I am fighting another night of no sleep and feeling a bit tossed and thinking about how happy I was in college...how magical it was, almost...and then I go on Facebook (something I don't do much of anymore) and I see an update from someone I adored way back then. She was probably the first person I ever really saw as a role model who wasn't a teacher or favorite author.

We met one day in the cafeteria. She was so fascinating...her hair all adorably messy, her eyes bright and wide, her hands carrying a fully loaded tray with a tattered copy of One Hundred Years of Solitude tucked under one arm. She had this energy that drew me to her right away. And she was a junior while I was a freshman so there was also that aspect of "looking up to" to as well.

We would end sharing several classes together the two years we overlapped and I loved her take on all the different stories and novels we read in our Irish fiction course. Often, we would traipse to the dining hall together discussing something we had just read. Her mind was wonderfully wild and it turned out she could sing and dance (really, really well) and was theatrically bound.

Before I met her I had never heard of Gabriel Garcia Marquez. She spoke of him in way that made it impossible not to read him. Though her dreams were for Broadway (and she certainly could have made it there) she ended up becoming a well-respected writer, which only seems fitting, given how much passion she had for books when I knew her in college.

I remember the nerve it took me to Facebook her a while back. "What is she remembers how dorky I was around her?" I worried. "Or what if she knew I had a crush on her?" She always was kind to me and often patted me on the head (somehow this didn't insult me because it had happened before and still does with other people) and I just always had the sense she kind of knew and it didn't bother her. Still, I was pleasantly surprised when she not only accepted my request, but wrote me a nice note back.

She is probably the one (of the very few) people I ever had feelings for that I could be perfectly normal around. Maybe it was because she could put anyone at ease and had the most terrifically bizarre sense of humor and she accepted everyone.

Tonight, when I saw her photo (with a favorite professor of mine whom I also looked up to and who gave me my crazy passion for Henry James and Nathaniel Hawthorne) I felt joy. She is really, really happy, I thought, her dreams have come true and she is doing what she loves and she deserves it so very much. I remember her for so many reasons and I will never forget her for how she made people feel when they were around her: alive and thriving.

etsy.com

Sleeping At Last just released a new cover of Snow Patrol's "Chasing Cars." It's wretchedly painful to listen to, but maybe 'wretchedly' isn't the right word since this is a 'wretched' that the soul sometimes needs to unburden itself and everything about this is just gorgeous.

This is so incredibly sad it physically hurts to listen. I totally failed my 'if I can make it through without crying' I'll be fine test...it's just achingly beautiful and really unleashes something within. Make sure you're somewhere safe if you listen because you are most likely going to cry your eyes out.

I have never felt more for a bird in my entire life. At work, we have windows where trees back right up to them and all morning long this bird has been flying into the window (which doesn't open) and knocking himself up quite a bit. 

He also has been sliding down at times so that you are on eye level with him and actually see the frustration he is experiencing. Of course, this could be me projecting my feelings onto him but I do think he is very upset and my heart goes out to him. 

Even if he does think he's attacking another bird (not nice, I know) the frenzy and determination (and utter futility) of what he is doing is very troubling. It feels exactly like someone repeatedly knocking their head against a wall, which is part of what's so troubling about it.

We have tried tapping on the window when he approaches, putting up something to try and deflect the reflection that must be making him think he's seeing another bird, talking to him...but nothing works. The weird thing is even his singing sounds frustrated. I don't know how many times he can hurt himself before he does damage. :(

According to an article I found this is what is actually going on:

 http://www.wild-bird-watching.com/Cardinals-Windows.html

...Though it's a few hours later now and he is still at it and it seems so out of the ordinary, even for birds...one of my co-workers thinks the bird might have a brain injury. It seems like that could be it...but it is just so sad to witness no matter what the cause. He is on this loop that is so hard to witness.

I went outside to look closer and to see if anything could be done and this is what he looks like (I couldn't take my own picture since he is so agitated):

When I came back in a customer was watching the bird from inside and she told me it's less common for the tufted titmouse bird (above) to fly into windows repeatedly like this guy has been doing...

Even if I weren't gay and even if I weren't at odds with my parents over this issue, I know I would still support gay rights. Earlier today at work, I overheard a co-worker say something homophobic and I think it was only how tired I was and how futile I knew it would be that I didn't say anything to them. I clip news articles sometimes so I can pull them out on especially trying days and read things like this:

"His commandment is worthy — and warranted. All of us, no matter our religious traditions, should know better than to tell gay people that they’re an offense. And that’s precisely what the florists and bakers who want to turn them away are saying to them."

 http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/05/opinion/sunday/frank-bruni-same-sex-sinners.html

There are so many real evils in this world, so many real battles to fight, I sincerely, with no malice towards the far far right or anyone else who is anti-gay, cannot understand why gay marriage (and the desire for two people to share love and grow old together) is considered one of those battles. Love is love and I firmly believe that, even when people I know and respect are telling me otherwise.

I have been thinking about solitude again and how to live with yourself when you're not sure you particularly like your own company and the things that normally take you outside of yourself are just not just holding your attention like they used to. 

This article, even more than the Post one on grace, really resonates with me today. It is so painfully true it hurts to read. Some parts just jumped right out and hit really hard:


--I want to like myself. I want to love myself. I want to be happy with my life. What I'm learning is that I'm uncomfortable in my own skin. That seems crazy to me, but it's the truth. At 42 I'm uncomfortable in the skin of a gay man. I think that has everything to do with my feelings of unworthiness and undesirability. I just don't like myself. I'm looking for outside "liking" in order to feel good about me. That's never going to cut it. I have to be proud of me: my life, my accomplishments, my choices.

The article concludes with this:

--I wish we could bottle up that time in childhood when we feared nothing and were game to try anything. Imagine being able to uncork that bottle and take a small whiff, remembering how it felt to be fearless, to not care what other people think, to know we are loved, worthy, cared for, desired.

Go ahead. Imagine that bottle. Uncork it. Breathe deeply. Find it. Find the courage. Find the confidence. I'm talking to myself here. Breathe deeply. They're there. Breathe deeply, Michael. Now live.

The rest can be read here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-rohrer/how-do-you-find-self-worth-when-you-dont-like-yourself_b_3658485.html