They say california is a recipe for a black hole

I have been on a serious Rilo Kiley kick for at least a week. Blame it on cranberry sauce, which I was making last Wednesday, and it was lovely, had the house to myself all day and just listened to tons of music and cooked odds and ends of supplemental Thanksgiving foods. I love those days, maybe once a month. Silence and solitude and making something out of nothing. Insofar as there is stress in my life, these are the days when it is released, when you might say I channel and release tension from my shoulders into the food I make.

As for Rilo Kiley, they are everything. Sweet, cutting, country, rock, peerless lyrics, great music. Three Rilo Kiley songs:

Jenny, You're Barely Alive

My Slumbering Heart

Portions for Foxes

NFL network misheard

The broom is off the Lions' rose. Pick sicks. He will go up and get it at 11 feet. Clocking was a little too rude.

Laundry!

Landry.

Go get it A-1!

For the first time in Lane's history

Ice cream paint job

My father kept turning things off or changing the channel just as I was getting interested in the programs

I sent the same message twice, but doubted that Nancy would notice

I like to play fast and loose with the rules late in the week

Just sitting here idly querying databases, as one does

The usual end-of-the-month posting binge

Smuggling tires to Norway to make a fast buck; riskier than it sounds

I only eat ice cream when it rains

Slush on the sidewalks is worse than ice; ice can't enter your shoes by osmosis

The chair, another item that doesn't get its due for the huge role it plays in modern life

Scattered

So I've come to have a preternatural calm about me in bad situations. I can make things better if I can be calmer than anyone else. The calm can be easily mistaken by others for acumen or intelligence. Really it's just a defense mechanism. Stay calm, we can build off of calm. I didn't panic today when the snow interfered with my plans. I pursued the matter to the fullest extent that I could, then pulled back, made a strategic decision to go to the movies, that was that. Allow the calm to fill you. You can't change anything by your madness and rat-like scurrying.

4 Months

Places I have lived or spent time in growing up that could partially or fully be considered my hometown:

*Boston, MA
*Ipswich, MA
*Groveland, MA
*Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso
*Bamako, Mali
*West Newbury, MA
*Cannon Beach, OR
*Portland, OR
*Grenoble, France
*Medford, MA

[In approximate reverse chronological order by date of first contact]

It's a list. I'm nothing if not transient.

days go by, I don't know why

The ends of days have been better than the beginnings lately. I had this fear this morning, that I had no control. It was a dream that bled into the morning and threatened to destroy any chance of having a good day. Events were running their course without my input. I was an actor in the play of my life. The actor doesn't write the lines, or create the scenery, or direct the action. He is a puppet, moved by others and bent to their will.

It was frightening, and the terror I felt pressed down on me, clamoring to be heard to the exclusion of all other thoughts. Everything reminded me of my fear, that I would be passed by. A wave washed over me, and in it was everything I hold dear, racing over me, through me, and past me in a flash before I could grab hold of it. For the life of me, I couldn't make it right. I knew I shouldn't feel this way, and that I would feel fine later on, but the immediacy of it was the worst part. In that moment I could not escape, and it was an awful thing.