Tag Archives: celebration

Family, Humor, Mental Illness

Dear Friends, Indian Weddings, and Many Safety Pins

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A dear friend I haven’t seen in years is visiting this week, so I am all about her and the niece and nephew I’ve never met and must dote over like a proper auntie.

We’ve been friends a long time, so there are many memories to be had, but I thought I’d share a few of my favorites from her wedding in Mumbai.

She married an Indian man I approve of (important, he’s got to be good enough for my girl!) Chris and I traveled to India for the wedding. We had never been there or attended a Hindu wedding, so we had no idea what we were doing.  Wanting to be good guests, we learned as much as we could, but there were a few things we missed.

We dressed in traditional clothes, he in a lime green kurta and me in a beautiful cranberry sari.  We bought the sari the day we arrived so we didn’t have time to learn how to wrap it.  They sent us away with detailed instructions, a pin here, a tuck there, how hard could it be?

Friend visit 1
To the ladies who wrap these every day, respect!

The next morning, one day after arriving and no time for coffee, we took the instructions and began to wrap.  No problem.

The shop had sent us on our way with a few large safety pins, should be plenty!  One frantic call to the front desk later, and a hotel staffer appeared at our door with many additional safety pins, because there was no way this garment was going to stay on my body without dozens of pins.

So Chris wraps, I hold, he pins, it falls, he swears, he wraps, I hold…this goes on for some time, and I am anxious we will be late.  One does not show up to weddings late.

Finally, it is staying put.  The pallu (the fabric draped over the shoulder) reached only about a foot down, but we figure, well we tried.  It’s fine.  We’re going to be late.

Off to the front desk to ask for a cab.

The lovely lady looks at me, smiles sweetly, and says “Oh, you look so pretty!  Would you like me to help you wrap it?”  I looked up “diplomatic” in the dictionary, and there she was.

Off to a back room to be entirely re-wrapped.

She and another lady set about removing it, disconnecting the pins, and rewrapping.  This took a while, and I’m stressing; we are going to be so late for the wedding.  But they finished, the extra fabric cascaded down my back. I thanked them profusely and scurried away.

Off to the waiting taxi.

Western people, you know that you do not show up late to a wedding. Never, ever. If you do, you walk into the silent, reverent room, all heads swivel to stare at this breach of WASP rules, and the walk of shame begins until you slink down into a pew.  That is what I’m used to.

We tell the cab driver that we are in a terrible hurry, we will be late for a wedding we’ve come halfway around the globe to attend.  He understands and promptly stops for gas.

Once we were finally on our way, dizzy from no food and more importantly no coffee, we arrive at the hotel.  We enter with fear and caffeine headaches and…there’s my friend, the bride, sitting in a chair watching with everyone else.  Part of the ceremony is taking place without her.

She looks up and smiles.  “Oh hi!  There’s coffee and food in the back if you’d like.”

Do you know those cartoons where someone is running away quickly, and all that’s left is a cloud in their shape?  Yeah.

Later the groom joins us, and we tell him that we were so afraid we’d be late.  He smiles and says, a little confused, “there is no late.”

My friend’s sister and brother were not able to make it, so my husband and I stood in for them.  I cannot tell you how wonderful that was, being directly involved, performing a Hindu ritual on such an important day. It was an experience I will never forget.

After the wedding, there was a few hours break until the reception.  Chris and I were deeply jet-lagged and on a stress come-down, so we went back to the hotel for a nap and then a change of clothes.  We were excited to dress properly, so we had bought two different outfits, my evening wear was a salwar kameez, and Chris had a beautiful purple kurta.  Feeling good, feeling proper, off we go to the hotel.

Friend vist 6

We walked in and saw all the Indian men dressed entirely in Western clothes.  To a person, suits and ties, not one traditional outfit to be found.

The swiveled heads I expected earlier happened now, only amused rather than eye-stabby.  Chris later joked with a few guests that no one at the wedding actually knew us, but we had shown up and won’t go away.  The groom’s brother laughed so hard nearly lost the ability to stay upright.  If you live to make people laugh like we do, this was almost the highest praise possible, just under peeing oneself and passing out.

That was in 2011. My friend settled down in New York, but it seems like she is still in Mumbai; I’ve only seen her once since that time and have never met her children.

Now they will be here, and I will do the auntie thing, and there will be presents and bonding because kids tend to love me.

My great hope is that they are not afraid of all the spooky stuff in here.  I’ll make little goths out of them in no time.

See you Monday!

Anger, Dreams, gallows humor, Humor, Mental Illness, Regret, writing

National Poetry Month – It Matters

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April is National Poetry Month.

Does it matter?

It matters to me because I was first and foremost a poet, from my very early days. I was proud to call myself that, it was a title for me, an identity, something that set me apart from others.  I could play guitar, albeit poorly, I could sing, and I wrote poetry. I put my heart on paper and bled my very soul.

I was a bit dramatic.

I don’t remember not writing, hunched over notebooks, scraps of paper, diaries, recording my life and joys and traumas in one of my only outlets.  It was the only power I had, creating worlds, recording events, finding some escape with a skill that, as far as I knew, not many others had.  The fact that not too many people understood it, or valued it, made it somehow more enticing.  They didn’t like it because they didn’t understand it.  They made no effort to understand it.  I still kind of feel that way, actually.

Years later I would major in Creative Writing, with a focus on poetry.  One of the worst mistakes I ever made, by the way.  It placed a watcher on my shoulder I never had before, it silenced my voice, took my muse, and left me a shell of a person.  In fairness, the watcher was the gasoline, but the excessive, crippling drunkenness and black depression was the match that blew it all up. I did not get my degree.

It was not all bad though, it gave me stories I managed to write to long term memory.

I transferred to UC Santa Cruz from Ohlone Junior College in Fremont, CA.  I was accepted with the understanding that I complete in summer session two courses I missed, astronomy and statistics.  Math and I are not friends, it’s just a jerk, actually, so this was not a good thing for me.

Sitting in my seat, I  looked around the room and saw 40-some people, all of them artists, staring at the professor like deer in the headlights, trembling slightly and clutching a copy of “Leaves of Grass” all of us simply not wired this way, all of us taking General Education classes in the summertime.

Poetry Month 3
They were not clutching copies of Leaves of Grass.  I lied.

That fall semester, UCSC canceled Creative Writing and I, and all the other poets were lost.  We sat under the shade of a tree, dressed in black, shunning the sun the Math majors were prancing in, chain-smoking and silent.  In hindsight, this is a pretty funny picture.

So a quick romp in and out of San Francisco State, and that was that. No more hope of a degree, no more poetry in my heart, a whole lot of booze.

It took 25 years to get this back.  Twenty-five years later I finally got my muse back.

And now, it is National Poetry Month.

Does anyone still care?

I was just at City Lights bookstore here in San Francisco for the 100th birthday party of Lawrence Ferlinghetti.  It was packed with people, blocking the streets, crowding the store, an entire day of poetry readings and positive, glowing, happy energy.  People just beaming, surrounded by like minds.

Some of those people were poets, I’m sure, some not.  It doesn’t matter.  What brought them there was poetry and the celebration of this amazing man and the haven he created.  He just released a new book, at 100.  I have released one in 51 years. I’ll get right on that.

Poetry Month 1
City Lights Books – A haven for poets and everyone else.

Poetry does matter.  It matters like the air we breathe, like laughter, like tears, like fire, like rage.  It matters to every abused child who uses it to escape.

Worlds are built.  People are created.  Flight and magic and vengeance and mirth made real.

It matters.

Do you write?  Do you want to?  Then write, for crying out loud!  Who cares if it’s good?  Does it make you happy?  Were you filled in some way by writing it?  Then write more. Keep it private if you like, or show it to only those people you trust to hold it gently.

It matters.

If you write and you would like to share it, do put it in the comments.  I love to see poetry proudly offered.  I love to see art of any kind.

I’ve included a link to my book as well.

My advice to you, for what it’s worth, whatever you do, whatever your plans, for fuck’s sake don’t take a poetry class!

Life Songs – Discussions with an Angry Child

Humor, Mental Illness, writing

Happy Anniversary Nightmares & Laughter!

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It’s been three years ago this month since I started this blog, and I’m feeling reflective.

It’s my first, and I have been slow to get moving, but I’m starting to get my groove. I have shared great times – my first book – horrible times when I could barely write – the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings – and simple daydreams.

And an article about goats because goats are funny.

Goats are Funny. They just are.

I started N&L to speak to, advocate for, and comfort people like me, people with mental illness, addiction, trauma issues, or a combination of those.  It’s been my hope that my voice could reflect both the struggles and pain we face, but also the joy and silliness and dark humor that keeps us alive.

So, Nightmares & Laughter.

I have shared snippets of my life and pictures of my home and pieces of my history that I thought hard about before I hit Publish. I think it’s helpful to see the writer in their natural habitat, make them a human, a human adult who has a stunning amount of children’s toys.

This anniversary also marks three years since I’ve been unemployed.  I have been using this time to live some dreams;  finish my book, start a second one, work on photography and painting and basically mess around in my studio, write this blog, panic about money, live the life of an artist, the life I’ve always wanted.

Now it’s three years later.  I’ve covered a lot of ground, and sometimes I think I’ve nothing left to say and stare at the screen whimpering (every writer just nodded), but I always find something.  I write what is interesting to me and I hope it’s interesting to you as well.

To those following N&L, I want to say thank you so much, I will continue to write articles that you will enjoy getting an alert for, articles without sentences like this tortured mess.

Soon I will get a job, but I will keep writing and making art.  And someday, someday I will get paid to do it. Someone will find this blog and say, “hey, let’s give her all of the money!”

That will happen any day now.  Any day.

 

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