Pulling a Carmen

So, following in the footsteps of my friend Carmen, I've decided to post a blog a day, cuz why not. I thoroughly enjoy reading hers each day, or a few in a row, like catching up with a friend - and keeping up with people in this busy world.

So, can I admit that I just wikipedia'd adam levine - that maroon 5 singer, after watching some of charlie day on SNL (on hulu; no tv ~ not a california thing, just a ... don't have a tv thing). And lord, have, mercy. My god. That is one hot jewish man. And god save me, there are actually hot jewish men in this world.

Now I know you can't chose (particularly) who you fall in love with, but boy, would it be nice to find a tall, handsome, jewish man. ... and while we're at it, employed. It's been interesting - as a semi-result of reading Carmen's blog, I bought and started to do the exercises in this book "Calling in the One". Now, gag if you must, but I did a lot of browsing in the "preview" on amazon, and it seemed like it was up my alley - very Artist's Way-style exercises and readings, and hey, why the f. not.  Now interestingly enough, I'm asked to look at what ways are my relationships with men a reflection of my relationship with myself - She, the author, asks, if we're picking up this book, in what ways is are we not loving, nurturing, or committing to ourselves ... and I knew immediately that there are tons of ways in which I am not committed to myself - to my dreams/goals/little internal nudges. And that is certainly mirrored back to me in the real world.

So, I've been reading this book, and doing these exercises - and shit you not, the week I was home in NJ was the week on "Letting Go" ... I'm not doing it all precisely one-a-day, but reading, flagging, going back, doing the exercises on more than one situation like she suggests. And things are changing. Take a look at my apartment!!

But, also, I recently downloaded from the SF Public Library on eBook (yes you can do this now!), What Color is your Parachute? It's a book about careers, career advice, how to figure out what you want, what you're good at. And so I'm now doing the exercises in this as well. Because, no, I am not committed to my dreams. I am always embarrassed to tell people I sing. No one's heard me (well, except Carmen actually, who once told me [after I'd just sung with a band in front of an audience of a hundred people...] that I was really good, and when I said "Really??", she said, No I'm just trying to sleep with you) ;) But more than just sing, I want to perform. I want to act, be on stage, riddle you with emotion - I wrote a poem about it once. About throwing you off the edge of a cliff and gently reeling you back in - about steamrolling you with emotion - and the fucked up thing is that I really do think I can. I really do believe that I have it in me to possess myself so completely that I might possess you too.

What a powerful thing is that?

Now, the advanced portion of this exercise, is to let myself head there.

This blog, I suppose, is a part of that. Emptying out my childhood home is a part of that. Finally completing the art project I began in July is a part of it ~ and I'll tell you something, It Looks Amazing. Even I'm proud of myself.

I've been realizing I have a pattern of thought/behavior lately, which states that I can only have happiness when I have success. I can only have love when I have a job. I can only have a career when I ... when I let myself take the hideously frightening action steps - even the baby ones, like call these two working actors I know in SF and set up coffee dates/informational interviews. So, putting up my artwork yesterday was part of spitting in the face of that belief - the art doesn't have to be perfect for it to go up (that was actually the purpose of that project - was to let myself paint it, no matter how it came out - and when it was done - it was done, no finnicking with it). The art doesn't have to be perfect to make me happy. I don't have to be perfect to be happy, because let's face it - that would be never. So, I've set up for myself a system of belief where I can never have love or joy in my life. And, in realizing this, I'm realizing how ultimately retarded it is, and I'm beginning to take action in the opposite direction.

Because maybe there's another Adam Levine out there just waiting for an actress/writer/singer. ... bass player ;)

(source: huffington post via Cosmo UK)

Excavation: Chapter 3

So, it's been bothering me that I have recently been writing about all this fucked up shit about my family and childhood, particularly now when I feel that I've been "doing so much better" and "moving beyond it." Or rather, truly feeling that it (the past) doesn't have the same power to inform my behavior and interpretation of the world that it used to have.

And so, I've been curious then to see that it's been coming out so much in my poetry. Then, I had a realization. I had begun a serial poem a few years ago titled "Excavation", and it has a few "chapters", Curiosity, and Betrayal, and a 2.5 that I can't find, But I'd always been curious as to when the next chapters would show up, and, I believe they are. I believe this is the work that is happening right now.

It occurs to me now that "excavation" is not just, dig stuff up and get rid of it. It's dig stuff up, examine it, and then get rid of it (or lay it aside, or hold it differently, etc.). And so, writing all these poems, I've recognized, is the examination. This is what these ancient pieces have to say; there's a reason they don't feel current, and that's because they're not. They're like fossils of an ancient emotion or experience, and my work now is just recording them. Acknowledging they exist, validating the experience, and setting them aside with honor, but without the power of tyranny.

I find comfort in this realization; that I am "moving beyond" these old wounds and experiences. But, I actually have to process them (record them) as I excavate them, or else they still have a hold on me, they're still unexamined, and therefore like the ghosts of souls who still have work left to do on this plane. By writing about them, I am finalizing the work of these experiences. By recording what was written in and on these fossils, I am laying them to a final rest. And so, "Excavation Chapter 3: Examination", so that eventually, I may come to the next chapter, Freedom.

Cadillac Beauty.

there are problems i hear referred to as “Cadillac problems,” which are thereby deemed unfit to be of actual import in the course of human maturation, and the person lamenting such problems should promptly be force-fed humble pie. however, labeling an experience as shallow and unworthy of examination hinders the degree of honesty a person can have with another.

and so, i will here attempt to be honest.

i have been ashamed to broach the subject with anyone until recently for fear of reprisal, or dismissal. or that i will be considered narcissistic, vapid, or ungrateful. and, throwing aside for one moment the imagined bitter murmurs of contempt and derision, i’d like to give voice to my struggle.

i am beautiful. i catch myself at moments when it reflects back to me so blatantly, i sometimes gasp. i sometimes pause with awe that this person is me. and sometimes, i find myself so in possession of these gifts, that i actually feel like i am inhabiting the skin given me, instead of wearing it like a cocktail dress that i want to tell people i bought at the second-hand store, so they don’t think i’m showing off.

there are moments when i own this body. the long lines of legs. the carved cheekbones, and ravenous almond eyes. the legs are the hardest. they’re so damn visible. i can hide the eyes and cheeks behind glasses or matted hair. and i usually hide my thirty-six inches of legs under pants or dresses to my knees, but this weekend, i wore shorts. not booty, i-can-see-the-fine-china shorts, just shorts. ones that exposed the vast expanse of thighs that are pale white, in comparison to my tanned arms, because i keep them hidden away. because they cause whiplash, and traffic accidents.

sort of.

what they do cause, what i cause, are turned heads. and i can’t begin to tell you how uncomfortable that can be. hence, the Cadillac problems. imagine? me lamenting that i get stared at by men? some men; some times. but they do, and it makes me so very hyper aware of myself, i start to wonder if this body i have is mine or not. if i am actually in possession of it. or, as i have often done, if i should shrink away inside of my own skin so i can’t feel your stares, or the glares of the woman you’re with.

as i become more comfortable and confident within myself, my life, my body, i begin to walk in it – the life and the body – differently, more fully. and thusly, i find myself attracting attention that i don’t get when covered by layers of “don’t look at me.” and so, i am looked at, which is okay, and sometimes fun, but sometimes intrusive, as if a conversation i’m having is being eavesdropped upon – and in some ways it is. it’s a conversation, a relationship, with myself that i am having, and flaunting, and caressing – and you, sir, are a voyeur.

and sometimes, sir, you are with a woman. and she looks at you, and sees you looking at me – then, she looks at me. and i feel suddenly branded with a scarlet A, like i am now a harlot, a siren attempting to lure away your man. when really, lady, i’m just buying fruit. when really, dude, you’re with a girl. and i feel so uncomfortable in those moments. like not only has my brilliant moment of self-possession been besmirched, but also, your moment as a couple.

a friend told me recently that she is afraid to introduce me to men she likes for fear they’ll think i’m cuter than she is. and besides the fact she herself is stunning, and that i told her she didn’t have to then introduce me to any men she thought were cute, i felt icky. like somehow being the woman i am is a bad thing. that being beautiful, or walking with poise is wrong. that i should shrink to let couples have their moments, and friends feel secure.

that by hiding my light, as they say, i will make room for other people.

however, this conclusion is erroneous.

perhaps it may be possible that owning what i am, who i am, what i’ve been given can be a bolster to others to do the same. perhaps not. but perhaps it is possible that i can allow myself to shine as brilliantly as i care to shine without fear of reprisal. without fear of being shot down - without fear that i ought to shoot myself down. maybe it’s possible for me to stand in my skin when men look, single or not, and allow myself to be seen. affirming that i can claim myself, life, and body. and not be ashamed.

because, in the end, it's about ownership of all of myself, not just the external, but also the shy, dorky, blemished, tentative parts.

but, too, it is about owning this external piece of me. this piece that i am sometimes awed by, sometimes mad at, sometimes prod and poke and suck in and lament and feed gallons of ice cream to and wonder if i'm "enough." sometimes i’m just a woman. and sometimes, i would just like to feel that being a woman engaged in this social world is not a Cadillac problem.

trauma and literature

i’ve been watching that show parenthood on hulu lately, and i’ve been crying at every episode. i’ve been writing lately about my mother, and how much she hurts and hurt me and how i hate her, even though i don’t, but there are significant parts of me that still do, and i don’t know how to reconcile them yet, or at all. and so there’s the writing that has to be done, because there’s nothing else to do about it. i haven’t been able to exorcise this stuff out of me.

i was in my creative writing class last semester and we were workshopping a book of my poetry, and the second poem, the one that follows the martyr poem is about me. and my mom. and her telling me about her online affair with a 19 year old. when i myself was eighteen. and her telling me they met through an online chatroom about leather … fetishes i assume is the right word there. you can read the poem. but the ‘funny’ thing about it was in workshop the teacher asked the class who they thought the woman was in the poem, because it certainly couldn’t be the mom, even though that’s who it seems to be; that no one’s mom would talk like that. that it simply couldn’t be. true.

and at the end of the class i said as much. i said it was a mom, my mom. and everyone was silent for that beat too long when something awkward has been said, and you don’t know how to react. much like in the poem itself.

and so, how does it end? does forgetting happen, or numbing, or leaving or reconciling. surely, i know this isn’t the worst motherly behavior. surely i know people who have had trauma greater than mine. but. to acknowledge it as trauma … isn’t enough. it's not full enough, or un-cliche enough. it doesn’t lessen it, or make it better, or take it away.

i was in my senior year of college, only a few months away from institutionalization, though i didn’t know it at the time. i only knew i was drinking in class by then. in film class though. experimental film. the only way to watch bunuel, of course. i was taking a class called trauma and literature. we read books about domestic violence, the holocaust, slavery. and i remember. mostly i remember this one book about domestic violence where the man slams a kitchen drawer on his blonde wife’s fingers, severing them, and we hear and see through her eyes that moment of necessitated numbness when she doesn’t feel anything because she can’t. because it’s too massive to feel anything at all. and so she’s intrinsically protected by her body and all of human decendency, and i know that moment. that suspension before the agony. i lived that suspension. and i don’t know how to land those moments. how to lay them down, how to put them to rest.

and so i watch television that makes me weep, and i ache in a place that is unchartable. and i wait for something to change. for change to overcome me like long awaited sleep. for it to catch up to me and allow me to let go of my breath and trust that maybe for once, and yet maybe for the millionth time, i can be safe in whatever’s happening, drawer or no drawer – i have to believe that something. will change. mainly because it must.

a year in verbs.

It’s sort of amazing. I have the most divine sense of productiveness and accomplishment and wonder and gratitude. “I did it; We did it” were the 1st words out of my mouth this morning. And I/we did do it.

I wrote many poems, I read many poems, I discussed many poems. I meditated. I led a meditation. I participated in a seder. I mixed neutral black. I painted wood planks, and paper and canvas. I used power tools. I auditioned for live modeling. I made new friends and firmed up old ones. I took care of myself and dropped a class that didn’t work for me. I spoke in class. I learned to speak less openly opinionated in class.

I was disappointed by a bad review and I was supported thru that. I was in the vagina monologues. I talked to people and I felt respectful of my need for quietude and solitude. I allowed my writing to surprise me and change. I wrote a poem a day for a while. I learned how I write best. I listened to the experience of others and took the advice of my advisor. I did it. We did it.

I likely wouldn’t have made it on my own, or not nearly as successfully, or evenly, despite still the trial of it. It was hard. It was a trial, and there were errors and there were successes. I walked hobbled thru a breakup in this time. I volunteered to read in public. I was pushed and friendily coaxed to read in public after the disheartening review.

This was an accomplishment. This was the very definition of one, if I knew the definition.

I relied on the knowledge and experience of a former student/current poet who walked me out of the “what the f*ck am I doing here” moments. I took myself to the movies.

This was a triumph of perseverance and self-care. And the magic is that I can now acknowledge that I have these qualities, that I can exercise generosity and consideration toward myself, which is what coming to school was/is for me in the 1st place. This whole adventure and experience is an opportunity to show myself that I have respect for my desires, my artistic tuggings. That I haven’t dismissed these pulls is a demonstrative powerhouse of triumph for me and my path of integrity.

The/my path in front of me is no more clear as to outcome, destination, or result than it was when I began, but as this magnum list of rewards, transformations, and accomplishment suggests, the outcome isn’t nearly as important as the rewards garnered along the way. Along, beside, because of this path I have chosen, the make-up of me is changing. The way I engage the world is shifting, and confidence, humility, respect for others are firming up. I did know that the path was the end in itself, and I’m tickled, awed, and delightedly expectant at the bounty it has already provided. Amen.


May 4th, 2011.

The Pan Story

I was walking home yesterday afternoon, when it occurred to me.

I love to cook eggs. I’d been cooking eggs every morning, in the same pan, for three years. It was a black pan with a red bottom, as I liked to envision my future kitchen being kind to black pans with red bottoms. But this pan, had seen better days. The surface of the pan was shredding, and each morning more bits of egg would cling to more bits of iron, and surely I was eating more iron than was found in the eggs alone. And each morning, as I was earnestly scraping bits of egg from between the threads of raised, raw metal, I would tell myself I needed to get a new pan.

But I didn’t. Each day, I would cook eggs in the thoroughly aggravating way, with the thoroughly aggravating pan. And even took to microwaving the eggs so I wouldn’t have to deal with the pan. The pan with the red bottom. The pan that had been the first real piece I’d bought when I moved into my last apartment. My first apartment to myself in several years. And so I kept this damned pan, cursing it, and each day putting it back in the cupboard. After all, I am a student, living on student loans; I couldn’t really afford a pan right now. Plus my car was stolen a little while ago, so I couldn’t really get to the store that would sell the kind of pan I wanted anyway. And so on…

Until. One morning. I’d had enough. I put the pan in the garbage can.

The next day I took it out. Washed it, ripping up another sponge, and used it.

A few weeks later, I put it in the garbage can again, and took the garbage out to the building’s dumpster. The pan was no longer useful to me. Or to anyone really. It was now, after years of good service, not suited to my needs.

Two days later, I was walking home and out front of the apartment building next to mine, someone had put a box of moving-out items: mugs, magazines, candles, and… a pan. The pan wasn’t what I wanted it to be – medium sized Teflon with a red bottom – but it was exactly what I needed. A pan, with a smooth cooking surface, in reasonable condition. I took it home.


And so, I remembered the pan story as I was walking home yesterday afternoon. Not long ago, I’d ended a relationship that was not working for me. I had been waffling on that decision lately, agonizing over whether I had done the right thing. Wasn’t “good enough” good enough? Why isn’t “good enough” good enough for me? Can’t it have been?

And so, I remembered the pan story. If my Higher Power, or the Universe, is able to put a pan perfect for my use directly in my path just when I needed it, isn’t that same power able to provide me with a relationship that is mutually wonderful just when I’ll need it? I realized then, that perhaps, Yes. Perhaps relationships, as with kitchenware, are under G-d’s domain, and I can let it go, leave it be, and continue to walk in my life until I come across the relationship-sized box.

(P.S. My goal by the end of the week is to buy myself a new, red-bottomed, Teflon pan.)

Metal and Red

(fiction class 'group' story - each person to write a story referencing kevin bacon - yes, 6 degrees of kevin bacon - and yes, just kevin, or just bacon could be used) ;) enjoy!

Kevin stood nonplussed over the warm fleshy body and watched transfixed as the blood pooled underneath Mr. T.’s shaved scalp, darkening the red rug. The metal picture frame tumbled end over end, image back image back, from his hand in a suspended eerie slow motion. It was the clatter of the metal as it bounced off the plush onto the hardwood that jolted Kevin out of his reverie.

He blinked his amber eyes, and looked up and around Mr. T.’s sparse law office, which felt no more or less impersonal than it always did. Sleek, sharp -- corporate -- lines and manicured dark woods. The kind of office that was too stoic to concern itself with the personalities it harbored, a structured tabula rasa which housed any new executive with the same masculine malaise, and remained unaffected by the dramatic disturbance it now witnessed.

The only scrap of deviation from this elegant vacuity was the ruby rug that had been delivered earlier that day. The chicano and Black man wore blue jeans, and buttoned-down short-sleeved shirts embellished with a patch expressing their first name, and printed on the back with their company’s. Mr. T. had peeked out of the corner of his eye to note two things. Firstly, to ensure the delivery men didn’t scrape the metallic and black leather chairs across the richly-oiled floor, and secondly to observe that the young black man reminded him vaguely of a photo he’d seen of his nephew in the holiday newsletter his mother sent each year to the seven children and the spreading branches of half, step, and full grandchildren.

Mr. T., unlike his office, had had to learn to be remote and unemotional, to be the aggressive shark instead of the Black black sheep prosecuting the White white-collars. Such voracity allowed little room for compassion, or appreciation of the subtle or often passionate gifts of human relationships. The last woman he’d involved himself with was during his first year of law school, almost twenty years before. Ruby, he almost smiled nostalgically.

This brief and rare reminiscence therefore seemed apropos when later that evening Mr. T. rose to approach the same young Black man who had been in his office just hours before. And as he crossed onto the red carpet, he realized it wasn’t the newsletter photo this man resembled—it was his own mirror, twenty years before. The broad and proud nostrils, the heavy eyebrows that masked seclusion but could blaze scorn.

Mr. T’s final coherent vision before clutching the striking and sudden pain in his wide chest was the name patch on the man’s chest. It read, Kevin.



December 2, 2010