as summer rolllllllls in....

tired. getting old. can't keep up.

but i love it. arthritic knee and all.

-little brother arrived tuesday and we surprised the whole hoosier clan. i have a newfound love for SURPRISES. i want to work them in more often into the rigmarole of life.

-saw Arabian Nights at Lookingglass Theatre. as usual, Mary Zimmerman makes theatre a painting-come-to-life. but I have to wonder, WhAt WaS wItH the FaRt JoKes?

-waited on John Hughes at work. I was like, 'Whatza happenin' hot stuff?' and he gestured his hands into L-shapes as if they were camera shots angling my face and pitched an idea to me about Pretty In Pink 2. don't tell Mr. T the husband but he does kinda resemble Duckie in that certain light....

-headed back to NYC in a few weeks. I plan to ride roller coasters, go to Coney Island Freak Shows, the circus, roller skating, walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, win a million dollars or two in Atlantic City and kick off my summer righteously in the three new pairs of shoes I bought last week.

-my little 14 year old cousin is coming to stay with me in July. from where? FRANCE! she doesn't speak english so je crois que nous serions attachees aux hanches. just too bad i don't have any vacation time left or much of a staff to cover.........

crrrrrrrrrrrreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeak <-----that's the sound of my old lady knee. another wild Friday night dans la vie fabuleuse de Nikki....

R.I.P. Marley 1993-2009

He was the silliest lil boy kitty. "Ask my older brother about his cat."

This little fuzzy outgoing black cat followed one of my brothers back to a party after leaving a bar and slept on his chest all night. The next morning when I awoke, still finishing up high school at the time, my brother comes in my room....Nikki, want a kitty?

The street kitty used to hang around McDonalds in our hometown where he was fed cheeseburger scraps and therefore went crazy anytime he thought he smelled Macdo. He was terrified of brooms and thunderstorms. He had a thick thick thick coat and when he would groom himself sometimes the gray hairs got stuck in his mouth so it looked like he had a little old man kitty beard.

Was he named for Ziggy or Bob? We don't really know. We just knew he was happy like a reggae song.

Marley never got along with the kitty I already adopted, Minga (1992-2005) so he stayed at my parents' house until just this last Tuesday where he died in the company of his human Granny and BooBoo, another black cat who traveled in the carnival before landing on the Indiana homestead.

RIP little Marley. The funny lil cubby/kitty all stuffed with fluff. Sweet sweet lil boy he was....

pulling a Madonna

Well, not THAT Madonna. Ca serait sacrilege!

But what I mean is that I am reinventing myself.

In a small way.

Kinda.

Well, it's more of the journey, I suppose, so it's not a Reinvention.

I am GOING BACK TO SCHOOL! Over the next few weeks I will map out the Big Plan. Going slowly, semester by semester, but I am moving into a new field of work.

It's such a lengthy, cumbersome, problematic, HAYWIRE kind of territory, but all the more reason for me to pitch in a helping hand.

The rehabilitation of those in crisis mode.

I refuse to say 'mental health,' because I firmly believe that EVERY SINGLE HUMAN BEING has an ounce of mental crises at some point in his or her life. If one cannot confess to this statement, then one is a liar.

I have been spending days with Grandmere. She is still frail. Was not healing from a back surgery and now going back in for another hip surgery. Her spirits are down. She does not want to talk about everything. But I love her. And I understand her....



My grandmere told me she started to look forward to going to the shelter during class when Air Raids alarmed because one of her older classmates used to play Blue Danube on the piano...

Bob Ross Days

The husband finished training in his new job and therefore is settled into his 3-12am shift.

I don't see much of him. For awhile. It's a lot to get used to.

Cooking for one, hanging out alone, sitting on the bus alone. Again.

But in the big grand scheme of things, more people are roaming out there alone than we probably estimate. I notice patterns in the behavior of several of my regular customers, and even among the folks who seemingly have incredibly active social lives. They tell me all of these wonderful grand plans and plentitude of activities to keep themselves busy, and I listen and listen and listen. "Really?" I think to myself....

I suppose for those with children this concept of being 'alone' is alien. To know you have an extension of your self, your creation, breathing life and looking always in your direction...perhaps solitude becomes a thing of the past. I do not know. Does it?

I look at my cat and she seems to say, 'Oh. Hey Mom,' as she slithers back under the bed.

But I know that I have overcome enormous struggles and have learned to cope with doubt, isolation, and all the nastiness that life's difficulties bring forth and I am stronger and wiser for it.


"I have my books
And my poetry to protect me;
I am shielded in my armor,
Hiding in my room, safe within my womb.
I touch no one and no one touches me.
I am a rock,
I am an island.

And a rock feels no pain;
And an island never cries."
-Simon & Garfunkel

In these times of 'isolation,' for lack of better word, I do turn to certain figures for inspiration. Particularly when you've gone through your phone list and left about ten messages for others who are busy out there doing other things.

See, when Bob Ross found himself alone with a canvas and a low budget television camera, he might talk aloud to himself and say something like this:

"Little more black, little more blue. And we'll just put that in using little crisscross strokes or--or little X's, whatever you want to call them. Whatever."

And in the course of 20 minutes, he'd have a new landscape to reflect upon.

What a beautiful man he was....

I want to get out my supplies now and invent.

"There."