Tangerine Thoughts

An honest account of the things I love and the thoughts on my mind.

[rainfallsonwednesday]

artist: Michael Lipsey

[rainfallsonwednesday]

Darlin’ you’re my dream, honey be my love.

-tangerine thoughts

[rainfallsonwednesday]

I am from the mountains 

Ethereal and grand. 

From the snow capped and silent

To the rushing rivers kissing soft, warm soil 

Where leeches wait patiently.

I am from the dancing colours 

The silver bells, the fragrant cloths and 

Stained hands of red kumkum and golden turmeric.

...

I am from the rolling meadows

Emerald green- viridescent 

Spiders, butterflies and grazing deer. 

A squashed frog under a tractor’s tire. 

From blueberry lips to strawberry fingers 

I am from log burning kitchens

And words whose only understanding

Materialized in the form of steaming food: 

Schnitzel, strudel and sauerkraut.

...

I am from the lemon house 

With the green shuttered windows and 

Blue tiled floors that never seem to warm in winter.

I am from the bubbling river who 

Bathed me in the summers heat 

And bit my toes when the ice broke 

Beneath my second hand boots.

I am from bitter coffee and hand tossed 

Dough awaiting the blaze of fire.

...

I am from the small home on a hill 

Whose paintings carry memories

And whose oil seems always fresh 

To my nostalgic touch. 

I am from the tea leaves who dance all day long 

In a burnished pot on an old stove 

In a place seemingly too small but 

Always made to fit.

-tangerine thoughts

[rainfallsonwednesday]

Today I’m happy.

Though I’m not quite sure why. Perhaps it is that this unbarring darkness within me is just ever so briefly quenched and thus he’s gone somewhere else for the moment, his absence having left me feeling dizzy with freedom.  

The world slips by.  

The scene outside is blurred and distorted by translucent whispers of gray. The trees are every color of warmth and though shrouded, they are there nonetheless, smiling softly behind the dull pane of fog.

I think of the future.

And then of the past and all that has brought me here: gliding through the dark to a home warm and inviting. How blessed I am! For even in my silent spells of melancholy and detestable moments of doubt, somewhere deep down I’m aware that this time here is special. I’m fulfilling some larger purpose and in doing so, my life has gained some intelligible weight that I never felt it had before.

How long will it last?

Perhaps this unnatural tenderness, this simple love and forgiveness I feel for everything (yes, even myself!) is limited to these few words I can quickly pin down. But either way, for these brief moments of exceptional clarity, i’m indebted in gratitude. I yearn to embrace this bliss, to pluck just a small bloom from it, one that I could gingerly place somewhere safe in the sunshine, with an open window nearby. To somehow find it within me to nurture and cherish it. Perhaps then, even when the dark obscurity that my soul prefers, returns, ripping everything within me, smothering me in familiar disquietude, the fragrance of this single blossom will keep me anchored in the truth.

And what is the truth?

The truth that is that I am someone. Someone other than the words that escape me or actions that seem to invariably define me. Someone more than a noxious self-infliction of misery. Someone with more value than I am often capable of believing.

That I am someone with meaning.

-tangerine thoughts

[rainfallsonwednesday]

What if I told you the sky wasn’t always blue?

Hm?

What if I told you the sky wasn't always blue??

Mm...I’d say you’re right.

What??

Yeah, in the evening it turns different colors: purple, pink, orange, yellow, etcetera and in the morning it’s usually something similar. At night it’s black.

No, no, no. That’s not what I meant.

Okay... so what do you mean?

I mean, the regular sky, the color we see most days of our lives when are our eyes are wide open but we don’t even notice anymore that the sky is blue. What if it wasn’t?

Okay...

I’m telling you it’s hasn't always been blue!

Is this some kind of philosophical conversation I should have been prepared for?

No.

A metaphor?

No!

So you’re telling met that right now, at this time in the day when the sun is right above our heads and clouds are passing like dandelion fluff-that this sky was once a different color?

Yes.

What, like red?

Not, red.

So what then?

It’s hard to explain...

Try me.

Forget it.

You can’t just start a conversation, not explain yourself and then say forget it.

Okayyyyy, well nevermind then.

You’re impossible.

I know.  

She smiles and rolls onto her back to watch the dandelions on the blue upside down ocean. He watches her, propped up on lean arms and scabby elbows, full of love and slight exasperation for this girl. He sighs and flips onto his back in the grass that already taken his shape, to think about a sky colored something other than blue. Polk-dotted perhaps. Crickets begin to sing. Mosquitoes bite his ankles right where the skin stretches over the knobby bones- their sweet spot, it itches the most. But he won’t leave till she does. He sneaks a look out of the corner of his eye, her mouth is slightly open, a lady bug crawls across her nose. She’s fast asleep.

[rainfallsonwednesday]

again and again

i am an empty shell of things long gone. 

empty, save for the ocean of blue: suffocating and overwhelming; it fills my leaking lungs and my faltering heart and my leaden shoes, that still don’t know where to go. 

i am so empty and devoid that when the blue fills me up, my skin and lips and ears all go blue and trickles of blue leak from my eyes and when i open my mouth- only blue comes out. 

when people see me they say, “she’s all blue and only blue.”

but i’m not.

sometimes i’m filled with yellow or green or red or pink. but those moments are so small and infinitesimal, meager and inconsequential, so quiet and forgetful, that when the blue rushes in, it covers me all up and washes me all out. left empty and  

blue, blue, blue.

Here i stand at the ocean. 

well, actually i’m in my room and it’s dark outside and i’m alone. but for the sake of this metaphor,

i’m at the ocean. imagine it. 

The water is dark and never ending, a velvet, violet curtain pulled up tight to the horizon. Beneath my toes the sand is warm, heat emanates through my thin, cotton towel and soaks into my skin, through my shivering bones, sending goosebumps dancing across my scalp.

here on the beach, where the sun is resting its weary rays, i sleep and believe that the day will ever end, that the sand will stay warm and i’ll come away completely golden, finally safe within my own skin.

but just beyond the beach the water is creeping. it’s so sneaky like that; lifting up it’s skirts it treads carefully up across the sand, a smile splayed across it’s dark lips. 

“but the sun is so warm!” 

i’m convinced, absolutely, that nothing is wrong. that this utter bliss is everlasting. that this sunshine is fulfilling. that this happiness is

real. 

but the wave is now running, going full speed scrambling up the sandy beach, clawing as it slips and slides, golden sands gone gray.

and i know now it’s too late. too late to run. to hide. to ask for mercy. i know this because it’s happened before. 

but i retreat nonetheless. wrapping my towel around my body and hugging the warmth like a shield. i pray for time. i plead for anything but this.

despite it all i’m backed against the wall. 

and the water is here. violet and violent. 

somedays when it arrives i still struggle: i scream and cry and beg as i offer little bits of me in return for the promise of release. though i’ve learned the hard way that one piece missing feels the same as being broken apart; 

one hundred pieces of me scattered on a beach and carried out to sea. 

so there is no struggle today. no bartering or begging. 

backed against the wall, i do the only thing i can and lie down on the long lost golden sands and let the waves race over me. let the blue waves crash upon me, filling my faltering heart and my leaking lungs, slipping beneath my sallow skin and taking my sodden shoes back to the sea,  now i couldn’t walk away even if i wanted to. even if i knew where to go.

eventually, when my toes go numb and my lips cant taste my tears 

those vicious, virile waves retreat. 

violet violence on my skin and in my blood. 

the ocean is gone, smiling as it watches from the horizon

and swims blue through my veins. 

[rainfallsonwednesday]

[rainfallsonwednesday]

“And when we look in through the windows, all we see are shadows. And when we try and listen, all we hear is a whispering. And we cannot understand the whispering, because our minds have been invaded by a war. A war that we have both won and lost. The very worst sort of war. A war that captures dreams and re-dreams them. A war that has made us adore our conquerors and despise ourselves.”

[rainfallsonwednesday]

Dreamscape 

[rainfallsonwednesday]

Summer plans 

-tangerine thoughts 

[rainfallsonwednesday]

Do you ever feel as if the path you’ve laid so carefully for yourself is, in fact, what is blinding you from really seeing the way? 

-tangerine thoughts 

[rainfallsonwednesday]

My quarantine mood.

[rainfallsonwednesday]

An Addendum to Dreaming

   It’s funny thinking back to high school. Or better yet, even further back to middle school. Back to all my lofty expectations of myself. I still clearly recall the night before starting seventh grade, looking in the mirror as I brushed my teeth and imagined myself in middle school: long blonde hair with a chic side part, braces (which I thought were just so cool), a flip phone and a short skirt. I could see myself walking down the middle of the hallway (which seems to be the only way to walk as shown in every movie), casually calling out my girlfriends’ names and stopping by the lockers of boys to chat.  Instead I woke up and discovered that middle school was vastly different. It mostly consisted of me wearing the same bell-bottom jeans, hoarding a collection of scarves and smearing way too much kajal beneath my eyes. I discovered the concept of shaving and thus my mother slowly lost her razors to a very inept thirteen year old that would secretly shave her legs in the sink and hide the evidence.

Oh, but yes, I did get that chic side part.

     Then high school came along. That summer every time mom and I drove past the high school, I’d see the kids doing summer classes and think how grown up they were: how physically bigger and noticeably wiser. They bore the heady scent of over-confidence and talked with a sharp tongue. I definitely foresaw myself with a cute boyfriend and imagined all the prom nights looking exactly as they do in the movies. But of course my high school existence turned out very differently. In fact it was quite similar to middle school in terms of my let down expectations. I was a band kid with pimples; a flat chest and pokey wire push up bra and crusty mascara I bought without my mom knowing. And to top it off, a whiny, sardonic attitude. Instead of a boyfriend I had a series of guys I obsessed over (cue terrible code names and casual stalking). I had a small group of friends but like all groups of friends we experienced animosity as frequently as friendship. The real education of high school was never the content presented in the classroom.

   Finally, I graduated. And I cut my hair short in an act of rebellion, as if to say ‘with this hair I leave behind my failed dreams’. I knew I was destined for community college but I still imagined the day I would transition into a real university. Oh what fun would await me! I already could see the cobblestoned paths leading up to old English style buildings. I saw the rolling lawns and the big oak trees that would drop colorful leaves in the fall. I saw a sweet boy who read with me and walked with me and we planned out travels together. And yet, like every daydream before this, it didn’t happen. Instead I ended up at a school not far from home with some lawn but mostly dirt due to drought conditions. A beautiful school for the given climate but not the one I imagined. I didn’t acquire a boyfriend, or any friends really. My course load was massive but at the same time I wasn’t that studious, glasses-wearing girl in the library, poring over her textbooks. My eyes got achy from the computer screen and my mental capacity to keep up with my hundreds of open tabs wore me down. I downloaded Bumble, then Coffee Meets Bagel and then Hinge. I talked to so many guys and thought each might be the one. I organized dates that I cancelled the night before. I deleted all the apps only to download them again.  I questioned marriage and questioned a life of solitude in equal degree. And soon I was 23.

School continued on.

     I remember back to when I was small, really small, past high school and middle school. Back to the days when I still believed in fairy tales and so I married a life size stuffed frog on the front lawn in front of my family. To be fair, I also married my little brother that same year. But don’t let this detract from the earnestness of my dreams. I thought by twenty I’d be married and soon after have kids. I saw a small cottage with a big garden and lots of dogs. Making pie in the summer. Growing pumpkins in the fall. I imagined being a kid with my kids. And I don’t have these things. But what’s worse, is not even knowing if I would want these things if offered them. What’s worse than having dreams not come to fruition, is no longer knowing what to dream for. What life do I want? And like every adult, the addendum to that question is: what is realistic?

-tangerine thoughts 

[rainfallsonwednesday]

An Ode to Strangers No Longer Strange 

It’s strange the way people can slip into your life so easily and unnoticed, like the morning sunshine slowly drifting in, ignored by heavy eyes until shining down in full force. How easy it is to forget all the little moments that led up to what is now your everything and all consuming. Or perhaps not everything but something. Someone reliable and resourceful and radiant.

It’s funny when you stop to observe the beginnings of a friendship; the awkward moments of fumbling for the railings that guide each conversation to clearly define the bounds of familiarity. That anxious enthusiasm to agree and rejoice in similarity. And yet also the equal excitement of disagreements enlightening facets of individuality.

Quite suddenly this radiant sun has spread throughout the whole and it’s hard to remember what darkness was like. And more so, how you survived it? Every moment you wish to bask in this affectionate warmth, to uncover its every ray, seek the source of its brightness and question its wanderings on a cloudy day.

How does one go from a stranger to being your sunlit room? Does this happen in a day, a year, a life? Is this sensation just the epitome of life; to live for the celebration of sunshine, those moments so overflowing with life that even cloudy days are just reminders of their return?

-tangerine thoughts 

[rainfallsonwednesday]

She lived deep, deep down. Under trash and plastic and layers of layers of layers of layers. But where? Where? Her only feelings were of paranoia and anxiety. Her skin was translucent and white and soft from living beneath the layer and layers and layers. Long ago she had slipped beneath the thousands of pages of paper with a soft, slippery child clinging to her chest. She would slide down through darkness, through the layers to emerge into new places with nothing but the familiar feel of the thing’s hands wrapped around her tiny neck and the fear pushing her forward. Deep, deep, deep down. Her life was nothing but climbing up and pushing away and pushing up and being pulled down and emerging upwards. She remembers little of past paths but of a woman who followed and would try to stop but could never keep up.

I have been pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing pushing forward and up and the thing no longer clings to my neck. I have pulled my way through the layers and found more layers. 

-tangerine thoughts

[rainfallsonwednesday]

In the night

in the deep black dark,

I think of all the world around:

the silent stars rushing overhead 

the millions of lonely lights in lit up skyscrapers

the wandering, weary drivers on wistful, winding roads  

the ducks sheltered in the reeds with nothing but moonlight beneath them

the stoplights flicking green, yellow, orange with no one to justify their flicking

the lonesome tossing in bed as they thank science for the warmth of friction, 

the countless TVs still humming away as someone lay curled in sleep, 

the books placed on nightstands never to be reopened,

the trees who know not the night nor the day

In the world, in the deep black dark

there in the soft half-slumber

I wonder what it would feel like to be held.

 -tangerine thoughts 

[rainfallsonwednesday]

I found my lover sleeping        while I was deep in dreams I found my lover sleeping        in sweet, soft orange beams I found my lover sleeping      and I dared not awake him  for when I found my lover sleeping    my dreams I knew were soon forsaken. 

-tangerine thoughts