gold teeth &a curse for this town were all in my mouth

There are times where I take up with certain things. I will refuse to use the proper tense, to stay in the proper place. I will not keep my mouth shut. Like when it was that one summer, and I'd only wear one piece of clothing. "One-sies" I referred to them as. It was one hundred degrees, and no one cared. I could walk to the Gulf of Mexico in ten minutes, and no one cared. I would purchase "onesies" and "rompers" and the occasional dress from suburban thrift stores or stores like Forever 21. It was either vintage or sweatshop labor. And as long as I said "I love you," you did not care. I wanted to wear just one thing for the whole week but I didn't want to spend more than ten dollars on the process.

Back in New York it is winter, and I want to take up with certain things again. I have started sleeping in night gowns, but only when I sleep alone. I hardly sleep alone. Everyone wants to know how I spent my time in Florida. I hang the night gowns on the wall, they too have just traveled one thousand miles. Everyone wants to know "what I did with my winter vacation" or they want to know why I said I loved them when I "apparently do not love" them at all.

I keep noting to do this all the time- put on a nightgown before bed, every night without exception. As if waking up in white cloth will lead to salvation. I know I am spending the night at a man's house, so I stuff a slip into my bag while I am walking out the door. If you haven't figured-- if you don't know me well enough yet, I'm doing this for a reason. I am getting into character. I am back to writing about the things that I wrote about five years ago, so in order to do this, I need to feel this. I need to wake up in light colored lace so I can view the contrast it has against my dark hair. I want the sheets to be white, the pillow cases too. I ask someone, maybe a stranger, if they think I look Italian. I ask "do you think I look more Italian like this?" This infuriated my mother during the time I spent with her recently. She tells me that I am being racist, playing up to stereotypes. She tells me of men she loved with blond hair and blue eyes, that they were Italian. She takes a deep breath, my hair between her fingers (I am trying to teach her to French braid.) "Northern Italy, Daniela," Northern Italy, my mother sighs. She names off all her ginger cousins. As I put on dark red lipstick "what about this, Mom?"

Now, back in New York, I must try not to freeze to death. I walk into the apartment early every morning, or at least sometime after my roommate has woken up and from the sofa,without fail, she will ask "is it cold outside?" What she wants me to say is something like "well, you can wear your light winter coat, but you don't need to wear your pea coat" or that I should tell her that she will need mittens, but to me, it's all just "cold" it is very cold, so I don't know. I have either returned from the gym or the diner, it has been a short walk, and I cannot imagine what fifteen degrees feels like, or thirty, or even fifty. It's hard for me to say. So when I am walking back, I just know that it is cold. And when I walk inside, after she asks me, she always follows up with "I don't know why I ask." And I don't know why she asks either.



"You know, all I ever wanted were seasons."

I say this in Florida, to anyone, to someone, to a store clerk at Hollywood Video. I first ask "do you think that Arnold Schwarnzager would know a lot about terminators?" and he waits for me to say something like "I'm just kidding," but instead I just wait for his answer. He is most likely in high school, he replies "well, he is The Terminator," which I decide is a good enough response. In the car, my poor mother wants to know "why do you still ask people things like that?" And I say "well who am I supposed to ask, Ma?" My mom is kind of like my friend Gregg, they both act like everything I am saying is physically killing them, but in reality it is making their day. For some reason they just feel better if they get to act like I have done something wrong. But the seasons, yeah, I ask about them at K-Mart, the same one that I worked at when I was sixteen. The girls behind the register humor me, just like I would have humored myself. They say "yeah, I know. I like your hair. Me too."

It makes me want to work in retail desperately. When one of my ex-lovers comes over, I lecture him on "honest work" I don't know where my speech is really going, I don't even know exactly what I mean, "it's honest work, Michael, you know, it is exactly what it is supposed to be."
He calls me sweetheart, gives me a kiss on the lips and laughs
"Have you forgotten how much you used to hate your life, Daniela? Really?"

"Retrospect," I say, one piece of clothing on "retrospect. I remember it all wrong in retrospect."


During my two weeks in Florida, I smoke cigarettes while driving. I tan my skin. I drive and I drive and I drive. I refer to this process as "bleaching my brain," I go into the upstairs of my parents house and I go through boxes. This is "research" this is "fucking around". Most of the people I want to see will not see me, or they are in jail, or they just do not live in Clearwater anymore. Or well, they are dead. I put this all into one category regardless, and that category as I have said is "people that do not want to see me."

A lot of people do want to see me, but no one pushes it too hard. I guess when I promised that I'd answer the phone and that I'd see everyone, when I promised that I'd do whatever anyone wanted, I guess the people who really know me-- the ones that really do want me, I guess they knew I was lying. And lying isn't even the right word, because I meant it at the time. It's like with saying "I love you" I have never lied when saying "I love you," these arent lies, these are things that can be grouped in with "I meant it when I said it at the time."
All I ever wanted were seasons one piece of clothing on, I meant it at the time.
I hate my fucking life. sixteen years old, I meant it at the time.


When I planned to go to Florida for the holidays and for the end of 2008, I was sure it to mean something. I always want a reunion, I always want closure, but getting off the plane, I knew that this was not a reunion, that whatever closure I was looking for did not reside on the peninsula. I knew that if "two hours is still a really long time," then two weeks is forever. Driving in Bailey's car over the causeway, I realized that at some point, during the last two (or twenty-four) years, i learned a lot about all that "loving yourself" shit, I learned a lot about putting my feelings first. It took me my whole life to believe all that stuff about having to love yourself first, loving yourself before you can love anyone else, not being a human crutch. It took me my whole life, or maybe one plane ride to figure that out. So in Bailey's car, I stare at the water and the palm trees, and I know how this will end. I know what kind of vacation this is going to be. I want to look at her and say "you need to love yourself before anyone can love you," I know this will make me sound like a self-help book, so instead, for some reason I say "honestly Bailey, what the fuck is wrong with you?"

And so that's the kind of vacation it is. It's mainly me, by myself or with my mother, completing some task. I like going to Cameron's, I like going in sitting at the hair salon, I like when the students come to the house or hanging out with Toni. I like hanging out with Toni so much because she has been my friend longer than anyone, and we have the understanding that things will just be normal when we see each other. There are people you have that with and there are people that you just don't. I think the friendships that really last, the ones that are incapable of fading away are the ones that always feel like they just restart where they naturally left off. Toni and I do not catch up on every detail, because we share them casually, and we know what we know.

And other than this, I mainly hang out alone. I wear one piece of clothing. I take up on things, I bleach my brain. I can't read any of the novels I brought with me. I was sure I'd get them through them, even saved a book for the trip, but I can't do it. Instead I go through my own writing & the writing of the dead and sometimes my father's books about power or Chinese philosophy. Instead of having a reunion I go and have my hair set at the mall, I walk by the T-Mobile kiosk and let the boys flirt with me knowing damn well I do not intend on changing my service provider, or ever moving back to this town.


In two weeks time, I don't know if I detach or reattach to myself. I know that I bled from the mouth and the nose, that pink hair had been going on for ten years, that all roads did not lead to Rome, they all led to U.S 19. In two weeks time, it is not that I stopped loving you, it's not that I was lying when I said I did. It is just kind of like in the summer, when I was only wearing one piece of clothing, and you didn't care. You didn't ask how hot it was outside, because you knew it was just " really hot." It's not that I was lying, not about any of it. I meant all of it. And yes, I remember how much I hated you, that drive, myself.

Maybe-- maybe when I booked my flight I was thinking that old places could be like old friendships, that they could just go on from where they last left off. And maybe places are like that in certain ways. In Florida, the ocean gets more and more obstructed. They are even extending the sand bars. What I mean by this is that they have run out of sand to build new homes, hotels and condominiums on. So now they are pushing out sand and rock to build condominiums so that the people that live in them can see the water and the rest of us cannot.

I go to the beach alone, sometimes I walk, sometimes I drive. I don't wear a one piece. I walk through private beach, because it's not like they can put up a fence, and I go down to wear they will soon start building, I lay my towel down like I too am paying three hundred dollars a night. A man with a clipboard strikes up conversation with me, or maybe I am staring blankly at him. He is one of the city planners. So I say to this city planner very plainly that I thought they'd all die like this, that when the hurricanes came they would not tolerate buildings built on man made sand. The city planner tells me that all of the sand is man made, that the hurricanes would know no difference. The city planner has forgotten more about 2004 and 2005 than I ever thought possible. I want to tell him I have it all written down.

I am talking to him, because I talk to strangers. It is still 2008, well, at least for 48 more hours, and I am spread out on this towel, just like a tourist. Just like I swore I'd never be. It is only 78 degrees, and all the locals know that this is not warm enough weather for sun bathing, let alone swimming. Whatever this town did to my blood, well it stuck, because I do not wade into the water. I let the man look at me, I watch the children splashing. I have no desire to drown, no desire to float. I want them to stop building, but I also think the sand feels better when it's been crushed. I've taken up on certain things, I am not in a one piece but just in a plain old bikini, I havent even brought my phone. I havent brought sunscreen. I havent brought pants.

The city planner asks me "aren't you cold? aren't you freezing?"
He can tell that I think this land is still mine, or he'd never question me. And you see, I do think this land is mine, or I'd never question him. He belongs in an office or in a board meeting, I tell him how much I hate the mayor, I watch him frown. He doesn't take his eyes off of my breasts, my hair is set, maybe I love him, at least right now. Maybe I love him. I let him talk to me for what feels like a very long time, I tell him a hundred things that I should not say. I tell him how badly I wanted the storms to destroy the city, how I had to get out, how I couldn't breathe.

He asks me "why did you want out so badly? What about your parents? What about your friends? What about this weather-- even in the winter what about this weather? And besides", he says, "I am sure you can still see the ocean from a lot of places. "

I tell him "I starting taking up on certain things. All I ever wanted were seasons. I wanted to stop loving people, to stop bleaching my brain. And I've been looking for two weeks (or twenty-four years) and I can't see the ocean at all. It's ugly. The buildings block the view."

I ask him "why did you ever want to build out into the water like this? Why did you want to do that to the ocean, to the buildings? why did you fight against the residents? Why did you destroy the drive of the poor for the wealthy? Don't you understand it's all I had?"

He stares out too far and it gets colder. You see on this side of the sand, there is a strong breeze. I start wishing I had worn a onesie, I start wishing I had taken your calls, paid your bail, put my clothes on, thrown up. I wish I was a good swimmer, a good lover. I wish I was kinder in cars. I wish I could work in retail and forget everything I learned from self-help. And before I can keep or stop wishing, he lifts up his head so his eyes are at level with mine, and like it is killing him he says:

"I thought it would be beautiful,"

I look at the sand, like I am already dead

"I thought I wouldn't care if the whole state sank."


The things I did on my winter vacation: the cigarettes, the old lovers, the drives, the girls in red vests and the boys at the mall, the people I cannot see, the things my mother won't let me say, the year ending, my legs closing-- and still, still the water is stronger than them all, because it looks and it feels like it goes on forever. For a minute, I want to stay here, I want to sign a lease and ruin the view and watch the windows shatter come summer. For a minute, it's all retrospect.

A man's voice: "I thought it could be beautiful.

and then my own: "I thought I didn't care."

And if you don't know, well then you should know that I do ove you. You should know (whoever you are or whoever you were) that I loved you. I wasnt lying, you see. You should know damn well that we were not lying. You should know that we really, really meant it.
I really, really meant it.
I meant it at the time.