Sunday, January 19, 2003

One more round with the big edger and I am done. This house is still haunted. I remember her from doing the floors before. How she made the hair on my neck stand on end as I sanded away the rough parts, the paint splatters on her beautiful hardwood floors. Then, a moment after, she realized, she must have realized that I was here as her lover, redeemer. Friend. That fear was immediately embrace. And now, she is awake again, and happy. Even the gouges, she seems to laugh away. Happy to be dressed up a little even. On her way back to her prime. Accepting, enjoying even, some of the modern twists. I think of her as being jealous, watching me. So much neglect, these last two years. This may be my payback, maybe not so supernatural as her, inflicting my subconcious, but checking off the list, finally, sanding the stairs. Painting the stairwell. Painting the office. Will give me no small peace. And maybe assuage her slight, after almost a century of greater malignment, peeve with me. This is when, finishing these things, it may come time to spend hours with another lady. I can't imagine doing so, I find it daunting thinking about it, with so much of this on my plate. And relationships are even trickier than refinishing, in the way they can't be rushed. Prepare. Sand down the roughest parts. Vacuum. Gaze. Gaze again. Sand a level finer, starting to expose more of the grain, slowly in parts, lightly. Stopping frequently, when the machine is strained. Changing the pad. Vacuum. Clean. Assess. Gaze. Gaze again. This time is the first touch. There are some rough spots. Some you know you can't get out. But it's beautiful still, all the same. More so even, with character I didn't know was there before. And then another round. This time is not so rough, not so much dust. On some spots, the sander seems to polish more than cut. Wait for what dust there is to settle again. The pads don't need to be changed so much now. I know where the sander will catch. I've made some gouges here and there, impatient with rough spots, stains. I'm more careful, more accepting now of the others I find. They will come out with a finer hand, or they will stay, part of the wood's character, that I'm growing to love even more. Vacuum. Clean. Assess. Gaze. Gaze again. This time I stroke, grasping the wood as fully as I can. Knowing the rough spots especially. And then once again, now the 100 grit. Smooth now, with enough teeth to hold a polishing coat. To last a while. Shining through. With a touch up here and there. 11:45:11 PM

In one of my dreams last night, Loki and I were at Cave Creek, with Sarah Carmody. We watched as Loki spotted and then gave chase to a couple of deer in the woods, one of which, rather than running, went after Loki and then turned into a beautiful black Arabian, with a single white spot on her neck. I tried to distract the horse, and guide Loki to safety until I realized they were playing, plowing and barreling through the snow in this strange mutual chase. When I finally caught up with them, the horse turned into a wan mousy girl, sitting in the snow with bare feet, bad teeth and shorts and a tshirt. I asked her if she was cold, and she said no. At the restaurant last night, a husband and wife had a quarrel, which I missed. When I brought the food out, she was gone, and he asked for the check. After she still hadn't shown up again, I offered to take the food back and keep it warm for her. He asked me to pack hers up for her, and his as well. Which I did. And he left. She wandered back to the table five minutes later, and said that he had gotten mad at her and how embarassed she was and asked if she could just sit for a while. Throughout the course of the next hour, her husband kept coming back and leaving, coming back and leaving, and it made it look as if they were high schoolers having a spat, only there was something ominous about the icy calm and resilient sociability the doctor showed me. I finally had to ask them to leave, since, as they knew, we needed the table for another reservation. As he stood, glowering at her from the door, I finally had an opportunity to ask her if she was safe. She assured me she was. And I told her I hoped we'd see her under better circumstances. She said we would. The entire scenario reminded me of the wealthy Long Island surgery who would make his wife get down on her knees and beg for money. He would put $100 bills in her mouth. It's all the subtle abuse that keeps the world ticking for us men. She would not have identified herself either as being unsafe, since he may not physically hit her. These situations make me miss doing my RAVEN work, both teaching and facilitating AND working on my own stuff, but I don't know if there's really any way that's safe enough to make me feel as if I'm doing work without endangering the lives of the women and children who I always felt, still do, were our ultimate clients. I need a personal Kevin Bacon Footloose trainer, or some guru of cool. I can do the entire flirtation thing, the eyes and smiles and taking her in as she leans into me, but the only thing that keeps me from being terrified is the intrique. Seat four at the bachelorette party was totally checking me out, so much so that I bet John a dollar that she would be back in within the next week. Only this time, I'll actually have a better sense of just chilling. It just bums me out that I wasn't with the one who would have been about the most fun to hang out with anyone could have. I guess it's not so much getting older that's making me more neurotic about romance, but being so out of practice. As much as I'd like to hope there's some appeal to just putting it out there that I really don't remember how to do all that stuff, there isn't. Which creates a vicious cycle of lameness. One of the benefits of a wired tired sleep is the next morning feels like awakening from a vision quest, so deep is the refreshment. 10:31:28 AM

Relying on alkaloids for energy makes me weary and raw at the end of the day. I am actually wired and tired, with sore feet, more than I can last remember. It's single digits out, but I don't feel the cold. Exposed brick in the stairwell will make that entrance so grand, with the wood grain open again. Looking at the stairs now that they're vacuumed, I'm tempted to just leave it the way it is. It's so rustic and warm. The thing to do may be to do a rainbow stain on the bare wood. Doing refinishing work is the perfect discipline for me, forcing me to be patient, go slow. I've already guaged a couple spots in the stairs, but I'm going to treat those mars as sumi-e, where the brush led me. I wonder if an impact hammer drill would work for breaking up plaster. I don't know if I want to follow this road to a few months of chaos. Or more. But the brick here is so beautiful. I could do my entire room. The study. I think I'd keep the living room and dining room intact, to showcase the wood.   1:12:30 AM