People are like quarks

No exaggeration, EVERYTHING I know about physics comes from the song "Strange Charm" by Hank Green. According to the lyrics, quarks have color charge, "which means they exist solely inside of other kinds of particles and cannot exist alone."

I tend to be a very solitary creature. I've never had a roommate. I like living in my own space and having time to myself when I need it (which is pretty often). I don't like large social events, and when I have to participate in one for whatever reason, you'll usually find me off in a corner by myself somewhere. (Probably freaking out a little bit. If so, come give me a hug. Or talk to me about books. Or roller derby. That helps.)

But the thing is, even solitary creatures like me can't exist completely alone.

Today would have been my mom's 59th birthday. For more than a month, I've been having trouble sleeping, trouble writing, I've been distracted and sad and having a harder time than usual relating to people (which is saying a lot when you consider how often I feel like I'm speaking some odd subdialect that no one else in the world completely understands).

You'd think that the passing of time would make it easier. A year ago, I would've agreed with you. The first year, I was still so full of pain and numbness that I could barely tell up from down. Last year, I thought I was finally beginning to learn how to live motherlessly. But this year, it all got harder again, like suddenly someone was scraping at my soul with some kind of nasty dental tool. Scraping away every little bit of me that had figured out how to live in this world again.

Because I can't just sit and soak in it when things get like that, I tried to figure out what I could do to make myself feel better. I thought about Operation Mailing Chocolate. I sat down and I made a whole bunch of mix CDs, I painted the CD cases, and I mailed them to people who had participated in Misadventures with the Box o'Ma and the Red Notebook Conspiracy. I figured out how I want to handle Misadventure Canada, and I emailed a whole huge group of people telling them about it, in hopes that I can rope some of them in when the time comes. My friend Chantel wrote back asking what I was doing for Mom's birthday. I hadn't made a plan yet. So, we made one. She rearranged her work schedule so we could meet for lunch and then randomly wander.

I got up this morning, and although I'd been listening to the same mix CDs I'd made and mailed out -- that, according to a Twitter message, my friend Mia was listening to right then -- I found that I could not listen to them today. (I made a new one, starting with "Strange Charm" as track 1.)

I put on one of my mom's old sundresses (the one I have to wear braless, which makes me INCREDIBLY uncomfortable -- seemed like a good way to challenge myself), my charm bracelet (which has several of her old charms), and the old bracelet she gave me when I graduated from my MFA that my great grandmother had given her when she was a kid.

On the drive to Brunswick, I almost started crying and wondered if meeting Chantel was really a good idea. I'm glad I didn't chicken out. It was a nice afternoon. Chantel very carefully asked about Mom a few times, and I found it was easier to talk about her than I'd thought it would be.

I came home to an inbox full of messages. Within moments of each other (but without coordinating), both of my writing partners had sent emails telling me they were thinking of me. (Em's almost made me cry, and then my reply to her almost made HER cry; we are quite the pair, for sure.) I wrote to both of them: "Staying busy helps. Having awesome friends who make me feel loved is what gets me through. Thanks for being one of those awesome friends."

We can't exist alone, and I'm so relieved that I don't have to try.

The playlist on the left is the mix I sent my friends, minus "Child's Song" by Tom Rush, "Hula Hoop Girl from Tennessee" by The Sugar Honey Iced Tea, "99 Red Balloons" by Angry Salad, "Twenty-One" by Marry Me Jane, "Take-offs and Landings" by The Ataris, and "You're So Last Summer" by Vitamin String Quartet.

The playlist on the right is the mix I made this morning, minus "Worry Sick" by Edith Backlund.

"And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance."

- Kahlil Gibron, The Prophet

Dear Ma,

I was thinking that it's odd that I feel compelled to write to you so much lately. You'd think that as more time passes, the less I'd feel like I need to do this. But I guess that's just one more thing about me that doesn't quite fit expectations. I guess I'm writing to you more, because it's a way for me to keep you close. It's been more than two and a half years, and some days, you feel so far away.

Your birthday is coming up. Already - for a couple of weeks - I've been in a mood about it. Cranky. Distracted. Unable to sleep. Unable to write (especially because I've been realizing that what I need to be writing right now is the part with Ramona and her mom....).

I was on the road all last week conducting site visits for work. Lots of time alone in the car to think. About you, about the misadventures (about the fact that they're going to end someday...probably about a year from now), about things I want to change in my life. When it all gets too heavy (and it does a lot), I try to go back to the list of things that bring me joy. I try to DO SOMETHING, because that always seems to help.

I started plotting the last of the misadventures. I've got Vermont all planned out, just need to find out when Em can come to do it with me. While site visiting up north, I figured out how I want to do Canada; I just hope I can make that one happen the way I want it to. I made a list of all the ones I want to do and the partners in awesome yet to be included. ...And then, like magic, I had some ideas about the book. (Not Ramona and her mom, surprisingly, but Ira and hers.)

Tonight, I made some paintings. It's part of what I've got planned for your birthday (to make it suck less for me and hopefully to bring a little light into the lives of some friends). I haven't painted in forever, and I forget why. A lot of the paints had dried out, so I didn't have a lot of colors to choose from. They aren't particularly amazing, but it was fun making them. I made a mess, and I didn't care. Not even a little. And for a few minutes there, joy. Joy in the midst of all the yuck that has been permeating for the last few weeks, that I'm sure will continue to permeate for weeks to come.

There's this line from an episode of Dollhouse that I've clung to since you died: “You don't get past it. It just becomes a part of who you are.” The thing I didn't think about was how there are all these different parts of me -- for example, the part of me that likes to paint -- that sometimes fade into the background a bit, but sometimes stand so vividly front and center. Always part of me, but churning in unpredictable ways. And learning to live without a mom is like that, too. Some days -- probably even most days -- I feel like a real person who thinks and feels and wants to make the world a better place, who happens to also miss her mom. But other days, I feel your absence like a physical pain and there's no telling when or how things will shift again.

Today, I'm thankful that it seems to have gone the way of moving from physical pain to more of a deep longing. I'll take that.

Miss you, Ma.

Love, Tara

"She took what came at her and made it into joy."

- The Bloggess

I love the Bloggess. I love doing dramatic readings of her blogs at work, especially when I get to do the voice of Copernicus, the taxidermied monkey with half a face.

I read today's post when I was in a bit of a mood -- I'm overwhelmed trying to keep a lot of balls in the air (work, derby, writing, life in general), and when I got to the line I quoted in the title to this post, I froze.

"She took what came at her and made it into joy."

If I could choose a statement that I wish people would equate with me, now and long after I'm gone, it's that. When my mom died, people frequently commented on my strength. They'd say how strong I was, and it annoyed the crap out of me. I wouldn't call myself strong, but I would say I've tried to take what comes at me. And I've tried so very hard to turn as much of it as I can into joy.

I've been thinking about joy a lot recently. Last week, I was talking to Em about my list of things that bring me joy (which inspired me to update it).

Over the weekend, I went home to visit my family and celebrate my grandma's 89th birthday. We'd just left the party at my aunt's house when I drove around a corner and up a hill and went, "Wee," and then started laughing, realizing that Gram would probably think it was weird. I told her how I do that when I go around corners or up hills; I do it even when I'm the only one in the car. She said, "There's nothing wrong with a little joy." And that may be one of the best things she's ever said to me in my entire life.

My wish for myself and for everyone on this planet is that we can find a little more joy, even in the small things, even in the silly things, even in the hard and dark and painful things.

"They say that what doesn't kill us / makes us who we are"

- Motion City Soundtrack, "It Had to be You"

I have a tendency to come up with really outlandish ideas that are very physically demanding (and might also require a certain amount of manipulation of time and space).

I'd planned to ref a doubleheader and a hangover bout in the same weekend. (I've done this before, so that wasn't so outlandish.) I'd also planned to do two back-to-back DerbyLite classes, because I needed to make up one I missed when I was sick. (Several of my classmates have done this before, so that also didn't seem so outlandish.) But then I realized that these two things were happening the same weekend, and that seemed like it might be pushing it. Especially because I'd volunteered to ref the men's practice after my second DerbyLite class.

I kept waffling about whether or not I should do SO MUCH SKATING in such a short period of time, but the thing I kept coming back to was that I wanted to do it. I wanted to do it, because I thought it would be fun, and because I wanted to prove to myself that I could do it.

So, I did.

Saturday night, I outside pack reffed two bouts in a row. It was fun; I got a very nice compliment from The Famous Three-Day Bender; I got to participate in what may well be the most epic ref hip whip ever (thank you, Roo, for not pulling off my tutu); and then I got to eat with some of my favorite derby officials.

Sunday morning, I got up and outside pack reffed the hangover bout. A skater got knocked down and half out of bounds directly in front of me. Apparently, I lifted my left leg like a ballerina (I didn't even realize I did it) to try to avoid her, but I still clipped her head with my right thigh (and possibly my knee pad) -- thank goodness refs don't get called on major misconducts for blocking a downed skater. Oops.

I drove back to Portland, ran some errands. I stopped at Chipotle to get a burrito. Mmm. Chipotle. (Seriously, I can't say the name of the place without adding "Mmm. Chipotle" afterward. It's like a nervous tic or something.) I don't think I've ever eaten one of their burritos in one sitting before. But, I took my burrito to the park and ate it all while sitting on a hill, enjoying the sunshine. And then I leaned against a tree and read for a little bit before DerbyLite.

Back-to-back DerbyLite classes was actually pretty fun (despite the achy feet and sore ankle). Falling on my ass while attempting to jump over a cone during the fourth hour of DerbyLite? Not so fun. Still I survived it, and even participated in the men's practice afterward. I skated the drills -- even hitting drills! with guys! -- and then I tried to call penalties during some scrimmage-y drills (while also attempting to train some DerbyLiters in the basics of reffing, so I don't have to do it all by myself in the future).

Six and a half hours on skates Sunday, plus two from Saturday. That's A LOT of skating. But I did it. And it was FUN.

I read the phrase "keep working on love" in a book that meant something to my mom shortly after she died, and it's been my mission ever since. But I realize, it's not just about being more loving toward the people I care about or myself. It's also about DOING the things you love.

"I just ain't the same without you in my life"

- Yellow Card, "View from Heaven"

It's funny. I'd been thinking about writing a letter to my mom since Sunday night when I was driving home after the men's derby practice, when I was cutting through the park and stopped at the Boulevard and there was this giant moon hanging above the city, sparkling on the waters of Back Cove while "Sanvean: I am your shadow" came on my "No Words" mix CD and I had to skip to the next song because it was just too much for me.

I'd been thinking of it, and yesterday I found myself with things to say, so I wrote one.

And I was thinking about the one I wrote last August and, for some reason, that made me go back and look at the other letters I wrote. I hadn't realized that I wrote one exactly a year before the one I wrote yesterday or that the first one came almost exactly a year before that. (There was also one that I wrote and turned into a video for my last birthday.)

I guess Mother's Day bothers me more than I realized.

...Sometimes I still just can't believe you're gone....

Two years, seven months

Dear Ma,

I had this horrible, horrible dream right before I woke up this morning (why are the worst ones always those last-ditch, right-before-the-alarm dreams?) and almost immediately wanted to talk to you about it.

It’s two years, seven months today. No, I haven’t gone back to counting the days/weeks/months. I just happened to notice. Maybe the fact that every retailer in America is currently cramming Mother’s Day down my throat made me extra specially aware.

Maurice Sendak died today. He’s the guy who wrote Where the Wild Things Are. My favorite line from that book? “And Max the King of All Wild Things was lonely and wanted to go where someone loved him best of all.” I love it, because it breaks my heart. If that makes any sense.

There’s this line from an episode of Dollhouse that has stuck with me for these many months without you: “You don't get past it. It just becomes a part of who you are.” And it is so very true about grief, at least in my experience. But the thing about grief is that it also comes out of nowhere, just when you think you have a handle on how things are now, and shakes everything up for no reason other than it can. Fucking grief.

It’s not that I’m particularly miserable right now. It’s just cold and rainy and I miss you more than usual. I wish I could talk to you about that dream from this morning. I wish I knew who in this world loved me best of all (because I know it used to be you – you may not have always loved me the way I wanted you to and you may not have always understood me, but I knew without a doubt that you loved me more than anyone else on this planet does – it’s hard losing that feeling on top of everything else).

Last year, this guy I barely knew wished me luck on Mother’s Day and I was so taken aback by that – not in the bad way, in the way that kind of stops your heart for a second because you realize that you are not invisible and that someone is reaching toward you in kindness. A couple others chimed in later, and I was surprised every time. It was, after all, the second Mother’s Day without you. (I thought the statute of limitations on people being thoughtful about my loss had run out. I don’t know that I’ve ever been that thoughtful about anyone else’s loss.)

What’s weird is that this year, Mother’s Day is on my mind more than the last two years. I’m more annoyed by all the advertisements (I had to stop myself from emailing a response to an ad that appeared in my inbox: “Sorry, my mom lives in a box on top of my refrigerator, so I really don’t think she will appreciate your chocolates after all”). Again with the grief thing being unpredictable. To head off any sadness on the actual day, I’ve decided to go to the movies. There are a couple of things I’ve been wanting to see. If Joss Whedon can’t make a day seem brighter, there is no hope left in the world.

I still have hope. And I’m still working on love, like Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Days like today make it hard, but I wish you could see how your death has affected me. Not the sad part – the part where I’ve tried to learn something (about myself and the world and how we’re all connected) and how I’ve tried to make sure the people I care about know that and how much braver I’ve been (not just risking my physical safety – pushing myself to step out of my comfort zone and say and do things that scare me and risk humiliation and rejection). I think you’d be proud of that.

And now I’m going to make myself cry for the first time in months and months (since I read The Fault in Our Stars) and I’ve got to go facilitate a meeting, so I should just stop.

Love you, Ma. Miss you so much.

Whatever you do, don't think of elephants*

Except, I can't stop thinking about elephants.

The book I'm writing is very sad and personal and to offset those things for myself, I've also made it a bit wacky. Like, there's a werewolf. And a gnome (yes, a real one). And a family of former circus freaks (except it's mean to call them that, so don't). Said family also just happens to have an elephant living in a large barn-like structure behind the house.

I am a big proponent of imaginative, original writing. I like the fantastical (in fact, my favorite genre to read tends to err on the side of dystopic fantasy with a dash of the supernatural). But I'm also a firm believer in authenticity. I can make up whatever I want about werewolves and gnomes, because they don't actually exist. But when it comes to this elephant, I need to do some research. I need to know what they smell like, what it feels like being in the presence of one, exactly how it feels to brush your hand against one, the way they move, etc. (And, even if I find out in the course of my research that no elephant would ACTUALLY eat ice cream sandwiches and bread and butter pickles -- spears, not chips -- well, then I'm just going to have to take some creative license with that.)

This need for authenticity and to do some real-life research is what led me to google "pet an elephant in New England" yesterday. (I'm sure you're astounded to find that I didn't really come up with much for results.) That's when I turned to Facebook, asking if any of my friends knew a place where a girl could go to pet an elephant.

I was astonished how many replies I got. Unsurprisingly, most of the responses were about zoos. This makes me sad (and raises a bunch of moral/ethical quandaries about patronizing such establishments). I have fond memories of being a very small child and riding an elephant at Catskill Game Farm. Although Wikipedia refers to it as a zoo (technically, I guess it was), I still think of it as an animal preserve. There weren't the traditional cages or small enclosures. The animals always seemed well cared for and roamed in large fenced-off areas of a mountain.

My MFA mentor Suzanne posted a link to this video, which elicited a response from me something along the lines of: OMGTHATISSOAMAZINGIWISHICOULDDOSOMETHINGLIKETHATWOW. (And, while the location in the video is a zoo, at least they seem to strive to enrich the lives of the elephants living there. I feel like I can get behind that.)

So, I'm still trying to figure out which of the many options my friends suggested to pursue in my quest to get near an elephant. But then something dawned on me. I haven't been in very close proximity to any exotic animals in a long time. Me + exotic animals = wackiness

The first wacky encounter was with the least exotic animal, a baby goat. I was four and we were at Catskill Game Farm, in the special pen where the baby animals ran loose and you could feed them from bottles. I had bent down to feed a baby goat and got its nubbly little horn up my nose. (Yeah, I know. You can't do it if you TRY, but I manage to do it completely by accident. Thank goodness it was just the nubbly horn.)

Wacky encounter number two was approximately 11 years later at the Orange County Fair. There were a few years during my adolescence that, in addition to the typical 4H enclosures with various livestock, the fair featured pens and cages with exotic animals. The summer I was 15, they had some tigers (in very small cages, I might add). We were standing a good several yards back when there was a stream of liquid from the cage of a white tiger. (I tried to convince myself that said tiger had only kicked his water bowl and that's what splashed my arm. My sister laughed and said I was deluding myself.)

A year after the tiger peed on me, I was back at the fair and this time they had a petting zoo -- a tent with little pens filled with potbellied pigs and goats and a water buffalo. I think there was even a giraffe. You could put quarters into a gumball machine nearby and get handfuls of food for the animals. I stood in front of the water buffalo with my cupped hand filled with something that looked a lot like the stuff I feed my guinea pig. He ate it all up and rather than licking his plate (so to speak), he bit. My hand.

And that is how I got a goat horn up my nose, was peed on by a white tiger, and got bitten by a water buffalo (all before the age of 18), and lived to tell about it.

Getting up close and personal with an elephant may not be my wisest idea yet, but it's still worth pursuing....




* My favorite part of the book The Cheese Monkeys by Chip Kidd (which is AWESOME) is all about that phrase.

I wish

I wish that everyone had an Emily. Everyone should have a writing partner who is willing (and eager) to read and comment on your latest material from the dentist's chair. Everyone should have a friend who is willing to fly from Colorado to Maine to be your buddy at a wedding just so you don't freak out and die (willing, if not actually able).

And everyone should have someone who participates in email exchanges like this:

Email from me at 10:33 this morning:

Day 4 and it's actually the worst so far. It's like the little virusy things in my body know their time is up, so they're staging one last assault*. I don't even want to look at anything edible right now. Ugh.

I did a weensy bit of writing last night and I'd like to finish it up tonight. We'll see how things go.

Being sick is stupid.

LOVE

*I should get such amazingly huge grammar points for getting both "their" and "they're" right when I feel like crap.

Reply from Em:

CERTIFICATE OF GRAMMAR BONUS

issued to:  Ms. Tara Thomas

For the astute act of using "their" and "they're" correctly even when ill.

signed:  Ms. Emily France, Grammar Cheerleading Squad, Acting Captain

Reply from me:

And this is why, some day, we need to publish our emails. (well, not all of them. just the funny ones.) 

Reply from Em:

Which, you know, would be, like, what...98%?

(LOVE.)

"If I get it all down on paper / it's no longer inside of me / threatening the life it belongs to"

- Anna Nalick, "Breathe (2 a.m.)"

Have you ever been so tired that when you wake up your eyes actually hurt? It's something I deal with all the time, having been an insomniac, literally, since I was born. This morning, I got up and my eyes were so sore that I had to keep squinting.

See, I'd gone to bed late (even though I'd planned to go to bed on time) -- I was, in fact, on my way to bed when I got sidetracked by the computer. Out of nowhere, I sat down and started writing a scene I hadn't planned or even thought about. And then this morning -- even though I NEVER write when I first get up -- I added another half scene to it.

I sent these rough drafts to my writing partner, Em. She wrote back later today: "By the way, I am reading and commenting on this scene from the dentist's chair. No shit! I couldn't wait!"

And I owe her not just because she was reading/commenting IN THE DENTIST'S CHAIR. I owe her because all this writing I've been doing is because she gave me the thing I've been lacking for months and months and months: Accountability.

See, I'm a hard worker, but I'm also entropic. I lack discipline. If I don't have someone who is depending on me to do what I need to do, I end up binging on reruns of tv shows I never watched on Netflix or making my way through the shelves of unread books in my library or napping. I think about writing; I fantasize about how my life could be different if I wrote more, if I had the time to devote to writing, if I didn't have to worry about paying my bills. But for all my good intentions, I blow through every deadline I set for myself.

Em and I talked about this recently and we agreed that I will send her stuff on the 1st and 15th of every month. My first submission was earlier this week. I wasn't feeling very inspired, but I knew I had to get some writing to Em. So I did it. And, somehow, that unblocked all this stuff that I didn't even know was waiting to be written. Waiting on me.

That story isn't going to unfuck itself.

Once again, realizing that I have to learn every major life lesson about a gazillion times before it sinks in. Accountability: It's an amazing thing. And I'm glad I have a friend who loves me (and my book) enough to do this for me.

Sometimes being a Pisces sucks

I’ve started watching Battlestar Galactica, because so many people have so often told me I should. The religious stuff makes me twitchy, but I’m sticking with it for now. In the episodes I just watched, Number Six and Gaius are talking about going to pyramid ball games: “And then let the emotion of the crowd flood over me. Waves and waves of it. Like electric current.”

They said this like it was a good thing.

I have this experience all the time, but I hate it. The waves of emotion make me feel like I’m drowning. The electric current burns and shocks, just like when I stuck that key in the outlet in the downstairs bathroom when I was 3ish or 4ish or how ever old I was.

The thing is, I don’t just need to go to a sports stadium to feel like that. Surround me with more than a handful of people, and it starts happening. There’s all this emotion I don’t know how to process and then my own emotions get lost somewhere in the mix of it all and I don’t know how to deal with it and I usually end up confused and angry and crying.

In the last eight years or so, I’ve learned that certain tricks work. If I can sit in a corner with a book, I can pretend that I’m all by myself, lost in the world of the story. (Which is why this album exists.) If I have something I have to do – any kind of job or responsibility – I can focus on the task at hand and forget the people around me who aren’t directly involved in the job I have to do. If I can’t do either of those things, I find a buddy. As long as there is SOMEONE that I know that I can talk to, it’s like suddenly the waves become ripples and the electric current is more like a static shock you get walking across the room and it’s all manageable (as long as that person is not in the middle of an intense emotional experience - then all bets are off).

I’ve known for months that I would be attending a wedding where I wouldn’t know any other guests and that was on the same date that most of my friends were going to be busy. I asked pretty much everyone whose company I knew I could stand for more than a couple hours if they’d be willing to go with me. (Not as a “date” or an “escort” because there are way too many connotations attached to those words – I just needed a buddy, someone to hang out with me and distract me from the waves and electric current sure to be swirling around.) It’s not easy having to beg your friends to hang out with you (although I did receive replies from two friends – one in Colorado and one in New York – that were very sweet assurances that if they weren’t otherwise engaged, they would actually have traveled THAT FAR for me; it's pretty amazing having people who will do that for you in your life). In the end, I’m going to be on my own.

I’ve warned the friend who’s getting married that I might have to leave early. The people and the emotions might just be too much for me. But, maybe I need to try to see it from Number Six’s point of view. Maybe the waves and electricity can be a good thing when you get past the fear of feeling things you don’t understand. Maybe you just have to feel it and accept that. At least, I think this is the game plan I’m going to adopt. Let’s see if it works….