Mantra

My new mantra: Almost Done. Almost Done.
It's said that the older we get the more difficult it is to learn new things. I don't know how true that is. Maybe it is true if you spend down time trying to forget what you did all day along. But for those of us who like to remember everything we do with clarity, learning new things is like the air that we breathe. I do wish though, like the hard drive of my lovely laptop, I could compartmentalize all the little bits of this and bits of that into organized drawers and files, to be pulled out as needed. Mostly this kind of thing doesn't bother me, until I lay my head on pillow and find that like a calculator, my mind tabulates information and runs it back at me in speedy display.
In six weeks I have learned some basic programming techniques which programmer 'friends' who have spent huge sums of cash in university told me couldn't be done. Perhaps it is the spending of that cash that made them think education is only gotten when paid to someone who has a variety of initials after their name. Obviously nothing could be further from the truth. Of course, we need to qualify the expression "Paid for". Hahaha. We pay for things sometimes in a currency richer than green paper - like blood or time. Although other than a couple of new wrinkles under my poor traitorous eyes, I see no lasting harm from pushing the envelope.

I am happy to be so busy. It has kept me from feeling a certain depth of depression about moving here which I still haven't completely reconciled with. I have met a few very good people. And then I have met many really creepy people - people who could give me nightmares if I weren't so dog tired by nightfall. People whose words are so ugly that they make me embarrassed for them - that such ugliness could be borne by humans.
Many years ago I excised some ugly language from my life. Not just gender based language, but language that I deemed offensive to racial makeup, sexual preference, education, socio-economic background. Language is a funny thing - we use it as a high form of communication, and we humans use it to disenfranchise others. Perhaps it is more about making ourselves feel better about who we are than making others feel bad about who they are. Whatever the case, ugly language serves no purpose other than to point out to others (me) that someone is lacking in self esteem. Yes, Indiana - one of the three states in the union which refuses to pass an Anti-Hate law. A state which would create prejudice in careers, housing, social services and other human needs based on a person's sexual preference. A state which prefers polling places to be in churches than in libraries or schools. A "red" state. A conservative state. EEEEKKKK. What am I doing here? Am I being tested to see if I can find the proper language to make people who don't want to see equality do just that - see equality and why it is necessary?

Yes, I get depressed about being here. Indiana has less than 2% of it's total landmass devoted to public spaces. I have hunted for a park to go walking in and with little success. Most of the city parks in my area are located next to industrial sites. I have yet to see a space of trees that has any sense of the wild. I have yet to find solitude among trees. Or to hear the silence of snow on bare branches, the birdsong of returning robins, my boots squelching in mud on a less traveled path.
I am wilderness bereft. I long for crane song. I long for a long walk in the snow or spring rain. I long so much for the rarefied air of Lake Michigan on my face, turning my hair to ringlets, my nose red, my cheeks raw. I long for silence and space.
I miss my last, small home. Here it is endless rooms; endless, dusty rooms beckoning to be dusted or vacuumed or to have the blinds opened. I miss the small space and economy of my Wisconsin home. I miss seeing the bulbs I planted in the front garden come up. I miss the snap of prayer flags on a windy morning. I miss Thursday night 'Salons" at our house where friends would gather and we'd call each other names like "republicat" or "democan" and talk about W and his daddy, the first King George and wonder where America would be in 20 years. I miss my artist friends and drum circles and the snippy way Judes would comment about so and so's new painting. I miss Olympia Brown U.U. even if I never joined, I miss the open-ness and acceptance.
Who knew Indiana could be this far north, yet feel that far south? I do not miss the woman I met at the hair dressers last week who said in a loud voice "I am SOOOOO not a coat person". I did chuckle though as I slid on my nice Norwegian jacket and headed out into the snow showers ....

OK. Is this a rant? Not really. Like I said, I've been busy, I'm learning. I am accomplishing stuff and I don't have time to think too much or feel sorry for myself. Hey, I have a home, food, warmth, clothes, a good man, a silly bird .... but dammit! I really am a simple woman and I miss that little simplicity I built in Racine.
That being said, when this darned pool opens and I can sit out side in the sun and read something great and absorbing, maybe, just maybe I will delete this rant and think about how I don't miss winter in Wisconsin.