Side Body

kiss your friends’ faces more / destroy the belief that intimacy must be reserved for monogamous relationships / be more loving / embrace platonic intimacy / embrace vulnerability / use emotionality as a radical tactic against a society which teaches you that emotions are a sign of weakness / tell more people you care about them / hold their hands / tell others you are proud of them / offer support readily / take care of the people around you 

- Lora Mathis

~

Sometimes, I truly believe I shouldn’t be allowed to talk to people.

The other day I was driving with my parents to lunch- hot, sweaty Dallas hung over us like a bad case of morning breath that just won’t go away. As we drove, we passed a street corner filled with boys from the local middle school football team. They held signs asking for donations to support the team’s gear purchases and future tournaments. As we pull up to them, I think I hear my mom mutter something about a car wash. It looks like the team has reserved the empty parking lot behind them, since many players stand scattered around the lot. I remember that teams in Broomfield washed cars all the time to raise money, so I assume the team is running a community car wash station for their fundraiser. When we slow to pass them, my mom hands me ten dollars to give to them as a donation. I roll down the window, and as the boy approaches, I feel the need to over-explain (my tendency to mumble dripping over), so I spit out: “We don’t have time for a carwash, but here’s a donation!” I even muster both an apologetic smile to make up for our inability to stay for a carwash and a look that says, “I get you”. I think I even give him a head nod. So suave, so cool.

The boy gives me a puzzled gaze and opens his mouth to retort. Before he can begin his sentence, his coach cuts in to grab him on the shoulder and reply, “Thank you for the donation. We appreciate it.” The boy continues to look puzzled, if not slightly bothered, while we drive away. As soon as we pull away from the street corner, my parents burst into laughter. I immediately get kind of hot and flustered as I beg them to tell me what is so funny. My father finally breaks to tell me, “There was no car wash.”

Oh no. No no no no no no.

There was no car wash, which means I just insinuated an expectation for labor FROM A SMALL CHILD ON A STREET CORNER. HE NEVER WANTED TO WASH MY CAR.

“Not everyone exists to serve you, Aly” my mother retorts. I cry on the inside.

I DIDN’T KNOW I PROMISE, I WAS JUST TRYING TO BE SUAVE.

The good news? This is only the second most embarrassing thing that’s happened to me over the past few weeks. During my last week in Denver, I went to the same Walgreens 5 times in under 24 hours. And yes, the same woman was working the cash register every time.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t at Walgreens for glamorous reasons. Let’s just say I needed many, um, ‘interesting’ things. Three of my five trips happened in the late evening after I had already gotten into my pajamas. I had come down suddenly with a pretty severe throat ache (think fusion of an exploding jagged spork and an unsanded bowling ball lodged all up in there). At this point, I had already been to Walgreens twice for other ‘interesting’ things, but as my throat slowly gave birth to a fucking baby dragon spewing fire from the vast pits of the underworld, I caved and dragged myself out of bed, pajamas and all, to travel back to Walgreens.

I spent two trips buying more painkillers and throat lodges. As I lay back in bed after these shopping trips, I unfolded into an unruly state of self-pity. In the comfort of florescent overhead lighting and no air conditioning, I sucked my lodges while whimpering and/or moaning and soft crying. Sarah McLachlan’s “Arms of an Angel” played overhead as I scrolled through old photos on Facebook. 2012!!! Ah, to feel joy again.  

“Arms of an Angel” was promptly followed by Beyoncé’s “Don’t Hurt Yourself”. The volume increased ten-fold, which caused me to kind of jump out of surprise. The wrappers from my chest spilled over, and as my computer screen went black, I accidentally caught a glimpse of my own reflection. My hair had plastered itself over my left eyebrow. A single tear had the audacity to keep rolling down my cheek.

In this moment, I am forced to Beyoncé myself: “Who the fuck do *I* think I am?”

I decide a tub of ice cream and some Advil PM (ahhhh the pharmaceutical industrial complex, I know I know!!!) are in order, so I roll myself out of bed for my fifth trip to Walgreens in those same pajamas. I stroll up to the cash register, telling myself, yet again, that whimpering is not acceptable in public. At this point, the woman and I have a routine. She has warm brown eyes that have allotted me growing levels of pity over my 5 trips to Walgreens. It’s almost midnight now. I think I love her.

I begin to walk out the store, but I drop my Advil PM in the doorframe. As I crouch to grab it, I look down at my torso and the t-shirt I am wearing. The t-shirt has a few holes littered around the front, which I knew, but as I look down this time, I do a double take.

The bottom half of my left areola is showing. Weird hairs and all.

I have been wearing this shirt for 4 hours.

And so, I leave Denver how I was always meant to- areola first.

~

I left Denver, and I sit writing this during a sort of in-between time. I am waiting for what will happen next. I find myself facing stillness, a stillness rendered spacious through its capacity to open up time for daydreams and self-reflection. Over my ever-present cup of tea, I wander softly, forward and backward and everywhere else. I sip and try to let the thoughtfulness of stillness wash over me.

I wonder: when you leave somewhere, or someone, or even something, what do you hold on to?

I take a sip and close my eyes. This, of course, has no answer. In fact, I have never been great with concrete responses- always too absurdly sentimental for that. Instead, I sit in my in-between and wait for the nerves, fears and overwhlemedness to creak amongst my bones. Sometimes the creaking consumes me, and when it does, my mind escapes to my favorite place.

I hope you all have been to this place too; I know I have been here many times. My favorite place is when I am lying next to someone I care about deeply. This 'someone' has been many different people. In my favorite place, the person I care about lies slightly above me. I lie on my side body to rest my chin on their shoulder, so that when I look at them, I look up through my own eyelashes to see the side of their face. Their eyes concave into the slope of their nose and onto the curve of their mouth. When I’m not looking at them, my forehead is pressed softly against their upper arm and shoulder with my nose slightly squished. Maybe I squeeze my eyes shut to better hold on to that feeling of closeness. My hands clasp theirs or maybe slide across their body to hug them. When I look up to watch my friend from this place, I can almost hear them breathing. Most likely, as I watch them, they are looking straight up into the sky or roof or plastered-ceiling. If I am lucky, I can see their eyes begin to wander some place else. Perhaps, they are getting lost in a whirring piece of their little Universe. It is always when they get lost that I lose my own breath. They look beautiful because whether they are whirring in sadness- tears streaming down their face- or whirring in wonder- stars alive in their eyes- they are alone with themselves for just a moment. There, I can see a soul, raw and shaking.

Have you ever seen a soul before?

When they are ready to come back to us, I usually dip my forehead back to their shoulder. As their eyes become alert, I close mine to press deeper into their arm. I probably grasp their hands or side body even tighter, to let them know that I am there. That I will always, always be there.

So that’s what I hope to hold on to: tenderness. Tenderness like admitting, ‘I need you’. Tender like being buckled over in laughter. Like giving one look and knowing everything. The kind of tenderness that may break my heart only to fill it with more stories. Tenderness that asks,

‘will you be still with me’.

I sip my tea in the in-between.
Of course, I have left a cup of tea warming on the stove for you.

Erasure

"yes
it is possible
to hate and love
someone
at the same time
i do it to myself
everyday"
- rupi kaur

~

For as long as I can remember, I have woken up with a face covered in white pimples. They crowd the creases of my nostrils and clutter themselves along my upper lip.

My eyes creak awake- the familiar blurry scenery there to drip me in new-morning haze. The left seam of my favorite boxer shorts has completely deteriorated, so my thigh and hip, soft in this fetal position, fall without barrier. The creases of my nose and the line of my upper lip are filled with tension. The pain is concentrated pressure, and if I run my tongue along my upper lip, I feel the pointed ridges of the pimples. I start my inner dialogue:

·      What if puss is actually cream cheese and I am #blessed to have a lifetime supply on my face?

·      Wait, what is puss?

·      Can I pop them by rapidly flashing smiles for a 2-minute sequence? (*tries 2 minute sequence*)

·      Counting: 1, 2, 3, 4, 4.5 (?), 5, maybe 6? Fuck if I know.

·      What do I want to eat for lunch?

·      How many of them have conjoined…

·      ARE THEY WHITE OR THAT WEIRD GREEN CRUSTY COLOR

·      Do they glow in the dark? Serious question.

I sigh, no answers clear after all my fretting. I get up to go to the bathroom. When I look in the mirror, I see them. There they are: white lines like parentheses around my nostrils and ridges as quotation marks on the corners of my mouth. I’ve been daring myself lately. I look in the mirror and see how long I can last without changing anything on my body. I must admit, it is hard to look at myself without reaching to erase the ‘ugliness’. When I look in the mirror, I see my crooked bangs and the hair standing straight out at the nape of my neck. Watered-down mascara from last night’s face washing puddles under my eyes. I can taste my own breath. In my hole-ridden shirt, I see the long hairs that canvas the bone between my breasts. I crinkle my nose and the white parentheses elongate; when I hesitantly smile, the quotation marks raise parallel to my dimples.  

I admit that I don’t last long before changing something. I reach to pop my pimples first. The puss smears, and spot by spot my face begins to throb. I push my hair down. I brush my teeth, sometimes spitting out blood. I tug on a sweater to cover up the hair on my breastbone.

Most ‘self-love’ narratives- even when they attempt to defy the dominant, standard-setting frameworks (i.e. capitalism, white supremacy, the gender binary, Eurocentrism, cisherteronormativity)- still depend on the use of the word ‘beautiful’. Narratives promoting self-love work to reclaim the word ‘beautiful’, using it to attribute value to qualities that have been historically marginalized or deemed ‘ugly’. Re-conceptualizing what it means to be beautiful serves an important, radical purpose, but if I’m going to be honest, sometimes I don’t want to be beautiful.

I want to be seen.

Maybe ‘beautiful’ is not always an adequate term. I have memories of feeling beautiful, softly beautiful in both expected and unexpected moments, but not fully worthy. What if I told you my ugliness is worthy too? I must tell you that I am afraid to wake up next to someone because they may dismiss me as ugly before they really see me. I wish I could tell them: sometimes, I have rosy cheeks and white blemishes together, unedited.

When I grow up, I want to be bare. I must admit I wonder if I will be liked in my barest state. In this bareness, I would be seen by both you and myself, unwaveringly. If I could be bare, I would redefine what it means to be strong. When I am bare, my worthiness will need no justification because it will not have to be beautiful. It will be from me, and you will see me. You will know that my battle scars are in my eyes and that in my first childhood memory I am talking to trees and that I like the ragged, discolored skin on my left knee and that I sometimes believe in fate even when I am told not to and that I wish I was better at being kind. If you see me, you will know that I am not always kind.

You will know that even though I’d love to be seen, I have a habit of smiling after saying something sad. In this way, I try to erase the sad thing into something small. And, do you want to know a secret?

Sometimes being small is easier than being seen.

Insecurities

“the year of letting go, of understanding loss. grace. of the word ‘no’ and also being able to say ‘you are not kind’. the year of humanity/humility. when the whole world couldn’t get out of bed. everyone i’ve met this year, says the same thing ‘you are so easy to be around, how do you do that?’. the year i broke open and dug out all the rot with own hands. the year i learnt small talk. and how to smile at strangers. the year i understood that i am my best when i reach out and ask ‘do you want to be my friend?’. the year of sugar, everywhere. softness. sweetness. honey honey. the year of being alone, and learning how much i like it. the year of hugging people i don’t know, because i want to know them. the year i made peace and love, right here.”- warsan shire

~

My trip to Chile begins with an ‘almost’ fuck-up, which is not surprising as I always seem to live my life on the verge of chaos, unclean and slightly reckless. If you have ever been inside my bedroom, you know this side of me well. I live amongst piles of things- lucky to see a square foot of open floor space. It’s probably gross, but there is something about being in a space unhinged that makes me feel imperfect, and thus, much more human.

My flight from Denver to Houston was delayed, so I have three minutes to make my connecting flight to Santiago after getting off the plane. It is my first time pulling the ‘DESPERATE RUN THROUGH THE AIRPORT GET OUT OF MY WAY I’M SWEATING’ dash, so to get myself through the pain of harsh breathing and flailing suitcases, I script a movie narration in my head:

*‘The Winner Is’ by DeVotchKa plays softly overhead*

With a body that hosts both chicken-wing dagger elbows and the soft belly of an all queso diet, the girl of our story begins her journey in a rush. Sweat pelting her hairline down like a half-lubed penis, our girl puts one foot in front of another- over and over her feet pulse forward and through. Here, she escapes the chronic blistering thoughts we all have in those empty moments, in those times we must remain still on the border between awake and dazed. She does not know what she is doing, or really, where she is going.

Out-of-shape puke forms in the belly, and our girl moves forward.

Foot after foot, our story begins.

And this… Well, this is a story of a girl.

I make up fake movie narrations for my life often. Once, I was able to continue a narration for several months; I would finish one daydream and pick it right back up in my next dream. In this particular several month endeavor, I created a boyfriend in my head and for all intents and purposes, it was a pretty fo-reals relationship. We met in the park, held hands, had a steamy kiss in the feminist section of the public library. Two months into our escalating relationship, Wyatt (yes, he had a name) came over to my house to tell me he never loved me and that he was leaving me for my best friend.

In real life, I sobbed to ‘Unchained Melody’ by the Righteous Brothers for a solid thirty minutes before eating a whole Kit-Kat bar in one bite.

(Am I aware that I made this all up in my head and that I self-inflicted this fucked ending? Yes. Yes, I am. Stop giving me that look.)

Anyways, I am running in the airport trying to catch this flight, and I know I must be making the most uncomfortable facial expressions. My face is an open book- every thought manifests itself in some sort of visible expression. I can get so lost in my thoughts that I often am not aware of my facial expressions. Many times, I will be sitting with friends lost in thought, and someone will interject, “Aly, what is wrong?”. I usually am taken aback, not realizing such twisted expressions have made their way to my face. I then have to awkwardly mumble “nothing”, as I really don’t want to get into how I just had a small life freak out about eggs that crack with a double-yolk (WAS THE DOUBLE-YOLK TWINS, WAS IT CONJOINED TWINS, CAN TWO CHICKENS COME FROM ONE EGG AND WILL SOMEONE JUST LIKE DECIDE IF THE CHICKEN OR EGG CAME FIRST BECAUSE I’M SICK OF ALL THE RIDDLING OKAY).

I make it to my gate and my suspicion that I am wearing a ghastly expression is confirmed as the guy sitting in the gate next to me hears my heaving and glances up with an appalled look of concern. I shove my passport and plane ticket into the hands of the gate attendant with the utmost urgency. Do you ever expect the world to be at your same level of urgency and then get ridiculously disappointed when your level of urgency is not reciprocated? I get this all the time in the drive-through at McDonald’s when I want a McFlurry:

Me, ordering as if this is the last thing I will accomplish on earth: “I must have a large M&M McFlurry.”

McDonald’s employee: “A’ight.”

This occurs with the gate attendant:

Me, after running a literal marathon 1 minute and 45 seconds to get here on time: “Did I make it? Am I okay? Here’s my ticket! (+ !¹⁷)”

Gate attendant, without looking at me reaches out: *drops passport and plane ticket*

Me: ….

Gate attendant, after I dip down to grab my things and hand them to her: “Kay.”

The anti-climatic nature of this is deafening. I find my seat on the plane and close my eyes.

~

I travel on various planes and buses down to Puerto Natales, the base city for entering the national park area of Patagonia. During my travels, I meet a handful of other travelers. To make conversation, we divulge what has brought us here; most mention something akin to adventure and greater self-discovery. I listen, but I think about borders as we talk. I’ve been thinking about borders a lot lately. On this trip, I am traveling to Chile to hike the W-Route in Patagonia and to later attend a conference in Viña Del Mar. I will move with ease along the southern tip of Chile- my ‘sense of adventure’ and blue US passport working as justification free from further questioning. Meanwhile, on countless other borders, fronteras, borderlands and bordertowns, people trying to traverse land will be stopped, detained, emotionally/physically/sexually abused, de-humanized and abandoned.

I can’t help but think of borders. Of the twisted privileging of my individualistic pleasure over others’ existence and well being. When I think about borders, I vary my reactions from wordless spinning to flustered, incoherent rants to my friends and family. Borders and this spatial abuse of neocolonial power leave me flustered as fuck because the hypocrisy of borders is just so full of shit. A LOT OF SHIT- just all shit, like that same shit that names me ‘bilingual’ while others of different positionalities get labeled ‘can’t speak English’ even though I cannot roll my r’s and a decade of institutional training has left my Spanish SUB PAR SUB PAR I TELL YOU! Uh, it’s all just one big shit hole, a big hole with a big shit and…

I can hear Emma Burns telling me ‘to simmer’. I digress.

I finally make it to my hostel, a completo and greasy middle part in tow. After a much-needed shower, I lay reading on my bed and try to squash my growing fear of hiking the W-Route alone. I start a mantra to ease my nerves: I will not fall off a mountain and die. I will not fall off a mountain and die… My roommate interrupts my growing mantra to introduce herself. She is from Denmark and is traveling for six months before beginning her full-time job in September. Within five minutes of talking to her, I have invited myself to hike with her and her co-worker for three days. My innate witty charm or a needy desperateness? Not going to question it.

We wake up early the next morning to travel into the park. As we walk, the small talk quickly dissipates and evolves into bigger wonderings about the world. This is what leaves me addicted to traveling- the swiftness at which feelings and big ideas can color a conversation between two strangers. We hike for 8 hours the first day; of course, there is beauty I cannot begin to describe. My fondness for my hiking companions is confirmed after two key events: 1) the male co-worker immediately names us #squadheavybreathing and 2) we stop for coffee at the hostel on the trail, showing a winding calmness that warms our journey.

A few days and many conversations later, we reach the end of the hiking route. My companions will continue hiking another day as I begin my return back to Viña del Mar. We sit sipping a few beers in celebration and nursing our swollen heels. By this point, my neurotic, over-thinking nature has been revealed. Mathias, the male co-worker, asks me more about my plans for after graduation. Immediately, my tendency to freak out is activated, and I start spilling over. I spill self-doubt because right now, my self-doubt is the only thing I am sure of and I feel the need to spit out vulnerabilities.

I have a strong tendency for freaking out- for alienating myself amongst my thoughts so completely that I disjoint myself from reality. I don’t see my tendency to freak out stopping any time soon. (In fact, a few days later at the meet and greet for my conference, I will be overwhelmed by the prospect of having to meet all new people. I will grab a glass of wine and lock myself into a bathroom stall to chug the wine as my ‘social lubricant’. Then, in the sweaty fervor of going to the bathroom and eating an olive empanada, I will almost wipe my vagina with said cheesy empanada napkin. It will be a really close call.)

I finally come to the end of spilling with Mathias. He pauses, a look of sureness personifying his eyes. He looks at me to say:

“Let yourself be insecure, Aly”.

~

So, I am learning to open myself. I am learning to be uncomfortable. Unexpectedly, I am learning to be insecure- less rigid and more stable in the unknown. I hope to exist imperfectly.  

There is this socialized myth about what it means to ‘grow up’. It is closely tied with professionalism, so that somehow growing up means you are less free to be emotionally honest with both yourself and others. You grow up and you warp yourself into the image of ‘security’. But, I wish growing up was more about fullness- the fullness of laughing hysterically in public spaces or of crying in surprising times or of letting yourself be insecure in the face of vulnerability. Maybe I can still center silliness. Maybe I can be angry, unfiltered. Maybe I can still feel others deeply. Maybe, just maybe, I can break the isolation of stoicness.

Away from isolation, I am a feeling being. And so, if I love you (which I probably do), I have intertwined you into my being. I walk with you, I experience deep joy with you, I shake with you, I allow myself to be insecure with you. To be with you is to feel like the turning on of a warm heat lamp. As I intertwine you into my life and being, we may even develop an usness- those idiosyncratic intangibles that make us us. Our usness might be awkward laughing and ridiculous gossip and foggy glasses and sometimes broken smiles and tell me about your dreams and too much left unsaid.

In the end, I hope we exist imperfectly.