so says the straw hat

All I want is a nice, clean, functional house. And to learn how to sew.

Cristin has perfect eyesight. She doesn't even like carrots! That is a lie, maybe. I do not know how she feels about carrots. I do know that she wants to wear glasses because inside of her grown ass accomplished woman self there is her little girl and inside her as a little girl there was an image of her grown as woman self and that lady wears glasses. Same as how all the nerds on TV wear glasses. Same as how wearing glasses makes you seem "smart." Cristin doesn't need to have glasses on to seem smart though. She knows about all kinds of things. Presidents. History. Probably the table of elements. Today I was driving home from work and on the radio they were talking about the race between Romney and that other guy and how they are now looking at competing against Obama and I had a question and I wanted to call Cristin. Then I remembered she doesn't wear glasses. No, that is not really why. I just figured I would google it later. Once, a teacher told me I was ver...

The day Baby X and Baby O were born (for my new nanny babies) On the morning of the day you were born a flight left the Austin airport at 6:30 am, headed toward Philly and her old liberty bell. On the morning of the day you were born, a beautiful woman served me a cup of coffee and talked clever at me so that later, while I was grading poetry submissions, I jotted down a few lines about how she was the kind of girl anybody would want to kiss below the bleachers just so they could keep that moment hot-lava and licorice secret behind the back of their tongues. On the morning of the day you were born your big brother was learning how to hold his ring and pinky fingers down with his thumb so he could have just two solid little fingers in the air. How a big boy counts his age. And we stood near the corner of the roof of Whole Foods down on 6th and Lamar and watched the noisy passenger train rattle off below. At story time, we bought a book for your big brother about being a New Big Br...

Austin, Texas. Spring falls out of the beaks of birds like a jungle. I wait below the oak trees just looking for the vines to start growing wild. When we drove down to Port Aransas for the very first time we took the 183 headed south and the land rolled out like a river bed. It was wildflower season and boy, did little LadyBird do us proud, all the colors sun-bursting their speckled beauty so the whole earth was the aftermath of an epic party. Every stalk of grass was a favored guest with a great big bag of confetti and all I wanted to do was marry that setting sun. Seattle, Washington Visiting the ice caves takes good guess work and weather charting. One must go late enough in spring that the snow on the ground is mostly melted, but early enough in the year that the caves are still worth marveling over. Once, we went too early in the spring; it found us falling waist deep into snow drifts,  laughing so we never got cold. I heard a river running nearby and was scared we w...