Love Like Salt
by Lisel Mueller
It lies in our hands in crystals
too intricate to decipher
It goes into the skillet
without being given a second thought
It spills on the floor so fine
we step all over it
We carry a pinch behind each eyeball
It breaks out on our foreheads
We store it inside our bodies
in secret wineskins
At supper, we pass it around the table
talking of holidays and the sea.
3.15.2008
3.06.2008
as i lay dying
Annie, you have no idea how appropriate your bow to The Sisterhood was! Your head-tip to Tibby was all too timely.As I've sat here in bed for the past three and a half days with this dreaded cold, my sore, achy, stagnant, self has had somewhat of an epiphany, as most who lay on the edge of life and death oft times do.
The all-too wise E. Gilbert wrote, "I disappear into the person I love..." Yup. I'll nod to that. And, if that plight of self-pitty wasn't bad enough, I'll take it one step further: after the person I disappear into, disappears; when borrowed books are returned and text message conversations are terminated, why am I at the library counter with those same titles in hand? Why do I reach for the journal entries full of scribbled down text messages? When any normal individual, any person who has hope of moving on, would pick up the pieces and begin anew, I go back into the burning building. I comb the tsunami-tossed shore for tokens of the relationship, even though I know everything washed out with the tide.
In utter panic-mode, I search for a Sharpie. Scribbling out an S.O.S., I curl it up inside a bottle to send to sea along with the wild hope that it will reach that someone. That disappeared person on the other side of the world awaiting (I am sure of it) just such a bottle, ready to pull up the anchor and furl the sails, arriving at my rescue - our rescue.
Do you ever fear change so much it paralyzes you? Do you ever sit and think about how wonderful your life would be - how wonderful you know it could be and then do absolutely nothing about it? Do you ever get so falsely content watching other people up and doing, that the words "good luck," and "I'm so happy for you," spew forth from your mouth in utter obedience of this self you know could be up and doing right along with them? Of course I'm in love with the boy who is headed to Germany as I sit here, febrile and exhausted and type. Of course that kid in Colorado has a huge piece of my heart. Why? Because they are both untouchable. They are the Crush without the dreaded Curse of trying to pick myself up, dust myself off, and begin life again on my own, ready to sing The Song of Self.
While I find that movie sweet and touching and, okay, fine. I'll admit it: I cried the first time I watched that little girl (whatever her name is) die in her hospital bed, tears streaming down Tibby's face. And, while I love the idea of a package sent back and forth between best friends - sisters - I say we vow be the pant-wearers in our own lives. Pull out your favorite pair. The pair with the stains and the patches that you put there, not your best friend or your sister, or some guy, and head off into the future. Up and doing. Ready for anything.
Trust no future, howe’er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act, act in the living present!
Heart within, and God o’erhead!
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labour and to wait.
|Longfellow|
"Dedicated to You (everyone). Love, Annie"
I have become one of those boring movies.
You know what I mean. (silent groan and "do we have to watch that?" type of movie) I am the Tibby who works at Walmart. Her life changes because of meeting that monochromatic girl with cancer (don't remember her name but her pale lips haunt me.) You watch and sometimes find it nice and maybe cry; but, your true self prays for the cut of Lena in Greece or Bridget on the beach. I gradually become one of those novels that you read for pages in anticipation of the dashing prince, the tragic murder, or even the discovery that "I am a wizard/queen/dragon/future president/moviestar!" Lonely grandmas and weird Shakespeare professors in Missouri would find something interesting in my monotonous novel of the moment. However, I guarantee I kindly decline as the reader to spend my time with the book. As a potential audience-member, I set it down near my bed...with all my other some-day-when-I-have-spare-time dusty covers.
Well, it does not matter: I am the main character AND the author. I have no obligation to read the book and feign entertainment. I live the book. Right now the page discusses my mind's consolidation of a variety of questions and answers and possibilities and impossibilities. Since life consists of school and work and church and family and (occassionally) friends all lined up in a row, in perfect Times New Roman, I sometimes fall into a sense of blah sentence structures. I forget the blessing and excitement of each letter's linear perfection. When my better self emerges, I wonder, "what is my life 'calling'?" or "how do I make my dreams into reality?" Occasionally I ask the best question of all: "how can I change? and become better?"
Looking back on this past year, I found my soul's stacks of books. Bright bindings with titles of romance, a few travel guides to wonderful destinations, a tattered cover of 'how to....', a couple of boring titles Art in Ecuador or The Minoan Mother Goddess, and a satire on the humor of family life all line the catalogue of my inner essence. Open the first page to any of these books and find the same dedication: it says (in some variation) "Dedicated to Me. Love, Annie." Yes, all of them. Sad and true and selfish. Selfish. Selfish. I've known of my self-centered existence as a student and hoped to tip-toe around the trap of pure evil in the slippery slope of SELF, but I tripped on my un-tied shoelaces.
In tying my shoelaces and escaping the trap, I have become a boring movie. Not because I truly have to or not because I truly want to, just because the best question:"how can I change?" requires me to. Like a schizophrenic, I respond, "You can change by changing your dedication from 'me' to 'you'" You can change by taking the shelves of novels into account in revising the unwritten pages; write something different. What use is learning to love--to expand yourself, lose yourself, and find yourself in another--if you tuck the lesson away (like a bookmark) for the next one who captures your heart? What use is adversity and the refining fire if you blow it out after you feel "done"? So, yesterday I had breakfast and dinner with B-Money (the Provo icon who soemtimes needs a true friend.) My first self-aware attempt in my venture to actually apply life's lessons--God's lessons--from the books.
Totally Tibby (minus the bad taste.) Honestly, I do not care how much you enjoy the upcoming words. In fact, unless you like those weird stories of facing reality in the fields of Idaho or you teach college in Missouri you will not enjoy yourself. And I myself would not to read it.
But, I need to write it.
You know what I mean. (silent groan and "do we have to watch that?" type of movie) I am the Tibby who works at Walmart. Her life changes because of meeting that monochromatic girl with cancer (don't remember her name but her pale lips haunt me.) You watch and sometimes find it nice and maybe cry; but, your true self prays for the cut of Lena in Greece or Bridget on the beach. I gradually become one of those novels that you read for pages in anticipation of the dashing prince, the tragic murder, or even the discovery that "I am a wizard/queen/dragon/future president/moviestar!" Lonely grandmas and weird Shakespeare professors in Missouri would find something interesting in my monotonous novel of the moment. However, I guarantee I kindly decline as the reader to spend my time with the book. As a potential audience-member, I set it down near my bed...with all my other some-day-when-I-have-spare-time dusty covers.
Well, it does not matter: I am the main character AND the author. I have no obligation to read the book and feign entertainment. I live the book. Right now the page discusses my mind's consolidation of a variety of questions and answers and possibilities and impossibilities. Since life consists of school and work and church and family and (occassionally) friends all lined up in a row, in perfect Times New Roman, I sometimes fall into a sense of blah sentence structures. I forget the blessing and excitement of each letter's linear perfection. When my better self emerges, I wonder, "what is my life 'calling'?" or "how do I make my dreams into reality?" Occasionally I ask the best question of all: "how can I change? and become better?"
Looking back on this past year, I found my soul's stacks of books. Bright bindings with titles of romance, a few travel guides to wonderful destinations, a tattered cover of 'how to....', a couple of boring titles Art in Ecuador or The Minoan Mother Goddess, and a satire on the humor of family life all line the catalogue of my inner essence. Open the first page to any of these books and find the same dedication: it says (in some variation) "Dedicated to Me. Love, Annie." Yes, all of them. Sad and true and selfish. Selfish. Selfish. I've known of my self-centered existence as a student and hoped to tip-toe around the trap of pure evil in the slippery slope of SELF, but I tripped on my un-tied shoelaces.
In tying my shoelaces and escaping the trap, I have become a boring movie. Not because I truly have to or not because I truly want to, just because the best question:"how can I change?" requires me to. Like a schizophrenic, I respond, "You can change by changing your dedication from 'me' to 'you'" You can change by taking the shelves of novels into account in revising the unwritten pages; write something different. What use is learning to love--to expand yourself, lose yourself, and find yourself in another--if you tuck the lesson away (like a bookmark) for the next one who captures your heart? What use is adversity and the refining fire if you blow it out after you feel "done"? So, yesterday I had breakfast and dinner with B-Money (the Provo icon who soemtimes needs a true friend.) My first self-aware attempt in my venture to actually apply life's lessons--God's lessons--from the books.
Totally Tibby (minus the bad taste.) Honestly, I do not care how much you enjoy the upcoming words. In fact, unless you like those weird stories of facing reality in the fields of Idaho or you teach college in Missouri you will not enjoy yourself. And I myself would not to read it.
But, I need to write it.
3.03.2008
pearls and a pencil
The plate had finally reached me. There was one left. I grabbed for it. I popped open the fortune cookie, which read: Travel and romance go together now. After reading it aloud, I tucked it away with the other five golden fortunes I hope will turn out to be fate.* * *
I put my pearls back in, brushed my teeth, wiped the mascara from under my eyes and stepped back to evaluate. Taking a pencil from the drawer, I spiraled my hair upward, using the pencil to fasten it in place. Pearls and a pencil. Classy-casual. Red coat over blue button-up shirt, I stepped out. Ready. Confident. I tucked a 1965 German dictionary under-arm. Making sure the pencil cleared my up-and-under, I ducked my head and slid myself into the car.
* * *
Wearing funky earrings, a sporty skirt and faux-sheered calf-length boots with laces, she's the epitome of fashion-cool. She's got a FREE TIBET shirt and classic black flats, and, somehow, deep down she could make them work in the same outfit. Her A-line bob polishes everything off. And, even though it looks as though she'd never be able to pull it back, leaving her with only one hairstyle option, she'll prove you wrong. Two ponytails or one, it works and it's absolutely darling. Throwing a scarf over her Sunday outfit, she's out the door, cool earrings bobbing as she hops along the front walk.
He loves her. She's a power tool to his soft and hidden self, drilling information into him, relentless in her attempt to stop him from revealing more about his life. She's made of concrete walls; tough to the touch. He is open pastures and green vistas; very don't-fence-me-in, if only she'd ask. He loves even the harsh sides of her in his sweet style of devotion. You can sense it in the way he looks at her when she talks; in the way he looks at her when anyone is talking. And yet, I still feel there is hope.
* * *
We're sitting on the couch looking up cars. High-end. European-made. We talk the ups and downs, the fasts and slows of A6's and 300 series. He lets me go off about streamlined trunk and tail light design. One hour later, we joined the rest of the crowd for cupcakes. I think I'm a little bit in love with him. The thought popped into my head as I sunk my teeth into a pink-frosted cupcake and smiled at him from across the room.
He loves her. And yet, I still feel there is hope. Not as in love-hope. Just hope. Hope after a few evenings at our table, a map at our fingertips, tracing European trails with our fingers. Why Florence? His eyes lit up as my mouth rounded and pronounced Duomo. It was one of those moments. One of those connections. He just understood. There was a pause. And then he traced both hands over Greece. If you're talking architecture, why not start here? I looked up at him, his darling eyes as blue as the Aegean. We can start anywhere you want to. I raised my eyebrows suggesting an up-for-anything attitude.
* * *
I parked the car on the downward slope, staring into the Salt Lake Valley. I secured the pencil in my hair and walked in, feeling good in my red coat. The house was filled with family; sisters with dark hair and eyes, and flawless olive skin; a mother happy to hug upon meeting. He was in the dining room, a map directly behind him. He traced the border of Germany and the Netherlands as I've seen him do a dozen times, showing an aunt and uncle where he'll make his new home. This time, however, it was final. He looked up with wide eyes. I handed him the dictionary and explained I had pulled it from my Dad's collection from his German Lit. college days. He wowed at the sight of it, grateful for the sentiment. He immediately scooted the ribbon off to look inside. The note read, See you there. And I signed my name.
He loves her. I think he always will. And yet, I've found new life in this new person; this connection; this charming too-good-to-be-true guy who will board a plane in 48 hours. As guests shuffled out, he watched as I folded up his pocket-size Eurorail map and tucked it inside the dictionary. I'll put it in my back pocket, he said, smiling. I looked up at him and smiled back, well-aware of the book's anything-but-convenient size. We lingered at the door for quite awhile. Each scuffing our feet on the slate, eyes down. Then I finally spoke up. Well...I wasn't sure what to follow it up with. See you there, he said, nodding, like that's what I should be thinking, too. He gave me a hug, opened the door and watched as I walked down the steps. I turned around at the sound of his voice. Hey. Thanks for coming. He paused. Thanks...a lot. I gave a shy, sure and turned towards my car. I pulled the pencil from my hair and drove slowly down the road, hand rotating my pearl earring with my fingers.
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