It's been a long time...

I haven't posted in months now, but I think that's it's about time. The fall was crazy for me--my husband and I split up and life has been chaoctic. But maybe it's the coming new year or my own exhaustion but I am starting to yearn for calm. I am sick of the drama, so I am preparing for the upcoming year and the upcoming semester. I have the light at the end of tunnel (graduation) to look forward to. I also I have decided that since I am in a state of flux I might as well roll with it so I have decided that after graduation I am going to move across the country to WA state. I am ready for a change of scenery. I need to be someplace different. As trite as it is, I need a fresh start. I want to be someplace that doesn't remind me of anything at all. I have been sliced open and I need to figure out how to put myself back together again like Humpty Dumpty. But now I am off to work on the thesis so that I can get that degree! There will be more soon, I swear.

Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf was really onto something when she wrote A Room of One's Own. I have been struggling to find time to write, even think, since the summer began but it is impossible with four kids running around here. Or should I say three, the oldest in is some sort of computer-induced stasis. There are moments in life when nothing seems to make any sense. I am experiencing one of them right now. I feel like an observer. If there were a soundtrack to my life, the song playing right now would be "Once in a Lifetime." In fact, now it is. The problem is that I don't work well with disorder and that's what I am surrounded with right now. I haven't finished unpacking yet from WA and I am going to need to pack for AZ in two weeks. I think I may just leave it and throw in clean underwear. But hey, if you come to see me read at the Oliver House in Bisbee, AZ on July 21st at least you'll know that I have those on! Off to do writing for Craig's class...

In the Pink

Some days you wake up and you just know that it is going to be a bad one. For me this morning, the first blaring siren of doom was the pebbly feeling of pink eye that greeted me upon opening my eyes. After which I promptly forgot to wish my daughter happy birthday, making me feel like an utter ass when she reminded me. There is no food in the house that isn't filled with nitrates and preservatives, I have a mountain of laundry to do, and there is dog hair everywhere. All of which just add to the feeling of despair. I know that sounds melodramatic, but hey, it happens. Everybody else gets depressed, why shouldn't I once in awhile. I think pink eye is a marvelous excuse.

Not bad for someone who barely passed high school chemistry...

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Back in the O*H*I*O

Phew, it was a whirlwind weekend with a beautiful wedding, late nights, and lots to think about. It was sad leaving Wenatchee again. Every time that I go back it is confirmed for me more and more that it is where I want to live. There are things that I love about Youngstown, but I think that in order to grow as a person and a writer I need to experience life in a different place. Watch the moon rise and set above the banks of a river lustrous in the light of the stars laid bare in the alpine air. I have become complacent in this place where I know everyone and their parents and grandparents...I'll just have to wait and see where this next year leads. Hopefully that will be west. In the meantime I am going to start getting ready to go to Arizona in two weeks. I've never been to the Southwest, though I have a feeling that some things are going to remind me of W, WA. Off to finish my poem, "The Woman at the Wall." Much catching up to do after the last week. Crazy me thinking I'd have time to write in the middle of wedding preparations! OOh, here's a picture of the cake!

I wear my sunglasses at night...

Well, today was an interesting day. As per the first post, I started my first blog (I'm not counting MySpace) and then I went rafting with my sister (the bride), my father, step-mother, and brother. For someone to whom exercise is the walk out of the parking deck and into the office, I have been dragged all over Seattle, climbed Saddle Rock mid-afternoon (I was sure those buzzards were coming for me), and been down the ice-cold Wenatchee River in a wetsuit (noone is seeing that picture!) and all in the last three days! But the point of this story is, while hopped up on adrenaline (I had just been bounced four feet above the raft, talk about air, by a huge wave) I decided to swim class-two rapids...with my glasses on. Now I am typing this at 12:22 am while wearing sunglasses because I can't sleep. On the upside I will be going to get my first contacts in a decade in the morning. Watch out for the new me! Maybe tomorrow I'll post a picture of the bruise...

Hello Everyone,

My name is Mona. I am poet, among other things, in an MFA program in Ohio. On the advice of my friends Sara Tracey and Mary Biddinger, I am finally starting a blog. Right now I am sitting at my sister's house in East Wentachee, WA. Here is the view from the dining room table where I am sitting.

It seems like this unbelievable vista would be inspiring, but I am posting this inagural blog rather than e-mailing my homework for this evening back to Ohio. I guess I'll have to send a revision!

Mary, if you read this--guess who I saw in Seattle on Saturday--Jeannine Hall Gailey! I stopped to buy Peter Pereira's book for my sister's bridal shower (she's a doctor, her groom is a poet) and Jeannine was reading at the bookstore! She said to say hi and she'll see you in October!