I look up at the sky. It’s dark and threatening. I think where else would i be if I could just point myself there? And there I am. On the side of crystal clear blue waterfall pool. I’m young. Thin. Tan. Toned.

And I could actually care less about that. I am happy. I am ready to jump into the pool. My young psyche, lovely body, and relentless energy innocently taking me over.  I jump. Elegant and frozen in time. I hit the water, plunge under into a cool, bottomless place. And then I know I am ready. I can  swim back up to the place I want to be.  I think there would be a sunstreaked sky at this point.

Seriously. Can’t go on. Must keep thoughts to myself. If I have a piece of writing I think is worth sharing, I might. Otherwise the diary is closed. “Self Masturbatory” is what someone once called the blog. It’s true. Time to stop. Unless there’s something worth saying.  We’ve all heard about the ups and downs of the day to day life of a madwoman.    Good night and good luck.

What the birds see.

What the bird said.

Really. I should be working being that I am at work. But I have a problem concentrating and staying awake.  I can make some busywork for myself but I’d rather just sit here and pontificate.   I swear this will be the last sophmoric act of blathering for at least the next few days.  I was chatting online with the ex “boyfriend” (loosely termed)  and noting how for all those years I never felt that he returned any of the love I was giving him . He simply did not. It was quite frustrating to say the least. It lead me to do many self destructive acts, and now I marvel at the power he held over me.  As in “what the fuck????”  Anyway, his response? “Sorry. We were just looking for different things. “

Yes. Yes we were. I could say I regret having wasted all that time but then if I had done things differently I might not have ended up where I am now; things work out according to their own plans.  We make choices and we have power to make choices but still there is a randomness that oversees everything we do. Which was the thought that was ringing in my head as my body melted into S. yesterday afternoon…. all of those moments before, everything before, comes crashing into this moment – it all disappears and here we are right here, right now.  Having someone return my affection is pretty amazing - the heady first glimmer of connection, intense.  Thus, I walk around in a stupor associated with the emotions, the lack of sleep, the excitement, the raw physicality of it all. Raw. Open. Juicy. Head floating off like a balloon. Everything seems so much more.

Incoming Reference desk phone call as I sit here writing:

The lady we refer to as “the reference lady” just called.  She always opens with “Reference please” and then asks the weirdest or most mundane questions (never know what she’s going to ask). She then uses the question as a jumping off point to start digging into the personal lives of the poor saps who get her calls – she calls all the branches systemwide – she is a legendary figure. The last time she called here I passed her off to our poor student assistant, David.  I couldn’t deal. He took her question which was a mundane phone number request but then she segued into asking him if he thought it was proper for family members to fart in front of each other. Her exact question to him was “Did your father pass gas in front of you when you were a child?” “Do you think that is acceptable?”  Poor kid. He tried his best to be polite but he was visibly shaken by this interaction. Fortunately, it was closing time so I told him to cut her off and tell her he had to go.  Just now she simply wanted the definition of “ora pro nobis”.  It’s Latin for “pray for us”.

Oh, and if Pablo Escobar wasn’t dead (zombie maybe???) I’d swear he just walked into the library.  Pablo wants help creating a restaurant menu – he does not know how to type or how to use a word processing program and speaks little English.  I set him up on a computer as he eyes my cleavage which is out in full force today… ughh. In the end,  I help him above and beyond what is expected of me because he seems like a nice person who needs that little bit of extra help to open his pizza restaurant and pursue the Great AMERICAN DREAM!!!   Just doin’ my part here.  Holding out my hand to the masses, offering to lift them up and into the light of “how things work”…..  These are nuggets – maddening nuggets – of work in the public library.

Haven’t seen the movie nor do I care to. I think Hollywood is really stretching for material these days. Give me a good Almodovar film any day. Even when he’s dipped his toe into Hollywood he has remained phenomenal. Not that you can compare a spare children’s book adaptation to his work (nevermind that the usually great Dave Eggars had a part in Wild Things  – WTF??) , but I’m just saying the crap H’wood spits out and the sheeple who flock to it are somewhat disheartening. But I don’t really care. Just an aside.

On the home front, I have my own wild things. A forest dwelling enigma of a man who brings a whole new concept of primal to my world.  Fundamentally flawed, the both of us. Yet alarmingly honest it seems.  I like hiding out in his cabin in the woods, ignoring the rest of  humanity to the extent that a working mother of a teenage girl can.  I find myself living in two worlds. My week of custody is the week of the girl. Staying home, making dinners, watching tv, being with her, talking about our crazy life. She has her own wildness, her own secrets that surface as she grows into a woman. My week of non-custody is the week of primal matters. Eating, sleeping, taking long hot baths, discovering the secrets in his head, the trust required to give myself over to him emotionally and physically. Still having to go to work but in a bit of a stupor from the surreal world on the other side of the job. My prior post denied love. I don’t think I need go that far. There is love. And yes, there is a “BUT” coming up here…….  I just have to keep it in perspective.  I cannot change anyone but myself, nor do I want to.  But (aha!) when the thorns start to get out of control, again-  as thorns tend to do without meaning any harm – I must step away. Disentangle. Tomorrow I will see my shrink. I predict she will counsel me to disentangle permanently but I will not. I might have to disentangle from her, actually.  If I am not working toward our agreed goal, then why waste each others’ time?  I feel I have failed her.  But I guess it’s myself I have failed at least on a few points.

At any rate, I think we all go down paths by choice. And I have chosen this path for now. If it was perfect and without some potholes, I would be suspicious.  I’ll leave it as is.  Unfolding and winding and entangling me.

My beloved is beginning to show signs of self destruction. It hasn’t taken long has it? I give my heart to someone and they start nailing in the thorns one by one. At first they’re tender thorns attached to beautiful flowers. Slowly (well – quickly in this case) the thorns begin to lose control and grow ripping and ragged as they tear at your soul even though they don’t mean to.  They are just thorns after all, they don’t know what else to do with themselves.  Nature’s way. I should know by now that love is an illusion. It’s a little carrot that the evil forces concocted to make us feel like there’s some damn point to living. Well. There’s not.  And if there is, romantic love has nothing to do with it. I love my child. I loved my dog. I don’t think I will ever love another human being again. As soon as it starts, it begins the ending. It’s a set up. You have been warned.

I found the paper we wrote on last week in the late night hour. It is ours, I won’t quote it here. I found you without really looking. You were there. There you were.  If I lived in a jail, you would be the security guard with the crazy key that alternately fits and doesn’t fit into my  Felliniesque dream. Take it? Yes? Unlock it? Yes. Remember? Yes. I would like to write more but I am afraid to betray our secret. Our private……  (not privacy, yes I know the difference) . Our hiding place.

Our discovering. Yours is yours and mine is mine but I like the way it fits the lock and the crazy lovely dream.  Crazy = opposite of not .  Calm. Honest. True.  The new crazy.

I’m really starting to loathe that word. Thesaurus anyone????  OK. I’ll just take a Dictionary. Straight up.

Crazy… now known as

1. Full of cracks or flaws; damaged, impaired, unsound; liable to break or fall to pieces; frail, ‘shaky’. (Now usually of ships, buildings, etc.) 1583 STUBBES Anat. Abus. I. (1879) 51 If Aeolus with his blasts, or Neptune with his stormes chaunce to hit vppon the crasie bark. 1595 SPENSER Col. Clout 374 Or be their pipes untunable and craesie? 1612 T. TAYLOR Comm. Titus i. 16 As a crazie pitcher which is vnfit to hold water. 1748 Anson’s Voy. I. x. 151 With a crazy ship. 1776 ADAM SMITH W.N. II. ii. I. 310 The house is crazy..and will not stand very long. 1844 DICKENS Lett. (1880) I. 119 The court was full of crazy coaches. 1868 FREEMAN Norm. Conq. (1876) II. ix. 336 An old crazy ship.

One of 6 meanings (with at least 8  sub-variables) of the word “crazy” from the Oxford English Dictionary.

Seriously. There is a pebble in my hand. Not a pebble I am holding in my palm,  it is embedded there. It’s a reminder. I’m not sure if I like it or not.  It’s Monday. The week is going to be a good one. My girl is with me and I’m being productive. I’m starting to wonder about the way I spend my time. I refer you to Jonathan Lethem’s piece,

The dreaming jaw, the salivating ear

from the latest Harpers Magazine. You can’t see the whole text unless you subscribe online , but check it out if you can get your hands on a copy of the magazine.  It is fairly indecipherable to me, but I would have to read and dissect it with a little more effort than the first reading, I suppose. I kind of get it and I kind of don’t. Lethem is one of my favorite authors but WTF????  I want to have dinner with him.