Coming December 2011: An American Christmas

My daughter just informed me that she wants to be here in USA by and for "an American Christmas!"  I'll be spending Christmas with my daughter and granddaughter this year!!  It doesn't get more exciting than this.

Mum's the word.

This morning I paid all my bills and pretty much cut my budget as the rest of the world seems to have cut theirs. And I'm protesting!!! I can't afford to leave the house. But at least I do have a roof over my head. I signed a new lease today, so I guess I'm no longer a "newbie" to my new neighborhood. I lied about Lulu's weight on the lease application (she's an embarrassing 1.5 pounds overweight). But seriously, who could resist this tummy?

And I'm still wondering where this blog is headed. I had wanted it to be a log of what I do, but that turns out to be problematic to those with whom I do things. Which is even understandable, it just has left me with nothing to blog about. The only person in the world that calls me Mum won't let me blog about her (yes, there is a little play of words in today's title). I can't even talk about compliments I received without violating confidentialities.

Cousin Phil emailed me that he finally read my review of his book on Amazon. He was amused that I had cleverly not revealed our familial relationship. I told him I was thrilled he didn't care, and immediately revised my review to reveal it. I even got bold and stuck in that Mothership parenthetical. Ooh!!

I explained my woes to Cousin Phil, and he responded with these quotes, which made me feel so understood I tweeted them immediately:

“There’s nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein.” – Red Smith

“Writing is easy; all you do is sit staring at a blank sheet of paper until the drops of blood form on your forehead.” – Gene Fowler

That was the first time I ever conversed with another writer about writing.  It was a moment. And one I can actually talk about!
~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~
I feel like I'm just beginning
I feel like I'm just beginning to get my voice
I hadn't heard it yet myself
I can't believe what it is saying!
Which means I have no belief in myself.
Oh, but I do!
I so do!
I swear on every Bible!
I believe!
I prostrate myself before all that is holy
with no choice but to be a devout
Born Again
Believer
in my
Own Voice

Valentines

Michael was my first crush.
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Here's a sweet romance that happened in the early 70s, with another Michael.  I was living with an unimportant boyfriend (lasted only 3 weeks, the best of part of which was the dramatic ending where he threw my suitcases out the door down his attic stairs and hurled me out the door after them), when I met Michael.  Michael won my heart by playing "Your Song" on the juke box and keeping me company while I waited for aforementioned unimportant boyfriend to take me home. Michael was wearing a really beautiful hand crafted silver ring, which I slipped off his finger and put on mine.  I ran into Michael 3 years later.  I told him I still had his ring.  He came home with me that night and stayed a couple of days. I gave him back his ring and it was over. So perfect.

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Another Michael was a neighbor. He was perfect because neither of us fell more in love than the other, and being neighbors was so convenient.

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I changed my mind.  I decided Bruce, above-mentioned "unimportant boyfriend" for only 3 weeks, wasn't so unimportant.

I had just come to town to board Mothership.  I found an ad for a roommate on the bulletin board in the course room.  I called and spoke to a woman that asked me several times, "this guy is a musician.  He practices the piano a lot.  Are you sure that's ok with you?"  I told her my father was a musician that practiced the piano a lot.  It would be fine.  We had this exact same conversation several times.  Several times I asked her, "is there something else you are worried about?"  It was already night and I had nowhere to go.  So, she told me where the apartment was, I found it and met my new roommate, who seemed fine.  We talked a couple of hours.  He had made some little thing for us to eat. Then he started talking about our "arrangement." Huh?  What arrangement?  Apparently the landlord had hired me out for sex.  I opened the door, because I became scared of this guy.  I was truly a damsel in distress, wondering what I was going to do, staring at the doorway wondering if I should just run, when a beautiful young lad appeared in the doorway and rescued me.  He was the tenant in the attic, his name was Bruce, and he graciously took me in at my time of need.  He was basically homeless himself.  He had a room, but no money, and he found places that would feed him and feed me too.  It was in one of those places, a pool hall Bruce would take me to eat, where I met Michael. Bruce is that guy every woman has to have at least once, that you have knock down drag out fights with. The kind of man that makes you understand country songs.

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David and I locked eyes the first time I heard his voice coming from the back of the room in drama class.  I was terrified of this class because I was unable to speak even in ordinary circumstances.  But that voice was meant for this class.  And all he did was announce his name and say why he was taking drama class.  He was taking it because [fill in acting resume here].  I was taking it because it had been assigned to me and I was going to change it.  Until now.  I whirled to see what was producing this voice and got lost in the deepest, darkest eyes I had ever seen.

"Crush" is too mild a word for what we had, although we never dated or said anything of significance to each other. All we did was stare at each other for 3 years.  He asked me once, "you're in your own little world, aren't you?"  He had done this adorable backward jog down the steps while facing front, in what was not only a breathtaking stunt but was the most adorable thing I had ever seen. He left me breathless anyway.  So, I couldn't say a word.  Also, I was freaked out because I didn't know if he liked that about me or was putting me down. We didn't speak for a year after that.  I just found this in my journal:  "When the new library was built in Jamaica David and I would run into each other outside of it. That was where we spoke to each other for the first time."

I would see him all over town, often with his best friend (the editor of the school paper): at the Museum of Modern Art (where the guy at the turnstile would let me in for free) or the Donnell Library across the street, or the Cloisters. I would just watch him from afar, too shy to let him see me.  And now that my journal has jogged my memory, I do remember what our first conversation was about!  It was about how happy we were that a library opened in Jamaica! What else would it have been about, running right into each other by the front door of the new library?  And I remember how we smiled at each other, both relieved and thrilled to actually converse!  It was a moment I am really glad to relive.  It is moments like these that make me so grateful for this blog!!  I also remember thinking that I was additionally happy because I didn't have to go all the way into Manhattan for a peaceful place to escape home any more, plus the library was a quick walk to Thalia's house, my second home.

The summer before our senior year I discovered David lived around the corner from my uncle. As you might expect, I basically lived at my uncle's house that summer, just hoping to get a glimpse of him walking by.  When school started I began walking instead of taking the subway.  My uncle lived only 3 blocks from the school and was right between my house and the school. By the end of senior year I pretty much lived at my uncle's again, and would just wait until I saw him on his way to school and run out and join him.  So, we walked to school together many mornings, and sometimes walked home together also. I can't remember a thing we talked about, or even if we talked.

We were both unwilling teacher's pets.  From my journal:

Our senior year David sat behind me in English, and we were both teacher's pets. Mr. Certner praised me no end and would give my essays "A's." They soon became "A*", "A**, and one essay toward the end of the semester, which he read aloud to the class, received an "A***!!" David was his pet in a different way: Mr. Certner would demand much more of him than any other student and get angry with him if he didn't live up to it. For example, he once asked him if he knew one of Dylan's songs and made him sing it and got cranky when he wasn't sure about all of the verses. Thalia, my only high school friend, was also in this class, in the next row and two seats back from me. Sometimes we'd squeeze together at her desk to share a book and admire the back of David's head."

One day the theater director substituted in music class and asked if any student knew someone who should be in the school play?  I asked her if she knew David and she said no, but she had heard of him - would I please have him come see her?  So, before class started I told him the theater director wanted to see him, and he picked me up, twirled me around, gave me a kiss and ran from the room flourishing an imaginary musketeer hat. Even Mr. Certner seemed to be enchanted by this little drama. The next day all the girls began asking me about David and what was he really like?  Of course, nobody knew that I didn't even know. We had never actually gotten to know each other.

From my journal:

"Since David had apparently gone unnoticed by the student body until our senior year I often wondered if Thalia and I had been his only following. But toward the end of the year the girls started noticing him. In the cafeteria I overheard a conversation discussing who was the most good looking (they had categories like that in the yearbook which was now being compiled) and one said "I think David is really dirty looking." Another girl I had never known before accosted me in the hall with "gosh, David talks to you! He never talks to anybody. Boy, you're really lucky." A few days later another girl walked up to me and said enviously, "you and David are good friends, huh? What's he really like?"

Truthfully, I was madly jealous of his real best friend, to whom I enjoyed 3 degrees of separation - someone with a voice similar to Joan Baez's who Thalia had grown up with, and who had graduated a couple of years before us and was now at Queens College. She gave Thalia a picture of herself with Phil Ochs, our idol. We found Phil's apartment in the Village and saw his name on the doorbell list and we giggled like girls. But I digress.

The play was Oklahoma, and David was the male lead.  A young freshman's notoriety was rising who was being called "the next David." Coincidentally, my cousin Linda began attending my school that year.  She had been going to the High School of Performing Arts, which her parents felt was badly influencing her (for example, they didn't like that she ran away to Los Angeles her junior year and to London her senior year).  Linda was a year older than me, and I think she attended my school for part of the year to make up some time she had missed or something.  At any rate, she was fabulous, and dating rock stars (I know, because she dragged me along on her dates). When she walked in her first day of school dressed "mod" before it had even hit America she was an instant teen sensation.  And she was my friend.  Oh - and the reason the turnstile guard at the museum would let me in for free was because of Linda (drawn below). He always let her in for free, and after he saw me with her he extended to me the same courtesy.

So, there you have it.  My 15 minutes of faux fame.

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Next David:

I was living in a little cottage in Oakland when John broke up with me.  One day after John had left I heard a puppy whining.  I went in the yard across from mine and saw a little puppy tied up and tangled in its cord and had spilled its water bowl.  I straightened him all out, anxious for my neighbor to come home and tend to this little puppy.  When I heard a voice over there I ran out and saw someone who looked just like high school David but with blond hair.  I asked him if his name was David by any chance?  He said yes, how did I know? (His last name was amazingly similar too.) We had a short, lovely romance and I would have stayed with him forever, but he had a girlfriend that he was cheating on with me, so that pretty much ended it.  His girlfriend was so cool.  She gave him all the time he needed to say goodbye to me (I was off to Canada).  She just sat in his truck reading a book while the two of us hugged and cried, and he made me promise to write. What was the point?  I never did write.  I was so disappointed he had a girlfriend.  I was so stupid.  I should have written. Why waste a friendship?  Not to mention, it was clearly ripping his heart out to leave me.  Maybe he was undecided. Maybe if I had written he would have chosen me in the end. And if he didn't, so what? It would have been another friend I would have stayed in touch with. I was such an idiot.
~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~
Then there's My David, of course.  David and I often joked about how there were so many Davids in both our lives that telling a story could get really confusing. This Valentines Day would have been David's and my 24th wedding anniversary. David was the one that stuck around, my life's journey.  We were each other's mirror, teacher, student, soul mate and best friend forever. One day we looked at each other amazed to discover we were both married to our dream lover and madly in love. We reached the place we had been trying to get to for 32 years and then he died.

Roommate Ted challenged me on the facts of my own life.  He "reminded" me that David had divorced me, so our anniversary date would be different when we remarried.  I informed him that we had always celebrated our anniversary even when we were divorced, and that he asked me to remarry him on what we had thought was our 10th anniversary, but when I looked at our records after he died I realized it was actually our 11th.  And furthermore, we decided not to "remarry" but to "annul our divorce."  So, our anniversary was always Valentines Day and was always celebrated regardless of our marital status.  He is my forever valentine. I still feel him waiting for me. And David's birthday was also in February! I can't wait until March.

~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~
John was my first, and I recently realized that I had never gotten over him.  I had gone my whole life still in love with him.  In my John post, in our last conversation he clearly said this:  "I'm not living with Ann any more.  What are you doing?" And I clearly didn't say, "I miss you and wish you would come back to me."  Or given him any indication that I wanted him to.  What if I had?  How would my life have gone?  I hadn't even known it was an option at the time of that conversation.  I was so stupid!  No wonder I never got over him.
~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~
B is a guy I met on line last year. He managed to contact me just as his profile was exploding and cutting off all chance of communication between us. We just barely managed to exchange email addresses. Immediately after this fiasco we had an email fight.  He misunderstood me based on total lack of self esteem, exactly something I would do, so that actually endeared me to him.  Having survived our first fight we bonded instantly.  He was a musician and sent me some songs he was writing. I loved his voice and songs.  He could see, but he had a sight defect that prevented him from driving.  He had to take a bus everywhere, and was sure that would be a romance killer.  It wasn't, especially after he assured me he would come to me and not make me drive, because I am a really anxious distance driver these days. Three weeks had gone by while we got all this established, when he stopped writing.  He sent a couple of short, strange emails saying he was too sick to write, and I have no idea what happened, but he never wrote again.  Had a stroke?  Died? Just got cold feet? I often wondered was it a prank? But, if teenagers pulled a prank wouldn't they have picked some young hunky guy, not some old, ugly geek with a sight defect taking bad pictures of himself on his computer?  And a psycho would have acted psychotic, which he hadn't.  So, I'll never know.  It took me weeks to get over him. 

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After that I met this guy on line.  He also found me through a window of opportunity lasting only a day (a free weekend). He told me he loved me countless times (really, I just stopped counting, it became meaningless) and that he "had been looking for me for decades." We saw each other every week for a couple of months.  Then he stopped.  He was over just as I was beginning.  He stopped returning my calls, emails or letters.  I never even had a chance to send him this silly photo of us my old neighbor took in her house, where we dropped in unannounced after taking a beautiful drive through the hills.

~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~
And now I am getting involved yet again! I'm hopeless.

A totally dreamy guy contacted me on some free dating site I joined, but by the time I had gotten back from my trip to Miami a month had gone by before I saw his message. I immediately responded, and he responded by suggesting I look him up on facebook.  He requested my facebook friendship which I hesitantly granted, as I try to keep facebook limited to actual friends. But I fell for him in facebook - his beautiful paintings, all the languages he speaks with their strange characters, with the things he said and were said to him. I loved being his facebook friend! I devoured his facebook page all the way to the beginning where he posted, "I'm looking for my special girl." I want to be his special girl.  I want that guy nishing his grandson and walking in the wind.  I clicked on all his female friends to see if any had been girlfriends. I'm jealous of him already. I love facebook! It was so reassuring.  He's a real person.  The dating site didn't make him up.  And he's not a criminal. And he wants to be my facebook friend! Yay!

Suddenly he ended the friendship.  I was heartbroken.  So he didn't like me after all.  Maybe all my silly animal pictures (I can't help it - they really ARE animals I know!) were childish for him, maybe he was just looking for some young arm candy.  I was miserable for days, lost in that black jealous haze left over from John. And then I decided to send him a message through the dating site.  The worst that could happen would be that he wouldn't answer it - it's not like he could break my heart again.  He didn't answer it, and he did break my heart again. After a few days I got tired of seeing his sweet face and decided to delete his emails from the dating site when he responded with a friend request - not to facebook, but to the dating site. Oh, be still my heart!

We have not exchanged email addresses, and he hasn't written again. Neither have I.  I have no idea if he's just stringing me along while he's procrastinating, really falling for somebody else, shy like me, or something totally else.  Maybe he ended our facebook friendship to be gentlemanly and not overstay his welcome.  Maybe he does like me. If I've learned anything by now it's that dreams can sometimes come true. I just want him to come home from that cold Swedish winter and make me his special girl.  Maybe it can happen, and I won't be too stupid to let it.