Nina Nina Nina

 Remember the Brady Bunch? Marsha, Marsha, Marsha. Sometimes I feel like that’s me. Only I’m the one saying my own name. I sit cross-legged on my maroon oriental rug I bought from Ikea fifteen years ago; it’s still pretty. Am I? I try to remember god’s name but he doesn’t say it often and doesn’t say much anymore.A jar of peanut butter is open on the table in front of me, I can smell the rich buttery peanuts thick with an essence all their own. Tiny Dancer by Elton John is playing on the radio. Blue Jean Baby.The plant I killed, hasn’t been buried. I plan on keeping it as a memento of my inability to keep promises. Yo, yeah you. Hello. The red and gold silk sari blanket I put over my couch is wrinkled. I have too many pictures and statues of Buddha in my living room.I ate salmon soaked in sriracha and honey last night. I can still taste traces of it. I’m in my black lace panties and a blue t-shirt that is wrinkled from sleep. It’s a daytime shirt but I wore it all night long. It’s sexy underwear and I am alone.There was love here once, on my face. Now it’s washed clean with a French soap that wasn’t bought in Euros. I don’t know if it’s worth the dollars I paid but my skin stays fresh and I smell like summertime, all the time.It’s a little bit funny…I laugh to myself a lot. I wish I wasn’t alone, but do nothing to change that. I’m afraid of being touched by hands that won’t understand the hollow place on my neck. The part that can’t talk.I don’t want you to look at me. So I draw you these pictures. Like a kid making a drawing with colored pencils, I’m drawing me and my life. This is my house. This is me. I would have preferred watercolors.Most of the time, I feel invisible. I’m not wearing socks, I should in this weather. I don’t wear socks until October. I thought of wearing lip gloss to bed because it tastes minty. Don’t laugh. Don’t cry. I’m OK.I say the word fuck more than I say my own name. When does anyone say their own name? I don’t address myself formally. I’m thirsty and the coffee I finished has one single drop left that I try to sip. Shall I have another cup? Shall I get up and dance?Stevie Nicks is screaming on the radio, the Internet radio Spotify. I consider becoming a chain smoker so I can lose weight. My thighs are not the right size. Neither are my arms.I want to be held.I try not to sell my soul, but if you pay me to say all this, I will repeat it again. I’m singing with Stevie, her tough voice overtaking mine. I’m only in the background.I can see a pink Barbie corvette outside my window. I keep thinking the pink color is a bed of flowers. It’s a plastic toy. But if I make it blurry with my eyes enough it looks like petunias in the morning sun.Asian kids play in my backyard most of the day. They are probably still sleeping as it is before nine on a Saturday. Some crazy looking man who is slightly attractive is stalking me on Facebook. He’s from Islamabad, Pakistan.I should limit the people I accept as friends, but I’m trying to promote my work. The work is sitting here, sitting next to me, as I work on not working. Can that be my work? Emily Dickenson wrote hiding in the attic, I’m hiding in a basement. But I’m not Emily.My Creative Writing T.A. in undergrad said never use the word soul. I asked him why Emily Dickenson can use that word. Then I asked him to fuck off in my head. I think I have a soul still.All any of us can say is that we are getting older. “I’ve built my life around you…” Stevie sings. Her hoarse voice wakes me up. There are windows all around me, I can see trees before they turn into colors and all sleep for the winter.I should get Spotify without commercials, it’s cheap. I’m cheap. It breaks the mood to hear a Taco Bell commercial when you are in a zone. Although a breakfast burrito doesn’t sound so bad right now.There is a treadmill, an exercise bike, and an elliptical machine in this room. But if I were to move off this floor I would dance. I tried to do yoga the other day. I don’t think my body is enlightened enough to do it right.My telephone is on silent because I owe money to a couple places. I ran out of money for a hot minute this summer and I have some credit cards to pay. I’m stupid to avoid them, not deal with life, but I can’t this early when all I want to do is close my eyes and listen to the birds I can hear even through the music. I want to ignore the silent calls from 1-800 numbers.I should put on pants so I can sit outside on the cedar deck that’s withering away before it breaks entirely. Before summer officially ends, I should sit out there, and be. I should do a lot of things. But I will sit here.Some people say meditation is nothing but sitting. They could be right. There is a huge influx of sunlight suddenly through my window to the left. North, South, East, West? As if I know the difference.It is September. That much I know. I cannot be sure of much else.I know I will emerge from this room one day. Probably today. Give me time. I just started being me.nina