I believe in all the Gods, and trust none of them.
I believe in one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, which I no longer attend.
I believe in Twitter, Facebook, text messages, pie, and all the other tangible things people say they don't believe in.
I believe in all the things I can see, and more than a few things I can't.
I believe in evil.
I believe in good.
I believe that people are better than we give them credit for, but worse than we may hope.
I believe there is no right way to live your life, but there are more than a few wrong ways.
I believe there is sin.
I believe there is salvation.
I believe that the human experience cannot be explained singularly by science, culture, or religion, but by a combination of all three.
I believe in a thing called love.
I believe there are more things on heaven and earth than are dreamt of in philosophy.
I believe that bad things happen to good people, that good things happen to bad people and that there is no reasonable explanation for either.
I believe that natural disasters are natural.
I believe in myself, because I can't count on anyone else to.
I believe.
Saturday, April 17, 2010
Sunday, April 4, 2010
The Lattice
In A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers describes the human community as a lattice:
"The lattice is the connective tissue...I see us as one, as a vast matrix, an army, a whole, each one of us responsible to one another, because no one else is."
To be a part of the lattice, you don't need to be brilliant, or rich, or powerful. You just need to believe in the lattice, and be. Those words have stuck with me for years. I am part of a smaller lattice, and that lattice has both made me who I am and kept me strong. It is comprised of the people that I love, people who have passed through my life, and sometimes people I don't know at all. My mother, my sister, my family and friends, my loved ones who have gone on to a better place, every boy I ever dated, the Cannonball Read participants, Pajibans, random people whom I pass on the street or hold the door for me - every one of these people have built and reinforced my personal lattice and brought something new and special into my life.
The framework of my lattice is love, kindness, and caring. When these things are interlocked they become stronger than the sum of their parts and they bear me up. By the same token, I am part of someone else's lattice. I may not even know it. But with each kind gesture, supportive word, or expression of encouragement and love, I am helping to bear someone else up. One of the best examples of this connection is Facebook; how many friends do you have on that social networking site whom you've actually met in real life? Often it is the friends you don't "know" who are there to support you when you lose your job, your home, a loved one, your mind. One small kindness adds another rung to someone's lattice. We are responsible for each other. We are responsible.
I believe in the lattice.
"The lattice is the connective tissue...I see us as one, as a vast matrix, an army, a whole, each one of us responsible to one another, because no one else is."
To be a part of the lattice, you don't need to be brilliant, or rich, or powerful. You just need to believe in the lattice, and be. Those words have stuck with me for years. I am part of a smaller lattice, and that lattice has both made me who I am and kept me strong. It is comprised of the people that I love, people who have passed through my life, and sometimes people I don't know at all. My mother, my sister, my family and friends, my loved ones who have gone on to a better place, every boy I ever dated, the Cannonball Read participants, Pajibans, random people whom I pass on the street or hold the door for me - every one of these people have built and reinforced my personal lattice and brought something new and special into my life.
The framework of my lattice is love, kindness, and caring. When these things are interlocked they become stronger than the sum of their parts and they bear me up. By the same token, I am part of someone else's lattice. I may not even know it. But with each kind gesture, supportive word, or expression of encouragement and love, I am helping to bear someone else up. One of the best examples of this connection is Facebook; how many friends do you have on that social networking site whom you've actually met in real life? Often it is the friends you don't "know" who are there to support you when you lose your job, your home, a loved one, your mind. One small kindness adds another rung to someone's lattice. We are responsible for each other. We are responsible.
I believe in the lattice.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
April Theme: This I Believe
I don't know how many of you listen to NPR or are familiar with Edward R. Murrow's series by this name. I was hooked on the NPR series since they restarted it a few years ago and every time I heard it, I'd think, "I'm going submit something!" I didn't and now the has series ended.
While in its most recent on air version, there were a number of famous people sharing their beliefs, I loved the idea of a platform where people could share their principles. Listening (and reading the essays) over time, one sees that some beliefs are fundamental to who the people are and has always been with them; like Muhammad Ali's essay, I Am Still the Greatest (which is one of my favorites). Others' beliefs are results of experiences that shape them over time.
So this month's assignment is one dear to me. Tell us what you believe and why.
While in its most recent on air version, there were a number of famous people sharing their beliefs, I loved the idea of a platform where people could share their principles. Listening (and reading the essays) over time, one sees that some beliefs are fundamental to who the people are and has always been with them; like Muhammad Ali's essay, I Am Still the Greatest (which is one of my favorites). Others' beliefs are results of experiences that shape them over time.
So this month's assignment is one dear to me. Tell us what you believe and why.
Monday, March 29, 2010
the end is the beginning
You know, it’s not the loss that hits first. It’s the pain. The pain that doubles you over and wrings more tears from your eyes than you ever thought possible.
My dad died on October 2, 2007. It was a normal day, just like any other. A Tuesday. I was at work; I was always one of the first people to get to work, which I liked because I could goof off for a solid hour before my boss got there. It was just after eight when my mom called.
“Your dad is in the hospital again.”
I sighed. This was a pretty common occurrence over the past several years. To be honest, we’d gotten used to it. My dad was diabetic, and not the best ever. He’d gone into renal failure several years ago, and was on dialysis. It took my mom forever to convince him to even go on the donor list; they’d already turned down one kidney (with good reason, actually). My uncle offered up a kidney, but when they started the testing on him they discovered that he was diabetic too.
My uncle, of course, manages to be the epitome of the perfect T2 diabetic.
In August of that year, they gave my dad a kidney. He spent a solid two months in the hospital, with one brief trip home. He was back again the next day, because he had a major low and my mom had to call 911 on him.
He was finally home for real at the end of September. The kidney had finally woken up (translation: started working on its own), and things were looking up. There were about a bajillion tests that would have to be done. For months my dad would have to be at some doctor’s or another at least once a week.
Only none of that happened.
I remember going to the bathroom shortly after I got to the hospital. My mom was sitting in the waiting room, her only comment to me upon my arrival about how quickly I’d gotten there. I didn’t ask what had happened, and she didn’t tell me (until later).
I remember seeing the “Family Room” near the bathroom and thinking to myself that’s the room they take you in to tell you your loved one didn’t make it.
Guess where we ended up?
They let my mom go back to see him, but I couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to see my dad on some hospital gurney, full of tubes, empty of life. So I stayed in that room and cried and cried and cried.
The rest of that week is mostly blurred, and that’s probably for the best. I remember going to the airport that night to pick up my aunt, who changed the flight she’d been about to get on when my mom called to come out East. I remember that my grandparents both came, even though none of us expected to, and all three of my mom’s brothers.
But most of all, I remember the dreams that I had. They were the most vivid dreams I’ve ever had in my entire life. My dad stuck around for that week before his funeral. I don’t know if anyone else realized it, but I am nearly positive of it. I dreamed about him every single night that week, and it was like being awake.
And they weren’t the nightmares you might expect of a girl who’d just lost her father, right when she thought he was taking a turn for the better. They were the most cherished dreams I’ve ever had. It’s hard to explain, honestly. And it’s not even that I remember them exactly, but they were all the same:
I was at home, as was everyone else who was staying at the house (which was way too many people for such a tiny house). They were like repeating the day I’d just had, only my dad was there.
“But Dad,” I would say to him, “you know you’re dead, right?” Not one for subtlety in dreams, am I?
He would answer in the affirmative.
“Then what are you doing here?”
He would shrug and smile, and never actually answered the question, even though I’m pretty sure I asked him that every night.
I’m pretty sure that he was just hanging out, making sure we’d all be ok. I doubt he was ready to go when he died (we’re pretty sure the anti-rejection meds caused a massive heart attack. He’d had silent ones before, several times, and I guess this was the big one). So he stuck around for several days to keep an eye on us.
I remember that he was, well, I’m not sure that happy is the right word for it. But he was happier than I’d seen him in along time. In fact, he was more as I remember him being from when I was little. He smiled a lot more, and he felt a lot better all of the time. That is the Dad who was in my dreams.
He used to tickle my face with his whiskers when I was little. Every winter he’d grow out his beard. That’s one of my favorite memories.
My dad died on October 2, 2007. It was a normal day, just like any other. A Tuesday. I was at work; I was always one of the first people to get to work, which I liked because I could goof off for a solid hour before my boss got there. It was just after eight when my mom called.
“Your dad is in the hospital again.”
I sighed. This was a pretty common occurrence over the past several years. To be honest, we’d gotten used to it. My dad was diabetic, and not the best ever. He’d gone into renal failure several years ago, and was on dialysis. It took my mom forever to convince him to even go on the donor list; they’d already turned down one kidney (with good reason, actually). My uncle offered up a kidney, but when they started the testing on him they discovered that he was diabetic too.
My uncle, of course, manages to be the epitome of the perfect T2 diabetic.
In August of that year, they gave my dad a kidney. He spent a solid two months in the hospital, with one brief trip home. He was back again the next day, because he had a major low and my mom had to call 911 on him.
He was finally home for real at the end of September. The kidney had finally woken up (translation: started working on its own), and things were looking up. There were about a bajillion tests that would have to be done. For months my dad would have to be at some doctor’s or another at least once a week.
Only none of that happened.
I remember going to the bathroom shortly after I got to the hospital. My mom was sitting in the waiting room, her only comment to me upon my arrival about how quickly I’d gotten there. I didn’t ask what had happened, and she didn’t tell me (until later).
I remember seeing the “Family Room” near the bathroom and thinking to myself that’s the room they take you in to tell you your loved one didn’t make it.
Guess where we ended up?
They let my mom go back to see him, but I couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to see my dad on some hospital gurney, full of tubes, empty of life. So I stayed in that room and cried and cried and cried.
The rest of that week is mostly blurred, and that’s probably for the best. I remember going to the airport that night to pick up my aunt, who changed the flight she’d been about to get on when my mom called to come out East. I remember that my grandparents both came, even though none of us expected to, and all three of my mom’s brothers.
But most of all, I remember the dreams that I had. They were the most vivid dreams I’ve ever had in my entire life. My dad stuck around for that week before his funeral. I don’t know if anyone else realized it, but I am nearly positive of it. I dreamed about him every single night that week, and it was like being awake.
And they weren’t the nightmares you might expect of a girl who’d just lost her father, right when she thought he was taking a turn for the better. They were the most cherished dreams I’ve ever had. It’s hard to explain, honestly. And it’s not even that I remember them exactly, but they were all the same:
I was at home, as was everyone else who was staying at the house (which was way too many people for such a tiny house). They were like repeating the day I’d just had, only my dad was there.
“But Dad,” I would say to him, “you know you’re dead, right?” Not one for subtlety in dreams, am I?
He would answer in the affirmative.
“Then what are you doing here?”
He would shrug and smile, and never actually answered the question, even though I’m pretty sure I asked him that every night.
I’m pretty sure that he was just hanging out, making sure we’d all be ok. I doubt he was ready to go when he died (we’re pretty sure the anti-rejection meds caused a massive heart attack. He’d had silent ones before, several times, and I guess this was the big one). So he stuck around for several days to keep an eye on us.
I remember that he was, well, I’m not sure that happy is the right word for it. But he was happier than I’d seen him in along time. In fact, he was more as I remember him being from when I was little. He smiled a lot more, and he felt a lot better all of the time. That is the Dad who was in my dreams.
He used to tickle my face with his whiskers when I was little. Every winter he’d grow out his beard. That’s one of my favorite memories.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Teenage Girls
I'm not a Taylor Swift fan, but she has one lyric that hit me like a punch to the gut when I first heard it, and it's still her only lyric that has that much of an effect on me: "When you're fifteen and somebody tells you they love you, you're gonna believe them."
When I was fifteen, I lost my best friend because a boy told me he loved me and I believed him.
We'd only known each other since we were thirteen and I moved to town, she'd grown up there. We bonded in the way that shy, dorky girls in middle school who have glasses, braces, a large vocabulary and a wardrobe that doesn't quite fit anymore do. She was trying to hide the beginning of a stunning hourglass figure that she kept concealed all through high school, I was already within an inch of my full height and built like a whippet. Going into high school, we both joined marching band which only brought us closer together.
We talked all the time during our Freshman and Sophomore years. We had classes together that we'd spend writing notes to each other that we'd fold elaborately to hand to each other after class. We ate lunch together whenever possible, often sitting on the floor outside the band room to avoid the crowded, noisy cafeterias. We discussed crushes on the junior boys who had girlfriends, and then reassured each other that we were totally prettier/funnier/all together better than those girlfriends. She started a website devoted to competitive high school marching bands in our area and it was the first website I ever wrote for. We spent the night at each other's houses, spent lazy afternoons sitting around the school before band practice started rather than going home, and we longed for the days when we'd have real independence.
Then I got a boyfriend. A boy that another friend had dated previously, but who I'd been given her blessing to date. He was a year above me in school but about a year and a half older, had the kind of wonderfully fluffy hair that I'm still a sucker for on guys, and was moody in that way that's tragically appealing to teenage girls. Being with him was consuming. He called every night and insisted on talking for hours, at school he spent every possible minute next to me, if I couldn't get a ride to come hang out with him at the local music store while he played their store guitars for hours and expounded on all the ways his life was awful he took it as a personal affront. My friend didn't like him, and I knew that. I tried to find time to spend with her when he wasn't around, but he refused to not be around. It wasn't until I was well into college and shed of that relationship that I realized how controlling and manipulative that behavior was.
She never gave me an ultimatum. There was no confrontation, no "you're choosing him over me and that's wrong", no fight, she just drifted away. I kept trying to keep up with her, especially when he graduated and I had my time at school free again, but our friendship never recovered. By the time we left for college we were barely talking anymore, and the fact that she went to a school 40 minutes away and I went to one 18 hours away finished what that relationship had started.
I don't know if we would have made it if I'd broken up with the boy a few months into the relationship, or if I'd never dated him at all. I don't know if my going so far away to college would've ended the friendship just two years later no matter what. I just know that looking back I wish things had gone differently for so many reasons, but most of all I wish I had been a better friend.
But when you're fifteen and somebody tells you they love you, you're gonna believe them.
When I was fifteen, I lost my best friend because a boy told me he loved me and I believed him.
We'd only known each other since we were thirteen and I moved to town, she'd grown up there. We bonded in the way that shy, dorky girls in middle school who have glasses, braces, a large vocabulary and a wardrobe that doesn't quite fit anymore do. She was trying to hide the beginning of a stunning hourglass figure that she kept concealed all through high school, I was already within an inch of my full height and built like a whippet. Going into high school, we both joined marching band which only brought us closer together.
We talked all the time during our Freshman and Sophomore years. We had classes together that we'd spend writing notes to each other that we'd fold elaborately to hand to each other after class. We ate lunch together whenever possible, often sitting on the floor outside the band room to avoid the crowded, noisy cafeterias. We discussed crushes on the junior boys who had girlfriends, and then reassured each other that we were totally prettier/funnier/all together better than those girlfriends. She started a website devoted to competitive high school marching bands in our area and it was the first website I ever wrote for. We spent the night at each other's houses, spent lazy afternoons sitting around the school before band practice started rather than going home, and we longed for the days when we'd have real independence.
Then I got a boyfriend. A boy that another friend had dated previously, but who I'd been given her blessing to date. He was a year above me in school but about a year and a half older, had the kind of wonderfully fluffy hair that I'm still a sucker for on guys, and was moody in that way that's tragically appealing to teenage girls. Being with him was consuming. He called every night and insisted on talking for hours, at school he spent every possible minute next to me, if I couldn't get a ride to come hang out with him at the local music store while he played their store guitars for hours and expounded on all the ways his life was awful he took it as a personal affront. My friend didn't like him, and I knew that. I tried to find time to spend with her when he wasn't around, but he refused to not be around. It wasn't until I was well into college and shed of that relationship that I realized how controlling and manipulative that behavior was.
She never gave me an ultimatum. There was no confrontation, no "you're choosing him over me and that's wrong", no fight, she just drifted away. I kept trying to keep up with her, especially when he graduated and I had my time at school free again, but our friendship never recovered. By the time we left for college we were barely talking anymore, and the fact that she went to a school 40 minutes away and I went to one 18 hours away finished what that relationship had started.
I don't know if we would have made it if I'd broken up with the boy a few months into the relationship, or if I'd never dated him at all. I don't know if my going so far away to college would've ended the friendship just two years later no matter what. I just know that looking back I wish things had gone differently for so many reasons, but most of all I wish I had been a better friend.
But when you're fifteen and somebody tells you they love you, you're gonna believe them.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
1
She's been looking at me for a while, her hand protectively holding her cheeky boy. I can almost see her as a child, with the same defiant expression looking equally cheeky. Tears start to well up again and my throat is tightening. She says nothing, her steady gaze and smile get me every time I look up.
Today, she has been gone exactly a year.
Her picture sits at my work desk more than a year and a half after she sent it to me. At first, it was an absent-minded accident that the picture ended up at my work desk. I had brought the picture to work so I could scan it when my home scanner was on the fritz. I left it propped against my monitor to motivate me through the last days of training; to remind me why I was doing something so foreign to me. All these months later, it's still there even though I need no reminder of the friend I lost too soon.
I could write volumes about her, and yet cannot say anything that doesn't sound ordinary in comparison to the real thing. It's hard to focus on eloquence when one's heart is this heavy and eyes are so blurry. But I don't need to write volumes about her now. If you knew her, you already know. And if you didn't, I don't want to make you sad that you missed out on something so amazing.
Today, she has been gone exactly a year.
Her picture sits at my work desk more than a year and a half after she sent it to me. At first, it was an absent-minded accident that the picture ended up at my work desk. I had brought the picture to work so I could scan it when my home scanner was on the fritz. I left it propped against my monitor to motivate me through the last days of training; to remind me why I was doing something so foreign to me. All these months later, it's still there even though I need no reminder of the friend I lost too soon.
I could write volumes about her, and yet cannot say anything that doesn't sound ordinary in comparison to the real thing. It's hard to focus on eloquence when one's heart is this heavy and eyes are so blurry. But I don't need to write volumes about her now. If you knew her, you already know. And if you didn't, I don't want to make you sad that you missed out on something so amazing.
A friend
I'm not an emotional person. I don't wear my heart on my sleeve, but more likely buried under 14 layers of stuff. I don't cry often, and if I do, it's really bad. I generally chose to let things build up until I'd can't hide them anymore. It's not healthy nor ideal, but it's me. As a result, I have a hard time explaining my emotions and knowing how to react in emotional situations. The last time I can remember full out breaking down was exactly one year ago today.
A woman, whom I'd never met nor had an actual phone conversation with, lost her incredibly valiant fight with leukemia. Her name was Amanda, aka Alabama Pink. I'd read her blog for a very long time, shared emails and FB conversations with her. I felt like she was a friend, even if only in that odd way of the internet connection. I cared a great deal about her and I still do. She was funny, smart, with a wicked sharp wit, and a humor and grace about the worst parts of life that I can only hope to have should I find myself in a similar situation. She loved her husband and her son fiercely, and spoke about them so beautifully. Put simply, she was a beautiful person, inside and out.
When it was first made public knowledge that she was sick, I hoped like hell that it was minor and fixable. However, as the fog cleared and the picture became clearer, I was scared for her. She was what we in the south call " good people". Bad things shouldn't happen to good people. Every day, I'd look for a new blog from her or her husband, anxious for some news. I didn't know how to go about contacting them and I honestly didn't want to be the crazy lady poking around in someone else's business. When they posted about the genetics of her illness, I became even more scared (possibly because I'm an uber-geek and researched it). Out of all the cancers in my family, leukemia was a new one. I didn't know how to fight it. However, about 2 months after Manda's diagnosis, my father-in-law, a man I love quite a lot, was also diagnosed with leukemia, but a different type. I got a crash course in leukemia at that point. That year became a blur of leukemia updates, hospitals, and hope for Manda and my father-in-law. His CLL is currently in remission.
I followed Manda's journey of hospitals, clinical trials, and the search for treatment. Every time things went bad, I'd try to remain hopeful. After the Johns Hopkins mean doctor, I sent her an email with a funny photo, in what had to be a sad attempt to cheer her up. I didn't know what else to do and I felt like that may be the only thing I could do. She sent me back a lovely reply. Then, she went to Houston and I hoped things would turn out for the best. Her very last blog post about Barbara Bush being right down the road still makes me laugh. I have this idea of what she sounded like and what her laugh was like and hear that sound when I read it. It makes me smile. All of us know what followed. That morning, I got to work and logged onto FB and saw the Pajiba link. Audibly, I said "No". I went Pajiba, her blog, and finally her husbands. I broke down at my desk for a long time. I couldn't stop crying. I felt like a fool crying for someone I'd never met. I didn't know how to explain it. She was one of the nicest people I've ever had the privileged of knowing, even if only in limited capacity. I still think about her often. I'd love to know how she would have felt about the Alice In Wonderland movie. Miss you Manda.
A woman, whom I'd never met nor had an actual phone conversation with, lost her incredibly valiant fight with leukemia. Her name was Amanda, aka Alabama Pink. I'd read her blog for a very long time, shared emails and FB conversations with her. I felt like she was a friend, even if only in that odd way of the internet connection. I cared a great deal about her and I still do. She was funny, smart, with a wicked sharp wit, and a humor and grace about the worst parts of life that I can only hope to have should I find myself in a similar situation. She loved her husband and her son fiercely, and spoke about them so beautifully. Put simply, she was a beautiful person, inside and out.
When it was first made public knowledge that she was sick, I hoped like hell that it was minor and fixable. However, as the fog cleared and the picture became clearer, I was scared for her. She was what we in the south call " good people". Bad things shouldn't happen to good people. Every day, I'd look for a new blog from her or her husband, anxious for some news. I didn't know how to go about contacting them and I honestly didn't want to be the crazy lady poking around in someone else's business. When they posted about the genetics of her illness, I became even more scared (possibly because I'm an uber-geek and researched it). Out of all the cancers in my family, leukemia was a new one. I didn't know how to fight it. However, about 2 months after Manda's diagnosis, my father-in-law, a man I love quite a lot, was also diagnosed with leukemia, but a different type. I got a crash course in leukemia at that point. That year became a blur of leukemia updates, hospitals, and hope for Manda and my father-in-law. His CLL is currently in remission.
I followed Manda's journey of hospitals, clinical trials, and the search for treatment. Every time things went bad, I'd try to remain hopeful. After the Johns Hopkins mean doctor, I sent her an email with a funny photo, in what had to be a sad attempt to cheer her up. I didn't know what else to do and I felt like that may be the only thing I could do. She sent me back a lovely reply. Then, she went to Houston and I hoped things would turn out for the best. Her very last blog post about Barbara Bush being right down the road still makes me laugh. I have this idea of what she sounded like and what her laugh was like and hear that sound when I read it. It makes me smile. All of us know what followed. That morning, I got to work and logged onto FB and saw the Pajiba link. Audibly, I said "No". I went Pajiba, her blog, and finally her husbands. I broke down at my desk for a long time. I couldn't stop crying. I felt like a fool crying for someone I'd never met. I didn't know how to explain it. She was one of the nicest people I've ever had the privileged of knowing, even if only in limited capacity. I still think about her often. I'd love to know how she would have felt about the Alice In Wonderland movie. Miss you Manda.
Friday, February 19, 2010
Learning the Rhythm
A small remembrance of a friend I lost when I was 16. I miss you, dear one. You saved my life, and for that I am so grateful.
Eddie was a sensualist. Not in the sexual way (although that certainly came into play as we grew older) but because of his love of beauty. All beauty, especially music. He could be brought to tears by a good guitar riff, or a spectacular piano melody. But rhythm was his true love and he engulfed himself in it. One day, when I was fourteen and he was sixteen, he arrived at my house. I was in a mood, one of those moods that spontaneously pounce upon fourteen-year-old girls, and was sulking in my living room. “Field trip!” he announced. We went to New Orleans and walked to a corner near a construction site. He grabbed my arm to stop me and closed his eyes.
“What are you doing,” I asked. “Are you sleepy?”
“Shut up for a minute,” he said patiently.
“If we’re just gonna stand here, I came out for nothing. There are plenty of construction sites in Slidell. Aren’t we gonna DO something?”
“I said shut up. Have I ever brought you out here and not shown you a good time? If you shut up I can find it.”
Suddenly, he did. He opened his eyes and smiled.
“Okay, do you see that big yellow thing over there? The one that’s pounding the street?” he asked.
“Uh…yeah. So?”
“That’s the bass drum. Hear it? It’s a real slow beat, in 4/4. Now pay attention.”
I looked at him with my right eyebrow cocked in sarcastic bemusement. I had no clue what he was getting at. My early teenage attitude was on the rise and I was about to say something, but he beat me to it.
“I said shut up. You can give me that shit when we get home, but for now I need you to listen. So, we have a bass. Alright, hear that glass? Like a crashing, tinkling sound. Those are the cymbals. The hammer over there, that’s the snare. The heels, hear em? Those are the rims. Now close your eyes and listen.”
I did. I closed my eyes, before he yelled at me, and leaned my head back for good effect. I stood there, thinking what a moron and then…I heard it. I heard it. I heard the beat of the bass start it off, I heard the clicking of a woman’s high heels at a faster tempo. Someone threw a bag of trash somewhere, crash. Glass broke, cymbals shivered. I heard something new: swish, swish. A street sweeper had come along. I opened my eyes and looked at Eddie. He was thrilled; he’d always wanted to try brush sticks. He pulled me in front of him and began to beat a rhythm on my back. We stood there, audience for the street corner concert, and listened.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
I was doing fine, until I started this post.
My dad died six years ago today. His death was completely unexpected. He had had knee replacement surgery and then died from a subdural hematoma a week and a half later. He had been complaining about a headache since shortly after he woke up from surgery. Even after an autopsy, we still don't have a clear sense of what happened.
My relationship with my dad was complicated. And the best tribute I could give him came from the words I spoke at his memorial service. So, that's what I'm including here.
This is what is important to me: to not sugarcoat who Dad was. I refuse to present him as some saintly person, as that does him a grave injustice. Many of us loved Dad in spite of his faults, and that speaks volumes about his good traits.
If there is one word that I would use to describe Dad, it would be: intense. He was intensely joyful and intensely angry, intensely generous and intensely demanding, intensely playful and intensely competitive, intensely loving and intensely embarrassing. His sense of humor was often inappropriate. And boy, could that man hold a grudge. Dad took things very personally, and burned more than a few bridges over the years. At the same time, he was incredibly outgoing, and made new friends quickly.
The man had three wives and five children, and through it all, he had one house. The Farm, (as those of us who first lived and visited there called it), was always there; it was the one constant in his life. The fact that he is not still in that house is just wrong.
To say that his death was unexpected is to make an enormous understatement. He had lived through too much to be felled by delayed complications from knee replacement surgery. What he survived included: two boating incidents; alcoholism; one near-fatal car accident, which put him in CICU for a month; and Hepatitis C, which he got from the blood transfusion he received because of that car accident. Here’s the ironic thing: he put off having that knee surgery for so long because he feared the pain of the recovery period; it didn’t occur to any of us that it might lead to his death. Really, how could something so relatively minor affect such a survivor?
Dad was young beyond his years. He truly enjoyed playing any kind of game--especially with his kids. Popular board games included Sorry and Careers, which we would play for hours on end. Up to Seven Down to Seven (which is what my Grandmother Gaumnitz renamed Oh Hell) was the card game that dominated our house. He taught all of us how to play cribbage. Summer days were spent playing Frisbee and our special form of badminton, which involved no net and the goal was to keep the birdie in the air for as long as possible. Dad loved the pool—we would spend all day there and stay until it closed at night. In the winter, he would take us sledding and we would stay outside until we were sure that our whole bodies were frozen. Dad was tireless when it came to playing—particularly with his kids.
Dad loved to cook, and was quick to tell anyone what a great cook he was. For any of you who have tasted his food, you know his unspoken motto: more is more. This goes for flavorings as well as portions. Subtlety was not part of Dad’s vocabulary. There are two stoves at Dad’s house, because he refused to give up his beloved grill, which served up too many humongous breakfasts to count. Dad also hated to waste food, and his immediate family is all too familiar with his worst dish ever: leftover stew. Let’s just say that the rest of you are grateful you never sampled that one.
Dad had issues with privacy; it was a concept he just didn’t get. In addition to asking questions that would have been better left unasked, he often shared things about you that you didn’t want shared. I am sure that Dad never understood why I didn’t tell him more about what was going on in my life, but there was always the very real concern that whatever you told him would invariably be shared with others. Let me give you an example. When I was dating a woman in college, it took me months to tell Dad. Not because I thought he would have any problem with it, but because I knew he’d out me to everyone. Hi, my name is Glen, I’m an alcoholic and my daughter is a lesbian.
You will probably hear from many people what a generous person Dad was, and nothing could be more true. Heaven forbid that you might express interest in something, because before you knew it, it might be yours. One fall, Dad and Idalia came to visit Ethan and me in Northampton. I happened to mention that I liked some items I saw in the various stores we visited. Although I shouldn’t have been, I was surprised to find all those items under the tree at Christmastime. Speaking of that holiday, Christmas at Dad’s was an exercise in excess. Dad loved buying gifts for people.
Added to that, he was a bargain fiend. If Dad found something on sale, there was a good chance he’d buy multiples of it. The worst invention for Dad’s bargain obsession were those warehouse stores, you know, Pace, BJ’s, Sam’s Club. Dad was known to come home with gallons of cole slaw, for example. Something we clearly were never going to finish. We came up for a name for those items: Pace mistakes.
Dad would literally give you the shirt off his back. He has given me some of my favorite everyday items: two beloved baseball caps and a pen that everyone compliments me on when they use it. These were things that he really liked and enjoyed having, but which he thought nothing of giving to me. I’m sure there are many of you who have received random and not so random gifts from him over the years.
So, in the end, I know that Dad will be remembered for the many wonderful things he did for people. Things he thought nothing of doing, as it was simply his nature to give of himself. It’s clear that his tireless generosity will be missed in this world. And although, I will not miss those aspects of his personality which led me to dub him Mr. Annoying Man, it is the loss of the generous and loving part of him that I, and I’m sure many of you, find so unfair and impossible to understand.
My relationship with my dad was complicated. And the best tribute I could give him came from the words I spoke at his memorial service. So, that's what I'm including here.
This is what is important to me: to not sugarcoat who Dad was. I refuse to present him as some saintly person, as that does him a grave injustice. Many of us loved Dad in spite of his faults, and that speaks volumes about his good traits.
If there is one word that I would use to describe Dad, it would be: intense. He was intensely joyful and intensely angry, intensely generous and intensely demanding, intensely playful and intensely competitive, intensely loving and intensely embarrassing. His sense of humor was often inappropriate. And boy, could that man hold a grudge. Dad took things very personally, and burned more than a few bridges over the years. At the same time, he was incredibly outgoing, and made new friends quickly.
The man had three wives and five children, and through it all, he had one house. The Farm, (as those of us who first lived and visited there called it), was always there; it was the one constant in his life. The fact that he is not still in that house is just wrong.
To say that his death was unexpected is to make an enormous understatement. He had lived through too much to be felled by delayed complications from knee replacement surgery. What he survived included: two boating incidents; alcoholism; one near-fatal car accident, which put him in CICU for a month; and Hepatitis C, which he got from the blood transfusion he received because of that car accident. Here’s the ironic thing: he put off having that knee surgery for so long because he feared the pain of the recovery period; it didn’t occur to any of us that it might lead to his death. Really, how could something so relatively minor affect such a survivor?
Dad was young beyond his years. He truly enjoyed playing any kind of game--especially with his kids. Popular board games included Sorry and Careers, which we would play for hours on end. Up to Seven Down to Seven (which is what my Grandmother Gaumnitz renamed Oh Hell) was the card game that dominated our house. He taught all of us how to play cribbage. Summer days were spent playing Frisbee and our special form of badminton, which involved no net and the goal was to keep the birdie in the air for as long as possible. Dad loved the pool—we would spend all day there and stay until it closed at night. In the winter, he would take us sledding and we would stay outside until we were sure that our whole bodies were frozen. Dad was tireless when it came to playing—particularly with his kids.
Dad loved to cook, and was quick to tell anyone what a great cook he was. For any of you who have tasted his food, you know his unspoken motto: more is more. This goes for flavorings as well as portions. Subtlety was not part of Dad’s vocabulary. There are two stoves at Dad’s house, because he refused to give up his beloved grill, which served up too many humongous breakfasts to count. Dad also hated to waste food, and his immediate family is all too familiar with his worst dish ever: leftover stew. Let’s just say that the rest of you are grateful you never sampled that one.
Dad had issues with privacy; it was a concept he just didn’t get. In addition to asking questions that would have been better left unasked, he often shared things about you that you didn’t want shared. I am sure that Dad never understood why I didn’t tell him more about what was going on in my life, but there was always the very real concern that whatever you told him would invariably be shared with others. Let me give you an example. When I was dating a woman in college, it took me months to tell Dad. Not because I thought he would have any problem with it, but because I knew he’d out me to everyone. Hi, my name is Glen, I’m an alcoholic and my daughter is a lesbian.
You will probably hear from many people what a generous person Dad was, and nothing could be more true. Heaven forbid that you might express interest in something, because before you knew it, it might be yours. One fall, Dad and Idalia came to visit Ethan and me in Northampton. I happened to mention that I liked some items I saw in the various stores we visited. Although I shouldn’t have been, I was surprised to find all those items under the tree at Christmastime. Speaking of that holiday, Christmas at Dad’s was an exercise in excess. Dad loved buying gifts for people.
Added to that, he was a bargain fiend. If Dad found something on sale, there was a good chance he’d buy multiples of it. The worst invention for Dad’s bargain obsession were those warehouse stores, you know, Pace, BJ’s, Sam’s Club. Dad was known to come home with gallons of cole slaw, for example. Something we clearly were never going to finish. We came up for a name for those items: Pace mistakes.
Dad would literally give you the shirt off his back. He has given me some of my favorite everyday items: two beloved baseball caps and a pen that everyone compliments me on when they use it. These were things that he really liked and enjoyed having, but which he thought nothing of giving to me. I’m sure there are many of you who have received random and not so random gifts from him over the years.
So, in the end, I know that Dad will be remembered for the many wonderful things he did for people. Things he thought nothing of doing, as it was simply his nature to give of himself. It’s clear that his tireless generosity will be missed in this world. And although, I will not miss those aspects of his personality which led me to dub him Mr. Annoying Man, it is the loss of the generous and loving part of him that I, and I’m sure many of you, find so unfair and impossible to understand.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
The Ache Never Leaves
When I was growing up I had two mothers. My mother, and my aunt. My father was not around, and when he was, he was abusive. I remember one night, after a beating, my mother fled with us to the safety of my Aunt Judy’s. We remained with her for a day and a half; shortly after my parents separated and The Juice, as I called her, stepped up to help my mama raise us. She took us to her home for sleepovers with our cousin Karen, arranged weeks at the shore house where she took us to the beach, Marabella’s in Stone Harbor for dinner, Springer’s for ice cream, Hoy’s 5&10, and miniature golf. We did movie nights in. Juice took me, along with Karen, my uncle, and my grandparents to Aruba for Christmas 1993 (which also coincided with my birthday). We spent every holiday possible with Juice and our large extended family. Her favorite was Thanksgiving, and she would have us go around the table and say what we were thankful for. Judy never had a bad thing to say about anyone. Everyone she met was “dolly.” She attended every pre-prom photo session my sister and I had. She was the glue, and the center. In 1996, my mother threw a surprise party for Judybug, a leap year baby, to celebrate her 12th birthday. We went to the zoo when I was a child, to movies when I was a teen, to dinner when I was an adult. She bought me Godiva chocolate and took me to lunch to celebrate Valentine’s Day. Her hugs and belches were legendary, and her recipes for button cookies and dinner party chicken were sent from God. We called her “Miss Manners” because of her impeccable style, graciousness, and etiquette – it was she who taught me to say “Pardon my back” whenever she would have to face away from someone with whom she was conversing. She often sent thoughtful cards in her distinctive handwriting, just because. It was January 1999 when she was diagnosed with Stage III ovarian cancer.
She fought. Oh, she fought. Surgery, chemo, radiation. She stayed optimistic and never indulged in self-pity. I begged God every night for a miracle. When the cancer spread to her brain, I went to the Shrine of St. Katherine Drexel and asked, on my knees, for one more year. In return I would name my first daughter after that good saint.
A year later, when it had spread everywhere, the doctors said they were sorry but there was nothing else to do. They gave her three months. She gathered her family close and said her goodbyes, and she went to a place of peace and love on November 27, 2003, Thanksgiving Day. I had seen her only ten days before, but I didn’t know it would be the last time, the last hug, the last “I love you, heart and soul.” She refused to let her nieces and nephews see her at the very end; the Juice held onto her dignity until the very last and she didn’t want us to remember her that way. So I didn’t know it was the last time. Some day I’ll come to terms with that.
She was the glue, and the center, and the ache never goes away.
She fought. Oh, she fought. Surgery, chemo, radiation. She stayed optimistic and never indulged in self-pity. I begged God every night for a miracle. When the cancer spread to her brain, I went to the Shrine of St. Katherine Drexel and asked, on my knees, for one more year. In return I would name my first daughter after that good saint.
A year later, when it had spread everywhere, the doctors said they were sorry but there was nothing else to do. They gave her three months. She gathered her family close and said her goodbyes, and she went to a place of peace and love on November 27, 2003, Thanksgiving Day. I had seen her only ten days before, but I didn’t know it would be the last time, the last hug, the last “I love you, heart and soul.” She refused to let her nieces and nephews see her at the very end; the Juice held onto her dignity until the very last and she didn’t want us to remember her that way. So I didn’t know it was the last time. Some day I’ll come to terms with that.
She was the glue, and the center, and the ache never goes away.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
The Return of Blogged Tales
Much like a little sprout making its way out from beneath dormant land, the blog is shaking off the dust and rising. A great deal has happened since the last suggested topic. The last few months, participation dwindled and finally stopped. But recently old friends have come back and want to share their tales again. This is wonderful news.
So in celebration of friends, their stories and words that bring people together, we're back! March will have be the first official month so anyone who is interested can submit their stories and newcomers can send requests to join.
The theme for March is 'The Ones We've Lost'. Share you stories of friends or loved ones you've lost or just lost touch with. The stories can be fictional or true. There are no limits to the number of tales you can share each month, or how many chapters you break a certain story into. You must stick to the theme and all stories for this theme must be submitted by the end of March. Don't forget to tag your stories with the this month's tags (below)
Welcome back and spin your tales!
So in celebration of friends, their stories and words that bring people together, we're back! March will have be the first official month so anyone who is interested can submit their stories and newcomers can send requests to join.
The theme for March is 'The Ones We've Lost'. Share you stories of friends or loved ones you've lost or just lost touch with. The stories can be fictional or true. There are no limits to the number of tales you can share each month, or how many chapters you break a certain story into. You must stick to the theme and all stories for this theme must be submitted by the end of March. Don't forget to tag your stories with the this month's tags (below)
Welcome back and spin your tales!
Sunday, November 2, 2008
November Theme: Giving Thanks
November's theme is so easy for me; lately I have been grateful for many things. I always have a long list of things that I want or need at any given moment. More this, less that and just the right amount of the other. However, if I am honest there is plenty that I am thankful for every single day. The problem then becomes identifying that for which I'm most thankful. Thanksgiving is my favorite American holiday. Not for the marathon cooking sessions, nor the tense family gatherings that inevitably bring up unpleasant encounters but for the potential recognition of what is good and right in our lives.
Share Thanksgiving memories or things you're grateful for. Tell us your tales.
Share Thanksgiving memories or things you're grateful for. Tell us your tales.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Vice, Vice Baby
You know, a year ago this would have been a no-brainer. A year ago, I could have written an essay - a dissertation, even, on vice. More specifically, on my vices. Unfortunately (for the purposes of this space, anyway), my vices are slowly dissipating into history, like smoke from a bottle. It's taken a bit of adjusting to. In the last year, I've quit smoking, started eating right, getting regular exercise. I stopped drinking as much and pretty much stopped my minor recreational drug use (I'm far removed from my more serious drug use days). I mean, that's a steady list of vices right there, and I've dumped 'em all in less than a year.
For some reason, I feel almost embarrassed about it. The thing is, accepting those things as vices, as something wrong or bad or even immoral seems like a blow dealt to my youth. I feel as if once you start thinking about those things as behaviors you need to alter, you're evolving past the carefree attitudes of youth and making the slow, inexorable move towards true adulthood, where you spend more time watching your cholesterol level then you do enjoying yourself.
Except that I don't think that's really true. I'm under no illusions -- at 33 years old, I'm hardly an old man. It's not like I was suddenly faced with my own mortality. But at the same time, there comes a time when you really, truly start to realize that the path you are on... will have serious adverse effects on your life and the lives of those around you. Not today, perhaps. Not tomorrow or next year or in five years or ten. But... eventually.
Sometimes, the threat of that eventuality is enough.
So I've given up many of my vices. Of course, perhaps I've traded them in for new, more interesting ones. I no longer spend my money on cigarettes and cheap beer. Instead, I've developed a taste for expensive Scotch. I no longer sit on my ass all day andplay video games. Instead, I took up mountain biking, an expenisve endeavor in and of itself, not to mention an inherently dangerous one. As I write this, I've got a pair of shredded shins and a bruise that is quite literally the size of an egg.
I suppose I'll never give up everything -- someone once told me everyone needs at least a few vices, if for no other reason than to keep like interesting. I still play my music too loud. I still swear like a fucking sailor who stubbed his toe. I still spend money a little too freely.
But at least now, I'll be able to do those things for much longer.
ps - I know it's not October anymore, but fuck it. This came to me and seemed better served being posted here.
----------------
Now playing: Hatebreed - Healing To Suffer Again
via FoxyTunes
For some reason, I feel almost embarrassed about it. The thing is, accepting those things as vices, as something wrong or bad or even immoral seems like a blow dealt to my youth. I feel as if once you start thinking about those things as behaviors you need to alter, you're evolving past the carefree attitudes of youth and making the slow, inexorable move towards true adulthood, where you spend more time watching your cholesterol level then you do enjoying yourself.
Except that I don't think that's really true. I'm under no illusions -- at 33 years old, I'm hardly an old man. It's not like I was suddenly faced with my own mortality. But at the same time, there comes a time when you really, truly start to realize that the path you are on... will have serious adverse effects on your life and the lives of those around you. Not today, perhaps. Not tomorrow or next year or in five years or ten. But... eventually.
Sometimes, the threat of that eventuality is enough.
So I've given up many of my vices. Of course, perhaps I've traded them in for new, more interesting ones. I no longer spend my money on cigarettes and cheap beer. Instead, I've developed a taste for expensive Scotch. I no longer sit on my ass all day andplay video games. Instead, I took up mountain biking, an expenisve endeavor in and of itself, not to mention an inherently dangerous one. As I write this, I've got a pair of shredded shins and a bruise that is quite literally the size of an egg.
I suppose I'll never give up everything -- someone once told me everyone needs at least a few vices, if for no other reason than to keep like interesting. I still play my music too loud. I still swear like a fucking sailor who stubbed his toe. I still spend money a little too freely.
But at least now, I'll be able to do those things for much longer.
ps - I know it's not October anymore, but fuck it. This came to me and seemed better served being posted here.
----------------
Now playing: Hatebreed - Healing To Suffer Again
via FoxyTunes
Friday, October 31, 2008
Almost Viceless
Since this theme was suggested, I have been wondering what on earth can I list as a vice? It's the unfortunate downside of being so close to perfect. My one cup of morning coffee is a pleasant ritual; my sweet tooth is an reflection of my sweet nature...You can only imagine what my poor husband goes through having to live with someone with no known vices.
But if I had to imagine a vice that would possibly fit into my life, I suppose it would be my hopeless, constant need for the television to be on. No one--least of all my cerebral husband--understands this. Most of the time, I don't even watch or care what is on TV, I just want it on. Of course, I watch plenty of programs, occasionally get hooked on a few and move on--but the need to have distant voices fill my home is an entirely different tale.
Growing up, I spent a lot of time alone. Not just without friends my age--but without anyone. While many children of my generation were latch key kids, being babysat by TV while parents worked; I was home alone afraid to answer the phone lest news of my brother's death greeted me. Most of my brother's first four years were spent in various hospitals. I was there with him and my mom for the greater part of those years. But those times that my mom couldn't have me along, I'd stay home alone with little chores, promising not to answer the door--no matter how hard people knocked--and not answer the phone unless it rang once, hung up and called right back again. I knew then, at the tender age of 6, that I did not like house work. Nor did I like being alone, in silence. It did not take me long to find a world of friends with stories and adventures in the safety of my home. Since my literacy level limited my reading roster, I threw myself into the stories and lives of television characters. I fell in love with storytelling of almost any kind. Once the TV was on, I could forget everything that was going on around me and drown in unlikely stories and adventures. I didn't mind staying home alone anymore.
My peaceful world was shattered soon enough though. Half a world away, where the rest of my family still lived, a revolution was tearing the country apart--disrupting everyone's lives. It would only be a matter of time before the revolution upset my newfound peace as well. Soon enough, I would learn about the stern Ayatollah, the American hostages, the exiled Shah and burning effigies. Initial fears were replaced by a fascination and new addiction. I was hooked on any bit of news. Long after my bedtime, I'd sneak out of bed and try to hear the news. Ted Koppel was my new friend. He would tell me what was going on back home in a grown up voice. Sure, he said some things that didn't make sense--even I knew better than to believe some of the things they said on his show--but I was hooked on anything news related right then.
That is how I got where I am today. Addicted to news and stories. I do not like my news mixed with stories--I'm a purist--which is why watching the news most days is like a slow form of self inflicted torture. I still like stories of any kind as long as they're told well--that is getting a little harder to find these days as well, now that everyone has a reality show. Still, I can't let go of the need to fill the house with sounds of people to fill the void that I fell into so long ago. Which is good, I guess. Being perfect isn't all it's cracked up to be.
But if I had to imagine a vice that would possibly fit into my life, I suppose it would be my hopeless, constant need for the television to be on. No one--least of all my cerebral husband--understands this. Most of the time, I don't even watch or care what is on TV, I just want it on. Of course, I watch plenty of programs, occasionally get hooked on a few and move on--but the need to have distant voices fill my home is an entirely different tale.
Growing up, I spent a lot of time alone. Not just without friends my age--but without anyone. While many children of my generation were latch key kids, being babysat by TV while parents worked; I was home alone afraid to answer the phone lest news of my brother's death greeted me. Most of my brother's first four years were spent in various hospitals. I was there with him and my mom for the greater part of those years. But those times that my mom couldn't have me along, I'd stay home alone with little chores, promising not to answer the door--no matter how hard people knocked--and not answer the phone unless it rang once, hung up and called right back again. I knew then, at the tender age of 6, that I did not like house work. Nor did I like being alone, in silence. It did not take me long to find a world of friends with stories and adventures in the safety of my home. Since my literacy level limited my reading roster, I threw myself into the stories and lives of television characters. I fell in love with storytelling of almost any kind. Once the TV was on, I could forget everything that was going on around me and drown in unlikely stories and adventures. I didn't mind staying home alone anymore.
My peaceful world was shattered soon enough though. Half a world away, where the rest of my family still lived, a revolution was tearing the country apart--disrupting everyone's lives. It would only be a matter of time before the revolution upset my newfound peace as well. Soon enough, I would learn about the stern Ayatollah, the American hostages, the exiled Shah and burning effigies. Initial fears were replaced by a fascination and new addiction. I was hooked on any bit of news. Long after my bedtime, I'd sneak out of bed and try to hear the news. Ted Koppel was my new friend. He would tell me what was going on back home in a grown up voice. Sure, he said some things that didn't make sense--even I knew better than to believe some of the things they said on his show--but I was hooked on anything news related right then.
That is how I got where I am today. Addicted to news and stories. I do not like my news mixed with stories--I'm a purist--which is why watching the news most days is like a slow form of self inflicted torture. I still like stories of any kind as long as they're told well--that is getting a little harder to find these days as well, now that everyone has a reality show. Still, I can't let go of the need to fill the house with sounds of people to fill the void that I fell into so long ago. Which is good, I guess. Being perfect isn't all it's cracked up to be.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Excerpt from an Untitled Story
Authorial aside (haha, that just sounds pretentious): This may not make a whole lot of sense out of context, but at least the first section tells a little story, and the second section is a little bit philosophical, so I think we're good. Additionally, it has to do with vices, so it fits the theme, and I haven't posted in a long time because, well, I've been swamped with work and college. So, here is this for now, and if anyone is at all interested in the rest of the story (which is currently incomplete, as I am working on finishing it), please leave a comment and I can email it to you.
He started smoking cigarettes at a young age; he was thirteen. His father rolled his own, and one day he showed up at my house; papers in one hand, tobacco in the other, and a sly grin on his face. My parents did not smoke, or at least if they did I didn't know about it, so I initially tried to talk him out of it. But his enthusiasm was contagious, and shortly after, we were huddled in my basement, hacking up a storm. I decided I didn't like it; I felt my lungs were too weak. He, on the other hand, fell in love on the spot: he was made for it. He never looked so good as when exhaling a curling tendril of smoke. At the time, it was not terribly difficult for younger teenagers to get away with smoking in public. When we became old enough to frequent diners, he did not like to smoke if children were in the vicinity. 'Children are pure,' he would say. 'We all have a responsibility to keep them that way for as long as possible.' He would grow infuriated if he saw the smoking parents of babes, perhaps because his own parents always had. His preferred places to smoke were those marginal places of public use, areas no longer tended to, society's unpatrolled corridors, lost but then found, by us and other similar-minded people, policed by no one, places where a damn simply wasn't given whether you smoked or not: bathrooms in public parks, stairwells in concrete parking structures, run-down baseball diamonds in long-abandoned elementary schools. He didn't like to litter, either, so he developed the ostensibly disgusting habit of storing extinguished cigarette butts in his pockets until the appearance of trash cans. Later in life, I would watch a film in which an eccentric character had a similar habit, eliciting all sorts of sentimentality and nostalgia in me, to the point where I still have not been able to finish watching the damn movie.
Let's give it up for bad habits, shall we? He had his smoking, among other things. What about me? What are my bad habits? Well, I take pretty good care of myself physically. I don't smoke, I rarely drink, I go for long walks, I eat a lot of salad… my bad habits have more to do with the people I allow(ed) to become ingratiated into my life. I'm an enabler, I'm an over-analyzer, I'm far, far too loyal, and I want to save people. I'm not a humanitarian; I don't want to save everyone. But I wanted to save him, so badly. I wanted to be the light at the end of his tunnel. I wanted to be the silver living under his storm cloud. I wanted to make him believe in truth, loyalty, and trust. I wanted to show him that purity can exist beyond children, and I wanted to be pure for him, to be pure together. You shouldn't believe that you can save people. You shouldn't ever bring that burden onto yourself. People can only save themselves, and certain people have no desire to be saved. This is all very derivative, I understand, and abstract and vague and perhaps even a bit silly. But it's true, goddammit. We were both looking for something inexplicably indefinable, and I thought I found it in him, and now I know he never found it at all.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
October Theme: Vices
Last night, I was so tired that all I could do was lay on the couch and ponder the heat. Then I thought, summer hasn't been too bad. I have trained almost all summer without serious problems. And the temperature being close to ninety degrees in August wasn't too bad, right? Except I realized it wasn't August, but the first day of October. NINETY DEGREES in OCTOBER? If I didn't know better, I'd think I was living in Arizona again.
But here we are in October and it is time for another theme, suggested by one of our fun writers and her brilliant 'cousin'. The theme is Vices. Share your vices whether as innocent as the cup of coffee you can't give up or something truly indulgent and sordid. Surely there are some special vices you'd like to share with your favorite readers.
You know the rules. Write once or many times, tall tales or short notes; and don't forget to tag!
But here we are in October and it is time for another theme, suggested by one of our fun writers and her brilliant 'cousin'. The theme is Vices. Share your vices whether as innocent as the cup of coffee you can't give up or something truly indulgent and sordid. Surely there are some special vices you'd like to share with your favorite readers.
You know the rules. Write once or many times, tall tales or short notes; and don't forget to tag!
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Fruit of the Womb
ClickClick. ClickClick.
"So, did you like Costa Rica? Would you recommend it to your friends?"
"Yes", I said through clenched teeth. I tried to think of a happier time spent in Costa Rica, with monkeys roaming the streets, frescas and plush greenery.
ClickClick. Crinkled brow. Click.Click.
"What did you like most? Was the food good?"
I think there are two times when it is physically impossible for me to have a coherent conversation: when the dentist is working on my teeth, and when I'm reluctantly visiting my OB/GYN. Especially if there are cameras charting my insides, painfully held in place by a semi-distracted technician. I was thinking she should know better than to attempt small talk and sully my memories of Costa Rica in the process.
"Everything was wonderful. Too much rain in October. Food is ok."
"Hmm. Did you have your left ovary removed?"
"Not that I know of."
"I can't find it."
I'm pretty sure I hadn't misplaced an ovary. The very painful left ovary was pretty much the reason I was in this mess. Having her question my ovary count mid-exam did not inspire confidence.
Almost an hour of annoying double clicking, uninspired small talk and painful prodding later, she cheerfully let me know that I could 'empty my bladder if I liked'. Although it probably wasn't her fault, I had long decided that I did not like this woman.
I finally sat in a regular exam room, fully dressed and awaiting the doctor's opinion. He would probably take his sweet time and let me fester in my thoughts: how I hated August; how I had been planning my meals for the last two weeks around replenishing the pints of blood I had hemorrhaged, again; how I was behind in my Project class and how my projects at work were neglected. The more I sat there waiting, the more I was determined not to think about why I was sitting in a room covered with diagrams of the female reproductive system and various stage fetuses in the womb.
"Hi! I'm Dr. B. I've taken a look at the pictures they took today and would like to discuss them with you." He wasn't looking at me. At all. "We've been able to locate the cause of some of your cramping. Obviously, we'll discuss it in a little more detail."
He placed a blurry black and white image in front of me, marked with computer lines--the result of almost two hours of double-clicking.
"What you see here are some obvious fibroids. This one here is the largest, about the size of a grapefruit. No one had ever mentioned this one to you? No? Hmmm. Well, this one here is about average size, imagine an orange. This grape-like cluster here is a more recent development. It will grow with time and get much bigger. There is one in the corner--right there. That's about the size of a tangerine, right next to the lime sized one..."
"Key lime or regular?", I interrupted.
"Excuse me?"
"I'm asking if that last one is the size of a key lime or a regular lime."
He stopped and looked at me for the first time since he had walked in the room.
"If you had seen your doctor regularly, he--or she--would have noticed the larger ones. We can discuss treatment options, see what would work best in light of the endometriosis and your cysts."
"I have endometriosis?" I knew it was a stupid question as soon as I had blurted it. Of course I did. What else could have explained the excruciating pain that I suffered for years? And the GI problems that had a rotating series of diagnoses for years .
"I do get regular exams. I just have incompetent doctors who refused to examine me and put me on birth control when I asked for it. Which is how I ended up spending my honeymoon in surgery for a ruptured cyst that bled into my abdominal cavity for a whole day. I get examined at least once a year."
I was exhausted. I didn't really care what he said anymore, even though I could hear him droning on. "...and obviously, pregnancy isn't impossible. Have you been trying to conceive?"
"No. I'm happy with the fruit bowl I have going there." The truth was, we hadn't been trying to get pregnant, because we were too poor to think of adding another person to our family. But more than that, I sat there thinking I had cursed myself when M and I had dated. I had told him I didn't know if I wanted children, and if he wanted kids, he should probably move on to someone else. He stayed.
The doctor handed me a box of Kleenex and sat in silence for a bit. "As I mentioned, pregnancy is not impossible. You would need monitoring and treatment. Obviously, there are miracles in my line of work as well. There are women with severe cases of endo that conceive very quickly and have fairly uncomplicated pregnancies. This is not a final diagnosis. And many people choose to adopt."
I don't remember anything else that he said. He talked for a long time before he sent me home; I don't remember getting home. I just found myself inside our home, contemplating the dust bunnies and citrus sized lumps in my uterus. M called at some point and asked how my appointment went. For a moment, I regretted insisting that I go through the day on my own. I wanted him beside me, but was too stubborn to say anything. I tried to make light of what had happened; I emphasized the fruitiness. I lied to him for another few minutes about how fine everything was and went back to observing the dust bunnies.
And that is how I am where I am. Every year, I curse August, because for the past seven years, that is when all my problems rear their head. Every August I am alone--and lonely. If I loved my friends' children before, I cling to them even more now, knowing that I will be their"Aunty", and not just Mommy's friend. I rejoice in the arrival of babies around me. I clench my teeth and lie to my family when they ask me when I will have children--they don't know my secret and I have no intention of sharing it with them. Life moves on and brings new projects, distractions and miracles with it. And each time, I try to drown a little bit more.
"So, did you like Costa Rica? Would you recommend it to your friends?"
"Yes", I said through clenched teeth. I tried to think of a happier time spent in Costa Rica, with monkeys roaming the streets, frescas and plush greenery.
ClickClick. Crinkled brow. Click.Click.
"What did you like most? Was the food good?"
I think there are two times when it is physically impossible for me to have a coherent conversation: when the dentist is working on my teeth, and when I'm reluctantly visiting my OB/GYN. Especially if there are cameras charting my insides, painfully held in place by a semi-distracted technician. I was thinking she should know better than to attempt small talk and sully my memories of Costa Rica in the process.
"Everything was wonderful. Too much rain in October. Food is ok."
"Hmm. Did you have your left ovary removed?"
"Not that I know of."
"I can't find it."
I'm pretty sure I hadn't misplaced an ovary. The very painful left ovary was pretty much the reason I was in this mess. Having her question my ovary count mid-exam did not inspire confidence.
Almost an hour of annoying double clicking, uninspired small talk and painful prodding later, she cheerfully let me know that I could 'empty my bladder if I liked'. Although it probably wasn't her fault, I had long decided that I did not like this woman.
I finally sat in a regular exam room, fully dressed and awaiting the doctor's opinion. He would probably take his sweet time and let me fester in my thoughts: how I hated August; how I had been planning my meals for the last two weeks around replenishing the pints of blood I had hemorrhaged, again; how I was behind in my Project class and how my projects at work were neglected. The more I sat there waiting, the more I was determined not to think about why I was sitting in a room covered with diagrams of the female reproductive system and various stage fetuses in the womb.
"Hi! I'm Dr. B. I've taken a look at the pictures they took today and would like to discuss them with you." He wasn't looking at me. At all. "We've been able to locate the cause of some of your cramping. Obviously, we'll discuss it in a little more detail."
He placed a blurry black and white image in front of me, marked with computer lines--the result of almost two hours of double-clicking.
"What you see here are some obvious fibroids. This one here is the largest, about the size of a grapefruit. No one had ever mentioned this one to you? No? Hmmm. Well, this one here is about average size, imagine an orange. This grape-like cluster here is a more recent development. It will grow with time and get much bigger. There is one in the corner--right there. That's about the size of a tangerine, right next to the lime sized one..."
"Key lime or regular?", I interrupted.
"Excuse me?"
"I'm asking if that last one is the size of a key lime or a regular lime."
He stopped and looked at me for the first time since he had walked in the room.
"If you had seen your doctor regularly, he--or she--would have noticed the larger ones. We can discuss treatment options, see what would work best in light of the endometriosis and your cysts."
"I have endometriosis?" I knew it was a stupid question as soon as I had blurted it. Of course I did. What else could have explained the excruciating pain that I suffered for years? And the GI problems that had a rotating series of diagnoses for years .
"I do get regular exams. I just have incompetent doctors who refused to examine me and put me on birth control when I asked for it. Which is how I ended up spending my honeymoon in surgery for a ruptured cyst that bled into my abdominal cavity for a whole day. I get examined at least once a year."
I was exhausted. I didn't really care what he said anymore, even though I could hear him droning on. "...and obviously, pregnancy isn't impossible. Have you been trying to conceive?"
"No. I'm happy with the fruit bowl I have going there." The truth was, we hadn't been trying to get pregnant, because we were too poor to think of adding another person to our family. But more than that, I sat there thinking I had cursed myself when M and I had dated. I had told him I didn't know if I wanted children, and if he wanted kids, he should probably move on to someone else. He stayed.
The doctor handed me a box of Kleenex and sat in silence for a bit. "As I mentioned, pregnancy is not impossible. You would need monitoring and treatment. Obviously, there are miracles in my line of work as well. There are women with severe cases of endo that conceive very quickly and have fairly uncomplicated pregnancies. This is not a final diagnosis. And many people choose to adopt."
I don't remember anything else that he said. He talked for a long time before he sent me home; I don't remember getting home. I just found myself inside our home, contemplating the dust bunnies and citrus sized lumps in my uterus. M called at some point and asked how my appointment went. For a moment, I regretted insisting that I go through the day on my own. I wanted him beside me, but was too stubborn to say anything. I tried to make light of what had happened; I emphasized the fruitiness. I lied to him for another few minutes about how fine everything was and went back to observing the dust bunnies.
And that is how I am where I am. Every year, I curse August, because for the past seven years, that is when all my problems rear their head. Every August I am alone--and lonely. If I loved my friends' children before, I cling to them even more now, knowing that I will be their"Aunty", and not just Mommy's friend. I rejoice in the arrival of babies around me. I clench my teeth and lie to my family when they ask me when I will have children--they don't know my secret and I have no intention of sharing it with them. Life moves on and brings new projects, distractions and miracles with it. And each time, I try to drown a little bit more.
Saturday, September 6, 2008
September Theme: The Loneliness
Hello friends! I'm sorry I'm posting the September theme six days into the month, but life has been crazy lately. Last month, as a reward for my hard work on the last two projects at work, I was removed from my comfort zone and put on a project that is a mess. Under a new manager. In a group known for being overly 'helpful'. I spent a good part of August freaking out and resolving to be a failure at work.
The rest of the month, I spent in a panic over some health problems that mysteriously pop up every August, when none of my friends are available to listen to me whine. I realize I am a wimp, I just like to have friends around to listen to my hysteria on occasion. Is that too much to ask?
Which brings me to September's theme: The Loneliness. There are many ways of feeling lonely, and sometimes great things come from that loneliness. Write about the good and the bad, the times when you were lonely in crowds or times when lonely and lonesome went hand-in-hand. We've all been there, I'm sure you have handled it with more grace than I.
The rest of the month, I spent in a panic over some health problems that mysteriously pop up every August, when none of my friends are available to listen to me whine. I realize I am a wimp, I just like to have friends around to listen to my hysteria on occasion. Is that too much to ask?
Which brings me to September's theme: The Loneliness. There are many ways of feeling lonely, and sometimes great things come from that loneliness. Write about the good and the bad, the times when you were lonely in crowds or times when lonely and lonesome went hand-in-hand. We've all been there, I'm sure you have handled it with more grace than I.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
"We Need to Talk"
I’m led into our bedroom. Already, the computer chair is in the middle of the room facing the door, positioned for a one-member audience for a one-woman show.
“Since we got back to school, you’ve changed.”
I adjust in the chair. I lean too far back and flinch over my fear of tipping.
She continues, “You just stopped talking to me. I mean, about anything important. And you don’t sit next to me at dinner.” Her hands are on her hips with legs apart, her natural Superman pose.
I stare over her head at our matching plywood dressers. Both sets open, our clothes mingle in a dirty heap with shoes jutting out like lost children in the water. My sighing is internal.
“I thought maybe you were going through a rough patch, you know? During the first few weeks? I mean, I know we fought a lot when we were traveling, but that was just the stress.”
To her right is the window. In front of it is a big ugly fern that’s slowly dying. I hate how it blocks the view of the parking lot. It looks tacky from the outside. I checked last week when we argued about it again. The leaves are limp and colorless. Simply because the thing is ten years old doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be put down. I bet ten in fern years is about seventy-five in human years.
“Maybe moving in together right now was too soon. But you knew that we’d get the best apartment on campus if we did. I mean, I figured we’d just get over the summer and start fresh, you know?”
She doesn’t move very often. I noticed it on the trains from Italy to France to Luxemburg to The Black Forest. The woman doesn’t wiggle her fingers or bend her knees or even lean against doorframes. The way she can perfectly balance herself in the middle of a rocking city bus and not falter is unnatural.
“I just think you’re being mean.”
I suck my bottom lip through my teeth, pinching the thin skin until it bubbles between the gaps. My tongue prods, digging for blood. My chin juts a little.
“And, you know, I know you’ve been hanging out with Beth a lot. While I’m in class.”
Behind me, in her perfect line of vision, is where we sleep. Pillows and blankets spill over the edge; there are too many coverlets and sheets with clashing patterns.
Her eyes are hot, “I don’t care. I just wish you’d tell me.”
There’s a pause. I count to thirteen when she says, “It’s not that I don’t like Beth. I just don’t know why you think you can’t hang out with us both, you know?” Her right foot lifts to scratch the opposite calf.
Rubbing my arms, I lean forward until my vision falls to the ground. I stare at her pink and white sneakers. I sigh at their ugliness.
“I hear she used to be engaged until the guy broke it off. That’s why she transferred.”
I look at her. Not allowing myself to count the freckles on her nose or determine if she’s due for another highlighting, I focus on her eyes. These two huge blue orbs that glimmer when wet. It can be an odd vanity for a woman—to know she looks beautiful when she cries. It can be dangerous.
We stare off like this for too long. An intermission when we rehash the first acts points, character subtleties, and contemplate what will happen when the stage lights dim again.
As she breaks down, I get up. I move behind the chair and push it toward her. She sits down. With my body facing her back, her crying quiet but obvious, I offer her my moment.
“I can move out, if you want. It’s obvious that the summer can’t be forgotten. It was too much. I’m sure if it didn’t happen then, it’d happen like it is now. We just can’t do this anymore. I think we’ve moved beyond each other.”
We are both looking at the dressers. To their left, I see the door out of the bedroom and into the main room where Beth and a few others are studying.
“I’m not replacing you with Beth. With anyone. I think maybe we just aren’t good roommates. It can happen to friends, even best friends. Maybe, over time, we can start hanging out again. Right now, though, I just need some time.” I walk out. I don’t touch her shoulder as I pass. I don’t pause at the door, turning and giving her a calm, sad smile. I just walk out, she quietly crying in the chair. I shut the door.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
My Anchor
It was simple. I was born. I was born and I grew in a neighborhood of all boys. The Star Wars Action Figures had me relocated to Princes Leah every single time I played. I played, resigned to the way life was until the baby sister of one of my friends suddenly grew and seemed interesting. Having completed her bout with diapers and incessant crying, she suddenly was ‘not’ annoying. At six years old, my life of Princess Leah was finally over—just in time to miss armpit farts 101.
So, with my new found friend who was four, and I was six, the good times began. Suddenly my world of creating little things from paper what-nots and string, singing and performing, dressing up, giggling and whispering, and make believing that ‘Greg of the Brady’s’ was our hubby (a tad Polygamist, if you ask me) had begun.
Our bikes had baskets to fill with the neighbors prize flowers, and there were plenty of insects to kill and have fantastic mini funerals for. Life was good for us --not so much for the bugs.
Years later, life began. Work took over our lives, school became an on again off again game, and so did our boyfriends. And somewhere in between Holidays, our families proffered the opportunity for us to gather, laugh, and silently agree that as different as we were, our friendship was bonded by butterfly blood and the burial crosses that lined our childhood street.
We kept in sporadic contact.
It was years later that I called for a true friend request. I had moved to Croatia with my Croatian husband due to visa issues. The marriage had gone quite sour. I had returned home to Los Angeles with my daughter and without any of my belongings, leaving behind my visa less husband with his Mommy and Daddy. It was hard.
Suddenly I found myself in a role I’d never lived and had no clue how to do—a single parent in my home town. There I was. at my parents, wishing for something different. Feeling suspended in time, in limbo, without an anchor, and not sure what the future brought. And everything I had prior—was gone.
Working, and living with my parents, I found myself grateful… but that incessant heart ache would not leave. My father was less than approving of my upcoming divorce and my mother was my greatest cheerleader grateful I’d left the bastard. However, this life I was going to take on was foreign to her too. She was complete with her husband, as I viewed it. She had not only her husband, but her daughter and her granddaughter. And while she worried about me she couldn’t possibly know what ‘incomplete’ felt like. Did she know what it was like to feel like you were floating?
Needing an achor, my dear childhood friend came to my rescue. An apartment had opened up in her building. I filled out the application and soon we were neighbors yet again. We lived in the Industrial area of Long Beach. The bugs were sparse, the flowers were few, but the friendship still remained.
One day, sitting in my office at work I found myself hit, literally hit and overwhelmed by a flood of emotion. Grateful for the privacy and the early morning I chose to come in and put some last minute meeting ideas together, I closed my door and cried. And after the flood was gone, I pulled myself together and headed to my meeting with my cell phone in hand. Upon its completion I made the call.
“Hey Kristine, good morning, “ I said, sounding rather nonchalant as usual.
“Hey what’s up?” she retorted, busy with her stacks of work papers too.
I wondered how best to pose the question, but I went in for the kill….
“ How’d you like to go to Venice than Croatia with me?”
(Silence)
I continued, “I want to go this Fall. I left a lot of my things there including all of my daughter’s baby pictures.”
She agreed. Eager for the next adventure as most 20- somethings are, it wasn’t much to twist her arm and simply say, “total babes” –and suddenly it was a trip we were planning.
There we were with two giant suitcases, one sprightly five year old, and buckets of rain pouring down. It was Fall in Venice.
In Venice we ate authentic Italian food prepared at a Chinese family owned restaurant, complete with California wine. We put on our most enticing of outfits and showed the Italian boys what California Girls were made of. Our gondolier whom we jokingly bartered with charged us close to nothing and took us through canals not on the usual route.
Italian romance included five Italian young men crossing the Gran Canal. They were there for the Venice vs. Sicily soccer match. Newly divorced I walked in a city I had always wished my ex husband would have been romantic with me rather than argumentative in. I shared a kiss with one of these young men. As passionate as it was under a full moon, he suggested in Italian that we go back to his room.” It was the truth when I told him that my monthly friend was in town. At that point my ears and the skies of Venice heard, “Que Fortuna!!!” (What fortune!!!). My ego stroked, and some of my wounds healed…I was ready for the drive to Croatia the next day.
The following day we met my former father in law in the arrivals section of the airport. He did not know that we arrived the day before. We looked fresh, but he was a man and so, how could he tell? The drive to my old home was long and I was as tense as I thought I would be. But then I watched Kristine and I remembered why I had asked for her to come.
If I had gone alone their abusive statements would have taken away all the work I’d done to reground myself. I hadn’t felt strong yet. I was still broken. But in my world of Los Angeles I was not the way they had made me feel. I was capable. The two years that I had spent with them could not overshadow the lifetime I had spent with my dear friend. She was my anchor.
And as we drove to the next greatest adventure of our lives, I watched her laugh and joke and admire the country in which I had lived and cried. I, 'in a sense', watched the child that I was growing up, visit the country I struggled in--and realized I was not. And slowly I was no longer floating. Suddenly I was rooted. Finally, I was grounded. My friend who was born just in time to save me once, arrived again just in time to save me twice.
We had the most incredible time. And we share the most incredible stories. But someday when we are old and gray and still good girls hell bent on having a good time…we will look back and know that some friendships have a purpose far greater than the mortal eye. It is only the picture that we paint in retrospect that helps us see that without them, we merely float.
So, with my new found friend who was four, and I was six, the good times began. Suddenly my world of creating little things from paper what-nots and string, singing and performing, dressing up, giggling and whispering, and make believing that ‘Greg of the Brady’s’ was our hubby (a tad Polygamist, if you ask me) had begun.
Our bikes had baskets to fill with the neighbors prize flowers, and there were plenty of insects to kill and have fantastic mini funerals for. Life was good for us --not so much for the bugs.
Years later, life began. Work took over our lives, school became an on again off again game, and so did our boyfriends. And somewhere in between Holidays, our families proffered the opportunity for us to gather, laugh, and silently agree that as different as we were, our friendship was bonded by butterfly blood and the burial crosses that lined our childhood street.
We kept in sporadic contact.
It was years later that I called for a true friend request. I had moved to Croatia with my Croatian husband due to visa issues. The marriage had gone quite sour. I had returned home to Los Angeles with my daughter and without any of my belongings, leaving behind my visa less husband with his Mommy and Daddy. It was hard.
Suddenly I found myself in a role I’d never lived and had no clue how to do—a single parent in my home town. There I was. at my parents, wishing for something different. Feeling suspended in time, in limbo, without an anchor, and not sure what the future brought. And everything I had prior—was gone.
Working, and living with my parents, I found myself grateful… but that incessant heart ache would not leave. My father was less than approving of my upcoming divorce and my mother was my greatest cheerleader grateful I’d left the bastard. However, this life I was going to take on was foreign to her too. She was complete with her husband, as I viewed it. She had not only her husband, but her daughter and her granddaughter. And while she worried about me she couldn’t possibly know what ‘incomplete’ felt like. Did she know what it was like to feel like you were floating?
Needing an achor, my dear childhood friend came to my rescue. An apartment had opened up in her building. I filled out the application and soon we were neighbors yet again. We lived in the Industrial area of Long Beach. The bugs were sparse, the flowers were few, but the friendship still remained.
One day, sitting in my office at work I found myself hit, literally hit and overwhelmed by a flood of emotion. Grateful for the privacy and the early morning I chose to come in and put some last minute meeting ideas together, I closed my door and cried. And after the flood was gone, I pulled myself together and headed to my meeting with my cell phone in hand. Upon its completion I made the call.
“Hey Kristine, good morning, “ I said, sounding rather nonchalant as usual.
“Hey what’s up?” she retorted, busy with her stacks of work papers too.
I wondered how best to pose the question, but I went in for the kill….
“ How’d you like to go to Venice than Croatia with me?”
(Silence)
I continued, “I want to go this Fall. I left a lot of my things there including all of my daughter’s baby pictures.”
She agreed. Eager for the next adventure as most 20- somethings are, it wasn’t much to twist her arm and simply say, “total babes” –and suddenly it was a trip we were planning.
There we were with two giant suitcases, one sprightly five year old, and buckets of rain pouring down. It was Fall in Venice.
In Venice we ate authentic Italian food prepared at a Chinese family owned restaurant, complete with California wine. We put on our most enticing of outfits and showed the Italian boys what California Girls were made of. Our gondolier whom we jokingly bartered with charged us close to nothing and took us through canals not on the usual route.
Italian romance included five Italian young men crossing the Gran Canal. They were there for the Venice vs. Sicily soccer match. Newly divorced I walked in a city I had always wished my ex husband would have been romantic with me rather than argumentative in. I shared a kiss with one of these young men. As passionate as it was under a full moon, he suggested in Italian that we go back to his room.” It was the truth when I told him that my monthly friend was in town. At that point my ears and the skies of Venice heard, “Que Fortuna!!!” (What fortune!!!). My ego stroked, and some of my wounds healed…I was ready for the drive to Croatia the next day.
The following day we met my former father in law in the arrivals section of the airport. He did not know that we arrived the day before. We looked fresh, but he was a man and so, how could he tell? The drive to my old home was long and I was as tense as I thought I would be. But then I watched Kristine and I remembered why I had asked for her to come.
If I had gone alone their abusive statements would have taken away all the work I’d done to reground myself. I hadn’t felt strong yet. I was still broken. But in my world of Los Angeles I was not the way they had made me feel. I was capable. The two years that I had spent with them could not overshadow the lifetime I had spent with my dear friend. She was my anchor.
And as we drove to the next greatest adventure of our lives, I watched her laugh and joke and admire the country in which I had lived and cried. I, 'in a sense', watched the child that I was growing up, visit the country I struggled in--and realized I was not. And slowly I was no longer floating. Suddenly I was rooted. Finally, I was grounded. My friend who was born just in time to save me once, arrived again just in time to save me twice.
We had the most incredible time. And we share the most incredible stories. But someday when we are old and gray and still good girls hell bent on having a good time…we will look back and know that some friendships have a purpose far greater than the mortal eye. It is only the picture that we paint in retrospect that helps us see that without them, we merely float.
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