Things I have not accomplished in the last 24 hours:

• blueberry muffins
• weaving
• a walk this morning or Tuesday because of weather
• finished a book
• made decisions
• cleaning of any kind whatsoever

Things I (or we) accomplished in the past week:

• probably destroyed the ancient flip-phone
• got our first covid shots
• baked sourdough bread
• walked >16 miles + up-and-down searching the gravel for seaglass and found 72
• I achieved a “healthy” weight according to my BMI
• a lot of thinking about how and why I need art (no answers)

We got our vaccinations the day before yesterday, and so did our tenant, who is not unusual for our generation having no internet or email access at all. We helped him sign up for notification of county vaccine availability via phone. But they did not call him. He’s older than either of us, but it was only Gary who was notified.

The vaccine was entirely, incredibly, painless. I could not even tell when she did it. We sat for fifteen minutes and drove home. I was tired, but had not slept the night before. This morning my arm is still a little bit sore. I felt sleepy the first day or so. So far, so good.

The “remodeling: construction just south of us continues to offer bemusement. Crews have been showing up to begin work at a quarter after seven this week. Felt paper continues to fly around in the wind. How is it that this construction company does not seem able to check weather reports? It looked like someone was planning to work on the leaky chimney, but they have already given up. Today is trash day and there are already two huge trucks and several other vehicles completely blocking the road. We’ve seen as many as nine vehicles, but usually at least five parked here, plus one around the corner and a couple or three more on the other side of the highway when they have deliveries. It’s raining again, and the roof is still not fully sheathed. They took the roofing off in January and then did nothing more to the roof but patch the felt, which kept blowing off. Then they tarped the entire roof two weeks ago Friday and it all blew off. Twice. It took them till this week to properly tarp it, but if a gale comes up, no amount of stapling will hold that plastic down. Entertainment.

I am reading Syllabus by Lynda Barry. I have a soft spot for her because she’s close to my age, was born in Seattle, or somewhere near about, and attended Evergreen at the same time as a classmate of mine. I’ve had this book since it came out, which means six years. I wish I’d read it at the start. In 2015 I was discouraged not so much with teaching as with exhaustion. Four years later I was still not discouraged with teaching but with admin making decisions about what I was doing and where and then informing my by email. I was treated as a cog. So no problem with the teaching but with being a cog.

Her impossible questions, had I worked through this book in 2015, might have distracted me from feeling like part of a machine:

WHAT WOULD IT BE? AND
WHERE WOULD IT BE?
IF THE THING WE CALL 'THE ARTS'—
HAD A BIOLOGICAL FUNCTION—

She addresses issues about purpose and “good” and “bad” and how that judgement doesn’t change the art one bit. She points out that “art,” both static visual and theatrical art, have been around pretty much forever so far as humanity is concerned. Why?

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