Faith and the Dark

Another sheet of rain pounded the little car as Faith drove it past an exit on interstate 12. She hated driving in the rain--it was a trait she shared with both her mother and her grandmother. Getting lost was another, but Faith didn't like to admit that.

She was on her way to see her mother and grandmother. They'd be having coffee right about now, she thought, until the rain pounded down harder and she had to concentrate on not veering off the road. She held the steering wheel with two hands, at ten o'clock and two o'clock, and scooted so far up in the seat that her forehead almost touched the windshield. She still had miles to go, but the thought of a hot cup of coffee in her grandmother's dry, toasty kitchen kept her resolve strong. There was a mug at her grandmother's house that was always reserved for Faith, and her mother always kept her mug full when she was there.

But right now, she had to focus. The front tires on her ten-year-old car were as bald as her father's head, and every vehicle around her was passing her, flinging gallons of dirty water in her line of sight. The moments when she couldn't see the reflective paint on the road made her fear for her life, and for some reason, she always turned the radio off when she drove in conditions like this. She knew the silence didn't help her driving ability. She'd thought about it once, when she wasn't driving in a downpour, and she came to an unsatisfying conclusion: there could be no chance she'd die to a song she didn't like. It was either something that spoke about her life--shiny, optimistic and compassionate--or nothing at all.

There was always that control thing about Faith. She knew it, and she hated it, but it comforted her. She liked to be in control of things. The second that a situation began to drift away from her reigns, the anxiety began, and she couldn't function. She didn't know if it was by-definition anxiety--all she knew was that a fog descended, and she was rendered incapable of making decisions. She would simply turn around and walk away. Give up.

Which was why she had such a strong aversion to driving in downpours. With her usual reaction to everything else out of her control, Faith would simply give up and allow the inevitable, horrible accident to happen, and it would all be over. An inglorious death, by hydroplaning into one of those giant concrete walls that surround I-12. Her hands began to shake.

It's happening, she thought. It's happening, and I'll never make it out of this.

She forced herself to picture her thick ceramic mug at her Grandmother's, filled to the brim with everything warm and wonderful. And her mother, whom Faith resembled, sitting at the table with her characteristic, slightly-misshapen sugar cookies. Her mom wasn't very good at baking, but the memory wasn't about how they tasted.

Faith took a deep breath and took control of the situation. She was almost there.

The little car slowed to make the exit to Florida Boulevard. Just being on this road made Faith feel better; she'd been driving down this road since the day she passed her driver's test. And even years before that, her Grandmother would drive Faith to the little cemetery on the occasional Sunday after Mass, to visit Grandpa's grave.

She remembered one time she rode with her mother to the cemetery. Her Grandmother had been distressed about something, and had disappeared without telling anyone where she was going. Somehow, through some channel she was too young to feel, Faith's mother knew. And they found grandma there, in the cemetery, kneeling by grandpa's gravestone, weeping.

"He's still there Grandma," Faith had said, like the child she was.

"I know he is, Faith, he's the light of my life, but it gets dark sometimes kiddo, and the rain starts pouring. Sometimes I just have to come here to make sure he's still here."

At the time, Faith distinctly remembered wanting a happy meal after that exchange. She mentioned it to her mother, and they went to McDonald's. Everything felt so stable and unchanging.

She often wondered in her teenage years whether or not it was a good thing to be raised in such a grand illusion. The cons seemed far more numerous than the pros. Perhaps, if she hadn't been born to such a religious and grounded family, she could have better prepared for the horrible things that happened later--the heartbreak, the danger, the deaths. Maybe she wouldn't have been forced to fashion a way to cope, to live everyday life the same as it had been. If things hadn't been so constant or stable, she'd have come to expect them not to be.

Faith didn't know when she began to understand, but she had eventually stopped asking questions. The situations in life that she couldn't control still constantly threatened her well-being, and always would. Reality returned, as it always did when she passed the cemetery to pull into her driveway a few blocks away.

Sometimes she just had to believe that they weren't in there. When it got dark, and the rain poured, the only thing she could do was think about being in her grandmother's kitchen. And when she came home, like she always did, she put on a pot of coffee, no matter what time it was. Then, though she rarely did it, she'd think about making awful, awful cookies.

Today I woke up thinking about my parents. I don't know if they read my blog or not--I'd assume they don't, because my generation's parents don't really care to know about things like blogs. The concept of an online journal where you write feelings and things about your personal life is something that most folks from my parents' age don't understand. See, back then, a diary was a diary, and if you went around showing your diary to everyone you knew, you'd get made fun of, or looked at like you were a mutant. And if you happened to be a male doing these things, well, you might as well be homeschooled or homosexual.

My sister is getting married in October, and I've been toying around with the idea of writing a toast-type speech to make everyone cry when we're all boozed up. I think it'd be a wonderful bonding experience. But, seeing as how everyone started loudly sobbing before my dad even said a word at the engagement party, I'm worried I can't pull it off because he did it so well.

I've mulled it over since his speech. What made that lump happen in everyone's throat, even people who had just met my father that night? Since my father doesn't say those things very often, and I am his daughter, I held on to every single word like I'd never hear it again. And probably for good reason: he might never have the forum to say something like that to me, because I don't really want to get married. Man, I'm losing my cool just thinking about it.

I'd like to say I am skilled with words, and that I don't know where it came from, it was born of internal struggles, intense self-loathing, the roller coaster of life, whatever. But hearing my father pull something like that off the top of his head erased all doubt where my favorite knack came from. He had absolutely no idea he was supposed to make a toast. And the bastard NAILED IT.

How did he nail it, though? How did he pull that off with less than 5 minutes preparation? The most my dad writes is lists of things to do for the day. It kind of got me thinking about the era of no public forum, no blogosphere, no... outlets. My dad is still living in that era for all intents and purposes. All my life, he's said things like "I'd rather be fishing," and "Kids are holes in wallets". But still, all my life, I've wanted to be successful--half for myself, and half so I could buy my dad a camp on Grand Isle. I told him that once. He didn't believe me.

But he, more so than anyone I know, has things to write about. He works in a paper mill that he abhors with all of his existence. He is trapped in his life, his mortgage. Gave up a career playing music and doing drugs to have a family. My father is depressed. My father is so depressed, and has been so for so long, that everyone in that room could see it, even if they had only known him for an hour. All of that builds up in a person with no outlet.

And I guess, just to hear him say that he loved his daughter was enough to bring the room crashing. This toast had the atmosphere of 26 years of build-up. Everyone felt it.

Let me explain that better: I've wanted to buy my dad out of his life for as long as I can remember, to show him that it can be happy, and that he doesn't have to suffer every day to be alive, like he's taught me. And then he pulls that rug out from under my sisters and I. We can't do that anymore, because all this time, we've done that without money, and without knowing it.

"I hope someday, these two can be as happy as I am right now." The bastard made me weep.

Words

A forewarning: I don't know where I'm going with this post. I merely woke up at 8:30am and told myself I'd do something while I had my coffee, other than hit the stumble button 1500 times.

My project-a-day..project... has been a good thing for me, I think. I wanna recap all the things I've done, if I can remember them all:

LED lights, making my living room/kitchen look like a Miami nightclub at all hours

Quit smoking

Became a runner (still a novice with bad shoes, mind you)

Almost completely removed the resentment I had towards my job. Almost.

Made a habit of reading books with either a notebook or a highlighter

Grow garlic (still working on this one, it's in a mason jar with water and has rooted)

Spend less money, on everything

Eat better

Still working on writing more. Hello blog.

That's not all of them. Sometimes, running is my project. I still have a lot of things I want to do, and some of them take time and planning. Like visiting Macchu Pichu, for instance. Anyway, the point is that while I haven't yet gotten discouraged, things are slowing down, but in that graceful, paced kind of way. You know, the way these things are supposed to feel, without that manic breath down your neck shoving you every which way.

If anything, the lack of mania has made my resolve stronger and more focused. I am finally getting it through my thick skull that I can pull it off, what ever "it" may be, and I don't have to bend or slow down for anything. Belief was the project every day, from day one. It sounds so simple, but I guess years of sedentary sediment has done it's work. I have strata to dissolve now. Kind of like dissolving your stomach fat to reveal the ab muscles that have been there the whole time.

Oh, but once it starts, it goes down like acid down a mountain. I'm fucking up all sorts of shit.

The one, sort of bad but not really, thing is that I (sort of, not with all my heart or anything) wanted this to stop my escapist fantasies. I thought that if I systematically do the things I want to do and make every day useful, that I'd stop mind-wandering and wishing I was travelling all the time. It seemed like the source for a lot of my discontent, wanting those things. And truly, I have a pretty nice life here, about which I shouldn't complain.

I should have known better.

Instead, what it did was make the tedious more nerve-wrecking. Made mopping the worst chore in the world. Laundry does not excite me. Staying home all day is the worst torture I could possibly inflict on myself. It makes me angry when I have to do all the dishes and pick up after more than just me. In fact, when I have to do these things, I have to turn on autopilot or I'll blow my top. I told my boyfriend in a very calm voice the other day that if he couldn't pick up his living space, I didn't want him in mine. In short, I'm very aware of every minute I waste my potential.

It's turned my escapist fantasies into plans. Something has jarred loose in my brain, and reattached somewhere else. And I cannot seem to convince myself that this is a bad thing anymore. If I want to go, that's it then. I go. I sell all my shit and I go.

Words, they're just words until I do it.

A Post Brought To You By Real Paper, From A Real Notebook.

I need to reacquaint myself with the habit of writing on paper.

Writing used to be my escape tunnel, dug with a single stainless spoon over a period of time--decades, maybe--through a brick and mortar prison wall. On the other side, I could see things impossible in my dingy cell. I could run around in that beautiful world, creating something from nothing, seeing pure greens and blues unaffected by reality's shadowy presence.

I always had to come back. My cell was unguarded, but a prison nonetheless. What kept me there? The fact that long periods of time spent "outside" had a tendency to stretch my sanity thin when I returned. What's missing here is the explanation of why I had to return at all--I don't have an answer for that yet. I'd come back and continue to act as if I were still free, and nothing I said or did made any sense to anyone but me. I started to wonder if my field trips were excursions into the realm of lost minds. I had days when that idea scared all the imagination out of me, but I also had days where I was perfectly all right with it.

How many writers go crazy? Stark-raving mad magicians of words, creating something out of nothing, who delight in making readers feel deep emotion, using only 26 characters that only mean something because they said it did. Are writers insane? Are they hypnotists? Are they as weak as anyone else, or have they tamed insanity--put it on a leash and named it eccentricity?

As a general rule, they are all required to be slightly egotistic at the very least, even if it only stems from living inside themselves for too long. Am I thinking of eccentricity? Probably. But that requires being egotistic to an extent, so I'm sort of right. They're all--as far as I can tell--very particular about their pens and paper. Or their typewriters, or word processors. Line spacing, how the page looks when it's full, is very important. They'll rip a masterpiece to shreds if it's not aesthetically pleasing.

I know I do. I have done so. But they probably weren't masterpieces.

What is my problem, then? Why can I not identify with that group who calls themselves writers? Out of fear that the moment I do, it will become false? This is true, it's what I think--but it's false. I am afraid of what that label will mean when I stick it to myself. Afraid I won't live up to it if I call myself a writer before I really am. Afraid of disappointing everyone who heard me say it. Because outside of scheduling writing courses, it's always been my little secret. Because if I know it's going to be read before I write it, those poisonous thoughts will fill my head and smother my ideas. That is a fact.

So it's safe to say my problem lies in not being eccentric enough, because I give more than a shit if what I write is liked or impressive.

What's upsetting about that is that it goes against every bit of advice I've ever given to anybody. It goes against my mantra, if I have one: "love yourself, or no one will." I've preached this since... the birth of my self-awareness. That summer day in the daycare pool when I realized I wasn't exactly stunning in a bikini. It snowballed from there.

I guess I figured if I said it to enough people, they would believe it, and I would, in turn, come to know it as a fact about myself. This thought has been my crusade, to a point of absurdity, to a point where it has come between me and significant others.

What convoluted logic! It merely points a gaudy, blinking arrow back to my insecurity; that it would take others' opinions for me to love myself, and that can't happen. It can't hinge on others. So awful it is, that for most of my life, I've known that the louder someone shouts "I AM THIS", the more likely it is that they're not.

Deep down, I wonder, am I just a pre-pubescent chubby little girl in a swimming pool full of judgement and self-loathing? Are the things I write all just metaphors for what I wish was my psychic condition? What happens now that I know this? Is it possible to change, to accept myself untethered, without losing my mind? Or is that just the way psyches are built--interconnected, reliant, dependent on each other; and anyone who says theirs is otherwise is preaching doublespeak?

Do I change?

Or do I just stop preaching my own contradictions?

I get all the news I need from the weather report

I need to weed the garden, prune the bonsai, fertilize the petunias. Or perhaps I should just uproot the entire plant.

Certain things in my life have fallen into stagnation. Not because they are dead, or aren't being used, but because they remain still. They're thinking, they are alive, but like a tree, they're growing algae and moss, and parasites threaten to drive a chisel through their bodies slowly, until one day, they crack and the rot is exposed. And passers-by peer through the crack, and think, wow, it's been dying for years, I thought that old tree would be there forever, it looked so strong, and it was so stable...

As humans with language, song and thought, we don't like to think we can fall victim to things so easily wiped away as lichens or fungus. We're active creatures. We clean ourselves, our food, our living spaces. We run from being in one place for too long, with our jobs, our kids, our schools, our restaurants. But when you come home from all that at the end of the day, you sit.

See, that's when it happens.

When you're sitting there with your beer, your significant other and your television, you're letting things outside of you think for you. You're letting your television, your couch, your computer, your significant other, become parasites to your thought.

In farming, that's when the plant is cut and burned--after it's produced fruit, and probably won't any longer. Farmers know when to terminate life. Plus, it's good for the soil, all that decaying matter, mulch for the next crop.

If I terminate it now, it will decay. But when it's done, I'll be better for it. Spread the compost around so the soil can gather experience.

My life looks too much like this right now. I'm trying to find a compromise, to make this situation as painless as possible, but that's probably because I've been sitting still for too long. No real change happens painlessly. Compromising with what ails you is a silly thought.

My neighbor popped her head in my place the other day when we were getting ready to grill some steaks outside. She looked in and said, "Man, it's cozy in here. I love our little apartments. But they're so cozy, they make it hard to leave, and change, and grow." Then she turned around and left me with that.

This just isn't getting better with time.

I am obviously pleased with myself.

What an exciting year. As I previously stated, I've given up cigarettes, and I'm on day 4 with no nicotine. After last night at work, I thought I had broken down and would buy a pack on the way home, because I wait tables. Everyone who waits tables smokes cigarettes as well. A year on the job and you'll know why.

But I stopped for gas, and just pumped gas. I thought about it, the smell of lighting up, and that I could in fact SMELL it now, and realized I didn't want a cigarette. I wanted something, but it probably wasn't a cigarette.

Still no cigarettes. And now I have this crazy idea in my head that I'm going to cut out booze for a few months to shave off some pounds and save maximum money. What's happening to me?

Believe me or not, I don't care: I'm pointing my finger at the crazy trip on New Year's Eve. Cigarettes were so offensive, and I didn't want to drink for days afterwards. Plus I was broke for about a week and a half after that road trip. All makes sense, right? Thanks buddies, for dragging me to Oklahoma City and making me spend all my money, trip MOUNTAINS, and quit smoking.

Another exciting thing about this year:

"Smoking cigarettes costs you $43.75 per week, $190.10 per month, and $2,281.25 per year."


I'm gonna buy some real cool shit this year that probably won't give me cancer. That's a lot of money, people. I could live for 6 months in a foreign country for that much.

Making real changes in your life is one of the most exhilarating and motivating things you can do when you're in a rut. It's the only thing you can do that will get you anywhere closer to leaving said rut. Don't take this as, "Take a trip: quit smoking", please. Doesn't work that way.

Now for a bike ride. Hello, lung capacity.

50 Minutes

50 Minutes of writing, commence.

Happy new year! In true form, I'm not going to talk about 2009. Fuck that year. Nothing bad really happened, but I didn't improve my situation as I'd hoped.

2010, however, is shaping up quite nicely.

I tripped the new year in with the Flaming Lips in Oklahoma City. It might be the most mind-blowing experience I've had to date. For really real.

I have vowed (and so far, not broken) to eat better and exercise more, in a habitual fashion which I won't have to think about in a few weeks.

I have quit smoking cigarettes. HOW DID THIS HAPPEN I DON'T KNOW! I think it had something to do with abhorring the smell of cigarettes when I was tripping in Oklahoma City. I'm somehow more alerted to how offensive the smell is to people who don't smoke. Advice: Don't take psychoactives if you have a chest cold, unless you want your life to change. I smelled everything separated. For instance, if there was a mixture of body odor, bad breath and booze in the air, I smelled what felt like "beads" of each, one at a time, unmixed. And when I lit a cigarette... ooh. My nose said, "No ma'am."

That first morning after zero cigarettes was absolutely priceless. So refreshing, to sleep without shit in your lungs wanting out.

Tonight will be the real test though: I work for the first time since quit day. Working in a restaurant is nightmarish to an ex-smoker. I feel strong now, and I'll bring my sunflower seeds to work with me, but I'm a little scared. I think I'll be alright.

What's next for this year? Learn, read, build, build. A project every day. Happy 2010.