hope

it's a four letter word. it floats. it can be abandoned. (right-o, all ye entering pirates!)

we can hope for pleasant weather when planning an apple-picking day. however, all we really can do there is pack a slicker if mother nature chooses otherwise. we can hope to win the lottery, but you know the old saw about the guy when at the pearly gates, confessed never having bought a ticket, right?

it can be a comforting plush toy or the prickly porcupine we dare not touch. it can be the thing we refused, which is not the same as *hopelessness*, because that implies the previous existence of its opposite.

it can be the voice on the other end offering just that. it can be the thing it takes profound courage to accept.

the source

today somebody sent me some new amy winehouse. mostly, i like her, even if her sense of doomed sensationalism is trumping her talent. her drug- and booze-soaked escapades (and those skanky ballet slippers, sheesh) are getting all the attention, while she can't quite make it to the stage.

before the bulimia and the beehive really took over, she was wry, self-effacing and comfortable with herself. it's really funny:

f*** me pumps

hello!! "at least your breasts cost more than hers"! it's full of howlers.

so i got her new version of the classic "cupid". but, um, sam cooke and johnny nash got there way first. c'mon. she sounds like a cartoon of herself and the genre. maybe she was drunk? she certainly was trying too hard. cuz when you hear the sam, it's silk.

full disclosure: i have spent an inopportune hour trying to link sam cooke on youtube to my chicken feet. mother of god will not be implored to help. let's just leave it at how gorgeous we know the original mcdreamy sounded.

and how sometimes it's good to go back.

time suck redux

“People did not really talk about their work. They talked about their long weekends.”

a quote in today's ny times from france's new finance minister -- her impressions when she returned from some time spent working as a lawyer in chicago.

she and sarkozy are determined to ramp up the french economy and shake free the sloth-in-amber attitude of 35-hour work-weeks and long vacations by the seaside. a languid quality of life held as a birthright by most french. they excel at finding the muster to strike, however, lol, and today will be out in force against american-style encroachments on time spent in cafes or playing petanque.

i am on a 7-day a week tether to my job. constant e-mails and phone calls. (remember why i did NOT want a cellphone?) followed by snippy disapproval when i don't respond immediately. sometimes i'm in the shower or at the movies, ffs. i do not have 2 consecutive days off. it will be one year before i receive ONE WEEK of paid vacation. i shell out considerable cash each month for insurance.

she wants them to be more like us, and i want to be more like them. maybe i'd feel differently if i was watching my indoor lap pool being built. but, uh, not.

phooey.

words

powerful stuff.

i've been wooed by them. brought to tears by their sheer beauty. been made to laugh and challenged to see over a foggy hill. i like to think i have done the same for those in my life.

they can create misunderstandings, both small and profound. i confess i don't do *jobspeak* very well. please just say what you mean. i have run afoul of this more than once with colleagues and bosses, and in hindsight still don't appreciate the level of lotus-blossom sensitivity people bring to the shop each day. i have learned to preface with, "may i just be direct?", or mirror back, "am i understanding you as saying *x*?" but i rankle at and resent the extra effort. sigh. i have yet to find a salaried hermit position. 'nother thread, that. lol.

i have also been stunned by their power. i have been gagged and disemboweled, a useless husk, tossed down to the floor as by a titan. i have crashed into the wall of subterfuge. they taunt, they goad, they lie. they spin the room so fast to make you sick. they have been used as blunt weapons against me and one dear to me in what looks to be a war of attrition.

lucy's aunt and uncle climbed down from the canopy, wandered the savannah and over time, lil hairy hominids set up camp. for thousands of years, epics of victory and loss, the wonder of the skies and the honeyed stories of how we came to be were passed down. the spoken word leaves a trace only in memory.

with machines we now can speak and be heard even through another's absence. in the late hours, we hear the voice so long silent, and without control our water glass crashes to the floor.

yet remembering long-ago warnings of doom and feeling the squeeze of a not-so-rusty tinfoil hat, we look at something that fell from the ether and It Doesn't Read Right. wrong format; at best a rhetorical question, at worst a poke with a cruel stick. all i feel is uncertainty.

"i got the feeling that something ain't right...
clowns to left of me, jokers to the right,
stuck in the middle..." (intentional snip, dear readers...)

there are the three truths.

and there is what we want to believe.

maya's caged bird makes me terribly sad and cuts too close to bone. instead i begin my day with solitary emily:

"hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul - and sings the tunes without the words - and never stops at all."

:)

no surprise

he is getting divorced. it's no surprise to me and ultimately none to him either.

counseling, together and apart. books and late nights on-line. long emotional tirades about "what's wrong with you." trial separation. trial reconciliation. family meetings; in-laws and outlaws all with their 2 cents. friends and neighbors dumbstruck by lightning striking a golden couple. intellectually and philosophically such a good match. married when old enough to "know" the right thing when it came along. one would like to think.

"what really is best for the kids?" how much of a factor is personal contentment? happiness? validation from your spouse? when does her hurt finally end and the martyr robes come off?

yup. he did some shit things. yet in the last 15 months has tried mightily to set things to right. she cannot, will not put any of the past aside, nor will she accept the present and his mea culpa. his sincerely proffered "sorries" blow like dandelion fluffs in the wind of her unmitigated anger.

did she/he wake up one day and finally say, "enough"? was there a last straw or just an overdue admission of futility?

he swears he is fine. his writing feels better than in a very long time. he has moved out, and until coming east, saw the kids everyday. she is amicable and for neither is money an issue. he is hoping his visiting semester at yale turns into an offer to relocate from texas. lol, we both agree he's a much better fit into tweedy nerdy yale than trying to edumucate the barn-washers down there.

after dinner he asked me back to his hotel room. "no, i don't think so," rolled right off my tongue. his request came as no surprise, but my easy refusal did. the thread count at the ritz was a minor temptation, but i felt no desire for him. we have a long history of wanting the other at the *wrong* time.

i came home and took a long bath. it was good to see him. an excellent dinner with an old friend. sometimes it can be simple. i am grateful for that.

time suck

when i took this job, one consideration was my ability to get there. i moved back to the city to make my life easier. friends, cultural interests and *work* are all here. presumably anybody job-hunting factors in length of commute as part of the decision-making process.

during my initial forays for interviews i arrived easily and quickly. it lies on one of the more reliable lines that is less likely to be choked by students. so i took my local line off the island, made one transfer, read my book and it wasn't so bad at all.

cue to summer. construction. lots of it. shuttle buses. driven by union guys who had no idea how to get from here to there, having never driven the route. did the mbta even give them directions? did they just not bother to read them? although work was being done only between station f and r, or r and r, frequently, and with no warning or announcement, you were forced early off the train at station k and herded on another slow-moving bus that crawled through neighborhood traffic.

many weekends, "improvements" were being made on my local line, meaning now an initial bus ride. our infrastructure is collapsing, so a tunnel has been closed. this has meant a long and unscenic ride through more broke-down neighborhoods, out and away from our destination, over a bridge, circumnavigating our nexus in an unthinkable way.

who makes these routes? are the mbta honchos huddling over a ouija board and talking to the marquis de sade and the 3 stooges? "yeah, this'll hurt..." "nyuk, nyuk, nyuk." "why, i oughta..."

what should be a 6-minute ride to my connection can take an hour. factor in a bus on the other end, add on at least another 30 minutes. what should be a 45-minute trip, has often taken me more than 2 hours. yup. TWO HOURS. each way. pile that on to a 12- or 15 hour-day. yeah, that spells quality of life like little else.

last night i was traveling home late. 11:00-ish. got to my connection easily. no beer-soaked sox fans or throngs of drunken bc kids heading downtown to get drunker. yellow tape across the stairs: no train. upstairs to a bus. which traveled one stop. downstairs to the t. which traveled one stop. thank fucking god it at least brought me to the other side of the tunnel, so i could now walk home. the remaining brown people were shunted onto still another train, across the tracks to head further out.

i work a job i don't much enjoy. which pays barely enough to get by and certainly not enough to get ahead. with people whom i have nothing in common. i mentioned that on my day off this past weekend, i was going to see the new wes anderson movie and the new brad pitt movie (really stolen by casey affleck and augmented by a few craggy turns from sam shepard, but i digress.) i guess cuz there were no blue-screen special effects and no fart jokes in either, i was met only by blank stares. ffs, brad pitt. how could they be so unaware? yes, yes, it was a throwback to art-house 70s westerns, but still.

i never wanted to be a restaurant manager. ever. yet i dutifully took advice from somebody who'd never worked in the business. clenched tight the rcg's, believed him and thought i could make it better. feh.

lateral move this, out of financial duress. i put on a happy face though and don't complain. last time it took me 4 months to land a job. (at first i couldn't bear to look, while i repaired the inside compass.) so i'm starting to look now. pro-active.

my wset certificate is in the mail. passed with distinction, tyvm. however, what that buys in this city remains to be seen. we have yet to attain the sophistication where being a sommelier is much more than a hired monkey. the pay is terrible across the board. i buy for a company with combined sales of over $12 million, yet cannot afford cable tv. that shows respect, huh?

i know what i would *like* to do. who is out there who will pay me to do it? anybody? hello? anybody?

party pooper

balloons and ponies fell off my wish list a long time ago. for several years, i haven't been able to fete my friends, so stopped thinking they'd do it for me. except for that once, the gc decided it best to not acknowledge the day. (that *present* was beyond the scope of most; i've never discussed it.) last year i did spend it with some friends and despite my dark fragility, had a nice time. of course, the crazy aggrieved wife decided right then to take her martyr show on the road, so tossed me a lovely parting gift of shattering public humiliation. i'm sure she took rabid glee in ruining my day.

in fairness, lol, i wasn't forgotten and i did get some calls and cards today and had already decided to forgo dinner with the editor. he wanted to take me someplace nice (and i wouldn't have minded!) but tomorrow he leaves for spain on a trip i can't join and i just have to be out of here insanely early. it was a practical grown-up kinda decision -- you know, the kind i hate -- both skipping the trip and passing on tonight. tomorrow is a big day for me with the owner and i don't want to attempt it on too little sleep and too much wine.

it was a glorious fall day when i woke. my day *off*, i was anxious to get my work done and get outside. i'd been promised all the files by 10:00. by noon, still nothing, so had to cancel lunch with a friend. by 2:00, still nothing. i was fuming. i'd e-mailed and called several times already. finally arrived at 2:30. GAH! one is a mess and cannot be used. it takes the cow of a comptroller another 30 minutes to get me the proper file. day is basically over. i cannot make the appropriate arrangements with all my salespeople cuz it's too damn late so, more and unnecessary work tomorrow.

i rush through everything and run to the bank. it had just closed. i had planned a nice long walk, a movie and a quiet drink by myself. no, no and nope. not even enough cash to buy my t-pass, never mind wasting money on rides for fun.

instead i shop for dinner on the reduced produce rack and answer 7 calls from salespeople while i scope out the bin for deli ends. yeah. what a birfday and oh, the glamorous life of a corporate beverage director.

***************************************************

my blog has been quiet this past month. frankly i'm sick of my own travails. i can't imagine the bore they must be to those unlucky enough to stumble in here. but there is a glimmer of light on the homefront and i'm already putting out feelers for a new job. mid-month i was badly blue and just wishing wishing for a different dynamic. yeah well, all those pennies in the well were money wasted. bootstraps, suck it up, all that. could be worse, right?

right?

all by myself

i don't mind it. i'm more used to it than not. for years, i've gone alone to movies, plays, openings and dinner; moved, near and far. the too frequent presence of another is so jarring i often feel like an ascetic monk.

my problems now are large, so it's easier to hermit rather than risk being caught out by a rude question. i was raised with a very strict code of what is acceptably polite conversation, but apparently lots of folks didn't have my mom.

pass the biscuits, please.

pfffftt

this year i am not crying.

pfft.

i could.

i won't.

it's an indulgence. i can no longer afford them.

when we're young, crying brings comfort -- coos, flutters, arms, food, fluids, flutters ... light... dark... music... quiet. someone who cares comes to help. to make you feel better. to stop the crying. to console. to let you know you're safe in the world.

the complex proteins contained in tears are stress-related. granted, we don't all have the same breaking point, yet the chemistry is constant. what changes is the unquantifiable: how do you feel after? better? worse? the same? does your cat or dog get afraid or lick your hands that are salty with tears? do your kids cower because mommy is crying, or come running with hugs? i could count on one hand how many times i have seen men cry. i think that gives me a skewed view. or does it? dunno.

nothing feels certain or right. i hate that. yet everyday, i do what i should. why the hell? really?

it's a stunning moon tonight. low and so full. like a cartoon, really, cuz it seems so close. like i can see the cheese.

my non-sequiturs and i must go to bed.

mess

there was a time when i had nothing to explain
oh, this mess i have made
but then things got complicated
my innocence has all but faded
oh, this mess i have made

and i don't believe in god
so i can't be saved
all alone as i've learned to be
in this mess i have made

all the untested virtue
the things i said i'd never do
least of all to you
i know he's kind and true
i know that he is good to you
he'll never care for you more than i dobut i don't believe in love
and i can't be changed
all alone as i've learned to be
in this mess
i have made the same mistakes
over and over again

there are rooms in this house that i don't open anymore
dusty books of pictures on the floor
that she will never see
she'll never see that part of me
i want to be for her
what i could never be for you

but i don't believe in god
so i can't be saved
all alone as i've learned to be
in this mess i have made

~~ben folds

sunday in the park

surely, somebody else there tonight was named george, but i just wanted to walk and watch, not engage.

these last days stoopid, but tonight i got a bit of respite -- patio dinner in town with a dear friend. we were treated like royalty, lol, my title even printed on the check next to an absurd promo amount. the night was too nice, too clean and fresh, for me to duck underground. just no. i've been poisoned and smothered by stain and glue and paint lately; so out and up and walk.

in a few short blocks, the green peace of the country's first public park wrapped around me. it was cool, quiet, yet full of people. it's august, and the euro is humiliating the dollar, so lots of them foreign types meandering about wearing sandals with socks, flogging cartoon maps, and taking up all the space on crossbridges while snapping pix.

girls burdened in burkas playing murderball! yes! lol, i imagine they do have anger management issues...

1st date on a bench. she with artfully dishevelled hair saying, "and whenever you say you're going to call, you BETTER call..." i could see him already running from the whip crack...

3-card monty guys, still!

frisbee, catch, doggie-fetch, softball, tennis, busking.

it was a perfect city night. really.

i love living here.

pennies

i was that person tonight. fancy bag and expensive shoes. my outfit worth far more than i now make in a month. carefully parsing the percentage between loaves of bread -- dollars, ounces, fiber -- i might have looked cheap, but i am just on that tight of a string. dust in the account, atm card uesless and i long ago cut up the evil cards. only X amount of dollars each week. not enough X. not nearly.

so there i was, pondering loaves like i might make them somehow magically feed the multitudes. i wouldn't be caught short at the register, out of fear of looking stoopid more than broke. i swear, i've bought cars more decisively than that ciabatta tonight. it's humbling. it's hard. it keeps getting harder. it's not impossible.

right?

turn back the clock

by day 2, i was already back to weird vampiric night-crawling hours. by day 3, i was up til 5. got home at 2:00, didn't *feel* sleepy, so thought, "oh, i'll just have some wine and work on these spread sheets." finally turned my head around and it was light out. dozed a bit, and of course at work i looked and felt terrible and my mind was silly putty.

ack. how did i do that all those years?

this morning i was back up with the early birds with no effort. up even before the alarm. then kept awake by jackhammers, lol. so i put my nose down and finished the BIG one. i think the owner knows how impossible it has been for me to *work* in that particular location. no time, no privacy, a trillion interruptions and the most ergonomically fucked up desk and chair i've ever encountered. had to twist like a pretzel. so finally caved and worked at home. where i did log my hours.

i feel very good about this. finally. small yeah for me. let's see what he lets me execute. it is what he hired for me and is a far sight better than what i inherited. we shall see. he might be on the golf course all damn day for all i know.

it's been ages since i've had two days off (even though i worked all morning, lol). no work, no class. it feels nice. particularly since i'm moments away from some ugly banking. ack.

will i ever climb out of this hole? what the fuck was i thinking? i relied upon something that rested on the thinnest twig. in past relationships i'd always been so conscious of "what should happen if i end up on my own?" and always structured it so i could manage. when and how did he implant the rcg's so i'd believe anything he said? i'm fucked every way, every day to sunday. the recent love letters from his note-holding barrister brother ... wtf was i thinking? i should have told them all to go to fuck themselves. instead, i stayed in my place, thinking there would be some kind of grace in it. idiot. he's just one more suit with a claw in both my side and my future.

i get mentally straightjacketed when i've got too many conflicts, too many choices, too many decisions. hell, an overly-large dinner menu befuddles me. now i've got too many problems seemingly in a gordian knot, and it's never ever been this bad before. i've been aridly broke and lived on rice and lentils more than once, but i wasn't spooning them up from the bottom of a well of debt. a hole that gets deepened daily by my inability even to get one leg up. a toe-hold. something. no one to ask for advice makes everything seem even worse. the editor, a very wealthy man and in charge of one of the top financial publications on earth, couldn't discuss money. i didn't want any actual lucre from him (he knew that) just some compass points of advice. impossible. how ridiculous and useless was that? (just another rant i have about him -- no point in more of that here.)

feh. it's time to face some music.

is that you fiddling, nero?

it's just ... nothing

it's the heat.

it's the humidity.

it's my period.

it's another job that brings little fulfillment.

it's another owner (cheapest yet!) who just tells his employees (us; me) they (we) suck. sure, in other words. feh.

it's being transient and having to carry all my files and notes and books everywhere i go because i don't even have a "place". or a goddamn laptop.

it's never having sufficient access to the one damn pc in this store's miniscule office to get any work done.

it's the ordering on my day off that should take 45 minutes, but drowns me in e-mails and phone calls for 3-4 hours.

it's being a filler (feeling like a scab) while construction continues and then made to feel like i'm being wedged in as a favor.

it's being blamed for shit that gm has let go down-hill since before my arrival. does he want me stepping on his toes?

it's having a desperate need for amusing or challenging or topical conversation during work. now i fucking dream about witty banter because i so rarely engage in it anymore.

it's wanting to go to nyc or paris or somewhere. someplace that's not on the "t", not here, for just a few days.

it's being so terrifyingly broke and feeling like it will never end. hmmm... new toothbrush? ummmmm... nah, maybe next week...

it's having nobody in whom to confide just everything. or anything.

it's wanting what and whom i can't have.

it's knowing she's still watching and stalking me electronically. it's knowing every time i think it to be so, i have proof it is. can i sell a used tinfoil hat on e-bay?

i just feel down and sad and empty and bad.

i know i passed my exam, but since i left the classroom, i've felt weirdly empty. i was edgy and anxious before and during it. but, then, *poof*. nada.

the fog burned off yesterday and it was entirely lovely; still, i hermitted. never changed. didn't eat til dark. no phone calls, minimal e-mails. i didn't want wine or a boiling bath. couldn't watch tv or read.

today i begin an unusual week of all closes, so perhaps my flip-flopped schedule will take my mind off the searing nothing that's in there.

maybe it wasn't the best time to end things with the editor but it all just felt so disingenuous i couldn't stand it, or myself, or him, anymore.

ack. what is it? or what isn't it?

calling dr. freud

ack. i had the dream where i'm lost and naked in school. not totally naked. wrapped in one of my purple towels, but every corridor turned up something different and wrong.

the exam is tomorrow.

the international pass rate is 25%. 25%. the last group had a gimme for the tasting portion, and frankly even if tossed a monkey wrench, i feel confident about that bit, which is 50% of the mark. i find myself thinking that with so many non-professionals taking the course, that MUST drag down the pass rate considerably. i take for granted how many 1000s of wines i've tasted, and the knowledge i've gained by meeting and dining and drinking with 100s of winemakers and vineyard owners. meanwhile so many of my classmates were still struggling with identifying high acid in a wine. oof.

i'm just back from taking a walk. i'll peruse the books again, but not break my head open. i know i know this stuff.

it will be nice to be done with this phase and on break a few weeks. read something other than coursework. start posting here again. the frayed emotional threads have been all tightly wound in a big gordian knot in the back room of my brain for weeks.

feh. mixed blessing that.

in 24 hours i'll crack open that vintage veuve i've been saving. the one that tastes like toasted almonds and shitaake mushrooms. and cream. and celebrate taking control of this very big thing this year.

wake up

it's okay in the day i'm staying busy
tied up enough so i don't have to wonder where is he
got so sick of crying
so just lately
when i catch myself i do a 180
i stay up clean the house
at least i'm not drinking
run around just so i don't have to think about thinking
that silent sense of content
that everyone gets
just disappears soon as the sun sets

this face in my dreams seizes my guts
he floods me with dread
soaked in soul
he swims in my eyes by the bed
pour myself over him
moon spilling in
and i wake up alone

if i was my heart
i'd rather be restless
the second i stop the sleep catches up and i'm breathless
this ache in my chest
as my day is done now
the dark covers me and i cannot run now
my blood running cold
i stand before him

it's all i can do to assure him
when he comes to me
i drip for him tonight
drowning in me we bathe under blue light

his face in my dreams seizes my guts
he floods me with dread
soaked in soul
he swims in my eyes by the bed
pour myself over him
moon spilling in
and i wake up alone
and i wake up alone
and i wake up alone
and i wake up alone

how to save a life

step one you say we need to talk
he walks you say sit down it's just a talk
he smiles politely back at you
you stare politely right on through
some sort of window to your right
as he goes left and you stay right
between the lines of fear and blame
you begin to wonder why you came

where did i go wrong, i lost a friend
somewhere along in the bitterness
and i would have stayed up with you all night
had i known how to save a life

let him know that you know best
cause after all you do know best
try to slip past his defense
without granting innocence
lay down a list of what is wrong
the things you've told him all along
and pray to god he hears you
and pray to god he hears you

where did i go wrong, i lost a friend
somewhere along in the bitterness
and i would have stayed up with you all night
had i known how to save a life

as he begins to raise his voice
you lower yours and grant him one last choice
drive until you lose the road
or break with the ones you've followed
he will do one of two things
he will admit to everything
or he'll say he's just not the same
and you'll begin to wonder why you came

where did i go wrong, i lost a friend
somewhere along in the bitterness
and i would have stayed up with you all night
had i known how to save a life.

can i save my own?

falling up

hilarious avalanche of metaphor aside, and no chicken little looking skyward and saying otherwise, the floors are falling. and weaving. and undullating. he mentioned it in our 1st meeting and showed some of the damage wrought in our 2nd. cracked plaster; massive crown moulding growing ever more independent from the ceiling; banquettes divorcing from the walls; the floor in the bar caving centerwise; drawers and doors refusing to stay shut. more often than not i realize my toes are higher than my heels while standing still. or i'm navigating soft gullies and hills on the formerly gorgeous teak floors. numerous cracked pipes have been leaking hot water for years and the foundation is a complete wreck. we'll close in a few weeks, lift the place up and build a new stronger base.

ironic, eh?

no longer can i sleep past 7:00. 8:00 seems a long-gone fantasy of indolence. if i were a dilbertessa and home in front of american idol, it would be one thing, but somewhere along the corporate cultural curve 55+ hours became the norm for people like me. why do so many of the other managers in the company have trouble meeting this standard? i MAKE myself go home, knowing how early the alarm is set. however, i now steadfastly refuse to work from home. i'd rather go in 2 hours before anybody else gets to the restaurant or office to work in solitude. and clock my damn time.

part of my restlessness comes from having to train my superiors and assistants. accustomed to doing all the ins-and-outs of admin myself, i sometimes have assumed these people would *know* information i need, or should have retained for me. well, we know where that ass-word has led me. 2 steps forward and 1 step back. ayuh. the owner has compassionately said i don't need to climb everest in a day, and he's pleased with my output. fine. but the myopic snail's pace of certain developments makes me nutty. i sent pages to be typed and sent to all the stores. it took 6 days, were not the in form i approved, had typos and went out anyway. why can't i do it myself, right the 1st time, in a few minutes? arrrgh.

i'm on a learning curve too. these incidents have shown me everything, no matter how seemingly small, needs to be articulated. write it down. keep the e-mails. hard copies of edits and approved drafts. be 10 days ahead of where i'd like to be. p-r-i-o-r-i-t-i-z-e.

the shut-down of this location will bring me some mercy, and allow me to focus on beverage more than i've been able. not enough rungs on the hat-rack lately. it will also give my spine a chance to straighten the hell back up, since it's like treading jello all day and night.

however, i can thank the crushing clock for pushing away the indulgence of introspection and my wont of pulling everything inwards. the sadness, the frustration, the uncertainty and the pretend-it-just-ain't-so of all that led to some very unpleasant manifestations. in the months between march and may i crashed badly. so much was out of my control, i let go of even the few things i could. productivity, a more positive outlook, physical activity (finally), schedules and again being part of the fabric of work and society are bringing me back around. there are certain ways i want to see myself. sooner, rather than later.

fútbol en la medianoche

mostly, it's been incredibly early mornings. he lives just a short drive by lexus from where he's got me based. although not many miles, clearly by "t" it takes me many more minutes.

this was my first late night out there and i was frantic about catching the last (better still, 2nd to last) train. i did. i cannot miss it; it will be 90 million dollars. or something. the equivalent really, since every cent now is ledgered and promised.

until i switched lines, it was empty and quiet. soooooo late and now sharing the destination of my neighbors: big hands, swollen, gnarled and bleached, pruney and sore; forearms scarred from sautee pans, hot fry grease, knives and tatts. men. brown men. bleary-eyed and smelling of cleanser, oil and too much cologne. loud. noisy. chatter. guys who work ridiculously hard, blowing off a bit of steam. i'll get used to it.

my stop. fresh air.
the last fields are nearly finished, the turf laid. goalposts and fences not quite.

handful of guys kicking around a ball. in the dark. extra dark. it's a dawn to dusk kinda thing. all sorts of inflammatory nonsense on the building message board. gates, locks, constables. ack. i was glad those guys were there. it meant i wasn't wandering alone too late at night. i kept thinking another sort of person would have called the cops.

i hope they enjoy the summer nights too. the park and playing fields aren't just for us. ya know?

where we find ourselves

from fretting about t-fare to 14-hour days, my schedule has gone from zero to 80 in a blink. yesterday at last entirely free, i refused to heed to the hounding calls of projects and salespeople. bah. it can all wait. at least a day.

*******************

in spike heels and a power suit, obviously pressed for time, she scolded and pulled. he twisted in his collar and backpedaled fiercely. one more painful yank and he finally surrendered. he tried to show her he wasn't ready to come home, so he had to now plop, plop, plop three big turds on the marble floor. she cooed and comforted. a magnificent husky, his evacuation mid-stride would have been admirable if he'd been at his proper latitude, leashed to a moving sled team, but was hardly acceptable in an urban lobby. her actions and reactions were so backward and bad, i wanted to kidnap the dog then and there. why did she have the quintessential team/work dog who must spend all day alone, cooped up and purposeless? hasn't she read or watched anything about training him? he couldn't choose in whose home he wound up, but shouldn't she have ethically considered a dog more suited for her lifestyle? or perhaps no dog at all?

*******************

a walk in the sun and then an australian movie based on a carver story. quietly intense performances burned with the author's familiar theme of love, its absence burdening lives and marriages and the consequent eroding of self and identity. a person who suddenly realizes him- or herself in a thoroughly unsuitable situation or companionship -- unfit as mother, wife, workaday dad, small-town neighbor. how sudden tragedy affects change, but not really. people and place remain the same at their centers. yes. they do. the puzzle pieces do not always fit. no matter how much we thought they would and wish it so.

******************

when the movie broke, i needed room to breathe. the sun was clear and friendly, the air bright, the river shiny. i meandered along the charles and let the same breeze that powered all those sails carry me home at last. i'm a piece of just one. always?