Citizen Blackhole

Our enormous, gorgeous orange cat died. King Louis le Cat was 17ish and was literally the very best cat to walk this earth. I have no idea what particular sort of moronic monster abandoned him at the pound at 5 years old, but lucky for us someone did. A Norwegian Forest Cat or perhaps a Maine Coon, his size astounded all lookers and he loved, loved, loved the cold and the snow. I can almost see him now, the wind twirling the ends of his long orange hair, his huge white paws keeping him on top of the snow. He would lift his chin to the wind with a contented sigh and a smile. He also loved kids and would give a room full of five year olds his belly to rub, every time.

We'd been on "Louis Death Watch" for a few years. He had renal failure, but managed to last long after diagnosis. The night before he died, he seemed fine. He'd run across the field to the house. He'd jumped up on our bed that night. But in the late morning, I saw him laying awkwardly in Coyote's room and when I checked on him later, he'd hauled his suddenly paralyzed body down the stairs. His bodily functions released in the car, on Blue's lap and she was loaned a pair of scrubs at the vets. It was mercifully quick and by the time we got to the vet, he was barely breathing and cold. It was good that the thing to do was so obvious. I was not expecting to cry so hard that I could not drive us home. This happened only a few days after the election and it felt like the whole world was ending.

King Louis loved the garden, sunsets, kids, and cold weather

King Louis made us very happy very often

The election. Oh god. Radical change was in the air and some took advantage of it and others didn't think it was possible. For some of us, a shake up of some kind seemed inevitable, which is why I pulled so hard for Sanders in the primary. For those of us on the front end of recent economic tribulations, radical change seemed obvious and I was gunning for it to go the cohesive compassionate way instead of the crashing, bashing, smashing coup-like situation we're in now. Last spring I'd said to Huck, "I'm scared if Bernie doesn't get the nomination. (Hillary's gender was revolutionary but her style of governance appeared anachronistic to me). Revolution is coming and it's either going to be kind and democratic, or chaos and possibly violent and my kids will be the ages to get caught up in it." It looks like our new shadow president, Bannon, and I agree on something, we just disagree on what we want it to look like: Article about Bannon's WWIII fantasies.

The winter/sick days' 2000 piece time suck that is both a source of pride and shame

Since the election of Immortan Don, the Grifter in Chief, I don't know what to say to anyone about anything. Words seem pointless. It all feels meaningless. I have little faith in humans. And I don't see the point in spreading my personal blackhole around to the bright stars in the darkness that are my friends. So I've engaged very little with any humans other than my kids and husband. However, there was some thorough healthcare self-care in there as I'd met my out of pocket maximum (thanks to a huge breast lump that is graciously benign!) in October and over-filled my calendar with massages, acupuncture and chiropractics. I then came down with the entire respiratory suite of symptoms so severe that I ended up on four prescriptions, which is not something I typically engage in.  That prevented human interactions for at least three weeks. Once I dropped a gift off at someone's house and said "hi" for a few minutes. Other than that, I went about 50 days without seeing anyone, which isn't untypical in my winters. But that may have been a personal "best". Since my head injury, I am an uber-interovert, but even that was a bit much. So I'm trying to reach out more. An unhealthy isolation helps no one and does not make the world a better place.

And also, it is conversations with my friends that inspire this here blog. I often feel I don't have anything to say. Some things I'm not ready to blog about and somethings I don't want to blog about. And those are the things my therapists deal with. But with friends, we chat and joke and I don't think I have much to say, but then there's a look in their eye of keen interest. Or I tell the something I thought was mildly amusing but nothing worth writing about, but suddenly someone is laughing out loud and I think, "Oh! I have something to say!"

Someone conjectured that I was trying blog material out on them. But it's the opposite, really. It's their responses to an idea or story that help me see that I have an idea other people might enjoy. I think, "I might write about that." And then that idea shows up again and again in multiple situations and I sit down to write and it all coalesces into something that seems to me to be sort of coherent. And that, my friends, is how a blog is born.

But I wasn't hanging out with friends. And so the blog dried up.

But I'm feeling a bit better, not about the world though. I'm pretty sure nuclear annihilation is coming soon. And that the sub-oligarchy we've been living in for the past few decades will fully blossom into all-out economic abuse. And I can't fix it. I don't think HitlerII is at the helm, but I do think it's a fascist capitalist.


Between the election and the inauguration, there wasn't anything to be done, except make tear-water tea at home, alone, and try not to make the world a worse place. I tried to avoid the inauguration, staying off social media and making my morning busy, but then I was put on hold and on hold I heard, "I do solemnly swear..." It was like the cosmos needed me to bear witness, as if the USA had yelled at me, "Witness Me!"  I cried. I cried 8 years ago during the inauguration too, but for different reasons and feelings. But now with the appointment of a "fox for every hen house" (as Gloria Steinem said at the Women's March), there is something to do. And having something to do does perk me up a bit.

I can make phone calls. When Bush was president, I kept the phone numbers of each congress-person, state and federal, by the phone. And every night that I awoke in a sweat from nightmares of apocalypse, I would call them all first thing in the morning. I would promise myself that I would call in the morning and then I could fall back asleep. If, in the morning, I reneged on my promise, then the next time it wouldn't work and there'd be no sleep.

But I'd relaxed a bit in the intervening 8 years. I needed a break. Perhaps I shouldn't have, but it seemed healthy. Activist burn out is real and worth avoiding. A girl in college turned a sweatshop protest in to her own personal sweatshop, working 36 hours straight. She ended up screaming at everyone. She would not go home and she would not sleep. The foundation of a healthy society is healthy individuals. So we work on our shit, we take care of ourselves, we sleep and sometimes that has to be enough of a contribution.

But now I've resurrected the practice of phone calling. Once again I have my "representatives" numbers posted in the dining room and in my phone. And I have committed to making a phone call every day. Just one. That is my promise. That is literally the least I can do. I hate making phone calls.

my kids casting long winter shadows

It was hard to make that first call, despite it being easier than ever to find the numbers. But I couldn't figure out what to say. I asked the internet. I asked the organizations whose work I support. And got some great responses, scripts and instructions. And also, I was made fun of, "If you don't know what to say, maybe you shouldn't be calling, dumb-ass." But I catch myself imagining that I needed to write a 20 page paper on why the Exxon executive should not be Secretary of State (he is now) before I can call. This is obviously not true. It would also be a terrible idea because if I did write a 20 page paper on such a topic and then made a phone call, I would have difficulty figuring out what to say and what not to say and would nullify my whole point by lecturing their assistant for a very boring hour during which their minds would wander, and rightfully so, and they would not check the box on their form for which side of the issue this particular peon stands.

I was once a senate page, and that's what I did. Nuanced arguments could not fit on the yes/no spreadsheet before me as I, a fifteen year old, listened to irate constituents blather. Sometimes I could not even figure out what side of the issue they were on! In those cases, I couldn't even check a box.

And although I may be informed about an issue and know why I think the way I do, just picking up a phone can be difficult.  Now I write my own little scripts, trying not to spend too much time making them perfect. I'm down to just bullet points teetering on yes/no statements. But once I get it down, once I make the first phone call, it's easy. And I realize that I could just call ALL of them RIGHT NOW! And so I do. So that's at least three phone calls a day.


They say it's most effective to address 1 to 2 issues during a phone call. But everything is happening so fast and it took so much courage to make that call, that I end up talking about all of the issues on my list. It's not like I'm going to run out. By tomorrow, there will be at least 10 more issues to call about; there is this abundance of bullshit being fire-hosed in to the world and there's no end in sight. "My" senator's assistant thinks we're done and says, "Okay, I'll let the senator know! Thanks for calling." And I say, "But wait! There's more!" This possibly renders my already ineffectual little mosquito-annoying phone call even more useless. But I can't seem to help myself.

Afterwards, I can compartmentalize. I can tell myself that I did the politics thing for the day. I can move on, or try to. I can ignore the rest of the terrifying news of the day. And it seems to help. And there will certainly be more to call about tomorrow. It's the Lernaean Hydra of politics, replacing each head we cut off with infinite heads.

I'm also trying to remain calm during the calls. It's hard because this feels scary and the adrenaline flows freely. Everything seems unprecedented. It feels like we're careening into Banana Republic and one side believes in functioning government and the other side just wants its way and is willing to blow up the whole damn baby to get it. If I was Solomon, I'd know who the mother is. It's an anxious time and the typical tricks to keeping anxiety in check don't work. Usually, there's the method my friend put so succinctly: possible vs. likely. But everything here is so farfetched, so unfathomable just the day before that it's hard to parse out what's anxiety run amok and what is the sky actually falling. But I try to be calm because I don't need to spread my anxieties to every poor bloke on the phones. "My" representatives are going to do what they're going to do with my opinions and the exchange might as well be as pleasant as possible, for my sake at least.

And then there are the marches and rallies, full of energy and hope, almost more for the marchers than for our ignoring leaders. In fact, they were once such a powerful force for me that I wrote my college thesis on personal artistic expression in marches. My advisor was an art history professor specializing in Mexican art, so she got it. I got blowback from the rest of the Art Department at UW. They were under the bizarre impression that art is only true art if it communicates nothing, otherwise it's "propaganda". But art communicates, whether you want it to or not, and you better think long and hard about communicating the meaninglessness of art. In demonstrations against authority, it is most certainly not propaganda, but rather its opposite, a show of personal expression, a subversion of the conformity necessary to rule absolutely. Propaganda comes from the top down and that's not the art we see in political protest. Play and creativity are utterly necessary to every human endeavor, especially a social movement... making the road by walking it. But those are my old, academic battles. We've got a shit-ton of fresh, relevant battles to fight today.

I wanted to go to the women's march. At first. I thought, "Wtf, women's march? That seems hopelessly broad (harhar) and particularly pointless." But I began to remember my old college thesis, and part of that paper was devoted to the history of the parade, the march, a show of force. The conquering army would march through the town displaying their size and power, group chest-thumping, so to speak. It was meant to crush the rebellious soul.  And I began to realize that, yes, it would be appropriate to remind our "leaders" of how many of us there are. "Dear Administration: This is what you are up against! May your ambitions be crushed upon viewing." And then the glorious Gloria Steinem spoke. And I felt I had to go to Spokane's march (our largest ever at 8-10k people). But the day before, I'd gotten an oil change and little did I know they'd spectacularly over-filled my reservoir and the day was instead spent getting screwed over, again, at the mechanics.

But I marched for refugees and immigrants. Post TBI, it is difficult to be in a crowd. And so when Channel 2 interviewed me, I didn't make much sense, babbling, syntax errors, backing in to ideas. Plus I was wearing my light-sensitive glasses, which are never attractive. Then, when they published the written account of the video, they omitted all punctuation from my statement, no doubt having no clue where to put it, and my gibberish quotient grew exponentially. All-in-all, I was a highly ineffective spokeswoman for the movement. I will try to have a succinct and clear statement prepared before I head out into a crowd next time.

Does it work? Does marching work? Do protests work? Does calling work? A recent book claims that the WTO protests in Seattle had a huge impact in changing the conversation. The protests gave delegates from poor countries the courage they needed to stand up and be heard. It worked. A little. It seems all of our little mosquito phone calls are working now too. A little. All of our marching is helping, some. I'm fairly cynical about it all, though, thanks to this Princeton and Northwestern study: Citizens have No influence on laws passed. Thus, some of my phone calls have included off-the-cuff, unhelpful barbs like "This may be an oligarchy, but we demand that you be a bit more subtle about it." And more recently, "Is this a coup? This feels like a corporate coup."

Some reports are that all of us together have actually pushed back some of these sudden and shocking changes. Just today, phone calls ended the bill to give public lands to the states. But, as is the Hydra's nature, there's another to allow drilling in National Parks. And we lost the fight for clean water. But then, only a few of us still had had that privilege anyway.

It is heartening to see some unlikely coalitions forming under this strain. McCain, normally a nut job with terrible taste in vp's, seems to be holding the country together single-handedly.

It's also encouraging to see my fellow Americans voicing their opinions, being involved. We may not be able to stop this train-wreck, but at least I'm not alone in my horror. There are other humans, compassionate humans, here too.

Effective or not, there is still the matter of me. Can I sit idly by and let this destruction of democracy occur? I can't save the world. I can't save the country. And I can't make all of my fellow Americans get on board. But I also can't do nothing, can I? I don't think that's a position I can live with. So however illogical and ultimately pointless it may be, I am committed to making one phone call a day, at least. It is literally the least I can do without doing absolutely nothing.

Maybe nothing we do will change the inevitable, terrible outcome of humanity. But for me, I have to do something anyway. Perhaps I'm too cynical; I don't imagine I'll be changing the world. And yet, I'm still a citizen of it, and am committed to acting as such. I will raise my voice for love and peace, for the earth and all its inhabitants for as long as I have a voice. This is my solemn vow. I may not love the world right now, but I am deeply committed to its well-being. And I am not alone.

Sarajoy (not so) Fresh!

This summer, I was asked if my husband was my son. He still looks about 25, so the illusion that we are not of the same generation is clearly his fault. Also, the person who asked was 8.

This fall, as I shuffled across the soccer field, Coyote was asked if I was his grandmother.

What's next? Blue has suggested: "Congratulations on your pregnancy! You look like you've already been through menopause, so that must have been a real surprise!" I'm not pregnant, but I admit that I have extra hardcore.

Ending the garden

Then I needed my first major dental work in 8 years: crowns. I made it to 40, so "king me." Everything went wrong and it took over three hours (stretching in to two months) and we all cried. These days, they add epinephrine to the Novocaine (or whatever -caine they're using now) and this constricts the blood vessels and makes the numb last longer. But I can't have epinephrine (unless I'm in anaphylaxis from duck eggs, then I prefer it over death). The first and last time I had it, I leapt from the dentist chair and started pulling everything out of my mouth, screaming, "What did you just put in me, ohmygod! ohmygod!"  And that's how we discovered that I can't have epinephrine in my -caine. So every few minutes they had to shoot me up with more plain old -caine and it wasn't super effective.

And there was nothing to do, or think about, or look at. So I just contorted myself in pain and endured. When in unavoidable pain, I like to think about the best feeling part of my body, usually a toe, and how good that part feels. I tried to make myself feel lucky that I didn't live in medieval times. I felt grateful for our era until I remembered that I have actually had perfect teeth ripped out. I was 8. It was done without -caines. A la medieval Europe.

It started with a teeter totter accident. I'd been on both the giving and receiving end of many a cherry-bomb, but the last one launched me into the air (weee!) and dropped me on my face, messing my mouth up a bit.  It was postulated that the accident had caused my brain to make extra teeth and a multitude of surgeries ensued.

For my first bit of dental work, at 6, I was thoroughly numbed. Afterwards, my dad brought me to the library, a nice, quiet place for me to be quiet and calm. He introduced me for perhaps the first time to the children's section while he wandered into the reel-to-reel film section, looking for something appropriate for our neighborhood movie nights or possibly Sunday School. You would think a library would be a nice place for a good girl to be quiet and unsupervised, but you'd be wrong.

I'd only ever known "The Bookmobile", a bus/RV made to look like an aisle at the library. It moseyed out to our neck of the woods bi-weekly, parking in front of the Furr's house. It was fine and innovative for it's time, but it had few options, and once you'd read everything in your range, it wasn't terrifically interesting. Looking back, the bookmobile seems like an Anime character, strange and magical, and it makes me feel I'm from another era, an anachronism, a time-traveler. But this library thing, it was huge, rows and rows of bookmobiles. As thrilled as if I'd just discovered Narnia, there would be no quiet calm for me. And in the excitement, I met a friend and we jabbered despite warnings that I not talk with my mouth numb as my teeth wouldn't know to avoid tongue and cheek.  But it was all so exciting! Also, I met a computer for the first time and my friend and I played a lemonade stand game.  But the numbness and the talking were not a good combination and by the time I got home, I'd chewed the inside of my cheeks to ribbons and blood was pouring from my mouth. My mother was pretty irate at everyone involved. So the next dentist was told of the horrors of over-numbing my mouth, so he ripped out my canines without anything. My mother was pretty irate at everyone involved.  

My mother finally settled on a good, Christian dentist, one who believed in the merits of judiciously applied pain-killers, to guide us through the process and yet the psychological damage was done. Once a year, tipped back in his beige chair, something small would set my little self off and I would bolt from his office, a quaint house in the small town of Ferndale. I would run to a little Hallmark-y gift shop and hide among the crystal figurines until my mother would return to the dentist office, be informed of my escape, and find me in town.  It wasn't as if I literally thought, "I should run off and cause problems for these people!" I simply thought, in a very smart yet reptilian part of my brain, "FLEE!"  When we moved across country, the dentist gave us the tome of my complete records. Half the width of the folder was due to the many apologies my mother made me send him. 

Mouth: work in progress (hair, face, clothes too)

I have tried to suppress these memories. I do meditative breathing and distract myself with the sumptuous fullness of my big toe. But sometimes it all comes back, my true feelings invade, aiming to steal my sanity, and make me FLEE again.

So I tried laughing gas for the first time this fall. At first it felt so incredibly good, I worried I'd orgasm on the dentist chair, thus bringing to life the worst nightmares I've ever had.  So I sat up and screamed, "Turn it off! Turn it off!"  They dialed it down a bit, but instead of feeling happy and giggly, I got really really sad. So sad that I cried. So sad that I came to deeply hate the maple tree outside the window, leaves turning red in front of my fucking face. Bitch. How dare time move forward like this! How dare the seasons turn so blatantly AT me! I have been crying a lot at the turning trees, especially the one that tumbled off the back of a school bus, but that day the sad was so unbearable it turned to hate. Apparently, everyone reacts to "laughing gas" differently, they said. And I either felt way too good, or was capable of killing an entire office with only my soul, there was no in-between for me. I was so sad, I made everyone in the office sad. Even the dentist. I saw the light in his eyes go out; I made it go out. I've heard that dentistry has the highest suicide rate of any profession; if you're not a sadist, you're just going to live your life knowing that you are everyone's worst day. You are worse than Mondays. You cause pain and everyone hates you. No one thinks of their teeth when they don't hurt; the gratitude doesn't last. Your face is the face of torture and phobias and huge, unwelcome bills.

As I laid in that chair for 21 hours straight, thinking about my big toe, I forgot about all of the other parts of my body and how to keep them in line. I have a faint recollection of my right shoulder shooting for the bathroom while my lower back tried to get out to the parking lot. My body could not agree on which direction it was fantasizing about fleeing in. By that afternoon, my contorted back left me nearly unable to walk. I couldn't move all weekend. So I went to the chiropractor. It was during these weeks of shuffling about, every step causing deep, scarring pain, that I was accused of being Coyote's grandmother.

My massage therapist randomly mused, "I should have gone in to dentistry, that's where the big money is at."  I said, "I'm pretty sure that my dentist wishes he'd gone in to massage therapy at this point." Then he hit a surprise alarm button in my gluteous maximus, and I was pretty sure I'd rather be at the dentist.

Then I somehow got a gig doing a commercial for a grocery store chain. My audition must have gone well on some level because I got the job, but it was also a train wreck prompting my "talent agency" to offer a free class on how to do auditions. I knew I'd flubbed the technical aspects of the audition with my complete ignorance of common acting terms. I was told to do my "slate," but just stood there, trying to figure what that was without revealing that I didn't know.  Apparently the director showed my agent the clip and a class was born.

The only thing I knew heading in to the audition was that it was for a grocery store. I have no idea how to prepare for these things, so I did what I could think of: I got my eyebrows and nails done (things I've never previously had an interest in and now, at 41, have no idea how to do, so I am obliged to hired them out) and then practiced being pleasantly surprised by reasonable prices. But when I got there, I discovered they were going for an emotional connection and was told to welcome my son home from war. And so I imagined what that would be like and in less than a minute was hugging, clinging, and clawing the poor stand-in, and literally crying. Because that's what I do these days apparently, thanks to my TBI; I cry at the drop of a leaf.

In this commercial/fantasy-land, my "husband" was a hard-living 65 and my son was about 25.  And my back hurt and my temporary crowns hurt. And my hair is un-dyed, which no one does these days, and which seems to confuse the world, what with my face being a freckled forty and my hair apparently eighty. Not only does the camera add 10 pounds (this is true!) it also apparently adds two decades, but only to women. Despite a little sadness at playing a 55 year old, it was a thrilling experience with some rushing high's: I made a camera man cry with my acting and the director kept yelling, "Can we get more of that gorgeous hair in the shot?!"

And then Blue started Driver's Ed. My daughter is taking the wheel and the metaphor couldn't be more apt. I am in the passenger seat for this beautiful, last thing we do together. When I first got her, she didn't even know how to move her arms. She crapped herself dozens of times a day. We taught her to walk. We taught her to eat with utensils (not that she ever uses them). We taught her her first language (although it made me sad to limit her in this inevitable way... training the brain to hear a limited range of sounds). We taught her to ride a bike (it took 3 years).  Certainly there are other milestones in our future, but this feels like the last of this type.  And there she is, behind the wheel, steering herself, navigating through the college parking lot on a Sunday, Security having been duly alerted by a concerned and observant citizen and following us with their high beams on. It's a beautiful baton pass. But this forward plunge in to the future is accelerated by the fact that she started college this year too. I wasn't expecting that. And the leaves are turning. And the parts of me that do not include my hair and my teeth and my back, feel too young for this parent/child rite of passage. But it comes none-the-less. Hold back the autumn. Hold back the crimson from the leaves. I know what comes next, the leaving, the winter.

Driver

I had a vision of myself at 95. I appeared much like a woman I saw when I was 11, visiting my great grand parents in a yellow-hued North Dakota nursing home. She lingered in the hallway outside their room, hunched in her wheel chair, wiggling the fingers in her lap and chanting, "Knit one, Pearl two." I was told she thought she was knitting, the yarn and needles all in her head, which I thought was sort of nifty. You get to spend all day doing something you love and no one gives a shit if it's real. But I saw myself in that wheel chair, in that dim-yellow hallway, an imaginary smart phone in my hand, scrolling through an imaginary facebook feed, turning to my imaginary friend from time to time and saying "Look at this! Isn't that something!" And the little girl in the hallway asks her mother what I'm doing and her mother tells her about the ancient past-time of social media.

Some people say it's passe to grouse about arbitrary cultural milestones, as if their opinion is somehow objectively superior to my honest emotions.  I had a hard time with 40 and am grateful it's over now. And so what if you (or someone similar) think that's dumb. You know what I think is dumb? Trying to direct and dictate how people should feel or even how you yourself should feel. You're at where you're at when you're there. There's really no controlling it. For some, 40 is a lump in the throat, a speed bump, a time to reassess. For others, like my absurdly youthful husband, it's just another day in another seemingly inevitable year. Our interior worlds are what they are. They are inscrutable and not subject to rules of logic.  Dictating how one, anyone - self or other, SHOULD feel is to deny, to lie, to assume control that isn't there. How we feel is it's own truth, observable, real, essense-ial to our own unique being.

"The basis of all integrity is accepting what’s happening in the present moment. Fighting reality, through denial, minimization, fantasy, or avoidance, puts everything we think and do on a wobbly foundation. To accept reality, we must allow ourselves to know everything we know and feel everything we feel." - Martha Beck "The Integrity Cleanse"

For much of my life, I would ask: What should I feel here? What is best? Expedient? Logical? And then I would go about forcing myself to feel that way, to have the "right" feelings.  But what are the "right" feelings? Who decides? The "right" feelings are typically those that feel safe to whoever assumes they are in charge. The way we "should" feel is mostly just some sort of convenience. The head is easily corrupted, and the mind controlled, but the heart is where the truth of who we are lies.  And anyone who wants to tell you how you "should" feel (through shaming, fiat, any number of ways) is afraid of that truth and wants it smashed. Hell, my illogical feelings scare me too, but there's always something to learn from them. So now, I've got my heart here and it's in charge of what I feel. And my head is now in charge (marginally) about the why of it and what to do about it.  And whatever I subsequently do with those feelings, is also a truth about who I am.

There will be discomfort (maybe yours, certainly mine) with my feelings: about 40, the dentist, drivers ed and college. I am where I am. I feel what I feel. My feelings don't need to please or comfort you, or even me. They are, more or less, the essence of being an individual. And now I'm not telling myself I SHOULD be okay with the dentist, and 40 and time. I'm not. And now, now we can deal with those truths face to face. Not doing that, literally caused me more pain. We are clear now: pain is there. We know that it is unbearable; no denying that. So I used my emergency anxiety medication for my latest dentist visit, and for me it went quite well, for me anyway. My dentist, however, still has black holes where his eyes used to be. I'll used that anxiety medication again when I open the bill from the him.

A Zombie Dream Come True

I get a Sunday evening text from my "talent agency," having a "z-mergency." Zombies are needed ASAP and I fit the general criteria. Being utterly unemployed, I am available, always. At times, I will arrive on set within an hour of a call. This is how it goes for me, an always-available fill-in for no-shows and emergencies.

I arrive on location, in the far north of Spokane.Ten or so white trailers are set up in the parking lot of a defunct aluminum plant. This is a former Kaiser plant, abruptly closed when the workers went on strike and the pissy little bitch of an owner closed plants and moved operations to Chad, where he could more freely abuse the employees and environment. The place is huge and spooky. Miles and piles of industrial shit. Broken locker rooms with jackets still hanging on hooks. Warehouses with broken windows. Weeds. Dust. Peeling, rusty sheet metal. Broken ladders and ramps.  Huck, a Toxics Clean-up site manager, is very familiar with this place. It is post-apocalyptic defined. Costco would like to build on it, but the soil is too contaminated. As some point during this shoot, I will be asked to crawl around in dirt beneath old tanks. It will stink and the dust will be black. I will hope that just an hour or two of exposure will not be enough to harm me.

Ye Olde Aluminum Plante

It is raining and cold that first day. I check in and am handed a costume. It is filthy. It has a sheen of dirt, meant to indicate 5 years unwashed, that makes my whole body shiver. Later, I will watch the costume people spray the clothes with fake dirt from a can, like spray paint, and I will relax a bit. Based on my costumes, the zombie apocalypse clearly takes place in the late 90's. The pants are flared-legged; the shoes, chunky and round, brown clown shoes.

The extras have their own trailer and we sit there, waiting to be called by "Make-Up."  I'm not sure what the fraternization rules are here. We chat, but some don't want to chat. Some are zombie veterans from years past and they tell me everything I need to know.  They are reserved, though, doling out information only when asked. I get the idea that we aren't supposed to be chatting. But later, with other groups of zombies, I will discover that this first group was simply a non-chatting group, that there are no rules, there are only personal preferences. Later, with other zombies, I will learn why they were reserved: some of these people are fucking nuts, mean, terrifying, and very difficult. It is wise to hold back a moment or two, to see what you are dealing with.

Extras' Trailer

I met "L" on a different day, a 23 year old who hits on me at first. I'm fully off market (plus utterly surprised!) so I mention my kids and husband in the first sentence.  He sighs and moves on. There's so much more to life than fucking. I feel bad for him and hope he learns to relate to women as people, not just potentials. But as the day goes on, the chatter ebbs and flows, the camp chairs shuffle around the tent, we find we have lots in common. And we end up friends and it's not flirty or weird. I'm almost maternally proud of him for opening up to other ways to relate.

Blouse-zombie is a well known local actress. She's incredible and great for the crew to work with and direct. She's short and fearless and loves crashing her compact self into the ground. But in the extras tent, she's obnoxious and difficult. She's aggressively flirty and rude and demands attention constantly, even while napping. I don't hate her; I can see that this is simply how she's wired and we are a bad fit. Her need for energy will suck my limited supplies dry. A group plays Uno while we wait; each of her turns takes 5 minutes. If anyone reminds her it's her turn, she barks either that she's thinking or she forgot... it's impossible for any observer to know the difference. I learn to avoid her.  She's a net-worker and I leave without saying goodbye to the director, an acquaintance I know from our kid's extensive sex-ed program, where we were stuck in a room together for hours one night a week for eight weeks. I avoid him because I'm tired after 11 hours on set and I can't think any more. Also, I'm unsure he'll be able to recognize me under all of this make-up. And also Blousey is putting on her charming mask and giggling him up, hand on his arm, head cocked. After all the shit she flung all day, I can't stand it. Plus "L" is leaving and we are walking to the trailers together, talking about how much weed we are gong to smoke when we get home. But Juan is a person too and I probably should have just said hi because that's just being friendly to a friend. I don't have to say "hi" like Blousey says "hi." But I'm too tired to think it all through.

The Horde

Then there's the extra who used the chaos of a crowd of zombies to grab me, to hook his hands on my waist from behind. Pervy zombie. When they yell "Cut!" I whirl around, snarl low and quiet, "Fuck off." He giggles, shrugs and says "Zombies!" But he never touches me again.

I meet two women that are a bit older than me, also SAHM's with older kids. They say there's a lot of work for natural looking middle aged women. There's no work for middle aged women who are trying to look 20, though. We talk about bra shopping at Victoria's Secret and this one horrible shop girl that made fun of one zombie's side boob and back fat, who also chuckled at my small breasts and made me buy a beautiful bra that I can't breathe in because that was the only way I was going to get cleavage, she said. I'm not even a fan of cleavage. I think a flat chest can be hot, if you work it right and don't pretend you're something you're not.

There's also the red-headed lesbian whose face lights up when I don't skip a beat as she tells me about her girl friend. She compliments me on my crazy zombie motions.

And then there's the bragger in the wheel chair. She can walk a bit. She looks like one badasss zombie. But she calls it Spokompton and no one really likes her after that. We've all heard the slur before. Spokane is the 2nd largest city in Washington, it's going to have crime and all the bs that comes with cities. She's constantly telling us how much money she makes and how professional she is. It's annoying. I think I could like her, if she'd just cut the bullshit.

There's a hillbilly from Idaho. He wants to talk about guns and killing animals. He thinks he's shocking a bunch of city slickers. So I tell him about my steer Beignet and he shuts up.

I would never recognize any of these people without their layers of zombie make-up.

That first day, people are called from the extras trailer, raindrops singing on the metal roof,  to the make-up trailer and zombies return in their place. We are then called to the costume tent to be splattered in blood.

I am the last one called. I am slated to be a special-effects zombie called a "Hero Zombie." And there is only one make-up artist that can do that and he's been working on the principal actors all morning.  At 11 am, I am finally called to the make-up trailer. I walk up the metal steps into a wall of mirrors and barber chairs.  The mirrors at each station are lined with those large round bulbs and I feel very Hollywood; a thrill shoots through me.

My make-up artist is "Adam," let's say. Adam and I will become very close today. He will be my make up man twice. And then, since I've already been the same zombie 2x, I will get a new make up person who will make me into a totally different zombie, one with stunning cheek bones. But today, the first day, Steve will work on me for 4 hours, and then one more hour to clean me off. First he gets out facial prosthetics, sizes me up, and cuts them to fit. Then he actually glues them on to my face. But half way through, he's called to the set to give a principal actor a black eye, make-up-ly speaking of course.

I sit for 45 minutes. The music is hard and loud and I put ear plugs in. I'm worried I won't be able to make it through a whole day if this music wears out my mind here. I've been worried all along that I won't be able to do this. This is my first paid work since my head injury. I have no idea how my brain and body will respond. I'm scared, but I have ibuprofen and earplugs in my backpack and I know that I can lay in bed for the rest of the week if need be.  But until I hear "Action!" I'm reserving my energy as best as I can.

Hero Zombie

Adam returns to me and my prosthetics.  Adam is short and thin and smells like cigarette smoke. He's from LA and he's a make-up guy. "Twink" I think. That's probably the term, right? Small, wiry gay guy? Damn Spokane and it's provincial backwoodsiness. I don't know anything gay that "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" didn't teach me. The other make-up guy, the big one with the beard and tattoos, he's the "bear" right?

Just as Adam is beginning to contour my zombie face, we are called for lunch. We are herded into a white van and driven to a warehouse on the other end of the property. As I follow the driver into the lean-to shed where the extras are served our catered lunch, the main actors are being led into the main warehouse where their buffet is laid with table clothes. The character "Doc" would prefer to go with us, and follows us into the shed, but he's pulled back, laughing. The rule is that we are to be kept separate from the principal actors. You never know what kind of nut is going to show up in the extras bin. And the characters must be coddled, by necessity, must have their space to get in to character and stay there if need be. Later "Doc" and "Murphy" will give us hugs and take photos with us. They are the outgoing ones. The others are more reserved, always expressing gratitude for our work, but never engaging with us. After I meet several sets of extras, that seems like the safest option.

After lunch, Adam sets to work again. Zombies are needed on set, so the rest of them are vanned-off to location.  Adam and I chat while he layers my face. He sprays sealant on me. I am splattered with blood. Over the four hours we've been together, we've gotten closer, I've been less reserved than usual, comfortable that there is no risk of him misinterpreting my friendliness. He seems to like me, and in my isolated life where I run a tight energy budget, where I rarely go out anymore, it feels good to meet some one and have them like me, to succeed in building report. Closeness, for me, is often felt in similarities and we are similar. But then he starts talking about his ex-girlfriend. He is not a "twink". And it turns out, there is no "bear" either. Nobody in this trailer is gay. My friendliness has indeed been misinterpreted and hints are being given and oh my gawd, I'm a fucking idiot. I am still cringing at myself; I hope you are too, I need company here.

They need me on set, so other artists are called in to help. To get the "5 years without a shower" look, conditioner is smoothed in to my hair. But the hair lady loves my hair and is playing with it. It keeps looking better and better. I warn her that my hair now looks awesome. She's befuddled and can't figure out how to fuck up my hair. She says, "Wow, this is a great problem for an actress to have." I've not been called an actress since the 90's. Every time I come to this trailer, the LA people gush about my "look". I think of myself as simply being myself, whatever my DNA wants to express is what is expressed. I feel simple and plain. But apparently these Hollywood-types find me exotic. I am as susceptible to flattery as anyone and I begin to wonder if there might be more for me in this field than being a zombie extra.

Someone else is called in to paint my hands. I am being worked on by a hive of artists and I feel like canvas, like art, like an actress, like someone who matters to the world outside my home.  Once my hands are painted, I won't be able to wash them. I will have difficulty getting my button-happy pants down to pee. And then I won't be able to wash them. And then I will realize than no one can wash their hands and then I will look at the chip bowl on the catering table in a whole new way.

I'm called to the set just as they are moving location. The day is cold and rainy and windy and as we approach, the white tents go flying in the wind. It's a huge disaster and delay. The equipment gets wet and everyone needs new make up. We wait in the van. "Murphy" is in the van with me. He is kind and gregarious. There was previously some bruhaha about the principal actors hating Spokane and talking smack about this little work-horse city on twitter. The truth is no one moves here because they fall in love with it. This isn't Portland or Bellingham where people jump in with both feet and no job. Everyone who lives here is here for job or family, not city-love. Spokane is a practical town with a few fabulous pockets of creativity, but it's no San Francisco. And who could blame the actors? The locations are all shit. Their idea of Spokane is this broken down Kaiser plant. It's a place only a location scout could love.  But "Murphy" comments on the beauty of the storm against the hills, how pretty this place is. I love him and wish I weren't so tongue tied. I wish I had something to say other than a star-struck "Gah!"

The new location is on a hill beneath a blooming walnut tree. I unload from the van, grabbing my camp chair and bag of necessities. We bring our own chairs everywhere, but I did not need to bring my own water and snacks. A snack table and caterer follows us everywhere, sets up at every location.  We are given our own tent. On sunny days, this gives us shade. On rainy days, like this one, we get to stay dry. Our make-up is expensive and people were paid a lot of money to put it on us. Between each take, my make up is checked and my teeth are sprayed with Listerine and black dye.

It is 4 o'clock and I am finally called upon to act. I am so green that I have to ask a bunch of stupid questions like: Do I look at the Camera? Answer: NEVER. (Except later, I will blunder into other work and auditions where you do a "slate," which apparently involves directly looking in to the camera.)  I am to menacingly descend a hill.  I'm actually not sure I can remember the instructions. But when "Action" is yelled at us, I find I have a laser focus. I know exactly what to do. There is only one thought in my mind: "I will eat their brains." Because of my "hero" make up, I will get lots of close-ups. I will stay late for additional shots. I feel amazing, talented, useful.


The rain comes again and the on-site medic is worried that our lips are turning bluer. We are given blankets, which become stained by our make up. We are hauled into vans where we idle and chat and joke.

Finally, the weather clears and I am called upon to die. We are shown a hillside upon which we are to scatter ourselves.  I want to look dramatic, not peaceful or regal, no Lady of Shallot am I! I contort myself, an arabesque of blood and joints and dirt.  And there I must stay, trying not to breath, for an hour.  A principal actress points at me, and says, "What you are doing, I could NEVER do." I smile at her but I cannot do this either. I am in excruciating pain. I cannot breathe. Every time they break, I sit up gasping. But I've chosen this position, arms flailed in the wet grass, hips half broken off my body.  The director yells, "You guys look incredible!"  I feel pride in my dead body. I've given it my all and will need hours of yoga to straighten out.  I learn my lesson. On subsequent days, I die very comfortably. I contort only my face and one arm, that's all. One day, as I die, my ankle is crushed by a fellow zombie. We were to die in a pile on a foam pad, but my ankle couldn't quite make it and neither could he. His day job, I learned in our tent, is as a federal judge. The medic checks me out; I'm fine, but have a sore bruise for two months.  Later that day, the judge will tear his achilles.  The stunt advisor will take a much more active role from here on out. He is Australian and bald and well built.

I will eat you!

Every day on set, I am impressed with the organization and professionalism. A few of the crew whisper and gossip, but most everyone is focused and organized. No extra is ever forgotten in a trailer or toilet. I learn to relax and just wait for instructions. The only confusion is once when the extras' tent is on the other side of shooting from the bathrooms. We used a field, pre-contaminated with toxics far worse than any of us could possibly deposit. Until it's my turn and I ask for a system to get us through shooting to the toilets.

I am also impressed by the hush on the set as an actor approaches an emotional scene. The character "10K" must give it his all in a wrenching grief scene. There is an awed hush. This type of scene takes so much from an actor, they only want to ask them to do it once. There is a deep respect for the emotional places an actor must go to pull that kind of darkness out for the camera.

I watch TV differently now. I see how a scene was shot. I understand what it took from the actors. I notice the cuts to show something happening that cannot happen. I've seen behind the curtain. I've read the magicians manual. Watching is more interesting now.

That first day, I return to the make-up trailer when it is dark. It is the only day I will have my make-up professionally removed. It will take an hour. They will run out of water. More will be trucked in. "Murphy" is in the trailer with me, laughing and joking with his make-up artist. His make-up also takes a while to remove. Other days, I will get to leave in full make-up.  People will stare. I will arrive home and eat spaghetti and my family will laugh at the zombie at the table, dripping red noodles from her famished mouth.

SAHZombie

Every day that I am not on set, I have hurt feelings. For those into emotional accounting, that is every day but 3 for 4+ months! I don't know if it's just a sense of rejection, if I miss the feeling of being chosen, if I did something wrong. Maybe it was FOMO, fear of missing out on movie magic. Maybe I just miss feeling special in the make-up tent. Or maybe, I was too front and center on that first day, after which I was always hidden in the back of the zombie pack. Or maybe it's Adam, who's not allowed to fraternize with me anymore, which is fine because it was kind of creepy for a bit there. Or maybe that hurt is about how much I loved that work, and it was work I could do. It was perfect for me. Ten to twelve hours on set broken down into chunks I could handle: 1-5 hours sitting in a make-up chair, 1 hour playing dead, 1 hour acting crazy, 1/2 hour eating lunch and the rest was napping, reading, and chatting. It was perfect for me. And every extra agreed that it was the best job any of us had ever had.

As it turns out, I'm only in the first episode, a "movie."  Z-Nation is Syfy channel's top show and the season premier, the only one I'm likely to be in if they didn't cut my scenes, airs tonight.  I'm in one trailer three times, so there's a good chance you'll see me if you put it on slow-motion and look for the bobbed gray hair!

The Oxford Street Shelter

As we know, I married at 18 desperate to know who was going to love me forever and to have it in writing. I thought we were proving the vast chorus of naysayers wrong until Friday, September 13, 1996 when I discovered all that he'd been up to (in?). It was a month before my 21st birthday and I had exactly zero coping skills for such rejection. A girl so eager to have it all sown up shortly after her 18th birthday was not a girl on solid emotional footing, although I did a decent job of making it appear so.

I quit my resort receptionist job and hopped a Greyhound in hopes of something, distraction, redemption, I don't know anymore. Perhaps it wasn't hope at all, just agitation. I filled 7 journals during this time, all interlocking as I could never find my current journal and would use a new one until an older one showed up and then I'd use that until I lost it and repeat the process until I had 7 journals going at once. I recently took a confusing and white knuckled ride through these journals, screaming at the pages: WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING! Oh my god ohmygod ohmygod. And I don't mean the horrifying lack of organization, I mean the terrifying lack of concern for my own safety. I mean, I know that girl survives, but as I read those journals, it seemed beyond unlikely.

***

Making my Greyhound way from Orcas to Chicago, I get out to stretch my legs in the middle of the night at the Spokane station. A man starts up a conversation and I describe him in my journals as wearing satin shirts and being good looking and sitting next to me all the way to Butte trying to talk me in to coming to stay at his place for a bit. I note that he looks so much like a pimp that it was hard to believe he wasn't an actor on a cheesy tv show. OMFG girl, get your head out of your ass, he's actually a pimp. Lucky for me, I want nothing at all to do with any man at this point and his having a penis automatically disqualifies him from being taken seriously.

For a few nights I stay in my sister's dorm, just outside of Chicago. Later, I get a bed at a hostel in the center of the city. The basement is an ocean of pinball machines and I spend an inordinate amount of time drowning in them. I take drumming lessons. I try to sneak in to bars where favorite blues musicians are playing, but am rejected due to my age. I visit every single art museum in the city. I spend several days with the armor exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago, admiring the artistry of impervious garments, the beauty of not getting hurt.

Chicago

New York City seems to call suddenly and I arrive in the late afternoon. I grab my small backpack, the only thing I've brought, that and a purple shoulder bag full of half filled journals and an enormous camera. I emerge from the station into a sunny afternoon. I stand at the door. I am in New York City, BABY! But I don't know where. I don't know where I want to go from the place that I don't know where it is. I don't have a map. I don't have much money. This girl, me, running on the idea that there are no bad ideas (the irony!) realizes that this might actually be one. I turn a 180 and queue up at the ticket counter. I tell the woman at the window that I want the next bus leaving the city. She hands me a ticket for Portland, Maine. As the bus navigates out of the chaos, I promise myself that I'll come back some day and someone will show me around and I'll have enough money to enjoy it all. I have never been back.

In Portland, I begin looking for a place to spend the night, a hostel, a room, something. Parked at the payphone, I learn that there's an elevator manufacturers' convention in town, plus President Clinton is here to bless an oil spill and hotelier after hotelier tells me that this means there are no rooms. The only one I find is at an expensive bed and breakfast 100 miles from Portland. I came in on the last bus and it's too late to leave this town now. I'm stuck here.

I decide to cafe hop all night. A solution so simple there's hardly a problem. I stash my backpack in a locker at the station. The first place I go is a restaurant named Papa's and I think that Lou Reed is mistaken in his cautions against eating at a place called Mama's. After too much coffee and some truly terrible soup, my journals get jittery, difficult to read and confusing. I realize that perhaps this is not the best time in my life to stay up all night writing about my feelings. I move on to a Uni dorm lobby, chatting with students as they come and go. At curfew I'm kicked out. I wander down to the waterfront, where the bars are. I'm days shy of 21 but no one will let me in. I'm feeling so low that I begin wondering about ways I could kill myself. The coffee is making my mind race and it's spinning out of my control. Plus, I really need to pee but the bouncers won't even let me in to do that. It's just constant rejection, up and down the street. I'm crying hysterically now and snot is burbling out of my nose. I have no tissues so I wipe with my sleeve, repeatedly shellacking my cheeks. I decide I need to call someone, someone who might care if I exist or don't exist, but someone not too wrapped up in it to freak out. I grab a payphone and call my ex-ing husband. (I eventually get actual, trained help with this later, so don't worry). He talks me down until I suddenly come to my senses, my olfactory senses specifically. "Ohmygod, what's that smell!! Holy shit! This phone is covered in vomit!" I drop it and run.

I try one last hotel, hoping that perhaps someone no-showed their reservations. No such luck, and also no public bathroom. But they point me to the YWCA up the hill.  As I turn the corner, hours of caffeine and watered down soup just can't be held back anymore and I wet myself thoroughly. It turns cold in seconds and my thighs chap as I waddle up hill to the YWCA.  The woman closing up the Y for the night tells me that tonight is the first hard freeze of the season and so all of the shelters are full, including theirs. I gesture at the nice couch in the lobby but she says she can't allow that. She eyes me, head to toe, and says I better use their restroom to freshen up before she has to kick me out.

In  the bathroom mirror, I see a girl covered in a variety of terrible bodily fluids. I try to clean myself, but it feels hopeless, pointless. I mostly just cry. Back in the lobby, she cheerfully tells me that one shelter has one bed open. It's across town. I'll have to walk miles, at night, through a dangerous area, and across a railroad yard, but they'll hold the door for me. I should be safe because no one will be out looking for trouble in this cold weather. I must leave immediately. I can hardly blame her for not offering to drive me but it's hard to imagine NYC turning out worse than this.

When I arrive at the Oxford Street Shelter, I endure several rounds of paperwork and then am allowed to mingle in the common room for a bit before lights out. A bakery messed up a wedding cake and I eat my fill, as Marie Antoinette suggested. There are only men in the common room now. At first I avoid them, but they are so nice that I move to their table.

They tell me their tales of woe and homelessness. One man tells me about his old factory job and how his coworker with kids got a lay off slip, but he talked the manager in to letting them trade, because he couldn't let those kids go hungry. They are kind and gentle men with super low IQ's or severe looking depression. I tell them I'm done with Portland and I hate this adorable little town. I tell them I'm thinking of trying out Bar Harbor. They erupt in excitement! They tell me I should really go to Bahaba. And I was like, "Bahaba? Where's that? Does the Grayhound go to Bahaba?" Yes, the bus goes to Bahaba, they assure me. They tell me I want to go to Bahaba. And I respond with, "Yes, but what about Bar Harbor?" And they say, yes, I should go to Bahaba. And I say great, maybe after I go to Bar Harbor, I'll try Bahaba. At this they erupt in frustration, slamming the table with their fists. I pull out a map and ask them to show me where Bahaba is. They point to Bar Harbor. And I say, "No, that's Bar Harbor. Show me Bahaba!" But they keep point at that little black dot and yelling "Bahaba!" Suddenly I realize we're doing a Nor'easterner's version of Who's on First. Bahaba is Maine-ish for Bar Harbor. Bar Harbor. Upon realizing the situation, our giggles quickly turn to belly laughs. As I look around me I think, A girl could get used to this. Delicious cake. A warm bed. Total freedom and good, kind company. What more could I want out of life?

It's lights out and I'm ushered into the last cot of Portland. The cot is about 18" wide with less than 12" between cots.  I'm encouraged by the caretaker to brush my teeth before bed and behind her the deadbolt clicks, locking us in, for our own safety.

Oxford Street Shelter looks partly kinda cute on a sunny Sunday morning

The bathroom is tiny and pink. And someone has smeared an oil based ointment on every single surface. The meticulous attention to detail is impressive. It's been q-tipped into the nooks and crannies of every screw and faucet. It's thick on the mirror and I feel fortunate I can't see myself.

I use my purple bag as a pillow. I stare up at the ceiling. It is a the dark room full of women, stacked like logs, snoring. To my left is a plump, short woman who overflows her cot and her thighs touch mine. To my right is a transvestite in white go-go boots and a mini-dress. No one seems concerned about her using this bathroom, but that was a different era. She sleeps so that her feet are in my face. I will wish she'd take off her boots, but then when she does, I'll wish she hadn't.  Every car that drives by wakes her up and she runs to the caged window and yells to the sodium vapor street light that she'll be right out. She always adds a name: Tim, Jim, Ryan.  But she won't be right out, because we're all locked in here.

I recognize that I'm hardly the ideal cot-mate either. I smell of urine and vomit and have a thick crust of snot over half my face. 

The plump woman to my left is snoring so loudly that I can't fall asleep. It is thunderous. I beg for god, who I'm beginning to think is made up or possibly a complete jerk, to make it stop. This, this is the prayer, the single prayer in my life that god answers. "He" could have used his own judgment here, but he passive-aggressively grants my ill-advised wish. Well played, mother fucker, well played.

As my wish comes true, her thunderous snores give way to giggling. And in her giggling she sometimes tells "Paul" to stop it. Stop tickling her. Stop telling jokes. Stop being so silly, Paul! So Paul stops being silly and gets dangerous. No Paul, she whispers, growls, I can't do that. You know I can't do that. Paul, what are you saying! That's not right. I could never. I couldn't harm her. She's getting louder, I wouldn't. You know that, Paul, so stop asking. Paul, NO. NO Paul. NO!!

I'm looking at her from the corner of my eye. I have no idea what Paul is telling her to do but it doesn't sound good. She sits up, her eyes open wide and she stares into my face. Screaming, spit flying, her eyes inches from mine: "DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND!?!?! YOU HAVE TO DIE!! You are going to die!!" From your lips to gods ears, honey.

If you are not crazy before homelessness, we can fix that.

Sleep is obviously out of the question. As soon as I hear the deadbolts in the morning, I bolt. The attendant yells something about breakfast, but I'd had it with the Oxford Street Shelter/Asylum.  In the cold morning light, I see how bad the neighborhoods I'd walked through are. I wonder at that woman at the Y sending me here, alone, at night. I find a Dunkin Donuts and buy myself, what else, more coffee, this time with donuts. Trembling, I am barely holding it together, perhaps only by the brute force of dried snot on my face.  A family strikes up a conversation with me. The mom says running away is never the answer. The dad says I can come home with them, get cleaned up, go to church with them. They say they know a nice shelter for me to stay at. But all I freak: well-meaning people are dangerous, sometimes rules need breaking and these people seem incapable of knowing when. I'd had it with obedient people, bouncers and hotel clerks and YWCA bitches and god and myself as well, getting married at 18, following all the rules and look what shit it all is.  At the word "shelter" I run so fast, I leave my coffee and donuts. I run and run. Running away might not solve every problem but it was very nicely solving the problem of stupid people talking to me, at least for a while.

I run back to the cheapest hotel. The clerk is shocked by my appearance, "Weren't you here last night? What happened to you?!"
"I stayed at the Oxford Street Shelter."
His jaw dropped. "oh. my. god. Not that place? Oh god, I'm so sorry. Had I known, I would've let you crash at my place." Oh great, another fucking pimp.
"We had an early check out. I'll go clean the room for you. I'll give you two nights for one."
I take an extremely long shower in the communal bath. When I returned to my room I open up a bottle of sleeping pills I acquired the day before. And I take as many as I feel like taking. I do not read the directions. I do not care. I want to sleep and if that is for a day or two or eternity, it does not matter to me anymore.

I took this photo just before I finally fell asleep

***

I awoke the next morning, nearly 24 hours later. I called my parents. They suggested a religious commune-ity outside of Boston where I stayed for a few months, safer, healing a bit, but also surrounded by a different kind of nut job and a whole other blog post or two about what happened next.  I am one of the lucky ones, spending only one night at that shelter, not weeks, months, years as was the case with some of the women.

Blue recently bemoaned that she'll never top my adventures (which she's just recently begun asking about) and I said that I hoped she cared enough about her own safety and value to not even try.  There are a great many things I am unsuccessful at; she could try one of those many low hanging fruits.

In my current life, things so look normal and occasionally some people make assumptions about me, about the path I took to get here, about how lock-step it must have been. But the truth is, whatever stability and normalcy I've found, I fought like hell to get and to keep. Maybe it's boring, but to me, now, this normalcy IS my wildest dream.