Rain On The Roof

Got up early yesterday, very early and then later that morning had an appointment around 10:30. I was so tired at 9:00am (was up at 3:00am) I realized that if I didn't go out, get in the car, drive to the appointment and wait outside in my car, I would end up instead falling asleep and missing it completely. So I did just that, drove there, parked there, threw back the driver's seat and had nearly an hour to snooze on a quiet residential street before I had to go in.

Once again, to even find an hour in my day is a bit of a miracle, and that particular "found hour" was luxurious in the extreme. It was raining and I like the sound of the rain in Arlington drumming on the roof of my car when I'm safe, sound and warm inside. Even found a blanket in the back seat and covered up with it. From the low angle I was lying at, I could see out the window, to lush green trees across the street. They had that twinkle color of new buds, nearly electric yellow green, and they were sucking up that rain. Foliage that looks like green pulses of light, not leaves. Ecstatic green vibrations of new growth. They shout out "See Me!" those little nutty new kid leaves.

Focus shift from long-range trees to up close raindrops rolling jiggity-jaggety down the window glass. I was up close memorizing every raindrop's herky-jerky path, like quicksilver droplets trying to find their mates, join forces. I was thinking about the way the rain falls, finding fellow drops. I was a little sad, found I could make rain too. My cheeks the window they would roll down.

Appointment was to see the shrink. I was thinking about my family. Heck call it what they call it "family of origin" sounds so clinical. I was thinking about kitchen tables and office conference rooms. Somewhere along the line, I stopped looking at trees and raindrops -- things that made sense to me, they just are what they are -- and got caught up in family stuff and teams at work.

Learned early at the kitchen table that people lie. They say one thing and mean another. As a writer, even way back, as a writer in a little girl dress with mary jane shoes that did not reach the floor, I learned that families are busy lieing and not telling you the truth, because sometimes, if not most of the time, the truth is a little scary. At the kitchen table I remember thinking as a writer -- if you lie, you're lost -- you lose your way and can't figure a way back, it's dangerous. To tell the truth in a family is also dangerous and you get punished for it. But to start lieing is the END of being a writer. You might as well pop your head off like an overused Barbie doll. Lies. Like taking your compass and mismarking NORTH. It's the big violation. Family lies.

Was thinking you do the very same thing at work. People sitting around a conference room table trying to tell the truth and often lying. The violence of the office. I find it a scary and violent place where nasty deeds are done and no one speaks up. Lying because of power. Lying to those in power that they are cool and smart when they aren't, although if you're really lucky maybe they are. Lying to customers. Lying to colleagues about their future at a company, perhaps, just to make them feel a little less terrified. Lying that there will be no layoffs. And I feel tired, knowing this is the coin of the realm in so many offices. They call it politics, but it's just plain lying mixed up with power. When you call it that, you risk everything. When you stop seeing the truth, however, to my mind, you're dead.

In the car, I'm glad the rain is not lying to me. It's being wet, it's rain, it knows writers get crazy when rain pretends to be dry and sandy. Writers who can't even remember how to spell lying or is it lieing but always know when it's happening.