Looking for love? Looking for love from zinesters?

FYI: I was just approached to draw a personal ad for the next issue of my zine. And it reminded me:  I want to let you all know that I will be putting another issue out soon and if you want a personal ad (looking for love???) I will draw your picture and run your text in the next issue of Somnambulist!! It only costs twenty dollars.

Contact me at marthagrover@hotmail.com

Walking Trip Part Two

For Walking Trip Part One: Click Here

(John is afraid I make him look "too fearless" in this story. Don't worry everyone - after I write part three, neither of us will have quite the shine left on us!)

I don’t remember a lot about the preparations for the walking trip - only that we had two back packs- my small Jansport and John’s proper backpack with shoulder and waist straps. We packed some clothes and picnic food, wine, utensils, some towels and then, standing in John’s entryway, we put on head-to-toe raingear. (This was late winter in Oregon after all.) I had pulled my only nice pair of tennis shoes out of my closet in San Francisco and now in John’s entryway sat down and put them on. I’d only worn these shoes once or twice - three years ago - during my stint at the gym, when I broke my ankles, right before I found out I had osteoporosis, right before I got really sick. 

John and I walked down to Division street. We stood drinking our coffee, my stomach a little upset,  and waited for the bus. We took the bus downtown, got on the max, took the bus to Forest Grove and then started walking.

The sky was blue, in small patches, as we walked away from the bus station. I thought - here we go, for better or worse, and it might actually be a dry walk. At the worst we’ll get sprinkled on occasionally.

John pulled out his i-phone periodically to see where we were on the route. I was new to this i-phone thing. No one I knew in San Francisco had one, or at least, they didn’t rely on it so heavily. John however, had our whole trip mapped out. He could also tell, by looking at his i-phone, what the weather was going to be like, our walking speed and our altitude. 

About three hours in, my back and my feet started to hurt. I didn’t say anything. The truth is, I am so used to a low level of chronic pain that an aching back and tender feet aren’t really a warning sign of injury, they’re just for me, a fact of life - the price this mermaid payed to be a human. 

Other than some aches and pains I was feeling pretty optimistic. The sky was blue and having spent the last two years climbing San Francisco’s unforgiving hills, I felt I was in pretty good shape.

We soon got off of the main road and started onto a back road that went up a hill. Every half mile or so gravel driveways disappeared into the typical mix of cedar and maple and douglas fir. It reminded me of Corbett, the small Oregon town I grew up in. Of course, I had hardly ever walked through Corbett, just witnessed it from the inside of a car, and on this walk I started to dread walking by houses with dogs. They would bark from the end of a chain, or worst of all, run from unfenced property straight at John and I, growl and bark at us from a distance of a few feet, until we made it past their house. 

My left foot started hurting pretty bad and I could tell I was getting blisters on both feet. It had been about four hours of walking so far and we still had more than ten miles before we made it to the BnB. John asked if I was okay. 

“I’m fine,” I said. “My back is starting to hurt.” 

John took some of the heavier items out of my back pack and stuffed them in his.   And we pressed on, past sheep farms, horses in pasture, large mud-covered cows and even some deer. As we walked along a field, John and I both saw a white husky dog sitting on a little ridge in the field. It looked like he was watching TV, except that the TV was the field. He was just sitting there waiting for something to happen. Just as I was hoping he didn’t notice us, (our experience with the other country dogs having been so negative,) the dog turned his head and jumped up to his feet. The dog made a bee-line across the green field, straight towards us. 

“Oh no,” I said, taking a step backwards.

“It’ll be fine,” John said. “He looks friendly.”

John was right. The Husky effortlessly jumped the broken down fence at the edge of the field and came up to us - tail wagging and tongue lolling. He circled around and around us. He wasn’t wearing a collar. I wondered who he belonged to. The Husky started following us, doing that typical thing dogs do when they walk with humans, running ahead and dashing back. I eventually reached out my hand to pet him. 

The white husky followed us for five miles, until we sat down by the side of the road to eat a snack and rest.  All we had were apples and I think after we didn’t give him any food, he got bored with us. We continued on our walk, turned around, and he had run off, never to return.

After the Husky left, we walked for a little while longer until we made it to Gaston a small town with a couple of small businesses arranged around a kind of main street. We went into the grocery which had an amazing selection of wine. John got a Willamette Valley pinot noir and we stuffed it in our backpacks and went across the street to a diner. I remember feeling as if John didn’t want to eat at the diner- it did look like a greasy spoon. I, on the other hand, just wanted to sit down somewhere warm for a while and rest my feet, which were beginning to feel very sore.

We sat down at a table and ordered food. I told John what my mother said about my toenails falling off. He put his head in his hand, “Geesh! Your mom thinks I’m a bad influence - she probably thinks I’m forcing you to go on this walk!” 

“She knows it’s my choice, honey. Don’t worry about that. My point is - when someone tells me I can’t do something - I’m determined to prove them wrong.”

After lunch we headed out of town towards the BnB. It started to lightly drizzle. Then, as the sun went down and the sky grew darker it started to rain - hard. My feet were killing me and I was aching and stiff feeling. John pulled out his iphone. “The BnB is at the top of this driveway.”

We started up the driveway. And it started to pour. The driveway was steep with reddish clay banks on either side. We put our hoods on and heads down for the push up the hill. Something switched inside of me and instead of concentrating on how bad I felt I kicked myself into high gear. I told John that I reminded myself of a horse. 

“What do you mean?”

“When I was a kid I went horseback riding a couple times at this ranch that rented out horses on an hourly basis. These poor horses had novice riders jabbing them and prodding them all day. Anyway it was hard to get them to do anything. They would walk really slow as you headed away from the barn. But then on the way back they would gallop down the hill, because they knew they were returning to food and water. That’s how I feel- like one of those horses who knows they are headed back to the barn.”

A car drove by- it was an older couple. The woman had a small dog in her lap. They stopped and asked us if we needed help. 

“We’re going up to the BnB,” we said.

“We’re staying there too,” said the woman. “It’s a long ways up! Are you sure you don’t want a ride?”

I looked in the back of the car, it looked small and cramped and John and I were soaking wet and covered in mud. 

“No. Thanks though. We’ve walked this far, we can walk the rest of the way.”

So we marched up the hill. I could feel my face get bright red. Whenever I exert myself my face gets bright red. It happens to all my siblings too. People often think we’re going to have a heart attack but there’s actually nothing wrong with us. By the time we got to the BnB we were actually steaming.

That night we drank a bottle of wine in fifteen minutes, took long hot showers and flopped into the large rustic BnB bed for a much needed night’s rest. 

New Artwork

This is some new artwork that I finished today. It's available on my Etsy site.

Another drawing I finished a couple days ago. Also available on my Etsy page.

CHECK OUT MY ETSY SITE HERE

Another food video

This morning I watched another video about why the "Paleo" diet is way better for you than the modern diet. The doctor giving the talk said she had cured herself of MS by eating like a hunter-gatherer. I was kind of blasé about the whole thing, but John, who was sitting on the floor playing with the cat, took offense to the video. I think he has and almost automatic negative reaction to people that come off as super-authoritative  - as if they know the answer and everyone else is wrong. Also, these kinds of strict diets annoy him because he is a chef and in a way, it seems like they are speaking directly to him. 

Last night we had brussels sprouts and bacon and chicken and flatbread and salad with blue cheese for dinner. I think that's a basically Paleo diet right? I mean, minus the blue cheese and bread. I told John that for someone who has actual rules about eating (no junk food) he is kinda judgmental of other people's rules. I mean, I eat way more junk food than he does. I have potato chip cravings. I can't help it. We had a laugh about that. I think for me, the take-away message from the video was: eat more kale. 

Ever since my book came out, my blog readership has gone up and up. Knowing that I have a bigger audience did change what I wrote about on my blog for a while. But now I think I am normalizing again and can say things like: John and I are having two alcohol-free days a week. There is a Grover family tradition of making February a dry month. After last month, John and I decided to make Sunday and Mondays dry days. Alcoholism runs in my family and I think it's important to check in with your alcohol consumption before it starts to snowball. 

On that note I've also found that it's important on days when I don't drink to watch my caffeine consumption. Unfortunately, I've found that I use alcohol as a way to relax after I've had way too much coffee and not enough physical activity during the day.

Last night we listened to Live Wire Radio. I was on the show a couple weeks ago and they broadcast that recording last night. It was cool to hear it and a lot of people responded positively to the show. You can download the podcast at the Live Wire Radio archives. I'm on episode 176 with Patrick DeWitt.

Yesterday I drew this picture.

It's from the book I bought a couple weeks ago about gypsies. It's just a book of photographs with no words. It follows the Roma from western France all the way to their ancestral homeland in India. I am probably going to put this up on my Etsy page to see if I can sell it.

In other news I got another zine subscription yesterday! If you want to buy a zine subscription for fifteen dollars, you can use the Paypal button on this page (marthagrover@hotmail.com) or you can do it the old fashioned way and send fifteen dollars to : Martha Grover PO Box 14871, Portland OR 97293

You get four issues of my zine and lots of freebies too!

Cheers!

Bleh

 I started off the day by checking my bank balance. BIG MISTAKE. I was going to go to the grocery store today and go to a reading of Doris Zine tonight and then a show with friends. Instead, I decided that since I have no money, I can do without milk and without literature and without music. Instead I went for a walk in the sunshine and then stayed at home and watched Project Runway and posted a couple things on my Etsy Page.

Then I burned my arm making Ramen noodles. I tried to draw some pictures for my sister Sarah and they all sucked. Then I weighed myself. How can I have gained five pounds since yesterday? 

Now I'm depressed, sitting in bed. Writing this blog. 

I seriously have to tell myself some things in order to cheer myself up: you're just gaining muscle from exercising. You just spelled the word exercise without having to look it up. You are working for your mother tomorrow and for Taya next week. If you go to your post office box tomorrow maybe someone will have sent you something nice. A. M. O'Malley is going to be in your next zine. On Monday you will be reading at Powell's bookstore from your first book.

Seriously - Powell's Bookstore.

In a couple weeks you and your dad will be recording your first podcast. And then you will be hosting a little music show in your living room. And by then maybe you will have sold more of your zine subscriptions. 

Now cheer the fuck up.

Live Wire Radio, Reading Frenzy, Power Grid, and Peter Bauer

I recently saw a mini-review/description of Somnambulist Zine number 17 up on the Reading Frenzy website. Read it here Then, if you feel like visiting one of the best little bookstores in the country, head on over to Reading Frenzy and pick up a copy. I have no more copies of this zine - so if you want to see some rad drawings by Kate Berube and some great drawings and writing by Jordan Karnes, and writing by me, you'll have to get it at Reading Frenzy. 

In other news, I decided to start graphing my pain level, exercise, and meds in a spread sheet so I can see if any patterns emerge. I am so sick of feeling achy and tired whenever I work out even a little bit. 

My father and I are still planning on doing a podcast.  We've invited our first guest, Peter Bauer, an old friend of mine who also runs an organization called Rewild Portland that teaches skills like basket weaving, fire starting, and archery. Peter is a funny and knowledgable person, so I'm really looking forward to the show!

My friend Halle also mentioned me on her blog after seeing me perform at Live Wire Radio last Saturday. The show she attended will air this Saturday night, March 10th, on OPB radio. Thanks for coming to the show Halle! I hope you and Mary Ann enjoyed yourselves. 

I feel like I had something else to talk about but now I can't remember what it was. I've been trying to quit smoking again and it's been kind of a nightmare. I let myself smoke all through the book tour in California  and by the end of it I was so stressed out I felt like I was having a heart attack. 

I'm reading a book right now called "How the Dog became the Dog." It's about the evolution of the wolf into the domesticated dog, or what the author calls,the "socialized wolf," since according to him the dog wasn't to really domesticated until the last two hundred years or so. It's a really fascinating book. I'm also always delighted to find myself familiar with research cited in books. It make me feel as if I were really becoming well versed in a topic. I love how books, when you've read enough on one topic, start talking to each other too. 

Last night we had some friends over to play this game I got for John when we were in Ashland for my book tour. The game is called Power Grid and is based on building power stations and supplying houses with electricity. I had a fun time but I am also SO BAD at math, especially when I've had a couple glasses of wine. I came in second to last. I was talking with some one I met on the tour and she was telling me how people's brains start to atrophy from disuse in regards to people getting into ruts and patterns and not challenging themselves. Sure, writing is challenging, but it's also something I already know how to do. It's my comfort zone. I hope that games like Power Grid will help me get out of my comfort zone. Also, doing things like making graphs and charts in Excel, which is something I like doing anyway. 

Food writing - Ages Zero to Nineteen

Ages Zero to Nineteen

First there was breast milk. And then there was the bottle. Whatever was in the bottle, I don’t know or can’t remember. Then there was my mother’s health food phase. There was brown, whole wheat bread and carob covered raisins. There was us kids avoiding the crusts and the heels. There were yogurt pops and Adams peanut butter - the kind with the oil on top, the kind you had to stir, and, floating in the oil, chunks of sweet peanuts.  There was shopping in the Fred Meyer’s health food section. There was another sibling. Dad was working. Mom wasn’t working. There were apples from the backyard, raspberries, homemade apple cider, and cherries from the neighbor’s tree. 

Our cousins across the street were allowed to eat white bread and jiffy and Kool Aid. I lusted after white bread and Jiffy and Kool Aid and white bread toast with butter and cinnamon sugar from a bowl on the kitchen counter. At their house I would watch as my cousin said: take a spoon and pour sparkling cinnamon sugar over your white bread, pick it up, dangle it over the bowl and let the extra sugar slide off into the bowl. Repeat until the toast is coated in sparkling and slowly caramelizing cinnamon sugar. 

There were the greek neighbors who made grape leaves, sour feta. Grandma Peaches made us homemade macaroni and cheese and graham crackers and milk. Grandma Nano arrived with two liter containers of soda and Oreo cookies. We ate them until our mouths were black. Mom complained that all she ever fed us was SUGAR.

Oh. How I loved Sugar. I lusted after sugar. Halloween candy was doled out one piece at a time for months.. I wanted to eat pancakes with maple syrup every morning and wieners for lunch slathered in inches of ketchup on white buns. Bowls and bowls of Ice cream.

And then we moved to Corbett. And there were more children, more siblings. Pasta. Pasta. Noodles. Macaroni. Spaghetti. Frozen hamburger in a big hunk in the pan. Italian seasoning from a plastic shaker. Parmesian cheese from a plastic shaker. Potatoes baked in the microwave. Large foil pans of chicken on the bone with BBQ sauce. Iceburg lettuce salad. Bags of red delicious apples. Bananas. Bananas. Family-size frozen juice cans. Rice. Rice. Crackers. Grilled cheese. Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Family-size everything. A gallon of Milk a day. More children. Gallon containers of Peanut butter. Boxes and boxes of cereal. Rice Krispies with honey on top. Rice microwaved with butter and milk and brown sugar.  Hamburger. Chicken. Cod.

(There were other homes, families with worse food. And some with better food. I ate my first steak when I was fourteen. I saw hummus for the first time when I was seventeen. We did eat out. Mac Donald’s. Dunkin’ Donuts. Sometimes Dominoes.) 

All this time there was breakfast and there was dinner but there was never lunch. Fix yourself something. Find something to read. An encyclopedia. A national Geographic. Sit down. Juice and a peanut butter sandwich. Aardvark and Abacus. The ancient Egyptians. Maybe some Cheez-its. Fig Newtons. An apple and some cheese. Saltines. Bologna.

Dad lost his job. And maybe for a week we had no food. I was hungry. But just barely. There was Gleaners - the food program where we waited in line with other poor families for moldy bread and bags of day old donuts.

And then. Food Stamps. Seven Children on Food stamps.

Corndogs. Macaroni and cheese in a box. Microwave burritos. Breyer’s ice cream by the gallon. Neopolitan ice cream. Fruit pies. Chocolate pudding pies. Ramen noodles. Chicken pot pies. 12 packs. 8 packs. 24 packs. Everything had instructions. The rotating glass tray in the microwave broke. The plate would fall off the spinning spoke in the middle of the microwave and bang around inside. 

There was Christmas and Thanksgiving and birthdays and Easter. Here is a bucket of apples - peel them. I’d eat the long red curly-cues of bitter rind. Here is a basket of potatoes- peel them. Here is a pan of hard-boiled eggs - peel them. I’d stand over a sink. None of us were chefs. We were all of us prep cooks. On Christmas Mom would make fudge. I’d have a piece and immediately come down with strep throat.

Set the table. Sit down. Avoid the salad and the potatoes. Someone spills their juice. Mom complains that she is also hungry and would like to eat her dinner. 

Clear the table. Load the dishwasher. Scrape the dishes.

Feed the dogs.

And then I moved out and went to college. 

* Photos by Mike Grover