It could've happened anywhere, but I just love this city so dang much. It highlights the awesomeness of following your whims in a city where hustle and bustle almost always take the lead.
Wednesday night I received a postcard with a lovely Gauguin painting on the front of two smart and mischievous-looking women. On the back read:
Simonian,
I found an empty envelope on the ground on 5th Ave. and 14th St. It was a welcome treat to find such a lonely envelope and I felt it necessary to send a little postal cheer back your way. I hope this post-card finds you well and happy. Spring is coming and the city will soon be at its best. Good luck in all you pursue this spring and beyond!
-Emily
She included her address, should I want to write her back, and of course I did for a myriad of reasons. But mostly for this one - it's so easy to forget how to LIVE. It's easy to remember all the crap we have to do or get done, but it feels so extra-special to be on the receiving end of unanticipated well-wishes, and even more satisfying to throw a handful of seeds into the air and be content to see or not see - what grows. It's a reminder of how important, and easy it is - to keep life interesting.
Thanks Emily!
Saturday, March 28, 2009
The Coolest Thing
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Thisisgonnabequick!
Listen. I have no business writing right now.... I'm supposed to be studying for a huge-o homeopathy board exam that I may likely fail (though I'm not supposed to say that). But my family and I have had a rough few weeks, as my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer, then had a lumpectomy, and was deemed healthy yesterday. They got 'it all' apparently, and her protocol involves radiation and a drug she doesn't want to take. As a matter of fact, I'll post her email to all of us kids here:
Subject: Me Me Me
Just a quick note to let you know that I am going to live to a ripe (or withered) old age. My cancer hasn't metastasized and only one of three lymph nodes showed cancer. The next step seems to be radiation for 6 weeks and then whatever the oncologist suggests. Except that I am not open to oncology suggestions. I am still following an intense homeopathic protocol and at this time don't see the need for anything further. Thanks for your support of me and your dad through some rather unsettling days. Love, Connie
We're so happy. I don't know if you can tell what she's like from this email, but she's a singular lady. That was the big problem with imagining my mom dying. How would I explain her to anyone who never met her?
My friend Patty Griffin (I don't even know her, but damn, her music!) says 'As far as I can tell most everything mean nothing, except some things mean everything.'
'nuff said.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
A New Dawn
I bet there are a lot of people who can't NOT WRITE - blog, email, letters, whatever - at a moment such as this.
Never have I been moved to tears of joy by an election. I've felt emotional, on the positive and negative side, depending on the election. But this brings up hope, love, and allowing ourselves to invest in a leader again. To feel something for a stranger - for a man we'll likely never meet.
I watched and listened to Barack Obama last night as he delivered his acceptance speech. The way he included us, included ALL OF US - especially those who didn't vote for him. He said 'I'm your president too' and said he'd do his best to represent all our interests. He urged us to come together, but mostly, he allowed us to remember what it's like to believe that is even possible. He's taken the most fractured nation and invited us to mend our wound as a people, as a country. He uses togetherness, instead of separateness - to govern, to heal.
We've been used to 8 years of the darkest form of governing possible. Fear tactics, lies, playing on differences among people to breed more fear. It's sick. We've been sick as a nation because of it. And here we've elected the right doctor to help us heal ourselves. He's inviting us to. That is reason alone for hope. We were able to make a healthy choice; we were offered an opportunity for change and responsibility and we recognized it and took advantage of that opportunity.
I've cried and cried to be able, to be given permission, to hope like this. But it's also scary to hope, to trust again in some ways, because what if this is taken from us? I'm not alone in my worry that certain diseased people will, out of fear of change, seek to obliterate that possibility. What can we learn from what Barack Obama is inviting us to do? He's teaching us how to hope again, to involve ourselves again, to take individual responsibility for participating in a nation that we create and nourish together. The gem of his guidance is that the world can be what we dare to dream and work for.
I'm off to a day in the new world today.
Friday, September 19, 2008
Nice-Ass Paper
It's been forever since I've written, and I have to say there are many reasons. (I always start these out with some excuse, so it's my format. Please be patient.)
I admit it here and now and will say it only once; I skipped about 4 days of letter writing. I've made up for them with doubling down on certain days prior and following, but this wasn't originally about putting out 365 letters, but putting them out consistently. But you know what? It's my project and my tiring life so it'll have to do. I will re-work and mold the rules as I see fit. Whatever it takes to make it so that what I actually did, works perfectly. It's nice being me.
A bunch of things have happened in the last month. I got married. That was huge. It was fun writing the letter on the wedding day. To whom, you might ask? My mother. I wrote my husband the following day, the first day of our married life together. He got a postcard because I was exhausted. A little foreshadowing into married life, perhaps.
I've been swimming in letters, postcards, writing materials and inquiries. 'Are you still doing the letters?' etc. is one of the more common openers from friends these days. It's replaced 'How are you?' and I'll take it. The answer is either Yes! Or an exasperated, grrr, yes - or a barely-audible-because-I'm-so-tired yes. There are many inflections to the answer yes, as I've learned from responding to the letter-project inquiry.
Mostly though, I want to report that today, in the mail, I received the following:
Four postcards. One from a friend who lives in Norway, but is on vacation in Paris right now. One from two friends in Brooklyn, where we live, congratulating us on the marriage. The other two are from a friend in Tennessee, and one contained a poem, even! Then a card addressed to both of us again. The last piece of mail was a check.
This is a red letter day for mail, folks! I've reached Nirvana. Not only way more personal mail than bills, but NO bills AND a check in the mail!!! The only potential problem I see here is that I will cease to appreciate my good fortune should it keep up. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to invite hate mail. Not ever. There's something more sinister about a piece of evil traveling through the post and making it to your door than if someone just called you or yelled in your face. I much prefer a hate phone call. But knowing someone took the time to write out the hate and send it your way, nobody needs that. Except the hater, maybe.
But curseth thee, thy haters! I am here to say that I didn't pick today's mail contents to discuss because it was so exceptional. Though it was better than average, today's mail actually represented the gestalt of my mailbox these days. Lots of love. So three and a half months in, my overall rating rests at WORTHWHILE. Only eight and a half months to go. More reports to come, but for now, I will adjourn - I have a friend who signed her divorce papers yesterday so she needs something written on some nice-ass paper. (That means 'paper that is nice'. I'm not going to write her a letter on fancy toilet paper, nor do I have stationary that says 'Nice Ass!' though, come to think of it....)
Sunday, August 10, 2008
My letter to James Tate
I've mentioned my dumb letter to James Tate. Well, I'm publishing it here.
There are a few things about James Tate. He was born in the same year as my mother, who is also a writer. His father died in World War II, my grandfather fought in that war. And my grandfather is the writer who's letters inspired the letter-writing dance of this year. And all these letters of his that I've been drinking in, were written to my mother.
It's non-linear, but it's fun for me to turn over and over in my mind.
June 13, 2008
Dear James Tate,
I'm writing one letter a day for a year. This is the exercise I've devised to celebrate the lost art of letter writing and to get my brain tumbling forward.
That's the background. The fun part is that each day it becomes obvious to whom I should write. It's 11:46 and I'm staring at your book, "Return to the City of White Donkeys" at my bedside. I LOVE THIS BOOK! I've loved it for a few years, since I got it as a gift from the bass player in my old band, as he thought my roommate, who is a poet, would like it. (This is getting to be a long story.) Anyway, I stole it when I moved out. Or maybe 'claimed' it - is a better way of putting it. But it's a treasure. I use it like I use only the most special things. You see, the most special things are the only things that can truly do the trick.
One poem, maybe two - when I need to dial in. My mother gave me a music box (you turn the crank) that plays Beautiful Dreamer - when I was 8. That's a special relic as well.
Anyway, this goes on - thank you. I really love the book.
Best, Erika
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Remembering and Forgetting
I am getting married in September. That's one angle of this whole thing.
So I figured, without thinking too hard about it, to somehow ORGANIZE my past. I know, it's ridiculous. I didn't really think about it, I just started doing it before I realized what I was doing.
My grandfather wrote amazing letters. I'm tempted to transcribe one here, but I can't make a decision on which one right yet - just too overwhelming. What I do know is that I took on compiling a book of my grandfather's letters for my mother as a thank you gift for hosting this wedding. And I've been swimming in the words of my family ever since.
Letters from my grandfather to my mother, his only child.
Letters from my father to my mother, before they were married.
Letters from my grandmother to other members of my family, but never to my mother, her only child. They didn't get along.
The lynchpin of the whole thing, the only surviving member of this vortex, is my mom. The rest are long dead. It is so strange to be reading these, flanking my day by reading one in the am, one in the pm. In some ways, it's a fantasy of the past, in others, a tangible reality - a piece of paper with thoughts written out, signed by the author. After all, you write letters when you're moved to communicate. It's getting all the inspired moments of someone and reading them at once, post-mortem. I wish my grandfather was back, but it's because I surface into reality every now and again. I feel like he IS here through reading all this. Every now and then I pop my head up from that world and check back into this one, remembering he's gone.
I'm still exploring, as there are more and more letters to read. I'm conscious of reading them only once, maybe parts twice. But it's much like a novel you don't want to end, but more. I'm walking slowly and quietly through this place, so as not to disturb anything. I want to stop and camp in certain sites before moving on or going home again. I feel like I'm with my grandfather, like he still lives with us, like he did when we were in high school. I didn't appreciate him then. Of course, I feel guilty about that.
A fact about my mom - she is about the least sentimental human being, a dyed-in-the-wool practical woman. So this leads me to the fact that I have to throw my body between her and anything I care to preserve. She won't explore a box of letters, a trunk full of old stuff. Paintings we had in the living room for years, suddenly without value. It brings up the question of value as well, as I've discussed with my friend Andy. His father is like my mother. Things that once meant so much, had SO much VALUE, so to speak, and are being sold at garage sales or plain thrown out. Brings up the question of what is value anyway? In observing my mother's and my very different styles (I save everything-) I've realized that we represent two kinds of people; those who don't want to forget (me), and those who either a) DO want to forget, or b) whose memories aren't dependent on tangible reminders of the past, or c) those who just don't care whether or not they forget. See, I need the letters to remember, to feel the vibe again, for transcendence to some other time in my life. Otherwise, I forget what seem to be important aspects of myself, of my past.
But, are they really important? If I don't remember them, do they matter? (A psychiatrist somewhere is having a field day with this one - like, YEAH. Ever heard of REPRESSION?) But I'm talking more the ilk of 'if a tree falls in the woods and no one is nearby, did it make a sound?' That kind of importance is debatable.
My mother probably wants to forget. Like Andy's father, she just moves forward from wherever she is, and moving forward is way more important than anything else. I don't know where I'm going with this post, except that this whole thing has become a whirlpool - and the whirlpool aspect gets put out of my head by writing about it. I guess now I can move forward.
I am still writing a letter a day. Sometimes to myself. I've written 3 now to myself. It's mostly when I can't stand to send anyone else my heart's wrestling-match-of-the-day. I also wrote a band I heard playing in Tompkins Square Park last Friday. The trumpet was soooo soooothing. They made me happy, so I returned the favor. I've received amazing letters in these past weeks - as well as books, postcards, gorgeous stationary and a magical pen. People are making me cry, actually. And I got word from my first person-on-board, Marta Lee. She started writing a letter a day two days ago, and started with one to herself that she'll open in 20 years. She's 16 now, so when she's my age, she'll be reading her younger self. How lovely... I hope she'll keep us posted.