Five Star Friday's 190th Edition Is Brought to You By Neil Gaiman

This week's Five Star Friday is brought to you by a life with alcohol, learning to define your own desires, rituals and the weight of love, a celebration of motherhood, the cost of operating an alcoholic, a cancer diagnosis, memory loss and growing up, and Neil Gaiman:



Happy Friday!

"Experiments In Sobriety or 'This Is When I Admit That I Have A Drinking Problem'" by Interrupted Girl at Autostraddle:

I do most of my drinking alone, which makes it not feel like drinking at all. It's just a thing I do on the way to doing something else. It's like taking the bus, a sort of invisible thing in-between two other places, and it isn’t very interesting so it's not really worth talking about. Because if a tree falls in some shithole bar, and no one is around to notice, it’s not much of an anecdote, now is it? It's a potent facilitator, that feeling of being shimmery and translucent all the time, of not having witnesses. It's easy to think whatever you want. It’s even easier to let those blind spots blot life out, seep outward like a drop of ink on a cocktail napkin.

"The Gravity of Pancakes" from Journey Mama:

This is so much of what practice is. I see it in all areas of my life: spiritual, family, friends, art — how doing the same thing again and again doesn't need to be stagnant. It gives weight to love, especially when you show up with your whole heart, but even sometimes when you can't quite bring all of you. The part of you that remembers not to forget is still there, still in motion, still building something that will be lovely in the end.

"Know What You Want" from helenjane.com:

Things I thought I wanted until on second thought I really didn't at all:
To be in movies. A boat. A certain luxury brand rugged vehicle. A Paris apartment. A pool. Her life. His seemingly well-behaved children.

I don't want those things.

I'd been convinced I wanted those things, but until I looked at what I really wanted, I realized I didn't want those things.

By society, by marketing, I've been convinced I wanted those things when I really just didn't have my own longings defined.

"Motherhood Isn't a Desk Job. It's Vaudeville." from Planting Dandelions:

Whenever career counselors try to parlay child-rearing experience to marketable job skills, what they typically come up with are administrative functions, like appointment making and record keeping. They completely overlook the far more specialized skill set moms acquire. By the time our kids head off to college, we are show business veterans, having produced, directed, and starred in such classics as "Christmas," "Halloween," "Birthday Party" and other holiday extravaganzas for eighteen consecutive years, at breathless tempo. Motherhood isn't a desk job. It's vaudeville.

"Adventures With Cancer, Part 3" from Kvetch Mom:

My parents are in the office the next morning awaiting our arrival. My mother is dressed up. I feel like she might take my picture. Give me a spray of flowers for my wrist. Compliment my cap and gown. I am commencing into an after.

"Mr. Fix-It Real Good" from Trudging Through the Fire:

The cost of operating an alcoholic was not cheap. There was always somebody to pay for something. It was either that or try to fix it myself, and that was always problematic since I’ve never been much of a handy man. Anything with more moving parts than a bottle of beer baffled me. If it couldn’t be fixed by repeated chops from a tennis racket, it was time to throw it away, and do without. Being drunk doesn’t lend itself to any painstaking problem solving.

"I Will Remember This" from Cry It Out:

She'd squeeze my hand and throw her head back and laugh, and I remember at the time thinking I would never forget these moments, but knowing full well they'd be lost on her years hence, swept away by that fog of childhood — all these memories clinging to her DNA and making her who she is and who she will become but out of reach somehow, warbling in some echo chamber forgotten by the cruelty of growth.

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Comments

[The Blog Fodder]

Very good writing this week. Especially the first one. Not an easy life.

[Kyran]

What a nice surprise! Bonus: it comes with a Madonna ear worm! This must be my lucky star... :-)

[Helen Jane]

Being featured here has always been a secret dream of mine. Thanks for helping it come true!