Lists

We are fresher than we have been in recent memory: me, Chris and Judah.
Judah is admittedly pretty fresh, being only three years into this world and still having so much living to do he can't begin to channel the stale, beaten-down energy that Chris and I can on the Wrong Day in the Wrong Year (est. 2004-2007). Truly we can, Chris and I, double over onto ourselves, contortionists of listlessness on top of depression! we can overwhelm whole cities with our emotional grey.
We can be pained and painful to be around.

and i admit that with a funny pride that knows that even in all that we have stayed together, grown closer and made our way to this half-way house, Chris' childhood home.

Here, no blue-skies for sure, but here, we are better. we are some newer versions of ourselves: appreciative for the new chapter that might not have been started, fierce about the border to our home, the one built in our hearts. Don't knock on the door unless you have kindness and grace with you, because we aren't interested in peddlars of despair, doubt, insecurities and the like. We know better than to let you in, we'll be mad at you if you knock.

Us against the world? not close. In fact, us and the world: what we have always wanted.
I sometimes write down a list of my girlfriends, names from undergrad and grad school, names of people reading this very blog and i write the middle names (if i know them)of my dears in pretty cursive. I look at the list: it is long and satisfying. It is the list that tucks me in at night, the blanket of stars i sleep under, each name gives me hope for hope- all my real friends are wild about hope.

I am beginning to reimagine Chicago with that list in my heart. Chicago was the literal mainfestation of my fears: i have felt the world too much for me, cold and ruthless, as if i could die in the snow on Chicago's front porch and she might just step over me on her way to work. I fled that city with my newborn, a refugee to the Sun.

This time it is different: i challenge my youthful perceptions. Chicago was also kind to me, glittery but also welcoming, if grey, i always had invitations to a campfire or dinnertable. I was never without friends, i was never jobless, heck i don't think i ever ran out of money there...

So i am getting back together with Chicago-- i know about the wind and cold. The good outweighs the bad. I think i am going to find the City as I expect to: i no longer expect to be abused or neglected. I am trusting that we can make it, the three of us, fresh as we are again, with hope and good intentions, our intentions.

1. Judah intends to ride every elevator in that city, starting with the Sears' Tower.
2. I intend to buy everyone flannel pjs and get that illusive master's degree from my dream college.
3. Chris intends to-- well that is all for him to write out i think.
4. we all intend to thrive.

2 weeks.

Day's end

It's nearly midnight and i sit in this strangely hot room and wonder where the day has gone.
Judah went to pre-school today and the hours always seem to fly by.
I had a lot of me time today- seems to be the reason I reflect on the day with a decent amount of satisfaction- though there is so much in the air.

I seem a weirdly unmotivated person lately. I have had strange thoughts that all seem to suggest that actually i do not want to do anything with my life.
i want to be cloistered!

but when i survey my life's course as of late, it seems to be calling me out, to be making me suddenly accountable. I have always detested the parable of the talents. I see that as my conflict this last week. I have no desire to be accountable for my "talents." I don't want to make any decisions that require that i use them, which i have already done! maybe i doubt them that much?

I recently read Virginia Woolf's A Room of One's Own and she exorts women to live by [our] wits. Blasted Woolf! how much easier to hide in a job that requires virtually no thinking!

So I sign up to perform for Life. Yeah, i did that. I said, Look , I am going out on my own. Give me opportunities and I will use them. Enable me, i will perform.

I didn't say that with conviction! I mean i said it because i was convinced of things that led me to deduce that that was the right thing to say.
is tres diferent!

Now i am feeling all the weight of making the "right" decision because it was right!

Last night i had a dream i was accepted to a very good PhD program. I was happy.
maybe my sleeping self is trying to motivate me.

Chicago-bound

I anticipate a few more posts like this one, each one a little more declarative, less tentative.

When we moved to Tulsa, I felt like i was turning in my real thesis, the one i have been working on without knowing, the one about My Life.
It seemed to me that i had acquired lots and lots of information and had plenty of evidence to support my thesis:
I know what is best for me, i know i want to move, i know the world, though not perfect is not so harsh that i cannot take this risk.

I also know that my life is My Homework, My Assignment. I know that i am meant to live it governed by my faculties, making my own mistakes so that i can also fully own all my triumphs.

In the end analysis, this road isn't about my dad and how bad he is. It is about how i see things, how i see the world. I don't see it as rigged, in totality, against me. I don't see rootedness as my immediate goal, though one day i hope to God to get there. I see different commodities as more immediate necessities. I think that is okay, valid, even if my dad's way really works for him. I conjecture that my way is what will work for me. More than one right answer, a thesis is about supporting your views.
the past three years have been about acquiring the perspective and experience to support my own views. they are different, slightly bohemian and sometimes a little bit radical. they will change over time. But i will not sell-out, whole-sale style, to someone else's views ever again.
I am committed to myself. I am committed to myself.


So when i set out for Tulsa, it was turning in my Life's thesis: I was ready to be graded on my own work. I literally said to the Universe, Here i am: Support Me in This Trajectory or Slit my Throat. Like that was the subtitle.

Two weeks ago I got a call from the company i want to work for.
I got the job.
They want me there in a month.
aye yai yai.

C. as in Can Write

so the husband has restarted blogging and he's got a lot to say. please go visit him at Exodus, linked to the right.
love.