it’s not so very bleak. for 40 i will dress like a grown up at a cocktail and dinner party in my own house. i will surround myself with my very favorite people. i will put a costume bin outside the door so people can “put on a persona” before coming into the house.
morning one of writing at dawn. soon 630 am will still be a dark hour. but for now, i am writing at dawn. September has hit. it is my birthday month. i’ve always loved September. it is my birthday month. it is the month of year when the leaves start to turn and that smell of fall starts to creep in; fresh leaves turning to compost.
i miss home in September.
i think of Mary and Cindy, my best friends growing up. I recall stone walls and fields and forests with streams running through them. sounds like idyllic heaven now but it was only my own small town back then. i think of the new-style organic and sustainable farms which must be trying to eke out a living there. i think again of getting my mother a weekly or bi-weekly csa delivery. fuck that town. there is no one to do the delivery. i will look again.
i’m not talking to her right now, and though i am sad about it, i have to admit i feel better. i am more sane when i do not have to hear her talk at me. why does it bother me so much? i suppose it is simple: i thought i learned to be polite from her, to listen when spoken to, to be curious about other people’s lives and … no. i stop my writing because that is not right. i feel better because i do not have to struggle with the guilt and anxiety of hearing her situation. she is so unrelateably poor.
i remember vague feelings and notions of poverty from childhood. i remember pretending i was a “washing machine” in the bathtub. spinning and splashing around, moving the clothes back and forth, learning the word “agitate”. it wasn’t until i finished reading Jenny Lawson’s “Let’s Pretend This Never Happened” that i would have associated that with being poor – not having the money for a washing machine, not have the money to pay for the water to wash clothes and ourselves in the same week. we were really poor. how else did that play out?
low quality government cheese? i do not remember the peanut butter, but maybe powdered milk? i talk to my mother now; who stockpiles meat she finds on sale in the freezer, cannot regularly buy fresh produce. finds deals on trail mix in bulk and buys five pounds of it to keep her protein and fruit intake constant. freezes applesauce to keep for later. i stopped living like that at some point. i eat expensively and though i recognize it, i do not apologize. i eat fresh and local foods because they are healthiest for me.
we never, ever bought clothes new when i was younger. department stores were all the same to me, jc penney may well have been saks fifth avenue or bergdorfs. they were all unattainable centers where women went if they were “put together” and could lay down plastic or $100 bills. my mother and i would head into Salvation Army and play a game to see who could find the best made, highest quality clothes in “Sal’s Boutique”. every trip would be followed by a “fashion show” w/ the choicest finds of the day. pleats and fine tailoring, lined skirts and suit jackets. dresses that were nipped and tucked and tabbed with detailing and buttons. i always dressed in my own taste. found my own way to be original and capture people’s attention. now, i am proud to shop mostly thrift. i reuse i recycle. why buy new? though i did shock myself by purchasing two pairs of fleuvogs on the same day for my best friend Ellen’s wedding in October. in my lifetime i will never share that with my mother. i will lie and say i found them at a discount sale. (she doesn’t know what fluevogs are and it won’t matter. i’ll still lie)
there were lots of ways that we were not poor; i had my own horse, at least until i was 12 or so. we had our own house, in the country where i could be outside. i had my own room and did not share beds or clothes with other people. i got a first class education where people send their children who graduated from ms porter’s. and now i am on my own in one of the most expensive cities in the world. paying more in rent than most people pay in mortgage.
in the end it is uncomfortable to talk with my mother. i used to help her financially, but that makes it worse. not better.
and more… for another day.