Ruby is 7 !!

Ruby's gymnastics Hannah Montana party at Chelsea Piers in NYC!!

Chiq pulled off a great party complete with pastelitos, veggies and dip and "cool" goodie bags -- but most importantly, a fast running, jumping, spinning and rope swinging, thrilled and smiling, giggling, Ruby.

Anna would be very proud...and definitely would have been swinging off the rope and jumping into the pit.

Contributing to the delinquency of a minor?

Al Bleyle, aka Junior, sent me this story:

I was 15 and visiting Portland for a few weeks in the summer, 1995 i suppose, and my sister Jody was busy doing something so I spent the day with Anna, who was her housemate at the time. What I remember from that house: That picture of Anna and Emil with her standing on top of him with a gun I think, circa Love Butt... that photo was on the wall. I remember going on Ben and Jerry ice cream runs for everybody at a nearby Plaid Pantry or 7-11. But most of all I remember Puppa, who was my favorite. I was not intimidated by his psychoticness. When he got crazy I would just laugh and get excited. The majority of the time he was just a playful loving dog, and we would roll around on the floor for hours. So anyways, this one day i spent with Anna that summer, and we drove in her Volvo 240 to go to the movies. We saw "The Hunchback Of Notre Dame", the animated Disney one. It wasn't very good at all, which was really disappointing because the other Disney movies of that era had been real good; The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, etc. This one marked the beginning of a new slump for Disney, or at least marked when I stopped paying much attention... Anna didn't like it either. Maybe because the movie was so bad, or maybe just because, Anna asked if I wanted to drive home. I'd never driven before. I was a few months short of getting my learners permit in New Hampshire at fifteen and a half. Also the car was standard I think... maybe I'm making that up. Either way, I had no idea about driving, and told Anna just that. She said she'd teach me, and we could take back streets the whole way, and I'd learn quick. Well...... well sure, I decided. My hair was green, I was fifteen, it was summer, why not? So I get in the drivers seat and pretty soon I'm on the road. Anna was confident in me the whole time, but really what made it easy was our joking back and forth about running over children or pet cats. I made it home fine, the most nervous moments being when I crossed major streets, but really it was no big deal and ever since I've thought: Driving? Yeah Anna taught me that!

Rock Anna

Anna's kickass guitar playing and inimitable song-writing must be chronicled. But, like lots of things, I'm just not at the chronicling stage b/c I just get too sad. Jody wrote recently that she thinks now of healthy Anna and not sick Anna as often. I do too. But I usually think of Anna in the past 5 or 10 years, when we were grown-ups, out of college. But the foundation of our friendship was built during our second coming-of-age: Reed College and the Portland era. Last night Josh and I were just randomly watching crap on YouTube and started looking at clips of Portland bands from the 90's and stuff about the X-Ray cafe, etc. It was making me really nostalgic. Anna and I used to wax nostalgic together about it, from time to time, as all of us who were there then did. It was so fun to think back about it and laugh - as Alicia would say, "Remember that time . . . " So last night we found our way to some old Hazel videos and at least two of them include Anna, but Dayglo has this great clip of her and Alicia and Anna just looks so adorable and so Anna and so young and so Anna and so vibrant and so Anna and I remember that shirt and that necklace and all of the hullabaloo about the shooting of that video featuring the nudie Emile. Anyway, there was just something about seeing her in that video that has just really set me off. I've just been so heartbroken and weepy since seeing it. Which annoys me at myself so much b/c I want to move forward and tell the fucking stories behind these things, like Anna asked us too. I want to write about Lovebutt and DEA and the crazy rock girls party at the house of rock. And as all of you as my witnesses, I will! I promise. And Emile owes us stories! Anyway, you can click here to go to the video (note the awesome young Jody, whose frontal lobe not being fully developed made her tempestuous and impulsive much of the time, but she sure could/can sing and play drums). I miss those days. Especially those days with Anna in PDX. We had so much fun.

October

This photo is from Halloween when Anna was 7. (Ruby is almost 7!) It was taken at Meadow Pond Elementary School (where Maggie and Annie now go to school!)

She was a tree. (...and oh yes, that is Nini in the back as a construction worker!)

Our mother had wrapped her in brown grocery bags covered in glue, had her roll in leaves and taped some pine branches on her head. (...even taped some leaves to her sleeves!)

As her oldest sister (I was 12), I thought this was the dumbest costume ever, and definitely, with out a doubt, told her so.

Needless to say, she won Most Original!

Anna and Otis

Otis, my son (!), came 15 days early on August 13th. Of course I thought about Anna throughout my pregnancy and wished almost every day that I could be sharing the experience w/ her and asking her advice.

When I found out that I had to have a c-section b/c Otis was breech. I was bummed, especially as it was all happening so fast (I was in active labor). And although I don't recomend a c-section, I did take some comfort in thinking that Anna had two and I imagined that her experience w/ ruby was a litle like mine w/ Otis (i.e., not a scheduled or pre-planned situation). Strange as it may sound, the fact that I had a c-section makes me feel closer to Anna, something we share from afar.

Also, I guess I always thought that I'd probably have a girl, but thanks largely to Dario, having a boy feels less strange than I think it would have otherwise.

Love,
Maud

Anna and Lucian

I'm pregnant with Anna's nephew, very pregnant, nine months pregnant. My due date is today and I've been anxiously wondering when this new little man will make his entrance. I've been thinking about Anna a lot these last few weeks, wanting to call her, to complain about the heat, the weight of my belly, my fears about having two kids.

I went to pregnancy yoga yesterday, hoping to get things moving. Anna would love this place. It's very hippie-groovy, with chanting and singing, dancing to Indian music, but also athletic-- some really hard yoga too. At the end of the class, we lie in savasana, a pose of total relaxation. I always try to take time to imagine Lucian, to connect my mind with his, my heart with his. I was concentrating on him and imagining his little head, and wondering why he was taking so long, why he hadn't come out yet. Suddenly, I had an image of Anna holding him, squeezing him and kissing him right on the lips. I immediately felt how safe he was with her, and knew why he hadn't come; who would want to leave Anna's hug? I asked her to give him her strength, her determination, her sense of humor, her love, her magnetism. *

I like to imagine them existing somewhere together in the inbetween. Kiss Anna for me, Lucian.

* As I wrote these words, the house began to shake very slightly. I went on line and found this:
"A microearthquake occurred at 10:31:15 AM (PDT) on Sunday, September 2, 2007. The magnitude 2.5 event occurred 13 km (8 miles) WNW of Lake Elsinore, CA."

It must not have been Anna; she'd never be a microearthquake.

just thinking about her today...

thinking how much she would have liked that ruby went on all the scariest rides at the south salem carnival without batting an eyelash.

thinking how proud she would be of what a great reader ruby is.

thinking how she would like to know that dario was the only one who helped plant my little vegetable garden, and is the only one who is truly delighted to see red tomatoes.

thinking how happy she would be to know that dario doesn't have to go for a heart check up for 6 months! (his longest between check ups, yet!)

thinking how unfair it is that she won't meet otis or her new nephew(when he is born).

thinking she should be in Fire Island right now in the rain with chiq and her kids.

just thinking about her today...