They sat in a house

In the Hollywood hills

Howling with coyotes

And negotiating deals

“Yeah babes, for sure!”

Are the only answers they got

But they continued to sit

As no one got off the pot.

The yesses slurred down

And the shininess dulled

The coyotes began to circle

Their fresh ideas now cold.

But they’ve worked with big names!

Though weren’t paid a lot

And so long ago

Maybe everyone’s forgot?

But they’re good and hard workers!

Just give them a chance!

Their once eager faces

No longer catching a glance

Their bank accounts wane

And their nails down to nubs

Their calls reeking and desperate

And garnering snubs

No Disneyland venture

Could be a balm for their plot

So they packed up their shit

And quite rightly fucked off.

I scuff and scrape my shoes along

The gritty graveled path

To catch the busy bumbling bees

I happ’d on this way last

They swerve and sizzle through the air

To and from their post

Within a knotted knobbled tree

From golden hive they boast

Sooty sand

circles the firepit

And socks my bare feet

an ashen grey

My steps

a dampened version

Of the ones

from our walk

along the trail

A muted

softened

roll over gravel

The inside voice equivalent

Fitting well in our

unwalled

Temporary home

for the night

Humming heart

Tip tapping tilt

Whirl-winding while i’m still

A perfect pleasant dizzy dream

Of the sweetest love-bit chill

It prickles all along my skin

And stiffens up my hair

I’m electrified

From deep inside

Of all else I’m unaware

I dream in languid lunacy

Of serpents and of sweets

I dream of better things to come

Of lives I’ve lived complete.

I dream of oceans eating me

Of waves roaring overhead

And kick sheets of tangled seaweed tides

In the torrents off my bed.

A glassy surface swallows me

And weightlessness ensues

My arms and body fall apart

Within the wat’ry blues

Undulating oils on the surface of the sea

Swirl and whirl in eely swells

In dreamy iridescency

What a waste

A total wash

The time I spent

Getting lost

It only added

Depth and grit

A sounder mind

A sharper wit

If only I'd stayed

Right in place

Never stepping out

Never in the race

If only I'd stayed

All on top

Of what I was

Instead of not

Never wond'ring

About beyond

Today I'd be

A much simpler song

But instead I strayed

And played

And sought

What I wasn't

And what others thought

I stretched

And reached

Both high and low

Exploring past

Where I thought I'd go

And now my song

Has colors too

A kaleidoscope

And a kazoo

It rings

And buzzes

Vibrates and mews

And bends and lilts

In technicolor hues

I am unsure

Of all that I am

And ‘certain unknowing’

Is all that I can

Place into words

To explain how I feel

Of the knowing of nothing

That is so humanly real.

Maybe I could be you

And you could be me

And being each other

We’d be able to see

That ‘certain unknowing’

We don’t know ourselves

And be better Us-es

Instead of One-self.

Crispy crunchy crinkly leaves

Sound out their song

In autumn’s breeze

Set on a cool swift whip of wind

From tree to earth

Back up again.

They ride on drafts that kick them up

Then tumble down to brittle touch

Of clinky critchy crutchy notes

A fall prelude: The March of Coats

My side is bare without you

When I awake into the day

The trees tip tap a tender song

That sings that you’re away

I want you as the day goes dim

And fades back into the night

And when again the dawn it breaks

You’re missed from morning light

Oh won’t you be my Pirate?

We’ll sail the seven seas!

And have great wooden pegg-ed legs

That screw on below the knees!

And maybe we’ll have wooden arms

And wooden torsos too!

And angry wooden eyebrows

Stuck on with wooden glue

And wooden hair caught in the wind

That doesn’t move so much

And wooden words for wooden birds

Too splintery to touch

Oh won’t you be my Woodrate?

We’ll sail the seven seas!

And clog around the wooden deck

Like pirate looking trees

“BACK OFF” Kee cried

but too loud for Tim

for her mouth, though up, was nearest to him

“Will not!” Tim scoffed with a grim set chin

“Keep it down!” came a shout

from the other end

and they all rolled eyes up at aluminum

because such is the life when you’re all packed in

and one pushes back about laying fin to fin.

Wait. What was I doing?

I swear it was big,

I walked in with purpose-

I am LOVING this fig

It's so fucking delicious

Y'know what I mean

It’s like sweet, and like honey-

Aaaw maaan, my shirt needs a clean!

Wait, what the hell is that

I have no fucking idea...

Wait, when did I wear this?

Ugh that chair is so skank and Ikea.

Like, what was I thinking?

I should move it around...

Have I bought those little cha-cha's

that keep things from scratching the ground?

Wait- where is my list?

I should add those to that.

Hey Cha-Cha Meow-Meow!

...where the fuck is the cat...

Okay what was I doing?

Right! Moving that chair!

I should take it from that corner

and drag it to there-

No! Wait don't do it, wait for the pads.

I wonder who sells those,

I should check Mom and Dad's...

Wait what was I doing?

I've so lost the plot

I was in here for something

And now I’ve forgot.

Think-think-think think-think-think!

Come on you can do it!

When you walked through the doorway

You totally knew it...

Oh!

No fuck it, it's totally gone from my mind.

I'll remember tomorrow and that'll be fine.

I should throw myself down

Call it a day.

Curl up with the cat,

Hit the metaphorical -

Hey where are my glasses?

I'll super need those

They've gotta be in here somewhere

I'm sure they're right under my nose.

Wait, what is all this crap?

I don't want to go through it

Oh fuck THERE'S the remote!

I'd remember, I knew it!

“But you’re so ill”

They squabbled and squawked

Touching and tending

Too, too much- a lot!

“No thank you I’ve got it”

I said to them all.

To you and to others

To Marco and Paul.

“I can do it myself!

If you don’t mind, if you please”

I said with eyes wincing

Stifling a sneeze

“Please go away now

I’m really unfit”

I croaked like a frog

Looking frog-like a bit

I wrestled the sheets up over my face

And tucked them quite tightly

And neatly in place

“I can fix me myself!”

I muffled a shout

And kicked at the wall

To turn the lights out

But caught on the lamp

Sat squat by my bed

And it tumbled and crashed

By my bedside instead

“Um, hey friends you there?

Help if you please..”

But the darkness was silent

Except for my wheeze.

Let’s climb atop a grassy hill

Or sand-soft oceanside

Or up an amber autumn tree

And watch the sun’n earth collide

Let’s name the colors spilling there

The purple pinkish blues

The whitish whirls and golden swirls

That fluff up sweet and humble hues.

Please tell me a story

Take me away

from right here in this car

from this part of my day

please wrap up my thoughts

and escort them out

And replace them with tales

my day knows nothing about

I am full of words.

Thinking

Teeming

Tickling words

Sitting just behind my teeth.

They call to trickle off my lips,

But wriggle just beneath.

They shout to burst beyond my lips,

To soar into the air

To dance and shake and liberate

The thoughts caught-up in there.

I lavish in the billowing

Of milk into my tea

It sinks and swirls,

Sweeps out and twirls

And balloons back up at me.

I giggle at its blooming cloud,

Clockwise it with my spoon

And watch the warmly scented steam

Rise up and fill the room.

Tea time for you

Tea time for me

In velvet covered chairs

Set in a sunlit teatime nook

Discussing our affairs.

We laugh and cry and dab our eyes

With lace-lined handkerchiefs

And appreciate the way we ate

Our sandwiches in fifths.

Now I watch my milky tea

And fondly think of you

And how we took in tea-scented air

As tea-friends are apt to do.

My pen is at the ready

But so is my teddy

Theoretically speaking

My childhood is not leaking

Into my serious life

Where I’m a Mom and a Wife

No, no teddy for me

Just the daily crushing reality

Of all I could be

But can’t quite pull together

No matter the timeline

Or whether the pressure is on

Write a book write a song

Yes, my pen is at the ready

Without the need of a teddy

Because now i’m grown up

And will fill up my cup

With work and achievements

No time for friends or bereavements

No I’ll get on to an office

Who cares what all this work life will cost us!

Yes, my pen is at the ready!

Who gives a fuck about a teddy

I’ll get to rising and gaining

No waxing or waning

Moon will excite me, distract or delight me

Because my pen is at the ready

I’ll get successful and heady

And not even remember

My soft squishy teddy

I’ll get busy spreadsheeting and Exel-ling

Passive aggressively yelling

At those working around me

Just circling back about

Compounding interests and facts

For this company I’m founding

Yes, my pen is at the ready

For numbers! Not my teddy!

Not how it is so cute and so sweet

Tucked tightly beside me

When I feel lost and need guiding

And the world overwhelms me

And I’ve achieved nothing yet

Except debt and regret

Yes my pen is at the ready

To write a poem about my teddy

And how I feel pretty unsteady

And don’t want to be serious and heady

And would rather tuck in

With its soft curls at my chin

Because the world around me

Can confuse and astound me

But feels so simple beneath

These crisp cotton sheets

Holding my teddy

Yes, for that, my pen is at the ready.

“It is time for a brush!”

She yelled on the bed

Headbutting our books

Trying to be read

“I’ll need attention to whiskers

Both sides if you please!”

She cried a bit louder

While kneading our knees.

“I’ve spent all day sleeping,

And seething and staring

But now’s time for brushing,

I command you by glaring!”

The kids sure like to loiter,

Near the curb outside the store

I’ve told them to “get outta here!”

They’ve told me I’m “a bore”

They’ve rolled their eyes

and snapped their gum

And blocked me from their sight,

I’ve stamped and stomped and roared about

“You kids! You’ve got no right!”

Oh huffy and puffy

he turns in the bed

With a humph and a hrmph!

And a nod of his head

He shuffles his feet

to snuggle back in

And lift off from pillow

to let dreamland begin

“Up up and away!”

he shouts to the stars

And lassoes spaghetti

around saturn and mars

He tugs just a little

and springs to a lot

And soars into wonder

with no second thought

How does one

unblock one's tongue

whilst trying to write a page.

The literature

I am quite sure

hides only to enrage.

I sit humbly here

and call it near

and it acts as if teenage

Giggling away

as if I've got all day

to coax it out onstage.

There's this pressure here

around my heart

stopping me

before i start

it builds and churns

and whirls and shouts

of my every lack

my every doubt

of all i haven't done

or cannot do

and how i'm not

as good as you

it grips me tight

and draws me near

until its words

are all I hear

The morning was lazy and we chatted in mutual half-dim AM grogginess, sipping coffee I can’t remember tasting and tinkling forks over plates of soft scrambled eggs. He looked sweet in his slouchy robe and slouchy pose and I shifted on top of my feet tucked beneath me. I unballed a soft-rumbled napkin to better cozy up to my coffee cup both hands free. Realizing it was later than either of us were aware, we untangled our sleepy selves and tumbled into clothes, heading out the door to make it into the day before it unfolded completely.

A clutter of bobbly squash offspring sat awkwardly huddled together on my dining room table. A collection of bright oranges and off oranges. A warty, goblin coven of little gourds. I uprighted one, adjusting it’s craning gooseneck, trying to balance it on it’s uneven bottom part. After a few attempts I ended up just hooking its neck part around its neighbor’s gargoylesque tophat part. Perfect. I stepped back and assessed the heap of produce turned “decoration”. They looked strained and uncomfortable, much like how I feel most of the time. I admired them quietly. Did they look sweet or horrifying?

The doorbell rang. It had been such a long time since I had heard my own doorbell ring that it took a moment to understand what I was listening to. No one visits in Los Angeles, we only coffee or hike. Social activities are relegated to neutral territory where we can all park with relative ease we hope. I untied my apron then decided better and tied it back on. It was a cute apron and I would appear more festive if I looked in media res.

I opened the door to a flush cheeked Jenna. If this were a photo we could pretend it was cheery and chilly outside. Instead she gulped down heat distress in her autumnal turmeric colored turtleneck and perspired lightly at the temples in the LA heat. Ah yes the 86 degrees purgatory, borderline hell that is this destination town. Each season blends vaguely into the next barely noticeable except by the grocery store displays.

“Hi hi hiiii!” She smiled, outstretching oven mitted hands holding a pie.

“Oooooo pie!! Hi hi hiiiii!” I sang back and made an exaggerated gesture at the pie, widening my expression as if reacting for an audience of children. She mirrored the expression and we did a little weight shifting dance at one another in lieu of a hug.

“Pieeee! I am on fire! Where do I put pie?” She said in the same sing-songy greeting voice we were using.

“Oh fuck! Hot pie! Table, table table table.” I rushed to clear the entry table of the little left sitting on top of it. I had done a thorough tidy earlier and very few things survived. All surfaces were sparse and empty. Except for the gourds.

Jenna quickly unmitted a hand on the entry table and dropped the pie onto the mitt. Craig bustled in behind her from the open door holding two overloaded paper bags under each arm as if they were basketballs.

“Where should I…” He looked around his eyebrows knitted in that way that says “must execute task given to me. Bring in bags. Put down bags. Unload bags.”

“Oh my gosh what did y’all bring? Pie is plenty!” I said assessing how I might help unload one of his armpits and save whatever was in those bags from further trauma.

“Linens!” Jenna said, untangling herself from her purse strap, “My Mom sent them to me a while ago and I haven’t gotten to used them yet. Ooo so festive in here!” I stopped my attempt to help knowing linens were safe from basketball hold breakage and looked back towards my dining room table.

“Ah yesss ze gourds!” I said in a sort of German accent. I looked to Craig who put a smile on his face and nodded in distracted agreeance. Bring in bags. Put down bags. Unload bags.

“Oh! Craig, so sorry, there should be a spot on top of the washing machine through the kitchen.”

“Oh yooo hooo!” David called, peering in from the hallway holding a towel around his waist. He covering his tits, feigning bashfulness. “Welcome welcome! I’m just out the shower, I’ll be in in a jiff.”

Amelia couldn’t stand the color pink and without fail, every gift she received boasted an increasingly noxious version of its hue. Pink wands and tutus, ballet flats and princess coloring books. A proudly presented Barbie doll from Tessa Mae donned a pink bikini and pink polished lips. Wrapped with a flagrant pink bow. Amelia always felt so sorry for these dolls shackled to their cardboard coffins with zip ties, staring out from behind the plastic, their faces painted in a forever smile that never quite reached the eyes. She touched the plastic gently with her finger tips and set it in the pile with the rest of the pink gestures, sighing to herself thinking it yet another birthday where no one understood.

“That’s a lovely dollie,” Amelia’s Mom said, sticking 8 candles into the confetti cake. Amelia loved confetti cake and looked longingly at it wishing she could skip the pink gift unwrapping parade and tuck into a brightly colored slice instead. Her mom caught her eyes and transmitted the message “stop looking miserable and smile and say thank you or I will kill you.” Amelia smiled, turned and thanked Tessa Mae. Tessa Mae grinned back. She had lost three of her front teeth and enthusiastically pressed her tongue against the holes.

Tom arrived late still wearing his karate kit. Amelia watched wide-eyed as he trundled down the hill, the starchy yellow belt tied around the waist, ends sticking out stiff and bouncing as he trod alongside his mom towards the pool house gazebo. Amelia turned pink as the mounting pile behind her and swore to herself she would have a karate party next year.

Tom Ratcliffe and Amelia Boyd had been friends since they were three. The Ratcliffes had moved next door to the Boyds on Peachtree Street and their houseful of boys Tom 3, Ryan 6 and Derrick 10 was a lively juxtaposition to the Boyd’s houseful of girls Amelia 3, Shannon 9 and Mrs. Boyd herself if she counted as a girl. Tom and Amelia were fast friends and grew closer to each other than, it seemed, to any of their siblings.

When Tom turned five, the Ratcliffes mounted the most glorious wooden fort in their backyard for his birthday and held the celebration right there upon the magnificent structure. Amelia had never seen such a thing of beauty; two levels, a slide, a sandpit underneath, a tire swing on the side. They scrambled and screamed around it like wild things in jubilant exaltation. The fort is nigh! The fort is ours! The fort will forever be!

Amelia rubbed her shoulder to her cheek and cast a subtle glance back at the mound of flashing tuile and tiaras behind her and burned at the unjust representation of her newly eight year old self.

“Haaaaappy Biiiiirthday to you…” Amelia’s Mom came around from behind her with a confetti cake alit with sizzling trick candles.

“HAAAAAPPY BIIIIRTHDAY TO YOOUUUU…” the rest of the party joined in. “HAAAAPPY BIIIIRTHDAAAAAYYY…”

“DEAR AMELIAAAAAAAA,” Tom crowed, thudding up beside her plugging into the shrieking circle of singing friends. He fake karate chopped her neck and she reacted in exaggerated chokes, grabbing her throat and falling down to her knees only to rise up with an uppercut to his jaw. He threw his head back and staggered backwards as if it had been a devastating blow.

“HAAAAAPPPYYYYY BIIIIIIIRTHDAAAAAY TOO YOOOOUUUUUU!!!” Tom and Amelia bowed to one another then Tom grabbed her wrist and raised it to the crowd to show her win and his defeat. The group cheered and Amelia laughed a real laugh, full of unfiltered joy at being known by another human being. She took bows and then karate-stanced the cake and blew a might, puff-cheeked blow upon the unphased sparkling candles much to the bemusement of all. The circle of friends began to bounce and giggle and fret over the candles sizzling down to the cake until Mrs. Boyd swept in, deftly grabbing each candle and submerging it into an awaiting glass of water, making karate swift sounds and hiyas as she moved. Tom moved around to raise Amelia’s mom’s fist to the crowd as the ultimate candle winner and all roared and cheered her triumph. He then went back to Amelia and reraised her fist as the one and only, the true champion of the event and the decibel raised and there was jumping and hooting and a thunderous foot stamping. Then slowly they settled down, Tom joined the audience of friends and together they bowed at Amelia. Amelia looked at all their toothless, smiling faces and with the humblest of nods, bowed back.

The birds didn’t go south for the winter. It was a preposterous notion, I said so from the start. But George can be so high and mighty, such an asshole. I am convinced he suggested it just to be a contrarian. And once it was said of course all the others flapped and cooed about “what a great idea” it was and “how unique” it sounded. Beaks snipped and claws stamped in blind adoration. If I had made the suggestion I would have been de-feathered right where I roosted, without a second thought! The flock would have shot every scathing beady eye there was at me and cast me out for the idiotic idea that it is. Not go south, I mean, if I haven’t heard it all. Who does George think he is? Changing our very nature for what? To look cool? Well I don’t think he looks cool at all. I think that big beak everyone seems to think is such a big deal isn’t anything but a deformity. A big, fat deformity. Not go south for winter my fine feathered ass! I’ll go south on my own. That’s exactly what I’ll do. To hell with them. To hell with this… this snow! And this.. intense blizzard… that… that wasn’t here… when I… when… did, was there mention of this storm? I, I did arrive quite late to the meeting... Oh dear. Well it doesn’t look like it is going to clear up anytime soon... Maybe I’ll, maybe I’ll start my journey later then. When all this blows over. Yeah. Then I’ll show them how wrong they are for listening to that bill-faced wing-nub. Not go south. Gah… that George really rustles my feathers.

I sit and nibble watermelon and imagine my mom is doing so also, I should text her to let her know I feel her with me, crunching munching watermelon, it cooling me from the inside, water crunch, dribble crunch, sticky sweet spots of water drops, pink circle splats, dribbles down chins onto buckled knees, sidewalks chalked and watermelon-water split, dispersed, parted like the sea but the chalk is the sea and the watermelon water the part, “juice” seams of pulp of citrus of pods, watermelon is water walls, a crunchy ‘sicle, a snappy crunchy crisp triangle with bitter white edges, sticky fingers and matted hair tucked behind soft floppy child’s ears, a fat-lipped tongue lick of almost the cheeks if only it could reach, tight effort, strained fingertips then clenched into fists and squinted brows, a shot to the pool to wash the summer off our hands, polka dotted swimsuits and fuchsia squiggled one pieces, hot cement, towels down, bounding out, stinging eyes and bubbles up cheeks and out noses underneath the water in a muted world of baby blue or white or both, ceramic edged tiles slick against knobbly fingers fat and wet and soaked and soft, marco polo, eyes shut, squeaks and squeals, thump kick splash, drops, rain, cool rain, sky rain down rain gray rain, out of the water, wrapped towels under awnings, cement smells, hot pavement beneath beating drops that seem to have come out of nowhere.

It all began when she walked into that dark little bar at the end of her street. In New Orleans, bars grow off the neighborhoods like barnacles, attaching themselves to storefronts, sidewalks and homes and Claire could have walked through just about any door jamb and found one. Which was fortunate as she had a cracking headache and preferred to keep thinking to a minimum.

“Club soda, please,” she said to the bartender through gritted teeth and wincing eyes. She pinched the bridge of her nose, hating herself for being so cliche but oooh it felt so good.

“Wild night?” the bartender said with a wink, tossing down a soft, water stained coaster onto the bar in front of Claire.

“A rager,” Claire retorted, tucking herself onto the barstool.

The club soda sparkled and fizzed at her, speckling the sticky, plastic-encased menu Claire had hunched over. She pulled the glass close and slipped a Tylenol from her pocket in between her teeth. Soon, much better.

Claire had spent her day unpacking in that dusty old house she guessed she would now be calling her home and, from the looks of it, would also be needing a call to someone about checking for mold or asbestos or lead or whatever it is that would give someone such a fucking headache.

“You eating?” the bartender cut into her concentration.

“I should, I’m going into an anger spiral. Is there anything that’s…” she studied the menu.

“Edible?” the bartender asked. “The pretzel or the fries are your best bet, if you value your life.”

“Thanks. Pretzel.”

Claire gave the menu a light toss out of the way and looked up for the first time since she had come in.

“The most important thing a garden needs is the shadow of a gardener.” -Joanna Cannon The Trouble with Goats and Sheep

If there is anything I am picking up on in this little life of mine it is that it needs tending. It needs weeding and watering and appreciation daily, hourly, secondly! Life needs word play and silliness and laughter, friends, community and hands in dirt. I recently made a deal with myself that I was going to start waking up to shake hands with Time instead of just glimpsing its heal as it walks out the door. And I have done that. Good for me! Now to make good use of it.

I am yanking out the Would, Should, Want and Need-tos. Fuck those guys. I have walked around in a state of Shoulding for too long. As my dear friend Elisabeth says, “Don’t should on yourself” and I think I shan’t.

Yesterday was Mothers Day, and cool people were out in force. It started as sparkly and wonderful, a celebration of Moms all around me, then promptly took a turn towards painful as I passed one after another after another chic and successful lady my age flourishing in their own mega-cool self-made business. A rosy cheeked florist in a pleated vintage skirt wrapped raffia around whimsical peonies at a Mothers Day pop-up shop, a delicate brunette sat behind a typewriter tip tapping poetry for passers by, a comfortably dressed songstress smoothed out her hand-printed blanket for the next round of toddler music-enthusiasts to plop down upon like little listening potatoes.

My heart hurt. Not only was I away from my wonderful Mommy, I was empty handed. I have not been using, exploring, savoring the gifts of creativity she gave me. I had no poppies, no ream of whimsical words, no hand-printed throw, no song to sing. What the fuck Would’ve, Should’ve, and Want to? What a bunch of jerks.

So once again, fuck those guys. I am on an adventure in babysitting myself. Of bringing a tending shadow onto this possibly propitious garden plot of me and keeping it there. Kicking the Post-pones and Maybe-laters out the window and into the GD trash.

Hiyahs and hallelujahs! I AM NOW.

7/15/17

Good morning world. Hello cactus tongue I collected from the back dredges of a full grown bush. One nopal. Nopalito. One paddle hand from the bunch had cast itself to the ground opting to call it quits from this world of heat exhaustion. He was like, “I mean I know I’m a cactus but COME ON.” It’s been pretty hot lately. So I scooped him up on my walk back from the mailbox to see if he might enjoy a little bit of time being my deskside company. I’ve stuck him in a tall white flower pot with cactus soil cushioning his little sealed, nubby end and his worrisome fully folded attitude has, if I do say so myself, lifted. Hello nopalito!

David had his first photo shoot in his Atwater studio yesterday and rocked it like a mer gerkin movie star. Or, photography star. He had a makeup artist in named Danielle who said David and my astrological signs coupled were due-in for lots of success and money come October so I took to her immediately. She gave me lovely dramatic black-lined eyes that lasted for the shoot then watered profusely for three hours before sealing themselves shut almost completely. I type this through reluctant, turtle eyes that, despite my seventy-five gentle cleansings, still have black around them. It’s going to be a good day. Right Nopalito? He looks hopeful.

9/30/17

Day 3 of being holed up in our apartment.

Two weeks ago when the first semi-serious huffs of this now pandemic had been scattered throughout the news I asked my husband David to return to Los Angeles immediately from London. That was Tuesday March 3. At the time I knew it sounded drastic and a bit melodramatic and after an overly emotional call for him to come home to me I felt foolish and hysterical. I went to work that night and frantically pooled opinions from my friends at work to calm my doubts. Asking whether or not I was being a bit crazy about the whole thing? Batting cartoonish, watering doe-eyes, searching for reassurance. I learned that unless they are your best of pals, humans in general do not read into provocative questions as a call for comfort but rather an inquiry into their own intelligence on the subject. They will impress their learned opinions and feelings, which were all markedly different and frankly a little disconcerting. I left feeling more alarmed by how varied our news sources must be, clutching my jacket a little tighter to my chest. Who were these people?

Of course I had only wanted to hear agreeance. I had only wanted to hear condoling coos and concerns that echoed my own fraught yarns and unspooling worries. I wanted to be scooped up and rushed home and put to bed by doting friends who could not believe I was alone in this time of chaos.

The real concern was that we would be separated for a considerable amount of time. See I am four months pregnant with our first and the month-long London tenure was already a lot to handle. We were two weeks into the division and already my nerves were frayed and raw and searching for solace. My need for the other genetic half of this budding human was undeniable. And then, Coronavirus.

Luckily my husband, hearing my adamant wails and progesterone pumped pleas, booked a flight home immediately. Not so much for Coronavirus but more to stop his wife from melting into the boiling pot of emotions she was obviously brewing for herself. The next time we spoke I sputtered my reluctant apologies for the way I had demanded rather that requested his return and when he softly said he would be on a flight home Monday I burst into sobs of relief.

The Wednesday after he returned home, Trump announced his travel ban on all flights from Europe beginning Friday. David pointed out that England was not included and that family members would not be denied but the victory of my rightness could not be squashed by such details. I immediately wrote texts to all my doubting work friends, because what is a demanding plea really but the need to be seen as right. With every click of send I quietly punched the air and mouthed, “booyah”.

By Wednesday night David was sick. And by Friday night, so was I. Miraculously I think we have come down with two different things. David sounds more vaguely like Coronavirus, body aches, fever sweats and a cough. Though his temperature has not risen and his cough is not persistent which according to the Kaiser doctor, does not qualify him for Coronavirus alarm. Mine is more like a head cold with a stuffy nose and pressure behind my eyes. But in these doubtful times, we are staying indoors for at least a week just in case. Slowly going mad on continuous Coronanews.

3/14/20

I’ll start by saying, you’re welcome Elizabeth Easterly.

There is little more joyful a thing than reuniting with family to get to express my innermost weird that only they truly understand. And probably don’t even like but this isn’t about them. It’s about me and I’m terrific just I am, even I said so myself!

I had the incredible gift of getting to spend my 32nd birthday with my sister-cuz Lizzy so I promptly planned a picnic and stuffed a piñata with mustaches in anticipation.

Oh the time we had! We laughed and frolicked and got upset about balloons together. We ate and walked and fashion showed every outfit option for every unnecessary thing we did. It was marvelous. She had a great time, even I said so myself!

There is nothing quite like family and I hold mine close and dear. I’m coming for you in June Hughes, Taylor, Mom and Dad. Where I shall only play it cool for the first hour.

Thank you all for being so wonderfully you.

7/19/17

I’VE JUST CONSTRUCTED A CARDBOARD FORT/MINIATURE HALLWAY FROM MY 3 AND 1 YEAR OLDS TO SIT IN AND CRAWL THROUGH. THIS IS THE HEIGHT OF EXCITEMENT IN MY HOUSEHOLD. TRUTH IS, I HAD SOMETHING GREAT RUNNING THROUGH MY MIND THIS MORNING. A BIT OF WRITING THAT WHISPED OUT OF THE CLOUDS AND ROLLED RIGHT OFF THE PROVERBIAL THOUGHT-TONGUE AND I TOLD IT TO HOLD ON. TO WAIT. WAIT FOR ME I PROMISE I’LL WRITE YOU DOWN WHEN I GET HOME. BUT THEN I DIDN’T. I WALTZED INTO MY HOUSE AND FORGOT. I WAS VISUALLY BOMBARDED WITH CLUTTER. IT SEEMED EVERY SURFACE OF THE HOUSE WAS COVERED IN THE DETRITUS OF THE MORNING’S BATTLE I SUPPOSE AS IT WAS SHRAPNEL AND CHAOS AND CHOKED THE CREATIVITY RIGHT OUT OF ME. SO I DID THE DISHES AND TIDIED UP AND WHEN I FINALLY GOT TO SITTING DOWN TO WRITE, THOSE GORGEOUS PROSE WERE GONE.

I CLOSED THE DOOR TO OUR ROOM AND SAT IN SILENCE. I WILLED IT TO COME BACK. TRIED TO REMEMBER WHAT THE HELL IT WAS. BUT IT WOULDN’T COME. IT HAD GONE. AND RIGHTLY SO, I HAD PROMISED AND NOT FOLLOWED THROUGH WITH MY ACTIONS.

SO I STOPPED AND TOOK TO WORKING WITH MY HANDS INSTEAD. PUT TOGETHER A FUCKING JUNK CARBOARD CITY FOR MY KIDS. SOMETIMES THAT’S THE WAY IT HAS TO GO THOUGH. THE CREATIVE ENERGY THERE BUT THE WORDS NO LONGER AT THE READY, SO THE FIRE TO CREATE SPREADS ONTO SOMETHING DIFFERENT AND INSTEAD OF WORDS AND WRITING, THE ENERGY TRAVELS TO THE HANDS AND THEY CREATE SOMETHING INSTEAD. LIKE… LIKE A CARDBOARD BOX TRASH DEN. I MEAN, IT ISN’T ALWAYS FUCKING MICHELANGELO CREATIVITY, SOMETIMES IT’S SIMPLY A FEW VEHEMENT STABS TO A GIANT WARPED CARDBOARD BOX FORGOTTEN IN THE GARDEN SCHLEPPED INSIDE AND LEANED UP AGAINST A WALL. IS IT BEAUTIFUL? NO. WILL IT BE PLAYED WITH FOR LONGER THAN ANY TOY WE HAVE EVERY PURCHASED? MOST CERTAINLY. ANYWAYS THAT’S WHAT I DID WITH THE ENERGY AND I HAVE TO HONOR THAT. IT ISN’T POETRY BUT IT IS JOY FOR MY KIDS AND WELL, I GUESS, THAT’S A SORT OF POETRY IN ITSELF.

8/31/2023

I have done it. I have finally cleaned house of my old battered memory archives of calendars past. Old sketch books of varying sizes full of scribbles, smudged agendas, creative half lives of poetry, doodles and dreams. I clasped onto them for so long thinking if I let go of the past it would somehow erase. It would blow off into the wind and I would no longer remember those times not really worth remembering. Oh no! Dear me!

Turns out my mind’s eye is much kinder than word for word documentation from an earlier version of me. I flipped through each book cringing, chuckling and gingerly tearing out words or art pieces I couldn’t bear to see cast into the recycling bin. Some repeated over the years. I spun in a loop I had no idea I was in always drawing out each piece of my wardrobe for trips, blueprinting every one of my apartments and apparently in January I am struck with a drive to perfect my drawing of watermelons. We are strange creatures. Souls driven to do something we don’t even know we are driven to do.

I did happen upon a few pieces of writing that made me soften. I have spent the past year and a half sober thank goodness. A time that seems tiny but also as if it has stretched an entire lifetime. Recovering myself, picking up tired, trying pieces of me, hugging each and putting them back where they need to go. I’d like to share this piece of writing about the unrest of not being able to be still with myself. Struggling merely to be in my every day.

Unstill:

The fissures seem to grind in irritated discomfort stirring at the top of my brain. Antsy and angry, needing to thrash out like restless limbs that have to move to feel any sense of being soothed or quieted. Screaming through clenched jaws. Tight. Anxious thoughts that do not have clear statements. Highly excited white noise clouds and when I sit to write them, to clear them, they light up furiously and become one hazy electric storm. The muscles in my neck feel uncomfortable. My forearms stiffen up as if the act of holding a pen to a page is an undesirable, difficult thing to do. Even my flexors and extensors ache with acidic memories, stored, held and unwilling to be released. Ugh. They seem to moan. Quit it. We were doing just fine – secretly storing all of our unpleasant feelings and memories. We’ll let them go eventually. Promise. Just not now. Stop writing. Can’t you feel everything resisting? Don’t you have something else to do? Has someone called? Is that wine still good? That knife was really dull, maybe you should sharpen it. How does one sharpen a knife? What is a sharpener made of? How did that come to be? Is it true wasabi is ground to a paste on sharkskin? I wonder if it’s from a specific type of shark.

11/13/18

I spent yesterday afternoon wringing my hands and pacing a nice layer down into our hardwoods awaiting my first “big room” “big girl” stand-up performance.

I ran, I bathed, I groomed, I wrote. I scream sang at myself in the mirror, I danced like David wasn’t watching.

And then it came. And I arrived dressed as fierce as I knew how to. And I sat backstage with a dear friend. And we cheered eachother on. And we hyped eachother up.

Then the curtain finally drew, and the stage clacked under my steps, and the lights lit me up from the inside. And I was there.

I was the seagull. And it was marvelous.

Thank you to The Comedy Store and to the incredible audience that I got to be with last night.

7/19/17

The first sentence is forever the most daunting. To dive into the blank slate that holds the possibilities of anything and everything. Hoping to craft a brilliant bit of gold, glittering and pure, heavy but real and rough in your hands that inspires awe and majesty deep inside of you. Or nothing. A sentence so dull you’ve forgotten you read it at all. A blurry space of time between a Facebook click and wondering where you left your coffee.

That sentence I started with? Not that great, but I got it out. I pulled out of me what I fear most- the beginning. To start something, to leap out of myself and put something out into the world. To put myself out into the world. What if nobody likes it? What if nobody likes me? What if it isn’t funny or clever. What if no one reads it? That last sentiment seems to be an issue I needn’t worry about as I have been on, but mostly off of this buzz of writing. The entirety of my audience is likely my Mom and I’m ok with that.

I have dipped in and out of writing my whole life. Even before I could read, I would occasionally sit at the typewriter and bang on the keys. I would then take the page to my Mom who would patiently circle words I had accidentally spelled.

Writing is something that brings me immeasurable joy. I delight in the crafting of words, the string along of sentences. To try to transmit a feeling through words. To remember the specificity of something and describe it. To remember that Grammy and Grandad’s house smelled of coffee and tapestries in the morning. That the light came in like beams I could hold onto and lift myself out of bed with. How the stirring awakedness from the kitchen downstairs could be felt all the way upstairs and the sparkling joy of Christmas excitement was in every breath, every heart beat. Cheeks were rosier, stories funnier, laughter uninhibited and full, leaping and tumbling about, everyone in a constant state of raucous delight. Everything was the most it could be. Memories so vibrant I can feel them.

I love that. It is as if writing makes my life more alive. So in this strange transitional time of not knowing exactly what I am supposed to be doing with my life, I shall write.

11/4/16

I wanted to write a beautiful poem that called to me earlier but it has left. It danced around after my shower and I hummed with it awhile enjoying it’s light, sing songy rift. Then I walked away from it. It was with me and I didn’t say thank you nor did I write it down. Now I can only remember a few of its playful lyrics and I am sorry to it, you and myself.

I sat awhile trying to force it back into me. To furrow my brow and bang out prose that didn’t belong. I tried and tried to no avail. I see I missed my sweet inspiration and now sit typing words, any as you can see, as an apology. I am here, I am sorry, next time I will listen and receive and act when you call.

It was a poem about a beckoning to action with the tag line, “Is it just me?”. I hope it finds another writer to live out its life, it’s a good one.

I hope you hear whatever is calling you. It is a time to create, to act, to speak. To hear those words that whisper from the ether and write them down or shout them out. To take those tears and hurt and pain and brush them into a river of the most sorrowful watercolor blues. We will all see ourselves in it and you and love one another more. It is a time to sing and dance and listen to our world, to each other. It is showing us Hate so we can remember to Love. Love, love love. Speak, listen, be heard.

I am with you. I love you.

11/11/16

I spilled a glass of water on the keyboard.

I thought I could salvage him. I thought I could stick him in a vat of rice and seal him up for a week or shake him, jostle him about or take the cartridge out, blow into it, put it back in and he would be fixed. He would start up again with butter ease and not only would he be well again but he would miraculously run faster and have more memory and have a long flowing main like a strong, valiant computer-stallion-elephant crossbreed.

This is not what happened. He died after about a week of whirring and groaning in his unchanged, stout, stubborn block-like body and a keyboard that would only respond to certain keys hit at certain angles with a certain amount of pressure sometimes. I even bought an external keyboard to plug into the usb thing. I was a hit at the coffee shops. Simsy-Two-Boards they called me. Aaaah, those were the days. Now he just stares out at me. Blue and anticipatory with a blinking cursor in the password box waiting for letters that will never be typed, stuck in a computer purgatory. I’m sorry buddy.

Though, I certainly don’t blame him as I have referred to him as a ‘cumbersome, hunk of junk’ for the past two years or so which is sort of cruel and unfair but safer than setting him on fire because I’m bad with electronics and he knew that and still wouldn’t ever give me a fucking bone. Uuuugh. I miss him so much.

But I think things are going to be OK. They are.

After Computer said goodnight I lost a job. As an actor, you “lose” a lot of “jobs”. It is part of the life, part of the career, “a numbers game” as many of my equally teary-eyed coworkers will tell you. But y’all, I thought I had it. I knew in my little heart that I had it. The callbacks were a dream. The row of execs giggled and exhaled in relieved, exuberant sighs as if I had answered their call, a call that no one else had been able to hear. I was plugged in, I was in the zone, I was having fun. We were having fun. One of the execs said ecstatically, loudly, “Well, we found her.” There were laughs and smiles and thank yous in a giddy room bubbling with their happiness and mine.

It was a life-changing gig. A massive company. A spot that would have allowed me to move into a new chapter in my life. Pay for the Christmas trip I had just put on credit because something has to come along, right? I was ready. Ready to visit my family more often, ready to pay for everyone’s dinner, ready to always get to pay for everyone’s dinner, ready to donate to NPR, ready to start up a charity, ready to donate to charity, ready to do good with a life that had money in it.

I didn’t get the job.

But things are going to be OK. They are.

I spent Christmas in England with David on a trip I couldn’t afford. But you only live once right? And that’s what “available credit” is for.

We went everywhere. We stayed with family and friends from one end of Blighty to the other. I laughed and met new faces, I drew four piece men with nephews and explained the difference between their “pants” and American “pants”, I bounced on trampolines and fell asleep against cool train car windows, I pointed at how green the moss is and how soft the grass is every day. I took in the diesel streets of London and the cold farmy air of Mawdesely. I visited the opposite bank to Liverpool to marvel at its glory and stepped out into a blanket of fog, I har-harred on a pirate ship made of driftwood, I missed my family. I thought of how my grandparent’s house smelled and the blue dress-up dress with the lace trim I loved wearing, of making miniature homework pages for my dolls to play school with. I thought of the champagne laughter of the adults playing Pictionary downstairs, the rattle of the Boggle box, the way the carpet felt. And I felt the carpet there. Where I was. In London and Mawdesley, the wooden floors at Simon and Ros’, the sheepskin throws in front of the glass wall window in the attic bedroom in Cornwall. I felt my then and felt my now. And I felt alive. My past warm in my heart, the present bright and real around me, and the future a magical unknown.

All I know is that this, right here, right now sitting in this library down the way from my sweet, warm, loving home tip tapping these moments on this hilariously dated keyboard, is perfect. My computer died and I didn’t get the job. But my life is rich. And things are going to OK. They are.

And one of these days I’m going to get to buy you all dinner.

1/10/17

I’m never one to shy away from a laborious job. In fact I enjoy working in places I never would have thought to find myself.

Over the years I have worked in very high-end and err, very low-end restaurants, a flower shop, and a paint-your-own-pottery studio. I’ve cleaned houses as a maid, underappreciated and overworked. My first day I was informed I would be driving the company van to the houses with two women who didn’t speak English. Untrained and oblivious to what was going on, I followed them about the houses moronically mirroring whatever they did and offering up an occasional, “Es todo?” when I felt like maybe the room was finished? It was awesome.

I’ve babysat, hosted an acting class for kids, and been a massage therapist crossing my fingers that I knew what I was doing in a rehabilitating chiropractor’s office. Everyone was in it for the insurance covered massage anyhow so I was usually in the clear.

I’ve worn scrubs, aprons, kiln gear, and gardener’s gloves. I love a new experience and unsurprisingly I recently accepted an interview via craigslist to be a chef/maid for a Millionaire in the Hollywood Hills, hiring courtesy of his brother who works for him.

I thought, sweet! Meet interesting people, get to indulge in my culinary snobbery with equally snobby peers, tidy up a little, this could be cool!

Also, it was my day off and I figured, if anything, it would be a good story.

And how, my friends, and how.

When I arrived, both of the gents that were to be hiring me were shirtless and barefoot. Millionaire was posted up in his “garage office” speaking loudly into a cell phone and hammered at an I-pad, the brother (the one hiring me) drifted about in his shiny workout shorts and told me to check out the place while he conferred with Millionaire about what I should do for the trial period.

I sat in the mansion taking in the fingerprinted floor to ceiling windows overlooking the infinity pool and scenic Hollywood hills. I delicately walked about the house, opening doors and looking into closets. I fluffed some pillows and eyed the smudged walls and cupboards thinking, whoever they have in here now is not doing what they need to be doing. I ran a finger inside a dust covered feature light..

After a good 20 minutes, shiny pants bro padded down the steps from upstairs, a strange entrance since he had just been on the first floor with me, within ear shot in the garage talking to Millionaire.

“Hey!”

“Ummm, hey.” I cranked around, startled to see him descending from above instead of walking through the door directly to the left of me.

“Sorry about that, just working out some kinks.”

“Oh, of course, no worries.”

He presented a two page spread sheet of daily tasks with a number of importance next to them.

1=very important/mandatory

2=not as important/but probably still mandatory.

I stood looking at it. He shuffled a pointer finger down it mentioning this thing and that.

“Yeah, sheets, you really want to get those done everyday… dishwasher, that’s gotta be started when you first get in… yeah, so… this is just a first draft…”

Granted, I know that both of these boys are wicked smart and all but their introductory etiquette was lacking. My mom would have given them The Eyebrow. You know what I’m talking about… the Mom look of disapproval that could straighten anything into line without having to utter a single word.

I felt her eyebrowing from a distance.

Brother padded about the house vaguely gesturing to things. “Yeah, so here’s the laundry room… we use this soap,” he tapped the only detergent in sight, “aannnd, yeah, the room is a work in progress… and then there’s this thing that comes in handy sometimes…”

“The iron?”

“Yeah yeah, the iron. So moving on, you cool with all that?”

“Umm… yes.”

On the tour we stopped into the library which waaaaas a crazy person’s room. An unfurnished office with a sliding closet that had been turned into a bookshelf stacked with books and then a tornado of hardbacks littered the floor. A small clearing was near the balcony door that led to a weather-worn exercise trampoline and a workout ball.

That must have been where magic reading sessions occurred, before Millionaire slammed each book shut and chucked it against the wall to watch a satisfactory page sprawling rebound into the pile of book rubble.

“I DOMINATED THAT BOOK!” I imagined Millionaire saying as he stood up shirtless and charged outside to bust out some crunches on his workout ball. “YEAAAHHH!!!!”

I was instructed that if I were to find any extraneous books about the house I was to neatly stack them at the entrance to the “library” so Millionaire could see they were new and then proceed to eat them and/or read them with an intense ferocity no one else should be witness to.

After the tour, sweet, shiny shorts Brother began to tell me what they wanted me to do for my trial day to which I said, “wait, I know we spoke of my expected starting wage, is that something you all feel you would accommodate?”

“Weeeeee were thinking more of something in the $10 range but there is certainly room to grow..” he said, wincing a little and thumbing his belly button.

“Oh! Oh, yeah, no. Yeah, ummm, this would not be the job for me. But thank you and you are lovely and I hope you find just the right person for the job.”

I exited through the garage where Millionaire was lifting weights, shirtless still, with studio size headphones on, spouting into the California afternoon what I can only imagine were world dominating affirmations.

“I AM THE MASTER OF THE WORLD…. I AM, THE WORLD…”

“Mmmmkay then, byeeee…”

“Here! Here! I call myself to the front, to stand before… myself! And I hereby declare a renaming of thine intentions! A casting off of the dull, anchor-weighted naming of thy dreams of yore and rejoice I decree! Rejoice and rename! For it is but a short life you have upon this earth! And I demand you find joy in it! Rejoice! *clang! clang! The gavel strikes the stand with might then dribbles into an anticlimactic tap, tap, dibi dibi dibi. Her highness’s wig has fallen askew and is covering one eye.

I am reading a book called Get It Done by Sam Bennett in which she encourages one to nix the self-named boring, homework-esque goals that are meant to be light and lovely gifts to the world but have labelled as daunting, horrific sounding tasks like “complete manuscript” and “draft work email to send to at least 10 people by end of week”. Kill me. Rightfully so, those aren’t steps towards dreams, they are steps towards doom and academic probation or reprimand. Yuck. In her book, which is fantastic, highly suggest, she recommends that one could if she or he wants to, retitle our creative gems as such. Embrace their wild, weird, wonderful selves just as they are! And give them titles that reflect their nature! And one’s own!

So I have relabeled my creative work as “Shimmying out the sparkles”. This renaming took me back to this blog, to rereading some of my previous entries in this silly little stashed away jewel. And in revisiting old entries I fell back in love with the inspiration that wriggles its way from the ether through me and onto the page. So I wanted to place my hands on the keyboard for a moment again so those little sparkles could wiggle and jive their way out again to do a little dance.

Thank you. I am delighted to get to be with such a tickling creative inspiration that draws me to the pen, to the page, to the poems. My creative inspiration has been making me laugh a lot recently and I am so grateful to it for gifting this glittering sunshine into my life.

1/15/19

On my run this morning between worried ponderings about whether or not the tightness in my lungs was due to lack of exercise or long covid, I thought about all those epic contemplation scenes in movies. You know what I’m talking about, the hero sits on their own gazing into a lake at the end of a dock, stares up at their ceiling as the camera slowly spins away or toward their face that is both blank and saying everything, that damn hand runs over that wheat field. But I was thinking about this “moment” that comes around in nearly every movie and surely must be a symbolic representation of the storyteller’s life experience, and not… something that people actually do right? A theoretical slowing down of oneself before a big choice or circumstance so impactful it seemed to make time stand still. Or spin away slowly. Or towards.

I am never still. I am on my phone or doing the dishes or listening to a podcast on my phone whilst doing the dishes. The forever clang and clatter of life seem to rattle around my mind ad nauseum and infinitum. Even when the day ends I run away from my life tornado into bed where I write the day’s tornadic events into my journal then read until I fall asleep reading because god forbid I just turn out the lights and be left alone with myself and nothing else to do but endure whoever I am. Pass.

But maybe I should be having these moments of stillness. Maybe it’s important. Sure as hell seems integral to all those protagonists’ lives in the movies. It was around this point in my forever downward spiraling thoughts that I saw an actual stag staring at me from the park. I slowed my jog that had become a walk into a tediously slow walk and thought, maybe this is one of those moments. What would happen if I started to integrate these reflective pauses into my life? What if I started with this stag?

And so I did. I sat down as close as he would let me and tried to be still with this wild beast. I was listening to an audiobook so I carefully took out my airpods while the deer stared at me, and flipped open the case to load them back in and.. dear god this looks like a very similar action to loading a shotgun… do deers pass down that warning knowledge of the way that looks and sounds? I showed my palms to him as a sign of… I don’t know, trust? As you can see, there are no cards up my sleeves deer, nor is this a shotgun, it is simply a modern device called airpods that I will never not call earpods… Thoughts and judgements about this, my first attempt to have a “still” experience, tumbled out and around me. But I sat with that deer for, I don’t know, felt like half an hour but probably closer to the five minute mark. Then the deer half hunched down on his hind legs and peed staring at me. Then he left.

Yuck, I thought as I got up, reloaded my earpods and trot walked back towards home, huffing and puffing from my too tight lungs, feeling proud and smug about my first, very own, contemplation scene. Camera slowly spins away.

6/22/21

This morning, to my delight, I rose earlier than I intended. Way before my alarm. So I sat up and pittered on my computer for a moment waiting for the sun to fully rise, listening to a little bit of the Hot 8 Brass Band. Their juicy, jazz-sassy tunes always set my feet to an itchy steppin trigger and my heart to gigglin.

I danced around soft footed as the music played from my laptop, muffled in my unmade bed- for neighborly consideration taking the hour.

Once the sun had properly made the morning and I was safe from sketchy 5AM Hollywood who-knows crowd, I eagerly reached for my sneakers to take myself out on a walk, jog, or jaunt in the time I now had before I needed to set out for work.

I chose my costume for the outing- I prefer to think I exist in costume changes instead of needing to stick to any preconceived notion of how I should dress or who I should be. Which leads to some iffy outfits. And some really killer ones too. It’s a situational wardrobe seesaw I like to ride. Keeps one on their toes.

One time I cut my bangs too short, a little “ancient Rome” kind of style I like to think. They were short, straight and a little too long across. You might have called them, aggressive.

So I felt compelled to dress sort of like John Lennon if he were a woman until they grew out.

I took to wearing a wine/plum/borderline too-darkish shade of lipstick and dressed in lots of black. I looked very coffee shop. Mod, moody, maybe not, but maybe. And I probably had an opinion on whatever you were going to talk to me about, but in a very serious yet mellow kind of way.

Oh! Demi Moore.

That’s who I was.

Demi Moore from Now and Then. And John Lennon as a woman.

Anyhow, I was feeling spunky and thought I would wear high waisted spandex pants and a sports bra in complimenting but not too matchy shades and patterns of blacks and greys.

My pants weren’t fitting correctly, unintended for highwaisting, don’t think too long on that, and my face was kind of morning puffy. I contemplated more outfit changes to see what wardrobe might feel right for me, now, in this moment… but then thought I should just make the most of my time and get out of the house rather than changing four or five or seventeen (who’s counting) more rounds.

So I reached for my original outfit gray socks that I had unbundled and tossed on the floor by my sneakers. I pulled them on, enjoying how they felt, snuggly hugging my arches. I ran my finger under the tops of them, straightening out the elastic at the ankles and checked down briefly to make sure the lines matched up with my toes and OH MY GOD THERE’S AN F-ING ROACH ON MY FOOOOOOOOTAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!

I went into a spasmotic panic, wildly kicking my ankle as if to unhinge the appendage itself from my body. I shrieked in short, mad outbursts that came from somewhere deep within. My arms thrashed about and I did a full psychotic 360, flinging every extremity in some raging, exhausting state of adrenaline fueled panic.

I found myself 7 seconds later yelling, “I’M OK! NO ONE WORRY!” into my apartment, strangely concerned that someone might have heard my horror-film screams and been worried I was in actual danger.

I came to a stiff stop. Facing the sock now on the floor again. Hyperventilating, with my shoulders at my ears, hands tightly clasp together at my chest and toes firmly curled all the way under the pads of my feet, hugging each other for solace and protection, one sock remained on, and the other sat helpless to it’s horrible roach host on the other side of the room.

Hitchcock dolly zoom and violin screech.

OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD

I had projectile thrown it during my fit, and in doing so had turned it inside out creating a perfect pocket of protection for the, I honestly convulse thinking of the word right now, …roach… to lay hidden.

OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD WHATDOIDOWHATDOIDOWHATDOIDOWHATDOIDO

Knowing I had to act fast, I snapped myself from my state of shock, facing the fact that I had to do something about this thing quickly before it ran its awful little self out and into the shadows and evil, secret cracks to live on hiding in its dark nasty corners only to come out at night and stare at me from the far, upper, opposite wall of the room.

Oh my god I hate them so much.

I seized my shoe, shaking it frantically at a distance first to make sure another roach wasn’t waiting in the toe space to crawl out and onto me. Once deemed clear, I grabbed onto it for dear life and, possessed with some animalistic sense of survival, hammered it with a force and fury I did’t know I was capable of, onto my devil sock. Shrinking in fear and convulsive disgust after each pummel. Because the awfulness that creature hiding in there embodies, is unspeakable…

I was hysterically shrieking all the while.

I disposed of the socks with plastic protected hands into another plastic double bag and immediately ran it to the trash can, held away from my body, knotted securely at the top and pinching it with the smallest amount of skin I could use to keep it up.

I threw it into the bin and sprinted away, shivering in traumatic disgust.

Bllleeeeghhh! Ughghgh!

I went back into my apartment and whimpered. It was all tainted… why was a roach in my sock drawer? Maybe I should move.. Maybe I should clean every single surface and nook and cranny… but what if there’s a NEST! Oh my god what if there is a roach NEST and I open a drawer and they all spill out and cover me… Aaaaaaahhhh.

Oh my god, I think I have to move. No. That’s silly. No I should just clean everything, every-thing. Gasp! But my vacuum is at the back of the closet. And there isn’t a light back there. Oh my god. Is there a roach on me right now!? Ah! What is that!? Meeerrrrr… I’m sooo scaaared….

Hyperventilation set in again quickly, if it had even left.

I finally managed to unball my fists and uncurl my toes, thinking, whew, ok, ok ok ok ok ok, it isn’t going to do me any goooood staying here in my roach moteeeel. Just get out and go on your jog. Get outsiiiide and take your mind off of this whoooole thing….

Deep breaths and, I can do this. It was just a roach. Psh, I mean, come on, it’s not like they bite. Deep breaths Sims… Ok. I’m cool. I’m good. I’m cool.

I definitely needed a new pair of socks now, having thrown away the other ones entirely, and opening my drawer, quickly, just in case there were any others around… whew.. just socks… I fell upon a single little white one, all by it’s lonesome there on top of the others.

I recalled seeing his match next to my bed when I woke up.

Perfect!

Bet you felt lonely without your buddy- I thought to the sock plucking it from the drawer before slamming it shut and running away.

I eyed the other one on the floor and scooped him up. I turned them rightside out while I searched for my separated sneakers, feeling zen/mentally exhausted/in shock from the morning’s events. I thought about how grossly identifiable a roach’s color is and how you can tell OHMYGODTHEROOACHISINMYFUCKINGHAAAAAAAAAAANDAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHGETITOFFOF MEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

I threw every joint out of socket to get it away and ran into the bathroom, damn near busting back through the door as I rammed it closed with my entire body, to scrape my fingers clean and cry in horror, making who-knows-what-kinds-of-faces and noises. It must have scurried to the other sock while I was beating the other one into the rug earlier.

I regained composure. Sort of. And tiptoed to the doorknob. Turning it with the fear of the world in me and baited breath.

When I finally tentatively reopened the door enough to see, peaking quickly after each crack, I saw it sitting there.

In the middle of my hardwoods.

Dying or injured or just waiting there to stare at me as only a roach would.

I gained the courage to hurl my body over my bed and into to the kitchen to grab my broom for dear life. The rubber tip popped off exposing its hollow metal handle.

OHMYGOD, IS THERE A ROACH IN MY BROOMHANDLE!? ARE THEY EVERYWHERE!? IS IT ON ME. AAAAAHHH!!!

I threw my body to shake anything that might be on me off or kill it with my sonic level, stunted jerks.

I checked my back and shoulders wildly before hobbling back into my bedroom, feet curled into protectionary balled up stubs, wielding the broom. I held the handle in the middle, not wanting to be close to the exposed hollow hiding place where others might be waiting.

I smashed into its awful body and finally flung it outside. Panting and sweating and maybe crying a little.

It was still moving inexplicably when I screamed and propelled it into the alley.

Soooo…. the moral of the story is, I’m traumatized, roaches are the devil aaaand, obviously, I have to move immediately.

You’re welcome for the nightmares. I’ll be having them too.

I woke up this morning with a sickening feeling of regret and failure and shame but I couldn’t place the reason.

And then I remembered the reality that is November 10, 2016. The day after the day after our country’s progress was disassembled and huffed and puffed and blown right down to the ground. The day after the day after Hate sang shrilly to the top and blew out our eardrums in a fit of triumphant tyrannical jubilant rage. The day after the day after we stood still and watched numbly as our world as we knew it was kicked off its axis. He won. And our ears rang in silence and the night came despite itself.

I cried myself to sleep and cried myself awake. I tucked into my reading chair in the morning sun and listened to Hilary’s speech and wept for women and people of color and belief. I wrote a shaky sign on cardstock that read “I LOVE U” and pinned it to my chest and ran for two hours out in the world feeling scared and liberated and sad.

It is the day after the day after and I still don’t know what to say. But I do know that Love must win. And so I will continue to go out into each day and Love more fervently and ferociously that I ever have. Love with all the fire and depth and compassion in my soul. Love despite the pain, despite the sorrow, despite the injustice. I love you. I love you I love you I love you.

We can heal, we can grow, we can and will go high.

My Dad always taught me that I decide whether I have a good day or not, that there is never an excuse for being rude, and that “hey, you are the best one out there.”

To all the little girls, the nasty women, people of color, brothers and sisters of the LGBT community, fighters for love and peace and equality, to the many best ones out there, I love you. Let’s go!

11/10/16

I intended to leave the house around 9:00AM, have a nice little morning walk over to the library, do some work, take my time and collect poetic words into a meaningful, beautifully composed entry. Wow even myself with the stillness I would certainly conjure and the musicality of the piece that would hum and buzz and vibrate inside lifting sweet thoughts and emotions even I was unaware of feeling and thinking.

It’s 11:37. I’ve had nine cups of coffee, a good hour and a half of singing to myself in my house, a 45 minute call to my Mom, some instagram checking and have just sat down to tack down whatever words I can salvage out of the jumble that are my thoughts right now. It’s all just neon, band marches and Bobcat Goldthwait.

Which is great because now I need to go and get ready for a lunch date.

1/13/17

I grew up with a very close family. I saw my cousins so frequently they count as siblings. We ran around our childhood together making forts out of rusted planks and garden bricks, drowning each other in any body of water playing Shark and unabashedly ganging up together to take home every cake at every cake walk on every holiday. It. Was. Awesome.

Today I celebrate the golden light we got to grow up in and how damned much I love you guys. To the ripped denim jorts of summer, trash bag smocks of Easter and every Christmas Horn we tore each other down after. I couldn’t ask for a better collection of bright sparks to get to call part of my posse. I love you Hughes, Taylor, George, Lizzie, Baker, Graham, & Kathleen. Whatever drum beat we march to, I like it.

6/25/17

Radiolab has this mind-blowingly rad episode exploring the secret life of trees (http://www.radiolab.org/story/from-tree-to-shining-tree/). Research into the soil beneath has shown that trees actual communicate with one another. They pass along food, warn eachanother of fires or drought and if an elder tree is dying it will straight up sends its nutrition to the youngest tree on the block because holy shit you guys this world is incredible. Whaaaat??? The episode ends simply stating that the root system beneath our feet is undeniably similar to that of a brain.

Get. Out. Of. Town.

I think about that a lot, how much I can learn from trees. How they all survive because they are together, staying open, constant lines of give and take and communication. It’s just so awesome.

What if that is the secret to our own survival. What if I stop being the tree that can do everything on my own and start being a part of the forest. Noticing what is around me, who is around me, what are they doing, how are they doing? It makes me relax just thinking about it.

We are better because of each other. I myself am little without the lessons and laughter from my family in my heart, my cat who teaches me patience and love, my friends who teach me how to take a joke and show up on time, my partner who teaches me how to persevere and believe in myself, my community that teaches me to care… I am full because of all of those things, those people. They are who I am. I am not a tree, I am a part of the forest.

On the stage of my high school theater, Mr. Dragoo impressed John Dunne’s poetry upon us, having us recite daily from Devotions upon Emergent Occasions. Reminding us always to care for our fellows because our fellows are ourselves.

Gosh y’all. There are so many lessons right in front of me all the time, it is such a gift.

Thank you trees, thank you family, friends, Charlie, David. Thank you Radiolab, thank you Mr. Dragoo and thank you John Dunne.

“No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as any manner of thy friends or of thine own were; any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.” -John Dunne Devotions upon Emergent Occasions 1624

7/16/17

I RECENTLY SAW A CARTOON OR BOOK COVER OR... ICON ON MY SPONSORED LIST BELOW MY GOOGLE SEARCH FOR "MOTIVATIONAL LITERATURE" THAT SAID I DON'T KNOW WHAT I WANT TO DO BUT I KNOW THIS IS NOT IT. OR SOMETHING TO THAT EFFECT. AND I THOUGHT, YES. EXACTLY.

THERE HAS BEEN A LOT OF CHANGE IN MY LIFE IN THE PAST THREE YEARS, SAID EVERYONE RIGHT NOW BUT ALSO ME TOO. THE PANDEMIC SURE, BUT SINCE THE BEGINNING OF THE PANDEMIC I HAVE HAD NOT 1 BUT 2 CHILDREN. I HAVE MOVED FROM LA TO AUSTIN AND IN DOING SO I HAVE REDIRECTED MY LIFE TRAJECTORY BY SWITCHING CAREERS FROM ACTOR/STANDUP/WAITER/ HOME STAGER/ORGANIZER/INTERIOR DESIGNER TO JUST INTERIOR DESIGNER. AND NOW ALL OF MY TRUEST, LONGEST SERVING ADULT-LIFE FRIENDS ARE LONG DISTANCE. THINGS FEEL... WOBBLY.

AFTER HAVING OUR 2ND BABE, MY HUSBAND AND I WERE WANDERING AROUND OUR LOS ANGELES NEIGHBORHOOD WITH OUR THEN TODDLER, WHO WAS EXUBERANTLY COATING HIMSELF IN DIRT LITTERED WITH CIGARETTE BUTTS AND CAT POO, OUR FRESH NEW BABY IN OUR ARMS ASKING OURSELVES WHAT THE FUCK WE WERE DOING IN SUCH A HARDCORE CITY WE HAD NEVER QUITE GOTTEN A FOOTHOLD IN.

BOTH OF US HAD CAREERS TO BE PROUD OF BUT NEITHER OF THEM EVER QUITE BROKE OUT INTO ANYTHING MORE THAN I SLOW WALK. WHICH WAS HARD ON OUR SELF ESTEEM AND WALLETS AND LIVING IN LA, I FOUND, EXPRESSLY REQUIRES THICK, LUSCIOUS, UNENDING SELF ESTEEM AND A BIG, FAT, JUICY WALLET.

WE LOOKED AROUND OUR 900 SQUARE FOOT CONDO; THE BEDROOM WINDOWS THAT OPENED DIRECTLY ONTO THE STREET, ANCIENT AND RATTLING FROM OMNIPRESENT HELICOPTERS AND CARS. THE TIRED, DISHWASHERLESS KITCHEN ONLY ONE OF US COULD FIT IN AT A TIME. THE HOLE IN THE DINING ROOM WINDOW WHERE THE AC WAS RIPPED OUT OF THE WALL BY A UHAUL VAN. AND WE CHUCKLED DELIRIOUSLY TO OURSELVES THAT THIS TIRED, HAGGARD CONDO WAS VALUED AT OVER HALF A MILLION DOLLARS.

SO WE PACKED THE FUCK UP AND LEFT.

AND NOW I'M IN A NEW(ISH) CITY FLAPPING AROUND IN THE SCARY INBETWEENS. I HAVE LEAPT AND MY NET IS DOWN HERE SOMEWHEEEEERREEEEEEEE.

MY COMMUNITY NOT YET BUILT, MY CAREER NOT YET ESTABLISHED, MY BANK ACCOUNT HOLDING ON BY THIN, NEWLY-OPENED-LOW-INTEREST-CREDIT-CARDS-SET-ON-MINIMUM-MONTHLY-PAYMENT THREADS. I KNOW THINGS WILL GET BETTER. I JUST CAN'T QUITE SEE HOW YET.

I DO NOT FEEL ALONE IN THIS SPACE THOUGH. SO MANY PEOPLE I HAVE TALKED TO ARE EXPERIENCING THEIR OWN FLAPPY INBETWEENS. STARTING NEW JOBS, QUITTING OLD ONES, MOVING, CHANGING, QUESTIONING WHAT THEY HAVE BEEN DOING OR HOW THEY GOT DOWN THIS PARTICULAR PATH OR THAT.

SO AS I ROUND THE CORNER ON ANOTHER PANIC JOG AROUND THE BLOCK, AS I SOB HEAVILY IN THE PARKING LOT OF ANOTHER IKEA LISTENING TO THIS AMERICAN LIFE OR PULL MYSELF AWAY FROM ANOTHER SILENT SCREAM STUCK IN A THOUSAND YARD STARE, I EXTEND MY HAND TO WHOEVER NEEDS IT TO SAY, I AM WITH YOU.

TOGETHER, SOON, THE NET WILL FIND US. I THIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNKKKKKK.

06/07/2023