America – FibroM.E.-Awesome

Time To Kill

Published on April 29, 2015April 30, 2015 by Mary Gelpi17 Comments

A little while ago, I was swinging on our porch swing while Monty did acrobatics with a stick and ran laps in the yard. I had been down for some time, but I couldn’t place exactly the source of the sadness. All I knew was that I could feel something missing and the result was not a loneliness but a “looked over” kind of feeling. It’s not uncommon for me to feel lost and uncertain about the direction and usefulness of my life, especially when I’m in a crash period. This feeling felt like it had roots in that. As I let my thoughts wander and my mind clear, these words entered my head and seemed to quiet the residual buzz: “I just want to make myself proud again.” It didn’t repeat itself like an incessant thought, rather the words just stood still in bold print, front and center in my mind. And then all at once I knew what that void I’d been feeling was. It wasn’t just a lack of pride, but the lack of pride and purpose that usually comes from working. Uselessness is a terrible feeling, and I know it arises sometimes from the fact that I don’t have a real job anymore. I haven’t in some time. And yet through this whole ordeal, that loss continues to cuts deep. It has me constantly wondering what I’m doing here and where I’m going and how I’m ever going to get there. As a working girl my path felt so clear-cut. I catch myself daydreaming of my desk and my business cards and the “importance” they implied. But once the crutch of a job was gone, everything inside me felt upside down. Who am I if I don’t “do” anything?

Sitting in my bosses office and having to admit with a quivering voice that I “just physically couldn’t do it anymore” was one of the hardest moments of my life. My whole goal up until then besides getting better, was to find a way to hold onto that job. I knew if I was forced to leave it, it meant everything was irreversibly real. It meant despite what I planned or wanted, the illness was making decisions that I couldn’t change. It meant the scales had tipped and I was no longer in control. (Maybe I never actually was, but the illusion felt good) But now here I had come face to face with the truth that clinging onto the job was only causing me more suffering, besides largely effecting the quality of my work. Were I smarter I would have given in earlier and dedicated myself more seriously to getting well. But I was in a sort of denial up till then. I kept expecting to get better. I didn’t want to believe that this was truly going to be the new state my body. No one really wants to accept something like that, I think out of an inborn fear that doing so means you’re giving into something crappy and letting it take over–That you’re giving up on the possibility of getting well. But it was more just coming to terms with a reality and giving my health the attention it needed. Everyone around me seemed to know the time had come and were just waiting on me to call it, so I finally did.

I can remember solidly a few things from that conversation. I can still see his big sappy eyes as Andrew listened to me speak, and the honest calmness in his voice when he said “It’s been hard to watch. I just can’t understand why this would happen to you.” I tried very hard not to cry but the tears fell anyway, much like they are now just remembering the whole interaction. We hugged goodbye and I tried to compose myself. I remember, I think in an attempt to lighten the sadness of that goodbye, him saying to please stay in touch and to come back and visit often. I said I would, knowing I probably wouldn’t. Knowing that life at the gallery would go on without me, while my own life was drifting into scary, uncharted waters. I punched out for the last time and felt totally numb. The French Quarter had just turned dark, freezing and damp, but I didn’t feel the cold at all. I paid the nice parking attendant with whom I normally joked around without even looking him in the eye. He made some comment about cheering up or smiling but I couldn’t bring myself to respond. I moved on autopilot like a robot. Once in the car all the terrible questions made their rounds. What would become of my life now? Who would I be now, sick and unemployed? What if I never get better? I tried to drown them out but the noise of the radio bothered me. That 40 minute drive home over the bridge felt like a dream. Once home, Monty ran up to me and my mom was sitting in her chair in the living room. Our eyes met and I lost it. “Well, I guess I don’t have a job anymore.” And that, as they say, was that.

Even though I fought it, leaving work was the right thing to do and in my condition, was just a matter of when and not if. In the beginning it was a relief– not to have to fake well, to call in sick, to let down coworkers, and to constantly apologize. But not so long after, I began to feel this noticeable hole, like the gap your tongue slides through after you’ve lost a tooth. I had all this new time to kill but couldn’t spend it how I’d like. The adjustment was extremely difficult. Besides giving me purpose and pride, my job had contributed to my identity and livelihood. There was a little space carved out in the world called Mary, and I was useful there; I fit. I did what was expected of me and was paid every two weeks. But now I no longer occupied that space and I couldn’t make sense of what place I held in the world. Without the distraction of work, I also had to learn to just “be” and accept these new circumstances, which was also hard. When you’re sick like that you can’t just leave and go for a drive, or go get drinks with friends to feel better about it. It makes you confront your life head on since there aren’t the typical escapes. I had to begin accepting my experience and not thinking of my days sick in bed as total wastes. I’m still learning to do this, but it is possible. It began with adjusting the expectations I held for myself, and redefining what my definitions of “work” and “purpose” really meant. For so long work was something you did 40 hours a week and got paid for. And our culture nearly defines who we are by what we do. I no longer had a satisfying answer to that question. “Uh, Unpaid blogger I guess?” It took adapting to where I was at that point and not in the past. I was always going to feel shitty comparing my life sick to someone’s who was well. I had to get real about my truth. Still, those adjustments were hard and I am still learning them.

Life with illness means a lot of time on your hands and a lot of solitude. You have to learn how to be still, which I’ve learned very few people know how to do. You’re away from the typical distractions and noise and chaos often, so there is a lot of “being” and not “doing.” It also means getting to know yourself really well. Luckily, I like myself. We seem to get along. But all of this new vast time without a lot of outside expectation took a long time to really understand and warm up to at all. I had to remind myself that being sick is a part of me but not who I am. That took time too. As time went on I would grow more worried that I hadn’t re-entered the workforce. Or I’d feel these waves of inadequacy like I did recently. But sometimes I wonder if it isn’t the purpose of my soul that’s getting carried out because I have a body that doesn’t allow me to be busy and caught up in the regular tasks of life.

This experience has taught me big things and continues to now. It continues to teach me to let go of things, to be still and not be restless, to be OK being alone, and to accept myself as worthy even if I’m not doing anything impressive or achieving BIG things. Most of these were learned because my body wouldn’t let me achieve all I wanted to, and the lesson in humility has actually made me happier in some ways. All of it has made me come to terms with things that I truly find important, things outside of a job where the ultimate goal was money. If I look at this time away from work another way, it feels more like a gift. It’s allowed me to find and develop my voice for writing, which was my passion all along. It’s let me explore many other parts of myself that were not a part of my life when working. Even small things like learning to play my dads guitar and spending more time with my family that I wouldn’t have otherwise. It’s forced me to find the same joy and fulfillment from the small things that I used to require in the bigger or louder stuff. Today it was just being outside in the sun with monty and appreciating the moment.

I think it’s easy to look back on my life with a “real job” through rose-colored glasses. I was “bringing home the bacon”and dressing in nice clothes and looked and sounded like someone who had it together. But I can still remember sitting at my desk sometimes and thinking is this it? This is what I do the next 60 years and then I retire? I’d be naive to say things were perfect and always made sense then, too. They didn’t. But it looked better on paper and gave me stuff to talk about when people asked what I was up to. Those conversations are funny now ;) I was still wondering about my purpose and the meaning of things then too. I was still asking those same questions. The only difference is, I don’t have the disguise anymore. I am clearly not headed in any predictable direction and I truly don’t know what the plan for my life is. But, at least I’ve got some time to figure it out. All kinds of time.

Still I wonder, were I to be better tomorrow, totally healed and ready to emerge back into the quick-paced world, is that what I would do? Go back to work at some job, have office birthday parties again and two-week vacations, and then all my problems would end? I doubt it. What I mean is, I don’t think that’s what this experience is about. There is something more to it than a temporary roadblock for my life. I know it has more to give me than suffering, and my work is to try and bring light to what has felt very dark. I think by learning to navigate any experience the right way, it’s never a total loss. Sometimes it’s the very thing that propels us or makes us better. There is always more meaning and a path to discover if we stay devoted to following the thing that makes us feel alive– this usually leads to finding our purpose, our spot where we fit. I guess it’s the days when I know that who I am is bigger than the things that have happened, that I still have things to offer the world, and I accept the course of my day even in its smallness, that I make myself proud again. It’s often not in what I do anymore, but in how I receive each day and whether I live it out as a gift or not.

Even if all I do is try, that is truly enough.

Health, Happiness, #SickPride

How To Come Home

Published on December 4, 2014December 8, 2014 by Mary Gelpi6 Comments

I’ve just made it home. My suitcase is still lying in the center of the kitchen floor.

It’s crazy how good home feels after you’ve been away from it, even when you’ve completely enjoyed your time away. Somewhere between waiting in line barefoot among rookie fliers who somehow forgot about the jug of water in their carry-on and the captain shouting God knows what into that fuzzy speaker, I start to feel my humanity slip like some kind of sock with lazy elastic hovering at the ankle.

Once upon a time, flying made me feel like a celebrity. The whole experience was a novelty and a privilege. And somewhere in my jaded depths I know that it still is. The mere idea of humans taking flight on a bus in mid-air is still mesmerizing and I’m lucky to have access to it. And yet somehow, the only celebrity I ever feel like is Ben Stiller in Meet the Parents. I’m all eye rolls and discouraged sighs, which sometimes emerge as a laugh–the kind of laugh you let out when nothing is actually funny. I try to keep my moans of discontent in, even when the automatic toilet flushes while I’m still on it and I’m sprinkled with fresh public toilet water. I try to breathe through the frustration of then not getting that same toilet to flush when I actually want it to and there I am dancing like some kind of monkey on fire trying to activate the motion detector that says just wave your hand to activate. It lies. I exit, I don’t care. I hate the toilet now. All I want to do is wash the Ebola off my hands and possible STD’s off my thighs, but the faucet requires the motion. And the soap requires a motion. And the dryer requires a motion. And what happened to handles? If I went on Shark Tank I’d reintroduce handles to public bathrooms. Anyway there is more dancing. More erratic behavior from inanimate objects. More laughing when it’s not funny. It’s like the DMV in there; the threat level of a Stage 5 freakout is just one toilet flush away in any given stall. You can sense it.

But not everyone confronts the airport bathroom circus. The old lady next to me doesn’t seem to have problems with her soap. I bet she’s been spared from the toilet water too. What is your secret, old white lady in the brown velour pant suit? What am I doing wrong? But there’s no time for philosophizing, I have to get to my gate. Guess where my gate is? Guess if it’s nearby or at the very far edge of the airport as in it has a separate zip code and everything. Guess.

Is it the tragedy that is modern American air travel that makes home feel this good? Maybe. Probably. I guess this account of flying would suggest I’m a young, old curmudgeon who has lost sight to how lucky I am. But it’s always temporary. I am either going somewhere great or coming home to relief and love, and it’s just the in-between antics that can get a girl down. Once home nobody shouts the temperature and the toilets flush WHEN YOU WANT THEM TO. Of course, an 80 pound furry beast running around you in circles then through your legs and back, shoving every toy in the box in your lap and wagging his tail with enough vigor to knock over small children and feeble adults, well, that helps too. That’s the best.

I celebrated Thanksgiving with my best friend big brother Nick and Company in Miami for a week. Mostly I felt like death, but I was excited to go and the change in scenery did me good. It’s been a rocky few months. My health declined from mediocre to poor without discernible reason, and that’s just the name of the game with illness like this. I can’t pretend I’m not discouraged by it or tired of feeling really shitty when I didn’t overdo it or change anything, as if a person deserves bad health anyway, but I’m trying not to wallow in it either. I saw the specialist in Miami and there are a few changes we are making, but we won’t know more until the results arrive from the copious amount of blood I gave to test. Aside from that, my progressive boyfriend and I broke up. Ew, breakups.

It’s interesting that a decision you’re sure of it’s the right one to make can be just as painful as the wrong ones you’ve made when you didn’t know any better. And by interesting I mean shitty. We did the adult thing and “called it” at the appropriate time. We saved ourselves the tragedy of letting it slowly burn and die until it ended in hatred. I guess ultimately, even an amicable breakup is still a breakup. It’s an end. You grieve for them and you grieve for who you were with them. I experienced a whole new pain this time around that stemmed from not being my whole self in the endeavor. I pretended and concealed when the truth was ugly or getting a less than desirable response. I don’t think Id ever done that In a relationship before, but I’ve never been under the circumstances I am now and had to introduce someone knew to a world that took so much explaining, and defending in some cases.

It’s weird, I actually wanted to keep my illness out of the whole thing. (I wanted to live in Neverland, is how that sentence should read.) I had this fear it would interfere with things before they ever had a shot to develop. I feared it would be difficult and unbecoming; It would suggest I was someone inferior. I was even afraid it might be the demise of the relationship. And then, it kind of was. The weight of it became too heavy, it’s unrelenting nature became too repetitive and it’s lack of a solution wore out the seams and we broke. There were other reasons, of course. But my being sick was up there, it messed with things, it was a big a part of the end. And for a while that was a really crushing thought. It made me feel small, made my life feel lesser. I push and work to live my life in spite of this invisible force trying to take it away, and yet sometimes, it still comes out on top. It wins.

But hiding it was like doing a monkey dance in a cramped bathroom stall. (Kind of) It was stupid on top of exhausting, and I don’t know how I expected anything authentically good to emerge when I wasn’t being true to myself. I am not my illness, I know that. But it’s there, it’s changed virtually everything in my life the last four years, and nothing good has ever come from denying or dismissing it; from pretending it’s not there. And yet, sometimes I can sense that people want me to pretend it’s not there. They want to hear that I’m better, and no one understands that fantasy more than me. But pretending makes me feel like I have to hide a part of my life that I can’t control, and that’s not a healthy place to be. I don’t want long conversations about my illness. Ive had enough of them for 20 lifetimes. But I do need an honest atmosphere that doesn’t require apology. I need to be able to be sick when I’m sick and well when I’m well and not judged inbetween. It will always take patience, compassion and effort in order for my life to be understood and loved from the outside. It will always be hard in my relationships. But hopefully if I am really seen, my external circumstances won’t take up so much space. And that was half the problem, I never really felt seen. Instead I felt sorry, and that’s because I betrayed myself. By not putting it all out there, I made it nearly impossible for my life to make sense. I am not jobless and living in my parents pool house writing on a blog called Twenty Five Pills a Day because of lifestyle choices. And that’s an attitude I confront a lot. I’ll work like hell my whole life to turn lemons into lemonade, but I didn’t pick the lemons, so I don’t think I need to apologize for that anymore. The weird thing is that in glossing over and skirting around this small part of me, so much more of who I am was stifled. Good parts! Fun parts! It doesn’t feel good not to bring your whole self to a party. In fact, that hurt the worst, and I did it to myself. I had a need that wasn’t getting met, and instead of accepting that once I knew it was true, I tried to do away with the need. Surprise surprise, that didn’t work. It’s OK to have needs. Love enjoys needs.

Now I am Stella getting my groove back. I see my health in the distance: a ship in flames slowly sinking into the ocean. Haha. That image makes me laugh. But this will pass. I’ll get better. Or I’ll get worse, then I’ll get better. It doesn’t matter, because I’m going to keep trying. I’ll attempt to transform all of this– pain, pleasure, toilet water– into something useful. Something fun. Because despair is boring and I’m seeking a creative life. The world doesn’t need more sad stories so I will find the good ones. I’ll trust what I’ve been given and let it fuel all my endeavors. Mostly I’ll breathe easier because I am who I am and I’ve made it home. I’m back. And I have so much to do.

Stay tuned.

Health, Happiness, Home.

How To Make It Matter

Published on July 27, 2014 by Mary Gelpi6 Comments

Today I was thinking about these petty things I struggle with. They’re a joke.

I’m in the midst of another virtual game of jenga with my trashcan. I stuff it as much as it can hold and then some, and then some. I have to stomp it down with my foot sometimes. I stack cups and cardboard things on top over and over until small towers emerge and a fragile city of trash balances on top. I avoid the alternative, which is to just take out the stupid trash, stupid. It’s a small walk–probably 45 seconds all in all. It’s funny how devastatingly huge the task becomes in my mind. I spend more time arranging the trash inside than just taking it out.

Netflix has become a problem and the reason is very simple: I would always rather pay a dollar than have to go somewhere. Thus, I end up buying virtually every movie that was only supposed to be a buck. Also, I’ve made a few questionable decisions in my movie selections. This is because when someone gets in line behind me I kind of unravel. I begin to sweat and all the movie titles start to blur together. I panic and get Coneheads and naturally never return it. Now I own Coneheads.

I won’t get into correspondence and sending letters in the mail, but I definitely have a couple of letters in stamped envelopes over a year old that have never made it to the mailbox. Disgraceful. Anyway, I was considering these petty struggles which are just a few among many. Life is full of small and mediocre “things to do” that I often dread or put off until I can’t anymore. I realize that the only reasons these tasks are anything more than tasks is that my mind has labeled them bad, annoying, a pain in the ass. When really they are just a few things in a string of a million things we will all do and then cross off our list. They’re all the same, it’s only our attitude that redefines them. A Zen Master described the essence of Zen as Doing one thing at a time. Tolle explains this as “Being total in what you do, to give it your complete attention. This is surrendered action- empowered action.” So I’m working on what I let take up space in my mind, on being conscious before I complain about something that is necessary and also just not that bad–Especially when I pay attention to the world beyond me, where actual struggles exist.

Like many people, I’ve been watching the events unfold in countries that feel very far off to me. I realize my life is somewhat sheltered here, and when I confront the news I feel a distant hopelessness. I remember hearing about the 300 kidnapped Nigerian school girls taken in the night. I felt angry and sad and followed the story for a while. But exposure to the story faded, and it seems my regard for it did too. A few months later, 219 of the girls are still missing, with low probability for their return. I haven’t thought about them in a while. Now there are other tragedies unfolding. I see the destabilizing of Ukraine at the hand of Pootie Poots (what my brother calls Putin) and the rising emergence and activity of terrorist groups over there. I feel awful watching it. But also I feel removed from it. I watch the news then eat spaghetti. Something feels off about that. In a few months I’ll see new tragedies, and maybe Ukraine like the Nigerian girls will fade. Or the world will end. Either way, I wonder what someone like me and my small life can do for the darkness unfolding. How can I bring any sort of light there? Especially when I’m trying to carve out time to return a Netflix movie here? That is a joke.

I’m reminded of a continual theme in Tolle’s teachings, which is that separateness is an illusion. We are all made up of the same billion-year-old stardust. We operate under the “Same in-dwelling consciousness.” So while our bodies and geography separate us, our lives unfold to one pulse. I imagine this is why we feel concern when we see a stranger cry, or why we’re happy for the good fortune of another. Somewhere in the depth of our unconsciousness, we’re feeling it too. Otherwise, why would we care? Technically it’s just strangers, and their pain or death won’t interfere with our afternoon in any way. But these teachings that connect the human spirit have always resonated with me. Many of the “dark” things I’ve witnessed in my own life seem to stem from people not recognizing themselves in another. I’ve done this plenty. When witnessing the sufferings and tragedies over there, first I must remind myself that their sufferings are mine too. Whether their effects are immediate or obvious doesn’t change their imprint on us.

That being said, I am not a soldier. I can’t help fight the good fight. Today I’m too weak to take a shower for instance, so the military is out. I’m not a war correspondent or a politician who can influence change. I am who I am, having a small sickly experience here in Louisiana with my dog. But I refuse to think I’m useless in all this–mostly because that take on life truly lacks creativity. My life is different from those I witness, here and there. But I think the way to have any positive influence on the world is through growing my own consciousness. It sounds selfish but at the root it is not. It means being honest with myself and making good of the strengths I do have; they exist for a reason. It means loving more, showing more compassion, opening up more, writing more, seeking truth more. Tolle’s teaching along with Joseph Campbell’s and a slew of others is that if my life can become more conscious, it adds to the collective consciousness of the world. That is how we can make our experience matter. Because I have to remember that my experience is theirs too, just the same. So if I seek and obtain light in my life, it can spread far beyond me. I continue to think and pray about the darkness in the world and how I can help it. Most answers say to begin with inner-me. So that is the start. And it’s aligned with something I’ve felt for a while– that there is no life too small to matter.

The same stream of life
that runs through the world
runs through my veins

-Tagore

Health, Happiness, Coneheads

One Month and the Buzz

Published on July 3, 2014July 3, 2014 by Mary Gelpi22 Comments

So, I took a month off. I’ve missed you.

Health-wise I’ve been up and down, but more ups I think. I’ve been out of the house doing things; normal people things, 29-year-old things. Living like a normal person doesn’t always fair well on my body and a few times I pushed it too far and paid the price, but somehow it felt worth it. My soul needed to get out in the world and roll around in the dirt. I felt like Monty when he sees a squirrel and I unhook the leash–caution to the wind, full force ahead. Maybe 50%. I’m often battling this fear that if I’m sick for too long I’ll go to sleep one night and when I wake up thirty years will have gone by and I’ll have barely moved. It’s not always easy but I know it’s important for my soul and my psyche to get out there and try a little. So I do. I did. And I experienced these moments where I felt so intensely alive I could feel it buzzing in my fingertips. And that’s the stuff of life people! The best kind of little reminders.

A while ago I was invited by a friend to attend a three-day meditation retreat in Magnolia, Mississippi. I’d never been on a retreat before and I felt apprehensive at first. For starters, I felt angst about whether my body would hold up through the weekend. Secondly, I had this cliché vision of long-haired hippies dancing naked around a fire, sharing their “truths” or something. But when I learned it was a silent retreat, I knew I had to do it. I don’t know if I’ve made this apparent, but I sort of hate meeting people. I cringe at smalltalk and I find strangers questions difficult and exhausting to answer. I know it’s just part of conventional social norms, but this question of “What do you do?” causes me an intense five-second panic attack, and introductions almost always go there. To give an honest answer comes with this pressure to provide a back-story, which is long and convoluted. I expect strangers have as much interest in hearing these details as I do telling them, and sometimes I feel like rolling my eyes at my own reality. But I haven’t yet figured out a way to give a succinct honest answer that leaves everybody comfortable. I think I’ll start answering ‘waitress’ and save everyone five whole minutes.

So this the idea that we wouldn’t have to talk to other people, including our assigned roommates, totally sold me. But I still felt angst about my health hovering in the background. This is nothing new. I confront this fear all the time making decisions because my health has failed me so many times before when I’ve really counted on it. So I don’t anymore. It’s hard always having to maneuver around this invisible thing in your life that you don’t even like. But this is my reality and hating or fearing it does me no good. So I considered the worse-case scenario; I crash. Even if that were the case and I spent the weekend in bed, what were they going to do? Strap me to a chair and force me to meditate? I figured I’d be OK. So I said yes. And there’s something pretty revitalizing about saying yes to something new, especially when for so long these kinds of opportunities were an automatic no.

I wrote an essay about the weekend and I’ll post that next. I’ll say now my favorite part was eating lunch next to my friend in total silence, only making eye contact every now and then. There’s a lot of space and freedom that opens up when no one feels the need to talk. They call it “noble silence” and I think we could all use a little more of it. It rocked!

After that I was invited on a weekend trip to the beach where I would share a house with 12 other girls. So basically the opposite of the silent retreat. I am a total beach bum and don’t feel I get enough of it, so I went. And it turned out to be a really awesome and fun weekend. I was feeling pretty sick the day we left, but I was also really craving the sand and the air and warm gulf water. (I’m a pansy about water temp) I knew I’d feel better once I got there, so Emily and I drove the three and half hours there and watched the sun set while crossing the Louisiana/Mississippi border. I felt really happy in that moment. The sunset was the kind that changed colors every 10 seconds and was remarkably beautiful over the Louisiana marsh. I tried to capture the spectacle made by all the intense colors, but a picture never does a great sunset justice. It’s like holding a rookie drawing next to a Monet. Maybe it’s better to just pause and enjoy the splendor of a disappearing sun. It’s such a short-lived pleasure anyway. Watching them always make me feel grateful. We finally arrived and learned that our house was next door to the classiest bar in the South: Florabama. So naturally, we went. Never heard of it? Here’s a peek.

Every time I visit this bar I am overwhelmed and baffled by it. It’s three stories (possibly more, I don’t know, I’ve gotten lost in it twice), hosts multiple bands on different levels, and is jam-packed with drunk people of every age. Every surface is a proverbial guest book where people under the influence leave their mark for the world to see. I’m always riveted and only sometimes horrified reading the graffiti that adorns literally every surface. I started photographing the funny ones so I could laugh later and have some weird photographic keepsake of the trip. So I took a photo of the surface of the bar we were ordering from.

We couldn’t stop laughing at the idea of some angry person pulling out a marker and deciding to write that Laken Franks sucks Donkey Penis. A while later I entered the Florabama bathroom, where I confronted many, so many more messages, in every color, on every surface, including the toilet seat. I took some more photos because so far no one I met was as interesting as this graffiti of the world. I liked the idea of one picture having the mark of so many strangers, many of whom likely have no memory of the literary gems they left. And now I’d have a piece of it and they’d have no idea about that, either. So what did I find while looking through those photos later? Another sentiment for Laken in the bathroom stall.

Only this time Laken’s a baby murdering whore. I couldn’t believe the name showed up in two photos. Pretty crazy odds given the volume of surface area in that place and the amount of angry messages. I wonder who Laken Franks is and what she (he?) did that left someone upset enough to get creative with their insults and tattoo them on two of the walls of the worlds classiest bar. I shall never know. I’m just glad I was alive enough to be there and capture it. My fingertips were buzzing at little moments like this all weekend. But mostly when I watched the sun rise on the beach at 6 am. There’s something almost holy about a sunrise. It feels like a sneak-peek at reality unfolding–a backstage pass to the universe or something. Anyway, I’ll leave you with that photo, because I was feeling very alive when I took it, and my fingertips still buzz when I look it now. Maybe yours will too.

Health, Happiness, Buzzing

Jumping Off.

Published on May 4, 2014May 5, 2014 by Mary Gelpi3 Comments

I’m never up at this hour. But at roughly 6:40 am as I drove across Lake Ponchartrain, one of only a few lonely cars on the 24 mile bridge, it struck me just how sacred the early mornings are. Of course over water, there are no distinct markers of distance traveled besides mile markers on land, but somehow over uninterrupted waves there were these distinct and momentary glimpses into the context of my life where all the working pieces fit together. The sense, however fleeting, had me second guessing my entire history as a bona-fide night person. Maybe there’s something to these early morning hours where people are drifting into the routine of their day or into the hangover of their night, and in the middle is me, not exactly doing either, but finding my place still–stumbling on a whole in lieu of constant and incompatible parts.

Yesterday I attended JazzFest and I remember walking around in no known direction, attempting to find a group of my friends, which is almost a miracle if achieved in such a clusterfuck of a public arena, and this thought kept trying to get a hold of me. “What am I doing? I have no business being here.” Over and over that thought, with every wrong turn and mistaken identity. What a sad thought! I couldn’t pinpoint the origin of it, but it probably had roots in my mostly confined and solitary past over a few years. And now sticking my head out, landing clumsily in the middle of the public world that not only didn’t stop while I was “out sick”, it also didn’t slow down at all either. And that continued, irreverent, incessant flow of time in one direction only all of the sudden felt very real and a little unnerving too. But I walked on. It’d be a lie to say I felt any confidence at all then, taking in every type of person of every age and origin.And even though none of them looked truly happy to me, none of them had a life that I felt cheated by not having, I was still odd man out. I started to wonder if I had real friends at all that I’d find. Maybe I had imagined them up in a fantasy of my mind, and I’d walk tirelessly never bumping into them because there was no them to bump into. But I walked on. I pretended some of those thoughts didn’t exist. Maybe more, I just didn’t take them very seriously. I’d feel the sun burning my shoulders and I’d affirm that more likely than not I’d find my friends, I’d engage in young adult behavior, and feel a little better about my place in reality.

After 45 minutes of circles and flags and strangers, I watched a really drunk boy hoisted up by his friends, being dragged with his lifeless converse trailing under him leaving shallow lines in the dirt, the unfamiliar sights were piling up, and even I started to feel like a stranger there. But then– something familiar. Emily’s ponytail. Someone. People. Friends. They existed, and I was not yet proven insane. In that moment those thoughts I had didn’t carry any weight at all. Whether I found my friends or not had nothing to do with belonging in all honesty. Separateness is just a construct of ego and I know that, but it can stab you anyway. I knew that afternoon I could’ve really used some friends. And there they were and there I was. I belonged. I knew those thoughts were shit. Time to keep on living. Time to have fun now. Time to participate in the onward direction of time, and attach to some other thought that experience will most likely prove wrong.

Maybe I should’ve mentioned it earlier, but I’ve never really been a live music person. Which makes me feel incredibly lame mostly. Just like I’m also not really into The Lord of the Rings. True “outsider” feelings emerge in me when this is brought up in public, and I feel like there’s some joke I’m just not getting. What is there to say about it? To each his own. Anyway, at every live music event I’ve attended, I find myself gazing off lost in observational mode of the people enjoying the music, instead of intrinsically enjoying the music myself. I can’t help it. There’s always some woman on the borderline of being “too old to be there” on some drug that’s a little too young for her to be doing, and I can’t help but watch her, dance carelessly, body parts hanging out, not giving a shit about what etiquette she’s breaking. Then I at once sympathize for her but also want to be her, because she is losing herself in something enjoyable, and she’s alone, and I’m the creeper at the concert not dancing but staring wide-eyed and blinking very slowly. I dated one of those music junkie type of guys for two years. He had an impressive collection of bands that you never heard of on his ipod and was always discovering music years before it became popular. (I on the other hand got my music from Apple Product commercials) He flew all over the country to catch his favorite bands at different venues. Sometimes with friends and sometimes alone and it was this small gap between us because this passion he fell off his seat for was somewhere that I just didn’t fit. And this schism in us always interested me, because at concerts we’d share a joint and then even more I’d separate from the setting and lose myself in the detach-and-detect humanity mode. He was good about keeping me down to earth and assuring me that dancing like an idiot was fine and encouraged, and that no, that guy next to me was not about to die from sensory overload regardless of what his face and body movements suggested. But there was always some wall with me at those shindigs. I could never really figure it out. Ultimately the relationship ended, and I wondered how much, if any, this disconnect had to do with it. Maybe nothing at all. Maybe a whole lot.

It’s funny how discovering clarity leaves with you so much to know still. My goal this year has been to find clarity of any kind, certainty of any measure. Because both of these things lack hugely in my personal life and it wares on me daily. It’d be nice to make a decision and know it to be right, or know anything at all for that matter and trust it to be true. But even with this goal in the forefront of my consciousness, it has still been incredibly hard, and so far, I’m yet to find either. I’m guessing the more things I pursue where the end is uncertain and there are no guarantees will help me to eventually get there, or in the general ball park. On the bridge this morning, the unceasing rhythm of a road bump every 1.5 seconds, I glimpsed certainty. I glimpsed knowing something at all, and it felt very good. But I don’t know if it’s possible to exist in this dimension full-time. At least half of life seems to rely on not knowing but jumping off anyway. Maybe love, happiness, success, peace..are all the outcomes of great risk and great faith. All anyone can do is make their best bet and go for it. Maybe once we let go of knowing anything for sure, the way I walked in endless circles yesterday, the way those waves went in no direction this morning, is how we find the happy end, whether we knew we would or could or not.

Health, Happiness, Walking On, Jumping Off.

America.

Published on April 29, 2014April 30, 2014 by Mary Gelpi4 Comments

Even When It’s Bad It’s Good

Published on December 28, 2013 by Mary Gelpi8 Comments

The Holidays rock. They just do. I feel worlds away when I talk to someone who doesn’t like Christmas. Or Christmas music. Or trees. Or gift-giving. Or ELF. (On repeat!)

Is it excessive? Sometimes. I can admit that. And has Christmas in our country become overly commercialized and sensationalized with the meaning lost in mall crowds, and could we have a long discussion about that over the dinner table? Yeah, we could. But I don’t like going there. I’ve never engaged in the War On Christmas propaganda that inevitably resurfaces each year. And it’s not in the name of denial, but because every year, for a small fleeting time, regardless of my health or where I am personally, the Holidays are a small but hopeful light at the end of a year–where I see more good in the world than bad. Often it’s a reason to become softer, reflective, and thankful. Or do something kind you wouldn’t normally do. If for no other reason than “Well, since it’s Christmas.” I love hearing those words. And I love the simple reasoning behind them.

For my immediate family, Christmas is always the time we give to ourselves to be a family. There are four kids in four states. There are grand-children and extended family and friends who might as well be. But I like that it’s been our staple. Usually it’s not a question of who will be attending Gelpi Christmas but where we’ll be making the noise. And we do, make a hell of a lot of noise. When it’s not me making it, I sometimes plug my ears. :) Life is busy. The work for all of us is different but tiring in its own way. It’s easy to get distracted and let time go by without realizing how many months have passed since we’ve had any genuine interaction. It’s easy for face time to turn into FaceTime and phone calls into text messages and those to turn into Facebook and Facebook to turn into emojis. I mean really, instead of writing this blog post I basically could have just put…

But emojis can’t replace real emotion in writing, just like emails aren’t as personal as phone calls and text messages will never compare to feeling the weight of a hug from someone you love. Admittedly, as the technology advances, it does help increase the amount of contact time between all of us. And thank God for it, because as secluded as my life sometimes gets, sometimes my iphone feels like my only window into the outside world. Technically I met my youngest niece Harlow over FaceTime and spent some virtual “feedings” with her. And I’m extremely impressed and grateful by what can be accomplished over a 2 x3 screen on my phone. It truly is, extraordinary. But still, holding her for the first time beat out those “virtual hangouts” by a long shot. Nothing like the smell of an infant, or getting her to smile. Or watching my niece Olive dance in circles to music or watching my parents enjoy grandchildren or playing cards with my grandma or my siblings annoy the hell out of each other. In a good way, of course! This year my 87-year-old grandma surprised us and came to California for A Very Gelpi Christmas. Show an old woman the capabilities of the iphone and try not to marvel at how far we’ve come and what we’re capable of. It’s a new world, and it’s changing all the time.

Every year at Christmas I always reflect on the previous Christmas. Where was I at this time last year? What has changed? Are things better or worse? And where can I do better? That’s the novelty of an upcoming new year. As they say, It’s never too late to live the life you want to live, and I am always striving to live better. To be a better me. Last year at this time, I was struggling immensely in my health. I had improved from the bed-ridden state but was still feeling awful day-to-day. It was a struggle not to be permanently supine. I found socializing exhausting and far from any fun. It was not one of my better Christmases, but I still enjoyed the tradition of it all, like always. Right after Christmas I relapsed again. I was stuck in Colorado, in and out of bed and freezing my ass off in their record Winter. I remember thinking in my darkest hours and sleepless nights, when the weight and relentlessness of my situation felt too heavy to bare, that this, like all things, would end. One way or another. It was a matter of physics. Time is one of the constants of the world, and it would keep going and eventually things would change. Winter would turn to Spring and at some point I’d lift my head with ease. I wouldn’t be bedridden in Colorado for the rest of my life, even if it felt like it. I remember reciting Winston Churchill’s quote: “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” That’s what I did, and at last, the physics of the world did what it always does. Winter passed. I was given the opportunity to live in a happy house with a lot of windows; just Monty and me. And my health very slowly improved from what it was. And I have truly never felt luckier or more grateful to be where I am. Things aren’t perfect. I’ve still a ways to go. And it’s never far away in my mind that this illness can hibernate and reemerge as if on its own agenda. Sometimes for no reason I can think of. But for now, I’m so improved from this time last year. And it feels good to know, that the reassurance I felt at night but could not see was real. The hardship wasn’t forever–the sun came out and I survived. It’s easy to be disillusioned and overwhelmed by our thoughts in hard times. But how important it’s been for me to remember, to everything, there is a season.

And for me, the best will always be this time of year.

Happy Holidays Yall. Hope it was a good one.

Health and Happiness and

The Great Indoors

Published on August 24, 2013 by Mary Gelpi8 Comments

I’ve spent most of this last week in bed, or in and out of sleep on respective furniture that I turn into a bed. But mostly in bed. During crash periods I have a lot of time to sit around and think and do nothing. And while “doing nothing” sounds a little worthless and at least a little depressing, I’ve gotten pretty good at feeling bad. That is, I’ve found ways not to succumb to complete boredom while spending my days and nights in the supine position. But I have to be decisive and proactive when it comes to mental stimulation. It’s easy to do nothing and think nothing and waste away hours watching cats on the internet. I’ve done a lot of that too.

Currently I’m reading “Further Away”– a book of essays by author Jonathan Franzen. It was given to me by my brother Nick, who wrote on the note inside to add it to our virtual book club. Nick and I don’t live in the same city and considering how poorly I keep in social contact even with people I care most about, we don’t talk so often. But we have similar taste in things and it’s true that I trust any literature from him will be enjoyable. Like the others this one doesn’t disappoint. I gave him the book “Why Does the Universe Exist?” and said it might be a good starter for the club. Nick is a full-time professor of architecture with multiple side projects and is a husband and father. I’ll be impressed if he has the time to finish it. I have nothing but time but in retrospect, I can think of at least three books in the last year I’ve simply left unfinished with less than 100 pages left. For whatever reason– It might be a commitment problem on my end. Because oddly enough I enjoyed the books I left undone. (Except 50 Shades of Grey. I just couldn’t do that one, even from a humorous standpoint. It was just so bad.) At any rate, I like that we’re trying. I know I need to read more and it is truly one thing, a gift even, that I can do whether or not I’m sick. I could read for hours and feel somehow refreshed at the end. TV and the internet are bottomless. I could be dead tired but watch more, click more, disengage more. It’s far too easy to fall in and at the end I never feel great. I’m like where am I? What time is it? How long have I been watching Tosh.0? I don’t know how many times I’ve watched the Kardashians and rolled my eyes thinking to myself that it’s the stupidest show on TV. And yet when it shows up on the guide, I almost unconsciously go straight to the channel. It’s like mindless auto-pilot in the way of my brain. I think it’s their hair that keeps me coming back. It’s just so pretty.

Speaking of the Kardashians, did you see the photo of baby North West? I think she’s cute. Wait, why do I know what their baby looks like? Because if you watched TV or were on the internet yesterday, it was everywhere. As well as mass hysteria about Ben Affleck becoming Batman. Maybe that says something about the places where I get information. But it also says something about the things that gain momentum and attention and a dialogue. Meanwhile, my state is sinking. I don’t totally understand the nature of a sinkhole. Except that I’m pretty sure it’s unnatural. And it’s a problem when entire trees are being swallowed whole. Something about salt domes? But why take the more effort-requiring time to find out when I could just look at a tumblr that makes fun of what Kanye’s baby looks like? It’s so easy to just lay back and look at what’s easy to look at and make fun of what’s easy to make fun of. But it’s not very wise for someone like me to do too much of that. I constantly have to remind myself to be careful with how I spend my time. I truly have a lot of it.

Anyway, maybe by the next post I’ll be much more knowledgeable about sinkholes. Or I’ll have a lot more photos of baby Nori. Anyway, I’ll continue my quest to be at least a half-way informed citizen and spend my horizontal time wisely. I love being outside but on weeks like this one, I’ve mostly been inside which can be wearing too. But don’t get me wrong, I’ll still watch internet cat videos because come on, that stuff is funny. And laughter is important. And if we spent all our days indulging in bad news we could succumb to despondency and boredom just as much as if we watched TV and internet videos nonstop. It’s all a balance and I’m always in search of the middle. So far, 29 has been just fine.

Health, Happiness, and Wouldn’t You Think Sinkhole Would Be Two Words? Me too.

To Be a Girl.

Published on July 16, 2013 by Mary Gelpi12 Comments

I must admit, I really love being a girl. I’m not sure most people would know that considering a few things. I’m not overwhelmingly feminine. I don’t officially dress the part that often. And my manners slip up a lot. Maybe I’m thinking more about what it is to be a Southern Girl, but I love being that too, even though I know I don’t always do the South proud. Still, it’s in me. And I like that it is.

A disappointing factor in being sick is that my wardrobe has taken quite a hit. I used to work 5 or 6 days a week, and I enjoyed putting together my little corporate outfits each day. It always felt like a part I was playing anyway, so I took time for the appropriate costume. There’s pride in getting dressed for work each day. Even if it was a crappy day– bad weather or crappy co-workers–whatever it was, there was still some amusement in dressing each day. Looking my best. It was some part of the job that I could control. And I indulged in looking good and smelling good and hearing my heels click on the gallery floor. There was some identity, among pride, in the ritual of all of that.

Now I don’t have somewhere to be 5 out of the 7 days a week. I don’t have to wake up at some ridiculous hour–which let me be clear, I don’t miss in the least. And while I don’t miss hitting the snooze button 6 times before forcing myself out of bed and dragging myself to the shower, I do miss the ritual of working. The wardrobe it required. The pride in looking good and knowing your purpose and getting a paycheck every two weeks. Clear parameters. Certain expectations. Consistent and adequate wages. I realize that while you’re working it’s not uncommon to be fantasizing about not working, because that grind–it’s a lot. Every day. All day. The same people. The same setting. It can be overwhelming in its sameness.

While I did enjoy the ritual of working, I knew I couldn’t stay there forever, mostly because it didn’t do a lot for my soul. The work was not a challenge creatively in the least. I told myself that I could work full-time and do my creative work on the side. I could write and draw at night or on the weekends, but I was so dead at the end of each day, so spent by the weekends, I always spent them half-conscious in sweats watching mindless television or attempting to write but tiring out quickly. Maybe some could do it, but it was certain I could not. One day I would have to leave that job if I wanted to explore the more creative life, but I never thought it would be involuntary. It was–due to my health. I wonder how long I would have stayed there had it not been.

Anyway, now I am sort of living the creative life. I follow my inner-self a lot which is a privilege, I admit. I’ve learned songs on my dads guitar. I paint watercolors when I’m bored. I watch French movies to brush up on my French. I write. I read. I rest. Repeat. I think it would be easy to look at my life from the outside and say it looks easy. And to an extent it’s certainly easier than my scheduled life I used to lead. There’s no calling in sick or feeling guilty about not performing well. But also, there’s no paycheck. No official schedule to follow or tasks to complete. But I have a feeling those things will come again.

It’d be easy to fall down the black hole of daytime TV or something more depressing. I work hard to keep things moving. To strike when the creativity is hot. To find newness in each day. I consciously work to keep my life from going to stagnant–that’s where a girl could get into trouble.

Since my new life doesn’t require any certain wardrobe, I often joke about the clothes I wear and my general appearance. Not to mention, the whole showering and routine that follows deal totally exhausts me, so it’s often a matter of energy reserves. I used to be so polished. Now I leave my hair curly and wild and am wearing a stretch cotton tank top with a cat wearing sunglasses on it. This of course is acceptable, as I don’t really have visitors or male suitors. Haha. But still, as much as I have to strive to keep my life moving, I think I need to remember that I am a girl and I can look pretty when I try. And I really enjoy smelling good. I don’t have official reasons to make those things happen anymore, but maybe just being a girl is reason enough.

Like last night, I painted my nails this bright red. And it really thrilled me. Red nails! The thrills of being a girl!

Laughably I take pride in being able to give myself a manicure comparable to the professional ones. Since I’m broke I can’t afford those things, but I can do them myself and so I do. I also bought this knock-off gold watch for $20 dollars which I really enjoy wearing. The best part is it fit perfectly, I didn’t have to remove any links. It makes me feel glamorous, with these red nails and lipstick too. Sometimes when I’m feeling good, I take really long bubble baths, I spend a long time doing my hair, I put on full makeup, and I spray myself in perfume. And then I go nowhere. I strut around my house like an idiot, just like it used to be–a girl playing dress up. Or I pretend to go somewhere and take photos like these:

Here's Monty and Me and the Eiffle! — Here’s Monty and Me at the Eiffle!

Monty gets nervous because it’s gotten to the point where if I put on pants he knows I am probably leaving. But I don’t leave. I clean the house. I indulge in the mirror. And still, even though I have nowhere to go or no one to see– I revel in being a girl. If even just to remind myself that when I try, I can still be one. One day I will have places to be and people to meet and parties to attend, so I’m just making sure I still know how. How to be polished. How to walk with poise in heels. How to look the part. How to be a girl.

Health, Happiness, Remembering.

Cutest Passport Photo in the History of Time?

Published on June 28, 2013 by Mary Gelpi6 Comments

Sometimes when I’m sad or frustrated or just looking for something to make smile, I look at this picture: It’s the passport photo of my 1-year-old niece, Olive. It’s funny how just an image can cheer us up or change our energy. Any photo of my nieces tend to brighten me up, but this one in particular makes me happy. Cutest passport in the history of time? I think so. Some things are too cute, words will only spoil them. So I’ll leave this one alone.

Health, Happiness, and Indecently Cute Passport Photos

Tiny Little Worlds

Published on June 20, 2013June 21, 2013 by Mary Gelpi13 Comments

Most mornings start out the same for me. My eyes peel open slowly like velcro. My insides feel like they want out. Everything feels out of balance. I throw pills in my mouth, make my pot of coffee, let Monty out, and wait to feel human again. It isn’t the best…mornings have always been the hardest. But roughly an hour later, I start to feel better. The pain subsides. The disoriented, dizzy haze fades, and I sip coffee slowly and let my thoughts organize themselves. Once I’m human again, Monty starts making noises that imply if we don’t go outside and play in the pool soon he is going to explode or implode or something of that nature, so we go. He jumps in immediately, I sit in the water on the first step, and the day really starts. I’ve come to love our routine. It feels good spending so much time outside. Especially after a year of feeling so imprisoned to the indoors. Lately, the last step of morning involves saving frogs from the pool. They are really tiny; cute actually. Usually there are at least 5 of them. I try to keep them together, like they are some kind of family I’m rescuing and I don’t want the children to get separated. I have no idea why I feel this obligation to save them, but I do, and so I do.

They are such incredibly small animals, sometimes I just watch them. I feel bad when I find a floater who didn’t make it. I scan the sides of the pool twice where there are usually one or two and then the two round filters that catch the extra debris. I then usually carry them to the nearby ditch so they can hangout in natural water. Last night, Monty was muddy so I walked him out to the pool to clean him off, (this is now what we consider bath time) and when we approached I heard a loud splash of something that jumped in. When I looked in the filter, a huge frog was in there, spinning from the pump circulation. Certainly he would have died in there. The steps are too deep for them to jump back out. I took him from the filter and released him in the garden, and told Monty to be gentle as he sniffed up close after every hop he took. Then I played “Folsom Prison Blues” to him on my guitar because I learned that song recently and it’s really fun to play. And what’s the frog going to do? Walk out on my concert? Come to think of it that is what happened, but you see my point.

Anyway, it’s interesting to look at such physically tiny life that we normally never see. There’s plenty around here. Including wolf spiders that are INSANELY large and terrifying-looking, but ultimately harmless. So when they’re inside I catch them in plastic cups and throw them outside, basically screeching the whole time because if it escaped the cup and crawled on my hand I’m pretty sure I would pee myself.

There is a huge variety of birds; there are mice and turtles, spiders and lizards, and even these tiny bunnies that Monty chases away. I like watching their world. Something about it makes my problems feel smaller, and I don’t know what the explanation is for that.

Anyway, I really don’t like killing anything alive. Especially because I don’t feel like they are in my territory but that I am in theirs…and it seems so pointless to kill them. There was a time I wouldn’t mind killing tiny things, I think. But now the idea doesn’t sit right with me. (Except mosquitoes, screw them.) So I catch them and release them. Save them from the filters. If anything, it helps me feel like I’ve done something. There are many stationary days. Sleep filled and cloudy. It makes sense to save something from drowning if only because I haven’t done anything else that day. I don’t have to, but I can. Might as well save a frog or five.

Health and Happiness and Little Tiny Worlds

Art!!!!!!!

Published on March 5, 2013March 6, 2013 by Mary Gelpi5 Comments

Since my genuine exposure to the “old times” has been either black and white photos or black and white film, these color photographs that have emerged of life in the 30’s and 40’s have found their way into every corner of the intweb and are a real gem. Every time I look at them I feel like I am glimpsing a reality that I’ve never truly felt connected with. The olden days have been described to me by my grandparents and in magazine articles and I’ve laughed at the way actors speak in old movies and their gay, wordy advertisements– but for some reason it’s just always seemed like a story. It never quite felt personal. I know it was real, because my grandpa used to tell me war stories and I’ve sat through history class since 3rd grade, never truly appreciating that there really was life before me. So it’s funny to me that something as simple as color could bring something so distant to life for me, but these really do that. It’s like looking at thousands of paintings of Jesus and then being handed a headshot.

A Man Named Jack and His Family, October 1940

Basically, the disconnect between then and now was broken, and I dove right in. The prints were taken on Kodachrome by the Farm Security Administration and Office of War Information throughout the 30’s and 40’s respectively. They were then released by the Library of Congress in 2006 for an exhibition called Bound For Glory; America in Color. I don’t know why the element of color has upped the real factor to such a high degree, but I never get tired of looking at them. I have to remind myself constantly that they aren’t actors and they aren’t in costume.

Homesteaders Faro and Doris, Pie Town New Mexico, 1940 — Homesteaders “Faro and Doris” Pie Town, New Mexico 1940

Woman Aircraft Worker- Burbank, California 1942

Bayou Borbeau Plantation- Natchitoches, Louisiana 1940

For as long ago as the “old days” have always felt to me, something about these color prints remind me it really wasn’t that long ago. Can you imagine showing the people in these photos an iphone? Or trying to explain the premise of Facebook? (Kind of makes me feel disdain for the times we’re living in) So much has changed and yet inside, I don’t feel we’re as far apart as we think. Then again when I looked at Facebook a few minutes ago, I may have changed my mind.

I think a lot about the “records” we’re leaving behind for the generations who will come after us. Looking for clues as to what life was like in our day, for the strands of humanity that tie us all together no matter how many years have passed. Will there be Facebook 100 years? How will our grandchildren study us? It hit me a few days ago that this blog is somewhat of a record itself- a sick girls life and her dog and yada yada. It then occurred to me that if I die tomorrow..the blog would live on. It has its own shelf life now. Unless I leave someone in charge to disassemble it once I’ve gone on. But I think I’m fine with it living without me. It’s turned into a community of sorts and that’s something I hope will live…forever? But my Facebook page– Maybe somebody should kill that.

So it was cloudy and California’s version of cold today and since it was one of those days that a normal person might go to a gallery..I brought the gallery to me and started looking at art online and some of this stuff was just too good not to share. It made me wish I was an artist. But the only art I’ve made lately is this drawing of Mario Lopez from December.

Pen on Paper. $50,000 or best offer. — Pen on Paper. $50,000 “Or best offer”

Maybe I should stick to writing. Or sharing actual artists work in this case. Here’s what really stuck with me today.

So this conceptual artist Rachel Perry Welty uses everyday items in sequence or on repeat per se to construe American “middle class minertia” as she puts it. In her show “Lost in My Life” she uses the byproducts of her domestic life to make for some unusual and beautiful prints. I couldn’t get over the stunning visuals and patterns brought on by tiny objects I see all the time.

I love how she never shows her face and how the small pieces become part of her apparel. Awesome stuff! You can read more about her and her exhibition here or here. For me the most inspiring part to hear was that she didn’t even enter the world of art until she was 36, and her work and ideas emerged out of lack of materials and time as she was a full-time working mother when she began. Word.

OK and then there’s this:

How effing cool is this? Artist Doris Salcedo filled a gap between two buildings in Central Istanbul with roughly 1,550 chairs and her intent was to create a “topography of war” embedded in everyday life. Whatever you deduce from it, you can’t deny that visually it’s just spectacular and the simplicity of materials with such a complex and poignant result is surprising, not to mention its impressive scale.

You can read more about the artist here or here.

OK last and not least I discovered a poem today that I found so incredibly enjoyable that I realized poetry can be fun and good modern poetry does exist. My friend Giselle, a ceramic artist, hates poetry mostly and I understand why, and a lot of the time I hate it too. (It doesn’t stop me from writing it or reading others) But this poem today, well it just really stuck with me and reminded me how much fun an often sad art form can be. It’s a little lengthy so click here to read it. It’s called Tap Water and is written by Mathew Yaeger. Job well done dude! A few favorite lines are:

What good is it
polishing to a shine the pile of dimes on which your life
has turned. You feel blessed or you feel regrets.

and also

When a woman has entered your life and then
left it you are changed and while you may change
forward into something resembling what you once were
you most certainly do not change back.

So, I guess that’s enough art for our cloudy cold Tuesday. Monty is bored. I’ll see you next time.

Health, Happiness, Art Gallery Day

That New House Smell.

Published on February 26, 2013February 26, 2013 by Mary Gelpi11 Comments

I’m sitting upstairs in my new bedroom in our new house. After eight months in an apartment complex I called the “California Projects” for many reasons, most recently a murder in the apartment above us, it feels good to be in a house. A real house. There’s a yard and a small playground. My room has a bay window; something I fantasized about having as a child, and now at 28, my window dreams came true. There are men downstairs installing the floors and speaking in Spanish. In typical white girl fashion, I say Hola! and ¿Cómo estás? and that is all I know so that is the end of the conversation. They are nice. I wish I could creep on their conversations, but I chose French in college which, outside of my semester in France, I never ever speak. Except for my dreams and a French dude I sat next to on the plane last time I flew.

The people who lived here before us hadn’t paid their house note in two years. They are one of thousands among Southern California and America whose eyes were bigger than their wallets. Their inability to pay made for a steal on the house but an insane amount of paperwork and complicated buying contingencies. After a lot of back and forthing, Amelie and Keegan got the house, and then tore out all the ugly stuff. Right now we don’t really have a downstairs with floors, or a kitchen or a living room. So I hang out in the yard with Monty and notice that when the old tenants kids were younger they carved their names into the cement on the side of the house. I feel a little bad. I’m sure when they moved in however long ago they figured this would be their house for life. But I guess it’s a lesson thousands of Americans learned these past few years. It makes me afraid of money. Which is fine because I don’t have any.

I mark this move as a symbol of better things to come. The last apartment was both literally and figuratively dark. There was definitely not enough windows and the light that shown in my bedroom came from fluorescent bulbs that burned in the corridor outside my room. Yellow and artificial. I spent my sickest days ever there. On the couch or in my bed. And those steep stairs you had to walk down to get to our place–my God I hated those stairs. Each one I cursed when I walked them and my legs were shaking with weakness. Screw you screw you screw you screw you screw you. All the way to the bottom. Or the top. Didn’t matter, I hated those stairs, and Sunday was the last day I had to walk them. I flipped them off from the car as I drove away from that apartment. In my mind that song “Movin’ On Up” played in my head and I hoped that this literal upgrade would also be the symbolic mark of how all of our lives turned around. How once we moved, everyone got everything they ever wanted. But even I know that’s not how it looks. Still, a girl can dream. Only good things here. Leave all the crappy stuff at the bottom of the stairs or in my old closet with the broken door.

Now we’re in real Suburbia. A three car garage and neighbors that say “Welcome to the Neighborhood!” You can hear kids playing outside and there are minivans and such. It’s a nice street in a nice neighborhood and you don’t have to go down any stairs to get in. Now when my large and loud family visits, there will be room for us- presuming we don’t all spit out a baby in the next nine months. But hey, you never know. Although last time I checked you have to have sex in order to have a kid, so, you know, I’M GOOD THERE. Monty is my one and only, and he’s happy to sleep on the floor. Here’s some pictures from the heart of the burbs. Enjoy.

Health, Happiness, Suburbia

Tiny furniture left behind in our sand box.

A neighbors astroturf af lawn. — A neighbors astroturf lawn.

What Happens In Vegas Goes On the Blog

Published on February 19, 2013March 1, 2013 by Mary Gelpi14 Comments

What’s up party people? I took my first week vacation away from the blog and I really missed it like it was some kind of boyfriend I took space from. I’d have moments observing something or participating in a conversation and think “Aww, the blog would really love this.” Then I’d try to store things in my brain to access later but most of it drifted away like cotton candy. Anyway, I have some items on the agenda to address beginning with something that might seem a little hard to believe, but believe it baby. I just returned from a bachelorette party in LAS VEGAS and I had the time of my life. Let it be known that I had no intention of attending this party weekend for obvious reasons. I have no money and no health. And yet it happened anyway.

Movie Poster for "Sick Girl at the Window" — Movie Poster for “Sick Girl at the Window”

I had three roommates throughout my tenure at LSU and we were kind of just our own family. We all studied abroad the same semester so we could meet up in Europe together. We tackled the angst of our early twenties together. When one of us went through a breakup we all felt it in a weird way, as sappy as that sounds. We were tight knit, and those years in college were the best of my life. Inevitably, it became difficult to maintain such closeness after college, as much as we all wanted to think it would never change. Geography, jobs, marriages, and ailing health took their toll on the crew and slowly those days of casual conversations on the porch about nothing became fewer and further between. Admittedly, I am absolutely terrible at maintaining and keeping up friendships in the sense that I rarely answer my phone or fill people in on “What’s new in your life?” I am for sure the worst in our crew. But with those girls it always felt like I could go a long time without seeing them and pick up where we left off. That’s the way to define a best friend isn’t it? Very, little, maintenance.

I remember after getting my full-time job at the gallery after college thinking “Hmm, how does one go about making friends after college?” I was the youngest person at the gallery but aside from age, I felt a real void not having that crew along for the ride. I wasn’t proactive about making friends, especially since most of my weekends were spent in bed recuperating my body anyway. I was nostalgic for the ease in which those three girls and I were friends together.

The first one in our crew was married in 2011 and in true female form, we all screamed and freaked out about it for a while. It really drove home the point that college was over and we were getting older. Last year we got a similar photo text of Tiffany wearing an engagement ring and now the second one of us was “biting the dust.” Once again in true female form, we all screamed and freaked out about it as we begged for details and said all those incredibly female things like Oh my god!! How cute!!! So romantic!! When it came to my attention that Tiffany’s bachelorette party was going to be held in Las Vegas, I felt a pit in my stomach. I’ve become pretty accustomed to missing out on things due to my lack of health and funds. But this one stung more. I have desperately missed my friends over the last two years. Especially the last few months. I feel like I’ve been a third wheel to other couples and their respective social groups for a while now, and I’ve missed the comfort and lack of effort being with your own great friends affords. I was sad to see the party would be in Las Vegas because there was just no way I was going to be able to make it and I resigned myself to the fact that it would be just one more thing I would have to miss.

But a month ago they informed me that whether I wanted to or not, I was coming on this bachelorette party. “We’re buying you your plane ticket and you’re coming,” Emily told me. Of course my ego and pride always protest a little when people volunteer to buy things for me or help me out, because a part of it just feels wrong. I want to be able to pay my own way. I don’t want to be a burden. But they insisted and I once again learned a lesson in gratitude and humility. Sometimes you need to rest that “Oh I couldn’t possibly!” reaction, and just accept with grace the gifts that are offered to you. But there was still another problem; even if they bought my plane ticket, how in the hell would I survive Las Vegas? A month ago I was barely walking! My mom and sister insisted that for my flight out there I use a wheelchair in the airport and then get a wheelchair at our hotel and let my friends take turns wheeling me around. This was once again, going to stir up things in my pride. I don’t want to use a wheelchair, I want to use my own two legs to walk. But I also know that every time I fly, I crash the next day, sometimes for like a week. I know if I walk for more than 10 minutes some days, I pay for it for days at a time. So we were proactive early on. We made a plan.

I would use a wheelchair the day I travelled, and I would also use one at the hotel and try to stay horizontal or sitting as much as possible. I had been reading that some people with CFS have found relief using adderall so I brought some with me to take at night so I could stay awake for dinner and everything after. I began praying constantly, whenever I thought of it, for strength and energy and for things to go smoothly while I was there. I had nightmares of me sleeping the entire trip away in a dark hotel room. But honestly, I thought, even if I don’t make it out after, it would be worth it me to go there and have dinner with my friends. It had just been so long since I had done something purely recreational like this. I knew my soul needed it. So we prepared as much as we could and I left the rest up to the Gods of partying and drunken debauchery.

As I stood in the crowded lobby of Caesars Palace on Friday night, over stimulated by the sounds and sights of Las Vegas, I saw out of the corner of my eye two girls pushing a wheelchair with huge smiles on their faces, headed in my direction. My heart wanted to explode. I was so unbelievably excited to be with them again, and to know that just like in the college, they were in my corner again and I was in theres. They would push me the entire weekend, even when I would say “Nah why don’t I just walk..” My friend Emily would put her foot down and insist I “wheel it.” I quickly got a small glimpse into the life of someone who is physically or mentally disabled because people stared at me in that chair. I thought of those who are physically handicapped or disfigured and how many of those stares they have to deal with on a daily basis. I wonder if they get used to it or if after years it still gets to them.

Besides being with friends again, one of the best parts of going on that trip was feeling like a WOMAN again. I wore dresses and high heels. I had my nails painted red, did my hair like celebrities and smelled sexy, because I could. I’ve been sick and wearing the respective sick costume so long, I needed to remind myself that if I really wanted or needed to, I could still take the time and emerge out of a hotel room with my heels clicking on the glossy floor, and make a man look twice. It’s just plain fun to play dress up. And even at age 28, I don’t feel any different than when I was five and I would clumsily walk around our kitchen in my moms high heels 6 sizes too big. All of life just feels like theatre to me now. Two years ago I was wearing the corporate girls costume in pinstriped skirts and last year I wore a sick girls costume and this weekend I was all dolled up at a club and no one knew the difference. I think I really needed to give my mind a rest from thinking about being sick all the time. It can be extremely consuming and I am always cautious not to let my “story” dictate who I am. It’s always been a fine line. But this weekend, for the most part, I was just Mary. A girl with her friends celebrating the upcoming marriage of one. I danced my heart out to terrible music in the VIP section at clubs. I drank gin and tonic and flirted with boys. I even kissed one, just to make sure I still knew how. Turns out I do. I had the time of my life and I think I needed it more than ever. How am I feeling now? Well, kind of crummy. It’s catching up to me. But at least this time, I’m paying for a great time I had, and it was well worth the price.

Thank you to my friends for insisting I go and helping pay the way. I needed it. I’ll pay you back when I’m a millionaire one day.

Health, Happiness, VEGAS

White Girls on Facebook: Part 2.

Published on January 9, 2013 by Mary Gelpi38 Comments

1. Write the name of an alcoholic beverage and a question mark followed by “Don’t Mind If I Do!”

2. Talk about how INSANELY busy they are and the massive amount of things they have to do! So much so they spend the next two hours on Facebook talking about it!!

3. Use “LOL” questionably and in an overabundance. “I have cancer lol” “Me too lol”

4. Some version of this picture, allll up in your biz.

My legs enjoying the beach. — The bottom half of my body enjoying the beach.

4. Talk about preparation for tomorrows workout, take a picture of today’s workout, or reflect on the burn from yesterdays workout.

5. Delve into the recent cold they caught, list all the corresponding symptoms of said cold, then tag a photo of Dayquil and Hot Tea. Potential Caption: Yucky sniffles AND a sore throat! :(

6. Take a picture of herself scandalously dressed and tag it with this caption: “Hey you.”

7. “Today I am thankful for gratitude lists.”

8. Attempt a really inspiring, self-written life quote. “Never take advantage of anyone. Life is short but regret is forever. Always thank your lucky stars and never forget to dance. Even in hard times, the sun will shine through the night.”

9. Talk some major smack about football and/or their fantasy team. Then talk some major smack about The Bachelor.

10. Take a picture of basically anything and caption with: LOVE. <3 <3 <3

12. Girls Night Out!! Prepare for pictures, captions and a play-by-play before the night is halfway over.

11. Something borderline horribly offensive followed by “Just Sayin.”

13. Picture of the hubs taking a nap with the baby!

14. Vent a frustration beginning with WOW. “Wow, I was under the impression that a STOP SIGN MEANS STOP.”

15. Duckface. Forever and Ever and Always.

Yall come to the party I'm having by myself in the bathroom! — Yall come to the party I’m having by myself in the bathroom!

Health. Happiness. Facebook. GIRLS. <3

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