#uncoffeed...

Kalamazoo now has traffic circles. why does pain so familiar feel so good?  I play the same song over & over opening the same vein over & over recounting the crossroads where the path could have been different mighta been coulda been shoulda been woulda been never matters anyway It's not regret I'm feeling, no I'm playing Physical Graffiti to remember a particular permutation of me. The me who helped break a puppy out of dog jail. ...the one who once took a bunch of the blinky traffic signs and put them in someone's yard like their front door was blocked off...and then another day did the same thing but blocking off Douglas, one of the main streets in Kalamazoo. THERE WASN'T ANYTHING ELSE TO DO. We were kids who didn't want to go home. I was "raised" by old hippies. I'd given up on traditional life entirely, skipped school, and went downtown to hang in basements on the North Side with musicians who had weed and philosophy. They talked to m...

I took somebody's online quiz (having no faith in online quizzes but needing entertainment.)   The quiz proclaimed me INFP-T. As I read their breakdown I kept mumbling no... no...No...NO...THIS IS ALL WRONG. It's an online quiz, for cripes' sake.  But the quiz-creators take themselves relatively seriously. The Briggs-Meyers test is considered reputable to some degree.   Worse, a friend sent me a link of Quora discussions:  https://www.quora.com/What-is-it-like-to-be-an-INFP https://www.quora.com/Is-anyone-an-INFP-They-seem-very-rare https://www.quora.com/What-frustrates-people-about-INFPs  "I dunno about that infp stuff," Sharon said. "Google says infp types tend to be verbally unassertive. (I think you assert verbally, frequently)" Sharon's met me.  Jim adds: "Because you know how much more there is that you didn't assert." Yes, Jim, so much yes.  It is nice to be understood. Let's just be clear on one t...

I miss my friend horribly today. I miss the way we could joke about anything, knowing this was the safe zone, knowing we were really all okay and could be trusted in the world despite what we thought funny right now. I miss coffee under palm trees.  I miss painting the stairs. I miss laughing over school assignments. Not holding back. I don't miss those days, but I miss the safe zone and the shared vocabulary.  We knew all along that we'd move on eventually, not knowing to where - it's a rite of passage. We are processes, always moving but not always with translatable maps.  Knowing never makes it easy. I'm alone among friends where I am now.  I've built myself a fort, and I am safe, but it's a different sort of safety.  I miss feeling understood.  I'm afraid of possibly never being understood again, since every minute of every day puts more mileage between then and tomorrow. Now is frangible.  I assure you the fear is valid. New words are...

The sky this morning is pale ocean blue - dull and thick with the water that lingers on the edge of a coastal storm. I'm 3.5 hours inland but the residuals of hurricanes are far-reaching. I made coffee last night, because I'm gross and like it room temperature and also like to grab it when I first wake up at dawn's early crack so I can coffee nap. Yes, this really works . Hurricane Florence is pummeling the Carolinas; Abby the Cockatiel and I watched CBS coverage for a few hours yesterday. Most of the interviewed voices reiterated that they felt lucky and ready to get back to work; I heard someone say the one thing they would like donated is cleaning supplies. My heart gets happy to hear a pragmatic person speaking to the world. I started watching a TV show called The First , starring Sean Penn (Abby didn't seem interested.) It's set in New Orleans, a city that will always hold a piece of my heart and soul. The city itself is a cliché for something that cann...

Sometimes I know exactly what's real, and it terrifies me. I've been up since dawn's early crack, having followed my own advice and having been asleep since n *PM last night. Asleep is a relative term - these days it means that several times I woke up enough to tell Netflix yes, I was still watching, and roll over again. I blame years of shift work for being unable to relax in a dark and silent room. My brain is too loud without external noise to mitigate it. I'm rarely awake to see the sun come up, but it's one of my favorite things. I turn off the TV and listen to the birds.  Ideally I have coffee and go back to bed, but today is a work-day, a heavy one. I'm going to try and tell you what my panic attack is like. I use the familiar term, but it doesn't mean the same thing for everyone. My work-space faces a window that looks out into the woods across the landlords' back patio. I can see the rooftop of the house over the hill, and I know that b...