anger · family · integrity · letting go · self-care

Gaslight

Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

*spoiler alert*
Gaslight is an old black and white suspense movie in which a
wife is tricked into thinking she is mad. Things disappear from her dressing
table. The lamp lights in her room dim and brighten without her touching them.
And her husband tells her she’s crazy, and says here’s your purse, you left it
x, even though she could have sworn she left it y. She is basically told that
the things she thinks are happening, which we as the viewer see happening, are not, in fact, happening. This, one can
imagine, produced fear, worry, self-doubt, and eventually a crack-up. This is gaslighting.
It’s funny that I’d been telling someone else about that
term yesterday morning, which made itself into regular parlance (like
“catch-22” from the book title) or at least made itself into my mom’s parlance
from whom I learned it, because later that day, I was gaslit.
On the phone with my dad, who’s wanting to coordinate about
my graduation, etc., as you may recall, I’d been anxious about him and my mom
being at the same place at the same time. So, I let him know this. I told him
that I know that he and my mom don’t have the most communicative relationship,
but that I hope we can all show up with a spirit of celebration. I told him
that I was anxious about them being here together, and that I hope they can get
along in a civil way.
He said, I have no idea what you’re talking about.
He said their relationship is fine; there’s no hard
feelings; that I must have gotten the wrong idea, and that, in essence, I was
wrong and there’s nothing wrong.
I reminded him of asking me to tell my mom about his
mother’s passing because they “aren’t talking,” and he had no recollection of
saying this. I said that he asked me to tell her, but I said I didn’t feel
comfortable doing so, and he said okay, Ben can tell her.
He has no recollection of this.
So, I got defensive, feeling like I was being told that what
really happened hadn’t happened. And he got defensive feeling, I imagine, that
I was attacking him for behavior that he doesn’t recall. I got a little
offensive in my “lightly insistent” reminder of his recent behavior, and he got a little offensive
accusing me of making things up.
And, so we got off the phone after reverting to the
“everything’s fine here” light, fake, cover-it-up tone.
I’ve never been divorced. And it became, now, less about my
parents’ interaction than about my interaction with my dad. This is usually how
it goes – it’s either, Everything’s fine, or it’s antagonistic. It’s either,
Gee my life’s swell, or it’s Oh wait, I’m not in control, I better use my vast
resources of rage and anger to intimidate it back into order.
This is the way it’s always been. To varying degrees of
each. He can barely ask a waiter for more water without it sounding like a
threat.
But, I’m also hyper-attuned to it, as his daughter.
So, moral? I told him what I hoped could happen at
graduation, he said things will be fine. So, needs voiced, needs heard. 
I know what my experience has been,
and I know the truth of things as I see them. And I have to have enough value
in my own experience that it doesn’t matter whether it’s verified by him, or
anyone else. It is not my job to break through someone else’s denial; to
instill in them proper manners of communication that do not swing from hot to
cold; it is not my job to change my dad. It’s just my job to not be gaslit by
him; to allow the conversation to hold contradiction, not have to “be right,”
and to let it go.
Not sure I have all of the “moral” here yet today, but I’m
pretty sure this is a lifetime process.
Next, it’ll be time to tell the same thing to my mom. … I
may need to do some work before I take that phone call on! … Or maybe I don’t need to call her on this at all. ?
community · compassion · gratitude · recovery · self-care · spirituality

Hold the Space

Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

It’s a very good thing I don’t have to do this on my own,
that I’m connected to friends and fellowships, and to a Higher Power that can
help me to hold the space for others. Because Lord, if today is not the day of
expanding that capacity.
Already today, I have sat and listened to the chaos and pain and
sadness of several people’s lives. I have been on the phone with someone who
asked to be given the space, for me to hold
the space, for her to share her grief. And then I sat one-on-one with someone
in chaos and pain, and offered action steps, encouragement, and hope.
I’m … well, I guess I’m not exhausted, because I haven’t
been doing this on my own power. Luckily, I have enough experience to know that
I cannot hold others’ grief all by
myself, and so I’ve taken moments here and there during this morning to call
upon the inner resources of strength to help me be present – not to check out
while they’re sharing, or to be in judgment of them, or think about my opinion about what they’re saying – but to really be present and listen.
I found it hardest first thing this morning, when for an hour that was the theme, and there were a few people grounded in their chaos, feeding
on it, and looking for relief in a way that felt toxic to me. That’s always the
hardest type. A friend informed me that Eckhart Tolle (whom, by the way, I
cannot stand…but that’s a story for another day), but that he had a concept
called the “pain body,” and it goes something like, when someone wants to share
their pain in a way that they want you to get stuck in it too – that they want
you to take it on. To stand nearby to someone, just aching to share their pain
body with you.
You probably know people like that – perhaps you are even
related to them. But they don’t want you to “hold space” for them; they want
you to become mired in it with them. A misery loves company kind of thing.
It’s hard to stand on top of the quagmire of trauma and
grief and sadness and suffering, and not get sucked down by it. One thing that
helps, and which has helped me today is gratitude.
For all the drama around school and finances, and even
around my trauma recovery, I am not where those people are, just for today. For
today, I am grateful that I woke up early, got to meet my commitments, and will
head this afternoon to the chiropractor and later to meet up with a lovely
group of cityfolk.
For today, there isn’t active drama or chaos or grief in my
life. And I am hugely grateful for that. I’ve heard it said that it’s a good
thing we’re not all crazy on the same day. Sometimes people hold the space for
me when I am in it. When I’m snot-bubble
sobbing the Ugly Cries and I can’t see the end of the abyss. And people hold
the space for me to cry it out, and likely sit in compassion and gratitude
themselves.
We’re not all crazy on the same day, nor are we all grieving
on the same day.
The other thing that I’ve found helpful today as I sit and
let the grief of others dissipate from around me, is that I did my dishes. All
of them. I vacuumed my apartment. And I will eat some healthy lunch before I
head on my way. Because no matter what resources I have available to me from a
Higher Power or from my community, if I’m not taking care of my basic needs,
I’m not at all available to others.
Water, Food, Recovery, Compassion, Gratitude. It’s been a
big day, and it’s only noon. But tomorrow someone may do it for me. 
action · change · fantasy · fear · integrity · responsibility

Magical Accidental Orgasm

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In The Vagina Monologues,
there is a piece in which a woman comes to the realization while in a
“Vagina Workshop” that she had avoided finding her clitoris. That she had
believed that orgasms happen to
her, that they weren’t something she should… have a hand in. She was
occasionally the recipient of magical, accidental orgasms (on horseback, or in
water, she says), but had never actually made one happen herself.
When she was instructed in the workshop that it was time to
find her clitoris, she noticed she began to panic. She had to now give up
the idea that someone would come along and give her orgasms, she had to now give up the
idea that someone was coming to live her life for her.
Her lines occurred to me as I walked toward yesterday’s professional
development seminar for writers. The sense that I was having to give up the
idea that someone would come along and live my life for me – that someone else
would make the decisions, take the actions that would enable me to be a something. A writer, an artist, a worker.
I have magical, accidental thinking too. And as I noticed I
was experiencing a strange sense of sadness on my way to the seminar yesterday,
I realized this was why. It is becoming time for me to “find my clitoris.” To
stop waiting for someone to do this for me, to stop waiting for someone to hand me
the roadmap for my life, and time for me to begin actually taking action if I
want results.
This brought grief. The death of my magical thinking. The
death of my hope that I could float along on half steam. Because I have floated along on half steam, the recipient of
magical gifts from the Universe. The problem with floating along without my own
power is that I now come to approach the job market, the work world, with no
sense of self-esteem. What have I
done? Where have I been a real
asset?
Sure, I have a long resume, with a host of attributes, but
none of them have anything to do with what gives me fire. When a friend
suggested recently that once May comes along, I’ll find my “fuck yeah” job at
40 hours a week with benefits… I thought I would vomit. Or rather, my whole
internal organ system went momentarily into a freeze. FUCK NO. 40 hours a week
with benefits sounds like a prison sentence. But it’s always what I’ve fallen
back on. I’m a good little worker bee; under half-steam I can coast along on
charisma and menial labor.
That is not my “fuck yeah” job. So what is? Because I have
ultimately avoided finding my “spot,” I have no idea.
But, I have now realized that I’ve been wishing that someone
would make those decisions and take those actions for me. That I would
magically and accidentally end up in the career, field, job that I love.
And I’ve realized that this is not true. And further, back
to the self-esteem thing, it doesn’t build it. Being gifted by the Universe has
been wonderful; I’ve been able to walk through the fire of dramatic uprisings
in finances and personal relationships. I have done this with as much work as I
thought was necessary, but not much more.
I am frightened. I have never really done much of the
showing up wholly and fully, and so I don’t yet have the experience that I can.
But, I know for absolute certain that if I don’t let go of my magical thinking,
I will “end up” in another cubicle, and I have promised myself, sworn to
myself, and begged myself to not do that.
This means accepting that I am worth the effort; and that I
am worthy of the effort. That I am worthy of my full attention, and don’t need
to be dependent on or subject to the random twists of fate. 
It’s time to take
matters into my own hand.
commitment · dating · faith · Jewish · recovery · self-care

Standards

Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

Yesterday as I was walking to catch my bus to the movies
with friends, a young man walked out of a nearby store and was walking just a few
paces next to me in the same direction. It was obvious we were going to be
going the same way for a while, so I asked him what he’d bought at the store –
it’s a little Italian food and cheese shop.
We ended up chatting and laughing a good bit on the way, and
as my bus came into sight, and he was going to continue on his way, I
introduced myself and held out my hand. He did the same, and then he asked, Do
you want to get together some time?
I smiled, and said, Actually I’m not dating right now, but
thank you. And he looked a little quizzical, but accepted it, and as we crossed
the street, I said maybe I’ll see you around. And I got on my bus, with
a grin on my face.
This young man, about my age, attractive, and I
picked up a Jewish vibe (my Jew-dar is pretty good with men). But, he was about
5 inches shorter than me. (I’m close to 6feet tall, if you didn’t know.)
I told my friend about the interaction later, and she said, “he wasn’t up to my standards, no pun intended…” But, unfortunately or not, it’s
true. I’ve tried to make good enough good enough, and it just doesn’t work for
me. I’ve tried to make almost the right fit into the right fit, but it’s like
Cinderella’s sisters’ bleeding toes. Eventually, the truth will out.
I felt glad that I was approachable and attractive. I felt
bummed that it wasn’t the right fit. But, I suppose it’s progress that I’m
approachable.
I still think about the Catholic and our incredible first
date in January – like something out of Before Sunrise.
I’ve been noticing I really do have a type, a physical type, at least. Blond and blue eyed. So, a blond blue
eyed, tall Jew. Right… But, as someone once told me, the Universe will either
fulfill your desire, or take it away. Or, as I’ve also heard, G-d has three answers: Yes, Not Now, and I have something better in mind.
For my reluctance to write this in an open forum, before I
met my last boyfriend, I felt like and said that I felt ready for “the one
before ‘The One,’” that I wasn’t quite ready for white-picket fence land, or to
be fully emotionally available – but that I was ready to try for the almost.
And believe it or not, I believe that’s exactly what
happened. It was almost right. It was in many ways also very not right. But I
got to practice being in a relationship; noticing my patterns, my alternation
between a desire to control and be approved of, and a desire to reject. I got to see that I wasn’t
a half-bad girlfriend, which was good, considering my self-esteem’s attachment to my sordid promiscuous past.
And, ultimately, I got to see that the difference between “almost” and “yes,”
though small, is also a canyon. Not easily crossed or bridged by any amount of
force or desire.
I’ve had a few approaches by “almosts” in the last six
months or so. And I’ve gotten to play the tape – the recent tape of trying with
an almost. It included tears, pain, “breaks,” coercion, frustration, despair.
(Of course, it also included joy, humor, contentment, and creativity.) It was
not enough. And so, I’ve had to practice saying no.
I’m not sure that I like using the phrase “I’m not dating
right now,” which had been true for the last few months, not being emotionally
available to date. But I feel that that’s changing. So, we’ll see. Maybe I will
get the opportunity to say Yes sometime soon.
(And, by the way, part of the reason for today’s blog is all
a ‘note to self’ about the inappropriate
dude-I-feel-like-a-13-year-old-lost-in-my-gawky-body-when-I-talk-to-you crush I
have on an blue-eyed acquaintance, who is non-jewish, short, taken, but oh so …
yummy.) 😉

abundance · courage · family · forgiveness · fortitude

My Life is in Harmony and in Perfect Living Order

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My Body is in Harmony and in Perfect Living Order

My Home is in Harmony and in Perfect Living Order
My Finances are in Harmony and in Perfect Living Order
My Time is in Harmony and in Perfect Living Order
My Family is in Harmony and in Perfect Living Order
Now that you’ve vomited, gagged, or simply stopped reading,
this is the phrase that occurred to me this morning. Particularly around my
family.
These are affirmations, which means that they may not be
precisely “true” at present, but the point is to work at believing them, and to
bring them into being. Affirmations have a long history, with me too, of being
thought of as poppy-cock, and nonsense, and sooooo gushy icky lovey for only the really far out
hopeless cases of wishful, magical thinkers.
And, be that as it may, what harm can they do.
It’s like the removal of the paintings of women hidden from
the viewer. What harm can it do? It’s like seeing a holistic chiropractor who
recommended gargling with (diluted!) apple cider vinegar because I was getting
sick. What harm can it do? It’s like believing that my parents will behave themselves when they see
each other at my graduation.
Like the anxiety/control bug will do, this parasite will
glom onto anything to maintain its existence. And, currently, now that it looks
like I may well graduate (WHEW!), it looks like my parents are coming out to see me
“walk” for graduation.
I’m… anxious in advance. My parents were not the fighting
kind when they were married. They were the not talking kind, speaking, toward
the end especially, only about who has a dentist appointment that day, or when
they’ll be home, etc. So, it’s difficult to imagine a reality in which they
talk less, but, I’m in it. We’re in it.
In fact, it’s worse. Because now, there’s rancor and
distrust and dislike. There’s resentment basically. And for the most part,
since their divorce ten years ago, a) they do not talk, email, communicate
(except through my brother and me), and b) if they mention each other, it’s
with bile.
So, my anxiety bug has been glomming onto the event of their
being in the same place at the same time, and how uncomfortable their tension
makes me.
It’s been suggested that I can let each of them know that
this is on my mind, and that I look forward to a happy occasion. They don’t
have to be best friends – they never really were – they just have to get along
enough to celebrate a happy occasion. My happy occasion.
My therapist said yesterday that it’s typical for people who
have had to take on adult responsibilities prior to adulthood to get a little
paralyzed and fearful when faced with adult rites of passage, such as
graduation. That we have put on such a show and action of being adult before our
years that when we’re actually faced with real acts of adulthood, we don’t
really know what to do with that. There’s a feeling that we haven’t in fact
grown up enough to take on the responsibilities we’re being asked to take on.
The fact is, I didn’t graduate undergrad with my friends and
roommates. I was in a mental institution at the time, coming off a combination
of drugs and alcohol, most of which noone knew I was abusing so much. I
remember my fear of what would happen when I graduated. This fear of going home
to live with my dad (my parents had only divorced that year) and knowing that
he and I were at odds. Seeing that my roommates and friends were all getting
ready to prepare for it, and I was in some bar, occasionally some bar in Philly, miles
away from school and responsibility.
And in a final act of “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing
– H E L P!!!,” I shaved my head – bicced it – in a moment of defiance, rage, and desperation.
I didn’t know why I was really doing it then – it seemed … logical? It seemed
like my only recourse. It felt like I was on that electric walkway at the
airport, and its moving along underneath me, but I’ve lost my footing, and its
dragging me, scraping me apart as others stand so calmly heading toward their
future.
I did graduate, and “walk” a year later, once the chaos all
settled. But, certainly, it’s been on my mind as I set to graduate this May. The
same sense … or maybe it’s just a similar sense – of not knowing what I’m
doing; that I don’t know what’s on the other side of this change; that don’t
you know how lost I am still, and I’m not sure I’m ready for this.
However, the truth is much different. It’s different than my
fear, and it’s much different than the reality of 9 years ago. The truth is, I’ve
been told by my academic advisor that this fear is normal. I’ve been told by my
therapist that this fear is normal. And, I’ve been told that I am certainly not
who I was 9 years ago. That the resources and foundation that I’ve worked to
build is actually quite solid, and my fears are no more than that. Just fears.
Just worries that Molly doesn’t know how to do it perfectly.
That Molly is at a different place than some of her high school and college
peers with their children, spouses, and minivans. I’m just worried that I’m
still a foundering vessel – but I’m not. I can let myself be. I can let myself
fall into the abyss of despair, worry, and self-pity. But that really doesn’t
take into account the facts.
The fact is, I’m much more capable to take care of myself
and my life than ever before, and I have a host of people to help me when I
feel like I’m failing at it. And, the fact is that whatever happens between my
parents when they come visit is not a reflection that I have somehow failed. That their tense relationship is an
outside reflection of my inability to have a normal, sane, happy life.
Not true. And, so I will repeat the above mantras, in their
purpose to solidify from wish and desire to truth. And maybe even get a little
excited and proud that I have accomplished something rather remarkable. 🙂
generosity · growth · humilty · poetry · school

Back to Basics.

Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

Sorry folks, for the interruption in my daily musings. I
have been under the weather, and yesterday morning slept in right until I had
to run out to do ‘first things first,’ and then over to school. This morning
was similar. So, thanks for your patience 😉 and for reading. 🙂
Yesterday, I had to run over to school in order to get my
painting professor to sign my “drop form.” Yes, I am dropping painting. A
number of things contributed to this decision. One of which was that I was
unable to do my morning practice on those Monday and Wednesday class mornings – the commute to class
was at an ungodly hour to me.
Another of which was that it wasn’t fun. It came as a
surprise to me to realize that I was feeling pinched by the instruction and
parameters that the class was offering. Surely, part of it was that my work wasn’t being “well received” and my ego was being hurt. But
part of it was that I wanted to do the work I wanted to do – to have fun – and I wasn’t. I was being told things like
“not formally correct” and at this stage of my painting game, I’m not concerned
with things like that. I’m concerned with expression, not correction. When she signed it though, my professor did tell me I have good instincts and to follow them, but that I need some development on my ideas (which I concur, and will do so with more “play”).
Lastly, for dropping painting – the class I was so looking
forward to taking – I have to focus on my “real” thesis. Despite my mental
flights of fancy into ideas for the thesis such as a visual and language art
project, or a 20 minute ballet, my flights have been grounded. For now.

The reality is… that I’m in an MFA program
and that program has certain prescribed requirements. This is not a free-for-all, however much I’d been playing it as such. So, I have
to play within the rules for now.
As I mentioned in the Reluctant Poet blog, I’m going back to
my original school work and am going to flesh
that out. In truth, some of the poetry I’m producing for it now could not have been written any earlier. I wouldn’t have had
access to writing about this a month ago, and certainly not anytime before
that. I’m doing a lot to free my voice and self, and it’s showing up in the
writing… now that I’m being forced to go back to it.
So. It turns out maybe this isn’t such a bad thing after
all. This “having to write a formal poetry thesis” thing. Which is good,
since I’m having to do it anyway, I may not as well see it as torture.
With the graciousness and generosity of the Universe,
yesterday before I went to get my drop form signed by the painting instructor,
I went to see my academic advisor for her signature, and to check in. This woman, is NOT the same as my “thesis advisor,” and
has known me and things about me for almost 2 years. I have a wonderful rapport
with her, and I value her immensely. She’s like a guidance counselor for grad
students ;P
And, that was precisely what I needed yesterday. The first
question she asked was “how’s the thesis,” and although at first I was
reluctant or cagey about the state of distraught I’ve been in over it, it
eventually all came out, tears and all.
She smiled. Kindly. She said that if the work wasn’t pushing
me, if I wasn’t coming up against blocks against it, if I wasn’t kicking and
screaming and being activated by it – then I wouldn’t be doing good work. I wouldn’t be changing as a writer. She
said that this reaction is normal; she
said that she had an all out break-down during her own dissertation. (Which,
btw, she’d shared about briefly at our student orientation, which is why I
then asked her to be my advisor. Her own journey and humanity made her feel
like the right person for me.)
She said that I needed to tell my thesis advisor what was up
with me and the work – why it has been so
hard for me to reapproach it. What’s been going on. And I sort of freeze up,
and say, Yeaaahh….. I know…..
And she says, I’d be happy to write her an email note as to
what’s going on. A short note, just to inform her. The relief I felt was
palpable. I had an advocate. I didn’t even know I needed one, but I said yes.
That I feel tender around all this, and get defensive, and that yes, I’d really
appreciate that.
See, my last interaction with my thesis advisor was that I’d
bring her all my work on Tuesday and we’d see if we can cobble something
together. So, I show up on Tuesday, and spend the half hour before our meeting
on the floor of the hallway with all my poems spread out, and I shuffle them
into an order, and I realize, I really do have a “body of work” that makes
sense – that has a theme, is coherent, and has a message, or a story arc. A
theme that is in perfect alignment with the work I’m currently doing.
And then, at 2pm on Tuesday, I knock on her office door, and
she’s not there. I wait. I fume. I’m all defensive in advance. And she doesn’t
show. … Turns out, she meant next
Tuesday, and I thought this one.
But, it all works out. I get to work through my resentment
some more before I see her; I get to have my academic advisor as my advocate, helping to calm
the waters; and I get to see that I might actually have something to say. In
poetry. 
art · change · painting · sexuality · trying

The Art of Progress.

Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

In considering ways to accrue and earn funds, I read that I
should make a list of things that I could sell, but not anything associated
with hobbies. It’s a good thing that was written there, because at first, I
immediately go, well, I guess I can sell my bass amp. Which I’ve been lugging
around for 5 years, and the bass guitar for … gosh, since college, almost 10 years. The bass which I do
not know how to play – not really. I fuck around with it, sometimes even plug
it in (which make my insides all joyfully trembly), and I have this bass riff that I enjoy to play that I made up. But, I
don’t know any songs or the scales (yet).
So, luckily it was written not to sell hobby things, because
I have a lot of such hobby items I’d start to list, like putting my disowned
children on the chopping block.
Then, in another book, the author told the story of a man,
an artist, who had several paintings around his home with a woman turned away
from the viewer. The person visiting his home said, I think you may have
trouble in your love life. The artist was shocked – yes, he did indeed. And she
pointed out that all these paintings, which he had made, were of women turning
away from him. And through her suggestions, he painted different, new paintings
– at first with multiple women in them together with a man(!), and later, of
just one man and one woman. Guess what happened.
So, I look at the art piece I have above my bed – 7
paintings of women, the central one of a man kissing a woman, and she’s looking
out at the viewer. The others are all obscured, obstructed, partial views of
women. As if you can never see, or have, all of her. Just these parts you have
to put together yourself in your mind. Sexy though they may be to me, I’m very
reminded of the above story of the artist.
This art piece reflects detachment, a “you can’t have all of
me” just the parts I choose to show you. I think it’s interesting to think on
it this way. As that’s certainly my M.O. in love and relationships.
Particularly around sex – I’ll give you my body, but like the woman looking
away from her lover and toward the camera, I won’t give you my self, my
attention, my all.
Therefore, it occurs to me, that perhaps it is time to let
this piece go. It represents a way of being that I want to move away from, and
perhaps… though I am terrified to begin the process – perhaps someone else
might want it – Might want to buy it.
Now, I realize this moment, that I ought not sell it to
someone who’s read this blog! G-d forbid I hand another person a scene of
loneliness! – but that’s my association. Other people have said, sensual and really
good and creative.
I’d written previously about my reluctance to sell my art,
art that means something to me – particularly one piece I sold very quickly without much thought to its importance to me, or to a price that would honor that
importance. But, this feels like I’m doing the work to let this one go. That I
am prepared and preparing to allow this piece of me to go out into the world.
There’s a café around the corner from me with a sign by the cash register: “Are you an artist? Then you should show here!” or something like
that. I think I’ll ask them what they think. 
“Find Me – Take Me”. Watercolor&mixed media. Nov ’12.
Asking Price $1500.00

art · fun · letting go · poetry · recovery · school

The Reluctant Poet

Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

I had the wonderful opportunity yesterday to sit in a park
with one of my best girl friends in the SF sunshine and shade and download the
mental vomit of my thesis bananas.
She had some interesting perspective too. She said that it
seems like I’m meant to be a poet right now. That I’ve tried to hand in and do
something else, and I’m being blocked, and that perhaps, I’m supposed to write
poetry right now.
I don’t want to. I have ALL these “thoughts” and “opinions”
about “poets” and “poetry.” I can’t tell you how rankled I am at conversations
that have included the following after I reluctantly reveal what it is I study at school:
Oh, I hate poetry. (my dentist’s receptionist…)
I don’t really like poetry.
I don’t know any poetry.
What are you going to do with that?
There’s no money in that.
Uh, I don’t know anything about poetry.
I hated poetry in high school.
I think I read Walt Whitman once.
I. Don’t. Give. A. Fuck. I don’t give a fuck what you think
about poetry. And, further, I ought to not give a fuck at the moment what I think about poetry.
I have some messed up ideas and beliefs about poetry. Like it’s not cool;
nobody likes it; nobody cares. Why can’t I be a painter, or a musician, or some
other “acceptable” form of artist? Why do I have to write like that?
So, yesterday before I met with my friend, I went into the
nearby indie bookstore, and I went to the poetry section – which although
toward the back, was not underlit (!). And I began to pick up titles that
interested me. I got to put some back … skip over the Walt Whitman, and … buy two I’d skimmed and thought I’d like. I bought two books of poetry.
I never buy books. Ever. (Well, unless you count the Harry
Potters, but they’re always OUT at the
library!) I therefore never buy books of poetry. I’ve had the opportunity
through school these last 2 years to read a lot of books of poetry, and buy a
lot of books of poetry. But, they’re not “for me.” They’re not ones I’ve chosen,
ones I’ve looked at and been sparked by. My hand, like Moses, was being pushed
away from the gold. And I burned my tongue — I lost my taste for it.
I’ve been so steeped in poetry, and the language of poetry,
and the analysis of poetry, and the conversations around poetry that I could
probably puke enough letters to make
poetry.
Therefore, it is not suprising that I have not been all that
enthused to reapproach the project I’d vaguely been working on. I know what I
was working on. I know that it’s raw, and honest, and revealing, and
vulnerable. I know that it talks about trauma, and I don’t really want to talk
about trauma. I know some of it is revealing of my parents’ human fallibility and I don’t want to come off as a thirty year old woman blaming her parents. 
My friend asked me what the work wants or needs right now. I said … it wants to be honored. I thought it would
be enough to write some of it out, have some folks read it in class, and shove it away as random pages in random drawers. But apparently this work wants to be held differently.
Apparently, it wants more of a laying to rest than that. That’s what the work
is. It’s an honoring of the past. Like the purpose of a funeral to provide a
space and a container for grief and letting go, this work wants to
be compiled, honored, and set to rest. Not left as it is, scattered parts
of a whole.
Which I suppose is its own metaphor.
So, I, the reluctant poet, got to read some really good,
funny, poignant, clever, honest poetry from my newly purchased book yesterday, one which I bought with my own sense of attraction and desire, not assigned, not suggested reading, not a professor’s newest book. I got to sit on that train with a slight grin, reading art with a perspective shift about my own work that I’m not completely on board with yet, but which apparently is happening anyway.
community · fortitude · gratitude · grief · love

Be Lightning.

Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

It will be impossible to write today without acknowledging
yesterday. Puffy eyed and dehydrated, as if I drank all the salt water
that I poured out yesterday.
A bottle of root beer was spilled ceremony-like into a glass
of vanilla ice cream. Like when someone spills a person’s favorite drink onto
their grave in memoriam.
Someone chuckled at the number of women he’d slept with who
came to the funeral. That that said something, that they all showed up.
A woman he worked with told about the practical jokes he’d
done at work, like rearranging her cubicle when she was gone for lunch, so that
when she came in, it was all walled in and backwards, and she couldn’t get into
it.
What I thought of him was that he
was like the initial spark of a lightning bolt. That all of the ions became
electrified just by being in his
vicinity, just by being adjacent to him. That suddenly the whole place, the
whole sky was lit up. He had that effect.
I am not among the women he slept
with. I was not friends with him in a familiar, close way. But I was in his
vicinity, often, and I too had been lit up by him. Heartened by his just being
there, even if he was sulky and sarcastic, as he was more and more. It just
felt good to know him. Just to know he was here.
There were more than 200 people
there yesterday, with standing room only, and all the doors to the small chapel
opened wide for people to crowd in together. I shook with repressed sobs. His
mother was in a mildly hysterical, altered state that you associate with
someone with dementia – oh, isn’t this nice, what’s your name. …
In Judaism, parents who have lost
a child get a free pass to heaven, no questions asked. In Judaism, we also
don’t do open caskets. So this was the first time I’d been near a … one.
Awkward in his My Girl made-up face. The slight raised angle of his
eyebrows toward the middle that always made him look like he was eager, or
worried.
I’d written a blog a while back
about death, and how it occurred to me that what was left was love, and
children’s laughter. There was a child there yesterday, his nephew, playing
outside the opened doors where people were crowding in. And love is not even
the right word for what was felt in that chapel yesterday. It’s not even close
to big enough.
With no other course, I am
inspired to honor this life, his life, by attempting to be a fraction of the electric ion that he was. To quit my solitude and hiding. To love as
much as I can, as I know I’m here to do. And lastly, with no other course, to accept that this had to be done. That this was necessary. That he needed to go home. That he needed to go back. 
For all of the lives you brightened. For the one thing that held you back from “getting it.” For addiction’s baffling ability to cut us down. And for your legacy that poured from every eye in that chapel.  May you be at peace. 

fear · fortitude · poetry · responsibility · school

Make It Work

Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

True to the mixed bag that life is, yesterday was a mixed
day. I’m insanely grateful that I wrote my confirmation of the goodness of the
Universe blog before I checked my email
yesterday morning. Because in that email was one from Thursday from my thesis advisor
which stated that my blog cannot be my thesis – that it is being rejected. …
And further that she strongly recommends, “no, let me put it more firmly,” she
writes, that I must go “thesis in progress.”
TIP means that I pay about $500 for the luxury of not having
to turn something in this semester. It means that I pause the thesis process
and am able to work on it and deliver something and meet with her still over
the course of the next year. It also means that I cannot “walk” for graduation
in May.
I write her back that this is my reluctancy to do this. And
that for the love of G-d, I want to be “done” when I am done. But I don’t tell
her that this time; I’d already done so in our previous … terse email exchange
before I handed in my blog in a “well, I don’t have anything better to give”
moment.
She says back that, okay, bring all the poetry I’ve got when
we meet on Tuesday, and we’ll try to make something work, “no promises.” Cobble
something together out of poetry and prose, and to clear my slate for the next
month to do a lot of revision, and who knows, she says, “you may just like it.”
Sniff. Ahem. It’s not
that I don’t like writing, or haven’t enjoyed writing poetry in the past. But, she asked me, I just don’t get
it, didn’t you come here to write a book? And this is where she and I are on very different pages. What
I have to inform her, I don’t know if I do. But, no, lady, I did not come to school to write a book. I have no
aspirations to be published. I believe there is a rich landscape of poets whom
I consider awful to not my style but have much merit to striking and inspiring. Do I really feel the overwhelming
need to put my voice in with them? As a book? In that limited particular, stick
on a shelf in some dusty graduate school library and possibly a few books
stores with shelves already lined with a million books in an underlit poetry corner?
No. I don’t have an overwhelming need to do that.
Do I believe in my voice? Yes. That’s what I’m doing here,
in this blog. With my community, and in other creative manners. Do I believe that
even if there are a million other people
on the shelf that I have as much a right as any of them to add my voice? Of
course. But that doesn’t mean I want to. Not now. Not in this way.
But, I’ve now recognized the pattern I have with her, which
is her as the little man in The Wizard of Oz in the circlular porthole
of the gigantic green Emerald City door saying “No way No how, nobody gets in
to see the wizard.” And we exchange a few emails, and then she says, Well,
we’ll see what we can do.
In the time between No Way No How, and We’ll See What We
Can Do, I am thrust into a dither of indignation, righteousness,
misunderstoodness, and despair. And then, on the other side, I am back to feet on the
ground, Okay, cool, we’ll see what we can do, hope, things can and will work
out – they always do, and I have faith that by doing some work it will.
That, dearests, is not her fault or her problem. That I get thrown WAAAAY overboard into a tizzy is not her
fault. And now, especially that I see the pattern, I am more prepared for it,
and more able to do what I’ve heard other people say, which is “to wear the world as a
loose garment.”
The reality is, yes, my family has plans to come out to see
me walk for graduation. I don’t believe they have their plane tickets yet
though. I do want to walk at graduation.
I do want to be “done” in May. I do want to move on to other things, and take a
flatbed of gratitude for the time that being in school has given me to pursue
all the other angles of healing that I’ve needed to pursue.
The reality is that if it does come down to it, I will take
the thesis in progress. I will be disappointed, my family will be disappointed,
but this really is the best I can do. And I have to allow myself that
compassion. If I could have written a book of poetry, I would have. But that’s
not what I’ve been doing. So be it. I am where I am now, and that’s looking at
making something work. I’ve seen Tim Gunn say his catch phrase in both his dubious, one-eyebrow-raised tone, and in his hopeful get-er-done tone.
I don’t need hope here, I just need to do the work. Satisfy
this requirement and get on with my life. This woman is not my enemy. Nor is
she my judge and jury.
So, beginning Tuesday, I will not be a poet, I will be an
editor. I can do that.