The 3rd and perhaps final version of my video:
In the first version, the narrative was presented in subtitles.
The 2nd version was adapted as one part of a 5-part performance I staged last year, with voice-over narration replacing the subtitles
The new version is a re-edit and re-mix of stage version.
how is it possible to move away from some things without moving toward other things?
this is the question i ask myself in this latest phase of adriftness. where am i heading and what am i leaving behind?
what is there for me here?
for what purpose?
to what end?
did i really go anywhere at all?
or have i been gone ever since i can remember?
what is this place i awaken to?
who are these people around me, standing and sitting and walking and commuting and eating?
what do they think of me?
what are they thinking when they are not thinking of me?
how could anyone not be thinking of me?
who else is there to think about?
i ran into a bit of danger on my way to the café in Cambridge from where I type these words. i was crossing one of those impenetrable intersections near Harvard Square and I did not know how to navigate it… so I followed a group of people crossing ahead me… meanwhile someone is blasting their horn and I thought, gosh, I hope he is not honking at me (I can recognize the genders of car honks). but my hopes were fruitless. as his SUV was passing, he leaned his head out the window and screamed
What the hell do you think you’re doing? What’s wrong with you? Fucking Idiot. Get a life!
such hatred and violence, it nearly crushed me.
and I thought, I had better get used to this
because this is what Boston feels like.
although technically I was in Cambridge.
and then I remembered that I came here voluntarily.
i came here to get unstuck.
but it isn’t so easy.
well, so far this dismantling of my previous life is not working so well… on just about every level. i am trying my hardest not to lay the blame on you, dear reader, for not stopping me when you had the chance. because you could have. but you didn’t.
and now look where we are. in a dilapidated Victorian house that sits atop a hill, with no heat and no hot water. alone.
my aloneness has chased me down and followed me here. i keep my bags packed because i am bound to keep me moving from house to house until my aloneness loses all sight of me, and wears down from the chase. i am determined to defeat it. i am determined to live in a way i have yet to live.
so really, the blame for this lies elsewhere in a place that is not you.
love,
LP
i am at a loss for words.
my vocabulary does not seem to work anymore.
my dialect is an artifact.
how can i replace it?
what to replace it with?
i’ve decided to absorb the dialect of the woman who sits directly across from me at work. i have been here almost a month and she thus far has not made eye contact.
but she dresses really well.
today she has some sort of bandana around her neck.
i think it could only be a statement.
and people seem to like her.
and she has tons of energy.
and she boxes in the morning.
and she has lots of enthusiasm.
so it makes sense that it would be her dialogue that i will try to absorb.
it helps to have a model.
i still have yet to figure out what i’m doing here. everything feels unnatural, inorganic, out-of-sync, out-of-tune. difficult. i seem to seek out difficult situations and difficult people. i came here voluntarily. and i knew this is how it would be for a while. that’s what i tell myself. because i must be my own cheerleader. that’s not quite what i meant. i meant, i will have to stage my own pep rally. I will say “I can do this!” over and over again until it loses all meaning. until the words are just tones without words inside them.
i don’t think that will help me from worrying about the close friendships i fear i am losing. if only i could find some sort of sign that these friendships will endure. because i am out i the wilderness. and i came here voluntarily.
tonight my new city feels eerily like my old city.
but i should qualify that by admitting that I am typing these words from a Starbucks (in Somerville). I tried the independent coffee place across the street but it was extremely unfriendly and the pool table noise was getting to me. I didn’t know where else to go.
And I can’t go back to the place where I am temporarily dwelling because it’s gotten a little strange with the woman who owns the house. She gets easily irked if I leave a light on in the bathroom after I leave for work.
She was very upset with me when I did not turn off the outdoor driveway light which has a motion sensor that automatically turns on. And I made the huge mistake of thinking it automatically turned off.
But then the more cataclysmic event happened 2 mornings ago. I was walking down the stairs that connect the kitchen to my dwelling in the basement. And I stepped on a white plastic bag that was lying on the stairs and I felt the crunching sound of something ceramic breaking… and it turned out to be a ceramic bowl. My host was devastated. Tears came flooding down. I knew I had done something terrible and I could sense irreparable.
She had found this ceramic bowl in a Mexican village and had planned on giving it as a surprise to a very special friend. I didn’t know what to say.
It reminded of a similar feeling I had 19 years ago when I lived in Seattle. I had left the door slightly ajar and my new housemate’s dog went scurrying out the door. And it took 12 hours before the poor dog was found. maybe the worst 12 hours of my life.
But this incident was more finite. It was futile to offer to pay for the bowl because it was irreplaceable. And I don’t think she had any plans to return to that village in Mexico.
Eventually, after many many apologies and “I feel terrible” utterances, she asked if I was OK because I could easily have fallen down the stairs.
So I can’t go back there tonight, until I know she is asleep.
I’ll give it another 1/2 hour.
today i feel so much lighter, for some reason, with my old city behind me. and a new life waiting to emerge, even if it’s a replica of the old life, in a different time zone.
a 2nd date with D who I met on Saturday. She asked me to meet her at a choral concert at the church at Harvard Yard. We arrived separately just before it started and took a bench at pew 33. Out of nowhere, she asked me if I had ever been married. “um… no.” And then she asked, “have you gotten close to getting married?” and i said, well sort of. but the music started before i had the chance to add “in the metaphorical sense”
after the concert, i asked if she wanted to go somewhere for tea.
she said, no, she wanted to go straight home.
and then she said, i feel like i should say yes, to be polite but i just want to go home.
and I said, you don’t have to be polite
and we stood there vacantly.
then she asked, why did you move to Boston in January?
I told her that i would have arrived early, but i had to tie things up at my previous job.
i did not think to mention that i stayed in Chicago to be there for my friend, also named D, in her final weeks of life before succumbing all too soon to cancer. i had promised D that I would not leave before she left this realm. And it meant so much that i could fulfill this vow.
But i did not disclose this to the other D.
i offered her a ride home, and she declined.
i offered to walk her to the bus, and she declined.
she was going to walk home, 4 miles in sub-zero weather.
she put on her face mask. and walked away.
i think that may have been it.
i got the sense that she did not want to be in presence for even one second longer. which even to me, made no sense since she had invited me to the concert.
maybe i gave the wrong answer to the marriage question.
but what is the correct answer?
Week number 2 in this new city will soon be a whisp. what have i learned in these past 2 weeks?
i’ve learned that i am not sleeping nearly enough to function at the level i am required to function.
i’ve learned that i should try to get more sleep.
i’ve learned that i can move anywhere in the world and i will still take my anxieties with me. my anxieties can go anywhere they please. they will probably outlive me.
i’ve learned that self-confidence is as foreign as it’s ever been.
i’ve learned that there are fleeting moments when i can pretend that i have confidence, which is not a new realization. i am just trying to make it more durational. but there is always a situation where i am put to the test.
take today for example. i met this woman on okcupid and after a few emails, she suggested we talk on the phone. which was frightening to me.
So I wandered around Cambridge for miles and miles, taking in the new landscape… and walking and stalling, avoiding that call… until i managed to find a cafe, with a table from where i called her.
And we were having this very awkward conversation, with many awkward silences.
and then the pretend confidence surfaced and i invited her to meet me there, right there and then, knowing full well what dangers awaited me. and she accepted the invitation.
and soon we were sitting across from each other. trying out different strands of conversation. and i think we were trying to read each other.
i could tell that things were going badly, but the pretend confidence voice spoke again and I suggested we go somewhere else for dinner. and she said, ok, let’s.
so we went to this seafood place in harvard square, and she took out a spiral notebook and wrote down a note that she was wearing ear plugs. and she showed me her ears to prove it.
i wrote in her notebook my question “why are you wearing earplugs?”
and she said that she needed to wear earplugs when she was tired and hungry. which seemed to make sense.
and we continued making conversation in her notebook through the entire dinner.
most of the written conversation was in response to a question she repeated like a chant (on paper).
“What do you think?
of what, I sad.
“What do you think?”
I don’t think I think.
“What do you think?”
I can’t separate one thought from the next. It’s all one vast slab of thought or no thought.
“What do you think?”
“What do you think?”
“What do you think?”
“What do you think?”
i had run of things to not think about.
and then she said we should get going. she was going to take the bus. and i offered to drive her. and she wasn’t sure what she wanted to do, and then she decided she wanted to take the bus, but the bus did not arrive and i ended up driving her home.
and for the entire ride, i could sense this energy draining and i could not tell if it was me or if it was her, but it was palpable.
we did not make much conversation.
and by the time we reached her apartment building, i had nothing left. all of my pretend confidence energies were depleted.
as she was leaving the car, the pretend confidence voice asked if could kiss her goodnight.
now what the hell was that about? it’s something that should just happen, not something that requires asking permission.
but the pretend person felt like that is what non-pretend people do. the pretend people hears about this all of the time.
as for me, i have no idea how to read people, or speed-read people, or even misread people.
so in my uncertainty, i caved into the pretend me.
and she turned back into the car and we kissed for about 10 seconds. and then it ended and she left.
it was then that i realized that my breath probably tasted/smelled like tuna (my lunch) or salmon (my dinner). like a dead fish that had washed up somewhere off of Cape Ann.
while driving back to the house where i am staying, through these strange massachusetts streets, fuming that my pretend confidence had crossed the line. all of my instincts telling me that this person had no interest in me and had no desire to be in my presence for a second longer.
my pretend confidence was clearly trying to humiliate me. why could it not leave well enough alone? if it had accepted date #1 ending at the bus stop, it would have been the perfect first date.
and now I am completely completely exhausted from essentially me trying not to be me. this pretend confidence… could not survive the endurance test. almost, but not quite. i give it credit for trying.
because i guess it is good to be tested once in a while. i just wish that one day something organic will spring up in me.
but really, how is it possible for one person to really know what another person is thinking?
i know that people can. i see it in movies. they must be real.
i left my home and all i knew of the world and all i’ve ever loved to come to this town where i am but a stranger. at this moment in time, it might be up there amongst the biggest mistakes i’ve yet to make. i am working for 2 people, one of whom wishes i were not there. And i am on the verge of granting her her wish. tomorrow, one condescending remark and I am out the door. and I will pack up my car with the few possessions i brought with me and then return to the home i so desperately sought to leave. it will not take much to set me on that path. Boston is not kind for people of my disposition and ilk.
i’ve been thinking a lot about the mayor of Chicago. what an odious man he seems to be… odious, as in arrogant, conniving, predatory, egomanical, megalomaniacal, insensitive, duplicitous… And so unfazed by the fact that so many people find him to be odious and unpleasant. but pretend compassionate when the cameras are on, like when he visits an inner city grade school.
i guess i don’t understand the psychology and mindset of politicians. how they came to be who they are. just their egos alone. what were their parents like? did they receive an abundance of love and support from their parents who created an environment for egos to blossom and eventually escalate to the Nth degree? maybe they did not receive enough love or approval and they are who they now are to compensate for what was lacking.
what is a healthy ego anyway? i don’t think it is anything a Buddhist would strive to attain.
what I am trying to get at is.. well, if I were in any environment or situation and noticed that not everyone welcomed me, or that i made someone feel uncomfortable, or if even one person disliked me or was critical of me… if it were me, i would want to clear out there pronto.
maybe it’s because i don’t like or don’t know how to handle conflict. or maybe because in the face of conflict, i freeze up rather than take effective action. maybe because negative situations and environments tend to weigh me down more than positive ones. i dwell too much upon them
but none of that seems to matter to the mayor of Chicago. how can he be or appear to be so oblivious? the negativity only seems to spur him on. he thrives upon it, maybe even seeks it out. how does one become a person like that?
lately i’ve been feeling really fatigued… a body/mind/spirit crushing fatigue, like all of the time. i try to stay alert, but i drift so easily into dreams. not even daydreams. but actual dreams that i see more clearly than the world around me…. which is not very convenient for a 350 mile drive, such as the one I took yesterday. i really had no business being behind the wheel. but i made it. my consciousness veered into so many places, so many images.
I saw a woman who had a parakeet’s beak instead of a nose. I saw a man whose head was a rolled piece of newspaper. i saw somebody i was infatuated with back in my early 20’s sitting across from me at a desk, and it seemed as if I was working for her, until her left foot rubbed up against my right leg. i saw myself on my first day of this potential new job being given a pop quiz to see if i actually knew things i claimed i knew in my job interview (which i actually do not know). i saw myself on the set of a Chinese movie that was actually a Roman coliseum.
fortunately the road from Des Moines to Chicago was a straight shot. it was impossible to veer off the road.
today the challenge is to resist my instincts to curl up into a fetal position under a warm blanket. fortunately there are no warm blankets where i work. so i have no choice but to resist.
i’m not sure what this is about. maybe it’s all about the decision. the decision to take on this new job in this new city, leaving everybody i am close to, everything i am familiar with behind. my whole infrastructure is rebelling. there’s a voice that cries out,
i
just
can
not
do
this
the challenge is to pay heed to or resist this voice. i can’t imagine really doing anything. unless forced.
i am not sure why, but i seem to be taking things so literally these days. seeing only what’s in front of me at the moment… or strategizing about decisions i cannot make, like buying shoes or shirts or relocating across the country. it’s nullifying my capacity for abstract thinking. even my dreams and nightmares are literal. reality dreaming.
this morning i dreamed it was the first day at my new job. And my boss was giving me a pop quiz to see if i knew what i was doing… if i had the skills i claimed i had at my job interview (which i do not). And then my friend JC appeared, and she was working there, too. I asked her if she could help me, but she seemed reluctant. i think she told me that i should be able to figure things out, at my salary. even though she was earning $10,000 more. I guess she may have wanted my job. i had never seen her so bitter, or bitter at all.
and then she was helping me pick up a ladder somewhere, i’m not sure where. but we seemed to be in a hurry to take it wherever we were supposed to take it. i think we may have managed to get there.
And when I awakened, i had the sense that one has when awakening from a disturbing nightmare. it all felt so literal. except for why JC was appearing. except for the ladder.
my friend’s cancer has been determined untreatable and she is now in hospice. although i have lost several people over the years, this is the first time i have experienced anyone who has gone through the hell of chemo and radiation with no positive results, who now is saying goodbye to family and friends. i can’t imagine what’s she’s going through, seeing friends and family visiting from out of town, possibly the last time.
yesterday she told me that she had heard I got a job offer in Boston and will be moving there. it’s partially true. i have the job offer. but i’m finding it difficult to convince myself that i would want to live there. but she persisted and asked when i would be moving, and i said i was not ready to go, and she said she was not ready to go either. but that i would be going somewhere life affirming while she was going into the unknown.
and then she cried and said she would miss me. and i said, i’m right here now and not going anywhere. and she apologized for saying or doing things that may have hurt me. and i told her that this had never happened. and that it i was who was sometimes grumpy and stubborn when we worked on projects together. and she said that, no, i was always open and compassionate. and i said, no, she was the one who was compassionate. and this went back and forth a few times, until we both gave up.
the only thing i do know is that i am going to stay at least as long as she does. i can’t bear the thought of leaving this friend. even though in 25 years prior, we were more collaborators than friends. and collaboration wasn’t always easy. but now, none of that matters.
The friend I mentioned to you in my previous post has decided that she would like to go on living. I was feeling selfish for wanting her to battle through more chemo and radiation. Who would want to go through that? Why would anyone who loves her want to prolong her suffering? But she’s had such an outpouring of love from her friends, she wants to give it another try. And I think she can do it. If anyone can.
Last week a group of us (musicians and vocalists) visited her hospital room to sing her a Sufjan Stevens song, Chicago. And it was most amazing to see her uplifted by it, when she was barely conscious my 2 visits prior. If only for a moment. The radiation to her brain has extinguished her short-term memory, and she has no recollection of that moment now, a few days later. She only has moments in the present, or further into the past.
But if enough of us can continuously help shape the present for her, we can get her through this. and hopefully it will not be purely selfish on our part.
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The Lost Pedestrian 