new blog

www.coffeeblog-thedailybrew.blogspot.com

right now, it's still just copied and pasted posts from this blog but stay tuned for more daily accounts.

living breathing coffee

It blows my mind that I've been so neglecting my sweet, little blog so much but I'm honestly left with no choice in the matter. It's either neglect the blog or ignore some daily essential function... which I'm already having to do. There aren't many left to neglect.

I closed up the shop myself two nights ago and opened today all by my lonesome... which I totally enjoyed. Coming in on a quiet, warm, overcast morning and having the place to myself before the open flag goes out... getting the three brews brewing, putting on some Nina Simone to keep me company, the place has a soft, fresh light to it...

Right now, though, in the bigger scheme of things, this place is a fucking wreck. The owner has totally checked out and I understand where she's coming from. I was the same way at the inn before I left but the yard is overgrown, the stone wall that wraps around the front of the building is thick with weeds, the two plastic tables on the big porch are just permanently filthy from never being wiped down. The other three have been stolen. Inside the shop, there is a thick layer of funk on nearly everything. The toaster oven (which has a bent fork wrapped through where the handle used to be and was purchased at a yard sale for $20) ... it caught on fire this morning and I had to unplug the thing, run it outside and pour water into it. The spray bottles don't spray, the fridge doesn't really close and the faucet is kept from a permanent drip with a Phillips screwdriver.

The landlord (who said, and I quote ~ "that faucet doesn't belong to me") has hired a mowing/landscaping company to come and start taking care of the grounds. Rent has been jacked up $100 a month to cover the cost of that service, as well as her growing property taxes and insurance (and her million dollar divorce). The mowing service came today with chainsaws to cut down some of the leggy trees along the side of the building and I ran out in a panic at one point when he started to buzz through the pretty one right outside my sink window. I insisted he stop till I talk to the landlord (who I still haven't met ~ only talked to on the phone) so he walked next door to one of the other many buildings she owns and brought her back. The tall green tree, which looks so beautiful when it collects rain, is cracking the foundation of the building. I'd have loved to draw up my EarthFirst attitude and insist that the building is just getting in the way of the tree but... I let it go. The tree is gone. And twenty minutes later I was already appreciating just how much light the windows now let in.

I should be sitting down right now and finishing my business plan. I should be plugging in those last numbers, writing up a resume and appendix to attach to the back of it and creating the "executive summary".... a cover letter, of sorts. I should be doing this so I could get the money in my hands to clean this place up, buy some hanging flower pots, new deck furniture, spray bottles.... hire me a plumber.

And I will... but before I go.... wanted to put it out there that soon soon soon I'll be posting an entirely different blog. A coffee blog. I'll keep this one as a journal of sorts and use it for it's own thing but stay tuned. I'll post the link when it's up and running.

More on coffee

My last day at the inn was yesterday. I made my rounds saying goodbye and realized, in doing so, that I might actually be genuinely missed by many of them. Not because I've done anything stellar to the department or because I've gone above and beyond in any way... but probably just because I'm a laid back person and like people. I don't shit talk and I have never fed into the beuracratic bullshit. I drove out of Stowe, my car a sauna in the 90 degree weather, listening to Feist and wondering what life will be like without the small but steady salary I've had for almost three years.
Today, I'm at the coffee shop, dying behind the counter in this heat but starting to understand the ropes here. I'm able to look around and see what needs done and the little systems here are starting to sink in.

I leave tomorrow for a week.... down to Pennsylvania to visit family and friends and when I get back it's nose to the grinding stone. Registering a tax ID number, getting payroll information and insurance policies into place, meeting with all the necessary people to make sure I'm all up to code. I'll have to fix up the half finished kitchen through the month of June, along with the sauna box office space on the second floor so that Ella will have someplace other than the coffee counter to amuse herself.

We've cancelled her childcare situation for the summer and have decided to have her here with me.... which I'll probably regret in a few weeks.... but already she's proving to be quite the little helper. I've showed her where to pour the beans, how to retrieve things from the closet fridge, how to wash the dishes, collect dirty plates and clear tables. She loves wrapping an apron around her waist and looking official. Her karate teachers, two brothers, have a web design office upstairs so they're down here all the time hanging out and drinking milkshakes with her.

I think I'm onto something here. I'm a sweaty mess and covered in grease from the focassia rolls and totally jacked on dark roast but it feels damn good.

even stowe has dirty old men

i was sitting at my friend's little cafe in stowe today, working on the coffee shop stuff. i was in the throws of putting together the "capital investment list" for the business plan. basically i was sitting in the midst of three or four commercial kitchen equipment catalogues and newsflyers, pricing out stuff that i'm going to need.... lists being made. pen in hand. brow furrowed.

the place was crowded with the noon lunch rush and one older gentlemen came over to my table after a while and leaned into it, looking over the catalogues.

"i can't help but notice that you're looking at commercial kitchen equipment. i work up at the mount mansfeild resort and have been in the hospitality and tourism industry for seventeen years."

he asks what my project is and then proceeds to tell me about the high-end catering companies he's run and the Atlanta, Georgia coffee shop chain he had, like, twenty years ago... "organic way before organic was hip..." (organic should not be considered hip. it should be considered an absolute fucking necessity, moron)

so, as he's leaning over the table puffing out his ego and his bad breath is wafting into my darling yogurt parfait, i notice that his gaze keeps moving down my face and into my tank top... like, right into my tank top. up and down. down and up.

so when he asks me if there's anything he could do to help with what i'm doing, why - i ask myself - didn't i say that what he could do to help would be to stop leaning over my workspace and checking out my boobs. they aren't even big boobs. they're tiny, little boobs.

i came so close to saying it... actually opened my mouth and then just shut it.

i'm way too polite for my own good.

Tis the Season

It's officially summer.

I know this not because there are flowers growing up in my flower beds or because we eat most of our meals outside now. Not because the screens are in the windows or Ella's bedtime has been naturally extended an extra hour or two because of the longer days. It has nothing to do with the upcoming Solstice or my suntan. I know this because there are small, dead rodents - or the body parts of small, dead rodents - all around my house.

Yesterday, a sprawled chipmunk was dropped in front of our kitchen door. Today, I found myself bent to ground, squinting, to try to figure out why that raspberry was furry. It wasn't a raspberry. It was the nose end and guts of a small mole. Just the mouth, teeth, whiskers and guts. I can't shake the image.

The barn is full of decomposing critters. The roads are littered with them. It's just a damn good thing they reproduce at the rate they do... otherwise their species would surely be doomed.

composing

seven times over
this unpaved road
remembering
waterfights as the sun went down
the beginning of summer nights
and only three more days of school

sky turned red
air gone just a little cold
barn cats gather like a congregation
at our ankles
wrapping around our feet like summer brambles
spiders start to freckle the barn windows
on bradly road
multiplying in fierce numbers
seven times over

the bush elms start to crack and crumble in this yard
bent spine of her favorite story
chapter by chapter
night by night
by bedside
window open to the night choir
the doorway between spring and summer
coming in to sweep her forehead
like my kiss goodnight

sunday shift

spent another afternoon at the coffee shop.... figuring out how filthy dirty the place is, how many new systems need to be put into place, and exactly how i should assault the paperboy who never delivers the paper on time.

i'm wishing i hadn't already committed to the price i did and i'm realizing it's still a pretty good deal.... considering.

driving home today along the hogback, feet tired but window down and clouds moving in and cooling things off, i started to realize just how suffocated i've felt these (almost) three years that i've been at the inn. kind of like i've been underwater the whole time, my only air coming in through a crazy straw. a clogged up crazy straw. like, wet and moldy clogged up.

there's a handful of great people i'm going to miss seeing.... people who make me laugh pretty regularly, people who have genuinly reached out to me in hard times.... okay, maybe like two people. three tops.

but i won't miss the long drives into stowe, i won't miss the weird little economic bubble that stowe is, i won't miss the feeling that stowe is a club and membership is limited.

i will miss the high end library and amy's cafe and my regular trips to the dump from which i've kept myself and my family well dressed for years now.

i won't miss having a passive aggressive bossie (or a bossie at all), or twice monthly manager roundtable meetings that make me want to kick a hole up through the center of the table just for kicks..... i won't miss tourists with diamond studded manicures and white furry boots that match their white furry muffs and coats.

i will miss chocolate martinis after work at pie casso and having daily access to a health club and sauna. i'll miss doing bodywork.

maybe in three years, or five years, when i've put the shop up for sale and have found my new adventure, published that year's bestseller, i'll be listing all the pros and cons of what i will and won't miss in the heart of johnson..... but for now it's just nice to know that i'm soon to be manning the fort, navigating my own waters, making my own playlists, building a mean foam.

One more thing in the pot.....

The land next door to us that just recently came up for sale. We were offered the first right of refusal. We looked at this land back in 1999, when we first started our land hunt. They weren't ready to sell at the time and we just happened to land this farm lease right next door to it about five years ago...been in contact with the owners next door since about building up the pasture and making arrangements for a hay contract.
This hillside is like a holy place. From the top of it is a fine view of Mount Mansfeild and the Green Mountains. The way the wind blows from the top of it, you'd think She was whispering secrets directly to your heart.
I don't know that we can NOT try to buy this land. I just don't know how to survive the juggle it'll entail. This little strip of river valley where I live has become home and I feel like I'm a part of the cycles here already, the hidden waterfalls in the woods, the geese migrations. I've watched Ella grow up under the canopy of it's hillsides. The farm we lease will likely never come up for sale and in order to stay where we are, this land is possibly the only option and definately the preferred option.
Wish us luck. It might mean diving headfirst into another building project, in which case, I'll need all the support we can get. But if it works out and we end up calling this place home, something will have surely clicked in the universe. Something in the cosmos will have aligned for us.

I just copied and pasted this old post here.

We found out last night that the owners of the land

next door are accepting our offer. One hundred and twenty acres.

We meet with a realtor on Saturday about selling

the land we own up the road.

Deep breath.

A Lune

Kids run loose

in the Tilton yard,

dusty kneed

and candy

faced, round belly fed.

I lose count

in trying

to track their ages.

Family van

full of teen

and toddler, Mama waves

like absent

clock-work to

dust raising pick ups

that drive too

fast comes this spring~

no rivers rush, no

mud clogs up

this Lapland

route we know so well.

But sweet winds

start up on

this hill and sure as

each spring comes

red clusters of

trillium up on

Tilton's hill.

(like a haiku ~ except it's 3*5*3)

Spring 2006

LaoTong

A hybrid of Alice and the serpent,
she came slithering from the limbs of the
Oak tree, book in hand, when I first arrived,
shaded by the thick, early autumn leaves.
Old Victorian fireplace mantles
littered with beheaded roses, dried up
and collecting dust. She's been raised up with
the sixties as her soundtrack and tarot
as her catechism.
"Heathen," the old
church ladies would say before they sent her
away from the basement of the North Main
Slovak church.
"Too many questions, that one."

We spent our earliest years driving the
camels from diner to diner. Caffeine-
our water in the desert, fueled our shared
verse. That dirty valley fueled perspective.

Half her face once hid behind that parted
sheet of brown hair. All these years later she
hides behind a more subtle veil. Somewhere,
though, in the years between then and now, that
shy girl came out and danced with an apple
in her hand. Reaching back to hand me the
fruit, her voice rising above the canvas
and drum,
"Bite down real hard and suck all the
juice out," she'd said, her feet pounding the Earth,
dirt in clouds around her ankles, skin brown
and shining. Eyes closed, I smiled, thinking of
those old ladies and that lost First Holy
Communion. She is her own creation
story, this one.

By then we'd outgrown coffee, she and I,
and by that time, the valley too. Though the
verse and the music and the highway lines
provided ample fuel. Then instead of
hair, she'd hide in bathtubs or in bottles
of brandy, her words slow, spilling out in
sticky sweetness from lavender teeth and
blackberry breath. She would smell of sweat and
summer and song. Her penmanship like egg
whites. The milk of her pointed fingernails like
calligraphy, like the folds of her skirts
falling on hips she hardley knew she had.

We found comfort in lovers and laughter
and as always, we'd disect it all by
fireside or waterside. By bridges
we had yet to walk across.
We live on
opposite sides of the highway lines now,
she and I, and occasionally the
geography of our busy lives finds
us, brushes in hand, painting fresh new lines,
feet in step, hips rocking rhythms now to
lull one or the other's daughter to sleep.
And still she smells of sweat, song and mid-day
sun. The rocks move themselves, still, from beneath
her graceful feet.
I draw what I can from
the easiness of Early, disrupted
by the growing up, by the dissection
of mystery and by bones scattered like
fossils from our digging - bleached and brittle
from time and weathering.
I make my own
mantle now from those old bones and song and sun,
from old bottles of brandy and Oak leaves
and coffee beans. I now make my own slow
geography and in that making I
am sure to always draw my highway lines
back to Her.

Auntie Me

My friend Sarah comes to visit in Vermont once or twice a year. She comes now in June, for the solstice, and we light candles on the pond and drink sangria. We've known eachother since we were fifteen years old. Last year, as her maid of honor, I told the story about the first time I came to pick her up in my car. I pulled up outside her old Victorian house and honked my horn. It was getting on evening and the house was shaded by a huge tree. I'm guessing maple. Maybe oak. I was about to honk one more time when the branches of the tree started to shake just a bit and she came slithering out the tree, book in hand. I knew then that it was love at first sight. A girl after my own heart. And she still is. The love runs deeper than any post can possibly convey.

We endured her years away at college, fixed up an old Volkswagon and set out to explore. We read to one another as we traveled back roads and freeways and even switched up drivers with that van at 65mph. Impressive.

She sat on my lawn two years after that VW summer as I labored inside my Main Street farmhouse with Ella. She sat and cried and rocked back and forth and sent out blessings. I felt them.

I left Vermont at 5pm, seven years later, on April 16th, when she went into labor, drove seven hours to Pennsylvania and labored through the night with her when she had her daughter. Living so far away, especially now that we're both moms, is almost painful. It's been so hard not to see her daughter through all of her firsts, not to be a regular auntie.

When Sarah would come to visit, when Ella was younger, I would occasionally catch her with tears in her eyes. Just watching Ella play and tears brimming her eyelids.

After spending a week now with her daughter, and falling absolutely in love with her, I understand now those tears. I understand how hard it was for her to pack up her car and go. To not be closer, to not be watching her grow.

The solstice is in three weeks. She'll be up here, in the knee high grass and house full of ants and the broken showerhead. But we'll have important business of eskimo and butterfly kisses to attend to. This time, after our week on the ocean, I think she'll remember me.

the ocean.....

...was all that. and then some.

isn't it always? sun, sand, not a cloud in the sky. fish tacos, old familiars, excessive drinking every night. i've been home three and a half days and i'm still exhausted.

we came home on sunday to grass up to our knees, ants in the house, a broken shower head and hungry barn cats. our "man servant" housesitter must have fallen short. we found two condoms in the bathroom. i can only guess.

so i've hit the ground running and have about a thousand and three phone calls to make, a hundred and ten people to meet and not enough hours in the day. i planned on giving my notice at work next week but someone has let the cat out of the bag. words out. and so it looks like i'll give my notice today. maybe friday. i'm not really worrying about it... which is so nice.

my head is still on the third floor deck of the beach house. it's about 6:30pm, the sky is starting to streak with an oncoming sunset, the moon is orange and directly above the horizon. it's full. i'm dancing on that deck with ladies and a toddler, a glass of wine in my hand. there is still sand between my toes and my skin is still hot with the sun. there are a half dozen or more people in the kitchen cooking food. sauces, pastas, salads, more. another half dozen at the table just laughing. all week. just laughing. and music and the sound of waves hitting the earth.

when can i go back for more?

More on Coffee

We agreed on a price and have drawn up an Asset Purchase Agreement. Very exciting! I went in last week and had my first day behind the counter, learning the espresso machines, how to brew, make sandwhiches, serve pastries, etc. It was great. My feet hurt, but it was great. I spent the entire day eyeballing the walls and the trim and the details, considering new paint colors and decorations.... the need to nest stirring inside me. I'll be borrowing extra money from the bank to purchase some new seating, nice paints, a stove, used sink, crepe machines and a toaster. Maybe more stuff... depends on cost and how much money I really want out on loan building interest....eeeeek.


I'll be leaving for vacation tomorrow after work. We pick up our rental van, drive to northern New York to pick up our friend and her daughter and then drive through the night to the eastern shore in Maryland where we'll spend two nights with Bill's family before we head south to the outer banks in North Carolina for a week! Ella is about to explode from excitement. Just playing barbies in the back of the van with her friend Amelia would be enough of a vacation as far as she's concerned. Bill has tried on his rash guard surf shirt and borrowed wet suit about a half dozen times since Friday. He's also been checking the water temperature and condition of surf every day on the surf shop's website. Me.... I just want to lay a blanket on the sand, not caring if it's sun or moon or storm, and just lay there and listen to the ocean drive out the activity in my brain. I'd like a week off from the activity in my brain. I don't want to think about business plans, three year financial flow charts, having to sheetrock the attic office in the space or how in the hell I'm going to handle learning all my inventory and purveyors. A break. The ocean. Then I'll come back and dive back into the java land.

When I get back in June, I'll be putting in a half dozen, maybe more, shifts at the shop... squeezed in on my days off from the inn. In July, while I finish working out the financing, I'll assume the owner's shifts so that she could devote her attention to her new business venture. Hopefully by August we'll close the deal and I'll be the bonafide owner. Still haven't found a new name for the place. It's currently called Groovin Beans and that name has got to go. I've had some great suggestions from friends but I'm still waiting for the heavens to part and the sun to streak down in golden rays when I hear THE NAME but that hasn't happened yet. Considering that it took us twenty days to name our own kid, I'm wondering if I should just get on with it and pick one for the shop. Otherwise, this could go on for years!

I meet tonight with the current owner tonight to go over our revised draft of the Asset Purchase Agreement, work out the details of our roles through the month of July and get the rest of the info I need to complete the financial aspect of the business plan. After this meeting I think I'll be able to wrap my head around the rest of my summer. I may even be able to organize those thoughts. Make a list. Not panic.

And then, maybe, the ocean won't have to work so darn hard to wash away my mind clutter. Maybe I'll be able to offer it up myself and watch it wash out to sea.

rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim rim

S*I*P*K*A

Drumming Words

Amidst the craziness of this coffee deal, getting ready for a week and a half vacation and hopefully purchasing the land next door, I'm taking a six week African dance class. The group that teaches the class is Jeh Kulu Dance Company and they are out of Burlington.

They're from West Africa and the teacher comes with three or four drummers. There are twenty or so women and two men, one of which shakes his bootie like no white man I've seen. The first class was held the night that our friend held the "dry run" for his new restaurant so I drank a half glass or so of wine before showing up for class that night. The second night, I skipped the wine by chance and discovered that the wine is essential. Even if it's three sips!

My good friend grew up with the Beatles and tarot cards. When I was eighteen or nineteen, her mom introduced us to a psychic who was in town for a few weeks. The psychic, upon meeting me briefly, proceeded to draw an elaborate drawing that she then explained. There were all kinds of details and totems and past lives, one of which was as an African woman (banished from the tribe, but that's another post).... I never knew how much weight I put into this encounter but I've always kept the drawing and remembered what she had to say, as did the friend I went with.

After these dance classes, though, graceful as I might otherwise be on my feet, all I can think to myself is that woman must have been wacked!

MORE ON COFFEE

Have I mentioned that I haven't had a cup of coffee since March?

I'm sitting with my friend's laptop, in the cafe she's just purchased (seems to be a trend within our circle right now) and before me are pages and pages of business plan guides, references, profit and loss statements and payroll information.

I just spoke with the current owner, who has been awesomely patient while I get all my ducks in a row, and told her that yes, for sure, I'm buying her stuff. I thought I had made that clear the other day but she said she had to get in touch with the owner of the building who wanted to put the shop in the paper to look for a new owner. So we clarified. I'm taking it on. We get together tomorrow so that I can continue to bombard her with more questions..... licensing, zoning, purveyors, insurance, utilities..... and to let her know my offer on her price.

I have a bad habit of stumbling over my tongue when I talk about money with someone. I have a hard time entering into a conversation about money with confidence and clarity. Maybe it's because I've had such a strange relationship with the stuff. When I turned eighteen, my great aunt decided that she wanted to share her wealth with her family before she was too senile or long gone to experience the satisfaction of seeing us all enjoy it. She married a wealthy man who taught her how to invest her money well. She was widowed at fifty, after which she married her sister's husband's brother (got that?) and the two of them enjoyed a sweet and comfortable life together.

So, at age eighteen I was handed a check for five thousand dollars. My parents, who were in many ways fairly controlling, chose this one time to not impose rules and regs and unsolicited advice. I have no idea why and now, in hindsight, I wish they had. I didn't even know how to balance a checkbook. I withdrew the money in large quantities from the ATM and it was spent on booze and weed and music and pretty little hippie dresses for all my girlfriends. It was gone by the end of the year.... and then, lo and behold, came another installment. Just go ahead and carbon copy that first year. More weed, more booze, more Grateful Dead shows and pretty little dresses. By the third year I "invested" the money in a 1972 VW van and paid my dad's quack mechanic to restore it so that I could get the hell out of dodge and find my place in the world. The fourth installment went toward massage school, fifth installment went toward a deposit on a sweet little cedar rental home shortly after Ella was born and the last installment paid for part of the deposit on our 32 acres of mountain paradise.

I didn't grow up with money. We weren't a wealthy family. I think I've mentioned in prior posts that my folks woke up and banged on the heaters to get em going and to scare the mice away. So being handed such large sums at such a young age with such little guidance really left me with no skills on how to budget. I'm still learning.

The years following such abundance have been sparse. We're a young family, getting going in a place where economic prosperity isn't a norm, and we're part-time farmers to boot. We're still banging on our own metaphorical heaters, I guess you could say.

It's only been in the past two years, maybe three or four, that I've gotten comfortable balancing a checkbook, checking my account online and keeping a general kind of budget when it comes to groceries, insurance, gas, etc.

So, I've gone over the first half of the business plan and now have to type it into some master copy. Next comes the financial peice that Bill helps me with. Bill, who has been on his own, for the most part, and self sufficient since he was fifteen. When we met, 12 years ago, he had an immaculate apartment in Lancaster, Pa, a good paying job and a very organized budget. He is the left side of my brain.

The Pagans are Coming! The Pagans are Coming!

Every year, on the first Sunday after May Day (or Beltane) people come out of the woodwork to gather in the woods behind the state house in Montpelier, Vermont for an event we call All Species Day.

I learned about it three years ago and it happened that my birthday, May 1rst, was on that first Sunday, so I got to celebrate it in this old traditional way. It was like a coming home. A hundred or so people of all ages gather in a circle in a feild around noon and witness or join in in a ritual to honor all the directions and their elements.

All the winged creatures of the East dance around in a procession within the circle.... little kids with paper mache beaks, old men on stilts with raven's wings. Then the summer creatures of the south, the lions, the goats (there was an actual goat on a leash this year!) took their turn within the circle singing their song to the south. Next came the pretty blues of the western waters... dolphins, little girls in their mermaid playclothes, a beautiful woman adorned in long blue dresses and silks and bells. And lastly, the earth creatures of the north... the elk, the deer, the bear. Old Abenaki women in leather mocassins and a man with the skin of a coyote draped across his shoulder.

After all the directions are honored, a bent old crone comes creeping into the circle, staff in hand. She crawls into a ring of haybales and disappears under her dark cloak. The familiar troop of dancers that organize this event every year start shaking their hips in their long white skirts and enter the circle in teasing waves, moving closer and closer to the center of the circle, to the heap of old crone and hay bales. They throw their petals onto the crones cloak, the dormant earth, convincing spring to come and then they sway back and forth, into and out of eachother and to and from the center.... like waves. Like sex. And only when the drums could beat no faster slender white fingers start to ripple from that heap of hay and then elbows and shoulders and long locks of dark brown hair and the shimmering green robes of the spring maiden. She's enticed, like Persephone, to come up from the underworld and bring with her the warmth and growth and rebirth that comes after every long winter. And meanwhile, the stag in his huge masked head and stilts, waits in the woods to guide us all in a drumming parade down the hill, across the street, around the roundabout and down Main Street and State Street in a long, colorful medley to the state house lawn. The dancers, still swaying their long white skirts, lead the parade and there are little kids dressed as rabbits, fairies, turtles, etc. all following parents dressed as older rabbits, fairies, turtles, etc. all walking slow in the procession. One of my friend's daughters trailed along a white paper mache crayfish, about two feet long and all trimmed appropriately in shades of pink, fastened to a little plastic rollerskate.

Once at the state house everyone spreads out their blankets on the big lawn and feeds their (by now) whinying, hungry children. People kick back to watch the spring maiden and paper mache stag do their hand fasting and copulation dance on the steps of the capital. The kids come back to life and jump off the canons, play chase, freak out and do their thing. Some more drumming, some more African dancing, a may pole dance led by fiddle and guitar and then everyone slowly trickles home to wait for next year.

I think sometimes about the people of my hometown, that old coal mining town where the politicians are all crooks and the general population is just generally disgruntled. Where it seems the atmosphere and enthusiasm are still coughing up old coal dust.... and I wonder what they would do if this scene came strolling into town, drums beating and plopped themselves down in front of the courthouse.....if a spring maiden and a handsome, bearded stag simulated good lovins right there with cars driving by and life going on. I look up at Ceres, the goddess of agriculture, all gold and overlooking atop the capital building and I thank something or someone somewhere that I landed here, of all places.

The whole thing might be a little more foof than I prefer but I love it all the same and am so grateful that my daughter looks forward to it every year.

Oh, and if anyone knows how to spell paper mache, let me know.

coffee coffee buzz buzz buzz

So I'm all the more wiser now that I met with my small business advisor.... who happened to retire from that post about two hours after our meeting on Thursday afternoon. But the nice fellow that he is gave me his business card and his home telephone number and personal email so that I could contact him with whatever questions I have and deliver to him my business plan and Monthly Flow Chart upon completion so that he could then make up a Three Year Projection Sheet for me to present to the bank upon requesting my business loan.

Breath.

I just sat at my kitchen table for two hours.... the first time I've had since Thursday to sit with all this information.... and I read through all of the paperwork about writing my business plan. To use a metaphor here.... this feels like a starfish trying to navigate it's way through a deciduous forest.... alien territory. I spent the first quarter of that time just sitting there with my head buzzing and eyes crossing, remembering that panic of sitting at my kitchen table trying to cram a semester's worth of neglected World History into my brain for tomorrow's final. The heat rushing into my face, that 'i'm so totally fucked' feeling creeping into my nervous system. It was like a disease that lasted from fourth grade until I stopped giving a shit halfway through my senior year of high school.

Anyway. I had to get past the daunting entirety of this project and began by simply reading through each section of what a business plan required. I had two outlines/workbooks to look at and compare and just took my time with it, like I was learning a foreign language. Which I am. This is. Bill suggested I write an outline, which is how he seems to function by simple nature, and I rolled my eyes like the adolescent I was reverting to and then, also like the adolescent, proceeded to do exactly as he suggested only after he was out of my way and in bed.

Business description, marketing, competition, operation, location, financials...... my head hurts.

But about three quarters of the way into this it dawned on me that I was starting to make sense of all of it and it also occurred to me that there have been plently of other ventures in my life that I've taken on without having had any prior experience. Motherhood, for one.

But when I started working at a group home for teenage boys in state's custody in 2001, I started there totally wet behind the ears. I had no degree in pyschology. I went at it with my heart. I read through case files, learned the lingo, toughened up, and loved them in a very quiet way. I became manager of that group home within six months and learned how to write reports, keep medical records, document case incidents, yadda yadda yadda. I learned how to hire employees, fire the ones that sucked and take care of the paperwork involved.

When the group home closed I stayed with the organization until all "my boys" graduated from the program and went on to stumble through their lives like we all do. I gardened until I knew what would come next. I had never gardened before. It was in that quiet, mindful environment, my hands in the earth, that I decided to get back into bodywork. I hadn't practiced in years but peiced together a worthwhile resume. From there I stumbled into my next job at the inn.... having applied for a job as massage therapist and gotten offered the job of massage supervisor. Here I learned marketing and promotion, budgeting, inventory, and how to dodge beauracracy and loads of bullshit.

And now coffee.
But first, a business plan.
And before that, sleep.

Ruminating Fears

I'm meeting with a small business advisor this afternoon to look over the Profit and Loss statements from the previous two owners of the coffee shop. I'm basically looking for someone who knows numbers to look at me in all honesty and either tell me to run screaming in the other direction or to go for it.

I tend to romanticize things and so I'm trying, hard as I can, to be realistic about the degree of work that'll be involved in this. The thing that scares me the most is dealing with the business end of things.... balancing the books, learning QuickBooks, payroll, inventory. A friend of mine just recently purchased a sweet little health food type cafe in Stowe and I accompanied her on her jaunt to Costco last week. I know she has to make a certain amount each day to just break even and that most days, being in the early stages still, that doesn't happen. So halfway through our shopping trip it dawned on me.....how is she paying for all this food? Just simple concepts like that trip me up. How do I pay for the food? What bundle of cash do I pay my employees with? It's not like I'll be going into this with any real capital and isn't having some initial capital the saving grace of most small business entepreneurs?

Granted, I'm not totally satisfied with my current job. I'm understimulated, under-appreciated, and completely fed up with a beauracratic environment. The bossies want me there a specific number of hours each week and for two and a half years I've been telling them that my position really doesn't require that many hours (in the off season, especially). In an effort to save my time and their money, I've tried proposing different situations but have been told, in response, that they don't care if I come in to count paperclips..... they want me there. So I go. But as a result, I have a lot of down time. I've been fairly spoiled. Leaving the cush-ness of this position, a guaranteed salary income, two weeks vacation pay, sick days, no financial risk..... all for a behind the counter, on my feet, greeting people all day, drone of the steaming whistle, good conversation, constant stimulation, casual environment and absolute and total financial risk. Hmmmm..... It's a tough toss of the coin.

Will I be able to come home from work and leave work behind? Will I be spreading myself way too thin? Will I absolutely love the transition? Will I drink too much coffee and drain my adrenals and put myself back on track with past health issues? Can I stand that temptation? I haven't had a cup of coffee in about a month.... a HUGE undertaking for my addictive personality.

So, here goes.
The owner needs/wants an answer by the end of this week. Pressure is on.

Sunday's Child ~ Full of Grace

I called my Nan this morning, first thing, mostly because I knew she'd be awake. I caught her on the john and in her birthday suit, which for some reason she felt comfortable enough divulging that information to me. I don't know. At 87, who gives a shit, I guess.

Before she wished me a happy birthday she told me all about this four thousand dollar check she received and that if she takes it to her bank she'll somehow get an additional forty thousand dollars from some Chris Roberts at the Golden Globe Awards. Old people can be so naive. It scares me. Scares our whole family.

She asked how old I was and told me that when she was my age she was finished having her three kids and her mother that year had helped her sew mother/daughter dresses for Easter. Something about the french stitches being all backwards itchy and some such detail I can't recall. She also told me that she was born on a Sunday morning at 7a.m. and that the church bells from the Polish church on Willow Street in Swoyersville were chiming. She told me that each of her children were born on Sundays and in the mornings as well and so was my Pop.

We spent about ten minutes on the phone, which is a fairly long conversation with my Nan, as she spends most days getting her hair done and playing poker. She wished me a happy birthday and when we hung up all I could think was, ' Is she still naked?'.

Birthday

I smelled fresh cut grass for the first time this afternoon.

I planned on spending the entirety of my birthday in the woods today but I woke to grey skies and cold temperatures so I took myself shopping instead. Went a little apeshit at the consignment store. I treated myself to some takeout sushi afterward and as I drove home balancing the soy sauce and raw fish with the steering wheel, the sun came pouring out and the clouds tarried along in another direction.

So I came home to a beautiful day and a beautiful birthday cake.... double layer chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and a fig and raisen goop between the layers. My chef friend, Jeff, gave me new windsheild wipers and a bulb for my left headlight. Bill and Ella got me fuzzy clogs and a beautiful embroidered April Cornell shirt. I guess there is something else in the mail but that'll be a while yet. I love presents.

I made myself some chai and pulled on my mudboots and a sweater to hit the woods before the school bus dropped Ella off. On the walk, I discovered this season's first spider webs, trout lilies, skunk cabbages, and leeks. I walked the land next door, the land I pray will be ours sometime soon. I found the far border, marked by a long stone wall and followed it till it trailed off. I then traversed the land until I hit the other stone wall and followed that until I reached the mountain stream. I followed the mountain stream to a point that was familiar and then walked further back until I came to "my waterfall".... a place I discovered three years ago when I took myself into the woods for centering and stumbled upon that waterfall like a small child in it's own universe. I also spied a mama moose with her baby that day.

From here, the sunny window and tall work desk, I'll go to my new African dance class and shake my bootie to West African drumming by actual West Africans! Vermont is so unbelievably white.... and so when I come across someone with some actual color in their skin I just want to hug them and buy them a cup of coffee. It makes me miss my hometown. It's one of the few things that make me miss my hometown. That and Middle Eastern cooking. And perogies.

And then it's dinner and vino at our friend's opening night at his new cafe. I couldn't ask for a better birthday!