In Between Days

https://open.spotify.com/embed/playlist/5jZTSwoD7kQKenztXmpVG7?utm_source=generator

I woke up at 6 a.m. this morning with that old familiar pang in my bladder that means I’m getting or have gotten a UTI. I haven’t been drinking enough water these last few days. I haven’t been drinking much of anything except V8, coffee, and wine. I should have known this was going to happen. Now, I’m sitting here absolutely miserable and wish I had one of those little orange pills that turn your pee the kind of orange you wish you could replicate with easter egg dye, but you’ll never be able to. Trust me. I am well acquainted with the orange pee from the UTI relief pills. The first time I took one, I was on a class trip to Washington D.C. Only these were prescription pills called Pyridium and they were purple, not orange like the ones you get over the counter. I remember my first pee in the hotel bathroom after I took that miraculous purple pill. It was blood orange and I was sure I was pissing actual blood and was probably halfway to dead already. Luckily, my mom has always had my back in every single scenario I have ever found myself. I called her on the hotel phone, probably in tears and hyperventilating, and she eased my mind with her calm understanding of the situation and told me exactly what was happening.

My mom is good like that.

Everytime I drive through Montgomery on I-65, I am reminded of the time I was driving back to Auburn after a weekend home. I had this white ’95 Honda Civic that my dad bought me for my high shcool graduation. It was a 5-speed (I don’t even think they make those anymore) and the AC had decided to go out in the middle of summer. In Alabama. I was cruising along with windows rolled down, probably listening to Eminem of The Cure, when suddenly traffic came to a stop. Everything was chill for a minute. Until the heat from the pavement and the sun and the other cars surrounding me suddenly became unbearable. Sweat was pouring from my hair follicles, dripping in my eyes, pooling between my thighs and my young, perky titties. I didn’t have any water, my mouth suddenly became scorched earth.
What was I to do????
Call mom. Of course. At her job.
Ring, ring, ring. May I speak to Teresa?
As soon as she gets on the phone the blubbering begins “Maaamaaa, I’m dying, the traffic is stopped, the AC is out, I have no water, I’m gonna die in the middle of I-65 and I’m only 21!! What do I dooooooo????? Maaamaaaa!!!”
Jesus H. Christ on a cracker, for the love of all that is holy, what an absolute fucktard I was. I don’t know how my mother put up with me but she did. She calmly told me everything would be ok, I wasn’t going to die, traffic would start moving again soon, think of something else to distract yourself, when you get to an exit pull off and get something to drink, you will be fine. And I was. Totally.

Everything happened just like she said it would.

One of her favorite things to say to me when I am experiencing a life crisis of epic proportions, such as the one I am in now, is that “You will be surprised how your life can change in a year.” She has been telling me that for as long as I can remember when I come to her with whatever dilemma I’m in and I’m so certain that this is the big one,
WW-eye-eye-eye,
it’s going down for real, ya’ll,
I will never recover,
my life is over,
dead man walking,
depressed doom down-in-the-ditch dirty d-bag mother sucker.

Nope, she says. You will be ok. Your life will go on and it will be ok.

And you know what? She’s never been wrong. Sure, my life may not make some miraculous recovery and I may not suddenly become successful or happy but whatever is ailing me right now in this moment? It will pass and I will be at peace with it and it won’t hurt to think of anymore. And really, what more can a person ask for? To make peace with themselves, with others, with their pain, their fear, their sadness. Suffering will follow us all the days of our lives in one form or another. All we can do is look it in the eye and say “I see you, I love you, you will hurt me now but someday you won’t and I will be stronger for having let you in because everytime you break me, you build me back up that much stronger, better, kinder, braver, more beautiful.”

Kintsugi (Japanese: 金継ぎ, romanized: “golden joinery”), also known as kintsukuroi (金繕い, “golden repair”),^[1] is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with urushi lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum. The method is similar to the maki-e technique.^[2][3][4] As a philosophy, it treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object, rather than something to disguise.^[5]

I have been working on this playlist the last several days. When I am in period of uncertainty, I can’t listen to familiar songs. It’s too painful, too raw. I have to find new ones to help me understand my journey. All of these are new to me with the exception of Ray Lamontagne’s Empty. His musical poetry speaks to me so deep and I always come back to this song.
Anwyay, I’m only a few songs into this playlist and I expect I will add more as I hear them but this is where I’m at right now. I played it for my mom last night as we sat on her porch and watched the dusk give way to dark.
She said “why do you listen to these sad songs that make you cry?”
Because they make me feel alive, they make me feel less alone in a world where I don’t know anyone who feels the way I feel about things. I feel a kinship with these people who create this kind of art, who speak these kinds of words, who live and love gently, gracefully, with intention. They don’t sound sad to me. They sound like beauty and grace and forgiveness.

Anyway, that’s all for now. I’m trying to be ok. I didn’t hear from J at all yesterday and that made me sad but I know he feels like he has hurt me. We have hurt each other.  Unintentionally but nevertheless. I hope he is finding the light somehow.