I am the Eeyore of the mayonnaise based holidays I cry easily even with the sun out and three cats window hunting blue sky through the trees I’m confused befuddled stupid I feel old my body my sad meals my inability to do the simplest task without help I call someone the number to call when you are told just call someone the phone shakes in my hand like a tambourine that tiny act sets me in a dizzy spiral I go to the beach steady girl I never really call anyone I have no friends left in the meat world bipolar1 and the meds I take to contain it have robbed my sparkle and I absolutely despise talking on the phone because someone might care and ask what’s wrong what's wrong always the infinite question what's wrong is my entire sideways life of doing the wrong thing being born into the wrong family marrying the wrong men of taking the wrong jobs sluicing my entire meatbag into the pan of almost boiling water crazy gets harder crawls up my spine shanks me like a prison bitch I am monsters and quagmires and hospitals and blindness I am a toothless girl caught in a fist fight my fists my fight
I put in my upper denture which fits well until a blister comes up I drive around the island and practice smiling at strangers most of whom smile back I practice laughing I look at myself in my car’s visor mirror I realized this week that I will never read my poetry in public again what if my dentures flew out and smacked someone listening or scrolling on their phone in the front row
The tv is on in the background a character in a show I don’t like just received word that his mother died and I start weeping into my mushroom gravy hot pungent tears I never cried for my own mother the tears stop suddenly after a brief rip in the continuum
I didn’t have tv or internet for a month after a storm left me without power water heat a flushing toilet (I’m on a well) 25° high winds etc for an entire week I just recently had my internet restored so I read all my mail then deleted my twitter account
I fear I am failing the denture primer I am not healing fast enough when someone tells me I should be chewing by now or asks me how it’s all going I shudder and feel like I flunked out of basic math again I feel I’m annoying the denturist that strange little troll when I go back for the liners by telling him where they cause blisters in my mouth he tells me gargle with salt water which I’ve been doing four times a day his black smock is dirty talk radio blaring from his little cave clearly irritated he says you’re going to have a real good Thanksgiving oh little man this holiday begins the bag of stress I have carried since childhood surrounding all family holidays Dr Google tells me it takes months to be able to chew food again there’s a new dentist in town I looked at her website and she says the same everyone it seems has an opinion about this but I can’t afford to see someone new I am already $10k in debt for the dentures (the same amount I’d have to pay for maybe two tooth implants surely the choice all the dentists wanted me to make)
Did you know you can burn yourself on those small disposable hand warmers you can buy at gas stations well you can especially if you stick them down your long johns and fall asleep during a freezing power outage I woke with a perfectly round dime shaped burn on my stomach that is taking a very long time to heal
At one point I thought I was growing a ghost tooth but it turned out to be a long suture floating on my lower gum I tried to pull it thinking it would give but it was well attached I made myself scream then cry then kept crying for an entire day after the sutures have all dissolved or fallen out but I still get ghost teeth from time to time I lived for 25 years with one toothache after another so this shouldn’t be a surprise
I eat my mushroom gravy with a spoon standing over the stove like a delicate fishwife Thanksgiving is a soft food day anyway with mashed potatoes the kind of cranberry sauce that slides out of the can with a soft sucking sound and a plop like a bog giving birth and cheese soft glorious cheese Brie and goat cheese with fresh raspberries and pumpkin pie without crust in spite of what the denturist might think I haven’t torn into a turkey for over 60 years I used to bring guacamole and artichoke dip and mushroom gravy to food gatherings potlucks and once upon a time when I still went to St. Catherine’s for first Thanksgiving mayonnaise was the common denominator it was my gold medal offering soft and eggy strange and unsatisfactory until transformed
I was seven years old when I learned that waves were the ocean rocking.
Choi Young-mi
Oh my god, good god, dear god how I miss your writing. So much that I don't even know it until I am reminded BY YOUR WRITING of how you write which is like no one else. This is going to stay up on my computer all day so that I can read it over and over. I do not want to miss one crumb of it.
Rebecca. Thank you. Mostly thank you for this right now today but thank you for being who you are to me and letting me be I am to you.
I love you, Rebecca.