The room with a view.

Someone said to me yesterday "Hey I heard you're a writer." I laughed because he followed it up with this bit about how I should write a sitcom and I thought ~ Yea, I don't really want to. I smiled and was polite - for me - then he explained how it was better with a visual expression of the things he thought I want to write about. I thought ~ What the fuck is the point then?!!! Will good sitcoms suddenly be more meaningful than Shakespeare?, what I said was nothing I smiled politely and moved on with my day. I came back to that conversation before writing this and thinking about how I haven't written on here lately because I'm doing other stuff, living other lives. I haven't stopped writing though. I write more regularly than I have in a very long time. It's a whole different writing experience to take your adventures and the characters you've met and try to find a balance between the actual factual people and the exaggerated  hilarity, humanity and humility of their stories colliding. I make that shit sound either fancy as fuck or downright pretentious. The real of it is though I have no clue what i'm doing, no idea if what I'm doing is worth anyone reading or worth trying to do. It could quite possibly all be utter nonsense. I could fail. I fuckin hate failing. I loathe the feeling of failing at anything, even things I don't particularly give a shit about. That said imagine how bad I'm going to feel if I never reach the goals I have regarding my writing.
Now, replace my writing with anything in the world. Any dream or hope you may have ventured to have any person you thought you would be when you were a kid. Think about it, simmer on it, are you doing it? Are you living the life you wanted? Are you the person you wanted to be? Are you miserable or happy? What do you want for yourself? Who the fuck are you? Are you movin and perhaps more importantly are you groovin?

 Suddenly the fact that I keep writing down fractals of ideas and beginning stories without finishing others as I go, doesn't seem so bad, because, well, what the fuck else am I working for if not to be a better human, a better me and so, a better writer. What is life, if not to some extent, a lesson in learning when to walk away and knowing if and when to go back. Bam! Instant inspiration. I want to be the type of person who is always writing something. I hope eventually something I write makes a difference somehow to someone else but also I want to be able to take care of myself. By which I mean get money. I want to write about Fuckin Bitches and Get Money for it so the way I see it I will...as soon as I stop being afraid and just do the shit.

 I have been in this intense growth spurt of awareness to who I am and mostly I think I am becoming a pretty fuckin awesome human being but I know my deepest failures and I know I can be a far better one. I think all too often we allow it to be all too easy. We say, Fuck it. this is where I am so this is who I am. We allow our fears to swallow our hopes and dreams and aspirations of being who we wanted to be before we became who we are. I could have been a million far shittier versions of myself if I had just accepted who I was at any of my past moments of doubt. I've slowly learned to give myself a healthier insulation of people who are both supportive and understanding of who I am. People who respect where I've been and can see where I'm going, who get me and love me even if they don't really know me. I relapse on that from time to time but more so lately I feel like I'm getting the hang of this living thing. I'm progressively happier as I recognize and address my flaws and failures. I am living to be someone I respect. It feels pretty good mostly.
We shouldn't be afraid of failures, of messes and mistakes. I don't want to be. That's not to say I'm not, but, the heart of it is, we shouldn't be afraid. If we are going to be, then we should pick better things to be afraid of. I am afraid of failure, it scares me more than anything in the world, but I am also afraid of not living the big beautiful adventure filled life I have been planning since I could think of cool shit to be when I grew up. I'm afraid all of the people I love not knowing how much I appreciate them even if I can't surround myself with them or immerse myself in their lives. I am afraid of missing really good sunsets and lives lost way too soon. I'm afraid of a world where no one is who they want to be and I'm afraid of dinosaurs making a comeback due to grossly negligent scientists...among other things.
You see? There's way better things to be afraid of than being a shitty writer and even those aren't worth the cost. Yes, there is a cost, there are casualties of fear, hope, dreams, adventures, love. All things that get lost when you choose to be afraid rather than keep it movin and groovin. More than that I dare say we ourselves get lost when we let fear tell us who we can or cannot be. When I die I want some one to get up and say "That bitch lived. She was one fun, fearless, fucking bitch of a cunt." I want to be remembered someday for doing the shit I said I would and even if I failed, at least I'll have done it. Not tried. Actually, done it. That. That's the shit right there. That is what living is to me among countless other equally important things. Life is an adventure and the way I imagine it adventurers need fear only to keep them moving. I'm an aspiring adventurer, writer, human. I never want to stop collecting characters and stories and moments. I want many things for my life but mostly I want to keep movin and grovin until I can't anymore.

Dangled carrots don't play guitars...

Sometimes I wonder if anyone sees half the shit I see in the world. I've been extremely fortunate to have many chances in this life to change my trajectory. To figure shit out. I will never have it all figured out, Never will there come a day where I know it all. I don't know shit really, not a goddamned thing. I know how I've lived, I know it hasn't always been roses. I know where I've been and I like to think I recognize something of that in the people I choose to surround myself with. Life isn't easy for anyone. Anyone who tells you their life is easy, is a goddamned liar. Someone who tells you their life is getting easier, that's someone to believe in, that's someone to stand with. The world we live in doesn't give us anything. we earn it, with battle scars and wounds that don't ever quite heal. Over the course of my life I have (Not always on purpose) made it my mission to keep a hard head soft butt mentality. I never learned to stop hoping, wanting and looking to the best in people, in myself. I lost myself in many ways and for a long time lost hope in all of the things I wanted for the world and myself. I still had hopes but they were pretty useless hopes, the hopes of an angry fuckin midget. The type of shit you hope for when you're not a total piece of shit just a little - broken.
For many different reasons my life got stalled for a while in a fairly broken and fucked up place. Occasionally, things would get better and inevitably something would come crashing down and I'd let myself be a sloppy mess of a person again. I still have lapses of judgement, I still fuck my own shit up from time to time, but somewhere along the way I've remembered how to hope for the right things again. It's not about expecting things to go the way I want them to, it's about hoping for the best even while preparing for the life parts.

Life will kick your ass if you let it. Sometimes we let it, we put our faces down, bend over and let it kick us with a big dirty boot and we say "Thank you". Those times can be for some people, more frequent than others. People cry about this or pray or scream from the rooftops, others silently move on with their shit. No two people ever feel the boot in the same way and while there are groups of people who may respond to this the same way, you never know why any one person is really responding to something with one emotion or another. It's endless possibilities of causes all relevant to only one person in truth. I believe in people and hope and myself after an excruciatingly long hiatus, but I am no where near done yet. I was a very angry person once for like over a decade, but the fact of the matter is I'm still kinda angry sometimes. I just like to think I handle it better more frequently than less these days.

I played Rockem Sockem Robots the other night with an extremely worthy adversary, we snorted like piggies and made a ridiculous amount of noise and we laughed more joyfully than anyone ever really truly laughs anymore, you know with bills and kids, wives, husbands, jobs, bosses, mortgages, who really laughs at the silly shit often anymore? I'm not talking the, that was funny laugh, but the deep amazing carefree laugh of life being simple. No past, no future just here, now and enjoying it. I strive to be more in that moment as I figure my shit out. It's getting simpler, once in a while to just be. To enjoy the really amazing parts of life that I might have missed out on if I'd taken the short road instead of the long one (or in some cases the extra long one with the circle rounds every ten miles or so).

 From time to time I've been known to make bad decisions as a rule, that's another thing I've really - no really, I'm totally serious, REALLY been working on. I'd like to think I've made some minor progress on that over the last few years, but change don't happen over night and a lifetime of crappy decisions doesn't suddenly get wiped clean with intentions to make better ones in the future. People have a way of either bringing you down or lifting you up but at the end of the day you decide which people can do what in your life. I can do a lot of things but refuse to keep believing people have to make each other feel shitty to feel good. I won't say I never want anybody to feel shitty, there are zillions of people I think should be thrown into a pit of lions, some for barely any reason at all, but at the end of the day even the shittiest people in my life get multiple chances before I cut them loose. I'm not talking the friends you fade out with but the ones who stay in your life but just keep bringing you down. I try to believe that they just need someone to believe in them, to hope for them while they figure out how to be - better. In some people I see little slivers of who they are capable of being and like a sucker, I give-em, Just. One. More. I have friends who get upset when other friends don't like them but the truth of it is, I don't really give a shit because I like them. Until I don't. To end up on my shit list for real, as in no coming back ever, you have to be a repeat offender and you pretty much have to cut me so deep I actually feel it. That shit ain't exactly easy, For either of us.

Why isn't it easy? What am I rambling about? What the fuck does one have to do with the other? When is this post going to finally be done?
Soon. A lot for me. I'm getting there and because to be in my life and kill my hope these days you have to be basically fucking my corpse.
 I mean my hope and joy and fierce gratefulness at the life I currently have isn't impossible to kick down a set of stairs and bruise pretty badly, but I'll still get the fuck up. I am much more agile then I look. I've lived a life not a bad one at all really, a pretty damned good one so far, but it's not been without some painful lessons. I've lost irreplaceable pieces of my life by being angry, by not enjoying the people around me and by forgetting who and what matters. I matter. The people I love matter and the people who love me matter. The rest of the world can all fall in line after those three in no particular order. People make a difference in your life to the degree you let them. I choose the survivors of real life, I choose, to hope we can all come out better than we imagined, to believe that where you've been makes you who you are, but you can always be more. Always grow and always find a way to be KINDER, if for some reason we are too weak in a moment to simply be kind. Be it to ourselves or to others.

I believe that life really could be as simple and silly and fun as Rockem Sockem Robots. It's some pretty basic shit, but what makes it fun is who you're playing with. No sore losers, no cheaters or overly boastful winners ever walk away happy from shit like that. The same goes for life, so why NOT enjoy it? Why not surround yourself with people who walk away generally happy no matter what happens. People who are hopeful despite their knowledge of real life, people who handle sadness and pain with a little humor and people who accept that sometimes you might be the weird hat girl or smiley, or an avid lover of unicorns, an Aunty, or a friend and other times you may be the angry midget, but you're evolving and it's good. Why not surround yourself with people who want you to be better because the world is full of people who want you to fail for one reason or another. Why waste love on people who don't see the slivers of potential, in people, in life. Why would you do that? Why does anyone do that? Not all of the people in my life see my life the way I do. Not a single person I choose to keep in my life would pull me down to get ahead of me. If they would, I'd like to say fuck em but really I'd still, like a true sucker, hope they'd figure it out, but not on my time. I'm too busy plotting spectacular dinner parties, having adventures, watching sunrises, laughing at knock knock jokes and remembering who I wanted to be when I grew up to let the things that hurt me define me or put me out. Nothing in life is easy but sometimes you've just got to find the fun, the hope, the happy shit, hold onto it and believe that the people and things that matter will eventually catch up. Even if they won't.

My pussy must have ate it...

Its strange the things we think of when our world begins to change, when we start out to change. The people around us do, or don't and life moves forward, we move forward, or we don't. It's strange. Life. It always ends the same way. We eventually, inevitably die. What people remember of us is how we lived and what they know of how we lived. These things are important. These things make a lasting difference in not only our lives but others too. Life and death have lessons. Lessons no one can teach you in school, things people can't buy with all the money in the world. Life is hard and downright dreary at times, but we live for the good moments. If we are really fortunate we have a person or two that teaches us not to take it too seriously. I have a habit of viewing things in a very black and white manner. It doesn't always serve me well, but i'm consistent about it, so is life. We live we die and the rest is truly details, details we have trillions of opportunities to rise or fail in. Surviving is tough but there are people in every life, every group, who truly live. Who enjoy the adventures and roller coasters that life presents. That's the kind of person I'm striving to be even in my bitchiest moments. That's a large part of who I want to be and who I am.

Eight days ago I left the gym after work, went home, took a shower and drove 30 minutes to go see a shell. I say shell because that was all that remained of the funny, bright, lighthearted and raunchy as fuck, woman I remember. I had resisted going to see her these last few months because I didn't want to remember her as the scared, lost person that old age and Alzheimer's had left. It wasn't until speaking to a really good friend and even then mulling it over that I managed to get over myself long enough to drive up there and see her. On the ride up I thought about what I wished I could ask her. What I wished I could ask all of the dead people in my life. Who did you want to be? Did you get to be her? Once I got there all I could do was just repeat in my head what my friend had said to me "You don't have to remember her like this", She was peaceful, but she wasn't the same woman who had thrown me in the pool, or tortured us with cicada shells on her finger. The crazy fun one who rode the roller coasters, told dirty jokes (even to children) and laughed like laughter was life itself, She was already gone. There was her body, there was breathing but she was long gone. I saw my grandfather be, human and real, my mother, a bit extra crazy with grief and a whole lot of weird, But I didn't see any of the light that was my Grammy. I made the right choice in going up there when I did and I'm glad I got to see my grandfather in that light and some day, I'm sure it will be appropriate to laugh a little about how my mother Sister Gloria'd me with pictures of New Orleans and asked me if I wanted some of my Grammy's hair, (because vikings or some shit like that.) Shortly after I left, so did my Grammy and I have no regrets thanks to one really smart and underpaid guy up north (someone must be paying some of these friends for them to stick around this long.), but I'll never know the answer to my question. Did she get to be who she wanted to be? Did she live the life she had hoped for?

Of all the people over the last ten years who have dropped out of this life and moved on to whatever comes next. I think maybe she's the only one who might have actually done that. It's kind of amazing that anyone could and even a little ridiculous when I think of all the shit I don't know about her or most of my family really, but I think she did. I think she lived through the bad shit, through hard times and sad ones and somehow she had fun whenever and wherever she could, I think that bitch really, fuckin, lived. If that's not what life is about then we're just not doing it right. Water Skiing, Sky diving, speeding over a bump in the road, throwing kids in a pool, dressing up as Miss Piggy for your birthday, getting a tattoo at 60 something, making faces, setting lobsters loose, letting us peel her sunburn and do her hair, sitting on the beach, having fun. That was Grammy. That was one fun Broad.

People will come and go from our lives for many different reasons, but the shit they teach us, the shit that molds us and provokes us to move forward, good or bad, these are the seeds they leave behind. You can grow stuff and make a life, You can let fear stop you, or you can jump right the fuck in and go. I don't remember learning how to swim but I know we didn't take one of those baby survival classes, I imagine my Grammy, (but possibly my mother,) tossed me in the pool, laughing. and obviously we didn't drown. Appalling as that may be to some, it was one of the best lessons she could have taught me, that and never smell a cupcake... There are all kinds of people and all kinds of ways to live, some are shitty, some are good and some are just plain fun. I hope that when I go ~ like a rockstar ~ I hope that I can be remembered as the fun one... My give a damn about anything or anyone that's not fun or enjoying their life is kinda like the mouse my Grammy used to tell us about, but could never find when she tried to show us. She'd ask us if we'd seen her mouse, she'd look for it on her leg and then when she couldn't find it she would look up and tell us her pussy must have ate it! Take from that what you will but it was years before I got it and once I did it was even funnier that this raunchy grandma would tell it to a bunch of kids, not giving a shit that we didn't get it cause some day we would and either way it was funny to her. That is how I will remember my Grammy.

~ Goodnight Irene.

Holding the line.

I'm exhausted, should be sleeping, but I'm furious. So I'm writing. Furious at the choices life leaves us and furious at how much tougher it becomes to know or feel the right choice the harder, the longer, the more ferociously and loyally we love. I've talked and written much over the past two years and some about my growing pains, decisions, strengths and failures. Examined openly and privately my motives and questioned myself and my behaviors in this growth. Taking the lessons I could from all of these experiences.
 The single most helpful thing I learned in earning my mostly useless Associates degree was to ask myself, What's that about". Whether pertaining to myself, someone I know or even a stranger on the street. What's that about? Be it a feeling, emotion, thought or behavior, what is it all about, why am I judging, defending, hurting, caring, laughing, smiling, what's driving my reaction,or lack of one to any given event, person or thing. The statement has effectively changed my perception for the better and was worth every penny spent on all that fancy book learnin!

As a kid I stole, I'm not proud of it but the shit happened. My favorite thing to steal was brownie mix. Like a true fat kid lovin cake and all things cake-like I would  hide out under the bed or in a closet and eat the fuck out of that shit. Sometimes the whole box sometimes just a little. I ate it dusty and dry, or added water and once or twice when there was a spare egg I would mix it all up and it that way too. One particularly unforgettable afternoon my mother went to make brownies only to find that some run by psycho brownie mix thief had thieved half a box of brownie mix. So, my Mothadear in a rare yet justifiable fit of what I can only describe as rage and exasperation, interrogated and promptly chased my lying ass around the house from the kitchen, up the stairs (on which she nearly got me), to the bedroom I shared with my sister where I narrowly and briefly escaped, only to come full circle and be caught in the kitchen. On my hands and knees I pleaded with her through tears and snots, not to kill me, (whether aloud or silently I can't recall). My mother, mommy dearest, Mothadear herself, proceeded to beat me about the head and face with what remained of the aforementioned brownie mix. When the last of the mix had spilled out and the floor and I alike were covered, I was told to clean up the mess and I quote, with conviction, I quote, "This, NEVER, happened!"

This never happened. It's a statement, a declaration that haunted me well into my twenties. Before I began to ask, what's that about, before I made any conscious effort to grow the fuck up. This tiny statement held power, clinging to my psyche like a barnacle and driving me for a long time to question many of the things that have actually happened in my life. Forcing me to store carefully and exactly all those, You can't make this shit up moments that for many go from memory to tall tale ever so quickly. This single experience shaped and implanted a part of me that will always doubt my own memories no matter how clear and confident of them I may be. She said it never happened. But it did. Denied it for years, would probably still deny it if you asked her today. I used to bring it up around friends and family, she would laugh, tell them it never happened, convince them I'd made it up by passing it off. It did happen though, I was there, I knew it was real, factual and true. Then FINALLY at some holiday or family event later in my twenties, after I'd once again told this story and she'd once more denied it and everyone had just about cleared the room she leaned in, this maniacal mother of mine, and quietly confirmed what I knew yet still doubted was, indeed true. Mothadear admitted that she had in fact beaten me about the head and face with half a bag of fuckin brownie mix.

For over ten years I'd been made to question my own memory. Even now as I write this I think wow my mom was kind of a dick. At the same time I appreciate the lessons she taught in this among other things. It taught me what it felt like to to tell the truth and go unheard, to hold my ground on the important stuff, the stuff that really mattered such as the truth. I was no angel, I was a lying liar from Liarsville until a particularly altering relationship at 18 taught me the value and sometime necessity of a lie as a survival mechanism rather than a way of life. The brownie mix incident also taught me slowly over time that I despise and detest being lied to. I'm not talking white lies people tell to get out of helping you move. I'm talking the big whoppers, the manufactured kind of webs people weave for sympathy, jealousy, pure fucking stupidity. Sometimes loosely based on facts but lies nonetheless. These are the ones that burn me to my center, they hurt me the most because I was there and know it didn't quite happen that way or because somewhere inside I see through the bullshit I'm being fed. It hurts when people take you for an idiot. Misuse your trust and faith in them and even worse than that keep it going until caught. I hate being cheated, manipulated, or played for a fool to me they're all unnecessary risks of friendships, support systems and pieces of my life I value.

I have this terrible grey area though, and I'm not much for grey on such things hence it being kind of terrible for me. The grey area lays between the place where I see a person for what they are and love them anyways, want them in my life flaws, warts,  lies and all. That's where the hard choices come in. Thats where its been getting tougher. Some of these people I keep in my life lie to themselves more than they're lying to me, convince themselves of their false truths, but aren't fooling me. Does that forgive the toxicity or offensiveness of behaviors like lying for two years about some pretty heavy shit out of jealousy, all the while proclaiming "I just wanted to protect you." Does it excuse revisionist history about saving my ass from an extremely unhealthy relationship which makes you the hero and me some victim? Does my knowledge of the facts as well as the flaws of these people I continue to keep in my life, whose offenses seem, so minor in comparison to the their champion moments and positive contributions to a life filled with amazing highs yet also intense lows that they stood by for in what ways they were capable of, change the amount of chances they get to essentially break my heart? Like a video game where you earn extra points just by bein there for the tough times. Is my loyalty, friendship AND presence in these lives as they are in mine worth wondering when the next time I hurt will be?
 Also, what in the fuck is this need to keep these people all about? Yep, I'm finally bringin it back around, bringin it to a close. See, the fatty in the closet, under the bed, that bitch mostly died a long time ago but she left a thing or two. That girl had one booger flickin friend, we were weird lonely kids with parents who were too poor or cheap to buy us new uniforms or normal kid clothes, eventually that girl had two friends and at some point they multiplied and so forth. Recently, these past few years the friend pool may have downsized but the people with the deepest roots in my heart are the ones who accepted me for all my weird, mostly right out of the gate and didn't disappear when shit got hard. Friendship, like life is one hard badass bitch. I don't believe in giving up on people you love unless you really fucking have to, but every time one of those original weirdos sticks a little jab in there I question, What's it about? I wonder, can this person love,  accept and appreciate how far I've come and want to go from that lonely lying liar from Liarsville eating her mothers brownie mix and her feelings, under the bed? I wonder do they see the person I'm capable of being or just the person I was or even worse the person they want me to be. I question it all because I think it's rare that we ever really look outside our own realities. My mother inadvertently trained me to question my own reality in addition to others, my father taught me to see what and who people really are and accept them anyways, keep them anyways, be good to them, find the good in them anyways.


** Sidebar/ Disclaimer: Aside from this incident I don't recall my mother ever hitting me while she did make us drink soap, the liquid dishsoap, a few times, I am certain I mostly, always, deserved that shit...

You're Fucking Amazing. Thank you.

Over this past weekend I had an opportunity to see two women I respect immensely, rock out.  One fronting an extremely metal and amazing band and another thoroughly celebrating another year of living.Both of these women inspire me daily, that's right. Daily. They're not the only ones, but that's what brought on my deep thoughts on the topic and moved my lazy ass to write for this silly blog again. Don't get me wrong, I've been writing, just not on here. This seemed worth sharing though, at least to me. It dawned on me that as we grow older and apart, or even just grow really. People come in and out of our day to day or week to week lives but those who inspire us, help us, relate to us and generally give enough of a fuck about us to care even on the most basic of levels, those people are always with us. I guess there's a sliver of possibility that I'm the only one who feels this way, buuuuut I doubt it. (Anyone who reads post secret has a clue what I'm talking about in that sense.)
I wish people expressed what they mean to each other more freely, more often and perhaps a little more clearly. I wish also that all the people I love even just a little could be in one place all at the same time ever again in my lifetime. One of these is impossible, the other, get it together people.

I've worked hard and harder to reach further for the things in my life that matter. I fuck up plenty, even real stupid shit like how money really works and washing clothes, I struggle to accept the idea that to make anything of myself I should probably focus on one thing at a time. So I focus on what I'm going to do with my life.~ Aside from ROCK!...I battle with the job I hate to buy shit I don't need and the cushion to fall on if it all goes to shit. I dream, and I hope and I struggle to figure out how I'm going to afford my rock and roll lifestyle, you know, that life where work is passion and passion pays. How does anyone get through to the parts of life that really matter? How does anyone break out of the box and into the pursuance of happiness, passion, living? Not living breathing, but living just out there hustling the world and enjoying that shit for real and pure, enjoying it. How do people get there. How do we find and contribute and survive for and on whatever it is we're passionate about.

Do you call it a hobby,tell yourself "eh, someday" or daydream about it at work, on the ride home or once in a while when a famous celebrity dies? Do you drown in it, or worse yet drown yourself in booze and hookers - both cheap cause you're broke... Do you tell yourself you can't? That there's no way you could possibly, just no way, to do whatever it is that would make you, yea you, feel good about the mark you leave on the world. Or convince yourself that whatever you get paid for IS what you're passionate about. Do you sometimes, maybe in the corner, at a party facing the wall, when no one is looking shed a single tear drop over all the shit you never did. Yea me either... Seriously, though I've done some of this shit, well, never and some of it all the fucking time. Maybe my insecurities and fears of failure are all on point, possibly I am meant to work at a desk and listen to first world problems all day every day. Could be, I'm built for that shit and am simply denying my full potential as a customer service representative with every artsy-craftsy, wordsmithy thing I do. Maybe I'm not. Perhaps my fears are unfounded and wrong.
What if I am wrong? What if the books I want to write and the movie I want to build from that one book that changed my entire life that time, and the adventure with Khloe "Brickhouse" Kardashian (like a week, just hangin out like we were friends, no big deal.Cause that shits on my internal bucketlist and I think she'd be so much fun!) or A movie night with Mr. Tarantino, followed by a brief discussion of his favorite scene in Blues Brothers or even that drag club with full health benefits for employees that I always dreamed of opening, what if all of it can actually, factually, happen. Not some, all. What if it can. I can. What if we all can.

That's the hope. The dream. The reason for living. That's the reason all of these people I've collected in my heart over the years and along the way, the ones I know but rarely see or barely know but still see, ones I love but mostly never say it, (cause, who does that?), matter, mean so much and inspire me so VERY, much. They live out their dreams in whatever ways they can. They say fuck it with their yes I can and yes I will attitudes about the things that mean something to them. The epic battles the demons and bullshit they overcome to be A rockstar, A Tattoo artist, an artist at all, A Nurse, A poet, La Profesora (I failed Spanish 9 times, you get it), A Father, A Mother, A Fireman, An Audio master (Cuz, I don't know the official title for either of those two dudes and that seemed epic enough),A helicopter pilot, A writer, or even just happy. Those are all very real people who I am ever so proud to have known or know in my life. All of them and many more Inspire me daily. To be better, to be who ever it is I want to be rather than who the world wants me to be. I'm grateful for the support, encouragement, and hope they and their lives give my broke winged dreams and the motivation they give me to grow. I'm thankful for these very real people and their exceptionally rare ability to evoke change and emotion and provide proof that people can, in fact, accomplish dreams and surpass expectation. I am awkwardly, proud of these people. Some, I don't necessarily know at all anymore others are day to day, week to week or phone call to phone call, but each of them touched my life in someway when I needed more sparkle and shine, more move and groove. Each of these magical yet ordinary people have given me an extremely extraordinary outlook on not so much living but life.Living, getting by, that's what I'm doing now, surviving, learning, gettin it together. I'll be doing that shit, forever. Life? Life is green grass between your toes, love, laughter of, friends, children and family. Life is about passion too though.


More than anything I am inspired and amazed by those who find a way, a will, the time, to pursue the things they are passionate about. To live the life they ~survived~ so long to enjoy. To have little people, fans, followers, friends, readers, patients, whatever you call a person rescued by another person, students, random strangers on the interwebs, and me, all looking up to you must be pretty cool. Though, I wonder, do any of these people even know what they're worth, to each other, to those of us who haven't quite gotten there, to the world of people like me who rarely barely see or speak to them. Do they know how absolutely fucking amazing they are? I think, "How could they not?", they're fucking amazing. Then I think, what if, yep, back to the what if, what if they didn't. Well, why don't they? What kind of horseshit must that be I mean surely some of them must know they're awesome. Perhaps they are simply too humble to bust through our doors parading their amazing inspirationally awesome selves around but they know. They know.

Or do they? Would it be so strange if people just told each other the good shit like, "oh hey, by the way, you make me want to live my dreams" Or Your art, your words, your voice, your zest for life, your smile, "Light up my whole fucking world, or maybe puts a sparkle on my sparkle, or just gets me through the day." What if people said thank you to one another for the shit that really matters, the real life movin and groovin, important shit like hope and dreams and the beauty and value of life's finer moments. Imagine how much the world can change if we just taught ourselves to say thank you instead of just think it. Thank you for all the little things that matter and all the even littler shit in between. Thanks for bein a friend or just bein there, but what if we just started saying thank you. Preposterous! I know. What if it's not though. What if we start the conversation and tell people the good shit. What if everyone tried it? I'd hypothesize that a lot more people would feel good like they should (NOW,obligatory 7 a.m. James Brown reference, don't mind if i do...).  They would know that they matter very much to someone, perhaps more than a few someones, a little to others and maybe not so much to a lot in the grand scheme of things but I can't imagine a person existing that doesn't inspire some one some how and matter to them. Not in a world where serial killers and rapists can marry people from inside prison, I mean if someone cares about those folks, then some one cares about everyone. Most people mean a lot to me, some more than they should and others mean a little, but none less than they should. Still I find myself wondering how uplifting and majestic would it, could it be, this world we live in if we took the time to acknowledge the best in eachother, even just once, in a blue moon.

Single is not alone.

When I was a kid I wanted only a handful of things when I grew up. To drive trucks, own  a house and a Harley and be able to take care of myself. It all seemed so simple as a kid. As I grow older and accomplish more of these things, other shit comes up. This is life right? Shit comes up. I've deviated from many a broke winged dream over the course of twenty years but those four, those have always been there, waiting for me to get it together. The past few years have been filled with struggles I never imagined as a child. I'm still here pluggin away at those 4 dreams though. Over the past few months I've begun to realize how these dreams of mine don't necessarily sync up with most peoples. Including but not limited to many of the people I surround myself with. It took me time to get used to the idea of my friends having kids and starting families, it took me time to really accept that other friends would leave and others would come back. Just as I finally got into the groove of  the changes and growth of myself and those around me, life started to get better, so I made more changes and learned a few things about what makes me different.

 One of these things I will never get rid of, I can never forget and were it not for my baby steps in other seemingly unrelated areas of my life I may never have discovered or found any relief on. For all of my adult life I have lived with a disease no one, NO ONE could tell me jack shit about. I spent a very long time assuming I had an std that I deserved for being such a... goodtime gal. I spent a long time in pain because this was normal for me. When I started asking questions, when I started seeking a better life quality I was told there wasn't one, that I should wash myself with surgical soap, slather creams on myself, hope and learn to live with it. I spent a good amount of my life pissed off, in pain and figuring my "do what I want lifestyle", had created a new std that no one had ever seen. Why am I telling you this? I'll get there. First, I do not have any std's! Winning! I do have a much healthier fear and understanding of processed foods, and a class of vegetables called Nightshades, (fuck those things). I've learned that many of my problems go directly back to this disease in ways I would never have thought. Depression, stress, random as fuck adult acne, the golfballs and marbles in my armpits and other areas, The ingrown hairs I panicked over at least once every six months since I was 13. All pretty gross and those are just a few! Heavy stuff right? Now throw in there that no one in the medical community has a s fucking clue and everyone who has it has a million different opinions and cures, then consider that its genetic. 

I know, I know, where the fuck is this going? Just stay with me. I'm 30 years old want kids, maybe I don't want kids, Fuck, I don't know! I know I just bought a Harley. I know driving trucks wasn't really my thing but it was also one of the most liberating experiences of my life. I know a house is possible if I can just decide where I want to be and put the money in the bank. I know I've  been taking care of myself (with the help of many good friends) for a long time now with plenty of ups and downs. What I know less and less lately is how fair it would be to involve anyone else with this shit that I'm only barely beginning to get under control in the grand scheme of things. So very much more than that, I've got to ask myself do I want to risk the possibility of passing this down to another generation along with the various other lovely family traits. I'm not getting any younger and I have no idea what ELSE I want and while I realize I have time, I also realize, I don't. Life is a short and precious thing, meant for living. As we grow older I think most of us grow more responsible, with others, with ourselves. Knowing is only half the battle, what you do with knowledge that's a whole other story. 

Can you feel it? My point is coming... As I grow older, I don't get any more or less single than I was before. I've become a lot less good time about my gal, but I've been on my own in that sense long enough to be ok with it most of the time. Recently, the children in my life have slowly started picking up that my life is a little different than their mothers. Oddly their mothers in some, not all, some, cases have suddenly begun to push a little harder in their own ways on the when I'm going to finally assimilate either with kids or a partner or both. My own mother quietly, silently even, except around Christmas, fights this battle these days while children and friends pick it up. These people all love me and I love them, that in itself keeps me from feeling alone. That in no way means I don't get lonely. It just means, after years of trying not to care over the wrong shit I finally care about the right shit. I have a family that I love made up of people who love me and maybe I'll find someone who can handle my past, my family, me and my genetics, In fact I am certain I eventually will but in the mean time I'm doin just fine with my baby steps. What I'd like to throw out there is the thought that maybe some of your other single friends are too.  My adventures, my life, my lifestyle, it's not easy but I've enjoyed it so far and will continue to, with or without someone by my side. Would it be nice to have a partner in crime? Someone to tell about my really spectacular day or really terrible one for that matter, and tell me about theirs? Of course. But, it's not necessary, I've done ok without and at the end of the day I have a pretty amazing life. Some days I want a kid, some days I want a relationship, some days, I just want a Jack and Ginger. Someday I may or may not have either, in the meantime I am extremely proud of how far I've come. I am a happier, healthier person today than I have been in probably my entire adult life, I get lonely sometimes but I am not alone. Lately, I've been wishing more often that people in general were a little more forgiving with themselves and others when it comes to all things different. My reasons for not doing things the way someone else would, I have plenty, but you don't need to know them all. Just try to respect that maybe I have an idea what I need and want for now.

Having somewhere to go... is home.

Three years ago tonight, a woman went to bed. She went to bed and never woke up. I will never hear her voice or see her face again in this life. What more do you really need to know about the end of someones life. Over the past few years I've searched my soul for the answers. Still don't have them and am finally coming to the conclusion I will never have them. People give up or others give up on them, or sometimes it's a little of both.
A convicted felon may have gotten away with murder or a beautiful broken heart may have given herself bittersweet relief, or a series of unfortunate events could have done something neither of them had even expected. What I know is either scenario leaves far too many questions for any of us that loved her to ever answer. The simplest easiest to digest way to say it is she went to bed and never woke up but the fact is like every rock star she went to bed, likely choked on her own fluids, drowned after coughing and choking for at least a couple minutes and then she was gone. I'm no doctor, I have never seen someone overdose but I'm guessing it was something more like that and less like some peaceful elderly woman passing in her sleep. The story is only magnified by the neighbors tales that the man in the very next room with the dogs barking and the possible motive sat in the living room watching his football telling the dogs to shut up and turning the TV up. This is the shit sadness is made of, I can't prove she killed herself and I can't prove he killed her. I can prove he was a bastard, I have my own proof of that, but I can't prove he killed her. She was sad and she had pain like only a Brickhouse would know, but I can't bring myself to believe a woman who always had a plan would have planned death.

I was 27 years old, had just started a new job and couldn't take a day to process the shittiest wake up call ever. I had no time. My brother called and I remember going through the motions, I remember going over what I knew then of the situation and thinking, it doesn't add up. I remember sleeping with a picture for awhile and being sad and silent. The silence death leaves inside of you is a cruel sound that's the only way I can explain it and each time, with each loss that silence gets louder. Some days I choose to hear it telling me to live, other days, I have to fight it just to do shit I want to do, to get out of bed and have even what I know is going to be a good day. This year there's been a shift in the power of that silence, a stifling of the fighting spirit of death and an overwhelming change in the tone of that loud crowd in the distance chanting, "Do something, Live, be a better you.". The silence doesn't taunt me lately so much as teach me and while I may, continue to at times daydream of my Aunt being off on a tropical island with a new name and identity, laughing at how well she planned her escape. I know my Nancy is not in witness protection anymore than Mike Crouse is going to walk through my door and tell me a racist joke, or my Black G-mo is sharing beauty tips with Richie Cunningham AND is going to be canonized, but each of these thoughts make me smile and sometimes even laugh out loud for seemingly no apparent reason at times. Especially that last one, that one is sure to crack a smile on even the worst of days.

The thing is, people die, they leave us with memories and love and a shitload of laughter, they give us all the chances they can to love them and be loved by them and then they're gone. Will the way my Aunt, my person, my Nancy died, forever haunt me? Forever. Do I have to spend tomorrow as angry as I want to be, angry at the whole world for shit that can't be changed? I submit that I can simply spend tomorrow living, that I can change the tone of the entire day if I just take a day, a personal day, a very, personal day and do something to remember the shit that makes life live-able. I mean being honest I may wake up tomorrow only to go back to bed, I may wake up and make art or read a book or clean my house like a madwoman. I know for the first time in 3 years I have time at that job I had to go to and smile while my soul cried and so I'm gonna take my time and I'm gonna use it effectively, and do my absolute best to remember shit other than how sad and painful and alone it must have been to go to bed and never wake up. At some point I will probably go to the sea wall and miss my Aunt, I'll replay my last conversation with her in my head and try to remember her voice and all the things she ever tried to teach me. The only difference between tomorrow and every other day for me is that tomorrow I spend the whole day wondering and angry that the whole entire world isn't stopping to miss her too.