisers, toy makers, agribusiness, fast food industry are not trying to kill our children? One is titled Farmers Market. Really? Quality of the photos are crap from a camera phone with overhead lighting reflection, but you get the idea. That crap isn't anywhere near what a farmers market is all about to me. Deluxe Mealtime by Ronald with an intercom included. And whatever the last one is about - it ain't cooking - kids or otherwise.
Monday night I spent eight hours with a wonderful woman, Adjowah, on the left above. After 21 years we talked and talked about the person that continues to mean so much in each of our lives, my deceased daughter Angela. Adjowah and Angela were best friends in New York City from 1985-1989, until Angela's death. Those few years meant more to Adjowah than I ever imagined.
I don't mean to exclude my son. He too loved hearing about those years and it helped him remember aspects of his sister he'd forgotten - like her humor and her role as a leader. In his father's home she had always remained quiet and reserved compared to the person she was in her Manhattan life. We all marveled at the difference between recollections among adults opposed to experiences as a teenager is living them in real time - with all of the confusion, questioning and fogginess of the moment.
Adjowah found him on facebook the week of Angela's birthday. This year both he and I struggled with sadness, and it made that the contact even more poignant. She decided then to drive from a craft show in LA, where she sold her work, to our neck of the woods in Southern California. We ate Thai food and hung out at my newly painted, remodeled space. It was so good we are planning on meeting again. She said that she comes south from her home in Oakland 3 or 4 times a year. It is like a reunion with family and I am very pleased.
BTW, the picture came from Adjowah the week or so after she spoke to M. She had gotten it from Angela's other friend, Emily, on the right. (I called this gang the vowel girls, Angela, Adjowah, Emily and Onika.) It was taken in our building's back yard, which was a part of my 175 sf apartment's allocated outdoor space. Pretty awful quality but I love it because I'd totally forgotten that M. had spray painted the message on the wall - his loving thought for me. Too bad he misspelled it.
I hate to admit to procrastination, but I had to clear away cobwebs to paint around my new windows. It was five weeks ago I proclaimed that I was 'almost there' and then I had a meltdown from a combination of construction, school gardens, school politics etc. I stopped everything for 2 weeks - even the pretense of trying to cook at my living room/kitchen set up. Not only did I not prepare for my friend's arrival, I stayed with her at her motel and abandoned my home.
Following that hiatus I found the task of pulling it all together insurmountable. The construction men had been so critical of my work on the home - the all too familiar diminishing comments, expressions and huddled laughter . . . followed by attitude that says, "no, really, we're just kidding. . . .“ I am already facing the loss of strength, agility and energy from age and sedentary lifestyle. At the school I struggle with the imperative of volunteer labor, so impossibly hard to rely on or even to recruit. This loss of confidence that I can charge into a project and pull it together is dying. Too harsh. Let me say it is changing. I much prefer the drama of a complete project push. It is exhilarating and an adrenaline buzz. Now I find I dread even mounting the energy to begin as I know my energy will stall before I am sufficiently finished. Then I get into a nasty loop of self disgust bringing disincentive to charge back into the work.
Yet again I dance around the middle way. I’d be really disappointed if I were trying to be a Buddhist. Seriously, I have rebelled against all things mid, middle or moderate in favor of all or nothing. These days I keep veering towards nothing. When it comes to purging, non-consuming, light footprint and other minimalist goals I excel. When it comes to putting all my attention or focus on something, I do just fine. But, shit howdy, the physical aspects loom large in my daily life. Though I deeply grateful I don’t suffer with pain like millions, I feel miserable about my lack of physical ‘preparedness’ or follow through. Eventually, I get things done. Like now.
I cleared the cobwebs and painted the last two evenings. I have gotten three loads of clothes, bedding and curtains washed before 8 am and have a week-end do list to pull my home together at last. Today is an anniversary as I got approved for this home renovation grant exactly ONE YEAR ago today. Now that is some slow moving change, my friends. Since it took so long, I am trying to mount a weekend cleanathon to have my drama finish. See, there is a special guest coming to visit on Monday. More on that later, so wish me good energy.
Update: While looking for something else I read a post I wrote at this time in April 2008 and I'll be damned if it couldn't have been written today. It was called Priorities and Patterns. I guess this may be a seasonal affect - spring overload or something. I hit upon the workaholic nature. Hmmm . . .
Recently the principal of the grade school suggested I attend a kindergarten registration to promote the garden and recruit parent volunteers. So, I decided to make a little sign for the table to encourage parents to pick up a garden bulletin and sign up on the list posted. I write a garden bulletin each month and April's was filled with photographs like I showed here.
This morning I raced to get the April garden bulletin's Spanish translation text into the newsletter format in time for the kindergarten registration. The woman who translates for the school sent it last night at 10:30 pm. She works full time and does translations, so I'm grateful she can turn it around within the week. I sure hope I can learn more Spanish by simply copying and pasting for this bulletin.
I got to the school and I'd forgotten to include the Spanish version .pdf attachment. I had to walk back home and send it. Finally, I got it sent and the school staff printed it. Well, I visited with the community resource staff person and a spanish-speaking woman (there for translations?) and learned where I just might be able to find chayote plants. We definately need some volunteers from the Hispanic community to bring cultural diversity to the garden beds.
I just remembered that the principal told me that there is great fear in this community. Nobody needs to wonder why after hearing the hate-filled nonsense coming out of Arizona's legilature and cowboy law enforcement. Hell, even found our own rethuglican congressional representative, Brian Bilbray (R-pulsive,CA) spewed this in response to the AZ profiling,
Discussing Arizona's pending profiling bill on "Hardball," Chris Matthews challenged Bilbray to cite a "non-ethnic aspect" by which law enforcement agents could identify illegal immigrants. "They will look at the kind of dress you wear, there is different type of attire, there is different type of -- right down to the shoes, right down to the clothes," Bilbray replied.
*headdesk* It's not surprising that registering a child for school is threatening to this community. So is answering a census worker's knock on the door and countless other tasks people of privilege never need consider, not for an instant. Even volunteering for a school garden could feel like too much exposure. Even so, I hope we can develop this relationship. The existing PTA is pretty dense-packed with white middle class women fixated on fund raising, grant writing, corporate crumbs and general silliness. (Now that last is just mean, but I just have to acknowledge I feel so much of the energy is devoted to fluff and nonsense). It is like having a mono-crop garden or all bluegrass landscape. Too vulnerable to disease and pests, besides depleting the nutrients. Diversity is key.
Capitalism is synonymous with starvation, capitalism is synonymous with inequality, it is synonymous with destruction of mother earth. Capitalism dies, or the Earth dies. Evo Morales
Bolivia is host to the most important environmental decsions being made on this day. Check out Democracy Now all week for complete reporting as USofA media (global north) will not be providing news.
Cochabamba, the Water Wars and Climate Change
Thousands of climate justice activists have arrived here in Bolivia for the World Peoples’ Summit on Climate Change and Rights of Mother Earth. Bolivian President Evo Morales called for the gathering to give the poor and the Global South an opportunity to respond to the failed climate talks in Copenhagen. Ten years ago this month, the host city for the summit, Cochabamba, was at the center of an epic fight over the most vital of natural resources: its own water.
I am so happy to report the garden festival, tour were a big success. The school campus was transformed within the last week - since the mountains of dirt of the last post. I am going to be keeping a really low profile this upcoming week. I have so much to do at my own home. Some pictures of the school gardens follow. Now I am listening to a soft rain fall. Perfect.
Maybe I should look for the book Becky recommends . . . Derrick Jensen's How Shall I Live My Life?
Today I am again going to try and make a beautiful garden plan come to life. The image is a portion of a garden a parent volunteer at the elementary school drew for an expanded garden area. It was her first attempt at putting a plan to paper and I was mightily impressed. The fruit trees in the plan were intended to be atop raised portions and surrounded by berms and swales down to the path level.
Well, I started this week with feeling I was single-handedly going to save this plan because I secured as much free fill dirt as we could want right outside the school gate. I don't call this soil because I don't think of it as vital, alive medium. But, in truth it really is soil. Let me back up. I left off a month ago writing about how exhausted I was. I also wrote about how I was so stressed with the lack of parent volunteer involvement. Just three weeks ago I showed up for a work day I'd planned through the PTA and only 3 others showed. Two had to leave within the first 2 hours. The third was a wonderful volunteer who wanted to take over this garden plan and rent the equipment, haul the dirt and make it happen. I introduced the plan creator and this enthusiastic working mom. I asked them to take the lead as I was getting out of town company. Didn't happen. This mom was called in the last several weeks to her job over the weekend. Without equipment or fill dirt to create the rolling hills - nothing could be done.
Then school was off for spring break and the streets all around my trailer park were torn apart with heavy equipment beeping all day every day. It seems that the sidewalks planned for years to address safety issues for kids walking to school were finally being created. One day I approached the earth moving supervisor and asked if they might simply haul the fill dirt up to the garden area where we want this new expanded garden. It took a day and my writing out a receipt, but we got a personable young man all to ourselves (Chief Treehugger and I, the only constants in the school garden program) to dump dirt. I had raced around with CT marking coordinate points, based on the above plan. We marked these points with stakes, connected them with caution tape planted tall colored stakes where the trees would be planted at the apex of each mound and watched the dirt pile up. A note on scale. The turquoise fence is 6' at the height of the curve. Yes, these are mountains.
This was a week ago and each day I opened the gate and then spent most of the day waiting for the young man in the Bobcat TM because I refused to push the dirt around with a shovel. CT and the garden plan creator both worked really hard for several days shoveling dirt. I watched and did minor tasks. I was bound and determined not to exhaust myself past the point again. It just wouldn't make sense for me to injure myself or again become bone weary. Besides, that little fossil fuel fired machine works miracles!
Oh, and CT and I raced around and placed wet cardboard over the grass and straw down along a strip beside another building. This zone will be for our sunflower planting project. This modified sheet mulching experiement was my quick decision to utilize more of the free dirt. I admit it - I got dirt greed. This is why we now have too much dirt and not enough shaped beds.
Let me put another perspective on this big, dramatic garden building. In just 6 days the school will be visited by 1,000's of visitors for the annual garden tour. Hells, bells. It is essentially CT and I to do all the prep work. The plan's creator will be involved and work hard. But, she has little kids and a husband.
My observation these last nine months is that women are way, way over-extended and over-scheduled. I know this old woman ends up doing too much of the physical work. Where is the muscle? (I'll admit that CT breaks the mold as a man giving unstintingly. He is a very rare bird.) Yesterday I watched more than a dozen men devote themselves to drilling little boys in how to win at baseball. I ached to approach these guys and beg them to each donate a half hour, one wheel barrel load, whatever . . . I wanted to confront them with this example they set for these little boys. Games rule. All free time is for entertainment.
Not one of the 15 or more men stopped and even asked what these women were doing with these mountains. I take that back. One dad ranted at seeing the dirt being dropped at the garden. He was outraged that the gopher holes dot the field and that is where the dirt should be hauled - because they spend (big dollar amount) to use the field. He was pissed. Another dad simply tossed orange peels on the pile. I did approach him. I pointed out the compost bin and asked the sons if they remember me from collecting their lunch scraps. The man looked at me like I was dog shit.
Oh, and the relocated pile of compost we'd asked the man on the Bobcat to move hit a sprinkler head and tore up the lawn. The compost pile blew apart like a volcano. Yikes. This will bring out the ire of the school district's facility staff. Whoops. Oh, and the capital project, the monster sidewalk, street, parking lot construction will not be done in time for school reopening. Whoops.
So, school starts tomorrow and it is also going to rain tomorrow. Kids will doubtless return filled with vacation freedom and need extra supervisory energy to get back into the routines. Heavy equipment will be blocking the hundreds of cars in long lines sitting, idling motors to drop each pupil at the front door. Kids will feel the tension, the anger of the parents and teachers. And here are these deliciously huge piles of dirt to charge. Ugh. I will hang out today at the farmers market and do some shoveling, but I am weary before I even start.
Next Saturday the tour will happen, I will speak at the formal presentation and I will lead groups around the campus. The reality will be that I'll be leading envisioning exercises, apirational descriptions and optimistic concepts for future development. It will be what it will be. I've decided my goal is 17 years from this tiring weekend. The school's centennial is in 2027. Maybe the school as a garden will be a reality by then.
P.S. Just read something that gave me a great fantasy . .. Wouldn't it be great today if a flash mob showed up and hundreds started dancing, singing, shoveling, stomping and shaping the great garden bed? That image might make me smile every now and then today. I'll have to come up with what tune might best suit. (Pink Floyd's "We don't need no education" - from "The Wall"?)
“There seems to be three ways for a nation to acquire wealth: the first is by war . . . this is robbery; the second by commerce, which is generally cheating; the third by agriculture, the only honest way.” Benjamin Franklin
I like the David Reports. There is a new report out, questioning quite powerfully the role of design, asking for a focus on life cycle instead of lifestyle.
"Let’s face it; design is now a major source of pollution, as process and a phenomenon, design has degenerated into a state of aesthetic proliferation that has reached accumulative and destructive levels, in terms of loss of meaning, value, and identity."
This is from Thriving Too and I really good thing to cogitate upon with a lifelong friend. Yea, I get to do that with a friend arriving in an hour or so. I have known her almost 44 years! A dialog about life cycle versus lifestyle with a lifelong friend - who leads a very different life than I.
So, I will have to pay $800 out of my pocket because the job took longer than the GC bid. Fuck.
The part that is galling is the attitude that I should consider myself so damn fortunate - like it has been a goodwill mission. Double Fuck. Go buy yourself a cookie. The plants in the window last night were from my neighbor's collection. Here I thought he'd bought them. They left Windex and paper towels along with a layer of dust everywhere. That can all go with them when they leave. I'd told the GC last fall I had figured out how to move everything and drape a barrier. He assured me they would put up visqueen. Didn't happen. Today they are putting up drywall. Maybe they'll get it taped and mudded. Or not. I'd rather they'd just wrap up, clean up and go - so I don't have to pay for it. I do need them to finish the outside flashing and finish work at the windows' edges. No leaks permissable.
Lots of things pushing my buttons today. PTA president, parents and the 5th and 6th graders I planted with all morning. I am shit with the kids. My heart is not in the actual hands on, face to face aspect of what I do at the school. I do it with a sense of humor and low stress, but I don't feel the burning mission. A few really connect, many others don't. Let's face it. Many, many kids don't have a clue what the garden experience can bring - tangible or intangible. I want to do planning, documentation rather than volunteer recruitment or working with the kids. Doesn't help that there are only 3 or 4 of us for any and all projects. And I am the only one without work or kid conflicts. Guess what that means? Bingo.
Just to remind myself, the following text was taken from the Edible Schoolyard (our template) and we used it in the proposal and in campus signage here. Click to embiggen.
When I got home around 6:15 pm I found these plants arranged in the windows and the windex on the sink. This was the GC's touch to make me happy. I am beginning to believe the windows are a reality. Check out how the sunset shines into these beautiful glass spaces! Too beautiful . . .
I had this picture at hand to show the contractor what the structure looked like below the drywall. This is a shot from my original remodel 5 years ago this month. But, I took off this morning for the school and the men pulled off all the drywall anyway to expose the structure. As it turns out, these guys want to seriously beef up the structure inside, outside and around the window's frame. Well, okay. It is probably a smart idea because the trains that run all day and night do some real earth shaking to my little home. And the home's construction is most comparable to a tin can.
It is slow going. Here are some shots of the partially installed side window. Tomorrow will mean the 6' wide back window I hope.
Lately I have grown really impatient with the men I've been working with who fuss endlessly with minor details. It feels more OCD than simply doing quality work. This is true at the school and at home.
In two weeks I'll be remembering my daughter, Angel. March 27th would have been her 40th birthday. A terrible waste. She shot herself and I will never know the tipping point, the trigger within her teenage angst that caused her to end her life.
I think of Angel when I think of the US military attacks on nations in the Middle East, Iraq, Aphganistan, Pakistan and all the dead infants, children and teens. This includes the loss of young American lives too. I think of Angela when I see the earnest young fighters and farmers - mouning parents in Gaza. And the dead around the world because of our country's military, economic and corporate interests. I grieve for the dead, for the young lives wasted and destroyed. Dick Cheyney lives and that is all kinds of wrong.
Tonight the following tribute to the growing numbers of dead in Chicago moved me to tears. Oh, and it is in part because this very theme moved my Angela like no other. The racism in the United States is our national shame.
Here are my new garden windows. These were delivered last Friday. (That's my neighbor's place in the background. He too is doing rehab work adding a room). I actually was thrilled even though I have been at this project since April, the windows are oversized from my design and the finish is *shudder* white vinyl. It will be fantastic to have dual panes, abundant light and a wonderful growing space. Be still my heart. In my world of 270 something square feet - this is like an added room.
On Friday the workmen (grunt workers without any authority or volition outside of the supervisor's direction) arrived and waited. I was at the school and my son tried to let them know they could begin. Another hour and then the supervisor appeared. Then another wait and the GC came, measured, talked and went to get the windows.
I purposely found a contractor who would work with me to essentially put a square peg in a round hole. At least a half dozen times since last summer he and I had conversations and he measured the damn trailer. I could have made my life simpler had I drawn a plan, elevation and some section details to illustrate squared off framing needed for the rounded roof to accommodate the window. But, these guys work on million dollar homes and know what they are doing. I think some of the stumbling, stuttering self-consciousness is due to me watching every step of the way. Whatever.
The thing is they started too late in the day. They had to put plywood up to close the newly made opening. And, they won't be back until Tuesday because it's the super's birthday. Gotta' love it. Thank goodness we are having deliciously wonderful weather. I just need to relax and go with the flow. Eventually it will all come together.
Post Script: While this was going on I checked my mail. I got a thick envelope filled with IRS notifications (read: lien threats) because I owe $80 from 2006 - with interest it's $110. Fuckers. How stupid is this? I live on no income for years and the moment I have my first social security check the ringwraiths come for me. And Dick Cheyney isn't jailed for all that he owes the IRS or has robbed the government blind. (I just chose him as the poster boy for the 1% at the top who have plundered the nation without any consequences.)
Chile's news of a home offer being accepted reminded me of the rainy day 5 years ago when my son and I started the demolition of my little trailer. We went gangbusters tearing the shit out of this place. I filled quite a few dumpsters. I paid for the first two loads and then just started using the park's dumpsters. What a disgusting mess of a job. Also, it really took a lot of strength and I found I was unable to give certain tasks the heave ho needed.
Join me as I reminisce. I'm trying to think positive thoughts about my garden style windows arriving and being installed tomorrow or the next day. Please . . .
gross black mold and other vile things . . .
I just realized I am wearing the same sweat clothes I bought that month. They are now sun bleached and covered in paint. Oh, and lots of holes. I chuckle that I thought I looked so old and fat. Just goes to show how one must appreciate each and every stage. I am much older and fatter.
