Henry Miller hanging round the toilet

In my bathroom I have a copy of Henry Miller's The Colossus of Maroussi sitting around.
I have been reading the first sentence several hundred times lately.

I would never have gone to Greece had it not been for a girl named Betty Ryan who lived in the same house with me in Paris.

I like thinking about the way the world works.
How life unfolds.
I also would have never have gone to Greece had it not been for a compulsive liar yet interesting boy I knew when I was in college.

There are so many I would never have________ had it not been for__________ in our lives.

Who's yr Betty Ryan?


photo via ffffound

all of this and nothing

Not sure but there is a feeling of wanting to listen to Wilco & The Psychedelic Furs all day long. I tire of explaining myself to people. Isn't it enough to know that I am just different and made like mountains of molehills and the world spins faster than a top spun by the fat finger of a child? Isn't it enough to just exhale and blow all of my breath in one simple direction. All of my breath pointed towards yr house of cards and they fly right out my window like tiny suicides. They hit the ground like bricks.

Oh yes, I went to NYC. It was just what I needed. I am waiting to scrounge some photos and tell you all about it. I have like five stories. You know I always do.

I think I am about to experience some sort of literary explosion. I am bubbling.

like a couple of years ago I said this would never happen

just walking around projecting my mental state unto the world around me

When Finnian was about a year old he had a terrible fever and was quite ill over the course of a weekend. Joe's dad was in town from England and the second night Finn was ill he held the baby on the couch and placed his hands on Finn's head and became very serious in his attention.
Dad was healing him. He was trying to heal him with his magic.
Magic is the best way I can describe it.
Dad was a spiritualist and his views on life rooted from that place.
My grandfather is a Baptist minister and his views root from there.
My grandfather would lay his hands on me too if I asked him to.
He would pray hard for me.

It is all magic. It is all magical thinking. It is all reasoning.

Magical thinking is all around me right now. I place my hands on books and telephones and wood and tables and press harder than I should to try and make things feel real.
But they don't.
I try and chant inside of my head letters strung together that form words and then sentences that beg the people that I love to find peace. I say these little words over and over in my mind and even as I am saying them I wonder if it will ever work.
Because grief is not a simple action.
It begins and assaults at random and does it ever have an end?
Or does it just hide away?
It is like a heavy velvet curtain at a theatre.
It just falls at random from the sky and blankets you.
It makes it difficult to move and the fabric traps yr feet.
It pools in piles at yr feet and you cannot move until it lets you.

I find myself trying very hard to think things fine. I reason with myself that in some arbitrary number of days that everyone will feel better and life will resume again in formation.
I make little deals with the universe that I will be a better wife, mother, sister, daughter, friend if everyone can just find that peace.
But it's only magical thinking. I pray in the quiet to a God who I am told by my grandfather knows the number of hairs on my head.
I say tiny words to God, but I am lost out there in the dark.
I am not sure I am heard.
I am not sure I am worthy or my magical thinking matters.

But the day after dad placed his hands on Finnian
the morning after he was so loving and focused and true
the very next day
my small boy uncurled in the bed
and stretched and smiled
and cooed
and snuggled to my chest and his forehead
was as cool
as a early morning breeze

and I can't help but irrationally wish for dad to be here now
to place his hands on his children's heads
to take away the sadness
the way they all feel
dealing with the subtraction of him from their lives

And nothing makes sense but I say the small words over and over again
inside of my magical mind

You never write the narrative of yr own sadness until the moment it happens.

I would have pulled bong hits today.
I would have drank hard liquor.
to forget

Today wasn't like any other day I have ever had.
I have never had to wake someone from slumber to deliver bad news like the news I gave today.
When you are younger than you even know you are and you are in love and most of yr problems can be solved in 24 short hours you don't look into the future and see heavy shit.
You just see much of the same.

You just forget to focus on the future and what will happen.
People tell you things and you look at others lives but it is never yr little life.

You never write the narrative of yr own sadness until the moment it happens.

Joe's father died last night.

It's like there is a giant hole in England now
in his town
in Joe's heart

And when I had to put my arms around him
to hold him and tell him
it was like he wasn't all there
like he had shrunk to the size of a boy
and even my strong strong arms
wrapped right around him
couldn't do enough

"It's like how hot dogs come in packs of 10, and buns come in packs of eight or 12 - you have to buy nine packs to make it come out even."

I want to fall down and sleep like Rip Van Winkle.
I also never want to eat Trader Joe' sushi again.
the taste was so different
like an assault on my mouth

I am trying to find the right song to be Little Alouette's new website song.
Yeah- expanding beyond the etsy and LA blog soon! woot!

I know it should be a kiddo song-but I really want this.
or this.
I can't shake David Byrne.
I would kiss his forehead. I would wash his feet.

And then you should see the state of my home.
I walk around squinting.
Everything looks better squinting.

And thank you God I am headed to the salon tomorrow night.
I had to wear a hat all weekend.
I am unkempt.

This is not one of those guilty posts. This is not an excuse.

I am tired and working mad and the world spins and all of the sudden one night Finnian pulls right from his little body all the words that make me just fine.

He tells me in sing song how much he loves us and the excitement of his life is just what I need. It can boil my bathwater.
It can curl my hair.
I am wild and frantic but at the end of the day these small arms...
All of these arms wrap around me and remind me of what I am doing.
I am growing these arms strong and one day they will unfold and the hands will straighten and the long fingers will point in the direction of Now.
Go there.
It's all good.
I know I can.
You told me.
You showed me.


title post- True Stories 1986