Sixteen

June 25, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFriesLeave a comment

Seventeen was sweeter than sixteen

But sixteen wasn’t half bad

Carefree and alive

Attempting to drive

Converse on the clutch

Bubblegum on the breath

Sargent at the Met

TAI… at the Bowery

Broadway Diner and Nautilus

Fries dipped in gravy

Magic Blends from the fountain

Tiny tastes of independence

Experimental fashion sense

Mini skirts and long sweaters

Julie Taymor directing our lives

Manya’s mannequin in the basement

Some controlled mayhem

Pouring sand on melted plastic in the driveway

Once the last knot burned

Movies on the weekend

Cross-legged in the seats

Peach Schnapps in the basement and The Virgin Suicides

A few sips could buzz our minds

Skylights, fireflies, and finding space on the couch

Sleeping in non-sleeping places

Light as a feather, stiff as a board

Stalled in a cornfield

Chainless saws in the distance

Squeals and laughter- fear’s resistance

Molly, Ally, Emilio, Judd, and Anthony

Stillwater and Doris

Grapes and wishes on New Year’s

With the friends turned family

In the beautiful days of sixteen

Poetry

Abandoned Character

June 24, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFriesLeave a comment

I walked by the bay and disposed of treasure

Without taking care to measure

The value at the time,

What I held as mine-

Now gone,

A passing thought,

A character erased,

The plot debased,

Left on the porch of History House

In a rocker beside the door-

The words no more,

Retained only in memory.

Characters suited to different tales,

Creative concept – doomed to fail,

Flightless birds,

Deleted words,

Debris of fate,

A breath exhaled,

Destruction mode on,

Eliminated pawns,

The Queen- exposed, unknowing.

Protect the protector-

That little defender

Who fell asleep on the job.

Health & Lifestyle · Healthy Habits

Testing Healthier Habits

June 20, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFries3 Comments

My focus for the past couple of weeks, during a break from my big writing project, has shifted to healthier habits and how to establish their foundations. The main issue for me is hunger, or rather “hunger” and not knowing when my sensation of being hungry is true or masking some other physical need or emotion.

I have come to learn that people experience hunger and fullness in a spectrum of ways and at different intensities. Some lucky people have an automatic physical cue mid-meal that tells them to stop eating while some people don’t feel full until well after finishing a meal and may suffer the uncomfortable effects of overeating. Some people feel “hungry” on a constant basis when really they may be thirsty, bored, anxious, tired, or sad. For as long as I can remember, I belong to this last camp, but I’ve been working on questioning my hunger and emotional cues to better recognize them for what they actually are. It’s not easy; I’ll tell you that, but it is getting less hard each day.

It’s uncomfortable to feel hungry all of the time, even when you are “fake hungry”. Your brain wants you to feel happy and eating releases dopamine to make you feel good. It’s not cozy to be uncomfortable and you all know that being cozy is a high priority of mine. Comfort is a necessity for coziness, in my opinion. And yet, I am sitting here now feeling cozy despite adopting healthier habits that I’ll get into more in a little bit.

Feeling my own emotions is one thing; they are a mauling bear sometimes. Food is a quick fix. I am great at multitasking when it comes to being emotional and hungry. Fun, right? My sense of empathy takes things over the top though. If I am in proximity to someone who is anxious or sad, it’s a little contagious and guess what? I feel hungry. Yay empathy!

My brain often tells me that I’m hungry when I’m not and because of it, I have a seasoned history of overindulging on things like groceries, eating out, calories, energy, and time. Hunger can be distracting and irritating for me. Satisfying a craving offers immediate, albeit temporary, gratification and relief.

I have learned that when I am truly hungry, I am not picky. The craving for true hunger is for nourishment, not for a particular taste. Certain foods do a better job at filling up real hunger while others trick you into eating more without providing the nutrients that your real hunger craves, so you will keep feeling hungry. Put the chips away! Those crunchy tricksters.

I haven’t had a drop of coffee since my last post and if you are a dedicated reader, you know it’s been a while since I’ve shared here, and you also know that I was a coffee addict. I feel better without coffee, honestly- less anxious. I am sleeping well and wake up energized as opposed to reliant on my next caffeine fix. Besides, my taste perception of coffee has changed from finding it delicious to finding it unpalatably bitter. It was my cue to lay off the bean juice for a while.

I am drinking less alcohol too and more water and am feeling and seeing the effects. My skin feels cleaner and brighter, my sleep – less interrupted, my scalp- less dry and itchy. Who knew that all this time relief for dandruff could be a side effect of proper nourishment? Let’s be real, probably many, many people. It just took me a while to trip over the wisdom and notice it.

Adopting healthy habits can feel like an insurmountable chore from the onset. This is the first time it hasn’t felt like that for me. I’m not “on a diet” and I’m not cutting out any foods for good. I am asking myself questions about how I feel when my body signals hunger. I am making choices based on that assessment. I am slowly figuring out my own hunger cues knowing that mine might be different from other people’s. I am sharing with you, because seeing it in my own writing always helps me to make sense of things.

If you are someone who struggles with frequent, false hunger and food cravings, I feel you. I understand the sense that achieving a healthier lifestyle can feel like a hopeless dream sometimes. Let me be one to remind you that the perfect body type doesn’t exist. Beauty and healthy bodies take many shapes and forms. Focus on baby steps and you’ll notice they can take you much further than you think. Talk with your “hunger” cues. Ask them if they are real and maybe your body will get back on speaking terms with you.

Here are a few strategies that I have practiced in order to assess my state of hunger before reaching for food.

Take a short walk or move around.
Talk to or text a friend or family member.
Have a glass of water.
Watch a YouTube video on a subject you enjoy.
Complete something on your to-do list.
Don’t deny yourself foods you love; they make you happy. You deserve to be happy, not deprived.
Try reaching for 3/4 or 1/2 of the portion of a snack you would normally have and save the rest for later.
Settle into the discomfort and hangriness of being hungry so you can recognize it for what it really means. Feel it and question it. Are you bored? Are you anxious? Thirsty? Needs and emotions like this can manifest as hunger.
Have a cup of tea or seltzer; it may feel more substantial than plain water.
Take it one meal at a time and don’t get discouraged if the first few days are really difficult. It gets easier.
Put your typical portion size on your plate and see if eating without distractions of television or phones quiets down the world enough for your body to hear you question if you are full. No one is making you throw the food away. Get some foil or Tupperware and put the rest away for a snack later on. You will be glad for it then!

I am not a medical professional so these tips are simply based on exercises that I have found helpful in my own experiment with adopting healthy habits. I want to feel good in my body because I’ve only got this one and there are people out there who care about me that I want to be around for for a long, long time.

I want to say thank you so much for reading my posts. Writing this was a nice distraction from false hunger this morning.

On another note, some friends alerted me to the difficulties of commenting on these blog posts so I have updated the comment settings for anyone so inclined (Thank you Jean and Darlene!). You all inspire me to be creative and I would love to hear from you. Hope you all have a beautiful, fulfilling, and filling day!

Poetry

Dream on the Cusp

May 27, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFriesLeave a comment

Woke up today feeling small-

Not weak or defeated,

Just not much at all,

A speck on a marble that spins round and round,

In a bed, in a house, on the ground.

You couldn’t see me from space,

Head up in the clouds

Of fog fallen from grace,

Looking up towards the gray to peel and reveal,

And wonder why Earth’s a big deal.

Dreams circle black holes

Drawn to depths un-suspect,

Stretched like melted shoe soles,

Till I can’t recognize, translate, or surmise,

Stars extinguished from sparkling skies.

Wake to reason sipped on the porch-

Ground elixir of addicts

That can’t hold a torch

To the infinite warps of spacetime, sublime

That inspired this wandering rhyme.

Poetry

Baby Bear’s Porridge

May 13, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFriesLeave a comment

I taste a sense of possibility and capability that is new to me today.

It’s the most delicious thing I’ve tasted so far

And I wonder why I put off making it for so long.

Perhaps the steps of the recipe were too daunting.

Perhaps it required a long list of ingredients from a hundred different places

Or the kitchen was too cluttered to get to the cabinets, sink, and stove.

Perhaps the recipe looked very long on the page

Or parts of it were torn from the cookbook

Or stuck together with once-edible, mystery adhesive.

I peeled apart the pages with an unfamiliar determination

And wiped away the weakened cement of grime so they wouldn’t stick together again.

I read the recipe through for the first time.

I let the overwhelm sink in and chose to ignore it

Then sourced the called-for ingredients –

Turns out I had most of them on hand already.

I prepared them at my own pace and came to realize

That I craved exactly this at many points in life:

All those times when I was ravenous

And snacked on something else that didn’t satisfy.

The recipe always seemed too difficult to attempt,

The estimated cook time-too long.

And once I got going, I was overzealous

And some of the magic splashed out of the pot,

But I’ve adjusted the heat and thrown in some spices.

It’s simmering now- just needs a little longer-

A few more spices here and there, maybe.

I want to get it just right.

Travel

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

May 9, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFriesLeave a comment

Today has been written off as a travel recovery day. We got home from the airport around 2:30AM due to a delay on our flight home from the sunshine state, but we were happy to have gotten home by then at all. The flight at the neighboring gate to ours in Tampa was canceled after 3+ hours of delays which resulted in one of the disappointed LaGuardia-bound passengers going full Hulk in the terminal, such that he had to be escorted out by eight police officers. We felt lucky in comparison to only be delayed two hours and not to have to spend the night in some airport hotel by the Bay in return-limbo.

Once we deplaned in Newark, the trek from our gate to our car felt long. We were racing against an unknown grace-period beyond the length of our pre-paid parking. We rolled our carry-ons along the waxed tile floors of the shiny new-ish terminal, down an escalator, up an escalator, down an escalator again. We slugged along the acid-washed, blue passage connecting Terminal A to the Airtrain station, passing a man who had lost all care for his luggage and was scraping his bags along the passage wall. We transferred on the Airtrain and finally arrived at our unreliable little car that decided to be reliable this morning, the little angel. We were pleasantly surprised to still be within the parking grace-period when driving through the exit toll of the garage and that put a smile on our faces.

We decided that, despite being dead tired, a stop at Wawa seemed necessary on the way home. Mike expertly navigated the confusing start to our journey as I pointed out all the ways we would have taken a wrong turn and ended up somewhere in Elizabeth if I were navigating.

We enjoyed the empty highways characteristic of the early morning hours when most of New Jersey’s dwellers are nestled in their beds. The hour offered quiet, cool relief compared with the Florida heat and Wawa was a bright, quick respite. We stocked up on a few snacks and we were home soon enough.

Typically, I unpack everything as soon as we get home, but hunger and sleepiness delayed this process. We ate our “meal” in groggy, happy silence, brushed our teeth and fell asleep before we even realized it.

Today, my muscles and bones feel like they were replaced with wet sand and my hair could use a wash but that would certainly be overextending for the day. The grocery shopping is done, the bags are unpacked, and a load of laundry needs to be folded, but that can wait until tomorrow. I preferred to sit here and catch up with you, to move my fingers, and pretend the day was somewhat productive even though I may still be a little bit asleep. I will relish 2:00AM tomorrow from my dreams, tucked comfortably up in warm sheets and a quilt, unconscious to the stress and uncertainties of planes, trains, and automobiles.

Health & Lifestyle · Mental Health

Henry, Jack, John, and Jo

May 3, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFries4 Comments

When I left work on the last day of my old job last summer, I cried on my short drive home, parked, composed myself, and that was that.

Last year was a rollercoaster that sort of coasted on the downs for more than was amusing and had me fighting for my misvalued worth for months in reaction to changes in salary structure for roles like mine at my place of work – a battle that I ultimately lost. Let’s just say there was a lot of crying in the shower. I was already down when the final kick came, but it was time to go and I was braced for it so it didn’t hurt too bad and the bruising was minimal.

Despite the low points, I still loved that place and it was rough to say goodbye.

Rewind to about a week and a half before that last day. I had just had a meeting to plead my final case, which you now know did not yield the desired outcome. It just wasn’t in the cards. I sort of expected that already, but I had to try everything. After work, I went to my family’s shore house to see relatives visiting from California and my cousin, having been pre-warned that I was probably going to have a difficult day at work, took my drink order in advance.

“What do you want when you get here?” she asked.

“An Old Fashioned,” I said.

“You got it,” she said.

I walked in the back door of the house and she handed me two, one for each hand, with a look of determination to make the night fun. That is love and that is what my family is like. They will pick you up when you are down and they will match your level, sip for sip the entire way.

The bottle of Jack Daniels was pretty full when I arrived that evening. It sat in the middle of the dark stained wooden buffet in the dining room. My uncle, aunts, mom, husband, cousin and her fiancée soon each had an Old Fashioned in front of them too. The glasses were warm honey in the glow of the chandelier fixture, adorned with delicately peeled orange rinds. We reviewed my day together. We bolstered my self confidence to the point where I could smile instead of just look worried and unsettled. I told them what I’d stay for and they increased the amount as the conversation continued until we came to a mutual agreement on what was a reasonable full time salary for a person of my skill.

As the night wore on, the purple Five Crowns box made its way to the table and we began to play. The bottle of Jack grew increasingly dehydrated. We grew increasingly giddy. We listened to a John Denver inspired Spotify playlist.

“Country Roads, Take me home, To the place I belong…”

My unease lessened. I laughed a lot. There is no medicine better than being with your people. Whatever was going to happen would happen and it was out of my hands. I’d given it my best effort. I’d given it every effort. I wouldn’t let the fight take more from me than it already had. It didn’t really matter anyway because I had these amazing people, a glass full of topaz, and cheeks that were sore from laughing.

I think in my head I knew how it would go. If it was in the cards, it wasn’t in my hand and I wasn’t ready for another round.

When I got in my car on my last day of work, I allowed myself to cry for the drive home. I got home and watched Little Women. I met Jo March. Jo was a writer. She was brave and she was told no. I was brave and I was told no for other things. So, might as well write like Jo.

Poetry

Metallic Lurex Shine

May 1, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFries2 Comments

Sometimes it can be tough to remember that you are pink champagne, red lipstick, and fizzing sparklers when it’s late and the spiral’s poised on the projector just about to unwind.

Letting it run would be less than wise,

Besides you’ve already seen the reel, time and again.

Don’t you remember?

Open the closet and the drawers before hitting the pillow.

You didn’t think it fitting to represent yourself with neutrals.

You are far from beige.

That’s not your kind of minimalism.

You are flower patterns and faux fur.

Silk and embroidery.

Red shoes and lurex.

You gleam and shine for everyone.

You gleam and shine for you.

Why can’t you see it at this hour?

Embrace the beauty that you choose everyday.

Maybe get rid of the mini dresses though? You’re over thirty now, love.

Then again, maybe not.

You are long legs and lashes, soulful pipes and the biggest smile.

Remember?

You are witty and sweet.

You relish really atrocious puns and dad jokes and you’ve absolutely no right, hear?

You are worth a lot to a lot.

You are worth a lot to you too.

You are nostalgia and seasonal stamps on long-winded greeting cards sent through snail mail.

You are passionate about the littlest things.

Your imagination can create a fictional reality from an image, word, or idea.

Sometimes you can’t stop laughing, to the point of pain.

You love all your kiddos to bits.

You shine for them too and it takes a decade off you.

You are sparkly magic.

You think dancing means jumping about, assuming it’s convincing enough in a fancy enough dress.

And you love a fancy dress.

You are pearls and gold hoops and tall, loud boots.

You are an encyclopedia of book, movie, and music trivia.

You are made of stardust,

Of family and friends.

You sprinkle dreams every day, hoping they grow tall as sunflowers.

You are blind to the point that lights shine like glowing K’nex Connectors.

You are a loveable nerd and an acceptable weirdo.

You make your loved ones laugh.

You are doing better than fine, better than beige.

You are my dream girl.

Now go get to dreaming.

Health & Lifestyle · Mental Health

Hare-Brained Tortoise

April 30, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFriesLeave a comment

It begins with a static current of nerves.

A deep breath.

Doubt.

How far can my legs carry me today?

My lungs?

My brain?

Just breathe and stop thinking so much.

Were the Lisbon girls based on real people? Did Jeffrey Eugenides love them?

A few steps and wild electrons of thoughts bound about with no rhyme or reason.

What’s Amanda Bynes up to these days? I hope she’s ok.

The velocity is random.

Find your pace.

Find your breath.

Stop thinking so much.

Did Christopher Tolkien even like interpreting his father’s posthumous voice?

Gulp the air.

Hold it and release it slow.

Which of Judy Garland’s five husbands did she love most, if any?

Throat,

Lungs,

Diaphragm.

Again.

Lift your knees.

Is it possible for anyone to be as effortlessly cool as Sofia Coppola?

Wow, you’re not great at this, are you?

That woman was walking when I started and she just passed me.

Doubt.

Slow and steady.

Set your own pace.

This isn’t a race.

Get out of your head, Bethy.

Mo calls me Bethy. And Mike. Who else?

Summer’s coming up – Ugh, the house.

Three inches of water in the basement that time. I had to wash my sneakers.

You should think more.

You should think less.

Breathe.

Gulp the air

Swallow it slow.

No spotted lantern flies yet.

Breathe.

Lift your knees higher.

Is that jasmine or honeysuckle? Smells like Natalie’s wedding.

Relax your hands.

Do my feet pronate since that injury on the train in 2017?

Focus on the path.

Careful on the sand.

That scar from Bradley Beach is still there after three years. Crazy.

Who are Jack Antonoff’s songs about? Scarlett, Lena, Margaret?

Run.

Push a little further than you think you can.

I likely ruined that friendship. Maybe that was meant to happen.

Relish the breeze

And the sound of the gulls.

I want to stop.

Keep running.

Stop thinking so much.

I can’t stop.

Almost there.

Withstand the toughest part.

Pain in legs.

Pump your heart.

Maybe there’s a muse is these surroundings.

Home stretch.

Slow your steps.

Rush of blood to the head.

I actually did it.

Permit the pride.

Cool down.

Hydrate

Stretch.

Endorphins.

Now wasn’t that worth it?

Health & Lifestyle · Nostalgic Posts

Drawings in the In-between

April 24, 2024November 21, 2024 Beth DeFriesLeave a comment

I used to walk between the L and the 1 train via the F, M platform in the 6th Ave/14th street subway transfer passage every weekday morning on my way to work from Williamsburg to the West Side. It was routine – automatic and got me from 6th Ave to 7th Ave to catch my connection. Most of the time, I was too lost in the realm of daydreams or looking forward to getting back to reading my novel to pay much attention to my fellow sardines on the conveyor belt of dress shoes plodding along grimy concrete tiles. One day, however, I found myself paying attention by accident, while looking at the ankles of the person walking in front of me, noticing I was seeing those ankles not as skin-covered tendons, muscles, and bones, but as black and white sketched pencil lines on drawing paper. Strange. Cool.

Fascinated, I tried to pencil sketch the rest of my view of the person attached to those ankles in my head on my three minute walk through the in-between, but it was hard to get beyond the ankles with them walking so quickly. On my way home, I did it again, walking the pass-through from the 1 to the F, M platform to the L. I continued to notice peoples’ ankles on my commute on multiple random occasions, each time, not even noticing I was doing it at first, like automatic flip books of pencil sketched ankles and heels walking along the in-between pavers in real ballet flats, loafers, heels, oxfords, and flip flops.

This subconscious turned conscious phenomenon started happening after I attended a few life drawing workshops in the city through the Drawing America program. I had been missing the mindless exercise of timed drawing, the translation of reality to art, the feel of good posture and soft 2B pencil on drawing paper. Looking at the model as lines and shading is a learned, turned automatic skill from my art training in college. I miss the feel of making art in a studio a lot lately. Creative spaces really do fuel creativity.

Lately, I feel like I could cover the walls in tubes and tubes of paint with no rhyme or reason other than because it would be pure fun.

I guess I’d prefer the world to be art sometimes. I certainly seemed to on my city commute all those times through the in-between. It made the gray world more beautiful and animated, more strange and interesting. A brain that thinks in art can catch you off guard in the best way and I entertain it every time I notice it happening and let my imagination run wild like a Mummer through a convent.

I haven’t drawn pencil ankles in the real world in a long time, but I have translated memories into words and to me, that’s sort of the same feeling, if that makes any sort of sense. Even if it doesn’t, don’t worry. Sometimes things you can’t explain or understand can be the most beautiful. Documented murals of letters, words, punctuation, mixed in with me like paint with plaster, presented in a forum for the open minded. Am I art? Perhaps. The reviews are mixed, but I’ll always have the pencil ankles in the in-between, propelling me toward creative pursuit.