I looked at the faded black and white photograph he held in his hand; and then I looked at his white handle bar mustache–the kind that employs wax to make it curl up at the ends–and I took in his blue eyes sparkling with love and pride for his sister.

And was head over heels enchanted.

“She does look like Audrey Hepburn,” I said, the two of us gazing at her together now. “What an absolute beauty.”

“I know–wasn’t she, though?” he agreed, still clutching the photo, now yellowed with age. “I have to hold onto this sister, you see–I lost two of them within three months of each other last year.”

And it never ceases to amaze me how we can casually mention death like that. I mean, we do it–we have to–it’s a part of our world here. But it feels terribly wrong, tempered only by eternity and the fact that we will see each other again. Dear God, there is hope in that. Let us all rest our tired hearts right there.

I told him how sorry I was to hear about his sisters, and then I listened to his story. Or at least some of it. I learned about the house that his two remaining sisters own in Brooklyn. How the Duane-Reade family (yes, Duane-Reade. Aka the Rite-aid of New York City) has offered to buy that house many times, but I get the feeling that, whether or not your last name is Duane-Reade or even Obama, these sisters are no respecters of persons when it comes to giving up their home, thankyouverymuch.

The mustachioed man leaned in, lowered his voice in such a way that alerts the listener that you are about to hear something VERY! EXCITING! and VERY! SECRET!, and said in a sort of stage whisper right into my ear, “They offered my sisters one million dollars!”

And, forgive me, but I thought about that scene in Austin Powers, when the outdated terrorist threatens to destroy the whole world–or something like that, I don’t remember the details–unless they give him ONE MILLION DOLLARS. And the negotiators start laughing because–well, because that just isn’t very much to ask for these days. And I wondered aloud if maybe the house in Brooklyn is worth more than that now, but the man just dismissed such a notion as wrong and insisted on helping me with my polka-dotted suitcase.

Just like a perfect gentleman.

“What is your name?” I finally asked him, right before I left Kinkos.

“William,” he said, extending his hand to me. I shook it and told him my name and didn’t walk away until I said, “Well William, you’re wonderful.”

Any man who loves his sisters and waxes his mustache and helps me with my suitcase and has sparkling blue eyes and shares his story generously is more than wonderful, actually.

And this.
This is the bits and pieces of Americana that I relish. That I stand raptly before, happy to be here and now. Happy to witness it.

Another part of Americana is when I got called an idiot on the subway today. Not so adorable, that part. I told the lady that wasn’t very nice, which didn’t seem to make her think I was any less of an idiot, but oh well. Americana is a lot of things–good and bad–but always, always interesting, at least.

Too big; and here I am, small in comparison.

The days have lengthened and I am not sure that I can stretch that far too. I am not sure that I can keep up. It is nighttime but not bedtime and I start to feel the way I can sometimes feel at parties.

Out of place and sort of like how I felt when I first started singing solos on a stage and without a microphone. Suddenly I was overly aware of my arms and my hands and how I just had no earthly idea what I should do with them. Jazz hands are not always the answer, believe it or not, and there I was–singing about longing for home and man, I must have looked like a girl who had never actually met her own arms before. Or if she had, she sure didn’t remember it because look how they reach so awkwardly when they should hang contentedly! look how they hang when it would actually be appropriate to do a subtle reach this time! It was awkward, definitely awkward.

And yes, the other day I was at a party and there were all these couples and then there was me and I couldn’t help but feel claustrophobic and lonely at once. Which was confusing. Because at first you just want to please. get. away. But then you don’t want to be alone. So what do you do? Go crazy with munching on the carrots, I guess, which is what I did. Try not to think about your own life so much and just ask a lot of questions to whomever is on your right or your left, which seems to work out pretty well too.

But summer.

It feels like a pair of pants that I cannot hope to fill out right now. I need a belt because it just doesn’t fit right. Maybe if I make enough adjustments, I can make it work, but right now that effort seems monumental and man, I’m tired, so very tired.

Please realize that I love the season of summer, I do. It’s just that right now the long days feel too long; the short nights too heavy. I am sure I won’t feel like this at some point, cause don’t our feelings like to trick us into believing that finally, they’ve settled down and decided to just stay put? And oh, you’re feeling pretty down right now? Your heart hurts, you say? Then yep. This is when I decide to stay FOREVER. Love, The Way You Feel About Life. But if I’ve learned anything besides the fact that, as a rule, snapping turtles bite with their mouths, it’s that things change. Life progresses. And this too shall pass.

God doesn’t change, though; I think I’ve learned that, too. Or rather, am continuing to learn it. Again and again and again, with each new revolution that surprises me yet another time. Hahaha you keep getting me, life! You’re a good one!

Seriously, though. You are a good one, life. Most of the time. And then there’s God and he’s a good one all of the time. Which needs to settle in and make my heart less sad, I think.

Which should happen just about…anytime now.

What bliss.

I, along with my team, won a game of ultimate frisbee and then I won a ping-pong tournament against someone who will remain nameless. Isn’t that so generous of me to leave him anonymous? I mean, it could really be a blow to his ego if the whole world knew exactly who it was that I beat in ping-pong. Quite soundly, I may add.

But nope, you won’t get a name out of me. Not about this, anyway.

And moving on from my unidentified friend who I beat in ping-pong.

Moving on to a phone call I made earlier.

I had to call AT&T because I awoke to a phone that had been shut off. Now that was not the most abnormal thing for me before my life exploded, I could go back to just the usual four names that I had been given at birth, and I traded a house I hated for a house I love. But now, well now, I am on my mom’s phone plan and she is nothing if not punctual with bills and such. Thus, miracles of miracles, the phone stays good and on.

Until today.

So I called AT&T to make sure that I was firmly on the Latshaw plan and not at all connected with anyone whose last name isn’t Latshaw, if you know what I mean. And so I explained to the lady over the phone that I am recently divorced and that my phone is now shut off and that I need to make sure that I am no longer on the old plan. A

nd after I said this, she just rattled off a sentence in the kind of innocuous tone of voice one uses for telling your friend that you’re sorry to hear her great Aunt Beatrice has bronchitis and you hope it isn’t actually consumption and goodness, but she better sleep with her window shut because the nighttime air cannot be good for a person.

Basically she sounded distant and unconcerned as she told me, I’m sorry to hear about the divorce and your phone being shut off. But actually she said it more like, I’msorrytohearaboutthedivorceandyourphonebeingshutoff without even a breath to give separation or distinction to either of my plights.

As if they are both pretty awful.

And when she said this, I couldn’t help but laugh. Because it’s hilarious. To hear a total stranger offer me condolences on two such separate, end of the spectrum type circumstances in the same thought is just too good.

But I did stop my quiet laughter so I could tell her, Well, I do think one is weightier than the other.

And then we were both laughing.

And it was good.

And then she told me about her story. About the man who had cheated on her and broke her heart in about enough pieces to rival the sand on the beach; how she couldn’t sleep at night and started letting her anger come out towards her poor innocent mom, though she knew her mom was hardly to blame. She told me how, after another failed marriage, this guy begged her back, but knows she is better than that. She told me about her kids and how they are good kids and that even though she’s a single mother, she raised them right and that’s speaks of something good and present, rather than the lack that is so easy to feel.

And she also told me that she is happy. Thrilled, actually. Well, she is now at least. And isn’t it amazing what time can do? How it’s the friend who comes over whether you want them too or not because they know that they can help you. And so you’re laying there helpless and unable to even offer Time a cup of tea, when suddenly you look at the clock and see that it’s later, sure, but more importantly you start to feel.

You feel like putting pants on and maybe even some lip gloss. You decide that the world still has so many things to throw at you; that maybe all those throws will be more like little league and even if it hits you hard it won’t hurt like it’s hurt in the past.

And so this woman and I, we certainly did have a talk. And yes, I told her some of my story–and she was appropriately saddened and appalled. And the cell phone being shut off took quite a backseat to the matter at hand, the matters of the heart. the matter that you try so hard to put your mind over.

And it’s delightful to find that human connection. To know that we are all people and when our journeys intersect-even so slightly–it is good to notice it. To learn from each other as we share our stories, respectively.

But still, Sorry about your divorce and your cell phone being shut off. I mean, whose life is this? I know it’s mine, but it’s a mine that I never anticipated, I have to admit.

Lately I have felt like hiding and people keep finding me anyway. I know this is a good thing, but sometimes I cannot tell you what I am planning. I do not know how long I will be blonde and I do not know what I will be doing in September. I know that one is more important than the other, though, so I suppose we could discuss priorities, if you’d like.

Lately I have worn shorts that are short and a sweatshirt that is big and the act of constantly pulling one down and the other up is tedious at best and I think that I shall wear clothes that actually fit me tomorrow, if that’s alright with you.

Lately I have felt different. And my thoughts, they are saying some ridiculous things. I wonder what people think of me, especially those who knew me before this past November. I wonder if I am that poor girl and even as I write this I know that I am not. I am not pitiable. I am rich. Like my name, Jessica; which means wealthy one. This always embarrassed me as a kid, because I thought it must just mean that I have money or something. And money is nice, but it’s so very general that it’s boring. It passes through the hands of every person; it’s spent and earned all in the same day and you can never pick up a dollar and know that it’s mine just by looking at it.

But, wealth. I think it’s mine because of the way that the world interests me all the time. There’s so much of it and even when I feel down, I cannot help but listen to the sound of water rushing by and, for a moment at least, forget about what it was that made me walk in the dark in the first place. And then there’s autonomy and the way I can choose to embrace this life. That’s a gift; that’s wealth, too.

Lately I have been telling myself that I don’t need a man. Or rather, have been told that quite a bit. And it’s true. I am fine. I have so much to do. So many words to write and people to listen to and a story all my own that needs to be spelled out one way or another. But then there is the fact that these people who tell me this–they all go home to someone and it is, I guess, okay for them to need that someone, but me? I was broken. And there is broken and then there is the hard work of recovery and then there is the abruptness of it all. The way you had a man, or at least you were led to believe you did, and how suddenly the door slammed like someone suddenly telling you NO! but you weren’t even asking permission–you didn’t even know it was a possibility–but there it was, a resounding NO! anyway. And now you don’t need a man. Now you can’t need a man. Now you are fine and you are fine and you are crying but tears are easily wiped away anyway, because you are fine.

Lately I have been laughing because life is nothing if not hilarious. And there is nothing so tiring as contrived laughter, but there is nothing so freeing as laughter that comes from some deep place inside of you that glows with familiarity at the sound of humor because you feel like you’ve come home again. And you don’t think about it, per se, but you know that something, at least, can be so right that it’s dangerously close to being perfect, and wouldn’t it be tragic to have missed the way you and your friend are laughing so hard that simply breathing becomes the goal because that hasn’t happened in a while now?

*hold for applause*

And there was a man in the elevator too.

*the man gets no applause because this is not his blog*

He had bright orange hair and we immediately had a connection; the kind that can only be shared by two people whose hair color comes out of a bottle.

But this man stood out because he started talking with me. And see that preposition? With. Not at. I think that it is easy to talk at people. To just go down the laundry list of things to say, making it so that it really doesn’t matter who it is that you are talking to, the other person has so little to do with the shape of the conversation.

But this orange haired man, he was looking at me and asking me if I was going to an audition, among other things. He was smiling kindly and included the maid in that smile as soon as she stepped into the elevator with us.

*you may applaud the maid because she seemed to have a hard day today and could use a few “bravos!” in her life*

She looked tired and worn down.  She had about a billion toilet paper rolls on her cart and started telling us that she had many bathrooms to fill with them, once the orange haired man asked her how she was doing. But then he did something else: he encouraged her. He asked her what time she gets off work, and once she told him, reminded her that she had just two more hours to go in a way that told her he knew she could do it.

And I believed him that he believed in her, as strange as that sounds.

Or maybe as unimportant as that sounds. A stranger encouraging a maid that she was almost done work–maybe that sounds dismissable. But I think for the maid it was not and isn’t it true that if you want to encourage the world, then you start with the person standing right next to you?

The maid juggling all that toilet paper.

Or the quiet girl standing in the elevator with you, orange backpack heavy on her back and maybe looking a tiny bit nervous.

Maybe you tell her right before she steps off on the seventh floor that you think she’s going to get the job.

And suddenly there are two people in that elevator who are believed in.

And I think words are weighty. I don’t think I always live like I think this, but I’d like to. I think I understand the weight and power of words when writing a song a little better. Because, see, songs–in comparison to life–have so few words. So each one has to be measured and weighed and compared and contrasted and stripped down to its raw meaning and then decided upon because yes, that’s exactly what I want to say.

And maybe life should be more like that, too.

What kind of song am I singing?

I’d like it to be a good one. Not good as in always pretty or happy or anything so boring as always the same thing, necessarily; but good. Building up this world that gets torn down, person by person, until it’s very hard to remember what it was like to not get that metallic taste of panic on your tongue as soon as anyone starts to whisper. Because God forbid a secret is ever actually a lovely thing to discover.

Remember that?

When secrets could be good and beautiful; a garden enclosed that was fairer than the walls all around it had pretended it to be.

That was nice.

And not over, though I wasn’t always so sure it wasn’t.

But yes, the orange haired man reminded me of Jesus some, I think. At least in the way that he saw people as unique and interesting and worth discovering and encouraging.

And even believing in.

And I kind of knew this would happen.

Because, see, we went to the open mic at the Castle tonight and whenever we go there we don’t get home till real real late.

But what makes this especially unfortunate is that tomorrow morning I have to be up and at ‘em for a 9:30 am class. In which I am teaching tiny children how to dance and if that isn’t just about the worst kind of thing to be doing at that hour, then it is not late.

And it is late.

And this might surprise you about me, but I try to be honest on this here blog, so here goes: I. Hate. Teaching. Small. Children. How. To. Dance.

Seriously. I usually avoid it like the plague, but when I do find myself doing it, the minutes tick by painstakingly slow. Sometimes it seems that surely the clock must be broken–please God, tell me that it has not only been one and a half minutes since last I looked!–and would these adorable little pink-clad girlies PLEASE just stand in first position, already?!

But tomorrow morning I get to convince them to stand in first position and try to make them think that making a diamond with their little legs is a good idea, because that’s what we call a demi plie when they’re that small.

But see, I like calling a demi plie a demi plie. I like working with people who want to be there; people who can conceptualize dance and understand technique and don’t show princess underwear underneath their pink tights.

Oh, but it’ll be okay. You can do anything for four hours, right?

But there are two things I must tell you before I give myself to sleep in order to be fresh as a daisy for the littles in the morning. And both of these things involve animals. I know, this post just got so much better.

Because see, something very momentous took place tonight. To me. I was sitting at a bonfire, wearing shoes without socks that also happened to expose a good deal of my feet. Scandalous, I know. And I was wearing a whole outfit, really, but the shoes part is important, which is why I mention it. Cause all of the sudden I felt something on my foot and that something was definitely slithering. But I didn’t want to jump to any conclusions, so I decided to look, and sure enough, a snake was slithering up and over my foot.

Yes.

A SNAKE WAS SLITHERING OVER MY FOOT. LIKE MY FOOT WAS GRASS OR A LOG OR MAYBE ANOTHER CREATURE, WHEN REALLY IT WAS MY FOOT, AND WHOAAAAAAAA! THAT’S DEFINITELY A SNAKE AND IT’S DEFINITELY SLITHERING OVER MY (MOSTLY!) EXPOSED FOOT.

Crazy, right?

But then I jumped because I had to, and if you don’t know why I had to, please refer to the paragraph that is all done up in caps right above. I screamed just a little and then calmly announced that a snake just slithered over my foot, but it’s okay. I added the but it’s okay part because I suddenly wanted to sound tough and not like a scaredy cat.

Then my friend Ian caught the snake and you know what happened almost immediately? He pooped. The snake, that is–not Ian. But I was suddenly really grateful because that snake could have not only just slithered over my foot–he could have slithered and pooped on my foot, too. Which would have been quite a story, I guess, but ew. gross. It’s moments like these that the provision of God is evident.

And then my other animal story takes place at the Castle. Because at the open mic there was a man dressed in a silken outfit, complete with a fancy silk vest and fancy silk shirt. And I looked over to see one of my friends do something that looked like he was stroking this man’s fancy silk sleeve, which was a little odd, but maybe warranted when you consider the silky nature of the man’s outfit. Totally, strokably silky. But then my friend kept stroking it and I suddenly realized that he was actually stroking a squirrel.

A squirrel that was laying comfortable as can be in the man’s silken lap, letting any and all humans pet it till kingdom come, apparently.

Which was strange.

But not as strange as the man getting up at the open mic to tell us the story of this squirrel and how it came to be so tame. The story goes that this man was working for a landscaping company (which further confused me, considering his silkiness) and that they noticed that a squirrel was stealing their peanuts. So they caught said squirrel, and nobody knowing what to do with it, this man took the squirrel home, killed it by severing his spine with a sharp knife in his bathtub (he graphically explained to us, much to my horror) and ate it with a red merlot sauce and mentioned something about the giblets being delicious, specifically.

And then the landscaping company employees heard some squeaking eventually–a baby squirrel calling for its mama. It’s dead mama. So, out of guilt and God knows what else, His Silkiness adopted the baby squirrel and has raised it as his own, bequeathing it with a name that is Russian and very difficult to remember.

But the nickname is Peanut, which is not nearly so difficult to remember.

So those are my animal stories. A squirrel and a snake. Not so bad in one Friday night, right?

I was introduced to a man this afternoon and when I tried to shake his hand, he told me that he doesn’t shake hands with ladies. I quickly put the offending hand out of sight within my pocket but didn’t mind so much because it was cold outside and my pocket was warm.

But I still wondered why he doesn’t shake hands with ladies.

And I still think the word ladies is a funny one.

It always, without fail, makes me think of the time when I was in the Nutcracker with two of my best friends in the world, Erin and Christine. I was maybe thirteen years old, had finished the performance, and was standing in the lobby when a man wandered up to all three of us. He took a good long look at us as if to confirm to himself that we were indeed three of the hundred or so dancers he had just seen on stage, and said, Interesting performance…ladies…We did our best to thank him with a straight face, but as soon as he walked away we just lost it.

Because first: ladies. He said it. And goodness, but we were girls. We STILL feel like girls. And if given the choice between being called ladies or girls, I’ll choose the latter, I think. But also, who goes up to some little ballerina bunhead kids and tells them that their performance is interesting?

Interesting.

The stock market dipping on most Wednesdays, that’s interesting. Or the fact that Martin guitars are built in Pennsylvania–interesting, again.

But girls, dancing in tutus in a classic Christmas ballet?

How about beautiful?
Or moving?
Or lovely?

Oh well, at least it made for a funny quote.

And okay, so maybe that was just one thing that stood out from today…Now, wait–there’s two more that I will mention really quick:

• a spider crawled out from inside the butter dish after I had already used the butter. I don’t particularly want to think of the ramifications that could mean for me. I hope I didn’t eat any spider eggs. I hope I don’t style my hair into a beehive and then a nest of black widow spiders moves in, as the urban legend goes. Fingers crossed.
• I played a game called Farkle for the first time tonight. It involved six dice and some really fun people. The best part of the game is that there were these little bears that were on one side of the dice. It made me happy every time I saw one. But I couldn’t quite understand the game. Apparently the bears were good, but you didn’t want to take all the bears if you could roll again. This went against my natural instinct to just gather up every good thing that presents itself to you and keep it close. Although, if the bears were real, I would not have been trying to gather them up, so there’s that. But like I said, I didn’t really get the game, not even by the time we finished and unbelievably, I won. Yep, I won at the game of Farkle. Next up? Winning at the game of life…

Okay, so I did a dumb thing once.

Ha.

I think I will have to stick with my original statement.

Like the time I was really sad and afraid of the night, afraid of the quiet, afraid of my thoughts, and decided it would be a good idea to take a tylenol pm. Well okay, I took a tylenol pm four times. And everyone was all, Is that a good idea? Are you gonna be okay? Blah blah blah we care we care we care while I was all, Blah blah blah I wanna sleep wanna sleep wanna sleeeeeeeeep.

I mean, it’s not like I took five or anything.

And then my friend Christian came over to talk some sense into my sad little brain and by the end of our talk I was really feeling the effects of my decision concerning the dosage of the tylenol pm and abruptly announced that I was either going to have to sit down or throw up.

To which he responded, Well then sit down!!!

And I guess that’s why he’s a good counselor; he regularly gives sound advice like that.

But I did one even better than that. I went to bed and proceeded to sleep like the dead, waking up about thirteen hours later feeling like Rumpelstiltskin rising out of bed with that niggling thought that you are probably late for something.

But yeah, that was kind of dumb. And for the record, I highly agree with the sentiment expressed in hugs not drugs. And also for the record, I think hugs can be kind of weird. Like a slow dance without the music. Especially when they’re lingering and you’d rather have moved on to the next stage of societal expectations, thank you.

But some hugs.

They can be really sweet.

I will say that.

Now onto my next dumb thing I’ve done.

Today, in fact.

There was a man who looked Russian nearby, so we had that in common, I guess. The looking Russian part, not the man part. Ew. Man part. Okay, moving on. But, in a thick accent, he told me that I have a beautiful body.

I know, creepy alert number one.

So I thanked him and then he asked me if I am a model.

So I said no, that I’m a dancer.

Professional? he asked. Yes, I answered.

And then he told me that he has lots of jobs available for dancers and asked me for my card. And I know, Jason, I need to get a card. But I told him I didn’t have one, so I could give him my email address.

And then he offered the option of me giving him my number.

And yes, probably another creepy alert.

And remember how I sometimes do dumb things? Well case in point: I did it. I gave him my number. But (deep breath)

Idon’teverhavetotalktohimbecauseIdon’thavetoanswermyphoneifhecalls
andnowthatIthinkaboutitIdon’tthinkhisjobsareevenlegitimate.

But I admit, it was a dumb thing to do.

Here’s to tomorrow; a blank slate.

Here’s to better choices and all that.