i am not alone.

a year or so ago we had an anti-bullying assembly at school and there were buttons. i keep two posted in my apartment where i can see them–one in the bathroom and one here on the bookshelf, next to the computer–that both say, “you are not alone.”

sometimes i feel very, very alone.

sometimes i think those buttons are mother-fucking liars.

kurt vonnegut has this quote from timequake:

“Many people need desperately to receive this message: ‘I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people do not care about them. You are not alone.'”

i know that there are lots of people who feel as despairing of hope and as abused and shocked and incredulous about this election as i do–i know this.  the buttons tell me, kurt vonnegut tells me, facebook tells me.

i am not alone.

and maybe, together, we can do something to salvage the ideals of our country.  maybe, together, we can protect the people and ideas so savagely attacked by trump in his campaign and heal some of the wounds and rifts that he might not have caused, but that he certainly made worse.

i am trying to hope.  i am trying to keep it together.  i am trying to understand that all those hateful, frightened trump supporters probably also just wanted to know that they are not alone, but i cannot stomach that anyone with a shred of humanity could ignore his hatefulness.  i don’t know if i can be the bigger person and forgive them–i don’t even know if i have it in me to try, but hating them isn’t going to help me and it isn’t going to hurt or teach them anything.

we are in this world together and the things we do matter, the things we say matter, the way we think matters.  we need to try to find a way to get through this together.

high and fine and free

the pixies–i can’t forget

i loved the pixies from their beginning and leonard cohen almost from my beginning and certainly this song since it first came out, but…damn.  this morning in the shower, it hit me in a much more personal way.

in a couple days it’ll be the one year anniversary of maureen’s death, and i’ve done a lot of mental and emotional rearranging in that time to get myself through all that stuff that we have to get through when a friend dies, along with a side of special suicide grief.  i can think back on certain things and try not to think back too often on others.  that mental filing job isn’t totally complete, of course, but main index is filling out.

i still miss her so much, every day.  every fucking day.  and i still get so angry with some people and so frustrated with myself and i wish i could give that up–i wouldn’t mind the missing her so much if i could get through the other thing.