*Originally written August 18, 2008*
Can't decide
Where my freedom lies.
I'm so used to being tangled up in ethereal memories of arguments that never occurred,
Of tearful reunions
Staged out of desperate subconscious loneliness.
I'm so used to pretending in front of a hall of mirrors,
Never remembering their images, the lines of wit they espoused in their constant echoes,
Never prepared for the moment of contact
So often feared, so often longed for.
I'm so used to the "never" being always that I forgot to want anything else.
Nothing hurts more than breaking the bonds of familiarity.
Your freedom offered me the pain of holes closing
And knowing that reprimands
Would be at hand
Should I choose to open them again.
Yet faithfulness to commands uttered in years so far detached from this present
Generates a prison of my own making,
Forcing me to choose between the bondage of keeping you locked away
Or keeping me locked out for good.
One cannot be saved when not allowed to fly out from their cage.
Oh this hell of indecision!
Where are you if not needed in my present?
Why were you needed in my past, if ever?!
I cannot see beyond horizons if you continue to block my path.
Let all memory of the future never be tainted with your presence.
Let fear of leaving you behind never cross the threshold of my conscience.
Constant battles of wills,
Mastery over passions,
Duels of wit and intellect
Have ended
And now I battle with myself...
But you remain as the vestige of my enmity.
Were you to come near,
I would be tempted to scratch, bite and rake across your skin;
A visual reminder of the pain of unrequited desire.
Yet without this fear, this anguish,
Without your memory of provocation,
I am nothing.
Emptiness is cold with no hope of warmth.
Freedom carries the burden of the unknown.
A desolate land of either hope of sustenance, or fear of flood or drought.
Nothing protects from the light once found.
Shadows provide the protection of certain darkness.
Can't decide
Where my freedom lies.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
A Taste of Forgetting
*Originally written Sept. 26, 2009*
You sit there, on your bed, laptop covering the front of your thighs, the warmth soaking through the blankets, and it hits you. Smell. Taste. Taste more than anything. It fills your mouth, and its source seems to be your soft palate, way at the back, like it's dripping from your nasal passages, liquid through a sieve. It's unmistakable, this taste of a smell. You know that its origin is nowhere in your physical vicinity, but instead bloomed and diffused from the unconscious mind that isn’t really aware of anything else that’s going on. Your body is seeking to remember while you are trying to forget. And when you try to remember, in your desperate attempts to reconnect with that which is no longer there, your body conveniently forgets, or chooses ignorance. But there is no escape when your body is in charge of things. And so you sit there with this taste in your mouth, and it forces you to remember the source.
It's his place. You must have absorbed it into your skin, even though it's been three weeks since your exposure. Long incubation period, it seems. It reminds you of the couch where you both sat too close together so that the only thought, the only action that occurred to both of you was to get closer. So you did. But it wasn’t close enough, you remind yourself. It was only the surface of closeness, and you wanted to go deeper before he was ready, and he couldn’t handle the pressure. Maybe that’s why he left. You introduced the idea too soon, no matter how gently. A cage is still a cage, no matter how slowly it is dropped over the captive. But there’s more to remember because the taste hasn’t disappeared yet. Go back.
There was the bed with the squeaking wooden frame that actually groaned more than squeaked when you got out of it. The duvet that you tried to sleep under that night, but couldn’t because the heat was so bad, and so for half the night you slept uncovered, bare breasted, only in your underwear, wondering how the hell people learned to sleep together, while you were practically pushed up against the wall on your side and he took up most of the space, along with the Chihuahua at both your feet. If you turned toward him, you could feel his breath on you, getting worse as time passed because of the build up of odor causing bacteria in his mouth. No good morning kiss without a sufficient rinse, that’s for sure. You liked watching him sleep though, head tilted back, mouth slightly open. You wondered if you could get used to this, and you started to realize your growing affection for this person who almost otherwise, in most senses of the word, was a stranger. But something felt right about it. Yes, you could do this. You saw yourself waking up on Saturday mornings, cuddling next to him while he was still half asleep and would be for some time, your hand grazing over his chest, like a mother unconsciously stroking the back of her baby. When he was more awake, lazy pillow talk would follow, soft laughter, gentle gazes and shy smiles, followed by giggles, playful kisses and smacks on the ass. A perfect vision, and it made it that much harder to sleep.
In the morning, or more like close to noon, he made you breakfast which you couldn’t finish. Not because of the quantity, but because you were nauseated from lack of sleep. You managed to nibble enough off your plate so that he wouldn’t feel insulted or think that you weren’t grateful. Maybe he wouldn’t have thought those things, but you weren’t sure. You hadn’t known him that long anyway. You even kissed his cheek gently and said, “Thanks for the breakfast sweetie,” as you walked back to the room to rest some more, hoping that sleep would over take you now. It didn’t. You left about an hour later, coming to the couch where he was lounging, reading Pygmy by Chuck Palahanuik, sat down next to him and pressed your lips to his. That was the last time, but you didn’t know it then. The last time you smelled that room, that whole place, tasted it on his mouth, in his skin. And now, three weeks later, it's back, without warning and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Sit with it. Breathe. Smell. Taste. Be with it even though it hurts like bricks being dropped inside, one by one, and knowing that the hardest part will be trying to get up to make the weight bearing easier. The familiarity hurts more than anything, because now you have to make it unfamiliar. Your body is working on forgetting. It’s remembering so that it can forget.
It's going away now. Slowly. But no, come back! What was that again? I want to remember now. Before I didn’t because I wasn’t ready, I wasn’t prepared. I can sit with it now, it's ok. I can take it. It's gone. Back to reality and the knowledge that this is the only way you’ll ever experience that place again, if you want to. You know you don’t. You’re not the type to settle for mediocre attention, brief text messages and sporadic phone calls. Long written messages complaining about the lack of respect you’ve shown for his tight schedule, yet giving you hope that there’s chance for more contact. But only when he decides it’s time. You’ll have to wait. No thanks. It was nice while it lasted.
Oh wait, there it is! It’s come back again, on its own. Like a shy puppy that won’t go near anyone trying to grab it, but will come wandering up to the first unsuspecting person (or animal) it sees. Is that what he’s like? Maybe you should have given him more space, more time… But how much more time does someone need? Almost a week since you called, and still nothing. You’re done, you’ve told yourself this. Ah, but taste it… No, you don’t want to. It tastes like stale hope, a masochistic remembering. You don’t want this. It’ll go away eventually. It will. You can handle this. Just sit. Breathe. You know why this is happening, don’t you? Remember, so that you can forget. Breathe it in. There.
You sit there, on your bed, laptop covering the front of your thighs, the warmth soaking through the blankets, and it hits you. Smell. Taste. Taste more than anything. It fills your mouth, and its source seems to be your soft palate, way at the back, like it's dripping from your nasal passages, liquid through a sieve. It's unmistakable, this taste of a smell. You know that its origin is nowhere in your physical vicinity, but instead bloomed and diffused from the unconscious mind that isn’t really aware of anything else that’s going on. Your body is seeking to remember while you are trying to forget. And when you try to remember, in your desperate attempts to reconnect with that which is no longer there, your body conveniently forgets, or chooses ignorance. But there is no escape when your body is in charge of things. And so you sit there with this taste in your mouth, and it forces you to remember the source.
It's his place. You must have absorbed it into your skin, even though it's been three weeks since your exposure. Long incubation period, it seems. It reminds you of the couch where you both sat too close together so that the only thought, the only action that occurred to both of you was to get closer. So you did. But it wasn’t close enough, you remind yourself. It was only the surface of closeness, and you wanted to go deeper before he was ready, and he couldn’t handle the pressure. Maybe that’s why he left. You introduced the idea too soon, no matter how gently. A cage is still a cage, no matter how slowly it is dropped over the captive. But there’s more to remember because the taste hasn’t disappeared yet. Go back.
There was the bed with the squeaking wooden frame that actually groaned more than squeaked when you got out of it. The duvet that you tried to sleep under that night, but couldn’t because the heat was so bad, and so for half the night you slept uncovered, bare breasted, only in your underwear, wondering how the hell people learned to sleep together, while you were practically pushed up against the wall on your side and he took up most of the space, along with the Chihuahua at both your feet. If you turned toward him, you could feel his breath on you, getting worse as time passed because of the build up of odor causing bacteria in his mouth. No good morning kiss without a sufficient rinse, that’s for sure. You liked watching him sleep though, head tilted back, mouth slightly open. You wondered if you could get used to this, and you started to realize your growing affection for this person who almost otherwise, in most senses of the word, was a stranger. But something felt right about it. Yes, you could do this. You saw yourself waking up on Saturday mornings, cuddling next to him while he was still half asleep and would be for some time, your hand grazing over his chest, like a mother unconsciously stroking the back of her baby. When he was more awake, lazy pillow talk would follow, soft laughter, gentle gazes and shy smiles, followed by giggles, playful kisses and smacks on the ass. A perfect vision, and it made it that much harder to sleep.
In the morning, or more like close to noon, he made you breakfast which you couldn’t finish. Not because of the quantity, but because you were nauseated from lack of sleep. You managed to nibble enough off your plate so that he wouldn’t feel insulted or think that you weren’t grateful. Maybe he wouldn’t have thought those things, but you weren’t sure. You hadn’t known him that long anyway. You even kissed his cheek gently and said, “Thanks for the breakfast sweetie,” as you walked back to the room to rest some more, hoping that sleep would over take you now. It didn’t. You left about an hour later, coming to the couch where he was lounging, reading Pygmy by Chuck Palahanuik, sat down next to him and pressed your lips to his. That was the last time, but you didn’t know it then. The last time you smelled that room, that whole place, tasted it on his mouth, in his skin. And now, three weeks later, it's back, without warning and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Sit with it. Breathe. Smell. Taste. Be with it even though it hurts like bricks being dropped inside, one by one, and knowing that the hardest part will be trying to get up to make the weight bearing easier. The familiarity hurts more than anything, because now you have to make it unfamiliar. Your body is working on forgetting. It’s remembering so that it can forget.
It's going away now. Slowly. But no, come back! What was that again? I want to remember now. Before I didn’t because I wasn’t ready, I wasn’t prepared. I can sit with it now, it's ok. I can take it. It's gone. Back to reality and the knowledge that this is the only way you’ll ever experience that place again, if you want to. You know you don’t. You’re not the type to settle for mediocre attention, brief text messages and sporadic phone calls. Long written messages complaining about the lack of respect you’ve shown for his tight schedule, yet giving you hope that there’s chance for more contact. But only when he decides it’s time. You’ll have to wait. No thanks. It was nice while it lasted.
Oh wait, there it is! It’s come back again, on its own. Like a shy puppy that won’t go near anyone trying to grab it, but will come wandering up to the first unsuspecting person (or animal) it sees. Is that what he’s like? Maybe you should have given him more space, more time… But how much more time does someone need? Almost a week since you called, and still nothing. You’re done, you’ve told yourself this. Ah, but taste it… No, you don’t want to. It tastes like stale hope, a masochistic remembering. You don’t want this. It’ll go away eventually. It will. You can handle this. Just sit. Breathe. You know why this is happening, don’t you? Remember, so that you can forget. Breathe it in. There.
Looking for a Yoga Mat
*Originally written Sept. 24, 2009*
**Some adult content**
She walks down the street, passing people shuffling by, taking in everything, but memorizing nothing. Faces, shop fronts, cars and motorcycles parked next to the curb or passing by; it’s all a mindless blur. There is a smell in the air, like clean, fresh soap. Not the strong kind you can buy at the dollar store, but a more subtle scent like when one walks into a bathroom where someone else has showered maybe ten minutes before, where the mist from the steam is still lightly hanging between the walls, carrying the smell of fragrant soap. Like that. She can smell the light from the sun, not quite hot, but warm because it had been foggy in this area about an hour before (San Francisco weather---get used to it). No fog is visible, but she can smell the integration of just-passed-just-melted fog with the sunlight. It is this sunlight and the faint but recognizable smell of fresh soap that makes her think of him.
Him. With him she is not in love. But there is a draw for her. It isn’t helping that she’s only a few blocks away from his house, unintentionally. She is here because she needs a yoga mat for her class. There are mats at the yoga studio, but her hands always slip from excessive sweating, of which she has no control over. So she had hoped to find one suitable for her needs down here, but so far, no such luck. He had gone with her to yoga a few weeks ago, she remembered. Last week, in a message concerning other things about their confusing, brief, quasi-relationship, he suggested that he come with her again. She didn’t see how that was going to be possible if he kept hiding behind his busy schedule, adamantly insisting that he had not enough time to keep in touch with her on a regular basis. Bastard. This smell wasn’t helping, either.
The soap smell makes her think of how her nose was pressed into the base of his neck when they made out on his love-seat for a couch. She had asked him what kind of cologne he used, but he replied that it was only his soap and shave products. Burt’s Bees brand. A perfect procurement of product for him, a non-militant vegan. The smell makes her mouth water, because the sense of smell is so closely related to the sense of taste. People born without olfactory receptors, or people who have lost the ability to smell, have often commented on the different experience of sex. You can still taste things without being able to smell, but what you taste is limited to the following five categories: spicy, sweet, salty, sour, and bitter. They are tastes, but not flavors. She had been able to taste him, smell him, touch him and feel him with all different parts of her body: her obvious hand, subtly with her lips and cheeks, her nose either subtly smelling the area between his nose and mouth as they kissed, or grazing it against his neck in a sweet nuzzle; her arms wrapped around his thicker body below his arms, her legs too. Her mouth salivates in some uncontrollable Pavlovian response, as well as the space between her legs.
Is that appropriate to say? Not on the point of introducing sexual anatomy into the text, but in describing what is occurring to said anatomy. Salivating is not possible without saliva glands, which are only present inside the mouth. Salivating refers to the ability to create saliva, the mouth’s lubrication to aid in digestion and in the pleasure of eating. The vagina holds glands which secrete fluid to aid in supposed reproduction (as the hetero-centric biology books would have you believe) and in sexual pleasure. In all literal sense of the word, it does not “salivate”, but performs its own version of it; though ironically, in the case of cunnilingus, the “salivation” of vaginal juices can make a sexual partner’s mouth salivate in anticipation and preparation for what it will be eating. Suffice to say, the use of the word “salivate” in relation to vaginal lubrication may not be entirely appropriate, but the author begs pardon of the audience, and asks that she may be allowed discretion in use of her literary license.
Her mouth, along with the previously discussed anatomy, eventually stops its excessive secretion. It’s like a wave of pain or hunger, a momentary craving that soon passes with the introduction of…something else. Now it is real hunger that has turned her mind. But in this neighborhood, there’s only taquerias on every corner, and she’s in no mood for Mexican or Central American food. Before her budget was crunched so tight, she used to think that she wouldn’t be able to bear the ten minute ride home without stopping to buy something to eat. Now she knows better.
A few blocks up is the train station, and she opts to slowly descend on the escalator instead of mustering up minimal energy to walk down the steps. She condescends to step down for the last few which quickly disappear underground after she disembarks, taking with it any momentary trace of her. The automatic turnstile accepts her monthly pass and spits it out for retrieval, allowing her to move to the lower level platform. She rushes down the steps to the just-arrived train, rushing through its opened doors, relieved to have such luck, as well as the multiple options for seating. Early weekday afternoons often afford this luxury. The trip passes almost mindlessly, only having to count one stop before her own. Subconsciously, she counts down before they emerge from the underground tunnel for a space of twenty seconds, and she uses the chance to take in the appearance of the sky. Here, it is clouded over with perpetual gray, unchanged since the morning. This is how days pass by so quickly: a lack of change in light or weather can make you believe that you’re not getting a late start on your day even when you’re getting dressed at noon.
The train moves back into another tunnel, a short interval before her stop. A man with a green backpack, white shirt, tight blue jeans, white cowboy hat, and carrying a leather jacket stands up as well on the other side of the aisle. They both make their way to the door before the train stops. She stands on the left, he on the right. In the windows, she notices him looking to his left, looking at her. (Perhaps, or maybe he’s just reading one of the signs on the train car’s interior, just past her left shoulder, advertising for this or that product or service, or even thanking the train’s riders for deciding on public transit that day instead of choosing to drive during rush hour. Anything to encourage the masses.) But she ultimately perceives him to be looking at her, though she is unsure why. There is really nothing special about what she looks like today. Her hair is down, somewhat tucked behind her ears, but its thickness defeats this style by still falling over and around her shoulders. It falls over the shoulders of her green army jacket, newly acquired from a thrift store over the weekend for a modest price. She loves wearing it, especially in this weather. Underneath, nothing but blue jeans and black high tops with orange and red flames not entirely visible under the jeans’ cuffs. But he’s looking down at her, at her face, her profile. It creeps her out. She turns away slightly, pretending to stare at the public transit map. Please God, not now, she thinks to herself. Her energy is still directed elsewhere. She feels the man move his attention in another direction, thankfully, yet all the same wondering if he really was checking her out, or just noticing as she had been doing during her outing.
After making her way off the train and up to the street, she whips out her phone to call the transit hotline to see when her bus would be arriving. Unknown waiting times are one of her pet peeves. Before she can even input the information, however, she spots the bus on its way up the foggy street, bouncing its way over, almost like an overly excited dog spotting a crowd of people to meet. She muses how this was one of the good days for her on public transit, at least for the trip back. She thinks that she still has to find a way to figure out how to time her future trips so that she won’t have to wait in such long intervals as she has in the past. Then again, some things you can’t always plan, like finding a good yoga mat that won’t mind how much your hands sweat, you’ll still be able to hold that downward facing dog pose. Or having the phone ring when you want it to. Or meeting the right person at the right time, instead of the right person at the wrong time, or the wrong person at the right time (whatever that means).
During the waiting time between getting on the bus and getting off at her stop a few minutes later, she reminds herself of what to write for her new status update on the ridiculously addictive, needless time consuming social networking site--Mission to procure yoga mat: fail.
**Some adult content**
She walks down the street, passing people shuffling by, taking in everything, but memorizing nothing. Faces, shop fronts, cars and motorcycles parked next to the curb or passing by; it’s all a mindless blur. There is a smell in the air, like clean, fresh soap. Not the strong kind you can buy at the dollar store, but a more subtle scent like when one walks into a bathroom where someone else has showered maybe ten minutes before, where the mist from the steam is still lightly hanging between the walls, carrying the smell of fragrant soap. Like that. She can smell the light from the sun, not quite hot, but warm because it had been foggy in this area about an hour before (San Francisco weather---get used to it). No fog is visible, but she can smell the integration of just-passed-just-melted fog with the sunlight. It is this sunlight and the faint but recognizable smell of fresh soap that makes her think of him.
Him. With him she is not in love. But there is a draw for her. It isn’t helping that she’s only a few blocks away from his house, unintentionally. She is here because she needs a yoga mat for her class. There are mats at the yoga studio, but her hands always slip from excessive sweating, of which she has no control over. So she had hoped to find one suitable for her needs down here, but so far, no such luck. He had gone with her to yoga a few weeks ago, she remembered. Last week, in a message concerning other things about their confusing, brief, quasi-relationship, he suggested that he come with her again. She didn’t see how that was going to be possible if he kept hiding behind his busy schedule, adamantly insisting that he had not enough time to keep in touch with her on a regular basis. Bastard. This smell wasn’t helping, either.
The soap smell makes her think of how her nose was pressed into the base of his neck when they made out on his love-seat for a couch. She had asked him what kind of cologne he used, but he replied that it was only his soap and shave products. Burt’s Bees brand. A perfect procurement of product for him, a non-militant vegan. The smell makes her mouth water, because the sense of smell is so closely related to the sense of taste. People born without olfactory receptors, or people who have lost the ability to smell, have often commented on the different experience of sex. You can still taste things without being able to smell, but what you taste is limited to the following five categories: spicy, sweet, salty, sour, and bitter. They are tastes, but not flavors. She had been able to taste him, smell him, touch him and feel him with all different parts of her body: her obvious hand, subtly with her lips and cheeks, her nose either subtly smelling the area between his nose and mouth as they kissed, or grazing it against his neck in a sweet nuzzle; her arms wrapped around his thicker body below his arms, her legs too. Her mouth salivates in some uncontrollable Pavlovian response, as well as the space between her legs.
Is that appropriate to say? Not on the point of introducing sexual anatomy into the text, but in describing what is occurring to said anatomy. Salivating is not possible without saliva glands, which are only present inside the mouth. Salivating refers to the ability to create saliva, the mouth’s lubrication to aid in digestion and in the pleasure of eating. The vagina holds glands which secrete fluid to aid in supposed reproduction (as the hetero-centric biology books would have you believe) and in sexual pleasure. In all literal sense of the word, it does not “salivate”, but performs its own version of it; though ironically, in the case of cunnilingus, the “salivation” of vaginal juices can make a sexual partner’s mouth salivate in anticipation and preparation for what it will be eating. Suffice to say, the use of the word “salivate” in relation to vaginal lubrication may not be entirely appropriate, but the author begs pardon of the audience, and asks that she may be allowed discretion in use of her literary license.
Her mouth, along with the previously discussed anatomy, eventually stops its excessive secretion. It’s like a wave of pain or hunger, a momentary craving that soon passes with the introduction of…something else. Now it is real hunger that has turned her mind. But in this neighborhood, there’s only taquerias on every corner, and she’s in no mood for Mexican or Central American food. Before her budget was crunched so tight, she used to think that she wouldn’t be able to bear the ten minute ride home without stopping to buy something to eat. Now she knows better.
A few blocks up is the train station, and she opts to slowly descend on the escalator instead of mustering up minimal energy to walk down the steps. She condescends to step down for the last few which quickly disappear underground after she disembarks, taking with it any momentary trace of her. The automatic turnstile accepts her monthly pass and spits it out for retrieval, allowing her to move to the lower level platform. She rushes down the steps to the just-arrived train, rushing through its opened doors, relieved to have such luck, as well as the multiple options for seating. Early weekday afternoons often afford this luxury. The trip passes almost mindlessly, only having to count one stop before her own. Subconsciously, she counts down before they emerge from the underground tunnel for a space of twenty seconds, and she uses the chance to take in the appearance of the sky. Here, it is clouded over with perpetual gray, unchanged since the morning. This is how days pass by so quickly: a lack of change in light or weather can make you believe that you’re not getting a late start on your day even when you’re getting dressed at noon.
The train moves back into another tunnel, a short interval before her stop. A man with a green backpack, white shirt, tight blue jeans, white cowboy hat, and carrying a leather jacket stands up as well on the other side of the aisle. They both make their way to the door before the train stops. She stands on the left, he on the right. In the windows, she notices him looking to his left, looking at her. (Perhaps, or maybe he’s just reading one of the signs on the train car’s interior, just past her left shoulder, advertising for this or that product or service, or even thanking the train’s riders for deciding on public transit that day instead of choosing to drive during rush hour. Anything to encourage the masses.) But she ultimately perceives him to be looking at her, though she is unsure why. There is really nothing special about what she looks like today. Her hair is down, somewhat tucked behind her ears, but its thickness defeats this style by still falling over and around her shoulders. It falls over the shoulders of her green army jacket, newly acquired from a thrift store over the weekend for a modest price. She loves wearing it, especially in this weather. Underneath, nothing but blue jeans and black high tops with orange and red flames not entirely visible under the jeans’ cuffs. But he’s looking down at her, at her face, her profile. It creeps her out. She turns away slightly, pretending to stare at the public transit map. Please God, not now, she thinks to herself. Her energy is still directed elsewhere. She feels the man move his attention in another direction, thankfully, yet all the same wondering if he really was checking her out, or just noticing as she had been doing during her outing.
After making her way off the train and up to the street, she whips out her phone to call the transit hotline to see when her bus would be arriving. Unknown waiting times are one of her pet peeves. Before she can even input the information, however, she spots the bus on its way up the foggy street, bouncing its way over, almost like an overly excited dog spotting a crowd of people to meet. She muses how this was one of the good days for her on public transit, at least for the trip back. She thinks that she still has to find a way to figure out how to time her future trips so that she won’t have to wait in such long intervals as she has in the past. Then again, some things you can’t always plan, like finding a good yoga mat that won’t mind how much your hands sweat, you’ll still be able to hold that downward facing dog pose. Or having the phone ring when you want it to. Or meeting the right person at the right time, instead of the right person at the wrong time, or the wrong person at the right time (whatever that means).
During the waiting time between getting on the bus and getting off at her stop a few minutes later, she reminds herself of what to write for her new status update on the ridiculously addictive, needless time consuming social networking site--Mission to procure yoga mat: fail.
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Grief
It's in the realizing that
After the bad day
Of missing the bus
The incessantly screaming child
A headache that hasn't fully gone away
A sink full of dishes not mine
A late dinner
And the heater turned up too high...
I can't call you.
It's in the knowing that
When I've just seen something
You would have laughed at
I can't pass it along to you
So it can be our inside joke.
It's when I suddenly remember
That I made every physical piece
Of you
Disappear
So that I could forget.
It's when I want to get my feet wet
And wear my sandals in the rain.
It's when I'm sitting still
And realizing that you're still here
Somehow.
It's when I remember that you're not.
It's when I remember you never will be.
That's when the tears come.
When the lump forms
Like mud in my throat.
Breath becomes labored,
Trying to outrun what has already
Caught up with me.
It's no tempest of tears,
But a soft drizzle
Or a careless drop here
And there,
Almost like forgotten pennies
Coming out of your pants' pockets
In the drier.
It's a slow, soft ache
That follows reality's knife cut
Of realization,
And it rests like a stone on my chest,
Rising and falling with each breath,
Sinking slowly into the gulf
Of short term memory.
Tides come in and go out,
Grief rushes and crashes
In waves that slowly let out. . .
Only to come in once more.
After the bad day
Of missing the bus
The incessantly screaming child
A headache that hasn't fully gone away
A sink full of dishes not mine
A late dinner
And the heater turned up too high...
I can't call you.
It's in the knowing that
When I've just seen something
You would have laughed at
I can't pass it along to you
So it can be our inside joke.
It's when I suddenly remember
That I made every physical piece
Of you
Disappear
So that I could forget.
It's when I want to get my feet wet
And wear my sandals in the rain.
It's when I'm sitting still
And realizing that you're still here
Somehow.
It's when I remember that you're not.
It's when I remember you never will be.
That's when the tears come.
When the lump forms
Like mud in my throat.
Breath becomes labored,
Trying to outrun what has already
Caught up with me.
It's no tempest of tears,
But a soft drizzle
Or a careless drop here
And there,
Almost like forgotten pennies
Coming out of your pants' pockets
In the drier.
It's a slow, soft ache
That follows reality's knife cut
Of realization,
And it rests like a stone on my chest,
Rising and falling with each breath,
Sinking slowly into the gulf
Of short term memory.
Tides come in and go out,
Grief rushes and crashes
In waves that slowly let out. . .
Only to come in once more.
Remembering Sight
Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.
(Where charity and love are, God is there.)
Downtown San Francisco is full of interesting characters, as in any urban area, and I'm used to seeing the poor and homeless walking around, sometimes asking for handouts. When I have the cash or change to spare, I'm usually happy to give it away to someone, especially if they're playing music or are selling The Street Sheet, a newspaper dedicated to issues around homelessness. It's not always easy for me to give money to someone who is only holding out their hand. I've grown accustomed to telling myself that they either want money for booze or drugs, and walk on by like I don't notice them. "Next time," I tell myself. And then I forget when the next time comes. Luckily, I didn't forget today. I almost did, but I think I'm lucky that I remembered.
I was standing at the bus stop outside of Powell Street Station, waiting for the bus to take me to Grace Cathedral in Nob Hill (a notoriously wealthy area in the City). A skinny man in a purple Adidas shirt and dirty blue jeans came up to me and begged me for seventy cents. I apologized and told him I had nothing to give. He incessantly begged me for even one whole dollar or possibly a fiver. I told him I had no cash. When he turned away to walk down the street, I saw the look of pure heartbreak on his face. "God, I am in fucking hell!" he cried out. My heart broke for him as I saw him attempt to ask another for their help. "God," I asked silently, "What can I give him?"
"Much," I heard from that voice, so still and quiet, and yet so strong it is undeniable. And then I remembered. I had gone out to lunch with a friend the day before and had taken out plenty of money from the bank for the occasion. I had a ten dollar bill still left in my wallet. I didn't hesitate.
"Sir!" I called out. "Sir?" I walked toward him, his face still full of despair as he had been turned away yet again. "I'm sorry, but I forgot I had this," handing him the folded up bill.
"Oh, thank you," he gasped, on the verge of tears. He turned it over and realized how much it was. "Oh God, thank you," his voice breaking and the tears beginning to fall from his tired blue eyes. These were not just tears of utter gratefulness, and I wouldn't be telling this story if that's what it was. Instead, these were tears of pain. "I just feel so awful," he said.
I placed my hand on his shoulder and asked what was wrong. It took him a while to reply. I waited. And then his story poured out. His name was Jordan. He had been a heroin addict for four years, but had been sober for another four, didn't even drink alcohol anymore. He did go to a methadone clinic, but he hadn't been for a few days. One of his friends had died a week ago. He was 29 and had been on the street off and on since he was 19. Originally from Lubbock, TX, he had gone to college there for a couple of years, and had even gone to SF City College for a year. Still, he was in trouble, never having enough. He had family back in Texas that he was still in touch with, but I didn't ask him why he didn't go back. We all have our reasons. In the last year, he had four back surgeries. He even lifted up his shirt to show me the scars. I saw a small black mark that looked like the burnt end of a cigarette butt, along with other scars and what looked like more bumps (from what, I don't know). I listened while he talked.
"Thank you so much for just talking to me," he said. "You have no idea. People just walk on by like they're numb or something. Or they look at you, but they look away with a disgusted look, like 'Oh, you're dirty! Get away from me!' You know, I'm not perfect, but I'm a human being." I wanted to tell him that people sometimes just can't handle the pain of others, but it seemed like a pathetic excuse. We don't always know what we can handle until we open ourselves up to it. "You really made my day," he went on. "It's just so hard when people treat you like shit and you don't even feel like you're worth anything." I looked at him: his face, though he was white, had seen much sun, he had a scruffy dirty-blond colored beard and hair to match; his hands with dirt under his fingernails, were tough and grubby, but were warm and yielding when I touched them. I looked into his eyes, and it was all I could do. . .I embraced him. I think I may have needed the hug as much as he did. Who wouldn't after listening to all that? How could you not want to connect in such a way to someone who just opened themselves up like that?
"God bless you," he said, the tears welling up again. I told him I would pray for him. "You really made my day," he said again.
"You're welcome," I said, really not sure what else to say. He held my hand and kissed it, like an old fashioned gentleman. Then he began to walk away.
"If you have any other thought today," he called back to me, "think about the fact that you made someone like me feel loved." And then Jordan walked down the street, into the heat of the day, to go do whatever it was that he had to to survive.
I'm telling this story not as a way to extol my own virtuous sense of charity. Far from it. As I said before, I had gotten used to forgetting what it was to love and care for "the least of these." I'm poor, but in comparison, I live a life of wealth and privilege. I don't have to beg for my bread, I don't have to huddle in some doorway or sleep on someone's couch. And yet, with all this privilege, I'm doomed to suffer from blindness. This story of meeting Jordan is about how I started to get my sight back. In short, Jordan saved me, possibly more than I could ever save him.
The bus came two minutes after Jordon left. I got on and headed to the cathedral on the top of the hill. The purpose of my excursion to this monument dedicated to Christ (and the Church), was for a confirmation of the youth of our parish, and other parishes within the diocese. (By the way, if you don't get all the church jargon, it's okay. It's really not that important. We're Episcopalians. . .we like to make a ceremony for pretty much everything.) Well, it just so happens that today at the confirmation service, the Gospel reading was the Beatitudes from the book of Matthew.
This lesson is revolutionary. Not only does it turn hierarchy on its head, but it even changes the image of God. Before it was "do this, don't do that, and God won't kill or punish you," which kind of made God look like an asshole to be honest. Here, we see a God of justice and peace, but also of reconciliation and undeniable love.
In the sermon, the confirmands were given their marching orders from the Bishop. He said that it is when the confirmation ceremony is over that the real service begins. (He was, of course, playing on the word "service" which can refer to either a church service, or the service that we are called to do by being in the world.) As he spoke, I began to get a sense of something else I had forgotten: that my faith is not safe. I don't mean that my belief is in danger of being dashed or ripped to shreds. On the contrary. I remembered that when I engage myself deeper in my faith, the more unsafe I am. The more risk there is for me in losing my own life (not necessarily in the physical sense). The barriers that society not only encourages me to have, but even sometimes demands and expects, begin to break down and I become "undone" in the process. My faith, my God, is not safe. My faith, my God, comforts me. . .but asks that I not become comfortable. ("Comfort the disturbed, and disturb the comfortable.")
Go back and read the lesson again. These words include both the powerful and the powerless. The privileged and the under classes. So the kingdom of God is for everyone! Put another way, it's available for everyone. It isn't always taken, even when it's offered. And that is understandable. The kingdom of God is not safe. Think about it. Attempting to abolish the status quo and turn a hierarchical social structure on its head? Where's the safety in that? There isn't any. None.
But we are assured that God is there, through it all. And even now. Through our blindness and in our seeing. Through our forgetting and in our remembering. Through our greed and in our abundant charity. Through our fear and in our love. Bidden or unbidden. We only have to remember to pay attention.
(Where charity and love are, God is there.)
Downtown San Francisco is full of interesting characters, as in any urban area, and I'm used to seeing the poor and homeless walking around, sometimes asking for handouts. When I have the cash or change to spare, I'm usually happy to give it away to someone, especially if they're playing music or are selling The Street Sheet, a newspaper dedicated to issues around homelessness. It's not always easy for me to give money to someone who is only holding out their hand. I've grown accustomed to telling myself that they either want money for booze or drugs, and walk on by like I don't notice them. "Next time," I tell myself. And then I forget when the next time comes. Luckily, I didn't forget today. I almost did, but I think I'm lucky that I remembered.
I was standing at the bus stop outside of Powell Street Station, waiting for the bus to take me to Grace Cathedral in Nob Hill (a notoriously wealthy area in the City). A skinny man in a purple Adidas shirt and dirty blue jeans came up to me and begged me for seventy cents. I apologized and told him I had nothing to give. He incessantly begged me for even one whole dollar or possibly a fiver. I told him I had no cash. When he turned away to walk down the street, I saw the look of pure heartbreak on his face. "God, I am in fucking hell!" he cried out. My heart broke for him as I saw him attempt to ask another for their help. "God," I asked silently, "What can I give him?"
"Much," I heard from that voice, so still and quiet, and yet so strong it is undeniable. And then I remembered. I had gone out to lunch with a friend the day before and had taken out plenty of money from the bank for the occasion. I had a ten dollar bill still left in my wallet. I didn't hesitate.
"Sir!" I called out. "Sir?" I walked toward him, his face still full of despair as he had been turned away yet again. "I'm sorry, but I forgot I had this," handing him the folded up bill.
"Oh, thank you," he gasped, on the verge of tears. He turned it over and realized how much it was. "Oh God, thank you," his voice breaking and the tears beginning to fall from his tired blue eyes. These were not just tears of utter gratefulness, and I wouldn't be telling this story if that's what it was. Instead, these were tears of pain. "I just feel so awful," he said.
I placed my hand on his shoulder and asked what was wrong. It took him a while to reply. I waited. And then his story poured out. His name was Jordan. He had been a heroin addict for four years, but had been sober for another four, didn't even drink alcohol anymore. He did go to a methadone clinic, but he hadn't been for a few days. One of his friends had died a week ago. He was 29 and had been on the street off and on since he was 19. Originally from Lubbock, TX, he had gone to college there for a couple of years, and had even gone to SF City College for a year. Still, he was in trouble, never having enough. He had family back in Texas that he was still in touch with, but I didn't ask him why he didn't go back. We all have our reasons. In the last year, he had four back surgeries. He even lifted up his shirt to show me the scars. I saw a small black mark that looked like the burnt end of a cigarette butt, along with other scars and what looked like more bumps (from what, I don't know). I listened while he talked.
"Thank you so much for just talking to me," he said. "You have no idea. People just walk on by like they're numb or something. Or they look at you, but they look away with a disgusted look, like 'Oh, you're dirty! Get away from me!' You know, I'm not perfect, but I'm a human being." I wanted to tell him that people sometimes just can't handle the pain of others, but it seemed like a pathetic excuse. We don't always know what we can handle until we open ourselves up to it. "You really made my day," he went on. "It's just so hard when people treat you like shit and you don't even feel like you're worth anything." I looked at him: his face, though he was white, had seen much sun, he had a scruffy dirty-blond colored beard and hair to match; his hands with dirt under his fingernails, were tough and grubby, but were warm and yielding when I touched them. I looked into his eyes, and it was all I could do. . .I embraced him. I think I may have needed the hug as much as he did. Who wouldn't after listening to all that? How could you not want to connect in such a way to someone who just opened themselves up like that?
"God bless you," he said, the tears welling up again. I told him I would pray for him. "You really made my day," he said again.
"You're welcome," I said, really not sure what else to say. He held my hand and kissed it, like an old fashioned gentleman. Then he began to walk away.
"If you have any other thought today," he called back to me, "think about the fact that you made someone like me feel loved." And then Jordan walked down the street, into the heat of the day, to go do whatever it was that he had to to survive.
I'm telling this story not as a way to extol my own virtuous sense of charity. Far from it. As I said before, I had gotten used to forgetting what it was to love and care for "the least of these." I'm poor, but in comparison, I live a life of wealth and privilege. I don't have to beg for my bread, I don't have to huddle in some doorway or sleep on someone's couch. And yet, with all this privilege, I'm doomed to suffer from blindness. This story of meeting Jordan is about how I started to get my sight back. In short, Jordan saved me, possibly more than I could ever save him.
The bus came two minutes after Jordon left. I got on and headed to the cathedral on the top of the hill. The purpose of my excursion to this monument dedicated to Christ (and the Church), was for a confirmation of the youth of our parish, and other parishes within the diocese. (By the way, if you don't get all the church jargon, it's okay. It's really not that important. We're Episcopalians. . .we like to make a ceremony for pretty much everything.) Well, it just so happens that today at the confirmation service, the Gospel reading was the Beatitudes from the book of Matthew.
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.
Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
This lesson is revolutionary. Not only does it turn hierarchy on its head, but it even changes the image of God. Before it was "do this, don't do that, and God won't kill or punish you," which kind of made God look like an asshole to be honest. Here, we see a God of justice and peace, but also of reconciliation and undeniable love.
In the sermon, the confirmands were given their marching orders from the Bishop. He said that it is when the confirmation ceremony is over that the real service begins. (He was, of course, playing on the word "service" which can refer to either a church service, or the service that we are called to do by being in the world.) As he spoke, I began to get a sense of something else I had forgotten: that my faith is not safe. I don't mean that my belief is in danger of being dashed or ripped to shreds. On the contrary. I remembered that when I engage myself deeper in my faith, the more unsafe I am. The more risk there is for me in losing my own life (not necessarily in the physical sense). The barriers that society not only encourages me to have, but even sometimes demands and expects, begin to break down and I become "undone" in the process. My faith, my God, is not safe. My faith, my God, comforts me. . .but asks that I not become comfortable. ("Comfort the disturbed, and disturb the comfortable.")
Go back and read the lesson again. These words include both the powerful and the powerless. The privileged and the under classes. So the kingdom of God is for everyone! Put another way, it's available for everyone. It isn't always taken, even when it's offered. And that is understandable. The kingdom of God is not safe. Think about it. Attempting to abolish the status quo and turn a hierarchical social structure on its head? Where's the safety in that? There isn't any. None.
But we are assured that God is there, through it all. And even now. Through our blindness and in our seeing. Through our forgetting and in our remembering. Through our greed and in our abundant charity. Through our fear and in our love. Bidden or unbidden. We only have to remember to pay attention.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Reflections on the concept of waiting
Originally written Sept. 24, 2009.
Waiting. We’ve all done it. Do it. All the time, even when we don’t notice, we are. We wait. For food. For hunger. For the check to clear. For the alarm to go off, or the repetitive snooze, giving the illusion that we have more time, a ten minute do-over of sleep. For the person in front to finish so that we can wait for the cashier to ring us up or for someone to look up the answer to our question of where to find that one book by that one author who was on NPR last week. When we’re sick, we wait to be well; or if the sickness includes trouble with the gastric system, we wait out our denial that sooner or later, the contents which are giving our body so much grief (or so it is perceived), must be expelled by the seemingly anti-gravitational force that our bodies inherently know so well. We wait for it to be quiet. Wait for the sound of…sound. Bladders wait to be filled, and then to expel their contents. And bowels seem to wait longer for the latter, sometimes too long that we accept defeat, only to have to return to our prior position two minutes later. We wait for the mail to come, even when we’re not expecting anything of significance. Our waiting signifies our hope of pleasant surprise (or the dread of an unpleasant one). Wait to be seen. Wait to leave. Wait for the bus to come, and wait until our stop is next. Life is just a bunch of quick successions of waiting. A more cynical approach: ultimately, we’re all just waiting to die.
Before our birth, during our gestation, there was waiting. Everyone, of course, only looks at the perspective of the mother in this case. No one ever wonders what it’s like to be on the other side of things. Especially when considering the expulsion from the publicly waiting subject who is the primary focus of sympathy and encouragement. No one ever thinks about what it might be like to be literally squeezed through a canal of which there is no hope of backtracking, being grabbed by an unknown pair of hands, feeling the drastic change in temperature, waiting for orientation to come, all the while thinking: What the fuck?! This is what I waited nine months for?! Yep. And it doesn’t ever end. Maybe even after we die, it doesn’t end, not entirely. Maybe we wait to reach the light, or we wait for the blackness to stop somewhere. Wait for the empty to become full again. Wait for the stopping to stop.
There is a calm anxiety in waiting. Or an anxious calm. It manifests in the shifting of eyes, the checking of the watch or wall clock, the tuning of a radio, the weight being shifted onto either foot, the licking of lips, pacing softly and casually, the thinking-of-other-things, the tapping of fingers, a heavy exhalation of breath. A run through of scenarios, both tragic and comedic, beautiful and horrifying. Minds busy and never idle. Never still. Never waiting for Thought to come, only for specific thoughts in the hopes of defeating public embarrassment, writer’s block, or any kind of creative block, brain farts and the like. Thoughts that never wait for control to step in because they have a mind of their own.
Waiting teaches us how quickly things can change. We wait for that car or that person or that bus to round the bend. Just when it seems like we’ll spend eternity in our one spot, practically immobile due to unfailing desperate hope, in three seconds its over, and relief floods our veins momentarily.
I almost forgot. The most clichéd and western-ly universal experience: waiting for the phone to ring. Arguably a predicament made worse by the acquiring of mobile phones. We can be found, contacted, virtually anywhere those supposedly brain cancer causing waves are strongest. And now there’s texting, so that you can talk without using your voice, only using those opposable thumbs which evolution has blessed us with. Receiving a text is almost as exciting as receiving a phone call. The beep, buzz, or even ring-tone goes off and our little hands reach into our pocket or purse, possibly asking our present company to excuse us for a moment, as curiosity has a higher priority than the conversation at hand, as we check to see who sent us a message that they couldn’t bother to say or ask in person. And sometimes we frantically answer, our thumbs clicking away on our miniature keyboards of communication, setting off the cycle once more, this time for the person on the other end. But a phone call can be so much more satisfying, gratifying, because the person on the other end is taking the time to actually want to talk to you, however briefly. Or maybe their thumbs were just tired. Either way, nothing can compare to that relief of seeing the name on the caller-i.d., and answering knowing who is on the other end. Even if we’re mad because they seem to have neglected us and made the waiting last longer than we feel appropriate, there is a sense of gratitude that fills us before we tersely answer, expecting an apology and holding onto a back up of venom if none ensues. We may not always have the guts to spit it out, but it’s there, just in case.
In the meantime. A euphemistic phrase for “waiting.” It means, “while you wait for such and such to happen, you should…” We’re constantly finding ways to ease the ache of waiting. Some call it reading a book. Some call it snacking or noshing. Or going for a ciggy break. Or chatting. Or checking email. Or picking up a hobby. Or making a phone call. Or listening to music or singing to yourself. Doing the dishes, vacuuming, tidying up. Going to a party. Dancing. Drinking. Recreational drug use. Sex. Hooking up. It’s all just entertainment. A way to fill the space, making use of Time. Using Time as a commodity, when in actuality, it’s been using us all along.
Waiting. We’ve all done it. Do it. All the time, even when we don’t notice, we are. We wait. For food. For hunger. For the check to clear. For the alarm to go off, or the repetitive snooze, giving the illusion that we have more time, a ten minute do-over of sleep. For the person in front to finish so that we can wait for the cashier to ring us up or for someone to look up the answer to our question of where to find that one book by that one author who was on NPR last week. When we’re sick, we wait to be well; or if the sickness includes trouble with the gastric system, we wait out our denial that sooner or later, the contents which are giving our body so much grief (or so it is perceived), must be expelled by the seemingly anti-gravitational force that our bodies inherently know so well. We wait for it to be quiet. Wait for the sound of…sound. Bladders wait to be filled, and then to expel their contents. And bowels seem to wait longer for the latter, sometimes too long that we accept defeat, only to have to return to our prior position two minutes later. We wait for the mail to come, even when we’re not expecting anything of significance. Our waiting signifies our hope of pleasant surprise (or the dread of an unpleasant one). Wait to be seen. Wait to leave. Wait for the bus to come, and wait until our stop is next. Life is just a bunch of quick successions of waiting. A more cynical approach: ultimately, we’re all just waiting to die.
Before our birth, during our gestation, there was waiting. Everyone, of course, only looks at the perspective of the mother in this case. No one ever wonders what it’s like to be on the other side of things. Especially when considering the expulsion from the publicly waiting subject who is the primary focus of sympathy and encouragement. No one ever thinks about what it might be like to be literally squeezed through a canal of which there is no hope of backtracking, being grabbed by an unknown pair of hands, feeling the drastic change in temperature, waiting for orientation to come, all the while thinking: What the fuck?! This is what I waited nine months for?! Yep. And it doesn’t ever end. Maybe even after we die, it doesn’t end, not entirely. Maybe we wait to reach the light, or we wait for the blackness to stop somewhere. Wait for the empty to become full again. Wait for the stopping to stop.
There is a calm anxiety in waiting. Or an anxious calm. It manifests in the shifting of eyes, the checking of the watch or wall clock, the tuning of a radio, the weight being shifted onto either foot, the licking of lips, pacing softly and casually, the thinking-of-other-things, the tapping of fingers, a heavy exhalation of breath. A run through of scenarios, both tragic and comedic, beautiful and horrifying. Minds busy and never idle. Never still. Never waiting for Thought to come, only for specific thoughts in the hopes of defeating public embarrassment, writer’s block, or any kind of creative block, brain farts and the like. Thoughts that never wait for control to step in because they have a mind of their own.
Waiting teaches us how quickly things can change. We wait for that car or that person or that bus to round the bend. Just when it seems like we’ll spend eternity in our one spot, practically immobile due to unfailing desperate hope, in three seconds its over, and relief floods our veins momentarily.
I almost forgot. The most clichéd and western-ly universal experience: waiting for the phone to ring. Arguably a predicament made worse by the acquiring of mobile phones. We can be found, contacted, virtually anywhere those supposedly brain cancer causing waves are strongest. And now there’s texting, so that you can talk without using your voice, only using those opposable thumbs which evolution has blessed us with. Receiving a text is almost as exciting as receiving a phone call. The beep, buzz, or even ring-tone goes off and our little hands reach into our pocket or purse, possibly asking our present company to excuse us for a moment, as curiosity has a higher priority than the conversation at hand, as we check to see who sent us a message that they couldn’t bother to say or ask in person. And sometimes we frantically answer, our thumbs clicking away on our miniature keyboards of communication, setting off the cycle once more, this time for the person on the other end. But a phone call can be so much more satisfying, gratifying, because the person on the other end is taking the time to actually want to talk to you, however briefly. Or maybe their thumbs were just tired. Either way, nothing can compare to that relief of seeing the name on the caller-i.d., and answering knowing who is on the other end. Even if we’re mad because they seem to have neglected us and made the waiting last longer than we feel appropriate, there is a sense of gratitude that fills us before we tersely answer, expecting an apology and holding onto a back up of venom if none ensues. We may not always have the guts to spit it out, but it’s there, just in case.
In the meantime. A euphemistic phrase for “waiting.” It means, “while you wait for such and such to happen, you should…” We’re constantly finding ways to ease the ache of waiting. Some call it reading a book. Some call it snacking or noshing. Or going for a ciggy break. Or chatting. Or checking email. Or picking up a hobby. Or making a phone call. Or listening to music or singing to yourself. Doing the dishes, vacuuming, tidying up. Going to a party. Dancing. Drinking. Recreational drug use. Sex. Hooking up. It’s all just entertainment. A way to fill the space, making use of Time. Using Time as a commodity, when in actuality, it’s been using us all along.
Just something I felt had to be shared...
Courtesy of "The God of Small Things" by Arundhati Roy.
A man had two sons, Pete and Stuart. Pete was an optimist. Stuart was a pessimist.
On their thirteenth birthday their father gave Stuart an expensive watch, a carpentry set, and a bicycle. In Pete's room, he filled it with horse dung.
When Stuart opened his presents, he grumbled all morning. He hadn't wanted a carpentry set, he didn't like the watch and the bicycle had the wrong kind of tires. When their father went to Pete's room, he couldn't see him, but he could hear the sound of frantic shoveling and heavy breathing. Horse dung was flying all over the room.
"What in heaven's name are you doing?" the father shouted.
A voice came from deep inside the dung. "Well, Father," Pete said, "if there's so much shit around, there has to be a pony somewhere!"
*So, let the moral of the story be: if Life hands you shit, start looking for a pony!*
A man had two sons, Pete and Stuart. Pete was an optimist. Stuart was a pessimist.
On their thirteenth birthday their father gave Stuart an expensive watch, a carpentry set, and a bicycle. In Pete's room, he filled it with horse dung.
When Stuart opened his presents, he grumbled all morning. He hadn't wanted a carpentry set, he didn't like the watch and the bicycle had the wrong kind of tires. When their father went to Pete's room, he couldn't see him, but he could hear the sound of frantic shoveling and heavy breathing. Horse dung was flying all over the room.
"What in heaven's name are you doing?" the father shouted.
A voice came from deep inside the dung. "Well, Father," Pete said, "if there's so much shit around, there has to be a pony somewhere!"
*So, let the moral of the story be: if Life hands you shit, start looking for a pony!*
autobiographical scene a la David Foster Wallace (sort of)
Originally written Sept. 23, 2009.
Bathroom scene. Standing in front of the mirror, hips level with the sink, not quite ready to wash the hands in water too hot so that the faucet needs to be readjusted for the right temperature mid-wash. Looking into the reflective glass in front, taking stock of the body seen. Long hair, amber red, having darkened on its own through the years, starting out as more of a light strawberry blond in its youth, now spilling down over the shoulders, around the cleavage peeking out from the strategic V-neckline of the turquoise-teal athletic shirt that hugs tightly to the body. The breasts beneath are rounded, pushed together by the black sports bra invisible underneath the turquoise-teal facade. The abdomen below the breasts is wide and fills the tight athletic shirt, but not to the point of bursting. It gives the impression of a body that is full, strong, well built; but instead is often given the more "feminine" names for a body not fitting in to the familiar and acceptable status quo: "plump", "chubby", or "roundy." Bare arms, freckled with moles, and a mosquito bite on each arm, closer to the wrists, sufficiently scratched at so that each has slightly scabbed over. A band-aid is wrapped halfway around the right forearm, giving the unrealistic impression of a wound much bigger than it really is: a scratch from the weekend that was picked at absentmindedly and has subsequently continued bleeding. It hasn't stopped yet, briefly bringing to mind a red flag for anemia, yet quickly dismissed as hypochondriacal thinking. An elastic hair-tie, coincidentally the exact same color as the athletic shirt, still hugs the right wrist after having been removed over an hour ago.
The face. Passive in the warm, soft, yellow orange light bouncing off the marble counter top of the sink. The eyes: softly ringed from slightly smudged mascara which dissolved about an hour before during an emotional release while in her yoga class; the instructor had come by while the body was in savasana, took hold of the ankles, one in each hand, pulled them gently toward her body, and then softly guided them to the left and then to the right, slowly, subsequently moving the legs from the calves to the thighs, all with this gentle movement of back and forth, from left to right. It opened up the hips, creating space, physically, emotionally and spiritually in those broad sockets that for some unknown reason had been tight. The emotional release, non-dramatic, subtle, but no less powerful, followed after the feet were pressed back to the floor, toes pointed outward, ankles relaxed against the soft yoga mat.
Hands washed and dried. A sniff, then the just clean hands are run through the hair, styling it momentarily. The body turns toward the door, face still turned towards the mirror, perfecting that over-the-shoulder pose that everyone seems to comment on positively when captured photgraphically. But before the hand reaches for the knob, or maybe just as it rests on the knob, before it hears the familiar click of the lock snapping out of place, a thought occurs: He'll never call.
Bathroom scene. Standing in front of the mirror, hips level with the sink, not quite ready to wash the hands in water too hot so that the faucet needs to be readjusted for the right temperature mid-wash. Looking into the reflective glass in front, taking stock of the body seen. Long hair, amber red, having darkened on its own through the years, starting out as more of a light strawberry blond in its youth, now spilling down over the shoulders, around the cleavage peeking out from the strategic V-neckline of the turquoise-teal athletic shirt that hugs tightly to the body. The breasts beneath are rounded, pushed together by the black sports bra invisible underneath the turquoise-teal facade. The abdomen below the breasts is wide and fills the tight athletic shirt, but not to the point of bursting. It gives the impression of a body that is full, strong, well built; but instead is often given the more "feminine" names for a body not fitting in to the familiar and acceptable status quo: "plump", "chubby", or "roundy." Bare arms, freckled with moles, and a mosquito bite on each arm, closer to the wrists, sufficiently scratched at so that each has slightly scabbed over. A band-aid is wrapped halfway around the right forearm, giving the unrealistic impression of a wound much bigger than it really is: a scratch from the weekend that was picked at absentmindedly and has subsequently continued bleeding. It hasn't stopped yet, briefly bringing to mind a red flag for anemia, yet quickly dismissed as hypochondriacal thinking. An elastic hair-tie, coincidentally the exact same color as the athletic shirt, still hugs the right wrist after having been removed over an hour ago.
The face. Passive in the warm, soft, yellow orange light bouncing off the marble counter top of the sink. The eyes: softly ringed from slightly smudged mascara which dissolved about an hour before during an emotional release while in her yoga class; the instructor had come by while the body was in savasana, took hold of the ankles, one in each hand, pulled them gently toward her body, and then softly guided them to the left and then to the right, slowly, subsequently moving the legs from the calves to the thighs, all with this gentle movement of back and forth, from left to right. It opened up the hips, creating space, physically, emotionally and spiritually in those broad sockets that for some unknown reason had been tight. The emotional release, non-dramatic, subtle, but no less powerful, followed after the feet were pressed back to the floor, toes pointed outward, ankles relaxed against the soft yoga mat.
Hands washed and dried. A sniff, then the just clean hands are run through the hair, styling it momentarily. The body turns toward the door, face still turned towards the mirror, perfecting that over-the-shoulder pose that everyone seems to comment on positively when captured photgraphically. But before the hand reaches for the knob, or maybe just as it rests on the knob, before it hears the familiar click of the lock snapping out of place, a thought occurs: He'll never call.
Friday, June 4, 2010
The 90% Crap rule and The Little Hater
Ever had that experience of sitting in front of a blank page, waiting for something brilliant to happen? Or staring at an instrument (that you know how to play) and waiting for the right inspiration to come so that you can compose some incredibly amazing piece of music? Ever decide to start watching old episodes of Seinfeld or Family Guy on Hulu because you're tired of staring at a blank Word document with that little cursor incessantly blinking? Welcome to the world of creativity. This is the part that no one likes to talk about, but everyone who has ever been a creative person, or has strived to be one, has experienced these moments. Another thing creative people experience is realizing that what they have just created is total and utter crap. Or at least, it can feel that way in the moment. Even worse is when you feel like you've just created something that's so awesome (new poem, new song, new story, picture, sculpture...you get the idea), and then you go back to it in a few weeks, months, even years, and realize that it is utter crap. No redemption whatsoever. Total, and utter crap. And you begin to wonder what on earth possessed you to think it was so good in the first place.
It's amazing that anyone has stayed with any kind of creative endeavor considering this kind of thing, as well as the aforementioned instance, happens about 90% of the time. You heard me. 90%. Ok, that may not be an exact statistic, but it's pretty darn close. (Full disclosure: I have a spiritual director who is also a very creative person and she was the one who passed this little statistic on to me.) As artists, writers, and creators, one of the hardest things for most of us to do, besides beginning to create something, is revising. And sometimes, just the idea of revision is what can get us scared and put off creating something in the first place. It's a lovely vicious cycle. Say hello to "The Little Hater." (Watch this video blog from Jay Smooth about this very subject: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TpmJgSfZ_8)
"The Little Hater" can be different for everyone, but it basically works like this: it gets you to doubt yourself and your own abilities. For me, it says things along the lines of "Who do you think you are to say something like this?" Or "Who do you think is going to read this shit?" Or "You know that whatever's in your head now won't look or sound as good as when you put it down on paper, right?" For the latter, I think this is true for every creative person that has ever lived. Even Pulitzer Prize winning authors have said that their novels never turn out how they had originally planned them. They were never as good as they had initially conceived them. Along the same lines, someone once told me the story of going over to a friend's house where their friend's son happened to be having a major tantrum. When they asked why the little boy was so upset, the mom replied, "Oh, he's been trying to draw something that's in his head and it won't come out the way he wants it to." Mind you, the little boy was four at the time. He later grew up to be an architect. But you see what I mean? We all go through it, even the best of us!
I've just started this blog, and while I'm excited about it now and have a whole bunch of ideas for what I want to post, I know that 1) not everything I post will be brilliant or note worthy or even worth reading (i.e. the 90% crap rule), and 2) that at some point, that Little Hater will start creeping in, and will continue to make guest appearances from time to time, letting me know that what I post is of no consequence to anyone. Especially right now when I don't have any followers (yet). But I am writing this entry as much for myself as for all of you creative people out there, who may be reading this right now. So what if 90% of what you create is total crap?! It just makes you appreciate that 10% of brilliance and genius even more! Revising is a good thing! It just goes to show that what you already created was worth creating in the first place! And as for that Little Hater...tell him to fuck off.
Until next time...
It's amazing that anyone has stayed with any kind of creative endeavor considering this kind of thing, as well as the aforementioned instance, happens about 90% of the time. You heard me. 90%. Ok, that may not be an exact statistic, but it's pretty darn close. (Full disclosure: I have a spiritual director who is also a very creative person and she was the one who passed this little statistic on to me.) As artists, writers, and creators, one of the hardest things for most of us to do, besides beginning to create something, is revising. And sometimes, just the idea of revision is what can get us scared and put off creating something in the first place. It's a lovely vicious cycle. Say hello to "The Little Hater." (Watch this video blog from Jay Smooth about this very subject: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TpmJgSfZ_8)
"The Little Hater" can be different for everyone, but it basically works like this: it gets you to doubt yourself and your own abilities. For me, it says things along the lines of "Who do you think you are to say something like this?" Or "Who do you think is going to read this shit?" Or "You know that whatever's in your head now won't look or sound as good as when you put it down on paper, right?" For the latter, I think this is true for every creative person that has ever lived. Even Pulitzer Prize winning authors have said that their novels never turn out how they had originally planned them. They were never as good as they had initially conceived them. Along the same lines, someone once told me the story of going over to a friend's house where their friend's son happened to be having a major tantrum. When they asked why the little boy was so upset, the mom replied, "Oh, he's been trying to draw something that's in his head and it won't come out the way he wants it to." Mind you, the little boy was four at the time. He later grew up to be an architect. But you see what I mean? We all go through it, even the best of us!
I've just started this blog, and while I'm excited about it now and have a whole bunch of ideas for what I want to post, I know that 1) not everything I post will be brilliant or note worthy or even worth reading (i.e. the 90% crap rule), and 2) that at some point, that Little Hater will start creeping in, and will continue to make guest appearances from time to time, letting me know that what I post is of no consequence to anyone. Especially right now when I don't have any followers (yet). But I am writing this entry as much for myself as for all of you creative people out there, who may be reading this right now. So what if 90% of what you create is total crap?! It just makes you appreciate that 10% of brilliance and genius even more! Revising is a good thing! It just goes to show that what you already created was worth creating in the first place! And as for that Little Hater...tell him to fuck off.
Until next time...
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Cabbie from the Bayview
Sometimes I'm just a sucker for a cab ride. Beats taking Muni, even though we do have a pretty good transit system here in The City. But if I have a suitcase, plus some extra bags, I'd like to be dropped off at my front door, thank you very much.
So, here I was, getting into the cab after a long weekend of house sitting over in a posh little neighborhood (yeah, life is hard). The cabbie was a gentlemen, putting my suitcase into the trunk for me, and opening my door. Once he knew where we were going, we were off.
He was listening to KOIT, the "lite rock, less talk" station. Not only was he listening, he was singing along (even though it was pretty apparent he wouldn't be auditioning for anyone, anywhere, anytime soon). The station was playing Roxanne's "It Must Have Been Love (But It's Over Now)." (For you cinematic folks, you'll recognize it from one of the final scenes in "Pretty Woman".) It wasn't exactly a song I wanted to hear, given that I had only just ended a connection a couple of days before, but I didn't get much of a chance to dwell on it since my cabbie decided to start a conversation.
"You know, when she say, 'It must have been love and it's over now'? That [sic] not love, that [sic] sex she's talking about. Real love doesn't end, it's when the sex is over, and they're all, 'You son of a bitch! You broke my heart! I'll kill you, motherfucker!'" I have to explain something here. It turns out my cabbie was from Vietnam and had been living in the City for 30 some-odd years. So picture an older, Vietnamese dude who's been singing along to the radio to this sappy piece of 80s music, with this now coming out of his mouth. Yeah. I couldn't help but laugh. It really did break the ice, though.
"Jesus Christ! Would you look at these houses?!" He was pointing to some nice homes along the main street. They weren't mansions with security gates around them, but they were very definitely owned by the more affluent. "Can you fuckin' believe that? Those are single family homes, too, you know? Jesus! Who the hell needs all that?" (These may not have been his exact words, but they're pretty close.) I asked him where he lived. Turns out he's lived in the Bayview pretty much ever since he moved to San Francisco. For those who are unfamiliar with SF neighborhoods, the Bayview/Hunter's Point area is notorious for gang violence, drugs, theft, and other crimes. Parts of it have been gentrified, but the problems of poverty still remain. A large portion of the population is African American.
"Yeah," he said. "I don't like it much, but the rent is cheap." I could imagine. "Lots of crime, though," he pointed out. I told him I knew, and that I had worked in that area a few years back as a tutor for middle school students. "Yeah, it's tough living there. You don't wanna be around at night. Lots of crazy shit happens. You get robbed right in front of your house! You know why? Cuz when you're in front of your house, your guard is down. Shit, when I'm out driving in this thing, I'm always aware of what's around me. But when I'm home, late at night, I forget to think about all that." Turns out, he had been robbed a few times in his own house. Some teenagers had come in with guns once and took a bunch of his stuff. "And they weren't more than 14 or 16 years old."
There's no doubt that this is tragic, both for the victim (my cabbie) and the fact that the perpetrators were so young. As much as I felt for my driver, having worked with some of the kids from that area, I knew that these young boys he was talking about weren't just heinous criminals without a conscience. Ok, I didn't know 100% that that was the case, but I had a feeling. I attempted to talk about the root causes behind their behavior. A lot of kids from disadvantaged neighborhoods will take up the gun because it's easier for them to believe they have more power that way, rather than believing that they have something to offer the world. (*Cue "Dangerous Minds" theme.* Yeah, I know, I'm a white lady talking about this like I've lived it. I haven't, but I've caught a glimpse of what they go through and how they see themselves. It ain't pretty. I'm not offering it as an excuse for their behavior. Excuses are what allow things to stay the way they are. Reasons can lead to a closer examination, and hopefully change, of a situation. Which is what I was offering to the man driving me home from my cushy little gig.) I told him about how there's this image that young black men can take up about what a real man looks like, i.e. one who uses violence as a way to dominate and have control. Or that some young men become involved in that life out of fear for their own life. Well, let's face it...fear pretty much lies at the heart of all violent acts. (If you need further evidence of this, watch "Bowling for Columbine." Again.)
"You know what I call that? I call that an excuse," he replied to my sociological musings. "People make choices. They know what's right and what's not. Take me. I lived in a poor neighborhood all my life. I had a dad who would drink a lot and beat me every day. But I never thought that my life would be better if I went out and shoot [sic] somebody. So, saying it's because of where you come from, that's why you do those things, that's just an excuse." (I'm paraphrasing here.)
I respectfully disagreed with him, and tried to point out that I wasn't making excuses, but instead trying to acknowledge the way things were, the reality for the kids in Hunter's Point and other inner cities. "What it comes down to," he said, "is that a human being is a human being. No one is different. We're all human, we all make mistakes, but we can all correct our mistakes, do the right thing."
"Well, that may be true to an extent," I conceded. "But, people will do what's familiar to them. Someone living in a rough neighborhood may want to do the right thing and have a better life, but if all they're told by the people around them or society in general, that they're a thug or should be one or are expected to be one, then the likelihood is that they will take that path."
"It's true that people do what they know. That's true. But take me for example." I stopped him momentarily to tell him to turn on the next street. "Yeah, I used to drink a lot. Every day. I was an alcoholic. I went to meetings and all that shit. Then, one day, I just said, 'No, I'm not doing this anymore. I don't want to be like this.' And I quit."
I acknowledged that this was great for him, and that it was indeed possible for people to change. "They have to want to change," he interrupted. I agreed. But there was the additional problem of wanting to change, and others around you not wanting you to take that path. I would have gone on more, but we were getting close to my house and I had to give him additional directions to make sure we ended up in the right place.
I don't think either of us really changed our perspectives. I'm a bleeding heart liberal (might as well be honest) and while he was not a man of privilege, based on what he told me, his own personal experiences led him to his beliefs. More than that, the experiences led him to hold true to those beliefs. It was almost as if he changed his point of view, he might invalidate his own experience. He seemed to have the mentality of "Hey, I made it out ok. Why can't other people get their shit together?"
There's no question that our own experiences lead us to have a certain perspective of the world. That's fine, it creates us and can, in a way, create the environment in which we live. But there's more to it than that. If we only hold to our own truth as "the truth" then we miss out on whole other perspectives that could be just as valid, and could, in some cases, add to our perspectives. I'm not a pure relativist and believe that everyone's truth is all truth, nor do I believe in some one, objective "Truth." It's something in between those two extremes. It's the belief that there is truth to everyone's experience, and truth within our own, and that somehow some kind of blending occurs, or can occur through dialectic and/or shared experiences. This blending or amalgamation is not "Truth" or even moving towards some "greater Truth", but instead is just another piece to creating who we are and who we shall be.
I wonder what my next cabbie will be like.
So, here I was, getting into the cab after a long weekend of house sitting over in a posh little neighborhood (yeah, life is hard). The cabbie was a gentlemen, putting my suitcase into the trunk for me, and opening my door. Once he knew where we were going, we were off.
He was listening to KOIT, the "lite rock, less talk" station. Not only was he listening, he was singing along (even though it was pretty apparent he wouldn't be auditioning for anyone, anywhere, anytime soon). The station was playing Roxanne's "It Must Have Been Love (But It's Over Now)." (For you cinematic folks, you'll recognize it from one of the final scenes in "Pretty Woman".) It wasn't exactly a song I wanted to hear, given that I had only just ended a connection a couple of days before, but I didn't get much of a chance to dwell on it since my cabbie decided to start a conversation.
"You know, when she say, 'It must have been love and it's over now'? That [sic] not love, that [sic] sex she's talking about. Real love doesn't end, it's when the sex is over, and they're all, 'You son of a bitch! You broke my heart! I'll kill you, motherfucker!'" I have to explain something here. It turns out my cabbie was from Vietnam and had been living in the City for 30 some-odd years. So picture an older, Vietnamese dude who's been singing along to the radio to this sappy piece of 80s music, with this now coming out of his mouth. Yeah. I couldn't help but laugh. It really did break the ice, though.
"Jesus Christ! Would you look at these houses?!" He was pointing to some nice homes along the main street. They weren't mansions with security gates around them, but they were very definitely owned by the more affluent. "Can you fuckin' believe that? Those are single family homes, too, you know? Jesus! Who the hell needs all that?" (These may not have been his exact words, but they're pretty close.) I asked him where he lived. Turns out he's lived in the Bayview pretty much ever since he moved to San Francisco. For those who are unfamiliar with SF neighborhoods, the Bayview/Hunter's Point area is notorious for gang violence, drugs, theft, and other crimes. Parts of it have been gentrified, but the problems of poverty still remain. A large portion of the population is African American.
"Yeah," he said. "I don't like it much, but the rent is cheap." I could imagine. "Lots of crime, though," he pointed out. I told him I knew, and that I had worked in that area a few years back as a tutor for middle school students. "Yeah, it's tough living there. You don't wanna be around at night. Lots of crazy shit happens. You get robbed right in front of your house! You know why? Cuz when you're in front of your house, your guard is down. Shit, when I'm out driving in this thing, I'm always aware of what's around me. But when I'm home, late at night, I forget to think about all that." Turns out, he had been robbed a few times in his own house. Some teenagers had come in with guns once and took a bunch of his stuff. "And they weren't more than 14 or 16 years old."
There's no doubt that this is tragic, both for the victim (my cabbie) and the fact that the perpetrators were so young. As much as I felt for my driver, having worked with some of the kids from that area, I knew that these young boys he was talking about weren't just heinous criminals without a conscience. Ok, I didn't know 100% that that was the case, but I had a feeling. I attempted to talk about the root causes behind their behavior. A lot of kids from disadvantaged neighborhoods will take up the gun because it's easier for them to believe they have more power that way, rather than believing that they have something to offer the world. (*Cue "Dangerous Minds" theme.* Yeah, I know, I'm a white lady talking about this like I've lived it. I haven't, but I've caught a glimpse of what they go through and how they see themselves. It ain't pretty. I'm not offering it as an excuse for their behavior. Excuses are what allow things to stay the way they are. Reasons can lead to a closer examination, and hopefully change, of a situation. Which is what I was offering to the man driving me home from my cushy little gig.) I told him about how there's this image that young black men can take up about what a real man looks like, i.e. one who uses violence as a way to dominate and have control. Or that some young men become involved in that life out of fear for their own life. Well, let's face it...fear pretty much lies at the heart of all violent acts. (If you need further evidence of this, watch "Bowling for Columbine." Again.)
"You know what I call that? I call that an excuse," he replied to my sociological musings. "People make choices. They know what's right and what's not. Take me. I lived in a poor neighborhood all my life. I had a dad who would drink a lot and beat me every day. But I never thought that my life would be better if I went out and shoot [sic] somebody. So, saying it's because of where you come from, that's why you do those things, that's just an excuse." (I'm paraphrasing here.)
I respectfully disagreed with him, and tried to point out that I wasn't making excuses, but instead trying to acknowledge the way things were, the reality for the kids in Hunter's Point and other inner cities. "What it comes down to," he said, "is that a human being is a human being. No one is different. We're all human, we all make mistakes, but we can all correct our mistakes, do the right thing."
"Well, that may be true to an extent," I conceded. "But, people will do what's familiar to them. Someone living in a rough neighborhood may want to do the right thing and have a better life, but if all they're told by the people around them or society in general, that they're a thug or should be one or are expected to be one, then the likelihood is that they will take that path."
"It's true that people do what they know. That's true. But take me for example." I stopped him momentarily to tell him to turn on the next street. "Yeah, I used to drink a lot. Every day. I was an alcoholic. I went to meetings and all that shit. Then, one day, I just said, 'No, I'm not doing this anymore. I don't want to be like this.' And I quit."
I acknowledged that this was great for him, and that it was indeed possible for people to change. "They have to want to change," he interrupted. I agreed. But there was the additional problem of wanting to change, and others around you not wanting you to take that path. I would have gone on more, but we were getting close to my house and I had to give him additional directions to make sure we ended up in the right place.
I don't think either of us really changed our perspectives. I'm a bleeding heart liberal (might as well be honest) and while he was not a man of privilege, based on what he told me, his own personal experiences led him to his beliefs. More than that, the experiences led him to hold true to those beliefs. It was almost as if he changed his point of view, he might invalidate his own experience. He seemed to have the mentality of "Hey, I made it out ok. Why can't other people get their shit together?"
There's no question that our own experiences lead us to have a certain perspective of the world. That's fine, it creates us and can, in a way, create the environment in which we live. But there's more to it than that. If we only hold to our own truth as "the truth" then we miss out on whole other perspectives that could be just as valid, and could, in some cases, add to our perspectives. I'm not a pure relativist and believe that everyone's truth is all truth, nor do I believe in some one, objective "Truth." It's something in between those two extremes. It's the belief that there is truth to everyone's experience, and truth within our own, and that somehow some kind of blending occurs, or can occur through dialectic and/or shared experiences. This blending or amalgamation is not "Truth" or even moving towards some "greater Truth", but instead is just another piece to creating who we are and who we shall be.
I wonder what my next cabbie will be like.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)