This weekend's reality; This week's dream

I made it back to DFW from my Oklahoma excursion this weekend, [just in time to watch the Sooners win the Big XII Championship 2010].

I was happy to be home, but a few hours before I left Oklahoma, I felt a flame of melancholy start to warm the inside of my chest. It felt dreadful and I started to miss my little brother [AKA Joe Darkly], though I hadn't even left yet. He had to work the first night I got there so we didn't get to talk much, but we made up for it the night before I left. I complain about my little brother's lack of respect for anyone including himself, but I still love him. Maybe distance really does make the heart grow fonder and he and I just needed some time apart in order to appreciate each other's existence?

If I thought we could get along, I would love to get him out of my mother's house and bring him back to live with us in Texas. Our sibling Holy Trinity isn't complete without him.

Ugh.

I think this sudden need to kidnap Darkly is part of the whole pseudo-support cycle I said I would stop relying upon. I know he's content with the time we spent visiting. In that same thought, I would be willing to put money on it that he would be just as content if he and I never had that time together. Truthfully, my little brother's ability to cope with life without ever needing anyone is something I've been jealous of, for all of my mine.

I also just realized that I forgot to add Darkly to the list of the unstable things in my life. I suppose I didn't add him because I'm not sure which one of us is behind the reason for our unstable relationship.

I bet it's a 50/50.

Oddly enough, the person I'm least concerned about these days is my mother. She seems to be doing really well which is awesome. I believe that when she moved back to Oklahoma this year, she was able to find some solitude after my dad's passing. I know she's not 100% content because she's never 100% content. It's her nature to be more than 50% dissatisfied with the world at all times. But after seeing her on the visit and feeling the confidence she exuded, I know she's feeling better these days. I just wish she had more to do with her time. The woman is intelligent and she has a degree that's just dying to be used. Not because she needs the extra income, but because I think it would secure her confidence if she was doing more.

That's another thing I need to work on letting go; letting go. It's not my job to save everyone, despite the past record. It's difficult learning to let go. But my mother and my brother have made the task of letting them go as easy as humanly possible.

This is the part where I accept their want to be alone because it isn't meant to be taken personally.


That was my last visit to the Sooner state for 2010 and for awhile, since I made the decision not to go back to Oklahoma until I get the first volume of my memoir finished. Through this written agreement with myself, I will make sure to utilize my time in Texas, without interruption. I'm not too far behind on the book and most of it is written. It's the format of the book I'm having issues with. It's proven to be a challenge because I don't want the book to be merely a book. I want it to be an experience that the reader; that the audience experiences as I did, so we share the experience, together.

On another note, I had a series of random dreams last night that I remembered vividly when I woke up this morning.

The dream began with my shift manager from Starbucks asking me to pick her up so she and I could go to work together. We both ended up running late and we got in trouble for opening the store late. Then all of my co-workers showed up and we went on a field trip and had a picnic out in this open, outdoorsy type place. The dream took a random turn and suddenly I was at A Perfect Circle concert. Paz Lenchatin, [their former guitarist who now plays with ZWAN], spoke to the audience.

She said, "Yeah, Maynard took a picture of me and this Mormon guy backstage before we came on. Remember not to live your life on your knees."

Strange, strange, strange.

In true dream fashion, I was suddenly teleported to another scene at Ryan's dad's house. Ryan and I walked into the house and his step-mother was laying on her bed next to a girlie magazine and a nail file. Ryan asked if he could have the magazine and she gave it to him. He walked out of the bedroom and left me with his step-mother, alone. I asked her if I could have the nail file and she handed it to me and started crying. I could hear loud music coming from somewhere in the house and his step-mother said, "That's [Ryan's dad]." I started to get the vibe that they were fighting and she wanted to be alone.

From the bedroom, I walked out and found the hallway staircase that led to the guest room. I heard a door slam shut from somewhere in the back of the house, which I assumed to be Ryan walking outside. Then the music coming from the room where Ryan's dad was at became louder and louder until it was all I could hear.

I stared up at the hallway staircase and felt a dreadful, warm feeling return to my chest. It felt similar to the feeling I had when I left Oklahoma this weekend.

"Life is not a dream when you can't wake up from the dream you wanted."

-- The Freak/SMASHING PUMPKINS

Ready...Aim...FIRE!

Tonight I faced the one thing I fear the most. The thing I fear more than life, more than the grief that still hangs around and sneaks up on me, more than heights or eating popcorn shrimp that I thought was popcorn chicken...

Tonight I faced me, myself.
Alone.

It's been roughly a year since I've done that.

When I left DFW on the Amtrak this evening, en route to OKC, I knew it was going to be an experience, but I wasn't prepared for what ensued once I stepped onto the train. While I found an empty seat and tried to get comfortable, I realized it wasn't going to happen. I was too anxious about going on the trip without Adam or Ryan, so there was no way I was going to be able to relax. Then I wondered if I still had time to back out and get off the train. My anxieties were already stewing earlier in the day and once the train started moving, they heated up and boiled over into a full-fledged panic attack nightmare.

I started looking around, trying to make a quick decision: Should I cry or get up and jump off the train? Like spidey-sense, I became hyper aware of everything around me. It felt violent, like I was forced to wake up from the longest period of sleep in the history of ZZzzzzs. The entire experience was shocking to my psyche and it cut sharp into me, leaving what felt like a gaping, deep Grand Canyon sized incision right in the center on the top of my head.

The sudden forced awake state and alertness caused the thoughts in my brain to spin around wildly and I starting questioning my life, the train ride, and their validity, combined.

Did my father really pass away last year? And did the murder really happen? Is my mother living in Oklahoma and I'm really living in Texas now? What about my brothers? They're still around, right? And Adam....and Ryan? Did I dream my entire life?. Who am I? Where am I?

In the past I would have refused the possibility of my life as a dream sequence. The theory as a viable answer to the things that I've seen and the things I've lived through is something I'd almost rather not imagine because even though I've lived through a good portion of fucked up situations, the experiences I've had are belong to me and they're my only reality.

Even if I were to cast aside my true experiences and buy into the idea that my entire life was a series of dreams, never ending until now, I'd still be the person I am today. Because no matter what, the things I've dreamed or lived through are all I know. The lessons I've learned, the touches, the kisses, the goodbyes that I wasn't ready to say and even the hellos that I wasn't prepared to offer...

That was all I wrote for the past 27 years, figuratively and literally speaking.

To explore this possibility even further, imagining life as a dream is entertaining because it offers no definite beginning, middle, or end. Without definite starts and an unknown ending, life, the dream, becomes infinite. Perhaps the ability for life to be infinite is possible without the dream theory? Maybe that's what life is truly meant to be?

Living = Seeing = Dreaming = Believing...
At least for the time being.

This theory about life as a dream is a theory I learned of a few years ago. It was inspired from the teachings of a psychologist named Carl Jung. Jung theorized that our dreams were meant to help guide us in our realities, in our lives as we live them. Take that theory a step further and you have the birth of the waking dream. A waking dream is thought to be any and every unique, noteworthy, stand-out, devastating, and monumental event[s] we experience and later recall. This act of recalling is said to aid us in our spiritual growth because we are meant to learn a lesson within each of the waking dreams we see and/or experience.

If the waking dreams theory is possible then let's go back to the start of this particular dream on the train and attempt to understand what it's trying to tell me.

My biggest fear is myself, solo.
This fear causes me great shame to admit, but I have to admit it openly and honestly because I made a vow to myself and to the world at the beginning of 2010, that I would be as open and honest as possible with my thoughts and feelings, especially as I expressed them within my writing.

Why is it that I fear myself?
This fear has been an on again/off again phobia I've dealt with during all of the 27 years of my life. It increased during the summer of 2009 and has grown at a rapid rate since then, nearly paralyzing my life, today. Examining the symbolism in the fear, it's constant coming and going, I'm forced to list all of the things in my life that share the on again/off again characteristic.

• Ex-boyfriends
• My father
• My patriarchal family, particularly my aunts
• Friends
• Fears
• Unsettled grief from the loss of loved ones

Listing the things in my life that share the trait of instability made me realize how drastic the instability in my life has been. But it's not totally bleak...

Fast-forward to the present and it's more than evident that instability is no longer a constant in my life. Life has calmed down since January 2010 when I moved to Texas. I have routines now, schedules I do my best to adhere to, and [somewhat] clear goals for my life. This is a first for me and it's a welcome change from the past. So why do I fear myself? Fearing myself sometimes and not sometimes, is an action I've come to find comfort within since it's familiar. Though unstable, it's been a consistent, reliable variable I could count on at my best and worst moments in life. Just the same as I always knew that my dad would go on alcoholic binges and leave for days or weeks, then he'd always come back home at the end of his vicious cycle, and the way I knew that my ex-boyfriends and I would fight, break-up, then make-up:

Lather, rinse, repeat.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
...

Translation: The fear of myself is merely an echo of the instability that has been my life story.

But as of now, that story is no longer mine. In fact, this is the ending of the old story and the start of an entirely new book, complete with new characters and fresh plots just waiting to be played out and told! With the excitement of this chance to start over,  why, why, why am I terrified of myself outside of the past chaos? I should be afraid of the chaos, not myself.

Trying to get the answer to this question is like having to drag someone out to face the front line of a firing squad. [Not that I would know first hand what it's like to drag someone to their death. I'm only making parallels to the two scenarios similarities for horrorcore's sake.]

There are several reasons I fear myself and this new life more than I fear the chaos I've already lived through. The biggest reason is because I dread any experience or person I don't know. Nothing seems more frightening to me than being forced to face or deal with yet another bullshit person or circumstance, especially without anything or anyone to turn to for help. Whether that help be in the form of offering me a bigger disaster to focus on besides the one at hand, or pseudo-support from anyone other than myself; these are the things I've come to depend upon.

Finally, the core of the fear is exposed; stripped down naked with every nasty flaw visible to on-lookers and to the imaginary firing squad, eagerly waiting to hear the signal.
Ready...
Aim...

There it is, assed out: I am addicted to pseudo-support systems and false hopes.
Now, what-if, and this is an Olympic sized what-if, but what-if I didn't rely on pseudo-support or false hopes any longer? Pseudo-support systems and false hopes are a lot like life support when you think about it. All those tubes and needles and fluids; being hooked up to a machine that controls the beating of the heart... Why? To live a life resigned to a twin sized gurney, loved ones stopping by the hospital for visits when it's convenient, to experience the heart wrenching goodbyes as loved ones leave and return to their lives in their queen-sized beds without tubes, needles and fluids being shoved into their bodies; their own hearts beating for them.

Either way death is inevitable and permanent life support becomes an unhealthy and unnatural means of survival that only prolongs the unavoidable event. Living on life support sounds way too familiar for comfort. Even with this knowledge, I'm still afraid to face this new life alone because I'm afraid I'm going to fail and if I fail--

Well I don't want to know what happens if I fail.

In the cheesiest of cheesy statements; Failure is not an option. I know it's not an option because I've purposefully tried to fail at life on several occasions. I mean I've tried really hard to fail at life before and have been unsuccessful in my attempts, every time. I fail at failing, so that leaves me with no other choice. Besides, if I've made it this far, despite my fears, I'd hate to give up now. Now that I've seen a happy life is possible. Of course, I also know it's possible I could end up living a crappy life pt.deux.

I have to give up the pseudo-support and embark on this new chapter of my life, alone. Just me in my life, living and dealing with whatever and whomever comes along.
               
Ready...

Kind of ironic when it's put in those terms; Just me in my life, living and dealing with whatever and whomever comes along.

Aim...

I guess no one is ever truly alone because life is constantly existing, whether we see it or not. Kind of like that legendary question: If a tree falls down in the wilderness and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound? It may not make a sound but it does cause a vibration which can set off a multitude of chain reactions. People and their lives are the same. Whether or not we know each other exists, we all do things that cause reactions we don't realize, or maybe we do realize them, though never in their absolute entirety. The reactions go on and on and overlap so that we lose their exact starts and their exact ends.

It's from this that I am certain of one thing: We are all connected and life is infinite.

I began to take solace on the train and in the certainty of the infinite. I relaxed as the train pulled into the station at OKC. I stretched my arms out in front of me and gathered my belongings. I pondered the idea of the waking dream. If it still stands as a possibility, then the things I've seen and lessons I learned in my dream, I plan to apply to my present life and to my future. My future from this moment is scary, but it's inevitable.

FIRE!

So the question resurfaces: Where do I go from here?

It's too soon to predict or say at the moment. I know I'm not running from anything and I'm willing to learn how to deal with life alone, sans pseudo support systems. Who knows what I'll do or where I'll go? Maybe I'll make breakfast and hang out in my PJs all day, watching daytime television? Maybe I'll shower and check out an art museum? Maybe I'll go back to sleep?

Or maybe I'll finish writing that memoir I've been working on for the past 27 years?

I
alone am uncertain about what's in store for the next chapter of my life.
That's okay because
I
even with the aid of others, am uncertain about what will happen from here.
All
I
am certain of is that the possibilities are endless.

Words, words, words!

Finishing with 83, 544 words toward the completion of my first novel;

Where do I go from here?

"In the end, the answer was so simple it took a week to come up with."
--THE VIRGIN SUICIDES

Thank god the weekend is finally here.

I've been anticipating the end of this week since it started. Mainly because my feelings of grief began resurfacing fully since last Sunday night. I tried to figure out why I felt so terrible, let it go, then felt like shit, then tried to figure it again; repeat. It makes me feel like I'm going insane when I feel down to the core of my entire being, extremely low.

Grief is an overwhelming thing to shoulder and deal with alone. I wouldn't wish the feeling of it upon my worst enemy, not because I don't have any enemies, but because working through grief is single-handedly the HARDEST thing I've ever had do in my life. That's a huge statement because I've dealt with some high-stress situations before this, especially for a 27 year old young woman. From being a single mother of a child with special needs, one marriage, one divorce, and recession. I managed to live through those circumstances without entirely losing it. Even with all of my previous stresses, they couldn't prepare me for the inevitable showdown between myself and the grief I feel from the losses of 2009.

This seems like a ridiculous victory to celebrate, but I am proud of myself for acknowledging what I am feeling. It's driving me mad because I don't understand it fully. I think my routine of picking up and moving on from each of the events that shook my life in 2009 have caused me to run, out of habit now, from everything I face in my life today. This includes running from the mental and emotional aftershock effects from it all and I ask myself frequently; Where do I go from here?

I've come to realize I have to face this grief because it doesn't matter where I run to; Texas, Canada, Australia... the Moon; it will still be with me. Fighting doesn't make sense to me unless it's to survive or to protect. But that doesn't matter because I'm going to have to drag out the fighter within me to face my grief and ride it out. [Unless of course, it rides me out instead].

On a more upbeat note, I was reminded of the kindness and beauty of humanity this week, twice.

My shift manager from work asked me how I was doing and I told her I just felt tired. She could tell there was a little more to the story but she was respectful and didn't force me to tell her the whole situation. Instead, she set my tips next to the register as she left; "Don't forget to count them", she said. I walked over to the register and found a note on my tips.

The note made me smile and I wanted to chase after her to thank her, but  I heard our door chime go off, signaling a customer coming into the store, so I looked up.

LIZ: Hi! Welcome to--Hey! What are you up to?!
RUSS: Just stopping by to check on you. Have you taken your lunch yet?
LIZ: Not yet. Give me a second and I'll go clock out downstairs.
RUSS: Oh hey, I thought you might like this.

RUSS: ...so yeah, my amp-head fried and I gotta buy a new one but it was still a good show. You and Pat missed out. What about you? What's been going on? 
LIZ: I think I've been depressed, dealing with a lot of old feelings from some things. It's been frustrating-- kind of the reason I've been out of the loop as of late. 
RUSS: That's okay. The biggest thing to do is just keep doing what you're doing. Keep working on your memoir and get it finished while you have the drive to... You know, to get it done. And keep yourself busy.
LIZ: Advice taken!
RUSS:  Just so you know, you're not going crazy girl.
LIZ: You know, I've found some solace in the past month from something you once told me.
RUSS: What was that?
LIZ: That paranoia wasn't a dysfunction. That paranoia was actually a heightened sense of awareness.
RUSS: It is. It's just being more aware of what's happening, what's going on around you.
LIZ: Do you ever look for repeating symbols in your life?
RUSS: Oh yeah, all the time. Mainly numbers. Certain sequences of numbers and their patterns.
LIZ: I've been trying to figure out why the infinite symbol keeps popping up in my life everywhere.
RUSS: It means that nothing has an exact start or end.
LIZ: You really think so?
RUSS: I know so.

It's instinctual to be aware of another person's emotions. But it's by our choice whether or not we choose to exercise our ability to empathize and show care for others. There's not much to it and it can be done with or without words.

I was grateful for the two acts of kindness and though I wasn't back to operating at 110%, the small talk and sincere gestures made me feel more connected to my present state of life and where I am today.

Then I found the answer to my daily questionnaire.

Q. Where do I go from here?

A. Nowhere. I don't have to run anymore.

Just a bad day.

Monday morning, 7:30am.
Outside on the balcony of the house, smoking cigarettes with Ryan before he leaves for his daily commute to work.

LIZ: I'm sorry for waking you up so late last night.
RYAN: I don't think it was that late, really. Do you know what time it was?
LIZ: No...
RYAN: Well try to have a good day.
LIZ: I'll be okay. It was just unexpected. It surprised me as much as it surprised you.

Neither Ryan or I knew what time it was when I got out of bed last night, sobbing. I do know what sparked the waterworks. It's embarrassing to admit because my sudden, deep sadness was sparked by one simple sentence from the bedtime story I read to Adam last night, [Mercer Mayer's Just a Bad Day]. Hearing myself say the sentence out loud made me feel vulnerable and lost. I wished that I could say the sentence in my everyday life, but I'll never get the chance to again. The sentence I'm referring to;

Then dad came home.

I was actually in a great mood last night until reading that sentence. It triggered something that made my heart feel like it was hit by a speeding freight train going 100 MPH; the train hauling issues from 2009 nearly smashing over the last, little bit of positive outlook I have left .

After Ryan left for work this morning, I began recalling my various experiences with death and loss. My archived mental notes exhibited a pattern I never noticed until now. It appears that I have a record. I have a record of habit; coming to terms with grief from the passing of my loved ones at the most inconvenient times and places.

There was last night's book massacre, and the coffee nazi...and there was even a third time I was K.O.'d by sudden grief.

A former lover of mine, [whom afterward, I remained good friends with], Smaz, died in a car accident in October 2002, I continued to live life as if his death didn't deeply affect me. Roughly a month after he passed, my advisor asked me to help judge a high school theatre contest and I agreed. The first scene we watched was from Steel Magnolias. As the characters began talking about their sister who just died, my eyes began to swell up at the mention of death. I bolted out of the theatre, [quietly as possible because I have a deep respect for the sanctuary of the stage.] Once I got out of the building and made it outside, I lurched over the grass like I was going to vomit but nothing came out. I just started hyperventilating. My heart began pounding and it felt like someone just shot me in the chest, close range, with a bazooka gun. I found out later that my reaction was a panic attack, complete with tears that erupted from my eyes as if they were mini geysers.

Even after assessing my coping skills, I do not understand why I reacted the way I did to the book last night. How could one measly sentence send me into a black hole of defeat? I feel like I've come to terms with 2009; my father's death, followed by the homicide, then my grandpa's passing, so there's no need to overreact anymore. Not understanding why it got to me so badly eats at me [almost] more than the feelings of depression that came with it.

There are a multitude of things that can ignite loss from the past. I get that. They say there's no exact way to partake in or understand the grieving process. The most important thing to do, is to allow yourself to grieve however you choose to, as needed. So I guess that means I have to accept that if I still cry sometimes over my father's death, it just happens. I wished I didn't because I hate sobbing. Simply, it sucks.

I am hopeful that in the future, the fall-out of feelings from 2009 will not feel as intensely negative as they do now. Once I get my memoir project finished, I believe it will be a huge step in helping me release some of the unsettled grief and grievances I continue to hold inside. 

In a letter from my father that was written in 1997, he told me the cycle of negativity that lingered around our family had to be stopped, starting with me and my life. His words and direction in the letter didn't make sense to me back then, but today I finally understand what he meant.

But [Together and Alone]

"I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but."

--Maniac/KID CUDI ft. CAGE

I've been working on a sort-of-kind-of memoir for the past year. It's been an extremely rough, raw writing experiment; terribly unorganized. The past two months I've spent trying to put some order to the whole concept in hopes to bring the short stories I've lived through, back to life. I want to share these experiences to entertain anyone who wants to be entertained. I also want to empathize with others who may have gone through and seen some of the realest life situations.

After living through some of the biggest life changes a person can live through, I feel like sharing my stories will positively affect anyone who chooses to listen or read. Most of what I've been through, would and will, shock people. If the stories are taken for face value, they sound like depressing, scary urban legends. However, if people place their own life experiences in between the written lines of mine and compare them, our experiences become shared. Everyone's experiences, everyone's problems, and everyone lives are connected, [and "no one man's stresses are greater than any other man's"].


Through this way of sharing, we live each and every experience together, so no one is ever truly alone.

But I'd be lying if I said I never wished that I was truly alone, sometimes.

"You are who you are and I know who I am."

It always starts with a small conversation, when suddenly I'm sent into an abyss of deep thought that forces me to explore and evaluate my life and art.

It almost always starts out this innocent; my descent. I'd swim around forever in those darkest, below sea-level depths if I could. Sometimes I wonder if maybe I am stuck in those waters, in that mode of thought, and I don't even realize it?

At work last week...
SHELBY: You remind me of this rapper named Cage.
LIZ: Well...I have been listening to a lot of rap lately.

I laughed when Shelby told me this, only because I had no idea what she meant exactly. I imagined myself as a rapper, pondered over various MC names, then giggled some more. She elaborated on her statement and where she failed to explain with her own words, she pulled out her iPhone and introduced me to the lyrical content and sounds from Mr.Cage.

You're always dying inside
That much closer to home
A crowded street corner
Surrounded by people, all alone.
Pain in the heart
Rain in the dark
The wind is glum and bitter.
-- I Never Knew You/CAGE

Yep. It appears that I am, in fact, stuck in that mode of thought. It's not a secret anymore. Not so much because everyone else knows it and sees it, but because I know it now.

I don't know what the hell I was thinking when I thought I wouldn't be permanently changed by the things I've experienced the past two years. It's incredible to have been through the INs and OUTs of life, especially at my age, thoroughly enough to see your happiest dreams, your most feared nightmares, and your reality all mesh together and become one. Suddenly there is no line between fantasy and real life. The walls come down and boundaries cease to exist.

It's at that moment, I believe, anything is possible becomes true.
Beautiful, heavenly things are possible and horrific, hell-on-earth things are possible.

You know it.
And now I know.
So that's everyone that needs to know I suppose.

With this knowledge, I've decided to start embracing the darkest parts of my life and art. No more editing for content or to save face.

You are who you are and I know who I am.

I've been working the past couple of months with Ryan and Patrick, laying out my artistic career goals and mapping out a plan to achieve those goals. It's awesome living and working with two managers who [mostly] understand my life and art.

With their help now, I'm able to freely explore and embrace in complete darkness and almost always, I never get completely lost, forever.

Prelude to the Prologue: Holy.Fuck.Shit.

NaNoWriMo

REsurfacation.

It's Monday, November 1st, 2010. Halloween is over and we're officially on the down slope of 2010. I didn't get to enter my art installation into the Dia de Los Muertos art show because the art director said he could only give me a 36" x 36" wall space. To this, my reply to him;

"Then don't advertise that your show is accepting installations. 36" x 36" of wall space is hardly enough space for an installation. [Fucka]." *

Usually I'd just pick myself up and move on from something like this. I still plan to put together the installation and enter it into another show. In the meantime I feel something unsettled within myself. I can't quite put my finger on it, but I can feel it rumbling inside of my chest. I thought maybe I just needed to cry or something, so I did that yesterday as we left Ryan's grandmother's house. Once we got home, I took a nap. I hoped to feel better after the tiny sleep break, but I didn't.

I imagine this feeling is from the never ending, constantly unsettled feelings from the past that won't ever subside. I go back and forth on the issues, letting them go, then being blindsided by the them when they resurface. I never anticipate their REsurfacation.**

I'm super paranoid
like a sixth sense.
Since [our] father[s] died
I ain't been writing since.
My heart is an Open sore
that I hope heals soon.

With it being November, it's time for me to get back on the art wagon for sure. As I write this paragraph I'm beginning to realize that's where some of the unsettled feelings in me start--
When I stop--Creating art.

I entered a script to D.C.'s The Source Theater play festival last week. We'll see how that goes. I should find out if I made the cut in a few months.

Speaking of resurfacing, it was roughly a year ago when my friend Jymz and I had a conversation that, for some reason, I haven't been able to stop thinking about, today.

LIZ: So what do you think about the new Jay-Z album?
JYMZ: It's aight.
LIZ: What do you mean, 'it's aight'?! It's amazing!
JYMZ: Yeah...but I have some issues with it. Lyrically speaking.
LIZ: Explain. I'm listening.
JYMZ: Well you know, the beats are good, but how many times can you sing about 'back in the day' when you used to sell drugs. You know things can't be that bad for Jay-Z now. It gets 'old' after a while singing about 'your old stash spots'.
LIZ: I didn't ever really think about it like that.
JYMZ: Get it?
LIZ: (Smiles) I hear ya.

*  I didn't actually call the art director a fucka, just in case he REsurfaced into my life again.
** Yeah, I know REsurfacation isn't a word. I just made it up.


________________________________________________________________________________________


November 1st, 2010
1:23pm

The four minutes and fifty-two seconds hallway.


I noticed I had a missed call from Adam's school, so I immediately returned the call.

After several rings....
MAN: Hello. [Insert name of Adam's school here]
LIZ: Hi! My son goes to school there. His name is Adam [insert last name here],
I just got a call from the school and I'm returning the call.
MAN: Oh, okay. Hold on, let me find someone who knows. Oh yeah, there's the school nurse. Hold on a second ma'am.

Exactly four minutes and fifty-two seconds pass...
NURSE: Hi! Is this Adam's mom?
LIZ: Yes! What's wrong?!?!
NURSE: Oh, Adam's fine. We just wanted to let you know that he got his arm stuck in a rocking chair earlier today and he may or may not have a little bruising from it.
LIZ: Oh my god! That's it?! That was the LONGEST four minutes and fifty-two seconds I've ever experienced in my life.
NURSE: (Laughing) Oh, I'm so sorry! I promise if there was ever something really wrong we would definitely find a way to get ahold of you.
LIZ: Well thank you for the phone call and for letting me know.
NURSE: Sure thing! Have a good day!

One thing I know for sure today. It's very evident that my anxieties have REsurfaced, fully.

There's only so far you can go
When you're living in a hallway
that keeps growing
I think to myself
[Four more minutes and fifty-two seconds]
and I'll be there.
--5 & 1/2 Minute Hallway/POE

Lemonade or straight whiskey?

Ryan and I are going to see Minus the Bear tonight at House of Blues in Dallas, TX. I'm excited about the show, though the reason we're going is because he bought the tickets a few weeks ago when we were fighting. I remember standing outside on my balcony when he handed me the envelope. I already knew what it was without opening it. "Nice try", I said, and I tossed the envelope aside; "You still have to talk to me."

Sometimes it's frustrating being in a relationship with someone who doesn't speak the same language. I feel like that with Ryan, frequently. I don't believe that we're incapable of communication. We can communicate if he's willing to listen and vice versa. Since the night we hashed out our differences and he gave me the Minus the Bear tickets, we've been working on communicating with each other. Trust that there are still days when I want to scream directly into one of his ears because it seems like he can't hear me. There are also days when I want to erect statues in his honor because he takes the time to talk things out when one of us is unhappy.

Going over it in my head, the central core of our biggest debates stem from growing up in two entirely different worlds. Ryan grew up in a Mormon faith based home where Joseph Smith (and apparently lemonade, as Ryan has confessed to me) ruled. I grew up in a place where no one truly ruled and straight whiskey was my father's drink of choice.

It seems like it wouldn't matter how we grew up since we both claim to be different people today than we were as children back then, but it does matter. The ideals we were conditioned to learn and believe in as children resound in every adult's soul, whether the adult chooses to believe it or not. Don't get me wrong, we discover things as we grow that shape our beings as people, but our upbringing is a key factor in who we are.

I didn't always believe that faith played any sort of role in relationships until a few years ago. A former lover of mine and I were sitting outside on the tailgate of his 1983 Ford pickup truck. We were drinking wine and staring up at the stars in the summer night sky.

"Do you believe in God?" he asked me.
"I don't know. I think it's a possibility", I replied.

The rage that followed from my reply made me wish I never dared to sit outside and stare at the stars in the sky with him.

"How can you believe in God when there is so much science that disproves it?!?!" he screamed at me.
"I don't know? It just seems to me that it's possible and it's not possible", I said.

He stormed off into the house and I sat there on the tailgate of his truck and finished my glass of wine. I stared at the stars alone and realized that our differences of opinions, faith, and beliefs affected more than what went on in our heads, separately. The differences and lack of communication affected us until we were no more.

I don't want that with Ryan. I want something better.

So I don't expect Ryan to learn to speak my language anymore. I don't want to learn his language either. We're making up an entirely new language of our own in order to live in harmony. I think that's part of what love is; starting something new, together.

Lemonade or straight whiskey?
Neither.
Combing the two?

Now we're talking.

Everyone has their obsession
Consuming thoughts, consuming time
They hold high their prized possession
That defines the meaning of their lives

You are mine.

-- You are Mine/MUTE MATH

Everything and everyone happens [and doesn't happen] for a reason. (The "Somewhere Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World" Reprise)

"When I was just a little boy standin' to my Daddy's knee, my poppa said, 'Son, don't let the man get you--
Do what he done to me.' "
--Born on the Bayou/CCR


It's been almost a month since my mom moved back to Oklahoma. I've spent this month adjusting to living and settling in with both Adam and Ryan. Admittedly, I will say it hasn't been all rainbows and sunshine. I almost forgot how hard it was to take care of Adam without my mother's help. On the Ryan side, I almost forgot how hard it was to make a true relationship work. But after the past few weeks we've begun to find our niche and started to learn how to live our new lives together, on every level.
(Cue in RAINBOWS and SUNSHINE.)

I'm figuring out how to balance all of the piEces of this new life; my family and art as well. I decided that once November gets here, my second priority will be working on getting my own art career in gear. Until then, I'm exposing my heart, my mind, and my soul to EVERYTHING and becoming inspired by the world around me; gaining inspiration from those close to me and from complete strangers.

October 2010 suggested list of things I should experience

Apocalypse Now - (Patrick and Ryan)
Mayan Exhibit at Kimbell Art Museum - (self-suggestion)
Ansel Adams photography exhibit at Amon Carter Museum - (Patrick)
Road trip to Oklahoma with Adam and Ryan - (self-suggestion)
Minus the Bear show at the House of Blues in Dallas - (Ryan)
[Open suggestions here.]

Wednesday afternoon, on the street, in downtown Fort Worth...
OLD MAN: Are you going to dye your hair purple like that girl's hair?
LIZ: (Smiles at the man) No, I didn't plan to.
OLD MAN: That's good. My hair is brown and gray. Your hair will get gray one day too.
LIZ: (Laughs) I hope it doesn't!
OLD MAN: You just gotta keep waking up. That's the key.You gotta keep waking up. Over and over. Everyday.

I've also decided to enter an art installation piece into an art show in Fort Worth. The show is themed Dia de Los Muertos, and opens on October 30th. It's my first art show, so obviously I'm excited but I'm also nervous. The installation I'm entering is going to feature a 12ft x 8ft recreation of my parents' dining room, as it would look in the morning, if my father were still alive today. It's sounds vague right now, but once I write out the concept and get the blue prints for the design drawn out it will make a little more sense, visually speaking.

RYAN: What do you think the best CCR song is?
LIZ: That's easy. It's, "Born on the Bayou".
RYAN: (Smiles) See, that's why I love you. Because you know that too.

What do tickets and lions got to do with it?

What's "consumption vs. destruction" got to do with it?

It's Friday! It's also the first day of October! What better way would there be to start off a beautiful Autumn day than a fight with Ryan?!

Oh yes, I'm being serious about that. That's how our Friday morning started.

Lately, (when we actually do spend time together), our time has been littered with countless awkward gaps of silence or bouts of fighting. The silence cuts into us gradually. Since it's not evident to Ryan, I imagine he won't notice until it starts adding up and he can see the empty space silence has filled,  separating us.

When we do talk, we're fighting, and our words become switchblades we use to purposefully cut into each others' flesh, recklessly. I can't help but feel we're trying to prove to ourselves that we're still alive through this grotesque form of blood letting. So what if one of us dies?! At least we'll know we were alive before we destroyed our relationship and each other, right?! This metaphorical comparison is just that, metaphorical, but it rings true, literally, more than you'll ever know. Especially if you've ever been brave enough to enter into a committed, romantic relationship with someone.

I have this theory about relationships. Not just romantic ones but relationships in general. 

The Consumption vs. Destruction Theory in Human Relationships

People are driven by two types of needs. One idea is a natural survival need; consumption. The other is a man-made, material need; destruction. The needs we choose to be driven by are based on our psyche, environment, and physical age.

Consumption, by definition, is the act of consuming. Consuming is thought to be a form of destroying, but that isn't the case at all. Consumption is necessary as a means to survive. Animals consume other animals and plants to live. From death, life is sustained. Once the animals consume, their waste fertilizes plant life so that plants can grow again. Upon the death of an animal, scavenger animals consume what's left and clear space on the planet for the next generation of plant and animal life to be born.

The cycle of consumption is a never-ending circle of life; the infinite; life feeds on life...

Destruction is to annihilate, to vanquish; to kill for the sake of killing; to do something simply for the sake of doing it. Examples of this need exhibiting itself in humanity are best seen through wars, manifest destinies, and imperialism. Humans destroy other humans and plants to gain power. Power is not a survival need. Power is an idea used to mask a fear of being unable to compete and survive in the circle of life through consumption. Destruction, fueled by power, warrants wiping out entire ethnic groups of people, (ie, Native Americans during the age of colonialism and Jewish people during the Holocaust). It is also seen through killing plant life by the masses, (ie, deforestation in South America due to commercial logging and global warming caused by the overuse of burning fossil fuels and deforestation).

When the natural circle of life is disrupted by destruction, everything dies and nothing survives.

Individually, humans approach each other and form one-on-one relationships that are driven by consumption and/or destruction. Again, they way we choose to approach this smaller scale interaction is based on psyche, environment, and physical age.

When a human relationship is formed with the need to consume, the relationship maintains a healthy, organic balance of naturally giving and taking; such as talking and listening, loving and being loved, making allowances and being allowed (AKA patience); all of these actions done to help each other survive.

A relationship that starts or becomes driven by the need to destroy, results in person-to-person battles from trying to force a relationship. The forcing comes from a fear of loss; an idea that says, It's better to have something than nothing. I consider that idea similar to another idea I'm not too keen on,; Doing something simply for the sake of doing it. It's random, pointless, and lacks meaning. When daily fighting starts and equally maintaining the balance in a relationship becomes obsolete, the relationship is eventually destroyed. And for the extremely unfortunate, lovers quarrels have been known to kill and end lives, literally and metaphoriclly speaking, because for some humans, the need for destruction and power goes beyond solely dictating a relationship. 

As of this Friday, first day of October, regarding the consumption vs destruction theory and my relationship with Ryan; I survived another battle. I'm growing tired of fighting because it's unnecessary.

"Love shouldn't be hard." --Anonymous

Meanwhile, we're using the only ten minutes we have in the morning to see each other, tearing each other down, avidly; doing something simply for the sake of doing it.

I can't swallow the idea of spending the rest of my Friday, first day of October, like that.

I can't swallow the idea of spending the rest of the days that follow, like that either.


A warm bed,
well that's something.
But that alone,
just ain't enough.
-- Roll On / DNTEL ft. JENNY LEWIS

The one about the butterfly. [Enclosed: An unrelated letter.]

After becoming unhealthily enamored with the book, House of Leaves this week, I put the book away in a new hiding spot in my house. I'll come back to it when I'm ready to devote more time to reading it. "Devote", isn't the right word to use though. "Brave", would be better suited to the previous sentence.

I put the book away until I'm brave enough to tackle the task of reading it from start to finish.

Out of sight, out of mind, pt. II.
(To be continued...)

This morning while Adam and I were outside in the front yard, waiting for his school bus to come, he spotted something on the ground and began jumping up and down, pointing at it. I looked down and quickly recognized it as the butterfly we saw last night. Last night it was fluttering it's wings; resting on the vines that grow along our fence line. It was alive yesterday, but this morning when we found it, it was now laying in the grass, stiff. It looked like a small, quarter-machine, novelty toy someone dropped and lost on the ground.

"What's that?! What's that?!" Adam asked me while he continued to jump up and down, almost landing on top of the dead butterfly.
I put my arm out in front of him to protect the last little bit of dignity the butterfly had, "Babe, babe! Don't step on it! It's dead..."
Adam stopped for a minute and looked at me puzzled. He matched my quietness and stopped jumping. Then he leaned down to get a closer look at the butterfly and began studying it. His inspection seemed harmless until he picked up a stick from the ground and started poking at the dead butterfly's body.
"EWWWWW! Gross!" he shouted.
I stopped him from assaulting the butterfly any further; "You're EWWW! Gross!", I said to him, laughing at his reaction. Luckily for the butterfly, Adam's school bus pulled up and saved the butterfly from mutilation.

After I got him on the bus I walked back to the dead butterfly and leaned down to study it for myself. It appeared to be in perfect health, so I couldn't imagine why it just died. There had to be a reason, right? Whatever the reason was, it was unseen to me.

There are lots of things we don't see that affect life and death on earth, I suppose.

I picked up the butterfly and moved it closer to the fence line so no one would step on it. Then I trekked my way up the stairs, back inside the house. I closed the door behind me and locked it. Then I walked over to the kitchen table and sat down. From the kitchen window, I looked down into the yard and started to think about having to explain life and death to Adam one day. He's getting older (speaking of which, his birthday is coming up on October 7th), questioning anything and everything he sees these days.

How would I explain it? What would I say about it? And how would it affect his perceptions?

I made a mental note of the butterfly's death. I thought re-telling the experience would help when I had to explain to Adam that life and death were a little more than just, "EWWW! Gross!"

with a long sigh let the hissing in

stones deformed by gentle kissing

all the closed eyes start to glisten

but it feels like someone's missing
-- Someone's Missing / MGMT

Since I was already at the kitchen table, I decided to have a bowl of Lucky Charms to start the day. While I was eating, I saw the mailman from the kitchen window. He was putting mail in our box and I and remembered that when my mom called earlier in the week, she said she mailed us something. She made a big deal about it, making it sound like something epic. I finished the cereal and walked outside to see if her mail made it yet.

I opened the box and found a letter from my mom. Usually I rip open mail that's addressed to me, immediately. I didn't with her letter though. I wasn't sure what would be inside of it. With my mother, there's no telling. I thought maybe it was a letter that would offer advice or guide me some during our transition into our new lives, apart. What could she possibly have to say, in a handwritten letter, no less?

When she called days before, I shared with her my anxieties in starting over. I confessed to her how much I loved being with Adam again full-time; how he seemed to be enjoying school and life at home with me. I told her that we loved her and missed her tremendously, despite the fact that she and I fought most of the time.

(Yesterday night...)
LIZ: I can't believe mom called just to check on us the other day. That's weird. She never does that.
PATRICK: (Laughing) She didn't call to check on us. She doesn't care about us. (Laughs again) She thinks we're abusing and neglecting your son, depriving him of having Mc Donald's every day.

Once I got up the stairs and back inside the house, I tore open the envelope.

Book-It for adults.

"There are crazy twists and turns and things that you never see coming. And you really have to debrief at the end and put it back together which, I always feel is a mark of well written literature and leads to endless re-readability."

-- prophetandmistress / House of Leaves Discussion Thread

A copy of the book House of Leaves, written by POE's brother, Mark Z. Danielewski, has been in my possession for several months now. I've tried to read it like a regular book from start to finish, and have failed successfully at every attempt. [Which, I attest to honestly, has only been once since the book found it's way into my home].

I came across the copy because of Ryan, the true owner of the book. He made a point to hunt down his lent out copy when he was telling me about it and I told him I never read it. He was stunned, and once he recovered the copy, he wasted no time in passing the book on to me, and insisted that I read it as soon as possible.

RYAN: (Hands LIZ the book.)
LIZ: (Opens the book directly to the middle, stares at the page, then turns it and fingers through the the pages of the book, out of order.) The format is kinda neat. (Shuts the book and begins studying the cover.) It's pretty big...
RYAN: If you want to be a good writer you have to read too.
LIZ: Why?
RYAN: Because you have to know about other authors and other styles of writing.
LIZ: If you say so...

I didn't understand why he was pushing me to read House of Leaves so badly. [That, and, On Writing: A Memoir of The Craft, by Stephen King.] I couldn't recall ever having issues with reading in my life. I was constantly reading as a child and snatched up free pizza certificates left and right in elementary school thanks to Pizza Hut's Book-It program. Why was he so adamant on convincing me to read?

I approached the book with a questionable attitude when he told me to read it. Mainly because I couldn't see any other reason to read it except for the sole sake of reading it.

Why on earth would I do something for the sole sake of doing it?
I do what I want. [That's very post-modern of me, I believe.]

I took the copy of House of Leaves from Ryan to appease him and to have the book in my home court. In my mind, I thought if I had the copy it would be up to me to decide ultimately what to do with it. I exercised the right to do as I pleased when Ryan left, and I immediately hid the book in my house, deep in the back of a cabinet, downstairs.

Out of sight, out of mind.

Months passed by and Ryan had forgotten about the book while it continued to stay locked away in it's temporary housing. I almost forgot about it too, until a few days ago. I was at home alone, listening to an internet radio station when I heard part of a POE song. Her lyrics from the song, Haunted, jolted my memory:

There's always a way,
here in November, in this
house of leaves,
we'll pray.

I'm a huge fan of her music and heard years ago that her album, Haunted, accompanied a book. I never knew it was House of Leaves, until I was reminded of the two from hearing the song snippet. I researched my assumption for official confirmation and learned that they were, in fact, very connected.

Haunted is my favorite POE album. The style of the music is eclectic, but the main reason I love the album is because I like the twisted and dark lyrical themes. The exhibition of the themes by way of overindulging in flashbacks from youth spoke honestly to me. Sounds creepy on it's own but thanks to the sweetly feminine sound of POE, her voice serves as a night light on the dark content. And with a night light on, the dark themes are less terrifying to approach as opposed to trying to find them like unknown noises heard in the middle of the night, in pitch darkness.

Now that I knew the two pieces of artwork were connected; the music and the book; I walked downstairs to the cabinet and pulled the book out from it's solitary confinement. The cover was slightly dusty so I wiped it off and stared at it. I became distracted with the encyclopedia size of the book just as I had the first time I saw it. It wasn't merely the physical size of the book that I was concerned with anymore. Upon confirmation of the connection between Haunted and House of Leaves, I learned that the content of the book was twisted and dark too.

Haunted complements the book, but it's not going to help me find my way through the tangled confusion of ideas printed on the book's pages. I could live happier having never learned that the two pieces of art went hand in hand. Because if I still didn't know, I wouldn't feel compelled to read the book. In fact, putting the two together has become the bane of my existence over the past couple of days. [Well, at least one of the multiple banes of my existence.]

Despite having an actual interest in reading the book, now I am afraid to read it.

What if I get lost in the Olympic sized book? What if it swallows me up whole and I'm never seen or heard from again? What if it turned me against writing?

Last and most importantly;
What if I read it and discover it was a complete waste of time?

But I'm already wasting my time on it.

Too bad there isn't a Book-It program for adults.


By the way
when the landlord came today
he measured everything.
I knew he'd get it wrong
but I just played along
because I was hoping
that he would fix it all.
-- 5 &1/2 Minute Hallway / POE

One Hundred Billion

"As processions fade, new hearts doubt."
-- Walking Through the Door / FUTURE ISLANDS


Starting over for the one hundred billionth time in your life is never easy. It becomes repetitive when you're constantly changing your plans. It's true what they say; The more things change, the more things stay the same. I just never thought I fell into that cliche, though here I am, starting over again. It's hard not to feel disgusted because I feel like I should already be past this phase in my life, at my age.

I would love to know what stability feels like, at least once before I die.

The presence of stability would be a true change in my life. There's no telling how I would react if it found it's way into my every day. Chances are, my first reaction would be to run in the other direction because stability is a stranger to me, [stranger danger].  But after I was introduced to it and became familiar with it, I'd do my best to keep it a constant in my life.

If I liked it that is, because who's to say I'd like stability once I got to know it?

One hundred billion possibilities abound when you're starting your life over for the one hundred billionth time. I'm hoping to discover only one of those possibilities though.

Past four years & now.

Into the distance
a ribbon of black
stretched to the point
of no turning back
a flight of fancy
on a wind swept field
standing alone
my sense reeled.
--Learning to Fly / PINK FLOYD



It's been exactly one week today since my mother moved to back to Oklahoma for good.

Last Monday when Adam and I said goodbye to her, it wasn't as lengthy and drawn out like I thought it would be. She was holding tears back, I could tell, as we pulled out of her driveway and waved goodbye. The moment I turned my head away from her and looked out at the road in front of me, I immediately felt different.

The first day without her was breezy, though the different feeling hung around. I tried to shrug it off but I couldn't. I tried to explain how I felt to Ryan, hoping it would make me feel better. He looked at me like I was crazy when I admitted to him that there was a part of me that missed my mother. I explained to him that I felt overwhelmed with the idea of knowing that I couldn't rely on my mother, daily anymore, like I had for... the past four years. [NOTE: It was at that exact moment when I realized how long she'd been with me, every single day.] Truthfully, I knew Ryan wouldn't relate to what I was feeling because I couldn't clearly define or understand it myself. So instead of trying to get answers and empathy from him, I turned my investigation inside out, directing my questions inward this time.

The answer I was searching for finally came to me four days after my mother moved out.

See, I never expected to live with or have my mother live with me until I was 27. It was a series of bad luck circumstances and tragic situations that bonded us together for.... the past four years. It started with my separation from AJ in 2006 and official divorce from him in 2007. Recession kept my mother and I economically bound together in 2008. March 2009 brought about the loss of my father, then losing a loved one to homicide months later in May. The failure of yet another toxic, romantic relationship left a post atom bomb fallout over my life at the end of August 2009. My mother was convinced I could not handle the stress and take care of Adam at the same time. She was right, I couldn't back then.

I regained some of my sanity in the winter of 2009 and decided to move to Texas with my brother, Patrick. Just before I moved, my grandfather, my mother's father, had a stroke and passed away on December 8, 2009. Coincidentally, my father would have been celebrating his 60th birthday on that day if he had lived.

My mother stayed at my side as we went through the past four years, together.

The emotional climax of all the events that took place happened a few moments after we received news about the homicide. I went outside and sat down on a curb in the parking lot of the hotel we were staying at and lit a cigarette. [We were on what was supposed to be a vacation when we were notified.] I remember watching other families coming in and out of the hotel's entrance and noticing two children in particular, skipping closely behind their parents. I wondered what on earth would compel them to want to skip in a world littered with ugliness. Then my observation was interrupted with a sound I had not heard since I was a little girl.

It was the sound of an ice cream truck melody.

I can remember having an instinctual need to get up and run after it, but I didn't. Instead, I put out my cigarette and lit another. I felt my eyes start to water when I took the first drag off of it. At that point I'd grown accustomed to crying, so I wasn‘t startled by the feeling of tears forming in my eyes. Tears and chain smoking were the norm in my world, not skipping or chasing after ice cream trucks. I stayed cemented to the concrete curb as the ice cream truck drove away and it‘s music faded.

The random resurfacing of one of my favorite childhood memories at that moment in my life, I took as a symbol of the end of anything sweet and innocent ever entering or passing through my world, again.

I had forgotten most of that ice cream truck memory until this past Saturday, around 6pm. I was standing outside on the balcony of my house with Ryan when our conversation was interrupted with a familiar tune.

I looked at his face, slightly confused as to the sound’s source, “Do you hear that?” I asked him.
Our conversation died as we stood in silence, trying to define the sound. He replied, “Yeah…it sounds like…”
“It sounds like ’Happy Birthday’,” I quickly interjected. 
He agreed, “It is ‘Happy Birthday’. Weird.”
“Where is it coming from?!” I asked, and before he even had a chance to answer, I started walking back and forth on the balcony, looking down into the neighborhood, trying to find it. The recognizable sound grew louder and clearer as it slowly passed by on the street in front of my house.

It was a man on a bicycle, selling ice cream.

When I heard the song playing I felt comforted. It was like gently waking up from a deep sleep. I thought the tune was appropriate too, because it was time to celebrate a birth, the start of my new life officially beginning with the past four years behind me.

“I feel a lot better suddenly”, I confessed to Ryan, smiling at him.
“Good”, he replied, and he leaned in to hug me.

I don’t know how it’s going to be without my mother in my life everyday. Looking back on it now, it’s hard to fathom everything that’s happened in the past four years. My heart literally aches when I think about it. But after realizing the depths of my experience, knowing that I made it through what I thought would never end, and finally moving on, I feel like I can face what ever may come today and every day after today..

without my mother and without my father.

The past four years is over and its time to start living on my own now.

"Nope."

Yesterday afternoon, Patrick and I decided to stop at a McDonald's for lunch. The drive-thru line was backed-up so we parked and chose to order inside. It was the same dilemma and customers were lined up at two separate open registers. I wasn't sure what I wanted to order, so I decided to go to the ladies room to wash my hands and think of what to order.

I walked into the bathroom, pulled the tab on the liquid soap dispenser and began to wash my hands. After I was done rinsing the lather away, I turned around and put my wet hands underneath the air dryer. It turned on automatically and I let the warm air current do it's job, blowing out and over my hands as I stood in front of a full length mirror that hung on the bathroom wall. I realized this was the first McDonald's I'd been to that had this type of mirror in the ladies room.

Placing a full length mirror in a fast food restaurant seemed like a bad marketing choice, I theorized, as I hypothesized that since women would have the opportunity to check out their bodies in the restaurant, they may possibly choose to eat less as a result. Wouldn't that equal less sales? Or maybe it would convince them to order the over-priced salad/wrap option?

My ridiculously too deep thought was interrupted by the silence the dryer left when it stopped. Then I turned around to open the door and walk out of the restroom. Before I got the door open, I felt my nose start to run. I let go of the door handle and walked over to one of the bathroom stalls and quickly grabbed some toilet paper, blew my nose, and tossed the trash in the toilet. I raised my foot up and pushed the flush handle down with my shoe. When I put my foot back on the ground and looked up, I noticed I wasn't alone.

A little brunette girl, probably around nine or ten years old, was standing in the bathroom, staring at me. I smiled at her and she smiled back at me. She slowly sauntered toward the sink and put her hands under the automatic water faucet and began washing. As I walked past her, I could see in my peripheral vision that she was still staring at me.

"Aren't you going to wash your hands!?!?" she asked, genuinely concerned.

It seemed like a strange question to ask until I realized that she probably assumed I had just used the toilet when she walked in on me flushing. I tried to think of the right answer to give her. Do I stop and wash my hands again to appease her? No, I'm ready to order now... The little girl was looking at me with big brown eyes, begging me to answer the question. My answer?

"Nope."

Her smile turned into a large frown and she looked at me like I just committed a felony. It was hilariously awkward. I didn't know what to do except walk away.

The Waking Dream

When I opened my eyes this morning, the sun hadn't risen yet which masked everything behind the darkness in the bedroom. I wondered to myself, as I laid on my back in bed, staring at the ceiling, "Why on earth am I awake right now? I should go back to sleep." Before I could close my eyes to entertain the idea of catching a few more minutes of sleep, I felt something extremely warm push against the side of my rib cage, forcefully. Though I knew what it was, or rather, who it was, I turned my head and smiled to greet the force.

The force was Adam <3.

He was still asleep as he pushed his tiny fat feet against my body. I rolled over on my side to give him some more room to move in bed. The moonlight coming through the muslin curtains that cover our bedroom window cast enough light so that I could see just the outline of his silhouette. I stared at him quietly and got lost in a flashback from years before, when his dad, AJ, and I separated.

Adam was barely two years old in 2006 when, just a few months before we parted ways, AJ and I finally got him to sleep in a toddler bed in his own bedroom. When AJ moved out, all of the hard work we put into helping Adam learn to put himself to sleep went out the window and it didn't take long for Adam to find his way back into bed with me. I didn't object because I was still adjusting to not sleeping next AJ, so having Adam next to me was comforting. This was despite the fact that he was a bed hog and insisted on sleeping right behind me, alternating with attempts to push me out of the bed, every night.

It's been like that ever since 2006. I never got Adam adjusted to sleeping on his own again.

My mother was also a constant at-my-side, after my divorce from AJ became final in 2007. Adam and I moved in with her and she began helping me care for him as I searched my soul to find the strength to get past the depression and anxiety that overtakes a suddenly divorced, 23 year old, single mother.She insisted on trying to offer me comfort in the only way she knew how, which was through a series of ego stroking phrases like, "You're so much better than him! You're much better off without that loser!". Those phrases I clung to and started to believe in enticed me to allow my anger and ego to over-inflate. Then days later she would burst my bubbling new confidence through relentless hours of twisted, tough love talk; "You're not a good mother! You can't do this on your own!" This became a cycle that continued for the rest of the time I lived with her. It was confusing, heartbreaking, and frustrating.

With Adam pushing on me all night, along with riding my mother's behavioral/mood rollercoaster death rides all day, I wasn't sure who to point fingers at as to the reason I wasn't sleeping or eating anymore. Truthfully it wasn't either of them that caused the stress that began to consume my life.

It was just life.

Not even so much life, but it was me, and my disdain for the direction my life had turned. I didn't want to be 23 years old, divorced,and forced to take care of so much responsibility on my own. I didn't want to be with AJ anymore either. I was convinced that no one would ever want to be with me again because now I was tainted with a fly-by-night, unholy, matrimony that took a nose dive crash into the surface of rock hard earth. I was so disconnected with reality at that point, I wasn't sure if I survived the humiliation of my divorce crash. Top that with the not sleeping and not eating, and I may as well have been dead. I looked like a zombie that wandered off the set of Night of The Living Dead. My (so-called) friends back then made no secret to gossip about my current D.O.A status to anyone who would listen.

I remember reading online once; I was being labeled as a terrible parent according to my, "friends". The line that stands out mostly from that terrorist attack on my motherhood was, "Be thankful for your sun! He's the only one you got!" I remember being torn between humor and betrayal; laughing at the misspelling of what should have been the word, "son", and fighting back tears because my son was and always will be the one subject that NO ONE is allowed to speak ill upon.

So my husband jumped ship on me and the people I called, "friends" did the same. Luckily, I managed to weather the high seas of drama. The image of a better life and my faith that the high tide of negativity in my life would eventually subside helped me get through all of the loss. And Adam. I wanted to get my life back so I could be there for him and make his life better.

I reached shoreline in 2008 and thought the worst was over. But instead of being stranded on an awesome island like Gilligan's, I found myself stranded on an island that was littered with more poor choices I made, along with my family's fate of experiencing death, three-fold, in 2009. 2009 made 2006 and 2007 seem like child play's in the realm of tragedy and disappointment. Again, I pressed on, and though 2009 was literally like living hell on earth, I learned how to be stronger because of what I had already lived through. I bounced back faster than I ever had before.

After escaping the living hell on earth, I resurfaced in 2010 on a new island known as, "Texas". Life in Texas is far from perfect but I can definitely say that it's on the up-and-up these days. It takes a lot of living in order to learn, and I know that from experience. It's taken this much time and this much bullshit for me to realize that I was the reason for much of the strife in my life. Since January 1, 2010, I vowed never to let myself become a willing part of the cycle of negativity.

All of these flashbacks took just a few seconds to play out in my memory as I woke up on this morning. Adam brought me back to present day, in bed, when he raised his hands up and traced his little fingers over the outline of my face; touching my eyelids, my nose, and over my fuller parts of my lips. He giggled and smiled, though still sleeping soundly. I felt truly lucky to have lived through the past few years to be here now, awake, to feel Adam's warm feet and hands touching me.

My memory suddenly flashed back to my dad. I wondered if he ever had moments like these with me. Moments that he kept safe, close to him in his heart, in his memory for all of his life. I wished he could have been there waking up to see Adam and to share that moment with us, but it was a moment meant only for Adam and me.

It dawned on me as the sun began to slowly rise, that I stayed awake just to watch Adam sleep. I laid next to him, on my side, completely still, and watched him as he shyly smiled, eyes closed, dreaming freely and happily. I leaned in carefully and smelled his hair. The sun rose and promised us this time together, even if was only for that moment. I saw more than just my child sleeping. I saw our past, our present, and our future, in all of it's entirety. It was the moment I survived my entire life to experience.

It was the waking dream I was born to see.


If you were here
I know that you would
Truly be amazed
At what's become of what you made
If you were here
You would know how I treasured every day
How every single word you spoke
Echoes in me like a memory of hope

Now that I'm here
I hear you
And wonder if maybe you can hear yourself
Ringing in me
Now that you're somewhere else
Because I hear your strange music
Gentle and true
Singing inside me
With the best parts of you
I hope somewhere you hear them too
Now that I'm here
  I love you

I miss you but it's okay
You can go now.
-- If You Were Here/POE