I tried not to cry.

Made it from the car, through the strong lingering hug that says all the things you don’t have words for, and to the ticket counter.  Then I cried.  Nothing weepy or soul trembling, blinding or compulsive.  Just tepid liquid sadness sliding from my eyes, collecting on my chin.  The kind that smears makeup and makes the white ladies clutch their handbags a little tighter.  The kind with an inverse correlation with my will for it to stop and it’s will to keep on going.

I cried.

For everything that I had, that I have, that’s not with me.  That’s with me in memory. With me in impulsive text messages. Captured, still, in fixed smiles in brushed silver frames. I feel a lost loss. Like everything was water in hands that seeped through the crevices of my obligation.  I laid in California King of cotton balls and was delivered to a marathon in the sand.   Started in math and ended up in differential equations.

I inhaled.

Breathed in the sights and sounds and smells and warmth of home.  Felt the ocean on my cheek, gave the sunset a piece of my heart.  Smiled with those who know my smile.  Laughed at jokes with secret punchlines.  Saw the rich texture of me. The brick and mortar of me.  Examined my foundation, filled the cracks  and polished the brass and reinforced the columns. 

I exhaled.

I wiped the last tear when I remembered. Remembered that novels are rich because they have chapters.  The world moves because it has seasons.  Music stimulates you because it changes.  Everything being  moves.

And I want to be. Moved.

My 2 weeks of work hell are over and I have my life back. But then I remembered my life wasn’t all that interesting to begin with, so now I am ready to give it up again… I kid.

Sort of.

So, My Blog is shopping for a new look. She’s trying on colors and styles. Wondering if she’s a warm summer or a crisp fall. A tailored Ralph Lauren or messy Betsy Johnson. Structured trench or loose flip flops. At the end of the day, she’s just wants to avoid asking if the header makes her look fat.

Then My Hair got all middle child-y and wanted something new, too. So she combed the internet and stumbled across this look, thinking it’s what all the almost-mid-30 kids are wearing these days:

And I tried to remind her that her past experience with braiders has not been a fruitful endeavor. But the bitch wants what the bitch wants, so I took a back seat with my glass of red wine and watched the action unfold. I wasn’t surprised when The Braider took 3 hours longer than usual and then left giant tufts of my hair’s natural afro hanging out of the sleek, new braids. “It looks like black cotton candy making a break from a coffee stirrer!  It’s not even close to looking like the picture!  The picture I had on my lap the entire 8 hours.  The picture I continued to reference all morning!”  “I know”, I said, “It’s like you handed her a picture of an apple and she went ‘Ooh, a sailboat! I can totally do that!’” In the middle of my “I told you so”, My Hair took out a little white glove and slapped my cheek.  She dragged me to the mirror with our all-purpose kitchen sheers and tried to cut the offending tufts, only to discover the tufts had some kind of braid-securing property that is rendered useless when said tufts are removed.  I drank more red wine and waited for her to stop crying.  I don’t have the heart to tell her it’s stuck like this for 3 months.

My Body was all baby child and wanted to be praised for unloading 22 pounds.  “But it took you 5 months and it only came out of my ass and boobs.  I liked my ass and boobs.  Plus, the fatties on The Biggest Loser can get rid of 22 pounds after a bowl of Shredded Wheat and a good fart!”  Then My Body started to cry and I hate the sound of My Body crying, so I took it shopping.  While she insisted that my boobs were supposed to hang out of each side of the vest we tried on and that no one could see the muffin top through the see-through gray tunic she sent me to 3 malls to find.  She overheard some the Big Ass in the next dressing room bragging about how she and Her Body a size by eating only meat and drinking detox tea for a week.  I told her that was silly as I gnawed on the beef jerky stuck to the quarter at the bottom of my purse.

My Ear insisted that she could not hear calls anymore and that we needed a new phone. I reminded her that she can’t hear calls because we don’t make calls. “We are a text-only body, My Ear”.  But The Hubster’s Ear was going on and on about how they were going to get The Storm 2. And she pouted and called “no fairsies” that they got a new phone and we didn’t.  She promised a new phone would truly motivate her to keep up with everyone on Fwitter and Tacebook, the weather, the news, music- “What about making calls?”, I interrupted.  “Huh?” she replied.

My Inspiration was hibernating until she saw her shadow for 6 months.  (I never said My Inspiration was clever).  Attending Texas Book Festival shone a big sunny light on her, so she’s rubbing crust out of her eyes, scratching her sleeping butt, and sighing morning breath into the world. The festival introduced her to a only-in-person handsome Colson Whitehead, a potty-mouthed Barbara Ehrenreich, a classy Jeanette Walls, and a tad annoyingly (if not just boringly) vegan Jonathan Safran Foer (I get it.  Meat is murder. Humans suck. As the panelist chef said “I would eat beef raised in a bald eagles nest if it tasted good”  Amen.)  My Inspiration was also introduced to the wide variety of weird and pungent “book people”. Oh, and the security guard who was already divorced at 23.