1. There will be several days that you daydream about stepping in front of a city bus. Don’t. It will not be beautiful. It will not be brave. It will be selfish. It will be broken. Your mother will cry.
2. Don’t write for him. Write for you. Write for others like you. Write so the girl that thinks about stepping in front of public transportation doesn’t. Don’t be selfish.
3. When you will yourself to sleep and it doesn’t come- get up. It doesn’t matter that it’s 3 am. There will be other 3 am’s. Take a shower. Take two. Wash him out of your hair. Write a poem. Read the same book you’ve read 202 times again. The 203rd time might tell you something different. Don’t stay in bed- you will think about the bus again.
4. Don’t kiss him because he’s broken. Don’t kiss him because his laughter never reaches his eyes. Don’t try and fix him. Fix yourself first. Be selfish. He can’t save you.
5. Date yourself. Take yourself out to eat. Don’t share your popcorn at the movies with anyone. Stroll around an art museum alone. Fall in love with canvases. Fall in love with yourself.
6. Dress up and wear red lipstick and get drunk with your friends. They’re the ones that will pick you up. Don’t kiss him. Or him. Don’t fall asleep on strange couches with strange boys. When his hand slides up your dress walk away. Hit him. Don’t kiss him. He can’t save you.
7. Get another tattoo. Get five more. Get another hole in your ear. Don’t listen to your dad. You will still be able to get a job. Did you really want to be employed by someone like your father? Haven’t you had enough of judgmental old white men anyway? Get fuck you tattooed in tiny letters on your hip.
8. When you feel the yearning for a new city- start over. Take 200 bucks and a three suitcases. Work anywhere that will have you. Meet strange people and forget your name. Call yourself Ruby. No one will know the difference. Remember to call your mother. Don’t be selfish. Come home when you find yourself in the strangers and the small one bedroom apartment.
9. Don’t whisper evil things into your own ear. Other people are going to shout them at you. Be your own hero. Keep a sword on your key ring.
10. Don’t step in front of a city bus. It will not be beautiful. Live. Stay up all night with a boy that promises you everything and means it. Live. See shitty local bands with a friend. Wear a different band’s t-shirt. No one will care. Live. Have a baby girl with tiny fingers and tiny toes someday. Pour love into her until it’s overflowing. Live. Wake up. Staying in bed all day is not poetic.
Live. Live.
Live.
Do you hear that? It’s me. It’s your life. Wake up.
Mother’s day with my daughter this year was incredible.
Honestly, I have no complaints. We had a great day. We laughed and played and blew bubbles and ate dinner with my family. It was peaceful. The last couple of mothers day haven’t been the best, and it’s a holiday that is always pretty hard for me considering that my mom died of cancer a few years ago.
Which because I can’t spend it with her physically, I make it a point to put flowers on her grave every year for the holiday. And that’s when the conversation started with my four year old about cancer.
She knows my mom is in heaven. She and I talk about it every once in a while, but when we were at the cemetery she said to me “Your mom is in heaven right? She got sick with cancer right? What’s cancer?”
Now, I will never lie to my daughter. Kids are smart. Smarter than sometimes we give them credit for. But honestly, How can I explain cancer to a toddler? I don’t even know how to explain it to an adult. How do you explain to your child about something so destructive. It destroyed my mother. It took someone away from me I will never get back. How do you tell that to an innocent four year old girl?
If there’s one thing in the whole world I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy, it’s watching someone they love go through cancer. I don’t want to explain the pain and anguish to my daughter. I go to bed and pray that she will never have to go through it. Whether it be me, Andrew, or her grandparents. I had a scare a couple of years ago, and it honestly terrified me, not for myself, but for my child. It takes a piece of your innocence when you watch one of the strongest people in your life, the person who used to protect you and bandage you when you were hurt, be in pain and there is nothing you can do about it. It’s frustrating, its sickening, it’s indescribable.You want to be mad, but you don’t know who to be mad at. You watch them fight a battle that they don’t deserve to fight, that you wish you could fight for them. You appreciate the good days, and hold your breath through the bad ones. People look at you differently, people who haven’t talked to you in years, apologizing for your pain, like it will make things better. Watching a love one fight the battle of cancer is a heartbreak like no other, because it’s one that can never be healed in time. It’s something you feel in someway, somehow for all time.
Still, even so many years later, the word cancer leaves a dirty taste in my mouth. And it’s something I described to my daughter as this: “Cancer is something that makes you very sick, and sometimes it makes you so sick that you have to go to heaven after you get it. That’s what happened to my mom anyways, but don’t worry. She is watching over you. She is one of your many guardian angels.”
What an awful thing to explain to a four year old.
Other times, I look at my scars and see something else: a girl who was trying to cope with something horrible that she should never have had to live through at all. My scars show pain and suffering, but they also show my will to survive. They’re part of my history that’ll always be there.
New record this Summer… Not a Born and Raised “plus”… A new group of songs to bring the whole thing up to date with Summer 2013. I have that hunger that always precedes something meaningful. See you all soon. And thanks for the warm welcome back to the stage. Getting back on it a little at a time.
