Month: November 2011

Sitting around, shooting the shit with the folks. We talked about odds and ends. They’re fond of bringing up relationships, marriage, and just how different they are from each other. Mostly about how they piss each other off in a non-endearing way. I sometimes think ‘get divorced already’ which is depressingly juvenile.

This particular time, I was standing and leaning against the doorframe. I was looking into the kitchen, my pop sitting by the breakfast nook and mom putting things away near the stove. She was wearing old sweaters. She’d just turned fifty and I told her she was beautiful then, beautiful now, beautiful tomorrow. I said it in in all seriousness and lacked the charm that some people require in order to believe things. Pop was wondering about my girlfriends and why they’ve never met a single one. Mom just listened, being more respectful of privacy and all.

“It doesn’t last. I think I lack the patience for the kind of women I love. Most things.”

“So why don’t you go out and find another girl? Just a friend.” He believes in satisfying needs. No harm, no foul.

“No. I’m all in or I don’t bother.”

“But you can’t be alone forever.”

“Don’t worry. Life doesn’t allow me to be alone.”

“You’re like me,” said Mom. “You do it with your heart or you don’t try.” It was such a sad thing to say. The ‘don’t try’ part lingered.

Pop gave us a look that reflected we weren’t him. “I’m just saying you can have friends. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“Not at all, but not for me.”

We became silent until he spoke up.

“What was her name? This girl?”

I was going to ask which, but I couldn’t explain the complicated nature of the past year. Or rather, the sheer simplicity of the situation. So I just talked about the last girl I was with, and how kind and thoughtful she was. They were thrilled when I told them she cooked for me.

Something so simple. If this was the point—the cooking and the providing and the satisfying needs—I’d be in heaven.

Sitting around, shooting the shit with the folks. We talked about odds and ends. They’re fond of bringing up relationships, marriage, and just how different they are from each other. Mostly about how they piss each other off in a non-endearing way. I sometimes think ‘get divorced already’ which is depressingly juvenile.

This particular time, I was standing and leaning against the doorframe. I was looking into the kitchen, my pop sitting by the breakfast nook and mom putting things away near the stove. She was wearing old sweaters. She’d just turned fifty and I told her she was beautiful then, beautiful now, beautiful tomorrow. I said it in in all seriousness and lacked the charm that some people require in order to believe things. Pop was wondering about my girlfriends and why they’ve never met a single one. Mom just listened, being more respectful of privacy and all.

“It doesn’t last. I think I lack the patience for the kind of women I love. Most things.”

“So why don’t you go out and find another girl? Just a friend.” He believes in satisfying needs. No harm, no foul.

“No. I’m all in or I don’t bother.”

“But you can’t be alone forever.”

“Don’t worry. Life doesn’t allow me to be alone.”

“You’re like me,” said Mom. “You do it with your heart or you don’t try.” It was such a sad thing to say. The ‘don’t try’ part lingered.

Pop gave us a look that reflected we weren’t him. “I’m just saying you can have friends. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“Not at all, but not for me.”

We became silent until he spoke up.

“What was her name? This girl?”

I was going to ask which, but I couldn’t explain the complicated nature of the past year. Or rather, the sheer simplicity of the situation. So I just talked about the last girl I was with, and how kind and thoughtful she was. They were thrilled when I told them she cooked for me.

Something so simple. If this was the point—the cooking and the providing and the satisfying needs—I’d be in heaven.

There was a woman in my Cultural Archaeology class—back in 2001—who was about sixty years old. She seemed very kind, had one of those nice smiles that makes you look forward to the latter half of your life. She was much older than most of us, of course, and as a newly transplanted college kid I was still mystified by the notion of school as anything more than obligation. I could not accept that education could be enjoyable, let alone the hours of work that it takes to complete papers and homework assignments. This was also back when college didn’t cost so much so it wasn’t difficult to get into a school and continue plodding along with the old ways.

Anyway, this woman whose name escapes me, she was about sixty and in a class full of teenagers. She was also the most respectful and studious by my estimation. She and the professor had the honest to god adult conversations that none of the rest of us really know about. Not the eighteens, the nineteens, or any of those twenties. They were kids, that is to say we were. She was talking about that whole being old and in a classroom full of us and she said, “I’m just a career student. I always want to learn.” Which, again, was baffling as all hell. She smiled, of course, so I knew she was real in the way arrogant youths aren’t. I trusted my gut on that one. I don’t remember how she did in the class but I’m willing to say that she did damn well, probably top of the class if not near. Now she’s probably in her seventies and who knows what she’s up to. I like thinking she never stopped learning.

I forgot why I was writing this, to be honest. I just remembered her. It’s possible I’d been thinking about education and money. Money’s good for many things, which is probably why we want and need it, but a lot of those big things, houses and the like, just don’t interest me. Not yet, anyway. Perhaps when I’m older and wiser. Until then I look at money and all I think is that’s two years of school, or that’s a car I might need to get from A to Z. And I think of how I have things to learn and places to be. I’m appreciative of it and kind of don’t want to get wiser than always wanting to learn. Goddamn right I do.

theossuary:

This blog belies my real relationship with its subject matter. Despite all you’ve seen here, I don’t like death.

It’s probably time for me come out about a few things:

  • I’ve never seen a dead body. (That’s not counting bog bodies and mummies in museums.)
  • I have been fascinated with death — particularly its physical aspect — since childhood. Before I settled on my various courses of study in college and grad school, I considered becoming an undertaker, a forensic anthropologist, or a pathologist. I never did, of course. In high school, I took a course on sports medicine and during a slide show of injuries, I blacked out at the sight of a severed hand sitting on a table. I knew I wouldn’t be able to hang with that kind of career, and I’ve been only a spectator ever since.
  • I am deeply, terribly afraid of dying. This has been an issue for me since childhood, when I used to repeat the sentence “I am going to die” to myself in my head, over and over, in hopes that that would make the truth more understandable. But it never did. It still hasn’t, and I’m 33. I white-knuckle turbulence on planes. Meanwhile, my boyfriend is serene. He knows death is inevitable and doesn’t understand my fear. I know death is inevitable, too. But I don’t feel it, and I’m not ready to accept it yet.
  • When my father died in 2004, I was halfway across the country from him and wasn’t with him in his last few days. He and my mother didn’t want me to see what was happening to him. I have never asked my mother to tell me what watching him die was like. In my dreams, he keeps showing up, alive, like a logical puzzle I can’t ever solve. I still don’t fully comprehend the fact that he’s dead, even seven years later. I didn’t see it. I wonder if that’s why.

Thanks for reading.

I have no particular fascination with the subject, but information about death and its physical effects is always interesting. Not to mention the arts and rituals that human beings engage in to honor or otherwise meaningfully recognize death. I think this sort of education is what has made me so accepting of the inevitability of corporeal existence, and thus why I strive to live while I can, even if I fuck up along the way.

This is an interesting blog. It’s worth a follow.

Edit: Actually, all of Amanda’s blogs are awesome.

I usually expect people to know what they’re doing. If I am required to instruct I figure I may as well do it myself.

Out of the way. I’ll do this.

If I must explain, I don’t want to sit there and talk at length about it. My brain and the structure of my thoughts doesn’t allow me. I mean, you read the way I write. It’s goddamn jumbles. I start at the end and skip to the beginning then pause in the middle to explain about the end. This, I suspect, is why I appreciate short stories. I start in the middle of something and there really is no end. It started before me and it’s going to continue after I’m finished. I know what might happen but I don’t know how to verbalize it, nor do I want to.

I once arrived at home to find that Kelly was still there after I’d left her in my bed in the morning. She’d hung out and rifled through my odds and ends. It bugged her that I’d locked my computer when I live alone.

“Hey,” I said, honestly surprised.

“Hey.”

I leaned in to kiss her where she laid beneath the covers. “Been here all day?”

“Yup. I didn’t have to work and didn’t want to go home.”

It bothered me, to be honest. We’d just started dating. I didn’t expect that the first woman I’d have at my place would be her and it just bothered me.

“Hm. Hungry?”

“Hm, yes.” She rubbed the denim that clung to my thigh. She loved my thighs.

I softened up. My voice deepened as it is wont to do.

“We can go out. Later.”

“What about now?”

All sorts of things ran through my mind. At the top of my list was how much I loved her eyes when she smiled. She was young and took great care of herself, aesthetically speaking. Soft skin. She had no laugh lines but God, I wish she did purely for my own pleasure. She had the covers up to her neck. Her hair was pressed down beneath her head on the pillow.

“Your eyes are amazing.” Whether I’ve been blessed with beautifully eyed women in my life or just viewed them as reflections of everything I cared about in them, I don’t know.

She started to scoot the covers down and I stopped her.

“Don’t do that.”

“Why?”

“Just think of me,” I told her. “Think of how much I want you right now.”

“Want me?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

This baiting was, of course, maddening. And I hated baiting, but being that I was being equally manipulative I could not protest. I wasn’t even thinking about it on a conscious level. But I didn’t want to have to speak. I didn’t want to say a damn thing.

“Just as you are,” I said. “Just as you are right now in my bed.”

I moved my hand along the shadow of her thigh and stopped. I wanted to take over and take action. The thought of talking wore on me.

“Touch yourself,” I told her.

She parted her legs and began. I sat by and watched her face. I watched her eyes. Her breathing grew heavy and mine probably did as well, but I wasn’t thinking about that. I was thinking about fucking her, which I did in due and wanton course, but in the meantime I simply watched her face. Her nose crinkled in such a beautiful way that I wanted to kiss her.

She parted her lips as if to speak but I pressed my hand over her mouth. Neither of us needed to say anything.

There was a woman in my Cultural Archaeology class—back in 2001—who was about sixty years old. She seemed very kind, had one of those nice smiles that makes you look forward to the latter half of your life. She was much older than most of us, of course, and as a newly transplanted college kid I was still mystified by the notion of school as anything more than obligation. I could not accept that education could be enjoyable, let alone the hours of work that it takes to complete papers and homework assignments. This was also back when college didn’t cost so much so it wasn’t difficult to get into a school and continue plodding along with the old ways.

Anyway, this woman whose name escapes me, she was about sixty and in a class full of teenagers. She was also the most respectful and studious by my estimation. She and the professor had the honest to god adult conversations that none of the rest of us really know about. Not the eighteens, the nineteens, or any of those twenties. They were kids, that is to say we were. She was talking about that whole being old and in a classroom full of us and she said, “I’m just a career student. I always want to learn.” Which, again, was baffling as all hell. She smiled, of course, so I knew she was real in the way arrogant youths aren’t. I trusted my gut on that one. I don’t remember how she did in the class but I’m willing to say that she did damn well, probably top of the class if not near. Now she’s probably in her seventies and who knows what she’s up to. I like thinking she never stopped learning.

I forgot why I was writing this, to be honest. I just remembered her. It’s possible I’d been thinking about education and money. Money’s good for many things, which is probably why we want and need it, but a lot of those big things, houses and the like, just don’t interest me. Not yet, anyway. Perhaps when I’m older and wiser. Until then I look at money and all I think is that’s two years of school, or that’s a car I might need to get from A to Z. And I think of how I have things to learn and places to be. I’m appreciative of it and kind of don’t want to get wiser than always wanting to learn. Goddamn right I do.

theossuary:

This blog belies my real relationship with its subject matter. Despite all you’ve seen here, I don’t like death.

It’s probably time for me come out about a few things:

  • I’ve never seen a dead body. (That’s not counting bog bodies and mummies in museums.)
  • I have been fascinated with death — particularly its physical aspect — since childhood. Before I settled on my various courses of study in college and grad school, I considered becoming an undertaker, a forensic anthropologist, or a pathologist. I never did, of course. In high school, I took a course on sports medicine and during a slide show of injuries, I blacked out at the sight of a severed hand sitting on a table. I knew I wouldn’t be able to hang with that kind of career, and I’ve been only a spectator ever since.
  • I am deeply, terribly afraid of dying. This has been an issue for me since childhood, when I used to repeat the sentence “I am going to die” to myself in my head, over and over, in hopes that that would make the truth more understandable. But it never did. It still hasn’t, and I’m 33. I white-knuckle turbulence on planes. Meanwhile, my boyfriend is serene. He knows death is inevitable and doesn’t understand my fear. I know death is inevitable, too. But I don’t feel it, and I’m not ready to accept it yet.
  • When my father died in 2004, I was halfway across the country from him and wasn’t with him in his last few days. He and my mother didn’t want me to see what was happening to him. I have never asked my mother to tell me what watching him die was like. In my dreams, he keeps showing up, alive, like a logical puzzle I can’t ever solve. I still don’t fully comprehend the fact that he’s dead, even seven years later. I didn’t see it. I wonder if that’s why.

Thanks for reading.

I have no particular fascination with the subject, but information about death and its physical effects is always interesting. Not to mention the arts and rituals that human beings engage in to honor or otherwise meaningfully recognize death. I think this sort of education is what has made me so accepting of the inevitability of corporeal existence, and thus why I strive to live while I can, even if I fuck up along the way.

This is an interesting blog. It’s worth a follow.

Edit: Actually, all of Amanda’s blogs are awesome.

I usually expect people to know what they’re doing. If I am required to instruct I figure I may as well do it myself.

Out of the way. I’ll do this.

If I must explain, I don’t want to sit there and talk at length about it. My brain and the structure of my thoughts doesn’t allow me. I mean, you read the way I write. It’s goddamn jumbles. I start at the end and skip to the beginning then pause in the middle to explain about the end. This, I suspect, is why I appreciate short stories. I start in the middle of something and there really is no end. It started before me and it’s going to continue after I’m finished. I know what might happen but I don’t know how to verbalize it, nor do I want to.

I once arrived at home to find that Kelly was still there after I’d left her in my bed in the morning. She’d hung out and rifled through my odds and ends. It bugged her that I’d locked my computer when I live alone.

“Hey,” I said, honestly surprised.

“Hey.”

I leaned in to kiss her where she laid beneath the covers. “Been here all day?”

“Yup. I didn’t have to work and didn’t want to go home.”

It bothered me, to be honest. We’d just started dating. I didn’t expect that the first woman I’d have at my place would be her and it just bothered me.

“Hm. Hungry?”

“Hm, yes.” She rubbed the denim that clung to my thigh. She loved my thighs.

I softened up. My voice deepened as it is wont to do.

“We can go out. Later.”

“What about now?”

All sorts of things ran through my mind. At the top of my list was how much I loved her eyes when she smiled. She was young and took great care of herself, aesthetically speaking. Soft skin. She had no laugh lines but God, I wish she did purely for my own pleasure. She had the covers up to her neck. Her hair was pressed down beneath her head on the pillow.

“Your eyes are amazing.” Whether I’ve been blessed with beautifully eyed women in my life or just viewed them as reflections of everything I cared about in them, I don’t know.

She started to scoot the covers down and I stopped her.

“Don’t do that.”

“Why?”

“Just think of me,” I told her. “Think of how much I want you right now.”

“Want me?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

This baiting was, of course, maddening. And I hated baiting, but being that I was being equally manipulative I could not protest. I wasn’t even thinking about it on a conscious level. But I didn’t want to have to speak. I didn’t want to say a damn thing.

“Just as you are,” I said. “Just as you are right now in my bed.”

I moved my hand along the shadow of her thigh and stopped. I wanted to take over and take action. The thought of talking wore on me.

“Touch yourself,” I told her.

She parted her legs and began. I sat by and watched her face. I watched her eyes. Her breathing grew heavy and mine probably did as well, but I wasn’t thinking about that. I was thinking about fucking her, which I did in due and wanton course, but in the meantime I simply watched her face. Her nose crinkled in such a beautiful way that I wanted to kiss her.

She parted her lips as if to speak but I pressed my hand over her mouth. Neither of us needed to say anything.

In pondering the problem of going out with a bang of desperation and bitterness, consider ego. People don’t generally want to be forgettably benign. Even the dispassionate desire an emotional response to their existence, whether happiness or disgust or hatred. To be readily dismissed as one who was once cared for but is now forgotten—or worse, perceived to be a non-threatening element—is to lose control over not only someone else but the part of oneself that was wholly dedicated to being an influence. The type of influence is sometimes irrelevant.

There is no more effective nourishment for the ego than acting or speaking and receiving a response.

The happenstance of running into an ex is unknown to me. I am either a homebody or so far out there that the chance of running into anyone familiar is significantly reduced. So, when I saw Marlene walking down the aisle toward me I had to stop and be sure that she was smiling at me, and that it was in fact her. Her hair was no longer the old peroxide orange. It was more of a dark cherry. Her hips and breasts had expanded, and she wore unflattering clothes. My verbal thinking was merely that she’s grown up.

The first thing she said was, “Oh, my God!”

And then she brought her arms out and I hugged her.

“Hey. Look at you.”

“And you! It’s been so long. Like, more than ten years? You have so much hair on your face! It feels so different.”

“So I’m told. How are you doing?”

“Ah, busy! Everyone’s coming over and I forgot so many things.”

“Who’s everyone?”

“Mi ama, Carlos, ALL of Ruben’s family.” She laughed and placed her hand on my arm in a familiar way. “I’m married! I forgot to tell you. What about you?”

“Notoriously single. Kids?”

“Yes, two. Here…” She produced a wallet from her purse and pointed at two boys in a photograph. “Ruben Junior y Danny.”

“How old are they?”

“Well, Junior is ten—I got pregnant with him at the end of high school—and Danny is eight.”

“Good ages. They’re strong-looking boys.”

“Ruben takes them out to futbol. He makes them practice every single day.”

“Yea, well. Practice makes perfect.”

“Yea, I know, I know… So what are you doing?”

“Oh, just picking up some buns for dinner. My mom forgot some things, too.”

“Como estan?”

“Good, good. They’re doing good. Just worrying about all the people that will be there, like you.”

“Your mom sola?”

“No, my brother’s girlfriend is helping with the turkey. The rest of us still watch movies and hang out with the cars.”

“Que huevones!”

“Yea, I know.”

“Pero es bueno. It’s good you’re together. Where are you living? Are you coming for Christmas?”

“Up in Oregon. I don’t know about this Christmas. I might just spend it alone somewhere.”

“Really? But you hated being alone.”

I perceived this as a weakness to be abhored. I didn’t like her saying it out loud.

“Asi es. We used to be some things, and now we’re others.”

“I know. You’re right.”

She paused long enough for me to crane my neck in search of a clock, or a person, or whatever she wanted to imagine.

“I better get going. I need to get this stuff back to the house.”

“Oh, me too. It was so good seeing you! Tell your mom I said hi!”

We hugged again and she went on her way. I watched her walk. If I’d only seen her from the back I would have never recognized her. Two boys, I thought.