The weather...

Radar Loops: Snow

I casually turned on the television today and found myself anxiously wading through just one more commercial for the latest computer model of
The first winter storm, heading our way.
I could hear those words you used to make me upset and even knowing the tricks I didn't change the channel.
It made me a little disgusted with myself.

I'm holding on,
Holding tight,
Listening for that musical note that resounds in my soul.
I've become convinced that something will strike me profoundly,
The light from heaven will sing through the blue sky
And I will kneel with a clear picture,
Vision,
Understanding.
In this romance I gain something I don't know I've lost quite yet and for this I will
Be grateful.

No matter how hard I try to look away and create distance my
Eyes are drawn to the window, my feet to the door,
To smell for snow and ice. Between turning on and turning off my television I developed an
Obsession for the weather and how it will impact my person.
Frantic wind and driving rain don't fit into my expectations,
Leaves me confused and doubtful.
I am stubborn in my refusal to adapt. I know with certainty that tomorrow I will turn on the television.

Positive thoughts

Since I have the illusion that somewhere, someone is reading this little thing of mine, I also have the delusion that people might like what I have to write. Or how I write it. Or something like that.

I've combined my delusions with my addiction to making myself miserable by submitting poems to various contests/journal submission calls. So far, NADA. I haven't even gotten a rejection letter. Apparently, they aren't in style anymore. Icy silence seems to be the way of disregard.

I digress.

Ok. No rejection letter, no acceptance either. I know, I'm crazy anyway. I keep blocking out which places I have submitted, what I submitted, and when the deadlines pass. To keep some degree of organization, I keep all that info in a handy word doc. That word doc has kindly reminded me that end of year deadlines are creeping up. And I wonder how much hope to have in the next 2 -3 months that somewhere a journal wants to publish something of mine.

All this is really just an exercise in failure. My therapist could probably talk your ear off for at least 2 hours going on about my failure related issues. How I've failed myself, how I have failed others, how I set myself up to fail, how others have failed me.... blah, blah, blah. The thing is, I actually expect to be rejected.

I think I'd rather have a cold rejection than icy silence.

I have to go now. My computer is trying sooooo hard to keep cool. I can hear it's little fan groaning. That also means that my screen is anywhere from 1 letter to 20 behind me as I type. It's damn irritating.

Topeka

When I hear the word, or think of the place, my stomach knots up and starts to drop away.
At some point in every week, I wonder if I'm making the right choices, doing the right things, if I am actually a good person.
Topeka makes me sick because I know I wasn't right or good there.

And yet it has brought me here. I am happy here, but I can't reconcile it with the path that brought me.
I can't accept the evil that flourished in me, in Topeka.
I can forgive myself for not meeting my own ideal,
But I cannot forgive falling so far short of it.

The forces in my life, then, came together in a particularly ugly way, but I can't see that as anything but an excuse. I should have been better.

But better might have taken me someplace else.

I know too intimately what I am capable of. My stomach knots in a desperate urge to deny everything.

No matter how hard I try, it makes me sick to think of it.

Fall is my favorite season

Black Tea in the Afternoon

I sipped hot tea while I stood at the living room windows and admired the industriousness of my neighbors.
There they were, with rakes and black plastic bags, corralling that riot of yellow, orange, red, and brown into slowly shifting piles.
I thought about how I should grab my rake and lend them a hand.

It's not really cold enough yet to sip hot tea throughout the day but I don't adjust well.
I'm fairly convinced it should be cold outside, and so my feet freeze even if it's moderately warm.
Sighing in resignation of this, I put down my tea and dug my rake out of the garage.
I raked and piled, shifted and herded, until most of the color disappeared into my bag.
I worked down a bit from the rest of the crew, until the very end.
And then, as we stood around making small talk, I had to turn my back to the wind.
Polite chatter filled the air as the temperature made itself felt, the rain began to fall, the wind blowing through the trees.

So I sipped hot tea while I stood at the living room windows, watching the trees rain a riot of color onto the sidewalk.
I smiled to myself when the street was obscured again.

Thoughts in a quiet car.

Coming Home

I am driving purposefully, hands placed at ten and two
Just as they taught me, in those ridiculously outdated metal machines,
Using reel to reel film showing little blond boys darting across the street.
Each time I turn to check my blind spot I feel a stab in my chest,
But I keep checking, looking forward, behind to the side;
After all these years I cannot help myself.
I judge the lane position of other cars, watch drivers make poor decisions
And each judgment pulls me down from the center.
Yet, I am so thoroughly engrossed that I missed my turn and now
Must go the long way around.

A sense of sadness.

I wanted to write this great poem about my week, but it just couldn't come together for me, so I guess I'll ramble on about it instead.

It was my birthday. I turned 29. No big deal, I guess. I was a little surprised that I wasn't in my thirties yet - I feel older. At least 31. A huge part of me wanted to hide away and quietly accept the day and move one. So I skipped the concert I was planning to attend, kept my day busy with small interactions. At the end of the day, eating a cake with unlit candles on it, reading a book I had really wanted, it all hit me.

It was my tenth birthday with a dead mom.

I want to say "without a mom" but the truth is that her death and resulting absence is just as profound as her life. I had a mom. For a time. Then she was gone. And her death was ugly, merciless, long, and leaves me with a complex set of emotions I barely understand. So I sat there, and I ate the cake someone else's mom made for me, and I tried to be grateful that there was a mom who wanted to make me cake. Sisters who wanted to celebrate with me. Friends who wanted to say hello. And a part of me was.

But knowing... ten birthdays, missed. And the list will grow. I may even live long enough to have more birthdays with a dead mom than with a living one. Macabre, eh? And. Oh how sad it makes me.

I feel tired, wounded, lost in this ache.

This year I said: I don't want a big thing next year. Sure, it'll be 30 years. But that's ok.
I hope everyone listens. I hope they could understand. Seeing them all, gathered together to celebrate, helps me remind of the one person who can't join us.

I'd rather be sad quietly than out loud.