Bread and Bread

More mornings than not in 2018, I woke up to a string of insults and imperatives--from myself, hurled at myself before I could bring a cup of coffee to my lips. I spent too much money on coffeehouse lattes, so they came with their own shame, curled like foam on top. I got coffee from gas stations and 7-Eleven, augmenting it with things that left a chemical taste in my mouth. There are too many tiny plastic creamer tubs in landfills bearing my fingerprints. I felt tacky and wasteful. On days I made coffee at home, I felt virtuous, even though it tended to be weak and/or instant, and I ran through portable mugs faster than I could wash them. The cliche I live by. Photo by Devin Avery on Unsplash Even the thing that was supposed to jolt me out of my internal invective to be better came with its own list of ways I could do it better. When I was a kid, I wanted to be an Olympic gymnast so badly that watching other girls execute higher, more graceful back flips gave me almost p

Unfortunately, I am always thinking about self-improvement. To the point that I am starting a pretend nonprofit called IT'S FINE. IT'S FINE's mission is that whatever is going on is fine. Could we use volunteers and donations and a board? I mean, maybe, but mostly we're fine. IT'S FINE was born because panic--the concern that MAYBE EVERYTHING IS WRONG WITH EVERYTHING, AND WE'VE BEEN DOING IT ALL WRONG UP UNTIL NOW, BURN IT DOWN, BURN IT DOWN AND START OVER, BUT THIS TIME BE PERFECT!--usually doesn't make anything better. Photo by  Matt Botsford  on  Unsplash I'm better at getting better when getting better is a whispered goal rather than a shouted one. So this is one thing I've been thinking about. At work and in my personal life. Not as much in my writing life, which is the one place I default to growth orientation and/or act like the mature human I strive to be elsewhere. * Here's another worky analogy for how I want to be in th

1. suspiria /mother of sighs “When women tell you the truth, you don’t pity them, you accuse them of delusion.” – Suspiria, 2018 Susie is the new girl in the dance troupe, pulled from the flat fields of Ohio as if by an umbilical cord, to a Berlin still catching its breath from the war. The Helena Markos company is a palace of mirrors, where dancers’ bodies twist and break as dancers’ bodies do, to live a story larger than any one ugly foot on one wooden floor. Susie says: More, please. Sara is an unknowing ambassador to the cabinet of curiosities that lurks beneath the floorboards, with the hair and wrecked bodies and bespoke metal hooks. She is a sweet English rose. Dr. Klemperer is an old psychoanalyst who does not believe in witches or ghosts, but he lost his true love to the Third Reich. He believes in what a group of people can do, when organized, to other people. More, please. Sara and Dr. Klemperer meet over trembling teacups. I think I am supposed to r

Google sinus headache, subcategory mucus Do not Google brain tumor When Google autocompletes "do sinus headaches have the same symptoms as" with "brain tumor," wonder if this is because sinus headaches have the same symptoms as, or because others are as anxious and sick in the head, haha, as you and artificial intelligence knows we are dumb Google brain tumor Say all the wrong things Resent her for dredging up your old apocalypses Wonder if she resented you when you were sick Know the answer Text your friends Text your doctor friend Call your sister Call your therapist Call your therapist back when the call breaks up twice Escalate: in the morning you spoke of sinus and tension Now, migraines and neurologists Hell is waiting for the results of an MRI Crunch numbers 20,000 Americans will be diagnosed with a brain tumor this year Calculate, add fairy dust, arrive at a .01% chance of brain tumor in this singular adulthood that belongs to a

1. barnacles “Every time I work directly with students, it helps me do my job better.” I say this a lot, to myself and others, but there’s a part of me that believes anything that’s too much fun, or too meaningful, must not be my actual job. I had a very vegetables-first upbringing. That analogy doesn’t work, though, because my point here is that candy is nutritious. As I was packing up to leave the office on Wednesday, Cathy, our Field Trips Coordinator, asked if anyone present had Barnacle experience. Mr. and Mrs. Barnacle are the fictional husband-wife team who run the publishing house inside each 826 location. When elementary school students file in, the day’s field trip leaders explain that one of their bosses is so nice! Always knitting sweaters for penguins, etc. The other is, well, kind of grumpy. But no worries, that Barnacle is out today. Then Mr. or Mrs. Barnacle (depending who is playing the curmudgeonly publisher that day) comes booming through the

This week I attended my first management training ever, with my coworker Miranda, in a tall building next to Pershing Square. I was excited because I’d heard good things about this particular training, and because management—like so many other parts of nonprofit work—is something my boss and I had hoped I’d be good at without any training or guidance, only to be unpleasantly surprised. I’m not a terrible manager. I listen and I don’t micromanage, and I have a good understanding of how various tasks fit into a larger picture. But there are so many other parts—clarifying roles and expectations, managing up and across, being proactive instead of just saying “What do we do now?” I’ve always shunned management culture because I fancy myself an artist or an activist or something. Management sounds so capitalistic and boring. It belongs to the world of khaki pants and TPS reports. It’s for people who can’t just all be cool and get along, and sometimes fight and cry and hug it out.

Dear Cheryl, This story takes place thirty years from now. Can you believe you'll ever be 41? You sort of almost didn't make it to that birthday, but that's another story. In this one, two board members at the organization you work for are Hillary Toomey . They think of you as a well-intentioned flea who is not great at gala event seating. They're not really concerned with you one way or another, but in their wake you feel small and frumpy and rejected. This is how you feel every day in sixth grade. You are too tall and have bangs that don't cooperate. You make jokes that fall flat. You are gay and trying not to be, because gay is just another way of doing everything wrong. The Hillary Toomeys of your future like your coworkers, who are Bonnie in this story. Two different coworkers represent Bonnie--both the conscientious, imaginative Bonnie who will be your lifelong friend, and the sixth-grade Bonnie, who is wooed by the opinions and charms of the mean, popular

We said goodbye to OC yesterday. I knew him for sixteen of his seventeen years, which is longer than I’ve known anyone else in this house. He lived with me in three places prior to this one. He was the last of the pets who knew my mom. Once, we assigned jobs to our cats. Ferdinand was a DJ and Temecula was getting her PhD in neuroscience; her dissertation was titled Why Do Some Cats Talk So Much? OC was Some Cats. His job was town crier. OC had a lot to say, and he believed that all human hands should be petting him at all times. B and I met him when, in a cage full of cats at a rescue event, he wriggled his orange nose under our extended hands. He was persistent to the point of being annoying, and endearing in his lack of guile. I could learn a thing or two from him. He was always beta to Ferdinand’s alpha, although Ferd backed off once OC got sick; I think cats know. But he was strong as a chimpanzee, as I learned the one time I tried to give him a bath, and up until a week

This week I’m at 826 ’s national Staff Development Conference, a welcome breath after many days of worky work. It’s been a pleasant roller coaster ride of inspiring speeches, helpful workshops, information overwhelm, and good chats with universally awesome coworkers. Topped with a sprinkling of my own white fragility because I like to swing between wild fear that the government is coming for my little queer family and unproductive worry that I Am The Problem. Blah blah blah. But I know this: 826 is the right place for me. That’s a good feeling. Anyway, one of my favorite parts was when poet Nate Marshall asked us to write a variation on Idris Goodwin’s “A Preface.” I riffed on my one true identity. Nerd on consent. My parents were nerds which is to say they studied hard and delayed gratification or their gratification was in sacrifice but also knowledge. They are not to be confused with academics, because they went to state schools. They are not to be con

All week, I've had a tightness in my chest and stomach. I tried to breathe like that chiropractor taught me in 2011, a year that was essentially a slow-motion panic attack. I thought it was about work, which has been a little bit intense. I felt frustrated with myself for letting something so banal--something that on balance is a positive in my life--get to me on such a visceral level. Then, yesterday, I had a great day at work, chatting with our spirited new intern and leading a writing prompt for our Summer Writers' Workshop. During my nightly plummet into social media, I soaked per usual in the day's headlines and outrage, and my stomach clenched again. It finally dawned on me. On Tuesday night, Dash woke up around 3 am, and I dragged him into bed with AK and me. He promptly fell back asleep while I tossed and turned and chased the blue light of my phone for hours. I kept thinking about what everyone not wearing a jacket announcing their lack of empathy is thinki