Chapter 1: This Wait-and-See-Game

I stop. I pause and take my hands off the wheel. I’m listening.

I’ve been driving down the back roads of my life. Syncopating my rhythm to the pace of these hidden highways, long and winding fast moving. I’m stretched out in the distance; it’s a long long drive down these back roads of the past week or so.

See, a card player, from my grandfather’s roots, showed me my hand. Then Oprah told me what to do with it. What a mad crazy road this road of life…we struggle for meaning, for time to get by, and here I am facing the possibility mine might be up. Let me tell you the story…

I’m skipping through life, trying to negotiate this really odd decision to stick around this town. My days are filled with setting up a plan for living here…a little bit longer. I’m working odd jobs while being a social worker part time. I’m spending time with friends, negotiating crash and burn love affairs. I’m working on my body, shedding unhealthy patterns, I am actively shaping myself into the gyrl I want to be. It’s hard. It’s a bumpy ride, but I’m doing it.

I decide one day, while stressing about something else, to go to the doctor’s office. Why not, right? It’s good to check in with your body? My body. I go and the nurse practitioner touches my throat. She’s been there before, lukewarm hands palpating the skin. She pauses, frowns at her memory flashing across her face where six months before I came in for my thyroid. She touched that spot then. I was worried, she was not. I wanted a test, an ultra sound of the lump growing there.

We part our ways the first time around and I get the test. Nothing comes up – no traders invading the body raising their hands. My ultra sound says I am good to go. I think nothing of it, except an internal high five for getting the job done – I WENT TO THE DOCTORS – and look, I am a-okay.

This time…this time, I am in for something else – a check up, routine and simple. But here she is with her hands paused on my throat and her memory flashes back to our first discussion when we both thought nothing of it.

Did you see the specialist?

What? I had the ultrasound. I was told it was okay! No specialist was mentioned.

The spot had grown. I could feel it when she touched it – a heavy lump sharing space below my left larynx. Fuck.

It’s not all that dramatic. Its just the nurse practitioner decides she’ll have the specialist call me and set up an appointment.

I’m cool, right. It’s nothing. A wait-and-see-game with my health. The specialist calls me and I take the first available appointment.

Then, my story gets trippy.

Now, I’m a gyrl from time to time who likes to throw out mystic bull shit about listening to life and getting the deeper things from our days. Why not? Life can have its lulls, so listening to some bigger soundtrack playing out keeps me interested.

I happened to have scheduled a tarot reading with a friend the next night. I scheduled the reading days before stepping into the physician’s office. I’m not saying I believe in tarot. Not sure I believe in a bigger picture these days, at least the one where I get to be a hero in my own life, living a good life where my story leads somewhere I want to go.

Whatever. Don’t judge. I guess I’m a talker of the deeper meaning in our days, but most days I wonder if this is some bland trip set up to see if I can keep my own self occupied. Most times I feel like I am just keeping myself entertained.

As for the tarot. It’s a fun thing. Can we really believe in a deck of cards to lay out our plans? Really?

I get to my friend’s house. I pick my deck of choice from many decks. He lays out the cards while I spin in my head asking my question, asking what the fuck am I doing again?

I admit. I was focused on money, love, and clichéd answers spoken out like those fun vague horoscopes.

My life is dealt out in complicated layers. Damn, even in the tarots my life comes out in a clumpy mess. But this time…this time, the tarot says some serious shit. I mean, there was no contradiction it was my days as if I had scripted the story unfolding. Then health pops up. I’m asked if I have any silent questions. Anything, ‘cause the cards apparently say there is something, to be addressed.

It was a stupid thing to do, right? Or maybe I don’t have to be so hard on myself. Really, it kind of entertains me…the power of suggestion influenced by this poorly played hand of gin rummy. Of course I ask “Do I have cancer?” And my friend, he responds, not knowing my question. Not knowing any of my words, he says “Yes.” Solid and firm, he tells me the meaning in the card. It’s bad. I swallow, and guess what, that lump…it swallowed back rummy. That was nine days ago.

Now, I’m four days out from the appointment with the specialist. Cancer pops up everyday. I watch Oprah and this professor guy is dying of cancer…He gives this last lecture that has sprung up on Utube. And he asks, “Can you look back and say you lived your dreams?”

Now, me I am still in the wait-and-see-game. I have nothing but a concerned doctor and this tarot reading giving me pause. I really wished I hadn’t asked the question…

It’s a mind fuck really. I’m not ready for the harder things in life, not my own. This is too deep, even for me…I’m too young to process this one, I tell myself. Of course my internal dialogue points out that my thought was a really ageist comment and it’s completely irrelevant to cancer anyway.

I want to shuck off this heavy stuff building up in my throat. I find its best not to go there…I mean the worse case scenarios playing out in my head. It’s kind of like telling yourself to not look down when you’re up so high. I don’t know about you, but I’m gonna look.

I tell myself, in the wait-and-see-game, it’s probably best to focus on life and not tread unconfirmed roads. So, of course, people are talking about cancer everywhere. It doesn’t help that this is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and I’ll be damned if that Susan G. Komen Foundation didn’t do a bang up job in getting the word out there.

A friend of mine this past week, as we laughed over my tarot story, reminded me that perhaps its okay to tread this heavier road and let myself listen to what the universe is telling me. To be honest, I’d never go there, not this time, if she didn’t point it out for me. ‘Cause when I say stories of cancer are popping up everywhere, I mean its everywhere. It helps that I can joke and laugh already and I have friends who will go there with me.

Tonight. Tonight though, it kind of broke me into tears. I’m sitting at a concert…Erin McKeown who performed at The Ark, if you must know. I’m really digging her since she played that set at Michigan Women’s Music Festival with Melissa Ferrick. Good stuff.

I’m sitting there with a friend and her jamboree of friends. It’s a fun time, an odd time, I’m there for Erin so it doesn’t matter to me, really.

She [McKeown] tells us about three of her friends getting cancer and the song that came from that.

What were her words again?

Oh yeah, something about cancer is here to teach us something. Or maybe I’m projecting that onto what she was saying. We need to listen to what cancer is trying to tell us is more like what she said.

I’m sitting there pretty certain I’m getting the distinct feeling that this GoGo is suppose to be listening to something. I realize, I’m scared. I’m not sure what I am listening too. Don’t get if this means I am suppose to take stock of my life when that is what I thought I was doing in the first place. I mean I am finally accomplishing one of my secret secrets where I am transforming this huge part of myself – literally. I’m not ready to assess if I am living my dreams. I’m trying to IS my best answer…and then my thoughts go to Mecca where every Muslim must make the journey, and even if they do not make it, as long as they take the first step on their pilgrimage to Mecca and die…they made the attempt and it counts.

I am not of the Islamic faith, but that story told once upon my days held tight to me. I like the idea of life as a pilgrimage meant to be taken toward something greater than our selves.

I don’t want a partial step to where I am heading, where I am leading myself. I have not accomplished my dreams, but I feel like I might just get there. I can’t face death now.

I say this and to be quite honest, 11 days ago I wondered, was I really getting anywhere?

And it’s not death. I don’t even know if its cancer, but I’m still getting this solid feeling that I’m supposed to be getting something from all of this.

If I break up this past week or so, it’s easier for me to understand why serendipity is a kind event in my days. I already know myself enough to know, had a card not forewarned cancer, I’d not take this wait-and-see-game seriously. I’d blow off even the possibility of cancer. I could have easily canceled the appointment for another time. Or at least not push the issue. So many stories out there start out with I was young, the doctor thought nothing of the lump AND six months later it was too late…OR had I not fought for a test, I’d have died. I am very conscious of the possibility of cancer and I am going to push for the absolute test to rule it out.

As for the rest…I don’t know…I guess I’m gonna stop trying to drive this life of mine as if I am the only one trying to get me somewhere and take my hand off this wheel. I feel like a passive passenger with no clue where this road is going.

…but I am listening.

written 10/26/07

always ready to go...

I sat in a room tonight, listening to another passer-by pass by. She told me a story of a stormy old road that I know. She told the story of not staying but going; she carried nothing with her, so she could always go. She talked of London, 2 years from now. She talked of Denver along the way. Her words drifting off the lip, I watched myself unfold. Leave it all and start over. This mirror reflection in a sandy orange shirt spoke my journey back at me.

What do you say to the concave mirror speaking, this serendipitous event colliding into my obscure reality?

I sat there and listened. Traveled her lines into my own story. That couch picked up on the side of the road, the dishes passed along from a friend. Stay simple and own nothing ‘cause you’ll be leaving it all in the end. She spoke of what to carry while unfurling baggage we picked along the way. Without a doubt she was not gonna stay.

It’s a casual conversation, neither of us met before. My road and hers happened to come across the same door. I didn’t know when I opened it, what this time had in store.

Now I sit here thinking, trying to wrap up this time. Two passers-by passed by and I said goodbye to that silly old road that I know. The one where I’m always leaving; always got someplace else to go. Nothing to carry, no one to know. Just me on my journey, so I’m always ready to go!

a pause, a thought, and then goodbye.

She smiles, a coy smile, the edges of her lips curled up as though she gets the inside joke of all inside jokes. She leans over and whispers in your ear, words you’ve waited to hear since you first met her, and suddenly you’re on the inside too. It’s nice to be on the inside.

~February 12, 1995~ For MN.

A friend of mine died last week. I haven’t seen her in years. I remember once we promised to keep in touch, promised to get together, and then time just made those promises irrelevant. I don’t think I’d even think about seeing her again, until I learned she’s gone. Not that I wouldn’t have loved to see her, but there was always time, a future to meet in. I know she probably felt the same way. At some point, at some time, it would have been nice to see this distant part of the past…just later, okay. So, in my world, I am learning how to say goodbye. More importantly, I am learning I don’t like this unresolved feeling of unfulfilled promises I’ve made.

I wrote a goodbye this weekend for this page, then removed it from public view. I guess there is a part of me that wants to share a really important person in my life back when I was 18 years old, and yet I don’t know if I should all at the same time. 18 was a crazy, whirlwind time for me, and for my friend, it was the same year where who she became had to be decided. Public view for a time spoken only to a private few? Ironically, I am a very private person. I just happen to be playing with this medium. Yet, there is this huge part of this self who wants to publicly offer a memorial for my friend. You were a fragile butterfly who let me see your wings drying in the sun. You were humor’s storyteller, a candid friend. Someone who lived in a time and a place on my journey and am glad you came into my path. I’m sorry I didn’t keep my promise to see you again. I’m sorry for this churning inside me for some unresolved goodbye, we probably never would have had anyway. I’m sorry I can’t make your funeral. And yet, am thankful, grateful, and better for having known you.

Here I have been worrying about my life changing, and all those goodbyes for folks I care about, and you slipped in a new one I wasn’t planning. You and Robert. Death is a morbid state of affairs. It’s so permanent. I know an obvious statement. But I figure, we all must face its understanding at some point. And yet, there is joy. Joy to know how important you were for me. Joy for the privilege of knowing you. Joy in the sharing and knowing.

Mari, thank you for sharing time on this journey.

With love,

Amanda

This little light of mine...I'm gonna let it....flicker

First and foremost, Good luck Bendingpeak!!

I’m sitting at the University library NOT writing my paper. Yes, these words are another distraction, another attempt at procrastination. My paper is a synthesis paper for this Administration class. I am to reflect on the logic model and program designs for a made up program I and my group members have created. There is nothing like pretending to do something. Did I ever write that this is the class I am not into? I’m the type of gyrl who likes challenges. I don’t enjoy anything to do with policy, so that just makes me want to work harder at understanding policy. This class where I am learning to design a program is tedious as hell though, even for me. This Synthesis paper is due tomorrow. This paper has been long put off for the sheer tediousness I feel regarding it. So, in the attempt to make writing it feel like tearing off a band-aide slowly with as much excruciating pain as possible complete with de-rooted hairs, I thought I would write something for the blog. I know I should just get at it already.

This is a sign of mild burn out, complete with “I don’t wanna” and long detours into reading fiction that has nothing to do with school. Currently, I am reading House of Leaves, by Mark Z. Danielewski. Well not currently, currently I am writing for the blog. I was reading the book earlier when I had daylight to write my paper. For those who have any sense of my herstory on this blog, you can see the distinct deterioration of my study habits. I am in fact, procrastinating BIG TIME. Anyway, this was not the best choice of books to distract me from my studies. I had to tear myself away from it. It wasn’t one to read between things. I knew that when I bought this book. That’s why I was waiting to read it when I had more time between things then I do now.

What can I say, it was sitting on my end table looking all nice and shiny. I had a few moments of not wanting to do anything and thought what could it hurt to crack the book. You know, read the copyright page, maybe flip through and read the author's bio....smell it. The next thing I know, I am reading the introduction, hands caressing the whiteness of the smooth paper, eyes dialated by the sheer joy of experiencing the read. It was all over from there.

Yeah, I’m in trouble. Oh, not because its past midnight and I haven’t started my paper. I’ll get that done tonight. Once I get started I will be fine. I’ll write something sweet. It’s the sheer inability to start it that is troubling. It’s also not my habit to procrastinate this bad with so many dstractions, which again brings me back to mild burn out.

…maybe I should leave out mild.

I ask myself, what do I need to do to rekindle my candle this semester? I know. Stop writing this and get to it?

Tomorrow is going to be a crappy sleepy day…

Checking In and then Checking Out

It’s the New Year. How’d that happen? No, seriously, I’ve been enjoying the transition into a new day, a new month, a new year. I’ve been writing, working on becoming short and concise. First, I had to admit that I had a problem. I stood up and admitted, I am a longwinded writer. I like my sentences long and winding. I had to stop blaming early exposure to long winded, yet good, literature. Stop blaming Faulkner. Faulkner! Then, I had to do all these writing exercises that helped me tighten my words. Mmm. I have a long way to go.

I’ve been writing this page, scratching it, and rewriting it. My days have been pretty low key these days. Coffee with friends, books to read, writing off this page. Getting ready for my road trip this weekend. I’m going down to Kentucky. I’m collecting a friend and heading out on the road. Fun. I’m just kind of being in the moment…at the moment. I just bought myself a digital camera and have been playing with that too. This page will never be the same. Expect road trip photo fun when I return.

I also bought Kate Bush’s new album Aerial. Ah, she was a definite part of my past. Kate Bush lived in my tape deck for most of junior high school. I tell the page this as a transition into the next part of the page. I’ve also been reading my journals from my High School/Junior High part of my life. Kate seems like a perfect backdrop to the deed. It’s been a great exercise of growing.

I started to read my old journals by accident. One day around the time I was redecorating my home, I found myself sitting on the floor and cracking my old journals between dust rags and a bed leaning against the wall mid move. I’ve been fortunate that I have written through most of my life and have something tangible to review. I found myself crying and laughing and reading more. I also found it hard and there were days when I didn’t want to look at another journal or even the gyrl in the mirror. I did find this self stronger then I thought I had left her. I’m the cliché. I couldn’t wait to leave my home town and “get out”. I found myself reading through the transition of a gyrl who loved her home town to the person who signed out long before the day I was dropped off at college. So, as the gyrl who ran, not walked, nor did I collect my $200 dollars out of town, I also didn’t like myself by the time I departed. The thing is, I always thought there was something that warranted not liking. I believed I wasn’t worth a place in this world, and have fought ever since for one. Even picked people in my life who wouldn’t hesitate to re-instill what I believed about myself. Funny how that goes.

I suppose I tell this page as an explanation for long absences, but really I’m just living my life. It’s nice to not have my lap top connected to my hip during this winter break. There is life without technology. It is beautiful. It is quiet. I am sure though, as time brings me back to the classroom and late night living with my 17 inch screen, I’ll be posting more. Expect introspections regarding my High School years…she needs a place to live too.

Well, I need to go. It’s getting later and I need to pack my things to head out. I’m looking forward to being on the road, the laughter, and the photos I’ll be taking.

Yeah, that’s about it.

~GoGo

The Photos are from the cellphone. I just wanted pictures.

Sunday Scribblings: Change for a Dollar

Sunday Scribblings post prompt: Change.

Click here for more...
~
Excuse me; do you have change for a dollar?
I suppose we aren’t talking about this kind of change, are we.

What do I want to say about change? I suppose I could talk about change as a constant part of life. Though time ticks in a constant pattern of 60 minutes and 12 hour increments, the today is never the same as yesterday. December 22 this year is different then December 22 last year. I could talk about the importance of understanding impermanence as a benign characteristic of change. That when we accept that change happens, we can let go of holding on too long and getting stuck to some invisible hitching post of the past. That when we can let go of things that come in seasons, moments, and periods, we can accept them for what they are absorbing the beauty in the moment without getting lost in the worries that change brings. If I accepted that you are only a moment, then I can appreciate the moment for what it is, and allow myself to accept the things that makes it only a moment. If I accept this self is only a moment, I can find new avenues to this self with less doubt and more self-love and compassion.

I could write about how it is important to not push out the moments that are limited just because they are not meant to stay. I will not want this moment because it cannot stay only means we lose the moment, it does not protect us from change. Change doesn’t one day give us sunlight and the next day takes it away either. She is not a malice force…though I will take a moment and say that societal progress is not the same as change. I will not excuse a business man who takes away the oceans for profit in the name of progress. He is not the change I am talking about on this page. American progress is something different, profusely manipulative of changes opportunity and a short-sighted coward.

I’m a GoGo who can talk the talk. I can say its time to let go and move on, its time for mourning and joy. It’s time to know change as the common denominator of life. And still, I struggle with change sometimes because I really don’t understand her. What comes and goes in shorter increments seems disproportionate to what comes and goes in longer waves. Sometimes I would prefer the reversal. But I am not supposed to understand her. It is not my job to know exactly what change will bring or to decide where change comes. Sounds powerless, doesn’t it? No. For me, what a relief that it is not my job to know when and how change comes and goes. In this way, change becomes a gift of opportunity. She opens doors and offers me the choice to go through or not. She offers me adaptability. She bestows upon this self the chance to not have to be the same person. She gives me time to mourn and to hope for newness. She gives me permission to not have to know it all and understand everything in order to grow or be valid in this world. Change a constant, is a constant reminder that every moment is unique. She is beautiful.

Change? What will I change about myself in the coming year? What will I let go of? What will change without my consent? Who will I be in December 22, 2007 and where will I be? Will the change of leaving for a new place mean my friendships are gone? I am leaving this town where I have built many wonderful relationships, while letting go of many more. I know leaving doesn’t mean they are gone. It just means we get to be friends in a different way, and something tells me that knowing this means it gets to be better. No. I’ve learned its okay to let go of this worry to embrace the beauty that newness can bring. And yet, it’s a hard leap. As I have said, I’m a GoGo who can talk the talk who’s about the walk the walk, and I am glad change is at my side.

Of course, some parts of these sentiments will change tomorrow.

for mandy

Walking with stationary thoughts,
tucked away on the loading dock,
while watching this city move.
I am reminded of you,
thoughts unfold from the envelopes
of living,
the stickiness of the seal
long since worn open.
I remember you –
age 3 running around
in the rays of the sun,
bare naked
and liberated
from any thought of indecency.
I remember you
at 6-years-old,
eyes closed
while pumping the legs
back and forth
forth and back
on the swings,
watching the colors
change
from yellow to red,
red to yellow,
the head tilts further and further back.
You hung like a board
arms tethering you to flight,
until you bonked your head
on the ground,
scraping skin
and bleeding your favorite color.
Tears were a momentary response
turned into another story
about how once,
while watching the black screen
of closed eyes light up into the Technicolor
from the sun, you scraped your head.
~A Letter From You~

Slowly, I am reconnecting to my words.

oh, and its snowing AND its sticking!

Transition Chapter: That's Micken High

I’m feeling a little off today. A little on the bluesy side complete with the hood up and my favorite socks wrapped around my toes. I’m not telling you what my favorite socks look like. Its not sad or blue in a sense, it’s more like I’m coming up to that cliff I’ve been working towards with school, and my chest’s feeling a little pressed. It’s not a bad feeling to have at all really, if there are bad feelings to have.

See, I have two weeks left of this semester and a “rear” load of things to get done, winter break, and then it’s my last semester. By May, I’ll have received my Master’s in Social Work and my goals for the last two years complete. Woot….no wait, no celebrating yet. Graduation is not the end of this little school thing I’ve been doing. There is the job search, hoping in London, but at some point I need to post about the many problems I am having with that. There is licensing exam here and in London. There is much to do. Being prepared is 50% foresight, and I even wrote on my calendar that today I would switch focus from “getting through school” to "What happens next". I’m not ready. I’ve decided to hold the sentiment off until tomorrow.

Hmm. I started this blog around the time I started school, so in a sense those of you who have read my blog have been witness to the experience. Don’t go running to read the back posts, I’ll sum them up – I’m tired, I have much work to do, I’ve made a list, I’m tired…work, internship, school, oh my. Chuckle.

I’m a blessed person. I have a job waiting for me at a Psychological Center a friend of mine runs, if I want it. I’ve met great folks in the program who I look forward to know as my peers in the working world, in all the various ways we will work. I am finally getting that promotion at work by the end of December, the one I’ve been doing already. I have an excellent resume, myriad more skills then most at this stage of the game. I have a few professors who will give me a reference when I go onto to get that doctorate. I’ve worked hard to get where I am going. The road forward will be just fine. With that said, today I feel like a diver about to come to the edge of the board. I know how to dive. I’ve prepared and am ready. It’s time to jump. Boi, this still looks a little too high.

;)

P.S. I am so not anal retentive for writing a game plan on my calendar.

Social Butterfly?

More like social butterflies in my tummy.

I am imagining a huge dumb ass sign all neon and flickering above my head. Why? It feels fun to feel like a dumb ass, its one of my favorite feelings. Okay, sarcasm aside because when I get nervous I tell stories. I pull from the pocket of myself interesting, funny stories that make people laugh. Um, that may be an exaggeration; maybe chuckle 5 out of 10 times is more like it. When life is in equilibrium, this is all find and dandy. But when I am nervous, I feel like I am puking stories all over people and I just won’t shut up already. Tonight, I went and hung out with friends, which is a normal pattern, but the group of people varied enough that I couldn’t ground myself. I am one of those unlucky people who hide my fear of socializing in being social. Besides feeling like a huge dumb ass, I am also an oxymoron. AND now I am writing bad puns.

Someone needs to stop me. The effect of this is my over critical mind will now commence with a thousand ways I should have been quiet, took way too much focus, and look self-absorbed.

Don’t get me wrong I prefer groups of people who can chat over and around each other, stopping and starting stories in a natural progression of unscripted dialogue. The best conversations fill the room with crowded noise. So, why do I feel bad when I am a part of it? Am I really as bad as I think I am or just askewing myself because socializing is my secret fear?
Hmm. Why doesn't life come with a manual and why hasn't anyone invented the book Being Human for Dummies?

I’m done sharing my fear of my own social ineptness. I am going to now go home and toss and turn before I sleep.

Eyes Wide Open, Eyes Wide Shut

Walking in the shadows before morning light, my mind is awake, but my eyes want to be closed.

To stay awake I made Cabbage soup at work. We had all these vegetables that needed to be used, including cabbage, so I thought why not make soup. Its filling this whole place with olfactory goodness. I feel accomplished. My work here is done, now I can go to home to bed. Oh wait, I have 3 more hours.

Today’s routine: I woke up surprisingly early and went to the library to do a Literature Review for a group presentation on Dialectical Behavior Therapy. I enjoy literature reviews and find myself having to pull back, otherwise I would spend more time then I have doing them. They remind me of when I was a kid and would spend hours reading the encyclopedia. I would start out with one subject, then flip to the other articles recommended at the bottom of the page, only to do the process over again at the end of the next page. I know, I know....I should have been practicing putting on makeup and creating visions of my wedding day in my head. Anyway, I loved the process. A Lit review is the same process. There are a thousand ways to find articles on a subject. I stopped at 27 articles knowing my group members wouldn’t appreciate my zealousness for information as much as I do.

I then worked on my internship application for next year. Rewrote the resume for the 100th time. I left the library and turned it into the Social Work Department. Met up with some peers who were doing the same thing. We chatted about the whole process, revealing gossip about what we heard about next year’s schedule. I learned the two people I was talking to think I’m anal. I kind of feel bad about this because I’m not...no seriously. I am self-aware people. See my thing is, I am lazy and loose attention pretty fast, so its best to do things quickly with detailed attention, so as not to have to worry about doing it later when I can be watching 6 Feet Under. I use efficiency so I can slack. But in the end, I just have to let go and hope its projection and not my anis in question.

Then when it was all said and done, I went home and went to bed to sleep for the overnight shift. I was awoken by a friend of mine who got a teaching job at the local community college. It took me a minute to realize it was my phone ringing and not my alarm clock. I kept hitting the thing, thinking all the while that 10 minutes sure do go by fast when your tired...I woke up when my phone beeped I had a message. I was happy for my friend when I listened to the excitement in her voice. Time finally paid off where patience was waning and she deserves this new experience. I wish I would have woken up fast enough to answer and tell her directly how proud I am.

After that, I went back to bed for about a half hour. My eyes were wide awake and didn’t want to stay closed any longer. I would like to point out to my eyes we could have had 2 additional hours tonight if they would have just stayed closed! :o).

P.S. I know I can turn off my phone. I do when I want to and don't when I don't...or forget.

In the Bottom of a Dried Up Well & I Can't Stop Looking at My Reflection

I’m going through financial hell right now. Somehow every area of incoming money has decided to stop…even my job! It seriously reminds me of the Mad About You episode where Paul finds out the government thinks he's dead and for a whole weekend he can't access his bank account. Insurance company owes me money and is not paying, tax refund is still in the hands of the bankrupted government, and I have a problem with my time card hours which has delayed some funds. There is a part of me that feels just fine with this. It will work out in the end, and I know how to live broke. I’ve seen the bottom of an empty pocket before. But damn, all at once! My eye started twitching today. For about a ½ hour I was a sassy lady winking at everyone walking by….yeah, I looked cool.

On one hand, I know I will be just fine. I’ve done what I can for the moment to remedy the problems. All I can do is wait. (Insert a picture of a GoGo tapping fingers on table). This isn’t a dire situation; it just means I can’t waist my money until things clear up again. Guess, I won’t be going to the spa this weekend with the Jones. The other hand, I’m living on fumes until I get the problem fixed. And since I am not a zen master this means I am stressed out. Thank the goddess for humor I say.

My director at my internship gave me a astrological reading for a New Years gift this year. I read it again today and thought to myself “Damn, the financial trouble prediction was right on time!” It literally said, serious financial dilemma begins in March and clear up by the end of April. If the rest of it is right, I should find a “spiritual” guide in April around the time my financial woes end that will grow and end by August, then in October I will begin a new relationship and we're not talking about the plantonic chummy humdrummy relationship either. Hey, I say if it got the financial problems right, let’s hope the rest is too.

I’m so cheering for my astrological sign this year!


Go Cancer, Go Cancer Go: BE AGGRESSIVE…B*E* AGGRESSIVE!

I just drooled from laughing.

Cluttered Mess of Self

She slips off her shoes with her toes. She turns on the light while shaking her coat off with her shoulders as she tosses her laptop bag in the papason next to the fireplace. She is home after a long day of working on various task, various parts of her life that needed tending to. Now, all she wants to do is pick up the trail of clothes that leads from the bedroom to the bathroom from the morning’s blurry rise. She smiles at the thought that she is picking up her history and piling it with assorted pieces of her past heaped in the corner of her bedroom. Tomorrow she’ll wash these yesterdays reinventing them into the today’s of tomorrow.

It’s as simple as that, she thinks to herself, trying to transform stagnate feelings into something new and possible. Of course, she knows the routine will be the same tomorrow – The trail of clothes as she makes her way to the bathroom, the dandruff of coffee grounds on the counter, and the coffee stained cup sitting unwashed on her kitchen table. Sometimes this varies and the cup is left on the end table next to the remote. Sometimes she actually gets dressed in her bedroom.

But she loves this routine like she loves to smile. She thinks most people just see her as a cluttered mess of self, but for her this is a ballet between morning and night. This is her dance.

Residuals From Doing Shrooms In College

I came home to my apartment this morning and immediately put on some pajama pants. I love to be in my kitchen first thing in the morning, the light drips in from the living room just right, a bent beam all over my stove. Not tired, I drank tea leaning against my counter just watching that beam move up the stove onto the wall and for the first time recognized this was my home. This was me spending time in my home.

I’ve been so stressed lately from the isolation of work, school and internship (oh my!). Worried that I don’t make friends quick enough or with charmed impressions that there must be something wrong with me. Living alone and not being in a relationship compounds this fear right now because without the comfort of someone else, living alone means your alone. Doing Grad School and living alone. Whew! This is one of those fears I’ve let sit in the corner, darkened by perception. I’ve done so much to try and prove it wrong, try and change it. But lately, I’ve just needed to drop it. Let it go...knowing if I give it enough time it will appear as it really is. Well not necessarily knowing...more like acting as if I know and hoping that acting isn’t just the bull in the shit I am feeding myself. I just let it sit in the corner while I drank my tea.

And wouldn't u know, there it was - me, my fear, and that beam of light sharing a moment in my home.

Time Tells a Tale That the Here & Now Never Could

I’m standing at a threshold of changes that need to be made – trying to change these old spots of mine. I wish I could explain these freckles I want out of my life, out of my thoughts, out into the darken scene where they are no longer seen. I wish I had a language deeper than metaphor or philosophical mental masturbation to offer. All I know is, I’m stuck with old fears and habits that just aren’t working anymore, but coming to terms with them is like holding a spider that if held long enough WILL bite you.

When I was a kid it was so much easier to face a fear. For example, once upon a childhood’s past I was afraid of the dark. I was terrified that the darkened shadows compounded in dark rooms held creepy monsters and Boogi-whatevers that were going to kill me. I had to have a nightlight. When that wasn’t enough, seeing that nightlights let in more dark than light, I had to have the bathroom light on. Well after a while that bathroom light was so bright shining into my room, I was no longer waking up every hour to see what was lurking in the corner, but because the beam of light was penetrating my eyelids like those blue colored headlights cars have now.

So, I faced the fear. One night I just decided to turn it off. I spent the entire night rationalizing every darkened misunderstanding between the child’s eye and reality. I was terrified, complete with no voice to scream and a pressured bladder that just wanted to pee already. By the end, nothing hurt me and every corner was what it was – a corner. Today I can walk in my blackened house without a sneeze of fear.

But now, the adult me can’t seem to clear the misunderstandings between the formed mind and reality. I’m stuck just like the child knowing these old fears are getting in my eyes blinding me into distraction, except rationalizing isn’t working anymore either. The funny part about this ego crisis is when I dream the fear comes out in the form of old fears. I’ve dreamt I am afraid of the dark and someone is in the room who is going to hurt me…I am so terrified I wake up jumping out of bed. Or I dream the walls are crawling with spiders falling on me and again I wake up shaking the covers. The instance I am awake, I am completely fine. The act of waking dissipates the fear, and like the childhood nature in me to protect the sacredness of sleep I instantly go back to sleep so as not to miss a minute of it.

But here I am still wondering what I can do to change these old spots of mine. How do I change the habits formed out of fear and the fear that needs to be released so I can let go of the habit? Um yeah. (Say that ten times fast). Then again, the only answer I can give myself is its going to take longer than a night for these corners to clear up.

Time will tell a tale that the here and now never could. Let’s hope the spider’s not poisonous.

You Mean I Have To Feel It? Not Do/Just Feel?!

I have been having a hard time posting. I want to keep this space authentic and about me, without making it about other people (i.e., gossip or like the Caroline King song "You think this song is About You, don't you/don't you") or personal details of my life that exposes too much. Apparently poop is not too personal, but most things in my life these days are...personal or boring. So personal, when I try to make it funny, it comes out sad and pathetic. (You know you've been there, don't judge).

Boring:
Started school. Back to the grindstone. Its all too new to have anything to report and to normal to have anything to make fun of.

Work. I never talk about work-work... I'm getting paid.

Internship. Busy.

Travel: Back to It...Japan or Ireland for Spring break maybe. Found a ticket for $400. I've never been outside the country, I think its time. Don't want to jinx it.

Personal:
crickets chirping. Without giving too much away am nursing a very sore ego and a very young heart. Life is good, life is great; I have much to appreciate. I also am hurting over silly corporeal things I have no control over which has turned into facing some old fears which has turned into having to learn how to love parts of self I don't know how...which has plummeted into life lessons that SUCK! Its all too personal and too specific...and not really all at the same time. Can you guess what it all might be?

At any rate, am learning I am human, and not a super hero when it comes to hurt feelings. Oh, the life lesson went something like this: "You mean I have to feel through it...not do/ just feel?" I got the blues and I don't think good old Katherine Hepburn movies are going to make it better right now. Maybe a Drew Berrymore DVD...but after I get my readings done for this week.

I still believe this is going to be a great year, this GoGo just got a little deflated that's all.

If someone could just point me in the direction of the nearest how to book on life, I would greatly appreciate it. Got any nonchemical, nonnumbing remedies? Smoking's out.

I Will Not Be Afraid of Women

Once upon a time ago, I was at a crossroad where my outside world did not fit what was inside, and what was inside was something I had no connection to. Serious. I worked solely for money and benefits. Everyday, I woke up dreading going to work and wishing I were somewhere other than the place I was. So, I quit. I had enough money to last me two months for rent, food, and that was about it. I spent those months being as industrious as I could be, panhandling my plasma and working a part time job at a peace organization. I had no clue what I was doing or what the hell my next step was. Then, one day I came across an ad in a Lesbian Magazine for Michigan for a Bookkeeping Assistant position at a Woman owned and Women ran Music Company. If your a lesbian and have gone to festival, you know of the place I am talking about.

Once upon this time ago, a very confused woman started working with 13 independent and very different women and she learned hard lessons that were loving lessons. I spent today revisiting this important place I worked at for 3 years, counting CDs for inventory. I guess I am writing this entry for anyone who might need to learn from others experiences or maybe to write them out to remember them myself. I am also writing to Thank these women with a Capital T for giving me their love, experiences, and let’s face it, a big kick in the ass.

Sometimes I get so focused on my life, I forget to look up. I came into this place a primordial ooze of self, living out patterns taught by family, and complaining about everything. I knew I wanted something different, but had too much “poor me” attitude to know how to do it different. For those who have ever been around a group of women who know how to love one another and as Dar Williams would say, not be afraid of women, then you know the “poor me” had to go.

I learned to look up and see. See the women around me and love them as they were. See the beauty of me – a complex mix of strength and ingenuity…and I learned I can do pretty much any task laid out in front of me. I also learned I am a very resistant detailed oriented person. I am spoiled by my strengths and expect the world to see it my way. When I let go of these last two things, I am a better person. When I let go of these things, I can incorporate the flawed parts of self that are just as beautiful, and dare I say more beautiful than the parts who try to be perfect.

Even now, as I sit here rolling my thoughts over the time there, I am in awe of how much I gained from this place. I travel through the warehouse in my head where the shelves are covered with women musicians, as we counted them in and out for the world. Were the warehouse women taught me to stop seeing the world as a dead end trip. Down the East Wing my thoughts carry me where I worked with the number crunching pussy powered women who taught me that I need to appreciate my stubbornness, but also reel it in when the time is needed. Into the bathroom that was our congregation place for jokes written on the wall. We wrote our stories in drawings and words. How many times did I walk by to hear laughter while someone was taking their daily constitution?

I turn left in my head down the sales wing, where women let me learn from them what all this music means. Where my boss gave me a key to a car and told me to travel the country and sell this music. I took those keys and learned on the road how much life is a trip, and I am the driver. I also learned there is a dyke pretty much anywhere who will take you in for a night and good conversation. I move down to the last office where a musician co-worker/friend of mine played me her new songs as they formed in her world. Who also taught me to relax and just have a good time.

Thanks, Women of G, you gave me exactly what I was looking for when I decided to jump into my life. You taught me to not be afraid of women.

Love, GoGo

Cruched salt, Flowing Water, and Silence

Spending time pushing thoughts from my head, trying to let go of things I cannot change.
This is me trying to avoid a bad accident, one I cannot walk away from.

Took another walk, but my mind was too restless with it all, so I walked faster.
Step after step, I listened to the heavy thud of boot on cement, the water mixed with undisolved salt crunched underneath.
I asked myself, am I the salt, boot, or the self walking?

I am restless and I am not letting go of things I should.

Came up to the river, flowing slow and thick.
Asked the current what does letting go look like?
My heart beating too fast, it thumped with impatience.
Silence from the water.

I asked myself am I the river, the shore, or the self standing?
Threw a stone in the river...
I asked the current again, what does letting go look like?
Silence.

Half Baked Truths and Parliments

Went walking a silent town, down the street toward the river. Came across myself hanging from a tree, dirty pack of parliments imploded and all used up. I smoked parliments in the end to remind me of the first time, the first girl who got me to smoke. Because of that time when we smoked parliments with your granddad at your family cabin. I started to smoke to cover up the silence between us when all I wanted to say was, stay with me. See me, love me, and don't stop calling me beautiful.

The air was chilly, my hips hurt from the weight of my thoughts. It was your hips I fell in love with first as they peeked outside the brim of your pants. I loved them because it was easier than loving that laugh too much, how it roared out of your mouth in hiccups. I loved them because your brightness scared me and I thought if I could convince myself I wanted hips like yours on me, that was actually the desire beating in me.

I went for a walk and I honored the genuine side of me, that was not so genuine then. Remembered half baked conversations on the phone when I called you higher than the sky, wanting to tell you this is me trying to get close to you, trying to stay close to you. Remembered that tremble in your voice b/c what I believed kept us close was pushing us further apart. If I could tell you I loved you, I would never have stayed so high for so long.

I went for a walk and enveloped myself in the memory of you - of that night when we cried in the receiver repeating to each other "I don't know why I'm crying." I know why today. I cried because I could never tell you, how much I loved you and wanted you to stay, and you were crying because you got me high for the first time, taught me to smoke, and you knew I loved you and you couldn't stay. Indirect conversations and half-baked undertones, seem so much clearer now when there is nothing between me and this memory anymore. Nothing to hide me from you.

Half baked truths and parliments. Half of us were together while the other was on our way. Its silly you know. You've reinvented yourself in my days, from one girl before to a few more. Each time, I wanted to say, stay with me. See me, love me, and don't stop calling me beautiful.

Went walking a silent town, down the street toward the river. Turning the internalized into internal trips - down, into, through and out. This time, I know who needs to stay with me. Me. See me. I. Love Me. Self. And I won't stop calling myself beautiful...but i will always love you.

Diary of a Nonsmoker: Day 16

Happy pick a Holiday!

So, I've gone through the 3 day withdrawl. I've been through the first week of "want to start up at any moment quivers". I even came to the edge of rage and like the little girl (Charlie) from the book FireStarter, I fought back the desire to set the place ablaze....well a cigarette anyway. My body still wants the stuff! I wonder if all this physical need is just me not wanting to give up this bad habit? I'm just loosing patience with the thoughts that occur in my head...the feelings not smoking bring up. I want to be done quitting already so I can think about other things obsessively, okay. :o). Just laughed at myself.

Seriously though, I'm never going back if its this hard to quit...its more the want of it...because it was so a part of my routine. It is what I ran too when anything happened. Got stressed had a smoke, got happy had a smoke, got paid had a smoke, got a crush had a smoke, got an ephiphany had a smoke, you name the got I had the smoke with it. Now its just me, baby! Which I like, but its not an addictive substance for no good reason...its hooked me and its not letting go any day soon...but it does not have me anymore and what I got it can't have. I have most assuredly let go of smoking...its just gonna take time for the smoking to realize this. Poor smoking, its time to move on 'cause I don't want you...I'm a better person without you. There are other decaying lungs out there, let go of me.

Excuse me while I play "I Will Survive" in my head and shake my butt.

Diary of a Nonsmoker: Day 15

Quiting smoking means my heart beat is faster, my lungs are getting more oxygen and there is this thump thump thump mixed with a high hum in my chest. It means I am healing. It also means that I find myself besides myself ready to jump. My pulse and blood pressure are just fine, but my body feels this pulse that beats closer to living and is a little overwhelming. I'm not going to label it anything, except a beat faster than I am accustomed to. Maybe its that twitter of self-love brewing in my chest.

In any case, my heart is beating faster and it causes my hands to shake a minor key to it all. I am surprised at how I am not in the mood to over eat and in fact I have found my appetite has decreased these days. I still miss smoking, but I know what it gave me I can get from learning how to ground myself in other ways. Ways that take time and patience and a little bit of focus on my part.

Damn its hard and my days are two-folded. Fold one is me feeling through this shame and human flawedness that just wants to give into the fuck its and be less of myself. Fold two is me loving this self-care knowing its easier than lighting a cigarette. Wanting to be this person I am trying to be. This part knows my herstory and loves me for getting to this place. I am beautifully human and if smoking is the hardest thing I have to face these days, then so be it. But damn its hard.

Ten years with minor time off, I'll take a little tremble of heart and soul if it means I am coming closer to climbing that mountain I always wanted to.

5 things I intend to do now:
Climb a mountain
hand glide
run 1 race
Run and Play as much as I can
Learn how to sing better