(whispers)

mrs. Gifford is here. don't tell her I am. she calls me Christine. christine. i have always liked Chris. been able to tolerate Christie for the friendly ignorant. i even once suppressed grimaces at Chrissie though that was part of the silent treatment of silent silence. but oh, i tell you there is that something about Christine that just makes. me. want. to... BLOG.

oops. said that last too loud.

christiiine?

coming.

Sunfields

Some time ago I told a friend that I wished to see a field of sunflowers once before I either die or don't care anymore. Maybe it seems like a silly wish, but all we've got here are corn fields bean fields hay fields, all beautiful in their own right but no sun fields. I wanted to see a field of bright.

Driving to the river town not long ago, I got my wish.

I believe he really loves us after all.

Feeling better

It is a good feeling and it seems to permeate into every minute of the day; the sun is warmer, the windows clear and even the A/C seems more friendly.

The worst day of the month

Fortunately my library seems to have no limit on number of call-in renewals.

I am sick and tired

of being sick and tired.

Impromptu at Sonatina

Fantasie Impromptu Chopin
I go far too fast, having an awful time slowing myself. So far I can only see it as a whole and when I know and say I must break it down first it is all confusing again. Badly related rhythms, blurred and tragic, either way. Yes, I can play it. I can't play it well. My hands are wayward.
I don't really know if I am trying to get anywhere, I don't know if I am trying to learn anything, all right, I don't know what I'm doing at all. I haven't touched the shiny metronome in probably a hundred and eighty six years and everything about that says I don't care enough. But I woke up very late this morning, I went to sleep very late last night; my throat wheezing head throbbing and whole self chilled. Is that an excuse? The fever is all in my fingers now. My wayward fingers.
*

I have to teach a lesson in a little while. The reason I couldn't possibly teach anyone other than my own sisters is that I always sit with my bare feet up on the Spinet and my notebook in hand, pencil scribbling or tapping a rhythm out between all my gentle advice, all my well meaning falsity: Go slower... not so fast... You should probably practice this week with the metronome the metronome I haven't touched in a hundred and eighty six years...

I promise

That sometime I will write about something other than music piano and music, I will think about something other than piano music and piano, but not just yet.

Sometimes it gets difficult

I have no ideas, no brilliance, no bravery; for an hour I have rested my back on the bench at the Spinet and my right handed fingers keep on in their disconsolation, but because I have no energy either, I only can play notes, one at a time, notes.

Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Spinetta

una corda being temporarily unattainable, I remember I used to never use it at all but now that I'm not again I miss its colour. The quietness can be had if my fingers are as shy as they have been but the tone is the thing, the drifting off, the dreaming that is missing.
Mozart is forgiving about this, Frederic, never.

At the doctor this morning I got a much less obtrusive shackle, it is more a glorified band-aid now covered with a lovely toneless stocking I intend to colour with my Crayons later when it gets boring again. I'm told I mayn't play in the dirt for at least forever and the situation all looks rather vapid.

All the exciting things happen to me

The reason the toothpick was on the floor was Sophie, it is always Sophie said everyone. I was determined to be sociable for once and heaved myself from the dumps and put all my note books and other books away and when I was walking out of my bedroom, my foot came down on it. It stuck halfway in slightly below my big toe, the other half mostly snapped off only to break off completely when Sophie tried immediately to pull it out. Now I had something stabbed in my left foot, and with no end protruding anymore. thanks very much it IS always you, I think I thought but I wasn't really thinking at all. It hurt and started to hurt more driving to the hospital; I kept reminding myself to breathe; I wished we could be there right now and that we didn't live 15 whole minutes from the ER and that Mom didn't drive like Gran. At the hospital I hobbled in and sat and waited in this room and that, answering paperwork questions to the nurse named Chris (me too, I said to him), all the while holding my foot and starting to seeth inside would you just get it out!!! I'll tell you everything!! It was forever, it was going numb, I hate everyone in this hospital. I would like to update my pain rating now, please.
*
The first doctor to work on me was nice until I decided he was fake and decidedly repulsive - I did not like him. The shot to deaden the area was awful but after it was numb he went to work and he worked and worked. I don't like to remember the feeling where I could feel nothing but the pulling, odd odd odd. It didn't budge. The groan "Damn. That's in deep." is not something I imagine they teach you in med school to reassure patients, especially not patients who already don't like you. He gave that pull a million times and I did feel it now and then but said I didn't. Just gritted my teeth watching the drops of blood go up the suction tube thing like tiny crimson tadpoles, slow quivering tadpoles.
He was of course not going to get it out. But he knew a doctor specialist guy person in Hannibal who could - except by then in was nearly 10 pm. He said maybe it will have to wait until morning, the doctor specialist guy person could come then. The thought of wood still in my foot all night was awful. He gave a last wrench and I winced prayed God let it come out this please please time please. It didn't, they bandaged it up and he went to phone the other doctor, Mom went to phone home and I waited. All that had happened that day and now this was so close to me still. I cried inside until
*
a little man with a mustache and balding head and glasses and a reek of cigarettes that was somehow comforting in an unhealthy way came in. I'm the radiologist, said he, we'll have to wheel you down here and X-ray that foot.
I liked Radiology. It was cold and the light was dim and soft not like hospital light at all. I'm a girl I'm under 18, they are of course required to ask the Question and he did so sheepishly that I liked him. In amused retrospect I should have said twins loudly and proudly. But then I probably couldn't have gone into Radiology where it was dim and cool not like hospital light at all.

*

Back in room one the first doctor said the second doctor was coming tonight in 45 minutes. I didn't remember whether or not that was a good thing, the meds made me sleepish. I was already sleepish. Another wait. why not. doze.


*

Doctor Specialist Guy Person was in shorts and T-shirt with the most laughable blond hair like a surfer wave, he was the realest person in the whole place. He came from his sons' sports game and I could have hugged him - but not yet - there was still a foreign body in my foot and Dr. Damitsdeep had said if Doctor Wave could not extract it, I'd have to be put under for surgery. But he started to work and confidently; I was a good deal numb still but could now and then feel it; so he had to give one more deadening shot. that was the worst of all. It hurt like the other ones but they subsided and this one did not, it hurt more and more like he was jabbing in further and further. I forgave him because he said this will hurt a lot and because he was a good person. I didn't feel anything anything after it.

*
The good doctor, when he realized I didn't speak chatted with Mom as he excavated the toothpick that as it turned out was stuck between some stubborn tendons - they had a grand time I should say, the company NOT the tendons - I fell 1/4ly asleep and listened and felt the tugging until until finally finally finally finally finally finally finally finally finally finally finally finally finally the doctor said there it is. Inch long, bloody bloody.

*

At home Sophie met us at the car, holding something in her hand. "I saved all the red Starburst for you," she said abashedly and I smiled for the first time.

**

This happens when I don't think circumspectly when I write, I write an awful lot lot lot and like in rapids or torrents. and you may think about nothing important? But you must understand, I never even took aspirin before, hardly a pill in my life, never the hospital, never emergencies. This is all so traumatising and just so terribly exciting!!

-

OK, I'll delete it.

*

Today I seem to be able to put some weight on it and the crutches hurt my hands so I will to get along without them. But I am not used to moving at a glacial pace at all. Already I want to run. Inability is intolerable.

Stupid, stupid toothpick.

Last night I hoped for today to be better, and even though I didn't know then that between that post and now I would have a visit to the ER and a sleepless night, I can honestly say that somehow it was.
more later, tomorrow, sometime.
I'm sleepy. I'm loopy. Good night.

I know only one thing

That tomorrow must be brighter than today.

A bright sunshiney day

The trees are whispering to the wind, and the birds are singing to each other, and Susan's showing off, and today I just have to say that I don't have anything to say. And that is really all right.


"I'd just like to look a little more
At such a curious earth!"

All in my head

Sitting around yesterday, quaffing death-by-chocolate ice cream and having the chats that sisters do.

O: (shaking head despairingly at K's bespattered front) "You're a mess."

K: "We all are!!"

C: "I am not..." (looking over self critically)

K: "No, you are a mess mentally."

Flash

I wonder sometimes whether he knows I'm there or not. His greatest joy is running, exploring - he puts his nose to the wind for a taut moment, he smiles a gleeful smile and then he is off. When we do start out together, it lasts for as long as I can keep step with the essence of sprightliness. Soon he is here! there!! If I'm lucky, I hear the familiar roadside rustling but oftentimes don't see him for miles, no matter how frequent my useless summons.

The problem, you see, is a very complexly simple one - somehow that dog is far too much like me.
We go to wander, to adventure, move and to be. Our obedience may be lacking, but the delight we find in the Sunshine and the joy splashing down with the Rain: boundless...

So I understand not to be upset with him on a walk when I miss Bear's closeness and devotion;
and I know that the best thing to do when he makes me want to laugh... is to laugh.

Hopeful wisdom for the 2nd half

If the Cardinals win just all of their remaining games, they
are a virtual lock to make the playoffs.

Recently discovered

Cornfields are wondrous places.

Flash thinks so too.

What have I got in my pocketses?

When I come home from roaming - however brief or lengthy it was - deep in my pockets I always find treasures discovered on or embedded in the dusty road.

Ishould vs. Iwill

Today I should make some phone calls, I should practice the Chopin, I should have the vacuum going - I should perhaps even brush my hair. But right now I feel quiet, and the only place I want to be is barefoot on the dirt road, walking to nowhere with the wind sounds and the familiar rustle of my funny, fiendish dog close by.

Shades of familiarity

On the 4th of July holiday this year we went fishing at a nearby nature reserve. I say we, but truth be told, I really only revisited that wont I've had since toddler-hood: to far prefer amusing myself with Dad's oversized sunglasses rather than some fishing pole.

Call me silly

But I always cry my blissful eyes out when I read David Copperfield.

Further proof that AC is basically from the devil

Yes, it is 95 degrees out and yes, I am wearing a sweater.

Killing me softly

This morning I hid all the Chopin so I wouldn't find it for a while at least. I will anyway. For days now it's been frederic frederic frederic and my back aches and aches, my right little finger is stuck quite aloof from the others (it is either marooned in the must-hit-the-high-notes position, or just plain getting uppity) and my both feet match the impressions in the carpet under the Spinet, under the now polished pedals. The thing is there's not a thing more I'm going to do about it. I shall die at the Piano, or at least from the looks of it, try. O Frederic? Where art thou. . .

We'll get it right some day

In the recent selection and announcement of the new and indeed impressive Seven Wonders of the World - including such grand and beautiful edifices as the Taj Mahal, Great Wall, the Colosseum, etc. - we humble midwesterners really can only find one small fault: That somehow forgotten and left off this list was one of the most enchanting and magical of all the sites in the not always big world.


Wonder is not so hard to find.

Opposites Attack

Lauren: I just got done reading the last book in the Love Comes Softly series. They are so awesome!

Christina: Oh please. You know what is awesome? This book about the great Composers and their lives and influences and works and stuff ... now that is awesome.
By the way, why are we friends?

(Comfortable pause)

Lauren: Good question.

Amadeus

There is music everywhere, on the Piano on the floor on my mind on the ceiling. Everyone is gone today, except the boys which is alright because they only watch TV and so there is no one but the Angels to think it funny when I lay my head on the keys and smile-sigh-cry-groan. I played for hours and hours, evening until night yesterday and I guess today I am picking up where I paused. Something gave with the Chopin last night - an incredible quick feeling when you finally begin to know you are getting it - "look, we have come through!"

A while ago I listened to the third movement of (Moonlight) Sonata Quasi una Fantasia seven times in a row, lying on my back with the piano thrilling and throbbing and I supposed I lay under it while Beethoven played his beautiful passion out, and the Countess Giulietta listened, and the Countess's father was in debtor's prison, being without rank, fortune or permanent employ. My angels smiled at me. I can't stop for that. After seven times it gave me a heartache and I turned it off and went back to the Piano and I played Mozart until it went away.

Transplant

The hay finally gotten in, the fields looking rather undressed.

For a friend

fly safe, land softly.

Summer in the City

Meet me in St. Louie, Loo-ee

Meet me at the Fair

Don't tell me the lights are shining

Anyplace but there