Lonely

            Today I went to the hospital because when I relax my shoulders and lift my chin, you can see a lump on my throat. (Of all the lumps that I have felt there, only this one, the one that doesn't actually hurt, gets attention. You understand, I’m sure.) After paperwork and monetary stress, my wrist was taped into a plastic manacle of information and I was pointed into a room full of chairs and bad television. I had barely settled when someone called, not my name, but a name that is close enough to mine to be entered by an absent-minded professional as my name, and I followed a nurse down a hall and into a room full of equipment.

            She was so kind. I don’t remember her name because I wanted to look at her face, not her name-tag, and it was unusual enough to be immune to sideways glances. She told me everything she was going to do, sometimes more than once. She kept asking me how I was doing. She called me “sweetheart.” She looked at me like her job was to take care of me and only me.

            I don’t know why I had such a strong reaction to her. I wasn’t nervous or worried in the slightest about my health (I think the lump is just a cyst) or the procedure (it was just some pictures) but I felt taken care of and listened-to for the first time in what has felt like years. I even admitted, in conversational tones, as if she cared, that the only thing that I had been worried about was being made to undress. I laughed about how my hands had been trembling from fasting and gratefully accepted apple-juice from her.

            I know this doesn't sound even the slightest bit unusual, but it is for me. We were through in less than twenty minutes, and I didn't want to leave. I shook her hand when I thanked her and I didn't want to let go.

            Now I am at home, paralyzed by things no one wants to hear, trapped between choices no one wants to validate, writing paragraphs straight from a teen-ages girl’s emo diary. Good Lord.

Back

       I've been back in PA for a few weeks now, untangling knots. I tried to write about it before, but I thought that maybe my vehemence was blinding, so I waited. Now I've come back to what I started and finished it.

       I am sitting on a mattress that hurts, in a room that is no longer mine, in a house full of junk, in a place where there is nothing to see or do, and I am angry. I keep telling myself that the world doesn't owe me an instruction manual. I remind myself that no one lied to me on purpose. I point out that I can at least take comfort in that fact that I was right about so many things. None of it helps.

       I can't even have a nice, satisfying rage, because there is no one to be angry at. I can only sit here, stewing in my frustration, trying desperately to have civil conversations about what I am going to do next with people who really love me and deserve none of my muted prickle.

       I'm not disappointed, because disappointment implies that at one time you fully expected something good, and that expectation was somehow dashed. I, on the other hand, have simply returned to a state of desperate longing that was, for a few brief months, lifted hopefully. I am not disappointed. I am back.

Secondhand

       Instead of any sort of personal update, I'm just going to tell you a funny story: Once upon a time (several weeks ago), in a faraway land (the apartment next door, with which I share a boarded-up doorway) there was a party.

       Now, when I say party I mean music and a few people who sounded like they were enjoying themselves, and my laid-back self was not particularly bothered. I might have tossed a little bit longer than usual in my bed against our shared wall, but I have ninja sleeping skills and was soon unconscious.

       The fire alarm went off.

       I found myself upright and awake, in that order, with images of myself outside in midnight Maine winter skating through my suddenly despairing mind. Then I stopped, and I listened.

       "BEEEEEEEP!"

       "I just blacked out!"

       "Shut it off!"

       "BEEEEEEEP!"

       "[expletive]"

       "Turn it off!"

       "BEEEEEEEP!"

       "I'm trying!"

       "Oh my God!"

       "[more expletives]"

       "BEEEEEEEP!"

       I considered the atmosphere. Neon city lights streaked through the window and informed me that, yes, my apartment was full of smoke. I sniffed: smoke, but strangely sweet smelling smoke.

       Oh.

       I groaned internally and collapsed, dragging the covers up over my head. Knuckleheads.

I Think About 'Adulthood'

       It looks like a clique, but it's not.

       It looks like a club, a collection of people who know things and do things and are a certain way that others can't put a finger on; but then suddenly you are on the other side of eighteen, or twenty-one, or twenty-five and you don't actually know those things or do those things or feel any different.

       You've graduated without having to pass the class, without realizing it was a class.

       You've felt the mantle drop over your head without ever proving you had the qualifications.

       You've gotten into the room, and realized that you actually just got out of one. This isn't the place where everyone knows and does and is a certain way. That was the place. That was blissful, ignorant childhood; and things that felt important but really weren't; and a few years of parental structure. This is a million choices, a billion outcomes, seven billion distinct universes that may or may not have anything in common. This is where people scramble to make sense of where/who/why they are, and what they are going to do in the decades that stretch before them.

       This is the real world.

       I read "coming of age" stories for fifteen years, and I never fully understood them. They are not about navigating something adult, like death or hardship; they are about seeing the world differently, as something that you are a part of. I guess that once you have experienced death, or love, or some other construct of these, you realize that you have touched the edges of human existence, that no adult has done any more, and that you have to make your own answers. You look up from yourself, and you see the world differently, as if you've passed through some barrier and are looking back. You realize that you are the world.

       Of course, not everyone goes to war or loves an ill-fated pet at just the right age for sudden illumination. Most people just get older, and then find themselves doing adult things, and then realize that if they want adulthood to be any different they are going to have to make it so themselves.

       I'm just going to have to make it so myself.

Yet Another False Start

       First of all, I had a lovely Christmas with my family. I ate almost nothing but candy and cookies and hugged all of my family members randomly and often. After a prolonged struggle, I agreed to take the car back up with me to expand my opportunities, and I gave myself one more month to pull out all the stops, get a job, and not be a failure. I was resolved. I was hopeful. I was...

       I was two hours into my trip back home, driving along through beautiful, drifting snow, when I swerved a bit and gently spun out onto the meridian of the highway.

You Don't Understand About Me and Books: Part II

       Sometimes I swear there are magnets on my soul.

       Sometimes I open the right book - and after a decade or so of practice it is often the right book - and we snap together, the story starts, the pages in my left hand are stacked higher than those in my right, and then it's over, done. I'll surface like someone emerging from a parallel universe and blink at my surroundings thinking, "oh, right. This is Here. Wait. What time is it?"

       Other times, I will open the right book and it is less like being swept along and more like the slow burn of running. It takes time, but the momentum grows and soon the magnets are humming and then lights start flickering and sometimes I'll even have to stop, panting, to chase the burning tales of ideas or concepts or understanding as they spiral outwards, rolling phrases around in my mouth like marbles, listening to the rumble of concepts falling into place.

Singing Though My Face is Numb

Today was fairly overcast,
my pictures not as pretty,
and so instead of posting them
I wrote this little ditty.

I took my bike to the shore this time
(walking takes much longer)
but hills are harder when on wheels
so my legs need to get stronger.

Highlights: shells (the twisty kind),
sea glass, ruby berries,
virgin sand and fuzzy vines,
people in a hurry.

I brought warm gloves but still I froze-
it's so cold over there!
-but so far my trips improve my mood
so much I do not care.

Swimming Blind

       There is an image in my head that I want to draw, but I simply don't have the skill. I see it as an oil painting (I have never used oils) and it focuses on a small girl. Hands are emerging from all around her, clapped against her mouth, pressed against her ears, covering her eyes. It would be a typical "Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil" image, but stifling.

       Now, I would like to stress that I have a high appreciation for the practice of "guarding your senses." What you choose to expose yourself to not only shapes your personality, but affects what I consider the skeletal system of your character: your habits. I could write an entire book on the power of controlling your personal universe, but this image is not about how you manage your world, but how others manage it for you.

Cold Patterns

       I got out of the apartment early, today, in the hopes of catching the rising sun. I was in such a rush to make sure that I actually went and didn't talk myself out of it that I left in a sleeveless shirt and a fleece cape, which is not exactly the right attire for freezing wind, but I pushed through it, just letting myself experience the morning.

       Highlights include watching the sun rise over the cemetery, plenty of canine friends, and magnificent frost patterns. Most of the leaves are down, but those that are left blazed in the early light. I grabbed a twig that I want to make into a dream-catcher necklace.

       I need to trust my camera more. I didn't try to take many pictures of the sea or the sky because I thought they would turn out terribly. Instead, they are nice. I guess I have to go back, don't I?

       On my way back (en-route to a terrible sandwich from Dunkin Donuts - seriously, don't get them) I saw this lovely collection of colors.

       I am definitely going to do this more often. 

Halloween Stories

       I have noticed that there are two kinds of horror: First there is the fun horror, the horror you go to experience at haunted houses, the kind that develops a cult following. It is so much fun because you get the rush of adrenaline from the tension (the same reaction you would feel on a roller-coaster or other simulated danger), and then afterwards all the hilarity of remembering your reactions, mixed with a healthy dose of relief. However, there is another type of horror, what I think of when I hear the term, which leaves you unsettled and uneasy afterwards. It is not about zombies, or sharp objects, or being startled, but about the human soul.

       Horror is an involuntary reaction. It is not controlled by reason, but by the senses. Think about navigating a haunted house: there are sounds (the sounds of distressed human beings works the best), there is visual input (the sets, and also the darkness, which gets your imagination scrambling) and there is tactile input (things hanging from the ceiling that you have to push away, as well as the plain fact that you are physically present.) Your mind might know that there is no danger, but your body is being tricked into tension, a tension that explodes when someone jumps out at you in a plastic mask. Slasher movies use as many of these tricks as they can, as well: other distressed humans, worrisome sounds, visual cues, and sudden scares.

       However, since horror comes from the subconscious, people are horrified by different things. Personally, I find myself laughing at slasher movies simply because my response to fear is to get super analytical: to point out the terrible acting, the cheap special effects, the inaccurate wounds, or even just the fact that it's a movie. Want to set me on edge? Be subtle. Don't show me the monster, or, better yet, show me a monster I can worry about: human beings.

       Well, I am currently trying to scribble a little something of my own for Halloween, but I also have to prepare for Nanowrimo, a job interview, and life in general, so please enjoy a few dark stories, in honor of the season. These are all picture-stories ("comics" doesn't seem like the appropriate term) because, as I mentioned, all the best horror touches as many senses as it can, so visual is better than just words.

       First, I would like to recommend His Face all Red, a dark little story by Emily Carroll. I read this on Halloween in 2010, and the imagery really stuck with me.

        Did you like it? Here is another by Emily Carroll: The Prince and the Sea. It is similar, except it starts out nicer, and ends up worse.

       Okay, well, I understand that things like that aren't necessarily everyone's cup of tea, so here, have some straight Korean horror: 2011 Mystery Short. Unlike the other two, which get under my skin, this one makes my heart jump. Every time. Yes, I know it is in Korean. No, you don't have to be able to read it. Just keep scrolling.

       Mwahahaha!

The Past Two Days

So, Monday, I woke up around noon. Then I grumbled a bit because I had planned to arise considerably earlier than noon. Then I tidied and considered all the things that I did not want to do, chief among them being ‘call about a job.’

I called about the job. I was invited to an impromptu interview. I panicked. I dressed hastily. I utterly failed to convince an old guy that I was not employed by the CIA, and I only sort of failed to catch the bus.

I was bright and experienced and obviously the best choice for a temporary employee, and I was perched on a swivel chair behind the counter as clients continued to stream past, doctors continued to stream around, and receptionists continued to direct the flow. My interviewer turned back to me every now and then when there was a lull in the action, and asked me “so tell me about yourself” and “what plans do you have for the next five years?” I was invited to return for a trial day. I missed the bus home. 

I bought sustenance (chiefly, water) and read “Lepanto” out loud to myself as I waited for the next one. I spoke with a stranger, and we slowly became less strange to each other on the ride home. I unlocked my apartment, set my alarm clock for early and collapsed.

I writhed for a bit, sleepless.

This morning I got out of bed and got ready and felt underdressed and successfully caught the bus in the rain. I filed and fed a shredder. I considered the fact that my adult life seems to consist of the thought “O God, no!” and the feeling that I could do great things, if only I could figure out how.

I sang to myself at the bus stop (The Scarlet Pimpernel, and Les Miserables), and read “Ceasar’s Antlers” on the bus home. There was mail waiting for the previous tenant, who seems to have skipped town and abandoned all his bills, including his student loan repayments.

I ate ramen. I am writing this. I have now decided to stop writing, leaving this poor post with the faint feeling that it has been abandoned, unresolved. 

Lightning

Sometimes I get struck, like as if by a bolt of lighting, by the phenomenal beauty of human life; what we can do, think, know, experience. Real life is so, so much better than any fiction that could ever be imagined, and there is so, so much more to life than sex and entertainment. I just...

Sometimes, I cry because I am not God. Sometimes I am just overwhelmed by the disparity between what there is to know and understand and live, and how much I reasonably expect, in my short little time here, to know and understand and live.

Changes

I started this brand new web log specifically because I have suddenly catapulted myself more than four hundred miles from everyone and everything that I have ever known in quest of a fresh start. I wasn't running away from anything in particular, but I thought that I needed a good kick to get me going towards more than just a mediocre life, so here I am!

It doesn't feel like home, yet, but it will. Also, for the record, I cried the first night, and I never cry. There were extenuating circumstances that I won’t bore you with, but I am also kind of glad that I did. It proves that not only am I capable of normal human emotions (haha!) but that this is a real turning point in my life. I just have to capture that initial energy and harness it to something good!

Introduction

I have tried, fairly unsuccessfully, to keep various parts of my online life separate: an art blog here, an account there, and anonymous online diary elsewhere… but not only is this fractured arrangement hard to manage, it’s kind of boring. The best art blogs involve not only the author’s creations, but her inspirations and life snippets, too; philosophical blogs can be heavy without news and light hearted truth sprinkled in; and no one wants to read pages of a teenager’s diary unless she has a really interesting life. (To be honest, I couldn't stomach “The Princess Diaries” books even though she was suddenly royalty!)

So here you go, world: a blog maintained by me. Sometimes I will wax philosophical, sometimes I will post art, sometimes I will show you things that I like, sometimes I will talk about books, sometimes I will talk about movies, sometimes I will subject you to my fiction writing, sometimes I will subject you to my scientific writing, and sometimes I will just record what is going on in my life.

Still here? Great! Please, please feel free to comment whenever you feel like it because monologues are so frivolous compared to conversations!

Peace,

            Maria

PS. I was going to name the blog “Truth and Beauty,” because that has been my motto ever since I decided to depose “No-one is going to help you so do it yourself.” However, it was a little too pretentious and suggested that everything here would be true and/or beautiful, which is my aim, but not my claim. Anyway, I went with Philosopher (for all my babbling), Creator (for all my art, writing and and crafting), and Pirate (for all my adventures, travels, and unapologetic plundering of other people's ideas.)