Glass Houses

Finished reading The Glass Room in the early afternoon. I was sitting outside a cafe, damp cold and raining.  When I got to the end, I started to cry.  "I am Ottilie" reduced me to tears. Just as I was wiping my eyes, my friend stepped off the bus and we set off on our usual Sunday expedition. We laughed at me.  Am I soft today or was that amazing writing?  I will have to reread the last part to ascertain that.

I want to know what house Mawer was describing in his book. It exists apparently but it is never identified outright.  Somewhere in the outskirts of Prague this glass house still stands.

Today was supposed to be a trip uptown to the Cloisters but the rain made us lazy. Wendy and I stayed in the Upper West Side. We watched a movie about Queen Victoria and ate terrible Chinese food and complained about the cold.

I have never been to The Cloisters. There is always an excuse not to go. In a way I was glad because I would like to see it alone.  I have a strange love for buildings, there are structures I prefer to see alone. Mostly because I never know how I will react to certain places. The Maparium makes me catch my breath and I can never explain to anyone why that is. The Temple of Dendaur, not the temple itself but the room it is housed in, makes me sad and happy in the same moment.

This morning I found out that my friend Sara does know the violinist I was raving about in December.  Her cousin went to high school with him in Livorno and her husband knows him from the chamber music world of New York. "Do you want to meet him again?" she asked me.  "We could arrange it." My fanhood is not quite so devoted so I declined.

My twin friends are trying to fix up with a friend of theirs. He is kind and trust-funded, they tell me.  He could buy you season tickets to the opera. I met this friend on Tuesday (not part of a set up), been to his big townhouse. I don't know about dating him because he is so shy it sort of hurts me, and I am happy to continue self-financing my expensive habits.

Last night I wrote many pages to add to the novel.  I hesitate to use the N word.  It scares me. The bursts of ideas amaze me, how for months on end I am backed into a corner not knowing how to go from one chapter to another and then suddenly, with two clicks of the mouse, everything falls into place.  My haphazard prose has been there all along, it just needed to be organized.  Here's hoping for more of last night.

Summertime and the Living is Easy

I'm thinking of that old song -- from Porgy and Bess maybe?

Family

In every family with more than one child, does it automatically happen that each child is assigned a role that they are to play throughout their lives?  I want to say that this is particularly the case for Asian families but I know that would be wrong.  Families are not all that different across ethnic lines, it just so happens I have the most intimate knowledge about Asians.

So what’s my point?  That we eldest children are expected to be provide a kind of reassurance that other siblings are not.  Even Lyna, who is kind of a wreck, is expected to hold her sister’s hand through childbirth.  No one seems to know or want to acknowledge that Lyna is drowning.  Never mind that – the other daughter is having a baby!

CC

My friend CC and I have not been in touch much lately.  This is what happens when you (well, CC) tell someone too much about your life.  She has revealed too much to me about her boyfriend. I decided he’s an asshole.  Now she feels bad/resentful that she told me all this because she knows that no matter what nice thing she tells me he did for her, I will keep remembering that he said to her “You do you and I do me,” meaning that he didn’t want to hear about her cancer problems.

This isn’t the first time this has happened with me and CC.  It’s funny that we keep getting back together.  I have had a lot of friends in my life and kept a good majority of them.  I find her to be the most trying.

I am a bit more careful with sharing than she is.  I tell 2/3 thirds of most stories.  I leave out the ugliest parts (or what I deem to be the ugliest).  I’m too concerned with what happens when the emotions calm. Damage control should be kept to a minimum.

Professor Dick

I am more and more uncomfortable with his “caring.” Today I wrote an email telling him that I’m going to San Francisco for Thanksgiving.  The truth is that I have nothing to do for that dreaded holiday. I am going to risk insanity rather than be around him and his wife.

Professor Dick’s kindness to me reminds me too much of the way A hovers over me. Not that these gestures go unappreciated or unreciprocated by me, but I do wonder what the point of it is.

Politically Incorrect Self Labeling

Before I left for California, A and I were talking and he said something weird.  I called him on it and he called himself an “emotional wetback” when it came to me. I have no idea what that even means, if anything at all. But I found it quite funny and felt bad that I couldn’t tell anyone I know that anyone I know said that to me.  My friends are all screaming crazy liberals.  Sometimes, they are oppressive in their embrace of political correctness and sympathy. 

Summertime

At Columbus Circle about a week ago, on Broadway and West 61^st Street, I had the clearest memory of an evening in August with A. I was wearing a blue dress and the wind started to pick up and the rain came pouring down.  A and I ran north in search of some kind of shelter.  It was a lovely time to be had by two broken up people.

Another night – M and I on his motorcycle roaring up Riverside Drive, across Manhattan to the FDR and onto the Brooklyn Bridge and then back across to the Westside Highway.

And another day – Heather and I napping on a blanket at Riverside Park at twilight.  A boy asked to take my picture.  Later the fireflies lit up the evening and we sat there to watch their show even though the bugs were attacking us.

And then that first night with AL on LaFayette Street – a first kiss at the entrance of the F Subway line and that was all. 

In between all these days and nights I mentioned, there were desperate days and nights. What is my point?  That I had a lovely awful summer.

I don’t know how it’s possible for me to say that, let alone mean it.  I’m having trouble accepting that despair coexisted with a kind of happiness.

Snooping

This I have told only my shrink and CC.  I told most of the story.  I have access to A’s personal and corporate email accounts. For a few weeks, I checked both sites, hands shaking (from shame, maybe?).  I don’t know if he’s changed any of the passwords.  I don’t go snooping anymore. Not that I’m not tempted.  But I am less interested for whatever reason. It’s too pathetic.

Baby

For the four or five days I was in L.A., I didn’t think that much about the abortion/fetus/baby.  My mother didn’t say a word about it. But last night after everyone had gone to bed, I found myself thinking about it.  Nothing specific, nothing I can name.  But it was there.  I suppose some part of me was fantasizing how it would be if I had a baby to share with my family.  I couldn’t give in to the fantasy.  Will there ever be a time when I can allow that?

Is there ever going to be a baby for me?  That's the real question, isn't it? Funny that's the first time I've ever actually said that out loud. I wish someone would say for sure.

Everywhere I Go

Cancer is a cruel disease, my mother said, puffing on a cigarette. Give me a heart attack or a stroke. She inhales deeper then clears her throat. Behind her, on the stove, the chicken stews and sour soup simmers.

In the almost 48 hours I’ve been here, my mother and I have gone between avoiding the topics of death and disease to diving headfirst to the heart of the matter. This year has mostly been about loss. The air in this house is stifling – the Christmas decorations were never put away from last December, the terracotta pots in the patio are filled with dirt rather than plants.  My mother has let her hair go gray and needs a haircut.

If you look at her when she leaves for work, you would never know she's kind of a messy housekeeper. Her shoes are Ferragamo, her jackets are boucle so there's never any need for an iron, and the jewelry is always just right.

This put togetherness is something I got from her and my father.  No one needs to know your business.

My mother just came out of her bedroom holding a pair of Pucci shoes that she wants me to have. Haha. Even when she's depressed as all hell, she thinks of my wardrobe.

I looked forward to coming to Los Angeles, but now I can’t wait to leave again. On the plane ride back to New York, I will keep seeing my mother’s soft face.  She is a thin woman with jowls. She is still pretty, but now she squints at everything and she is prone to sighing. She walks in a shuffle, the way old Asian ladies do. She is clearly tired and unhappy with the choices she’s made in her life.

Neither of us is that interested in one another’s life.  It is shocking to realize that this woman doesn’t want to hear a thing about what I do on the other side of the country, who I talk to, where I live.  I’m not sure if it’s because it’s so far away. Or if it’s because it involves no one else in the family but me.  Or maybe it’s because she is still grieving for her sister.  I wish I could say (as I have in the past) that she isn’t interested because she is too self absorbed. But this time around, she isn’t interested because she simply doesn’t care.

Last night A called while I was sitting around doing nothing. It reminded me how when we were together, talking to him was the thing I looked forward to whenever I was in L.A.  I rushed us off the phone – what is the point of all this friendship again? Why does he feel he has to tell me that his girlfriend call him and he had to get rid of her so he could call me?  Sometimes I think he calls to reassure me he hasn’t forgotten me AND to tell me that he’s just great without me.  Perhaps his motivations are not clear to anyone, most of all to himself.  Pretty much the same way I’m a little muddled about things.

The night before I left New York, M and I had dinner. On our way to the subway, we joked about dating each other. I told him, half seriously, that I wasn’t sure if dating is a good enough reason to risk our strange friendship.  He said, also half seriously, that he would be willing to take the risk.  Then we moved on to another topic.

What the fuck was that about? 

M and I been dancing around this for years now. It doesn’t seem to me like it’s ever going to happen. Or even that it should.  Then again, why not?

Now is probably not the time for it. But it’s a nice thing to think about. We could go to the opera together -- that has always held a kind of allure for me because I'm always going to the opera alone.

I'm going to see Faust with my Norwegian granny on Monday.  The Monday after that, I am going to see Aida. I'm going back to the life I had before I met A.

One of the things that changed when I was his girlfriend was that I stopped going to the opera.  I didn't care so much about shoes. I didn't suggest going to the restaurants I used to frequent. Mostly it was because I'd feel strange about it with him.

I don't regret any of the time I spent with A, but I have to say I've missed all this.  And I don't understand why I let it go. No one asked me to. Maybe this just means I'm lonely again -- I think of pretty things when I'm lonely.  Or maybe I wanted us to look as if we belonged together. Pucci and Land's End don't go together very well.

You Again

My reluctance to sit down and write something for this blog is disturbing.  Is this a harbinger that my days as a mad diarist are over? I think not.  There was a possibility of that but I’ve made a few decisions over the last few days that need to be recorded so that I can revisit myself after some time has passed.

Much has happened in the last month – a new man for a time, a new job due to start tomorrow, my sick friend, my dead cousin, floods in my old country, crying over the wrong things but not realizing that until after I’d made myself sick with too much whiskey.

A New Ex

AL and I became something of a couple.  Together, we went out, we talked, we slept, we watched movies. I found myself doing things I would not normally do because he asked me (playing video games). That’s a kind of couplehood, isn’t it?

On Friday, after an incredibly expensive and fun dinner, we broke up.  My fault – I started to think I liked him too much. He started to think I liked him too much.  But the truth of the matter is that I pushed him out and I don’t like him as much as I wanted to or as much as I led him to believe. This is not to say that I don’t like him.  I miss him right now, in fact. But I am not capable of feeling anything real for anyone new.  I thought I was.  I wanted it more than anything because it makes me less sad.  But I can’t hide behind a man. Not for too long anyway.

It seemed to me that AL and I weren’t getting to know each other better. We were stuck on third dates, if that makes sense. We had a good time.  But in the middle of the week, we had hardly any contact.  Any emails exchanged were more perfunctory than anything else.  I thought I would be content with that.  But I have to admit that I want more.  And that I probably won’t find it now because I’m not ready.

AL told me that I was different from his other girlfriends, that I was outgoing. It seemed that he didn't like that about me.  "Not that you walk down the street making friends or anything," he said. I almost contradicted him, but realized that this is how he knows me -- I am a little desperate these days, more vulnerable than I have ever been in my life maybe. Before this year, I was a bit of a hermit.  But now?  There are weeks when I go out every night with a different person.  And I dislike myself a little for it too.  I kept thinking that I wished AL knew me before this year.  I was a different person a year ago.

Would things have turned out differently for AL and me if we’d met six months from now? I feel like I'd be more myself again.  But maybe I'm not so bad now. 

The end of things with AL has left me very sad. It's just me again.

CC

She is losing her hair.  Tomorrow, she will get it all shaved off.  The hair looks dirty and shiny.  When I saw her yesterday, she had no energy. I guess this is how it is after chemo.

Her boyfriend is an asshole.  One of these days, I will have to see him again.  I don’t know where I’m going to find the energy to fake being nice to him.

New Job

My ex A found me a new job.  I will be working a large hospital in the city doing project management.  Exciting. I start tomorrow.

A

I hope that A helping me find this job is going to absolve him of some of the guilt he feels over our relationship.  I could say that he continues to hover around because he still loves me.  That might be true.  But really it’s guilt.  He thinks I’m going to be damaged goods forever because of how things turned out between us.

Baby All the Time

Last week, when I thought that I was falling in love with that guy AL, I told him about the abortion. This is what AL did – he said nothing, he whispered my name and wrapped his arms around me and I cried.  But it wasn’t enough.  He did exactly what I wanted him to do but it was not enough.

And last night I cried about my baby again. At first I thought I was crying over AL.  But then very quickly it came to me that even when I’m thinking of other people and other things, I’m thinking of my little fetus.  It’s not so bad anymore, but it’s still there and even as I say I’m dealing with it, some part of me still wants to run away.

Dating

I’m quitting that game for now. How long with this hiatus last? 

Fire Island

Next weekend, I’m going there.  I was there at the end of spring when I was half crazy.  There is a picture my friend took of me where I am holding a glass of wine.  I can’t bear to look at it.  Five minutes before that picture was taken, I’d been crying. 

I was there in the middle of the summer – no more tears.  But it was hard. 

And now in the fall when the island will be deserted, I’ll be back again.  How will I feel this time?

I met A in Fire Island in the summer of ’07.  

My Toe in the Water

I joined a dating service -- a dare for myself.  I've gone out with three men.  Slept with one.  It is rather thrilling in the moment -- the emails, the meeting, the sex. But in the end I sleep alone and it is still lonely. I'm doing this with a measure of hope for connection and also because it seems like the practical thing to do.  Why sit home?

I have a lot of friends.  I have standing invitations to go to the Hamptons, to Fire Island, to California.  Before the summer is over, I will go to each place I'm fairly certain.

I don't sit around thinking of fetuses. Babies don't make me weak-kneed. I go about my life like a person unburdened because lately that is how I feel. But I don't trust myself. No matter how okay I might appear, there is an emptiness in me. No matter how hard I laugh or how far I travel.  

How to explain it now?  It's not the same grief I lived with a few months ago.  It's quiet and doesn't need to be discussed -- I suppose this begs the question of why I must write about it if nothing else needs to be said.  I have no answer to that. 

Every time I get my period, I think of the abortion clinic.

On Saturday, a friend and I went to Roosevelt Island. From the southern tip of the island, you have a wonderful view of the ruins of the smallpox hospital framed by an ugly bridge. It's an only-in-New-York moment that makes my chest tighten up.  

My ex emails me often.  I wish he would say why.  But we talk about the weather and writing and things that, to me, don't matter quite so much.

Another Saturday Night

Here we are again.  

The title of this post and the first line are both song titles.  Can I write a post consisting entirely of lyrics from different songs to convey how I feel?  Probably.  But I'm won't do it.

A month ago, I decided [wait for it, it's cheesy] to say yes to everything. That meant having a flurry of activity day after day.  Dinner dates and lunches, barbeques in New Jersey, nights spent at wine bars drinking too much prosecco.  I'm not complaining. 

I joined an online dating service and I have two dates this weekend. One of the men seems --right.  But how do you know that from emails and chats?  I don't know.  Maybe he will turn out to be all wrong.

I told my friend Anna that I had an abortion.  She was very sympathetic  -- she offered me her house for as long as I needed it, somewhere to get away she said.  Then she told me she'd had an abortion too.  She said it quite blithely.  

Am I ever going to be able to say it that easily?  "Oh yeah, I once had to get all my wisdom teeth pulled in one day." She said it that lightly.

She has twins now, conceived through in vitro.  It helps to be able to have a kind of replacement for what has been lost, I suppose.

My ex is definitely dating that woman.  How did I know?

I think I am going to be sad about this abortion forever. It makes me feel better to say that, because admitting it also means that I can stop chasing after some kind of panacea to that will remove the stone from my heart.

I will live with this sadness. I'll be okay.