I’m in Manhattan eating a bagel as big as my head. We’re at a serviceman’s hostel: mom, Elaine and her boys, me and mine. 9:30 They’re all also except me. Typical. But here I am writing like dad would while on his travels. It feels right. It’s quiet. Mom sprang for this family gathering. Elice and Brahim couldn’t make it. It’s the end of Ramadan. We’ll see them later this …
Fast forward to equilibrium please.
C broke up with me. And I get it. I’m a lousy girlfriend. I really am. Or I have been for the last…oh, year. He waited a long time, and I don’t begrudge him getting on. Mood swings. My sexual desire nearly evaporated. Menopause is a b i t c h. I kept him at arms length. Felt guilty for not desiring him, for hiding because seeing anyone was work. …
Reading some dark Phillip K. Dick, heard the sound of a passing ice cream truck’s chimes. “Ask not for whom the bell tolls it tolls for thee” “You ain’t right, girl.” The background processes tweak interpretation of what the senses take in.
Basics: fed and watered. The sun shines. I can feel the bobbing of this uncertain sea. When I come to the surface, I breathe in and if – if – I can stay on the surface a while, I remember I am breathing and isn’t it pleasant to have the sun on my face and how cool is it not to be drowning? I have been more me this last …
Summer does not mean free time and a break from work. Professors still have things to do. It’s just unstructured…not really the best environment for me. There’s that thing-I-have-to-do and the-shiny-thing-I-wanted-to-do and the-house-that-is-chaos. But the paper is done. I just haven’t hit “send”. Leaving it until I forget the sentences so I can see it with unclouded eyes. With that done and after investigating where else I may submit it, …
Beatrice, a capuchin, says, “You are insignificant.” Beatrice says, “No one cares about you.” Beatrice says, “They expect nothing from you, why bother at all.” Beatrice is pissing me off. Adder, the lemur, thinks this is just fine. She rejoices in rage. She whispers, “Anger is powerful. Fuck that simpering bitch. Stoke that fire. Let’s get it on.” I’d rather that they both shut up and let me sleep instead …
It was a mistake to go o the attic. I had mistaken the quiet for…what? resolution? That maybe they were gone? Freddie is chittering, “titties! boobs!” Stupid little thing. We’re okay. He wings overhead as I hit the top of the stairs. I track him as he goes round three times and closes the door to the birdcage where he sleeps. Guess he just wanted me to know he was …
She has three fingers and one thumb on each hand — just like a cartoon. Her Maker took shortcuts with her, it seems. There are other ways she is not of us, her hair is too white; her skin, too dark. The gray eyes are some compromise of extremes. When I need a view well outside of myself, I go to her. Nothing like an alien perspective to put …
“You’re gorgeous.” The gut response is to argue the point. The list of what-is-not-gorgeous and possibly-downright-ugly springs to mind. That is, her mind. What she says instead is, “Thank you.” and walks away.
