I do not like:

- Turkey (unless it’s covered in something else, like mayonnaise or chocolate sauce) (but not both of those things at once, don’t be vulgar)
- Stuffing
- Gravy
- Mashed potatoes
- Pumpkin pie

I DO like green bean casserole, sweet potatoes, and cheesecake. And crescent rolls. And all of the other shapes of rolls. Also cranberry sauce but it has to be the jellied kind and it has to keep the shape of the can that it came in once it’s dumped onto the plate. And it must, MUST make a little sucking sound as it plops out. Or I just won’t enjoy it. (I will though, probably. But so help me, if you put orange peels in it, I am telling you right now that blood is going to shoot out of my nostrils. And I will be aiming them at you. You and your orange peels.)

This year my mom came over and we got drunk on my living room floor while Diego cooked everything. Then we lit the Christmas tree. The only pumpkin was in cheesecake form and nobody even mentioned the word “stuffing.” Just kidding, I did. I said, “I’M SO GLAD WE AREN’T HAVING ANY STUFFING.” I said it through mouthfuls of pumpkin cheesecake. It was all very Norman Rockwell.

Seriously, it was as perfect a Thanksgiving as my Christmas tree is short and wide. (So, extremely. Extremely perfect.) But alas, there’s nothing like kicking off a season of consumption with a national salute to gluttony to throw all your food issues into stark relief. The amount of sugar and fat I put into my mouth hole yesterday could sustain a small town for a… half an hour. (I’m practicing not exaggerating. It’s the hardest thing I or anyone has ever had to do.) It was a lot. Definitely, definitely too much. And I knew that, but what I didn’t remember to know was that at a certain point my ability to reason becomes severely limited in regards to food. And what made me remember to know that was when Diego casually observed that I had eaten almost an entire plateful of cookies and I said well yeah I had to eat all of them before tomorrow so I wouldn’t eat them all week and he looked at me like I wasn’t making any sense because OF COURSE HE DID, THAT DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE. But I know that there are a few of you who were right there with me up until you were jarred by my sudden and excessive use of capital letters.

Watch what you eat, but not too closely. Hold yourself accountable, but gently. Et cetera et cetera ugh. It’s never easy, not now and not in February and not in July. Well, sometimes it is. And it’s hard to tell if that’s a trick or if the other stuff is. So. I don’t know what my point is, was I supposed to bring one? Meh, well, if there WAS a point, I’d probably just eat it anyway. Better this way. Less calories.

I was going to leave on a lighthearted, we’re-all-in-this-together! note, but I went away for a long time and can’t remember what I was getting at. How about this: Let your heart be light! Friendship! Pillsbury!

Remember how I intended a bunch of stuff? If I check in now and then set December intentions, that means this last week of November can be like a free-for-all right? Right.

- Quit smoking. I’m doing so great. We are defining “great” as: Eating grilled cheese with a side of macaroni and cheese for lunch two days in a row. Death by cheese may be preferable to death by cigarettes, for many reasons, but I am now officially qualified to assure you that it is no less stinky. On the bright side, I’ve got plenty of ammo for when rude men take up too much space next to me on the bus. Plenty of ammo and zero shame. So. There’s that. Also I lost track of how long it’s been, so I’m just using concerts as mental time-markers. This method serves the dual purpose of letting people know how healthy and good of a person I am, and also giving me ample opportunity to continue discussing how much fun I had at Tegan and Sara a couple of weeks ago. I HAD SO MUCH FUN (not smoking). THERE WERE EMOTIONS EVERYWHERE (but no cigarette smoke). I WISH MY WHOLE LIFE WAS A TEGAN AND SARA CONCERT (and it will be such a long life barring bus accidents because I don’t smoke anymore). Etc. In December I intend to be more mindful of replacing cigarettes with cheese.
- Keep not eating meat. I’m the actual worst. I ate pepperoni pizza twice without the thought even occurring to me that pepperoni is meat. And while I’ve completely switched over to non-dairy milks, I have eaten more cheese in the past two weeks than I usually eat in a year. So nothing makes sense and everything is awful. Moving on. I'll do better next month. Or at least I intend to. 
- Journal. So anyway, we got our Christmas tree last night! Over a month before Christmas is the perfect time, I think. What also made it the perfect time was that we had just left the pharmacy where I’d been told that my insurance company won’t pay for my prescriptions anymore unless I sign up for some stupid mail-order thing that they sent me a letter about a week ago and that I neglected to read or care about. Don’t send me mail or leave me voice messages. Also don’t show up at my house unannounced, and don’t text me either. Also also I don’t read emails. Just leave me alone and pay for my drugs, everyone! GOD’S SAKE. So Diego, who is almost as good at intercepting my meltdowns as he is at causing them, steered us toward a Christmas tree stand and saved the night. And then I figured out my medicine later on, while I was high on the scent of pine trees, as everyone should be while coordinating with their healthcare providers.

I have work to do that requires paying attention now, and also I forgot what we were talking about. But hey, by the way, guess what! I haven't smoked for three shows, including TEGAN AND SARA WHERE I FELT ALL THE FEELINGS. Just in case I forget to mention it enough.

It’s taken almost ten months but I’ve finally nailed down my lunchtime salad delivery. It brings me an immeasurable amount of peace to know that even if everything else is stupid, I can click a button and twenty minutes later a lovely little man will bring me a Cobb salad topped with fried wontons and the exact perfect amount of dressing. If you’re thinking that fried wontons defeat the purpose of eating salad, my advice to you is to adjust your thinking. For peace’s sake.

The reason I am ordering lunch (again) today is not, unfortunately, that I have suddenly become very wealthy. It’s because I got so preoccupied ordering Thanksgiving-related groceries that I forgot that there are actually six other days in the week and that I might like to eat on one or more of those days, too. Also I hemmed and hawed over the stuff in my cart for too long so while I was dickering, French cut green beans went out of stock. So now I have to go to the real-life grocery store for non-holiday food to nourish myself with and for the holiday food that I couldn’t pay someone to bring to my house. (Please see: Have not suddenly become very wealthy.) I’m still Team Holidays though. Yesterday I watched a grown man belly laugh out loud, with his hand on his stomach and everything, while looking at the Christmas windows at Barney’s. There were also children laughing but one of the windows is of a South Park scene this year, and I strongly suspect that their laughing was in anticipation of some curse words. So they’re all on the naughty list and theirs is the laughter of Satan and definitely NOT Christmas-y. That’s what I told them, anyway, to get them to move out of the way so that my belly and I had room to stand in the window. (There weren’t any curse words, which was disappointing, but I'm holding out hope that the Macy's windows will be good for an expletive or two.)

In one, it’s halfway through the year and I haven’t done any of my science homework. 

In the other, I’m reunited with various colleagues from throughout the years for a new project. We’re at some sort of large, resort-like property. There’s a meeting on an enormous deck that has hundreds of round tables covered with umbrellas. Everyone is heading there, but for some reason I break off from the group because I desperately need to change my clothes before this meeting. I am then somehow in my grandparents’ foyer and there’s a giant pile of my clothes on the floor in between their guest bathroom and the stairs. Their stairs lead to the deck where everyone else is waiting for me, and more people begin climbing the stairs to join the meeting, but I can’t stop trying on dresses. When I finally try to climb the stairs to the deck, it’s like trying to climb a mountain that’s buried in Play-Doh. Everyone has broken off into pairs or small groups. I turn around and leave because I realize I left my phone and all of my notes downstairs.

The other night, I was putting on fake eyelashes when what I really wanted to do was go to bed. I’m telling you this not so you’ll feel sorry for me (“Poor sweet darling, forced to leave her cave after dark”), but so that you’ll understand I was under the influence of sleep deprivation and perhaps not judge me too harshly for what happened next. This is the thing that happened next: I thought the fake eyelashes were too much, so instead of TAKING THEM THE FUCK OFF I decided to TRIM THEM WHILE THEY WERE ATTACHED TO MY FACE. And while I was doing it I thought, “It sure would be stupid if I cut my own eyelashes, ha! ha! I’d look SO DUMB! ha! ha!”

It’s a good thing nobody notices my haircuts, because I gave one to my eyelids. Fuck. So that’s how I’m doing lately, in case you were going to ask. Fuck, is how.

Also, I have SO MANY ZITS. I’ve only been half-paying attention to them, because everything is terrible*** so why wouldn’t my skin also be? and my chin pretty predictably throws a tantrum every month or two so whatever who cares. But for the past, mm, week and a half? my skin has been OUT OF CONTROL. And one day I just noticed it all of a sudden, out of nowhere, like, you know, how I seem to notice most things lately. HI I’M TERRIBLE. DIDN’T YOU NOTICE? No, actually, I didn’t. OH WELL I AM. SORRY ABOUT IT.

And then I found out by accident that some people break out when they quit smoking. And I did that! So these zits are actually a good thing. BYE, TOXINS. BYE FOREVER. Now, I need a similar thing to make me feel better about these terrible bangs. And my stubby eyelashes. Isn’t there a song about this? “There is a season la la la, a time to be ugly, a time to get hot again, la”? If there’s not already I just wrote it. DON’T COPY ME JONAS BIEBER I KNOW YOU’RE READING THIS.



***Come on, guys. Everything’s not terrible. Or maybe a lot of things are but we can work on making them not as terrible. We really really can, and we really really need to. So let’s keep fighting the good fights and let’s start some new ones where there aren’t any but there should be. And also, let’s hug. Except if I don’t know you that well, then please don’t hug me, it’s not you, I have a thing? But we can stand close-ish to each other, in solidarity. Solidarity is important. Remember that.

because nobody voted for me so there's still too many days in the work week

It’s colder now. Sharp teeth on a gentle beast. We know winter is approaching but for now the only evidence is her sigh - soft, distant – and we are buoyed by the reminder of silver bells that hang in the back of her throat. For now it’s a relief to seek warmth, to crunch down sunny sidewalks instead of whimpering toward an illusory finish line in a dogged escape from swelter. For now we leave the windows open so we can smell the leaves, we watch the rain and hold warm drinks and light candles with names like vegetables and scents like dessert. 

Irises unfold, stardust surfaces. Soon enough the tiny lights will blink on, happy secrets in the dark.

I know how to knit exactly one stitch. I think it’s the knit stitch but I’m not sure. An old friend (old as in this happened a long time ago, not old as in she was alive for a long time, she wasn’t, well I mean long enough to learn how to knit and to teach it to me, but not long enough to be tired of it, of being alive I mean) taught it to me while we watched Audrey Hepburn DVDs in a Texas hotel room. Last night I thought, I think I’ll knit a blanket. And then I took the pokiest, local-est bus from work to Michael’s. And I walked a little, down some streets I used to walk on a lot but I haven’t in a long time. I used to live near here, near where I work now. And it seems somehow like that was even longer ago than I learned the knit stitch, but it wasn’t at all. It was less longer ago. Much less longer ago. It’s weird how time threads itself through the things in your brain. 

The air smelled so good. I carried my coat and smiled and remembered things. I even smiled about the things that didn’t make me want to smile while they were happening. I crossed the street to peek over the wall at Central Park, but it was pretty dark and uninteresting and peering over walls after dark is a good way to get yourself into trouble so any romantic notions I had about gazing moodily at dusky cityscapes etc were quickly abandoned, as are most of my romantic notions. Romantic notions are another good way to get yourself in trouble. 

I thought about home a lot. About what it is in our head and about the places that become it while we aren’t paying attention. About how you can just be running a yarn errand and the thought at the top of your head isn’t Life or Love or The Meaning Of It All or even The Meaning Of Part Of It, but just an idle one about stopping at the sports store because it’s right across the street from where you’re going and the boy you live with needs socks and what a fabulous woman you are to be so thoughtful about such things, and all of a sudden you realize that you know how to get places. You know where stuff is and how to find other stuff. More than that, you move through layers of memories and visions of Other Yous that you’ve been in these same places. Other people recognize you, and remember you, and you know who they are and can maybe even remember Other Thems. All of a sudden the streetlamp you’re standing under, holding your coat, is home. 

A loss of footing isn’t the worst thing. We remember what we have to hold onto when the ground disappears.