one of those days.

Have you ever had a day where you wish you just hadn’t gotten out of bed?

Yesterday after work I went and spent $100 on new running shoes. I was really ready to feel good during my run that followed, to take everything out on the pavement. And as I neared the 3.25 mile mark and stopped to turn around and walk the rest of the way home, I could hardly move. My left foot, I could tell, had already gotten a blister.

Walking home, I tried to focus my attention away from my blistering foot, away from my shoulder which has been rubbed raw from my sports bra. I tried to do anything but think of the email that had mapped out my day, the coworker who had disillusioned herself so as to imagine I capable of maliciously doing anything to her or to her job. When your boss asks you if you can handle something, you say yes. That’s what you do.

I listened to my ipod; I let Todd the dog roll around in the freshly cut grass on either side of the sidewalk. I watched a young boy and girl as they road their bikes.

About 15 yards ahead of me, I looked on as the bikes came to a stop. I watched as the little boy and girl turned their heads back towards me. I watched as though, in my mind, time too had stopped.

I could see their faces. Those familiar faces. That boy whose diaper I had changed when he was a baby, that girl who I remember holding just after she was born. Those eyes, that each of them had, staring at me with such familiarity. As if the past 8 years had not gone by. As if they knew me, though I knew they could not.

I wanted to shout to them.

“Hey! Hey, Jordan! Hey, Meg! It’s me, it’s.. it’s Kristin.”

But I knew, even though they’ve seen me, they would not know me. They wouldn’t remember. They were just babies when I thought they would be in my life forever.

In their eyes I saw him. I saw Chad looking back at me. I saw these two children, looking just like their father had, turn away from me and ride down the driveway of their grandparent’s house.

And I started to cry.

"my feelings show."

“It’s lucky I only have one of these, he said. I can see where you’d never think about anything else.” story people.

I haven’t always been that sensitive. When I was younger, I would yell when my brother touched me. But all in all, I didn’t let the actions of my school peers affect me. I kept on keeping on. That’s all you can do. I didn’t care [or didn't show I cared] that they, for reasons unbeknownst to me, decided to exclude me. I’d go on to my tennis match that afternoon. And I’d win. And I’d be me. And that’s that.

I don’t remember crying much at my grandfather’s funeral. I remember crying when I found out, but not again. My mother says when I was younger, I only cried when I wanted to go to bed.

When Chad died it was if things changed. Something inside me shifted. I don’t remember crying when I found out about his brain tumor. I remember shock. I remember hope. I had a lot of hope back then. But I also remember his funeral, the way my body wouldn’t stop shaking, the way I cried; we all cried.

I went to class the morning of his funeral. I was going to get early release – the things you had to do in high school to follow the rules. I remember going to art class and seeing Mrs. Fritz and breaking down, wanting to curl into a ball. I remember her looking at me, knowing me so well after those years of me practically living in her classroom. I remember sitting at her desk, trying to stop the tears.

I cry at the drop of the hat now. Tears well up in my eyes. It could be nervousness or stress. It could be fear. It could be any of the things normal people can handle with grace. I cry. If I really think about my mom and all that she has gone through, still suffers through, I cry. Sitting at home over Thanksgiving, realizing for the first time since I can remember that our beautiful lab Keeley was not there, I cried.

My eyes just well up. And that’s that. Sometimes no tears fall. Most times no tears are seen. It’s just something between me and the emotion.

Saturday night, I cried.

The night seemed like every other. That and the fact that Clemson was able to pull out a win in what seemed a game where neither team really wanted it. I sat around for awhile after the game before it was time for us all to start cleaning up. Tents were put down, grills were sizzled, trash was picked up. Goodbyes were said.

Heading to my car I found my brother in the back seat with a headache. And before I put the car in drive it became clear that a hat was missing and Tina didn’t want to leave without it. I tried looking for it, couldn’t find it. I tried waking Daniel for help. He was groggy. Tina opened his door to look and then shut it, hitting his head.

And a switch flipped.

I’ve seen him mad. Heck, I’ve made him mad. But bourbon brother is not my favorite. He just, he became this evil person that, as much as I love him, I don’t like. I called out to his roommate and neighbors who were loading up in their cars around the corner for help and they came. They came to tame his anger and it just infuriated him. They came to help me and for that I could not be more grateful for. I realized just how much I really care about those guys.

But I don’t understand it. I can’t. I can’t fathom it. It embarassed me and him. I don’t get how this good, normally happy and kind and sweet person, can just turn. At the drop of a hat. On everyone.

I stepped away. Crying. Receiving hugs from guys that are not my brother. Comfort from people that are not my family.

I looked to one of them who I think so much of and said, “I just.. I can’t handle this. I hate drama.” And, looking back at me, he said with such honesty, “I’ve heard girls say that before. But you’re the only one I’ve ever believed.”

It’s interesting, though, who stood there. Who stood up and who walked away. Dreadlocks walked away. He was there.. but it’s not him. And of the 7 of us that were out there.. he just.. walked away.

What did my parents say to me when I talked to them? With faces full of disappointment in the fact that I, at 23, had to turn to them for help in this situation, they asked me, “What did you do [to him]?”

[tribute to clemson football 2007]

what's it take?

There’s a part of me that will always think I’m not good enough. There’s a part of myself that will always make me feel out of place. There’s a part of me that will always think I’m stepping over that line again and again and no one’s on the other side.

In the beginning of August, right before we’d know each other for one year, he sent me this, which I wrote about here:

Kristin, I just want to say that I’m really sorry for the way I’ve acted the past few months.. I don’t expect that to make up for anything I’ve done.. but I thought you should know that I realize now that I have made some really bad decisions, and those decisions affected a lot more people than I considered.. and I’m sorry. You definitely have not deserved the way I’ve acted towards you.

And he was right. I didn’t. And I still don’t. Friday I sent him an email asking for my stuff back. Just a few things. Meaningless things. Signifiers of a friendship gone dry. Because true friends, no matter who they are, no matter what kind of relationship they’re in, don’t forget about friends. True friends, even if they blow you off, they blow you off to your face. True friends don’t wane. No matter what you do.

Sometimes I’m so inclined to say true friends hug it out. They talk it out, atleast. They don’t just.. disappear.

I’ve never really had my heart broken before. I guess it comes in big and small ways. I think you can have little bits of your heart chipped away over time. Like when Chad died.. a little part of me died with him. When I left Clemson, I knew that in some way I’d never be the same. When friends have disappointed me, I think I’ve changed. A part of me evolves. A part of me hardens. And each of these ways, I believe, affect the heart.

There’s some part of me that makes it difficult for me to grasp certain things. Like, I was an English major.. and so many people in my college could read it once, get it, analyze it, do everything we were supposed to do with it, and move on to the next piece. Me, no. I had to read it. And read it again. And again. And break it down.

I guess that’s telling.

So when he just set the stuff on my desk Monday morning before I got to work, I wondered. I wondered, did he give his girlfriend the scarf I asked for back? I wondered, did he not want the Phish CD he lent me last fall because on it they’re covering the White Album and he knew how much I loved the Beatles? I wondered why it was I didn’t mean as much to him as any other friend and why he felt the need to cut me out. And why, why he sent me that email if he was just going to go back to the way he’d been.

“If it’s that easy for him to let you go, you don’t want him in your life anyway,” McHottie said to me one day as we walked into the office. He was right, I know. But why can’t it be as easy for me as it obviously is for him?

looking up.

Most people might find it strange when their mom calls them from Hilton Head and says she’s sitting on the beach reading Catcher in the Rye. Well, I’m not most people.

I told Mom I wanted to name my son Holden and she didn’t even hesitate with her “no.”

I think, though, that if she saw my complete list of names.. that might win.

So while they’re away, I’ve been back and forth to their house taking care of the dog. The perfect dog, that is. I swear.

Yesterday, as I was leaving the house I’m house sitting to head across town to my folks’ to dog sit (money can make you do crazy things), I called a friend back that had left a message on my phone for the first time in many years. In fact, last night we decided this is the first time we’d spoken since the last time we saw each other, which would have been in February of 2001, six years ago.

Time flew by as we talked and we reverted back to that old language which had somehow become ours.. of me calling him “old” and him calling me “devil child.” The minutes seemed like seconds and before long we’d been on the phone for two hours. But it was cool, for once, to be able to talk to someone with no preconceived notions of who you are. We caught up on old friends and old stories, but for the first time in a long time I was able to tell someone who I am without them having already been told.

We talked about the last time we saw each other.. at Chad’s funeral. We talked about the aftermath. And he said to me, “I should have been around more then. I know. I’m sorry..” And see.. there’s something so different about that kind of eerie recognition verses the friend who recognizes the terrible blunder they’ve made and tries a simple “I’m sorry” and nothing more.

The consequences. That’s what it’s about. That’s what you can’t change.

When Chad died.. my group of six nearly died too. A lot of our hearts were crestfallen and no one was there to pick us up. No one was there to make us understand, to help us understand, to stand there with us.. just as he [Chad] would have done. He would have done anything.

It never seems to go away.. those tears that form in my eyes as I think of him in all sorts of wonderment. I swear he could make rain go away and the day turn sunny.

Sometimes it’s hard to believe that anyone could ever match up to him. Or even come close. But then I realize, as I’m on the phone, filled with a mix of euphoria and nostalgia, that there are other people who care about change.. who care about the people around them more than themselves.

It just takes some of us a little longer to realize.

that's all i'm gonna say about that.

I called Mr. Perfect last night. And it was different. It was kind of.. a relief. Well, relief may not be the right word. It was a cool thing. Cool in the sense that I called him on a purely selfish, but purely religious purpose. And when I had the question- I immediately turned to him.

Tuesday night, a friend of mine came into town by way of Clemson and on her way to Charleston. She is Buddhist and Cambodian, and recently returned from a 3 week trip to Asia for the first time. I think I am a kind of cool person to talk to religion about.. only in the sense that I have grown up in the church, the same church my parents wed in 28 years ago. I am a product of my youth group and express a great desire for that place and what it has molded me into. I commonly refer to Chad, my youth director who unexpectedly passed away whilst I was in the throes of high school, as my saving grace. But I must say, my church and my family has led me on this path all along.

I am a hugely moral person and I would say it has saved me from a lot.. a lot of pain, a lot of what some might call “sacrifice,” a lot of everything. And yet, with all of this in mind, I am not a person that judges. I am not someone that will say to you, “This is what you should believe.” And so I say to all, to each his own.

It must be said that, altogether, I’m still liberal on the basis of religion itself. Yes, it can get confusing. My church is rather liberal. My denomination is liberal. I, myself, am liberal within the sect. I think it is this which makes me.. somewhat..average.

I took Religion 101 in college, an introduction course to what I believe and recall to have been “worldly” religions. You kind of had to make a point to be unbiased in what you wrote. Similarly to what it was like being an English major in what is, obviously, a Liberal Arts department. I had to make more of an effort at wooing my professors than should be necessary being that I was hiding my hugely conservative nature in my analysis and depiction of all we did. And sadly, that was necessary to achieve any relative form of success. (Success being, itself, relative.)

Regardless, of what I know, people of any faith or belief cannot pass judgement. It is a huge misconception that in order to be examples one must lead.. because, I think, those in leadership oftentimes operate with the intent to outshine. And I think when you do something such as this, the tendency is to overwhelm. And altogether, I think that creates the hypocrisy hugely associated with the church.

This is my sole/soul opinion.

So I had dinner with my friend. And she’s Buddhist. And she was saying that while she believes Jesus existed.. and she believes in immaculate conception, but yet.. she is completely confused with why people “pray to Jesus.” Well, it got me thinking. I don’t.. I mean I never consciously have.. prayed to Jesus.. And she’s right about wondering. I’ve always heard that.. that people do that. But.. why?

So I called Mr. Perfect? And you know what? Mr. Perfect’s so perfect he was right there with me. “I don’t know, Kristin. I pray to God too. I’d never really thought.. thought that through. I guess some people think, with the trinity, it is all one body. But I’m like you. I pray to God. So really.. I don’t know.”

“So I stumped you, huh?”

“It’ll happen again and again.”

Well that’s pretty much what it went like. He’s human. And so am I.

Thank God.

"i will hold your people in my heart.."

I’m having a little problem.

I don’t understand and I’m really frustrated [about that]. It’s this little big thing called homelessness.

I went to Chick-fil-A for lunch today to use my July coupon. (A tell-tale sign I’m broke.) I was parallel parking while trying not to hit jaywalkers when a scraggly guy with a suitcase on wheels stood on the sidewalk trying to help me park. Now I may not be the best driver (although I do like to argue that point), I can park. And this time, for my run-in, I was neither aiming for perfection nor paying the meter. Like a tourist in San Francisco, I was recognizing a call for either money or food. Like an English major still in the shadow of college graduation, I was also dealing with the realization I came to yesterday that is of having no money and a laptop near dead. The emphasis, of course, being on the fact that I have no money. [And that a source of my income requires that my computer work so that I can submit my articles by deadline.]

So as I shook my head a number of times to shake him away, it got me thinking. And I really don’t know where to harbor these thoughts.

When do you know when to reach out and when to hold back?

My church is working right now to start up a program for young adults in their 20s and 30s. It continues to amaze me that such a program never before existed, as I have attended that church every year of my life. I find it amazing that for every other Sunday School class there is, it never occurred to anyone, not once, that there is an age gap being completely neglected. I guess I just had such an incredible experience growing up in that church, mainly due to Chad and having spun to an improbable decent once he passed away, I cannot fathom so much that the heart he had did not radiate throughout other bodies and through those narrow walls and chorus filled hallways.

Mr. Perfect and I, along with a few others who did not grow up at Shandon, are working together and regrouping every now and then to brainstorm, come up with ideas, and implement action plans. In one of the upcoming months, we have gotten a speaker to come address the homeless issues in Columbia. I spoke with our minister designated to respond to these young adult efforts sometime last week. In the throes of our conversation, we decided against Mayor Bob for his vast rather than specific knowledge and settled on a former USC professor and current Med School Assistant Dean.

I just want to share my excitement. This man has led the effort to develop the blue print for Columbia’s homelessness. Along with his personal commitment to empowering others, he has a profound dedication to seeing the betterment of this community I love so much.. through his belief that we truly are our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers.

Thinking over this, I looped around from the Main Street Chick-fil-A to the house to let Todd the dog out for a bit. I was headed back down Devine Street for the office and passed Charlie. Yes, Charlie is his name. That is, at least, what I call him.

He lives on Devine Street. His look never changes yet his smile oftentimes comes and goes. I find him on different benches.. at different times. Sometimes I drive by and play a Where’s Waldo game.. looking for him and finding him in various unexpected places.. even unexpected streets. And it amazes me. It amazes me because I do not understand at all.

I really hope to someday understand.

one fish, two fish.

Sunday night was one of those near perfect nights where you almost – just for a second – don’t miss the way things were in college.

Perfect Hair, Rob, the roommate, and I sat on Perfect Hair’s deck for hours – listening to Dave, grilling out, sitting by the fire when the night breeze settled in. It’s times like that when I realize why it is we have to grow up [as much as I try to stop it from happening].

Kenny Chesney sings a song called “Who you’d be today?” talking about someone who died too young. He asks questions that I wonder myself.. if it weren’t for this experience or that day or that person.. who would I be today? “Would you see the world? Would you chase your dreams? Settle down with a family?”

These experiences, these times that I get all to myself with my friends – like Wednesday nights at Salty Nut and Mondays at the Back Porch – they make me wonder. They make me grateful.. even in the smallest of ways.

And they make me sad.

Sometimes you don’t realize how much one person can affect your life. Even if they didn’t know it when they were around.. you know it now. You can lose your best friend.. but they’re still there. You still see them.. and there’s that pain.. that pain in knowing that they don’t want to be there for you anymore.

But the pain of losing someone without reason and without meaning, and without any sort of an ending.. is a loss that never ceases to affect. Losing Chad was that loss for me. And as I approach the age he was when he passed, I think of the things I’ve done since he’s been gone. I think of what he would think of me.. whether he would be proud or disappointed. I think of how I have changed. And I think of the wonderful person he still would have been. That’s what I know for sure.

Last week I spent a long time talking to my friend (of a friend) James. And it was the first time.. in a long time.. I remembered talking to someone about this constant feeling, this daily reminder, this sense – that I’m sure a lot of people have – that no one really talks about. He had that too. And it felt good to talk about. And as I remembered that comfort I used to find.. in high school.. when I always surrounded myself with those friends that had suffered that same unpredictable loss as I.. I thought about that sense of relief, that sense of understanding.. of kindred spirits.

I thought about Mr. Perfect.

What does that mean?

life's a mess.

I have very vivid memories. I remember people, as they walk away from me. I remember moments had and moments longed for. I remember Chad’s smile, and his laugh, and his funeral. I remember all the things we said we’d do and everything he’d said he’d teach me. And we just never had the time.

So when you make promises to me, say we’ll do that, say we’ll go there.. sometimes they’re nothing but empty promises. And all of that is validated by there lack of completion. And when the unspoken promise of a never-ending friendship is on the table, there remains something inside.. something inside of me.. that just fails to believe that. In all my faith it is there where my faith dwindles.

And the reason for that? It is because time has always ended, better people have always come along, and here I have always remained.. in the dust of something that was once wonderful, in the wake of something that once was.

If you ask me where the root of all this lies, if you ask me of its depth, if you ask me the deepest secret that no one knows, it is that I’m waiting. I am always waiting for a miracle.

If you ask me where my hesitations derive, where my insecurities and failed friendships come from, it is from my youth. It is from my first remembrance of that feeling that people were only friends with me because of my brothers, because they liked my brothers. And it was cemented by the number of friends, through high school and college, that took it upon themselves to date my brothers. A cardinal rule, I believe, broken.

And if you ask me where my cynicism takes root, it is in the idea provided me by those whom surround me, that everything fails. All friendships end. All people disappoint. And for many it is only a matter of time before true colors shine. And in the meantime we all live out an exercise of convenience.

Claire Colburn: “Do you ever just think I’m fooling everybody?”
Drew Baylor: “You have no idea.”
elizabethtown.

"a shorter one, a friend, [His] son.."

It’s been six years since Chad died and the thought of him has never gotten far from my head or my heart. There are some days, now, when I can go without thinking of him. Sometimes, I am certain, weeks go by. But the vision of him never escapes me. He remains so much of who I am and who I want to be.

There will always be people in each and everyone’s life that helped mold them and shape them. There are times when you can look back on who you were and who you have become and thank someone. Chad was, for so many, that someone.

Some days you feel lost and unwanted. Some days you feel alone, an orphan. Some days you feel the weaker link in the tug of war that is a romance. Some days you feel naked, running down a public street. And then some days, you’re staring into a crowd of people and can tell in every one of their eyes that they love and adore you. Chad was each of these. He was each of these feelings, each of these places, each of these men.

One day, just before the holidays, when I was in high school, Chad stood before a crowd of us and said, “I don’t want to ruin your Christmas.” What followed was a selfless announcement of Chad’s recent diagnosis of an inoperable brain tumor. Chad could be stubborn and hard headed.. but in the light of an ordinary day, he was as much an optimist as anybody I’d ever seen, and when he said those words.. he sounded foreign and distant. Time would show a merciful God who provided extra years for an infant child to enter the terrible twos and know her daddy.. at least for a little while.. and also the impossible.. an inoperable brain tumor that proved, in fact, operable by the gifted staff at Duke, if only to prolong an inevitability.

There are little things all around me that remind me of him. There are things you wouldn’t understand about me because you didn’t know him. There’s a pain I feel inside sometimes.. and it’s the pain of regret.. the pain of not getting enough.. the knowledge and realization and recognition of the ticking clock of time. There’s every time I pick up a camera I remember Chad telling me that he was going to teach me all I needed to know. I remember how excited I was when I told him I was interested in photography.. and how excited he was too. There are the photographs of the USC basketball team, kept in a glass case on the wall at Andy’s Deli. Every time I go there I can’t help but sit near it because you can see Chad’s signature scribbled at the bottom corner of all those old black and white photographs. That signature.. I knew that well. There’s the time we went to Chick-fil-A and they asked him to take his top off for a refill and he started lifting off his shirt. And when I heard about Clemson’s basketball coach being kicked out of the game Saturday.. I thought of Chad.. being kicked out of a church basketball game.. when he was the coach.. and he kept yelling back.. “those are my kids in there..” And by kids, he meant us.

It’s funny how certain dates bring back certain memories. It’s funny how they say you’re impressionable as a youth.. but I think you’re impressionable all along.

“Application.. who will they choose..
Accepted a new found life, the losses far and few..
A shorter one, a friend, his son.. my life wouldn’t be complete..
By his side I will abide, my life is a retreat.
A mission and a chance for life..
A strain upon my soul.
A true test, I did my best..
But still she calls me old..
Application.. who will they choose..
Accepted a new found life, the losses far and few..
A shorter one, a friend, his son.. my life wouldn’t be complete..
By his side I will abide, my life is a retreat.
Accident prone brother and Jerome..
The week is here for me.
Almost done, it’s been the bomb
You made it so for me..
Application.. who will they choose..
Accepted a new found life, the losses far and few..
A shorter one, a friend, his son.. my life wouldn’t be complete..
By his side I will abide, my life is a retreat.
A lilpurple.. a hammer or two.. an Ey and a Nations..
Life of a coach is what I love the most after long evaluation.
McGahee, Miss Gregory.. complete the ones I love..
I thank you for the times.. like a blessing from above..
Remember me.. I pray..
Sisters and daughters, brothers and sons,
I’m livin’.. the life of a summer slave..”
dave lee.