A Bear and a Moose Walk Into a Bar

Must I Make a New Year's Blog Post? Yes? Fine. Jeez.

2012-01-02T15:00:00.001-05:00

All right, I've been thinking about it for a while now and here's what my new year's resolutions are for this year:

-- be me, a little louder: I think it'll be okay. And the stuff that pops outta me is sometimes amazing. It's worth it to get to the good nuggets to deal with the flotsam that will also surely come

-- push the Columbo effect: That is to say, long awkward silences followed by weird questions. This works for me in terms of time needed to think. Might mean blocking out voices until I know what I need to understand, and then probe for more. Also, it's a fine meme for me. Work it.

-- get rumpled raincoat: It doesn't have to start rumpled, it'll get that way eventually naturally (re. the rest of your clothes) Also, get the stuff you need, dude, like socks and underwear. Handkerchiefs. Throw away the shit with holes. You make money: stop buying food and start buying clothes.

-- keep up the fight against fat: A great segue from the last, but true. I will ALWAYS have to be vigilant if I want to be successful with food. I love food. And food loves me. But we need some serious boundaries in our relationship. Love yourself. Love your body. Take good care of yourself, as you would your own child -- Lord knows someone needs to, finally.

Top Ten Times You Said Yes

2011-12-29T16:51:00.002-05:00

It promises to a helluva year
And I will do what I can to do those things
That will make me a better man.

I will stop talking about myself in gender-confusing ways
I'll eat only my prescribed 1200 calories a day and
waste away, mind first

I'll speak more and write
Even more than that
We have to keep the ratio right

I'll set aside my need for
snugly love and lean into
leather lashes, properly provided

Pretend harder that I wouldn't be
Equally confused and undecided
Even if I had a picket fence & puppy

I will make more effort to learn
the purpose and power, to yearn
for the rhyme. I'll own it.

I will tear down the paper thin walls
that looked like steel for years

I'll be consistent in my stanza
my phrase
my intent
my love

My love will always be consistent
Consistently there, waiting, wondering
Wandering, hopeless like a child

No.

I'll stand as still as I need to and listen to the rush of wind. I will predict the acorn falling. I'll know what it's all for.

I'll finally get over the failure of my mother, although I'll never forgive her. I'll describe her deeds in detail and publish them all over the cloud.

I'll tell the story
of the mountain of me
and how I got to be
so
tall

I'll own it
because I'm that strong.
I'll stand still
and let the children climb over me.

I will laugh
my signature hearty chuckle
and it will shake the trees
And I'll say, "I called that one."

And it won't matter at all.
And we'll smile all the same.

The pain is part of it. This we know.
But look! Look.
There it is.
Found it.

Doctors

2011-08-29T18:22:00.001-04:00

Okay, I admit it, it's true: I have a new found *thing* for doctors. Or maybe I'm simply just now identifying my predilection for the highly educated, highly motivated young woman doctor. They're so freaking cute!

The ER doc defintely started this trend, though I've always had a crush on my GP. You could've knocked me over with a feather when I saw the vet this morning. Of course her giant wedding ring was a (fairly) clear indicator that I should just stand down, but I was already agog.

I'm fairly certain that even the most socially inept individual can read my face. I am only mysterious at an Aspberger conference. So I'm certain the animal doc read me right away, leading to our mutual stammering-stuttering-blushing-fest as we talked fungus and ringworm and fleas.

I try not to look like an idiot. It doesn't always work.

The Thing About The Blogging

2011-08-26T10:16:00.001-04:00

I know, I know. I should be writing. Snippy snazzy bits of sentences and half-baked ideas go flying through my head all the time. Usually when I'm driving.

For weeks I've been promisng myself to reconnect to Blogger via email so I could just whip out my smart phone and be pithy on the spot. Or, you know, pull over.

Some of my favorite bloggers have been really quiet for too long, also. And I'd like to harass them about writing more, but really couldn't with my own poor showing.

So let's get back to it, shall we? The world needs our snark and sarcasm. It's a dimmer place without excessive alliteration and our unique perspective. Not everybody can live upside-down, or inside-out, or... whatever the hell I'm doing.

Oo-rah!

Standing Silent, Even While It Stings

2011-07-25T00:49:00.005-04:00

I recognize the need to keep a stiff upper lip. It's part play-acting, for others' sake and for your own. If you say it enough times, you believe it. "I'm fine. No worries." I am not so big on play-acting, though it has its place. Generally though I'm more of an emotional billboard, announcing broadly exactly what I feel.

Not sure which way to go right now.

I'll tell you honestly that I feel a strange kind of sad. It's strange because there's a stiff-upper-lip built into it, and I don't know why.

Maybe the crash started when I was coming down off the multi-day high of sexual tension building over e-media: photos and words exchanged, the former stolen and reblogged, the latter crafted by me. If crescendo doesn't mean crashing, it should.

This Saturday was full of wicked news: The untimely death of Amy Winehouse, crooner extraordinaire and a real hot mess. The massacre in Norway, by a man claiming to be a Christian, fighting for Israel. And the unrelenting heat wave, which wasn't really news, but continued to punish us across the country.

I feel guilt about Amy Winehouse -- probably not entirely because I feel that I should've done something more -- but more because her death is an echo of a work friend who died late last fall, also found dead in her bed, also who struggled with alcohol and a hard, complicated life. I didn't help her either, but rather kept her an arm's length away, not wanting the dark cloud of her defeating life to touch mine. I feel guilt about that, guilt that I didn't reach out, care more, fix more.

I am bitter about my inner desire to fix and heal. I see it as an illness that looks like graciousness but is probably rooted in something deeper, sicker, and certainly less desirable. I have already promised myself and announced that I am not going to be anybody's white knight anymore. Any potential partner will come with the ability to solve her own shit, and a job of her own.

I'm distressed about the Norway shooter, who claims to have done his destruction because he wants to support Israel. Whack-job militaristic nut bags defending Israel was NOT in my wishlist for peace in the Middle East. I'm left to wonder when the cycle of attack/defend from the other children of Abraham will simmer down enough to have a family reunion. Must we lump all Christians together? Must we lump all Muslims together? God knows the Jews themselves don't want to be indistinguishable from each other, even while we grudgingly defend our own whack-job counterparts' right to exist. Exist yes, legislate no. I fear the total demise of pluralistic religion in Israel, as the "right way" to be Jewish narrows.

My friends are largely saner than I. They explain to me the realistic expectations that I should have: I can't have done a thing for Amy Winehouse. There will probably never be peace in the Middle East. My friends think it's sweet that I want to save the world, but they're a fairly logical bunch, geeks and scientists and such. I would rather live near them, though, to counterbalance my own lofty dreams and excessive emotion. Someone needs to give me the high water mark, so I know when I'm flying and need to come down.

So. I saw the flag. The those-are-your-emotions flag and the data that accompanies it. I suppose that's where I know I need to buck it up, and keep going. Me and my long face did laundry and cleared off the mountain of crap on my coffee table. I did not cry, as I often do when I am overwhelmed with the sad emotion of the composite of humanity. It is not a happy story, even when you sample the greatness of some, the compassion of many. No. Overwhelmingly it is a story that makes you shout "not fair!" and occasionally "why me?" out loud. I feel the lows, and I am sometimes unwilling if not unable to drag myself out of bed and to work. I don't take a pill for it... yet. I am mostly healthy, even though my knees scream at me during and after a workout. According to doctors I am slowly dying from fatness. Even still I struggle with not consuming my grief through calories. I seek other solutions, other ways to relieve my soul. I workout like a maniac, every day I can, turning myself into an addict for adrenaline & pushing myself beyond my comfort zone.

Who am I to want to mend souls, with my own a patchwork in tatters? I don't know. But I know when others hurt, I hurt. Empathy is hardly a strength, when it buckles my own knees. My brain searches for a solution. It is an equation, after all. There must be a way to solve it. And then I think: there is a way, through loss, through pain and tragedy. I know, I sound melodramatic. But the point is: that *has* to be there. Has to be. Not just because we need an opposite for happiness and triumph. The negative is the chisel to the positive marble, cutting away the excess, showing us the form inside the block. It belongs. It is part of the process.

So. No crying, unless it's one of those stoic single tears tracing the curve of my cheek. Chin up, and stand tall. No one is going to save you but you. No one can do what you want, but you. Dust off your boots and tighten the tourniquet. Keep walking, cowboy.

Smells

2011-05-18T23:52:00.004-04:00

I can still smell her on me. We hugged, three times. Once in greeting, twice in departing. My wife, whom I haven't lived with since 2006. 2001 - 2006. We married in 2003 in Canada, Niagara-on-the-Lake, just weeks after Ontario passed a law making it possible for us to legally marry.

Her perfume is familiar, although I couldn't tell you the name of it. It goes nicely with my Old Spice. I would have you believe that she knows that.

We share a lot of common desires: good food, silverware that is both elegant and heavy in your hand, expensive glasses frames (although she got laser surgery), good food. She wanted to take me to dinner for my birthday, which was Monday. We went to a Japanese restaurant well known for their skewers. Their sushi was exquisite. I knew it would be. My wife don't play. Not when it comes to food.

With her I learned to appreciate fine things. I learned about blending two tastes together, two scents together, to make something completely amazing. With her I learned how to be quick and nimble, not physically, but financially and socially. I called her Rocketgirl. She was a true lion, a Leo all the way. I fancied myself a lion tamer, specially qualified to understand, moderate, and love.

I do still love. The rest, I know is folly. I love because... because I do. She has an apartment in my heart, next to some other important suites and residences.

Still, I worry, am wary. For all the fabulousness there were pitfalls, things I wouldn't describe in detail here. Enough, I would say, to give reason to the split. Faults were many, on both sides. I know so much more now. Who can say what could've happened otherwise.

So I sipped sake and listened, interjected occassionally a story, or simply exclaimed about the food. It is really good. We let the chef feed us whatever. I opted to set aside my half-assed kosher following and eat the funky fish and shellfish. I tasted the porkbelly, the first ever in my life. It was divine. The sake she ordered was light and bubbly and cold. I started the evening with chilled vodka straight up, so I was good and ready for this very drinkable sake.

She gave me a gift: a soft leather bound journal with unlined pages. And a card that said, mostly, "sorry."

So close. So soft. Known, with memories sown into the corners. Smells so good. But I don't lean in. I don't. I don't flirt, but I am looking, watching her eyes. Remembering. And then thinking about what is real, now. Words are one thing. Action something else. Will I even give enough room to move? I am fixed, for now. Time, says the 42-year-old part of my brain, is the key. That gives a pattern to movement, movement to intentions.

No. Part of me will still get lost. Gets lost between vodka and black sesame ice cream. That is enough for now. Back to me.

I hailed her a cab.

Parasha Kedoshim Lev 19:1 – 20:27

2011-04-29T15:16:00.004-04:00

This week’s parsha is Kedoshim, a meaty portion, especially compared to some of the other parshiot in Leviticus. No longer talking about scaly while affliction, this portion revisits some of the most important rules and laws: honoring your father and mother, not worshiping other gods, observing the Sabbath, not stealing. Several but not all of the Ten Commandments are reiterated. We also hear again about other laws that have been described elsewhere: don’t gossip, don’t stand by while your friend bleeds, don’t sleep with your aunt or your daughter-in-law or your step-mother, don’t try to mate with animals, and don’t practice divination (in this particular way).

But then we get a whole new slew of rules that are mentioned first (and maybe only) here: don’t cheat (you must use correct measures and weights), don’t lead others astray or injure or manipulate them (stumbling block before a blind man), don’t curse someone who cannot hear you, don’t gather the corners of your field – leave them for the poor, when you hire a worker you must pay them right away, don’t play favorites but instead be just and righteous.
These laws, I would contend, should be the foundation of our civil society. These laws are what separate those who are nice from those who are mean, basically.

There are all kinds of people in the world, we know this already. There are some who are less socially apt than others, sometimes it’s just introversion, sometimes it’s a question of mental faculty. People who have autism, even high on the functioning spectrum, can miss out on social cues, body language, even facial expressions or vocal tones. These laws protect these types of people from others who would prey on them. These laws – were we to actually follow them – would indeed set us apart, establish us as a light to the nations.

There are other rules within this portion that aren’t so clear, their meaning may be symbolic more than plain. A great example of this is 19:19 which instructs us not to mix animal species through mating, not mixing seed as you sow your field, and not wearing garments of mixed fibers. Our ancestors seem obsessed with keeping everything straight, perfectly aligned and in its own place. Of course earlier in the Torah we know that the priests themselves wore garments of wool and linen.

Also in this portion is the law concerning rounding off the edge of your scalp and the edge of your beard. This is the law that Orthodox follow when they grow payis and allow their beards to flourish. Next to this verse is the one that prohibits tattoos. Both of these laws, it has been suggested, are to separate Israel from the other communities who did have tattoos, and shaved their heads so that just the crown of the head was covered in hair.

Separation from others has long been a trademark of the Jewish sensibility. Many of our customs are designed to do just that. I experience this often first hand when I dine out with my friends – whether they are Jewish or not – and decline the pork products. I get a certain amount of razzing, as my friends test my dedication to this concept. They tell me there are refrigerators now and the pork is safe to eat. Many believe the original purpose for the law was sanitation and health. It probably did help, as did the commandments to wash our hands before we eat. But I don’t follow that rule because it’s better for my health. I follow the rule because I can. It seems like such a small thing, in the context of all the 613 mitzvot we are given, and one I can follow on faith. I have no logic (besides the health concept) to go on, really. What I do know is it does set me apart. At a table full of folks sharing pizza, I’m the one who has the veggie pizza.

I often don’t understand the deep meaning of the Torah. And there are parts of this portion that I still don’t get. Why it is that blended fibers make me less holy, I don’t know. I can’t logically accept every word of this holy book, but I honor its legacy. I believe there are parts here that are essential to humanity and those ideas are themselves holy: Take care of the stranger in our midst, for you too were strangers once, and you should know what it feels like. Care for the sick, the feeble and the elderly and treat them with respect. 19:32 You shall rise in the presence of an old person and you shall honor the presence of an elder.

This is the grand meaning of this parasha: we are to be set apart, to be holy, like Adonai our God, who is holy. Kedoshim – the holy ones, related to the word kadosh. In this way we are different, we are special, and we have a responsibility to be that light, to lead by example. May this be God’s will.

There's nothing funny about my colon.

2011-04-22T21:44:00.003-04:00

I had a lovely experience getting my colonoscopy. Really! I'm totally serious.

Even the prep work -- as the phrase goes -- wasn't as bad as it could've been. Sure, it's kind of sick to expect someone to take fourteen doses of stool softener in two hours. The relationship I've had with Gatorade has changed, if only because I dissolved it all in a 64 oz bottle and downed it.

It was also odd that I wasn't really hungry after fasting all day. Or maybe the pain in my gut is just normal now. So the next morning, again, I wasn't crazy hungry. (If only Yom Kippur were so easy.) I drove down to Georgetown in early morning traffic. Parked in the garage. Someone in the hospital corridor asked me if I needed help finding my way. It was all very civilized. The only people with their heads up their asses were the ladies at the check-in desk.

There was a nurse to ask me questions and get the IV started, and a different nurse for the procedure. At one point I had one on either side of me as Nurse 1 was looking for a vein. Nurse 2, establishing some rapport, says "Did you forget to bring your veins?" I answered "I brought my asshole. I thought that was all you needed."

"What?" she asked. I was either too funny or too rude. I repeated it. She repeated it to the anesthesiologist when we got into the other room.

I was chatty. I was nervous. Really getting the IV started was the worst. The actual doc came in and was kind and patient and informative. She drew diagrams. I got oxygen. I got hooked up to some stereo equipment. I got an automatic BP cuff. And then the milky white stuff started crawling up the tube. "You might hear ringing or have a metallic taste in your mouth." After about five seconds I said "Oh there's the ringing in the ears." Two seconds later I was out.

Two hours later I was listening to the old guy in the stall next to me hit on the nurses. I was groggy and high as hell. The nurse who came to check on me when I made a noise was East Indian in heritage but a local native. This was her 2nd career, after being a software developer project manager. I was chatty, and high. And happy.

I was chilling in the chill-out area for a while, eavesdropping and watching the nurses and doctors mill about. A young woman doc came back to talk to an older woman who insisted she see the senior doctor. I watched as the young woman doc brought the older man doctor back, and how she kept her mouth shut and her eyes up while he said the same things she already had. The nurses offered me more juice and saltines. Andy came to get me.

The Emperor was stoked to drive my stick shift car. We wove through streets, talking about lunch. Yes lunch. I wasn't sure if that was hunger or not but I was interested in this thing called food. We stopped at Rockland's and I got brisket and beans -- great choice for the first thing on my newly polished colon. Still, it was delish.

So... the news is: whatever I've got, it's not there. Stay tuned for more exciting adventures in my innards.

Eight

2011-03-20T21:11:00.005-04:00

I'm trying to be prepared, for once. Taking the time on Sunday night to sit still and THINK. (Insert Pooh Bear clip, with eyebrows knitting and a paw tapping the side of his head. Think. Think Think.)

On the eighth day, Moses said, bring a bunch of livestock, 'cause you're gonna see God. And the people were all like, "what?" And they brought the animals, exactly as prescribed. And Aaron lit it all up, like he was supposed to, but God still didn't show up. And then Moses and Aaron were like, "fuck!" and they both went inside the tent and had a little tête-á-tête with God. And then God was like, "Okay, jeez, you made this whole big tent thing for me and all the dolphins skins and shit. Fine. I'll come down." And the people totally freaked out and fell on their faces.

Then we get some strict lessons: don't enter the Mishkan while drunk; don't eat the shrimp or the pork, or camels or alligators, or centipedes (knock yourself out with the grasshoppers though!); and, uh, don't touch the ark. Yeah. You'll die.

All these RULES. Dude, you're killing me with the details and the rules. Can't we just stick to the good stuff, like don't kill your neighbor, and hang on to his ox if you see it wandering around? Don't put a stumbling block in front of a blind man, 'cause that's just fucking evil. No, you've gotta remind me again about the Red Heifer and how we'll never be pure again, really until we find one and turn it into ash. Dude. C'mon. Weren't the Israelites enough of a hard sell after You had your way with the Egyptians?

And yet there's this outlandish leap of faith we're supposed to take. For them it's putting their lives in the hands of a God who seems a little fickle and weird, with crazy instructions and details that are so convoluted even Aaron and Moses have to have a moment to figure out if something was wrong (who ate the sin offering and where?). For us now, it's just about believing. That's the leap of faith.

For me, it's about trusting.

Turning

2011-03-04T13:31:00.002-05:00

I am all fur and feathers
standing guard and pacing
Bear with wings and spear

Few are good enough for you
And me, I know this
Sorting through humanity is an onerous task

Keeping one eye skewed
squinting watching

of course your flower should blossom
your house warm to homeness

I, skeptical and untrusting,
leave the gate open
but refuse to abandon my post

Shel 3, Love 0

2011-02-23T09:50:00.002-05:00

Yes, I am winning, in the battle, the game against Love. Love, that flighty bitch, has pinned me down for the last time. I am fairly certain that I will win overall and NOT be burdened with that hormone-laden crazy-time known as losing myself in another's eyes. No, I won't.

I will WISH, hard and in secret, for a touch, tender and full of emotion. But in the blazing light of day I will know, in the bottoms of my feet, that I cannot wait for this thing, this romance, this fake fucker to come around and give me that dream. Crazy stupid dream of what? Someone to fawn over me and gush? Someone to pull on me and lean, needing me for every breath?

No no no. I can poke holes in anything. Just watch. I can be bitter, doubtful and most of all, alone. I will send out tendrils to scout out the landscape. But I will stay here, where I am me first of all, whatever that may mean.

f00d

2011-02-15T17:44:00.002-05:00

No, not a "w00t" but f00d. As in HOT DAMN it's FOOD! Which is pretty much how my brain feels as I sit down to a meal. My brain and food have a long lasting, highly sexual relationship. My body and food, however, are not exactly friends.

I write this as I stuff a Subway 6" sandwich into my mouth, knowing that it is that "full mouth" feeling that I really need. I need it. This is how I know my relationship with food is as fucked as my relationship with my mother.

And that's pretty fucked up.

Mentally I know what is good food and what is bad food. Bad for me. I know that I can have a little of the bad for me food, but it shouldn't be my diet. My brain is playing games with itself. It does this, whether I want it to or not.

I do notice when I eat better, that I feel better. For a while I did the Diet-to-Go thing. It was great. It taught me about portions. It taught me about what to eat for breakfast. But I'm fussy and still essentially a child inside, and I don't want to eat another yogurt for breakfast, damnit. Diet-to-Go has a particular smell. All the meals, no matter what, have this identifiable smell. A co-worker was heating up a meal the other day and I asked what it was, it smelled so familiar. Yup, Diet-to-Go. It's probably a function of one kitchen making every meal. So, I can't bring myself to go back to it.

My D-t-G days were also largely vegetarian, and lacking in dairy. So I seek to emulate that change now, while still allowing myself the mentally-vital cheats just now and again. My Subway sandwich is the VeggieMax, the funky veggie patty. It's an awesome funky patty: every once in a while you get a water chestnut. Double meat, bitchez.

Quickly Now

2011-02-15T11:48:00.002-05:00

I have to learn how to wedge in the important parts. Life; as it is in its natural, chaotic state; needs wrangling and some amount of structure. Not too much, so much as to squelch the organic growth and flow. But enough to say HEY, I need (insert verb, noun or complex phrase).

HEY: I need sleep. Hey, I need to work out, again. Last night was great but we need to keep that going.

Hey, I need to figure out why the hell Twitter won't post to sFB.

Hey, I need to write that girl back. She's far away but cute and TALKATIVE over email. That's a change. Nice to get a conversation going.

Hey...

This Post Has No Title

2011-02-09T22:18:00.003-05:00

I sliced my finger on a tool and now it won't work on the touchpad on my laptop. It's a peculiar thing to have to work around. This digit, that is tweaked anyway, is consistently rejected by my machine. It's getting a complex.

****

I am so freaking happy to get back to the internet, can I just tell you? It's not like I haven't been there, but I've been working. Work work work. Not even a freaking status update. FROM MY PHONE.

No, I can't even think, really, work is so big. I have three major initiatives RIGHT NOW PEOPLE. Moving an office; dealing with FREAKING service providers to double our bandwidth; massive changes to the infrastructure, which is really more of a LIST that begins with re-wire the fourth floor, and virtualize your server infrastructure.

And baby, if you followed all that.... Well then you probably feel my pain.

Pain that feels like a brain that doesn't really do lists well with too many freaking lists. I go by feel. I like to feel, frankly. At some point tonight I realized that I might really be an adrenaline junky, who likes to mostly hibernate. But that was only one of many moments when a THOUSAND ideas and lists and dependencies are whirling around in my brain. Hello? Hello? Can I get off this ride? No? Oh. Fuck.

****

The good news is this: I'm finally tired.

Sweet dreams, dusty ones. Snowed in and stuck. Rest, loveys, recuperating and caretaking. Easy. Slow. Silent. Sleep.

Zap, Zlat, Na na

2011-02-04T00:32:00.002-05:00

It'll get it
quick now switchin
I'll hear it,
say it list'nin'
focus and logic
thinking things out
creative real
cool baby no doubt
standing tall
as five two can be
some days darlin
big ol' redwood tree
eyes wide open
missing no miracle
if no one sees it
wasn't there at all

The Salt Mine

2011-02-04T00:23:00.002-05:00

I'm used to being good at what I do, at least professionally. I hate it when I do shit poorly. I don't like doing a bad job. I'd rather do something I know I can do. This can -- for a Taurusy Taurus like myself -- lead to ruts. I know this. I can adjust. Sometimes it is too late. And sometimes it's just late.

I'm hoping this is one of those cases of just late.

The truth is that this job is really fucking big and I need two of me to realistically get it done. Or another half of me. So I'm getting another, well-trained half-of-me part-time. I'll try not to let it bother me that it's a CTO level and that I'm not in it.

Although some days it is like getting punched in the stomach, repeatedly. As in: remember, you couldn't do this job, magically, when it was finally recognized as a need. Too slow, I was having a life, focusing on love and the pursuit of a really fucking long commute.

I cut my commute in half. And I'm about half-a-brain back. But I insist on having a life, and other desires. And yeah, maybe that might take me away someday. But until then, I'll be holding onto my job with both hands. Thank you very much.

soup for one

2011-01-25T12:03:00.002-05:00

soft sadness descends
dread drips into every crevice
I am anxious and I don't know why

I split my brain
simultaneously seeing myself
from the outside in
I sneer and critique
every trite mechanism I employ
makes me sick

I wonder if I have any realness left
I wonder if my ability to conversate
has also left the building

I am sticky with sadness
I cling to any well wisher any
sign of affection and then I sneer
again

push off push away pushing myself down
I would rather sleep, than breathe
it is easier
so quiet in the darkness behind my lids

much better than the repeating defeat of
looking for that which is not there
no email no note no text no photo
I look and look again
Spam and discounts, groupons for love

I have piled up the expectations
heaped on my own shoulders
I believed my own hype
I'll believe it again soon enough
Maybe this time I won't be so cocky
I won't think: oh yeah, all that
I won't think: maybe the next one will be better
I won't think: I deserve more

Even though I do.
I deserve love without fear, it's true.
I want what any artist exploding with passion wants
to express, to emote, to feel with every cell

Careful.
Lest you explode all over your options.
Yes, bub -- I reassure myself -- pulling back from 11,
Fierce and fine is love
When it comes

Not the metered interview, not the self-doubting,
self-editing.
She didn't even burp.
It all feels like dishonesty to me. But this is it.
This is how it's done. Welcome to the Right Way.
We know it doesn't fit. Yes.
Keep moving.

Yes, it is hard to find someone with whom
casual conversation is authentically interesting
You may not stay here.
Wander on, just like you said you would.

La vache qui rit... the bear who weeps...

2011-01-19T17:03:00.002-05:00

I gave up cheese for New Years, so of course my mind immediately went to cheese when I formulated this phrase in my head: "the bear who weeps". I don't recall how to say "weep" in French or I surely would've treated you to a story of Le Ours qui did something Francais.

No no. THIS bear weeps. I do. I'm leaky, like all through the eyes. I cry when my congregation's cantor sings Oseh Shalom in her amazing voice. I tear up when I watch a sappy Hallmark commercial. I wept a little driving home last night, because I was just SO BUMMED OUT. And I wept just now, reading this blog from Mom on a Wire: http://bit.ly/ifmR7q

I worry, occassionally, that I'm TOO sensitive. Lord knows, I'd like to turn it off from time to time. Usually once a month, actually. (checks calendar...) And then I think, "No... someone needs to feel all this." Someone needs to feel the depth of the despair, so that she can pull those despairing up.

Right?

Or at least describe the despiration to the local media, so someone can, like, send a truck. With a rope.

Hold Your Breath

2011-01-18T16:22:00.002-05:00

Don't breathe, don't move.
It might go away. This moment
this inbetween this not rock not hard place

I am random, I see that now. Periods.
Capitals.
I used to drive people crazy with my hand written poems
starting all over the page.
They said, why here? Halfway across
light blue lines on smooth milky white.

I am making time stand still
Time in the big sense
I am taking mental photos of how this feels
I am memorizing the luscious swing of my own hips
Documenting the pull of my shoulders
as I hold it all up.

I'll hold it up.
Until I get tired and then I'll
hand it over
let it drop
cry.

This is the sweet spot
between freedom and beloved capture
between knowing for sure
and playing the game

This is the moment to freeze in time
knowing there's more
not knowing what it will be

There will be more
clicking
electricity
hands and hair
skin

There is always the Long Term
after the rush is over
when the wave receeds, still standing
and fixing eyes on each other
knowing this stays

I get this, in doses from far away,
unsullied by the usual complications.

I get love and pets, in words and smiles
near, far
copious from some and others I gratefully wait

Gratefully, I wait.
I promise I will wait. Sit. Breathe.
Here I am, complete and whole,
a show of my own.

And you are?

New Year, Mutherf*cka

2011-01-13T00:28:00.003-05:00

And it's time to shake off the dust. Time to get your afram up and going. Ladies and gentlemen I'd like to welcome you to two-thousand and eleven and please note: there is no getting off this train. We're all on it together and yes indeedy we are hurtling down the track at breakneck speed. Now if you'd all just mind your step, I'm sure we'll be fine.

I know, I'm too late to jump on board with some schlocky 2010 retro-perspective. I'm really too late to make any sordid predictions about 2011. Mostly I'm just oddly happy about being able to say "eleven" a lot. And randomly insert "this one goes to eleven" as a non-sequitur. I'm pretty sure 11 will be an awesome year, if only because 12 is supposed to suck so bad. End of the world and all.

Here are my two second recommendations for living life at 11:
-- sing
-- dance
-- fall in love, without jumping off a cliff
-- dance, more

O that I could tell you to FEEL. This feeling thing, this mind-wrecking plummet, somersault, upswing and crash landing. Feel before and after keeping your feet in close proximity with the Earth. Feel those feet, your feet, and you. Dance, the weight of you in the middle. Focus, baby. You're a fucking rockstar and you can do whatever you imagine. Rocking back and forth and you know how that goes: listen Shlomi, all is one and one is all; everything is beautiful, and amazing. It's all in how you look at it.

The Occassional Dread of Being Awake

2010-08-25T10:59:00.002-04:00

I'm having a hard time going to work recently. In part it's because me and my team have been getting hammered with criticism, relentlessly since last fall. That's bound to wear on a Bear.

Part of it is the weather. Blazing hot temps that peel the sticky hooks off my wall and drop my shit to the ground while I'm at work. I come home to stretched and torn latex paint, and my frame drum looking at me from the floor like, "What?"

Most of it, I fear, is the love thing. I don't gotta love thing. Or rather, I've got bad case of the fucked up blues. Lauren's birthday just passed. Not that I noticed. It's been (counting... on fingers first and then on the calendar)... years. Three apartments and two girlfriends ago. Three if you count the one month stint.

That's how I mark time. Ages of my life have names. The Heidi Period, when I went on tour one summer, following around the remnants of the Grateful Dead and driving my ass off. The Lou Period, which is a lot like college. The Lauren period, when I lived richly. The Gena Period, when everyone thought I was crazy, including me, and I loved her like crazy.

That's the recent one, the one I'm stuck on. She called me after she emailed, proving that she really "demanded" a response. The non-response was not acceptable. She tried to keep the crazy out of her voice, like she had done so well in the email, but I heard it. And I was even more sure of not responding. Then another email: "Why won't you respond?"

So I'll answer her here: Because I don't trust you. You know I care about you and you'll use that to the best of your abilities, which are vast. You know I still love you, and so seeing your face or hearing your full voice (not through the digitation of the phone) or (God forbid) touching your skin would be the end of my resolve. Because I miss you so much it keeps me on my knees and hiding in my house, even while I know what I really miss is just part of my imagination. It is the image you want to project that I was happy to buy into. But you can't keep up the charade. And the results when it crumbles is disasterous. And in the end I give everything away, and you consume the life of me.

And the truth is: I don't know how to not give everything away when I fall in love. That's what I do. And so later, when I come to, and we're moved in and everything is in it's perfect locked down place, I will need room to grow, and move, and change, and expand.

Mental Blocks, building with colors

2010-08-23T16:04:00.002-04:00

I stop myself from writing here all the time. I think: That's not enough. Not meaty enough. Not long enough. Half the time I've got just a few more characters than 140, so it just seems like a Monster Tweet.

Alas, I create my own roadblocks. So. I hereby commit to stop fucking myself in the head and just let it go. Let it go so easily that I don't think about some schmuck reading it and shaking her head at my poor word choice or self-inflicted passive voice.

I promise to relay and relate every flinch and flicker... okay maybe not everyone but the ones I'm instantly motivated to share. Because, if I wait, I might change my mind.

Folks tell me they love the honesty, etc. That's because I don't think twice. Ima Jack Kerouac that shit. Pound it out and hit publish.

Fearless writing. So there.

Splitting Silently

2010-05-19T15:33:00.002-04:00

What's weird is not talking. I have the urge to call, but I don't. I fear what the conversation will turn into. Conversations over the phone have, in the recent past, turned into shouting matches, which then turn into me trying to get away and eventually just hanging up. Hanging up, mid-speech. I've never hung up on anybody before, but I started here, and I found eventually that I couldn't stop.

One of many signs of things gone bad.

So yes, I'm sad and lonely, but that comes and goes, like weather I can't control. Sometimes I want nothing to do with the rest of humanity. And then I remember, I have a commitment to make things better, and that generally means I can't live in a cave.

What I do have is a nice cave, high in the house, with a window for my cat. She gets out sometimes to scout out the rest of the house, with an old black cat waiting to chase her back to home base. I have one place where I lay down every night. I have one set of keys in my pocket. This I like.

Facinating sadness, this one

2010-05-10T09:30:00.001-04:00

It comes on like a sneeze
Of great length
Seizing my face up in an instant
The shame of it,
I think
Forehead in hand
Only a few tears eek out
But the sharpness of the pain is worth buckets
Sent on the Sprint® Now Network from my BlackBerry®

Dear Help Desk, Please Put the Gun Down

2010-01-18T13:53:00.006-05:00

It's probably unethical or something for me to work on Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday (observed). I came to work anyway, knowing that the office would be largely empty. I didn't know that the main source of my work-related consternation would be here, serving up shitty emails and sauntering into my office to blinkety-blink at me as they stuttered their discombombulated concerns.

I just want you to know that I just ate, so I should be less cranky, by a factor of at least five, and much less likely to begin to cry. But there's nothing really like a good frustrated cry.

Dear Help Desk, reads an email from a friend... someone I actually like and enjoy talking to... could you please change the wording of this fake official email that I keep getting from some spammer? Dear friend, I know it looks like it's our email system sending you email but we don't use the mailer-daemon for our email, so it's not us. And, yes, we've told you this at least four different times in five different ways, but I'll tell you again, patiently, because I like you. But I swear to G-d, if you ask me again about this crap I might just scream. P.S. You're still coming to the dinner-ish party I'm hosting, right?

Other topics, from people I really can't stand, or those who just annoy me intermittantly are:
"Why won't my computer knead and bake my bread for me? It is a computer after all. It can do anything, even if I have every application known to man open and running complex regression analyses."

"I've been having this recurring problem but I always call the emergency Help Desk phone number instead of documenting it in an email to Help Desk so that people can follow up on it. It gave me an error and I wrote it down, in crayon, on this napkin. I can't read this, can you?"

For the record, I disabled part of your email system because you abuse it so badly the rest of your programs won't work. And I refuse to even talk to you, even as you toddle around in my office on this quiet vacation-like day, when I was trying to get other stuff done that actually requires concentration.

Also, when I was working on your computer I took a screen shot of your desktop because you think that's where all your files should go. I share it with my co-workers and we laugh at you relentlessly because it is a great illustration of how far up your ass your head is.

(this image deleted, as requested)

Rabbi in training... or so I'd to think.

2009-11-20T16:05:00.005-05:00

Hi Peeps! How ya doing? Howzitgoing?

Me? Aw, I'm just getting ready for ANOTHER attempt at leading services at my synagogue tonight. I did it for the first time several weeks ago, for the parasha "Lech Lecha" which is Genesis 12:1-17:27, when God tells Abram to go, and leave his home.

I'm good at the actual prayer leading, but the sermonizing was a new thing to me. I felt like my sermon was too bookish, too studied, too much reference to other Rabbis and not enough me or now. It's interesting, for sure, but I think I put some people who really don't care that much to sleep.

This time I was more inspired and a little less hard on myself as I was writing it, and I think it turned out better. I'll post tonight's dvar Torah after I give it. Until then, here's my overstudious one on Lech Lecha:

Hi everyone. For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Shel West. Shel is short for Shelly, which in turn is short for Rachelle. Just don’t call me Anna, even though that’s my first name. I’ve never gone by Anna, only Shelly. Anna Rachelle West. It’s a pretty name and it is mine, but I rarely use the whole thing. Names are funny things. They define us as much as we define them. I never felt like an Anna, maybe because I was never called that. It was only in recent years that I started to call myself Shel. I wanted to be more grown up, more adult, without the sing-song E at the end of my name. It only sort of stuck.

It was hard to try and change my name. Almost as hard to change myself, my habits and behaviors. Sometimes, you have to change your location to change yourself, as we’re about to find out.

We’re at the beginning of the beginning of the Torah still, only the third Parasha in as we read Lech Lecha. The famous line heads the portion, it’s a well known song, and it commands Moses to move. Go, from your land, your birthplace, your house – successively smaller ideas of home, larger to smaller – and I (God) will make of you a great nation (with lots of descendents) and I will bless you (with wealth, says the Rashi footnotes) and I will make your name great (by adding letters to it, in fact). It is during this portion that Abram becomes Abraham, and Sarai becomes Sarah. According to Rashi it is when God takes Abram out of his tent later in 15:5 and instructs him to count the stars that God really explains that Abram must step out of where he is and what he has predicted for his own life, to grasp the concept that even in his nineties he will be the father of a nation. Rashi says that Abram relied on astrology and the science of the stars to predetermine what his future would be. God’s message to Abram is that if you go outside of what you know, and put your trust in God, the blessings will come.

There is a lot that happens in this Parasha. Abram and Sarai travel to Egypt during a famine in the land. This will happen again later. They tell everyone they are siblings so that Abram will receive gifts and wealth as the Pharaoh take Sarai into his palace. The Pharaoh and his household are afflicted with plagues. This will also happen again. Rashi says that Sarai’s word causes the tzaras to appear – she says “strike!” and an angel of God strikes them with the plague. Pharaoh arranges an escort to take them out of Egypt. This, not so much doesn’t happen again.

Abram, with his nephew Lot, take all the wealth they have amassed and go back to southern Israel, to the Negev. Abram and Lot split up because their livestock are too many and Lot’s suspicious herdsmen can’t get along with Abram’s. Lot moves to Sodom, which will be later destroyed in the next Parasha, and his choice of surroundings is intended to make us suspicious of him, and by proxy, his shepherds.

Sodom and Gommorah are besieged by kings waging war. The battle of Four Kings against Five is waged and Lot is taken captive. The names of the kings and the names of their kingdoms all make various references to their character, generally negative. Genesis says “The Fugitive” tells Abram about the fate of his nephew. According to Rashi the fugitive is Og, the last of the Rephaim who both escaped from the fighting but also who escaped from the flood. Abram here is described as “Abram the Ivri” which the modern translation renders as “the Hebrew.” The Rashi edition, however, says this means he “came from across the river” and therefore had the courage to fight against the odds. Abram gathers up his servants and this small band go and rescue Lot and defeat the kings’ armies. At the end of this odd story King Melchizedek – sounds a lot like Melech Tzedek, doesn’t it? – brings out bread and wine, because – it says – he is a priest of God Most High. That must be the same God Abram’s always talking to, right? He blesses Abram and they share bread and wine. Could this be the first blessing of bread and wine? This will happen again, every week, as we celebrate Shabbat, until the end of time.

Melchizedek is said to be Shem, a descendent of Noah. He is the king of Salem. Rashi explains that this is the same city that Abraham will later call Yirei. This city is eventually named Yerushalem, by God, who wishes to honor both Shem and Abraham’s name for the same place.

It is at this point that Abram begins to worry that his luck has run out, according to Rashi, which is why he has another conversation with God. “How will I know?” asks Abram, how will I know I will have an heir? How will I know that I will possess this land? God reassures Abram repeatedly, explaining that his descendents will outnumber the stars, and asking for an elaborate offering. This offering is special because Abram is instructed to split the cows, goat and ram. Rashi says that the smoke and flame between the pieces of meat is the sign that God is there. God tells Abram, “I am a shield for you; your reward will be great.” God tells more about the future, about the enslavement and oppression of his children, and of their return to the land.

Then we get the story of Hagar, who is supposedly Pharaoh’s daughter. Another royal Egyptian daughter will figure prominently later. Hagar conceives and begins to take her position as servant lightly, to Sarai’s displeasure. Hagar runs away but is told by God to return and submit to Sarai’s authority. Hagar calls God “El-roi” meaning “God of Seeing” and returns to bear a son to Abram, Ishmael (“God heeds”).

Just a few verses later God self identifies as El Shaddai. Rashi explains that this is a contraction of she-yesh dai: “that there is enough”. It is at this moment that God renames Abram to Abraham and instructs him in the ways of circumcision. This will mark the covenant in the flesh and shall be done throughout the generations.

God renames Sarai to Sarah. Sarai means “my governor” and Sarah means “governor of all”… clearly a promotion in rank. Abraham falls on his face and laughs, and thus God deems Sarah’s son will be named Issac, Yitzchak, or “laugh”.

Names have great importantance, whether it’s the king Melech Tzedek, Jerusalem, Sarah, Abraham, El-roi or El Shaddai. The entity or person is the same, but the names highlight different pieces of the individual mosaic. We get used to the name-changing from here out in Genesis. Jacob will eventually become Israel, also to show a change in the person.

This parashat gives us some method to our ongoing desire for improvement. Move from where you are. Get out of your rut. Step out of your tent. Change who you are. Change your name. May we all have the courage to step outside of our norms, to have a little faith, and make of ourselves a great people.

Communications Confuzion

2009-10-12T09:11:00.002-04:00

I'm really not the most social person in the world. Really. I can do the social thing. Sometimes it's easier than others. And some situations really confuse me.

The work thing, for example, brings much mental stress. I know my position puts me at a level of the program mangers... I *am* a program manager, for all intents and purposes. So I'm supposed to socialize with these folks?

I don't quite have enough in common. I'm working on the family aspect, which many share. But I've been the lonely single person too, and we have at least a handful of those folks. Still, I just don't feel as related to these folks as I do to the researchers who make up the ranks.

I know it's logical and standard practice to not get too chummy with folks that you manage, even if they're not directly your folks. It's a stratification of the organizational structure. At once I am drawn to break ranks but still wanting the privileges, protection and influence of the upper echelon.

Fuck.

Life is Good

2009-10-03T14:55:00.000-04:00

Instead of relentlessly tweeting, I'll blather on here a bit. That's probably a relief for the two of you who gets my tweets directly to cell phone.

It seems ridiculously relaxing to be sitting at a pub drinking a beer before the wedding of Liz and Miles. I drove three hours, from Northern Baltimore, straight here to participate in the mitzvah of celebrating with Bride and Groom. I'm seriously kvelling, if only because I find myself so incredibly in love with a wonderful woman. I fantasize about a Ward and June Cleaver life with her. I think I'm quite silly. And smitten and in love.

The drive was nice, clear skies and plenty of animals -- wild and domesticated -- to watch along the way. A fair share of flattened tragedies as well, including a small black bear. I try to think of the cycle of life and not get overwrought about death. I spent a lot of time thinking about my sweetie and how gentle and kind she is.

I left her to finish packing her house, in preparation for the move tomorrow to the new apartment, free from the madness of her Ex finally. The apartment is in the same building with her Bubbie and other extended family. The door frame of the apartment bears the marks of at least four different mezzuzot. We nearly crashed into the young Frum woman coming out of the laundry room. I suspect we'll be quite the spectacle in the land of the very Orthodox: me and my yarmulke and men's clothes and she and her giant chest tattoo, us both holding hands everywhere we go.

Don't be afraid. We're actually both very nice.
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The New Year

2009-09-18T14:11:00.000-04:00

I started out the morning with my love, snuggling and getting frisky. I watch her bounce between the stress of child custody battles and the joy of my distractions. It's not easy and it's been constant. I attempted to draw her anxiety and take it with me, which I may have actually done.

I knew it would be a short day. I had already planned to leave early to get ready for Rosh Hashana. My grumpiness began with a coworker who is better at getting other people to do things than doing them herself. I made a suggestion and asked her to call if it didn't work. I called later to check in. She didn't try, and instead decided to solve the problem by coming in early Monday. Maybe she was going to tell me. Maybe.

Then, too much news reading ensued. Tea baggers and pseudo-political pundits and their poor logic and bad grammar. And their sentence fragments. Who does that?! More co-workers talking loudly in the hallway then stage-whispered secrets. My ire raised like hackles on a wolf. I needed to be alone.

I graused, I tweeted. Is this the way to start the new year? No clearly not. I left my office and the drama-politcs in search of friends. Stood around for a few moments, chatting and teasing. Someone offered me chocolate and I gladly accepted.

This is what it's all about. Friends. Kindness when you need it. Chocolate when you need it. Another excuse to eat gefilte fish and good ole reliable Balducci's challah, round please, to crown the new year with glory.

May this year be better than the last. May we all have peace and love and companionship. May we have solitude when we need it, and a warm strong hand when we need that too.

I'll take the ups and down, Hashem. I'll be loving and supportive when I can, and grumpy when I need to be.

May we all have the space to honor ourselves. May our behaviour honor You, and may our souls be a reflection of Your greatness.
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Overwhelming, Sad Day

2009-09-17T14:26:00.003-04:00

Dear Peeps, all my peeps, and even the peeps that ain't my peeps: It's gonna be okay. I swear.

Seems like there's a lot of sadness out there today. Today especially. Worn and weary, we are all so tired of trying. Trying and failing. Trying and giving up. Just trying.

Time will pass. The earth will turn and things will change. Probably more slowly than you want. This knot, whatever knot it is that you are trying to unravel, will loosen.

Stop for a moment and listen to the wind. Put both feet on the ground, flat. Feel your feet. Breathe through your nose (if you can). Feel the source of life, universal love, energy, G-d ... what ever you want to call it ... feel it come into you, right through the top of your head.

We're all in this together. All of us. Jews and Muslims. Lovers and exes. Family and friends. Strangers. We are all connected, whether we want to be or not.

So take a breath. Get yourself. Open your eyes. Know where you are. Know that I love you. Hard moments will pass. Love stays. Relax.

Inglourious Basterds -- did I misspell that correctly?

2009-08-23T23:09:00.003-04:00

Sick and gross, first of all. It is a Quentin Tarantino movie. So get ready. I'd like to say you can set that aside and consider the rest of the movie, but the violence, after all is part of the point. Violence we do to each other. Cruelty we inflict, and when do we find it okay. When do we cheer or simply smile smugly? In the end we shoot each other, whether we are already dying or not.

I did smile. I did. Jeff quoted someone else (Mel Brooks?) saying, "it's always funny when a Nazi gets shot." There was a disgusting joy in watching Hitler picked apart in slo mo by bullets. Then, there is the general desire to see some wacky US dudes wreaking terror on the Nazis, tormenting them with the stories of their disgusting rituals.

The winner for best Jeff Toppall quote of the night:

After Brad Pitt gives his wacked-out, violent and non-PC sales pitch to the new recruits, Jeff leans over and says, "Sounds like you at a staff meeting." He would know, but he hasn't seen me in action for over ten years. I have a little more chutzpah now than before. Feel the power.

Honestly, I'll have to see the movie again to stitch it all together. The symbolism is constant, it seems. Time management is amazing. From the old-style credits at the beginning of the movie, QT slows us down to get ready for the lengthy and detailed opening "Chapter." Character development without words, in the faces of the actors, was amazing. The bad guy was really well done. You *knew* him by the end. And you also knew what was coming to him. And it felt good.

Feel the power.

Yes, Yes, O Yes: to remember my toes

2009-08-23T23:04:00.003-04:00

I know, I know. Too long without posting! Lack of info, lack of consistency. It's like the rest of my life, things fall apart and I come back later to push it all into a pile again.

You should see my desk. It is an avalanche of paper waiting for a good echo to release it. "Hellooooooo!" Getting my shit together, it seems, is and will be an ongoing project. Honestly, I'm okay with that.

Love and it's complications have arrived. Let us (and by us I mean me) endeavor to keep sight of ourselves (meaning myself and all it's parts... there are many) and making sure we do what is in our best interests. Keep our word, yes. Say the right ones and mean it. Yes, yes. Restate and clarify and then, yes, protect the space.

It is the space I needed, truly. I could probably take more but I too crave the companionship. Alas: I am still figuring myself out. Thank you for your patience. And your honesty and communication. And yes, you did make it thunder, of that I am sure.

Right! Back to me! Ummmm....

O how the mighty have fallen

2009-08-08T07:38:00.000-04:00

Or maybe just how they've gotten old. Let's face it folks: I am not 20 years old anymore. I am just not as resilient.

I had to sleep. I pulled over and maybe shoulda set an alarm. I didn't wake up until there was a crying baby outside my window. That'll wake you up.

Okay so it's 7:30 now. I'm relatively well rested after the standard 5 hour nap. I'll miss the Farmer's market on Peoria, but I should be there in time for the Scoggins shin-dig.

Full costume change. Coffee. Rub eyes one more time. Let's go!
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La Vale? MD, about 20 miles from Cumberland

2009-08-07T14:27:00.000-04:00

This is one of those towns where all the folks are real nice to each other but not to me. I get the long stare, and then the cold shoulder. Eventually I get the long stare and some sort of interaction, a question maybe. Today, I asked the question, "what town is this?" "It's about twenty 'til..." "No, no. What's the locale? Where are we?"

Where are we?
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Leg 1-a, Metro to airport. Picking up the rental car.

2009-08-07T09:31:00.000-04:00

Washington in the summertime: ladies' legs as far as the eye can see. I ain't mad at ya. Metro train gradually fills with suits and skirts. Young gay guy, annoyed at the disheveled proximity. Obvious Jews and those hidden, a brown skinned woman with round features and a subtle necklace pendant engraved with a seven-branched candlestick. Fabulous and fancy, men wearing cologne. If my earbuds weren't pumping Robin Thicke I'd hear four different languages, only two I can identify.

I scoot around slow moving tourists. Not mad at you either. No I'm just getting my adrenaline pumping with a brief jog in flipflops. I'm excited. I grin widely, splitting my cheeks, and just make every connection I need. Effort combined with luck will get me on my way, and keep me as I go. G-d bless.

This is D.C., so varied that I am only one of many brightly colored comments. Mine is not the only head bobbing to personal music, there's a blonde and a dude with twists who's pounding out beats on the hand grip bar.

My city. It accepted me and I took it. A little too buttoned up for most bohemians but a few still camp out here. A little too lefty for the uber-suited, but they've got plans. The grand machinery grinds here. I heard it every night when I slept in the underbelly of Capital Hill, down in the moisture with the bugs.

Here I start, reborn as myself, having found my feet, my root religion. From here I start, going back to Tulsa to meet my past -- the one I left but didn't mean to.
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Srsly?

2009-07-06T15:33:00.007-04:00

No really... srsly.

Okay, it's Monday and I've been gone from the office for nearly a whole week. I had a mailbox full of papers to sign, initial or otherwise photocopy and file. I have projects that languished while I was out, delirious with antibiotics from hell. And let me just tell you, I have no motivation. The shit didn't blow up while I wasn't here. Clearly, it's not going to blow up today either.

Maybe I'm just waiting for something to blow up. Like it's just not that interesting around here unless something's REALLY wonky. Or, perchance, maybe I'm just procrastinating again, relentlessly like I sometimes do.

So today I've filled my day with a lot of re-direction of other people, a significant amount of Facebooking, and reading my friends' blogs. To that end, I'd like to promote the cool people I know, and all the cool shit they write.

First, my dyke-buddy Vikki posts at Up Popped a Fox. She's long-term partnered with two kids that actually came through her womb, which I find amazing, in general. A social worker on a mission, Vikki will treat you to the bizarre views of her life, with an occassional recipe for a smashing cocktail.

Another fave is the Cleaner Plate Club by Ali, another college buddy, same as the Vikster. Ali has an amazing way of knitting words together to make a nice snug sweater vest for you, which you can then parade around in, showing everyone else what you've learned. This includes recipes -- for food -- travel details, knitting shit, burying beloved fish, and generally being gentle on the planet and to others. Ali's blog makes me look shit up and check my spelling before I post a comment. And, uh, check my verb tenses. Her writing kinda makes me feel like Keith Haring next to Michelangelo. But hey, Haring was still cool.

(para on Dykes deleted... not his blog! crikey! meanwhile I totally thought Chris was knitting his knuckles off. (shrug) .ed)

Kelly Wickham, at Mochamomma, came recommended from a good friend. I've been following her on Twitter for months. She was the first to get sent directly to my phone. She cracks my shit up all the time and then she writes some shit that blows me away. What could be better than that? Maybe if she was smoking hot... aw damn. The killer trifecta: humor, brains and beauty. Sign me up.

Last, but not least, is the soul-searching poet Jenn Mattern. Breed 'Em and Weep is a comfy combination of self-reflection and universal wondering. Her two girls provide plenty of fodder for funny stories, but it's her brutal honesty, unique lens and lyrical sentence structure that constantly seduce me. Yes, yes, that's what I said. What can I say? I'm at the mercy of beauty and there it is.

Several times over, honestly. Each one of these writers gives me new things to think about, ideas that roll around in my head for days, and with regularity a soul-shock that makes my eyes water and leaves me gasping for breath. It's good stuff. Check 'em out, and don't forget to leave a tip in the tip jar, to give the artist a thumbs up and keep 'em going.

Bless the ones who give part of themselves, YY, whether or not they know we need it. You know we do.

Blind Date Break Down

2009-07-02T19:06:00.002-04:00

Here it is:

Was it a waste of time? Absolutely not. The upside of this unfortunate meeting is that I know what I want, and it is not what I have had.

Do I like fiesty women who know what they want? Yes, absolutely. I require someone interesting.

Is there a difference between being fiesty and being an outright bitch? Yes.

I know, I know. Some women "own" the word bitch and it means something good to them. Frankly, if that meaning also means you care mostly about yourself then I want nothing to do with it.

She wasn't rude to the waiter. She was weirdly, silently insistent. All in the eyes. She let the conversation drop, and would stare, simply. She was stilted and asked few questions of me that were of any interest to either of us. Although maybe she wanted me to talk about my job at the same length she talked about hers. Or maybe she wanted me to try to impress her with my vast knowledge of something, like she did.

Largely I didn't like her. But I feel like that's because she was a gorgeous but horrible amalgamation of everything I don't want. Almost like Lauren -- my estranged (still) wife -- in a different body. I'm sure she was more complicated than I might make her out to be. I suggested at the end that she was complicated, which she seemed to find offensive. I also suggested she was strange -- and she is -- which I meant as a point of interest, but again... yeah, who would like being told they're strange? Me, I suppose.

I know what I am. I am strange. I bridge lots of odd polar opposites and cannot be easily defined.

Her ex transitioned from female to male while they were together, after the birth of their daughter. We had an awkward conversation about transgender issues, where she told me what all the words meant, like I haven't been alive for the last fifteen years. The gender bending didn't appeal to her, in fact she's fleeing from it. My own squishy self-definition made her really uncomfortable. What's the line between being butch and being trans? I'm not a transvestite, I contend, because I don't do it for fun. But I don't exactly identify as female, either. Mind you, I want to keep all my parts. That's not up for discussion. The body stays the way it is. The rest is in my mind, and how I define myself. It is just outer appearance? She says yes. I say, I don't think so... it's more important than that.

But you know what? The gender conversation was probably the most real part of the conversation. The rest was... yucky. Yucky attempts at being interesting. Yucky attempts at maintaining control of the conversation.

Yeah. I just didn't like her. When it comes down to it. But there was that fiesty part, the piercing eyes, that I still found attractive. But I know better. I see trouble coming a mile away from this one.

Why? Why am I attracted to this personality type that is just not good for me. Why do I go for women who want to tell me what to do, when I KNOW that's not what I want or need?

Other props to me include being really upfront with her. Ballsy. Not the person that I was before. When she showed up, all late and shit, she walked up as I sat outside texting on my phone. She says, "texting someone?" That's her opening line. Not "hello." Not "nice to meet you." Baby, don't try to be sly. So I said, "Facebooking, yes. Pleased to meet you." I extended my hand and, because I had decided way before that if she was cute, I would express it somehow, I did the pseudo kiss-on-the-cheek. Really more a meeting of cheeks, but still, brash, eh?! (Yes, so forward, Shel. You might as well have goosed her.) Still, she's cute. Fact.

Also a fact, she knows it. Wah wah wah. Total downer. Then! She talks about it! How cute she is, how high femme she is. Mind you her nails were dirtier than mine. At some point I thought, I shaved my chin for this? I shoulda left it stubbly. She probably wouldn't have even had lunch with me if she had seen that.

Yeah. No. Not even. Weird. Weird.

So I walk her to her car. I've got my fly hat on and I say, "So, what do you think? Will you call me again?" Really knowing, hoping she'll say no. She says, "Probably not. I've had my share of gender issues and..." "Yeah," I say, "I've had my share of dominate women, too." "Well that's gonna be a problem!" she suddenly exclaims. "Yep, yep, it is." "You should find someone submissive."

And sure, I'll take relationship advice from you. "Right," I say. The conversation stops and we look at each other for a long moment. I break the silence: "Good luck."

ICKY PEOPLE! Just fucking icky. The unspoken pushyness was really profound. And me, in my medicinal haze, being my usual open, playful, cute self just got ill. Emotionally ill, for a moment.

I told her about the wreck and the infection and the meds during lunch. It held her attention for a moment. I said, "I'd probably be funnier if I weren't on these meds." Now that I think about it, the giggle she gave there was probably as fake as the nervous laugh she made when I told her I had beard envy. Not penis envy, but beard envy. She started to ask me questions, to probe where I was on the gender curve, having been told I have no interest in surgery or hormones. "Would you want to grow facial hair?" "Well I already have it," I said, touching my chin where my mini-Shaggy-goatee was just an hour before. "Would you want to walk around with your shirt off?" "Hell yeah!" I said without thinking.

When I was three I refused to wear a top. This was around the time my mother first grilled me with the ever so open question "do you want to be a boy?!?" What the hell could I tell her at three? At seven? I knew enough at thirteen to lie. And at sixteen when she asked if I was gay.

Back to the blind date grilling. I said, laughingly, "So this is your transgender quiz? Keep going." Yeah. End on beard envy and then the question, "where's the bathroom?" Then, when she comes back, "Are you ready?" Over over over.

Ugly, people. If you've got a sweetie, hug 'em hard and be glad they'll put up with your shit. If they make you crazy, take a good look and ask yourself if it's a crazy you can live with... then hug 'em anyway.

Seriously. If this is what I bring to myself, then what the fuck am I doing? And if you're still reading, what the fuck are you doing? :-)

bad ass, cream puff

2009-06-17T16:32:00.002-04:00

It seems those are my two main modes. I wonder, if I move quickly enough from one to the other, will it appear as if I am in the middle?

I'm sick, it's true. And I tell you, right now I can feel it. It's not like crashing my Vespa at the end of March wasn't enough. You know, broken fingertip, ankle raped by asphalt. It's not like I don't already make the same exact turn every day on my way to work, in my limping LandRover, and curse the spot. There's been a dead smushed furry somthing there for the past three weeks.

No I know I'm not feeling well. I hide behind my monitors. I hate people secretly, without reason. Short-tempered, I bark. Brittle bad-ass, snapping at friends and people who try to take care of me. That's just before melting into a puddle of weepy, nose-reddening self-pity, writhing around in despair.

O Despair!

No... then I can go into some sort of auto-pilot... particularly facilitated by FB Mafia Wars. Click. Click. Fidget, wait. Click. It's the ultimate mouse-in-maze cheese hunt ever, for me at least.

Now my ears are burning, and I'm pretty sure it's coming from inside.

I crank the volume on my music, to drown out the LOUD OBNOXIOUS voices coming from the hallway. I think again with queasiness about the grinding sound now suddenly coming from my front wheels in the truck. Or maybe that queasiness is from the meds Doc T gave me yesterday. They are pretty potent, making the world spin just a litle. And I feel... ill. Hard to describe yukkiness, coiling and hissing in the base of my skull. Light bothers me. Some sounds bother me. That voice in the hall particularly, but she seems to have gotten the hint from my music volume and is now no longer using her outside voice.

Fucking moron.

I whip up hatefull thoughts more easily than I cry. I wonder about my defense mechanisms, and knowing that those who care for you are the first ones to take advantage of you. I know it. Four year old me knows it. And she's been around for a long time. She sits in a rocking chair on the front porch, a bitter Lily-Tomlin-take-off, smoking a long pipe and reminding me that it's never safe. Ever. Never safe. Feeling bad now? Just wait, it gets worse.

It's probably the brake pads wearing down or just wearing out. I should stop driving it until it's fixed, I can tell. Wonder how much that'll be. Wonder when my money will get straight. Wonder when I'll pass Adult 101... I'm not sure that I have. Is it possible to get a grade in 301 and still be remedial in 101? All the kids in the advanced class love my prose but they don't know I still can't tie my shoes.

Spinning, spinning. I know. I do! Or else I couldn't write it down. No no. I document to disarm. Proof and evidence of existence. I am here. Here I am. Beautiful and bumpy and infected.

And worn out. With a smile in the corner of my mouth. Even as I pool up in distress. I reach out and feel love coming back. I can imagine your hand on my head, smoothing my hair. Many hands. Many snuggles and nuzzles.

And that's when I know I just want to go to bed. And dream of Angel Caretakers who don't know how to steal.

And tho you're not here, in this moment, I can tell you that Ani DiFranco serenades me with Amazing Grace, and I'm sure it's gonna be all right.

Sweet, Bitter, Shalem, Shalom

2009-06-10T16:00:00.005-04:00

I have to stop to beg
which is another way to pray
I beg for a moment
for a slice of time when I am fine
otherwise I fling from heartbeating to heartracing
am flung from up to down and around
wondering why
why this why that why now bastard
how could you
do that
be that
want that
wish that
when?
when will I get a moment of rest
to
stop
tears
instead of watering them and watching them grow

time is tight like skin over a burn
the universe hates me and sends
sickness upon all who touch me
I have pleaded, unworthy
wished, without giving first
is that it? is it a price to pay?
is it all chits in the bank
tokens to sell, deficits and profits
score keeping tallies and
tandem break downs
tortured souls tapping out
rhythms and syllablles
never spoken but
screamed in here, between my ears
time telling what
only time will tell

she keeps her secrets and slyly seduces me
with a humor only she understands.
the joke's on me

I am
upright for which I am eternally gratefull
thinking, my Lord and for that I am proud
You did that.
If I thank You for each breath with each breath
can I have all I wish for?
Will all my wishes come like horses and
trample me to the ground?

I consider I already have my wish
I already praise Thee Adonai,
with each breath and every language I know
olde english, hebrew and so
I
want
still

I tried to cut it out of me, to
bang it out with my fists

I set my wanting aside and only observe
even then I am thronged by masses souls hearts
in need of things
life, love, comfort
energy
You, God, give us all we wish for
we do not know how to stop it
how to handle it
make it go when it seems gone

My people
these people of my heart
the ones I have dared to let in and love
the ones who I care for
whether they know it or not
these people, my people,
if I bless them You must promise not
to curse them

Would I trade this world
the one where any man
upright
can stand with death in his hand
for one where no one can stand upright?
Choice, my God, hurts.

If you can't make it not hurt,
if that's part of the whole nasty deal
can you show me why?
Can you give a picture, so I could explain?
Or just comfort myself
silently in slow tears.

I consider, I already have my wish.

Dripping quietly behind dual monitors
hiding behind technology because the rest is
too hard, my God, it's too hard.
yes I feel my feet,
so far both of them.
What are you telling me?
What is the message? The moral of the story?
I tempt fate, leaving my door open
weeping openly
I tempt fate, living so
walking around town with this cap on my crown
I do tempt fate

Bring it to me. Bring me the gun man
bring me the hater
I will surely take out my rage for You on him
and so,
disgrace your Face
shame You

To not defend is also a crime
lesser yes but how

sitting here,
naked as the Naked Lunch
I suckle my own instincts
to bring something of nourishment for the rest
I pull from my own
to see into the distance
type without checking
the endless sheet of paper I never have to change
I consider I have my wish

Naked, yes, I was

Am Still naked in front of you.
The faces of friends who read
are shocked to see me
Upright
knowing the dark corners
surprized to find me functional
Others know
from experience direct Direct evidence
Without others present I must
pass the crazy torch to myself
Yes I am that crazy
Passion unbridled and luckily mostly uninterested
beware the laser focus of intent
you may burn under its intesity
or just crush under its weight

Naked here me
For you, for me To what end?
What for?
Why?
Why now?
Writer's block
writer's flow much worse when you can't turn it off
much more frightening when you know you can't control
when it comes or when it goes
how fast
how far
how bitter or sweet

Waking up
Will you wake up?
Will you snap out of it
And go back to the work that is
Our Every Day Lives
It's packageable and sold
black market costs more
and tastes so sweet

Life, not for sale
Not for hire
We hardly know how to steer it
much less ride
Much less plan
Driven by passion by force
I insist on the will to resist
I cannot condone the random violence
I must insist it be planned
thought through
and ultimately disregarded
because it will not work
It won't work

Talk to me
That's all we can do really
Talk, try to understand
Communicate.
Talk to me, what do you need?
You know I am here for you
I exist to keep you
upright, standing
breathing deeply.

I duck, from
birds slamming into my windows
from feet standing in front of me
I can only see toes
as I duck
behind my monitors
behind my every day.

I'll wave to you as I pass by
If you'll blow kisses as you go.
Send love, strength and hope
In buckets and boatloads
To the Celstial Processing Center
for intensive distribution
to my people sweet hearts
the ones who don't even know

Misha's Mocha

2009-06-05T11:05:00.003-04:00

Ach the love! The light frothy milk at the top.
The button of choco-flavored foam.
Had I not gone to lunch, had he not been driving,
My love, I would have never known your spicy kiss.

Coffee comes and coffee goes but
Misha's roasters ought to know.
They do it there, you smell it:
The love poured into, over, and on
A tiny bean uncovered in a huge fruit
How did this meeting ever come to pass?

I won't question but the flavor brings me out.
The elixir on my tongue
Front to back and side to side
Every millimeter tingles and screams with joy
The sweet chocolate dances with coffee
And I am gone

Gone gone, head off and floating
Mind reeling remembering
Jerusalem
Amsterdam
Berlin
Maesot
Duesseldorf
The coffee of kings the drink of legend
Each mouthful is a history

What a glorious day!
Raining outside and strolling through the
Cement castle of parking places
My feet skate lightly and my head
My head is traveling
Back in time
Around the globe
This taste this flavor as powerful as a memory
As moving as a song
As savory as love

(Blessing for spice? For drink? For all that comes from the Earth? Baruch Ata YY. That's some damn good coffee.)

Full Life, Full Cup

2009-05-31T00:50:00.004-04:00

How dare I even complain? I haven't even enough worry to fill a thimble, when you compare to all that I am given.

Sparkly, shiny Shavuot! How you pull at my heart. What a blessing to find you, hidden here amongst the holidays, celebrations and fasts. Ticking of time and passing of signs... I always did miss you. Maybe I wasn't ready. Like the newly-freed slaves weren't ready.

I woke up this morning hearing Cantor Bortnick's voice in my head, from the Shirei Shabbat on Friday night. I wasn't planning on going, having just been there in the morning for Shavuot services. But I had had enough of work and bolted at quarter after five. "Heal us and we shall be healed. Save us and we shall be saved." The first lines of the prayer for -- you guessed it -- healing, of body and mind. It's one I stutteringly recorded months ago for a friend in Hebrew. I've been saying it a lot recently over my ankle. In English and in the Cantor's unique timbre it sounds even better.

I had decided on Friday that I'd check out a different synagogue on Saturday morning. Having just heard the Women of the Bible concert with the four Reform Cantors (all female) from the area, I had a little more information in my pocket about where to go. I intended to go to Cantor Boxt's Temple Emanuel, but they weren't having services. So I went to Northern Virginia (I know, crossing the river!) to Rodef Shalom. I still don't know what Rodef means. Yikes! I looked at the root which points to being chased or pursued. WTF?

Anyway, the building was magnificent, really. With a sort of woodsy, of the earth feel... lots of giant wood beams and plenty of glass. They have a gift shop that makes WHC's look like an airport kiosk. Their library looks very municipal, but they've got videos and it looks like much cooler stuff in it. (Why did I not know Frida Kahlo was Jewish?) Big reception hall with the requisite dude setting up tables. A small group was meeting in the library before services, clearly a Torah study group which wasn't advertised on the website. They also use the NEW Reform prayerbook which frankly is reason enough for me to go. I'd really like to get more familiar with that. They were more casual than WHC in some ways, and more formal in others. I can see that they'd be a big competitor, if that's possible... and I'm sure it is. One of the largest congregations with a female Senior Rabbi. Excellent Cantor, but Bortnick has the voice that sounds like home.

Plenty of "wow" moments as I looked around this synagogue. A handful of ho-hums, and at least one "huh?" moment. Overall I just really enjoy sampling other congregations, seeing how they do things.

Okay so that's morning. Afternoon I putz around at home... I eat at home not out, because I know later I'll be going out to see Terminator and money will surely be spent then. I nap. I wake, and putz and drive and greet and roll some dice then we get on our way. Movie -- ticket issues and minor anxiousness but we settle down front long before the actual movie starts. Totally excellent ride, this movie. Had me shrieking like the girly girl I am. Big explosions. Wicked machines. What more could you want from the big screen, when you don't really want to think too hard?

Spontaneous dinner at a nearby bizarre Asian buffet: shellfish galore, weird desserty things, California rolls, and everything else you can think of.

You know? It's just one good thing after another. My cup, surely, overflows.

And yet, wisps of sadness cloud my eyes. Why? Who knows. Projecting, probably. Investigating, this hole in my ankle, and elsewhere. Tiny missing parts. I wonder about the Source of Hole Fullfillment and I wonder.

I know, I know my lot is full of grace. Let me not pretend that this life is not truly easy, even with its complications. Life must have texture, yes? Careful not to slice yourself on it.

Did You Hear It?

2009-05-29T03:00:00.003-04:00

Okay, so it's a weird little esoteric holiday. I can dig that. If you wanna put it to the side and say, "Weird little esoteric, I'll wink at you and keep walking" that's no problem for me. Honestly I usually miss it. I'm usually in some sort of state of major fluxx right now, wondering which way is up. This year I was resolute in wanting to observe Shavuot. It was the red-headed step-child of Jewish holidays, always forgotten.

I planned on going to the Adas Israel synogogue, where Tikkun Leil Shabbat (TLS) and Adas (and I don't know who else) were going to do the all-night study session. It started at 9 and I shut my eyes at 7, wanting to catch a cat-nap before the long hours. Four hours later I woke up. Nice. I do that. Should've known better.

Okay, fine. I've done holidays solo before. Gives me the time and space to really bury my head in texts, and think and think and think.

I woke up to a thunderstorm. Gentle thunder, not frightening. I read just a moment ago of a mystical tradition that says the skies open up during this night for a brief instant and at that very moment G-d will favorably answer any prayer. Then I thought, crap, I missed it.

Then I laughed.

I wonder if it makes a difference to anyone else out there to know that for all my seriousness, for all my potentially apparent religious devotion, there is a mental divide where I can reflect on the mysticism with cynicism. I am the shrugging new high priest, letting the people make a Golden Calf while Moses is off communing with G-d.

Then I get all devout and shit again.

I will do and I will listen. Then I'll question and pull it apart and buck Your authority. I'll get my heart crushed and I'll shake my fist at the sky and scream "WHY?" I might get mad and walk away, but I'll be back. That's pretty much how it works with me and You. It's what makes it real, and not just me going through the motions, either on the devout end or on the questioning end.

Know what I mean?

Totally too late to make any sense but...

2009-05-17T03:33:00.000-04:00

She wonders, what kind of crackery are we? We who won't bow and scrape? We who won't accomodate?

What kind of lackluster performance is this? For whom do you play at penitence?

Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

want wanting wanted

2009-05-15T22:24:00.002-04:00

Oh I try, I do. I try not to want. I try not to give in to the delicious wanting of skin, of lips. I try not to want attention. Alas! I should better try not to breathe.

I try to direct my desires, to those for whom it is appropriate, warrented, motivated. These rules narrow my options significantly. Again, I fail at self control, wanting what I cannot have, wishing for what will never be, for what shouldn't be. Shouldn't. It shouldn't work and indeed it shall not.

Over, done, end of story, yes? Then stop, by G-d, stop yourself. Change your mind, for once for good and get on with it! Get on with living with life... yes yes yes, it's not so interesting over here where all the people are made of wood and going through the motions like an Old Navy mannequin. That won't help you with your looking on and such.

No, first do your homework. Like work there's an inbox full of names you don't know and links leading you through the process with your hands firmly tied behind your back. This guided communication provides safety in anonymity, because as we all know, I am much more comfortable being naked and exposed online above all. No, this way they don't know the extent of oddness peering back at them through the screen. And they won't remember me at all when I close the match, saying "distance too great", "I don't feel chemistry" or quite simply "other". I won't think less of them as they line up to tell me: no, no, no.

Oh! That's it! This is a lesson in No. Must be the year for NOT getting what I want. Perhaps I've had it easy up until now, unappreciative of how easily a wanton woman falls into my lap and writhes so rigorously. I'm a big fan of the rigor, but only when not accompanied by necrosis. Stiffening, in general, denoting an excitement, a presence, a towering "hello! I'm here" and green flag waving.

I don't consider the baggage, because of my own activities it is less clear. I have forgotten already the crazed, cuisine-laced relapse that follows a fine fucking. I missed the opportunity to truly examine this behavior before. I almost forgot the wincing pinch, the pressing down and subtle force required to get me where I need to go. I forgot I was ashamed. I forgot I was twisted and broken and in need of repair.

What shall I do if I should find a fair face to fall in love with? Shall I unplug my psyche and pretend that it works? Shall I uncover the lumps and bumps beneath the super-hero cape? Somewhere inbetween all-important and essentially ignorable I'll sit, a seven-year-old in a white t-shirt tank top not knowing male from female but knowing force and fear.

I can take my history with me, carry it like a cross and let it sink me to the bottom of the river. I could let it sink, to settle in the muck, but I'll have to remember this bend of the river and point to it on my way. Remember to forget the name of Amalek. Never forget how you were hurt. Now forget about it so that it won't keep you down.

I am the superbowl quarterback who must have a short memory. I am the historian who knows how it played out before. All the knowledge. None of the fear. May this be Your will.

My Life the Radio Show, on the Internet.

2009-05-12T19:08:00.002-04:00

I had this thought on the way home, as I often do. Driving and thinking like I do. The thought was this: I've been effing broadcasting myself my whole flippin' life.

I have. Radio in college, at KDIC: the most phallic call letters on the planet and they were mine. I was relentless with Wimmin's Music and Fun Dyke Tunes. It was awesome fun. Theater in high school. Cheesy little publication we did in middle school. Now I tweet. I am a content generator for Facebook. I cannot stop.

I slow down, sure. I have instituted periods of enforced quietness. Problem is, eventually I do have something to say. Problem? For nay-sayers, for folks who feel like I put too much out there, for folks who just wish I'd be a little bit different, in this one little way.

Everyone's got an opinion. Sometimes it's hard for me to form one. Sometimes it's coming out of my mouth before the whole story is told. A little bit of age and a couple of lovely people giving honest feedback, and I know that I need to shut up and listen from time to time. I practice. I fear that I err too much on the side of "make yourself small"... and I can only shrink myself for so long. Eventually the real me will bust out in some expletive explosion or just a burp and that'll be the end of the honeymoon.

Please reference my doormat-asshole dial for a visual understanding of my dilemma.

Balance balance. That bitch always comes back.

Dear Blog, I miss you when I'm gone. I know it's me. I know it's in my head. I've got so frickin' much to say, but it comes at me in clumps and lumps and then I get distracted. There's this life thing, you know, the one that keeps generating all this content, and trying to wrap my arms around that. Well... life is hard, but it's all the same.

Let's remind each other to remind each other that bitching is fine, as long as we can look up sometimes too.

I have talked a lot in the past, to anyone who'll listen, about finding comfort, even divinity, in the small things. Water running over fingers. Birds singing their hearts out. An amazing sky, like a fiery divine canvas.

I gotta tell you. I'm ready for some effing large scale happiness. I'm not trying to be Miss Too Big for Her Britches. I'm just saying. If I can thread this needle, then I should be able to stitch this together. I think I'm gonna need help. I'm pretty sure that's the title of the next lesson coming up: How to Ask for Help from Others.

God I SUCK at this lesson. What is this, the fourth time through? Muther. At least.

I'm ready for the big picture. I'm ready to try this out. I'll be honest and an asshole and loving all at the same time. Respect. Give respect. Focus. Be real. Be yourself, whatever the fuck that is at the moment. Steel yourself, then relax.

Upright? Yes. Steady as she goes then, love.

Meow?

2009-05-09T23:35:00.003-04:00

I'm listening to my cat, Milkshake, make a cat call. It really is like a telephone call. Definitely a question, 'cause it goes up in tone at the end. She's looking, intently, but not like some "I want to eat that" noise. "Meow? ... Meow? ... Meow?" She cocks her ear. Wonder if anybody picked up.

Exhaustion

2009-05-06T22:30:00.003-04:00

Really I just want to go to bed. Like an hour ago. But I had to finish the super freaky SVU with Swoosie Kurtz playing this nutzo judge. And reminding us all that there's no shame in growing old, because facelifts alter our countenance and make it impossible to properly enunciate. Lips should be able to come together. Just sayin'.

For weeks I've been thinking about you, Blog. Thinking about how I've neglected you. Sure, I crashed my bike. Sure, I've lived the last four weeks with at least one leg elevated. I've been busy. Work has been kicking my ass. Kicking. My ass. And when I get up to get going it lays me out again. And I get up. And boom, again. Seriously. It's been weeks since I've gone without a major fuckup. You know, I'm resilient, but this? Fuck. Fuck me, man. Fuck me? Fuck you!

And that's pretty much where I'm at now: Fuck you. I'm out of steam and have two more days to pull through. I'm behind STILL at work, and not working at this moment right now, as I should be. My body is... being mortal and shit. Fucking irritating. I know, I know, it's doing what it can. I should be nice to my body, since I treated it like shit for decades. My love life consists of an online, overly-chaperoned quiz application and excessive visual hunting ("damn, she's gorgeous, ring check... married. fuck.") Like I would actually speak to anyone.

Mother's day is coming up, and I don't want to harsh anyone's potential happiness on that day so I'll say this here and now: Dear Mom: You were supposed to help, not hurt. Fuck you.

Okay so I can check that off my list of things to do.

One year, when I was in junior high, or high school maybe, I bought the recently released in paperback "Mommie Dearest" for her for mother's day. I had no idea what the book was about. I was getting a gift because she said she'd take my birthday present back if I didn't get her something. Maybe reading the back of the book would've alerted me to the fact that this was not an appropriate, dutiful gift. I was stupidly bold and daring... without meaning to be. Her reaction? An astonishing muted retreat. What was she gonna do anyway, beat me? HA! Awesomeness.

Bold. Bold and brash. And stupid.

Not much has changed really. I get by on luck and love, and I have had plenty of both. I love and luck comes to me. And when I'm lucky, I get love. I'm extra bold and brash at this moment because I have been SUPREMELY energized and fortified by the word knitting of the best poet I know. To me, for me, beautiful delicacies of syllables images blessings, wrapped up in love. I am momentarily invincible. As a result I can say anything.

I consider the Blog, the open letter to anyone who'll read it. It's a shouting in the darkness, to be sure. One sits on this side, tippity-typing and never really knowing. It's a love letter, sometimes. Multidirectional. I consider much of my writing as a conversation with G-d, you know, giving the low-down, taking stock of what's what and where, and putting in a couple of requests for this or that. I don't ask for much or very often. When I do, it's often in writing.

I count the number of sentences that start with "I" and I wonder what Gramma would do to fix that. She always just left it off and started the sentence like normal. You would assume the "I" was there. Not sure it would work here. Thinking it'll sound a lot like Tweetering or status updating. No, no. I should put myself in the picture. After all, if I am not for myself, who will be?

No, yes, I will put myself in the picture. I will not hide and I will not be hidden. I won't hide myself from you, as I've done recently. My brain bubbles over with ideas and thoughts and then I arrive at work and can't capture it. It was in the deep winter that I tossed away any concern and spent hours at work not working but writing. I was wide open and pouring it out. That changes. And changes again. You may wonder how it is that I could ever hide, an elephant behind a birch. And of course, here, on the screen, in pixels first then letters, I am all brash and bold. Naked always. Exposed, but only in pieces.

I know. I know it's not about me but about the connections, person to person. We crave it and shun simultaneously. Welcome to the wire; balance well.

Now I am tired. Tired of wobbling back and forth, unable to maintain balance. Falling off of writing, falling into the brain-suck of TV. Falling off Facebook, unable to keep up. Dropping balls like rain. Some juggler I am. Weary, I am. But I just got this safe place to curl up in, sent to me in pixels and letters. Fortify, regenerate, rest, she said, safely. No harm will come to me here. Thumb pillow, here I come.

It Was a Dark and Stormy Night

2009-04-19T19:05:00.004-04:00

When I was a kid I had an electric typewriter. I was going to be a writer. I started each one of my first four novels with the same line: It was a dark and stormy night. I was Snoopy, on my house, with an imaginary Woodstock flying in circles around my head.

Then, much like now, I found the process of getting ready to write to be a big distraction in actually writing. I loathed having to change the sheet of paper, one for another. I wanted one long sheet of paper so I wouldn't have to stop. I wrote based on the title, which I always deliberated over for at least as long as it took to get the typewriter out and set up.

My stories then were of beautiful people doing beautiful things, being stunning and fabulous. I had no idea what I wanted, except that it should be excellent. I had no idea what excellent looked like, but I could describe the scent of the wind and the way it bends the new grass all day. Details, it seems, I've got.

When I get seriously stressed out, that's where I go. Into the details. I remember being somewhere once, where I really really really didn't want to be. But as things are often out of our control, I went into what was controllable: water running over my fingers. In a moment of sheer nail-scraping undesire I went into the water. I think that's when I started to pray, for real, for need, to assuage the fear. And this is the message I got then: this too shall pass.

And of course it did.

Today. Today is different. I have total control. Well more or less. I control what happens next. If I want to flake out, I can. Sometimes I do. If I want to get down and get to it, sometimes I do.

And that's where I start to watch myself, and wonder, "Shelby T., why do you do that to yourself?" I'm good at wishing. Really good. I've got a VERY active imagination. Very thorough imagination. Very detail oriented. I've also got a penchant for chasing what feels good. This makes me only proficient at taxes and excellent at fucking. Just saying.

Now, that chasing the good feeling... that comes back to this past Saturday's Torah reading, if you can believe that. Those poor G-d chasers Abihu and Nadab just wanted more of the estatic vision. Who could blame them? There was already tension: would the Shechinah appear and reside in what they had built? Moses and Aaron going in together, what's going on? Where's G-d? So in their great passion, they brought strange fire, breaking the rules, these priests. And what happened to them? The story goes that G-d zapped their souls, with a red beam through the nose, leaving their bodies and clothes intact. Some say they were drunk when they went in, breaking another rule stated nearby in the text. That's still chasing pleasure, and at the wrong time too.

Careful... careful with that motivation to feel good, to be at the pinnacle, the highest high. No one can live there, no human. There is a time and place. You may get lucky. You may see the face of G-d. You may feel ecstasy. Or you may have to keep working.

I watch myself, watching movies, not studying. I have watched myself put more in my mouth than I could stand, just for the sensation. I have put myself in emotional pretzels, just to feel passion.

I still want the story to be excellent. Still not sure what I want. But a little age makes the concept of planning quite desirable.

Careful, how fast you go around that curve. Yes, the ride is sensational. And then, there is the rest of life. Careful.

When?

2009-04-05T13:17:00.003-04:00

I am mostly impatient. On a minute by minute basis, I am constantly jumping head. On a theorectical plane, I want results. On a tangible plane, I want explanations. I consider that I might have some sort of quantum-affliction that will only be diagnosed 1000 years from now that prevents me from being in just one place at one time.

Perhaps I'm just an obsessive multi-tasker. That surely comes to play in many spheres of life.

I want the ankle to heal. I want to ride my motorcycle... I want another motorcycle. I want to go to Israel. I want someone to kiss. I want to feel. Everything.

And then I remind myself: be careful of what you want.

I want to live, by G-d, loudly. So you can't get me to swear to this grand theory when I'm weeping my eyes out, feeling the low after the intense high. That doesn't mean I don't mean it. It means I'm busy wailing and mourning. DND, BRB.

You know, good shit often hurts when it's gone. That's just how it works. Like love. Like skin.

I want to heal. I want to feel. I am obsessing over not obsessing. Not so much in a corkscrew spiral downward. Maybe in a gearing up to spring?

Spring, new, rebirth. I hate myself again for crashing my bike. I was waiting so long all winter for good weather, warmer weather.

I wait, I wait. And my insistence on Now brings it crashing to a halt. I need to slow down. Even further than before. Slow. Way. Down. Change direction. Is this me telling myself to chill? A voice from the other side of the room that is still just me: There is love out there. There is language in there. Just wait.

Great. I do need practice in waiting.

The Crash 09

2009-03-29T17:18:00.004-04:00

Just to be clear, cuz folks want details and want to know everything's cool.

I did lose control of the Vespa, going about 30 around a curve, in the right lane. Water + speed + curve = no es bueno. Simple physics really.

And THAT's where that limit is. Good to know. Moving right along.

Road rash on the ankle. Shin is numb, bruised and swollen. Closed fracture on the middle finger tip. And thumb, but that one's not so bad at all. Apparently I was giving Someone the finger as I was going down? Bad Shel!

I have insurance. It's being towed to a repair shop. All is well and right in the world. Except that neither the strippers nor nurses ever showed up.

Hmmmmmm

2009-03-29T16:26:00.002-04:00

I ruminate. I attempt to not change verb tenses and therefore start in the present. Cuz that's where I'm going to wind up, telling any story. I'm transported there. I might be here, typing away, talking to you through my fingers, but I'm there, baby.

I'm there.

Every song sounds great to me right now. Annie Lennox is giving me a HA! like only she can, straight from the first track of the 1984 soundtrack. Beautiful. Gorgeous.

I just read Ali's blog and was SUCKED IN and transported to a spot where a Yogi Penguin showed her a place where you can always find a stretch of time, in between the moments.

If music is about the spaces inbetween the notes, then is life between the moments?

I am and I am here and mostly put together and that my friends is amazing. I could have little face. I could have broken bones. I am battered but whole. Story of my life. Dig it. Own it. CANNOT bring me down, baby. Goes down and gets right back up. Witness.

Watch me. I don't care. Watch me win.

Hand to Heart - Can you feel it?

2009-03-25T00:35:00.005-04:00

There is a tempo
a definite beat
deep and through and through
shakes you over there
and tremors here

electromagnetic ethernet
elements whizzing
you there she where
we left her stretching
out over the unseen
over the nettweetsphere
reaching touching true

between the planet's rhythm
and the electric connection
there is a symphony of
breathing walking knocking
me to you and you to she

waves of optimism
crashes of oh no oh no no no
mundane my brain
but you connect know see

movement soulwise, bonded
progression? evolution?
which why how where
where?

we're moving together
this is true regardless of recognition
where are we going?
where do you want to go?

so many directions
infinite
all the bits and bytes don't represent
even part of the options
imagine that

imagine the solution is
un-imaginable
just you
just me
must be in the connection
the ethernetsphereweb
the electricity in the band of rain
stretching across the land
pulling across oceans

assuming the sum is more
I'll ask again
where are we going?

The rabbis used to say: make
Peace where there is strife.
Strife caused by: fear, hunger
disempowerment
Protection Provisions
Education

A Plan

Whirling

2009-03-22T18:17:00.002-04:00

Frantic whirling is going on, but it's all in the head. "I shouldn't have said that," I insist, silently and only to myself. "I wish I could take it back." But I can't of course. What's said is said and what's done is done and that's pretty much the problem with life in general.

Twice now in recent days I've been reminded of my "wrath". Twice. By two different people. Two women. (Men, I assume, would simply think "oh shit" and dissapear. This is a vast assumption.) I do tend to get riled up. It's true.

And verbally... those damn words... I can really let 'er rip. After the fact -- after my wrath has been called out -- I wonder if I didn't actually mean my words, or if I simply should've come up with softer, better ones.

This is my pet project, really. Myself. Bringing out the strengths of this tattered ego and unfurling the flags of my psyche. There's a goal in here somewhere. A reason. A truth to be told. A story to relay. A soul to defend.

Yes, that's it. A soul to defend.

I am somehow naturally inclined to defend. I defended the kitten being swung by it's tail when I was only six. Got my first black-eye. I defended the girls being chased by the boys... or at least the ones running behind me screeching "Save me!" I defend the religious against the non-religious, and the non-religious from the believers. I mean to defend hearts from being broken, and then I break them myself. I am a perpetual traffic cop, just wanting the flow to keep flowing. I am quick with the advice and adamant about the suggestions. Bullyish, though my heart is is the right place.

That's just it... easy on the bullying, Shelby T. You can't make anyone do anything. That whole free will thing, remember?

Needs. I do have needs. I try to minimize them whenever possible. Something from Taoism tickling the inside of my frontal lobe is telling me if I am small enough I won't get hurt. If I bend enough, I won't break. Still I need. I need things spelled out for me. I need the obvious stated, and then re-stated again not too long after, because I might not trust my memory. I need clear stop and go signs. I need a manual, that I won't read closely but I will stick a bunch of post-it notes in at odd angles with little scribbles like "yes!" and "important".

I need petting. I need kisses. I need snuggling. Need need need. Knead. Twist turn, punch down. That's what you do with dough.

Punch this shit down girl. You've got stuff to do. You can't wait. Go! Go! Go!

Note to Self

2009-03-22T18:06:00.003-04:00

Note to self... she's just not that into you, so start thinking of something else. I know you've tried this before. It's becoming so very necessary. Think!

Note to self: focusing on Hebrew is not easy. Try lubing up the grey matter with a little grain alcohol next time.

Self of note: You get taller every time you work out at the gym. And those oblique exercises make your cramps feel like they're going all the way around your gut. Does that mean they're working?

Note to self: Stop farting around and do something. Waiting sucks.

Selfish note: Must find snuggling. Stat.

Pacing in the Darkness

2009-03-10T23:57:00.002-04:00

Waiting. Waiting mostly for more time. More hours in the day. More days in the week. Everyone wants time to do something. Me, I want it to slow the fuck down.

Slow down! Give me more time. I feel like I just woke up. I feel like I just got my driver's license. I feel like I just figured out what it is I want to do. I just realized my hands aren't shackled.

Now my boundaries are determined by what I can and can't take, what my personal limits are. How long can I sleep only five hours and still study and do martial arts? How will my work suffer? I've taken the girlfriend metaphor that I've struggled with for eighteen years -- longer -- and have transposed it onto myself. Folding it over, living with myself... dating myself, as I told a friend once. Dealing with myself, with no one else to blame.

I'm not a bad date. We definitely have a lot in common, me and me. I've taken myself out for concerts and dinners and movies. There's never any tension about whether or not I want to have sex. Although amazingly enough I do yell at myself for dirty dishes in the sink and the complete disrepair of whatever is in disrepair. I am kind of a slacker.

When I said, right after graduating from college, that I wanted to spend the next ten years watching T.V. I meant it. And, I did. And now...

You know my career has chugged along. I'm smart and fairly sociable. This goes a long way in the corporate world, especially when you're find yourself amongst programmers and other geeks. Especially when you wind up managing them, at some level. But even at work I am prone to slack. I need deadlines. In some cases a little frenzy is good. Or extreme work hours. If I put everything off totally then I have to pull an all-nighter... well this is just what I do to myself.

And that's what I'm watching: what I do to myself. Partnerless, after being partnered for so long, it's astonishing to realize what crap is yours.

So... I'm dreamy, which can make for motivation sometimes. There is nothing holding me back but my own mind. Unfortunately, there's a lot to that. I'm pretty good at fucking with myself, and not as good with doing what I need to do. I give in and eat a Honey Bun because I know for those three minutes that I'm stuffing the sweet, warm gooeyness into my pie-hole I will feel as delicious as it tastes. Nevermind that ten minutes after I'll wish I hadn't done that. I'll watch a stupid T.V. movie -- live and with commericals -- rather than study. I'll stay up late just to try and squeeze out a blog post. (er.... )

Most days are a combination of a good job keeping to the plan and a handful of oh-well's. Today I didn't study but I did go to the gym. I consider writing to be part good deed, even if it takes me a minute to get into the space. I was good at work today. Big meeting; my part was easy, easy, easy. (I ended with the phrase, "I've got some work to do." What else can you say when you list all the things you still need to fix?)

Some days I slip. Badly. Some days I call in sick and hide in bed. Some days I *am* sick. Some days I drop everything. Like, on my toes. And figuratively as well.

I love it when I think I did well, and then find out after that I bungled something.

Check, check, recheck. Measure. (Hmmmm.) Tall enough? Strong enough? Smart enough? Loveable? Liveable? Contributing? Helping? Doing the Right Thing?

It is an obsession, I think, to worry about such things. And I think it is also necessary. Otherwise, I'd just watch T.V.

I Promised

2009-03-08T22:48:00.002-04:00

I promised myself that I'd write something today. I knew it was going to be a weird day for me: baby shower in the early afternoon, followed by leading a mixed group of Jews and non-Jews through the traditional mourning service the same day as the funeral.

The baby shower I thought would be easy. My overly-simplified plans of just giving a wad of cash went out the window during a consultation with a close female friend. So close that she could say, no cash, here do this instead. The This being handmade gifts from Etsy -- I got two, a cute print of a bird on a bike and a onesie with Obama stenciled on it -- way classier, for sure. Just the touch the gift needed. (And where was my Work Wife for this task? She would've made me buy something too, certainly. As would've Pig. Frankly, I thought Sparky was channelling Pig when she said it.)

So, I got a card, and with my printed out map and directions I was off on my scooter. I got lost. I was late. Like seriously late. One hour late would've been cool, probably. I was buying the card at CVS then, though. The house was someone's mother's house, out in Virginia, the place where I am most likely to get lost. I did get lost. I found my way and snuck in, awkwardly pulling my blue Doc Martin's off at the bottom of of the stairs. Everyone was upstairs and the Games were underway. I was trying to avoid those. I regarded the collection of shoes. There were a ton of sophisticated, nice casual women's shoes and about four pairs of huge men's shoes, only one of which were sneakers. I considered I might be under-dressed. Oy. Late and underdressed.

At least when my white face emerged from the stairs Felicia and Von both let out a hearty "Shellyyyyyyyyyy!" and came to hug me. Please give a hand to the only cracka in the room. Thank you. Where's the food?

I was also the ONLY person from the office, where Felicia used to work with us. I'm sure there's some sort of weird something because the organization did let her go. And during the "game" where we went around the room to introduce and say how we all knew the couple there was a dull silence when I mentioned my company by name. I said we bonded on a work trip to Arkansas, and Felicia added where she feared she'd be lynched by the white folks.

Hello my name is Shelly. I can vouch for this black persron. Really. Who am I? Just a cross-dressing lesbian jewish convert. Is that a gun?

To their credit, Felicia and Von have awesome friends. Most they know through church or the programs through the church they help run. Good people. Solid. Preggers. I say it's a boy (it's a small belly!) who'll come in the early afternoon.

Still, I didn't know anyone else there besides the center of attention people. And I was not feeling, you know, gregarious. Even for how sweet the people were. I told them I had to cut out and snuck back down stairs after about a total of 40 minutes at the party.

I zoomed home. Still a beautiful day outside, I was seriously enjoying riding around. I got home promptly at 4:20 and opted for a nap. An hour later I needed to get up and move. The Shiva Service was to start at 7 and I wanted to get there early, unlike my two hour lateness at the shower.

Google maps, again. Print, again. Helmet on, again. This time I've got a bag of prayerbooks with a half a dozen shiny black kippot stuffed in there. "I hope the hats don't come flying out down the highway," I said to Milkshake. She was unconcerned.

Zipping down the road, getting on I-270, I tried to remember the name of the woman who I was supposed to contact at the house. I recited the name of the man who died. I got there about fifteen minutes early to find that, since the funeral already happened, the whole crowd is there. They've been noshing on the vast spread for at least a couple of hours now. Actually I have no idea how long they had been back from the grave site.

The house is huge and beautiful. There is food or beverage on every surface. There is one non-white face in the whole crowd, and she was there to do the dishes. Boom.

I met the ex-wife of the deceased, and the sons. It's the daughter though, whose house we're all at, and who is my contact. I met cousins and close family friends. "Hi, I'm Shel West, from Washington Hebrew." Pressing hands, meeting eyes. A blur. Finally I met the daughter. She is feeling this, big time. Her face says to me confused, sad, overwhelmed. "I'm so sorry," I said I explained there's a part during the service where the familly can address the crowd. Even just a sentence or two, I assured her, you don't have to do it at all. People move, more faces, hands. I got introduced to a cousin who is a lay cantor and they'd love to hear her sing. "Sure!" I said, honestly exuberantly. We talked about the flow briefly and her smile was a great welcome to me.

People moved. Some folks got ansty about starting, other folks would stand around and talk forever if you let them. I tried to ride the crowd's emotion, letting it do its thing, perhaps not reining it in enough. A couple of times we started to talk about the prayer books ("there's more in the front") and kippot ("you don't have to wear them if you don't want") and the page number. The page number. Forever Jews will be yelling out the page number. G-d bless 'em.

The cantor-cousin started singing a niggun. She had said "that'll calm 'em down." Herding Jews is like herding cats. This is Moses' true miracle, moving that many Jews all at the same time. God must've known that.

Anyway, the service part was fine. You know me, nose in book, talk to the kippah. Cantor-cousin sounded awesome which reminded me that I am flat, flat, flat. And not a cantor. I do love it though. It was good. It was going a little long with extra singing. I felt some people start to shift and wiggle. Twice we were silent, once for the "optional" daily prayers... yadda yadda redemption, yadda yadda Jerusalem... ah, we'll pick up on page 30. The second silence was for the silent prayer. I've been at services enough to know the silent prayer routine, and gave the idea a go for myself... written words, words of the heart. Yadda. It was good.

When it was time for the "family to say something" I looked up to where I had spotted the daughter sitting the one time I looked up earlier. Her eyes got big as saucers and she started making the "time-out" or "he's safe" motion, I couldn't tell which. "I could not...?" "Of course," I said, trying to not miss a beat. "Let's continue on page...." Thank God for the page call out, the most reliable segue ever.

I read a fair amount from the pre-printed, kosher-for-Reform, temple-distributed prayer book. It's a special one for the Shiva service. It's got some nice words in it, although sometimes I feel like it's a little too God-focused for someone who might be really pissed at God at such a moment. (Ach, God, I know. I want more. I want less. Who could put up with me but You?) I took it nice and slow on the Mourner's Kaddish. I thanked the crowd for coming, and for joining, and reminded them not to say goodbye, but instead l'chaiyim. That's how they told me to end it. And I'm a good little soldier, sometimes.

So folks go back to the talking thing. I thank the cantor-cousin and she thanks me. The cousin who was handing out books came by. Some woman I hadn't seen before at all comes up to me and grips my hand fiercely as she thanks me. "Really," she says. "Really." Death grip. I look her in the eye, really. "Good luck," I say. Then the daughter comes to up to me. Her face! My God. She is crushed. A face of strength, softened by bludgeoning grief. Eyes, just overwhelmed. I might be giving her the death grip. I wish I had said, "I wish you a good night's sleep" but it might be too soon for that for her. What I did say was something about wishing the best for her. I don't remember. She wanted me to eat. There was a LOT of food. I declined, thinking my garbanzo beans would be soft when I got home.

I spoke to the daughter's husband too, once before the service and once after. His face also will haunt me tonight. His face said "Help me" and "I'm exhausted." I wish them peace, soon but not too soon.

May we all get what we need.

Killing time

2009-03-08T01:21:00.000-05:00

I am in a place I often find myself, put myself in fact. I find it comforting and like home. I had it last night when Shawn was over, and I get it all the time at Wunderland, Chez Emperor. Playing some game, hanging out, music playing, talking or quite possibly not.

It's not necessarily productive time. Once I tried to study while playing multiple games with E. Yeah, no.

Still... There's so much interaction in the competitive jibbing (?) and playful taunting. It's a dynamic I get, I can deal with. Works.

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Relief

2009-03-04T22:51:00.004-05:00

I'm cutting myself a break. Just for the moment. It's a hard balance because I'm one of those who will take a mile when given an inch, even when I'm doing it to myself.

No, I'm giving myself permission not to be perfect or even try to be for my university level Hebrew class. It's probably an excuse, but I really need it right now. I've been physically ill, on and off for over a week. I'm trying to cram this language into my brain and do my job, which is easily more than 40 hours a week. And I'm trying to take care of this body in a way that I haven't been for the first 39 years of my life. And, you know, do the dishes and shit.

I feel like a slacker, though, I do. I know people with children who are doing as much as I'm trying to do. I know people with children who are doing more than I'm doing. I try not to compare, but I do. No one really knows, I explain to myself, how heavy my brain is on me, how complicated this existence is. I should say how heavy my heart is, because that comes into play too, in complication, and in stretching out time.

Time is so stretchy right now. It disappears from me. I sit still in silence in my living room. The T.V. isn't on. There's no music on. Milkshake comes by periodically, and the green digital clock on the VHS player tell me that time is passing. I feel a moment, and the clock says it was forty minutes. 40. And where was I? Lost in thought for forty minutes.

I'm overwhelmed, between class and work, and I need time to get lost in my thoughts. And I feel like I don't even have 40 minutes anymore. It's not really any wonder that I'm sick.

So... I'm patting myself on the head, and putting in stupid T.V. and probably falling asleep on the sofa. I'll get up, go to work and go to class and look Rivka straight in the eye and say: Yeah, I didn't do it yet.

Screen reading

2009-03-03T12:27:00.000-05:00

I just tried to eat lunch without reading text on a screen. I made it about ten minutes before I pulled out my Blackberry.

Even my internal thinks seems to require a keyboard.

Why is it that I am so easily moved by an old soul in a young body? Why is it that I feel my life depends on Hebrew? Am I really supposed to go back to shuffling through papers and playing traffic cop to electrons in cyberspace when there are bigger issues out there, even in my little world?

People are sick, suffering and in pain. I know only a handful of them and am still overwhelmed.

I wonder if God gets overwhelmed.
(Yeah, I know, I actually left the O in. Shocking. I had shrimp the other might too, just to reinforce to myself the Reform nature of my commitment.)
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On being better

2009-03-02T22:54:00.000-05:00

Not perfect, just better.

Today was a snow day, and plenty of people who could have come in and prolly shoulda come in just didn't. It was a giant excuse for everyone to stop.

You know, I stop. I do. I slack. I fart around at the office. I write blog posts and entertaining personal emails there.

It's not that. It's not that because that's a down moment, not a standard. What seriously disturbs me is the effort to maintain that lifestyle.

That's technically awful isn't it? To judge and publicly disapprove of how someone chooses to live? Even if that way of living is doing the minimum possible and expecting other people to give you even more than need. That sense of expectation, deservedness. Privilege. It pisses me off.

Don't worry. If you're reading this, it probably doesn't apply to you. It applies to Alicia-with-a-dot in Hebrew who talks during class like she's the only one there. She complains that her homework should get an excellent, because for *her* it was excellent. With all that red. Or the horrible teacher who just wants a captive audience. The person who wants a government job so they can barely show up and still get paid, who winds up getting promoted just so other people can get rid of them.

Where does the total lack of motivation come from. You can't blame it on weed. I know too many smart and productive pot-heads.

I know. Rant.
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Insecure Self-Correcting Haiku of the Day

2009-02-25T13:46:00.001-05:00

I try yes I try
To be worthy of you to
Be worthy of me

I Woke Up in Electrons

2009-02-24T14:32:00.002-05:00

It just occurred to me, that with every online emotion, even written in hard copy, I extrude a part of my inside. Blorp. Here's what I listen to, gratis blip.fm, new timesucker extraordinaire. Here's my momentary fear, as captured by Twitter, from my cell phone, as I am truly lost in thought, but not letters.

It seems that I have resumed duties as Facebook content provider. Hello and welcome back to the show.

My life is on Facebook. Sad, perhaps, but shockingly true. So much so that I felt I had to limit co-workers a little. Momentary fears not appropriate. No, no, complete strangers can see that shit, but I can't have my #1 being all up in it. Work dynamics are strange enough anyway.

Speaking of which I'll be going to a hockey game later with my boss, after having essentially blown off all of this morning and most of this afternoon. I'll have to do something to show that I'm worthy, if I haven't already. I'm banking on the fact that I have, I realize. I'm just tired, and so I slept. Not much more to it than that. I've got three hours or more to get some work done. That's at least equal to half a day at the office.

Right. Working. Let me get on that.

I'm Singing It Anyway, by G-d

2009-02-22T19:52:00.003-05:00

So the *other* purpose of the Hatzi Kaddish is a blessing after some amount of prayer. Which makes me think that saying that right after only one blessing, Hinei MaTov, is slightly not legit. Which means that even with the crowd it still wasn't appropriate.

Which means I have a hard time getting it right. Which means, damnit, I want to say it by myself. I'll call together a full chorus in my head for the responsive line. I need it. Forgive me, I am lazy.

*****

Meanwhile, back at headquarters...

*****

1st Time Chanting for Services

2009-02-20T21:35:00.003-05:00

It was awesome. Freakin' awesome. I helped to do Friday evening services at my synagogue. I did the chanting. Amazing.

I was nervous, of course. I *should* be, you know? It's worthy of a few butterflies.

So I met with Diane S., who leads lay services occassionally. She says she winds up doing it like three or four times a year. Her usual co-host just lost her husband, and so was not up to singing, though she was there. Diane and I went through the service, as she usually does it.

Me: Oh, Shabbat Evening II... yeah I like that one better than I. (flip, flip, flip)

I notice that she *doesn't* do the Hatzi Kaddish. Gulp. I *just* wrote a friend about how psyched I was to do this particular prayer, since I recently learned it's very not kosher to do it alone.

Diane: Just let me know if you want to take anything out or put anything in.

Me: (!) Oh yes.

So, we added the Hatzi Kaddish to the begining, and continued through what the service would be, checking to see if I knew the tunes to various prayers. Yep, know that one. Ooo, we should just read that one in English, 'cause I have no idea. Yup. Cool. Cool. Chant Oseh Shalom instead of wrapping up with it? How about ending with Ein Keloheinu? 'Kay?

People start to come in. My hand is sweating, holding the prayerbook. We sit down. I feel like it's NEVER going to start. I wonder if Diane has lost all sense of time. It feels like the first time I ever smoked pot and I thought that an hour had passed in the space of three minutes. I tell myself to chill and just be. "Moses and the bush," I remind myself.

Be. Look up. Don't look at the faces of the people who are looking right at you, wondering when the hell the service is going to start. Resist the urge to ask Diane again if the woman doing the candle lighting knows when to come up. Breathe. OMG Diane's never going to ... oh, she's ready.

Diane has to gesture to me to get me out of my seat. My facial expression is probably "oh right!" We start. Breathe.

First a lively "hine matov" and then, the long awaited Hatzi Kaddish, right there.

Diane is chanting with me. Mind you she's not the most... musical. I step back slightly, and start in, wobbling slightly. I realize, about ten words in, that no one else is with me. I am doing a solo, not entirely abnormal for this prayer, but still slightly shocking. I get to the line where the crowd should join in, nervous and waiting for the sound. They're there, including the guy who always wears suspenders and is basically his own horn section. He pronounces everything with an S, in the Ashkenazi style. He's on it. I'm golden. Line is over and I'm back to the rest of the prayer. A voice in my head says, go for it. I let it rip, just like I used to before I was cognizant of the practice of chanting it publicly on purpose. I screw my face up, I bend my knees, I sway and I clear my lungs of air.

Nailed it.

And *that* was when it became Just Fine that I was going to be doing the chanting tonight.

The rest of it was awesome. With Diane next to me I felt like Cantor Bortnick (with a cold). I was able to use my Big Voice to power over and through, actually *leading* the tune. I kept my nose in the book, because when I looked up I was distracted by the faces looking directly at me. Talk to the kippah.

When Diane and I sat down briefly for a moment of silent prayer she quickly told me, "You've got a great voice, I'm so glad you're here."

*Whew*

Status Update: COLLIDER ROCKS

2009-02-18T23:43:00.005-05:00

The title "status update" should be read in a loud British accent. And you know, like "stay-tus", British-like.

Okay fine. Don't.

It's Thursday, not quite but it will be soon. All day I've been thinking it was Thursday. I've wanted it desperately to be Thursday. I really want time to pass. Weird, and not.

I was asked tonight "Are you okay?" Like, yeah dude, I'm okay. Life is rough and this is the inside of my head. I still am who I am on the outside, even when that's a little rough too. This is how I operate. You see me on the outside. You know me on the inside. It's not so incredibly incongruous.

Like my Vespa and my Rover. Yes. I can do both. I can do extremely fucked in the head and mostly put together in real life. I can do excessively weepy and then do my best bad ass. Survival.

Doesn't mean that my lows don't get low. I think it freaks people out a little. Until they get used to it. Maybe. Sometimes even I am not used to it.

******

So I'm up. Yea me! It's not hard when I have awesome friends. I do. You all rock. And there's stuff, there's life, things to do. People to see. There's tons of stuff I should do that I don't. (Hello homework!)

It's not hard when the music FUCKING ROCKS.

Okay, so here's the skinny on Collider and why I think they are so fabulous:
Rocking beat, hard core sound, with an edge of funkiness. Awesome lead voice. Incredible bass guitar artist with a five string bass (one string is lower than standard). And the songs are not predictable. Listening to and knowing the songs in their complexity makes the live shows incredibly seductive as you are pulled into the whipping crescendos and hairpin turns. It's beach music meets punk meets Led Zepplin. It's nutty and multilayered. It's FUN and COMPLICATED. Just like I like 'em.

******

So I had a blast tonight. Great music. Just enough beer. Danced 'til my kippah was sweaty under my hat. A rush, a soul song, a lift. Lovely. Thank you.

Wiped

2009-02-17T14:57:00.002-05:00

I'm spent, wiped out, completely out of juice. It's Tuesday. This is not good.

Work is being... you know, work. And life is being difficult and complicated. I am actively attempting to ratchet myself back, care a little less, perhaps, become less involved. Because, you know, I never get involved. And I definitely never care.

Nope. Don't care. That's nice, just another news flash, another drastic headline. Another plane going down. One more bawling, weeping soul -- I don't really care. I'm as distant as the other shore. Yep. Yep. Don't care.

I am annoyed by work, as it continues to pop into my consiousness. Another new employee? Really? Did we get any information about that? I don't think we have an open phone line. Where are we on expanding our phone capabilities? *Who* is calling me all frantic? A salesman? He's being rude? Jeez, people.

Okay, what's this about a crisis with the proposal? Well who was supposed to do that? Okay, we need what kind of file format? Sure sure, I can do that. Okay, people, breathe. This isn't life or death, just millions of dollars of project money. Someone's job could be on the line and we've got forty minutes to burn this DVD... patience... wait for it. Breathe. No, I'm not talking to you, I'm talking to me so I don't rip your head off.

His hard drive won't read at all? What did you try to do to fix it? You don't remember. Well that's okay, we'll take over from here. Yes, go back to programming the web application. I'm sure we'll figure it out.

I'm sorry what? Of course I was serious. I'm way more serious than you think. No no, I didn't mean that of course. I'm not thinking about that. I'm off onto something else, you know, more important, like work.

********

I can't tell what's working and what's not. I can't feel anything but angst, frustration and fear. I'm sure there are other feelings in there somewhere, but right now it's all just pooling up in my eyes, making it hard to focus on the screen.

My whole life is on a computer screen. And a whiteboard. But I'm not paying much attention to that.

*********

Okay, so back to work. Time to make a Powerpoint presentation. I have two hours before I have to leave for martial arts class. Must go to martial arts class. Though I won't be able to hide all this weepy shit there as easily as I can duck behind my monitors or shut my office door.

Don't care, don't care. I don't care. Nope.

Mobile Blogger Test

2009-02-15T14:13:00.001-05:00

I'm trying to be a slightly more engaged tech professional. I configured my cell phone to connect to Blogger.com ... we'll see how it works.

Included is this gloomy and beautiful pic I took on Valentine's day. I haven't had a poignant V-day in a long time, but this year was oddly difficult. I checked out early, ducking into bed before 9 PM. I had company was but was lonely. Had an awesome dinner, and a largely productive day, going to the gym and sword class. But I skipped synagogue services, evening and morning, and felt like a bad Jew just because my favorite cantor wasn't on.

Dear friends sent me sweet emails. Other friends had their hearts ripped out. This heart thing, this love thing, is dangerous and seductive.

Sending love.
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The Problem with Writing

2009-02-11T23:34:00.005-05:00

I used to want to be a writer. When I was like six. Okay, maybe seven. I had a typewriter and I'd settle in to write, rolling in the pages one by one. I would always think long and hard about the title first. That was my jumping off point. I imagined I was Snoopy, hunched over the top of his doghouse, tippity tapping away. "It was a dark and stormy night...." In homage to the dog I actually started at least one unfinished novella exactly like that.

I did writing type stuff all through junior and high school. Little bits. Even then I felt the odd pull of what people wanted me to produce against what was coming out naturally. Of course in school it's all pretty whiny and self-centered. I consider that I haven't really changed that much. I start probably 90% of my sentences with "I", and I do notice. I do. I went to Quartz Mountain summer arts camp for creative writing. Eventually it got hard to produce back then. It scared me. I worried about running out.

I stopped wanting to be writer. Foolish, I thought. Who could possibly live as a writer? (Sorry, boo.) Plus how could you possibly keep producing? I worry about people who do it for a living, and the critiques they get after years of cranking it out. I am just not that brave. Not for that. Now, I did find something to jump off a cliff for. I'm still measuring the distance between where I'm standing and the edge. Calculating. Doubting, for sure.

And yet, writing is part of that. I have to be able to communicate with written word. It is very important to me, and I can't really explain that. Not beyond my other urges, which include the usual and needing to drive for hours on end. No, I must write. It's like that somehow got included in the promises I've made. I keep wondering "how did You slip that in there?" Dude.

Facebook. Connections. Written word. Say no more. Feelings, motivated by history, motivated by feelings, motivated by competition. A healthy version of running around the school yard playing tag? Whatever it is, it has me smiling intensely.

I'm largely motivated by the much-cooler-than-me friends who have been blogging and chatting it up for years now. They toss me positive nuggets and that keeps me going. Then I get quiet and run out of shit to say. Sometimes I really don't have a thought, beyond what's in front of me. If you haven't had the privilege of turning me down on Facebook yet, you can always go directly to my profile page to see what's been in front of me in half hour intervals for the past three months. Because I manage to find enough OCD to check in with the world via Twitter.

Now THAT'S an odd thought, said the woman who broke up with her last girlfriend because the woman wanted to know what was going on daily basis. Sheesh. She shoulda waited until I really started tweeting. I could probably go a week or more without calling.

Sometimes -- like now -- I really don't know what it is in my prose that works. People tell me I'm funny. I know I'm not always funny. In person I occassionally have the perception that what's funny isn't exactly what I meant to be funny. I'd bet money that what I think is a zinger goes thud and the following sentence, full of wit-n-wisdom is actually the punchline.

But that's regular life, really. Day to day. What I find that doesn't feel good about writing is the ebb and flow of the ease, the gush of words, the rush of I need to say this. Sometimes it feels good, and sometimes it's work. And now I feel like a gluttonous hedonist, addicted to the fabulous feeling when it comes easy, and not willing to work.

Will work for job that also requires passion...? I know how to work for stuff I don't care much about. Software... don't care much about software, but I've written my share. Don't care much about managing people. They really piss me off. I consider it practice for not losing my shit. I'm finding that practice useful. Perhaps when I get that down, a magic door will open for me and I'll be whisked off to HUC where I'll submerge myself in ancient, dusty texts and Hebrew and Aramaic will swirl around in my brain effortlessly.

What will they want me to write?

What am I supposed to learn from this point? How do I get to the next step?

So really it all boils down to the rise and fall of self-esteem... the perpetually fluctuating ratio of insecurity and positive feedback. Pulled by the moon? Riding high, I feel on point and sure. The low end is the bottom falling out, silent screaming. Climbing, falling, we're usually somewhere in there. Hang on children, we're all on the ride. Some of just enjoy it more than others.

Travellin'

2009-02-08T19:10:00.004-05:00

I seriously love to travel. I do. I love renting cars and driving the hell outta them. I love getting lost in a new city -- though not when I'm expected to be somewhere. I love the process of figuring a city out, getting a sense of it's personality.

P.S. I love Minneapolis. Great frickin' city. And I'll tell you why:

Skyline... I love a good skyline
College town
Lots of local shops... restaurants, coffee shops, bookstores
Mary Tyler Moore will be forever cute to me
Water, water everywhere
People... friends, colleagues and strangers alike, they're just different, and they really set the tone

I guess people are different everywhere. And I could go about making some grand generalizations (which I'll probably do in a minute) that a lot of folks will disagree with. Regardless, I really do think each city has a personality, made up of a lot of things, but also largely the people there. Question is, are they more a product of their environment (the other stuff) or do they interact with it, bringing a common human element, or do people in cities really have distinguishable attitudes?

Here's some juicy generalizations, as promised. Minneapolis has a lefty bent. The whole state does, technically. But Minneapolis also has a sort of Californian-save-the-world vibe going on. Recycling is really expected. Composting is not out of the ordinary. It's got a major university in it, which brings liberals and pot-smokers. I saw two MASSIVE head shops and smelled prolific weed in the air in the partying downtown Saturday night. The personal is political, and there is a significant core of folks walking the walk there, bringing the median even closer to the left.

DC has universities, and liberals. But there is also a conservative element, both from the political party and from the sheer pomp and circumstance of the government machine. Power brokers and deal makers tinge the air and make it bitter. Seriously. The nasty, dirty, back room deals... I swear I can feel them. But then, I'm a little nuts.

So... maybe I'm just swooning still, but it seems like an awesome town. Good people, with good intentions, trying to do the right things and take care of each othe and have a good time too.

Word up, Mpls.

OMG OMG OMG

2009-01-30T10:57:00.002-05:00

I officially can't take it. Officially.

There have been two deaths in the HumRRO family this week, one an employee, the other the father of an employee and a friend. I don't know if my friend expected her father to die. I know he had been ill. The employee who passed was in a hospice situation, otherwise known as waiting for death. And while not surprizing, the loss of life is still a shock to my psyche.

So I'll be starting off Superbowl Sunday with a funeral. One more reason to go to someone's house for the game... make myself be social. Make myself sit next to someone. Force small talk. Force myself not to weep.

Then I read a blog post of someone dear to my heart, and like the little stinker writer she is, she pokes her finger into my softest spot and relays her results like a champ: "A love that can stand up straight, won’t bump its head on conditions, run into glass walls. A love that won’t drown in miscommunication, in things left unsaid. A love that can handle a good fight, a love that realizes fighting for each other is the best kind of fighting, even if things get messy now or then, even if it seems too late in the game."

And that just does it. That's it for me. Sanity, signing off.

Can't take it. Can't take the idea that it's my own effing conditions, it's my own freaking glass walls... me me me, my stopping myself, me taking down the possibilities and sorting them into all the ways it'll go wrong. All the while it's still me looking into faces and asking is it you? Can you hear me? Do you understand me? Is anybody out there?

I'm pretty sure I'm not.

I'm curled in a ball in my bed, sobbing until I can't breathe, wracking my brain for a way out of this downward spiral. I'm scaring the cat.

A Distinct Pulling, East to West

2009-01-25T19:17:00.002-05:00

First let me say: all praise due Facebook! Facebook has given me cherished souls that were long lost to me. Facebook has uncovered personalities previously missed. It has hooked my heart and at least one quarter of my productive time at work. Praise be.

Okay, next, due to the amazing powers of Facebook, I have reconnected with the complex and dangerous minds that probably saved me during high school. And here's a link one of them gave me: http://www.vipassana.com/meditation/khema/allofus/be_nobody.php

I've heard from other friends too, about this Eastern concept of expecting less, or having no expectations. They're not entirely the same topic... the link talks about not giving in to the desire to "be somebody", as in the guise of wanting to become famous, I suppose. Although I suspect that if you expect less, you won't become famous.

I wonder if the Eastern flavor of lesser expectations and unplugging wants is the 21st Century way of alieviating our psychic stress. In the Middle Ages the people were promised a glorious afterlife, and that seemed to do the trick, right? The concept has lasted us until today, where some still cling to it. Maybe the Thinking Man's Heaven is a dismembered spirit, where one's inherent instincts are denied. If you're a monk you might even practice with things like hunger, pain, cold or needing to pee. But what we really want is relief from our complex instincts: our need to achieve, to feel like we contribute, to feel real (whatever that means to us).

No, I disagree with the Eastern perspective. I understand it provides relief... even if we can't unplug our desires, we can at least point to them and say THAT'S the problem and focus on that. Problem is, those feelings, those desires, those emotions are still part of us. Denying them, suppressing them is just temporary, for they will surely grow back like weeds. Maybe, like unwanted hair removed by waxing, if we just keep after it, they'll grow back less and less, thinner and thinner, until we just don't notice them at all.

And then?

Would we be a nice, compliant, vegetable of a person? Would we be devoid of passion? Is life without passion life at all?

I know I'm something of a hedonist, but I can't imagine it. Even though I seriously torture myself by giving my heart away or pining for what could never be, I would rather -- G-d help me -- I would rather weep and pine than know that my heart is so hard that it can't feel at all.

The Rabbis say that within each of us is both the yetzer hara, the evil inclination, and the inclination to be good, yetzer hatov. Both exist within us, regardless of wisdom or age. The ability to master them, however, is the variable. Still yetzer hara provides us with the motivation to DO things: build a house, achieve in business, etc. Yetzer hara is the inclincation for competition, and it spurs us on. It is not entirely evil, it is just ... self-centered.(Genesis Rabbah 9:7) Rabbi Joseph Telushkin even says, in Jewish Literacy: "A rich person, for example, might have an overwhelming desire to be famous. Let him fulfill that potentially ignoble desire through tzedaka (charity); that way his name will be known because it is engraved on the wing of a hospital, or a college library, or a Jewish day school. These sorts of activities would clearly fulfill another rabbinic teaching, that people should worship God with both their yetzer ha-tov and yetzer ha-ra." The Reform Jewish (and other Jewish strains too, I reckon) belief is that we do have free will. And with that free will, we can choose how to deal with our desires.

Much like I don't believe taking sex out of one's life has made Catholic priests any more G-dlike, I don't believe taking our emotions, wants or needs out of our everyday life will bring us any more happiness. It's just avoiding the issue that we must choose. We must wrestle with ourselves.

The technique could be used as an analgesic, I'm sure. And to be sure, I'm using it now to stave off the PMS-blamed rollercoaster I just got on. You know, I've been sick for days. It makes me cranky and I've started yelling at motorists more. I yell and then I think, shit Shel, you just don't feel good. Take it easy. I can spend three-quarters of a lovely Sunday farting around the house, taking pictures of pancakes and videos of myself acting the fool. But one quarter could still be spent in internal wailing: why not me? why alone? why now? why this?

Peering through welling eyes, the screen going diagonal through the teary prism, I take a deep breath and try to unplug my feelings. They'll come back. But until they come back a little happier, I'm going to breathe, and wish them away. I'll wish my brain into interest about something else. Dive into Hebrew. Hide my head in dry governmental documentation. Go through the motions. Am I living? Am I breathing? Am I feeling?

Sort of. Yes. Soon.

Horoscopes

2009-01-21T14:31:00.005-05:00

I often tell people that the religion I was raised with was astrology. My mother was always one-foot-out-the-door of whatever religion she was trying on at the time, and facing the old stand-by of astrology. Church of Christ... Mercury in retrograde... Methodist... Venus trine Mars... Unitarian... double shot of Taurus with an Aries ascendent. Astrology was the only real consistency. That and her Edgar Cayce stuff.

So I know what my chart says, mostly. I get it re-plotted every so often and take a look at it, and try to pull real meaning out of a computer generated reading. I ran my numbers again yesterday and read my chart and the associated break down. And I realized, I'm older now than the last time I read this. I've tried to fix some stuff. And occassionally something surprizes me.

"You are a doer and thrive on freedom, challenge, and activity." I never FELT this so strongly before, probably because I was always working within the confines of a relationship. Yes, I must have my freedom. And if you don't give it to me, I will take it. I am a thief at heart, just trying to do right.

"You have three major faults: one is your bullheaded obstinacy. The second is your unwillingness to deviate from your safe, predictable routine. And the third is your tendency to always insist upon realism and undervalue the imaginative, speculative, and fanciful - in other words, you lack the ability to play with ideas and possibilities, to open your mind to the new." Okay, I can't really get rid of the first, just try to be aware. I actively battle against the 2nd. The third fault is susceptible to time and the swinging pendulum of my mind.

"The unusual and unorthodox appeal to you, and you do not allow tradition, convention, or other people's expectations to dictate how you are going to live your life." Amen.

"A great deal of physical affection, closeness, and touching is essential to your well-being, and you have a tendency to overindulge in sensual comforts and pleasures. At times you substitute food for emotional comfort and love." Mmmmhmmm. Pet me please. It will make me skinny.

The computerized astrologer is also often contradictory. It tells me that I'm at once gentle and aggressive, self-serving and extremely giving, and on and on. I consider these to be areas that I've worked on, or continue to work on. It also tells me that I tend to be a loner and yet "you tend to feel lonely, even when you are in the company of others." What to do with that?

"You like to be original and do not mind going it alone. You may feel that you do not fit into groups very well, and that you do not naturally blend in and cooperate with others very easily. You like to be either a leader or a loner."

Ah, lonely loner, where are you going?

Shelly is observing her body shrink in stages.

2009-01-18T11:10:00.001-05:00

Shelly is observing her body shrink in stages.

It's freaking me out more than it should be.

My estranged wife weighed over 300 pounds when I married her on October 31st, 2003. She was less than that when we met, but over the course of our relationship she discovered she was diabetic and had been on insulin injections for a while. Apparently insulin, given to type two diabetics who are usually overweight, causes serious weight gain. (And with this information I wonder if there isn’t a reason to merge lawyers and doctors so that folks can get some satisfaction from the struggle between meds and the damage they do.)

She had gastric by-pass surgery, although in which year following 2003 I can’t be sure. Life during that time is a blur for me. She did have the surgery, and with some post-operative complications, she came out fine. She began to lose weight radically quickly. It would go in stages: First her flub, as it was, would get soft. The once firmly fat parts got a little squishy, lose about the skin. The skin puckered and wondered where its friend went, I’m sure. Then the skin would respond, and shrink to fit. Now for her, she was losing weight faster than her skin could respond, leaving her with baggy thighs and an oddly deflated stomach. She began to talk about surgery to fix all that, dollar signs flashing in her eyes and falling out of her mouth.

I left her at the end of 2006, the same year my Jewish conversion was completed. They are connected, but that’s a different story. The real connective tissue there, however, is that I felt finally that I had a responsibility to take care of myself. I probably weighed 255 or there about when we split. Maybe more. That’s a lot on this 5’2” frame, for sure, even if some of that is heavy, dense muscle, as I often interject when talking about my weight. Today, I’m at 230-something, which is something. It’s shocking every time I see it, especially because I’m so used to the 250-something range. Twenty pounds ain’t much, I know. Realistically I’d like to lose fifty more, and then see where I’m at. I dread putting all this information in writing because I feel it might make me somehow stop losing weight. I might jinx myself entirely.

Right now, however, in direct opposition to the jinx, is reality: my softening thighs and gut. I poke at them gingerly, wondering if what I’m seeing is real. There is an incredible pain going from my inner left thigh down to my knee. After considering it for a moment I recognize this as a muscle that hasn’t been used properly in over twenty years. Welcome, I think, and get busy, I’m gonna need you.

So, the question typically is “What are you doing to lose weight?” This question can probably be asked of well over half of Americans, and everyone will have some sort of answer. Here’s what I’m doing: not eating after 9 PM. That’s mostly it. I’m exercising, as I need to for all other kinds of reasons, mostly bodily health and flexibility. I go to martial arts class three times a week, and I hit the elliptical machine in the apartment complex’s gym whenever I can. But mostly, I make myself deal with the hunger pains and munchies from late night until early morning. I keep telling myself that if I’m up at 6 AM (or 5, say) then I will gladly roll into IHoP and down a stack of pancakes, hash browns, a mess of eggs and turkey sausage (keep the defib paddles handy). But if I can deal with being hungry at night, I just might slay this dragon.

Then I just need to deal with my head, and the loss of my protective outer covering. If I can’t hide, then I’d better be strong.

98%

2009-01-17T23:59:00.002-05:00

I figure that I'm about 98% gay.

That leaves 2% of room for my very loud and obnoxious ovaries to smack me around about the potential for sperm donors in every moderately good looking man that crosses my path. I understand, the ovaries are just trying to do their job and procreate. I get it. I just don't want it.

I'm quite happy with the idea that the gene pool of at least one side of my family will not propogate. I'd be more than happy to raise and live with someone else's womb-fruit, should I be called upon to do so. But without divine intervention, that doesn't seem particularly likely. And so the ovaries scream. Just like they're doing right now.

I drove through the Taco Bell drive through the other night and nearly hit on the dude with the earphone and mic set on. He was way too cute to be handing out hot sauce through a freezing cold sliding window and I nearly told him so. Why am I not so nearly bold with women? Is it really just the fact that I probably popped an egg while ordering my pintos and cheese?

Who knows. I tried to be straight in junior high, once, and that went horribly after I stuck my tongue in his mouth and he screamed like a sissy-boy. Of course, he *was* a sissy boy. And then there was the guy in Germany. Again, another tragic pairing of two clearly gay people trying just one more time and with plenty of liquid courage. At least he and I stayed friends.

No, now I find myself staring at one particular martial arts instructor and his rippling forearms. I'm sure it's the lesbian in me drooling over his powerful hands, but there is something about this guy that makes me wonder how wiley that 2% might be.

“… and they were disgusted because of the Children of Israel.” 1:12 Exodus (Shemot)

2009-01-16T22:52:00.003-05:00

“… and they were disgusted because of the Children of Israel.” 1:12 Exodus (Shemot)

I read this and instantly began to cry. I mean, I know I’m premenstrual. Knowing doesn’t always help, however. And it’s not necessarily always the culprit… it could just happen to coincide with something else awful. Of course, it could just be PMS.

But here’s what I was thinking, as I was crying: Why? Why were the Egyptians disgusted? Was there some new story about someone’s daughter being raped or a botched wedding plan with a stand-in bride? Did the Israelites piss someone off? Or was it really just the fact that they grew, they multiplied, and would not be kept small?

My hormone induced mind does what most women’s does, I think, and it began to draw connections.

Isn’t this related to the issues currently in the Gaza Strip and Israel? Bad blood, for unclear reasons. Factions on both sides wish the others would just go away. And what do the ones in power do?

“The Egyptians enslaved the Children of Israel with crushing labor. They embittered their lives with hard work, with mortar and with bricks….” (And suddenly I have a taste for charoset.)

I’ve been talking with a lot of different people about the recently violence in Gaza and Israel. (I say them separately like a wish: May we each have a home.) My personal Middle East peace plan requires Israel to develop, support and care for the ones lofting rockets and missiles at them. We can’t pretend we’re not related. We’re family, like it or not. Whether you think we’re all descendants of Abraham or you think we’re all human beings, we’re family. And we have responsibilities to each other. We are not separate, two distinct peoples fighting without history and without bonds. Mother – child or warring cousins, I don’t know. I dare say the power dynamic will shift and change between many relationship paradigms. It all depends on who has the power. And right now, I believe the power is in Israel’s hands, really. And I believe that to retain that power – as I wish Israel would – then Israel must wield it wisely. And to be honest, I’m not old enough to know if it’s being wise or not, but I sense it’s becoming not so brilliant.

But I digress. Back to more fascinating topics, such as “How is it that someone could not like me?” Which is where my mind went next, when it turned back to the essential phrase “they were disgusted.” I’ve been in that position, personally. Young, too young to confront the disgust of someone I was supposed to trust, to rely on. Vicious, twisted and angry is the action from a disgusted position of power. Another’s will inflicted upon you, just to watch you writhe. Why? What did I do, except exist?

Were the Egyptians somehow insecure about themselves? About their standing? Maybe their philosophy was at stake, and watching the vast hordes of reproducing Israelites freaked them out. Like some white people I know when they talk about how there will be more Spanish-speaking people in the US after so many years and such and such. Their eyes get wide as saucers and they clutch their alligator logos. “And most of them are Catholics.” Shocking.

Rashi references the rabbis that came before him, saying that they believed the word for disgust, ya-ku-tzu, come from the word for thorn, kutz, indicating that they were a thorn in the Egyptian’s eyes. (I think we say “thorn in the side” now, but Rashi’s from 12th century France, what does he know?)

And what do you do when you find yourself in the role of thorn?

Yep, I cried. I wailed and cried. I covered my face and my nose knotted up and my tongue folded in and I cried and cried until I coughed for air.

How? How do you make yourself so small that you don't hurt others? And should you?

Time is a Fantasy

2009-01-14T23:29:00.007-05:00

How quickly I go back to the groove I was in before. Still, I might complain about how constricting it is, even if it is all self-imposed and also good for me. That's probably the problem, that it's good for me, and therefore takes time away from things like skipping around on Facebook or watching T.V. or something equally time-sucking.

Time is a figment of our imagination. I'm pretty sure of it. Mostly because it starts and stops, slows down and then goes whizzing by and we suddenly feel like we need a Day-Runner in quarter-hour increments but WHEN will we find the time to fill it out?

I would LOVE to be able to slow down time and speed it up at will. Then I could've spent what would feel like days in each stop of my recent roadtrip. A few hours, somewhere between 17 and 23 hours, I spent at three different locations. I drove over 1400 miles in total. I spent a grand total of 24 hours on the road driving. Not too shabby. I drove through rain and leftover snowfall. G-d bless the Yankees who know how to (a) clear the roads and (b) drive in it.

Sheri I saw first, a high school friend who has grown a family since the last time I saw her. When was that? 96? That was a while ago. Her hubby was sweet and her two boys sociable and good natured. I only had to watch one play video games for a little while, and later distracted him with juggling. He also taught me a simple game that kept both of us busy for a while: guess the number in my head. It was really a negotiation of rules for the game, which was interesting in itself. Smart guy. Dinner was delish! The image of Sheri cooking was wacky for me, but she was totally at home with that roasted bird. Yum.

Roads here were pretty good, except for that moment when I tried to turn around in a residential and slightly icy driveway. I learned that my rental car was a front-wheel drive. That's good, I thought, rocking back and forth and spinning my wheels until they found pavement.

Lisa B. and Jenn are both from college. That's stop number 2 and 3, respectively.

Lisa B. and I did what seems like a lot of driving together during my college years, as well as holidays spent together. Felt a lot like visting family after not being in touch for a long time. It is wacky how easily and quickly that comfortable feeling comes back. Even with the passage of time and a lot of unknown history, having that past-past connection gives a certain grounding. I met the dog, and that was cool, having had a poodle before myself (tho not one of the giant ones).

After a lovely evening of football -- we watched a game and a half -- we retired happily. Snow fell that night. In the morning, after toast, eggs and tea, we played in the snow for a while. I drove away moments later, swerving boldly on packed snow. WHOO HOO!

Now that drive was more fun. Slow slow going down Route 7, sliding down the Vermont landscape, with beautiful visions on either side. The snow wasn't falling. But the trucks were rolling, and the sun was melting it a little, enough to spatter my windshield and for me to burn through my wiper fluid before arriving at my next destination.

Jenn and I knew each other in college. We bumped into each other at off-campus dinners and on the pages of the Scarlet and Black. Figures we'd bump into each other in Facebook and continue our ourpouring verbiage. So if it's possible to have an old-new friend, that's what I've got. Most excellent!

I've been hearing about "foodies" for so long... I've decided that I'm a "wordie" and it's nice to find others whose word-knitting. Jenn's basically famous, in a nascent kind of way, through her blog Breed 'Em and Weep. By nascent I mean a shitload of people read her blog. And by shitload I mean nearly four figures worth of unique visitors a month. Pretty effing impressive. My Jahbear site probably gets ten total visitors a month, and that's me hitting it twice from two locations. My corporate site doesn't get that much traffic. Did I mention she's basically famous? Anyway.... Activities with the offspring consisted of trying to get foam animals in gel capsules to be freed, attempts at belching the A-B-C's and doing some fashion consulting. Her girls are fantastically brilliant and adorable. Figures.

So... now it's back to martial arts twice or three times a week, Hebrew twice, and more than 40 hours of work a week. Squeeze in some writing, and a healthy amount of Facebooking. That's pretty much my life. Maybe that means I don't have to update my FB status any more. Except for when I go to Minneapolis to that Hum-Office and to visit with other awesome college friends and cool bloggers.

Yeah, I'm so constricted. Puh-lease. Life is good... don't let me convince you otherwise.

Refusing to settle for less, the Bear steps into the fray.

2009-01-08T22:24:00.003-05:00

I’m resisting the urge to update my Facebook status.

Shelly is resisting the urge to update her Facebook status. Shelly is happy that she finally got the BCS Championship Bowl on the T.V. She was about to cry. Seriously.

Shelly is getting a little worked up about her trip. Nervous? Nervous? Hells yeah! People I haven’t seen in over ten years. Three different people. Three different GROUPS of people. What the hell am I thinking? That I am Superman. I am intrepid Shelby T., fighter of injustice, teller of things what to do, driver of the night roads. Smartypants Extraordinaire.

Shelly’s converting anxiety into excitement. And really, it’s not hard. I WANT to see these people. I’m thrilled, that at the last minute, and quite unexpectedly, each one has invited me into her home.

Shelly is laughing at the Tostitos commercial. The dude is lost in thought in the chip aisle. He must be high.

Everything I touch rattles. Things that shouldn’t rattle. The T.V. in the hotel room is buzzing unnaturally, like some tube inside is loose. Yes, it’s a gi-normous cathode tube T.V., or whatever. The laptop I’m using makes noise. I’ve already discussed replacing the hard drive. It’ll have to happen. The rental car has lit the low tire-air light, a menacing orange tire with exaggerated tread and flattening sides. The engine sounds suspiciously a lot like the busted engine of my Rover that I left at home.

I don’t really expect everything to work perfectly. So what is this telling me? (I decided long ago that the world creates it’s own poetry, telling us subtly and some times not so subtly what’s what.) That if my expectations are low then that’s what I’ll get? Settling for less means getting less? How then to compete for better, without being a bitch?

Shelly gave in to the urge to change her Facebook status.

Splorf Goes the Willpower

2009-01-04T16:28:00.004-05:00

Splorf: (v., adv.) 1. a gelatinous movement, an oozing 2. one way to move a piece in Andy's Secret Project PD-09 3. a completely made up word, propagated by silly bears.

Splorf goes the diet. The diet only consisted of a) not eating crappy food and b) not eating before bed. Something about the end of the year, the excessive partying, or simply my own lack of will has led me to break both rules. Late late, too late last night, with one stiff martini in me, I drove up to the 24-hour McDonald's. It's been a LONG time since I had a Big Mac, and MAN that shit was good. What do they put in there? It's ridiculous, really, how they have me by the short hairs.

So I'm trying not to totally crucify myself about it, while also not completely letting myself off the hook. Great mental exercise. I err on the side of "whatev'." Not good.

I was just getting moving, really, on the whole "know the body" routine. I'm still on the edge of the zone. I can feel my legs rebel when I sit in this one position on the sofa for too long... the one I'm in right now, tippy-typing away. But I'm also cramping in my calves and in my feet. I haven't gone to the gym as often as I should have. I've been slacking, sitting at home on the sofa, eating cheese (as Grandmaster says). I've been watching T.V., being bored, being comfortably numb.

The upside of my late night escapades last night was going to the 24-hour Giant to buy groceries. Just a little food in the house makes a compelling argument for not ordering delivery Chinese. (The delivery food is always a little bit of a let down, too. Strange that. It used to make me so happy.) So I got some chicken breasts... and I caved and got a 12 pack of Coke Zero. Bad. But no doughnuts. Good! No ice cream. Very good.

Gotta get my head back into the zone. Remember WHY. Yes, why. Why bother trying? Not just for the annoyance of baggy underpants. Not just for the benefit of fitting into the skinny clothes again. Because I DESERVE it. I deserve to have an excellent body, taking me around in this lifetime. I should take care of it, try to keep it running. Ease the stress on it. Love it.

Bless Me (A Parting Shot to 2008)

2008-12-31T00:15:00.001-05:00

Or maybe I should say that I have been blessed. Not just by appreciative friends, but by the Big Kahuna, the Universe and Everything.

My life is largely perfect... it's true. I have a job (knock on wood) and I have multiple ways to get there (knock, knock). I am by and large healthy -- despite being somewhat large. I have a lovely all-white cat who puts up with me, even though I often don't want to play when she does, I never give her enough tuna, I won't let her outside, and I don't sleep when she wants to, thus negating the sleep-cuddle. It's actually a lot like having a girlfriend, except that there's no sex (wait, that's kinda like having a girlfriend) and I don't feel nearly as bad for ignoring her needs.

I have a home -- nicer than I should be paying for. I bring down the curb appeal value just by having all my shit in it. I spend more money than I make, which makes me a great American, propping up the economy with the dreams of money I might have. I am surrounded by great friends. People love me and I love them back.

What else could you ask for?

I mean realistically. Sure, I could have a partner or spouse, but being partnered isn't the end-all be-all... trust me I know. I know it's just as valid to go solo. In fact, it might a requirement for me. Successful, by many standards, what does a human then do?

That is the grace of our time, isn't it? We've mostly figured out the food, clothing and shelter part of existence -- at least we the privileged have. Now we can delve into the other parts of our psyche.

My boss has a new painting on his office wall. It was painted by an orangutan at the National Zoo, Bonnie. He said that there is a study about animals who paint. Apparently orangutans and elephants in particular have a penchant for painting. (Not cats, because the book "Why Cats Paint" was a joke I didn't get until years after selling it.) Not all elephants and orangutans want to paint. Only some.

One part of the study showed that once the animals were done, they were done. They'd just as soon eat the painting or use it to wipe their butts than to matte and frame it. So apparently there needs to be some sort of human intervention to rescue the artwork. Bonnie selects her own brushes and colors, although she's not using a canvas stretched over the a frame. Her work was in greens and purples, and involved some sort of folding over, along with detail work . Facinating.
So I ask him, my boss the I-O psychologist, does this mean that there is something natural, something inate about the "human" need to create art? And what I didn't ask him but also thought: is it the actual humans who have inserted their ego into what they create, so that they should want fame, glory, and adulation for their work?

Two months ago I didn't have this blog. I had Jahbear.com, and that was it. Jahbear is a stripped down website, completely built by hand, by me. It is completely alterable. There is no template. It also takes me WAY longer to change and update, so that doesn't get done as much.

It was the extreme transformation that Facebook perpetrated on my life. Connecting me with people whom I had almost forgotten, Facebook has been a space-time vortex, sucking hours away from me with the vigor of a good video game. It's also made my affliction for the passive voice horrific. I try, I do, to pry myself away from it, to stop looking for the people that made my life possible through the formative years. I have learned to approach folks from high school slightly cautiously. Either I am much farther out than I used to be, or I just don't understand as well. People from college click with me quickly or not at all. I guess we've all learned what we want since then.

The other thing I got from Facebook: a muse. Part competition, part infatuation, I am compelled to write it all down, like never before. I've always been a jotter. Okay, not actually jotting it down, but in my head I'm writing all the time. I'm flipping out phrases and comparative statements like breathing in and out. Now, between the ease of updating and the desire to connect, I'm prolific. For a few weeks it was all I did. Literally. Especially over my vacation. Happy as a pig in mud, I've been rolling around in the twisted English of my friends and splurping out quips of my own. What would you call that? Verbal interaction in writing? It's lucious, that's all I know. I love it. It loves me back.

So... another skin is shed, another part of life begun. Where I used to count my years out in girlfriends, I'm now responsible for the meaning in my life. Just me. Free to be. It's a horrible responsibility, really. And yet... today, right now, I'm not afraid. That's about as good as it gets.

The Great Ship

2008-12-21T23:06:00.004-05:00

I can't imagine being on Noah's Ark. I read the exact dimensions every year, and I marvel at a G-d that understands the need for a multi-level, extra water-proofed vessel. I marvel at the direction communication that breaks down instructions like an IKEA manual.

I can imagine being on a giant ship... all of the people on it being subject to the same tides and waves. I imagine this great ship with all my friends, all the people I care about. Sometimes I'm right there next to them, as they're blowing chunks over the side of the boat. Sometimes they're in the front and I'm in the back and we're all being tossed around, just dealing with the deck furniture flying around.

I talk to my friends, all the time. I think that living alone may have exacerbated this situation. I know I used to do it before, sometimes actually speaking out loud, in a sudden burst of emotion and startling myself back to reality. When I was perpetually partnered, I would crave time alone just so I could have these sort of internal conversations (that occassionally crept external). Now I have the time I want, and I relish it. And, I talk outloud sometimes.

The perspective from the outside of my life looks way more fantastic than it is. I guess that's normal. What to me is wandering aimlessly on my Vespa is to someone else a mini-adventure. So what if I'm freezing or frustrated by my inability to get to class on time, I'm still cruising around on Awesome... and I'm free.

I am critical of my relative success. Watching and re-meeting my friends on Facebook makes me a little nutty about success. I want to be speaking Hebrew. I want to be beautifully, ridiculously skinny and gorgeous. I want to be nicer, and not scare people away with my fire. Calculations of my success look something like this: (workout*2) + martial arts(3-1) + late night eating+95% - no Hebrew*18 + socializing*1 + services*2 + purring cat. It really doesn't look that much worse from the inside... The truth is, my life is good. I've got money stress, and work stress, and I could use some physical affection, but I don't want to give up my life or my freedoms. The truth is, love and affection is too important to be tossing it around randomly around people I care about. Maybe this is why gay men just cruise and screw anonymously. I don't want to break anyone's heart, and I don't want to get involved. I just want to smell and kiss a beautiful woman. Periodically. Potentially randomly.

Maybe I could run into her on the lower deck, after the ship has stopped rolling around in the storm.

Wake up and purge

2008-12-20T00:45:00.002-05:00

I was sound asleep until my stomach started to gurgle. It was sour as hell and waking me up. I could feel little furry feet pressed against my back and I blinked my eyes open. "Ergh, " I actually said out loud. I had to get up.

I chomped down two Super Extra Tums and I knew even then that those suckers were gonna come right back up. I drank some cold, clear water and waited about sixty seconds. Yup -- find a recepticle now, cuz here comes dinner.

Some people are barf-phobic. Thank G-d I'm not, or my whole life would be hell. Both of my parents like to tell stories of me as a kid, embarassing them in a restaurant by managing to nail our table and the next two with my impressive gastronic purging. Ibarf when I'm too nervous to deal with stress. Sometimes it comes on immediately, like an innocent witness reacting to nasty crime scene photos, and sometimes my stomach churns for hours until it decides on the grand finale. And that's just the emotional ralphing. I can't decide which this is, physical or emotional.

I was incredibly upbeat all day today. Even through two meetings with incessant technological problems, I was chipper and patient. Incredible. So it can't be that.

The building I live in is referred to by the owners association as a townhouse. It's a square brick building with four floors, and eight apartments. There are real working fireplaces in each apartment and folks have been having fires all night tonight. I can smell them from my place. There is a rich woody scent, like someone paid extra for some kind of balsam wood or something. Not your average fire, something fancy. Figures.

When I woke with my super sour stomach, I noticed that my apartment had a faint smokeyness all around. I wasn't sure at first if it was me without my glasses thinking it was foggy or what. So I wonder if the saturation of fireplace scents and smoke isn't making me a little ill.

Or maybe it was the homemade pot pie I had for dinner.

management = parenting?

2008-12-17T17:49:00.002-05:00

I gotta wonder.

I yell, I scream. I demand and I set timelines, deadlines. They look at me and blink, then talk about what to do. They know that I am demanding, and they do try... they try to meet my expectations. Exhausted and punchy later, I laugh at myself for being so keyed up. I am grateful for their efforts, and think they're doing okay.

Then it'll be a few days, maybe a week, maybe more... we'll be chugging along, doing things. Someone will start to come in really late, and say the same things over and over again at team meetings. I'll wonder what they're doing all day. I'll start sniffing around, getting overly involved in the details of their work, and they'll start to feel me getting prickly again. I yell, I scream.

Okay, honestly I don't really yell and scream. I do say things like "... and this is the last time I'll say it" and "I'm serious! This is your job!". I am insistent. I want good quality work from everyone. I insistent on at least the effort to attain that, even if the mark isn't reached. Evidence of effort is required. Except for when I get tired and distracted by my own work.

And right now, that's what's suffering. Haven't even touched those two sticky projects yet.

Ah... work. Love it. Hate it. Either way it keeps you out of the rain and fed. Now... stop piddling around and go back to work! Sheesh.

Dread

2008-12-17T14:51:00.003-05:00

Ever had a heavy sense of dread, pulling your stomach down, making your butt all tingly and weighing down your insides? I've got that today, like a virus. It's probably related to my Happy Time of the month. Or maybe the impending holidays and my unwillingness to participate... except for sending happy shit to friends.

So I'm doing "non-work" things while multi-tasking mundane things. What I really need to do is focus on those two projects that are giving me ulcers.

Mothers

2008-12-16T08:40:00.002-05:00

What a loaded topic. And, with the passage of time, an even more loaded one as my friends become mothers.

I struggle. I know my mother was not 100% evil, but the extent... the content... evilness was there. Not just the usual "mama don't understand me" crap. Not just "she didn't love me" or whatev'. No no. Seriously sick shit. That was the content. Part of it. Enough.

So... I struggle first with a basic precept I have sworn to myself and G-d to uphold: honoring one's parents. I give myself a pass with not saying anything, not going into details, not being outwardly, actively hateful. But the hatred is there, G-d help me. And deserved... and that's where the root is, making it hard to weed out.

I don't want to get into a contest, a whose-mama-is-worst contest. I don't even want to share stories really. I don't want your details and I don't want to give you mine. Not really. I replay them in my head enough as it is. I slash at the memories with an imaginary knife and muy thai moves I've never seen. I am the memory killer. Or so I try. If I could get numb enough, I might not have the memories. For years I tried to let them wash through me -- an emotional storm tearing through a wide flat landscape. I tried the Eastern religion trip... the life is suffering, so just expect less and you won't be pissed all the time trip. It works. Especially if you're in the running for the best doormat in town. At least that's how it worked out for me.

No the issue is and continues to be: when I put my wants into the equation, I can't balance for peace. If I put nothing into the equation, I can accomodate, duck, support, whatever. But when I show up, in all my glory and splendor....

I'm pissing on myself, of course. Already. Verbally, loquaciously and with every corner of my vocabulary I'll smack myself around. Makes it sound good. Makes it really important and very right. This is how it's done. Rise up, smack down. See? I do it to myself, I've been trained so well. THAT wins the "good job", the "nicely done"... not the effort to incorporate what I want into the grand equation of life.

Easier. Known.

Still not safe.

There is no peace here. I am frightened... out of my mind frightened. But I have to change. Now.

Destiny vs Free Will

2008-12-13T14:25:00.003-05:00

One of the starkest differences between Orthodox and Reform Judiasm is the difference between believing that G-d has a plan and everything is predetermined, opposed to the idea that we all have free will, regardless. Now, I don't know if the Orthodox view also includes free will, and just deals with the tension between the two opposing options as part of the mystery of life or what. I do know that by and large Reform Jews don't believe in our lives as being predestined.

Rabbi Lustig retold an older story (imagine that) about a man -- Zussman, I think -- who upon entering heaven was asked why he was not more like Zussman. Not why was he not more like Jacob, or more like Moses. But why was he not more himself.

These actually are connected. If we believe that all is in the hands of G-d, then what will spur us to act? We must act. We must take action first, and then perhaps Divine intervention will take us the rest of the way... perhaps. We must be ourselves fully; to understand oneself, and allow all of it to become real, alive, full, vibrant. Each of us with our own gift, with our own uniqueness, has a responsibility to ourselves and everyone around us, to be ourselves. To be real.

I know, I'm spinning in circles. Hang in there with me. Think of the things you've done in your life. Think of what could've happened if you hadn't done some of those things. Sixty thousand dollars in debt, but two beautiful children. Increased rent and additional sneezing but a beautiful home and a loving, fuzzy cat. Hormone therapy and the horrible side-effects, but a child nonetheless. Money stress but the knowledge that studying continues, and the path shortens a step each day.

The future is wobbly and uncertain. We fear. Still, steps must be taken. Maybe believing it's all predestined makes it easier to step. Maybe wishing for a Big Papa in the Sky will ease our concerns, soothe our fears. It's hard to take the idea that we are all alone, whether we are childless or not, single or not, loneliness creeps in through the cracks. People pull us together, eventually. The magic of friendship and love connects us to a life line. And there we find G-d. Time passes, and a heavy heart becomes lighter. Crazy thoughts subside and clarity breezes into the brain. Everything changes: up and down. Rollercoaster rides are macrocosms of our internal self-sitting, how we view ourselves as we respond to the turning of time. Sometimes we steer, sometimes we just hang on for dear life.

At some point, though, you must try to steer. Overcome, overwhelmed, overtaxed, overburdened. Sure. And this too, like even happy times, will pass. Space to breathe? Time to think. Plan. Think. Act! If not now, when? The next time we can come up for air? Sure, except there's no itenerary for when that will happen again.

You know, I say these things, but there is nothing saying I can do it myself. I am coaching myself, as much as anyone, believe me. Myself, I get scared and I hide. Very good at hiding. I can duck and cover like no one else. And it's only me saying to myself: Get up! Get up! The sun in shining and you are alive and breathing. So many times -- how many times -- I thought that would not happen again. Amazing.

Finals, Fury, Fear

2008-12-11T17:25:00.003-05:00

Okay, so I took my Hebrew final. I didn't do nearly as well as I wanted to. I've been trying to keep a stiff upper lip about it, but the truth is I'm pissed. I did well on the oral exam; she told me right away it was a 92. That's kinda low. I am hoping I got at least an 85 on the final. The vocabulary from the last two lessons just weren't totally in my head. Rocked the verbal part though... I guess I should be happy about that.

Okay, then there's the truck. The engine light has been on for months. Today, on the way to class it started to smell differently. On the way home the amber "check engine" flashed and the temperature gauge was all over the place... very low to mid-range, back and forth. That can't be good.

So I go home. I debate going out tonight, even though it's poker night. I debate going to martial arts class (and didn't go). I tried to pay my Verizon bill. For some reason, I'm $90 behind ever since I moved, even though it's in my automatic payments. So the phone doesn't work... thank G-d the Internet still does. I tried EIGHT times to try and pay it, both through their phone prompt system which rang busy all day today, and with their website. WHY must they make it so difficult? I don't think I paid it yet.

I was overcome with anger. Rage. Blinding. I screamed, deep, throaty, and wild. Scared the piss outta my cat. And I tried, really hard, to not want to break something, kick something, throw something. I bent my head, knuckles to the center of my forehead, motionless. Overwhelmed, I started to cry.

Been weepy ever since.

A Bear and a Moose walk into a bar...

2008-12-10T11:40:00.001-05:00

... and the Moose says to the Bear, "I don't think we've been here before."

It's just a bar, of course. We all know what a bar consists of, generally. Just like pretty much everyone knows what a Blog is these days. I've tried to do Blogs before... a craptastic one off of my website host, I think I've even had one on Blogger before. It also seems like all of my pals have been writing Blogs for years. They've all got months and months of old posts, and I feel like I could take a whole day just to read what they've been through.

Me, I've got Jahbear (www.jahbear.com) which I started in earnest right when I was leaving Heidi for Lauren. And then life got even more complicated than usual. But it's not a Blog so much as a light HTML sampling of color combinations and nifty images. I have complete control and as a result it's not the easiest thing to update.

So, as usual, I am one of the last to jump into the water. It's a Blog, just like other Blogs you know. But we (me, the Bear and you, the Moose) haven't been here before.

Wonder what's on tap?