Big Girl Moms and Man Babies

I took a break from this blog. It's not that I didn't have anything to say. Maybe I didn't have anything nice to say.

During a one-hour courtesy visit with my parents, my Mother pulled me into her bedroom and accused me of corrupting one of my baby brothers almost thirty years ago when he was nine by introducing him to marijuana and thinking that was funny. Apparently she derived this narrative from some hate-filled tirade of my brother's, in which, I infer, he was blaming others including me for his fucked up life. She apparently mapped out dates and came up with this specific charge against me as the root cause.

I was offended in so many ways:

• Not only was it not true, that when I was a young adult I would never have given my nine-year-old brother weed, but the legend among the adult children goes another way. Legend has it that my brother and his friends were roaming freely with no parental supervision (in a suburb in which I never lived because I was away at college), and found joints in his friend's mom's bedroom. He was somewhere between four and six years old. Maybe, a few years later when we heard this legend and he claimed he was "done with pot" at age nine, we laughed and thought, "What the hell? How did that happen?"
• My mother's statement/question, "How could I have raised a child, [i.e., you] who thought it was funny for a nine year old to smoke pot?" Within the anguish-laden question was the charge that I was her evil spawn that ruined her "baby" and caused his life to go off the rails. 
• That my Mom wanted to blame someone else for my brother's troubles, and that she conveniently wanted to finger one of her other kids: that is deeply offensive to me. 
• Imbedded in the desire to blame me or one of her other kids ("If it wasn't you, who was it? Was [another brother]?") was the abdication of responsibility for her own neglect and total cluelessness about what was actually going on in our family at that time. Or maybe at any time.

I was deeply offended in part because I have leveled similar charges and disguised accusations at my husband and kids: "Where did I go wrong that I raised someone [like you] who would do [such-and-such]?"

This kind of shit is completely wrong.

I yelled at my Mom and said, "Are you seriously blaming me for my brother's life? I do not accept! You were the parent! Not me! Where the hell were you?"

The sad fact: She was out hustling real estate, desperately working to put food on the table. She had suddenly gone from stay-at-home-mom with six kids to leaving the younger ones home alone to raise themselves. The perils of the latch-key childhood in the suburban wilds, which I am convinced is the worst possible environment for kids.

Seriously, where was my Dad? Being a reserve LAPD cop and busting "real criminals" while his kids were living a feral existence in the suburbs?

But even if my Mom had been home, would my brother have discovered the joints in his friend's house and smoked them? Yes. And would my Mom have figured it out even if she had been at home baking cookies? No!! She was living in some fifties bubble where nothing bad happened. Where the children she raised would never think of doing such a thing.

After I yelled at my Mom and saw how distraught and broken she was, so unable to understand what happened to her grown "baby" man's life, I put her head to my breast, the way I would my own child.

"It's okay, Mom. Some bad things happened. You don't know half of what happened, thankfully, and never will. But here we are. It doesn't matter what happened 30 years ago that made us all the way we are now, we are who we are."

She nestled into my breast and cried a little bit. "Let's focus on healing now," I said. "If we need some real family therapy, we will make that happen." I said that knowing that if any family healing is ever going to happen, it will be because I insist. I will be the one to research the right therapist and send out all the emails and do all the one-on-one work to convince everyone to participate. And I might fail. People may or may not want to heal.

"He is my baby," she said again.

"I know, Mom. I have a baby, too. A big man baby. But there are so many things that contribute to a person's life. It's not one incident or one thing or one influence. It's the time in history, it's the state of the family, it's the neighborhood you live in, it's the school you go to, it's many random things, all of which contribute to that person's growth. And everyone comes in with their own agenda. Not everyone who smoked a joint at age nine turned out like my brother. Some people who did are CEO's and some are dead. My brother is doing fine. He is where he is because of his choices. Not because someone gave him a joint."

I still love my Mother. And I still love my brother. But if there's ever going to be another family gathering that is in any sense authentic, there is a lot of work ahead of us.

Drug Bloopers and Miracles

Sitting around the table eating a nice Christmas dinner with my three grown up kids and a couple of close friends. Somehow we got onto the subject of drug bloopers. "When bad things happen on good drugs." Zoe kept wanting me to tell a certain story about a little mishap that wasn't all that long ago, fondly known in the family as "Mom's Porta-Party." I was able to divert eveyone's attention with a tale from days of yore. But it was a whopper...

My story involved some purple dot acid (among other things) at a Grateful Dead show at Winterland, New Year's Eve 1977. It was my first of three Dead shows in short succession. To make a long story short, I ended up on New Year's Day 1978 with some strange guys in a van in a rest stop outside Santa Cruz wearing nothing but a leotard, having left all my belongings somewhere along the way. Including my shoes, which were silver spray-painted rainboots. As the sun came up I got out of the van and gingerly walked out and sat at the end of the jetty, shivered and cried my heart out. Then had to "borrow" some oversized jeans and Converse high tops and hitchhike back to Berkeley.

Thus inspired by my story, others shared tales of drug bloopers so outrageous that my story sounded like child's play, which it was. Things a mom can't know about until the Five Year Rule has passed. (If you and everyone involved are still alive to tell the tale after five years, any story is fair game.) Peyote trips, and the time my son and his friend "accidentally" ate some chocolate mushrooms and I had to tell the friend's mom. Somehow my kids all survived their childhoods and teen years. Just as Joe and I did. Miracles, really, when you hear what we all went through to get here. 

We played a wholesome and rousing game of Dictionary to counteract the unwholesomeness. After that, Zoe suggested an appreciation circle. By then it was just our family, including Zoe's awesome boyfriend T. It was so moving to hear what we recognize about each other. Things that we all felt but maybe have never said to each other or heard each other say.

Jesus, pass the chutney

Christmas.

The down side of not participating in the consumer frenzy is feeling a little left out this morning. It feels kind of wrong, like it's unAmerican, but I'll get over it. I could say my rebellion was in solidarity with my homeless neighbors for whom Christmas is a painful reminder of their lack of a home or a family. But that would be a lie.

Fuck it.

Last night was one of the best Christmas Eve's ever, and the Baby Jesus was never mentioned and not a single gift box or ribbon in sight. We went to a Sikh celebration of the birth of my friends Hari and Lara's son. I will get the proper spelling of his very long name. In the enormous meeting room at the Holy Trinity Church in Moraga, there was not so much as a cross to be seen. Instead, there was an open bar -- right when you walked in. My sons were thrilled.

There were appetizers waiting such as tandoori chicken and samosas and pakoras and various chutnies. There was a DJ playing mashed up indian music and technopop. Women in saris and men in suits and turbans. Tons of kids running around, girls in silk dresses, boys in suits and turbans or just suits.

Four hours of dancing, drinking, laughing and catching up. There was the ceremony to honor the first-born-son-of-the-first-born-son involving a procession with giant turbans lit with candles and dancing to Indian pop (featuring Hari and Lara), then passing the turbans around with everyone trying to balance the candle-lit turbans on their heads. Old ladies and young kids all dancing to the 180 beats per minute mash-ups.

By 9:00 we were exhausted, having consumed way too much of the dinner, because it was so phenomenally good. The whole thing made me want to move to India ASAP. I'm sure there is a reason Hari's family is living in the East Bay and not Mumbai, but being there last night put into perspective how young and inexperienced our culture is. Makes the ham and mashed potato dinner Joe and I are cooking today seem neolithic.

Can I say something about the sari: no matter what shape your body is in, the sari makes any woman look like a queen. No shit. While I figure out how to move to India, I think I'll be shopping at the Sari Palace.

I'm avoiding Christmas and the reality that when my boys wander in here in a few minutes, there will be breakfast. And that's it. Not even a stocking stuffer. I think I'll pass off the unwrapped garment rack I bought for their studio as their joint Christmas gift. No wrapping to throw away. I guess that's a plus.

I hope that your day is free of stress and guilt and regret. Tomorrow: December 26.

 

Stay on the grid with me, baby

Celebrating December 24.

The task: connect the dots.

#1) It's difficult for me to completely shut down for business. I noticed that I did not leave an out-of-office reply or change my voicemail. They might seem like dumb things to do, because you know you are going to sneak a few peaks at your email. Everyday. But when you activate those "closed for business" messages, it's a signal to the world that you are really turning your ringer down, and may even go temporarily off-grid.

Then I thought, it's just how I am. I'm always open for business. If you are my son and you have a situation, it could be a broken heart or just an ingrown toenail that is causing you pain, and you come into my sanctuary, even if it's my birthday, and let's say you ask for some medical attention, or any kind of attention, chances are I'll drop what I'm doing and take care of that business. I'm that way.

I'm that way about sex. I just don't close for business. Why should I? I'd rather take care of our business now.

Some people like to let their phones go to voicemail. Then they take their sweet time getting back to you. Or maybe they never do because they know you're going to call them back anyway. So they let your needs rise to up into earshot or you just go away.*

I'm the kind that always answers the phone. Always have been. Even if I'm in the deepest sleep. And in the same way, even when I am woken up for sex, I almost never say, "Sorry. Closed for business."

#2) The cause-and-effect seemingly embedded in these two sentences:

"Seeing a friend you've known since you were 28...and who is very, very happy. And finally not wanting to fuck him."

Does it imply that I only want to fuck the unhappy or emotionally crippled?

I'm wondering now. I've said more than once, "I see the pain in their eyes and I'm drawn like a moth to the flame." I'm not saying I'm some fucking saint who wants to fix everyone by fucking. I think I'm good with happy, too. I'm probably like most women, or... I don't know. Is it about "over-giving"?

Donna Britt connects these dots:

"Though I'd long been bewildered by my penchant for offering so much, writing a memoir forced me to dig deeply enough to realize that my over-giving was connected to the mysterious, decades-ago death of my brother at the hands of police in my Gary, Indiana, hometown." It's fascinating and perturbing.

In my case it's not too dark, just unsettling.

Because I am truly happy for my old friend. If we ever did fuck it was back in the day when at least one of us was single. If that ever happened. But happy? Who knows.

To stay sexually on-call is to stay 'on-grid,' as it were. It's a certain zen, to always be up for an invigorating off-hours business call or a fuck in a hallway or say parking garage. It's being in the moment, not building a goddam shrine around sex. I don't have time for that. Fucking is raw humanness with the added element of the sublime.

I guess that's the connection: staying open for biz...equals staying in love...equals what? staying on the grid? equals staying available to spontaneity?

Or does staying on the grid equal staying available to other people's needs equal exactly what's wrong with me?

I guess when you go off grid, you want to go off at the same time with the right people. Or alone.


*My daughter almost never answers her phone. And rarely returns calls. But she's so fucking delightful you can't stay mad at her for more than a second. She has a winning smile and a focus on you when you are in her aura that is genuine and uplifting. When you want her, you learn to shoot her a text and speed dial her number in a one-two punch. If you do that, generally, you can count on hearing from her within a reasonably short time. Unless she's off-grid, usually with close friends. Or if I'm really lucky, I'm off-grid with her.

Wintry things that inspire

Seeing a friend you've known since you were 28 but now lives in London and now has a gorgeous wife and two young kids and is very, very happy. And finally not wanting to fuck him.

Seeing a friend who had a major brain injury five years ago finally starting to act like herself. It's never going to be the same, but seeing that in her acceptance of her new life, there is hope.

Knowing exactly how much champagne, red wine and other mind altering libations to consume in one night and still wake up on time for work, more or less in one piece.

Realizing it's okay once in awhile to over do it on a week night if you over do it just right and have just the right drugs to ensure sleep afterwards.

Remembering what it means to love. To really, really love.

Listening to Nick Drake alone, three days before Christmas.

Letting the joyousness of winter seep into your bones while sitting in a hot bath.

Ravenously eating kimchi and other Korean food that not so long ago disgusted you.

Realizing that there is very little that disgusts you these days except bad politicians and pedophiles.

Crawling into really, really good sheets and a badass down comforter

and settling in for a long winter's night.

Winter Solstice Haiku

Cruel bright sun insists,
"I'm late bro, so so sorry.
Tomorrow: better."

Take the breast!

Being #2 is kind of a mind fuck.

You can really get stuck in being #2.

I'm thinking of a few different ways in which I've been #2 in my life. For like my whole life. When you are #2, you get used to saying, "Go ahead, #1. I'm good. I'll go after you. Take what you want. Really. No, go ahead and take the breast. I don't mind the leg."

You get used to sloppy seconds. You get used to letting other people go first. It's more polite to go second. But do you get to say what you really want to say and do what you really want to do? It's a mind fuck because it's internalized sexism which functions the same way as internalized racism or colonialism. You expect that the Man or the White Person or the Master are going to go first and take what they want. And you're just glad you're not last. Though often you are, especially if there are only two positions in line. You know what I'm talking about.

It's even hard to write about because it feels ungrateful or wrongly assertive. Worse, "unladylike." Whoa. Where does that shit come from?

All I know is that I almost always let other people go first. I thought it was because I'm so tall. When you are really tall, you feel like you have to constantly disarm people. People are automatically intimidated by you, so you spend your whole life being nice and bending down to put your ear closer to theirs because, what can they do? Stand on their tip toes and shout? But I think it has fed right into my internalized sexism.

Here's my guilt about even bringing it up: I'm white, so how would I know what it feels like to be unseen, ignored or discriminated against because of my skin color? I only know because I watch it happen and it breaks my heart. And when I see people of color automatically step back and be #2 (or #3 or last) I recognize how I do that, too.

Again, my guilt at bringing it up: I'm not saying I want to be like Mr. Entitled Straight White Man who doesn't want to wait his turn and pushes his way to the front and assumes he should be #1 every single time - and doesn't even realize he's doing it. No, I'm just observing that being #2 is a difficult state of mind to break out of.

A few (not all) arena's in which I've accepted being #2 (and what I'm doing about it):

Marriage - Unconsciously and consciously making my spouse's needs more important than mine. Working very hard on shifting the balance, and Joe is, too.

Motherhood - It's hard not to be #2 for the first 18-20 years, but eventually you have to assert your rights. I'm trying.

Some friendships - I have more than a few in which I am the listener and supporter, but fortunately those are balanced out by my rock solid friends who give me a shitload of their time and energy.

There comes a time and a place when you just know you are better off being #1. You look around and you say to yourself, I know what I'm doing. I know, in fact, better than anyone else here. That's when you have to say, Move over, my friend. It's my turn. Trust me. I'm taking the breast.

Does weird mean god?

I feel like I haven't acknowledged you an a while, Unique Visitor. A clean 68.00% of you are also Returning Visitors. The vast majority of you are in San Francisco, which makes sense. But here's a shout out to Ballinger, TX, where someone is reading, in fact Ballinger and Portland, OR have the same number of site visits as of today. After Ballinger it's Providence, RI, then Seattle, Berkeley, Thousand Oaks, New York, Oakland, Paris, Bangkok, Los Angeles, Sankt Polten, Alameda, San Anselmo, Westlake Village. And so on.

Hi guys. I'm kind of into Google Analytics. Joe makes fun of me, but he's really into stats for his fantasy football team "The Panty Raiders" so I told him pipe down.

Most of you stay on the site just under four minutes, and read three an a half pages. There are a couple hundred of you. It's huge for me, and I want to say thank you for reading. It warms my heart. It's still so weird for me, but as Trishna commented, "maybe weird means god."

I'm kind of nervous this morning. About what? About "finishing the year well?" About "making enough money to keep my company afloat?" About "making enough money to keep my family afloat?" About "being a good parent so that my kids contribute significantly to society and to the evolutionary future of mankind?" Yeah. Probably all that. What else?

There is stuff I can't write about in this blog. Maybe you think you're getting all of it, but I assure you, there is more. Probably it's the really juicy stuff. I'm nervous that writing this blog is somehow making me feel like I'm writing, which I am, but it's distracting me from the novel I started.

Because now the novel seems like a piece of shit. Like I have to start all over. Like maybe there a few parts that are salvageable, but most of it will end up on a forgotten thumb drive in a dumpy landfill somewhere. Or on a computer that crashes and ends up in the same place. Maybe that's okay. Maybe I'm also nervous about digital media preservation.

Maybe there is another way to tell a story that people are just inventing now. And it's about using the internet and moving images and recorded sounds and letting people explore dumb tangents if they want to. I kind of like that idea.

But privacy is the issue I struggle with. Is there a new way to write a novel that still allows for the immediacy of a blogpost but let's your imagination fly freely? To take chances and explore really out there things without losing all your privacy? Or your job?

There are lots of writers these days who take chances and open up their lives to the public and somehow maintain a sense of integrity and privacy. I should talk to them.

Do you have any thoughts on this subject? Does weird mean god?

"There is Hope!"

Friday night was a double header of holiday bashes. We started out in Oakland at one kind of party, where there was good cheer and merriment and toasts and singing and photo booths and kids and, here's the key: a two hour limit. Once the clock struck the witching hour, that party was broken down, trashed out and doors were locked - before sentiments strayed or tears were shed.

From there to another kind of party in the City. Folks had been laid off. Some of whom had worked at this company for many years. It was like arriving at the life boat dock for the Titanic. Purgatory: the condition or process of purification or temporary punishment in which, it is believed, the souls of those who die in a state of grace are made ready for Heaven.

After more than a few stiff drinks we went to Brandy Ho's to be further purified by Hunan. So many hugs and well wishes and talk about moving to Paris or Buenos Aires. Sitting around the table nibbling spicy eggplant with four friends who'd just been laid off, the rest of us could only listen to their understandable bitterness and disbelief that their "services were no longer needed." Feeling at times left out, at times guilty for having jobs, and at times jealous that no one was giving us the kick in the ass we need to leave this bloody country for some extended period of time.

When we paid the joint bill, some of us threw down a little extra cash to cover dinner for the recently fired. It was a small gesture, but I hope our beloved friends who are now statistics for next month's unemployment figures will know that they have friends who truly care.

After all that Hunan moroseness for which I wore sagging jeans and a t-shirt, Saturday night called for notching it up. With little time to get ready, I pulled on my trusty black geometric-pattern tights and a too-short black velvet strappy dress. Too short as in my sons said it was okay to wear as long as I didn't bend over, so I added a white shiny coat and black feather boa to distract the eye from my geometrically patterned ass in case I forgot and kneeled down to pick up a coin or fallen credit card.

Sometimes a girl needs to be 6'3" and not give a shit about towering over everyone. The weather's nice up there, you can see everything, albeit chilly from the almost bare legs. It's not that chilly because when you are wearing a skimpy black velvet dress lots of well-wishers want to find out what the weather is like up there. We started out at the Homestead for Matt's birthday party. The back room is plush and all padded, and there was a ton of food. I grazed on lamb, but did not want to feel too bloated in my skimpy dress.

Then to a house party for filmmakers and physicists, where we drank exotic drinks and I snuck out with a friend's husband to smoke from a Vapor Genie - which was genius, though may have spawned some conspiracy theories in later discussions.

We danced to the crazy Italian music until Joe pulled me out to go back to the Homestead for another Manhattan and some coat groping -- as though we were were high on ecstacy. We weren't. We just had good coats - velvet and shiny and cashmere and lambswool. Our friend who publishes Whore magazine had a particularly tactile coat on, and his lady friends had particularly nice breasts. The tactilly-induced-ecstacy-flashbacks  resulted in some breast exposure and fondling, though no one seemed to mind.

We left after the last Manhattan to park the car at home and walk two blocks to another sort of party,  where Skanky Claus was singing carols with skankily clad elves, songs that were nasty and fun. We danced and next thing we knew without any forethought we nibbled simultaneously on a mushroom chocolate that eventually landed us in bed sometime after 2:00am tripping our balls off. Why? No reason. We each took an Ativan (aka lorazepam) and fell into dreamy psychedelic 600-thread-count cotton bliss.

Slept in, got an invitation to go to Glide while writing this. It's just a couple blocks from here so I went. When I walked in the church was packed with people of all colors and shapes and sizes swaying and belting out together, "There is HOPE!" Cecil himself preached, a message to honor Mary and the feminine in all of us. I joined in, "There is HOPE!"

Can I be queer?

I was talking to a young friend about marriage. By young I mean early 30s. She is in a long-term relationship with a man and they are both in a new relationship with a lesbian couple. I asked her how that was working out.

"It's working out great for everyone!" she said. In her circle it's not unusual. She and her friends do not believe in monogamy or the "old school" rendition of marriage where two people are committed to each other exclusively for life. She said she's not sure about marriage at all, but does envision being with her partner in some form for life.

I want to understand how that works. One of the key things in their circle is that everyone is committed to a very high level of communication. I know several of them, and I would give them all an A++ on how they communicate with each other. At least it appears that way from the outside. They go to communications workshops. They co-counsel each other. They strive for 100% honesty.

I asked, "What happens if you want to sleep with someone else and your partner is threatened by that person?" She said, "We talk about it before anything happens." There are rules. It sounds a little complicated and scary, and it's true that communication takes up a good deal of their time. But the five or six people that I've met in that circle seem happier than most other people I meet. They live near each other. They travel together or separately. They do large art projects together. They are involved in community service together, often in an effort to help other young people become better communicators.

The people in this circle identify as queer. By queer I think they mean this definition: "A political statement, as well as a sexual orientation, which advocates breaking binary thinking and seeing both sexual orientation and gender identity as potentially fluid."

It's pretty forward thinking. Makes me feel kind of old. Is it too late for me to be queer? Do I have enough time?

What would I tell my kids about marriage?

People, I think I'm done with holiday cards. I love getting yours, though. I could write about opting out of Christmas, but Laura Munson already did such a good job. Maybe I'll feel different next year.

I could write about having a baby when your single in hopes of attracting men. I have a lot of friends who are still waiting for Mr. Right. Should they just go to the sperm bank and/or work something out with their gay friend? See Melanie Notkin.

I'm stuck on the whole marriage thing. When I ask myself whether I recommend it, I have to ask, Do I recommend marriage for my own kids? Is it in fact good for your health? Studies seem to point to Yes.

I love this, in a lame article in yesterday's L.A. Times: "Men who showed less antisocial behavior at ages 17 and 20 were more likely to have been married by the age of 29, showing some self-selection. But once they were married, levels of antisocial behavior went down further." Duh. This seems to substantiate my theory that my sons really won't mature until they have a serious girlfriend. I feel kind of bad about it, but it's like, Hey, Sister, I've done what I can for him. Can you please take over from here? The basic values: we got those laid down. But forgive me for dropping the ball in a few areas. Now it's up to you.

It's harder than you'd think to raise a good man. That's obvious when I see there are so few good ones to recommend to my single friends.

I think, yeah, it would be great if my kids got married. But why? Is it merely to let me off the hook? Is it all leftover BS from my own parents and those traditional expectations? Being born in 1960 means my parents, the greatest influencers of my unconscious, were born in the mid-1930s. Their parents were born between 1900 and 1913. Yet I grew up in the 1960s and 70s. No wonder I am who I am, married with three kids and still asking how did I get here? and is there a better way? I'm a product of the entire 20th Century.

But what about evolution? What do I actually tell my kids about marriage? Of course more than anything I can say is how I am everyday. The choices I make. The way I live.

But here's what I would say, off the cuff, knowing that in fact at least one of my kids may be reading this: Get married only if you feel you must. Because you really want to. Because you feel that you want to be with this person for a long, long time. And you can't imagine living without her/him. Define what marriage means for you. Make your expectations known to each other. Say the hard things now. Express your deepest desires and your deepest fears to each other before you take the plunge. Has your communication been tested?

Obviously, you better really like having sex with him/her. More than like, it better blow your mind. And you better be able to get a good night's sleep with him/her afterwards.

Also, be sure to talk about money. Do you both want the same things, and are you clear about who is going to work to make them happen?

If it doesn't work out, or it doesn't last forever, it's okay. It doesn't mean it was a mistake. It's okay to make mistakes.

I realize I'm assuming my kids will arrive at the same questions as I did. But I could be way off. Maybe they will decide marriage is not for them. Or to make a very different kind of marriage with someone.

Sleeping with someone

Let's talk about sleeping with the same person. Another benefit of marriage -IF you are the kind that likes to sleep with someone. I know there are lots and lots of people who prefer to sleep alone. I understand that.

Sleeping is for me more intimate than sex. To completely lose consciousness for a period of hours requires even more trust than getting naked with someone.

There are far fewer people on this earth whom I can actually sleep with than whom I can fuck.

I am the kind that sleeps in a full embrace all night. Except when I'm having hot flashes or pouting.

Preparing for sleep is like preparing for battle, I remember Rachel saying. To sleep, some of us need gear: the turbo eye mask with a roll bar to shut out all light, the ear plugs, and I hate to say it, the dreaded mouth guard (because you have mild TMJ). With all that going on, it narrows down whom you can sleep with even further. Let's just say it's not sexy. You are even more vulnerable because if you do achieve the holy grail of nonREM delta wave sleep, and say there's an emergency, you need someone you can trust to wake you up - but only if it's truly an emergency! You need to be with someone who knows the difference.

I remember, way back before I needed any gear, having a great time in bed with someone but once they were asleep realizing I cannot sleep with this person. For whatever reason. Maybe they sprawl hoggishly across the bed and have no awareness of you. Maybe their snore is obnoxiously loud. Maybe it's just a feeling that you like everything about them but as soon as they are unconscious you feel severely lonely and you don't want to wake them up. Maybe it's just the way they look. Maybe you realize when they fall asleep that it's someone else next to you, someone you don't really know and maybe don't want to know.

If you have sleep issues to begin with, or you develop insomnia, or you sleep so lightly, like me, that you can hear a fucking pin drop even with your earplugs in, sleep becomes a huge deal. Have you tried to work at a high pressure job without sleep for days? Or do anything for that matter. Or even just really bad sleep? I'm sure you have. It sucks ass. It sucks ass just to be alive if you haven't had good sleep.

In mate-selection, maybe finding someone whom you can actually sleep with is one of the factors that no one really talks about. I mean, if you are going to spend half of your life with someone you damn well better be able to get some sleep.

Bonus story

Imagine being homeless and trying to sleep. Having to deal with people kicking you or trying to rob you or rape you or just making you move somewhere else, like, every night. How do people sleep on the street? I bet you get pretty desperate to get some shut eye. No wonder they are cranky.

I remember a few weeks ago parking down by the Embarcadero to go to the gym. There was a cluster of homeless people camping on a triangle of concrete. As I was getting out of the car a woman sat up. She had been cuddling next to someone, in a sort of double bed with their blankets. She stood up and stretched. She had a pink slip on over a jogging outfit. I kind of dawdled while getting my stuff together so I could watch her routine. She had her shopping cart and she started changing clothes right there. She was a largish black woman. I wanted to give her some privacy, so I moved on.

When I got back all the bed rolls were gone and people were sitting next to their shopping carts, set up for the day. Some had moved on to new places. Others were eating food from their stashes. The woman was still there, in her daytime attire of jeans and a jacket. She was throwing bread crumbs to the pigeons. She looked like she'd had a good night's sleep. Maybe it was because she cuddled all night with the man sitting by her cart. Or that's what I imagined.

Being married to an artist

I was talking last night to one of my best friends who is going through a divorce. She was weepy. Mostly she was sad that her ex was not really doing so great. She is doing much better on her own. I have known her since before they got married over twenty years ago, and I've known her ex for even longer.

We had to laugh about how it takes us so long to make changes. We are the kind that give people multiple chances, and then more chances. We are the kind that want to stay married. We want to make people happy. We love our families almost more than anything in the world.

She, like me, is married to an artist. When you are an artist yourself and you marry another artist, whether you have kids or not but you live in the industrialized world (or maybe even anywhere anytime), you have the problem of Who is going to sacrifice? You start out like the young couple who got married on Saturday and you think, It will all work out. Our love will overcome everything. I will sacrifice whatever it takes to be together.

When you meet your mate, the one who has the exact genetic code in his/her pheromones, the code you unconsciously smell that is similar enough to recognize your future and different enough to diversify your gene pool, your hormones flood your brain and urge you to "Go. Fuck. Make babies." (See The Female Brain for more on that.)

If you, like my friend and me, are an artist yourself and marry one, you have a problem around sacrifice that normal people may not face as much, but maybe everyone faces. When you are a painter or a writer, you may be okay sacrificing for 20 years, but there comes a point when you must bust out. Or, it feels, you will die. The little voice starts screaming, "My turn!"

And if you are the other one in the partnership, the one that was able to continue making art throughout the marriage (in a hetero couple, often the Man), you might get caught off guard when your spouse asserts, "My turn!"

I understand that it could be a shock. It's like, "Hey, we had a deal here. I told you when we met that I was an artist. I never said I'd sacrifice my art for you or our family. I never said I would carry the lion's share of the weight around here. Everything was working so well, why is the deal changing now?"

What's scary to a marriage is when so much time has passed that one partner is no longer capable of sacrificing enough because he/she no longer has "marketable skills" or thinks that is the case.

Let's just say the Woman tries to shed her role as caretaker and bread winner so she can finally write her novel or paint her paintings. She says, "Can you please take the wheel for the next twenty years?" Maybe the Man is making his art. Let's say he even sells a little bit of art and has shows but not enough to pay the mortgage. Let's say he feels he just can't, or doesn't want to take the wheel.

What do you do?

You can sell the house. You can downsize. You can go to therapy.

My Marriage: the beginning

My marriage. For me to examine it is like analyzing my own blood. Or my face. It's such a part of me that I can't see what it really is. Objectively. Or how it really functions. Twenty-six years is a long time. I say twenty-six years but Joe and I got married in May 1988, so only twenty-three and a half, technically. But we've been married for all intents and purposes since I was 25.

I met Joe in September of 1986. I was out with Tony Mendoza, whom I'd "dated" in the past but we were through. Tony dragged me out to an underground nightclub in downtown L.A. called the Dirt Box. I remember driving through empty downtown in Tony's old blue Buick, following some obscure directions across the L.A. river into a covered parking lot, and hearing the bass beat throbbing in the distance. We parked, and followed the sound to a door into an abandoned warehouse. We paid and walked into an enormous scene. There were probably 1,500 people dancing. There was an arialist doing a performance over everyone with no safety net. The music was amazing. Everyone was beautiful. It was the days of MDA. We were not high, but looking back, I'm sure a lot of people were.

We danced. It was steaming hot. We made our way through the crowd to an outdoor section. It was enclosed by chainlink fence, and was only a few feet from railroad tracks. Tony and I lit up a Marlborough and maybe had a can of beer. There were a bunch of guys standing near us, all good looking in very different ways. Ian, Steve, Jamie and Joe. I thought they were probably gay. A lively discussion arose around who was the first cubist painter. It got a little heated between Tony and Joe about Juan Gris versus George Braque. Joe took my hand and pulled me onto the dance floor.

He was shorter than me, and was wearing a wife beater t-shirt and tight black pants. He was in incredibly good shape. He told me he was a surfer. His head was shaved except for a shock of blond hair that was teased almost straight up. He wore clear horn rimmed glasses that were taped together at the bridge.

He whispered in my ear, "I'm tripping on acid." Or did he yell it?

He was a great dancer.

I left with Tony. We made our way across the even more crowded warehouse through wall to wall dancers. Just as we were exiting I felt a hand around my wrist. It was Surfer Joe. He wanted my phone number.

"I'm listed," I yelled.

I gave him my last name.

That was the beginning.

Full Moon Wedding

I went to a wedding yesterday. On my roof. Crazy young people rushing headlong into a commitment to each other based on love.

It was a low-key affair, pot-luck, with dogs and kids and really good music. A touch of Burning Man: silver elves with stars of David on their nipples, red Santa corsets. Both families were there. Though they looked somewhat straight and a bit out of place in our little art community on the second floor, they all seemed tolerant and supportive of their young people doing this traditional thing in a most nontraditional way.

The couple had food and an open house first in our communal living space overlooking Market Street. Then there were some really great toasts. Then we all went up to the roof and under the December moon the couple stated their vows. They were impromptu, unwritten, unrehearsed. Unmediated. Somehow that made the words sound so much more true. There wasn't a dry eye in the circle of 42 people that surrounded them, including mine.

Watching two people take the plunge into the unknown while holding hands was so moving. We all want them to succeed, especially knowing the odds are against them.

Living with someone through all the trials. I just don't know. Can I recommend it?

The good things about marriage:

1) it's easier if you're going to have kids - more helping hands, two forces against the gaping chasm of kid needs
2) someone to take care of you when you're sick
3) someone to share the joys and sorrows with: alleviates loneliness
4) someone to challenge you to look at your shit and help you grow
5) someone to have sex with
6) someone to complain to
7) someone to share the work required to live in our society

The bad things about marriage:

1) it's hard to agree on how to raise kids - harder to make decisions and stick to them
2) someone you have to take care of when he/she is sick
3) your partner may not share your joys and sorrows: can be even more lonely
4) someone who WILL challenge you to look at your shit, whether you like it or not
5) having sex with the same person can get boring
6) it's hard to hear the same complaints for years on end
7) your partner may not want to work as hard as you do, or vice versa

On the whole...it's right for some and definitely not for others. I guess the key is being honest enough with yourself about which kind you are. I guess I'm the marrying kind.

The nuclear family seems outdated, though. It's too isolating. I'm much more interested in circles or networks of friends who share values, living close enough to each other to provide needed support. Especially when there are kids involved. Not like the commune or the old-style kibbutz where the kids were raised by designated kid-specialists. That we know doesn't work. But the whole 'It takes a village' thing may sound corny and over-used but it's so f-ing true. It does take a village.

After the wedding, Zoe came with me to Woolf's, my girly private studio where I go to be alone. I had told her for years that when she turned 25 I'd let her read my journals. She's 25. Last night I let her read the journal from 1986/87, before and after she was born, my impressions of her as a baby, what it was like being a mom for the first time, how we were all so in love. Me, Joe and Zoe. Travelling through Mexico together in our VW Squareback for six months, camping on the beach in unknown surf spots, and eventually moving to San Francisco.

Zoe remembers growing up as part of a large extended family we still call La Familia. She asked me why we eventually went nuclear and "upwardly mobile." I didn't know what to say.

The Lover Who Loved Red

Come. I'm going to tell you the tale of a lover from days of yore.

His name...let's call him Jeff. Let's say I was much, much younger. Maybe not much, much. Let's say I was old enough.

I was out on the town with, let's call her Bernadette. I hadn't realized that I'd been so isolated. Let's say I was a mother.

I wore my long black velvet skirt and a black velevet top. Let's say it was late September, Indian Summer. My hair...was long and curly. With nary a gray tendril.

I was inappropriately crushing on an ex, let's call him Steve, a friend of the family. Sadly (for me), Steve was falling in love with the woman he would eventually marry. Right before my eyes.

How could I fault him?

I was married.

Bernadette was taking me out to get my mind off it. The last time I'd seen Steve was at Bruno's, so of course that's where we went. I was wallowing in nostalgia and self-pity while sipping excellent cocktails.

This was back in the day. When Bruno's first re-opened and was so elegant in a madmen sort way. Like Vegas in the 50s. It was way out on Mission and 20th, though, which was run down and scary. Entering Bruno's was like entering another world, with a giant aquarium and leather booths and jazz. You had to make an effort to get there, so people got dressed up. It was that kind of place. Everybody looked good.

After a drink or two, when I was sure that Steve wasn't going to appear, we went to another bar where Carl was bartending, one of Bernadette's sugar daddy's. It was brand new. It was in a shitty part of town, too, and it was empty. I sat down at a table while Bernadette went up to hustle free drinks. I admired the austerity of the room that was also surprisingly warm. I put my hair up in a twist and leaned back so the wall would keep it off my neck. I was warm and maybe a little bit tired. It felt like the night was going to be a bust.

When I opened my eyes Jeff was setting down a bottle of champagne. He poured us each a glass. We hadn't spoken one word. I understood he was a friend of Carl's.

"Prost!" we said and each took sips and put the glasses down.

He leaned over and kissed me. I was totally caught off guard.

It was good.

I didn't know his name yet.

Then he got up to greet someone who walked in.

He was tall, I noticed, and had broad shoulders. He had a square jaw. He wore some kind of dog tags around his neck, and clogs. And yet he was hot. It intrigued me.

He drove a red 1969 Pontiac GTO.

Faking it till you make it

I faked it yesterday. I made it.

To help, before work I walked up Market Street past scores of junkies and homeless people to the Walgreen's. I thought, a little mascara might help. The familiar Walgreen's layout was soothing and my eye was immediately caught by a rack of bling. "New earrings will really help me fake it," I thought, and found a pair of silver hoops for $5.99. I also thought, "They really know their product placement." In fact, I felt stronger with the earrings, plus my new longer, thicker eyelashes.

The earrings and eyelashes helped me stay focused all day. There were meetings. I contributed. I left my self-doubt here, where I now sit. I asserted and opined. I congratulated. I solved problems and aspired.

I made a personal goal for the day: to laugh. As if she knew, my colleague sent me this link.

The day built to a set of highlights that my morning could never have predicted. Sitting around a vast table in a penthouse conference room. Six of us. We talked about lofty ideas. The democratization of media. Putting new storytelling tools in the hands of millions. We identified ways to work together toward shared goals.

Then we all went to a dive bar and drank, partly in celebration of our meeting, partly to get to know each other. The more we got to know (and drank) the more kindred we felt. I stuck to one Fat Tire, but everyone else had cocktails.

I left early to drive over the mountain to Bolinas for the season kick-off holiday party. My Bo colleagues were so welcoming. Conversations spanned from living in Chiapas to the male brain to the killer instinct.

On the way home I automatically turned right instead of left and drove downtown. As if I were going home. I got choked up seeing my beautiful house on Brighton. I was afraid it would look neglected and sad. But it didn't. It looked cared for and lovely. It's just waiting patiently.

Tripping

I don't know what matters. I don't know if it matters whether I get up or write or pay my bills or pretend I know what I'm doing. I'm tripping. Will my large cup of Earl Grey help? It's kind of asking a lot.

It feels dark. I worry about cancer. I worry I'll be taking care of people the rest of my life. I worry other people will have to take care of me because I didn't plan right.

Maybe two therapists isn't enough. Maybe I need therapy more than once a week. Maybe it's not such a bad thing to "have a nervous breakdown." But then I would have bigger messes to clean up after I got some rest.

Everything feels fucked up.

Yet, I have a holiday party to go to tonight. Which I'm kind of looking forward to. I have some meetings. I have to wash my hair and make a good impression. I think I can do that. I know how. I have to listen. I have to listen for the one thing that I can contribute. It might come at the end of the meeting, or in the middle. But it always comes.

I'm going to take a shower. I'm going to finish my tea. I'm going to fake it til I make it.

The hole

I heard a man crying this morning. I looked out the window and he was shuffling slowly along the alley behind the 9th Circuit Court. The high, helpless sound of someone who lost his mother. "Why?" he moaned, the soul-piercing wail of a wounded animal.. "Mom....I want my Mom..." I heard him shouting to no one. His mom will never hear him. He was old, but not that old. But his mom is long gone.

I held him in my mind. I put my arms around him and let his body shake with grief. I said, "It's okay. Let it out. There's so much there." I stood and watched him until I could hardly hear him. I kept watching. He sat down on the granite steps and kept crying. He pulled a rag out of his pocket and blew his nose. He took a few deep breaths, then got up and kept walking.

I used to try to be the Mother. I used to try to fill that bottomless hole. Now, I just want to hold the space for people to be real.

Sugar said:

16. The obliterated place is equal parts destruction and creation. The obliterated place is pitch black and bright light. It is water and parched earth. It is mud and it is manna. The real work of deep grief is making a home there.
17. You have the power to withstand this sorrow. We all do, though we all claim not to. We say, “I couldn’t go on,” instead of saying we hope we won’t have to. ...You’ve made it so fucking long without your sweet XXX and now you can’t take it anymore. But you can. You must.
24. You go on by doing the best you can, you go on by being generous, you go on by being true, you go on by offering comfort to others who can’t go on, you go on by allowing the unbearable days to pass and allowing the pleasure in other days, you go on by finding a channel for your love and another for your rage.

Escape from Anxiety

Anxiety.  Free floating and debilitating anxiety about everything, but add to it the Holiday Season. A time to blow your budget so badly that you will suffer for months.

Last year instead of buying any presents Heather and I rented a minivan and fled to Mexico - with Joe, Zoe, Ian and Spencer. Remember that crazy storm that lasted two weeks, or maybe four? We escaped. It was one of the best things I've ever done for the holidays. It still broke my budget, which isn't hard, but it wasn't over in the flash/bang of ripping paper off hastily purchased objects. It was a week of sun and family and best friends.

I remember getting up at 4:00am in San Diego and driving through the storm to Tijuana. It was just days before Christmas and there was nobody at the border at that time. I mean we were the only car driving through. We had to wait for the workers to arrive to show them our permits and change money. The storm was raging, and apparently no one else was leaving the U.S. at that moment.

I was driving. People at home were worried we were going to be robbed or kidnapped in Baja. I wasn't worried. But there was the strange feeling as your are driving and no one else is on the road, navigating through TJ which is a very weird place, but maybe more so right then with the water rushing down the steep highway, dodging boulders uncleared by highway workers that understandably took the day off. The massive border fence, the overly cheerful signs to Buy Beachfront Property! Evidence everywhere of a collapsed economy.

You feel like you are driving through an abandoned dream. Unfinished construction projects and gigantic billboards as you approach Rosarito Beach. You start to feel like you are getting somewhere when you pass through Ensenada and there's commerce happening, then the highway turns inland and becomes two lane and gets bad. I mean ridiculously bad. There was a long section that was "under construction" and was just dirt and giant potholes, so you had to drive about 5 miles per hour.

The storm continued all day. We just kept driving and driving, past thousands of roadside shrines marking deaths of loved ones, little tiendas, tire stores and so many abandoned structures. Mostly there was nothing. The lush green landscape gave way to the desert. And there was still almost no one on the road.

In the late afternoon we drove out from under the storm. The pyramid shaped mountains and cacti and finally the gorgeous Sea of Cortez. 1000 miles and two full days of listening to the satellite radio chill station and we finally arrived in Pescadero at Carolen and Windspirit's beautiful place. We pitched our tents on their property just steps from the beach. Christmas eve were were lounging in the 75 degree sun, swimming in the Pacific, eating fresh organic food from Carolen's garden.

That night I wrote haikus for everyone and read them.  Zoe sang a song she wrote on her ukulele called "Family." There were no other presents and it was more than fine.

This year I'm staying in California. I want everyone to feel okay not spending money we don't have on Christmas presents. My kids no longer expect anything for Christmas. They know all I want is to spend time with them. But staying here, two blocks from Union Square and the apparently thriving consumer economy will require incredible discipline not to get sucked in. Hunker down. Cook. Insulate with close friends to weather the irrational spending frenzy. Instead just have a little party at home.

Three drink limit?

How many times will we have to arrive at the same conclusion: three drinks is the limit. No more. Once you go past three drinks during an average length of stay at a party or a bar, you are entering the Zone of No Accountability. Only it's a very temporary Zone. Holiday times: people will die because they enter that Zone.

Drink #3 is the one that launches you into, “We are really having fun now,” and parts of your brain start shutting down. Parts that would normally be computing answers to “How am I gonna feel when I wake up?” or “How am I getting home?” or “Where is my credit card?” or “Am I okay to drive?” or “Am I being an asshole?”

Drinks #4 #5 and #6 –even if you’re drinking water in between – almost guarantee you are going to be an asshole to someone. Really, you are being an asshole to yourself. You may not even realize it until the next day or ever. You just feel like shit when you wake up and have a bad feeling not only in your head and stomach but the vague and unsettling feeling that you may have offended someone or done something else you regret.

You know what I’m talking about.

Last night The National at Bill Graham Auditorium: so fantastic. I’m a huge fan and it was the first time seeing them. They played most of the songs from High Violet which was my intro to them in 2010 and which dominated my playlist for several months. I like moody and layered and poetic and complicated.

Adam Kennedy in NME: “…their lyrics once enveloped twisted relationships and, prior to quitting their day jobs, office-toil hell, now moments like ‘Afraid Of Everyone’ allude to parenthood’s perils. No cheery paean to reproduction, Berninger hoists his “kid on my shoulders” before the stark, spine-chilling realisation that “I don’t have the drugs to sort it out”, ending utterly broken and vulnerable. Just when you fear the mood is unrelentingly bleak, however, single ‘Bloodbuzz Ohio’ arrives, overflowing with bombastic charisma and a longing for the open road.”

In between the sets I checked my phone and discovered that my 23-year-old son was in a car accident. The friend driving the car was “slightly buzzed” and went into a curve too fast and slammed into a tree. Miraculously neither was badly hurt, in spite of no seatbelts. The airbags may have resulted in some broken ribs and a bloody nose, but saved their lives. It sobered me right up. After The National my friend and I went to Zuni for a tea and juice. 

I was ready to crash out, but Joe, Jim and Anne picked me up to go to the Boom Boom Room to see the Funk Revival Orchestra. I didn’t need another drink, but had one.  Why? It was my third over the course of five hours if beers only count for half.

Joe was on fire on the dance floor and I rose to the occasion. We love to dance and can get pretty crazy together. Jim and Anne were right there with us. At our age we don't give a fuck about making a spectacle. Or was it that last Black Russian?

Nothing very bad happened to us last night. No car crashes or behavior so regrettable that apologies are necessary today. We lost a credit card and Joe’s hung over. Maybe someone was “accidentally groped on the dance floor,” but other than that, no one was really hurt.

But next week Ye Olde Holiday Party season is starting.  Four weeks chock full of opportunities to be assholes. Or to lose more than a credit card.

Any tips worth sharing about how to stay out of the Zone and get home safely?

How do you whore?

I whore all day long some days. Yesterday was one of them. By that I mean I am selling my wares in a way that feels repetitive and soul-less. I am not writing my novel all day. Or blogging. Or doing what I might really want to be doing. I pimp, too, by making others do what I need them to do, even when they don't really want to. Usually it's fine.

But some days are harder than others. Yesterday I had to say a couple of times, "Yes, xxx, you are absolutely right. This is about my pimping you and in turn your pimping yy. But it's what we have to do. We need XXX."

Don't get me wrong: I love what I do. I say Yes to people and tell them what they need to hear. I help them tell other people what they need to hear. It's very gratifying to see people get what they want.

How do you whore?

I help my kids pay rent sometimes. I help my brother navigate the criminal justice system. (I fail sometimes.) I clean my parents' house. But that's not whoring. It's being codependent. Days when I'm feeling like a whore, I might be more prone to codependency. Maybe it's like, "I'm already compromised. I might as well spread the wealth and excessively caretake everyone I know."

Speaking of codependency,  Erin Markey is fucking hilarious. She made me feel better. She's here from NY to perform for only two weekends as part of the Film Society's KinoTek series. I laughed so hard I'm sore. In the performance she has a skype conversation between a mother and a daughter, playing both of them. It's utterly fascinating. Of course I identified with both characters. She's a very talented singer with an insane sense of humor. The Sondheimish songs with choruses like "Make Me Full Screen" are maybe hit and miss, but she succeeds at striking a tone that is simultaneously loving and bitterly sardonic. In the banter she ventures into some of the most mundane family turf, murky as ever and so, so familiar. She pivots between characters so artfully it's astonishing. Did I mention she's gorgeous? There's something about her, it's not self-mocking but self-aware, that makes makes me double up. You've GOT to read the great article by Michelle Tea. She says it much better than I could. Watch some of the videos. If you are in the Bay Area, GO SEE ERIN MARKEY.

6th Street on December 1st

Hollow cheeks and tears and toothless smiles on 6th Street. It was strangely balmy tonight with an unseasonable east wind. A jacket and no scarf necessary. I almost bought a Christmas tree on Bryant on my way home from work. But felt too unstable with hunger.

Bruce came over. He was in a mood. Bummed that he has to fly to Barcelona in the morning to give a talk about brains, then back to SF by Monday. "Poor you," I said and handed him a drink. Vodka and ginger tea, of course.

Then down Market to 6th and into Pearl's. We sat at the chrome tables and ate our deluxe burgers and sweet potato/garlic fries. For a few minutes life was very, very good.

Eleanor is selling art in Miami. She's sold at least two pieces already, enough to make the trip worthwhile.

Bruce picked up his James Chronister painting of Jimi Hendrix and Brian Jones today. We argued about the use of iconic images in paintings. Joe thinks they make the work too accessible. Figures. I love that work. It could be that Joe doesn't really like rock. We all love James' paintings and agreed that the 40" x 40" winter scenes are his most spectacular. You have to see them in person. I also really like James' statement.

"My guess is that the rock paintings sell really well, right?" Joe said.

"Yeah. I mean, I bought one," Bruce said.

"Come on, Joe," I said. "Can't you whore yourself just a little and give people what they want? I'll be your pimp."

"No! Painting is a sacred act."

"Bruce," I said, "You have to do a little whoring, don't you?"

"Hell yes. What do you think I'm doing tomorrow?"

"We all have to whore a little bit, Joe," I said.

"I am thinking of doing more small paintings on canvas. People love goddam canvas."

Thank god, I thought. Jeez. Come on. Take one for the team. The economy sucks.

After Pearl's we went the Show Down and sat in the booth in the bay window. Every few minutes there would be a scene worth looking at on 6th Street. A super drunk white woman distinctly not from the neighborhood left the bar to smoke at the curb with her boyfriend. She started flirting with a local black dude who was maybe not homeless but clearly a street hustler. She got closer and closer to him, slapping his ass, almost nuzzling up to him. It was such a funny sight, watching the sparks fly between those two while the white boyfriend got more and more freaked out. His head tilted back, smoking, trying to look cool. Then they all walked into the liquor store together. I love the mixing-it-up that happens on 6th.

We talked about a friend turning 50. (No bigs.) How M. is in jail for shoplifting...how he may have been smarter than all of us, but will probably be deported to Iran for his pathalogical behavior. "Maybe he'll have a successful career as a criminal there," Joe mused. We talked about a dear friend who's a junky living in a half-way house. How another friend's kid is now a "high end escort." That was sobering.

We all had a hard day, me Joe and Bruce. A day where we felt beaten down by our respective jobs and all the rest of it. It doesn't matter if you are a doctor giving talks or a painter or a hustler on 6th Street: Life is fucking hard. Of course it matters what you do. But it's hard for everyone.

On the way back we stopped in to see what was happening at the Luggage Store. They were setting up for some experimental music performance. The three of us walked back up Market Street arm in arm toward 7th. No man's land. The neon lights, the cheesy hotels, the brightly lit shoe stores and snowflake street decorations. The clear sky and weird, almost warm wind.

I love San Francisco.

I have a warm bed waiting for me. It's hard knowing not everyone does.
     

White gauze curtain

Okay, just to finish the thread about fiction vs memoir. It's pretty clear that most of you want me to write a novel. "More artistic license," my friend Steve whispered into my ear at Tosca last night. I agree. I don't think I could bear to declare "this is real" in a longform narrative. In other words, not to have the gauzy curtain of fiction to protect me. My skin is not so thick. It's enough to do that here in the blogosphere where there are no editors or economics to smack me down. I've already told you how hard this is for me.

So I choose the abyss of nothingness. It's cleaner. It's like...starting in a clean little room instead of eyeballs deep in landfill. Even though your little room that is all white and clutter-free is  in the middle of the landfill. When you open the door the wall of crap starts oozing in. It's easier to keep the door closed while I write than to feel myself getting sucked into the turgid quicksand of "reality." The tidal wave of shit in your brain.

Since I went to the dump a couple of times on Saturday to joyfully heave truckloads of my parents' crap into its welcoming slope...to watch the broken toys and files from 2001 get immediately turned under by the tractor and thus becoming one with the earth...I feel...better. Like I'm a better person. And even more sure that I need a clutter- free room in which to distill my narrative into something beautiful. For me and hopefully for you. So it's decided: I will stick to the novel.

It's weird bumping into you who are reading this blog. "In person." It's like we've been in close touch, only it's one way. Once you say, "I've been reading your blog," there is a moment of recognition when we look into each others' eyes. I run through a list of "oh shits" then "oh wells." We can start our conversation in a different place. It's like we stood together on the tailgate of the truck and watched the tractor shovel all of my shit into the landfill of our collective consciousness. We can thus dispense with my story in short order and focus on yours. There is an efficiency I quite like.

I'm feeling a sense of gratitude. For you. I am writing to you now. I can just do that. I can just tell you that I know you are there. You can hide and lurk and be anonymous, and that's okay. I still feel you behind the white gauze curtain, the one that still protects me even here, in this "reality" which is messy and unruly. You are bold enough to touch me through the sheer fabric. I still love you. I feel your heartbeat. Come closer. Don't be afraid. My skin is thin but not that thin.

Which abyss?

Only a few people, maybe the writers, are interested in the Fiction vs Memoir question. The rest of you might want to skip this post. Don't worry, I just need to get this out of my system.

Last night I read David Foster Wallace's intro to The Best American Essays 2007 - in which he freely admits he "isn't sure what an essay even is." The first astonishing selection Werner felt very much like a short story. Was it, as he suggests, "narrative essay?" Whoa.

Anyway, he says:

"Writing-wise, fiction is scarier, but nonfiction is harder--because nonfiction's based in reality, and today's felt reality is overwhelmingly, circuit-blowingly huge and complex. Whereas fiction comes out of nothing. Actually, so wait: the truth is that both genres are scary; both feel like they're executed on tightropes, over the abysses--it's the abysses that are different. Fiction's abyss is silence, nada. Whereas nonfiction's abyss is Total Noise, the seething static of every particular thing and experience, and one's total freedom of infinite choice about what to choose to attend to and represent and connect, and how, and why, etc.

"...With a few big exceptions, I don't much care for abreactive or confessional memoirs. I'm not sure how to explain this. There is probably a sound, serious argument to be made about the popularity of confessional memoirs as a symptom of something especially sick and narcissistic/voyeuristic about U.S. culture right now. About certain deep connections between narcissism and voyeurism in the mediated psyche. But this isn't it. I think the real reason is that I just don't trust them. Memoirs/confessions I mean. Not so much their factual truth as their agenda. The sense I get from a lot of contemporary memoirs is that they have an unconscious and unacknowledged project, which is to make the memoirist seem as endlessly fascinating and important to the reader as they are to themselves. I find most of them sad in a way that I don't think their authors intend. There are, to be sure, some memoirish-type pieces in this year's BAE--although these tend either to be about hair-raisingly unusual circumstances or else to use the confessional stuff as part of a larger and (to me) much richer scheme or story."

Okay, so it kind of sounds like DFW votes for fiction, or nonabreactive nonfiction. The abyss...there is always the abyss, whether it's Nothing or Total Noise. I guess I am using the blog to grapple with the Noise, to quiet some of it. I hope it doesn't feel like my agenda is to make myself endlessly fascinating. But I don't really think that's it for me. I have enough places where I confess. It's really about telling a story and not being afraid of you, the reader. Is that abreactive? Don't know. Maybe.

The abyss of nothingness where fiction hovers...It is a scary place, and one to which I am irrationally drawn. And maybe there is abreaction in fiction, too.

DFW hung himself three years ago. Maybe he could have used a little more abreaction.

Abreaction

This is for the rest of you.

I like to drink ginger tea with vodka. On a Monday night.

I am married and have an imaginary lover whom I may not be seeing but whom I still love.

I have two therapists.

I need two therapists and two men. At least.

I have a big appetite.

I like to fuck.

I am older than most of my friends. Except the ones that are much older than me.

I am my Mother's mother.

My children are smarter than me.

I am "exceptionally orgasmic."

I am not afraid of you.

I don't want to take care of you.

I am not responsible for you.

Fiction vs Memoir

I have a novel that is well underway. Maybe you do, too. I have worked hard at fictionalizing my characters. But a bunch of you, my friends, are telling me to consider writing a memoir instead. Or maybe in addition.

Memoir scares the fuck out of me. I feel like writing a memoir is more egotistical than writing fiction. Why? In both instances, the writer is saying, "I've written something of universal value, something that will entertain you, and give you insight, and remind you of yourself - either by how different the characters are from you or how similar. And I want you to spend some time reading it." This is true of both fiction and nonfiction, right?

Why do I feel okay about blogging but not about memoir? Isn't blogging a form of memoir? It is, in this Wikipedia sense: In ancient Greece and Rome, memoirs were like "memos," pieces of unfinished and unpublished writing which a writer might use as a memory aid to make a more finished document later on.

In fiction, I create a couple of layers of protection against the accusing eye of imaginary readers. But I'm writing about my experience. Duh. When I fictionalize, I change names and locations and sometimes merge two or three people into one. I do that enough to say that I do it, so that imaginary readers will not be able to point fingers at me and say, "You are wrong about her/me!" If it's fiction, all you have to say is, "Yes, but it's fiction. I am allowed to be wrong."

And that imagined response has given me comfort and freedom. Would I be able to own that stance in writing a memoir? Could I say, "Yes, I may be wrong. But it is how I experienced you, or that event." I just don't know.

Writing fiction is harder than writing a blog. For me. To achieve an authentic voice in an imagined parallel universe is hard.

I guess I want to ask You: Should I finish my novel as a piece of third person fiction about love, marriage, and being a woman in the 21st century? Or should I write a memoir? The subject would be the same. Or should I write a novel in first person that blurs the line even further?

I can't promise that I'll take your advice, but I want to know: Which would you rather read, a novel or a memoir?

"This is water" by David Foster Wallace

For some reason I read this commencement speech from 2005 TODAY, which expresses exactly what I was trying to get at in Benign reality this morning. DFW said:

"It will actually be within your power to experience a hot, slow, consumer-hell-type situation as not only meaningful, but sacred, on fire with the same force that lit the stars--compassion, love, the subsurface unity of all things.

"Not that that mystical stuff's necessarily true: The only thing that's capital-T True is that you get to decide how you're going to try to see it.

"This, I submit, is the freedom of real education, of learning how to be well-adjusted: You get to consciously decide what has meaning and what doesn't."

This is what Zoe showed me yesterday.

Benign reality

After I wrote Things that freak me out, I remembered that Zoe wanted to take a walk before we loaded the truck for the dump run. We decided to take baby V, my feisty, curious and adorable little niece. Zoe had made a point to connect with V, had figured out how to give her a respectful sense of freedom and yet set boundaries.

The three of us walked together down the long gravel road on my parents' 18 acre property in San Miguel. Casey the dog ran ahead. The house my parents built about eight years ago sits on top of a  hill surrounded by oak trees and small vineyards, including 27 rows of Petite Sirah and Muscat Canelli on their northwest slope.

The sun was out but the morning fog was still hovering, making it bright but with visibility so low that all we could see was the road just ahead and behind. V would veer off and run into the plowed fields and look over her shoulder at Zoe with her mischievous little face. Zoe would run and catch up to her, gently pick her up and turn her around. "We are going this way, V," and take her little hand and walk her back to the road.

"It's really beautiful here," Zoe said.

I told her I was freaked out. She said she was having a hard time figuring out how to connect with my parents on this visit. I told her Me, too.

"Maybe it's the circumstances, Mom," she said. Afterall, we were there to prepare for a CPS inspection, which meant scrutinizing my parents' house and all its contents through a harsh lens in search of poisons and unlocked firearms and other hazards.

"Yes, no doubt," I said, but added that all the accumulated crap was really getting me down. The way my parents hold onto things.

Zoe said, "Ultimately it's all about nostalgia." I added that a dimension of nostalgia was letting go of potentials. Keeping things means the potential of using them in the future. Letting go means those things will never be used. They have no future. You hold onto the things you hope you will need. Maybe it was about the fear of death.

We remembered how my grandparents lived through the depression, and though my parents climbed up into comfort, like their parents they continue to hold tightly onto things just in case. It's something inside me, too: a fear of scarcity.

I told Zoe I was really sad.

"It seems normal to be sad and disappointed by your parents and their choices, Mom," she said. Baby V ran ahead, chasing the dog down the hill. Zoe lovingly ran after them, not yelling at them to come back, just letting them run. It was safe. It was the middle of fucking nowhere.

Alone in the bright fog I started bawling. When we caught up to each other again, Zoe said gently, "You can keep crying, Mom. It's the human condition. It's good to cry...But then, when you are done, you can come up for air and see the benign reality. I mean, look around." The sun was burning through the fog revealing the rows and rows of orange, yellow and red grape leaves close by and on the rolling hills as far as you could see.

"Many more human beings are leading much harder lives right now, and in the past and always will be. When you are ready,  you can put on another lens and see the beauty." We started walking back up the hill towards the house surrounded by the young willow and sycamore trees my Mom planted.

"To be honest," Zoe said, "I've had more than one session in which I've cried deeply about the sacrifices you have made, the life of the artist you didn't get to lead because of them. Then I feel better, and can see that this is your life."

I was speechless. Just the sound of our feet on the crushed granite. Baby V and the dog ran ahead. Zoe put her arm around me and we walked back. I was able to see the benign reality.

Things that freak me out

Cluttery crap

The food in my parents’ refrigerator

Mice

Weird undefinable smells

Polyester blankets

Murky ethics displayed by your parents that hint at something corrupt inside you.

I unfriended my Mom before sending this, and went through and unfriended a few other family members, exercising my facebook-given right to do so, and an inconsistent “single generation” facebook policy that my daughter ruthlessly initiated. She will not friend me. My son unfriended me when he took one look at this blog. In fact he unfriended himself from my account while sitting at my computer when I noted to him that my blog link would have probably popped up on his wall.

At first he said, “That’s not a good enough reason for me to unfriend you, Mom,” in a moment of magnanimous facebook-generosity. We looked at each other and thought the same thing, “But…I think…it’s probably better if I unfriend you…” I agreed.

Easier for me to unfriend my own Mom today. When in doubt, unfriend.

I unfriended my Mom because I am at my parents’ house right now. I’m writing from the kitchen table where I wearily played a fierce game of Sudoku from 2:30 to 4:30am because I couldn’t sleep. I won. But it didn’t help me sleep.

The murky ethics thing. The mice. Murky ethics like mice running around in your tired brain. Quiet! you silently shout while tossing around on the couch under polyester blankets that were once electric, so probably belonged to your grandmother who died in 1982.

You put in your earplugs. But you know the mice are there. Running around even more boldly because you can’t hear them anymore. The things that have hobbled your parents’ are too close to the surface for you to sleep. Their foibles, their misguided form of anti-authority that erupts when they feel backed into a corner. It’s heartbreaking to hear your father talk about moving from one real estate office to another because of a "misunderstanding." He admitted he was crushed – “But I walked into the xx office one minute later and they accepted me with open arms.” How do you get fired when you are working on commission? By pissing people off.

Jeez. I hope I figure some things out by the time I’m 76. Later he told me some stories about how two different people had screwed him over in the 70s. These are part of a long anthology of his called, "The Many Who Screwed Me Over." 

I remember when he left Petersen Publishing and we went from a middle class family in West L.A. to dirt poor, living in my grandmother’s two one room houses – the “middle house” and the “North house” out in Canoga Park. All eight of us. My Mom and Dad gave the oldest three kids the North house because it was bigger, the size of a double garage. In the middle house, two of my brothers slept on bunk beds in the bathroom/laundry room, and my parents slept on the fold out couch bed with my baby brother.

It was while living there that the whole terrible scene happened. It was while living there that my dad got colon cancer. For me it was less than a year: I got out at age 17 and headed North to Berkeley and never went back.

The old refrigerator that didn’t keep things cold. The ancient sink. The over-taxed septic system.

Those houses are gone now. Tract houses replaced them after my grandmother died.

I’m freaked out. My dad is cooking eggs that I don’t want to eat. We are on a mission today to child-proof this house for the inspection by Child Protective Services on Tuesday. There is so much crap that all I want to do is load up their truck and take it to the dump. My parents are hoarders. Though they grew up in the forties, they became like their own depression-era parents. The only reason you can walk around in this house is that it’s big enough for a whole lot of crap. They have a three-car garage full of crap. And now all my brother's and his wife’s crap is comingling with my parents’ crap. It’s overwhelming.

Every few years there is some crisis that requires some of us kids to come here and purge their crap. Like they are so broke we insist they have a garage sale to get rid of some of this crap. Or we have to make room for someone to move into a room that is full of crap.

I’m so freaked out I can hardly function. On the surface I seem fine. Zoe is playing with my adorable niece, and the sounds of those lovely voices make me feel calmer. I’m going to go get the truck now and start loading it up with as much crap as I can wrest from their watchful eyes and hoarding arms. It will feel so good to toss away all the pvc pipe and old broken tiles and Cool Whip containers and sea shells and broken gadgets and artificial flower arrangements.

Then I will drive home with Zoe. I will ask her to help me “discharge” all of my angst. Maybe we will have a co-counseling session to help me do this. When I listen to my daughter talking with my niece I think thank god for evolution (!).

Therapy

I was having a difficult conversation with a friend about another friend who thinks I betrayed her. I place such a high value on my female friendships, almost higher than my marriage, so this misunderstanding about a work matter that's intruding on our friendship is extremely disturbing to me.

I was pacing the long hallway here at the Hotel Hibernia aka The Sweatshop aka the Art Asylum. Without thinking much and without even getting off the phone I walked into the open door of a cute couple who waived me in. They were sitting on their plush burgundy carpet in front of an alter and had a bong loaded up. While listening to my friend I took one deep drag. It was Friday-like. I wanted to change my reality.

I kept listening to my friend explain why my other friend is so hurt by my actions. I understood better as the high grade Santa Cruz Kush with a bit of kief sprinkled lovingly on top seeped into my brain.

But then remembered I had to make a deposit at the f-ing bank. So I kept listening and talking as I walked down Market Street. My friend laughed at me when I told her what I was doing. I was having trouble with the ATM machine but still rapt in conversation about feelings and the politics of the workplace. It was dark by now, and I hoped that the neon sign over my head flashing "not paying attention" did not register with anyone lurking and looking for an easy target.

I concluded that I need to apologize to my other friend, and do whatever it takes to make her feel better. It doesn't matter who is right.

When I got home with cash in my pocket Joe arrived. I like to tell him right away that I'm stoned, so that he doesn't make fun of me or get mad when he notices. "Just letting you know," I like to say. I only allow myself to get stoned on weekends and special occasions. It's cheap therapy.

Joe said immediately, "What about therapy?"

Ooops. That's a rule. Never get stoned before therapy or important talks. Or of course work or anything work-ish like paying bills. Shit.

"Don't be mad at me baby, please?" He was mad for a few seconds, then decided not to be.

So when we arrived at our therapist's offie I told her immediately, "I'm stoned." She said without missing a beat, "Welcome to the club." We spent the first few minutes while I made out her check talking about joining a pot club, how she loves learning about and tasting all the different strains. I should have known that she would not be mad.

I love our therapist. She's so genius. It was the best session we've ever had. She got to watch Joe and me in action in a way that has never happened before and she kept bringing it back and asking hard questions while mingling it with anecdotes. She gets Joe in a way that no one else ever has, and it helps me see him differently.

She gets me, too, in a freakishly accurate way that startles me.

First we talked about how great it is that I finally have my own studio. How it allows me to see Joe in a new way, as an individual. We talked about Mating in Captivity, the Esther Perel book that inspired the title of my novel and this blog. Joe expressed his skepticism about Perel's "over-use of anecdotes" about couples that does not, in his view, represent "researched-based science." Our therapist argued that her own books about couples were not at all scientific, and that there are just too many variables in human behavior. We talked about the work of Virginia Satir the "Mother of Family Therapy."

I expressed my fear that we will fall back into bad patterns. "What are the triggers?" I asked out loud. "Oh yeah...Money."

Then we broached that painful subject. She identified with Joe's commitment to keeping a wide open schedule so he can do his art. And the hardship that results from it. And commended us for declaring financial independence from one another. Somehow she validated me in the discussion while also validating Joe. She watched as I theorized that I use our money problems to distance myself from Joe, as a device for creating that necessary space between us. She brought it back to reality: my anxiety about money is real and anyone would be deeply anxious in my situation. And suggested ways that we can talk about our own anxieties without blaming the other or taking blame.

We talked about why blogging is good for me after she made seemless reference to things I'd written about in Acting My Age and Money, Love and Art. "Having children forces you into routines and predictability, and now you are entering a phase where that isn't as necessary. You finally have more expansiveness, and you are chaffing at Joe's desire for you to remain predictable." "Gosh, Dxxx," I said, "I really feel like I'm getting my money's worth when you spend time off the clock on my backstory." Again, she didn't miss a beat.

She gave us some clear steps for "no-lose" conflict resolution. It's all about deciding to make appointments for the hardest talks. About being able to say, "I'm not ready for this conversation," but making a commitment to having it at a specific time in the future. About giving yourself time to prepare and really figure out how to say the hard things. Then saying them when you are ready.

Somehow all of this and much more in a short 50 minutes.

Now I realize that is what I need to do with my friend who is mad at me. She has not been ready to have the hard talk, and is figuring out what she wants to say. And so am I.

My Neighbors

Last night on 6th Street a woman came toward me in a wheel chair and said, "Hey mama, you got some change?" She was African American, maybe in her forties, missing a front tooth or two. Her leg was bandaged. I was reaching into my pocket to see what I had and she said, "Got shot four times. Here, let me show you," and started pulling up her shirt. "It's okay," I said and handed her a dollar. But I saw her stomach wound all bandaged up.

Shit. Getting shot and killed is one thing. It's over then. No more trying to scratch out a living on the street. But to get wounded and live on the street? I never thought of that. That seems way worse.

The woman looked up at me as I handed her the dollar like I was some kind of hero. I smiled and kept walking. "Mama, come back! I need to talk to you!" she said as I kept walking away. "There's something else I gotta show you!" I looked over my shoulder. She was straining in her wheel chair to see me. "I gotta go," I said and kept walking.

We walked past junkies with sad sunken faces. Those are mostly white people. Sometimes they look like "regular" people from behind, then as you walk past you see their shriveled faces. Aged and collapsed around a mouth that has few teeth or none.

A man walking across the street reached down and picked up a lit cigarette butt and smoked the last of it. We turned the corner and there were the usual suspects that live or just lurk on our street. OG Will was tucked into the doorway of the Marinello Beauty School. Every time we see him he says, "Another day in paradise."

I'm used to it. I'm used to seeing people pissing against a wall in broad daylight. I don't often see people shitting but there is evidence every day that some people have no other place to go. We joke about it, but I imagine there is a line people cross the first time they have to take a dump and there is no place to go except right on the sidewalk or between two cars. None of them were raised to do that. Even if they were dirt poor. But a lot more people than you'd think have crossed that line, at least in my neighborhood.

People crouch in the doorway together, one lighting a pipe for the other to suck hard before whatever they are smoking is gone and they have to go looking for more. Something to give their lives a fleeting moment of joy or at least relief. I understand that.

People buy and sell sex for the same reason. I've seen someone giving another person head between two parked cars on my street.

People often talk to themselves on my street. Or yell at unseen other people, maybe their mother or someone who left them behind or ripped them off or who didn't love them enough. Sometimes people scream and cry for hours while they pick through a trash can looking for something lost that can never be found.

I really try to see these people. I try to make eye contact. I know it's not "recommended." But it's my instinct to acknowledge them. To recognize their humanity even for one moment. I feel safer when we can see each other.

I'm not sure what more I want to tell you. It's almost Thanksgiving and cold outside. I wish there were more I could do to help my neighbors. I'm going to think of something.