I had an unremarkable first date last week with a guy who made two mistakes:
1. He told me where he lived and that he worked as an attorney a few blocks away.
2. He sent me the following texts this morning, and I am NOT a morning person.
*this is a picture of his neighborhood with all the law offices flagged
I love this.
Pessimism is an attitude that may look brave – there are certain people who propose it with a rather macho stance: “I’m tough enough to see the facts” – but it’s actually a very cowardly way of dealing with the world, because if you only think that things can get worse, then there’s nothing to do but lie back in your armchair and shake your head at it. Whereas, if you think there’s some chance that human action could make the world just slightly better or keep it from getting worse, well, you’re actually responsible then for doing some small bit of something in your lifetime. So the idea that pessimism is somehow brave or honest is, I think, a sleight of hand.
-Susan Neiman
You can’t just sit shotgun and slip away. Leaving home is never that easy. You must run.
Picture a blue-collar town, bordered by hills of grass and pine. Imagine a school, high school, perhaps, the summer after graduation. You sunned by the ribbon of river that was more sewage than water, walked to the library, smoked weed in the school baseball field. There was your job at the Dairy Queen, and day trips to outlet malls. You were supposed to aim high; it was easier not to. You packed your parents’ minivan with childhood photos you chose so slowly, with clothes folded with a methodology so concentrated, for a life that stretched before you like a Kansas highway. On weekends, you came home. You forgot to dream.
Now, after New York, after Boston and Los Angeles, you can see your miscalculation, the error in thinking that a nearby college, discount designer clothes, eventual marriage, and peddling Avon door-to-door in your hometown could ever equal happiness. How you didn’t think when you moved home after your third semester in the dorms. College: your first failed departure.
You come from that town, where rains stir cow dung and maple leaves on the valley floor. That static town, when it was where you were from, when it was where you were going. Houses erected in rows adjacent to community churches. The city outside your window breathed in lolling hums and weary, clunking metallic sighs. Like some old woman’s pathetic wheezes of defeat. The day you decided to run, you woke up expecting to someday be that woman.
Can you help out with dinner/bath/bedtime some evenings? It’s difficult with 2 kids.
-text received from my boss, a stay-at-home-mom, whose husband is home every night, and who has a live-in 24/7 baby nanny.
I’m reminded of my mother who was miraculously able to feed my brother, me, and my dad every night (“Dinner pancakes, everyone!” – aka, our uneaten breakfast/lunch, blended up with an egg, fried and served with syrup), give us baths (“Your brother’s going to use the same water, so don’t pee in the tub this time.”), and snuggle us into bed with a story (“Want to hear about the time I tied up Aunt Barbie and lit her on fire?”).
My mom let me have 100 pet rats in my bedroom, kept me from young heartache and grabby boys by always buying me size Large shirts, and she baked me bunny cakes and Barbie cakes and even an all-black mourning cake when I was depressed about turning 22. She cooked fancy meals for me to bring to boyfriends and let me take all the credit, consoled me that time I sat in the middle of the street and let a bunch of pet mice climb up my pants legs and they suffocated – even though it was my fault, and she always gave me the first bite of her dessert and saved me the last.
Happy Mother’s Day, Mom.
Give me time to figure it all out rather than the judgments of my life, pressed as lines into the face staring back at me when in the mirror, reflected in shop windows. Give me the cool, laid-back acceptance of the California Dream. I don’t want to drown in the swirling black current of a city girl’s life, but if I am going to be caught in a numbered agenda of expectations, let it be with enough time to fully become, let it be permissive. Let it be kind. But…aging is an inescapable, tangible and permanent descent. There are no grassy expanses, no gently rolling hills. The seasons don’t wait for you to arrive.
I believe we have a duty as compassionate, civilized people to not only know where the food we are eating comes from, but to do our best to eat foods that were produced using methods that are good for all involved: animals raised humanely and fed their natural diet; workers who aren’t exploited; produce that isn’t sprayed with pesticides that arguably destroy our bodies and then run off into streams, poisoning the fish we eat.
As an aspiring nutrition professional, I think it is imperative to share knowledge that is supported by science. I believe in the scientific method, and in not merely reading an article summarizing the findings of properly executed studies, but in analyzing the data for oneself. Feelings are wonderful, but to wax poetic about foods’ “spiritual energy” and make wild assertions about diet without having evidence to back it up undermines your credibility as a nutritionist. It is Bauman College’s emphasis on science-based nutrition, holistic health, and the inherent (and identifiable) healing and life-changing properties in food that have me so drawn to this institution. Reading Dr. Bauman’s “The Whole Food Guide for Breast Cancer Survivors” further solidified my conviction that this is the perfect school for me.
My career objectives are fluid, but I foresee building a consulting practice that specializes in nutrition as it relates to cancer, primarily by using food to create in one’s body a habitat that is not conducive to proliferating cell mutations. Upon completing the Nutrition Consultant program, I plan to enroll in the Natural Foods Chef program and pursue building up a business that offers adjunct food preparation services for my clients. I have a proclivity for writing and entrepreneurship that I anticipate being particularly helpful in business development.
Our deepest draw is always toward life, to wholeness and well-being. I hope to inspire, educate and help improve the quality of life for individuals. I look forward to the education I will receive at Bauman College equipping me with the skills necessary to provide those I meet with the promise of hope and the skills and knowledge necessary to utilize natural foods for optimal health.
I’ve spent so many nights writing with this song playing on repeat that it seems to belong here just as much as any of the writing.
That song slays me. It is a nail in my heart.
It makes me want, want, want
so very much.
I played with my pet mouse on the couch and watched my grandfather do headstands in front of the TV. All the blood rushed to his head while my brother snatched up the change that fell out of Grandpa’s pockets. In a few years, Grandpa would completely lose his mind, but that winter I was eight, so he mostly just did headstands and yelled at my father for not filling up at Texaco.
When Grandpa started talking about motor oil, or maybe it was the Challenger explosion, my brother ran out of the living room and came back with a small feeder mouse, our parents, Grandma. My mother had unplugged the plastic log fireplace when we moved into the rental house, and that’s where the California King Snake’s aquarium went.
We all gathered around when my brother dropped the mouse into Harvey’s cage. The snake struck and greedily swallowed the feeder, who moved through his body like a knot.
Daddy started talking in his magazine salesman voice. “I’ve got an idea,” he said. “Christine, give me your mouse.”
I shook my head. She was a red-eyed albino, and I’d named her Sarah – after the prettiest girl in my first grade class – and put a wheel in her cage; she was fat.
“I just want to see what happens.” Daddy smiled. “She’s too big for the snake to eat. Promise.”
Sarah spilled from my outstretched hands like milk. Daddy pinched her tail with his thumb and forefinger and dropped her in the aquarium.
She sat in the corner, sat on top of the snake, in front of him, heart pulsating, even after Harvey struck. I flung my arms around my mother and wailed, while my brother and grandparents watched the tip of Sarah’s tail disappear, and Daddy said, “I didn’t know.” I can’t remember if Grandpa did any headstands after that.
in the Tim Burton movie of my life, I am an isolated woman
going slowly mad between the pink walls of her apartment
painting her body with oil pastels in front of laughing mirrors
chasing a little girl version of herself with arms oustretched
because that’s what every hour is doing: chasing her
