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A little over four years ago, Chad adopted a scraggly black cat that he named Frances. She was born an outdoor cat and spent an estimated year living outside before she was trapped and brought into the local APL. She was so accustomed to an outdoor life that on her first night inside she waited for us to fall asleep before crawling into a box of dirt that Chad was using to propagate plants and settling in to sleep in the place that felt most familiar to her.

Frances always had health problems - a chronic upper respiratory tract infection, occasional fleas, dental trouble that meant annual cleanings and extractions, and, more recently, kidney disease,

If her estimated age is to be believed, Fran was young to have kidney issues. But her vet reinforced that a life outside is a hard one and that Fran’s tenderest developmental stages were likely difficult, with uncertain access to food or shelter. There was so much we would never know about her.

We had to say goodbye to Fran today and I’m reeling, terribly sad for this sweet and funny little animal who took a long time to learn to love people, who would rather sleep in a pile of dirt, whose favorite toy was a catnip banana, and whose snaggletoothed little fangs gave her the sweetest smile. My dad was often critical of Fran’s bedraggled appearance , but the one time I tried to joke with him about it he cut me off and said, “Is Frances not one of god’s creatures, deserving of love and respect.” And she was, she was.

Oh, I miss her. I miss her.

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What I bought in Portland: Stephen Malkmus’s A Groove Denied LP (“Rushing the Acid Frat”), 1991 Plume paperback of Lorrie Moore’s Like Life, 1986 Seal Press paperback of Sarah Schulman’s Girls, Visions and Everything, two new black bras.

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I’m in Portland for work. Tomorrow morning I’m moderating a conference panel - I had been feeling anxious about it for weeks, but a few days ago something in my brain coiled too tight and snapped and now I’m not anxious anymore.

I read most of Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck on the plane and the second half made me so sad and angry that I had to put it down for awhile. My copy is sitting next to me on the couch, unopened while I look at my phone.

Chad is flying out to meet me today. We’ll be in Portland together until Friday morning, then we’ll drive up to Astoria to visit Alana and Ari. We’ll drive back to Portland on Sunday and will fly home on Monday. A whole week away! I miss our cats.

N and T are coming to the house to check on the cats while we’re gone. Chad asked T for his Portland recommendations and he sent him a list of 82 places, a nontrivial number of which are just spots with good steps for skating.

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Feeling seen by my friends

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I want something but I don’t know what it is

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We went to see Mary Timony earlier in the week, she’s been playing “Honeycomb” in other cities but she didn’t play it here. This afternoon I watched a video of her playing it at Johnny Brenda’s in Philadelphia and cried (and she spits and swears until she can’t swear anymore/and she doesn’t care when you call her a whore).

At some point, I don’t remember when anymore, Alana tattooed a honeycomb on my left arm, the words “stay alone” (how I misheard the lyric “stay at home” when I was a teenager) beneath it. My old boyfriend hated that tattoo.

I cry more often since going off of my medication a few years ago - playing catch up, making up for all of those years I couldn’t cry. I’m not depressed, I just have feelings again, which is interesting. All of those years I spent existing outside my body. Now I’m back in it.

I was talking to my dad the other night and he told me he ran into a friend of my old boyfriend, that this friend was telling him that not being able to make it work with me was the biggest mistake his buddy ever made. I don’t believe that’s true, not even for a minute, and I think it’s embarrassing that this person even brought me up.

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Yesterday I finished reading Molly by Blake Butler, sat in the soft morning light with the cats padding around on their little paws and thought about the many times in my life I have longed not for death but for never having been to begin with.

Today I drove home listening to a playlist I had forgotten about and when “Homemade” by Sebadoh came on, I thought of Blake saying that Molly would rant and rave about Lou Barlow being the real genius of Dinosaur Jr. Speaking from experience, no woman who identifies with Lou Barlow is well.

Here I am, on my knees/With nothing to blame but my curiosity/It got the best of me

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I went to put my copy of The Golden Dove on this morning and Chad did a deep sigh, so I put it back in the crate. Now I’m home alone sitting on the couch & letting it spin. Sorry to the man I love, but real heads know.

You showed me pictures of your ex-girlfriend on a beach without her shirt on/And it made me sick, but I didn’t tell you it did

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I don’t care about you and whatever you want me to do/Wipe your nose, take out the trash, give and give and never ask

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We went to see Liz Phair last night - the last show on her 30 years of Exile in Guyville tour. She didn’t play this song (she never does, why should she?) but I thought of it all night anyway.

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I have something really good for the Anaïs Nin heads, but posting means sharing info that cuts a little too close to my real life… missing the days of the LJ friends list…

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Is there a better album opener/closer than “Mallo Cup”/“Ever” on Lemonheads’ Lick (1989)?

Here I am outside your house at 3am/Trying to think you out of bed

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I know commitment is not the trend/Don’t misunderstand what I intend/When I say this doesn’t have to end

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I spent my birthday at a funeral home, which is, unfortunately, par for the course at this point. I don’t think there is a time of year I hate more than my birthday - an annual reminder of how many people I love who are no longer here, a time that feels more and more lonely with each passing year. The sour, end of the season punctuation mark that I always spend crying.

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The business book I’m being forced to read for work is so stupid it should be illegal

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We went to see Angel Olsen play in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery & I found myself overwhelmed by memories listening to her play “Give It Up” (the year I lost my mind) and “All Mirrors” (the year I started over) and, most of all, “Sans.” I’ll never see Angel play another house show, but it was beautiful to see her out under the open sky.

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Saying hi to every guy at the Braid show (except for the ones I’ve slept with)

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Jenna Gribbon (American, 1978) - If a Woman Reads a Book in the Forest But No One is There to See It (2020)