September
I’m crying because it’s September again, and I have to do it without my mama again. I love September–it’s my birth month. But doesn’t feel possible to live through again, without her.
So here I am. Feeling the pain–doing grief. How do I make plans? I keep learning, changing, and moving forward. But sometimes without her, it feels pointless.
I want to say I love you to friends but don’t want it to get complicated and confusing for anyone. And I want to ask for help, but broad brush help or generic help aren’t good for me. Confusing help, help with strings attached that I don’t understand, and help on someone else’s terms really just hurt me.
Sometimes I feel like I want a do-over. Shake the etch-a-sketch and only connect with people I really trust. I guess that’s not possible. Every relationship has a beginning part, getting to know someone, not really knowing their heart yet. And people change also, thank God. I always change.
My trust feels fucked up anyway. I’ve trusted with my life people who I later understood were super dangerous. And when I was a kid and had no choice, of course, I had to trust people who were super dangerous.
dream dialog
I had a dream last night that had only me and white guys in it. My ex-husband was in it. He’d written a poem, and I saw it in his handwriting on a billboard. I tried not to read it, because I hadn’t been invited. The title was one word and started with a b. Maybe bushel.
There was another white guy I’d been spending some time with over the course of this multi-day event. It was a conference, maybe related to poetry. I said, “I don’t even know your name. What’s your name?”
“I don’t really have a name,” he said. “My last name is Cheryl. Some people have figured out they can call me Cher-dan or Dan-cher.” He was joking toward another white guy who was also with us. “But yeah. I don’t have a name.”
“…Ok!” I said.
protester
Then in another part, I was in a building, a weird big boxy old building. There was a dark green panel. I was naked and alone, wishing to be alone. Someone knocked at the door.
“Who is it?” I asked, peeking through the window.
“A protester,” he said. He was a white guy–you guessed it.
“I’m not taking visitors today!” I said. “Can you leave a message?”
He tried to look in the window. I put my face in front of his face and made an angry expression trying to scare him off. The expression was like, “Leave me the fuck alone.”
Yep, it’s me–naked Laura-Marie. Not taking visitors today or helping protesters.
garden
Oh yeah, there was the garden part also. There was this garden that had been closed off for a long time. A powerful politician (white guy) had closed it off for some reason I didn’t understand, but other people understood. He was a politician everyone knew about but me. I was reading the wikipedia article, in my dream.
But the gate was left open, and people started going into this secret garden. It was a great, joyful thing. Groups of white guys, going into this garden, but it didn’t have plants. It was full of sculptures–a sculpture garden.
The coloring was very gray. And there were all these levels–it was on a slope, with small flights of stairs. I was glad the people could go in the garden again. I’d done some work behind the scenes to help open the garden, but no one knew.
I remember my dreams because I told them to Ming. They were his bedtime story–he drifted off to my words. I kissed him.
toy
On a walk yesterday, Ming and I saw this dino toy in the gutter near our place. Thought you might like it. Love to your September.
