Summer? Yes?

Once upon a time…

I saw Leonard Cohen: Live in London last night on Prairie Public. It had been a while since I'd heard Cohen, and was reminded of earlier years when I'd listened closer, and seen him glow and low voice sung from the TV screen in a friend's apartment. I miss that.

This is one of my Cohen favorites, Chelsea Hotel -- a number I didn't here in Live in London.

Happy Cold Pizza Day! (A new holiday cuisine)

Let's face it -- Thanksgiving was not created for vegetarians. It's a well-known fact that pulling that shiny Butterball from the oven is, indeed two-fifths of the fun of Thanksgiving (Grandma's antics provide the other three-fifths). When you take away the turkey, a herbivore's delight are the mashed potatoes, the cranberry relish, and the cold pizza that your brother brought home from work last night.

Due to working conflictions of other family members, we've not eaten our dinner yet. This is kind of a problem, because aside from the bowl of oatmeal I ate for breakfast/lunch, I've been gnawing on cold pizza all afternoon. I'm not blaming this on anyone. Clearly I could run to my refrigerator right now and shove a package of deli meat in my mouth if I so pleased, but in keeping with my desire to remain veg, I've restrained myself. Next week marks one year without meat, and I intend to reach that mark and then some. (Note: This is the longest I've stuck with anything, ever. Not even my longest relationship, or consecutive months of not shaving my legs beat this.)

I made a grocery store run this afternoon with the intention of buying a bag of potatoes, and a side intention of finding a turkey substitute. In a city where 0.5% of residents claim vegetarianism, and the other 99.5% are on a strict meat and potato diet, I found nothing but buffalo sausage and birds. I was actually skeptical to ask where the tofu was, for fear of that look...you know, the look, the one that reminds you that tofu was not eaten by pilgrims at any national celebration of citizenship and/or discovery. The look that says, "You and your vegetable-eating psycho environmentalist inconveniences of friends are the exact reason why my faith in humanity is waning." The look that says, "Substitute? Why not just eat potatoes and cold pizza?" I walked out of the store with a sack of potatoes.

On second thought, an orchestra of awkward stares at the questionable turkey substitute on my plate would, in fact, not be worth the trouble. Dodging the questions to follow could prove tricky ("That looks like...what is that?"), and aside from being nutritional, I can't think of any reason why it would beat cold pizza and potatoes.

One thing to be thankful for: Pumpkin pie. No meat in that.

Happy day, all.

There I was, walking, whistling "The Ants Go Marching One By One, etc." My face was contorted, about as usual as one would expect from a whistle face. I only do this when I'm alone—and I was, for a moment at least, until he came from the opposite way.

I thought, I remember you! He had appeared once in a doorway in the fall, year 2006. I can recall feeling uncertain, and insecure, clinging to the acquaintance whom I bore no interest in for the sake of being acquainted. Now we were standing in front of her full-length mirror. Her breasts were bulging out of her top, and likewise with her midriff. I pretended to admire the decorations on the wall, compliment the comforters and the stale, institution-like charm of it all. He stood in the doorway as she laughed a shrill cadence of manufactured approval. Boys! New boys. They'd all been drinking alcohol, fascinating. I felt fourteen and twenty-four altogether, a regenerated life deadfall in a girlish figure. I became excited in anticipation of an evening brimful of havoc, and distributed my phone number accordingly.

All this gave way to a false relief, and the tension between who I was and wasn't. For every day I tried, I grew further from myself; and growing further, I fell faster. Now I was walking faster, away from I remember you! and toward I'm going to forget you. Or better, I'm going to forget you, and the person I was that year.

Not to ostracize necessary growth, but to keep moving forward. I whistled, The ants go marching two by two…

Nothing but a passing.

I am thoroughly in love with this man.

I'm searching for validity, for justification, for the right words to explain why I am where I am, doing what I do. It's day after day of seeking a congratulations, a memory, a truth. I'm driving solo and won't go to sleep, I'm washing dishes and thinking too deep, it's a Friday, a Sunday, an everyday too little, overanalyze, repeat.

It's a familiar feeling that waits around, the lull and pass, the deafening sound of worry.

Her mother is dying. She's made it very clear, through photographs and a description—that description, of fluids and fallacies.

He wants more coffee. He's made it very clear, waving his thick, ragged index my way, under that crisp foam hat, amidst wrinkles and a livid complexion.

She's a single mom. She's making it clear, that her food stamps make it alright to go out on Saturday night, to leave her son with the Dad she mistook for forever, or just mistook.

He's balding. It's so clear, it's painful and alarming. His mustaches conceals hours of sports statistics, and he's a phony.

She thinks I'm a little demon. In jest she's made it clear, and she's willing to borrow me her cat any given day, for the sake of not being alone.

Of June

Of course I remember this night. I was lushly drunk off wine and having a darling time, running around in high heels, dancing with dads. I made the floors crush and the doors rush with ready—whoa, whoa steady now! Stand up straight, I couldn't wait to take another sip and trip over those nasty sidewalks ripped, from years of hot and cold they shift, I drifted clumsy into the night.

Then I fight, a blank memory and scrambled mind of matter and debris, see the couch and long to slink to my knees, to succumb, to breath deep and heave, ho, heave, ho, to release the dance and the heels, the pool, the drunken chatter, my longing to feel, and suddenly...

Breath deep, heave, sleep, and leave. And on to a morning to pull myself together, so secret an abandoned eve.

Thanks (and then some)

It's tomorrow already. I'm still awake, going to bed is and has been overrated since the 17th century. I've drank, twice my weight in tea, in thinking of better days. I'm still awake, my hairs are flayed in all sorts of greasy, mystical, maniacal directions of stress and late. I'm past care and before sleep. I'm still awake.

It's today now and I'm still awake, and I'm going to thank everyone for each day. Thanks, thanks for calling and thanks for smiling and thank you for carrying my groceries to my car. Thanks for writing back, thanks for turning down the radio, thank you. Thank you for doing my laundry, for retaining my sanity, for the gift card and the get-well. Thanks for turning the heat on. Thanks for liking my eyes, thanks for running up the bill, and thank you, thank you for changing the toilet paper roll.

I thank you for each day, for this day we didn't talk, and that day that I took the time to walk around the block and see, the folks I don't usually see. Thanks for the .41 between my car seat, thanks for the extra cup with my tea, thanks for staying put. Thanks for the trash, and taking out the trash, and making me feel like trash. Thank you, and you, and you. Thanks for wiping your feet. Thank you for taking the time, and the space to realize that I'm waiting…still.

Everyone, thanks. I'm still awake.

P.S.

More thank you's available here.

I excessively dwell on the past.

Richard Avedon, Bob Dylan, musician, Central Park, New York, February 10, 1965, Gelatin silver print, 19-1/2 x 15-5/8",
© 2008 The Richard Avedon Foundation.

I saw this photograph at the Foam Museum in Amsterdam. It was by chance that I found the museum, and on the last day of the exhibit's showing. Ambling through room after room of Avedon photographs—authentic prints that'd been worked by his very hands. It was by and far one of the most glorious events of my life.

Oh, so beautiful.

It was my last visit to London. I remember taking the Underground to St. John's Wood, then talking to a handsome fellow working at the station. He gave me a map to Abbey Road and I walked the several blocks through a quiet neighborhood, absorbing the tranquil houses and beautiful gray skies. I remember making the cross, in the same footsteps as John, Paul, Ringo, George and tourists. I remember that afternoon, walking Abbey Road by myself on a rainy Sunday. I had strangers take my photograph. I ran my hands across the worn graffiti on the walls of Abbey Road Studios, thinking of the Beatles, and the 60's, fortune and luck. How lucky I was to be in London…

It aches. I miss every step of the journey, every day, every single day, all the time.

Vitamin 3-D

I bought a BIG, shiny new book today (that cost an arm and a leg).

I'm hoping this is the onset of something fantastic.

And,




I'm sinking.

Happy

I heard this song on a preview for a show on TLC and absolutely couldn't resist it. Apologies for the emo child that (creepily) stares…and…doesn't…move throughout the video. Let that be a lesson. Close your eyes if it helps, this song has sunny day written all over it. Love.

A busy week, and a slow weekend—I'm hoping to
make it through the upcoming days, successfully.

Despite all that's well there is, something
slightly skewed, slightly missing, terribly
obviously awry.

This is tired.

Swinging lines of hungry minds
Catching eyes and awkward ties
Measured sighs and flying time
To go.

This link is not fresh news, but honestly—it's a serious, oft-overlooked issue.

Listen here.

Think about it.

I'm never going to write you a letter
Never going to call you on the phone
I'm never going to drive by your house
I'm never going to catch you coming outside
Never going to walk up your walk
And ring your bell
And feel you fall into my arms

Never wanted to care like this.