It's Saturday

So it's Saturday. I fell asleep on the couch with the dogs last night. Or they fell asleep on the couch with me, I'm not sure which. I guess it doesn't matter. Woke up and got up at 5:00 and stumbled into the bedroom and crawled into bed. Dogs followed suit of course. Got up again at 9:30. Walked dogs, it's a lovely day out. Steve (boy beagle) was especially wiggly and happy. He never fails to make me laugh and cheer up a little, he's a complete goofball.

Had breakfast in the living room in the sunshine and quasi-planned my day. E should be back from OK at some point, either about 4am or later. So of course house cleaning is in order. Oh, I should be careful, she reads this too.

Well, New Years Day will be one year since Bryan, Kathy, Stella and Ruby were murdered. It's kind of hard to believe it's been a year, I guess because it still seems so fresh, because I think about them every day and I still have this tiny, tiny hope that they will appear, together and happy, greeting us all. It still brings me to tears. I've never cried so much and so hard in my life as I have this year. I can't imagine that I ever will. My heart is still completely broken and I think it always will be. I was at friends for Christmas and her daughter said "whenever I talk about the Harveys, Mommy starts crying.." She does her best to comfort Mommy. Of course when she said that, tears began rolling down my face, almost involutarily, and she said "You're crying too." I gave them my love and got in my car and sobbed against the steering wheel and then all the way home. I felt like a wounded animal, I howled. This pain is still just as strong. I am thankful for all the blessings and love in my life, I know I am lucky in so many ways, I know this has changed me forever . I will always remember every thing about them, every moment I shared with Kathy, the smile that always appeared on her face when I saw her, her laugh, her style, everything, and I will always feel this wind blow through the hole in my heart.

what i am today, other days

I am: smart, stupid, hard-working, lazy, kind, generous, snarky, mean, resentful, self-pitying, angry, lachrymose, selfish, shallow, ignorant, self-absorbed, sad, depressed, pissy, whiny, intolerant, irresponsible, loser-ish, dependable, not dependable, thoughtless, shiftless, unaccountable, melancholy, irritable, talented, slothful, unrealised, unprepared, inexcusable, forgivable, unforgivable, stubborn, block-headed, rueful, unquiet

MTB

Yesterday we drove to Petersburg to the P'burg National Battlefield Park or "nps.gov/pete" on the world wide web. That amuses me, the "pete" part. I'm easy. Anyway, lots of trails, nothing really challenging but great scenery and the land, I can't help but feel, is permeated with spirit.

Leemur Chops!

Allen Concedes, I Am Scared of Nancy Pelosi

Okay, I praise George Allen for stepping up and giving it up--he's correct, it's the right thing to do, to save everyone's time and money and so forth. Nice work cowboy.

Basically, I'm just scared of Nancy Pelosi as a person.

Virginia Elections

So as I write at this moment, Webb is ahead but Allen hasn't backed down. I voted for Webb. I'm not in love with him by any means, but I hope for his victory. I am chagrined, but I suppose not surprised, by the easy passage of Amendment 1. What a waste of time, money, resources, headaches, and breath. I only wish that those who so fervently believed in the need for our state constitution to be amended in such a way would use some of their time and resources and energy to do something actually useful, something that would really be life and Christ affirming, like teaching children and adults to read, working with Habitat for Humanity and other such organisations, getting food and clothing to those who need it most, spending some time listening to the elderly who are alone, the sick who have no one, buying books and art supplies for kids who long for those things but have no access to them. Wouldn't that be a blessing to and from God?

Life or Death

I'm still at work. The jury is still at work also. I know this because of the Times Dispatch trial blog. It's been updated throughout the day every day of the trial. I keep coming back over to the computer and refreshing that page, waiting to see if Ricky Gray will live or die. It's very weird...I click on the refresh button and then have a few seconds to try and prepare, guess, hope, before the page reappears. Still the same--they came out and asked some questions and went back in. Why isn't it quick like the guilty verdict?! What is there to hash out?! I wonder who the 12 are and wish I could whisper in the ears of whomever may be thinking about a life sentence : take his life, take his life away for those of us who can't. He didn't just take the lives of Bryan, Kathryn, Stella and Ruby, he took pieces of all of us, he stabbed us all in the heart. I don't want him to breathe the same air as I do, I don't want him to ever feel the rain, hear the thunder, see the lightening, see the moon or stars, the sun shine, the taste of water to pass his lips. He has no rights. He has nothing inside. He and the other monster have robbed all of us.

A Sampling of Thoughts That Run Thru My Mind During the Day

Another day, another dollar... I wish I'd stop humming The Girl From Ipanema... What should we do this weekend...How will I ever pay off all my debts...I wish she would just shut up for a while...I'm hungry but there's nothing to eat here...I wonder how my mother is doing, I'm too much of a little pussy to find out...I'm scared...if you're allergic to peanuts, you should ask if something has peanuts in it before you shove it in your piehole...God, I love zip loc bags!...why are people so stupid sometimes...what would I be doing if I were at home right now instead of at work...ow, I bit the inside of my cheek, I hate that...why am I so stupid sometimes...why are my friends dead...why did those two monsters do what they did...I would like to execute them myself...I think I could live with that, easily...next week is gonna be hard, I don't know how to be prepared. I wish I could build a protective coating over my heart and my brain...I shouldn't have eaten that cereal for breakfast...I feel sick...I don't know where I fall in the world...why are there people who want to blow up jet airplanes...I want to teach you a lesson...she shouldn't have had that baby if she wanted to continue to live like a single drunky girl...how many kids get no love...I love the beagles...I love my friends...I wish I could put my arms around all of them...

Snakes in the Trees at the Richmond Vegetarian Festival!!

E and I decided late in the afternoon to take a jaunt over to the Azalea Gardens and see what the Veggiefest was all about as neither of us had been before. We parked on Bellevue and walked from there, making our way thru the greenery, following the sound of music. A band played on a nifty stage with rows of folding chairs in front of it, children were running about, leashed dogs panted, strained and sniffed, and we began to explore. As expected, there were plenty of yoga/massage things, Buddhist stuff, all-natural this and that, a tent that apparently showed explicit videos inside...of farm animals, and I expect not sexy stuff with farm animals. There was a warning of graphic nature and no children. We proceeded the other way thru a variety of smells in the air from patchouli, to incense, to good food smells, to burnt food smells, to barnyardish smells. E got food from the Indian place, I got yummies from Ginger Thai. We sat in chairs under a tree near the general picnic area. Kids chased each other around and around. It was all quite pleasant.
We finished up and decided (by "we decided" what I mean is that I asked imploringly, since I had no cash...) to get a funnel cake. It had to be done. And what it was was a funnel cake. We walked around more and noshed. We had just passed thru the storytelling and face painting areas, and were heading back to the food area when E passed in front of me from my left to my right and then we were both startled by a THUNK sound and we looked to the ground and saw what initially appeared to be a rubber snake. We looked up at each other dumbly, or perhaps quizically, and then up at the branches way above us and then back down to the ground. Closer inspection confirmed that the snake was in fact not made of rubber but of snake-flesh and had the requisite flickering tongue and snaky movement. We then realised that it had fallen from the tree. Or perhaps the sky. But probably the tree. At that point an older woman carrying something mysterious inside a large opaque plastic box, took an interest and expressed concern that someone would run over or otherwise harm the snake. She suggested one of us pick it up by the tail but then withdrew that suggestion. She left. I found a stick of suitable length and strength and nudged the tapered end underneath the possibly endangered reptile and airlifted him/her into the safety of a tangle of bushes and poison oak.
Damndest thing. Though I was raised a Southern Baptist, there was never any snakehandling in any of our services that I recall. However seeing that I am currently an ordained minister, I may now add snakehandling to my list of credentials. Or at the very least snake-sticking.

Floyd!

This is of the kitchen counter. I was going to make hummus. Note, if you will, the tv remote. Right there with the ingredients, pencil, and whatnot. That was so I could turn the tv on and/or change the channel back to OLN in mere milliseconds while preparing food for dinner. In case you haven't heard, OLN is changing their name to "Versus" in September. In case you don't know what OLN is, it's the Outdoor Life Network. In case you don't know who I am, I'm The Leemur. I hope they stop showing so many fishing and hunting shows. You shouldn't be watching fishing and hunting shows--you should be out hunting and fishing. You should probably be doing that right now. Go.

Our First Tomato (please click image for full glory)

Kind of Pissy

fireworks, july 4 at the diamond, seen from our porch

Happy 4 of July Y'all

It's a great sunny day though it's supposed to get up to 98. I think we are going to pack up the backpacks and go on a mt bike trek all around and hopefully set up somewhere in the shade for a picnic and whatnot.

The Tour de France is well under way and has been pretty exciting so far. I was surprised, disgusted and disappointed when Ian breathlessly delivered the news at work on Friday about Basso, Ullrich and the others being suspended. I was really rooting for Basso. At this point Ullrich is over I think, this would be the Tour for him to shake everything off and win for once and for all, but that seems to be that about that. I think it will prove to be quite a race anyway. I'm going for Hincapie.


E made dinner last night(her delicious lentil enchiladas) and we sat on the side porch and ate and watched the fireworks from the Diamond. And the Braves actually won! We went to Friday's game and I was pleased as punch for that win too. Which brings a brief aside : I hate it when people leave before the game is over. Win or lose. I don't get it. When I go to a ballgame, I go to a ballgame, I stay to the bloody and/or glorious end. Whatever people.

Let include in conclusion, this picture, of these perfectly adorable packs of butter that I bought yesterday, not knowing that they weren't regular whole sticks of butter, but in fact these smaller, nicely wrapped little thingies that I wouldn't mind at all receiving as a present. But I'm just like that. Don't worry, I won't give you one for Christmas..

As I was in bed this morning listening to the news on NPR, the station dj came on with tidbits of the upcoming local news, the most important of which was "Warren Buffett does not use email." Wowsers.

Quote DuJour of the Highest Importance

"Right now more Virginians need new furniture than ever before."
--from Haynes "Big Wednesday Sale" commercial.
I don't get it.

Captech Classic 06.01.06--Great Fun

Game of Boggle, anyone?
No, wait, I forgot, I hate Boggle.
Nevermind.

I Admit It...My Blood is Drunk, My Heart Weeps, and I Know Nothing About the Universe

I'm a bit drunk right this minute...I didn't mean for that to rhyme. Tonight I met M. for beers at Zippys. We have not seen or talked in too long for good friends. There are too many dumb things in the middle. I had good time. We talked about movies, her movie, casting, music, I brought out my shame at having blown the screenwriting partners deal, and we talked on and beered, and decided that I am the one for Casting and maybe Concepts and Stuff. Zippys has a fine variety of beers, the first one I had was the @!#^%^%$^! Wheat Beer, (@!#^%^%^!) being Germanic something or another, then a $*^$*^)(*)(_)(#$#@^&) India Pale Ale, then something I split with M, a lager, it was all quite fine in the scheme of things, talking about life, love, movies, and whatnot over spirits.
We dismissed and I made my short way home, in the Golf, with the windows and sunroof open, and I swear, as I drove east on Brookland Park Blvd, I felt the unmistakable smell of Big Red gum on the air. That smell smacks you like a spicy brick that rings bells from the back of your throat down your esophagus and thru your sinuses and the very back bottom edge of your brainpan. What the hell Ginter Park, that was refreshing!
I get to my loving home, touch base, touch face, touch sweet loving heart, and work my way to my study, to my inbox. I have an email from a close friend..."HAVING ONE OF THOSE UNREAL MOMENTS.CANT SHAKE IT;
WANTING TO TEAR SOMEONES LIMBS FROM THEIR BODY. I
CANT STAND IT. SAW (friend) TONIGHT AT LOWES AND SHE
ALSO SAID IT IS GETTING HARDER EVERY DAY FOR HER. I
GUESS WE ARE COMING OUT OF SHOCK. IT IS SO FUCKING
HARD TO BELIEVE THAT THIS HAPPENED. I GUESS WE SHOULD
BE GLAD THAT WE ARE SO UNABLE TO ACCEPT THIS, AND NOT
BE COMPLIANT AND NUMB TO IT. I THINK THIS SUMMER IS
GOING TO BE REAL REAL SAD. I THINK WE ARE GOING TO
HAVE TO REALLY WATCH OUT FOR OUR FRIENDS. THE REALITY
OF THIS REARS ITS UGLY UGLY HEAD AT ANY MOMENT, AND
YOU CANT ALWAYS FIGHT IT OFF. I THINK WE WILL REALLY
NEED TO BE AWARE OF ALL OUR BUDDIES,EACH OTHER AND
OURSELVES."
And there is sad, open, painful, real, dirty, plain truth. Our friends, our sweet, loving, beautiful, funny, serious, goofy, gorgeous, very real friends, are very gone, have been horribly taken from us. They won't be at the pool in a few weeks, won't be at the store, at school, at the coffee shop, walking by your house, waving at you while you're in your yard, or at the stoplight beside you. None of us will see them there, even though we still feel them everywhere. It is very hard to try to tell someone who's removed, in one way or another, what this is like. It is not like any loss I have so far known. It is not like anything I have known in my life. It is not regular, it is not normal, there is no pattern, no road, no map, no sketch, no platitude, no psalm, no hand, no look, no saying, no nothing that can cover this, that can cope with this, that can placate this, that can bless this, that can cure our hearts of this. Sorry God, I can't figure this out. I feel comfort from my friends, but nothing stops the pain of the salt screaming the water from my heart and the acid soaking though my soul.

I can't shake my blue. Family closet skeleton of genes strung together muddle and wailing. I look at this :
"Come back to square one, just the minimum bare bones. Relaxing with the present moment, relaxing with hopelessness, relaxing with death, not resisting the fact that things end, that things pass, that things have no lasting substance, that everything is changing all the time--that is the basic message. " --Pema Chodron
I am butting my head against everything. Against my own head. Against my heart. Against the wall around me.

(...and your crappy lamp I always hated...)

Allergies Blow...

FedEx has swallowed my package, and my rear derailleur cable on my road bike is no longer even holding on by a thread. All in all, I'd rather be mt biking thru a quiet green forest with birds singing hymns and sunlight shining through here and there to spotlight some simple treasure. And then a good Vietnamese meal afterward on the side porch.

Long Time No See

Hey. I've been really sluggish about posting. I guess mostly because I feel like the majority of things I have to say have been about wanting to kill killers and lacking the power to make everything right in the world. I'm trying to be more positive now. Most of the time. I'll be back. I gotta go to work now.

Love, Leemur

No Title

I am here. I am awake. It's 2:39 am. E and I played cards for a good while after dinner. That was fun. She has gone to bed. The dog is on the couch asleep. The cats are tucked somewhere around here, under a jacket or sweater. I sip a bit of Maker's Mark. I am sleepy, physically tired, but my mind is relentless, throbbing, picking at me with it's claws. So many things refer to Kathy, Bryan, those beautiful girls, without my even realising initially. A song, place, gesture, laugh, are like catching a smell that triggers an instant sweet sense memory, and I walk on from that smiling blindly, then trip on the wires of the bouncing betties of reality bringing back the fresh taste of iron in the mouth and eyes burning and chest turning within itself. It almost seems as the days pass that it is more unreal, more likely that they are on vacation, out of town, touring somewhere nutty and great, but they'll be right around the corner, back for a party any time soon--this is not true, and yet maybe it is. I am sad. I am hopeful. I am filled with anger, grief, madness, confusion, love, lostness. I am waiting.

World of Mirth Reopens

I have more to say. I've just been feeling quiet, sad, heavy, angry.

Trouble in mind, I'm blue,
But I won't be blue always
The sun will shine
In my back door some day.
Trouble in mind, that's true,
I have almost lost my mind.
Life ain't worth living,
Sometimes I feel like dying.
I'm gonna lay my head
On some lonesome railroad line,
Let the 2:19 train
Ease my trouble in mind.
Trouble, oh trouble
Trouble's on your worried mind.
When you see me laughing, baby,
I'm laughing just to keep from crying.
I'm going down to the river
I'm gonna take my old rocking chair
And if those blues overtake me,
I'm gonna rock on away from there.
Trouble in mind, I'm blue,
My poor heart is beating slow.
Never had no trouble
In my life before.
Never had no trouble
In my life before

My Confusion, My Confession, My Friends Have Been Taken Away

Still I barely know what to say--There is no satisfaction in the absence of reason, the chaining of someone who is an "animal," but not that, because animals only do what their circuitry and nature direct them to, and we cannot label that in our own terms. These ones--I don't know what name to give them...criminal, assailant, monster, killer, convict, murderer, none of that is enough--I could search for the rest of my life for a word or words to name them, still that would not be enough, nothing now will ever be enough. They have scarred more hearts and souls than they could have imagined, they have ruined concrete, wood, tile, rug, curtain, grass, tree, cloth, window, the very air... a hammer is for creating and building, not for taking away. Yet I think if they were before me, and I a weapon in my hands, God fogive me, I would kill them and I would feel more for a pencil's lead breaking on a piece of paper.

No Words

Friday, It's Still Overcast

My heart is still so heavy. As I try to get back in "the swing of things" there is normalcy, the mundane details of everyday life, also the smiles of loved ones, friendly hellos at work, the dog romping with her toys, but then the crushing reality back again of terrible loss, so many sad, crying, staring, wringing hands, minds grappling with this obscene puzzle. This will go on for a long time I think.

I had a dream, the night before last, that I was talking to Kathy. We were both jabbering away, playing catch-up, what we had both been up to. She said she had moved, something she didn't think she'd ever want to do again but that it was okay. I asked her if she was happy. She smiled her big sweet smile and said "yeah, I am."

Vigil

Here I sit at my desk, a beer and a candle lit, I am trying to figure out the unfigurable, trying to make sense of all the pieces of a horrible explosion. It is impossible. I cannot get my head around it. When I can clearly see something in my head, a facial expression, the sound of someone saying "hey Lee!," a child frolicking at the pool, a smile that's in the eyes as well as on the mouth, how can these people that I'm seeing be gone? How can Bryan, Kathy, and the girls be torn away from us all by another human being? What person could do such a thing, what person could take the lives of children as though they were nothing? There is no answer to this. Even when "justice" is brought, there will still never be a satisfactory answer. What brain holds the neurons and synapses that has brought a sledgehammer down on so many hearts, that has left us reeling in confusion?

I was alone at home yesterday, trying to digest everything. When I couldn't make it any further, I left and drove around the city. Then I headed across the river and went to the house. I didn't know what else to do. It was raining. I pulled up and parked on the wrong side of the street, got out and walked over to the tree in front of their house. It was encircled with bouquets of flowers, a few stuffed animals, and children's drawings in ziplock bags. It was the stuffed bunny and Pooh and Kitty that wrenched me, and the drawings...as much as we can't understand this, what about the children, what are they to make out of things? Perhaps they have a better sense of it, I don't know. Maybe magical thinking is the way to go for now, Mommy and Daddy and the girls are on a long trip....
A older gentleman neighbor came over at that point and asked me if I thought it would be okay to move the flowers and things to the porch. The police crime lab van was still there but I said that I didn't know why not. No one stopped us. I handled the plush animals as though they were glass, they were to me, and tucked them together, all touching, to the right of the front door. It made me think of when my sister and I were little and a thunderstorm came, we would go through our bedroom and make sure that all the stuffed animals were at least in pairs, the buddy system, so they wouldn't be so scared.

I paused, squatting on my heels after we had moved everything, and looked to my left. Front windows broken, police tape over them. Chairs, a glider, a small table with a small notebook on it, but mostly it was the hula hoop that I couldn't take my eyes off of. Half on the porch, half on the chair. Left in the way that a kid would cast it off before going inside. I never would have thought that a hula hoop could cover me in such a wet wool sweater of abject sadness. I cannot remove that sweater. I cannot censor the awful visions and fight to run them over with the memories and feelings of goodness, laughs, music, Kathy's smile and laugh, visiting her at Main St Grill back in the day, our time working together at the Feast, the lovely pies she made, visiting her at the newly minted World of Mirth when it was over top of Exile, buying the rubbery scorpion women to decorate my Christmas tree when I lived on Hanover Ave in my teeny tiny apartment.

I cannot remove the sweater.

Bryan, Kathy, Stella, and Ruby Harvey

I am completely in shock...two friends and their two sweet daughters were brutally murdered in their home yesterday...New Year's Day 2006. They have an annual party...people came...they found cops and firemen, police tape and death. This is unimaginable, horrific. I have cried most of the day. I have no idea what to do. Everybody is trying to comfort one another...It's on the news, in the paper...Kathy was one of those really sweet good people that you don't meet often enough. She had the same birthday as my sister Phred so I always remembered when her birthday was, and she would always say, "I can't believe you always remember my birthday!". God damn it. God please bless the souls of Bryan, Kathy, Stella, and Ruby. Please say a prayer for them, in whatever way you pray.