Writing Through the Mess

This was an art installation at a hotel we stayed at for Mike’s birthday in January of this year in San Francisco

My writing has been all over the place, in a sort of no man’s land for a few months now. I have a photography memoir manuscript that is on life support, a dozen or so researched pieces that are started, but never finished, a million scraps of something (or is it nothing?) in my Notes app, and Google docs filled with…stuff. I was in a Open Mic the other day, and I dusted off a few unpolished pieces to read. I realized I have a lot of material and no internal compass that will reliably guide me towards next steps. I even struggled mightily coming here today. I just don’t know what to say or how to say it. It feels like my brain is buffering all day long, trying to come up with a signal so that I can communicate time and place. That even though I am horribly lost in so many ways, I do know the way back to myself, which is all that really matters.

I can tell you that my older sister is sick with double pneumonia and I am worried about her. That Mom would always know what to do for Shelly because they spoke a language only they understood and I don’t and didn’t. That I can’t be her mom, or her nurse, only her little sister.

I can tell you how I sat in the cool breeze of a Minor League baseball game last night with friends, eating freshly fried churros on “Churro Night” while a band of young boys cheered for their team, screaming “The Pitcher’s got a big butt!”, happy to be a part of that world, if only for an evening.

I can tell you that two weeks ago I commented on an influencer’s page on Instagram and I thought I was winning a sweater with strawberries on it, but I won two vibrators instead and I cannot stop laughing. I blushed to myself when I opened the box, unclear of my misstep and how it lead me to sex toys? One looks like a red rubber rose. It took me twenty minutes to unravel this mystery. If you don’t know me, and most of you don’t, if I had a brand (no thanks, BTW!) and I were that brand, this would be very on brand for me. I am really irritated because I wanted that sweater. HA!

I can tell you how quiet and still my downtown becomes at 2AM as I observe it from my insomniac perch on the front porch. How I sometimes get the sudden urge to run through the streets laughing and blowing bubbles, or to do backflips all down the center lane while singing “Ricky Don’t Lose That Number,” like I did in my childhood summers on our front lawn.

I can tell you how I am trying to write a piece about the cardiac arrhythmia atrial fibrillation, and another one on how I was voted “Most Gullible” in high school. I still am suggestible but that is mostly because I still love people more than I fear them, even after all the Dateline I watch.

I can tell you my side of our bedroom is covered with unfolded laundry on the floor, under the bed, and on the bed because folding and putting laundry away is my most hated chore. That I sometimes pretend I am a medieval laundry woman named Nikita in order to complete this task, even going so far as tying a bandana around my head to play the part completely. It hasn’t worked today, but I won’t give up.

I can tell you that in order to write, I know I need to write. That I need to sit down and give myself over to all of these thoughts in order to make them into a piece of prose, or poetry, or maybe even an essay. That I need to pay closer attention to details, be less forgiving, more tidy, less careless. For now, though, I am going to work on writing something, anything down and letting that be enough