carnal

last week

At w’s we sat around his new round table and told stories and made jokes and slurped salsa and tortilla chips and lost drops of red goop onto each other's legs. July is wet, hot, and moving slowly, and I miss people. There’s a little black bird on my windowsill and he’s all wet and looks very frazzled. My camera is not turning on. I wear the same clothes over and over.

I’m eating a lot of peanut butter sandwiches and drinking a lot of watered-down lemonade from a jug someone bought me at white castle weeks ago. When it gets to about three-quarters empty I fill it with water and shake it around. It's getting sour. I could fall asleep at 7 o’clock. I reread Just Kids and I feel like just as much of a dog as she did. it was nice to read smith's words and feel united in a lineage of dogdom.

I managed to pick myself up last night and get drinks with l. We talked about women we find striking, Lily Rose and Jemima Kirke among them—I’m watching girls. We could stare at them for hours.

Today it rained and rained and I laid in bed a lot. After I dropped a drawer on my foot I limped all the way to molasses and carefully selected two books to spend my crumpled twenty-dollar bill on: kafka's the castle and my mother: demonology by kathy acker. Tax brought it to 21.50 but the person behind the counter accepted my bill so I thanked them and scurried out embarrassed by my lack and then my limp. 

I sat on the bench outside in the rain and felt my toe throb. I sat there for what felt like a while, trying to muster up the courage to go home or somewhere else, to at least get out of the rain. I boarded a bus, got a sandwich and an orange, went home and canceled my plans. 

I watched Buffalo 66 and Bad Timing where Christine Ricci and Theresa Russell respectfully possess a kind of sexuality that has little to do with how they look. Different kinds of course, Ricci’s is supple and comes from an earnestness, Russell’s burns and dissolves at the sides. 

This sexuality is something I've obviously been thinking about. And Jane Birkin, who’s sexuality both as a young and old person, came from her grace and poise and self-assuredness, of course died yesterday, and the times’ lede to her obituary read: Jane Birkin, who helped define chic female sexuality of the 1970s as an actress in arty and erotic European movies and in her relationship — equal parts romantic and artistic — with the singer Serge Gainsbourg, died on Sunday in Paris.

There seems to be some kind of collective horniness that’s exploding in the city. Men have been approaching me on the street, quite respectfully actually, to tell me how gorgeous I am and to get coffee with them. I don't pretend to have my finger on the pulse of anything. I’m not on tik tok, not that online, and I can hardly find the energy to type the words I write on paper with a #2 pencil to post on my blog (lol), but I and I think people other than me are drawn by carnal desire right now, perhaps because it's summer and hot and the proverbial pendulum is swinging after the sanitization of the pandemic and it's just a part of the ever-present nineties resurgence, but sex is hot again. Lily Rose and Sam Levinson know it. Karina Longworth, as evidenced by her podcast’s new focus, the erotic 90s, knows it. And I certainly do. 

resisting

When I was going to work last week the j train wasn’t running, which I learned on the platform—there was an apparent emergency on the bridge. I stood still for five valuable minutes, then ran down and boarded a citibike, rode to the nearest station that would get me to the L, and thus boarded the g. During the hour I was sprinting to work the station bustled with people and I had no idea where to go. Sweat dripped down my neck and I blindly followed signs, sometimes walking in circles that I couldn't afford according to the watch on my wrist. I felt hopeless a thousand times but finally a part of the bustle. I emailed my boss that I would be late and showed up 5 minutes early, feeling like I had passed a test. 

I feel like there's some sort of cohesion of thought around resistance, that if you encounter much of it you're going the wrong way. But this in my opinion is so ridiculous and, like, lazy. Perhaps this is the imprint of my father's blue collar but anything worth something is worth working hard for.

Weeks ago I picked up a pamphlet called “defending the zad,” which was a kind of manifesto written by people and farmers in France defending their land against governmental development. I picked it up because it was free and there’s a swath of land back home that was once a trail miles long to a body of water that’s currently being developed and sold for cheap and I’m nervous about the damage it will do. I've been reading it lately. The writers of the pamphlet have created through their resistance a kind of experimental zone called La zad.

They wrote: No one can pretend that they did not feel the fear and the doubts, the fragility that shuddered through us during those times. But then there's a moment where shared certainty emerges, that if there is the slightest chance, however infinitely small, to be able to influence the situation that we are living through, then we must grab it. That certainty enables us to overcome the sleepless nights, the thick mud, police projectiles and the damp. It's about keeping one's head high and accepting that resistance is always a gamble.

I worked a couple hours and was officially afforded the job. I boarded the 6 and transferred to the m. I sat down next to an older latina lady with a bunch of hydrangeas in her lap. I took out my headphones to say how beautiful they smelled and she offered me one. I resisted accepting but she insisted. The sprig was thick and the bush full and the petals white as a dole of doves. I accepted. We rode together over the bridge and beyond. I thanked her again and got off and decided to walk home instead of taking the bus. I stopped by a store to check the price of bread (five dollars, too much) and the man checking out told me how beautiful my hydrangeas were. He offered me a crepe out of a box wrapped in plastic. I accepted because I was starving and gave him a clipping of my sprig and walked away. I peeled the plastic open and took bites out of the crepe. It dangled in one hand, the hydrangea in another. I felt armed, like no one could touch me on account of other people's kindness. I walked past jazz playing outside of a cafe and little metal tables surrounding it. I thought to myself, this is what I work so hard for: these people together in this city, this shared certainty. This is what I get for passing the test. Like the nuzzle of a baby in the crook of your arm after it's spent all night crying. I realize new york and La zad almost stand at odds, but nevertheless: living in the city is hard, the challenges it poses are sometimes awful and humans living here are always resisting them (I don't know where I'm going to live in august), but I've come to hold the whole thing very very dear. 

I clipped the sprig, filled the empty modelo can that has sat on my dresser for weeks with water, and slipped it through the aluminum. 

It’s wilting now. I will press its pedals. 

beach entries (entrails)

earnest, enter at your own risk

7/7

It was perfect. We swam and sipped drinks and saw the sun set from the park. The air was warm and so was the water. Salt clung to our shoulders, little white flecks. Our drinking was jolly and slow. We ate dinner late. We shoveled vegetables and mustard onto keizer buns and ground beef patties and then the whole things into our mouths. I bummed a cigarette off of c and put it out before j came around. I smoked it fast as he puttered around the house, fluffing pillows and turning lights off. c admired my haste. she talked about all of her dear friends, so many of whom have died by drugs or cancer or are in abusive relationships. We sat with each other and loved each other until the shit storm blew through, at which point our drinking turned desperate. Desperate to tune out, escape, inspire the bells in our head to ring the world out. I went to my room and called someone and we talked until 5am. I had a question that I couldn’t ask but he knew what it was, and answered. 

This morning we went out to breakfast at a diner that’s been on the island for years. j explained how the owner used to be the dishwasher and now he’s retiring, so the place is going to close because no one wants to buy a diner for three mill. We sat in a warm booth that the sun beat on, drank cups and cups of coffee and ice cold water, and littered the table with plastic single-serving cups of cream. We waited hours for food, or what felt like hours. I drank four cups of hot coffee. Beads of sweat poured down our faces. I pressed the side of my water glass to my cheek. We were starving by the time our food got there. 

I ordered blueberry french toast and it came with three mounds of salted butter atop it. I dribbled maple syrup and spread the mounds around with a dull butter knife. The bread soaked up the syrup and butter and tasted eggy, the way I like it.

We hunched over our plates and ate fast and quiet, only taking breaks to sip our coffee and motion to our waiter for refills.

i and I went to the beach. We now remember why we always had the impulse to leave the house as girls: to escape the shitstorm’s debris. Now all of our earthly concerns have returned: how we are going to pay rent, work, live, and exactly where. 

7/8

I started to cry for the first time in a real way in a long time watching j sort shells. He had been out all night. From 6pm to midnight. We had no idea where he was. We were scared because [tmi] and it’s been bad lately and we love him. He’s steely and prickly and cares. Throughout this trip he’s been uncharacteristically sweet. He’s talked to me in a way he hasn’t during the twenty years I’ve known him. He’s been all over his girlfriend, who hates to see him in pain; affectionate toward his daughter, pushing the swing she plopped herself on as a twenty-two year old woman. I cried maybe because it feels like he’s about to die, my dad is about to die, we’re about to die. Because we are in mourning. I looked over his shoulder as he hunched over his shells that he came back with after being out all night. I felt like I should have been shorter, my voice higher, my age lower. I sat quietly next to him. His hands shook as he lifted them out of a colander, freshly rinsed, and placed them on the newspaper he reads every day. He answered every one of my questions. What’s this one made of. Who used this for what ritual. I cried because I wished things were different. Because my silly soft spot is silly sad men passionate over silly somethings. Because this man, whom I’ve known my whole life, is finally opening up to me. Because this day was hard. Because I love this ravaged family I have so much. Because I’m so lucky and so cursed. Because I wish I could share it, maybe for selfish reasons. Because I wish people could know our love and our pain. Because we are so beautiful beautiful beautiful. Because we hold the ocean so dear and care so much. I felt silly with my eyes wet the way they were. I said goodnight and went upstairs and started writing. I gave my bed to someone else because I didn’t want to sleep alone. I’ll sleep with i and d and most certainly not be alone.

7/10

I don’t remember falling asleep last night. I awoke at 4am with the light on and the door open. I walked around the empty house. The radio blared. The lights were on. I turned them off. I packed up my things. We leave at 8. I remember eating a small plate of food for dinner but I don’t remember what was on it. A turkey burger with cheese, no bun? With a roasted red pepper that I speared with a fork and yanked from a jar. I want to knock on i’s door and crawl into her bed and sleep together the way we used to. (She’s always been mom.) I would were it not for her boyfriend. Someone turned the lights back on downstairs—silly me. The shitstorm’s gone. I asked him for money. He said he didn’t have any and laughed: Happy birthday. 

I’m worried about finding a place to live, but everyone says it’ll work out. We stayed an extra day because we didn’t have anything to go back to and we weren't ready to leave maybe for good and this big house needs bodies in it.

I fell off my bike and scraped my leg. This made me feel even more like a kid, uncoordinated and too long for my own good. Except this time vodka had something to do with it. It was after happy hour. I was wearing only a long dress. I may have flashed everyone. We soaked in the bay afterward. I swam to the other side and back. Then it poured and we watched the rain soak the dock, the stones. It battered the bay. Thankfully no laundry hung on the line. It’s 5am, I texted i that I am up and nervous without a memory. This big house, with all its bodies in bed, doesn’t help my nerves. I feel little, and sort of wish I was. Then my tears would warrant someone waking up and taking me in their arms. Please please deliver me a pair of arms and a sweet song.

i came into my room at 5:30 and laid in bed with me and calmed my nerves. She filled in the blanks of my memory and talked about her mother. I listened.

7/11

When we left the island i hit the vape and started balling. I wrapped my arms around her through the seat that separated us. She wiped her tears and rested her head against the crook of my arm. I just don’t want this to be the last time. We’ve been coming here since we were six. We would come for memorial day, the fourth, and then labor day. Then just the fourth and labor day. Then just the fourth and sometimes, in the event of a pandemic, not at all. Life got in the way. But it’s still what we do and where we go. Things have transpired so her family might lose the house. It would be a death greater than any death I’ve ever experienced up to now.

Toms River

Yesterday I shaved my legs, quick. Packed up and boarded a bus to toms river, nj. There I sat for four hours because why not. Outside of a little colonial bus station that was more like a kiosk. I laid in the grass and read my book, the use of man. I read for hours about vindictive men and their urges until I looked up and three guys were around me. I shrugged them off. A bus driver motioned me over and told me to move, that area wasn’t safe. I thanked him. I had known the same thing, but I wasn’t going to move. I was too comfortable. Perhaps he knew that, nudged: come on. Don’t be stupid. (but he probably actually thought I was stupid, blonde, and naive.) I moved to the other side of the building and found a tree I could lean up against and not get rashes from the grass. Beetles landed on me. Another man addressed me by miss and warned me about ticks. I smiled and thanked him, though I’m very aware of ticks. 

I finished my book and it broke my heart. It concluded that memories are all we have, especially when things are awful. Memories of feeling and moments of connection and inexplicable bliss shared—that can be only confirmed by the glint in a person’s eye, their irregular heartbeat, telepathy. i and d picked me up from the bus station right after that. My skin was red from the grass and the sun.

We go to new jersey for the fourth every year and have since we were seven or something. 

i and I met when we were babies, and our mothers lived together when our parents split up when we were both three. Our dads have become platonic life partners, though they refer to themselves as buddies. I used to tell people i and I were sisters, and she’s still the closest thing I have to one; from what I’ve heard about sisters, that’s what we are. We picked out boys on the beach or on our street we thought were cute and made up names for them and plugged them into romances. We had matching toy mermaids, hers pink and mine blue. We fought ruthlessly, screamed and slammed doors in each other's faces. Then whispered what we dreamed about. Now we live far away from each other and have a snapchat streak to stay clued into each other's lives and know everything there is to know about each other.

We got to the house and hugged and kissed everyone and got to drinking. I looked at my toes and wished I had painted them beforehand. The red I painted on them weeks ago is grown out and dull. I cut them over a baby blue plastic trash can. I dove into the lagoon. i’s dad and his friend played guitar and made up songs. We took jello shots under a full moon.