Everything I Do I Do in Slow Motion

It's quiet right now.
Shadows are silk on my hands as I type.
The sun is about 6 inches from setting behind the vacant house next to mine. Once a group of people lived in the downstairs apartment there. Their troubles were heavier than mine in many ways; they let their dog shit in my yard. Once they drank beers on my porch with me and told about Diane's baby and jail time and working on mopeds and how hard it is to pay child support and how warm evenings remind them of when they were kids.
I remember feeling lucky. I still feel lucky.
How rude to feel lucky that my life isn't theirs.
What an egocentric circle to spin.
-
While on the issue of remembering, I want to say something here about summer. Something about milkweed. Something about a black dog named Cocoa; I used to press my ear against her belly, overflowing with puppies, and listen to the sacred movement. She was a good dog: my babysitter's dog with prune sized nipples pulled all the way to the ground. She followed me -- I was kind to her, to the ever flow of sweet puppies from her belly, to the snake my babysitter's boys killed with a slingshot. I ran to the cellar, sobbed; couldn't shake the writhing body, (innards ballooning out into the summer-evening, cool grass) out of my tiny-blonde mind. Something about cruelty. Something about growing up. Something right here about the sanctity of every Black Kingsnake. 
-
Look at that.
The shadows on my hands are heavier.
That sun found the roof.

This is Your Heart, It's Alive, It's Pumping Blood

I admit it, okay?

Most of the time I do not think I'm a deserving human. I don't know where it originated; actually, I have an idea but I don't want to get into it today. But now that my poetry is being combed through by professional poets the issue is getting recognized. And called out. It's terrifying in all the ways it could be and therapeutic in ways I can't understand.

First things: 1) In your letter you say (casually), "I, mostly, am the worst person." No. You aren't. Dick Cheney is the worst person. You know what else? I think this steady self-deprecation of yours is really some kind of mask -- something you deploy to ward off the world and to beat others to the punch -- or something. 

That is an excerpt from the letter Mark Wunderlich wrote. To me. Yes, THAT Mark Wunderlich. And this Mark Wunderlich - and even THIS Mark Wunderlich. This man is my poetry mentor during my final term with the Writing Seminars at Bennington College. Can you believe the goodness? My luck? Can you? I can't. I still can't. I'm overwhelmed.

I ripped open my correspondence with Mark as soon as Andy put it in my hands, sat down on our kitchen floor and sobbed.

You rely on writing how you're a bad person, how you hurt other people, how you had an affair and everyone hated you, etc. Life is too fucking short. He goes on: I wonder what would happen if you just wrote a poem about being awesome? About how much you love the parts of your body, or your mind...? What would happen? 

The letter went on and on with the most beautiful, personal, soul exposing words. He went through ALL of my poems and personally noted each one. Every single poem has his handwriting all over it. I am lucky. I am overpowered by what I get to experience, moved by my mentor, and down right scared to address the juggernaut of self-hate. But how exciting to think that I might deserve attention from an incredibly important poet, to think that I might be better than what I give myself credit for, to think that maybe, just maybe, I'll be okay.

Dice Were Loaded from the Start

My therapist, recently, said that the universe is rigged in my favor. The energy I put out into the world is absorbed by an ever-loving, ever-growing, and balanced universe. I might find nuggets of love and little shoves forward hidden under rocks or in tall grass. That this whole big thing is some how tilted in my light.

My therapist, who recently, saved my life, said that to me in all seriousness.

I looked her straight in her eyes and told her, "I don't buy it." I don't mean to be contrary -- but come on. I didn't have time to recreate images of my childhood: alcoholism thick as humidity, emotional manipulation heavy on my little towhead, losing my dad to a hungry fire, my tiny best friend dying in my lap when I needed her most, holding on to what I could until my little finger nails were ripped from their beds... If the universe is rigged in my favor, why did I (why do WE) have to fist fight with it outside on the playground with rusty swings screaming in the wind?
*
Riding bikes downtown yesterday, I came across the carcass of this female Belted Kingfisher. It sickened and unsettled me in a way I can't really describe. She was roasting on the hot asphalt outside a bank pretty distant from any river where she should be diving. Yes, I took a picture. Yes, I screamed FUCK to the construction guys who were 4 stories up and heckling me: we shot it, they laughed. Yes, I took it as an offensive omen from the universe.  What an aggressive affront. A dead kingfisher might symbolize anything: my death or an act of terror at the winery via terrible customers or a foreboding cloud above my little head or plague or famine or drought. It might not, though. Who really knows. It could just mean everything is chaos and nothing makes sense.

In which case, nothing is rigged in our favor.

Heaven's Waiting on Down the Tracks

Jesus was either 30 or 32 when he volunteered to hang on a crucifix and die for me. Not SPECIFICALLY me -- not that he had visions of a small blonde sometime in the future, pouring wine, bad mouthing creeps, wearing all black and bright lipstick, and writing poetry -- but ME in the large sense. ME meaning you and me and my black cat and your mother and your mother's best friend's brother and his wife and his side chick and the person who checks out your library books. You get the meaning. The man was 30 (or 32).

Now, whether or not his dying for ME did anything in the cosmic scene  -- he felt he had to do it, so he damn well did it. He was a kind man, or at least he was rumored to be (except that one time he lost it and flipped tables (but who HASN'T done that)), who thought about other people constantly. He told the truth, though he sometimes talked in puzzles. And, if you ask me, suffered with anxiety. (How can one be part of the holy trinity and NOT have anxiety? Especially if you got the human third.)

This isn't about Jesus. It's about me. You knew that already, but I needed to point it out just in case. I'm a 32 year old human being. Let me be honest: there are only a select few of you I'd die for -- there are even more of you I'd NEVER think about dying for. I'm not like Jesus at all. But I'm going to start embracing his fervor for doing what I need to do.

I don't know exactly what that means though I have some ideas. And I feel the stir. I feel the stir and I know it's happening.

I Got the Month of May

Let me tell you about what I did yesterday: I got out of bed, made my husband coffee, packed him a lunch, did chore related items, showered, marched up to my office and polished off a 20 page paper (31 pages with Works Cited and an Appendix).

Today: I got out of bed, made my husband coffee, packed him a lunch, did chore related items, went out to breakfast, and saved a nest of baby sparrows. It's true.

I watched a Blue Jay fly up to where I assumed a nest was - all the while 7 sparrows are screaming at him - so, I saved the day by hopping out of my car, clapping my hands together and screaming, "GET OUT OF HERE, BLUE JAY". He and 5 sparrows flew away and immediately, the petite female jumped right in the hole. I save birds in public. 

I've been taking walks when anxiety dips his toe in. I made hummingbird food. Bought pink roses. Wore my husbands dirty shirt. I'm doing important work, you guys. Every single thing I've done today and yesterday I register on the Extremely Valuable scale.

Three years ago, I was in the Painted Desert. Last year, in an emotional one.

And this year, I'm a better human than I've ever been.   

Everyday is Like Survival

Decomposing is the easy part.

Watching things decompose, though, that's the challenge.
I don't really know why - surely we've gotten used to it, right?

Everything changes and all of that -
everything is temporary.

Sometimes I'll call my Nena and I'll sob and sob and sob into my little phone and she'll listen. She always does. Afterwards, she says: "I didn't understand a thing you said" or: "Life's about change, nothing never stays the same". (It's usually a toss up between the two.) Now, I know that's not original to her -- but every time I hear her say it, it resonates.

Everything is temporary.

Anyway - right?

Now, I Crave You

My neighborhood is quiet. And white. People are sleeping. I just put my last Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Ale to bed. My kittens finished grooming hours ago. The TV is still on, but muted.

This whole city is yawning. Almost like it's too bored to keep it's eyes open: Biology during 6th period. Training for the new job you don't really want. Early character development in that one movie you've seen 46.5 times.

It's okay to be tired.

I'm tired, too. But a different kind.

Heart Beat Runnin' Away

What can I say? I drink beer now. Any beer. I don't even care. I listen to pop hip hop/pop music. I don't care - I've turned into a stereotype that pretentious college-Erica would hate. But I have something that college-Erica doesn't have: first of all, I'm skinny. Take that! I'm skinny AND I'm just getting better looking!!! Second, people are people, you little bitch. Quit being so stark about rules and the rights and wrongs and all the bull shit that you get so wrapped up in, that's what i'd say. I don't even know what I'm saying.

I got a deep tissue massage today and it was all the things: good. bad. healing. sad. But whatever. Please, don't ask me about it.

I, also, researched Shore Birds of Indiana. 44 of them. More than 44 shores. I think.

Seriously, though, MAYBE I've had too much beer, but can you believe life? And, like, everything that goes along with it?
Don't answer that.

Also, do you know when I started liking the Violent Femmes? You don't know this, but let me tell you. 6th grade. Sixth GRADE. I hadn't even started my menses when I knew all the words to Gone Daddy Gone. Jealous? You should be.

Do jelly fish feel pain? No, seriously. Do they? Because, if not, what do I have to do to be a jellyfish? I drink too much Miller Lite. And wine.

I wrote a poem today and it sucked. I can't believe I"m going to poetry school; i guess i can't even believe poetry school is real.
WTF.

'Cause I'm Moving Out

Probably this is going to alarm you. Don't let it. Know that it's coming from a spot where sincerity and honesty fester together. So, don't call my mom or anything. This is what I want to say:

If I haven't already told you, I care about you. And if anything should happen to me between now and the next time we talk, I want you to know it. I want you to know that thing we said to each other that one time was special. I'm serious. And you've probably been a person to save me, at least once. And a lot of the time, I write for you. I do.

As a follow up - when I was a teenager, I didn't think I'd ever be a grown up. I am one, though. Kind of. But now, I don't know what I'm doing. Is it weird to say I think I missed my chance to die? It is weird to say, but whatever. I'm throwing off the balance. And I'm paying retribution to whatever force I tricked into living.

Anyway, if I do not see you: Thank you.

Only The Good Die Young

I want to tell you about poetry school. I want to be able to say, shyly, "Who woulda' thought, you know?" and you say, in sweetness, "I thought. I always thought" in the kind of way a dad would say. Except we would both know that you've been worried about my trajectory.

Teach me to change my oil, would ya? And while we're at it, can we conquer the country roads with a manual shift?

Let's sit on the porch and gossip about your neighbor lady, but the good gossip. The "can you believe how earnest she is about keeping strangers out of our yard?" gossip. And the "She's honestly still kicking" and "She never NOT talks about her surgery" gossip. We'd start every sentence with: "I mean, I'm not talking bad, but.." We'd finish (probably) a 12 pack of beer and feel fulled up with the meat of a good-goddamned autumn night.

Tell me the importance of measuring twice, cutting once. Tell me the mistakes you've made, that seemed big, but now are small.

Is everything permanent? If not, why does it seem like concrete has filled the little sacs in my lungs?

We should be crazy one night and buy expensive tickets to a rock and roll show. We can sit and eat up the night; poison it with sentiment. If you wanted, I'd let you tell me about when you fell in love with mom, what it was like in the 80s, the first time you heard Guns'N'Roses, why you stayed with mom, what it was like when your children were born... If you wanted, I'd listen all night, after the music died with the moon. Maybe we'd drink a little bourbon and I'd promise my first born would have your name. Girl or boy.

Maybe one day I'd call you and cry, but I'd call you because I just needed your voice to calm me, like it did when I was a tiny with an upturned nose. You'd say, "Did I ever tell you about that time we were in the abortion clinic - and I looked at your mom and your mom looked at me? Did I tell you what I said?" [Silence] "I said, 'I think we can do this,' and so we left." And that would appease me. That would reaffirm me that at least two people in the whole world, so big/so small, loved me before I even existed. And I'd stop crying. We'd probably make dinner plans. Afterwards, I'd help you weed the garden.

Anyway, I want to tell you about poetry school. But you're dead.

It Feels Like Independence Day

[This one was hard to write. It may be hard to read]

Once, when I was smaller, I was terrified that my aunt and uncle were going to beat someone up in the big blue van they had. And when I say "terrified", I mean that. Memories of the nervous nausea that comes along with that kind of anxiety never leaves you. And I knew they were serious. A few years before, while we were camping at the Prairie Creek Reservoir, they captured a mole around 10am and stabbed it to death with a screwdriver. I begged them. I remember begging them until I threw up to just let it live. They didn't listen; I locked myself in our pop-up camper and cried until I was delirious.

So, I knew they'd do it. This time I didn't protest.

They lived near the rumored gay park in Muncie where, if you were driving through the park at night and someone tapped his brakes at you, it was invitation to get to know each other better. And this just didn't sit well with them. I still don't know the origin of the hate they had. Queer Bashing became an obsession in many conversations and it all became super aggravated after school one day. My cousin came home and said that a man tried to coerce him into his car. Which, I believe happened. Instead of praising my cousin for staying strong and getting away, and thanking their lucky stars nothing happened to their son, my aunt and uncle were furious. This was the night that someone was going to get it real bad, pay for these sins and get dumped near the White River, bloody and broken. They had a plan and I was this little tiny thing, petrified for another living soul.

Yesterday I was reminded of this memory while I was running. Running affords me a lot of time to myself - and yesterday... yesterday, I felt free. Absolutely and stunningly free. Somehow I got out of terrible situations in my formative years unscathed - save my gnawing anxieties. Somehow, even as a tiny, I knew killing a mole with a screwdriver was a disgusting display of brute and possibly the deepest sin I had experienced.

Somehow, even though I was inundated with the gospel that homosexuality was wrong and needed to be punished, I never believed it. I never believed it and I never understood it.

Yesterday I was reminded that sometimes there's a resiliency that needs to be praised.
I was reminded that even though some people hate, some people love. Some people love. Some people love.

And how lucky I am for a million reasons.

My heart's learned to kill

The summer between my junior and senior year of high school, I had a boyfriend named Jon. In August, he went away to the Naval Academy where I visited him twice. It was nice. I was friends with his youngest sister. I called her MixMaster. That summer was slightly stressful - my stepdad had moved away to set up house in Arizona where he accepted a job with a huge pay bump. I had decided to stay in Indiana to finish up my senior year. I was approaching a year without my mother. Anyway, I had this boyfriend, before Arizona, before Annapolis.

He was a nice boy. Smart. He loved to make out in his Caprice Classic, he had a wonderful mother and dad. He liked me a lot. Once, in a moment of vulnerability, he sort of proposed to me. This, however, wasn't *before* Annapolis. This was during. Anyway, I had this boyfriend.

I was with him the night my dad died. He left about 3 hours before it happened. We didn't really talk that night, we did a lot of kissing on that green couch. Well, anyway, he was the 4th or 5th person to stand next to me the morning after my childhood home burned down. He was the one who waited on me while I told the firemen "exactly what happened as [I] remember[ed] it". He let me lose my shit.

He moved away weeks later. He accidentally proposed months later. And I cheated on him. Lots. I was a vacant human being. I know now I should have been nicer - fuck, I knew it then. But I couldn't.

Let's be honest: I couldn't do anything. School, and grief, and school, and grief, and blowjobs, and movie theaters and lots of Fazolis, and the loneliest, scariest nights of my life. That's what I had to hold on.

And the distinct memory of watching that green couch in flames as I escaped the house without my dad.

He died 13 years ago today. I was the last person to see him, the last person to talk to him. He didn't really like my boyfriend.

I'll Be Up Up and Away

Here it is. Here it comes. I want to make this official unofficial announcement right here on this blog. Are you ready for it, because it's going to make you feel like standing on top of light poles and scream happy profanities into the air. It's going to make you want to high-five every stranger in a 3 mile radius. It's going to make you think, "yeah. Maybe." in the face of a terribly devastating personal conflict.. Are you ready?

I've made the decision to leave the library. I've accepted a position at Two-EE's Winery in Roanoke.

I'm disengaging from customer service from the public library and stepping into an atmosphere of service that revolves around wine. I can't explain how nervous I am. I mean, I can. I'm really-terribly-bite-all-my-nails-off nervous. It's less money, it's less hours - but it's a step up as far as my brain and soul are concerned.

Out my window: a vineyard. My bosses are fresh faced. I get to wear all black. (!!) You will come in, I will talk to you about wine. Ask about your family. Your hometown. Your favorite wine. And probably (hopefully) you won't yell at me for asking you to stay off your cell phone in the Early Learning Center. Probably (hopefully) you won't call me a racist because I ask your kids to follow the rules. Probably (hopefully) you'll walk out the doors and say, "isn't that place nice? Their wine is good. The staff is great. Amen." (you'll probably leave off the Amen, but who knows.)

I'm excited. I normally don't have enough courage to take such a big risk. But this time was different. My entire spirit has become fatigued in the daily crucifixion. I made a choice that involves lots of unknowns, but here's this thing: after May 10th I get to hang out with wine. And people who love wine.
For 30 hours a week.

I wept in fear for things

I want to write a letter to my imaginary baby. You know, it'd start out saying something like "Dear Baby (if you ever exist)" and I'd follow it up with poignant pieces of life that I've gathered to be helpful. For example, "Life is fucking hard, lightening splitting the earth, and there's no two ways around it" - something like that. I might paraphrase. But, maybe not. My imaginary baby knows I have a mouth on me. I would then continue with apology after apology. For instance, "I'm sorry that you will always have dirt under your fingernails.", "I'm sorry I will be drunk, like garden parties and paper lanterns, more than I should be.", "I'm sorry that I will for sure lose my temper, a firecracker in closed hands." The best thing? Imaginary babies forgive. Real ones internalize. But, that's besides the letter I want to write.

I'd write about my dad. A workin' man with hands like dried sponges. And also, my mom, ol' knives for tongue. I'd write about me. And how, secretly, I always wanted the (imaginary) baby to look like an Anderson (aren't we glad he does!!). I'd write about writing. And how, the moment, right above the creek near Maxville on highway 32, when I saw a Belted Kingfisher for the first time, how that moment I knew that life was different than what was given me. Whatever that means.

I'm sure I'd write about love. But, probably in a way that's not appropriate for babies. Even really rough and tumble babies like my imaginary one. I might even tell that child about the times I snuck out of my house to meet older boys with magic hands. I'd use the word "magic" and make a footnote* (*ask me about this when you are older - babies can't read anyway.) I'd be pithy about love, because let's face it, does anyone ever listen anyway? (The answer is no. But you fucking knew that)

I would probably say it's okay to fight. Even with fists sometimes. Not always*. (*footnote: consult with me first. Please.)

I'd probably end with something like "Dear (imaginary) baby - just know that mostly, I'm gonna try real hard to be what you need, but probably, I'll let you down. Aint that the way?".

Far more aware than I have been

Today it was mostly eating the small moments with a delicate fork and well poised knife. "The sun really showed up and is doing it's job" was a good salutation to a really weird morning - but it's true what he said. The sun had armies. They blew my face off.

With unsteady steps I walked up my stairs in someone else's purple sweatpants and fancy blue shoes, nearly my burial shroud, or so it felt. The only longing was for my empty bed- dried wine in the cuts on my lips. A bruise on my chin. Arms that smelled like vomit.

Let's get one thing straight, I don't ever mean to binge drink. I don't ever mean to nearly die in my friends' new home. I don't ever mean to make other people's husbands carry me to their homes. Last night, I fucked up. And I'm embarrassed. And I'm sorry. But, in a very serious way, I'm grateful.

And way scared.

I'm blood and carbon and magic. And these ribs and this heart - I've only been given this. And I'm sorry I'm not a better steward. And I'm sorry that I'm falling into a stereotype. And I'm so goddamned sorry that I have to keep saying sorry.

But like I said before, the sun showed up. Thank goodness. And the moments today, even the ones where I felt heavy with a coat of guilt, were welcomed. If I would have felt better, I would have thrown each minute today a fucking party. Hugged them like I'm picking them up at the airport.

I'll show you my scars

My horoscope yesterday said "you're longing for the new, the different, the unique." That doesn't mean anything to you - and if we're honest, it doesn't mean anything to me, either. But for a moment, I stood up straight on this little mountain I've constructed mostly from cardboard and thought, "I do need anything but this" and the entire day I jotted down notes about my escape to the ocean.

And everything was affirmed about a trillion times before bedtime - yes, yes! the echoes bouncing off the church walls, crawling up the bricks on the outside of my house, coming in with the wind through the cracks in my floorboards. Yes! Move away, lady. Be something else. Pick up each grain of sand, tell them the secrets you have hidden in your sinews. Braid your hair until your fingers fall the fuck off your hands.

Go.

Because let's face it, sometimes a girl is alone. But not really alone - just lonely. And let down.

i've grown weary on my own.

I blame myself for not listening to my psychic.

She was probably spot on, but shame on me, I didn't take notes and I didn't take heed. I do remember it being something like, "now is the time to DO", but WHO doesn't she say that to, you know? Anyway, I was in my Saturn Return and I swear to god, I wish my Saturn Return would last forever, but it doesn't. The threshold isn't very wide. And I'll be goddamned if I took advantage of Saturn and her orbit. I didn't.

I stayed stagnant, and as a result, here I am.

What no one tells you is, being a grown up is hard and it takes courage. I don't have that.

You've got to wait for it

Please, if you must know, Yes! Of course, I've been sad lately. That's a silly question. The answer to your questions lay in wait in my belly, the mystics of my body. Crazy shit happens in that cavity. My colon, for instance, can tell you. It somehow, in the last few years, got fused to the left wall of my abdominal cavity. And that shit ain't right. I know this because of a laparoscopic surgery I had on Valentine's Day to scrape my insides of endometriosis. Delightful, is it not? Anyhow, things are fixed and that colon is back to it's rightful place. This should be cause for celebration - and I suppose, it is. But, as is par for the course, I just feel nuts about it.

I could tell you, but you already know.

Maybe you don't, so here's the summary: issues with control and trust and paralyzing anxiety (complete with fat tears) because said ailments in psyche. Afraid of, but grounded by, mortality. Et cetera, et cetera. I blame my mother, who, by the way, hasn't even called me. I get it, it was a small surgery, but god damn it, it was surgery. So, that's where I am. Reduced to the same issues revolving around a different circumstance. Ain't that life?

And tonight, I sat in my bar - my throat tight like dried leather, holding back the good weeping I deserve because of poetry. A book of poetry to be exact. And, as we all know, so much more.

I made a mistake tonight. I wanted whiskey, but I chose tea.

pull me out from inside

I can't get Jeffrey Dahmer out of my head.

There. I said it.

I'm not in love with him. I don't like him, I don't forgive him, but I just can't stop thinking about him. How lonely, you know? In addition to the devastatingly sick desires he couldn't smother, he was lonely. But fuck him.

In this mess of being surrounded in my thoughts about this killer, I wonder, if he knew, like he claimed he knew that these longings were straight from hell, why didn't he just kill himself. And is that fair to even say? And it's not like this is a gray area, but he was a person, so where does that leave me as a person? But where does that leave the families of his innocent victims as people?

And that poor baby, the one who almost got away: Konerak Sinthasomphone. You know, he'd be 35 years old if those assholes in Milwaukee did their jobs. But, should I blame them? And the women, the mary and martha, who comforted the poor baby who was bleeding from his rectum, nude in the street, do they weep and drink wine in the mornings because they almost saved his life?

And then he cut off his head. And his arms. His 14 year old arms.

There's one thing I keep coming back to: What if the baby I have and love and raise and cry over and discipline and teach and cuddle and nurse.. what if my baby grows up and becomes a murdering lunatic who eats organs in his spare time?

It's scary shit.

run until we're out of time

Recently, I had a person tell me that I was "quite attractive". Isn't that funny? It's like something I could put on my resume. "Erica Anderson-Senter: finished college with a good GPA, can diffuse difficult social situations and is quite attractive." I thanked the person and quietly noted the formal feel of being not cute, and not hot, but "quite attractive." Fuck it, you guys, I'll take it.

This morning it was cold outside and I overburdened myself with too many things to carry. The most difficult thought I could entertain was how the hell I was going to open the door. As luck would have it, a man was standing near the entrance, so I asked him to help me out. He obliged, but he said he was only doing so because I looked like a nice young woman who voted for Romney. If I had voted for Obama, he beamed with confidence, there's no way he would have opened the door for me. That shit's funny, huh?

Once, when I was six, I got a new baby brother. As the earth would spin, this baby grew up. Tucked in there, between then and now, we had this one shining moment when we jumped hard on my bed in the cold room and sang Farmer in the Dell as loudly as two blonde Andersons could. We sang and jumped and jumped and sang until our feet and throats were bloody with so much love. The moment stayed in time. But, goddamn, how far away.

Once, I overheard my cousin getting beat in her bedroom for not sweeping the floor.

Another time, Monica told me in the gym that daddies pee inside mommies every night. I couldn't handle this, so I ran away crying.

Early, one morning, I watched my childhood home burn to the ground.

Each life composed of tiny, pin-head moments that craft something beautiful. And something awful.