Forgetful

Posted December 16th, 2004 by Michelle

In July of 1997, I started work at a Kansas City restaurant, now closed, called Parkway 600. I interviewed there because they had a beautiful flowered patio and it was one of the few places left in KC where my boyfriend and I had not had a fight. We’d only been there once. My first week there was a little hard, because the women were excessively clique-y, and the men all too pretty. I was introduced to everyone at family meal. “This is Michelle, from Chicago,” said my manager. “Please make her feel like home.” They didn’t so much. But the next week, there was another new blonde. “This is Hayley. Please make her feel like home.” Hayley had long blonde hair and was dotted with freckles and had the hugest brown eyes this side of the equator. After family meal, as I remember it, I overheard Hayley say quite loudly, “I just got back from college and I don’t have any friends. Will anyone be my friend?” I sidled over to her and applied for the job. We went on our first “date” that night, moved to Los Angeles together a year later, then to New York two years after that. She’s now in Chicago, and I’m here in Napa, but pictures of us line my cottage and I think about her all the time.

We’ve had some crazy stuff happen to us during the last seven years, stuff far too delicate and precious to discuss. We have managed to get the other in plenty of trouble, and then find the way out every time. We’ve nursed each other’s hearts (and hangovers). She watched my cats for three months when I took to the woods, I slept on couches and floors for two months looking for a place for us to live in New York. We’ve seen death and life together, and fought and played and celebrated like any two sisters in the world.

She’s never felt as far away from me as she does right now. She’s making a life with a truly good man, and she’s finally following her greatest passion and talent. Maybe that’s what it is; maybe she doesn’t need me like she used to. We both struggled, searching for that path that would finally make us feel some degree of satisfaction, any sense of worth. And she lept, lept far from New York, and as she fell she found not just a net but a web that will lead her to the life she wants. I saw her briefly last month, just for two days, and it was bittersweet. I used to worry about her all the time, like I worry about my brothers or my mom, and during those two days I saw that she’s not on my watch anymore- not right now. We will circle back in a few months, or a few years- it doesn’t matter, I’ll know her as long as I live- but for now, she’s building a life and a future and a *self*. And it’s just not about me. We were symbiotic for so long, and now we are both doing exactly what we should be doing, separately. But I look forward to the day, or year, that we live near each other again, and we will pick up right where we left off.

For the first time in seven years, I forgot Hayley’s birthday. This realization knocked the wind out of me, because birthdays are sacred to us, and every one of my last seven are distinct and memorable because of Hayley. So, finally, my dear Hayley, my beautiful friend, a belated, but very happy birthday to you- I hope it was wonderful and sparkly and ridiculous fun. I should have been there, and barring that, I should have remembered. I will do better next time.

Love,

Michelle

Writers Write

Posted December 13th, 2004 by Michelle

This I understand. I also understand that writers read. I am deep into Stephen King’s brilliant “On Writing”, and it is haunting me day and night, even worse than the clown from “It”. I get it, I get it, writers write and writers read. They do these things almost constantly. I read like crazy, I write like crazy, but he (and all the others- Lamont, Kingsolver, Dillard) insists that writers have a schedule. He’s got my panites in a bunch over this whole schedule thing; apparently hellfire and brimstone and utter despair is all that await the unorganized writer. He wants me to churn out 1000 words a day, at least. I double that number every day I’m at work, but none of them are for my own project. I have to leave for work at 8:30 AM at the latest, and I (albeit feebly) run in the mornings, and even if I didn’t, I still couldn’t write 1000 words between 7:30 and 8:30 AM. And that’s if I don’t bathe, which is problematic. My evenings are about 75% full, and when they are not, I leave work some time between 6-7, getting home around 7 or 8, and then it’s the end of the day and I’m too…

I was about to say that I’m too drained to write, but it’s not true. I just do everything better in the morning hours. I could tuck in right now and do that 1000 words, but truth be told, I’ve had a nasty cold for almost a month and I’m about to go to bed. Because apparently that’s the OTHER thing I should do- stay healthy. Where does the full-time job fit in with the healthy and the reading and the writing and the schedule? I understand that lots of writers write at work. Lots of writers have subsistence jobs where they actually have time during the day to put pen to paper. Not only do I not have one of those jobs, I have a job for which I am constantly WRITING. Which is great, hey, I’m not complaining, but I am having a helluva time trying to figure out when I can schedule my three hours- three hours a day, is that asking too much?- in a row that I can close the door of my study and write for me. My mom often bemoans that she’s tired of working on other people’s music, because it starts to interfere with her own. I finally understand. Mom, apparently it’s all about schedule.

Could I swing it from 6-9 PM? I’d have to leave work on time, and stop dating entirely. Wait, maybe that’s not such a bad idea. But it is the holidays, and I am booked most nights. Could I start getting up at 6? Even then, I’d have to be in the shower by 7:30, and that means no run. Could I start going into work at 10? UGH! HOW CAN I DO THIS?! My characters are going to become unfamiliar and stale and my plot will start to fade and everything will be ruined IF I DON’T GET ON SCHEDULE!

Did I happen to mention that the lovely board of my super arts non-profit offered me a new contract with a raise? AND we’re having a holiday party? Now if only I could figure out my writing schedule.

yet another obstacle in my schedule…

Friends

Posted December 4th, 2004 by Michelle

I have this friend- we’ll call her “Stacey”, who I’ve known my whole life. I got the rare opportunity to spend a week with her last month, and although I’m a little concerned that she brought home a tapeworm from Vanuatu, at least she gets to eat all the cookies she wants and she gets to stay super fit. We lived in the same town for a year during college, but I was going through a particularly joy-less phase and my boyfriend kept hitting on her friends so I didn’t see her nearly enough. A couple of years later, she moved to Chicago, and had her own unfortunate year, but I didn’t even stick around to see her through it- I left on tour about three or four months after she moved there. So our visits have been short but totally and completely awesome, and I’ve found that if she’s around, I do stuff I should do but that I probably wouldn’t have done. I walked the Brooklyn Bridge, only once, saw a grotto in Wisconsin, only once, dove fully clothed into Lake Michigan at sunset in the middle of a bike ride, only once, and had the fates been better to us, I would have gone to Vanuatu to visit her. Alas, instead, I went to Iowa, but I am certainly not complaining.

Next year, in late fall, Stacey and I are going to Peru. We’ve decided that I’m going to learn Spanish for the trip, and I’ve found the perfect class at my local college. On separate sides of the continent, we are drooling through our guide books, trying to decide how best to use those two weeks. Last night, I saw “The Motorcycle Diaries” and watched Che and his chubby companion climb the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. Stace and I will do the same, and maybe by then neither of us will be chubby.

We are going to climb that trail, wander Machu Picchu, take the train back and drink tequila with the locals, just like we did in Iowa:

Thanks

Posted November 26th, 2004 by Michelle

I am thankful that a year ago, my entire family rallied behind me and supported me when I up and moved to the other side of the country. Every member of my family held my hand, or laced their own hands together to give me a leg up into a better life.

I am thankful for my friends, who love me, who see me as I actually am and they celebrate me and they let me love them like crazy.

I am thankful for clarity, for realizing how dreadfully unhappy I was in my job in New York, and the effect that unhappiness had on my entire life. I am thankful that I can drain the moat, put the fire-breathing dragon to rest, lower the drawbridge, and creak open the iron gates surrounding my heart and realize that I know and love a hell of a lot of good people.

I am thankful for a job that allows me to be successful every single day. I don’t have it in me every single day, but the possibility is always there.

I am thankful to be writing again.

I am thankful for direction.

I am thankful that I was born of great artists, and I am thankful for how that altered me from day one.

Most of all, I am thankful for my family. I know exactly how lucky I am to belong to this tribe.

Yeah… no.

Posted November 24th, 2004 by Michelle

Well, it wasn’t exactly a waste of lipstick, but nor was it the one and only. I soldier on.

Foolishness

Posted November 23rd, 2004 by Michelle

I seem to be incapable of giving up. Every time I say I have, every time I do something that indicates I have, something sad and silly endures and somehow I still believe I’m going to find that life partner who eludes me so thoroughly. I was talking to Sean today, and he was telling me how much he’s learned from the people with whom he’s been in relationships, and I so completely cannot relate. I haven’t been in a serious relationship in almost four years- FOUR YEARS!- and my relationship before that one taught me only what is bad between two people. Before that, well, that goes back to spring of 1995. Doesn’t even count. So I have only learned from my friends and family. I lucked out there, clearly, but I have no frame of reference as to how to relate to a man on a day-to-day basis, who is not family, but more than a friend, who could be smarter, cooler, wiser, and funnier than I am. I mean, wouldn’t that just be lovely? Someone to tell me I’m being ridiculous, or terrific. What’s that?

Back in the day, my ex used to call me, loaded and sad, crying because I wasn’t there to tell him he was okay. This is when we were together but living in separate states because, well, he was an awful addict and a ridiculous man but I couldn’t purge myself of him. He would cry and cry and tell me how he had to be the one to tell himself that he was okay. The problem was, he wasn’t okay, not nearly, and yet I can see him, looking at his red, bloated, drunken (and still very handsome) face in the mirror, telling himself that all was well, that he was a good guy, that he deserved more in life than the sad lot before him. I really doubt he ever decided to tell himself that he was a mess.

Anyway, I haven’t given up hope, because I brushed my hair and put on pink lipstick and I wait for the call to go on yet another first date. My life is filled with first dates. You could say that’s better than no dates, but meeting more men is not the boost giving me faith that the right one is out there. Meeting more men is making me wonder if I simply come from another planet and that’s why I can’t find someone who fits. But… still… I go. I don’t go with much hope, but I do go with as open a heart I can muster.

Where art thou going, oh friends of mine

Posted November 18th, 2004 by Michelle

This is one of the few times these days that I take a break from my work life to blog. You can call a blog a diary, a narrative, anything you want, but a blog is merely a snapshot that covers the most compelling three or four minutes of that blogger’s day. And “compelling” clearly often applies only the blogger as opposed to the reader.

I am having a tremendous few days at work, filled with hope and good work and long, fruitful hours. My new office has a lovely view of treetops towering above my second-floor window. The closest tree is slowly turning, and is right now dominated by my mom’s favorite yellow. Three grand evergreens, twice as tall as my building, are perfectly framed in the window from where I sit and write. There is a little traffic noise, but just enough to remind me that the world is whirling by as I sit and write about the arts.

But I don’t know how long I can last here. It’s been the topic of debate with my friends and colleagues of late: how can we bear to continue to live in this valley when there is no reason for thirtysomethings to be here. There is no physical structure dedicated to us, no coffee shop with comfy sofas and modest prices and a high-speed internet connection. There is no dark wine bar where we might sip Cabernet and meet one another. There is no arts center where we might buy paints or see a show. The only thing to “do” here is go out to very expensive dinners, or have a very expensive glass of wine at the bar of a very expensive restaurant, or go see a movie in a terrible theatre with all of the drug-dealing, bored teenagers in downtown Napa. (Lord, I think it’s bad for us thirtysomethings, I can only imagine how dreadful it is for high schoolers.)

San Francisco is over an hour away, and I have to say, it utterly pales in comparison to New York. I love my little cottage, but I long to live within walking distance of a coffee shop, newsstand, thrift store, grocery. I long to see people my age. We take road trips to San Fran and we stare out the windows of the car at the young people as if the world outside is a zoo, filled with strange creatures who will never know us. I go back to New York and walk down the street and see so much possibility in the teeming hordes of my generation.

I love my job, I love my employer, I love my friends. But my friends are slowly leaving. I have only one left who still lives in the valley full-time, and he is thinking of moving across the country, or into the city…and there isn’t that much difference between the two, in my mind. The community we built so quickly is stretching, sprawling, and eventually I’m going to have to make some decisions about what is most important in my life.

But for now, I continue to work hard, and continue to try to deepen my connection to this community. I’m running off right now to meet with the local Red Cross chapter to see if there is any good work to be done. But unless a couple thousand forward-thinking young ones decide to move to this valley, I’m ultimately going to have to look elsewhere to create the life I want.

Greatness

Posted November 14th, 2004 by Michelle

My father is a symphony conductor. He stands on the podium, absolutely still, waiting for his orchestra to finish scooting their seats and arranging their music, only a few short seconds allowed. When he raises his arms, every instrument flies into position, every back is straight, every muscle posed and ready… even in the audience. We, too, respond to the lift of my father’s baton, to his call to action. I have watched him, both as child and adult, create greatness out of what was simply average. His talent is so obvious, and so sublime, all at once.

My brother Steve makes sense out of any kind of chaos. He’d have to, considering the madness that he calls his living room, but he can make anything work. He also knows how just about everything works before he’s even looked at it. I can call him with any idea or problem and he either provides the solution or the knowledge that there is no solution. His knowledge of computers, in particular, is staggering. Make that his knowledge of anything electronic. I see these beasts made of metal and cords and plastic and hard drives and ram and THEY MAKE NO SENSE outside of simple operations. I can barely wrap my mind around the idea of flight, and yet Steve owns and repairs and flies his own airplane. There are things he knows, and knows about, that will never be clear to me.

Kent is the gentle giant who reminds me who I’d like to be when I grow up. Kent’s talents, from childrearing to music to pancakes, are too many to list, other than to say that he’s one of the few true artists I know. I remember thumbing through a book of his poetry and drawings when I was eight years old and wondering if I would ever be capable of doing what he did. It seems so strange to find such grace in a man so tall. And if his kids are any indication, Kent is one of the best fathers on the planet.

Ian’s writing haunts me. Phrases he wrote ten or more years ago find their way to the front of my brain on a daily basis. Sometimes I’m angry because I wish I had his education; there were years in my young life that I knew that I was exceptionally smart, but as my schooling got worse (and my focus on my own appearance got stronger) I became decidedly less. Sometimes I think that if I had had his education, maybe I could do what he does. But I’m wrong. Ian writes from a place unknown to me, and unknown to most of the literary world. I don’t know how he does it, how he puts a string of ordinary words together and creates something otherworldly. I wish I knew, but all I can do is sit back in awe. Sometimes it’s just a blog, sometimes it’s an article, sometimes it’s a screenplay, but it is pretty much always brilliant.

Sean is a storyteller. He is so much more than an actor. He is what actors would be if only the tiny percent of the population capable of transportive greatness were allowed the title. His talent is so utterly clear, so bright, so gorgeous and terrifying, so truthful that it hurts. Again, I don’t entirely understand how he does it. Even though I was taught the method, I don’t understand it like Sean does. He, too, has access to that pool where only true artists are allowed to dip their cup.

My mom. My mom need only play you one of her songs, any one of them, and you’ll understand that she is not like the rest of the world. Her music reached me when she could not, when I was young and furious and hateful. Her music makes me think that the Phates wanted her to be one of them, and so gave her a gift that made her more than mortal. Tell my mom to write a song about a zucchini or a hubcap, and she’ll do it, and it will be great. Give her time to write her own music, and it will be extraordinary. Her melodies are never what you expected, but always what you wanted without knowing it. She swims in that pool of artistry. She giggles as the other artists come to the shore with their meager cups; she does the backstroke and spurts the sacred water out of her mouth like a fountain. It’s all she knows.

Tonight, at the concert, as the Brahms washed over my friends and me, I wondered where I fit. I know all the things I am, but suddenly I was terrified, because I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to act again. I just don’t know that I should do it if I’m not truly great. I wasn’t sure if I should keep writing; I wondered if I should have never given up the cello; I wondered if I should have gone to school to be a vet: I wondered if, surrounded by greatness that all came before me, if there was anything left in the pool.

Sense

Posted November 10th, 2004 by Michelle

Ten minutes after I returned to work after presenting in front of the granting board, I got a call from their President telling me that not only do they want to fund my program, they want to partner with my organization to make the program as successful as possible. It’s incredibly good news. My board is elated, my boss is elated, and I am proud to have been the liason that made this happen. But also, this program makes sense. It is not just vital, necessary, and important, it makes sense. It has been wonderful to have affirmation towards something based on solid facts, on good research, on truths and needs. It feels like the world at large, here in the USA, things aren’t moving in a linear fashion; truth and research are completely irrelevant. To sit in front of a board, a board where basic good ethics prevent my father from speaking up too much in support of his daughter’s program, and to have that board listen, and ask questions, and get solid answers, and decide to get involved… for a few minutes there, I found peace and order in this world.

I can’t believe how bent out of shape the crazies are getting right now. It’s really disturbring, and I’m realizing that since the election, reality has shifted. It’s almost like the days after 9/11, but only in a very narrow sense that what once was is no longer. We couldn’t really wrap our heads around what happened, and I’m there again. I’m there again, and I’ve been sleeping with the phone next to my bed because I’m scared that some guy is going to break in here and hurt me. I’m scared walking the dark, foggy ten feet from my car to my door. I’m scared of the zealots in this country, I’m scared of the hate and anger flying around, I’m scared of my own hate and anger.

I was telling some friends about that person, the one that really chaffs my hide, so to speak, and I was doing a vitriolic song and dance about that person’s many evils, and one of my friends shook her head and said, “Man, what do you see in her that you hate in yourself so much?” I mean, it’s boring and obvious, isn’t it, that we hate in others what we are loathe to see in ourselves. This person challenges and by doing so thinks she’s being smart and controversial. She questions things that make sense because she feels that makes her clever. The volume of her voice raises as her knowledge of the subject diminishes. She wastes time- she wastes my time, everyone’s time. She is in the wrong company, in way over her head, and she postures to try to remind herself why she is there. She is exactly who I don’t want to be.

But I called her dumb and mean. “Mean” can be defined and proven quite easily; “dumb” is slightly harder to justify. Regardless, who the hell am I to call anyone dumb? But I’m so damn angry, so furious, and so terrified, that I lash out sometimes when I least expect to, and too quickly to check myself. I am helping no one by spouting hate. I do not believe that giving in to your anger makes it go away; I do not believe in “letting it out”. Every time I’ve “let it out” in my life, I’ve not just lived to regret it as my hurtful words make their way through the universe; I’ve also just gotten angrier.

Things aren’t making sense. I’m sleeping too much, and wanting even more sleep. Great things happen, and I see them in a fog. I’m forgetting to do some of the things I need to do, basic things like dropping stuff off at my dad’s in time for the movers, or calling a friend when I’m supposed to spend the evening with her. I dream that I’m punching my way through invisible marshmallow, like the very air around me is sticky and endless and doesn’t want me to connect with anything solid.

So to sit in front of that board yesterday, and know on a very deep level that people were listening as I was speaking, and understanding my clear and simple goal to support artists, was the most satisfying experience I’ve had in weeks. I’m so thankful that something, finally, made sense.

Gray

Posted November 9th, 2004 by Michelle

How is it possible that I woke up a full hour early this morning? Where is the logic in that? I have to be somewhere, somewhere close by, in an hour, to do a presentation for a grant. I am fully dressed, completely ready to walk out the door, I’m as prepared as possible, but I have an hour to go. I should just now be opening my eyes, the deer nudging my face, the bluebirds lifting and flying my hair, soft Disney music in the background, a brilliant spring day dawning out the window.

Instead, I opted against a shower, my soy milk curdled in my flavored coffee, and the day is bleak and gray with promises of the winter ahead. Even my cat is hiding under the bed.

And yet, I have hope. The weeks before the election, and then the week of election, I lost hope in my job as I lost hope in our country to elect the better guy. All weekend I was reconciling myself to moving to a different position, leaving my arts job, abandoning that which I could no longer help. But this week, I have hope. The support is out there, I just need to keep on diggin to find it. We’ve cancelled our fundraiser because not enough people wanted to show, but after making hundreds of calls, I’ve at least found a handful that were interested. They are who I’ll turn to now. If that fails, well, yeah, I’ll have to deal with that then, which actually may be sooner than later, but at least I no longer feel like there are no options. There are still options, and as long as there are options, there is hope.