Photo Journal: Milan, Italy 9.2022

 My youngest went to Italy the fall before she graduated, which meant she'd be away from home for a whole semester without us seeing one another, which neither of us was ready to accept. So after I quit my job at the library, I booked a two-week trip to Milan (and a week-long stay in Rome we can discuss later) that almost convinced me to give up my American citizenship. And don't I feel stupid now, that I decided to come back to this sinking ship?

Anywhores, here are some of my favorite memories from my time as a carefree gal in the streets of Milan and other neighboring towns.

Lake Como ain't just for the Clooneys of the world

The actual Last Supper by DaVinci

A view from the top (of Il Duomo)

Only I'd run into a book fair abroad

Authentic bolognese in Bologna

Learning to make egg pasta in someone's home

Love & Balls,
Jaded
-----
and all the things that I used to be afraid of
suddenly it all disappear...
and you remain my most favorite thing
and everywhere I go you're here with me

What I Read: February 2025 Edition

So listen, I follow a nice handful of BookTubers, and one of the things they like to do is a recap of everything they read, which I use to feed my To Be Read (TBR) list. I'm not going to do a video because I'm not a YouTuber, and the thought of setting up a camera and a backdrop and the lights, and hair/makeup/wardrobe is my version of the Eighth Circle of Hell, because we all know that my baseline aesthetic is depression sweatsuit AT BEST. 

But I have my blog again; I can participate thusly.

Here's what I read and/or listened to last month as I desperately tried to escape reality:

1. Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes🎧

This was a bit of a slow burn, PG romance about a widow who rents out her guest house to a failed baseball pitcher, and the relationship they end up building. What stood out here is there's a B-plot between Evvie and her best friend, a man, and neither one is pining for the other. I love a platonic friendship. Like, they truly exist; beautiful! ✮✮✮✮

2. Faithless (Grant County Series #5) by Karin Slaughter🎧
Do y'all watch WILL TRENT on TV? Well it's based on a series of books by Slaughter, and I've read them all. Correction, I've DEVOURED them all. But when they were done I was all, "I need to know about Sara Linton's life before she met Will," Linton being the protagonist of the Grant County books (along with her ex/husband, Jeffrey Tolliver). So I started the Grant County books back in December, and the first one, maybe two, were good, but I have to be honest, at this point I'm reading them just for closure. It's not great. The TRENT books are much, much better. It's about Linton, a doctor and medical examiner, and Tolliver, a police chief in Grant County, Georgia, and the cases that they work on together, which usually puts one or both of them in harm's way. Each book, I keep wishing they all die in a fire... ✮✮✮

3. Heartstopper, Volume 1 by Alice Oseman 🕮
YOU GUYSSSSSSSS. I abso-fucking-lutely LOVE the Heartstopper series--both on screen and now in book form. One of the first things I'm going to do once I'm gainfully employed again is buy all of the books so I can reread them every time I'm feeling blue. It is a queer-positive YA graphic novel about Charlie, an out teen, and Nick, a newly out/bi-curious boy, who fall in love. It's truly innocent and sweet and loving and just... I want to be a teenager again just to be Charlie and Nick's friend. ✮✮✮✮✮

4. Goal (St. Louis Series, Book 1) by Alexandria House🎧
So ya girl tried out an ultra spicy book to see what all the fuss was about, but made sure and chose one by a Black author featuring Black characters because BLACK HISTORY MONTH, and BAY-BEEEEEEE, I get it. I understand why people read this. I just wish I had more of a warning. In this one, a famous hockey player takes custody of younger siblings he barely knows after his estranged father passes away, and then starts a romance with the nanny his fiance hires to take care of the kids because she doesn't want to do it herself. And listen if Spice is your thing, the spice was spicing in this book. As for me, myself, personally, I find sexy talk mad corny and cringe, so I had more second-hand embarrassment than I expected. Not sure I'll read the rest of the series, but I did kind of like this one! ✮✮✮1/2

5. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid🎧
I've discussed my feelings about this book with y'all already, but I will add that I do plan to read a physical copy of this one day because the audiobook made me feel a bit scattered; I need to read the book and see if it's more grounding. ✮✮✮

6. The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz🎧
I chose this thinking it was a supernatural horror and it was just a plain old thriller, so right there you can tell I was a bit disappointed with this book. This woman goes to a selective writing retreat hosted by one of her literary icons at a remote estate, and finds that her former friend, current enemy is also attending (plus three other women). Once there, they all learn that they are going to compete against each other by writing a whole ass novel from scratch; winner gets published, of course. But this is a thriller, so you already know some sinister shit is afoot. I liked it but I didn't, if it makes sense? I'm not sure if everyone's behaviour was believable, even for a fiction novel, and that would take me out of the story. And the ending was trash. Overall, ✮✮✮

7. Neruda on the Park by Cleyvis Natera 🕮
Let me tell y'all about this Garbage Pail Kid of a book I had the misfortune of choosing for the first meeting of the Jaded Book Club. Like, my friends were within their rights to beat my ass for choosing this book. It was awful. Mother and daughter deal with the gentrification of their Washington Heights, NYC neighborhood in peculiar ways. The characters were unlikeable, behaved in unlikely manners; there were cop-out conclusions to storylines; the prose was forced; the storytelling was clunky; and everyone needed a hot slap, including the author and her editor for allowing this book to be published in this state of disarray. Don't read this book. I only scored it as high as I did because there's a scene in the end that was exciting, and even then I was told I scored it too high. ✮✮

8. Lone Women by Victor LaValle🎧
This was supposed to be horror and YET AGAIN I was tricked because it was just a thriller wrapped in a cozy historical fiction sweater. While I was invested in the fate of the characters, and the storytelling was decent, it was lacking something that I can't pinpoint, but I won't let that keep me from telling folks to check it out. Adelaide moves from California to stake a claim in Montana, and brings with her this heavy ass trunk filled with what she calls her burden. Adelaide is Black, by the way. Montana at this point in the story is quite empty. Her 'burden' starts eviscerating folks. Yeah, it's a lot. You might like it.✮✮✮

After all this, you'll feel the urge to recommend a book to me, I know, but PLEASE RESIST. I currently have over 200 books on my TBR list and it's starting to cause some stress. I don't want to burn out; I've only just found joy in books again.

Love & Balls,
Jaded
-----
well I've been scratching around in the dirt
looking for meaning in the cold, cold earth
to gather in what's left of your self-worth
'cause only love is what survives of us

Who Is This Plant, Really?

I do not have a green thumb. That's what I tried to explain to my mom years ago when she offered me leaves from her plant to grow in my apartment. A plant, I should mention, she's had since forever. A plant that survived countless moves, moods, environments, and bouts of neglect. Surely, this plant would not live to tell its tale should it come live with me.

But Mami insisted, and I find it hard to say no to her, so I took the plant. Besides, I was up for the challenge.

I placed it in a bowl of water to encourage root growth with the intention of planting it. That 'plant' was in that bowl of water for the better part of three years. I mean, perfectly green and countless roots, but just in a bowl of water; stubborn little thing! I can't remember when exactly I planted it, but I finally got off my ass, bought some soil and put it in a cute little green pot. And then proceeded to barely remember to take care of it ever since.

This plant has been in my care for, I don't know, 10 years, easy! It's still in the cute little green pot, grown a bit, died a bit, but there it sits. Surviving. Sometimes, even thriving.

When I moved during the pandemic, I had the audacity to purchase two additional plants for my new apartment. One, a peace lily, proceeded to peace out thanks to a gnat infestation and lack of care (basically I gave up on it). The other, a snake plant, grew like a beanstalk, and is still here, but is surely dead or dying due to the same infestation and neglect. Last summer, my niece and nephew gifted me a new pothos we call Ariel Mermaid, and she teeters in between life and death DAILY.

But the plant my mom gave me? Surviving. Sometimes, even thriving.

Now listen, I'm stuck in this house, a victim of my own anxiety and low-balance bank account, and that does things to your mind, right? Like, you start to wonder, what kind of plant is this, that survives me being gone for two weeks and perks the fuck back up after just a little water? What is it made of? Who really sent it here? Is it watching over me, or just watching me.

Or is it just a really low maintenance, resilient, living thing, here to remind me that, if there's a will, there's a way. That there will be periods where you will want to shrivel up and die, but that, unless it's your time, The Universe will send something or someone to water your roots and set you straight. Maybe, that thing or person will even see fit to replant you somewhere new, roomier, where you can stop choking on your own misery day in and day out. That you can stand up after a fall. That you can weather anything. That the thing you think is breaking you, really is giving you a chance to be reborn-

in life, with life.

Maybe if I replant that plant... maybe...

The conspiracy theories abound.

Meanwhile, I saw soil for $5 and planters for $3 at The Dollar Tree; anything is possible.

Love & Balls,

Jaded

-----

but can it be

when we can see so vividly a memory?

and yes, you say so must the day

too fade away, and leave a ray of sun

so gold

Writing Prompt, 2.26.25

I've been contemplating resuming my now-defunct writing career. I mentioned this, right? Right. I mean, just look at my phone's home screen; it's been trying to drag me out of this funk for half a decade now, poor thing. Anyways, a few of the books I've read have reminded me about the joy writing used to bring; they've lit the tiniest of fires. I may have written a small synopsis or two. But so far I remain way too clogged with depression and anxiety and a general abundance of ennui. 

So let's try a little experiment; play along. Long ago and far away, when I was known (on here) as THE Master of Fine Arts, friends and followers would tell me, "I don't know what to write about," and ask me for writing prompts. I still have a lot of them saved on my trusty red thumb drive. Maybe it will shake some of you up?

You wake up here, in Cuba. You feel groggy and sluggish, and don't remember how you got here. The last thing you recall is leaving your loft in Philadelphia to meet your cousin for dinner. Everything after locking your door is gone. What now?

Feel free to leave your response in the comments, or email me, if you'd like, but it's not mandatory. As long as this prompt gets you writing and thinking creatively, that's all that matters!

Love & Balls,

Jaded

-----

una foto bonita 

un atardecer hermoso

una bailaíta' 

tu cadenita de oro

Lessons I've Learned at the Movies

Besides all the countless hours of mindless entertainment that movies provide me, I have also learned so many things about myself and about the world around me. My dwindling attention span and expanding backside was not gotten in vain because of those lessons.

Lessons like Bruce Lee really gets pissed when you make him bleed his own blood. And that jerky made from humans is the best tasting jerky around.

And that when a house tells you to get out...you need to get the fuck out.

Mostly I've gained some insight into human relationships through the movies...I'm not saying it has all been good, but I experienced it just the same. Some of it made me so Jaded you could have stabbed a pregnant Virgin Mary in front of me and I would have said, "oh, excuse me" and stepped right over her bloody corpse without blinking an eye.

Others have left me weeping in a disheveled pile of blankets on the floor in the fetal position. And still others have offered so many nuggets of wisdom that I almost went to the screenwriter's house to personally thank them.

But someone told me that that's called "stalking."

Examples:

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Jim Carey (Joel) and Kate Winslet (Clementine) attempt to erase the memory of their passionate-yet-destructive relationship by letting some quack literally erase the memory of the passionate-yet-destructive relationship. But their passion for one another is so deep that they keep finding each other anyway. The lesson I got here was: no matter how much a relationship turns you upside down, shakes you up, and tosses you about, it was a great ride and you wouldn't be "you" without it; you're meant to experience it.

In a scene where they realize the memories are just about erased:

Clementine: This is it, Joel. It's going to be gone soon.

Joel: I know.

Clementine: What do we do?

Joel: Enjoy it.

The Anniversary Party

This beautifully written, directed and portrayed tale of a famous couple's anniversary party, starring Alan Cumming and Jennifer Jason Leigh, was one of the best movies I could have ever discovered in the indie movie section of Poppy's Video Store in Hornell, NY. The couple have just reunited after a long separation and try to mask all their problems with a lavish celebration. One of their (many) issues is that Sally (Leigh) doesn't want children, and Joe (Cumming) does. In order to hold on to her man, Sally decides to move to his native London and give him the babies he desires. But her best friend, played by the LOVELY Phoebe Cates, says in all her infinite wisdom, as a mother of two who gave up HER career to be a "wife": "You can't do yourself in! Kids just rob you of that option!"

Gone With The Wind

This film about the height and fall of the Old South still moves me today, regardless of the racism and shit depicted in it. This movie kicked ass, debate your mom. Scarlett's unrequited love for Ashley. Rhett's unrequited love for Scarlett. And Mammy's unrequited love for white folks. It made me laugh, cry and taught me that chasing a ghost is just that- chasing a ghost. Not something I can grab onto and hold on for dear life. Just a ghost. But a firm grasp of reality (or land...whatever the case may be) is fucking priceless. "It's the only thing that lasts."

West Side Story

If you know me, you know I'm obsessed with Leonard Bernstein, Jerome Robbins, Stephen Sondhein, and their motherfucking brilliant and award-winning love child, West Side Story. What did I learn from it, besides the fact that Hollywood hates minorities to the point of not casting them in their own roles? I learned to be cool. No matter how pissed I get, no matter who's in my face, what's making me mad, I just gotta play it cool. No matter if my boss dropped three new last minute assignments on my desk, or my kids stained my couch, or the person I'm dating keeps pushing me to the point of adding wolfsbane in his drink when he's not looking...I just gotta play it cool.

"Boy, boy, crazy boy,

Get cool, boy!

Got a rocket in your pocket,

Keep coolly cool, boy!

Don't get hot,

'Cause man, you got
Some high times ahead.
Take it slow and Daddy-O,
You can live it up and die in bed!"

My mom used to (still does) lament that if I got a job watching TV or movies I'd be a billionaire. For me, it's enough to have all these little takeaways that I'm sure to remember, even when I forget what a fork is for or what year it is.

And listen, all of these Jaded Classics might be banned soon under the new Musk Dictatorship WHO KNOWS, so I make no apologies for the amount of entertainment I decide to shield myself with. The shelves of books I hide behind. The 1000th stream, a todo volumen, of Bad Bunny's complete DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS album. "Art can save you, but entertainment will never be your salvation,"* and that's fine, I'll accept it.

Love & Balls,

Jaded

-----

i've paid enough of petty dues

i've heard enough of shitty news

*Quote: Comedian Josh Johnson

The Lina & Philip Chronicles: Pt. 1

So I'm a Titi to a set of amazingly smart, sassy, funny, adorable, three-year-old twins (y'all please pray for my sister and brother-in-law!), and for about 10 days out of the month I squat on my sister's couch in the DMV area while I love on these babies and spend quality time with my family (Mami is living there, too). These chronicles will give you a glimpse into the marvelously chaotic life we live raising twin toddlers.

____________

Scene: Pre-dinner homework hour, kitchen table. Lina is dilly-dallying and digressing, and her father reminds her to get back to work. She's not feeling it.

LINA: ...blah blah blah

(no, she really truly said BLAH BLAH BLAH to her father! I wanted to run out of the room and never return!)

In a surprisingly calm and even tone, my BIL lets her know that's not an acceptable way to speak to him; out of embarrassment, she starts crying. For someone who hates to be yelled at, she sure does push on boundaries.

But anyways, I don't know if y'all know much about twins, but what I'm learning is that this pair are RIDE OR DIE for one another, you hear me? So, at witnessing his sister in tears, Phil starts to chime in, and both his parents tell him to stay out of it. Then...

PHIL: I want to ask a question...

ME: (to self) it's a trap; don't let him ask a question!

BIL: OK Phil what's your question?

PHIL: You're a bad man, Daddy. You're a bad man to my sister!

Y'all. Y'ALL. 

I can only pray to have people in my life willing to jump in the line of fire for me like these kids are for each other!

I 💗 them so much.

Love & Balls,
Jaded
-----
don't know what I'd ever do without you
from the beginning to the end
you've always been here right beside me
so, I'll call you my best friend

The Things We Need

"I say, fuck you Jobu..."

 As a sports fan, it tickles me to know about athletes' good luck charms- the items they believe will help them win games. Things like a crucifix, a certain piece of equipment, or even a pair of lucky underwear. It's funny that these men and women, who have practiced until their bodies are beyond hurt, think a sock will make all the difference. Forget skills, precision, expertise. We've got SOCKS!

What's even funnier is realizing that I, too, have my little trinkets that helped me write, travel, and just get through the day in general, and without them everything feels wrong and out of place. My grandmother's ring; a novelty pencil from Jamaica that I dubbed Barrington Mon; a bullet on a chain given to me by a sweet Vietnamese suitor back in high school; my thumb drive, filled with everything I've ever even thought about writing. These are the things I need.

If I dare get on a train, plane, or automobile and am not wearing or carrying Grandma's ring, or my thumb drive, I freak out inside. When I used to perform at readings, I needed that bullet necklace in my pocket. When I would sit at the computer trying to conjure up a story and Barrington Mon was not nearby, I couldn't focus on what I was trying to write.

Of course it's silly to depend on them. After all, I have all this talent, I had all those stories that wanted and needed to be told. The lack of a pencil or a piece of jewelry should not have stood in the way of that. But it did. On the flip side, maybe there's truth to trinkets and totems holding a certain energy that can help, protect, and comfort, and then transfers that energy to us. 

You know, my grandmother didn't get to travel (NJ doesn't count). As far as I know, she came to Brooklyn and stayed put, with just a few tiny trips to Lawrence, Massachusettes; Buffalo, NY; Virginia Beach; and maybe she went a cruise to Alaska? Am I making that up? I think I am... Anyways, that was the extent of it. But with me, through that ring, and in my heart, she's been across the Atlantic, across the country, and even parasailing in Key West. I need Grandma's ring with me everywhere because she's not here in body. (The thumb drive coming with me is just a panic response to having countless computers crash on me, taking with them countless raw documents I'll never get back. It's my emotional support thumb drive.)

And every desk I've ever had since 2005 has featured Barrington Mon; he was gifted to me by a kind, gentle soul I met during my MFA residency, who always had wise observations and a beautiful way of speaking and writing. This pencil reminds me to be easy and trust the light within (advice given to me by said friend), even though I abandoned my craft in 2020. 

The bullet necklace? Well, I mean it's a bullet necklace. Like an actual bullet. It's cool as fuck and I will always cherish it and remember that kid from high school who took it from around his neck and gave it to me when I complimented it. I don't really know it's history, and I've given it at least three backstories from my imagination, but I do know that when I wear it, my confidence level is through the roof.

Does this sound crazy? Do you have your own little false idols? Or is it just this recovering Catholic + a bunch of MLB players? Either way, it's what I need.

Love & Balls,
Jaded

-----

hey, please excuse the mess

see I just wanna feel

i mean really really feel

it all, it all

so give me something...

Exit Where?

I'm on a reading kick, or maybe it's a frenzy, now that I've found I can tolerate audiobooks. Mostly I devour a thriller or crime because it feels like I'm listening to a podcast, or a fun romance because even this Jaded NYer needs a palate cleanser from all that murder, you know?

But recently I tried a quickie, a piece of literary fiction, to see if I can branch out and up my book count (why are there so many books to read but only this one life with this one brain and this one set of eyeballs?). I chose Exit West by Mohsin Hamid and let me tell you why this book fucked me up.

We are currently living in the middle of the fall of 'democracy' in these so-called United States. When the history books refer to this period, IF we have history books in the future, they'll point out all the obvious shit a lot of voters chose to ignore or overlook in order to keep being the oppressor and not allowing the oppressed to what all are supposedly entitled to according to the Declaration of Independence: Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. 

Side Note: If I were you I'd purchase printed copies of the Declaration and the Constitution while they're still intact, if for no other reason than to remember them fondly.

We can all sit here and think, "No, someone will stop it, this won't be Nazi Germany, we'll all be fine," but every day it gets harder and harder to believe that. So instead, my mind goes to, "where can I go to escape it, and how do I get there?" Which is so unbelievably depressing I can barely sleep. Y'all know I've never wanted to live anywhere, really, other than my hometown of Brooklyn, NY, and the thought of not only leaving BK, but the U.S. altogether, and be a refugee in a new place that might treat me like our government treated them? I want to throw up right now after having typed that. Like, will I be somewhere in Greece, on my deathbed, trying to remember what it felt like to stroll through Prospect Park after work? Or what a real bagel tastes like? Or the thrill of the start of the summer season of the American Ballet Theatre?

This is what ran through my head during and long after the five hours of Exit West played in my ears. It's about a couple who escape their country during a military occupation, and what they had to endure in all of the new places they had to squat in because they could not go back home. It was awful. The fear, the violence, sleeping outside, not having food, not being able to cleanse yourself, having to depend on the kindness of others in a world that's not very kind to brown people at all.

Like, can I honestly hoof it to Canada, when Toronto, as I understand it, is already pretty full? Should I chance it in Mexico? Peru? Antigua? Should I hope for a soft place to land with my family in the Dominican Republic? Maybe take a chance in an African country and leave the West altogether? Where could I go, with my whole family, and be a safe distance from the demise of this world that I know? And when I get there, will I be able to land on my feet, or will I have to pitch a tent in a shanty and pray an angry mob of nationalists don't set us on fire?

And sure, there are more serious things to worry about under the second go-round of this bullshit administration, but what is prevelant in my head is where am I supposed to go? They clearly don't want us here, so where do we go if THIS IS OUR HOME? I mean, I'm watching all this shit go down in Gaza, with the Israeli army bullying their way through Palestinian land, the destruction of life, property, standards of living, BASIC. FUCKING. HUMAN. NECESSITIES. Am I built for all that?

I don't know... where y'all going? Got room for about 15 more?

Love & Balls,
Jaded
----- 
father, father
we don't need to escalate
you see, war is not the answer
only love can conquer hate

Saying the Uncomfortable Thing Out Loud...

...just not to the right person.

The way he tells it, I was aggressive on our first date. He emphasized that first of all I was late, but also that I rebuffed the drink he had pre ordered for me, a mojito. "I don't drink mojitos; I don't like things floating in my drink" or something like that is what I said. He then said I did end up drinking it and liking it (because it was frozen, mind you), but because I was so aggressive out the box I almost didn't get to enjoy this "experience." A stupid mojito.

When I corrected him and said, "I'm not aggressive, I'm assertive, I speak up when I don't want something and I don't see that as negative," he said, "well I do."

That was during a Friday night date back in 2022, and it damn near put me off my Buffalo wings and cold beer.

It's 2025 and the memory of this conversation has basically put me off my relationship.

How can I be with someone who sees my speaking up for myself, what I want and need, what I prefer or what makes me feel good, as a negative?

And if you know me, you know I always have one foot out the door, ready, willing, and able to walk away, dignity intact, and live well. But I'm trying to be a grown up, and I heard a rumor that grown ups talk things out first.

A huge part of me is still The Jaded NYer, though, which means that before I activate my inner grown up, I activate my inner petty blogger.

Because FUCK HIM. Why should I drink a drink I know I don't like, just to impress a date? So now every time we go out I have to endure a drink with fucking leaves in it to keep up appearances? I have to eat your "chicken stew" when I have a physical aversion to BOILED chicken with the bone in? I can't complain about huge chunks of onions and peppers in the mac and cheese? I'm supposed to fuck you even when I'm not in the mood? Where does it end? When do I get to be me?

I'll tell you when: ALWAYS. I'm ALWAYS going to be me. And if you're only going to love me IN SPITE of that fact, instead of BECAUSE OF it, I really have to ask, why are you even with me?

I probably should have posted this in my Letters I'll Never Send blog...

Anywhores... Happy Valentine's Day, losers.

Love & Balls,
Jaded
-----
please stop asking, do you still love me?
don't have much to say, let's speak in the morning
please don't do this, I'm too far away
don't know what to tell you, babe

Coasting Looks Like...

...abandoning previous goals because it got too hard or something minor felt major and got in your way

Häagen-Dazs, Butter Pecan

...not speaking up for yourself because what's the point? they're never going to see your side of it

...doing just enough to keep a roof over your head and food on the table

...eating yourself into oblivion so you have a reason to self-isolate from the world

...answering "How have you been" texts with "Meh, but pushing on anyway" instead of unleashing the full weight of the hell swirling around in your brain, because we're all meh, but pushing on anyway, everyday, and commiserating on being meh isn't going to make you feel better; I've tried it

This all seems quite familiar, like I've written these words before, and felt these feelings before. 

But hey, consistency, amirite?

Love & Balls,

Jaded

-----

hey, there, you, looking for a brighter season

need to lay your burden down

hey, there, you, drowning in a helpless season

buried under deeper ground

When the Party's Over

Art Deco Grandeur

In 2009 or so, I was sent out by a staffing agency to temp at Central Library in Brooklyn, and I was thrilled because, I mean, books. I grew up with the library system as my babysitter (shout out to the DeKalb, Marcy, and Bushwick branches!) and now I'd get to go behind the curtain, so to speak, and work there.

About a year into my assignment, the boss offered me a permanent position on the marketing team and I played it cool ("let me think about it over the weekend") but really, I was living the dream. It was shit money but the hours were good, the people were nice, the benefits were stellar, and the organization as a whole was beyond reproach. I could sleep well at night knowing I worked for/with the good guys.

Then the cracks started to show: the head honcho wasn't a former librarian when historically they were (I think it was a must but they changed the rules for her); said head honcho decided she didn't like my boss NOR the head of the design team, so more often than not, she poo-pooed everything we were trying to do; a new guy came in, from the DoT, and decided to bring along a crony from the DoT, and oust my boss; that crony, who did not have the marketing experience or gravitas that my former boss had, brought in a third crony, so that cronies 1 and 2 were now both being paid crazy amounts to split the job my boss was doing by himself (and then they also brought in a third person to deal with press, which is something my former boss did, too). So are you keeping score? Three mediocre white people doing the job of one talented Black man, all because the Head White Lady didn't like the cut of his jib.

Ephemera

It all started to go downhill from there, for me at least, and definitely in the area of morale.

I personally dealt with so many microaggressions, and was passed up for a promotion because I supposedly didn't have the experience and I was, quote, "unapproachable." So they hired someone with no marketing experience which made all the sense, right? And then proceeded to groom her for any and every salary increase and promotion they could think of. Not me, though, because I was unapproachable and didn't hang out with people after the workday or celebrate my birthday in the office or participate in something called Lunch Crew where they expected me to allow and trust white women with cats to make me a tasty and pet-hair-free meal. I didn't care for any of it, I was vocal about all of it, "I haven't seen your kitchen, so no, thank you," and it made me "not a team player.

Celebrating Z outside the office!

Still, I showed up, did my job, got my check, because that's how I came up. I don't go to work to make friends and kiki and party and bullshit, I'm there to do a job. And I will be cordial and might even smile here and there and contribute my fair share to the workload but that's all. Being friends is not in the job description, and frankly none of these people were folks I'd be friends with outside the office (minus one, HEY Z!)

The final straw came in the fall of 2022.

I was making plans to visit my daughter in Italy; she was going to study abroad so I was going to do 10 days in Milan, and then a week in Rome with a weekend in Athens, Greece. To make it work, I figured, I could do a full remote work time (the library had started going hybrid by then) so as not to use up all my time. I only did two days in the office anyway, what could it hurt? Well, request denied, even though I know they'd done similar deals with other non-brown workers, and I was pissed but whatever. THEN I was informed that the worst kept secret in the marketing department was that my direct supervisor was resigning, she wanted the other copywriter to be her successor, and they had all met about it without me. 

Well, listen. I'd signed on as a contractor with a corporate giant during this time as a side gig, making roughly $1K a day, so I thought about it and decided, before they even approach me with a bullshit explanation as to why I wasn't considered (and probably threw a tiny disrespectful raise at me) I was going to finally grant their collective wish and leave. Fuck that whole marketing department full of transplants (EXCEPT Z & Fritzi!) with a bag full of rusty tire irons. The whole lot. I can't think of a more toxic place for this Black Latina to work, except maybe the current White House administration.

A BK Winter Wonderland

Things I miss: working for an institution that focuses on access for all; the steady, non-freelance paycheck, the benefits, Z. THE VIEW OF PROSPECT PARK FROM THE OFFICE. What I don't miss, everything else. 

I don't look back and think, "I wish I still worked there," even as freelance work is beginning to dry up. I look back and think, "The stories I could tell you about this place..." Because you just gotta know when to walk away from shit that no longer serves you. Honestly, I should have left sooner, but I let fear be my guide.

Don't let fear keep you where you're not wanted or appreciated. No matter how green the grass on that side is.

Love & Balls,
Jaded
-----
I hate people that feel entitled
look at me crazy 'cause I ain't invite you
oh, you important?
you the moral to the story, you endorsing?
motherfucker, I don't even like you

On Retirement and Finding My "Why"

courtesy of Simon Sinek

"Why do you do what you do? It’s not an easy question, but the answer could make a big difference in your life."

Sometime around 2018 I started to notice that I had been coasting on autopilot in my life. Maybe it was because my youngest was graduating and leaving for school across the country, and I had more time to think, but it was a sobering realization. I finally had the time and freedom to do whatever the fuck I wanted, but didn't know exactly what that was, or if I did know, wasn't taking the steps to get what I wanted. The one area of my life that took the biggest hit was writing (and all of my literary endeavours). I remember thinking, "who cares?" and "what's the point?" and I began to hate everything I had created and resent the people who were reaching out to me about their writing, wanting to do readings, etc. AND I HATED MY COLLEAGUES AT MY 9-5, which I couldn't do anything about because I was paying tuition for one kid and subsidizing rent for another.

So to summarize, I was very unhappy and had too much time to think about that unhappiness but I was stuck in a situation of my own making because I had dependents, which meant that chasing a dream (even if I had lost sight of that dream) wasn't possible because I had to do practical things.

Then in the summer of 2019, my literary org was turning ten and I planned what I thought was a fun celebration...that no one wanted to attend. I took a step back and thought, "all these people that I've helped, or published, or given a stage to, or collaborated with, and maybe five ride-or-die folks wanted to celebrate that with me. Enough was enough. I decided to retire and disappear from the literary scene in NYC. I refused all invites to talks and readings and workshops, stopped editing manuscripts, and abandoned my own work. I even handed over the reins to La Pluma y La Tinta to someone else.

That fall, a bunch of shit started to happen, like a snowball rolling down a hill, that forced me into therapy. And every session was just me crying because I felt weak and lost and really, what was I even doing with this life anymore?

It's been a lot. And my therapist concluded the obvious: I do for everyone else, and hardly ever for me. 

Where does that leave me now? Slightly un-retired. I'm reading again. I've even started listening to audiobooks. Ideas for stories have popped in my head. A tiny vision of where I want to focus my energies emerged. Now, I'm not saying therapy did all that, but it didn't NOT do all that, either.

I'm working on my why. I think I'm meant to use my storytelling abilities to persuade you mongrels to stop being assholes to the planet and each other. That's what really matters to me. This reboot is a part of that work.

Lake Como, my heart

But if in pursuit of de-mongrelizing you I happen to become a best-selling author who splits her time between a three-bedroom condo in Riverdale, a refurbished farmhouse on the right good side (read: the side that doesn't touch NJ) of the Hudson River Valley, and a vineyard in Italy, too, you know, I wouldn't be mad at that.

Love & Balls,

Jaded

-----

it seems like I'm always against me

seems like this is never ending

and I refuse to let it end me

mentally, spiritually, physically

i need my peace

A Bitch Got Fat.

That "F" word can be really triggering or polarizing but I'm An Old and I use accurate words to describe things that are real, and I. Am. Fat. How do I know? Well, besides having pretty decent vision and a working mirror: my back and joint pains have increased, my belly sticks out and hangs like a trash bag full of pudding, and my snoring has gotten so much worse.

Now, because I'm gifted in height, it took a while for it to really show, but then one day I took a selfie and thought WHO THE FUCK IS THAT FAT BITCH? Clothes that I've owned and comfortably worn for years no longer fit, and then rock bottom: I sat down and my jeans gave up on life. That's when I really knew.

"You can't be fat AND mean, Raquel"

I got on a scale and a number I never thought I'd see associated with me popped up; 252lbs. I'm not sure how you deal with bad news, but my way is to feel defeated, fall into a shame spiral wherein I identify and dwell on every wrong decision I ever made, then escape into a new hyperfixation while completely avoiding the obvious solutions. It's so much fun in my brain, I wish I could sell tickets!

And a lot of things contributed to this; not the actual lockdown but life after, where everyone walks around maskless and not social distancing and coughing into the open air as if Covid never happened. That shit stresses me out. Being in a stagnant relationship that I refuse to make a decision about one way or another, stresses me out. Being underemployed and in a financial crisis stresses me out. Worrying about my daughters' well-being stresses me out. Worried that my mom isn't progressing in her recovery the way we thought she would, and the pressure it adds onto my sister and brother-in-law, stresses me out. THE GOVERNMENT COUP THAT IS CURRENTLY TAKING PLACE WHICH MAKES ME FEEL HELPLESS AND POWERLESS, STRESSES. ME. OUT. And when I stress out, I EAT & SHUT DOWN, a combination well documented for its ability to fatten people up.

If I could just be 100% depressed only, then I could lose some weight, you know? Because that's when I lose interest in food altogether. Ahhh, I miss only being depressed...

(I will share, however, the one major positive of looking like someone's Big Momma... no more catcalls in these streets. PRAISE ALLAH.)

So what do I plan to do about it? *kanyeshrug* Does this blog post not count as something being done?

I think I'm sharing this out loud because if/when you see me in these streets wearing a mumu or complaining about my diabetes acting up (who are we kidding, it's only a matter of time), I don't want you to be surprised and wonder, "what happened to that hot Dominican blogger I used to fantasize about?" I'll tell you what happened, a bitch got fat.

Love & Balls,

Jaded

-----

like the scar of age

written all over my face

the war is still raging inside of me

i still feel the chill

as i reveal my shame to you

i wear it like a tattoo

The Jaded NYer: The Reboot

Hi. Remember when I used to blog regularly, and on the days I'd take a break, I'd come back with a song? I figured that, since I've decided to revive the blog, I'd ease you back in with a little tune.

Wasn't that fun? Great, let's move on.

Why reboot the Jaded Blog? Well. A lot of factors led to this decision.

1. I have been RUDDERLESS since Papi died. Just walking around this world like a chicken without a head. This is a strange world for me- first I lose Grandma and just when I've made peace with it, Papi leaves. The one man in my life who loved me unconditionally. It's a lot for a girl to lose her dad.

2. I lost focus on my WHY. I became so entangled in trying to run La Pluma y La Tinta, trying to host events that would garner likes on the interwebs, bigging up others only to get nothing in return. It depleted me.

3. I quit my library job after it became ABUNDANTLY CLEAR that they didn't value me or my skills, and my whole department, minus one or two people, became overrun with people NOT from NY, telling NYers what types of events/books/art they should like. And finding a new job, one that will pay me what I'm worth but also feels like I'm positively contributing to the good in this world has been... not great.

4. My daughter had a major health crisis, the world shut down, my mom got sick, and my sister had twins, and I realized, fuck everything else, family is what I need to focus on.

5. I'm living in a world that, basically, hates me and everyone who looks like me or is where I'm from, and the anxiety and depression that comes with that has forced me to seek some sort of anchor, and I think I'm realizing that anchor is language, literature, the written word.

So I guess, for now, I'm un-retired. 

Listen, if Stephen King can do it, so can I.

Happy Black History & Dominican Heritage Month.

Love & Balls,
Jaded

-----

does anyone remember
what it felt like to laugh all night
and sleep in late
not worry about anyone or anything?

well, I don't, I don't, I don't