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Listful and Asea

September 13, 2014 in City Matters, Language Matters, Past Matters, Spirit Matters

I’m sitting up in bed—an unmade bed, even, which is so unlike me these days. It’s a big, soft tousle of linens and pillows and books, and I’m leaning against a velvet headboard, drinking a latte—extra-hot, extra shot—while eyeballing the grey, cool morning right outside my window. I like the idea of it all but, frankly, I’m exhausted.

Part of my exhaustion is just another day at the races: I did my laundry, fetched my groceries, picnicked by the water before it was even 10 am. But partly I’m exhausted because this was a huge week for me. It marked the real end of my Summer of Reckoning.

I fear bureaucracies—the IRS, the DMV, health insurance companies, housing agencies, patriarchy—the way others fear public speaking or being alone. In June my fears came home to roost or, rather, the rotten fruits of my avoidance became unavoidable. In the months since, every day I’ve had to do something that scares me. Which, of course, has not been the worst thing in the world. But a fun summer it did not make.

I crossed the last onerous item off my SOR to-do list yesterday morning, and immediately took off for the beach to celebrate the occasion. It was my first trip to the Rockaways this summer, never mind that to most summer had already ended. Continue Reading →

My Trans-Everything Cousin

September 8, 2014 in Past Matters, Queer Matters, Spirit Matters

Pictured here is my amazing cousin Martine, as featured in a lengthy New York Magazine profile. Ironically, though she shares my suspicion of DNA bonds, she’s a new millennium incarnation of our outlaw grandmother Masha Rubenfire. A Polish Jewish immigrant who ran a successful Salem, Mass, brothel, Rubenfire made it all happen when her schnorrer husband ditched her with two small kids and no language skills. Martine–who looks more like Rubenfire than anyone else in our family does–has constructed a gender reality, a financial reality, a relationship reality, a technological reality, and a spiritual reality not only for herself but for others, including me. Say what we will but the blood is fierce in our line. Rubenfire helps from beyond the grave.

Gracie and the Good Grandpa Ghost

August 25, 2014 in Cat Lady Matters, Ruby Intuition, Spirit Matters

Used to be, when I came home, my permakitten Grace would come sauntering to the door. It wasn’t like she catapulted into my arms as my dearly departed calico Maxiemillion Rosmoon always did. She’d greet me more like–Oh! You’re home? I just happened to be walking down the hall and here you are. Still, as I put down my things, she’d bump me—casually, super-casually—until I lay down on the floor and scratched behind her ears. It was a perfect ritual for shedding the mishegos of the outside world, and I appreciated it all the more for the effort it required of my normally reserved cat.

Nowadays, I don’t hear word one from Little Miss when I come home. Frankly, I blame it on the Magic Chair. Ever since I dragged it home from the Hamptons earlier this summer, Gracie has spent all her time lolling in its wooden splendor. She doesn’t sleep with me anymore, she doesn’t perch on my legs as I write, she doesn’t even trot around the apartment, prowling for evil, evil dust mice. She just snuggles in that blasted rocking chair, communing with the Good Grandpa Ghost who came with it. I get the sense that he caresses her all day long, rubbing her striped belly and purring softly like the mommy from which she was mysteriously separated when she was but a month old. (We found her as a still-bleating baby, mawing Doritos and malt liquor from trash cans like all the other toughies on the block.) The other day, when I was very stuck on a review, I displaced her briefly so I could soak up The Chair’s good writing energy–this grandfather liked authors, methinks–and she glowered until I ceded what she apparently now regards as her rightful throne. Twas no joke, I assure you.

I’m torn: I miss my tiny friend’s companionship but am glad she has found a way to quell the anxiety that has plagued her since she was small. To that end, I leave a small glass of water every night on my ancestors’ altar for this grandpa of another man–I know his spirit boasts an uncomplicated kindness that only can be good for us both—and I have placed a striped cushion on the chair to make my sweet friend even cozier. Even witch’s familiars need familiars, and it is my duty to respect that.

"All, everything I understand, I understand only because I love."
― Leo Tolstoy