the links entry

I don't know what to write but was told to do so. The semester is over and it is a huge relief. Here is what I have been working on, school-wise, for the past month or so:





PUBLISHING: 20+ page outline on magazine concept, JUBILEE: the adventure parenting magazine. outline contained financial outlook for a three year span, marketing strategies, demographics, advertisers and pricing, layout, workforce outline and timeline of production, budget, etc.



LATIN AMERICAN NARRATIVE: a short story written in the style of Jorge Luis Borges, an Argentinian writer from the first half of the century who had a very particular style, and who used a lot of labyrinth and mirror imagery, and never used simile or metaphor, and did a lot with playing with identity, reality, and plains of existence. The short story was about 10 pages, with the accompanying essay about three pages.



WRITING POETRY: at least twelve edited poems in a chapbook, complete with introduction. I also made a smaller chapbook for one poem I'd written, due to it's literary format: It is a poem written in the form of a glossary, and I made it a quarter-size zine, with each glossary term (which were sailing terms, etc., formulated to both explain what the objects, movements, etc. are in the literal sense, and also how they relate to the motional state of the sailor, Tania Aebi) on it's own page, an introductory page explaining who Aebi is and was, and the cover was a picture of a basic sailboat with all the parts labelled, so that following the glossary is a bit easier.



We also had a poetry reading at the Most Wanted Fine Arts Gallery. I think it went well, everyone sounded great and their edits were strong. We read with Mark Neison's Creative Nonfiction class, which I am taking next semester. I was told later that I have a good reading voice, it's very captivating. ooh-la-la! I also made Soupie blush pretty hard when I read a few poems I'd written for him. Not "sexy" poems, but I think that true love poems are much sexier than poems trying to be sexy, anyway, and besides it's a public school forum. And besides I don't write sexy poems, I write poems about dead people and love.



I know what I got in Poetry (97% on my final project, 95% over-all, which I am writing just to gloat to my family members who read this, and friends of Soupie's who I don't know), and I know I got A's in my other glasses, but don't know the percentages or what my final project grades were. Despite grades, however, I am very pleased with my output this semester. Especially considering I did not think I was a poet any longer, and was balancing a relationship (which actually does require a lot of work and commitment, even though prior to this one I would have claimed otherwise), caring for a puppy, and working full-time, oh, and living at two different houses. pat on the back, Carolyne, big ups.




In other news, my roommate is officially moving out. We've started interviewing people, and the pickin's are pretty slim. I have actually liked everyone so far, but my other two roommates think I am being too easy. Joe at one point said, "you talk to these people and ask them questions and it doesn't even seem like you're judging them!" But he and Adam did make up a few good points, like that they may be nice, but imagine living with them, how awkward it will be in the morning waking up to this person, how we might unknowingly join against that person, or mainly just all three of us get along so well together so that this third person who isn't quite like us cannot blend in well. The one girl who fit in great with us, and is a really awesome candidate, has two cats and therefore is most likely eliminated, unfortunately. It is a shame, as she is wonderful and would fit well in our house dynamic, but the dog freaks out and even though she is saying now that she could keep them in her room, it wouldn't be fair to the cats or to her, and it wouldn't be fair to the dog to keep him from always having to stay in my room, or even moreso, on a leash, because at least with zoe when he did get out of my room he played a bit but wasn't murderous.



On the same note, in an undisclosed way, I started on a tangent with my mother on Muslim fundamentalists. In Canada, a woman was murdered by her Muslim community for disgracing her family, which could mean something such as going out on a date with a man of whom they disapprove. Even something such as adultery is not cause for murder, in my opinion. But because it was in Canada, the Canadian government is trying the people for murder. Rightfully so, again in my opinion, but then there is the sense of whether or not they really wanted to murder her or truly felt it was there duty to God. In Saudi Arabia, however, a woman was gang raped, and then the community stoned her for putting herself in a situation where she was alone with men. They would ordinarily execute the woman, but in this case the Saudi Arabian government said they would not execute her, but would instead find an alternative means of punishment. Woah. I was discussing it with Evan later, and he said that my argument was problematic, and was also a bit discriminatory because it was anti-Muslim and not anti- the governments that rule by fundamentalist beliefs. Regardless, though, a woman in Canada is dead, though the difference is that in Saudi Arabia, a Muslim-ruled government, or for that matter a religion-ruled government, it is the government sanctioning the punishment. I talked about this with Michele Kort during our interview: how feminism is for women wordwide, regardless of whether they are part of a religious organization that sanctions their mistreatment. Abuse is still abuse, rape is still rape, and murder is still murder.





Oh, and this past weekend I went to a fancy-pants party in Presco, PA. I went with Evan and Ovens, and holy crap was this house big. I had intended originally on wearing my coctail dress, a classy number from the revered establishment Frederick's of Hollywood, but got nervous when we were all waiting around at Evan's mom's house for the Ovens to get dressed and for Soupie to decide which of his brothers outfits to wear. They were all dressed very conservatively, in v-neck sweaters, collared shirts, and pants. I had on sneakers, hot pink fishnet thigh-highs, and a black shimmery halter party dress. The neck was VERY low. So, I put on my party dress, my favorite fall-back, a strapless black dress with red polka dots, and a corset-like back with black lace and it comes down about to the knee. Very much a party dress. So we all went, all dressed up in our Saturday best, and went to THE BIGGEST HOUSE WE'VE EVER SEEN IN OUR LIVES. It looked like a giant illuminated cube, which it essentially was. Inside the 21,000 square foot home was over 1,000 units (or whatever) of electricity (apparently the average large house has 150-200 max), and 6 really nice furnaces. There was also a basketball court, six or seven water bubblers, a 5,000 square foot apartment downstairs for guests, a bar, and who knows what else, on top of a hill in the woods. Beautiful, but a bit much. Read Soupie's blog for his experience in the house, full of oil and breaking things. I was mainly hungry and overwhelmed. Also, as it turned out, I would have fit in very well with all the drunk middle-aged housewives bopping about on the dance floor, had I worn the original dress. As it were, I felt a bit under-dressed, but at least it's my favorite dress.



I sort of want to write about my mall experiences the other day(s), about being completely ambushed and all but forced into buying products, and how when I went with Evan yesterday, not a single person approached us. Also about the insult tactics of sales people lately. But mainly, had I the energy and the desire, I would write about one company who accosted me, a curling iron company, who showed me a straightener to make me pretty, and when I explained that I like my curly hair, they recurled it and said, see in ten seconds you can have nicer curls (ps I have very nice curls, thankyouverymuch, and my hair was a bit messy because I had been partying in it all night, did not brush or wash it, and it was goddamn snowing out. not that I even care). She wanted to see a curly-haired person a curling iron. UGH! some people.

ch-ch-ch-changes

Dreams last night: One neutral, one bad. The neutral one came second. I was living at the Pittsburgh house but instead of being fancy it was REALLY REALLY fancy. There was the same uncomfortable tension between roommate X and I, but this time it was against a whole lot of people and not just me, because a lot of friends from Boston -- both highschool friends and punk friends -- also lived there, and Soupie lived there, and the dog. It was like some sort of weird huge fancy community clubhouse or something. I remember a lot of gold fixtures in the bathroom, a lot of people in the glorious bathroom putting on eye make-up, and i was yelled at again for some bullshit and somebody, maybe kris or kyle the girl, sticking up for me, and the dog being awesome.



In the bad dream, I was living in New York again. But I was living by myself, in this weird apartment in a row house. The dream was very disjointed, or maybe my memory is disjointed, but the main drag of it was that it was cold So cold. So could people were dying, and the homeless were breaking into people's houses just to get warm. The cold wasn't like a weather factor, it was an epidemic. Everyone looked ghostly, hollow. I had to leave my apartment for something, and I got accosted, and when I finally got back to my apartment it was in shambles, the cold had gotten to it and collapsed the wood, and the little bit of shelter left was overrun by crazies and the dead. So I was homeless and miserable, and looking hollow and ghostly myself, and then the dog jumped on me and I woke up.



Speaking of which, we have started getting the dog to sleep on a pillow next to the bed, on the floor, rather than in the crate. He sees it as a fairly comforting compromise, and doesn't fight it nearly as much as he fights the crate. He's also completely housebroken. I want to start letting him loose in the house while we are gone, trying it for a bit at a time. When we did it before he was great, I think he messed up once and we never did it again. But lately on walks he's been good. Even in my house, with Zoe who he loves but also who he torments, and who he's tormented by, he's stopped going after her toys so much, and when I tell him to drop it, he does. He hangs out in my room with me all day and it's no big deal as long as we play a little bit and I take him for a walk at some point. He's also learned Stay, finally, and is starting to pick up on Down. On walks, he doesn't really bark or pull when he passes dogs anymore, which was a huge thing with him for a while, one of the really frustrating aspects of taking him for walks, in parks or whatever. I think he's ready. We talked about it last night. How maybe he's just too late for the crate, since we adopted him at a pretty old age to be teaching him puppy skills like "your crate is your home."



Evan's birthday is on Thursday, and yesterday (Sunday) we had a family party for him at his mom's house. It was a real nice time, I like his family a lot and they've really opened their arms to me as a member of the family, which is comforting when my own family is so far away and spread out at the moment. I wrote him a card that he seemed to like a lot, and a book on eating right to cure ailments. Something he'd mentioned a few times being interested in learning about, but would never actually buy for himself. Which is what gifts are all about. That's what my mother always told me, and what I never wanted to believe, but it's true. We stopped by Soupie's new shop on the way. It looks great. Reminds me a bit of TRM and Bicycle Habitat. Well lit, clean, but still with a bike shop feel, rather than a department store feel. They also carry some real nice bikes, and a good number of not so great bikes that are still pretty cool and marketable. And they carry Patagonia clothes, not Nike. Really, it's just a change, and I'm glad it's a good one. I think it will be a good experience.



I guess that's it. The semester's winding down, and I'll be glad when things are over and done with. We slept in on Sunday for the first time in I can't remember how long. Months. Vacation will be greatly welcomed.

prison dream

Another dream I had a bit ago was that I was a woman, not myself, and had commited a crime. I think it was a murder or something that just sort of fell into "my" life. So this woman (me) is in complete denial about her predicament, being in prison, having found this fate. She goes through the processes in a dreamlike state, but she is on death row and every week they put her through this low dosage electrocution and torture test, that is painful and increases her idea that it is all a dream, unreal. So she makes jokes and maintains conversation with her guards, and then they let her know that the next day she is going to be actually executed. So suddenly she's at home telling her parents because she'd just disappeared and they wanted to know where she was. Her family is very Christian so they just stary praying. Then shes taken away and she is executed. But remember she is me. I woke up a bit shaken, to say the least.

dreams, awkward moments and thoughts

So I am officially "that girl" of the Pittsburgh student literary scene. I am "that girl" who cries in poetry class when, after listening to everyone go through her fairly emotional poem line-by-line, is asked to explain exactly what is going on. How embarrassing. How trite. The bright side is that my professor loved the poem and said that my tears were a sign that I am really on to something in the piece, and she said it is a very brave poem and with a bit of tweaking it will be even more powerful than it already is.


I'd forgotten what it feels like to cry, or perhaps to cry in public, when you are trying to not cry. Either way. It feels like it's raining inside you. Maybe rain feels like crying. They're both sad, they both evoke. Afterwards I went to Mad Mex with Adam, Joe, and Ed. The food wasn't very good, but it was nice to be out socializing, to laugh a lot and make jokes. I feel like I haven't been funny in a while. I'm a little nervous that my friends will be disappointed when they come see me. It's a silly fair, but a legitimate one, I think. But as Kyle warned, we will wear tights and eyeliner and drink coffee and photocopy our boobs and it will be awesome.

When I was younger I never really considered people understanding me or not, that I can remember. And now that I am past all that truly, I have a deep feeling that there are very few people in the world of people I know who actually "get" me. I feel like a big weirdo with whoever I'm hanging out with. It's alright, it's just how it is I suppose. To normal or to weird or too smelly or two clean looking or too deep or too goofy. Maybe people should stop thinking about me so much, maybe I should stop thinking about people thinking about me. Maybe I'm doing all this thinking about people thinking about me, but no one is really thinking about it at all.


Soupie's gone and it's depressing. I'm really glad he's out on the road, and that he's in California and the west coast in general, seeing so much, but that selfishness of also missing him and wanting him to come home is hard to suppress. Not that I want him to leave tour early, I just want the next week go to by quickly. He's been gone for a week and a half, and will be home in another week. The bright side is that the first complete draft of my portfolio is due the day he returns, so in the meantime I am preoccupied with school and also not distracted by him. Also, My parents came to visit last weekend for a day, and tonight Kyle and Metro arrive and will be here until Sunday. Also, Nay is coming to visit on Saturday. Full house, lots of friends, hopefully they will keep themselves busy enough that I can get some thesis work done.



I have been having reoccurring nightmares for the past few weeks, maybe longer. Not every single night, but maybe every other night. The overall story is that I was at a fort, it was my home, and troops of some sort came in to evacuate, but I wouldn't leave, and kept hidden in the dark hallways, with some other people. Eventually the troops annouced that we could stay, but then started massacring and torturing people. People get skinned in every dream, that's the most common torture/murder, and you can hear them in agony, and you can hear people searching for you, and some soldiers see you and tell you where not to go, who to look out for, etc. You see people you knew were skinned walking around, and they have weird plain loose clothing on, and act totally normal, like they are in shock, and I can't tell if they are alive and in shock, or dead and don't realize it.



The whole emotion of the dream is suffocation, and it's horrifying. Maybe I should write a poem about this, too. It'd fit with the other ones I'd been writing. Good grief.



I finally wrote a poem about that time a gang fight broke out in front of me in the subway car I was in, during the beginning of a blizzard, in NYC. Also horrifying.


I am performing on the North Side at some music festival thing on January 3rd. If you are in the Pittsburgh area, please come. And if you'd like to come, please buy tickets off me, they are two dollars cheaper ($5 opposed to $7) and it pays me more, the more tickets I sell.



I don't know what else to write. I get my Latin America paper back tonight, I'm nervous.

I'm supposed to be working on a paper right now. My idea is the concept of time in 100 Years of Solitude, and that there are three tracks. There is the one track that is the linear way in which the story happens; the second in the cyclical way in which the family developes and history repeats itself; the third is the way in which the story is told, constantly with leaps forward "years later..." type statements. I want to explore how this represents Latin American Literature, and how our concept of these being different sets of time and not just one that works with much fluidity is in itself an imposition of our contemporary minds. BUT my book and notes are at Evan's house, and the article on the internet is LOCKED, so I can't really do much research. It's frustrating. My car is also broken down and that is frustrating, too. It's in Oakland. I gotta get it towed today before they close, but later in the day so I can get a ride home with Evan cause he works nearbye. I asked him to take Major Tom with him, the puppy, because I would be riding my bike to Oakland and then riding in the tow truck, then riding my bike to his shop, and it'd be easier than sticking him in my bag or leaving him in his crate. He's really good in cars, and good at the shop as well, at least it seems so. We have been staying primarily at Evan's house in Oakland because the puppy is a bit much for Courtney, but we brought him over last night and Major Tom and Zoe (Courtney's dog) got along real well. He's not perfect, but neigher are we, and I like that he's a little nutzy. He's stopped freaking out at dogs so much, which is incredible, though he still has his moments. I've never regretted adopting him, even though we have altered our lifestyles to accommodate him. That's what owning a dog is about, though. We think in about 6 months he'll be the coolest dog in the world, and we're willing to keep hugging and loving and feeding and running and scolding him until then.

In other news, I wrote this poem. I can't find the most recent draft, which is of course not the final draft. But this is what I have. It is weird and I'm sure that everyone who reads it will internalize it differently and incorrectly. It's a poem. Don't think about it.





Because he asked



it wasn't so bad, it was an annex.

I'll say it again: my heart

was annexed in your love. I'd forgotten

about the month spend watching zombie movies

in that room with no windows,

your cat by my head, big and happy as a dog,

I passed out from stress, you fell

drunk and eyes rolling back onto me, cock

annexed in that warm cuccoon, between

my need to hide, my need to keep you hidden.

Unused condoms forlorn behind the mattress,

they probably wanted trusted, I just wanted rest

or a place to find it. Nobody gets what they want.


There was no air. Not in that attic, not what we breathed.

It was all carbon, all salt. The ocean so close we could feel

the webbing tide, not hear, not see, just the pull.

It was okay, there was a safety to the knowing

and the not knowing, to the bed like beer foam.

I remember lots of drowning. The air up there

warmer than November New England but not much,

we steamed against it like dead animals. The fresh dead.




It's based roughly on a conversation I had with Soupie on the way back from our camping trip in southeastern PA, where he had some bike races. We talked a lot about pasts, which we often talk about during long drives, and he mentioned this Bukowski poem he likes a lot. The conglomeration between the poem and the shared stories created the poem. Looking only at that first draft, I know there's something missing, but I can't remember what it is. It feels very flat and unbalanced right now, though. So it goes, poor readers once again get a peak into my creative process.



So, camping. I am going to cheat by reposting my Myspace blog about it. But I will reimberse you by infiltrating it with pictures, if I can figure out how to do so.:



Speaking of higher ground, I went camping this weekend, perhaps my first time ever really CAMPING. Me, Soupie, and Major Tom G. Warrior (the puppy) went down to French Creek National Park, in Delaware on Friday for a race Soupie had on Saturday morning, an hour away. We got there after dark, having driven in a light mist with not too much disruption in the drive. Evan will attest that I jinxed us by saying, "The trip down here went off without a hitch," though I rebutt that statement with the fact that I meant exclusively our drive to the park, not the entire trip, and the he is actually the jinxer, turning the meaning of my statement into that of the whole broad weekend. Regardless, it rained all night. We couldn't get the fire started with the stupid flint thing, but even if we could have, it would have gone out soon anyway, because the rains were so heavy. We were also too tired to remember we had camping forks, etc., and also had not packed a can opener so we had to use that stupid one that thank goodness comes as part of most multitools. So we ate half a can of cold beans with our fingers. Then one of us went to step out of the tent for a moment and saw that our shoes, which we'd kept under the rain guard, but outside the tent 'cause they were muddy, were floating. The tent was also floating, in about 2.5, 3 inches of rain. Being two relatively pragmatic people, we just picked up the tent and moved it to higher ground. Being two wet and tired and therefore very relatively cranky people, he snipped at me for not being able to follow his simple directions on where to place the half of the tent I was carrying, and I snipped at him for leaving my nice hiking sneakers on the picnic bench. The tent was put in the right place, the shoes eventually dried out, we both apologized and cuddled with the puppy, occasionally waking up to the dramatic pummeling by the rain.



We woke up before sunrise and woke up the world with our drowsy shuffling and hazy driving. We got to the race late so there was no chance for Soupie to pre-ride the course or warm up his muscles, and he came in top 30, out of just over 60. Had a bad start, was in the back of the pack, but still held up alright. The course was incredible and obviously difficult but looked like a blast to ride. The worst thing was watching the A's ride it, because they are so good they make it look like it's not hard but as a sub-par mountain biker I am watching, thinking, "oh come on! I know that's hard, don't play it like it's easy!" Major Tom had a pretty hard time of it, too. There were a lot more dogs than we'd anticipated, and he does not really get along with most dogs. He has what we think is "fear aggression." But I gave him a nap and ran him a bunch and he was pretty good to go. If we hold him he's not so bad, but I know that's not the best way to deal with him if we want him to grow and become socialized and have K-9 friends who are not just submissive dogs who don't mind being nipped at in the face.

Anyway, after the races, we bought some more beans, and some veggie dogs to celebrate making it through the previous night (and also some matches and that $1.50 kindling you buy at the grocery store that burns real easily and clean because the flint thing was stupid and in fact Evan returned it to the store today and demonstrated on the counter how stupid it is and they agreed), but when we finally got back to French Creek, it was full for the day because the next day's race was right down the street and the weather was much nicer. So we went to this place called Sun Valley, in Amish Country. There was a Haunted Hayride going on so every half hour or so we heard "bang bang aaahhhh!" We clipped Major Tom to the lead and I set up the tent and our sleeping bags while Evan got the fire and food started. He made "campfire corn chili" and we made chili dogs out of that and the hotdogs and buns. We took Major Tom for a short walk in the woods, but the train behind our tent ended abruptly and with the haunted hayride going on if we were to be mauled by Amish meth heads on Rumspringa (jokes!). On the way back to the campsite, I happened to flash my headlamp upon a HUGE spider that was hanging mid-air in the darkness, completely unseeable without the light. So I just turned the light off and thought it best to just not think about such things, as we were already bitten by a number of spiders, and would continue to be bitten, and there was really no use bringing fear or wariness into the matter.

We slept well, and before dawn once again we packed up our camp and got in the car to greet the day as it woke, only this time it was a bit harder since there was a big campground breakfast happening at 8am at Sun Valley, and I had a headache probably due to lack of caffeine. But we had a chance to stop for coffee at a gas station, and I took some advil we bought the night before when Soupie had a bad headache for probably the same reason, so by the time we got to the race, back near French Creek, the sun was up, the air was still crisp, and my headache was subsiding. We were all (including Major Tom) in much better spirits than on Saturday. Evan got to preride the course, I got to run Major Tom and feed him, We ate some bananas we'd picked up, and Soupie came in 5th in the race, again out of about 60. I saw him cross the finish line and I say he got 3rd, and he said he actually got 4th since the kid who won was in the U-19 class (which I think means he is a junior, but I dunno. he was damn fast though). Regardless, he did better than 5th but 5th is still podium, if the C race had a podium, and it's something to be proud of. The rest of the day was nice, Major Tom was real good for most of it, but again got cranky at around 1:30 or so and he needed a nap. Only on Sunday it was hot so we had to run the AC while he was in the kennel. So I sat in there with him for a while and tried to get some homework done. I was a bit bored by the end of the day, and had taken the dog for many walks to keep him from getting distracted by the other dogs, and keep him busy enough to not care when he saw them. He was much better though, in general, about keeping his cool and allowing me to refocus his attention on me, sitting when i said so and not fighting when I held his face in front of mine so he couldn't see the dogs. I think he is finally learning how to behave, slowly but surely. He's very very smart, he can open doors and comes when he's called and when he focuses he picks up on commands almost immediately. Anyway....regardless of how tired I was of training the puppy and generally just being at the races, it was again fun to watch the A race. Steevo was there, and I finally met Adam Meyerson who lives in Boston (Dorchester to be exact, from Brockton) and for whom Soupie Pits. Also, the person I kept seeing around all weekend who looked like Craig Roth was indeed Craig Roth, which was awesome because that kid is really nice. He said he had a Cambridge Bicycle t-shirt for me but at the end of the day I didn't see him. Ah well, a familiar face is always a comfort, and even the idea that he had a gift for me made my day that much nicer.

an update of sorts. flight.

I am blogging from work. Maybe this winter while stuck behind a desk all day and bored with doing homework I will learn how to write a real blog. Anyway...yes I am at work and I have a desk. I am a lawfirm secretary for two women lawyers, in downtown Pittsburgh, on the 13th floor, above a coffee shop. No Diggity. I get paid to screw up phone messages and type up letters.




In slightly more personal news, I have an interview with Ms. Magazine's executive editor on Thursday. I know what you must be thinking, "Carolyne, that's wonderful, good luck, you'd be great there!" But no. I am interviewing her! It's for my publishing class, but while most others went for local publishing houses and college presses, I went right for the jugular, classic Carolyne style. I am supposed to interview her about the publishing world, but of course I am interested in the publishing world of feminism, her take on the other magazines and what she thinks of her own, why her audience is largely adult and middle class, what that says about modern feminism and what ought to be done about that. I want to talk to her about the anti-feminist feminist movement, where feminism has become all about using one's sex to hold power over men. So many things, and yet I've promised to use up only a half hour, max, of her time. I will record nothing and listen as hard as possible.





I don't know what else to say. I ride my bike a lot but not as much as I'd like. I go through moments of extreme energy and of extreme lethargia. Often at the wrong times.





My significant other brought up buying a house last night. Not in a, "we should buy a house together to solidify this relationship" sort of way, but in a, "this is what I am thinking of doing, what's your opinion?" matter. It was an incredibly odd sensation of NOT feeling stuck or cornered or manipulated, which is wonderful. However it did make me have to think a bit into the future, which is a big downfall of mine. I don't really know how to do it. I always tell jobs I will stick around for another year or so, but really nobody knows what is going to happen. I will likely be in Pittsburgh until next January when I graduate (that's the plan right now), but what then? Will I want to stay in Pittsburgh, will I want to leave? What kind of job will I even want? In what country? This is where my scatteredness is reminded to me. I can settle into a place because I feel comfortable with myself right now. I can surround myself with illusions of settlement: a relationship, a job, a nice house, the quest for dogs, an education, a striving writing career. But when it is brought into focus, when the idea of time is met with place, my brain falters, or else perhaps regains it's comfortable footing and says, "Carolyne, remember who you are. You've always been one of internal security, and external chaos."





It's fine right now. This life is great. I'm in love with someone I respect deeply, and who respects me. I have a job that doesn't make me feel like an idiot or an asshole. My house is beautiful, my roommates are wonderful, Pittsburgh is full of rolling hills to climb and descend. My brain is constantly expanding. But what then? What about when the one thing holding me in place ends? I cannot say where I'll want to be. But I don't think I have to.





Time to change back into my bike clothes and ride home.

six months round II

updates on poems coming soon. here's the second draft of "six months" but there is another one in the making:



Six Months



—when you woke me up midmorning,


put a pot of flowers on the nightstand,


set down two humble cups of coffee,


and handed me a mango.


It was hard and I held it with the same grip


I hold dreams when I awake to feel them


miscarriaging inside me.


I don't know how to pick them, you said,

but it smells sweet, we can wait for it, I know

it will take you to a place set deep in your eyes.

It was firm and unready, protected and sapless, waiting


for the right moment to immolate itself, sacrifice it's


sweet juices for my need to taste.





In its thick skin, its tart flesh, is the moment


in Couva just before the winds, Laurence the bus driver

and I
beneath the mango trees, hungry, picking


the hanging red and green bulbs with our eyes,


watching them bend those thin young boughs.


By our feet are mangoes bruised, rotting,

tree sap dripped on them like fossilized tears.

We do not dig through these; we wait—

knowing what we want will come.





The mango is ripening now on my nightstand.

I will wake you up early tomorrow, when the sun crisps


in the far eastern angle of my room, almost shadowing us.


We will not use knives. We will not care


about the white sheets and the yellow mess of death,


the memory bitten into, the skin peeled back,



Laurence and I under the mango trees in the wind,

fruits falling like stars or dreams or shoes kicked


off the side of the bed. Laurence and I


catching and laughing and yelling. You and I


laughing and biting and sucking. We will not worry.

Place of Trees

Place of Trees a tarot card poem

for Mary


I didn't believe you when you said

these trees are hollow.

"They stack the little ones inside the big ones, that's

how they get their rings."

When I disagreed you asked me if I'd ever

killed one myself, swung this axe I carry

like a trumpeteer carries his instrument, and struck

one down in a blow. I hadn't.

But you gave me flowers anyway, to remind me

we are simply mermaids ventured too far,

that neither of us know a thing about bark, leaves

broken roots rebelling against this dry earth.

I throw up my axe in thanks and it hums

as it reaches to cut the blood orange

from the sky. In this place of trees

everything casts a shadow. Some are big,

hard, full of air and sorrow and unknowing.

And some, if we let go of all we have,

are the sweetest gifts we can give.

burn collector, and elegy

Burn Collector

elegy for Devon Risley




I've been asked to write a poem about food and I think:

Blackbean burgers. Devon. The desert.

I think: That first night, dancing around the kitchen

to Billy Idol, realizing over pots of beans

and fried vegetables and mush that we are doomed

to a sad, inevitable friendship. The kind that starts

and ends in the same place, with the same existential

mantra, the same cheap, sustaining food. The kind

that chokes on a gunshot hallucination

with my feet quaking in a kitchen

in some city 3,000 miles away

like a fisherman feeling a coming tsunami.



I'm supposed to write about food and I think:

can they make liquid smoke out of any smoke?

Throw a bag over to catch, condense,

would they filter a soul out of gunsmoke

and soldered skin before bottling? I pour anyway.

The vegetables pop and sizzle in the heat.

I can sense their sticking in the pan but my hands

are filmed with bean paste and tonight

I am cooking alone.



This is the loss I never prepare for—

three a.m. in a kitchen in Pittsburgh, liquid smoke

spilt on the table, Devon evaporated somewhere

I can't taste, and I just wish there was another

set of hands to scrape the vegetables, patty

the burgers, fry and stack.



I can't think about food. The burgers

aren't spiced right when I make them alone,

some vital hot is gone. The roasting

green chilis turning and crisping in a nearby

parking lot, flavoring the early autumn air

cannot be replaced by some bottle,

some synthetic effigy. I leave the mess

on the table and pull a chair for it to drip onto.



I think: I'm losing my mind. Devon and I

sat for hours that first night, this last one,

two drippy messes sitting at a table eating burgers,

writing poetry. And one of us is thinking too much

and the other isn't doing enough.

When It Rains It Pours?

It's been raining for days. Yesterday I rode my bike to the gym and worked out until the rain eased up. It still didn't stop, but it calmed to a drizzle for enough time for me to ride home. I was almost excited to ride in the rain, as it is a pleasure of mine I don't often give myself. I don't want to ruin my bikes, I don't want to get hurt, I have convinced myself that I don't actually like riding in the rain because it is so often talked about in negative connotations. Regardless, I spent two and a half, three hours at the gym yesterday. Ran three miles, did 50 sit-ups, 25 leg-lifts, and some other stomach exercises for 15-second intervals, stretched for 15 minutes, and did the stair master thingy for 13 minutes. There were also times factored in where I had to go outside to retreive my bike from the brutalizing rain outside, refill my water bottle, etc.



After the gym, after showering, after sending out more resumes and applications, I helped Courtney make tomato sauce. After coming in from the garden to teach her how to use the juicer, the sky got hellishly dark in a matter of second, and then the rains came. The deafening rain. Derek Wilcott described such rains, as the have in Trinidad, as a drawer of knives pulled out too quickly. I called Evan and asked if he'd like a ride home, as he's ridden his bike 15 miles to Castle Shannon for work (both of us have been getting restless in this domestication and foul weather and home-bodiedness to which I've become accustomed during this sad summer). He offered to trade the ride home for dinner somewhere, so I put on my black dress with the white polka-dots and the ribbon around the waste, filled the gas tank (I hadn't driven in weeks, save for Evan borrowing it to go to his house, and my driving us to Dingle's house on two recent rainy days), and took off. The ride was uneventful as ever, save for the mixtapes and the regular excitement of traffic on roads out of the city, where the buildings change slightly and there's more to which to pay attention.



Upon leaving the bike shop, however, we made it about a block away from the shop, toward's Mayhew's house, and the "check engine" lit dimly as the car lost power and drifted to a stop by the side of the rode, just across the train tracks.



"Maybe it's a computer thing and the car will start again in a few minutes," Evan suggested, hope buzzing like a swarm of flies.



Waited a few minutes, tried again. Nothing.



The rain wasn't monumental, so I popped the hood and Evan took a look. I was mainly concerned that the fan belt had finally snapped. Not because it is expensive to fix, but because it is something I should have fixed a while ago and have been too cheap to bother. The fan belt was as dry-rotted and intact as ever. The rain started coming harder, so after checking the parts we both know at least a little about, he got back in the car and made a few phone calls to the people we were supposed to meet and his mom, who lives in the area. I called AAA, he called his mechanic, and we waited in the bike shop for the tow truck to arrive.



"Maybe something just got saturated from the rain. Cars have been breaking down all day from this weather," he gargled through the downpour. I apologized for making him come out in the rain, but for someone who'd been out working when I called Evan, or when I was in the gym, the rain of the evening was a mist. Still though, we saw everything through silver slivers of water, reflections off everything else. I took off Evan's glasses, as they were too splashed to be of any help.



Another helpful remark buzzing around uselessly, to be swatted by reality as the tow driver said:



"Nope, nothing's wet. "Nothing wet enough to stop the car. Not that I can fix, anwyay."



I handed over my key, registration, and insurance and Evan unpacked his bike and other belongings from the back seat. We walked back to the bike shop, soggy and sullen.



There's something about this summer. I easily want to cry. But I know my own emotional strength, what I should and shouldn't be able to handle, and I stop myself. Sometimes I can't say anything at all, sometimes I just smile, but I don't cry. I can't. When I want to cry, it's not for something that usually would spark such honest emotion. There's something deeper in me.



Evan's mom picks us up at the bike shop and takes us home. We all chat for a while, then Evan and I take his mom's car and go out for a pizza.



"I think this is my Bummer Summer," I confide, remembering Missy's blog post about how this is decidedly not her "bummer summer." We are in the car, on our way, finally, to dinner. I can talk now, having processed and feeling out of control enough to not need to try to regain control. I talk slowly, in stages. "I don't know if I am being reacting reasonably, emotionally, to the stages in my life, or if hormones are playing a part. What happened pre-Trinidad? What was I like? I don't remember anything before coming home, and Trinidad plays out like a movie, very detached."



We broke my summer down. Over-stimulating trip to a foreign country with strangers. Two suicides and a fatal accident, which I heard about all at once, upon returning to the country. Feeling horribly insulted by the bike industry as a whole in Pittsburgh, namely by the company for whom I formerly worked. Being unemployed, unable to find a job in my field, feeling at once broke, helpless, and unsuited make a living as a writer. Turning 25 is a big step, too. So I don't have a job and my classes are over, I don't have a large circle of friends here and have not had the drive to call people since I am already emotionally exhausted and even the thought of devoting an entire night to someone with whom I am not totally comfortable sitting around doing nothing with is draining. I have been trying to preoccupy myself instead by looking for a *real* job, taking care of adult issues (going to the doctor, the dentist, the eye doctor, getting my blood tested, etc), and doing very domestic things like moving into a nice house, cooking big meals every day, washing my sheets (damn), etc. I feel like I am turning into an adult when it is most important for me to "keep it real." But what is keeping it real, anyway, when I feel like the whole world is masked, when I find punks as boring, for the most part, as normal people, when all I really want to do is ride my bike around town all day and bird watch in the park, but it rains everyday and now my car's broken down so to go anywhere I must get soaked?



"And summers are always so epic for me," I add. "They're always the most fun, the most exhausting, entirely fulfilling and exciting."



"It seems like in the past you've filled your time to the brim and have over-exerted yourself to deal with the hard parts of your life you can't face. And now that you're life has slowed down, you are dealing with everything, and it's overwhelming, on top of all the pressures of this summer. I think the emotional weight would make anyone feel down."



I am satisfied. I feel better. Having someone in my life who nonjudgementally understands me, who is separate enough from my past(s) to be able to break things down without being emotionally involved past his care for me, is a blessing. By the time we get back to the car, I am back to my old self as best as I can be, making conversation about the randomness of the universe, the quirkiness of every-day people.



"This is one of the things that makes me never understand you. We just had a heavy talk about all these horrible things you're dealing with, how awful you feel every day, and here you are making jokes in the garage and smiling at me through those stormy eyes."



"Well, life's not really so bad." I smile and turn before I start thinking again and lost the momentum of happiness.




I change into some old clothes of his and we cozy up on the couch to watch TV and eat greasy pizza. I feel like I'm in junior high at a sleep over. In baggy pajamas at someone's mom's house. I think she even paid for the pizza. We tried to sleep on his tiny twin bed, but it just didn't work. Evan slept on the floor. Slumber Party.



I still haven't heard from the mechanics, save for that my car did make it to their shop. I did just get a call about my glasses. They are in, both pairs, but I have to drive in the rain to get to them. We've hit another lull in weather, and hopefully it will last until I get out there and back.



Really, life's not so bad at all. I just gotta deal with things one stage at a time.

essays on trinidad

Beyond Africa

The little girl three rows down from me is dancing. She watches the people on stage and shakes her bum as they do, turns when they do, watches them from the monitor and raises her arms like them, holding the pretend hem of the African dress of her mind, turns again. They wear long, flowy field dresses, white and bright-colored, contrasting their rich dark skin. The corners of their skirts are held up in their hands as they prance around on stage, flicking gravity with their toes as they jump. Some wear decorative war masks, carved and painted with grotesque faces, their dances low, predatory. Different costumes represent different moments in African history and it's relationship with Tobago. The child in front of me mimics the evolution of a people without the use of props or costumes, just her own imagination and willing suspension of believe in time and space.


She is about three years old, probably, energetically awake late into the night while even the twenty-three-year-old visitor next to me sleeps soundly. We are at the Twentieth Anniversary Heritage Festival in Tobago. The theme: "Beyond." The premise behind the pageant is a 103-year-old man whose dying wish is that future generations tap into their African roots and live on that sweet sap. So in front of me, on stage, are dancers pageanting African cultures with bodies and the way they move them, costumes and the ways they wear them, and music so distant from my own history it sounds like a dream. I am not African. I am not Tobagonian. I am white, Irish American, born from a family who traveled across the Atlantic on their own will, to escape oppression and create a better lives. They were not kidnapped, they were not kidnappers. My grandparents and great grandparents left their homes to escape the English, and still when I watch these dances and reenactments I daydream myself into both oppressed and oppressor. I am not on either side, but my skin color says otherwise, and everyone around me knows what side to put me on.


The beat monitors my tranced heart beat. So quick, I sit levitating, smiling against my two hours sleep, eyes escaping the stage only to collapse upon a three-year-old girl framing herself in a moment not in a parking lot under some tent, too late at night with a crowded field of strangers and extended family, but in a savannah somewhere, an open field, or maybe a cotton field just down the street from her and many years ago. God has materialized Itself in her, as if she is a Spiritual Baptist with reverberating fingertips. Or no, as if she is in another place entirely, some land she's never known. And history rushes into her, so full, if it were not for the density of her youth, the thick resilience that's to be spread thin over her lifetime, she may combust.


She, three years old, is the buffer between a history that is not mine, and my wanting self. This is a culture so distant and mesmerizing, so captivating and intense as this drumming I feel in my stomach, and I want it, but I can't have it, and this pageant is a window I may only look through. To appreciate too much, to take in too much of what I see, to accept too much of what I want to feel, would be a co-opting representative of some of the reasons people of African descent live in Tobago today. It is important and wrong for me to be here.


There is a dance called "The History of Africans in Tobago in Five Minutes" and it is the first time a rendition of history has made me teary-eyed in public. It was such a small display. The songs are sung in a language so unlike any I speak that they may as well not be words at all. The rhythm of the songs are simple, the dances are not the most complex I have seen even at this pageant. And yet, the intensity of the moment, of the women sitting in front of my in African head dresses and the young men dressed like American gangstas and the dancers on stage morose rowing a mimed boat across an ocean of stage, shows history more than any text book or essay. The three-year-old girl in front of me dances to the sway of women picking cotton, of men crushing cacao, of rape, of escape. She dances the anticlimax of emancipation, she dances hope and pride in her culture now, she dances unity. I cannot dance with her, I can only sit three rows away and cry.


Still, it feels wrong for me to feel this emotional wave at a festival not meant for me, like watching the birth of someone else's child. Perhaps this outburst should have come when I was young, when I learned the word "slave" and what it means. Perhaps it should have come when I watched an After School Special in first grade about a girl getting bullied at a water fountain. But here I am, crying at someone else's party. I step out of the tent to find some water and a bathroom. Everyone seems to be looking at me. I stick out, white skin shining like a dumb moon in an otherwise vast night sky.


It is not my duty to feel this tension, the way so many of my African and People of Color friends feel when they walk through a white neighborhood at night, but this is part of the importance for me. If I am going to step into a people's culture and heritage where I have no true right to experience all these generational secrets, then I should absorb wholly. The importance is an understanding. Not just about what happened, or what is happening. Not just the facts, just the distant and unconnected stories. But the visceral understanding of experience.


Here is the beauty and strength and challenge and love of a continent of people. Here is a three-year-old child connected to her roots like a flower to the earth, impregnated with her own history. Here is a five-minute taste of the injustice experienced 100-fold for centuries. And no amount of reparations can truly connect the people of Tobago with their ancestral grounds. So they go beyond, search beyond the realms of the tangible and the actual. This is Tobago, but, if only for tonight at the Heritage Festival, it is an extension, just beyond Africa.

Identity Warfare

I am thinking again about color and nationality. About Jason at the Santa Rosa Carib Center, who knew so much about his culture and heritage, not shyly, showed me tools and materials and weapons and was excited to share. And about how I felt bonded and wanted to take their picture, realizing the heavy and embarrassing reality of my own tourism.


About Jack the American with a British accent at the Trinidad Theatre Workshop, trying to hide his own embarrassing Americanness with the language of the local slave owners.


I am thinking about the way I feel when I wear my hair in a bandana and make my empowerment tattoo visible. I think about Tupac Shakur and our belly tattoos and I remember how I felt when I found out he was a rapist. I think about our bandanas and how JoJo, in Salt, tied a bandana around his head similarly to hide his severed ear. And I want to say to the boys at the mall looking at me crooked, "I'm Irish American, second generation, my family had nothing to do with JoJo's ear, my Nana wore her hair like this." But I don't. I look down and identify myself by the color I see. And nobody is just his or her color. And still, we must wear them, and be identified and judged by them.


And it is not the same feeling I have in Big American Cities, the Harlems and Roxburys and West L.A.s of my home country, where my skin color and lifestyle mean even more to the people in those communities, yet I walk wearing it all with the same strength they wear theirs. Or at least I feel that I do. I know so little about these things sometimes.


I am thinking now about the times I have heard People of Color discuss my tattoo, deciding I am probably Hispanic and forgiving the girl whose headphone volume is lower than they realize. I am thinking about the accent I've assumed, the ways I call and respond, feel my lips forming, choose my words. It is the accent that people have called Canadian, Irish, Norwegian, Dutch, French. All the comfortable White skins. It is the indigenous accent of my own wanting to step out of my identity without interpolating anyone else's.


I am thinking about the abandonment I felt in 9th grade when Kara started hanging out with all the new People of Color who went to our High School. How my parents said, "Can you blame her?" And I couldn't, I blamed myself for not sharing and nurturing enough of an identity with her.


Even further back I think about Irish Festivals, my family, tracing my own family history proudly back into its own revolutions and fights for freedom and acts of heroism. The martyred grandfather I never knew. James Connolly who fought in the Rising of 1916 for Ireland and Communism and women's suffrage, who fought gangrenous, who was also martyred. My grandmother, the first female bailiff, my other grandmother the factory worker in WWII. The music, the pride, the love.


I am thinking now about Trinidad. About a people I would like to fall in love with but don't know how to without taking advantage of them. As if I had a right to, I described Trinidad to my partner, Evan, as: a developing nation, a nation in its infancy. He said he thinks the latter term is ridiculous and makes little sense despite how often it's used. I explained to him what I meant but he is right.


I did not come to Trinidad to be a cultural tourist. There is a movement in middle class adventurists to seek out places that still feel a little feral. People want to think them wild. Want to drive through their "dark side" as in a safari, to feel cultured and humanized. If I don't want to fall in love with their "other-ness" what is it I have come to fall in love with? What do I write about if not how estranged I feel in this odd paradise?


I am thinking about Akel, our tour guide in Tobago. How we walked together through the rainforest, a bit ahead of the others, talking about plants and the world as we both know it, differently. In order to not love someone for their otherness, we must recognize their humanness. I keep my humanity hidden in the shallows of my eyes; Akel holds his broadly in his smile. I ask him about where he grew up, his family, how he likes Tobago. He asks me what it will take for me to move to Tobago. He grew up in a bad part of Trinidad called Laventille, and his father asked for Akel to live with him on the quiet island of Tobago to escape the violence – a request Akel was happy to fulfill. It would take a career to move me to Tobago, I tell him, and he offers me his job.


Tim Cahill writes in Hold the Enlightenment about the danger of referring to local people as "natives" and worrying they may be "ruined" by intervention. The passage is more in reference to small communities that have little contact with the western world, not small communities that have cable television and satellite dishes. The sentiment is still a legitimate one, no matter who is local where. The point is that we all come from some place, all dream of other places, of expanding our own horizons. We are all locals to someone, all foreign. The places we are from are not always the places we call home, and the places that resonate in our souls may be places to which we've never been. This is the part of Trinidad and Tobago I love. The new friends with genuine smiles who do not try to pinpoint me into a role of whiteness, and who do not fall prey to self segregation. For a few days, we are not tourist and guide, not white and black, but friend and friend.

Exotica

After grabbing my two drinks, I meander over to the shore of the dancehall, watching the waves of people curtsy into each other, curl and foam, retract, and pull each other back in. The air is salty from the harbor behind me and the partiers in front of me. We are at Sunday School at Bucco Reef, Tobago: a weekly Sunday night party that celebrates the final hours of a day of church and family, and also the exotic that exudes from the small island's inhabitants, including the visitors such as myself.


Old local African men with dreadlocks dance with European women who could be from anywhere. Young men with gold teeth approach my friend like an assembly line, waiting for the chance to dance with her, whose color blends so well with the locals, but whose face and style and mannerisms are all so new and non-Tobagonian.




I am thinking now about the exotic and what makes us as such. The Trinidadians who visit the U.S. and find harems, are asked to "say something Trini," who do things just differently enough to seem distant, romantic as a lost love or a fond memory just now recounted. The tourists who visit Trinidad and get their hair braided like Africans, taking the commonness of the region with them, hoping to capture a bit of that exotic themselves when returning to America or Europe. My own strangeness, seeming not as the threat or flaw it is in the U.S., but as the true exotic in Trinidad and Tobago.


"You are a real woman," says Brian, the quiet and commanding captain of the glass-bottomed boat Soca Queen.


"You are different from the others," says Frankie, our soft-spoken and mischievous older tour guide.


"Such a soft voice from such a strong woman. There's no one like you on these islands," says Akel, my young tour guide friend with a perfect smile, who grew up in Laventille, Trinidad.
"What are you afraid of," asks Damien, the stranger who tried to get my attention three different times before approaching me to call me rude.


And I answer him: "Cunning locals."


The exoticness makes me feel confident, almost intimidated by myself and the presence I command. I am sure of my own strength but unsure of how much I have to use. I describe things to TT locals as if I am from some small, distant place, hard to remember or locate on a map.


"In America we have flowers called Honeysuckles. You can eat the middle parts and they taste sweet." The exotic goes to my head. I am exotic now even to myself.


"You can't be American," Captain Brian says, "You're too foreign. You don't even talk American. Irish?"


"My family's Irish but I was born in New England. I just have a strange accent."


"Not strange. Refreshing."




Living on a small island like Tobago must give one an interesting perception of love and romance. On one side, there is the reality of those few who are actually permanent and not just visitors like myself. About 25,000 women on the island, all not exotic to the other island inhabitants, and probably not so different from each other, having been influenced so much by each other and the same limited media. These are the ones who make Tobagonian wives, and yet it's people like me who are proposed to daily – the perfect stranger, as all strangers are welcomed to be.


There is another side of the matrix. There is a constant influx of "other." We, the visitors, are the squinty, sunburnt newness to Tobago. Some of us are exotically decorated with tattoos, mohawks, and confident loftiness. The Tobagonians, however, are unavoidably still "othered" in our minds. Their exotic presence fumes from us, who name them as such. Just as I come to see myself as exotic, these exotic-thinking men likely see themselves as the reflection in our eyes, while still seeing their female counterparts as only locals, denying them their own exotica.




Captain Brian watches me as I float, pale, tattooed, bare-belled on the clear, cool roof of the Caribbean. He stands against the sky like a captain even when wading in shallow water. Arms laced behind his back, shoulders poised and correct, skin darkened to pure black from the sun with a red glow so warm it must come from his core.


"I'll have to call your boyfriend and tell him you're not returning," he says when I forfeit my buoyancy for stability, communication the ability to at least stare back.


"That would be a sad phone call," I say, allowing both of us to stay exotic, if only for a moment, strangers feeling erotic autonomously but because of each other, awkwardly close, identifying ourselves by how we see each other.


"You can live in Tobago with me, what do you like to do? I bet you like to party."


This last part is what every Trinidadian and Tobagonian man says to me, to us, the exotic foreigner. The love for partying maintains the distancing image of no responsibility. If I love to party as much as The Captain and Damien and the others presume, I ward off the responsibilities of jobs, family, aspirations that the real women in their lives possess. I am as fictional as a porn star and yet as tangible as every other exotic fruit growing here.




The women respond to me in various ways. Vendors at the beach are used to seeing tourists and white women and are interested in me but not allured. They can see the boring and unthreatening humanity I share with them.


"I like your tattoos," says the woman at the roti stand.


"Where are you from," asks the woman sitting by a fan in the cool, dark convenient store.
"Are you African," asks the woman at the ice cream stand.


I look down at my pale, Irish-American body, then look back at her, blinking, waiting for some punch line.


"You have an African haircut, and African tattoos. And isn't that an African tree on your back, African flowers on your shoulders?" She pauses, realizing how confused I am and how wrong she is at the assumption. "I just thought you might be from there," she says quietly, as an afterthought.


"No, I'm from the U.S. The tree is a bodhi tree, and the flowers are buttercups. That's my nickname, Buttercup. I didn't know this was an African hairdo." I am embarrassed. In my originality, I have taken on the form of what I see as exotic, not even realizing that to someone else it is very normal. I twirl the dreadlocks in gape of my neck with my index finger and blush.


"Well, girl, you got good style anyway." She smiles and hands me my coconut cherry cone.



It isn't always so pleasant, though. At the heritage festival, women routinely cut me in line for food and drinks, try staring me down as I saunter past them to the bathroom, and ignore me when I try to ask questions about products in stores. The hostility at the Heritage Festival is understandable. Everyone is drinking and cannot be held as accountable for their behavior towards odd-looking strangers, especially if the hostility is purely in energy given off and shifty moves to cut in line, and is not actually violent or otherwise hurtful. At cultural events there is community pride. Women at the Heritage Festival in Tobago dress in African-styled clothes and headdresses. At the very least, they are there to pay regard to their ancestors. I am not African, despite what the woman at the ice cream parlor suggests. My style could be seen as a co-opting, presenting myself as an African at an African Heritage event. From the color of my skin, I unfortunately represent the horrific ways in which Africans became Tobagonians. The Tobagonian women, however, manifest the spirits of their ancestors, of the queens of Africa, of the sheer beauty of perseverance and strength and pride. In their solidarity, they are exotic. I am just a white stranger.


Otherwise, the general hostility and willingness to ignore can stem from a deep understanding of the role of female visitors to this island. The irresponsibility that steals their husbands and partners for a night, the smiles at the men that last a bit too long and end with their working overtime to feed their children in the absence of their male partners. While the men of Tobago hold more registered jobs, namely in the tourism industry, the women are estimated to hold far more jobs that go under the radar, either through self-employment or payment "under the table." On construction sites, women and men work side-by-side, seemingly equal from my view in the depths of the van as we drive by the numerous work zones.


It is a region of celebration, but the citizens of the islands are responsible for making sure the party endures, especially for the tourists who keep money flowing into the economy. For the citizens who work in the tourism industry, their job is partly to keep the party going, to show an appearance at parties such as Sunday School, to maintain the illusion of Tobago as being a tropical paradise for partying and freedom. Which is true, but only in part. The weather is beautiful, the landscape is breathtaking, even the textile feeling of the island is inviting. The locals do come out to party, there is a comforting easiness in the air. Having lived in a number of major metropolises around the United States and Europe, the small island's easy speed is what feels the most exotic to me. The most aggressive people I encounter here are still speaking the language of a palm breeze, still ask politely if they can take me home and do exotically impolite things with me. To look in people's eyes, whether they are sea captains looking for a first mate for the evening or women frustrated with so many pale, frolicking crew members, that is where the exotic tropical paradise I see is. No one I meet has a hard, New England soul. I have crow's feet at twenty-five years old, and as long as I am Tobago, I can see how sexy those can be.

Traffic Signs

I am eight years old and driving back from the dentist's office with my mom and my older sister, Katie. I am sitting in the back seat, the left side, the side closest to the other cars on the highway. In the next lane is a red hatch-back full of teenage boys. They are goofy, almost grotesque the way smiling gargoyles are grotesque. I smile back. I love strangers and the ways we maneuver the distances between each other. They wave and my eyes explode, throwing me into the back of the seat.


"Carolyne quit flirting with those boys!" Mom says in a sing-song tone that strings through her harsh Boston accent like pearls.


"Mooom, I'm not flirting! They smiled first."


"That's how boys flirt, Carolyne. And you flirted back, you flirt!" She is laughing, joking, because I am still a littler girl and boys still have cooties and I am taking her too seriously.


"They weren't flirting. They're stupid and ugly and that one by the window who waved at me has braces." My sister, who has just gotten braces, turns around in her passenger seat and gives me a dirty look. "I wasn't flirting," I add with finality. I peep out the window one more time to catch their eyes and flash them a too-coy smile before going back to coloring the dinosaur drawings on my lap.




***




I am twenty-five now and giving Sarah the crazy eyes. Her smile grows huge and excitable, twitching off her cheeks.


"Should I? You really think I should?"


"I definitely think you should. It's such a horrible idea and you should definitely do it." There is a royal blue pickup truck driving along-side our maxi as we crawl through the cramped Trinidad highway traffic. Sarah looks over and three boys in the backseat lean to the window, waving and smiling.


"It's for the one in the middle. I'll have to put that on here."


"This is such a bad idea. I'm so stoked you are doing this. I think mistakes and adventure are an important part of a good trip. That includes flirting with strangers and taking things to the next level." My crazy eyes are spiraling in my head as Sarah stares into them and pulls a piece of paper and a pen from her bag. Crystalee giggles in the backseat of the maxi and Lauren turns in the passenger seat to look at us suspiciously.


"I'm an enabler," I admit. "Live the chaos, Sarah!"




***




Traffic has always interested me. On my drives home from work on days it's too hot to ride my bike, I alleviate the pain of congestion by rolling my windows down and blasting my horrible mixtapes. I imagine us all at a party. I am the dj. The other cars with no air conditioner give me dirty looks as I belt along with Billy Idol and Glen Danzig. But a connection is made and we are no longer just cars, we are people all stuck on a highway together, uncomfortable and annoyed and glancing at each other in our mirrors. I may be tacky, but at least I am not grumbling to myself alone in my car, wishing my cell-phone got reception so I had someone to talk to. I am an enabler.




***




Sarah@email.com, she scribbles onto the paper as the maxi trudges along, acknowledging every crack and pothole on the road. From the girl in the maxi….p.s. I think you have a nice smile. She sneaks the piece of paper on my lap, smiling like a child about to swing at a piñata.


"Ooh, great touch, love the last line!"


Sarah folds the paper up like a paper airplane, writing for the guy in the middle, in the backseat of the blue truck on the wings.


"Just in case," she explains, "it doesn't make it to them and someone else picks it up."


"Sarah, if you are concerned about the incredible possibility of the plane not making it to the blue truck, are you also concerned about the dudes selling stuff between the traffic lanes who will get your email address first?"


"It's just an email address. What can they do?" My mind filtered through the possibilities of her email address being tied to her Myspace and Facebook accounts on the internet, some online blog she may have, things that would connect her to a particular place out of traffic, out of Trinidad, a place real planes can take real people to Sarah's real life back home in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. There, a real man is waiting for her to return. Here, imaginary people with real pretty faces leer out truck windows and I encourage her to leer right back.




***




There is a thrill to traffic romance. A division keeping two worlds apart, while maintaining an odd intimacy through coincidence and space. Two vehicles happening to need to go in a certain direction on a certain road at a certain time. Two sets of eyes meeting each other, saying hello with the soundless glances that penetrate the thick and pulpy noise of thousands of mufflers grumbling and tires peeling themselves from tar.


We are in Port Of Spain, Tobago. Traffic is moving, but slowly. I glance out the window opposite me, to find myself eyed up with the driver of a van in the next lane. He stares. I smile. His eyes widen in a flurry and wrap around me like a sticky web. I turn away but can feel him looking still. It means nothing, there is no engagement made, there is no assumption of connection. Just eyes to pass the time. But in traffic there is no escape. In real life, there is the ability to say, I'm just not that into you, but here on the Main Road, communication is enforced by the time-space equilibrium. And here on the Main Road, vehicles are so close we could touch each other if we want to.


People in Trinidad are friendly. There is a general willingness to engage. Traffic can easily be a party. Everyone's windows are down, everyone's stereos are turned up. Maybe it is the difference between a swollen continent and a petite island that makes Americans generally uncomfortable when forced to become aware of other travelers, and Trinidadians more than willing to maintain a connection with any smiling stranger within sight range. The Trinidadian in the van next to me is aggressive in his friendliness, and my American prudeness makes me uncomfortable. I can hear my mother squawking at me about flirting with the boys in traffic again. I sink low in the back of the Maxi and scribble in my notebook.




***




Sarah leans out the window, looking for the blue truck.


"They're all the way up there," she says. The man who might sweep her away to live in Trinidad forever is about nine vehicles ahead of us in traffic, barely within site. She leans out and waves at them, but they must not be able to see her; there's no response.


"We'll catch up to them," I say hopefully. Our lane starts moving again, and Sarah props her arm for a good paper airplane toss once we pass their truck. Right before we make it to them, our lane branches off to head East, and Sarah hands me the note to destroy.


"Oh you should keep it," I say, "as a memento of your spontaneity and daring in Trinidad."


"What happens in Trinidad stays in Trinidad. People in America would never understand." I take the note and lean over the aisle to the passenger-side window. The airplane flies from my fingers like a blown kiss. What happens in Trinidad remains in Trinidad.

the art of losing isn't hard to master

i've lost the ability to realize time. it all stopped and has restarted. i keep thinking it is january, the year is new. three friends of mine have died. i found out upon returning to the country. a new place. a new reality. a new emotional foundation. nothing seems real the way it seemed real before. i have known death. i have visited death in my dreams. a few nights ago, death visited me and i saw it and called it the devil. it was a big black emptiness that moved about and entered the house in which i was staying, it's edges were shaggy, unkept, like an old ill-fitting coat. the devil had a sickle and encompassed all. when i saw the devil, in my dream, i passed out. i woke up with blisters all over my body in the shape of whip lashes. death was getting to me. three of my friends are dead. two suicides in one day, both hangings. a scooter crash the next day. everyone i love is depressed and that is the most painful. i am worried. i am experiencing this all on a very psychological plane, not being in boston. my head hurts and my body is doing weird things. there are good moments and bad moments and not much to shift them in between. who knows what the earth is anymore, if so many people have found a way to dwell elsewhere? so many people in my life have gone and i can't imagine what makes me still here? i have a guardian angel. i know it. when the real trouble comes, i leave right before it. but i wish sometimes that maybe i could just take the place of one of them. there are so many bad people in the world, and all the good people are putting corn husks in their armpits and flying off. i am sick to my stomach. my eyes have been blurry for a week now. sometimes life it really, really hard. and i have no answers at all.

i don't need my friends here with me. i have friends all over the world who i miss. i just need my friends happy. there is so much sadness all the time. no one ever wants to talk about anything. i am scared. i admit it. i'm scared that people are a lot more depressed than they let on. i am scared that i can't help. i'm scared of the great Silence of my younger days, and that too many people still hear that inaudible rapping. I'm scared of that vast emptiness engulfing my home-city and the people i love most. the silence is rising and persistent. i don't want to listen to music anymore except at work, and i don't want to work. i can feel the silence in my bones. it is rapping on my marrow. it is sucking at my friends. i want to help, but i've got nothing.


The art of losing isn't hard to master;

so many things seem filled with the intent

to be lost that their loss is no disaster.



Lose something every day. Accept the fluster

of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.

The art of losing isn't hard to master.



Then practice losing farther, losing faster:

places, and names, and where it was you meant

to travel. None of these will bring disaster.



I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or

next-to-last, of three loved houses went.

The art of losing isn't hard to master.



I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,

some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.

I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.



-- Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture

I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident

the art of losing's not too hard to master

though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

Elizabeth Bishop, "One Art"

I love that dirty water

When I was younger -- not too much younger, but within the past seven years at least, probably -- I had conceded to the idea that that I could survive happily with a dead-end job as long as I could write on the side. I just wanted to be a good writer so what people did read, they appreciated. NOT TRUE! Because once you become a decent writer, even though you still are filled with self-doubt and apprehension about moving towards the real writing and publishing market, you at least realize your potential, and have continuous positive feedback from peers and people who are already "making it" and then you go back to your regular job that doesn't pay you anything, and you start to think, "I bet my time is worth more than this." That said, I applied for a big person job today, as a Communications Specialist at a fancy private school in a fancy suburb outside Pittsburgh. We'll see what happens. I have a stupid haircut, but a winning smile. I am mailing the application in proper, because I feel that people take more fondly to traditional mail than to email, as it takes more time and effort.





In other news, I went to Boston a couple weekends ago. It was a business trip, though once I got there I couldn't remember much of the business except for getting a new computer and getting my beloved sandles. I didn't even get my favorite tank top or any of the other things I had intended on picking up. I got my bike, and then wasn't even sure if I wanted to take it, but took it out of principle since we had driven so far. It will undoubtedly be nice to have a real winter bike instead of turning my older nice bike into a winter bike. Soupie and I stayed at my parents all three nights, because it was easier and because I was sick.




When we arrived at my parents' house it was about 5:30 and my mom was awake on the couch watching television. We said hello and checked in and drove to Hull, the town that harbors my heart in its waters as if I myself were a docked ship buoying in the bay. We watched the grim sunrise over the wide sea at Nantasket, hopped along the old forts, stopped for a moment by the docks to see the views of the cities I don't love nearly as much as that spot where I can view them. I fell in love again with the salt on my skin and we hugged sleepily and passed out on the pull-out bed for not enough hours. Mom made us pancakes and I felt so at home I could have cried but there was no reason to, plus my eye was swollen to tears already.



Soupie went and saw one of his friends in Dot while Mom and I took care of computer stuff. She gave me a ride to meet him with my bike and by the time I got there I was almost dead, almost cried earnestly in the car. But here's the thing about me, when I am really sick I don't like to show just how sick I am and that's how I know myself that I am really in a bad way. If I am sad I say I'm fine but if things aren't so rough I will complain and vent. If I am near death I will say, "nah I'm ok, don't worry, I don't feel so bad." It's when the baby stops crying that the parents start to worry. And I sat still and teary-eyed and quiet and apologetic in Evan's car and he gave me a sorrowful look that must have nursed me back to health. By the time we met up with Kristen I felt alive again, and by the time we had bumped into a few friends of mine from different places in my life, and were sitting with Joe and Conor and Kris I laughed enough to start complaining again and I knew I would be ok.



We took Kris home and stayed for a while with Theresa there, then I took him to my favorite spot in the city, the BU bridge, and we dangled our feet off the edge and on the way back I was almost entirely blind and Soupie needed to backtrack and grab my hand and walk me across the bridge I know by heart.



The next morning we had more pancakes, hung around the house, went to see Rob Noyes at the Posi Fort. I took Evan to Spikes and we ceremoniously ate french fries from the trash. Got some pharmeceudicals and some coffee and went to Somerville to see the punks. Baby Safe Haven seemed a lot like the Cuntree Club, full of color and ladies and a strange sad awkwardness that comes I think with feeling a bit too close to something of which I'm no longer a part. The Vomitorium was oddly more comfortable, amidst the poor lighting and graffitti and bad ideas and remnants of parties that were never cleaned up -- I felt like I was inside the brains of Elie, Pat, and JonCon. Evan and I walked to Charlestown to see Dot and Nana Ollie and by the time we got there I was miserable again, but fueled on the excitement of seeing my grandmother and my friends and the impending potluck at the Vomitorium. After a half hour or so of small talk and watching television with no sound on, we gladly accepted a ride home with Dot's granddaughter, even though we got lost and ended up getting dropped off half-way home and walking the rest to save more driving in circles.



By the time we got back to the potluck, most of the food was gone and a game of kicking ball was in full affect. Everyone was standing in a circle, backs to the walls, kicking a kickball as hard as they could at each other, bouncing it off the walls and ducking to not get hit too hard in the face. A firework was lit in the kitchen, causing the smoke alarm to go off, which was then put in the microwave. The bathroom caught fire at some point, and we all sat around the livingroom after the house was aired out and we were kicked out of the yard by the neighbors. Fun turned to raucus turned to chaos, and the one miserable light was turned pff and we all threw bottles and furniture at each other and laughed fully and honestly. I lost my ring and it was time to go home.



The night was hard and sore and full of nuclear air caught in my throat and eyes, and the morning came too soon but we welcomed it anyway. We were on the road before 7am and Evan was kind enough to drive while I yawned and wrote a paper for the class I had that evening. We hit a turrential storm right outside Pittsburgh and I made it to the library just in time to print out my paper and make it to class on time.

consolidation and egotism

I have too many passwords. To the point where I go to check my email (all 5 of my emails), sign in to my school's Blackboard system, update one of my journals, or check my Myspace and it takes scrolling the complete Rolodex of personal history to think of what I was focused on during the period in my life when I last changed the password on said site. I need to consolidate.



I feel this is an adequate phrase that could be used for a lot of my "problems" in life. I need to consolidate my papers. My objectives. I need to consolidate my goals and the steps needed to get there. I'm too wishy-washy. I am constantly wanting to be "on the go" but find myself spending time laying in bed dreamy-eyed during my spare time, then rushing around trying to re-budget. Isn't this why I quit my job? Oh yeah. I quit my job. I stopped working at the cafe to give me more time to write, edit, work on my career as a writer, and specifically as a travel writer. Being in school has really gotten the ball rolling for me as far as instilling a deepened passion for writing that had started to wane over the past few years of not being in a literary circle. Now, even if I am not really on the same page as many of my peers as far as my objectives as a writer, what I want to write about and why, I am still in a community of people who understand the importance of the written word, and am mentored by people with a vast knowledge of various fields of writing to study.



This has also brought me to the decision to move into a house with classmates of mine. Soupie reminded me, when I was tossing the idea over in my head, that many of the great movements of thought throughout history were birthed from great minds sharing a house together, constantly bouncing ideas off one another, even if just in conversation, passively. The house is beautiful, with a front and back yard, basement, huge rooms, tons of storage, all the amenities, a porch swing (complete with front porch!) and a grill in the back, and a 2-car garage. I am excited. It is one step in the direction of "getting my ducks in a row" but I still feel like I am disorganized as ever, need to further consolidate, need to take care of business I consistently neglect.



Parking tickets. Traffic violation ticket. Parking permit. Paying bills. Fixing car. (Lets take a moment also to notice how many of these are car related. A car I didn't want. This must be what taking an unwanted pregnancy to full term is like, except for the rest of your life.). Budgeting time affectively to give myself proper time for writing, reflection, editing, and submitting work. Also, finding the best places to submit work. I am hoping the new house of writers will be able to help each other in that regard.



In order to help take care of some of these issues, I have started building bikes part time at Trek of PGH in Robinson. It sucks because I am still not getting paid very much but it is far away. It is cool because I get to work with GW and Blockhead and Amanda and other people I will not mention because I just met them. It is cool because at least I get riding time because it is 15 miles each way. It is cool because I get to use my chatham ID for free bus rides, which I had not been having a reason to take advantage of, thus far. It sucks because I am back at working at a bike shop, doing mechanically remedial work. It is cool because I was feeling financially vulnerable and Soupie made a phone call that put me in control of my financial situation again, even if I am not making much money it at least gives me the peace of mind that I am going to be O.K. It is cool that I can basically make my own hours. It sucks that I am again spending my time at a job that has nothing to do with that I have been studying for so many years. It is cool that I have a trade upon which I know I can always fall back.



****************



I went to North Carolina and Georgia last week and I don't feel like getting into it, but it was very fun and necessary. Next week is Soupie and my honeymoon in Boston. I plan on mainly picnicing on the beach in Hull, hanging out with h.s. friends, and spending a little time with the punx. Enough to remind me why I will always be punk and therefore never be totally successful, but not enough to make me think why I do this to myself and what I am wasting my life aspiring towards.



Aahh, I just wrote a long rant about punks and not feeling the need to impress anyone anymore, but why waste my time? If I was 15 and coming to that revelation, it would be something worthy of public journalling. But I am 25. It is not a revellation, but a mere sigh, a recognition of self. It is a reflection of where I am now in my life and in the world. Not incredibly far -- I still have a lot of debt, even though it's "good debt" and a lot of reorganizing and restructuring to do -- but at least I am not an asshole, and don't hold much respect for people who aren't good to other people.






I'm gonna go swimming in my school's pool and finish my homework before class. It may not be the punk thing to do. But it makes me happy. And that's one thing I have successfully organized in my life. That regardless of how detrimentally cool something seems, I am on top of my own totem pole, and I don't need to fuck myself over all the time to survive. I can float, and even make a few hapless strokes in the water, and not sink for the sake of the story.

That girl thinks she's the queen of the neighborhood!

(I got news for you -- she is!)





Riot Grrrl Summer. 2007.





When Emily called me, I was wearing cargo shorts and a tank top, listening to Bikini Kill on my walkman, wearing sunglasses, and drinking a cup half full of cherry slush and half full of Sparks.





I dress in the spirit of 1994, she says, and it's a style she can appreciate.





Emily and I go on walks together. On my birthday, we went on a picnic in the yard of some church and read magazines and ate sushi. We bumped into friends sitting in another yard of some other building and all walked together. We got slurpees and sat on the Wall and laughed. Shakes and I argued with Perry about how he can't holler at girls who walk by, no matter what they are wearing. How strangers don't know he's "only joking." I wore a strapless party dress and flexed my muscled. We walked far and laughed loud and got revved on sugar. We made fun of beefy drunk jocks walking by.





We are a pack. We are Riot Grrrls and this is our summer.





We find boom boxes and sewing machines in the trash and sit on Emily's stoop. Sneak across the fenced off bridge, throw bikes and catch them on the other side. There are a lot of us. Yinzers sneak across with us. Two younger girls and we hope they want to be like us and become Riot Grrrls too.








We meet at Leanne's later and sit in her congrete back yard, go to the gas station and get energy drinks and junk food. Light fireworks in the Hollow like there's no way we can get in trouble. Like we skirt every obstacle just barely. Slowly. Taking our time. A few bottle rockets and some talking. Some roman candles and some laughing and some walking. More bottle rockets. more roman candles. 5 shot with report. 10 shot with report. The police come looking for us. We run but not fast. We walk. We unlock the front door as the police drive by. They keep driving by and we sit in Leanne's room. Soupie, Shakes, me, and Leanne. Leanne gives me copies of her zine and I follow the code and don't read them. We tell stories and make slight references to 90s street punk.





I am now 25. I am punk and happy. This is Riot Grrrl summer. I wear dresses and spit and don't hide my smile. I wear boots and lace and keep my skateboard in my car. Always a plan B. Always a fucking blast. We are developing a crew. We see each other and get excited. It's summer and we are outside. We are everywhere. We are Riot Grrrls.










(they say she's a dyke but I know...she is...my best friend!)

the hills have eyes, but they are ours and wide, wide open.

I'm trying to write but it's hard. At this point there are too many stories and essays in my head and just deciding the focal point or where to begin is daunting enough to make me write a few lines and delete, write a few lines about something else and delete. My issues with labels and identity. the initiation of Riot Grrrl Summer. Working at the job I've already quit, who won't stop scheduling me to work. Recent mountain biking excursions and the lessons I've learned.





Lets start there.





I've lived in Massachusetts about a mile away from a State Park renowned for it's mountain bike trails. I've lived in New Mexico in between two mountain ranges, to which whole issues of mountain bike magazines have been dedicated. Now here I am in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and I am trying my damnedest to stay on my bike and not tip over, not roll over the handlebars, and not lose all faith and just clip out when the ride gets interesting.





I have been out twice so far, both times to South Park. It was exciting enough building this bike with Soupie, little by little, putting it all together, working out the kinks and getting prepared for the ride. When the day actually came for my first time out, I was excited but nervous. Soupie was even moreso, waking up at 8am and laying still for two hours, trying not to seem over-anxious or pushy about initiating me into this new world of trees and mud and bruises and merciless two wheels.





When we do get to South Park, Mayhem is riding a trail back to meet us with his two dogs, who get put in the car to avoid the park police, and the three of us jump on the first trail. It was my first time riding, and my seatpost was far too short for the frame that is a size too small for me (and that cost $25!), and my gear ratio was far too high, so it took some getting used to, but I made it. This is perhaps the first lesson I learned, asside from the importance of not having too much air in the tires so the bike doesn't bounce-- an easy gear ratio is imperative. Soupie runs a 1:1.6 or something rediculous like that. I was running like a 1:2.something. I got frustrated a lot because the terrain didn't seem too hard to look at it, but then my legs just couldn't push myself up. I wasn't even too tired, I just couldn't do it. I ran up a lot of hills, walked down quite a few. Got more frustrated and ate half a Clif Bar and felt a bit better. When Mayhem split with us to go on his own ride and make his way back to his dogs, I took a water break and Soupie hopped on my bike to test it out. "Damn," he said, "I'm so sorry. This sucks." Really, though, I hypothesized that it would make the next ride with an easier gearing all the easier. Mayhem had a spare cog at his shop that would work on my wheel. So it was a bit of a blessing that the first time out was the hardest schenario, because it prepared my body for the worst, to make everything else seem easier.





Sure enough, on Tuesday we went riding again, this time with an easier gear ratio and a longer seat post, and I found myself able to climb much easier, which helped me maintain my confidence and keep my mental and emotional cool while going through all the trails.





This was the ride where I learned the importance of just sucking it up and doing it, of staying clipped in and leaning all my weight on the rear wheel. I found it best when I was in front, with Soupie behind me saying, "go go go! don't unclip, lean back! just crush it, lift up the front wheel! go go go!" Because when he said that, I did it. When he was behind me, wanting to go himself, I could not stop and be a baby. When he was watching me do something he knew I could do, then I had to trust that I could do it also. And I could. It helped that I could see where I was going, what I was going over, and just had to think in each instant as it came to me. When Mayhem joined us and I ended up in the back of the pack (He, by the way, was on his ROAD BIKE! Carbon fiber frame, 23c tires, what?!), I found it best to not watch them, to keep my eyes on the trail and yell to myself all the things my coach had been telling me.






It was all very mental. The times when I was exhausted the first time, it was my brain collapsing. The second time, I was a bit more confident, could have more fun, and the mental exhaustion hit right around lunch time, where we climbed to the top of a hill and ate delicious Clif Blocks. By the time we hit our next rest stop, I was beginning to feel the physical exhaustion, and as I dismounted to walk along this old stone embankment, I embraced the wobbly legs and glistening sweat. We met up again with Mayhem and did a loop around the Golf Course, then Mayhem left and we did second, different loop around Golf Course and that was it, we had ridden just about every trail in South Park, asside from a few off-shoots that were incredibly steep, to which I said, "hell no!"




I feel like I am getting the hang of it, slowly but determinedly. I know that when I feel confident I can roll over logs and through creeks and across long, narrow, twisty passages full of gnarling roots and loose soil. I know that these trails are not the hardest to ride. But I know I can ride them. I know that as long as I keep my cool and don't stress myself out, I can ride them. And most importantly, I know there isn't a better way to spend a warm spring weekday than riding bikes through the woods with my husband, staring buffalo in the eye, picnicing on an knoll, and going to bed early and exhausted and happy.