what great hours
I took Desmond to his first show this month. I had planned it to be Glass Animals because he loves them - I got us tickets for September. But Winona Fighter is a band I saw open for Something Corporate on 12/30 last year and instantly became a fan. I kept getting notifications they were opening for Bayside, and then I reached out to their publicist to book them for our Setlist.fm series. I didn't want to say - I'm a fan but I didn't GO. I also didn't want a sitter for one hour, especially when Des has been asking to go to shows.
What's funny is I told him he had to know 5 songs to go to a show with me. Earlier this week he said - Mama! I only know two songs! I said: I am making an exception. Later I explained tickets usually cost money and to get your moneys worth you gotta know many songs. The sing-along is satisfying. We had to have a talk about swear words, because punk band. He said, "You have to say what it is, so I don't say it on accident." Today the algo delivered Olivia Rodrigo's "Bad Idea, Right?" and he made me play it 3 more times so.
It was a 20 minute set at 7PM so it was IDEAL. My arms are so sore from holding him up AND dancing around - but it was the Wiltern and we did not have PIT ACCESS. We stopped by merch to say hi and Des got a high five.
I told him he should wear a band shirt to the show so he asked me to make him an OK Go one. Of course, I obliged. He wore grey jeans because I did. And his blue chucks. Friends, I almost died. I lived a goddamn dream. I got to support a baby band and introduce my baby to punkish music. Cloud nine.
I'm not trying to force my music tastes on him - I like to make sprawling playlists and see what he snags on. On the way to the show he made me play "Lovecats" a few times because I was wearing a Cure shirt. He loves HAIM. Some Paramore, most OK Go, some Florence. Kacey. Goldfinger.
Questions he's asked me in the last week:
How old is the earth?
Can I be in a band?
Who made the song sound like that?
Why can your car go 150 if you're not allowed to drive that fast?
Is Bluey real?
How tiny was I in your tummy?
Can I have a kid when I grow up?
Why do singers play guitar?
Why can't something be more than 100%?
He is full of questions. He is my inspiration.
"Playing" Coachella
Des wanted to spend a weekend with me, and the rain ruined all of my original plans (Underwood Farms and Huntington) so we played Coachella. How does one PLAY Coachella/Couchella? Glad you asked. You fire up the livestream on your TV. You put on your dancing clothes. You build a tent in your living room and put some LED lights in Balloons. You dance around to Sabrina Carpenter and Bleachers. You veto Blur for Jon Bastiste. You get a little bored during a DJ set and just eat popcorn in your tent.
"The Neighbor Tent"
I actually have a reverse parenting hack for you. I told Des we were staying up late to catch No Doubt's set - that's why we set up a bed fort in the living room. But we were already laying down by the time they came on stage. Des made it through like three songs before he passed out. Once he said, "Mama? I thought you were tired?" And I said yes yes, I'm going to sleep soon. Two songs later he grumbled at me, "Mamaaaa, go to sleep." I watched to the end of the set. Oli destroyed our fort in the middle of the night. But a curious thing happened LAST night. His Hatch white noise machine turns on at 8pm, but usually he is still eating SNACKS. Last night he was already bathed and his teeth were brushed. He retrieves his twenty minute timer from his play area and brings it into the bedroom. He puts it between us. "What's that for?" I ask. "It's our wind-down timer," he says. Ah. We read Bluey stories and when the timer goes off, he winds it again. "Now what's that one for," I ask. "It's the LAY DOWN timer."
I stay up late ONE night to watch a band that hasn't played together in NINE years and suddenly we have a role reversal? Anyway, it was kind of adorable.
Another funny gesture happened when we were eating dinner - I made lemon parmesan orzo because we love lemony foods. He took a few bites, chewed thoughtfully, then turned to me and opened his arms. Look, we give good night hugs and hello hugs and goodbye hugs but dinner hugs? So I said, "What?" He said, "I'm giving you a hug." While I was in the throes of said hug he explained: "This is so yummy and I'm so glad it's real."
I bought us tickets for Glass Animals in September
But I might take him to a show on Wednesday, unless someone can watch him for 2 hours!
Des Almost 5
This is kind of like his baby book, right? We're very modern.
He'a almost 5 and the songs he likes the most are:
"Now I'm In It" by HAIM (he calls them "the three sisters")
"Cupid's Chokehold" by Gym Class Heroes ("the picture in my wallet song")
"It's Nice To Have a Friend" by Taylor Swift
These are all songs I have a on a "chill" playlist for him, because most of the time he prefers to listen to OK Go. I bought him a CD player specifically for those OK Go CDs, and that is probably how he will learn swear words.
In this last month or so is the first time he expressed MISSING me, which makes me squishy inside. The first time was just a shift in routine, his Dad had picked him up the night before so I could go to a show. When I picked him up the next morning he shouted "I'm so happy today is the day we're back together!" It'd been less than 12 hours, but you know what? I'll take it.
The second time was this weekend, the beginning of his spring break. He got to spend an extra longer weekend with Dad and had his first snow trip. I'm so happy he got to see it FALL FROM THE SKY. I'm glad Tim took pictures of the unbridled delight on his face.
The ridiculous thing is how much time I still spend on him when he's not here. Maybe not ridiculous. Maybe... unexpected? Yes, I put my running shoes on and dash out the door during a thunderstorm. Yes I eat popcorn with jalapenos for dinner. But I also fix up his art cart and find printable scavenger hunt pages and laminate them. I log into shutterfly and order prints and glue his selfies into his baby book. This space is yours this history is yours.
New Year, new idea, same stuff
My new year's idea - experiment (not resolution, at that sort of adheres to a pass/fail attitude) is to use what I have.
I think the STUFF we collect becomes more obvious, more questionable when we move from place (Los Feliz) to place (North Hollywood) to place (Studio City). I'm not a minimalist by any means - nor a hoarder. But the best way for me to use what I have is to have those things be visible. For some categories, this is easy - my hand weights, my yoga mat, my kettle bell, my foam roller are all in the living room. My planner is open, pen usually uncapped. Books are bookmarked on the dining table, recipes taped to cupboards, all my favorite clothes piled in my yellow butterfly chair.The abundance of counter space where we live now allows me to have the blender, instant pot, air fryer at the ready. I used all of them a ton in 2023. I even became one of those assholes who makes their own refried beans because they taste better. It would be insufferable, if I had told anyone about it.
The use-it challenge comes in food, ingredients. I bought a tub of couscous, so what am I going to DO with it? I can't really keep cans of coconut milk, diced tomatoes visible. Or, I don't want to. All the aspirational dry goods have to be put to use this year.
Pinterest used to have a "tried it" check box. I liked that. Made the pins actionable rather than wishful. No matter, I do it on my own now. I pull up my "work out" board after I finish Jillian Michaels and try a few of the tiktok pins.
Hoping to teach myself how to make planters out of glass jars, candles out of wine bottles. Seeing things not for just what they are, but what they could be. Part of this is inspired by Des, of course, who uses Amazon boxes as boats, sleds, playpens, you name it -- he always finds new ways to play with things. He still has orange paper cups leftover from his 2nd birthday that he plays with regularly.
There's also the library, Buy Nothing, craigslist.
I watched FIVE movies yesterday, while my COVID booster coursed through my body and made me twinge with pain every so often. The Olivia Experiment (an "Ace" movie but didn't love it), Saltburn (traumatized by it, thanks), Elemental (heart-warming), Orphan (delightfully horrific) and I started the Hunger Games prequel but didn't finish.
To close 2023, here were some of my favorites
Book: Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt
Song: Fake Out by Fall Out Boy
Band I hadn't heard of before this year: The Beaches
Show: Yellowcard @ YouTube Theater
Hike: Mount Baden-Powell
Addition to my life: Music League
Food: Lobster Bisque and the Butter Lettuce salad kit from Trader Joes
New icon: Olivia Rodrigo
Game: Just One (aff link) https://amzn.to/3RoKPjC
Tiny delight: Propagating succulents
Milk: Chobani extra creamy oat milk
Instagrammer: Welcome to Heidi
We are what we consume
What an honor it is to parent this little one. An honor? A delight. A task. A challenge. An experience that constantly melts me and reshapes me.
"Mama, I want BROSH."
You want what?
"BROSH"
What is BROSH? BRO-SHURE?
"No, BROSH."
I need a category. I need context. What do you do with BROSH?
"You eat it, mama, it's soft."
BRIOCHE? The bread?
"Yes, I want bree-OSH. And Hawaiian bread."
Only one bread, pick a bread.
"Ok, BROSH."
Like those paw-print sprinkled bumper stickers that say "who rescued who?!" Who is teaching who, here.
My therapist said, in our last meeting, that despite my anxieties, none seem centered around being a good parent. I am not worried about making the wrong choices, of passing down my traumas. "I'm here, aren't I?" I already know I'm imperfect, and I am always doing the work. There's no sense of being worried about it IN GENERAL.
The way I see it, he just needs to hear as many stories as possible. Not all of them, all at once - but a landscape of stories he can stumble through, at his own pace.
Tonight he ate a whole mango, skin and all. "Hey Google," we asked, "are mango skins edible?" Google said yes, it has lots of nutrients. Edible, but unnecessary. I went to the bathroom to floss mango flesh out of my teeth while he yelled, "hey mama, have you tried the skin?" Yes, I said, and I don't like it. "But it has NUTRIENTS" he said, nailing a word he'd learned about 2 minutes earlier.
I don't know if I would have what I finally feel like is a normal relationship with food if it wasn't for Des. I am still peripherally enticed by hacks, intermittent fasting, restriction. But I also have BUTTER in my fridge right now, and full-fat cream cheese. Me, who would for years only buy the lowest lightest skimmest barely there version of itself foods. It isn't dangerous, or taboo. It's for recipes, for baking, for taste and I do sample nearly everything I feed Des at least once. Food is an adventure, an experiment. Energy. Not the enemy.
He's a skinny preschooler, but admirably adventurous when it comes to eating. He pops cherry tomatoes like candy. We had tiny tuna wraps with nori, tuna, rice, avocado and cucumber last night. He will sample Flamin Hot Cheetos with curiosity but not destroy a whole bag. True, he has also dipped seaweed snacks into oatmilk "just to try it" but for the most part he is a paragon of intuitive eating.
Also true that I have to remind him to eat more often than not because he gets distracted, gets an idea or decides to start a project. But that's a lesson in inspiration, too. It is my job to interject before we hit HANGRY, and also my job to occasionally make meals interesting. I let him choose a couple nights a week, he often requests salmon. He's learning to chop, grate, grow, savor.
We do not forbid much, but we pay attention to what certain foods do to our bodies, our minds. Chili mangoes are not a bedtime snack. Actually, we've been tuning into what things -besides food- that we consume do to our bodies, our moods, our disposition. Videos, music, movement, how we talk.
I am learning so much.
Me in a mosh pit
Me, tapping average-sized guy I happen to be next to on the shoulder: Hi
Guy: Hey
Me: Can you put me up? *gestures*
Guy: Looks me up and down
Me: Are you trying to guess my weight? Am I too heavy?
Guy: Oh, no, you're just really hot
Me: Oh, ok, thank you. Can you put me up now?
Guy: Does what I ask
Me: Crowdsurfs
MxPx @ the Palladium - 1/6/24
I went back into my LiveJournal to verify a few relationship timelines but I got distracted by all my imported tweets where I documented who I watched every day on 2008 Warped Tour (mostly Against Me, All Time Low, Katy Perry, The Academy Is..). And then a bunch of other shows that year - MxPx, Paramore, Panic at the Disco.
One of PJ's hugest slights to me should've been a bigger deal, but I was so happy I got to attend three of the Get Up Kids final* shows that I kind of glossed over it.
Desmond has been into OK Go lately and I'm having the time of my life hearing him learn the words and asking if we can learn the dance to "A Million Ways."
Having something to look forward to is important to my mental health and usually that thing is a show or three.
I'm still working my way through 2009 and beyond but very much letting myself get sidetracked to make sure I account for all the shows I attended. Funny thing is, it also counts as work for a project I hope to spearhead next year.
I only have 5 more years of LJ to sort through, as I migrated to Tumblr in 2015. It's kind of crazy to me that LJ had so many security features, and I had some entries that only three chosen people could read. Then I went to Tumblr and started spilling my guts to the entire world. I don't even know who's reading. Maybe that's for the best.
all your little dooms
I'm OK. I feel like the storm of mourning has passed. I still want to make sense of it, make a lesson of it - I just don't know how. Yet.
Maybe I've already said this, written this but - it's hard for me to accept he doesn't EXIST anywhere now. My Dad lives in his art and his home and my aunt lives on in her traditions and I know PJ was a tangential figure but he was young, still. I am so fortunate to have never lost anyone below the age of 70 before this. Except little Olivia. That was hard, too.
I centered myself by saying: Focus on what you DO have.
My verbose little 4-year-old, telling me who was "struggling" and what things were "spooky" to him.
Fall Out Boy, with the best album of their career, and songs that pierced my very soul.
Friends, and a view, and a 20lb cat who will ground me in a very literal sense. Panic surrenders to purring.
I didn't see the glass as already broken. I checked the cupboard and because I found one sparkling example, I expected more of the same. Or maybe chips, chinks, flaws - but still a whole I could worship momentarily, pay tribute to with a pause. Something I could grasp, refract the light.
There have been so many think pieces, lately, on millennial motherhood-dread. Really, what's not to fear? I waited for a person, a position and I made sacrifices. I'm always happy for the first announcement - it's hard to create a thing, right? For some of us, more than others.
I've even thought, in all honesty - I should have two because what if some tragic fate befalls my only? But that's not, I know now, how grief works. There's no hierarchy, or tiers, or safety net. You feel what you feel regardless of any plans delicately laid in place.
I feel weird about 3s and 4s - you're gambling with fate and stability and well maybe it's just easier for those who are drawn to each other, who don't try to excuse themselves after one project has taken on literal legs of his own.
Focus on what you do have.
You don't get to decide what or who bears more weight. You'll think you can make educated guesses but I don't think this knowledge comes from your brain, your intellect. It's in your body, in your bones. You might be the lift in a butterfly wing that changes history.
I tell friends: Being small doesn't serve you. But really, size is irrelevant to experience. Time is irrelevant. You'll spend half your life trying to make sense of it.
This will be our year --
Moving and transitioning and ending and searching. Spicy popcorn and texts just to check in. K.Flay and drawing with the right pens and making up words. Fizzy water and Lorde and ace community immersion. Thinking of the worst responses possible and keeping them to myself. Anna Banana workouts and binge reading and lemon gum trees. Yellowcard's "end" lasting exactly as long as my marriage. The Crane Wife and roles and relationships. Done lists over to-do lists and taking back nostalgia and seaweed snacks. The trivial and monumental, interwoven. Fall Out Boy's best album and again feeling like I NEED to be at certain shows. Hearing "Space" at WWWY. Watching lives fall apart and be stitched back together again. Realizing I have so many more questions than the ones I am asking - how can I be the next Barbara Walters? Planks and patio projects and tingling in my toes when the gummies hit just right. Facing the Instant Pot and failing a little but also making it work, a few times. Glass Animals and Goldfinger for Des and counterspace after the downstairs neighbors that gave me PTSD. Book club(s) and 6 pack of peaks and having friends to send sad text messages to. My 20-lb cat sleeping on my chest and framing mantras and having a few morning dance parties with Des. From "I made the mistake of reading your blog" to scrivener to hold my hand while we fall asleep. Booking The Warning and listening to Nosebleeds and feeling sleepy at The Hollywood Bowl during DCFC. To groupchats and moms club(s) and buying a dining table. Olivia Rodrigo and Paramore and Kesha and also wasn't 2008 a great year?
When I wrote this: It's my birthday. I'm celebrating but still also kind of mourning and my kid had a winter show today where he performed 3 songs from Grease (which is maybe the most I've ever seen of Grease) and it was the cutest thing I've ever seen and then got my friends into a show I didn't care to see but wanted to be out, doing something. I also knew there were words, sentences bubbling up inside of me. Eat a grilled cheese, talk about life, get home before you spill over. Too bad we couldn't find the warm floor of an abandoned basketball court to watch for shooting stars. In this smog? Well, we're optimists.
I've embarked on a personal project to go through all of my 3200+ LiveJournal entries. It's self-indulgent, I know. It's not without purpose. I'm writing a book about all the relationships I've navigated while not (really) knowing I'm Ace and I wanted to make sure I got the timeline and the sentiments correct. It's easy to be a badass in retrospect - but I don't want to lie to make myself look better. I've loved with my whole heart, with one ankle bearing the pressure of a door plenty of people had try to -end scene- me with.
Two things can be true? Actually, ten things can be true.
Can you believe how many lives we've already lived, inside of this one?
PJ already has 7000 words. He always said he said he felt small compared to me. The reason for his tall tales. I've been courted and carried and loved and weaved into the fabric of other beings and yet this shitbird from Missouri - he opens me up like its arterial. He's dead, and I'm still bleeding. I don't know what the LESSON is here. Worse - maybe there isn't one. Maybe I just feel bad until I feel better.
Overall, though - I guess this is progress. I'm feeling my feelings, even if they seem overdramatic, irrational. Future me is going to be back here, searching - so I give her this: You were sad. Your friend cup was overflowing and everyone wanted to celebrate with you, but you didn't have the energy (or money) to plan anything. You were going to a lot of shows. Reading like a fiend. Getting Desmond into OK Go. Forcing yourself to workout for the endorphins. You love where you live, in Studio City. The giant window, the patio, trees, the hummingbirds - the smallest things make the hugest impact. You have so much to look forward to.
Celebrate your friends birthdays because they are not guaranteed. Reach out, reach back, reach wherever and tell people that they matter. Spread your wings, take up space because this is it. This is it.
Confront all of your pain like a gift under the tree
It takes a lot of energy to keep it together. I had so much fun at Emo Nite on Friday, celebrating my birthday (early) with my best friend, singing to Fall Out Boy, Paramore, MCR, TSL and even Brand New (I've seen more spine in jellyfish / I've seen more guts in 11-year-old kids). It was exactly what I needed.
It was fun, but I felt just on the edge of losing my shit the whole time. I only cried a little, when they played "I Miss You" by blink-182, because that came out in 2004. Peak me and PJ. Oh, and "Memory" by Sugarcult. Just trickles. I am still having so much trouble with how sad I am. The grief feels physical, heavy. The sobs suck the life out of me. This is stupid. He was just my first boyfriend. I'm just an ex-girlfriend. Worse, probably one whose timeline overlaps with several others. What I'm learning is that doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if the relationship was credible. It's not a court case, it was a formative experience.
I went out instead of staying home alone and grieving, excavating. It felt like progress, but I know I still have complicated feelings to wade through. Lots of water metaphors lately - waves, the sea, swimming.
What does it mean, that I'm having such a hard time with this?
A breakup is immediate pain, surface pain, relatable, identifiable, categorical. A hole. A changing of roles. This was a TWENTY year old relationship. Is he haunting me? I do feel like the time I didn't know about it (almost 3 years) was kind of a gift. There is no way I could have handled this news at the top of 2021. With a kid under two, quarantine and a bubbling identity crisis?
A weird thing I tried to figure out is - what was I doing when he was dying? What was I tweeting, what was I writing, what was I thinking? We didn't have any kind of cosmic connection, that's not what this is about. (This is what I was writing)
It's hard for me to say we were friends because that feels like an insult to the friends who were good to me. Mostly we flirted, and we fought. But I did care about him, and I wrote about checking up on him a lot. Once he asked me to check his email for him while he was traveling. It was 2003, so that's not a thing we could do on our phones yet. He never changed his password after that, so I sporadically checked his email until like, 2010, when two-factor authentication appeared on the scene. This is how I knew he was a compulsive liar. This is how I knew he did NOT have "abdominal" cancer in 2009, and that it was just a ploy to get me to talk to him again.
Should I have done something? Could I have done anything?
My therapist asked, what did he make you feel? I had trouble putting it into words, called it elemental - I had such strong reactions to him, I said. "Oh," she said, "so he made you feel alive."
And that's where the gut-punch is, right?
I'm glad I wrote down everything. I saved everything. He still lives there. I was already diving into past stuff for the book I'm writing, but now I'm a little more focused on getting the timeline right. And it's all there.
That fraction of my life feels so neon-bright. So sharp. I was so unfiltered.
I can't believe I'm still feeling this. I can't believe I'm still writing about it. It feels like a little like purging, like I'm trying to exorcise it so it exists OUTSIDE of me. Wringing it out of my organs, pushing on the bruise again and again and again until the pain is base level.
"What makes you feel alive now?" she asked.
Music.
cry a little, cry a lot
I'm still so stupidly sad. I feel like a layer of my skin has been peeled off and now I'm too sensitive to everything - music, silence, pictures, water, wind. I feel like I need to be bandaged, protected from the elements until I feel less raw, less full of tears.
It's a complicated ball of emotions, mourning a jerk that no one liked.
We were not friends on Facebook, but I sent him a message about 2 months ago, not knowing he'd passed. I want to report his account as dead, it makes me angry to see it still there - living when he's not.
He always knew how to push my buttons, get a reaction out of me - and here he is, still doing exactly that, from the beyond. What a dick.
The usual ways you might comfort yourself after a loss, "_____ would want me to ______" or there being a particular way to honor that person - none of that works here.
I forgot how physical grief can feel. A heaviness in my chest. A few times this weekend I just laid down on my couch and cried, and my cat jumped up and sat right on my heart. It felt good to having something real there.
I tried to focus on some of the shitty things he did - like leaving me at HOB Sunset when he was working for The get Up Kids - which cycled me through fury, disappointment, annoyance - but it leads back to feeling alive, being alive. Which he is not.
Maybe this loss feels worse because I can't share it with anyone. Meaning, there are probably plenty of people who are not bothered that he is no longer of this earth.
But in the history of ME, he was a very important person.
I think he'd probably make the cut as a ghost - unfinished business and shit.
While I was writing on the couch earlier today, a hummingbird came up and tapped the window. I thought, is now the time to believe in reincarnation? But PJ would't be something as delightful as a hummingbird, no. He'd be a honey badger or an insect that is just offensive on principle. A mosquito? He could totally be a mosquito.
Then there's that problem of there was something, someone, and now there is nothing. When I first came across the obituary, I wanted to slam the laptop closed and just unsee it. Unknow it.
He was not a good person. I keep thinking that should make this easier. But he was a person, and now he is not.
I hadn't even interacted with him since maybe 2011? 2013 at the very most recent. So why does this feel like such a punch in the heart? I've been crying for three days. It doesn't feel equitable. I'm sad, and I feel bad about it.
Still, no one has told me how to mourn the villain.
rest in peace, my bad muse
Sometimes, instead of starting a new chapter or working on a new blog, I'll go back into a draft to add details. Or edit. Last night, I opened up the section about PJ, which is the second-longest essay next to Tim's. Moreover, I don't think PJ ever lived in or even near California. We met in Florida, flirted in SoCal - but only when work (a tour) brought him to town - Yellowcard, Anti-Flag, The Get Up Kids. I was involved with PJ from 2003 to 2013, when I changed my phone number and severed a bunch of contacts. I say involved with but I really mean in contact with. The height of our situationship was from 2003-2005, and yes, I am loathe to list dates because lord only knows how many other girls he was "dating" at the exact same time. I know of three at least. He wasn't a stand-up guy. I've spent plenty of time cursing him.
Last night when I Googled his name, I found an obituary. PJ is dead. He passed away in January of 2021, at 36 years old. I watched a 23-minute memorial montage set to "Ocean Avenue." Then I cried. No, I wailed. Are we allowed to grieve for people who weren't awesome? What's the protocol?
I didn't want him dead, I just wanted him to be a better person.
When the band fired him, I was told to cut off contact. I did, for awhile. I liked how reactive he made feel - like a live wire - a bad muse, maybe - is there a word for that? ("Is there a word for 'bad miracle'" -Fall Out Boy)
I was with PJ when I found out about Asexuality, about AVEN. I was 24 years old and for the first time I wanted to want to have sex. Read that again. I (cerebrally) wanted to experience want (physically). Instead, I had a panic attack in the bathroom of a Motel 6 in Ventura. He was very kind about it, which was weird, because he was, in general, unkind about plenty of other things.
The first time I wanted to want to is actually significantly more crucial to my personal timeline than the time I actually DID IT.
Since he was a compulsive liar (the only personality disorder I can confirm by my own account), I'm sure he rewrote that story in his head. Now we'll never know.
Did he become a better person? I know he got married, and divorced. The obit didn't mention a bio kid, even though I know he has one out there.
How do we grieve for the unsavory sort?
One time he told me he had abdominal cancer. He did not.
He is the first person I exchanged "I love you"s with, even if I was super skeptical about it. We actually had a few fights about how he believed I loved him, but did not believe I was IN LOVE with him. I think I said something to the effect of, "This is as good as it gets with me, man." That tracks, right?
Also, is it worth mentioning that he was 19? I mean, I know guys who've just NOT been shitty their whole lives, sure. He had time to grow out of it.
Did he?
Would it be less sad if we knew he was still lying for sport?
In 2004, I flew him out to OC for a few days to hang out. It was a total disaster, of course and after I got home from dropping him off at LAX, I burst into tears. My mom said, "Oh, do you love him?" I said No, I was sad because I didn't have my computer to write about it, about him. Which was the truth.
My bad muse.
One time I told him I was writing and book and he was in it. "You can't do that" he texted. "It's illegal." I laughed.
There has never been much info about him online. Our fling was pre-social media, thus his thriving un-network of girlfriends all over the US of A.
So, is the pain less permanent for the undeserving?
Listen, no one liked him. He was a liar, a cheater, and just really bad with people. All of his girlfriends in the aughts were of the secret variety, including me. I didn't, at any point, try to defend his character. Of the few people I texted to see if they'd heard (it happened nearly 3 years ago, after all) I half expected an "I know, because I murdered him" reply.
How do we mourn the bad guy?
Rest in peace, PJ Oxenfeldt.
You were my first love, even if you didn't deserve it.
Asking for a friend
My therapist is retiring after our next session. I've been with her since 2006, since I first got health insurance and wanted to know how to live on my own as a person without an eating disorder.
I started seeing her when I was with Jeff, my first serious boyfriend. We met in Culver City and I sat in the wrong chair, her chair, criss-cross applesauce and she always had to flip the clock around. We've always talked a lot about books. We got me on medication that sated my calorie counting. When I was sleeping 12 hours a day but not throwing up she suggested Wellbutrin. We found the magic combination. Sometimes I saw her once a week, sometimes once a month. I moved out on my own, thrived in Hollywood proper.
When I transitioned from Buzznet to Live Nation, about a year in, I tried a new therapist because of insurance and a friend recommendation. The new one was closer, in Glendale. She tried to teach me tapping. EFT? Tried to get me to sit with my emotions way before I was ready to. I ran back to Dr. Witherspoon, eventually. The commute was worth it. I think, for me, therapy was about accountability. Progress. It was not acceptable to vent about the same things week after week, especially if it was my own money. The same way I stopped tanning after I got a reliable dermatologist. Oh, do you want to just set your money on fire?
Today, she said she was going to miss me, her eyes rimmed red. She teared up. I sort of deflected all emotion. Not that she is ANYTHING like my Dad, but she's been "trying" to retire for years. The pandemic and teletherapy providing more freedoms. I can't really be sad, can I? She's given me so much perspective. I've lived so many lives since we started in 2006.
She confessed she was caught unaware when I got engaged (and I guess, by proxy, married), got pregnant. Those were not things I talked about, at all. Being married, building a family. I said, you're not the only one who had that reaction. But I'm still glad I did it, had that experience.
When I dig in for book stuff, for writing (is this what they call SHADOW WORK?) it is not easy. I'm trying to writing a collection of semi-humorous essays like David Sedaris or Samatha Irby but it's not as flippant as recalling conversations or flirtations, I can feel it in my bones and tendons and tear ducts.
I can come up with a few true sentences and then I am so, so tired.
If I ever publish my book I will thank her.
My son, my sun
Where did my little boo learn to talk to plants? We take plant babies from Gramma Lita's massive yard, recently started propagating them in water. Nothing for the first couple of weeks. Then Des said, "Mama, let me hold them" - and he took the bulb in his hand, looked lovingly at that little would-be-could-be plant and spoke to it in a way that astonished me. "You are so beautiful" he said. "You are doing such a good job. I am so happy to see you." I died, they thrived.
Four nights ago we unwrapped a fragrant bath bomb and I said, "Mmm, rose" and he started serenading me, from the "wonderful roses" part of "Til There Was You" and who can even do that? I feel like if I want to sing something, even casually, I have to start from the top. He vocalizes the percussion part of songs. Chh chh chh. Probably not revolutionary, but something new for my brain.
Some of the moms who got a spot in TK are reporting back that one of their kids "goals" for the year is to count to 20. Oh. Des can count to 100, and in Spanish. The other day he taught me how to say "knees" in Spanish, which is when I found out he can sing "Head Shoulders Knees and Toes" in a second language. He remembers numbers really well, and has a good grasp of time. He can math way more at 4 years old than I could at like, 7 years old - and that's just because it's interesting to him, measurements and doubling things and how old was his friend Felix when he turned 2? Sometimes I just have to say, "That is a calculation I can't do on the fly, buddy."
He's growing his hair out long so he can make it curly, like his friend Vienna and his cousin Emerson. I wish he liked to read books together more, but maybe that will come later. It's OK if that's an interest we don't share. We make up new words until we're too tired, me channeling the IKEA catalog. Sometimes he says, "I have an idea - let's count to the highest number we know" to which I reply, "That does not sound like fun to mama, can we play a word game instead?" He also loves blowing up and popping balloons. Actually, he loves doing a lot of things with balloons - keepy uppy, birdy-flying, inflating then deflating, using them as stamps, talking about them on his imaginary YouTube channel...
He likes to eat seaweed snacks and will basically try any food at least once. He loves tomatoes, so much so that he will eat them like an apple. He steals my sushi and told me the pumpkin seeds needed "more paprika."
He makes funny observations. I took him to my work party recently and I told him Erica was in charge. When we looked back at photos from that night he asked, "Does Erica ever go home?" I said "Yes, of course, she has two kiddos of her own - why do you think that she doesn't?" He said, "Well, she's in charge."
My therapist is retiring at the end of the year, and then I won't have anyone to tell me what's healthy or adjusted anymore. I told her that sometimes Desmond says, "You know, Mama, I love Dada more than you." I respond: "That's OK, my love for you doesn't change." It doesn't hurt me, it makes me curious - what is he trying to accomplish? That non-judgemental curiosity they tried to summon from the depth of my cold being during the "can we save this marriage?" time - there it is! Therapist said: It's remarkable that he even vocalized this. It's called secure attachment.
For awhile I also wondered - does Des need therapy during this transition? He has asked why we don't live together anymore and I said, "not all families live together" - but all the families he knew of, did. So we got a couple books. Representation. Therapist said: Unless he is acting out, or it's disrupting, he is ok. Again, the fact that he's even asking these questions is GREAT. I do a value a good question-asker.
I'm still writing my book of essays and I've recently hit 38K words. I've considered publishing under a pseudonym, because I don't want to FIGHT about asexuality. I just want some previously unlearned people to know that it EXISTS. I publish most of my revelations and feelings about being Ace on my Medium. The blog that upset him was titled "Ace Week 2023" - and posted on Medium. I didn't have the time or mental capacity to react at the time. I just chose not to. Spiral, if you must - I will not add any fuel. But I did feel mad, when I unboxed that compartmentalization --
Sometimes I want to be kind and gentle and empathic because, wow we didn’t know anything, did we? There wasn’t the vocabulary for what I was experiencing. There were no alternate storylines to draw inspiration from. But sometimes I am furious, violated, underestimated.
If you just light the path, everyone will find their own way there, right? I’m the deer in headlights, then I run towards the inevitable crash. Scampering off into the unlit wild was somehow more intimidating. So, blind yourself. Numb yourself. Anything to get to the other side.
Prescriptive
I know people use media to escape, but I think it could serve a greater purpose. You are what you eat. Try again: You are molded and reshaped by what you consume. Garbage in, garbage out. Stardust and pull quotes and soaring bridges and that not only that appetizer you shared, but how you felt about it. The breadcrumbs AND the destination.
Sometimes I start reading or watching something and I think: I don't need this. I don't need more violence, more behind the scenes of cult-building, more white-man first-person perspective. I know we rarely want to venture into a world where we have to give everything a new name, but playing it too close to everything we already know can have it's consequences, too -- a dulling, an amalgamation of what could be sharp, piercing but is not - instead, GA, N/A, for all.
I read Jennette McCurdy's "I'm Glad My Mom Died" and man (I have to stop using that gendered WORD as an exclamation, I know) was it a punch in the face. Sometimes we venture into media searching for ourselves. For a lot of us, this search is fruitless.
I think Republicans who want to restrict access to abortions and birth control should watch Call The Midwife.
I think everyone should watch Ted Lasso.
I want the hours I wasted on NCIS and other crime procedurals back. How would one earn those on the flipside? Sitting quietly amongst trees? Sipping tea and breathing and living? I watched a lot of Law & Order while I did homework, what did that add to my life?
Kevin Can F*ck Himself literally actually f*cked themselves with the show title, because it's hard to talk about. But it had the most perfect ending. "Let's die alone, together." I think that's why we take chances on TV shows, music, books - it might be the narrative that changes our perspective. We're a tree, growing growing and suddenly, an offshoot (a fork in the road).
I think there should be recommended content the same way there is recommended vitamin intake. Just a tad more tailored. Motivational, spiritual, informational. Maybe not the pyramid since that was a scam, anyway. Bucketed. Clear. You could be diagnosed with an excess by your behavior. Distorted sense of self. Disassociation. Tunnel-visioned, relationship-wise.
The things you watch, listen to, ingest ingest ingest - create a profile. Maybe you need the darkness to balance the light. Maybe you're searching for something relevant in the midst of unpredictable familial landmines. Maybe you're at peace with your mortality.
Not me, not me, not me.
Pema Chodron, free weights making you hurt a little bit, scream-laughing in a cold shower. If the algorithm knows us, couldn't it help us?