9 posts tagged “nothing real”
a long time ago, but not long enough ago that hearts weren't broken and girls weren't afraid, a philosopher told me that the next great task belonged to me.
i knew of what he meant, but i assumed death would follow, a great task that was to the point and ceasing. it was only last night in the soft air of five a.m. that i realized that my great task was this incredible being growing in my belly. i had begun building, and my job wouldn't be done until i could contribute to the world what has been taken from us. the next generation is beneath my belly with the hiccups.
a fantastic feeling to know that my husband and i can not only create together but build as well.
i began a small traveling last night. the night on the porch in austin when a opossum tried to chew my toes. back to a smoky bar, in which i first met my dear friend, josh. trying to remember what the armchair looked like, the one that kate and i transported via T in boston. a china cabinet, antique and well-laden, full of books. and how seth's room was always the smallest room in the back that drew all of the people.
occasionally, i would try to sleep, but i felt as if someone were awake with me somewhere and needed my comfort.
skulking around in the back of my closet, and i keep dreaming of something that looks like the bowels of the past. but instead of paying attention or paying no mind, i sit there and listen while it scolds me, while it tells me that i'm always wrong, while it tells me that it hopes me and the future are very happy together.
and i don't mean to cry when that song comes back to the chorus, but it sounds like something that i used to call home before it burned down. before it became the ashes i tattooed into my skin.
thanksgiving brought my parents back and family home. it was good.
strange again to be in the middle of november and happy.
we're all trying to figure out something more or less to make it more fulfilling and more laughable and more redeeming. but we all sleep the same at night with different actions on our shoulders.
and my dad said, "i'm just trying to be a better person."
and that's admirable because at least he's fuckin' trying.
where are our poets and our indecents? where are the people that make you scream and mean it? where is our storyteller? where are our heroes?
we're flying home without lifting a finger.
none of us know what it means to live today.
people who take themselves so goddamn seriously that they're impossible to have a conversation with without trying not to send them to a work camp in your head.
people who take themselves too seriously should be sent to volunteer in a cancer ward. they should not be allowed to adhere to any fashion craze/scene/trend that may inhibit their punishment/redemption/heart growth of spending time with people who are allowed to take themselves so seriously but by virtue of the fact that they're awesome... don't.
end scene.
it's an infectious time of year, and i'm not talking about the holiday spirit or thanksgiving graciousness. i've been battling through the emotional quicksand that is november, but my sleep pattern is delinquent and my productivity has reached a record ohnolow. but i keep thinking, if i stare at the screen long enough or if i choose a little bit better or if i throw on that pensive hand to chin grimace... well, maybe i'll get something done that doesn't depress me. maybe i'll understand why it is that the sea takes over the sky in my dreams and my cats speak in tongues. maybe, just maybe, i'll fucking comprehend the songs that are being sung to me when i can't think of any other words. the voices in my head are quiet and tasteful. the souls i left behind are restful and in their places. and yet, satisfaction is furthest from my mind because i had to leave anything at all.
the days are short, and time is abundant. i never pictured myself as the kind of chick to long for the nine to five, but you just get burned out. you get to feeling like you want to know what to expect.
the big surprises in your life, they hop on you from behind the half-closed doors and give you a fuckin' heart attack. you can't breathe. you stop short in some crooked, question mark pose while your heart skips a beat. eventually, your heart yearns for that even pace.
i used to write. really write.
but it was all when i had so much in my head and so many people to be angry with ... and then there was THEM. the expense on my system was beyond taxing; it was exhausting. i was a shell.
i don't have as much to say anymore, and maybe it's because that passion to fight has left my system; like all good grown-ups, i've learned it just doesn't help. but what i do say, i want it to really rock you. i want you to appreciate the letters within the words and savor every moment of time i spend writing this. i want to be appreciated and loved for the words that come out of my mouth. i want to be published from the mountain tops. i want to be translated into 43 different languages. i want libraries to tick 'yes' in the box next to my name. i want it all, for no fee whatsoever.
is it sad that i think i deserve it?
four years go by, and does anyone remember? has anyone followed me from here to now?
letting the bottom rot through, it eats your brain. when your feet are in the rising water, you just gotta cry out.
in my head, i lay down and rest. felt the wind on my cheeks as the grass spun around me, and i stopped the clouds just by staring at them for long enough.
real time kicked in, and i was raking leaves. traveling back and forth from 12 years old, awkward and alone. it's the last time i remember raking leaves. it's the last time i remember those big orange pumpkin bags (is that why i was so insistent upon buying them?).
12 years old was the most awkward and alone time that i recall. so frequently, we forget these times, especially when we grow up and are forced to make decisions. there's the stress of everyday looming over us, bills-responsibilities-pmsing-holidayplans-multivitamins-antacids-furniture-cancer.... it all just sits there, and we forget about those moments when we were merely twelve years old and the world was going to frikkin end because you just hadn't hit puberty like all the other girls. it's a vicious cycle really. between the highs and lows in our personal sagas, we just forget to remember when everything was ok, when we were focused on raking leaves.
i bundled all the leaves safe away into the bright orange bags with the pumpkin faces. and i was fairly proud of myself when my husband pulled into the driveway. it wasn't necessarily for raking the full yard of leaves, but for conquering at least some small part of being awkward and alone. i had spent many years of my life that way, but i had never felt such control over it.
i'm certainly still an awkward girl, and a lot of times, i choose to be alone. but neither are to my detriment anymore. neither make me less of a person. in fact, frequently, they contribute to the eccentric but loveable girl i'm proud to be.
i don't miss it that much, you know ... being new. my feet finding that particular pavement for that first time, or my eyes darting from here to there with a twinge of not only self-doubt but relinquishing the power i had to a new city.
i was new for two years, because as far as that tiny country went and no matter how many people in a pub i knew, i was always the yank, always that american girl, yer wan wit da ink.
unfortunately, now i'm in a sea of same and struggling to seem new to those that matter. or i suppose those i'm told matter because i can't see a difference between my struggles and their own, between the hair that grows on my head and the scalp they scratch while perusing my toe to head indefinitely.
take a long walk to a cul-de-sac and turn around to do it all again but in reverse order as though you're seventeen again, and you couldn't give a fuck if you tried and tried and tried to alphabetize each line that they gave you, each reason to say no.
there's a funny story: this girl that worked for me thought that i made up the word "alphabetize", and she viewed me as though i was the ultimate keeper of this word. i was so damn organized that i, indeed, had spent my most precious moments brainstorming a word to encapsulate not only the alphabet, but the placing of things into said alphabet. i have to say, it was a great day for the part of me that gets off on being a "manager". otherwise, i just laughed near her and wondered what my life would have been like if i had pioneered that particular word.
what was i on about? being new. i'm feeling old, but not in years ... more so in "been there, done that" terms. and i suppose this is a cry for, please color me different in a sky of blue.
i think the heat is really getting to us all, moving in slow motion and the words melting together.
yes, we refuse to leave the house.
i don't want to play with the children, move the boxes, or read another word for fear my skin will drip slowly from my bones, and i'm tired, too.
the return home is plagued with people to talk to and catch up with and no, i still i have no idea what i'm going to do with my life. but damn, i can put a few words together to decorate this smile. would you all please just stop talking? i want to spend my time in my parents' basement away from the sun and the telephone with my husband draped around me.
