The Truth The Lonely Know

I want to mark this day, this hour, somewhere. Here. Why not? After all, this is a more permanent mark than my frantic scribbles in the air. Air evaporates into nothingness and my words fly away.

I finished Lighthousekeeping today. My third Jeanette Winterson in as many days. These books sat on my desk for years. I can't remember how many. I let them gather dust. And now, in one fell swoop, I am devouring them, blood, bone and gristle.

Written on the Body. The Passion. Lighthousekeeping.

And before that Robert Graves. Goodbye to All That. And before that, Evelyn Waugh. Decline and Fall. Brideshead Revisited.

And now I'm thinking of the one remaining Joan Didion on my table. But I shall settle for Chekhov instead.

This is the truth the lonely know. We people our world with creatures of other people's imaginations. We choose the people. We drown in the words. We switch off the light and turn off the tv and say, no more. We withdraw from life. We sit in cafes with a notebook, a book and rueful smile.

We sit in bars alone, watching. Waiting. In the quiet dark, for something, someone to spring. No, not the one with the clumsy thoughts, clumsy hands, eyes like dishcloths, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Not him. Not her.

We listen. Not for the endless interminable conversations full of meaningless drivel, dribble, drip, drip, drip, a leaky faucet somewhere...somebody turn it off. Turn off the main.

Oh for God's sake, shut up!

This is the truth the lonely know.

We could choose to be part of the pageant but the pageant no longer makes sense to us and we choose not to.

The dark envelops, overwhelms, comforts, caresses.

And we fall asleep.

Circles

I intended to stay an hour but I barely stayed half. I saw the boyfriend and went up to him with a smile and a hug and gave him my card. He said, you alone? I said, how long have you known me? Haven't I always been alone? And he smiled.

There are circles. And circles within circles. I sit outside the circle.

I sit alone.

I make my way along the outer rim and grab a seat. Order a tepid Coke because I don't want beer. And those are the only choices with the cover charge.

Singing.

It's nice here, outdoors, feels like the beach. That's what it's supposed to feel like.

The boyfriend comes up to me after a while, his plate full of greasy food that he really shouldn't be having, not with his arteries in the condition they are. He feels sorry for me, sitting all alone, so he chats.

I see you there. Dazzling as usual. I see you there but you don't see me. And then you do. You see the both of us chatting. And you raise one hand in acknowledgement and disappear into a crowd, swallowed up by your popularity.

Within all those circles.

I sit outside.

It's not an hour yet, the time I've given myself to be here, but I cannot take it. I'm not as strong as I thought.

I hug the boyfriend, say I only came for a little while, I only came to show my support. He smiles and nods. He understands.

I leave.

Large gasping breaths, but I make my way demurely to the car I parked far away because I didn't think I'd find a place here.

Farther and farther from the circle containing you.

The Heart Asks The Pleasure First

My darling, a card lies drying on my table. It's for your boyfriend. Well, one of them. The only one I liked.

He of the broken heart, externalised. I made him a card I will put in his hand tomorrow if I see him. Along with some money. Very little. I have very little money on me at the moment.

But what is money, anyway? It's everything when you need it to pay for an operation. It's everything when without that operation, you die.

He looks at me, we acknowledge each other's presence. We're not enemies, but allies in this scourge. We both dove for cover, we tried to self protect, but you were relentless.

Lustrous, shining, as hard as diamond, we threw ourselves against you, and we ended up...

Well you saw how we ended up.

Him nearly dead. Me still dying.

I will put this card into his hand, with the appropriate sentiment. (Did you know I've taken to painting? It makes me feel closer to you. You used to paint, once upon a time)

But how does one commiserate a fellow broken heart?

I say, follow your heart.

But should he? Look where it got him.

Look where it got me.

My darling, when the paint dries, I shall outline the words, Happy Heart Day which surround a blood red heart. The rest of it I painted swirly waves of pink and yellow. Just because.

And I shall write inside:

The heart is so easily mocked, believing that the sun can rise twice or that roses bloom because we want them to. In between freezing and melting. In between love and despair. In between fear and sex, passion is.

And I'll give it to him.

But I mean it for you.

I Follow

I've taken to hiding behind doors and pictures to get a glimpse of her. Skin like silk and a face as limpid as plasticine.

We don't always get to choose what we fall in love with. Or whom. I meant whom.

I listen to her voice in my head and us talking, only it's not us, it's her, I'm silent catching the words as they fall from her lips, saphires to be stored away, sweet saphires I pop into my mouth, sultry saphires that taste of midnight.

Ah, but the moon is orange tonight. And unreadable. And you saw me hiding behind the picture and turned and smiled.

Why was I following you around?

I'm sorry. I thought if I did it quietly, unobstrusively, you wouldn't mind, you wouldn't notice.

And you offer me a glass full of blood. No, wait, it's wine. Yes, wine.

Drink up, you say.

So I do.

I always do.

If you told me to dive into my wineglass I would.

That's how much.

And then you've filled my glass again. I didn't see you do it. I was not looking. You always do things when I'm not looking.

She laughs, her teeth glinting like teardrops. Oh my, but it's wonderful here, in this world that shifts and wobbles and bears me up like waves. Motion. Motion is all I have.

I don't have her. You. You're just a dream and I'm not talking to you here. Not really. You're too beautiful and you only see other beautiful people.

I don't love you. I drown in you. You've taken my volition and I find myself grinning stupidly.

Oh my, but I have no volition. So I follow her dumbly, ducking behind doorways like she hasn't already seen me, accepting glasses of wine when she does, because that's all I know how to do.

I follow.

Love, love, love...

So are you to my thoughts, as food to life,
Or as sweet season'd showers are to the ground...

Love, love, love...

Being your slave, what should I do but tend
Upon the hours and times of your desire...

Love, love, love...

Don't turn around, don't smile at me, don't beckon and please, please, please...

Don't love me back.

The Afternoon After

First, I assume the position. My version of the lotus. And as I sit, I allow the horrors to beat over my head. Primarily self loathing, but Suzuki says, to observe your breathing, and just let it be. So I let it be. I step outside and look at myself, a piece of scrap on the junkyard of life, and just...let it be.

Of course, the mother of all hangovers doesn't seem to work. I'm just thinking about my next drink.

But instead, I take my laptop and start typing. I have to do the various morning (afternoon) chores and then I'll write some more of the "history" section of my book. Flawed, but then, what is editing for if not to correct flawed copy?

Wish someone would edit me, but I resist all editing from anyone, however close or distant. If I had a guru I would probably kick her in the balls.

The screaming keeps on screaming. My head is a cage of spiders. I spit out a large glob of green silk and watch as I weave my phlegm from one point in the window to the next.

Pretty webs. Pretty pretty webs. Why should spiders have all the fun? For that matter, why should cockroaches?

Sit. Breathe. Observe calmly.

Never mind tonight.

I won't think about tonight.

And last night is just a blur. We are supposed to forget. Memory is not our friend.

Let me rephrase that.

Memory is not MY friend.

Wasted Away Again in Margaritaville

It's been awhile since I got smashed, since I dove from a skylight into a puddle, since, since...I forgot what I was about to say.

This is pleasant, this softening of colours, the familiar smells, sweet and noxious, the pain that reaches into my marrow and slams me to the floor.

Do I weep?

Do I vomit?

Decisions, decisions...

There's something vaguely cleansing about the whole thing. Like a benediction. I look out of my little corner and smile sweetly at the blurred, indistinct figures all around.

Ah, someone is talking to me, but I can't hear over the noise (music?)and my ears are already blocked from the absinthe. Who is that? Is he looking down my front? What am I wearing again?

I glance down, oh dear, acres of cleavage.

I want to lean back, but that wouldn't be a good idea. I might fall and there would be no one to catch me. Because I'm here alone. As always. Alone. I don't mind. You get used to it after awhile. I just wish that guy would get his face off my chest. It's slightly uncomfortable. I know I'm supposed to be outraged but find it difficult to care.

Yet.

I'll care tomorrow.

And maybe I should take a walk outside because, because, because, I could keep the rats company and wave at strangers and sing to myself....

Wasted again in Margaritaville
Searching for my last shaker of salt
Some people claim that there's a woman to blame
But I know, it's my own damn fault.

And Then Silence

I choose to. I don't choose to. Those are the only answers we ever need. We don't have to explain, there's no one out there important enough to deserve an explanation.

And yet we find ourselves stumbling over words trying to justify a course of action that has nothing to do with the person we're trying to justify it to.

When really, the only words we need are:

Because I choose to.

Because I don't choose to.

Deep breath.

And then, silence.

I Tawt I Thaw a Puddy Tat

So there I was, seated at the traffic police section of the police headquarters, waiting for my number to be called, deep into Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, the short, short chapter on control. I liked the way this book was laid out and the short chapters (from which Natalie Goldberg got her inspiration to write Writing Down the Bones) and I didn't bother to check my wallet to see if I had enough money to pay for the fine.

Of course, the only reason I was fined in the first place was that in an attempt to get away from home and work somewhere else, I had taken myself to a nearby Starbucks and parked illegally so as not to pay the exorbitant parking rates there. Nothing as exorbitant as what I would have to be forking out now for my fine.

Somewhere at the back of my mind I was vaguely aware of a RM50 note in my wallet so I was none too fussed about it. I didn't even bother to check.

Finally my number was called and as I dug into my wallet and ran my finger through the notes, I swallowed nervously. No, it couldn't be. There was RM26 there, two 10s and six singles. What about the RM50?

I checked and re-checked and in the meantime the police cashier starting getting restive. I mean, it was only RM30 for crying out loud. Surely I had that much on me?

I didn't.

Actually I did if I counted the coins, but I was way too flustered to think of pouring out all the coins and counting out RM4. So I asked if they accepted credit cards, she said they didn't, gave me back my summons and I removed myself from there with all speed.

All the way home I fumed. How could I have lost that RM50? I ran my mind over all the things I had bought in the past few days since I last visited an ATM machine and took out RM100. Well, there was that RM10 that I had to add to the credit card payment. And then there was RM2.05 for that card to Helen, the card, mind you, that I had made myself (no more am I going to fork out impossible amounts for Hallmark). And then there was that RM5.15 for water (the cheapest thing I could buy to sit at Starbucks). And today, there was about RM12.05 at the grocers for a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter and grape jelly. How much did that come to? Oh yeah, and there was RM3 that first day, for a loaf of multigrain bread. (have since decided to shift to white because it's cheaper, lasts longer, and I'm nearly out of money till my next cheque which, knowing this company, will take its time in coming).

So that was little over RM30. I know I had some money left when I withdrew RM100 on Sunday. Where could it have gone? Where could I have dropped it? I ran through various scenarios in my mind as I drove home, completely flummoxed.

When I got home, I overturned my large large bag and set to work. Checked every compartment of my voluminous wallet (emptying it of sundry receipts, hey lookie here...there's the receipt for RM180 for the passel of books I bought from Kino just Friday...oh well, books, you know...it's not a waste of money, it's a tax deduction) I carefully put away the receipt in the envelope marked "Book Receipts 2010" in my tax file. (Yeah, who knew I could be so organised...that filing cabinet changed my life, it did)

And then, there was a faint glimmer of light. Or the cousin of light. I didn't withdraw RM100 on Sunday. I withdrew RM50. Which meant that...I was lucky to have the RM26 in my wallet at all.

Oh dear. I thought of the chapter on control that I read, which urged us to watch our chaotic thoughts, just observe and do nothing about them, feel nothing about them. The first two chapters had to do with posture (fail) and breathing (also fail).

So I sat down, all Zen-like, acknowledged that I had messed up, made myself a pot of tea, and settled down before our rather large television set, popped in a DVD of random Grizzly Adams episodes, and read my Robert Graves memoir.

Now it's Sergeant Bilko on. And I guess I'll read some of my notes.

Just Zenning in the Rain.

What I Really Really Want

1. Seeds from a Birch Tree - Clark Strand.

2. Both seasons of Grizzly Adams.

3. To paint a picture full of purple and yellow.

4. Time to simply read my poetry books and not worry about highways.

I Thought I Heard You Laugh

You were always a joyous creature, a child of laughter, a lighthearted soul, and if you had to go, I wish you had gone simply, sweetly, like falling asleep after a long day.

I would have had you laughing till the end. Not diminished until your voice thin and tired barely made it across the phone line that last birthday, when so many miles away, I called.

It was the last time we spoke. You said you were ready to go. Immolated by the blaze of radiation, poisoned by the chemo and then, the two strokes.

Now I understand that you had to go. But I wish you had chosen some other way. I wish you had believed in a merciful God, I wish the angels had carried you off lightly, like a song, half-remembered, like the flutter of butterfly wings, like the whisper of mist. I would have waved goodbye and it wouldn't have hurt so much.

I know you're in a better place now, but your going the way you did has left a bitter corner in my heart.

So today I take back your death. I erase the pain, the deterioration, the indignity of it all.

No!

You stepped into another room.

You dissolved into light.

And I thought I heard you laugh.

Forgiveness, forgiveness, even if, even if...

Sometimes anger blurs your vision and stains backwards, colouring memories.

Now as the smoke clears, I remember that the child was lean. And that he had lost too much weight for a two-year old. And maybe he wasn't being greedy when he kept stuffing his face full of biscuits and murukku.

Maybe he was just hungry.

And because his hunger opened up gorges inside her, tore at her soft belly with fingernails of steel she was forced to beg:

Please, our phone line has been cut off, we don't have money to pay the bills, the milk has almost run out, my son is hungry...

No one likes to beg. Especially a person who's hitherto been mistress of her own fate. But things change when you're a stranger in a strange land with no job and a husband who has become distant and angry.

There is no bond here to secure lasting love or compassion. Most people look at her with contempt and turn away. If not to begin with, then eventually.

And when one door is slammed in her face, she knocks at another. And another. And another. Any number of doors.

There is no shame in begging so her son doesn't go hungry. So her son doesn't lose any more weight. If anything were to happen to him... but no, she will not think about that now.

Hate melts and forgiveness creeps in furtively like a dog through the links of a broken fence. My broken fence.

I'm guess what I'm trying to say is...

I'm letting it go.

The Beginning of the End (The Sequel)

There comes a time when your friends seem like strangers...not because you have ceased to love them, but because you don't really remember who they are and how you once were together.

So you step carefully, try to be polite and hope no one will notice. Oh, you may do some weird things like get off Facebook just cos suddenly, even if you've been really really careful about add-ons, it seems full of strangers.

So there you are, making it through the day, pushing through traffic until you feel your blood vessels will explode from sheer fury and impotence and suddenly you think...

I need to get out of here. Wonder if there are any jobs in Langkawi. Wonder if I could work half a day and hang out at the beach the other half.

I hate KL. I hate it so much I want to ram into the cars in front of me and scream till I pass out.

I need to get away.

Wholehearted

I have just finished my Emily Dickinson book, some poems, some letters. Mary bought it for me last year - it was part of my birthday present - there were many, many books in that lot, all good, and most of which, I'm sorry to say, I've taken my time to come to, while I read the old books over and over again. Books, to me, are friends. Some of them become good friends. Some of them, it takes time to make friends with.

I'm into my fourth reading of The Waves. It took me a long time to make friends with that one, and to slow down sufficiently to let its beauty wash all over me.

But that's not what I want to talk about. I want to talk about Emily. Not her poems, but her letters. It's hard to believe she was a recluse, reading her letters. They were so loving and affectionate and even when in the deepest affliction (like the deaths of her father and mother) she still found time to write to those who had expressed their love and sympathy and nothing she said ever seemed cliched. It was always fresh.

And I think of the cards we send now, with prepackaged sentiments, or the trite emotions we express (you could probably get them off a Cyrano-type website for every occasion). But even the Hallmark sentiments or Cyrano letters are better than what we usually offer in such cases. Maybe a Facebook comment on a status update. Most times, not even that.

Funny thing is, the more connected we have supposedly become (what with the social networking sites, the God Almighty mobile phone, to say nothing of email) the further apart we have drifted. I felt more real emotion in any one of Emily's letters, whimsical, brilliant, sweet - than in a dozen prepackaged sentiments...but you will say, she was a genius, of course she could write like that.

She didn't know she was a genius. She was just a very plain, reclusive woman, unsung for the most part, loved by those who knew her, who wrote from the heart. And who took the time to write from the heart.

So maybe, with all our avenues for instant communication, we lack the time, (or maybe the wherewithal) to form a single coherent thought. To put thought into a letter, or a card, to write out an address (or even know the address in the first place, who cares about addresses these days), walk to the nearest post office, affix a stamp on the envelope and post it.

The rhythms of life have changed. The currents of our heart have changed.

So there is no peace, no peace anywhere. Just the stormy drums, the discordant blare of the traffic, the boom boom boom of regress and the dissolving into a million fragments.

I want to live with herbs and flowers, and die, when I die, whole.

Emily's Letters

Dear Mary,

When the best is gone, I know that other things are not of consequence. The heart wants what it wants, or else it does not care...

Not to see what we love is very terrible, and talking doesn't ease it, and nothing does but just itself. The eyes and hair we chose are all there - to us. Isn't this so, Mary?

Emily

Time Does Not

They say "time assuages," -
Time never did assuage;
An actual suffering strengthens,
As sinews do, with age.

Time is a test of trouble,
But not a remedy,
If such it prove, it prove too
There was no malady.

Emily Dickinson

This Moment, Perfection

This moment,
Perfection
would be
listening
to you play
Norwegian wood,
Closing my eyes
and drifting off
to sleep
in my own bed.

Chocolate and Adam

Today I went on eBay and bought three books by Natalie Goldberg - Banana Rose, Long Quiet Highway and Living Colour. I love her writing so much, it's so alive and present, that I wanted to binge.

Some people (including Natalie) binge on chocolate.

I binge on books.

Especially books you cannot get here. Hopefully it will arrive in the post in due course without any delays because of ash clouds and volcanoes and stroppy weather.

Today, as I sat at Starbucks and sipped my hot chocolate, licking the whipped cream off the top, I thought, chocolate makes me feel loved. So do some books. Like Martha Becks's Expecting Adam. It's such a weird, friendly book, that when I'm reading it (preferably with a cup of hot chocolate by me) I feel like a good friend is embracing me. I feel warm and tingly inside.

Maybe sometimes, you don't need to have someone across the table from you smiling in amusement and reaching out to touch you.

Maybe sometimes all you need is a glass of chocolate and a good book.

Under Drifts Of Sand

Destiny means nothing.
You could lose the one you love
Misplace them
like a set of keys
and never quite find them again.

I was determined, so determined, the little will, the Big Will, fused together for once.

I was a raven.

I was THE RAVEN.

Nevermore, I breathed.

NEVERMORE.

Yet, every day, every day you are here, more present than the glass of water I hold in my hand, sweating little droplets of condensation, more present than the hum of the car beneath my feet as I force my way onto the roundabout shoving past cars that will not give way, because that's the way you do it, if you drive here.

You're here as I write. You're here as I speak. You're here as I inhale. You're here as I weep. You're trailing down my cheeks, salt tears from some eternal fount. You hurt my eyes. You catch in my breath. You're stuck in my chest.

And I ache.

I ache.

I keep aching.

I have misplaced you. I can't find you again. You're always at the edge of my consciousness, and when I turn around, you disappear.

I've forgotten that I left you behind. In fact, maybe it was you who left. And I've been looking for you for so long now.

But you're lost.

You're lost.

You're not there anymore.

You're lost.

Like me.

Knowing She Would

I once had a girl
or should I say
she once had me...

Sometimes my body is so heavy with sleep that I sink down on the bed and disappear for a while. No words, no sounds penetrate the thick mist...and it aches, a pleasant ache and it's so wonderful, this ache being assuaged, finally...after a long drive into Kajang, a long meandering interview that went nowhere (I don't really know, will have to sift through the recording to find out if he did in fact manage to say something interesting in the whole 90 minutes) and a long drive back in the fading twilight pushing through traffic-clogged streets.

To come home to tea (why is tea always so comforting) and hazelnut chocolate cookies and then, to sleep, sleep, sleep, perchance to dream. I did dream, I think. Auntie Leela was there. Soft spoken and sweet, she's now dead. Two small children, a law practice and breast cancer. A strident mother-in-law, who never quite took to her.

Words, words, words...and her little daughter running to hide under a table as they removed the body from the house. Words, words, words.

Auntie Ann says, painful. Auntie Ann says, one of these days I'll have to talk to her about it. Holding all her pain in her little body. Fending off her loud grandmother and weeping at night, when nobody's listening, for her soft-spoken mother.

I nodded, not having seen the girl. I hadn't spoken to Auntie Leela in years. I hadn't known she was sick. And when she died, it was final. A fullstop. There is nothing quite so final as death. There was no I'm sorry, there was no goodbye. Just two small children, holding their father's hands, looking lost, looking forlorn.

Nothing would ever be the same again, of course. Everyone else falls into routine, everyone else forgets, everyone else expects you to forget, to get over it, to move on.

You never do. (If you accept this, you'll get a lot further than if you expect to)

And then I came up for air. Awake. And wondered what to do. There was much. Maybe I would start with all the stuff the concessionaires had provided. Words. Words. Words. Technical words that couldn't be sexy if they put on a leotard and draped themselves around a pole, slick with sweat.

Steamy.

Slick.

Slimy.

Ooze.

and when I awoke
I was alone
whispered a fool
so I lit a fire
isn't it good
Norwegian wood....

Furyouhin

Furyouhin, I thought of you today. It was intense and disturbing... I hadn't thought of you for so long now. I wondered where you were and why you never let anyone help you or send anything...why you were so ashamed of your life and what you had become.

I thought of you and wanted to talk to you so bad...which is funny cos we've never talked. I've disengaged from the people around me, the people who actually fill my life and overflow out into the sides....and I want to talk to you.

Furyouhin, I know you google your name and you may stumble across this...if you're there...please say hi. Please be OK. Please be alive.

Disconnections

At night, the bears come out. At night, the shadows deepen into dark. At night, all the dreams I comfort myself with during the day, disappear. At night I can no longer pretend.

At night, I don't want to.

I received a call today from someone I didn't particularly want to speak to. Not that I hate him. He's not substantial enough to hate. It was just irritation that after I took all that trouble to change my number, these pests can get a hold of it.

No problem.

Should I change it again?

I switched it off instead. And kept it off.

Then I showered, dabbed on some make-up and went grocery shopping. Well, I stopped at this nice wine bar first, had a glass of sweet sweet Moscatel (maybe a little too sweet), and read my book. Then wrote a little. The place wasn't crowded but the few tables that were occupied were overflowing. Colleagues having their after work drinks. Happy hours. You know the type.

Then I picked myself up off the bar stool to go get the groceries. Shopping is always therapeutic, especially when you try to decide which chocolate chip cookie would best serve. And whether to get that bar of fruit and nut chocolate. (When in doubt, always say yes to chocolate)

And then, clutching my three overflowing plastic bags I emerged outside. It was raining. From what I could see of the wet pavement, it had obviously been raining steadily for some time. I like steady rain. Especially when I'm lying in bed with no place to go, listening to that musical drip on the awning.

But when I've parked the car some distance away it's a different matter. No help for it. I would have to run. So I did, getting drenched in the process. You gotta love that tropical rain.

And came home to make a fish curry and watch Black Adder. And then as I sat at the computer playing (and losing) endless games of Spider Solitaire, this feeling started to grow. I checked the time. Yes, it was after midnight. That witching hour when the sadness grows too big for my body and bleeds out into the corners of the room.

Black Adder notwithstanding.

Tomorrow I have an interview. I will be forced to put on my game face, ask questions, pretend to listen (I won't, I'll leave it to the digital recorder to do all the listening for me), pretend to care.

Ah me, but I don't.

I think I'll keep my phone off for now.

Please Don't Let It Be True

Today, death started whispering to me. Soon, it said, soon I will be coming... and I started to weep, for it was not me death was coming for.

That would have been easy, there is little in my life I would care to take; and if death told me early enough, I would burn everything. And then I would lie down to be consumed.

Leave nothing.

Not even the shells, bones and silence.

But no, it was not me death was coming for. I listened carefully, I heard, but I didn't want to understand.

Please, I said, no, please, take me instead, nobody loves me, not really, it would be OK if you took me... I occupy space and maybe in a little box I would occupy less space, or even better, melt me down to essentials and toss me in the air... and I'd not take up any more space than the light in your eyes, the snowflake on your shoulder, the dust on this book.

It whispered. And I said, no, no, no... please take me instead.

You see, when I was little there was a sense of destiny. I was born for a reason. I was sure. I was here. I was present.

But somewhere along the way, I drifted off the path and landed up tangled in the underbrush. And I tore my clothes and scratched my face and got tired of struggling and sat down to rest awhile.

But then I watched life pass silently by, this ridiculous parade, this circus, this pageant, of which I was no longer a part. And slowly I disentangled myself. And slowly they forgot me. And I, them. (Your face, I seem to remember the lines, the shadows...but it resolves itself into emptiness... don't mind me, just for a minute there, I thought we'd met, but don't worry, I forget, I always forget)

There was my heart
A peeled orange
Dribbling juice
down my front.

Unsightly, you said.
Do something about it,
They said.
Orange stains
all over your cuffs.

So I stopped breathing,
Covered it in clingwrap,
and grew a skin,
tough as a scab.

It is possible to stop feeling.

It is.

And still, death whispered.

And down on my knees.

I begged. Please.

Please don't let it be true.

Silence and Tears

They knew not I knew thee
Who knew thee too well
Long long shall I rue thee
Too deeply to tell...

On a whim, I google his name to see what comes up, this old flame who's been in the news. I flick through the articles, the blog entries, the whole apparatus of his notoriety, and shudder.

I guess he was always weird. I just never realised how weird. When something is not quite quite, when the music is sweet but discordant, take note. It will play itself out sooner or later. And you can either brace yourself or plug your ears and run for cover.

The seeds were already there. But then, he was a no-account and it didn't matter how loud he shouted. Nobody heard cos nobody listened cos nobody cared.

But now....

I read an article he wrote recently and feel the weight of negativity settle gently on my shoulders like an shawl of sackcloth. It itches. It's uncomfortable. I fidget and squirm. I throw it off.

He's not a prophet. He's not God. He just thinks he is.

Sighing, I sip my brew of the day and bite into my apple doughnut with the creamy centre and dream of Corica apple strudel. And listen to Michael Buble's Crazy Love yet again.

I've broken my heart so many times I stopped keeping track...

And suddenly I wish I was still talking to our one mutual friend so I could ask her, have you heard about ...and she would say yes...and we would both sigh and let the silence grow between us, encompassing all complications, half truths, hard edges, broken glass, coffee grounds, rotten vegetables.

We wouldn't have to say much. There is nothing to say.

And if I should meet thee
after long years
how should I greet thee?
With silence...

And tears.

Grrrrr....

You know how some days you can feel stressed and like you're not getting anywhere and anything anyone says, no matter how seemingly innocuous, gets on your nerves?

This is one of those days.

Grrr....

Writing My Way Out

Writing is amazing. It gets you through things you never thought you could get through. When you're not writing, and just feeling and wondering if this excess of feeling is going to tail off, politely, it never does.

But then you write, and you sob through the words, and keep writing...and somehow, you come out on the other side. Not quite the same, but then who wants to be the same? Stagnation by any other name is still boring.

There are a thousand ways to fall apart...

I'd prefer to fall apart with a pen in my hand and some paper to scribble on.

Later for you.

Be Still My Heart

Sometimes the storm simply means you're moving through it. The pain comes up to the light, only to be absorbed by it. It's an excruciating process, but clean. Necessary. Better than bearing all my griefs in my arms.

So yesterday was a day of monumental migraines and an expiration for most of the day, when I had planned to leave, to drive some 300 kilometres down South. Instead, I curled up for hours, trying to get comfortable, to get some blessed relief. But someone stood on the inside of my head and banged away with a sledgehammer.

I felt it.

Dhoom, dhoom, dhoom.

And I kept feeling it, until tired from all that pain, I succumbed and took two Panadols. And then a half hour later, the pain subsided. But by then, I was too exhausted from wrestling with the pain, and too weak, to pack up the car and leave.

And now it's today and I can go. I need to get a birthday cake along the way. And I want to go alone.

Somehow, as time goes on, I seem to place a higher and higher value on being solitary. When voices crowd in, I put up my hands and push them away. Shut them out.

Shut everyone out.

For now.

Giving Up

Sometimes when all else fails, all that's left is for you to get over the one you had given up trying to get over.

I feel myself tear open and I'm falling and I don't know what to do when I hit the ground. It being me, I know I'll bounce a few times before I shatter. That's the way it goes. That's the way it always goes.

Why aren't I dead yet? If life is all pain, where is the savour?

Tonight, I got lost in Shah Alam and I thought of you and I missed you. If you were around, I'd have called you to say, hey I'm your neck of the woods and I'm lost. How do I get to where I want to go?

You were always brilliant with directions.

And I miss you. And I wish you were still here.

Why did you have to go?

Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life, and thou no breath at all?

Maybe you're reading this somewhere. You always said, write to me. And I did.

And guess what? It's been five years and I'm still writing to you.

My heart is broken, the way yours was. You willed yourself dead. How did you do it? What's the secret?

I have an interview tomorrow and I have to be there bright and early, asking questions, nodding and looking interested.

I have an interview and I have to bathe my eyes, red and small from too much weeping.

Why should a horse, a dog, a rat....

I've decided to give up. Something happened and I can't go back there. And I felt my heart start to shatter. And you know the thing with my heart. It keeps shattering, but doesn't quite kill me. It leaves me suspended, neither living nor quite dead.

Are you happy now?

Was it worth it?

We never said goodbye.

I love you.

And we never said goodbye.

And I love you.

And we never said goodbye.

So I'll keep talking to you if that's OK.

And maybe I'll see you around sometime.

Roadworthy

We both drove out, two cars, which seems a little wasteful, but then Maggot destroyed both our number plates. Her back one and my front one. He goes mad dog when it storms (this is a new manifestation and quite scary) and destroys something. Destroys it so utterly and effectively that there is no putting it together again.

We made it to the mechanic fine, my car following hers, going slowly, our lack of number plates on display. The mechanic fixed our problems, laughed at us, asked about the destructive dog (Maggot by name, maggot by nature) and then I prepared to follow Mum back. Which is when things went horribly horribly wrong.

I'm following her as she misses the turning we're supposed to take, the turning she has probably taken, like a million times before, and goes on to Courts, beyond Courts and then the road ends and we are forced to turn into this posh housing estate. A posh housing estate with one entrance which also functions as the exit and Mum is manipulating her car through strange roads trying to find a way out. Instead of simply turning around and going out the way we came in.

We arrive at a great expanse of sand, a house under construction, which effectively puts paid the the road we were on. It's time to reverse, to get out of there. But even then, as she reverses, she stops a postman who is on his rounds, delivering mail in that very isolated and empty area, eyeing us curiously. She stops him and gets him to tell her how to get out. When it should be obvious. I mean, just the way we came in.

And then she turns the car and heads out the way we came in and we arrive at Courts once again. Now if you turn right at Courts, you end up the wrong way on a double lane going in a single direction. What you have to do is cross over to the other side of the road and make a turn into the road going in the opposite direction.

You'd think Mum would know this. She's lived here all her life. She's lived here as we, one by one, moved to KL. Instead, she gets on the wrong side of the road and starts trundling down happily in the wrong direction. I watch horrified, unable to do anything. I horned a few times when I saw she was about to get into the road, but Mum, not knowing who it was horning, ignored it and went anyway.

I have a choice. I could follow her on the wrong side of the road. I could cross over and get onto the right side. I cross over and get onto the right side. After all, two wrongs don't make a right. And watch in horror as the legitimate traffic coming in the opposite direction start honking and flashing her. What on earth does this old lady think she's doing? We continue like this for a while, me watching carefully, Mum, having lost sight of me thinking I'm lost, till we come to a traffic lights. At this point she crosses over to the right side of the road. (which is the left).

When we get home I ask her what she thinks she was doing. She covers it up. I said, why did you turn into that road? She said, she forgot. Didn't know. I say, why did you take us to that housing estate? She says, I missed the turning. How could you miss the turning when missing the turning meant crossing a whole road over to the other side?

She's been sick, very sick this week. That's why I'm here. I came over to look after her. She could barely get out of bed, heavy with phlegm and a shattered throat. I cooked and generally saw that she took her meds, etc. We went to the hospital and to pay a couple of bills on Wednesday. I drove.

Today is the first day she's driving. And I'm starting to be afraid that my ultra-capable Mum, the one who could do anything, talk to anybody, get anything she wanted, is no longer roadworthy.

Backyard on a Thursday Night

Raymond and Mark have taken the floor
And I'm ensconced in my corner
A glass of white to chase
A glass of red
A notebook,
a volume of Sexton
And the music pulses.

I'm alive!
and the world shines for me today,
I'm alive!
suddenly I am here today.
Seems like forever (and a day)
thought I could never (feel this way)
is this really me?

I look up, clap, sing along,
Go back to my book.
Errol asks me: why so alone?
The deejay wants to know:
How can you read in all this noise?
Jerry is curious:
What book are you reading
In all this commotion?

Eccentricity by any other word
is still strange.
He turns over the cover
and shakes his head
Kisses me, and moves off.

Suddenly came the dawn (from the night),
suddenly I was born (into light)
How can it be real?
I'm alive, I'm alive, I'm alive.

And I read some more Sexton.

And the drunk get drunker
Move together
Bodies offering warmth for a night
What's your name again?

And I read some more Sexton.

Avoid the eyes of those who are too dumb to know
that eccentrics are not to be engaged.

Down on the corner
Out in the street
Where the poor boys are jamming
Bring your nickel, tap your feet.

They finish their second set
My cue to leave.
And I do, I'm outta there.
At 39, you're allowed to be weird
No one turns a hair.

A Letter to Whoever

Dear Barry,

There are levels to selling your body; selling your mind; selling your talent, hack though you may be. I've done it in various forms (as you so rightly pointed out, one needs to eat and fork out more than 10 bucks for a coffee at Starbucks, if one is to rest, complacent in these shifting sands of commerce and philosophy) but being a PR, writing what I knew not to be true, pretending honesty and upfrontNESS and manipulating outcomes, that was something else.

Some people are good at this. I used to despise them for being good at this, but now I don't. It takes a certain sort of toughness to be able to look someone in the eye and lie convincingly. In many ways I think I am still a child. I try to occupy my body, to be real, but more and more I float off.

I'm reading The Waves again, and funnily enough the character I most identify with is Rhoda, the girl who ends up killing herself, but you don't know it because of the way the novel is written....you just don't hear her voice again, and later someone happens to mention poor Rhoda's suicide...all those years trailing after Jinny and Susan, trying to step firmly in the earth, make an imprint, matter.

At the moment writing is pouring out of me, but mostly broken, twisted things. I got myself a supply of sleeping pills for five nights, but the problem with sleeping pills is that the effect tends to stay in your system a lot longer. I didn't take one yesterday because I had come back to Johor and I only want to take them in KL, when I have to wake up early and work...and I tossed and turned and threw off the twisted sheets and generally made a nuisance of myself.

There is something in me, something, something, something....so slick and slimy and writhing...that I grow so big to contain it and end up disappearing...I don't know. Nothing makes sense and I don't expect it to anymore. What I think is, plod, one foot in front of another, take the next step, do what needs to be done, just do what needs to be done and then see if you can finish it. I hate the tattered remnants of projects unfinished, unnamed, unsigned, like aborted children trailing around, their vague pale faces full of question, full of longing, full of this great big NOTHING in the centre of me.

I'm sorry for inflicting this on you, Barry. It's relentless, I know.

But you caught me in one of those moods.

My New Best Friend

One little pink goodnight
and I'm floating over my body
trying to absorb the intricacies
of financing the roads we travel
the highways
the byways
and the little roads between.

My own road story
to be written by talking to
cotton heads nodding over
glasses of water
or sneezing over
dusty reports
churning out words
I don't care to read.

Not like Kerouac
who took off on his own journey
who imbibed the necessary
I want some of that
I want to drink
and write
and drink
and write

and hang by a thread

and fall

and fall

and fall

and fall...

I'd like to make myself believe
that planet Earth turns slowly
it's hard to say I'd rather stay awake
when I'm asleep
cos everything is never as it seems

And Kerouac told me to
Accept loss forever
Loss? I can't feel it now
Pain? I can't feel it now
I'm in the air looking on
at the body scored and riven
wondering what it's going to feel like
to crash all the way back down

down

down

down

I'll set my alarm now.

Goodnight.

Temporary

Can't you stay a few days? You're just what I need Ben, because I - I have a fine position here, but I - well Dad left when I was such a baby and I never had the chance to talk to him and I still feel - kind of temporary about myself. Willy Loman, Death of a Salesman.

She stands a little ways away
looking in through the window
always on the outside
looking in.

I live a borrowed life, she says,
Unresolved, temporary
on someone else's time
floating over heads
like a thought
dismissed.

And she wonders
what it's like to breathe
to feel her chords vibrate
and words carry over the emptiness
filling the space between.

And she wonders
what it's like to occupy space
solid in this wooden chair
in this anonymous bar
full of people
empty of dreams.

And she wonders
what it's like
to have more weight
than a passing shadow.

Forever on the outside
looking in
she'll never know.

Lodged Between the Cracks

Back at Starbucks. Where it all started out. Well maybe not all. Maybe some. Starbucks takes me back to the one job I loathed probably the most in my life, and the one that paid me the most. Strange, isn't it, how money is unable to paper over misery? Or maybe not so strange.

Anyways here I am, ostensibly to do some research for my next project. Instead, I've had a shepherd's pie followed by a noir (gooey chocolate with cookie centre) and then read some of Naomi Wolf's memoir about her dad. Well, the book is actually about creativity and about how finding your creative passion is the one important thing in life.

And I arrived here with my laptop and bag of books (including a very very heavy coffee table book I will have to go through carefully) and my eyes were assaulted by people. People on people on people. Oh yeah, well, it IS the weekend. And Bangsar IS very popular. But still. Not a single solitary table for me with all my stuff.

And then I saw Adrian, my friend from Hollywood that I had met at a networking event. We don't stay in touch. We see each other once in a few years. And we catch up. He's a writer. And he tells me things I remember. About exiles being walking wounds. About the manipulative games supposedly nice people can play. About superficiality. That sort of thing. He's into a million projects at the moment, chasing life because someone happened to die in his arms. Someone, he didn't know. Someone who was only 40. Someone who had come for a quick game of football. Someone who had a wife and six kids depending on him.

Makes you think, huh? So Adrian has plunged himself into life, this endless eddying stream, not allowing a moment, a microsecond to escape. While I'm sitting here trying to ease myself into being silent and solitary.

I asked Adrian if he was happy. He said yes, most times. And he asked me if I was happy. I told him I was liminal. And he said that's not a word he hears in this part of the world. In fact, he's never heard it here. And I said, yeah, I read it in some poem in Australia.

And before this, on my way here, stuck in traffic, I kept telling myself, I control my moods, not these cars, not these badly behaved drivers, not this heat, I don't have to lose it...calm down, Jenny, calm down.

Then Rod Stewart started up on the radio and I found myself smiling. Rod Stewart reminded me of an old boss who would say, Jenny, do you have a hot date this Saturday? And I would ask why cautiously, knowing where this would lead. And he would say, how would you like to date me? Meaning, how would I like to write this particular column for the week, after which he would treat me to butter prawns. He had something about him, he made working Saturdays fun. I never knew how much fun until he left and working weekends became both interminable and untenable.

And I had a meeting with some bigwig who asked me if I would like to go back to my old newspaper and I said no. It was home, I grew up there, I loved it, but all the people who made it home, all the desks, chairs, clunky old computers, all gone. It had become a foreign place, gleaming and arrogant, not somewhere I would want to be. I told him, I don't fit into organizations. If you want to, give me work to do separately. But I'll never go back. Who was it who said you could never go home?

I don't remember.

But it's true.

So here I am at Starbucks, just getting along, trying to make it through today, trying to go home.

I Don't Know How Not To

Yesterday I gave away my favourite fountain pen. I was sitting in one of those cute little armchairs, all curled up, scribbling away for dear life, when the man I loved showed up. He sat down next to me and chatted. It was one brandy later with no lunch after about a month of not drinking. So I was just a little high. No, higher. Yeah, higher.

And he said, what a beautiful pen, and reached out to take it. Running his fingers over the black and gold, he told me he loved fountain pens. And gave it back to me. I screwed the cover back on and held it out to him. My favourite fountain pen. The one that just minutes ago was recording this whirpool of longing I felt for him, washing over his waterproof boots as he smiled tolerantly.

Polite, but distant, as always.

What the fuck is wrong with me? I wondered. But it wasn't even a question. Here, take the pen. And I fished into my pencil box for the refills. You need to get more of these for it.

He tried it out on a piece of paper I had torn out of my journal. A firm hand. A few words. I don't think I'd really seen his handwriting before. He doesn't write. That's what I do. He sings. And suddenly that torn piece of paper became precious. I wanted to keep it.

So he sang. And I read my book some, clapped some, finished my journal entry some. And at the end, three brandies later, I collected my stuff and stumbled over to where he stood, behind the stage. Here, this is yours. He smiled. No, I can't do that. I can't take your pen. But I held it out, swaying silently, drunkedly determined.

And he took it, thanked me, collected his stuff to head out. No, he couldn't stay and hang out. No, not even for a while as he was meeting someone for dinner and then heading home to sleep. Bad throat and all that. You know how it goes.

Write something, I proferred the piece of paper. He wrote some Lennon lyrics. Signed it. I folded the paper carefully and stuffed it in my wallet.

No, I don't know why. No, I don't know what. No, I can't justify a single thing.

I'm so far past gone that I don't even remember what it was like to be heart whole.

I don't know how to love someone who will never love me.

And I don't know how not to.

Happy Easter

Easter feels weird this year. For the first time, in a long time, I did not observe Lent. Did not give up alcohol or meat or sweets or anything. Did not give up being angry with people who made me angry, did not give up my unforgiveness or judgement, did not give up anything.

So when Mum asked if I was celebrating it, I said, feels strange to celebrate it without preparation.

I have done the fasting and abstinence thing before. Many times. But what I've never given up are my prejudices, my anger or my hatred. Those I've clutched to my chest like treasured bastard children I did not want to abort.

I'm still mad at drama queen though every day I tell myself, look, she's moved on, and I have to forget it. If I get the money back from her, bonus. But really, she didn't ask me, and I can safely blame myself for the whole drama of the weekend. Yes, she led me by the nose. But for someone who's been a reporter all these years and is trained to sift apart what people tell me (if I'm interviewing them) I swallowed everything she said hook, line and sinker without investigation.

I had coffee with a friend yesterday and we discussed my dreadful naivete. And I came to see that if I like you and esteem you as a friend, I probably will not question what you say even if your actions contradict your words. Case in point, a friend who told me she didn't know why she couldn't lose any weight when she ate so little. Of course, when she was saying this, she was stuffing her face with handfuls of greasy French Fries, but my brain could not make the connection between her rather disgusting eating habits and her considerable girth. No, instead, I believed her until another friend pointed out....poor thing, she does like to eat doesn't she?

Reading the transcendentalists now, who require you to make up your own mind about everything (so I can't sail along oblivious like I usually do) I realise that I have to come to some sort of understanding about myself and the world I live in. It's just dumb to take everything at face value and never question what anyone says because it hurts so much to view anyone I like with suspicion.

Better by far, to question everything, and not get caught out or surprised later on. Because I notice that when the disillusionment sets it, it goes pretty far and I tumble down the rabbit hole and take a long time to emerge. I go from a simple and transient liking to black hatred which eventually dwindles away to an even blacker indifference. The kind of indifference where, if you see the person being mowed down by a truck in front of you, your only reaction would be to turn and walk away in the opposite direction because bloodied corpses are icky and you have no room for ick in your life.

So now it's Easter and I'm still trying to figure out what to give up for Lent and what to give up for life and how to live my life.

I woke up to an empty house - Dadda and Julie must be in church. Years ago, Easter was a time for celebration - there was midnight mass which was always more impressive than the Christmas midnight mass, the lighting of the Paschal candle, the church in darkness....the sweet voices of the choir...all of us decked out in our new Sunday best. The final hymn was always a rousing rendition of "Jesus Christ is Risen Today". And we'd file out of church, hearts beating wildly to kiss all those friends and wish them a Happy Easter.

No presents, no Easter bunnies, no chocolate, but a feeling of joy, nevertheless.

This year, it's all ashes and dust, like Good Friday has decided to extend its transmission. No triumph, no starbursts, no joy.

Just a feeling of lingering desolation.

Drama, anyone?

There's some drama going on with the alleged victim of domestic violence and for now, I'm trying to avoid knowing what it is. She sent me a text saying she was very very sorry, but her new company only pays out commissions on a quarterly basis, so as much as she would have liked to pay me back instantly, well, no can do. Could I wait till June?

Sigh.

And in case that wasn't appealing enough, she said her present salary was just enough to cover her baby's needs.

Look, not like I'm bugging her or anything. I have refrained from harassing her, and I know that if left to just the two of us, she would conveniently forget she has a debt (she's a user and that's what users do. Honour forsooth! And I'm too lazy to come down heavy on users when I'm just so grateful that they're not in my life anymore and I don't have to deal with them again) but two of my other friends are involved and one of them at least, is hounding the life out of the poor martyr. She lent the martyr money as well (in her case, the woman asked, nay, begged) and after getting daily doses of just how awful martyr's life was, was prevailed on to say:

"Never you mind about what you owe me. Put it on the backburner. You concentrate on sorting your life out."

Humph.

When it clicked that martyr was:

(a) as hard as nails, really, and a survivor; and

(b) simply making use of us.

my friend was baying for blood.

But the whole thing seems to have gotten out of hand. I don't know what transpired yesterday because the cough mixture knocked me out and I was sleeping like, the WHOLE day, only waking up late at night for dinner and after that unable to go to sleep again. But when I checked my phone close to midnight there were two missed calls and no less than seven messages. SEVEN!

Most of them hinting at some big thing that had happened while I was snoring away peacefully. A fight? A showdown? Was blood drawn? Unforgivable words thrown at each other?

All, mind you, via the weird and wonderful SMS system.

Am glad I missed out on the drama but not too keen to find out what's been happening because you can be sure it will be sordid and ugly and the way I'm feeling now, I don't have the energy to deal with sordid and ugly.

Oh well, I'll keep you posted.

I Just Finished Walden

After hemming and hawing and trying (in vain) to read Maine Woods, on and off for the past 20 years at least (OK it may be less but it feels like the full 20) I have finally tackled Walden, the book that has been much quoted...the fantasy of leaving everything to live in the woods, to live deliberately off the land, to live in some more innocent, morning of life sort of way.

As expected most of the book was not so much about Walden Pond or the changing of the seasons or the wildlife as it was Thoreau's treatise on man, wicked man, and the life to which he had dwindled, a life led foremost by artificialities, a life that was less real and becoming steadily more unreal.

Do I have a woods to go to? And if I did, could I survive? I'm afraid of the jungles around here, the jungles peopled with the old gods of the place who retreated there when the new religions came, cleared out large swaths of land and forced people to forget the old ways. The old gods, now hostile.

So if I were to disappear into the woods, it would not be the Malaysian jungles.

I needed to write this post because I have just turned the last page of Walden and I need something to mark the occasion. Now I'm wondering whether to move on to Emerson's essays (oh you transcendentalists, you!) or Whitman's poems.

(I know what I do want to read now...I want to re-read Naomi Wolf's Treehouse, because there is a philosophy quite in keeping with what I believe in. Thoreau at times struck me as too austere and priestlike).

Decisions, decisions.

The Lies I Tell

I've been pretty sick recently. The usual story - a slight irritation in the throat which was ignored, and which grew to an overall bone-deep tiredness and then the racking cough, and then the long bouts of unrefreshing sleep that felt more like drowning.

And then as I was not getting any better despite the sleep and dosing myself on cough mixture and Panadol, a trip to my favourite doctor provided the needed meds (another cough mixture and something to dry up a runny nose and fever pills as needed) and today a day later, I can actually say I feel better.

The interesting thing I've found lately is that whenever I fall sick, boundaries start to dissolve, dishonesties in my life surface and I see more clearly.

And this time the subject was me. In sharp relief. And I'm so ashamed. As honest as I think I am, I'm a coward. I run away. I avoid confrontation. I escape. I never tell people what I actually think of them. Or stand up for what I think I'm worth. Even saying no has to be done roundabout. Never directly.

I'm ashamed of how I walked out of my previous job without a letter of resignation. I'm ashamed I let my boss underpay me, never acknowledge my work and then yell at me like it was OK to do so. (Of course, he made a slight misjudgement here, thinking I would take it lying down like I had taken everything else)

I'm ashamed of how I never told someone who lied to me, jerked me around and then boasted to others about it, what I actually thought about him (true, I did it indirectly, by writing two very stinging posts and making sure he read them, but it wasn't the same thing as sending him an email). I'm ashamed that I didn't stick around to face him and show him that he was less than nothing, when I knew he was coming to the bar where I was. No, I left. And I left him and his little troupe of whores to slap their thighs and cackle wildly. One of the prostitutes being no less than the cancer patient I had wasted nights and sacrificed sleep over because she was in pain and had: "no one else to talk to."

Note to self: The moment any relationship seems more effort than it's worth, ditch it.

Abandon anyone anytime.

That's a more honest motto to live by than help anyone who needs it. Or who you think needs it. People don't need it. And if they go out of their way to secure your sympathy, there's something wrong, very wrong, in fact, right down rotten (in the state of Denmark, you might say).

I helped someone recently who called me up late at night, accused her husband of violence, led me to a merry dance of driving her all over creation for the police report, the medical report, and all the accoutrements, only to reunite with him that very day. Oh yeah, and I lent her money I couldn't spare. Not that she asked. No, she just let me know she had RM17 to her name, no place to go, no one to turn to...and then silence. She left it open. And like the fool that I always am, I dove right in.

The only good thing that came out of that is that we're no longer friends and even if he half kills her the next time, mine is not a number she can call. Well, she can call. But mine is not a number that will answer. As I said, people who go out of their way to secure your sympathy are suspect. Let her be somebody else's burden.

Because now I look at it, I realise I don't really care.

No really, I don't.

All my goodwill is just about used up.

Conjoined

Days stretch into weeks,
stretch into months,
stretch into years,
And you're here,
you're always here.

You frighten me
with your inability
to just disappear
and resolve yourself
into the dust
of old Memory.

No, you just live on and on
tough as a scar
buried under layers
of fragile new skin.

I want to rip these scabs
and the scabs under the scabs
and every individual scar
that shields your memory.

But it's an endless onion
and every layer gives way to
fresh bleeding, new pain
And somehow,
I don't have the art
to get to the heart
of it.

However much I want to be free
I cannot.
I think I am
and then...

Days stretch into weeks
stretch into months
stretch into years
And you're still here.

And somehow I know
that as the days stretch into years
stretch into decades
stretch into centuries
that you always will be.

Injured Muffin

I'm sitting on the white marble of the hall floor with Maggot who has his forelegs on a towel and his back legs and a large portion of his tummy on the floor. He is quiet for the moment. I have to sit with him to watch him. Elliot, the other dog, has torn up his nose and it seems to be getting worse.

I wasn't here in JB on Wednesday, or we could have taken him to the vet to get it sutured at once. When we arrived in JB and went to the vet yesterday, she exclaimed in horror at the nose, which had deteriorated (it is torn in half right down the middle and in other places too...his habit of sneezing, licking it, and scratching it with his front paw has made matters worse - much worse) and said infection had set in. She couldn't suture it. She gave us pills to bring down the infection, other pills for his sinuses and instructions to come back in a week when hopefully, the infection would have dried up and they can do reconstructive surgery.

This afternoon, I heard Ivan bellowing for me. The nose had started to bleed. That was the point that I decided to take Maggot into the house so I could watch him until we take him to the vet again, tomorrow. This state of affairs cannot go on. My doggie, who is a mass of dried wounds, legacy of another recent vicious fight, sits quietly beside me. He doesn't whine or complain about the pain. I know he doesn't like being inside the house (has tried to escape twice) but he is glad of the company.

My father is sleeping. Because of his recent illness, he is on powerful medication which makes him dizzy. So two sick puppies to take care of. Although I have to admit, since I've come to Johor, I have done precious little taking care of either.

Valentine's Day

I didn't end up watching Percy Jackson. I watched Valentine's Day instead, which I loved, although it still surprises me how big of a deal it is in the US. Speaking of which this year, I wrote out Valentine's Day cards and sent them to a bunch of people. Some, I even gave presents. I guess I was never made to be the Valentine grinch. When I get going I really love it.

And I'm not talking romance.

I remember reading What Katy Did when I was 14 and totally loving that whole Valentine's Day bit and resolving to do something similar. So, I wrote out anonymous rhymes for a bunch of friends signing off "St. Valentine". They knew it was me, of course, but it was still a whole lot of fun. I wrote an awful lot of rhymes when I was 14. Not that many at 15 and still less at 16, but there you go.

This year, the day itself came and went without any hubbub. I think I was asleep for most of it. But the cards and presents, now that was fun. And I met a friend for lunch today that I gave a whole lot of presents to, and when she asked me why, I said...um, Valentine's Day I think. She was tickled pink.

And I've bought Julia Cameron's latest book, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance which means I'll be doing Morning Pages, Artist Dates and Weekly Walks (Solvitur ambulando) for a bit. Maybe that will crank up and kickstart the old creativity machine.

Chug. A chug. A chug. A chug.

Lightning

Usually I wake up at 4 in the afternoon. Today, I woke up at 4. So no change there. The city goes quiet for Chinese New Year. Except when the pesky neighbours decide to drum up the decibels with a dragon dance or illegal firecrackers. (Thank God Maggot and Elliot are not here, they would go crazy).

I can only say I have done nothing in this time.

Today, in a bid to do something, anything, I am going to Tropicana to watch Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief.

So, whatever.

Later for you.

Burning

This heat beats on us in waves - it is everpresent, stifling, dizzying. The air is thirsty, barren and everywhere, people shrink into their air conditioned cars or deep into the hearts of their air conditioned buildings, in a bid to escape it all.

I, on the other hand, haven't left the house in three days. I wake up in the evening (I was watching the first season of Weeds until half past six this morning), have a bite to eat then wander around sleepy and dazed. I feel my face swelling and my body baking. I feel like all the heat is bleeding out of the cold cold North to burn us to a crisp.

I need to go out.

I need to shift this energy somehow.

This overpowering energy.

Burning.

Freefall

At some point, I guess, this pain will get old and dusty and I'll hardly remember the names and faces of the sad occasion (but that's no consolation, here and now).

At some point, it will finally be over and I will not be recycling tired emotions, walking in circles in this thick dark maze, no flicker of light, no way out.

My life has shrunk to nothing.

A teaspoon of leaves.

A grain of pepper.

Nothing.

The road is dark and the ground beneath my feet is no longer simply the shifting sands. It has disappeared.

I stand on nothing.

I am becoming nothing.

This Inferno Inside

You'd think of course, that having nothing to do, nothing to stress me out, no idiots to deal with (idiot being a relative term for anyone who annoys me in any capacity at all, whether they're aware of it and doing it deliberately, or not) I would be all Zen.

Instead, it seems like the rage is stepping up, coming to the surface. For the most part, I'm not aware of it, and then suddenly, someone says something. It may be innocuous or it may not. However, it's like they've tripped a light switch and the anger rises up and blazes forth.

This inferno inside me. And I go from 0 to 1,000,000 in a second. A microsecond. And part of me stands aside, aghast at the ugly thoughts and the ugly words that rise up in the throat and choke me, spill out, engulf, excoriate.

And I try to rein them in and they continue to blaze. I work at my pretty little exercise in futility (I'm told that anger can be channelled into creativity), my journal, read books, listen to relaxing MP3s, but still it surges. And surges.

And I'm hoping that this light switch is a sign that all this stuff is moving through me and getting done with.

But it makes me unfit company for normal people.

I think I'll hang out here and deal, a little while longer.

Resolutions

I started the year pretty disappointed that seemingly nothing had changed. My life was still in the same old rut, and I felt less and less like being upbeat and perky, even for a few minutes everyday, as I read through a list of goals for the upcoming year. I worked on one or another of my exercises in futility (OK, that needlework project may be something I end up giving nobody but it is sure starting to look attractive now). And I decided that I would persist despite the lack of results.

If you're waiting for a breakthrough story right about now, don't hold your breath. There are none. But if I had to zero in on one fault (among, like, a billion) I would say it is a lack of follow through. If I don't get what I want instantly, I stamp my foot, I give up.

Maybe it's the fact that I keep watching for results, rather like one watches a kettle hoping for it to boil sooner, that derails me.

So for now I say, OK, to hell with it. I will keep meditating, reading my goals, visualizing, doing all that kooky stuff.

Maybe things will change inside me. And then outside me. Maybe they won't.

But this sure feels better than wallowing in misery.

I just gave my mother a foot massage. Ever since her stroke, more than 20 years ago, her feet have become more and more non-functional. She stumbles about on them slowly and they hurt more and more. Today, she woke up and they were really hurting.

Until now, because of my habit of awaking only in the evening, I have done thing to ease my mother's pain. So today, I took the muscle and joint cream, asked her to lie on the bed and did a rough lymphatic drainage massage on her feet and legs. (The complete lymphatic drainage massage is a whole body thing and I think I may be introducing that for before she goes to bed every night and watch for results). The last time I did that for someone everyday, (a severely obese friend who had everything and their fourth cousins, wrong with her) for a month straight, there were wonderful results. Her feet, which were permanently swollen, unswelled themselves, her skin was glowing, she could walk rather than stagger and I think she actually lost some weight. Of course, doing the massage every day took its toll on my energy levels and I started to resent it. So I stopped. (see what I mean about becoming derailed?) And all my good work reversed itself.

So maybe there are some good things about this new year. If I look hard enough.

Cut Off

It's 8 in the morning and I haven't been to bed yet. Although I had plans to do something useful tonight, I watched eight episodes of Supernatural (First Season) and worked on my useless piece of needlework that I can't give to anybody instead.

It's easy to shut your mind off and get caught in the world of Sam and Dean (and this season, Dad too) and not ponder on the things that upset me.

I think I'll make a pot of coffee now and have my breakfast. After which I can toddle along to bed.

Nothing is moving, or at least I can't see it if it is and I feel very very cut off from everyone.

Emerging from Oblivion

It's been four very very quiet days. May have something to do with the fact that I only wake up long after the sun goes down and fall asleep in the throes of noontime. I feel very conflicted about a lot of things and basically out of it.

So far the only things that abound are mosquitoes. Mum is irritated at my nocturnal habits but she bears it with her mixture of Bollywood and the trashy novels that Uncle Solomon gave her for Christmas that she can't seem to put down.

Speaking of novels, I have just finished the Lucia ones, and think that EF Benson is frigging genius. They are light, airy (kind of like PG Wodehouse) but here each sting tells. Maybe because all the principle characters are women. And men, such men as there happen to be, are only incidental, and don't really care about the outcomes of all these breathless intrigues. (The main man, the most vivid one there is, does petit point embroidery and polishes his bibelots, rejoices in the name Georgie and acts as Lucia's lieutenant).

I've started a project in New Year's which was supposed to have been completed in time for the Millennium. As you can imagine, it's seriously out of date, but I figured, as I want to finish all the projects I bought from Harvinder, oh all those years ago (the oldest are about 15 years old), I would work on it. I have finished the top border which is pretty good for four days. And it's pretty. And I have nobody to give it to and even if I did, they would think it pretty strange but I try not to think of that. Sometimes we must do senseless thing, to fill the empty hours.

My life is scattered pieces of sunshine and many drops of rain. Really, it's pretty much oblivion and my attempts to emerge from it.

The Old Year is Dying, Let Him Die

I wish to sum up the year, but that requires reflection and its 11am in the morning - and I am in my nocturnal phase, which means I should be fast asleep now. But because Mum insisted I get up and have some breakfast, well the coffee is singing in my brain and I am up, up, up!

This year, I lived by default. I fell into a job because there was nothing better on offer - not that I regret everything about the job - I did meet some pretty amazing and interesting people and I did get to produce two issues of a magazine my way - I fell into flings, I ate my heart out over someone who didn't care and never would care.

Frankly, it all seems like a frantic lack of planning.

Well, I'm starting the next year with a plan. It's slowly solidifying and I'm feeling quite happy about it.

Life can simply happen to you like a traffic accident. Or you can take the wheel.

I'm taking the wheel.

Later for you.

Merry Christmas

What a weird day. I saw it in, puking my guts out and crawling into bed beside my mother. "Ma, I'm sick," I whispered as she moved back to make place for me. And then I shot out of bed again to puke some more. Dry heaves as my stomach had been effectively emptied by first episode a few minutes before.

I tossed and turned, my head in a vice, unbelievable pressure behind my eyes. Pain blotted out everything else. These things happen, sometimes.

And then suddenly, unaccountably, I fell fast asleep.

And today, well today, I wandered through the day, watching Christmas movie after Christmas movie, reading one of my Lucia novels (EF Benson is a fricking genius), working on yet another needlework project (I think this one will be for Helen, Simon's mother).

The day I was due to leave for JB I had dinner with my good friend A. We met at what has become our usual place in Taman Tun, and exchanged gifts. Surprisingly, or maybe not surprisingly considering the fact that we have known each other for 18 years and tend to communicate telepathically, both gifts were handmade. I cross stitched an eagle. She framed one of the few pictures of us together, complete with poem, meaningful words and scrapbook stick-ons. As she doesn't tend to make gifts (that's my weakness) it was more than meaningful. We chewed on our lamb shanks, emptied our glasses of Malbec and the conversation flowed like the wine.

After which I drove back through the relatively quiet highway and Mum had a fit cos I hadn't told her what time I was leaving and all she knew for sure was that I was definitely in KL at 6pm.

I arrived at one in the morning and she staggered out to open the gate as the dogs went crazy. I couldn't let them go, as they were still growly with each other and jealous (they have become significantly more well-behaved since then).

And now, it's the wee hours and I'm awake because there is something, something, something...on the edge of my consciousness and I don't know how to reach out and grab it, or if I should let it light softly, like a feather, on my shoulder.

Perhaps, the latter.

Mark's only present to me ever was his song that he bluetoothed to my phone, which I have subsequently transferred to my Ipod. And when I listen to it, that umbilical cord I thought was cut, twinges.

If music be the food of love, play on...

Never mind.

It is Christmas after all.

Or at least, Boxing Day.

And lemon cakes and moist chocolate cakes and chocolate chip cookies and puddings and mince pies abound.

Sometimes a good friend is all you need

Mary is packing up to leave and I'm transcribing furiously. Furiously. This guy is chattering on about strategic active hedges, and I grit my teeth and type. Did I mention furiously? I pause the recording and look up longingly for a while.

"You leaving?"

"Not unless you want me to stay."

I grin.

"Stay. Please. Then we can have dinner and I can send you home."

She seats herself right down, and decides to go through her voluminous google alerts.

I resume typing. Bad English and all. I don't bother to edit. Too tired. Too fucking tired.

Mel leaves. Then Gerry. And we're alone by the skin of a second. Mary removes her fancy sequinned red purse which contains the all-important keys. We will be LOCKING UP. For the first time. I cram my water cup and coffee mug into an overflowing sink. Lady will be coming tomorrow to wash. Mary moves things around at her desk.

We switch off the lights. Zap ourselves out. And then I rush into the bathroom outside leaving her to get on with it. I come out and she's on her knees trying to jam the keys into their supposed sockets.

"Child, I think she gave me the wrong keys. I've never tried these but they don't seem to fit."

"Give it here."

I try. And try. And try. Maybe there's a knack to this. Maybe not. We look at each other in consternation. "Mel? She only just left. Maybe she hasn't gotten far."

Mary calls her. Mel is already in her car driving away. She will call the boys to see if anyone is in Marketplace. If not she'll come back herself to effect rescue. By now, Mary and I are sitting cross legged on the welcome carpet outside. Except there's no welcome carpet. So we're basically sitting on the floor. Laughing at each other.

"Do you think Dana did this on purpose? Gave me the wrong keys cos I bugged her for them so much. Shoved this unlikely pair in my hands while thinking, he he he I got you, just wait till you try these?"

Now Dana is this inoffensive nice Indian girl. The mousy kind who hides behind her dupatta. You know what I'm talking about. I say, yes, yes, typical Indian drama queen. Maybe she will come here singing then run to one corner and then the other, shade her eyes, and sing...aaaaaaaaaaaaah (you must imagine the wobbliness of the aaaaahs)

Mary and I are rolling on the floor. Charles calls. He's the one coming to our rescue. He's a bit tipsy (they have been at it at Marketplace since 6. It's half 8 now) But he's coming up anyways. He does. Greets us sitting on the floor and shakes his head. Tries our keys just to make sure that the two ditzy females didn't get it wrong. We didn't.

So he locks up for us like the nice boy he is.

And says he might see me at Backyard later. If I'm going. Tired as I am, I tend to drag my ass to Backyard on Mondays just for the sheer punishment of it.

Mary and I make our way to Devi's Corner. Hungry as I am, I tell her my ghost story through mouthfuls of roti canai and mutton curry. Suddenly she remembers:

"Our boy is getting married. He was hanging around the other when you were paying and I wondered what he wanted, and he told me he was going to be away for a few days...going back to India to get married."

We look at each other. If our boy is going to get married, we have to give him an ang pow. Thing is, we don't have any red packets. Or white packets. Or even brown packets. I suggest we nip across the road to see if they have any likely looking envelopes. Mary is all for coming back on another day. But I say, no, we must give him the ang pow before he leaves, not after he comes back.

(For those not in the know, our boy is the best waiter in Devi's Corner. The one comes charging along when he sees us, providing us with water, napkins, and all the attention he possibly can, while attending to 100 or so other customers at Devi's. He's the reason we're platinum card holders there).

Anyway, we are nothing if not subtle. After asking him when he is leaving, we hurtle across the street, look for envelopes, find only ugly brown ones, ask the nice Bangladeshi fler there to show us other envelopes, he shows us some shocking shocking pink ones, Mary blanches, but I think they look festive....so I buy the packet, RM1 for all 25...and we take our own envelopes, write touching notes on the cover, stuff our money into it....then go across the street from him and signal for him to cross the street, present him with the envelopes....ahhh furtive....ahhh drama queens, I hear the tablas and the veenas...

And then Mary slips into the DVD shop and I follow her. She's promised to buy one, just one...or two, no more than two...and the first one is there and the second is sorrylar miss, not arrived yet....and she starts leafing through a pile and I grab her and drag her out of there bodily (I have to, if Mary gets going, we could be here all night).

And I send her home and hoping that one of my other colleagues doesn't come to Backyard with Charlie boy. "Mark doesn't like him lar...but then, knowing Mark he'd have to recognise him before he remembers he doesn't like him..."

Mary: "Oh yeah?"

Jen: "Yeah. Remember how hard I had to work to get him to remember me? I mean, he'd come out to get the morning paper and stumble over me at this front doorstep....Jen, what are you doing here? Me (giggling sheepishly): Oh I just happened to be in the neighbourhood...and then he goes to his neighbourhood mamak to have a teh tarek and there I am behind giant shades and a broadsheet....and then he's driving and glances in his rearview and there I am...

"Child, you're a stalker."

I acknowledge the truth with a sigh: "Yeah."

And we collapse in our seats laughing.

And I don't care that tomorrow is going to be even more complicated than today.

And oh yeah, I decided to give Backyard a miss after all.

No More

All my life it seems that I have been adjusting to one prison or another. Safe behind these golden bars, because I'm too afraid to venture out, alone, in the dark. Safe behind these golden bars, because I'm afraid of what will happen if I do.

I step out, step out into the dark and fall.

And I know now, having lost everything, having to start anew, it's time to be stupid. To let go.

I'm about to step out.

I'm prepared to fall.

In sooth...

In sooth I know not why I am so sad.

I should have that stitched on a sampler and put by my desk. So I could gaze at it at leisure and just get lost in the interminable sadness that to me, seems to characterise this existence.

I fall.

I keep falling.

I haven't stopped falling.

I wish I knew where to go from here.

Creaky Bones

It's about 11.04 in the morning now, which is pretty early for me up to be up, considering. I took knock out cough mixture last night but the effects were temporary. So I spent most of the night tossing (bed was full of bees, empty of sleep).

Before dropping off I attempted to make a start on Italo Calvino's If On A Winter's Night A Traveller. All I can say is he messes with your mind to such an extent that you begin to feel unstitched. Lovely.

In a few minutes I'll have to take a shower and head off for the mechanic to see why my car is leaking. On Saturday they said I could have blown a gasket. Oh well...once it's fixed it's fixed.

Presumably.

This is a car we're talking about.

Counting the Minutes

I finished Baldwin's Giovanni's Room last night. Or rather, this morning at 7am. And then I went to sleep. And woke up at 3. With Mum hollering for me from downstairs from breakfast onwards. Poor thing. I should have taken the knock out cough mixture and gone to sleep.

I wonder which book I'll go for next. Probably Go Tell It On A Mountain as I have that book too. But alternatively I might go for the Italo Calvino book. Hmmm, decisions, decisions.

Giovanni's Room was unbearably tragic. The tragedy was foreshadowed on the first page, the fatal flaw, so to speak (although as a homosexual, I wonder why he considered it a fatal flaw, or maybe, it was the closets who pretended and tried to lead hetero lives despite their proclivities, lying to everyone around, lying to themselves and then destroying everyone around them, who were fatally flawed).

I wish I had a volume of Tony Curtis's poetry now to break the mood.

Let everything that is to fall, fall, beginning with tired love...

Oh well.

I've survived one day more.

This Deafening Silence

Mum stood by the door chattering. She was telling me how she had nearly lost me before I was born. She was 8 months pregnant and in hospital because "the baby was in distress". She told me about the doctor, she couldn't remember his name, but he was very senior, a lecturer even, who sat there with her, recounted his life, told story after story, to calm her down, so they didn't have to operate. One nurse kept coming in to take her blood pressure, etc.

After this, the nurse told her: "You're very lucky. The baby's chance of survival at 8 months is very slim."

So it took another month of distress and a C-section for me to be dragged kicking and screaming into the world. Actually into an incubator as I was so tiny.

And I listened and tried to feel grateful that I had been spared. And I wondered if the baby that was had decided to give it a miss.

All I feel right now is unbearably weary. Like life has passed by and somehow, I missed the bus. And now there is nothing left for me but the slow process of growing old and dying.

And I see his face, white and mocking floating in front of me, laughing. Saying come out and play. And I look at him, beautiful, cruel, angry - and I think...oh God, not again. I know you. And I know what you will do to me. Go play with someone else. I'm not sure I'll survive you.

He withdraws.

All is silent.

I can't bear this silence.

The End

Virginia left her last letter (dated 28 March 1941) on the writing block in her garden lodge. About 11.30am she walked the half mile to the River Ouse, filled her pockets with stones, and threw herself into the water. Her body was not found until 18 April, when some children discovered it a short way downstream. She was cremated at Brighton on 21 April with only Leonard present, and her ashes were buried under the great elm tree at Monk's House with the penultimate words of The Waves as her epitaph: 'Against you I will fling myself, unvanquished and unyielding, O Death!'

Final page, Selected Letters, Virginia Woolf.

Because You Left Me

I was reading Virginia's last letter to Carrington (this was just before Carrington's suicide) and I cried. Just bawled. Who knew that a letter could convey such depths, but then it was Virginia Woolf writing, so that would explain it.

Lytton Strachey had just died and Carrington was unravelling...she was in some ways already dead.

Somehow, in her letter, Virginia managed to capture that sense of loss and futility, reaching out to someone, your arms closing over nothing, the emptiness washing over you, bottomless, irreversible.

And stale platitudes are less than useless, except for the vague sense of someone out there attempting to reach out a hand and comfort you.

But goodness knows, blind as I am, I know all day long whatever I'm doing, what you're suffering. And no one can help you...

Getting Ready To Jump Again!

My life takes on a sameness after a while...walking the dogs in the evening (they look forward to this almost as much as their mealtime), playing Bejewelled Blitz on Facebook, reading my Virginia Woolf (I'm at 1930 now and she's writing to Ethel Smyth of having torn her skirt, knickers and some tender parts not mentioned even between ladies, on barbed wire - ouch!).

So Mum asks when I want to go fix my car (the RPM is all out of sync - Mark trying it out told me to switch cars - he tossed it off lightly as if buying another car was a walk in the park - and maybe it is - I live in a world with imaginary fences which I am afraid to cross and maybe, just maybe, there are no fences but in my head)

And to pay some bills and post my first batch of Christmas cards (I wrote out all of 10 yesterday). I'm listening to Ordinary Miracles by Sarah Mclachlan now on Youtube, I find it particularly evocative. Sun comes up and shines so bright and disappears into the night. Except that the sun hasn't come up, or if it has, it is hidden behind muggy blanketing clouds that obscure and obfuscate the day itself.

Oh well, I'll stop prattling now, and stop playing BB and have a shower and take off for the wild blue yonder.

Later for you.

(I miss Mark. No, not that one, the other Mark)

Flaneurs

The rhythms of this place is like balm to a wounded soul. I see myself slowly coming up for air. It's like a time-out from life. Hard to think that just 5 months left me this bleeding mess. That's all it took.

And I think I'm so smart but I never, never recognise the signs. The falling apart, the forced withdrawal from life and all I hold dear, the mounting irritation at my friends who are doing nothing more than simply staying in touch.

And slowly I start to feel like I'm going to fly into a million pieces.

And then I do.

Phew!

That was close. Almost too close for comfort.

Maybe I was born to be a flaneur. Now I just need to find my City Lights and my brew of choice and there I'll be.

Later for you.

If Tomorrow Comes

And the next day, I loaded up the car, and took a slow drive back to JB. Slower than I intended because it was tropical storming, so heavy, there were times I wondered if I was going to make it. What with buses and lorries flashing me for going too slow and all that.

So, tension.

And when I got back here, I just fell apart. Sick as a dog. I crept into my mother's bed and stayed there. Phone switched off. I went dark for a week.

Slowly, I felt my spirit knitting itself back together. Slowly.

And a week later I switched on my phone. Now this being my network, all the calls or texts that came during the week would be wiped out. But the phone started to ring. One by one, friends started checking in.

I started to reconnect.

A night spent tossing and turning after these conversations...and now...

What happens tomorrow?

I wonder.

And So I Jumped

And so I finally came to the end of Virginia Woolf's Selected Diaries. The last word in them (unless the last word was edited out) is rhododendrons. Not even a word I know how to spell without looking up. The last year has a sort of unreal quality to it - the war slowly destroying everything she had taken as real and sweeping away the ground beneath her feet. Before that, even when depressed, she was light, sparkling, piquant, provocative and even in all her insecurity - secure in herself.

And yesterday I walked out of a job of no more than five months. I walked out before he ground me beneath his heel, having brought in my replacement and flaunted her in my face and attempted to order me to go for a special lunch in her honour.

"She'll keep you on your toes."

"I wasn't aware that I needed keeping on my toes."

"She can help out in the magazine."

Uh oh. You make your motives very transparent when you say things like that. You hired her for the newsletter. You want a clear delienation between the newsletter and magazine. And you say, she can help out in the magazine?

You said, would you like to come for lunch with...And I said no thanks. And you glared at me, went back to your office and issued an order. Via email. All of you are to come. Which I ignored. And then, you yelled at me in public for not showing up. Everybody else showed up. Why couldn't you?

But you see, you did it to the wrong girl at the wrong time.

I wake up every day with a tension headache wondering how we are going to see yet another issue through. I wake up everyday with a good for nothing deputy who comes and doesn't come to work as she pleases and who doesn't answer either my calls or emails asking for an update on her stories. I wake up everyday, now to your displeasure and the smouldering hatred in your eyes. Marshalling your forces. Making up the charge sheet. Preparing.

I see it all, neatly laid out at my feet, the course you follow. The course you always follow. I guess you must secretly despise me for agreeing to the low salary. We're all worth what we think we're worth. Never mind the fact that you make me work about five times as hard as my predecessor and that I successfully turned around your stupid magazine.

Never mind that.

You're looking to the international face of it, your new acquisition, oh, isn't she just precious, isn't she bout the cutest thing you've ever seen. A master's degree, some experience as a practitioner, she speaks the language...what more could one want?

And now, I've become the one who has defied you one too many times, the one who says no, the one who doesn't sugarcoat her no's to take into account your massive ego.

And so.

I have to go.

Not until this issue is closed, of course. I mean, there are only four stories in....still, oh, I don't know...another nine to go? Yes, let's all be civilized about it. Close the issue and then we'll have our fight and I'll either demote you or push you hard enough so you'll quit on your own accord.

No one is indispensable Jennifer, I thought you knew that.

And if I'd actually given two shits about you, I would have paid you properly.

So I jumped.

Without a net.

Without a parachute.

I cleared out my desk. Left my tag and my key on it.

And because of your frantic phone calls and your frantic texts (which I haven't read) I've switched off my phone and it will stay switched off.

Goodbye.