Unsent Letters, #999

The truth is I can't
I haven't got words
I can't fly back in time
I can't convince you that I would, just to erase this, if I could.

I can't let you in to see why I can't,
Because I can't make our t's cross or our eyes meet.

I can't because life is big, and it'll take us both down. It's taken me down in 7 days.
I can't because I can't unfold your hand and take the burning coal out.
I can't because there's no way in, and I can't because that's just not how things work.

And if I could I wouldn't, because that's not how things should work.
So still in my funeral attire, still in ragged breaths of loss, still I wait. And I hope.
And I know that I can't.
And you can.

Supporting Cast...

It's pretty human to tell a story from your own perspective. It's how we see the world. It makes sense. We're the main character, then there's a few other big roles, and a supporting cast.   There's nothing wrong with that but it's not the only thing.  It's always important to remember that everyone that's supporting cast to us is a main character in their own story and they hold a big role in several other people's stories.  Sometimes the stories of people we know and love, our main cast. 

I spent the last six days with Lewis, a close friend I made through another close friend.  He wasn't important to me until he was.  He grew more and more important and he's more than supporting cast now. He's a close friend, a trusted confidante, and someone I always have great adventures with.   He lives in NM and travels extensively, so being able to spend 6 days with him was amazing.  I used to see him every few days, and I missed that so much, so getting to have him here for so long and seeing him every day, and long talks and walks and bike trips just reinforced how great it is to have people like him in my life. 

When he packed up and got on his bike and left this morning after giving me a big hug, I was sad to see him go, enough that it tinged my morning blue. 

I have this circle of friends, and as cheesy as it sounds to say, we forged some major bonds at bonfires held in a backyard in Round Lake.  We were young and figuring things out but the fires were a given, and the main group was always the same, with supporting cast making appearances here and there, adding fresh conversation, laughter, and new stories.  

Tonight I unexpectedly found out that a friend from some of those fires passed away unexpectedly yesterday.  I can't say he had a big role in my story, but for more than one of my close friends from the "fire circle" he did, at least at one point or another. I'm still in shock and since I'm not finding the spoken word very...coherent or easy to speak, I'm here, writing.  

It's not my place to tell the story of my friend who passed away.  What I can say though, is that although he may not have been someone I talked with recently or whose story I knew very well, he was a kind person.  A quiet, funny, sweet guy who I only have fond memories of, from laughing around the fire, to the occasional one on one conversations and beyond.   When I think of him, it's a highlight reel, because his addition to the group was always positive.  And that's something that I don't want to overlook. 

We're bicoastal now, my fire friends and I.  All I really want right now is everyone in one place, like my friend Ben's basement.  We'd probably still be in shock, and maybe no one would have anything to say. Maybe we'd all hug or maybe we'd sit there in silence.  But the distance seems a little too far tonight.  The sadness has been spreading like a pond ripple and no one seems to know what to say.  There's really no words that make anything better.  

My thoughts are still everywhere right now.   

I didn't know I'd feel the absence so strongly.  I knew I'd hurt for my friends whose lives he played a much bigger role in, but I guess I didn't realize the memories that would spring to mind and play back so readily. Maybe I didn't realize just how much supporting cast matters. 

Of course, like anyone else does, I started thinking about some of the people who hold the big roles, and people who things aren't right with right now, and what was important. Some part of me wants to scream "it's not worth it to hold on to this stuff- anything could happen. Life is short. I'm afraid, and I don't want to lose you." 

Like anyone else, I want to hug the hell out of all the people I love.  

Tonight I'm thinking of "the supporting cast" though.  

I'm thinking of a friend who I lost.  

I'm thinking that if anyone plays any role in your life, if you can honestly say that they've made your life better or happier, then it's worth it to let them know.

We don't know who's going to come in and out of our lives, and what kind of role they're really going to play.  Maybe it starts small and becomes giant.  Maybe it's a big role and it gets a bit smaller with time. 

But our friends and family shape us.  They make memories with us and we carry that with us forever. 

So really, there are no small roles. 

Spirit Al-minal: The Importance of Being Weird.

So

This past weekend, I took a day off and spent it at the Wisconsin State Fair.  While the cream puffs alone are a reason to be there, the entire reason I took the day off and went back after having not gone since I was a child was to see Weird Al.  I was super psyched about it, and after the show I realized it was more than just a fun, silly thing to do.  It was important to me.  Here's the kicker:  Weird Al is important to me. 

Lest you think I'm some kind of stalker fan, lemme splain.  Or at least let me sum up. 

I've got a weird name.  While I'm proud of that now, sometimes it made me stick out when I wasn't keen on sticking out.  For the record, I'm not *often* keen on sticking out, even now.  On top of that, I was an only child who was around adults more than I was other kids.  On top of *that*, I had one very close friend and we kinda stayed in our own world.  So I was weird. 

And I was called weird.  And when I was little, I remember how much it hurt when people would call me weird.  I think even as a kid we have a pressure to be like everyone else. Maybe especially when we're kids. We don't really have a sense of how ridiculous the argument "But everyone ELSE has L.A. Lights sneakers Mommmmm"  really sounds. 

Going to a very small private school didn't really help me much.  There's only one clique and as Heidi Klum tells us, "You're either in...or you're out."  

It's innocuous enough when she says it in her cute German accent, but when you're living it, it's a different story. 

Once my best friend left my school and I wasn't in...well that was the worst of times. 

But then came high school at a public school.  Hundreds more kids, tons of classes, tons of "types" of people.  Jock, stoner, band nerd (hey that's me!), drama kids, choir kids, student government...gaming club...standard nerds...just a lot of different types.  

I found a tribe, or a tribe was thrust upon me when I attended band camp.  Make any American Pie reference you wish to here, but what that gave me was confidence, because I had a skill.  It gave me a place where I already had something in common with everyone else.  As it happens, the high school I went to, band wasn't as "uncool" as people make it out to be.  In the week or so of camp, I met people, I worked hard with people, I sat around in the sun with people.  I talked about Star Wars with people (because I was TOTALLY obsessed at the time) and whipped out Cantina Band on my clarinet.    And on the first day of actual school, me, the little freshman...already knew 84 people.  I already had a table to sit at with people I knew.  Not only people, some of them were upper classmen.   

That was when I started to feel ok about being weird.  It didn't seem like such a bad thing all of the sudden. 

I'm not going to claim to be the kind of Weird Al fan who knew every song by the time I was 10. I wasn't. I knew of him, and I'd heard some things, but I wasn't this lifelong, die-hard, sing every word fan. 

Even in high school, though I'd have said I was a fan, I wasn't someone who had all the cds or knew all the songs.  I knew of him, and I enjoyed him.  I knew he was the guy who parodied everyone else's songs, and I thought he was hilarious.  As I got older, I got more and more "educated" on Weird Al.  In recent years I've heard lots of interviews with him that made me like him more and more, as a person and a performer.  By the time I got to the concert Friday night, I was a very big fan. 

See...the reason why Weird Al is my spirit animal is BECAUSE he's Weird.  

Hearing him in concert it's evident how talented he is.  The man can sing, and he can play instruments, and at 56 he can high kick above his head in leather pants (seriously? seriously.)

And he's unapologetic.  And he's NICE.  The man is genuinely nice, and you rarely hear him speak a bad word about anyone else.  

He's made a living doing something he loves to do.  He's silly and he's irreverent and he has insane long curly hair, and he likes intensely obnoxious Hawaiian shirts.  He plays accordion.  And instead of letting weird hurt him, he took it and made an amazingly successful career out of it. When Weird Al parodies your song, it's an honor.   Bands like Nirvana loved him.  And speaking of.... 

He does a pretty great Kobain.  I think Kurt would be just as happy with it now as he was originally. 

Al does costume changes after every song, and his Weird Al TV segments play in the interim.  Really, who else can wear things like this?  Ten guesses what song this was for...

Sometimes during the show, it struck me that he didn't have to *be* Weird Al.  He's talented enough to have pulled off a "normal" music career.  And he definitely has the rocker hair.

What I admire most is that he IS Weird Al though.  This is what he does. And he does it unapologetically. Whether it looks like this...

Or more like this.  It's hard to explain til you're there, but the concert vibe is so different than any other show I've been to.  I think you go in knowing the people around you have a sense of humor, and you go in knowing they might've caught some flak from their friends for going to see Weird Al in concert.  But they're there anyway, and they're loving it.  Everyone's laughing and singing along and it feels more like a living room situation than an arena situation. 

He's a chameleon but he's always still HIM. 

And on top of it all, he's a nerd.  A nerd who loves Star Wars. And plays accordion.  And dresses like a peacock.  And has a massively succesful and incredibly long-lasting music career. 

Weird Al reminds me that you *can* "dare to be stupid" and not take yourself so damn seriously. 

He reminds me that you can be successful without being a jerk, and that you can do your own thing, be your own person, and make it. 

So...if I have kids some day, and when I'm around my nephews (including my newest Caleb, who arrived today!! Happy birthday kiddo!!), they'll be life-long Weird Al fans if I have anything to say about it. 

I was joking on the way back to the car that I should put on an online dating profile that I was looking for a guy who was "Just like Weird Al" but maybe that's not that funny. 

I guess what I wanted to say with all this is just that this past weekend, with that concert and being with a really good friend...I remembered how good it feels to just be you.  Silly or serious.  Silly AND serious. 

Be weird.

Go forth, and be weird. 

Because weird is better than ok, it's good. 

And I'm not afraid of it anymore.

Write Here, Write Now - Shut Up and Dance

Eighteen days doesn't seem like a lot, but I've been gone since before then.  I talked to a really good friend tonight, and out of frustration I just asked him WHY, if I had so many things swirling around in my head and my heart to put on "paper"...why couldn't I do it?  Why am I feeling choked.

As sometimes happens with questions like that, I actually ended up getting to the answer right as I finished typing the question.   But...as only friends can do...he tough loved me a little.   Go do it.  Talk is cheap.  Shut up and dance.  (Ok, so he didn't quote Aerosmith, but the idea is the same.)

That I had a close friend to confide in about this who understood and encouraged/tough loved me is reason enough to realize all my reasons are...crap.

See...I've been gone from here, and I've been hoarding.  Hoarding all my words and all my feelings.  I've been taking up other challenges, and that's good- I'm going on a kayaking trip tomorrow to cross THAT off the bucket list because a few years ago I got injured 2 days before I was supposed to go on a trip down the Des Plaines and I always wanted to kayak down a river all day.   I'm very excited about that and proud of the fact that I didn't let time convince me not to go.  I'm proud that I spoke up and just went for it and I'm proud that when I first got in a kayak to practice and it felt insanely unstable and tippy right off the bat, that I didn't let fear win and just write it off as too dangerous because I hadn't done enough of it recently.   I realized I can swim, and my body remembered the motions, and when I just took a deep breath and calmed down, the boat steadied.

BUT.

Even though I'm actually *doing* more things I had meant to do...I'm still hoarding.  I'm still hiding.  I have NEVER gone on a trip full of so many wonderful adventures like I did in April and not come home just brimming with stories and thoughts and feelings to share.   But look back at that last post here.  That's half of a trip, and I just stopped writing it.  I was face to face with mountains and the sun was on my shoulders and hummingbirds danced outside the window at our dinner table, and it was incredible, and I felt just a little bit healed.  Maybe a lot bit.  But I couldn't even put that much out there.

There's so much since then and some of that story still floating around in here.  There's stories I want to tell and ones I don't yet, but will.  But hurt people build walls, and I was going Cheyenne Mountain base style. The thing is, it doesn't make me happy to hide.  I love to let words breathe and live and maybe mean something to someone else.  I want to share my life and in sharing mine get to know more about other people's lives.  I'm sick of the fort. I've got cabin fever. I've gotta get out of here.

Maybe I'm afraid to get hurt more.  Maybe I'm afraid to talk about being hurt still, because so many other people are hurting, even the ones who hurt me.  Maybe I'm afraid people are thinking
 "Aren't you over that yet?"
 "Why is that still important?"
"Who cares?"
Maybe I'm afraid that I don't have full control of my emotions still, and while some days are really awesome, some days suck hard.

I've been overly cautious around most of my friends and overly cautious in new friendships.  And I don't like it.

"I'm tired of meeeting people who define themselves by what they don't like. I don't like that" -Mike McGee

Maybe...if I don't like something, I should do something about it.
Maybe that's why I wrote this.


Thanks, Trev.
You reminded me to shut up and dance, and you reminded me what the walls keep out.

Butterflies and Blooms- Chicago Botanic Gardens 2013

Butterflies and Blooms- Chicago Botanic Gardens 2013, a set on Flickr.

I decided a picture's worth a thousand words so this will count as 40k words! In other words, I have no words. Just look at pretty butterflies. :)

Call and Response

I read this yesterday: http://amandapalmer.net/blog/20130618/ .

In the middle of the day, at work, when I maybe shouldn't have.  And it made me want to read Ocean at the End of the Lane, but it also made me want to say things I hadn't said.  I'm not promoting this post- if you find it you do.  I'm not explaining this post- you'll understand it or you won't.  I need the words to come, and I need to release it like one of those paper lanterns and let it fade out into the night sky. 

It's quiet, my door is closed, the fan's blowing on me and drowning out the traffic noise, and it's time to speak.

"it all started to make sense. i cried a lot.

and even THEN, i didn’t get it.

it wasn’t until we were at TED, taking a walk up a little hill in long beach a day or two before my talk, that i finally understood.

we were chatting about the book, i asked him a question about some of the symbolism in the story….and he stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and looked at me.

you twit,

he said.

and he filled in the blanks, and connected the dots for me.

i’d missed it completely.

i loved him so much in that moment.

and for a second, a split second, i was a neil gaiman fan.

and i was a fan because he’d tricked me, and he’d tricked me without me knowing, and i’d heard rumors that he does that, but i thought i was immune."

(Amanda Palmer)

These were the words that stuck out to me. It might never make sense to anyone but me, but I'm ok with it. 

The thing is, sometimes I miss the forest for the trees.  Sometimes I'm so deep into it that I've forgotten the big picture. 

Sometimes things overwhelm me. Too much interaction and I want to get somewhere like I am now- closed doors, blackout curtains, a cool breeze and nothing (and no one) else. As much as I love my friends and family, social interaction doesn't revive me.  I feel bad about it sometimes, because I don't want to ever sound ungrateful for the interaction or make people think I'd rather be alone, but I really value the time at the end of the day when it's dark, it's quiet, and I'm alone with my thoughts. 

Sometimes I wander off with my own thoughts and don't say what I intended to say, and that's what the last two paragraphs were.  

The thing is, there's exceptions.  There aren't many, but there's exceptions.  What claws at my guts from inside my rib-cage is that I'm missing an exception.  What makes my eyes well up with angry tears is that I can't seem to fight off the feeling.   

See, the exception for me was someone.  It's mayflies in a jar though, these exceptions, and there's only ever been two.  This last one though...maybe I thought it was a firefly, and it'd be in the field for more than a night casting a soft glow on the grass.  It occurs to me maybe the firefly was too dumb to know it was him lighting up the night because he couldn't see behind him.

I didn't know before this that a person could be a refuge.  I always assumed people would leave, and that's not the kind of place you could build your house.  I didn't know that as much as I gave could be given back in big and little things.  I didn't know that beautiful bright flowers grew out of hot sand, and that fire was a proving ground.  I didn't know a scarred hand and a heavy heart could hold ME and take away pain.  

I never thought there'd be a time when I'd be ok with not having that wind-down time by myself, to turn on some show, or surf through some sites, or write.  Better than ok, I would start to feel the sigh of relief I felt flopping onto the couch by myself in opening someone else's door.  I didn't know what it was like to laugh when the whole world is nothing but fucked up and pain.  

But the exception.  The exception turned back and said "you twit."

And I understood, FINALLY.

And yes, I did love him in that moment. 

And yes, that moment's gone, and it's possible it passed by unnoticed by anyone but me. 

And I'm a fan.  

I'm a fan waiting in line for five hours with a book to say "You changed my life, did you know that?"

And if I could just get that message into those hands...

I thought I was immune too, but I wasn't.  I didn't know about those exceptions, but there they are, and here they aren't.  I've learned so much but nothing at all.  I've been waiting in line to say "you're the exception. If nothing else, I need you to know that. I need you to know that you changed my life." and I could maybe walk away a little better.  But the truth is, sometimes the store closes, and your idols go home, and you have to move along to something else, and your heart will break, but you'll still be better.  And that's still love.

Father's Day

This isn't a day I really know what to say, so I usually just don't say anything at all. 

I've started and gotten halfway through this post a hundred times, here and in my head the past two days. 

It's hard to know what to say.  It's hard for me to write this because part of me really doesn't want to share anything at all.  I've been on my own all day and that's the way I handle these things. 

I know I'm not the only one who's hurting, but with the multitude of Facebook posts of yellowed photos of happy little girls with curls and dads with striped shirts and bad haircuts, I feel a little bit alone.  I don't know what that's like. 

Sometimes I think it'd be easier to talk to other people who have lost parents on days like today, but I don't. I don't know the way it feels to have someone there one day and not the next, and I don't know what it feels like to watch death slowly creep in and take someone, either.   

I just know it as a hole.  Something that should be there that isn't.  

I've come at it thousands of different ways, and I should be good at handling it after having it there with me my whole life, but one thing I can tell you is that grief isn't temporary.  It's there. It's there when you feel it and when you don't. 

I don't think I'd have started writing this at all if it hadn't snuck up on me a week or two ago at a relative's wedding. One minute I was on a trip, taking pictures, and the next I was watching the bride dance with her dad feeling the kind of pain that makes it hard to breathe.  And I didn't see it coming, and I didn't like that I couldn't control it, that it came so out of left field, and that it just hadn't gotten better already.  Because honestly, as an adult, shouldn't I have seen it coming and been able to just push it off?

When I was a kid, I made up stories about spies and dreamed of unlikely returns. When I was a teenager, I wanted to learn.  I felt like I couldn't know who I was if I didn't know who he was, even though the more I heard the wider the hole seemed to tear open, and the angrier and sadder I got knowing more about who I'd missed.  I was jealous that everyone else had stories- relatives and aunts and uncles.  They had encounters and I had ideas, and that was never going to change. 

I wanted to be like him, but when I was, and someone noticed, that hurt too.  I read thing he wrote and dreamed of places he'd loved.  When I first got to Colorado, I couldn't stop staring.  I felt like the better I knew the place the better I'd know him.  When I saw my first mountain I felt like it was something that we could share, because I knew it was something that he loved too, and I knew that I was somewhere that he had been.  That trip was with the school, and I worked hard to hide everything I was secretly trying to process, save from a few people. 

A few years later I went back to Colorado as a newly minted "adult" to stay with a friend.  The plane landed in Denver as the sun set over the Rockies, and I cried. I felt like I was touching something I couldn't touch anywhere else. 

The truth is, all these years and I still don't know the best way to deal with it. 

All these years later and I still lose "control" over it, even as an adult. 

Sometimes it's something I barely think about, and ten seconds later I'm setting my jaw against a complete breakdown.  Sometimes I see someone with their dad and I get angry or jealous, and I know it's not rational, but it doesn't make the feeling go away. Sometimes I feel like I shouldn't feel the way I feel, like I don't have the right, or it's not important, because I was too young to know what life was, let alone death.  Sometimes it feels good to know that I was so, SO loved by my dad, even before I understood what that meant, and sometimes it makes me sad that I never once got to run up and hug his neck and love him right back. Sometimes I'd give anything to remember, and other times I'd give anything to forget. 

This time I'm writing this because I don't know the right way to grieve. Nobody does. 

I don't understand how anybody else who has lost someone they love feels, and nobody else understands exactly how I feel about my loss. 

I've had to learn that it's ok to have my rituals and it's ok to have my radio silence.  It's ok to allow myself a moment of anger or jealousy or just cry. I've relearned in the course of three weeks that as far removed as you feel from it, loss can sneak right back up on you and tear down all the fortresses you built to keep it out. 

And that sucks. It sucks that it's a part of who you are from that point forward,  and you can't change that.  

I don't have it figured out, and I don't know that I ever will. 

Some days are better than others.

This isn't a better day. 

But there's other ones coming. 

Maybe no one knows how I feel exactly, and maybe I'll never be able to explain it, but I know I'm not alone.

I'm not alone, and that's enough. 

And that's why I decided to write this.

Because you aren't alone, either.