and you may find yourself in a beautiful house

does it ever seem as if your place of residence has started to feel less like 'home' and more like 'home-base'? in the last month and a half, i have spent more than twice the number of hours in the office than i have spent at home. and considering that roughly 3/4 of those where i was actually physically present within the confines of my own four walls were spent in bed, i'm beginning to wonder why i bother to own things like a t.v.. or a mother. or several cats. (no, that's not true. the last ones serve as the most accurate alarm clock in existence. 5 a.m., rain or shine, it's tuna time!) on the other hand, my most prized posessions have somehow become my laptop, cell phone, car, and digital camera, not necessarily in that order. don't get me wrong, i'm not complaining! i'm loving every second of it - well, there was that one miserable one about two weeks ago - but i'm kind of starting to feel like i'm living out of my duffel bag again. and i have to wonder.

see, i love stuff. square-shaped, pear-shaped, purple or see-through, i just love stuff. i surround myself with it whenever i can: patently useful things where the purchases are easily justified which i never actually use for any real purpose. candles and books and bubble bath for those relaxing evenings winding down after work; shirts and shoes and 3 shades of foundation for those nights on the town. i have 7 pillows on my bed right now, and 4 blankets, nevermind that it was 90 degrees today. my 'lifesize' cardboard legolas cutout is resting on a pile of clothing, wearing my cowboy hat - and a sign that says 'hey baby - 'ow you doin'?'- but i digress. my point is that i have more stuff than i know what to do with. but if i've learned anything from the last few years of feeling restless, it's that there's nothing that can't be cured by the application of a good beer. well, that, and oh yeah, that i don't really NEED anything for my daily existence beyond what i can carry on my back. and yet, that free sample of perfume i got two months ago in the mail is still sitting under six unread magazines on my desk. go figure.

but why the dichotomy, i wonder? i like to think that i am one of the most low-maintenance human beings on the planet, physically. i really don't need much to make it through the day, as long as it starts with a cup of coffee and ends in a feather bed and a down comforter. although i suppose, if necessary, i could live out of a sleeping bag for more than a week without complaint if i set myself to the task. so why do i own so many... things? where does this pack-rat compulsion come from, this need to nest? i've proven to myself many times over that i can 'rough it' with the best of civilized society for at least a night (although i will be a crabby bitch in the morning) - and yet there is a closet in the basement full of boxes of my crap that i just can't bring myself to throw away. why is it that if i'm never around, i have to make sure that home has all the comforts thereof, even if i'm not there to use them?

do you ever wonder what happens to the words that we send

We're finally cancelling our AOL account, so this morning I sent out a 'change of address' email to some of the people in my address book - the ones I was pretty sure didn't already know. I came home tonight to a reply email from someone I'd met while I was in the UK - someone I thought had forgotten all about me. (Our last communcation was 'ages ago' as you measure time in the electronic world, just after I got back, and not much at that.) I'd considered him one in a string of missed opportunities from that time - one of the ones I was saddest to have missed, and I when I'd think of him, it was always with regret. Regret that it was never the right time or the right place; regret that he went his way and I went mine; regret that I let him just slide out of my life like that, with hardly a ripple.

But it turns out that he didn't forget about me. And I think that it made him happy to hear from me. And it made me happy to hear from him. For the record, it wasn't some grand declaration of love that he sent, and, you know, I didn't need it to be. Just knowing that I meant something to him, even one tiny part of what he meant to me, and for however brief a period, is enough. I guess it just reminded me of how much we all touch each other's lives on a daily basis. And that sometimes the briefest of interactions can leave a tremendously lasting impression.

'Always glad to hear from you.'

curiously strong

You know, I didn't think I'd like these ginger altoids, but I can't seem to help myself. When I eat one, my mouth explodes and my tongue goes a little bit numb, and just like that, I'm back in London. It's early December. One of those days when I wasn't working and had nothing to do; had no clue, really, what I was even doing there in the first place. But I had a notebook and a pen, and even though it was too cold and wet to sit outside, the Books, Etc. had comfy overstuffed chairs and a Starbucks close by. And for hours I sat, and without taking my gloves off, I scribbled, and skimmed the books I couldn't afford to buy and I smelled the coffee of passers by. And after a few hours, I dug through my bag and I scraped up all my loose pennies and my ten pence coins and I decided I wouldn't eat. And I bought myself a tall gingerbread latte, my first of the season, and I asked for extra whipped cream. And, silly as it is, it was a little bit like I was home - where Christmas meant more than just decorations on unfamiliar buildings and listening politely to other people's plans with family. And I sipped my overpriced coffee, and I wrote a poem, and for one moment, I saw London through fresh eyes. And it was enough.

I wonder if the taste of ginger will always do that.

Blessings of the Season to you and yours.

uniquely american

the day before thanksgiving, and i've already told the story twice to anyone who'll listen. remember last year... remember working ten hours at two jobs, remember perpetual grey skies without even the beginning of the promise of snow, remember staring at the spot of drying vomit on the Tube and smelling turkey over the phone lines, remember choking down dry, pre-packaged falafel after everyone else was asleep?

remember how much you missed the thought of hours in a kitchen big enough to use, and the simple pleasure of flour in your hair? remember how even the family friends who always forgot your name would have been comforting, would have been something, at least, to be thankful for. remember how the day passed unremarked.

looking back, i think i've forgiven myself for feeling directionless, for seeming spiteful or angry. this year, there'll be a house full of loud and fabulous people, an assault of smells, and lights, and garish decorations. this year pumpkin pie will rub out the taste of couscous, and people who care will gently touch my scars and ask me to explain. and i'll tell them twice, about feeling lonely and empty and lost without them and about all the people to whom i owe thanks for making last year bearable.

the day before thanksgiving, and this morning coworker S. said, "you're starting to look thinner," and suddenly it doesn't matter so much that it's raining.

i write my song to that city heartbeat

i miss the exhilaration of living in the city. the comforting chatter of thousands of voices, clatter of countless cups on countless saucers, ting tap ting of metal, cooling. in the suburbs these sounds come muted, packaged in road maps and receipts from the commuter train. our trains have no whistles, and the steady clack clack that used to hum in our blood is now an electric buzz that possibly (definitely) causes cancer in lab rats. an illusion of safety.

i want the city to bleed on me, color and light and that peculiar brand of vibrant, gritty reality in grey stone and red brick, wrought iron bars. i want to soak up other people's spilled coffee and half-smoked cigarettes, make myself a receptacle for their losses, their sweaty fucks and slow, nervous disagreements. i want to always be moving.

i'm too young, yet, to be this still.

blazing a trail

sometimes i start to feel nostalgic for all the thoughts i had that i never wrote down.
i wonder what they're doing out there without me
who else they might have found to attach themselves to.
it seems to me that if life were fair
one day i'd get to meet these people
and we might call each other 'kindred spirits'
and share life over cups of coffee -
black, because we like to think ourselves severe.


i imagine that some day all of my snippets will equal poetry and my snapshots, photographs. i guess i imagine that one day all gypsies will have a place to go. but for now, i'll just keep setting off tiny fireworks, and hope they put out enough light for me to see my feet. still moving. still moving on.