"I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love." ...on the picnic table outside Kip's.
I'm with a man who gets drunk and quotes poetry on a picnic table with a red Sharpie he keeps in the kitchen uniform he's worn straight from work to the bar. Life is good.
I want to be alone and not surrounded by tourists or coworkers, so 4PM finds me at the bar I left just 14 hours ago.
Caught up with my sister earlier. From her concerned words I could easily gather that the whole family is worried about me. Sometimes, I worry too, but most of the time I live happily an exhilarated life.
At 26, if I were to be hit by a dumb tourist looking for elk in his Escalade, on my bike broken and bleeding out on the Sun Road half a mile from Rising, I suspect I would feel content with the life I'd chosen to live. I don't ever wish I had stayed at home studying political science, going to frat parties and meticulously selecting nailpolish at the CVS.
Quoth Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits, "Slippin' and slidin', hey life's a rollerball."
That there is such ignorance and illiteracy in this country baffles me. Y'know, how people like text each other from the same room while they're both in it? Yeah.
Living in MT for so long now has made me feel like I'm becoming more authentic all the time. Practical. Down to earth, with less and less patience for trivial bullshit despite my naturally patient demeanor... Cut to the chase, don't be an idiot, leave me be if I ask you to.
The east coast is hell on my psyche after so much Montana, and while I look back romantically on my years in Austin I don't think I'd go back to stay.
So my family's worried about me, but I'm perfectly alright up here.
I think they've just had a hard time watching me slip away. For 15 months now I've been entirely out of their reach - not an hour's drive away, but 2500 miles away. I've had some serious hardships but I've been learning more than I ever expected to, and blossoming this summer into something really Content.
Missoula is a beautiful little city, and working in Glacier is a phenomenal way to spend the summer - are you kidding? I've made solid, good friendships, met such a kind (and smokin' hot) man, and I could turn a corner and see a bear at any given moment.
I relish in the moments I come to remember where I live, and how, relative to the 9-to-5ers posting on Facebook about their new washer/dryer. I don't mean to come across like an asshole - there are plenty of times when I want a more secure setup. I've just been hitting the gas and feeling defiant for about 8 years now - shifting around every 4-8 months or so. I can't recall my old address in San Antonio - sometimes I forget that I even lived there.
Quoth The Beatles:
"Oh that magic feeling - nowhere to go."
SO! Writing workshops.
Friday, August 22, 2014
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
bleah!
here's this thing I just dug up from the bowels of my computer, illustrating a little of the dark, dear bloggery...! I don't always feel this way, I don't even often get down and out like this, but nonetheless.. whatever.. here's some whiny shit.
I think I am becoming a nihilist, if I’m not incidentally one already.
I think I am becoming a nihilist, if I’m not incidentally one already.
I manage to make a few plans
and I manage to follow through with a few of them.
It’s 2014, the fucking world
is terminal.
I am part of what’s called
the human race. I am a sickness, and I am waiting around to die. I consume
almost without much restraint. If I can get it, I will. If I can eat it, if I
can drink it, drive it, use it, turn it on, smoke it, wear it, throw it away, I
will. Oh don’t worry I drink a lot of water, too, and I have a bagel every
morning, and I brush my teeth at least twice a day. I drive a car. I eat frozen
pizzas but I buy the ones that seem healthier. Like sometimes the way a product
is packaged? Makes it look healthier?
I want it to be the ‘50s, I
want to be a housewife who writes and gets published sometimes, with a
professor husband, and I want to make meals and clean up and live modestly.
It’s 2014.
Of course all I want to do is listen to music,
read nonfiction, drink alone, stare at my face in
the mirror and pluck blackheads from my nose with my thumbnail, be
judgmental, project my flip-side winning and emotionally mature personality, marvel at how
I manage to go about the daily routine, how I manage to do anything at all.
Saturday, April 12, 2014
April Skies
Took one of my spontaneous drives today. They're becoming a weekly tradition.
This time, a first! Drove 45 minutes east on I-90 to stop in the tiny town of Drummond for a coffee + Milky Way bar before turning back.
Followed the Clark Fork and the railroad. Passed the entrance to a railroad tunnel and when I saw clear thru it, I saw a green light on the signal beyond, and the lamps of a BNSF locomotive approaching further down the line.
Passed by an old dilapidated homestead - tiny house, old dark wood, weathered + abandoned - in a high valley near the Sapphire Mountains. The river was across the Interstate from the house but it didn't used to be...
I let loose my imagination and luxuriated in the thought of a small family of frontierspeople, pushing west - west - West - West -West - West, and coming to that one little spot, and the pioneer husband, the pioneer father, he stops and puts his hands on his hips and absorbs his surroundings, says something like "House right there, barn over there," and nods slowly.
I pretended that I-90 wasn't there even though I was driving 75mph on it, and I tried to see the land as it was so recently virgin - even 150 years ago.
I had to reel my wandering perception in for the crazy weather as I approached Drummond - high cross-winds from the north, and blowing sleet.
The tiny town looked like a typical Montanan tiny-town. Hardware store, saloon, one or two little cafes, and anti-meth messages painted on old buildings.
Going back toward Missoula the weather over the pass had become more exciting. My iPod shuffled to "Life In A Northern Town" by the Dream Academy, one of my favorite guilty pleasures, and produced by David Gilmour so don't hate! Hard wind swirling bands of big snowflakes coming down, blowing horizontally, swooping diagonally. It was so beautiful to drive through such dramatic weather - temperature plummeting, a freak fast and short-lived April snowstorm up in the mountains somewhere northwest of Anaconda.. like Winter knows it's dying but has enough desperate energy to spasm and wreak havoc briefly over Granite County.
Jaw dropped, eyes opened wide, the fluttering flakes flew in a grey frenzy against the stark sky, obscuring the mountains all around my little car, rolling swiftly sideways, & my breath was taken, & I turned up the volume for that song, & today's braided pigtails were worn with pride.
This time, a first! Drove 45 minutes east on I-90 to stop in the tiny town of Drummond for a coffee + Milky Way bar before turning back.
Followed the Clark Fork and the railroad. Passed the entrance to a railroad tunnel and when I saw clear thru it, I saw a green light on the signal beyond, and the lamps of a BNSF locomotive approaching further down the line.
Passed by an old dilapidated homestead - tiny house, old dark wood, weathered + abandoned - in a high valley near the Sapphire Mountains. The river was across the Interstate from the house but it didn't used to be...
I let loose my imagination and luxuriated in the thought of a small family of frontierspeople, pushing west - west - West - West -West - West, and coming to that one little spot, and the pioneer husband, the pioneer father, he stops and puts his hands on his hips and absorbs his surroundings, says something like "House right there, barn over there," and nods slowly.
I pretended that I-90 wasn't there even though I was driving 75mph on it, and I tried to see the land as it was so recently virgin - even 150 years ago.
I had to reel my wandering perception in for the crazy weather as I approached Drummond - high cross-winds from the north, and blowing sleet.
The tiny town looked like a typical Montanan tiny-town. Hardware store, saloon, one or two little cafes, and anti-meth messages painted on old buildings.
Going back toward Missoula the weather over the pass had become more exciting. My iPod shuffled to "Life In A Northern Town" by the Dream Academy, one of my favorite guilty pleasures, and produced by David Gilmour so don't hate! Hard wind swirling bands of big snowflakes coming down, blowing horizontally, swooping diagonally. It was so beautiful to drive through such dramatic weather - temperature plummeting, a freak fast and short-lived April snowstorm up in the mountains somewhere northwest of Anaconda.. like Winter knows it's dying but has enough desperate energy to spasm and wreak havoc briefly over Granite County.
Jaw dropped, eyes opened wide, the fluttering flakes flew in a grey frenzy against the stark sky, obscuring the mountains all around my little car, rolling swiftly sideways, & my breath was taken, & I turned up the volume for that song, & today's braided pigtails were worn with pride.
Tuesday, April 1, 2014
Springtime in Montana is here!
I didn't know, couldn't tell how much I was going to love it.
I ended my previous journal with the final dozen-or-so pages left blank. That journal was bleak and it ended well with winter's curtain call. Whup-de-f*ing Do. Bra-vo.
My new journal is ROBIN'S EGG BLUE!! and the sky above today was blue... and my sweater is periwinkle... and my bike is blue.
That's right, dear diary, my bike is here.
Saturday I dropped it off at the shop around the corner.
Picked it up yesterday evenin' and pedaled home - walked back for my car. It was perfect.
So as soon as I drove home from collecting the Beefmobile, I went on a ride around town. Aaahhh.
I did it again today after work despite a ten-hour shift.
All the way from Austin, my bike!
I got it (and its tune-ups) at Clown Dog... San Jacinto at 30th St maybe... and it became my best friend. We got to know each other at the house on Brookdale, on the east side. Over I-35 on 51st, down Duval toward Hyde Park where I worked.
We were together on Tisdale.
The studio on Woodrow. <3 Dozens of days of triple-digit temperatures. Parking at Spider House and stumbling in to the bathroom, shedding earbuds and sunglasses, to towel the sweat off my face and neck.
...Then two years ago, Glacier happened. I left my bike in CandEban's garage. I worked in MT, got a car in VA over the winter, and worked in MT again.
Just now I endured a long, cold, lonely winter (indeed, George Harrison) but, yes! here comes the sun!
and my bike is in Montana!
It's learning Missoula! We're watchful of rogue potholes!
For the first time I can coast through residential neighborhoods and look up to Mt Sentinel and Mt Jumbo, or to the Bitterroot Range when I turn westward to come home.
The crepe myrtles and grackles are down in TX.
Up here it's lodgepole pines and a skyline of mountains.
...and in June, my bike will be with me at Rising Sun. We'll be on Going-to-the-Sun Road together. Man oh man.
I'm beginning my 56th journal the opposite of how my last one began. This one? I'm remembering to number it for Chrissake, I'm beginning it happily and I'm single and it's not about to be winter; it's the very onset of spring. I do not feel stuck in any way - I feel free. I do not feel stumped, I feel thankful and I feel that good ol' "creative perception" kicking in again.
So now, again, I can make every day into a work of art by being open and happy, and able to embrace appreciation.
I'm not in a cluttered, boozey, dank basement apartment crying 3x/week because I can't believe the relationship I'd believed in turned out to be such a waste of time.
Things are looking up!
This is good.
I ended my previous journal with the final dozen-or-so pages left blank. That journal was bleak and it ended well with winter's curtain call. Whup-de-f*ing Do. Bra-vo.
My new journal is ROBIN'S EGG BLUE!! and the sky above today was blue... and my sweater is periwinkle... and my bike is blue.
That's right, dear diary, my bike is here.
Saturday I dropped it off at the shop around the corner.
Picked it up yesterday evenin' and pedaled home - walked back for my car. It was perfect.
So as soon as I drove home from collecting the Beefmobile, I went on a ride around town. Aaahhh.
I did it again today after work despite a ten-hour shift.
All the way from Austin, my bike!
I got it (and its tune-ups) at Clown Dog... San Jacinto at 30th St maybe... and it became my best friend. We got to know each other at the house on Brookdale, on the east side. Over I-35 on 51st, down Duval toward Hyde Park where I worked.
We were together on Tisdale.
The studio on Woodrow. <3 Dozens of days of triple-digit temperatures. Parking at Spider House and stumbling in to the bathroom, shedding earbuds and sunglasses, to towel the sweat off my face and neck.
...Then two years ago, Glacier happened. I left my bike in CandEban's garage. I worked in MT, got a car in VA over the winter, and worked in MT again.
Just now I endured a long, cold, lonely winter (indeed, George Harrison) but, yes! here comes the sun!
and my bike is in Montana!
It's learning Missoula! We're watchful of rogue potholes!
For the first time I can coast through residential neighborhoods and look up to Mt Sentinel and Mt Jumbo, or to the Bitterroot Range when I turn westward to come home.
The crepe myrtles and grackles are down in TX.
Up here it's lodgepole pines and a skyline of mountains.
...and in June, my bike will be with me at Rising Sun. We'll be on Going-to-the-Sun Road together. Man oh man.
I'm beginning my 56th journal the opposite of how my last one began. This one? I'm remembering to number it for Chrissake, I'm beginning it happily and I'm single and it's not about to be winter; it's the very onset of spring. I do not feel stuck in any way - I feel free. I do not feel stumped, I feel thankful and I feel that good ol' "creative perception" kicking in again.
So now, again, I can make every day into a work of art by being open and happy, and able to embrace appreciation.
I'm not in a cluttered, boozey, dank basement apartment crying 3x/week because I can't believe the relationship I'd believed in turned out to be such a waste of time.
Things are looking up!
This is good.
Monday, March 3, 2014
blizzard March 2 snowed in fer days
It's a monumental day in a number of ways:
Julie and I got out of the house for like four hours! We walked to the mall! We walked around IN the mall! We sat down to a lovely lunch!
It was cold but pleasant to plod single-file down the game trail of pedestrian tracks down Johnson St... sidewalks, curbs still totally invisible. As above, so below -- the sky and ground matched starkly white all day and still do. The opaque strip of the visible world seemed powerless to wear any colors today. Even the red car I see across the street now looks grey.
It was 11:15 when we made it to the parking lot of the South Gate Mall -- desolate, a VW Beetle parked apparently for days, covered in a foot of snow. We approached one of the ends of the mall, so all we could see was the bleakness of the great brown wall with its humongous letters spelling out, "Dillard's".
As we walked ever-nearer, I stared up at it, and felt the great windowless box of retail looming over us. We were walking up crunchingly across the lot, and it was very quiet, and I was amazed and thrilled by the post-apocalyptic mood of the whole scene.
Julie & I shared nervous laughter as we approached the main doors around the corner.
Soon, and IN we were, and it was juxtaposition to the extreme. Suddenly there were regular people milling about all around us, with babies and old folks in tow, juggling their DQ soda cups and shopping bags, and carrying on just as if the world outside hadn't already ended.
My new bestie and I exchanged glances that may be exchanged before people step off a ledge with bungee cord equipment tied to their ankles.
First item of business: Find a bench and un-bundle. Gloves, scarves, hats, coats.
We are not people who go to the mall, but we've been snowed in for three days, and it's the only thing within walking distance in this cold. We're people who make thrift-shop rounds. Malls are full of Top-40 music, aggressive sales associates, bedazzled kiosks, and the types of consumers that nearly incited panic attacks within me when I was twenty.
64-oz Diet Pepsi, the sort of consumers who truly believe that, "The more you spend, the more you $ave!"
For the first few minutes the sensory overload was apparent, but we were determined to enjoy ourselves and try to shrug off the sense that we were in a zoo. "People go shopping at the mall. That's what we're doing. We are people."
First: A big shop full of randoms! Horribly cheap, creepy clothing. Montana-themed gifts. Lots of cool kitchen stuff in the back.
Potato peeler. Garlic press. Grater.
Postcards of Missoula for the fam'.
Alright, we can do this!
We'd approach a shop and squint. "Do you want to check it out?"
"I dunno if I should. Maybe. Do you?"
"Meh, I dunno, I guess."
My inner 15-year-old giggled at the sight of Wet Seal, and it was so full of ultra-cheap fun crap on Super-Sale, I found myself leaving with a hat and a floral crop-tip.
Trying on various dresses was the best idea of the day -- I haven't seen myself in anything but layers for months. I've been bundled up and thanks to how my recent relationship disintegrated, I've felt my usual Zip and Zap reduced to more Meh and Bleh.
Summertime is COMING! and I am still allowed to be FOXY! Can't wait to unearth the bicycle and tie the laces on a new pair of purple Vans.
I had a great time feeling 25 in the some stores. I have absolutely no clue what the "Kids These Days" care about in 2014. It made me chuckle.
Then I walked past the Coldwater Creek shop and half-cringed. Julie and I had the exact same thought: We've thrifted their clothes plenty of times, but can't bring ourselves to set foot in there.
We ate at The Mustard Seed which wound up being GREAT. They even had a vegan/GF dessert option. We gorged on delicious food brought to us by a real, live Server. So much more grand and appealing than our dissolving supply of rations at the house. I think both of us were tired of opening the cupboards at home after the long weekend.
Marveled at the thought: This, for both of us, was the first time either of us as adults had "chosen to go Shopping At The Mall," without a Mom or a family-venture involved.
We spent a surprisingly long time at the Gap rummaging through sale stuff, and I got a great periwinkle sweater.
"Recessionista Chic," indeed.
We walked home quietly. It was a good excursion.
How else is today monumental?
Matt returns to Kalispell.
Flipping thru the previous journal for a moment earlier, we had SO MANY issues. He was horrible, and living with that brought out the worst in me. I barely wrote, didn't call my parents the way I usually do, I slept way too late, and got so depressed I quit my job.
From June to December, I held on to what I 'knew' of Matt from last summer and last winter. I held on to June '12 thru May '13... and June '13 thru Jan. '14 were, let's get real now: Disastrous.
I wanted him to be .. who he made himself out to be .. but none of that person really existed.
He was a different person, and I couldn't believe it. I kept vigorously shaking my head, blinking my eyes, blinking again, and repeating -- trying to shake myself out of the nightmare of a relationship that was... actually a nightmare.
Of course I'm doomed to be empathetic forever so I hope he'll be OK, and well, but I can guarantee he's incapable of feeling that way about me, or about anyone, because he doesn't have real feelings.
People may disagree with that statement and think I'm being a twat, but it's a valid statement. He "thinks he feels how he thinks he should feel" about any given situation. I know this because I spent every waking moment by his side for 8 months, which in retrospect were the most confusing, grueling, agitating, stunning and heartbreaking 8 months of my life.
Guess I'm still learning! Yippee for that..
That relationship... It was like I won the lottery,
but the prizes wound up being not worth anything, and even though I still felt congratulated, I'd go to bed at night with Nothing, and I kept thinking its value would increase, but zero times millions is still zero.
Quoth my big sister: "Make him the last loser you ever date."
Julie and I got out of the house for like four hours! We walked to the mall! We walked around IN the mall! We sat down to a lovely lunch!
It was cold but pleasant to plod single-file down the game trail of pedestrian tracks down Johnson St... sidewalks, curbs still totally invisible. As above, so below -- the sky and ground matched starkly white all day and still do. The opaque strip of the visible world seemed powerless to wear any colors today. Even the red car I see across the street now looks grey.
It was 11:15 when we made it to the parking lot of the South Gate Mall -- desolate, a VW Beetle parked apparently for days, covered in a foot of snow. We approached one of the ends of the mall, so all we could see was the bleakness of the great brown wall with its humongous letters spelling out, "Dillard's".
As we walked ever-nearer, I stared up at it, and felt the great windowless box of retail looming over us. We were walking up crunchingly across the lot, and it was very quiet, and I was amazed and thrilled by the post-apocalyptic mood of the whole scene.
Julie & I shared nervous laughter as we approached the main doors around the corner.
Soon, and IN we were, and it was juxtaposition to the extreme. Suddenly there were regular people milling about all around us, with babies and old folks in tow, juggling their DQ soda cups and shopping bags, and carrying on just as if the world outside hadn't already ended.
My new bestie and I exchanged glances that may be exchanged before people step off a ledge with bungee cord equipment tied to their ankles.
First item of business: Find a bench and un-bundle. Gloves, scarves, hats, coats.
We are not people who go to the mall, but we've been snowed in for three days, and it's the only thing within walking distance in this cold. We're people who make thrift-shop rounds. Malls are full of Top-40 music, aggressive sales associates, bedazzled kiosks, and the types of consumers that nearly incited panic attacks within me when I was twenty.
64-oz Diet Pepsi, the sort of consumers who truly believe that, "The more you spend, the more you $ave!"
For the first few minutes the sensory overload was apparent, but we were determined to enjoy ourselves and try to shrug off the sense that we were in a zoo. "People go shopping at the mall. That's what we're doing. We are people."
First: A big shop full of randoms! Horribly cheap, creepy clothing. Montana-themed gifts. Lots of cool kitchen stuff in the back.
Potato peeler. Garlic press. Grater.
Postcards of Missoula for the fam'.
Alright, we can do this!
We'd approach a shop and squint. "Do you want to check it out?"
"I dunno if I should. Maybe. Do you?"
"Meh, I dunno, I guess."
My inner 15-year-old giggled at the sight of Wet Seal, and it was so full of ultra-cheap fun crap on Super-Sale, I found myself leaving with a hat and a floral crop-tip.
Trying on various dresses was the best idea of the day -- I haven't seen myself in anything but layers for months. I've been bundled up and thanks to how my recent relationship disintegrated, I've felt my usual Zip and Zap reduced to more Meh and Bleh.
Summertime is COMING! and I am still allowed to be FOXY! Can't wait to unearth the bicycle and tie the laces on a new pair of purple Vans.
I had a great time feeling 25 in the some stores. I have absolutely no clue what the "Kids These Days" care about in 2014. It made me chuckle.
Then I walked past the Coldwater Creek shop and half-cringed. Julie and I had the exact same thought: We've thrifted their clothes plenty of times, but can't bring ourselves to set foot in there.
We ate at The Mustard Seed which wound up being GREAT. They even had a vegan/GF dessert option. We gorged on delicious food brought to us by a real, live Server. So much more grand and appealing than our dissolving supply of rations at the house. I think both of us were tired of opening the cupboards at home after the long weekend.
Marveled at the thought: This, for both of us, was the first time either of us as adults had "chosen to go Shopping At The Mall," without a Mom or a family-venture involved.
We spent a surprisingly long time at the Gap rummaging through sale stuff, and I got a great periwinkle sweater.
"Recessionista Chic," indeed.
We walked home quietly. It was a good excursion.
How else is today monumental?
Matt returns to Kalispell.
Flipping thru the previous journal for a moment earlier, we had SO MANY issues. He was horrible, and living with that brought out the worst in me. I barely wrote, didn't call my parents the way I usually do, I slept way too late, and got so depressed I quit my job.
From June to December, I held on to what I 'knew' of Matt from last summer and last winter. I held on to June '12 thru May '13... and June '13 thru Jan. '14 were, let's get real now: Disastrous.
I wanted him to be .. who he made himself out to be .. but none of that person really existed.
He was a different person, and I couldn't believe it. I kept vigorously shaking my head, blinking my eyes, blinking again, and repeating -- trying to shake myself out of the nightmare of a relationship that was... actually a nightmare.
Of course I'm doomed to be empathetic forever so I hope he'll be OK, and well, but I can guarantee he's incapable of feeling that way about me, or about anyone, because he doesn't have real feelings.
People may disagree with that statement and think I'm being a twat, but it's a valid statement. He "thinks he feels how he thinks he should feel" about any given situation. I know this because I spent every waking moment by his side for 8 months, which in retrospect were the most confusing, grueling, agitating, stunning and heartbreaking 8 months of my life.
Guess I'm still learning! Yippee for that..
That relationship... It was like I won the lottery,
but the prizes wound up being not worth anything, and even though I still felt congratulated, I'd go to bed at night with Nothing, and I kept thinking its value would increase, but zero times millions is still zero.
Quoth my big sister: "Make him the last loser you ever date."
Wednesday, January 15, 2014
tim-berrrrr
he's on his way home from work
on foot
cuz I found
more vacuous sex videos
that he downloaded
on Sunday, only hours
after I opened up
and told him
how much
his legitimate addiction
was destroying
our relationship,
and my psyche
as
his
girlfriend.
If your boyfriend hides his insatiable habit for the xxx-files in your apartment when you aren't there to see it, does it still make you lose your mind? If a tree falls in the woods, Matt doesn't care if it makes a sound or not because he's too busy at his laptop if I'm not in the room. Time to get out.
on foot
cuz I found
more vacuous sex videos
that he downloaded
on Sunday, only hours
after I opened up
and told him
how much
his legitimate addiction
was destroying
our relationship,
and my psyche
as
his
girlfriend.
If your boyfriend hides his insatiable habit for the xxx-files in your apartment when you aren't there to see it, does it still make you lose your mind? If a tree falls in the woods, Matt doesn't care if it makes a sound or not because he's too busy at his laptop if I'm not in the room. Time to get out.
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