Hey Loners,
It’s been awhile.
Been under the weepier side of my star chart, the grotesque parts of mortality. I’m in pain. I’ve been tired. I can’t tell if it’s a statement of the times but I think I have a celebrity case of fatigue and burn out. The only remedy is to whisk me away to a undisclosed tropical location and allow me to repair.
This afternoon I got up and cut an old pineapple that sat on the counter. I gave it more purpose than I’ve had my whole life. I’m grateful for that pineapple. The smell of it, the enzymes that make it tang and tingle on the meat of my tongue. I feel wholly tenderized by the sweet experience of it. I will honor the whole of the pineapple down to the last swallow of it and I will pray that this is enough. Give me life, give me energy, give me joy, please, please, please. What if the body is not a vessel but an altar to God? I’m always hopeful I’ll be better but I accept that I’m cast in the image of God in a broken mirror.
The pineapple in turn gives me enough energy to do the things I have to do. I’m going to make atole from the pineapple. It’s a type of hot corn drink. I’m going to make it the way Lilian makes it which has similarities to the aforementioned link. I’ll boil the pineapple in milk and sugar and add a corn mixture of masa/cornstarch slurry in slowly. It’s better when she makes it, of course. Lilian made it for me one more and now I’m going to make it for myself. It requires very little of me and I love it for that. I tucked the dress I’ve been sleeping in into trousers and went to grab the mail, take the stairs slowly and ascend glacially. This is a brief moment in the unwell and then it will evaporate and be invisible under the “too much” of my personality and “they’ll be fine” spontaneity.
Last year or two years ago or three I started a gratitude practice with my friend Mitchell. It comes after my friend Adam goes above and beyond as always to make sure I’m all right. I spend a long time asking God how come my friends love me? Larissa buys me groceries and a large bag of rice lasts til the end of the year. I find a photo of my friends Anna, Paul, Hannah sitting in front of my hospital bed. Mitchell and I send each other things we were grateful for in a text. Grapefruits and phone calls. The train is on time. A spectacular wave of ocean blue on a shoreline. Simple. Mundane joys. I kept the practice up and we don’t always share them with each other now but the energy of what and how it started remains.
I don’t like to discuss gratitude at this point because it reminds me there’s a yoga clothing company called Spiritual Gangster. I don’t want to talk about gratitude when people can’t feed themselves, when folks are emotionally overdrafted. There are days in which the only thing I can do is anchor in on the fact that I’m breathing, that I’ve talked to Sammie on the phone. Zach drives down and we walk around the lake with his pup. I am chronicling the herculean efforts of undoing the dishwasher and can hear laughing from afar. It’s the laughter. It’s how close it feels. How there’s someone near after the social distancing— your hand on mine while riding the Q, a hug outside of train terminal in Times Square, shouting the lyrics of a beloved song into my face. There's so much - oh, so much - out of my control.
I don’t deal well with change, even things I want to change. I’ve been wanting a new job and now I got a promotion and I don’t feel ready. I don’t know if I’ll do a good job but I keep wondering who is going to watch over the people. I know that’s…that’s smooth brain in retail. The turnover is too high to be attached to a specific cast, a specific season and yet.
I’m going to tell you about what I’m grateful:
Wylo brings me groceries when my body hurts to move and I think think of him in laughter. Do I think of my everyone in the bell of their hysteria? Laughter means so much to me. I think of them, their arms lifting to give me a hug, to take a load off of my cart or to give me what they’ve been carrying. Thank you. Fil biked to the farmer’s market to bring me a beloved falafel on his last day.
The walk-in at work while it may be a meme is an incredible place to cry. Often it’s the cool side of a pillow. Reese sometimes sees the tears in my eyes and gives me a hug saying I can’t let anyone know that I cry because they don’t deserve it. With Reese I never worry she’s misunderstood me or that I need to apologize for doing.
When I come back after my car accident Lillian is the first to appear before me with tears in her eyes. She says “where you go, nobody would say, so I thought you went to God.” I was just at home, Lil. I’m sorry.
She doesn’t assume we are in competition for anything other than survival. I am grateful that I never have to explain myself or an interest. She just says where can I see it and I will eat that. She coordinates birthday parties and celebrations and works endlessly and goes home and takes care of her kids. She’s the breadwinner, she’s the bread and butter of our store. She’s the soul and it’s often when she’s not there I can tell how much I wouldn’t be me now. I wish I could buy her a house with a yard. I play the lottery hoping to be able to.
Grateful for Claudia’s hands that often hold my face and tell me to sleep. They press into masa and sculpt tamales. They’re hard working.I asked her why her pupusas are so good and she says that she puts so much love in them. She wants me to eat. She wants me to eat well. She wakes at dawn and packs us all sandwiches and in the assembly line of creation she pauses to make mine. It’s different. I can taste it. It makes me cry.
Oscar calls me his teacher because whenever he wants to test out a new phrase in English, he’d come tap me on the shoulder and say “over there, under there” and point. He tells me that Claudia says it used to be so quiet at work before me. I say soy como un trueno, las patas de los elefantes and he said no, no, como una fiesta. The way he explains it is that it’s like a party where he gets invited and isn’t left out. We all laugh together and dream together. They want to adopt a baby and start a business one day.
The new kids at work inspire me so much. K comes in and always says “Hi Miss Kelly” and it’s that twang. I meet her mom once and say she reminds me of what I would want my kid to be like and she says she gets it. It’s a nourishing hug. It’s huge. It’s how I hug Claudia. It’s how Lilian rubs my back when I’m tired. She stops me in the middle of working to give me a big hug after she’s finished school and she shuffles to the back to get ready for her shift. It’s that her first words to me was “Miss Kelly, I have so many dreams.” I say, “tell me about them.” She dreams of going to HBCU, full ride, and how she’s going to live in her future life. She tells me about her future room. One day. She says that’s my dream. It’s in my head now.
I needed to think about how grateful I am to get to know she exists. I had to remember that she has dreams. I do too.
Maybe you do too.
I think she’s gonna make it.
Maybe we all will.
Godspeed Loners,
Kelly
alone in my room is a once defunct and maybe weekly dispatch from the mundane from a local ficus. kelly is a writer, food himbo & serial hobbyist.
you can support a hobby or buy soil for a plant here.