I think we need a break. It's not you, it's me...

I miss your sexy little curves
the way you're so sensitive to my touch
God I love you in your sleek little black ensemble
and the noises you make are enough to make a girl
jump right out of her seat and to your side every time

But this my love, this is just too much.
I start to dream of your sounds, just ringing in my ears
I envision myself pressing all your buttons just right
and we go on for hours until you're out of battery..
Oh how it devastates me when you turn off for the night

I know there are others, but they don't know me like you do
they don't know all the things I like to do
or who I talk to at odd hours of the night.
They don't know my preferences for black and never white.

Why can't I leave you alone?
I'll admit, I am obsessed.
It's like when you're in the room
no one else exists

You are no good for me, no good at all
but you're ringing louder and louder
oh dear God, please answer my call.

I forgot my phone as I was leaving my apartment a few days ago. I was carrying five bags of presents down two flights of stairs and into my car wearing a lovely dress and snow boots. I guess the phone was a minor detail. I remembered that I had forgotten it about a mile away from my house and decided that perhaps it was the Universe’s way of telling me to disconnect for a little bit.

Last time I tried to do that I went to this cabin in Wisconsin with no reception on my phone and on the drive back to the city I got a voicemail from a journalist at NPR who wanted to interview me about my response to the 20-something article New York Times came out with. Hopefully this time no one called from the New Yorker after stumbling upon my blog for a one time spot in the next issue or anything.

So I didn’t have my phone (I still don’t have it) and I can’t help but feel so present and in the moment. I’m not standing around mid conversation with someone a slave to the beeping on my phone telling me I have a text message or playing chess while I could be listening to real people around me.

It’s been good to be with people and wholly fully be there. Present and center. I start to think about how I need to change my relationship with my phone. I should turn it off more. I should put it away if I’m with other people and instead be present and in the moment. Why is that so hard?

I start to rethink how much power my phone has over me in waking life. Any message could be a missed opportunity to meet up with a friend who is in town for one night only or maybe that cute boy I met the other night has finally decided to call.

Then I realize that nothing is more important than being here now. This break with my phone has been good, somewhat accidental, but good. That is, if no one from the New Yorker called. :)

My Life as a Bear

My grandmother will be 90 years old in June. She was telling me this over the phone yesterday and I could sense her fear of turning 90 and thought about how many steps her feet have taken over the span of her life. I thought about her growing up in Cuba and Spain, getting married and having a family then watching her only son leave his country. I thought about her moving to a whole new world in Miami – leaving her country behind too.

I asked her if she ever wrote. She said she didn’t much anymore and I told her that she should write all the lessons she has learned in her 90 years down. I was hoping to someday read them and learn about my great grandmother curing colds with fresh eucalyptus leaves or about a country brewing with revolution and then struggling with despair in the aftermath.

I think it’s human nature to not know what you have in front of you until it’s not there anymore. Youth is fleeting. I keep thinking that and trying to convince myself not to waste any time and then I feel exhausted from thinking about all the things I should be doing with my life like returning to Miami, building my own legacy professionally, listening to my elders’ stories more so not to lose my own history… I start thinking about how tomorrow isn’t guaranteed and why I am not living the life I need to be living now?

I may feel like I need a pause from the madness of the unimportant things I give significance to only to realize that nothing else pauses. That while the bear wants to go into her cave and hibernate during the winter there will be a different forest in the spring. The winter may have killed away some decay, some dying trees and the newness of fresh buds and baby insects buzzing await outside the cave. Life does not give one the luxury of pausing so that you could figure out its purpose. It’s a forest of challenges you to keep moving out of necessity. The only option is movement.

I am an animal, always. It will always come back to me being that bear in the woods responding to her environment. Animals don’t have existential crises about the meaning of life – they see a branch in their path and they move past it, they track their prey and they eat, they meet someone and they mate. They take what they need to survive and then they procreate and die leaving enough of this world for their offspring to enjoy for generations to come.

For now, there is no rest, there is only movement. Eyes focused on my prey with the vision of a better world for humanity’s offspring in my mind’s eye and I take the leap.

Rooster alarm clock or the dancing deer sweater? What says I love you more?

Have you noticed that you are feeling more stressed out around these “relaxing days” more than other times of the year?  The crowded shopping malls, the angry shoppers perusing useless crap that no one would buy any other time of the year.  

Then there’s the annoying Christmas music reminding you that if you haven’t found so and so the perfect gift by now you are running out of time.  You must be thorough and consider all possibilities because she might really like that horrible sweater with dancing deer on it and of course your mother needs a new rooster clock to replace the one you got her last year. 

I don’t hate the holidays.  I’m not trying to be a Grinch or whatever else the media will call me for not buying this consumer/product love fest as the answer to the U.S.’s economic problems but I always figured that the point of these times was to hang out with loved ones have some time to appreciate what you have within your family, friends, etc.  It should be a celebration of love and taking time to see what matters but instead we’re like little monkeys looking at the T.V. screen to see what shiny new thing to buy.

Instead, I’m rushed and exhausted by walking past the gray faces on the bus as my tired shaky arms carry bags full of God knows what for people.  Why are we choosing to do this to ourselves?

I had dinner with a friend the other night and he was telling me about how this is the busiest time for a couple of his clients.  One owns a funeral home and the other is a psychiatrist.  It makes me think we have this thing backwards.

I’ve noticed that the holidays are so much less about the point.  It’s become this huge consumption oriented time of busy-ness that just distracts you from feeling what you feel, from reflecting on the year, on what you liked, what you didn’t like – things you’d like to change, things you’d like to remain the same.

In my family, the presents are the least favorite part of the night for me.  It’s the games, the food, the drinks, being with my family that is the primary joy on Christmas day.  

Cheers to those good times!  

I've gotten very good at saying my goodbyes...

It’s always greener on the other side of the fence because you never see the little termites destroying the decaying wood or the mass hornets’ nest right above the hammock.

There is a heavy weight a heart carries in being the one to leave.  There’s a great responsibility and duty to oneself to speak your own truth.  Caring for someone means walking away when you can’t give them what they need or want from you.  It’s not so easy on this side when you wake up with giant hornets looming over you and look across the fence and think: well sure those weeds are taking over the lawn a little but at least they don’t have this. Yet you know the resident who lives on the other side of the fence would love nothing more than to face the dangerous hornets head on just for a chance to lay in your hammock alongside you.  But you’ve only got room for one now, don’t you?

You just got tired of wondering if there’s enough bug spray to last you both, or if you should be worried that he wants to sleep when you feel like rocking the hammock back and forth like a child on a swing.  Or worse, packing it up and leaving because the world needs one more explorer and one less day dreamer swinging on a hammock.  In full disclosure you mention the termites’ ability to eat through the decay of your heart where there used to be room for two and now there’s only one chamber left.

You worry because you only brought your backpack with enough supplies for one and the nights can be long and cold and you’ll only resent having to share.  You worry because you never wanted to hurt anyone and suddenly every action feels as though it’s weighed against two hearts, one of which not your own. 

You leave.  You always leave armed with your backpack and your one-chamber heart still pumping fast and warm.   You bid goodbye to the hornets, hammock and fences because you’ve been practicing your goodbyes and you’ve gotten quite good at them.

Makeshift pathways lead to here or maybe there...

There is something I need to say and I just am not quite sure what it is yet.

Till then I am full of joy and happiness and excited about the uncertainty.  One chapter has ended and I am staring at this beautiful blank page that separates the chapters in a dream almost waiting for the next one to begin.  It’s not waiting so much as being present, in this blank page where suddenly my eyes are playing tricks on me and images appear or maybe it’s a book with pictures (which it is because I’m writing this book and I like pictures).  I am losing myself in this imagery that represents where I came from and this path I walk, not sure where, wondering.

Blessed be this day.

The boy, the bus stop and me...

She had a moment while sitting on a bench waiting for the bus.  One of those moments that twinges on those lost memories at the beginning of a long love affair: the flirtation with ambiguity, the naivety of her youth, the newness of every single little freckle on her lover’s body.

She didn’t run to catch the bus today and instead waited.  She had forgotten to look around all these years because she was running after the bus and now she waited and wished she could sit there all day in the winter’s brisk, fresh snow just to watch. 

She had played the game so well these past few years.  The city looked like a handsome boy smiling and turning away only to look again and smile at her while her face blushed so bright she couldn’t help but smile back.  He would never speak to her though.

All of a sudden she was eighteen years old again, new to this city, these buildings like these giant enigmas filled with strangers.  The pigeons on the street peck at crumbs under the lights on Michigan Avenue.  She is enamored with each begging squirrel, each lingering look from a stranger or the ones that shift quickly by hoping not to be seen.  She is in love.

She is faced with uncertainty all of which is surely leading her away from her lover, Chicago.  The city: the one who nurtured her sweetly in all those bars she nursed a whiskey or a broken heart, in all of those apartment buildings and alleyways.

The city: the one who showed her through mazes of endless streets, brick buildings, steel bridges, wrong directions on the way to finding someone, maybe something new today, maybe herself.

She kept an array of little notes friends and lovers had written her from stupid drunken conversations to times of desperation. They seemed so insignificant at the time but they were like the pigeons now, another extraordinary ordinary moment she’d forgotten to notice.

Her drawings were gateways to periods in her life.  She sat in the living room of her mind remembering the friends that had come and gone, the neighborhoods she had known so well.  They were little snippets into her history – like playing a song from your childhood that would leave you uncertain as to Now’s time and place.

She didn’t get on the bus and instead went back home.  She put on a record and began the process.  The cardboard boxes each categorized so neatly: Kitchen, bedroom, books, bathroom, office…  She sat sorting through drawers and putting new labels on the boxes: Christopher, 2809 N California Ave., Summer ’06…and each item in the box was a familiar pain to the heart, a tinge of anxiety then release, like a needle entering a vein delivering instant relief.  She knew her anxiety hurt her more than the prick of the needle.

She took a deep breath and found a vein pumping her blood back to her heart.  She plunged the syringe into herself of too many late nights, loves lost and friends loved and began to feel the relief. She let go and allowed her tears to rinse the blood off her arm.  Her work was done here.  

I'll lock the vagrant winter out..

and lock my wandering in...

"Pruébame" Dijo el Veneno

"Puébame" Dijo el Veneno

"Try me." Said the Poison

This is familiar territory

Butterflies wreaking havoc

In the pit of my stomach

Suddenly I’m reverted to

Being a 15 year old girl

And I swear I giggle like this

On a regular basis

I’m too old to have a crush

Because I know better

Than to like your eyes

Or quote the words out of

your pretty little mouth

to my friends

Words beyond an auditory sense

they don’t stream a straight line like logic

but rather float a pretty little cadence

I think I danced to it

At least I did in my head

Damn butterflies look so pretty and free

But I swear they hate me

Their precious wings

Just flap so delicately

In the lining of my stomach

I am riding this rollercoaster

Up the creaking metal rails on a wooden frame

And right before the dive

There’s a bright flash to blind me

Photo will show me on this day

Dumbly smiling happy

with my eyes closed and arms raised up high

way over my head

God, I hope you never read this blog….

Winter Warrior Status: Survivor - 25 years and counting

When it's winter in Chicago, everyone feels like a warrior - you can see the warpaint on the red faces on the street.  Everyone battles the cold just to get on the bus or get to work.  Everyone goes to war the moment they step out of their homes.  They put on their armor - the long underwear, the gloves, the hats, the coats and scarves.

The enemy is tricksy (Gollum voice).  He (clearly Winter is male) is cruel with his ferocious winds...he limits the daylight to only a few hours a day because he prefers you live in darkness!  All the better to defeat you...

This is your enemy. Look at his "don't mess with me" expression...he will leave you defeated and huddled at home over a heater ALONE.  

He is this giant beast that keeps all of your friends fearful -  hiding in their apartments instead of at your birthday party or dinner party.  All your work events become dependent on the weather - it is this fickle enemy that will either take it easy on you or make you wish you were never born.

Yet, staring out my window at the gleaming bright snow, I don't know that I could survive anywhere without a cold winter.  It's a time a reflection and seclusion in a way.  You realize what's really important to you - what will pull you out of your seclusion for battle... You learn about yourself.  Do you take the easy way out?  Do you rise to the challenge?  How strong is your will?

We in Chicago tend to be like bears...hibernating indoors until the flirtation of warmth pulls us out.

Winter is a time of scrabble, movies, chess, close friends and family, making art, playing music, reading, tea,  cuddling, hot chocolate, baked goods and such and such.  It makes you feel all warm inside sometimes.

But then you remember the ugly beast outside your door and like in any war, you prepare by doing things like:  stocking up on canned foods, extra armor and weapons of war (extra space heaters, blankets, ugly wool socks, gross shoes you'd never wear any other time but are entirely justifiable during the winter).

So here's a toast (Baileys is justifiable in your morning coffee during the winter - you've got to stay warm) to my fellow brave warriors in the Midwest.  Godspeed.

Sometimes I suck at dating.

I know it’s hard to believe.  Well, this wasn’t really a date persay, but I had kind of wanted to date this guy eventually because I liked him.

So I had a few drinks and was talking to this gentleman for quite a while.  He seemed really sweet and didn’t mind me talking about dead babies at all so in my mind, it was going well.

It was close to 2 a.m. and so I asked him if he’d like to go back to my place to make some art because I lived so close to the bar.

He agreed.

You’d think making some sort of move to show that I was interested in him would be easy for me considering he’s coming to my apartment.

I'm sure he was thinking I was just as weird as this guy thinks Liz Lemon is...

WRONG – I am like the Liz Lemon of dating – I somehow will find ways to screw something up even when it’s “in the bag.”

We get to my place what do I do?  I go and get my easel and markers and charcoal and instruct him to work with the charcoal while I work with the markers, and oh would he like some tea?

Charcoal, Jen – seriously? 

I don’t think he actually thought I was serious about the art…

It’s late.  We are tired.  So I ask if he would like to watch a movie and he says he would love to.  Okay, good…movies are good, there could be some cuddle action…maybe a kiss. NOPE!

 Another great potentially romantic moment ruined by yours truly.

First of all, I put a documentary on about coal mining.  Really, Jen, COALMINING?!? That’s real sexy.

Then while he’s sitting on my loveseat to one side so I can sit next to him and I step over him to sit on my other couch.  

This time I actually realize I screwed up and am thinking okay, you can still salvage this…just go sit next to him, Jen – it’s not so hard..just go and sit next to him.  Five minutes later I’m still thinking about how to maneuver this incredibly complicated action and finally think: Too much time has passed.  You made your choice.  You have to stay here now.

Naturally he falls asleep.  Why?  Because it’s 4a.m. and WE ARE WATCHING A DOCUMENTARY ABOUT COALMINING!!

I go to my bedroom and fall asleep.  The next morning I wake up excited thinking, okay today’s a new day and he slept over so we can grab a bite and some coffee and talk some more only to awaken to find that he’s gone.  FAILED!

I finally turn my phone on to a nice text message that says it was great chatting with you and hanging out blah blah blah…but one of those that just means that we’ll probably never do that again.

Men are like chess pieces...

but I still love them.

The deeper into the game I get, the more real life examples I see of why it’s imperative to understand the nature of the game. 

Chess is all about strategy.  When I play I think of all the great leaders throughout history like Ghengis Khan and Machiavelli.  You will always have your pawns that help position you; the powerhouses like the rooks, your unexpected secret weapons like the knights and those who just beg to be crossed like the bishops.  How you play them is what matters; really – how you set the stage for the next thing to happen that’s important.

Lessons I’m slowly learning about dating from chess:

1. Be deliberate.  This means being strategic about what you’re doing and having a sense of what your next moves will be.
2. Learn the basics.  You can’t do anything advanced if you don’t know the basic rules that apply. 
3. Make every move count.
4. The Queen is the key protector of the King.  The Queen possesses all the power and can maneuver every which way.
5. Know your opponent – never underestimate your opponent.
6. PATIENCE.  The game of chess takes time – sometimes games last hours. 
7. Kill your opponent until he is dead