the mystery of

Immediately following high school, I worked full-time for a few years. Part-time student, 9 to 5 other stuff. At my job, I had occasion to read. A lot. Books for school and such. There was plenty of down time that could be spent doing other things. That was cool, pretty much the only cool thing about that job.

I've never been a newspaper reader, but one day I picked up a copy of something resembling "news." Back when they had regular writers who assembled somewhat local stories, rather then rehashing packaged pieces from around the country. Just to make sure we all understand the same thing about the latest medical research or, in some cases, interpretations of political maneuvering. "Some" might be a bit optimistic.

This had none of that. The cover story was a total and complete tragedy: the murder of a very young, local women. Not a whodunit, because they knew already. But there was murkiness in the details of why and just what, exactly, went down. In the end, the sentences handed down were minimal, especially given the nature of the crime. It was all very, very bad.

I remembered the story being crafted as a metaphor for a sadness that had consumed parts of my city. A rise in violent crime. Senselessness and abandon. There were references to the neighborhood where the crime occurred as being "rough". There were allusions; this kind of thing might happen there, though the writer did not give blame to the environment. This should not have happened, never and not anywhere. The seeds had been sewn long ago.

I read the story at my desk. There were so many details, it took up several pages. I was attached to every word, to the interpretations and the facts and the assumptions about what those facts meant, or what they might have meant. It was not pleasant or exciting. I was afraid. This was my town, but none of these things sounded like they could happen here. I didn't know where they were talking about. No familiar landmarks. I only knew streets with names. This must have been far away from me. Far enough to make me feel safe. But it sounded like such a big deal. I wondered if everyone had known about it except for me. I finished the story, and I didn't ask anyone if they knew. But I thought about it a lot, until I didn't anymore.

Time passes, and that story and many of its details have stuck with me. There have been contexts that give clues. Where the victim worked is a place I've driven past. I've thought about her every time. Without intention, I bring up some of the details in my mind, fuzzy though they are. And then I put them away. It is just not good to think about those things for very long. It's amazing how memories flow in and out and mean something but not too much. All the things we think throughout any given day. If we stopped to dwell too long, we would stand still forever.

Something that has faded, though, is the metaphor I mentioned. A sense that this story meant something more about the land. This memory has not stayed as much. Neither has the sense that this was a big case. There have been many events since then. A lot of other tragedies. And each one is as large as life for the moment its in the eye. When it's gone, there's not a space left unfilled. Just blanks in the periphery, where there are certain people who remember everything that used to be there.

Today, I thought very clearly of this case again. I had mentioned it to my husband when one of those times of remembering struck me, and I asked if he had heard of it, which he hadn't. I decided to try and find the original article to share it with him. In part so it could be big for him, too. And, if I'm honest, to see if the details I remembered were real or just the product of a groping memory. Maybe it hadn't happened at all; like when you see a movie for the second time and you wonder if the ending has changed. I had a few key words which I mixed back in forth in the search. Finally, I found it. Nestled in the findings, but certainly the same story that had once been read on paper.

There were several things I had remembered with crystal clarity. Descriptions of the trial, some direct quotes. And some things I hadn't known at all that now seem interesting. But something that hadn't stuck with me looked up from the first paragraph. The first sentence, even.

It was the location of the murder. It was one block from my current home.

I read the story out loud as though it were for the first time. Every landmark was not just recognizable; they make up the backdrop of my every day. Where phone calls were made just before. The house. The house. Corners and blocks. Places to eat. Everything is here.

I finished reading. We both agreed it was so terribly sad, and things have changed so much since then. "This isn't the same place." We haven't heard about these things happening that close in many years. It's safe now.

For someone's family, it is the same place. On those peripheries are endless spaces that used to be one thing and now the absence means something. Driving by this noun and the past tense will make someone stop.

Standing still.

We will fill this house with love and memories. Like tonight, too, she walked like mad and shook her head "no" to me when I asked her to stop doing something. Where she pulled the blanket up and over her head, getting caught, laughing without end. She leaped over my legs to cross the room and get a toy, banging her head on the floor and bursting into tired and woozy tears. But not into so many that she couldn't make her way over to my arms and put her head close to my chest, her face red and crying aloud. Wrapping herself as far around me as she could. I hushed her. And I kissed her. I held her and sent her love through the safeness I provide. Until she calmed down, and smiled, and went to play away from me again.

hope takes happiness in two rounds

I'm a harsh critic of the end of things. And that's not to say I have discerning taste. But I find the way things end does not often do justice to their beginnings or middles. I have found this to be a common problem with books. I haven't read fiction in a long time for this reason, though my mind has ached for that distraction. It's an issue with movies, too. I think part of the reason I like old movies so much is that I can give them a let on reality. It's like being on another planet with fabulous dresses made of sequins and mink. Where women go on boats to get some rest and perspective. There are notes pinned to their garments so they remember which coat to wear at dinner. She meets Paul Henreid and together, they crash their car in the mountains. Later on, he lights two cigarettes and gives her one. They blow smoke into a blue embrace. I could go on, but you get the idea. Or maybe you know what I'm talking about.

So I've found that often times, the end of things leaves me wanting more. Things really get going in a story and suddenly, or so it seems, the adventure is over and everyone is...happy. Like that's how it happens. As if happiness were inevitable. As if we weren't all trying to catch a glimpse of it in the ether.

Sometimes, all you have is hope, a most dastardly four-letter word. It's not even the promise of something that will come for certain, if not a long time from now. Hope could last forever. You could die hoping. But who wants to read a book where Romeo and Juliet sit in their opposing castledoms, but a moat away, just hoping they will get the chance to be together. Really, it's better if they meet, bang, see the birds, and off it. It's so much more understandable when you think about it that way.

I have found that the ends of things that make sense to me are the ones that lie awake in a bed of wanting. Dreams are unfulfilled and sometimes, the bad guy gets away. There is sadness and pain for certain. There is contemplation. You are alone, and you're thinking about the choices you have made and how you got there. And wondering if all the choices were right. And my God, some of those choices you've made affect other people. In fact, you've brought some people you love along for this crazy ride called "your life." And what if you've been horribly, fatally wrong? What if you thought you knew but you didn't really? What if there are more choices to make. Better choices. What if you can change things, right now. What if there's something else out there that is meant to be magic for you, where you're not split into halves of compromise. What if there's a world where you fit, se,ttled into the chair meant for you where you can do what you want to do and where there are no questions about the matter. And everyone you love is happy. What if that?

This is where the stories I don't like often end. In a place where the world ahead is a model of the moment where happiness was found. Every day from then on out must be the same. No growth. No character development. No reflection. It's a pudding of a life, really. Like taking your favorite picture and photocopying it again, and again, and again. The colors start to fade; it's never as good as the real thing.

I want an ending that distinguishes hope from happiness. Because hope isn't always easy. It's grasping and furious. I've seen it, and I know that's true. It's confrontational. You can't lie to it. And sometimes, you can't have enough. Some things have to end, and you redefine. To be strong enough for the next race. To keep fighting for the chance to get it right, and not blaming the absence of youth for your apathy. No one is ever too old for this.

I rip myself inside and out to change sometimes, almost for the sport of it. That's not good either. Sometimes the waters can be calm. We can learn some details about our protagonist. Habits and vices. It's important to understand what will come to pass. How can you imagine an ending without the shadow of a past?

But it's the imagining that is important, at least to me. Getting there, to wonder what has happened, and what's behind that door as it opens. The cool bell ringing on the frame signals the entrance of someone. Peek behind the shelf to see, and stay as long as the moment lets you. The end lays beyond the pages or the frame. Listen. Look with me.

the sequence with a smash cut

This was one of those weeks. When you do it to yourself, and the week finishes you off.

I overextended myself these last seven days. Some very important things at work, mix in a few personal endeavors, and then there's the general unexpectedness of life. A dash, let's say. As it goes, some things went well and some things, I think I'd rather forget. If I had it to do again, I would have made some different choices about my commitments. In a quiet moment, I'm even a little worried that I actually like to do this to myself. To make it almost impossible for me to have just one important thing going on at a time. Like how my daughter was born when Obama became president. I mean, come on.

This was a week when I played the impostor at the things I wish I could do. Let's face it: I'm not a scholar. I believe in the discipline, I believe in the rigor. I love to read about it. But, when it gets right down to it, it's just not me. This is a difficult thing to admit, because I've had a lot of dreams about the person I could be. An actress, director, lawyer, professor. I didn't put everything I had into any one of these pursuits, but they were roles I had imagined myself playing. The ones that made the cut after I read Nancy Drew and realized I wasn't going to be a detective. Or a cardiologist. These were identities I felt might be within my reach, and the only thing keeping me from taking their shape was time, and effort. That's what I always thought, anyway.

This week, I realized that one of these things was never really available to me. I just don't have the constitution, the muster, the belief. Or the skills. The aptitude. I'm really one of those people that everyone just thinks is worldly. And I can sell almost everything, because I'll believe in anything. With honesty. So this comes off as smart, committed, and knowledgeable. It's gotten me far. I'm not a fake, that's not what I'm saying. But I'm not meant to be an expert, a specialist. I'm a pinwheel. I'm gullible.

So this week, I shut the door to a future I thought I might have had. Without sadness or regret. I just said good-bye, and took a step away and into something else that is uncertain. It could be exciting, even. There are other dreams to be had, I'm sure. I just wish I hadn't packed this discovery all into this week.

This morning, sitting on the floor with my daughter while she was playing, my legs crossed, she handed me a book to read. I know it by heart, but we went through the pages one by one and read as though each one was new. She sunk her head into my lap and held my knee. She looked up at me and smiled and made a lion's roar. And I thought to myself, she has no idea the dreams I've let go.

So I'll still believe in anything.

Fridays with my father

There came some point in my life when I realized I had two parents.

I have always been close to my mother. Very, very close. She's a part of me that is undeniable. We look alike, we talk alike...sometimes I wish I had a gun. A little gun. Extra points to those who understand that reference.

This is a brief entry, because it's an introduction; a teaser.

There came a moment where I realized I had a father. A wonderful being who is as much a part of me as anything in this world. There is no therapy that could help me understand myself as much as the time I spend with my dad. An amazing person. A flawed wild thing. From outside Minnesota. A half of me that I almost didn't believe I had.

I have so many things to say about this. But for now, for this moment, I only want to tell you that my father and I share a serious kinetic vibe. Something that passes over and beyond any distance we've created, or that has been born despite our intentions. Our Friday mornings bear stories. And there are so many to tell. He is wonderful and beautiful and I love him with all my heart. He is how I understand the world. And this next entry. The one I have yet to write. It's in that time that I will begin to explain what that love is all about. The day I realized I was like someone else other than the women I have known. And that thing, that person...was so, amazingly cool.

alone in a room of 1,000

Before my daughter was born, we suffered the loss of a child. That event kicked off a truly horrible week of crap. The kind of week that, when someone tells you about it, makes you wonder whether or not "those sorts of things" always happen to "that person."

* * *

On Christmas Eve 2007, we discovered we were expecting our first child. That same day, my husband accidentally severely cut himself cooking dinner. We laughed at the carelessness of the mistake, and noted that it would make it on our list of bad things that had happened. I remember he turned grey. We had an ER trip on Christmas Eve. Whatever.

We heard the heartbeat at 10 weeks; the doctor found it right away with a tiny microphone pressed against my belly. It sounded strong, like a racehorse.We made small plans and talked about the good times to come. Boy or a girl? Redhead? I really had no idea.

At 14 weeks, I went in for my monthly doctor’s visit, the first one I had been to by myself. My husband was home, horribly sick with the flu. He was in-between bouts of fever and shivering, and sort of felt like he was going crazy or dying. So he stayed home. I read a People magazine while I waited for the doctor. Nicole Kidman was finally going to have a child after years of trying and some previous tragedies. Good for her.

The doctor came in, we talked. I asked questions about food I could eat, and she said as long as I didn't eat only Cheetos and smoke crack, I would be fine. A little blue cheese was nothing to worry about. I felt like I was gaining weight in not cute ways. She checked for the heartbeat but couldn’t find it. “Don’t freak out,” she said, smiling. “I’m not,” I said. “We’ll do an ultrasound,” she said. “Sounds good,” I said. I'm not actually prone to freaking out. Especially when things don't look good. It's a strange calm that I'm grateful for.

In the ultrasound room, the technician put the warm wand on my stomach. The picture of the baby appeared. It looked just like I thought it would, but I knew it was over before she even told me. I saw a band of solid lines where I would have expected to see the blips of life. And it just didn't move.

“I’m so sorry; we didn’t expect to see this today.”

I had just told everyone because I thought it was safe. The baby was gone but had not gone away. I felt hot. I cursed out loud and asked if I could call my husband. I knew I would have to do what hadn't been taken care of for me. And because my partner in crime was totally bedridden, I would have to do it alone. The doctor came in. I asked if I could have a drink that night. She said I could have two. And that I could smoke crack. That last part was a joke, I'm pretty sure.

I got home and poured myself a big vodka and something and went into the bedroom where my love lay all bundled up to prevent the chills, still sweating. It was all so sad. I didn't care at that point if I got sick. I almost wished I would. He was missing his class that night, a course that was co-taught by a professor out-of-state and another professor who I knew quite well. He had written one of my recommendations for graduate school, served as my honor's thesis adviser, and had been very supportive of my scholarly pursuits. He was a good guy and the closest thing I had to a mentor. And he was funny. So because he couldn't go to class, my husband had called in and was listening via phone, not really participating. I sat there with him, hearing students talk and the professor I know guide the conversation with insight and humor. I didn't finish my drink. I made a few phone calls and talked to some friends. There was even some much needed laughter, which I was so happy for. But I spent the night on the couch not sleeping, my mind racing.

* * *

At the hospital the next morning, a sweet woman in the elevator told me how much she liked my shoes. “Thanks,” I creaked and entered into idle conversation. The intake nurse, eying my feet said, “Those shoes are too cool.” Apparently, as you're being squeezed through a black hole, you are forced to be normal. My shoes were hand-painted with a picture of Botticelli's "Primavera" on the top of each. They are pretty cool.

The intake nurse left after asking me some questions, making sure I knew the name of the procedure I was going to have. I accidentally switched around the letters and called it a "CD." I sat there, sobbing. Really at the total sadness of the loss, for the thought of what would never be. That something had ended and that somehow, my body had been a part of it. I had lost something I had never known, which was even sadder. We had never had a chance to fall in love with each other. I said "good-bye" aloud and waited for someone to come get me. And I stopped crying.

In the room where they do the procedure, one of the nurses noticed the tattoo on my right calf. “It’s Whinnie the Pooh! I love Whinnie the Pooh!” I felt sick. She was so sweet. And so normal. I imagined her going home and having dinner with her family. I wondered if she ate breakfast, mostly because I hadn't. Could she eat food before she helped people go through things like this? I wondered if she had always been that sweet or if she had grown to be as she learned to care for strangers.

I had decided I wanted to be awake for everything and as things commenced, I literally began to see stars. My head and chest started to implode. “I feel hot,” I said, and soon a cool washcloth was on my forehead. My heart was pounding in my throat and I suddenly had a very terrible headache. I was made of fire, and the stars exploded into tiny planets. I breathed deeply and steadily. I am convinced that one can conquer anything with breath. I started to cool down, though the headache remained. And it was over. The nurse handed me my clothes.

“What cool shoes!” she said. Seriously, I'm not making this up.

I went home and sat on the corner of the couch. My husband was still home sick. We sat at opposite ends in our own zones of sickness and sadness.

* * *

I stayed home the next day, too. A Wednesday. I just wanted one more day to compose myself before facing people telling me how sorry they were. I knew I would be annoyed by these comments, and I hated myself in advance for that. That day, I received a phone call from my mom. She told me the professor who had been my mentor, the same professor who had been teaching my husband's class and whose voice I had heard on my worst day, had passed away the night before. Very, very suddenly. The memorial would be on Friday. We decided we would go together, my mother and I. I hung up the phone and began to cry again. It all felt so tremendous.

***

On Friday, we went to the temple. It was a really cold day, especially for March. I recognized people there, none of whom knew what had happened to me on Monday. We sat there with another former teacher of mine and listened to people tell stories. They were things I hadn't known about him: how he took care of immigrants from Russia. How much he loved trains. How he and his wife loved to dance. And there were some things I knew already: how he loved to teach. What a mess he was. How he made big things happen out of nothing. There was a lot of love there. Both of his children, older than me and with families of their own, shared memories of their dad. It felt strange to listen to it. I felt as though I were invisible, eavesdropping in on a part of someone's life that was supposed to be private. Sitting there with my own private story. Their loss was so big, because his death had sealed up the possibility of future memories. And they already had some idea of how wonderful that future might have been.

***

The week after all of this, I had to travel out of town for a conference. Of course I did. The keynote speaker was a very vibrant, well-known conductor, and his shtick was to tell us how music tells stories that transcend language. He played a piece by Chopin that, he said, was about loss. And he asked the room of over 1,000 people to take a moment and be silent, and to remember someone close who had been lost. Everyone obliged, and the room fell into a hush.

I felt like I was made of sand, falling into the shape of something else. I had so much I was missing but still felt as though none of belonged to me. What memories was I entitled to, the ones that hadn't been or the ones that weren't mine to have? I danced along a precipice. And finally, I chose something to remember.