neverending writer's block.

It's almost mid-way through summer (actually, for me, more than midway), and I have to admit I have been suffering from the worst fucking case of writer's block. Aside from the medical writing for work, I have not really written anything new since classes ended. I wrote 6 pages of complete and utter shit. That's about it. When I go to Starbucks to "write," I pull out my Moleskine (yes, I am that cliche) and pen, write some sentences, scribble them out, chew on my pen cap, stare into space while listening to my iPod, write something more, then cross it out again. I end up closing my notebook and opening up a book instead. So I guess there's a slight upside to all this: I've been reading a lot. Faulkner still remains unfinished, as does Adrian's novel, aaaaand Cloud Atlas.....I admit, I've been reading a lot of YA. Sigh. I don't know. My concentration isn't as good as I'd like it to be right now.

And, ever since going back to gluten-free, pizza is like crack. Everyday, I'm tempted to go on PizzaHut.com and get a thin and crispy pizza with breadsticks. A few times, I've fallen off the wagon, and like any addict, felt sick and remorseful the day after, vowing never to do that again. But it's sooooo good. I actually imagine how the pizza will taste. And smell. It's a bit ridiculous.

Here's to hoping it gets better.

tote-ally.

I'm sitting here watching "You've Got Mail," and reminded how much I love, love, love books. Like I could really ever forget. When I was in high school, a great Friday or Saturday night was often a trip to Borders or B&N with a friend, staying out until they closed, laughing and talking and reading books with friends. In college, we also would go to Starbucks during the summer.....smoking clove cigarettes with iced chai, rambling about things we thought we knew so much about. In many ways, not too much has changed in those respects. All throughout grad school, friends and I would go to Starbucks or some other coffee place and talk about our lives and things we thought we knew about and what we thought we wanted. We still do. Post-workshop, when many people in most programs go to the bar, some friends and I would either go to Vine, a yummy sushi place, or to Starbucks, to decompress.

Anyway. Lost my train of thought. Books. I love Chapel Hill, but in the indie bookstore department, it can be lacking. McIntyre's, where I worked, is wonderful and amazing, but not in Chapel Hill and not open too late. Flyleaf is good, but I don't really go there that often, I'm not sure why. Something is just not as warm as McIntyre's. I think because many times whoever is working there isn't really super-personable, unfortunately. But Manhattan, now that's a great place for indie books. McNally Jackson, BookCulture (formerly Labyrinth, which it was when I lived across the street from it), Strand.

Strand Books. I am so intrigued by them. They're downtown, in Union Square. It's huge, for those of you who've never been there. The smell of paper and leather and old books is everwhere in the store. The last time I went there was in early November. I remember what I was wearing that day. Mainly because that was the day that my aunt was taken to the hospital. It was, as my dad said on the phone that day, "The beginning of the end." When I left the store I saw that I had multiple missed calls from him. I had gone there before meeting my friend M for a writing afternoon. There's a cute coffee shop right across from Strand with yummy macarons and coffee and friendly people.
The Strand has used books, new books, and everything in between. They sell Moleskines, Out of Print tees, totes, souvenirs for tourists, etc. It's a huge, dusty, musty, warehouse. The employees are surly hipsters who are usually too cool for you and are frustrated because their Comp Lit degrees and MFAs have enabled them to work for minimum wage. But that's okay, because you kind of still want their jobs anyway. I remember leaving the store with something like 12 books, a pen and a tote for less than $90. Their tagline is "18 Miles of books." As my family knows, taking me to a place like that means I can spend an inordinate amount of time there.
But really, for all the touristy stuff, I love their tote bags. Because who DOESN'T like totes? Who DOESN'T need totes? Especially living in NYC, where you carry your life with you at all times. But they've gotten a touristy rap. Which makes me sad. Because they're strong and well made and really cute. I have two. But I feel like I can only use them when I'm NOT in nyc. A McJ tote, fine. The Independent Booksellers of NYC tote? I use all the time. A BookCulture tote? Seen everywhere around Columbia. But something about the Strand tote makes it too touristy. Sad face.

waiting.

This summer has been weird. I haven't written anything new since classes ended. I haven't worked on the freelance project as much as I'd expected to be able to. I mean, I work daily, but not to the extent I thought I would. Maybe I overestimated my expected prodicutivity. Which is so ironic to me because I still haven't been paid. Yup, working since end of May....and no paycheck yet.

I thought I'd be able to keep up my fast reading pace of 2-4 books a week at the least. Hasn't quite worked out that way. This malaise is so pervasive. Maybe the heat just feels extra oppressive. Maybe this ridiculous, unrelenting insomnia since moving down here has just disturbed everything and thrown my life off. Part of me just wishes it was the end of August already so I can get back to my routine. Maybe I'm just waiting for a breakthrough.

capturing cancer.

I've become quite the Netflix aficionado lately. My friend with whom I'm staying in NC has the whole Netflix on TV thing, and after not having television for so long, I admit, I've overdosed a little bit. Rewatched the whole series of "My So-Called Life?" Yup. Also watched 45 episodes of "Intervention" - great for insomnia, FYI. Watched movies and documentaries, etc. I saw one today that knocked the breath out of me. "Two Weeks" is a movie starring Sally Field, and I vaguely remember wanting to see it when it came out, but then I forgot about it. I venture to say no one's really heard of it. It's about 4 siblings who return home to their dying mother, which they think will only be a few days on hospice, but ends up being two weeks.

Well, wouldn't you know. Sally Field plays a woman who is dying from ovarian cancer. It was like watching a slightly altered version of what my family went through the last two weeks of December. Most movies don't capture death or dying very well. They gloss over it, they make it tidy and neat. Not this movie. It was spot on, from the hospice nurse doing her jobs, to Field puking in a plastic bucket because of the bowel obstruction, to the bodily signs of dying like arching your back, talking to deceased relatives, and reaching out into the air. Even the (mostly unsaid) conversation with the hospice nurse about the use of increasing doses of morphine to expedite the dying process was extremely realistic. The hospice nurse giving the pamphlet about the stages of active dying, and the "timeline." The siblings' reactions to dying and grief was well-portrayed, from the daughter going to the bookstore and getting all the information she could to disseminate it to her family, to the youngest boy being standoffish to hide his fear. The dimmed lights in the bedroom of Field, the music playing, the blanket over the body bag as the stretcher is wheeled out...even the plaid flannel pajamas - these all were in my aunt's experience, as well. What got me was the toast they had after she died. We did the same thing, around midnight, since it was New Year's Eve. 

But what it really captured well was the odd state of limbo one finds oneself in while a family member is actively dying. It is easy to forget that the world is operating normally outside the house. And to be blunt, there's a lot of waiting around when someone is in the last stages of dying. They sleep more and more, and when they are somewhat conscious, they're often really drugged up. There's only so long you can sit by their bed and talk with them. So you find yourself watching television. Or starting to comb through stuff. Or making inappropriate jokes about the situation that would probably horrify anyone not involved. 

It's much less dramatic than movies often show, and that was captured perfectly in this movie. But I think the most accurate thing was the scene when the oldest son goes into his mother's room after she's died, and she's lying there in the bed. He takes her hand and says that even when she was comatose, he still felt like she was there, like she was listening - but he doesn't feel anything now. He's right. You'd be surprised at the palpable lack of life energy there is when someone dies.

It's funny that I happened to watch the movie now, because something happened the other day that really hit me. So, I don't know if I've posted this before, but my aunt had a B&N card, that gives you a discount. All I'd do was give her phone number to use the card. I've used it for years. Well, the day of her funeral, I was at B&N and wondered if she still had it, and it's good until September. So I've been using it. And for a brief moment, things are normal. Well, the other day, I went to get coffee at B&N and was told that the phone number isn't in the system. I insisted she was wrong, since I'd been using it down here when I write in their cafe. She never found it and I left, all pissed off. Well, I go there again and this time, the cashier is a guy who REMEMBERS me from when I lived here, when I'd be there several days a week, doing my freelance writing. He knows I use the card, so when he couldn't find it either, we were both stunned. He asked if it could be under anyone else's name, and I mentioned my cousin. He plugged it in, and whaddayaknow. It was changed the previous day. And for some reason, this really bugged me. I called my cousin, and he said it'll be renewed again, and to keep using it with his phone number, but still. I was annoyed that he couldn't have just kept it the way it was. 

Anyway. Why are you still reading this? Go watch the movie.


ADDENDUM: I'm watching the movie "Griffin and Phoenix", about two people with cancer who fall in love. Amanda Peet plays the girl, and her character says her cancer "started in her ovaries and now it's everywhere." Well, for someone who is in her last months/weeks of cancer, she looks fantastic. Thin, no sign of a bloated belly, she's eating in restaurants, great skin and hair, able to function fully in life....THIS is the kind of movie I was talking about before. So not realistic. 

ramblings of a rainy Monday.

So I'm back in NC. And allergies are still killing me, maybe even more so here. It's been one of those "wherever you go, there you are" past few days. I'm still not writing anything but work stuff, and even then, not nearly as much as I'd like. It was great to see my old coworkers and get piles of ARCs, but there's this latent restlessness/agitation that just isn't going away. My paycheck still hasn't arrived here yet, which gives me an idea of how this is going to be the rest of the summer. (major fail). Super stressed about work, thesis, money, life.....it goes on and on. Nothing new, I guess.

I don't know if I mentioned this before, but on Facebook several people I've gone to college with have been posting about wait lists for preschools, etc. I don't get it. It's preschool. This will not affect your child's chances of getting into Harvard or Yale or Brown. The cache that preschools have, in my opinion, is total bullshit. THIS is what you're worried about? The "right" program where your child can babble with peers and parallel play with blocks and tinker toys? Eventually learn the alphabet? (Although I remember learning it in kindergarten, even though I learned it at home already). I don't know. Maybe it's just the NJ/NYC East Coast thing. I just have a feeling I'd want to shoot myself if I were one of those people freaking out about where my child was going to go for preschool. Safety, etc - yes, I get that. But the other stuff? Ugh. What ever happened to the local preschool? Have things changed that much? Or is this the whole Parenting, Inc thing again? 


Seriously, though, breathe. Think about it. We didn't grow up with competitive preschool admissions. (what a ridiculous phrase, "preschool admissions."). We didn't have thousand-dollar strollers the size of tanks, or videos purporting to make us geniuses. Our parents didn't have designer 3-D ultrasounds (or 4-D, whatever). Hell, my parents didn't even know if I was going to be a boy or girl. We played in the dirt and sometimes ate it. We didn't wash our hands 24/7. We wore - gasp - hand-me-downs. Because we were toddlers. We didn't care. And we turned out okay, for the most part. For all my enthusiasm with kid stuff and baby stuff, this just irks the crap out of me. I know it's a certain socioeconomic niche that I'm talking about, by G-d help me if I ever become like that. 

on the road again.

Well, I  moved out of the city last week and have been at my mom's in NJ. Spent lots of time with my family, including my cousins, who happened to be up from TX. That was nice. Tomorrow, bright and early, I will be hitting the road for Chapel Hill. I always dread the drive, but it's never as bad as I think it will be. It just gets tedious somewhere around Virginia. It feels like a big state. But I'll have caffeine and cd's, so all is well.

My freelance job is supposed to last through the end of July, and then the second phase starts. They said I'll be able to continue, which is good. So that's a relief. I can wear whatever I want to work and work on my own hours. Yay! I see lots of time in Starbucks and B&N in my future.

I've been exhausted to the core lately. Since going to NJ, I haven't been strictly gluten-free, and it's really thrown my body for a loop, I think. The difference in how I feel is big. Once I get down to NC I will be back on the gluten-free track.

One of the fiction MFAs and I might start a YA book club when we go back. There are really great YA books out there. I just read DIVERGENT, which was really well-thought out and has a very strong female protagonist. Sort of like Katniss from the Hunger Games, but more raw.

Anyway....should get back to work. I'm behind on stuff today, since my mom and I went last-minute shopping for K-cups. (And a new pink ribbon Tervis tumbler, which will hold my endless cups of coffee I will be consuming).

one last night.

I'm sitting at my living room desk in my apartment, cooking Annie's gluten-free mac-and-cheese and trying not to die from the heat. I'm listening to "Carolina In My Mind" and "Sweet Home Alabama." That's right....I go back to North Carolina soon!!!!! But more specifically, tonight is my last night in the city. Oddly, I'm kind of sad, but not so sad that I want to stay. I've been busy on a medical writing freelance job, and this weekend has been full of work and packing and cleaning. 


And - I finally met my next door neighbor. I held the elevator for her while she was locking up her apartment, and we got to talking in the elevator, because I had a bunch of recycling I was taking down to the basement. Banner day today. 
And ironically, her name is Faith. 


Still looking for a regular job down South. I emailed the guy at NCSU in the English department that Jill McCorkle told me to email, and got in touch with the Chapel Hill Library. *fingers crossed*. 
In all honesty, I need this time out of the city. I'm worn down, exhausted, have sensory-overload and need to recharge my batteries. I need to fill up my heart again.

But I did it. I survived the year. :)

books and deep thoughts.

Stack o'summer books

Magazines: The New Yorker, like any good MFA student; Publisher's Weekly; Garden & Gun; and the new J.Crew catalog - which they are now calling a "style guide"

So. Above are what I have to look forward to this summer. The bookstore around the corner from me gives store credit for books, and since I had a ton of books, I was able to make several trips to the bookstore and get credit. This is a very good thing, since I am trying to save money. Thrown in there are some ARCs I was able to get, and who doesn't like free advance copies of books? 

I am kind of stunned right now. My old neighborhood in Chapel Hill had an elementary school in it - it was right across from my first townhouse there. The neighborhood is a planned community, and it resembles Pleasantville. There is a village green, people see each other in the co-op and have breakfast together, and many of my professors and even my doctor lived in my 'hood. Each house had a porch to encourage socialization, and the homes were/are beautiful. There were houses, townhouses and apartments. It was perfect, and I loved it. I still do. There are parks, a dog run, green spaces and a running/bike trail. It's an awesome place, in my opinion. The family I babysat for would leave their house unlocked, and really, there was no crime there. I don't remember any, anyway. Well, today, a woman was shot multiple times by her significant other while in the carpool line, waiting to pick up the kids. The same carpool line that I would wait in countless times last year, waiting for the little boy to get let out of school. In broad daylight, in front of the other parents waiting in the carpool line, he drove up to her and shot her. You have to know, this is unheard of in this neighborhood. I mean, this is a place where little kids ride their bikes to school and park them on the lawn outside - and nothing happens to them. Everyone says hi and smiles. In the summer, there is music on the village green every sunday, and on fridays and saturdays, there's outdoor movies on the green. It is pretty idyllic. 

I know crime happens everywhere, but wow, I am just shocked. I can't even put it into words. 

ain't no doubt in no one's mind that love's the finest thing around....

I'm listening to James Taylor's "Carolina In My Mind," and without fail, it still - every single time - brings a smile across my face. It still astounds me how much I've fallen in love with North Carolina and UNC. I don't even know how this happened, or why it endures. After 10 months here in NYC, I am glad that I have not completely reverted back to that city girl. I still have my inner Manhattan compass, and I no longer expect people to smile or say hi to me while walking down the sidewalk, but I still make an effort to talk to salespeople and cashiers, and hold the elevator if I see someone getting their mail. And when I go to NC in a week or two, I will, once again, be greeted with strangers striking up conversations at Starbucks or at the library, people smiling and saying hi at the park, running with my running group, and the slower, friendlier life in Chapel Hill. There is something about that that truly warms my heart, literally.  It's funny, I kind of dread going down there, because I know it will be that much harder to come back to Manhattan.

Some things I want to do this summer:
- go to as many "movies and music on the green" as possible
- gluten be damned, eat my southern fried chicken, mashed potatoes and green beans at Top of the Hill
- sit on the rockingchairs at Maple View while eating homemade ice cream
- work on my thesis outside at the Carrboro Weaver St Market
- drink Diet Cheerwine ice cream floats and eat hush puppies (again, gluten be damned) from CookOut
- go to author events at Flyleaf and McIntyre's
- if I run into her, finally get my picture with Jill McCorkle at one of the events
- meet up with my MFA friends at NC State and UNCG
- go to a North Carolina BEACH!!!!! Would you believe I haven't been????

I can't wait.

I am.

Ten years ago this weekend I graduated from college. Wow. In some ways, it feels like I have lived several lifetimes since then, and in other ways, it feels like it was just yesterday. Ten years ago, the night before graduation, we all got back our letters to ourselves that the school had us write, on a college notecard, the first night we got there. And then I proceeded to get drunk, along with the rest of my class and our families, in the tent party the school threw for us. I remember it as a good night, and I have the pictures to prove it.
Ten years ago, I thought, at the ripe old age of 21, that I had my life figured out. I was ahead of the game. Only 21 and heading to a doctoral program in clinical psychology, I actually had "Jaime's Life Plan" written out. I swear. Little did I know.
Back then, I was consumed with the need to avoid making "the wrong choice." Like my life would take an irreversible turn if I did. I had no idea that some of those "wrong choices" would ultimately show me what I was and wasn't good at, and where my passions were.

I had no idea that the surgery I would have on my foot two days later would be the first of three, and result in chronic pain.

I had no idea that my biggest fear at that time would ultimately come true - I would not be a doctor, ever. And I am finally okay with that. Although I admit, I envied the doctoral robes I saw graduates carrying around here, with those velvet arm stripes.....

I didn't know that I would lose an aunt and a cousin, or gain a nephew, in the next decade. I never would have thought I would lose friends to cancer or see many more live with it.

I never imagined I'd learn to think of myself as an adopted Southerner, or grow to dislike New York.

I'd have scoffed if you told me I'd still be single. But when I see my old friends and those who are significantly younger than me move to their second - and even third - marriages, I am glad that I am waiting to marry. I only want to do it once.

I would have laughed if you told me that eventually, I'd get to be what I'd always wanted to be, but never thought was practical - a writer.

At 21, I thought I knew it all - as most people in their early 20s do. At 31, I'm beginning to realize that I may just be starting to learn what's most important. I am growing into myself. I know what I want in life. I also realize that I may not be able to "have it all," as we were told we could in the 80s. I have struggled more than I imagined, and for longer than I expected. But I have also started to listen to that voice inside that says, to quote Sylvia Plath, "I am, I am, I am."

I think that's called growing up.

There will come a time when you believe everything is finished. That will be the beginning. - Louis L'Amour