[Catherine (this will be how I introduce these from now on)]
Chronologically:
When I was born, my parents had planned on a girl. This was not uncommon for them, as they had wished for a girl as each of my four brothers was born. Thus (though I was a disappointment), it came as no surprise that they would have to ready a boy's name for me. After ten minutes of arguing, my father won out. I'm quite glad of this, because my mother wanted to name me Andre, and that name does not suit me.
If I had been a girl, I would have been Rose and called Rosalita. I know this because "Rosalita" was painted above my bed for the first ten years of my life.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
12.6
I'm considering writing love letters and posting them to random P.O. boxes. These won't be love letters to the people who own the boxes, or (hopefully) to people they know. Credit where credit is due; this is not my idea. I saw it as I was perusing the weirder parts of the web: a woman has actually done this and taken pictures of the letters as she sent them. She took it one step further and actually pasted the note itself to the outside of the envelope, though I doubt that postal workers have the time to read a letter like that.
Anyway, the idea is to engage the reader in some sort of mutual voyeuristic relationship to which they cannot retaliate.
I don't know if this is a good idea or a terrible one, but I would like to try it, and make it mine.
Ages ago, a kid at camp took post-it notes and wrote "this is graffiti" on them and put them everywhere. I did that for a while.
I have a few things that are weird that I came up with myself, but they're few and far between. I feel like the cooler things I do are all stolen.
Thanks, Solomon. Thanks, Ecclesiastes. You make me feel better about myself.
Anyway, the idea is to engage the reader in some sort of mutual voyeuristic relationship to which they cannot retaliate.
I don't know if this is a good idea or a terrible one, but I would like to try it, and make it mine.
Ages ago, a kid at camp took post-it notes and wrote "this is graffiti" on them and put them everywhere. I did that for a while.
I have a few things that are weird that I came up with myself, but they're few and far between. I feel like the cooler things I do are all stolen.
Thanks, Solomon. Thanks, Ecclesiastes. You make me feel better about myself.
Sunday, December 4, 2011
12.5
Whenever I come home in the rain, she greets me with a smile. Whenever I can't find my shoes, she knows just where to look. Now, I'm not saying my daughter and I have a close relationship all the time, but she seems to love me just the same.
I don't know; I just haven't asked. She's two.
Someday, I'll tell her about boys and why they look at her funny. Someday, I'll tell her to "turn around young lady" and go change and she'll just sneak out the back way. Someday, I'll pick her up from a party where a guy dumped her. Someday, I'll pray when she runs from me.
Today is not that day. She's two.
God, let me make use of the time I have.
Amen.
I don't know; I just haven't asked. She's two.
Someday, I'll tell her about boys and why they look at her funny. Someday, I'll tell her to "turn around young lady" and go change and she'll just sneak out the back way. Someday, I'll pick her up from a party where a guy dumped her. Someday, I'll pray when she runs from me.
Today is not that day. She's two.
God, let me make use of the time I have.
Amen.
12.4
If I were honest with myself, I could see the truths I'm missing. For instance: I broke mom's case at the age of three. It wasn't the dog. I never was nice enough to my grandmother. It wasn't her attitude. I stole a cd from the store. It wasn't a prank. I ran a car off a bridge. It wasn't the rain. I hit my girlfriend. It wasn't her fault. I'm addicted to liquor. It's not under my control. I'm not right with God. It's not his prerogative.
I'm dying in here. It's up to me to get out.
Too bad I'm not honest with myself.
I'm dying in here. It's up to me to get out.
Too bad I'm not honest with myself.
Saturday, December 3, 2011
12.3b
Rosalyn and I didn't often go to parks, but when we did, it was an event.
In our senior year of high school, we went to a local park near Ros's house and set up our tents and camped there until a policeman came to kick us out. When the poor man saw that we weren't hardened hobos, and were instead impressionable young girls, he basically shut down. We offered him a can of our cherry pie filling, heated on our fire. P.S. if you ever want a delicacy, hang out in a tent for a three-day weekend and then take the top off a can of cherry pie filling and stuff the butt of that thing in the coals of a dying fire. I mean, minutes later, the can is too hot to touch with bare hands and the cherries inside are the best thing any human has ever tasted and you can take my word for that.
After Ros's last final, she got back to the room, threw her books at the bed, and said "I'm in the mood for a park. You?"
We gathered our supplies and went to the mall because the park was too cold. In the mall, there was an atrium with trees in it, where the soft winter light filtered through the sad green of the tree leaves a world away above our heads. We sat down with our armloads of bags underneath the largest tree in the place. My mother always said to not be afraid to spend money on the things I find important, so Ros and I had spent more than a hundred dollars on craft materials (Popsicle sticks, glue, sparkles, paper, colored pencils, crayons, foam shapes, pipe cleaners, and beads. We devastated the craft aisle of a major department store.
We started building posters (mine had a cat on it who wore top hats for a living).
Ten minutes later, our ploy worked. A teensy girl walked by, holding her mother's hand, and made noises so high and so happy I swear my ears died. She struggled out of her mother's grasp and turbowalked straight to us. She landed somewhere in the bead bags and started sorting through the bags to find the fancy sparkle bag. The mother looked mortified. "Susan! Susan, come back here. These nice ladies don't want their crafts disturbed."
That was my cue. "Actucally, we don't mind. My name's Cath, and this is Ros."
"Hi." This, from Ros, who was fastidiously assembling a portrait of her favorite rockstar, replete with besequined suit.
"We brought our crafts to the mall because it's boring to be alone with a glue stick." I had been practicing this line all morning. I thought it was rather clever.
The mother looked defeated. "Susan, what do you say to these ladies?"
"My name's Susan. I'm this old." Four fat fingers flew up. I'm pretty sure she doubled her age on accident.
"The other, Susan."
"Thank you."
The mother sighed like she was tired from living through all the years of all of time. "Say please."
"Ok." At this point, I was ready to laugh right out loud. I didn't. Susan turned her big, round eyes on me and said "Pleeeeeeese?"
"Of course, Susan. Here, take this pipe cleaner for your beads."
Susan opened the floodgates. Soon, we had a dozen kids rolling through our Popsicle sticks and sparkle glue. A set of twins was collaborating on a picture of their house. A boy had made a dinosaur of pipe cleaners. A baby had turned a huge pile of paper into a mess of squiggles that his older sister was folding into swans.
Two security officers came to make sure nobody walked over the kids. Parents filled the benches of the atrium, happy for the test from running between stores. We stopped crafting and just watched.
It was a good parking, I thought.
Of course, malls being what they are, and my luck being what it is, Marco saw us. He walked in and sat down next to me and didn't say much of anything for a solid hour. Ros and I looked and said nothing at each other forty seven times. I didn't actually count. Marco made a cathedral from popsicle sticks and glue. When he stood up, he had a piece of construction paper stuck to his butt. I didn't laugh.
"Thanks," he said. "Weird thing you're doing. I like it. See ya on Friday."
Of course, I tried to be silent, but Rosalyn poked me in the ribs.
"Cath? What's this?"
"Oh, Ros, I think it's nothing but it might not be nothing, so I didn't want to tell you about it in case it was nothing, so Marco and I met up after my final on Tuesday and he asked me on a date, and--"
"What about the skin? Did you do what I said?"
"I did! I said I can't date boys I don't know but he said we should get to know each other so we're sharing autobiographies on Friday." I clapped my mouth shut and frowned.
Ros laughed at me. "Really? Is that it? I said only use the skin defense when a boy was asking you for sex!"
"I panicked!"
Ros shook with laughter. "So, are you gonna do it? Are you gonna write an autobiography?"
I shut up and put the finishing touches on my cat poster family.
Marco's cathedral went above my computer when I got home.
In our senior year of high school, we went to a local park near Ros's house and set up our tents and camped there until a policeman came to kick us out. When the poor man saw that we weren't hardened hobos, and were instead impressionable young girls, he basically shut down. We offered him a can of our cherry pie filling, heated on our fire. P.S. if you ever want a delicacy, hang out in a tent for a three-day weekend and then take the top off a can of cherry pie filling and stuff the butt of that thing in the coals of a dying fire. I mean, minutes later, the can is too hot to touch with bare hands and the cherries inside are the best thing any human has ever tasted and you can take my word for that.
After Ros's last final, she got back to the room, threw her books at the bed, and said "I'm in the mood for a park. You?"
We gathered our supplies and went to the mall because the park was too cold. In the mall, there was an atrium with trees in it, where the soft winter light filtered through the sad green of the tree leaves a world away above our heads. We sat down with our armloads of bags underneath the largest tree in the place. My mother always said to not be afraid to spend money on the things I find important, so Ros and I had spent more than a hundred dollars on craft materials (Popsicle sticks, glue, sparkles, paper, colored pencils, crayons, foam shapes, pipe cleaners, and beads. We devastated the craft aisle of a major department store.
We started building posters (mine had a cat on it who wore top hats for a living).
Ten minutes later, our ploy worked. A teensy girl walked by, holding her mother's hand, and made noises so high and so happy I swear my ears died. She struggled out of her mother's grasp and turbowalked straight to us. She landed somewhere in the bead bags and started sorting through the bags to find the fancy sparkle bag. The mother looked mortified. "Susan! Susan, come back here. These nice ladies don't want their crafts disturbed."
That was my cue. "Actucally, we don't mind. My name's Cath, and this is Ros."
"Hi." This, from Ros, who was fastidiously assembling a portrait of her favorite rockstar, replete with besequined suit.
"We brought our crafts to the mall because it's boring to be alone with a glue stick." I had been practicing this line all morning. I thought it was rather clever.
The mother looked defeated. "Susan, what do you say to these ladies?"
"My name's Susan. I'm this old." Four fat fingers flew up. I'm pretty sure she doubled her age on accident.
"The other, Susan."
"Thank you."
The mother sighed like she was tired from living through all the years of all of time. "Say please."
"Ok." At this point, I was ready to laugh right out loud. I didn't. Susan turned her big, round eyes on me and said "Pleeeeeeese?"
"Of course, Susan. Here, take this pipe cleaner for your beads."
Susan opened the floodgates. Soon, we had a dozen kids rolling through our Popsicle sticks and sparkle glue. A set of twins was collaborating on a picture of their house. A boy had made a dinosaur of pipe cleaners. A baby had turned a huge pile of paper into a mess of squiggles that his older sister was folding into swans.
Two security officers came to make sure nobody walked over the kids. Parents filled the benches of the atrium, happy for the test from running between stores. We stopped crafting and just watched.
It was a good parking, I thought.
Of course, malls being what they are, and my luck being what it is, Marco saw us. He walked in and sat down next to me and didn't say much of anything for a solid hour. Ros and I looked and said nothing at each other forty seven times. I didn't actually count. Marco made a cathedral from popsicle sticks and glue. When he stood up, he had a piece of construction paper stuck to his butt. I didn't laugh.
"Thanks," he said. "Weird thing you're doing. I like it. See ya on Friday."
Of course, I tried to be silent, but Rosalyn poked me in the ribs.
"Cath? What's this?"
"Oh, Ros, I think it's nothing but it might not be nothing, so I didn't want to tell you about it in case it was nothing, so Marco and I met up after my final on Tuesday and he asked me on a date, and--"
"What about the skin? Did you do what I said?"
"I did! I said I can't date boys I don't know but he said we should get to know each other so we're sharing autobiographies on Friday." I clapped my mouth shut and frowned.
Ros laughed at me. "Really? Is that it? I said only use the skin defense when a boy was asking you for sex!"
"I panicked!"
Ros shook with laughter. "So, are you gonna do it? Are you gonna write an autobiography?"
I shut up and put the finishing touches on my cat poster family.
Marco's cathedral went above my computer when I got home.
12.3
[I haven't written lately. I've missed writing. Then I read 1/4 of a good book and writing hit me as I was getting dressed for church. I'll be late, but I don't mind.]
There's no reason to get so dressed up
just to go into town and write "no" on the walls
with the lipstick you keep in your back pocket.
Why we do this, nobody knows,
but it's solidly ours and stolidly grows into
something we do together. Never apart--
both we and (the towntrips and wallwords).
Change.
There's no reason to get so dressed up
just to fight on the porch about how much I drink
or how long you linger and trace circles with fingers
on other men's skin.
Why we do this, nobody knows,
but the way that we argue makes the time slow
and crawl to a halt.
When time-lost momentum
and angry-face tantrums
sub-sequently end, we
fix all the blinds and pull all the curtains
and make love together on the semi-plaid couch.
It's angry and sad but it works, don't you think?
End.
There's no reason to get so dressed up
just to visit your folks in Chestervilletown
where the relatives glisten and shimmer and shine.
Why we do this, nobody knows,
but you, my dear, and that's why it shows
that you wear the pants,
ever since we wrote "no" to the world long ago in that corner of town where the beggars all go.
There's no reason to get so dressed up
just to go into town and write "no" on the walls
with the lipstick you keep in your back pocket.
Why we do this, nobody knows,
but it's solidly ours and stolidly grows into
something we do together. Never apart--
both we and (the towntrips and wallwords).
Change.
There's no reason to get so dressed up
just to fight on the porch about how much I drink
or how long you linger and trace circles with fingers
on other men's skin.
Why we do this, nobody knows,
but the way that we argue makes the time slow
and crawl to a halt.
When time-lost momentum
and angry-face tantrums
sub-sequently end, we
fix all the blinds and pull all the curtains
and make love together on the semi-plaid couch.
It's angry and sad but it works, don't you think?
End.
There's no reason to get so dressed up
just to visit your folks in Chestervilletown
where the relatives glisten and shimmer and shine.
Why we do this, nobody knows,
but you, my dear, and that's why it shows
that you wear the pants,
ever since we wrote "no" to the world long ago in that corner of town where the beggars all go.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
12.1
1. I shouldn't talk to her. She's basically unapproachable. I only stammer or choke or sweat when I'm around her. I wish I had his suavity, his courage, his strength. Then maybe she'd love me.
2. Why does she want that guy instead of me? We laugh and have inside jokes and understand each other so perfectly. Yet she wants that guy who can't talk to her because he's so nervous (trapped inside his own head).
3. I want someone who's nice, you see. Sure, he's ok and all. We're good friends, but . . . well, you know. There's this guy. He's so sweet and innocent and cute and I think he likes me, but he can't say it. It's adorable.
2. Why does she want that guy instead of me? We laugh and have inside jokes and understand each other so perfectly. Yet she wants that guy who can't talk to her because he's so nervous (trapped inside his own head).
3. I want someone who's nice, you see. Sure, he's ok and all. We're good friends, but . . . well, you know. There's this guy. He's so sweet and innocent and cute and I think he likes me, but he can't say it. It's adorable.
11.30a
Ok stretch groan yawn scratch under chin. Flip off blanket. Roll. Flip blanket back on.
What was with that dream?
I don't remember much of it--it seemed like hours and hours, and all I can remember are the last ten minutes. I climbed a wall. All my friends were sitting on top of it. There was only one ladder, so those who went up first were farthest away from the ladder, and couldn't get down without clambering down the edifice of the building, scrabbling on windows and bricks, fearing of falling. Those closest to the ladder had all the power they wanted. They could climb up or down at their leisure.
I edged my way past her and had to climb down the wall on the other side. (No ladder). I had to hook my legs through windows and drive my fingers into cracks.
Wake up.
What was with that dream?
I don't remember much of it--it seemed like hours and hours, and all I can remember are the last ten minutes. I climbed a wall. All my friends were sitting on top of it. There was only one ladder, so those who went up first were farthest away from the ladder, and couldn't get down without clambering down the edifice of the building, scrabbling on windows and bricks, fearing of falling. Those closest to the ladder had all the power they wanted. They could climb up or down at their leisure.
She was, of course, at the top of the ladder.
She would be, you know, at the top of the ladder, holding all the power, preventing everyone else's happiness, controlling, protecting herself. I don't know if it was symbolic, but it sure felt typical to me.
I edged my way past her and had to climb down the wall on the other side. (No ladder). I had to hook my legs through windows and drive my fingers into cracks.
When I got to the bottom, there was nothing there. Why did I climb down? I could look back up and see all my friends' legs, waving down at me. Symbolic? No. Just perspective. I was down, they were up. Easy to explain; I climbed down. I'm not worse than any of my friends, am I?
I turned around. She was there, suddenly, vibrant and alive. I hate her.
I wandered away and play with Andy Griffith. I calmed down.
Now awake. Do I still hate her? Probably not.
Here's a good question: does my brain believe what I tell myself?
Saturday, November 26, 2011
11.27
[not Catherine. Sometimes I feel like I have no idea why or what is happening in that story. I have no idea how to pace a novel]
I just laughed with him. Not five minutes ago. I can prove it; people took pictures. It was a big to-do. It's not every day someone gets engaged. Of course.
See, she didn't know about it. Most people didn't. He invited all of his and her closest friends to a party. He didn't bother saying what for, just that nobody would want to miss it for any reason. But it was supposed to be a surprise for her, or else she might get suspicious. And when she's suspicious, that's basically the worst (she doesn't let go of a thing once she's gotten curious about it). All he said was that it was a surprise, so we didn't tell a living soul.
We all trucked it down to her park. Not hers, strictly speaking, but the park where, if you walk to the right spot on the cliff, you can hold hands with your woman and watch the sun go down in the valley until the last fingers of twilight are the only things illuminating your mad dash back to the car, and this all with laughing about the jokes you told and the things you saw and the kiss you're waiting for at the door of the car (the parking lot is fully black now; you've planned it exactly, and no one can see you as she pulls you against her and you back her against the car and you kiss so log and do sweet that when you break free, you wish you could repeat it, but of course night has settled at that exact moment and heaved its heavy sigh and folded its blackness down across the world. Forgive my indiscretion. All you need to know is that it had been her favorite park since she realized that she could have them, and preferences weren't limited to others.
She must have arrived more than a half and hour ago. Of course, we'd all arrived early--that's me, Cindy and Sherri, Dan, Elena, Tristan and Desiree, and, of course, Marcel. So we all stood around, kind of, waiting. It was a good kind of waiting: the kind where time doesn't seem to pass, but when everybody quiets down again, you realize that it's time to go again and all the waiting you've done has paid off and you can just continue on with your life. It's a good kind of waiting: the kind people wait their entire lives to have to do. Pleasant waiting. It's a novel concept.
She arrived, and when she came through the woods down the path, she had exactly that radiance which poets try so hard to capture but never can quite, and now I'm tempted to make a run at it just to see if I can explain how the sunlight filtered through the dying woods cut all the darkness from the light and left only golden, reddish glory to slash down to her face and gather there in her golden curls. She smiled and it made her cheeks blush the red of the sugar maples behind her. Her hair swayed with every step and flashed the gold of the oaks above. She was not a part of the woods; she was the woods, and when I realized it it tore a tiny hole in me that's been leaking ever since.
Strictly speaking, we didn't know what was going on, but we figured it out sooner than she did. And even so, people closest to the hurricane are least likely to see the size of it. So it's not like she's stupid.
Marcel pulled out his guitar and sang a song to her that another man wrote.
He used the words of a better man, an artist from a different age who had to search his soul for his words, who reached for his guitar when things were bad and when things were good and when things were just okay. He took the words of a man who had no advantages (no Internet, no predecessors, no collaborators) and used them to succinctly summarize his own feelings. It felt like uprooting and moving a sequoia to show New Yorkers how important the trees are. It felt like stealing money from a man to buy gifts for his wife. It felt like stabbing a man so you could do a good deed by driving him to the hospital. It felt like giving her another man's heart. But nobody else saw it, and if they saw it, they didn't care, and if they cared, they new better than to feel. I was the fool and felt. And it felt horrible.
I cried. It helped that everyone else was crying too, if for different reasons. I could at least imagine they all felt the same pain I did.
Marcel got down on one knee and asked her "D, will you marry me?"
She didn't even pause to consider her options.
So yes, I laughed with him. I smiled and laughed and clapped and cried, not five minutes ago, as my best friend asked my ex-girlfriend to marry him.
I'll tell you when it stops hurting.
Don't expect a call from me anytime soon.
I just laughed with him. Not five minutes ago. I can prove it; people took pictures. It was a big to-do. It's not every day someone gets engaged. Of course.
See, she didn't know about it. Most people didn't. He invited all of his and her closest friends to a party. He didn't bother saying what for, just that nobody would want to miss it for any reason. But it was supposed to be a surprise for her, or else she might get suspicious. And when she's suspicious, that's basically the worst (she doesn't let go of a thing once she's gotten curious about it). All he said was that it was a surprise, so we didn't tell a living soul.
We all trucked it down to her park. Not hers, strictly speaking, but the park where, if you walk to the right spot on the cliff, you can hold hands with your woman and watch the sun go down in the valley until the last fingers of twilight are the only things illuminating your mad dash back to the car, and this all with laughing about the jokes you told and the things you saw and the kiss you're waiting for at the door of the car (the parking lot is fully black now; you've planned it exactly, and no one can see you as she pulls you against her and you back her against the car and you kiss so log and do sweet that when you break free, you wish you could repeat it, but of course night has settled at that exact moment and heaved its heavy sigh and folded its blackness down across the world. Forgive my indiscretion. All you need to know is that it had been her favorite park since she realized that she could have them, and preferences weren't limited to others.
She must have arrived more than a half and hour ago. Of course, we'd all arrived early--that's me, Cindy and Sherri, Dan, Elena, Tristan and Desiree, and, of course, Marcel. So we all stood around, kind of, waiting. It was a good kind of waiting: the kind where time doesn't seem to pass, but when everybody quiets down again, you realize that it's time to go again and all the waiting you've done has paid off and you can just continue on with your life. It's a good kind of waiting: the kind people wait their entire lives to have to do. Pleasant waiting. It's a novel concept.
She arrived, and when she came through the woods down the path, she had exactly that radiance which poets try so hard to capture but never can quite, and now I'm tempted to make a run at it just to see if I can explain how the sunlight filtered through the dying woods cut all the darkness from the light and left only golden, reddish glory to slash down to her face and gather there in her golden curls. She smiled and it made her cheeks blush the red of the sugar maples behind her. Her hair swayed with every step and flashed the gold of the oaks above. She was not a part of the woods; she was the woods, and when I realized it it tore a tiny hole in me that's been leaking ever since.
Strictly speaking, we didn't know what was going on, but we figured it out sooner than she did. And even so, people closest to the hurricane are least likely to see the size of it. So it's not like she's stupid.
Marcel pulled out his guitar and sang a song to her that another man wrote.
He used the words of a better man, an artist from a different age who had to search his soul for his words, who reached for his guitar when things were bad and when things were good and when things were just okay. He took the words of a man who had no advantages (no Internet, no predecessors, no collaborators) and used them to succinctly summarize his own feelings. It felt like uprooting and moving a sequoia to show New Yorkers how important the trees are. It felt like stealing money from a man to buy gifts for his wife. It felt like stabbing a man so you could do a good deed by driving him to the hospital. It felt like giving her another man's heart. But nobody else saw it, and if they saw it, they didn't care, and if they cared, they new better than to feel. I was the fool and felt. And it felt horrible.
I cried. It helped that everyone else was crying too, if for different reasons. I could at least imagine they all felt the same pain I did.
Marcel got down on one knee and asked her "D, will you marry me?"
She didn't even pause to consider her options.
So yes, I laughed with him. I smiled and laughed and clapped and cried, not five minutes ago, as my best friend asked my ex-girlfriend to marry him.
I'll tell you when it stops hurting.
Don't expect a call from me anytime soon.
11.26
I didn't quite pass out, of course. That would be silly. I didn't allow myself that luxury.
Ok, self.
Self.
Ok. Breathe, me. I can see me not breathing. Self, I have to make me breathe.
Gasp.
Good job, me. Again.
Hey, self. Am I going to get my skin eaten by Marco Who Speaks In Class? Is that my fate, me? Answer myself.
Ok, self.
Self.
Ok. Breathe, me. I can see me not breathing. Self, I have to make me breathe.
Gasp.
Good job, me. Again.
Hey, self. Am I going to get my skin eaten by Marco Who Speaks In Class? Is that my fate, me? Answer myself.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
11.24
Black black black he takes his coffee black. I don't know why, but this strikes me as the manliest thing anybody has ever done.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
11.23
[catherine tomorrow? If I can read what I've written, then yes.]
I didn't see her, really. What I saw was a tangled mix of messages to my brain. I saw the way her forearms tensed when she moved, the way her fingers slipped through the air, the way her hair curled down over her forehead, the way her shirt stretched over her breasts, the way her ear slipped out behind her hair, the way her body settled as she walked, the way she didn't look around but looked straight ahead, and the way her waist trimmed in like the feel of the first icicle I break off and hold in my hands and it's cold and real and yet I can see right through it to the center and beyond and it's my icicle mine from the eaves and it's fragile and precious and if I drop it it will break. But I can't see her, she's not mine, and though she feels like my icicle, I can't see through her and she's not mine. I can't see the trouble with her passive aggressive manager or the recent death of her grandfather or the man who keeps calling her in the middle of the night just to remind her that she isn't safe anymore and he's the reason why she carries the knife with her like the knife is going to do her any good at all but at least it's something it's something to let her keep living and not hide forever in her house it's a way to step outside and face the day knowing that at any time that knife is right there on her belt in easy reach just there next to her icicle fragile waist and below the shirt that ripples just there and the icy cold smile that doesn't look around and just looks ahead.
So what do I really value? The way her ear (coy) sneaks out from behind the single scattered curl, or the woman struggling to finish what she started (life) and make it to the other side?
I guess what I'm really asking is for forgiveness.
I didn't see her, really. What I saw was a tangled mix of messages to my brain. I saw the way her forearms tensed when she moved, the way her fingers slipped through the air, the way her hair curled down over her forehead, the way her shirt stretched over her breasts, the way her ear slipped out behind her hair, the way her body settled as she walked, the way she didn't look around but looked straight ahead, and the way her waist trimmed in like the feel of the first icicle I break off and hold in my hands and it's cold and real and yet I can see right through it to the center and beyond and it's my icicle mine from the eaves and it's fragile and precious and if I drop it it will break. But I can't see her, she's not mine, and though she feels like my icicle, I can't see through her and she's not mine. I can't see the trouble with her passive aggressive manager or the recent death of her grandfather or the man who keeps calling her in the middle of the night just to remind her that she isn't safe anymore and he's the reason why she carries the knife with her like the knife is going to do her any good at all but at least it's something it's something to let her keep living and not hide forever in her house it's a way to step outside and face the day knowing that at any time that knife is right there on her belt in easy reach just there next to her icicle fragile waist and below the shirt that ripples just there and the icy cold smile that doesn't look around and just looks ahead.
So what do I really value? The way her ear (coy) sneaks out from behind the single scattered curl, or the woman struggling to finish what she started (life) and make it to the other side?
I guess what I'm really asking is for forgiveness.
Friday, November 18, 2011
11.18
[This has been a week to end all weeks. I'll get back to Catherine. It won't take me a month, but I will finish. This I vow.]
It's not a lie, really. Just a half truth. Just exactly what you want to hear. It's not mean-spirited, or hurtful, or hateful. And yet you reacted so very badly.
"And do you think you can get away with that?" So say you.
"You haven't defined your antecedent." So say I.
I'm angry too. You aren't the only one allowed to be angry, anyway. Stop being angry.
"You said you wanted to be friends, and this isn't what friendship looks like." You.
"Friendship is a two-way street, I'll have you know." I.
"Easy for you to say. You haven't even tried to be my friend." You.
That's stupid and you know it. I'm here talking to you right now, aren't I? That's something friends do.
"That's not fair--" I, and yet you cut me off with a giant humph.
"I'm afraid of being friends on your terms. I don't know what it means." You? That doesn't sound like you. That sounds like anger and fear. You don't sound like that.
My terms? My terms are simple. Love me forever, but never tell me about it. Hold me in the highest regard, but never approach me. Always be there when I call, but don't expect anything of me. Be a perfect memory of my triumph in forgetting.
Oh! And never, ever, hurt me again.
Simple.
It's not a lie, really. Just a half truth. Just exactly what you want to hear. It's not mean-spirited, or hurtful, or hateful. And yet you reacted so very badly.
"And do you think you can get away with that?" So say you.
"You haven't defined your antecedent." So say I.
I'm angry too. You aren't the only one allowed to be angry, anyway. Stop being angry.
"You said you wanted to be friends, and this isn't what friendship looks like." You.
"Friendship is a two-way street, I'll have you know." I.
"Easy for you to say. You haven't even tried to be my friend." You.
That's stupid and you know it. I'm here talking to you right now, aren't I? That's something friends do.
"That's not fair--" I, and yet you cut me off with a giant humph.
"I'm afraid of being friends on your terms. I don't know what it means." You? That doesn't sound like you. That sounds like anger and fear. You don't sound like that.
My terms? My terms are simple. Love me forever, but never tell me about it. Hold me in the highest regard, but never approach me. Always be there when I call, but don't expect anything of me. Be a perfect memory of my triumph in forgetting.
Oh! And never, ever, hurt me again.
Simple.
Monday, November 14, 2011
11.14
[I am super way behind. Nearly ten thousand words. Not tonight, I think. Unless the mood hits me. I had a pleasant evening, but I need to write a paper tomorrow and it's going to be a beast.]
What's a pleasant way to say this? How do I go about this casually? How can I point this out without being offensive and rude?
Excuse me, ma'am. I can see down your shirt. Either I'm too tall or you're too short, or God has gifted you unnecessarily.
Now.
What are we going to do about it?
What's a pleasant way to say this? How do I go about this casually? How can I point this out without being offensive and rude?
Excuse me, ma'am. I can see down your shirt. Either I'm too tall or you're too short, or God has gifted you unnecessarily.
Now.
What are we going to do about it?
Thursday, November 10, 2011
11.10b
On the day of the final, professor musicpants mixed the class and put on a calm classical cd and passed out a stack of tests and then probably danced a little happy jig in his little happy heart because he just enjoyed causing so much pain and horror in his students.
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