Amy's way or the highway

Lent Day 43, Holy Sh--

What a week. My nail polish is chipping. Jesus. What else can happen? This is why I don't normally polish, people. Ben says my nails look like I was trying to scratch my way out of somewhere. But where? Where!? What is life if not scratching our way out of somewhere? (insert maniacal laughter here). Whew! This blog is too jolly. I'm going to go get some downers from Johnny on the Corner and return instantly.

Instantly, moments later:
My brother says I can be Jewish if I want to be Jewish, no conversion necessario. Maybe I want to  be Spanish. I sound so much more exotic in Spanish; my good looks make so much more sense in Spanish.

What is it with identity anyway? I'm sort of an idiot when it comes to religion. Ask anybody. I grew up so secular, I thought people who believed in God and church were indulging some hobby. Hobbies gone wild. I thought it didn't occur to them that they could just sleep in on Sundays.

I thought people who talked about Jesus were talking about Santa Claus, publicly. It embarrassed me. I was like "Can you tuck that crazy in?"

Listening to Garry Wills(author, historian, pulitzer prizer) on NPR yesterday talking about his book "What Paul Meant" made me realize how weird it is that I don't think of Jesus and Paul and all those cats as real. Sure, who knows who wrote the Bible, but disregard history? That's weird? Mr. Wills was talking about Paul and Jesus like they were people and I was like Homer Simpson hitting myself in the head "Donk!"

And then on Passover? All those characters. Wait. Pull that bus over. Not characters? People? Oy, I am a babe in the woods of life.

Last Day of Lent-Day 43. I blame shopping for idiocracy. I mean shopping hid all these things I wasn't paying attention to. Jammed up the landfills of my soul. So I stopped questing for anything beyond the perfect black cashmere sweater.

Update: No shopping in sight, the world is ajar. Attention attention, world is ajar.

Happy Lent. Happy Passover. Cashmere is not the answer. I don't know the question, but I know that much.

day 42, lent post passover

Woke up squirrelly. Today dad would have been 66 years old.
I wonder what he would have thought about me doing lent. I think he would have said what he always said. "Amy, you're a strange person."

I have a zit on my cheek from applying coco butter to my face so I don't become a wrinkley dinkley. My pores are starting a cocoa butter revolution.
They are marching to the beat of Duke or Earl. They are singing "No more coco-butter. WE want coconuts." I salute their passion.

Announcement: Non-alcoholic beer and Whole Foods four-dollar brownies are delightful. I don't know if my father ever tried that combo. He was more of a duck and Diet Coke man.

It's snowing, which is ridiculous, cause it's April and my hyacinths are attempting to open. The itty bitty bit of purple flowering just knocked on my door and demanded "Ahem! Blanket out here, por favor!" A blade of grass sneaked through and screamed out the window "She's got the fucking heat on in here."

I've laid out nana's fur on the flower bed, as an amends. Some animal rights people came by and added a touch of red to it. Vogue magazine sent a fashion writer who said "Very skinny women are lying flat out on their flower beds in furs." The woman's health clinic called and said "Get your grandma out of the flower bed." I said "She's not in there." They called the shrink. The shrink said "Just cause nobody is there doesn't mean nobody is there."

I've decided I'm going to be a very rich white man when I'm done with this spiritual journey. I'd just like to wear a tie without looking like a metrosexual.

Don't pass me over

Today on day 40 of lent(no, not the last one), I am lost and tired and yet paced and calm.
Day 40.
I am majorly missing shopping. Not the shitty post shopping feeling, but the freedom to shop, to say "I want to buy this.' I have also done no Yoga for over a week and  I stopped my chiro for about the same amount of time, so my body is in shock. After I finish this blog, I'll go running, which is stupid because I just ate a can of sardines, two slices of Irish soda bread and a pear.

Oh and announcement! I am almost not a blogger, because after Lent 1 is over, I am onto Lent 2 which is curating everything I have written and seeing what it is. I will be a scary monster during this, I promise. And I will be relatively silent on the blog posts.

Speaking of Lent, passover is around the corner. I was just at the Jewel near the conservative and Hassidic Jewish area in Chicago and I felt very Jewish and very non-Jewish. Non-Jewish because of what I was wearing, or more importantly, not wearing. Wearing jeans. Not wearing wig. Not wearing long shirt. Wearing crop top that shows my navel. Navel-such an ugly word. Na-vel. Ish. I can't believe I have a navel. Naaaaa-vel. Neigh-vul. Filthy word. No way to make it pretty. Maybe that's why people normally say tummy or abs, ignoring the umbilical chord outlet totally.
And put jewels in them. Belly button ring sounds so much better than that's a pretty diamond in your na-vel.

At the store where I felt Jewish and non-Jewish, I bought matzo, for Ben. Ben loves matzo and I honestly don't know if his love for matzo came before or after me. Maybe I'm matzo. Maybe it's his way of saying "I accept all parts of you, but I really love your matzo." I have perfectly lovely Christian friends who have talked of converting to Judaism; I know how yummy Matzo can be.

I almost bought a tub of matzo ball soup, but my stepmother makes it so much better than Jewel does; I get the real thing tomorrow night at Pesach. Along with bitter herbs and the always yummy salted hard-boiled egg, and don't forget the charoseth(chopped nuts, apples, cinnamon,and wine(representing the clay the Israelites made bricks while in slavery). Food is indeed memory.

It's hard to explain to non-Jews what it is to be a cultural Jew even if you don't practice Judaism in your everyday life. And no, it's not all because of Hitler, though I was scared of him, even growing up in a non-Jewish house; I always thought he would find me. It's hard to explain why I feel protective over this part of me, even while I celebrate Christmas and longed for my annual Easter basket that miraculously showed up on my window sill every Easter morning. Pink marshmallow candy, delicious.

It's hard to explain why anti-Semitism makes me feel more, not less Jewish. Makes me not want to hide and shy away but claim and declare!

I wonder if I feel like someone who is bi-racial who is always feeling the need to acknowledge both sides of my identity. Not so much for themselves, but for the world: Yes, I am a Jew. Yes, I would have to convert to be a Jew. No, you cannot say bad things about Jews in front of me. Yes, it is anti-Semitic to say that. Somehow, my foot in both worlds has made people feel comfortable and uncomfortable about my Jewishness. I've heard many times "You're the first Jew I've ever met" and I feel pressure to not screw it up. I feel pressure to be funny and intelligent. Some people ask me "Do Jews do that?" Or "Is it Anti-Semitic to say that?" They get chummy with my non-Jewish side to interview me about my Jewish side. With more trepidation, they say "But if you would have to convert to be a Jew, doesn't that make you angry?" Or "You're not really Jewish because it was your father not your mother.."
Which is such a weird thing to say to someone. I would never say "You're not really Catholic cause you don't go to church." OR "Obama's not really black, because his mother was white."
Honestly, even growing up with a non-Jewish mother, who incidentally has a wealth of information on Jewish holidays and Yiddish expressions, I have always felt like a Jew. So, aren't I? I mean I don't feel like a boy, or I don't feel like a labor-doodle, so I'm not crazy to feel this way.
So, what can I say?
Happy Passover.

Lent day 36. ME.

The scientist on the radio is talking about radiation. Illinois is looking to put a nuclear plant in Illinois. Oy. The scientist and the reporter are discussing the toxicity of radiation. Apparently, we're not supposed to get our teeth x-rayed every year. I always suspected my dentist was killing me.
Well! All this talk about radiation gets me to thinking about yours truly.
And lent.
And toxicity.
And enough about me, what do you think about me?
The MEEEEEEEEE generation.
The MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
generation.
Speaking of toxicity in the me generation, I am totally in support of taking care of ourselves, but do we do it too much?  Do we do it instead of taking care of other people? Have other people's needs become a mere inconvenience? Something to schedule between me this and me that?
If you're doing both, this doesn't apply to you.
If you're saving the world and getting facials, you're off the hook(you know who you are:))

But what about those of us who are on fire with ourselves? Where do we go to confess? I'll tell ya where.

There's this church on 42nd and Indiana. The doors blue. It's in a basement. Don't worry, they';re serving champagne and beluga. You get a hot towel when you walk in cause yes, the doorknob is dirty with all sorts of overpriced hand lotion; the wrong combination will blow you to the sky. No, not all hand lotions are chemically compatible.
The leader is brutal. King Kong Cafe Bong is his nickname and he is not so much a tall drink of water as a short cup of espresso.
Since you're afraid of 42nd and Indiana, here's the Sermon:
King Kong Soda Bong: We can't get enough of ourselves.(hallelujah!) We hit this lows of woes and instead of going out and volunteering, we wallow! (Oh lord! We wallow.) We say "I don't know what's wrong with me. Me so sad. Me so lonely. Me so not where me want to be." (Ungeee!)
--this is only an excerpt, you gotta pay the pot to get the god(pronounced got)

There's a lot of weeping, a lot of self sacrifice
involving tossing out credit cards and cutting out the glob of their brain that holds the neon sign "Latte!") Then people leave, broken, uncertain, writing blank checks to King Kong Cafe Bong, who promptly escapes to another neighborhood latte people fear to travel.

Note: Do not worry if this is a blog about you.  This is the meeeeee generation. It's all about meeeeeeee. And I'm not being clever or wink winky, it really is about me. Maybe it's about you too, but not my intention.

Back to radiation and what I learned at King Kong Cafe Bong that only cost me 50,000 dollars:
There are high levels of me on my Geiger counter. Me shouldn't have moved a me plant so close to me. Me should have built the me plant further out where no one else lived. Where no one could get hurt if me blew.

Conclusion: Contrary to this odd mood, I am not interested in being locked up. That would only lead to therapy and more discussion of me. In fact, I'd like the opposite to happen. Send me out in the world, make me deal with others. Or, leave me here and let Me be really sad me is out of coffee.  Me is done. Me is not profound today. Me go back into me cave. Me go look in mirror and make me look pretty for me.
Au revoir
Lovely day to y'all.

Day 35, Spring Cleaning

Spring is in the air. Well, temporarily. But ads for spring are definitely in the air. Car ads. Volkswagens spring cleaning car sale. Yoga studio spring cleaning seminars. Target spring cleaning outdoor furniture for summer. I could get so many fantastic deals if I just would buy NOW. Day 35, lent. Easter Sales around the bend. Dora the Explorer easter baskets. Cad berry Eggs, two for one!

Yesterday, I did my own spring cleaning. I am semi-convinced that if I get rid of all my extra crap, my back will no longer hurt. That my trouble lay in my internal and external clutter. That my stuff is crushing me. That uncluttered, I could frolic up and down hills like a four-year old, joints liquid, knees like a newborn, back like a slinky.

I have not shopped for 34 days going on 35. My name is Culberg and I'm a lot of things.

My friend Shea asked me the last time I was getting rid of clutter, something I do OFTEN, she said "Haven't you gotten rid of everything yet? I don't get how you have more stuff to get rid of. Is your house empty?"(Au contraire) Shea lives in a one bedroom. She cannot collect too much. Lucky girl. But it's not only the one room that keeps her clutter free, because there are people who live in one room and it is piled to the ceiling in newspapers and trinkets. No, Shea also is orderly and non-cluttery. Otherwise, I would have moved into an efficiency a long time ago and solved this problem once and for all. But, alas, wherever you go, voila, there you are. She irons her clothes. I collect trash.

Some people are children of the depression. Some people are children of Wolves. Some people are children of fundamentalists. Some people are children of psychiatrists. I am the child of people who liked rummage sales and craft stores. Yes, there was little hope for me. Then, there was my disposition, foggy and chaotic all at once.My mother could survive her clutter because she is also organized. I got my father's ability to organize.  He stuffed drawers with tube socks and dollar bills. I built my clutter clothes into a fort.

Let me pause her for storytime:
Years ago, I was climbing a volcano in Guatemala. No, really. I was. I befriended a little boy, who was actually our group mountain guide, which in retrospect is sort of terrifying, considering at the time, banditos were kidnapping bus groups of Danish girls and I, incidentally, am a quarter Danish. I don't look it, but perhaps I smell like it. Luckily, I am dark and rarely mistaken for a blue eyed blond. Rarely, not never. I did briefly pose as one and my friend John said "I guess the myth of blonds is true. I feel even more attracted to you with blond hair." Of course, I dyed it dark chestnut the next day, a lifetime of being liked for my personality, I was not ready at twenty-five to
start being valued for my good looks.

Where was I? Yes, racing down a mountain with Everardo, the seven-year old, with a machete. He told me to run sideways and then I wouldn't fall. He said Gravidido or something-I knew he meant trust gravity. Though he may have meant the situation is grave. Or you are going to your grave.
I am not a brave woman, by any comparison, unless you compare me to a shut-in who doesn't even retrieve her own mail because she thinks her mailbox will bite her.
But there are moments I've thrown caution to the wind and racing down the hill with Everardo was one of them. The climb up had taken four hours. The group stopped to marvel and click photos of the clouds below us, share an avocado and a can of sardines, then turned around. The rest of the group stayed  clustered together, as far as I knew. When I ran away with the boy, I think I heard someone say "Stupido." But they may have been saying "Go Culberg Go." Or "Do you expect snow?"

About half-way down the volcano, the boy left me(boy, if I had a nickel for every time that happened). Now, for those of you who know me, you know that I am navigation-ally impaired.That I have been known to walk out of my house and look both ways to ensure I don't walk back into my house. People think it's cute and quirky, which feels condescending, but I tell myself they're all just jealous I never go on vacations, which are never are as fun-filled as promised.

Ah, yes, half-way down the mountain, I realize I am alone. I had read enough literature to appreciate the metaphor and for a moment, I felt acutely like a writer living inside the pages. I thought, when I reach the bottom of this lava hill, my book will be finished.
Unfortunately, half-way down was cloud level, so I was walking through the clouds, beautiful, but difficult to navigate, which actually was irrelevant since I am also lost with maps and street signs; the brain rebels.
I did not, however, worry about the banditos looking for Danes. I did tell myself, however, to 'look Mayan,' just in case. I'm sort of a shape shifter, if you must know, even if no one sees it but me.
I was a little concerned I would arrive at the wrong part of the bottom of the volcano which would be the wrong town. And my Spanish was good enough for an eight-year old who wasn't listening to me, but not good enough to get me to an embassy. Embassio? Aeropuerto? I tried to conjure up all the Spanish I knew: Hospitalo? Banyo. Hola. Triste.  Agua. Oy, I was in trouble. Perdido?
The one thing I did have going for me was that the only way to go was down. Two points for the good guys.
I tend to act two ways when I'm scared.  I freeze or I run. I chose run. I ran as fast as I could down, sideways, amazed I didn't fall on my side. Momentum. Momemtumo, I thought. Gravity. Gravidido. I felt like I was in that olympic sport where they ride a kind of kayak down a frozen water slide...What's that sport called? I always wonder, "What keeps them from capsizing?" Gravidido? Nothing will stop me, I'm thinking. No stoppo. Even if I have to run for hours, I'll do it.
I'm kicking volcanic dust into my own face, it's sticking to my damp body, and I start to imagine myself on television, discussing my life and death trial. The doll-faced news anchor says "So you were running unbelievably fast and sideways for 3 hours...Was there any point that you thought you could go no further?" I'm nodding when she's talking, very self-important me. People who hate me, who are watching, are thinking "I hate her." "No," I tell the anchor. "All I could think of was I gotta get down that volcano?" "When did you realize it had erupted?" The anchor asked. More self-important nodding.

It didn't actually erupt. But I was stopped in my tracks by a white horse who galloped out of the clouds. No, really. I thought "Narnia?" I thought, "Am I dead?" I really did. Not just pretend.  Think about it. Seriously, if you are ever alone on a volcano in a foreign land, surrounded by clouds and a white horse runs out and stands in front of you, you're dead. The horse is your bus to heaven. Right? Righto?
Or at least, that's how I thought it worked, when I got my "You know you're dead when-" brochure.

It actually only took 45 minutes to run down and at the bottom the little boy pointed at me and laughed. I was covered in dirt. The people at the store who sold me agua pointed and laughed. I was not embarrassed though. I was proud. The rest of the group arrived two hours later. It gave me time to finish the Kate Atkinson book I was reading.The ending brings anyone with a dollop of feelings to tears. When the group arrived I was powdered dust and streaks of tears. They coined me "The dirtiest girl on the mountain." I'd be offended, but I like nicknames. Nicknames are love.

Why have I told you this story? Other than to impress you with my travels and bravery? Well, my junk addiction did make me the dirtiest girl, metaphorically and literally, in my travels abroad and in my livings at home. But that was then. And now I have spring cleaned. Spring Clunged. Sprunged from my old cluttered self into this sparse shiny floored, bleached sinked, labeled boxed human and it only took 35 days. 35 days and 36 years and then some. But here I am and there I is.

Lent day 34, minus Sundays

I asked my religions neighbors. Lent is 40 days but this is the deal. It ends on the Thursday (Maunday Thursday) before Easter and Sundays don't count so that makes 40 days. Love, Mom

Sundays don't count cause I'm supposed to not sin already on Sundays? Or I'm supposed to not shop or eat chocolate already on Sundays? And what about those Sundays? What is a day of rest? A day of resting like God wants me to? Or a day of resting like I want to?

Day 34, lent, Culberg checking in. Oh, minus however many Sundays are in 34 days. Oy. Good thing lent is not a diet. That would make me very angry. I might have to eat a rhubarb pie a la mode if I found out half-way into my 40 day diet, I was not actually half-way through with my 40 day diet. Actually, lent probably is a diet, for some people. No chocolate for some, no bread, no sugar...sounds like a diet. No meat. No carbs. Yep. Diet.

So, is our culture of abundance using lent like a diet? Am I?
I've always bragged about not dieting. I'm like "I don't diet. I don't believe in diets." It's probably annoying. But my opinion about dieting comes from a solid judgmental place, so I'm okay with that. Here's where it comes from: The 50s did a number on our mothers and the 20s and 30s did on our grandmothers, and I don't mean a dance number. I mean a "this is what you're supposed to look like, act like..you go to college to meet a husband, not learn."  And they've all been on diets for as long as I can remember. They're always  depriving themselves. "Oh no, I really shouldn't." "Well, maybe just one bite." "Oh, I'm going to have to starve myself tomorrow if I eat this cookie." Generations of shaking their heads at food like it was rat poison or heroine. And then they've been getting on scales and judging themselves daily. And I hate it. It depresses me. I'm sure its empowering but I never wanted to measure myself by my weight or food intake.

Hey, I know my generation is f---ed up too. I mean, please, our role models are twelve year old movie stars and gun-riddled rap stars, who go in and out of rehab and anorexia clinics like packages go in and out of UPS trucks.

But, I swore a long time ago(sorry grandma) that I would not weigh myself. Meanwhile, I'm sure my husband is like "Honey, maybe you should weigh yourself." Of course, he can see my ass easier than I can, so maybe he's right, but as the singing fat lady sings, it's my ass. And sure, sometimes I get a little tire around my middle or a little jiggle around my biggle, but I don't need a scale to tell me that. I got eyes. If my jeans don't zip, I'm hip to it.

I know I'll be really evolved if I toss out all my mirrors, but I'm not that facially flawless that sometimes I don't need a little self-correction before I leave the house. I don't want to scare any of the dogs or kids I work with. I don't need to look like a 50s housewife at the grocery store, but I don't need to look like the creature from the black lagoon either. I don't need a blow dryer camping, but I'd like a pair of tweezers.

So, lent. On the one hand, we have worse portion control than our mothers because we're hungrier hungrier hippos. The Insatiable Generation. We eat to calm down, to feel better, to celebrate. We eat at weird hours, late at night, middle of the night. We can't control our hunger cause its replaced so many spiritual voids, so we take pills that say "You're too wired to eat." Smoking might actually improve our health. Just kidding. This is not one-helping nation (for those of us who are still eating, that is-some people have just given it up- how the hell else are they going to maintain a size zero?) But to overcompensate for our big plates and giant forks, we exercise until we break and if the doctors are right, we'll all need new knees before we're fifty. We're the walking wounded.

So, I ask. Were our mothers wrong to not have forth and fifth helpings instead of spin till they can't spin no more? Wasn't sitting on the curb drinking wine a bit more pleasant than suiting up for the track? Was it more honest to acknowledge we are a nation obsessed with our looks and control our looks by eating less, acting sweeter, playing by the rules? Was it easier to go to college to find a husband than deal with these intimidated men who are unclear why they should marry someone who doesn't need them financially?

I don't know. I'm not fond of going back before women could vote or get paid or weren't allowed to ask men on dates, and a time that people of color had to sit elsewhere.

However, there is something to take from every generation, and I'd like to take a little self-control from my mother's generation, just a touch.

I don't know. It's 630 am. What do you want from me?

Is lent a diet? Maybe.
Do I need to go on lent because I have no other ideas on how to stop consuming? Yep.
Is it sacrilegious since I didn't even know how many days lent was yesterday? Probably.
Am I going to go make another cup of coffee now cause the first one sucked? You got it.

LENT DAY 33, it may be longer than 40 days

Well, here's how the joke starts: A man walks into the desert for forty days to save all mankind for eternity. He doesn't decide to quit something, but due to the fact he's in the dessert, he quits everything; everything but living and breathing and digging for water holes. Day 33, God says, oops, it's actually another 13 days. Thirteen days, the messiah says, I only packed for 40 and that makes 46. I know how he feels. This happened to me. I'm doing lent and I'm on 33 and mom says "Only 13 left." 13, I say, but 13 plus 33 does not make 40. She says "I don't know. Maybe lent is longer than forty." Ach, I'm in the proverbial desert. What did I expect?

However, does that means lent is 46 days? Am I a mathematical idiot or is the desert reference vague? Was the messiah so tired he lost count?

Tangent: All my life, people have told me to dress up, polish up, buy a suit, wear pumps, brush my hair, shut up, be polite, match my purse with my shoes, don't quit college, marry a nice man, hang out with people doing better than me, don't have a fourth helping, don't eat dinner after ten, don't smoke, don't put whiskey in a water glass, don't flirt with other people's person, don't take up so much space, let other people shine, make your bed no matter where you are(even if it's not your bed), hang up your clothes when you're done with them, write thank you letters, call people back, when you make a prank call hold the ear piece to your ear so you can hear what they say back(don't hold the phone far away and yell into it "Is your refrigerator running, then go catch it!" Give the person a chance to say "No, it's not running."), go to the dentist, get a pap, test your boobs for lumps, check your armpits too(no your armpits are not technically part of your boobs), read intelligent books, don't watch soap operas, don't expect your husband to act like they do on television, don't date drunks, don't walk without shoes unless you want fat feet(that apparently is the opposite of foot binding), don't travel without your husband(unless you're looking to get lucky), don't flirt so much, don't eat onions before a date, don't talk about people, don't dumpster dive, sleep with your professors(sluts elevate faster in this business), don't use duct tape to wrap Christmas gifts, don't speak ill of the dead unless it's really funny(not just sort of funny), do unto others as others yotta yotta, go to church, go to temple, go to Bora Bora(You must! You absolutely must!)

So, here I am in the desert. My mom adds 7 days to my 8. Oy. My sister tells me the other day that quiet meditation makes you find things that noisy meditation does not help you find. So here I am, these thoughts swirling around my head, like buzzards if you must know, swirling and landing, swirling and landing, and I'm wondering what do I take from all this? What do I bring with me when I leave this sand hell? Or I am carrying too much.  Will the desert customs sand people send me back and say "No way. You can't bring that into the non-desert." Or maybe customs will let me through, but then a waterman offers me a trade :"Would I trade all I've been carrying for a bottle of Fuji water and a kick ass mirage?" Yes, I would holler. Yes. And, alas, I am free to lent another day.

day 33, Lent, you elitist snob

The shoulder is screwed up again.
On the flipside, we saw Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson, and Ray Pride(lucky for him, Gay Pride wouldn't happen for decades after he attended elementary school) last night and that was fab. Especially since we left during the middle of the last encore, so we didn't have to deal with un-parking madness. We got to drive home with the music on the brain, not the honk honk, and orange jacketed policeman guiding us out with flares.

There are times that it is very clear I live in the midwest. Usually, it's when I look at what we're wearing. Other than Lincoln Park, the Gold Coast and some affluent suburban pockets, we are not a fancy people. And there is nothing like being in Chicago(well, sort of, Rosemont) and seeing people stand up and lasso their cowboy hats around. There's something like it, but I don't know what. It makes me both happy and smug at the same time. I think "Oh those hill billies" on one hand(the hour hand). And on the other hand(the minute hand), I think "What a happy unneurotic people. They probably don't stay up at night wondering if they'll every write a sentence as beautifully as Pamuk or Calvino." On the third hand, what would that be? Oh, the second hand, maybe they are up at night worried about Pamuk. Maybe they have book clubs and unfinished dissertations and insecurity complexes about their 1560 SAT scores. It is so easy to simplify people in other tribes.

However, none of that has anything to do with Lent. Day 33. Holler!
What does is, I didn't buy a Willie Nelson t-shirt. Pat my back. Granted, the t-shirts were not cute or the right fabric. However, if I were a shopper, that would not have mattered. I would have found my way to buy this thick cotton schmata with a picture of a bearded old man wearing a flag, playing a guitar with a hole in it. Why do I need that again? Why do any of us need t-shirts from concerts when we're just forked out many dollars to see them play? Do t-shirts help us remember? When we're old and our minds are mere memories?

Where'd I get this t-shirt again, Ester?

How the hell should I know, Merve?

Hmmm...Oh, right. I went to that Willie Nelson concert. Oh thank god, I bought this tshirt or I wouldn't even remember.

I looked around at the various t-shirts at the midwest fashion show happening during intermission. There were Harley t-shirts beneath leather vests worn by packs who huddled together like mini-gritty-big-bald long haired-male, skinny-feathered back haired female co-ed football teams, the techies(sound, camera, film people) wore the standard black white lettered Ramones and CASH t-shirts(Just so we didn't mistake their allegiance-they're cooler), there were Willie t-shirts from four decades(all pretty ugly); people wore those proud and taut on their watermelon bellies. The older the t-shirt, the higher the status- something very elite about how long everyone had been a fan. Real fans versus new fans versus people who go to concerts cause they can. There were the people who knew all the words and sang louder than Willie or Merle or Ray, and there was the one guy who gave every song a standing ovation. Good knees, I thought. There was country people versus City People, North versus South. It probably wouldn't have taken much to stage a civil war re-inactment.

These were not, I started to imagine, people I wanted to get in an anti-war dialog with.

And while I'm making grand conclusions about who these people are, let me interject with this: I always equate cell phone with city folks. This is again attached to my elitism, but it's attached so...there it is. I'm watching this Good Ol' Boy hooting and hollering, sneaking opening beer cans and chugging them throughout and he's hooting and hollering in agreement of every mumbled song, that I cannot understand (Cause I'm not a real fan yet. Not really.). I don't mind the man because he adds to the flavor. In my mind, he's higher status than me in this room. Maybe at Starbucks I'm more high status, but here, I'm rock bottom. And this guy likes Willie a lot; Willie's church to this guy. I'd seen the insanity in Texas last year and I knew I lacked the working classness to completely relate. I know no convicts, I have no naked woman tattoos, I work no factory jobs(nor do I know anyone who has) and the times I have been on the road...well, I was on the way to my grandparents. So, I accept the hooting and hollering as something I don't do, but can't judge either. But when the good ol' boy starts yelling into his cell phone, my brain experiences a clash of context. What? A good ol' boy on a cellphone? Do good ol' boys use cellphones? I am such a snob that I would be less offended if he were using a Cambells soup can with a rope stretched across the room to the balcony where his good ol' boy friend was sitting.
I thought only city assholes yelled in concerts, or checked their texts during movies. I get real sad, seeing it's leaked into the rural. And I am not so much disappointed in myself(I know I suck) as I am in the world. I like to think factions of the world are immune to this technological wasteland. That good ol' boys wives do not want Paris Hilton's puppy and purse. I would like to think there are wild people in the hills who are missing all this capitolism and technological rudeness and when we all blow ourselves up, they will remain, bringing mankind back to the basics. And that the first thing on their mind will not be to build a mall or wonder if they are too fat.

Day 32_Lent

Next lent, television
Jesus, what the hell is wrong with me?
I have a new plan.
Every forty days.
Forty days of quitting.
Forty days of adding.
So as soon as lent is over, I'm adding something for forty days, and I can mix it up.
Yoga and Submitting Writing.
Yoga one day.
Submissions, next day.
Yoga.
Submissions.

I am weary of subtraction.
I am propelling towards addition.

It calms me to think of it this way.
I will ruminate on it.
What will be added.
How exciting.

Lent day 30-31, release me

Today the non-shoppingness of my life is palatable. I can taste it's non-existence. Just beneath my tongue, I feel the words Buy, Shop, Want. It is as rich as scent memory. I am touching an invisible silk scarf in my hand. I am dreaming of trying on clothes. I am envying people who go into stores and feel satisfaction with their purchase, whose day is made better by a new unpilled sweater. Someone actually said to me "But Amy, who will you be when you are not decked out in beautiful funky clothes?" The question repelled me. I am that? That is who I am? My god, then, take me behind the barn and shoot me. I was hoping to do something more valuable here on earth when my planet zoomed me over. My alien president must be disgusted.

Minutes ago, I watched a lovely Asian woman in a bright orange coat walk out of a Mexican clothes shop. A wonderfully rich reddish-orange coat, not the orange of a crossing guard.  Her coat was fantastic; the zipper was fushia. I wanted to eat it. Her black framed glasses were expensive, Prada probably. They framed her face, like the ad promises. Watching her walk out of the shop exhaling, squeezing her hands in her pockets, I felt the way an alcoholic feels when he spots a pretty girl walk out of a bar, sober; she can handle the bar, he thinks, jealous. She can go in there, have a drink and leave. She can leave without ripping a barstool out of the concrete floor or strangling an old colleague with a winter scarf. She can leave the bar without calling his ex-wife and screaming "One more chance. Once more. I'll change." Not me, he thinks. I'm sick. I don't get to do that anymore. One day at a time, he says, reading his AA key chain, rubbing his one year token. The ex-drunk finds a meeting by calling his sponsor. There's one at noon at Old Saint Nicks. "Is everything all right, Paul?" His sponsor asks. Untilt he meeting starts, he bides his time in the new non-fiction section of the library, where he sees a drunk homeless man, face pressed up against a window, whisper-yelling at a woman running past. The homeless man has his hand up in the air like a fan at a marathon; he is yelling "Go baby go! You can do it!" The homeless man is weeping. The ex-drunk admires his passion. The ex-drunk feels his own life muted, like someone has blocked some of the channels on his television set.

Since I have been on earth,  I wonder who I am supposed to be. Obviously, for the past thirty-one days, it is shopping in question. Am I suppose to be a shopper? I hate the thought. If only I didn't crave what I don't have, I say to myself. If only the sentence "I will be happy when I have an infinity pool" were not in my vernacular. If only I were not so good at spotting bargains. My quitting shopping, in that sense, is such a waste. I am so good at it. If only I could be discovered by a rich heiress who wanted me to find her bargains at the Salvation Army. I am actually a hypocrite by giving up shopping. I tell people all the time, "Do what you're good at. Embrace it. Be who you are. Don't force yourself to go in an unnatural direction. In other wards, go with your flow."

Here's the problem with my thinking. What if what you're good at is "Drinking Jameson, finding bargains and making lost men fall in love with you..." what then?

I do not include my husband in this equation. He was something else, something unexpected.  He was a parcel left at my door from a store that I did not know existed.  He was a stranger who entered without my asking, but there he was. I did not pick him out of a catalog. I did not see him in a bar and hope to seduce him with my charming lostness and my vague wit. But in spite of me, there he is, in the kitchen washing the popcorn pan, because I've pulled my shoulder muscle and cannot lift a pan. Perhaps I should buy a lighter one.