these last weeks

The last three weeks or so have been pretty intense. There was the lead-up to my trip. And then there was my trip. I saw most of the people I really wanted to catch up with this time around, with one glaring exception. I got to spend a lot of time with my goddaughter and her baby, which was really lovely. I got a lot of time at Powell's Books, which was also great. And I got some good family time as well. I flew back home two days before Hurrican Sandy hit. I am thankful my flight was Saturday, not Sunday or Monday! But the storm means that this last week has been a weird one. There's been so subway service in my neighborhood for nearly a week now. A good portion of the system is up and running, but not my train. The office was closed due to lack of power all week, so my partner-in-crime and I have had a staycation. I know it's weird to talk about it like it's a holiday when so many people's lives have been just devastated by this storm, but that's the way it has felt. We got very lucky in coming through the storm unscathed. Today and tomorrow I'll be putting together a pile of items to donate to victims of the hurricane, and my office will probably be open on Monday. And that will be madness.
I gave myself a couple of lazy days at the beginning of things. The last couple of days I've really tried to be productive though. I'm purging the apartment again, and trudging through some freelancing work, and trying to get some novel work done as well. We also did ritual for Samhain on the 31st, just me, my partner-in-crime, and two friends. It was a nice evening, and a good ritual. Samhain is one of the two times of the year when they veil between the worlds is thinnest, so it's a good time for divination as well as contacting spirits. It's also our New Year, so the four of us wrote New Year's resolutions down and burned the slips of paper in a white votive candle. Did anyone else out there do anything exciting for Samhain?
I have two books to report, but absurdly, I can't remember what oen of them was. I know I finished a book just before my trip. But for the life of me I can't remember what it was. So when I figure it out, or when I give up on figuring it out, I'll report it on my recent reading.
A couple of strange dreams last night. First, I was at some sort of boarding school and was getting ready to leave, I think to catch a flight, but then my ex-girlfriend showed up. She was in mourning because her mother just died, so I decided to stay with her. There was something about a boy I was supposed to be meeting . . . something about him and a walk in the woods . . . it's all faded though. I also dreamed that I was still nannying for the family I used to work for, and while I was out with the kids Neil Gaiman called their apartment and left a voice mail for me. The gist was that my writing is good and I should keep at it. Then I left to go somewhere, and had my face done up, and was wearing some sort of weird spacesuit type thing, but the thing I was on was sort of a roller coaster. And someone passed me a gizmo to remove my makeup, only instead it screwed up my face so half of it was all saggy and veiny and unresponsive and awful. And I panicked about it, and they said they'd tell me how to fix it if I did something for them, but I don't recall what that was. The previous night I remember flashes of dreams. I was walking somewhere with Laura Bourgeois, out of a school building, and from an office there I'd retrieved a doll named Lettuce that was important to me for some reason. There was another dream about a baby I was holding, though it wasn't my baby. And I know there was a third dream, but I can't recall what it was. . . .
Anyway. I need to shower and get some work done. Blessed Be, everyone, and I hope you're all doing well.