part one

a memory, 1999

my mother is sitting next to me in the car, driving. i'm a youngun just starting to be aware of BODY HAIR. my best friend shaves her legs and i am ashamed that i don't yet because i'm convinced that the girls who sit behind me and whisper are whispering about me (even though my leg hair was and has always been basically invisible). i'm afraid to even ask about shaving because that would be admitting that i even have leg hair in the first place. my mother - the image of a southern femme with her tan legs, big permed hair, dark red lipstick - is unaware of her part in the internal battle within me.

my mother doesn't shave her legs above her knees, so against her tan lies a downy coat of blonde hair that disappears under the hem of her shorts. the hairs are curly but calm, neither short nor long, dense like a suburban lawn.

i'm 11, and i think it's gross. i tell her i think it is weird. those are my words. "that's weird, ma," i tell her. "why don't you shave your whole leg?" and she looks at me, eyebrows raised over her sunglasses. "i like how it looks," she says. my memory is conflicted, because i remember in that moment that her reaction meant she didn't give a shit. also in my memory is that she didn't have that downy coat the following summer.

now, i think about it and am irritated by the insecure asshole child i was. then, i only saw what i imagined my friends would see and judge: d rene's bizarre mom with the hairy legs and no-bra. now, i think about her hairy legs and our complicated relationship and i wish that, just once, i had rested my head in her lap to feel it on my face. ma, if only i could grow leg hair thick like yours. so lush, and soft, and oh how it shone golden in the texas summer.

jbdb

moving to baltimore on monday with charm city and there's a huge part of me that is very excited and ready, but right now i am just sad. my room is sorta almost packed and i'm listening to robyn which is pretty ridiculous and i puked a while ago from either nerves or acid-tummy. who knows. the sky is getting dark and it's making me panic.

i really want to take a shower but the hot water heater went off, again, so i have to wait an hour after i reset it. this has been a plague upon our house all summer, where the hot water heater randomly turns itself off. the first time, we called the super, she sent over her brother, and he did some magic in the basement for us. or so we thought. after it happened 4 or 5 more times, the brother agreed to show us how to do it ourselves (instead of, you know, fixing it) where previously he had refused saying it really was a better idea for him to do it himself. so we follow him into the basement, which is mad creepy by the way, and he says: "this one, on the right, is your house. see how it says #15 on it. follow the power cord, like this," as he moves the flashlight beam, "to the outlet." he proceeds to unplug it, then plug it back in, and the heater starts up again. it was that easy.

my housemate and i said goodbye, twice, and after each time i cried pretty helplessly for a while. i'm even crying now! i'm such a softie. guthrie and i haven't known each other for years but i'm still very sad to leave our house, aka the homestead, and a friendship that i feel did not have nearly enough time. our schedules this summer were so like ships passing in the night that i regret not making more time for just hangin out with them... and even though i know we will see each other soon, it's really more the symbolism than anything else. saying goodbye to people that i've been through so much with, who stuck with me and i with them. it makes me so sad that i can't even wax anything about it. it just is what it is. i usually spend more time on my blog entries, making them interestingly written and less like a stupid captain's log, but i just can't right now y'all.


maybe someday we'll actually do karaoke to 'somethin like that' by tim mcgraw.

brought to you by the letters A and P

so this is how my afternoon went after i got home from work: first i laid in bed and didn't do anything but read everything the internet has to say and was surprised to realize that i was in the dark cause it had been gradually getting darker but i hadn't noticed. then i was grossed out by how lazy that is and got up to Be Productive, i.e. feed myself or clean my room, ideally both, and instead drank some RC cola out of the bottle in my underwear and thought about how tasty a sandwich would be but decided to have a photoshoot with the cat and write a blog post instead.


this summer is not as hot as last summer when i was in new york city but it's still fucking hot, y'all. most of my time is spent at the ice cream shop where i work, swimming, taking cold showers, and finding the exact position of my fan for maximum breeze. it's a good life. i have a lot of time to get in trouble and a lot of time to do nothing. at night i watch arnold palmer the cat purrsue (!) a fruitless relationship with owl cat from Outside, who comes every night to sit on the banister next to my window and they mournfully meow at each other and i feel bad for standing in the way of what could be a beautiful relationship but damn. owl cat is creepy. (owl cat is called owl cat cause he has black spots right below his eyes so at night / in low lighting he looks like his eyes are fucking huge and totally black.)

anyway, the point of this thing is that now i've done something and maybe will go on to do more things! like play lasers with the cat or other things with the cat since i'm obsessed.

dedicated to the few

a lot of people talk about how great facebook is for reuniting with people who have fallen by the wayside over the years - former classmates, estranged relatives, whatever - but it does not help at all with the people who you sometimes miss, but have burned bridges with. when that kid who taunted you mercilessly in middle school friends you, saying "fuck off asshole" and clicking "deny" feels good and is easy. but what about those people, those "friends," who you can still stalk and check up on, but would never ever let them know about it?

the people who have been significant in my life that i now intentionally no longer talk to are a blessed few. for one of them, it was my own decision that i am (usually) glad i made. another, it was her decision to cut ties with me for what i imagine was self-preservation, hurt, or not knowing how to deal. i can't say for sure because, well, she cut ties with me. there was one i ceremoniously un-friended from facebook and i doubt that he ever even realized it.

i wonder sometimes if these people ever think of me, ever mourn the way things ended, ever talk about me. what do they say? what do these people take away after knowing me?

does it matter? probably not. is it curiosity that makes me wonder, or insecurity?

in moments of weakness i am tempted (and have, at times) reached out just one more time to the other half of a broken relationship. today i was thinking about one person who is rarely in my thoughts these days, wondering where she is, wondering if she's changed, and dare i say it, missing her presence in my life. part of it is nostalgia for a period of my life that was, in almost all ways, miserable. what's that about? but i think about sitting on that porch in the summertime, about riding bikes together, those first few weeks of dizzying lust, and i feel weird. not good-weird, or bad-weird. i just wonder if she thinks about those times.

i can "discuss" (read: argue) for hours without feeling satisfied. i can say my fiercest goodbyes to a terrible influence on my self-worth and two years later contemplate inviting them back into my life. for me, there's no such thing as enough closure.

as i sit here in my pajamas, heating pad on my achin' back, it occurs to me that i'm really happy.

i am graduating college. wait what? i'm graduating college. out of school for the first time in 17 years. what does that even mean?

so things are great, i have a million hours a day to do whatever the fuck i want, and that includes writing interesting blog posts. maybe tomorrow.

thoughts

"what would happen if one woman told the truth about her life? the world would split open."
muriel rukeyser, from käthe kollwitz

things i intend to do after div iii:
eat more gd vegetables

finish finish finish finish finish

i love writing about the lesbian avengers but right now i'm over it.

and another thing

i miss texas so much. so fucking much. barton springs and the intersection of lamar and 6th and the drive out to my house and my dogs and my parents and the horses and my stupid evil cat and sagan's house and drinking coronas under covered patios or on a boat out on the lake. camping and driving my mama's big truck and, dare i say it, kase 101 radio. the rusty spur and the capitol lawn and the bat bridge and just everything.

week of brutal honesty

two events are the impetus for this:

1. one of my oldest friends from junior high is getting a tattoo. she and i and our other friends were very close with a particular teacher at our school who was young and hip and allowed us to fuck around like the fuck ups we were. he died a year after we went to high school on april first. it's hard to explain the significance of this briefly, but i still think about him seven years later and wonder how my life would've been had he not died. i am almost positive that his death is what made me appreciate the study of history, among other things. cooking, too. so my friend is getting a tattoo of his glasses which, today, would be real stylish y'all. but back then they were nothing more than one of the many distinguishing characteristics of this man. i should probably write about mr owens sometime because he was the first person close to me to die among other more important things. i wrote a song about him once. every year for maybe 5 years after he died i would write him a letter.

2. on saturday evening i went to a seder, put together by some of my friends. it was my first time so i don't have anything to compare it to, but i'm still thinking about it so i think that means it was good.  for one of the parts of the seder, i had my hands washed by the person next to me and was supposed to state something i wanted to learn to let go of. everyone went through the same process, either silently or not.

i wanted to let go of not being able to let go. i didn't say it out loud because, at first, i didn't realize that that was what i was thinking. i was thinking about the people and the things and the moments in my life right now that still make me uneasy, upset, or just sad, depending on the time of day. they were connected by my inability or unwillingness to let go of them.  i don't think that's an uncommon human tradition, but for some reason my way of executing it feels different and a little more frantic.  a little more desperate. what's that about?

anyway, the same friend getting said tattoo used to do this thing in high school called the "week of brutal honesty" where she would list 7 lies she allowed people to believe and 7 truths she often denied.

and so i give you, my week of brutal honesty.

some lies i usually allow people to believe:

- the majority of my break-ups have been truly mutual (maybe it looks that way on the surface but i'm pretty sure i'm almost always the saddest about it ending)

- i'm totally comfortable with myself

- i'm over it

- i don't get jealous

- i brush my teeth every night

some truths i often deny:

- i don't really trust people to treat me well

- sometimes i'm scared of the dark

- if i got in a fist fight, i don't know if i would win

- i'll argue a point even if i don't believe entirely in it just because i don't like to be wrong

- i absolutely hate feeling left out

- one time a few years ago i knowingly drank the rest of my housemate's juice out of revenge

that last one has never really come up but it sure feels good to get that off my chest. and, here is something that i will never let go of:

i fucking loved that truck.

ripe as a peach

also:

handle with care

this morning, i took charm city to the airport and instead of going immediately back to bed, i decided to enjoy the morning that i rarely see. so i'm sitting at the haymarket with a warm(!) oatcake and tea. i guess this means i'm becoming an adult, all with the being up early thing.

i'm not even going to talk about the time between me and graduating. but i am forming plans including buying a scooter and a summer spent reveling in being out of school for the first time since i was 5 and drinking beers.

which is all i have to say.

that grrl thinks she's the queen of the neighborhood

here's a collection of thoughts:

- i wish la roux wasn't such a terrible person.
- i'm starting to come around to the word "pussy" (hah get it, "come" around)
- i may be one of those people who likes to make my bed everyday now (thanks charm city)
- i wonder how much time i actually waste in relation to how much time i think i waste
- i pass div iii on my birthday
- i stopped taking birth control 3 weeks ago and it was the best decision i've made in a long time, because now my moods are back to normal and i'm not 90% depressed all the time
- but my period is coming and the pain that will surely accompany it scares me cause i'm back at square one

the end, but here's this:

warning: vague

well, this is unexpected.

so, have a poem, by e e cummings.
-
in spite of everything
which breathes and moves,since Doom
(with white longest hands
neatening each crease)
will smooth entirely our minds

-before leaving my room
i turn,and(stooping
through the morning)kiss
this pillow,dear
where our heads lived and were.

today's date is a palindrome

goals for 2k10 / life:

1. pursue more of what makes me happy
2. let it go
3. worry less
4. eat more fruit
5. graduate college
6. spend less time on the computer
7. and more time outside, once it's not a fucking tundra
8. be less cautious and more deliberate
9. be a good daughter
10. be honest, always