Sitting folded up in the car, knee knocking the gearshift, writing on paper (!) by the light of passing traffic. The last time I wrote in blackness was at 3 AM the day after the twins were born. With the familiar swell of milk I was victorious, yet terrified of the coney-island babies two floors below who would be unable to digest it. To look at the notebook later you’d almost never know it was written blind except for the 14-point penmanship that swerved drunkenly, one line bleeding into another.

One side of me is no harm done, the poor thing, and I went and unleashed a shitstorm, and the whole thing was just ridiculous, and all she needs is help.

But then eyes are narrowed, arms crossed. She’d done it before. She’d been given discreet chances multiple times by multiple people. She lied and tried to cover her tracks. She made me feel violated in my own space, dammit. She got what was coming.

What came of all this? Into the ether I pumped contagious anger, fear, frustration, creeped-outedness. Justified—and I’d do it again—but still. I may have sent scores of already-skittish bloggers and flickrers either running for their pitchforks, or for off-grid cabins in the deep woods. But to say that an episode like this is typical of sharing our lives is to say that disease is typical of kissing. And I’ll risk a little herpes simplex for the sake of community like this.

My initial outrage was satiated by yours. But it was at the expense of a living, breathing, very troubled person. That’s the one thing we know for sure, other than what else has come to light.

The relative truth of the facts as supplied by her isn’t really that important. We know that she needed escape. What she needs now is a quiet space in which to grow more comfortable in her own skin, regardless of what she is or isn’t. Let’s give her that and call this chapter closed.*

*and get really, really good at defensive googling.

+++

A bell needs to be rung.

How do you go about living who you actually are?

When could you have smothered what you really need—because it would have been easier—but didn’t? What happened, and what did it teach you?

  

Two things to follow: 1) A lesson in just how small the Internet is; and 2) a lesson to not fuck with someone who has an ALL-SEEING EYE, a ROOMFUL OF INTERNET SCOURING, HIGHLY TRAINED ORANGUTANGS and FRIENDS EVERYWHERE.

There’s this guy. Just your average, run-of-the-mill gay single-dad lumberjack, or somesuch—so he says. His name is Cooper. Or Nico. So he says.

He’d been stealing my writing, you see, and repurposing it on his own personal blog—Cooper’s Corridor.

A few months back, one of my readers emailed me and said “This is… beyond weird, but look at THIS!”

So I did. And I emailed him and said “Cooper, this is awkward, but I believe one of my posts fell into your grocery cart by accident. Please do the right thing and remove it. Off to peruse the rest of your site now..."

My mistake was making a pot of tea first. By the time I came back, Cooper’s Corridor had been deleted. The whole thing.

He concocted a story about 'right-wing-trolls' and 'gay-single-dad-lumberjack-haters threatening the safety of his family' and being bullied off the Internet—even making another blogger think it was his fault.

But he wasn’t bullied off the Internet. He was shamed off the Internet. And that was enough for me, as chickenshit as it was. I saw no need to cannonball into his cosy blogging pool with a megaphone and a cartful of links. In the Wile E. Coyote dustcloud left in his wake I bowed to an audience of my lone self and said "D-d-dat's all, folks!" and such was the end of the story.

Or so I thought.

First, I put a copyright notice on this blog, which I can’t stand but serves as I KNOW YOU’RE OUT THERE, YOU STICKY-FINGERED DICKWAD.

Then silence.

Then a few days ago, another reader showed me the peephole to Cooper's Corridor Redux: the private Nico’s Niche. A moment later I’m sitting there sputtering and completely agog, staring at this (click to see the full-size version):

Looks familiar, does it not? With unfortunately impeccable timing, Justin leans in behind me and says What’s that?

(Justin, who's frankly a little creeped out by the Internet. And computers. And anything THAT PLUGS IN. Justin, who refinished that very canoe with his bare hands. Justin, who asks about Teh Blogging, “WHEN WILL IT END?")

And I say Oh nothing, honey. It’s just somebody PRETENDING TO BE YOU. By the by, have you seen Fluffy? He missed his morning lettuce. What's that smell?

+++++

Welcome, ladies and gents, to another exciting episode of 'HEY! WHAT'S THAT ECHO?'

Me: My chrysalis has crumbled, dried, blown away in the wind.

Cooper/Nico: The protective chrysalis I have encompassed myself in these past weeks, crumbles, dries, is blown away in the fragrant July rain.

Me: I lust so deeply for magic, I swear sometimes I can will it into existence.

Cooper/Nico: I lust so deeply for the magic in life, that I am usually able to percieve it wherever I am.

Me: As soon as I walk up the driveway he yells she’s here! and runs to me through the scents of woodsmoke and cinnamon and mystic. He might embrace me eye-to-eye, gruff and scratchy and with his own stories and adventure. Or he might crawl to me with a dirty bum, grasp the hem of my jeans with sticky fists grinning broadly to say up! then wrap koala arms around my neck.

Cooper/Nico: As soon as I pull up in the driveway, Dario yells “He’s here!” and runs to me, hurling his body into my arms like a small cannonball. I catch a whiff of strawberry scented shampoo and coconut suntan oil on his warm, summer scented skin. He embraces me eye-to-eye, his voice high with excitement, full of stories, tinged with anxiety. My own voice is deeper than usual, gruff with wood smoke and fatigue. “You sound scratchy!“, says Dario. Matteo grasps my legs, grinning broadly, wrapping me in koala arms.

+++++

That’s just a sampling of the stuff he was kind enough to tweak.

I know what you're thinking. 'Coconut suntan oil'? On a kid? Riiiight.

He’s taken word-for-word chunks of posts before too, turning Evan into 'Dario' or 'Matteo' and me into him. Which is a formidable task, given that it's been more shits than giggles around here lately, so far as content thievery is concerned. Just, y'know, the CATASTROPHIC PREMATURE BIRTH, HEART SURGERY, BRAIN SURGERY and DEATH OF AN INFANT. The very same infant I write about above.

Dead baby, meet Internet newcomers. Internet newcomers, meet dead baby. His name was Liam. Not 'Dario', not 'Matteo'. LIAM.

I don’t know what’s more pathetic—him plagiarizing a personal blog for his own personal blog, or me wanting him tarred and feathered for it. I mean, it’s just a blog, for chrissakes.

Serious stuff, though. I had no idea.

Let’s hear from one of his heartbroken readers upon the apparent demise of Cooper's Corridor V1.0: “Cooper wrote with a grace and maturity that belied his young age. His writing was never ‘cute’ and more often it was breathtaking prose worthy of the loftiest prizes. He was selfless—he could sell books by the millions but he seemed much more content nurturing his loyal readers. …His was the most human voice of all. He, perhaps, the single greatest gay role model.”

The SINGLE GREATEST GAY ROLE MODEL? Stop. Just stop right there. First, for reprinting that, let me apologize to every excellent gay person in the entire freaking universe. And second, I cannot—as an avid Dan Savage devotee—let that statement go unchallenged. Please wait a moment while my master removes my ballgag so that I may object.

Time and time again, this guy has clicked and dragged over my writing, my family's life, and hit Edit > Copy > Paste. Does his internal dickwad-o-meter not go berserk? Or does he lack an internal dickwad-o-meter entirely?

External voice: Hi. I’m Kate, and I’m 31.
Internal dickwad-o-meter (shouting): BZZZT! LIAR!

External voice: Hi. I’m Kate, and I weigh 121 pounds, just like always.
Internal dickwad-o-meter (shouting): BZZZT! LIAR!

External voice: Hi. I’m Cooper and writing is Everything To Me.
Internal dickwad-o-meter (shouting): BZZZT! PLAGIARIST!

I wonder about people who are frauds. Is the public approval worth the self-loathing? Does the ego boost go down without a choke when it’s built on a lie?

Let’s play a game. What lies do you tell? Little and white, big and stinking? Are they worth what they cost?

I’ll start.

External voice: It’s just a blog.
Internal dickwad-o-meter (shouting): BZZZT! LIAR!

+++++

I'm sorry if

I am not a jerk

You know, I just had to take off my Mrs. Nice hat. I'm trying to keep my sense of humour but this space is sacred to me, as are all the people and memories on it. I've got no more patience to see it continually reinterpreted and claimed by someone else.

Some of you might say, What did you expect? You're the one who put it all Out There. And I know that. We all do. But to see it actually happen—and to know just as well as he does how to use the Internet Wayback Machine and save webpages offline and capture screens—I have no choice but to claim it as mine, as it always has been. Because it belongs to me.

If I’m ever pregnant again—which would begin with myself and a random passerby on the street with a c-pooch fetish being even remotely inclined—post categories will be

::  GOALIE, GOALIE, WHEREFORE WERE THOU, GOALIE?
::  THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF STRESS-INDUCED ALL-OVER BODY RASH
::  HELP! MY RANDOM PASSERBY RAN AWAY TO MEXICO AND I CAN’T GET UP
::  MY RANDOM PASSERBY RAN AWAY TO MEXICO AND ALL HE GOT ME WAS THIS UNEXPECTED FETUS

Until spring 2010, posts tagged THE NEXT GESTATION are about the Distant but Apparently Assured Published Novel because I figured after all the mess of last year, you’d know better than to expect Justin to share his popcorn with me ever again.

Just so you know.

++++

Weaving through the midnight crowd at the Shediac Lobster Festival, I lusted for my camera and for several more hours.

I love the signs, the lights, the cigarette butts, the relentless BING! BING! BING! BA-OOOGA! WEEDEEWEEDEEWOOO! BIDDI BIDDI BLEEPIE DEEP! and the bass thump and the shouted step-right-ups of competing game hosts. The teensy booths, each with their purpose—tickets by the roll, cotton candy, frankenfood-on-a-stick—all lined with teen sensations stuffed like sausages into polyester tube tops.

And the carnies, of course. Like the one who bared what may have once been a full set of teeth and winked: a lady such as yourself can ride my dragon for free.

Turning a corner to see this spinning upside-down about six hundred feet above our heads, grasping Justin’s arm like don’t you even … no… I can’t… I… okay but quick, before I change my mind… holy shit… HOLY SHIT it’s going higher. Ooooooh, oh no. Oh my UNHOLY CRAP. Tell me I am not IN LINE TO GET ON THAT THING.

$5.00 each for ten minutes of waiting, three minutes of hanging there as they lock us in, and a mere 45 seconds in flight but OH MY BILLY-BE-FRIGGING-JEEZUS, I’ll park myself aboard the Cosmic Upchucker for an entire day screaming my head off with joy until my voice runs out.

I love fairs. Even when the highlight is Bill Lynch’s Zipper in the parking lot of the Lower Sackville Mini-Mart, I skip around grinning stupidly because I’m addicted to being stomach-turningly freaked while staring down whatever’s in front of me and saying ahh, screw it… sure, why the hell not?*

* provided of course that said amusement propels at such a velocity so as to neatly soak the person directly opposite me, rather than myself, in the event that I barf.

They say it’s my birthday, na-na-na-na-na-na. Truthy portraits by Evan, his first.

 

Intended or not, blog traffic ramps up in step with catastrophe’s fallout.

And then like so many spectacles, firefighters clear up the tangled metal and all that’s left are the marks of a doomed swerve on the asphalt and once again everyone speeds past without a glance, this bit of roadway being just like all the rest.

I am Inigo Montoya.

It's very strange—I have been in the trauma business so long, now that it's over, I don't know what to do with the rest of my blog.

I started Glow in the Woods and rapidly it went from mine to theirs and then it became yours, too. I look around and they’re all gathered together in the flickering warmth, arms across shoulders, firelight shining through glass and wine, the storm muffled and distant, dampened by healing tears and contemplation and laughter. Meanwhile I busy myself with whoopie pies and fussing over blankets and fetching kindling for a fire that doesn’t need me, hiding in hospitality.

Myself again, hormonally speaking, nothing short of self-generated anti-depressants. And suddenly overwhelmed with what am I clinging to, anyway?

What I hadn’t realized until now is that my chrysalis has crumbled, dried, blown away in the wind. I hang there wilting on the vine, wings folded, head tucked in and eyes shut tight. I’m supposed to fly away now, this new being, the mother of a spirit-baby.

All this time my heart’s felt as though Liam is the green, the penance, the stem. If I let go of the sadness I let go of him.

I think I might be ready.

I’m more confident in his spirit. That it knows how to find me again, how to visit with me without being always RIGHTHERE <gestures with palm to nose>, my last sight of him and his suffering.

But what now? What am I looking for? What are you looking for?

I am considering piracy.

 

I wish the cursor didn’t blink. That it blinks makes it say

I’m waiting.
I’m waiting.
I’m waiting.
I’m waiting.
I’m waiting.
I’m waiting.

They said we think there’s somebody missing and I said funny you mention it, so do I and so I sit simply for a bit and ask the quiet who are you? and she replies me, of course.

I have to draw lines around her form so I type what do you wear? and promptly she answers see? I made it from old spinnaker cloth and I can see her there.

I ask how are you useful?

And she tells me I can’t carry much but I’m the fastest they’ve ever seen.

It’s as if they're all travellers waiting in some sort of jumbled queue, some sprawled across rows of chairs and some cross-legged on the floor against backpacks, waiting for names to be called.

She’s pressed her way to the front now and her eyes are bright, and she is ready.

 

It was even more vivid than last time: the very day Ben stopped breastfeeding, some kind of hormonal veil lifted and I went from raving straightjacketed maniac to unshakable stepford wife.

The other night I said to Justin “You know what?” and he said “What?” and I said “I think I might be myself again. I think I might be back to normal.” and he said “Normal? What, you mean THIS wasn’t normal?” (sits upright in chair clutching imaginary safety bar)

“Tck-tck-tck-tck-tck-tck-tck-tck isn’t this lovely! tck-tck-tck-tck look at the view from up here! tck-tck-tck wait, what’s going on? tck-tck-tck what’s that peak up ahead? tck-tck-tck-aaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHH!!!!!! UUUUUGHHH I NEED NEW PANTS WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIIIIIEEEEE!!! tck-tck-tck-tck-tck-tck oh phewph, thank god that’s over… WAAHGGGHHHUPSIDEDOWNAAAARRGGGHH!!”

I guess that means he’s relieved.

+++++

The end of breastfeeding marks the end of gestation, the sideways promotion of what I’d affectionately call a parasitic love. And yet another goodbye to the boy we left behind, the last of Liam's mark on me.

Summoning him can be like arriving at a summer home already warm with company. As soon as I walk up the driveway he yells she’s here! and runs to me through the scents of woodsmoke and cinnamon and mystic. He might embrace me eye-to-eye, gruff and scratchy and with his own stories and adventure. Or he might crawl to me with a dirty bum, grasp the hem of my jeans with sticky fists grinning broadly to say up! then wrap koala arms around my neck. No matter what his form he meets my eye so deliberately, as Ben does, and says in his own way hello again mama, I missed you, and look, look at all this.

Or I arrive to see grass grown to hay, windows boarded up for winter, mothballs and plastic sheets. I try the door just in case, call through the porch hello? are you here? and get no answer. It is not abandonment, just vacancy.

That’s how it is now. He is not with me. I don’t know where he is. Maybe his next, a place or calling that might give him the chance to run to me again in some way, just now and then, I hope.

+++++

1979. At the top of the paper, saved all these years by my parents:

WHAT I WILL BE WHEN I GROW UP.

 

First up, and most important, when you are six:  to be A TEENAGER. With CURLY HAIR. And mascara, and lipstick (a.k.a. FAST AND EASY).
 

Next, I would be a roller derby star. Of course. DUH. Apparently an Amish one.
 

In addition to all of the above, my life’s ambition? To be TANNED. sigh.
 

 

The last and final option was the only one in which it was acceptable to have straight hair. And I don’t even know how to say this, in case the publisher falls down a well and emerges with amnesia—but I'm told it’s going to happen, although it’s not what you might think. It’s an adventure novel for kids, and in about 18 months, it will be born.

(What you might think might happen too, if I can pull it together. We’ll see.)

!!!

 

It’s a good thing I was at the bottom of my fourth rum drink when we saw them wake up. Bats don’t eat pickles.

“What the…”

“DUCK!”

“Holy shit. HOLY shit. HOLY SHIT!”

Roaring fire. Plaid. Moose antlers. Giant rock fireplace. Rum. The friendly, whooshing hiss of a coleman stove. The best frigging supper ever eaten in all of frigging christendom (papardalle, asiago, garlic, garlic, garlic, butter, asparagus, and scallops, which, handily, have no faces). More rum. Bigger fire. Drunken interpretive dance. More rum. Cozy slippers. A clock that strikes midnight. A COVEN OF RABIED BATS HUNGRY FOR BLOOD.

ONE! One wide-awake bat! A-ha-ha! TWO! Two black bats! A-ha-ha! THREE! FOUR! FIVE! SIX! SEVEN! Seven wide-awake black furry swooping bats! A-ha-ha-haaa!

My instincts? Sharp as a tack. 1) Pull sweater up over gaping mouth; 2) Say ‘holy shit!’ fourteen times in quick succession; 3) Lay immobile thinking if I don’t move they’ll think I'm sofa if I don’t move they’ll think I'm sofa if I don’t move they’ll think I'm sofa.

Meanwhile Justin stood frozen solid as three of them circled his head almost too fast to track and said this:

“In french they’re called chauve-souris. You know, there aren’t many things that really give me the queebs. Mice are one of them. (FLAP! FLAP! FLAP!) Mice with wings are another. I think… (SHRIEK! SHRIEK! SHRIEK!) …yes. I think I’m about to lose my shit.”

Ten seconds later we were in the car headed home, these particular bats having been bred in Sauron’s evil lair to be unafraid of light. Thankfully, Justin had only sipped at a lone beer so as to enjoy the drunken interpretive dance unimpaired, and was able to drive home at mach ten screeching like a little girl until we made the shore.

(confession: that last bit may have been me.)

+++++

We returned the next morning to paddle to Liam’s eddy and I felt strangely blank.

Here is a mother whose baby died, and here she is paddling a canoe, and there she is standing under the tree where the beavers have been busy, and it’s all different now, everything shifted, and look, she’s hungry, and it’s time for rice crackers.

+++++

As we tied the canoe to the roof for the second drive home this trip, a large butterfly coaxed to me

Look! Look! Come and see!

And so I followed, lying on my side on the beach, admiring as it preened and sunbathed on the sand.

I am all joy! My wings, they are mine! They catch wind and eyes! I am beautiful.

We sat together for a while, me and the butterfly, and I cooed to him how lovely he was, how proud he must be of his wonderful yellow. He agreed and then went on to find adventure, and I wondered if in some deep recess he might harbour a speck of my baby and I thought to myself onward, onward, brave son!

 

+++++

Two hours later we pulled into the driveway. As soon as I opened the door I saw another on the grass, a different butterfly but identical to my preening friend, this one injured and fluttering pitifully. Half a wing missing from some misfortune, he told me

I was all joy, but now I am done

and I picked him up in my hand and cooed to him how lovely he was, how proud he must be of his wonderful yellow. He agreed, and I found a soft, broad hosta leaf in the shade where he went still and I thought to myself onward, onward, brave son!

 

 

LALALALALALAAA CAN’T HEAR YOU my brain singsongs, its fingers stuck in its ears as the throbbing, whimpering thing in my chest emotes and aches.

LALALALALAAAA let’s think about HAIR MOUSSE! and MEN! and VODKA COCKTAILS! and A NEW SUMMER SKIRT! and MOUNTAINS! and BUSINESS TRIPS! and THAT WAD OF PRIMAL GOO THAT’S BLOCKING THE BATHTUB DRAIN!

My brain has given itself Chiclet veneers to cover the rot underneath.

I fell apart a few weeks before their birthday. Then that day came and went and in the past six weeks I’ve lamented everything except Liam. What to do with this life. What to do with an unwanted minivan. How to ease off on paying work in the interest of making time for possibly dream-fulfilling work. How to possibly ease off on paying work after losing ten thousand dollars on a minivan that is apparently unwanted by everyone else, too. How to get my mojo back. How to shake this angry pallor.

<BZZZT>

Scratch that last one.

I’ve got grief exhaustion. I haven’t got any more profound left in me.

I’m tired of being honourable. Not as-in ‘sick of it’ but just plain tired. Tapped. There’s the first day he died, then the second day he died, then the six weeks in between: the day of his heart surgery, through his steroid-fuelled bloom, the day his brain began to flood. And one year ago today: the day they tried to fix it and he said that’s it, world. I think I’ve had enough.

Likewise.

++++++

This weekend we go to be with him, just the two of us, to see if we can spot his urn in the creekbed again. We’ll take our red canoe, paddle through the everglades that lead to the gnarly, twin-trunked maple that canopies over his gurgling eddy.

I’m bringing rum.

And after that I’m going to try and honour him by allowing myself to be human, not just some shadow of a human.

His soft, floppy body lies pressed to your skin and no matter your own heat, you can't keep him warm. From the inside-out, he is the still coolness of the end of life. Then his spirit is lifted into mystery, and it is done. And forever after that you take your own breaths under pressure: pressure to be in a state of constant spiritual vigilance, of love, of gratitude.

It’s impossible. I can only be so serene. It’s just not in my nature, except in fleeting moments. So I hope for one, just one, sometime tomorrow night.

 

The minivan is no more. Finally we decided to eat the loss (thousands) and trade it in, crippled by gas prices and emotional trauma and vanity. We bought the thing—the pentecostal retiree convention motorcoach, the Ferris-Beuller-endcredits schoolbus, the circa 1850s battleship—just over a year ago because we were going to have three children, and three children pushed us hopelessly into peoplemover territory.

We are once again Volkswagen people, our fifth. It’s sturdy-sexy and it smells right. It’s a standard. It is us. And we no longer require those guys in jumpsuits with the orange glowsticks to help us navigate underground parking garages.

As we drove away from the dealership Justin ya-hooed I’m not even looking back! as I turned in my seat to stare at its bulk, a brick shithouse in a lot full of German minxes, my eyes suddenly glassy. Thinking as I do with every step that leaves him further behind us goodbye my Liam, we wanted you.

++++++

The grasses are knee-high now around his blackened ruin, lupins and bramble spreading where there was once hissing smoke.

Now to be a wife again, a friend, a woman. To laugh and mean it.

++++++

FB | Message : night out

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Today at 8:23pm

So girls: I've been thinking lately how great it would be to get out. Not 'out' as in a barf-encrusted sweater and a trip for groceries, but 'out' as in a yummy dinner downtown and drinks, plentiful drinks, and TAXICABS (!!!) and maybe even a few bars—just a chance for a bunch of us to get polished up and whatever else may follow.

I'm wondering just how late I can stay out. I'm hoping I'd be able to make it past 10:30. That would be EPIC!!

so... care to join me? I figured you might be tempted....?
xo Kate

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Reply at 8:30pm

OH I AM VERY TEMPTED!!!!
I may have to make it a full night and crash at K’s—she's away for the weekend, but I am sure she'll be up for it!

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Today at 8:36pm

Oh goodie! ...I guess I'd need to crash somewhere too. I plan on being incapable of much else other than giggling and eating, so let’s make a night of it. yay!

K's going to get back from her weekend to find the two of us have invited ourselves for a sleepover. Where do city people go these days to drink and dance on the speakers? Where does it, you know, rain men?

Kidding.

Kind of.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Reply at 8:45pm

HAHAHAHA....no kidding, we'll find that place!!
I am sure she won't care if we crash there!! Plus then when we get up in the morning and enjoy R's fresh muffins and coffee... he set the standard last time I was there!

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Today at 8:51pm

YES. This is so great. I'm going to have to find my way to Winners first though, see if they sell all-over body girdles. I'm determined to *not* look like a lesbian farmer as per usual.

although... if I try to not look like a lesbian farmer then I really will look like a cougar. must find happy middle ground.. must find happy middle ground...

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Reply at 8:53pm

you are too much!! ;o)
Yes I may have to pull out the spanx!!!! they do the trick!

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Today at 9:02pm

Okay, that's what I need... I've seen them at Winners before but never the right size.

Christ. We’re totally cougars. Before we’ve even figured out where to go and when, we’ve already discussed the required maximum-support undergarments.