1st page (diary entry)

23. january

Another new notebook begins already! And this morning my piece "The ground shook, they said" was published at Entropy.  And last night, with only 3 minutes remaining before the midnight deadline, i submitted a poetry manuscript to NYFA after getting a solidly bad (but nevertheless solid) practice in at Red Note all by myself. And all of this after having gone to an AA meeting and then out to lunch with Lacey and then coming clean about it to Brian the second i walked in the door. So, I mean, the last 24 hours have been pretty full is what I'm getting at and, though stressful at points, it feels good to be industriously pursuing the life I now what for myself, the outline of which gets clearer everyday. Lacey did me the good turn yesterday of reminding me what a wild state of transition I am in right now and that, though normal to want to start throwing everything out the window, it's important to move through this transition slowly and thoughtfully. Part of what I'm dealing with is breaking a habit of chaos, of treating everything as if it is an emergency. The truth is my house is not on fire. I am uncomfortable. Calm is unsettling. I'm looking for action because TAKING ACTION and having something to fix or deal with RIGHT NOW is how i was raised and how i achieved any sense of worthiness whatsoever. and NOT because i wanted it that way. This is the fall-out of being placed in the role of care-taker way too early in life.  This is the fall-out of a parent's alcoholism and the tragedy of injury and the pain of poverty and divorce.  The is the fall-out of so much atrocious loss too soon. And this is what I am now choosing to confront soberly and through the daily action of opening a notebook, sitting with a cup of coffee and an ink pen, and letting myself spill out. All the things that me me a messy drunk can still have their say, they're just going to say it here. These blue lines, not a barstool, not cocaine on a house-key. Here: this space. This expanse.  This is where I'm going to figure out who the fuck I actually am, and it starts with dealing with all the childhood shit I no longer want to think about.

I pulled a photograph of myself when i was 14 years old from my shoebox of family photos that lives under the bed. I came across it while looking for a photo of my mom the other day and felt a call to rescue this young, sweet girl from the chaos of images she was weighted down by. In the photo, I am sitting on the living-room floor against the jamb of the side door. I am wearing the boots Steve Finley bullied me over. My knees are drawn up to my chest and my elbows are jammed into my lap. My hands cover my face.  My head bowed into my hands, believing myself to be ugly and painfully un-photogenic, I was attempting to thwart my mother's request to capture me on film.


"But you look so beautiful right now..." she coaxed.

"God, Mom, NO!"

I don't think she realized i was trying not to cry. I was not only hiding my face, but its display of unwanted emotion; the undeniable expression of my own wild insecurity.

I look at this photo and remember the moment so well, remember freezing into position and stubbornly waiting my mother out.  I remember the horrible silence of her waiting and wanting, then the thin, spare click of her camera's shutter when she finally gave up. I peeked out through the tiny slivers of light that pressed through my fingers - a child during the a scary part of a movie - as I felt the soft tremble of the living-room floor as she stood from where she'd been kneeling a few feet in front of me. I remember the sweep of my deep insecurity and my desire to be loved... the belong somewhere, with someone... to be beautiful and not hurt.

Many of those hard teenage frailties are alive in me still. I understand the girl in the photograph so well.

My mother's much loved drawing of a young boy and girl - a brother and a sister - the one my grandfather ached to see again, hangs above me in the photograph. Her. Me.

I am keeping the photograph near me this week. I am giving that girl some air and much needed soft attention. She felt (feels) such an incredible degree of shame and just wants to be able to be herself.  She wants so badly to be loved for being who she is but has so little idea of who that might be.  She hides so much of the time. Always a fire, always an emergency, always someone else's needs to put first.

I've set her photograph next to The Animal archetype card. I'm gonna let these two hang out together for a bit... see what happens.  It was around the time this photo was taken that some serious magic seemed to be following me around.  I wanted desperately to be a singer but was too shy with too frail an ego to share this desire with anyone else.  I sang in secret. And I hid my secret well.  I couldn't bear the thought of being compared to my mother and judged against her undeniable ability.  She was the singer of the family.  And so I hid my call.  And I hid myself in notebooks.  And I hid those notebooks under my bed, shoved deep below the mess that was also hidden there.  I lay awake at night dreaming of singing my heart out on a stage - reckoning with and expressing my pain and loneliness, my unmet need to be loved, need to be understood, and using my voice to achieve a sense of connection and belonging I utterly lacked. Rather than sing, I wrote, save for when I was remarkably alone and without threat of anyone coming home. I tucked myself away into notebooks, scribbling my own adolescent poetry, crying when no one was looking.


We have band practice tonight at 9pm.  I have 2 guitars of my own. I have a little harmonica in my tote-bag and a notebook under my hand.  What can I offer that young girl today? What can I say to her?  What gift can I give?


One day you'll get out of that awful fucking town, Angela. One day you'll roll out of the top bunk in a Berlin hostel and spend the entire morning and afternoon and evening scribbling in your notebook on a picnic bench that's been hauled onto the roof of a boat. One day you'll roll out of bed in your own New York City flat, stumble into the kitchen to make coffee, and then stumble into your own studio to sit down at your own desk to scribble in your notebook for as long as you need or please. One day you'll be far away from the pain that plagues you now. One day you'll feel so appreciated and respected by other artists and writers. One day you'll sing on stage at Lady Stardust at A2 in the Lower East Side and, afterward, a woman you don't know will come up to you and say, "You have an amazing voice." One day it won't be so scary to trust others with your heart or your talents and you won't have to hide them anymore. One day you will feel safe displaying your real self.  You are not ugly, sweet girl.  Not nearly.  You are so incredibly pretty. Sweet and endearing and absolutely lovable. There is no reason for you to be ashamed.