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.

lying liars

I just found out my fiancé was on Lavalife last October. This is while we were definitely seeing each other, definitely exclusive, and he was definitely giving me all kinds of crap all up and down for hanging out with ex-boyfriends and wearing sexy clothes and trying to hold on to my "single life". Two months later he broke up with me for a week. Apparently he only spoke on the phone with Lauren, and they never met, but my oh my is my fiancé a good liar, what with all of his indignance. In fact, he lied exquisitely to his wife while we were falling in love.

Of course I thought that it was a function of his relationship, and of his being "trapped" in an "inauthentic" life. I didn't realize that lying was a function of his borderline narcissistic personality disorder. Of course I can't bring up narcissism. Ever since it was brought up in his divorce proceedings, if I allude to it at all, he says, "Oh, I guess that's just me being narcissistic," as though it were patently absurd.

So that's when we talked about honesty.

"You know that I'll tell you the truth no matter what, right?... It feels good knowing you can trust me, right?... Makes you feel safe?... Well I don't feel very safe now."

Not that I did before. We've were entrenched in his divorce for 18 or 19 months. Now we're still fighting for my right to sleep in the house when his sons are over. Throughout all of it I've been vilified - paramour, drug user, meretricious relationship - and then every once in while I find out some little piece of information I should have known already. It's astonishing, but that frog in boiling water bullshit is right on. As long as it doesn't get hot all at once, you adjust. And adjust.

So this Lavalife crap is just one more thing. Oddly enough, it's a relief to see he at least started to explore other possibilities. I'm choosing him after a lifetime of dates and relationships and crushes and false starts, and he's jumping from one lily pad right smack onto the next. So honestly, I was glad to see the impulse was there. But hey, for future reference, I could do without the secrecy and hypocrisy.

on lying

I said to my fiancee, without laughing:

When you lie to me, the molecules of my body don't fit with the molecules of your body because they're not even in the same reality.

they're not refugees

Pronunciation: "re-fyu-'jE

Function: noun: an individual seeking refuge or asylum; especially: an individual who has left his or her native country and is unwilling or unable to return to it because of persecution or fear of persecution (as because of race, religion, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion).