Dear Vincent, Sorrowful Simon has written you a letter.

Dear Vincent,

Sorrowful Simon has written you a letter. He sounds quite sad. Sorrowful Simon initially reached out to me on the dating site, OkCupid. We’ve never met in real life. My excuse for not going a date with him was that I had already experienced a Sorrowful Simon in a rather extensive way. You, and some other people know that the first Sorrowful Simon in my life ended up jumping off a building. Perhaps my excuse for not going on a date was adequate. Now I have repeated the name, “Sorrowful Simon,” four-and now five-times in one paragraph. That’s enough times. It is time to address Simon’s plight.

 

Simon says,

 

By habit, or because they sense that I’m not doing too good, friends have been asking me how I am feeling more frequently lately, and I’m finding it difficult to answer them with any degree of clarity. Like Erica, I had a therapist which really helped me a few months back, and in the same way I ran out of allowed sessions so we had to part ways. Since then, I have strived to keep clarifying my feelings and emotions in my head, but inevitably I get lazy and stop doing it regularly, which then makes it harder to do so, and the cycle leads to where I’m at right now, I guess: having so much in my head that nothing can get out, or just barely, sometimes when I get drunk/high and start writing poems, or if I start talking with a friend or a lover and I’m in the right frame of mind (but then sooner or later I start thinking that I’m boring that person, imposing, or just not making sense, and I reel back my outspoken outburst).

 

Dear Simon, How are you?

 

So easily this question can trigger such performance anxiety. It sounds like your friends genuinely care and want to know, and yet you feel like you can’t quite open up, because what if the true answer is actually too much? My sense is that many people feel as though if they were to honestly reveal themselves, all their feelings and suffering and struggles, that this would be way too much for those around them. An unacceptable and tedious burden. And so you hold back. But this doesn’t sound like a viable option, since it is building up to more than you can bear. You need a mode of expression, a means of release. I’m sorry that therapy is no longer available. How can you replicate some of the relief it provided?

 

Alcohol and drugs, well, these can have their place, as long as they’re pursued without desperation or addiction. But substances have their limits as long-term sources of comfort. In my experience, they tend to isolate over time, in addition to generating shame and/or oblivion, whether immediate or in their aftermath. Thus, with as clear a mind as you can access, I think you need to reach out to real people, either your friends, or the kind voices at the end of a crisis helpline. Choose the most non-judgmental and compassionate person you can find, perhaps not your mother, but maybe. And then speak. So frequently I hear of people finally opening up to their loved ones, disclosing the deep and seemingly intolerable darkness on their hearts. And you know what their loved ones say? “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

 

Simon:

 

There are so many things I could say right now, things which I know are weighing down on me, but to explain them in a coherent manner would require so much back-story… I don’t know if you would think it relevant or even intelligible.

 

Some of those things concern my ex-wife and children… some are about the situation with my current lover… some are about my day-to-day life and yearnings… about writing, which I still consider to be my vocation, but a failed one… but mostly it’s about Loneliness, which (I realized recently) I am more afraid of than Death (which is paradoxical, seeing as I am a solitary person by nature, and quite enjoy solitude).

 

At some point it will likely be worthwhile to rehash and unleash all the backstory. But right now I want to talk about writing. Writing and then Loneliness. But first writing. Although failing at any vocation sounds immensely painful, writing is a particularly loaded thing to fail at. There are all sorts of so-called empowering self-help books on how to awaken your creativity and write incessantly, prolifically, uninhibitedly, and with unrelenting joy, great brilliance and then you get rich and famous. I have read most of these books. Last summer, I threw out a book called, “The Right to Write” and I hope to avoid encountering such publications for the rest of my life.

 

No book will grant you with “The Right to Write.” It is all yours. Always. As for vocations and failure, humans invented both of these things, and while I don’t want to invalidate your perception, it could be helpful to challenge your beliefs on what it is you are “supposed” to be doing, and what it means to be successful.

 

On the bathroom wall of where I am staying, there’s a list written by a 90-year-old woman, containing 45 lessons that life taught her. The woman’s name is Regina

One of Regina’s lessons is, “All that really matters in the end, is that you loved.”

It’s possible that this sentence provides you with absolutely no relief. It might even fill you with cynicism. But I want you to consider what your list would be. Will becoming a successful writer truly provide you with the redemption you think you need? What societal bullshit are you clinging to? What personal bullshit are you clinging to? When you are 90 years old or younger and dying, what choices will seem like excruciating mistakes? What memories will bring you peace? What does your meaningful life look like? As Oprah would say, “What do YOU want?”

 

I used to think I wanted to be a best-selling novelist. Over and over again, I would write the first 80 pages of “My Life’s Work.” Then one morning after cranking my various spines through a sweaty yoga practice in India, I realized, the hell with it. I don’t want to write novels. The act of writing novels entails a whole slew of tasks I don’t particularly enjoy. For example, making things up. Rewriting drafts of long and imaginary stories over and over again. Writing about something other than myself and my own life. Well, this embarrassing, but honest. And what a relief to let that so-called dream unravel.

 

You get to choose the terms of your own success, creative or otherwise. During the spring of 2015, I decided that I would combat the unrelenting notion that I was perpetually failing creatively by committing to publishing two blogs per week, no matter what. This became my creative practice, and though I only maintained it religiously for a few months, it got me out of an angsty stagnant funk. I came up with a whole bunch of work that I am proud of and that even made me feel more at peace about the possibility of dying. Some people read it and most of the world didn’t. To a certain extent, Margaret Atwood’s experience is not all that different. We are all like Margaret Atwood, and not at all.

 

So I am wondering, Simon, if perhaps you could somehow take the “failure” and “vocation” out of your story about being a writer. Is there some sort of tangible and low pressure creative practice that might bring you a sense of accomplishment and joy? Ten minutes of rambling on the bus, a heartfelt email every afternoon, beginning the day with your pen and notebook and three to five sentences. Come up with something that’s small enough to pull off, but large enough to not feel like a cop out. During the times in my life when I am writing, no matter what I’m writing, and no matter what else is going on, I hate myself less, and am also less lonely.

 

That’s all I will say about loneliness this time. I will leave Simon, Vincent and our readers with the poem Simon wrote at the end of his letter:

 

I’m just half a person

part of me withered

(like Janus looking

at Death & Life

at the same time)

but still

I must take on

the Whole of my Life

 

no wonder

I’m so tired

-by Simon.

 

Yes, Simon, I can see why you’re tired. I’d be tired too. I wish you the deepest and most unshakeable peace available.

 

With love to Vincent and to this and every Simon,

Erica.


The End.


Vincent was my therapist from October of 2016, and May 2017. After we ran out of subsidized sessions, I began to write him daily imaginary emails. I called the project, "Mondays without Vincent," and it turned out to be quite healing. You too can write imaginary emails to Vincent. In fact, if you'd like, you can send them to me, on any day of the week.

My secret address is: ericaschmidt85(at)gmail.com.

Let me know if you’d like a response. The correspondence can remain between us, or else we can share it here with others and maybe it could be healing for everyone. Love, Erica.

"What truly happy person needs to stand in front of the mirror every morning to convince themselves they're happy?"
-Mark Manson, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck.
Not me, Mark. No. Not me.




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Deep Unyielding Depression

Deep Unyielding Depression.

I love this phrase, especially the word, Unyielding. As a second selling point, its acronym spells, DUD. How deep is your DUD?

My loving and thorough parents started sending me to therapy when I was eleven. Because of this and other theatrical tendencies, I believe I have the tendency to transform every un-exuberant moment into something unyielding and pathological.

And it has been awhile since we heard from Simon, my dead ex-boyfriend who jumped off a building on January 4th, 2016. What does Simon say this time?

Simon says: I wonder what I’d be like if, like you, I’d been sent to psychologists from the age of eleven. If a bunch of people had played around in my head the way children play in the bathtub-I think that by now I would have died ten times already. I’ve already died ten times anyways.

Ten times, or at least once. I’m not sure the bathtub analogy works in English. Simon and I used to fight extensively about translation.

Since I got back from India, I’ve been busy translating exciting phrases about soothing and luxurious skin creams and foams. My favourite is the foaming and emollient shower gel. You can use it in the bathtub or the shower.

Last week’s Catchphrase:

Do you want to be emollient and foaming?
I do.

This Week’s Catchphrase:

Deep Unyielding Depression.

So far the low-grade DUD has lasted 1.5 days. I think that the act of paying taxes has triggered Delayed Reverse Culture Shock. (DRCS.) Taxes, and a birthday party filled with babies. Everyone knows I don’t want babies. I don’t hate babies either. And yet, a great abundance of babies can make me feel lonely and empty, as though my life is unimportant and shallow.

Now is probably an excellent time to start making my own yogurt. Yogurt, or no-knead bread. Bacteria and/or yeast.

All your sadness is in your lungs.
I wish I was Miranda July.                               

Erica says to Simon: Aren't excessively self-indulgent, self-deprecating people irritating?

Simon says: Yes.

Erica: I hate people like me.

Simon says: Me too, but you’re not only self-deprecating. You also believe in yourself immensely. I have a theory on how this happens. Here it is: so one parent loves and cherishes their kid, but the other doesn’t believe she can do anything. You end up with a kid who turns into a half-shit, half-magnificent adult. Over time, one half swallows the other. Which half swallows what is yet to be determined.

Both of my parents thought I was magnificent.

There must be something clever to say about swallowing.

Me and My Sister, Being Magnificent.
I am not sure what is going on with the brown shit-like speckles.
Emollient foaming gels were not in the budget.

Certain skin creams produce a freshening effect upon application. Produce or procure. I googled “freshening effect” and everteen vaginal tightening gel natural intimate wash came up. In Montreal, it’s raining really hard.

Half Shit, Half Magnificent. This was the title of the poem Simon begged me to write. Simon didn’t like it very much. It’s true the poem was pretty terrible, but better than the one he wrote about my phosphorescent ass cheeks.

Hungry Halves. Contact Dermatitis. Another word I like is Unrelenting. Also, Unrivalled.

Are you seeking unrivalled comfort?
Yes.

I wish to be captured within a meticulous formula.

What they mean by everteen, this only just occurred to me. Everteen and the Intimate Wash. Gross, and rather upsetting.

My eye contours feel uncomfortable on a daily basis. Not everyone is as happy as they look on the Internet.

The End.

 

Me and my uncomfortable eye contours.
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Why I am Different from Margaret Atwood, and What I Don't Gain from Humping Duvets

 

Cardboard Box

Inhaling chocolate covered pomegranate berries, I watched Michael Stone as he talked on my i-Phone screen and told me about the wise use of sexual energy.

“Sexual energy is not personal,” said Michael Stone. Apparently sexual energy doesn’t belong to anybody. This is an interesting way of looking at it. My sexual energy feels very personal. And if I’m not the one who wants to hump the bed, who is? Michael Stone says that despite living in a world where sex is everywhere, few people are willing to talk about it. I tend to be one of those people. Along with shit, masturbation, and menstruation, sex is one of my favourite topics. 

“You are different from anybody I’ve ever met.” People tell me this all the time. Either the phrase triggers my Special Person Syndrome or it makes me feel uncomfortably odd. How come everybody says that?

Odd? Me?

“Well, you are different from everyone else,” a friend told me over coffee. “Most people have boundaries.”

“Boundaries,” I thought. “Should I look into getting some of those?”

 

My 60-year-old Jewish therapist from Westmount used to describe some of my sexual endeavours as “Sport Fucking.” “So you’re just using each other for sex,” she'd say. In English, they call this a Fuck Buddy. My Quebecois roommates call it un ami d’oreiller. A jPillow Friend. Sounds kind of nice.  People say that it is easy to treat your Pillow friends like objects. But I wonder if sometimes it is easier to treat a person like an object within the context of an official relationship. Now that you are MY boyfriend, shouldn’t we have sex whenever I want? 

One Sunday morning last April, the Boatman picked a civil war documentary over having sex with me. He made a valid choice, and yet, it took me about three and a half weeks to get over this. If the Boatman had been a Pillow Friend, I feel like it would have felt less personal. With Pillow Friends and Fuck Buddies, whoever it is has no obligation to you. You have to respect what they’re willing to give or take. Pros and Cons.

Michael Stone says that every sexual relationship builds something, even if you don’t make a baby. What are you building, and with who?

Simon used to say, “We’re not writing a book, we’re writing our lives.” Well, the book is done. He’s dead. I’m not. I love writing letters. It is one of my favourite kinds of writing. As a child, I was an excellent pen pal. So far I have already had at least three romantic relationships that were based almost entirely on writing letters. It is so fun. But sometimes I am too charming, too creative. I send too many locks of hair. (One is far too many.) I also tend to send stickers. Who knew that grown men adore stickers? Me. When I turn thirty, I will stop sending grown men stickers. I will look into getting some boundaries.  

Exciting Whale Stickers


Dollarama Gold

It’s like we can’t get close enough.” In bed, I have noticed that many people say this. Our tummies fuse together. Still we want to be closer. We may as well just write letters because we’ll never get close enough anyways.

 

This is a letter to Simon from “The Little Savage and the Hermit.” I wrote it one third of the way into the book, at which point Simon thought it would be a good idea if we flipped the narrative on its head by turning ourselves into squirrels or airplane seats or something similarly groundbreaking. I didn't turn us into anything and the letter was supposed to help set boundaries. It didn’t exactly work. The Wise Use of Sexual Energy also means treating all beings with dignity. The year or so I had with Simon was not my best era for treating all beings with dignity. Poor Simon got the brunt of it. But he really liked this letter. It is called, “Cardboard Box.”

Cardboard box

Dear Simon,

I am eating salad again.  These days, I am eating a lot of seaweed.  It goes right through me.  I know that you find my digestive system tiresome.  I find it tiresome too.  I’d apologize, but there are more important things to say.

 No self-respecting person would read your last letter, mix gin and energy drinks and then appear at your doorway to fuck.  Turns out I’m not a very self-respecting person. Sure, it counts, even if I was drunk, but it will never happen again.  I’m sorry that I set shitty boundaries and pissed you off.  Now it’s my turn to use Italics. 

             I don’t want to have anything to do with you anymore.  Unless it’s in a letter, I never want to hear from you again.

Perhaps you were trying to inspire me to turn myself into a cardboard box and drastically redirect the narrative.  Not necessary. I am already a cardboard box.  I always have been.  The reason I didn’t want to continue the narrative was...  I can’t tell you, it’s against the rules.  Too self-absorbed.  So you don't get to hear the story about the park bench and the man with the hole in his liver.  This summer, emotionally dependent guys came in packages of two, and my solution was to throw both of them out at the same time.

I saw a picture of you on Facebook with Marcel, the man who drives a power wheelchair who I got you a job with. Marcel's giving you a low five.  He looks a little dazed and delirious. I can tell he loves having you on his team.  Did you coordinate your black shirts and blue pants on purpose?  Your smile is large and goofy and ridiculous and your eyes are bright.  You have a long beard, as though for the last two weeks you’ve rolled out of bed without having time to do anything except run to the metro to get happy with Marcel.  I’m glad I gave you that job, even though now I’m financially desperate and essentially unemployed.  My job at the swimming pool has been put on hold due to a leak.  Throughout my frantic job hunt, I’ve applied for a few adult gigs on Craigslist. Dominatrix, Threesome, Cleaning Lady in Lingerie.  I don’t own any lingerie. Only yoga clothes.  The Threesome man just got back to me.  He asked if I had a friend who could join us.  No, I don’t.  No friend.  No friends.

I’ve been teaching yoga to weightlifters.  That’s probably about all you want to know about that.  I also wrote some articles for a website that would pay me if enough people read my stuff, but not enough people do.

My last bad news is I’m seeing a new shrink.  He says I have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Madonna Whore Complex and Gifted Child Syndrome.  I sort of hate him so I drink vodka cocktails out of Mason jars before our sessions.  That’s the good news.  Also, I am about to roll up my duvet and hump it.  But before I do that, I want to make amends.  You’re probably right that it’s best we never see or hear from each other ever again, except for in letters.  That said, I don’t want to be that girl you never talk to anymore, who you pretend not to see when you run into her on the street.  I don’t believe in that.  I never want to be that girl, and you’re not that guy for me.  If I ever see you again, I will smile and say hello.   

Erica.

The End.
Besides exciting whale stickers, Dollarama has all kinds of titillating outlets for your sexual energy.

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How I am violent, by Erica J. Schmidt

Since May, I have been taking an online course called, Embodying Ethics and Vows. It is with Michael Stone and Elaine Pierce. This week, our assignment was to write about how we are working with the precept of not causing harm (ahimsa) in our lives. Here's what I got:

How I am Violent, by Erica J. Schmidt

Instead of non-violence, I am thinking about violence. This makes me think of my relationships, especially with Simon and with my body, but with the Boatman too. Everyone saves their violence up for someone, for something. Actually, I have no idea what everyone else does.

It is hard not to tell the same old story over and over again. The story of Simon, my ex-boyfriend who I fucked at the Granola Party, on the biodegradable yoga mat. I was really drunk, and he wasn’t. Perhaps this should have been the last time. Instead, there was a big saga of alcohol, vomit, both passionate and ambivalent sex, and name calling. We wrote all this down in letters that were supposed to be published in brilliant books that were supposed to allow me to quit my three and a half low-paying jobs.

Simon used to say that I was like an eight-year-old sore loser tennis player. And I was always losing the match and so being with me was unbearable. He didn’t understand how the Boatman was able to stand me. Simon was probably more right about this than I was when I wrote,

“Sometimes I think that it would kind of be ideal for you to die.

Then our book would be a huge success.  I could feel somewhat sorry for myself, because a guy I fucked died and that is always traumatizing.  Everyone would look at me with odd sympathy. Especially if you committed suicide.  The sympathy would be immense.  Oh poor poor, Erica.  You slept with a sick and twisted soul.  Scarred forever.  How terrible.”

Highly mediocre writing, and unkind. This was from the second volume of the Little Savage and the Hermit. I wasn’t really into writing this book. Simon wanted the plot to be about how I finally got an orgasm. I felt like this was a dumb plot.

I am not the reason Simon jumped off his apartment building. I can just hear him say, “I would never jump off a building for you, you stupid fucking cunt!” His voice carries a tinge of love.

Simon’s most recent girlfriend gave me pictures and memorabilia from the funeral. When I first put the pictures on my meditation alter, I told myself that after a week, I was allowed to take them down. It has been awhile. They are still there. One of his photos is in a disposable coffee cup that is covered with the stream-of-consciousness poem I wrote during my French Literature Class in 2009. Simon kept this cup all the way until he died.  Those cups don’t biodegrade.

The alter, with spectacular lighting.

Simon once said that based on a study they did on rats in the 1970’s, I will never ever get cancer. The rats who expressed their stress by freaking out didn’t die or get any diseases. At this rate, I will live until I’m 98.

Not every day can be fulfilling and lucrative and productive. Some days are for melting down. Yesterday was a meltdown day. It was the first time I had woken up at 5 a.m. for a while. That could have caused the meltdown. I also don’t think I ate properly the day before. All the trivial and banal things tend to matter. Alas. I was stressed because I had this assignment to write, and Thursday is also blogging day. I thought that maybe I could combine the two activities, although I wasn’t sure whether or not the world should know that I told Simon it might be better if he died. As a creative practice, I have vaguely committed to myself and my four and a half fans that I will blog every Monday and Thursday. It started off being fun. Now I am starting to crap out.

Writing, with all its potential for redemption can also be violent.  Same thing goes for meltdowns.

My favourite person to have a meltdown with is the Boatman. No one can console and contain my eight-year-old sore-loser-tennis-player-self better than him. Plus I don’t really want to really want to impose this self onto anyone else. Some friends say that I should limit my contact with the Boatman. Otherwise, how will I possible get over him, move on. The idea of getting over anyone is so silly.  How can we possibly get over anyone?

Well, I suppose I am over the Vegan Life Coach. God bless the Vegan Life Coach, and his spirulina powder.

The Boatman and I talk once or twice a week. I try to make sure each time is not a meltdown. I try to ask him about his life. That was one of my goals when I began the ethics course. To ask people about their lives.

Yesterday, I called the Boatman in tears. “I can’t keep calling you like this. I will keep doing this forever.” For the rest of my life, for the rest of the world, I will compartmentalize myself to resemble a manageable and acceptable human being. Then when the eight-year-old tennis player appears, I will excuse myself to call the Boatman. I’ll be eighty years old, forty-nine years into a marriage, with seventeen grandchildren. Some blogging drama will emerge. “Excuse me, honey,” I will say to my geriatric husband. “I need to melt down to the Boatman.” The Boatman will be eighty-eight.

“It’s okay,” the Boatman told me yesterday as I fretted and wept about my lack of meltdown autonomy. “You can just call me.” Maybe they can make a special Boatman Meltdown App.

As for my body, well, I cannot believe the violence I have imposed upon it. Sri W. Ham Wrap was right. My yoga practice was super violent, and  I cling to things until they die.

People always say, “My poor body,” and/or “My body is not happy with me,” and/or my body is angry with me. I know what they mean, but I wonder who they are talking about.

Or what about, “my back was killing me?” My back was killing me the day I went to meet Simon’s girlfriend. Earlier I had spent two hours on my bike, to visit a friend. Now I was walking. I felt that if anything in my clicky, crooked eighty-year-old spine were to shift .035 mm the wrong way, the whole thing would surely collapse. Someone would have to wheel me and my body away.

"Jesus," I thought. People think about Jesus when their backs hurt. I remembered listening to Ashtanga teacher Tim Feldman talking about his herniated discs. He could barely move, but he thought about his guru, Pattabhi Jois, who said, “You taking your yanus.” So Tim started squeezing his anus like nobody’s business. Somehow this helped. Seemed a bit simplistic to me, or rather, perhaps too complicated. But what else could I do? As I walked, I brought my awareness to my anus and pelvic floor. I didn’t squeeze, I just thought about it. I considered how it was all connected to my feet that were touching the ground. And how my sitbones were also somewhat connected to my nostrils. And how the crown of my head sort of balanced on top of everything. There was still pain, but by the time I arrived at Simon’s girlfriend’s house, it felt like maybe things had shifted 0.035 mm away from me being in a wheelchair.

It is a good idea to try and keep your body happy.

This afternoon I’ll be taking a stab at my dream job. I am going to help a three-year-old learn how to use the potty. Very little is more grounding than helping someone else to take a shit.

The End.

The cup with the biodegradable poem on it
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Simon Girard, 1979-2015
The Benefits of an Ashtanga Yoga Practice, Part Two
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Simon

Creative Practice, Simon's Genies and the Exuberant Bodhisattva's Big Exciting Blog News

Last Thursday evening at the end of Ecstatic Dance, which you can read all about tomorrow, I ran into a man carrying a pile of paper plates and an open package of plastic forks. He had been in charge of the birthday cake, but alas, there was no more. I’d been blabbering away about how I’d self-published an illustrated self-help book and the man with the plates and the forks seemed quite intrigued. I helped him look up the book on Amazon.

 

“My name’s Simon,” he said. We shook hands and inched our way to the top of the stairs outside the dance room. I stood at the top, and he stood two steps below.

“Oh,” I said. “I have a soft spot for Simons.” And thus, I’d arrive at the perfect segue to embark upon the “My ex-boyfriend jumped off a building,” speech. Thank you, to Simon the dead Hermit, who has provided me with so many fabulous pick-up lines that may last me the rest of my life. I told the other Simon all about me and Simon Girard’s three-part epistolary novel, The Little Savage and the Hermit. How most of it was terrible and embarrassing. How most of our relationship was terrible and embarrassing. But now that Simon was dead, maybe it was suddenly really important. The other Simon put down his plates and forks and embraced me out of nowhere.

“It’s something to love someone who suffers so much,” he said. “It’s amazing how people suffer so much…” For a few moments, we held our embrace on the stairs. Then the unrestrained conversation continued. The other Simon does something important that has to do with telephones and left-wing political parties. From what I understand, it is also good for the environment. His father writes piles of important books about various non-fiction issues. The last one was about the CBC and what he considers to be the ideal model for public broadcasting. When asked about my job, I said I do piece-meal work translating stuff from French to English. I’m not insatiably passionate about it, but I like to keep up my French, it is stimulating enough, plus I get to pick my own schedule.

“So if you had a genie, what would you ask for?” said Simon.

When’s the last time someone asked you that? It’s easy to just laugh off this sort of question. Since we all know that nothing in the world can make life entirely unrelentingly blissful. Still, what is so terrifying about considering what we want?

For me, I want a healthy, healed body. Regular sources of sexual gratification and intimacy are also helpful. I want regular, exuberant, uninhibited, and unceasing conversations about sex, yoga, bodies, eating disorders and people’s lives. I want this somehow incorporated into my daily existence. (I.E. ERICA, START A FUCKING PODCAST…) And the other thing that has created a consistent source of grief in my life has been the unrelenting notion that somehow I am failing creatively. That I am forever lacking a creative focus, a fruitful creative practice, and at the end of my life, this will leave me with Deep Regrets. The pressure of making something massive and groundbreaking is paralyzing and enormous. And then it occurred to me, what is wrong with making blogging your creative practice?

So maybe blogs are too 2008, and maybe they’re not the most literary or artistic or edgy mediums. But just because you didn’t get to be Margaret Atwood this time around doesn’t mean you don’t get to be a writer. There are a million different ways to be a creative person. And if your transcribed verbal machine gun provides you and even a mere handful of people with some joy and relief, well then, why not just run with it?

And so, I’ve decided that this blog, this random slew of sentences and awkward graphics will become my new, official creative practice. After beating myself up forever throughout torturous efforts to write novels and plays about foot fungus, I realize that it is through blogging, through these uncensored, reality-based words that I find my most natural and authentic voice. And although there’s some value in challenging yourself to create beyond what’s natural and easy for you, there’s also something terribly painful and futile about trying to fit into a mold that’s just not you. Margaret Atwood is Margaret Atwood. You get to have a Kale Phone.

Me and my Kale Phone

So that’s that. Thank you to the Simon who didn’t jump off a building for asking me about my genies. When it was time for him to go, he said, “You are such a delightful ball of candid emotional intimacy.” It is one of the kindest compliments I have ever received. I will try to live up to it as I go about my days.

The End.

Bless all the Simons I have known, Bless Ecstatic Dance, and Bless Toronto. I am here until Tuesday, at which point I am going to Montreal for at least the summer…  From now on, I am going to try to post something new, every MONDAY around 4 or 5 o’clock, and every THURSDAY, around lunchtime. Maybe I will also do that Throwback Thursday Thing on my Facebook Page, even though it is a little silly. I invite you to follow me however you would like.

Exuberant Bodhisattva on Facebook
Twitter: @mypelvicfloor
I Let Go, by Erica J. Schmidt

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P.S. Who remembers the Karadavasana duck? Seems like a lifetime away... 

Karandavasana Duck: created by my very talented artist friend Sara E. Enquist. Check out her website!
Yours til Ekam Inhales
Simon Girard (1979-2015)
Ecstatic Adventures of the Exuberant Bodhisattva