Regina is Russian

I run, sometimes.

I walk, hardly ever.

Until now.

When my plans have changed and my schedule has shifted, 

All by force.

Humans have fallen into the hands of Nature.

Here’s to the Coronavirus 2020.

I used to write songs in my early 20’s.

I had a lyric that sang,

“I walk all day to finally say, 

The old has gone away

And I have returned with a new name.”

The sound of it was decent.

I even tried to imitate Regina Spektor in how I emphasized “return”.

She was one of my favorites at the time.

I mean, who wouldn’t say that in 2010?

When a friend of mine first listened to this song, he kindly asked,

“Wait, how do you say ‘return’?”

I get it: I was trying too hard, and the way I sang it with a “th” sound for the t is not anywhere close to how I actually say the word.

I mean, let’s be honest, Regina is Russian. 

I am most definitely not Russian.

The meaning behind that song fell to the tune of a bad breakup and finding my voice again.

I think I was writing about my high school boyfriend who I dated for a year and a half but had some leftover stains and stubbles to deal with in college.

He kept dating my friends… kept showing up at bars and parties…you know, that kind of ex.

The type that’s hard to never see again, which is usually my style of a breakup.

The thing is, I often do this thing in relationships where I get scared to use my voice.

In fact, I shrink.

My voice gets tiny.

With age I am getting better, I promise.

My vocal chords are gaining strength and my impulse to run has weakened.

You know what?

Sometimes life calls us to walk.

Whether it be all day or for a 20 minute rush out the door when we are cooped up in our houses, quarantined for what seems like decades.

What does it look like for you, for me, for all of us, to walk right now?

To casually but mindfully take one step after another at a slower pace than normal, perhaps with an announcement or statement or yes, a “new name”… or perhaps not. 

Sometimes it’s nothing more than just that: 

A walk.

Rain Check.

Stops you in your tracks, that rain.
Slows ya down,
Shuts ya up,
Calms ya down,
... if you let it.

My rain is your rain,
We share it.
And it smells good today
As I sit on the back porch and watch the puddles form against the pavement.

Some days, not every day,
We curse at the rain.
Changing our plans every which-away.
How dare you, rain!

But Today?

It slows me down,
It shuts me up,
It calms me down,
...I'm lettin it.

The Things That Get Us Out of Bed.

Last spring, packed right between a visit back home to Alabama- the playful, sing-song voices of my niece and nephew still echoing in my ear- and what was supposed to be a visit in the other direction to White Bluff, Tennessee for a visit with my boyfriend’s family…

I got food poisoning.

Yes.

Food. 

Poisoning.

Kept me up all night.

And all night, I swapped between the bathroom and the bed constantly, like a full moon-shaped ping pong ball, tossed between a more-than tipsy Vanderbilt freshman guy and a curly-haired, mascara-heavy girl down at Clyde’s on Church Street. 

Sometimes just racing and praying I make it in time.

If you have ever had this curse of the stomach, this curse of humanity, rather… 

I’m sorry. 

And… you know. 

In a similar way to extreme weather changing your plans and cancelling the concert, postponing the dance or the baseball game or the soccer game... getting sick, (like… food poisoning sick…) literally stops you in your tracks. 

There is no moving around it.

At ALL. 

It has all authority and you have no choice but to play by the rules:

Sleep when you can.

Medicate.

Eventually eat saltines and pray you can hold it down. 

Finally, though...

I make it to my garden.

My plants need water like I need calories.

For the first time in a long time,

I can actually stand up again.

So I know it’s Time.

Here I was, coming out of a stomach bug, dazed and confused like a cast member of the Walking Dead, endlessly roaming.

I wore a blank, grossly pale face.
My limbs were nearly broken, but doing their job...just barely.

And all my movements were sticky, like I was first learning how to walk again.

The things that get us out of bed-

Sometimes they’ll surprise you. 

And there he was.

Mowing my lawn.

I sat down on my front steps, knees drawn in, just watching him.

When he sees me, he stops the lawnmower to come over.

You know... to give me a hug and check in.

I forget about the plants for a moment. 

As soon as he hugs me, I cry.

Like a little girl.

But I was okay with it.

I wanted to be near him.

As Dark as Midnight

What is happening? 

Golfball-sized eyeballs and sticky handprints, glued to the glass.

Waiting.

Waiting for truth to unfold, facts to emerge, and solid, concrete answers to lingering, ever-growing questions, like tiny beads of a mile-long necklace.

I am reminded of an aquarium.

Just standing, in awe of nature, in all of its forms.

Some of us shocked, some of us at a complete standstill.

Just watching from the other side of the glass.

I remember visiting the Chattanooga aquarium with a busload of high school students from Stratford out of East Nashville, back when bumpy roads and old, forgotten houses were still its neighbor.

Terrified I was going to lose one of the eight girls in my group,
I could hardly enjoy it.

I was constantly counting heads and looking over my shoulder like I was checking my blind spot, about to change lanes.

The hallways and handrails were as dark as midnight.

I remember a few weeks ago when Brandon and I drove to North Carolina overnight in the snow.

Terrified I was going to wreck the car and slip and slide all the way down the mountain, I could hardly enjoy it.

Threatening roads, hard-to-see cars, my lack of experience… and this time, the backdrop to our “fairytale snow” was as dark as midnight.

And this?

Well, this is completely new territory for me.

Staying home, not teaching yoga, not visiting schools and the Detention Center…

Some times, more than other times, robotically scrolling through Facebook and Instagram in search of… 

Something.

I can hardly enjoy it.

The Echo.

There is something about being backstage. 

I love and hate the feeling.

Everyone is waiting for you.

Everyone in the whole world is waiting for you.

Here I stand, wobbly unshaved knees.

Limited Too attire.

Twelve years old.

Holding (or not holding) a deep, empty pit in the cave of my stomach.

I feel hollow inside.

Trying to keep my mouth from going dry, I swallow nervously.

I look down at the floor a couple of times.

They need to sweep back here, I tell myself.

OMG! What do I do with my hands?!

A silent cry goes off in my head, like a fire alarm.

Kids racing outside.. light-up Sketcher shoes from Payless rub and screech against the mismatched tile floor.

“Is it real? Is it real? Is it real?!” they ask.

Teachers hurry them along.

I wonder if I will be able to see my Mom in the audience.

And if so... 

Will that make all this better or worse?

Ya know, this whole being on a stage thing is new for me.

Do I crave this kind of attention?

I know some people do.

I don’t think I do?

I mean, yes.. I did grow up performing for my mom and her friends, belting out “Tomorrow” and “Hard Knock Life” from the Annie movie, standing behind that ugly hunter green, potato chip-stained couch, (the one with the pink fringe at the corners, on purpose).

And I did tend to impulsively run outside to the front yard when I had a new song lyric in my head. I wanted to see what it felt like to sing my new hit with the breeze in my hair and the hand motions I had just made up to go along with the words. My first song was about a blue jay. My right palm would paint the sky above me, and I would shake my hips a little bit, like the girls always did on television. That memory still tugs at me from time to time, taps me on the elbow and whispers, “Remember?”

Oh, and I did stay up for hours on end learning every single word of the Dixie Chicks hits, “There’s Your Trouble”, “Wide Open Spaces”, and “Cowboy Take Me Away”.

But those moments were Pretend.

Not the same, right?

I could mess up, laugh about it, shrug my shoulders, and keep going. 

Something about this whole stage thing, it felt… 

Well... 

Fake.

This was different. 

And I wasn’t ready for it.

I wasn’t made for it.

Mom or no Mom in the audience.

My name is eventually called. 

I walk out on the stage, not able to see a thing under those bright lights, I wrap my small fingers around the microphone, my lips trembling.

What was I doing?

This isn’t me.

Words finally stumble out of my mouth, my voice sounded decent, I guess, but I could do better.

I was internally judging myself in real-time, my increasingly cruel inner dialogue becoming the constant echo to my voice.

I just wanted this 3 minutes to be over.

This Sara Evans song Needed.To.End.

No more proving anything to myself after this.

No more bright lights or fluttering heartbeat, it's too painful.

What am I even wearing?

Again, a silent cry goes off inside my head.

The echo.

I am embarrassed.
I am so embarrassed.

Please let this song end early.

Can the sound guy hit the wrong button in the back and just turn my microphone off? 

Is that possible?

Please, God.

Get me off of this stage, back in the comfort of those dark corners where no one can see me. Give me those hallways with the unswept, dusty wooden floors- Back where I belong.

…….

Has that ever happened to you?

On the outside you are performing, words leave your body with ease or unease.

You put on a smile and a happy face, like a preteen playing with makeup.

You play the part.

You do the thing.

But inside?

Inside the basement of your thoughts, you are tearing yourself down.

Constantly cursing at yourself.

Constantly talking down at yourself.

You shame your outfit and every single ounce of your being.

Like a cat clawing away at your very own soul.

A nightmare inside.

What is that?

If the audience could hear that...

Would they still clap??

Their Dinosaur-Bird

Enormous white birds with long noses stare back at me on the other side of the the glass.

I turn around.

Scattered eyes dart in every direction, searching for Gate numbers, departure times, bathrooms…

My feet play Checkers with all kinds of shoes all across the floor.

One step diagonal, one step forward.

Two steps to the right.

You have to pay attention in a place like this.

I touch eyes with a stranger,

Even offer up a half-smile.

A mumbled “Hello?”

(Too much?)

(Probably).

Women in the crowded restroom apply blush and mascara ever so-gently, in the most feminine of ways.

But most definitely in a hurry.

One woman brushes her teeth.

Are they preparing to see someone special?

When their dinosaur-bird returns back from the clouds?

When wheels hit pavement and a new time zone confuses their plans?

Boxy luggage at their heels, black like their mascara.

This place is interesting.

My Little Ant-Size Body.

I remember staring at the row of ant soldiers emerge from the dirt.

Belly to the ground.

The tiniest tip-top of my pointer finger tapping the black dots, all marching in a row, obediently.

They were so organized, those ants.

I was with the Sisters.

You know, the Crew.

All the younger sisters of the Orioles (often mispronounced “Oreos”) Little League baseball team.

We stuck together.

“Let’s go to the sandbox,” demanded Sarah.

She was the Leader.

Her skin was tan and people listened to her.

So, we went.

Shoes thrown high over our shoulders into the overgrown grass.

No looking back.

We didn’t need them.

Sand was meant for bare feet.

Everyone knew that.

“Who wants to have me over to spend the night tonight?” Sarah asked.

Was this some sort of test? I quietly wondered.

A cry for loyalty among her people?

Sarah was the Queen Ant and we were her tiny black dots, marching obediently in a row, under the potential careless tap of a giant.

It seemed strange she asked this question.

But Sarah had taught us how to get every SPECK of pink and blue sugar out of the candy straws sold at the concession stand. 

You know, the ones that were half our height.

Sarah even taught us how to play Wall Ball with the boys.

We owed her.

So I answered back quietly, trying not to sound too scared.

"You can spend the night with me.” 

A sigh of relief was audibly released among the other small ants dressed in overalls and Krackeroos hair bows.

Queen Sarah nodded in approval.

The dark blanket of stars above her shoulders, above all of our shoulders, was impressive.

There was something about the sound of metal baseball bats and tired but proud parents cheering on their kids, and their kids’ friends, and the friends of their kids’ friends that was oddly comforting. 

I felt safe underneath that sky with those sounds and those people.

My little ant-size body with my small, timid voice but yet-

Tonight I was as big as the sky.