Ann Hysteric

I’m going to change my name to Ann Hysteric. The parrots of Telegraph Hill are in my cotoneaster this morning, eating the berries and having a raucous time in my tree. They’re so loud and unruly, I want to be out there with them, stuffing our beaks, swinging from the limbs and dishing our good-for-nothing mates for all the neighbors to hear. And then off to the next tree. There we go… It’s so quiet in my house now. And in my mind, uncharacteristically calm, and it has been, off and on, for the past, what, week? I heard a wonderful radio piece years ago in which someone interviewed crazy people, asking them to describe their minds. They all described their minds as if they were separate from who they were, very detached, like framing a distant landscape. I looked at pictures of that guy that I went out with a few weeks ago, the one who really threw me for a loop, and I felt so detached from him, not even attracted. Okay, even a little repulsed. “How could I have been attracted to him?” Whatever I felt so intensely has completely vanished. It’s like the opposite of what happens in the movies–Doris, the successful interior designer being chased by Rock, the handsome playboy, is initially resistant to his beauty and charm, but by the end of the movie is having his baby. I want to have the baby first, and then throw Rock out with the bathwater. Perhaps going out with Chris has calmed me. There’s no pressure, or at least none that I’m giving in to. I know that I’m sitting in the eye of the storm, and I’m just going to enjoy the serenity while it lasts, the clear skies above, and not look at the lightning on the horizon. Back to my Ceylon Supreme tea and my papers, and my silent house, and then I’ll make some art. Life is just really good.