2 a.m.

I had a dream tonight. DH and I were in bed and the ceiling started dripping. One drop in my face... pause... maybe I imagined it... then another. Next thing I know we're watching the storm from our second story bedroom. Trees are flying through the air. I realize we're in peril. One comes toward the house, wiping out the first floor. Magically, dreamily, the second floor is still standing. Then I'm walking, surveying the Africa-like landscape. I see kangaroos. And land-bound water buffalo. I don't think I can count them. Then I understand I don't need to, I just need to take them in. And the moment I decide to accept the beauty of it, a water buffalo starts lunging at me, hitting the trees that I hide behind with its formidable forehead.

This hostile environment -- the flying trees, the lunging animals -- is the suburbs. I haven't been writing because I can't afford to be in touch with how I feel about it all, the fear, the resentment. But DH said something that brought it all to the surface. We met with a friend from NY and DH told her that this place wouldn't even make the top 20 places we would like to live (it was a clear and un-accidental We). And I thought later, Carrie-Bradshaw-on-her-Mac style, What does it mean to live in a place that isn't in your top 20? What does it mean to give up waking up in the morning and seeing a place, city, view that makes you happy?

And I'm not sure it's fair. Not whether it's not fair of him, but it may not be fair of me, to myself. What kind of loyalty do I have to myself to let this happen, to drag myself to a place I find banal, where I feel no vitality and have no connections. And, in my defense, it's not as though any of the places I have loved have made me happy. To wake up pleased with one's habitat in no way guarantees that one's day will be lively and satisfying. And, my life is now filled with beautiful things, like a daughter, and stepsons, and a partner who understands what it means to be a partner. I'm still not confident in the honesty component, but the rest, the rest is irreproachable.

But still, I wonder.

month four

He's out of town today. Off to work, to make money to give to her. She gets a lot for five years. That's part of my penance for being a parasite, I have to share him with her. I empty the dishwasher because he's stressed and i want to help as he builds his business to support her. So it is.

I don't ache for the physical anymore. Everything is intellectual. I explain to myself that I'm lucky to have him and this home and this life. I explain to myself that what he's doing feels good. I explain to myself that I love him and I'm lucky to feel that love. And all of it is true. I just don't feel it.

Like I don't feel close to my brother. I wonder it it's autism. I wonder how I will love my children, if I won't resent their perpetual need, if I will savor the daily drain.

rides and doctors

The boys were here last night. They have boundless energy. They went on a bike ride with DF on the trailer bike and then we all rode/walked to the park and ran around some more. They eventually ran out of steam, and that’s when they just start falling down. They get up and try to keep going but their motor skills are giving out and there’s nothing they can do.

DF and I don’t interact at all when we’re with the boys. It’s purely and utterly about them. I brought it up after they left and he said What am I supposed to do? and It will be easier when they’re older.

I thought it would be fun to make fondue with cheddar cheese soup, so we prepared bread and rotini and meatballs and Cheezits and put them out with bowls of the soup. Gavin pretty much started crying and he agreed to try it but the meatball he tried wasn’t cooked through so he had to spit it out and we gave him SpaghettiOs instead. That’s when I reached my threshold. And I tried to get ice to mix a drink, but the freezer ice dispenser on the fridge sticks now, and spits water or ice until it’s ready to stop, so I got ice all over the floor. And G asked what I was doing and I said getting water and he said What water? and I went and sat on the couch with the newspaper. DF made me a drink and then we put on an I Love Trains video, and we had a nice time sitting together for the last 45 minutes of their visit.

Today we’re meeting with Dr. PC. We’re still prohibited from having overnights. We thought they were supposed to start last week when I got here—a one-night overnight that would transition to a full weekend. But it didn’t work out that way. We were waylaid, and the week of my move was full of faxes between the lawyers and, finally, a call from Dr. PC saying we would meet [this] week to begin overnights. I have no idea what we’re in for, but I’m prepared for the worst. XW has proven to be very persuasive. The abandoned mother is a powerful figure, and so is the wanton home wrecker. But I’m going to wear a light blue or a light pink shirt and I’ll probably even blow-dry my hair and I’m not going to yell at her unless she tells us that I shouldn’t be present during overnights.

I have it all worked out in my mind—With all due respect, Dr. PC, you’ve been lied to and duped—and I’ll explain to her how manipulative and desperate XW is. But I’m not successful even in my mind, and Dr. PC is either not persuaded or she’s too embarrassed to correct herself. So then I have to yell at her that she’s unprofessional and that it’s a critical time for the boys and she’s affecting how they will develop relationships with their father and with me and with women 20 years from now. It doesn’t go well. And then the boys can’t sleep over, or they do and I sleep in the living room, and DF and I face one more stress.

Mostly I wish I knew what XW was thinking. To me, she is half victim and half persecutor.

subjectivity

I wonder if lives are like religions, where you have to believe on some level that yours is the right one.

day four

I'm disoriented when I wake up. And there's at least one break down a day. I don't really feel like I belong here. I feel like I slipped in. I acclimate like my cat, wandering from room to room, covering my territory, making ever larger circles -- the living room the bedroom the yard the Giant and back to home base. Next to a yoga class, and back. Then to town, down the streets and marking landmarks and then back.

There are too many boxes still. And DF is at times overly deferential, clearing off a shelf or emptying a closet. It's a minefield. Neither of us know which sacrifices become resentment.

The house is full of windows and from the living room I can watch a single breeze shake trees on three sides of me. You realize your being kept safe. You begin to forget that you're in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the country. You begin to relax.

next week

We're starting a brand new life together in 5 days. It's camouflaged a bit by the fact that he's been there a couple of months already, but next week it becomes our home. And it's partly an extension of our lives together now, but it also something entirely different.

jet lag

We got back on Saturday. I'm still a couple of hours off. DF went to MD to see his kids so I've been left to recover peacefully. It's for the best, of course. It was our first period of time together so constantly. And our first vacation. It went better than I thought and worse than he thought. He's more sensitive than I am. And has more of a fantasy. But he's also more resilient. So when we got back – waiting for our bags, riding in the cab, squeezing everything into the elevator for a one-floor ride to my apartment – he was his usual affectionate and good natured self, while I was irritable and carnivorous. I’ve never seen anything like it. I’m seething and critical, flinching at almost everything he says, and he asks what he can do. “Remember you love me,” I say, not sure why he does. Meanwhile I sit quietly beside him cataloging what’s wrong with everything he says. Technical. Inorganic. Inaccurate. Naïve.

When we get back he goes to get a haircut from the Russians across the street. They always make him look like a college kid, and I look and feel much older by comparison. I always imagine the difference increasing exponentially as we age. He’s twenty-three days older than me, but undamaged by years of California tanning and obscene teenage and college drinking. He was an athlete, and he still wears the discipline, and the youthful vigor of hours of training and conscientious rationing of protein and carbs. I picture our evolution, his Jack LaLanne to my Courtney Love. Sometimes I can feel a martini yellowing my eyes and weighing down my cheeks and drying out my cells and polluting my liver and eroding my brain stem. And beside me: his vigor. Muscular, upright, sex-ready, legs too thick for most jeans, breathing evenly in sleep, nothing malodorous save his morning dump, which smells the same day after day, his body working ever so steadily on whatever goes into it.

He wakes up amorous. Ever amorous. I remind myself this is a good thing, even though I wish he had something to tell me about besides his desire. Back from breakfast I coax myself into wanting sex. It’s always good with him, but the birth control pill squelches most of my desire. The vibrator helps. The hum of it is soothing like a glass of wine would be. And soon I feel the fire and it’s almost like the first months we were together, before we pumped my body full of extra hormones. Again I feel the Mrs. Robinson to his Benjamin Braddock, but now I don’t mind so much.

Soon after, he checks the train schedule and takes a cab to Penn Station and gets on the Regional. Soon after that he’s shopping for milk and macaroni and cheese and picking up his sons for a sixteen-hour overnight visit. He would drive thirty hours for that visit if he had to. He would drive that far for me, too.

girl

my inner child loves 15 year old rum.
she doesn't like explaining herself. she
loves making the bed. and folding clothes.
and making small drawings. a few years
ago her piano teacher asked her out. she
sat on the couch while he called and hung
up about ten times and she hasn't tickled
the ivories much since. she's sensitive like
that. easily discouraged. i tell her the world
is benign but i don't think she believes me.

lonely week

This bed's surface leads only to its edge. I traverse it looking for you. If it were round I would orbit it. Trying to find you. Listening for your breath. Breathing for your scent. Seeking something warmer and harder than the soft give I find. Hunting for you. And your sleep. It makes mine sounder. Your solid puts me at ease. Your solid warm hard that mostly loves makes the bed a place I fit. Not wander.

overheard in new york

Little girl: Mommy, can you please get me a balloon?
Mother: I'm sorry dear, but they don't make them anymore.
(14th Street & 8th Avenue)

Tween girl #1: She's been in this bitchy mood all week and when I asked her why she said she just got back from the Holocaust Memorial.
Tween girl #2: Holo--oh, that Jewish thing with all the candles? Why does that have a memorial?
(Dumbo)

compliments of Overheard in New York

Thirteen

I went to the Red Cross of NY website and it turns out that they've had an overwhelming response to hurricane Katrina and they are not taking any more volunteers. This should come as no surprise, I suppose. New Yorkers know tragedy. Not that I was here on 9/11. I moved here one month later. As many people understandably fled the city, I wanted to get back to it. It was the only way I could think of to show my solidarity. And of course I never would have come back if events had not conspired to make it possible. The job became available, as did the sublet. Now I don't think that That Than Which Nothing Greater Can Be Conceived actually wanted me to be in New York, or thought I should be in New York. But I do think that the world opens doors for us and invites us through them – makes some things more possible than others.

I called my mother in Santa Barbara. She is interviewing for the Red Cross there and sending people South. She told me that they were sending people without the normal requisite training because they needed people down there in a hurry. It was two to three days as opposed to whatever is normally required. And Santa Barbara was not experiencing an overwhelming response, so she would be able to ship me out if I made my way to SB first. By the time I made up my mind to go, or rather to try to go, she told me not to bother. She said to wait until the initial response had dies down, said they'd be sending people for years, said to wait until I was working part-time instead of full-time.

I'm waiting for a lot of things until then.

I was out with DF and a friend and I started telling them about the organizations I'm considering volunteering with. One of them is called HIPS and, from what I can tell, they work with sex industry workers to help them stay healthy and safe. Seemed simple to me. But DF was appalled. Doesn't know why I would want to associate myself with those people. Says they make a choice and that he doesn't want to laud that "profession" in any way. I'm still not sure why he got so upset about it, and actually yelled at me in front of our friend. But he did. I suspect it has something to do with compassion, and who I have it for. He doesn't think I have much for him.

So then "Thirteen" was on yesterday, with Holly Hunter, Evan Rachel Wood, Nikki Read and Jeremy Sisto, all phenomenal, and we watched their lives unravel, and watched Hunter shellshocked, like when her finger was cut off, just trying to hang on to life and a little sanity. I hoped maybe DF got it a little, got that some of those "choices" people make are really other choices in disguise.