Make Death Worth It

So here we are - you and me - resting, sitting, wondering about what is next to come on the platter of what is next to come.  I sit with a warm tea warming my right foot.  It's green tea, but I don't really want to drink it because I am enjoying this feeling of tired.

Today is Valentine's day.  I don't know what to write about.  In fact, I have been dawdling all morning trying to avoid writing altogether.  I made a smoothie.  Then I memorized all the ingredients on the special powder I used in it.  I checked my email seven or eight times.  I stretched my back by positioning my body upside down on the staircase.   I sat in a squat while reading the abstract of an essay about the relationship between certain pollutants and type 2 diabetes.

I popped a pimple at the end of my right eyebrow.  I made another cup of tea.  I looked through the refrigerator for cream and found three containers of sour milk products which I brought out and intended to throw away, but got sidetracked and forgot about them. 

I plucked a few hairs from my chin.  I sent some text messages.  Now, here I am...thinking about food, thinking about mermaids, contemplating dreams.

Among other things, including (but not limited to) images of stealth bombers practicing loop-d-loops in a pristine sky above a dirty beach, I dreamed a dagger was thrust into my heart.  Through the protective barrier of my ribcage, the implement entered my back with keen force, then twisted with a combination of subtlety and confidence that indicated skill on the part of the stabber.  I did not feel physical pain.  I attempted to identify my assailant, but could not easily turn around.  When I did eventually, I was met with faceless onlookers. 

"Vengeance!" my brain yelled, "Who has done this?  There must be retribution!" This was the thought, a forceful mechanism for comfort in a moment of great confusion.  It was the logical thing to do in a time of coming undone.

"Attack back!" a voice sounded, though I knew there was nothing left to defend, nothing left to save.  The humble realization slowed my frenzied movements.  For a moment I wondered if I had stabbed myself. 

I sat down in the space that was now becoming blurry, much like the physiognomies of those nearby.  Alone.  A question arose, "Now that I'm dying, what do I wish I had done in life?  What am I most proud of?"

I woke after, the sensual remnants of heart piercing lingering as I lie in a soft bed.  Why is it scary to do what I love?  Why is it scary to love?

I ask you now, whoever you may be, is it as scary for you to love?  To love yourself so much that you give yourself the gift of doing what you love?  Or loving what you do? 

Is it like that for you, kind reader?  The experiences that highlight mortality are those which so vividly illustrate the importance of love?

One of the scariest things for me (as well as a thing I love most) is to write.  So I give myself a gift today: I promise to write a blog every day for the next month.

If you have certain things you like to read, let me know.  I'll write those.  I can write you stories, or sensual encounters, I can include recipes, advice, my anxieties, yours.  Manifestos, diatribes, reflections on academic abstracts regarding the relationship between pollutants and type 2 diabetes. 

If you like I will write specifically to you, something special - not faceless - personal. 

Because - chances are - I love you.  And I love myself enough to indulge in the ridiculous universal love that is always driving a knife into my heart and demanding I do what I love most.  Today we celebrate (or don't) Valentine's Day, the marrying saint, VD, a famous mobster massacre. Today and in the days that follow, let us love the shit out of ourselves and do something (maybe it's scary) that makes death worth it.

A Speculative Guide Written While Privy to a Small Circus Festival in the French Countryside

How We Live

1.  We smell flowers.  It's a good starting place.  Soon we'll notice the delicate aromas of other things too - like grass and people and whatever happens to be riding the wind.
 
2.  We stretch.  Our faces, our lungs our inner thighs, our chests, our hands. 
 
3.  We enjoy, dance to and play music.  Singing alone counts.  Rundancing counts.  Silence counts.
 
    3a.  Play!  In play we find ourselves and in ourselves we find life.  We see the world and recognize the absurdity of purpose taken too seriously.  The paradox is this: service, political redesign, and artistic manifestation require the integrity that is built on a foundation of innovation and trust.  How do we grow these?  (see 3a)
 
4.  We eat and cook (or prepare) the best food possible - food that grows in the ground near where we live or are eating it.
 
5.  We think about bees.  We consider them.  We taste honey like it is what it is.
 
6.  We listen to people.  Especially to those six years and younger, sixty years and older.  There is  wisdom here and there are good stories.
 
    6a.  Listen to and tell stories.  Wild stories, simple stories, dream stories and sad stories.  "Mythological thinking helps us face the inevitabilities of our lives." ~Joseph Campbell
 
7.  Give.  When we do, we realize we have more than imagined.

Scrambling to Get My Pants Down in the Cafe Water Closet

The streets are wet and crowded.  I walk down them this morning pressing a nonchalant hand against my crotch.  It is a very specific position, its execution complicated because I am in motion.  The delicate dance of halted urination.  Right where the thumb meets the wrist, I affectionately refer to it as the "urethra block."  The pose in its entirety is called "Please please please please please…." because that's what I am saying every time I have to use it. 

This morning I almost made it.  It's always those last three seconds - scrambling to get my pants down in the cafe water closet, still wearing my backpack, legs shaking, face sweating, I'm so close!  I let out a little squirt. 

It's not the first time.  This dance is not unfamiliar, especially in this city.  I don't often pee my pants (and really, I just left a little dribble on my panties, which I immediately removed), but it happens. 

One time, after a long drive and 1/2 hour of desperate toilet searching in sticky July at three in the morning in Downtown Brooklyn, wearing a leaf-printed polyester onesie which prevented me from squatting behind a car without being completely naked, I leaned against a building and fully let it go.  People passed by (thankfully inebriated) and I pretended not to be peeing in my pants, which means I smiled a lot while doing it. 

In New York, people are everywhere.  A quick private pee is rarely possible with female anatomy, my predilection for one-piece pant suits, and this dense population.  Everywhere people are honking their horns, blaming each other for inconveniences, pushing, assessing status, sucking in their cheeks, competing for professional positions, unknowingly policing one another for minor social faux pas like public urination. 

The city is loud.  It's hard to sleep sometimes with all the noise.  The smell of garbage and pee is common - which, admittedly (depending on my prior consumption of liquids and the outfit I happen to be wearing) sometimes makes me a little jealous.  Rent is high, jobs are demanding, woody perennials are scarce, stars are hard to see.  So why, when I could be closer to a forest, fresh air, the naked sound of wind and birds...why, when at least once a week I am practicing the "Please please please please please" position because there are not any proximal trees offering themselves for a tête-à-tête, do I live here? 

***

Cities are people places.  Manhattan is people-made.  What makes it beautiful - epic bridges, subway systems, grand performances, universities, high-rise architecture, the 800 languages, the kaleidoscope of various cuisine, legendary visual art, sundry music, the museums, even the parks - these are people things.  This may seem a minor revelation, but when (after a noisy, sleepless night, getting stuck in honky rain morning traffic, and peeing my panties) I realized this, something in me relaxed.  I stopped resenting the decision to come back. 

Why am I here?  Because I love people.  And, on some level, be it conscious or un-, other people are here because they love people too.  I love people so much, it's hard to stop myself from trying to hug strangers...and they are everywhere.  Everyone is full  of stories and dreams that spill onto the urban landscape and make New York what it is.

But it's not what people create that make this city glow...it's them, it's us.  We live here together, stacked on one another in giant buildings, shuffling around in underground mazes, making love, crying, dancing, pooping, heck, some people are even peeing their pants on the street.  Despite stoic faces and well-built personal bubbles, we are still here, all of us always breathing at the same time. 

If I am in Love...

My birthday is a day for being alone. 

I drove through the hills of Marin county - bending trees articulated their branches across the landscape, offering gestures of conversation to the sky, providing arced resting spots for birthday vagabonds. 

Now, the moist loop, be-lichened and sweet smelling, welcomes travelers.  It gives a comfortable perch to purple corduroy.  It listens happily to an off-key rendition of Amazing Grace.  It wholly accepts an impromptu poem that began like this:

If love is space,
    then I am in love.
   
If I am in love, then so is the loneliness.  It is in love,
    with me.

***   

I ate California fruits - the waxy tang and orange cream flesh of a perfect persimmon.  I savored an avocado, grassy and sweet.  It was the best avocado I ever tasted.  I peeled it, exposing its buttery inside, biting it like I would a giant hard boiled egg, enjoying the smooth green smear on my cheeks and squish between my fingers. 

I left the grove of trees and drove down to the ocean.  Running along the surf, I flirted with a vulture, I let the icy tongue of the Pacific chase my feet with its swelling tide.  I found a large rock, stood behind it and took off all of my clothes.  A mother and her son were walking nearby, so I used a superhero cloaking device and disguised myself as a naked woman.  They couldn't see beyond the absurdity of midday November skinny dipping on a public beach.

I squealed as waves crashed against my body.  I turned to face the land, reached my arms out and closed my eyes, falling back into the water.  My bottom met the sandy floor.  I tried to imagine all the habits, addictions, and harmful patterns in my life washing away. 

***

I made my way from beach to car to winding road.  I drove to the town where he said he lived, the beautiful man I met at the desert festival.  One of the elusive spirits that stir my loneliness.

Clouds hovered in the hills and each time a dip in the road brought be below the dense mist, I discovered a hidden forest, giant trees reaching skyward, surreptitious fungi peeking out from behind their roots. 

When I arrived the sun was setting.  Population 350...Elevation 33 feet.  I began at the radio station.  The rain had started and I peered into the cozy room, lined with tapes and records and other labeled stackables.  Three people inside were singing a beautiful rendition of happy birthday to a gray-haired woman.  She tilted her head to the side, clasped her hands, and thanked her friends.  She saw me through the glass and beckoned I come inside. 

"Happy Birthday!" I said. 
"Thank you."
"It's my birthday too."  Everyone laughed. 
"Ha! You don't say.  Happy Birthday to you."

After I had left - nobody knew of my man - a young woman ran outside to meet me.  The rain was real now.  She held a newspaper above her head. 
"I love that you're doing this," she said.  "I love this kind of thing, these adventures.  Why don't you give me your name and email?  I'll keep my eyes/ ears open just in case I come across him."
When I had given my information, she hugged me, crinkling the soggy paper against my back. 
"Good luck."

***

I went to the creamery.  This town - 350 people - has a creamery.  I went inside and temporarily forgot all about the mission to find my beloved.  Wheels of beautiful cheese were stacked in the corner.  Here is the fresh white fuzz covering the triple cream...and here, over here we have the dumplings of cheese washed with chardonnay, flavored with the genius of another ambient bacterium (one, I learned, is in special abundance here, so the cheese cannot be duplicated in other areas).  Over there is the seasonal variety, a cheese made only with the milk from Jersey cows, then rolled in forest mushrooms.  And if you sample this one, mmmm, one of my favorites, your tongue will go wild with the sharp tang - almost like a goat's cheese - it goes so well with warm honey and a sprig of thyme.  (I sampled every one.)

I skipped around the gourmet shop and came across a section where local artists sell their wares.  Hats, gloves, earrings, and lingerie adorned the colorful corner.  The woman at the stand did not recognize my man by his description, but guided me to the nearby gift store.  I bought a sun hat, put on some lipstick, and wandered, cheese-belly-full out into the rain.

It was dark.  The store was so full of things it was difficult to move.  Antique relics, mood rings and figurines shaped like animals all waiting for the relevant moment to tell (or invent) their stories.  None of them had seen the person for whom I searched.

In the bookstore, I read a few pages of a book called Mycophilia and admired an illustrated version of Pinocchio.  I asked the woman behind the register. 

"Hmmm, don't know anybody like that.  Mark, do you know anybody like that?"
"Hmmm, I don't, but that gentleman," he pointed behind me, "he knows just about everyone in town.  Jeremiah, this young lady is looking for somebody."

Jeremiah turned around and stood near to me.  Our eyes met and my heart made an attempt at jumping from my chest into his.  I stuttered as I spoke to him, trying to describe the connection, the festival, the dancing in front of an old timey house on wheels where they bake cookies in the oven and a gypsy fiddling group plays on the front porch. 

He listened quietly and gazed into my eyes, periodically covered by the wide brim of my wet sunhat as I blushed and dipped my chin.

"I don't know anybody like that," he said, "but I'll text my friend.  She may have some idea."
I reached out my hand and placed it inside his.  We both stopped breathing.  He squeezed.
"T-thank you."

It was time for me to go.  I was borrowing a friend's car.  Jeremiah called me shortly after I departed.  I missed the call, but he left a message, asking if I wanted to spend the evening with him. 

A gentle fragrance, the one of sweet longing, came in through a crack in the window.  I listened to his voice.  I would spend the night with you, Jeremiah, if I wasn't so in love…

If I am in love, then I am in love with this warm loneliness.

The Antihelp Manifesto

“Provided we can escape from the museums we carry around inside us, provided we can stop selling ourselves tickets to the galleries in our own skulls, we can begin to contemplate an art which re-creates the goal of the sorcerer: changing the structure of reality by the manipulation of living symbols … Art tells gorgeous lies that come true.”
~Hakim Bey

We call ourselves “The Antihelp.”  The exposure of parts of us that want to sweep in and play rescue.  While our insecurities might be assuaged in the moment of felt helpfulness, we recognize such an approach as contradictory to service.  Ultimately, it is rarely relevant and works against creative social opening.

The Antihelp interrupts a cycle of aid that overlooks the reciprocal energetics of world systems and dependency.  We do not participate in global Munchausen Syndrome by proxy, poisoning communities so that we may eventually offer flag-bearing antidotes. We are not blinded by pity and virtue.  We play gratefully in the sweet particularity of culture and pinch one another at any attempt to fix or exploit.  We are interested in healing through inquisition, participatory governance and recognizing opportunities for creativity within conflict.

1.  Intention without direction.  (a.k.a. play).

Change is inevitable.  We stop trying to direct it.  Our efforts are not a series of superficial reactions, but arise within a container of intelligent improvisation.  We are honest about and willing to explore the depths necessary to identify and rebuild obsolete or dysfunctional structures, however, we embrace the process of exploring itself as a primary strengthener of community.

2.  Participation.

We do not play alone.  We need people to participate to build connections.  Change is not relevant unless it’s relevant.
We listen.  With our bodies, our ears, our minds.  We listen.  To each other, to our dreams, to everyone involved.

3.  A sense of humor.

We graciously accept benevolent disparagement.  If not graciously, we expect to be made fun of for reacting to it and/ or throwing tantrums.  The willingness to take the piss out of ourselves, our friends and our projects, dissolves righteousness.  We make absurd demands for laughter, regardless of circumstance.  When we are laughing more than not, all pain is worth it.

4.  Radical Inclusion.

When the uncool, the curmudgeon, the foreign, the weak, the indomitable, or those perceived as threatening ask to be involved, we spread our arms and make vulnerable our tender viscera.  “Bless your heart, you asshole, I love you!” we shout as we embrace participants and onlookers.  Everyone who understands the premises of this community and wants to engage is welcome.  No preconceptions to defend exceptions.  As long as we can tickle each other, it works.  Genetic, cultural, ideological diversity makes for a healthy party.
We love hypocrites.  Because we love making fun of them.
We dissolve the boundaries between helper and helpee…celebrating their obsolescence.
We appreciate radical inclusion as self reflexive: by treating others this way, we get to accept all the parts of ourselves we deny or compartmentalize and judge.  As we open our arms to everyone, risking our well being, we reintegrate ourselves.
We take care of each other.

5.  Wonder

wonder:  a feeling of surprise mingled with admiration, caused by something beautiful.

curiosity:  a strong desire to learn something.

We are honest with our reactions to a space, a circumstance and a people.  We have a multi-disciplinary approach to the perception of beauty.  We encounter circumstances present in the physical and social environment with awe and respect.

Likewise, we are unwaveringly committed to feeling emotional, physical, psychological sensations that arise within our experiences.  We do not deny them, nor do we silence them in others.  We marvel at individual and group reactions.  Anything that arises on the multidimentional spectrum of pain and pleasure, we meet with wonder and curiosity.  We accept the pain.  We follow the pleasure.
We learn with our bodies.
We believe in magic.

6.  Gratitumility.

Even though we have ideas about what is good for us, we meet people with gratitude for any inclusion. We recognize that when we are visitors, strangers, outsiders or aliens, the home-people dictate what kind of help we offer.  We bring the willingness (and appreciation) for being accountants and shit shovelers if that is what is asked, rather than thinking we can offer something better.
We do not identify as “community builders.”  Instead we are lucky visitors who get to participate in the reveal of what is already happening in a space.  We come with playful intention, curiosity, a sense of humor, and a commitment to work hard.
We take our shoes off when entering.
We offer help, but treat it as a privilege when it is accepted and directed.  We come with open minds and creative approaches to problems, but we do not impose.

7.  Respectful Autonomy.

We do what we want to do.  As long as it is harmless, we indulge our passions freely.   As visual artists, we make; as dancers, we move; as chefs, we cook, as musicians, we play.  When people are attracted to what feeds us, we offer them plates.
Creative endeavors such as those expressed in art, music, circus and dance bring opportunities for play, wonder, and a connection with our bodies.  We consider one question of paramount importance in any approach to problem solving and conflict resolution:  “What do we do for fun?”

Pat Benatar Does the Woods

I went dance running through the woods today.  That's when you put on some big headphones (because your ears are shaped differently than other people's and the earbuds they make for runners never stay in) and shove your iphone (which is your music because you don't have a nifty tiny ipod) in your mother's sport's bra (which you're wearing because you like it better than yours) and jog like you've just scored a touchdown...knees high, arms reaching for the sky, throwing dramatic turns and making a periodic microphone of your fist so that you might join in the epic call from Pat Benatar reminding you that yes, we belong to each other.

I did that.  I ran up the hill through a canopy of yellow leaved, bowing branches.  The wind blew hard as I made pirouettes on mossed rocks and leaned against the damp bark of autumn hemlocks.  I ran to the meadow then stopped.  A gust, carrying a dozen yellow leaves pulled me from my anthem and begged my affection.  I turned the music off, resting the soggy headphones around my neck. 

A leaf landed on my left breast and I watched others sail to the ground.  A broken mushroom cap, showing its creamy gills had been nibbled.  Nearby a field of silver acorns disguised themselves as giant beetles until I moved closer to inspect them.  I decided to walk back.  It was an abrupt transition from my superhero cavort to a quiet autumn dreamscape. 

I warmed into my surroundings, decanting myself.  The forest unfurled its scent with my attention.  Wet wood and fungal umbrellas descended in aromatic layers.  I wondered how my scent mixed with the melange and imagined myself a perfume for the pinewood.  Slow motion walking, I came to a point in the path I had run past minutes before.  Another burst of wind pulled a school of leaves through the air.  I shivered.

Above me, pinned in the canopy, a dead branch the size of my body, quivering in delicate suspension perpendicular to the ground.  The slightest breath of wind might set it free.

I knew the perfect timing of its fall could end a life or paralyze or at least cause a serious head injury.  I thought of other people passing beneath it, unaware of their momentary increased risk of death. 

I had been worrying about other things before this place found me, ways to justify my existence - how to bring the circus to Haiti, should I go to graduate school, if I'll ever finish that book, whether I should build a yurt and live on a farm or move back to the city, what logo to use on my website, etc…  Thoughts like the flailing arms of eager kindergarteners hoping to be called on when they know the answer.  When I saw the tree branch, the brain buzzing hushed. 

I walked underneath it.  I closed my eyes.

It felt like my body was possessed by ants - a crawling sensation, "Get away!  Move!  Don't fucking stand here Stupid!"  Everything in me yelled.  I could only stand there for a few seconds.

This mind in my brain thinks it's saving me.  There are always branches trembling above, ready to fall.  The only difference is I know about this one. 

"Don't wanna leave you really, I've invested too much time
To give you up that easy, to the doubts that complicate your mind

We belong to the light, we belong to the thunder…"

It's hard to feel sexy with a skank rash on my face

It's not really a skank rash - I mean, I did give a few dozen blow jobs and had the pleasure of burying my face in some delectable female delights over the weekend, but really...it's not a skank rash.

Sometimes when the weather changes I get a little crack at the side of my mouth.  My ego, strong as it is, rebels against this mild mar on my visage with a ferocity that would match that of mama bear defending her young.  I attack.

After a day or so of patience I went after it.  I rubbed it with tinctures, applied coconut oil, tea tree oil, jojoba oil, marula oil, vitamin e oil.  I washed it, put vinegar on it.  I even cleaned it with my own urine.  Gross?  Well, yes I am...and (ahem) I would risk anything to keep my poor sweet image safe and beautifully static.  When it wouldn't disappear (and, in fact, worsened - I have no idea why) I caved and used a topical steroid.  If I can just give it a quick fix, I'll be more attractive.  It's hard to feel sexy when there is a blemish at the corner of my lip.  (And I like to feel sexy).

As part of a gross reaction to steroid cream, the rash began to spread.  I didn't have to do anything except go to NYC to visit friends I had not seen in months.  Naturally, I covered the deformation with foundation.

Yes, it worsened.

Soon the little crack at the corner of my mouth had become a clown-lip, crusty yuck face.  Deep breath. 

I had to go to New York anyway.  I wanted to be beautiful.  I didn't feel it though.  It's unreasonable to feel sexy with a skank rash on my face.

Got to the point where I had to drop back into myself.  I could no longer cover it up - there was no use.  It was painful and fed up.  I wanted to crawl inside somewhere and not come out until I had healed and could again present my crust free smile.

I don't live in New York right now.  I stay with friends.  I could not hide away.  So I reached inside myself and turned it around.

I realized at any moment a change like this (or one far more permanent) could land on my reality.  Who knows, after some exciting sexual escapade I may actually contract a rash.  I may fall on my face, tumble into a patch of poison ivy, collide with a confused goose while on a rollercoaster, breaking my perfect nose (I know how you feel Fabio), I might get into a street fight with a pitbull, get hit by a car (again), piss off a leprosy-curse-casting warlock...

Would that mean I could never feel sexy again?  No!  Even with the stigma attached to a rash around the mouth, even though it's unreasonable, I decided to try, just try, and feel sexy anyway.

Perhaps sexy doesn't need reciprocation.  Perhaps sexy does not need to be validated through a whistle or a pick up line.  Maybe sexy is something felt, not seen.  While it's hard to feel sexy with a skank rash on my face, it is far from impossible. 

I walk down the street, I order coffee, I smile at strangers, I admire attractive men and women, I perform for a crowd, I flirt, I see old friends and pretend like I am radiantly beautiful.  I am full of sexy, it spills from every gesture like a honey waterfall.  Ha!

Sexy, beautiful, attractive, has nothing to do with the measly two dimensions reflected in mirrors.  It cannot be fabricated or reasoned with.  It is felt. 

I still pick at it.  I still worry about it.  I still wish it would go the fuck away.  I still daub at it with topical medicines and think twice after peeing.  That voice keeps whispering lies about how sexy and skank rash can't co-exist.  But when I do feel that way (y'know, sexy), no voice can argue with it.  It is not something seen, it's unreasonable. 

It's Velveteen Rabbit sexy.  All shabby and lumpy and worn and real...but that's another blog.