Fluid Pudding

Two weeks from right about now, I will look exactly like this:

On the morning of the 26th, I’ll be having oral surgery, if you know what I’m saying.*

Also, I quit my job. #2021CRAZYsexycool (It’s okay. More freelance will surely come along, and after the 26th I’m going to be looking for something that takes me out of the house. Locals with suggestions? Feel free to shoot them my way.)

Let’s see… I ate bread pudding in the dark last night. (Bread Pudding? Always soft, and always available at the 24-hour drive-thru bakery.) That’s about it.

*I’m saying I’ll be having oral surgery. They’ll be robbing skin from Peter (the right side of my mouth) to pay Paul (the left side of my mouth) and that’s all I want to say because Dear Lord. I’ll have stitches, so it’s going to be a soft food diet for three weeks. Vodka is soft. Also, doughnuts.

When I was trying to write short stories, every single one of them took place during the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day. This week holds potential. Can you feel it? (You can. You might not recognize that feeling, but it’s there.)

What have I been up to, (I pretend) you just asked?
Let’s see.
Here’s the fun stuff:

I did this for about three minutes because a friend dared me.

Then I did this, and I always hate photos of myself, but I sort of like this photo because I’m digging being bald and EVERYONE looks good in black and white. (Sometimes I wish I could leave the house in black and white. Oh, wishes…)

I’ve been knitting.
This will eventually be a scarf that will triple (or quadruple or more) around my neck. Until it becomes a scarf, it will be half a pair of (crotchless, I guess) sexy wool pants!

This shawl is part of the Cast Off 2020 kit from Three Irish Girls, my favorite yarn dyer. Every day from December 17th until December 30, I’ll be opening a tiny package that contains a tiny skein of yarn that was dyed to honor someone who died during 2020. So far, this shawl shows (from bottom to top, if you’re curious) Jerry Stiller, Alex Trebek, John Lewis, Sean Connery, Kenny Rogers, and Eddie Van Halen.

Also, I knit a hat, and it makes me feel like a little magic might happen.

I hope you’ve been well. A lot of people I know have experienced some truly shitty things over the past month, and sometimes everything bubbles up and explodes and life feels sort of dismal. Please let me know if I can do anything for you.

The cranky guy next door put a Coming Soon sign in front of his house a few weeks back, and last week he filled the side yard with a gaggle of men carrying hammers and drills and lunch boxes. For five days the air was filled with the sound of banging and whirring and damnits and shits and now the house has an opening that wasn’t there before! More Doors = More Opportunities!

Meanwhile, I’ve been watching a squirrel as he carries sticks and leaves from our yard to our pine tree, where I assume he’s building a house. He’s been working very hard, and it feels like all of the back-and-forths would be tiring for a squirrel, so I’ve been helping.

I know putting these leaves in the tree for him screws with the balance between man and beast and will surely lead to him losing all of his squirrel skills and then he’ll start begging for money, but as so many people say: We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it!

As I packed some leaves into the tree this morning, I noticed a hole in the yard. I’m pretty sure the hole is filled with murder hornets because that’s just the sort of year it has been, but just in case it’s vacant I want the word to get out that it would be really nice to have a groundhog as a tenant.

I’ve placed a sign.

So now we wait.

The goal was to write every day in November, but I took yesterday off because as some people might say: I wasn’t in a good place. SO, I punished myself by forcing the failure of my goal. Sounds crazy? It is! Maybe someday I’ll tell you all about my history with self-punishment, but today is not that day because today I want to tell you these things:

1. I’ve been taking Vitamin E because I heard it will help fade mosquito bite scars. So far, it is absolutely not working.

2. I went to Trader Joe’s last week and I couldn’t NOT buy the Nuts About Rosemary Mix. Every time I open the can, I think about my friend whose mom’s name is Rosemary. I also think about How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying because of this.
Sadly, these damned nuts are not only delicious, but they’re also a migraine trigger. Life is so uncertain.

3. Now that the election is over, my Facebook feed is starting to fill with people judging others for putting up Christmas tree lights too early. Damnit! I say: Unless you’re wrapping your lights a little too tightly around the necks of street urchins, hang those lights.

4. My therapist is trying to work with me on Confrontation and my (mostly unhealthy) avoidance of it. As a result, every single time I feel like disagreeing with someone, I don’t. And then I feel shitty because my therapist is in my head saying, “Speak your truth.” BUT, this is my truth: Unless your (often unsolicited) truth has knocked me down and is kicking the shit out of me, I can walk away from it. That’s the nice thing about having legs and choices.

(Side note: I’ve been having this dream lately where I can’t walk. I try to walk, but it just hurts. By the way, nobody wants to hear about dreams.)

5. I always laugh to myself when people talk about their truths or their journeys. I have no idea why I think those phrases are funny (overuse, maybe?), but I do.

Today is a good day for everyone who voted for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.
I know it’s not such a good day for those who didn’t.
(You probably know that today is a good day for me and my family.)
((A few of you also know that I have never said the words President and Trump together. I never will. I will also never say the words “National Treasure” and “Mariah Carey” together.))

The next few months and maybe even years are going to be rough, but I also know we all want what’s best. Some of us just have a different idea of what “best” means and how to get there.

I hope I live to see the day when things don’t get ugly during election season. The past few months have been shitty.
More importantly, I hope I live to see the day when Every American is willing to fight for Every American without exception.
Also, the day when Every American is supportive and welcoming to those who are trying so hard to become American citizens.

Let’s make the best of this, regardless of how the day has gone for you.

(Full disclosure: Four years ago when Trump was elected, I was all, “fuck Fuck FUCK!” so I totally understand the people who are rolling their eyes at what I wrote up there. I get it.)

We knew it would be ugly.
It’s ugly.
It will get uglier.

Everything keeps happening, and a lot of it is just so awful.

BUT! I went to the eye doctor this morning and then I drove to Trader Joe’s where I stocked up on dried apricots and raw cheese and rosemary nuts and THEN I scored a referral for a psychiatrist AND a colonoscopy!

And you may be saying to yourself, “Wait. Didn’t she just have a colonoscopy in 2014?” I did!

I also had one in 2009! (Click the link for photos of my insides!)

We will get through all of these things. (Unless we don’t. But we probably will. BUT we also need to keep fighting. Not WITH each other. More like FOR each other.)

If you ever find yourself talking about me, and the person with whom you are speaking says, “Wait. I think I know who you’re talking about. Who does she look like?” you can use these three men as examples.

I mean, Nabokov is a stretch but the other two are eerily accurate.
Of course, as I’ve mentioned many times before, Jeff Goldblum is my doppelgänger.

And here is proof:

Oh, Election Day.

One of the few great things I’ve done in the past eight months? I found a therapist. I hadn’t seen a therapist in nearly thirty years, because:

Therapist #1:

She was super nice (although very much into molestation). The wife of one of my favorite professors. And I’m definitely not against hypnotization. In fact, I let her try to hypnotize me, but I fell asleep on the couch and she seemed a little pissed when she had to wake me up. (She released me as a client shortly after my nap.)

Therapist #2:

This guy was a therapist specializing in career counseling, and I saw him after I graduated from college while I was bagging up dead folks at the hospital. I did go out for a drink after therapy, but never with Mitchell the Therapist. (I ended our relationship less than a month after Cobain’s suicide.)

Therapist #3:
This is my current therapist, and I’m not going to draw her because I don’t want to reveal her identity. Unlike Therapist #1 and Therapist #2, Therapist #3 asks good questions and makes me talk and our conversations lately have gone a little bit like this:

Therapist #3 (T3): Your feelings are valid.

Me: No, I know, but…

T3: Your feelings are valid and your happiness is just as important as anyone else’s happiness.

Me: Okay.

T3: Let’s do a quick exercise. Make a list of the 5 people who are the most important to you.

Me: (makes list)

T3: Now, tell me where you fall on the list.

Me: I’m not on the list.

T3: (Looks at me.)

Me: I know.

I love her. She will not fix me, but she might put some tools in my toolbox and we all need tools.