Only by the Night...

Only by The Night by Kings of Leon. Let’s talk about this whole album and how it relates to my life, because quite frankly, it’s a current soundtrack to my life these days.
1. Closer – This song actually sways two ways for me. It has a lot to do with me following my heart on two agendas and one of them breaking apart on me. Falling in love with someone who doesn’t love you back really can leave you feeling “Stranded in this spooky town” and living in New Jersey, more than once I have felt stranded. But I also look at it in a brighter light in that the dreams that I had as a child were not “Get married, have kids” unless the person I was marrying was a backstreet boy (Listen, I still cling to the hope, even though he’s married.) I realize that marriage and kids were never something I HAD to have, but school was. I had to have a college degree. I remember being seven and thinking that I was going to go somewhere great. Stanford, Harvard or Princeton. At a young age I had my eyes set on something bigger, better. “And it’s coming closer”

2. Crawl – This song relates to a lot of my rage and anger that I’ve had lately. To me it’s a an anthem to learn to be humble when its needed. The idea that you need to crawl before you walk. Knowing this I can push it forward and learn to forgive before I can forget. And really I just love the guitar riffs in it.

3. Sex on Fire – “You, your sex is on fire.” Or as Luke, the 4-year-old I watch says, “I want to hear the ‘on fire’ song.’ This song speaks to me in a way that sex does for most. It’s desire, its passion; it’s a longing and need. As adults it’s a basic need. It’s a cause for pain; it’s a cause for distressed. Married people go to marriage counseling to discuss where their desire for sex has gone. Magazines write about how to get the passion back. For me it’s about my desire I’ve had for life as a young kid. As an adult I feel it’s my passion to be bigger (hopefully not in the pant size) and greater than I am. It’s a passion, a fire, and a need. “Consumed with what’s to transpire.”

4. Use Somebody – It’s their hit, I heard it once and loved it but never really thought much about it, I didn’t even know who sang it, just that I liked the song. On a personal note as a single fat girl, I’m constantly wondering if someone will ever notice “someone like me.” And the opening line is a dead ringer for how I have been most of my life “I’ve been roaming around always looking down at all I see, painted faces fill the places I can’t reach.” Lets dissect what “painted faces” means to me. For me it was my desire and need to be my friends, to be as beautiful and popular as Kristin, or fun and flirty like Elizabeth. I looked at my friends and wanted so badly to not be the fat kid and to be them. They were my painted faces filling the places I couldn’t reach. Back to this being their hit. Luke loves this band, he talks about them because it’s his dad’s favorite band (he says.) Then one day I’m sitting in the car and I hear the song and the DJ says that its Kings of Leon and it was a light bulb that hit. I am a fan.
5. Manhattan – Uh? Do I really even need to explain this? Honestly. I moved to New Jersey to be closer to it. It’s my candy store. “ We’re gonna fuel this fire, gonna stoke it up, we’re gonna sip this wine and pass the cup. Who needs avenues, who needs reservoirs, gonna show this town how to kiss these stars.” This town makes me feel like something bigger and better. But it also makes me feel small. It’s amazing that it has this ability to make me feel two opposing ideas. I love it for the magic it makes me feel and the fire that it lights for me.

6. Revelry – For me this is about the loss of my grandma. The lyrics speak of a romantic love but what I drive from it is the thought and emotions of feeling my grandmother’s presence so often in my life. It doesn’t seem to get better to me. Specifically there’s a line that says “just know it was you who had a hold of my heart, but the demon and me were the best of friends from the start.” Speaks volumes on the relationship I had with her. I loved her, I hated her, I wanted her to notice me and I acted out in all the wrong ways possible. I struggle so hard with this. I can talk about and I can confess my thoughts and emotions but I can’t seem to let it go, can’t seem to find my peace.

7. 17 – Okay, it’s me. Exactly me. I’m 17 stuck in a 25-year-olds body. My thoughts are often immature, but my intentions are mostly wise and older. “Oh she’s only 17, wind and wind and wound up over thing…” I get so caught up in my lack of childhood, the idea that I hurt more than I felt good.

8. Notion – “So don’t knock it, you’ve been here before” is a tribute to me knowing that I am not alone in my thoughts that someone has always felt the way I felt and I’m not alone. It’s also a tribute to going with my gut instinct on things and say how I feel. Cause “I’ve got a notion to say what doesn’t feel right.”

9. I Want You – This is, exactly as the lyrics have it. It’s about wanting something that is bad for me. Something that doesn’t do anything for me. I relate to that in my relationships with friends that are more poison than good. And I want them, like it used to be.

10. Be Somebody – I put this song on to inspire me when I feel like I’m getting nowhere. I put it on when I need to remember what I keep fighting for. What I want out of life. I want to do more than survive; I want to make an imprint.

11. Cold Desert – Well if this isn’t the anthem for the inner Emo me. This reminds me of the failure I had to a choice I was making. It holds me accountable for my actions and pushes me to see the error in my thinking. “I’ve always been known to cross the lines.” Speaks of my “spunk.” How I push the limits and need to be heard. My cousin commented about how even at a young age I had to push myself into the center of things. It’s true then and now. I need to be seen and I need to be noticed. So I’ve taken myself out of the cold of the desert to shine.

But it also heals your soul...

“When the morning came I was up before first light…”

I woke up unusually early for myself this morning. Like a good student the night before my first day of class I attempted to get to sleep earlier than I usually do and I was in bed and asleep before midnight. This is actually a pretty good feat for me as my night owl habits often have me up into the wee hours of the morning.

“My heartbeat started pounding a rhythm in my brain, a voice from deep inside said you’ve gotta be insane…”

I’ve found myself lately really clinging to the lyrics of a song. I learned as a musician it’s often the melody and the music behind a song that really make it a song. As a writer I look at that as more of a supporting actor type role, unless you’re going entirely instrumental, in which case it definitely has a starring role. For the most part, it’s the supporting actor; at least in my plays.

“A melody is like seeing someone for the first time. The physical attraction. Sex. But then, as you get to know the person, that's the lyrics. Their story. Who they are underneath. It's the combination of the two that makes it magic.” – Music and Lyrics quote.

So what is the point of all this rambling on and on about music and lyrics and sleeping or not. It has to do with the influence that music has had on me to be happy. To go to work each day and see it as a good thing rather than something I don’t want to do. I’ve found that the more positive I am about the day, the better day I have with the kids. I want to use this motto in everything that I do so that when I do find myself slipping down the backwards slope into a depression, I can look and see how it really is.

“I don’t want to turn me into something that I’m not, keep me close in mind and body you are all I’ve got.”

In my self-discovery I have found myself to be harboring a bit of rage and anger. And by a bit, I mean an unusual amount. In this anger I also find myself wanting to bite back, and bite back hard to those who have misused me in the past and those who are still doing so now. Instead of just letting these feelings roll into the “suppressed feelings” jar I keep in the back of my mind, I’m finding that these feelings want to spring forth, that perhaps the jar is now full and is now seeping out, it’s demon springing forth ready for revenge.

“And when it rains on this side of town it touches everything. Just say it again and mean it we don't miss a thing. You made yourself a bed at the bottom of the blackest hole and convinced yourself that it's not the reason you don't see the sun anymore…”

The way my brain works is there will be a trigger, something said, something realized, something heard. And from that it melts into something so warped and nothing as it was when it began. A domino effect where I can “convince myself I don’t see the sun anymore.” And I will find myself at the bottom of a blackest hole. I have found myself at the bottom of that hole more times than I would like to count and I have seen the effects it has had on the people around me, and I think that makes for some good news.

“Open me up and you will see, I'm a gallery of broken hearts, I'm beyond repair, let me be and give me back my broken parts… I just want to be okay..”

So maybe in my attempts to realize, rationalize and grow I need to learn to forgive? I know that it’s not easy to forget especially for someone like me, but perhaps I can work on forgiveness.

“Sometimes mature just means over my head and I don’t really know what I’m saying”

And that is where my writing and music are going to be more important in this healing process. I’m using my writing to flush myself of these negative thoughts and emotions. I’m using it to remind myself of the positive things in my life to see things in the “rose colored” glasses again. And the music to remind me how good “sex” can be, most importantly to know the story behind myself, to relate on that level. To dissect who I am underneath and find ways to explain myself.

“I wanna feel a car crash, cause I’m dying on the inside. I wanna let go and know that I’ll be all right, Alright. Push me till I have to fly, I shed my skin, my scars. Take me deep out past these lights, where nothing dims these stars…I’m wide awake and so alive…”

Touch me, touch me baby, but don't mess up my hair...

Early on I learned as a female that shopping could make you feel better, we call this retail therapy. I knew pair of shoes or a new shirt was an easy way to cure the blues.

When I first started talking to my ex boyfriend, I told him I judged the week and or day by what I got that day. He later began asking me if it was a one shirt or two shirts kind of day and I would respond accordingly, sometimes saying that it was a no shirt kid of day. Meaning that I had not bought anything. I imagine I inherited this shopping problem from my grandmother, she was kind of queen of QVC and I was queen of buying new shirts.

And then I discovered hair dye in a whole new way and that was something I could change instantly and feel better about myself without adding to my wardrobe of too many shirts. And this has been a trend for me since my mid teens. My hair color was ever changing in high school as I discovered who I was, what I wanted and how I was going to get it.

Whenever I feel like my life is out of my control my hair color is something I can control. The best part is, no matter what color I do, I can manage to pull it off. I have the kind of complexion that can be paired with blonde; brunette, red and even black and still look like it was meant for me. I love my hair/face for this reason. And so this past weekend I found myself browsing the color isles of Sally’s Beauty Supply looking for some control. I found it in L’Oreal Dark Brown.

I feel in control, and I love my new hair color. I feel fantastically beautiful and ready to take on the new school year.

Back then I didn't know why, Why you were misunderstood

I am very angry with my mother. The mere thought of her contacting me makes my skin boil and my eyes darken.
It wasn’t always that way. For a long time I always had a soft spot for my mother, she was after all the women who gave birth to me and she was so good at spinning words, ideas, and dreams in my head that it was hard for me to not believe her when she would tell me things were going to be better. No I didn’t always hold such anger and resentment towards her, in fact she was often the one I sought comfort in.

When I was 10 and seemed to have sat in something that caused my white pants to be stained in red. My sister asked me if I had started my period and she asked me in a way that made me think that a period was bad. Something forbidden like reading dirty magazines or thinking about sex. I remember holding back tears, running into my mother’s room leaving my friends who had spent the night behind and crawling into her arms to cry softly.

I was horrified and I remember sobbing and telling my mother I was sorry and that I didn’t mean to. She held me in her arms petting my hair and wiping my tears explaining to me that a period was not a bad thing and that it was something all women would experience. Her eyes filled with tears as she told me that her baby was growing up and becoming a woman. She told me when she got her first period she had laid on basement floor crying, convinced she was dying. I can still smell the Smokey smell of her skin and hair from her 2-pack a day habit. I remember her raspy laugh when I apologized and the way she was able to comfort my fears and ease my tears. I remember laying there in her arms and feeling safe, feeling okay.

For being such a smart kid I’m not sure why I never caught on to the fact that my mother was sick and truly needed help. I just knew I wanted to believe her and so I did. It wasn’t until I was in my twenties that the rose colored glasses finally came off and I finally saw my mother for what she was to me. Even in her sickness I still cannot find it in my heart to forgive her. I began to resent her for fighting to keep my siblings and I when we could have been placed in better homes. I resented her for using my grandparents instead of raising us. I resented the lies she fed us. More so now than then I resented the lack of structure and the constant state of moving. It has left me so completely lost in myself and insecure of stability.

I began to feel anger and hatred for her actions and started blaming her for the way I was and the person I was becoming. Maybe if she would have loved us more and wasn’t so selfish we wouldn’t be such a broken family. I would not be such a broken person. It is very hard for me to not dwell on these ideas as many of my friends are getting engaged and my own sister talks of marriage and with my grandmothers passing, I find myself now more than ever wanting a mother. Because I listen to my friends talk about mother daughter situations and I see how the kids I nanny for interact with their mother and I find my soul searching for that same bond.

So perhaps it's reasons like when I pass by that diamond shaped bottle filled with its amber liquid I instinctively pluck it from the counter and inhale it. It has the power to take me back to the times when my mother was a beautiful person and things would be good. The irony being that the smell of her perfume always meant she was going somewhere and would be gone for awhile one and two days at time. My brother Michael and I knew the cue as we sat in our living room fighting over what to watch that anytime the wavering scent of Tresor By Lancome came into the room we would both instinctively stop what we were doing and shout “Where are you going mom? Are you coming home tonight?” Because we knew that regardless she would be spending Sunday in bed sleeping after an extensive night of alcohol and drugs.

And yet still, even knowing what her weekends entailed, the aroma of Tresor still is innocent to me and I miss the mother who held me in her arms and calmed my fears.

I wont tell them your name...

Someone asked me to tell them a story about something I did in high school that was crazy. And so I started to think about myself in high school and my brain wasn’t flooded with the loneliness I felt nor was I reminded of the teenage angst I had but rather the few close friends I had when I was in high school and the stupid things we did.
My friend Kristin probably could have convinced me that the sky was purple and it was the reason we had to ditch our next class (generally the class following our lunch period.) Or maybe it was that I didn’t need convincing to know that whatever we did instead would be epic.

One particular morning as Kristin and I were walking to class from the lower parking lot of our ever massively sprawled out school I watched as Kristin pretty much ate dust and I can’t remember if she broke her zipper or if this was the time she tore her jeans. It was just before our first class and as she fell I remember laughing because she was carrying a Frappacino in her hand and I saw as she risked impact with her face to the dirt so that she would not break the starbucks glass bottle. Really, the fact that Kristin fell wasn’t the shocker; she would trip on a daily basis so it wasn’t like “remember that time you ate shit?” Because the answered for her would be “Which time?” it was that she stood up, looked at me and said, “Ugh, lets just go home.” So we turned around not even taking more than 15 steps onto campus and left.

Or how I was in the same spot as the fall incident when she approached me said, “My zippers busted, lets go get ice cream.” And again, I we left sliding into the seats of my ever-growing trashcan of a red Honda civic and bailing on yet another class.

It’s not that I’m all for ditching classes because I really did love school, it was a time in my life when I was able to focus on something that wasn’t my life. I could fade into the history lesson and be warped into whatever time period we spoke about. It was a time when I could slide into seat at the back of the class and slouch into my own little world and be safe from my real life. But there was something about the times Kristin and I were together that fills me with such joy and nostalgia.

Like the time we left class both dressed in black skirts and heels and decided that taking my 88 Honda civic off road would be the best idea we’ve ever had. Okay, in Hein sight I see why the car died. Would I have done it differently? I’m not sure, because wouldn’t it figure that the road we’re on out in the middle of Marana that happens to have less traffic would be the road that suddenly became I-10 when one afternoon after a rain I would get my car stuck in a wash. She’d warned me before I did it “That’s a wash” she said as I turned the wheel and within moments was spinning my tires and burring my poor “Putt-Putt” deeper into the sand.

While attempting to dig the car out or push it backwards we would duck behind the car whenever another car passed feeling like idiots for being stuck in the wash and unwilling to accept assistance until it became finally clear that there was no way my car was going to come unstuck and someone had to pull it out.

So maybe I wasn’t the most popular girl and maybe among an 800+ student body I seemed to melt into the unknown, but I was definitely somebody to the few friends I had and I looking back on my high school years I remember the funny moments spent with some incredible friends. Most of us survive high school because of the friends we have, I continue to survive life because of these same friends.

Between the line of Fear and Blame...

I remember sitting in my office at work, my head hung down and propped in my hands. I had just come off “Grandma Watch” as my cousin Elspeth had just gotten in the night before with her son. My eyes were swollen from crying, my body ached from the lack of sleep and my head pounded with the replay of our last argument.

When my grandmother fell ill and my aunt needed to return home to take care of things I was assigned the task of staying the night and helping her with things when I was off work and during the day various of our relatives would come stay with her.

It was always important to my grandma that I did work and that I never took time off. She often scolded me when she got wind of a day or time off that I took when it was not necessary in her book. Which meant everything. Nothing was necessary to her. Doctor’s appointments should be scheduled before or after work, or during lunch.

I remember our last fight being about my inability to cope with her situation. I read about others ability to cope and deal with being a nurse to their dying family and I hang my head in shame. I told her I couldn’t deal with it. I told her that it was hurting me so bad to see her the way she was. She was scared enough and I told her I couldn’t handle it. As if she didn’t have enough on her plate, she yelled violently at me, as she was known to do. She let her words whip out in anger and they cut sharp into the core of my being. Her venom sunk in as I cried. I cried for her, I cried to a god I didn’t believe in and I begged for her to get better.

That would be the last lucid moment I would have with her before delirium took its toll. And so I sat the following morning after this fight, breathing, thinking and trying to recoil myself from the past nights. I needed to get away; I needed to take a deep breath away from this tragedy that I was facing.

I picked up my phone and sent a text to my roommate.

“Lets go to CA tonight” and I pressed send.

I started my day’s work burying my emotions into printing, labeling and mailing documents that needed to be sent. In the last few weeks of my grandmother’s life I spent much of my time at work alone, away from everyone, which was strange in that I was the social butterfly of the office. Throughout that Friday I sent texts back and forth between my three friends Michelle (The Roommate), Nora, and Kat; mapping out the plan of driving San Diego, getting a hotel room and spending the day at the beach then returning that following night.

What I thought was just wishful thinking turned out to be something I truly needed. Hyundai Accent packed we grabbed our cameras, one ken doll, some clothes, drinks and stuffed our four bodies into the two door egg and began our trip. The night was cool and the car was soon filled with the scent of cigarettes and laughter. With Michelle and I taking turns on driving and Nora and Kat fading in and out of sleep for most of the ride. Well, mostly Nora slept; Kat did her best to be part of the crazy antics. The car ride included many energy drinks, a few packs of cigarettes (on my friends part), a few games of “Car flirting” and a couple guys flashed but most of all it included lots a laughter.

We wouldn’t get into California until a little after 3 AM and daylight was approaching fast so we settled on a Super 8 right off Interstate 8 on the hotel circle a few miles from beach. I remember sneaking Kat and Nora in the hotel room because we didn’t want to pay the extra for the two other people and staking claim on the half of the one queen bed before giggling off to sleep.

That trip we did exactly as we had planned. We spent the day at the beach getting burned and enjoying the cool Pacific Ocean. Laughed as waves knocked us over into each other, one specific time when my 5’3 friend came colliding face first into my boobs and the other face first into my butt because of a strong wave that knocked us all off our feet. I remember laughing so hard I had to walk to shore and sit on the surf because I couldn’t keep standing.

I look back and think about sitting on the beach snapping pictures of Ken on the beach, and watching seagulls swoop down and nabbing bits of Jalepeno Cheddar Cheetos or more specifically the seagull that had Nora shouting “Oh my god he took the fucking cup!” As one gracefully swooped down and grabbed an entire Styrofoam cup and flew off. And then we both threw ourselves back on our towls in laughter tears streaming from our eyes.
The day on the beach ended with a trip to Horton Plaza, a mall in downtown San Diego where I met up with a friend in California and allowed him to tear into me as no one has ever had with jokes. We laughed, joked, jabbed at each other and he starred at me like no other guy has before in my life. He saw through my tired hazel eyes and then did what any normal sarcastic individual such as myself would do. He tore into me like it was a Comedy Central Roast of Jennie, and I was still laughing.

Looking back I know I should have been spending every waking moment with my grandma and if I had known that the weekend before Easter would be her last weekend Alive I would have. But also looking back I realized that weekend with my friends on the beach saved me from myself. It saved me from falling into my own self-doubt; it saved me from crawling into a dark tunnel and lying there until everything blew over which as it is, still hasn’t.

My godmother Peggy said this to me Christmas Eve; “It seems like its only getting worse with time, its not getting better.” And I agreed.
Losing my grandma almost 2 years ago and I still can’t bring myself to erase her numbers from my phone. I still take a deep breath when I manage to scroll past her name. I still reach for the phone when I want to know what I’m supposed to turn the oven to when I need to make speedy fruit pie (aka peach cobber.) When I made green Jello over Thanksgiving at Kathleen’s house I looked for her body to be next to me on a stool asking me for some type o seasoning. I still drive past her house when I’m in town.
She was more than my grandmother, she was the person who tried with all her abilities to make sure my siblings and I had somewhat of a normal life. She saved my family from a life on the streets. She came from the school of “tough love.” And I have her to thank for my “spiky-ness”, my dry sense of humor and unfortunately, my nose. She gave me the gift of life so many times over.

But I know that without Nora, Kat & Michelle and our escape to California when I returned early Easter Morning and she was gone the next day, I know that weekend would have been more than I could bear. And so, I don’t regret taking off, I don’t regret the escape. I just wish I could have been a stronger person for Jean, for my grandmother in her last week of life.

I'll pretend...

What is it about a broken heart that makes us want to pick ourselves off the floor and become the opposite of who we used to be? Why do we allow another person the control to leave us breathing haphazardly on the floor and wondering what we did wrong? What words where said that shouldn’t have been said?

What is it about heartache that makes us question everything we ever stood for and everything that we have become? Maybe if I was thinner, prettier, beautiful or more quite. What if I was more punk, or rock instead of who I am now?

Why do I have to change to be better? “It’s not you, it’s me.” I can’t deal with such bullshit spoon fed to people when a person cannot come up with something better or true to say, they use a cop out and that cop out leaves the broken hearted trying to figure out where they went wrong.

If only I’d talked more when we first met, was darker, older, smarter, or thinner.

I’m over feeling like I’m the problem.