9:30pm. Raining. Playing Oscar Peterson Trio’s Night Train album. Hair tied up in a high pony tail. Hot tea. Candles flickering. I should be doing homework, but I just want to listen to this jazz and bob my head up and down, and swing my hair from side to side. The dog is barking. No one else is home. I am loving tonight.

This morning I took a bath at The Lips’ place. Babes, do you mind if I take a bath?  I asked because I am polite like that. Not at all, he replied, In fact, I insist that you take a bath (I think our relationship is largely defined by these goofy moments. We both try to get a laugh, a giggle, a smile out of each other). So I ran the water. It was too hot as usual. I sat in the water with my knees curled up to my chest and read Water by Bapsi Sidhwa. 

Out of nowhere there were these little bubbles of joy rising in my chest. I thought, hey, everything’s good. These little bubbles keep rising up for me throughout the day despite me burying Bonnie in the backyard in the rain… that wasn’t so good. I exercised, met up with Mark at starbucks and we read our poems to each other, made myself a simple dinner, and am still bobbing my head to the music. 

This is the calm before a storm… i’ve got so much schoolwork coming at me as the term closes, but am not gonna let it dampen my mood, am gonna keep bobbing my head. Oh oh oh, look at them shoulders move! hehe..

It’s nearing ten at night. Our third day at Troutdale, Oregon is coming to an end. Tomorrow we finish up the last bit of our training course and head back home. 

I sleep well in hotels. The bleach smells on sheets soothe me. On the road, on the road. Anthony and I joked that if Dad came here with us, we’d be meeting in the lobby in ten minutes. We’ll have a hourly based itinerary. Not a minute will be wasted. Once Eric said to me, you really like making plans, don’t you? I felt a little embarrassed. We often joke about Dad and his somewhat rigid way of being, but I have gotten accustomed to it. I like knowing where I am going to be the next hour, tomorrow, and the coming weeks. 

Last night I had a dream of Anthony. He was about 5 in my dream. Vulnerable, curious and soft. Wobbles. Then Anthony woke me up when he got up to use the washroom. I had a hard time recognizing that they are the same person. They are the same person.

Yesterday I dreamt that Jess was dating a killer. I was furious with her for staying with him. He wanted to kill me. I walked through streets, passed by stores…the tiles under my feet were the green kinds with white spots on them. I was on a mission, in search for something. I was not running away from him. I kissed a faceless guy. In my dream we were in love. I kissed him and told him the killer would come after him because of me. He didn’t care. He was faceless, a bronze face with only lips, lips that look like the ones on my clay buddha. 

I was tired at the end of class today. Got back to the hotel to try to do some homework. Prose poems I had to read and respond to. I could not read. I glanced at the lines. Sabrina talked to me about a good encounter. Anthony was throwing some bouts of anger around. I have gotten used to these. Eric gave me a long space of silence. I was frustrated I couldn’t understand the prose poems. They were prose poems, damn it! Anyways.. this one I got, this one I like… 

Be Drunk

by charles baudelaire

You have to be always drunk. That’s all there is to it—it’s the only way. So as not to feel the horrible burden of time that breaks your back and bends you to the earth, you have to be continually drunk.

But on what? Wine, poetry or virtue, as you wish. But be drunk.

And if sometimes, on the steps of a palace or the green grass of a ditch, in the mournful solitude of your room, you wake again, drunkenness already diminishing or gone, ask the wind, the wave, the star, the bird, the clock, everything that is flying, everything that is groaning, everything that is rolling, everything that is singing, everything that is speaking. . .ask what time it is and wind, wave, star, bird, clock will answer you: “It is time to be drunk! So as not to be the martyred slaves of time, be drunk, be continually drunk! On wine, on poetry or on virtue as you wish.  

… I’d like to be drunk right now.