Day Three in Everyday Ramblings

I think she may be working me but I have most definitively been adopted. My guess is that she came to live in the neighborhood in one of the student households and still lives there but is thinking the grass may be… or at least the food better… I have completely lost contact with my birds. Sigh. And Sammy knows. He has nothing but grumpy old man things to say about this whole situation. And it isn’t that he didn’t want lap time before now… he is just that more insistent. Gosh no wonder I manifested a cat!

The poetry reading last night was just lovely. Which is an odd thing to say about a poetry reading. They usually aren’t. Lovely. And the topic here loss, and in particular widowhood, was not exactly easy. There were five readers from the anthology The Widow’s Handbook so as you can imagine all the featured readers and most of the audience were women. There was a lot of compassion in the studio, a shared sense of a burden being carried by many is lighter than one carried alone. And that the burden of loss is one we all carry in various ways through our lives.

I think it was that warmth and shared humanity that made it feel lovely.

And I got to see my wonderful friend in poetry from Flight of the Mind 15 years ago. I haven’t seen her in about 7 years and was hugely relieved to find that her poem about widowhood, which was the lead off poem of the night, was about a friend of hers and not her story.

I adore her and she was pleased to see me although surprised. She even stayed for the open mic to hear me read my recent poem. It went well. It is always good to do this with decent poems, read or recite them to an audience. You get a feel where the hitches and contact points are and I was thrilled that they stayed with me and got the end.

They are doing these readings all over the country so if you see one on the calendar I encourage you to go. Experienced well-educated interesting women. One was from Vermont, one from North Carolina.

Afterwards this woman maybe 10 years younger than me caught up with me as I was trying to leave and told me that she was very impressed with my poem and wondered if I would join her writing group. She moved here recently from Colorado and is very happy with the change. I know of the woman that runs the group but both the location and the timing of the meeting are not good for me. I was touched though and we exchanged contact info. Maybe we can go for a walk she said.

And maybe we will.

I need to write more and hang out more with artists of all kinds but I don’t need a group. I need time. And an editor I trust.

I am tired, I admit it and after doing a little grocery shopping and going for a modest walk this evening I am chilling. Letting my brain and body have a much needed respite as I have all sorts of appointments this week and my three classes to teach.

Oh, and work. That too.