the camera had it

i sent sadia a text with a photo of a photo from an old album I found at home, at my parent’s house.

Look at this.

I look like I’m 40.

the picture was from my 16th birthday party. my plastic frame glasses were too large for my face, large and round and that kind of pink that was popular in the 80s. i wore a long white denim skirt that hit almost at the ankle and an ill fitting white button down shirt 3 sizes too big because i hated my body.

oh but my hair. my glorious hair. it was permed and floated around my had like a frizzy cloud with no clear boundaries, like black mist. with the signature bangs that had 2 layers, the one that curled up to give you height and the flat layer underneath, perfect to cover the zits on your forehead.

and white point flats. flatter than flat flat flats, because i had surprisingly large flat feet for a teenager.

i was never dainty and my mother had given up on trying to find me clothes in my age group so sears women’s wear became my friend.

it’s a miracle really that i went to a catholic school and had to wear a uniform. i wouldn’t have survived high school without it.

things i might be afraid to write about

that i’m scared that i’m selfish. that whatever good things i have in my life i didn’t earn. that i’ve worked hard but was only mediocre in a carer that ate up half my living years. that i care too much about the lives of make believe people and this is what happens when you grow up with too much reality tv masquerading as real life.

that i will never be cool enough.

that i care.

that i’m actually frightened of some of my friends. and that makes me a bad judge of character.

that the more i read about hand washing with soap for 20 seconds, avoiding public transportation and how to make your own purell the more i want to ride all the buses and hug all the people and rub my eyes and touch my face. that i’ve all but memorized my script about why i’m unemployed that includes a lot of possibly false information about going back to school, about becoming a doctor of pt, about becoming an acceptable version of success because it’s not ok to find success in fully realized rest or free time or day dreams or boredom. that you are only celebrated if you can work 80 hours a week while volunteering at a shelter, while holding down a daily meditation practice, while raising kids and recovering from trauma with a full schedule. that i will always think the impossible is real and if i’m not going for it, then i’m lazy. and the worst thing you can be today is fat and lazy. godforbid you be both.

let this be the year

let this be the year of learning to actively adjust the seat instead of sitting in it in whatever position i find it in, contorting my body to face the table.

“you can move the chair you know.”
being stubborn gave me a bum hip and a stiff neck so i adjust the chair now.

let this be the year i have my best interests in mind. i’ll say no to chocolate that’s over 75% because I like sweetness in my life. i’ll give up austerity and suffering for all the wrong reasons.

let this be the year i take the last serving of mac and cheese without asking anyone.

let it be the year i stop bumping into doorways and tables and errant unexpected chair legs and apologizing to inanimate objects.

at least i’m trying.

the bathroom door has a handle like a dull blade and i still said “Sorry!” as it stabbed me.

let this be the time i stop rifling through my backpack because I’m bored or pick up my phone because it’s 5 minutes into a conversation about tech or world politics or how to clean bathtub grout.

i can learn a thing or two.

or i can leave the table and look at my phone on the toilet like a polite person.

anything can happen

anything can happen

i can be swallowed whole by the sea

i can be the wave that does us all in

the fish that nibbles on your flesh.

anything can happen

you will forget me and i’ll be under the boat

watching you grieve and then try to decide which is the least touristy taco joint for dinner

“they’re all touristy!” i gargle underwater. “you can’t escape white capitalism!”
i’ll learn spanish now that i live here.

the barracuda that inhabit the waters will expect me to.

i’ll hunt for coral. i hear it’s pretty.

i’ll bemoan the loss of my legs as they eventually form a fish tail.

i’ll vaguely remember that 80s movie with tom hanks and the mermaid.

anything can happen

maybe my husband will remarry.

maybe he’ll grow old and gristly with weathered leathery hands gripping the wheel of an old boat he named after me, looking for me

maybe fish people don’t age. especially asian fish people.

maybe i’ll come to him in a dream and tell him to let me go

because anything can happen.

i don’t like to talk about it but maybe I do. maybe i do too much. i’m a watery cancer, born in the warm sun of july, us watery crabs like to talk about it and cry about it and cry when you talk about it and we want to wrap our awkward crab like claws around you and tell you ‘you’ll be ok’ and that ‘you are beautiful’ and ‘you are resilient’ and even if we just met, waiting for the same bus, this 5 minutes together has meant so much to me, i’ll never forget it.

i drown in my astrology. i read about the moon. i pull a tarot card. if i don’t like it i pull another. i hear a voice tell me, ‘that’s cheating.’ it can’t be cheating, you don’t know my game and i keep pulling and pulling because my favorites are the hermit and death.

i bring my cards home when i go see my parents in new jersey. my mom has given up and in not so many words, thinks i am a heathen. like pulling cards is so different than saying 10 hail mary’s or praying the rosary, looking for forgiveness or love or a promise.

she’s on her way home to the philippines. back to the mother land. they go every year, like a pilgrimage, like this is where they go to refill their batteries, to draw from the well of familiar, to remember where they are from. they don’t understand why i don’t do the same. it’s like they forget. me. i am from new jersey.

period

that’s the thing about having your period again.

this absolute need to burn everything to the ground because someone forgot something. that someone could be you. there’s a rock in your shoe. a sports event means your show isn’t on. everything is wrong.

the world is horrible and it all must be burned down.

human beings are terrible. all you feel is terrible and the only thing that could possibly make you feel better is fire and death and all things illegal.

but you don’t think you’re ready for prison so instead you do the things the internet has told you to do.

you drink some water.

you take deep breaths.

you turn on a meditation app.

if you’re one of those people you go to a boxing class or try to kill it with cardio.

i used to be one of those people.

i thought if i could punish myself and make something inside of me hurt more than the thing itself it would be better for everyone. it’s always better for everyone if i just hurt the thing inside of me instead of the thing outside this skin.

how powerful are my hormones.

wtf

everything feels hard.

i’m really over every single thing i need to do and none of it feels good, none of it feels like i’m accomplishing anything. all of it feels meaningless and i’m over doing thankless work.

feelings aren’t facts, they’re indicators.

all signs point to the fact i need to do more with my life.

i think i’m finally ready for it.

but first: i need to eat a hot meal.

i need to get more than 4-5 hours of sleep.

i need to drink more water.

i need to carve out real time every day to sit with myself and do nothing.

i haven’t really written since Wild Writing ended this year. I’m at a loss to say where my time has gone. I wished it had gone to more writing, to books, to afternoons lying down under blankets or under the hot gaze of the sun listening to neko case’s ‘I’m An Animal’ on repeat. My guess is that it’s mostly gone to work, worrisome thoughts about dumb things that don’t really matter (and some that do as the 2020 election looms large) and many a youtube black hole of videos about harry styles and this strange new obsession with a random pop star that feels like something i should be ashamed of (but i’m not) ?

it’s gone to smoothies for breakfast for the past 2 months because food has all of a sudden become hard again. i can’t discern what my body wants when it’s hungry so i pulverize some things in a blender because it’s easier to suck down gloop through a straw than it is to prepare a meal. there was a brief english muffin phase but that’s mostly past since they don’t keep me full very long and i’m now obsessed with how long smoothies stay with me. frozen banana, frozen spinach, frozen cauliflower, chia seeds, flax seeds, mct oil, collagen powder, hemp protein powder, kale, oat milk, cold brew coffee, chocolate syrup and if i remember, peanut butter.

most days i have to drink some from the blender because it doesn’t all fit in a mason jar. 20+ oz of wellness industry bullshit that a part of me still buys into because old habits die hard. the chocolate syrup is my addition. fuck you and your cacao or unsweetened cocoa powder. it’s not the same.

somedays it’s enough of a coating to my innards that my meds don’t bug me. somedays it is not and i’m a hot mess on the toilet with my eating disorder in my brain telling me, “Diarrhea is awesome and i should drink more of my meals!”

it’s still there. i still hear it. i don’t often do what it wants me to do but i still book circuit workouts and then cancel them. i still book hot yoga classes then cancel them. i still wonder what that number is on the scale. it’s like the one sliver of pie in a trivial pursuit piece that i’ve purposefully removed (i was always the worst at science and nature so let’s say i’m missing the green piece). i will never be able to finish the game because i’ve opted out of being “complete” so i can win according to a set of rules set by old white dudes who think all women should be skinny and quiet.

last month my obgyn told me i dropped x amt of lbs since my last visit with her 3 months ago and went to high five me and i was seized with fear because she looked poised to tell me my weight even though I had written all over every piece of intake paperwork they gave me that i was in recovery from an ED and i could not know that number. I mention it every time i step on a scale backwards. I mention it at every opportunity i get with a medical professional I see.

i haven’t mentioned the smoothies to my therapist until this week when i mentioned it in the context of a story about being excited about bagels and the new bagel joint near my house. the idea of solid breakfast was finally appealing to me. she asked me about the smoothies and i told her it’s because food is confusing in the mornings. it’s true. mostly. i also wonder if it’s partially false. i also wonder if the part of me that wants to celebrate having the shits is also the part that says if i can live on drinkable kale and oat milk i’ll become smaller.

my head has been a dangerous place to be living in lately. so many booby traps. hence the youtube blackholes and the edibles every night.

i’ve known for awhile that i’ve been surviving.

Will I ever know when i’m actually thriving? I barely remember what that feels like.


this part of my life is over

what does it say that i spilled diet coke all over my laptop and i was more concerned with cleaning up the wood table, chasing the running liquid with a paper towel that wasn’t fast enough and it spilled like a waterfall over the edge, the dogs running towards the drips and me throwing a nearby hoodie onto the floor on top of it so they wouldn’t lick up its dangerous xylitol or whatever fake sweetener that even i shouldn’t be consuming. i muted myself off the conference call and stared at my laptop keyboard, covered in something that would soon solidify into a sticky mess, unmoving, not wanting to clean it up. “This part of my life is over,” i wanted to declare. i wanted to close the machine, say a short prayer and toss it in the garbage. This part of my life.

I made it through college with a typewriter with a tiny screen that showed 2 lines, a word processor. who needs this thing, this brick i carry with m from room to room because if it pings and i don’t reply in a timely manner i call myself a failure who is always behind. i spout out all sorts of untruths about my worth in relationship to the number of unanswered pings and what would my sub-saharan ancestors think?

“Do you know when that’s supposed to come in?” s. asked.

I had forgotten I was on a conference call. I unmuted myself.

”No, but I’ll find out.”

I hit the mute button again and carried my laptop to the kitchen sink and tipped it to the side, watching brown liquid drip down on top of the unwashed dishes that I’d have to address at a later time, just like everything else, the dogs sniffing the hoodie on the floor like it was full of delicious cat turds.

it's a lie to say i never look back

We tied garbage bags around our waists and sat on the ice that covered the sidewalk and streets as far as we could see. Michele and I locked our gloved hands together.

“We can do this,” she said.

“We can do this,” I repeated, less sure we could do this, but at this point, 5 snowed in days in our apartment anything was worth trying. We had run out of food that morning.

When we signed the lease on our apartment, our first real adult home that wasn’t a dorm or a house someone else paid for, we didn’t think anything about the hill it sat on. A hill we climbed everyday to get home, a hill we descended every time we needed groceries since the closest store that wasn’t the creepy guy at the bodega who cat called and pinched butts was the stop and shop at the bottom of the hill. Assault for some fruit and veggies or makeshift garbage diapers?

Garbage diapers FTW.

I’d seen my sister do this to go sledding without a sled. We scrounged out our last 2 hefty bags and went out into the icy city determined to make it to stop and shop without dying.

We dug our heels in and pilled our butts to the edge and let gravity do its thing. Michele was lighter and longer and despite our hand holding she fell ahead of me.

“Let go!” I yelled. “I’m only going to hold you back! Lift your legs!”

“No!” She gripped my hand tighter. “I refuse to die alone!”

I opened my fingers and she lost her grip and somehow turned herself around to face me.

“It’s going to be ok!” I yelled. “I love you! If you make it, don’t forget the milk!”

i searched under the covers for her hand and it was so far in, farther than i thought. she had shrunk. It has been a month since i had last seen her and she was half the size it seemed. in april she was sitting up, legs off the side of the bed, the remnants of breakfast in a blue plastic bowl on the rolling side table not far from her. an indistinguishable beige mush. oat meal, apple sauce or bananas. her eyes were quick, darting from me, to Jeff, to me, to the bowl. we didn’t talk about it but she knew. when death hangs in the air it makes itself known.

we held hands while jeff went to speak to a nurse in the hallway. her fingers plump, her ring snug against her skin. a shiny bright emerald nestled into my palm when she placed her hand inside of mine instead of threading our fingers together. we said goodbye with the promise of coming back.

and here we were again. my hand reaching for hers, closing her fingers and wrapping mine around the outside, like before.

nobody gets out unscathed.

the hospice nurse explains in detail what happens to the body because ben wants to know. he has questions. like the ability to identify these signs means you can stop it. mottled skin, labored breathing, fever. she can only really see shadows.

“you have to tell her to close her eyes,” she said and showed us how she would do it.

“miss gerard. i’m going to close your eyes for you, ok?” she said loudly and gently moved her hands over margaret’s face, closing each eye.

“they can hear you. so tell her. say everything.”

write as poorly as possible

i wash. i take. i see.

i am full of false starts. i think when it’s too familiar a topic and something so embedded into your coding it can be hard to take it out and examine it, this feeling, outside of your body. i try to break it down, the details. this is what i look like. i take selfies so i can try and remember. dysmorphia is real. what i see is always changing so i can’t trust this information so i have to use different tools. things i know that are facts. i have receipts. i am kind and i love hard to my own detriment. i am likeable. i know how to make people feel at ease. my husband’s mother is dying. i am watching how i hold space for him, for his family, mostly for him. i can read the room and intuitively know when to leave it. i make a mean loaf of bread. i have the patience for waiting for it. i remember birthdays. i send cards. i even send cards on non-holidays because i love like that. i dig for these things everyday. i hold them in my hands, i open each finger to show you these small treasures, it’s all i have that matters, it’s all i know to be true.

this is what i told him

these windows make me feel like i’m living in a terrarium. they’re tall, 4 large panes of glass overlooking they bay and coit tower. 2 panes with a view of an office building. i watch as the shades get rolled up at 7AM. I imagine cold grey sleepy faces looking for the sun. I wonder if they can see me. i’m short. the desk is tall. they look across the way and wonder who left the little kid in the hotel room alone.

the other 2 panes are cloudy, a thin layer of grit making the bay and oakland look like a fading old post card. the view straight ahead shows a slowing hill up to coit tower with offices and oddly shaped millionaire homes layered on top of one another like a wedding cake.

a lyft driver yesterday was excited to be dropping me off in chinatown.

“i live 3 blocks over,” he said. “I want to be done for the day.”

his accent is thick and so are his glasses. he’s lived here his whole life, nestled into the pocket of the city that looks to be the most untouched. he talks about the lyft IPO and the making of young millionaires everyday and i admit to him that i don’t even know what IPO stands for and he says the same and we both laugh at our ignorance and wonder how we’ve managed to survive so long, relics in a place that will soon feel like shiny science fiction space.

here's what i want you to know

i have completionist syndrome. i must finish something before i move on to the next thing. i can’t tell you how may banal books, boxes of tasteless healthy cereal or rolls of the “wrong” kind of toilet paper i’ve suffered through, refusing to believe that i can just stop doing, reading, eating the awful thing and move on to something better.

“you know you are an adult, right?” jeff says. “you can do whatever you want to do.”

“but then this unfinished thing will be wasted and then it’ll just be there, starting at me, serving as a reminder that i failed.”

“wait, wait, wait.” he put both hands up, palms facing me. “do you really think it’s a failure to not finish that disgusting box of kashi go lean fiber pellets?”

“well,” i thought about it. “it’s wasteful. that’s failure.”

“who did this to you?”

“all signs point to my mother,” I reply. “at least that’s what therapy tells me.”

i sat down in front of my bowl of cereal, fiber pellets and all i can think of is rabbit poop floating in a murky grey sea of almond milk. all i can hear is the voices of the starving children my mother often waived as a weapon against waste. i scooped up a spoonful.

“don’t do it,” jeff shook his head. “ don’t do it. what happens if you don’t do it?”

but i quickly shove the spoon into my mouth before he can say anything else because really, i am my mother’s daughter.

who doesn't appreciate a good deal?

my roommate was moving out.

the idea of having a stranger move into my home was exhausting. it was san francisco so it’s pretty much the norm to be well into your 30s living with people don’t know so you can hold onto your rent controlled apartment until the day you die.

but i was done. i was no longer willing to learn the hard way the strange social ticks of another human being. jeff lived alone in a three bedroom shotgun a block away from a sunny park, a fancy grocery store and the best ethiopian food in the city. he had a back porch lined with plants and I had imagined setting up a hammock for reading outside on warm days. i had to convince him i was a good deal. who doesn’t want to cut their living expenses with someone they’re sleeping with?

“I’m fun!” was the first thing i had said. i’m not sure if it was the best lead in, but that’s what came out. “I’m so much fun! i own half the amount of shoes other girls own, i like cleaning, i’m good at reading the room so i know when to leave it, give you space, let you do your own thing.”

it was then i realized how good i am at being small how that was the take away from all my past relationships, what those i have loved loved about me.

“you’re barely there,” greg had said once. “you pop in. do something nice and then leave like cinderella running away from the ball. what is that? that’s not normal.”

it was such a small thing.

in san francisco i bought an overpriced jar of some sort of moisturizer from kabuki springs because it smelled like fresh cut grass. i was standing in a skinny hallway lined with products waiting sadia to finish her treatment, slathering testers all over myself. 3 days in a hotel room with its dry heat had sucked the life from my skin leaving me feeling like a walking slab of turkey jerky. i looked at prices of things and made use of them in the moment. a $60 jar of manuka honey. i rubbed its expensive contents onto my cheeks and face feeling like i was getting away with something.

sadia came out of an unmarked door looking like someone had told her the world wasn’t ending and everything was going to be alright. i wished i had booked a massage.

“what are you doing?” she asked. “you look…shiny.”

“I need this,” I whispered. “my skin is dying. it’s going to fall off and i’ll just be this mass of walking meat. i can’t anymore.”

“are you ok?”

i handed her the jar that smelled like blue skies, mowed lawns and long days.

“don’t judge me,” I replied. “i need this. it’s february in portland. by march i’m going to question the existence of the sun.”

$20 for a thimble full of sunshine. how san francisco.

i miss the city.

my friends tell me, “let me remind you why you don’t.” and “do you miss seeing human feces everyday? or do you really like setting money you don’t have on fire?”

they’re right.

i miss them. i miss the idea of sunny park days and the feeling that anything is possible.

portland feels unsafe right now and i hate that.

things I might want to write about

the time i climbed into the tub and pulled the shower curtain closed because it was the last place to hide.

the time my parents let us know that they were pregnant and my sister asked if we could put it back.

how much fun it was to give the baby slippery ice cubes.

making it rain shredded cheese over the dogs and watching their faces light up.

the 25 minute walk to the convenience store one block away in 3 inch heels without dying.


the time i raised my arms in the air and wiggled my body in a wave while hissing and called myself bacon and he thought i was a snake.

my first cigarette.

the time we test rode a tandem bike and my control issues refused to let me sit in the back and my fear oddly resulted in my inability to turn right.

the time i drunk purchased an eames chair.

eating scrambled eggs in a stale hot dog bun because I had $3.50 until payday.

crying because i was too young for all my shoes to look this orthopedic.

the time i bleached my hair at home because i was bored on my day off and no one was home to stop me.

the one time i tried to wear a thong and deeply regretted it.

the year of failing/falling underwear and losing weight.

the time i called josh on mushrooms to tell him everyone was having dinner and i could hear all their conversations.

hungover and trying to eat a cinnamon bun on a bus in chicago.

all the times jake called me selfish.

playing hungry hungry hippos with everyone’s prescription meds instead of the white marbles.

watching alix clean the apartment in her underwear and realizing that heroin could make me just as thin.

realizing that was awful but true and i thought about it.

the time we slept under tablecloths thinking they were blankets.

the time gloria showed up with $50 worth of popeye’s fried chicken and the room exploded in cheers.

the time i loaned my cellphone to a stranger at a coffee shop and he called his boyfriend. i listened to him break up with him then he handed it back to me while he cried.

the time the assistant at the vet hospital carried my dog out into the waiting room and called out, “Mother of Pancakes? Mother of Charlie Pancakes?”

the midnight panic attack about loneliness and the filipino nurse who drove me home because no one else could take me.

the time i called out of work hungover and my roommate set off a flea bomb in the apartment not knowing i was asleep.

the time i went back to the office after a miscarriage like nothing happened.

laying on the floor of josh and ryan’s kitchen ear candling and frying pickles.

losing feeling in both arms because we all fell asleep in a pile.

writing heavy metal band fan fiction in spiral bound notebooks.

i thought i knew what i was doing

set the alarm for 5:30AM to make the 6AM bus to make the 6:45AM spin class

protein shake with almond milk and cold coffee

office at 8. no one here yet

i thought i knew what i was doing

busy myself. look stressed even if i wasn’t. make stress look apparent when i was. if you don’t show it they won’t know how hard you’re working for your paycheck

say no when offered a cigarette. go outside with them anyway. be social. act like you belong though you know you’re just an interloper. you do not wear enough makeup to look like you’re not wearing any. your shoes are entirely too comfortable for you to be one of them

tofu and steamed greens, doesn’t matter what veg. say no to the 3PM coffee run even though you want it

make sure you change into gym clothes before leaving the office so people see you. linger long enough and someone will pat you on the back. explain to them what HIIT is. mountain climbers and plank jacks and burpees until you almost throw up but you stop. rest. do it again. it’s good for your heart. if you do it and don’t throw up, it’s good for your heart

1/2 a protein bar. hardboiled eggs. i hate salads. i eat salads. 13 pistachios. 8 blueberries

8 oz of protein. i like prescriptions. they make someone else happy because i’m really good at conforming

get enough sleep. 64 oz of water. the internet tells you you’re not hungry, you’re just dehydrated most of the time. this will help your skin. keeps you young

i thought i knew what i was doing

rest were yoga days

i thought i knew

nothing was ever completely restful. even the naps my body demanded

i thought i knew

be social just enough. bootstrap. be clever but not obnoxious. switch to green tea. learn to drink your whiskey neat. be mysterious but open. unattainable but likeable

i thought i knew

eat just enough in public so no one questions. there is a right way to do everything. this is clearly the right way

i thought

wild writing - what the living do

this is the everyday. most days i don’t set an alarm. bean wakes me. he has the breakfast shakes at 7:30AM. even on sundays and i wished he understood what weekends are. i don’t bother putting on pants to go downstairs and feed him. drop the food in his bowl with a handful of cooked green beans because i am now that person who cooks for their dog. i drink some water. i contemplate more clothes but upstairs is so far away, i let the dog out and stand on the back porch in a t-shirt and underwear in the dead of winter grateful for tall fences. clothes are too complicated in the morning. i make caffeine happen. i open my journal. i write the date. i write one line. i’m here. i’m still here. this is good news to someone i’m sure. i close the book. i drag my feet. i brush my teeth while bean licks my naked calves. i finally figure out pants. reluctantly. i watch my husband sleep. his arms overhead like the inflatable waving balloons outside of car dealerships. in 10 years of being together we’ve never had a car. we’re city people. bus people. i think about how this has shaped me. i rode the bus in los angeles in 1999. i took it from hollywood to west hollywood every day for almost 2 years and left the city after being pushed off the bus by a homeless person. i spilled onto the street, out onto sunset blvd like a bag of trash. this was probably not a good place for me to be anymore.

i sat on the sidewalk for awhile. that’s the thing with falling. i don’t remember how i got to the ground. what shapes did my body make on the way down. i can only imagine the cartoon banana peel way of falling, all arms flailing in circles but i’m sure mine was less flail and more bracing. and the impact. knees scraped, one worse than the other. palms, gravel embedded. i rolled over onto my butt and sat, taking stock of the damage. i didn’t even notice for awhile that the driver had gotten off the bus. not to help me, but to wrestle the homeless guy to the ground 10 feet away from me. both of their necks and faces were engorged. red. sweaty. i couldn’t make out what they were yelling. did i hit my head? i don’t remember. it didn’t hurt. my hearing felt muffled and underwater until a shrill voice coming from the bus pierced through like i had broken the surface of a lake. a woman with too much makeup on had opened a window and her shiny fire engine red lips were moving.

“You!” she yelled. “Do something!”

no one else was outside. just me and the two men fighting next to me. that’s the thing about LA. no one was ever outside on the sidewalk. cars were safer i guess. she must have meant me. i had just tumbled out of the #2 on sunset like a piece of wayward luggage and she was looking at me like i was the only person in the world who could do something. i will never forget the throbbing vein in her neck, showing through the thin crepey skin of her throat. people were so angry here. i was so angry here. i never should have moved here.