#uncoffeed...

Somebody once asked me the question, not in the form of a question: "You like the chaos..." I laughed, and then I responded to Mr. Geminii:  "I get bored." Mr. Geminii laughed, too. He sees me for what I am, appreciates me, and slowly backs away because he knows. What excellent trouble we could cause as a team! It is nice to be understood. I am not bragging here: I struggle daily. Getting through day-to-day life is onerous. Would that neatly folding my linens and chatting over coffee were sufficient to make my day shiny. I really like both of those things, but my brain goes walking off, looking for more, touching with itchy fingers things that I've been told should not be touched. Here's what my brain tells me, though, when I tell it to Leave Those Things Alone: Why do they exist, then? Why have humans fought to pin and identify every moving part of our universe for centuries now? Why are all forms of life different from each other, if they are...

Longtime long distance friend Linda Fields posted on Facebook recently: Did you ever wonder whose feet you had on when you bought the shoes you thought fit?  It turns out she was talking literally about shoes. But that wasn't how I read it, and yeah I have, Linda. In allegorical shoes, I really have.  There was that time in middle school when I wrote an erotic fiction book on lined paper and with a pencil; it was passed around the class until my best friend got hold of it. She said she put it in the dog pen and "let the dogs dukey all over it, because that's all it was good for." I wonder if anybody remembers that. I need to realize I can really write a whole book. There was the time I moved to four different states and had three babies with a guy who told me we were like "John and Yoko" - we didn't mean to start a family, but we can rock this, yeah? Turns out he meant I would do the family part and he would do the rock part. There was the t...

I attended an AA meeting once in the early 80s, having hitch-hiked to Daytona Beach with the guy who would later become the father of all my children. Laden with sleeping-bag rolls , we were  befriended by people who live on the beach. They immediately showed us the ropes: you can attend the Meeting and get some free donuts and coffee. You don't have to say anything if you don't want to. There will be lots of coffee. You will need it to stay awake during the 3 hours you aren't allowed to be on the beach. It isn't recommended for newbies to try and congregate under the bridge where the regulars go - folks are territorial. So those who don't have territory stay awake and wander the city for 3 hours. We ended up making another friend - a guy on a Harley chopper who let us stay at his apartment overnight. I had about 8 minutes of terror standing on a corner at midnight, waiting to see if this guy came back after taking away my friend; he did. The guy let us ...

I was recently asked to follow instructions with no explanation and I did it.  If  you know me in real life, you are probably amazed. I heeded because I trust the person who made the request (which wasn't really a request.) There were times in my life when I would have gone straight to do the thing I was explicitly asked to not do. I'm feeling pretty adulty, if confused. The Wielder of Instructions has a history with me that's earned my trust - a series of honorable decisions made, not deference to a title nor membership in any particular club. You need to let people know where you stand, and that can make you a potential target. Sort of a double-edged sword, isn't it?  Nobody wants to be cut. People sometimes use templates to define their ethics and values:  clubs and churches are the easy ones to identify.  We like the idea of knowing what to expect - it's easy, maybe even a ready-made personality. When we want to parse the template, we're accus...

Let's go be children - You're the red panda; I'm Tiger - Some lost Saturday I vacillate - sometimes daily - on the joys and tribulations of single life. I keep a handle on the joyful  by realising one day life will surprise me. Keep a watchful eye: no surprises, homeostasis preserved, single again today. Whew . We present a facade to others - this is a fact. Your facade - we should call it your Archetype - may be (and should be) made up of actual, true, parts of you. It isn't going to be all of you because we filter, and rightly so. You choose which parts to put forth, possibly based on your read of the candidate. We like to be impressive, yeah? No. I am not a name-tag emblazoned with HELLO I'M (they never really have commas, do they?) and so I should not present myself that way. I am smart and socially oblivious. I'm eclectic - quirky is the word Chantelle used for me - and I try to present ArchetypeMe as quirky because it will be so awesome when s...

Not the actual necklace; I think she's lost it. My daughter Alia tells people about me: "I literally tell people you're like shots of tequila. OK here and there but too much and you'll end up wandering the streets in an unknown city."   Her friends still ask "What's your mom been up to? Does she have any stories?"  I still have to tell y'all about doing laundry while Alia was in the hospital with a bum knee, but in the meantime here's a family classic:  The Christmas of Bacon. I was so proud of myself. And it was too easy. My daughter asked me to send her bacon for Christmas. "I will," I said, because I am a Good Mum, "and you WILL be sorry." Because she's met me. I found a single eBay seller who had bacon Christmas ornaments, candy canes, chap-stick, bandages, dental floss, pose-able figurines, and car air fresheners. And wrapping paper, and was willing to wrap the package for me before sending becau...

That shiny paper is its own reward:  It scampers out of reach so flittingly And dances nearer of its own accord, Much more intriguing when compared to me. What value is not obvious to see The worth at hand compared with effort spent, But who am I to judge the cost to thee?  A thing already won, irrelevant, I'll take the status quo, but play is cruel intent.

I'm about to add "trigger" to the list of catchphrases that should be retired due to misleading connotations.  I've seen the term used by people (read: internet trolls) whose only goal is to cause reactions  for the purpose of some creepy short-term gratification. Triggers can be personal and polarizing:  mention the poet Robert Frost and I'm triggered immediately, because how you feel about him is going to impact how I feel about you. The concept of  trigger in therapy has been extremely useful for people who have difficulty navigating every-day life.  Using the word this way implies an element of surprise:  something new sets off a knee-jerk reaction   founded in an unrelated traumatic event.  Therapy can help you create a tool that works to keep you in control of yourself when you're triggered. The phenomenon I'm talking about here needs a different word. It's not a trigger; it does not present as surprise.  It's the thing ...

Processes are nonrigid, and resemblance to linearity is a mirage. Creative process has to alternate like electricity or cricket batters. I use input/output methods like playing the same song over and again until a painting is finished - the song builds the world and keeps the tone while I interpret what the universe has shown me. What I read is an important input to what I write, even when what I write is my own nonfictional experience. Favourite authors sculpted my understanding of what literature should be. Ray Bradbury is at the top of that list. I met him once at a book signing in Palm Springs, California, ca. 2001. He was more adorable than I'd always suspected he was: those red suspenders and khaki shorts, comfortable shoes and trouser socks. He'd just found out that  Fahrenheit 451   would be assigned reading in France, and he was so happy for his characters. They remained very real people to him, he told me. We had a great conversation before the media showed u...

Photo by Martin Jones Quantum entanglement is a thing - a physical phenomenon - occurring when a pair of particles (or a group of them) have a correlation such that the state of one cannot be described independently of the other, even when separated by a large distance. Their relationship must be addressed in terms of the collection as a whole. If you take a measure of one, you will find same in the other (and possibly annihilate both , but that's a different tangent.) What affects one affects the whole system.  This is the baby-food version - I'm still learning. Einstein called it " Spooky Action at a Distance. " He had doubts , and those doubts spawned debate which continues today. Recently, though, scientists at the University of Glasgow have captured evidence of Bell Entanglement on camera . I'm gonna stretch this skeleton a bit and apply it to human connection. We've all heard twin stories - people formed from a split egg who claim special c...

The same day I planted irises in the yard outside my Tiny Cottage, I pulled up a bunch of weeds that usually grow so tall I can't see my car behind them .  I also broadcast a collection of seeds - broadleaf and holy basils, poppies, tomatoes, zinnias - around the stump next to the driveway.  And then I forgot all about the project. Farming is hard work, not just from the perspective of the farmer but also from the perspective of the seed.  Everything's an enemy:  the sun, the rain, the bugs, the birds, the other plants.  As a new sprout you are in constant danger of being eaten, strangled, or baked.  As the weeds grew back in around the stump, I noticed a zinnia standing a little taller than everybody else.  It seemed to be the only product of my sowing to survive, all cute and limey-green. And then some days later, the thing happened that makes me happiest:  Another human came along and, with no idea that I was responsibl...

I'm not sure how I got here - yes, I am. I'm searching Facebook posts for a reference to entangled photon pairs or Lewis Pairs from a conversation I know happened - but I got distracted. I love this picture. It is so very me. Even if you haven't met me in person, well you did now.  On my middle finger is the 5-year Anniversary ring I bought for myself - a battle trophy. One of the necklaces was a gift from a friend in 1988. The shirt was a thrift-store find I wore in Istanbul. I did my own hair - cut and color. And here it is, sort of inception-style, because the Facebook post was written four years after the photo was taken. At the time of the writing, I was studying The Art of War by Sun Tzu and applying it to the divorce process. It worked marvelously. I remember this day well. I was angry; I wanted to leave my husband and this life even then. I didn't want to go to a fucking birthday party of three people in this [ redacted ] town, but I did, and I made s...

I thought about your question, and I have an answer:  If we had stayed together...well, we didn't because we couldn't.  You misunderstand when you think I was finding myself, and maybe I misunderstand when I think you were finding yourself and think you still are. In truth, we both understand ourselves very well, and the one miscommunication - me not getting what you meant when you said 'you can do whatever you want...' - can probably be extrapolated into an entire relationship of What Would Have Happened, if we'd stayed together.  It would have been passionate and messy. We would have been stubborn enough to stay together for far too long and harbor too many grudges. We would have cooked for each other, broken furniture, cleaned up the mess, broken each other's hearts over and again.   I may have to write this story just for the fun of it.  Or maybe I just did.

A tree on Roanoke, photo by débora Ewing The first English Expedition to explore Roanoke Island in 1584 was a fact-finding mission bent on gaining land as a means of wealth and strategic advantage for the British Crown. A second expedition came in 1585 as a military and scientific mission, far from peaceful. The extant citizenry of The New Land were disrespected and blood was spilled. In July of 1587, a third expedition to the island came with women and children, intending to control property by permanently settling British colonial families. Not  only did the attempt fail, but the settlers disappeared completely, possibly integrating with natives in order to survive. The only clue was the mysterious word 'CROATOAN' carved into a tree. In 1607, Jamestown was founded. Christian white settlers became permanent fixtures in the new British territory. Expeditions sent by France, the Netherlands, Spain, and Portugal carried out similar missions. Their narratives have n...

Eddie's girl had told him: "If you're gonna propose to me, you need to make sure of three things. First, make sure my nails are done. Second, make sure there's a photographer. Third, make sure my family is there." Eddie said no to the third one. I was enlisted by my office-mom Stacy and Auntie Shantel to be the photog. For the record, I am older than both of them. That conversation went like this: "There goes Debora. She'll do it. Debora, you got anything going on August 1st? You do now."  I've shot 2 weddings and a birthday party for coworkers. I'm the unofficial official. Eddie wanted to pop the question at the time and place where he'd asked his girl for a date the very first time -  Waterfront Park in Georgetown, DC, at midnight. I told him I'd do the job for the cost of parking. Since I had to be in DC on a Saturday night, I went camouflaged: skeleton dress, bow tie, combat boots, blue lipstick. So maybe that i...