If I swallowed truth serum

Could you handle hearing it?

2011, St. Louis

 

The world is full of signs

The trick is following them.

He became a father

Our friend Maya says that she watched Adam become a father when he gave a speech at Baz's bris. She's right.

Prague

I was standing

You were there

Two worlds collided

And they could never tear us apart

Written to a friend

Maybe that's how feelings change: not because you try to make them change, but because you can't stop them from changing.

Pride Festival in Downtown Berkeley, 2019

Back in the quaint days when you could, y'know, gather.

This morning's meditation

Yoga with Adriene. She rocks!

Natalie Goldberg at the Upaya Zen Center

You can't just be out there, asleep or with the constellations. You have to brush your teeth. You have to drink a cup of coffee.

Full talk here.

Name one bad idea

I’ll take looking up exes for a thousand, Alex. 

Nadia Bolz-Weber on Christmas

So I am delighted to finally say Merry Christmas, because we could use some good news of great joy for all the people right about now.

And I believe that the Christ child is always born where he is most needed, where he is most cherished, where he is most potent. So wherever in your life you need this babe – that is always where he is to be found. 

Whoever listening right now who needs this baby…

It is unto you a child is born.

Unto you.

Unto you the mother without her own children.

Unto you an addict who can’t keep clean.

Unto you the survivor.

Unto you who can’t lose it because you have to keep it together for everyone else.

Unto you the bullied kid.

Unto you whose family never got you.

Unto you who lost your parents this year.

Unto you who doesn't know how in the world you can keep going.

Unto you.

Unto you a child is born. And also unto me. 

And also unto me and all who already smell of sheep and grass a dirt. 

Because the Christ child is always born wherever he is most needed. Wherever a soul needs to feel it’s worth.

Merry Christmas, family.

Amen.

This morning's writing

We lived at 13442 Black Hills Road, accessed by Salmon River Road and Sawtooth Way. I mention these because they are such anomalies in the San Diego world of streets. Most are Spanish for honeysuckle or dog dick. For a town that near-obsessively protects its southern border, San Diego is whooped on the language. It’s pretty until you realize that it’s all the same. Then it seems prettier because monochrome is sometimes the way to go. No real need to differentiate, to shift your vision. Only Caminito and Bernardo and Rancho Penasquitos, which was where we lived, and if you can picture a shitload of red tile roofs – minus ours, stubbornly shingle because my father was too cheap to upgrade – and scrub-brush lawns, you’ve got it.

 There is no need for cynicism. It’s just the suburbs. But as it so happens, the burbs make a particularly nice home for it. It’s a comfy home, an apt one. In the 1980s the suburbs looked slightly different only because there were different chains: Crown Books instead of Barnes & Noble, Heidi’s Frozen Yogurt rather than TCBY. Eminent domain hadn’t yet come to Paseo Montalban; the Ted Williams Parkway hadn’t rendered the destruction of so many burrito joints. Yet the loved was the loved regardless of how cookie-cutter it might appear. In kindergarten my mother took us by foot to the 7-Eleven after school, choosing carefully from ice creams stacked in frozen cases. That walk down Carmel Mountain Road a beloved eternity, hands linked, me and my brother always shunted away from roadside so that in the event of a terrible accident, my mother would get clocked first. Who said parenthood doesn’t equal sacrifice?

THREE WOMEN, Lisa Taddeo

Some people, Maggie thinks, live their lives as if they are sure they're going to get another one. One more chance to be cool and popular or smart and rich and have a lot of sex. They act as though it's okay to hang back on this one and merely watch it like a movie. Maggie is devoutly Catholic and doesn't believe in multiple lives. She's intent on making the most out of this one. She wants to experience everything, but she also wants to follow the mandates of her religion. She was upset, for example, when Melia first told her she was pregnant. It isn't right to have sex outside of marriage. But Emily, the little girl, is sinless, starry. Maggie can't imagine her born of sin. Especially now that Dane and Melia have one resounding last name. They have a blender. Nothing is as Catholic and binding as a clean, white blender. 

Just written in email

I think you have to get there organically, whatever the hell that means. I guess what I mean by that is that no one else can tell you where to go with it, how to feel, or where you draw the line. I think I just hit this point today where I was like -- no. I don't have unlimited time. I don't have unlimited energy. I want to believe I have both, but I have neither. It saddened me, but it also woke me up. All the repeated things I do, the things I grumble over, the things I dread or come close to regretting -- they don't have to happen. Hand-washing underwear where there's been a potty accident, yes. I just did that. That's a given. The things that are taking my life away cell by cell -- that's a different story. But you have to get to a certain place with it. I don't know that there's any controlling it.

Heather Farm Playground

We took Baz out to Walnut Creek yesterday. Something so normal as a playground visit -- but it was amazing too. He's been in the house too much. He hasn't been around other kids enough. It was awesome to see him play and enjoy himself.

What happens when I try to write

 

Ocean breaths and roller-coaster breaths

Baz has the awesome transitional-kindergarten teacher. She's amazing. Part of what she teaches are meditation principles: ocean breaths, roller-coaster breaths, star breaths. I know you can laugh and say, Jesus, Berkeley. I do and yet I don't. It's what I want him to learn.

That doesn't mean he'll always be in the Berkeley school system. I don't want to live here forever. But I do like the schools -- and the enrichment. He's got two dance classes, music, gardening, library. Virtual schooling can be a pain in the ass, but at least I get to see what he does up close and personal.

Today's writing

Make yourself at home. Cliché, right? Except for a six-year-old, the one looking for exactly that. A first-grader doesn’t know pleasantry, only that words spoken are promises meant. “Thank you,” I said, and I imagine her looking down into who I was, who I remain: the wide-eyed, the slightly disbelieving. To this day I cannot imagine someone is actually in love with me; tell that to my husband of 12 years. I cannot believe I too could be wanted, desired, needed.

Or in this case, welcomed.

 

This morning's writing

The Morrisons’ house stood out. A two-story Mediterranean that towered more than it sprawled, it was soon to impress me with its surprises. The entryway, first off, was huge, the marble floor dappled by strategic light from an oval chandelier. Down two oval steps was the living room, a space that looked like it hadn’t been used once since the furniture was set into place. A dual-step platform led to an impressive circular staircase, but we didn’t go up there. Instead Leslie – Mrs. Morrison – led me through a pastel kitchen into a wonderfully jumbled family room.

 

That’s where the girls were.

 

The female energy in that space was nearly enough to cause me to back out through the French doors, past the poodle and into the pool.

You Wear it Well

Texting with Marcus, I wrote: "Right? I wear it well." (Don't ask what I was responding to.)

His response:

Today's writing

When we got to the front door my mind locked up. Something shut down inside of me, went hard and flat. An envelope of sorts, mailing thoughts, emotions, fears. Wait a minute, Mr. Postman. The front door itself was a sculpted master class in craftsmanship. The whorls alone could rival a fingertip, the depth, the intricacy. The ugliness was so deep that it was lovely. It was beautiful in that way that six-year-olds regard as beautiful, something gaudy and careless, something without the significance of subtlety or the framing of creative fear. It was simply what it was, and what it was was one crazy piece of shit.

 

I reached for my mother’s hand. She looked at me as if I were a mental disease and she the reluctant lithium. “What’s with you?”

 

Scared, I said. I was scared.

 

“Jesus Christ. It’s a sleepover, not a scalping.”

 

She jabbed at the doorbell with such force that I thought she’d knock off her Lee Press-On. I grabbed that hand, too. We stood there with both hands entwined. It could have been a sweet goddamn moment, but this was my mother.

 

Leslie Morrison came to the door. She was taller and darker than my mother. She held a cigarette. Do parents still do that today? Aren’t they all relegated to puffing in some dark outpost of the backyard?

Cool Hand Luke

 

Yes, I delete posts all the time.

Why do you ask?

Early-morning writing

The take-your-order guy, also known as a waiter in case you forgot restaurant terminology, looks from one face to the next. “You folks ready?”

 

“Yeah,” your father says, “I’ll have the kippers and eggs.”

 

You find kippers disgusting, but what does it matter? You don’t have to eat it. You know your father will try to pull family-style on you, though, lifting from his plate, stealing from yours. Share and share alike, right, Steve? Adam always manages to slip out of this tradition, leaving it to you and your father to share even though you hate sharing food – probably because you grew up on this horseshit.

 

You order the Reuben – a whole, not a half, with a side of matzoh ball soup. You can hear Adam silently losing his mind. You’ll never finish this meal. You’ll never even begin to consume these mass quantities. But they won’t go wasted.

 

“I’ll have two latkes,” Adam says, knowing he’ll be able to tuck into your food. Share, as we say, and share alike.

 

Coffees and waters all around, and take-your-order guy retreats to the kitchen to get matters going. “But,” your father says, “we didn’t order anything for Baz.”

 

“He’ll eat what we eat.”

 

Your father regards Adam as the human equivalent of shit on a shingle. “Will he eat what we eat?” he asks you.

 

You shrug. Of course he will. Or, rather, he’ll eat a piece of toast, nibble on some type of meat or another, maybe deign to try a latke, and all will be well. Your father seems to regard your son as some type of strange space creature with his own set of rules and regulations. He’s just a damn kid. You love him, he’s your heart, but he’s just a kid.

 

Here’s the thing, though: you’re jealous of him, jealous of the fact that your father takes such an interest in him. When he was first born, your father said: “I’d like to come up every few months to watch him grow up. I don’t want him not to know his grandpa.” Touching, true, but also dispiriting. You lived in the same house as him for 18 years and he rarely showed interest in your knowing him. Times change, of course, but let’s face it: our hearts continue to sing the same song.

Deborah sent me this

It's pretty goddamned accurate. 

We're all living so many lies. The work of life is to get down to the fucking truth and do something about it. Starting now. 

The edge

Some days you feel like you're going to fall apart. There's a moment like that in every day for me. I yelled at Baz this morning: "Fuck!" He was pissing me off and I had had it. I've had it with everything. 

"You're good"

Earlier this year, we were thrown out of couples counseling. "I see you two," our counselor said. "You're good."

Adam crows about that shit. "We got thrown out," he says. "Don't tell me we're not good."

The Meatball

 

A record

I did an overnight in Santa Cruz this weekend. Took not one picture, wrote not a single Facebook post. This wasn't about reportage. It was about sanity. It was Adam's idea. "Why don't you do an overnight?" he said. "Before the lockdown comes down."

I didn't do a whole hell of a lot. Hung out on Pacific Avenue. Froze my way through a delicious dinner where Adam and I once sat and watched waitstaff dance. Listened to the most ridiculous public-broadcasting show ever. ("Can we talk about the patriarchy in Santa Cruz? Can we?") 

Less than 24 hours. Necessary.

Beginning of a new essay

Your father doesn’t do anything halfway. That includes getting a Radio Flyer for your son. He comes up with the idea while visiting during a September weekend. Baz has just turned four. His hair extends down beyond his shoulders. You have yet to learn he may be autistic. You have so much to learn.

 

“He needs a wagon,” your dad says. By now he’s almost entirely bald. He looks nothing like the man who raised you. He looks – if you are to be honest – like a latter-day Chevy Chase: round of cheek, gray of face. And Chevy Chase was always known to be a son of a bitch.

 

“He doesn’t need anything other than what he has,” your husband says. You stuff another pickle in your mouth because you’re at Saul’s and they’re free and it keeps you from freaking out over the fact that they always, always fight. Saul’s is what Moses would look like if he lived in Berkeley for a while: Judaism, hippified. They do a hell of a Reuben, though.

 

“Let me amend that,” your father says, leaving out the operative word: asshole. “I’m going to buy him a wagon. And I’m going to pull him around in it until I drop dead of a heart attack.”

 

The framed photos quiver on the wall. An earthquake, hyper-localized.

 

Your father and husband can barely stand each other. Never much could. Being around them is like being in a gas chamber filled with fruit flies. Not only do you die a horrible death, but you do it with them. Your husband tries to tell him something in his halting way and your father barely restrains his impatience. Your father talks about his points and miles and your husband only partly bites back his laughter. Derision, frustration; this lends to the type of environment that has you eating extra pickles because otherwise you’d have to address it. None of you really wants that.

 

2015

 

Andrea Fella on truth

Let's look at what's true in terms of what's true in the moment. What's the truth of this experience right now? The truth is that the mind is spinning, trying to figure something out. That's the truth of the moment ... What's arising? What is this experience that's arising?

2009

Love this creepy picture by our wedding photographer, Luke Snyder. 

Recent writing

This is what happens to you since you move here: you grow hard. Your soul, sharpened on the treeless sidewalks, the glaring lights, the thumping music that takes you from day into night and back again. Your eyes, narrowed against the abandoned cars, stolen and crashed and stowed here on the Berkeley-Oakland border, hoods stripped to reveal the guts inside, seats pushed forward so thieves can take what they can grab.