Editing my manuscript

In a way, this feels like the most legitimate work I've ever done. An excerpt:

            Dinner is beef and broccoli with a side of television. We serve ourselves and my mother serves my father, who sits in the small dining nook wearing only his underwear. Middle and I are in charge of getting him drinks. He communicates through grunts and hand signals, pounding his chest like an ape for emphasis. Even Jonathan looks disgusted in his high chair.

          We take our places at the scarred bleached-wood table. I want to roll around in the wheeled dining-room chair until I vomit, but instead I load up my fork and put it to my lips. Small bites, I’d counseled myself in my journal. Chew well. Trick your stomach into thinking it’s not hungry.

          “I took her to Frye’s office today,” my mother says.

          Rooster makes a humph noise.

          “He said she was –”

          “Do you mind?” He doesn’t take his eyes from the screen. “Family Ties is on.”

Forthcoming from Woodhall Press: BEARDED LADY!

 

Today's writing

Oh shit. I really need to get out of here. Being in the middle has never been my bag, though sexually it was slightly hot, I can’t lie. There really was something about him having me from behind while I was going down on her. I’d seen it in movies, but never quite experienced it as I did with them here on this needs-to-be-replaced floor.

 

Baby, it’s a wild world. Cat Stevens only knew the half of it.

 

Still, I feel like I need to fly. This whole experience felt jagged, partway, unfinished, and I’m not looking to put it to rest. I have this weird need to find Andy, to sit him down and explain who and what and why and how I’m feeling about it, to have him hold me, to rub my feet, to help me make sense of it all. It may not occur to me until later, if at all, how selfish that impulse is, how Andy may be angry at me for stepping out on him or worse, that he might have concerns of his own and that they might not have anything to do with me. Sometimes it’s the absolute worst when something isn’t about you at all, like you’re pressing your nose against the cold glass of the situation, trying to make sense of it and utterly failing in the endeavor, alone in the task, shivering and regretful. When you realize life isn’t all about you, far from it. When you understand that you’re not in the middle after all, that you are not the nexus, that intersection of everything. When you understand that you are lingering and lonely, just like everyone else.

 

Two years ago

 

17 years

First real date at La Mediterranee on College. Wearing a short skirt. Nervous. Excited as fuck.

Today's writing

When I was six, I fell into the community pool. It wasn’t anything overly dramatic; it was simply the fact that one minute I was upright and dry and the next I was waterlogged and flailing. It took maybe a minute if not seconds, but in that time I could feel the importance of my life press upon my shoulders, like I had important things waiting in my future. What I didn’t realize was that I was so close to drowning I could taste, touch, smell, see it. Feel it. Understand it, in that way of a child. By the time I broke through that glassy surface something inside me had changed, an incontrovertible switch I would only truly understand right fucking now.

 

I should have known it was going to be weird. I mean, how could it not be? It’s a constant series of calculations, of checking in, making sure everyone’s feeling included because it would be impolite to leave someone out of the equation. It feels like walking down the street with your head continually turned, just in case.

 

Still, I manage to come several times. I mean, that’s just good manners.

 

“Jesus,” Danny says, trying a little too hard, “why haven’t we done this before?”

 

He’s trying to put one arm around each of us and neither of us is having it. It’s like she and I are in sync, and he’s just fallen behind a little bit. My poor little drummer boy. I couldn’t even tell you why I don’t want him to touch me.

 

Then again, maybe I can.

 

It’s not because of anything that took place in this weird triad we called sex, not because he cheated on me with Tabitha before we threw ourselves into this nonsensical void. It’s something that started before her, before this place, maybe even before his mother passed away.

 

It’s something called misguided love. And as I lie here with my ass pushed against the scratchy carpet of Guest House, I realize that we suffer from it. Now, realizing something means close to nothing if you don’t know what to do, but it’s at least a start. If you can name it, you can do something about it.

 

Right?

God, I love dogs

 

Trying to move

Have I mentioned that I hate where I live? It's pretty hardcore. Adam wants us to cull our belongings and start packing before we find a place, so that's where I'm at at the moment in my copious free time. Joy!

Cat Stevens, "Moonshadow"

Yes, I'm being followed by a moonshadow
Moonshadow, moonshadow
Leaping and hopping on a moonshadow
Moonshadow, moonshadow

And if I ever lose my hands
Lose my plow, lose my land
Oh, if I ever lose my hands
Oh, if, I won't have to work no more

And if I ever lose my eyes
If my colours all run dry
Yes, if I ever lose my eyes
Oh, if, I won't have to cry no more

Yes, I'm being followed by a moonshadow
Moonshadow, moonshadow
Leaping and hopping on a moonshadow
Moonshadow, moonshadow

And if I ever lose my legs
I won't moan, and I won't beg
Oh, if I ever lose my legs
Oh, if, I won't have to walk no more

And if I ever lose my mouth
All my teeth, north and south
Yes, if I ever lose my mouth
Oh, if, I won't have to talk

Did it take long to find me?
I ask the faithful light
Oh, did it take long to find me?
And, are you gonna stay the night?

I'm being followed by a moonshadow
Moonshadow, moonshadow
Leaping and hopping on a moonshadow
Moonshadow, moonshadow

Moonshadow, moonshadow
Moonshadow, moonshadow

Today's writing

I feel Danny’s hard-on in the corner, practically poking a hole in his Levi’s. I smell his insecurity, his uncertainty. I hear the jackhammer of his heart.

 

In contrast, Kelly is chill. She’s just looking at me like – whenever you want to start. I like that. Less pressure. “You know,” I say, “I’ve cleaned here, delivered food here, but never actually hung out. This place is nice.”

 

“Yeah,” she says, and we sit there like morons until I kiss her again. This time it’s different. Hotter, harder, longer. I feel the uptick, the sweat bead my brow, and I know she does too.

 

“I haven’t done this here either,” I say, and brush her hair with the back of my hand. Then I turn to Danny and smile. It’s like hot glue stretching across my face. I feel like there’s something I’m trying to prove to him, to her, to both of them, maybe to myself. Some point I’m trying to get across, some message to be communicated through lips and fingertips.

New House Day School, 2019

Pancakes and Pajamas Week.

Croce Plays Croce

Worth the drive down to Saratoga in the teeth of rush hour. Worth the ticket fee. Worth it. So worth it.

My puppies

They're getting older. It's like someone flipped a switch and my 11 1/2-year-old whirling dervishes somehow aged. My heart hurts today. I feel it, and I feel it keenly.

Brought to you by afternoon chill

 

En route home

Worried about Jack, who is showing signs of canine vestibular disease (if that's what it is, it's less worrisome than it looks, but still). A piece of plastic came loose on our car, scraping the road as we drove. The wind kicked up, pushing us around. Fuck, I thought. Fuck.

Tonight

ADAM: I thought you were still talking about dicks.

ME: I'm talking about tongues. Keep up.

Railroad Park Resort

 

A poem

Cardboard
 
Begin the exploration,
the excavation,
whatever you choose
to call it,
first groaning about the task.
 
So hard to leave your chair,
that bastion of tattered comfort.
So hard to set yourself in motion.
 
When it starts,
juggle a series of bags –
keep, donate, recycle –
the common wisdom
Marie Kondo
and your mother
might impart.
 
Plunge wrist-deep
into the task,
finding along the way
that you’re a minor-league failure.
 
Mail you never bothered to open.
shopping lists for dinners never made.
Get to the aborted love letter from 1996
abandon ship
seek port.

Today's writing

She seems really into it. That slight stiffness – she gets that when she’s down for it. Always has. Throws her head back just slightly so that I can kiss her. It’s not long before my tongue is in her mouth and my hands are on her tits.

 

Then she pushes me away.

 

What the hell? Am I supposed to pull out my goddamned pom-poms and watch them go at it? You could seriously create a new Pantone color out of my blue balls. I stand like an asshole, hovering over them. Jesus, this is history’s worst threesome and it hasn’t even really kicked off yet.

 

Five years ago

 

God, this was awful.

Just sheerly awful. Who the fuck wants to read about the trials and tribulations of two writers backstabbing each other? These two, at least. Yuck.

Today's writing

Danny’s somehow migrated to the corner. He’s crouching down, just watching. I can’t really get a good read on his face – that might be considered kind of rude when I’m supposed to be getting it on with this girl – but I can imagine it: the slight furrow above his brow when he’s concentrating, the purse of his lips, eyes wide with surprise. What’s going on for him right now, watching me make out with another person, a girl no less? I mean, maybe it doesn’t make a difference whether she’s a girl or a guy, but something tells me it does. There’s a reason that guys watch porn with two females and one male, right? Do they watch it with two guys and one girl as often? I guess there are no real statistics on that, are there?

 

Back to Tabitha. Back to getting it on. Back to paying attention to what I’m doing because I’ve never done this before. Never kissed another woman. Certainly never lay prone with one, hand dangerously close to her hip. Never felt that slippery mix of connection and confusion leading me into something small and narrow, a claustrophobic center that cannot hold.

 

Something surges inside of me and I kiss her hard. Under my mouth I can feel her thin lips, that quirk of surprise. They’re sturdy and stiff and in a way I feel that they’re fighting against me. That turns me on. I slide my hands down her arms to her wrists, hold them against the floor. She makes some sort of muffled noise. I take that for a good sign.

 

Then she somehow gets out from under me and maneuvers herself atop my body, flips the tables. We’re playing out the power exchange, pressing back against one another, yin-ing and yang-ing. She’s small but fierce and I can feel her intensity as I begin to run my fingers along her body.

 

Just as it’s getting good, Danny joins us.

Today's writing

I lift my pipe to my lips and take a grand old hit. Major, more so than normal. Somehow my head falls into my hand and I rub my forehead until I can almost feel the static electricity start to build. I should leave this place, and for more reasons than simply escaping the fire.

 

St. Orres is cloistered, a beautiful nunnery. People come here to escape, and they’re right for doing it. But what they’re escaping, what they think they’re leaving behind, comes right along with them. It hangs on fibers of their clothes and luggage, clinging onto car trunks and dog collars.

 

They may think they no longer feel it, and perhaps they don’t – they transfer it to us. We, the people who bring them their breakfast baskets, who fluff their pillows and change their sheets. We don’t just take care of them. We bear their burdens until the next batch pulls into the dusty parking lot.

Random note

Negativity is a nasty, nasty disease. Don't fall prey to catching it.

I admit sometimes I can be negative -- ask Adam, he'll tell you. But I am not nasty to others. When I experience that, it can really throw me off. 

I don't even use Twitter that much

 

Dude, I just scored a book deal.

— Allison Landa (@allisonlanda) September 30, 2021

15 years

That's how long it took to get Bearded Lady moving toward print. Along the way I went through three agents, a micro-press, many publisher requests, two editorial board meetings, and a ton of fits and starts.

Then there were all the changes at the personal level.

Moving in together. An engagement, a marriage. Professional rockiness. An unexpected pregnancy. All along the running undercurrent that something was missing. 

Getting a publishing contract isn't a panacea. But I'd be lying if I said it didn't feel fucking good. 

This was big when Adam and I got together

And so appropriate.

Jams in the morning

Girls call me Jolly Rancher
Cause I stay so hard 
You can suck me for a long time
Oh my God