One Week Later

There is a buttery cowslip of a moon in the sky floating over the beach.

I looked at it.

I thought of you.

“You will always have the moon,” you told me a week ago as we lay together our last time.

Maybe not our last time.

But for this time, this chapter, this experience, it was the last time.

Whatever comes next is new and unknown and I do not know when we will meet again.

But I will always have the moon.

So too.

Conversely.

Shall you.

I looked up at the curl of cream yellow in the darkened sky.

My heart ached in my chest.

I wished you well.

I wished you  love.

I wished for you to be kind to yourself.

It was not the first time today that I thought of you.

I thought of you so often.

How could I not?

It’s been a week.

And like I said.

Wednesdays, well, lucky for me, they will always be yours.

So many things are yours.

That damn car wash on Lincoln Ave at 19th.

The one we made out in like hormone fueled teenagers.

I don’t know that I have ever, ever, ever had such an intense make out session.

I drive past that damn car wash all the time.

And.

Thoughts of you.

Or the park on the hill where we made out sitting on a bench overlooking the city.

Yeah.

That one.

The one I drive past every morning on my way to work.

You are everywhere.

You are in the avocado tree in the back yard that overhangs the porch at work.

The one the two nesting crows like to fly in and out of.

They are young.

They have not been there long, but I noticed.

You and I have an affinity for some things dark.

Crows being one.

I noticed when the young pair started flying through the yard.

They have a nest in the tree to the left of the house.

Crows mate for life.

And I think of you.

You the one I want to be mated to for life.

You who are gone now.

Far away.

And yet.

Ever present in my body, the ache in my chest, the tears pulling at my eyes.

Tonight, driving home.

You again.

A surprising gasp of pain when I saw the sunlight reflecting on the ocean water.

There was something to the juxtaposition of telephone poles and wires crisscrossed over the sea in the background and the glitter of light bouncing back towards my eyes.

The beauty of it struck me and it was all you.

All about you.

All in my heart and my soul and I almost had to pull over and sob in my car.

But I drove on.

To what I knew might be the worst.

The early evening sun setting in the back door windows of my room.

The light slanting in across my bed.

The bed that you last lay in a week ago today.

I miss you.

Your smell.

Your laugh.

The way you look at me.

The text messages and phone calls and the poetry of my name in your mouth.

All the silly sweet endearing nicknames you had for me.

I sat quietly in a five-minute meditation tonight, in a room you and I have sat together in so many times, so many Wednesdays, for this past year and change.

Sat in the dark, with my eyes closed.

Thought of you, far away, in another time zone, most likely in bed.

I imagined curling up next to you and holding you and smelling you.

The other night.

I cried out.

My duvet cover smelled of you.

How?

How!?

I washed everything.

Nothing should smell like you.

And yet.

It did.

And I cried into my pillow and looked out between the bamboo slats in the window shade and thought about when the time will come that the moon will be full and shine through and wake me up.

Insistent that I think of you in the dead of night, pulled from dreams by the bright shine pouring into the window.

You were the bright shine pouring into my life.

I miss you bunny.

I miss you.

So.

Damn.

Much.

I Blame It On

The hormones.

It has been an up and down day.

I re-started my day only an hour and a half after it started, I was already annoyed and yelling fuck in my kitchen while I was stirring oatmeal on the stove.

My boss wanted me to come in early.

The kids had an unexpected day off from school.

Dude.

Ugh.

Of course, I said yes, I was able to do it, it just threw a little loop in my day and I had to adjust, get flexible, and just suck it up.

Besides I would be getting out of work an hour early and all the things that I didn’t do this morning, writing and reading for school, I could do after work.

Except the mom got stuck in bad, rainy coming home from work traffic.

In the end it didn’t matter, as I ended up being late to work.

Worst driver I have ever had on a shared ride.

I actually complained for the first time ever.

I am not one to kick up a fuss, but the guy ran stop a sign-passing on the left to go around a car that was stopped at a stop sign on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive in the park, scared the crap out of me as there was oncoming traffic, missed turns, then cut across traffic to make the turns, had an argument with one of the other passengers about directions and was horribly inconsistent with his driving.  I actually thought are you high?

Then right before he drops me off, asks with a really big, forced smile, how my day was going?  Dude.

A little too late.

I’m late for work and overwhelmed with annoyance by the three near death experiences I had while in the car.

I looked up at him, startled, and said, “fine, thanks,” in a flat tone of voice.

God damn.

It was creepy.

But yes, I did actually complain.

Of course, no response, but I’m not going to freak out, I know it’s one of the things that you just have to account for, once in a while getting a bad driver, I actually found myself laughing a little at my obvious desire to have control and my realization, that shit, there was nothing to do, but get through the ride, be grateful and get out of the car and go to work.

I was resigned to not being able to do any homework at work either, so I brought one of my meditation coloring books to color in with my charges and that was a hit.

Lots of coloring on this rainy, rainy, rainy day.

Clay, stickers, paper dolls, and drawing as well.

Robots, jet engines, race cars, stuffed animals.

Pancakes for lunch.

They were so cute about it, and insisted it was a special day and I was happy to indulge them.

I made them homemade pancakes, from scratch, not a box, with raspberries, butter, powdered sugar and maple syrup.

They were in heaven.

I had some of the raspberries later with my own lunch and got knocked over by a wave of nostalgia.

If I haven’t had raspberries in a while, and I don’t often have them, they are expensive little beasts ad I prefer to spend my money on blueberries, inevitably the first bite will always remind me of my Grandma Munz.

My grandparents had an amazing garden in Lodi, Wisconsin.

My grandfather cultivated and cared for most of it, but the raspberry vines were grandma’s territory, or so it seemed to me as a child, and I have a memory of picking raspberries with her–perhaps my favorite memory of my grandmother.

I don’t recall how old I was, but elementary school seems about right, 4th or 5th grade, and it was summer and my mom had taken my sister and I out to Lodi to visit our grandparents.

Grandma wanted to pick raspberries and she and I went out to the brambles to pick carrying 5 gallon vanilla ice cream buckets.

I remember my sister mostly ate the raspberries.

I ate quite a few too, but I liked to see how they gathered and grew in heaps and piles, the luxurious spill of berries a kind of abundance I didn’t often see in my life.

We picked for a while, quiet and serious and when my grandmother deemed we had enough for whatever project she was working on, we brought the berries back to the kitchen to be washed in the sink.

She scooped up a big bowl of them for my sister and I, one bowl for each of us, poured milk over the top of them and then sprinkled them with sugar.

I don’t think I have every eaten anything so glorious and simple and intoxicating in all the rest of my life.

I can taste them still.

Perhaps that’s why I haven’t much bothered with them since.

When one has had the pen ultimate tasting experience of an object most other things pale in comparison.

Sort of like my grandfather’s sweet corn, nary a corn on the cob since has done his justice.

I am lucky to have this appreciation for simple things.

The pure joy of a small bowl of warm just off the vine raspberries, cool, creamy milk, and a heaping teaspoon of fine granulated sugar, C&H Cane sugar, in the white paper bag with the pink label and blue ribbon badge with white writing.

Somethings, small things, are utter simple and glorious in their perfection.

I think that bowl of raspberries is what heaven tastes like.

I had tears prick at my eyes when I ate that first raspberry.

I felt the grass of my grandparents back yard underneath my bare feet, I could see my grandmother’s kitchen, I could taste the cold water from the tap, they had their own well and the water there, the best in the world, seriously, I could feel the breeze coming in through the big screened in windows in the dining room.

I could almost hear the laughter of my mom and aunts smoking cigarettes on the front porch in the big aluminum lawn chairs, waving at passing cars and gossiping about the rest of the family that wasn’t there.

I could feel  the moment pass as I sat at the table drawing with my charges, I did not try to hold onto it, it will come back when I need it, this beautiful thing, my sweet memory that colored the rest of my day.

It reminded me of my roots and also of that there were many, quite a few, moments of bliss in my childhood, simple, exquisite, and etched into my heart despite, or perhaps because of how hard things were at times, I appreciate so much when I got to experience beauty.

I still do.

Ah.

Perspective.

You got me again.

 

 

The Half Way Point

Has been met.

I wrapped up my third weekend of five here in the first semester of my second year of graduate school.

Graduate school is sexy.

In case you were wondering.

Sleep deprivation.

Overconsumption of caffeine.

Anxiety about keeping up on the reading.

Writing papers.

Cramming it all in between the nooks and crannies of living life.

And.

Hoping once in a while to get a little sunshine on my face or a hug from a friend.

Or.

God fucking forbid.

A date.

Dating is challenging.

Throw recovery into the mix, full-time work and grad school.

Fuck me.

I’ll see you when I graduate and oh, then I’ll be interning.

That will be entertaining.

I do have hopes though for some magic.

I do.

I might even hop back out into online dating and Tinder.

I might.

I say this as I’m downloading the app to my phone.

I might use it.

Fuck me.

I amuse myself.

I was chatting with a friend of mine after class today at Philz and I told her about how I was getting a little too hormonal for my own good.

I also have to say, thank God for girlfriends you can share all the things with.

I am so lucky.

I told her about how things have gone this week and got all flustered and wound up and how if I’m feeling like this, if I’m so flushed up and flustered, maybe I need to take action.

“I need a fucking boyfriend,” I said.

“Yes, you do, but get laid and maybe, don’t worry about the guy being sober, like, throw open the pool and just you know, have some fun, get you through for a little while,” she said and laughed with me.

I’m a touch frustrated.

And it’s ok.

It is what it is.

But walking around perpetually turned on, although, hey, my skin is glowing, is a lot to deal with on top of grad school, work, etc, ad nauseum, blah, blah, blah.

It’s just life.

I remind myself.

It’s just another thing to experience.

I’ll probably have it up, the Tinder profile, for a week and be like fuck this like I have previously.

But.

I do feel a need to take some action.

I was thinking about asking someone out.

Not that I have had the opportunity to do so recently.

Recently having been this weekend, in which I was in school classes for 29 hours, so yeah, maybe not the best time to go out on a date.

But.

I do feel like I need to keep trying.

Keep things moving.

Keep trying.

Keep living.

I’m going to be a fucking therapist.

I should have some more relationship experience.

And besides.

I feel ready.

Definitely ready and I’m adamant about the “no married men” thing and the being available to be with someone who is available.

No going back to the drawing board.

But maybe just a little roll around the hay.

Hmm.

I don’t know.

I definitely don’t have to figure it out right now.

Perhaps the frustration of not getting what I want can be harnessed.

Heh.

I could run the world.

Not like I’m not already busy enough.

I was able to express myself to my friend though, it was so helpful and I am so grateful for my friend and to get to have dinner with her and her husband and another beloved person tonight after school, after cups of Philz coffee in the Castro, I was really so very grateful for them.

We went and had dinner at Lark, up on 18th between Castro and Hartford.

Pretty much the heart of the Castro.

Lots of lovely men to look at.

Not that anyone of them were interested in me, aside to compliment my frock.

I have to say, nothing like having a load of gay men tell me I look divine in polka dots and red lipstick.

Thank you very much.

I wore my crinoline too, it was just too much, but just right all at the same time.

And we had such a lovely time.

My friend also suggested that I talk more with them in French.

I tried.

I get a little flustered with it, but it’s such good practice and considering how much I love my friend and she’s French and lives in Paris and I’ll be going to Paris to visit her.

I also suspect that it won’t be my last time to Paris.

When someone you love dearly is living in Paris, you go when you can.

I did rather well, with the French-speaking, actually.

I ended up describing my relationship to my person, my mentor so to speak (wink, wink, nudge, nudge) all in French and though I stumbled a bit, I got it all out and that felt rather good to explain about my person and how I am helped by working with him and the whys and whereof of getting support around my family of origin alcohol and drug addictions.

It was rather awesome.

I mean, there was still some things lost in translation, but really, I did ok.

And my friend said the same thing, she told me that I actually speak a lot better than I think I do and that what I should start doing with her is speak as much French as I can and when I can’t, then use English.

She’s totally right.

It helped immediately.

I went back and forth between English and French all dinner.

It was thrilling.

And when I thought about it.

My heart just beat so hard in my chest.

Who was this woman, in her red Chanel lipstick, speaking French at a fancy restaurant in San Francisco?

Surrounded by people who love me.

I mean.

I have absolutely no question that I am loved.

It was just amazing.

And I felt so, well, awed, really.

I felt validated too.

It’s been a good week for that.

I’m in a good place.

A happy place.

A secure place.

A place of love.

A place of polka dots and my heart on my sleeve.

A place full of music and joy.

I might be just a tiny bit relieved to be done with the school weekend too.

Heh.

Happy.

Joyous.

Sexy.

And.

Motherfucking.

Free.

 

Everything Is Coming Up Pink

I mean everything.

Fuck me.

Ugh.

I got my hair done today and it’s awesome and fun and I had a really nice time at the salon reading trashy magazines and drinking coffee and discussing dating with my hair dresser.

You know.

Tinder versus OkStupid.

And it was a great time.

It’s nice to let myself be pampered.

I love, love, love, having my hair played with.

Seriously.

Offer to brush my hair, wash my hair, play with my hair, I’m yours.

Give me a scalp massage?

Dude.

Yeah.

So.

Getting the hair done is always an extraordinary treat.

And not one I do all that often.

Although when I do.

I do like to pull a bit of a hair geographic.

Today’s was pink.

Pastel and hot pink and it looks fantastic and my colorist was a doll and mixed up some extra color for me with some conditioner to put in my hair the next couple of times I wash it.

And away I went to Sephora on Cloud 9 to go match my hair color to my lipstick.

Because.

Please.

That is how I roll.

“Oh, I like the glitter,” my colorist said, referring to my nails which are painted sky blue, robin’s egg blue, and overlaid with, yes, pink glitter.

Because.

Again, I ain’t nothing but subtle.

Anyway.

I came back to grab my scooter and head off to my first date of the evening.

Yes.

I said first.

I had two dates tonight.

Yeah, I’m a hussy, get over it.

I’m also making up for lost time, the cancelled dates over the past few weekends, the one guy not available and the other that just never bothered to confirm, so I figured, fuck it, book two, one is bound to not be good.

They were both good.

But in very different ways.

Anyway.

I get a head of myself.

And yes, Virginia, I don’t normally do that, I have never actually done that before, but it just sort of happened and it just sort of worked.

So.

I head back to my scooter, replete with my pink hair and blow out, that’s the other thing, I got a blow out and that is so much fun, I have wild curly hair and not one iota of desire to blow out my hair, it would take me days, no thank you, not going to do it.

But put me in a salon.

All bets off.

Blow it out.

Side bar.

I can’t believe I’m blogging right now, I should be in bed, considering what time I got up this morning and that I did yoga as well, but I also had a late, as in way past my normal cut off time, Americano and I think that has just jazzed me up a bit.

So.

Blow out, new lip gloss, matches the hair like spot on and is glittery, natch, floating in the late afternoon, early evening golden light bathing the downtown and open my purse to get out my keys and check my phone.

And what the fuck?

Oh.

No.

Oh.

Shit.

Oh.

Pink.

EVERYWHERE.

The jar opened in my purse, I managed to finagle out my phone an wipe it down and my wallet, but all the stuff, all the lining of the purse, the canvas tote I got from the Jeu de Paume in Paris all of it, doused in hot pink hair dye.

Ugh.

What I am happy to report is that I did not lose my shit.

Nope.

Just took the jar wrapped it up in the bag, wiped off what I could and got on my scooter and said, well, I’ve been wanting to replace that purse anyhow.

And off I went to the first of my dates.

We met for sushi, I recognized him at the corner as he was crossing over to the restaurant, yay for looking like your profile, always a plus.

Yay, also for being on time, in fact, just a tiny bit early, which I totally appreciate as that’s how I tend to roll.

Yay for being tall.

I mean, hello, 6’5″.

I could have worn heels.

It was a slow to start date, but in the end, the dinner was nice, although I was slightly surprised to be asked to go dutch on the date, I was like, ok, whatever, not the first time, although, I had expected…

Oh, sneaky, expectations, I know where you lead.

But, I was like, ok, whatever.

And moving on.

But.

Not exactly moving on.

We walked down Valencia Street, which is odd for me to walk down when it’s the weekend and also when I’m not working, I ran into a lot of folks I know and that was amusing, always nice to be seen and to be seen on a date, I think too, is nice.

We went to Ritual, aforementioned late Americano, we sat outside.

We discussed some things.

Talked over some things.

And oh.

There.

Ha.

I wasn’t sure.

He was indeed attracted, just a slow burn sort of deal.

And that’s ok.

Some times quickly, sometimes slowly.

He had friends to meet and I had a friend to meet.

Well.

I should clarify.

I had a friends with benefits to meet.

Which was fantastic and fun and none of your business.

I can’t put it all out here, now can I?

I did find out some lovely things about myself in the whole process.

First.

Guys don’t notice, and/or care, that I had a huge, awful patch of pimples on my temples.

Like bad.

Like haven’t had a break out like this since high school.

Hello hormones, fuck you, I’m 43, enough already.

If they were noticed, which I noticed them, gah, get off my face, nothing was said.

Of course, said dates could have been blinded by the hot pink hair.

Second.

That despite getting thrown a curve ball, one in which I would have used previously as an excuse to cancel or delay, pink dye all over my purse and stuff and things, was just a small impediment to the evening and nothing to get worked up about.

What I found is that by not caring so much about how I look and presenting myself as I was, pink hair, purse, pimples, and all, I was just more me somehow.

More human.

Less put together.

And perhaps.

More approachable.

I sure hope so.

I like this new part of me emerging.

Oh.

I’m sure I’ll get wound up about something.

But for right now.

Despite the ruination of my satchel.

I’m really sitting pretty.

And.

Very.

Very.

Very.

Pink.

 

Take The Fucking Drama

Out of it.

Oh my god.

What a fucking concept.

I laughed and almost slapped my own forehead.

Instead of getting worked up about work, I just thought, fuck, all I have to do is show up and be of service, I don’t have to ask anything, I don’t have to do anything, I don’t have to be stupid and pushy, I can ask for what I need the next time it comes around.

No need to do it today.

Just having done the work around it, the internal re-arranging of my perspective was the relief.

My boss doesn’t have to change.

My boss is never going to change.

She doesn’t have to.

I do.

I change.

And today I decided that creating unnecessary drama before a three day weekend was stupid.

Idiotic really.

When I was going to get off work early today and be eating out with my boys and drinking pricey iced coffees.

Oh Stumptown how do I love thee.

Yeah, I know, it’s not San Francisco based, but fuck, they have good ass coffee.

I am all out of the coffee I bought in New York.

Frankly, I have to say I was disappointed with the Gorilla Coffee I got, the roast was far darker than I like and just a tiny bit charred to my taste.

The coffee I had at the cafe when I popped into it was great, but they were out of the beans that I wanted.

Now.

Variety, in Williamsburg, that stood up to the test.

In fact.

It was like being transported back to the cafe and the talk I had with the barista and then the getting together with my friend and doing that thing I like to do in church basements that evening.

It was a sweet reminder every time I ground up a batch of the Variety beans I brought back.

Maybe I’ll find some hipster coffee in New Orleans.

Fuck me.

Total digression.

I’m all over the place.

Like always.

But.

I’m a tiny bit at loose ends.

Having a clear three day weekend ahead of me.

I got free of jury duty for tomorrow and the family is out of town visiting aunts and uncles and grandparents in the Midwest.

I spent the day keeping the boys on the move and out of the house, hence the Stumptown, I popped into Atlas Cafe on Alabama and 20th.

I have so many fond, and not so fond, memories of the cafe.

It was my first heavily visited cafe, being a block and a half away from the first place I lived in the city, 20th and York.

The first time I go there I ran into someone from Madison who had moved to San Francisco years before me and I had had a class with at University, a TS Eliot class that was amazing and also challenging beyond comprehension, most of the class dropped, including the guy I ran into at the cafe, but I stuck it out and though it may seem odd, that was were I began to believe in God.

That coupled with the course on fairy tales I took the next summer and there, a chink in my armor.

A place where the light got in.

Not for a while though.

Just ask my dealer.

He made a few deliveries to me at Atlas Cafe as well.

I have a nodding acquaintance with the bathroom there.

And a fondness tinged with nicotine nostalgia for the back patio where once upon a time a lady could smoke a cigarette with her espresso romano–a shot of espresso with a lemon twist.

God damn.

I don’t smoke anymore.

I forget that sometimes.

I can forget many things easily.

Use to weigh over 80lbs heavier.

Forgot that.

Used to do drink every day.

Forgot that.

Used to not be able to not spend the money on the bag or pick up the phone to call my dealer to do a little delivery.

“Fuck, you’re guys faster than pizza delivery,” a friend “complained” as he had to scramble to get to the cash machine when my dealer showed up less than fifteen minutes after I had placed my “order.”

He was pretty quick.

Grateful for other things today.

Explained how grateful to be less of what I was and somehow so much more, humbled by the grace that I have been given, bowed head, loved, shined on so that I can turn it out and shine it forward.

That this body is no less and no more than a conveyance for love.

And hopefully sex once in a while.

Oh my God.

43.

STAWP with the hormones.

Oh.

I suppose I’ll rue the day when they go away, but seriously, the sexy sex chemicals in my blood stream.

I don’t have the screaming baby keening ache that I had for a few years, no, it’s been replaced by a last ditch ovarian siege where I am smoking out any guy with the testosterone to hang with me.

FUCK ME!

That’s what it feels like all the time.

ALL THE TIME.

Ok.

Maybe I exaggerate a little, but seriously, the body and the brain in collusion are trying real hard to get this lady some action.

“Let’s go out and find some trouble….nothing’s sexier than regret.”

Heh.

Were I to stumble upon that I might be smote.

So.

Until then.

The yoga.

The masturbation.

Thank you rechargeable Hitachi Magic Wand.

The hair geographic, which will happen Saturday.

I have a tentative date, blind date, Tinder date, not to hook up, which he made that clear, thanks, I think, but hey, you know, just trying, and I wonder if I should warn him about the impending pink hair or just spring it on him.

Fuck.

Who cares?

The drama.

There is none.

If my worst fucking problem is that I want to get laid and no one has thrown their hat in the ring, then my life is a fucking cake walk.

Rent is paid.

The phone is paid.

I got a yoga membership at the studio.

I got that thing in the church basements doing it’s deal for me.

I got happy, joyous, free.

I got friends.

I got good coffee in the cupboard.

Light in the soul.

Shine on my heart.

I ain’t got worries.

All I got.

Is three day weekend and endless fun.

Let’s see what kind of silly I can get up to.

Want to come along?

I promise.

Good times.

Seriously.

4/20 Expect Delays

You are not shitting me.

Seriously.

San Francisco.

The amount of smoke over Golden Gate Park this evening as I was riding home was stupid.

I mean.

It can be foggy in the park, but this was something the fuck else.

It was already getting a little crazy out there when I was heading into work today at 12 noon.

Vendors setting up stands with water and ice.

Just chilling on the sidewalk waiting for the cotton mouth to commence.

I actually rolled through a smoke cloud at the Pan Handle.

I was grateful to get to work and not have to deal with it all too much, in fact, I had rather forgotten, I work in the Mission, people are always smoking up, not much different.

It was when I went home that it was messy.

All day love fest with the marijuana leaf and it was stupid on the roads.

I split lanes at one point as this car was not moving on the green light.

“GET OFF YOUR PHONE!” I hollered at the dazed and confused young woman driver who was texting and sitting through a green light.

Then I zipped by.

Thank you God for lane splitting.

Seriously.

I suspect pizza delivery drivers are making a lot of money tonight.

Grateful to have gotten home safe and sound, to lock up my scooter, shoot out a flirtatious text about a possible date and hustle up the street to the market to get some coffee before doing the deal.

And there’s the motorcycle

Hello ex-boyfriend.

Why you got to look so cute?

Ugh.

And I’m on my period, end days you know, but it does not seem to matter right now, I feel like I am just at the top of my game.

Not to be all ego and that, no rather my body is hormonally doing the dance of Saint Vitus trying to get some.

It did not help when he hugged me later.

Was that a “mmm” on my neck?

Maybe not, maybe it was just my imagination, like that hand at my waist lingering just a moment.

Dude.

Watch out.

His room mate caught me watching him walk out the door and I blushed to beat the band.

Well.

He does look good in those jeans and that blue flannel, flattering.

And moving on.

I know better.

I am pretty certain he’s got a lady friend.

And it ain’t me.

And I’m pretty sure it’s serious.

Or.

I’m pretty sure we would have hit it by this point.

There’s still chemistry there.

That’s ok.

I think right now I have chemistry with a lot of men.

I’m not saying that to stroke myself off, I’m still single over here, going to bed alone, but not lonely, thank you, in my little studio by the sea.

But.

There’s interest.

Oh yes there is.

This is fun, I thought earlier, intercepting  a few messages about “thinking about you” and well, yeah, me too, thinking about you.

I do sort of feel like I am on fire and it feels good.

I am a house on fire.

Burn me all down to the ground.

I’m not upset about this, I’m not looking to change it, I am completely accepting this heat and enjoying it.

Perhaps it is the apex of something.

“There is more to you than, that, that,”  he hesitated.

“That thing in the desert,” I interjected.

“Yes! You are so much more,” he beamed at me tender with sweet deep eyes, my friend patted my arm, “there is something that is going to happen in that time, you’ll see, it will be great.”

It will be.

I’m positive.

There is so much.

And.

There is more time than I thought!

I got my weeks confused.

I still have two weekends before my next school weekend, I had this big idea that I had to have papers written this weekend.

Nope.

I have another weekend before I go back in for my last round of classes before summer break.

I have never been more excited for summer break in my life.

Seriously.

So I can have some play time this weekend and not get my undies in a twist about having to write papers.

Thank God.

I’m still moving forward with reading and making sure that I am caught up with it, but I have some breathing space.

And as of yet.

A completely free Saturday.

I have thoughts of things I want to do.

Sex.

Ahem.

Heh.

Yoga.

Doing that deal.

Getting my nails done, a little mani/pedi will be a nice treat.

Sleeping in if I want.

Like I ever do.

Well.

I sort of did today, I decided to wait on the yoga before work until tomorrow.

Wednesday’s I go in a little early as I have an evening commitment that I am adamant about getting to, so I go in early and leave early, not the best day to squeeze yoga in as well.

But tomorrow.

Yoga it up I will.

And hopefully by the time I do head to work the 4/20 will have been cleaned up and swept away for another season.

Unlike my hormones and sex drive which just seems to be coming out of the closet.

“Oh my forties were insane, enjoy them!  It’s the best time, really, the sex was amazing,” she said and smiled.

I’m sort of understanding that on a very new level.

Maybe I’m just comfortable in my skin.

Maybe I’ve just been in one place long enough.

Easier to hook up with a sitting target than one constantly on the move.

Maybe, after all these years, I finally am embracing the sexy that I have been told I have.

“You are so fucking hot,” he messaged me.

Thanks man.

I appreciate hearing that.

It’s nice to be acknowledged and it’s really nice to just not give a fuck.

This is where I am at in my life.

I don’t have to ask for approval or permission.

Not from you.

Not from me.

I think God’s got me covered pretty good.

I’ll go with God.

And if you don’t think there’s a lot of God in sex.

Well.

You haven’t heard me in the throes.

Ahem.

It’s all about the love.

Or the loving.

But whatever it is.

More please.

Thanks!

 

 

Teeny Tiny Case

Of the feels.

Fucking sads.

Go the fuck away.

Don’t you know tomorrow is Friday?

Bah.

Oh, body, really, do you have to do this?

Sometimes I wonder if my body cycles the way it does just so that I can occasionally access emotions that I sit on.

It’s like, normal Carmen just breezes through the day and I am pretty fucking unruffled.

Quick!

Pee before yoga, you got a minute, it only takes two to walk to the studio, go, fast.

And there like a little blight on my happiness.

The dreaded red spot.

Not the period, nope, that’s got about two days to go, unless I get lucky, insert irony here, and I get it tomorrow morning, which the rate my hormones are emotionally playing the violin may strike a day early.

Ugh.

I ovulated.

“Another baby down the drain,” my brain whispered to me.

Fuck you.

WHO ASKED?

I most certainly did not and was a bit abject that this is now the tact my brain takes to malign my day.

FUCK.

I hate overblown emotions.

I don’t like having the sad’s and I am not interested in the feel’s either.

Back off.

Maybe I should change the music, Regina Spektor is lovely and all, but I don’t want to think about Ne Me Quitte Pas Ma Cher.

It just makes me want to burst into tears.

And now I’m full blown crying.

Good thing this is not a video blog.

Bah.

I just miss someone.

And sometimes that happens.

And it catches you off guard and it doesn’t matter that you’re wearing red lipstick and look really cute, sexy pin-up hot, I mean, I do, I got some looks today, it doesn’t matter if you’re crying over fantasy spilt milk.

Some times things don’t work out and it’s not because there’s not love there, it’s just not there for you.

Every one knows its going to hurt.

Ugh.

I guess I just needed a really good sloppy cry.

I guess I am surprised that I still feel like this, the grief comes, it goes, it dissipates like the moon waning in the evening sky, the stars flashing while the moon whirls slowly over the arc of the sky.

And when I am awake, late in the night, when I so just want to be asleep.

And there’s still no cure for crying.

But the moon is streaming in and the whiteness, like snow illuminated, sand ripples, waves crash, the icing floating over the ocean, the glitter of diamonds, the shatter of breaking my own heart.

Darling let go of her hand, let go of her hand, let go of her hand.

She’s the kind of girl who’ll smash herself down in the night.

She’ll break her own heart.

And you know, she’ll break your own heart too.

The pain of knowing true love exists.

Oof.

Ok.

All cried out.

Fuck listening listening to this music any more.

Back to Mike Doughty Stellar Motel.

Ah.

Better.

Side bar.

My friend commented about Mike Doughty liking one of my Instagram photos and did I just freak out?

Yes.

I did.

And I freaked out more when he started following me and now he’s coming up on my facecrack page as a friend suggestions we have four or five friends in common.

I’m like, hey sugar, we don’t really know each other, but hey, hey.

I like your music a lot.

A LOT.

Swear to god I have listened to Stellar Motel on repeat now for a good solid week and a half, I’ve played it every day, at least once, often times more than once.

Now.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not just listening to Mister Doughty, but he’s kind of got my attention right now, plus, I like to think that I sound good singing his stuff, it matches my vocal range pretty well.

I love singing.

I’m not the greatest, but it does make me happy.

I sang a long to all sorts of things tonight trying to find the right thing for the boys to listen to.

Everything from “Somewhere over the Rainbow,” to Thomas Dolby, then Jim Croce, Van Morrison, Steely Dan, again Mike Doughty, but from Yes and Also Yes, not Stellar Motel, oh and some Art of Noise–the boys freaking love it.

I was at work late tonight and I go in early tomorrow.

And I found out I’m getting out a little earlier than I thought tomorrow as well, I’ll be done by 5:15pm or so, the family has dinner plans.

Swell.

I’ll get my nails did.

Or do some grocery shopping.

Definitely need to take care of doing the deal, not sure where, who knows.

After the emotional roller coaster of hormones, it seems to have passed, I really think I just needed a good cry.

And lucky you, you got to be the witness thereof.

I thought I had all my cries out, but sometimes there’s just another in there.

I’m being a bit vague about the whole thing and I’m not sure why, the person I am having the feels around stopped following my blog.

That hit like a ton of bricks.

We’re still facecrack friends, but I did stop following him.

It was just too hard.

I haven’t been on his page in weeks but it’s hard, his profile photo is one I took.

The last time I saw his page he was half naked on the beach.

I was like.

Um.

I can not look at that.

I’ve basically been in, shocker, a unrequited love relationship for months.

It started to fall apart in November, had it’s death knoll in December, buried under the glittering lights of Paris, dissolved in the New Year and the week or so before Valentines Day, well.

Yeah.

I haven’t done much writing about it because I was so fucking in love it felt like I was being consumed.

Oh fuck, here comes the waterworks.

It’s hard.

But I will live through it.

“Just be grateful that God gave you this man in your life so that you could get a chance to see how deep you can love,” she said weeks and weeks ago at Tart to Tart.

Yeah.

Like that.

I prayed for weeks, months, let it go, surrender, move on.

And I have.

I have stopped walking down that street, I don’t fall in the pothole, but man, the siren song of it lures.

I saw him sitting in Burger Joint a few weeks ago, the one by my job, and as I rode my bicycle past I said, “don’t look, don’t look, don’t look, fuck, looking, looking, fuck, yup, there he is, and keep fucking moving.”

That’s what it’s been like.

The anger that my person was talking about that needed a valve, yeah, might have had something to do with being mad at myself.

I assuaged myself for a nano second.

“But he said he was in love with you too,” and yup.

He did say that.

It’s a powerful thing to tell someone that you are in love with them and they tell you that they are in love with you too and there’s nothing he can do and there’s nothing I can do and it’s not important the why’s and where of’s, it just is what it is.

And I can cry in my soup, or tea, or whatever is in front of me, the collar of my red cardigan, my heart broken and bloody once more, or I can say hey, you lived, you loved–oh so hard–and you learned and now.

Well.

You get to keep loving.

Harder and stronger.

Bigger and faster.

With greater joy and fervor.

With all my heart.

And that heart is so big now, so full and open and blown apart, you’d be amazed at what I can hold.

I don’t regret a moment.

Or the experience.

I know greater love for having known this love.

I always will.

And for that I am grateful.

Hormonal or not.

I get to have this experience.

And knowing that.

I know that I am taken care of.

Always.

Blessed.

Graced.

Held.

Loved.

Always.

 

 

Welcome To The Club

She said.

The “smooshed boobs club.”

She giggled a little and gave me a pink ribbon pin on my way back out to the dressing room.

“Pretty.”

She also said.

I don’t believe she was responding to my sideways mashed breast, rather, the tattoo on my arm was drawing her attention.

“You’re doing really well, so much better than some, so good for your first time.”

“Hold still, hold your breath, ok, and……”

“Breathe.”

This conversation could have been much more uncomfortable, but I am just that, comfortable in my body.

I remember going into to the same room, the same dressing area, with the same grey back drop at Kaiser Geary years and years ago with a friend who needed moral support.

It wasn’t so bad.

I mean.

Her hands were not the hands that I wanted to be man handling my breasts, but at least it was not painful.  I rather thought that it might be.

Yes.

It was certainly uncomfortable to be half-naked in front of a stranger, but I have taken showers in the communal shower trailers (although not nearly as many as I thought I would this past burn) at Burning Man for the staff, that stripping down wasn’t such a difficult thing.

I did not feel vulnerable or scared or uncomfortable.

I felt all those things last night.

Counterpoint with the absolute thrill of being with a person I really like making out while the stars exploded over our heads.

“There’s the moon,” I said pointing it out in the sky, a bit facetiously, trying to make light conversation, trying to not wear my ragged little heart on my sleeve, trying to be funny in my own way.

Then the fireworks.

Literally.

Figuratively.

The Giants won the World Series last night.

Go Gigantes!

Ahem.

Not that I am really all that big a fan of the sportsball thing, in any of its various manifestations, I’m not even a fair weather friend.

I think I have been too traumatized by too many sports teams and the inevitable fall out of drunken revellers.

Whether I was drunk or not.

Most of the time when a large sporting event was happening that was a big deal, I was working.

I was working last night and then I went to do the deal.

“I don’t know why he cancelled,” the text read, “would you be able to fill in?”

Of course.

I wasn’t even thinking that it was game seven of the series.

I was just thinking, when you’re asked, you say yes.

So I did.

And I am grateful for it because it gave me something to fixate on rather than the text I received about being in my neighborhood and would it be alright to drop by and say hello.

“If sex is very troublesome, we throw ourselves the harder into helping others.”

Good Lord, let me help some others.

So I can stop thinking about what I am going to wear, do I have enough time to get home and shower and what am I going to wear, oh, did I already say that?

What the fuck am I going to wear?

I think I could have answered the door in a gunny sack, but I do believe that effort means something.

When a person is meaningful, I want to reflect that and show up for it.

I mean, I won’t lie, I debated taking the shower and getting back into regular civilian clothes, not that any of my clothes are all that civilian–tomorrow is Halloween and I didn’t go out and buy a costume, my costume is from my regular wardrobe, just slightly rearranged into a conceptualized idea.

Then I thought, that’s stupid, you’re just getting home from work, you’ve had an adrenaline inducing ride through the wilds of San Francisco and its drunken environs, put on your pajamas.

But I couldn’t bring myself to pull on my yoga pants and my Hello Kitty nightshirt.

I compromised, but on a dress that looks like a sexy night slip and slipped into a sweatshirt that is a tiny bit fancier than my Bicycle Coalition hoodie.

I didn’t wear makeup, but my color was so high from the ride home that I doubt it was necessary, and something about being freshly showered feels glowy and pretty.

And there were fireworks.

Of course they were commemorating the World Series win, but I could extrapolate that to my situation.

I felt like fireworks.

Clothed fireworks.

Let me reassure you.

Or me.

I suppose it’s me.

I so want to get carried away, swept away, take me away, ravish me, have me.

But.

Whoa.

Slow girl.

There’s nowhere to go, nowhere to rush to.

It’s been awhile since I have felt like going it slower.

This, this speed I am at, is still above average, I do have a lead foot, I do like exhilaration, I am not good at reigning in passion about anything, let alone being alone with a handsome and sexy and delicious man.

Sweet Jesus.

Gotta get right with God, and there is no judgement here, no trying to wrangle it or snag something, it’s a building up, is what it feels like.

A slow steady burn rather than a flash of light and heat and fire and the embers faint and fading as they fall into the sea.

The fireworks were dreamy and I felt my body shake today, flashes of color and heat on the inside of my eyes and I was swept back up in the feeling of passion that was there.

As well as the excitement of knowing I will get to see him again.

Soon.

Tomorrow.

It’s Halloween and I have a date to the dance.

I mean that literally.

I have a date to the dance.

It does feel like high school, I feel like high school, nervous, giggly, then ravaged with hormones (just because I was welcomed into the smooshed boobs club does not mean that I don’t still have a surfeit of hormones), giddy.

And I am going to run with that feeling as long as I can.

Unlike high school, though, or college or last year, I suppose, I haven’t capitulated on waiting a little, slowing it down, it could have happened the first night I met him.

That whoosh of feeling and magnetism.

I could have stripped down and done a little dance of lust in the basement.

There is something to that bonfire of passion, but I don’t want it to burn out.

I want to bank it and feed it and build it up.

I think it’s only going to get better.

And then.

Well.

Fireworks.