Please join us in Montpelier on Sunday, July 24 for a celebration of motherhood, music, and healing. Scrag Mountain Music will perform songs written by new and expecting mothers as part of the Lullaby Project!

It didn't seem realistic to me. I'm really struggling today. every day if I'm honest. I feel like crying. I was so determined to keep sober. but Friday tequila was on sale at the grocery store so I picked it up. and a bottle of rum. I drank the tequila on Friday when I cooked the lasagna for Saturday. Sunday I drank the rum. yesterday I walked to the corner shop and got a litre of vodka. I don't enjoy drinking anymore. I wake up in the morning feeling like shit. but wanting more alcohol. I can't seem to string weeks together to get a month of sobriety. I need help. but I don't know where to go. I feel like I'm letting my kids down, my sponsor down, my friend. I miss my kids so much and I want them back.

Getting sober in San Francisco was weird. So much of my geography of the city was built around places I drank–even neutral zones like parks and a bus line here or there were colored by memories (or lack thereof) of bottles and cans in brown paper bags…

When I started AA it was like wearing a new pair of glasses. Now I was going to meetings in places where my previous experiences were blurry memories, but trying to reorient my brain to see them differently. There were whole new networks of people where the boozy friends once were. I had to learn how to interact with humans sober–how does one exactly start a conversation? How do you show you're interested in what a person is saying? What do people, um, do when they aren't drinking? 

On top of that I had to interact with my old friends in new ways. Maybe go over to my friend's house who just had a baby and give the baby a bath, maybe show up for a (sober) writing group. There was a lot more to life than sitting around at a bar refusing alcohol while everyone else drank.

I still feel like a stranger to my old self in some ways, still learning to walk steadily in my new land. Maybe it will always be like this, but I hope it won't.

Am I the only one who sees

The way she glances at him when she thinks 

No one is looking?

Am I the only one who sees

The way his hand lightly brushes her back

When he first passes behind her in the crowded bar?

Am I the only one who sees 

The flush of pink on her cheeks 

And the knowing smile on his lips

When his hand lingers longer the next time he sidles by?

Am I the only one who sees

How her eyes and his meet

And hold for just a heartbeat too long 

For two people who are “just friends”?

Am I the only one who sees 

Him whisper briefly into her willing ear

As he buys her one more whiskey

And the bartender announces last call?

Am I the only one who sees

How her unguarded gaze follows him

When he leaves by the side door, without a backward glance,

And she finishes her drink in one smooth gulp, then slips out too?

Am I the only one who sees,

In the shadows of the back parking lot, 

Two hazy outlines in the dim streetlight -

His truck, parked so close to hers?

Am I the only one who sees 

Two silhouettes merge into one?

Does anyone else see -

Or is it just me?

Cracked

When I got the call

When she said head-on collision

When I heard no feeling below his neck

When I got in my car, drove across the country, got there in two days

When I saw a cross on the side of the road with your name on it

When I prayed harder than I’ve ever prayed

When I had to wait four days and take two covid tests just to see you

When I finally saw you

When I sat by your bedside and let those machines breathe for you

When I listened to the chug and whirl of the liquid being pumped into your stomach

When they said things like very slim chance and five percent survival rate

When I waited for news that wasn’t the colour of vending machine coffee

When I finished another vending machine coffee

When I called my sponsor every day for eighteen days

When, on the nineteenth day, I didn’t

When I walked into a new meeting in a new city in a new church basement and didn’t say a word

When I drove circles around the liquor store parking lot before going in

When I knew I shouldn’t do this

When I saw no other way

When it burned my lungs going down

When I needed relief so badly

When I fell asleep in the bathtub

When I lied for the next two weeks

When I blacked out and missed them wheeling you into surgery

When you lived

When I celebrated by scoring an eight ball

When I went back to that church for a silver chip

When I cried the whole damn time

When you came to and I had to tell you

When I waited for six months to tell you

When they finally took the tube out of your throat

When I got the call

And heard your voice

And my heart

It just went crack

“For god sake leave me alone” she said. “I can’t do everything.” She felt guilty about yelling at him because in fact he had commanded her to get the fucking fridge clean. She was a bit ashamed, drooping under the weight of broken promises to do better, to operate on a more adult organized level. Damn it all anyway there were more important things to ponder than the moldering mildewy smelly creatures living in the fridge such as why am I here why am I in this suffocating marriage why must I forsake Camels and bourbon those were the really important things on her mind.

My people are a crazy mixed can of nuts laughing at unimaginable tragedy kind very kind no bullies nor brutes, no guns concealed or otherwise, emanating warmth…welcome home we know your heart aches for missing mother and father for aunt Carm and uncle Harold for James for Paul for fried chicken potato salad picnics and homemade blueberry pies my people are that sense that permeates my being that there is a Peopled world living inside me.

“Meditation helps to de-accelerate the brain interrupt rage transmission
before it strikes,” he thinks
as he walks into the house, breathless
having weeded and pruned his alternative self, yanked out sprouts of plant destruction chopped up thistles before

their bite became too sharp.

“I did it,” he yells to no one in particular for his house remains vacant
of any species of mammal
that understands the linguistics

of spoken human words.

His hound dog, assaulted
with the scent of the sweat
from his armpit and forehead empathizes with the exhaustion, and plops to the ground

beside the chair he slumps into, and his coffee - cold in its cup on the otherwise empty table
in his otherwise cared for cabin - waits patiently for him to drink.

His woman left long ago
scarred and defeated by his curses and blows.

She ran off with a neighbor’s son
half her age and of tranquil disposition,

and he wonders

while drinking his bitter coffee

if she would come back - if only she knew him now.

I look like hell. Not the usual put together ready for roll call snob I prefer to present. I’ve been sleeping on a fellowship friends couch, locked out of my own house, suitcase left on the porch. Spent the night in jail, again. Here we go, down the stairs to face them in the oh so hot basement. Ay, yay, yay. Who the hell is that? Look what the cat dragged in this week! Lo and behold, my support has stayed by my side, told me I don’t have to stay but try my best. Take what works, leave the rest. They have rescued me from myself. From tough love once again. From the crowd that doesn’t recognize me. Does it matter what they think? Does it matter what I think? Here’s what they are probably thinking-you’re in the right place.

just now

what’s next

perhaps the reverse

even with the pact

sure within this spell

found lost again gone

is this the way really

the keen asking shies

the groaning

use a still listening branch

the stones know

the wish maker smiles

I alone dance in the

ashes

would you please pass the garnish

I am really hungry

for a moment I am split

not cracked with jagged edge

more like a ---fade

smooth

no demarcation

no calendar blocks

boxing in my day

coffee fresh, steamy hot

white cup on white mat

same Diner..

same table as always

chitter chatter rising

buzzing around my head

but I'm some where - else

cosmic hang gliding

no one noticed my escape

but the coffee - the coffee

hot and steamy

brought me back

to this time in this place

I’m not sure where you’re going

What do you want to be when you grow up?

What a stupid question, the expression on your face said,

and I agreed.

You came into the world, eyes on fire like onyx, and a soul to match.

Quiet observation of all around you, me, us, them, all of it, you were taking it in, processing it in that little head of yours.

Comfortable with ladybugs, Belgium horses, kittens’ needle sharp claws, goats with spiky horns, great dane dogs taller than your tiny 3 year old self.

I hesitated to push you into the world, you turned at the door of the school with confidence telling me, you can go home Mom, and you walked bravely into the future.

You made comfortable visiting babies, unsure toddlers, insecure little boys, curious parents, and leaders in the community, all before you even reached the 5th grade.

You could have moved ahead without waisting time as a senior, but insisted that it was important to have the full high school experience, and did not let them rush you.

My heart broke and I cried all the way home after settling you into your dorm room. You only told me months later how afraid you were to let me leave, but you never let it show.

The photo shows a confident young woman, in red heals, black graduation gown with ropes indicating "graduated with honors", degree in hand, rental lease signed, jobs offers to choose from, life partner in the wings.

I should have known, from that first moment I saw those onyx eyes,

you are going far.

There was that X-Files episode, where the antagonist would “push” people’s perception. He walked through a hospital with a piece of tape on his shirt that said “nurse” and to everyone he encountered, he was perceived as a nurse. Don’t remember what he was up to, surely no good, but ever since seeing that show I think about “pushing.”

How much do you strain to create a reality or... restrain yourself and let events happen? Some of the most irritating and famous just push push push. Pushing into a persona not earned through action, compassion, acuity, skillfulness. Push push push to be rich, to be most handsome, to be the name on the university stadium. Push push push to the front of the line.

I seldom push. I’m content that way. What would I push for if I knew where it was going? And now, oxymoronically, I am my own pusher, pushing towards an unknown, must-be-better-reality. Pushing for a life free of the bullshit lie that we actually know where it is going.

I wake up and once again I can’t remember my name, where I am or where I’ve been. My thoughts are so disjointed that I can’t even form a sentence, a thought in my mind. I can’t even pull myself up and out of bed. After 30 minutes, it passes and the me I am familiar with returns. My thinking returns to normal and I recognize my surroundings, my pajamas, my bedroom. This was the first time that has happened and it reminds me of talking with Dad on the phone, when we were trying to sort out his taxes on the farm and he told a customer service representative and me that his two blue shoes were facing north on the highway exit ramp, repeating it over and over. Said he knew what he was trying to say but it wasn’t coming out right, could we please please figure out what he was trying to say because it was important. I can feel how fragile and how tenuous, how taken for granted it is just to know, to remember, and to think a simple thought.

It’s not where I wanna go again.

Not for long anyway.

Not even to vacation in.

It’s more of a dead end journey, than it is a ticket out of here.

 Where I’ve been, as quoted fromMcBeth,

 “Have lighted fool the way to Dusty death”.

 Yesterday was just a day.

 And tomorrow is just a dream, a hope, a maybe. 

Where I want to be, is where I’ve never been. 

Here, now in the moment.

 In my moment.

 Sharing it with your moment.

I have been making myself my ideal woman.  I am a baddie around him, thinking of all the ways I could get extradited for indecency.  This is the best way to deal with a sleight: to get tongue in cheek attention.

I am going to miss the children most of all.  Not everyone gets a two YETI cooler relationship and plays a kid version of softball with makeshift everything while picnicking, no fast food,  at a rest area in PA,  we had that, and when they have forgotten, I will still have that.  We had the road roar, and my private thoughts.  There were ever so many of them because sometimes the conversation, to be having it all, seemed weird.

I can do anything, Just had a meeting with a supervisor about professional goals, thinking how I can do everything, and I included them as a 9 month gestation.  This is how my ADHD serves me,  I can do more than most.  This time around, I wrote a ticket to Stab City, known as Limerick.  I will leave in 30 days.  I dare to dream. 

I am well-adored.  A coworker wrote me an appreciation email.  I sobbed frenetically.  Peter sent me a blessing. David sent me a diagram of in flagrante delicto.  It may spur ideas of how simultaneously I am an impish mastermind, and known with “ducklings”, queues of children that follow me, and for my sweetnesses.  Could a sober school teacher on a professional development trip get arrested?  There’s that me again. Too irreverent to stay down.

My friends worship me.  Not that anyone has to. I am not wearing a break up like a fur coat.  My recovery time- there you go again.  I can’t do everything, like make you like me.  What a sweet act to let me go!  It was not worth the exchange value of the really great coffee we drink, or the meals we plan, or the performative in person team we are, or as someone called us this van festival weekend, “power couple”.  I can’t do everything, but I have way more to do.   

Thrilling skill, reserve and hidden wink, 

they call it a “hidden reserve” in the quote, 

“literature” end quote

Where did you find that swagger?

that confidence that sway?

I’ve always been the one to make too much of everything.  

I could be sitting in band or seminar and be filled or fueled 

on another’s beauty.  In my new car, I imbibe landscapes, 

and roads, and varying velocities, and barns, and make 

the acquaintance of trees, and a film strip of postcards.  

I want to make a quilt of sorts out of the things I have seen 

in the summer months, as if you could take out a July road trip 

in February; I thought July looked good on everybody and 

every place, and now, with my goldfish eyes, I wonder about 

the yellowing slants of late September.  Forgetting so easily, 

it takes on a dreaminess, which may be the person I am when 

alone with my thoughts, or the who am when I’ve unzipped 

my limited beliefs and go skinny dipping in the scene, and speed, 

and accelerating into the curve.

It may be a time to flirt with complete abandon, or harvest some 

of the sweetnesses of a lingering moment, or a bon mot I do 

not want to forget, but taste again and against the edginess and 

dagger cold. I am not sure where to put it so that I may find it later.

“It’s not what it looks like”
Him holding my feet on his lap
We were Broken up a whole week now
Get over it!
As I lead him upstairs
Lights on
Than lights off
You next door see this all unfolding
You run home to mom
You can’t take it
I can’t take it
I can’t take you
Loving me anymore
Can I hurt you any more than this?
I can try
I will try
I will succeed
Blame it on the bottle
Blame it on the lack of sleep
Blame it on the years of
Resentment
I blame it on you
You blame
Everybody else but you
It’s not what it looks like
It never was
Couldn’t you see it?
I bet you see it now!

Photo by Elizabeth Wheeler

In my own little corner. My happy place. Blues, purples, a new piece of furniture. Some papers finally filed. Pictures of family, beautiful daughter, a happy me. A lifetime of love, learning, hopes, dreams. Often my space to think, to write, to escape. To isolate. Yes, to isolate. Past tense. To have isolated. Today it’s not what it looks like. Mom, my daughter asked me,How will you deal with your “ corner” when you get home? It’s not what it looks like. I’m holding strong, steady. A bird on the edge of those mountains. Soaring with the winds of time time, no more fighting. Accepting the fate that has been dealt me. It’s not what it looks like. The past is gone. The wind blows with me. Blowing clean air. My corner is clean. I am home wherever I am now. It’s what I want it to look like. It’s mine.

One of those spontaneous – get up early, go now! –

Like an angelic voice awaking you from a drunken slumber in a Bruges inn, “Matthew, wake up! You must leave now!” And I did and spilled my cup of hangover remedy on my pant leg while on the train to Zaventem and missed my plane. Again.

Yeah, beer holidays can be hard to return from.

But it wasn’t that morning, it was in the desert. I’d gone to bed thinking ‘maybe a hike tomorrow’ and then it was first light and as I regained consciousness I regained the plan to go to a canyon, with a rare water-filled streambed and even rarer morning fog, moistly emancipating the shellac-smelling creosote bush and powder room bitter dusty scent of brittlebush.

And I came to that running wash and couldn’t see across, but there were large stones, maybe haphazard, maybe laid down by a hiker who felt the need to organize. I made my way to one rock in the dense fog, then another, never able to see all the way. But one leap at a time I made it to the opposite bank, on a cool desert hike of solitude. And I looked back at the way and the fog lifted and I could see the whole path.

It gave me clarity, a metaphor, for my life. Circumstances. And I thought, ‘Yeah, here’s what I found. I need that right now.’