Monday, July 02, 2007

crossroads

As I drive along near the fairgrounds one Sunday not far in the past, punching at the radio buttons in a vain search to find music worth listening to, I realize something I've forgotten again. So I turn off the blasted radio and roll down the window. I can hear it, but not well – a sax riff, the beat of a bass, a hum gearing up to the next chorus. It's the last night of the blues festival. I sail through the yellow light into another year's wait.

What's a blog for if not embarrassing confessions?

In eight summers here, half that time living in walking distance to the fairgrounds, I have never gotten to a blues festival. It's weird. Every year I say I want to go and every year I don't.

I seem to hear artists talk all the time about what music filled their houses growing up. Their dads with Sinatra on and their head under the hood of a car, or their parents away and the kids playing the Billie Holiday record over and over again.

What will Isaac say? “I have no idea how I ever came to tour Europe singing opera. Must have been all that talk radio I grew up listening to.”

What kind of artistic environment am I giving my kiddo besides a mom who disappears once in a while to create frustrated half-poems?

Shouldn't art be absorbing what you know and then letting go into possibility and visceral emotion? Sometimes I feel like my “art” is simply about thinking and over thinking. And lately I've been thinking that the problem with this blog isn't that I need to revitalize it, but maybe that I need to put it to rest. Mike says it isn't “Fetal Positions” any more, that it needs a new look and focus.

This is the last official day of my week-long drive to write every day. I did. But I'm not sure to what end. I of course have lots of other stories about my amazing, aggravating, beautiful son who is going to drain every little bit of energy out of me if it's the last thing he does. I've been less able to pull those stories from the pages of my journal in the last months and glean from them any pithy truths or witty verbiage.

If you read this thing, please send a comment and let me know if you do. Now would be the time to check in.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Kitty,
I really have enjoyed the daily posts . You touch on our humanity so well.
Do what you need to do to avoid total madness but know that you and your stories will be missed if you close 'Fetal Positions'

Sally

inkandpen said...

Hi Kitty,
I check in every day. When there is no new post, I often read old ones. I make my husband read them.

I have enjoyed the daily posts this week, enjoy it every time you find more time for blogging.

With regard to today's post... last night, I forgot to watch Ithaca's fireworks, and spent the time between 9:45 and 10:15 cursing the crazy, barking dogs.

Kitty said...

Sally and Katie,

Thanks alot for letting me know you're out there! And for reading! I don't know what I'll do yet, but it's a nice refresher to start to see the writing through others' eyes.

k

Anonymous said...

Kitty, I've been checking in periodically on your blog ever since learning of its existence. I felt like I'd hit gold this week, finding all kinds of new posts at once. I love reading your stuff and your take on motherhood. It amuses me and often alarms me, but mostly it is just good reading. I'd miss it if it weren't here.

Anonymous said...

Hi Kitty

As a fellow feminist, mother and wife, (my 2-week-old is asleep in my lap right now) I have truly appreciated your blog. I find your honesty refreshing and liberating. In the interest of full disclosure, Mike and I go way back, and used to date. The dating part was 10 or 15 years ago now, so I hope you can take my adoration at face value. You are quite a talented writer.
-Michelle

Anonymous said...

Kitty,
Thank you for pulling so much truth out of swings and babytalk.Motherhood makes a bit more sense once you have explained it...Jude

David Weinstock said...

Hi Kitty, you're doing a good job, blogging and mothering too. This physical exhaustion phase is not infinite. I promise you that someday soon you'll have whole hours where Isaac is wide awake but doesn't need you at all. You'll wonder why he's being so quiet. At first you'll pester him. Then you'll get used to it. P.S. The magic word from your blog's security captcha system is izqiub. Squiggly green letters, Izqiub! Izqiub!

David Weinstock said...

I just realized that I have posted a comment that was explicitly forbidden on pain of being eaten. Forgive me, or eat me, I throw myself upon your mercy. Cannibalism is an interesting subject. My very first cookbook, The Grub Bag by Ita Jones, includes an extensive discussion of cannibalism, although without providing recipes. I'm thinking long, slow braising would be good.

AnnieD said...

Do. not. stop. writing. on. this. blog.

You are fantasmaphaticamundously talented.

Much love,
Annie D

Anonymous said...

I regularly read. I sometimes smile, I sometimes cringe, I always enjoy and I often contemplate. Hope you'll find a new direction and will keep blogging.

Anonymous said...

I only cringed once.
;-)

-Michelle

Kitty said...

what makes people cringe, huh? huh? tell me!

Anonymous said...

Hmm, let's see. I would have to say it was tripping the kid at the Goodwill that got me. Laugh!

-Michelle

Share Related Posts with Thumbnails