Views

I always get lost
when I leave the Village
I knew that
I'm not sure why I went.

Under Water

The train left the tunnel for a minute, crossed the bridge, and revealed rows of people in their t-shirts, lines up along the water and basking in the sunlight. Indian Summer. We sat at an outdoor cafe, and I took my jacket off, just because I could.

It was an evening of gathering up the threads of friendships neglected. Of remembering how much I love these people, and the person they make me. Of the simplicity of hours of laughter. I am grateful.

Sometimes, you have to let it be, just as simple as that.

Before October

Today it feels like spring out, did you notice? There was that certain warm air like when the ground is thawing and you know it's almost here. Birds chirp relentlessly, people were sitting on doorsteps as I passed them. The sky is the kind of blue you'd like to lie on a blanket in a park and look at for hours.

I know it's not real. I know.

But I don't care.

Vacation

Screw it. If you suddenly wake up smiling, then do it. I'm giving you some time off from your regularly scheduled misery. Listen to Appetite for Destruction so loud your ears wince and you arrive out of breath at the office from walking too fast. Sit at bars and carry on silly conversation with newfound friends and don't worry so much about missing dinner. Put aside the writing, the reading, the reminiscing. Forget you-know-what and who-know-whom and you-know-where. Ignore the darkening evenings, the ominous chill. Revel in soft skin and soft hearts, in how good a real proper laugh feels, all the way from your gut, through your teeth, into the air.

However long it lasts, enjoy it. You can think about it later. You will think about it later. Vacations aren't forever. Enjoy it, for all it's worth.

And Then

I don't know why it happened, I just looked at my iPod and didn't go for the same old songs that make me think, that make my heart ache, that make the walk home dark. I put on Brit Pop and M.I.A., I straightened my back and looked at every single person I passed. Fuck it, I thought, I'm over being tired, and sad, and homeless, and helpless, and lost. I walked a little bit faster. I smiled, just a little bit, just enough to probably look crazy but fuck it. Like I said. I felt happy. I felt like I was going to pull my shit together and make a life out of these days.

Do you ever get so tired of yourself that you've just had enough? Do you ever hurt so much that you're just over hurting anymore and you stop? Do you ever hear a really happy song and find your heart bubbling even though you didn't try to make it?

I came home, and she said if you want, you can stay a little longer. The cold, rainy streets are suddenly three months further away. The rent that is asked of me a motivation to find work, to find money, to get the rest of the puzzle pieces and fit them in. Crookedly, perhaps, but there.

Fuck it. I have a home. We'll be okay.

Someone Else's Days

Rested limbs and light heart. Limitless coffee and better company could not be wished for. It's Sunday and brunch and the view is all turning leaves and it seems a shame to ask them to pull down the shades. For a brief moment, how easy life. How easy the future, how close the laughter. I understand why people choose such a world. For a brief moment, I don't understand why I don't.

Retreat to a quiet apartment. Such a blessing to have somewhere to go, even if only for a while. Ignore the clocks counting down, they will only disturb your slumber. I sit in front of that word processor, knowing full well the words must be written, but unable to resume their story. How far away they seem.

Today I see the stable life, and I wish that it were mine.

Årsta

Oh how bright the sun today, we fought bravely at the outdoor café, Look! I'm sitting here without a jacket on! and no matter that we piled the blankets high and the coffee grew cold halfway through. Winter is far away yet, I laugh in its face and am invincible.

Nine floors up and the view tames the fiercest lion. The train there crossed the bridge, but pulling out of the south island tunnel was nothing like climbing the Williamsburg bridge. The unsullied houses made my heart sink. I read my manuscript, those dirtied crumpled pages, and they only remind me of things I am better off forgetting, how can I ever finish it when I cannot pull on those feelings again? If I sink in I may never be able to crawl out. I feel like I'm being judged by my bookshelf, she said, but I simply reveled in her collection, in how delicious titles taste when you read them like that, the reminder what it is to be devoured by literature. Words never fail, where life cannot compete.

I saw you tonight, and how comforting your voice, that smile in your eyes. I saw you so close, and yet you were endlessly far away. When I came home we spoke of impossibilities, how there are too many things to wish for. Life has a lot to live up to. Winter, when it comes, will be long.

(all) Over It

On Piglets

A day of rain, but once evening came, the skies cleared and the sun set perfectly over our view in the harbor. For a second I could pretend the boat was the one on the 26th street pier and wasn't the company just as sweet, the light as breathtaking?

Giggles move on to that familiar bar, that feeling of home, and the bartender plays a tune that makes the soul sing, it's not lost on you. Last night, a pair of eyes that knew you when asked questions that made your heart break and you didn't think you were so easily broken. A single sentence can lose your hope and you don't know how to pick it up again. I know you are elsewhere, I can't help but wish you were here.

She looked at me with sadness in her eyes, and I said, I have somewhere to sleep, I have something to eat, I'm fine. But it wasn't the whole truth. The whole truth is I have her, I have hands to hold and smiles to face. I couldn't ask for more, if I tried.

Perspective

Surgery
Four months chemo
Radiation

The second child falls ill
a few years after
the first one was declared well

I can't help but think
how ridiculous
that I should create
my worries
so willingly

when theirs
were so out of their control.

Fall/ter

Today fall truly arrived to Stockholm. I was late for work but still the skies were dark, ominous, I remembered what a winter in Sweden was and shivered. By the time I'd locked up the office, the sun was out and the scarf superfluous. It's easy to be grateful over such a small change.

The weekend passed in stretches of immobility. Of wearing pajamas all day and enjoying movies to which you knew the ending by looking at the cover. Of sitting on opposite sides of the kitchen table with magazines and coffee in silence, but still preferring it to sitting there alone.

I do not write. I do not find the words in my soul. I have been feeling well this weekend, freed from the dark clouds that perpetually circle my air with their questions, their intangible answers. It saddens me that I cannot both be light at heart and literate.

But tonight, just tonight, I do not mind.

2006

I haven't told you yet
but I'm gonna be
with you

Pet Sounds

Some sort of scribble on my wrist; a book title, a reminder of inspiration in times of need, I wash my hands carefully so as not to lose it. The happy hour champagne prices quickly run away with us and by the time we leave the bar, I am wasted. Adults around me keep their walks straight; I adore them already and try to keep up. By the time we reach the next bar, I am falling over myself and have to hold on to my phone to stay standing. A calm voice comes across the line, walks me home.

I reach a quiet apartment, the world's spinning slows, and I regret having had to leave the party when the night was just beginning to sparkle. Remind myself that the fall is long and the bars will remain, the people within. Voices of the evening remind me that time is magic, the world beautiful. I smile in recollection, sleep better than I have in weeks.

Re/Hash

http://twodollarstwentysevencents.blogspot.com/2010/03/if-i-could-come-home.html

(I miss you
so much
it hurts)

Stockholm

sometimes
at night
when there are very few people out
and the city is so beautiful
it hurts
I feel like home.

Re:Spite

The bar felt like a New York speakeasy, the kind that's become so popular lately and you are welcome to hang your coat on the meat hook. You won't need your jacket she said as we went out for a smoke, but the wind had turned, and I shivered. Before I left we had made plans of wedding dress shopping, of party secrets and humble celebrations. My heart burst in the simplicity of their joy. We don't want to make a big fuss. I was reminded how much I love that they are a part of my life.

The wind picked up on the south island, but I was let into a warm apartment and hardly noticed. A rented movie, a few hours of quiet. Normal. Like this living room was a short respite from the storm outside, from the tangled mess within. I reveled in the simplicity. By the time I walked home, the storm lay thick over the city, the streets were dark.

Sleepless, I gave up my staring at the ceiling and turned the lights back on. Began reading through the pages of a manuscript long neglected. Thought, this is what I'm meant to be doing, and for a second felt a sense of calm at my side. I slept. Does it have to be so hard?

Re/search

Inspiration. That's what they call it.

I spend the morning sifting through innumerable sites, all clad in white, all decked with overexposed, semi-focused pictures of happy people, just randomly nibbling on local-organic treats while reclining in designer chairs with vintage fabrics. This is what you should wish your life looked like, they tell me, and I know I'm supposed to create a site, an image, a life just like that. Somebody should say the same about me.

But I am not inspired. I am not envious, or eager to paint my to-do list in their soft white smiles and just-so unruly hair. I am overwhelmed by the perfection, and I am over it.

Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. Give me dirt, and grime, and an honest face I do not have to cover for. Give me truth, and in it I will find the beauty. I will relax. I will live.

When It Drizzles

It seemed a sweet gift that the pouring rain ended just as I needed to go out. Layers of clothes and suddenly it turned out that the air was warm; I am so grateful for every morsel of summer that remains. The movie ended up being about how much the protagonist loved the rain. The irony was not lost on me; I allowed myself to giggle, it was lovely.

He waxed poetic on walking through Paris at night, dreaming of beautiful ages in romantic hues. Every frame dripping with cobblestoned streets and red wine in small glasses, bistro tables lining the sidewalks and Paris doesn't need any help in looking like magic.

Montmartre is beautiful in the evenings. Do you remember that cavernous restaurant in the Marais? We took a wrong turn and found a house where you said we'd one day live. Tonight, I stepped out of the movie theater and the streets looked nothing like that, but no matter. Paris brightens my heart, just by reminding me it's there.

Of Mice

It was hours later than we'd aimed to go home. We left the apartment together, we returned together; I'd forgotten the feeling of having a roommate. I'd forgotten the feeling of having a home; I revel in the sweetness.

The night wore long, the bottles of wine opened lined the table and we couldn't get up. How lovely a long night in Stockholm, the apartment was beautiful, I contemplated hardwood floors and British design, a terrace in the making.

But they spoke of their lives in New York: old apartments, the East Village mice, the Williamsburg rent deals, cockroach customs and cabs, West Village puzzles. Every sentence made my heart ache. New York left a void in me I haven't begun to understand. It beats and cuts and twists in me like a rusty dagger with a vengeance; I bleed.

It is easier to miss than to love. I make up for lost time; the pain is unbearable.

So Do It

Out Loud

We talked for hours, I suspect. I walked around the living room table fifty times; the carpet is so soft underneath. I stared into the neighbors' across the street; they were watching television; I should have watered the plants instead.

The point is, after all the little tornadoes of contempt and regret had twirled through our conversation and into the air, finally the right words came out.

There, she said. You said it. And I knew she was right.

It's funny how you knew all along what to do. How that light always shone and you followed it, on crooked paths perhaps but you always knew what you hoped you'd find at the end.

Sift through the madness. You'll get there, in time.

My Dear Disco

A jumble of thoughts in my head, unidentifiable emotions swirling around like angry bees through my insides. I stand, sit, pace, trying to let them sink to their respective pockets, or storm out of me and at least make sense. I trip in limbo and wait for the days to pass. Today I left the office early; five hours later I'm still waiting to resume my work day.

I suspect I paint a much prettier picture of my past than how it really looked. As though there was a time when I could properly feel things, instead of wading around in this thick soup of ignorance, that I could put words to them and know them and live them. This heart beats so heavy, how does all the blood sink to my knees? I had a home once, filled with things that were mine, I had invoices with my name on them and keys and routines. It seems so pretty in retrospect; the truth is, when I think of it now, does it not make me a little queasy?

There was a point a few weeks ago, when I stood at the edge of having no place to go, and I seriously considered a park bench in a quiet nook south of Hornsgatan. I remember standing there, looking at it, and thinking, wouldn't it be a relief to just give in, lie down, be free. The nights were still warm then, the world still kind. The days are an incessant toss between two extremes of longing. The soup thickens, my heart grows numb.

I think I miss clarity, most of all.

Soundtrack

I'm Not There

How long a Tuesday night can become, such an innocent day and laundry waiting in my sister's basement. One glass in and I was too tired, the world still seemed impossible, where do you go when there is no place that is yours, what do you do when there is no pocket of life in which to toil?

We said goodbye at that same street corner, do you remember, it was months ago now and Stockholm was an unknown adventure in the making. I only barely knew my direction then and now the streets were so calm, so comforting. My heart bubbled with pride over you and I forgot the words for it.

The bar was quiet, Tuesday night quiet, it made the glasses hum at the music. There was a moment, perhaps it was just the beer, where I thought, this is better than a concert, when Bob Dylan vibrated heavy along the old wooden bar, and I wanted to lie on it, sleep until the songs were still and dawn was new, no intrusions to disturb my slumber.

New York, honey. I miss your heavy bars and humming sleep. Your warm Tuesday nights and comforting streets. New York, I miss that place which was mine.

Playing House

The wind picked up tonight. It swirled around me as I made my way down dark, quiet streets. I had forgotten to notice the summer night light has gone. The air is still so warm, my bare legs trick me, I retain the fearlessness of a whole other season. Is it fall now? Is it time to board the windows and hibernate our hearts till spring? I cannot conceive it; my heart burns much too hotly still.

As I made my way up that last part of the hill, around that last corner, followed my confident footsteps through locked gates to which I had the keys, I giggled slightly at the simple pleasure of going home. And I know this is not real, I know this is only just pretend, but sometimes games are just as good as the real thing, if you believe them bad enough.

When I lie in my bed, I can hear the subway trains run underneath me. Under this building, under the earth, at a steady pace on a regular schedule, the green line trains run underneath the bed where I sleep. The thought comforts me infinitely. I vow to believe, however much it takes.

Re:turn.

That last bit, I know it so well. Past the shoreline, past reeds, and trees and bike paths. Past the sliver of an island where I first got drunk. Past the old stone bridge, wasn't there a story of the architect plunging to his death from its edge to save him the shame of seeing it fall? And then the train had stopped at its final destination; like a bad holiday rom-com, I was back in the city where I grew up.

Anxiously navigating familiar streets; I know them by heart and still they are strangers to me. Avoiding eye contact for fear of recognition. Past my old high school, the town square, the orange buses. The twang of the voices around me like an untuned piano in my cringing ears. Such a friendly dialect. My old hairdresser and the concrete slab library relic from the 70s, a reminder of happy childhood summers and it is a beautiful city to grow up in. Another shudder, down my spine. Turning the corner and climbing the elevator, I entered predictability, comfort, a world entirely according to expectation and plan. The world we grew up in, regenerated.

And yet the goal was worth it. Three days spent holding this baby, this new child in a family without blood ties. The magic of shallow breaths against my own, of impossibly small fingers wrapped around my cynical limbs and warm weight sleeping soundly in my arms. Of an entirely new person in the making, and the way the world stops revolving around us when we find ourselves part of a greater whole. I held on to her curious gaze, the soft smell of her blond locks, the innocence of her trust, and swallowed my pride.

That city is not mine. I left it long ago and perhaps it never was to begin with. While it twists and turns through my innards like shrapnel from a war I thought I'd finished long ago, it wraps people I love in soft down and whispers to them sweetly of a life just like they always knew it.

How glad I was when the time came to leave.