issue 252

Maybe California should change their slogan to “The Land of the Crazy.” I remember one day at work, sitting on the brittle gray-blue carpet on my boss’s office floor. My legs were crossed beneath me Indian style as my hands rested on my knees, palms up.

“Now feel your cord go down through the floors of the building, all nine of them,” my boss said in a soft hum. “All the way down, down through the concrete.” I wondered where was she taking us this time. She guided my mental extension cord all the way down to my own little core of the Earth. I saw the flashing neon lights that read “HILARY” with little arrows pointing to an ugly Lazy Boy recliner and a little outlet sitting atop the brown center of the earth. I plugged in my cord, per my boss’ request.

I have never been one to underestimate the power of crazy. To me, this world seems impossible inside the four walls of an office, a stale conversation, or an attempt to be normal. I have understood all my life that normal just doesn’t exist. This however, was something else entirely. Did my mental core really include a recliner and flashing neon signs?

Out in California, I had somehow landed a semi-respectable position as a marketing assistant for an employment law firm. It seemed normal enough. I had my own office. I had to wear nice clothes and couldn’t even participate in casual Friday. I learned employment law as if it were the back of my hand, and could spout off people’s rights at a moment’s notice. But what might have otherwise terrified me in what I consider to be a suffocating lifestyle, turned out to be too crazy even for me. Was it really possible that someone would trust me with the laws of the United States Government?

“Okay, now where were we?” she asked, smiling at me triumphantly. We had been in the middle of a meeting. I’d gotten distracted, needing to recharge. Clearly, it had been time to meditate, and this was not an uncommon venture.

One morning, months later, my boss stormed through our office, tears streaming out of her eyes, screaming, “I’m outta here! He’s driven me insane!” referring to the owner of the company. As if it were something unachievably hard to do. I helped her pack up her boxes, told her I thought she had made a great decision to leave her well-paying job when she was a single mom with two young girls to raise and no prospect of future employment. I was lying. Sometimes crazy can go a bit too far.

But there was something inside her crazy behavior. While it was maddening at times to deal with, she left me with the knowledge that a sense of self is more important than anything else in your life. She knew who she was, and she never made any apologies for it. Sometimes things didn’t always work out, but to her, that was just the price you pay for personal power.

For the five weeks after my boss quit, my coworker and I managed ourselves. Eventually, another boss arrived, this time a guy of a whole different breed. He opined on our choice of clothing every day and “complimented” the outfits he liked. One day he walked into the office, grabbed my co-workers purse and threw it on the floor.

“You better keep that purse closed,” he screamed.
“Why,” she asked, surprised by his sudden outburst.
“Because you might have underwear in there!”

The look on our faces was baffled at best, although fearful and disturbed were not far off. He was a different kind of crazy. I was suddenly missing the days of crazy tarot and chakra alignment. I started shutting my office door more and more, trying to block out the awkward, uncomfortable world that I lived in day in and day out. I felt imprisoned.

There are all kinds of crazy in the world. Some kinds of crazy are good. They open your mind to things that might make you uncomfortable but can give you a sense of freedom you would not otherwise have. Other kinds are bad– the killing kind, the abusive kind, the awkward and alienating kind. Each of us has a little in us, either way.

California seemed especially keen on it and not afraid to show it, even if it was the bad kind. Trust me, there was plenty of it to go around. But in some ways, it’s one of the things I miss most about the place. Here in the South, we keep our crazy hidden. It’s just not proper. We turn a blind eye or change the conversation when someone does something weird or talks about uncomfortable subjects.

That’s not to say I want to go back to the world I left behind. It was a nice visit that made for some nice stories, but I want to wear my crazy with a little more pride. Maybe that’s what I’m doing right now. I’m showing you my crazy. I promise not to bring it out too often, for everyone’s sake. But it’s there in all of us. We should be proud to say we’re crazy. It’s what makes us worth telling about.

issue 250

This past weekend, I was in Tallahassee with my family celebrating the induction of my uncle, Gary Pajcic, into the Florida State University Athletics Hall of Fame. Almost everyone from my mom’s side of the family came together, from near or nearer or even far, to celebrate. We bought new dresses for the banquet. My mom, my sister and I all wore outfits of black and tan animal print in an accidental stand of unity. Uncles and aunts in their seventies came, as well as little toddlers and even one baby still in the belly. We reserved clusters of hotel rooms and tickets to the game and got my huge family of a thousand and one together in one place.

Everyone of importance, besides my grandma who is too old to travel now, came out for the event. Everyone, that is, but my uncle. Last year, in a tragic moment that changed the rest of our lives forever, my uncle was diagnosed with encephalitis and died within four days. A figurehead of my family, of Jacksonville, and of the state of Florida, his death reached so many that it left everyone who knew him with a hole inside of them that can never be filled.

It was a little over a year ago that my whole family was last gathered, to attend his funeral. Newspapers all over the state remarked upon his death, all the news channels covered it for the week surrounding his passing, and over a thousand people attended the funeral. But, despite knowing his great contributions to his community, I will always remember him as the man who called himself my “second daddy,” who always had a bag of change saved up for my little sister every time we saw him, who gave more hugs than anyone else I know, who cherished family and made certain everyone else in our expanding family did as well. He held us together.

I was excited for this weekend. I was excited to be able to celebrate his life with the people who knew him best, to cherish what he was as a man, and to do it in his favorite kind of way, with his family, his good friends, football and some good food.

The weekend started with the induction banquet. My aunt, my late uncle’s wife who has been given the enormous task of carrying on his name and his convictions, gracefully introduced him to the room and remembered him for all the amazing things he was. She even told one of his favorite stories, because telling stories was one of the things my uncle did best. I cried, as did many others, watching her stand before us, so strong and still so full of his presence. Sometimes it feels as if he hasn’t really left us, and I hope that’s because we are able to keep him alive in our hearts.

The next day was the game. This was the part he really would have enjoyed. We all walked from the hotel to the stadium and started the celebration in his special parking space, the same one we tailgated in all through my college years, and my sisters before me, as long as I can remember. Everyone was there, just as it had been in years past. I kept expecting to turn my head and see him standing with his best friend, Ron Sellers, or chowing into some of his famous homemade boiled peanuts. Florida State won the game, the family was together, and it was a beautiful warm summer night. If he could have seen us, he would have been so proud.

I moved away to California two weeks after my uncle passed. It was the hardest thing I have ever had to do. My family is my foundation, and that is something that I cherish and respect about myself. It felt like a black cloud hung over all of our heads this past year as we tried to find our way through. I know I am back where I belong. If there is one thing I learned from him, it’s to be proud of who you are and where you’re from. Hold up your community and your community will hold you. My uncle knew that, and used the word “community” loosely to define anything and everything in his life that meant something to him.

This weekend, my pride in my family, in my team (go Noles!), and in my home could not have been stronger. I spent five years trying to find the place that could fill my heart, not knowing that it was right where I had left it. It had been here waiting for me all along. And although I regret not having spent more time with him in his final days, I can still feel him with us. He has taught me so much, and the lessons keep on coming. I miss his hugs, I miss his stories, I miss the man, but his spirit is still here. It’s inside us all.

issue 249

The other day I was talking with a friend who lives in Barcelona. We were practicing our foreign language skills on one another. I was in America speaking Italian and she was in Spain speaking Spanish. The similarities allowed us to communicate, despite speaking two entirely different languages. When you look beyond the phrasing and the varying vocabulary, all languages intend to do the same thing. It furthers the human experience and allows us to share it with one another. The bilingual exchange pulled us together from opposite sides of the world, uniting not one or two, but three cultures. We tenuously deciphered the core of the sentences, using context clues and similar verb structure. The thing that broke our communication were the small words like “then” or “now,” the words that pull a language together, but that I had always deemed unnecessary.

Moving to a new city is a similar process as speaking another language. You know to expect the big things. I must find a job. I must find a place to live. I will need a bed. I will need a couch. I must have food and pots and pans. But the little things are what pull the whole process together, and are what I have found to be the most difficult to grasp.

I have lived in Jacksonville almost my entire life. But still, I find it hard to navigate through some neighborhoods. It could have been my five-year absence that has clouded my memory or the constant development and growth that has turned this city into another place in many ways. Merely trying to find my way to Target has proven confusing. Or, when looking at possible places to live, I got lost almost every time. I thought I already knew the way and had even MapQuested directions, just to be safe. But roads are closed or under construction or have been rerouted. It made me understand that despite my familiarity with this place, I am truly starting over. It all looks different from a different point of view.

At times I even feel lost in my own house. In California, I lived in a two-bedroom apartment that I shared with three other people. I now live in a three-bedroom house in San Marco that is cheaper to rent than the apartment in Oakland. I knew when moving home I would need some big items to fill a much larger space, like a dining room table or a desk, but I hadn’t anticipated all the little things I would need. Having never lived on my own before, it never occurred to me that I would need cabinet liners, a functional screwdriver, mattress covers for extra beds, or a little jar to hold utensils.

Just the other day I went to a friend’s birthday party. When I arrived, I found tables lined with little dishes and decorative bowls, cake platters and serving trays. There were wall hangings and pinwheels (the party was for a five-year old) and even little jars of plant life to give the party a garden theme. Right now, the best I could do for a party is to stick a bag of Doritos on a makeshift coffee table. Not only do I not have all the little dishes, but I don’t even have a table to put them on and I definitely do not have little jars of grass for decoration. I have this new house, my very first place to really find myself in, but the lack of knickknacks is getting in the way.

It would also be nice to have a little slice of Jacksonville to call my own. A few places that I can be known for so that, when asked, I can advise people on where I go, instead of where someone has told me to go. I want a small way to connect with this town I have always called “home” that hasn’t existed for the past twenty-three years. I so identify with the notion that I am an explorer, but with Jacksonville as my hometown, it could be easy to fall back on my laurels. I need to discover Jacksonville on my own, find a few small parts that are all me. Otherwise it will be like moving backwards in time instead of jumping forward into my new life.

I know it will all come together. Just like a language, you start with the big things in a small way, and it grows into the small things in a big way. You can’t truly have a first hand conversation without the secondary words. Otherwise you’ll be lost in translation. If it had not been for that conversation with my friend, I may never have noticed the importance of the small words. As with any experience, the discovery is futile without the little things. Sooner or later, I will have found my own roads. I will stop calling for directions and I will hold my own as a native foreigner. I will know the knickknacks, and Jacksonville will then know me.