I'm mentally quite well, which is a nice change from, say, the beginning of the month.  I am not so great, physically.  In fact, I'm in a fair amount of pain.  But after the initial E.R. diagnoses of "ruptured ovarian cyst" about a year and a half ago, I'd always thought that the mild to downright knife-like stabbing pain was, I dunno, scar tissue?  Lucky for me, I live with my best friend of twenty years, Cricket.

Now, she may present as a well balanced, well adjusted woman of the world, but there are some tell-tale signs that may give a hint to the twisted, I'm Not A Normal:  Piss Off Ya Mainstream Twit woman that has saved my arse, my life, my sanity and often, my cats.  She is whom I learned the ability to speak honestly with about my feelings, (with the help of my Cognitive Therapist Doctor Ruth Greenberg), because she has always been able to handle me at my most psychotic, depraved, self-mutilating, depressed and self-loathing self.  She has also rejoiced in my small steps toward mental health and well-being, without any pressure on me, except that I try.  Sometimes, that meant that she asked me to get out of bed, for just one hour of the day.

But.  She's got four tattoos, which include one on the back of each hand.  A nose piercing, smallish ear-plugs and a seriously funky sense of fashion.  Her pick-up, which I'll be driving at the end of the month, as she has a new Prius, has a sticker on the side window, which is shaped in a black heart, with the legend (same script as the "I Love Lucy" show), stating "I Love Lucifer."  Some people fail to see the humour in it.  What's most telling, is her choice of best friends.  There's me.  And then there's Betty the Siggi who is a brilliant, but seriously crazy woman in her own right.

Betty is who you want on your side.   A Social Worker, with degrees in everything from psychiatry, EMDS, massage and the application of paranormal insight, she is a bloody terrier.  When I had flown the mental coop, back at the end of the last century, she was the one who moved my SSDI file from the wrong desk, to the top of the right desk.  By phone.  And think how hard it is for you to get anyone on the phone.  She's a formidable advocate of the children driven to psychotic states by their fuck-wit families.

But.  She was actually able to tell me how to make Shit Soup.  Yep.  She's a "Siggi"!  Now that's a word that I'd never heard, but from her.  She grew up in Trenton, in a rough neighbourhood.  Apparently, it's in reference to her Scicilian parents. I digress. She was pissed off at her neighbours in the lovely suburb where she lives, whom she thought had wronged her. Her idea of a good return on that, was to make Shit Soup and pour it all over their yard.

She'd kind of lost me here, on a couple of points, like how she knew which neighbour did what and why she wouldn't just talk to them, (after all, she's got degrees in that kind of stuff)! But what confused me the most, was why on earth would you wreck a good pot, stink up your kitchen and concoct Shit Soup on your stove, just for the sake of revenge? So, naturally, I had to ask, "How do you make this Shit Soup?"

I won't give you the knowledge, but it doesn't involve bringing loads of crap into your kitchen. You may wreck a garbage can, but hey, a small price to pay compared to scatting up your La Creuset copper bottomed soup pot. She never got out of bed long enough to do it though, which worked out. About a month or so later, she ended up chit-chatting over vin rose with the evil neighbours. They made great friends, and she discovered that they weren't the folks who'd done her wrong!

Where's this going? Beats me. My father, Snidley Senior once remarked that trying to get me together, was like trying to herd cats. Silly man! Herding's for cattle and pride is for cats. Anyway, Cricket and Betty persuaded me to get the consistent pain checked out. I think maybe when you're used to so much mental pain, the physical stuff seems like just one more thing that you have to live with. Which right now, after many tests, may be right.

Except. Cricket doesn't believe that I should give up.

Well, I canceled all my social engagements for the day. Now I'm free to grub about in the disaster that's my back yard. I've hacked back the fig from it's jaunt into my neighbour Junior's tidy yard. I've chopped down a young tree that showed up through bird poop, which was threatening to break my other neighbour's new fence if I didn't murder it soon. I've spent a few hours laying brick down over the cracked and weedy concrete and I feel sweaty and oh, so much better! Amazing!

Years ago, I bought a coffin from Freeman's Auction House, on Chestnut Street. Nothing fancy; brushed metal, lightweight with an oddly comfortable interior. I guess that when you're making the big decision of which box to put your loved one in, the natural tendency is to check the softness of their final bed. Like at a restaurant, when the waiter tells you that the plate is hot, so you touch it.

A few years ago, I'd decided to rid myself of it. It was in poor shape, the material was tattered and torn and it was beginning to rust. My neighbour "Junior", thought it might make a nice planter in front of his house. It took a lot of trips to the Frankford and Norris (ish) Nursery to get enough dirt.

On Sunday, I discovered that my terminally ill art-car had given up the ghost. The day was shot in terms of plans that I had made, so I wandered down to Honey's for brunch. I ran into Junior and invited him along. Popping in his false teeth, he joined me in the inevitable wait for a week-end table. Afterwards, we strolled into the new City Planter to take a gander.

It is a beautiful space, with a fabulous array of; you guessed it, planters. Also, fountains, plants and objects d'art. Junior was most impressed and took less than five minutes to find the largest product in the store, a three foot tall planter with a diameter of at least that across. I suppose the good news was that it was made out of resin, so we were able to carry it home between us. He was planning to replace the old coffin with this snappy new look, when it occurred to me that the thing was too damn big. As in, it would not fit into his house through the door.

Which gave me something to do with my neighbour that afternoon. Dig dirt.
This was a steamy Philly day. Earlier in the week, I had been taken to the E.R., due to the heat, with a B.P. of 220/110: Topamax, heat and I do not mix. I was in the process of withdrawing from it, but was still feeling the effects. Junior has prostate cancer. The two of us were not exactly the best for the job, but we were the only ones sick enough to do it. And I mean sick in any way you want to infer it!

The highlight has to have been the spat he had with his other neighbour; the one with the Wisteria he secretly murdered with sprayed applications of bleach. Her son had draped the BBQ-cover over their common fence to dry on last Tuesday. Miffed and vengeful, Junior had hidden it his basement. His neighbour "Sarah" wanted to know if he'd seen it. I'll just say it ended in a stale-mate. He'll "find" it a couple of days from now and claim that the work-men moved it. In the meantime, Sarah got another ear-full of just what's wrong with her family.

Having filled the new planter and two fifty-gallon trash cans with the coffin's content, we had moved a load of mud. The empty coffin was placed in Junior's alley until garbage day. The metal guys will drive by and hit pay-dirt, no double entendre intended. He kept the tidy fir tree in his new container.

Me? I took the over-grown Dusty Millers and stuffed them into the varied collection of pots and distressed (for real) vessels that I use in front of my house. We are a study in contrast. But I enjoy him. I also never want to piss him off.