it’s hard to write here when the only thing i want to talk about and tell you about is exactly the one thing that i cannot write and/or talk about. it frustrates me and leaves me, well constipated. because everything else seems so lame when i think about all the BIG BIG things that i really want to write about it. maybe next week, when i’m not working at all (for NINE days in a row) i’ll feel a little bit more comfortable writing about it all. maybe you’ll have have to wait until january.

perhaps i’ll come up with something else to say.

in the meantime, can i just tell you how everytime i hear Tori Amos’ “Silent All These Years” i think of either one of two things.

first, i think of this short story that some girl (woman, i guess. at 32 can i call 22-year-olds girls?) wrote when i was in college. i heard her read it in the basement of the Eau Claire library. i don’t remember her name or the name of her story. but i do remember that she had a scene in the story where the main character was talking about her boyfriend’s jeans. i guess the boyfriend’s ex had written her name on the pocket of these jeans — Melissa. in the story the writer had this wonderful scene of the character imagining Melissa’s arm wrapped around his waist and writing her name in ball point pen. it was a fabulous thing. really. i mean i remember it now, all these years later. in this story, which now that i think about it, might have been called “Melissa” the main character also talks about how she thinks her boyfriend likes her butt because she has small breasts and how he seems to keep squeezing it hoping a nipple will pop out.

i also think about going through the drive-thru at McDonald’s with my friend Whitley. we were getting hot fudge sundaes that we were to go back and eat on a bench somewhere. in the car, Tori’s song came on and Whitley started singing along. it was beautiful. Whitley had an amazing voice. she asked me to sing along too and shoved her thumb in my direction, a pretend microphone. i pretended not to know the words, just so i could listen to Whitley sing.