Wooden Deceit

The wind was blowing softly, and I sat down on the neglected wooden swing in the backyard. Green leaves popped out of the decaying section of the next tree. Swinging back and forth, I thought about what we would all write on your headstone. My words seemed harsh and unnatural- perfectly fitting for  a concrete memorial to a young life full of regret and pain. But I didn't want my words to be fitting. I wanted my words to left you up to everything that I knew you could be. As if words in death could re-write life. 

Let's re-write life with drawn out adjectives and over emphatic verbs. Let's infuse the drab misgivings of yesterday with a colorful fire that strangers would be envious of. Let's deceive ourselves with the beauty of language...

Jersey

Jersey this is what I miss about you:

1. Climbing up on Life Guard Stands to have serious conversations
2. Summer dried salty curly hair
3. Garden State Parkway Signs
4. Driving around late at night
5. Best friends and trouble
6. Wawa
7. A gaint excuse to have an attitude
8. Recording thunderstorms

............ and maybe that's it.....

My connection to you still allows me to be teased by by Constitutional Law professor. Every. Other. Day.

Whoah Flashback

In 2012, I started this blog when I first decided that I would spend a year traveling in Europe. That did not happen. I think that was largely to do with my struggle with mental health and a broken heart. My writing used to be so rich. I reminisced about experiences and positively strode on and on about adventures that I had. 

I am so glad that I wrote about them, because I can't remember them nearly as clearly today. However, that makes me think that I should keep blogging. Despite being quite boring this year, I have had experiences that I would like to recall and grow from. 

Can I make a new vow? Yes. I will. I will try to blog at least every other day. This summer I will be in Birmingham, Alabama for an internship so there should be some really interesting material to write about. 

However, I decided not to take the bus to the deep south this summer. I will be flying I will also be making a trip to Boston.. and possibly NYC. 

Judge Me, Because I am Judging Myself

I judged myself today when I dropped my phone on my toe.
And the entire screen shattered.
I cried. The real salty kind of tears.

Perhaps yesterday was a more apt day for judgement,
when I drank tequila silver alone while lying on my bedroom floor
over a criminal law textbook.

Or maybe today..
My brother called me collect from prison
I wonder how much the recollection of his crack induced burglary will cost
Or coaching him through the GED process
As I pushed my law books off of the table

Once

Once I read this book that told me to start a poem with
"Once"
"Once," every line
"Once," like I owned it- as if it was mine
"Once," like that time
I took the greyhound line, and told myself once
Only once.
Not twice, because I could only handle a cross-country bus ride once
I only wanted to be bitten by a stranger once
But then I remembered that happened twice- once
On a bus, once in basketball game
And then "once" turned into twice.

My blog now functions as the only means to edit my papers for law school, because Microsoft Word has insisted that I cam attempting to write my papers in french.

I am not sir. I am not.

Being Native

My mother told me when I was a little girl that she was Native American. Her real parents were and she wanted to find them. She never told me directly that I was Native, but I knew that since I was her daughter I could infer my decent. For years I watched her toil with her heritage. We went to reservations and museums. All of her artwork was made on reservations. It was her most prized possession. I do not think that I ever saw her as empassioned by something as when she was searching for her birth parents. 

In her pursuit, she would forget that she had children of her own and that we were part of this struggle with her. I was young then and my mom had already become abusive, but she had moments when she would share the freedom and hope that she gained from connecting with Native culture with us. When I was six, I think a major obstacle came in her way and she became ill. I remember how distraught she was over the thought of her search for her parents ending. She wanted to hire a private investigator. 

Hey mom, we are still here. Hey mom, I don't know if this is you or the drugs but you are hurting me. Hey mom, you are turning my curiousity about you into hate. Hey mom, you are someone else's daughter, but I am yours. 

After I left my mother's care, people could tell I was native because of my skin tone in the summer, my face shape, and my body type. I never owned being Native American. The choas growing up in drugs, abuse, and poverty became the only culture that I was exposed to. 

In college, I tried to connect but I am not native "enough." What is enough? I know I didn't grow up n the reservation and my skin is so light I pass for fully white. That is the Irish half of me washing the Native out. I never wanted it to be washed out-- I didn't even fully grasp what it is. I want to, because I can feel the missing part. Native spiritualiy calls to me. But I am an outsider... forever an outsider. 

Isn't it funny how people can feel sorry for you, but when you grow up without a family on the outside of any community, no one will accept you later..