40 or so...

Fuck.  July 7, 1974, at some point I was brought into this world.  I don't even know when, exactly, as both of my parents are dead.  Nixon was resigning the day I was born.

So, in order the things that resonated with me, by age, or an approximation of so:

Abbot & Costello
Godzilla
99 Luftbuluns
Men Without Hats
Bo Derek
The Vilolent Femmes
Drew Barrymore
Lawrence  Welk (sadly)
a ferret
Jan Magnus Pauley (My father was born on the same day as Prince and he called him a Spic)
Prince...Huge
Echo Hill Camp
Peter Rice
Marianna Gaffney
Carlos T. Blackburn
Minor Threat
The Misfits
Metallica
Madonna
North Carolina
Brian Young
Pavement
Aubrey Lowen
Jill Chisnell
Maggie Roma
Graffiti
Sid Vicious
Caring about kids, before you have kids
cats, especially Mocha and Commanche
Murph, the dog.
Pittsburgh and Zombies
Derek Bupp
Turner's Creek
Fucking Sewick.....
Eide's
Brooklyn
Tower Records
Will Oldham
Leigh Fox
Tom Williams
The West Coast
Stranger Than Paradise
Jim Jarmusch
Ozu

The Longest of Times

As I write this, Leigh, my wife, is asleep on the couch to my left.  We are rekindling a marriage and at points it is as easy as riding a bike, or looking out your window.  At others, it is as hard as doing complex math calculations.  I was never good at that subject and found it to be grueling.  Yet, I also found it to be rewarding when the problem was solved.  Marriages are hard things to make it through and I am trying my best to make this one work with a person I love wholeheartedly.  Yet it is difficult.

She picks up on things I didn't even know are going on and I know she is feeling insecure at points before she does.  It is this odd tandem.  I pull away, she pulls me in and we are not ready to meet at certain points.  But, I'm hoping with time and healing, those points will become rearview mirrors as we move forward.  They have to.  They must.  Yet, we have to figure out the strength of our lines.  That is our job.  To make everything less taut.

I've been riding the bike a lot less frequently than I would hope for by this point of time of the year.  It is a drag as I know how much mental bullshit I clear from my mind on long rides.  The weather is not cooperating, nor is whiskey and a vampiric schedule as of late.  Been working mostly evenings and can somehow still pull off late nights and be a productive human.....at least for the most part.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the weather to allow for some good, long rides (aka head clearers).

Off to city island tomorrow and hopefully something substantial on Monday as well.  Should tack down 50 miles or so tomorrow, then we shall see what the rainy week brings.  I hope my guard lowers a bit in all ways as the rides are able to continue.

It has been a long time since I've written and apologize for all the Jon psychobabble.  There is a lot going on and keeping my fingers crossed for a few major things.  Please keep them crossed for me too.

East of Eden 3: Mom's Eyes

Lately, I keep on returning to my mother's eyes.  They were this incredibly vibrant blue, like Caribbean Sea water.  They absolutely sparkled and shined as she pounced through her life.  There was this eagerness in them.  I share a trait with my mom of this overeagerness to please and have people like me.  Like, really like me and have this fondness of me.  Yet, I do not have those same eyes as she did.  I inherited my father's brown color, though I wish I had hers.  Even more, those eyes displayed her emotions as clearly as possible.  When she was happy, they were bright and eager. When she was down, they conveyed the same blue as a Robert Johnson song.  They were magical.

When I returned home from Japan, a week before she passed, she saw me and made this ridiculous comment.  I'll never forget it.  She told me that I looked just like her son, Jon.  Her eyes danced and flickered, although they looked watery and tired due to the morphine pumping through her system.  The eyes didn't seem to carry the cancer that intensely, yet they did carry a sense of frailty and desperation  It took a while, but I convinced her it was really me and I had come back from Japan.  She was pretty out of it, but had her lucid moments too.

The days, long, long days passed.  On June 21, 2003, the day before the equinox, she took her last breath and it was one of the most resonating memories I have.  To watch someone take their last breath after so much suffering provides a sense of dread and relief at the same time.  The dread is to be expected.  That woman, my mother, is not there anymore.  Yet, the relief comes because you knew that her intense moments of pain had finally come to an end.  We told her it was okay to move on.  It was okay to let go.  She was engaged to be married and her fiancé didn't happen to be in the room yet.  We had called him earlier because we could sense it was happening.  She took all of us in, her breathing running in distant pants.  They were deep breaths.  Meaningful breaths.  Finally, her fiancé, a man who went by the name of Tex, entered the room.  That was who she wanted to see!  The person she loved and was intending on being with for the rest of her life.  She could have never guessed the time would have passed so quickly.  She caught sight of him and her eyes lit up one last time.  Again, that vibrancy engaged with those who could see her, but most importantly, with him.  And then there was a last exhalation.  After a few seconds her eyes changed and they remained open, as if she had stopped in space.  The energy lingered for a moment and then they became this steely blue, almost metallic, it seemed.  

This image is one I need to let go of in some way.  I am hoping that writing about it and really "putting it out" here will serve some therapeutic and healing purpose.  It needs to be filed away somewhere I can't always find it.  It is a powerful and meaningful moment, but it is a ghost I really don't want to have such a strong inventory of that causes pain.  It is so odd how a day can be going just fine.  You're just walking down the street and then BAM that image pops into your mind and suddenly all feels flat and lifeless, something of an existence without a sense of purpose.  So, hopefully, like taillights on the highway, this image will start to streak on by a bit.  At least I hope that happens.  My mom was a pretty good soul.  If she were alive on this Earth today, she would be turning 71 next Wednesday.  She had 60 meaningful years, filled with extreme joy and devastating sadness, like all lives I guess.  I think reading East of Eden gave me the courage to actually do this and make some sort of attempt to let it go and forgive myself for staying in Japan as long as I did before really dealing with what was happening.  I truly hope it works.......

East of Eden # 2: Mom

Reading East of Eden made me understand death better.  Or, more so it made me remember that death  always rolls around.  We don't want it to ever come, but it does.  So, I'm kind of cleansing myself in a way.  Like East of Eden, I'm going to describe a death.  I'm guessing, like Steinbeck, this was a way to let it go.

This was my experience:

March 2003:

I got a phone call while in Japan.

While in Japan, I was making huge segues in sleeping/fucking this ex-swimsuit model.

The call was from Steve, my sisters's ex-husband Jon, your mom is not doing well.

Swimsuit model and me are now fucking.

Jon:  What do you mean?

Steve: Your mom has pancreatic cancer.

While in Japan, I was making huge segues in sleeping/fucking this ex-swimsuit model.

While in Japan, I was making huge segues in sleeping/fucking this ex-swimsuit model.While in Japan, I was making huge segues in sleeping/fucking this ex-swimsuit model.While in Japan, I was making huge segues in sleeping/fucking this ex-swimsuit model.While in Japan, I was making huge segues in sleeping/fucking this ex-swimsuit model.While in Japan, I was making huge segues in sleeping/fucking this ex-swimsuit model.While in Japan, I was making huge segues in sleeping/fucking this ex-swimsuit model.

That was all I thought about.

April 2003:

I came home.....and planted a bullshit garden of teas in her backyard.  Planted mint, too.  Herbs galore that she would never pick.

June 2003:

So, I made it back, one week before she died.

And this is where it matters: her eyes.  I have never seen anything like it, probably never will.  Her eyes were the bluest of blue, really pure.  When she took that last breath, they turned grey/slate/wide open.