It was cold like the first teasing breaths of autumn from far away north, carried across the lakes by a canadian wind. I was completely distracted from the pain of mosquito puncturing flesh by the delicious smell of acrid leaves, and apples that were left to fall to the ground. Nature in transition.
He called me and told me that the man flagged him down. That he told him the story of hitting a deer (it was a fawn and still had its spots) and stopping there, on the roadway, to see if it was dead. He said the man told him that it was still twitching, so he went to his car, retrieved a sledge hammer, and caved in its brain. And me trying to imagine the look on his face while all of this was being relayed. He is not one who much disturbs, and he was. Disturbed. So I snaked my way east and plain as day in the middle of the road, a pool of blood, drag marks, and a fawn with spotted downy fluff lay on the treelawn with its head stove in. Who does that?
And before that, the confrontation. Life is such a stupid, fickle, short thing. He tried to explain himself to me, lies and contradictions and flat out bullshit while I nodded and said whatever. I am a bitch, I thought. But I couldn't amend my lack of desire to fix things. He looked at me with his beady eyes and stupid hair cut and I thought of the chapter in my life that was Evergreen, and circular logic, and trying to understand MacIntyre. And none of it helped, so I told him whatever and that in two days it wouldn't mean anything anyway, and I drove on.
And the second thought was that I am wasting my life.
My heart is heavy.
It feels like the chaotic energy in the sky before a big storm and I find myself wishing to get swept up. I spent half of the Jeep ride home with my head back, looking up at the clouds and how fast they were moving. That I could see the stars and the blackness of the night in the gaps of fluffy cumulus. I thought about nights on the deck and cigarettes and how long it has been since I got drunk and solved the world's problems and just, plain, waxed poetic. How long it has been since I forgot (or didn't care) that I am an adult.
The juniper berries are sour on my tongue, to match the quinine's bitterness, but, no catharsis.
22.8.11
25.7.11
Auf Wiedersehen
Hot humid sun perched in the apex of the blistering sky, it made the long black end of the asphalt look like gin settling to the bottom of the glass, a thick syrupy bitter swirl. He spoke to me while we reconnected and my eyes focused on the few stray hairs his razor missed on his neck this morning. And the faint smell of his aftershave. It has been a long, long, time since I was the girl that he knew. Our tribe disbanded - not that we wanted what fate wanted - but we went gently like dust across a late summer prairie nonetheless. John asked me to come shoot with them one midnight shift, after I had been laid off, and in his omnipotent almost cocky way he told me you never know where we will be in a year.
He killed a man, not two months later. As I took the phone call from a lonely hotel room in Nevada. And I think about that view, sometimes. The sprawling effluent of our society in its decline. Neon cowboys and all. That moment of the three of us in the dank and wonderful range, encased like an orb of amber, for always.
That is how death should be, whether it is of a man or an identity or a memory or a love. Let the bones be laid to bleach under the furnace of a thousand suns, let the pieces that remain be cleansed in fire.
The few stray hairs on his neck made all of those memories come violently back. And how when he speaks to me I stand with my back to my new tribe, but can still feel their heat on my calves, my shoulder blades. I am not that girl anymore.
We got engaged and we will be married in September. For the first time in my life I am not afraid of changing my name, I don't feel like the loss of it will be a priceless sacrifice on my part. His father was George, as was my grandfather, and it makes me grateful to think that his name will be given to me and that I can do right by it. As simple of a desire as that is. A year and a half later and there is still that wild stir within me when he comes home, when I hear his voice. When I see the flecks of brown buried deep within his blue eyes and wonder if George is happy for his son, if he approves.
I got a text one night, several months back, it may have even been last year. From the phone of the man with the stray and rebellious neck hair. And I did not remember it until we were gathered under that oppressive sun seeking shelter in the memories of a time that we will never be able to get back to, bittersweet and just, simply, gone. He said would you like to talk to me, and, I, thought, I would put her on the phone, but I don't know where she's gone to.
He killed a man, not two months later. As I took the phone call from a lonely hotel room in Nevada. And I think about that view, sometimes. The sprawling effluent of our society in its decline. Neon cowboys and all. That moment of the three of us in the dank and wonderful range, encased like an orb of amber, for always.
That is how death should be, whether it is of a man or an identity or a memory or a love. Let the bones be laid to bleach under the furnace of a thousand suns, let the pieces that remain be cleansed in fire.
The few stray hairs on his neck made all of those memories come violently back. And how when he speaks to me I stand with my back to my new tribe, but can still feel their heat on my calves, my shoulder blades. I am not that girl anymore.
We got engaged and we will be married in September. For the first time in my life I am not afraid of changing my name, I don't feel like the loss of it will be a priceless sacrifice on my part. His father was George, as was my grandfather, and it makes me grateful to think that his name will be given to me and that I can do right by it. As simple of a desire as that is. A year and a half later and there is still that wild stir within me when he comes home, when I hear his voice. When I see the flecks of brown buried deep within his blue eyes and wonder if George is happy for his son, if he approves.
I got a text one night, several months back, it may have even been last year. From the phone of the man with the stray and rebellious neck hair. And I did not remember it until we were gathered under that oppressive sun seeking shelter in the memories of a time that we will never be able to get back to, bittersweet and just, simply, gone. He said would you like to talk to me, and, I, thought, I would put her on the phone, but I don't know where she's gone to.
21.2.11
Last Call
Last call, or so I thought, on a long and meandering shift. Monotonous day, in the middle of a number of monotonous days. We had made plans for when I got home and all I could think about was the bed he was warming and his hands on my body, as I turned in a U and snaked back to the address that, I knew, would keep me from all of that. DOA. I didn’t know what to expect when they came to the door because, as has become custom, radio left out several important details as it dispatched me to where I was needed.
There were three of them that let me inside and led me to the back bedroom. They were all crying, and had been crying - eyes red and the skin underneath puffy, and tired. He was laying at an angle across their bed, and his mother crawled in beside him and wrapped her arm around his neck, his face. His skin was waxy, and was the most striking color of yellow that I had ever seen on a body. The first glance startled me, the strangeness of it – so much that I told myself to not let them see me react, lest they be offended. Their loved one, their rock, now departed, absence hanging heavy in the room like cigarette smoke that lingers, hours later. I went through all the procedures in the kitchen while E stood off in the breakfast nook, out of sight, trying to make me laugh. God, we are sick, we are so sick, I thought as I bit down hard on a smile. An hour later and I was the only one, with the three, waiting for the boatman to come and ferry him across the river. We talked about life, and what it was to be a woman with so many men, and how you never know, you just never know. Life is so fickle, and fleeting. When I left they gave me hugs and said they were glad they got me, and I stammered out a few awkward goodbye’s and pointed my cruiser west, to begin the process of going home. His face, and the smell, traveling with me as I drove.
I was on station, inefficiently rushing through my paperwork when the next call came. It was an hour and a half past the time I should have been in that warm bed. But when he said over the radio that a train conductor reported hitting a man, I knew that I was going. There were only two others on the road and they were at the front of the train, talking to the engineers. So I parked where they guessed the point of impact to be, and started walking east in the pitch blackness. It was slow-going, scrambling over the loose-pack of the lava rock that lined the track. My flashlight made moon-shaped orbs of light under the train as I worked my way toward the engine. The woods were deeper as I got farther from the crossing, and the embankment steeper. It was dark, and cold, and windy, and lonely as hell, and I thought to myself this is fucking creepy, as I looked for any sign of death, in the isolated blackness. And then. The orb of light from my flashlight fell upon a red and shining piece of evidence not ten feet ahead, and then I saw the hat he had been wearing, and more pieces of a life that had ended so abruptly. His body twisted and mangled and stuck up under the train, his wallet laying perfectly between two cars, several feet from the carnage. And just all the detritus. The detective came, and the railroad police were there, and the train masters, and we all pretended to know what the procedure for this should be and we went through the motions. Finally after documenting and photographing, the wallet was removed, and opened, and damn if I didn’t know the face on the driver’s license. Damn if it had not been just two weeks since the last time I talked to him. And I looked back at what was left and it was not a picture that I could understand.
I left then, hours later, tired and freezing and drained. When I got home I lay on top of the covers for awhile, just holding him. Just letting his warmth soak into me. I tried to wash it all off in a long, hot shower, I tried to scrub my mind of the images. I crawled in bed and put my arms around him and held him while he slept and I stayed awake. He had a nightmare, and I told him it was okay, that I was there, and he held my hand and went back to sleep. And I thought, I would be like that mother, and I would crawl in next to him too, if he were cold, and I would not be able to let go. Not ever. And I did not want those thoughts in my head, not there, not when I didn’t have on my uniform, or my gun. Because I didn’t think I would be able to flip the switch if I didn’t have those things. That I would be too human, and vulnerable.
The next day they wanted the stories, and the gore, and it made me mad. But I knew I would want to know the same things, if I had not been there.
And then. I was sent to a car crash and when I got there, the SUV was on its side, pitched up in a steep front yard, with its ass end clinging to stability at the end of a utility pole. The driver inside seated where the passenger door should be, me and some passersby trying to keep everything in a precarious balance while the FD was enroute. The man inside began to complain that he was getting rained on, and I could not believe, that as he sat there in someone’s front yard, safety glass all over him, unable to get out of his car, his complaint was that he was getting wet. I was soaked and freezing, and I let him in on my incredulity at his whining. When they cut him out and got him strapped down on the stretcher, the smell of booze filled the entire scene and clung low in the damp, cold air. I knew that I would be following the ambulance back to the hospital. And so I did, and the nurses seemed pissed that they had to deal with his belligerent rambling, as if it was my fault for bringing him there. And I played with him, and he did not understand, and he laughed, and then the hospital staff joined in and we tried to make the whole thing better by making him an ass.
After babysitting him for an hour or so, I was parked at the side door of the station getting my paperwork together, when another city called out a possible drunk driver who had fled the scene of an accident. For a second I sat there, in my running car, thinking, he will not pass through my zone, but he will come through the city. I have so much work to do already, I should just go inside and get started. And then the next second my car was in gear, headed west to where I knew the suspect car would be. And it passed me as I pulled up to the intersection, and I got behind it, and like I was just acting a part I called it out, turned on my lights and sirens, as five or so others caught up and did likewise. The driver did not stop and we went on a slow and icy and anti-climactic pursuit until he finally realized the futility of trying to make it home. That we would follow him there, too. I got soaked again, as we tested him, and he kept asking me can you please close the window to my corvette and I wondered what the fuck is wrong with people. He told me that he didn’t see or hear me, or the five other cop cars behind him, and that was why he didn’t stop. The other city took him, and I went back to my paperwork, and to dry off.
Then, then. Radio called the two other cars, but one of them didn’t listen, and there was no way I could let the one who did acknowledge the call go alone. I knew the house, and when it came out as an unresponsive female, I knew it was going to be her, and that she would be on God only knows what. My partner got there first because I followed the ambulance from station, and they do not go faster than the speed limit. I cussed at them the whole way there. Inside the front door, I could see E on the floor trying to revive the girl, and the grandma approached me and said “there’s one more”. In the house? Another one in the house? Where?? I took a firefighter with me up the stairs, and there he was, in the landing. Jeans around his ankles, dick hanging out of his underwear, t-shirt sweat soaked and drooling on himself. Unconscious. He reared up like a zombie when I knuckle rubbed his sternum and the firefighter and I went about our tasks. A few minutes later and that third car had still not responded, and I could hear the girl downstairs screaming and giving E a battle. The firefighter looked at me and I said, “you just let me know if you need me back up here. Give a yell and I will be right back.” The girl had come back to life and she was pissed at the world for it. We had to hold her down and then strap her down to the cot, and still she got out of the restraints, so that I had to ride in the back of the ambulance all the way to the hospital, holding her down. She looked at me and she kept saying, “I know you, I know you,” with her thick tongue and her pupils as wide as saucers. Again, the hospital was not happy to see me, especially when I told them that my partner was on his way with the male half, and that he was likely to be just as mad when he came around. But it was an hour past the time I should have been at home, and I didn’t care anymore about their lack of desire to do their jobs. E showed up and the male had indeed come around, and he was foaming at the mouth, and was just utterly disgusting, telling us that his life was fucked up and that he couldn’t read or write. And look at you, you are cops, you did something with your life, and I won’t do anything with my life I can’t read or write. Life already over at 23. And I wondered why in the hell do people drink, or get high, if this is how it ends up. Foaming at the mouth tied down to a hospital bed with your dick hanging out.
They were sedated, and another officer came to get us, and we went back to station, and out of our gear, and home. He was asleep, but had left the bottle of Irish Whiskey and a shot glass out for me (to help combat the cold). I poked my head in the bedroom before I got into the shower and he was sound asleep, with the light on my nightstand left on for me. My God, I am so lucky. And life is so short. And precious. And please, Lord, let me not live with this regret in my heart. Help us to fix what is broken while there is still time. Please fill her heart with love, Lord, and find a way to forgive me and let us move on. After the very long shower I crawled in beside him, and he turned over and his big, strong arms surrounded me and I closed my eyes, and I slept and I did not dream.
There were three of them that let me inside and led me to the back bedroom. They were all crying, and had been crying - eyes red and the skin underneath puffy, and tired. He was laying at an angle across their bed, and his mother crawled in beside him and wrapped her arm around his neck, his face. His skin was waxy, and was the most striking color of yellow that I had ever seen on a body. The first glance startled me, the strangeness of it – so much that I told myself to not let them see me react, lest they be offended. Their loved one, their rock, now departed, absence hanging heavy in the room like cigarette smoke that lingers, hours later. I went through all the procedures in the kitchen while E stood off in the breakfast nook, out of sight, trying to make me laugh. God, we are sick, we are so sick, I thought as I bit down hard on a smile. An hour later and I was the only one, with the three, waiting for the boatman to come and ferry him across the river. We talked about life, and what it was to be a woman with so many men, and how you never know, you just never know. Life is so fickle, and fleeting. When I left they gave me hugs and said they were glad they got me, and I stammered out a few awkward goodbye’s and pointed my cruiser west, to begin the process of going home. His face, and the smell, traveling with me as I drove.
I was on station, inefficiently rushing through my paperwork when the next call came. It was an hour and a half past the time I should have been in that warm bed. But when he said over the radio that a train conductor reported hitting a man, I knew that I was going. There were only two others on the road and they were at the front of the train, talking to the engineers. So I parked where they guessed the point of impact to be, and started walking east in the pitch blackness. It was slow-going, scrambling over the loose-pack of the lava rock that lined the track. My flashlight made moon-shaped orbs of light under the train as I worked my way toward the engine. The woods were deeper as I got farther from the crossing, and the embankment steeper. It was dark, and cold, and windy, and lonely as hell, and I thought to myself this is fucking creepy, as I looked for any sign of death, in the isolated blackness. And then. The orb of light from my flashlight fell upon a red and shining piece of evidence not ten feet ahead, and then I saw the hat he had been wearing, and more pieces of a life that had ended so abruptly. His body twisted and mangled and stuck up under the train, his wallet laying perfectly between two cars, several feet from the carnage. And just all the detritus. The detective came, and the railroad police were there, and the train masters, and we all pretended to know what the procedure for this should be and we went through the motions. Finally after documenting and photographing, the wallet was removed, and opened, and damn if I didn’t know the face on the driver’s license. Damn if it had not been just two weeks since the last time I talked to him. And I looked back at what was left and it was not a picture that I could understand.
I left then, hours later, tired and freezing and drained. When I got home I lay on top of the covers for awhile, just holding him. Just letting his warmth soak into me. I tried to wash it all off in a long, hot shower, I tried to scrub my mind of the images. I crawled in bed and put my arms around him and held him while he slept and I stayed awake. He had a nightmare, and I told him it was okay, that I was there, and he held my hand and went back to sleep. And I thought, I would be like that mother, and I would crawl in next to him too, if he were cold, and I would not be able to let go. Not ever. And I did not want those thoughts in my head, not there, not when I didn’t have on my uniform, or my gun. Because I didn’t think I would be able to flip the switch if I didn’t have those things. That I would be too human, and vulnerable.
The next day they wanted the stories, and the gore, and it made me mad. But I knew I would want to know the same things, if I had not been there.
And then. I was sent to a car crash and when I got there, the SUV was on its side, pitched up in a steep front yard, with its ass end clinging to stability at the end of a utility pole. The driver inside seated where the passenger door should be, me and some passersby trying to keep everything in a precarious balance while the FD was enroute. The man inside began to complain that he was getting rained on, and I could not believe, that as he sat there in someone’s front yard, safety glass all over him, unable to get out of his car, his complaint was that he was getting wet. I was soaked and freezing, and I let him in on my incredulity at his whining. When they cut him out and got him strapped down on the stretcher, the smell of booze filled the entire scene and clung low in the damp, cold air. I knew that I would be following the ambulance back to the hospital. And so I did, and the nurses seemed pissed that they had to deal with his belligerent rambling, as if it was my fault for bringing him there. And I played with him, and he did not understand, and he laughed, and then the hospital staff joined in and we tried to make the whole thing better by making him an ass.
After babysitting him for an hour or so, I was parked at the side door of the station getting my paperwork together, when another city called out a possible drunk driver who had fled the scene of an accident. For a second I sat there, in my running car, thinking, he will not pass through my zone, but he will come through the city. I have so much work to do already, I should just go inside and get started. And then the next second my car was in gear, headed west to where I knew the suspect car would be. And it passed me as I pulled up to the intersection, and I got behind it, and like I was just acting a part I called it out, turned on my lights and sirens, as five or so others caught up and did likewise. The driver did not stop and we went on a slow and icy and anti-climactic pursuit until he finally realized the futility of trying to make it home. That we would follow him there, too. I got soaked again, as we tested him, and he kept asking me can you please close the window to my corvette and I wondered what the fuck is wrong with people. He told me that he didn’t see or hear me, or the five other cop cars behind him, and that was why he didn’t stop. The other city took him, and I went back to my paperwork, and to dry off.
Then, then. Radio called the two other cars, but one of them didn’t listen, and there was no way I could let the one who did acknowledge the call go alone. I knew the house, and when it came out as an unresponsive female, I knew it was going to be her, and that she would be on God only knows what. My partner got there first because I followed the ambulance from station, and they do not go faster than the speed limit. I cussed at them the whole way there. Inside the front door, I could see E on the floor trying to revive the girl, and the grandma approached me and said “there’s one more”. In the house? Another one in the house? Where?? I took a firefighter with me up the stairs, and there he was, in the landing. Jeans around his ankles, dick hanging out of his underwear, t-shirt sweat soaked and drooling on himself. Unconscious. He reared up like a zombie when I knuckle rubbed his sternum and the firefighter and I went about our tasks. A few minutes later and that third car had still not responded, and I could hear the girl downstairs screaming and giving E a battle. The firefighter looked at me and I said, “you just let me know if you need me back up here. Give a yell and I will be right back.” The girl had come back to life and she was pissed at the world for it. We had to hold her down and then strap her down to the cot, and still she got out of the restraints, so that I had to ride in the back of the ambulance all the way to the hospital, holding her down. She looked at me and she kept saying, “I know you, I know you,” with her thick tongue and her pupils as wide as saucers. Again, the hospital was not happy to see me, especially when I told them that my partner was on his way with the male half, and that he was likely to be just as mad when he came around. But it was an hour past the time I should have been at home, and I didn’t care anymore about their lack of desire to do their jobs. E showed up and the male had indeed come around, and he was foaming at the mouth, and was just utterly disgusting, telling us that his life was fucked up and that he couldn’t read or write. And look at you, you are cops, you did something with your life, and I won’t do anything with my life I can’t read or write. Life already over at 23. And I wondered why in the hell do people drink, or get high, if this is how it ends up. Foaming at the mouth tied down to a hospital bed with your dick hanging out.
They were sedated, and another officer came to get us, and we went back to station, and out of our gear, and home. He was asleep, but had left the bottle of Irish Whiskey and a shot glass out for me (to help combat the cold). I poked my head in the bedroom before I got into the shower and he was sound asleep, with the light on my nightstand left on for me. My God, I am so lucky. And life is so short. And precious. And please, Lord, let me not live with this regret in my heart. Help us to fix what is broken while there is still time. Please fill her heart with love, Lord, and find a way to forgive me and let us move on. After the very long shower I crawled in beside him, and he turned over and his big, strong arms surrounded me and I closed my eyes, and I slept and I did not dream.
29.10.10
King to my Queen
The chords and harmonies come pressing in like rich color, warm textures thick on the tongue, when I am this exhausted. Sleep comes to test me in the deep, dark blackness of 4am and laughs in my face when I call her name in the late morning.
It was a picture-perfect day for shooting; crisp blue autumn sky smell of leaves rotting and of apples and pumpkins and long sleeves. I used the small aperture because I hate how sloppy the larger one feels. It leaves too much open to interpretation. I pulled the magazine in towards the soft hollow of my breathing and pressed my cheek and nose into the far end of stock and receiver. And I remembered. This image of the clown wig and another chilly day on the range and the explanation for why the nose, of all things, would take the brunt of the (slight) recoil. And of holding hands in the predawn, and the bitter cold, always the cold, and how speechless I could become in the face of my own stupidity.
And again the soft hollow of my breathing and the little clumps of dirt that exploded two hundred feet down range. That I can manipulate the inanimate mechanical so much more accurately than the fleshy ephemeral (and how that is an extravagant lie).
I saw one of our number last night, backing us up on a dark, cold stretch of midnight road. And it was not the same. The skeletons are all still here, but the brotherhood disbanded. And I wondered how things felt for him, and if he was patrolling a foreign land reminiscing, too. The lack of sleep will make the mind wander.
I am in love with the greatest man that I have ever known. And he sends me flowers for no reason, holds the car door for me, tells me that I am his missing piece, and gives me the most beautiful smile whenever our eyes meet. And I, I tell him that I am the luckiest person in the history of people because he loves me back, but he refuses to believe me. He says we will still be arguing about who is luckier when we are old, and gray, and wrinkled, and racing our walkers down the hallways of our nursing home. (I told him I would cheat, and lock up the brakes on his so that I would win, once and for all.)
I want you to be this happy, too.
It was a picture-perfect day for shooting; crisp blue autumn sky smell of leaves rotting and of apples and pumpkins and long sleeves. I used the small aperture because I hate how sloppy the larger one feels. It leaves too much open to interpretation. I pulled the magazine in towards the soft hollow of my breathing and pressed my cheek and nose into the far end of stock and receiver. And I remembered. This image of the clown wig and another chilly day on the range and the explanation for why the nose, of all things, would take the brunt of the (slight) recoil. And of holding hands in the predawn, and the bitter cold, always the cold, and how speechless I could become in the face of my own stupidity.
And again the soft hollow of my breathing and the little clumps of dirt that exploded two hundred feet down range. That I can manipulate the inanimate mechanical so much more accurately than the fleshy ephemeral (and how that is an extravagant lie).
I saw one of our number last night, backing us up on a dark, cold stretch of midnight road. And it was not the same. The skeletons are all still here, but the brotherhood disbanded. And I wondered how things felt for him, and if he was patrolling a foreign land reminiscing, too. The lack of sleep will make the mind wander.
I am in love with the greatest man that I have ever known. And he sends me flowers for no reason, holds the car door for me, tells me that I am his missing piece, and gives me the most beautiful smile whenever our eyes meet. And I, I tell him that I am the luckiest person in the history of people because he loves me back, but he refuses to believe me. He says we will still be arguing about who is luckier when we are old, and gray, and wrinkled, and racing our walkers down the hallways of our nursing home. (I told him I would cheat, and lock up the brakes on his so that I would win, once and for all.)
I want you to be this happy, too.
31.8.10
Before Work
Ripe earthy smell of tilled fields and late, heavy summer around the neck, and collar bone, and corner of the mouth that I breathed it deep into me when we kissed. The corners of his eyes still look like the little boy squinting in the picture, dearly departed father standing by, still life of dusty county fair. Showing livestock, the flies and the heat and the sour barn smell and the sadness of a future we can neither forestall nor predict.
His arm around my neck, hand on back pulling me in, close, tight, lest some north wind come and take me, too. A moment, suspended, my hand on his chest with his heart beating, and his breath in my ear. I love you. I just wanted you to know.
His arm around my neck, hand on back pulling me in, close, tight, lest some north wind come and take me, too. A moment, suspended, my hand on his chest with his heart beating, and his breath in my ear. I love you. I just wanted you to know.
22.8.10
The first pitch theory.
I sink my head into my chest as I pass cars in traffic on my way into work to see all the way inside and to practice at reading the souls of the drivers, and the passengers, wherever they may be carried. A flip that I cannot switch off. On-coming headlights are blinding, and the streetlights obscure everything. I find myself muttering a soft and selfish prayer for perfect pitch darkness as I snake my way north.
Frustration mounts. Everyone lost everything in the trade and my mind turns back to a cold and late winter evening, at the side door to J.C.Penney and how he said as a save-all, yeah, but we have a four year call back, you'll get your job back. And how all I could do was laugh. And just drive away. And plan for a future without them. And now, they, in my radio and echoing in the hollow spaces of my heart, sound fractured and broken.
A few calls last night and it was just the two of us, and in the rain and dank humid night air of almost September rotting leaves already and rose blooms still hanging on in the dampness I surprised myself at the remembering that we had started on the exact same day. The advice I parcel out in incredulous doses; I would keep him under my wing but I would not enjoy it. The 93 year old father of the 58 year old naked-and-walking-around-the-streets dementia patient told me they were the last of the mohicans, and damn if that was not the most sensible thing anyone said to me all night. And that I knew exactly how that felt.
It started out so simply. I had been trying to come in for the better part of two hours but kept getting called away to pick up his slack. To perform the function that no one else wanted. Finally, a pause, and I closed the distance from one traffic light to the last one when I saw the brake lights of the car ahead as it went through the green light. And then release. And the moment of suspended breath when I thought to myself, well, well, well, will I. Do I ever even really have the choice, would I want it? A mile down the road and its driver was in handcuffs and me wondering how things happen, and the reasons for them. If I hadn't stopped and done this and that and then and after and five million different ways you can try to change the course of the night but in the end the sun rises, you begin the journey westward, and you have done what you have done and there is no need to think too hard about the how or the why. You are just happy to have been a vessel that night, and to have been moved by a hand greater than your own. For one tiny moment in a tiny life in a tiny town on a tiny planet to have felt God move through you.
(But you can't help and over think it anyway. As you drift off into a fitful sleep.)
There is no place to put the frustration, so you offer it up with your nightly prayer. Help me cast away this burden and give myself over completely. If nothing else, let them at least be proud to have me.
Amen.
And in the most crushing darkness just before the dawn as I drove directionless to metabolize the coming early morning, in the street stood five very large bucks, antlers covered in fur, eyes glowing from the light of my headlights. And in the middle of the empty street we all stood, regarding each other. And then, went on our ways.
Frustration mounts. Everyone lost everything in the trade and my mind turns back to a cold and late winter evening, at the side door to J.C.Penney and how he said as a save-all, yeah, but we have a four year call back, you'll get your job back. And how all I could do was laugh. And just drive away. And plan for a future without them. And now, they, in my radio and echoing in the hollow spaces of my heart, sound fractured and broken.
A few calls last night and it was just the two of us, and in the rain and dank humid night air of almost September rotting leaves already and rose blooms still hanging on in the dampness I surprised myself at the remembering that we had started on the exact same day. The advice I parcel out in incredulous doses; I would keep him under my wing but I would not enjoy it. The 93 year old father of the 58 year old naked-and-walking-around-the-streets dementia patient told me they were the last of the mohicans, and damn if that was not the most sensible thing anyone said to me all night. And that I knew exactly how that felt.
It started out so simply. I had been trying to come in for the better part of two hours but kept getting called away to pick up his slack. To perform the function that no one else wanted. Finally, a pause, and I closed the distance from one traffic light to the last one when I saw the brake lights of the car ahead as it went through the green light. And then release. And the moment of suspended breath when I thought to myself, well, well, well, will I. Do I ever even really have the choice, would I want it? A mile down the road and its driver was in handcuffs and me wondering how things happen, and the reasons for them. If I hadn't stopped and done this and that and then and after and five million different ways you can try to change the course of the night but in the end the sun rises, you begin the journey westward, and you have done what you have done and there is no need to think too hard about the how or the why. You are just happy to have been a vessel that night, and to have been moved by a hand greater than your own. For one tiny moment in a tiny life in a tiny town on a tiny planet to have felt God move through you.
(But you can't help and over think it anyway. As you drift off into a fitful sleep.)
There is no place to put the frustration, so you offer it up with your nightly prayer. Help me cast away this burden and give myself over completely. If nothing else, let them at least be proud to have me.
Amen.
And in the most crushing darkness just before the dawn as I drove directionless to metabolize the coming early morning, in the street stood five very large bucks, antlers covered in fur, eyes glowing from the light of my headlights. And in the middle of the empty street we all stood, regarding each other. And then, went on our ways.
18.8.10
My same
The strange lava-rock and tar soaked logs along the railroad track and how the pitch of the lumber smells ten times more fragrant in the sticky, humid midnight air. Acrid smell in your nostrils reminds you of the playground by the depot when you were small, and your Grandfather, dearly departed. And E and how she got stung, and the taste of a water-logged paper towel that you sucked on their back patio in the sweltering heat of summer. Walking on the lava-rocks, now, to avoid the train track. A subconscious acknowledgment of the ludicrous fear that every track had the potentiality for electric charge.
Later as we walked back to our cruisers along the sidewalk we talked about old times when I saw the drunk's blue and white stripes stretched out in a random front yard and grabbed ET's elbow and his surprise and that he would have just walked on by. That he would not have noticed, though the man lay before us, prostrate. That he lay before us on a stretch of road where I had saved an illiterate cabbie's life and seriously contemplated my own mortality and given over my desire to understand the path I had been set upon in three different nights of working, that he lay before us in such a way and on such a night and with my old shift listening...
That when I cleared, later, much later, and pulled out of the driveway it made me question my ability to be St. Micheal's vessel, when. When I had my turn signal pointing west and a car went through the intersection and my lizard brain turned the headlights east and. With a deep breath, well, let's see, let's see.
And as the sun crested the eastern part of the lake my drunk driver shook my hand and said thank you as his girlfriend's mother smiled and tucked him away into her car. And that he was a good egg, she said. A good boy for her daughter. My headlights agreed with me, finally, as we wound our way east, and then north, and to the beach to watch the sun take off her nightgown and light the world ablaze, the worst part of the shift but somehow the most prescient.
And it is lonely. It is certainly that. And sometimes I wonder if the OVI arrests are all a ruse and what I am looking for is the isolation, and the loneliness, and the introspection, and. And.
My darling, my darling, he used to say that. And now it is like the smell of leaves in Autumn, beautiful but so ephemeral that it breaks your heart. The more you try to contain it the more it evades.
And, now. The reverence of predawn, eclipsed by that prima donna sun, but the good morning and how was your night and I missed you and I wish you were here eclipses everything, and there is only the sunrise, and the goosebumps, and the desire, and the nearness of something you never in five million years knew that you deserved.
And how much I love you.
Later as we walked back to our cruisers along the sidewalk we talked about old times when I saw the drunk's blue and white stripes stretched out in a random front yard and grabbed ET's elbow and his surprise and that he would have just walked on by. That he would not have noticed, though the man lay before us, prostrate. That he lay before us on a stretch of road where I had saved an illiterate cabbie's life and seriously contemplated my own mortality and given over my desire to understand the path I had been set upon in three different nights of working, that he lay before us in such a way and on such a night and with my old shift listening...
That when I cleared, later, much later, and pulled out of the driveway it made me question my ability to be St. Micheal's vessel, when. When I had my turn signal pointing west and a car went through the intersection and my lizard brain turned the headlights east and. With a deep breath, well, let's see, let's see.
And as the sun crested the eastern part of the lake my drunk driver shook my hand and said thank you as his girlfriend's mother smiled and tucked him away into her car. And that he was a good egg, she said. A good boy for her daughter. My headlights agreed with me, finally, as we wound our way east, and then north, and to the beach to watch the sun take off her nightgown and light the world ablaze, the worst part of the shift but somehow the most prescient.
And it is lonely. It is certainly that. And sometimes I wonder if the OVI arrests are all a ruse and what I am looking for is the isolation, and the loneliness, and the introspection, and. And.
My darling, my darling, he used to say that. And now it is like the smell of leaves in Autumn, beautiful but so ephemeral that it breaks your heart. The more you try to contain it the more it evades.
And, now. The reverence of predawn, eclipsed by that prima donna sun, but the good morning and how was your night and I missed you and I wish you were here eclipses everything, and there is only the sunrise, and the goosebumps, and the desire, and the nearness of something you never in five million years knew that you deserved.
And how much I love you.
28.7.10
The Grand Inquisitor
Nighttime in the dark parking lot, blackness of the heavy humid sky swallowing up the push-bumpers on the car and her fighting the sobbing on the other end of the phone. And that there was nothing I could do but quietly rage and swallow back the bile that was rising in my throat. I imagined his androgynous frame and stupid slack-jawed stories that I endured but never listened to and what the squirrel's head looked like in the shoebox, after. The two visions winding themselves around each other and the passing thought that perhaps it signified how I was utterly broken inside, desensitized to some things, corners of the heart filled with hate. And the immediate dismissal and then sinking back down into that image of broken, fragmented skull and viscera and brain and the stupid smile.
All I could think to offer was the only form of strength I knew, and that was sequestering ourselves away in the Ford on a midnight stretch of road and to put of why and to just exist as a function. The prayer I say to St. Michael to guide my mind and eyes and hands and feet and to just let me be worthy of having your mission pass through me for the next eight hours.
And I may have decided that these long, dark, lonely tours are the best way to heal. From anything.
Later, days later, the oppressive sun and lake and the late night heat and that I had no place to go, that there had been no plan made, and how my mind took that and plotted it on a chart somewhere, in the recesses. Middle of the day fluorescent lit bathroom, my escape, and she kept me company while the eyes of the person in the glass welled up, spilled. I bit my cheeks. Feeling trapped in every way possible, I always imagine myself on a piece of slide glass, under a microscope's lens. I walked out into the heat and up and up and up and offered up a long and rambling prayer while I decided that it was not a bad thing that we had been spoiled by each other.
There is so much more inside but the sun is cresting the eastern horizon, painting the sky, and it would be wrong of me to not bear witness.
All I could think to offer was the only form of strength I knew, and that was sequestering ourselves away in the Ford on a midnight stretch of road and to put of why and to just exist as a function. The prayer I say to St. Michael to guide my mind and eyes and hands and feet and to just let me be worthy of having your mission pass through me for the next eight hours.
And I may have decided that these long, dark, lonely tours are the best way to heal. From anything.
Later, days later, the oppressive sun and lake and the late night heat and that I had no place to go, that there had been no plan made, and how my mind took that and plotted it on a chart somewhere, in the recesses. Middle of the day fluorescent lit bathroom, my escape, and she kept me company while the eyes of the person in the glass welled up, spilled. I bit my cheeks. Feeling trapped in every way possible, I always imagine myself on a piece of slide glass, under a microscope's lens. I walked out into the heat and up and up and up and offered up a long and rambling prayer while I decided that it was not a bad thing that we had been spoiled by each other.
There is so much more inside but the sun is cresting the eastern horizon, painting the sky, and it would be wrong of me to not bear witness.
14.6.10
Sugar maple
The sun pressed in through the windows and I drew the gauzy shades to filter its unrelenting light. As if I could somehow edit, or delay its ability to expose all the tiny imperfections. Flipping switches in an ever-evolving strategy of controlling what is uncovered, displayed, found out. But I underestimated the voracity of a balmy late-spring Ohio afternoon, and how sometimes it feels better to just, let, go.
I asked him, tell me why, is it okay if I ask you why? He told me how it ended, as we sat on the over-stuffed leather cushions, legs entwined and bodies sinking into the fluff of the couch. We were on opposite ends and I would not let his gaze go, as if there were some kind of telekinetic opportunity, if only we could just lock our eyes for long enough. As if I could reveal my entire heart to him with the right amount of determination. He looked at me softly and told me about the way one could be defeated so thoroughly, and that he never in a million years could have imagined, after leaving a situation so devastated (though he amended it to say that it was not the right word, but did not know what would be, and I thought of P and understood) that he could find something so real, so simple in its perfection. And I told him my story, of disappointment, and how my father told me that you cannot make your own happiness beholden upon someone else. We talked about our families, and what was important, and he made the correlation between cakes and cookies and brownies and all of the support in the whole entire world, and how he felt that he was a shadow most of the time, how no one knew to whom he belonged. And I pieced together the thought process that led us to the conversation, and what that meant to me, how my heart overflowed and I thought of that black lab in Arizona, with Ranger on the food bowl. And of my forebears, and the ponderosa, and mi gemela, and how I never, not once, not ever, doubted that I would have 25 generations of their love and support no matter what this life brought me. And how that made me invincible.
And how all I wanted to do was to wrap him up in me and let him know that he would never have to worry about belonging ever again, and that I would protect him against the ugliness of the world for as long as he would let me.
Later, it was dark, and he pulled me close and we rubbed noses, and he kissed my forehead, and I held him until his breathing slowed and his arms twitched, and I just watched him, sleeping. And I wondered, how on earth did I ever get so lucky? And I sent up a quiet and fragile prayer to make me worthy of such a man.
I asked him, tell me why, is it okay if I ask you why? He told me how it ended, as we sat on the over-stuffed leather cushions, legs entwined and bodies sinking into the fluff of the couch. We were on opposite ends and I would not let his gaze go, as if there were some kind of telekinetic opportunity, if only we could just lock our eyes for long enough. As if I could reveal my entire heart to him with the right amount of determination. He looked at me softly and told me about the way one could be defeated so thoroughly, and that he never in a million years could have imagined, after leaving a situation so devastated (though he amended it to say that it was not the right word, but did not know what would be, and I thought of P and understood) that he could find something so real, so simple in its perfection. And I told him my story, of disappointment, and how my father told me that you cannot make your own happiness beholden upon someone else. We talked about our families, and what was important, and he made the correlation between cakes and cookies and brownies and all of the support in the whole entire world, and how he felt that he was a shadow most of the time, how no one knew to whom he belonged. And I pieced together the thought process that led us to the conversation, and what that meant to me, how my heart overflowed and I thought of that black lab in Arizona, with Ranger on the food bowl. And of my forebears, and the ponderosa, and mi gemela, and how I never, not once, not ever, doubted that I would have 25 generations of their love and support no matter what this life brought me. And how that made me invincible.
And how all I wanted to do was to wrap him up in me and let him know that he would never have to worry about belonging ever again, and that I would protect him against the ugliness of the world for as long as he would let me.
Later, it was dark, and he pulled me close and we rubbed noses, and he kissed my forehead, and I held him until his breathing slowed and his arms twitched, and I just watched him, sleeping. And I wondered, how on earth did I ever get so lucky? And I sent up a quiet and fragile prayer to make me worthy of such a man.
1.6.10
Children of God
It had started out as a bad day. Nothing major, no meteorites dropped like funk bombshells in the middle of my afternoon, but more like minor grumblings throughout the morning and into the hot, late, humid evening. The haze pressed oppressively down through flaccid leaves, onto the pitch-colored asphalt and reflected back up like dirty lake water. I told her that I was a hermit crab, and told him that I kept my post like a lone wolf, let no one bother me. Irritation like tree pollen getting into my eyes.
She flagged me down and I was annoyed. Because I knew her, knew her type of crazy, and still had my rifle sights on her brother. I called it in and asked for another car when I saw the rabid dog that was the source of her emotional outburst that night. She talked into my ear but all I could take in was the front porch, and the pacing. And despite my training I told her to stay by the car and I swaggered to him, alone. He was crazed. His breath smelled of cheap booze and his eyes darted from the PCP coursing through his veins. There was nothing about it that was good.
The others arrived, and we came to some type of solution, though I hated every inch of it. And when I pushed him back and said get up off of me I knew he should have been wearing handcuffs out of there. But I deferred, and it ended up that I was right.
Ten minutes later and we get the call that he is back, and she is screaming bloody murder, and all of the neighbors are calling, and step it up, just step it up. My partner got there first (this time) and he, big strong tough guy that he is, got on the radio and said A-, expedite. On the radio when I played it back you could hear the V8 roaring in the background and the tires squealing as I took the turn and said I am just down the street, almost there. I put my sunglasses away because I knew what was coming.
I parked and she was possessed, in the treelawn, and just pointed and said he is inside. She grabbed my arm and tried to approach with us, but I pushed her and said, no, you aren't coming. My partner and I looked at each other as we walked to the house and I told him that I was done, that it was ending here, now. He nodded and we saw him come to the door. Rabid dog foaming at its mouth. He came out briefly, then tried to go back inside through the door he had smashed in, but D grabbed his arm and the fight was on. It was ugly, it is always ugly, but we spun him to the ground and landed on top of him and he kicked and pushed and hissed like the devil was trying to come up out of him to fight off the hands of St. Michael. And his legion. I grabbed the back of his head and pushed his face in the dirt and called him a m---erf---er and bent his arm back as far as it would go and twisted his wrist and put the cuffs on too tight and dug my knee into his back. D- slammed him down onto the trunk of his car and grabbed him by the belt and pitched him into the backseat like a sack of potatoes. Before I shut the door I stuck my face into the darkness and whispered the cops always win.
The next day she came to the station and said she wanted to drop the charges because she had too many other things going on currently. Was incredulous to find out that it was out of her hands and that yes, her dear boyfriend, was likely going back to prison. And what we had put ourselves through and for, in her mind, nothing.
I went to his house, and I sat in the garage for awhile, not knowing what to say. Or not say. I went in, climbed into the shower and let the hot water play on my skin for a very long time, as if I could somehow wash the cynicism and grittiness off. When I climbed in next to him he was asleep, but woke long enough to wrap me up in his arms and with a big smile say hello before falling back into sleep. I lay there, in the darkness, surrounded, and wondered if it was okay if I didn't tell him? If it was selfish of me to keep it bottled up inside and shield him from how bitter I can be, from how ugly and dangerous some things are.
The next morning I think I realized that I am vulnerable, and that I don't want anyone to know.
She flagged me down and I was annoyed. Because I knew her, knew her type of crazy, and still had my rifle sights on her brother. I called it in and asked for another car when I saw the rabid dog that was the source of her emotional outburst that night. She talked into my ear but all I could take in was the front porch, and the pacing. And despite my training I told her to stay by the car and I swaggered to him, alone. He was crazed. His breath smelled of cheap booze and his eyes darted from the PCP coursing through his veins. There was nothing about it that was good.
The others arrived, and we came to some type of solution, though I hated every inch of it. And when I pushed him back and said get up off of me I knew he should have been wearing handcuffs out of there. But I deferred, and it ended up that I was right.
Ten minutes later and we get the call that he is back, and she is screaming bloody murder, and all of the neighbors are calling, and step it up, just step it up. My partner got there first (this time) and he, big strong tough guy that he is, got on the radio and said A-, expedite. On the radio when I played it back you could hear the V8 roaring in the background and the tires squealing as I took the turn and said I am just down the street, almost there. I put my sunglasses away because I knew what was coming.
I parked and she was possessed, in the treelawn, and just pointed and said he is inside. She grabbed my arm and tried to approach with us, but I pushed her and said, no, you aren't coming. My partner and I looked at each other as we walked to the house and I told him that I was done, that it was ending here, now. He nodded and we saw him come to the door. Rabid dog foaming at its mouth. He came out briefly, then tried to go back inside through the door he had smashed in, but D grabbed his arm and the fight was on. It was ugly, it is always ugly, but we spun him to the ground and landed on top of him and he kicked and pushed and hissed like the devil was trying to come up out of him to fight off the hands of St. Michael. And his legion. I grabbed the back of his head and pushed his face in the dirt and called him a m---erf---er and bent his arm back as far as it would go and twisted his wrist and put the cuffs on too tight and dug my knee into his back. D- slammed him down onto the trunk of his car and grabbed him by the belt and pitched him into the backseat like a sack of potatoes. Before I shut the door I stuck my face into the darkness and whispered the cops always win.
The next day she came to the station and said she wanted to drop the charges because she had too many other things going on currently. Was incredulous to find out that it was out of her hands and that yes, her dear boyfriend, was likely going back to prison. And what we had put ourselves through and for, in her mind, nothing.
I went to his house, and I sat in the garage for awhile, not knowing what to say. Or not say. I went in, climbed into the shower and let the hot water play on my skin for a very long time, as if I could somehow wash the cynicism and grittiness off. When I climbed in next to him he was asleep, but woke long enough to wrap me up in his arms and with a big smile say hello before falling back into sleep. I lay there, in the darkness, surrounded, and wondered if it was okay if I didn't tell him? If it was selfish of me to keep it bottled up inside and shield him from how bitter I can be, from how ugly and dangerous some things are.
The next morning I think I realized that I am vulnerable, and that I don't want anyone to know.
27.5.10
Lightning Bugs
We sneaked kisses in between chopping and marinating and sidewalk chalk and fake plastic bowling. His lips smiled on mine as we stood, lingering, when she called out daaaaaaaaadcomehere! She wanted to show us the giant ant she found, and for me to help her fill the heart she had drawn on the driveway with pink chalk.
We sat on the concrete and she told me all about her day in between directing the grand illustration we were engaged in. He stood at the grill and watched, and when I looked up the held gaze and smile made it too easy to read what was in his heart. And mine, too. Later, later, she wanted me to help her with the nightly rituals and her wiry little girl body gave me a big hug before climbing into the shower. She sang loudly under the tap, and we stood in the living room listening, suspended in each other. A perfect moment. A pause, a slip, a thud, a silence and then crying and I watched as he ran to see what had happened. I watched as he performed a comedic assessment to make her laugh, and listened as his voice went soft as he asked her but you are okay, right? He was so young when his own father died, and I wondered how that influenced this perfect little vignette that I was thankful to be a part of.
I combed her hair when she got out and in her pink pajamas she put on a show for us and then nearly immediately fell asleep. We stayed, after she went to bed, and he put his arm around me and drew me close. Told me stories from his childhood, made plans for us to visit an old friend and said he had told her about me. When I laughed and could not imagine what she must already think based on his exaggerations, he turned serious for a moment and said he had never introduced her to anyone before and what that meant.
He kissed my forehead and pulled me in closer and with his lips next to my ear told me that when it's time for his long nap he is going to sit down on his bench and tell everyone that he's just waiting for me to get there, too. His way of telling me. His hand on my hand and the line where one started and the other stopped was blurred, electric current binding us to each other, blending everything.
My heart is full. Lord, thank You, because I know that I am not deserving of this much happiness on my merits alone.
We sat on the concrete and she told me all about her day in between directing the grand illustration we were engaged in. He stood at the grill and watched, and when I looked up the held gaze and smile made it too easy to read what was in his heart. And mine, too. Later, later, she wanted me to help her with the nightly rituals and her wiry little girl body gave me a big hug before climbing into the shower. She sang loudly under the tap, and we stood in the living room listening, suspended in each other. A perfect moment. A pause, a slip, a thud, a silence and then crying and I watched as he ran to see what had happened. I watched as he performed a comedic assessment to make her laugh, and listened as his voice went soft as he asked her but you are okay, right? He was so young when his own father died, and I wondered how that influenced this perfect little vignette that I was thankful to be a part of.
I combed her hair when she got out and in her pink pajamas she put on a show for us and then nearly immediately fell asleep. We stayed, after she went to bed, and he put his arm around me and drew me close. Told me stories from his childhood, made plans for us to visit an old friend and said he had told her about me. When I laughed and could not imagine what she must already think based on his exaggerations, he turned serious for a moment and said he had never introduced her to anyone before and what that meant.
He kissed my forehead and pulled me in closer and with his lips next to my ear told me that when it's time for his long nap he is going to sit down on his bench and tell everyone that he's just waiting for me to get there, too. His way of telling me. His hand on my hand and the line where one started and the other stopped was blurred, electric current binding us to each other, blending everything.
My heart is full. Lord, thank You, because I know that I am not deserving of this much happiness on my merits alone.
18.5.10
The glowing green
I read him like that untamed dog, all crazy energy and frenetic movements like the lake when it storms, his mouth foamed when he spoke. More than once I stepped out of my role as cover and in my fiercest Rocky voice condemned him to silence. He is swagger and ego that will pop with the slightest pin-prick. And the explosion will be loud, violent. It is odd to look through someone's eyes, and to see that lying dormant inside. To wonder when not if we will get the call and fly down there with .223s and aggression. It was bile on my tongue that I tasted as I yelled at him. And he knew that I hated him, and I watched him file it away in his mind. A test for later, I thought. And Lord knows, I do not like to lose.
If I had a mohawk (like Etienne) it was certainly standing on end as I walked down the driveway, tail bushy and poised, as if I could make myself look bigger, meaner. A look next door as I cleared the side of the house, and there she was. All nine years of her little kid jeans and pink shirt, and she was waving me over. The smile on my face belied all the steeling of my flesh and I changed direction and went over. She was wide-eyed-stream-of-consciousness excited and after taking a breath she told me to wait right there. Went inside and in a second came out. With a bunch of flowers. That she had picked from their garden. When she saw my cruiser pull up.
I took the flowers and she gave me a big hug and her mom and I talked while she ran around but I could not hear her. The bouquet in my hand sent a warmth through my arm and into my heart and like an electric current through the rest of my body rendering me numb, idiot grin on my face as if there were a perfect moment to life, a tiny microcosm where everything was all in its right place, this was it, and I stayed as still as I could lest that feeling go away.
Jaysus, you hear your grandfather say.
And then the scratch scratch next to my ear called me away, and I wound my way back to my car and away, away. But the feeling remained and I wanted so desperately to call someone, to tell someone, to have them explain to me how my life could encompass such extremes (hate and love being neighbors?!) and how I could walk between the two worlds without going utterly insane. How I would define normal if someone were to pose the question.
There is no normal life, he whispered, again, in my ear.
On station they made fun of me, but it was no joke when, at the end of shift, I told them that today we were difference makers, even though they laughed. And I laughed too. There are people whom we prey upon, they decided to partake in the hunt and it is always open season, always. And there are those whom we protect. And me, in my black and white mind, take it to the extreme and want to put those fragile parts of the world under my wing and snuff out the evil parts until not even the smoke of their existence remains.
The flowers are in my kitchen now. And I have told the story many times, but I don't know how to show anyone what is in my heart.
Lord guide us when our experience out-paces our understanding.
If I had a mohawk (like Etienne) it was certainly standing on end as I walked down the driveway, tail bushy and poised, as if I could make myself look bigger, meaner. A look next door as I cleared the side of the house, and there she was. All nine years of her little kid jeans and pink shirt, and she was waving me over. The smile on my face belied all the steeling of my flesh and I changed direction and went over. She was wide-eyed-stream-of-consciousness excited and after taking a breath she told me to wait right there. Went inside and in a second came out. With a bunch of flowers. That she had picked from their garden. When she saw my cruiser pull up.
I took the flowers and she gave me a big hug and her mom and I talked while she ran around but I could not hear her. The bouquet in my hand sent a warmth through my arm and into my heart and like an electric current through the rest of my body rendering me numb, idiot grin on my face as if there were a perfect moment to life, a tiny microcosm where everything was all in its right place, this was it, and I stayed as still as I could lest that feeling go away.
Jaysus, you hear your grandfather say.
And then the scratch scratch next to my ear called me away, and I wound my way back to my car and away, away. But the feeling remained and I wanted so desperately to call someone, to tell someone, to have them explain to me how my life could encompass such extremes (hate and love being neighbors?!) and how I could walk between the two worlds without going utterly insane. How I would define normal if someone were to pose the question.
There is no normal life, he whispered, again, in my ear.
On station they made fun of me, but it was no joke when, at the end of shift, I told them that today we were difference makers, even though they laughed. And I laughed too. There are people whom we prey upon, they decided to partake in the hunt and it is always open season, always. And there are those whom we protect. And me, in my black and white mind, take it to the extreme and want to put those fragile parts of the world under my wing and snuff out the evil parts until not even the smoke of their existence remains.
The flowers are in my kitchen now. And I have told the story many times, but I don't know how to show anyone what is in my heart.
Lord guide us when our experience out-paces our understanding.
12.5.10
My rose
I wanted him to be my Holden Caulfield, but he didn't know. Didn't know, and I did not tell a soul, lest my heavy heart be some kind of sign of weakness. When we got the call and flooded the area, and after I spoke with the complainant and got a better description of who exactly we were looking for, his image flashed in my mind and I could not let it go. Went to his house and like a tidal wave banged on the door and when his small boy frame opened it wide, I realized I had forgotten to plan out what I was going to say. Mother provided a cheap and easy alibi and I left after making him promise he would be at school the next day. And he did go, but left halfway through. I guess he found a loophole in our contract. And I drove around for the next several hours wondering what in the hell I was going to do.
You are responsible for what you tame.
The words pressed in on me and I sat there on my perch, and pondered. I did not want to be one of countless adults whose words promised a lot but whose actions would only disappoint. A wayward country mouse he is, with his too long hair hiding his vulnerable chocolate-brown eyes, and he has managed to find the weak spot in my armor. And for all my over-thinking I can't figure out how or why.
It was surprising to me that he could sense my heavy heart through sanitized and distant texts. Said, you are being soft tonight, what is wrong and the blinking cursor staring back at me would not allow me to lie. The world breaks everyone, and most of the time I can get by with the steeled exterior and heart like a black hole. Most of the time. But some nights the sky coalesces with ether and in my bones I feel the entire weight of everything, the changing of tides, ship lights on and distant, the curling of leaves before a storm. And for a moment, it is too much to bear. And then it passes.
Last night he stopped and I was staring at him and his gaze pierced back into all of the tiny holes. We stayed suspended in time like that and he kissed me and I did not let him go. Later I woke to the two of us entwined like puzzle pieces and I drifted back into sleep to the sound of his soft, warm breathing. And I drifted back into sleep with a prayer on my lips of how grateful I am, and how lucky.
You are responsible for what you tame.
The words pressed in on me and I sat there on my perch, and pondered. I did not want to be one of countless adults whose words promised a lot but whose actions would only disappoint. A wayward country mouse he is, with his too long hair hiding his vulnerable chocolate-brown eyes, and he has managed to find the weak spot in my armor. And for all my over-thinking I can't figure out how or why.
It was surprising to me that he could sense my heavy heart through sanitized and distant texts. Said, you are being soft tonight, what is wrong and the blinking cursor staring back at me would not allow me to lie. The world breaks everyone, and most of the time I can get by with the steeled exterior and heart like a black hole. Most of the time. But some nights the sky coalesces with ether and in my bones I feel the entire weight of everything, the changing of tides, ship lights on and distant, the curling of leaves before a storm. And for a moment, it is too much to bear. And then it passes.
Last night he stopped and I was staring at him and his gaze pierced back into all of the tiny holes. We stayed suspended in time like that and he kissed me and I did not let him go. Later I woke to the two of us entwined like puzzle pieces and I drifted back into sleep to the sound of his soft, warm breathing. And I drifted back into sleep with a prayer on my lips of how grateful I am, and how lucky.
4.5.10
Chain maille
Going into the small white room I instantly hated how the fluorescence reflected off all four walls, ceiling, and floor. Sanitized and unfeeling; institutional. The dad had a mullet and he smelled of sweat that had dried on dirty cotton. The diminutive son did his best to shrink into his corner and be absorbed by the white of the cinder block walls, to disappear. In my mind I was a kid again and had to do my best to remember that of the three of us, I was the adult and had to play my part.
The dad flapped his gums and soon it was just sound reverberating against my eardrums, words obliterated into tiny syllables of meaninglessness. I stared at him, the son, with his too long hair hiding his eyes, almost but not quite buried in his arm resting on the table. A lapse, a silence, and I listened to myself part the air with look at me. No, look me in the eyes, look at me.
Tears wetted his childish cheeks and I held his gaze until it became awkward. I thought about the story at Grandpa J's wake, and the junior detective league, and I wondered how that would translate into the present day with drugs and sex and no parents and so much pressure. All I could think was that I am responsible for you now, and you need to tell me what to do. I am going to help you, but you have to show me how.
A day later and I heard that he had run away again. They did not report it this time because, well, why bother. I filed it away and looked for him on every side street and playground, and wondered, what would it be like? I thought about growing up with E, and what it felt like to be beholden to someone else, and to be raised with strong ideas about what was right, and what was expected. We had a bonfire that night and after too much whiskey the war stories poured out and I thought about all the things my dad said around camp fires in the middle of the night as we stared into the flames. Some kind of purging, you just need someone who wants to listen.
It is a heavy burden to bear.
Today at work they told me that he had attempted suicide the night before. They found him in time and took him to the hospital to be evaluated. He is a child, he is tiny, he has a mom who comes home drunk, a sister who was molested, a father who has thrown in the towel and...... what else?
I remember homemade cookies in grade school, mom and dad being at every game, family vacations to the ocean where E and I made ten-thousand lifelong pacts, band boosters, holidays, Sunday dinners, and an untold number of moments where I knew, I knew that I was loved and supported and that nothing bad could ever happen. That, like she said, our bond was stronger than space or time and that nothing would ever change that.
Whoever you are, if you love someone or are grateful for someone, let them know.
The dad flapped his gums and soon it was just sound reverberating against my eardrums, words obliterated into tiny syllables of meaninglessness. I stared at him, the son, with his too long hair hiding his eyes, almost but not quite buried in his arm resting on the table. A lapse, a silence, and I listened to myself part the air with look at me. No, look me in the eyes, look at me.
Tears wetted his childish cheeks and I held his gaze until it became awkward. I thought about the story at Grandpa J's wake, and the junior detective league, and I wondered how that would translate into the present day with drugs and sex and no parents and so much pressure. All I could think was that I am responsible for you now, and you need to tell me what to do. I am going to help you, but you have to show me how.
A day later and I heard that he had run away again. They did not report it this time because, well, why bother. I filed it away and looked for him on every side street and playground, and wondered, what would it be like? I thought about growing up with E, and what it felt like to be beholden to someone else, and to be raised with strong ideas about what was right, and what was expected. We had a bonfire that night and after too much whiskey the war stories poured out and I thought about all the things my dad said around camp fires in the middle of the night as we stared into the flames. Some kind of purging, you just need someone who wants to listen.
It is a heavy burden to bear.
Today at work they told me that he had attempted suicide the night before. They found him in time and took him to the hospital to be evaluated. He is a child, he is tiny, he has a mom who comes home drunk, a sister who was molested, a father who has thrown in the towel and...... what else?
I remember homemade cookies in grade school, mom and dad being at every game, family vacations to the ocean where E and I made ten-thousand lifelong pacts, band boosters, holidays, Sunday dinners, and an untold number of moments where I knew, I knew that I was loved and supported and that nothing bad could ever happen. That, like she said, our bond was stronger than space or time and that nothing would ever change that.
Whoever you are, if you love someone or are grateful for someone, let them know.
30.4.10
In lit.
The radio was off when I turned the key in the ignition. The v8 roared to life with a familiar rumble and I pointed the push-bumper north, towards the lake turned orange with the setting sun. A scratch and a silence put my foot on the brake as I waited for what was to follow. The call came out and it was not without irony that I flipped the light switch all the way to the right and dialed on my sirens as I peeled out of the middle school parking lot. Moments earlier the principal wishing me a quiet night, and me just laughing and saying, yeah, well, I hope not.
I kept the radio off as I drove, car outpacing sirens, lights reflecting blue and white off houses and oncoming traffic. It was strangely quiet in the cab and as I passed the people stopped and pulled off to the side of the road I realized that they were all wondering where on earth I was heading and what was happening. A very slick and devilish smile played on my lips as I hurtled down the road, iron and steel and rubber and authority. I felt my pulse quicken, my heart stir and my entire body tense as the euphoria of being able to ply my trade entered my blood stream. First to arrive, a habit I cannot break, I kept the lights on as a beacon to my backup, and I hurled myself into the reason why someone would dial 911 on an otherwise sleepy and beautiful Thursday night.
Somewhere along the way the switch flipped on and I watched myself come to some type of reasoning with a drunk woman and the rabid others involved. The sorting out of the particulars of a crisis followed, and when I dropped her off she bawled, and wanted me to meet her dog. She had lost her shoes somehow, and stood there in her driveway barefoot, stooped, sobbing. I faked a call so that I could leave and wondered what her tomorrow morning looked like. And wondered what the choices were that led to us meeting that night.
A busy shift, a rare and precious thing in my new digs, and later, much later, as the sweat soaked my clothes I realized that it had been a long while since I felt, truly, like a cop. And that it was a feeling unlike any other, and my God, I am lucky to know it.
And throughout it all, there is you. And the words you choose and the way they come out and the tenderness and how much I trust you. To keep my heart and guard it, and that I will do the same for you, more than I ever would my own. The smile still playing on my lips as I drifted off to sleep.
I kept the radio off as I drove, car outpacing sirens, lights reflecting blue and white off houses and oncoming traffic. It was strangely quiet in the cab and as I passed the people stopped and pulled off to the side of the road I realized that they were all wondering where on earth I was heading and what was happening. A very slick and devilish smile played on my lips as I hurtled down the road, iron and steel and rubber and authority. I felt my pulse quicken, my heart stir and my entire body tense as the euphoria of being able to ply my trade entered my blood stream. First to arrive, a habit I cannot break, I kept the lights on as a beacon to my backup, and I hurled myself into the reason why someone would dial 911 on an otherwise sleepy and beautiful Thursday night.
Somewhere along the way the switch flipped on and I watched myself come to some type of reasoning with a drunk woman and the rabid others involved. The sorting out of the particulars of a crisis followed, and when I dropped her off she bawled, and wanted me to meet her dog. She had lost her shoes somehow, and stood there in her driveway barefoot, stooped, sobbing. I faked a call so that I could leave and wondered what her tomorrow morning looked like. And wondered what the choices were that led to us meeting that night.
A busy shift, a rare and precious thing in my new digs, and later, much later, as the sweat soaked my clothes I realized that it had been a long while since I felt, truly, like a cop. And that it was a feeling unlike any other, and my God, I am lucky to know it.
And throughout it all, there is you. And the words you choose and the way they come out and the tenderness and how much I trust you. To keep my heart and guard it, and that I will do the same for you, more than I ever would my own. The smile still playing on my lips as I drifted off to sleep.
22.4.10
SPQR
Maybe there is some truth to the notion of disquietude being an efficient muse. Perhaps spring and regeneration puts pens on shelves and locks the mind in a sort of lazy and superficial vacation. Whatever it is, it has been awhile.
But my dreams at night and in the early morning belie the calm routine of daytime. I have woken sweaty, and shaking, and uneasy, with a vague notion that I should look for an intruder that was getting away, that I had shot, or that had buried cold steel and aggression in me, just moments earlier. Taking to my feet slowly, last night's reheated coffee playing acridly on my tongue I can't help but wonder, where is the disconnect between what swirls in the unconscious and this, the unassuming day. But I give up my pondering very easily. Lately.
I had a dream last night that in a text message he asked why I had stopped calling. There was a picture attached of a sad smiley face crying its eyes out and the totality of it disgusted me. I knew that I would never give an answer because, frankly, I did not care. At the same time I was yelling profanities at an idiot teacher who was giving a class that I had forgotten to show up for, save the last day. Again, I did not care. I remember seeing that she had given me an "A", but since I had not attended I had no idea how to participate in the routine of the class, and I was holding everything up. She would not explain and I was furious. I stood up, unleashed an ugly verbal attack and just, walked, out. My parents were waiting outside to give me a ride home and they laughed when I told them what had happened. As if the outlandishness and incredulity, from me, was formulaic.
I remembered this conversation that I had in Olympia with this crazy woman I used to live with. It was, I think, a lifetime ago. At least, I was certainly not this person then. She was talking about how men have an easier time claiming what they want, their space, being generally entitled about this life. We gave each other the example of my ex (then current) and how he would have no problem taking the last seat on the couch if there were several other people still standing. As if to say, if you won't make space for me, I'll just make my own space for me. And how we (then) could never do such a thing.
And how that has all changed. Life has become a much more angular place since then. Soft edges chiseled down into right angles, hard, gritty, the black and white receiving and parsing out what used to be mostly grey. I can't even remember all of the different homes I have been in, people I have yelled at, or escorted to jail, or written off in my mind as a lost cause. I would not be able to even estimate how many times I have sat alone, in my cruiser, hair on the back of my neck standing up, playing over and over how I was going to kill each and every occupant if I had to as I waited for backup to arrive. I think, maybe, the experiences change your perspective, of yourself, of life, of what other people are capable of (I take that back, I know it changes you) and one day, without realizing it, you are just different.
It has been so long that the thoughts are all jumbled and difficult to lure out in a sensible way. The sea is like glass on top, but the rip tide churns underneath.
And underneath it all there is still the vulnerability. But maybe that's the most important part. And as the sun sinks, the town condenses around me, I turn my lights out and snake around the underbelly of its streets and alleys I think, I have your name tattooed on my heart, where no one can see.
But my dreams at night and in the early morning belie the calm routine of daytime. I have woken sweaty, and shaking, and uneasy, with a vague notion that I should look for an intruder that was getting away, that I had shot, or that had buried cold steel and aggression in me, just moments earlier. Taking to my feet slowly, last night's reheated coffee playing acridly on my tongue I can't help but wonder, where is the disconnect between what swirls in the unconscious and this, the unassuming day. But I give up my pondering very easily. Lately.
I had a dream last night that in a text message he asked why I had stopped calling. There was a picture attached of a sad smiley face crying its eyes out and the totality of it disgusted me. I knew that I would never give an answer because, frankly, I did not care. At the same time I was yelling profanities at an idiot teacher who was giving a class that I had forgotten to show up for, save the last day. Again, I did not care. I remember seeing that she had given me an "A", but since I had not attended I had no idea how to participate in the routine of the class, and I was holding everything up. She would not explain and I was furious. I stood up, unleashed an ugly verbal attack and just, walked, out. My parents were waiting outside to give me a ride home and they laughed when I told them what had happened. As if the outlandishness and incredulity, from me, was formulaic.
I remembered this conversation that I had in Olympia with this crazy woman I used to live with. It was, I think, a lifetime ago. At least, I was certainly not this person then. She was talking about how men have an easier time claiming what they want, their space, being generally entitled about this life. We gave each other the example of my ex (then current) and how he would have no problem taking the last seat on the couch if there were several other people still standing. As if to say, if you won't make space for me, I'll just make my own space for me. And how we (then) could never do such a thing.
And how that has all changed. Life has become a much more angular place since then. Soft edges chiseled down into right angles, hard, gritty, the black and white receiving and parsing out what used to be mostly grey. I can't even remember all of the different homes I have been in, people I have yelled at, or escorted to jail, or written off in my mind as a lost cause. I would not be able to even estimate how many times I have sat alone, in my cruiser, hair on the back of my neck standing up, playing over and over how I was going to kill each and every occupant if I had to as I waited for backup to arrive. I think, maybe, the experiences change your perspective, of yourself, of life, of what other people are capable of (I take that back, I know it changes you) and one day, without realizing it, you are just different.
It has been so long that the thoughts are all jumbled and difficult to lure out in a sensible way. The sea is like glass on top, but the rip tide churns underneath.
And underneath it all there is still the vulnerability. But maybe that's the most important part. And as the sun sinks, the town condenses around me, I turn my lights out and snake around the underbelly of its streets and alleys I think, I have your name tattooed on my heart, where no one can see.
27.3.10
The only exception.
The grey came in cold and pressing, clouds touching the rocks on the beach below with their wetness, leaving us on the shore damp, and chilled. I parked with my headlights pointed east to the city line, and looked north out at the melting and moonly expanse of ice and slush and garbage, floating in the quietly thawing lake. There was no point on the horizon where land or water became sky, or cloud gave way to white capped wave. All was obscured and blended together in a dingy white that crept in between the spaces of flesh and bone, carving out a stark and lonely outpost. A washed out photo from another century.
There was a small dark spot among the translucence of the melting snow, turning into ice with the rain. It caught my eye every now and then as it fluttered in the wind, some discarded garbage bag caught in the freeze. And then it moved, and then it moved again, and like all of those nights of figure-eights in isolation, some part of my mind put the forms together like a patchwork and I knew. I kept the car door open when I got out, and walked down the rain-slick pier to where it ended in the ice. The lake looked different so close-up, slush suspended in dirty runoff, the waste of three or four months floating on top of it all.
There was blood on the ice. Bright spots of crimson that made a technicolor trail to where he lay, dying. His coat was matted from the dampness and he looked around at me as I stood there, looking at him. Nothing that I could do. He floated on the tide about fifty or sixty feet off shore in a nest of snow he found when the lake had been frozen solid enough to walk on. A viking funeral, I thought, but sometimes there is no boat, sometimes you just have to make-do. The crushing greyness of it pressed in as it hit me again that there was nothing I could do. I thought of her photo from several summers ago of a solitary flower sprouting from a crack in the asphalt, and how there is always hope. And somehow in my mind it made sense that this stark image was my version of her parking lot, that the picture of ice and wave and blood and fur and bleakness inspired the same feeling of renewal. Even if it is impossible to elucidate. The world breaks everyone, we said, and it is not meant to be a condemnation, she said. Amen. And Thank God for you.
And then, later, what we thought the other meant by silence, and what we said, after it was explained. He lay next to me and pulled me close and in a moment of tenderness told me what his mind said to him, and how vulnerable he made himself. And I lay there with his heartbeat on my chest, and ran my fingers through his hair, and stroked his cheek, and chin, and could not look away from the blue of his eyes as we lingered there, in silence, after. I love you. And I wondered how it was possible for there to be so much convulsive beauty left in the world, ten years later and I was still shaken to the core by how fragile and perfect this life can be.
There was a small dark spot among the translucence of the melting snow, turning into ice with the rain. It caught my eye every now and then as it fluttered in the wind, some discarded garbage bag caught in the freeze. And then it moved, and then it moved again, and like all of those nights of figure-eights in isolation, some part of my mind put the forms together like a patchwork and I knew. I kept the car door open when I got out, and walked down the rain-slick pier to where it ended in the ice. The lake looked different so close-up, slush suspended in dirty runoff, the waste of three or four months floating on top of it all.
There was blood on the ice. Bright spots of crimson that made a technicolor trail to where he lay, dying. His coat was matted from the dampness and he looked around at me as I stood there, looking at him. Nothing that I could do. He floated on the tide about fifty or sixty feet off shore in a nest of snow he found when the lake had been frozen solid enough to walk on. A viking funeral, I thought, but sometimes there is no boat, sometimes you just have to make-do. The crushing greyness of it pressed in as it hit me again that there was nothing I could do. I thought of her photo from several summers ago of a solitary flower sprouting from a crack in the asphalt, and how there is always hope. And somehow in my mind it made sense that this stark image was my version of her parking lot, that the picture of ice and wave and blood and fur and bleakness inspired the same feeling of renewal. Even if it is impossible to elucidate. The world breaks everyone, we said, and it is not meant to be a condemnation, she said. Amen. And Thank God for you.
And then, later, what we thought the other meant by silence, and what we said, after it was explained. He lay next to me and pulled me close and in a moment of tenderness told me what his mind said to him, and how vulnerable he made himself. And I lay there with his heartbeat on my chest, and ran my fingers through his hair, and stroked his cheek, and chin, and could not look away from the blue of his eyes as we lingered there, in silence, after. I love you. And I wondered how it was possible for there to be so much convulsive beauty left in the world, ten years later and I was still shaken to the core by how fragile and perfect this life can be.
12.3.10
Laundry detergent.
There was an electricity in the air that reminded me of two summers ago and one early morning run after a flurry of text messages when I set out, one foot in front of the other, to claim my territory over ten miles of the town's streets, and sidewalks. A route I had not visited since at least the early summer, and I claimed it, slower, but steady, for my own. The wind cut into me as I wound my east, buffeted and resolve weary, a test. What came to me was the cadence of three summers gone, and the steeled warrior that waited to be found again, and called to duty. The way back was downhill, and tailwind, and strength and focus and the words looped, if you want to be the po-lice you gotta be thin.
In the stupid movie he said to Stay Hungry, and Lord knows that it's true.
A missive sent at the closing of the tab, of sorts, and afterward I pulled the silicone, black and dusty, out of retirement and took it with me for duty, for the hunt. It had been a long time. The words hit me like arrows, little pieces of acid that penetrated what I thought was immutable, resolute. The afternoon waned, and the drive home was bittersweet in a way that it had not been for a long, long time. How funny it was, to realize how so much remains, despite the will's attempts to excoriate the weak spots.
I focused on the movement of the calves kicking up towards the back of the thigh as I tired near mile five. I thought of a waltz, and how the irregular and unfamiliar cadence could keep the body moving, engaged. My toes dug in towards each other, and it hurt, and I told myself that pain is a good teacher, and helps us to remember how to be strong. Made a mental note of what to do in May, when the goal was 13.1 and not just 6, and how to make it more comfortable for myself. Because everyone has a breaking point, even the stubborn.
Later, later, he wrapped me up in his arms and kissed the space next to my eye that closes when I laugh. Kissed the bone under my chin, my neck, my ear. I turned my body and breathed in a deep and greedy lung-full of his smell, kissing his neck and collarbone and the corners of his lips as a mutinous smile played on my own. What is this road we walk, how do we pretend to know where we are headed when the fog is so thick that even the tiniest light obscures the smallest insight.
All that remains is to be grateful. To cherish (perhaps greedily) the dance while we are able to move, and to not look back on the fools that we have been before. The naivete, the posturing, the needing to prove oneself, to belong. All we can do is soak up every ounce while we have it. The perfect simplicity of imperfection (indulge me).
How easy, and yet how uncommon. Thank You. God speed, good luck. May You watch over us all.
In the stupid movie he said to Stay Hungry, and Lord knows that it's true.
A missive sent at the closing of the tab, of sorts, and afterward I pulled the silicone, black and dusty, out of retirement and took it with me for duty, for the hunt. It had been a long time. The words hit me like arrows, little pieces of acid that penetrated what I thought was immutable, resolute. The afternoon waned, and the drive home was bittersweet in a way that it had not been for a long, long time. How funny it was, to realize how so much remains, despite the will's attempts to excoriate the weak spots.
I focused on the movement of the calves kicking up towards the back of the thigh as I tired near mile five. I thought of a waltz, and how the irregular and unfamiliar cadence could keep the body moving, engaged. My toes dug in towards each other, and it hurt, and I told myself that pain is a good teacher, and helps us to remember how to be strong. Made a mental note of what to do in May, when the goal was 13.1 and not just 6, and how to make it more comfortable for myself. Because everyone has a breaking point, even the stubborn.
Later, later, he wrapped me up in his arms and kissed the space next to my eye that closes when I laugh. Kissed the bone under my chin, my neck, my ear. I turned my body and breathed in a deep and greedy lung-full of his smell, kissing his neck and collarbone and the corners of his lips as a mutinous smile played on my own. What is this road we walk, how do we pretend to know where we are headed when the fog is so thick that even the tiniest light obscures the smallest insight.
All that remains is to be grateful. To cherish (perhaps greedily) the dance while we are able to move, and to not look back on the fools that we have been before. The naivete, the posturing, the needing to prove oneself, to belong. All we can do is soak up every ounce while we have it. The perfect simplicity of imperfection (indulge me).
How easy, and yet how uncommon. Thank You. God speed, good luck. May You watch over us all.
8.3.10
The post-it.
Watching her die from a folding chair in the corner of the room, I moved it from the bedside to the wall to escape the crushing insistence of the fan. The room smelled of lily flowers, and incontinence, and old coffee. She woke, and slept, and woke to sleep again, and talked through the surreal thrush of worlds that bridged the gap between lucid, and not. Over red wine and steak she told me that the night before she, my grandmother had a waking nightmare and in the hallucination told her I am evil, I have been bad, I am going to hell and can I kill myself? In her sobering honesty she answered, no you cannot, do you want to? She replied, Yes, yes I do. I do.
The sun was setting red and fat and vein-glorious to the west when I backed my car into its spot and, dismounting, wound my way inside, letting the smell acquire itself to my nostrils. The view at the threshold still startles me, she looks so wasted, small, defeated. She does not wear her false teeth anymore and her face caves in on itself around her mouth in a way that I am not yet used to. I remember the story I wrote in college, of the spunky old woman who wore lime green jackets and gold ballet slippers on Sunday to church, and led the charge out the door into the waiting Spring after the sermon had been delivered, guilt weighing heavily on all of the parishioners' shoulders, save hers. She told me then, God wants us to greet nature, and to find Him in the out of doors. We followed my grandfather's broad back into the sunlight and the smells of cut grass, and daffodils. Now when I tell her that in the morning the world smells of budding flowers and nectar it is with a resigned look of sadness that she accepts what is coming.
The color has been bled out of the room, and everything whispers in a hushed tone of grey and biege and quiet. She asks me questions about things that even I do not remember, and I wonder, is this how it happens? Do we even know what is important while we hold it? My phone vibrated in my pocket and he teased me, and I smiled, and I thanked God for the momentary lapse of introspection.
My mind turned back to a winter evening, years ago. We were so young, it is almost painful how young we were! The sun waned and cast their bedroom in an orb of blinding orange, and magenta. She sat, on their bed, soaking in the taste of loss, soaking in God knows what, because I was not there. Downstairs, but far enough away. A yellow sticky piece of paper, next to a makeup encrusted phone, next to a pushed together bed, next to five million years of history. She wrote hope is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without the words, and never stops at all.
Amen. God speed. Tomorrow is a last day for many of us. Let us live it to its full potential, let us never stop or doubt or wonder. May we love what we love, without exception.
May God hold you, and guide you, amen.
The sun was setting red and fat and vein-glorious to the west when I backed my car into its spot and, dismounting, wound my way inside, letting the smell acquire itself to my nostrils. The view at the threshold still startles me, she looks so wasted, small, defeated. She does not wear her false teeth anymore and her face caves in on itself around her mouth in a way that I am not yet used to. I remember the story I wrote in college, of the spunky old woman who wore lime green jackets and gold ballet slippers on Sunday to church, and led the charge out the door into the waiting Spring after the sermon had been delivered, guilt weighing heavily on all of the parishioners' shoulders, save hers. She told me then, God wants us to greet nature, and to find Him in the out of doors. We followed my grandfather's broad back into the sunlight and the smells of cut grass, and daffodils. Now when I tell her that in the morning the world smells of budding flowers and nectar it is with a resigned look of sadness that she accepts what is coming.
The color has been bled out of the room, and everything whispers in a hushed tone of grey and biege and quiet. She asks me questions about things that even I do not remember, and I wonder, is this how it happens? Do we even know what is important while we hold it? My phone vibrated in my pocket and he teased me, and I smiled, and I thanked God for the momentary lapse of introspection.
My mind turned back to a winter evening, years ago. We were so young, it is almost painful how young we were! The sun waned and cast their bedroom in an orb of blinding orange, and magenta. She sat, on their bed, soaking in the taste of loss, soaking in God knows what, because I was not there. Downstairs, but far enough away. A yellow sticky piece of paper, next to a makeup encrusted phone, next to a pushed together bed, next to five million years of history. She wrote hope is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without the words, and never stops at all.
Amen. God speed. Tomorrow is a last day for many of us. Let us live it to its full potential, let us never stop or doubt or wonder. May we love what we love, without exception.
May God hold you, and guide you, amen.
2.3.10
A week and a wake up.
We sent each other messages a year after it happened, and my mind fell back into the cold earth of that day, and where I was, and how I found out. The spiderweb of our network, how it was fragile but unbreakable and, like my mom used to tell us, that it knew no distance and could not be disrupted. No matter what. I talked to a few of them for hours the moments and days after, looking down upon a distant and gritty world from the high and sunny vantage point of a rented room, an isolated chamber. He told me that they left him alone for too long in a stark room of boiled fluorescence, dust on the floor. And what he thought, and the advice he told me to keep my loved ones close, and to keep God even closer.
A prayer offered up for him without fail everyday thereafter. He told me they won the challenge, despite my absence, and my happiness was bittersweet.
And then the debacle of the year to follow, and how crazy it is to look back now at all of the broken glass on the trail, all the snares and pitfalls. And the voice in the back of my head telling me to not worry, keep walking, you have shoes on. I still think of seeing the bullet-riddled car, with the cigarette packs and mix CDs laying on the passenger side, and how real it all became. Blood on the door. And that I can't watch the video anymore, like other memories that some self-reliant part of me has taken, and locked away, keeping it hidden from that part that might feel nostalgic one night, and run down the furrows of what should have been left behind, and perhaps never sowed at all. The feeling of the cold earth on bare feet, sometimes you can convince yourself that it's part of an effort to remember that you still feel.
The worst lie being the one you tell yourself.
It is different now. Morning light I slowly wake to the warmth of him, and a feeling of protection, and just being so lucky that it is almost unbearable. We dance and I focus on getting all of the moves right, as if were I to miss a step, the dream would be over and I would wake up to how it was. Before. Sometimes I pinch him just to be sure. No Christmas lights in a far away courtyard, no fleeting moments of normalcy, no more of that music, I threw it all away. Just a naked smile on my face and the way he kisses the corners of my lips when I laugh.
Be safe, be happy, keep running.
A prayer offered up for him without fail everyday thereafter. He told me they won the challenge, despite my absence, and my happiness was bittersweet.
And then the debacle of the year to follow, and how crazy it is to look back now at all of the broken glass on the trail, all the snares and pitfalls. And the voice in the back of my head telling me to not worry, keep walking, you have shoes on. I still think of seeing the bullet-riddled car, with the cigarette packs and mix CDs laying on the passenger side, and how real it all became. Blood on the door. And that I can't watch the video anymore, like other memories that some self-reliant part of me has taken, and locked away, keeping it hidden from that part that might feel nostalgic one night, and run down the furrows of what should have been left behind, and perhaps never sowed at all. The feeling of the cold earth on bare feet, sometimes you can convince yourself that it's part of an effort to remember that you still feel.
The worst lie being the one you tell yourself.
It is different now. Morning light I slowly wake to the warmth of him, and a feeling of protection, and just being so lucky that it is almost unbearable. We dance and I focus on getting all of the moves right, as if were I to miss a step, the dream would be over and I would wake up to how it was. Before. Sometimes I pinch him just to be sure. No Christmas lights in a far away courtyard, no fleeting moments of normalcy, no more of that music, I threw it all away. Just a naked smile on my face and the way he kisses the corners of my lips when I laugh.
Be safe, be happy, keep running.
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