Same Air

I wrote this poem in 1993...

Same Air

The same air.
We're all,
breathing,
the same air.

Is it choking you too?
Is it making you so sick
that you have to
blame me,
hate me,
say that it's my "kind"
that's fouling up your breathing?

Do I have to
get out of
your way,
your face,
so that you can breathe,
a little easier?

So that you don't feel
like I'm taking
all the air,
and you are left
with nothing,
gasping.

Do you want me
to apologize for
getting in your
breathing,
space?

I won't do that.

It's all
the same,
air,
and there's
plenty of it,
and it's free.

Daisy C. Abreu

Saying No

It’s Saturday night and you are on your way to meet friends for an evening out. You are catching up with one friend as you wait for the final member of your group to join you. You are laughing about something. You forget now what it was.

A man approaches.  He is a stranger and not necessarily menacing, but…you can sense it coming.

A grin breaks his face open and there is a hint of swagger in his walk. Maybe he is thinking he is about to make your day.  He speaks.

“Can I just say...?"

“No.”

You say no.  You say no with a straight spine, a straight face, and an even tone in your voice.

“No, you may not.  Please leave us alone. Really.”

His face darkens.

“Really?”

Yes, really.

You say no, and in saying no you stop him from what he thought was going to be the highlight of your day. You are firm. You won’t allow yourself to be “complimented,” objectified, verbally assaulted. He is shocked, then enraged. He sends a stream of expletives and insults your way. Now you are a “dyke” because you didn’t succumb to his charms. Now you are “ugly” and “dumb” because you weren’t grateful that he deemed you worthy of his attention. He leaves your friend alone, maybe because she didn’t turn around when he approached. Maybe you were his only target.

You aren’t scared of him. You are furious and fearless, even in the face of his threats. He is now your target, the way you were his. He is every man you backed away from, every man who filled you with fear and shame. You stand on the corner, looking him in the eye, never averting your gaze as he showers you with invectives.

“Remember my face!”  He shouts as he crosses the street.

“No,” you think. “Remember mine.”

Feeling it.

Activation

There is a rhythm

a beat making me believe
this is the way

Still right
to write

the things bubbling under my skin

making me tingle
feeling the goosebumps
without the chill
without the fear

A hand guiding me

stroking my shoulder

Embracing who I was always supposed to be

pushing

reassuring

arousing

It comes at night

stays until

1 2 3 am

excitement

uncertainty

knowing

The opposite
of my quiet epiphany
at 29

At 42

I am
stiffening sinews

summoning up blood

I am

a greyhound in the slip

straining against the start*

let’s go

*From Shakespeare’s Henry V

#YesAllWomen

I find myself thinking about all of the times I have tried to make myself forget.

I think about that time at a friend’s quinceñera when an older boy moving through the crowd squeezed by me, his hand brushing my crotch. No, not brushing. His hand didn’t slip; he pushed his palm against the peach taffeta of my dress and between my legs. I was two weeks shy of turning thirteen.

One of my father’s friends told me I was beautiful after he forced his tongue into my mouth as we stood in the entryway of his home. He was in pajama pants and an undershirt. I was in jeans and an oversized men’s shirt. It was my first day of high school.

“She’s fuckable.” That’s what a boy said about me when he heard I had a crush on him. I was sixteen.

I think of how when I spoke of my assault at 14—because I know now that it was an assault—I was silenced by some of the women and girls in my life. “No one wants to hear about that…”

A colleague, someone I considered a mentor, tells me over dinner about how he met his wife. When I say I hope for that kind of longevity in my own life, he tells me that my problem is that I am too independent. Then he tells me that there is something about me he cannot shake and that he is all caught up in it. I spend the next hours, weeks, and months, feeling anxious whenever I encounter him, wondering what I did to provoke him, rather than wondering why he thought it was OK to say that to me in that moment. Or ever.  

As I get ready to leave the house every day, I check the mirror. I think I look nice, but I also know that somewhere along my walk across town a man will make a comment that I am supposed to take as a compliment. It is not vanity; it is fear.

I think of the time a man asked me my ethnicity as I passed him on the street. And when I apologized (!) and said I could not speak to him because I was late for an appointment, he followed me down the crowded city street, berating me for half a block.

I ignore a catcall on my way home from work and am followed, my “admirer’s” words escalating. I have to seal myself off, steel myself, and hope that the light does not turn red before I can get to the intersection.

I think about all the times I walked home alone after a night out with friends and made it safely to my apartment. I think about how my girlfriends and I text each other to say we are on our way to the meeting place or that we have made it home from the meeting place safely.

I think about how I make a point of meeting dates at a restaurant or bar where I know the staff.

I think about the night I sat at the opposite end of a bar from another single woman during happy hour, both of us waiting for friends who were running late. I think about how the man who sat between us is the reason she and I became friends that night.

I think about how the women I am closest to all have stories like these.  I think about how we recognized that silence in each other for months or years before we were brave enough to share our experiences. I think about how those friendships have been deepened.

I think about the guilt and the shame that comes with the silence and how this movement has brought all of that noise back to my surface; how it has allowed me to reevaluate and remind myself that none of it was my fault.

I think about how thinking about all of these things tonight makes me frightened of trying to date again because although all men are not “like that,” all women have experiences like these.

I think about believing that I can still be fearless with my heart while protecting my body, my being.

End of the First Quarter

Today was a rough writing day. I opened three different word documents and tried to make sense of things I typed up in October. I opened my notebook and wrote for all of six minutes before writing "This is shit," closing the notebook, and going to the kitchen for tea and Oreos. Then I took a nap. It happens. I expect there to be more rough writing days as I figure out my rhythm in this new life. I also expect there to be plenty of good writing days.

Armed with tea and Oreos, I opened my notebook to the first entry of the year. Here's what it said. 

 

January 1, 2014

Resolutions? No. Affirmations? Maybe. More like promises to myself. Gifts to my own heart and soul. A vision for the next twelve months.This is hard because while I am great at planning for others, I find it challenging to put myself first. But I need to try for my own happiness and strength and security. What are these things I can do for myself in the second half of my 41^st year? 

Push my own limits emotionally and mentally. Find a new place in the world. Make room for myself in it. Learn new things. Be braver, be gentler, be more open, be more protective of myself, trust myself more. Love more deeply – not just others but myself. Find my center. Protect it. Make it count.

What about tangible things? What will I do?

Get paid for writing

Make good contacts with other writers

Apply for writing jobs and get one

Write in a notebook a minimum of three times a week (it’s a start)

Have more solo dance parties

Purge the unnecessary physical items

Write more letters, put more love into the world.

Read more of the unread books on my bookshelf

Up yoga to two times a week

Be: brave, scrupulous, fearless, loving, calm, centered, active, considerate, animated, balanced, generous, thoughtful, kind, intense, ambitious, understanding, patient, fabulous, chic, empowered, enriched, enamored, fruitful, voracious, prolific, unencumbered, believing, rhythmic, engaged, rapt, ridiculous, game, open, cautious, concerned, discerning, romantic, free, freeing, freed, subtle, outrageous, enigmatic, enthusiastic. Be. 

So, yeah. That's a lot. But, you know what? I'm getting some of it done (especially the yoga and the solo dance parties). And I'll keep working on the rest.

Reflections on a month at the Vermont Studio Center

I received a grant to spend the month of October living and working alongside fifty international artists at the Vermont Studio Center, an artists’ residency and retreat in Johnson, Vermont. Here is my take on my time there. (originally published in the January/February 2014 issue of the Arts Council of Greater New Haven's Arts Paper)

_____________________________________

Everything is still outside the studio buildings. The Guhon River gurgles outside my studio window and an occasional car drives down Pearl Street, but the town is quiet. Inside the studios, painters, sculptors, and writers from all over the world are working on drawings, paintings, installations, essays, and stories. The Vermont Studio Center provides artists with the opportunity to work in residence for two to twelve weeks at a time. We live together, eat all of our meals together and share our work, whether it is in the casual setting of the Red Mill Dining Hall, during open studios events, slide talks and readings, or over a drink at one of the two pubs on Main Street. We have everything we need to be productive—time, space in which to work and live, plenty of coffee, meals, and a community to support and encourage us. We also have access to visiting artists who meet with and mentor us in one on one sessions. I am amazed to have four weeks to work in a studio of my own, as free from the distractions of my “regular” life as I want to be, and that I get to share the experience with a group of people with a similar goal: to create.

Maverick Studio

I go to my studio in the Maverick Building every morning after breakfast with a thermos of coffee and some fruit. It is warm for October in Vermont, so I open my window and set up my easy chair close enough to set my bare feet on the windowsill. I write a prompt at the top of the blank notebook page, set a timer, put my headphones in, and write in longhand for sixty minutes, unedited and uncensored. My intention is to expand on some of the themes I began working on in my graduate thesis, but the free writing exercises take me in a different direction.  I follow. When the timer goes off, I unfold myself from the chair, reach for one of the books I brought with me, and read for another hour. I take a walk to get more coffee around 11:30am and sit on my favorite bench by the river before lunch.

I find my friends in the dining hall, some of whom have come to the Vermont Studio Center from as near as Boston and as far as Alaska, and we debrief about our mornings. There is excitement for the painter who has sold three paintings from her MFA show at Johnson State College up the road. I ask a fellow writer about the progress she is making on an essay she asked me to look at the day before.  She says she’s figured out how to finish it. I hear snippets of conversation in English, Spanish, French, and Chinese coming from nearby tables as I clear my dishes away.

I return to the studio to type up the morning’s work after lunch. I don’t look at what I’ve written too closely in an effort to keep myself from editing as I go. I wait until the end of the week to print out pages and mark them up with notes and rewrites. I am able to get my routine and rhythm to a place where I am averaging fifteen hundred to two thousand words per day. Is it all great work? Only in the sense that for the first time since I completed graduate school in January I am writing every day. I was afraid when I arrived at Vermont Studio Center that I wouldn’t have anything to write about. I realize during these weeks away from my life in New Haven that what is most important is to write every day; to create a habit and maintain it every day no matter where I am.

Enough.

To the men I encountered on my way to and from work today:

I assume you think you are complimenting me when you share your opinions about my hair, clothes, legs, etc.; I assure you that you are only succeeding in making me angry. Twice today, men not only referred to me as “delicious” as I walked by, but they followed me for a few steps. How is that supposed to make me feel anything other than objectified, unsafe, and more than a little creeped out?  Gentlemen, I PROMISE you that the approach you seem to be so fond of will NEVER result in my saying, “and that’s how I met your father.” 

If you heard a man speaking this way toward your wife, girlfriend, sister, mother, niece, or daughter, you would want to take action, right? This is my action, my response to your disrespecting me and all the women in your life with your catcalls, leering,muttering and following. It’s not even WHAT you are saying at this point, it is HOW. The power is in the tone you use when you speak to me—at me—as I walk by.  When you use that tone to say I look "delicious," I am no longer a woman; I am a thing.

You know what would be better (and by better I mean, more respectful)? If you acknowledged me as a person, and not as an object, by smiling or nodding in my direction, then I would reply in kind.  If you feel compelled to speak to me, then try wishing me a good morning, good afternoon, or good evening.  Again, I will respond in kind. I don’t find it amusing, charming, or endearing when you say and do the things you said and did today. You like my haircut? I don’t care. You think I have nice legs? Keep it to yourself. You think I should smile? You don’t know me, you don’t know what kind of day I’m having, but you should know that your encouragement is not going to turn my frown upside down.


Let’s review:

1.     You don’t know me.

2.     Your behavior is not going to create a situation in which you get to know me.

3.     Next time you are tempted to engage me, think of the women in your life  

4.     Stop it.

5.     These are the most words you are ever going to receive in response to your behavior toward me.

Oscars 2013

Three-peat!

That's out of the way...

Yes, I'm still excited about it. I'll have more later in the week, once I've processed everything.

DCA/MFA

Daisy Christina Abreu, MFA

On January 4, 2013, I graduated from Fairfield University's MFA in creative writing program and was honored to be chosen by my fellow graduates to deliver the student address. The  text from my speech is below. 

Dr. White, Dr. Crabtree, fellow students, faculty, family, friends, and my beloved Cohort 5.  It is an honor to be here speaking on behalf of my fellow graduates as we celebrate this huge accomplishment.

December 2010. It was a dark and snowy night. We arrived on Enders island, OUR island, not knowing what to expect of the program or of each other. The only thing we knew was that we wanted to be writers. Better writers.

Every six months we gather in this sacred place to commune with words and with each other. Summer and winter, we come together to check in, to encourage, to workshop, to be around other writers. We ask the hard questions:

“What the hell is a craft essay?” “Do I have time for a nap before the next seminar?”
“Has anyone seen Chuck Johnson?” 

Enders Island in Winter

We commiserate over a lack of sleep and an abundance of salad. Most importantly we talk
about writing. Not just in workshops and in seminars, but in this chapel and in the gazebo, and over those ever-present salads and over more than one glass of Crane Lake.

Fiction…nonfiction…poetry…screenplays. Fitzgerald…Hemingway…Didion…Baldwin…Neruda… Whitman.

We cannot get enough.

Second semester reading

We learn the craft from the best professors we could ever hope for; teachers who give us pages of notes, direct us to readings that inform our own work, and reassure us when we think we are the WORST writers in the world. They urge us onward, reminding us that the only way to get better is to keep reading. And keep writing.

There were times when we thought: I’m not here to make friends. I’m here to do the work, to be better than I was last semester…last residency…last year. There were times when we thought: What am I doing here? This is crazy. I don’t think I can do this.

I admit that there was a night or two…or ten…that first residency when I sat in my room and wept. I was nervous and I was scared, but I was also excited. I knew I was where I belonged. Nothing scarier than the first few days of a new life, acknowledging that it is all I ever wanted, and realizing that this is only the beginning. 


The fear passed, then returned and stayed for a while…looking at you, third semester projects…but we knew it was all going to be fine. Tough, but fine. Whether sitting under a tent talking about literary heartthrobs, or standing up in a chapel in front of what is probably the most receptive audience any of us may ever have, we realized: We are here to make friends.

Friends and writers forever

This is not a competition. While we are competing with ourselves to be better, we are not necessarily competing with each other. That is evident on our Facebook page, where every new student is welcomed “to the family,” every success is cheered, and every setback is received with support and words of encouragement. And that support is not limited to Enders Island or the Internet. And it does not end when we graduate. We will continue to show up for each other at readings whether at the Fairfield University bookstore, the public library, or some random coffee shop. We will return to Enders for alumni day and support the new cohorts of students. And we will break sales records on amazon.com whenever one of us publishes a book.

 
Ten years ago, my dear friend and mentor, Clayton Hudnall, gave me this advice when I asked what I should do with my life: “Know what you want. Do not go anywhere for creative writing, unless you are obsessed by it.”
   
It wasn’t until recently that I understood what he meant. Everyone in this chapel knows how obsessed my fellow classmates and I are with this program and with writing. On behalf of my fellow graduates, I want to thank all of you for supporting and allowing us to indulge in our obsession for two solid years. The good news is, we did it. The bad news is, we’re still obsessed. That’s not going to change. Ever.
  
We are writers. Writers who teach, who parent, who care for ailing parents, who work for nonprofits, who freelance, who search for Bigfoot. We were writers when we arrived on that snowy night and we are better writers as we prepare to leave this place.

No matter what we do, we write. We can’t help it. In the shower, in the car, at our desks, as we drift off to sleep. Writing…always writing. We. Can’t. Help it. It makes our loved ones crazy. It distracts us during the day. It keeps us up at night. We are constantly searching for the right word, the right line, the best way to express ourselves. 

Poems…novels…essays…messays. We make lists and outlines, on notecards and on napkins. They are in our pockets and in our pocketbooks.

This is a messy business. But we won’t stop. We can’t stop. This isn’t the end of our work; it is the beginning, the next chapter. We are prepared, even when we feel unprepared. Don’t misunderstand me. We are scared to death, but we are at our most fearless when we are writing.  Don’t try and stop us. We’re writers.

Maybe I’m sentimental, basking in the glow of graduation, enjoying a last wistful lap around the Island.  December does bring much reflection; there is a lot of flipping through the old notebooks and reviewing first, second and third drafts.  But January. January is a clean sheet of paper, a new page. White as the snow that fell on this island the night we arrived.

My friends, this—tonight—this is our new year.  Let us go forth and write up a storm.  

Blizzard Cohort for life.  
 

Blizzard Cohort for life

Forgetting Myself

I'm at a party or in a bar, and the question comes up. 

"What do you do?"

"I'm a deputy director at a business improvement district." 

Right, what does that mean?

I'm part of a team that works to make downtown a better, more livable place. I talk about how the organization helps support local business owners. I talk about the Downtown Ambassadors, the visitor center, special events and advocacy. I talk about how I like making a difference in my community. 

One of my friends will say, "AND?"

Oh, right. I'm in graduate school. I'm working toward an MFA in Creative Writing at Fairfield University. I'm writing a book. 

Why do I forget to mention that part? It's not that I don't think it's important. It is important. It might be the most important thing I've ever done for myself. But sometimes I forget I'm doing it. It's a lot of work, but it doesn't feel like work. I'm doing something I love and pursuing a dream. One that seems more attainable than, say, dancing with Gene Kelly. 

Maybe I don't mention it because it is kind of private. As private as writing a memoir can be. I'm shy about it. Yes, me.

Maybe I think people won't care, or won't get it. I have to get over it. 

It's what I do and who I am. I'm a writer.

Midway

By Thanksgiving weekend, my last packet for this semester will be in the mail. Another thirty plus pages of original work and three critical essays on the books I'm reading are all due by November 20th. This means I am (almost) halfway to completing my MFA. Holy. Crap. I am actually doing this. It still amazes me. A year ago I was getting ready to leave for my very first residency. I was a wreck. I didn't know if I could really do this or how I would manage. Balance my full-time job and the MFA and all my community work (yeah, I took on two board positions AFTER I started the program. I know.)? How?

Guess what. I'm doing it. Not brilliantly, but I'm not half-assing it either. I'm learning how to manage my time, how to focus when I need to and how to say no to things. That's the tricky part. Saying no means sometimes feeling like I'm letting people down. But saying yes to too many things means my work (and my health, mental and physical) suffer.

If anything has "suffered" it's been my social life. My friends are not only understanding about the "New Haven Maven" becoming "Daisy the Disappeared", they are supportive and encouraging and loving. Even when I don't show up to Trivia for weeks at a time. Even when I ask if we can meet for coffee on a weekday afternoon instead of dinner and drinks on Saturday night. They want me to succeed, they believe in me. I love them for it.

So, two semesters down and two to go. A third semester project and my thesis are down the road a piece. And somewhere in there are holidays with my family, residencies on Enders Island, work events in the Have, board meetings and...my fortieth birthday. Yikes! And, hooray!

Senses of Loss

There is not a day he is not in my thoughts. Nat King Cole singing Mona Lisa on my music player, someone whistling to a friend on the street, a change in the air stirring up a man's cologne as he brushes by me. He's there, reminding me. I'm fine. And then I'm not.

It is the muscle memory of that last week. My arms remember the weight of his body as I steadied him on his side while my mother and brother changed the sheets on the hospital bed we set up in the back bedroom. I smell the peppermint lotion I rubbed into his legs and feet every day to soothe him and myself, the coolness of his skin under my hands. I hear what they call the death rattle shaking his insides on the last morning of his life. I knew what it meant. We were losing. We lost.

And today, almost eight years later, I am reminded again. My mood shifts and there's a change in me I cannot shake. A sadness I pretend not to understand, that I try to ignore until I realize there's no fighting it. It's not work or school or other obligations getting me down. I know what it is. I remember. And I grieve. Still.

D Essentials: Family Matters

I've got family on the brain. Makes sense since my school work is focused on learning and writing about my family. Between thinking about (and doing) the writing, reading, my full time job and other obligations (Mason's Road, two different community boards and two City committees), it's no wonder I've been a bit sleepless. You know what helps? Lists.

Instead of counting sheep, I make alphabetical lists (authors, actors, books) to quiet my mind. The last time I did this, I started with actors. Astaire, Bridges, Cooper, Day-Lewis...you get the idea. That got me thinking about acting families (or dynasties, depending on how you look at it). Then I started thinking about signature films for each family member. I know, how can this possibly help me sleep? It does. So here's a list of great film families and my favorite movie(s) from each member.

Note: There is nothing even remotely scientific or sanctioned by any Academy or Institute here. These are based on my personal (and occasionally cheesy) taste. Feel free to disagree with me.

Fonda
Henry Fonda
Yours, Mine and Ours. He's got ten kids, Lucille Ball is his love interest and she has eight kids. Comedy ensues!

On Golden Pond. "You're my knight in shining armor. Don't you forget it." Tears. Every time.
 
Jane Fonda:
Nine to Five. "Judy Bernly, please hold. Judy Bernly, please hold. This is Judy Bernly."

Peter Fonda:
Easy Rider. Badass. And he wrote it.

Bridget Fonda:
Singles. "Somewhere around 25, bizarre becomes immature." Oh, the 90s.

Bridges
Lloyd Bridges:  
Cousins. "You've got only one life to live. You can either make it chickenshit or chicken salad."

Airplane. "Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit amphetamines"

Beau Bridges:  
The Fabulous Baker Boys. Down on his luck, playing piano and sparring with his brother.

Jeff Bridges:
The Contender. The Dude plays the President.

The Last Unicorn. Watched it every time it was on TV. Come on, she's the LAST one!


Leigh/Curtis
Tony Curtis:
Some Like it Hot. Still can't decide if I like him better in lady drag or Cary Grant drag.

Janet Leigh:  
Bye, Bye Birdie. Because watching her dance with Dick Van Dyke is infinitely less scary than watching her get stabbed to death by Tony Perkins.

Jamie Lee Curtis:  
Amazing Grace & Chuck. I know you've never heard of it. It's an 80s movie about a kid who gives up baseball in order to stop the threat of nuclear was. Yes, really.
 
Garland/Minelli
Judy Garland:  
The Wizard of Oz. Was there ever any doubt on this one?

Vincente Minnelli:  
An American in Paris. Kelly, Caron, Gershwin, Paris. Perfect.

Liza Minnelli:  
Arthur. When she steals the tie from Bergdorf's and goes off on Chester the store detective? Brilliant.

I know I've got more of these in me. Favorite ensemble pieces, dynamic duos, bad movies I can't stop watching...suggestions are welcome. Making lists plus thinking about movies equals enough brain unscrambling to allow me to get back to the big project feeling somewhat relaxed.

Now...back to work! I've got a packet to finish!