Over the holidays I talked with a couple of girlfriends who were heartsick over games of emotional tug of war, also known as codependence. Codependent love goes like this: Here's all the shitty, unreasonable, terrible, horrible, no good things this person did and here's all the great, rule-following, generous, responsible, hard-working, sacrificial, exhausting, never-ending, perfect things I…Read more Hey, It’s Ok
More
She'd shake me awake in the dark. Not bothering to shower, I'd twist my hair into a bun and follow her to the car. The women in my mother's family all worked in some kind of nursing capacity. They also share a painful legacy of miscarriages. My initial aversion to bodily fluids and human…Read more More
Tidings
Perception, access, resources and ability largely determine the way we approach accountability, healing and change. Initially when my mother and stepfather told us we were moving to a 20 mile long floating land mass in the middle of a giant puddle known as the Atlantic, we wailed in protest. I was tired of unpacking…Read more Tidings
Lionitis
“I've been absolutely terrified every moment of my life and I've never let it keep me from doing a single thing that I wanted to do.” -Georgia O'Keeffe Good, bad or otherwise there was no time for fear growing up in my family. Poverty doesn't give you the space to pause; maybe that's true for…Read more Lionitis
Consumed
Last night I dreamt about amorphous blob creatures called muffies. They laid, thoughtless, purple, clam-like yet motionless and unclothed on yoga mats making moaning and sucking sounds with eyeballs connected to no thoughts other than to be fed. I spent the dream trying to manage their slimy groaning needs while actual work scenarios rushed up…Read more Consumed
Shutter
We broke into pieces slowly, like an uncovered cake drying out for weeks on a counter. I'd say the crumbling began after he'd admitted to starting the fire in our apartment. It took a while to accept it as truth given the erosion of safety I'd been avoiding most of my adult life. I'd been brave enough to examine…Read more Shutter
Mum
It's Me! she said Like that store in Oak Bluffs A clever name ensuring identification would equate with profit It's Me! she said Of the shirt brother wanted Of the success sister achieved Of my crooked nose If it was not an extension of herself it didn't exist There are many things I can almost…Read more Mum
The Weight
He was never tasked with picking us up from anywhere and truthfully I don't remember if on this occasion, we were coming or going. What I do recall was, he couldn't see the road. Katie and Reid were oblivious in the back seat of the Isuzu looking small, bright and cute. Katie was wearing a…Read more The Weight
Genius
Thomas Wolfe had hypergraphia. His editor was patient. The end.
Love is.
Yesterday I bumped into some old writing; several thousand words chronicling the death of a decade which now looks like a worn out towel in my memory. It made me question love; why we need it, how to go about it, what it's for, why bother the risks. Last night I dreamt about an…Read more Love is.
Born in Providence 