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Seems like there are people who want to boo the Nevilles off the stage or not see them at all since they weren’t back for the first two after Katrina – I’ve learned from watching how my five siblings handled the death of my father in 1985, not everyone grieves the same or over the same time period. It seems Aaron had his hands full with his wife’s cancer and his asthma. Seems Art had back surgery. Seems like everyone could just pipe down and be glad they are back and call it a day.

Here was my daily affirmation – I’m sending it out to New Orleans:

November 16, 2007

I release negativity. I am now set free to live a glorious life!

Flower says I overchippered and now that is why I am suffering a setback – my cold has gotten worse. No two ways about it. So I am laying low – real low – because I feel so low. I’ve gone through two boxes of Kleenex and so has Loca. She steals them out of the trash and rips them to shreds all over the carpet. Why I oughta….

But seriously – being sick sucks. I can’t breathe. I can’t call my sources because I sound like a ventriloquist. I can’t think because my mind is mush. So I sit at my computer in a relative stupor feeling sorry for myself.

There is nothing worse than a sick Rachel – I can’t jump and sing and move in fifty directions – I can only slug along, and blow my nose every five minutes and watch Loca steal the Kleenex out of the trash.

November 15, 2007

I joyfully answer my soul’s call! I open up to a new idea of myself!

That is my daily affirmation this morning and it seems so, I don’t know, joyous, exuberant, la di da! But this morning didn’t start like that. Forget about that certain someone who thinks (knows) her husband is cheating on her while he works at a job in Texas, that is honest to goodness jealousy.

I was jealous this morning when my friend S told me that his #1 on his dating list was moving into a more secured position. Feeling sickly and a lighter shade of pale than normal, I thought as I walked around the bayou to get Coldeez from him that his time might suddenly be absorbed and he might not be in my life and, and, and what? He says he’s flattered I’m jealous – blech – doesn’t make me feel any better.

Wikipedia says that jealousy typically refers to the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that occur when a person believes a valued relationship is being threatened by a rival. This rival may or may not know that he or she is perceived as a threat.

The opposite of jealousy is compersion. Who ever heard of this word – compersion? Again, Wikipedia says compersion is a term used by practitioners of polyamory or swingers to describe the experience of taking pleasure when one’s partner is with another person. Good god – that would not be me – in my quest to have it all, to want it all, I DO NOT WANT COMPERSION. Just so you know.

Whew, I feel better now.

That someone who thinks her husband is cheating just called me to say that I made her feel better yesterday by saying if she loves him, she can forgive him, because it’s probably only sex. She’s going to operate her own stealth sting and go sit outside his apartment and see if she can catch him. I said, be careful for goodness sakes – people do stupid things when they are jealous and angry.

But most of all, I told her, “be strong.”

Now was I right or what? Even in being completely a hard ass, she took the one glint of optimism I gave her and decided that is what I said to her yesterday. God help her and me.

Someone called me yesterday and said she needed to talk. She suspects her husband is cheating on her. Her husband has been working in Texas and coming home on weekends. When he comes home, they fight. They have an adolescent son. My response was not sympathetic, and I regret it. She said to me “I think he is seeing someone else and I need your help.” I said, “You want a divorce because I’ve had three and can help you.” Then she said, “I don’t know what I want.” And I said, “Well you’ve been miserable with him for the past few years and he is gone most of the time so I’m not surprised he is seeing someone else. But more than likely it is just for sex.” She said, “Yes, that must be it. Men need sex more than women.”

Then I knew that she was delusional. She doesn’t want to lose him. She took the small crumb I gave her of positive news and turned that into the answer to her problem.

Let’s set the record straight – men don’t want sex more than women do and a woman in love will believe anything.

A friend describes this exchange to me – backstory: the people in question are ex-lovers:

Man getting in car in front of house on his way to work. Sees woman rounding corner with dog. Woman trips on loose brick framing his front yard.

Woman: “You better put that back in there or someone is going to sue you.”
Man: “Are you going to sue me?”
Woman: “No, you’re already unhappy enough.”

People are uncomfortable with incongruousness.

I was speaking to a neighbor about a mutual friend’s parents, who I didn’t get a chance to meet because I was sick and they are leaving tomorrow. I asked, “What are they like?” – my neighbor replied, “Midwesterners, white bread, nice.” I said, “Oh. I wish I could describe my family in a similar fashion. Instead, I was speaking to someone the other day when my brother called and I said, ‘I’ve got to take this, it’s my brother calling from prison.'”

I thought about this again as I crossed over the Magnolia Bridge tonight with the dogs and saw the Buddhist prayer flags strewn from one end to the other flapping in the gentle breeze. When the KVille production people were here filming they took down the flags. I reckon you think New Orleans, you don’t think Buddhist prayer flags. But I like those flags and I know who sneaks them up there.

I look like an Irish Catholic – but I am a Spanish Jew.

I know someone whose physical self is young, but whose mind is old.

There are lots of things in this world that don’t quite match up – that are incongruous. I’d like to write a book about such incongruousness – about a woman who has flashes of brilliance but is a fuck up, who loves profoundly, but can’t stay focused, who moves through life at lightning pace just trying to be still, who thinks God tapped her on the shoulder but feels guilty she’s so lucky, who had small dreams but real life exceeded her fantasies – I’d like to try to describe that incongruousness.

I hate being sick.

My friend complains to me today that her husband wants to have sex all the time.

This is a problem? I ask.

This morning coming back from my walk – my mind still feeling like a bowl of jello from 24 hours laid up – I spied a small jade elephant that someone left on my front brick wall. Hmmm.