conversation with myself

tonight i finished reading a book. i finished reading a book on the blue feather couch in the living room. the couch reminds me of the renaissance. and on that couch, i cried. i cried after i closed the book. i was mourning the end of the story - because i'd been reading it for several weeks, and growing attached, and leaning on it for support, and going to it for connection, and then it was over. and the end was like a finely cut crystal with so many sides and reflective colors and i felt so alive and yet so claustrophobic and i wanted to scream and jump out of my skin, but i can't because i'm human. so i walked outside, down the dimly lit staircase and i stood outside for seconds, but i didn't even feel like i was walking, i was just there and it didn't feel the way i wanted it to feel. i didn't feel refreshed. so i walked back upstairs, and i continued to cry. and the tears kept coming, and i liked it. 

i can't really explain what happened. i was inspired, and yet shut down. i felt bound to something greater, and yet never more alone. the contradictions were too intense that i felt empty. and now i'm sitting in my bed with the television on mute because if there is ever any silence or a lack of faces i feel so utterly unpresent and uninvited and uncared for that i need to watch commercials without sound to feel like someone is watching me. to feel like someone is there. and i'm here typing these words, because something wants to come out, but i'm not sure what. 

and when i scroll through my address book on my iphone and look at the names of cherished friends, or people i've spoken to, no one really gets it and i'm not sure anyone ever will, and maybe people scroll past my name when they are feeling low and overwhelmed and they pass my number or maybe they hesitate over it and wonder if they should call, but they don't because i don't understand them. and maybe that's just the way the world works. 

i'm tired now. my eyes are heavy. my stomach's worn. the faces from the television screen beckon me, seduce me, tell me i'm not alone, but i am. those deceivers. those glowing thieves. stealing my time and my energy and my brain and my heart. but it's easier. it's easier with them. easier than crouching alone on the blue couch that reminds me of the renaissance after reading a bunch of moving words and having no one to experience it with but myself. and so in a sense, i am writing these words to myself. and in the end, this is just a conversation with myself. my self. me. mine. who? i don't know. some girl sitting here. hey. hi. hello. 

Things were never simple. But I long for the days when things were simpler than this.

one day you will read this

i didn't do it. i forgot again. i was insane. repeating repetition. over and over. i did it again. i let myself go. i let myself fall. and i forgot to look. and there was no net. just concrete. just pavement. i'm falling now. i see the ground. the cracks and indentations in the hard road. nothing to cushion the blow. no padding. i told myself "look before you leap" like a hallmark greeting card, but i was careless, and i forgot, and now i'm falling again and the winds slapping against my face and it's bruising me. and my stomachs jumping into my mouth and all i see is where i'm going and it's cold and bare and will hurt.

if i close my eyes, sometimes i think about you. i haven't met you. not yet. i hope you are there. you have to be there. you just have to. i close my eyes even when they are open. and i see you. and i feel you. your warm breath on my neck. your smile that spreads the sun. please find me. please be real. please exist. i've dreamt of you for so long. be my canopy. be a soft patch of freshly cut green grass. be a cloud. be sugary crystallized cotton candy that melts in my mouth. be velvet. be there to catch me.

be.

one day you will read this. our toes touching under cool sheets. our bodies melding into one. you will know me. you will know i need you to read this. and you will. and you will want to. and you will smile that smile. and you will have wisdom in your eyes. your pupils expanding as you read this text. and you will know me more. and you will like this and you will like me and you will like us and we will be.

we.

and we will live.

Neighborhood Watch: A story of two voyeurs

He had photos of Betty Page on his wall, he opened car doors for women, and he slicked back his hair. He did this with a wide-tooth comb and clear gel that he bought at the corner barber shop, that was almost out of business. He drove a standard, loved the smell of his authentic, vintage brown leather jacket, weathered from, well, weather, straight off of his grandfather's back, and he whistled while he worked. The funny thing was, as old-fashioned as he seemed, he loved technology.

He blasted oldies in his state-of-the-art headphones, as he tinkered on his computer, which was of the highest quality. He used electronics as though they were second nature to him. Plugging in and plugging out, turning on and turning off, staring at the blaring neon screen, animating figurines, turning numbers and codes into visual structures. Larry was a conundrum, a juxtaposition; he was a perplexing puzzle to those who knew him.

He puffed on a cigar, as he twiddled on his i-pod, marked his schedule in his i-pad, and calibrated the colors on his mac monitor. He was stuck between generations - intrigued by the fast-pasted, numerical, coldness of the age of technology, and held together by the warmth and simplicity of the 60's.

I don't know much about Larry. I can safely say my assumptions about him are correct though. I tend to be good at reading people. But I know he is only my neighbor. Sometimes I peer through my blinds, and I see him pacing around his room, or lying face up on his bed. I assume he must be thinking or listening to the radio - sometimes I hear voices coming from his speakers. I press my ear up against the glass, but I can't discern what they are saying. Sometimes I see him laugh, and his entire body shakes and his smile takes up his whole face. Sometimes I see him cry. I don't think he'd like that.

Once I came home from work, grabbed a bag of potato chips out of the cupboard, and stared out my window. Larry was huddled in a corner of his room, hugging himself, and sobbing. He kept fogging up his glasses with tears, taking his glasses off, cleaning them, and putting them back on. After about 10 minutes, he stood up, with a quiet calm, and punched his closet door. I dropped my bag of potato chips.

Larry was aggressive. I hadn't known. He smashed a huge hole into the door, and he shook his hand, and pressed his knuckles into his lips, because the blow was harder than he'd expected. But his expression was soft. I wanted to run over and ask if he was okay and tell him to settle down and to take a sip of water or maybe a walk or a cold shower and to clear his head, but then I remembered that I'm his neighbor, a girl he's never met. I thought I should respect him, so I walked away from the window.

Larry's outburst got me worried, so I decided to take a walk myself. I grabbed my keys and my walkman - I still listen to cassettes, myself, and I left. As I was walking along the pavement, counting the cracks, reading the graffiti, and tree-engravings scattered along my street, I heard a noise.

I turned around, and, of course, it was Larry. He'd fallen on the ground. I was paralyzed - this was the moment I had been waiting for, and yet, I couldn't move. I slowly approached him (after much personal coaxing).

"Are you alright?" I asked meekly. He nodded, ashamed. "Just stubbed my fucking toe, and tripped like an idiot". His language was vulgar. I kind of liked it. I had expected him to be charming or dazzling, like a Fred Astaire or maybe a strong, silent, intense type like Marlon Brando. But he was neither of those. He was just a kid. A guy who'd had a rough night, went for a walk, and stubbed his toe. He was real.

I was going to ask if he needed help, but I knew that would insult him. I didn't want to laugh for fear of mocking him. So I just stood, towering above his broad, manly body, and smiled. "Okay," I said. I turned around and starting walking.

"Hey," he said. "I know this is a stupid way to meet someone. But I've seen you. You live across from me, right? In that building?" He pointed directly to my apartment. I nodded, and blushed, hoping he couldn't see my red cheeks in the dark. "I'm Larry. Nice to meet you, Sh-". He stopped himself. He had started to say my name. He knew my name. He knew my name.

He knew my name.

Yellow Chalk

Yellow Chalk

She dropped her chalk on the classroom floor. It ricocheted off the linoleum. The white flecks sprayed into the air in slow motion. Her heart pounded through her chest and splattered onto the board. Her heart smatterings displayed for all her classmates to see. 

She wanted to dance. She imagined the light fixture, that Bobby always said looked like a “titty” becoming a disco ball. She pictured all her classmates in 70’s outfits dancing a choreographed piece, her afro reflecting specks of lights.

But this was not the disco era. It was the 90’s. And her overalls were covered in urine. And her hands were covered in chalk, the remnants of her embarrassment. She didn’t remember the words, she didn’t remember where she was. And all she could see were the faces. All the faces. And the mouths. Endless, gaping holes – dark, black holes laughing maniacally. Opening and closing.

Miranda remembered what her mother used to tell her. “If you fake it you can make it.” “Fake the confidence.” she thought. Pretend you meant to pee your pants. Pretend yellow-stained jean is chic. Walk to the nurse’s office like it’s a runway in New York. Act cool. Pretend you are fine, and you will be fine.

She got dizzy. And then she did something she didn’t expect. She started laughing. She started laughing so hard, that her mouth mimicked the rest of the classes. It was ridiculous. A 10-year-old girl, peeing in her pants, because she forgot how to spell omniscient. That was a hard word. She had to be kind to herself. And so she laughed.

She laughed at giving herself bruises after her father left. She laughed at being jealous of Sandra for her long, blonde hair and her beautiful smile that all the boys drooled over. And she laughed that she cared so much about winning the class spelling bee that she peed herself.

She looked at the floor beneath her sandaled feet. They stuck to the yellowed ground, wiped the tears from her eyes, looked at the still faces, took a deep breath and walked out the door. Then she started running. She ran so fast. Faster than she’d ever run before. Before she knew it she was in the playground, she sprinted past the swings where she almost had her first kiss with Jimmy, the class “geek” but she turned her head, past the foursquare where she skinned her knee and got her first scar, past the handball court where she learned what sex was, and past all the trees leading to the forest, where she realized she was different.

Miranda stopped at the bench. She heaved in and out. Her breath couldn’t catch up with her chest. She grabbed onto the splintered wood that made up the seat. She didn’t know why her feet brought her here. This was where it all happened. Where she ran after him on that steaming day in July. She saw his suitcases, leathered and worn, and his hand. It was deafening. Like a long tone. She couldn’t hear any other sounds, she couldn’t even hear the silence. She watched his hand and the bags disappear as the bus doors closed. And she never saw him again.

She blamed herself. And her mother did too, and her sister. She was the closest to him. Her father. And if he left, it had to be because of her. Because she wasn’t good enough. Because she didn’t beg enough. Because she did something wrong.

She sat on the bench, clenching her fists, closing her eyes. She wanted so badly to understand the world around her, why she was here, why people did what they did, what things happened. But she knew the answers would never come. She wanted rain to come and wash away her pain, and then the next day could be new and clean, and the air wouldn’t be covered in smog the way her head always was. Everything would be clear. Everything would make sense.

Miranda reached into her pocket, and pulled out the piece of chalk, and winced. 

The Plagued Seeker

Why am I always the seeker in Hide and Go Seek? I want to hide and I want someone to find me.

It must be because I am too impatient. I cannot wait, and the seeker always looks in the silliest places - places where no human could even fit. So as the anticipation builds, I, with much excitement, jump out of my hiding spot, which is dark and cold and lonely and frightening, and I say "here I am, here I am!" and then the seeker gets angry and says, "That's not how you play the game" and storms off.

I never was keen on rules.

cheeto puffs and cigarettes part II: they met indoors

Who she wanted to be

Who she was

She met him in a room. She didn’t remember which room, but she remembered the meeting took place indoors. He wore glasses that made his eyes look bigger than they were, which also made his capacity for listening, a sense of eagerness, appear magnified as well.  This was misleading, she later found out. He was not very much interested in her or what she had to say at all.

He did introduce her to a life of petty crime – stealing gummy worms out of the jar at Tug’s Candy Shop down on Main Street, pocketing small items as big as her palm at vendors on the Venice Boardwalk, and swiping bags of Cheeto Puffs off the counter at, well, any drug store, really. Cheeto puffs had become her vice now. They reminded her of something, but she wasn’t sure what. It was just a feeling - a mixture of excitement and comfort, the perfect combination. She smiled every time she saw that overzealous, egomaniacal cheetah staring back at her behind his big black shades. She smiled because she had given something ordinary, significance. And she felt quite profound whenever she did that.

His name was Pete, and he told her a story once – about how he had stolen a bag of Cheetos, the regular kind, when he was 10 years old. This immediately bonded them in a way she could not describe. Who knew that some chemically enhanced, metallic orange snack food could bind two vastly different people together?

Unfortunately, for both, the crunchy treat proved insufficient, and was not the glue that kept the two lovebirds together. She had wanted to play the role of Mary Astor in The Maltese Falcon. Luring the suave detective to her. But that was all a pipe dream that never came to fruition. According to him, she only shared insanity and intensity with Astor’s character. She lacked the intrigue, the seduction, the power. All qualities she could easily acquire and maintain if she wasn’t so damn accessible and desiring of love and attachment and warm embraces underneath the pier and cotton candy kisses and tender touches and giddiness about silly things and...oh femme fatales are not romantic! She had to remind herself. The femmes are cold and cruel, that’s how they get their men. She had to accept that she was not like that. And maybe it’d be the true crime to change. She could not eat her mate after sex. No. She could only cuddle.

She sat out on her grand-mother’s balcony, inhaling the nicotine, feeling it pollute her lungs, the disintegration of her whiteness, the impurity escape and transcend through her. She was staying with her grand-mother now, in the apartment she had once called her home and now called her celestial palace, with much sarcasm. The apartment was blue and that’s all you really need to know about it. She looked up at the stars and back down at her shaking, trembling fingers attempting to grasp the cigarette in a “cool” way. But it wasn’t cool. It was desperate. 

Looking up at the sky, however, made her feel strangely calm. Listening to the silence that wasn’t silent, all the quiet sounds suddenly became illuminated. The snicker across the street in the neighbor’s yard, the sexual panting next door, the typing of a keyboard, a distant bicycle whizzing by into the late night. But it was the moon. It was the moon that really soothed her. No, she didn’t believe in God. But she believed in Him. The man in the moon.

He watched her, looking down from his pasted position in the blackened sky peppered with salted stars.  He smiled at her sadly when she was in despair, wishing she would just hush. He was always gentle, always there, always watching. Always sympathetic, it seemed.

The balcony felt cold and claustrophobic. It kept closing in and in until she filled the entire rectangular space, the entire block, the entire town, the entire world with her thoughts and her feelings that she couldn’t rid herself of even when she talked it through with her grand-mother, her therapist, her friends, her former lovers (why did she fucking tell them?). Why wasn’t talking it through enough? GET OUT OF MY SYSTEM, her mind cried. But her system remained full. At all times. Like a beat boy’s blaring boom box – straight out of the 90’s.

She stared at the white circular pattern outlining the balcony - the barriers, as she saw them. Preventing her from coming and going, from leaving at will, protecting her through entrapment. She remembered how her cat would carelessly slither his body in and out between the circles, as if the two-story fall was non-existent. She missed her cat, Bowtie. His purr used to lull her into a rhythmic sleep. She envisioned his small grey face nuzzling into her armpit, and his tail swaying happily as he strutted along, owning that balcony – his very own runway.

Trying to erase this memory and all the others that made her stomach sick, she chomped on her cheeto puffs, ironically, smoked her cigarette, and pretended. She was calm and not claustrophobic and not scared out of her mind and agitated and antsy and sad and yearning and disappointed and stuck in a daily purgatory.

She pretended lots of things. When she was little she played psychologist and would make up stories for invisible patients and write down prescriptions to their problems on a legal pad. Now she pretended to be happy and stable. I suppose they tie into each other quite nicely.

She was fine, just fine. At least that’s what she told the world. At least that’s what her painted veil of a face said to strangers when they first met.  That’s what she told Pete, when they met indoors, in the room. But when he told her to be honest, it was like a lie detector test, and she couldn’t lie and the words came out and her skin came off and he saw her skeleton and her bruised bones and her imperfections and he did not embrace them like they do in romance novels or the movies. He said goodbye. And she cried because she was worried they always would. All she wanted was to hear hello, instead of goodbye. But maybe that was too much to ask. 

Five Fingers, Five Friends

Five Fingers, Five Friends.

Thumb was rotund and short, with crooked teeth and a furrowed brow. He had thick hair, baby blue eyes, and a sniffing nose. He liked to brood and take control. When a conversation went a way that didn't please him, he said so, and changed the subject. He had little man's complex and puffed up his chest to show that he was strong. Deep inside, underneath the layers of skin and cells, he was soft, or so I thought. Who is to say really?

Thumb and I met for drinks. The red candlelight enunciated his bone structure and his eagerness to get over his craving for Spanish rice. He licked his lips and talked. I was surprised because I thought he was a good listener, but maybe not tonight. He tried to kiss me underneath the moonlight, but I was hesitant. It could have been worse. It could have been better. But I did feel like I knew him for years.

Mr. Pointer was scrappy and intense, with deep sunken eyes and hair of amber. His face reminded me of a delicate skeleton's, harsh and vulnerable, bare and angry. Small nose, long lashes. Time had changed my range and motion with him. Began as a budding flower, then opened to reveal the pollen, and now the falling, browning petals. More like egg shells and shards of glass.

Mr. P and I spoke over the phone. His voice always sounded different, and thus I constantly forgot who he was until I heard the gravel on the other end of the line. Agitation and exasperation hung on his lips like dried saliva. He had a way of ending things without ending them. He'd slowly stop responding, give a curt reply, or spit out a sarcastic remark - all which shut me down. The seed was no longer a seed, but I wanted to keep the remaining petals from wilting. Not sure how, and he won't tell me. He thrives on secrets, though he claims not to keep any.

Mid was goofy and lanky. He towered over me and the other minions like the jolly green giant, except not green. He looked stoned, though he wasn't, technically. He was against the reefer, against alcohol, against chemical enhancement - this turned me on. We could talk for hours, but it was only a conversation after I asked it to be. He was kind and that was clear. In his touch and his hesitation to touch.

Mid and I met for a movie. It was the only time we could meet, because he lacked motivation and was stuck in a rut, literally. He lived in a pot hole, on the side of the road. The flick was fun and we laughed and I put my head on his shoulder and he awkwardly tried to put his arm around me. It was uncomfortable and he could tell, so he removed it. This was sweet, and I enjoyed the gentleness of the giant.

Ring had green eyes engulfed in blue and strong, yet feminine hands. His smile lines told the story of his heart, and made him incapable of having a winning poker face. Ring was chivalrous - he opened doors, paid for meals, checked in every day, gave practical advice, and genuinely cared.

Ring and I sat in the park. He wiped the black off my face with a damp touch. We laughed after time, but he was simple. In darker topics of conversation he got silent and giggled nervously and changed the subject. But maybe this was good for me. Maybe I need the ring without a tarnished jewel.

Pinky was short and disarming with round spectacles and a piercing nose that went well with his bright eyes. His openness, his experiments frightened me. He loved life, that was clear. He was an amalgam of movement and senses and sight and sound and touch. He would talk to a random stranger, and feel as though he were talking to God. Maybe he wasn't cynical enough for me.

Pinky and I danced together. We bobbed our heads to the beat - the only two on the dance floor. We sipped our bubbled drinks, encased in flutes, letting the glass clink together, but not our bodies. We stepped outside and the night went from light to dark, from fast to slow. The world stopped spinning and I hoped he kept his distance.

Those are my five fingers. They are connected to my palm. Each one different, with a separate purpose and function, some more necessary than others. And yet they all have wrinkled knuckles, painted nails of the same chipped turquoise color, blue veins, callouses, and tremors.

I think I'll cut all my fingers off with a sharpened knife, let the blood drain out and the bones fall to the ground. Without my fingers, I can still feel, I can still touch, my palm grazing against surfaces and skin.

I won't be able to attach, because fingers cling and hold and grab and pull. Without them there is no latching on, no tugging, no pushing away. Just touching.

But, I think that's all I need. Because if you don't attach, you don't have to let go, and then it doesn't hurt when there is nothing to hold on to but air.

Jar of Poisoned Memories

Inspired by Adele's song "Turning Tables" and also inspired by life and the subconscious, per usual.

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Next time, I'll be braver.
Next time, I'll be my own savior.

I had a dream that I was strong. That I belonged. To myself.
I dreamt that the waves crashed over me, covering me in a bath of clean, the crests white and frothy like a cappuccino, and you caressed my skin as though it were a baby's. I dreamt that we dipped our toes into the sand and it was wet and grainy and felt delicious. We laughed. I pinched you so hard you bled and tears collected in your eyes. It made me excited.
The next day you didn't call. Or I didn't answer. I won't know which, because I had tossed my phone into the toilet, or was it the ocean? I'll never speak to you or anyone again. I'll just skip in the grass garden of my heart, where leaves fall from the trees, and flowers smell like flowers, and honey summons the bees, and I feel serene. Then dark shadows came. I ran for shelter, but there was none. I saw you lurking, you wore a hood, and you didn't have a face. But I didn't fear you this time. I ran to you and scoffed into the dark, cavernous hole where your head should be. I laughed so hard I fell onto the ground and I rolled down the hill.
The day after, I sat alone, on a cloud. Or was it my pillow? I don't know the difference. When I am strong, I lose focus. I forget who I am and where I'm going, because I try so hard to be brave and to fight and to forget. I forget to forget. Remember to forget! I say it, over and over. Then I forget what I'm trying to remember to forget. I do remember I was sitting on white. I held my pencil to my lips, the eraser felt like a piece of bubble gum and I had to scold myself when I tried to chew it. My journal was empty. You were gone and so were my words. I tried to write, but the pencil had no lead. I felt you behind me. I breathed you in, smelled your scent, heard your beating heart. When I turned around, you slapped me. With your words, of course. So I stood up, and I took my pencil and I wrote hateful things about you, in capital letters, across the walls and the ceiling and then I bit off my eraser and spit it out so it could not be used. Then I remembered the pencil had no lead.
The following day, I sat Indian style, with a jar of jellybeans, searching for watermelon, with the fleshy pink insides - the way you liked it. I let the watermelon beans collect in the folds of my dress, and then I picked out all the good flavors and left the ones you hated: cinnamon, buttered popcorn, and being nice. The next time I saw you, I was going to give this jar to you as a passive aggressive present. It made me giddy.
The next week - for days had passed of nothingness and so much that I can't recall any of it - I waited impatiently in the rocking chair. I rocked so hard, I fell right through to the wood floor. I stood up and paced around the room. You told me you'd come. You'd left a note on my door. A little yellow post-it  that said "I'll be there" - I had assumed you'd meant today. I thought I knew you. I thought you'd be here by now. But you weren't. But you're not. I guess you were only there when you wanted to be, not when I needed you to be.
A month went by and I was dry and bare as a turkey bone at the end of a big Thanksgiving meal. I wandered off the plate looking for my meat, but it had been eaten by the fat uncle who always sat at the end of the table and demanded the leg. It was swallowed and digested, and I had to accept that I was a mere bone now, about to be tossed to the dog. I scampered off the table, or I suppose I fell off, and succumbed to my fate of entering a slobbering mouth. This wasn't very brave, this wasn't very strong. I had failed.
A year's gone by. That's funny. It makes me smile. But when I look in the mirror, I look like I'm smelling a bad smell, because the smile looks forced and my nose is scrunched and my eyes water. I guess it's not funny. A year of trying to be a man, a pirate, a warrior has gone by, but I'm a withered, unwatered fern leaf. I'm brown, not green, and I've fallen off the plant. I wonder what's happened to you. I only imagine because we don't speak. I thought we were connected, so I guess. And when I see your hands, and the way you walk, and your feet under your sheets, and your blinking eyes, it feels very real, but it's not. If you were a figment of my imagination I could control you. But unfortunately you're real. I think. So I have to let you go, and free you. Once my budgerigar, Sky, was let out of his cage, and his wings weren't clipped so he flew out and he never came back. I thought he loved me. The next day it rained. I was certain he had died. He didn't know how to survive. My mom told me he probably flew off to some exotic tropical land and was eating banana chips. I cried and cried and felt abandoned and angry. We should have clipped his wings, but we were trying to spare him.

Next time I will inflict the pain.
Next time I will know better.

Left-Overs

This is funny. And it's happened before. I opened my old creative writing folder on my laptop, and found this gem - this heart-wrenching love splattering that I wrote over a year ago. It's funny because since I have written this, I've felt the same thing about 4 more times with 4 other people. I just find it slightly amusing that life is a cycle, where we are constantly putting ourselves into similar situations (whether it's conscious or not, I don't know) or repeating actions over and over again. It's a sad kind of observation, because these aren't necessarily good actions. This passage is about feeling like left-overs, about feeling like I've been discarded for something better, about feeling unwanted. I've felt this over and over again. It's funny...but it's not. 

Regardless, I like the rhythm of this piece, because it was raw and it's the way my brain works - constant and punctuated and on-going. I am assuming and some-what hoping the subject of this passage is a universal feeling, which is why I will post my vulnerability for all the world aka my mom and the 3 other people that read this blog (ha). If nothing else, hopefully I will come across this later in life and have a soft pity for my old self. The future me, having experienced true care, will smile with withheld tears and compassion for the old me who suffered so when it came to love, knowing that it got so much better, and so much easier with time, wisdom, and age. Let's hope. Fingers crossed.

WARNING: This piece get's emotionally intense and depressing. But we all have those moments right? Yeeeeesh. 

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I saw her today. It was jarring. I didn’t expect to see her. I didn’t want to see her.  I didn’t know she’d be there. I was caught off guard. Unawares. I didn’t know you still felt that way about her. Whatever way that is. I didn’t know you still felt it. I didn’t know that feeling, whatever it is, still coursed through your veins, like tobacco on your lips after a cigarette. I thought you’d given up the addiction, if that’s what it was. Who knows. What do I know? I know nothing. So I’m forced to guess, to estimate, to guestimate. I’m left to analyze, to wonder, to scrounge for details. I’m left searching my brain for memories and words and bits and pieces so I can put together this puzzle that doesn’t even matter. I’m racking and ranting and reveling over you and this girl. Why? I saw her today, and I didn’t expect to, but I also didn’t expect to feel anything. I thought I was over you. Maybe that’s where the shock comes in – not that you are not over her, but that I’m not over you. I feel like left-overs. The kind you don’t eat the next day, but that sits in the refridgerator for days, until the whole kitchen starts to smell, and finally someone throws it away, like you threw me away. I was her left-overs. I was your left-overs? Whose left-over was I? Regardless, I meant nothing to you. I was just some distraction. I was temporary, momentary. Like a blink, a wisp, a breath of air, but an inconsequential one, like a sigh, an unnecessary one, like a gasp. Not even a gasp. Gasps are too momentous. It hurts. I won’t deny it. It hurts to not feel wanted or needed or desired or thought about. It hurts that you could have me, but choose not to or don’t want to. You did have me, but you didn’t like it. It wasn’t your thing. Me. I wasn’t. I wasn’t your thing. I was just sort of there, for amusement. It was nothing. I guess I knew it was nothing and thought it was nothing too. Until now. Now I’m reveling and racking and wondering and pondering and analyzing and questioning and fantasizing. What are you two doing now? I bet you’re making love. Is it sweet or sour? Do you like it or is it out of habit? We are creatures of habit, you know. Since I’m pessimistic I bet you like it. A lot. I bet you are so happy. With her. I bet you never think about me. Some girls aren’t like this, I realize. Some may find ways to make themselves feel better – may think you are unhappy or feeling neutral with this other girl, this “other woman”. But not I. I don’t. Why do I make myself unhappy? Why do I choose to make myself unhappy? I think I’m being realistic. But maybe I like being miserable. Maybe I like feeling “bad”. Who knows. Who cares. Who gives a fuck. You certainly don’t. I bet you haven’t thought 2 seconds about me since we last saw eachother – since that fateful day when I gave myself away to curiosity, sex, and you. Since I gave myself away to temptation, and destruction, and self-loathing. Since I gave myself away to someone who didn’t even want me. Good thing I didn’t give all of me. Good thing I didn’t fall in love with you. Now that would have been disastrous. People say things are more complicated than they seem. That we never know what goes on behind closed doors, and we never will. But maybe we do know, but are too scared to face it. Maybe I face it and that’s why I’m left feeling empty inside. I don’t think this is more complicated, though I wish it were. I think its plain and simple. I’m thrown away left-overs, that you haven’t thought about since you took the trash out. You’re eating at a fancy restaurant now, your favorite restaurant, the one you’re a regular at – and you are loving every minute of it. Well guess what, I still exist. I’m still in the garbage can, right where you left me. 

Drowning in Cake Batter

I forgot that other people, aside from my mum, may read this blog. One such reader asked why I hadn't updated in a while. The truth is, I've been too busy and in my spare time, I do a lot of thinking...not so much writing. Recently, the business has settled a bit, tho the hiatus shall be brief, and the wallowing in my sorrows has started to come back. And, obvi, whenever that happens, I take to the pen, or the keyboard...So here is something cheery. NOT. Here is some free-form about how situations are always so much bigger and more complex than they seem. About how people we have relationships with often stand in as symbols for something of greater meaning, like our psychological make-up or something in our past, or our "character flaw". If only everyone understood that, and stopped thinking I was a middle school girl who loved talking about boys. It's not that, you dim-witted ninnies. It is so much more.
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I miss something that wasn't there. Someone who wasn't there. He plagues me - Loneliness...and he who shall not be named. Men who have too much power over me, who control me, who lure me with their fingers into a trance. Men who I long to possess and whom I obsess over. Men who were never there and are not there still. Who show their face than remove it. Who taunt me and tease me and then say it was nothing. But to me it was. How silly of me. To think of men when others think of politics or school or interior decorating. I think of men. That is my weakness. I think of how they are not there and how I want them to be. How I want to fix it, change it, scrape it up, ooze it out, melt, cry, be held. Why doesn't anyone love me? "Because you don't love yourself". No. I don't love myself because no one loves me. What is life without love? What is life without being needed, without being wanted? What is life if you just exist for yourself? It is empty. It hurts. It is not enough.

Scrape the remnants of the bowl and lick your fingers. It'll satisfy your taste buds for a minute. And then when it settles, you'll crave more. But the bowl is empty, the ingredients gone. No, this is not souffle, you fool. This is my heart. This is my fucking guts, we are talking about. My bottomless-pit of a stomach that aches and yearns to be full and filled and forever satisfied. Never enough. It's a wonder I am not obese.

Stuffing my face with fruitless attempts at love. At stolen, contrived, pulled, contracted moments of faux emotion to feel a glimpse of reciprocity that isn't even real. So that when I watch two people in front of me, holding hands, touching her knee, rubbing his back - it doesn't hurt as much because...I had that...once.

I can't be alone. It is not boredom. It's the inability to distract. The sounds and thoughts and perspective drown out the world. I can't see or hear reality, just my beating heart and the wind in my ears, whistling, and the obsessive thoughts and the wandering thoughts and the thoughts and the thoughts and the thoughts. STOP.

I can't.

Unless you're here. Whoever you are.

The Clock

I wrote this poem, and for some reason it makes me laugh. I don't usually write in rhyme scheme or write poetry about men wanting to die. The whole concept is just bizarre. Maybe it's the "woh, woh" ending, maybe it's because it reminds me of those chain e-mails from the nineties where if you didn't send it to 10 people something terrible would happen to you, and the poems were always corny and written by a middle schooler. Regardless, I kind of like this piece because I don't typically write like this or about this subject matter, and I think it's important for artists to step outside of what they normally create. So here it is...I'd say enjoy, but that's not really the point. This is about our survival instinct, about fighting to die, and then fighting to live. This is about feeling trapped between life and death - wanting both. Being stuck in daily purgatory. Oh jeez, I'm getting dark. Just read the poem. 

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Tick tock goes the clock

He wonders when this will stop

Bang bang goes the gun

Shoot it now, shoot it son

Bullet penetrates the skin

Piercing, pulsing, blood within

Red runs down his chest and cheek

He stumbles, he slows, he feels weak

Gravel and cement becomes his bed

But now he doesn’t want to end

Frantic, pacing, adrenaline

Grabbing onto life - must win

Someone help me! Someone, please!

Save me, love me, I’m on my knees

It’s too late, the clock’s run out

His cries are unnoticed, no one hears his shout

He is gone now, from this earth

He chose to leave, he had no worth

Now

I haven’t written about you yet. I’m not sure why. I’ve written about many of them, but not you. Did you not inspire dark emotions? I thought you did. Did you not reach my core? I felt it sink. Or is it simply because I feel too much and will not allow myself to delve into the depth, as I usually do?

Let me write about you now. Let me write about your small eyes. They did not peer into my soul, but I think they yearned to. And your thin lips, which at certain angles looked plump and full and I wanted to pounce on them like pillows. I liked the way you moved your hands. Your fingers were long and thin, but strong, and your wrists held them firmly when you waved them around as you spoke. Your body - lean and fresh, tight and tasty. I liked to grab your arms and stroke your smooth skin. Did you like to touch mine? Your teeth were like tablets, straightly aligned, your nose protruding like he wanted to be heard and seen, your hair was slight and wispy, like a warm summer breeze.

Let me write about you and me now. Let me write about us. Did such a thing even exist? It feels so surreal to me. Our first kiss. When you made me laugh. When you saw the freckles in my eyes, as the sun hit them. When I cried in front of you. When you held back your own tears and my heart leapt because your emotions were dancing in front of me. When you first took my hand in yours. When we looked at art, and sat in a movie theatre, and had a picnic on the grass, and you brought me yellow roses, and I beat you in Boggle, and you beat me in cards and we wrestled like siblings. When I borrowed your clothes and wore them to work. When you lit candles. When we danced the tango, naked, in your room. When you stood behind me, your hand wandering up my dress, as I stirred brownie batter in the kitchen. When we joked about gnomes and lumps and other silly things. When we hiked to a waterfall. When you stroked my back early in the morning as I slept in my twin bed. When you forced me to eat tuna fish. When I expressed my fear and you held me. When you didn’t say anything.

Let me write about what’s left of me now. We are no longer. Just me. And you. I feel broken. I do. I feel abandoned. I feel…unhappy. Why didn’t you want to jump for me? Why did you lay in the lawn chair, sunbathing, as I was drowning in the pool? You watched my body slowly sink. You didn’t care to save me. All I wanted was to save you.

You still exist. But now you live somewhere far away. Somewhere I am not allowed to go. I have been banished, exiled from the place I called home. I don’t know if I want to go back. An evil ogre lives in that land. An ogre who told me things I didn’t want to hear, who hurt me, who didn’t listen to me, who didn’t want me. A gentle lion lives there too, one whose purr comforted me in times of sadness, whose strength made me feel safe, and who gave me great joy.

I tried to sneak back once, back into this forbidden forest. They kicked me out – the guards. They grabbed me by my frail wrists, tied them together with twine, and shipped me back to my jail cell. So here I am. Sitting, wondering – do I rot behind these bars, within these four walls? Do I try to escape once again and return home? No. I will look beyond the barriers and find myself again. 

Teddy Bear

I have a teddy bear that my mother gave me before entering college. He has scruffy golden fur, a red knitted sweater to keep him warm, a loving, moldable body, and innocent eyes. I feel very close to this teddy bear, whose name shall not be revealed for anonymity purposes (he is quite skeptical about blogs, and is in fear of attracting stalkers). Anyway, as you can tell, this teddy bear has quite the personality. Sometimes, when I make my bed, I tuck him in with the comforter and he waits patiently, alert and ready for my return. Other times, when I am in a rush, he lies, contorted and hurled across the room, sometimes on the floor, sometimes hidden under crumpled sheets. But nonetheless, he is always there. My teddy bear meets my friends, especially the special ones...you know, the ones who sleep over. He tells me which he likes the most. It is a kind of a ritual, with my special friends, to make my teddy bear dance before bed time, move his limbs around whilst listening to a random shuffle of music. It is a fun game I like to play with my pals. I like to observe how they treat my teddy bear. It says a lot about their character. Some friends are crude with teddy. They sexualize him and force him into uncomfortable and inappropriate positions, for a laugh. We don't think it's funny. Teddy and I. Well...sometimes I do. Other friends go more along with Teddy's persona, making him dance awkwardly and out of sync with the music. This is how I think my teddy bear would dance. He doesn't really have a good sense of rhythm. Sorry, Teds. But, it's true. My teddy bear is an extremely good nuzzler. NOT cuddler, but nuzzler. He fits perfectly into the neck/shoulder crevice. I like to put him there. I like to force other people to put my teddy bear into their neck/shoulder crevice and see how they respond. If they think I'm strange and refuse, that is a check minus in my book. If they oblige and find my attachment to my stuffed animal endearing, we have a winner! Once, I was lying in bed with someone, and we were playing with my teddy bear and he told me that it smelled like me. It doesn't sound romantic, but to this day, I find it one of the sweetest things anyone has ever said. Up to that point, I didn't even know I had a "smell". I do not wear perfume, nor do I shower with any fragranced body wash or shampoo. For him to recognize my smell, and then to notice it on my teddy bear was something so intimate. It meant he cared. It meant he felt close to me. Whenever I nuzzle with my teddy bear, I think about that moment. I put my nose up to his soft fur, sniffing intently, hoping to get a whiff of my "smell". But to no avail. I smell nothing. Well, not nothing, per se. But I don't smell anything distinct. I wish I could speak to that friend again, ask him what my smell reminds him of, so I would at least have some vague idea. Teddy misses him more than I do, actually. He told me so. My teddy bear has favorites, just like you and I do. That boy was his favorite. He hasn't really liked the others.

how do i feel?

a little poem from a little person on a little day...
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i feel random
i feel rickety
repugnant
resounding
resolving
resolved
grounded
disgruntled
disintegrating
denegrated
violated
vulnerable
viable
affable
laughable
lightable
lickable
loveable
listen
to
me
it's
hard
.

Words Forgotten

Words Forgotten

This poem was written using excerpts from an ongoing, organic conversation I had with a friend. I did not change much - except for the order and some pronouns. I guess we see life poetically, when we speak with one another. I find it quite beautiful. I hope you do too. The sad, or silly, thing is, if it were not for technology we might not remember the sweet words we have said to each other. So I suppose, for once, I thank my cell phone and my computer for saving my messages.

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Think

           About the ocean

                        The undulating waves

                                  It will make your heart smile

You are at the beach

            With the girl

                        She has almond eyes

                                    And an upper lip shaped like cupid's bow

You lie on your bed

            Playing with your toes

                       Watching the fan make shadows

                                   Across the ceiling

I would have enjoyed the daylight with you

            But instead I am excited

                        Excited for our friendship

                                    Maybe it will fulfill me

Our conversation was comforting and warm

            You played with my hair

                        I touched your face

                                 It was wonderful

I have the urge to say I love you

            Even though we are so far from that

                        I have so much love

                                    For you

I thought you loved me

           In our mesh, mushy bubble world

                        Of no memory

                                 You do love me

           

I have so much to say and yet

           I’m speechless

                      Let’s adventure

                                Was this morning even real?

cheeto puffs and cigarettes

Dark times inspire dark writing. I don't have much to say as a precursor, here. Just that as humans, we beat ourselves up for things, sometimes for things that weren't even our fault, or sometimes for reasons we can't quite discern. I guess life is a constant struggle to love yourself and treat yourself well and learn what you need. Some people learn from the mistakes of others, and some must learn for themselves by repeating mistakes over and over again. It's all a journey. And with every journey there are battles. I must thank a dear friend of mine for giving me the title of this piece and thus encouraging me to write the rest. You know who you are and I love you.
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cheeto puffs and cigarettes by victoria rose

Her hands smelled of cheeto puffs and cigarettes. It was a strange, repugnant combination – one of self-destruction, of sabotage. She was out to commit a crime. She was out to be an adulterer…to herself. It was her first cigarette, her first pack. She held the limp “cancer stick” up to her lips, pretending that she was Greta Garbo. She stared at her pale reflection in the car mirror as she puffed and blew the smoke out through her chapped lips. She wanted to pollute her lungs, pollute herself. But she also wanted to be romantic.

Why did she want to hurt herself, you ask? She didn’t really know. This was new to her, this form of self-mutilation, this desecration. Up to this point, punishment came in the form of casual “sexcapades” – ones that made the emptiness deeper and more tangible. She would get lonely, search through her cell phone address book, pick a number at random, invite herself over, fool around while fantasizing about the man of her dreams, and leave feeling less fulfilled and less desirable than before. Now she wanted something harsher.

An innocent, she wanted to corrupt herself with things she’d scoffed for years. She was the kind of girl that thought drinking was a conformist act, didn’t understand smoking because "it is clearly carcinogenic," and refused recreational drugs because she was hyper-sensitive– she didn’t need a chemical alteration to feel creative and found it less legitimate, and almost a form of cheating when other people did. Now, here she was, driving aimlessly around Los Angeles, at 3:30 AM, because she had nowhere to go, nowhere to turn, with a pack of cigarettes in hand, looking for a drinking buddy, and fantasizing about doing something big. She was actively searching for the big, bad, wolf instead of meandering along to her grandmother’s cottage unaware of the darkness existing within the forest.

Her home was hell, so she couldn’t go there. In fact, she felt she had no home at all. Every enclosed space bred claustrophobia, and every outdoor one made her feel small. At a loss, she parked on a random neighborhood street. She had intended to go to the beach, but realized midway through the drive that parking would be a hassle, and strange men might lurk in the shadows. While she was feeling destructive and dangerous, she didn’t have an immediate death wish.

She stood outside, leaned up against her car door, stared up at the darkened night sky and the few and far between dull, twinkling stars, and puffed on her cigarette. It wasn’t lit. She used the cheap red lighter she had bought at the Shell gas station, along with the Parliaments, and the cheeto puffs, and a pack of gum, and where she exchanged her self-worth as currency, and watched the flames burn down the paper. It looked strikingly beautiful.

She put the cigarette up to her lips, inhaled, exhaled, and felt a bit calmer. Hurting herself made her feel better. Even though it wasn’t physical pain, it was “bad,” conceptually, and for some reason that made her feel peaceful. She was so accustomed to being good. And what good had it done her?

She opened the bag of cheeto puffs, and crunched down on one, the cheese collecting in between the indentations of her molars. When did life get this convoluted? She wondered, almost aloud. It’s always been difficult, but when did it get to the point when others hurting her wasn’t enough, that now she had to resort to self-sabotage? She threw the cigarette onto the slicked pavement, channeling the femme fatales in the forties, stepped on it with the tip of her sandal, and sighed. She got back into her car and decided it was time to get wasted. No more aimless driving, no more aimless thoughts. Decisiveness. This girl will self-destruct in…3…2…1…

Blast off.

The Birthday Party

The Birthday Party

The Birthday Party was written at the Stanford Discovery Institute, the summer before my Senior year of high school. It is a vignette describing a birthday party from a third-person perspective, and then from one of the character's points of view AKA first-person narration. Strangely, later in life, this past year, I made a short film entitled: Karl's Big Day which is strikingly reminiscent of this written piece. (You can view Karl's Big Day HERE - if vimeo asks for a password, type in KARL) Anyway, I had completely forgotten about "The Birthday Party", at least consciously, when I made this film. So for some odd reason, drunken clowns, the subject matter for both, have a penchant for floating in and out of my mind and making their way into my creative works. I haven't quite delved deeply enough to figure out what this represents or why I care about this figure so much. Maybe you, Reader, will solve the mystery of my obsession with the fallen funny man. Enjoy.

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The Birthday Party: 3rd Person

Mara clenched her 5-year-old fist around the 3 apple-red balloons. Her innocent cherub face was covered with a huge grin and 2 dimples that her papa called "craters on the moon". This wasn't any ordinary sunny west coast day; it was her birthday. A day of laughter, black and white cake, and boxes wrapped in colorfully printed and checkered paper. Mara was especially excited about this particular birthday celebration and she could hardly go to sleep the night before due to the sparks and flutters in her stomach. Her papa had promised that this party would far surpass her previous ones. Not only would there be party games such as "pin the tail on the donkey or "musical chairs", but there would be a really funny clown - the clown that went to Sally McDougal's 5th birthday party and the other overly privileged, rich girls from Mara's school. Mara and George (whom Mara called Papa) lived alone and in terms of material wealth, were struggling. Their home, covered in ivy and bug spray, and reeking of an unidentified musty odor, was barely presentable. The cream-colored paint was chipping, but it had character. George worked as hard as he possibly could and wrinkles had started to form on his always-sweaty forehead. He had crow's feet around his eyes, making him appear gentle and kind. He worked at a small insurance company in Inglewood, but most of the time the clients were so impoverished and distraught that he provided service free of charge. However, no matter how kind-hearted or hard-working he was, George never felt adequate enough. He had to be the mother and the father, the provider, for his dear little Mara. George could only imagine how difficult it must be for Mara to not have the warm, soothing coo of a mother's voice or the loving, tender touch from a mother's arms. He wanted to make the world a better place for his daughter and if he hired Craig the Clown and spread a little joy and light into Mara's face for one afternoon he would feel that much closer to success. So, he had pulled together all his spare change, which he kept in a tiny glass jar under the kitchen sink. For years he had saved up: searching through dirty couch cushions, and on hot pavement, for pennies, coins that would accumulate to the grand total. And finally, they did. Unfortunately, here he was, standing on the porch, with those worried wrinkles getting deeper and more defined. It was 3:00 PM and Craig was supposed to have arrived at 1:00 PM, right after lunch. He alternated glancing at his tightly fitted black wristwatch that his father had given him and at the smiling, glowing face of Mara. He was lucky one of the mothers had taken the reigns and lead an elongated group game of hide-and-go seek. Should he tell Mara that Craig the Clown wasn't coming? No, he did not want to see the disappointment on her precious face. Should he wait longer? No, that wouldn't be fair to all the guests. The parents' backs were starting to sag and their phony smiles were starting to fade. Sighs were coming from the children who were patiently waiting on the grassy lawn, the ones who opted out of the communal game, tired of playing, wanting to see this commodity, this climax: Craig the Clown. But not little Mara, her face stayed in a permanent grin. She was hopeful, and she waited happily in anticipation for what she thought would be the greatest day of her life.

The Birthday Party: 1st Person

I really just didn't want to go to work today. I am sick and tired of driving all around town in my shitty old van. By now, I hate little kids, which I never thought was even possible. Their runny noses, the dirty diapers, the endless crying and red little faces. They really get on my last fucking nerve. I know I sound like an ass, but after 20 some odd years of going to kid's birthday parties and wearing a big-ass red ball on your nose, and huge shoes that you trip in constantly, you would feel the same way too. This morning, after swallowing some pills that are supposed to cure a hangover (that shit never works but I keep taking them any way), I put on my orange wig, and my "clown clothes", which by the way, I don't think I've washed in about 2 months now. Honestly, what's the point? I feel pathetic. I just had my own birthday a few days ago. May 8th. And I turned 40. Maybe this is my mid-life crisis or whatever Dr. Phil or those other people talk about on TV. Whatever. Even though I didn't feel like plastering on my famously happy "Craig the Clown" face, I dragged myself to the van. I sped on the freeway, driving about 80 miles per hour. At least my piece of shit van can pick up speed. I took the Rosita Street Exit that was posted on the big green sign and I turned onto the street. This was the poorest neighborhood I had ever gone to. Most people who hire me are these rich pretentious bitches who spend their husband's money. That's why I never got married. Too much responsibility, not enough time alone. I parked my van far away from the actual house, hoping that the air might clear my head. I needed to prepare myself and practice my signature "Craig the Clown" laugh. They don't pay me the big bucks for nothing. My laugh is the shit. I've worked on it for years. I've developed it, honed it. I guess I'm kind of proud of it. Wow. I really am pathetic. Anyway, I took one clunky foot step after another, I hate those fucking shoes, and stopped when I saw bunches of red balloons tied onto a fence surrounding THE crappiest house I'd ever seen. I mean, my apartment looks like a fucking mansion compared to this. I stopped behind a big oak tree in front of their house because I wanted to get the general feeling of the party, see how many people were there, see if there were any whores who might give me a blow job or something after the party. Some women are like that. You would be surprised. They get a thrill out of blowing a clown. These married women, man, I'm telling you. Pretty fucked up. I saw the little kids sitting on the lawn, the parents lined by the "refreshment table, talking "amongst" themselves (yeah I got a proper education, I know grammar), and then I noticed the dad. The parent is always the one who looks worried. I tried to find the birthday kid; I had forgotten whether it was a girl or a boy. Normally he will have a party hat on or he is extra loud and obnoxious, but I didn't see anyone that stood out. After scanning the party, I saw her. I hate to admit it but she was really cute. Smiling and everything, looking real sweet, unlike the bratty kids I usually have to deal with - you know, the ones that yank my nose off, or tie my shoelaces together; the ones that pop my balloons after I have turned them into dogs or flowers. I didn't see a mom anywhere. The mom is usually the one running around trying to set everything up, making sure everything is in order. That's when I remembered. This was the call my boss told me about, specifically. It was the little girl who lost her mom in the fire a few years ago. I felt like such an asshole. Here I was, this 40 year old clown, hiding behind a giant tree, spying on the birthday party I was supposed to be at 2 hours ago. I didn't know what to do. My head was pounding from the beer and grinding techno music from the strip club I had been to the night before. I felt like complete shit and I wanted to quit my job and stay locked up in my house watching crap TV shows like Jerry Springer or Roseanne. But here was this poor girl without a mom, waiting for ME. I didn't know what the hell to do. I could either go to the party despite my shitty mood or possibly ruin what this little girl thought would be the best day of her life.

Ode to an Orange

Written Sophomore Year of High School at L'Acadamie de Paris. Orange in hand - I was inspired to write this piece. The orange, of which I speak, also represents a person in my life. It's strange how spiritual a piece of fruit can be. Running your fingers across the indentations and marks, feeling the bumpiness of the skin or the peel. We take the beauty and richness of color, scent, and taste so much for granted in our daily life, but it is truly something to study. Here is your daily dose of vitamin C:

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Ode to an Orange

How did you detach from your stem, your tree, your family?

Were you plucked relentlessly when you weren't ready?

Or did you fall with a loud thud onto the soil canopy below?

Willing to leave, wanting to search and see

Seductive

Mysterious

With your simple peel

But inside -

Full of succulent some-what sour juice

With fleshy pulp that gets stuck in stained teeth

Refreshing, tempting

Desired on hot summer days after a roll in the mud

Strong

Independent

Inside you are soft

Bitable, chewable, easily shred

Vulnerable

Unlike your hard exterior

Of minor scratches and engravings

Scars, remembrances -

Of your journey

From the intimidating tree

To my warm, accepting hand

Schizophrenic Snow Globe Thoughts

The strange thing is...I don't even remember when I wrote this. I must have been contemplative and in a particularly dreary, angry, hateful mood. But the actual act of writing this, what I was thinking, what spawned this creativity-  is lost. I typically remember exactly why and how and what inspired me to write pieces - but this escapes me. This lapse of memory means something. What that something is? I'm not sure... I do remember hunching over the computer, and standing while I wrote - which means it was really flowing out of my fingers - that I wasn't censoring, and I wasn't thinking. But then again, I never really think about what I write - it just travels out,  like breath, like a long exhale, like a meditation. This is a fictional piece - with bits of reality, or realistic undertones/emotions I should say. But let me clarify one thing: I do NOT go into online chatrooms. Haha. Don't get me wrong - I did in middle school, when that was the "kool" thing to do. But I haven't gone into a chatroom since eighth grade when my friend and I fought over a cyber boy who was simultaneously flirting with both of us. Very dramatic. Oh, middle school. Enjoy the darkness. 

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Sometimes I trace your outline with my fingertips across the wooden floor. I close my eyes, envision your smile, the wrinkled lines by your eyes, and I laugh silently to myself. Sometimes, I'll lick an ice-cream cone, and the chocolate will get on my nose, maybe a few rainbow sprinkles, and I imagine you there wiping it off with a folded napkin, shaking your head at me. Sometimes I'll be talking to someone. I won't hear a sound besides the wind, whirring loudly into my ears, resounding and pounding like a drum. And I remember the way you would dance. 

No one knows about these thoughts. I don't tell anyone. I keep it to myself. I plaster a goofy grin on my face, nod at everything they say, and I listen. I listen to every word, but I don't hear what they are saying, because I don't genuinely care. I am only thinking of you. What you would say. Your voice is in my head, like a commentator from the horse races. 

Sometimes I worry that I've become schizophrenic. That the words I conjure up and form in my mind, though I know they are fictional or excerpts of things you once said, are not conscious. Then I have a Truman Show moment and wonder if anyone in my life is real. Once I lost my friend in a department store. I felt dizzy and light headed and parched. She was gone. I wondered if she had ever been there to begin with. Then she reappeared. But maybe I'm just that crazy person everyone stares at, everyone humors. I suppose I'll never know.

Sometimes I'll go into an online chatroom and pretend to be you. I say what I think you would say, laugh when I think you would laugh, be sarcastic or funny or rude or ill-tempered the way I remember you to be. It is my way of keeping you alive. Is that sick? Is that unhealthy? I know it is. But I continue to do it. 

Sometimes I'll sit under a tree, a giant oak or a tall fern, and pretend that you are dead. I pretend that you are a spirit, and that the soil and the earth underneath me, the wind blowing through the leaves, the fallen blossoms are a culmination of you. I talk to you, and people, passersby, think I'm in mourning. They think I have lost someone. I suppose I have.

Sometimes I get into my car and I scream and sob at the wheel. And at the red light the people in the car next to me look into the window, and I feel like I'm in a movie. They don't know why I'm crying, and they probably come up with far-fetched, ridiculous stories. In truth, I'm only crying about you - as inconsequential as you may seem. When I heave in and out, my chest pumping, my breath shortening and my eyes filled to the lid with tears, I feel calm, I feel real. I feel at peace with you. I feel angry with you. 

Sometimes I look at the moon and the stars, when I am walking alone at night. I tilt my head up and feel trapped in a snow globe, and I wonder when you are going to shake me up again. When is the snow going to fall? I don't see the sky expanding. I see it moving downward, closing in on me. But I feel connected to the moon. I wonder if you look at it too. I wonder if we look at the moon at the same time, feel a sense of reassurance, a sense of beautiful sadness. I wonder if we feel poetic at the same time, and close our eyes together and feel the breeze ripple through our hair. I'd like to think we do. 

When I feel contemplative like this, I often wish I had some place to go. A quiet mountainside by the beach, with padded grass and daisies. Without intruders. Just me and a checkered blanket. I would play with the strands of fabric, thinking to myself, looking up at the sky, looking down at the earth, wondering how we evolved, and you would come. You - my saving grace from the world, my saving grace from myself. You would hold me. You would tell me that everything would be alright. That I didn't have to worry anymore. That I didn't have to question the world. But when I did, you would give me your thoughts and they would provoke me to new, profound levels. And we would sit, on my red checkered blanket, huddled in eachothers warmth, until the sun came up and we didn't feel alone anymore.