Jonny fell asleep last night in the crook of my arm, purring! We've come so far.

Then he woke up at 3:00am and started batting mugs full of pens off of my desk. He does like to knock things to the floor. Especially in the middle of the night. Especially if they are made of glass. Bat-cat.

Happy Birthday Me!

Seriously, so many people have written, called, sent little notes - it's a bit overwhelming. I'm so used to my birthday going relatively unnoticed, and then y'all have to go and remember it. Almost enough to make a girl cry.

We were talking, tonight, about birthdays, Chris, Chris, Coquina and I. Coquina asked if any one of us ever had one birthday that was really, truly, memorable. I told this story, which I will now share with you -

I remember, on my fifth birthday, walking down the hall of my nursery school with my uncle. In the course of conversation, he said, "You know, you will never be four again."

Just like that. Exactly those words.

I was traumantized.

Four was a good age, you know? I quite enjoyed it. At that point, it had been a quarter of my life so far; I wasn't really ready to give it up. This is one of my strongest persisting childhood memories, this point of surprise and horror at the passing of time, at the thought that four was now in the past, unreachable for all the rest of time.

I'll never be four again.

the days fly away like leaves in a gale

each breath fills my lungs
breath in
breath out
an endless repetition
my heart bleeds
to and from
each organ
each limb
every extremity
fire consumes my vision
time blurs the days, a parade
what was yesterday?
so many heart beats ago
the air which filled me
which left me
long since replaced

- Kathryn Krueger, March 2005

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

I'm really finding that, at heart, I'm a social dancer. I want to teach, I want to DJ, I want to build a dance community -- but most of all, I want to social dance. I want to be out every night that I can be, dance with a variety of people, search for connection, and occasionally connect with someone in a way that is so compelling, beautiful, and powerful that I can't help but keep going out searching for a repeat or a sequel to the experience.

We've been cat-sitting for a few weeks. Jonny is a 2-year old white cat. But for the occasional scuffle, he and Louie have been doing quite well.

The cat loves Chris's chair. He will lie in wait for hours, until Chris gets up, and then attempt a steal.

He also loves to break things. Set a perfectly good mug down in the middle of the table, and the cat might jump up and purposefully knock it all the way to the edge.

Don't we all love to break things, though? I mean, I do. I just don't act on that love all too often.

I do miss having cats about. Such a different energy than that of dogs.

Much of what I am posting now I have stolen from correspondence. Lesley, if you are reading, do not be offended -- I took the time first to write you, and only now that it has already been written am I picking out bits for journaling.

In other, related news, Chris and Chris and I are moving. A whole 50 feet, or something. We're moving to the lower apartment next door, which is owned by the same landlord. It's a bit bigger, almost the same price, has windows on 3 sides of the house instead of 2 (none of which face a driving school parking lot with cars going in and out and blowing exhaust right by the house), has 2 bedrooms which I think would be big enough for my personal belongings AND my massage table (which will be great for me, not to have to depend on someone else's space!), is not directly underneath noisy 6:00 AM driving classes in the summer, and generally, feels to be a good change. We've been given permission to fence off the back yard and let Louie run back there. Chris will rent the shed in back and turn it into a dark room. Many, many good things. See, Kat? Change isn't all bad.

Jaimes has left, also. Right now in New Zealand. Soon to be in Vancouver, Toronto, Portland, Eugene, and then off to Beijing; pretty much gone from Seattle through August. How things do change.

Christa has moved away. It's quiet without her. I miss her, but perhaps the break is good. I think we were simply too close for a while there at the end, and it was stressing our friendship. Hopefully the break from daily-roommate-living-stresses will give our friendship a chance to regenerate.

In the meanwhile, one of Chris's friends is staying in our 3rd room. His name is also Chris. From living with Christa and Chris to living with Chris and Chris... cute. He's only here until June 13th, when he heads off to Rome. I'm not sure what we'll do with the room after that. Maybe, when deciding, we should make a rule that if "Chris" is not at least a portion of your name, you can't live there. Just to stick with tradition and all. You know.

Is it possible to miss someone and to be glad that they've gone, all at once?

Man, what a pity party last night, eh?

I'm feeling much better today.

Well, I was feeling a little overwhelmed this morning, just thinking about all the things I want to get done in the next few months and the discipline I will have to employ to do so (discipline has not, traditionally, been my strong point), but even that seems all good at the moment. As the theme song to Reading Rainbow comes to mind and plays on in my head:

butterfly in the sky -
I can go twice as high!
take a look, it's in a book, it's reading rainbow.

I can do anything -
friends to know, and ways to grow
reading rainbow.
I can go anywhere -
reading rainbow.

Some days I feel like my life is charmed. So many wonderful things happen, one after another, chains of amazing, wondrous events. I feel loved and warmly enveloped by the universe.

Other days I feel like I'm being tested. Change makes me uneasy to start with, and then so many things change all at once. People leave, places change, homes take on different feels as new people become dominant forces within them. Belongings get broken. Objects get lost.

It's such a trial, learning to let things go, to give up attachments. Things are merely things, but it is so easy to forget this. Emotions encase things, cover them in so many layers, and then after a time these objects seem to be so much more... and then when they reach their time, disappear or get lost or broken, what happens to all these emotions? How to let them go gracefully, also, to let them blow away in the wind, gently breathing a goodbye, rather than stir them up and drown oneself in them?

It all comes back to this mortality notion that I feel breathing down my neck now and again. Nothing is forever. We are all but dust in the wind. I want to be more than dust! But I am powerless, utterly impotent. These objects which are broken, they are each a bitter reminder of all mortality -- with time, everything and everyone I love and care for will be broken, lost to this world as well. And so will I.

I am hosting the Tuesday night practica at the Century Ballroom and the monthly After-Hours Tango dance at the Trabant Chai Lounge now that Jaimes is off exploring the greater world. Ah, how things change. I've DJ'd and partially-hosted two practicas already, and it has gone well, but it's still a bit to swallow - suddenly going from no responsiblity at all to quite-a-bit-more-than-none.

Tonight's the first night that I host all on my own. Wish me luck. And if you're ever in Seattle and you feel like dancing tango, watching tango, or experiencing tango in any way, stop by and give me some love.

Behold, the Power of Garlic

I've been on this kick lately where, whenver I feel that I might be getting a cold or such, I eat raw garlic. It's quite heady. The last few times I've done it, it has worked like a charm; I felt better within hours, and did not come down with a full-blown cold. But I did smell like garlic for days on end. Ah, the sacrifices we make.

On the subject of garlic, if you are ever slicing cheese to eat on top of apple slices, and you were slicing raw garlic just before, and you are using the same knife -- maybe rinse the knife off before slicing the cheese. Otherwise your appley-cheesey snack may pack a bit more kick than you had been planning for.

Peeing after you've been holding it for a while has to be one of the most gratifying feelings ever. But not gratifying enough that I would voluntarily choose to do it all the time.