Poshdeluxe

i stayed home this morning. i’ve been avoiding my journal like the
plague, and i just needed to get everything out before insanity set in
(or i started vomiting).

it was hard… but i’m glad i did it. deep breath. ok.

i started listing thoughts as they came, as they’ve been coming, flying
through my head, banging and screaming and scratching like rabid bats
trapped in a dirty glass cage. now it’s on paper, and my journal can
deal with wild creatures. i mean, this list is a wily one, completely
schitzophrenic and unwieldy; but that’s the purpose of my journal,
really. it corrals. it handles. it occasionally needs to use a stun
gun.

i re-read cards and emails i’ve received from friends in the past few
months, and wrote down passages that i wanted to remember, to think
about, to believe. i feel like i say this too much– i don’t want it to
lose meaning through repetition– but thank you, dear friends. i want
to transform the word “thank you” into something beautiful, so you know
just how much i mean it– into tiny periwinkle flowers and butterflies
on the subway and warm brownies and laughter that makes you cry and
funny college photographs and inside jokes that never die and the sweet
tiny hands of babies. so know that’s what i mean, when i say: thank you.

one of the passages i copied down is from a march entry that i had printed and saved from jessica beck’s journal. jessica, i hope you don’t mind that i’m sharing a bit of yr beautiful soul here:
***
i feel like the wispy aftermath of a dream. i would like to feel alive
and wholly present. but maybe we’re all looking for the same thing–
who we are, the something that makes us real.

and even when we’re certain, we aren’t.
****

last night i bought a new pot of moisturizer, and as i put it on my
face, i slowed. i relaxed. i breathed in the soft, flowery smell. and
then i realized that the scent reminds me of the rose lotion my
grandmother (helen) used to keep by her bedside. when i was little, i’d
sleep in the other bed, and i always put lotion on my hands before
turning out the lamp. i felt so safe, knowing she was just one bed
over, and i would fall asleep to the rhythm of her breathing. last
night i laid down and wished my heart would beat to the rhythm of her
soul.

***
in my journal i also included this great quote from a recent email sent to me by the fabulous and much beloved katrina july:

“dammit you are a pain in my ass!”

i know. and you love me anyway. t.h.a.n.k.y.o.u.