As Requested by Amo... or, how I found out I'm stronger than I ever knew

It's been a long time since I posted, cause you know... sometimes things get ROUGH. And when you're in the middle, you know nobody wants to hear the story yet. It's hard to even tell it because it's unfinished. You're in the bleak and you haven't yet learned the blessed lessons of the dark. But now, now I can see my way into the light. I'm not quite there but man, there's gonna be a brighter day (about this time next week, give or take a couple of days).

I'm moving. I know, I know... the last post was all about how I loved my neighborhood. And I still love this neighborhood. It's just the neighbors I'm not crazy about... specifically, the six-legged neighbors. About two months ago, the roaches started. I've got a mixture of German and Brown Banded cockroaches that have taken up residence in my apartment walls. No matter how many times I have tried to evict them, they still refuse to leave. I have resulted to open murder, hired professionals and in some cases, genocide-like warfare. Still they hang on.

So, I got out of my lease. I'm tucking my tail, packing my things - and only my things - and leaving. I'm heading about 3 miles North, so technically, still East Dallas. But, a better leasing company with a great reputation. I'm super excited, as you can imagine.

But I learned some things about myself in the midst of trial by roaches:

1. I can totally survive on the one meal a day I microwave at my office. The apartment has become a food-free zone. I'm sure this will change when I have a functional kitchen again, but it's a good exercise to live on less.
2. I have too many things. Too many things for roaches to crawl upon. So, in the process of packing, I have gotten rid of probably a third of my belongings. Thank you Goodwill and East Dallas Freecycling.
   
3. ...and probably most stunningly, I've had to take a hard look at my sense of entitlement... how many times I have cried out that I don't deserve to live like this. But - why not? What makes me better or more deserving of living without calamity?
   

Certainly, I don't want to, nor do I feel convicted to stay in the apartment with all of its excess tenants. That's not the point. But, maybe I can take with me this bit of humility. Surely, the three or four cockroaches I kill nearly everyday are not the worst thing I could experience. It's bad. And I won't soon forget these past two months... but ultimately, this is something I can and will live through, and something that will not alter the path of my life.

and further... I get to see most wonderful friends this weekend.
I get to hug necks and take zany pictures and love on friends I haven't seen in far too long.
does anything else really matter?

Brighter days are ahead, my friends.

I live in East Dallas.

Everyday I walk down streets that take me back in time.

tree-lined lanes that look like this:


it's like something caught up out of a dream
a movie set from a place that only exists in memory

Libby and I stroll down these streets near dawn each day and it's a blessing. It's nostalgia and hot cocoa and apple pies cooling on the windowsill. It's a dream and a wish held together and these kinds of neighborhoods aren't being built anymore. It's more than the clapboard and columns, the sidewalks set in off the road. It's wholesome and it makes me feel safe. I imagine the tenants feel safe, too. safe, and proud.

I live in a two bedroom apartment in a building out on Gaston and it's nothing like these - but I get to share in all this neighborhood offers because it's mine too.

This past week there was a murder in my neighborhood.
And I guess I share in that, too.
I share in the grief and the shock and the feelings of violation.
Aghast that someone could take the life of a harmless eccentric old man.

I understand maybe a little more why some of the homes are barred, though I'll always wish it didn't have to be that way. The truth is that simply because it's east doesn't make it any less dallas. and while one block looks as whimsical as Victor between Munger and Colette, the next block's homes have suffered unholy surgery; chopped into four and five unit apartments, unkempt and showing their age. and always the homeless are among us.

but it's such a great metaphor for all of us, I think - and that's maybe why I love it here so much. Parts of all of us are like a dream of something wholesome and sweet and homemade. and parts of all of us have been violated, or have aged without care. I'm in this neighborhood. I'm in the streets and the hillsides, in both the rotting clapboard and whitewashed window boxes full of pansies. I can see that even the most abandoned of homes was at once hope for the best life imaginable, a place where home and family and a piece of the american dream was all anybody ever really wanted anyway. It's caught up in the bones of these homes - good strong homes that will continue to line East Dallas long after I am gone. They whisper to me... that the dream is still alive.

...in which I am corny and talk about thankfulness and The Neverending Story

I suppose it's mostly during the rough times when I stop long enough to think about how good I've got it. Sure there have been a lot of tears and scary nights recently - but mostly it boils down to a lot of near misses and even though we've taken some hits, it seems most if not all of them will heal - given the right amount of time and treatment.

some things I'm thankful for, in no particular order (and by no means a complete list):

• I've got GREAT parents. Okay, okay - Dr. Spock or whatever parenting expert you want to poll might have frowned upon a few of their "unorthodox" methods and no they didn't always do everything right - but they're mine and I love them and I wouldn't trade a day I get to spend with them.
  
• my siblings are pretty keen, too. We don't hardly ever see each other and there are like a dozen or so years between me and them - but differences in time zones and age don't negate care. We've had more good phonecalls lately then I think we have in the last several years combined. ...and I like that. I think I'll try to be better about making regular calls to my brother and sister - 'cause I think they're pretty amazing individuals and I think maybe we're finally old enough to bridge some kind of substantial relationship.
• This day. Today, the people I love are still with me. I have wonderful and brilliant friends. I'm relatively healthy, as are those whom I love. and as long as these things remain true, each new day is a gift I want to hold out just for a moment and admire.

It makes me think of that scene near the end of The Neverending Story:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2noq4itRq3Y

...where the empress holds out the one remaining grain of sand, all that is left of Fantasia. Each day, each moment when all of our hopes and dreams are still alive - when the people we love are near - each moment is locked up in that glistening grain of sand and we hold it out and we build from there. If I have these things - I have all I need. I have all the world and all the vast possibilities in my open hand.

a poem

somewhere there is a poem
to inspire me
to breathe
this simple involuntary act that seems to require
so much effort
since the rains came

poem take my hand and teach me
the rhythms of getting through
the steps to cross over
a dance so holy as to rise above
take flight
take on
all the demons facing us
and fling them back to their
unearthly home

poem build in me a fire
whose embers will last
through this unyielding winter
flames to lick the sky and
laugh at its chill
enough smoke to signal some hope to those
who wait for our safe return

poem I know it's a lot to ask
but you have done it before
and I know
I know
together
we're gonna make it through


***

What I'm reading:

The Hunger Games
and
Catching Fire

by Suzanne Collins

2010 - no regrets

I know you've got a little life in you yet
I know you've got a lot of strength left...

These years, these days that pile upon days - they're hard on all of us. hard on me.

but today is a new day and a new year and I'm trying to start something. and maybe start something by ending some things. I know I'm being cryptic, but it's my right... if you know me, I'm sure you can imagine some of the things I could end and be better for the ending.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JYxc5ftEzg

It's probably difficult to understand how the above link can be an anthem for new beginnings, but I think it talks a lot about regrets. We all have them, regrets about relationships, about personal goals unfulfilled. I don't want them this year. This year - I want to do right by me.

...All the things we should've said that were never said
All the things we should've done that we never did
All the things that you wanted from me
All the things that that you needed from me
All the things I should of given but I didn't

I want to say and do what I need to this year.
In some ways, I want to take my own hand and do what I need to do
for me.

...and perhaps allow myself the freedom to let go of some things - so I can grab hold of of what I need. I'm standing on the cusp of a new year, and I've got a lot of strength left.


What I'm reading:

The Bookseller of Kabul
by Asne Seierstad

my nativity has six wisemen

my nativity set has issues. It's a wooden stable with plastic figurines glued inside. The shepherd broke some years ago so that only his feet and a small patch of grass were left in the manger scene. Broken off at the legs is a tough way to go... and no amount of glue could reassemble feet to legs (as witnessed by the oozed and now solidified glue stuck to the once attached legs of said shepherd boy). You'll be happy to know I have pried up the patch of grass and feet and now my manger scene is shepherdless.

Joseph became unattached from the stable last year. Intact, but removable - in case Mary would like to try it on her own. But, assumedly raising the Son of God is not recommended as a single-parent activity.

I have various animal figurines that are actually several sizes larger than the human figurines, so Mary and company are either all dwarfs, or the animals in Bethlehem are freakishly large. A three-legged sheep watches over the baby Jesus. A large three-legged shepherdless sheep.

There are six wisemen. Three are glued within the manger scene, watching over Mary's shoulder as she watches over the babe, and three (sized extra-large) stand outside with their camels, also extra large. I post them because perhaps little extra wisdom (or at the very least a little more gold) might help us all.

All this to illustrate something... perhaps that it's easier to accept and find room on my countertop for a mixed-media manger scene (Oh little plastic Son of God), than to actually find room in my heart for Christmas this year. I used to be a real fanatic about the Jesus stuff. Got more Bibles than any one person really needs. and I can beat myself up pretty well when I think about losing the faith... but here in my kitchen/living room on the countertop bar next to my foot-and-a-half tall pre-lit Christmas tree is a plastic metamorphosis. a momentary revelation. and maybe my religion is as mixed up as my manger these days - but I have a feeling that plastic Baby Jesus has a little grace for me.

So, I'll keep plugging in the small naked light bulb that is supposed to be coming from some star over the manger. And I'll think about Christmas and faith and the kind of room needed for all representations of the love and peace and joy we all want at the holidays and throughout the year - no matter what or whom we believe in. ...or even if we don't know, anymore.

Dear plastic Baby Jesus, is there hope for us yet?
I hope so.

I want to ride my bicycle!

I have that song - you know the one - Queen, Bicycle - stuck in my head. It's been there since I left work yesterday to pick up the old Schwinn Suburban from the bike shop after a near complete overhaul. I guess I should have expected that since all the parts were original and the bike is a 1970s dinosaur. But what a pretty dinosaur she is, and I can't wait to take her out for a ride. But - it's raining. again. And so she waits by the door... calling to me... and I tell her... soon...

In other news, I'm looking at a comparative/contrasting study on Black poetry with the theme, mother. The first poem I chose was Langston Hughes, The Negro Mother. Then, Gwendolyn Brooks, The Mother. .. I'm looking for more - but these two are a really great start with incredibly conflicting and moving lines. I need at least one more from the Black Arts period ... and then I need to find a few contemporary examples to round out my little study. I'm reciting these poems for my class on African American Poetry. The class lacks the structure typical even to undergraduate (let alone graduate) courses, but is otherwise not completely aggravating. If you're interested in what other poems I find, hit me up and we'll talk it out.

The orange juice lifestyle change 2009 is still going strong. I've lost more than 15 pounds in about 5 weeks. I'm excited - and I can't wait to keep losing more. woohoo!

oh, and yes - I'm completely unpacked - or at least 95% there... found the kitchen knives! ...and I love the new place - I should post some pictures. I want to do that "week in the life of me" photoblog that I've seen others do... I should rock that next week - we'll see what happens.

for now - Mr. Raincloud, please go away so I can ride my BICYCLE!