Monday, October 24, 2016 9:46 a.m.
Sipping chocolate turned into a mocha by using 8 oz of soy milk and a heaping teaspoon of instant coffee. As the steaming thick liquid hits my lips, I can feel its warmth gliding inside my throat and chest. The kind of flavor that makes you want to cry, its flavor is so intense.
An autumn vine's leaf glows at me in its fluorescent crimson shades of peach, run through with yellow veins, tipped with vanishing yellow- green chlorophyll.
The air outside is humid in a pleasant but present way.
This weekend we went to Palm Desert for a hot minute. My folks were at their timeshare and wanted us to meet them. I love that desert area these days, how sparse the population and housing is when compared to L.A. I enjoy our quick visits on a weekend at the end of the folk’s week-long stay. I accepted this invitation knowing we were paying for our room. Our paying turned out to not be the case. Mom told us she had said it was on them when she invited us, but I don't recall that fact. Mom rarely remembers what she has or hasn’t told me these days, though she will deny this fact.
Friday and Saturday night I found myself woken from sleep no less than five to six times each night. Even with a few feet separating our beds and ear plugs in my ears, Will's snoring still got the best of my night. Each time I fell back to sleep, but the constant waking takes its toll.
I was super tired yesterday on Sunday morning. Had a bunch of coffee at breakfast. My folks like to end their stay by having brunch at the River Rock Café at the hotel and spa which sits on an artificial lake, next door to the villas
Getting to the desert on a Friday night took us three and a half hours. I was the passenger as I had worked that day and Will had not. My body was so shifty and uncomfortable; I know a product of nerves that have had a smoking owner. The whole time we were in Palm Desert, I didn’t crave a cigarette. The surroundings were so relaxing and I didn’t smell the scent of party revelers indulging; not the nighttime adults gathered round one of the many gaslit fire pits on the grounds, nor the perfect looking party types by the hotel spa pool that was playing music so loud it could be heard from across the golf greens a quarter mile away in the villas. I imagined staying there for a week and resting, doing the activities on the calendar, the morning yoga, tush and belly burner work-outs, sushi making class…
Will and I got along reasonably well. On the trip, I couldn’t resist soaking in the giant tub in the room when Will filled it and asked if I wanted to join. I had said I wasn’t interested, but the hot water called.
I was turned on till we talked about the impending SNL episode that was fifteen minutes from starting. But didn’t take much to get me going. My ovaries were sore, so we had to go slow with the pushing, steady and slow. I was so there, so in the moment, loving him, then started thinking about reading my September 27th piece at my writer’s group. I have said that my writing is gritty. Whenever it was as a child that I began writing, I let myself put anything down and gave myself permission to do it. I would roll my eyes at a page and write down whatever thought, silly or weird, just did it. And that is where I a now as a 41-year-old. Being warned by some not to be so open, while other artists feel it is okay.
I don’t want to be disrespectful to my spouse, but my art has been to write it all down and share, now for the past nine years online. What is the point of writing if not sharing? No one nearby is listening, or they seem not to be. I don’t do it with the intent of hurting others. I publish with the intent of being heard, being brave I suppose. I don’t think about that much, though. Or do I? Being bold.
I was there in the moment of sex with Will, then out of the moment lost in my thoughts of should I, shouldn’t I share my writing with the group. My mentor says we are all adults. One of her former students wrote a memoir about being a professional in the BDSM world.
Reading out loud to a group, now that feels truly brave. I can hide behind the anonymity of the internet realm, but reading it out loud where I might have to see people judge me is something else. Although, maybe the other artists like Steve won’t see me as a miscreant. And I so want to smoke right now. The feeling, the desire comes and goes as my mood rises and falls.
Before I copied and then pasted that bit about sex, I had written that I want to try and remember Will’s warm, friendly eyes as I saw them in the tub that night. Remember them as being reason I married the man I did. The warm smile and eyes, find that pit of love in my gut.
I was to work a half-day this morning teaching math. I thought perhaps the teacher had the time wrong for the high school, giving me the start time at 8:30 instead of 7:45. Maybe he planned to be there and then go to a meeting, though.
When Will and I got back from picking up the dogs at the tail end of driving back from the desert, I thought I would take a quick power nap if I could. I had chugged the morning coffee and was so tired at the beginning of the ride home. There had been a massive accident, a big rig and bus collided in the a.m., and the road had been at a halt from 7:30, and still going by 12:44 when we were beginning to head back. I was too uncomfortable trying to sleep curled up in the back seat, so switched to the driver just in time for Will to navigate. He wanted to make a left onto a smaller desert road, while a long line of cars waited to turn left on a better-known thoroughfare. The bit of road was a, merge to the right eventually, type. I glided by the pretty red lights on the tail of a work truck where we snuck through on a left turn and sped down the desert road, beating the mainstream, waiting, commuters.
Will had not followed my dad and his route, something I always advise, dad knows how to negotiate maps and side streets. The folks called to check on what progress we were making, and Will admitted that he messed up by not following my dad who was already flying down the ten by this point. In a surprising acknowledgment of admiration, Will said he was glad I took the wheel when I did and bypassed the long line because he would have politely waited his turn for the little desert road we took. Usually my, I’m not looking just doing and getting ahead bothers the strict rule abiding Will, but it seems he likes that I can take charge like a bull, every now and then.
When we got home, we watched the beginning of what we missed and the rest of SNL. It was only 4:30. Will wanted me to go to trivia with him and his team that night. I thought I would take a nap before. Saw what I thought was Claritin and took one, but as I lay in bed and it had not melted immediately like it should, got up and ran to the bathroom to realize I was swallowing the last bit of a 5 mg of Melatonin. I normally only take half, sometimes a whole.
The whole drive back I considered stopping to get an iced soy mocha, but knew I didn’t need one and kept talking myself out of it. We were a bit early to pick up the fur babies from Auntie Sue’s Furry Care. Will decided we should stop and get me that mocha to bide our time. I got my usual with a double shot.
I decided not to nap after I had realized I had taken the 5 mg sleep aid, didn’t seem to come on right away anyway. Then to stay home as I expected the accidental Melatonin would render me sleepy soon. I was but stayed up till 8 p.m. reading about Willie Bosket, a frightening tale which I am unclear substantiates the authors inferred thesis, that it is the tradition of American violence in families that creates violent, emotionally disturbed criminals and a string of such in the African American communities.
Finally, after 8 I decided to go to bed. I couldn’t sleep and couldn’t sleep. I took a whole 1 mg Klonopin. I still couldn’t sleep. Will came home around 10:30, and I was still awake. Finally, I did sleep and slept then through the night.
When the alarm hit at 5:40 a.m. I could have kept going but decided to cancel the job and let myself sleep, as I felt I must need it since getting to sleep had been such a chore. It was silly, I should have gone, even though I still worked later for three hours tutoring.
So I sit on my patio before tutoring. Will go and sit at the more comfortable desk and edit this. I could go to the gym, can do laundry, can put away the items from the quick sojourn to meet the folks for the half second in the desert. I haven’t talked myself into the gym in months. Decided it was bad to mix that with smoking, which replaced energy to work out, rationalized that I shouldn't mix the two, which found me sitting on my porch, smoking instead.