Life

So many things were disrupted this week that I don’t know where to start. I’ll start with the most important: despite a health scare, Zen is okay.

On Thursday morning, Zen started to show signs of discomfort due to constipation, and by the early afternoon her health appeared to have deteriorated rather quickly. Despite our vet being closed due to the weather, we managed to get her an appointment with an emergency vet six miles away. But neither FunkyPlaid nor I could drive due to the state of the roads. Portland’s largest cab company had just stopped answering the phone, and another cab company let me schedule a cab ride hours in advance but then never called to tell me that they were running 30-45 minutes behind schedule. Thank goodness for Lyft drivers with chains and 4-wheel drive.

48 hours of hospitalization later, Zen is starting to approach her old self. She is still worn out from the procedures, but she is eating and drinking and purring and cuddling. Right now she is happily curled up in her favorite cardboard box. Her prognosis is good, especially for a cat about to turn twenty, and I am so grateful.

Of course, I have been a total wreck over this, plus I came down with my own illness on Thursday morning (a standard yet persistent head-cold), so it has not been the greatest of weeks on record.

And then there’s the snowpocalypse. Portland pretty much shut down on Tuesday evening and started to open back up again on Friday morning, but as of this writing the roads in our neighborhood are still packed with snow and ice. FunkyPlaid has been an expert forager, but I’m really, really, really tired of not being able to do basic things like drive to work or even walk to the bus stop safely.

Work

I only had a two-day work week, and although I tried to enjoy the enforced downtime I am fairly stressed about everything that has piled up and is waiting for me tomorrow morning. RescueTime tells me that I have been 50% productive this week, which seems high for being snowed in and having a sick cat and the lurgy.

Media

I was too restless to spend much time reading, but Mini Metro has been an exceptionally good distraction in times of stress. It’s a subway layout game; what’s not to love?

Spotify’s Winter Classical playlist is a treat, especially on snow days.

https://open.spotify.com/user/spotify/playlist/0FUPBhebw9cDI6khiitWpR

As a side note, I upgraded my car’s software so it now has CarPlay, which means I can listen to Spotify on the way to work! If I ever get to drive my car again.

FunkyPlaid and I are almost finished with Luke Cage and are loving the soundtrack too. I also have a lot of reading to do.

On the Internet

twitter.com/cygnoir/s…

twitter.com/GeorgeTak…

www.instagram.com/p/BPIcqDj…

Ink o' the Week

Kaweco Summer Purple: a muted, calming purple. Breathe. Visualize the snow melting away … there, that’s better.

After a wearying week of winter weather, bouts of insomnia, and seasonal ennui, I found myself on this path near the end of my morning commute.

I would like to say that I was 100% thrilled to be going to work this morning, but I was not. I was exhausted and irritated and overwhelmed and pretty daunted by all the slipperiness pictured. I can be pretty idealistic about my profession, but I wasn’t feeling so hot about the logistics, not today.

I started to walk anyway, and as I did I heard the satisfying crunch underfoot and saw the glimmer of the sunrise on the slick outlines of footprints. I moved forward. I did it slowly, but I did move forward.

And it was worth it.

Writing from: my study in Portland, Oregon. Listening to: cars skidding out around the corner.

Here’s how my evening commute went today:

• 15:15: I decide to stick around past quitting time in order to avoid some of the traffic on snowy roads. This decision has the added benefit of helping out at work a little, too.
• 16:30: Quitting time comes and goes. Snow continues to fall. I remain unperturbed.
• 18:00: The library closes early and I leave with two coworkers to walk across the traffic-laden street and get into my car.
• 18:10: After scraping the windows and warming the car up a bit, I decide to drive around the parking lot a few times to see how the car holds up with the snow. A bit skiddy, but okay.
• 18:15: I set off on my way home.
• 18:17: I hit my first patch of ice and experience that fun sliding feeling.
• 18:18 & 18:19: Two more patches of ice. I get the hint and decide to drive to the transit center and take a bus home instead.
• 18:50: I finally make it the seven-tenths of a mile to the transit center. I call FunkyPlaid to confirm that I am doing the right thing by leaving my car at the Park & Ride and taking the bus home.
• 19:00: I approach the bus that appears to be my bus, but it is a driverless, darkened bus, and does nothing to greet me.
• 19:46: The driver appears and lets us all on the bus. I feel very happy that I am soon going to be home! I am less happy when I watch my phone battery and backup battery drain from 100% and 60% respectively to 0% and 1% without warning. But still pretty happy.
• 20:21: The bus, unable to make much headway in brutal traffic, gets stuck on a very busy road. Not even a little stuck: properly stuck. And all of the passengers suddenly discover that we have boarded a bus that has no chains. No chains. In a snowstorm.
• 20:30, 20:40, 20:50: Helpful passengers try to get the bus un-stuck. It is of no use. Other helpful passengers say really encouraging things and share their snacks with people who have said they are hungry. I am reminded that I do like Portland, even when it is a big snow wimp.
• 21:01: Another bus comes and we all get on it. It is now very full but it has chains and is moving at a proper pace. A fellow passenger strikes up a conversation and we trade commute woes. They are similar; we share solidarity and even bitch about the recent election a little. This takes my mind off the fact that I have not eaten dinner or gone to the restroom in too long. We marvel at the number of cars stranded, apocalypse-style, along the side of the roads.
• 22:01: The second bus gets stuck, just over a mile from my house. I debate walking and then I watch people attempting to walk down the street and near cars and really falling a lot more than I am comfortable with. The bus driver and another passenger start digging the bus out. My new bus friend is not going to walk; she is going to stick it out. I decide to stick it out with her.
• 22:50: With all of the passengers crowded toward the back of the bus, crossing fingers and otherwise hoping a lot of hopes right out loud in front of each other (maybe even some bad language, but in a positive way), the bus driver punches it like when I say, "Punch it, Marge!" to myself even though I'm not Marge and have no idea where I got that, "The Simpsons" maybe? He punches it and the bus demurs a whole lot before lurching out into the intersection. We are free! We whoop and holler. It feels a lot like the winning goal in an '80s movie high school sports event.
• 22:59: My new bus friend waves goodbye and gets off the bus. When I get off the bus, I thank the bus driver and the helpful passenger, and all of my other new bus acquaintances wave goodbye. It is pretty great. I forget that I still have to walk home.
• 23:00: I remember quickly. The walk sucks. I take a lame photo.
• 23:15: I walk in the door and Zen yells at me and all is well.

Writing from: my study in Portland, Oregon. Listening to: a loud explosion. Uh-oh, power outages are on the way …

Freezing rain continued to fall overnight, and I couldn’t get my car defrosted enough to drive in this morning. The roads and sidewalks were so icy that it took me twice as long to walk to and from the bus. But look at how photogenic the ice-covered trees are!

The power has flickered twice this evening already, so I’m going to bed. I hope we all thaw out in the morning.

Writing from: my study in icy Portland, Oregon. Listening to: still more freezing rain.

I survived! It was a bit painful waking up at a terribly early time this morning just to catch the bus, but come quitting time I was very glad that I wasn’t driving myself home. Trimet to the rescue! The bus couldn’t go faster than 25 miles an hour due to the chains on the tires, but it got me home safely.

Writing from: my study in snowy Portland, Oregon. Listening to: ice pellets hitting the window.

“Snow!” screamed the child in the street. I glanced out at our garden and saw the wet flakes glopping down. They wouldn’t stick. They didn’t last. Magical all the same.

I’ve fancied myself a minimalist before, although you wouldn’t know it for all the things I have accumulated, spread out across continents. Objects loom larger in memory, just like the they do in the mirror’s warning, pulsing with intention: a small leather notebook in a basement, a grandfather clock in a storage unit, a doll-house in an attic.

Some books reached escape velocity today, trajectories burning off into used bookstores. My face was wet before the snow began; I had sold off my children to the perennially unimpressed. So they’re no longer mine, and not yet someone else’s. Frozen above, puddles below, and something magical and misunderstood in between.

Writing from: a drowsy lounge in Edinburgh. Listening to: “The Glass Shelter and the View” by Seas of Years.