the new me is the old me

As confused as ever and still finding joy.

Trading shade with a fashion director, and laughing at her meme-able expression.
Discovering new opportunities at a neighborhood salvage yard. (Old stuff! New stuff! Free stuff!)
Writing and talking about writing at a comfortable cafe with writer pals, frozen fruit drinks and a persistent, elderly cat.
Nervously anticipating a friend's second line.
Phone calls with family and a friend, laughing and listening and commiserating and catching up.

As always though, the darkness hovers. It's a constant companion.

when I'm feeling low these icons comfort me

 

 

 

why can’t I stop, or the eternal writing of this memoir

When we all went home in 2020, I started working on a memoir.

To get started, I dug through old journals and realized I’d documented much of my teen years, in great detail. The confusion of puberty, my longings for the future, worries about God and page after page of swooning over hot guys I no longer remember.

Five years and a full-on draft and a dozen rejections later, I’m embarking on a huge edit.

It’s necessary I think but I also think I’m somehow reluctant to be done.

To leave this space.

There’s something about staying in here in this time when my sisters and I were teenagers. When we were close, when all we had was each other. We went really hard things together. Poverty, deprivation and abuse and hilarity, a father’s rages and a mother’s near-fatal illness. It’s like I think I can change the outcome somehow if I stay.

I know I can’t. That would be silly. Unrealistic.

But if I stay, if I continue to be patient, I can figure some things out, maybe.

Maybe.

to from

From a recent trip.

>>to Seattle

 

>>from Seattle

 

don't ever change

Visiting a place where I lived for thirty years feels strange, now.

Coming from the humid Gulf South, Seattle seems so clean, bursting with greenery and efficiency.

Gas is five dollars a gallon.

You don’t have to talk to anyone to do most things like order coffee or buy a $7.99 dress at the thrift store. Even so I talk to clerks and security guards and homeless people and feel gaudy and garrulous and slow.

Don’t ever change, a co-worker crows. You’ve always been just yourself.

You’re such an eccentric, a Southern friend comments, looking at my caftan-y dress and sneakers.

*

My sisters planned a week’s worth of events but I only made it to one-point-five-ish.

After rising at four a.m., flying for 4.5 hours, jumping a dead car battery and sitting in hot traffic for hours, we sat on a porch politely catching up and swatting flies off chunks of juicy watermelon.

We had an enjoyable but subdued Fourth, playing bocce with a restless eight year old, eating veggie dogs and s’mores, and lighting $150 worth of fireworks amid Gen Z diffidence (“that one was mid”).

Then a chaotic brunch, glorious hours on a houseboat and wistful goodbyes.

*

Relief and regret.

How I mostly feel these days.

this is courage

Not hyper macho body armored muscle queens laden with weapons.

But.

People. Americans of all sorts. Showing up all day for the mundane and the glorious. 

First, at a non-regulation polling site at 8.30am on a Saturday, to find like minded neighbors already in line. A grumpy blond woman in her jammies. A harried couple with their child, half-costumed for the No Kings march. Millenials en route to brunch. All of us trying to weigh in despite little information and limited ballots.

Then thousands gathering in oppressive Louisianan heat, humidity and a blistering sun, from elderly veterans to pre-gaming gays and parents with sweaty kids, holding handmade signs, some in costume, exercising the right to free speech and having a say.

And later, Pride, onlookers and dancers and performers damp from the passing thunderstorms, decked out in glitter and rainbows to celebrate our beloved gay friends and families. A visitor from Arizona excitedly scooping up beads to take home to her kids. A white-haired woman in a leotard, lip-syncing to George Michael's "Freedom", her krewe dancing in the street around her. Glitter gays diffidently texting from their float. It's chaos and joy and I love it.

 

* 

To those who criticize, I wonder about motivations. It's personal for me. I show up because I want to (have you BEEN to a protest or a parade?! the joy and solidarity and camaraderie are <<chef's kiss>>). I show up to be counted. To feel less alone. For those who can't because of work or mobility or exhaustion or fear. I'm not brave. Just determined.