Yeah, I'm back...

Oh, Mercury retrograde, what hath thou loosed in me? I am a jumble of memories, impressions, sensations and desires… I feel so cold tonight. Can’t decide if it’s hormones or the presence of my dead husband’s ghost. I fell asleep earlier and had a strange dream of walking through the house in hard leather shoes that clacked loudly against the wooden floor as I returned to my bedroom and they clattered off my feet. Climbed into my bed and heard the clanging sound of something falling from the wall. The lid of some sort of tin box. But where had it come from? In the dream, I was somehow thinking of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz… I woke up for real, and heard the rumble of a loud car… the refurbished vintage muscle car from up the block, I think, idling, idling, so loud, in the middle of the night… I felt so very cold, and thought, I’m just like E-. Swathed in long pants, a t-shirt AND a sweatshirt, under a down quilt, and still chilled to the bone. I was getting ready to put my socks on, and the phone rang. He called, just as I was thinking of him. Are you still coming over, I asked. Yes, he replied. He sounded breathless and faraway. Are you at your house or in the Bronx? At the house, he replied. Oh, you sound so sexy in the country. And he laughed. A joyful, unselfconscious laugh. I could see his teeth flashing in my mind. Mmmm… I’m in bed, but I’ll leave the door unlocked, and you can just come right in… Mmmm… I said, that sounds good… More sexy. That keeps coming up…

But as I lay there, I realized, I can’t sleep. There is something in my gut, driving me out from under the safety of the covers, my warm socks now back on. The coziness, the drowsy, cozy heat of expectation was so enticing, yet I kept thinking about things I wanted to write about. Yes, the pull of the words was/is so great. They are definitely coming to the surface, needing to be organized.

This weekend, I took my son to his first Baptist Church. My boyfriend, who, like my husband… now what do I call him? My former husband? We never divorced. My dead husband? Anyway, he was African American. My son is the color of caramel, and his features carry the distinction of his African heritage – from the spread of his slightly flattened nose and his full lips to his dark brown almost black eyes and tight, curly hair, and the high round ass that will surely slay many potential suitors as he comes into his ripened pre teen years… he is a Black boy. And yet, he has never had the experience of being in a room full of hundreds if not thousands of brown-skinned people. Until this past Sunday morning.

It was only for a short period of time, not even an hour, if 45 minutes. I don’t think E- was really expecting me to say, yes, we want to come with you, and then proceed to shower and dress the two of us in our Sunday best as he took over the breakfast preparations. He took the batter I had mixed up and cooked us all a lovely batch of pancakes, and eggs. What a thrill having a man in the kitchen. But it all took longer than any of us thought, and by the time we got out of the house, it was later than we expected. By the time we reached the church, the choir was just finishing up their last big number.

I had enticed my son to break up his Sunday morning video watching jag by describing the amazing music he was about to hear. I was excited, myself, because there is nothing like a real, Gospel choir. The first time I heard authentic Gospel music sung live by brown skinned people, I wept. And there we were, at the Grace Baptist Church in Mt. Vernon, surrounded by a sea of brown people, and I couldn’t have felt more at home. My little boy seemed to light up when the time came to shake hands with those seated near us, and he fell right in line with the “God Bless You’s” of the moment. Later on, he told me he had never been around that many brown skinned people at the same time before. We discovered that we both had noticed the same “only other white person” in the room, a middle aged man with a large head, about halfway across the huge room. It would seem my son has already developed his own sense of race radar.

And now, here I am, writing, in the middle of the night. Waiting for my boyfriend to come over. He is also brown skinned. Tall, dark and handsome, I like to call him. He is. All three. I am feeling intoxicated with anticipation. My body is prickly and bloated with PMS, and there is an odd sensation in my midsection – a fullness, a swelling, a discomfort. What is it that I expect? I am sitting in front of the computer, typing, the screen bringing the only light into the darkened room. I am at my dining room table, the window looking out on the house next door, where I can see my neighbor’s bathroom light on through that room’s frosted glass lower window with translucent fish stickers on the upper pane of glass. When anyone is in there, I can see the top of his/her head. I like looking over there and seeing people walk in and out of that room, even though I can’t make out anything clearly below the foreheads of the tall ones.

I’ve decided that I’m going to write something every morning. Something that could loosely be construed as a blog post. I feel the urge to share my voice with others, even though at times I feel so unfocused and vague about my intentions. I am not sure why I want people to read my words. I don’t really know what I’m seeking… Sure, all the usual stuff – love, approval, all that shit… but what about beyond that… a following? A career? Financial remuneration? Other opportunities for self-expression? All of the above?

Being on a journey like this seems so haphazard. So precarious. So dangerous and frightening. So liberating, and ultimately reassuring. A journey into the chaos of my mind… into the fear of not knowing. Into the trust in my own impulses, my own instincts, my own floundering in the dark. Tonight I pulled myself out of a warm bed, out of the safety of the covers, where I was bundled in all my coziest cotton gear. I pulled myself away from the sweet escape of sleep, to the drafty space near the front door, to write my words, and wait for a late night visitor.

I have so many stories to tell. So many dreams to explore and nightmares to purge. So many theories to test out and visions to bring to life. So much pain to heal and desire to quench. So much to do. Must organize the words into some semblance of order. That is what I want. The beauty and joy of seeing the words come together in a way that traces the paths of energy I’m feeling. Tracing the familiar patterns. Feeling them come to the surface. Taking the expectation, the fullness, the discomfort and the desire and forming them into something coherent, something that reflects what I’m feeling, something that makes it all seem real, somehow. Something that reminds me of who I am. I guess that’s enough for now.

Photo "Under the Milky Way" by jurvetson