Generally speaking, when real pain was involved, there was no reason. No one to hold accountable. No apology. Pain just was; it radiated with no narrative and no end.

Menopause coinciding with the death of a family member has brought to me the lesson that to live, truly and completely, you have to be willing to let go. Of everything and everyone.

whispered I love you one night, it felt natural enough—also preposterous. Who was the you in that sentence? I’d said it like cowboys say Yee-haw! Meaning, I’m really on this horse right now and I wanna make some noise about it!

“Maybe we shouldn’t do that,” Jordi said. “Flatten ourselves

So much of what I had thought of as femininity was really just youth.

A flashback was actually a lot like a period. Involuntary, not easy, but still a relief, to be unexpectedly pulled into something so primeval, almost cozy in its leveling pain.

kundalini?”

Mostly you put concealer on and then later take it off and nothing life-changing happens in between.

most of life is a vapor of unconscious associations, never brought to light. A