Category: sathead

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truth telling

I can’t do anything about the ambivalence but acknowledge it. maybe I am too old. maybe too irresponsible or neurotic, too self-involved, flawed in a thousand, a hundred thousand ways. maybe I will worry myself to death. perhaps 100% of me is not entirely convinced that parenthood is the best course– no more staying up late noodling just for the hell of it, no more morning lassitude or wide open spaces of minutes to ponder the dilemma of self– god, I want a baby. it’s that bald, at times. at times, it is that basic, the desire to grow beyond the self, to forge a family alongside another thinking/feeling favorite person. it’s ridiculous, really– I can speak blatantly about my desire for a dog, but to admit my yearning to be a mother feels somehow unmentionable, awkward, at this point, in some lights, pathetic. it is a lot to admit. so dreams have spoken the truth I cannot utter for years– the fears and desires. I can’t bear witnessing my changing, aging body, because it heralds the passing of possibility. it’s not all I’ve ever wanted, and honestly many days I fear I’ve accomplished so little– but this one thing, on the verge of being taken from me, seems regrettable, if missed. I know there are a lot of ways to parent, many many valid ways. I have considered several of them, as alternatives. but the chance may not yet be gone to carry my own child in my body, concocted from parts of both of us– what a wonder! brilliant. I want that. I don’t want the opportunity to pass, in the course of things.

I realize this is a lot. I struggle with knowing I’m inclined to say too much, so I say nothing and end up feeling unbearably lonely and unconnected. I must write my heart or risk falling entirely to pieces. it’s a little sloppy, but the only thing that works.

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the problem with facebook

Sarah Townsend
… is feeling bittersweet, conflicting emotions as she views one niece’s posted photos of the eldest niece’s wedding this past weekend, which sarah herself was unable to attend.
… experiences a moment while brushing teeth in which the mirror face comments, sotto voce but unmistakeable, so-called bloom of youth vanished.
… ‘s boyfriend tickled her out of bed rather than allow her to wallow indefinitely in a weepy slump.
… often feels overwhelmed by the myriad glimpses of other people’s lives and psyches crushed together in the virtual realm.
… isn’t entirely certain to what extent she continues to “know” people she was once friends with in a different time and place.
… doesn’t altogether recognize, in a real, concrete sense, family members and other loved ones, when seeing them or reading them in decontextualized slivers.
… has an unsettling array of uncertainties and questions.
… is hyper-aware that depressives are a serious drag.
… settles too often for the too-familiar, too-human unspiffy personal truth.
… is mushing forward, struggling to feel okay.

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quotidian thrash

A Three Dog Life
A Three Dog Life

 

another fine book with “dog” in the title (no mystery why these jump off the shelf at me): a three dog life by abigail thomas– memoir most gracefully arranged.

my head is full of shards that poke me awake at three and four a.m.– at which point I’ll get out of bed, fed up with it, meander aimlessly from bathroom to kitchen, alight on the couch and sit staring, full of unreconcilable noise, simply fraught in the dark, until eventually exhaustion wins out and back to bed.

saturday we spent entirely out, unusual for habitual homebodies– downtown among the shamrock throng– we pursued our own parallel and unrelated course from cell phone store to lunch to art museum to secondhand shops to bar and so on, weaving through and among all those drunken costumed babies– girls crying into cell phones, boys hollering, singing, peeing in doorways– loud and incidental to our own daylong adventure.

we’ve decided to stay put for now, though spring is tweaking me– it’s the good choice, pull ourselves together in all the right ways for planned rather than haphazard forward momentum. practicing patience is uncomfortable. my mind hounds itself with buts and ifs, and it’s difficult to keep still and steady. my heart craves large, marked and decisive gestures, but is unable or unwilling to settle on a single direction for momentum and so thrashes against itself, pushing this way and that until it’s simply worn out.

the time has changed, so days are brighter and seem longer, which lifts my mood across the board– regardless the prospect of another year confounds.

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vertigo

I’ll be lying in bed, deep in the middle of the night, and will shift, turn my head on the pillow or roll my body to a new position, and the whole world suddenly tilts on its axis and wobbles there, uncertain of north. Heat washes over me, followed by nausea, and then I’m wide awake, trying to hold my head in a neutral position to make the tilting stop. The feeling is unbearable, so for two nights now I’ve ended up getting out of bed and sitting up on the couch, holding my head so carefully upright, tentatively on solid ground. Tomorrow I’m calling the doctor to get my ears looked at.

I have a fear of heights. I don’t recall any sensation of the world spinning as I looked down from a height, only sweating palms, racing heart, tunnel vision. When I was a child, I visited some family who lived near Niagra Falls in upstate New York, and we went to witness that great spectacle one unlikely icy day. All I can recall of the place is the elevator bank on the blustery observation platform, which I could not bear to step away from, and the high surrounding fence laughing back at me.

We used to go repelling off rock faces up in the wilds of northern Michigan. We’d scramble up the less vertical parts off ’round the side, and I vividly recall that feeling of freezing to the face, incapable of motion either forward or back, up or down, just hanging suspended there in the most hated position, my fingernails dug into some wet clump of moss, patches of lichen shearing away under my Keds.

Well into adulthood to this day I dislike malls with tall escalators stretching into wide open space, follies of some interior designer. I’ll locate an elevator, if I can, despite the swoop that lodges in my stomach—but if compelled to, I will ride those infernal ascents, heart pumping at the yawn of gravity at my back, fingers gripping the rail too hard, eyes fixed on the steps or someone’s back, anything solid, before me.

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due diligence

the deal is 200 words a day, at minimum, regardless of mood or weather. doesn’t matter if you walk in the door with nose dripping and right eardrum throbbing. forget about losing the street parking skirmish for the evening, ceding that spot, though you didn’t have to, to the guy who’d turned in that driveway just before you pulled up, who reversed and filled up tight on your tail flashing his brights as testament to prior claim– you could have ignored him, did for 10 or 15 seconds, aching ear, 20 degree weather and all, but then you thought about the roles reversed, muttered fuckit and pulled out, parking finally blocks away, grumbling the way home all hunched against the wind. doesn’t matter if you’re working for less than you think you should doing work with little meaning or appeal most days– you focus on keeping afloat, fending off the big questions, tasting moments, floes of grace in the grey expanse– you work, as they say, for the weekend, for the delectable companionship of off-hours with the warm soul who lies beside you in bed at night. you disregard the wind that rattles the window frames. you look for a light, even in your sleep– tell yourself to see it, that you’re the only one to rub the sticks together or strike flint. notes from the universe keep saying to raise the bar, startle yourself, try something new. you try. dreams are full of sinister families, strangers who stand too close, convoluted apartment building layouts. the checkerboard of windows across the way houses an unfathomable array of lives– the city baffles and overwhelms. you begin to feel old, without marks in the ground to show your progress. the big questions are unavoidable for long– unless you stay away from the page, fill your head with busy replaceable noise– but still they hover outside, whispering to be answered, or at least addressed.

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melancholia and other malarkey

the other day I wrote this line: “I grow older and older without knowing a single thing more.” it’s just that kind of winter, I guess, dragging on, you know. I was lying there, doing my due diligence to fall asleep, and then some strings of words wedged themselves in my consciousness– so I got up to throw out the net– sometimes tasty bits wash up– but this time the haul sparse and spiny. for one thing I fear I’ve developed an addiction to nyquil cough syrup, or maybe I just shouldn’t have had that cup of earl grey nigh on midnight. or fallen into bed at eight. all cockeyed. speaking of, my right tear duct squirts every time I blow my nose. in any case. the bare space here embarrasses, so I’m stuffing it with wadded tissues and dead fish.

here:

“the clock reads three sticks, and I long for small things to hold. it’s a wednesday that feels like a wednesday made of bisque– daylight salt-dusted and wind blown over frozen waves. I perched on the curl and peered for something suspended, witnessed only grit gone opaque in lake teeth set descending. I grow older and older without knowing a single thing more, am grown so brittle– though somewhere swims flashing scales, pooling eyes, if I could just thaw to it– somewhere grow dark ropey arms that sway to a warmer current and reach greenly for great swallows of sunlight.”

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ho ho holiday

good christmas morning, world.

I’m so happy I can’t sleep– so totally relieved to be off work until january 5– I’ve been desperately craving some good big swathes of uninterrupted time to just do whatever, mull, write, play at the art table, address christmas cards.

I woke up cold from a flock of dreams that immediately took wing and went and grabbed another quilt and lay waking for a few minutes just watching the steam from the heating unit of the building across the way float white across the dark sky.

last night chris and I opened a bottle of wine and agreed that we couldn’t wait for christmas morning, so opened our presents before dinner– my gifts to him were haphazard and necessary– sneakers, slippers, socks, coffee cup–  last-minute dispensable items to fill the space beneath the tree– because we’ve so danced around the issue of gifts with one another– while I’ve run around in my free moments to fetch and pack and ship gifts to family hither and yon, even little somethings for work colleagues, I ended up by and large neglecting to figure out anything special and surprising for my favorite person. I’m going to chalk this one up to my harried and aggravated state of mind lately and coach myself to move on, since he’s clearly not sprung about it– but it’s there. in contrast, my most excellent and handsome feller went out and got me an ipod touch, which I’ve slavered over for a year, since they gave one out at last year’s work christmas party raffle. wheeeee! a most excellent toy! it’s making me feel like a very lucky girl indeed.

yesterday I was thinking about the modern mythologies of this season– vividly remembering one specific night, lying in the radiant glow of street lamps through the window curtains, wide awake and determined to remain so long enough to witness santa’s arrival– I remember this, how determined I felt– in retrospect I tend to think I was half-believing, half-skeptical, dead-set on settling the question once and for all. I have no specific memory of learning about the vast conspiracy of fabrication on the other side of this credulity– unless it was neighbors laurie and mary ann smith finding all their hidden christmas presents ahead of time and being punished with disillusionment and spoiled surprises alone. I remember annie hoey and I bearing witness to their collective hubris of cleverness in discovering the stash and the subsequent shared shame and regret.

I recall a pervasive sense of being a fifth wheel in that society, a tolerated rather than treasured and coveted participant in the play, as annie was. we actively vied for her best friend status. to this day I have trouble with groups of girls– always have, have always felt not quite jibing with the whole groove. more and more it strikes me that in many ways we never grow up. yesterday a 60 year old woman was complaining to me about how “mean girls” had ruined her day by not including her in lunch plans. in the midst of this weird and ongoing social limbo I’m experiencing in chicago, I’ve had occasion to ponder these phenomena. I miss my own dear girlfriends, the ones I imagine actually enjoy and value my company– but, if I’m honest with myself, I’ll own up to the fact that I’m only considering the little moments, islands of sync and grace in a more general ocean of discord, resentment, miscommunication, and petty strifes. lately I’m thinking that all my preoccupation with community is as much about difficulty getting along peaceably with girlfriends as it is about forging some idealized family structure.

and I know I probably have too much time or energy on my hands to be preoccupied by such thoughts.

chris has installed The Clapper on the christmas tree– surely a device devised by a man if ever one was– who else would consider loud, percussive handclaps to be preferable to getting up and flipping a switch? only a guy enchanted with the fact that he could do it. and, for all that, it’s still pretty cute. guys are really kind of awesome.

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thoughts on having babies and what signifies in being a woman, not necessarily related topics

occasionally I’ll have a terrible, terrible dream in which I kill a baby– someone will hand a newborn or 1-yr-old to me, and while I struggle to hold it most responsibly and carefully, some combination of factors (the baby arching backward, someone else pushing by me, my own clumsiness or incompetence) will conspire to result in a dead baby in my arms. I woke this morning with a dead arm from sleeping on it and in a panic from just such a dream: tiny dead newborn in my hands.

I know these babies are not representative of babies alone– they stand in for many things, projects, hopes, other people’s hearts, a multitude of delicate, mortal worries– but they are also babies. I have for many years now lived with a good deal of ambivalence regarding the choice to parent– with concerns running the gamut from my own competence, selfish hoarding of my personal space and sleep and general autonomy, financing and clothing, feeding, housing such an important venture, the basic terrible vulnerability of loving and being responsible for something so vulnerable in a busy and difficult and dangerous world. in the midst of my not altogether chosen childlessness, I wrestle with these myriad pieces both in my waking hours and inside my dreams.

recently chris and I have been discussing our future together– all the various steps and pragmatic considerations that weigh against one another– we’ve gently, and so sweetly, begun weaving our visions together, laying timelines, projecting into the months and years ahead the important pieces of a life together. children are part of this for us– an undertaking that we both approach with humor and gravity and much hope– we would like, I’m sure it’s no surprise, to do it as right as we can– which involves, for us, arranging pieces, paving the way in this way and that.

so the other day I had a dr appointment to discuss new birth control options in the interim, finally having conceded to the fact of my lackadaisical pill-taking. in the course of this appointment I told my doctor that we wanted something relatively short term and reversible, as we would be wanting to begin trying to get pregnant at some visible point down the road– and she sat down and fixed me with a serious look, recited to me my age and statistics regarding ageing eggs and genetic disorders and a host of other complications, told me that she was going to proceed with the prescription for the birth control but that she hoped we’d choose never to use it– in short, not to wait.

well. I suppose sometimes we need to hear serious advice from our doctors. so chris and I are now sitting with this perspective. which is to say, nothing has changed substantively– only that this is the landscape, the various large bodies moving on the horizon– this is the frame of mind in which I dream of killing babies.

and in which I receive this video of writer kelly corrigan reading a piece she’s written on women and life to a collected audience of women– intended surely in the most loving way by my sister in law, who likes to forward on such pieces of inspiration to the women in her life. yesterday my computer was acting up, so this morning was when I managed to get it to play and watched it, fresh from this dream of the dead baby, in the midst of a more general frame of mind of missing friends and trying to find some inroads toward building my community here in chicago, fed up with my isolation two years in– and I watched this video and listened to the words from within my own position and perspective– and hated it with all my heart. I hated the constructed map of significance for women’s lives which is so inconsonant with my own experience, all the chanted coordinates of commonality that spell out my own dissonance with this picture of being a woman, being meaningful, having relevance and connection.

I could, perhaps, write this all off to the populist, best-seller perspective which fails to take into account all the different permutations of difference in women’s lives– but this isn’t enough for me right now where I am. I’m angry. on a lot of counts. among the many things I’m angry about is the tyranny of ideas around what constitutes a valid, valuable life in this world. I’ve struggled with my own prejudices and expectations for many years, trying to experience directly and honestly, trying to silence and set aside a host of conditions and judgements. and so when I’m confronted by texts in the world that are so rife with these thinking frames, which presume to speak in the voice of some universal “we” that purports to include me yet fails to reflect me in ways that feel salient, I take offense at the presumption and self-congratulation. I understand that each person can only write from our own experience and that we do our best to offer what we can to the world– but, by golly, this piece of … inspirational writing resulted in my feeling more pronouncedly outside whatever definitive fold of women it is addressing than embraced and included in it. bah and humbug.

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because gratitude is a practice

(as the lovely bodhibound reminds me.)

on sunday afternoon I went to the animal shelter for volunteer orientation– I’m going to be a dog person (they make you choose between dogs and cats), so we took a couple of the guys out and about. felt really good to be around dogs– just the tail-wagging, panting, happyface energy of them did more good for me than I can say. so now I’m just waiting for the call to schedule my first real training shift.

first snows, bunchy drifty flake clumps. the other evening I stood out in it for a bit, just watching as I spoke on the phone with my sweet friend moni back in iowa.

payday and grocery shopping. making chicken soup from the carcass.

the anticipation of being reunited with someone you love and miss.

the signposts on my block without caps that yodel mournfully in the wind off the lake.

finding parking right away.

a cup of hot tea and a home-baked muffin.

knocking out debt bit by bit.

jaw and neck feeling much better.

vox friends. cell phones.

having a job to complain about going to. :)

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