short story chapter one

The kind of life you fight for

The rain fell hard, almost as hard as his feet falling to the pavement. He ran and the rain stung his eyes, and mixed with his tears. Looking back the ground fading and the street lights disappearing, looking forward the fog swallowed him, until all he felt was the burning in his lungs from running so hard. Then the pavement came rushing at his face, he felt the warm blood coming out of his nose and he slipped into a cold wet sleep.

After what seemed like decades John awoke, his blonde hair matted to his head like an old wool hat. The air smelled sweet, and the sun filtered through the trees, as he sat up he felt the soft grass under hand. What had happened, one moment he was running for his life, and now he was in some sort of nature park. "Okay, I see! This is a dream, my party days have caught up to me, I am A. In a coma, or B. dead. " he stood on shaky legs and checked out his surroundings. "Definitely dead, this place can not be real..."

A calm stream flowed nearby, and he could have sworn the animals were watching him! "Calm creek, cool breeze, small woodland creatures...I must have really tied one on last night, we are so not in Kansas anymore Toto." He laughed as he thought of witches, and tornados and far away lands in fairy tales. "The wiz has nothing on this place. " He looked down at his watch hoping to find some small bit of reality, and of course, the face was crushed, one of the hands missing. "Worthless piece of shit!" He took it off and hurled it into the woods. A fraction of a second later it came hurdling back at him smacking him in the head. "Shit! Let me guess, it must have hit the cowardly lion. "

"With all due respect, they call me Jane, and that thing you are throwing around rudely interrupted our corners... Now if you'll excuse me."
His heart sank, then swam, then sank, the most beautiful woman stood before him. Her mouse brown hair fell around her shoulders and met in the back with a braid held by wild flowers. Her skin seemed to glow with a faint blue light, and the air stirred with the scent of lilac as she turned quietly to go...

to be continued, possibly

You are beautiful

She walked with a cane, and she spoke with a thick accent, German perhaps, I couldn't tell. We walked and talked about flowers at a leisured pace for a half hour or so. She finally settled on an English garden set up, red pentas, butter daisies, and white fluff zinnia linearis. I had gone through several color combinations, and many different foliage types before we came on that perfect grouping. I loaded several dozen plants on the wagon and pulled it slowly so she could keep step with me. She asked my name, when I told her she stopped in her step and repeated it aloud,then she said," well, that is beautiful, and you are beautiful, and now my garden will be beautiful", and I smiled, because I don't think I am beautiful. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and wisdom is built like a great wall, slowly over time, and a little old lady named Nellie made me stop for a few minutes today and see beauty in the things I take for granted. So if I haven't told you lately, and you are reading this, you are beautiful to me, and hopefully that makes you smile like it did me.

Thieves suck

last night our store was robbed. the just got away with some petty cash, but the thought pisses me off! whatever happened to "if you can afford it, you don't need it" . i guess some people are just assholes.

This olde doghouse

So the doghouse was fun to build, and came out pretty well, but the dog doesn't seem to care much for it. As you can see Lola thinks it's great fun, and one of the few places she can go that the dog doesn't care to follow her. I'll post the finished pictures later, I finally got it painted and added the singles. I'm quiet handy when I need to be.

Interesting article

The divine irony of 'intelligent design'
By Garret Keizer

February 24, 2006

"ADVOCATES OF teaching "intelligent design" aren't giving up, no matter the recent setbacks in California and Pennsylvania. In Utah, Texas, New York and elsewhere, they persist in trying to make science education subservient to a religious worldview. And yet the longer the controversy continues, the more it illustrates their own subservience to science. As its name suggests, the major premise of intelligent design is that the existence of a supreme designer can be inferred by evidence of his, her or its "intelligence." And that premise rests in turn on an even more basic assumption: that intelligence is the most important, perceivable and telling attribute of God and of the creature supposedly created in God's image."

read more here:

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-keizer24feb24,0,5984839.story?coll=la-news-comment-opinions

i spent about six thousand dollars in the last couple of days, buying stuff with other peoples money is fun. just a thought...

How does your garden grow?

these are a few more custom designs i have finished up in the last week or so. the 2 behind the fat girl went to some foo foo salon, the others have found homes in the greater san antonio area as well. mary mary quiet contrary, how does your garden grow?

Stormy weather

Another spring, another beginning, another set of Texas storms blowing through. The beauty here is in the simplicity. The land is flat, you can see for miles, stand on your tippy toes, and you can see twice as far. I love watching the thunderheads build. Billowing, passionate white clouds tinged in grey. It's almost as if they are stretching, trying as hard as they can to hold back the raging storm within, we all know about those, don't we? I love the moments just before breaking, the wind howls, the trees sway, and everything takes on that pre storm glow. Drop by drop the slow fury falls, deliberate, distant, until the watershed breaks and the sky pours. I feel like a storm a lot lately, slow, steady, deliberate, just waiting for the right moment to burst. The question then becomes, when is the right moment? Do the clouds care if the earth is ready to be drenched? Do I care if the earth is ready to be drenched? Have I stopped pouring myself into life because I am afraid of how I will be received? Do the drops of rain not find the path of least resistance? Do I still look for that path? Have I stopped looking for a path and settled in a calm quiet place where storms no longer rage. I know, we all find that place where we stop and rest and find the stillness in the storm, but there are certain times in life when we are the storm, we are the front, pushing everything near us away, reaching and taking the world in handfuls. Then there comes the silence again, a storm is momentary, puddles fade, the ground is thankful, and the temporary insanity of the storm passes and life resumes....

Got Bone?

Free man

My cheeks are rosy, my body is warm, two glasses of wine always seem to find something hiding deep inside waiting to be written. I'm looking down at golden brown hands typing, I already have a nice base tan, by mid summer I will be a deep bronze. I haven't worn " real " shoes in over a month, and pants are a small winter dream. Palm trees aren't so unusual, and local burger joints aren't so hard to find anymore. My heart is planted. A small part of me hides a handful of sadness for my friends and family back home, more for my family. My friends , I love you all more than you know, and I know you all know how to read a map and will be here sooner or later to visit me. My family on the other hand, I wish I could wrap them all up, keep them in my pocket, safe, familiar, home, keep it closer than skin. I miss my mom the most, mamma's girl, hell yeah, damn proud of it. The youngest of three growing up on hand me downs and government help, I stuck to my mother like white on rice. She was life, she was safety, she was stability, what little we had in those days. I know I've said it before, but the world was so big and we we're so close that I never remember being poor. I remember being free, I knew every one by name, at least three blocks away, and everybody knew me. There was comfort in that. I can't say that I know my neighbors name now... " I ain't saying it's the only way, but wouldn't you like to know how it feels to live like a free man, to give, when there is nothing in your hand, and to run, by god , like only the river can.....Like a free man...." Those words, that song, I remember, a night by my lonesome, at an Angie concert, a girl from Michigan bootlegged homeade blackberry wine in, and we got trashed and sang at the top of our lungs how we wanted to live like a free man.... I don't remember her name, but I remember the night, and the spirit, and how much I wanted to, and still want to be free like a river, I close my eyes, and I'm lying on my back floating down the ocoee, or the tennessee, water in my ears, freedom, release, a free man. I suppose somewhere in the middle of this whole thing I lost track a bit , I don't even know where I meant to go with it really, but , my heart feels better, and I will sleep tonight with a warm glow of spring sun on my face, and the words of a song running through my head...." Wouldn't you like to know, how it feels to live like a free man....." If memories were nickles, i'd be a millionaire...hehehe

Break your heart

So I guess I've complained enough about my new management role at work for this season, it's a lot like new dress shoes, they usually hurt your feet, but in the long run you come out looking better for having worn them. I'm being stretched to all limits now. Some parts are fun, some parts suck, and some parts are so human that when the day ends and I am alone with myself I just want to cry. One of my new employees came to me the other day needing time off, she said the doctors found a lump in her breast and she had to have a routine check up. She broke down and fell against me crying Sunday when she found out that the cancer she had beat twice is back, and is now spread to both breasts and possibly her lungs. Against a bright blue Texas sky the birds sang as she wept.
I helped a young couple today, the man wanted to plant flowers at his new home for his wife, he said, you see, I only have a few days left before I'm deployed, who knows when I'll be back.
A lonely little woman had me help her choose the perfect flowers to brighten up her bed, her husband passed a year to the day, and he always did the yard work, and now she is lost without him.
I pass my days chatting with all sorts of people, but they all have a story, and they all seem to just want to get it out. Another little lady, I would have to guess she was in her late seventies, spent the longest time picking flowers with me. Before we had finished she smiled at me and said "this day reminds me of a song", she sang it to me, and I wish I could remember the words, but it was beautiful, and the breeze took it away as fast as it fell from her lips. I thanked her for helping me find a song in the day.
Perhaps it's just me. Maybe it's the full moon, maybe it's a world full of us all struggling to not get lost, broken by disease, broken by the grief of losing the man you spent fifty years with, broken by the reality of foreign soil and the fear of never coming home, broken by a life that passes so quickly.
I took a different path at the park tonight when I walked the dog. I went up a side hill, and the moon was so big on the horizon, there in the opening were several doe, beautiful, graceful, the sunsetting, the moon rising, silence in a million plus city, the dog sat there and the deer just looked back at me for the longest time, and thoughts ran and swirled and drifted. You have a story, I probably know part of it, I have a story, we all love and break and cry and laugh and sing, and somedays it';s so fucking real that we can hardly stand it,and somedays it's so big that it crushes us, so we find a quiet connection, we make eye contact for a brief moment, and we find the solace in a stranger and sometimes it breaks our hearts....


"I know it will hurt.I know that it will break your heart.The way things are and the way they've been.Don't spread discontent, don't spread the lies.Don't make the same mistakes with your own life.You know it will always come back"
~~Natalie Merchant,
"Break your heart"

Run Forest...Run!

This week, I ran, 3 days in a row , on purpose. nothing was chasing me, i was not in any immediate danger, no one was giving out free beer. i have found that going to the park and running my dog releives her stress and energy, as well as my own. i intend to keep it up. she is getting so big, and i have also been getting big, so i figure , win win, the dog gets exercise and play time, and so do i. puppy was a great idea for me, i have no time to drink or any other extra curricular acctivity for that matter. work out for 8 hours moving plants, then a nice brisk evening jog. i'm well on my way to dog lovin yuppie, nah!

Reason 264 why i hate the general population

**ring ring**

me: Garden nursery plant store "x", how can i help you?

phone idiot: What are your store hours?

me: We are open from 9 am to 6 pm, 7 days a week...

phone idiot: What about sundays?

me: Eat draino dumby!!@!@!@#

In the dog house...

I have spent the better part of the day building a dog house, and drinking beer. Power tools, small excitable animals, and drunks. Yes, I know it reminds you all of homespun holiday redneck fun, but alas no, it's not uncle cobweb, or aunt gertie, just me and a dog and a beer and a dewalt saw... yee haw, and god bless America! I think my crack was even showin when I bent over, my heritage is still in tack...Don't laugh, I'm describing your family too...hehehe.

Catahoula Leopard Dog

today i took sasha to a real vet, turns out she is a Catahoula Leopard Dog, descended from red wolves originally. i learn something new every day. hehe

So New...

Today I held a baby... A two week old baby girl. She had that new baby smell, and she grunted that new baby grunt, and she was beautiful. My days are spent hoisting 50 pound bags of soil, and trees, and rocks, and the marvel of something so small, so perfect, fingers , toes, life, was a blessing in my day. I know, babies are a dime a dozen, thousands born everyday, but to hold one to your chest, to feel soft new skin, days old, helpless, precious, tiny pieces of the future, in my hands, hands rough, calloused, dirty from a life I don't always appreciate. Whatever god, goddess, idol, shrine, or being you credit for this life we live should be praised for something so tiny, so new, so perfectly innocent. Innocents is an ideal at this stage of life, unfathomable, unreachable, but for her, everything is new, she will spend the next several years of her life, touching, tasting, absorbing new things, she will come in contact with you's, and me's, and we will have a brief moment in her life, a brief smile, a growl, a high five, a scowl, but the world will surround her, as it surrounds us all. So new, so perfect. She was barely a handful for me, this is the part of being alive that makes me happy...So little...So new....

Winding down

I was very productive today, against my better judgment. I woke up called my mom, picked up my check, shampooed the carpet, cleaned the house, used my new drill to hang the new spice racks, and went to buy lumber that I intend to use in the forthcoming days for the building of a dog mansion. Well, more like a doggie bungalow on stilts, keep out the critters, and the flash flooding, assuming the gods smile and it ever rains here again. All in all it was a good day. The best part had to be the ride home from the hardware store tonite. Jeremy got a new truck this week, hooray, which I promptly put to use, anyway, Sandra myself and the boy loaded up and headed out. We got the lumber and I rode in the back of the truck laying on top of the plywood. I can't remember the last time I rode in the back of a truck, but it was great. The wind swirling around me, flat on my back, moon, stars, street lights, tree tops, overpasses, billboards. I am convinced that the world is prettier at night looking up from the bed of a truck. I soaked in the twenty minute ride like it was a tub of steaming water, grinning from ear to ear the whole way. It really is the little things in life....

Dog Scratch Fever

i took the dog to get her nails trimmed, sharp little knives, i couldn't handle it anymore. she peed on the lady, thats her m.o. pee on new people make them your own!

Crazy world

Girl, 7, shares cocaine with Grade 2 classmates
www.thestar.com this was in the toronto star, they start early yo!
Feb. 28, 2006. 09:45 PM
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A 7-year-old girl took cocaine to her Grade 2 classroom in Philadelphia and passed it around, police said Tuesday.
Detectives were trying to determine where the girl obtained the drugs, which she brought into the John M. Patterson School in her backpack Monday, said police Capt. Benjamin Naish. The teacher called authorities after she discovered the drugs among her students.
One child told her mother she had eaten some of the powder but was found to be okay when examined at a hospital, authorities said.
The School District of Philadelphia is waiting for the results of the police investigation before deciding how to punish the child, said spokesman Vincent Thompson.
"We're outraged that some parent or guardian of a second-grade student in Philadelphia would allow their child to bring in powdered cocaine to a school," Thompson said.

Breaking ground

The last week has been physically and emotionally taxing. I have pushed myself to every limit breaking task I could handle. I have literally passed over 6000 plants through my hands in the last 3 days. On average, this is a scale of one to five gallon plants, that would break down to some where between 5 pounds and 10 pounds per plant on average. Now, 5 times 6000, if my math is right is 30000 lbs, that's a damn lot of plant to hoist around on man power alone. I don't even want to think about the weight of the 10, 15, and 30 gallon plants we moved. If it is flesh to bone, it hurts. I can feel the lattice work of muscle that is my body, and it makes me cry sometimes because the ache is so much at the end of the day, but I feel like I have something to prove. This is my year , this is the time to absorb. This is the time to find the seed in my self, small, dry from the cold, hard in the ground, until the perfect combination of sky and earth and water cause the moment of germination and I too will break ground. My body is tired, having gone dormant for another winter season, and this year, the challenge will make or break not only my physical, but my mental growing season. A small group of people depend on me, they look to me for answers, and guidance, and while that may not seem like a trying task, the addition of the physical labor is beginning to wear on me. I wake to the same bruises I have gone to bed with, and I often wonder if the passion I have for the plants might very well be the very thing that breaks me. As I turned my key in the lock tonight, I stopped and looked out on a sea of blooming color. An overwhelming ocean of fragrance, and foliage. When I am the only person on the five acre lot paradise, I smile, because I know a part of me has touched all of the life on the small Texas plot. Tonight I will fall asleep sunkissed and warm from the first 90 degree day of the year. The aches will fade as I grow, the flowers will bloom as they grow, I will learn something new everyday, I will bite my tongue when the new kids mess up, I will watch everything around me grow, I will stumble, fall, bleed, cry, and at the end of the day my hands will be dirty, each groove filled with the soil that is life, my life, this is my life...This is my life......