opening to an unfinished story

“I do not know how the pieces of my life all fit together,” she told him that night.

Only earlier that day, the morning ferry had rolled into the dock with the fog, heaving a heavy sigh as it’s body was once again tied down tight with heavy ropes to keep it still, let it rest. As the fog horn softly moaned its montonous, regular moan, the cars filed out of the boat, down the ramp, and onto the cobblestone streets. Normally, windows would be rolled down, hands would be reaching straight out as if to grab some salty island air, radios would be crackling summer tunes. But this morning, the first boat was heavy with people with heavy lungs filled with the heavy fog.

Not her though. Her lungs had become immune to the fog. For many summers and the occassional winter, fog had rolled in through her nose and out through her mouth. The fog had no affect on her. The only thing it told her body was that she was in fact on the island and this was the only place in the world she needed to be. No, the only shapeless shifting body that filled her lungs that morning  was the smoke of her cigarette.

Now a cresecent moon was climbing a ladder of stars. The sky was black and bottomless so that if it weren’t for the lights from the houses that dotted the horizon, it would have been near impossible to determine where the sky met the sea. There they sat on the dock that was folded inside one of island’s sandy bends, he sitting cross legged, she swinging her feet over the edge, leaning back on her hands.  An open bottle of wine sat between them next to two half empty glasses. He played with the cork in his fingers, ocassionaly holding it up to his nose to breathe in that beautiful intersection of earth and art. He was wondering what to say next to this girl with lungs full of cigerette smoke when his own were still processing the weight of the fog.

“I do not know how the pieces of my life all fit together.”

Tongues

My mother has been urging (or berating) me recently to try and relate more to my two young teenage sisters. So I went back through some old journals and read some old writing and found this from 2009.




I dream of words.
I had a dream the other night about the word 'delectable.'
It was soft cotton candy pink and was swirly on the ends of the letters.
It danced beside the rumbling ice cream truck, sporting matching soft cotton candy pink stripes.

Then I dreamt of the "Sahara"- the word slithers off my tongue along with a million hissing snakes. I dreamt of walking alongside huge, bumbling camels. Some of them let me ride on top of the huge bumps on their backs, and we'd bumble along. We all wore long purple and royal blue robes with funny flat hats with red tassels.

The camels were thirsty, so we stopped by a little stream. There, I watched them poke their long pink tongues into the cup I held out to them. In/out/in/out/in/out went their tongues. Who knew a tongue could be so strong? I mimicked them, sticking my tongue out as far as it would go and pressed it up against my own little cup. In/out/in/out/in/out/in/out.

In my dreams, my tongue is the strongest in the world.

Have you ever heard of a man named Cicero? He was a very famous orator way back in ancient Rome. We were told to read a packet on him over Thanksgiving, but I barely skimmed over it the period before. All the information bored my until I yawned and listened to the senior girl tell a senior boy in the row in front of me how she ate bagels, played soccer, and got wasted last weekend.

The only thing I remember from the packet is that Cicero was such an amazing orator he literally moved and forced people to do things with his words. Imagine! To have complete supreme power over someone with just your tongue!

Cicero was once presented a case prosecuting Verres (who's layer was the eminent Hortensius). But Cicero's tongue was so strong, his words were so commanding and passionate, Hortensius withdrew from the case and Verres went into voluntary exile. Imagine! Winning a case with just one speech!

Today at the gym, there was a huge man with huge muscles and huge tattoos lifting weights. But this man had a tiny head and wore tiny Converse.

Imagine! Little, weak me being able to knock him over with my words! I would shoot words like bullets at him.

"kumquat"     "estuary"    "seismic"   "Mississippi"   "Venetian"

My tongue is so strong it can conquer anyone.

My Philosophy of Food: Upon the Request of Rachel

My friend asked me in the beginning of the summer to write out my philosophy of food for her. I went into this task thinking it would be relatively easy since I tend to think about food and its surrounding consequences often. But, as most writing prompts seem to go, writing this was much more difficult than I thought it would be. There was just an unending amount of ground to cover and I soon realized that I am split on many issues (eg. GMO’s)  and need time to learn more before I make any sweeping remarks about my beliefs.

So, for the time being, below is what I believe is the ideal way to approach food for those who have ready access to it. By no means am I saying that I follow these things myself, but I do consider this the standard I strive to reach (and will undoubtedly never attain).

• Eat with a simple mindset. Eat what you want, when you want, but in moderation
• Eat until you are just full enough. You should never feel too uncomfortable after eating something. Even if you are hungry an hour later, that’s okay. You can eat again.
• Not only is overeating disrespectful to the people who labored to produce the food, those who barely have enough to eat to live, and your own body, but it is also the selfish act of a glutton- an act every single human is guilty of.
• For many people, stress eating is a common way of overeating. The idea that gorging ourselves helps us relax before a test, get over a breakup, etc. is simply mental. To an extent, it is merely a social construct that we have adopted in modern society. There are healthier ways to relax and to distract your mind.
• Every human has the right to know the truth of what part of the world their food came from, the processes it underwent before landing on the shelves of the grocery store, and the payment/ conditions of the workers who helped to carry out these processes. This information should be readily available to the public.
• Think about the processes and people it took to create the food you are eating. View each piece of food as a piece of artwork with an artist, a medium, a date, and an intention.
• Sit down to eat and eat slowly so you can think about the above things as well as how your food tastes and how it makes you feel at that moment.
• You cannot be “healthy” by just eating “healthy”- you have to exercise your body too. Whatever this form of exercise is is a completely personal decision. It should make you feel good physically and should be able to clear and relax your mind.
• Always, always be open to trying new dishes no matter how strange they may sound. (Especially pizza toppings. My new favorites are egg and shrimp, though not together.)
• Experiment with mixing flavors and textures. You should never be bored with what you are eating. Once the act of eating becomes only a necessity in order to stay alive, something is wrong.

She Blamed It on the Air

The air made her feel restless. Unconsciously, she would take up the edge of whatever loose fabric happened to be in her reach (a blanket, the end of her shirt, a curtain) and she would rub it between her thumb and forefinger, faster and faster. When she caught herself doing this, she knew something was not right. Although she rarely knew what. So she blamed it on the air.

Alice Berkley Chaste had spent July with her grandfather on the island for the past seventeen years.  She always looked forward to coming. Her grandfather’s weathered, low-lying cottage, overtaken by runaway bushes of Black Eyed Susan's and Rosa Rugosas, had, what she eventually decided was, “a quaint kind of charm.” The house had a kitchen, a sitting room, a bathroom, her grandfather’s bedroom, and a guest bedroom with twin-beds. For many years, Alice’s mother and father would come and stay in the guest bedroom with Alice sleeping in a collapsable crib, and when she grew too big, a makeshift bed of pillows and comforters on the floor. One year, Alice grandfather surprised her with an air mattress, although it ultimately went to waste since the following year, Alice’s father demanded a divorce. From then on, Alice spent her July’s with her grandfather alone.

This particular July (her seventeenth), Alice felt particularly restless. One evening, after the dinner dishes had been washed and the leftovers stored in the fridge, Alice grabbed an old knitted blanket out of the trunk in her bedroom. She sat on the wooden rocking chair on the front porch with her feet pulled up, draping the blanket over her knees, and began to rub her fingers along the fringed edges. Despite the air, the sunsets never failed to disappoint Alice. From her vantage point, over the thick brush in the yard and above the gray roofs across the street and up the hill, she watched the sky slowly pull apart the lingering clouds, illuminating their edges with gold. After a while, she heard the muffled boom, and she knew that, somewhere, the sun had sunk under the horizon. When she was a little girl, her grandfather told her the boom was the gun of a soldier on the beach, paying homage to the sun as she underwent her temporary death. But today Alice knew it was nothing more but a boy in kaki shorts at the yacht club downtown setting off a small canyon.

She loved this time of day. This was the time of day where she felt the most free, although, as she would willingly admit, she often failed to embrace it’s potential.

Alice heard the screen door screech open and she turned her head to see her grandfather stepping out onto the porch. She quickly put her feet down and began to stand up to offer him the chair (the porch being so small, the chair was the only real piece of furniture and took up about half of the area) but he just as quickly motioned for her to sit back down, pressing his eyebrows down, never making eye contact. He sat down on the top step of the porch in front of the rocking chair. The soft hum of bicycle tires passed by on the other side of the brush.

As the colors in the sky began to fade into hazy dusk, Alice watched her grandfather.  She often did this, forcing herself to memorize his features.

He was a bit taller than most men and, over the past several years, had grown a bit of belly. His hair, a mixture of white and gray strands, was bushy around his head and fell down to a short beard around his chin. He was wearing his green pants, the ones with a stripe of white paint stained on the left leg, and a navy tee shirt that was frayed along the edges of the sleeves. Whenever he went outside, he would put on his Nantucket red baseball cap. He held it in his hands now.

Alice’s grandmother, although she never met her, used to say his eye’s were the shade of the still water of the harbor and held the power to calm any storm.

Two dragonflies sped  along the front hedges, swerving in and out along the flowers. Alice sunk deeper into the chair, pulling the blanket higher up to her chin.

Something had not felt right inside Alice for a what felt like a very long time. It was as if her perspective had shifted overtime so that everything in her view stood on an angle. Nothing felt normal, whatever normal means. Every night, Alice would go to sleep with a prayer that in the morning she would wake up and feel okay again, but the morning never brought anything new.

Time after time she flipped through her memories, desperately trying to pinpoint what could have possibly triggered this unbalance. She found no clarity. She wanted to give up looking, but she couldn’t. So she blamed it on the air.

Alice loved this island.  She loved how it stood on a history of independence and self sufficiency, and how these morals carried through the centuries. She loved the way the people who lived there year round were devoted to some trade that helped the island function, whether that means upholding the role of the head of the fire department, or running the corner bakery downtown where fisherman and school children alike would buy a doughnut for a dollar just as the sun was rising. She loved its physical beauty, the vast moors that stretched for miles, the patterns of sandbars along the Northern shore that shifted with the tides, the driveways made of white shells, the hydrangeas that flowed over white fences. On nights that follow sunny days, the stars were as distinct as strings of Christmas lights.

Strolling along the docks, watching the sailboats tack back and forth around the bend with the lighthouse, she would think to herself “I am happy.” But the next morning she would wake up and before she even swung her feet onto the floor, she would force herself to admit that this found sense of happiness was only a lie she told herself to try and move a step forward. In admitting to this lie, she knew that she was taking a step back.

Alice’s grandfather was a year rounder, a local (although not a native). After dropping out of college, he joined the crew of a massive sailboat named The Essex owned by a young, wealthy couple. For three years, he tied ropes, hauled sails, and slept in the bottom drawer or a dresser when it rained. He learned how to read a barometer to detect approaching storms, navigate the sea with only a map and a compass, and make even the limpest fish come to life with flavor. Every summer, The Essex would make its way to the docks of Nantucket Island. There she would rest, sails down and stored away, for a week or two. Alice’s grandfather would spend a small sum of money to rent a bicycle and would explore the far reaches of the island, biking through the rocky paths in the moors, around small ponds, along the sand that the ocean waves had flattened hard and smooth. At night, he would drift in and out of the local bars like the way the fog rolls over the gray rooftops most evenings. He fell in love with the island. One summer, he decided to stay and become an apprentice for an old ship builder at the tiny marina on the outskirts of town. Many long winters and blissful summers down the line, he came to inherit the marina and has been the been there ever since.

“You have to learn to love your own company,” he would tell his family and tourists alike who asked him how he ever survived those endless, empty winter months. He never regretted his choice to stay.

Alice and her grandfather both loved the island. The object of their love was the same. Although sea and wind and sand may erode the sensuous curves of her land, the island hardly ever changes. But their love was different. The island was the home of Alice’s grandfather. He felt as if he belonged to her shore and sea just as much as she belonged to him. Alice could not yet fully understand her relationship with the island. She desperately longed to belong, to fall into the hills of her bodice like a warm friend, but she did not feel that comfortable quite yet. They were still learning about each other. It felt awkward, and Alice, loving from afar, disliked it.

Oh how she wished she could come to the island on her own, keeping nothing but a backpack with her necessities (a few dresses, her straw hat, a Bible, some paper and postcards, a ballpoint pen, a leather pouch of cash) and a rusted bike. Like her grandfather did before her, she longed to explore the depths and crevices of the island on her own. To go beyond what meets the eye of the ones who only stay to simply see what they had seen on the posters hung in travel agents’ offices. She fantasized of working on one of the island’s many farms, helping to weed flower beds and sell vegetables off the back of a trucks in town. The land of the island produced vegetables, fruits, and fish- what more could a man need?

One night, Alice dreamt of carrying a canoe from her grandfather’s house over her head. She walked on the side of the deserted roads under a full moon until she reached a familiar opening in the brush. There she turned and crept down through the moors until she came to a cranberry bog, the moon’s reflection cratered with thousands of floating, dark bodies. Carefully, she shifted the canoe off of her head and placed it into the black sea. Climbing in, she began to row through the black water, parting the berries as she went. When she awoke, still trapped in that foggy purgatory between sleep and waking, tears began to drip from her eyes, for her dream had broken apart before she was able to reach the end of the world.

May Thoughts

mulch is the smell of

spring is coming we are all

going to be fine

The Juxtaposition of Pain

April 16, 2013

Yesterday, two bombs exploded at the finish line of the Boston Marathon at around 3:00 in the afternoon. Another went off at the JFK library later, believed to be unaffiliated. Three people were killed. One was an eight year old boy who had gone to cheer his father on.

As I reflect, I realize that until now I have not been able to separate myself from the fact that this is an “act of terror.” This term immediately calls to mind a whole collection of associations with strong connotations- external threat, war, anti-Americam, anti-freedom, anti- captialism, patriotism, courage, hero, red, white, blue.

Not until now have I been able to remove myself from examining these events from the point of an American and, instead, simply take the persepctive a girl who loves to run.

Right now, all I can think about is pain. There is good pain, like the way your legs feel after you have been running for a while. They ache, they feel almost separated from your body, like phantom limbs. But this pain is encouraging. It sustains you. It makes you feel strong.

And then there is bad pain. The kind of pain that makes you stop dead in your tracks, feeling the hot breath of Death upon your lips. The pain of one moment holding something firmly in your hand, and the next, having it plucked from your reach. The pain of suddenly having a time limit. Of having to come to terms with the end. This pain is both physical and mental. An army and navy.

That afternoon in Boston, these two feelings were juxaposed to a fatally close degree. And I cannot even begin to imagine what those runners must have felt.

They were tired, their legs were burning, their hearts were racing, their skin was sweating. But the finish line was in sight. They knew that they only had to push a little further, take a few more strides until they would cross the finish line. And then their pain would cease. The warm glow of accomplishment and celebration would take its place.

But then, the bombs explode. And everything comes crashing down to the pavement.

Those runners who were just a few minutes too slow, who didn’t get to cross the finish line, experienced this increibly baffaling jump from one kind of pain to the next. The first whispered words of encouragment in their ear, the next hissed fire and ice down their throat. The physical pain of exposed blood and severed bone. The mental pain of knowing that they had just taken their last step, and not understanding why.

Now, more than ever, I carry the weight of each stride with thanksgiving.

A First Year's First Winter Quarter in Haiku

this is not real life

their voices somehow become

my own words inside.

this statement changes

to questions that cannot be

answered in a proof,

explained and reasoned

by papers drafted over

and over again.

when do my actions

cease to be prerequisites

for so called real life?

Twenty Dollars

I carelessly lost $20 today, so I decided to turn my self-loathing (and my self-loathing for being self-loathing) into art (or shit).






Lying in the snow, there was a twenty dollar bill. Johanna saw it when she stepped off the bus. The other two passengers just walked down the stairs and turned in their predetermined directions, but Johanna noticed the money, stuck in a pile of dirty snow piled up against the base of a street sign.

The bus sighed and drove away.

Johanna flung the end of her scarf around her shoulder and crouched down to pick up the bill.

The city sidewalk was crowded with pedestrians. She looked up and down the street to see if anyone was searching for the money they had lost. Any second now, she thought, someone was going to come flying around the corner, frantically looking at the ground, a distressed look on their face. But the people just kept on walking by, looking straight ahead, determined to get where they were going.

There was no way to tell if someone had come back earlier to look for the money. There were no tracks to trace. Commuters’ boots, runners’ sneakers, and stroller wheels had worn down the snow on the pavement to a thin layer of gray slush. A map with so many roads, there was no distinction of one from the other. No way to tell where each lead.

Johanna stood where the bus dropped her off, paralyzed in her ambivalence. Should she wait to see if the owner of the money comes back? Should she just leave the money where she found it? Should she take it? (God knows she needed it)

Had Johanna found herself in this exact situation six months earlier, she would have taken the money without a doubt. Her addiction had rearranged her priorities and, with that, the hierarchy of her morals. But now she had been sober for half a year, a huge accomplishment in her eyes.

Still, this huge accomplishment was only made possible because of her many small victories. The first, saying yes to an old friend’s invitation to attend Sunday chapel. The second, returning for the same service the following week. The third, listening. The fourth, responding. The fifth, believing.

Now, three blocks north, the bells in that exact chapel rang out into the winter air, chiming five o’clock.

Johanna suddenly had an idea.

The twenty dollar bill wasn’t hers. Even though it was pretty clear now that the owner of this money wasn’t coming back, the money still belonged to them. So, as Johanna’s train of thought followed, it would make sense to spend the money on something that would be considered a kind of universal good. Something that any rational human being could look at and say, I wouldn’t mind spending money on that.

Just across the street from the chapel was little theater where the neighborhood theater company put on productions. Their new show had just opened last week and already word had spread of how wonderful it was.

“From the time the curtain goes up, to the time the curtain falls, your heart will feel strained,” a reviewer for the local paper had written. “You will laugh. You will cry. You will forget where you and are and who you are. It is a marvelous feeling.”

Those words had resonated, loud and echoing, deep in the hollow corner that alcohol had created in Johanna’s chest. How she yearned to feel that marvelous feeling.

Now, she clutched the bill in her fist and began to trudge through the slush up to the theater. At the box office window, she purchased two tickets, $6.25 each. This left $7.50. Just enough to take the bus across town to the home of the old friend who had thought to invite Johanna to chapel, and then for the two of them to ride back for the eight o’clock show. Somehow, it had worked out to the dime.

Johanna put the two tickets, the five dollar bill, two ones, and two quarters in her coat pocket and walked back into the flow of people. She couldn’t help but smile as she imagined her friend’s face when she presented her with the tickets.

When she arrived at the bus stop, she sat down on the bench and crossed her legs, swinging her foot in the air. She put her hand in her pocket to take out $2.50. Her foot stopped swinging and her heart dropped her stomach when she couldn’t feel the cold metal of the two quarters. They were gone.

Johanna leapt up and walked back from where she had come from, frantically looking at the ground, a distressed look on her face. Fifty cents. That’s all it was. And in this city, that meant it was practically nothing. But this particular fifty cents was more than just half a dollar. It was Johanna’s pride. Part of her method of appreciation for all her friend had done for her. That’s what this whole affair was, a method of appreciation. To Johanna, that meant that she would supply everything herself. Even the $2.50 bus fare. She didn’t think she would be able to find the gut to admit that she was short on cash and needed some help when she knew her friend herself didn’t exactly have money to spare either. Even if it was just fifty cents. But it wasn’t just fifty cents. It was more than that.

But the bus was coming.

The next bus wasn’t coming for another half an hour and it was a good twenty minute ride across town to her friend’s home. If she were to catch the next bus, they would be late for the play.

The bus sighed to a stop. A rush of people filed off. Johanna got on.

Now she had two tickets, four one dollar bills, two quarters, and a racing mind. How could she have been so careless? She just had the money. It was just in her hand. She held it. She could feel the cold, rounded metal. And now it was gone. She had no idea where it could be now. How could she have been careless.

But there she sat. There was nothing she could do now. She breathe in, breathed out, and let her foot begin to swing again.

Another little victory achieved, surrendering.

A little while later (although it was what felt like three days to Johanna), she buzzed the intercom at the entrance of an apartment complex. The gate unlocked, and Johanna walked inside the courtyard, up through the front door.

She knocked on room 158. Her friend answered, and immediately took Johanna into her arms, laughing, delighted to have an unexpected visitor.

The door shut behind them.

“So, what brings you here today?” she asked, cordially, without a trace of annoyance.

Johanna explained what had happened, that she found a twenty dollar bill and wanted to do something nice for her, to thank her for all that she had done over the past few months. She had wanted to pay for everything. She wanted every part of the evening to be a gift. But she had carelessly lost fifty cents in the snow and she no other money to spare. She knew her cheeks were dyed the color of humiliation.

Her friend’s eyes were wide, her head slowly shaking back and forth.

She reached out and held both of Johanna’s hands in her own.

“My darling, I consider fifty cents an incredibly small price, as long as it is the price I must pay to see you smile again. You must learn to forgive yourself.”

And, over a bit of time and prayer, Johanna did. One final little victory achieved.


~~~~~~~~

Later that night, the girls walked out of the theater arm-in-arm. They were silent, each contemplating the happenings they had just watched, not exactly sure how to identify the strange emotions the play had evoked in their hearts. A little ways down the street, in the path of a street lamp’s light, Johanna’s old friend saw something shimmer. Two quarters.

A Typical FaceTiming Session

My parents wanted to FaceTime the other day. My mother and my father individually texted me in the morning three minutes apart from each other.

Hey Lc, hope your day is going well. Can we Skype tonight? I love you. xoxo <3

Hey bud. How are you doin? Skype l8er?

So we set a time, and about fifteen minutes after that time, we were talking over the unromantically convenient medium of an iPhone and an iPad. I sat on my bed, alone in my closet of a room, curled around a cup of tea, balancing the phone on my knee.

My parents sat on the floor in front of the fireplace in their pajamas. I could still see the holiday garland hung across the mantel. My father was wearing his round tortishell glasses and was holding a half empty glass of red wine. I could tell the iPad was situated on the coffee table.

How are you, LC? Where are you? Are you in your room? Can I see it? You look tired. Do you feel okay? Is it cold? How are your hands? Are you eating enough? Are you running? You run that far? Off campus? Is that safe? Do you want me send you a can of pepper spray? Because I can do that. Pop-pop told him some story he heard on the news and he’s all freaked out. Don’t listen to him, he’s joking.

I could hear feet running down the kitchen stairs and one by one each sister had a turn to say hello. Catch up. See faces. Then they scampered up the stairs again to finish math worksheets and cultural geography projects that involved scissors and tape and puffy paint and poster boards.

Occasionally, a blurry mass would cover the screen, and I would coo my dog’s name as he obliviously walked past.

I am good. It’s not too cold. My hands are fine. Yes, I’m tired. But I feel fine. Yes, I’ve been running.

(lost connection, reconnecting)

I said, yeah, I’ve been running. And it’s safe. Why are you just freaking out about this now? I’m fine, really I’m fine. Seriously, I’ve come up with a backup plan. Plan B. It’s perfect. If all else fails, I will move to Nantucket and live in a  light house in Madaket. I’ll be the next Madaket Millie. It will be grand. I will live in the lighthouse alone with an old dog and I will guide sailors home when the fog rolls in. I’ll save lives. That’s what I’ve always wanted to do, right? Save lives? I could save lives this way. Living in my little lighthouse on Nantucket. It will be grand. Maybe someday I will have a restaurant named after me where people can order famous homemade guacamole and lemonade served in Mason Jars. They will order from picnic benches. Their dogs can come too. They can come and curl up underneath the table while their owners eat the guacamole. The waitresses can bring out bowls of water for the dogs. It will be grand. Maybe whoever is the new Mr. Rogers will travel to Nantucket and do a television special on me. On me and my lighthouse and my dog and how I save lives. We’ll become friends, the new Mr. Rogers and I. Maybe they won’t air the episode because all of my answers to his questions are two words long and my eyes dart back and forth whenever the cameraman turns towards me. Maybe my dog will be a labrador named Cosmo.

My father took a sip of wine and pushed the bridge of his glasses higher up his nose with his forefinger.

Let’s hope we will never have to resort to that.

Resonance

Hear my voice through the
open wood: I am no one's
critic but my own

The Sketchbook Project

This is such a neat initiative that I am so happy to be a part of.


The cover of my sketchbook.

My favorite page.

Hopping Onto the Bandwagen

The more I read, the more I acknowledge the reality that other people are just going to be much better at putting certain thoughts and emotions into coherent words than I ever will be. So, I figured it's about time I start collecting those words here.