11/23/23 Happy Thanksgiving.
I am mad at Israel and Joe Biden. Both of them could decide not to support GENOCIDE for GOD’S SAKE.
Clearly I have difficulty moving forward with daily writing. Who is looking at this then, and why?
4/20/21 My memories are like ice sculptures, very fragile, and melting. The people who fill my mind haven’t the slightest idea they are part of this ice capades that is my life. I watch and I create, both the artist and god. I make them in my mind the way I want them, with very little concern about who they really are.
11/13/2020-
OTHER PEOPLE’S HORSES
This best friend of mine, Kathy. We have had adventures from the time we were in Kindergarten, but our early teens, we are lucky to have lived through.
FAT PAT-This horse was a paint or a pinto. But it was horribly fat, completely foundered after grazing freely in a pasture we passed.
MAJOR
BABE
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6/6/2020
Yesterday, in front of the courthouse I joined not a protest, but more of a rally—the dictionary definition of ‘an arousal from depression and weakness.’ A variety show of freaks. Citizens of this town and country who are visitors wherever they walk. Taxpayers who are measured significantly smaller than the white people in town. Me. I’m a white person in town.
The police had the street blocked off and directed traffic, essentially they were peaceful participants. I soaked up the feeling of unity. I basked in the energy of ‘yes we can’. I was not ashamed to be white.
I went home to the safety of my locked apartment, and out front I found a quartet of police officers lounging in their unmarked black suv, visiting with biked officers from Central Washington University. They laughed with each other, fat, white and relaxed.
Quickly, I gathered my pups, and without fear, reemerged. At first, the dogs were startled by the group and were alert, assessing the situation to determine if there was danger. One officer laughed and talked to them, and they quickly relaxed, as did I.
I headed south, intending to take the dogs around the corner, which is a usual route for dog walking in my neighborhood.
A menacing figure stepped in my path from around the corner. A figure desecrating my lifetime image of the friendly cowboy. A rifle held ready, up high, in front of a body rigid, silent, harsh and terrifying in it’s demeanor. “I will kill you”, is the non verbal message I heard.
I screamed profanities, and unwilled, tears streamed down my face. I alerted the officers. OH MY GOD THIS MAN HAS HIS RIFLE HELD UP-not at me, just at the ready.
I can see that this man is PURPOSELY scaring me and he steps back, not losing his stiff military like demeanor. He has done his job.
The police are there and they are immediately alerted by my cries, however they do not seem concerned about the man. They approach me and say “Ma’am, can we help you?”
DO YOU SEE HIM? DID YOU SEE THAT GUN? HE CUT ME OFF WITH HIS GUN UP. WHY ARE YOU OK WITH THAT?
“Ma’am, he continued calmly, it’s his right.”
IT’S HIS RIGHT TO SCARE A PERSON WALKING HER DOGS? THAT IS HIS RIGHT?????
“Yes ma’am.”
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
“How can I help you with this Ma’am, would you like me to walk past him with you?”
NO I WOULD LIKE YOU TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT HIM STEPPING OUT IN FRONT OF ME WITH A BIG RIFLE UP LIKE THAT. THAT’S HIS RIGHT???
“Ma’am, I can empathize with you, but yes, that is his right.”
I was born here. I am a fan of the fair and rodeo, and want to continue seeing the cowboy as the handsome, rugged, working man. But yesterday, I saw the police in my town protect a man’s right to bully while bearing arms, over the rights of a person to feel safe walking her dogs in town.
Ask yourself— please.
What if that was a black man waving his rifle in front of me in a menacing way? Would that have been his right, too?
Cheryl Ray
304 W. 5th Ave #104
Ellensburg, WA 98926
253-202-8616
5/16/2020
I am currently reading My Ears are Bent, Joseph Mitchell. This thanks to Richard Ray, my oldest brother. He lives New York. He doesn’t just live IN New York, he rolls around in it like….he wants every inch of it to cover him with itself. He is in love with it.
He would like me to write about Ellensburg in a similar manner. This book is a collection of this reporter’s feature writing. I have thought about analyzing the people of Ellensburg, but wondered how, so reading this book may help.
1980- as a junior at Bethel High School, I attended a day long conference for high school students. I have no idea how it happened, but I decided to take a feature writing course and at the end of the course there was a competition. Our teacher stood up and told us a story, and we wrote.
I won 2nd place, and that was first place, in my mind.
In 2016, Kathryn Schultz wrote about ‘the really big one’…which finally gave me permission to move east a few hours. I had yearned to move back to Ellensburg for many years, but never could find a compelling enough excuse. The Really Big One was it for me, so thank you Kathryn Schultz for scaring the crap out of me.
I guess I should also admit I am reading A Year of Yes, by Shondra Rimes. I dig her bold patterns.
4/18/20
At first I was elated. I felt the same rush of adrenaline as when my husband and I decided to buy the beautiful blue mobile home to put on the family land. According to the test, I had already beat Covid-19, the brutal flu virus raging through the world population—I had the antibody. Whoosh. Like the time my grandmother bought me the pink shirt and plaid pink, yellow, blue and green pants. This time, like then, reality followed closely with a kick in the gut.
The pink pants were too tight. The blue mobile home…was a blue mobile home, and because of my test results, I was asked to report immediately to my new job for the state, helping test millions of citizens for the disease.
1/11/2020
Dopamine rushes in and
catches me off-guard
and I think it’s my heart, instead.
Brain kicks in and identifies
self-destructive actions like the moth
to the flame.
1/9/2020
My heart is busy today, liking you, directing my mind back to your Self. your paintings, your person.
My insides are smiling today and commanding my Self to touch my lips to your ear, without living in your house.
Maybe I should organize one little booklet around my loves and losses...Romance. barf.
Child Bride
He took me as his child bride
and I stayed closely by his side
He took me as his child bride
and could not let me grow.
But grow I did on wild side
no longer being child bride
he did not love my wild side
and chose to let me go.
So off I went down hallowed halls
to learn inside these different walls
at night I hear my children's calls
what death it is to grow.
Does a man exist to love a woman grown
or shall I spend my life alone?
Will young sons love their mother grown,
or will they too, turn away?
CLM
9/93
I am the luckiest person I know, and because of that, I am the most grateful person I know, and because of that, I am the luckiest person I know. :)
She is a sweet older lady who was once a sweet younger lady. She is a cranky old lady who used to be a cranky young lady. He is a helpful old man who used to be a helpful young man. He is an old asshole who used to be a young asshole. Time’s target.
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This is where I write. If for no other reason than that, I will pay for this website. Decision. Made.
The world becomes vaguely inhospitable when my little Pontiac heads west, with me in it. The world becomes a horrible monster as little car and I entered the freeway , a screaming river of vehicles. In five quick miles down the road, We will pull off at the antique fruit stand like it was the most natural thing to do. And back home I will drive, a few days earlier than I had anticipated, with my heart feeling lighter every inch east the car takes me. Every. time. And this is how I became convinced that Ellensburg was the place for me. Anxiety. Fear. It drove me here.
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Life ends and begins without sympathy, disappointment or joy. It doesn't care. It doesn't feel. It just ends and begins wherever it must and wherever it can. And Kate felt her part distinctly was to die.
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Here is a blank, white page waiting for me to fill it. Just like the 24 hours that lay ahead of me, I am completely in control of what goes here. Keeping in mind that I decide what is good enough for this page, or this next hour, only me and no one else, my words slow to a screeching halt.
Suddenly I wonder what the temperature is outside. I notice that the plants need watering. I wonder if that Christmas ornament would be prettier on this side of the room instead.
I suddenly wonder what Barak Obama is doing right now. I’m guessing he is jogging or lifting weights. Young W. He’s sound asleep. He cried himself to sleep in the early hours thinking of his dad, gone now almost 72 hours.
I am sure no one in the world who amounted to anything is doing what I do. Sitting on the couch with my computer on my lap, dogs within arms’ length, distracting myself over and over.
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When two people are crazy, stupid in love, nothing else matters. The rest of humanity, it is expected, will make way for their story. Dave and I were in love, volleyball and I were in love. English writing, reading, and teaching and I were in love. And always, Ellensburg, my most patient lover, waited for me to make my way through the fickle loves of youth. Ellensburg and I are together at last and underneath the rigid rings of ritual and the passage from birth to death, love is what I chase without end.
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After 20 years in the classroom, she left, little by little. She did not miss the intellectual checkmate and heart pain of %110 commitment to public education. Now she travelled through the buildings on air. She swooshed in to fill the gaps, for tired teachers who could not get out of bed. She felt light and good, and robust. What she saw in the classrooms and hallways and offices were shimmering mirages, familiar and loved faces bursting with surprise and delight when she caught their eye--like mirrors reflecting the rightness of her place at that moment.
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She didn't know it at the time, but The Quitting was brave and correct.
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Childhood is the one free gifts that she was given. It was her Given in which she had no choice where nothing was her fault. If nothing was her fault
At 19 she reluctantly left childhood behind, and without realizing it, sought the feeling of being a child again--being blameless and at the whim of another. This time, it was a husband who would say when, where, and how any particular project would be done. Next time, a boyfriend whose requirement for copious amounts of alcohol required damage control on a daily basis, making it work to keep her world from falling apart, which again, took away any blame for her lack of growth. This kept her satisfied in the way a toddler is satisfied with a new toy, for a few hours or minutes, depending on the complexity of the plaything.
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And so, she watched April go by. It wasn't the freckle faced best friend from grade school, it wasn't a cranky old man in a recliner. It was just numbers. Marching by. Step by step, going exactly nowhere.
One character: Lare
And then there was Larry. He stood two heads above the tallest in an average roomful of folks, and yet he kept his head down so he stood about the same as them all. Now middle-aged bald, blonde curls once framed his long milky face, which was frozen in a perpetual smile, with eyes that said “HEY”! As though he came from the Midwest, his polite greetings and easy conversation put everyone around him at ease, and though he never tried much, he always had friends. He cared not for luxury or fine food, but he would know it well if it fell from the sky. He knew what was what, and who was who, and he always paid his bills, which were almost none, right on time. His naturally dazzling daughter, Autumn, who whisped in and out of his consciousness all day, was his purpose. But at 22, Autumn had a kingdom of her own where she reigned high. In so many ways. She loved and lived with a boy and his family and hoped that on his next birthday, his 30th, he would still be working at Walmart where he started last month. Larry wanted to think the best of her love. And yet it was not easy, so his tongue was perpetually bit.
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Ok I am adding this to a new page! this will go on a not yet made FAMILY STORIES page I may call: The Moral of The Story
BY ANNE GARVIN,
My cousin
Anne Marie (Nelson) Garvin
There once was a girl named Anne. She was a quiet, easy going, middle child of a middle class family growing up in a middle class neighborhood. Her parents expected great things from her younger sister and older brother but they assumed that Anne would simply get married soon after high school and, without much a-do, live a quiet, middle class life.
The summer before Anne's second year of high school, there was a teacher’s strike that postponed the start of school by several weeks. This would be a turning point in Anne’s expectation of how life should progress. Frustrated by the continued delay, Anne decided to enroll in the local community college where her mother was attending classes. Because Anne was not at risk of failing high school she was not allowed to enroll in the high school completion program so, long before the Running Start program was an option for high school students, she decided to take college level classes instead. She would receive both her Associate degree and High School diploma when she turned 18.
When Anne became pregnant at the age of 17, her doctor told her she was just another burden on society and would never amount to anything. This comment surprised Anne and likely set her on a path to prove this doctor wrong. Anne continued school, graduated at 18 with her Associate degree and High School diploma and later trained to be a Mechanical Engineering Technician.
This career direction surprised her because she had never considered herself good or even interested in math. Anne went to work at Ft Lewis's Research and Development department designing weapons mounts and radio racks for the army's Fast Attack vehicles where she eventually tired of having to prove to each newly assigned colonel that she did indeed know how to produce mechanical drawings and was not there to make his coffee and answer his phone.
Anne had four children. Three of which were born before she finally married the love of her life, John Garvin. Her children and husband taught her a deeper meaning of unconditional love, acceptance and joy in life than Anne had ever dreamed possible and she never regretted having her kids under such non-traditional circumstances.
During a lay off from Ft Lewis, she volunteered at a local food bank. From this, Anne noticed that there was a dearth of toiletries and cleaning supplies for the poor. Finding this unacceptable, she researched and studied ways to help them until Bare Necessities was born. She was now the CEO of a non-profit business providing non-food items to low income individuals in her community.
After finishing her Bachelors degree during a layoff at Boeing, Anne got her Real Estate license as a way to help fund the non-profit business. To her daughters dismay, (other mothers collect spoons or bells. Why do you have to collect houses!!), Anne began to challenge herself to see how many properties she could purchase. Following her grandmother’s passion for education, Anne eventually received her Masters degree in Organizational Psychology and Development.
At the age of 55, Anne retired from the Boeing Company so that she could spend her days enjoying time with her family and friends and traveling to many amazing places around this big, wonderful world.
Yes this quiet, unwed, teenage mother did grow up to defy that doctor’s opinion of her and showed doubters that despite the rough start, she was capable of making a meaningful contribution to society and living a full and happy life.
Don’t allow social norms to determine your self-worth.