December 2008 – LaDonnaWitmer

Wishful Thinking

Mood: Chilly | Drinking: Water

leaves

Begone already, 2008! Begone and take your bad juju with you.

I am ready for the new, for the nines, for the next. I’m ready to get on with it.

Out with your tired recession, with your fearmongering H8, with your lame duck, lame ass “decider”.

Out with your hopeless pundits, with your gloomy forecasts, with your insistence upon serving up more bad news with every broadcast.

Let’s bring in a season of change, 2009. Let’s bring in hope. Let’s bring in fresh faces with new ideas. Let’s bring in the motivation to make this place better, and do it together.

Whether I like it or not, my new year is barreling in with a world of change, and I am doing my best to be ready for it, to meet it head-on and make it work. So here we go…

-Lo, kicking out the old.

Like Lucy

Mood: Wishful Thinking | Drinking: The Usual Tea

lucypevensie

When I was a kid, I wanted to be Lucy Pevensie.

I wanted to stumble across a magical wardrobe and find myself suddenly transported to a strange world filled with all manner of bewitching possibilities and talking animals.

I believed that if given the chance, I, like Lucy, would be the fiercest ally of dryads and nyads, of fauns and other furry folk.

I would believe in Aslan. I would see him amid the trees when no-one else could, and would keep believing even when all hope was abandoned.

I deserved a chance at magic, I thought, and looked for it everywhere, always expecting to chance upon a clue, a key to Narnia or some other equally fascinating and decidedly non-Earth-as-I-knew-it realm.

Then I grew up.

And now? Now I find my magic in the small places and neglected corners. I find my magic in words and in rhythm and in drinking sweet tea. I find it where I can.

But I still wish I could be Lucy Pevensie. I wish I could believe so easily, hope so bravely.

Perhaps I still have a chance, though. I can’t exactly be Lucy herself (on account of my advanced age and all), but maybe someday I could be her mother.

-Lo, who sometimes believes her dog can speak.

Hope Is the Hardest Part

Mood: Determined | Drinking: Tea

darkwindow

A friend and I had a discussion recently about the nature of hope. She said, “Without hope, what is there?” And I agree.

But hope is so hard, and so painful. It’s the knife edge that cuts both ways.

With hope, you live on the edge of constantly being without, being proven wrong, being a fool. The object of your hope, the things you hope for, may remain forever elusive, may never materialize.

With hope, you feel the edge — the prick of faith, the sting of doubt.

But without hope, you’re so lost. No light in the blackness. No promise of a way out.

And so we hope. In spite of, because of, in the face of all fear and doubt and evidence to the contrary, we hope. What else can we do?

Years ago, I tattooed a mantra on the inside of my wrist. Written in latin so strangers couldn’t read my heart whenever they chanced upon it: “I am a prisoner of hope.”

The days of late have been dark, and not just for me. So many sad stories from so many people.

As for my own story, I’m working my way through a morass of anger, of fear, of helplessness, of sadness and loss. But I’m leaving room for hope. I’m turning my face toward the light.

What else can I do?

-Lo, who is getting better at waiting.

I Crave Fortresses

Mood: Heat-Seeking | Drinking: Iced Tea

fortress

Precautions

I crave fortresses.
High stone walls
cold deep moats
and perimeters
stalked by mastiffs.

I seek sanctuary
in earthquake kits
emergency flares
and fire retardant
safety blankets.

I take confidence
in escape hatches
and lookout towers,
fallout shelters
and exit rows.

I make shopping lists
for burglar alarms,
spice casseroles
with motion sensors.
I knit and purl
with taser guns.

I want to sleep
every night
in a panic room
clad in maximum security pajamas,
one titanium alloy bodyguard
hiding in the closet, another
beneath the bed.

I require invincible
Swiss bank accounts,
infallible evacuation procedures
and infinite Plan B’s.

There must always be
another way out.

I trust no-one now,
not even God.
Not even you.

-Lo, taking it out on paper.

Let There Be Dark

Mood: Low | Drinking: Watery Tea

nuuanupali

Although I’ve never been a big holiday cheer sort of gal, I have, in times past, managed to muster up a helluva lot more cheer than I am this year.

2008 didn’t come in looking like a brawler, but she’s going out leaving me battered and bruised and more than a little bewildered.

I’m no stranger to getting laid off. I survived the dot com bust of ’01, and I know such things are to be expected when you’re a creative person working in a corporate company while the economy sinks below sea level.

Funny thing is, I wasn’t expecting it this time. I’m the only copywriter in my entire company, and I thought that alone garnered me some job security. Not to mention the fact that I’m a damn fine employee. I work hard and fast. I don’t miss deadlines. I’m more organized than the average type-A office manager. My cubicle is fetchingly decorated. In short, I’m a gem to have on staff.

But it seems the hard truth of the lesson learned is this: Companies don’t give a shit about you.

It doesn’t matter how hard you work, how early you arrive or how late you leave. It doesn’t matter how valuable or singular your skills. When push comes to shove and you’re up against the almighty dollar, they will shove you out the door without a second’s hesitation.

Yes, I’m bitter.

I’ll get over it. I will. But when your entirely unexpected layoff is sandwiched in between the sudden death of your grandmother and your birthday; when said layoff means that the baby you’ve been postponing for 5 years has to be postponed even longer; when your CEO-dictated departure falls on the day after Christmas, well, I think you deserve a good wallow with a heaping spoonful of bitterness on the side. Don’t you?

In the meantime, my website has been down, my neck has a squinch, my dog’s eating dirt, and there’s a wee Asian boy outside my window screaming at his mother in Mandarin because she took away his favorite toy or some equivalent of toddler trauma.

*sigh*

Once the poor-mes are over, though, I’m going to fix my sights on a few things I’ve been promising you all for a long time and have not yet delivered. To wit: the long-awaited arrival of the newest cinepoem, Homeland Security; the long-overdue overhaul of this here fine website, including a real live RSS-feed on yon blog; and some shiny new poetry, fresh from my writing group revisions.

Sound good to you? Yeah, me too.

Now I’m just going to wrap up the boo-hooing and get on with it.

-Lo, keeping her silver lining intact.