Mantras for the COVID-19 Pandemic*

• Don't freak out!
• Think positive!
• Stay active!
• Be grateful!
• Take care of yourself!
• Eat healthy!
• Sleep well!

*From my IG and IRL friend @jean.themachine

Why I'm single...

Because I want to be.  Because it would take a a VERY special person to make it worth not being single.

Because I'm busy and full.  I love my work, and I work hard at it, it's demanding, and that's OK. I have friends and fun and family, and they all fill me up.

Because I'm a mom.  She gives me lots of meaning.  Not all meaning, of course.  I have little privacy.  And very little room to take care of me, which I do when I can, and that's always primordial and lovely.

Because I'm strong and independent.  I like being a free agent. I sometimes can't imagine the space to cultivate and tend a relationship. I've struggled with the idea of "reporting" and being accountable to someone else.

Because I focused on men for too long.  This seems ridiculous to me right now.  But ok, no beating myself up and no regrets. I'm on a journey. It's a beautiful one.

Because I'm ok with vulnerability, but not very good at it.

Writing again

I just started a creative writing class, and it's fueling me like nobody's business.  Just 4-weeks long, 2-hours every Monday night.  It. Is. So. Fun.

Tonight's earlier post, a hastily written short story, came from that.  A writing partner gave us a character - their character - and we had to write  a quick short story about that character.  We had just 25 minutes.

My writing group partner, Richard, described his character: a man in his 20's having experienced his first failure.  Broke, down and out on his luck, surrounded by take-out containers.  Now, that he had failed, he was open to possibilities. Open and ready to pick himself up, and start making money by any means.  

Steve was born.  I don't know if it's any good or not.  Not horrible for a quickie exercise, I suppose.

But there are some things I like about it or at least had great fun with. I like his apartment full of desperation and depression.  I love that the "world wide web" is accessed from his isolated and depressed apartment, and ultimately, the "world wide web" will isolate and depress him more.  I like that his entrepreneurial risk that he took with his start-up, is now playing out with online poker.  He likes quick wins; making quick money drives him.  He is impatient.  He loves the addiction and the adrenaline of it all - for better for worse.  I like how The Golden Ticket somewhat evokes Willy Wonka.  I love the line about $$ and the XX's on porn sites.

Thank you.

The Golden Ticket (a hastily written short story)

Steve slumped on his couch, a crumpled mess.  He hadn’t showered in days, and even he could smell his own stink. The TV blared in the background, some cable host blabbing.  Steve didn’t know or care what or who anymore, it had all blurred together over the last few days. “Meaningless.  All fucking meaningless,” he muttered.

His stomach rumbled, and he farted simultaneously. “Hungry,” he thought.  But he was uninspired by the pile of take-out menus stacked on the table beside him.  They matched the collection of containers scattered around him on the table, floor, and couch, which in turn matched the collection of condiments: soy, ketchup, hot sauce.

“Damn bastards got there first!” he said to the empty room. “It was my idea! My concept! Mine!” He was nearly shouting now, but it took too much energy.  He slumped again. 

Coulda, woulda, shoulda been a millionaire.  Steve’s app, LumberJack, had been on the verge of acquisition.  A brilliant social network with an actual revenue component, Lumberjack was hot in the coveted 18 to 24 year old space,  and growing in members and clicks by the hour.

But the two guys over at the Firefly app had been steadily creeping up on him over the last two months.  Steve felt the heat, and was dying to close his damn deal.  He also noted the longer pauses between negotiating calls.  

And then last week, the dreaded call came.  He had let it go to voicemail, he knew what it was.  “Steve, I’m sorry.  It’s just not gonna work out.  Stay in touch, you’ve got great potential,” said the tech firm’s dispassionate counsel.  Steve had listened to those words over and over again since.

Now he was broke, his money had all gone into business development.  He had pre-spent some of his deal money.  He had tasted it.

Steve turned on his laptop, balanced it across his knees, and ate a chip.  Clicking, browsing, surfing the world wide web.  He started playing a game of Solitaire, but was instantly numb.  He craved the excitement he’d been feeling before the call, back when he held the Golden Ticket.  

An ad blinked in the right hand corner of his screen.  “Online Poker. Win. Win. Win.” The dollar signs were as plentiful and tantalizing as the X’s on the door to a porn site.  He clicked, and played a quick winning hand.  He reached for his credit card, not quite maxed out, he realized, the light returning to his listless eyes.  

“Small money. Just a little fun,"  he thought.  He won again, and stated chatting with the online lurkers on the bottom of his screen.  His energy was building with another win.

Steve got up, cleared off the table, plugged in, and sat down.  Another win, his total had crept up to over $1,000 in just a few minutes.  

Steve entered the high roller room.  “Just looking,” he said to himself, picked up the phone and dialed the Thai place down the street.  He watched the high roller action for a few minutes.  The $10,000 bet button winked at him, he ignored it, but it winked at him again.  He clicked.  “My Golden Ticket,” he said with a small smile creeping across his face.  He was back in the game.

DC Taxis

Not sure why this matters to me, but DC taxis must officially be painted red & silver over the next few years (as they age out of service or get bodywork).  So over the next few years, we'll be phasing in the red & silver cabs

Maybe it's my love for order.  Or my sense of aesthetic.  But I'm excited that one day, there will be an official DC taxi color.  I imagine the red & silver taxis zipping around town, easy to spot, and helping make a more vibrant city.

Vouchers are available for painting work this month, with work to be completed by September 15.

Because I'm a dork, and I'm bored, and I need something to think about while I walk around trying to get 10,000 steps on my Fitbit....I occasionally do an unofficially tally by cab stands or in streets. My totally unscientific estimate is about 1/4 to  1/3 of DC taxis currently sport the red & silver scheme.

5 Words.

Interesting exercise via Joanna Goddard via Nora Ephron.

Five words I'd use to describe myself right now - that is, today, September 2, 2014, age 44

Smart. Funny. Mom. Searching. Homey.

Struggled with # 5 - Professional...Successful...Content...Homebody....Present...Here...all came to mind.

I [HAIKU] NY

 

Wow! It's National Poetry Month!  How'd I miss it?!?  
Hello, Billy Collins, Mary Oliver, Margaret Atwood.
Urban poetry lover that I am, THIS inspired me to blog again.

Once again the NYTimes nails it by inviting readers to write a haiku about the Big Apple. Five/Seven/Five syllables. 
Evoking nature. 
Quiet. 
Japanese. 
Haiku is my favorite poetry form.

Here are some simple beauties:

morning Q commute
has the best smell of the day:
coffee and shampoo
                     —Vanessa Vichit-Vadakan, 43, Berkeley, Calif.

Riding through the park
no daffodils blooming yet
— but unbuttoned coats.
                  —Sharon Rousseau, 50, Manhattan

“Insufficient fare!”
But, without saying a word,
stranger swipes me in.
                   —Janet Gottlieb, 59, Brooklyn

If the “F” comes now,
I could get there, right on time.
But I’m still in bed.
            —Jill Helene, 34, Manhattan

On the 6 to Spring
two cops help a tourist whose
map is upside down
            —Frances Richey, 63, Manhattan

****Themes were kindness, strangers, 6am, commute, the island, and solitude.  Thus, a few train references. :-)

I'm alive!

I know because ...

Not today's real weather map, but I love all the swirly colors.

It's freezing cold.

I wouldn't mind some warm and spicy daal right about now.

I think I'd like to get back to blogging.

Breathtaking

This poem is so beautiful, so heartwarming, it literally took my breath away and gave me goosebumps.  

So in these days of summer (summer camp on the brain), and years of motherhood (Dear Daughter, I'm forever humbled), and a lifetime of being a daughter (thank you, Mom), it seemed especially apt to post, share, and save. Flag for Mother's Day 2013.

Poet Billy Collins is a gem.