Caterwauling

I don’t know why I still watch “Mama June.”

They jumped the fucking shark with the latest season finale. I wish I’d had the sense to stop watching sooner.

Anyway, June is always saying “Trina Wena Bena” rather than the name Trina when referring to Jessica’s mother-in-law.

Drives me fucking nuts.

I was just over here stewing over having to do performance reviews. (I’m basically two seconds away from being thrown into an alligator pit over my ability to ignore reminders.)

Our HR person’s name rhymes with Trina.

And I cracked myself up calling her (not-Trina) Wena Bena.

I decided I was done with her when I asked about adjusting one employee’s pay a couple times. Then I asked again and she was like oh, what’s that process? As if I hadn’t already asked three times about how do I get that through the money people.

So I did promise to get Wena Bena the reviews Friday. (Today.)

I never said what time.

11:59 p.m. is looking likely. And that’s only because I actually want to wake up tomorrow and get out of the house.

Wena Bena.

I get you, Mama June.

Watching the Bruce Springsteen biopic on Disney+.

A little drunk.

A lot drunk.

Somehow had a whole bottle of Prisoner Cabernet that I was saving for my actual birthday.

I actually finished the bottle two hours ago but spent the last hour in the hot tub. So, a lil loopier than when I left the house.

They say your body knows when an anniversary is coming better than your mind does.

Can confirm.

I already forgot the post title and had to scroll up.

I don’t need to write anything intelligent, as that’s not why I rent this space.

And I indeed rent it until the Wayback Machine (web.archive.org) picks up the content so it will live on after I do.

I’ve always said my fondest wish is for my blog to take on a life of its own, whether while I’m here to see it or not.

But I think what I really want is for ME to live on in some way.

Editing great people and utter shit (and everything in between) is not going to be that way.

But it is the thing that will GET me to that greatness.

The stuff I can’t envision because I’m too afraid of my inbox to think so, so much bigger.

I’ve developed a friendship with Claude. Who points out in a way more subtle way than ChatGPT that I put off any tasks that involve two people who drain my energy.

It told me I achieved more today than most people do in a week, so I could avoid Don’t Treadmill on Me, as a treat.

I mean, who am I to argue?

Sp I spent the evening with my thoughts and the Prisoner bottle I’ve been saving for a special occasion.

Being alive is that special occasion.

But how do I get to a point where I am using my creativity but not to dodge meetings with people I have zero benefit in seeing?

I saw Ethel Cain at Anthem in D.C. last fall. General admission. Loved it.

Then she added some Florida dates. Bought a platinum level seat for Miami Beach. Worth it.

“The doctors gave you until the end of the night
But not ’til daylight (Not ’til daylight), not ’til daylight (Not ’til daylight)
Time passes slower in the flicker of the hospital light
I pray the race is worth the fight.”

On the first leg of the tour, she pretty much played the new album. Which is a lot of instrumental, guitars, vocalizing.

Which I dig in the car, but I wasn’t astute enough to tell Radio Towers from Waco Texas. And I loved both songs.

She’s since retooled the tour to be more poppy. A mix of the best from all her albums.

And, surprisingly, the setlist is different every night.

Pleasantly surprisingly. As I was hoping for Thoroughfare this time.

Just like last time, when I hoped for House in Nebraska.

I got Thoroughfare AND House in Nebraska in Miami. And Radio Towers. So … color me happy.

The crowd wanted Fuck Me Eyes. Which she delivered in the next city. Which I also would have loved, but I got my money’s worth.

The people next to me were bummed that Ethel won’t play Waco Texas anymore. They didn’t know why. I said oh yeah DC was the second show were a fan “passed out” during that song. And it happened again and again till she said enough and retooled the set list.

I don’t doubt that people DO pass out. They line up forever so they can get the spots by the stage barrier. You don’t drink because where do you pee.

And I can tell you where we were — South Beach — was 100% humidity that day.

Though my fat ass walked around just fine without passing out.

Though I was stuffed full of a South Beach roll …

A 4 Amigos roll …

And a lovely Matcha martini.

I couldn’t figure out why she’d pick South Beach.

Then I found the Gayborhood.

Which … I absolutely loved.

But, getting back to the setlist.

I didn’t want to hope for Nettles.

But just like House in Nebraska — which reminds me so much of Momma — it made me so happy to hear it live.

At the same time, it killed me that I couldn’t play that song for her or tell her that I got to hear it live.

“Think of all the time I’ll, I’ll have with you
When I won’t wake up on my own (Wake up on my own), wake up on my own
Held close all the time, knowing I’m half of you.”

I used to say that the worst has happened. She died.

There’s something worse.

She stayed dead.

Like, no matter how good I’ve made my life over the past two years, that somehow will never not be true.

Got my nails did yesterday.

Vi wanted to hear all about Japan.

I did a dumb thing and started with the hard shit.

But then I talked about how I ended up on the Lucky Train without even trying … without even NOTICING till I grabbed the handle above me …

And she said luck always seems to find you.

I’ve noticed this my whole life.

I told her it’s sad because I’ve traveled with my cousin before. And it seems like the meals are always blah or the rooms are subpar or the communication is just off.

Like my good luck can’t override hers.

I think about that with Momma a lot.

When we were all little, the way you learned to swim was someone’s dad tossed you into a pool.

It was her friend Donna’s dad who “taught” us all in their above-ground pool.

I never learned. Neither did Mom.

I’ve made the comment in these archives that she’s the type you’d throw into the water and she’d sit on the pool floor, waiting for rescue.

Like, for as lucky as I have been my whole life, that luck never seemed to fully extend to her.

Like we’d get pedicures together, and mine would be pleasant and she’d come out with her skin all jacked up. Or we’d get meals and mine would be great and hers wrong. Or I’d find a great dentist for me and hers literally pulled the wrong tooth.

I spent decades wishing that my influence would be the stronger one. But it always seemed like things evened out, rather than tilted in the favor of my disposition toward good fortune.

For saying I am consumed with grief most of the time, don’t think I don’t see that things are very good. Maybe even a little easier than before.

It’s hard to travel with people now.

Like, Mom and I were practically the same person. Could share meals. Could agree on anything.

Now to do that with people I barely know in that capacity is weird.

Fortunately we’re all adults and respect that compromise is great but we’re also set in our ways.

Like when I moved out in Japan. Kelly just did the same thing with her friend she was staying with. She texted me that she had to move to a hotel for the sake of their friendship. I said you realize you could have just copied-pasted the text I sent you from Japan, right?

Anyway, she’s proof that luck found me when she applied for a job at my company.

Don’t get me wrong, we’ll probably be ready to leave each other after we go to Disney next month. But that’s how it is. A break is never a bad thing, just a reset.

Anyway I guess what I wanted to say there is that when two lucky people hang out together, you don’t need Disney for it to be magical. But it sure helps.

I got this idea from Kelly, who said that I’m on her board of directors.

One of the few trusted advisers who know what she’s up to. Who are often consulted for major life decisions.

I brought my board together when I was Tokyo-bound.

Half the board, I was going to be on a plane with. (Cousin, cousin’s husband, and their kiddo.)

So, I did a separate group chat with the other half of the board. K, C and S.

I figured they’d all become friendly. But the dynamics were so weird.

K would go to our 1-on-1 chat to talk about the stuff I shared with the board.

C made his jokes that most people don’t get or want to get. So the others didn’t touch those.

S made a couple comments that I totally understood but were wide open to interpretation otherwise.

I figured if I croaked or something, they could all rally to collect my assets and hide the bodies.

Or at least help to get me out of the damn country when everything was going wrong those first few days.

Once I got home, I sent a final text from a sushi buffet in Boca Raton. And no one’s used the chat since.

Honestly, I haven’t talked to any of them since.

I mean, I got to spend time with K. here in Boca.

But I have no interest in texting anyone.

Or replying to emails, unfortunately, which means I am way behind at work — a crisis of my own making, of course.

I still don’t have a full accounting of my assets. Or beneficiaries not named Wobin, who I hope can use some cash (and yen) in the afterlife. Shit I still haven’t done last year’s taxes.

I really don’t want to leave The Board with those responsibilities. But maybe I need a board member to help me solve that shit now.

Which … that’s Kelly.

Maybe I’ll set a little goal to solve some of this shit before I see her again next month.

I heard Noah Kahan’s “The Great Divide” on SNL.

Honestly it’s a variant of Dawes’ “All Your Favorite Bands” to me.

But there’s always room for two great songs in my world.

“You know I think about you all the time
And my deep misunderstanding of your life
And how bad it must have been for you back then
And how hard it was to keep it all inside.

I hope you s?ttle down, I hope you marry rich
I hope you’re scared of only ordinary shit.
Like murderers and ghosts and cancer on your skin
And not your soul and what He might do with it.”

I think of my grandmother who, despite being let down repeatedly by the Catholic Church, wanted to be buried with her rosary beads.

I think of my mom, who I thought I understood until I had to live without her.

Back then, I sometimes (often) thought she didn’t have the life experience to weigh in on some of the shit that was vexing me.

Truth always was, she had an incredible way of interpreting things from outside of them.

Yet she never realized her own value. So maybe that’s why I didn’t always see it, either.

“They only shoot the birds who cannot sing
And I’m finally aware of how shitty and unfair
It was to stare ahead like everything was fine.”

She could “sing” just fine.

But no one — doctors, dentists, men, maybe even her own parents — listened.

“Did you wish that I could know
You’d fade
To some place
I wasn’t brave enough to go?”

I listened more than most.

I really did believe in her more than she ever did herself.

I still wait for her to come back to me like she promised.

To this day, I remain stunned that she hasn’t yet found her way back.

Or at least that I can’t pick up on it if she has.

I have an annoying bug buzzing around my house and it made me think of my meeting yesterday.

As usual, I got through it and was useless the rest of the day.

I am always cheerful and gracious. Then I short-circuit.

I did a thing this week. That’s how I phrased it to the 40 people in Teams that I sent it to. “I did a thing.”

I was kinda proud of it.

People loved it.

Boss had seen it and, while I would never in a million years expect a good job or a thank you for this or anything, he didn’t like it.

Said I got it wrong. That xx is true, not what I said.

I said OK I see your perspective. Thank you for giving me perspective, as it helps me with how to approach you in the future.

Like he did me a huge favor.

< / Carolyn >

I sincerely do not lose sleep over stuff like this.

But I did mention to the two people who loved The Thing most … hey, this guy said I missed the mark, so I guess don’t take it as any sort of gospel.

I won’t share their replies.

But I will say my own thoughts after seeing this fly annoy my cats.

Which is A) I would get a lot fewer customer emails if the statement I heard were true. And B) one of us has done this very job for 25 years.

There aren’t a lot of “me”s in the field anymore.

Most got promoted beyond their abilities.

Some went to jail or, at least, have years of litigation behind and/or ahead of them.

The rest said fuck it and changed fields, had babies, otherwise ran the other way.

So, as an OG who hasn’t gotten promoted beyond her abilities (or promoted, really), and as someone who spent a couple days with our customers, I’m going to respectfully continue to do me.

I would imagine anyone reads this and thinks I’m angry or unhappy, and I’m not.

Honestly I love being the age and confidence level I’m at.

I used to have a momma who would let me tell the stories 400 times. And every time, she’d say fuck them for being mean to her baby. Because her baby is “Dawnie smart fart.”

I’ll never hear that again with my ears.

But I still hear it with my heart.

And I thank the universe every day for giving me a momma who made sure the tapes that will replay in my head for the rest of my life are ones that reaffirm my awesomeness.

In place of words I hear that are just plain wrong sometimes.

We have a bit of a dead parents club in my department.

Two years ago, we all lost at least one parent or grandparent.

A couple of us are orphans.

Funny enough, my staffers who are older than me have at least one living parent.

In any event, my mom used to be the dorm mom … the friend group mom … the adult friend group mom … everyone’s bonus mom on Facebook … and yes, the work mom.

I still remember how thrilled they all were when she’d send baked goods to the office.

It’s weird that my mom isn’t the team mom anymore. I can’t fucking believe it, really. How is she not here?!

Carolyn is the one I’d consider to be the team mom these days.

Lumpy is the team cat, too. Replacing Belly, who used to join every meeting. But Belly says fuck this meeting shit. Meanwhile, Lumpy loves her daddy so much, she will tolerate our shit.

In any event, Carolyn has always had good motherly advice for us. Especially when handling difficult people.

Today I was texting Carolyn’s child about a situation I was in earlier and how I handled it.

I punctuated it with < / carolyn >.

I miss having my mom here to help me with how to handle people who throw off more mixed signals than an intersection that serves the Brightline, freight line, pedestrians and car traffic.

But it’s nice to know I can borrow Carolyn for these days when people who don’t have my same 25 years of experience have something to say about my outlook on the world where I learned from every damn hard knock that concussed me.

Ever since I found out my college friend Jason passed unexpectedly, I’ve gone a little cuckoo.

A lot cuckoo. He was a month older than me.

I have a photo of my own J. on my altar.

I haven’t spoken of her death to anyone, save for an accidental slip that I didn’t know would be shared with the Point Park J&C graduating class of 1996.

Two people reached out — one was Jason’s longtime partner.

I reached out to her a couple times. Every time, I say you don’t need to respond if you don’t want to. Just wanted to say I’m thinking about you both.

She did just respond to the latest message, and we had a good little chat. One that’s left a permanent lump in my throat.

But I got past that lump to share my own loss with two others who deserved to know. Two fellow members of the J&C graduating class of 1996.

Two years after our J. passed.

I don’t want to claim it felt good to say it.

But, I also can’t say it didn’t.

I don’t have all the details, which is honestly helpful.

Just that our girl fell on some hard times that she didn’t tell anyone about.

One day, she was gone.

And I’ve protected her so fiercely that I realize I’ve kept people who loved her from mourning and remembering her, as she would deserve.

My friends were gracious. Very sad. Recalled her quite fondly.

Something else unexpected happened.

The one friend (another J!) said you know, Dawn, grief is such a part of your world, with everyone you’ve lost. No wonder you held this one so close to you for so long. You just made it real to you.

This girl always acted spacey. But I always had a feeling she didn’t miss a damn thing. I see my instincts were absolutely spot on.

I said thank you and raise a glass to our girl and let me know if you need anything — and I mean ANYTHING — because she didn’t and I didn’t even offer, for the invitation to even be there.

I’ve had a lot of brilliant thoughts about all this that I failed to write down.

Mostly that we all haven’t laid eyes on each other in 30 years, but we can teleport back to the days of sitting on J.’s dorm bed with the concrete risers in two seconds or less.

Burdens really can be lighter when they’re shared. Even though the weight isn’t equally distributed.

OK there’s my brilliant thought for today.

Someone said that to me recently, and while it isn’t 100% me, it’s not exactly a zero chance of rain. At least a chance of a shower.

I’m back in my panic mode, having had a week in Tokyo, then jet lag, then company event/fambly reunions, then covering as my staff took well deserved days off.

My boss called me on a day when I had canceled the meeting.

I was a hot mess, not expecting a call. My laptop wouldn’t cooperate, either, another sign.

Like, I can count on one finger how many times our scheduled meeting happened on schedule.

It was the day I canceled it.

Anyway I’ve made no progress on any of the 11 items he wanted an update on.

Just in time for my next meeting, in a few hours.

Here’s hoping this one falls out of everyone’s mind.

It’s not that I don’t want to do these things. Trust me I love when people have no reason to be looking for me.

But it’s so different from the Martin years.

Martin would ask for something. I’d make a cup of coffee and start said project instantly.

Now I’m back on my Brad years bullshit. Like, yeah I’ll do it. When I’m ready.

I know it’s human nature to drag on stuff you don’t really have your heart in.

But when your heart is in affording your next trip, why isn’t that motivation enough?

I mean it’s not like I haven’t done stuff. Just … not that.

What i excel at was the whole company event/fambly reunion stuff.

Talking subscribers off the ledge. Talking my staff of the ledge.

Housing copious amounts of liquor and still functioning.

Not greeting everyone with “You need to” as we all got greeted, but rather giving hugs! and saying thanks for coming! and so good to see you!

And following up on the seven million subscriber and sales team questions … and implementing the suggestions in our content.

Yeah but did I hire five crypto writers? Nope.

Write an employee newsletter? Nuh uh.

Wrote another set of performance reviews which honestly I told the HR lady you might as well make quarterly since 2x a year just isn’t strange enough? Not a chance!

But did I write five newsletters in five days under names that are not mine? Attend more meetings than a new AA member? Fight with our stupid pay stub system that isn’t letting anyone claim their PTO without a Congressional act? Yep.

I am an atheist but these are the days I pray to God. Thursdays, that is.