Posted 10:37 AM by Michelle

"I see your money on the floor, I felt the pocket change.
Though all the feelings that broke through that door
just didn't seem to be too real.
The yard is nothing but a fence, the sun just hurts my eyes.
Somewhere it must be time for penitence. Gardening at night is never where.
Gardening at night. Gardening at night. Gardening at night.

The neighbors go to bed at ten.
Call the prayer line for a change.
The charge is changing every month.
They said it couldn't be arranged.

We ankled up the garbage sound, but they were busy in the rows.
We fell up, not to see the sun, gardening at night just didn't grow.
I see your money on the floor, I felt the pocket change.
Though all the feelings that broke through that door
just didn't seem to be too real.
Gardening at night. Gardening at night. Gardening at night

Your sister said that you're too young.
They should know they've been there twice.
The call was 2 and 51.
They said it couldn't be arranged.

I see your money on the floor, I felt the pocket change.
Though all the feelings that broke through that door
just didn't seem to be too real.
We ankled up the garbage sound, but they were busy in the rows.
We fell up not to see the sun, gardening at night just didn't grow.
Gardening at night. Gardening at night. Gardening at night"


Wow. One of life's mysteries solved for me, seventeen years later. Sean and I saw REM at the Felt Forum on November 7th, 1986 (http://www.geocities.com/brettlowman/remshows1986.html). I just listened to "Night Swimming" and am left speechless in a room full of boxes. That song reminds me of what I thought possible then, that maybe I still think it could still be.

Posted 12:22 AM by Michelle

The only problem with quitting my icky and very short-lived former job is not being up later than Ian anymore. It's almost 3:30 for chrissakes and he hasn't posted his blog yet. I, however, am. Posting my blog. I'm also up. With a cat on my lap.

Kellie and I had dinner at the... uh... it's a culinary school that does a dinner every Friday night but it's all vegan! I'll give props where props are due when I can figure out where we were. It was a spectacular dinner, and I brought two bottles of wine, both from Ian's and Tessa's wedding (one rehearsal dinner wine, one reception). Kellie and I were munching on mushroom casserole and then a pear tart when we decided that she would call in sick to work tomorrow and that we would grab our camping gear and go upstate. Then I remembered that my camping gear is in a box moving slowly towards California, and that she brought her gear to her parents' house some three hours away.

So, instead we went to McSorley's where we were instantly thickened by a bachelor party of twenty men. They were everywhere, surrounding us, prodding us, buying us beers when we hadn't breathed on our first. One guy draped an arm around me and then put his mouth to my ear, and within seconds I had found out that he was the one to be married in a week. I grabbed Kellie and ran for my life- but not before I was grabbed by a man from my past. Mr. Republican Pro-Life Pro-Rich Pro-Death Penalty grabbed my arm as we fought our way towards the door. I hadn't seen him since the fateful night when we discussed politics and I left him standing outside a restaurant in the East Village. He was distraught that I never called him back, begged to be given a second shot. I said, "Call me if you change your politics, and besides, I'm moving to California".

And now, home, in my apartment where my landlord seems to keep forgetting to turn on the heat. Four blankets and a warm cat await. Things could be worse. It could be four blankets and a cold Republican.

Posted 8:27 AM by Michelle

Sean and I moved at least every two years, sometimes every year, growing up. You could say that it was my family, or fractured parts of my family, that did the moving, but ultimately every time it was Sean and I, in the same school or not, trying to live through childhood and adolescence. We had help, sometimes, and a place to lay our heads. But the true surviving was figured out at school or in the middle of the night when one of us thought we might go mad, and asked the other to talk us out of the nightmare.

There were patterns of behavior each time we moved. Sean usually stopped going to school pretty quickly, I would get involved with the wrong guy as soon as possible. At some point during our stay, we'd turn to each other and say, "What if we left right now?" and the answer would often be, "I could leave without saying goodbye." What this meant was there was not one person we cared enough about to say goodbye the next time we left. This would change as the year or years went by; sometimes we'd want to take several of our friends with us, sometimes just a girlfriend, sometimes even a park. A place would start to be dear to us. There was Anne, there was Russ, there was Coleen and Craig, there was Ho and Brynne. There was Southard Park.

But it wasn't exactly that we didn't care enough about these people. More, it was that leaving was what we did, and when you learn to leave, you also learn to make quick, passionate friendships that will easily burn out before it was time to go. So there were no painful goodbyes, no sore hearts from missing our friends.

We got too good at this. Or, at least, I did. This ended for Sean when he hit college and made friends he still hires to sing for him today. And then it was walloped and sent out of town forever when Sean moved to North Carolina. All of his good friends, and there are many, he's now known for years. He takes people with them, he keeps them, and he will know most of these people for the rest of his life.

Me? Well. My best friend I've known for thirty-one years. Her mother started babysitting me when I was 10 months old. My other great friend I've known for seven years, and perhaps only because we've moved three times together. And then the next closest to me is a woman I met four or five months ago. I'm not counting my new sisters, since they are stuck with me as family; I can't help but keep them, lucky, lucky for me. But I realize that I never quite recovered from this nomadic habit. I lived in Hollywood for over two years: no one. I went to my last college for two years: not one single soul. Citrus Singers, two years: no one I stay in touch with, although I have love for several of them. High School, three years: nope. Other high school, arguably one of the most important years of my life: nope. Kansas City, a year and a half: nope, although complicated, because when my boyfriend abandoned me he took my friends. Other than my seven-year friend. Chicago, one year: nada. New York: remains to be seen. There are four people I'm holding onto tight, and they to me, and there are two others who might still be my friend in a year. Even if I keep only those four, that's a new track record.

I did not have the college experience that my brothers did. I do, however, get to reap those benefits, since some of the best people I've met have been through Sean and Ian (and, therefore, Tess and Jordi, so the numbers get exponential). But as I look at another move, even one that is supposed to be temporary, I'm thinking about all of this again. This time, I want to say goodbye to everyone I love. It's not a crowd, but it is a collective, and I'm going to do the best I can to hang on.

But I'm concerned that, in a way, I'm running again, like Sean and I did whenever things got sticky. My life is not sticky, not right now, but there are things I've done that, sadly, make it better if I go away. Friends who stay apart because I'm there. I'd rather not be a part of that.

But if I am running, I am also running towards possibility, to change. Maybe I running to a place I actually want to be.

Posted 12:41 PM by Michelle

Ah, Christ, I've done it again. I barely know where to start. I'm learning a thing or two about writing in so public a place as this. I have a terrible habit of referencing things, in a vague way that is entirely open to interpretation, and sometimes that truly does get me into trouble because my words are taken the wrong way. A few days ago I wrote a blog, and mind you I was drunk, referencing truth and stories and wives and "sad men". Ugh. Here's the thing: I was writing of people completely outside my world of friends and my brothers' friends. I have had a terrible rash of married men, men that I've met outside of the life that exists in my family, who seem utterly cavalier when it comes to their marriage, and it makes me so, so sad. Mad, actually, truly angry since I think they are so incredibly lucky to have love in their lives and yet they deny it. I tell you, this happened to me again LAST NIGHT- two different married men in two sets of people I met made it very clear that their intentions were not remotely pure.

These are the sad men I was writing of. I know that it was a stupid thing to write, considering recent events, oh my god DUH, but even in the haze of amazing red wine I would never, never be so cruel or ugly towards anyone I care about. I did not, and will not attack anything like that unless the people I'm referencing don't read this blog. And the blog I wrote the other night will never be read by the men it was directed to. They don't know me, they don't know my family. They are strangers. There is just too many of them in this city, and they seem to find me.

I've met a lot of men, really good, true, wonderful men, who came upon a difficult choice and ultimately made the right one, even if there were slips and falls along the way. We are not defined by each choice but by the whole, and god knows I've screwed up worse than anyone I know. I screwed up three days ago by not being clear.

Things are as they seem, not as they are colored by a misinterpreted blog. I'm proud of the people I know who have made good choices to work things out. I'm glad that I am right here, today, having had the experiences I've had because hopefully it takes me one step closer to love in my life. I learned this summer that I can love again, that all it takes is the right person to come along. I didn't know that before. I didn't know how closed off I was. So thankyou, for anyone who has taught me that, and seriously, let's be done. I promise not to be vague and sucky anymore.

My book allows me to write about all of this, this single silly life, clearly, with perspective, and with history. I can research things, go back and edit, and best of all, use my very rich fantasy life. I'm not nearly so clear on my blog sometimes. But I guess I deserve some forgiveness, too.

Posted 9:33 AM by Michelle

I have to publicly admit a fetish, one I can hardly control, and one that is a part of each and every day of my life... weather.com. Every day I find myself checking it more than once, sometimes, just to be sure nothing's changed. I check it for New York first, of course, but then for California and then I start checking it for places I want to go: Prague, Florence, Paris... and it seems as though there are no listings for Niger. What's up with that.

A week from today, right now, I'll have just arrived at Oakland Airport with three bags, two bikes and and cat.

I went to Blue Smoke last night to see Hayley and to enjoy some mac 'n' cheese one last time. One thing led to another and suddenly it is 3:45 AM and I'm swing dancing to the jukebox at the Hairy Monk with a Texan toy company art director. I'm not kidding. Ahh, the life of a single woman. There are things about living in this city that I'll miss all winter. But there are things I can also live without.

Posted 6:27 PM by Michelle

Geeze, I get a little belligerent when I'm drunk, don't I? Actually, I don't, I just get mad when the situation calls for getting mad. But last night was also great fun. I'm just so tired of being disappointed, and tired of disappointing myself. But enough of that. For now.

My apartment is finally rented; the sweetest woman ever named Jessica called me this afternoon beside herself with excitement. She had just signed the lease and wanted to stop by for another look around. I'm selling her my futon and butcher block for a song. I figure it's easier than moving everything, and I have no idea what my next home will be, or where it will be, so I might as well simplify as much as possible. 90% of my stuff is already up at the farmhouse, and the few boxes left are far overshadowed by the mass of what goes to California. I'm not even sure anymore what is in these boxes, but there are five of them labeled and ready to go. I know much of it is clothes I don't usually wear, as in they 1) don't wick or 2) are actually nice.

So 90% of my stuff is gone and strangely, sadly, I miss none of it. I've realized that all I need are two mugs, two bowls, two spoons and forks, a coffee grinder and press, one pot and one pan. This is most likely all I've ever used since I've lived here, and the twos of everything come in handy only when I'm too lazy to wash the one. Everything else- the complete set of my Grandmother's china, the pot and pan housewarming gift from my father- I've used these things but they have yet to cook dinner for eight, as they are designed to do. It's largely a problem of space. I don't even have a table in this studio apartment of mine. And so my next place, my next place beyond my Dad's and any other camping I do, will be one that beckons.

In the words of good 'ol Thoreau:

I sometimes dream of a larger and more populous house, standing in a golden age, of enduring materials, and without gingerbread-work, which shall still consist of only one room, a vast, rude, substantial, primitive hall, without ceiling or plastering, with bare rafters and purlins supporting a sort of lower heaven over one’s head--useful to keep off rain and snow...


...where the weary traveller may wash, and eat, and converse, and sleep, without further journey; such a shelter as you would be glad to reach in a tempestuous night, containing all the essentials of a house, and nothing for house-keeping, where you can see all the treasures of the house at one view, and everything hangs upon its peg that a man should use;

...where to be a guest is to be presented with the freedom of the house, and not to be carefully excluded from seven eighths of it, shut up in a particular cell, and told to make yourself at home there,--in solitary confinement. Nowadays the host does not admit you to his hearth, but has got the mason to build one for yourself somewhere in his alley, and hospitality is the art of keeping you at the greatest distance.

...the parlor is so far from the kitchen and workshop.

Posted 11:59 PM by Michelle

The amazing part about tonight was the screening of a movie I am truly proud of, a movie that is greater than I could have imagined. I have no doubt that The Pink House will be picked up, that it will go far, that it will reach everyone from New York film geeks to Middle America K-Mart shoppers. The movie is great. I loved it. It was funny and sad and true and obnoxious and I'm so, so proud of all of us who worked on it. So proud.

The other highlight of the evening was dinner spent with Dana, Lindsay and Salem who are the good guys, good people, folks I hope to keep and keep well. These are the exceptions to all the ugly rules, and the makers of the beautiful, kind, truthful book of rules. They also didn't freak out when I ordered a bottle of '97 Masi Amarone. Now that is good people.

Posted 12:53 PM by Michelle

Weekends like these leave me weary but the opposite of sad. I can't seem to stomach that happy is the opposite of sad- happy seems too active, too bright, while sad is passive and almost comforting- predictable, relatively stable, far from actual misery. This weekend did not leave me happy, persay, but it did leave me good.

I'm just home in my destroyed apartment. The boxes are gone but replaced with two huge stacks- one to go to California, one to find its way to the farmhouse. Tess asked me if my head was in California yet, but my head is nowhere but here, right now, still dealing with leaving, still curious and confused and wrapping around my next week and a half. Everything feels like a challenge, an obstacle, in a way, or maybe even a curiosity that is complicated enough to cause lost sleep.

Posted 5:10 PM by Michelle

My life has become so strange that I have to grab ten minutes to write this blog whenever and wherever I can. Right now I'm sitting at the enormous dining room table at the farmhouse (chaired right now to seat twelve) and listening to two different conversations- one in the kitchen, between Tess and Jiffer and friends, and one in the living room where Lars and Babs and Bud are marvelling over the fact that there is a show on cable about the history of stone. Stone.

We rode the Harlem Valley Rail Trail today and it truly, truly, defied description. I won't even try other than to say that the day was in the upper 60's, the leaves are turning every shade of brilliant, and the company couldn't have been much better. The ride was second only to minuature golfing and Go-Kart driving of yesterday. We were the only people left at the Go-Kart place, so the guy in charge told us to ignore the warning signs (no bumping, no crashing, no head-on collisions) and to take out all of our road rage on each other. "The gas pedal is all you need" he cried as he strapped us into each cart. Sean, Jordi, Babs, John and I tore around the course, slamming each other and catching air on the little hills. It was the most fun I've had in way too long.

After playtime Tessa cooked a spectacular dinner- onion soup, polenta, swiss chard, mushroom casserole and something beautiful and chicken. Apres-dinner was a rousing and contested game of celebrity (my team, as usual, lost) and then debates into the night about ousting our current administration.

Today I woke at noon, and every second I'm here I understand that it's the last time I'll see the farm for a while. It's the last time I'll see many of the people here as well, and a last taste of New York fall. Every second is precious to me, even if I'm curled up on the couch with old friends of Ian's, doing exactly nothing at all.

The basil in the herb garden, planted this spring in a rainstorm, has withered and blackened as the leaves choose more colorful ways to die. One by one, each room in the farmhouse is being redone with brilliant blues and greens and new mattresses and curtains. Every time I come another space beckons to me, asks me to stay for a while and sit down to write. But I'll be without friends all too soon, and I'm taking this time to be a joiner. Of course I will create a community in California, but it will take time. Less than two weeks now. It's almost hard to believe.