Violet Wilson

V. has been one of my co-workers since I started this shift in September. Not just someone I worked with, but part of a kind of group of four of us; we partnered with each other — though usually she partnered with Jonathan — sat together in the break room, teased and picked and made juvenile off-color comments. One slow day, we had a rubber-band war while we waited for mail to show up. One night when I couldn't mentally function, she sat on the floor with me, an arm around my shoulder, humming.

November and December were hard for all the PSEs, the contract-temp workers like us who aren't fully vested career people. We went from 40-hour weeks to 48, to sometimes having to stay late and ending up working over 50 hours. We were all pretty damn worn out. V. was maybe worn out more than the rest of us, because she has a family, obligations outside of work. Then things slowed down in January, and while I think all of us were still not as energetic as we'd been in the fall, V. still seemed more tired. Someone said something was going on with her father but I never knew what; she didn't say anything to me, and I don't tend to ask about things like that.

She's missed a lot of days at work this winter and spring. She's been worn out on the days she's been there. And more and more irritated, by smaller and smaller things. Nothing directed at me, but it's still hard to be around, partly because I don't deal well with discord or outright anger, but partly... I worry. She's unhappy, and it's hard to see her unhappy because she's a friend. Or I considered her a friend.

She's been wearing perfume, or something scented, for weeks, going into months. I'd never noticed it before, and at first I only noticed it once a week or so, and I didn't work at a machine with her often, so it didn't matter. But it slowly became an everyday thing, and on the days I worked near her, I was miserable: migraine, lightheaded; I think now that scents trigger the irregular heartbeat that's becoming more of an issue. Thinking about it now, I might have seemed irritated to her, at her, because I probably didn't speak much, didn't interact more than I had to, partly because it made my head hurt worse to be near her, partly because one of the effects of scents on me is that it feels like my brain slows down, it's hard to think, and all my concentration goes to the work I'm doing and it still feels like it's not enough, and I don't have energy left to have a conversation.

Then my regular partner switched shifts. So did V.'s usual partner. And the only person without a regular partner is V. I knew I had to talk to her, but I feel like I'm oversensitive, and I should just learn to deal, and it's not an easy conversation to have with anyone. And she's been so irritated, angry, tired. I was afraid it wouldn't go well.

But Friday, I nearly had to go home; it was bad enough my vision was tunneling in on a few occasions, bad enough I was sitting down during a lull, and the supervisor came and asked if I was all right, because, well, feeling like crap had been a regular occurrence for me for several months, including going home early, and taking an ambulance ride one night from work because I either passed out or was so close to it that I was unresponsive. And really, what I felt now was the beginning of that. Maybe it's just stress, psychological, and scents trigger stress which triggers the arrhythmia. Maybe it's more. Either way, I can't will myself to relax and not pass out, if that's all it is. I told the supervisor that the scent was the problem at the moment, and that I had to talk to V. about it. But for the time being, the supervisor moved us to different, separate machines.

Maybe V. was angry at how I'd been acting all day; if you didn't know I felt like crap, I probably seemed like a sullen child. Maybe she thought I'd told the supervisor something bad, and her being moved away was punishment. Or just was angry that she was being moved, which is annoying, and knew or suspected that this move was my fault. She'd already been fractious all shift; I didn't see her much for the next couple of hours, but she seemed more pissed than before. But I tend to feel like people are angry even when they aren't, worry that they are angry at me. And regardless, I had to talk to her.

So after the shift was over, in the break room, I went over to her table. She was on the phone, but she paused and asked what was up, or something like that. I said, "I can't work with anyone wearing scented products." She said, "That's okay, Bev, I don't plan on ever working with you again, anyway." The syrupy bitterness to it, the stereotypical passive-aggressive bitch-ness of it, was so over the top that I almost expected her to start laughing. It was exactly what would have happened in September or October. It's what the v. I knew then would have done. But there was no laugh, no smile. I walked away.

It was a bad night after that. I was in tears walking to the train, on the train, waiting to start sobbing until I was at my station, and then sobbing most of the next two hours. It was a typical response from me to rejection, especially to the girly/bitchy rejection that goes back to horrible interactions in middle school and high school, threats of violence, threats of sodomy with a broomstick. And back to interactions with my mother, subtle, indirect, dehumanizing, annihilating. I am nothing. I am not a person. I do not exist. By the next day, I was pretty much mutedly resigned, jaw not clenched but set; but she wasn't at work, so I had a day to let it fade, not to regrow skin but at least to let the nerve endings give up and stop screaming. Sunday, she seemed to studiously ignore me, except for the two minutes when the supervisor of the day asked, once there was mail to run, if we wanted to partner up and she very quickly said, "No," and she was sent off with some fill-in guy from the other end of the plant. Or maybe the ignoring wasn't deliberate on her part; maybe she just honestly didn't see me anymore. It was what I expected, and not pleasant, but it didn't destroy me like Friday night had.

I want to be mad. I am mad, but I want to just be mad, uncomplicatedly "fuck you, too" pissed off. But what I feel most... I don't know, it's not a feeling, not an emotion, I just, it hurts to think about her, to think about the her I knew for months, the her I liked, the her who was fairly happy, and, God, she's so fucking miserable, all the time at work, and I don't even know what life outside of work is like, and just, I just want to ask, "What happened? Can I do something? Can I do something to help bring back the V. from last fall?" And "Why the perfume?" She never wore it before, or not that strong. What changed, that she suddenly now needs that? Does she feel unclean, like she smells? Is her father ill, and she spends so much time at the hospital or caring for him at home, smelling disinfectant and medicine and illness, that she needs to surround herself with something that doesn't smell like that?

Part of what I feel — what I felt even before this last straw — is just, everyone likes to be around happy people, fun people, so it's entirely selfish that I want the old her back: it's less stress, I'm human, I like laughing with people.

But that's only partly it. Because: it's V. We were never exactly friends, but we were colleagues, and we made each other laugh, and she offered me comfort, and she didn't treat me like a freak, and I want to offer comfort back. But I can't, not through this wall of anger. Anything else I could deal with: sadness, depression, fear, anxiety, crying, screaming, curled into a ball, any of those I would at least try to reach through, try to punch through the wall. But anger — it's not brick or barbed wire or something I can withstand the pain of: it is fire, and I have no protection. I want to try. At least I think I want to. But I know, I just can not do this. It will destroy me, and I'll be no good to anyone, I'll just make it worse. So I sit helplessly, and I burn with a different fire, with shame and helplessness and smallness, my hands aching with the desire to do something, my throat aching with words I can't even think of, let alone say.

Thirty days ago, as I wrote about at the time, I adopted a new cat, Precious; she'd been at the shelter where I volunteer for three years without allowing anyone to pet her, until I started working with her and essentially tricked her into allowing touch.  I am borrowing a kennel-type cage until she's ready to explore, and while I've been leaving it open at times, she's not yet ready to venture into the first actual home she's ever been in.  I'm sure it will come with time.  Until then, I do what I often do with kitties at the shelter, and clamber inside the cage to pet her.  And on that front:

She loves belly rubs, but sometimes she's too antsy to lie still for one.  I'd been occasionally rubbing her belly while she was standing, my other hand rubbing her neck.  Then I started lifting her front half up an inch or so sometimes, just to get her used to the concept.  Then one day, she was on the fleece on the floor of the cage instead of on the hammock-shelf.  And I pressed my luck: I let her turn her back, and then I lifted her slightly and pulled/walked her backwards into my lap.  She didn't stay, but she didn't freak out.  I tried again a couple of minutes later, and she paused longer before leaving.  The third time, she didn't leave immediately, and after 30 seconds or so, she slowly, suspiciously settled in.  She stayed for nearly 5 minutes, partly because I managed to refrain from giggling in shocked, hysterical glee.

Now I put her in my lap every time she's on the floor of the cage instead of on the hammock-shelf.  And she stays, for half an hour or more.  Including, the last couple of times, lying sideways enough that I can rub her belly. She can only enjoy belly rubs lying on her left side, so she ends up facing me, so I could see last night as her eyes got that drunken, half-closed look.  Then, for a solid minute, her eyes closed entirely.  It's the first time I've ever petted her when her eyes were closed.  

I've realized that, in a lot of ways, she reminds me of Butler: the type of caution about anything new, the befuddledness of her face, even the texture of her fur, so soft it's like a plush toy.  Looking at her face with her eyes closed, I could see Butler again, feeling him sitting in my lap, settling into contentment and letting go of vigilance.  I miss him dearly.  I love her dearly, for her own self, but I'm also so grateful that she can bring him back so clearly in my mind.  That will fade, I know, and eventually her face will not remind me of another.  There's a way I'm grieving now for that loss, too, for the day when my memories of him will be memories of memories, not ghosts but just wisps of fog that look a little ghostly.  So for now I treasure the pain of the strength of the memories, smile and cry at the same time, and think, "This is right; this is what I should feel."

[Written May 22, 2013]

I started volunteering at a small cat shelter in November 2011. Precious had been at the shelter since July 2010. She came in as a mother cat, estimated to be about 2 years old — already too old to ever be socialized — and the reasons why she wasn't just spayed and released have been lost to time, but now she's, well, institutionalized. After nearly 3 years in the shelter, no one can touch her. But: she loves to be brushed. Her brush has been duct-taped to a two-foot-long stick, because that's as close as she'll allow a hand to get to her without freaking out. When she's being brushed, she purrs until she drools, falls over, rolls, lets you brush her belly.

I never really cared for Precious. It's odd, because I'm a sucker for scaredy cats. For the year and a third I've volunteered at the shelter, I've spend countless hours with dozens of unsocialized cats, sometimes doing nothing more for weeks than touching a nose, then learning that one spot on only one side of the neck that makes that one cat push against my hand against his will, or that this girl can't resist having her shoulder blades scratched. And many of them get adopted, and it's bittersweet because I miss them, but it feels so good when the untouchable cat seeks you out, then makes in impression on a stranger and gets to have a whole house, a whole human, to himself. I love it. But for some reason, I never tried with Precious. Maybe it was just that tortoiseshells don't do it for me aesthetically; maybe it was just that there were others who were younger, seemed less settled, seemed like they had a chance. Maybe it was that there were other people who spent time with her, had spent time with her for years, now, and it hadn't mattered.

I had an idea four weeks ago. It was something I'd tried with Caleb, another cat who hadn't let anyone touch him but who liked being brushed. Ages ago, my friend had bought a double-thickness fake-fur mitten from Petco, big as an oven mitt, so that she could wrestle with one of her cats who loved to play-fight but didn't know not to use his claws. Unfortunately, the glove wigged him out and he'd run away, so it sat unused in a drawer for years until I brought it to the shelter. I also bought a pair of cheap, stiff leather work gloves. First with Caleb, now with Precious, I donned a work glove, then put the mitt on over it, so that when she inevitably freaked out and lashed out, as Caleb had, her claws wouldn't penetrate.

I didn't hold a lot of hope. Caleb had only been about 9 months old when I started working with him. Precious was probably 5 years old. The first weekend, I spent fifteen minutes at a stretch with her, several times each night, brushing her with one hand, resting the other one — in the doubled gloves — on the cage shelf. I moved the gloved hand a little occasionally, kept brushing. That Sunday, I had a chance and I took it. Her head was to the left of the brush-on-a-stick that was in my left hand, with the gloves on my right hand. I brushed her neck and cheek, and then rested the gloved hand on her back. She's no dummy, and the glare she gave me and my gloved hand said so. But: brush, cheek, yeah, right there, hey, there's something on my back and it's, wait, ear, yes, ear please, hey, what's on my... oh, fine, whatever.

I only work at the shelter on weekends, so it was six days before I was back. That weekend, we went from the gloved hand simply resting on her back during brushing, to the gloved hand stroking her back in unison with the brush stroking her neck and shoulders. This garnered more dirty looks, but finally resignation. Sunday, I started with the brush stroking her cheek while the glove petted her back, but then after a few minutes I moved the brush aside and rubbed her cheek with the gloved hand. Her eyes burned with the fires of hell, but she couldn't help herself. Even her cheek couldn't help itself; it would push slightly against the glove, and she would glare at me with reproach — perhaps mixed with self-reproach — pull her head back a little, but then slowly relax back to her original position.

The next Saturday, I moved the gloves to my left hand, rubbing her neck and shoulders with the glove. And then rested my bare right hand on her back. Over the course of the night, I stroked her back a little, a little more, always in unison with the gloved hand on her neck. She glared at me, and then — maybe I'm reading too much into it, but still — she seemed to deliberately turn her head away from me, so she couldn't see my bare hand.

Sunday, I started the night with the gloved hand and the bare hand. Then I pulled the gloved hand back. The first couple of sessions, she turned her head away, and I had a pretty strong worry that when she did finally see my bare hand on her back... well, I've never had stitches yet. But by the end of the night, she saw. She wasn't pleased when she saw, and she turned away again to ignore me, but she didn't freak out.

The next Saturday, I didn't even ease into it. Opened the cage, showed her my bare hand, let her glare, set it on her back. Waited. Stroked her back just an inch or so. Did it again. The third time, she turned her head away, and when I moved up to her neck, she leaned into it. She was still glaring at the wall behind her, but she was purring. We did this several times that night, and the next. She was restless, flinching sometimes when I moved abruptly or touched her cheek, but then leaning into my fingers five seconds later. Then she got more restless. Half-standing, meatloafing back down, tucking paws in, reaching out to knead, falling over, immediately standing back up and glaring. Then, late on Sunday, she fell over onto her side and stayed there. Her back was to me. I petted the side of her round belly. She twitched, perhaps mad, perhaps ready to strike, and I tried not to tense up as I thought about stitches. But she didn't stop purring as I kept petting her. And then she stretched, rolled just a little so I could get to her belly itself, still half-turned-away. One paw kneaded the blanket, one paw kneaded the air, and I stood rubbing the belly of a feral cat that no one could touch.

I was floating above my shoulder. My mind seemed to dig its claws into my collarbone to keep from leaving completely, because the joy was so strong it hurt. My eyes stung, and I concentrated on not sobbing, on breathing without whimpering, my mouth open to pull in air silently and let it out. This was real, but it couldn't be real, because nothing this perfect was real, as perfect as my daydreams about it had been, and nothing real is as perfect as the daydream. But in the daydream, my arm wasn't screaming with cramping pain from being held straight out in front of me with no support under it for 15 minutes.

***
[Written Wednesday, February 26]

When I wrote that in May, I did not know I would be starting a job in August that meant working weekends and giving up volunteering. I thought when I wrote that in May that it was the start of months of wonderful work with Precious, socializing her to the point where maybe someone, someday, would adopt her. She'd been destined to spend the rest of her life in the shelter, which is a nice enough place, but I wanted her to want more. But I had to work weekends, and that meant getting to the shelter once every few weeks as a treat. I still petted her when I went, and Michele worked with her when she was in on weekends, and a few others could pet her. But she plateaued socially. It was my biggest regret about leaving: I'd made her start to want, and then left her hanging.

I didn't know that one of my cats would be diagnosed with cancer in October and have to be put to sleep in February. I didn't know another of my cats would have to be put to sleep without warning in December. I went from a four-cat household to two in two months. I have room, physical room in my condo. A dining table that I never use except to stack sewing projects on, just the right size for a kennel-cage for a few weeks until she gets used to a new place. I have room.

She went to the vet's yesterday for her rabies shot. And then she came home. I didn't expect her to want attention for a while, prepared myself to let her be and give her time and not burst into tears when a week went by and she still hated me. She let me rub her neck yesterday afternoon. She purred. Last night, she gave me her belly, and when she raised her head for a minute, a drop of drool plopped on the blanket under her cheek. This morning she'd moved from the small carrier up onto the hammock shelf, which means she's feeling secure enough to be partly in the open, and also means I can climb into the cage and sit and pet her without my neck and shoulders cramping. I still need to steel myself for regression, and steel myself for joy, and the tears that both will bring. The joy even now is dagger-sharp in my ribs, makes me forget to breathe. But she is home. She is where, a year ago, I didn't know she would belong.

I wrote the following the day after Chess died last Monday, with light editing the next day. Time to post it.

-----


I put Chess to sleep Monday night.

Sunday before I left for work at noon, Chess wasn't interested in eating, although she finally had a few bites. She's had a couple of days like that in the last few weeks since the cancer grew back, but they were false alarms. Still, I knew I was closer now than those times. But it's not like I can take off work every day I worry about her. Work was okay as long as there was something to do, but we ran out of mail to process before the first break, even, and I was too unfocused to read my book, so I listened to music with my noise-blocking earbuds even though it isolates me and can lead to a sensory-deprivation shutdown, but I did it because at least then if you keep moving your hands, it's in time to something, or people watching as least think it's in time to whatever you hear. It got me through that first quarter of the day, and through break, and work picked up afterwards, but then after maybe 45 minutes we were out of mail again. This time my hands weren't moving. it was hard to move at all: my body, my mind, both hard to move, dangerous to move. The day was not yet half over, and I thought, I can't get through the rest of the day if it's like this, thoughts of Chess at the edge but not looking, and I finally got up and found Mary, the supervisor, and asked if it would be a problem if I went home, and she said no, it'd be fine. So I went home, and Chess came to her food dish like she always does when I get home, because she only checks for food if someone is there at the dish, so I put out fresh food, and she sniffed, hesitated, and walked away. I busied myself cleaning the living room and dining nook, and she would walk into the kitchen for food, but then walk away without eating. Then she sniffed the water bowl and walked away without drinking. I knew then, with the water, the way she walked two feet and then turned and sat and stared at the bowl, which was betraying her somehow by not having something she wanted. I didn't admit that I knew until tears were falling on the floor by the water bowl while I rubbed her head. I knew. I didn't want to pester her, and the urge to follow her and coax was so strong my fingers curled. So I went to michele's to watch tv like we'd planned to do. I didn't tell Michele. I came home, and Chess walked toward the kitchen, stopped five feet from her bowl, and sat for a minute, and then walked away. I emailed Michele and told her I'd probably need a ride to the vet's tomorrow, and told her why. If I had a car or a license, I'm not sure I would have said anything even then.

I called the vet when I woke up, and since Chess wasn't in pain or distress, they said it was less hectic at the end of the morning or the end of the day. Michele needed to go to work, so I made the appointment for 7:45. I've never made an appointment to put a cat to sleep. I never had advance notice, never had to choose a time or even make a decision; always it's been obvious, there's been no choice to make, really.

In the morning, she sat in my lap and purred while I rubbed her ear and cheek, but then it was too much, she often gets overstimulated or something, always has, and she left, looked for food, didn't want, came back to my lap, stayed longer while I only petted her a minute or so at a time, but then she left again, restless, sitting five feet from the food dish, five feet from the water bowl, wanting but not wanting what was there, maybe I read too much into it, but it seemed like she wanted to want, that she missed the longing for food, missed thirst. Restless. She lay on the bare floor, but she was restless each time I passed by. So I put up the shade on my bedroom window so the bed would be in the sunlight, and I set her there, and petted her for just a few seconds, stopping before she got restless again, and through most of the day, I just let her sleep. I wanted to spend the day just lying on the bed with her, but she wouldn't have stayed, would have been roused to restlessness again, and I knew, it would be less uncomfortable for her to just spend most of her last day unaware of time passing. So I left her alone, and I cleaned all day, petted her only if she was already awake, and then only for a minute or two. Twice I lay down across the bed, on the covers, and stayed for maybe five minutes, but I didn't dare stay longer. At around 7, I lay down again, for maybe 20 minutes, but for the most part I didn't pet her; I'd rub her ears for a minute or two, then just lie looking at the ceiling while she kept purring, rub her ears again for a minute. I left for 10 minutes, then came back and sat rubbing her until Michele got there.

I did right. I did what she needed, not what I wanted, and it should comfort me, but it doesn't. I want to feel guilty, somehow, I want that to fill the hole, or distract me from it.

Two short pieces from workshop tonight:

***


Suffer, little children,
And then you may come unto me.
How can I take your pain if you have none to offer?
Your father, like mine, is holy:
He is only doing what must be done
To mold you into what you need to be
If you are ever to join me in heaven.
I know you can't tell the difference now
Between the fires of hell
And this forge you are living in,
But some day you will understand.
You will sit at my right hand
And my own daddy will kneel before you
And beg your forgiveness.


***

"You will be the Good Shepherd," he told me. "You will be perfect and pure and whiter than snow, and they are sheep, after all, so they will follow you."

He left me with them on the mountainside, never doubting I would succeed, because I was his son. He expected me to know what to do, to tell where the wolf howl was coming from and to lead them away, but I'd never even heard a wolf, and it's a beautiful song, enticing and intoxicating and hauntingly sad, and nothing that sad can be a danger, anything that sad should be comforted, so I sought out the maker of the melancholy melody and the flock followed me without hesitation. With no one left to shepherd, I had no choice but to be his lamb, and lead myself gently to slaughter.

[From workshop Wednesday night; not inspired by the prompt, but just by that particular word that had come into my head earlier in the day]

I miss things. Things I never had, things that never even existed. Yearning, that's the word I used today; I usually say that I ache, but today I found the word "yearning."

I miss God. Miss believing in God, in a higher purpose, in a kind parent who puts us through hardships — or allows hardships to happen — only to make us into the better people he knows we can be. I miss unconditional love. I don't understand it, can't comprehend someone or something loving you no matter what, but I used to imagine God weeping every time he had to cast someone into hell, because he'd tried, he'd done his best to make them fit for heaven, and he wished he could bend the rules. He wished he could go back and make them do the right thing, relieve them of the burden of free will and shepherd them into his kingdom. My God ached for each soul that would never join him, had a hole in his own perfect soul for each of them. I knew he had a hole where I was supposed to be, knew I would not be with him in heaven, but it was enough that he yearned for me.

I yearn for my mother, of course, or the mother I thought I had when I was a child. I yearn to believe that the problem is me, that the hole in my own soul is my own deficiency, because if it were, then I could do something about it.

I yearn to be hidden. I know, I know, it was a horrible, twisted existence, walking around unseen behind whatever mask I'd made that day, silently screaming for someone to notice that I wasn't there, and I often leaked through the mask as if it were a diaper, usually at the most humiliating times. But this thing now, this pathological inability to hide anything from anyone: it's shameful, and tiring, and out of my control, and I yearn for a middle ground, where I choose what to reveal to whom.

There are two main aspects to my job at the USPS; people work in two-person teams on each machine, with one person "feeding" unsorted mail into the machine, and the other person "sweeping" the sorted mail out of the "stackers," which are arranged in four rows of 50 to 75 columns, looking kind of like a big wall of PO boxes, only with little flip-up gates instead of doors. You sweep the mail from each stacker as it starts to get full, which sounds simple, but depending on the type of sorting the machine is doing, and the mail you get, the stackers may fill up in sudden and unpredictable ways: stacker 15 fills up, and you empty it and 10 seconds later stacker 119 halfway down the big machine fills up, and so on. That's the type of mail we usually run on my shift. But Sunday night at work, Finness and I were running "first-pass" mail, which usually has stackers all filling up slowly and steadily at the same time, and sweeping is pretty methodical and mellow, especially for the first half hour, when about all the sweeper does is clear the occasional (or not-so-occasional, depending) jam. The lack of anything to do usually drives me crazy and I'd rather feed, but Sunday I went with it, and Finness and I were just generally talking and joking as he fed, and the machine jammed, so I strolled about a third of the way down the machine to deal with it. And I smelled smoke. Not burning rubber from one of the many belts, but wood smoke, or paper. This does happen sometimes, if a piece of mail gets caught somewhere and doesn't cause an actual jam: not actual fire, of course, but enough friction to blacken the paper. But not that often. And this was pretty strong.

So, one of the things my father used to do when drunk was threaten to burn down the house with us in it. I used to be terrified of fire, and yet compelled to watch when we burned burnable trash, because otherwise I'd spend the time while the fire was burning worrying about it going out of control. I needed to watch and be prepared. So that was going on in my head at work, smelling this: a desire to run before the house burned down, but also needing to know what it was, where it was, to figure it out and fix it and stop something bad from happening. Of course, in the present, nothing bad was going to happen. A piece of paper getting so hot from just friction that it bursts into flames? No, I knew that wasn't going to happen. But the smell, and the not-knowingness, triggered an adrenaline dump and a need to do — if not to run, than to stay and rectify.

I couldn't identify the spot it was coming from, partly because of the overhead fans blowing, maybe; all I could tell at first was it was somewhere in the middle third. I discounted the last third or so of that, because the fans would have wafted the smokey smell that direction. So I started at the far end of where I thought the smoke could be coming from, clearing the stackers of mail. I started at stacker 130, and worked my way forward, up one 4-row column, down the next. It was getting stronger. Eventually I was pretty sure it wasn't on the bottom row, because the smell wasn't as strong when I bent close enough that the ceiling of that row was inches from my head. A couple more columns up, I was sure it wasn't the next-lowest of the four rows. But I kept clearing all the rows because they needed clearing, anyway, and because I needed that methodicality to feel like I was in control, I think: no emergency here, no urgency, just doing the job like normal. Then I got to stacker 52, and I found a flyer, flimsy like a small sale bill, with the edge caught under a belt, but in such a way that the belt could still turn, just kept grinding away at the paper. I got Finness to stop the machine and I pulled the paper out, its edge charred, with a drop of congealed... Ink? Lamination? I don't know... brown-black stuff on one corner. I'd found it. I took it up to the feeder; Finness marveled at its condition; it was done.

And then the terror hit. He knew from a previous conversation we'd had about my issues with fire, and he's seen me melt down way more than I was doing now, so it wasn't surprising, and I didn't have to do anything as far as working, so I stood and let my hands spasm until the run of mail on that machine was done, and then we moved on to another machine, and I said, essentially, I'm going to sit down, on the floor, and it doesn't mean I'm freaking out any more than when I'm standing, I just need to be sitting. So I sat, and grasped my shoulder where it vibrates, and I was jumpy but okay, so I just stayed like that, still not understanding why I'd delayed freaking out until the smoke was done. Then I realized what I'd been thinking while I was looking for the source of the smell, even while I wasn't consciously aware of thinking it:

I'm imagining it. I'm making it up. There's nothing here, I'm being a drama queen, just pretending there's something here to get attention, and convincing my own self at the same time so I won't have to admit I'm pretending. I was actually so sure of this that I convinced myself so thoroughly that there wasn't anything there, that when I saw the paper, I still didn't entirely believe it. I had to show Finness and see his reaction to be sure it was real, and when it was real, that was so at odds with what I believed that I... The world was not what I thought it was, and it was terrifying. Even though I was right. I was so sure I was wrong that when I was presented with objective evidence that I wasn't wrong, I nearly lost track of the present because of the cognitive dissonance.

First, a product review for a product I've never used.  As you might imagine, we've been processing a rather larger-than-average number of cards (versus letters, postcards, etc.) for the last few weeks at the post office.  Some of these get ripped through no fault of their own: a corner gets caught on a diverter gate in the machine, or they get involved in a 7-card pile-up behind some card that has frickin' BEADS as part of its decoration.  But there's one puzzling thing that I've noticed several times a day.  A card will come through the machine, and the envelope will look like it's been slit with a letter opener, only on three or on all four sides.  This is kinda a problem when the side of the envelope with the address maybe ends up no longer with the card; sometimes all that ends up in the tray is that single side of envelope, with no clue where the card is; sometimes the card ends up envelope-less in the reject tray and we can't find the envelope.  Particularly awesome when there's a check inside the card; I don't honestly know if we mail those back to the address on the check or not, because it might not be kosher since it's not a return address per se, so there might actually be rules that prevent doing that.  Anyway, I noticed a couple of things about these envelopes: they were all the same off-white/light-grey color, and they were all of a texture rather more like newspaper than like a normal envelope.  And, since the envelopes are open on 3 or 4 sides, and since I needed to check for a check in case the card needed special handling, I couldn't help but notice the company name on the back of each and every one of the cards was the same: Paper Craft.  Now, I don't know how many of their cards do make it through the machines intact; maybe this problem only affects one in a thousand, maybe less.  But this particular problem doesn't seem to be happening with any other company's envelopes.

Now, back to the beaded cards.  Also, this new trend than I can only refer to as "Bedazzled" cards, with little faux gemstones on the cards.  They probably look really cool when your first get them, but be aware, once they've gone through a postal machine, which moves the mail through lots of narrow slots, there's a good chance that the envelope over those little gemstone thingies is now going to be punched through like you've used an awl.  It actually makes for a pretty cool-looking envelope.  But probably not the look you're going for.

Finally, a word on sealing your envelopes: DO!  Seal them with the adhesive strip pretty much all envelopes have.  Seal them all the way across.  Don't just stick an adorable little snowman or Santa sticker in the middle of the flap and think that's enough.  Because there's a good chance that your envelope is going to end up in a tray with another piece of mail that slides under that unsealed flap, and the two fornicators are now going to be fed as one into the machine, and they'll go in just fine, but somewhere along the path in the machine, they will have a falling out and each go their separate ways, and chances are decent that when that happens, it's gonna rip off the unsealed flap on your envelope and the twee little sticker, and now it's not so frickin' cute, is it?

Of course, all of this is moot for this Christmas-card season, because presumably you've either already mailed your cards or you've said, "Screw it, I'll save them for next year."  But file the info away for upcoming birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, get-wells, what have you.

I CANNOT believe I ended up following this particular writing workshop prompt, since I loathe Christmas, and never liked Santa.  But here it is.  The prompt was to write a letter to Santa from your younger self, or one of your characters.  This is what I would have written when I was somewhere between 7 and 9 years old, had I been articulate; I remember having each of these thoughts at some point around that age.

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Dear Santa,

I'm not sure what I want this year, but I know what I don't want.

I don't want a doll this year. See, I really like the dolls you brought me last year, especially the one with the straight black hair, because I've always wanted to be an Indian and have my hair not frizz and tangle and not turn red at the ends, so, I know this sounds weird, but when I play with her, I pretend she's me as a baby and she's going to grow into what I want to grow into instead of what I really am. And she doesn't look like a baby, really, she looks like a two-year-old, so I can pretend she can talk without feeling stupid. But Jenny's my favorite doll ever in my life, and I want her to always be my favorite, so if you bring me another doll and I don't like it as much, it won't be fair to the new doll, and maybe someone else would love it as much as I love Jenny, so you should give it to them, instead. And on the other hand, if you bring me a doll I like better than Jenny, I would feel really bad about not loving Jenny best anymore, and anyway, she deserves to be loved best. Actually, if you want to, you can take my other dolls and give them to other kids, if you know someone who will love them better. Except Lilly, because she and Jenny are friends, and I like her almost as much and some days maybe even a little more because she's older and can go on adventures.

I don't want any more Matchbox cars this year, unless I can have another U.S. Mail Jeep. Darrell and me have too many cars already, and it gets confusing. Oh, except if the Matchboxes are for both of us, that'd mean he wouldn't get any either, and I don't think he'd like that.

Mainly I guess I just want fewer things, period, at least at Christmas, because Darrell is too old to get many toys anymore, so he only gets like six things, and mom only gets three, and dad just gets the one from mom and the one from both Darrell and me, and then I'm still opening presents after everyone else is done and it feels quiet and weird and the air is heavy and I feel greedy with all the stuff around me.

What I really want more than anything is for the church to have the candlelight service every Sunday night and not just the one before Christmas. I don't know if you have candlelight services where you live, but what they do is, they turn off the lights, and then Brother Bob lights one candle in the front of the room. And he uses that one to light two other candles, and two deacons take those candles and start with the front row on each side, and light the first person's candle, and then while that person's lighting the next one, the deacon moves to the next row, and the next, and then in like five minutes, everybody's holding a lighted candle and there's enough light you can see the hymn book to sing Silent Night, and it all came from that one candle, and I don't know why I love it, but I want to do it every week until I can figure out why I feel so light and full and like crying and laughing and flying and curling up in bed all at the same time.

[Prompt: Write about something you've always wanted, but that you hope you never get.]

I got baptized when I was 11. I'd been wanting to since I was 8, but I always chickened out when the call went out at the end of service and I'd think about standing in front of everyone and having to say something. It wasn't until I was 11 that I realized I could talk to Brother Bob beforehand, and he could say something for me, and all I had to do was stand and stare at the floor.

The baptism was the next week, and in between we happened to have a revival, so by the time Sunday came, there were three of us. Brother Bob explained what would happen, everything from "The water will be a little cold but not too cold" to reassurances that when he dunked me, it would be quick enough that I would absolutely not breathe in any water through the folded handkerchief he would hold over my nose and mouth. And he was right. The actual baptism wasn't a big deal: I went under, I didn't feel any different when I came up, but because I'd declared my faith in public I wouldn't go to hell if I died.

Herb Broughton was one of the other two baptized. He was probably close to 40 years old, and he'd been baptized before, but a lot of people rededicated themselves to God this way. After we'd all been dunked, the three of us and Brother Bob were going to hold hands and bow our heads while Brother Bob prayed. I was disappointed that I ended up between Herb and the other guy I didn't know, so I was holding hands not with my much-loved pastor but with two near-strangers. Herb started to reach for my hand, but then he shifted. He cupped my shivering right shoulder in his big hand. It was a firm touch, but not pushing, not demanding. And as we stood with bowed heads and closed eyes, I could feel the warmth from beneath my skin meet the warmth of his quilt-heavy hand. What I felt was sacred. Safety. Acceptance. Connection. Peace. At that moment, I adored, not God and Jesus, but this comforting man and his palm that brought me the comfort I didn't know I'd been aching for.

I sought him out every Sunday after that. Before church started, then between Sunday School and preaching, then after the sermon was over. We mainly talked, mainly the sarcastic teasing that was the only way I knew to show affection. Not every week, but often enough, he'd put a hand on my shoulder, or sometimes his arm around me to hold the far shoulder, buddy-like, father-and-son-like, and he'd smile with a slight squint that seemed a little self-conscious, and he'd keep me from floating away into the nothingness where I mostly lived.

There was never anything dark in it. I was primed to expect something sexual in any touch, and to suspect even where there was nothing, and it was never there with him.

He was, I know now, the first parent-I-wanted. Less than a year later, my mother switched from that church, where we'd gone all my life, because of a feud with another member. I was adrift again, unmoored, floating.

In 7th grade, there were three physical education teachers supervising a gym full of us. At the beginning of the year, the court was set up with about 10 different "stations," and we were divided up into small groups and rotated through half of the stations each day doing each of the activities. One station was juggling, which was Mr. Huffman's forte. He wasn't there the whole ten minutes or so each group spent, because there were more groups than teachers. But one day, when my group was ending the period there, he came over. Ora Decker excitedly told him that I'd actually been juggling the scarves. Not just two, but all three at once, in the right pattern and everything. He wanted to see, of course, and I wanted to show him, but I knew before I even tried that there was no way my hands could do what I wanted with a teacher watching. I made the attempt, though, three or four times, until I finally gave up and stood still, begging the tears not to fall in front of the rest of the group. I glanced for a second across his face, risking that moment of eye contact in hopes of telegraphing into his mind that I needed an escape. And I saw such sympathy in the curve of his eyebrows that I felt in a way sorry for him. But he was also smiling softly, and he reached out, touched my shoulder for a second, father-and-son-like, and said, "That's fine, I'll see it at some point."

For two years or more, I daydreamed of him somehow becoming my guardian.

He wasn't the last: Mr. Jacobs in 9th grade, Mr. Huffman's wife that year, too. Mr. Berryman in 10th and 11th grades, Reverend Parrish at the same time, Mr. Tyler in the summer program before 12th grade, Mr. and Ms. Lee that last year of high school. Countless others in between, including the foster father from the three weeks I lived away from my parents. Then after I "grew up," there were professors, fellow college students, coworkers, my shrink to some extent, men I thought I wanted to be my boyfriends because that's what intimacy and intensity is supposed to be about. I at least know now that it isn't sex I'm sublimating. It isn't even a parent I want, a different mother or a different father, a replacement. I don't understand what a parent feels like, so that isn't the cavity I'm trying to fill, or if it is, I have no idea what the hole is shaped like or even where it resides within me. I want. I want. It is relentless and insistent and the shame of it makes me back away always from the person I want, makes me shove, bite, run.