Pining for the Fjords

Can someone still be considered a friend even if you haven’t seen them in a zillion years?

Bob Ray, who I worked with too many decades ago, turns up in my dreams periodically. I was and still am fond of him. He’s def cool – played sax (tenor? bari?) in a couple bands, drew and wrote comix, and had a good, solid head on his shoulders. We weren’t close but I would definitely consider him a friend versus acquaintance. 

Is there an official line for that – a measurement system? How do you know when an acquaintanceship has grown into a friendship? Does a bell ring? Do you get gold stars? Does it happen after you’ve consumed X number of adult beverages together and exchanged X amount of discreet confidences? Voila! You’ve now crossed the border. Please don one of these lovely bracelets.

Another thing – I’ve never met his wife but, from the comments she’s made on his Facebook posts, she’s obviously fabola. Too bad they live 800 miles away – I’d love to meet her.

Why does Bob Ray keep turning up in Dream Land? How? What does he symbolize?

Usually, his dream appearances are as a warm, supportive presence. Ya know, if good vibes were palpable, this is what they’d look like. Bob Ray – fairy godfather.

In last night’s nocturnal movieola though, he magically appeared out of nowhere. Bob Ray was holding in his raised hand, a puzzle piece. It was a very important piece and it was glowing ever so slightly.

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN!!!

It’s probably something simple and obvious and has nothing to do with Bob Ray himself. It’s just so damn mystifying though – the glowing puzzle piece; Bob holding it aloft in his fingers as though it were a Eucharist; the darkened, Gothic, stone-walled room. I mean WTAF!?

Related sort of – there’s my friend Craig. We were friends in high school and kept in light touch during college. After I graduated, came off the carnival road and moved to Boston, I briefly stayed with him. He introduced me to all his friends and helped me get situated in my new digs. Later, he and his wife moved out to California. I’ve only seen him once since then.

I miss him awfully. Craig’s an absolutely wonderful human. His laugh is like music. He deserves every good thing that life has to offer.

Craig’s not on social media at all. Can’t blame him but I’d like to at least have that slight, tenuous connection. Since I’m deaf I can’t just ring him up for a chat. 

I’d text but:

• I don’t have his phone number.
• I’m terrible at chit chat – I’m more of a full-blown convo kind of a person.
• I don’t even know if he’d be open to texting and I don’t want to intrude.
• I’d write him a letter but he and his wife have moved and I don’t have their new address and I’m not sure how to find it.

Possibly this feeling of warmth is one-sided? I am, after all, a rather odd duck. Also, obvs, insecure. I could just find his new address, send a damn card saying “You’re awesome and I miss you” and be done with it. He doesn’t have to write back (though that’d be nice).

Old friends
Sat on their park bench
Like bookends
A newspaper blown through the grass
Falls on the round toes
On the high shoes
Of the old friends

Old friends
Winter companions
The old men
Lost in their overcoats
Waiting for the sunset
The sounds of the city
Sifting through trees
Settle like dust
On the shoulders
Of the old friends

Can you imagine us
Years from today
Sharing a park bench quietly?
How terribly strange
To be seventy

Old friends
Memory brushes the same years
Silently sharing the same fear
~ Paul Simon

Not That There’s Anything Wrong With That

Jen took her car in for its 18 month check up yesterday. 

Aren’t these things suppose to be done once a year? Isn’t a year 12 months? No? Sorry, my mistake – carry on. 

Anyway, the car’s all fine and dandy. Passed with flying colors and shit. Jen had the check up and servicing done at the dealership – a Subaru dealership. I, naturally had to ask “so, you’re a lesbian now? When did this happen? How did I fail to notice? Does Oni know yet?”

Our infinitely patient Jen replied, ”no Donna, I have a Subaru Crosstrek (NOT to be confused with the Subaru Star Trek which, to date, does not exist), NOT a Forester. So, not gay.” 

Right. RIGHT! It’s the Forester. *ahem* USED to be the Outback. I get all those Subarus confused. I’m terribly out of date. Mi scusi and shit.

In any case. Jen had a cozy time at the Subaru dealership. She said all the other customers were like her – little to no makeup, no dye jobs, clad in comfortable, casual attire. She said it looked like a book club or political action meeting for middle-aged, laid back, New England women.

Now, back when I still drove, I had a SmartCar and had it serviced at the Mercedes-Benz dealership. That’s who made Smart cars. The Mercedes/Smart shared dealership didn’t have the comfy, homey, Vermont-ish vibe Jen found at Subaru. Nope. It was dudes and dudettes in slick business suits on work calls or reading the Wall Street Journal or some other uptight, boring-ass, money-industry rag. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. I kind of stood out in my tie dye T, metallic silver Vans, and yoga pants, reading my comic books but whatevs, eh?

Here’s what I think would be ideal for a dealership waiting room for when my car (if I was still a driver) goes in for its annual appointment. These things take…what? An hour or so? There should be seasonal snacks. It’s winter and I’m in Boston. I’m thinking clam chowder with a thick slab of warm dark rye bread. There should be hot chocolate (with real whipped cream), a fancy schmancy coffee, and/or a nice Lapsang Souchong. That would do me up just right. There should be deep, dark, lushly upholstered club chairs and chaises with packed bookshelves lining the walls. They should contain epic amounts of brill short story collections since none of us will be there long enough to read more than that. Any windows – I’m imagining floor to ceiling, with views of the Charles or Boston Harbor – will be shaded by deep emerald velvet drapes. Sounds ideal, right?

Question – is there a gay men’s equivalent to the stereotype of lesbians owning Subarus? Not really. Light googling shows that gay men are  supposedly also in the Forester camp but favor the boring ass Audi RS Q8 and Kia EV6 as well. Zzzzzzzzz. I’ve seen the Jeep Wrangler Rubicon  mentioned but, OOOF, how boxy and utterly inelegant.

Look, I totally understand the wish for a sturdy, practical, utilitarian vehicle. Honest I do but can we PLEASE have just a wee bit of style? I’d LOVE to have a Karmann Ghia BUT we need the trunk room for my rollator and wheelchair. Compromise was in order. What’d we get? An electric two door MINI Cooper. Adorable, no?

Is there no possible way to make an SUV, a jeep, a vehicle appropriate for the wilds of exurbia such that it has at least some small shred of duende? Can designers at least not make them look like untalented children’s drawings of boxes with wheels?

By the by, in the 1990s and 00s, Subaru actively marketed to LGBTQ people. Savvy. Very.

A Puzzling Old Coot

I often have dreams about a friend with whom I’d once been very close. He died about six and a half years ago from cancer. He was 67 years old.

Why am I dreaming about Tom now?

Grief √
There’s no set time frame to being sad about a loved one dying. Grief doesn’t happen in discrete units. It comes and goes like the tides only maybe not so regular. I miss him.
 
Coping with memories √

Processing unresolved, complicated emotions √
Oh yeah, babies!

Tom and I had been tight for years – from my early 20s until the year I turned 40. He moved in with his new girlfriend that year and, afterward, I rarely saw him. We began traveling in very different circles and no longer frequented the same bars, clubs, parties or meet once a week for a pint and check-in. Life shifted.

Tom had been like a brother to me. He’s dead and I miss him. I missed him when he disappeared into his girlfriend’s world. Okay, he didn’t really disappear – I just didn’t fit into his new galaxy. It’s complicated and I suppose this is part of why I still have dreams about him. My mind continues to puzzle out what went wrong, why I didn't fit, why we didn’t remain close anyway. I want to turn back time and make everything all better.

Naturally, I’ve completely blamed myself – assumed all fault, figured that it’s my job to repair anything that’s possibly gone wrong. This, by the by, is a deeply ingrained bad habit and is absolute, total bullshit. Where’s it come from? Mia madre. I was the “responsible” child, the stable one. I was expected to step in when mother couldn’t cope or didn’t want to. She seemed to regard me as the family fixer.

OF COURSE I grew up thinking that if I just tried hard enough I could make any situation better. And if I couldn’t? The mess would def be my fault.

One good thing about getting old, I can usually recognize when I’m falling into this self-blame trap and logic myself back to reality.

Bad things about getting old? 

• Compression socks
• There’s too many damn meds to take every damn day
• My friends keep dying
• Reading glasses
• Like Nora Ephron, I Feel Bad About My Neck 
• My hair was already thin – now, after eight brain surgeries and attaining old coot-dom, I’m THIS close to just shaving my head and painting it purple (with scars in metallic silver).
• My feet seem to have gotten bigger or fatter or something. Goodbye fashionable Vans and slick Vionics. I just bought my first pair of Birkenstocks.

I’m thinking about mourning customs in the Victorian era. For women, the recommended, structured mourning time for a husband was two years, a parent or child – one year, and six months for a sibling. Men were less restricted – widowers mourned for six months or less. They were expected to get back to work to provide for their children and marry, presumably, for the same reason.

Two years after The Amazing Bob shuffled off this mortal coil, I was obscenely lucky enough to meet and spark with Ten. I wonder if Tom’s wife has remarried. No matter what, I hope she’s happy or at the very least secure and content.

Think Too Much

When people say “don’t take it personally,” I think "Sure, I can do this" when:

• Frieda is always late for our lunch dates. That’s just her. If we agree to meet at one o’clock, I’m fully aware and prepared (armed with book and/or pad and pen) that she won’t show until 1:15 or 1:30.

• Greg’s a busy, busy guy and lives, in best traffic, a couple hours away. Now that I don’t drive anymore, we rarely get together since I can’t travel to meet him halfway. I miss seeing him but //shrugs// I understand. Driving the whole way down here is a LOT.

• A former employer – mostly a wonderful and caring person BUT, when stressed or taking heat from a client, would pass that fire down to employees whether it was deserved or not. Often enough, it was not. There was a distinct lack of poise under pressure. I chose not to work there anymore but remain friendly, if not terribly close. We just have different workplace styles.

In other circumstance not taking it personally is much harder to do.

A friend’s spouse was unfailingly condescending, critical, and otherwise rude to me – often in a spectacularly childish manner. This was right from first meeting too – no getting-to-know-and-dislike-you period. Just straight off Dis City.

I absolutely took my friend’s spouse’s behavior personally. There was and is something(s) about me that they DO NOT like and that was made quite clear.

I’m, of fucking course, not without fault here. I complained bitterly to a mutual friend about the spouse. This person later, in a drunken state, conveyed my complaints to the couple. Naturally, this didn’t endear me to the couple. UNDERSTATEMENT!

The (non-drunk) friend and I are still in touch but now distant. We exchange memes or pics via text message on occasion but that’s about it.

The Amazing Bob used to tell me that this person (the spouse) was just a brawler. He’d known a million assholes like this in his life – folks who were perma-angry, always looking for/hoping for a fight. Given my own shoddy grasp on people skills, I should have totally recognized this and kept a polite distance. Hah! Have I met me?! I'm not so dispassionate. 

Instead of just taking TAB and Jen’s word, that this person’s just an ass, I kept/keep looking for ways to blame myself for the their awful behavior toward me. WHY? Because if I’m at fault, I can fix the problem. I can somehow make things allllll better. The closeness with my once very dear friend can be restored.

Yeah, yeah, that’s mighty damned presumptuous of me, eh? I not only don’t have the super powers to fix everything, it’s rather bold and selfish of me to hog all the blame. There’s plenty to go around.

So, in this particular case, perhaps half of this person’s jabs and slights are pointed and intentional and the other half are just their normal personality? I’ve spent an enormous amount of time puzzling this out over the years primarily because I miss the closeness my friend and I once shared.

Paul Simon’s songs Think Too Much (a) and Think Too Much (b) come to mind.

Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood.
~ Helen Keller

I am a spy in the house of me. I report back from the front lines of the battle that is me. I am somewhat nonplused by the event that is my life.
~ Carrie Fisher

I find it hard to understand how certain people can be such an essential component of someone's life one day and then just disappear the next. Shouldn't it be able to endure forever?
~ Jonathan Harnisch, Sex, Drugs, and Schizophrenia 

Resident Stranger

H.R. Giger

Sometimes I feel like an alien.

A stranger in a strange land but NOT a stranger as written by Robert Heinlein (the Ayn Rand of science fiction – i.e. an emotionally stunted cartoon). Unless the land we're talking about is found within Starship Troopers. In that case, yeah sure, I do kinda feel like a stranger in a starship troopery sort of land.

The point? I have a deep connection to a few people – it’s not a big group. I’m not filling stadiums here. Why not? Amongst the reasons, it’s how some folks interact with me vis-à-vis my little tumor infestation.

Fer instance, intellectually, I can feature that Catroina (who I’ve known longer than forever) honestly cares about me and my struggles. Still, she hasn’t once, in our long-ass lives, wished me luck on an upcoming surgery, sent a get well card OR even asked how I’m doing/recovering. Same with Marco. Both happily, on their own/no prompting adapted to my new socializing dynamics after the old hearing went south though.

BUT, if I so much as allude to a past or upcoming surgery or a nasty outcome (like when I lost the use of my left leg – which is back now, thenx) Marco clams up or changes the subject or has to stop texting immediately. Catroina? There’s no point in texting or emailing her any of my health news – she never responds. Odd, no?

These are just two examples. Two friends, two not terribly evolved adult behaviors.

I do get it – there’s something funky in their social wiring. It ain’t me, babes. Some folks just can’t deal with scary, disabling, life and death health shit. It’s a real mellow-harsher. Life can be like that…ya know?

I can be pretty matter-of-fact about death. I know I’ll get there faster than others (a race I hadn’t originally planned on winning). Talking about basic logistics can be off-putting. (i.e., I’d like to be buried at sea – that is – just toss me over the wall at high tide. Giant statues of Bastet should be placed along the seawall upon my demise. Offerings of kibble should be left at her base daily to feed her priests and priestesses. I’d like a weeping willow planted in my memory somewhere because, unlike Evita, I want someone/thing always melodramatically sobbing for me.) Apparently, having a dark sense of humor also weirds some of my friends and acquaintances out.

I understand. Plus, few are are able to join in with my giddy interests in my new scars (which I’m inevitably thrilled about and eager to show off. Like yeah, I just made it through something big and ultra scary and this is, like, my merit badge. Please, gaze on it and applaud!).

Back to the point though – I don’t expect hospital or home visits with forced jocularity or deep, depressing sympathies. Actually, spare me, PLEASE! Send some funny memes or a good luck text with a pic of your dog/cat/goldfish instead. Cookies are always in good taste too (white chocolate/macadamia nut plz!). Just gimme a simple, basic acknowledgment that I’m going through some heavy shit. Let's not go all dismal and shit – k?

Without necessarily intending to say so (or maybe I’m being too generous and this exactly what they mean), they’re telling me I can only be loved if/when I’m healthy.

What I do as a result of folks like Catroina and Marco’s seeming rejection of me at my weakest, is that I keep more to myself. I assume no one wants to know what’s happening in Donna’s fun, fun Neuro PlayLand. I feel that I need to project a Superwoman, upbeat, pshaw-this-millionth-grapefruit-sized-brain/spine-tumor’s-nothing-serious vibe at all times. Friends will unfriend me if I’m sick or less fun for too long. Or so my subconscious seems to think.

I will have fun with my nasty-ass disease. I’ll also have times when I’m sad as hell, scared shitless, and totally living in Bleak City.

And THIS, mes amis, is why I don’t like carnival rides. Life is enough of one as it is.  

It’s All Jen’s Fault

Really!

You see, I’m a deeply serious individual. It's true. I was actually born without a normal, socially appropriate sense of humor. I have a sense of humor but it's a bit skewed. I mean, all those brain tumors? They've totally forced out my ability to color (i.e., laugh and joke) within the lines. It's a tragedy. I'm tellin' ya.

You know what this means, don’t you? Yep, Firesign Theatre, Monty Python, and The Smother’s Brothers went a long ways toward shaping my humor.

Why’s this come up now? I had an interesting exchange on Facebook with a couple of guys I went to high school with but only met recently in this deeply strange, online world of ours. (FYI – names have been changed to protect these poor sods who put up with me)
~~~
Max: So, last Monday I was doing what I usually do on Monday evenings and if you can tell me what that is I'd appreciate it. However, in the midst of doing whatever it was that I was doing I fell. 

Our man Max is now in a skilled nursing facility for a few weeks undergoing intense physical therapy. He’s learning how to walk again along with all the other happy horseshit that yurs truly has been going through over the past five years. Mondo fun!

Me: Dude, falling is NOT fun! Learning to walk again? Even less of a good time. Also too, it gets boring after awhile. Just FYI and shit. 

Now, as for what you can usually be found doing on Mondays, contrary to what Rob said, I know for a fact that you have a standing gig down in Encino at the Starlite Lounge. It’s you and Dinah Washington singing standards with McCoy Tyner on keys. Of course this MIGHT only be in my alt universe where Ella Fitzgerald and Freddie Mercury scat the Beastie Boys’ catalogue whilst performing hot yoga. They’d kill it. You KNOW it!

….ummmm, in bocca al lupo?

What had Rob claimed as Max’s usual Monday habit?

Rob: Max, for some reason, I am remembering you saying that you had reserved Mondays for perfecting your recreation of Evel Knievel’s famous motorcycle jump over the Caesar’s Palace fountain. I know that balance played a critical role in that event. Please PLEASE mend yourself quickly and thoroughly! And, just perhaps, take a few photos of those wildly colored bruises. It’s been quite a while since anyone has inspired a new organically-influenced modern art trend! Be well, my friend!

Rob responded to my counterclaim.

Rob: Donna, I stand corrected… I think. You know what that means? I will have to go back to Max’s very first post ever, and then read through ALL of them to find out exactly what it was that he said about recreating Evel Knievel’s jump over the Caesar’s Palace fountain. Oh my…

Me: Ya know Rob, and please correct me if I’m wrong, but I felt certain that our man Max had previously injured himself while attempting to recreate Evel’s lesser known, but also brilliantly talented, sister Eva’s skateboarding leap over Niagara Falls.

I could be getting this mixed up with that time Max went hillwalking during a land war in Asia (something I’ve been told, on reliable authority, to avoid).

In any case, rereading his wild tales of derring-do is a grand way to spend the day!

Max: Rob, I still want to know which of my posts you've read 30 or 40 times.

Rob: A good way to spend a day??? Clearly, you have forgotten just how often this guy posts… I do, and I am now thinking that I can just kiss my intended activities for my retirement years goodbye. 

Oh… to Mark: ONE of your posts that I read 30-40 times was this one:

“I spent a good chunk of today sitting on a lawn chair with a cold drink and my dog, watching the flowers in my garden grow. No, really! Several of them grew roughly two inches while I watched. But, it was only the pink ones. The yellow ones didn’t do shit. Who understands this gardening stuff? I sure do not! 

At one point, the dog snarled really loudly and jumped down to chase the FedEx guy who was only trying to deliver my parcel of the day. The dog nearly spilled my drink, and I nearly soiled myself! It’s a good thing that I have an incredible rock-solid sense of balance! So, I didn’t end up face-down in the garden. 

Again. I suppose I should go and retrieve the dog’s teeth from FedEx’s thigh so he can get on about his business. He’ll probably just want to spend the rest of the day sitting on my lap and whimpering to get attention. And, the dog… will probably go back in the house for a nap.”

Not sure why I read that one so many times…

Me: Now Rob, once you’ve finished reading Max’s back catalogue you can always get right back to your recreation of Botticelli's Birth of Venus (done a la Jack Kirby with Ellen Ripley as Venus, of course and, goddamn, I can’t wait to see it!). Art requires deep thoughts which inevitably arise whilst reading the booze soaked Facebook posts of our peers and heroes.

Related, this post of Max’s you’ve quoted – THIS is exactly the sort of writing Hunter S. Thompson would be doing now had he survived into his retirement years. Max is helping us travel into a creative universe we’d never otherwise know!

Another of Max’s friends writes:

Karl: Sorry to learn of your injury. After two back surgeries within 30 months, I know how you feel. 

Me: Karl, we should all form a club. I had 2 spine surgeries between '20 and '21. Oh, but wait, maybe we already have? The first rule of Fucked Up Back Club is we do NOT talk about Fucked Up Back Club. 

Max: Shut up, you're jinxing us!
~~~
I love Max. He totally get me.

How is me cracking wise at otherwise serious times Jen’s fault? Emmm, she laughs at my attempts at wit? Does she know that she’s only encouraging my inappropriate, antisocial humor? 

I would, like totally, be a somber, sober credit to my upright, upstate New York forebears if not for Jen. Truly! 

Whole Lotta Love

Thanks to my friend Kathy, I happily have Led Zeppelin in my head this morning.

Warum?

She sent me a link to a Substack post by John Pavlovitz—Grieving People Who Are Still Alive—The relational deaths by irreconcilable differences.

He talks of the grief of losing friends and family with whom we no longer share a common sense of right and wrong. Pavlovitz is referring to loved ones who, we’ve discovered, we’re fundamentally morally misaligned. Maybe we’ve always been ethically out of sync? Maybe we’ve never occupied the realm of compassion together—we just assumed that this loved one was there too?

The good news/bad news for me is that I learned this lesson early. When I was diagnosed at the nowhere-near-ripe age of 22 with neurofibromatosis type 2, I understood that my life would be more constrained. That is, I learned that a large percentage of humans shy away from those of us who are somewhat limited by a physical and/or mental crapoli. We’re less fun and scary/sad to be around. We're unrelatable to the young and healthy.

Brain surgery scares the fuck out of a lot of folks (even when they’re not the ones going under the knife) so they back off, create distance; they underline the fact that they just can’t deal. I get it—unless you’re already in love (platonically or romantically) with a person, or share qualities similar to Keanu or Dolly, sick people are a drag for vibrant, unafflicted types. I understand.

Also, as a grumpy, oddly humored misanthrope, loving me is a real challenge anyway. Honestly, I totally get it!

The point? Getting back to Pavlovitz’s post, a lot of these compassion-free MAGAt idiots, long ago, self-airlocked themselves from my life. Good! The ones who didn’t, managed to show their cards early enough so that I could in-real-life block them before much (or further) damage was done.

Funnily, they've consistently failed to grasp why I’ve put up a wall. Not the former studio-mate who devolved into a compassion-free, mocking, bullying twatzilla. Nor the family member who called me a race traitor for being an outspoken anti-racist (AKA a sentient human being). Definitely not the other MAGAt, racist fuck of a family member who claims to be the BESTEST Christian EVER. These are just a few of the shitheels who will never breech my tungsten clad, reinforced concrete wall of self-protection.

I imagine it sucks to be fully grown adults without clue.

This morning, after a big night of dreams, I’m grieving the corporeal loss of the magnificent Scott Artman, Kevin Scott and the always amazing, caring, and beautiful Bob. I’m also deeply grateful for and in love with Ten, Jen, Oni, and my fabulous sister Celeste. They all stand (and stood) by me despite the unending surgeries, recoveries, warped sense of humor, and incorrigible misanthropy.

Ghosts

People are weird. In what way? ALL sorts of ways but what I’m thinking about is basic social interactions and communications.

Specifically I’m talking about getting low-key or flat-out ghosted. Is it always on purpose?

Exemple numéro un:
Let’s say you and someone you’re loosely acquainted with are in the midst of discussions about doing some joint project. Maybe you’re working on a collaborative protest idea. Very cool. You’re psyched. You’re (okay I’m) waiting for a reply on an email I’ve sent—the ball is now in the other person’s court. After a few days without a word I’ve figured the other person’s no longer interested. MAYBE that’s the case. Maybe not.

This is an online acquaintance not an in real life friend so, in the absence of a response, it’s impossible to know what’s truly up. Possibly, the person caught a bad cold or is overwhelmed with family or work probs and forgot all about me and the project. Could be they’re no longer interested in the proposed biz or they’ve found some other way to protest that’s a better fit for them. This is totally fine but it sure would have been nice to get a brief heads up email.

Exemple numéro deux:
A couple who had been dear friends—one of whom I’ve known since childhood—stopped answering my emails. Why? Maybe they’re just not so into me and my quirky-ass (obnoxious? who…moi?!) stylings anymore. Possibly my emails went into their spam folders? Who knows?

Exemple numéro trois:
Someone I’ve known for 40+years. Though we once had been, we’re not close friends and don’t have many, if any, mutual friends. He occasionally drops a note announcing a Zoom party that he and his wife are throwing, mentions current events, and wishes me well. I respond but it’s as though I’ve sent my email off into a cosmic void. His emails are clearly not meant as the beginnings of a conversation.

 Exemple numéro quatre:
Another long-time good friend. She hasn’t completely dropped off the face of the earth but she almost never writes and rarely responds to birthday or holiday greetings that I send. Am I being purposely ghosted or is something else going on? I'd ask a mutual friend but...see exemple numéro trois.

Jeffrey Schweitzer

It’s taken me until now to realize that their responses (rather, the lack thereof) most likely has fuck-all to do with me. My knee-jerk tendency to take everything as a personal, laser directed rejection isn’t fair to me or them. Still, it's weird to be left hanging like this. Even a short blow-off type email (“crazy busy right now. Will email as soon as I get a chance”) would be preferable to twisting in the wind. 

How long do you wait before:

• accepting that their lack of response is intentional and meaningful?

• figuring they’re too overwhelmingly busy to even dash off a note?

• calling the cops to do a wellness check?

No, really, how long before YOU know?

By no means am I exempt from social weirdness—fuck no. I’ve not always succeeded in rising above my cranky, careless, misanthropic tendencies (yes, that was in fact a big ass understatement) but I try to follow polite protocols. REALLY!

Now this song’s playing on the old internal turntable. 

So, You Wanna Be Friends

Most of us want/need friends. I sure as hell do. It’s necessary to have one’s needs, wishes, and rules in place though. It’s not enough to just work in the same cube farm, attend the same yoga sessions or take the same classes.

Some of my rules and stipulations:

1) If you make food you are required to share. This especially includes:

• Sweet potato fries
• Cookies (chocolate chip, peanut butter, gingerbread, snicker doodles, ANY kind of frosting filled sandwich cookie, etc.)
• Roasted brussel sprouts
• Falafel
• Black bean burgers
• Spanakopita
• Guacamole
• Spinach and feta scones

…did I mention cookies yet?

2) Must be comfortable with long stretches of hanging out together whilst doing nothing in particular.

3) You need to be in possession of a deep love for our feline overlords or, at least, a finely tuned respect and appreciation.

 4) Having the same taste in books, music, movies or art is not essential but overlaps certainly don’t hurt.  

5) A fully developed creative conversational sense is absolutely necessary.
     Fer instance:

• If you could be a god of something, what would it be? I’d be torn between music and visual arts. Maybe I could be Apollo on even days and Minerva on odd days?

•  You’re starting your adult life over again. This time out you’re financially supported by a wealthy benefactor (with no strings attached). What would you do for work? Me? I’d move to Vermont—maybe just outside Brattleboro—and start an alpaca farm. I’d eventually open a shop where I’d sell alpaca yarn as well as locally created alpaca yarn creations—sweaters, full body suits, spaceships…you know, the usual knit products.

• Remember An Elderly Lady Is Up to No Good by Helene Tursten? If you could, who would you Dexter and why? No, of course we’d never actually do this—that’s not the point. Having an imagination is. 

I've never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.
    ~ Clarence Darrow 

6) Sense of humor—gotta have it. Friends don’t need to be a reincarnation of Robin Williams or Dorothy Parker. It can’t hurt though. If you can’t be funny, be verbally imaginative. 

7) Kindness is required in your honesty. Yes, you can be blunt as fuck without being thoughtless or cruel. Don’t be an empathy devoid dick. 

8) If you vote for anyone in the Republican Party, we’ll never achieve more than a nonviolent, nodding acquaintanceship. Why not? You’ve voted against my ability to exist as a free, equal, human on this Earth. I’m not happy about that to say the very least.

Likewise, if you’re so far Left that you refused to vote for the Black woman because something, something, PALESTINE…come back when you’ve grown up and understand reality more fully. I may fully support your cause or point of view BUT protest votes or not voting have given us four more years of Hell, minimum. Also, you’ve not done the Palestinians or Ukrainians any favors with your purity protest.

 

9) You don’t have to love science fiction but, honestly now, with John Scalzi, Martha Wells, Philip K. Dick, Charlie Jane Anders, Margaret Atwood, Catherynne M. Valente, etc., etc. how could you not?! Okay, we don’t need to read the same books but being able to appreciate (on some level) and discuss each other’s literary indulgences is a good thing.

10) Remembering my birthday isn’t important but my surgery dates are. More precisely, knowing about and acknowledging my battles with this stupid, tumor riddled skin suit is important.

Witty or otherwise fun pre-op encouragement is WAY better than wishing this old, beleaguered broad a happy birthday.

I suppose that's my top ten rules for friends. What are yours?

Editing, Growling and TMI

Word for the day:
Growlery
     noun

• A place to retreat to, alone, when ill-humoured

• A place to growl

Everyone needs a proper growlery. Mine includes my beautiful Cake, dark chocolate covered pretzels, e-books (currently reading Titanium Noir by Nick Harkaway), a comfy chair and way too easy online access. Why do I say “too easy?” Because I spend too much time doomscrolling. I’m desperately trying to cut back on that shit. Why? I have a bleak enough view of this country, this cruel world, the insanity that we’re living through—I don’t need amplify that. I’ll continue to follow the news but it’s time to retire to my growlery.

While I’m here growling, I wonder how folks make new friends as they get older.

By “older” I mean my age—mid-60s. I’m hardly ancient but, with the old Nf2 and its shitbaggian effects, neither am I a vibrant, dynamic creature.

There’s a thoughtful, independent woman on Threads who’s always posts interesting lists of things she’s thinking about, working on, doing. She asks readers for their/our thoughts and ideas.

I want to join the discussions but my life is so very different from hers and all her commenters (due to that pesky old Nf2 and the havoc it’s wrought). They all seem healthy or, at least, in better shape than yurs truly. I’m afraid that, if I respond, I’ll come off as some self pitying egoist, out to steal everyone’s spotlight. There seems to be no way to jump in unless I leave out my honest, real-life bits. What’s the point in entering the discussion if I’m going to leave a generic, pablum-y reply?

If I responded to her post, it’d look sort of like this:

At 65 I'm thinking about what choices I want to make for the rest of my life.

1 and 2: To relocate or not to relocate, that is the question—It's not an option for me. My doctors, specialists and surgeons are all here.

Also, when we were home hunting 20 years ago, I looked ahead.

• Would Valhalla be a good neighborhood for someone old and rickety, needing frequent trips to MGH Land. (so far, yes)
  

• Would it be pretty and peaceful or turn into a college student ghetto? (not yet)
  

• Would a strip mall get built in place of the park? (nope)

• Would mini-mansions with huge, environment assaulting golf-club style landscaping replace all the old cottages and Victorians? (there are some big houses but not many)
  

• Would a McDonalds or Starbucks move in across the street? (no)
  

• Would this become a cacatopia, an epic wasteland of asphalt, greed and trash, devoid of trees? (not so far but MORE trees are always needed)
  

Neighborhoods change and evolve. I know that. Before buying, we checked zoning laws and it looked safe. Asshole neighbors come and go. Most of ours have been lovely but still, we generally keep to ourselves. We’re friendly and helpful but not looking to become BFFs.

3: Siblings—I have three. One lives in a town nearby. We frequently text but, with our respective vida locas, don’t get together often. The other two live halfway across the country. I’m strictly No Contact with one. The other sends me the odd, brief email.

This is fine.

4: Health—I’m rebuilding, becoming stronger so that, whatever excrement hits the fan, I’ll survive, sparkle and break on through to the other side (in as close to in one piece as possible). I’m making slow but sure progress on this front.

5: Simplifying—The older I get the more stuff I want to get rid of. There are things from my Aunt Mary Ann and my grandparents that are precious to me. I’ve got artworks, made by friends or picked up on holidays, which are deeply meaningful. There’s so much that I can (and have) let go of though. Possessions, excess ones, feel like an unnecessary, suffocating weight.

6: Creating—My essential tremors have advanced to the point that handwriting is almost impossible. Painting is no longer manageable (except, perhaps, large abstracts). I haven’t played the flute in 20 years (due to facial nerves damaged in brain surgeries). I can write though, doodle a bit on the computer and maybe knit.

What other choices can/will I make for my future?

I can allow my imagination to go off leash more. I won’t necessarily attempt to write fiction but I could sit in a coffeehouse inventing/imagining the lives of other patrons. I can tell myself stories...for a start.

I’d like to see if the dexterity needed for knitting is in any way therapeutic. That is, between my meds and the focused, precise moves of knitting, could I regain better use of my hands? Could I then draw and paint again?

So, I want to join this woman’s discussions but not be that Too Much Information participant who’s ignored and/or pitied. How can I be open, honest and real but concise AND still connect with people? Edit, edit, edit and more of it!

What choices are you making for your future?

Rando

The southern cassowary (Casuarius casuarius), also known as double-wattled cassowary, Australian cassowary, or two-wattled cassowary, is a large flightless black bird, found in Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, and northeastern Australia. It is one of the three living species of cassowary, alongside the dwarf cassowary and the northern cassowary. It is a ratite and therefore related to the emu, ostriches, rheas and kiwi. (source)
~~~
City I dislike: Syracuse, NY
Why? Eh, no major reason. It’s a big Western New York college town and yet it’s nearly completely devoid of rizz. It lacks charm for me…Nice ceramics museum  though.

San Marco Square, Venice—James Innes

City I think is overrated: Venice, Italy. Too crowded with careless, annoying tourists who seem to think they’re in Disneyland/World versus a place where people actually live and work.

City I think is underrated: Brattleboro, VT
Really. Go there. It small but has a few independent bookstores, lovely restaurants and pubs, a decent little art museum, farmer’s, flea, antique and other street markets, distilleries, live theater and more than a few art galleries, at least three different spas and The New England Center for Circus Arts.

City I like: Reykjavik, Iceland

City I love: NYC

City I feel most myself in: Cambridge, MA?

City I dream of living in (again): Cambridge, MA
~~~
Jen and I are still binge-watching Northern Exposure and I continue to be disappointed in most of the characters and storylines. Maurice had a few epps in a row where he showed personal growth. That arc’s apparently now on vacation. Shelly continues to be a vapid, little, self obsessed bleach blonde teen. There was actually an episode employing the old exact-identical-(but very different)-twin trope. Ya know, we didn’t need a second, new Doctor Fleischmann (though his twin was an improvement). Couldn’t the writers have made a Chris (who wasn’t such a lady magnet? Unsure that would be possible.). A Marylyn who was now an outspoken, hell raising feminist? Shelly with a brain and compassion? (not sure that’s doable but it’d be interesting….maybe)

~~~
This is from a speech my pal Hillel recently gave while sitting shiva after his mother recently died.

I love this tapestry. I know there were a lot of dedicated and talented women who worked on it, but forgive me if it makes me think so much of my mother. Her stitching and esthetics are incorporated into it, and it is dedicated to her beloved husband, but that’s not even what I mean when I say it makes me think of her. My mother’s life was a tapestry, harmoniously blending so many elements and making the sum more than the parts.

I’m not surprised to see so many of you here for her today. Community was a vital, living part of my mother’s tapestry of life. Community is the air that she breathed. She gained sustenance from being with this kehillah, participating in it, sometimes leading it, reveling in its joys, commiserating in its sorrows. My father loved to say that “you can’t Jew it alone” and my mom felt that in her very bones. She was, in many ways, a pretty private person, but having and being in community gave her purpose and energy, and made her thrive.

For mom, a critical aspect of that community is Jewish living and learning. For her, those two things were inseparable. Going through my parents’ study over the last weeks, I found reams – literally reams – of notes, study materials, and teaching outlines for the innumerable classes that she took and courses that she taught here and elsewhere. And while Jewish subjects were paramount, she had broad curiosity about the world. Paul Applefield mentioned to me that he’d come visit mom one week and she’d have torah text open on her lap. He’d come a week later, and she’d be reading a book about the sculptures of Henry Moore. Mom never went anywhere without a book or a magazine article in her hand, you know, just in case she had to wait for an appointment to start or a parking spot to open up. She wanted to put that ten minutes to good use by soaking up some learning.

My mother learned from everyone and wanted to know about people’s lives and what is important to them. In the hospital recently, she asked the nurses how they came to be in their job and what their tattoos were all about. She would ask museum docents detailed questions about art and artifacts. She talked with plumbers and store clerks and neighbors and John the produce guy, not just about what they were doing or selling, but who they are and what is important to them. She regarded everyone with utmost respect for their background and perspective on the world. For my ima, everyone had something to teach and she wanted to learn.

Often, that learning was a prelude to appreciating the world’s beauty in all its forms. She loved to travel so she could see the world’s wonders first hand, and invariably the trip would include visits to the local art museums, libraries, and botanical gardens. So mom would learn beforehand about indigenous art and customs and flora, but she wanted to see it for herself, to immerse herself in it.

One of mom’s favorite Hebrew phrases was from the paragraph before the shema:
 וּבְטוּבוֹ מְחַדֵּשׁ בְּכָל יוֹם תָּמִיד מַעֲשֵׂה בְרֵאשִׁית, which refers to god as the force that, with kindness, renews creation continuously every day. My mother saw creation as an ongoing activity, a constant presence, and thought that it is our responsibility, not just to appreciate the beauty of the world, but to participate in the creation of the world. “Enjoy every moment” she would say to us, whether the moment was travel, going to a concert, being with friends, or spending time with family. For years, my brother and I have only half joked that our mother was a guru and her mantra was “enjoy every moment.”

Unquestionably, the thread that tied together my mother’s tapestry was family. She shared a life of deep love, profound respect, mutual interests, and mutual support with my father. She was Savta to my kids and beloved Aunt J to my cousins. She was our matriarch and she kept up with everyone’s struggles and accomplishments. I have the letters where I would confide in her about the angst of my 20s because I knew I could talk with her about those things. More recently, she talked a lot with her grandchildren about what they were doing, and not just in a "that's nice, dear" kind of way, but with genuine interest and curiosity. In October, she danced at my son Caleb’s wedding and just a couple of weeks ago, she tried to wrap her head around what my nephew Max does to create software that 3D prints prosthetics.

She wanted to know what everyone was doing and being because she took absolute glowing pride in the mark that her family was making on the world. It’s kind of a running joke in my family that at least two of my kids and several of my nieces and nephews are the fourth generation to work in the nonprofit world, god help them. But my mother was so happy about the positive things that her family does to improve the world, to reinvent it as a better place, to find their place in it, and to create the community and the loving personal connections that make that happen. During this past pesach, my mother’s health was already in severe decline, but when she was surrounded by 8 of her children and grandchildren, she so rose to the occasion. Sitting in her throne in her living room, surrounded by family at the seder, mom absolutely glowed with energy and naches*… Family was mom’s happy place.
 
My mother’s life wove together beauty, presence, learning, family, and so much love. I hope you know that all of you are a part of that. That’s a beautiful tapestry you have there.

I wish that, in the nearly 50 years that Hillel and I have been buds, that I’d spent more time with his Muti—his Mother.

What is the translation of muti?
In South African English, the word muti is derived from the Zulu/Xhosa/Northern Ndebele umuthi, meaning 'tree', whose root is -thi.

*Naches
     noun
pride or gratification, especially at the achievements of one's children.

May Mrs. Bromberg's memory be a massive blessing to all.