I always wanted to be Harriet the Spy

“Don't you want to be a writer, Sport? Gee, your father could even help you.”
Sport almost collapsed at the sink.
“Are you kidding? You know I want to be a ball player. And if I'm not a good ball player, I'll tell you something, I'm going to be a C.P.A.”
“What's that?”
“You don't know what a C.P.A. is?” Sport screeched.
“No," said Harriet. She never minded admitting she didn't know something. “So what,” she thought; “I could always learn.”

[Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh, 1964]

Old home, new life; New home, old life

Driving by

I’ve been driving by our old house a lot lately. Work takes me south, sometimes to Boston, sometimes to the Cape, sometimes even farther. But I usually find myself driving past Haverhill on 495 and, without thinking, pulling off the exit. After weeks and days and hours of exploring new places and sleeping in an apartment I still haven’t settled into, it is nice to feel comfortable. Even if it is just for a moment, sitting on the porch reading a book, locked out and watching my old neighbors walk by.

Explorer

I have a strange sense of familiarity when I see signs for the surrounding towns: Methuen, Salem, Plaistow, Lawrence, Lowell. The funny thing is, I hardly spent time in those cities when I lived nearby. Now that I live an hour away, I explore them. I try to pick out the good things in each place, try to see what makes people want to live there. I still haven’t figured out why these invisible town lines dictate different cultures, different ways of life, but they do. I'm determined to not isolate myself: I don't want to see the same side of every city. I know there’s more than coffee shops and arguing couples and trash buildup and art walks.

Catching the train

When I fall asleep late at night in my new bedroom, I can hear the train whistling somewhere far away. There’s something inexplicably compelling about trains, something beautiful and melancholy. I could hear the train from Haverhill, too. I remember discovering the train tracks behind the cemetery with my cousin. It was like we had stumbled upon this long-forgotten secret. The tracks ran along the river and we walked on them for a couple miles. It was just a day in September, back when he was secretly planning on running away to Argentina and I was secretly missing him already.

Intimacy

I wake up to the sound of neighbors all around me. Quiet, private sounds: water running, breakfast-making, good mornings and good byes. Waking up in Haverhill was different. The dog across the street was chained up outside and would howl without fail every morning. Our bed was up against this beautiful window alcove and we’d leave the windows open on warm nights. In the morning the air would be perfect. The room would be dark except for the glow coming in under the closet door. There was a small window in there, I’m not sure why, but it guaranteed us a little bit of light, always.

Ghosts & possibilites

I thought it was weird when my family took pictures of my grandmother in her casket after the wake. After we broke the receiving line, after they turned off the music and dimmed the lights, my aunts and cousins snuck up to the altar and snapped a couple photos. She hasn’t looked this good in a long time, they said. I disagreed, because I was 19 and still trying to figure out where social norms and familial norms intersected. But the truth was, Grandma hadn’t looked like herself in years: she had looked like Diabetes; Cancer; Alzheimer’s; Emphysema. She’d been sick a long time. But the point was, in the end, in that casket, she wasn’t sick anymore.

Walking around the house (it used to be our house) feels like looking at those pictures of grandma. It’s familiar, and in an intangible way it’s still mine, but it’s different now. It’s a skeleton of a home and its emptiness is full of possibility. I feel nostalgic and eerie. Not like I’m trespassing, but like I’m the ghost that haunts the place now.

The first morning

Woke up at 5 am and watched the sun rise for the first day in my life without her.

The first morning in 90 years without a fern.

Multi-grain bagels and mugs of coffee that I still find hard to stomach. Usually it is tea for breakfast.

Boston in the morning; gossiping girls to my left and an old man on a cell phone to my right.

Home is green mountains, home is across the lake, home is how many folding chairs you can fit into a hospital room.

I'm in New England, but not the New England I am from. This is a different New England: faster, louder, cruder, bigger.

I live here now, drive here, sleep here, walk here, fit in here, but I still hold on to the sweet, kind, and good.

And here it is warm inside, autumn-cold outside.

Scarecrows with child smiles erected in a cemetery for Halloween.

Giant green and orange pumpkins in row along the side of the highway.

It really is a beautiful day to be alive.

... drive steadily forever

Not a huge Miranda July fan, but this movie has some great moments.

Gypsy; Nomad; Vagrant

Four extra seats, for the hitchhikers I'd like to pick up. I think of all the people I could have taken places, all the stories I could have heard.

Fifty extra dollars that I didn't spend on extravagant meals. Instead, I went to the grocery store and had broccoli with alfredo sauce for dinner and raspberries for dessert. I think of the people I could've met at a bar, the people I could have fed.

Three extra beds, three nights in a row, waiting to be slept in. I curled into a ball like I always do (bad for your back) and left the other side of the bed untouched, the bed across from me unruffled. I think of some of the places I've slept in my life. I would've killed for that empty bed across from me.

I don't mind traveling alone. I am, by nature, a private person. I like to do things on my own, in my own way. Even though these are not the places I dream about seeing, they are something new.

I'm not used to having all of these resources at my disposal. Somehow it seems wasteful, like I should be sharing it with people that need seats and dollars and beds. Just give me a little bed, a nightstand with a lamp and a book. I realize that I could not easily transition into a life of frivolity.

(I think of how you can always clean the slate, always start a new life. It's unsettling and comforting to see how possible it is.)

three hundred words and three hundred ways to miss you (an attempt to understand the ever-present longing without backspacing because i'd be erasing a moment i'd never get back)

Missing you has become a part of me. I actively miss you, I think of you every day. But there is not something missing inside me, not an emptiness in my heart. I, very simply, just miss you.

I live fully and completely inside your absence. It is not sadness, I do not feel broken or damaged. Missing you is in between the cells in my skin, it is in my blood and saliva and I can feel it, taste it; it is in my heart and brain and bones and lungs.

You are not a single person. You are a handful of carefully selected thoughts.

You are not dead, but I will wonder every day if you are alive. I probably always will. Sing, Night Owl, sing. I feel you in my chest. I have shallow breaths when I think of you, I am swimming in the lake at night again.

You have not changed and I will never see you again. I didn't ask for it to be this way. Run away, Tough Guys, run away. I feel you most in my skin. I become hot and red and never want to feel that way again. I do not want you back in my life. I do not want to miss you. I do not try to miss you.

You are dead, but you come back to me. Lost poems in text messages, old articles in new newspapers, your smile in a picture taken yesterday. Sleep, Sad Woman, sleep. I feel you most in my fingers, you buzz and you creep out through my fingertips when I least expect it.

You always remind me that the world is full of passion, even when all I've got is old ticket stubs and letters to jog my memory. Dream, Beautiful, dream. I feel you in my head, words and poems humming to me like a city. I get dizzy and hope that I can keep this high with me forever.

Now that you're gone, you have become a part of me.

So I'll remember the little things

The universe & the start of the world

Piano Man: You can see the whole world from here.

Brother: He means the universe.

Piano Man: No, I mean the world. You can see the whole world from here.

Texas Love: I dig it. The world.

Bookworm: Didn’t I tell you the driveway is the best place to see the sky?

Piano Man: I can’t believe you have this view every night.

Bookworm: I’ve been taking it for granted.

Brother: We all do. But the view is almost perfect. Except for this big-ass building blocking Cassiopeia.

Bookworm: I used to live there. All my life until I was fourteen.

Texas Love: It seems like a nice place.

Bookworm: I used to climb up to the roof and watch the sky with my friends. They’d throw rocks at my window -- that window right there -- to get my attention.

Piano Man: I didn’t know people really did that. That’s awesome.

Bookworm: I took it for granted.

Brother: All those stars up there. Most of them are already dead, we just can’t see it yet.

Piano Man: Light years and red giants and shit. It makes me feel so insignificant. I fucking love it.

Texas Love: It’s all so beautiful, and it probably doesn’t even exist anymore. What does that say about us? Right now, admiring something from a distance that might not even be there.

Brother: We’re human. We’ll always see what we want to.

Bookworm: It's all rooted in astronomy. We’re in a world created by the stars, but they could've died before we were even conceived. I can’t tell if that’s morbid.

Texas Love: It’s just how it is. It’s life.

Piano Man: And it’s fucking great.

Brother: And it’ll always make me think of this, right here, right now.

Bookworm: I take it for granted.

The universe & the end of the world

A warm night in June. Full moon, rain clouds in the air, blankets wrapped around our shoulders. We both knew we wouldn't have many nights together like this again.

I get overwhelmed at how big the universe is, she said, looking at the sky. It could just never end.

Whenever I look at the sky, I said, I think of sitting in my driveway with my dad. He showed me that even if you can’t see it, the whole moon is always there.

It’s funny how something that makes me feel so lost makes you feel so at home, she said. But I think I know what you mean.

Then we started talking about the end of the world, and how we will take it as it comes. And it will probably be beautiful.

Great Hudson River Revival

-->

9^th year at the festival and it feels like it’s yours, but it’s only been 34 nights of your life. 90 hours volunteering. 108 hours driving there and back. Feeling like you never left. Missing a part of yourself when you’re not there.

Eat breakfast elbow-to-elbow with other blue-shirted volunteers. Compostable plates and silverware, food fresh and organic: that’s why you’re here. Makes you feel like you’re a small piece of the earth and you could take root any day if only you’d stop moving.

Call it a fiddle here, call it a violin, just play it. Dance under the tent until your body feels like it’ll never stop sweating and beating. Musicians with big sunglasses and top hats play their instruments like they’d die if they ever let go. Wonder if this feeling is a little bit of the elusive peace everyone’s been talking about.

Girls with colorful strings and beautiful faces. Boys with jack-o-lantern smiles and crumpled-up joints. Some are from the city, they are glamorous and edgy. Some are from upstate, they are lovely and natural. Two o’clock alcoholic kisses and underwear smelling of sunscreen and expectation. In the morning everything will be different, but tonight you appreciate the laughter and how everyone looks beautiful in the firelight.

Activists scream demands, petitions smudge with sweat from forearms, old women in tie dye play banjos and curse. They are louder if you ignore them. Pick your battles. Remind yourself you can’t save everyone, but you can change the world (if only a little.) Know that underneath the aggression and anger is a deep wanting for basic good. Walk on and smile.

Fall asleep by the river. Moon, grass, laughter, music. There’s a couple just a few feet away under the willow and an old man snoring in the grass and a party going on in the dance tent. But it’s just you and the water and an entire year gone by. Wonder if you’ve changed since the last time you were in this place. Hope you’ve grown like the river, stronger each year.

Promise to stay in touch, promise to visit. You know it rarely happens. But these people, they know you. In the night, the day, the sun, the rain, the best, and in the worst. Promise you love them, promise you’ll see them next year. And you start to count the days.

The living & the dead

"Mexico City" - Jolie Holland

What I know

What I know about this moccasin:

. Found on a Sunday evening before the rainstorm

. Lost in the sand lot by the dam

. Survived at least one winter in the North Country

. No mate to be found

. Small, maybe belonged to a small person
. Not authentic: plastic beads and material

. With a Cyanotype filter it looks tragic

Conversations not to be lost

[A weekend of words.]

. He wore a sombrero and stood in the corner of the elevator. “I don’t know how to work this thing,” he told us. “I’m lost and I don’t know where to go.” The key in his hand said 932, so we took him to the 9^th floor. When the doors opened he said, “I don’t want to go back. This is my home now.” He lied down in the elevator and fell asleep, sombrero titled over his face.  

. A man came up to us on the street, he had bagpipes strapped across his chest. We’d been walking a while, heels in hand, tired and lost. "I'll play you a song if you can give me directions," he said. We told him that we were lost, too, and he played for us anyway. I wondered who was waiting for him, whose song we were listening to.

. Our cab driver was Haitian and had a smile so handsome I couldn’t help but blush a little. His family kept all of their money in a safe box under the house, but it is buried now under the earth. “The house is gone,” he told us, “but you can rebuild a house. You can’t rebuild the people you love.” 

. “We came into a bit of money,” she said. “Now we’ve got our own business, we provide tents for festivals and events.” They bought the tent for their ceremony and they will be the ones to set it up on their wedding day. Just the two of them.

. The ocean past midnight is louder, you can hear it wailing and groaning and singing and sighing and roaring. We wail and groan and sigh and sing and roar with it, together, maybe for the last time. “It’s so hard to say goodbye,” I said. “That’s why you NEVER say goodbye, my love…” she wrote.

. She got tears in her eyes when she talked about the baby. “We’ll never know,” she said quietly. “We’ll never know.” She’s got so much love inside her, and it is heartbreaking when a piece of it is taken away. I want to help, I want to fix her, but nothing is broken. No one could stop her from loving so much.

. “We’re in it together. It’s up to us. We’ll save the world with books and words.” We looked out over the cigarette smoke and into the dark night.

Lykke Li & Bon Iver doing 'Dance Dance Dance' in L.A

Don't...

Some well-intended (but unwelcomed) advice I received: Don't get a 9-to-5. Don't become one of them. Don't let them take advantage of you. Don't forget you are an artist. Don't sell out.


Some happened-upon, unexpected wisdom: Don't let anyone ever make you feel like you don't deserve what you want.

For The Widows In Paradise, For The Fatherless In Ypsilanti

Peace

We walk by you some afternoons, to get away from chaos and monotony. To find a place to breathe. This time, it's raining and I keep my hands in my pockets. My nose gets cold even though it's May.

I wonder what it's like to be frozen and unfrozen, year after year. I wonder what it's like to die and bloom. To be struck by lightning and drowned. You hear the train whistle and you breathe in the exhaust. You let the quiet woman push the sad man's wheelchair beside you and you feel the ash drifting from their roaches.

I like to think that, really, you are at peace.

I cannot want you with all my heart

i
"How rarely do we see people living, or for that matter, creating by them."

.Yellow walls, purple curtains, red couch. Knowing there are cities and stories there, somewhere. Holding on to the days we live. The days we really live. Fighting to never forget them.

ii
"What are the best things and worst things in your life, and when are you going to get around to whispering or shouting about them?"

.The worst: wanting, failing, losing what you loved, isolation, wondering why they don't care to listen anymore. The best: laughter, kindness, family, beauty in the unexpected, comfort and strength in being alone.
.WHISPERING. shouting.

iii
"What do you love most in the world? The big and little things, I mean. A trolley car, a pair of tennis shoes? These, at one time when we were children, were invested with magic for us."

.The smell of an old book, a favorite baseball glove, sharing a blanket and a room and a story, grapefruit at night, the lake in the morning before everyone else is awake, the air in Pompeii, the rooftops in Venice, the rocks at Zion, the spices in New Orleans, listening to a life-changing song with someone who understands.

iv
"What do you want more than anything else in the world? What do you love, or what do you hate? Find a character, like yourself, who will want something or not want something, with all his heart."

.He wants to be the music that makes people breathe slower, makes them remember. She wants to save the people around her again, she wants to be hope. He loves to hate. She hates to love. He wants to pull fame out from the elementary school hallways and shake it out. She doesn't want to believe in ghosts forever, she wants to live.

[Quotes from Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury]

3:02 - 4:35

Fear; revisited.

A year ago, I was on top of the world. It was all possibilities and late nights and awards and love. Now, it's stagnancy and shaky hope and confronting my fears (not because I want to, but because I have to.)

My fears have been showing up almost every day now, always new and more intimidating. Some people say that's life, they say it'll never end. I hope it's making me stronger and that I won't be afraid forever.

I met one fear when I opened that first letter: now I can move on. I met one at an afternoon party and introduced myself: now I'm not tormented. I met one when I felt that pain in my chest: now I can breathe. I met one late at night dreaming beside me: now I can sleep.

A year ago, I was terrified. Of losing my world, my foundation, my future. Now, I realize that I can have everything that matters, I just can't stop fighting for it. I never considered myself much of a fighter, but I can be. Now I've got to be.

Quieted

We saw an old man in an old church talk about writing last night. He was famous, accomplished, but when it came down to it, he was really just a man. A chapel full of readers and writers and I think, at times, none of us had anything to say. It wasn't the actual man we were captured by, in his button-down shirt and worn baseball cap, it was his words and the memories they evoked.

A conversation in the last pew; A conversation during a funeral

."I'm the only one left now. Soon no one will remember us."

-"You've got Sue."

."No one should have to bury their little sister. Or their little brother. I'm the only one left."

-"They lived good lives."

."Did they? How can you tell?"

-"They had people who loved them."

."I don't know if that matters."

-"It matters. Besides, you've still got Sue."

."We buried her a long time ago. I'm the only one left."

A whole world

There's a whole world out there, he told me. There's a whole world and we're gonna see it, he told me.

One day

The windows are all open so it feels like spring. There's blue paint on the side of the court, little boys with signatures that will outlast their youth.

There's a woman dressed in layers, tending to her garden of broken objects. Spoons and tin cans hang from a tree and she's maybe what you would call "an artist", or maybe what neighbors would call "eclectic".

The India House has been closed for years, but the sign and menu are still up. The sun shines on the windows like the lights are still on, and I'm sure when people walk by, they smell the spices.

There are buildings, four stories high, where the refugees live with prayer flags hanging from porches. In dorm rooms and hippie chicks' bedrooms, the flags are just a passing notion. Here, they represent a past, a life, a memory, a future, a need.

On Cold Nights

The space heater by my feet has got an orange light and it makes a tick, tick, tick sound every now and then. When I hear that sound and see that light, I feel warm again.

The tip of my nose is cold and when you touch the back of my neck, I get goosebumps. I eat soup and curl my body around the bowl, sucking life out of the steam.

I'm under down blankets and the feathers sometime poke out and stick in my hair. I'll pull one leg out from the warmth we've created and let the cold settle on me.

When it is cold and the moon is out, I look around the world and think, I belong here. But I may never come back.

Antifreeze

He looked at me and said, "tell me something I don't know about you."
So I told him about the time my cat died when I was eight.

The look in his eyes, the smell of his fur.
Cross-legged, enveloping him.
The antifreeze he'd been poisoned with, the neighbor kid who did it.
The first time I saw anything die: the air changed and my fingertips tingled.
The first time I understood there was cruelty in the world.
But kindness, too. Cross-legged, enveloping him.

He looked at me and said, "I've already heard that story."
But he hadn't. I'd only ever told him I was eight, the cat died, antifreeze.

Profoundly sad

Sometimes I read her words and think I don't understand love. I think that, maybe, I missed something. I think that, maybe, I've been too cynical. Sometimes I wish I had that in me, that love, like sadness, that can seep into everything if you let it. And I wonder if I'll ever change.

Then I think about love, and I think of the smell of sawdust and snow. Opening that door with the three little window panes. Sharing a bedroom and talking in the dark. Patchouli and spices. Guitars and champagne. Watching those memories, packed so tight, escape slowly and finally find a place to sleep. Hidden pictures of skinny dipping and late night road trips. Canyons, castles, cities. The feeling of saying goodbye. Marking time by moments apart, not calendars. Quilts folded on couches. There are tears sometimes, screaming sometimes, but why waste your sometimes?

My love isn't better, it isn't as consuming. It's not that can't-breathe, got-fire-and-butterflies-in-your-stomach, cry-all-night-'cause-you-can't-live-without-each other kind of love. I couldn't live that way. My love is a quieter thing, melancholy at times, but usually, it's right where it needs to be.

Quiet stories

Sometimes you find stories in the most unlikely places.

"I knew it was over when Mom had me try on her wedding dress. I was five and it was Halloween and I stood on a stool while she cut off the bottom so I could wear it. Dad walked in the room and saw me and Mom with the dress and I knew it was over. They're still together, but the dress is gone and I'm still waiting for him to leave."

"So we were driving across town, right? We had this big U-Haul with everything he ever owned it in. We've only been together three months now, but we've been living together for two. It was weird that day when we were moving because he was driving the truck and I was sitting beside him with his dog's ashes in my lap and his ex-girlfriend's engagement ring on a chain around my neck. They were up front with us because they were the most important things he owned. His girlfriend cheated on him before he could give her the ring -- his grandmother's, re-sized to fit the girlfriend -- and now he doesn't know what to do with it. He won't give it to me, but he wanted me to keep it safe while we drove across town."

Not to be confused with

You can tell by the paint on the walls that they've got money, which most of us confuse with class. Rich colors; New England colors; reds and yellows and golds. You can tell by the beers in their hands, brown bottles with local brewery labels, and the tables with trays of steaming food. They've got nice smiles and all is well.

In our pictures, we've got old barns with Christmas lights and people sitting in heaps on the floor. We've got boxes of wine and bowls of Chex Mix and people dancing. We wonder what people will confuse us with.

Masking tape names

He got it in Rio De Janeiro, he said, but it's got pictures of his trip to Antarctica. When most people say they've been there, you don't believe them. But he's got the pictures to prove it.

He was handsome back then and was the only one on the ship with the camera. It's a waste now, he says, but I thought it'd mean something someday. Just like he thought he'd always be handsome. Some things don't last forever.

He wrapped us up in his mother's furs 'cause it's the only way he can keep us warm. We won't wear them. One of us is allergic, one is vegan, and one lives in Florida. But it's nice to be warm for a few moments on that cold night.

He wants us to put our names on the things we want, 'cause he knows that he'll die someday. He knows that his things aren't safe with anyone and might as well give it all away 'cause he can't keep the thieves out of the attic.

what's under your pavement

we used to slide back there. it seemed like miles. we'd get a running start and hit the ice and our boots were like skates and we'd go all the way to the end, where the river cut the field in half and was still runnin even on the coldest days. sometimes we'd jump it and get our boots wet and knew we were in trouble. frostbite happens, especially out here, mom always said. so we'd carry the person with the icy boot back home like they were already dead and get into the house with yellow warm lights and mom would pick the burrs out of our mittens and wrap up the icy foot.

daddy knew we'd outgrown our backyard when i bust the seams in my baseball. he made us these bats out of the spare wood in the garage and they were the most beautiful things in the world, smooth and the perfect weight and size, just for us. well one day i hit a pitch so hard it landed in the drop off behind our apartment, with the old rusted fridge and broken glass and tangles of thorns. daddy said then, we have to find a new place to practice. so he took us out to the field and we made a baseball diamond with some of daddy's old shirts as bases. the ground was uneven and there were burrs everywhere, but we could hit the ball as hard as we wanted. i hit those pitches so hard i cracked my bat and my dad never looked so proud.

there was this time i was all wrapped up in something, 'cause my friend kissed the boy i loved, so i went out there to the field. it became this place that i could go and it felt like it was mine, even though it never really belonged to me. i found this old broken down barn under layers of yellow grass and got these pieces of coal and metal and kept them in my pocket. i went to the tree on the other side of the river, the tree that grew sideways. i tried to climb it but couldn't so instead i just sat under it and watched my house. it looked so different from the back, lined up with the other townhouses like big, quiet people just waiting for something to happen.

Late night thoughts in the Vineyard

I can hear the ocean through my window and my skin's got sand inside it now. I'm on someone else's vacation, in a house that no one ever lives in. There are natives and vacationers and workers and I'm a little bit of all of them.

No return

I'll send you letters without return addresses. And you'll open them, one by one, and wonder who in the world could love you so much. You won't know it's me, and it's better that way.

people don't smile much anymore

"to the pretty brunette at the bagel market in essex: your friendly smile brightened my gray vermont day. thanks."

It's people like this that make me realize everything will be okay.

Listen

I want to write you back, but I'm not going to. I have a lot to say, but you wouldn't listen.