WHEN WILL MY SORE HEART

Both Tupie and Emmylou were happy to see me when I got to 8th Avenue on Tuesday. They sat on the leather couch with me. Both of them are accustomed to having their people around most of the time, so with me in Brewster and John back at Charlex, they have to entertain themselves a bit more. And then there's the problem with the weather.

I had dinner with Becky and Devin at their place in Billyburg. I finally met their kittehs, Bubble and Ricky (not sure if that is the correct spelling of Ricky). Bubble's original human had died and she had spent a year in the shelter. Devin couldn't resist. She is pretty large. And sweet. Becky told me Ricky's story but all I really remember is that she had been on the verge of buying a $1400 Burmese kitten when sanity returned to her. Ricky is a nice kitty himself. Very friendly, these two.

Becky has won or placed in a couple of cooking "take-downs" so one is always thrilled to be fed by her. She can't participate in this year's Bacon Takedown as she will be having a baby boy, currently named Clarkity.

The weather is foul again. 77% humidity right now, at 9:37. Tomorrow will be worse. I am driving up to Rhinebeck to hang out with Louise, Erik, and Cosmo. I haven't been up there in months.

I write this blog in my head all the time, but when I sit down to write these days, I sort of fade away or blank a bit. I think the truth is that given that I don't quite understand my life, I don't quite know what voice or attitude to jump in with. I'm pretty sure that most of you aren't all that interested in all this cat business. I find the kittehs reassuring. Maybe I look to them for guidance.

I'd really like to go to bed, but I think it is too early and that I wouldn't even fall asleep or I would wake up at some ungodly hour and face just that ... the ungodly strangeness of my life.

There are aspect to being back in Brooklyn that are ghostly, walking around my old and not-quite surrendered 'hood, I feel vestigial: traces of me and my life that are disappearing or no longer exist. It might be that I am in my former building too much, smelling the fresh paint going on the walls of my old apartment. I practically run by it as the superstitious might avoid a cemetery. But besides my dear friends, there is Emmylou to see and her delight and pleasure in my being around makes me hang out there, even when it is sad or uncomfortable. And I nearly choke up when I say goodbye to her.

Emmy looks quite a bit like Cooder in this picure.

RT has a beautiful song, Ghosts in the Wind. There aren't any versions on you tube, but I think of this verse quite a bit:

!'m empty and cold, 
I'm empty and cold like a ruin
The wind tears through me, 
The wind tears through me like a ruin
Ah, ghosts in the wind, 
Oh ghosts in the wind
When will my sore heart ever mend
Ghosts in the wind, 
Ah ghosts in the wind

If you don't know it, trust me. Beautiful and evocative.

So, although I am not writing all that much, I am thinking. I think I feel a bit better in general, emphasis on "a bit." Although I don't feel I have a direction or a plan, I do feel as if I can add them onto the to-do list (and it is still quite long).

Today is the one-month anniversary of Cooder and I being here in Brewster.