This is what I posted one year ago today... Sometimes it helps to see how far you've come....

Letter to myself at Six

Kate,

This is the year that you have learned what terror is, though you do not yet know this word. And hand in hand with that terror, you feel an odd sensation that you will describe in your later life as "a hand of ice over the heart." Honey, this word is called dread. Up until now you walked through the world expecting to laugh, read books, charm the people you meet, and walk unflinching into new situations owning them before all is said and done. But this year is the year you will start expecting to fail, become unsure even of the things you know, that you will learn to wait for cues of coming danger. This is the year everything in your life—at home and at school—will tell you that you are not safe. The words that go with this feeling, sweetheart, are worthlessness and shame. This is the year you will become afraid of dogs. This is the year you will begin to believe that you must settle for crumbs, and be grateful to have been thought of at all. You will be 29 before you are even able to consider that you deserve something more.

You splintered inside your own screams, dating your life from the day your father blackened your mother's eye. I am sorry to say you will see him beat her again, at least 5 or 6 times before you really leave their home. You will hear him call her stupid everyday for about 13 more years. You will learn that your intellect frightens him and earns his respect at the same time. So to feel loved, you will only ever show anyone this part of yourself. Later, you will add your anger as expressed through sarcasm and unyieldingness to your arsenal. Kate, you will hurt so many people. You will wound your own soul deeply, too.

And you will move forward with your life in this vein, shunning your withered parts, afraid to ever dance, or need, or play again. You will pick men to love who will be openly astounded by your intellect, but who will have none of your heart, and you will internalize this as further proof of your unworthiness. At one point in your late twenties, it will not be enough for you to have a man respect your mind (as you told yourself it was), and it will feel as though the bottom has dropped from your world, because it is the only trick you will think you have up your sleeve.

You will be a writer, and will know that you are a writer as early as at 10 years old. Two of the men you will love will champion your work, the closest thing to your actual heart, and you will want to believe that this means love. One of them, in your early twenties will paste your poems all over his wall while he dates and eventually marries another girl. The other, in your later twenties, will tell you that he carries them (the corpus of your work, he will call it) with him wherever he goes. He will put your poems alongside his paintings on a web site, and will tell anyone who'll listen about you, saying that your work is beautiful, that it is erotic, and ignites the imagination. He will even ask you to write him a poem in exchange for one of his paintings. It will feel in that moment like pure adoration for him to ask this of you.

He will introduce you to people at parties before you have a moment to introduce yourself; He will say that he never cared for poetry before your work opened him up. Before any of this happens, though, you will ask him out, and he will say that he is not interested in a relationship. You will hear of two dates that he goes on within weeks of that answer. When you do, your knees will buckle, and your heart will open and then crumple like a biscuit tin. You will still love him when he is no longer talking to either of those women, also within a few short weeks. You are the one who will still be there, looking him full in the face.

This is the man you will meet at a wedding reception where you will be miserable because the man you thought you cared for at the time will be there, three tables over, with his girlfriend. Sadly, this is not a new scene for you at the age of 24. It will be pretty par for the course. This man, the one you are so miserable over when you meet the painter—the love of your life—will not even care about your poetry. He will think he could have written better. Sadly, this will not be a warning sign to you while you wait, wanting something to come of your feelings for him.

By the time you are 30 you will still not know how to drive because you remain haunted by the agony of your father helping you with math homework. Six is the age you learn that you would rather never try than try and fail on the first attempt. If you cannot do something right the first time, you will not do it. This paradigm will ruin so much for you for so long. You will live your life embarrassed by the smallest failures and oversights, and will have a difficult time recovering your equilibrium afterward.

But you are tough, too, Kate. You grow up to be very generous, eloquent, and dignified. You are an artist honey, not in spite of your pain, but because of it. You are a writer because of your wounds. And you will never make the mistakes your mother did, because you understand the value of an object lesson. You have a real gift for assessment, collating the data presented in a given situation, and interpreting it, anecdotally, and you know how to implement an action plan, girl! You are punctual, analytical, funny, and you yearn passionately...

You do make it to college, just like you're always talking about; you will even go to graduate school to become a literature professor. You have friends who love you. You have two sisters who look up to you. Your parents' terrible marriage will end. And you, little girl, do survive.

So much Love,

The Kate you will become

Open door; Closed door

I saw my new apartment today. I was supposed to see it on Friday, but the current occupant flaked out again. She was supposed to have moved out over the weekend, so I planned to go this afternoon. As was the case in my dream about going to see the place a few weeks back, most of her things were still there.

I loved it. It is smaller than the one I have now, but the layout is charming, and it is perfect for this new era of my life. I am going to be downsizing--getting rid of my current desk; it's too big; getting rid of my entertainment center; it's way too big. I am going to procure smaller versions of each.

The placement of furniture will need to be very strategic to accommodate my new sofa, loveseat, and dining room set--to effect a cozy, but classy feeling.

What was so striking about yesterday is how normal, how reasonable it felt to be at St. Mary's. I have not been there for 8 years (perhaps 9)--in any case, the better part of a decade, and even with all the changes, it was to me what it always had been. A sanctuary at the end of the line. The last thing on the western bank of Maryland before everything fades to water. It seemed completely right that I should be hanging out with Sarah and my sister, who is now a student there, in all the places I used to walk, pray, laugh, cry, and hope.

The reading went well. I read the poem with as much courage as I could muster. It is a piece that still causes me to experience emotional tremors, even though I wrote it nearly three years ago. It had never been read aloud, formally--and I was happy I got an opportunity to share it in that specific forum of women writers. The response to it was warm, affirming, and gracious.

I feel that attending this celebration of women's voices--reading my own work as a celebration of where my life is headed--was a hurdle I needed to clear, and at the same time a coronation of sorts. If you are more for sports, the tip off or kick off. In any case, the beginning. So fitting that everything should start again where it all started.

Happy Hour

Last night the girls and I went out for our second in what I hope is now a weekly tradition of the after work happy hour. We went to the Kiss Cafe in Canton, and once the sun went down and the ambience came up, I liked it. Unfortunately a patron began to puff on a cheap stogey just before we left. It made my stomach hurt.

Next week we are trying a new Sushi, cocktails, and coffee bar called Xs that just opened up on Charles Street. It's been written up in this month's issue of Baltimore Magazine.

I'm excited. Today I am going to St. Mary's to read the poem I wrote for Gordon, but first, I am going to see my new home. I leave work at 12 noon, and then off I go--headlong into my real life.

I like this picture...


Indie rock! You're my most favourite type of
music... Your music channels lots of emotion.
On the top it seems simple, but underneath
there's always a deep meaning... As your name
you're independent from most of music! Stay
that way! Good on you! There's so much
variation in your style...from deep and
thoughtful like The Stills, to happy go lucky
like Belle & Sebastian, to dancy and catchy
Franz Ferdinand, and back to boogie down Hot
Hot Heat and The Rapture...


What genre of rock are you?
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I feel exactly the opposite about this rhyming business...


Non curo. Si metrum non habet, non est poema.
"I don't care. If it doesn't rhyme, it isn't
a poem."
You are a type A personality. You like bright
things, you don't call in sick to work, and you
have devastating opinions about art.


Which Weird Latin Phrase Are You?
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Find Your Soul Mate Now!

For the last several weeks, I have been bombarded with junk e-mail and phone calls from a bevy of dating services (Christian and secular) all pleading with me to find the one for whom my soul longs. I've started telling the phone pirates to take me off their lists because I'm not single. Technically, I am single, but philosophically, it is a very different story. The way I see it, God already knows who my mate is, and in my heart, I am already being faithful to this man by not serial dating for kicks.

I will know when it is time to begin a relationship and with whom. And I know it sounds closed-minded to think that God would not use something like a dating service to bring me someone great--clearly He could if he wanted to, but I just intuitively understand that for me, it will not be this way.

And let me state for the record I have no problem with someone proactively enlisting a professional or amateur matchmaker's services. I do have a problem with a company deciding I am single based on some mail list they purchased from someone else, and bombarding me with phone calls to offer their help in my quest for love.

I have the Creator of the universe on the case, thanks ever so much...

Clearing the Air

My boss and I had a followup conversation yesterday during the time allotted for our weekly check-in meeting. As it turns out she had misheard or misunderstood about 97% of what I'd been saying for the last two weeks, which of course, caused her to react to me out of what she thought she understood.

I still think that inherent prejudices in both of us (for I have my own, though not necessarily race-based) caused us each to come to the proverbial table ready to misunderstand each other. It's something to be mindful of. Every experience prior to the one in which you currently find yourself has made you predisposed to a given set of expectations. Every other person you've met has created a template in your mind for the person you're dealing with now. You have to be proactive and ask yourself "What exactly was said here? Am I hearing this person through the filter of conversations I've had with my mother?" Etcetera, etcetera.

I felt so relieved, yet this has been an object lesson I'll never forget. From now on, I won't be taking it for granted that everyone can handle unadulterated candor. And I can stand to watch how I present information, even if it's valid, I can help the perception more often than not. The Bible says that "Calmness can lay great errors to rest," that "a soft answer turns away wrath..." I kept both sentiments uppermost in my mind this week.

I bought myself a spinach feta croissant for breakfast and some tulips for my office from Wholefoods this morning--because I feel like i've earned an overpriced pastry and some flowers that herald the coming of Spring. See, the winter is past....

On Sunday I went to see "Eternal Sunshine on the Spotless Mind," and I was sorely tempted to be spontaneous and call up Gordon to invite him to come along. I had this wonderful feeling that if I did, he would say yes. And it was for that reason that I didn't.

I have always been very successful at offering Gordon something in which he is interested and getting him to participate. It stopped feeling like a payoff to have my invitations accepted; I want to be invited... So, I prayed that I would have the strength to refuse myself the easy out of bringing him back into my landscape. I went to the theatre alone.

On Sunday night I began to feel overwhelmed with discouragement about work as I was clearing my wallet of old receipts. I came across a beautiful note he wrote me back in October--a note telling me that while he was glad I liked my job so much, he didn't want me to forget about my poetry...that "what [I] have to say is beautiful..." As much as that communique meant to me then, it doubled in value as I stressed about having to go into the office on Monday.

In a spirit of gratitude, I wrote to thank him again...I told him that things were hard for me right now, but that this was not the point. The point was simply that I could feel the weight of his friendship toward me so strongly in his note, and he needed to know that he'd done so much more than perhaps he knew...

On Monday he wrote me back, and the tone of his e-mail was so warm and newsy and open, that I found it hard to censor myself--so I said "we should get together sometime soon to discuss what's been up with each of us." I didn't know if he would reply to that or not. And I didn't care. It came from a place of candor in me that didn't require anything from him. When he replied the second time it was to say "let's get together tonight."

He arrived at my place yesterday at about 7:30, and for 3 hours we talked about everything. Something was different. Something in me was less obsequious, less "grateful" to be in his presence, and so I enjoyed him so much more. In our time of "exile" from each other, we've come to so many of the same conclusions about things, our individual lives... I find that the passing of time has done nothing to our uncanny similarity to each other--in obvious and obscure ways. I didn't feel afraid to rock the boat with him. He was like an open door to me--there was nothing I was scared to ask. There were no huge disclosures, but for the first time I didn't fear hearing something I didn't want to know, so I didn't hold back.

I told him that he is an anamoly, that I hope he never loses the beautiful contradictions that take turns vying for supremacy in his heart. He told me my poems were contemplative, yet restless.
He suggested about three things we could do together in the future. I told him that since he can't make it to St. Mary's to hear me read the poem I wrote for him 2 and a half years ago, that I will give him a private reading later. He sang to me some song his band covers ("Mama Tried" by Merle Haggard), he was confessional, he was funny. He was a man and a boy--and his tenderness disarmed me. Really.

Something odd happened. At one point we were talking about his graduation from seminary--3 and a half years ago, now. He stopped in the middle of what he was saying and asked "Did you come to that?" I told him that I hadn't. He said "Did I invite you?" I replied, without any undertone, "There are so many things you didn't tell me about or invite me to..." He looked remorseful and said plaintively. "I'm sorry." I didn't bother to say to him what I was thinking--that 3.5 years ago it made sense to me not to be invited to things in which he was involved, because that was the nature of our relationship.

I guess it doesn't matter because I don't think he was only apologizing for that.

I thought about him all night long while I slept, and have yet, a full 24 hours later, to throw away the ashes from the many cigarettes he smoked.

The Race Card

If you know me, you know that race is not my first consideration--not when things are going well, and not when they are decidedly bad. I know various and sundry forms of it exist (I'm not ignorant or naive), but it often has to dawn on me that misdeeds might be racially motivated because it is not high on my list of self-identifiers. If I were white that attitude might make sense, but I am a Christian woman who is a writer who lives in Baltimore who is black.

I will admit that as a child I had deep self-loathing because of my race--because it seemed only to bar my participation in activities or social circles where I wanted to be accepted. Being black didn't open up possibilities for me, so I saw it as a liability. I had teachers whose racism was so thinly-veiled, they might as well have not made any effort at all to hide their true feelings.

I've weighed my situation with my manager, and at the end of the day, I do believe that race is a factor in this situation. I don't think it's malicious or conscious, but I think that as a forthright black woman, I frighten her and make her feel undermined. Anything that smacks of resistance (her word, not mine) she views as a threat to herself. There is a cultural clash between my poor upbringing in the blighted area of Prince George's County, MD and her privelged, upper middle class, New England one.

It isn't that my persona screams "urban hoodlum," but there is a difference in my default demonstration of strength, posture, etc., that is inherent in my self-expression as a black woman, writer, Christian that she cannot relate to. And she hates it.

The other person that I know of who's been reprimanded in the last month is the other black woman at our company. It doesn't matter that everyone on our team voiced his or her discontent at recent meetings. I'm the one she feels compelled to silence.

Scapegoat

I've been written up for "strong and divisive" comments that "erode the morale of our team." The amount of time I actually spend on task has also been called into question. I have to sign and date the letter acknowledging receipt. And I will sign it, attaching my own letter presenting my own cause, delineating specific facts which I believe have been ignored. I told my manager that I take issue with her perception. It was negligent that she did not mention this in her letter documenting our meeting. Equally curious that the charge about personal business during work time is being levied after a series of meetings on team morale in which I was outspoken, and in which others were as well...

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

A couple of friends from work and I went out for St. Patrick's Day drinks, and I am pleased to say that I drank two Guinness, ate some so-so crab and artichoke dip, and got even more dish about the office. I love the concept of Happy Hour, so much more so on St. Pat's Day with Irish hotties in abundance. The James Joyce Irish Pub has a very real Irish contingent, not just Irish-American. I heard the lilt of that beautiful accent all over the place.

It was packed body to body. I joked with my cohorts than one man passed by me so closely, I thought I may have gotten pregnant from the encounter.

Still more meetings at work. Like Cuba Gooding Jr. in Jerry MacGuire, I have a commitment to the truth. I've been given an opportunity to be frank, so I am. I said to my manager yesterday "You know it's bad when people start hoping the company they work for goes under...."

In other news, I found out that I am going to be seeing my new place next Friday, March 26th right before I leave Baltimore for the day to read my Poetry at my undergrad alma mater.

It's almost time for our weekly editorial powwow. I guess I should get psyched up for that.

It is head-ache inducing cold today. It was supposed to snow up to six inches, and while I did not expect to see any white stuff on the streets when I woke up this morning, I can understand the forecast. I imagine that it’s snowing on top of the clouds as I write this, and simply raining little rock pellets down here. I’ve had to go outside about 3 times today for various reasons, and I was chagrined each time to face the bitter, freezing air.

The switching of horses midstream on our project is a pain, but we had an “all hands on deck” powwow today, and now the bulk of the extra work is done. We all just hunkered down and gave up 8 hours of time we could have used on our own work to get everyone’s work done. It’s a good feeling, actually.

I think I’m going to make some cocoa, listen to Ella, and keep making my peace with the way things are. I find that everyday I have to decide that Jesus is Lord, everyday I have to choose Him and set Him apart as Lord in my heart, lest I forget that before one of my days came to be, they were all accounted for in His book. And when, before time, He imagined me, foresaw my existence, He knew that tonight I would plan to enjoy potstickers and steamed spinach and garlic for dinner. He knew that I would love Jazz, He knew that I would love Him. He knew and knows every detail, so why do I obsess so much?

None of this is a surprise to the One I trust. And really, of what account am I that God should care about my lying down and my rising up and everything in between? But, He does, and that is more than enough. It’s everything.

How can both of these (top two) be true?


You belong on a lazy-day beach or anywhere where
you can set up a relaxing bench or chair and
watch the world go by. You don't want to make
any changes, watching is enough to make you
content. The blue of the sky and the light of
day beat into your soul and you drift into the
world and around without harming anything or
making any ripples in the fabric of humanity.
Enjoy your peace, few have it, though few would
want it at the cost.


Where do you belong?(ANIME IMAGES)
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Everybody's

Your Lyrics

Perfect by nature
Icons of self-indulgence
Just what we all need
More lies about our world that
Never was and never will be
Have you no shame ? Don't you see me ?
You know you've got everybody fooled
Look here, she comes now
Bow down and stare in wonder !
Oh how we love you !
Too bad we didn't know she
Never was and never will be
You don't know how you've betrayed me
Somehow you've got everybody fooled
Never was and never will be
You don't know how you've betrayed me
Somehow you've got everybody fooled
Never was and never will be
You're not real and you can't save me
Somehow now you're everybody's fool


What Evanescence song are you?
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You are a moon shadow. With the moon as your source
you are a being of great mystery. Constantly
drifting, you descend into darkness to conceal
your brokenness. You have come to believe that
you are the only one you can rely upon for
constancy and safety that you need. But those
who know how to see you find enchanting beauty
in your wistfulness and fragility. It is to
them that you should flee, for their arms are
an open haven where your true light can finally
thrive...


What Kind of Shadow Are You? (with gorgeous pics)
brought to you by Quizilla

Assessing the damage

The long and short of it is that we got reprimanded, somewhat, for calling this meeting and not acting in the spirit of team solidarity. Whatever. Oh, and we are going to have to do all that extra work. I swear there needs to be a union for editors.

Uprising

At our usual Friday morning roundtable this week, a strange thing happened. Ms. Duplicity (my manager) had to leave early, and when she exited the room, we all began to talk candidly about how we're feeling about work. It seems that everyone has been nursing a fantasy in which all of us in the department quit on the same day, in the middle of the deadline, leaving Ms. D, her oblivious boss, Mr. Head in the Clouds, and the rest of the company in a lurch. It is bad when well-adjusted adults with a commendable work ethic start to imagine ways to cause trouble.

So we all decided to call a meeting with our manager and Mr. Head in the Clouds (because we know the bulk of the impractical ideas that get communicated through her come from him). To say that she was nervous would be an understatement. The comments were kept to the work conditions (i.e., decisions that are made during crunch time that impede our ability to meet the deadline), and wanting to clarify priorities. No one said anything about the fact that we all feel micromanaged, belittled, and condescended to, because that is harder to discuss concretely--and not something we wanted to call her boss in on considering that we have not discussed it with her at this point. We were fired up, but not irrational.

Nothing changed as a result of the meeting, but it still felt like a victory, because we, the majority, stood up and made a statement. And, we heard Mr. Head in the Clouds say that he puts a higher premium on one element of our work than the other. Funny that this was never communicated to us.

The best part was seeing her try to recover a shred of dignity at the end, reducing the meeting to an unnecessary exercise by saying "there's no need to call a big meeting..."

I hope the fallout is worth it, because I'm sure there will be some.

Now this is more like it....

You're The Dictionary!

by Merriam-Webster

You're one of those know-it-all types, with an amazing amount of
knowledge at your command. People really enjoy spending time with you in very short
spurts, but hanging out with you for a long time tends to bore them. When folks
really need an authority to refer to, however, you're the one they seek. You're an
exceptional speller and very well organized.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

This isn't really good news, yet....

You're Cambodia!

Life's been really rough, but it's slowly improving.  You know
way too much about the skeletal structure of humans, mostly from being forced to study
it.  This has given you a fear of many things, most especially the color red.
 The future has to be more promising though, and your greatest adversary can now
never come back to hurt you any more.
Take
the Country Quiz at the href="http://bluepyramid.org">Blue Pyramid

In Between

I had a dream that I was walking around in my new apartment. The old tenant had moved out, but her furniture remained. It was my understanding that it would be removed before I took up residence, but because I wanted to see it and insisted on seeing it, the rental agent let me look around inside before it was cleaned up. The walls were painted various colours, there were winding stairs, and whatever direction I looked in, there seemed to be no end to the length and depth of the unit. It was spacious, sunny, and character-infused. Even though I knew it wasn’t perfect—and the old occupant’s junk was hindering my ability to really see it’s full glory, I was genuinely glad it was mine.

In real life, I have still been unable to go and see the apartment I am to occupy, because the tenant is unwilling to let the leasing agent show it prior to her moving out. In an effort to be proactive, I just called to establish that I will simply plan to see it on/after March 31st when it has been vacated.

At that point, it will be two weeks out from my move. I hope I am satisfied with it, because I’ll have two weeks to figure something else out if I don’t.

I found an excellent vocal jazz Internet radio station today. It’s ideal for long stretches of hardcopy editing. Sorry I’ve been somewhat incognito lately. I’ve drastically reduced my online hours billing plan (at home), and I am chagrined to blog at work too frequently, for obvious reasons.

My recent efforts toward financial integrity have suffered a blow this week. I’ve unintentionally overdrawn my account due to a series of addition errors. A direct consequence of this snafu is that I now cannot afford to get my hair done. I was looking forward to having my self-image ratchet up a couple of notches after a much-needed hair appointment.

One good thing about today is that I learned we have much more time on our editing deadline than I realized.

I’m looking forward to seeing Toni Morrison tonight. Life is all about taking the good with the bad, I suppose.

I reread The Screwtape Letters this weekend, which is still, hands down, the best commentary (albeit clothed as a series of letters from one fictitious demon to another) on spiritual warfare. I also read Strong Women Soft Hearts by Paula Rinehart, which is a nonfiction commentary on the tendency in many Christian circles to make strength and efficiency hotter properties than other elements of a woman?s interior life and heart. As a woman I have always protected myself from men by trying to act and think like them. The book does not address this idea, specifically, but it discussed, more, the feeling that many women with whom the author has worked felt they needed to sublimate certain elements of their femininity in order to be seen and respected as Godly women.

Rinehart also discussed the ever-present tension between vulnerability and strength and the travails of learning to negotiate them, not as mutually exclusive properties, but as interwoven elements of one?s feminine identity.

Other than this, I spent Friday night at Sarah?s place, and enjoyed a leisurely day with her on Saturday. Another friend of hers from high school days came to visit and we all went out to eat at what had been one of my favourite places. Unfortunately, the quality and service are no longer very reliable. After a lackluster (and incomplete meal) we ended up needing to summon the manager, who took care of our entire bill, and we left without even eating our entrees. Sarah and her friend dropped me off back in the city?and went off in search of dinner. I made myself dinner at home.

I spent a lot of time thinking about how I?ve searched for my significance in other people, when I should have been trying to find it in the Lord. As a Christian, my significance should be derived from my relationship with God through Christ. On the one hand, there?s nothing wrong with helpful, healthy validation from a friend. But there is also a clutching, clawing, blatant demand for reassurance that has emerged in several of my relationships that is wearying?because of my idolatrous paradigm. I am not saying this in a twisted, self-flagellating spirit. I need to move on from this mindset. It is just as much a cop out to accurately label a negative pathology but to keep living it, as it is to be utterly blind to it. It is probably worse because awareness equals responsibility.

I sent my sister a letter apologizing to her for utilizing her innate nurturing qualities to reassure me over and over again about Gordon. First of all, she is 12 years my junior, and as such should not have to parent me through any crisis. This is what my mother did to me, and lo and behold, I did what I said I would never do, because I know first hand how damaging it can be. She never even said anything to me about it, but as I?ve been forced to look closely at my life, I see what I did and it pains me.

I am at a point in my life now where I long for intimacy with God to the exclusion of anything else. I have wanted so many other things to legitimize and authenticate my value, my life, my choices. But ever since God got me alone, cordoned me off for a period of time, I have seen that He is what I need. Everything and everyone else is all the more appreciated and lovely filtered through my relationship with Him. So, regardless of who is in my life or who leaves my life, it can?t destroy me?because I am not looking to anyone but God to determine the value and worth of my days.

March is the Month of Literary Exploration and Enjoyment

Due to the kindness of a former supervisor, I am going to hear Toni Morrison speak next Wednesday at the very University I will be attending in the fall. Later on this month, I will be reading one of my poems at the annual Women-In-Poetry celebration held by my undergrad alma mater.

It’s a little after 4 p.m. on Wednesday. I’m eating a mealy banana, and trying to construct a winning hook for this post.

I possess an alternate past—it is the one in which I remember instances from high school and college as the me I wish I had been. In these retouched memories, I am always significantly thinner, happy, and unconflicted. I sometimes imagine that a friend who knew me during these periods of my life (it doesn’t matter what friend, it varies…) is visiting me in my present life, and comes with a videotape of some of my best moments immortalized in VHS format. “Remember this, Kate?” She’ll ask. We pop in the tape, and I relive my teens and early 20s (which I don’t regret a moment of in this scenario).

Oh, look! There I am in the cafeteria at Urban High, eating tater tots and ready to conquer the world. I am bantering with the most eclectic group of students, and they all respect me. I don’t project neediness, so no one is repulsed, because they perceive that nothing is required of them. They can see that I am complete in and of myself. I am not, as I was in actuality, the third wheel of a 3-personed wannabe monster. I was not, as I was in actuality, amputated from my little clique seemingly without provocation in the late winter of my senior year. I did not graduate friendless, as I did in my true past.

In this imagined schematic, Gordon, and other people that I am chagrined to admit I want to impress, are also present, and they are amazed at how wonderful I was—even then. ‘Oh, why couldn’t we have known her then?’… they silently muse.

But, Wait! There I am in college on a grassy hill, or at the water front, looking svelte, in control of my destiny, unaffected and gracious. I am coveted by the young love of my life. Rewind… What did I just say? Something incredibly funny and intellectual. Look at how that beautiful, smiling boy I’m with adores me! It is not the case in my revisionist history that I will someday hear him say that He has never loved anyone like he loves the girl he met at a dance in Seattle—after one stupid song.

In this altered retroactive reality I also possess talents and skills I don’t actually have. For example, I can drive in these day dreams, Lovelorn artists have written dirges about me, but most of all, I like this person I think I could be with just a little tweaking here and there. Her mistakes are low-grade and endearing, their implications for the worst, minimal. She is so together. No slippage in the schedule of goals and achievements. She never cried when her high school crush embarrassed her during a game on the bleachers. That never happened, because this girl I could have been did not have a crush on that pedestrian thinker come Volunteer Fireman. She would never play herself that way.

I entertain these lighting flash images less and less these days. My time alone with God over the last few months has definitely reoriented my focal point. I hope to leave them behind for good. I also fear that they betray a tiny bit of insanity.

Here’s the truth. In high school I became very depressed. I didn’t know it at the time, but looking back I can see that’s what I was. I was also being eaten alive by a very stealthy form of anger. I sublimated through food. I started to pick up weight. By the time I reached college I was well on my way to being fat, and may as well have been wearing a sandwich board–sized sign that read “Reject me, Please!”

I liked no fewer than 4 guys over the course of those years who felt that I was good enough to be a friend, or “sister in the Lord,” but who never considered I was worth a second glance for much else. And in much the same way I was decisively cut off by my two friends in high school, each of these friendships ended abruptly when the guys tired of me, got wind of my feelings, or met other girls to whom they wanted to declare undying love.

I try to look back at myself, as I really was then, and make my peace with the fact that I was emotionally-unkempt, and felt like a social beggar, always afraid I was going to fall, unprovoked, out of people’s good graces. I wasn’t buff and on the crew team, I couldn’t drive, I never danced seductively with anyone, and I didn’t even have the experience of being loved by a boy with unchecked, guileless passion.

What choice do I have? If ever I were presented with a tape of my past, it would be footage of an awkward, chunky girl, whose neediness was apparent to everyone. I better love that girl, though. She’s the reason I got here. And someday, when there are no traces of her left, it will be important to me to know what she meant.

You are CLARISSA EXPLAINS IT ALL. She is a rad
chick with absolutely no fashion sense.



Which old school Nickelodeon show are you?
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This used to be one of my favourite songs (as a pre-teen).

The gentle weather we are having has put me in a good mood. I would not say that I experience seasonal depression, but there is clearly a variation of some sort in my outlook from season to season. It is isn't even connected to sunlight, for me, but to the warmth in the air. I think 60 degress is ideal. Give me a balmy, overcast day anytime.

I'm starting to figure out financial aid issues for school. I never thought I'd be doing this again, but I am so pleased to have a compass and a sense of purpose, something concrete to work toward, that I am willing to lose myself in a mound of paperwork, and play phone tag with people to give this dream of mine some legs.

I am drinking a decidedly sub par cup of coffee and feeling all right. How are you doing?

Monday, Monday

In a strange twist of events, and thanks to alternative programming, Monday is now my favorite television night (globally speaking) of the week. I plop down on the couch at 8 p.m. and don't get up until 11:30. I watch the entire UPN line up, and thoroughly enjoy every single show. Monday night used to be the "dead zone" of the tv week, so much so that none of the networks even seemed to try to put anything worthwhile on the schedule.

Of course the rule of 'To Each His Own' is in effect. Maybe Monday night has been great for others....

I've had a very productive day today. I've arranged for Michael to drive my moving truck, I've put in an order for my mail to be forwarded starting April 14th, and I edited the last of those Spanish culture lessons. I also involved Gordon in something of a philosophical e-mail trail about art as self, or as an extension of self. It ended with his sending me a very long article about nominalism, conceptualism, moderate realism, and exaggerated realism. Clearly, this is love, people.