The year before embarking on this journey, I felt the weight of being human collapsing inside of me. For the first time in my life, I didn’t know if I had the stamina to pull through.  When I thought of the possibility of dying, it felt like a mercy. I realized then that I wasn’t afraid of dying at all. It was life I had grown afraid of, with all of its dark surprises, uncertainties, contradictions, and seemingly endless obstacles. A feeling of simply being done washed over me. It wasn’t an altogether unhappy feeling. I had, I felt, managed to live many lives inside of this one shell.  I’d worn all the collar colors, loved and lost, loved until my heart couldn’t have been bigger, celebrated a few joys, and faced a number of extraordinary challenges with as much optimism as I could muster. That’s not to say I handled everything well, or as well as others might have, but I did have the belief that it was better to bend toward ideals rather than let myself fall into the mire of hopelessness.

I stoked my hopes, even when other people told me they were impossible. Child abuse, molestation, rapes, an abbreviated education, single parenthood, poverty, and an excess of toxic circumstances and people could have led me down many paths, but I became a writer. Not one that’s well known, or able to sustain herself on words alone, but still. . .I didn’t become a total stereotype. I took a sideways kind of pride in that: in knowing that no matter how grim the reality was — no matter how empty the cupboards, or dead-end the paychecks were — I could still write stories that mattered to someone, somewhere.  Through those stories, I could stoke my hopes, express my ideals and, when necessary, scream out my pain and frustration.

Of course, there were criticisms. Not only of my circumstances and some choices I made, but of my insistence on becoming a writer, not just someone with a hobby. It was, according to some friends and family, an out of reach dream, a dying art, and an impractical dream for someone “like me”.  Even among those who were not as gloom and doom, there were criticisms.  Some people didn’t like when I wrote about the harsher truths that helped create who I am. They felt like it was somehow separatist, or a way to make myself seem “special”. Others felt that stories of challenged lives long ago became cliché, and that my purpose would be better served by telling the story of a woman who “got over it” and found the happy high road to self-fulfillment. They liked the happy ending of a fairly well rounded woman, but felt like more polish and shine needed to be added to the beginning and middle. They preferred when I wrote about Elephant Girls and not Straw Sanctuaries, no matter that both stem from the same place inside of me – a place that’s not limited to only one set of facts, emotions, thoughts, or consequences.

In the balance, I have overcome some long odds and succumbed to others.  I’ve been the “strong woman” as well as the one who just couldn’t seem to pull it all together. I’ve been bold, fought battles, and taken risks, but I’ve also spent a lot of time trying to find relief from a world that often felt, to me, nonsensical, driven by habit, and destructive. In the last decade, I’ve found myself more and more drawn to bare bones simplicity – to living a plain and spare life as far away from the noise and the crowds as possible.

However, this trip was precipitated by an overwhelming sense of too much. This didn’t come from my challenged past, but a feeling of being overfull in the present– of having visited the same table too many times, and having the last few times feel toxic. My body was shot after a long illness, my nerves were frayed, 47 years of searching for a sense of place had grown exhausting, and I didn’t see anything new, energizing, or particularly hopeful on the horizon.  And although I had conquered so many fears before, I felt myself becoming timid in a visceral, heart-racing, mind-numbing sort of way. My confidence was gone. My steadfast belief that living by ideals made them more possible was fractured. All that I once felt deeply connected to seemed irreparably broken or out of reach. I wondered if I hadn’t spent the better part of my life chasing after things that really didn’t exist, or that couldn’t exist in the world outside of my imagination. I wondered if I had it in me to write another story, or if any of the stories I had left would be worth telling.

It may disappoint some people to learn that this journey was not the enlightening, eye-opening, bright hope bringing, soul-fulfilling answer I went searching for. It wasn’t Eat, Pray, Love. There have been no easy answers, and there’s no snap-on happy ending.

What there has been is a new layer of life, with all of its amazing potential, messy complications, evolutionary pains, tender connections, searing disappointments, soul-tearing struggles, beautiful memories, and challenged ideals. There have been feelings of alienation and of being misunderstood – but also of being invited in, warmly greeted, and gently, unselfishly supported. I’ve made new friends, let go of others, and been let go of. There have been surprising swells of love, crushing blows, fits of laughter, bursts of hope, and days spent in tears.

And I don’t know how, but the weight of this new layer, which isn’t really that different from all the rest, has fallen on me like a blanket rather than like a sinking anchor.

I did not find the America I went searching for. I did not find the abundant opportunities, the idyllic circumstances, the solid ground, the perfect answers, the strokes of life-changing luck, or the sense of home or belonging that I’ve always craved.

I did find my way back to my own off-center self, and gathered an abundance of support from people who were warm and full of hope for me, even when my own hopes were strained.

America is not always a kind or forgiving place. It can be irrational, senseless, and sometimes brutal. Hard work and talent doesn’t often get you as far as family connections, a pretty face, or a suspension of ethics — but sometimes it does. People can be unkind, messed-up, rigid, judgmental, and fighting their own demons — but sometimes they can pluck hope and love from their own hearts and share it in unexpectedly touching ways.  Intentional cruelty and incredible greed exist, and often go unnoticed or unexamined — but there’s also a lot of innocence, compassion, and generosity to be found.

I needed, I think more than anything else, to know these things. My world had grown small, and there was not enough diversity in its confines. I wanted to break out of my own weary fears and see if the ideals I learned in childhood books, as well as the ones I created on my own, existed in any tangible way outside of the 800 square feet I inhabited, and the small town I felt I knew too well.

They did. And they didn’t.  Nothing comes easy, except the questions. I’ve learned that, for me, the answers may never be complete, or at least not completely satisfying.

Nature made me curious and early circumstances made mysteries, especially the human kind, almost intolerable to me.  I know now that no matter how I spend the rest of my days – whether I continue to travel, or return to a life similar to the one I had before, or keep searching for the kind of sanctuary I’ve always wanted – I’ll never stop exploring the terrible, beautiful, wounding, uplifting territory of being human.

This coming Wednesday, I’ll be joining Karen Monroy, Marcia Reynolds, and our host Ana Lewis for another broadcast of “Living the Dream” on Blogtalk radio. (If you’d like to hear the first show, you can download it here. The download version includes an interesting 15 minute exchange that wasn’t heard on-air).

Ana sent me an email this week asking me to come up with a single word that indicates what my focus will be for the rest of the year. So far, all the words that have come to mind feel incomplete. It’s likely because I rarely think in terms of months or years anymore, but in days.

The first word I thought of was drive, which is kind of funny because I won’t have a car when this journey ends in 23 days, and the alternate meaning – as in driving ambition – doesn’t resonate with me at all. I’m not ambitious in the typical sense of the word. I don’t aspire to pots of gold but to a sense of peace, mostly within myself, but also in my environment and with other people. In many ways, I think I’ve floated between Maslow’s first three tiers in the hierarchy of human needs, without ever knowing any of them to be stable, or something that could easily be taken away by a slight change in circumstance or by the actions of other people. My pyramid doesn’t place as high of a value on self-actualization as it does on simple peace. I believe that peace, even more than food, is essential to my spirit.

To drive, though, also means to be in control. In the process of writing lately, I’ve had to revisit how much advice I’ve taken over the years, how many messages I’ve let sink in, and how many words I believed that later turned out to be untrue. There are people who believe that I am stubborn and full of strong convictions, and maybe that’s part of me, (and certainly some convictions have grown stronger with experience), but there’s a bigger other part of me that’s remained perpetually naive, often to my own detriment. The Counting Crows have a song called Mr. Jones and Me, with the lyric “Believe in me, help me believe in anything, I want to be someone who believes”.  There’s no one line that sums up 48 years of my emotional life better. I’ve wanted so badly to believe in some things at times that I suspended disbelief, and hung all my hopes on the fantastical, elusive power of imagination and once-in-a-blue-moon miracles.

Maybe I have to learn to be as good of an emotional driver as a I am a driver of automobiles. Be on the defensive more, slow down, look both ways and then once more, proceed with caution, be more aware of what other people are doing on the road.

Speaking of driving, I sometimes wish my thoughts would yield to a Stop sign. I analyze too much. I think too much. Everything in me that loves simplicity fights against this kind of laborious, painstaking search for rationality, and there’s a huge part of me that envies those who, by nature or habit, can really let things roll off their back. I am a sponge that sometimes envies the bricks. Sometimes I wish I were a brick. I wish I could be hard like that, and weather all the storms without letting them fill me up.

The word disconnect also comes to mind. I’ll be returning my internet equipment and spare Blackberry to Verizon soon, and I’ll be giving up my primary cell phone in August in order to spare myself any extra expenses while I’m writing my book. I won’t be blogging, and I will be disconnected, at least for a time, from my online friends and acquaintances. Hopefully, when the book is done, they’ll still be interested in reading it, but I know there are no guarantees. The important thing is to finish first, worry later.

I don’t know what word I’ll come up with for the radio show. I’m kind of in a funk right now, not because it’s not time to end the road trip but because, along with the good experiences I’ve had, I’m grappling with a few harsh lessons I’ve (re)learned in the past few months, and I’m not sure they are lessons worth imparting. I don’t know if the full story in my heart will find it’s way to paper. I’m scared that I’m not up to that kind of bruising, delicate challenge. And I’m afraid because I’m going into the world again every bit as naked as I was at sixteen. I’m not afraid to be naked. I’m only fearful, (often), of everything else. I’m also brave, I know, and full of stubborn conviction, including the (maybe naive) belief that I can write a book worth reading.

I’m packing now and getting ready to hit the road again tomorrow. I’ll be visiting New Mexico again as one of my last destinations. It will take me a few days to get there. Maybe in the meantime I’ll come up with a word. And a way to steel my courage.

The words we speak to each other are not empty. Speech is an action. It fills the silence, fills in the blanks, and connects the lines between thoughts and responses.

Words can bring us closer to understanding each other or they can cause distance and disconnection. They can be a joyful affirmation or an unpleasant surprise.

“They’re only words”, but sometimes words are everything. They can show (not just tell of) our lives, our spirits, our intentions, and our most tender and vulnerable selves.

Our words are our questions, about others and about ourselves. They are our answers, our lifeline, our courage, our confidences, and one of our most powerful expressions of thoughts and feelings.

Writers are often told to “show, don’t tell”. Words can do both, of course, but even in the telling they show so many things: knowledge, intent, feeling, philosophy, conscientiousness, and care, for example. Even the word “telling” has a double meaning.

tell·ing
adj.
1. Having force and producing a striking effect.
2. Revealing previously unknown information.
3. Having a marked effect or impact. a telling blow
4. Revealing. a telling smile

I can tell you of my belief that words are actions, and you might even agree (or not), but to drive my point home I might show you some of the ways in which words had a tangible affect.

I might, but I know that most of my readers already understand — words hurt. Words comfort. Words can strike out, lift up, provoke, encourage, enrage, celebrate, defend, and demonstrate.

Your words and mine. Ours together and separately. Those we say out loud and those we whisper in secret.

They’re only words, but they’re not. They are sometimes everything, including what remains thought of but unspoken.

I’m getting ready to write a book. Thousands of words are gathering around me. I’m immersed in words — those I’ve heard, those I’ve spoken, and those that have been kept still and silent, waiting to be told. I don’t know if this purposeful drowning will have the happy ending of being sold and read. I do know that I’ll pour everything I’ve got into making it a story with a conscience.

After an extended stay at a Holiday Inn, Lucy and I took to the streets for our next adventure, which isn’t really that adventurous at all. We got a house-sitting gig that will fill the gas tank up a few more times, give me some time to work on my book, and create an ART (After the Road Trip) plan.

This morning, we’re squirreled away in a Midwest location. Lucy is resting up in a nice, cool garage and I’m having a free Continental breakfast that won’t incur the wrath of the Inn’s black-shirted egg guards.

Lucy and I are at something of a stand off after yesterday’s long drive, though. She’s still speaking to me, but barely, and there’s a chill to her leather seats that feels like disenchantment.

Our road trip here started off well enough.  The Michigan sky was bright and cloudless and traffic was light, even through the construction zones.  Lucy had her sunroof open and was cranking out happy music from XM’s Soultown radio station.

“This is Aretha Franklin, and you’re listening to Soouull-Town”. Lucy didn’t seem to mind when I parroted the promo phrase and then sang along with Smoky Robinson’s Tears of a Clown. She seemed content to be gliding along I-75, her V6 engine purring as she passed lesser, slower cars. My 2010 Chevy Malibu has really turned out to be quite the ride — she’s solid, stylish, and exceptionally comfortable.

To show my appreciation, I pulled off at an exit to take Lucy to a car wash. I bought her the full service treatment, including vacuuming, dashboard dusting, and a light spray of new car scent. She seemed to like the attention she got from the teenage girls who were making her shine. They ooh-ed and ahh-ed over her dual DVD players, leather seats, and Bose sound system. I let them change the station to hip-hop while they worked, and I sat on a nearby bench scribbling things that felt urgent on the back of a hotel receipt. After I wrote those things down, they didn’t feel urgent at all anymore, just jumbled, so I crumpled the paper and threw it in the trash along with an empty coffee cup.

When the girls were done with Lucy, I threw a tip into their jar and set the station to Bluesville, B.B. King’s XM station. I made my way to Starbucks for a fresh cup of coffee, and then returned to the highway. I wasn’t really paying that much attention to Lucy. I was lost in my own thoughts and wondering if what I’d written on the hotel receipt would ever make sense to anyone, including me.

Somewhere between Etta James telling me not to lose my good thing and Otis Redding and Carla Thomas battling over whether he was a tramp or a lover, I noticed that Lucy was giving me the cold shoulder.

“Is the air conditioning too high? Here, I’ll turn it down.”  I turned the air off, but Lucy remained tight-lipped, keeping her headlights firmly on the road.  I checked my gauges – the cruise control was set to the speed limit, the gas tank was full, the tires were properly inflated, I was getting an average of 24.8 miles to the gallon, and the temp was normal.

“Well, what is it?” I asked. “Would you just tell me so I don’t have to guess?”

“Oh, I think you know,” she said after a chilly pause.

“I really don’t,” I begged. “Would you at least give me a clue?”

“Okay, here’s one. Check your odometer. Do you see how many miles you’ve put on me?”

“Sure. . .it hasn’t been that many.”

“And you don’t see the problem with that?”

“What? No. I’d think you’d be happy. . .”.

“Happy? Happy??? You took the Camaros all over California! You took the Equinox to the Oregon coast and to Moab, Utah! And let’s not even talk about where you took the Buick LaCrosse, the Silverado, and then the Cadillac CTS – oh, let’s not even talk about how many miles you put on the precious Cadillac!”

“Oh my god, Lucy. . .you mean you’re jealous?”

“I mean you disappointment me, Jane Devin! We were supposed to go places together! I was supposed to see the ocean in Maine and the monuments in Washington, DC.  Remember all those plans you had for upstate New York and New Hamphshire?”

“I’m sorry, Luce. It’s not personal – you’re a great car, truly, one of the most comfortable and beautifully economical I’ve driven. It’s just that, well, life sometimes has a way of interfering with other plans. I’ve got to find a way to earn some money. I’ve got books that are ready to write. And I really don’t know what I’m going to do when this road trip ends, but I know that I don’t have much time left to figure everything out.”

“You were supposed to take me to the ocean, Jane.”

“I know, Lucy, and I’m sorry. I don’t know what else I can say.”

“You were going to be my ticket out of the media fleet for awhile. You know how rough some of those guys are with cars, don’t you? They don’t keep Armor-All wipes in the glove compartment. They’ve been known to leave mud on my carpets and crumbs on my seats.”

“I’m sorry, Lucy. We’ll have each other until August 9^th though, and I promise I’ll take you to a couple of really great places before than – places I never took the Cadillac.”

“Hmmph.”

“No, seriously, I will. And I’ll take some really great photos that will show off your awesome interior as well as your solidly designed exterior. You’ll be the envy of Ford Fusion owners everywhere.”

“And Honda Civic owners, and Toyota Camry owners?”

“Of course, them too. What do you say? You want to make some memories together?”

“But first a week in a garage?”

“Actually, about ten days. . .”.

“You never parked the Cadillac for longer than a day.”

“I spilled coffee in the Cadillac. Did I ever tell you that? And when I handed her in, there was a bit of a bird mess on her front window. I’d never let that happen to you, Luce.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

Despite my best efforts to assure her that her tires would soon be rolling down another long stretch of interstate, Lucy remains disappointed. She really wanted to climb the winding roads of the Maine coastline. So did I, but a ten-month long adventure is better than no adventure at all, and I’m happy to be able to make it as long as August. The Finding My America road trip will end then, but the rest of the story will be just beginning.

Several people have asked about the books I’m working on in-between travels, job searches, and posts. There are two. The first , “I Know How You Feel”, is a collection of twelve stories about women in various stages of crisis. The second, “One Happy Year”,  is a memoir which combines the story of this trip with reflections from the past. I’ll likely self-publish the story collection, but will be looking for an agent for the other. The following is an excerpt from one of the chapters in OHY. Please feel free to let me know your thoughts.

I met John at 16. I was living on my own, in a rundown studio apartment in Sunnyvale, CA, which had a daybed covered in brown plaid, faded orange carpet, and aqua-colored appliances. I worked temp jobs in factories to pay my $350 monthly rent, and spent whatever was left on bus fare, convenience store food, and cigarettes. I was high-strung and skinny – constantly fearful that someone would find out my real age and send me back to the hell I left.

I don’t think I’ve ever spoken as much or as loudly as I did then. I wanted to meet everyone, from the waitresses at Denny’s to the teenagers on the bus. The world felt new to me – I was unprepared for most of it and excited about the rest. It often felt like there were secrets I didn’t know, and that if I pressed people hard enough they’d let them spill. I’d learn how to put on makeup, stretch a paycheck, go to college, and buy a car.

Despite my desperate outgoingness, I made few friends. Bob & Jack were a drug-addicted couple who lived in the apartment complex next door. A few days after we met, they spiked my Coke with something that left me curled up on my floor in a rigid ball, afraid to move because I was convinced that men with machine guns were outside of my window. If I moved they’d shoot me, so I had to pretend I was dead. When I finally screwed up the courage to unfurl myself – and it probably wasn’t courage as much as it was physical pain – there were no machine guns but there was a cartoon. Everything from the trees to people looked overly bright and animated. Rocks moved and sidewalks rolled. My own hands felt disconnected, like feathers that might blow away if I did not keep them in my pockets. Bob and Jack thought it was funny; I did not. We remained friends, but I never ate or drank anything with them after that.

Debbie was a skinny, freckled, 19 year-old redhead who lived next door. She was fond of wearing bright purple pants or red Ditto jeans tucked into knee-high black boots. She chain-smoked camels, drank a six-pack of Tab every day, and had an elaborate process of putting on mascara which involved a heated needle, an eyelash curler, a magnification mirror, and a pink tube of Great Lash. At night, when she was getting ready to go to the clubs, I’d sit in her smoky apartment, flip through her collection of Cosmo magazines, and listen to her versions of Ten Ways to Keep Your Man Happy or The Things He’d Never Tell You that Really Turn Him On.

Ted was a Vietnam vet who lived in the back of the complex. His apartment was full of guns and homemade bongs. He scared me, but he had a bicycle that he’d let me borrow if he was awake and in a good mood. Most often, though, his curtains were drawn and my knocks went unanswered.

I first saw John on a rainy spring morning. I read a lot of self-help books in those days, and it seems to me that I was probably reading one then, and had set it down to absorb some message about how to be, act, or think in order to fit into the world with some sense of belonging. At 16, I saw the suburbs, with their manicured lawns and storybook windows as some sort of sorority that one could only join by consensus, and I worried that I would never pass muster. It didn’t matter that I spent years of my own childhood in a tri-level house with evergreen shrubs and rose bushes in the front yard. That was a different kind of club. It was dark and violent, and shrouded in lies that the Others – the people who really belonged there – could never know.

I wanted nothing more at the time than to untangle the lies – to be the kind of person my parents were incapable of being: open and free, without the burden of carefully crafted facades that left me anxious and constantly scurrying to hide the truth. I wanted to be my own person, but not the one my parents had raised to feel unacceptable, outside, and irrelevant. I didn’t really know what other kind of person I could be, so I read books and explored a world full of characters and personalities, hoping that I’d find something or someone that would act as a beacon.

John was not a beacon; he was just a man who looked like he might be. He had locks of curly hair and a trimmed, red beard. He wore a faded flannel shirt with rolled up sleeves and moccasin boots. He was short but strong looking, and there was something appealing about his unhurried walk. I watched him from my window for what seemed like ten minutes. Eventually, he rounded the corner to the back of the building and I did what any 16 year-old girl loaded up with self-help bromides would do – I threw on my shoes and went to chase after my vision.

The buffet table in the hallway was filled with steam pans of scrambled eggs, sausage, and breakfast potatoes. There was also a big bowl of fruit and a plate filled with Danish pastry that looked inviting.  I rarely manage to make it to any of the complimentary breakfasts offered by hotels, not because I don’t get up early enough but because I usually wake up and start writing and/or looking for jobs. I’m also usually dressed in something not suitable for public viewing, like oversized sweat pants and a wrinkled hoodie.

Anyway, yesterday morning I had a dental appointment so I set aside my morning routine, took a handful of Motrin, put on some passable clothes, and attempted to cash in my free breakfast coupon. No one was around except for some missionary kids in the halls, many whom were wearing oversized crosses, or t-shirts letting other people know that they were WARRIORS FOR CHRIST. I assume the kids arrived in the old white buses that line the parking lot, which advertised the name of a Baptist church in faded brown paint.  Most of the warriors were cute, fresh-faced teens. I wondered how many of them sincerely feel called to duty and how many might be like one of my friends, who joined a Christian music group at 16 just so she could escape her parents for awhile.

I took a plate from the table and chose my morning fare – a spoonful of eggs, some potatoes, and a pear. Suddenly, two men dressed in black appeared. The older one, “Nico” according to his name badge, started exclaiming to me in a foreign accent that, “This is not breakfast! This is not the breakfast!”  Confused, I looked at my plate and then back at him.

“No!” he repeated, “This is not breakfast!”
I stared back dumbly.
“Your breakfast is not here!”
“Um, I don’t understand?”
“Not yours! Yours is over there.”

Nico pointed to the bar, and I began to understand that I may have just hustled into a buffet meant for the missionary kids.

“Well, okay,” I said. “What do want me to do?”

Nico paused for a moment, as if he were deciding whether to call the cops.“You have to eat here,” he finally said, “not there.”

I looked around here, which was nothing but a hallway. All the chairs in the lobby were filled with kids, none of whom were eating. There was no place to sit, and it was becoming clear to me that I couldn’t take the plate back up to my room.

“I don’t understand.”

Nico sighed with exasperation. “This. Is. NOT. The. Breakfast!”

We were getting nowhere fast, so I walked to the garbage can and emptied my plate. Nico shouted at me then. “No, no! You don’t have to waste!” But the breakfast was already gone, and my sense of embarrassment had stalled my appetite anyway.

I made my way to the elevator where a group of missionary kids were exiting. They were giggling and full of good cheer. “God bless you!” said one spunky girl in a bright pink and silver glitter top. At that moment, I envied her youth and her perfect rows of straight white teeth. My own teeth were throbbing. I knew the dentist wasn’t going to have good news for me, and that bad news was going to cost more than I could afford. Dentists cost more than God.

Oh well, at least there’s free breakfast. Somewhere. Just not here.

She walks with a certain gait. She knows where she is going, and she smiles the whole way. Her skin is tanning booth brown, her teeth are bleach white, and her shoes cost more than the entire contents of my suitcase. Her boobs are squished together and hoisted up so that her cleavage starts just beneath her collarbones. Despite the heat of the day, Her hair stays in place – a fashionable highlighted bob that frames her perfectly made-up face.

I watch her from a short distance. Despite my best efforts at wielding a blow dryer and makeup brush in the morning, my hair has fallen flat and I can feel beads of sweat forming on my freckled nose. My mascara has probably formed dark circles under my eyes. My fingernail polish is chipped, my teeth ache, and my feet are swelling in the $12 sandals I found in the clearance section of Famous Footwear.  I could probably use a new bra, especially since I’m wearing a form fitting and garishly bright t-shirt that does absolutely nothing for my 48 year-old boobs.

It’s the kind of day that makes me feel out of my element and out of place, and the orange shirt I bought for this three-day trip to a Utah resort isn’t helping. I also bought a pair of white jeans that (I decided when I tried them on in my hotel room) make me look like an aging orderly who should be delivering J-ello in an institution rather than walking the hallways of a four-star mountain getaway.  Luckily, I’m not wearing the hospital pants — I folded them back up and opted for a loose pair of khakis.

Even then, I feel slightly creepy, like a geeky, slope-shouldered girl feels who’s donned an ill-fitting strapless taffeta dress for a prom she shouldn’t have been invited to, in the hopes that somehow she’ll blend into the environment, like a chameleon or potted plant.

The ice cream colored wardrobe was my attempt – my really wrong and clumsy attempt – to feel like the kind of summer-y, social woman who belongs at a resort. It was my way of trying to trick my hermitic, socially awkward, working-class self into feeling okay in a bustling hotel that smells of eucalyptus spa treatments and $30 dinners.

And of course, it was stupid. There are probably as many other women here who struggle with feelings of outsided-ness as those who feel like they belong. Clothes might make a person look less obviously outcast in their environment (if they’re good shoppers and have any fashion sense at all, which I don’t), but they can’t bridge the real gaps.

Earlier in the morning, I sat out on a sun-drenched balcony and watched the housekeepers cross the long expanse from the dirt parking lot to the employee entrance. It takes them about ten minutes. I’m sure they’re not paid for that time – twenty minutes a day in good weather, and probably about thirty in the winter.  Over the course of the year, that’s a lot of unpaid hours.

The housekeepers wear dark green smocks pinned with sparkling gold name tags, and most have their hair pulled back. I know that their feet probably ache when they get home, and the older ones likely have sore backs. I’m sure they can’t afford a massage with eucalyptus oil. Maybe, like my mom did after a day in retail, they go home, make dinner, clean the kitchen, give the kids a bath, and then sit in a recliner. Maybe one of their children rubs their feet in the hopes of currying favor and a later bedtime.

Maybe, like so many other working class women, they crawl into bed and dream of the day they can stop walking through dirt fields, get braces for their kids, and live in a house instead of an apartment.

My working class roots finds the dichotomy between the natural beauty of mountains and the manufactured beauty of this resort unsettling. It seems odd to me to see people in uniforms among the backdrop of pine trees. It feels strange to be in the mountains, but to have no sense of solitude or privacy – no quiet place to sit outside alone and reflect.

In the sense of “majority rules” my feelings are misplaced. People come here to bike, ski, hike, attend conferences, and take romantic gondola rides, and their needs are fulfilled. They enjoy lounging poolside, and conversing in lobbies filled with comfortable leather chairs. This is their prom, and it’s a happy occasion for them. For me, it’s a place where my heartstrings feel uneasily tugged.

I have more in common with the women in the shapeless green smocks than I do with the well-to-do woman with the bright smile, but there’s no comfort in this sense of familiarity – there’s only dread-fear and panicky memories of low-wage poverty. I flashback to cold, dark apartments, empty cupboards, broken-down cars, stony faces, and years of an exhaustion so deep I didn’t think that I’d ever fully waken.

I flashback to me: 13, washing dishes; 14, cleaning apartments; 16, working in a factory; 19, a single mother; 21, a casino cocktail waitress . . . and to all the times I held a second job, even when I was in advertising, in order to buy extras, like school clothes or dental appointments. Then there was the discovery, after a couple of years as an adult student in college, that I could actually make more as a blue-collar worker. I drove a frozen food truck. I became a massage therapist. I worked in an office filled with hostile workers. I climbed out of the worst of poverty, but was never more than one mishap or miscalculation away from disaster.

Longevity hasn’t brought me to peace with poverty, but it doesn’t scare me as it once did. I learned to do without so many things, over so many years, that even the simplest of things — like a good cup of coffee — still feel like a gift. What scares me isn’t the cold, or the hunger, or the absence of things in the poverty equation, it’s the absence of me.

What scares me is the bone-deep memory of having nothing left of myself at the end of long, fruitless days, and the sleepless nights spent fearing that if I fell asleep I wouldn’t hear the alarm clock in the morning.  What scares me is the visceral sensation of workplace antagonism: the coworkers who bullied those who ranked below them, the chronic complainers, the micro-managers, and the openly hostile or nepotistic supervisors.

Lastly, what scares me is my own lack of tolerance for such circumstances anymore, and the panic that rises in my gut whenever I think of returning to days of desperate energy and dead-end dreams.

I know that I write more for the women in the green smocks than the woman with the stylish shoes, and that there’s really no big demand for that – the shadowed underclass isn’t really a market as much as it is an undesirable demographic, and many people like stories with snap-on happy endings – but I’ll keep writing anyway. Not just because it’s what I know but because while some truths may never make it to the shelves of Barnes & Noble, it doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be told.

In NYC, my friend Julie asks me if I’m daunted by the crowds. She knows me well and is worried about me. My anxiety level rises and falls in relation to people. Some people are panicked by elevators or heights, but my own shaky-legged, heart-racing, head-pounding, queasy panic tends to set itself off in crowds. The problem is that I never know which crowd will provoke this response in me. Sometimes it’s a crowd of two and sometimes it’s a mall full of holiday shoppers.

I didn’t feel panic while walking the streets of NYC. In an odd way, I felt accepted, like a chameleon that blended naturally among the thousands of anonymous faces. Instead of heart-racing panic, I felt engaged and curious.

I didn’t meet any rude New Yorkers — not a single one — and I found that the anonymity I felt on the streets quickly disappeared in neighborhoods. The girls at Starbucks knew my order after just a couple of visits. The bartender at Muldoon’s knew that I liked my margaritas on the rocks, with salt. Strangers patiently explained the subway system to me. I met a group of school children, including DeJohn, who entertained me on the Uptown Express. A beautiful woman named Fate prevented me from getting off at the wrong stop.

And then there was Lewis, a West Village waiter with a Master’s degree, who used to teach school but who’s now working on a novel in-between counting tips and worrying about his future. Lewis and I bonded. I told him about my road trip, he told me about his dreams. Over eggplant parmesan and red wine, we bantered about love, lost hopes, crazy-making circumstances, and taking risks.

Afterward, Lewis walked my friend and I to a nearby bar he thought we’d enjoy. He introduced us to the bartender and made sure we knew which subway we had to take when we were done exploring the neighborhood.

The West Village was my favorite place in NYC. I could envision myself living in one of the brick-front apartments near Christopher Street, shopping for groceries at the Gourmet Garage, planting flowers outside my window, browsing books at Three Lives & Company, and visiting the Cubby Hole bar on Friday nights. There was an ease to the West Village that lent itself to imagining — writing stories at an outdoor cafe, walking hand-in-hand down Greenwich, or sitting on a stoop watching people pass by on clear summer days. In reality, the cost of renting an apartment in the Village is prohibitive, especially for people like me, who like to live alone.  If I could afford to, I’d seriously consider living here, even if only for a year or two. My short visit has left me inspired and filled with stories. It’s also made me miss my dogs, Hanna and Hudson. Hanna, the lab mix, would have loved standing sentry on a stoop. Hudson, the Daschund, would have loved walking the neighborhood streets and stopping at any one of the dog-friendly cafes that provide water bowls and bone-shaped treats. Like me, he was filled with curiosity, and loathe to return home when there was so much left to explore.

I’m not done with NYC. For now, I’m heading to Park City, Utah to speak on a panel sponsored by Buick at the EVO ‘10 conference. Afterward, I’ll make my way back to the East coast, where I’ll visit the West Village again, and parts of New York I missed this time, including Brooklyn, Queens, Harlem and a few Upstate cities. I’m excited about returning, but I really hope I can carve at least a week out of my schedule to do nothing but write the stories that have already filled my mind.

]]> http://www.findingmyamerica.com/?feed=rss2&p=867 14 http://www.findingmyamerica.com/?p=849 http://www.findingmyamerica.com/?p=849#comments Thu, 17 Jun 2010 22:18:00 +0000 Jane Devin http://www.findingmyamerica.com/?p=849

It’s 1:30 in the morning. My feet are so sore after a day of walking the city streets that they almost feel broken. I’m sitting in the only peaceful haven I’ve found in New York so far – the backyard of Muldoon’s Irish pub on 3rd Avenue. It’s supposed to be closed, but the bartender took pity on me. “I just want a place I can sit and write,” I told him. “A place to relax.” He let me come back to the Bier Garten – a 14’ fenced-in alley space left abandoned by the crowd that keeps regular hours. He makes me skinny margaritas with club soda, I give him too much money, and it feels like the beginnings of a mutually utilitarian friendship.

I’ve always had this esoteric belief that I wouldn’t really be complete as an American until I visited New York City. It was the first stop for the immigrant grandparents I hardly knew — where my grandmother sewed shirts in a factory for 13 cents an hour as a teenager, and where she met my grandfather, who moved her to Newark and then Hartford, where she spent her life in a kitchen, making kielbasa breakfasts and pierogie dinners.

As a kid, I watched countless shows that were filmed in NYC, from the Chorus Line to Baretta. Alongside the booming skyscrapers, aging doormen, scruffed ballet shoes, and the pimps with feathered hats, NYC always seemed to be the place where Big Things Happen – to dreamers, travelers, tap dancers, singers from the corn fields of Iowa, and down-on-their-luck writers.

I’ve been in NY for two days. I’ve seen the upper West Side, Times Square, the theater district, Chinatown, and Little Italy. I’ve heard waitresses sing while waiting for their turn at restroom stalls. I’ve seen dead turtles on ice, fake Coach purses and Rolex watches, and thousands of tourist-y trinkets. I’ve smelled hot dog steam, garbage trucks, burning plastic, body odors, and sewage. I’ve sat on stoops, watching people pass: Mothers with MacClaren strollers, women in sundresses, men with day old beards and tiny dogs on leashes.

What I haven’t seen in any great number are homeless people, obvious drug addicts, pimps or hookers.  I haven’t seen any crack needles on the sidewalk or crime scene tape. I feel slightly disappointed by that. It’s like I prepared for a dark Disneyland and the felonious Mickey Mouse failed to show up.

I’ve seen a lot of thin people in NYC – more than average. I imagine it’s because they walk everywhere, often without stopping until they reach their destination. There was a meaty woman on a New Jersey bus, wearing giant hoop earrings and a flowered sundress, who didn’t seem to mind sharing her cell phone conversation with the public.

“So she aks me if that’s my baby’s daddy. I tell her helllll nooooo, he’s just  a sperm donor. I’d rather have a German Shepherd be my baby daddy.”

On Amsterdam Street, a woman walks alongside a skinny man in an old pink Izod shirt and green cargo pants. She’s wearing a translucent yellow sundress. I can see the pink hearts on her underpants. She’s pushing a stroller that contains a contented-looking toddler and a four pack of Starbucks Double Shot. “He’s an old soul, you know,” she tells her companion. “He’s lived many lives. My sensei told me he’s destined for art”. I have no idea if she’s talking about the baby or someone else.

At Stand-Up NY, a small crowd gathers for an evening of laughs. The emcee and comics seem daunted by the small crowd. They make note of it, as if to say their acts might go over better in front of hundreds of people instead of seventeen but they still do their best, even though it’s hot and the air conditioner is on the fritz.  Paul Mercurio draws the biggest laughs of the evening, but I can’t remember a single joke he told. I can’t remember any of the acts a day later and have to refer to my notes. At least ten of the seventeen people in the audience were international tourists. I won free shots of alcohol in a drawing and donated them to girls from England, but they didn’t want them. No one did.

There’s almost too much entertainment in NY — too much dancing, singing, choreography, and too many performers with too many stages. It seems that all but the hardcore fans are jaded. No one stops to listen to the guitar payer in the subway. It’s too much.

He’s too much, in his faded jeans and Bob Marley knit cap, but he makes me think of Harry Chapin. Cats in the Cradle, WOTV, a lonely man and a homely waitress, a spilled banana truck . . . Harry Chapin is dead, and so much of his music died with him. Some of Chapin’s work remains timeless, especially the songs of his that were recorded by other artists, but most of it is archaic and unheard.

At a crosswalk on Park Avenue, I stand next to a woman with iPod buds in her ears. Tori Amos is singing her rendition of Vincent by Don MacLean. It’s haunting. Starry starry night, paint your palette blue and gray, look out on a summer day, with eyes that know the world and can’t forget. . .like strangers you have met. . .the ragged men in ragged clothes. . .

Red turns to white and the woman crosses the busy street. I lose her among the throngs of people. I finish the song in my head and for the millionth time, I wish I could sing. It seems like a curse to have a vice on my throat when my head is filled with music.

I stare out among the brick buildings and fire escapes and I wonder – who lives here? Could I? For a moment I imagine myself on a roof top deck, or in a brick-walled apartment, where the blights of the city carry over into personal spaces. Piano strains and screaming children.  The smell of curry wafting trough hallways. Water leaks and heat and musty elevators, thick with people.  I know that the scene would grow old in a short amount of time, and that while the anonymity would not daunt me, the invisibility would.

I know that in NYC, I would only feel truly alive in places like Muldoon’s, where the bartender already knows my name and is willing to share 14’ of semi-secret space with me and let me pretend, at least in the wee hours of the morning, that I truly do have a room of my own, for the cost of three margaritas, a Baileys coffee, and a small stack of dollar bills.