Psyche and Eros Part 1: Extended Journey

Fifteen years ago, I was side-swiped by love. Looking back to see whether I'd written about this before, I found my little series from five years ago: This Space of Love.  I was a bit surprised at myself...I wrote that?!  There's some pretty good stuff there. Not long after finding myself on this weepy roller-coaster of unrequited love at the age of thirty, I came across a book while shelving as a page at the library. This ranks right up there with the top five cases of serendipity in my life.  Incidentally, that weepy unrequited love sent me into a depression, and it was some casual sex that pulled me out of it, thus my current strategy of seeking closer encounters now.

That book, She: Understanding Feminine Psychology, has been a presence in my life ever since.  At that time, it sure helped to learn that there was no avoiding the heartbreak, even if I had ended up with that person. There must be a period of individuation, where I find myself and I busy myself with tasks of the hands that occupy my mind a little, but aren't too complex.  I spent a lot of time that year folding origami.  In the time following, I recognized that I wouldn't have fallen in love if I hadn't been ready for that.  The author informed me not everyone experiences this transformative love, that a grandmother could still be 'virginal' in her psychological love framework.

Consequent to my experiences, I have said many times it is my hypothesis that love isn't about soul mates, but about people coming together at the right time, sometimes the wrong people, but one or both is ripe for falling in love. And then when one does, there's a good likelihood one will go through the mythical archetype of Eros and Psyche.  I'm glad to see Robert A Johnson's books on He and She are both available on Kindle. I'd like to read the one, and revisit the other, but not yet.

First, I'd like to explore the myth to find my own understanding, and find the telling of the myth in my own life. There's a pair of poems brewing, too.  Then, maybe I'll get to those very short books, and do some more exploration. Philip Pullman said in the introduction of his new book:

The fairy tale is in a perpetual state of becoming and alteration. To keep to one version or one translation alone is to put a robin redbreast in a cage.  ...You are at perfect liberty to invent other details...you're not only at liberty to do so: you have a positive duty to make the story your own. A fairy tale is not a text.

The same, I'm sure, applies to myths.  I found several versions of these gods' story, linking to one in my last post.  I like this person's version, as it has the most details that I remember from my first encounter. Here are parts one, two, three, and four. She also has some great analysis, but again, I want to find my own way first. (Let me tell you, the new Send to Kindle toolbar button is my new best friend for extended web reading.)

Found here

At the age of thirty, once I was on that mythic journey of Eros and Psyche, my psyche wasn't going to be finished until I found that love. I think. I don't know what would have happened if I hadn't found a beloved.  Happily, I found it in my third love, my life-long sweetie I live with today. Funny thing, Important Conclusions happen in threes in those archetypal fairy tales as well. He was the Eros that did not run away.

First I'd like to capture the story in a few plot lines.  Then I may examine those plot lines more deeply, but I may be impatient and get to work on the pair of poems.  I may have mentioned in the past I am only occasionally a poet.  I don't really try to make poems happen, but sometimes poems insist they happen and I become a poet.  This is a case where I foresee a lot of groundwork happening before I can even write the poems, and may well be the most complex poems I will have written.

The Story of Eros and Psyche

1. Psyche is so beautiful that people compare her to Aphrodite and neglect the temples of the Goddess of Love.  The Goddess of Love is pissed.
2. Aphrodite seeks vengeance, and solicits the help of her son, Eros.
3. Meanwhile, Psyche's parents seek the advice of the oracle of Apollo (God of Music, Light, and Reason) and learn Psyche is destined to marry no mortal.
4. Psyche is sent to a mountain as a bride to her unknown, scary bridegroom
5. Eros is taken by her beauty, and (oops, how'd that happen?) pricks himself with his own arrow.  He has a God of Wind carry her to his palace.
6. Psyche finds incredible riches in her new palatial home, and voices that inform her that they will meet her every need.
7. Her new husband visits her only at night, a very pleasurable recurring event. 
8. But during the day she becomes lonely and bored. She pleas with her husband to have her sisters brought to visit. She has become pregnant and wants to share her joy. Eros warns her that no good would come from such a visit.
9. Her sisters are somewhat jealous of Psyche's wealth. They raise concerns about the unseen husband, that he could be a monster, and the neighbors say he is a monstrous serpent. (ha!) Psyche protests he is good and kind, but  she also has doubts. The sisters convince her to take a lamp and a knife to her marriage bed, and if he is a monster, she should cut off his head.
10. Psyche lifts her lamp, and sees the divine. 
11. Psyche pricks herself on one of his arrows, and falls in love with Love.
12. Lamp oil burns Eros, and he sees betrayal and mistrust. He leaves her. She is disconsolate.
13. Psyche wanders in search of her husband. She comes upon a magnificent temple and hopes to find her love. It is a temple to Demeter (Goddess of Fertility, Grain, and Agriculture). Psyche sorts and arranges the food offerings. Demeter cannot help her, but advises Psyche make amends with Aphrodite.
14. Aphrodite sends Psyche on four impossible tasks, and with each task, Psyche weeps, and receives help: ants help with sorting grain; the reeds advise her on gathering golden fleece; the eagle of Zeus fetches her water from the river of life; and a voice from the tower she climbs to throw herself off advises her on the trip to the underworld to fetch a drop of Persephone's beauty. Another version has Eros secretly helping these along. 
15. Returning from the underworld, Psyche realizes she looks bedraggled and fatigued with pregnancy. She opens the box for a bit of that beauty and a mist envelopes her, putting her to sleep.
16. Eros finally comes along, and gathers up the mist and returns it to the box, and revives Psyche.
17. Eros takes her to Olympus and Zeus makes her immortal as a wedding gift. Aphrodite is fine with that, as Psyche will no longer be on earth seducing mortals away from her.

Found here

Next I want to revisit the neuro-chemicals of love, and see how that fits with the story.

Adventures in Dating

The good news is that my campaign to lift myself out of depression is working.  That bad news is that it is keeping me too busy to find time to write, though I have been percolating with ideas, and that wasn't happening when I was depressed. I've also been too busy to read so much. As a bonus, I've found that I want to be more active...and here I was beating myself up for not being active enough, with that inactivity affecting my health.  It proves once again my hypothesis if everything is working the way it should, we will do what is right for our bodies.  I was depressed, and didn't feel like getting out and moving.  In fact, it could hurt more, aches and pains, getting older. Not so depressed, there is lightness in my step, and I feel invigorated rather than fatigued.  So the lesson once again is, rather than place the blame on laziness, look for the reasons underlying the symptom.

Mondrian's Composition in Brown and Gray

Just the knowledge that I've been depressed helped me lift myself out, some.  Thanks to my Buddhist training, I have the skill to catch a thought at its inception (sometimes) and when I could catch that thought, I could also make a choice.  I would say to myself, "Oh, there's that depressed impulse again. I don't need to fall into it."  And I would look up, rather than hunker down in. Let me say that I don't think people who are ill can just decide not to be sick, and people with depression can just decide not to be depressed.  In my case, I am not naturally prone to depression, and I don't think I was severely depressed, though it must have been going on for a long time. With this awareness, I could steer myself toward my more natural positive state of mind.

The other main action has been my adventures in dating.  I can't count the ways I am grateful for my relationship with my sweetie, nor can words say how deeply I love him.  I believe our freedom makes this deep love possible.  We are a lot of things to each other, but we don't have to provide everything the other wants or likes, nor do we expect it from each other. I have no reason to be resentful or disappointed, and I'm not.  He loves me even though I'm a pack rat and leave messy habitats wherever I go!  When has a couple been evenly matched on how often they want to have sex? When have they been interested in the same exact things? What we do expect is honesty and consideration; these are the signs our relationship is healthy. On my adventures in dating, I have the freedom to seek what I need with the comfort of knowing my existing love will not be torn apart.

Just as an aside, I learned a few things about this particular scene.  One thing, online dating is the thing for us fat women.  All I have to do is wait, and those who are looking for someone exactly like me come and find me.  I don't have to approach only to be rejected.  They find me!  Another thing, there are a lot of way younger guys who are looking for older, large women.  What's up with that?  I was talking to another quite bosomy woman who is thirty-three. (I, if you haven't been keeping up, am forty-five.)  We were comparing our experiences with online dating. She said she seems to attract older, creepy guys. I said I too have had interest from some older guys, but have been surprised by how many younger men are interested in me, and not just geek boys (who are sexy) but fit, athletic guys.  Just that alone patches up a whole bunch of tears in self-esteem that might still exist from years of being considered too fat to be sexy.  When I said she should go to the site I'm using, she said, "Oh, I'm too young."  They might be twenty, but these particular guys are looking for me, not her.  Baffling, but hey! I'm not looking for that much younger, but I'll give them a chance.

Another thing learned, sexting is the thing they're into.  Instead of talking on the phone and getting excited, or chatting online, they're looking for sexy texting.  Oh, that is hard on my thumbs.  And then sometimes it turns out that's all they are looking for, and when it comes time to actually meet me in person, they turn into flakes. Hmmm.   Finally, I've learned it's a little suspicious if they don't post a photo as part of their profile...could be a sign of cheating.  This is the thing that's difficult to navigate.  I don't want to poach, so the ones who are honest are left to continue suffering, but the liars get to cheat all they want until their actions start to reveal their secrets.  I feel for the honest ones, I do...they aren't getting what they need, and they don't see a way to find it in their existing relationship. They still love, but don't know how to fix what's broken. I think the sexting without follow-through may be related to this, that these guys are seeking stimulation without it seeming to be cheating.

If you're reading, you who don't want to be cheating dogs, you need to be brave and talk to her. Tell her what you've always wanted and haven't been able to find with her, but that you love her. And that you want her to have a way to find what she's always wanted too.  We always change, all of us, and our needs change, while our love remains.  Yes, the monogamist way is often to break it off, to allow the love to wither, and to seek the next monogamous partner that newly meets our needs. Or to cheat. Sometimes, and this has to be very hard, steer the changes together so that the two still mesh.  Sometimes this is possible, many loves, to seek new loves, or simply to date, while consciously nurturing this love you've dedicated so much of your life to.  How could you tear it apart? You could be surprised. If you are careful, and considerate, and take it slowly, you could find what you're looking for and keep what you have.

Psyche looks upon the divine Eros

I've found those endorphins I needed. I found that boosts to the ego sure help lift depression as well.  I've had some awkward encounters, some nice encounters, some really hot encounters, and one very profound encounter. At the time I told him I felt we touched a bit of heaven.  Later I told him I felt the act we shared opened a gateway and returned a piece of me to me, and it was a sacred moment.  All these encounters helped with endorphins, but this one, I think, brought the healing I needed.  Then, of course, I struggled with attaching to that and falling a little bit in love...how could I not?  Classic Eros and Psyche. (That's another writing project.)

Books Read, including on Love

These are some books I read a while ago, and the draft has been hanging around waiting to be posted. So, finally, I post:

Cupid: A Tale of Love and Desire
by Julius Lester

rating: 4 of 5 stars
Over 10 years ago I read She: Understanding Feminine Psychology. I chanced upon it at an opportune time...I had fallen in love, and that book became my operations manual.

The story of Eros and Psyche is timeless for its archetypal truths. Julius Lester tells it in the way of a traditional black storyteller. In some ways this pulls us in closer to the story, in some ways it distracts. I would have liked to see more of his narrator's hints of how Cupid had touched his own life. The intrusion of the story itself into the narration didn't work for me as well.

I enjoyed the narrator's commentary on love and how this story relates to this contemporary life. I recognized the insights of psychological book mentioned above. I appreciated the insight from the male and Cupid's point of view.

In all of his eternal life there had never been and never would be another moment like this one. Cupid had to choose which truth meant more to him--the truth of his love for his mother, or this new truth with its promise of a beauty that would unfold, evermore and evermore. But he did not choose truth.
...It is fearful to merge one's spirit with that of another's. This is why the beginning of relationships can be fraught with terror. Love requires courage, and I am sad to say, Cupid was a coward. In lying to his mother, he was choosing to keep secret his soul's love. True, he kept his mother's love, but he placed himself in danger of losing something of greater value--himself. However, we must be fair to him. He was new to love. He did not know how much courage love required.

I knew I'd like it when I read this:

I'm going to get philosophical for a moment since this is a philosophical novel. In love, and perhaps only in love, are the finite limitations of self dissolved and we merge, not only with the beloved other, but with wonder itself. In love, whether it is love of another, of music, of art, or whatever, we belong to someone or something and are no longer alone.

Exactly. I remember in She that Johnson said not everyone experiences this. Even grandmothers could be 'virginal.' It is a gift to experience this, though overwhelming.

When it does happen, one could use a guide, whether it is someone who has experienced it, or a psychological tome, or this novel. This book would be a good guide to love.


She: Understanding Feminine Psychology
by Robert A. Johnson

rating: 5 of 5 stars
a must-read for any woman overwhelmed by falling in love




Inkheart
by Cornelia Funke

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I wasn't quite as enamored of this story by Cornelia Funke as I was by her books Dragon Rider and The Thief Lord but it may have just been a matter of timing, and perhaps I'd seen too much of the movie previews. I think the story itself is just getting started. Lynn Redgrave as reader of the audio book was perfect.

Inkspell
by Cornelia Funke

rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is definitely the middle of a trilogy...the story is not over at the end of the book, so I'm ready for the next one.

While I loved Brendan Fraser's reading of Dragon Rider, I needed some time to adjust to his reading after Lynn Redgrave's reading of Inkheart. While I find his use of different accents to indicate different characters adorable, some of them didn't seem to fit, but again that could be due to associating those characters with the voices by Ms. Redgrave. So if listening to both, allow some time between your listen.

I noticed some characters are growing up, and it's not working quite as well for me as Tamora Pierce's work, or J.K. Rowling's. The books are enjoyable, nice listen for a walk.


Nobodies: Modern American Slave Labor and the Dark Side of the New Global Economy
by John Bowe

rating: 3 of 5 stars
Just the fact that this book exists means it needs some attention. I didn't finish just because I don't have the time for this...I don't need the details to be outraged by the fact of coerced and forced labor.

How convenient that the general public is so outraged over 'illegal aliens.' This allows for this kind of stuff to happen, hidden in plain sight.

The other day I heard an anecdote of racists in Florida, and I have to wonder if it is just coincidence that today I read in this book of several cases of slave labor in Florida. So much of my world is invisible to me...where my clothes are made, my material goods. Whether WalMart or Target, if things are cheap, I have to wonder, who made these for less than livable wages? Did they receive wages at all?

In the introduction, the author says, "In the United States, most modern slavery involves the coercion of recent or trafficked immigrants. Such cases are incredibly hard to detect, because much of the time the perpetrators don't rely on chains, guns, or even the use of force. All they require is some form of coercion: threats of beating, deportation, death, or, perhaps most effective, harm to the victim's family back home should he or she eve speak up. These cases occur in out-of-the-way places that are, to quote one activist I met, beyond most Americans' "cognitive map."


The Bloodless Revolution: A Cultural History of Vegetarianism: From 1600 to Modern Times
by Tristram Stuart
no rating: haven't yet read it.

This would be a good book to read with someone. Could be dry, academic, but packed full of philosophical, religious, imperial, as well as cultural history around the idea of vegetarianism.

I would be more inclined to read it and enjoy it if I read it slowly over several months, and could have conversations in a group of people about it.

My Montana: A History and Memoir, 1930-1950
by Jewel Beck Lansing

rating: 3 of 5 stars
I read this for a book group....it is a good book for that kind of group in which people can bring their own experiences of the local history. There's some talk of the book, and the conversation can meander from there. I really like that it is one person's experience of a particular place and time. It is a true glimpse into recent history. On the other hand, it then lacks some neutral omniscience. For instance, this was about whites growing up in the middle of an Indian reservation, and aside from acknowledgment that the government engineered this stealing of land, there was little written, and thus little awareness, of what life was like for Indians at that time on that reservation.

I was very aware that I would have been very uncomfortable with the hygiene of those poorer times. Impetigo is just not something I want to encourage.

Catching Up

Those who are not on Facebook but read me here wouldn't know why the silence, but may have guessed. Yes, my cat Jig died. I didn't feel ready to write about it at first, then I felt like that was the first thing I should write about, and then not writing became a habit. That's often been a pattern of procrastination for me....because I don't feel like doing the thing I think I should do first, I don't do any of it.

The first night after the first visit to the vet, I had a dream. I kept it to myself for a long time. There was a creature after Jig, and I was trying to save her from it. It was spiky-faced and black with a big wide mouth and sharp fangs. I was only somewhat succeeding in keeping it at bay when I woke up. I didn't know if it got to her or not. I tried to do that waking thing where I complete the story of the dream the way I want it to be, but that doesn't work. I knew this wasn't good. Throughout my life, I have rarely dreamt about those who are closest to me. It is only when they have died, or have left me, or about to die or leave me, that I dream about those that are as much a part of me as my own blood. I guess those I've shared oxytocin with. I didn't want to give the dream any more power than it already had in my head.

A few days after that dream, I realized that creature was like an animal version of Lord Yama. This is, believe it or not, another reason I kept it to myself. I didn't want to spark conversations on the cosmology of Buddhism, and how I feel about it, which is 'I don't know.' or 'both-and.' Or quite likely, 'it's all in our heads, but what does that mean if we are all interconnected?' It was kind of like this graffiti dragon that showed up a week or so later. At the very least, I knew my subconscious was telling me how serious this was with Jig.

On February 15th, Jig didn't come out all day. When I went to find her to feed her, she was hiding deep under a piece of furniture. She was gasping for breath. She didn't want to come out. I knew she was trying to die, and trying to do this alone. Again this was a Sunday evening, and again we took her to the emergency pet hospital. The doc thought she was likely experiencing heart failure, that when muscles waste away from weight loss, this sometimes damages the heart too. Jig seemed to be desperately asking us to make the pain stop, to let her be so she could stop. She seemed to be all bone, skin, fur, and pointy tips. While the doc gave us the option of more tests, etc, we decided to let her go. Steve said, "You're a good cat, Jig," which made me cry all the more.

I realized she looked a bit like the creature from my dream. In some way I couldn't shake the feeling that Jig had shared my dream, that she had made this decision over a month before, and we'd only been delaying something that had already occurred. After she was gone, I noticed a change in myself. My legs worked better. Sometimes I felt like my circulation was poor, and I had difficulty standing. Now my legs felt fine. While I was grieving, I felt less depressed and more able to do things. These past few years, Jig and I have had quite an empathetic connection, and it occurred to me perhaps I'd been experiencing a physiological empathetic reaction to her weakness and her sadness. It wouldn't be the first time I've done something like that. Now that she's gone, I'm learning just how much she defined me. I still have the thought when I come home, "Soon I'll see Jig." Sometimes it's that verbal, sometimes it's an image or a feeling of her about to be on my lap. I still have the habit of peeking behind the bathroom door before I go in there to make sure I don't startle her if she's in the litter box.

Now that she's absent, I've realized just how much less of a barrier it is between my identity and an animal friend's, than it is between me and another human. We can be more physically close, lap-sitting for hours. I can pet her whole body in one motion. Most of our language is non-verbal. There is less of a sense of separateness, whereas with a human, even a lover, there's almost always an awareness that our thoughts are separate, that we are separate selves. So while I grieve for a lost love, I also grieve for a lost piece of myself. The part of me that was me-and-Jig can no longer be what she was.

How did I get to be 41 and not experience this, you ask? Jig was the first animal that lived this long with me. As a child, many of our cats didn't live very long, being outdoor animals in a rural area. Our dogs, too, were outdoor animals, and while there was some of that intimacy of snuggling together on the floor, I didn't get so close as I did with Jig. And, well, I've learned to love more deeply in the decade I've known Jig. Indeed I believe she taught me I could love an animal with all my heart. She taught me to see the Buddha in her.

You're a good cat, Jig. I miss you.

When the Time Comes...

In Blackwater Woods (excerpt)
by Mary Oliver

To live in this world

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.

My grandma died last night. She was 89. When I talked to her a day or so before Christmas, she asked as she always asked, "When do you think you'll be coming to visit?" I couldn't say. I was prepared to take a leave of absence and help care for her if needed. She'd been under 24 hour care for a couple of weeks. My mom, my aunt, and a few friends were sharing caregiver duties. Mom told me that grandma was more confused, couldn't remember something that happened an hour before, but she could remember big pleasant things, like my calling. Mom tossed out the Alzheimer word, but it sounded more to me like the withdrawal that comes before death. The happenings of this physical world become less important. It also seemed Grandma was getting less oxygen, her lung cancer depriving her of that brain food. Mom told me they had a nice Christmas, with everyone remembering old times.

Now I am thinking about going back to Wisconsin, of visiting the house without my Grandma there. As much as her absence, I am thinking about the dismantling of her house, her big house that she'd always wanted, filled with the keepsakes of five generations. I think of sleeping for the last time on the bed that was always "my bed," and before my time, my aunt's bed. I think of the bed my grandma and grandpa shared for years, and my grandma alone for another decade. Who in my family will take these, or will they be sold, the past lives of these objects meaning nothing to the new owners? So many photos, scrapbooks, pieces of a life, how will they be scattered? We each will receive pieces of her, physical mementos, reminders for our hearts.

My grandma (and grandpa) and their house were always a refuge for me and my brothers. Theirs was a place we could find unconditional love, treats (ice cream every night), and none of the negative judgements. Even as I let her go, she will always be a part of me.

Better Together

Today, like any other day, we wake up empty

and frightened. Don't open the door to the study

and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument.

Let the beauty we love be what we do.

There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.
~Rumi ...translated by Coleman Barks

Today Steve and I celebrate our anniversary. We officially married on December 27, 2002.

Notice the date just before the end of the year. We bought our duplex together that year, and when we thought of the complicated tax preparations, we decided to make it a little easier. So many legal documents are rolled up into that one signature. I know, that doesn't sound very romantic. From our point of view, we didn't and don't need that document to forge our commitment and love for each other. I was a little ambivalent about it, thinking of my gay friends who cannot get married and resolve so many legal matters in this way. This morning Steve and I were saying it didn't make much difference to us. In fact, we've never had anybody question our right to speak for each other. All we have to do is say we're married and the doctor will tell all, or the insurance will cover us.


Steve took this photo of us Christmas night. He spent Christmas day with Krissy. He asked me how my day went, and noticed my lack of enthusiasm. I didn't want to say so, but I'd been feeling lonely. I didn't want him to feel bad about spending Christmas Eve with me, and Christmas day with Krissy. In the end, I was glad I confessed, because allowing the words to come out, I realized my pain was about something deeper than that. I'd meant to do so much more on my vacation, and I missed him that day as a distraction from the things I didn't do. Also, we were going back to work the next day. His sabbatical over, we'd have no more relaxed days together, very few chances to dine out for breakfast. Thus the look.


As he left for work today, Steve said, "Don't spend all day reading a sad book of poetry." He'd seen the book in my hand, Risking Everything: 110 Poems of Love and Revelation.


I said, "It's about love!"
He said, "And poems about love are sad. At least bittersweet."
In a way he was right. Poems about love, or more especially about revelation, are about death. This will all go away.


I don't see it as sad, though death still scares me even after 20 years of a Buddhist practice. I see it as a reminder to let my divinity shine.


I'm not doing that when I'm wallowing in loneliness because I'm seeking distraction from inertia. Sometimes I escape in reading, as Rumi cautions against. Often I escape in TV. I watched way too many Christmas movies this year, even though there are only a few types: Santa (Miracle on 34th St), Love (A Holiday Affair), A Christmas Carol, and It's a Wonderful Life. I suppose I could include a magical category, but those can usually fall into those other types. At least all those holiday movies were uncomplicated fun, and always had a happy ending.

On February 7 it will be our 10th anniversary of the day we first met. For me, it was love within a couple of days. Steve declared love a few days after that, but admitted a few years later that he was slow to feel his was a deeper love. He is careful like that. It is easy to love him. If we're walking along a sidewalk, he will reach out to touch me, or put his arm around me, and I think, oh my, am I showing my love enough? I need to reach out more. and I reach out to touch him. It goes like that. Neither of us ever seem to think, I do too much. Rather, we keep trying to do more for the other, and my gratitude never ends.

Between us, it is not the way Marge Piercy says in "To Have Without Holding":

"It hurts to love wide open
stretching the muscles that feel
as if they are made of wet plaster,
then of blunt knives, then
of sharp knives."
[snip]
...to have
and not to hold, to love
with minimized malice, hunger
and anger moment by moment balanced.

I don't find that finely tuned tension that Piercy writes of. Rather, I feel that we amplify each other, bring out the best in each other. We have each other, and like Piercy, we do not hold tight. We value the autonomy of the other, and the returns are so sweet. When I have loved others wide open, there has been this pain of stretched muscles, but with Steve, who so generously met my passion of a few days, I found warm embrace. We have found the sweet trust of non-ownership. We don't expect or want to be the only one, the soul mate, the one who is entitled, and through that not-holding, we find a peace that comes with never losing each other.

Tonight we went to the restaurant where we got married 5 years ago, Takahashi. We go there often, but tonight after reading these love poems, and remembering our 10 years together, I was excited about revisiting the night we tied the knot. Our same waitress was there, and when I said, "You'll never guess what night it is," she said, "Would it be an anniversary?" She told us there have been three marriages, three proposals, and when Steve asked, thinking of course not, "Yes, there was! One divorce." They wanted to give us free ice cream, but we didn't feel up to ginger, green tea, or red bean ice cream.

We decided to get dessert at Palio. A chocolate mousse tort for Steve, Red Velvet Cake for me. Divine. Once home, we finished the Scrabble game that we've been playing for over a year. We usually only play this travel Scrabble at Takahashi, and lately the food has been arriving much faster.

Neighborhood Changes

Less than a month ago I started watching the progress of a house down the street getting remodeled. They gutted the insides down to the studs. I was astonished to walk by one day and find they'd removed half the roof. A day or two later I started taking pictures because Steve was interested, but hadn't the time to see the place before they built it back up again.

August 8:
If you look closely you can see they nailed plywood right over the siding. They've already begun the second story that is replacing the right half of the roof.


The view from the right:
...
I believe it was on that day I spoke to the contractor. I think he was the company owner or at least the lead guy. He always seems to be there, and he was the last one there that day. I told him I'd been wondering why they didn't just take the whole thing down. Was the wood still that good, did it save them some money? He told me they were just under the wire with the amount demolished to still be classified as a remodel, rather than a new building. That saved them $90,000. I know nothing of the details, but I'm aware the difference in classification makes it a completely different thing with the permits and whatnot. He had a magnetic sign on his truck: Wood Dog Rebuilders.

Nine days later, the house is taking a new shape, as viewed from the right:


They will have quite the view of their neighbor's roof:


This weekend, it's looking pretty well enclosed, but that siding is still showing in places. I wonder if they have plans for those spots, or just haven't got the plywood cut yet. Earlier, such spots on the right-hand side did get covered:


The view from the right:


I like the Native American Flag. I wonder if that is temporary until the roof is finished. I wonder if it belongs to one of the remodelers or the new owners. I don't even know if there are new owners. (Pause while I look at portlandmaps.com.) There was never a For Sale sign. Portland Maps does not yet reflect a sale. The house next to it recently sold for $325,500. That house had even less square feet than this one before improvements, yet this one did not have as great a value. This gutting will surely raise the value by $200,000.

The house next door is seeing some changes too. The second story is getting a balcony, I guess. A couple of years ago I'd walk past tsk-tsking, looking at that window with the broken glass that went unfixed for months on end. Now here the new owners removed the wood below (hmmm) and put in a door.




That's not all. Another house down the street lost its roof too:




That was August 16. The next day, morning:


and evening:


The Division Maytag that has been on Division forever has moved. Sadly, they can't compete with places like Sears for new products sales. The new occupants have a bunch of reclaimed stained glass windows and "architectural details" for sale.

Maytag moved just a block away, to the retail hinterlands, you could say. There is no ramp to their back door. How'd they get that fridge there?

The Maytag guy is still cheerful:
..

...
Just a small sunken storefront next to the tattoo parlor and Food Fight Vegan Grocery. Let me say this is not the hinterlands for Food Fight, because I'm sure people come from around the city to shop at a vegan-dedicated store.

Just so you know, there is junk food in the vegan store too:

Another neighborhood change, a new horse. I was sad a couple months ago to find this white horse in pieces. She did like to hop down into the street at times, and must have been in the wrong place when a car drove up. (I thought I took a photo but can't find it now.) Now, this black beauty has taken her place.

Finally, a gift left on the sidewalk. Sanskrit, meaning just what it says: