Sunday Scribblings: Poetry

This week's Sunday Scribblings prompt, Poetry, is so timely for me. One of the things I wanted to do with my week away was to read some poetry, and I have read, and listened to, Mary Oliver's beautiful poems.

I'm not quite brave enough to write and share a poem on the blog yet, since I don't, by far, consider myself a poet. What I want to do instead is share some of my favorite lines/phrases from Oliver's poems from the book Thirst.

*My work is loving the world.*

*the lovely meaninglessness of time*

*For a long time I was not even in this world*

*How to keep warm is always a problem, isn't it?*

*From the complications of loving you/ I think there is no end or return.*

*You have broken my heart./ Just as well.*

*In the city called Wait,/ also known as the airport,/ you might think about your life--/there is not much else to do.*

Beautiful, no? For more poems and writing about poetry, head over to Sunday Scribblings.

Sunday Scribblings: Adult

I haven't Scribbled in a long, long time. But since I'm trying to reinvigorate my blogging (as I posted about here), I figured I'd return to an old favorite way to get my writing.

On this week's Sunday Scribblings prompt, this question about adulthood spoke to me the most: Are you glad to finally be an adult? I thought about this question the other day, when I heard some fellow commuters talking about their teenagers. The parents were saying how lucky the teens had it--they didn't have bills to pay or jobs to worry about. I shook my head and thought to myself, How wrong those people are. I will take bills and jobs and car troubles and relationship problems and all the other downsides of adult life over the many downsides of being a teen. The most prominent one in my memory? How poorly developed my sense of myself was.

With every passing year, I get to know myself that much better. And with that knowledge comes a sense of confidence that I just couldn't have had as a teenager. I didn't trust that I had the strength to get through the minor challenges that I barely think about now. I remember crying so hard when the Amtrak train I was supposed to get on was oversold and there was no more room for me. I was 19 or so, heading back to college after winter break. When the train stopped at Penn Station, even the doorways were crammed with people sitting on their suitcases.

As the train pulled away, tears of frustration filled my eyes. I didn't know what else to do. I pictured train after train coming into the station already full, and my being stuck in Penn Station forever.

Now, when things like that happen, I know that even if I can't get a fair or reasonable response from the people in charge (as was the case when I tried to get someone to explain to me how they could sell more tickets for a train than there were seats on that train--why have me make a reservation for a particular train if that reservation is meaningless?), I can take care of myself. I can buy a bus ticket instead, or rent a car. I can call someone to see if I can spend the night on their couch and catch a train the next day. I can sleep in the train station if I really have to.

I can also deal with the anger and frustration that comes with these situations by venting out loud or in my head. By knowing that when I get home, I WILL be getting a refund for that train ticket if I had to spend more money on an alternate mode of transportation. And I know that no matter what happens, I'll be OK. I'm smart enough and strong enough to figure something out.

As a teenager, I didn't know that about myself. And I wouldn't trade that knowledge for anything--not the ability to sleep in every day of the summer, not the ignorance of credit card late fees, none of it.

What are your thoughts on adulthood? For others' take on the subject, check out Sunday Scribblings.

Sunday Scribblings: Scary

This is from the point of view of Em, the main character in my novel-in-progress

What am I scared of? A few weeks ago I would've said nothing. I would've even told myself that, answered with the one word before I even gave the question any thought. Now I'm realizing that I'm scared of my life continuing on like this, so lonely, so alone.

Before Carrie died, she was the only person I needed. Even when she was in New York and I was in Boston, just knowing she was out there was enough. Knowing that someone, somewhere understood me, saw me. I never would've said that to her, never would've even thought it. I just knew it in my gut.

It's been five years since I've felt like someone got me. I have friends who I drink with and play darts with. We do trivia once a week. From the outside, it would seem like I had created the family I didn't have growing up. But they don't even know about Carrie, let alone what I think or feel about anything other than the Red Sox, the sloppy old guys who sit at the bar, and the various political stories of the moment.

It's terrifying to think of going through life like this forever. The only thing scarier? Actually opening up.

Sunday Scribblings: Dear Past Me, Dear Future Me

It's been a loooong time since I scribbled. But I like this prompt and am going to use it to brainstorm from the point of view of the main character in the novel I'm working on. Here goes.

Dear Past Me/Future Me,
What the f*ck? Is this some therapy bullshit? That crap does not work, I don't care what all those shrink-a-dinks say.

Ok, that skepticism out of the way, here goes. I wish I could tell a past me to cherish my time with Carrie, that the time will end much too soon. And that things are not always what they appear. Someone who seems much more stable and happy than you yourself are might actually be way more f*cked up. F*cked up enough to take her own life. Oh, and past me? You yourself are not suicidal and you never will be, so give up on that messed up "dream" before it takes hold of you and won't let go until a monsoon-like October after your 30th birthday.

Future me? What can I tell you? I don't even know who you are. And I guess that's as exciting as it is scary.

XO,
Em

Sunday Scribbling: Ask

The first phrase that popped into my head when I read this week's prompt was "Ask and ye shall receive." This reminded me of Becca's post this week about how she decided she needed to do something to take her writing to the next level and that day she saw a sign advertising a new writing group that sounds like it's convenient to her. She called it the universe at work.

My mother has often prays on things, and finds an answer soon thereafter.

My take? It's not so much the universe or God fixing your problems for you, but it's the power of articulating a goal, and then directing yourself and your energy toward meeting it. So asking God or the Universe for a million dollars isn't going to do anything. But asking for a million dollars might make you realize how very important it is for you to have a million dollars, which could spark you figuring out a way to get there. That, to me, is the power of prayer or putting your desires "into the universe".

But now that I type this, I realize, too, that I believe a little bit of mystery is involved too. Like just working out a problem isn't the whole she-bang. Maybe it's that getting to the point where you'll pray for something means that you've thought long and hard about it yourself already. Or maybe it's the surrender of asking for help that gets your subconscious going full force on the problem.

It seems natural to end this post with a few requests for the universe/God/my subconscious/ whomever.

1. I'd like to find a way to better integrate my writing into my daily life. Right now it's feeling a bit more like a tack-on/must do, than an organic part of my day.
   
2. I'd like a best friend. I know I am ridiculously fortunate to have a husband whom I adore and who is also my best friend, and to have many other friends with whom I can celebrate things like my house warming, and a few other friends who I feel super close to even though they are not physically nearby. But I miss having one really good girlfriend who I can do everything with, who I can sit around and do nothing with, who really knows me and understands me, who I can plan on being around for the rest of my life. Not having that makes me feel lonely at times.
   
3. I'd like to publish some stories. I'm guessing lots of people have this goal. But I really, really want it. Like when I think about what I want to accomplish in my life, this (in varying forms, ie publish a novel) is pretty much the only thing I'd be ridiculously disappointed about not doing.

What do you want? And do you believe that articulating your goals has any power?

Sunday Scribblings: Solace

For the third week in a row, my Sunday Scribblings is a look at the world in the eyes of my fictional character, whose husband Bob has just been taken in for bypass surgery.

I went to the patient lounge seeking solace. But even the lounge was cold--both in terms of the air temperature and the general feel of the place. The couches and chairs were upholstered in the thick plaster of diner seats. Probably easier to keep clean, but certainly not cozy. One wall had large windows, but they overlooked a parking lot, and a large building sat about 20 feet away, blocking any farther off view.

I sank into the plastic couch and put my head back. I planned to just rest my eyes, but I must've fallen asleep. I woke to the sound of hushed voices, voices that, I assumed, were trying not to wake me.

A man with a slight accent--Indian? Middle Eastern?--said something about this being the best space to talk in, despite the lack of privacy. A pipe had frozen overnight and flooded his administrative office.

The other voice, a woman's said, "Fine, fine." She sounded annoyed. Like Bob sounded with me a lot.

"I just wanted to apologize again. I can explain to you exactly how the mistake happened if you like." His voice sounded a bit warmer than it had when he was talking about his office flooding.

I heard one of the people shift in their seats, and imagined the woman shifting in reaction to the doctor's apology.

The doctor continued talking, faster now, obviously nervous. "Now none of these are excuses, I know that. There are a number of things I did wrong in the situation. But anyway, it was the end of a 14 hour shift. My twin babies had cried throughout all of the night before, and even though my wife does night duty on the days before my hospital shifts, it's amazing the wails these little bodies can expel. They wake me sometimes even when she's brought them downstairs to protect my sleep. Anyway, I was tired. And the nursing staff who was supposed to assist me got held up in another operation. So the people in the OR weren't familiar with your case.

Again, I'm sorry. None of this excuses what happened. But I hope you can understand. It wasn't just blatant uncaring, or recklessness. It was a series of mistakes, but the responsibility for the end result resides with me. And I am sorry." On these last words, his voice sounded so soft, like he was talking to one of his babies, not an adult.

Of course I was dying to know what this doctor had done. I opened my eyes a little in hopes of getting a glimpse of the patient. Maybe she would be misshapen in some obvious way. But I barely saw her. My eyes stopped on the face of the doctor, a slight man with dark hair and dark--almost black--eyes. It wasn't his looks that were so striking. It was his look. His face looked the same way I knew mine did when I talked to Bob. When I pleaded with him to forgive me, to try to understand that my hitting the dog was an accident, that he was in my blind spot, and that I felt terrible. He had the look of true remorse on his face.

The woman--a chubby , 40-something year old with black, curly hair-- unfolded her arms and sighed. She, too, seemed caught by his gaze. "It's...Well, it's not OK. What happened is not OK. But, I forgive you." She smiled at him. "These things happen."

The man sighed, and then took her hands in his. "Thank you. Thank you." The words seemed to flow out of his mouth on his breath. "I haven't slept since... Haven't eaten. You don't know how much this means to me."

But I did. I knew just how much being forgiving meant. And then it hit me--Bob would never forgive me. It'd been months now. And it wasn't that what I'd done was so unforgivable--"these things happen" after all. It was that he didn't want to forgive me. And that--that--is unforgivable.

Sunday Scribbling: Ghosts

Like my last Sunday Scribbling, this is in the voice of a fictional character whose story I am currently writing. This is background info that probably won't even make it into my story, but which I know will help me understand my character.


I don't believe in ghosts, but that doesn't mean I don't feel the presence of my parents--my mother in particular. They died in a car accident when I was 32--bad weather, an inexperienced driver going too fast on the highway.


I had been living in Manhattan at the time, enjoying my life despite a recent bad break up. That's how I ended up moving back to upstate N.Y. I needed to tend to their house, which I assumed I'd sell. But I just couldn't. I felt my parents there in a way I didn't anywhere else. I'd occasionally smell my mom's floral scent on a towel I hadn't yet used and washed. I'd hear the oldie's station echo through my parents' bedroom with the same acoustics as it did every morning when their alarm rang. Sometimes I would have to do a double take because I'd swear I'd seen my dad leaning against the kitchen counter, coffee in one hand, newspaper in the other.


So I got a job as a paralegal at a small firm near Albany. I took an absurd cut in pay, which was fine since I didn't have to pay absurdly high city rents-or any rent for that matter, since my parents had paid off their mortgage.


It was hard to be there without my mom, who was really more like a sister to me in her last years. If she had been there, we would've been going to the farmers markets together, stopping for lunch at the dinner on the way home and planning what we'd make for supper over our greasy grilled cheese sandwiches. Instead I was doing those things alone. Which was fine, just not the same.


Years passed. I made some friends through work, connected with a friend from high school, Lea, who I hadn't seen since we graduated. She and I got very close, but she had a family--a husband and two little girls. So there were still plenty of weekends where I went about my shopping and cooking and relaxing alone.


I was happy, though a bit lonely. And time was a ticking. I wasn't baby-crazy in a serious way, but like any woman who has crested the hill of 35 will tell you, it's pretty impossible to avoid thinking about the topic of fertility and motherhood when you're starting to realize that you might not have a choice as to whether or not you join that particular sorority.

So maybe that's why I was so grateful to find Bob when he came into my life. Maybe that's why I was so willing to overlook some things I didn't like in how he treated me, namely what Lea calls looking at me without seeing me, listening to me without hearing.

***
To read other ghost stories, click here.

Sunday Scribblings: My oldest friend

I immediately had a very personal story tug on me when I saw this prompt, but I want to try to use Sunday Scribbling as a means of getting deeper into my fiction writing, so here is the story of my new main character Ellen's Oldest Friend.

**So just to reiterate, this is fiction. Don't want anyone to think I'm airing info about my failing marriage over the internet. (Not that I even have a failing marriage. Thankfully!) :) **

I always thought that my husband would be my best friend. I thought that's how it worked. I'd have to watch our wedding video to verify this, but I think I even wrote the word "best friend" into our wedding ceremony. But I guess you can't make a person live up to their promises, can you.

Let me be blunt: I killed my husband's dog. No, I never liked the thing. But no, I didn't mean
to kill him either. Bob knows this. He must--I've told him a thousand times, even had him back my car out of the driveway so he could see that the dog just happened to be lying in the car's blind spot, and that there was no way I could've known he was there until I felt the impact and heard his little bones crushing. Even though I'm no animal lover, that sound replays in my head sometimes, and I get so nauseous I have to sit down.

There's no way I could've killed a dog on purpose.

And I guess that's the crux of the problem, I'm coming to see, how can I be with someone who doesn't know that about me? Who can't, even after 6 months, accept my apology and allow us to move on?

It's not that he says he doesn't believe it was an accident, or even that he doesn't forgive me. No, he's much more on the passive side of the passive-aggressive equation. He "jokes" about my killing his dog, for instance. In front of other people. As in: In response to something I've said that he doesn't agree with: "This from the woman who killed my dog!" Or, if he's trying to get out of doing something he doesn't want to do, he'll say he can't do it because he's overcome with grief. Convenient that the grief only lasts as long as it takes for me to do whatever it is myself.

At the beginning of the story, when I take him to the hospital because he's having chest pain, I'm scared for him. I'm a bulldog (no pun intended; Shasta was a yellow lab, anyway). I bark at the nurses when they don't get him tested right away to see if he's having a heart attack. I repeat Bob's long list of allergies every time a new orderly comes in to give him some new drug. I'm scared, to be honest, that after all the hard work I've done to try to save my marriage after not being able to save Bob's dog (and then working overtime to pay for the $2,000 vet bill), he'll die on me. And I love him, I do. I tell him that as they roll him into heart surgery. He doesn't say it back.

But then, I witness a doctor-patient apology: he operated on the wrong side of her body. I see in his face the same pain and true regret that I felt about Shasta. I wait for the patient to come back with some nasty comment about the surgeon's incompetence or to call her lawyer. But she doesn't. She accepts the apology, saying she'll need some time to deal with this news, but that she knows he didn't mean to hurt her. She smiles.

After that, I know it's time to leave Bob. If he loved me, he would forgive me and see how much anguish this situation has put me through.

Can intense people/overachievers be OK with calm?

I recently got introduced to some wonderful craft blogs (links on the side of my blog). These bloggers' lives are what I've always dreamed of. They write, they craft, they hang out with their children, who do their own crafts with their sweet little fingers. They are just like the person who, as a kid, I assumed I'd be when I grew up.

My husband and I are in the process of buying a house--our dream house--the kind of house where I imagined myself doing all that crafting and writing. It's on an acre of land, so we'll have plenty of room for gardens and hanging out (and animals--lots of dogs, rabbits, etc!). It's big enough that I'll get a craft/writing room, where I can decorate as I please and leave yarn all over if I want to. (Of course I'll have to work to help pay for the house, but that's just a pesky detail.)

So now that I'm getting to a place in my life where I can really envision myself living the life I've dreamed of for so long, I find myself asking, Will I really be able to? Will I be able to devote so much time to things that give me pleasure? Will I be able to not feel incredibly guilty doing so? Will I be able to enjoy it without feeling like there are better things I ought to be doing with my time? (Like, say, saving the world.) Is it OK to relax and enjoy life? Will I just find something new to worry about?

I guess I'll find out in the months and years ahead. (I assume that finalizing the buying of this place, selling our condo, and moving will give me enough to stress about in the near future.) But in the mean time, the idea that I could be worried about not worrying is something I Just Don't Get.

For more writing on things that baffle us, check out this week's Sunday Scribblings.

Miscellaneous numbers regarding being sick , and having existential crises

Times I've been very ill this cold/flu season: 3

Days this current cold has lasted: 3

Times I've been outside in the last 48 hours: 0

Hours in the last 24 hour period that I have been asleep: 17

Pints of frozen yogurt I've eaten since getting sick: 2

Days of work missed: 2

Social events cancelled: 2

Moments of existential crises gone through: too many to count

What is it about being sick, when my body's defences are totally down and my cells need all the energy I can give them to fight whatever virus has invaded, that makes my mind swim in circles around questions like: What is my purpose on this earth?

I came down with an awful case of bronchitis my Freshman year in college. It was then I decided I ought to drop out of school since I really had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. This question--of what to major in, of who I was--had bothered me since the day I moved into my cell-like dorm room, but it really started to get to me when I had hours upon miserable hours to lie in bed and think.

I called my parents during this crisis and told them of my plans to drop out of school. Instead of freaking out, my mother, in her infinite wisdom, said, "Why don't you just focus on feeling better and we'll talk about this later." By the time "later" came, I realized that thought I still had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up, dropping out of school wasn't going to help me figure that out.

During this current illness, I happened to get my MFA mentor's comments on the stories I had given her. Even on the best of days, comments on my work are often enough to send me straight to the Land of Crisis. Needless to say, feeling like crap physically didn't make her comments easier to take. So of the 7 hours I've been awake in the past day or so, I would say 5 of them have been spent wondering, WHAT AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE? I CAN'T WRITE! WHY AM I EVEN BOTHERING TRYING TO GET A STORY ON THE PAGE AND THEN OUT THERE INTO THE WORLD? WHO AM I KIDDING?????

Her comments weren't harsh or even surprising--I knew the stories I handed in needed a ton of work. And I'm excited to work on them. I guess I was just hoping for some over-arching positive message like, "You've come a long way since we first worked together" or "You're totally going to make it--don't worry!" I guess that's what we're all always hoping for, though, and I should just get used to not always getting it.

For more miscellany, visit Sunday Scribblings.

Sunday Scribblings: Fellow Travelers

I have so many stories about meeting wonderfully nice and helpful people in my travels.

One of my favorite stories is from a trip I took recently with my mother to Paris. Despite all the jokes about how rude the French are to tourists, we encountered nothing by smiles and helpfulness.

When we first got there, we took the Metro from the airport to our hotel with no problems. So on our way back to the airport at the end of the trip, we decided to take it again, instead of a cab.

But this time, the trip was not so smooth. First of all, the escalator was broken at the metro station near our hotel. My mom is a small woman who travels with a large suitcase, and there was no way she could carry it down the stairs. So I told her to wait up top with her bag, and I would carry mine down and then come back for hers. By the time I got half way back up the stairs, two young men had taken her bag and were carrying down the stairs. (I'm surprised my mother didn't freak out and think they were stealing it, since she doesn't speak much French...)

We switched trains and unfortunately got on the wrong one (the first time this happened, throughout the many times we took the Metro!). Once I realized we were headed the wrong way, we got off, as did a young man who overheard us and realized that he, too, was on the wrong train.

When we got off, I asked this Amazon of a woman where we could go to get the right train. Not only did she tell us where to go, but she hoisted my mom's suitcase, balanced it on her head, and told us to follow her. She carried the bag up one flight of stairs and down another to the correct track--only to turn around and go back up and down the stairs to go back to the track she needed to be on.

By this time, my mom was close to tears. She hated feeling so helpless, and was cursing our decision not to take a damn cab. The man who got off the train with us came to the rescue, chatting with us about how he used to live in Paris, and now lives in Greece with his wife and kids, but returns for business sometimes. When our train got there, he helped me lug our luggage onto it (there's an awfully steep step onto some trains in Paris).

Then, when we got to the airport, he stayed with us until we found our terminal (which sounds easier than it is), using his flawless French to ask questions and get answers in a fraction of the time it would've taken me to struggle through the conversation with my limited French.

When he left us, we all hugged goodbye, and my mom kept calling him an angel.

When we got home, we told this story to my family. My brother asked, "Are you sure you were in Paris? You didn't get lost and go to Ohio or some other super friendly place by mistake?"

I love bashing cultural stereotypes, and only hope we helped bash that of the Ugly American when we were in Paris, trying very hard to speak French and honor their customs.

For more travel tales, click here.

Sunday Scribbilings: Walk

God it's been so long since I scribbled! It feels good to be back!

This week's prompt, Walk, made me think of a few different things:

1. When I'm waiting to meet someone, if I'm not reading to pass the time, I watch people as they come towards me. I try to determine, well before the person's face or characteristics come into focus, whether or not it's the person I'm waiting for. I watch the person walk.

I'm most familiar with my husband's walk, and I'm pretty good at spotting him from afar. He sort of slides down the street, no bounce in his step, almost as if he's skateboarding.

When we were first dating, when he'd get to the point where we both could definitely make out each other's faces, he would nod his head a little, like a basketball player might say "hey" to his teammate. Now he usually does something silly. He'll give me the peace sign, or the "rock on" sign.

Being able to spot him from afar, and knowing how he'll first give recognition to the fact that I'm waiting for him is one of the intimacies of marriage that I never thought about or even knew existed before being with someone for so long.


2. One of the things I most enjoy in life is walking my dog. I love watching people smile and coo over her (at least the ones who aren't cowering at the sight of a silly black lab). I love getting to know my neighborhood well by walking down its streets a few times a day. For example, I never would've known that the house across the street from the park has been for sale twice in the last two years, or that it's an 80-something year old woman who puts a garbage can in the street so she can save the spot in front of her house whenever she goes out.

The few times a year when I'm not in the least bit excited to take Chloe out, I know something is wrong. My excitement about this chore is like a barometer for my mood. And as soon as the pressure is so low that I have to drag myself out the door, I know there's a bad mood a 'coming.

Though this knowledge doesn't make getting my butt out the door any easier, it does help me get to the bottom of what's bothering me well before I would otherwise. I guess that's why people say walks are meditative.

For more takes on walks, click here.

Sunday Scribblings: The End

I'm spending this end-of-the-summer weekend visiting my parents' new house in New Jersey. I'm hoping this weekend will mark the end of some bad dynamics that have arisen in the past few years.

You see, my mom and husband have a bit of a checkered past. It's a long-ish story, but it boils down to a day a few Christmas's ago that I spent hysterically crying after my mom criticized a ton of stuff about my then fiancé—first to me, and then to him. She and my dad left, and we didn’t speak for a few days (which isn’t that long, but felt it. Time slows down when you know you’re ignoring/avoiding someone).

She has since apologized profusely, but once words are out there, you can’t take them back. So when B displays any of the tendencies she attacked him for (being too aloof, not wanting to spend every waking hour chatting with her, etc.), I get uncomfortable. I spend the whole time wondering if she’s judging him. And for some odd psychological (I’m sure!) reason, I tend to take all this discomfort out on B, wishing that he could act however it is she wants him to act.

So this weekend, I am setting an intention to not play into this dynamic any longer. I will just concern myself with my own feelings, and with making sure I am relaxing and doing what I want to do—not worrying about what someone else may or may not be thinking. And I definitely won’t get mad at B, no matter how he decides to act/spend his time.

Here’s to the (hopefully) end of all that! For more endings, click here.

Sunday Scribbilings: Dear Diary

I'm using this Sunday Scribblings to help me get into the head of my new character, Celia, a woman who is going through a divorce and moves from NYC to Boston to get away from her husband and his mistress. Here is one of her diary entries:

Dear Diary,
I haven't written those words in years. Maybe since those days of 7th and 8th grade when I was so worried about pimples and boys and fitting in. Just like everybody else, though the worst part of course was how alone in my worries I felt. I realize now that there are probably hundreds of women going through the same thing as me now, and probably thousands before me who have too.

But not really. I'm probably the only who moved to a strange city to make sure I never would drop my hot coffee all over my tighted legs when I saw my husband and his mistress in Starbucks, after he told me he had stopped seeing her. And I'm almost definitely the only one who finds healing in the Boston Aquarium--going each morning as soon as it opens to stare at a new spot in the giant column of water that makes up the middle of the building. It's dark and fairly quiet at that hour, and it's the only place where I lose myself and forget my loneliness and fear and betrayal. The fish swim past--different shapes and sizes and colors--and it's amazing how I can be staring at one fish only to realize that there are three more between me and it, only I couldn't notice them and my current obsession at the same time.

And the fish make me laugh. My face will be right up against the tank and an ugly, ugly blow fish will swim by, centimeters away from my face and I'll startle and laugh at the same time. Those moments are probably the only true laughs I've had in months.

I joined a book club, at the insistence of Jen [narrator's best friend in New York, who introduces her to one of the book club members]. The women are all really nice, and I'm sure I'll like going eventually. But I left my first meeting feeling lonelier than I had when I went in. They all knew each other so well, they'd gone traveling together, watched each other get married and have babies.

I realize now that Bobby's gone, nobody knows me that well. Jen is the closest, but we've definitely grown apart since she had her babies. And plus the last few months it's all I could do not to push her away completely. After all, if your husband can betray you and decide unilaterally that the marriage wasn't worth working on, how can I trust anyone? Jen and I met at the same time I met Bobby, so we don't even have more longevity that I can point to as a reason to trust her.

It's impossible for me not to think and think and think about everything--both was has happened and what will happen. That's why I love the aquarium. When I watch the fish, I just watch the fish. It's like an instant meditation. If only they were open 24 hours a day, I might just move in.

For more diary entries--real and imagined--go to Sunday Scribblings.

Sunday Scribbilings: Decisions

I think a lot about the topic of decision making. I don't have much trouble making decisions, but I do ponder about their consequences a lot. What if I hadn't gone to BU? What if I didn't take a semester off and got a job interning at the Globe, where I met my husband? (I would like to believe that we would've met anyway, that we were somehow destined to be together, but I don't think I can truly buy the idea of destiny.)

What if I hadn't decided, somewhat on a whim, to apply to Lesley's MFA program? What if I hadn't gone to the Ann Lammott reading on a snowy night in a church downtown, where I met the friend who ended up introducing me to the neighborhood in which I now live? What if...

When I was younger, I used to think that any changes to the major decisions in my life would lead me down a path to becoming a totally different person. Now, I think that despite the fact that every decision impacts the course of one's life, I'd be the same person with similar worries and goals no matter which road I chose.

Sunday Scribbilings: Hair

I read the Sunday Scribbling prompt earlier today, and have been trying to think of a good hair-related tale from my past. This is what I came up with:

I studied abroad in London in the spring of my Junior year. That semester was one of the best times in my life--a whole new continent to explore, a houseful of (mostly) wonderful women, some of whom I'm still good friends with, classes that gave little homework, and no other responsibilities to distract me from my job of having fun and soaking up a new country. I had even left behind my husband (then my boyfriend of 6 months), who, while not a responsibility exactly, did take up a lot of time and energy. (Love ya, bug!)

Since Bug was an ocean away, and since we had decided to stay monogamously together despite that fact, I decided that I would stop shaving my legs, and wouldn't start again until Bug came to visit. It was cold in London in January, when I arrived, and it showed no promise of warming up before March, when Bug's trip was planned. So skirts were out anyway.

My legs itched a bit for the first weeks, not used to so much hair brushing against their skin. But after that, I loved my hairy legs. At the time, I couldn't have told you why, or even why I was trying this fashion experiment of sorts. But looking back I know that it was a small sign of the wonderful freedoms that go along with moving to a place where very few people know your name, let alone your personal hygiene habits.

I shaved a few days before Bug's visit (a small price to pay to see the man you love! And that's not to say he would ever force me to shave anything. But, for better or worse I do buy into the Western culture's view of leg hair just not being sexy on a woman). That night in bed in my nightshirt, it felt nice to let my smooth legs rub up against one another, with no stubble to get snagged on the pills of my tattered sheets. But what was nicer was knowing that, in ways big and small, this was the time to reinvent myself, to try on as many different hats (or hairstyles as it were) as I possibly could.

Sunday Scribbilings: Slippery

Here's a very stream of consciousness take on this week's Sunday Scribblings' prompt, Slippery.

Slippery when wet, slippery=liar, slippery road, slippery slope, slippery soap, bubbles, sex, shower floors, flip-flops in the rain, ice, winter (which I've managed to pretend never existed and will never exist again), bare tires, frogs, eels, fish, any animal you're trying to catch, happiness.

Sunday Scribbilings: What's your sign?

My birthday was two days ago, which means that I'm a Cancer. According to astrology-online.com, cancers are:

Emotional and loving
Intuitive and imaginative
Shrewd and cautious
Protective and sympathetic
Changeable and moody
Overemotional and touchy
Clinging and unable to let go

I don't follow my horoscope. I can't believe that what someone predicts in a newspaper can somehow apply to me and the millions of other people who are born in the same month as I. That said, the Cancer description pretty much sums me up. The only trait on the list I'd question is shrewd and cautious. But overemotional and touchy? You got me there, horoscope.

Sunday Scribblings: Country vs. city

I spent most of today sleeping, when I should have been revising the stories I need to hand in in preparation for my MFA residency at the end of the month. I don't know if it's allergies or what, but I've had a huge headache since I woke up. (Hence all the sleeping). Anyway, I decided that in this break between naps, I'd multitask--doing both the Sunday Scribbling and some character development work. Here's one of my character's, Janine's, take on city vs. country. For other scribblings on the topic, click here.

I've lived in the country and the city, and everywhere in between. From Paris to Manhattan to upstate New York, I've called lots of places home. I don't think my soul was meant to stay put. And I don't think I have a favorite type of setting, either. Sometimes I need the craziness of the city, sometimes the calmness of the country.

But what I do need is a better sense of what I'm doing with my life. For the past 15 years or so, I've let random people and events push me from one place/job/life to another. A boyfriend wants to move to Paris? I went. A friend has an extra room in Barcelona? I was there in two weeks time.

I've liked these adventures, and I've learned a lot about the world. But for some reason I haven't learned enough about my own needs. (That reason has a lot to do with the fact that I learned to suppress them as a child, after my mom died and I didn't want to make my dad's life hard.) But now, my father has died too, and I'm an orphan at 38. I have no parents, no husband, no kids, and only a few friends scattered across the globe.

The only errand I have left involving my father's estate is transporting his bee collection to Delaware (from his house in upstate NY). After that's done, I can go back to Manhattan and... I don't know what. How does one go about figuring out what they want? Or, more pressingly, how does one figure out how to figure out what one wants?

Sunday Scribblings: Second Chances

This week's Sunday Scribblings had me stumped. I can think of minor things I'd like to do over, but nothing major. So I started to think about the topic in terms of my characters. My goal in just about every story I write is to give my characters something they wish they could do over, but to have them learn enough from the experience caused by the tragedy/mistake so as to make them somewhat glad they went through it.

And I guess maybe that's how I look at my own life, and why I can't think of too many regrets. I try to take something away from the crappy times my mistakes cause so that even if I don't enjoy them, I'm glad to have gone through them in some way.

PS--I'm taking myself off line this weekend in an attempt to relax, so I'll come visit others' scribblings next week.