Present

Yesterday, we went to lunch at the Mission Inn and to the Cheech Museum for my mom's birthday which is Wednesday. I'm not always present is what I'm realizing. I don't know if it's my writing, or Covid, but sometimes I find it hard just to relax. I want to. I do, but it's not easy.

The same characteristics that make me a good writer and performer, are what make it hard for me to relax. I'm driven. I'm usually in my head. If I have a piece I'm working on, I'm intensely focused. If it's a reading or signing, I'm on task. Yet, I want to be me more. The real me.

Who is that though? Who am I? I've been asking that question for years. And years. Maybe I'm no one. Maybe I'm everyone.

I feel as if I lost my essence at times. That there is no me outside of the public persona or that on the page. Yet, there are times, sitting with my husband having that first coffee of the day, listening to Prince or Bowie in the background, that I see a glimmer of me. Or who I could be. 

This JEM would be herself, but a bit more laid back. As if you let me breathe, and took away all the anxiety, self analysis and neurosis. I am gonna work on it. I am. And I think I can.