Deserving

Many years ago now Adriene passionately delivered an address against the usage of the word "deserve". No, not just usage, but a belief in the concept of "deservedness" itself. To believe that someone deserves something, or doesn't, is dangerous. It projects your morals across a situation that may be more nuanced that whatever black and white belief system you've developed in order to simplify the world into a manageble bite. I find myself rearranging sentences in my head now as I'm thinking them: from "well she deserves it" into, "well, she's worked really hard- not only for this outcome,  but in many spheres of her life. When the opportunity came not only was she ready, but able. And, on top of all of that, I'm happy for her, but jealous, and that's okay." It's long winded, but it makes me reflect more? 

^ that example is actually what made me think of it today actually. Ester just got a new apartment, she's been approved and she'll be moving in throughout the month. It's more money than I would want to spend, and I have debts with the utilities companies and my taxes that paralyze me and make it feel impossible to strike out on my own. I want to live alone but I feel like a child. All I can really think, all that I continue to come back to repeat like a little horrible mantra is I don't deserve it. I can rephrase it too: "Because I ignore the responsibilities are required to live as an independent adult, and can barely keep one thought or intention in my head from minute to minute; because my savings are abysmal; because my credit is middling; because all of this and more, I do not deserve it. There is no world except for inside my maladaptive daydreams which are the only thing that propel me out of bed in the morning in which I deserve this life. " (The Dream: I win $93 million, pay back everything, hire the best accountant and a money manager, buy 4 houses or apartments for me, my mom, Adriene, and someone else, and then live comfortably for the rest of my life, drowning in ADHD medication and antidepressants) 

Camille Claudel

 I love Rodin. There was a small exhibition of his work a few years ago at the Brooklyn Museum, in the oft forgotten about gallery on the first floor, before you even get to the ticket area. They've redesigned that foyer so many times, shifting the gift shop into a gallery and then into a classroom, and back again, I dont know if the Rodin space exists anymore in that same form. Like my memory exists in a walled off room. 

It was poorly attended the two times I went, with maybe two guards, bored, with drifted gazes boring through the walls opposite their posts. So no one noticed when I touched the toes of a sculpture. It's maddening being so close to a sculpture and not being able to touch it. I can remember visually, of course, but memory through feel is so strong. I can remember how my dads face looks partially through memory of feel, running my fingers over his face, even as his shook me away in irritation. 

Camille Claudel is always a part of Rodin's biography. Usually a chapter, or an aside. As a model in one of his pieces, or sometimes they put her work in his show. I hadn't really looked at her as deeply. 

I'm reading some of Anne Carson's Short Talks. This one caught my eye and made me look again, or for the first time? at Camille Claudel: 

SHORT TALK ON SLEEP STONES
Camille Claudel lived the last thirty years of her life in an asylum wondering why, writing letters to her brother the poet, who had signed the papers. Come visit me, she says. Remember I am living here with madwomen, days are long. She did not smoke or stroll. She refused to sculpt. Although they gave her sleep stones—marble and granite and porphyry—she broke them, then collected the pieces and buried these outside the walls at night. Night was when her hands grew huger and huger, until in the photograph they are like two parts of someone else loaded onto her knees.

30 years. Thirty years. I am thirty five, that's mostly my entire life, thirty years. Imprisoned by her younger brother who dissaporved of her lifestyle- who was a POET! He wasn't some artless fob, he was only her younger by 4 years, he only visited her 7 times in three decades, and he denied every request by everyone to release her.

I read it once and was curious. I read it again and was confused. I read it again, and then the wikipedia page, and then the wiki again, and then I put my head in my hands and cried. How do we do this to people, to people we know, people we are supposed to love? How could so many people and policies fail a sane woman, a genius, a well known figure? She lived until her 70's, she didn't tragically die young, she was merely illusioned into a young death. Disappeared away. It all happened when her father died, the wiki said "her loving and wealthy father," the last line between her and the end of her life. I'm ineloquent about this, but I will be thinking about this for a long time. I feel like I must align myself with Claudel over Rodin, like having ignored her for... 30 years... I. feel complicit. Like she's been there there whole time but in a little walled off room. 

Ocean Grove Day

 

Waiting, so I'm not early, after being late

The first sighting of a fuzzy bumblebee:  I heard buzzing behind me and caught it just as it disappeared under a wooden awning. Josie and Rachel will be upset- even the most innocent flying bug freaks them out- but I love the fat little guys. They are like little floating bumper cars, fizzing and drifting, drunk on pollen. 

Last night Samson, Ester, Lilian and I had a drink after work. I had to finish up a trynight, and Sam got off work right as I was done so we walked together to meet the other two at Sea Witch - which was *bumping* Some kind of birthday party I'm sure. We saw Maryim, a student at Gasworks, and also two different tik tokers. Samson was the only one who recognized one of them, I think our algorithms are similar. I actually really like the content of the guys I saw, but I didn't say anything to them. 

I don't know if Lilian's crush on Ester is a play act or real, maybe it's a little of both. Ester just broke up with Nick, who is a nice man, but I think everyone was a little relieved, everyone was expecting it to happen. Anyways, we were sitting there and the way optical illusions can flip an image from one reality into another, I kept switching between the reality we were in, and one where Ester and Lil were a couple. I think it would be really sweet, they'd be such a power couple.

This morning I was supposed to be on a train to New Jersey. Mom is here for two more days, and I was invited out to spend time with Tate and Mom at the same time, which hasn't happened since Christmas, two years ago (two? three?) in Tennessee. But the trynight, the drink. The fact that I'm in sleep debt. I woke at 6 but couldn't make it out of bed till 7:30. Had to buy toilet paper, the first place I tried wasn't open (really Brooklyn bodega?? 8am you're still shuttered?? for shame, FOR SHAME). I also meant to buy deodorant. I also just realized, via misspelling it just no that deodorant is a de-odor- ant. I mean, barely a revelation but I've never looked at it before.  Language is a complex made of bricks and each brick is a tome. 

Well, I didn't make that train in the end. Didn't even try. Looked at the schedule for the F, realized I wouldn't make it. Called my mom nearly in tears. I'll catch the next one. I'll be there by 1. 

I gotta go now, actually. dang. 

Post Script: I made the train, and got to New Jersey and had a really nice weekend with the fam. 

New Years Day 2025

 We did the polar plunge! 

New Years Eve 2025

 

Of course, I'm posting this a month later. This was my best effort and thank god I'm so inept at dressing up, because the place we ended up going felt like the only bar in a small fishing town- in the best sense. It was jolly and crowded, and we sat next to some really sweet lawyers and chatted with them for awhile. But this, this outfit which was a sheer top (which youth instagram just informed me is OUT) with my work pants, plus lots of eye makeup and some glitter, and big hair-- this felt like the most glamorous outfit in the whole bar. Lots of people were wearing like, cozy sweaters. 

There was live music, and a countdown at midnight, and everyone sang Auld Lang Syne. After midnight the band started playing all the hits (from the 60's and 70's) (it was the perfect band for the perfect crowd, I couldn't have asked for more). We walked for 20 minutes to the Ikea- Ester insisted that if we went through the parking lot we'd have an amazing view, but we were stopped by the cops. We all went home and went to bed. New Years Eve at age 35. 

Finding the light

Or chasing it, rather. 

This little window of sun lasted for only a few minutes. 

I took some pictures and stepped away and came back,

it was diminished considerably. 

New Year, New Me

Look, my dad died years ago, and I miss him, and I'm sure it's affected me quite a lot, but he's gone. I think that it's been the worst for mom, because when you partner with someone, you're not really one person anymore. You're a little bit them, and a little bit you. Percentages vary. But I'm single. And my friendships are surface. If I died, I think people would be upset but I think it would be like taking a rock out of a river. The empty space gets filled in immediately with water, and the river keeps running.

I'm in a mood because I came into work an hour early for apparently no reason, and I wish I had had the extra hour to put in my contacts, and choose different shoes (it's snowing, I'm wearing tennis shoes) (tenna shoes). I'm cold and I'm peeved. I want to be on the couch. Also, Sunny barked for 6 minutes this morning and I had to get up to make her stop. I'm the only one who tells her not to bark, and she stops when she sees me now, why am I the only one training her out of this habit? Like, am I crazy, we don't want dogs who just bark all the time, in the city, right? Did I miss something? Is it cruel now, and no one told me? She ate her own shit last night. I like her a lot, she hangs out on my lap and chest now a lot more, which is very comforting and sweet, but who chooses a creature that needs and needs and needs all the time, when you're already stretched so thin? 

Goals for the year: 

Get Passport. 

Get a handle on debts. 

Get back on meds. 

Travel somewhere. 

Have a happiness, even if just for a day, or a moment, or a week. Real joy. The kind that cuts through and makes a permanent memory. 

Looking Up

Questionnaire for 2024

 I've been having a grand ol' time slogging through the tumblr I've been keeping since... college? High school? Anyways, it's 1 am and I'm probably still on'y gone back to 2016 or so, plenty more to scroll through. I found this series of questions though, and since it's a new year I thought I'd try and answer them. 

end of year asks

1. what did you learn about yourself this year? Not sure. Maybe that I am not as strong as I have been in the past. I really just kind of gave up this year and if i don't change things, actually put effort into something, anything, I'll just keep on deteriorating.
2. best moment of the year? I'm not really a "remember-best-moments" kind of lady. I literally can't remember anything.
3. worst moment of the year? Probably cleaning the house and moving out. It was brutal, and unending. And exhausting, physically, emotionally.
4. what was the biggest change you experienced this year? Moving. I don't live in my own place anymore.
5. best song of the year? At the end of the year, the very end, I found a song called "Bone to Bone" by Small Fools and listened to that on repeat a couple hours a day for a few days. "Togtet" by Vanir, and other songs on my Metal, Etc playlist kept me from spiraling a lot this year. "Money on the Dash" and "What I Want" were top on my spotify wrapped, for what that's worth.
6. best album of the year? I enjoyed brat.
7. what’s one thing that happened this year that you want to change? I want to get back on meds. I am a pretty useless human being and want to be better.
8. best book/book series of the year? I read a lot of Richard Osman. I really enjoyed his worlds he built for me and my mom.
9. best television series? Oh god, I don't know. I watched Survivor with my friends, and that makes it the best show.
10. how was your love life this year? pass
11. what made you cry the most this year? weird stuff. I have been pretty turned off, but every once in a while somethign will sneak past the gate and I must do my duty and sob. And then stop.
12. biggest regret of the year? why choose. They're all my children.
13. best movie of the year? I enjoyed Challengers, Conclave, Nosferatu. I also enjoyed Drive Away Dolls, though I wish it had been tighter. I liked Furiousa, and Love Lies Bleeding too.
14. favourite place you travelled this year? I went back home, to say goodbye.
15. did you make any new friends? Yes
16. did you learn anything about your sexuality this year? It needs to be tended to or it dies.
17. what are some hobbies that you developed? no
18. what surprised you the most this year? nothing really
19. do you look different from the beginning of the year? I can't really differentiate time anymore.
20. how did this year treat you in general? the way I treated it. badly. via indifference.
21. what message would you give yourself at the beginning of the year? try a bit harder. You have health insurance, btw.
22. has your fashion style changed this year? I have leaned even farther into uniforms. I have about 6 pairs of the same pants, all the same socks. 3 pairs of the same bra, mostly the same underwear.
23. one of the best meals you’ve had this year? who can say.
24. who has made the biggest impact in your life this year? Rachel, she's housing me, god bless her.
25. what’s one thing that you hope will continue next year? living i guess, just better.

I don't know why I bothered, sad sack