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Jesus and Our Marbles

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Sunday. — I’m on my knees in a church pew, and — I’m waiting.

Sometimes church seems like the only appropriate place to go when my head feels like the inside of pinball machine. Voices are echoing and the organ is humming. And I’m not sure that anyone’s really listening, but, truth be told — I may not really be praying.

At St. Patrick’s, in Bay Ridge, the crucifix is painted on the wall. It’s a weird sorta mosaic. In most churches, it’s a statue or pillar — something three dimensional — just so you know that Christ is hanging right there in front of you. He’s solid. His limbs are smooth and round and the nails in his hands and feet are these tiny raised bumps that you can reach out and touch if you’re so inclined. But, not here. Not in this church.

I think about that — the dimensions of Christ — while I try to pray. I attempt to slow the thoughts that race around my brain. Today, there’s a lot going on. There are too many prayers. I can’t pick out just one. There isn’t enough time. I try to pray for everyone else and find some way to ignore all my crap. I mean, that’s what I should be doing. But then, where will I put it all? — All this stuff I brought here to iron out?

After the priest reads the gospel, our hearts spill all of their contents onto the floor like giant bags of marbles. Rolling wildly under the pews and across the aisle. No one else hears or sees them. — Well, maybe, mosaic Jesus does — but, if he does, he doesn’t move or change his expression. He’s still just casting his eyes down at Mary with that sad-face that all church Jesus’ have — I mean — he’s dying. And us, we’ve only lost our marbles.

At the end of the homily, my friend, who joined me for mass, grabs my knee. It was like everything that the priest said was tailored to us. With a sideways look, we silently acknowledge this. The strange thing is, we’d only walked down to St. Pat’s because Our Lady of Angels, twenty blocks away, had the wrong fucking mass times posted on the their website. So, when my buddy and I arrived at 11:30AM — missals blazing like spiritual gangsters — the priest was already sending parishioners off, in peace, to love and serve the Lord.

So, here we are, at St. Pat’s 12:30PM mass. Praying and not praying. Spilling our marbles. Waiting for JC to give us a sign that something good is headed our way. But, neither of us gets one. — JC is still motionless up there on the wall.

The mass ends, and after the priest and his posse file out, we follow suit. We leave our marbles scattered across the church floor. Because — it’s better that way. We know they’ll get sorted out here, even without us.

We walk down Third Avenue, where there’s a street fair in progress. There are bagpipers playing and little kids with painted faces and it smells like funnel cake and Italian sausages and my buddy keeps stopping in the middle of the street to adjust his shoe.

For some reason, around Eighty-Third Street, he and I both start to laugh. I’m not sure what came over us. I’m not sure what happened in that church. What we took. What we left behind. But, I will say this — even though I couldn’t say a prayer to save my life — I’m almost certain that one was answered.

 

 

Artwork Photo Credit: Jesus Christ, Painting in a Catholic Church in Maseok; http://d-roamingcat.blogspot.com/2013_02_01_archive.html?m=1

 

The Hunker Bunker

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wyeth-day-dream-1980

There is nothing worse than being stuck.

I’ve heard it said, the definition of hell is standing in one place while wishing you were standing in another.

Unfortunately for us, it would appear that the human experience itself is an ongoing parade from one plane of our stuck-ness to the next. We stop. We assess. We look for new places to stand. And, me, I know — I’ve been in this spot before. I’ve felt it. — Change is imminent. I’m on the brink, but, I still find myself looking too far down the path ahead. I get caught up in distances that are too mysterious to gauge.

And, when I become overwhelmed by my own sense of place — or lack thereof — I do it. — I hunker.

My best friend can predict my hunkering — episodes of withdrawal and isolation — with laser-like precision. It’s no secret when I am tired of fighting the good fight. I become exhausted searching for the next, best place. So, I resign myself to my bed where I binge-watch television shows on Hulu and Netflix and tell myself that nothing will ever change. Ever. Ever. Ever.

It sounds terrible. But, in truth, it’s pretty fantastic. Not only is hunkering incredibly relaxing, non-invasive, and cheap — it’s the pre-cursor to breakthrough.

I wrote recently about the advantages of identifying patterns. — How labeling my predictable routines has helped me to see where I was wrong, or where I needed to change, or where I kept putting myself in harm’s way. And, yet another advantage of this self-awareness is — you know when things are about to shift.

Hunkering is a sign. And while I’ll admit that it’s a behavior that sends up some red flags, — mainly a house-ridden, quiet, and antisocial alcoholic — it’s not all bad, I assure you. I’ve camped out in the hunker bunker many times before. I know the drill. And, I know that what follows is the sincere desire, drive, and momentum — to evacuate.

An experienced hunker-er knows that change is inevitable. There are only so many hours we can stay in the good graces of our beds. There are only so many days we can devote to celebrating our own misery. And — there are only so many episodes of The Mindy Project available on Hulu Plus.

The truth is, if we stand in one place long enough, wishing we were standing somewhere else — we will eventually move toward that other place. We move because it is unbearable if we don’t. Sometimes, we don’t even know that we’ve taken the step.

To hunker is to catalyze.

So, I tell my best friend, lovingly — I’m going. Don’t call. Don’t write. Don’t text. I’m headed into the bunker. I know the drill. I celebrate my stuck-ness. I know where I’m disappearing to, and I know what’s coming. And, soon — I’ll emerge.

Because, after standing in the same place for far too long there is nothing else to do — but move.

 

Artwork: Andrew Wyeth; Daydream, Tempera on panel.

Hand Signals

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Shadow-puppets-with-hands

I’m laying in Shavasana on the living room floor.

My head is uncomfortably quiet. In the gold plated fixture on the ceiling where a lamp used to be, I see my own reflection. I’m wearing black, and, I stare at my corpse. Palms open. Hands signalling to myself — the crow above.

Since returning to New York, I’ve revisited many things. Most of which, are very different than the way I left them. People. Places. Feelings. While I was gone, I wasn’t the only one reinventing myself. Losing myself. Rebuilding myself. It was all happening here, without me.

The world spins madly on. But, this evening, after returning home from a 12-Step meeting, the only thing spinning inside me is an immense gratitude. — A gratitude so big that it quiets everything else.

In Portland, I’d all but lost my 12-Step program. I crumbled after meeting an unstable and dangerous person, and, it almost took me out of the game that made me. I forgot who I was and how I had arrived at my own sobriety. I connected confused feelings to 12-Step that were better left isolated, and, as a result, I returned to the angry and bitter woman I had worked so hard to leave behind. But, here, back home, I’m peeking through the crack in the door. I am revisiting the program that once saved me — with a childlike caution. There is comfort returning to this thing that never truly left me, though, I tried to tell myself it was gone. Things I once let frighten me, return and become my beacons. My reminders. — We are here. — And, none of us is safe, but, unified, we are all alive and trying.

Change, so incredibly painful, — ushers us forward.

In a church basement, things I had forgotten return to me. My ears, once again, are opened and humbled by someone else’s pain. And, in a strange moment where I feel loss and gain simultaneously, I remember how it feels to have a profound understanding of someone else without knowing them at all — the power just one voice can wield.

In quiet stillness, our hands reach out for each other. I am truly home again.

Nothing is the same. No one is the same.

Visibly shaken, our hands make quick work of signaling our stories. Dark shadows on a bright wall. And, in our shared state of despondent confusion, we are united in possibility.

And gratitude. — Immense and compelling gratitude. — The kind that quiets you for days. — Until you hear your own words leave another man’s mouth.

And, without making a sound, you have returned. To this beautiful, and changed, universe. — Brooklyn.

 

 

Little Fish, Big Sea

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portraits_2_3_subway

The subway. It’s revelatory. I’d forgotten.

Every time the conductor cries out “Stand clear of the closing doors!” and the bell chimes, I have a sort of epiphany.

It’s been awhile. But, I’m back on the train — literally and figuratively.

These moments. These people. These — STOPS. I think about them. With every little movement, something huge shifts. Someone changes. A woman turns the page of her book. A kid shoves his scooter under the orange and yellow seats. A guy stuffs a bagel with cream cheese into his face and the white glop oozes out the sides of his Everything and over the wax paper and down his fat, pink fingers. — It’s a show. A glorious fucking show.

I sit on the 2 train, awed. I wonder — Have I been gone so long that these vignettes of mundane existence, these glimpses into the drudgery of everyone’s daily, city commute, have suddenly become the most romantic thing in the world? Maybe it’s because I’ve only been home for a month. And, sure, everything is still shiny and new. But, no, the more I think about it — it’s so much more than that.

I boil it down to get to what’s different and, — I think it’s sobriety. And no — not just the fact that I’m clean and sober — whomp, whomp, patontheback, patontheback — it’s more. It’s one of the side effects of sobriety that have slowly begun to crop up. A kind of gift. It’s something I was denied while I was living here years ago, but now, I suddenly have access. And that, that thing I’ve finally tapped into — is the ability to admire the machine of which I am part.

Here, in  New York City, sober, I have allowed myself to become small again. Something I never could have permitted myself to do before. Back then, I wanted to be a big fish. The biggest fucking fish in the biggest fucking sea. And, blazing forward in my self-obsessed fury — to become and to have and to live and to consume — I missed it. I missed the incredible beauty of living a small life. I never saw these little pieces. The city under a microscope.  I never appreciated the infinite and tiny parts of this incredible and unique place that, without asking anything in return, surrounds and envelops me with beauty and intrigue.

All this. Right here. A big sea. A HUGE FUCKING SEA. And me, somehow, no longer terrified of being a guppy. To the contrary — I wish I were smaller. I want to see it all come up around me. My eyes well up as we clatter through the dark tunnels of the NYC underworld. I keep thinking of all the things I missed while I fought so hard trying to get upstream. — All the pages that were turned, all the scooters that were shoved, and all the cream cheese that was oozing. — And, I missed it.

But, I catch myself and I smile when I hear it again. — “Stand clear of the closing doors!”

And, one last straggler — a man in a suit with a missing button — squeezes through the metal doors and joins our little school of fish and, together, we all dive beneath the waves of the East River.

 

 

Photo: “Portraits, 2-3 Train” By: James Maher; http://www.jamesmaherphotography.com/photoblog_view_post/637-portraits-2-3-train

 

Three Years On The See-Saw

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str180-1

We wake up. Really slowly.

Maybe it takes a year or two to move one, rotten inch. And, it’s sneaky, the business of waking up. Fucking subtle. So, don’t expect it to hit you hard or for it to happen all at once. It’s not some invincible force that saves and redeems you. But, it happens. There is an awakening.

Today marks three years sober. And, like every year, for the past three years, I’ve spent the week, leading up to today, trying to figure out where, exactly, I fit into all of this. Sobriety. — A word I throw around somewhat haphazardly. — I often forget the weight of things. Honestly, I’d being lying if I told you I felt one way or the other about it. In truth, it feels like I’m standing right in the middle of an enormous see-saw.

I wasn’t always up for the balancing act. Three years ago today, I wouldn’t have been able to stand in the middle of anything. Everything was an extreme. — Loss or gain. In or out. Good or evil. God or none. — One side or the other.

Today, I’m not so sure. I find that I’m often open to things that I’m not privy to. Miracles. Fate. Divine intervention. Maybe even some chaos and anarchy. — But, I’m open. That’s for sure.

The night before I got sober, I got cut off at my favorite pub. The owner told me, “Happy Birthday,” as I walked out of his bar, shitfaced. He knew all about sober anniversaries. He was a good guy who was happy to see me go. I, on the other hand, wasn’t so happy. I knew my drinking was bad news, but, I wasn’t so sure that the alternative was better. I think about her — Good ol’ shitfaced me. The girl who was so uncertain about the possibility of something genuinely good coming her way. And, three years later, I look back on that time, wide awake. I didn’t know how to comfort myself back then, because — I wasn’t there. But, now, I’m here every day. And all my voices speak.

The voice that reminds me to cry. The voice that tells me to step up. The voice that ushers me, with care, away from the people and places that no longer serve me. And, the voice that honors all that I’ve lost in these three years. — Together, we kneel at the graves of the many versions of myself that I’ve buried because they didn’t learn the right lessons.

I stand in the middle now, with confidence. Because I know, sooner or later, like it or not — this see-saw’s gonna flip and I’ll see what each end has to offer. I’ll stand high and I’ll sink low. Tides turn. And, I’m not afraid of the change anymore.

It’s nothing I can mark on paper. It’s not even a feeling. Three years is nothing but a notch I use to keep my place in the mess of cogs — a system in flux. Something that, next year, will be even more expansive. Awake and limitless, without warnings or boundaries. I count the years even though I know now — they mean nothing.

Just more room. Room for losses and gains. Ins and outs. Gods and none.

And me. There’s finally room for me.

And, I’m standing, three years deep — in the middle of it all.

 

 

Artwork: Life’s See-saw By: Brad Stroman; http://convergencegallery.com/stroman/stroman.html

 

The Break-Up

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letting-go

Breaking up is hard to do.

When I was a kid, I used to love it when the oldies station would play Neil Sedaka and it would spill out of the car-radio speakers. Back then, I had no idea what the lyrics meant, but, I gathered that holding onto love was important. And now, I know, much of our love is the kind that we hold on to, desperately. Not the adult kind where — you know — you let it go and it returns to you.

I’ve tried that tactic. Love seldom finds it’s way back to me. The letting go part is too hard.

I think that’s the beauty of getting older — beginning to see your own patterns. Internalizing them. Recognizing them as they’re happening. Developing a keen awareness of what our bodies and brains would have us do, even if we ourselves are totally checked out. It’s pretty amazing how we all have our own modus operandi. From folding laundry to getting our hearts broken, it’s a cycle — on repeat.

Now that I’m back in New York City, I’m starting to see them. — My old, Portland patterns beginning to emerge. Some good, and some that I was hoping to leave behind. I try not to overthink it. But, of course — I do.

New York. — It’s an old pattern, but, I have to see it in a new way. Because, it is new. I’m new.

I decide I have to break-up with myself. Because, my two selves — we’re in two different places. We’re at the pivotol moment when you realize that there’s this one thing — and it’s just not what you want. It’s a deal breaker. So, you have to let go. And, letting go is hard.

If it were the old me, the Portland-me, — I’d stay. I’d try to make it work. Tip-toe around it. Insert myself in little ways only to have my own current pull me back out to sea. I know the pattern.

I have to break-up with the girl who’s always just skirting the heart of the problem. I’ve decided to be straight forward with everyone now that I’m back home. — And, I’m realizing that I need to have that same candor with myself.

I’m breaking up with the girl who worries about what other people think of her. — Where she is in her life. — Her marital status, her veganism, her body, her life’s plan. I may be sleeping in the same room I was when I was 18, but, I am decidedly not that girl anymore. I’m a grown-ass woman. — I’m weathered and wise. Independent and inspired. I have my Portland-hippie roots grounding me, and, I’m not scared to set them down.

Breaking up with this part of myself is hard. But, it frees me up. It makes room for new love. — The adult kind. The kind that I was once so busy holding on to, I never had time to feel. — So, I say my goodbyes and I let her go…

And now, I stand here — ready to welcome whoever comes back for me.

 

Artwork: “Letting Go” By: Annalee Davis; http://www.annaleedavis.com/

 

Rest, For The Weary

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Weary is a really good word.

Until this past week, I’ve never been truly weary before. I’ve been exhausted, tired, drained, tapped out, and spent. Not weary.

Goodbyes are tiring. Traveling is tiring. Road trips, while they are the experience of a lifetime, are tiring. Sitting in a car at a ninety degree angle for sixteen hours at pop is tiring. Yes — even trail mix — is tiring. And, some combination of these things, at random or in succession, leads to extreme weariness.

So, I sit here in a fog. Waiting. Waiting for the moment to hit. The moment when I’ll begin processing all this change and movement I’ve been barreling through at warp speed. But, now, I allow myself the time to rest.

I try to write about home and place. The two things that have always fascinated me the most. They are synonyms and antonyms simultaneously. And, my search for home never started by going to a place, but, instead, by searching within. You must use caution. Home and place will deceive you. I’ve learned too well how familiar things can, very quickly, become foreign.

On the last leg of our trip, as my mother and I crossed over the Pennsylvania border, she said, “This is the East coast landscape I’m used to. It’s so green and lush. It’s beautiful. And, maybe it’s not as dramatic as the West coast, but, this is my home.” Those few, short sentences, summed up everything. My hopes and expectations for this move, the place I hold and have always held for myself in NYC, the sense of myself that I’ve left behind and — the one I’m returning to.

Sometimes, in those TV shows where famous actors or athletes return to their childhood hometowns the host will say, “Stay tuned, and watch as So-and-So returns to the place that made him!” I keep thinking about that. Because, I returned to my childhood home, and, in doing so, I left the place that made me behind. But, having been re-made somewhere else, and returning back home, has its advantages. — It makes everything here look new. Better. Or, at the very least, different.

It’s an unknown feeling. An exciting one. And, when I’m less weary, it’s one I look forward to exploring.

It’s like crossing a state line into something unexpected, but, still familiar. A life that’s green and lush. And, maybe not as dramatic as the one I left behind out on the West coast. But, here I am. And I won’t look back.

Because this — this is my home. And, weary or not, I’ve arrived.

 

As-Is, Oregonian

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Oregonian

We don’t have to say goodbye. To the people. The places. The things.

We can just let them be. — Who they are. Where they are. As they are.

This is my big lesson in letting go. The one I needed to learn. My unavoidable and inevitable truth.

My mother and I pack up my apartment, and, I wish it were different. I wish that my last moments here, in this place, weren’t tip-toeing around my life’s possessions, all of which are strewn haphazardly across the floor. I wish that the big, black garbage bags — one for Goodwill and one for the dumpster — didn’t sit in the middle of my living room, slinking, dark portals to the sad and hopeless lost worlds that await my unwanted past. But we continue — dismantling this world as I know it, piece by piece.

It helps to remember that — I can come back. Maybe in 5 years. Maybe 10. On a plane, or, in a car. On another road trip — maybe with some new beau, or on business, or I don’t know — with a baby. I can’t know how I’ll return to this place. And, I think that’s the thing that scares and excites me the most. Who will I become without this place? Will I like her? Will I miss this woman I am now? Revile her?

Who can say what I’ll be when I return to Portland? I don’t know. — I can’t know. — What I’ll be wearing. What job I’ll have taken time off from to make the trip back. Until that moment, I will not know whether or not I’ve found the illusive thing I’ve always been seeking.

So, instead, I do it. I let go. — I make peace with what’s here. Now. — Who I am. Now.

The most difficult thing, is this: Letting go of everything. Allowing it all to just be — as is. Not knowing how my dreams will return to me, or, how I’ll return to them. In 12-Step, this is called — turning it over. And, it’s the thing that I have always wanted to do, but, never actually did. And, here I am, — allowing it. Placing it all into someone else’s hands, because I am tired of wringing my own.

No promises or commitments. Just time and space. A strange, uncertain portal to my destination — like the garbage bags, sitting in the middle of the living room floor.

But, that’s the way I want to tie it all up. My sobriety. My love. My city. — My letting go. Memorizing all the people, places, and things that held me together. Keeping them somewhere safe, as I turn, and walk the other way.

I will place all these moments into a cranial time capsule. I don’t know that it’s something that I want to write. It’s something I prefer to feel. And, feeling, that’s something I learned to do here — in Portland.

I tape up boxes. I clank through kitchen drawers and cupboards. I clear my cache. I pack up what I need and I throw the rest into the black-hole-garbage-bags in the middle of the living room floor. — I make room for new things. I convince myself to forget about the ways in which I’ll leave, and return, to this place.

In just hours, I will no longer be an Oregonian. And, maybe, I never was one. But, in order for me to leave — I have to believe: I was. I have to believe that in the same way this place made me who I am, it also allowed me to become what it is. Oregon is inside me now. An integral part. Maybe even the central part.

So, I don’t have to say goodbye. — Not even to myself. I can allow it all to just be. As is.

Me. My Oregon. My Portland.

The people. The places. The things. — Who they are. Where they are. As they are.

 

Photo: Allison Webber; http://www.allisonwebber.photography/

 

The Softer Road: There, And Back

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Photo Aug 11, 3 29 56 PM

I returned to New York City soaked in cat piss.

My sweet, 14+ pound kitty and I had quite the traumatic flight. But, we survived, and we pulled up to my childhood home in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn very much alive. I returned home to find that, despite the fatigue, stress, and moving-related nostalgia, I had been gifted an unusual and, somehow, special sense of place and peace upon my arrival. My cat, however — hid under my bed.

Just days later, my mother and I embarked on our epic cross-country journey BACK to Oregon. (We’re still on the road.) In Portland, we’ll be packing up the last of my things and saying final goodbyes to the people and places I have cherished for the past six years before driving back East. For good.

It’s a strange feeling. Moving — shuttling around. A friend of mine recently moved from Portland to Richmond, Virginia. We’ve been talking about the highs and lows of leaving one home behind for another. The excitement and the sadness. The stress and the satisfaction. One night, after expressing my mild panic about one thing or another, he sent me a text from the road: “The drive across country helped soften the change.”

I thought about his words. Digested them. That’s really what I’ve needed all along. — Something to soften things. All my things. — To make my places safe and comfortable. Graceful transitions have never been my forte.

But, in the car with my mother these past few days, between our laughter, obsessive podcast listening, eclectic music selections, and the obvious we’re-in-a-car-together-for-several-weeks frustrations…I’ve all but forgotten the sadness that my Portland-loss had brought. And, while there’s still packing to do and goodbyes to make, I think that confusing my sense of place has — softened things.

So, this week, and next, I celebrate. I celebrate myself. I celebrate my mother. And we celebrate our place — together and in the world. — Wherever that may be.

I learn that place will never define us. It cannot define us. It only builds and informs us — it transforms us. But, it is us who will do the defining. And, with each step I take away from, and back toward, Portland — I write myself. — My place. — I discover that I am my own home.

And, I allow myself to live — here — in my own heart.

And with that knowledge, I soften with every passing day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Un)Pack Your Heart

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Photo Aug 04, 5 12 17 PM

I am leaving Portland in 48 hours.

As I pack, I find stories strewn about everywhere. Stacks of old papers. Pictures. Books. Dresses and socks. Keychains and candles. Molskines and mugs.

I can hardly breathe. — So, bear with me, there won’t be bonafide essays for a few weeks. Just travelogues. Notes on a transient life — which has spilled out in front of me like a bag of rice on the kitchen floor.

One thing is certain — we can tell who we were by the things we carry. Tim O’Brien once wrote a beautiful book that captured those feelings I’m only now beginning to understand.

What follows here are snapshots. Truly. There is so much more. Boxing up my life. Leaving this place I love. I sit with it. I look at it. All of it. I lay it all out on the cutting board. And, I cut away the pieces. Choosing the ones I will throw in my pot — and tossing the rest to the side.

I acknowledge these. These that were. These that shall remain.

1. Adam

Photo Aug 04, 4 40 23 PM

His photos are all in one box. I put them there — years ago. A coffin at the top of a closet. The lid was covered with dust. We used to take photo-booth-photos everywhere we went. I still have all of them. The strip above was from our friend’s wedding. He loved me on that day — I remember — and I loved him back. We danced. We sat on cement steps with plates of food in our laps and we laughed. I have tried to throw everything of ours away before. No matter what I trash, I will forever keep this photo strip. Always. Because he was my first love. And, I will never love that way again. And this. — This is what that looked like.

2. Theresa

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My maternal grandmother died before I was born, but I’m told that we are a lot alike. My mother says that she was no-frills. That she said what she had to say when she felt like saying it. That she insisted on eating salad with every meal. — And, that she was a fox. People see my fair skin and know that I’m Irish. But, they forget that her Mediterranean blood courses through my veins too. In the Summer, my shoulders turn her Italian, olive brown.

I knew my grandfather well. And, I knew he loved her real bad. — Even years after she died. — He’s gone now too. But, every time I consider settling on some guy — I think about them. And, I know, there’s some dude out there who’s gonna love me, real bad, even when I’m dead. And, I’m waiting for him.

When I see the picture above, the one with my mother sitting in Grandma T’s lap, I think to myself — we all look alike. And, we’re beautiful. Three generations of beautiful. Theresa’s dead, but she sees me. — I’ve known that since I was a kid. It’s weird. — I keep her pictures in every room so she can watch me. So she knows — her daughter did a really good thing.

3. Dad

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My dad is, and always will be, a strange bird. But, there’s no guy in the world who will ever love me more. Growing up, he used to listen to a lot of classical music. Opera, symphony, choral — all that stuff. He had bookcases full of classical recordings. One day, he was just over it. Suddenly — it was all Bob Dylan — all the time. He used to pick me up at play rehearsal in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn and blast Blood On The Tracks like it had been released that day — every day. If we’re being honest, I’d rather not admit I know every track by heart — but, I do. My dad gives me Bob Dylan postcards and books. It’s like, he’s telling me — subliminally — if I get Bob, then, I’ll get him. That alone is enough to keep my interest. I don’t always acknowledge it, but, I love that my Dad is weird as fuck. Because, I am too. And, it’s nice not being so alone in my weirdness. He’ll watch an entire season of any HBO show I want — in 1-2 days. When I sold my complete series of OZ DVDs on Hawthorne yesterday, it kinda broke my heart. But, my Dad knows what’s up. He’s got HBO GO. And, I know, we’ll get back into it. And now, while we’re in the car — I get to pick the album. — I paid some dues getting through, Tangled Up In Blue.

4. Mom

Photo Aug 04, 4 43 57 PM

My mom sends me a card for everything. They arrive so frequently, I forget how amazing they are. Now, I’m finding them everywhere. Sometimes, she’ll throw in some cash and tell me to grab a bite, or to do something nice for myself, or to buy the cat a treat. She wants me to be happy — always. In good, motherly fashion, she has always wanted me to have, feel, and be the best. I find her heart scribbled on tiny cards everywhere. Maybe she doesn’t know — I save them all. When I was little, she emphasized the art and necessity of the “Thank You” card. — How it will “never go out of style to have class.” How, to appreciate people and things is important. It occurs to me as I pour over her notes — crying like a child, because it’s uncanny how she always knew exactly when I needed saving — that I should send her more cards. There is no one in my life more deserving of thanks and kindness. She deserves nothing less than 100% class. And, there’s no one who needs more reminding to do kind things for herself. Someone needs to give her permission to feel good. Maybe that person is me.

The card above was sent to me at Christmastime — the year that my heart was first brutally slaughtered. Whenever I come across this note — I’m reminded of who I’m supposed to be. And, that’s a woman who’s a lot like my Mom. — Gracious, brave, strong, and impossibly classy.

5. Me, Myself & Eye

Photo Aug 04, 4 48 08 PM

I took this photo yesterday in my kitchen.

I wanted to share a vulnerable moment with you this week because, well, that’s how I’m feeling. I wanted to show you the vulnerability. But, I don’t have to. I’ve been showing you for months and months. These things I’m packing up aren’t me. They’re my archives. All this crap I’m putting into bags and boxes — those aren’t the moments — they’re the evidence. Proof. My tears are like that too. All that outside stuff.

The good stuff? — It’s packed up and ready to go.

Better still, it’s on its way.

Me. — Coming soon. To a city near you.