someone died today

and it puts everything in perspective. the little bs we let sideline us, it doesn't matter. i will admit though, it was tough standing there for four hours explaining to every customer "what happened" and answering the inevitable question,

did they die?

do many people survive being struck by a train? none that i know of. it just got way old, it was ptsd wednesday at the bux. hated every minute of it.

a customer whom i'd always felt a kinship toward, maybe it's the venti chai he drinks, came walking in, face distraught saying,

i have to use your phone, i have to call 911.

and it went downhill from there, some nightmare unfolding in the picture windows we stood in front of.

and every two minutes,

what happened? did they die?

YES, they died!

we finally answered.

it was rough by the time i left because hours into this, we're still getting people who have no clue,

someone died,

i said. and turned away.

i didn't cry. wanted to several times. wanted to hurl, wanted to lose it in all manner of ways, but somehow, held it together.

it's strange how that shockwave goes out. the guy walking in the door,

i need to use your phone.

his face, his breaking down on the phone to his wife,

can you just come and sit with me for a while. i need to talk to the cops.

then, hours later he returned.

i'm sorry for how i acted.

no one needed an apology. i told him,

i would have hugged you if it didn't feel inappropriate.

he was falling apart. he slapped me on the back as he left, his thank you for my unrealized gesture. i watched him drive away and said,

i hope he gets therapy.

because he saw it happen. he kept replaying it saying,

if only, if only.

those moments never leave us. they scar the mind.

i hope, for the many people who witnessed today's tragedy, for their healing. for their collective outpouring of grief. for the mom who will get the inevitable phone call, for the friends and loved ones who will soon find out, that she just stepped out in front of the train.

i hope that they cherished every moment with her, because she's gone.

and i drove up to see my friend. i had to lay eyes on someone i love. to hug my child. to hold my bunny.

my boss made me leave on schedule saying,

any other day i'd be grateful for you to stay, but you need to go.

and i was glad to leave. so, so glad.

i couldn't take it anymore.

but now, home, grateful for the breath in my lungs, i will go sit in the sun beside the freezing cold kiddie pool with my neighbor and cherish the stifling heat, that i am still here to complain about it.

and maybe, i won't complain, i'll just be grateful i'm still here.

still here.

i wish she was too.

um yeah

finding myself at crossroads again.

i felt this way on saturday when the past came rolling up the drive. it's hard to prepare for the unknown (at least it is for me). so, i just do the best i can and muddle through. that's all i can do.

i understand a few things in this life, among them, that there are consequences to every action.

trust is huge for me. once lost, quite possibly, never regained. i simply move on. it's who i am.

so, now, to deal with that which is before me, soundly in my field.

that which needs to happen, does. i believe this.

i will lean upon that which i know to be true, and the rest will fall away. the rest will fall away.

why write

i'm not sure why i come here, to this place and write these thoughts. why i share them, why i continue to open up but the answer isn't as simple as one response can hold. there are many reasons. habit. boredom. nowhereelsetoturn. no therapy. literary exhibitionist tendencies. you name it. why does anyone create art? is what i'm doing here art? that is not for me to decide. but i do know artists create art by virtue of the fact that they are artists. not the other way around. art is not the impetus here, artists are.

this is something i've not really come to terms with until now, but we were asked at the midway point of our residency by our fabulous new poet what we would do with twenty million dollars. the responses varied from the practical to the wild, mine was,

whatever i want.

.

will you make time for writing?

.

i don't have to make time for my writing. this is my life. it is who i am, what i do.

.

i feel the same,

she said.

it has been too many years that i've given myself over to writing for me to question that process, that ingrained nature now. a dear neighbor whom i'm just getting to know offered to teach me folk guitar, but i have to refuse because i have only so much time for one, and my arms must be saved for writing. already i give too much arm and hand to my job. cannot divide the waters again.

someday, when art is my sole occupation, i may take up guitar. at the moment, making a living is the priority, and thus the demands it puts on my arms are warranted. but that will change as well.

i'm not sure how, i'm not sure when, but that which i need is coming to me.
i believe this.

myth

i'm trying to digest this very meaty portion of a book i'm reading. some princeton university press book, which is thick with logic and i find the invocation of myth. i love it when this happens, granted, but it sure makes me work very hard to articulate my argument when i so disagree (or simply diverge from the path well trod), with what's being said. in this case, much as in my personal life, i find the assent more captivating than the negation.

YES.

it is all i feel coursing through me. the yes of the moment. the yes of inspiration. the yes of hope.

there it is, there it all is in that passage. my paper is waiting there for me to uncoil it from the snake's suffocating embrace. the question is, how do i do that? how do i accomplish what i'm hoping to accomplish here? i don't know.

that is never comforting. that my process begins and ends in unknowing is most disconcerting. not for me, mind you, i live in this alien territory. i have to keep myself calm, and centered, and let my mind do the digesting. when my tummy starts to turn, i say,

no, it's okay. we've got this under control.

and then, i push it out of my mind. it's madness really. that my process is so seemingly detached. i understand how disconcerting it could be for someone hoping i can give them any valid answer when all i can say is a genuine, i don't know.

because i don't.

bottom line. will i fail? no. my mind has never let me down, it won't start now.

will i be successful as i want to be? i hope so. that remains to be seen. if it can be had by hardwork and ingenuity then it will be had by me. if not, then, it remains to be seen. but that is life. life is all mystery. we simply do the best we can with what we've got before us. good, bad, indifferent, our best is all we have to offer at any moment.

and i grow weary of my station. i want to launch out. i find myself chomping at the bit for that better life i'm imagining. i'm creating in my mind. that place of peace and happiness i will no longer live without. how does one get to that place? i don't know.

does such a place exist. surely, there is a whole world to be had out there. i'm not asking for anything more than goodness. not an ounce more than abundance. nothing less than utter and complete triumph. no more unhappy endings for me. i won't settle for that anymore.

and when i go flying from my misadventures. whether tangible or figurative, i will laugh the laugh of a content woman. and be grateful for a moment of defying gravity. and look forward to the next flight.

favored of the gods am i.

my paper is right there in this one passage, waiting to be unleashed. so be it.

set a course

i've not worked on my visual file (ala artist's way) for about two years. maybe longer. i lug the thing around (it's about six feet long by three feet high and currently acts as a very inspirational room divider. trouble is, it is two sided and the back side is blank except for my girls attempts to create a visual file, which consists of about five pictures of spongebob, fairly odd parents, some random animal shots. a few horses, and lots of parrots. i'm going to strip them off, because i thought about just pasting over them, and i don't know that it won't compromise the core to not have it all adhered nicely, though that sounds mercinary, ripping off pictures, even random pictures, that my daughter pasted there.

this is why i'm doddling.

so i've had it in my mind, have an O magazine or two around, been meaning to shred them, often there are very fine words in O mag. but that isn't enough. i found a stack of martha stewart living at work today, and brought them home. they are perfect the photos really inspire me. and now, i will begin giving substance to my dreams. because what i've found in the course of this file business is, dreams really do come true.

watch and see.

safety here

i've compromised my own safety, no one did that to me, i did that to myself. now i have to figure out where to go, what to do with it all. how to proceed given my new self imposed constraints. i don't do well constrained. so, part of me says, fuck it, just do what you do. let the chips fall where they may. and i'm trying so hard to be nice. it really requires a vast amount of effort for me to just smile sometimes (granted, there are those who get the gentle, soft, cuddly suzanne, but those are the few, the rare, the chosen). everyone else gets the hedgehog, or porcupine might be better.

all i know is i don't know where to go or what to do now. constraints confound me.

while i understand i can chew the cud to nothing then regurgitate it and chew it some more. this process i understand, it is part and parcel of who i am.

what i don't understand is how someone like me makes it in a world where politeness is the rule. granted, i don't throw tantrums (my closest friends get that), but i can stay pretty well composed in most situations. but sometimes, i wonder how i'll get anywhere. baffled. my own fault. but i am who i am.

so where to go from here. what to do with who i am. my very bent is this way.

i keep trusting it will be well. in part because there is not a whole hell of a lot else i can do. sure i can wring my hands but that has never been an activity i much engage in. rather, i get active and do something about it. if the context can't change perspective can. there's lots of room to shift focus. to feel around the elephant and describe some other part.

i can do this. i know i can. these trials are not bigger than me. my will is strong. my stubbornness serves me well.

but i'm tired. i'm busy. i'm trying to be positive but finding there are variables i can't control.

i tell my friends,

control what you can. yourself alone.

i need to take my own advice. but sometimes i'm trapped in my head and when i've offered up my venting space, well, i've screwed myself in ways unimaginable. only now am i realizing it. the problem of lack of foresight is not knowing where you're headed.

likely, this is all hormonal (easy to chalk it up to that), but i want to grow beyond this. to evolve.

that can only happen if i'm gentle with myself and those around me. i have found lashing out helps no one.

i keep trying to change my life, and i trust that i have. that things will continue to come up, but i am equipped to handle them.

i am safe here. in my home. in my head. in my heart. here is my land and country, and no one has constraining power over me here. not even myself.

there is some comfort in that fact.

find your way back

there are so many things i could say. so many ways i could trip myself up. but nothing is wrong. i have to just trust that even when it feels like doom is impending, it isn't that's just some catastrophic thinking i have learned to live with and i'm not living like that anymore.

my girl had her heart set on a particular bunny. we found him and adopted him today. it was nice to see her wish fulfilled. wish i could do that more often. and he has such a sweet disposition, that he let her hold him for an hour while we dashed about trying to get the things he needed to live with us. (someone more practical, perhaps, would have had everything prepared in advance, but not me, i like to wing it. or i'm so used to winging it, i don't know how to plan which is why i assembled the cage with two walls upside down and had to reconfigure it). my girl said,

next time, let's read the directions.

i did!

that's the trouble. directions don't work for me.

but bunny is happy and we are well. now i have to start knocking out some schoolwork so i can rest. i had a lot of personal stuff to tend to (still do) when i got back from boston, but i'm through most of it, by no means all, but most of it is under wraps. my pony has had an oil change, a good 1400 miles later than i usually get around to it, but i've been racing. so, i've let a few things slip.

now to cuddle that bunny and settle down for a nap before my phone starts a ringing. which fortunately for me, it does.

there is no other shoe, this goodness will prevail. trust it and see.