i try to remember

i try to remember
the last time i was this
nervous,
blood humming in my ears, even the
deaf side, so loud
that i remember the atlantic ocean
thrumming
one young summer.
my heart pounds and instead of
considering why
i recall the pow-wow, feet thudding,
color swirling, the steady beat of each drum.
air catches behind my ribs,
an invisible hand tugging it down,
further and further, and
the kite swoops towards tree,
red and light,
caught by tangled green branches,
and i cannot remember
how to breathe.

***

when i was a kid i used to hyperventilate on a semi-regular basis. my mom would hand me a brown paper lunch bag and tell me to breathe in and out, and remind me that my grandpa did the same thing. clearly i recall this on my first day of second grade, so many years ago now.

as an adult i cope better with nerves...but apparently not much better. buying my first home is...terrifying and wonderful. i'm excited to make the house my own, but at the same time, my "what if's" list expands with each minute, spiraling down and out of control, and i'm transported back years to the last time my breath escaped and i worried.

it comes and goes, these nerves, that scratchy feeling of fear, much as seasons whirl around, out of control. i know that it is within my capabilities to snatch it back and make it mine, make it useful, but today i cast my mind back, trying to find that anchor, and i'm adrift.

time to do something--activity always helps, no matter the kind, reminds me that life will continue, regardless of if i am at the helm.

estates that are real. aka, real estate.

so for a long time now i've been looking at houses online. it's been interesting, to see what's out there and also, perversely, to see how other people decorate their homes. *shudders*

at any rate, we've looked at 16 houses so far now--actually walked through with our realtor. saw two that were possibles...both of which had offers that were accepted before we could even formulate questions. i suppose that's to be expected.

where before it was interesting to see the houses online--pry into bedrooms and dens, peek at kitchens, wonder why on earth someone would put forest green carpeting with hot pink walls--now we get to actually go into it. we've seen some really...different places. one had a shrine to jagermeister, one had what appeared to be a flood in the basement, another had a shower that qualified for its own show on The Discovery Channel. nothing, yet, has been "the one."

everyone says you'll know it when you walk into it. i suppose that is true; i think of it in terms of other things i have acquired: shoes, purse, earrings, jeans. i see it and i think: that looks like something i would wear. or: that looks like it belongs in my house.

now i need to find that house that says: this is where i want to live. this is where i want to store all that other stuff that says "me" all over it, in shades of blue and green and pink and whatever other colors seem apropos.

i usually think of myself as going with the flow--accepting life as it comes, whatnot. it's strange to realize that you're exceedingly picky.

i was soothed tonight talking to dan's sister and bro in law; they looked at over thirty houses before finding the right one, and i'm guessing that we'll have to do the same.

years ago when i wanted something hard to find--a book, the right dress--i used to ask it to come to me, and then let go. just ask the universe at large--whatever you call it, spirit, god, jesus--to send that item my way. i haven't done that in a long time, mainly because i haven't needed anything in a long time. i need a house now, a place i can call home, where i can plant flowers and gripe about mowing the lawn and cleaning the gutters.

so here it is: home, find me.

the blog less traveled

when i started blogging it was already on its way out the popularity door; i'm slow that way. there seem to be a lot of people who still do blog, but not nearly as many as previous to myspace or facebook or the ever-present twitter. blogging is becoming, to my mind, something outdated, outmoded and already, in the span of a few electronic years, ancient.

it always awes me to think of a time in my own life when we didn't have access to all of this--and yet i have grown up more connected to technology than i'd ever like to admit. my parents, when they were young, didn't even have private telephones, and tv was a luxury. they adapted to these things just as i have done in my lifetime.

perhaps that is the hallmark of being human and adapting to our environs. then again, dogs seem to have done pretty well, as far as adapting goes. how many thousands of years ago they were wolves--and now we have daschaunds, rottweilers and poodles.

i always wonder if all this technology is slowing us down -- ie, my memory of phone numbers is crappier than it has ever been, simply because i just have to tell my phone who to call. it's fantastic and it's strange.

no one buys a black and white tv any longer; they're not made. i suppose that eventually blogging will go completely out of style, but i've never been on the cutting edge of fashion or whatnot anyway, so i'll just continue plugging away, until the plug is pulled.

in moderation

for the last two weeks i've been sick again. it's probably all hormone-related but sick is sick. i generally feel weak and tired, and a bit afraid to leave the safety of my own home, mainly for restroom purposes.

anyway on friday when i was driving home from work i really allowed the sick to get me down. by the time i got home--after a ten minute drive from work--i was so down in the dumps that dan took one look at me and said, what's wrong?

he cheered me up--brought me to the grocery store, was all around uplifting and after an hour and some food, i felt much, much better.

i suppose the "all in moderation" thing goes for emotional upset just as it does for chocolate consumption.

***

today when i went on facebook i was scrolling through everyone's thoughts and what not. i ran into my post from yesterday, and below that, veronica's note about posting something i remembered from our shared past. i was going to post about the Shred-It guy who came in and was pretty darn hot, and had a thing for veronica even though she was in the beginning stages of a relationship with her now-husband--which i eventually did, after some thought.

the thought was required because serena had posted there too.

i try to avoid thinking about her. she's like a pain, a toothache, that's finally dead and numb. when i saw her picture i did not feel anything but curiosity. which is perhaps what you would feel after this many years have passed. time, they say, heals all wounds -- but that isn't true. it isn't true because the minute i saw her picture and the numb feeling passed, and the curiosity set in--what has she done, what is she like, has she changed as i have?--after all that, all i could think was, would dan be happier if he was with her? would he have had to deal with the histrionics of friday night if she walked in the door? no, he probably wouldn't.

at first it hurts again, that same wound. the one that reminds me i'm not good enough, the one that breaks open every now and again and says, why is he with me, truly? is it because he loves me or because he's comfortable?

it's been many years since we indulged in our first love, our first headlong plunge into passion. what i feel for him now is so very different than what i felt for him then. i can still remember those heady feelings of lust, of adoration, of puppy-love, but they are a memory now.

then again, do i remain because i'm comfortable? i certainly love being around dan -- i do, honestly. he's the first person i want to call when i have seen something new, the first person i want to hug at the end of the day, the first person i want to see in the morning. that part has not dimmed, for me, and as often as i wonder if it has for him, i am reminded that he loves me in the things he does -- the chocolate bar when he knew i was feeling down, the gift of a picture because i know he listens to me.

i do love him, and i don't want to consider the other option--but seeing her face makes me doubt, makes me wonder, makes me a little upset.

***

last night, feeling a bit better, i allowed myself two small squares of the chocolate bar he brought home. they were so good and filled that strange void that is "craving," and so far, my stomach is not unhappy with me.

that said, i need to address the upset i feel with the same handling. i need to allow myself the upset, in moderation, and then i need to set it aside, perhaps to moderately ponder again later...but not now.

the space between my fingers

when dan and i first started seeing each other, we held hands. constantly. i used to hold my hand up to his, to see how much larger it was than mine. for whatever reason that consistently astounded me.

the size, the shape of his hand, so foreign from my own, and yet so well known.

every once in a while i still do that -- measure my hand to his. remind myself of the span of his hands, how he can palm a basketball with ease.

it's been many years since we met. so much shapes you, as you grow--the wind, rain, the cold and the heat, all the various emotions. when we were young we used to argue all the time--sometimes about the most mundane of things, sometimes about simply who was right and who was wrong. as time passed and we grew to know one another better, other things stood in our way and our arguments shifted. then we argued about money, about jealousy, about the things that are so terribly important when you're twenty-two and think that you're All Grown Up.

really, nothing could be further from the truth.

but at that age, you don't know it.

i think that many people, myself included, have a difficult time understanding how to put aside that drama from childhood--the fears of monsters under the bed, of the dark, of things that are unknown to us, the proverbial bump in the night. that drama sustains us, for a time. when dan and i first held hands it was strange and comforting and exciting. of course later we argued about it, i'm sure. if i look in all my old journals i'm certain to find that it was some part or parcel of discussion.

who knows.

it grows easier and easier with time to become mellow--to drift, to float along, to find all the things that bind you together with other people and forget the things that keep you apart. while swimming you forget that you cannot fly; while walking you forget that you can swim. there is space between my fingers--it's always been there, holding them separate. in the womb there was no space, the fingers were paws, webbed and alien.

and then growth--time passes and one is born, and the fingers are their own little entities. did i take the time then to quibble about the why, or question the need for ten digits? was i overwrought with this change? did it consume me?

no--i was too young to remember it. and now i am old enough to see the difference and appreciate it. so very few things separated my fingers three decades ago, so very few things separate me from dan, from my family, from my friends, now. why should i argue? why should i gnash my teeth and suffer? what is the point?

i guess somewhere along the way--in between the fretting and worrying and shouting--i let it go. there was no point to holding onto all of that drama; it was useless. it became a question, each time an issue arose--is this life-altering? if not, then pick another battle. save your strength. wait, this too shall pass.

all the arguments we had ten years ago, all the suffering and agonizing over decisions and opinions--it all falls away. in the end it is his hand in mine, and if it were not for the space between my fingers, i would not know that balm.

lost and found

here's a list of what i found under a tv stand yesterday while assisting with a move:

--child's cap, blue & purple striped tiger with ears and eyes
--batman action figure
--Tony Hawk's something or other disc for Playstation
--red bowl
--one small pink striped sock, rolled into a ball
--neon orange squirt gun, thankfully empty
--sudoku book

and assorted other items. it's always strange when you move -- you pick up one thing and discover an item you'd written off as gone years and years ago sitting there, patiently waiting for you.

moving always hurts; it hurts to lift all the stuff you've accumulated and it hurts to leave a place you've called home. i guess in this case it just hurts because i've got all kinds of muscles, whose location i'd rather not disclose, clamoring in pain, but there's no "why-did-we-have-to-move" pain. just the pain of disuse, which is my own fault.

i remember the last time i cleaned the carpets in the house, before we got the new couch. when i shoved the old one out from the wall, there were items to which i too had said goodbye: a red twenty-sided dice, cat toys galore. this morning i cleaned out a bin that's been in the front closet probably since we moved in. it's where we keep the light bulbs but heaven forbid that you actually lay hands on a light bulb in said bin. it was more of a catch-all for cords, duct tape, those dowel-holders for closet rods, some tiny, tiny light bulb that could only be for a car we no longer own, and a random vacuum cleaner belt for, yes, an appliance that's no longer here, either.

it's so odd to think of all these items lurking in the house -- things that i don't necessarily need on a daily basis, but items that could, at some conceivable point, come in handy. part of me wants to scour the house for these treasure-troves of stuff, while the other half of me would rather write about it and then perhaps take a nap.

i won't even discuss the random bits that end up beneath seats in cars.

anyway, today i'm going to relax and allow my own found treasures--at the moment, my biceps--take a well-deserved break. with some flexing now and again, to reassure myself and my body that everything's still there, and perhaps won't be forgotten again for a while.

dejavu

It seems like every day’s the same/and I’m left to discover on my own -- seether, Fine Again

i get this feeling a lot, that "i've been here/done this before" feeling. today i had it and then i realized that it was just the radio conspiring to make me think that i had just repeated monday.

they're doing this promo giving away a year's worth of gasoline--they see your license plate, they call you, you win, the usual crud. anyway yesterday on my way home i was interested and strangely uplifted to hear someone win this.

it didn't occur to me until today, when on my drive home i heard the same winner again, that it could be recorded.

everything else on the radio is recorded...so why not the winners?

as i waited at the turn signal, however, i had an internal argument. was this the same thing i heard yesterday? or was this actually something that just sounded that familiar? or had i actually heard it but just in a dream or something?

it sounded familiar because it sounded vaguely like my brother, and the guy used the words "dude" and "unbelieveable" and "you have no idea how much this means."

so the question becomes: of all the random shit that piles through my brain during the course of the day, why on earth do i remember this?

i have no idea.

***

anyway the fact of the matter is that every day is different, and every day is the same. the sun comes up, the sun goes down. i go to work, i come home. never-ending cycle. which is fine, because there are so many permutations that can occur that it makes every day different.

until you hear something on the radio and begin to question your sanity, ie, did i just repeat monday all over again, or is it actually tuesday now?

noise

when i was a kid, my parents really didn't curtail my reading habits. i read whatever i pleased, even if there were the unforseen consequences of misunderstanding that i probably couldn't be a leper at the age of 11 in wisconsin. (a gift of james michener's hawaii and an overactive imagination.)

at any rate, i never had much if any restriction on what i read. i was restricted in what i listened to, however, and whether or not i could go to concerts. everything was too late, too out of the norm--which amuses me now, as at the time the music of which i thought so highly was hair bands of the eighties. when my friends were sneaking out of windows to attend metal concerts, i was home, reading--my one escape.

of course as i got older i had the ability to go to live shows, when and where i pleased. in my first few years of college i didn't see much at all, as i was going to bemidji, but i discovered alice in chains, which changed my outlook on music completely.

dark, bleak, rolling over you with the strange melody of layne and jerry--it was auditory beauty.

***

being deaf, i guess i never questioned much the thought that i don't listen to a lot of music. the stuff that other people really enjoy--dave matthews, etc--sounds so bland to me. perhaps it's because of being deaf that i came to this "noise" as my parents would term it--it has to be loud enough and brash enough to snare my attention and keep it held.

who knows. all i know is that my first two tapes (yes, cassette tapes) were janet jackson's rhythm nation and heart's brigade--and janet got tossed aside soon thereafter.

***

one of my first concerts was type o negative--dark and dreary, but ever so crunchy. standing in that small venue, pressed up against so many people, sweating and feeling my very marrow quake, was almost the most relaxed i've ever been.

years afterward i learned about "toning," which is kind of an auditory massage therapy--different sounds and tones that have various affects on your body. it makes sense, if for no other reason that just as a therapist manipulates your muscles, the volume of music can move the fibers of your being--physically and mentally, i suppose.

anyway, last night we went and saw a band that was definitely "noise." had a few beers and felt old among the crowd of twenty-three year old kids who had a penchant for thinking they were goth...or at least costuming themselves as such. i remembered fondly my days of combat boots and dark clothing, the industrial feel of a carbiner filled with jangling keys. i'm generalizing here because i guess as you get older that's what you do, and how you become the old shit sitting on the porch, railing at "those kids" to get off your lawn.

today i have a stamp that is slowly bleeding ink in jagged lines on my hand. i remember how i longed for this twenty years ago--to be one of the cool kids, to sneak out and disobey--and how much better it feels, and how completely relaxed i can be, without the pleasure of guilty window panes, for having heard and felt all that noise.

corey

it's too many yesterdays to count
since you were here. it seems as if
you've just left--
especially these days
when celebration and mourning
wear the same dark mask. if i look at that scar,
the one i've worn for ten years
to this day
to this hour
to this very moment--
the tears well up hot and fresh, just
as they did then.

the grief i feel is small
compared to the one that i see,
when time slows long enough
for his own wounds to show. i believe
they go deeper
than he would ever admit,
even to you.

it all
continues,
despite our best efforts
to call out a halt, to savor, relish and sorrow.

the best we can do all these
yesterdays later
is remember, and in doing so
keep you
here.

***

i cannot miss him near so as much as dan does. april is always such a hard month, no matter what you do to prepare yourself for it. no matter how you celebrate a life missed, you still do that -- you miss it.

after corey died, dan's mom found a stash of his--puzzle pieces, ones that he would steal just before she finished a puzzle, so that the puzzle would never be finished. part of me feels as though he still has one piece with him, somewhere, and is probably grinning about it just now.

simplification, the long route

it's been quite some time since i posted again, which in reality doesn't mean too terribly much as i suppose i'm not posting for my adoring fans but mainly for my own writing needs.

which, sadly, have taken quite the backseat lately.

why, you may ask? because there are so many things going on! every weekend has been busy, every weekday long. in my heart of hearts i know how much i enjoy sitting down and allowing my fingers to play over the keyboard, listen to the tap tap tap of keys as the words appear before me. it's like watching a magic act, or someone playing the piano. i'm no houdini, and certainly no virtuoso with words, but i do so much enjoy the act of vowel creation.

it's basic and plain, and both of those items are close to my heart.

it seems like so many things are not basic or plain any longer. recently i needed a new phone -- mine had no range, anywhere, except for one square of the sofa, part of the stairway landing, and a corner of the upstairs bedroom...and anywhere outside of my own home. so i jumped online and found a phone.

generally speaking i'm reluctant at best to enter the world of electronics or vehicles. to put it mildly, i exist in a state of ever-present "i don't need a different one...mine works fine." but my car has not been working fine, and my phone's hijinx were annoying, to say the least.

(this horrid reluctance does NOT apply to purses or clothing or books, unfortunately...)

online i picked out what looked like a simple phone -- a shiny, satiny pink. it's actually quite easy to use, and it has a calendar in it, so that i can store events, which is completely fabulous when you consider that for that last how many years, despite the advent of palm pilots and i-phones and the myriad other personal oranizers, i've still relied on my little paper day planner. works great provided you have a pen handy--which usually i do not.

thus when i realized what my phone was able to do, i tossed the planner.

there was hesitation, of course, because my heels were dug into the "this is good enough for me" mentality. why shouldn't my found-in-the-dollar-store planner not stay in my purse, taking up residence among my mango-flavored chapstick, my mp3 player, the wad of keychain and keys that only actually has 3 keys on it, a package of kleenex and some burt's bees hand salve. it was good enough for last year; what has changed?

it seemed so strange to replace something so basic with this sparkling pink device, which was only a third of the size of the planner itself--something that could store all of the days of the year AND notes AND phone numbers in one compact place. replacing the simple with something more elaborate--and yet that in and of itself simplified my life some.

at any rate, my simplified organizer is indicating that it's high time i get to the DMV and renew my license.

and as long as i'm at it, perhaps look at a different car. or mule. your choice.

online cat dating: tips and hints

henry's been mopey lately, if a cat can be mopey. he and shiva were never the best of friends, but he keeps looking for her, watching the stairs as if she'll come down, and has become completely obsessed--to the point of self-mutilation--with the end of his tail.

dan and i have done everything we could think of to get him involved with toys and away from the tail, but it's been a losing battle. the other day i realized that a series of spots on the wall was actually blood spatter. it would have made "dexter" proud--little action dots and dashes that soaked in and will not come out without a coat of paint. i felt a little like i was covering up a crime scene when i broke out the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser--but even Mr. Clean cannot take on blood, i learned.

either way, i came to the conclusion that we needed another wee beast in the household. we considered a dog, but at this time of year, with my hours, it would be all on dan, and that did not seem fair to me. also i have to admit i was a bit nervous about him bonding with the theoretical dog whilst i crunched numbers at work.

so it came to a cat. that said, we wanted to adopt a cat around henry's age. he's not a small animal, and needs a companion who is roughly the same size. i looked on petfinder and saw a ton of eight-week-old kittens, and a variety of cats who were quite elderly, and a lot of special needs.

i know my limits.

instead i turned to craigslist.

i know, i know. there was that horrible incident in the good ol' state of mn itself involving a homicide and craigslist. i figured if i stuck to pets i would be safe.

for a few weeks now i've cruised the pet info. first i looked at dogs--but after deciding against a dog, i started surveying the feline choices. there were quite a few, but most of them were either the aforementioned kittens, or a pair of cats who "would prefer not to be separated."

on thursday i saw a post for an orange tabby. the picture reminded me of henry--orange spots on a white cat--and i thought, why not. emailed and today we are now proudly owned by a timid tabby whose name is skitters.

i'm not sure i can live with that moniker, but it remains to be seen what she'd like her name to be.

she's bigger than henry, but just as much a silly cat--terrified of the ceiling fan, even when it's not on.

she wants to meet henry quite badly; henry, for his part, is huddled under our bed, probably wondering why we're putting him through this hell.

either way, he's not chewing on his tail, and i'm hoping that, given his past interest in shiva, and skitters' current interest in him, he'll come around eventually and they will be able to keep one another company.

in whatever way cats do.

rock, meet hard place.

i hate this time of year. not for any of the usual reasons--the cloying muzak about christmas trees, the glittery tinsel that gives me a headache, the ubiquitous travel during a season meant for staying put.

no, i hate this time of year because of where i work.

this year, for some reason, i'm having a much harder time with it than i did last year. perhaps last year it was just the newness of being back in the same position where i started, or the fact that i was on different drugs, or age, or any thousand things.

when i lived up north my days were busy too--but not this sapping, please-god-be-merciful exhaustion that sets in after 10 hours spent trying to help Very Angry People without any support other than from my bra.

this year i have run into the proverbial wall. i'm tired but too stressed to sleep, i feel like i'm getting sick but cannot quite get truly sick, i want to curl up on the sofa and do Nothing, since my days are so full of Something that i cannot keep up.

there's a ton of snow outside for the first time in years, and i have not played in it once. i haven't gone hiking, haven't done anything. perhaps it scares me--if i go out and enjoy myself and recharge, all that recharge will just be squandered on getting up tomorrow morning and heading back to work. by tomorrow night i will be the same husk of a person that i am this morning.

i feel bland and uninteresting--and i know the only way to change that is via action. the mountain will not come to mohammed, etc.

i know these things--logically, i know them all the time--so why is it so difficult to make waves in my own life, when the ocean does so with ease?