Dear Vincent, You will be so thrilled to know

Wednesday, January 2, 2018

Subject: Dear Vincent, Happy New Year! You will be so thrilled to know

Dear Vincent,

Happy New Year! You will be so thrilled to know that in addition to weekly penetrative masturbation, my list of 19 for 2019 includes sending you my very last email. After that, perhaps one time per year is acceptable. Maybe I am almost ready. Maybe not. 

[dot dot dot, by the way, I also wished Vincent a happy Solstice and I told him I had a dream that he had a shaggy hippie haircut and this is not something I would not recommend. .]

I got on the podcast, Grownups Read Things They Wrote as Kids. It is my memoirs from when I was fifteen and the conclusion makes me cry every other time I read it. Hearing myself is neither deeply empowering nor deeply embarrassing. The host asked me if I had advice for my teenage self and before calling in, I wrote out my answer on fuschia post-it’s. 

Grown-ups Read Thing They Wrote As Kids

Episode, The Republic of Dad

[dot dot dot, I ordered Vincent’s medical records of my appointments and they came on Tuesday, December 4, 2018 and in the records, Vincent calls me Mme. and he speaks of us doing a bunch of things together in the première personne au pluriel, for example Concluons, Tramons, Co-regulons, and and Co-regulons means, let us co-regulate, and my favourite part of the records was when he referred to my 2017 New Year’s Eve Oblivion Fuck til you get rug burns from the carpet as empty calories in brackets (calories vides).]

The Fushia post-it says,

I am both humbled and a bit heartbroken by my teenage self’s enormous expectations for perfect healing. I love that part of myself who yearns for life to be deep and meaningful and spectacular. To my teenage self, I would say, keep your courage and sincerity and don’t give up. Try not to measure your so-called successes and failures. 

Though you will struggle for a long time, perhaps even your whole life, you will get to make beautiful connections and meaningful experiences and these bear more weight than the voice in your head that says, you’re a broken disaster and that your life is a series of mistakes. Bam. 

Maybe one day there will be a podcast called, Grownups Read Things They Wrote to Their Therapists and Grownups Read Things They Wrote As Cleaners. 

My friend Benjamin Hunting is coming over tonight to even out my crooked DIY haircut for my pragmatic and optimistic bestie’s wedding.

Love you!  Happy New Year! 

Best wishes as always, Erica. 

Tuesday January 8, 2019

Subject: [dot dot dot Maybe I should get my clients to sign a contract that they will fire me within the next year, forcing me to go to funeral school, or join CSIS, or become a nurse, or a sexologist. Or maybe I can become the next Marie Kondo except I am likely not tiny and sweet and adorable enough]

Dear Vincent,

On January 1, 2018, I wrote on my wall,

My goals in life are, Creativity, Service,

Buy a new roll of masking tape.

deep love for all of my cells, a clear and cleared and generous heart, what is a cervical orgasm? Ultimately, I pulled off the creativity and the service. Nailed the masking tape. The deep cellular love was a little hit or miss, as was the clear and cleared heart, but I would say my heart was mainly generous. What is a cervical orgasm? This remained a question, and so a no-go. Overall, would you say I pulled off 43% of my goals in life? Possibly 52-63% depending on the generosity of my heart.

Love, Erica.

Monday, January 21, 2019

Subject: Dear Vincent, You are my jardin secret

Dear Vincent,

You are my jardin secret. Except I also send these emails to my sister, Maxine, and sometimes Benjamin Hunting. [dot dot dot, one time I had a lucid dream about Vincent, but unfortunately he evaporated almost immediately. Another time I told Benjamin Hunting, maybe I don't need to eat out all my feelings. Plus something about how I might make an excellent sexologist]

The poet Mary Oliver died this week.

My favourite Mary Oliver words are,

'Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.' And,

“You don’t have to be good.”

And I remember one Friday afternoon last winter, weeping pretty hard underneath my pink and purple polka dot duvet, and I’d taken out Mary Oliver’s book of essays from the library, and though I never finished the book, I remember the sentences,

“You must not ever stop being whimsical. And you must not, ever, give anyone else the responsibility for your life.”

These words, exactly the truth, and yet I stayed weeping under the covers. Maybe I fell asleep. Eventually my pragmatic and optimistic bestie phoned, and convinced me to come meet her at Indigo, repeating Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, all the way there. And it was about -20 degrees and every few fucks, I laughed and every few fucks I cried, and at Indigo, I melted down on the expensive Casper bed that they have diagnol to the kids section and the magazines, and all the pillows and candles and scarves that they have to sell because not enough people buy books anymore. And the Faraway Polyamorous Client walked by with his son, and a gorgeous blonde woman who was not his extra hot girlfriend. He said hi and gave me a hug.

[dot dot dot, I started to interpret my dreams on the advice of the ludicrous bastard Jordan Peterson, of all people. I don’t know much about Jordan Peterson, except I heard he is a ludicrous bastard and I could not stand what he had to say about transpeople]

On Sunday, I tried making a FetLife profile, but then my dashboard was bombarded by enormous tits and asses and impossibly waxed vaginas, and I bailed. I tried Bumble for the seventeenth time. My profile says,

Looking for my next beautiful blogging fairy tale. Acute sense of smell.

Mots préférés: effervescence, exigeant, multiple, humanize, vaguely, impossible, liberation.

I forgive myself for not being Lena Dunham.

My other favourite word that I forgot, is perpetuate. So far I asked two people if they liked the snow, and this seems to be a dealbreaker.

All over Facebook, people are quoting Mary Oliver’s sentence, What will you do with your one precious life? and obviously I am thinking I am probably not doing the best job.

One time in India, my temporary gay travel buddy Hugo and I rented a scooter, and we went for a ride outside a little town in Rajasthan called Bundi, and we found a beautiful waterfall, and standing under the waterfall, I thought about Simon jumping, but I was not sad and I convinced Hugo that we should go swimming in our underwear and as I stood under the waterfall, the words, I am so free, came into my head. About seven seconds later we had to swim back to shore because a bunch of monkeys were stealing our bags and our clothes.

Happy Full Moon!

Love, Erica. 

Monday, January 28, 2019

Subject: Life is a musical quest you’re supposed to dance to

Dear Vincent,

Got cervical orgasms on the brain, and that’s probably not the best spot for them.

On Sunday, January 20, at approximately 1:47 P.M., I embarked upon my third daily 7-10 k walk in a row, and I was wearing one layer of pyjamas, and one layer of enormous sweatpants, and I hadn’t showered, and there was a snowstorm, and I’d spent the entire morning watching a half shit half magnificent Netflix documentary about the perils of root canals, and swiping every male face on Bumble between the ages of 33 and 53, and none of them was you, and none of them seemed to be excellent candidates for my next beautiful blogging fairy tale. For example, they sought someone chill and didn’t want anyone who took stuff and themselves and their lives too seriously. Or for example, they smoked, and/or wanted children. Or maybe they summarized their philosophy as, “Life is a musical quest you’re supposed to dance to.” Or “5’4 is a must. Taller girls please abstain.” Or “I heart curves.”

Approximately 1.7 km in, I found myself weeping in the foyer of the TD bank, even though this is not my bank, and I have plenty of cash hidden in a jar [dot dot dot, I landed four shoe boxes for the folding workshop, and these are meant to mimic civilized dresser drawers], and I mourned the waste of the day slash my life and the endless long weekend, and I took it all so seriously. The Dead Inside Man was not around to hear my meltdown and so I walked down Mont Royal to

[dot dot dot, And anyways, the best thing that can happen to you is not necessarily falling deeply and madly in love and getting your brains fucked and then cuddled on the couch until all your cells dissolve.]

My wall now says, “Listen to the sound of your dealbreakers,” and the colours are two shades of blue, plus bright red.

Got cervical orgasms on the brain, and this likely is not the best spot for them.

Happy Monday!

Love, Erica. 

Monday, February 4, 2019

Subject: 47 377

Dear Vincent,

Happy New Moon, and I suppose also Belated Groundhog Day. So much of my life is Groundhog Day. Do you feel that way too?

If I had been you last week, I would have been so proud of me, and not because I consolidated all of the Dear Vincent emails and blogposts, plus a few deeply embarrassing poems into a Word document, and the total was 47 377 words. You beat the Married Man by almost 15 000 words, and sometimes the Married Man wrote back.

Now is the season for 6-word love stories. My six-word love story is, All my friends are super heroes, and as fate would have it, I am reading a novel by this exact name, which was written by Andrew Kaufman, who I met once, and the novel is short with a whole bunch of pictures, though I should mention that in fact, I am a pretty good reader these days, even if the books do not have any pictures, and if I were a psychologist, I would recommend that my patients try to become pretty good readers, since reading makes for a soothing and democratic activity, that tends to be low in self-loathing.

All My Friends Are Super Heroes,
by Andrew Kaufman
Buy Book Here

Follow Andrew Kaufman on Twitter @several moments

As fate would have it, the best super hero that everyone wants to be is Mistresscleanasyougo, and as fate would have it, this is the super hero who most resembles me.

“The most powerful superhero of all, the one everyone wishes they were is, Mistresscleanasyougo. At the end of every day, she folds her clothes. She never leaves scissors on the table, pens with no ink are thrown in the trash, wet towels are always hung up, dishes are washed directly after dinner and nothing is left unsaid.” [p. 81, All My Friends Are Super Heroes, 10th Anniversary Edition with extra superheroes, and more pictures!  Mistresscleanasyougo wholeheartedly recommends it.] 

I put pens with no ink in the recycling, but this may be wishful thinking. Otherwise, nothing is left unsaid.

My other love story is me and all of my clients, especially the Self-Mutilating Parrot Family. I love all of my clients deeply and equally, especially the Self-Mutilating Parrot family.

Happy Monday!

Love, Erica.

I omitted approximately 7.7 threads of my life, plus 4.3 odours, and 11.9 miscellaneous details. Otherwise, nothing is left unsaid. Email me and/or Vincent at the secret email address ericaschmidt85(at)gmail(dot)com.

Mistresscleanasyougo

Follow Erica J. Schmidt on Facebook

Exuberant Bodhisattva on Facebook
Twitter: @mypelvicfloor
I Let Go

Follow Andrew Kaufman on Twitter @several moments

Bodhisattva Business Ventures:

Deep Cleans by Erica J. Schmidt (@deepcleanswitherica)
Instagram: @deepcleanswitherica

Dear Vincent, You are not the only person I write letters to.

Dear Vincent, I made it three days writing my daily goals on fuschia post-its, and then sticking these on my refrigerator. 

Dear Vincent, Looks like you got some sun.

Yours til I'm a Post-Modern Literary Genius

Hi Everyone! Sorry to leave you hanging on the Magical Rock Vagina Cleanse. I'll announce the fascinating conclusion soon. The following post was meant as a Facebook status update for my new business, Deep Cleans by Erica J. Schmidt. Deep Cleans involves me sparking joy in other people's houses. As fate would have it, the post ended up being a little too long for Facebook, and so I decided to publish it here.

Yours til I'm a Post-Modern Literary Genius

Parting with the written word can be difficult. Everyone possesses at least one shoe box if not several crates of old course notes, journals and handwritten letters. Certainly going through these boxes later on can bring laughter and deep joy. Also, everyone wants to channel this material into the book they’re going to write in all their spare time. And how is that book going, everybody?

When I opened my boxes from Halifax last week, I came upon a FedEx envelope of a romantic personal correspondence from 2005. At a CPR course, upon performing a pretend secondary body check, my partner concluded, “Well, looks like you’re in pretty good shape.” Once the course was over, I delivered a rambly verbal machine gun speech. In it I must have mentioned how I believed that we could change the world by writing letters, by being pen pals. My CPR partner’s name was Cavan Van Ulft and he was eager to try and change the world with me.

For the next month or so, we wrote letters back and forth. He was living with his parents in Nepean, while I was working at an Easters Seals Camp. Cavan Van Ulft sent each letter in a brown 3 by 5 Manila envelope.

“Miss Erica Schmidt,” he would write in the first address line. Beneath this, he’d write a flattering and eloquent caption.

“Warning! May be habit-forming or addictive,”
“Post-modern Literary Genius,”
“The prettiest girl on the prettiest street in the prettiest town in Ontario.”

Cavan's Letters

His letters were always meticulously composed and handwritten on plain white paper. Both of us always wrote back immediately upon receiving the other's letter. My stationary varied from long thin strips of cardboard to red and blue paper, in case either red or blue were his favourite colours. I sealed many envelopes with frog stickers. “Sealed with sticky frogs,” I'd written on one envelope. Another time I included a lock of my hair.

Thursday, June 30, 2005

Dear Cavan,

Maybe your favourite colour is blue, or maybe it is red. Or maybe I should send you a fill-in-the-blank worksheet for you to send back to me. So that I will know your favourite colour. I could also ask you whether you prefer my sentence fragments to be written on stationary with straight lines on it or on blank sheets of blue and red (or some other colour) My next though might have been, do you maybe wish there were fewer sentence fragments and more complete sentences. Or vice versa. Unfortunately, however, this potentially brilliant series of complete and fragmented sentences was interrupted by a phone call.

It was you! I had piece of lettuce stuck in my teeth the whole time and you never said anything! How embarrassing. After flossing and brushing away lettuce and gingivitis (if I’m lucky), I have laid myself down in preparation for sleep…

My Letters

8 July 2005

Re: “Money is nice but it can’t hold hands.”

Dear Erica,

Your letter was beautiful! Thank you so much for sending it. I read it over and over. And the gifts you included in the envelope are amazingly thoughtful. It is very postmodern. Especially the bumper sticker.

(The bumper sticker was inscribed in blue and black markers, “Everything comes down to one thing,” it said. “The single key to mastering human existence is.”)

It is very postmodern. You know by now, no doubt, from my list of favourite things, that my favorite style of art is suprematism, so I am very into ambiguous messages that require input from an audience to be understood. So I think it’s just great. And also very clever…

You are constantly surprising me, exceeding my expectations, and delighting me. You are pretty irresistible, as far as I can tell. So don’t you dare stop – ever.

The Post-Modern Bumper Sticker

There are few people in the world who can compete with me in their eccentricity and intensity. Likely, Cavan Van Ulft was one of these people. The last time I googled him, it seemed he was trying to become the prince or ruler of an obscure island somewhere in the arctic.

During one of my days off at camp, I went on a “date” with Cavan. My parents drove me to Ottawa and dropped me off at the Rideau Center, where Cavan and I wandered around and he revealed his taste in jeans. Cavan was nice enough; however, I realized right away that my imagination had gone overboard, and that our in-person experience was doomed to be infinitely less exciting than our riveting correspondence. As tactfully as my 19 year-old self knew how, I told him so in my next letter.

Within a few days, I received a priority post FedEx package at camp. It contained all of my letters. The frog stickers, the postmodern bumper sticker, my lock of hair, photos of my dog.

In the weeks that followed, Cavan sent me several emails with the words, “PLEASE SEND MY LETTERS BACK” in the subject line. I believed this was ridiculous and have kept the correspondence ever since.

Rereading Cavan’s letters now, I now appreciate that they are absolutely exquisite.

19 July 2005

Probably as a result of the intense heat wave that we have been going through, the scent of your lock of hair has permeated both pages of your last letter and its envelope. In the slight breeze that's been blowing in my back yard, it has made everything around me smell like you. It is absolutely delivious. The only problem is that I frequently get lost in thought while sitting outside re-reading your letters and I think slightly sunburnt... because I kept taking deep breaths and zoning out and losing track of time. But it's wonderful nonetheless...

Everyone should be so privileged as to be the recipient of such generous and inflating epistles. I feel some regret at writing Cavan off as some crazy nut. I think he does deserve to get his letters back. After inhaling one last spark of joy from my favourite missives, I am going to try and track him down, to return his side of this unreplicable correspondence, and to wish him well.

The End.


Exuberant Bodhisattva on Facebook
Twitter: @mypelvicfloor
I Let Go

Bodhisattva Business Ventures:
 
Deep Cleans by Erica J. Schmidt
Hippie Threads by Erica J. Schmidt
 
The Magical Rock Vagina Cleanse
The Tidying Festival
Yours til Ekam Inhales
 
Cardboard Box

The Tidying Festival

Cleaning is masturbation for the people on Prozac.

M.D. friends, I am due for a consult.

In the meantime, my apartment looks spectacular. The floors and the windowsills glimmer and beam.

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, by Marie Kondo.
On Amazon.
tidyingup.com
konmarie.com

Essential reading for eager cleaners is of course, Marie Kondo’s The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. Marie Kondo’s unrivalled passion for keeping immaculate house began at the age of five, when the kindergartner felt compelled to devour housewives magazines. By junior high, she had embarked upon an “earnest” study of tidying, and each afternoon she’d come home from school, infused with enthusiasm and the resolve to tidy a different location. The fifth of every month was “living room day.” Another day would be, “pantry cleaning day.” Or perhaps she would “conquer the cupboards.” This woman has devoted an unimaginable number of hours devoted to creating a magical, clutter-free home. Her zealousness has led to the invention of the KonMari method, the key to abolishing mess and disorder for the rest of your life. Marie Kondo promises that her technique works for everyone, and even her laziest clients who suffered the most extreme cases of hoarding did not experience the dreaded “rebound” back to a disastrous living space. Her steadfast conviction fills me with such hope. As though life can be solved through fancy folding techniques and giving away your extra Mason jars you don’t need.

The heart of the KonMari method lies is determining what you should discard and what you should keep. After gathering all your items from a single category, you must handle each item lovingly, one by one. With careful consideration, you must ask yourself, “Does this spark joy?” According to Marie Kondo, everything you own must spark joy. If it doesn’t spark joy, it doesn’t belong in your home. Good luck with the toilet brush, folks!

For objects that don’t pass the joy sparking test, Marie Kondo recommends expressing gratitude for everything they once brought you. You might also wish them well as they embark on their new journey, to the dumpster or to the Salvation Army.

In my new room, the sparks are a little sparse, not due to a hoarding problem but because I am down to about three and a half suitcases worth of possessions. At the risk of being spark-less, and/or nude, I figured I couldn’t afford to throw out too many objects. I did, however, part with the threesome tights on my last moving day. Strangely enough, I saw some woman wearing them down the street from me. I hope they spark deep joy in her heart. But all this is to say that I did not spend that much time considering the joy-sparking capacities of my few possessions. I feel rather joyful about my new room slash Erica Museum.  That said, as I proceeded with my Tidying Festival, I discovered I had an enormous amount to learn about folding.

Perhaps like the old me, you believe that folding is no fun. To this Marie Kondo insists that “you have not discovered the impact of folding.” Folding must be done with great heart. As we fold, we should thank “our clothes for protecting our bodies. Folding is really a dialogue with our clothing.”

Marie Kondo believes that, “Every piece of clothing has its own ‘sweet spot’ where it feels just right – a folded state that best suits that item.” She maintains that, “There is nothing more satisfying than finding that ‘sweet spot.’ The piece of clothing keeps its shape when stood on edge and feels just right when held in your hand. It’s like a sudden revelation – so this is how you always wanted to be folded! – a special moment in which your mind and the piece of clothing connect.”

In Kondo’s mind, “to go through life without knowing how to fold is a huge loss.” At the same time, I can testify that spending Sunday morning talking to your clothing in attempts to discover how each item would prefer to be folded is somewhat frightening. Even more frightening is trying to master KonMari folding without first watching the Youtube video. I tried this and my clothes ended up spending four days in fat vertical rectangle shapes instead of in the way they always wanted – micro-thin and horizontal. My poor clothes were not grateful. Fortunately, I was able to make it up to them yesterday. The result is impeccable. Each item exudes comfort and appreciation. Having never been a neat freak, this is one of the most unlikely things I have ever done.

My Grateful Clothes

Also unlikely, last Wednesday a lovely pregnant woman hired me to clean her house.  I was really excited because she has a darling big black dog. For new friends and fans who haven’t read the archives, I used to have a Big Black Dog when I lived in Halifax. His name was Eliot and for a solid two years, he was a big star of the blog, and a highlight of my life. 

Eliot, the Old Big Black Dog. 

Although I derive immense delight from dusting and mopping, I expected that the pregnant lady’s adorable big black dog would be the highlight of my day of housework.

As it happened, the day turned out to be quite performative.

One of my friends who is writing a novel wanted to know what it’s like being a cleaning lady. I would say that it is similar to cleaning your own house except you don’t know where anything is. And if you are the sort of person who feels disgusted by your own mess, other people’s dust usually feels less personal.

People always say that children are easier when they’re your own. I’m not sure I believe them. But mess is usually easier when it’s other people’s. Unless you are on Prozac, in which case all forms of cleaning can serve as your new masturbation replacement.

I am on Prozac, and last Wednesday, I was ready to be invigorated via dust eradication. With exuberance and determination, I prepared myself to tackle the dust and the corners and the big black dog hair. My serotonin leapt at the kitchen counter’s newfound luminosity. Windex in hand, at around 11 o’clock, I went outside on the patio to conquer the dirt on the glass table.

(In truth the best technique for cleaning glass is vinegar and newspaper, but in a pinch, Windex will do.)

The Big Black Dog, whose fake name is a toss-up between Michael and Jeremy came outside with me. He promptly lay down to bask in the sun on the patio shingles. Before I finished with the table, I thought I saw MJ return to the house. Summer is sweltering for big black dogs. Once the table was done, I went inside to scrub the bathroom sink. Soon it would be time for vacuuming. I felt highly satisfied with my level of efficiency. I transferred the sheets from the washer to the dryer, and threw in a load of curtains.  It suddenly occurred to me that I had not seen Michael-Jeremy for some time.

 

To protect Michael-Jeremy's anonymity, photos of the old Big Black Dog 
have been used to evoke canine images in your head.

“Michael slash Jeremy?” I called out. No answer. The apartment was not enormous and it took me seven and a half minutes to make three thorough searches and realize that Michael/Jeremy the Big Black Dog was nowhere to be found. Had I forgotten him on the patio? Nope, not there.

Now I had lost the lovely pregnant woman’s dog. Worst fail ever. I imagined him jumping off the side of the terrace, and his injured body being lugged away by horrified animal rights activists. Or he had simply slipped away, soon to fall into the hands of irate city inspectors.

I happened to have a picture of M-J on my phone from a picnic the previous weekend.

“Mile End,” I posted on Facebook. “Has anyone seen this dog? Let me know.” I messaged my phD friend who is always drinking decaf lattes somewhere in the neighbourhood. No answer. I like to call my phD friend, The Mayor of Mile End. Calling out for Michael-Jeremy on the way, I went to Chez Boris Café to see if the Mayor of Mile End was taking advantage of Boris’s excellent doughnuts, and if he had come across the Big Black Dog. But alas, my phD Mayor of Mile End Friend wasn’t there.

I felt quite devastated. It was the first of June. June was supposed to be a month of explosive and transformative creativity, and now I was failing as a maid. Even though I am a thirty-year-old grown up, I decided to call my mother and shed some performative tears.

My mother recommended calling the pregnant woman despite my fear that this would result in long-term trauma. Maybe the pregnant lady would have an idea of where M-J had gone. I called and left the most serene message I could pull off on the answering machine. Highly performative.

For the next twenty minutes, I wandered around alleyways and asked random people if they had seen a big black dog. Nobody had. Finally the pregnant lady called back.

“Oh, don’t worry,” she said. “It was the dog walker. I forgot to tell him you were coming. You must have missed each other.”

My life is an ecstatic adventure. Tidying up is a special event. The rest of the afternoon involved rather extensive wars with the vacuum cleaner and its multiple fancy attachments. For fear the machine was not to be conquered, I went back to my apartment to get our dirt devil.  I hope the sight of me in my short shorts hauling a bright red dirt devil through Mile End sparked joy in several people’s hearts.

Eventually, at least the bottom half of the fancy vacuum became willing to suck dirt up. Victory was mine.

If you’d like me to be part of your Tidying Festival, let me know.

The End.

Exquisite Folding with Marie Kondo.
Exuberant Bodhisattva on Facebook
Twitter: @mypelvicfloor

I Let Go, by Erica J. Schmidt

The Erica Museum
Deep Unyielding Depression, Part One.
The Budgie Exodus of Mile End
Taes Floats Your Boat (re: doughnuts)