​Seeing figs in their little paper crates at the grocery store makes me light and lusty again. I would have shrieked like a child at the sight had I not put on mascara and been masquerading as an adult already.

There are a few things (the moors in Scotland, real olive oil, Hemingway, black sand, painting wood, figs, strange liqueur, building a fire) that remind me of a time when I lived simpler (No no! of course not a time in this life...) They provoke in me a longing that comes from god help me to find out where. I look and as soon as the scent reaches me it is gone.

When I get home to eat the rich little delicacies, provoking devils, lovely mid-day adventures, I have no time, no patience, to peel the skins off with a paring knife. Instead, I slice them in half and run my fingers over their silky seedy flesh, warm with the walk home in the sun before scraping and sucking the insides from the out. Eating them is like a sigh of relief. They slide straight to the sad spot in my belly and make me easy for just a moment but like the scent of belonging, the effortlessness dodges away before I can call it my own.

Now the longing remains. 

The next time I go to the grocery and see figs in their little paper crates I will be light and lusty again, I tell myself. There are fig seasons to come.

I stop myself short. I remind the light in my eyes to dim. Those of us who are familiar with life know that may not be true. Seasons to come are immeasurable, unknowable, and never guaranteed; easily jettisoned or recoursed or derailed; often late or early (timing is a mean old mistress) or not at all. 

Though if fig season does come again, I hope I am not wearing mascara.

[On another note: To the Fig Tree on 9th and Christian by Ross Gay (here) is absolutely stunning and in perfect time for fig season and read it]

​

1. Grand Guignol theatre + Cleansed at the National theatre earlier this year
2. Bouncing thoughts off a wall is not the same as having a conversation but you continue to try this. Is this attempt futile or hopeful? Is hope futile? Hope in general, just think about it. Discuss.
3. Rhinoceros by Ionesco + the current state of affairs
4. The bottom of your left foot is two different colors of skin because you have peeled off almost the entirety of that heel. No. It is actually three colors if you count red. Right. And your fingers are in no better state. To consider: Why?
5.  Alone v. Lonely - one is a fact of being, the other painful at worst and manageable at best, the two together, are nearly impossible, absolutely insurmountably crippling. You know where you are. 
6. Begin drafting second version of the play you just finished and begin the second. I would like to see a third draft of the first and a first working draft of the second by Sunday. 
7. I held a man having a seizure earlier today.
8. The body + nature poems - you've got 17. Can we work this all into submittable form by the end of the month? Yes. That is do-able. 
9. What kind of a word is "do-able"? Can you find something better than that please and never use that word again? Thank you.
10. Fog
11. There's another response that no one addresses: Freeze. We only talk about fight or flight. And that is rather generous, don't you think?
12. The Conformist. 
13. Also get through the rest of TA's movie list. 
14. To Do: make a pros and cons list re: going "off the grid"
15. New York

Everything is in my head.