In the secret space of dreams

This post’s title is from “Attics of my Life” by the Grateful Dead, a song that will forever remind me of a very poignant and emotional time in my life, coming up on its 20th anniversary at the end of this month.

Next year, as has been well-publicized in the past couple of days, will mark the 20th anniversary of the Columbine massacre, and while I needn’t point out the obvious, as this blog will live in cyberspace indefinitely, I will: this past Wednesday, Valentine’s Day, saw another massacre at a high school carried out because a young man had access to an assault rifle. This time it was in Parkland, Florida, which happens to be the home of one of my oldest, dearest childhood friends. I contacted her as soon as I heard the news, and she was on her way to the school to pick up her daughter, who survived the carnage and was barricaded in a classroom.

Conflicting reports list the number of shootings at schools since 2018 began and the number itself, in the double digits, is irrelevant; one is far too many.

Somehow I managed to inure myself to the other incidents that took place, and that is on me. It took emotional proximity—a term I learned in the aftermath of the Bataclan attacks—for me to really react.

Not something I’m proud of, but something I understand.

When will the madness end? When the NRA stops buying politicians. When gun owners and enthusiasts recognize that gun violence prevention is NOT about the abolition of the 2nd Amendment, but rather about updating it so that its intent bears some semblance of reality to what is possible and impossible in 21st Century America. When the children of Parkland and other afflicted schools turn 18 and exercise their rights to vote.

Maybe.

To the victims and survivors of this and all the other mass shootings in the past 19 years, I am sorry. I am sorry that I don’t always pay attention. I am sorry that of the devastating number of such incidents, only a handful really stand out for me: Columbine, Sandy Hook, Aurora, Pulse Nightclub, Parkland. I pledge to do much more than hope and pray. I pledge to vote responsibly and to encourage others to do the same, to support affected communities if and when I can, and to not let this issue fall to the wayside. I pledge this as an activist and as a human being. This should never happen again, but it will. And to quote someone I read today, who’s escaping my mind at the moment, while I am not necessarily optimistic that this incident will be the one to turn the tides, I am hopeful. I am hopeful because of the strength and grace and determination of generations of future voters.

A friend asked me the other night why I keep this blog, what purpose it serves for me, and I really appreciate this question. I think the answer is manifold; I keep this blog because it keeps me writing, for one, and because it forces me to organize my thoughts. It forces me to try to put them into words, and in so doing, to really crystallize what I feel and think and why. When I started it, coming upon five years ago, it was a way for me to manage an intensely transitional and uncertain phase, which has always been difficult for me—for most of us—and at the time I felt as though I were writing myself out of a rut. And then, as I mentioned a couple of posts ago, I realized that talking about my stuff was a way to connect to others who are going through stuff, and that was richly rewarding. I am a connector—it is difficult for me to have superficial friendships because I need to talk about things. And I like to hear people’s stories and, as I said last time, to help and support if I can. So this blog feels like a tangible manifestation of the emotional connections I strive for on a regular basis. There you go, AG, that’s why I write this. Thanks for making me think about it.

Hug your loved ones if you’re a hugger, think warm thoughts about them if you’re not, never go to bed angry if you can help it, apologize for your missteps to yourself and those you hurt or inconvenience along the way—but do NOT apologize for being imperfect—be kind to strangers who don’t seem creepy, be gentle to the ones who do, and remind yourself that all that is certain, as my friend said yesterday, is this very moment. Nothing else really exists. So make this moment matter, and if you hit snooze, make the next one matter, or the one after that. We are living in a fractured world, and we are all lonely, and we are all connected. If you are reading this, I have love for you. Unless you are an NRA-funded politician or a white supremacist; if you are, I have faith that you can change. But that’s up to you.

 

Just like starting over

“Writing in English is the most ingenious torture ever devised for sins committed in previous lives.” -James Joyce

Granted I’ve not tried to write much in other languages, but this book writing thing (did I mention I wrote a book?) can be maddening. Maddening! And yet so many books get written and published and a fair amount of them are really good. How do these people do it?

I’m in the mountains celebrating Father’s Day and then taking a few days to, as I keep saying for some odd reason, as it’s not an expression I’ve ever used before, “bang out my revisions.”

I saw a friend last week who comes to town a couple times a year and he said, “Wait—weren’t you working on revisions when I was here in December?”

WHY YES, I WAS!!!! And then, based on those revisions, I needed to copyedit, which led to further changes. Then I submitted my draft to my editor and my writing group and my beta readers and more revisions stemmed from that … and so on and so on and so on.

I found a metaphor for this today. I love metaphors. Not in writing per se, but in life. I took a longer walk this afternoon than I’d set out to … this is a hilly walk and is decent exercise and exercise is something I wish I loved more than I do. It’s a walk where, once you reach a certain point, it’s silly to turn back, you might as well just keep going up that road and take the long way back—you’ve gotten this far. So I kept bargaining with myself that I didn’t have to do the whole thing—I just needed to do something, which is my general approach to exercise. I would turn around once I got to the bend in the road, which I could see many steps in the distance. Only I’d never get to the bend in the road because once there I’d realize it wasn’t a bend, it was the suggestion of one. So I could never really catch up and I had to keep going. And that’s what this revision process feels like. I’ll revise until I finish this draft, only once there I realize the draft isn’t finished after all.

However, I want to move on to new projects, and so I must finish this one for the time being. In so doing I will start pitching to agents—in fact I already have begun this process, and it is a long and arduous one that uses a very different part of the brain than the writing does and a different part than the revising and maybe I should go back to school and learn a trade or follow a new pursuit?

But since I’m not going to do that, I’m going to “bang out” these revisions, continue my agent research and querying, and move on to my next writing project.

I don’t make New Year’s resolutions, but I do set goals at other times of the year. This feels like a starting point. My goals for the second half of 2017 are: to become a better writer, to read more, to spend less, to finish revisions (for now) and move on to the next thing, to purge a bunch of stuff that is cluttering my apartment and mind, to meditate and exercise regularly, and a whole bunch of stuff that I don’t want to put on record.

Happy Father’s Day, y’all.

When autumn leaves start to fall

And just like that, summer is the stuff of distant memory. Much as I love the beach and need the sun, this is traditionally a good time of year for me, a fruitful, productive time. It’s the back-to-school mentality combined with the fact that we’re in the last quarter of the year (I had a conversation with a tax attorney last night; I’m thinking in quarters), and by year’s end I’d best have something to show for the preceding 12 months. The holidays-birthday-New Year trifecta is one of taking stock, so I tend to cram an awful lot between October and December.

Autumn and winter can be cozy seasons – my experiences from this stretch of time are among the strongest of my childhood memories.

I’m taking a respite from drinking booze for several reasons, most notably that it bears mention that I’m doing so. It’s not the easiest thing I’ve ever attempted, but it’s not always as difficult as I’d anticipated. It turns out there are many people in my life – people who I’m used to going out to dinner and drinks – or just drinks – with – who are perfectly happy to take a night off here and there. And that’s incredibly helpful in this process, though I find that even on the nights that I’m out with someone who is having a drink or four, any craving I have is fleeting. A momentary, wistful admission that their glass of Malbec would beautifully complement my entree. Someone told me recently that, physiologically, such cravings last a maximum of 20 seconds. Ours is such a culture of immediate gratification and of all the conveniences that afford this immediacy that we don’t often allow this theory to manifest. I don’t plan to never drink again, but I needed to hit reset, and in so doing my goal is to not rely on wine (or the occasional martini) as I once did. To actually adhere to the maximum I’ve often set for myself and ignored. So much of the drinking I and the people in my life do is by rote – breaking this pattern is something many of us don’t do until we feel we have to.

I think I’ve mentioned that I’m sleeping much, much better lately. Not waking up in the middle of the night once the booze wears off. And vividly dreaming, though that could be the Melatonin.

During this self, social, and anthropological study I’ve realized a few things.

• This city is full of incentives to drink – until you decide to take a break you don’t realize how many half-price-Mondays/unlimited-Mimosas/Cosmos-with-your-manicure/Happy Hours abound. Le Pain Quotidien now offers Happy Hour from 4 – 7pm every day. Le Pain Quotidien. Yep, the bakery where my mother buys her favorite multigrain bread now has Happy (Three) Hour(s).
• Restaurants instruct their servers at dinner and, in some cases, lunch, to ask, “Can I get you anything from the bar, wine, beer, a cocktail?”  The power of suggestion.
• Drunk people can be really annoying; conversely, annoying people and things don’t bother me as much when I’ve eliminated the elimination of reaction time.
• Drinking things out of stemmed glasses is nice.
• Restaurants ought to offer more nonalcoholic choices; ginger beer should be ubiquitous.

Much more to say about this but I’m running late for Pilates. Turns out the running-late thing is a preexisting condition that has little or nothing to do with how much wine I drank the night before.

Cheers!

I’m only happy when it rains

Well that’s not entirely true, but there are times that call for torrential downpours and this weekend is one of them. I have a lot of purging to do, literally and figuratively, and a rainy day would allow me to sit in my apartment without feeling guilty that I should be soaking in the waning days of summer (it’s still summer until the 21st and perhaps a bit after if it chooses to remain so), boxing up decades’ worth of books and photos and clothing and mementos whose significance elude me. It will feel really good to do this; it will be a start in the myriad steps I must now take to become the right version of myself, the one I’ve been shirking for 43 years. The one who relies on old pain to justify defensive reactions, on fear of my feelings not being validated to spew them in the most vicious and verbal way that I can in order to be heard. My childhood was a long time ago and it’s time I caught up to that reality.

And so I have begun taking some very important steps – and very scary ones, in some ways – as my dear L says, “learning to take care of ourselves first goes against everything we’re ingrained to believe” – or words to that effect. And she’s right. I’ve been called selfish, I’ve been called irresponsible, I’ve been called worthless – and those are some of the accolades – but the fact of the matter is that I’ve spent an awfully long time putting the needs of others – or what I perceive to be the needs of others – before my own. And so when my efforts to be needed are met with resistance, 43-years worth of frustration and loneliness and the absolute irrefutable “knowledge” that no one will ever really see me as I am or understand me as I want to be understood manifest in a torrent of ugliness that only a time machine could fix.

Mistakes I’ve made, many throughout my life and far too many in recent weeks, and while I do accept full responsibility for my actions, I have limited choices as to how to proceed now. I can apologize – and I do – with every cell of sincerity in my body. I can beat myself up (figuratively) and chastise myself and hate the little girl who rears her ugly head as a grown woman and says and does things she’ll forever regret. I can also breathe, deeply, use some of the breathing exercises a wise woman taught me this week, and I can begin to heal. I can learn from my past regrets and make what may seem like empty promises to never repeat certain behaviors, but until my final day on earth I will not know that I’ll never be “that bad” again. I certainly intend not to be – that is my goal. I can live in the present and pray for the future. I can accept my solitude because assigning fault or blame to it is fruitless; this is where I am today for reasons that are too complex for WordPress.

I can pour my vast stores of emotion into love and tranquility for myself and for anyone who enters my life from here on out. This is what I can do. I can not change the past, I can only embrace the present and strive for a better future. As I’ve said recently, I am pathologically optimistic (and yes, feel free to insert other ways in which you deem me pathological here). This is why I “ignore” signs that shouldn’t be ignored, and this is why I get myself into a terrible state where I ruin days and nights. I’m very, very tired of living this way.

In keeping with the poem I posted the other day, here’s another from Mary Oliver, which I’ve posted before. I know she’s not everybody’s cup of tea, but these words helped me once and they will again; I just have to learn to bear the lessons in mind and to stop sabotaging my life and ignoring the truth. If someone is hellbent on vilifying [you], no amount of repentance, explanation, or love can help. It’s time to move forward, hard as this may be:

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Too cool to bluff

I was having one of those if-not-for-Lou-I-wouldn’t-leave-the-house mornings. One of those thank-God-there’s-no-cafeteria-for-me-to-sit-alone-in days. A sort of bad mood/existential crisis hybrid. You know what I mean.

But because my dog is so needy I took him out (I kid, I kid, he’s not the needy one) and it was delightful! The neighborhood is very smiley and friendly today – and now I have that line from Scarlet Begonias in my head – and I had a lovely conversation with a French bulldog owner who said of Louie, “Oh my God – what a fox-monkey he is!” At the bank I ran into a woman who used to live in my building – the stunning, tall, ambiguously European blonde who flirts with my boy friends and spends a lot of time unabashedly naked in the locker room at Chelsea Piers – and we had a really good conversation about the neighborhood, the building, and the aforementioned locker room. I didn’t bring up the full-frontal thing. I came back and bought three barstools from a neighbor who is about to move to Amagansett – which sounds so perfect I couldn’t ask him about it for fear of getting in my car and driving east and never looking back.

And now I’m here.

I’m also in the process — several of us are — of saying goodbye to an old friend who is very close to the end of his earthly days. I have lost a lot of people – close and distant – and that is because I have loved a lot of people. Not in the romantic sense, in the soul sense. In the recognizing another’s intrinsic beauty sense. It sucks. It hurts like hell. But I’d rather be someone who loves too much than someone who doesn’t want to love at all. I think I would – I don’t know because I’ve never not been this way. I had this conversation with my sweet new friend/brunch partner yesterday, that as challenging as it is to be someone who walks around with her heart galloping ten feet in front of her, and who throws herself full force into her friendships and relationships, we would rather know that we’ve shown all of our cards and lived authentically reaching for what we want than build walls and wonder what might have been.

But I digress. Our sweet Phil is leaving us soon. I’ve known this man for 20 years and he is part of some of my strongest and greatest memories in that time. ‘Tis better to have loved and lost.

Thank you for reading this. I mean it.

Here by the sea and and, nothing ever goes as planned

Some merry prankster has taken to writing the words “Bad Luck Spot” in chalk on the street corners by my house. Thanks, buddy. I’m way too superstitious for that. It’s a bizarre little enclave Lou and I live in; the gas station down the road has been temporarily usurped by an “art” installation – there is a white picket fence around it, a few dozen metal sheep, rams and lambs (are these one and the same? I do not know) grazing on astroturf, and a man in head-to-toe black holding a clipboard. The man is real. Maybe the grass is, too. The farm life is definitely not.

This has been a week of things not-quite-going-as-expected: shifted plans, chance encounters, interesting strangers. Today I escorted a visually impaired man to the Verizon store, where I was headed as well; this is the third or fourth time I’ve had occasion to do this. Once it happened while I was fortunate enough to be visiting Paris, beautiful, magical Paris; a blind woman asked me to escort her out of the metro. As we’ve established, I’m afraid of heights and, much to the dismay of anyone who’s been to an airport or shopping mall with me, terrified of escalators — I much prefer the stairs. This was one of these metro stations with a fifteen-story vertical escalator, and the woman grabbed me and asked for assistance just as I was bypassing it. I couldn’t summon the French for “debilitating, irrational fear of moving stairs,” and so I clung to her for dear life and made petite-talk for the 12-minute ride. It was all at once a good deed and extreme sport.

A friend used to tease me that my greatest fear would be riding an escalator without mascara. Which is ridiculous; I’d be fine with just eyeliner. 

So … I might be published in the New York Times! Yep. In the past couple of days I’ve submitted a question/complaint to the Social Q’s column and a found haiku to Metropolitan Diary. Hey, a byline’s a byline – even if every grandparent-of-a-precocious-child-who-takes-public-transport gets one in the Diary.

I am learning a tremendous amount, this year, about how to live in this world. And, as I’ve said aloud to a couple of people in the past few days, my life has been infused with a lot more color than it used to be – in my decor, my wardrobe, my experiences and relationships. What a difference it makes; I spent April 2011 – April 2012 in a series of casts for a fractured scapula (look it up, too tired to explain); because I was x-rayed regularly my cast was changed regularly, and the day I opted for a fuchsia one instead of the standard bone-white, my mood improved dramatically. You learn a lot about human nature when you spend a year in a cast – particularly how intrusive strangers can be. I can’t imagine seeing someone with a broken bone (or black eye or gaping wound) and asking for an explanation, but an amazing number of people NEED TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED!!! At first I would explain, in painstaking detail, my official version of events, but I soon learned that if I just said “accident” people would seldom ask me to elaborate. I also learned in that year to type very quickly with one hand (insert obligatory internet porn joke). 

Alright then. I had intended to write about something entirely different, had been thinking about it since this morning, but here by the sea and sand …

Buenas noches a todos. 

 

 

Addendum: I have always depended on the kindness of strangers

 So this one, obviously, is not a lyric. 

My good day was ruffled a few hours ago, and then it redeemed itself. I was running late due to a miscommunication – typed conversation breeds confusion – and when I got to the train I was asked repeatedly to swipe again; swipe again at this turnstile; too fast; swipe again. I don’t do “flustered” well and I walked in a circle, tried again, and got the same behests. 

Reply hazy, try again.

I watched helplessly as one train, then another, passed me by; I’m not the turnstile-jumping type. I went to the booth and handed the booth-gentleman my card; he did whatever it is he did and said, “This card hasn’t been used since September 19th.” I waited for him to go on, realized he was the one waiting, and said, “I haven’t used it since then!” “What have you been doing?” he asked. “I’ve used another card.” Another train roared through the station and he said something I couldn’t hear. “I’ve been traveling?” He shook his head and asked again how it is that my Metro Card hadn’t been used since the 19th. 

I’m ashamed to admit that I don’t use public transportation as often as I should. It’s not a hygiene or a safety or a mingling-with-the-masses thing at all. It’s that … actually, maybe it is a mingling-with-the-masses thing, but not because I don’t want to do so, because I’m not very good at it. I’m not good at rushing down the stairs, at balancing, at keeping a poker face no matter what’s going on in my head, at finding my way around my hometown. If it’s doable I much prefer walking, but truth be told I spend way too much money on taxis. 

So all of this is swirling through my head while the man’s admonishing me and trains fly past.

“You’re going to have to buy a new card,” he yells.

“Okay!” Another train is pulling into the station and he’s saying something else I can’t hear, though he must realize I’m getting agitated about my thwarted efforts to get to 34th Street. I could have burst into tears and probably looked like I was about to, out of frustration as much as anything else. A young woman who’s been watching for a bit snaps at him, “Stop being so hard on her!” and offers to let me use her card. “I can’t give it to you,” she says, “But I can get you through the turnstile.

By this point it had been about 15 minutes since I was supposed to be where I was supposed to be, and it was fruitless. I thanked her, cast what I’ve no doubt was a pitiful look at the man in the booth, and went home with my tail between my legs. 

Travel snafu and aborted plans notwithstanding, this young woman was lovely to me in a ridiculous moment when I just needed someone to be lovely to me. 

The point of all this: despite what our parents warned us, do talk to strangers if you might be able to make their day a tiny bit brighter. 

I’m going to make a concerted effort to become more comfortable with the MTA.

That’ll show him. 

My sole intention is learning to fly …

According to the internets I might have that lyric wrong, but the essence of the two versions is the same. Learning to fly, finding one’s bearings after being set adrift. It’s hard to do, and accepting this is the only recourse for beginning to heal a broken heart or beaten soul or combination of the two. The process is exhausting and there are regressions along the way, but if one has some semblance of determination, the powers-that-be will reverse what’s seemed like a spell of misdirected punishment and the world will be brighter.

Despite all my foibles and missteps and temper tantrums, I think the people who choose to stick around know that my love is boundless and my loyalty fierce. I do have a fair amount of people in my life, and this is because, for whatever crazy reason, excellent people have come my way. I’ve met plenty, plenty of toxic people along the way, some of whom have disguised themselves as knights in shining armor and all-weather friends, and as such I’ve had my spirit broken many times. But through it I’ve held onto a faith that comes from some mysterious source and I’ve not given up on the universe. I can’t. Otherwise, why am I here? I’ve accepted the fact that mine will be a hard-won happiness; I’ve walked through deluges and spent years in foxholes and I’ve raged and rebelled against a world that’s at times seemed hell-bent on watching me suffer through life. But I’ve gotten back up, licked my many wounds, and struck out again to make mistakes and continue to fight for light and love. Because, I think, you don’t get one without weathering the other. I guess I’d rather keep battling because the moments of beauty, tranquility, and bliss are brighter and more powerful than one thousand demons could ever be.

When I was a kid I thought the song “Torn Between Two Lovers” was “Torn Between Two Leopards”.

Third time’s a charm:

I wish I could show you, when you are lonely or in darkness, the astonishing light of your own being.

I do, and I mean that for all of you.

Why can’t we be ourselves like we were yesterday

Traditions are good. Last night we sailed NY Harbor for E’s birthday, something we’ve been doing for … five years? Six? I haven’t updated that number, but it’s a lovely event whose guest list morphs with each passing year. I am honored to always be included and was especially honored to be given the opportunity to blow the captain’s conch this year.

No, that was actually weird.

In addition to not being able to ski or ride a bicycle, I don’t know how to whistle. I’m not sure that skill would have helped with the conch blowing, but I imagine it couldn’t have hurt.

Two days ago I had a meeting with a writer whose screenplay I’d read and critiqued. It was a little terrifying at first – I’d not met this man, though I know his husband for many years. The writer would be a hell of a poker player – as I went through my notes he watched me, almost expressionless, and his resting face is not one of joy. Because I doubt myself WAY more than I should, what ran through my mind was the notion that I’d completely misread his work and that he couldn’t believe he was having to listen to this blithering idiot who claims to be an editor missing the point entirely.

Not the case. He walked me out, thanked me profusely, and wrote a lovely follow up note about how helpful my ideas are and how excited he is to work on the next draft.

I suffer from the self-doubt my father has described as, “Every day I wake up and think, today’s the day they’re going to catch onto me.” I know that I’m a good editor, and that sometimes writers don’t like to be edited. I know that I’m a decent writer when I understand the assignment. But as B and I have discussed, we write because it feels like the only thing we can do, and we fear that every decent sentence we string together will be our last. That’s another reason this blahhhg has been good for me – I can string together shoddy sentences and I’ve no choice but to try again.

When I feel I’ve done something wrong, I have a hard time accepting forgiveness. This happened this week in a way that brought me back to big-long relationship with musician (not the wandering minstrel); I was told repeatedly in several ways that I was “ruining [his] career”, by not being involved, by being too involved, by making introductions and suggestions, by not making them … ultimately, it’s hard to ruin another person’s anything, I think. But having grown up (and you know how much I love my family, but I was not an easy little one – way too emotional) being reminded that I “ruined” every meal, conversation, vacation, celebration … it’s taken me a while to completely eradicate that mindset. And so I take criticism to heart in a way that is not at all productive. What I need to do instead is to get back on that bike I don’t know how to ride and carry on, because regardless of how I’m perceived, my intentions are almost always good. Some months ago I was the “victim” of rumours that are simply not true, and I flipped out. Not how everyone would handle it, but I can’t change the past. I’m filled with paralyzing regret about this incident, and I need to move forward. I’ve thought about apologizing to everyone involved; however, not everyone involved cares enough about me to see my apology for what it is, and so it would likely fall on deaf ears.

Need to keep moving forward – now and forward are all we’ve got.

Thanks for a lovely evening, Erika! Happy birthday and many more to one of the best friends a gal could have.

Dream a dream with you

This was a lovely weekend that began with music and included a trip to the ocean, a movie, and the requisite tears and laughter. Friday night we went to the pier in Hoboken  to see Wilco and Bob Dylan; there was an opening act followed by the cloyingly named My Morning Jacket, who are good musicians with unmemorable music — to me, that is. Apparently there are many people who disagree, as scores of fans were singing along. To each her own, says I. It took me a while to wrap my head around Wilco, despite the fact that I’d seen them play several times — I’m a good friend — but now I absolutely get it. They’re fantastic performers. (I’m such a good friend that, loathe as I am to admit this, I took a dear friend to see Dave Matthews many years ago as that’s what she wanted for her birthday. I’m sorry.) And Bob Dylan was excellent – clear-voiced and strong and we were close enough that we could see his blue eyes.

A few days before this show, a person I know who is undeservedly arrogant took great pleasure in telling my friend how much Dylan was “going to suck” and that he had it on good authority that the man is a hopeless junkie. This took place in the same room where I had the following conversation with a former friend a few years ago:

FF: What are you guys up to?

Me: We just had an amazing night – we saw Paul McCartney at the Apollo!

FF: I’d rather stick needles in my eyes.

Be that as it may, you pseudo-arrogant twit, what is it in your DNA that makes you derive pleasure from shooting down other peoples’ excitement? Or from trying to break their spirits? Can you – any of you – imagine saying to someone, “You’re going to Cancun? It’s going to suck.” “You’re dining at Babbo? That place blows.” “You got into med school? I’d rather skewer kittens on knitting needles!” It’s the opposite of schadenfreude, which, as we know, is the phenomenon of deriving pleasure from the misery of others. This is about deriving misery from the pleasure of others. Baffling.

Less baffling but quite irksome: people who spend the duration of a live musical event – or any event, for that matter – watching it through the screen of their SmartPhone. The uploaded concert is never as good as the event itself. Nor is the photo of the sunset. I take photos – I have some beautiful ones of the sunset in Montauk – but I do so pretty sparingly so that I can be in that elusive moment to the best of my ability. This Friday is the annual birthday sail for my friend E. One of the guests who usually attends (but isn’t this year, I’ve just learned) tends to spend the two-and-a-half hours of the trip photographing, tagging, and uploading. There’s a  feeling of  “if you can’t prove it it never happened” to this behavior. I love photos – I miss film, I love my digital camera. But unless one does something with them, makes a thing of beauty out of the evidence, capturing seems a poor substitute for experiencing.

Why am I so ranty today? I’m actually in a good mood.

Another thing. I really wish people wouldn’t walk their dogs off-leash in this town. The proliferation of off-leashers and the advent of the Citibike is an ominous combination.

[/rant]

I know that for some of us, this moment is less than ideal. I know about the singularity of heartbreak and the feeling that it might never get better. I know about walking out on the street feeling entirely vulnerable and about never knowing when the tears might sneak up and fall without your being able to do anything but stand helplessly by. I know about the only solution being the problem itself, about pleading with the gods that the other person just open his or her eyes and see what seems so very obvious, and about waking each day with the sinking feeling that we’re right back where we started from. And, dear L, I know about walking headfirst into a situation that we absolutely know just can’t yet (yet!) be what we want it to be, and that has caused us pain and sadness, but that holds some sort of power we feel incapable of resisting. And I know how fruitless it is when people warn us not to do what we’re going to do anyway and worse, when they judge us and get mad at us and give up on us. I will never give up on you, sweet girl – on any of you, for that matter. I can’t fix it, but I can promise you with everything I have that you are not alone. And that, if you allow yourselves to have the faith that’s been challenged so many, many times, it will get better. In the meantime, know that I am here and that I want to be the best I can be and I want you to do the same.

Love yourselves.