Procedure

They expect me to sit in the chair in the corner. Human behavior in this room with nothing but a chair and a mirror is that the person will sit in the chair. It's the expectation of a calculated system.

I wait with the door open. My phone is locked up. I count all the objects in the room, including fixtures and outlets and door handles (both sides), and I include myself sitting in the chair. Forty-eight. This number is pleasing because it is divisible by eight. I do some neck stretches. There's the play I'm writing that I could think about, but when I'm away from it all the characters lead other lives, separate from the play, like they have day jobs and my play is a diversion.

Some song by Rod Stewart is playing through the tinny speaker on the ceiling (object #14), and I'm reminded of how much I don't like his voice, but he had that jazz album that wasn't bad. Didn't my friend Danielle sing one of his songs in a high school choral concert? She was on the homecoming court. Maybe the song was part of the event. There's a connection between her and Rod Stewart in my brain.

The blouse I wore here is a size six petite, too big in the waist, too short in the arms. Another Alice in Wonderland item of clothing I thrifted. It has gussets and placket buttons, and cuffs that fold back to reveal my wrists and two inches of my arm. Dan said I looked skinny in it when I left for this appointment, noting the looseness. None of my clothing feels right on my body. I prefer the outlandishness of costumes, where proportions are malleable. 

The carpeting in here is dark shades of greens in a pattern of varied circles that touch each other and remind me of lumps of moss. The hallway has a thinly striped carpeting of lighter shades of green. The patterns do not match. There is no door threshold strip, and some of the weave has come apart, spiraling up like a weed from a sidewalk crack.

I watch the shadow of another woman as she gets dressed in the room across the hall. The shapes and patterns the shadows make are as beautiful as watching leaf patterns on the ground. This thought strikes a low gong in me. All the leaves are falling now, and the leaf shadows will go with them. Bare branch patterns, arterial, will replace them. I wonder about the life of the woman behind the door, the woman in shadow, who nodded to me a grim acknowledgement as she left for her procedure. Why is she here? I hope it's routine.

I kick my feet to the music, tick-tock them, then move them in opposition. I do the same with my shoulders. This has taken some practice for me to do. Getting mocked about it in a theatre class started the practice. How urgent all the younger-than-me students in that class were. I resented their futures, and loved their enthusiasm.

Didn't I have better thoughts when I was in my 40s? Why can't I just be content sitting in this chair in the corner, a half naked human being with an ill-fitting blouse waiting for her? It seems all my friends who are in their 40s now are leading shinier lives than mine but I know this isn't true. My 40s weren't all that great. My mother was in decline. Helen will be in her 40s in ten years, and I will be ...

The math of that thought is a dark corner I avoid by observing the empty chair in the other room across the hall. It is a nicer chair than this one, I decide, because it's lines have an elegant mid-century modern style. It's arms are polished wood. My mother would have commented on that chair.

Now I am uncomfortable enough to stand, unlock the closet, and rifle around my bag to find my phone. The phone, that devil that promises to connect but divides me from the real world. I'll text Dan to see how he's doing. 

The lab tech arrives to walk me to my test. She's probably 42 or so, thick dark hair, big brown eyes. Lovely. "Hello Jennifer," she says. This week I talked to a receptionist who told me my full name was the same as her best friend. Jennifer Hill. 

My astrological chart reminds me that I am not that special, and my karmic lesson is to learn that others lead lives that are different from my own. Even the other people named Jennifer Hill.

Everything for me right now is 8, 16, 24, 32, 40, 48, 56, present, and accounted for, part of the system.

That Emerson Feeling

As a child I was comforted by the crackling reception of my grandfather's Emerson radio which was gifted as a hand-me-down electronic. Whatever my childhood imagination was up to in the moment -- setting up a set for a TV show, creating a beauty parlor in my room, or writing a short story from the back of my closet, fuzzy AM/FM radio programming was my companion and guide. Switching it on and waiting the half a minute for it to "warm up," was part of the magic of my theatre.

As my parents aged, they kept a radio in their kitchen which was on in the morning and evening. It was always tuned to their local PBS affiliate, WITF. When dad read in the evenings at the kitchen table, he listened to classical music and then would complain when John Diliberto came on with his show, "Echoes." That was his signal to stop reading.

Last week I asked Dan if we could get a radio for the kitchen. I felt like it was our turn to start listening to WITF in the morning and evenings. I'm tired of bluetooth connections and algorhythmic listening. I'm getting older, and I am discerning. I prefer print to digital, face-to-face interactions to online, and I'm loathe to admit I find a strange satisfaction in solving jigsaw puzzles now. I want to turn on a radio and have it fill up the room with songs or stories.

The radio we got also has a bluetooth option (of course), along with its ancient AM/FM capabilities. It is now sitting between the coffeepot and the tea kettle. I have learned after a week of listening that WITF is now all talk radio of some sort or another. There's no programming like Echoes, or classical music. 

I think what I wanted from this radio is something it can't give anymore or its funding gets cut. Free thought. The beauty of cellos on an otherwise empty Tuesday afternoon that lift your spirits and carry you through the rest of your workday. 

At this point, our donations keep the radio voices barely breathing. The knee of the administration is on the neck of every outlet that doesn't applaud it.

My addition of a radio in the kitchen was a way for me to keep the memory of my parents alive. When I switch it on, I find myself grateful that they aren't around to hear what is happening in the world.

I'm listening to a sample of Echoes on my computer's tinny speaker now, a track called "That Shore," from a band called "Pineapple Thief."  I can imagine my father closing his book, switching off the radio, and standing up from the ladderback chair. The caned seat squeaks and then he switches the lights off, the last note in the room an echo in the dark. 

Wyrd Bird Always Looking for Seeds

Well, hello. It's In-betweenween! My favorite time of year, when the leaves sing opera, and the crow visits the Hackberry every morning, and the eye of day squints longer at the start and earlier at the end. Reflection requires some darkness, and silence. This time of year provides it, but you have to be willing to slow down to receive it.

Several months ago, when we were in high sun time, Dan and I stopped at an antique shop in New Hampshire. We both saw the giant letters on the porch, but he was the one who spoke up about them. "What do you think they spell?" he asked. That was just what I needed to hear (he knows me), and we were up on that porch rearranging, trying to figure out what they once read. We found enough intriguing anagrams to buy them, and then drive for hours with giant metal letters squeaking in the back of the car until we were home. We rearranged them several times before getting them to be tolerably squeaky. They wanted to talk! Probably excited to have a new home.

For awhile, the letters sat on the ground by the fence, and we had our turns anagramming. 

A couple of weeks ago, Dan built a shelf for them that is slightly tilted, so the letters won't fall off, but we can still play with them. It's genius. My favorite full anagram of these letters is SOOTHSAYER. It's just right for In-betweenween, which is also my season of life. 

*Note visiting trickter raccoon in photo below:

This past week I completed a HarvardX course in Divination practices. It was fascinating, and illuminated a lot of the work I am doing right now creatively. I'm beyond excited to share some of what I've learned, but am not quite there yet as I am building some pieces and parts. (Don't worry, there are no sheep livers involved.) But I'm verified!

The other day my instincts told me I should spend time in my little attic treehouse after work, and I did, digging through old journals trying to find an answer to a question, and also to look for an empty book to use. I found my answer, and an empty notebook, and I was also gifted with an entry in my journal from last year, where I wrote about the origin of the word "weird." It was originally a noun, and spelled wyrd.

noun: wyrd

connected with fate.

noun: weird; plural noun: weirds 

a person's destiny.

The "weird sisters" of Macbeth were not odd, they were the three Fates. Well, they were also odd, so it was doubly good. Shakespeare was like that. A wyrd bird.

Self-Portrait at 52

Hex of snow I pluck,
lattice of lines I live with,
and this body, Saturnalian,
still rises at 5 a.m.
A quick jerk, upright
each minute the last minute
in this hollow hour.
Bees spark inside me,
and stones moss over,
the entrance shaded.
There’s less to say now.
I see.

Kind Regards for the Banana

I'm trying to befriend the banana, a portable and amicable fruit. I've spent my life disdaining their texture, the little stringy pieces, the black spots, their rubbery skins, the banana-y flavor. I described them to Dan the other day as "the person you don't really like, but you know they are smart and funny and you'll learn from them, so you stick around."

So every morning, I eat half a banana for the easy source of potassium. Dan showed me how to peel a banana the way monkeys do, from the bottom, rather than the stem. And he explained the other marvelous way you can split it into its three natural sections. 

Baking it into things like bread or cake seems like asking it to wear a mask. The theatrics are tempting, but I'm trying to love it for its very nature.  For now, we're at least respectful acquaintances.

Face Full of Something

A week or so ago, I reconnected with a photographer friend to set up an appointment for a new headshot. It's been years, and it's time for an update. "I definitely can't use the one you took of me in 2011, as much as I love it. I've changed," I told her. Eyeglasses are now a permanent feature of my face, as are laughlines, and a WiFi signal of wrinkles on my forehead (good connectivity up there!).  I got off the phone, smiling after catching up on each other's lives, then thought about my self-care routine, and my face, which would be the front-and-center subject for her camera.

That's all it took for me to start thinking that maybe my real face wasn't quite right. In the early morning hours, I succumbed to an Instagram ad for a foundation that got unrealistically great reviews. It seemed to work for all types of skin. The deal was appealing -- a "try before you buy." I could send it all back if I didn't like it. I took the bait.

Two sleek, black bubble wrapped packages arrived within what seemed like hours. It was as if I'd tapped into some secret service agency dedicated to my self-improvement. My face was an emergency. One of the packages bore a sticker that read, "MORE IS MORE." The other, "YOU CAN NEVER HAVE ENOUGH." I already hated it. And yet, I was willing to give it a try. I've worn makeup and it really can make me feel good. I don't wear it too often now, unless I'm performing. I keep a favorite tube of lipstick on my desk so I can swipe it on before Zoom meetings. It's a shade of red called, "No Cry."

Shiny, industrial sized, glittering, and almost architectural containers were nestled inside a box filled with black shredded paper. It was like a Gothic Easter basket. The offering here was layers of assistance, and I scored a "free mystery gift" of eyeliner, which I never use, even for stage makeup.

I spent some time applying everything, and began with the concealer, then realized I was doing it wrong, I forgot to put on the underlayer that spackles and primes the pores. Whoops. Well, whatever. I continued on with spackle, then the foundation, and dabbed a little more concealer on here and there and blended. I have a small palette of rosy blush/lip/whatever that I added so I didn't look dead.

Much improved? In an iPhone photo, I guess a smoother, more even toned version of myself shows. But with the closeup inspection of my 10x mirror (required for makeup now that I have old eyeballs), all I saw was the mask that makeup actually is.  I thought I'd wear it for the day, and returned to my desk to answer some emails. Then I felt itchy. Were my pores breathing? Was this stuff soaking into my bloodstream? Am I allergic? Suddenly I was wearing a face full of anxiety.

It was on 15 minutes before I ran back upstairs and took it all off. Magic! Human again.

A Total Zero

My body is the luminous suit that carries my spirit through this life. I get to enjoy its eccentricities and quirks, like the extra long second toes, the mole on the upper right corner by my mouth, my overall lush-as-a-jungle hairyness, lines across my forehead, a pair of clear, green eyes with aging vision. I've trained my body to be strong enough to perform various feats with hula hoops, an unusual act for someone my age. As a friend said recently, "You defy gravity." Not quite, but in order to dazzle and convince a pal I defy gravity, my body requires a daily maintenance through practice. This has helped (I think), my overall health. It keeps my brain and body challenged.

So yay! My body! I'm celebrating it all the time, right? No. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't think about my body in a negative way:

Is that a jowl?
Why are my legs so pale and cottage cheesy? They don't even look good when I shave them.
Whoa. Arm sag.
Stretch marks.
Can I still see my hip bones? Yes. I'm ok.
My ass feels huge.
I  have the body I did in 2015, I'm ok.
I have the body I did in 2015, I'm fat.

I don't compare myself to others. I compare myself to myself.

Two years ago,  I was a size zero. I was complimented on this thinness, often. When I went to a Redi-Care center with a badly strained back muscle, the doctor spent more time complimenting my physique than assessing my pain. A fellow hooper on Instagram, one I admire, commented on how great I looked, how thin. Friends I hadn't seen in awhile would see me and the first thing out of their mouths would be about my body. "Wow! You look great! Look how skinny! Must be all that hooping!"

I felt great with all this attention, and I felt awful with all this attention. 

It wasn't all that hooping. It was stress. I wasn't eating. It was probably one of the worst times in my life. I was unhappy, depressed, out of my mind with worry all the time, and scrambling to do the right thing for someone I loved. Most days, I was dizzy. I often woke up and had panic attacks. I tried to tell myself the dizziness and panic attacks were just hormonal, but I was dangerously thin and undernourished.

To be skeletal in our society is a goal. I'm five foot eight inches tall and I weighed 117 pounds. I began to praise myself, too. "I'm thinner than I was in high school!"

I think we need to consider what we say to people about their bodies. We don't know why a person has lost weight, or gained it, or how they feel about it. But our culture sure celebrates the thin, the lost pounds, and a youthful look. All the ads I see on social media are for age-defying makeup, tricks to keep my ponytail lively, or diet apps. They have my demographic pegged.

I'm not a size zero now, and most of the time, the little voice inside my head tells me I'm fat, saggy, and too old to be doing what I'm doing. I should just stop. This voice keeps me from being happy sometimes, all these thoughts about my body and it's "failings," which aren't failings at all. It's just my body, being alive right now, in this moment. My body is the luminous suit that carries my spirit through this life. I get one. Let me love it, please, before I have to leave it.

Po Chü-i

The older I get the more I need to read poems by very ancient, and quite dead poets of earlier centuries. Po Chü-i is a Chinese poet who lived from 772-846.

There's great comfort of reading the thoughts of another person, from a great distance in time, and how they connect now. Being human hasn't changed. In this poem about the dreaming and waking world, Po Chu-i reflects on how those two worlds  are both entwined and separate, and how the dream spaces allow him to move as he ages. Po Chü-i  had a long and successful career both as a government official and as a poet, and these two careers seem to have come in conflict with each other at certain points in his life, which is interesting to think about as well as I read this poem.


A Dream of Mountaineering

At night, in my dream, I stoutly climbed a mountain,
Going out alone with my staff of holly-wood.
A thousand crags, a hundred hundred valleys --
In my dream journey none were unexplored
And all the while my feet never grew tired
And my step was as stong as in my young days.
Can it be that when the mind travels backward
The body also returns to its old state?
And can it be, as between body and soul,
That the body may languish, which the soul is still strong?
Soul and body -- both are vanities;
Dreaming and waking -- both alike unreal.
In the day my feet are palsied and tottering;
In the night my steps go striding over the hills.
As day and night are divided in equal parts --
Between the two, I get as much as I lose.

Translated form the Chinese by Arthur Waley