And just so we're clear, you will owe me $100 when you get married.

This is the first time in 9 years that I have forgotten your birthday.

Time is marked by forgetting. (Or is it remembering? I forget...)

Happy belated birthday, Christopher Paul Giguere. Thanks for saving my life and stuff.

a secret in 4 parts

1.1 here's the secret
in your absence my love turns into green apples
i imagine eating them with you
under the trees

2.1 i left the bar when it was raining
down the stairs, into the night
except...
everything turned into poetry
tom waits was playing
i smoked under the christmas lights
thinking about unrequited love

3.1 here's the secret
i don't miss you anymore

2.2 it's been raining since you left

1.2 there are no apples

4.1 i don't miss you anymore

2.3 um, I don't even know you?

0.1 when i am with you, the air i breath turns into bone

3.1.1 but...

2.4 the romantic and the cynic have been battling since we met
even the cynic wants to throw the game
lose spectacularly

0.2 we all carry the past within us
in the crook of our dendrites
in the lines of our palms
in our bones

1.3 here's the secret
there are apples when you touch me

4.1.1 i will always miss you

4.2 you understand the beauty of the perfect moment

2.5 i loved you at first sight (more or less)

2.5.1 a secret i try to keep from myself

3.2 i loved you when you told me "this is what a pecan a tree smells like"

4.3 i loved you at first sight (more or less)

1.4 i will never know when I first loved you

0.3 everything turns into the beating of blood
everything turns into poetry
everything turns

0.4 here's the not-very-well-kept secret
I confuse dreams with reality

0.4.1 because i am human

1.5 thank you

4.4 thank you

Almost

It's been so long since I've seen you, I almost don't miss you any more.

Almost.

In June, we are going to be friends again. And all I will say is "Thank you."

Last night I dreamt of you. And houses. I dreamt of you and houses last night.

And I woke up. To a three-legged cat who needed to be fed. To a paper that needed to be written because it was due seven months ago. To a desire for a cigarette, even though I quit. Again. For the third time. And I wasn't ready. For any of it. I wasn't ready to miss you terribly.

I miss you terribly.

Because I know what houses mean in dreams. I know what it means that I was moving my clothes out of the closet underneath your stairs. And I was reassuring your girlfriend that there was no broken glass in the carpet. That I was making space for her.

So, because I wasn't ready, I went back to sleep. And dreamt of houses.

This entry is about you

my love for you is tangled up in the lines of my palms
i am not even the same person any more
thank you

Text message that made me so happy I wanted to explode into a million pieces

"In miami. i'll bring you home a dolphin"

Kisses to Christopher

I've always wanted someone to describe me using the phrase, "She's got a mind like a steel trap." But no ever has and I seriously doubt anyone ever will. Which made me wonder, what simile would best describe my mind? I guess there is something a little predatory about the steel trap analogy, and I don't think of my mind as being particularly predatory. I think my mind is somehow like my closet - full of unpacked boxes, lanterns, old writings, games, shoes, dirty laundry, and broken or outdated computer equipment. That sounds about right. And messy. Quite messy. And difficult to maneuver around in or find what you are looking for. Yes

**************************

I just called my best friend and asked him to describe my mind. His first answer was, "Like a hive of Africanized killer bees." He then said it depended on which Wendy was running the show. To truly understand my mind, we would need a "psycho-botanist" who could create a "taxonomy of the different manifestations of wendyness."

How can you not fucking love him?

This explains my mid-twenties. (Thanks, Chris, for getting me through them, you magnificent bastard)

"The human shape is a ghost
made of distraction and pain.
Sometimes pure light, sometimes cruel,
trying wildly to open,
this image tightly held within itself."
Rumi

How sweet

My best friend has Kiss on Wet Glass bookmarked in his favorites, between Doom and Live365 Internet Radio.

The internet makes strange bedfellows.

Christopher, can you please rearrange your favorites so I am between PostSecret and Bat Conservation International?

Thanks.

2nd most drunken poem ever

Actually, it is probably the third. There is that one I don't think about, scrawled on cloud paper, full of whispers, that fell into the mysterious space between the bed and the wall, which I never retrieved. Pretending I don't see it on those rare occasions when I remove the socks and the novels and the cds from under my bed. So, third most drunken poem ever. This morning I removed the lines in which I compared love to a slutty, insecure unicorn. Yeah, drunken poetry is uber-fabulous.

I am not drunk-dialing you
even though I am eating left-over Chinese food
plucking bamboo shoots off my breasts
and counting the roaches in my kitchen
even though the night is short, I will not call you
I don’t understand why I am letting you go
Whatever, I’m calling you right now
I want to hear your belief in me
I wait, body heavy, toes numb
imagining the cat toy is a subatomic particle
imagining I am filled with light

When we are older, I will rest you in a basket and set you out to sea
I don’t want you to be a dream from which I will awake

Maybe I can be an adult

"That's why I like you. Because you want a cone of probability for your birthday. Does that settle it?"

Yes. Yes it does. Hopefully.

I hate my uterus. Part II

So I am on the phone with Chris, holding back tears in my office because, oh I don't know, a student who didn't speak English very well made me sad, I saw a bird with a limp, someone asked me for change on the street, I don't know what I want to do with my life, what's the point of all this anyway, etc., etc. And something starts to seem vaguely familiar. And it's not just that Chris is the person I always call when I am on the verge of tears. The poor bastard. And then I realize - this same thing happened exactly four weeks ago.

Holy fuck. I am a prisoner of my own reproductive system. And there isn't a damn thing I can do about it. Except bust out the champagne, measuring cup, and cigarettes.

Chris, thank you for being the bestest best friend a girl could ever wish for. I wish I was one of your internal organs, so we could always take naps together.

sultry night

driving home, windows down, listening to ibrahim ferrer, elbows touching. and he said, "all you need is the occasional perfect moment"

I hate my uterus

Wow. I just tried to convince an ex to date me again. Three times. On the phone. Once while at a bus stop, holding back tears and blowing my nose on my shirt. Shortly thereafter, I bought champagne, ice cream, and cigarettes at the convenience store. I drank the champagne out of a measuring cup.

I am 100% premenstrual. Oh, cruel sisters estrogen and progesterone, why must you brawl so?

Blood and tears

Another attempt at bike riding with Chris ended in blood and tears. Maybe I should avoid bikes in his company.

Cops

Cops have no subtlety or nuance

sushi happy hour, tipsy from half a beer, sitting on bench on Congress, unexpectedly fooling around on new sofa, drinking sangria on porch, christmas lights

jealousy

Just had an overwhelming surge of jealousy about Chris. It is really quite fascinating how powerful and irrational an emotion jealousy is - strong and almost uncontrollable. While I was trying to get to the heart of my feelings, I came across this fabulous article articulating a Buddhist view of jealousy.

My favorite quote, although not directly related to jealousy is, "Every human being relates to his or her own existence. Existence is God. In that relationship you're totally alone. In that you have no company. That is what it is to be a human -- relating alone and reflectively to your own existence"

And then we get to, "Jealousy is basically, fundamentally, a spiritual problem." Great. As if I wasn't feeling overwhelmed already. Now it's a spiritual problem.

I kind-of wish I didn't believe that, even though I would be lying to myself.

I think I am still unsure how I feel about the spiritual direction my life is taking.