we got to go home

home. it's really hard to be with all my confused feelings around why we get to go home and others don't. i really don't feel like there is a why. it just is. and it's really really hard. literally, just over the hill a whole bunch can't go home. well, until they deal with all the ash and burn and then build a new one. if they have insurance. or deep pockets.

this is the day after we went home. this helicopter went back and forth from the mountain to a lake to fill up it's little bucket to dump on the mountain that was still hot and smoky.

there it is right above our roof.

going over to the burned area.

you can see him spilling the water there. that water fall white spot.

you can see there that big ole light green house there that didn't burn, but everything around it did.

well. what to say. we just had a huge brush with a wild fire. what do i want to say? what do i want to remember from this? well, i'll just make a list.

• slurry bombers are really awesome.
• firefighters are really incredible brave helpful people.
• all our stuff, all that stuff in the house that you think means a lot, really didn't mean as much i thought it did, when i found myself in a moment looking around for what to take with us. i oddly grabbed my wedding dress. that's funny to me. i mean, david didn't grab his tux. not sure what that was about. heirloom thinking or something. and photos. and video. we forgot all paperwork and passports. oops. i did also grab some elderberry syrup cuz max had a cough and i wanted him to have it right away. i got my cowgirl boots too. if i got in a pinch i guess i was thinking i could wear my wedding dress with my boots and that would be all i'd ever want. hahaha. oh, and quilts. but really, as i was grabbing things, i kept feeling like this is dumb. this is just stuff, and i'm just going through the motions, cuz i know you're supposed to save special things. and i also know that if our house went, i would be glad i had some old special stuff to make our next home feel a little bit more like our home.
• having said that, now that we are home, i am aware that i do love our stuff, even though i know it doesn't really mean what i used to think it meant. i have been having tender moments seeing things, feeling glad i get to see them again. and that makes me so sad for all those who don't get to.
• community is everything. going to meet at gatherings for all of us mountain folk was so nourishing. that's when some tears would come, and stories of miraculous firefighter saves, and stories of loss. meeting up with the kids' school community. life goes on, and this school district was all about getting something going for our mountain school kids who can't go back to their sweet old school house for a while. till that little town is all put back together. so we've been invited in to a big large city school down in town. and the kids all seem really fine with it. they are getting so much love. and we are having some friends say with us who can't go home yet. the friends who showed up at our house right as the fire started. their area will take a while to get electric back into. and to make it safe again.
• it is so hard for me to say this because i know so many pets were lost in this fire. and i have to say it. here i go. it was really great to see our chickens lived. and our hideaway black cat girl, solstice. i feel so fucking selfish feeling happy. but my sister told me if her house burned and mine didn't, she'd want me to be real free and out with my happiness. she said if i wasn't, then she'd be pissed. like what do i have to cry and be down about? so. i am so happy these girls, and maybe one boy, we're not sure if we brought a rooster home yet, made it. we got these four new 3 month old chickens on the sunday before the fire. and then we wake up monday and have to bolt. poor things. but there they are. all ok in our case. some kind officers checked on them a lot i heard. when we got home, i gave them a bunch of fresh corn. happy birds now.

• fire is a really powerful element. it can do a lot of damage. but it can clear a lot away too, in a good way. i have felt into this a lot this past week. i've been feeling how the wildfire in me sometimes gets really really out of control and how it has done damage in the past. but it can be so accidental. it seems this fire was an accident. maybe even caused by a firefighter the detectives are saying. a total freak accident. we aren't in control here. that's really what i'm getting. but to the degree that we are, i'm getting that our internal wildfires can hurt those we love. if we can learn to burn wildly, within a safe container, which seems to take the wild out of it, we can use fire to our benefit. i am kind of stumped on how to burn wildly without hurting anyone else. i feel like i am asking how to have an earthquake with no damage. or a hurricane in a populated place. i am trying to make sense of all this. i can't. sometimes there is no making sense. shit. that freaks me out. you know? fucking freaks me out. our little town is freaked out. we are settling also, but what a freaky fucking wildfire. aaaaaaaa, i can feel myself finally as i let myself feel freaked.

• the way i woke up during this wildfire was awesome. i realized this yesterday at my group with this lady....the second our power went out i woke up. i knew this fire wasn't messing around in our area. in an instant. nothing mattered but that moment. that is an awesome feeling. even with fear coming in and out of the field, it was holy awesomeness too. she reminded us all that that level of awareness is always here, always available to us. that's what i really want to remember most. the way the fire woke me up.

and now we are able to walk with our wild friends back home. love.

that's the smoke from monday night.

well, this post below was all written over the last week, as in last week. not this week. i almost posted it labor day morning. and a lot of it is gone, i guess it wasn't saved from that morning when i added a bunch on to it. and then something happened. something so normal. i don't know what. but like a tea kettle whistling kind of thing. and then. something really, i guess, normal, too happened, just something wildly unexpected. however something we prepare for, or so we say, living in the mountains. every other neighbor is a volunteer firefighter it seems. the most devastating wildfire in colorado's recent history began labor day right near our home. like 5 miles away. sounds far in a way, but by night it was within 3/4 of a mile from our home. it started 1/4 mile from one of my best friend's home. somehow hers is still standing. 140 or so houses are gone. deep deep deep. we are not in the clear. the winds are picking up tonight and we don't know what will happen. you never do, right? we have been in a hotel. we are fine. we have been reached out to in ways i haven't felt since max's birth. people come out of the woodwork. people are awesome at times like this. my sister is caring for our cat, pie. our other cat would not show up when i called as we were told we had to leave in a hurry. our chickens are okay i've been told today by an animal control officer who went and fed and watered them, and then by my mom who got in with her fire fighter badge. she said our fridge stinks. right before we were told we had to evacuate the power went out. you know what i keep thinking about? all the food we just got the friday before labor day. the first field trip of the year was to a farm where we got to pick our own veggies. harvest our own food. it was so amazing. and i was SO into my plans for what we were going to make with it to store away in the freezer. in addition to what i already made the week before. this is my first year to do this. prepare food for winter. one of the things i am getting so far from this experience is how attached i was to that food. that food we picked and washed and were preparing. i had a big bowl of tomatoes and basil on the counter that i was just about to put in the food processor. and then my friend showed up at the door after she had just run from the fire at her house. we thought we might be safe at my house. then the power went out. she took her kids and left for town. we stayed a while longer, till a loud loud pounding came on the back door telling us we had fifteen minutes. that's actually pretty generous compared to a lot of our mountain neighbors who literally had to run for their lives. the kids grabbed what they wanted. max got his batmobile. zhi got her art supplies. olive got a hole punch, a piece of paper, and a yellow wooden peg guy that goes in a car with 9 other guys. just yellow man number 1 came. i have some good friends who lost their home. lost it. just gone. this is what has happened. so far, no reports of anyone injured or killed from this fire. but i know a lot of pets were. fire. tall. long. not out yet. there is zhi, below, labor day morning. she wanted to see how burning incense in charcoal worked. we smoked our home out with that incense. and then this fire appeared in our forest. i want to write so much more. i will later. i am not proofreading. i just want some people to know we are ok cause they are starting to ask. we are ok. freaked and okay. and i have pretty much let go of that food. what a small thing to let go of compared to the number of people who have let go of their homes that have burned. the number is now up to 170. this is just crazy. fire. wildfire. our town is coming together so beautifully. i walked into a donation center this evening to see what they have for those of us who are evacuated. i broke into tears just looking at the generosity of our community. i needed to cry. it's been hard to get the tears out. my kids new school is in the burn area. it is still standing though, amidst a lot of burned down buildings. we are all just breathing, holding out for tonight's winds and to see what happens overnight. there are something like 660 firefighters working for our town. i now understand why firefighters are so loved. i've never felt it like this before. children just know. aaaaaaaack. this is fucking insane. wildfare is crazy insane energy. wildly chaotic and scary.

here is the old post......or what is left of it...

low energy days this week. something in the air keeping me low. down to the ground. guess that could be a good thing. this has been a summer of hiking. amazing hiking. and scooting. since max's surgery, we've done these things as a family, all of us together, and i can't even say how incredible it is.

the other day, i picked the kids up from the bus stop, sort-of near our house. it's a little more than half a mile away. but from the stop it's all up hill to our house. i walked down there with olive in the stroller. i could not have done this before because that walk home would have been too hard for max. he walked home last week from the bus stop with a b s o l u t e l y NO problem. it is miraculous!! i can't wait to post this on his surgery blog. i always seem to post his exciting stuff here first. it's my sounding board. or something. it kind-of reminds me of when he was two and just taking his first steps, and how i had this image in my mind of him walking with me out to the compost bins. i just had this goal i set for him quietly in my mind, and when he achieved it, it was just the most exciting thing ever. he can walk home from the school bus stop!! it's really really amazing. and not only walk, but he ran a bit. the boys got some energy and some strength. and to top it off, he is driving his dad absolutely CRAZY these days with his, ummmm, what do you call it......, TESTING. we've been watching the dog whisperer lately, rented it from netflix, and it seems to me, and i know d too, that we have some work to do to establish exactly who the leaders of our pack are. it's trickier of course with humans than dogs, but with children, there is something similar that needs to be established, i feel. why is it so damn hard to do this? cesar, the dog whisperer, says in every episode practically, that your dog will challenge you in exactly the way you need to grow. now i have always felt that our children do that for us. there really are some similarities. we love the show. "i love what i do, and i'm here to share the gift that i was born with, " (or something like that) says cesar at the beginning of every episode. david keeps quoting that in a funny way since we've been watching. i want to be able to say that!! i'm here to share the gift that i was born with. what gift was i born with? i can find a needle in a hay stack. that's all that comes to mind right now.

a lot of everything

we told max about his birth finally!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i say finally because for the past year i have been feeling crazy that he didn't know some of his story. but it is such an intense story, that david and i still have yet, and probably never will, to clear out our shock from his birth. we practiced telling him a few times over the past few years. and then last week it just really felt like it was the time. i told my women's group last week, and they were so helpful and loving and helped me role play a bit to practice even more and to get really clear on what my intentions are in telling him. god was that helpful. and then on saturday morning we told him. it was beautiful. we showed him the baby book i so passionately made in his first year. ummm, neither girl's baby book really has anything in it. but his is fat. so funny how that is what happens. the girls listened. everyone listened. max listened the most. it was like he became a sponge for that time. he didn't really say anything. except, 'i want to see that book,' i think. he was so quiet and thoughtful. and kind-of smily. and he hasn't said a word about it since. which is unusual for him. usually he will retell an intense story like that for months. it's so interesting to me that he just soaked it up like that. zhi has since told me how she just had no idea a baby could come out any other way than the yoni. she is amazed at that possibility. aaaaaah. coming out. i was so ready to let that story see light, max's light. finally. my boy's miracle story.

that night, as i was coming home from our date night in david's car that i picked up at the mechanic's, i hit a raccoon and killed it.

i am so sorry. so sorry.

this picture of zhi from a year ago, burning sweet grass, in a lion suit, feels like love to me right now.

we went on a hike sunday. a very nice august hike. after a lame argument by d and me.

we had friends over in the evening. i was playing in that dress, hula hooping, trying to learn that trick that erin at bluebirdbaby posted a while ago where you spin while taking the hoop up to over your head with your hand, then bringing it back down. tricky. i ripped my dress! i guess that's why it really is smart to listen to the pattern's suggested fabrics, and when it says use a knit, they really mean a knit. i will stitch it up though, and it will be all the better for it. a new detail. it was a large large rip though, right across the chest. hmmmmm.

and, we like hipstamatic a lot now.

love. gratitude. creative passion. sorrow.

love.

when domestic bliss happens

my little gnocchi.





this is my new dress. from the thrift store. 2 dollars. i love it.

it's fun to play in.

domestic bliss. it is just not a habit for me. i really really want it to be. what makes a habit a habit? lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots (heh) of repetition. does that mean if i do what i consider a chore of domesticity that i am not really feeling like doing, over and over, just do it, without thinking so much about how i don't want to do it, that it will eventually become blissful? chop wood carry water? i feel like maybe. when i cook something beyond the basics, and sometimes even the basics, i feel like i just fucking climbed everest a lot of the time. i feel so proud. because i made dinner!!! that is crazy. or because i vacuumed. or i washed the sheets. or i made a dress. or a scarf. it's not simple for me. i feel proud for things that i see others throwing around as if they just drank a glass of water.

yesterday i hung out with my stove all day. cookin beans. makin a bean soup so i could use up some of the plethora of peppers and squash from our csa and from a friend's garden. i tried to make some magical veggie stock, by adding in some wild greens that i knew were edible. what i didn't know is how bitter wild lettuce becomes later in the year, and i think is made even more bitter by cooking it. hahaha! i was adoring this stock brewing on the stove. my sister and i were smelling it thinking it was just the best thing ever. when i took off the heat after an hour or so, the taste was awful. so bad. unpalatable. downright horrible. we laughed it was so so so bitter. i made a quick trip to the store and got some chicken stock instead. my soup turned out swell. i just really love knowing the wild energy of unplanned nature is in our food sometimes. instead this time, we get some storebought chicken stock. and now i know about the increasing bitterness of wild lettuce over the season.. and i feel really proud that i made this soup.

and this song and video just made me feel good and thoughtful.

i may need to stop reading some of the perfection blogs for a while. i get so jealous. what they share is pretty much 99% pure awesome creation. what the fuck? why can't i relate to them in a healthy way? i stare at them and feel so unworthy. pretty weird experience to make myself have over and over again. i keep feeling the urge to measure up, and i never feel like i do. it feels like i would do better if i simply go inward, and find my inspiration there. i love all these amazing creatures out there showing their abundant creativity. but it's not helping me find mine so much. or did it spark the desire? and now it's just paralyzing me in a way? i really end up feeling like shit 90% of the time after visiting the perfection blogs. i own this. they are doing nothing at all wrong. they are pure awesomeness. i just react in a crazy way. a wounded animal way. i don't even care what it's about for me, really. i am just hopeful that i'm able to get to the bottom of it, and come back all bright and shiny, like i felt when i first discovered them. this is a weird thing to relate it to, but it feels similar to when i was 18ish, and i realized that i had an unhealthy reaction to mirrors. i would either look into a mirror for way too long, or i'd notice that i'd feel worse after i looked into it than i did before i looked into it. i would get sucked into the mirror and then when it spit me back out i felt gross. so i stopped. for like 6 months i think, i would not let myself look into a mirror. i'd ask friends to tell me if i had something on my face that needed to be tended to. it helped so much. i was so much freer. and i never seemed to have a problem again when i looked into mirrors after that. freedom is what i want. freedom!! oh i hope this helps me. am i the biggest weirdo? yes. yes. yes. a weirdo trying to heal herself.

how funny that i write this after a post of my own version of domestic blissness. but that's my point. it's a rarity for me. i want it more, and if i want it more, i feel like i need to go in to discover how to make it more of a habit. i've studied the others for a good while now. no more studying. now time to act!

we'll see. you know i'll keep you posted.

more more more

this article.

woohoo!!!!!!!!!

i am crying so much today. that article just made me BALL. i don't even know what number max was, but i bet i could find out! i'm gonna guess 1962. oh it's so beautiful. beautiful dancers this doctor has made.

yay!!!!!

and here are a bunch of photos of my baby.....how it happens so fast is just down right insane. this is an insane world.

been blasting liz phair today. exile and white chocolate. but i'm psyched to hear these new ones she's put up that i just discovered by going to her site. i used to listen to her a lot like 15 years ago. how am i that old now? it sounds as good as ever today. yay.

her. she. who i love. adore. oh.

she started preschool today. she was happy. she was excited. she totally wanted to go. i thought nothing of it really. i mean it's just so different with the third babe. i got her ready. i had her rest stuff, her extra clothes, her lunch bag all ready. but it's different. with max i was up all night the night before embroidering his name on his blanket and sewing him a pillow. at least i remembered my camera today for olive. these photos above are from last week, but i love them. it's how it's been for so long, me and her. while the olders go to school.

as i left her giggling and squealing having the time of her life at school, i was holding in tears that i had no idea were gonna come. wow. i made it to my car and then just balled. so crazy. it felt great. i love her. i am so glad she loves her school. she is seriously psyched!

smile. cry. it's all happening. i will be there at 3 oclock baby girl. i can't wait!!!!