reprint -- my bio

I wrote this a couple of years ago -- and I'm reprinting it because I realize I haven't changed. And see, for that's a good thing, cause I'm quite mutable. Sometimes, I think I change my mind with every wind that blows. I want to live in the city. I want to live in the country. I want to go to Asheville. I want to go home to West Virginia. and so on...

But I wrote this in March 2009 and nothing's changed. This is sitll my Bio:

I've got a big yard and a messy house and a gazillion books stacked everywhere. I like going for long drives with my husband and long walks with our grandchildren and I like reading what my kids write. I like to listen to the rain and light candles for magic and I like to spin yarn on my spinning wheel. I like astrology, runes, tarot, numerology and all the knowing ways.

What I want: I want a little house with a screen door, a front porch and wood stove. I want to listen to the rain on the tin roof and the wind blowing in the trees.

I want to have a little table upstairs over someone else's cute little downtown shop and read tarot and runes and tea leaves for the folks who come to call.

I want to ride a bus all through the night and watch the people at the station and read their stories in the way they move and the way they glance at bus windows. I want to ride a bike all through a city and wind the streets backward to home as the sun goes down. I want to grow up with brothers and sisters who have wit and integrity and a lot of independence. I want a Mom who knows how to make the difficult job of raising kids look simple and who takes time to believe in fairies and to read the same books I read. I want a dad who is a gentle-hearted fellow who likes everyone. I want to walk home from a revival, up a dark mountain road, by lantern light. I want that road to be cobblestone and be the same road my mom walked when she was my age. I want to wade in a creek and catch crawdads.

I want to walk upriver, barefoot on a day in November, with my sister, two days after meeting the man I'll love forever. I want to get married outside in April when the dogwoods are in bloom and spend my honeymoon in an off-grid log cabin with a man who carves a set of clothespins out of maple wood when I discover we have no way to hang the laundry I just washed.

I want to raise children who walk barefoot, sing loud, aren't spoiled, are poets, and know enough to live life on their own terms.
I want to hear the wisdom of my grandchildren.

I want to pick blackberries with my daughters. I want to grow tomatoes and herbs. I want to sleep in a tent with my head on the earth outside the tent and watch the stars until I fall asleep. I want to wake up outside before the sun is up and go fetch wood for a fire. I want to put words together that make me cry and laugh and think I'm clever. I want to go outside and walk paths that are lit only by moonlight. I want to hear the first words of babies. I want to dance for hours to the beat of many drums. I want to say something wise to someone who needs to hear it and say something dumb to someone who needs to be wise. I want to tell my poems and stories at an open mic in a cafe full of books.

I want to travel and bliss out on music as I watch the first light of morning touch the tops of trees and mountains. I want to work until I'm too tired to work and then work until I'm not tired anymore. I want to keep myself going by quoting things such as "miles to go before I sleep". I want to wash clothes on a washboard and hang them to dry by 7 am. I want to be thrilled at small presents. I want to know that God/dess doesn't exist unless S/he exists in each of us. I want to know that God/dess exists.

And I have done all these things at one time or another.