Monthly Archive

Toni L. - Pjs& Bathrobes - Group 1   

There are days I want to stay in my pajamas.  Is that so wrong, every once in a while to just keep on my baggy flannels with the sheep jumping over fences on them?  On the way to the kid’s school, I see some of the 7^th and 8^th grade girls wearing plaid pajama bottoms with the mandatory footwear of their age: Uggs.  I would have liked that at 13, to wear pajamas to school without anybody thinking I’d suffered  a brain injury during the night.   

The thing here is, though that I don’t mean I want to wear my pajamas outside the house, what I mean, is I’d like to wear them inside the house and without feeling the tiniest bit bad about the fact that I’m not waking up, throwing on my workout clothes, getting the kids ready for school, getting myself over to the gym,coming home, taking a shower, food shopping (aren’t you at the market  too much when all the grocery baggers  know when you’re getting your period), checking my e-mail, doing whatever work & school volunteer projects I have, cleaning up the kitchen (which even after I clean it, seems dirty one minute later—perhaps I am the new David Blaine?), throwing in a load of laundry (which, let me tell you, is a whole Mickey Mouse Fantasia situation—the more wash I do, the more dirty clothes that appear), host three eighth grade girls that my 7^th grade son is now bringing home to play guitar hero with (in hopes that one of them, one of them will say yes they will “go out” with him, which by the way, is now defined as talking on the phone and computer-cating through facebook, but does not include doing any actual live activites), picking up my daughter and getting her to a) voice lessons b) soccer practice c) drama class d) e) basketball practice e)to buy another fucking eraser for her fucking eraser collection that she cannot stop talking to us about, pulling together a dinner, cleaning up after said pulled together dinner, and promptly collapsing on the couch to watch the news, while nagging my son to finish his homework, and my daughter to stop talking about her fucking eraser collection.     

I would like to not be sick, not have an irritated back that would make it ok and acceptable to be in my pajamas for the day, but to be well, to feel great and stay in my pajamas and laze around the house without worrying that I am not doing all the stuff I do in my normal day.  I would like to just stay in those cozy pj’s without the everyday list of chores and errands and work obligations I need to accomplish, or any of my back-up-think-about-it-everyday-but –never-have-time-to-do-it stuff haunting me, like cleaning out my third floor closets, jammed with the kid’s school work (like, all of it, not some of it, BUT EVERY PIECE OF IT FROM EVERY GRADE) and old bedding I’m saving for my summer house (which I don’t have) and all the ads I’ve ever written, photos I’ve ever taken, words I’ve ever committed to paper.  Or the nagging daily reminder of having to (or wanting to) clean my office, which is overflowing with past work, present work, wrapping paper, ribbon (I have a gift for wrapping a nice gift) card making supplies, advertising and writing books, and stuff that I don’t have a place for because I don’t know what the hell category it even falls under.  And there’s always the nagging and persistent problem of organizing my actual closet, where the clothes I wear outnumber the clothes I don’t wear, by like, 1,000 to 1.      

Yeah, I’d like to stay home in my pajamas without thinking about anything more than eating pancakes with butter and syrup and watching good movies and reading bad magazines without feeling like the FBI productivity unit is going to come over and bust me for not filling up every moment of my day.  I feel bad about myself when I’m not overwhelmed with a to do list, like I’m a lazy slacker, an unworthy person.  It’s good old fashioned guilt, and I ought to know about guilt, being half Italian Catholic and half Jewish. Guilt like an irritating drip, drip, drip in the bathroom sink that makes you want to move into a hotel in the middle of the night, like a papercut on your finger that gets caught on everything, like a nasty, August sunburn you worry will turn into a questionable freckle in five years.      

I’d give up my favorite worn pajamas, for just a day without a  list, without a must, without a hint of guilt that I’m not channeling the energizer bunny. For just ONE day, one relaxing day, in my pajamas.   

Terrie - BATHROBES AND PJ’s - Group 1   

It is Bitburg, Germany, 1968.  I am in the 6^th grade, and am attending my very first slumber party. It is being held at the home of our church youth leader, Mrs. Brown.  

Mrs. Brown lives in a small village near the air base. There are at least a dozen girls at the slumber party, with sleeping bags and makeshift beds covering the floor. The girls are listening to records as they roll each other’s hair and paint each other’s toenails. As someone who is in transition from full-fledged tomboy to preteen girl, I am taking care to describe the scene fully in my brand new diary. Two months earlier, on Christmas Day, I started my period, got my first bra, and got my first stockings and garter belt.  Talk about a Christmas I’ll never forget.  On Christmas Eve I was free, unencumbered, normal.  On Christmas Day I went over to my best friend Kim’s house wearing all of this new apparatus, walking like a robot.

“Kim. I’m a woman,” I said solemnly, my voice strange, my body even stranger.  

I also got the diary for Christmas.  The next month, my parents took us to Amsterdam, to see Anne Frank’s Secret Hideaway.  They bought Anne’s diary that day and I read it raptly on the drive home, enthralled that a girl only one year older than me could write something that had, literally, changed the world.  Anne Frank had stood for goodness in a world of evil.  I wanted to do the same.   

Tonight I note the different pj’s and bathrobes at the party.  The younger girls are wearing red Vanity Fair nylon gown and robe sets like my grandmother sends each year.  The older girls are more sophisticated in Lucille Ball-type boyish pajamas.  Then Mrs. Brown comes out in adorable baby doll pajamas, all flowers and flounce.  Someone puts “Penny Lane” on the record player, and we all dance.  We laugh as we dance to “Green Tambourine” and “These Boots Are Made For Walking,” and I think maybe turning into a girl won’t be so bad after all.  The next morning, after breakfast, Mrs. Brown takes us all on a walk through her village.  It is a beautiful day, clear and cool, and we chatter and laugh as we walk, waving to the villagers.  We climb across an ancient stone wall at the edge of town. On the other side is a mountain creek, icy cold Bavarian water, rushing and gurgling a peaceful song.  Rainbow trout swim by, shimmering in silvery hues.  I am enchanted with the beauty of it all when someone calls out. 

“Mrs. Brown! Look!”

Across the stream, wedged under a rock overhang, is a helmet.  Mrs. Brown wades in and works it loose, and we see the Nazi swastika, ominous and perfectly preserved in the morning sunlight.  Our laughter stops and we all stand suddenly silent, realizing what we are seeing.  

Whenever I think of this day, I cannot remember what happened next.  My memory stops with the sudden ringing silence of a group of young girls and the goodhearted Mrs. Brown, as we face that irrevocable symbol of evil.  

Grace - Bathrobes & P.J.’s – Group 1     

We were the animal house, like Dr. Dolittle, not the fraternity. At dancing school the teacher announced “Anyone with more than three pets in their household please sit down with your partner.” as a way to eliminate us from the competition at the end of each class. “GRACE!”  the room erupted, as our reputation was well known there was no escape. When we sat down Johnny Greene, my dance partner, leaned in and whispered “don’t worry I have more than three too!”

    

There are two kinds of people in this world, those with pets and those without pets. I can’t remember where it all began or if it even began at one specific time, it just seemed that forever, since the beginning of my consciousness we were people that liked pets. More specifically it was Dad and us kids who liked pets and Easter was our special holiday. While other kids planned on celebrating the resurrection of Christ by going to mass and having dinner with their extended family we were all about the animals. For Easter you either got real animals, toy animals, chocolate animals or new paraphernalia for the animals you already had. It was like Christmas but with a singular focus. We would run downstairs in P.J.s (which my baby sister Cathy pronounced “payamas” as it is in Spanish) and bathrobes and shriek with the joy of whatever species we were granted that year.

    

It was finally spring “for Christ’s sake” as Dad would say and for anyone who hates the cold and lives through the dismal days of winter in the greater Chicagoland area, it was understandable how we could celebrate the approach of longer, warmer days with such enthusiasm.

    

The tradition was established long before my sisters arrived. When I was two years old I discovered two snow white bunnies in my wicker basket Easter Sunday morning. They were the domestic variety with pink eyes and ears and super soft fur. They never had names, we just called them the rabbits. Mom and Dad learned they had purchased a buck and a doe when they found the first litter of pups in the garage. Dad separated the pair by letting the male run loose in the garage and when he accidentally ran over the male with the car there was on moratorium on bunnies until I was eleven. That was the year my two sisters and I received Minky, Butterscotch and Brownie, three English show rabbits with their distinctive colored ears, tail and stripe along their spine and a colored mole on each of their right cheeks in black, tan and brown respectively. That year we also got hermit crabs which five year old Cathy had never seen before and she ran upstairs to tell Mom and Dad that the Easter Bunny left us “monsters” in three separate bowls.

    

The following year we got the ducks, two white muscovies which we later named Dan and Daisy. And once you’ve switched to fowl there is no return.

Terrie – Bathrobes & PJ’s – Group 1, Second Piece on this Topic

   On the day of Kate’s “Come As Your Sensuous Self” party, I had been working in the yard all day, digging daffodils and planting day lilies.  I was bone tired and sunburned, and nothing felt quite as sensuous to me right then as soaking in Goldleaf and Hydrangea bath salts and putting on my favorite white cotton gown, the one that was so soft it felt like I was sliding clouds and comfort right down over my shoulders, billowing out around my legs as it settled like cool air upon my body.  “This is as sensuous as it gets,” I explained as I walked in the door that night.     

As it turned out, every one of the distinctive women who gathered at Kate’s had a different image of their sensuous selves.  There were the two beauties from Iceland, Gudrun and Brendis, who came in slinky, satiny gowns and vivid make-up.  A skilled cosmetologist, Brendis performed magic with everyone’s eyebrows that night, literally taking years off of our faces with her deft tweezers.  She visibly jumped when she saw my craggy arches, but did not shy from the difficult task ahead.   

 “Ach!” she exclaimed as she pulled and jerked, her lovely lips pursed in concentration. 

“Do you never pluck?”     

Maggie, our beloved spiritual mother, came that night despite the nauseating chemotherapy she had just endured.  A former Mother Superior, Maggie wore a simple linen pants set which resembled the Chinese uniform of the Mao Tse-tung era.  Maggie used henna to express her sensuous self.  She let Kate apply an elaborate henna tattoo to the top of her newly-bald head, an intricate and mystical pattern which resembled the labyrinth at Chartres.     

Then there was Trudie, the outspoken octogenarian from Germany who married a Louisiana soldier after World War II.  White-haired and aristocratic, Trudie proudly wore a dress she got in the late 40’s, which still fit her perfectly.  It was one of those sexy swaying numbers, in a flirty wrap style that tied on the side. I could just see her wearing it 50 years earlier, with a flower in her hair.  When Trudie saw the henna design on Maggie’s head, she promptly selected a henna dragon and applied it down the front of her chest, curling around her mastectomy scar.    

About a dozen of us gathered that evening, each bearing our own scars and wearing our own version of sensuality.  Wine and laughter flowed as we told stories and applied henna tattoos.  At the end of the evening, Kate took pictures of the group.  The one I have taped into my journal shows Gudrun and Brendis standing on chairs behind us, sexy gowns hiked high on their legs, lips pouty, hair piled into tousled bedroom styles.  Trudie is perched on the side of the sofa in her classic dress, but she has it pulled open on the side, to reveal her dragon-adorned mastectomy scar.  The rest of us are gathered here and there, showing henna stars and scrolls, Celtic circles and crescent moons.  In the center of our circle, laying on the floor with the glowing smile we all described at her memorial service the following spring, was our beloved Maggie.  The elaborate path on the top of her head would remind us of the journey we must all eventually make if we are to arrive at peace.

Julie G. - Making Out – Group 3

I don’t remember.  I just cannot remember.  I thought I would never have to remember because you would forever be in my life, reminding me daily of your love and desire for me.  I thought you and I would always take each other to that heavenly place that is reserved for those rare and blessed people whose love spans lifetimes, crosses dimensions and soars out of body and into the divine.  We had triumphed over one seemingly insurmountable challenge after another, hadn’t we?  We were going to get it right this in lifetime, weren’t we?  I thought we were in the home stretch.  I thought we were indestructible, shatter-proof, everlasting.  I thought wrong.    

I put so much energy and attention into loving and believing in you that I had no time or inclination to look at the incongruence between your words and your actions.  I derived so much sustenance and bliss from that “I love you ” look in your eyes that I neglected to focus on your inconsistencies and excuses.  And I lost myself again and again in our torrents of passion and ecstasy … so much so that I could barely find my way back to that wise and knowing part of me that had always come to my own rescue whenever my heart threatened to override my sense of self-preservation.  I almost lost me to stay in love with you.    

What is it that wakes us up from the asleep-ness that blankets us under the cozy comfort of denial?  Is it that part of us that says, “The truth, just show me the truth…”?  The part of our soul that promised the Universe to live glorious or bust?  Or is it our departed loved ones reaching through the veil to guide us back to clarity, sanity and our immutable divinity?  My spiritual protagonist, whomever or whatever it was, decided to simultaneously shine the light on my habitual in-love blind spot and on your smokescreens and dexterous deceptions.   I could no longer pretend that I didn’t see what I saw, that I didn’t know what I knew.   Your kisses could no longer melt me, your hugs would never again comfort me and even your sensual, sexual prowess lost it’s power over me.  What was once sublime was now painful.   I’m awake, I’m aware … the fog has lifted.  We are in the final chapter of us.    

And so the making out ensued.  It was apparent that I had changed our rules and this did not sit well with you – at all.   We had one frustrating argument after another.  I’m a lover, not a fighter, this did not live well in me.  The times when we were OK-ish were fewer and farther between.  I questioned you.  I reminded you of promises made and not yet kept.  I asked you why everything seemed to be my fault.  You denied saying and you denied doing until I thought I was losing my mind.  You artfully presented an astonishing array of revisionistic history lessons.  Then you yelled and accused and twisted it all back on me.      

I made out of there.  This was no longer healthy, this was no longer home, this was no longer love.  Your irate outbursts scared me, shut me down and literally made me sick.   With tear-filled eyes and trampled spirit I said the words, “No more… .”  With heavy heart and righteous indignation you walked right out the door.  And for the last time, you made out of my home — anger, sense of entitlement and non-existent accountability in tow.  No more fighting, no more hurting, no more us.    I still can’t remember.  What was true?  Was there really ever love between us?  Did it only exist when I buried myself in denial, living by my “I move mountains for love” credo?  The Course in Miracles says, “Your past is gone … and nothing is left but its beauty.”   May THIS be true.  May you and may I be free from pain and sorrow.  May I someday find my way to that corner in my heart where what’s left of our love now hides.  May I learn to move mountains for me.  And may I never again forget the Truth about mySelf.

Barb – Making Out – Group 3  

How are you making out?  Frequently, I find myself floundering, feeling my way around, bumping into things, thoughts, ideas, and skepticism.  I was never like this before. What triggered it?  I had a set path for a long time, high school, college, the CPA exam, and Al for seven years.    

Was leaving the comfort and familiarity of a miserable relationship the beginning?  Where did I get the gaul to think I can break out of this?  My parents fought constantly, the perfect example of what I didn’t want.  Even when I met my spouse, I still had doubts about what I did want. Therapy and spiritual reading made me wonder what other paths were out there.  I began to question everything I thought I needed, everything I thought was important.   

There was no “I just knew” magic moment.  Luckily, we ended up married and I began to build a home life.  David and I were, and are happy together. My mistake was getting comfortable in that life. Important people were obscured in a fog of trivialities and the lessons missed along the way.  I thought the miscarriage would have taught me not to jump to conclusions. Later, the reality of the job loss set in. After working in a large bank for over four years the illusion of safety was damaging.  I didn’t plan on being home for nine months.        

Then came the call from Maryland.  It was the sister of an old flame.  James had killed himself two years ago and she couldn’t bear to see the Christmas cards I sent.  She moved into his house.  Another piece of my “background” I took for granted disappeared.  There would be no “someday maybe”.  Once the shock receded, I remembered the gifts left behind.  He taught me to appreciate nature and explore the martial arts.   

Why did I continue on as normal?  How many more rugs would have to be yanked out from under me?  Without thinking, on an ordinary Sunday night, I spoke to my ex fiancée.  He, too was questioning every choice he had ever made.  I told him it was good that he was figuring these things out now, at 44, not 74.  You’re still young enough to do something about this, I said.  I’ve been frustrated at my current job for a while and when I found out the writing radio show I had been on was cancelled, I couldn’t handle going back to work.  A small piece of my dream life was threatened.  I called out sick the next day. Then came another call.     

Al’s former partner introduced herself and said “I’m sorry I have to tell you this but I didn’t want you to hear it on television.  Al killed himself this morning.”  I remember standing there in stunned silence.  I said something polite and hung up. I flew to his house in minutes.  I told myself she was crazy, Al had always said so.  He’ll be there to get the door and look confused, I thought.  When I arrived his front door was open, it was never kept open.    

Two days later my work was published in the Courier Post newspaper.  I wrote Al’s obituary.  The coroner ruled the death accidental.  I knew Al for sixteen years but it was still a comfort to hear the confirmation.  A week later I pulled over on the way in to work and cried.   

More weeks have passed and we are almost three months pregnant.  After everything that’s happened I can’t bring myself to make future plans.  Somehow I feel like Al’s pushed me. Follow your passion he said, be a writer.  Deviation is frightening but the curiosity will not leave. Somedays and maybes are delusions of safety, was that his gift?  How are you making out?  I don’t know for sure.  I am still fighting my fear.    

Suzy - Making Out - Group 2

Making out. I made out once big time when I was 17. I had a midnight to dawn, straight on, nonstop make out session on the deck of a schooner. That was it. From there it turned into getting laid. The making out part diminished except for my mother asking me how am I making out? I never made out very well in the way that would make my mother happy. The bitter truth is that my mother could give a rat’s ass as to how I was really doing so I always hated that phrase  “making out.”

How am I  ”making out” now?  I do not know. I feel I am still struggling to pull it together. I had a glimpse of joy when I found my love of touch and massage but that came to an end when I crushed my hand in a very serious car accident one month after I graduated from massage school. I was destroyed and I am still trying to put myself together.

Nothing seems to fit in my world. My life is not my dream. And I am 52. I think the hardest thing right now is being ostracized in the town I live in. I am not making out very well here. I am not included, not invited, not called. When I call, people hang up on me, people don’t say hello or acknowledge me. I am to the point where if someone nods, no smiling, just a nod, I am having a good moment. Although the one that nods didn’t even do that when I walked by her sitting in her car two days ago. So I can’t even say someone nods.
 

These are people that know me and see me frequently. They will not talk to me.  It is very strange and it hurts immensely. I am not making out very well. I avoid the local grocery store and coffee shop because the pain of
being snubbed is horrible. All my unanswered smiles and hellos, all my volunteering and offering to help, all my showing up and not having any one talk to me. It has been five years of social torture.  Worst of all is the lack of understanding of what this really feels like.  The “if you did this, if you did that, why don’t you.” Šo nothing I do matters. When you’re out, you’re out.  And I am out. Not making out.

I am moving on. Between the stepford wives and my narcissistic mother there is no social grace left for me other than to continue to search for where I belong. I am moving on and I think the answer is to start making out on the deck of a schooner. All of me there. Stars, black night air, salt, lots of salt, coils of line to fall into and roll onto, canvas to pull over us to keep the dew off, soft warm clothes dirty from a days work, the willing body, hands and lips of a real sweetie.

im just learning the ins and outs of the blogosphere, and wanted you to know im this close to understanding. pls bear with…

I swore by making out for many years
Because I knew
That skin on skin told more
Of what I wished to hear
Than words could ever do.
Since when the phrase expands
As I have learned what words are for–
To serve the heart instead
Of mastering the head, and beggaring the hand
To make out meanings
As one makes out stars
Once light descends.

i’ve been feeling for a while now that this experiment with humans was destined to fail. the cosmic soup from which we emerged doesn’t give a whit about what we do with our collective consciousness. God is not rooting for you. Neither is my dead Uncle George.  when the elections were rigged a few years back and the medical system failed my son Dan and the schools were leaving all the children behind and the pharmaceudical companies were telling the doctors what to prescribe (with that male authoritative voice behind the visual of the happy healthy returned to life- force image) could cause cramping diarrhea or stroke ….if you are over 18 and under 73 and pregnant and your father suffers from psoriasis and your mother gets migraines on washday and there have been one or more family members who have had their breasts lopped off  you should consult your doctor (but since the drug companies have the most amount of lobbyists your doctor has already been consulted. He made up his mind during the flight to the free trip to Hawaii.

But then there was Be Here Now in 1977 when i found my teacher Ram Dass on a shelf in western mass in a home where children were listened to and cookies were baked and music was played and then I started running in the woods where the trees gave me hints about what was really important….and it turned out to my surprise it wasn’t how thin i was or the grades my kids got in biology or the money my husband was making or the year of the car we were driving. It wasn’t my betsy johnson dress with the little waist and the victorian hips. o what a Surprise.  It was being in the time that was happening right there and right then. it was loving my kids who suddenly weren’t my job but my teachers, my little gifts where i would learn hard work was what we are here to do. It was listening to my husband playing twinkle twinkle on his rented violin practicing with josh over and over and over again (because in suzuki once you do it right you do it over and over and over until Right becomes natural) it was finding out that practice is what makes perfection but that process was actually where the juice is. Practice is the deliciousness of freedom. And I always thought freedom came from saying fuck when i felt like it. Another surprise. Turns out freedom Ger said it best;  freedom is the space between your perception and your opinion. (o and did i have opinions. about just about everything.) this was too lumpy… that was too dark.. she was too loud and the room was too stark. oh if there were a something I had a judgment about it. I learned that product was the end of process and the middle is where the spice is and that there would be other teachers like jack kornfield who would remind me that some people are loyal to their suffering and the dali llama who wrote The Secret to Happiness when asked what his happiest moment was answered in that child like giggle ; I think ….right now. More teachers more teaching and more pain. I am not loyal to my suffering but i do honor my heart when it hurts. I know every bit of that pain has been how i have learned and how i have deepened. Don’t forget kids I’m the one who always lectured about how we live in a culture that is terrified of sorrow…. (if you’ve got a pain…. we’ve got a pill for ya.) i also honor anti depressants. i have learned to not throw the baby out with the bath water or my baby would have gone under. he used to say “I’m not depressed. i have depressing circumstances” and i bowed to him. you show ‘em Dan’ I thought.    

Anyway this has gone on too long so i will tell you how light came pouring out of my computer monday night and how in retrospect it has all been happening all along albeit slowly too slowly for the likes of me. But there was the harmonic convergence and something teeny shifted and then Health food stores started springing up like Portabello mushrooms and eating yogurt and buying bran wasn’t weird anymore….. and then the likes of andrew weil, a real doctor combined his eastern wisdom with his western training…. and the shirley mclaines who got laughed at on johnny carson for daring to speak about reincarnation, multiplied so that talking about your next life time or your inner child or your spiritual life became part of the lexicon and then I started to hear the tales of all of your heartbreaks and I knew we would survive if we could just keep telling each other the truth and making it safe for each other to have our own experience without anyone telling us how we should feel about it.  Having our own story with our own interpretation so we could ultimately open up the constricting too small frames of those stories and let every possibility in. And then Oprah goes and does the most astounding thing; she invites us all in to hear Eckhart tell it like it really really really is. And he says “When you dont cover up the world with words and labels, a sense of the miraculous returns to your life that was lost a long time ago when humanity, instead of using thought, became possessed by thought.” And he says a million wise things. 

 Here’s the one that got me today; “somethingsomethingsomething… but IT’S EASIER TO LET GO.” as if this were news to me. Letting go is what I’ve been trying to do ever since my kid got sick, we lost all our money and my mother died. But something in the simplicity and earnestness in the way he said it, something about Oprah getting it and sharing it with a million and a half fellow beings fellow beings, something about the timing, I guess. I didn’t just hear it. I felt it.  Maybe that’s why suddenly I have all this energy to write to you. Because it takes a huge amount of electrons working overtime to resist, to push away, to block, to stop time and to freeze movement, using all those ever changing cells simply to keep holding on as if it were for dear life. When in fact Dear Life is just being.

Judy S. - Making Out – Group 3                  

In the car, drive-in movie,

 

on the couch, in the hallway,

 

or at the door

 

hormonal surges

 practicie on the nearest, most convenient, willing lips     The teen magazine

has all the newest fabulous fashions,

glamor hints, and boyfriend tips.     In my day dreams

I know I’m sexy

My mirror just doesn’t reflect it quite yet.    

One day the irresistible,

 voluptuously endowed Daisy Mae in me

will emerge for all to see, admire and desire.    

The many calls will rock the phone

right off the wall

Invitations and love notes

dripping from my backpack

waiting to be read in secret

with my newest best friend.    Wanta be next best friends

will trail in my wake

as I swish down the school corridor.

Jealous and admiring eyes

stare in disbelief of my magnetic beauty   

In the mean time

I’d better do my homework

or I’ll never get out of  sixth grade.

Joel F. - Making Out -Group 3

Mary Agnes - How did you Make Out – Group 3     

I don’t “make out” anymore.  As a single woman in my mid-fifties, it’s not that I don’t want to; I just can’t find a man to “make out” with.

   

I’ve asked all my friends to match me up.  They tell me how wonderful and “special” I am, but they don’t know anyone for me.  I attend every party I’m invited to, but, as an extra woman of a certain age, I’m invited to the all-women Sunday brunches and family parties, not to the evening parties. Last year I was thrilled to be invited to a dinner party.  After I had accepted, the hostess giggled that this was going to be a hen party and wouldn’t it be fun to get together without the guys?  Not fun, but I still went, hoping someone “might have a brother.”  No one did.

   

Adult school classes?  No matter what subject I choose, including a recent class in time management, the class is often all women.  I taught in an adult school.  They told us their overall enrollment was more than 90% female.  I remember a “Mid-life Suburban Singles Day” event that had one man to almost 100 female enrollees.  I heard women in the group discussions attacking the man, “You men…,” as if he represented all the men in the world.  In our world, he did; he was the only one who signed up.

   

I tried on-line dating, arguably the last bastion of middle-aged single men.  I signed up for eHarmony.  My advice?  Don’t.  True, they matched me with more than 100 electronic men, but all my e-men closed me out.  95% of them lived far away, most more than a thousand miles from me.  One match, in India, “required a wife of child-bearing age.”  Another man could only call me during office hours.  He had no explanation; I did.

   

So where are the men?  I decided to walk the bike path after work just to see men.  Whether they were married or not, I could at least practice smiling and saying good evening to them.  I saw 13 joggers—all women.  Take public transportation to meet men?   My bus stop makes me feel like I’m going back to all-girls Catholic high school. As a school secretary, my co-workers are females and married men.  My city is mostly female.  So is my state.

   

I’m mortified to admit that I can’t even seem to be able to find a single man, let alone date one.  I worry that this is somehow my fault, that there is something wrong with me.  I feel I “wasn’t chosen” and maybe I should instead be ready to get on with a life without a man, or perhaps I need instead to aggressively invest time and money in having plastic surgery, losing weight, and looking as young as possible. Even as I write this essay from the heart, I wonder if my wanting love at this age is whining and maybe I should just shut up.

Rajka - MAKING OUT – Group 3          “ Are you going to tell me a story or not?” inquires my granddaughter.

       

“Yes.   When I was your age…”

“Oh no, not one of those.”

“Just listen.”

“It better be good.” 

Many years ago, shortly after the end of five year war my  family moved to Zagreb. The houses in the old city are being repaired the same as the hearts and  souls of people are healed:  only on the surface.  Inside the beautiful facades are holes of disaster, empty spaces of destruction.   The city walls and the proud ancient tower of Gric have for centuries weathered the ravages of nature and wars of men.

“Is this your story?”  she interrupts./

 “Yes, this is the prologue.  Can I continue?”/

Our house is well preserved Baroque building with terra cotta facade.  There is a big courtyard with an old  chestnut tree that generously gives shade to our playground.  My sister Ankica, four years older than me, is competing with the boy next door who can climb higher.  I like tagging along.  She is so good at everything.  I am only six but keep on trying to climb the tree, when nobody is watching. I keep on falling and trying again. I can hardly wait to be ten years old. Then I will be able to climb that tree to the top.

  Our apartment is on the third floor.  A  balcony connects the large hallway with living area.   I often play there.  Alone or with Mira, a girl I do not like very much.  She lives on the second floor and is good enough to play with, when nobody else is around.  My mother tells me to be nice to her, because her father never came back from the war. I try, whenever I remember.

We are just undressing our dolls when mother calls from the kitchen:

“Ruzica, do you want orangeade now?”

“Yes, please”.

“Come and get it.”

“I cannot now.  Bring it to me.”

/

“I cannot.  My hands are full of flour. Get it when you want it.”

.         “OK.”  I get up and on the way to the kitchen I stop to tell Mira:

“Listen Mira, you’d better not touch anything until I come back.”

Mother is standing by the table, rolling a big ball of dough.  Her face is red and looks very hot.  Pulling on her apron I plead with her:

 

“Mama,  don’t do this.  Let somebody else do it.  Come and sit with us on the balcony.  You can watch us play.”

 

“Ah, don’t bother me.  I have to cut noodles for dinner.  You like noodles, don’t you?”

 

“I love noodles.  I can hardly wait.”

“OK, be a good girl.  Take the orangeade and go back to play”.  Adjusting her apron, she turns back to her rolling board.

 

“Thank you, mama.  Do  you have one for Mira?”

 

“No, I do not.  You can share yours with her.”

“But, mama, I…..”

“Off to the balcony you go.”

  

I turn around to leave the kitchen.  Before opening the door to the  balcony I spy on Mira to see if she touched anything.  If she had I won’t give her any of my orangeade.  However, Mira is just sitting there, as I left her, not touching anything.   Now I will share the orangeade with her.

Finishing my story I turn to my granddaughter:  “Well, what do you think?”

 

“I cannot make it out,  Is it a true story or did you make it up?”

 

          “All stories are true and all stories are made up.”

“Come on, Grandma, who can make you out.?”

“Good question.”

“Forget it. I actually like your story.” 

 A hug and a kiss make out for it all.    

Julie G. - TINY MURDERS – Group 3

What happened to the WHOLE of me?  I popped out whole, that much I know. On April 11^th, 1960 at 2:08 in the morning I entered this world full of innocence, beneficence and a wordless sense of the magnificence from which I came. Babies just KNOW, on a very deep level, they know that they are spectacular little miracles. And I, too, was certain of my gloriousity. I came from God and love and the mystical ethers. There I was, this timeless Spirit in a tiny human body.  “What extraordinary life awaits me?” I wondered.  “What am I here to learn and share and remember? And how will I grow my soul this lifetime?”  Ask and you shall receive.

I was daughter # 4 out of 4.  I’m told that I was a smiley, adorable little cherub with strawberry blond curls and big blue eyes.  While specific details elude me, I do remember feeling safe and warm and very adored.  Daughter #5 arrived when I was 3 years old and though I was completely enamored of her sweet baby-ness, I remember feeling somewhat de-throned in the attention-receiving department.  Unable to express these conflicting feelings, I would do the 3 year-old version of running away by hiding under the back porch for what seemed like hours on end.  Both my presence and my absence seemed to go unnoticed.  So there, amongst the cobwebs and decaying leaves I sat and sat and sat – in a painful heap of the “I don’t matters.”  Then when I was accidentally left behind in a neighborhood store at the age of four by my ever-loving and often over-whelmed Mom, a part of me just up and left.  “I am forgettable.” Casualty #1.  

Bound and determined to re-earn my specialness and lovability, I went into overdrive – excelling in school, becoming the consummate performer and the world’s youngest over-giver.  Then, at last, I found my passion, my joy, my physical, emotional and spiritual bliss – Gymnastics.  Julie the Gymnast burst onto the scene of my life and upstaged every other part of me.  I cart-wheeled down the aisles of the supermarket, I walked from room to room in a handstand, I watched TV in a Russian split …upside-down felt right-side up and passion reigned supreme as I flipped and tumbled my way to heaven on earth.  

I improved so much year after year that my parents decided to enroll me in lessons with a private coach who was known in our area for turning Gymnasts into champions.  GC, Gymnastics Coach, inspired me like never before and I got really good really fast.  I stared down every potential fear and rose to his every occasion.  I lived to be Julie the Champion Gymnast and, maybe even more so, to make GC proud.  I won meets, I went to NY State Floor-Exercise Finals and I even earned a college Gymnastics scholarship.  I was in my glory!  Then one night, in the name of “love,” GC did the unimaginable … and taught me things I never wanted to learn … .  So much for Julie the Gymnast.  So much for expressing my passion.  So much for remaining innocent and pure.  I was now guilty and tainted.  I vacated my premises and shame moved in.  “There is something horribly wrong with me.”  Casualty #2.

Shame steered the ship of my life to pain, heartbreak, struggle, sickness and a protracted case of the “I’m not lovables.”  Casualties 3, 4, 5, and then some.  Enough already!  Into the cocoon of healing and introspection I went.  I summoned up all of the broken parts of me, added equal parts love and faith and gratitude and pieced us back together.  It took a while but lo and behold, a spectacular Julie butterfly finally emerged, in all my resplendent glory.  I remembered the Truth about myself.  I do make a difference!  There are so many things that are so very right about me!  And I am indeed lovable.  Now I can fly high … because I am happy, I am harmonious and, most importantly, I am WHOLE.

  Rajka - Tiny Murder - Group 3

          On a lazy Sunday afternoon I feel mellow. My mind wonders wherever it wishes.  I’ve been playing Chopin’s 1 ^st Concerto the whole afternoon, dozing off pleasantly from time to time.

I cannot just sit here and listen to music. Too many things have to be done,

no matter how dull and boring they might be. There must be more to life

than just daily maintainace. I must do something. Anything. I cannot let

the time pass me by.

I get up, go to the kitchen, look at the breakfast dishes, shrug my shoulders

and make a Cappuccino. 

Cappuccino in hand, I am startled by the telephone. I do not want to answer it, but then, you never know.  Putting down the mug, I spill coffee and burn my hand. The phone keeps on ringing. 

Shall I first wipe the spill? I should put my hand under cold water first.  

I answer the telephone.

“Is this my countryman?”  asks the voice. 

“No, this is your country woman.”

“I am sorry I cannot distinguish between men and women. The only thing that matters is that you and I are from the same part of the world.”

       

    For the past 40 years, every January, Milan calls to invite me to his “Slava”, a party in honor of his Saint’s namesake, a tradition of Orthodox Serbs.   The ritual is always the same. He stands at the entrance door offering each guest a little spoon and asks them to dip into the bowl of wheat and honey, the symbol of good faith. For many years there a stream of guests came and went between 6pm and midnight. Suckling pig and a generous spread of Serbian specialties were preceded by Slivovica, the national plum brandy.

When I first began attending his Slava, the majority of guests were Yugoslavs: Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Macedonians, Bosnians, Montenegrians.   There were also some Americans, Germans, French, Latin Americans, a few Chinese, Japanese and Koreans.  Most of them were married to a Yugoslav.

Milan used to say:

“I am a lucky man.  I have United Nations right here in my house. The difference between mine and the official UN is that we all get along much better and have much more fun.”

It is not so any more. Every year there are fewer and fewer people coming.   Ever since the war in my country some people who were Yugoslavs now identify with their own “newly independent country.”  I am the only Croatian in a Serbian home to show and accept good faith.

I tell Milan that I admire his determination to celebrate  “Slava” with people regardless of their nationalities.

“Ah, what really matters is that we are still the same people only under different flags. Those who changed have committed tiny murders. They’ve killed off part of their original selves.”

“I am glad there are people like you. I can boast to my friends: 

There is a man, a Serb, who keeps on inviting to his sacred holiday a woman, a Croat.”

I am back in my chair, with the half-cup of Cappuccino. I put my feet up and listen, again, to Chopin. I wonder: to whom does he belong? To everyone, to no one. Another soul who transcends us all and makes us whole. Content, I listen

Go to Reader Writer Bloggers Kathy, Kim & David’s writing on the Making Out topic:

http://writingfromtheheart.wordpress.com/bloggers-readers-writing/

Grace - TINY MURDERS - Group 1

 (Grace - My apologies for this getting up late. Today, yours will be the only new post. We’re still working out the behind-the-scenes stuff. Cissy)  

 

You are a boat in a slip moored to shore. A storm is brewing and already you are moving, pulling against the line and bumping against the dock. There will be no safe harbor for you, my father. All we have is time. How much only heaven knows, and it’s not giving up any answers. But, the leaving began long before you were gone. Little losses. Tiny murders. Small deaths. I am losing you gradually. Practice, to prepare myself for days without you.

 

It begins with the diagnosis. A cancer so aggressive they cannot determine its origins. “Where?” we ask. “Everywhere!” the Doctor repeats and gestures with her hands from her diaphragm to her pubic bone, side to side and back to front. The enormity swallows us whole; Jonah in the whale. We are stunned. There is no recourse. You are adrift at sea.

 

With each advance of the disease the you I knew retreated.

 

Fatigue was the first tide to take you. Exhaustion, the kind no sleep could cure. Then came confusion and I could no longer rely on your words. Did you really swallow that pill or put it in your pocket? Next appeared the mouth sores that spread to your throat and tongue. We always loved you with food; pecan pie, Snickers and snowball cookies, none of which could be chewed or swallowed. Then the sores took your voice. The drugs were switched and your skin suffered next. Hundreds of pustules rose and wept blood, you could not lie your head down to sleep for the pain. Your eyesight was not spared but there was no spread to your brain. Like a bear to his cave you withdrew to your room and soon stopped leaving the house altogether. Valentine’s Day, The Fourth of July, my 40^th Birthday … we all gathered and each time you stayed alone. As the painkillers increased the crazies set in. We would fight about what time of day it was. Voices called to you from other rooms. Then you limited your visitors to three family friends, your two brothers, children and ex-wife.