Mallory's Camera

Dreamed I was in Guatemala (specifically, Antigua) with RTT and had inadvertently ingested some ketamine—someone had spiked a food vendor’s cart. I was waiting for the effects to begin, but so far, all that was happening was that colors were growing more vibrant and intense.

RTT, being the most sociable human being on the planet, had invited over tons and tons of people without really vetting them very carefully—and I saw that these people were walking out of the Airbnb with our stuff. Mostly electronics at this point (which I don’t really care about), but I could tell they would soon be stealing art (which I do really care about.)

I was trying to get all these people out of our house without the stuff they were stealing. Which I could generally accomplish by screeching. In a few instances, though, I had to shove, push, and grab, and the people I was shoving, pushing, and grabbing were very derisive. Difficult to deal with in my psychedelically enhanced state.

Plus, RTT was on the sidelines looking disapproving and telling me, Chill, Mom!

What the hell is going on with him? I wondered. Doesn’t he see what’s happening?

Woke up.

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Brief editorial note here to add that ketamine is one psychedelic I have never tried in real life and that I wouldn’t ever willingly try in real life, ketamine being a veterinary tranquilizer when it’s used on-label.



Friday night was the garden’s annual Harvest Dinner.

I was one of the servers, and this was taxing since I had just said goodbye to Sybyl a few brief hours before.

But I didn’t see how I could possibly bow out of it since this is our big fundraiser of the year, and it depends on volunteer labor. Didn’t want to leave the garden in the lurch.

We raised just over $3,000.

One of our multiple seatings:



Chef Claude in the kitchen:



(Claude was an instructor at the Culinary Institute and owned a highly successful French restaurant for 30 years, so I would never question what he does in the kitchen.

Still. If it were me preparing food for a large group of people, I’d wear gloves.)

Me working the brittle smile:




Completed the volunteer stint but really wasn’t up for the festive communal garden after-feast with wine and laughter.

Went home to cry.

Yesterday, the latest in a seemingly endless parade of tropical storms parked itself over us, and it rained and rained and rained.

Today looks like more of the same.

A built-in Hibernation Weekend!

It occurs to me that this weather pattern is likely to be repeated into the winter. Except the rain will become (altogether now) Hideous White Stuff From the Sky!!

###

It was good to have a Hibernation Weekend!

I did do some Useful Work, but I also played computer games, watched TV (the American version of Prime Suspect is surprisingly good,) and reread Fritz Leiber’s Our Lady of Darkness, a novel I have read many, many times before.

The expensive cosmetics arrived, and by golly, that mascara does everything it was supposed to do. I no longer have to daydream about eyelash extensions!

A number of people checked in on me. I was touched. I am used to thinking of myself as a friendless orphan.

In one of my conversations with a person who checked in with me, I heard myself saying, I’m grateful that the Universe let me spend time with a blythe little being like Sybyl—and as soon as the words left my mouth, I knew they were true! Corny but true. I am grateful. It was a gift.

And that feeling of gratitude really has tempered that feeling of sadness.

Quite the fabulous day weatherwise.

I was mildly not wildly productive.

Remunerated all morning.

In the early afternoon, I toddled off to the garden and met this spunky fellow:



My garden is just not doing very well this year.

In retrospect, I should have ruthlessly dug out all those opportunistic Black-Eyed Susans that ended up taking over my pollinator garden.

Ah, well. I dug up a lot of dead flowers yesterday.

And the fermented garlic concoction I’ve been spraying on my eggplants, collards and replanted basil does seem to be having the desired insecticidal effect.

This was the day’s harvest:



In the evening, L&C invited me to have dinner with them.

But I could barely talk and had to excuse myself early.

###

It feels like I’m waiting for a message from somebody.

But I don’t know who that somebody is.

Though RTT reminds me that we are coming up on the three-year? four-year? anniversary of Ben’s death, so maybe it’s Ben.

With all his immense flaws of character, Ben was always my favorite person in the world to talk to.

###

I’m thinking in the fall, it might be interesting to book a retreat in one of those psychedelic resorts that have popped up all over Vermont.

Ayahuasca doesn’t interest me at all. I hate vomiting.

Ketamine and LSD would probably be too strong. I’ve never done ketamine—its on-label use as an animal tranquilizer is a major turnoff—but I did LSD many, many times in my dissolute youth when I had little to lose because such ego as I possessed back then was as transient a state as any hallucinatory wobblies and insights.

And I’m not sure I possess any more ego today, but I am much better at prioritizing and organizing. I think it would seriously freak me if those two hard-staked facilities were lost even for a brief moment. There are no brief moments on LSD. On LSD, every moment is an eternity.

But I’m confident I could handle psilocybin.

I don’t feel mentally unhealthy or anything.

Just as though I’m gravity-bound. If some messenger were to try and get my attention, I’d miss it.