Today is a funny day. A huge storm rolled in last night, but it was the oddest storm. Hot wind, very hot wind with thick clouds of humidity. My mom called on the phone and said, are you getting hit with a storm? A haboub is on its way to you.
No sooner had she called than a wall of orange thick air came towards us. Something I had never experienced where I am in Arizona. Followed by rain and crazy intense lightning.
Chaos erupted in the yard, things being broken, torn about, swung around, madness.
And then, a loud explosion and no electricity.
It was quite exciting.
I love weather.
I was enjoying gathering candles and such.
That was until we noticed that the storm was not cooling things down and after 100' weather, to have no a/c (electricity) and lots of moisture, was oh so pleasant.
It got dark so fast, and I went to bed.
I pretended it was 1912, and I was in Savannah, in sweltering humidity.
I was in my bed, looking up at an evil goblin shadow made by the candle.
Fanning myself with a piece of cardboard.
Thinking about how dependent we are on electricity.
Sort of freaking out about it really.
Then I realized that if the electricity was out, the well would stop pumping water soon.
So, I filled up a bunch of containers with water.
Then I sat in the darkness, with one candle, and pondered our dependence on electricity even more.
I started to doze off.
Dreaming about a painting I was working on - which morphed into killer raccoons, and a flash flood in the garden with a rogue boat that almost killed Lovee, which I saved him from. Of course, you get to be wonder woman in your own dreams. ha.
Oh gosh.
I woke up.
I went outside and saw some large containers I had in the driveway had lost their lids, and they were full of water. Things I loved were inside (which I should have put away already but it's been too hot), so of course, damage control ensued. Then I found out another container had been damaged and had mold in it on treasures, fabric etc. I was so sad.
More damage control.
And yet, there was a sense of calm in me.
Like, oh well.
I tried to do all I could without water or electricity in the dark.
Filling up jugs of water, and pouring them into the washing machine with bleach water.
Worked on that for a long while.
Then I went to bed again.
I had another nightmare in that hot dark heat.
I woke up, and went outside.
Have you ever made the mistake of going to a carnival, and getting into a haunted walk through ride, that is in a trailer or semi truck? It's hot and dark, and you feel like you will hyperventilate if you don't get out soon?
I did that once a few years ago.
I told Mister Lovee that the air last night felt like being in that dark hot carnival walk through ride thingamajig.
I said, I think that ride scarred me, because I think about it all the time. People pushing, trying to get out. Hot smoke, pitch darkness, feeling your way around. Screams. Screeching sounds.
Me too, he said.
You too? I said.
Funny, we both thought about it but had never talked about it.
I walked down the driveway in pitch darkness, and could see the guys in the far distance working on the electric poll. Transformer blew or something.
I wanted to take them a plate of cookies.
Thank them somehow.
As the lights went on and I was still at the end of the driveway, I screamed YAYYYYY!!!!! And clapped as loud as I could.
It was 2:30 a.m.
I stayed up until 5:30.
I watched the movie Albert Nobbs.
Matty Miles cuddled up.
And, I felt guilty for loving my air conditioning.
But that was leveled off by my sheer happiness in cold air glory.
This morning I appreciated every bit of the comforts we have in life.
I stole Mister Lovee's bag of cereal.
I made breakfast ever so slowly.
I love my electric tea kettle.
Today is painting day, so I wasn't going to pop in and say hello.
I try to just paint and nothing else on painting day.
But, I have blogs that I like to visit.
And I love when they pop in to share stories as such.
Regular life things, that don't mean anything, but mean everything at the same time.
Blogging is like a tunnel.
You only see a snippet here, a snippet there.
All the daily life stuff mostly gets lost.
We know people through a tunnel vision.
I like the extra stuff too though, do you?
Like...
I love seeing what people have for breakfast or dinner or lunch.
I love hearing about mundane daily things, that aren't mundane at all really.
There's a curious comfort I find in it.
When I watch cooking shows, I am drawn to the crackling of opening bags.
The the clipping sounds of chopping.
The crunch in the tasting.
I love the sounds.
The little things.
The extras.
I loooove outtakes at the end of movies.
Bloopers, and slip ups.
I love seeing famous people being regular.
Because they are.
Only their job makes them visible to everyone.
They aren't super human.
But everyone expects them to be.
We all say and do stupid things from time to time.
Don't you hate that word?
We all judge each other.
I find myself often saying, who cares?
Who cares what anyone does?
Who cares if they mess up, or trip, or don't perform so well?
Who cares what people look like, how they did or didn't do this or that?
Who cares?
Can't we all just give each other a break?
Trivial things make me so annoyed.
Especially people trivializing things.
I really have to yell at myself when I fall into trivializing things.
I have these heart to hearts with myself.
Move on, get over it.
Who cares.
Don't drown in a glass of water kid (as my dad would say).
I'm just happy that the a/c works again.
And that there are things to eat from the earth.
And that, I have people and furs to love.
And that, there was tea and yogurt and fruit this morning.
And that, I am healthy.
And mostly, that paint is waiting for me, to take me on journeys to those sacred places painting takes you to.
Little planets in other realms.
Where pups have eyebrows?
Yes I know, rotten of me.
But, I saw this thing that said, on bath day, use a non-toxic eye pencil to make your doggie some fancy eyebrows, because it washes right off.
Miles was a ham in his new eyebrows.
And they did wash right off in the bath.
:)
Love, V
ps: My sister's pics from the Grand Canyon are stunning. Wish I had been there...
