Grandma's Favorite? This is Fucked Up.

At every family gathering this year, there has been a point when the older folks switch the topic of conversation from living to dying. I don't know if they've been doing this the whole time, or if I've just happened to walk in on it this year. It's not subtle either--straight up things like, "I just know any day now, I'm gonna roll over to wake him up and he's gonna be cold."

It's not just talk of dying, either.

The family, generally speaking, knows about my grandma's brother and father. How they weren't right in the head, how they were alcoholics. How they were predators. My grandma left them behind in Massachusetts, but not before my mom was exposed to them. It's ugly and sick and shameful, and I can't imagine how it must feel to be harmed, like that, by people directly related to me.

We all know of it, but it's not detailed in our minds; in fact, I'm sure they left it that way because they didn't want us to feel like we'd been through it too. We don't need specific instances, we don't need to know what room it was, or what time it happened.

But it's part of the story of my family, and the stories of my mother and grandmother. They were altered as people because of those events, which affected every part of their lives--their emotional distance, the way they raised their children, and their ability to show (and be shown) love.

I picked up a Christmas card on my aunt's table while sitting around on Christmas day. It said, "Hope you all are OK. We are OK. Lou is not so well. It's hard to see", and then the pre-printed Christmas message. It is the saddest Christmas card I've ever seen in my life. A bit later, I'm outside with my grandma, and I ask her about the card from her sister. All she said to that was, "I don't talk to them no more." I asked why, and she tells me that they neglected to notify her when her brother died. She didn't know until three months later.

Then, she started talking about her brother. I wasn't asking her anything about it at this point--this is free-form grandma, and grandma doesn't talk much, and very rarely complains. She said he was her favorite, but he had a bad streak in him. She said he picked her up from school one day and got a ticket because he didn't stop for the school bus. And you know, I laugh, cause it's funny to me. And she laughs, and then tells me he didn't stop because he was trying to put his hand up her skirt.
"...and you know, I told him not to do that..."

My little sister, who was sitting there listening with me, audibly gasped. She looked at me for a cue, and I didn't have one. I just looked at her, wide-eyed.

All I had was confirmation that my happy childhood had only existed because all of them--my mother, grandmother, aunts and uncles, families by marriage and the like--had put us in the middle and made a human barrier to keep out the darkness. They were the Atlas that held my world on their shoulders. They'd all looked at it so we didn't have to.

Once you get to a certain age, you know or at least suspect as much. A few years ago, I started to see the reason why it's so hard to hold other people to my expectations: because everyone is from a different world, has had different struggles, and has seen different amounts of darkness. You don't know how warped they are, or if they've ever seen true darkness. Or if they've seen too much of it and can't trust anyone because of it.

Not all my memories of my grandma are good ones. She had it out for me when I was young, for reasons still kind of unclear. We'd stay at her house a lot, and she'd always accuse me of random offenses, like eating her lipstick. Furthermore, she'd make fun of me in public, or straight-up TRIP me when I was 7. She cackled like a demon, she thought it was so funny. The terrible thing was that I wanted her to love me more than anything. I'm sure she did, but when I was 7, that shit didn't feel like love.

She's clearly outgrown that phase, but after talking to her on Christmas, it occurred to me that maybe she resented her grandkids back then--just the tiniest, childish little bit--because growing up was made so easy for us. Paired with our generation's excellent complaining skills, she doesn't get it, and felt like she got the shaft. Why do we get nerf guns and hundreds of barbies while she grew up eating expired food from the restaurant her family lived behind? In the bitter cold Massachusetts winter, with an abusive alcoholic predator of a father? After the depression? WITH 8 SIBLINGS? I guess the least she could do was trip me in public to make me feel a slight smidgen of how painful growing up was for her.

Every Christmas feels more and more like "The Dead". All the kids leave, and the spirit dies, and all that's left is the old ones talking about their impending death like they'll put it in tomorrow's coffee.

on junkies

When I see the junkie at the gas station, while I'm dressed comfortably and freshly-showered, a little bit of my stomach sinks and starts fucking with my sense of well-being. An overwhelming sadness, with flecks of worry and fear. It's caused by the knowledge that a day in my life might come when I choose that path. Being a junkie doesn't just happen to people--they choose it, right? And I have those same choices to make in my own life.

I might be making them right now. My car needs gas, my rent is still unpaid, and I have this little itch in the back of my head. Yes, I want to get fucked up.

Oh God.

And then I think about God.

God, what soul would think of free will as a great gift to mankind? Perhaps, a soul who has never been among them, has not faced these choices every day, and instead sent his son to die at the hands of the junkies.

God begins to make no sense to me, though I'm not sure I really thought about it before. The junkie has "turned away from God", and as a kid, when I'd see a junkie, my mom told me that's why he was a junkie. Why?

I start to dissect the logic, and discover that there is none. And like most people, I do not have a clear grip on what God is. The Christians tell you that you aren't supposed to understand. God is a nebulous, celestial entity who created life, and gave the glorious burden of free will to humans alone. Not the cats, not the hamsters, but me. Me.

Perhaps God is a feeling that you get when a path is set in front of you, clear-cut, and you have no choice but to keep walking on it, and a large portion of the world accepts you and praises you for it. The pure kind of love that comes with security, acceptance, and peace of mind, often found in infants.

Perhaps Free Will is called a gift because that's the only way we can be happy about it at all.

Perhaps turning away from God is a feeling you get when you realize you can jump over the shrubs, scale the fence, get as far away from that path as you want to. Perhaps those "without god" know free will is not a gift, but a burden, because we have so many options. You could be a cabbie, rob a bank, breathe air atop Mount Fuji, or fall to your death. You realize you can do anything, and that there is no path.

Perhaps there is no God/Satan dialectic. Maybe it is the God/Free Will dialectic. The Set Path/Erratic Tumult.

The night after I saw the junkie at the gas station, the sinking churned my stomach into a restless, fruitless sleep, because all I thought about was how tomorrow's choices might land me begging in front of a gas station in five years, with my infected track marks and my decaying teeth. Of course I won't make those choices, I'm better than that, but there's no way to be sure.

All of a sudden, the road was littered with sinister pot-holes that I swore I'd never seen before. Maybe I'd just been overlooking them--is that how it starts? I wanted to go to my parents' house, my childhood home, my alma mater, with an urgency that I haven't felt since infancy, or what I imagined infancy felt like (Isn't it funny that we don't remember it? What God felt like?). I wanted to be coddled, to be told that I am a good person, and that I don't have it in me to end up like that.

But the thing is, I do have it in me. That's the God-damned truth.

And tomorrow, at any point, maybe sitting at a desk or in the middle of a phone call, that sinking shadow in my gut could crawl up into my stomach and start convulsing again, sprouting thick, scarred veins and a mugshot-worthy complexion. My safety net, hand-crafted out of questionable mythic materials, evaporated and I might be halfway to the bottom already. I'll hit the bottom before I realize there was never any safety net. I'm not any different from the Godless junkies.

Sometimes, I have these dreams. I'll be out with my friends at a bar, and we'll all be having fun. Then all of a sudden, I am a zombie. I cannot talk, walk, or function, and all I want is another of something. It doesn't matter what it is, the It is always variable. But I want it. Need it. After I turn into a zombie, I don't remember who I'm with or what is happening--only that I need another.

And I wake up so convinced that it happened, that I don't remember how it started. As if I blacked out. When I wake up from dreams like this, the sense of shame is almost unbearable. Sure, it was a dream. But in the back of my head, there's this itch.

Ask Me To Pull Through

I feel sorry for my neighbor across the hall tonight. She's got company, and I absolutely must listen to the entire Ben Folds discography, including Ben Folds Five. In a few hours, she'll want to take an axe to my door, throw my cat out the window and destroy my hard drive via explosives. Ahh, too bad for her.

I took the mystery editor's freelance offer, despite my misgivings and disillusionment with journalism. I could say I did it for money--that's certainly part of it, but it doesn't account for the whole. I've been in a slump for the last month or so, not because of any particular reason, but rather...a lot of pixels come together and create a feeling of woe, like Poe's all-inclusive mood style. But the one thing that seems to consistently pull me out of it is directed writing. Not this blog--sometimes it helps to dump everything out, but this is not one of those times. In a way that has a lot to do with pride, I hate admitting it, but it's nice to have someone just tell me what to do. Especially when it's writing, and especially when I don't know what else to do.

And the assignment I just finished was one of the most intensive I've ever done. Definitely the most journalistic thing I've ever written, much different from the fluff pieces and movie reviews I've written in the last six months. It was hard, on several levels--the first being I only had 3.5 days to do the research and interviews necessary, the second being I was required to come to a conclusion after interviewing six people. Six people rarely come to a consensus, so the consensus had to be mine.

I know it doesn't sound like a tall order, but real-world-related writing that must conclude something is asking a lot. You really have to put yourself out there, and be okay knowing that someone's going to disagree with you vehemently. To someone like me, that's a billion times more terrifying than writing fiction, because it's real. Personally, I spend as little time in reality as possible. Therefore, my opinions about reality are often completely incorrect, and I go into it expecting everyone to disagree with me.

But I really needed an assignment. Something that was DUE. And when I finished at 8:47pm tonight, after four hours of dissecting, transcribing and deciphering recorded interviews, all I wanted to do was bask in the afterglow and eat a healthy meal.

I'm not going to think about it too hard. They pay well, anyway. I'm clearly just doing it for the money.

The Saddest Christmas Story Ever

I've never been a huge fan of Christmas decorations. Well, I'll rephrase that--I've never been a fan of putting up Christmas decorations. I like other peoples' hard work and I like taking that drive to see all the pretty lights, but I've never actually put any effort into my own living space, aside from the plug-in fiber-optic mini-tree I bought last year. I don't think I could get away with calling that "effort".

This year, I find myself in a different sort of state. Last year, I was more or less financially secure, vaguely unhappy with myself and most things in my life. I shared this space with someone as lost as I was. We clung to each other to validate some stray path we'd both taken. It sounds kind of sad, and it is, but that kind of relationship is part of the human condition--experiencing that is necessary on the way to understanding the human soul. Or, my soul, anyway.

This year, I've nothing to cling to. My finances, while strict and disciplined, don't allow for much excess. It's a double-edged sword: while it can mortally wound me, it also cuts out all the excess that eventually makes me "sad without cause". Not having the money to buy the bag of cookies kinda makes the choice for you, you know?

This year, my life feels a bit like my room when I was a kid. I'd create modifications out of what I had on hand (example: I once made a speaker shelf out of an old plastic pencil case, hemp twine and duct tape), tied together with string and tiny bits of prayers I remember from childhood. Everything is so fragile. If I drop the ball, it all breaks to pieces, and this time I won't be able to glue them back together.

So I got a Christmas tree.

I didn't pay for it; it was the old fake tree my parents have been putting together for 14 years now. And even though it isn't a money tree, and it does not grow peace-of-mind pinecones, it has somehow glued the living room together.

I didn't have any ornaments or tinsel, or shiny breakable baubles to adorn it with, so of course I made some. Old CDs tied to the branches with hemp twine, a handmade dream catcher from JH, strips of mismatched fabric as bows. A Chinese takeout box with a light bulb inside as the topper. It really does look like my tree.

And I've been thinking a lot about it. Not just the tree, but the atmosphere of a widely-celebrated holiday. I'm not exactly a Christian; I'm not exactly a believer in anything outside of positivity. So why would a Christmas tree smooth over the rough spots? Bridge the gaps over abyssal sadnesses? It's not even a real tree.

I guess it could be as simple as, this is what's always happened around this time of year. There's always been a tree. Maybe it's just familiarity, like the ghost of something that once made me so excited I couldn't sleep.

I hear we spend our whole lives trying to get back to our care-free youth. Maybe, in a sense, the more care-free your youth is, the more lost you are when you grow up, because it doesn't exist outside of that. To get it back, you have to build it; shove over everything else in the real world and make room for it. And still, no matter how much hemp twine or scrap fabric I tie together, I'm never going to get it back, not really. It will always be the ghost of it--a smell, a warmth, but less than it was. A residual. Until I spawn my crotchfruit, of course; then I can re-create it for them, and weep a little inside when I see how happy they are. And I'll think, I remember that. I remember that.

The Christmas tree helps, though.

Grumbles

This is so fun. I sometimes think I have too much fun, and later on, when I'm old, the weight of all my fun will come crashing down on my weak bones. For all the pain and responsibility that I see other adults having to deal with, I've only ever dealt with a fraction of that. Everyone's so grumbles about their stressful lives. Sometimes I think that mine is, too, and I get grumbles. But then I have a night like last night, paired with a morning like this morning, and I have no grumble excuses.

This morning, it took everything in me to get out of bed. I didn't have to get out of bed, actually, but my teeth felt nasty and I wanted coffee really bad. My bed was so warm. So, so warm and cozy and smushy, and my brain was swollen from last night (and was at critical mass). I had this perfect pillow formation set up to where I was laying on one, and the other cold, lumpy pillow (affectionately dubbed "the Jank") was on top of my head, chilling it.

But stomach acidity and toothbrushes pulled me out. Chuggin' water and cooking eggs kept me out. Now, I've got 2 fried eggs, sauteed & curried garlic spinach, chard, and bell peppers with couscous in my tummy, and I kinda want to go back to bed.

The moral of the story, and the point of writing this, is that I CAN JUST GO BACK TO BED IF I WANT TO. I have too much fun.

On the Lam

When things surround me and don't let me breathe, usually I simply ignore it until it's no longer a problem, or if the things are tasks, I do them and move on. If they are bills, I pay them and cross them off a list.

I may be a lot of things, but something I'm not is easily affected by things that don't matter. That's why these past three weeks have been exhausting, surprising, and awful. Not the entire time, but you know how negativity bloats up and fills your days with thoughts concerning it, no matter what other fun things and happy people are around to distract you?

That's probably a given, but I haven't truly felt this way since I was a mopey teenager. I'm new to this. I'm pretty much sold that it's not a valid way to be, and I simply cannot get anything done when I'm not happy.

Since I don't want to directly speak of the subject matter, I will now list all the things that didn't go wrong in the last three weeks:

It wasn't sadness; no one died. My friends didn't desert me. I didn't default on my student loans, entergy has not cut off my power. My sandals didn't break in New Orleans. I didn't throw punches, though I almost wanted to. I've not gone a day without everything I need. No one caught me stealing their internet. My family didn't fall apart, I did not get into a car accident, no one overdosed. I'm not in jail, and none of my friends are either.

Those are the real things that could go wrong, not just in the last few weeks, but every day. What went wrong wasn't real, and on the way home from New Orleans this weekend, the fog around me finally dissipated. That was a terrible three-week vacation, and a real physical vacation to New Orleans fixed it.

I'm back to being impermeable. Score!

The Art of Burning Bridges

Hello, November. It's been a long year. I'm ready to throw it all back, get naked and climb under the covers for a nice, long binge sleep. Pretend that a good 60% of this never happened. Wouldn't mind dabbing a little concealer on the things I've seen, said and done in the past 3 months.

There is something eating at me, and I need to drive a stake through it before I change into someone I'm not; before everyone notices. I have bigger goals for myself than a single feeling, or a temporary reprieve from loneliness.

I'm better than this.

Day two of No Toilet. Sometimes I feel that my life is a Seinfeld episode. LOLtastic. I just had to drive to Cracker Barrel to poop. AHAHAHAAHAHHAthisislaaaame

First World

Not a day and a half goes by, and most of my first-world problems have evaporated, or tended to themselves. The check didn't bounce. I'm not dwelling on the mess I used to be. I got to the bank in time. I wrote my cousin a heartfelt note detailing why exactly I would not be attending his wedding (entirely due to finances and not being able to afford taking off work for 3 weekends in a row). I'm getting enough sleep, eating well, and am not pregnant. The magazine I over-committed to, seems to have...gone under; it's October 9th and still no October issue, and no contact from the editor in a month.

It's rare, but I do love when my problems evaporate. Still want to leave, though.

Shame

October is to be celebrated. Usually here in the dirty south, the climate gets mixed up and forgets that it's supposed to be autumnal outside, but this October is different. LA finally figured it out, but the cold snap feels... foreboding.

I've enjoyed having my windows open, yes. Have I been basking in the noon sunshine-breeze combo? For hours. But the unnaturalness of this season has been getting to me, along with impending clashes of multiple personal relationships, over-committing my time in all of my endeavors, my sister's impending marriage on the 23rd (and all of its accouterments, including shoes, hair, dress, jewelry, makeup, bachelorette party, gifts) and generally feeling like I can't afford my life, even though I've chopped out almost everything I used to dump my money into. Shit, I wrote a check for rent and it could bounce at any moment. The double tomorrow should take care of that, but if my landlord decides to go to the bank tomorrow morning, then I get to make one of the most embarassing phone calls ever.

My life dug a hole and I've been dancing around it with my fingers crossed.

On the bright side, I have somehow dropped 25 pounds since June. I'm 5'2", so it shows like a strip club in a neighborhood. It has been really dramatic, and hard in a way, because when I run into someone I haven't seen for awhile, they make a point to say something to the effect of, "You look great! You really let yourself go for awhile." And yes, I did, but in ways that those people don't know. It's a constant reminder that I spent a long time replacing myself with habits and junk and people that didn't make me happy. I'll come to terms with it one day, but right now, I just wish that it hadn't happened. I lost some of the best years of my life to forgetting what makes me happy. The worst part was that I was okay with it for the most part. It sickens me, angers me, makes me feel that I was lazy with my life and was just cool with letting my dreams evaporate. And yeah, it's great to be able to fit in clothes that I haven't worn in 5 years, but it's kind of a bittersweet achievement.

I can see it in my mother's eyes, she is concerned, because I had a bit of an issue with an eating disorder in high school. She thinks I'm back at it again, but that couldn't be further from the truth. I hate being hungry, and have absolutely no idea how I managed that years ago. But I really don't know how to explain it--I dropped about 10 pounds when I got my wisdom teeth out, but it just kept falling off me. I did change the way I eat, but not really consciously. Tommy moved out and I found that my grocery loads were vastly different. Also, money issues made it imperative that I eat cheaply, which meant I didn't go out to eat at all, all summer. I'm eating the way I've always wanted to eat. It's what I would have been eating if I hadn't tied myself to people for the last five years. I was making jumps and taking risks and living life on my toes, which seems to be my true nature. I felt better about my life, and somehow that all translated into looking like I did back when I was happy. It involved virtually no exercise.

Man, that was supposed to be the bright side. It is a bright side, but I don't like thinking about it right now. It'd be easier if I didn't keep running into people who remind me of how much of a mess I used to be.

My burgeoning mental state will likely catch up with me soon. Probably the weekend of my sister's wedding. After that, the climate will remember that it is dyslexic and go back to sweltering, and I can go back to remembering exactly why I'm here; I seem to have forgotten. Or maybe I won't remember. Maybe I just need to leave soon. I hear Oregon is fantastic.

Series

She loaded the DVD into the player out of habit, and he pressed play on the remote control.

"Which one did we stop on?" she asked.
"I forget," he replied.

How do we always forget? she wondered. They watched this show every night, and had, for...awhile. She just picked the first episode on the disc and told him to press play. She vaguely remembered doing it the night before, but she couldn't remember what had happened in the episode, so they might as well watch it again.

They had seen this one before, but neither said anything against replaying it. It was the one where Mulder and Scully end up trapped in an abandoned house on Christmas Eve, and the ghosts of a couple who had died there trick them. The agents go from room to room, and every time they think they've found a door, it's the same room again. This big library, with lots of books and multiple floors, but the ghosts had taken away the ladder. The exit was boarded up.

She sipped on some water and glanced over at him; he seemed engrossed with the episode. Yet, every time something funny happened, or scary, or anything that begged for a reaction, he didn't give one. He just stared.

"What are you thinking about?" she asked.
"This is a good one," he replied.

She quietly wondered if he was unhappy with her. Unsatisfied, out of love, or otherwise. Was she ugly? Had she somehow changed since they'd gotten together to make him not notice her? She'd always been prone to thoughts like these, and rarely did they have any basis in reality, so she hushed her mind. He was probably just watching the episode, and it had nothing to do with her.

She resumed her attentions to the television. Mulder and Scully were pulling up the old floorboards in the library, and they found two skeletons, dead en embrace, which they thought were just some old murder victims. But upon closer inspection, the skeletons were dressed identically to the agents. Same socks and everything.

All of a sudden, she didn't like this episode. She started mildly panicking, looking at him and then at the wall. She didn't know what had set it off--she didn't like those skeletons, though they'd never bothered her before. Not wanting to stir up worry in her significant other, she tried to keep her irrational panic out of his view.

What was it? What was making her anxious about an episode of X-Files, or two skeletons in the floorboards? She loved this show. Maybe it wasn't the show. Was it him? Was it their apartment? A hot wave of sick nausea washed over her, like how she felt when he'd made her watch the Texas Chainsaw Massacre a few months ago.

Then an idea crept out from an overgrown mental pathways. She knew it was irrational, unreal, and plenty of other words in the same vein, but she knew without a doubt that if she pulled up her own floorboards at that instant, she'd find her skeleton next to his, holding a DVD. And his would be holding the remote control.

She didn't remember it getting this way, but they'd somehow ended up here. She tried hard to think of the moment it happened, but nothing registered. When had she stopped remembering things? She didn't even remember what she'd done yesterday, or what episode they'd stopped on. How long had they been dating? It was somewhere around three years, but she didn't remember at least one of them. Not the specifics. Not the fun things, the double dates, the bad things, anything. It was just a chunk of white time.

Still not wanting to alarm him, she took the DVD case to check which season they were on. Season 6, out of 9. In the back of her mind, she knew the right thing was to turn off the TV and bring this up--the whole thing, that whole year of white time that she couldn't recall, and break it off. But he would inevitably ask where this thought came from, and all she'd have to say was the X-Files. Because she couldn't remember how it got this way. She had no argument.

Technically there shouldn't have to be an argument, but she figured he was in the same spot she was, and didn't realize it. She'd have to convince him, because it's hard to move someone out of such a comfortable, unmemorable existence. It's scary. She was scared.

So scared, she decided that when the series was over, she'd do it. She'd pull up the floorboards and show him, and he would have to believe her. He'd have to see that they were either dead or dying, she didn't know which; perhaps he could tell her. Perhaps he would agree, and they could just call this whole thing off. The whole three years, or however long it had been.

What if they had been watching the same episode over and over again, for years? She could not produce a shred of evidence proving that wrong. The skeletons, the same room, over and over. The exit blocked.

She might not last another three seasons. Her skin might start falling off, and she'd have to put on extra makeup to cover it. And at some point, the floorboards would open up and swallow the both of them, and they'd never even know it. She turned her head to look at him, oblivious, one last time.

Then, he met her gaze and turned the TV off.
"We need to talk," he said.

Cakewalks Happen for a Reason

I'm drawn to the sad love poems. There's such a depth to sadness as pertains to love--well, depth, in that it is absolutely bottomless. I remember it well, and the variations are endless. But I'm also drawn to sad music, short stories, and films. I'm not a very sad person, but someone who looked through my iTunes or movie collection would think I was a total bummer. I'm not! My curiosities about humanity just lie in what we do when we're sad. It's just so damned interesting!

Been thinking about that one a lot lately. I think I'm so curious about it because I don't ever use my friends as support. Not by choice, I don't think--I think I was just raised as such. Throughout my life, I've been honored to be the support system for many, many wonderful people. I've learned a lot because of it, though I never really understood why I became that person for so many. I don't question it.

But I've never really learned how to share my own pain with others. Not at a manageable or reasonable pace, anyway. If it's something I can't handle, it just kind of bubbles and steeps for awhile, and then when I erupt, no one understands it because it is completely unreasonable. Even I know it, but I don't understand myself either when it happens. I do not like what that turns me into.

As of late, my life has been relatively stress-free, outside of the normal money woes and deadlines. Compared to 4 months ago, emotionally, I'm currently enjoying a blissful cakewalk. Compared to 2 months ago, physically, I feel like a champ. Seeing as this is my perfect situation to test the waters, I have been opening up little by little to the people who should know me better. It seems so elementary, but seriously, I never learned how to do this. And it causes me to talk about completely inappropriate things when I'm drunk... need to cap that off. There might be two (probably only one) people in the human race that know me as well as I want them to. I feel it sometimes. It's lonely on a different level.

I think that might be one of the reasons I started this blog. I'm tough to talk to one-on-one, if it's about me. But this blog is more or less entirely about me. I feel a lot better when I have time to formulate feelings into blocks and grammar, and serve it polished to the masses of the internet. Blame it on my having AOL as a child--it's a cheap outlet. Even here, though, I can't say everything (nor do I think I should).

I have so much to give that it hurts to carry it around all the time.

me: SADS
WHARE
IS
IT
Mandi: :(((((((((((((
me: MOUM
Mandi: A MILLION SAD FACED
FACES
PARP

Break Me To Small Parts

Once upon a time, I did something bad. I guess it wasn't THAT bad, since I was only 20 when it happened. On some level, no one should be held accountable for things they do from ages 19-21. I hurt someone, repeatedly. I hurt a lot of people repeatedly. Then, I proceeded to get so drunk, I forgot about it. Self-induced amnesia.

Last week, the brain damage evaporated as I was put in a situation where I came face-to-face, one-on-one with the one I hurt the most. I never really totally forgot about him, because he haunted me the whole time. I'd see people around Baton Rouge who looked like him, all of them bartenders, even though he didn't live here anymore. His ghosts and doppelgangers stalked me the harder I tried to forget, and my dreams were far more forgiving than reality. I tortured myself about it for years.

He got me in a corner last week. He seemed to thoroughly enjoy the way I kept trying to duck his questions and cover myself with a pillow. I was shaking, and still stunned that he even wanted to talk to me, much less invite me over. He wanted specifics, and he grinned while I stumbled over my words.

I had no specifics. I said I was a little girl the last time I saw him, in Connecticut around this time in 2006. I told him about his doppelgangers and how much I'd wanted to apologize since then. In fact, I said "I'm sorry" more that night than I have in my entire life. My conscience clearly had some cleaning up to do.

He said he was fine, and he looked like he was, albeit a little confused. He seemed unable to understand why I felt so bad about the end of our relationship. When I told him I had no words, he didn't believe me; said I always had words. I usually do. I am rarely speechless. Kept saying it over and over, because all the words I'd repeated in my dreams and thoughts for four years somehow weren't going to cut it in that situation.

The only ones that would cut it ended up being a stuttered, mumbled forgive me. forgive me. forgive me. forgive me. I need you to forgive me.

Back in the USSR

What I want to write right now should be saved for a night when I've had too much to drink, and I'm lonely and sad, and can't understand why I can't have the things I want. Because as it stands, it's 10:40am, and I'm stone sober. It's not that I can't understand why I can't have what I want; I just don't want to understand.

When I have too much to drink, I get into that mindset--the childlike get-grab-gimme. It's kind of amusing, and makes for some really funny stories sometimes. Right now, I can't even blame it on booze, and last night I wasn't drunk either. I hate it when issues become symptomatic even after you remove the most obvious cause. Ahh, I'm just throwing an inexcusable fit. Haha.

Understanding probably won't solve anything. There's no sense in asking things like "Why have I been dealt this hand?" or "When will it be easy again?" The sad and horrible truth is probably as simple as Christie waits. Why? Because she's good at it.

That's how Russia avoided becoming Napoleon Country. Want to conquer Russia? Go right ahead, they won't stop you. Just don't come running when you realize how much of Russia is impenetrable frozen tundra, and your troops start dying of frostbite and hunger.

Actually, that metaphor sucks. I give up on this block of text.

A Hearty Meal

Eating pride is like swallowing a bag of broken glass.

I'm bleeding from my esophagus.

It's One Big Question

Waking up and the bed was made
No one looked me in the eye
More I try, more I cry
And it’s all for the best

Watched my brother cutting grass outside
Sitting on the porch he told me
It’s a long way to go before we can rest
But it’s all for the best

You’re so beautiful it sings
On a lonely lazy morning
And when I see you rocking back and forth
Whispering that it’s all for the best

One day the stone will roll away
Soon you’ll see
you’re far away from home but never far away from me
And that’s all for the best

An Old Mix

Recently, while cleaning out my closet, I found a few old mix CDs I made when I was in high school. Some were badly scratched and unplayable, but I was able to salvage one labeled "Compilation #1". It might be the first CD I ever burned.

When I was in high school, I had a handful of songs that were my absolute overplayed favorites. I'd rotate a few songs in and out, but for the most part, my favorites were made of bricks and unmovable.

When I stuck it in the CD player and hit play, it was as if I'd found a diary full of entries I'd forgotten to write down ten years ago. The wave was so huge it knocked me flat. I was speechless. It was more powerful than when I found the CD I burned to roll for the first time.

I know it's bullshit, but I felt like I was connecting myself then with myself now, skipping all that calamity in between. All the stuff that happened after I burned that CD made me a different person, and I'm glad I took that audible snapshot of my life when I was 15.

Biblical Lot's Stress Fractures

It's been a difficult month. I'm feeling the physical effects of extreme stress, lack of money, and a new (and financially unsatisfactory) job. Living less than paycheck to paycheck is taxing in so many ways.

My hope is not totally lost. Many great people in history have died penniless, at the expense of inspiring others.

Honestly, I probably shouldn't be so dramatic about it. Everyone goes through shitty financial circumstances, and mine could be so much worse. The most stressful part seems to be working my ass off and not making what I deserve. I'm disappointed with every paycheck, because it's gone immediately to (usually overdue) bills.

Is this the life I wanted? I've asked myself this so many times in the last 30 days, but the words have not lost their meaning. I've got to keep asking, because I need to make sure I'm still on track--with all this messy, consuming stress laying about, it's incredibly easy to want to backpedal. Undo all this ground-removal and put the corpses back underneath me, so I can bury them again and stand comfortably upon them. Forget their names and their lives, like I had before. It was so easy.

For better or for worse, this is what I wanted. I wanted to dig them up and catalog them so I could remember how I came to be. I wanted to write in publications, be free to come and go, and make my income wherever I land; however, getting finances in order is the first step to what I want. These are the circumstances that occasionally accompany it. And for me to survive them, it has to continue to be what I want. I can't stray my eyes away just to look back.

I've been told that I've been stubborn my entire life. Maybe this is why--so that when I'm running so hard that stress fractures my bones and breaks me piece by little piece, I'll keep running, because I simply do not believe in stopping.

"And Lot's wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been. But she did look back, and I love her for that, because it was so human. So she was turned to a pillar of salt. So it goes."

Hungry

I looked in my fridge today, and was greeted with desolation. Rarely has my fridge been so bare. I haven't been grocery shopping in...2 weeks now, and that was a measley $20 trip. I've just been broke lately, what with the car insurance, rent, dental bill, bridesmaid dress, and AAA membership renewal happening in the space of 2 weeks, while I also have a new day job that doesn't pay nearly what I thought it did. I'm more strapped than I have ever been in my life, to say the least. I'm not starving by any means, but these circumstances started a thought that grew into the plight of starving families. How terrible it must be. I may get hungry sometimes or eat once a day to tide groceries over, but imagine the pain of being a parent, having to skip a meal to feed your children. Or, god forbid, having to watch your child starve, and being tasked with explaining why something like sustenance costs money.

That's when I remembered something from my childhood that I hadn't bothered to think about in a long time.

My mom worked at a Catholic Church office when we were kids. Actually, that's the reason we were able to go to the adjoining Catholic elementary school--her boss, the pastor, gave her a tuition waiver or discount on some level. I remember the tuition bills coming in, and seeing my parents stress about it, so they must have had to pay something; it wasn't free.

Every once in awhile, mom would bring home strange bags of foods that we'd never buy--weird stuff like spam, ranch-style beans in cans, odd pastas and mac-n-cheese. I always got really excited about these occurrences, because when you're a kid, different groceries in a giant bag are a treasure to dig through. It's like a surprise present bag. And mom would bring it home ceremoniously. I can't remember if both me and my sister got excited, maybe it was just me, haha. I didn't realize then... I actually don't know exactly when I figured it out, but that food had been donated to the church for needy families. At some point, we qualified under that category.

I've no idea the extent that the church helped us out, or how "needy" we really were, because all I remember about my childhood is that it was beautiful. I never truly wanted for anything. Though, in reality, we lived in a rapidly-shifting ghetto, had some broke-ass vehicles to carpool to school in a high-crime area.

I don't think it'd be right to ask my parents about that period in our lives, because I'm sure it broke their hearts at the time to have to ask for help. I know my parents. Especially my father. He doesn't like asking for help.

I look at my parents now, fairly well-off and able to handle pretty much anything that comes their way financially, and every wrinkle (they wear them well) was hard-earned. They gave me everything I needed, and I might never know their personal sacrifices to do so, as my kids will never know if I have to ask for help.

I didn't need the weight I'm losing, anyway. Everything good in American cuisine was facilitated by the lack of resources, and I'm gettin' creative. Bring on the ranch-style beans; I was born for this shit.

Meet me anyplace, or anywhere at any time, I don't care with you tonight. If you will dare, I will dare.

It's interesting how my priorities have changed in the last few months. This month, I've made probably $1,000.00 less than I did last month. And somehow, I've made it on so little. As a side note, eating truly healthy is a whole hell of a lot cheaper and tastier than Lean Cuisine makes it out to be.

I also bought a car, got my very first insurance policy (how on earth have I gotten away without having to do that for so long?), renewed my AAA membership, bought a bridesmaid dress, and paid the first of six $300 dental payments for the surgery (mugging) I got a month ago. Sure, I borrowed some cash from my sister, but only to cover the dress.

I have acquired five jobs, quit one, and settled on four. By "jobs", I mean freelancing. You know, my dream job I've been talking about for as long as I've had this blog running. I'd say I've wondered why I waited so long, but truthfully, I know why.

I was looking for a job I could apply for. One, single job that encapsulated everything I wanted to work for. The problem was that it didn't exist, not in that fashion anyway. The question that remains is why I was looking for a job I had to wake up at 7am for, because never, ever once in my life have I wanted a job that made me do that. Oh, how I remember how everyone told me to get used to it; that I'd just have to deal with that in adulthood. I hated those words, and now I have proved them wrong. Fuck them. They're just bitter because they never thought to create their dream job.

Maybe they didn't have the drive, or had families to support. I shouldn't judge, but it seems such a waste when people with great ideas (most people, actually) don't force those ideas into existence. I see it as them robbing the world of their ingenuity and creativity. Everyone's experience is different, and every single one of us here have different opinions and ideas and thoughts, patterns, worldviews. As someone who wants to experience as many worldviews as possible in my lifetime, I resent people who don't think they have anything to offer.

Most of the things that have gotten me anywhere have operated entirely on belief. My old car, for example. That shit should have died four years ago, yet it still runs, even having been replaced recently by a Saturn ION. Don't laugh, it really runs on my belief that it will get me where I'm going, though I'll admit, it's really nice knowing my tires won't fall off randomly, or the steering column will fail to work.

My life's work is similar. People have walked this path before, but none have ever walked it as I will. I believe it will work, and so far, it is the ONLY credential that I have besides an English degree. English degrees don't get you very far, but believing in everything you can do, does.

Actually, I have yet to see how far it will take me. It's such a strange sensation, riding on nothing, when so many around me have so much and can't seem to get anywhere. Maybe all that's missing is their own faith in themselves. Sure, I've had to worry a lot in a month. Wondering if you're going to make rent is taxing and uncomfortable, but as a trade-off, a little worrying is worth doing exactly what I want to do, for money.

I hope I always think of it like that.

I've nothing to do for the first time in weeks. If I were a molecule, I've been blasted apart repeatedly in a small frame of time, and this silence right now is welding my atoms back together.

Market Research

Market research is an attempt to understand human thought processes solely to sell something by way of weaseling thoughts into unsuspecting brains. Market research could be done in ways that don't offend me, but isn't. I'd like to think of myself as a mercenary, with my weapons being my words, but I can't work toward that cause. Can't do it. The money feels dirty, knowing it was laid in my hands because I cheapened something that should be beautiful.

...and sorry, but I'm contractually obligated to not talk about this in further detail.

"I have something to say."

Now's all I have. And right now, I don't know shit. That doesn't mean that I can't act like I know shit, and convince other people I know shit, so that they hire me. Which is what I seem to be doing left and right lately.

My dream job is a series of jobs that I can prance between and come and go from, without having to be responsible for anything outside of a monthly or weekly deadline. After that deadline, I can skip town with no ill feelings. My dream job lets me go anywhere I want, and occasionally sends me places I want to go, with nothing but a vague guideline (a word requirement) and all my crazy ideas.

Wander around and find a story, Christie, and we'll pay you to write it. I got that assignment today. I feel like I hit a milestone. It's not going to pay a mortgage or anything, but see, my dream job not only prevents the paying of a mortgage--it prevents the having of a mortgage. To me, this prevents me from getting comfortable in a life I'm not truly happy with. I could be young and naive, but I don't think I'll ever be happy with a mortgage. I'd still just be daydreaming and nightdreaming about the dreams I didn't follow up on, while being stuck in one place, collecting junk I don't need. I wouldn't speak up about it so much if I didn't know for a fact I could succumb to it. It can appear enticing when you're tired.

For a long time, I was hesitant to cold-call for freelance jobs. The only reason I can figure is I wasn't sure if I could do it, or if I had anything to say, or that anyone would care what I said. I've always known I've had SOMETHING to say, but stopped short of knowing what it was. That made me doubt myself, made me nervous.

What I have to say hasn't happened yet. I'll know it when I go to Grand Isle to "find something hopeful" in spite of the oil spill, with a tent and no cushy expense account. I'll know it when I remember that I don't need scissors to cut paper, like my favorite teacher in high school taught me. When I can stop putting things in front of me to get distracted with, I'll see everything else in the world. And I'll write about it.

It's silly that I ever thought I had to know what I wanted to say to the world. I think all I have to say is, "I have something to say." Believing it, I guess, was the hard part. Still kind of is the hard part, but it doesn't get me very far to think I'm worthless.

I love this point in my life, this one speck of time where I don't know shit about anything, and I allow myself that luxury. It might be different tomorrow, but I can't expect to know everything before it happens, right? Into the caverns of tomorrow, with just my flashlight and my love, I PLUNGE!

A Week-Long Paragraph

I was just thinking about how I rarely post day-to-day activities. I suppose there isn't much to say about them, but I've been trying to do important things every day lately in an effort to make my life memorable.

About six months ago, I realized that I'd wake up on Sunday morning and not remember most of the previous week, or I'd be asked a question about a particular day that had passed and not be able to answer, for total lack of recollection. Moreover, I didn't care to remember anything. Nothing happened that seemed worth remembering. Plenty happened every day, but nothing shook me, I guess.

Today, I realized how much I've been remembering.

This is what I did this week, in no clear or particular order, and with no line breaks for convenience:

Bridesmaid shopping with the bride. Had some lunch with them. Thought briefly about what it'd be like to get married. Pricing on veils at the bridal store made me take a mental note to learn how to make veils--it can't possibly be $100 worth of labor. Wrote articles, wrote articles. Walked to Chelsea's to have a beer at happy hour and plan my escape from Louisiana, on paper (the math did work out, thanks). Travis met me; we had a beer, showed each other facebook pictures of our parents. Laid on the golf course by campus at dark, it was very wet and the bugs came, but the stars were out. Mandi, Travis and I had a pajama party at my apartment and Mandi fell asleep in my bed for the 3rd time in a week or two. We all had lentil soup and brown rice, all the bowls I had were dirty (that's not a complaint; just something cute I noticed the next morning). Travis wanted us to put make-up on him, but between two girls, we couldn't figure out how to make eyeshadow look good on anyone but ourselves (is that indicative of something?). Went to Hound Dog's, my favorite gay bar, and had three G&Ts. Watched people play pool. The bartender called me a goddess because I brought back everyone's dirty glasses. At Ross's house, I missed the last stair on his stoop and skinned my knee trying to dodge Blair's giant bike. No one had ever seen me drunk enough to fall down stairs, but the truth is that I fall down stairs sober. I even fall up stairs sometimes; stairs are not my thing. Watched the Motorcycle Diaries with Ross until 5am, something we both needed. Asked him to come somewhere with me eventually, he is thinking. Trained Travis on meatloaf day, secretly so I could say goodbye to Judith Stubblefield. She will always be wheezing and immortal in my mind. Tried to swim with Mandi and Annie for hours, but ended up just drinking a bottle of wine while sitting outside of P's, listening to this unfortunate drunk lady talk about the state of the mental health system. While her story inconvenienced me slightly, I couldn't pull away--she'd gotten picked up by the hospital because, while talking to her sister on the phone about a recent death, her sister called 911 thinking she was suicidal. They kept her institutionalized for 6 days, without allowing her a phone call and her husband was out of town. They called her daughter (who was on vacation in Florida) and said her mother had tried to kill herself with an overdose, even though the tox screen was clear. After we finally broke away from her (then repeating) story, we got to swim; while fun, it was almost anticlimactic. Had lunch with Mandi at Zeeland Street Market, ate a tuna salad with deliciousness so great that I wrote down everything I could see in the salad, and plan to make it at a later date. Went in for an interview and got the job on the spot. Went to Duvic's with Amanda after chugging coffee, which made me very nervous and talkative. Ran into guy I interviewed for BR In Focus the first week I did it; he remembered me. Walked to P's to catch a ride with one of the neighbors, and my old boss summoned such anger inside of me that I just ended up walking the 2.5 miles home at 11pm. It wasn't anything she did outright; it's just now that I've stepped away, I can see exactly how fucked up she really is, and it's gloriously paired with my freedom to leave that building the moment I want to, so I did. Freaked out over silly things, about the paper. Cooking made me feel better, a la always. Over the course of the week, I've made black bean salad, lentil soup with udon, curry vegetables and polenta, miso soup and brown rice. In love with honey and everything whole and tasty. Decided to give away my cover story because I'll be too busy to handle it. My nephew's third birthday party and slip and slide and margaritas and good old boys, staples from my life long ago, the smell of my parents' house and the feeling of someone always hovering over my shoulder at the computer. The latter subconsciously drove me to talk to Josh, even if I couldn't find anything to say. I almost reached for my stash of chocolate covered coffee beans behind the picture frame on the mantle, but I knew they weren't there and thought better of it. Tiger Weekly meeting found me deciding to put my opinions in print next week; I do believe I can find something to be pissed off about by then. I am using a pen name, for I believe my real superpower will shine only through anonymity--it's the way of my existence.

I run rabid through the city, past the texting drivers and old candy wrappers, the wealthy elderly and underfed youth, smokestacks pumping, wondering what's wrong with me.

Sometimes I get so...angry. One drop of ire heads my way, and it falls into a vast body of water, waiting to be disturbed. It's so still, it begs to be disturbed. When it hits, it ripples out and out and out, onward, until I hate the whole goddamn world because of that one thing.

An hour passes and I'm in love with it again. It's a feeling akin to ripping off old skin. I don't know what to do with myself sometimes, other than tear my skin off. Sometimes that's the only thing that works when I don't feel like being anywhere. I don't feel like I belong anywhere right now, or that I even want to belong anywhere, but I'm here anyway. I have no idea what I want.

I think everyone feels this way from time to time. I hope so, anyway. For how alone I always want to be, I wouldn't mind someone telling me they've felt this before, even if I already know it's true. A voice would be better than my thoughts alone.

I do sometimes get what I ask for, and that's when I tend to learn a thing or two about what I asked for. I should remember that.

You Don't Belong Where the Humans Eat

And she claimed it took no effort of will to hold him as he wept as he raped her. She just stared into his eyes lovingly the entire time. She stayed where he left her
all day in the gravel, weeping and giving thanks to her religious principles. She wept out of gratitude, she says.

She had addressed the psychotic's core weakness, the terror of a soul-exposing connection with another human being. Nor is any of this all that different
than a man sizing up an attractive girl at a concert and pushing all the right buttons to induce her to come home with him and lighting her cigarettes and engaging in an hour
of post-coital chitchat, seemingly very content and close. But what he really wants to do is give her a special disconnected telephone number and never contact her again. And that the reason for this cold and victimizing behavior is that the very connection
he had worked so hard to make her feel, terrifies him.

50 to Free

1. How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are?
2. Which is worse, failing or never trying?
3. If life is so short, why do we do so many things we don’t like and like so many things we don’t do?
4. When it’s all said and done, will you have said more than you’ve done?
5. What is the one thing you’d most like to change about the world?
6. If happiness was the national currency, what kind of work would make you rich?
7. Are you doing what you believe in, or are you settling for what you are doing?
8. If the average human life span was 40 years, how would you live your life differently?
9. To what degree have you actually controlled the course your life has taken?
10. Are you more worried about doing things right, or doing the right things?
11. You’re having lunch with three people you respect and admire.  They all start criticizing a close friend of yours, not knowing she is your friend.  The criticism is distasteful and unjustified.  What do you do?
12. If you could offer a newborn child only one piece of advice, what would it be?
13. Would you break the law to save a loved one?
14. Have you ever seen insanity where you later saw creativity?
15. What’s something you know you do differently than most people?
16. How come the things that make you happy don’t make everyone happy?
17. What one thing have you not done that you really want to do?  What’s holding you back?
18. Are you holding onto something you need to let go of?
19. If you had to move to a state or country besides the one you currently live in, where would you move and why?
20. Do you push the elevator button more than once?  Do you really believe it makes the elevator faster?
21. Would you rather be a worried genius or a joyful simpleton?
22. Why are you, you?
23. Have you been the kind of friend you want as a friend?
24. Which is worse, when a good friend moves away, or losing touch with a good friend who lives right near you?
25. What are you most grateful for?
26. Would you rather lose all of your old memories, or never be able to make new ones?
27. Is is possible to know the truth without challenging it first?
28. Has your greatest fear ever come true?
29. Do you remember that time 5 years ago when you were extremely upset?  Does it really matter now?
30. What is your happiest childhood memory?  What makes it so special?
31. At what time in your recent past have you felt most passionate and alive?
32. If not now, then when?
33. If you haven’t achieved it yet, what do you have to lose?
34. Have you ever been with someone, said nothing, and walked away feeling like you just had the best conversation ever?
35. Why do religions that support love cause so many wars?
36. Is it possible to know, without a doubt, what is good and what is evil?
37. If you just won a million dollars, would you quit your job?
38. Would you rather have less work to do, or more work you actually enjoy doing?
39. Do you feel like you’ve lived this day a hundred times before?
40. When was the last time you marched into the dark with only the soft glow of an idea you strongly believed in?
41. If you knew that everyone you know was going to die tomorrow, who would you visit today?
42. Would you be willing to reduce your life expectancy by 10 years to become extremely attractive or famous?
43. What is the difference between being alive and truly living?
44. When is it time to stop calculating risk and rewards, and just go ahead and do what you know is right?
45. If we learn from our mistakes, why are we always so afraid to make a mistake?
46. What would you do differently if you knew nobody would judge you?
47. When was the last time you noticed the sound of your own breathing?
48. What do you love?  Have any of your recent actions openly expressed this love?
49. In 5 years from now, will you remember what you did yesterday?  What about the day before that?  Or the day before that?
50. Decisions are being made right now.  The question is:  Are you making them for yourself, or are you letting others make them for you?

Taken from this place.

Calgon, Human Beans and Unemployment

Today, my room reminds me of the one I had at my parents' house. I'm laying on the bed, mostly unemployed, drinking coffee from my Human Bean mug, listening to Death Cab For Cutie. I'm apparently still in high school. It's nice to go back every once in awhile. My shirt even smells like the calgon spray I put on every day for 5 years or so.

It's fabulous to be unemployed. My bout with unemployment won't last long, though--I've got an interview on Friday for a more normal day job, still working for Tiger Weekly and I got another interview for a company that ghostwrites email for online daters (it takes a long time to explain). I'm starting to think that my parents didn't know what the hell they were talking about when they said "it's easier to find a job when you've got a job." Yeah, to hell with that. Some jobs are so mindwrecking and unhealthy that you have to quit just to think clearly. And, for at least a month, I've been wondering why the hell I didn't do this six months ago, or even a year, when I got the degree and made all these half-hearted promises to myself. I guess I was too scared, too comfortable, too addicted to things. Who knows. I can't afford to spend more time worrying about it right now, though I'll probably dig it up later and do an autopsy.

Reading Mandi's 101 in 1001 list makes me want to write one. Today seems like a good day for that, since I've apparently moved to Seattle as far as weather is concerned. It's been raining every 20 minutes for days. Not joking.

I'm in love.

The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas

It might be too early to say this, and I might be jinxing myself, but I think I've got a novel growing in. My brain is too small for it right now. I hope it doesn't have to be extracted, and instead my brain grows to accommodate it.

Tonight is my last shift at Pinetta's. I'll be really sad on some level--you don't just work for someone for 5 years and not be sad when you have to part ways. And my co-workers, I'll never have co-workers like that again. The bar is perpetually raised, and though I've never worked at another restaurant before, I know I won't find such a tight-knit group anywhere else. They're my siblings in some parallel universe, where our mother is abusive and we have no choice but to fraternize and unite against the injustice being served to us.

Everyone who just read that thinks I'm absolutely nuts. I'll keep going anyway.

My idea of Pinetta's is intertwined with my idea of the South. It's originally from Croatia, but there's this spirit of Louisiana in it that mimics old South values. The unchanging decor, the rarely-changed menu, the pride with which we serve the food (there are no substitutions, additions or alterations), and the favoritism that goes on (no substitutions, additions or alterations, unless you're Mr. xxxxx or Mrs. xxxxx or the daughter of Mr. xxxxxx). The emphasis is on family, who's who, and fighting fiercely to keep tradition the same. To keep that way of life the same, because if it's not, somehow everything else starts to crumble. It's a building made up of illusions and worldviews.

And, as if I needed more validation, no matter how many times the owner is rude or runs people away or pisses people off, we still somehow manage to go on a wait every weekend. We just get busier as time goes on. People LIKE the way she fights for it. The people who claim they'll take an ad out in the paper against Pinetta's, never do. Same goes for the ones who say they'll report us to the Better Business Bureau. We never hear from those people again, and no one notices them gone, because they didn't fit in with the illusion, therefore we cannot see them.

The novel seems to dance around this, slightly circle around it without ever smashing it to pieces. Because no matter how much the employees might hate the institution or the person representing it, they can't do a damn thing to change it except remove themselves from it. After that, it can crumble, because the group of disgruntled employees is a necessary component of the South, and maybe not just the South. Maybe it's a component of a lot of other social systems in the world. I'm not talking about slavery... It's something more universal, some part of free enterprise that no one likes to talk about, the part where we need a lower class and peons, the krill of society, in order for anyone to get rich or be successful.

The grand illusion of the South was that they could support a grandiose lifestyle with all the finest of everything, a true Southern Gentleman, while simultaneously condoning human slavery not ten feet away at all times.

I'm not saying Pinetta's employs slaves, but damnit, we felt like we were. And that sentiment was never acknowledged or given any thought when it was brought up, in the entire five years I've worked there. It's not just us being young, either: when I first started working there, I worked with people anywhere from five to twelve years older than I was. They felt the same, five years ago. What this did to us, was kind of instill a fear of leaving in us. We have always been free to go, but for some reason, never did, or always came back. Paternalism and fear.

In a lot of ways, the restaurant is the last bastion, the final stand. The most unique restaurant in Baton Rouge. Truly, there are a hell of a lot of reasons to fight for its survival, but just like the old South, the cushy ladylike comfort of it is entirely an illusion. It's a memory people are trying to preserve.

I quit.

Into the caverns of tomorrow with just our flashlights and our love

June has been good to me.

Rounded it off with a gathering of unique souls yesterday and last night. It's amazing what people can do when we set our sights on one goal, especially when that goal is our own happiness.

I've been happy before, but this is something entirely different. The things that came out of us last night felt like ectoplasm in a seance, something wholly not of us, but partly possessing us. Using us for some purpose that none of us would have thought of, something that no one believes has a purpose anymore.

To play is to remember what it was like before I imposed limitations on myself, before I became self-conscious about the only body I'll ever have. Before I was taught that life was pain, a constant lack of money, and a series of unhappy relationships.

Before all of that, I was brilliant. I remember now.

The Pool

I've always been a vagrant. Mostly in my mind, not travelling as I'd like to, I separate myself from those I should be most close to. I like to look at them as I'd look at an ant farm, watching them procreate and interact, seeing how they do things. I've never really counted myself as one of them.

But I am one of them. Undeniably, I am just another person who feels at least just as strongly about anything as they do, about the same things they do. Instead of living in the pool though, I prefer to pace the edge, deciding when and where I dive in and getting out quickly after, lest I be swirled into the ebb and flow of human drama. Sometimes I think I'm kidding myself, or putting myself above everyone I love. Other times, I feel that by doing this, I'm below them--less courageous somehow, not able to risk my skin over something I believe in.

Yet the fact remains that I love them, deeply. Sometimes I want nothing else but to jump in the water with them, and stay there, losing myself in a big whirlpool along with everyone else. It's human nature to connect, to desire that connection that keeps friends around us as we age. As the years go by, the water gets warmer, and the more inviting it becomes.

I'd love to say it's because I've been hurt before, but everyone has. It's not because I've been hurt. I don't know why I prefer to dance around real commitment in relationships or friendships. I don't want people to think I'll be around forever, because I've always known I won't be.

My sister told me recently that she always knew I'd leave. That I wouldn't be me if I stayed here, that if I did, she'd know I wasn't happy. My mother told me something similar, but in a more worried tone. I guess I won't know how much I worry her until I have a child like myself--a wild girl who seems to never be satiated. I'd never wish it on anyone to raise a child like me. It's far easier to have a normal child who wants the things she's raised to want. Toys, boys and rings. Cushy comfort, monetary happiness. It's easy enough to gain that in this day and age. I wish I could jump in that pool, and I've definitely tried to before.

I'm just not happy there. It's unnaturally warm, and I have this feeling that it'll boil without me ever noticing, when I'm 35 or so. And when it starts to hurt, I won't know what's happening. I'll have forgotten what it's like to be uncomfortable, and I'll just die slowly, on my own neglected watch, forgetting everything I've sacrificed to get that comfort that I don't even actively enjoy.

It's a sad story, but it won't be mine. I'm not meant to be satiated or satisfied. I'm meant to starve and strive for everything I want, because that's what people like me have to do to be happy. I don't have a choice. I never did.

And still, I want to drag them all out of the pool with me, because I love them. Such is the heartbreak of life, because I'll never get them out of there. It's too comfortable. I can't blame them.

I'm

get your saddle
don't bother putting on your boots
go as you are

chopping off her hair

clothes bespeak the person

exchanging slippers for walking boots,
chose a pair rough

"I mustn't polish my boots any more."

she was growing less distant
through her skill at disassembling
she was growing in grace

she made no reference to the last evening

the topics they had broached
not to be touched upon again

I carry you around

These sights disturbed him deeply
the animals coughing and
sneezing


imagine
a nuclear war. A layer of sweat
inside his plastic head bubble,
he could
hear them, shrieking and calling distantly beyond
claustrophobia or panic

fitting each syringe with a needle
to be filled with drugs


"You are going to euthanize,
don't get attached"
They were going to die
anyway

They have to go


every last one

blackout poem

she was asleep before
he ordered champagne
little girl,
"It's a long life . . . there
will be lots of champagne another time . . ."


In some ways, the prospect excited him,
In truth, it was difficult to imagine.

Oh man. I'm never gonna be the same, am I? I might be worried.

...whoops.

Every once in awhile, I bump into someone or remember something that grows a wild hair in my ass and makes me do something.

I just had a conversation with an old classmate that more or less convinced me to go teach English in Korea in September.

Let's see where this hole goes!

Beans of Solitude

Ever since I got my space back, I've been... oh, how do I say it? Reveling. Being amazed by my surroundings and my Self and how far I've come. The thing I didn't have before--the feeling that people lose after being comfortable for so long--was the certainty that I was still myself under all that mess I'd made. It's probably what kept me there for so long, standing on some precipice, staring longingly into the unknown I've loved for centuries. You know, some bullshit like that.

I wasn't sure she still existed. I thought maybe I'd killed her--rolled over her in my sleep, or something equally unceremonious. And the me that I once respected, the girl who could survive this sort of trauma, was gone for good. And whatever was left, well she'd never survive.

There was a brief moment, of course, where I fell apart. I lost it. I fell into an abysmal mania and wondered whether or not I'd done the right thing. I imagined this cliff I'd been coming to for a while now, and I'd jumped over a gap to another ledge, equally unstable. I was afraid and in a dark place. The cool thing about my tendencies though, something that others have mistaken for insincerity in the past, is that I tend to go through dark periods really fucking fast. I put my head down, close my eyes, and run like hell to the other side.

The second I hit the bottom and started running with my head down, though, was the second I knew I was still alive. Of course it hurts, just as bad as everyone else does. It wasn't fun. But to know that the me I know so well was still there, and ready to power me through anything, was enough to believe I can deal with whatever is heading my way.

Regardless of what ledge I landed on, or if I even landed anywhere, the jump was correct. That's an absolute. I can't look back.

And, as a separate thought pertaining to the same thing: I read this again and realize it sounds very self-centered. It is, in a sense, but that's avoiding an entire other side to this.

I believe in certain souls helping others along and certain intervals in time--when something is supposed to happen, or needs to happen--and I owe them all everything in this situation. A great friend of mine told me in December of last year to jump in a car with him, because I "needed to be reminded that I could." He told me that I originally put those seeds in him, years ago, and that he was returning the favor. I went ahead and jumped in the car, regardless of impending rent that I didn't have. He started it.

My neighbor popped her head in my door once in March to say hello, and said "Aw, it looks so cozy in here. Our places are so cozy. They make it hard to leave, or grow." Then she left.

A friend came into town a few weeks ago. He started a fire that burned most of the things that needed to burn.

I didn't get here alone. Though I'd like to think so sometimes, I've never gotten anywhere alone. There's a lot more to be said about that, but I'll stop. Some quarks and strings and geists do not like to be discovered, or talked about. In a sense, they're the elves that clean house while we sleep, that your mother always wished she had.

Little bursts of energy, pushing people ever so slightly to say and do things to encourage others. Instead of quarks or strings or geists, they should be called beans. That's my big idea.

I love when I consciously try to spend extended periods of time without the internet. All that mentality does is make it off-limits, which in turn, makes it all the more alluring. I love you, internet. I can't go more than a day or two without needing to google something.

Permaculture for Renters (.com) is something I've been wondering about for a while now. Found it tonight, about 6-7 hours after I decided I would take an internet break for a few days. Whatever, Christie. You can't do it. Not when it's right here!

Talked to a friend of mine at work tonight about that sort of lifestyle--the "I don't need your bill, Entergy" lifestyle--and his grandfather, a spunky old man who goes by the name Wild Bill, does exactly that. He has a blacksmith shop somewhere in North Louisiana and just kind of lives off his land and makes knives and guns. I googled Wild Bill Caldwell tonight also. I want to learn all that shit. I probably never will, but you know. I waited on Wild Bill once, and that's probably the closest I'll ever come to learning how to make weapons.

I'm cutting this one short for frozen yogurt. That's something the internet can't give me.

Trash, for later inspection.

Among the littered floors of break-ups and job-quitting, and the baseboard-cleaning of exterminations, I found all this...stuff. Pictures, flyers, drunken ramblings, textbooks, those little pamphlets the hare krishnas give out in free speech alley. Bar napkins with awful poetry written on them, fiction critiques from classmates I've long forgotten, doodles in the margins of classes I later failed.

Part of me wants to stuff all of it in a bag and chunk it, like I've been doing with everything else. Really, no matter how much I love throwing stuff away, I'm absurdly sentimental... and I went full-blown grandma on the things I found today. There was something very... important, and subtle about everything, because most of it I never intended to keep. It's the residue of my life for the past four years.

Important, because these are the things my brain has used to file away memories. These are the things my college experience memory is based on. And I know it's silly, but I feel like if I sweep them all away or scrub them out of existence, I'm also doing that to the six years I spent at LSU. I know I'll never forget them, but I will forget the little things--the bar napkins and dusty pieces of mirrors, ha--because finding them today, I hadn't thought of their stories in years.

And god damnit, the little things are what I consider to be the blood of experience. They're the things I write about--they center my stories, and they are my literary devices. Little pieces of stuff, trash, that I can pile together to paint not just a story, but a scene--complete with smell, touch, electricity. Life. A force that has power to move others.

I have these boxes in my closet. I haven't gone through them in years, but I think I'll put all those important pieces of trash in there. When I leave here, I'll secretly put them in my parents' attic, where they'll be safe. If I take them with me, they're likely to be destroyed, and I kind of think of them like my crow, or Samson's hair. The source of my power, whatever my power is. I'm not sure I know what my superpower is yet, but I know the potential for it is in those boxes.

Along with everyone I've ever gone on a date with, or destroyed, or anyone who's broken me down to pieces--how it happened is in the closet. All my love stories, all the residue from my drug experiments, all the pictures at the watering holes where everything went down. Bits of string I played with at the park and names of bartenders I loved and customers I loved even more. Besides holding the secret to my superpower, I think I keep all this stuff so that, maybe later in my old age and infinite wisdom, I can open the boxes and put together some document that makes sense out of the things I've done. Because man, it's rare when anything I do makes sense while I'm doing it.

People say hindsight is a bitch. I think hindsight contains the meaning of life. And you know, even if it is a bitch, it always makes sense. Maybe people who think it's a bitch don't want it to make sense, because they wish they'd done it better, or smoother, or otherwise different. I've had my own instances of that--where you're angry because you see exactly why you made a wrong decision, but you still can't go back and correct it.

A life that makes sense in hindsight is the most any of us can ask for. We just want more, more perfection, so we can have the right to go out and tell others how to live. No one has that right. It's hard to blame people for seeking priests and spiritual advisors, or for keeping boxes of trash in their closets for later inspection. We all just really, really want there to be an answer. I don't think there is one, aside from what we each experience, because that's the only thing that will ever make sense to anyone.

daisuki

I haven't spent a dime in days. I've even offered money to people who didn't take it. The universe seems to want me to pay my bills by myself. I've been offered money to buy me out of my life of student loan debt. I've been taken care of many times over this week--my wisdom teeth are gone and I feel I've grown closer to my family by letting them take care of me (also the painkillers helped me be very, very chatty). For the first time in a very long time, I'm not wishing for anything or envious of another's life, or thinking that I should be doing something else with mine. For once, I'm pretty damn sure that I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. In the prophetic words of my magic 8 ball: All signs point to yes.

Tommy and I split up in the best way it could have happened. I hope everything he wants comes to him, but before that, I hope his wants mature a little. He had a lot of them, I could never keep up.

All the bullshit in my life is evaporating at an explosive rate, like none of it was ever real in the first place. It's finally my turn.

This has happened before

I abruptly jerked from my sleep and instantly remembered being there before, when I never have been. I looked around, and the resemblance faded into a gradient, starting at the banisters and ending in the corners of the room, as if the recollection were right there, sneaking around in the shadows, just out of my reach.

The distinct impressions that future memories leave--in the form of smells, flashes, and lighting; the colors of the paint and the creaks of the stairs--are the residuals of dreams.

I had been there before, in a dream. I remembered being there before I ever was.

The fifth dimension is tricky, and it's all the more because we're only 3-D creatures, incapable of anything but small flashes of clarity at random, meaningless intervals. Most of the time, they come and go, and they end up being nothing but a good dream, something that couldn't or wouldn't ever happen, and you file it away with all the other good, improbable dreams.

But maybe it will happen. Or if it doesn't, then it did on some plane of time, when you chose another path. Maybe what you're dreaming is glimpses of a future--not the future--that exists somewhere. Maybe they're gifts from the past versions of yourself, put there to guide you along to what you're supposed to do with this one.

Normal deja vu at places I've been to before happens frequently. But this--this is rare for me. All these things are happening in a positive feedback loop that I no longer have the power to stop. I suppose if this were the wrong way to go, it'd be too late now to change it. And that's something that I'm going to go ahead and thank God for, because if I had to think about it and make every step meticulously, then none of it would have ever happened.

It looks like I might be lighting that fire under my ass way quicker than I originally anticipated. Every few minutes, I feel a door opening somewhere that, only 48 hours ago, was locked with fear and doubt. I've none of that any longer. Everything will happen, and is happening, quicker than I have time to think about. I think I trust it.

The Land of the Dead Bugs

I need a decompression. The last few days have been excruciating, but oddly invigorating.

I discovered bedbugs in my box spring about four days ago. I won't go into the nightmare that ensued, because I've been complaining about it for days. And in all actuality, the baseboard-cleaning and furniture dissection and disposal of beds has turned into something... uh, somewhat therapeutic.

Throwing away things has always been kind of cathartic to me. It's really hard for me to do, but when things happen that necessitate the mass removal of crap that I don't actually need, I jump at the opportunity and never look back. My bed had a pull-out drawer where I just piled up old school stuff, like returned papers and homework and things. I thought I'd want to keep it for one day when I forget everything I learned from LSU. But instead of picking through it and wasting hours of precious bug-ridding time, I just got a garbage bag and shoved everything in it. I can't explain how good this made me feel.

It's like a chance to start over.

I lit a fire under my ass after that. I've had a degree for over a year now, and decided that along with my less-cluttered life, I'd quit my job too. So I put in a month's notice on Thursday. I've already got some leads on jobs, and have for awhile now--just haven't had the courage to follow through on anything. For the longest time, I said it had nothing to do with courage, and it was everything to do with practicality and finances. But what I was really saying, was that I didn't have the drive it took to make things work. I make more than enough money to pay my bills every month--I just don't exactly live frugally. I guess by comparison, I'm in the most frugal category, but I'm not comparing anymore. I'm just looking at the numbers, and how I could better spend my money while possibly taking a pay cut. I'm not concerned with the way others spend their money.

Courage has everything to do with it. I've been living without it for years now, and it is destroying everything I love about myself. So I'm done with that--I'm tossing it in the garbage bag without picking through every little detail and wasting more time. The illusion that I have to be absolutely secure every hour of my life has prevented me from taking any sort of step forward. I'm done being scared; and I truly do not know what's going to happen after this, but I don't give a shit anymore.

Hello, life! Opportunities! Changes! Low budgets! Absolute uncertainty and leaps of faith on par with Kierkegaard! See, I do remember things I learned at LSU without keeping all that crap. And I even failed Existentialism. Like, really failed, with a giant red F.

In other news, I've written and published my first few articles for the Tiger Weekly. They're free and around Baton Rouge. My first lead story goes to press for Wednesday of this week--check it out, it took a lot more work than it looks like. And I'm getting paid for it, although minimally, it's still a payoff.

A Moppy Sunday

I keep having these dreams that my teeth are falling out, or I'm mopping the floor. Sometimes my teeth are falling out while I'm mopping the floor. Or that I'm so busy mopping the floor that I don't realize my teeth are falling out. Very unsettling.

In the dream dictionary, tooth loss symbolizes powerlessness, working with the teeth as a symbol of power. Your teeth are what people see when you let your guard down and smile. They are a symbol of power, but only when you combine confidence and self-image.

Well, maybe the confidence thing is right on the money. I'm not very gung-ho about myself lately. I feel like a knick-knack. You know those antique, nicotine-stained old things your grandmother's grandmother had when she was a little girl? Some of them had actual uses that mattered in their hayday, like a washboard or a burner cover. Now that they've been rendered obsolete by the washing machine and electric stoves, there will come a day, probably soon, where no one is left who remembers their purpose. I feel kind of like that.

My confidence and self-image are falling out, I suppose. I'm sure you can't trust those books anyway. Maybe all it means is a glimpse into eternity; this is my lot, this is what I deserve. Sentenced to forever remember what I gave up for mediocrity's sake; for the ability to mop the floor until my teeth fall out.

Hey, Mushrooms Have to Grow Too.

On a bored day, I tend to rearrange things obsessively. I really enjoy getting the most out of this small space I have, and trying to make it feel cozy rather than tiny is part of that. I've come to love my dilapidated "garage apartment" (as the landlady calls it), and all its quirks. Signing the lease was agreeing to fix problems as they arise, and I understood even though it remained unsaid as I left her house.

Not big problems, like the time a tree fell on my bathroom during hurricane Gustave. Little things, like the giant crack in the tank of the toilet. The lack of a P-trap entirely on the bathroom sink. The window unit pissing water all over the hard-wood floor. Truly, this place has forced me to become acquainted with the use of power tools and caulk, hammer and nails, and weather stripping. I'm almost happy about that; it's gotten me out of the habit of letting problems get infinitely worse before I get off my ass to fix them. The difference? It's my home, and I've never thought of it as "just an apartment".

Here's a secret that could have been the worst thing I've ever done: I didn't even look inside this place before I signed the lease. At $375 a month, located in a nice Mid-City neighborhood where most people have families and pay more than $800 for one bedroom, I really should have looked at the place. But I didn't.

And when I got the key, I came here immediately, no power or water or heat. I put votives on the windowsills and set up camp in my future bedroom, and slept on the freezing wood floor. The only thought in my head was that I'd never, ever had this much space to call my own, and I thought it was fake. I thought it would be taken away from me because it was too good to be true, so I wanted to get as much time in it as I possibly could. It felt like a vacation.

Growing up, if I wanted alone time, I had to go to the bathroom or wait until everyone was asleep to take over the living room. I'm not sure if it's because I've always had to share a room, but I now require periods of time behind a closed door to retain sanity. It has to be that way, and I don't often come across people who understand that. Sure, everyone feels anti-social every once in awhile, but I want to kill people if I don't have a night to myself once a week. I'm a textbook introvert.

("But wait, doesn't she wait tables?"

Yes, and I had to force myself to do so. It was a conscious effort to be more outgoing. It didn't work.)

But even when the bills rolled in and didn't stop and got bigger, it still felt like a vacation. And on nights like these, when Tommy's at work and no one is bombarding me with stimuli or beer, that I remember what release I felt years ago upon walking through the door. I realize how vastly I have changed as a person within these walls, and how much of it is due to these walls.

I've become more assertive and insistent; decisive, both confident and stubborn. I've coached myself through issues and conflicts, and learned to compromise when my selfishness wants everything my way. I have become more myself than I ever have been, no matter how many times I've thought I was losing it because my sisters weren't around. I've fallen on my face a lot in the 3 years I've lived here (literally and figuratively), but if someone is always there to pick you up, you continue to get too drunk. Growth can be painful, but it's necessary. Also necessary: a few walls to keep your emotional insides contained while it happens; a place where you can let them splatter all over the floor if you need to, and the ability to say, "fuck it, I'll clean it up later." They might need the air anyway.

And aside from the occasional mushroom growing in the bathroom, no quirk has been too much. At least my apartment has less quirks and more structural integrity than I do.

The mushroom was close, though.

Tired

I've been running so hard this week that I have blood blisters on my feet. Just about burned my fingerprints off yesterday holding a plate for a jackass who wouldn't get his damn hand off the table so I could put it down. I've never consciously swallowed pain before--I just took a big gulp and hid the searing in my throat until I had a chance to run cold water over it.

When that shift finally ended (still can't believe it did, actually), my friends were drunk and wanted to get drunker. Tommy had to meet someone at a bar, and wanted me to come. I wanted A Beer, as in one, because I knew I had to get up at 9 to endure more abuse all over again.

We ended up at a different bar, having shots forced upon us from a drunk ex co-worker. He just kept buying them, and they were awful. Things like "espresso tequila" and Jager. So all in all, I had 1.5 pints of beer, 2 gin and tonics, a shot of Jager and that fucking espresso tequila...in that order. It wasn't like your standard "aww I can't take shots.... well, OKAY." It was more like "I can't do that shit tonight dude. No, really, I have to fucking get up in the morning and I'm already way drunker than I wanted to be" and he just stared at me like I'd offended him. Tommy was of no help. I've never been more pissed off about having to take a shot, and NO ONE else at the bar wanted it.

So, I had to stay up and chug water until 4am, sleep until 9, wake up with the worst goddamn hangover I've had since freshman year of college, and sling meatloaf and lasagna in hellfire-temperature skillets for 4 hours.

Bad days.

Personals

I'm chipping away at my grand to-do list. Friends, I will soon be employed by two newspapers and a restaurant. I keep telling myself, this has to work, this has to work. As long as I'm doing something about this planet-sized boulder on my back, I don't mind having it there for another few months.

And then, there's my living situation. I currently share a one-bedroom apartment with my boyfriend of almost three years. A few months ago, I told him I wanted him out. Not mean like that, but more of an "I need my space" deal, as in "our relationship won't make it much further if I continue to live with you".

Well, I must not have explained it very well. He's still here, tossing his laundry about, clipping his beard in my sink.

Sunday night, I reminded him by asking if he'd been looking for a place. He said no, and that he didn't understand why this was happening; all his other friends were getting married or engaged, and moving in with each other. In his mind, he feels us stepping backwards.

Maybe we are, who am I to tell? All I know is that I need, NEED, a place where I can do what I want to do all day. And with Tommy living here, I can't do that. If I can't do that now, what happens when he pops the question? If we continue doing this to each other (i.e. me yelling at him incessantly when he doesn't pick up after himself, or his telling me to stop reading books and writing all the time), then there will be no future. It might sound like a step backwards, but it's a healthy step, whatever direction it may be.

I admit, sometimes I wonder what the hell we're doing with each other. Sometimes it seems like we don't have anything in common anymore; I'm bored with his interests and he's bored with mine.

I know living apart will aid some of this, but the only thing I have hope for is that it will be okay no matter what happens. And no matter what happens, this was the right decision, and I did it for myself--against social norms and expectations, against what people tell me about my relationship ("you two are so right for each other!"), and against my own weak desire to stay in constant comfort. Fuck constant comfort. Nothing good, valuable, or important ever came from such an environment. How will I pay the bills? If I want to live alone badly enough, I will pay the bills by any means necessary. If I want to be a freelance writer badly enough, I will find a way. I just need space to know that these things I say are true; that I can pay the bills, freelance for a living, etc. I just don't know those things for sure yet.

I know I can, but I haven't. Makes all the difference.

Heartache Gumbo

Gumbo is sacred. It is the stew-soup of the south. Outside of being a regional delicacy, southerners tend to guard the process as a ritual; something "foreigners" to the southern states shouldn't bother to try and reproduce. For a long time, I felt this way about gumbo, but couldn't explain why.

When I was young, gumbo day was something like a holiday. It usually happened in between Thanksgiving and Christmas, using the Thanksgiving fried turkey carcass as a base for the stock. If any of us kids had any plans that night, they were cancelled as soon as the news spread. On more than one occasion, my friends actually cancelled entire social events to come to my parents' house and eat gumbo.

Yes, it was delicious, but that's only half the reason it was so important. My friends loved gumbo day because so few of their families sat down to eat together. Of course, when you're a teenager, sitting down to dinner with your family is a bother, because you have so many other important things to do. So none of my friends minded not eating with their families, until they sat down at our dining table. It's something you don't realize you want until it's right there, and you've been without it for years.

When I finally (yes finally) moved out of my parents' house, I had a lot of trouble making my apartment feel like home. I know everyone has trouble with that, but my family was so... rich in informal tradition that I really noticed when it was gone. It was like an un-nameable void in my soul, and I unconsciously bought things for my kitchen when the void took over. I thought it was just a compulsion to take my mind off things, but what I was really doing was creating a home, in exactly the fashion my parents had instilled in me when I was a toddler. Stocking my kitchen was the only thing I knew how to do, to recreate the smells and warmth of my childhood.

I lived here for years before I got the nerve to make a gumbo of my own. My father fried three turkeys for Thanksgiving, specifically so we could bring them home and make our own gumbo day. I was nervous, especially about the roux part--they're so easy to mess up, and if it burns, you just have to throw it out and start over.

I always heard that gumbo takes an entire day, sometimes two, to make. And it can, but my first one didn't take all day-- but it came out all wrong. Not in flavor or texture, but in feeling. The reason gumbo takes a whole day to make is because everything in your living space has to be spotless before you begin to chop. Why? Because when you're done cooking, you try to sit down on your couch full of laundry and put your bowl on the cluttered coffee table, and you can't enjoy it. It's downright unpleasant. You sit there and wonder why the smell alone isn't enough to make this place feel like home, and it's because everything is a mess. You get angry, like I did. Add to that the amazing amount of dishes and large stock pots in the sink, and you've got an erupting volcano of rage.

So when you've got a gumbo itch, no matter how late in the day it is, throw your stock on the stove and clean the shit out of everything in your life that could use it. Think about things you regret, ball them up and throw them into the stock pot--sadness and heartache are the unnamed spices in a great gumbo. And when you start cooking, there's no time to think about the bad, messy, or regretted things in your life--the roux is like a baby, you cannot leave it alone, and you have to put every ounce of attention on it for it to happen right. If your base is not done correctly, you might as well throw out the entire pot.

There's no time to think about the reason you wanted to make a gumbo in the first place. It might be because your life needs a hard day's work. Or, like me, because you're homesick--not for the place, but for that feeling: a mixture of aromas, a few people you want to feed, and everything in its place, inside and out.

When it's done, your apartment is still spotless, and you can take a break to cry if you want to, because it's hard to build a gumbo or a life. If you do this enough, eventually you won't have to measure anything anymore; it'll be a feeling, not a tablespoon. You'll somehow have everything you need to make it right when you need to; no running to the store or running out of time.

And you'll never burn a roux again, because you'll know how to make it without knowing exactly how to make it. At some point, you realize that no one does.