the big kitchen table.


you know what i want?

one of those ridiculously, unbelievably, alarmingly large kitchen tables--the kind that are long and thick and made from recycled, imperfect wood.

i want that kind of table that if need be (and why wouldn't need be?)  could host a party of twenty.  let it be big as a ship, middle of the kitchen, steering our home life through the tempestuous waters of this deliriously juicy life.

let it be covered in papers. let those papers be stained by coffee and tea. let them be slips of words i've yet to collect, half-formed ideas--fragments of scribble on white that you found i've left behind in the bathroom, the bedroom, by the table under the stairs.

let it be messy. our mess. let our mess sing. let it thrum the beat of the daily grind and subsequent salve.

let the table house stacks of things that must be read and marked up--things we'll know the words to by day's end. let those things be the marrow of our work. let those things be reminders of all that we love and that which we still foolishly believe might change the world--or our little corner of it, at least.

let the table see dinner party after dinner party. quiet ones, raucous ones, ones for just us two. let it be where we feed the ones we love. where we build the life we love. let it anchor us to a place and to each other and to hard work and late nights and lots of wine and the following morning with its warm, pooling lattes.




i don't want a life that's perfect. where every day is good. where happiness never falters and gives way to longing or loneliness or pain. that doesn't interest me. why try and hide what makes us human? show me that. give me that. offer up your humanity, your fault-line of divinity, and i will spend each day forging forward into that land where language has no meaning. to that place beyond words where we find and love  each other wholly and simply.




image.

this morning.

in going through last year's posts to come up with some sort of year-end review there was a thing that became alarmingly clear.

i hadn't written much--i couldn't find the words to accurately chart what a compelling year it was for me. where were those posts i was sure i had written?

i've become a lazy writer. i'll cop to that. not that i've ever been terribly disciplined. but as of late...well, it's been harder to get the words out. and the fear of that reality has kept me from even trying.

so i woke this morning, determined.

i sat down, pounded some very poor words onto paper.

gave up halfway through and pulled out a book instead.




reading is imperative for writers. {that was my excuse this morning}.

my manhattan: the wreaths are still up, but the resolutions are resolving and revolving.

stoop

still a bag lady

pop up stand

georgio's

chelsea market coffee

lost

it's that sacred time in new york when the decorations are scattered, the trees are finding their way once more to the sidewalk, but everything feels possible with the start of a fresh year and the blistering wind sweeping in off the river.

i'm feeling the newness of this year more than usual. so i put on heels today, have taken to drinking tea when i can--you see i am trying to live as the person i've always wanted to be.

but the thing is: i'm still half-way to a bag-lady. and i still lose things. all the time i'm having just lost my keys or my sunglasses or my metro card, and there i am stooping on the sidewalk so as to empty the contents of my many bags in search of the thing which i haven't really lost, but hell if i can find it.

some things never change. new year or not.

i think i'll look back on 2011 as the year i was made bold by a love of music and the weight of a camera against my chest:

noah&thewhale

beirut2

beirut1

johnny flynn 6




these are the songs that will tell the story of this year. these are the songs i carry in me. these are the songs that will remind me of my first-ever-concert in boston, the long cab-ride to brooklyn, how music marks time and makes circles, of all the things i learned in chicago this summer.

i will remember what song i was listening to when i took the subway downtown to face my greatest fear, my greatest love, to mark the passage of could-have-been lives.

it will be the beginning of the soundtrack for when i finally get around to making my own cameron crowe coming of age film.

this past year was magic. heartbreaking and difficult and monumental and heaven-sent in so many ways. i may not yet have the words to adequately sum it all up, and my photos may not do it justice, so until i take the time to hash it all out, i offer up these melodies...