Women Are Visual

Death, Madness, and Holiday Crafts

[women-are-visual]

Okay, Buddy?

I needed new ideas and my friends were too crazy and stupid to give me any, so I went to the bookstore on College Avenue. It was a Saturday afternoon, bright and sunny. The front door was propped open. Two clerks stood behind the counter and customers milled around.

The table straight ahead held the new books. I took one and began reading it. There were extra words. I closed it and put it back.

I ruled out several of the books automatically, the ones with gendered words in the titles, like, “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” or “The Boy Against the World.” They’re usually crap, written by people too mediocre to see their pain as universal, who force it to mince along in high heels or hide behind a beard. 

Finally I found a decent one. It was written by an old Jewish woman who’d survived the concentration camps and now counseled soldiers with PTSD. A soldier was in her office, but no matter how many times she asked him to tell her about his problems, he wouldn’t speak. He was catatonic from the trauma. She decided to speak to him in the language he understood, that of the military, and she ordered him outside for a walk. He looked surprised but he followed her outside. 

That’s as far as I got before I stopped reading it. I couldn’t see “where she was going with this,” as my dad would say. I read the chapter titles and they gave me no clue either. I put that one back too. It wasn’t good enough to clutter up my mind or my apartment.

I was looking through an interior design book when I heard a young mom talking to her kid.

She had short, side swept hair and wore Birkenstocks and a grody sundress made of white terry cloth. She was telling him that he couldn’t get a Batman book, only a book without any TV or movie characters, and he was sitting on the floor, crying and kicking his legs, and begging for the book. 

“If you don’t stop, we’re gonna have to leave the store, do you want that, Buddy?”

It pissed me off to hear her, abusing her kid like that, so I had to say something.

“Why don’t you just let him read what he wants? He’s not going to get into reading if you make him read what you want. It has to be what he wants.” 

The kid stopped crying and looked at me with his mouth hanging open. The mom raised her eyebrows, inhaled and clamped her lips, like a tea kettle about to boil. I could tell she was happy though, because now she had an enemy.

“Mind your own business!”

“Okay, buddy.” I walked away. 

Some old guys started talking loudly about some stupid book, as if to smooth over what had just happened. They wanted to assert that they were intellectuals when they were really just cowards.

Control is abuse. Controllers always act like they’re doing something for your own good, but it’s never true. I let my ex control me for years, because I got sick after caring for my sister who died of breast cancer, and he was making all the money. I wasn’t allowed to smoke, drink, or eat desserts, or he said he’d leave me. So I’d get pissed and blow up just like that kid. Then I’d feel guilty and go off by myself to have a few drinks or eat a dessert and enjoy myself. I’m so grateful that he’s gone.

Now I set boundaries with my partner and do whatever I like, and I hope someday that kid is able to do the same. I hope he ignores all the classics, buys himself a Batman book, and enjoys it.

[women-are-visual]

Want Some Fries?

My coworker retired after working as a library assistant for 26 years, and I agreed to meet her for dinner to celebrate. We met at my favorite restaurant, Sidebar. She was sitting at a small table in the window when I got there.

“To your retirement,” we toasted.

We’d only been working together for half a year, since the pandemic started, and it was the first time I’d seen her without a mask. She had a pretty, tiny face, but there was no fat on it whatsoever. Her cheeks were severely sunken in and her eyes were framed with dark eyeliner so that she looked like a skull on a stick. She had curly black hair pulled back on the top and a fluffy dark sweater and a black necklace. But she was so severely thin that it was disturbing.

“What are you going to do with your time?”

“I’m looking into pickle ball,” she said in her New Jersey accent.

The first day I met her, we sat in the library parking lot and handed patrons the books they’d put on hold. 

“I’ve never made any friends and I’ve never figured out what I wanted to do with my life,” she said. 

That pissed me off. I felt like, why would you say that to me? How do you think that’s attractive? But of course I felt guilty when she invited me out. That’s my downfall. 

The server brought over her grilled cheese with fries. It looked really crispy and buttery and I wanted some, but while I was sawing off a corner of her sandwich, she ate some fries, and then started talking, and spit the chewed up fries all over her plate of food. She did this several times.

“Swallow and then talk!” I laughed, but she just shook her head and waved her hand, and kept doing it.

I thought it must be part of her eating disorder, that she didn’t know how to eat properly, so I questioned her about her diet. 

“What do you eat?”

“Oh, nothing in particular.”

“What do you like to eat?”

“Soup, sometimes I get pasta from a deli. I don’t have a normal diet. I eat a lot of sweets.”

“You don’t look like you do.”

I ate half a steak and half my fries. I drank two drinks. I felt bored, like I always do.

The next morning, I made a healthy breakfast of an avocado banana chocolate shake and some collards and orange juice. I felt grateful that I have a boyfriend who taught me how to shop at healthy supermarkets with fresh produce and how to prepare healthy meals at home.

I thought about my coworker and how she’ll always be depressed until she learns how to eat properly. All of the women I know seem to get caught up in self-objectification and eating disorders. My mother and sister both had eating disorders and I had a mild one too, in which I dieted for years, but I’m done with that now. 

The key to being happy is to go grocery shopping and to eat healthy meals. Everything else comes after that.

[women-are-visual]

Feisty’s Breakdown

My friend Feisty Lee has been in a breakdown for over a year now, and I’m not sure how to help her. I still live in Oakland, California, while she’s moved to Los Angeles to be near her family, and when she asks me to visit her, I do.

It’s a warm and calm January night when she flails to the front gate of her white stucco apartment building. She’s super skinny, dressed in leggings and rose gold sneakers, a big sweater, long brown hair, thick eyeliner. 

“Oh my god, oh my god!” she shouts, flinging her arms and legs as she runs, like a child, although she’s in her early forties. “I’m Michael Jackson!” she says, kicking her big shiny sneakers.

We walk through a tiny courtyard, past a sad patch of grass and a lonely palm tree. Apartment balconies circle overhead and it feels fake and strange, like the set of a sitcom.

“I like your hair, you look the best with a curly bob,” she says, “Have you lost weight, you’re so skinny, I’m fat.” She’s always so attentive and complimentary. That’s why I like her. It feels good just to be noticed. I’m not skinny though, I’m chubby, and I don’t care.

Inside, her place is plain and modern, white walls and white rugs, a combo living room/kitchen with no furniture. On the back windows, vertical blinds cast gray shadows. Her paintings of cartoonish heads are propped against the walls and her bedroom is like a mini version of her favorite clothing store, Anthropologie, with an old wooden dresser, black and white photos hung on clothes lines above it, a metal rack of colorful, patterned clothes, and a paper lamp in the corner.

“Todd wanted me to be a dental hygienist, but I couldn’t stand the thought of it, what if I’d hurt someone’s tooth when I went crazy? I’d rather try to be an artist than embarrass myself.” 

I drive us to the restaurant, along the dark and warm highway, through the black silhouetted mountains. I love the calm and friendly feeling of LA, being from Buffalo, I wouldn’t think I’d feel so at home, but I do. We listen to “L.A. Woman” by The Doors and talk about our favorite L.A. bands, but when we're almost there, she grabs my arm and stares into my eyes.

“I’m an heiress, don’t lie to me and say you don’t know!”

“Okay, Feisty, I know, I know.” 

I just want her to let go so that I can drive safely. Really, I just want her to be sane, I need my friend back, the one who’s funny and fun. But when she reveals her craziness again, I feel so betrayed and ashamed for trying to make a connection with someone who’s mental.

I picked the wrong restaurant, Enterprise Fish Co., it got good reviews on Yelp, but it’s too big, cold, and corporate.

We’re seated at a booth and served too sweet margaritas made with cheap mixers. 

Just in case I still think Feisty’s sane, she laughs and says, “I’m in a knife fight with big oil.”

She drops her fork and crawls beneath the booth to get it. “I used to think it was about talent,” she shouts from beneath the table, “but now I know that everyone just wants to see your ass in the air.”

Oh god, she thinks that everyone’s watching her and wants to have sex with her. Those are typical breakdown thoughts, I know because I’ve had them myself, but I don’t try to argue with her. My friend Rachel cares for seniors with dementia, and she taught me to go along with whatever they say, otherwise, you’ll just upset them.

Our food arrives. For me, oysters on a platter of rock salt and a shrimp Louie salad, and for Feisty, roasted corn and squash enchiladas.

I drink the cold, salty brine from the shells and pick out the oysters with a little fork, but while I’m enjoying myself, I notice that Feisty is staring at her plate.

“Your food smells great,” I say. 

She takes a few bites, then stops.

“You need to eat and sleep every day,” I say, “You’re never going to get better if you don’t.”

“I’ll eat later.”

She asks the server for a to go box.

“This place is a rip,” she says when he walks away.

She grabs the glass carafe off the table, pours out the water, and stuffs it into her purse. I protest, but I let it go, I just want to leave without an incident.

On the Santa Monica Pier, the colorful spokes of the ferris wheel light up the night. We drive to my Airbnb in Venice Beach and it’s perfect, a small yellow cottage with white trim and a red door, one big room inside with a vaulted ceiling, a kitchenette, a bed, and a little living room area with a boxy gray couch. 

“That’s a Gretel couch,” Feisty says.

We sit on the floor in front of the space heater and drink beer. She opens her box of enchiladas and starts eating them, and I act like I don’t notice, but I’m relieved.

“It’s just nice to have a little money and to not have those fun squelchers around,” I say, referring to our exes. 

“They were paid actors,” Feisty says. “Todd was never happy with how much money we had, but he’ll miss me, I did a lot for him.”

It’s not long before she turns on me again.

“Every woman is jealous of me because I’m skinny and every guy wants to fuck me. I’m so sick of it!”

“Stop it! I’m not jealous of you! I spent a lot of money to get here, so don’t turn on me, you always turn on me!”

She leaves and I make tea in the little kitchenette and lie in bed, planning the next day. I’m not upset because I already knew Feisty would turn on me and I planned this vacation as if I’d be alone. That’s part of being a stoic, planning for the things that are going to go wrong, so you can handle them calmly. 

Tomorrow I’ll go to the fancy grocery store and walk through the canals to the beach. I’m excited to see the ocean and to feel the sun on my skin.

I don’t know what’s going to become of us. We have a little bit of money from our exes, but it’s not enough, and Feisty’s blowing through hers, still in a breakdown. 

All I can do is try to help her in little ways and enjoy myself while I can.

[women-are-visual]

The Fat Sow Salad

My friend Feisty Lee called me the other night for the first time in awhile.

“What are you doing?” I said.

“I’m eating a Fat Sow salad,” she said, crunching.

“Is it good? What’s on it?”

“Yeah, it’s great, it’s got pickles, onions, croutons, and this Fat Sow dressing.”

She kept emphasizing “fat sow,” and I realized that maybe there was no Fat Sow restaurant in L.A., she was just referring to the fact that I’m fat. I’m not really fat, I’m just chubby, but I don’t care. I’d rather be fat than crazy. 

Here’s the rule I learned from my natural psychiatrist.

If you eat enough, you can sleep, And if you sleep enough, you will never go crazy.

That’s my mantra for staying sane without medication, but eating isn’t easy for Feisty Lee, like it is for me. She says she can’t eat when she’s stressed and she thinks her ex is poisoning her food and water, so she starves herself and then goes into these prolonged breakdowns, like the one she’s in now. 

“Are you referring to me when you say Fat Sow? Are you angry at me?”

“No, I’m not angry at you.”

“Okay, what’s going on?”

“I’m testing out all these products. I bought an expensive computer and lots of other stuff, most of it’s still in the boxes, I haven’t gotten around to setting it up. I don’t want to be hacked anyway. You know how hackers are always messing with me.”

“I’m not a hacker, Feisty, my brother made that up because he was mad at me.”

“I’m not referring to you!”

“Okay,” I say, “I have to go, goodnight.”

I hang up and Feisty texts me.

“You’re a witch. Stop casting spells on me and my family. Use your powers for good!”

“Okay, Feisty,” I text, “I'll use my powers for good. Please try to eat and sleep. Goodnight.”

[women-are-visual]

Byron at the Library

Byron came into the computer lab at the library again. He’s a short, dark black man in his sixties and he’s probably homeless or something close to it, but he looked cleaned up this time, there was no lint in his short curly hair or crud in his bloodshot eyes. He chose a computer near my desk and we started talking.

“I’m writing a book, it’s about how location and wisdom are the most important things,” he said. Then he muttered something about God.

He sounded like a cross between a real estate agent and a preacher. I’d heard him say, “God is good,” beneath his breath, like many of the people in the lab. But it wouldn’t be professional for me to say that I think religion is misogynist bullshit, so I changed the subject.

“Cool, do you need help with anything?”

“Yeah, I want to apply for a security guard job and I need help filling in an application,” he said.

I got up and went over to his computer. I needed room to pull up a chair next to his, so I straightened out his backpack, which was on the floor, propped up at an angle. Then I saw why he’d positioned it that way. There was a tall silver can of Steel Reserve malt liquor behind it, under the table, and it was open. 

I hesitated for a second, unsure of what to do. Should I mention it to him or to anyone else? I thought about the past when I was younger and a control freak; I wouldn’t have tolerated alcohol in the library. But I’d just been reading a book by a heart surgeon who was a severe alcoholic, called The End of My Addiction, and he talked about how it was a disease that he couldn’t control, yet everyone punished him for it. They wouldn’t shun or punish someone with heart disease, yet they treated his disease like it was a matter of willpower. He tried everything to cure it: AA, talk therapy, and rehabs, but they never worked because he wasn’t normal when he was sober, he was extremely anxious. Finally he found baclofen, a nonaddictive drug that made him stop drinking and feel normal when he was sober.

Anyway, I like drinking too, I’ve read that beer is the best painkiller, and if I was homeless I’m sure I’d like it even more. And if Byron was a severe alcoholic and he quit abruptly, he could go into seizures like the doctor I was reading about did. Maybe he needed a little alcohol just to be functional.

So I did nothing. I ignored the can of malt liquor and pulled a chair up next to him.

He took out a dirty notebook in which he’d written down his email and resume logins. I sat there with him while he typed everything in one digit at a time, excruciatingly slowly. Then I showed him how to scroll with the mouse. It took him awhile to learn how to do that. I’d forgotten that it’s a skill because I’ve been doing it for so long, but it’s hard at first to left click, hold down the button, and then drag the mouse. I tried to just be patient and let him learn. His hands were like the paws of an animal, he had rough and calloused palms and dirty nails, but eventually he got the hang of it. I told him that he was getting good at computers and he laughed with delight.

We filled out an excruciatingly long application for a security guard job. They wanted a resume, references, and answers to questions about what he would do in several situations. We both started moaning as we completed one page and then another appeared. “Oh no!” we moaned.

“Are you a veteran?” I asked him.

“No, thank god,” he said.

Eventually we completed the application.

Byron thanked me for my help and said, “What sign are you, a Cancer?”

“No, I’m a Scorpio, what are you?”

“A Pisces,” he said.

“We’re supposed to get along. You’re emotional and I’m mysterious, but I’m emotional too. I hope you get this job.”

“Yeah, me too.”

He packed up and left and I felt happy that I’d helped him. The thing is that he’d helped me too, he helped me to be less lonely and less fearful of people and to feel grateful for all that I have. 

My shift was up, so I got out a few zines, but I only liked the one, No Gods, No Mattress, by Enola Dismay. She’s a homeless punk rock girl who lives in her van in Berkeley and writes interesting things about her life, like about visits to her mother and grandmother and descriptions of their houses.

It was a dark and rainy night as I ran out to my car. I felt happy because I love the rain and I’d been waiting for it for months. I got inside, damp, and watched the rain wash down the windshield and listened to it hit the roof in sheets, and I felt grateful that I have a car and an apartment. I don’t know how long it will last, I worry that I might be homeless myself because I can’t work that much, but the work I do manage to do satisfies me greatly. On that note, I went shopping for Thanksgiving.

[women-are-visual]

Dominitra at the Library

It was the third day of my volunteer job in the computer lab at the library. I filled out the signup sheet, put on my name tag, and picked out a few books in the lobby to read if my shift was slow. 

The computer lab is one of the large main areas to the right of the lobby and it was hot and crowded. There were eight tables with six computers at each and a homeless person at every one of them. “Unhoused,” the head librarian put it during the volunteer orientation. Interesting, I thought, I hadn’t heard that term before. Was it was supposed to mean that they weren’t “less” for not having a home? 

I didn’t have a chance to put my books down on my desk before another volunteer, Lydia, stopped me. “This is Dominitra. She needs help filling out an application,” she said, and scurried away, why I would learn in a minute. I put my books on the floor and pulled up a chair. 

Dominitra was in her early 30s and wore a bedazzled jean baseball cap and hoop earrings. She had long brown hair and green fluorescent nails that were nearly as long as her fingers. She was filling out an online job application with her fingers arched back, and she was rushing through everything, constantly making mistakes, then jabbing the delete button. 

“What do you want to do?” I asked her. 

“I want to be an admin. I’ll take anything.” 

“Cool,” I said.

She didn’t really need my help, but I could tell that it reassured her to have me there, and it allowed her to concentrate enough to figure out what forms she needed to fill out. 

A woman on computer number 23 at the next table waved me over. She was very small and very old. She wore a housedress and was mostly bald, but she had used some hair product that looked like black spray paint to cover her baldness. Over that she wore a hair net. It looked very strange. A painted outline surrounded her face in a perfect arc, but it was too far down on her forehead, like a badly worn wig. 

“I need some help with this application,” she said. 

She was filling out a form for a loan. She made $2,000 a year and wanted a loan for $5,000. She was born in 1934, which made her 85 years old. Sad. She didn’t know how to left click or scroll. I showed her how to do both and she was filling in a password field when Dominitra went over to the scanner. 

“Oooo, it smells like pussy over here!” she shouted. I looked at her. 

“Sorry.”

An older man came over to her and said, “How you doing?” 

“Just being hot as hell, as usual.” 

“Huh?” He hadn’t heard her right because her answer was so ludicrous. Dominitra wasn’t hot at all. She was bossy and scary. She repeated herself louder.

“Just being hot as hell, as usual.” 

The old man walked away.

She yelled over to me.

“I need help. Type this email for me.”

I got up and went over to the scanner.

“You can do this. You don’t need me to do this.”

“I can’t do it.”

“What if you have to do this at your job?”

“I won’t.”

She sat back down at her computer and I typed in the email.

“You need to be the boss, not the employee. Start your own business.”

“Haha, I don’t have the money.”

“Get your first client, then start from there.”

I finished entering the email.

“Okay, now you do the rest. You’re not learning if I do it for you.” That was one of our directives in the orientation. Let people do things themselves.

Dominitra went back to the scanner.

“I’m proud of you, Dominitra.”

I sat back down with the older woman. She’d erased the entire form we’d just filled out. I recovered it from her history and we began filling it in once more. Dominitra didn’t ask for my help again and she left quietly.

8/22/19

[women-are-visual]

Part Library, Part Homeless Shelter

I got a job volunteering in the computer lab in the downtown library. For two hours a week, I show people how to do things like scan and print documents and create email accounts. Most of them are homeless, and many of them are crazy. But I wanted to make sure that I would like working in a library before I go for my master’s in library science, and I wanted to start in the trenches. 

It’s my fourth week and a guy at computer number 19 turns to me and asks if I can help him with his phone. 

“I’m a web designer and I don’t know a lot about phones, but I’ll try,” I say.

I get up from my desk facing the rows of tables in the center of the book lined room. He’s skinny and middle aged and he’s wearing all black: a black t-shirt tucked into black jeans with black suspenders and a black leather wristband. As I approach him, I notice that his t-shirt is cruddy and he smells like urine.

“I can’t get online,” he says, “I think my phone might be hacked.”

He hands me his cracked black cell phone with his long yellow nails. 

"Hackers don’t target individuals and hacking is extremely hard to do,” I try to reassure him.

“It’s my boyfriend.” 

“Your boyfriend would have to be a computer genius to hack you, it’s not easy.”

“He was.” 

“No.” 

An old guy with a trucker’s cap and a white beard across the table asks me for help next. He's trying to get into his AOL email, he hates Google, but he can’t get in. 

“Jeff Bezos is trying to block me,” he says. 

“See!” the gay guy across the table exclaims. 

“Jeff Bezos is rich and he doesn’t give a damn about you,” I say. 

I stay 20 minutes late, trying to help him set up a new email, but we can’t verify his phone number, he only has a landline, not a cell phone, so I ask the next volunteer to help him and leave.

I walk around the lake afterwards and wonder how much I can really help these people. I do what I can, but they need housing and other social programs. I tell myself that, if they have to be homeless, then at least the library is a pleasant and safe place for them to come sit for awhile.

8/22/19

[women-are-visual]

The Artist & The Moon Gate

I went over to my friend Sandy’s late at night and we drank and danced to “In Da Club.” That was was my favorite song during my breakdown, so now we laugh about it. 

She was super thin from not eating and her hair was long and straight with bangs. She was wearing a big sweater and black eyeliner that went all the way around each eye. She said she’s becoming an artist now that her husband is leaving her and she’s having another breakdown. 

“So many bad things have happened to me, I don’t care anymore, I just want to make paintings.”

She was living in the apartment on the lower level of their house while they fixed it up to sell it. She’d painted a cartoonish portrait of a couple over her computer monitor and put a camera inside a painting, where the eye was, and broken the back off a chair and made it into a blue vase cutout that she displayed on her fireplace mantle. She sat on the couch and I sat on the rug in front of the coffee table. It was covered with open jars of linseed oil that smelled like turpentine and gave me a headache. 

“You should cover these jars,” I said. 

“It’s natural,” she said. 

“Yeah, but Gwen went crazy when she left turpentine out in her bedroom.”

Two of her paintings of cartoonish people hung above the couch. She complimented me profusely and said, “Your hair looks better than ever, you could get any guy you want,” but she became angry when I tried to give her advice.

“You have to eat and sleep every day,” I said, “Not every three days.” 

“People are just conformist!” she shouted. 

She showed me a “sludgehammer” she’d use to beat anyone who broke in, and said, “People are coming in all the time and fucking with me. I have enemies.” 

We went to 7-11 to get more beer. The older African man working as a cashier had to unlock the door to let us in because there have been robberies. When Sandy tried to open the cooler, she screamed. It was locked, it was after 2:30 a.m., and they weren’t selling alcohol anymore. The cashier was jumpy and nervous and he scolded her. “Please excuse my friend, she’s crazy,” I said, but he frowned and wouldn’t look at us, he just jabbed the handheld scanner at our snacks, looking down. 

The next day she hung out with her other friend Heidi and told me they’d gotten a Zachary’s pizza and drank red wine and danced to Britney Spears and had lots of fun. The day after that, she called and texted and insulted me nonstop, saying it’s all my fault that my brother Nate beat me up and Scott left me. I hardly responded because I know she’s just a vicious little nut when she’s in a breakdown, it’s from not eating, but I asked her why she instantly turns against me whenever she hangs out with Heidi. I sent her a video of angry Ren and told her she always takes any guy’s side against me and she’s a moron. Then I stopped responding. She’s too crazy and I don’t know how to help her.

I wasn’t actually mad because I was walking around the Moon Gate and the moon had come out. The hills of redwood trees were black against the silver sky. It was a warm night and I stood there listening to the rhythmic sound of the crickets chirping and thinking of my favorite holiday, Halloween. I felt incredibly grateful that I’m sane and capable and not like Sandy. I felt grateful that Scott left and I have a chance to find someone who’s warm and fun and honest, not someone who pretends to be loving and then, after 20 years, viciously turns on me the minute they get a chance with someone else. I’m finally getting over the shock of that happening and moving on.

8/22/19

[women-are-visual]

In a Concrete Tower

“I feel like everyone in this place wants to fuck me,” my boyfriend of twenty years says, leaning back in his chair. We’re on vacation in Mendocino and we’re having dinner at a fancy French restaurant. It’s in a Victorian house and the tables are tastefully decorated with white tablecloths, cut glass vases full of wildflowers, and glowing candles. My boyfriend is tall, six foot six, and his voice is bassy and loud. At 46, deep lines surround his mouth like parentheses and some grey is woven into his black hair, but he’s still very handsome. I will always think of him as the nerdy new waver who I met when I was 16 though, and, although he’s become a successful IT consultant, he’s hardly a lady’s man. There’s something wrong.

I look around the room. Our server is a conservative looking woman with her hair in a neat bun and she’s been nice to us, but of course that’s her job. At the table next to us, two white haired, sixty-something couples exclaim over their beef bourguignons. No one’s looking at us or showing any interest in us, sexual or otherwise, and I feel confused. Is my boyfriend losing his mind? I know he’s been depressed and has been having some sort of midlife crisis lately. I don’t know what to think, but I try to boost his ego. “You are pretty handsome,” I say.

We return from vacation and he writes a short story about cheating on his first girlfriend, an overweight punk rock, glam girl. He wants me to edit it and post it on his blog.

“Are you posting this story to let women know that you’re available?” I ask him.

“Of course not,” he says, “I would never cheat on you.”

But I discover texts on his phone.

“Amy D. is so hot. She would be a definite upgrade as a side chick,” he texts his friend. I feel stunned and devastated. Scott has always preached monogamy and stoicism and I know he’s never cheated on me in twenty years. I can’t believe he’s even using terms like “side chick,” we’re smart and we like to read.

I find her profile on Facebook and she’s a blond girl in her mid-twenties who works for a futurist organization he’s involved with. She looks very gendered and conservative, like the type of girl we laughed at in high school. We're too cool for this kind of person, I thought. Also, she’s twenty years younger than him, she would be our daughter’s age now if we had one, and that’s just creepy. My boyfriend isn’t a creep. When he gets home, I confront him about his texts.

“I wasn’t being serious, I was joking,” he says, “how could you think that was serious?”

“Who’s your current side chick?” I ask him.

“No one, that was a joke, I don’t really talk that way,” he says.

I ask my friend and her husband about the texts.

“Could they possibly be a joke?” I say.

“I don’t know, but don’t worry, he could never get a girl like that,” my friend’s husband says. But that’s not what I’m worried about, I’m worried that he wants a girl like that. And I’m 46, a middle-aged woman. I don’t think I look bad for my age, but I’m chubby and I was far from a model even in my youth.

I’m beside myself. Scott and I normally get along so well, but now we fight constantly and he’s never around. At night, alone in our apartment, I smoke cigarettes and drink until I vomit. When he comes home I tell him that I’m lonely, but he doesn’t care. While before he used to listen to and compliment me, now he ignores and insults me. He screams that I’m a burden and he doesn’t have the energy to care for me anymore. Eventually I can’t take the abuse and I scream back that he’s a robot dick.

I think about when we first met.

When I was 16, shortly after my family moved from the country to the suburbs of Buffalo, New York, a girl in my new high school handed me a note. It was written by two boys from another high school who had heard about me and it said, “Someday all boys will wear skirts.” It had a drawing of googly eyes and their phone numbers on it. I wasn’t going to call them, but eventually the loneliness of being in a new town sunk in and I did. They showed up at my door the following Saturday.

It was the 80s and new wave was popular. They were dressed like old men with their shirts buttoned all the way up to the top, but that’s where their similarities ended. One was short and sweaty and totally silent. The other one was tall, thin, and arrogant. He was the spokesperson for the two.

“We’re here to see the bald girl with sewer boots,” he told my mom.

I came downstairs. I was wearing a pink house dress, my head was shaved bald, and I was totally crazy looking. Scott was super tall and thin, wearing a green plaid trench coat. He had long bangs, a huge pimple in the center of his nose, and he smelled like fish from working at a fish fry restaurant. I was madly in love.

I thought we would easily be partners forever, but now things have changed. I check his emails and discover that he’s been having an affair. It was with some autistic girl from his futurist group who treated him badly and it’s over, but he’s not over it emotionally. He’s trying to heal from it by starting affairs with other women. I tell him that I forgive him and I’ve had one night stands too; I don’t care; I just want to stay together. But he goes off to visit his old friend Nancy in Phoenix. I agree that he can have sex with her ahead of time, I know I have no choice, and I think it might help him get over his bad affair, but when he comes home he acts more aloof and arrogant than ever.

In November, right after our 20th anniversary and right before my 46th birthday, my boyfriend, a person who I’ve known for two-thirds of my life, dumps me. He moves into an awful, expensive apartment in a concrete tower on the side of the highway in Emeryville. It’s right above a sewage treatment plant and it’s as cold as he’s become towards me.

It’s been a few months now and I still wonder about what happened. I know I was a shitty girlfriend in many ways, I didn’t work on my web design business enough or make a lot of money, but I also think I was a good companion to him. Then again, I always compared myself to my mom, who got drunk for a week at a time and shit the couch, so I had pretty low standards.

I’ve looked up articles on midlife crises and he seems to match the profile. On one site, the Midlife Club, it reads, “If your partner always cheated and he’s not middle-aged, then he’s just a cheater. If your partner has never cheated and he’s middle-aged, then he might be having a midlife crisis.” So in part I think that’s what this is. A lot of men go through them. They get older and lose their testosterone and it makes them miserable and scared about aging and death and worried about not having accomplished enough.

My new boyfriend, Jon, says his dad also had a midlife crisis, and he dumped their family and started a new one. It was with a worse woman than his mom, but his dad didn’t care. For whatever reason, many men abandon their families in midlife.

I tell Jon about the incident at the restaurant in Mendocino and he laughs. “No, he didn’t really say that!” He raises his eyebrows and scoffs. “So, let me get this straight,” he says, “he wrote a short story about cheating on you to let all these women know he was available and he heard crickets. So he went all the way to Phoenix to have sex with some burnt out mom?”

Then my anger disappears and I feel sad for my old boyfriend again. I hope he figures himself out and gets through this crazy time.

February 18, 2018

[danbily]

This moss covered rock is the final resting place of one of the greatest American authors of his time.  As you know, snow has closed down my flying for the remainder of the WNY winter.  My daughter, Gretchen, recently made this pilgrimage from the Bay Area to the the Jack London State Historic Park in Sonoma  County.  This can be done as a air adventure as well.  Gretchen has lived in Bay Area for years and has visited most if not all of the important sites.  This one is unique and was granted her five star” must see” status. It is out of way but well worth your time.  With a plane, this is a simple Class D airport with much to offer the GA pilot. Go fly the West Coast and find out for yourself!  

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You sent me this article, which is what inspired the trip:

The Short, Frantic, Rags-to-Riches Life of Jack London: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/short-heroic-rags-riches-life-jack-london-180961200.

Now I have to read “To Build a Fire” again. That has been one of my favorite short stories since I was 11.

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The Bewitching Fete

For Halloween this year, Scott and I went to The Bewitching Fete, a crafts fair in Pleasanton that featured Halloween decor made by artists. Scott picked out the ceramic jack-o-lantern, and I ended up winning the raffle and all of these other unique crafts. I like everything besides the Pickled Tickle Finger, but I kept it anyway, because it seems like something kooky my mom would have made.

It came with a poem inside:

The pickled tickle finger, it comes for you at night, It rings the bell when you’re in bed and causes you a fright, Now the pickled tickle finger is on your window tapping, It inches ‘cross the carpet while your parents are a'napping, Oh, the pickled tickle finger will get you good one day, And, by the way, it’s really only made of clay.

October 17, 2017

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My Broken Things

It’s a cool night in early October. On my way to the grocery store, I drive past the daycare center at the bottom of my hill. It’s in a Craftsman house that’s been decorated for Halloween. Paper ghosts are taped to the front window and orange lights are strung around the little tree in the yard. The lights glow warmly in the dark and would be very pretty, but whoever put them up did a terrible job, they are not strung neatly around the branches in a spiral, they have simply been thrown onto the tree and they zigzag along the front in a random z-shape and dangle off a branch near the trunk. I feel annoyed looking at them, hardly anyone in my Oakland, California neighborhood is friendly, no one decorates for the holidays, and these people don’t seem to care either.

So after I’ve gotten my groceries, on my way back home, I do a u-turn and park in front of the house, determined to fix the lights. It must be the middle aged woman in me who is so used to caring for my own home that now I want to care for my entire neighborhood. And it comforts me to make order and beauty, especially at this time in my life when I feel so powerless and alone. The tree is taller than I expected and even standing on the porch steps I can’t reach the lights on the top branches, but I arrange the ones on the lower branches, so that they are in a neat s-shape and don’t hang off at the bottom. I step back on the sidewalk to admire my work, but I don’t look behind me and the side of my right foot rolls off of a curb that slopes downward, so that all of my weight shifts onto the side of my foot. I hear a snap and I shout and fall sideways, into the street.

For a moment, I just lie there. The gravel is rough on my cheek and I feel a surge of anxiety, afraid of the pain that’s certain to come. Why did this happen to me, when it can’t happen? I would normally feel embarrassed or fearful lying there, immobilized in public, but at this time of night the houses are dark and quiet and there’s no one around. I only hear the rhythmic sound of crickets chirping. I have scraped my palms and my right foot hurts, but it doesn’t hurt that badly. Maybe the sound I heard is just like a knuckle cracking, it’s probably nothing. I’m tough and this can’t happen to me right now, so I conclude that it must not have. I get up and brush the gravel off of my pants, but when I step down on my right foot, it hurts. Maybe it’s just a sprain. I keep walking, limping and wincing. I drive home and carry two bags of groceries up the stairs to my apartment on the second floor. I go inside and put the groceries down in the kitchen and sit at my computer desk, still waiting for the wave of pain to come.

“I might have hurt my foot,” I tell Scott.

“What happened?” he says.

My boyfriend is sitting next to me in his recliner with his laptop on a pillow in his lap. He’s 46 years old, an IT consultant, futurist, and sci-fi writer. He’s tall and slim, dark and handsome, but for the past few months, he has not been the same caring, loving partner I’ve had for twenty years. He’s aloof now. “You’re a burden,” he says. “I’m sick of caring for your emotions. I’m having a midlife crisis, it’s some sort of breakdown, you have to take care of me now. I cared for you during your breakdowns and you owe me.”

I take off my tan boat shoe and gray sock. There’s a raised area on the side of my right foot which is slightly purple. I run my finger over it and feel a bump. I take off my other shoe and feel the side of my left foot to compare. No bump there. I search on articles about how to tell if you have a broken foot. Two of the biggest signs are a snapping sound and pain when you stand on it. Oh shit. I call a Kaiser advice nurse. “Keep it elevated and iced for twenty minutes at a time. I’m making an appointment for you to get an x-ray and be seen in podiatry tomorrow. By the way, did you get the Halloween lights up?” she says. I laugh and tell her yes.

The next morning, Scott tells me that I moaned in my sleep. I know why. It’s because I dreamed about being sick and trapped with someone who doesn’t care about me anymore.

I’m still hopeful that I just have a sprain, but at the hospital, the doctor shows me two cracks on the x-ray. “You broke the long bone on the outside of your foot in two places,” she says. “That area gets very little blood flow and is notoriously hard to heal. You’ll have to be in a cast for two months.”

In the cast room, the news hits me and I start crying. I’ve just been through Scott’s affair for five months and now two months of this. I’m sitting with my legs hanging off the side of a hospital bed. A middle aged Filipino man kneels below me and wraps my foot and calf in cotton padding and blue ace bandages dipped in a warm fiberglass liquid. “Keep your foot at a right angle, otherwise it won’t heal right, relax.” He’s very skilled at and proud of his work. The end result is an old fashioned, rock hard cast that covers my foot and goes to my knee. All I can think of is how I will be stuck at home while my boyfriend goes clubbing. And the punk rock feminist in me wants to drink and smoke and fuck the pain away.

I go home and cry all night.

The next day I decide that I’m going to get through this. I read articles on how to heal my bones faster. I can’t smoke. I’ve been smoking during Scott’s affair, but I will quit now because otherwise it will take 65% longer for my bones to heal.

I watch videos on how to use crutches properly. A middle aged woman has made one, “8 Weeks on Crutches,” that shows her going around the grocery store and on nature walks. She says you have to get out every day or you’ll get depressed.

Scott modifies the apartment so that it’s easier for me to move around. He rolls up the area rugs in the living and dining room and I use my office chair as a wheelchair. I use a sippy cup with a lid for my tea. Scott puts a hose on the shower head and buys me a bath bench, a knee scooter, and a wheelchair. He’s already back into caregiver mode, but I’m nervous about it, because he’s unhappy with that role, and I don’t blame him.

The couch is an island, covered with pillows, books, my laptop and iPad, a stool for tea and an ottoman. I lie there with my leg elevated. I look around the living room and notice everything cruddy, dusty, and out of place, but I can’t do much about it.

Finally, I can’t take it anymore. I stand up on my crutches and try to move a ceramic jack-o-lantern to the center of the dining room table, but I lose my balance and fall backwards onto my hip. I have managed to not put my weight on my bad foot, but I have landed on my side and I lie there for a moment in pain. It’s okay, I haven’t broken anything else, but I’m scared now. It’s so hard to balance on one leg. It takes an incredible amount of strength. I vow to never forget how wonderful it is to have two feet again.

The worst part of my day is the nighttime, when I’m lying in bed with my leg propped up on pillows. My foot throbs. I switch positions over and over again, rearrange the pillows, turn on my left side and then my right, but nothing helps. I lie there in the dark and start to panic. My foot’s being held at a right angle, which is not a natural position. My calf muscle tenses and flutters. I feel claustrophobic. I want to scream and cut the cast off, but I just turn on the bedside light, take deep breaths, and exercise my bandaged leg and foot. I point and flex my toes and stretch my leg toward the ceiling and bend my knee and do leg lifts. I’ve read that it’s best to keep the parts of your body surrounding the cast mobile. Finally I take three ibuprofen and the pain subsides.

In the morning, Scott gets me tea and picks up the house. “Did I call you a burden?” he says. “I forgot how much work it is to pick up the house. It’s an enormous amount of work. I’m never going to call you a burden again.”

October 17, 2017

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My Boyfriend’s Midlife Crisis

I haven’t posted in awhile. I’ve been going through a lot emotionally and I find it hard to write during those times.

A few months ago in April, Scott, my boyfriend of 20 years, began going out every night and coming home drunk at 12:30 or 1:00 in the morning.

I’m sitting at my computer desk when I hear his key in the door. The knob turns and the door runner slides across the floor. He’s laughing. “Paul and I met some firemen who made us do shots. I’m so drunk, I’m spinning,” he says. He moans and sits down on the Mission chair in his office and takes off his wingtips. He’s still dressed in his business clothing for his job as an IT consultant, a light blue button down shirt and olive wool pants. He’s 46 and has laugh lines on either side of his mouth and some grey hair mixed in with the black, but he’s still tall and slim, dark and handsome. We’ve known each other since we were teenagers, when he was a new waver with long bangs and I was a punk rocker with a bald head. He is the giant and I am the elf. He is the rock and I am the spark. But he’s not the rock anymore.

“I’m hungry. Do we have anything to eat?” he asks.

I tell him I made tacos for dinner and he says those sound good, so I go into the kitchen and begin cooking. I’m angry. I’ve spent another night alone, drinking beer and vodka, sitting on the back steps of our apartment building and smoking in the cool dark night. I looked at the giant redwood trees and the lights of the little houses on the hills in the distance. After I had gone through all of the alcohol in the house, I drove to 7-11 to get more. The cashier, an Arab boy in a red vest, said, “Did you run out?” and I laughed. I got a six pack of Lagunitas IPA, a Skor bar, and a pack of Marlboro Reds. I’m not supposed to smoke because I’ve had breakdowns and it seems to trigger them, but I’m a punk rock girl again, pissed off and rebelling against my boyfriend’s rules. I drove home and smoked and drank some more and rubbed myself with peppermint essential oil before Scott got home, to cover the smell, but he hasn’t noticed anything.

He sits down at the table and I serve him a plate of tacos, but I can’t control my anger.

“Here you go, fucker.”

He laughs and starts eating. “These are great,” he says. He doesn’t care about me or my temper anymore. Afterwards, he sits in his recliner and gets on his laptop and acts like I’m not even there.

“I was lonely tonight,” I tell him.

“That’s not my fault. You need to get a life. You’re a burden. I’m sick of dealing with your moods. You need a counselor and a social life. I don’t care what you do. Just let me go out and have fun. I’m having a midlife crisis and I can’t care for you anymore. I cared for you during your sister’s death and your breakdowns. You owe me.”

“You’re having an affair.”

“I couldn’t have an affair if I wanted to. No women like me,” he says.

This goes on for a month or two.

On a Friday night, we go to one of our favorite restaurants for dinner and drinks. We split a salad and a steak frites and I get a cocktail and Scott gets a cabernet. We normally have fun, talking and laughing, but that night he stares through me and acts bored.

“What are you thinking about? It’s another woman, isn’t it?”

“No, you know how it is when you socialize, how you think about every stupid thing you said afterward.”

“You wouldn’t think about your autistic friends that much.”

He gets up to use the bathroom and I ask him if I can look at photos on his phone, but he pretends not to hear me and takes it with him. My heart starts beating hard.

“You’re cheating on me,” I say when he gets back to the table.

“No, I’m not, I’m just bitching to my friends about you and I don’t want you to see it because it would hurt you. I need to be able to talk about my problems with my friends. You do it with your friends and you wouldn’t want me to see your conversations.”

We go home and I put on LED tea lights and we listen to new wave: The Cure, Siouxsie, The Fall, and Molly Nillson. I sit at my computer desk and play everything off of YouTube, which has videos, song suggestions on the right, and comments. We have the argument about YouTube vs. Spotify again.

“YouTube is so much better,” I say. “It’s interactive. Spotify is just the Beatles listening app.”

Normally Scott dances on the big rug in front of the couch, but tonight he is too tired and he just sits in his recliner and drinks with his blue blockers on.

“Put on Stacks by Bon Iver,” he says.

“Okay,” I say. We listen to two lines, but it’s depressing and has a bad rhythm.

“This sucks, let’s listen to something else,” I say.

“Don’t say it sucks. Say you don’t like it, but don’t say it sucks and imply that I suck for liking it.”

“What are you talking about? Since when do I have to talk to you that way? We’re two monsters in a cave.”

“I’m breaking down; I can’t take it anymore.”

And another night of arguing begins.

The next day, after working on a website, I look up articles on the signs of someone cheating or having a midlife crisis. He has all of the signs of both. I email my friends and tell them what’s going on. I have very few friends, but the ones I do have tell me that I need to start working out and get hot. I need to feed him more and schedule a vacation so he can get some time away to write his sci-fi novel. I need to wear wigs and lingerie.

I shower and get dressed. I look in the mirror and see a chubby middle aged woman with short curly hair, but I still see the punk rock girl in me too, and I don’t think I look that bad. I have a nice body with big breasts, even if I am a little fat. It’s not about how I look. I have guts and my friends don’t get it. If Scott doesn’t want me, I’ll find someone else. My friend with Asperger’s, Cheryl, says the nicest thing.

“If you broke up, you would do better than him. He might have the money and the clothes, but he doesn’t have the joie de vivre that you do.” We smoke cigarettes and have a dance party in her studio, listening to the Ramones on our phones, and I feel better.

I’ve cheated too. I’ve made out with random guys and it was always mediocre. Most guys smell and they can’t kiss, they can’t hold a decent conversation or show interest in me or give me a compliment. I never get involved emotionally, I’m always grateful for Scott when I come home, so I can’t understand the way he’s treating me.

“I said you could have an affair if you wanted to, as long as you didn’t tell me about it,” I tell him. “But you’re supposed to feel guilty about it and be extra nice to me!”

Another month passes, then Scott leaves his computer on while he goes out to lunch with a friend. I see that his email is up and my heart starts beating hard, I can hear it pounding in my ears, and my face feels hot. I pull the shades and sit at his desk and find the tab with his Facebook messages on it. I read several conversations with his friends. The affair has been over for two months by that time. It was with some girl in her thirties and it was awful. I email my brother her picture and he says, “She looks like a bulldog.”

I call Scott while he’s still out. “I know about your affair,” I say.

“Wait there, I’ll be home in a minute,” he says, but I leave and go to Shepherd’s Canyon and sit in the sun and smoke. I don’t come home until that night, when he’s gone and staying at a friend’s. Another night of heavy drinking. I puke, then I drink some more and puke again. I sit on the kitchen floor and smoke a pack of cigarettes out the window. I worry about having another breakdown. I don’t want to talk to him, but I end up texting him late at night.

“Hey, you fucking piece of shit robot dick.”

“You owe me forgiveness,” he texts. “Love is about forgiveness. You ignored me for months at a time during your breakdowns and I stayed with you and cared for you. You cheated on me too with that guy in Germany.”

I know he’s right, but I can’t let it go. I’m beside myself, but I have been for the past few months anyway. I weave through the apartment that I normally so carefully clean and decorate, but it doesn’t feel like my home anymore. Nothing is the same because nobody loves me and there’s no one to share it with. My heart feels like there’s a fist squeezing it and I’m nauseous.

I call him the next day and we meet at a bar in uptown Oakland. He tells me about the affair and how shitty it was and eventually I tell him about my affairs too. We consider polyamory, but we decide that we don’t want to get into a polyamorous nerd slapping contest, in which each of us tries to outdo each other with hotter partners. We know nerd couples in Scott’s rationalist scene who do that.

“We’ve been together for 20 years,” he says. “Nothing’s going to break our relationship. I don’t have the history with anyone else.”

“I’m not going anywhere either,” I say. “You’re my favorite person.”

We get drunk. I ask him questions about the affair and he tells me everything. I find myself comforting him, trying to boost him after all. We talk and laugh and compliment each other and reminisce about our past friends in Buffalo and listen to the Violent Femmes and have great sex.

The funny thing is that, in the end, this affair actually helped our relationship. I find myself more attracted to my boyfriend than ever. I like to think of him as an evil stud. Our sex life has gotten better and we’ve decided to be more honest and less controlling with each other.

“My friends were warning me that this affair might end our relationship,” Scott says, tisking and laughing. “They don’t understand what 20 years means.”

“We’ve been through death and madness,” I say. “An affair is nothing.”

October 16, 2017

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How To Decorate a Grave

Annie Levy’s gravestone in Mountain View Cemetery

It’s August in Oakland, California and it hasn’t rained for months. The last time it rained it was April and it won’t rain again until October, which is more than half a year without rain. It’s really driving me crazy at this point, but at least it was foggy and grey yesterday, which offered some relief.

Scott and I walked in Mountain View Cemetery after dinner and, as usual, we stopped by the Jewish section to visit Annie Levy’s grave. She was only 27 when she died and her family still spends a lot of time keeping her stone nicely decorated. There's a bar hung with ornaments across the top, a potted plant at the head of it, a bird on a metal stick to the left, a pinwheel on the right, and figurines all around. As a Jewish tradition, people leave little stones as a sign they’ve visited and that the person still lives on in their memory. 

I can relate to the heartbreak of this family because my sister Gwen died of breast cancer ten years ago, when she was only 34. I was one year older than her, 35, and I didn’t have any money when she died because I’d been caregiving and spending time with her during the last few years of her life, and I hadn’t been working. I called Mountain View Cemetery and the Chapel of the Chimes (a gothic columbarium next door) to see what it cost for a niche or a grave, but the starting price was nearly $10,000 and I couldn’t afford it. So I still have her ashes in a cardboard box in my closet and I’m not sure what to do with them. I did make a cool website for her artwork, which I think is more important. Gwen told me that she didn’t care what I did with her body or her art after she died, she would be dead, so it wouldn’t matter to her. She added that necrophilia wasn’t really a crime either, it didn’t hurt anyone.

Women’s magazines have articles on how to decorate a living room or a bedroom, but there’s never one on how to decorate a grave. Death is not a subject that is covered, which makes me sad, because women deal with caregiving and death all of the time and they need support. My new favorite online magazine is Country Living, which has the usual articles about decorating, crafts, and food, but isn’t afraid to discuss death too.

August 10, 2017

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The fairy post office in Tilden Park

Scott and I like to take nature walks on Sundays. Lately, we’ve been going to Tilden Park in Berkeley. Lake Anza is in the center of the park, but it’s always crowded, so it’s not my favorite walk. However, the paths off of the lake are really beautiful and private.

This week we took the Wildcat Gorge Trail. We walked on a hard dirt path scattered with orange and yellow bay leaves that smelled really strongly. The path followed a stream that flowed over rocks and spilled off of ledges into waterfalls. We passed forests of tall, peeling eucalyptus trees that made spooky sounds; they creaked in the wind like doors on rusty hinges, so loudly sometimes that we worried they would fall on us. We kept looking for a “fairy post office” that we saw marked on the trail map. Finally we found it. It was in the hollow of a tree and inside there was a little desk and lots of little letters. I plan on writing one the next time we go there.

We walked for half an hour and then we turned around. On the way back, it was the golden hour and the sun lit up the tops of the oak trees. There was a slight breeze, but it was still perfectly temperate. I felt very lucky being there, like I was the richest person in the world, which is how I always feel on our walks. We passed the lake and everyone was gone so we stood at the edge of the water and watched the fog blowing over the eucalyptus trees on the hills in the distance.

August 6, 2017

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It was the Fourth of July and I got up late. Scott and I wanted to go walking in Mountain View Cemetery, but when we got there, it was already dusk, so it was closed. The security guard was standing in front of the gates, turning people away. He was in his late twenties, wearing a white shirt with patches and standing next to a white jeep. Other people had come there too, probably hoping to watch the fireworks from the hill. The cemetery has an amazing panoramic view of Oakland, the bay, and both bridges in San Francisco. There was a thirty year old Arab guy, a couple of queer women with their two ten year old girls, and another family with more ten year olds. That is the demographic of people who watch fireworks, young families with preteens.

No one wanted to leave. Everyone was arguing with the security guard. I said to one of the queer women with a mohawk and glasses, “We need to make a break for it, everyone has to run in at once and then he can’t stop us.” She smiled, but she didn’t say anything. You can’t do that sort of thing when you have kids, they’re not that coordinated.

The exit gate automatically opened inward to let a car out and the Arab guy in the black car tried to drive in. The security guard shouted and ran over to the car and he stopped. He didn’t have the guts to drive in anyway or he didn’t want the trouble, so he turned around and left. The guard walked back over to the entrance gate on the right and continued arguing with the two queer women. The exit gate opened again. This time I walked past the gate and into the cemetery while the guard had his back turned, but one of the queer women looked at me and then he turned to look and he saw me and shouted, “Stop!” I took off running. I ran as fast as I could and I screamed as I ran. It’s very hard for me to run, I’m chubby and middle-aged and I never really was a runner, but I found that screaming helped me to run faster and built my courage.

I ran around the corner and ducked behind a hedge surrounding the fountain, near the brick building, which is the main office. I saw a break in the hedge and I thought about stepping inside of it and hiding there if the guard came after me, but he didn’t. I waited for Scott, but it was futile. I knew he wasn’t coming. I stood there for a while looking at the mausoleums and the sun setting on the hill. Then I came back around the corner and walked out the gate again. One of the ten year old girls with ponytails and polka dot leggings looked up at me and asked me in a really cute, worried voice, “Did you get caught?” And I patted her shoulder and said, “No, but we’d all have to make a break for it in order to get in.” It’s always good to teach kids how to break the rules when the rules are stupid.

Scott was waiting in the car. I got in and he told me that when I took off running and screaming, one of the queer women had said, “That was amazing.” Then she said, “What’s she going to do in there alone though?” That was a good point. It’s lonely being a rebel.

July 4, 2017

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2017 Alameda County Fair

My friend, Cheryl, and I went to the county fair in Pleasanton, California yesterday. We had corn dogs, curly fries, a funnel cake, beer, and lemonade, but I felt sick all night. I ate too much fat, too fast.

My favorite part was just looking at the art, crafts, flowers, and animals.

July 4, 2017