Apr
8
It seems like EONS of time have passed since I last wrote here and it’s impossible to dip into any sort of context or commentary so let’s just chat about how we’re doing, okay? How are you? God, I hope you’re okay. Things are rough. Things are terrible! Things are beautiful! A dear friend of mine wrote to me about how she felt weird going to Disneyland in the midst of some turmoil, but: it’s all just happening at the same time! and that feels like my mantra for All of This: it’s all happening at the same time.
I’m feeling my way into a new stage of life with one child out of the nest, and all the new revelations that has brought. I went to the coast with Riley and his girlfriend, we all stayed in an oceanfront hotel with separate rooms and I treated them to meals and we walked on the beach, the two of them and me by myself at different times, which felt right, and we all went shopping and thrifting and laughed at the loud smelly seals together and really had a grand time. It was so nice to get to know her better and to see the side of him that is a doting boyfriend, who could have ever imagined such a thing, I would/could never have done this with my own mom and wow, what a gift to experience something so different and cool and fun. I feel so grateful for that little getaway.
I had to say goodbye to my sweet Callie cat and it was so painful and such a loss and yet it was so peaceful and loving and such a good ending for her. I’m grateful for all the years we had, even as I miss her presence. I miss her so much and I miss how we would love her together as a family, you know what I mean if you have family pets. The love you shower onto the pets is also shared love, maybe a way to show love among each other that’s easier when you’re a teenager or even grumpy-feeling spouses. I love you Callie is also I love us.
When I was on the beach I took a lot of photos and that felt good to see with a photographer’s eye, to specifically look for beauty in the way impermanent moments can line up, and I suppose I have been trying to do that in life, too. There has been so much heaviness inside and outside of my own personal life but so much goodness.
The day after Callie died I had my first hospice patient since 2020 — I have rejoined the volunteer group and am an active participant again, today I meet with some folks to discuss joining a summer camp for kids dealing with loss — and that was sad but also peaceful and a bit … holy? Yes. She was a tiny slip of a woman, still beautiful in her diminished state, and we spent several quiet hours together not talking, the TV going, her mini Yorkie dog occasionally wandering in and out of the room, the windows letting in the glowing spring sunshine, birds calling and singing outside and her dying, me dying too but somewhere behind her, all of it unknown, unknowable. It felt holy. I was there to relieve her caretaking daughter but it felt like a gift to me rather than the reverse, a reminder of how every speck of time has meaning. We’re here until we’re not.
Later that very same day someone at the barn brought cows in to introduce to the horses and I was able to ride Little Joe like a real goddamned cowgirl, trotting behind a herd. Just in an arena, just with young easily-moved cows, but gosh. Holy shit. Me and some other ladies, riding like that. What an absolute thrill. Something I could never have pictured myself doing.
My future feels so wide open these days, uncertain and kind of scary at times, but full of promise, too. The promise that life keeps delivering change, over and over. Nothing stays, and that is the sweet hell of it. Nothing stays and the weather keeps changing. I feel ready for it all. The rain, the sun, the biting cold wind and the warm soft breeze. I feel like I’m finally in step with the movements of life, not at all sure where it will lead but no longer dragging against the flow.
It’s all happening, at the same time.
Jan
13
A while ago my aunt asked me if I was planning to work on a book, now that I’m in this season of parenting/life and have more time on my hands. Oh gosh no, I said, laughing a little. I guess I just don’t feel called to that. I wish I did, really. I wish the words felt pent up, ready to pour from me. Or even that I would lower a bucket and at first it would just be a hollow rattling sound but eventually, arduously, it would fill. Writing feels like such a wetwork excavation, and I feel so dry.
People have often asked me when I plan to write a book. It’s meant as a compliment, I know. Writing a whole entire book and of course getting that book published is such an massive accomplishment and endorsement, I have so much admiration for that path. Maybe that’s still in my future, I don’t know. It’s always just felt too hard for me, really. I can’t imagine the discipline to spend that much time in the liminal space of writing, especially without constant feedback and encouragement along the way. I can’t imagine coming up with that much material, to be honest. I have often felt best suited to exactly this type of writing here on my little blog, relatively short and without much structure. When people say you should write a book! I have often thought, well but I like this. I’ve recently been watching TikTok videos from a girl who talks about true crime stories and her comments are full of people telling her to get a podcast, but she’s so right for the short-form video format.
It is true there is more of a potential for a larger audience with a book. I wonder if that would even be something I’d want, though. Larger audiences are scary. Whoever is still out there reading this blog, bless you, because it’s not like I make it easy. The little email notification thing is long broken, no one really uses RSS readers any more, and I don’t promote on social media. I feel like whatever’s happening here between me the writer and you the reader, it’s pretty intentional and personal at this point. You’re not just stumbling upon me. And even if you are, that’s kind of special just because of how unlikely it is. Here I am, writing letters in bottles and tossing them willy-nilly into the sea, and there you are on some distant beach. That’s pretty cool.
I miss how the Internet used to be, how we used to discover each other as writers. I miss reading bloggers on a regular basis and how that was so motivating for my own writing, and how I just don’t feel that way from monetized Substacks or viral social posts. But who cares — the world has moved on. Crabbing about that feels like when I drive by this sign near our town that says “I MISS THE AMERICA I GREW UP IN.” You probably miss blatant racism, I always think, grouchily, but maybe they mean something more wholesomely nostalgic. Maybe they miss when everyone watched the same TV shows or didn’t have phones to stare at or kids played outside until moms stood on porches and called them in or food wasn’t full of processed garbage or microplastics, but what does it matter? The sign is silly, because here we are, hurtling ever forward. We can’t be mired in what we miss because we’ll never get it back, not really. I’d write a book about it but I’ll never have the right words.
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