Happiness Is...

(Haven't done one of these in far too long.)

1. Realizing that getting a "B" in a class isn't the worst thing in the world.

2. Skipping classes to read, in bed, for fun, for the entire day! (Hunger Games! Read it!)

3. Knowing that in 28 days I will (a) have finished my first year of graduate school and (b) will be in Chicago with my people.

4. Hiking in Red Rocks, moving my body as it wants to be moved, witnessing the gloriousness of Colorado.

5. Talking with a fabulous friend for hours and hours.

6. Watching a Red Wings playoff game with wonderful people!

7. Being able to provide support to friends, old and new, when they find life too overwhelming.

8. Planning my 26th birthday party!

9. Thinking about Telluride and how amazing the festival will be!

10. Getting overwhelmed with school work, not having a summer job, and planning next year... and then remember that it will all work out in the long run.

“Someday, sometime, you will be sitting somewhere. A berm overlooking a pond in Vermont. The lip of the Grand Canyon at sunset. A seat on the subway. And something bad will have happened: You will have lost someone you loved, or failed at something at which you badly wanted to succeed. And sitting there, you will fall into the center of yourself. You will look for some core to sustain you. And if you have been perfect all your life and have managed to meet all the expectations of your family, your friends, your community, your society, chances are excellent that there will be a black hole where that core ought to be.”
-Anna Quindlen, Being Perfect

I miss Chicago with every part of me. My friends who are my family, my security, my confidence, my babes, my city, my neighborhood.... my old life.

Daughter
by Nicole Blackman

"One day I’ll give birth to a tiny baby girl
and when she’s born she’ll scream
and I’ll tell her to never stop

I will kiss her before I lay her down at night
and will tell her a story so she knows
how it is and how it must be for her to survive

I’ll tell her to set things on fire
and keep them burning
I’ll teach her that fire will not consume her
that she must use it

I’ll tell her that people must earn the right
to use her nickname
that forced intimacy is an ugly thing

I’ll help her to see that she will not find God
or salvation in a dark brick building
built by dead men

I’ll make sure she always carries a pen
so she can take down evidence
If she has no paper, I’ll teach her to
write everything down with her tongue,
write it on her thighs

I’ll make her keep reinventing herself and run fast
I’ll teach her to write her manifestos
on cocktail napkins
I’ll say she should make men lick her ambition
I’ll make her understand that she is worth more
with her clothes on
I’ll teach her to talk hard

I’ll tell her that when the words come too fast
and she has no use for a pen
that she must quit her job
run out of the house in her bathrobe
leave the door open
I’ll teach her to follow the words

They will try to make her stay
comfort her, let her sleep, bathe her in a television blue glow
I will cut her hair, tell her to light the house on fire
kill the kittens
When nothing is there
nothing will keep her
and she is not to be kept

I’ll say that everything she has done seen spoken
has brought her to the here this now
This is no time for tenderness
no time to stand, waiting for them to find her
There are nations within her skin
Queendoms come without keys you can carry

I’ll teach her that she has an army inside her
that can save her life
I’ll teach her to be whole, to be holy
I’ll teach her how to live,
to be so much that she doesn’t even
need me anymore
I’ll teach her to go quickly and never come back
Things get broken fast here

I’ll make her stronger
than I ever was

Turned at twenty she’ll break into bits of star and throw herself against the sky

(2006 is an excellent year to disappear)

I will not let them
distroy her life
the way they distroyed
mine

I’ll tell her to never forget
what they did to you
and never let them know
you remember

Never forget
what they did to you
and never let them know
you remember

Never forget
what they did to you
and never let them know
you remember"

Comes and Goes in Waves

Doubt

I have great friends. Really great friends. I'm truly blessed. I know this. But I have such a hard time grasping the truth of it.

I doubt my friends. When they want to go out and have a fun time, I doubt they really want to go out with me. When they say they want to listen to my problems, sit with me when I'm sad, I doubt that in any way they could possibly handle it all. When I fuck up, whether our friendship, some event, or anything, I doubt they truly aren't mad or that they forgive me.

I doubt it all.


I am so insecure in myself sometimes that I doubt that anyone else could be secure in loving me. I so often believe that I find my friends to be more important to me than I am to them and I pull away. I don't want to care more, I don't want to need more, I don't want to be the only one caring. And in reality, I'm not. They care about me as much as I care about them. They aren't full of empty words and fake actions. I KNOW this.

But I don't believe it. Where does such mistrust come from? Why do I chase away the people I love the most? Why can't I believe them when they say, "I love you?"

Airports

One of the things I love about traveling is that you're stuck in the same mess as everyone with you. Delayed flight back to Chicago? Delayed flight for a whole plane full. Thinking about how long it's going to take you to get home after it lands, so are others. Dreading how exhausted you'll be at work tomorrow? Ditto for many. You're all stuck at the airport without a say about what will happen next.

And once you land, you watch those with loved ones come pick them up. You watch the happiness of both people, the joy of someone coming home after a long time away or someone coming for a visit.

Or you watch the people just like you: those getting into a cab alone for the ride home. Or those boarding the train, three hours later than planned, and riding it with you, home in the darkness together. Going home to a dark house, to no one looking forward to seeing you, to the deep silence and loneliness that comes after saying goodbye.


Airports are an interesting mix of strangers and intimacy. It's a place where you can watch someone break into the biggest smile seeing someone again, watch people jump up and down with excitment, hug loved ones, show such happiness. And it's a place where you can watch someone silently sob, perhaps over saying goodbye to a boyfriend or girlfriend, a best friend, or a family member. The person crying because the next visit isn't know. The next time you lay eyes on your loved one could be in a month, a year, or longer.

The person could be angry or upset because something happened on the trip--a fight, an ending, a realization not known before, the sense of an ending. Or the sadness that comes with leaving a piece of yourself behind or of knowing something shifted and won't be the same again. An extra emotional scene because traveling weakens the defenses, opens you in a way you normally aren't.

Traveling usually is a mix of exhaustion and excitement for me. It's a period of time when you don't get to control what happens--who sits next to you, when the flight leaves, if there's turbulence, if you land at the right time etc. It's just you, your hopes, your plans, and sometimes, someone waiting on the other end.

You have to let go when you travel. You have to accept that what will be, will be. You get what you get and have no choice but to let that be good enough.