topping from the

One year ago today this past weekend, I told my mother, aunt, and uncle that I had signed a lease, one approximately a thousand miles from home. It was a definite as I reached Lake Kekegama, and I waited until the evening of Saturday the fourth to bring it up to my uncle, after having come back to the cabin early from the big show. He was very supportive, and I told him that I hadn't revealed my plan to any other blood relative, besides his wife as a fleeting thought that morning, before going on the tractor-trailer ride through the fields of buffalo. I believe I did this with him with some amount of alcohol in my system, while his wife and my parents sat outside listening to the fireworks' finale.

I awoke early on Sunday the 5th. I had told myself on the four-hour road trip to the cabin that I was not going to reveal my plans. They weren't ready to hear it, and I hadn't received official word that it was set in stone. However, by Friday the third, it was confirmed, and I sat with the information about twelve hours before consulting my aunt first. She relayed, "Baltimore is a wonderful place. If you love crabs, you'll love it there." I hadn't had non-imitation crab in my life.

A morning later on that fifth, I sipped coffee in the cabin's living room with my mother and my aunt. I was strained in getting my things together, as I knew it would be last time spent in that wonderful place for a long time. As she knew my lease with my former boyfriend would soon be coming to a close, she started inquiring about my plans as of mid-August.

"Yes, I did sign another lease, Mom."

"Oh, good. Where did you two decide?"

"Well, I decided on Maryland."

"Oh, where's that?"

I laughed; she's not an idiot. She thought I was talking about some suburb of Madison with which she wasn't familiar. That was when I knew I was in the conversation that I tried to avoid. At this very point, my aunt slipped out of the room, over to the kitchen where my father and uncle were talking, conveniently out of earshot

"Oh, I mean like Maryland, the state. I'm moving with my other friend. He's not moving with me."

There was a stifling silence, one that I half-anticipated. She did not understand. She liked him very much, but she heard me talking of moving East for several years.

"Well, do you have a job lined up?"

"No, I don't. I just took care of the lease this weekend, and I thought it was the first step. Not many places like to hire people with mailing addresses so far away. That is the next thing on the agenda."

"Well, it doesn't sound like you've thought this through enough. What about a steady income, health insurance, anyone you might know in the area?"

My face got hot first, then my hands, my heart. She didn't trust me to have a plan. I had a plan. One can only plan so much in the future, and one can take but one stride forward before finding her next footing. She doubted me. She doubted my energy, intuition. It hurt, and then it made me angry.

"You know, if you don't think I've thought about those things, then you don't know me at all." I stormed off to the room I had slept in, sloppily packing my things to leave hastily. Slamming the door to the room, I felt guilty and cowardly for the way I reacted. Parents have that impact on children sometimes when they question motives and follow-through.

I packed my things and reentered the living room, ready to apologize and explain myself. I found my aunt and my uncle in the room, talking intently with my mother. My aunt patted down on the space between her and her husband.

"What about Hopkins?"

I didn't think myself a candidate of such an institution, but I nodded my head. I felt proud that my aunt believed in me to be capable of working for them. We discussed from there, and my mother eagerly participated.

Now, I sit with the job at such an institution, staring my year anniversary in the state six-week in the face, and my ninth-month anniversary in the city proper less than two weeks away. This morning, I didn't know where to place myself, despite appearances and subtle achievements. Where am I as a human? I read my own tarots as a litmus, gauging my interactions with the universe, while trying to attain a clear and pure understanding by doing so.

The significator showed my that I am amidst creative potential, balancing a healthy sense of natural or self-power while also throwing energy into new projects. The matter at hand seemed to be a lack of resolve, a weakened momentum or will, and an unset direction. The blocking energy projected a foundation, a realization of a completed first stage, with that a rest after labor, of good yet to come. The potential outcome warned of the danger of imbalance between the body and the mind, an attention to humility and being humble, and the need for discipline. Events not to be overlooked focused on materialism, the requirement of shelter and protection, and having extra care with money. The recent to immediate past gives way to a certain fullness, a temporary satisfaction, one that bring a lack of receptivity in its satiety along with the need to broad ed one's community work and activism. The recent to immediate future leads to a path of self-development and self-care without one's ego, a confronting of the darkness within, while also seeking out an individuality. The psyche and internal machinations of the querant point to the analytic side of the mind, as a time for decision-making, path-choosing, as a way to put actions and consequences together. The external influences show opposition while confronting conflict, though in a gentle way, a fair way, while also perhaps taking an unorthodox method of problem-solving. The root or subconscious influence within this reading reveals the extreme transmission of forces, keen perception and intuition, a reflective and stable emotionality which is also hard to penetrate.

The final outcome to pursue or avoid details interference, fleeting good times, wasted energy, bad luck, and lack of focus.

Nor a year's review for that matter. Nor a goals and dreams list for 2010 or the next decade. I'll just blurt it all out, per usual.

I just want everything to be okay for every person that I think about, care for, or love. I want to continue learning about having forgiveness for everyone. I want to apologize more appropriately. I want to act in the service of greater good all the time. I want to leave it up to the universe when things are out of my control, and consequently reduce my mental noise/worry. I want to remember without having to remind myself that the only person's actions I can control are my own. I want to be able to clearly understand the goal of any situation, no matter how trivial.

These are things that were brought to my attention this year, and in which I have been dipping my toes. Let's just go ahead and jump right in. There is nothing to lose, no tangible risk.

I do not regret one singlefuckingGoddamn moment of this adventure. This was the best thing I have ever done, including moments from past lives. I am also very homesick and lonely. These two things do not negate each other, but I wish the latter would go away.

"Am I to become profligate as if I were a blonde? Or religious as if I were French?

Each time my heart is broken it makes me feel more adventurous (and how the same names keep recurring on that interminable list!), but one of these days there'll be nothing left with which to venture forth.

Why should I share you? Why don't you get rid of someone else for a change?

I am the least difficult of men. All I want is boundless love.

(...)

It is easy to be beautiful; it is difficult to appear so. I admire you, beloved, for the trap you've set. It's like a final chapter no one reads because the plot is over."

- Frank O'Hara, excerpt from Meditations in an Emergency

Went back to NYC this weekend. Second time around, fantastically. I've found it's not a place you plan for/forget. One of the most memorable moments took place on the green line, number four uptown. Ten on a Saturday morning. Walking that certain walk home that certain occasions permit. Board the subway at Wall Street, take a seat, mind-chasing a negative thought cycle, looking at the other passengers in the car. A student, a businessman, a woman searching the flyer section of the morning news and cutting coupons. A man with a cane that has a tin can taped to it enters. It is quiet. He waits a few seconds before bursting into song, which sounds more like a gorgeous female alto--not the male tenor I was expecting, movements choreographed with his cane as a rhythm section, coins jingling at strategic moments in the chorus. What a way to stop beating yourself up for a moment and focus on some kind of a larger picture. Whatever that means. He stays with us for one stop, maybe two. Then exits. The businessman shoves five-dollar bills in the cup as they both leave the car to transfer trains.



I was born by the river
In a little tent,
and just like that river
I've been running ever since.

It's been a long, a long time comin,
But I know
A change is gonna come.
Oh, yes it will.

It's been too hard living
but I'm afraid to die
'cause I don't know what's up there
beyond the sky.

It's been a long time comin,
But I know
A change is gonna come.
Oh, yes it will.

I go to the movie,
And I go downtown.
Somebody keep tellin me,
"Don't hang around."

It's been a long time coming,
But I know
A change is gonna come.
Oh, yes it will.

Then I go to my brother,
and I say, "Brother, help me please."
But he winds up knocking me
back down on my knees.

There have been times that I thought
I couldn't last for long,
But now I think
I'm able to carry on.

It's been a long time,
But I know
A change is gonna come.
Oh, yes it will.

Or as I like to misquote, "Nothing beats a real cool hand." Classic.

Before I go ahead and post superfluous lyrics to a song I was made to listen to since I was three without knowing until this past weekend what it was famous for or that it was related to anything famous at all, I will let you know that I am here.

I wait. I go to the park. I get phone calls. I don't sip things. There is water all around me.

I don't care if it rains or freezes
Long as I got my plastic Jesus
Sitting on the dashboard of my car

Comes in colors, pink and pleasant
Glows in the dark because it's iridescent
Take it with you when you travel far

Get yourself a sweet Madonna
Dressed in rhinestone, sitting on a
Pedestal of abalone shells

Going ninety, I ain't scary
Because I got the Virgin Mary
Assuring me that I won't go to Hell

Get yourself a sweet Madonna
Dressed in rhinestone, sitting on a
Pedestal of abalone shells

Going ninety, I ain't scary
Because I got the Virgin Mary
Assuring me that I won't go to Hell