It’s hard to put a bandaid
on yourself
You know what I mean
It’s hard to be the aid
To hold the bandage and have the wound
Of course it’s not impossible
People do it all the time
But still
Just because people do it all the time
Doesn’t make it the best way
The loving way
It’s just a way
I miss my mom wrapping up my fingers for me
There I said it
I miss her and I wish I didn’t have so many
painful places to begin with
Welcome to The ALIVE hour.
Illustration: Shannon Colon
Audio: Chloe Riley, Nathan Karagianis. carefulGIANTS, music.
Things found in real life:
This vow from “The Mummy, the Will, and the Crypt” by John Bellairs
This decomposing punkin head
This ginkgo tree, completely green and shedding its leaves
Things found on the internet:
This quote from that master of horror Stephen King, talking about the real-life horror he endured when he was almost killed after being hit by a car:
“For me, there have been times when the act of writing has been an act of faith, a spit in the eye of despair. Writing is not life, but I think that sometimes it can be a way back to life.”
This poem from this story of doctor and terminal patient sharing a love of words:
Time is promise,
But uninvited circumstance
And wounded souls
Eventually barter it away.
The owner of my borrowed time
Will arrive at random to insist
All what remains of me vanish . . . .
A shadow of a shadow
Passing into mist.
So, I and my last day
Will take a journey together
When we both are spent,
That leaves the familiar
Once infused in all the days,
To stand at the edge of night,
And wonder in the dying light
Exactly where we went.
This reminiscence about painter Helen Frankenthaler, via her stepdaughter Lise Motherwell:
“…Helen could paint anywhere. She could paint near the water, in the woods, in a hotel room, in a closet. That really speaks to something she said about her painting ‘Mountains and Sea’ — that she held a place in her arms as a memory, as something she felt, more than something she saw. She held the emotional memory of it.”
The ALIVE hour can also be found on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Google Podcasts
The ALIVE hour