Important Info For This Evening

Merry Thanksgivoween

I'll be busy the next few months, so I thought I'd just cover it all now.

Mmm. They left out a few holidays. I'll work on that.

The most delicious time of year is coming...

...and I'm not talking about candy. PIE! I am a whore for pumpkin pie. Mmm, whipped cream, yum yum!

So not funny, and yet....

"This is the story of how we begin to remember
This is the powerful pulsing of love in the vein
After the dream of falling and calling your name out
These are the roots of rhythm
And the roots of rhythm remain..."

Paul Simon, Under African Skies

deadbolts, drugs, and Christmas Eve: The Last Straw

Onward....

After being kicked out, being homeless, starving and then juvvie, I was sent back home via the court system.

Oh joy.

Same old bullshit, but then my parents had a trump card over my head- the dead bolts. Yes, the dead bolts they installed when they kicked me out, the dead bolts that required a key from both the inside and outside of the house, the dead bolts that they would give my fucked up older brother a key to but I was not allowed to have one.

I think it was their own personal way of saying, "Fuck you, subhuman," to me, since they were being forced by the legal system to take care of me.

Whatever.

The difficulty it placed on my brother didn't seem to bother them either.

After awhile, I caught on to why they installed them both ways. Not only could they lock me out, but they could also lock me in.

If I was in trouble, they would lock all the doors so I couldn't leave. Couldn't go outside. Couldn't go sit under my favorite tree, no making snowmen, whatever. Couldn't check the mail. (This was back before the internet, which they no doubt would have blocked me from as well.)

Combined with the switch they had installed in the computer room, this effectively isolated me. The switch was to turn off every phone in the house, except for the one in the computer room, which had an answering machine. Meaning, I couldn't use a phone, but they wouldn't miss any calls. The computer room was also locked at all times.

I could go to school. I could go to church. Whoopdeedoo. I started skipping school all the time, because it was the only damn chance I had to get out of the house. I'd go sit in the park, play frisbee with my friends. Sure I would get in trouble for skipping school, but how much more trouble could I possibly get in? What where they going to do, stop me from going to school?

I stopped going to church. It was just more time to have the empty house to myself. I started to despise the plastic way my mom acted like we were a normal family, the way she was hateful to me the whole ride there (and back) but inside the church she acted like the kind hearted Christian, involved in choir, bell choir, the finance committee, what the fuck ever else. People would smile at us and hug me, and I started to just hate them all. What a load of crap. I'd rather sit at home and stare at the fucking walls, thanks.

More than a few times I was freaked out by the fact that I was afraid I would start screaming during the minute long silent prayer. I always liked the silent prayer. There was something really cool about a room full of people being silent and thoughtful.

Alas, the panic attacks that I'd started having at fourteen were worsening. And for some reason, the silent prayer always set them off. I was terrified I would just start screaming, uncontrollably, and be unable to stop. I could imagine the echo, the shocked faces once I stopped and opened my eyes.

Yah. Better to just stay at home. So, I did.

Now, I should explain that I spent most of my childhood "grounded", in this case meaning I wasn't allowed to go out and play. My mom would give me the choice of a spanking or being grounded, but once she and my dad split up, she didn't seem to have the heart to do spankings anymore. So, from the age of about six, I was grounded. Most of my life.

My friends would comment about it all the time. There were times I was grounded for not days, weeks, but months at a time. When you know you're not allowed to go out for the next 3 months, what's the harm in sneaking out with your friends and hoping you don't get caught? Oh, golly gee whiz, another week tacked on to that three months? What the fuck ever, you know? Sometimes I just wanted to go for a fucking bike ride. My mom always assumed I wanted to go out for some nefarious reason, but as a teenager, my favorite thing to do was go make a campfire in the woods with my friends. Some of them would drink, but I wasn't a drinker. Someone would bring a little tape player and we'd all dance around to the B-52's or Dead Can Dance or something. Just sit around, smoke cigarrettes, talk about life, laugh. The good stuff (other than smoking).

Don't let me fool you, I was doing drugs then. Thanks to my older brother insisting I try (well, everything) I started smoking weed. I noticed it made the unbearably long periods of time stuck in the house a wee bit more bearable. One can only read so many books, people. I would get high and paint, write, read, listen to music, sit there and (I know, GASP) introspect.

At one point I tried LSD for the first time. That is a story in and of itself, which I will get to, but I found that LSD made a LOT of hours go by quickly. Or, if not quickly, at least they were far more interesting.

The strange thing is, I liked pot ok, but I really liked LSD. Reasons, many, of which I will get to later, but mostly because it wasn't alcohol. You can't become addicted to LSD. If I was going to do drugs, it wasn't going to be the shit that fucked my dad all up. With LSD, you can only take so much, and then you've depleted the chemicals in your brain. (Dopamine, I believe it is.) So, you have to have a waiting period inbetween the times you can do it again, or it just doesn't work. It's not something you can do every day, or even every week.

Let me clear about this: in no way am I condoning the use of LSD. It is a VERY powerful drug. It has the ability to do irreperable damage to the psyche, not to mention the physical aspects. I'm just telling you my story. I'm not trying to make it sound glamorous. There were some very bad times, but I'll get to that when I get to the tales of LSD.

My point is simply that I was stuck in my house, and it was like taking a mini vacation.

Sometimes I would just get too claustrophobic and sneak out. Sometimes while tripping, usually not. When I was tripping I was pretty content to just paint with watercolors and listen to music. I got really good at sneaking out, going so far as to get a wig that looked like my hair for when I stuffed my bed. My mom would come check, and seeing a lumpy bed is one thing, but she didn't catch on to the wig for a long time. Ha. Most of my teenage years were a battle of who could outwit the other, me or my mom. She won a few times, but it was mostly me. I'm guessing she didn't like that too much.

The difference was, of course, that our reasons for doing so were completely different motivations. She wanted to keep me in line. I wanted to keep my sanity intact. Which runs faster, the lion who wants some dinner, or the antelope that wants to live?

Antelope: victorious.

If you can call sneaking around to have human contact victorious, sure.

The door locking thing was just ridiculous. When they were home, even, the doors were locked. They would unlock them to let the dogs out into the backyard, then lock them again. Unlock them to let the dogs back in, lock them again. At sixteen years old, I could see that all that LSD in the world could not make me as insane as these people. It was unbearable to watch them do that. What maniacs, what hateful, control freak maniacs.

Christmas Eve was the breaking point. They asked me if I wanted to go to church. I liked the Christmas services, they were really beautiful. The candlelight service was especially gorgeous, with everyone getting a candle and one person would light one candle, then person to person through the aisles, aisle after aisle, until everyones candles were lit. We would all sing Silent Night and then walk out of the sanctuary in silence, with our candles lighting the way. Powerful imagery. I wanted to see it, but I just hated them so. I knew they wouldn't let me get out of their sight for a second, and I didn't feel like letting them ruin such a beautiful thing for me, so I stayed home.

My brother went out with his friends. My parents locked me in the house (phones turned off) and left.

There were two ceremonies that night. My mom, being in choir (me having given it up the year before), had to be at both. I knew they would be gone for over four hours.

Silence. I sat there in the living room, staring at the lights on our Christmas tree, twinkling merrily. I sat there for hours, long after it was dark, just sat there staring at it, thinking. The snow outside, the twinkling tree, the "Let's Pretend We Like Each Other" presents under the tree, the silence. I thought about all the Christmas movies, carols, and how Christmas was supposed to be such a merry time.



I decided I hated Christmas. Fuck Christmas. Fucking holiday of joy, fuck it. I realized that if I fell down the stairs and bashed my head open, I couldn't even call a fucking ambulance, nor go outside and get help. No. I would have to open a window, pry out a screen, fall to the ground and crawl through the snow to a neighbors house. While my parents yukked it up and made merry with all the other plastic people in church, I could die and they wouldn't even know until they came home.

I almost wished I would, just to show them what bastards they were.

My brother came home, unexpectedly. He walked in, saw me sitting there staring at the tree, stopped suddenly and gently said, "Come on. Get your coat."

(pause for a moment of crying...somebody cared, you know? At least someone was thinking of me...)

We walked out to the car, where all his friends were. They basically just drove around some back roads, drinking and blaring Megadeath or whatever it was, and I was glad to be with people, but really had nothing to say. They were all so drunk and happy, and I was just too far into my own misery to join in the hoopla.

At midnight, he took me home. He said, "Just don't mention it to Mom, ok?" I nodded. He left, locking the door behind him. I went upstairs and started plotting how to run away. A week later, I was gone...

"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
-Martin Luther King, Jr.

(thanks, Stardust)

I have a strange urge to take up bicycling...

you tell me...

Don't be a rude asshole

Or you will force old ladies to seek their own sweet revenge.

Here's to you, Rosa. You were my very first hero.

.........................oh

I've been listening to a meditation CD that I got this weekend. At first it seemed hokie, but then I managed to calm down and focus more, and felt so much better.

Being in the now.

It's difficult.

It's interesting, with all the emotional vomiting of the past that I've been doing, I've been having the most difficult time acknowledging that these aren't just stories I am telling you. To write them is painful, cathartic. But to read them is worse.

It makes me feel oddly schizophrenic. I know this is my life I'm reading about. I know these stories I tell you have happened to me. And yet, somehow... the stories are NOT me.

I've been struggling with this feeling for days. There are more to write, but first I feel I need to understand why it is that telling the stories leaves me feeling so strangely splintered.

I suspect most of it comes from the fact that I was never fully present for a lot of it. I managed to disassociate myself at the time.

*shocked pause*

Ok, I went and googled "disassociation" in relation to psychology and found a few tests. They are tests for children. I took them. They fit me to a T, as they say.

Oh fuck. I'm going to go work out. I don't really know what to write about at the moment, I need to think about this one.

you tell me

compactable car

Apparently a car company in China has come out with a new car, the Landwind, which will be available in European markets soon, and European junk yards soon thereafter.

I'm all about affordable transportation, but I, personally, like my cars to be not so crunchy.

This is a test.

This was only a test. In case of a real emergency, you would have been flooded with vaginal information on your local radio station. You would have heard enough information about vaginas to become a gynocologist on the spot. Never fear, this is only a test, and you may still have your lovely delusions about the glorious mysteries of the vagina.

But I cannot resist this public service announcement: The outside of the pussy is NOT called the vagina. The part you can see is called the vulva. Please, stop calling the vulva a vagina. Unless you have a speculum handy, or looking into a woman who's just had a baby pop out of her, you cannot SEE a vagina. It is inside.

And I am a proud owner of one.

So there.

*clunk*

I would tell you things, but I'm too busy curling up into fetal positions around my house.
That story telling yesterday just fucked me all up. Pulling things out of The Fact Box is painful. Writing through two feet of solid armor is difficult, too.

For me, I present me with this:




to make me feel better.

That's me in the middle, of course. At least, what I would look like if I looked like her and weren't wearing all the fucking armor.

I'm in here somewhere.

kicked out (the whole story)

At fifteen, my mom kicked me out the house.

I wasn't a terrible kid, (well, maybe). I came home late. All the time. Most of the time it wasn't on purpose, I was just enjoying myself and since that happened so fucking rarely, I lost track of time. Other times, I would know it was time to go home but just dread being there, so I would put it off. I knew I would get in trouble no matter how later I was- 5 minutes or 5 hours, so fuck it. Most of the time I just came home and then sneak back out when they fell asleep. Easy enough.

I should note that this had been the case since I was little. I mean, five or six. I would go to my friends house and leave for home late, take some crazy long out of the way trip home, dawdle near my favorite tree, just lay in the fields listening to the wind whisper in the grass, that sort of thing.

I ask you, what would you prefer: your mother telling you how bad you suck or listening to the snow fall, the crickets sing, the frogs croak....? It was a no-brainer for me.

Come home on time? Why? She was a bitch, either way. If I came home on time I got a well earned sarcastic, "WOW. You managed to make it here on time. Why? Wouldn't they feed you? You must have been bored." etc etc, blah fucking blah.

Positive reinforcement goes a long way people. It is a difficult task for me to do with my son, as I wasn't trained in it.

So, one day my mom just snapped. I came home, and she followed me upstairs. She stood in my doorway and told me to get out. She said, "You're friends like keeping you out late, they can just keep you. Get out."

I suppose maybe she thought I would be upset? Fuck- she just handed me my ticket to freedom, as far as I was concerned. The only thing I was upset about was that I had bought my first Grateful Dead album (Terrapin Station) and there was no way my record player was portable. (sigh) I would have to leave it, unlistened to. Sad. Other than that, I calmly threw my favorite clothes in a bag while she glared at me and then took off.

Where did I go? I don't remember.

Eventually I ended up in a rather fucked up situation, surprise, surprise. The guy my friend had been trying to hook me up with was telling me he could find me somewhere to stay, and knowing that being his "girlfriend" (i.e. fucking him) would seal the deal, I did. I thought it was for the best. The girl I had only recently made friends with, and most of my friends didn't know her. So, her friends were a whole new group of people a few cities away, and thus I was less likely to be found.

Note: I did not want to be found. I was afraid my mom would make me come back.

Apparently, the feeling was mutual. I called home a few times just to let her know I was ok, so she wouldn't worry. She informed me that she changed all the locks on the house to deadbolts, so I couldn't come home if I wanted to. These deadbolts required a key from BOTH sides, but that only comes in to the story where I ran away. I have yet to tell you that one.

Ok. Not going home. Fifteen years old. No money. No job. What to do?

Let the retarded alcoholic "boyfriend" figure that out. I thought it was a fair exchange for letting him fuck me. I realize, in hindsight, it was basically a form of prostitution. At the time, I didn't give a shit. He was stupid enough to think he was in love with me, and get me food sometimes.

I still think of him every time I eat sloppy joe's. His mom had made some and she left to go out somewhere, so he'd sneek me into his house (she hated me) and told me what was for dinner (/breakfast/lunch/dinner). I would have taken a dog crap sandwich, I didn't care. I always thought I hated sloppy joe's, but it turns out that when you're starving ANY food tastes really good.

I have eaten a Spam sandwich, also. It was absolutely fucking spectacular, I have to say. Hunger does funny things.

Dumb ass "boyfriend" works out a deal with a friend of his that lets me stay in his garage. The friend is nice enough, although under house arrest for something. What, I never bothered to ask. Because he couldn't leave, everyone had to party at his house, and half of his garage had a ratty ass old couch, a couple of lawn chairs and a table or something in the middle. This was where we all hung out, where they all drank (I've never been a drinker), smoked pot and played poker.

It was also my home. The ratty disgusting old couch was my bed. Unfortunately, I had to wait till all the stoned drunks were done yelling and laughing and playing poker before I could go to "bed". They would all go home, leaving beer bottles and overflowing ashtrays and whatever other filth they managed to partially consume behind. I would wait a little while, to make sure (Garage Guys) Mom was asleep, then take my giant cup and go fill it up with water from their house out back.

I would find somewhere semi private to pee, and then I would drink the entire glass of water. It filled my stomach, and since I was starving, it helped me get to sleep. And then I would go lay on the nasty couch and fell asleep amid the smoke and old beer and gasoline fumes.

(Note: I suspect this is where my manic "I hate scratchy things" came from. Hmm.)

I would, of course, try to clean it all up a little, but there's only so much I could do.

I lived there for a long time, maybe a few months? The thing is, I don't remember. I think I've blocked an awful lot of it out. I do remember how much it sucked to wake up and have to pee but have nowhere to go in the daylight. And then I would have to sneak out so his mom didn't notice...but then where to go? I had no money. So mostly I would wait in the garage till the dumbass "boyfriend" would come get me.

~sigh~

I spent a lot of time in that garage, I suspect.

I rarely ever spoke to anyone other than them. I was cast out , so I did my part by being an outcast. When I told this story to my shrink last week, she asked me if I called anyone. I just looked at her like an idiot. "Who?" And then realized, "My dad? My grandparents? My friends? The police, for fucks sake?" None of those things occurred to me. I didn't realize that what my mother was doing wasn't just wrong, it was actually illegal. She had trained me so well to despise my horrible self that I just accepted my fate without any struggle at all.

I liked it better than living at home, at any rate.

I got really good at garage hopping. I don't know if this is a common term anywhere else, so I'll explain: garage hopping means going into other peoples garages and stealing shit. A lot of people have refrigerators in the garage, full of beer. It was a trade. I could find beer for the underage kids, they would slip me some cash or food.

Mostly, though, I did it to eat the food. I was far more happy to find food in a fridge than beer. Pepsi? Yum. Maybe some donuts or something? I could make that shit last a week or more. Honestly, most of it I don't remember.

I managed to get in contact with some of my friends who informed me that they were moving to California. They bought a big school bus and had renovated it for the trip to the the West Coast. They said I could come along, and I was thrilled. Absolutely beside myself THRILLED. A bus meant a place to stay. Sort of. A step up from a garage, I thought, anyway. When I asked them how I could possibly pull my share, they told me there were all kinds of strip clubs that would allow underage girls to dance. My thought at the time, "Ok, whatever." I didn't want to strip, but it was still better than going home.

I called my mom. I told her I was moving to California, and asked if I could come back to grab a few more things before I left. I told her she wouldn't have to worry about her precious deadbolts, I'd be on the other side of the continent. She said, yes, I could come back, but that she would watch every single thing that I packed to make sure I didn't "try to steal anything". Yah, whatever bitch. I figured it was the last time I'd have to see her cunt face, so who cared?

I got there. I started packing. I was really excited, although the feeling was dampened by my moms incessant questioning/belittlement. "How do you think a fifteen year old girl is going to make it on her own in California?" she snarled. "The same way she does it in Michigan," I reasonably responded. She kept asking me questions, getting more and more pissed off. My general attitude was like, "Yah, un huh, buh bye."

She kept stalling me. I wasn't sure why. I just wanted to get out.

I figured it out when the cops arrived. I heard my step dad announce, "They're here," to which my mom smiled an evil little grin. "Someone would like to talk to you before you move," she said.

I walked downstairs to find two cops, and wondered what the bloody hell they wanted to ask me. It turned out some friend of mine were in deep shit with the law, and they wanted some answers. I gave them none. They then handcuffed me. I was baffled and pissed.

"What the hell are you handcuffing me for?" I angrily protested. "For being a run away," was their retarded response. I yelled, "I'm not a damn run away! I got kicked OUT! I came home to get clothes! How the hell can you arrest me for being a run away when I didn't run away and I'M IN MY DAMN HOUSE?!?!?"

They just led me out to the police car. I started screaming, totally fucking furious. I yelled something on the way out about how my step dad had underage porn (at the time, I didn't realize it was legal girls acting underage) and once we got outside I was quiet. It was broad daylight. All the neighbors could see me. Fucking nice. Real nice.

I sat in the backseat, completely pissed off. I was still handcuffed. Considering that I was wearing a thin cotton tank dress, tie-dyed, of course, I found it even more humiliating. I started giving them the verbal tongue lashing that only my mother herself could teach me how to do, asking them if the handcuffs were really necessary, or did they just want to look at my nipples? Did they think perhaps I was hiding a gun in there, and if so, where would it be? They could have just performed a cavity search but apparently handcuffing a scantily clad fifteen year old is how they got their jollies, etc etc, you get the idea.

They took me to juvie. As in, juvenile jail. I was placed into the low security (but still plenty fucking secure, I assure you) area, where they finally removed my handcuffs. I asked them if they were sure, had they seen enough, would they like a fucking picture to remember my titties by? Are they sure? No? Ok then. I'm sure I added something lovely about them rotting in hell or sticking it up their asses or something, but I couldn't tell you what it was.

Locked up.

I spent the last month or two starving, living in a fucking garage, and then my mom somehow manages to convince the police to throw me in kid jail. What the fucking fuck? An hour before I was excited about starting my new life in California, and then instead I'm locked up with what turned out to be a whole bunch of seriously psycho bitches.

I was immediately ordered to some "dressing room" where I was issued some hideously horrible clothes and assigned to a bed, a locker, in a room full of fucking nut jobs. I didn't know they were nut jobs. I found out the next morning.

One girl took my last package of jam. I took it back from her. The entire table fell silent, and she coldly informed me that since I was "the new kid" she might led it slide, since I obviously didn't know who she was. I told her calmly that I didn't give a fuck who she was, it's my jam. I spread it on my toast, and ate it. She informed me I was going to "get it" and I told her to pencil me in when she could.

Be under no delusion that I wasn't scared shitless. I just knew how bullies operated and I damn well wasn't about to put up with anyone's shit. I had enough. I didn't care if I got my ass beat every day by that bitch, she would find out that my will was much stronger than my body. She would never break me. That was a fact.

It never came to that, and thank goodness. I had so much pentup rage I might have killed her by accident, and that would have, you know, been bad. What ended up happening was that I spent the day with a couple of the other "new kids", while all the "been there's" went to "school" (it was of course, on the barbed wire fenced premises as well...)

Me and those guys spent the day talking about what a fucking crazy place it was and playing cards. They were three young black guys, and kept trying to teach me spades. I was trying to teach them euchre. Alas, all good things must come to an end and the "been there's" came back.

At dinner, the bully bitch informed me that she knew I had been talking about her while she was gone (I rolled my eyes at her) and that she hoped I could sleep through the night. I told her to give it her best shot.

Nothing happened. She just kept throwing me looks and warning me about what was going to happen, and since she was the girls bully, all the other girls treated me like a piece of shit, afraid of her wrath if she didn't.

That day was my court date.

To stay in juvie, the court has a hearing and all, to decide exactly how bad you are, how long you'll be staying, yadda yadda. I sit down at a bench with whoever was representing me. They asked me questions. I answered them, honestly.

I looked over to see my mom and stepdad in the court room. Of course. What could make this moment any more hideous for me? Perhaps the bully bitch will come knock my teeth out while I'm on the stand and my mom could stand up and cheer her on? I mean, really.

Court turned out to be nothing like I expected. It was, in all honesty, the exact OPPOSITE of what I thought would happen.

The judge starts asking me questions, I answer him. My lawyer or whatever starts answering them. It's all very cold hard, these are the facts sort of thing.

The the judge starts asking my mom questions. It suddenly got very interesting...

"Did you ask your daughter to leave the house on the night of (whatever it was, I forget)?" She answered, with her shitty righteous tone of voice, "Yes, sir, I did."

"Did you, at any time, ask your daughter to come back home?" She replied, "No, sir, I did not."

"Did you have any contact with your daughter during this time?" She said, "Yes, she did phone me on a few occasions to let me know that she was ok. She called once to make sure she didn't miss her dentist appointment, also."

I suddenly started hearing what sounded like repressed snickers in the courtroom. I couldn't figure out what was going on.

The judge said, "You are telling me, then, that your daughter called to inform you of her safety, and you did not ask her to return home. Is this correct?" She said, "Yes."

My lawyer dude made a comment about the locks being changed on all the doors so that I couldn't return.

The judge said, "Is that true?" My mom,"Yes. We were afraid she would try to come back home while we were at work."

The snickers got louder. There were even outright laughs.

Huh? What was going on?

Once the judge had had enough, he just went off on my mom, and thundered, "I order you to take your daughter home RIGHT NOW. She is your responsibility and it is illegal for you to kick her out of your house, DO YOU UNDERSTAND???"

My mom, ever bitchful, said frantically, "But we filed for incorrigibility!"

The judge said, "Until those papers arrive on my desk, I do not want to see your face again!"

BAM! went the gavel.

The courtroom was now awash in derisive laughter.

They were laughing. At my mom.

I don't know that I have ever had a sweeter self righteous moment as that, but that was classic. I turned around, glad she was wrong, glad I was right, but not particularly happy to have to go back and live with her. Ugh. I sighed, resigned for the moment.

My mom looked as if she were ready to kill.

I was taken back to the place I was locked up, got my stuff, and made sure to leave a message for the bully bitch. Something sweet like, "Fucking blow me, you two bit whore." I wrote it on the cover of her diary. I was a small hurricane in there, while they weren't looking. Why would they bother? I was no longer a ward of the state. I gathered up my shit and left.

My parents were waiting at the door, looking as if everything in the world had gone wrong. Whatever. I got in the backseat of the car and we rode in silence for a long time. They finally informed me that we were on our way to a family dinner with my stepdad's parents, at Red Lobster. They begged me to behave.

Behave? Are you fucking kidding me? I'm going to Red Lobster! I've been starving for months and nearly beaten up for a package of fucking jam! I'm going to Red motherfucking Lobster!

We got there, and his whole family was there, and all looking rather surprised to see me. Ha. My mom informed me that since his parents were paying for everyone, it would be polite of me to order something inexpensive. Yah. Ok.

When the waitress came over I ordered a pile of crab legs and I don't know what all. F-u-c-k-i-n-g s-t-a-r-v-e-d, what was there not to understand? I was rail thin. If I could, I wanted to gain back every goddamn pound right then and there, starting with melted butter and crab legs.

I'm surprised I didn't puke, honestly. But I didn't.

My parents reamed me out the whole way home about how rude that was of me to order the most expensive things, blah blah fucking blah. I was so full. I didn't fucking care.

We got home, and they unlocked the door. They informed me that I was not going to GET a key to the deadbolts. No. My brother had one, and I would just have to organize with him to let me in, since he was far more responsible than I was.

Yah. The Satanist is more responsible than me. He's the one who started me smoking cigarettes. He's the one who got me high the first time. He's the one who told me all about how cool is was to trip. He's the one that taught me how to sneak out. Yah. Ok.

I just nodded, went upstairs and threw my shit down on the floor. I laid in a bed, in a real bed, my bed, and put on my new, unlistened to Dead album. Finally.


Inspiration, move me brightly
Light the song with sense of colour
Hold away despair
More than this I will not ask
Faced with mysteries dark and vast
Statements just seem vain at last
Some rise, some fall, some climb
To get to Terrapin

Bacharach gets jiggy wid it

Aweomse! My favorite! Who doesn't love a little Pee Pee Pie?

so many puns, so little time

Oh, no, wait. So much time?

Proof that some people have too much time on their hands...

The Clock of the Long Now. When it stops, is now over? I mean, that name implies an awful lot. Will it then be referred to as The Clock of the Long Then?

Personally, this obsessive-compulsive finds it admirable. You really like that clock. I get it, dude. You have a very serious clock thing going on. The idea is genius. The dedication is astounding.

But how will it help me get anywhere on time? Oh. Right.

Has anyone else read Thief of Time (by Terry Pratchett) and had a little twinkling of wonder?

grocery minions

I just spent an hour at the grocery store. I bought just a few things.

What took me so long? My cashier.

The other ladies in line (two, count em, two) were livid. It took this poor guy almost 40 minutes to ring the three of us up. I was trying to keep the poor lady in front of me from going straight up postal on this kids ass, and it wasn't easy.

She kept turning and looking at me, with this expression of exasperation, like, "Can you BELIEVE this???" I just laughed every time she did it.

Finally she turns around and says, "He's got to be on something! I mean, really!" I smiled at her. I got to thinking about when I smoked pot and went to work, and all I could think is, if this is him high, he hasn't been smoking for long. I could whip those groceries right on through there, although coherant conversation wasn't one of my strong points.

But this kid...it was like everything he did was stupid. If you can imagine a cashier than cannot do anything right, that was him. I didn't want to judge him too harshly, I mean, what if he's mentally handicapped or something? I tried to watch him as discreetly as possible, although I think he was finally catching on to the fact that we were talking about him.

When the lady in front of me finally got her turn, she looked at me as she pushed the cart forward, and said, "I don't even know if I want to do this..." as if she was going to just freak out and run balls out screaming from the store. I tried to not look at her while he rang her up. I was afraid I was just going to start laughing and not stop.

When he finally finished her, she nearly ran off. He told her, "Wait, wait..." and she told him, "It's fine! I don't need my receipt!" I think she was afraid he might try to shackle her to his Stupid or something. He was having trouble with running her check through, and he kept saying, "Wait. Don't go yet. It won't work. Wait." and doing it over and over again until the machine took it correctly.

She split.

My turn.

I'm all little miss chill, talking to him, "Hey, how's it going?" He groaned and rolled his eyes at me in perfect teenage angst. He said, "Well, I felt fine till I stood up." I nearly bit my tongue off trying not to laugh. "Long day, huh?" I managed to say with a straight face.

He just looked at me, looked at me, with that same teenage oh-my-god-could-you-just-die expression and actually thwacks the computer monitor towards me and motions at it stupidly.

"I've been here 30 minutes," he says. As if this was just proof that his job was obviously the fourth or at least fifth pit of hell itself.

I look at the monitor, but all I can see is my grocery receipt and no proof of his time spent in hell or what have you. Besides, I know he's been there longer than 30 minutes, I've been standing in his fucking line that long.

I grab everything as it comes down the little conveyor belt, quickly bagging them myself, not trusting the state of my lightbulbs to him.

I say some niceties, tell him I hope his day gets better (knowing full well it won't) and go home. Then I call the manager.

It takes forever to get a hold of him, too. When I finally get through, I explain that I just waited over 30 minutes in a line of 3 people, and he might want to go see what's wrong with the kid on that last register. First I tactfully said, "I..uh...I'm not sure there's a delicate way to ask this... I'm wondering if perhaps the cashier that rang me up might be...ah...mentally challenged in some way? Because, if not, he's sick or maybe high. I'm not sure, but you might want to go check him out before anyone else goes through his line."

The manager apologized profusely, I told him it wasn't a big deal (depsite my no longer frozen food) and hung up.

Alas, I will not know the fate of Stupid Cashier Boy. We will just have to assume that he is currently residing in the 6th pit of hell.



And dude, it is slow down there.

sticks and stones...

I'm at a bit of a loss.

There are things I want to write about. Traumatic things. You've heard plenty of them already, but there are sooooo many more to go.

I worry, that you will be turned off by the sheer amount of emotional vomit that I spew these days. Because I do so love you, dear readers. Your comments, witty snippets, reality checks, and emotional support mean far more than you know.

It's true.

The things I have to say aren't the sort of small talk you make with strangers. The problem is, I rarely ever bother with the small talk, which is why I have so few friends. Either people can handle my straight up psychological mosh pit of introspection, or they cannot.

Many cannot.

My family cannot.

That's why I started blogging. The tagline on the top of the page hasn't changed since day 1. "Brain overflowing..." That sums up my need to blog.

That and sometimes I just want to make you laugh. Lately, not so much. There's so much seriousness pouring out of me I'm afraid of coming off as heavy.

Well, such is life. Life can be very heavy. And I go through these phases, where it bubbles up to the surface and there is only two choices:

1) stuff it back down and get an ulcer (a frequent choice throughout my life)

2) projectile vomit it into the blogosphere

My wedding....the wedding...is no doubt causing this.

I took a nap today. It was lovely. I woke up, feeling joyous. I wanted to stay in that sleepy carefree state of not-wakefulness, but it was mere moments before my brain clicked on and started running.

My first thought:

I can't wait to marry Jack (Mr. Wonderful). In particular, I can't wait to shed my fathers name.

Like a rebirth, Jack and I an island unto ourselves, my new family. Jack and I will be family. The family I've always wanted. The family I've dreamed of.

We are that already, I know. I just mean, legally...I get to lose that last name. It will be gone. Scoured clean, metaphorically free of an affliction. A snake shedding it's skin, a butterfly hatching from it's cucoon.

No longer introducing myself with the constant reminder of my father and who he is. That name will not be me.

I look forward to it.

"What Kind of Soul Do You Retain?"

Loving
You have a very warm and loving aura about your soul and believe in the virtues of Love. To you, there is a bright side to everything! You are the polar opposite of the Dark soul.

Them, me and sand.

I had an appointment with the shrink today. I showed her the stupid card my dad sent. She asked me a lot of questions, trying to figure out why the hell my dad would be such a freak. I told her a lot of answers. I told her a lot of stories about my childhood. She stared at me a lot, and managed to only gape a few times.

I explained to her my theory about being the sum of our experiences. Wait- let me clarify...It is not that we are the sum of our experience, but that our understanding of the world is shaped by our experience.

In my case, my fucked up family seemed perfectly normal to me. I was unhappy, but thought that was just your average run of the mill angst. I was pissed off, sure, but not half as pissed off as I am now. At the time, I was made to believe that all the problems I encountered were my own stupid doing. And while, yes, that is true, your parents job is to guide you to make better choices. They exist to raise you, teach you how to get along in the world, make you a productive member of society, and hopefully, a happy person.

Mine did not do that. I am thinking in particular of when my mom kicked me out of the house at fifteen. It's a story for another day, but I'll get back to it. It was a tale that my shrink was flabbergasted with. I explained that to me, it was normal. I'm fifteen, I'm homeless, shit happens. It was only in retrospect that I realized what a crappy fucking job she did raising me.

Anyway, all that aside, I then went to the bank. I deposited the check from my dad, only then noticing that in the little area at the bottom for "memo:" it says, "have a good day".

I blinked at it, and handed it to the bank teller.

I then drove to the beach and just laid in the sand. Just laid there. Blue sky above me, endless ocean in front of me, seagulls circling, warm breeze...

I looked at seashells on the shore for a few minutes, then went back to just laying there, spread eagled in the sand.

I took off my shoes, dug my feet in. I spread out my arms and started touching the sand. My mind wandered. I let it do so.

I thought about how I am a product of my environment (cue: Circle Jerks, the band, not the act you ninnies), but that doesn't make me the END product. I have been sculpted but I am not finished. I am changeable.

The sand drifted through my open palms, scoop it up, let it drift down, gaze at sky...

Each particle of sand, each event in my life, the ocean, ever moving, yet one whole body of water. The distance between my family and I, as seen from space, them there, me here, laying at the edge of the ocean, 700 miles away. I am a product of them, but I am NOT them.

I am me.

I am individual.

I am I.

I ran my hands over the crusted over top layer of sand, then broke through to the softer and moister sand beneath. My shell, my inner world. Sand being an endless array of crushed and pulverized used-to-be-life. My issues being events that happened and are no more.

I am here. I am now. I am I.

Metaphor's dancing through my mind as I enjoyed the amazing feeling of being able to lie back on the sand and not constantly scan for possible dangers (thank you Xanax). It's been a really long time since I just sat or laid anywhere outside of my own house and relaxed. Eyes closed. Trusting, or at least, hopeful. I would say it's been at least 10 years since that's happened.

I worried once or twice about seagulls crapping on me, but that was the worst of it. Some guys came by, talking loudly, and I found that jarring a bit. Turns out they both had dogs they were playing with, so I settled back and relaxed again.

The ocean, the sand, the sun, the solitude. Me. Not them. Me.

I pondered my families ability to make me feel worthless, second best (and that's being hopeful), not good enough. I saw myself from outside of myself, outside of the realm of their judgmental eyes, and I saw a diamond laying in the sand. A jewel.

I wonder... why can't they see me?

My guess would be a good old psychological answer: they have never been trained to see themselves that way, either. As much as I love my grandma, the woman has a razor tongue. The fact that my mother is a cold as she is should come as no great surprise.

In the same way that my grandmother is likely far more tender with me, my mother is also far more tender with my son. He can't understand why his mom hated his grandma so much when she was younger (and now, but I leave that out of it).

The sand, drifting, blowing hard, scouring my skin, then covering me with grainy particles. I still haven't gotten it out of my bra as I write this...

The events of life, scouring, invasive, yet blow away. Shifting, changing, even sometimes accommodating.

Them, far away, living the lives they chose. Me, here, living the life I chose.

Me, them. Connected, but separate.

~~cue the song "Blackbird" by The Beatles~~

I request your love, please...

I just got the wedding RSVP card back from my dad.

My dad isn't coming. That I knew. I sent him the invite because what else was I supposed to do? So I sent it.

I didn't expect to see anything from him in my mailbox. I think, actually, I've seen things from my dad a total of 5 times -in my life- in my mailbox.

In it was the card that I wrote to him,

"Hi Dad,

I know you aren't coming to the wedding but I thought you might like to see the official invitations anyway.

Love you!

The Soon-To-Be Mrs. (Wonderful)"

I mean, what else could I write? How much resentment can one person filter out? Even on paper?

~sigh~

He sent the card back, with a check for $100. (He gave my brother 4 times that much when he got married, but who's resentfully counting?) His bizarre fucked up scrawl says this,

"Best of luck for you and (Mr. Wonderful) and (my sons name, which he has yet to spell correctly)- I will not travel to Virginia Beach. You should know I go deer hunting & Nov. 15th Ha Ha. So I won't miss my hunting trip. They need someone to keep them happy..

Dad.

Small ck, I don't shop at (place we registered)"

(That was exactly what he wrote, misspellings and weirdness and all.)

I know my dad used to go hunting when I was really little, but I've never heard anything about him going hunting in 25 years. He can barely walk around the grocery store, am I supposed to believe he's going to go hide up in trees and be Mr. Fucking Stealth in the forest? Hell, he groans about walking to the kitchen to get a fresh cup of coffee!

Besides the fact that he wouldn't miss the fucking "trip" to come to my wedding anyway. It's like he just sat there trying to come up with an excuse. And then he took the lamest one he could and tried to pass it off as believable.

There is, quite possibly, nothing that pisses me off more than being treated as if I am stupid.

Yah. It was hunting that kept you away. Not only did he tell me he wasn't coming before I even SET A DATE, now he's trying to tell me that it's more important to shoot a fucking deer than attend the wedding of his only daughter.

I really don't know if there is a way for me to express the electrifying feeling of a lifetime of rage, so I'm not even going to try.

I can tell you I sat here and tried to figure out what to do with his check. For a moment I wished I smoked pot, so I could go spend it on drugs, or like a hooker or something. Something as tainted as it feels to me.

I'd like to send him a thank you note, telling him I sent it to my mom in lieu of a lifetime of child support he never paid.

Ok, help a girl out here. You all know I love to diffuse my anger with humor. For me, as a beautiful gift for me, I would love for you to come up with a way for me to spend that $100. It can be as ridiculous, wonderful, revolting, insane or downright illegal as possible. I can't promise you I'll do any of it, I'm just begging you to help me feel better.

Please?

oh slayer of dragons

Strange things have been happening. Small miracles, if you will. I certainly will.

A week ago, 'Doodles and I went to the gym. We were stretching. She looked down and commented on the fact that my legs- my bare legs- were on the carpet.

Pssh, say most of you. What's the big deal? The big deal is that some rather bizarre manifestation of my anxiety is that my skin is freakishly sensitive to texture. I get hives. Even a stiff wind, when I'm wearing shorts, is enough to make me prickle and itch.

Carpet has been on the forefront of my Things To Rid My World Of. Also on that list is Anyone Else's Couch, Any And All Burlap, Wool, Sequins, Glitter, Polyester, etc...the list has been long.

As you might imagine, this has left me in a comfy world of cotton. Fleece is ok, as long as it's not fuzzy. Cashmere? Just shoot me. It's like wearing a sweater of fiberglass insulation particles.

But as I've been faithfully taking my Xanax (anxiety medication), trying to take it on a more regular basis to keep the anxiety at bay, I've become something I had nearly forgotten:

Normal.

One day I got into 'Doodle car and the stereo was turned way up when she turne on the car. She yanked it down, horrified, and started apologizing, knowing how sensitive I am to loud sounds. I just grinned at her, gave her two thumbs up and said, "Yay Xanax!" to which she laughed.

Everyone has been noticing the difference. Friends have commented that I sound like my old self, I sound happier, more cheerful than they can remember. My mom has noted that I seem to have "regained" my sense of humor. (bites tongue) Ahem, well, yes.

The jet noise is just stupid, but not mind erasingly terrifying anymore.

And on Saturday, we went to the park. We were playing Frisbee. It was fun. At one point I tackled my son, and started steamrolling him in the grass, saying how he had to go get the Frisbee, come on already! Rolling over and over, being careful not to squash him while he was on the bottom, you know. After about maybe ten feet I tuckered out and got up.

'Doodles was staring at me, with this exhuberant look. I just figured her new Mr. Wonderful had said something nice to her or something, but a few minutes later she said, "You rolled in the grass!" She looked at me, breathless, excited.

It took me a second. It did. I blinked at her. It dawned on me, slowly, beautifully, fully.

Grass. My Arch Nemisis. Prickly, pointy, dust and mold and pollen covered grass. I rolled all around in it.

I stared at her. "....I....I did!" I said, "I DID!"

I can't tell you how good that makes me feel. It's not just that I can do those things because of the medication; I'm hoping that therapy can train my body not to react in such freakishly strange ways. The beauty of it is that I had forgotten I COULD do it. I had lost faith in my bodies ability to be normal ever again.

While I was in the shrinks office this past week, I asked her about the medicine. I wanted to make sure the amount I was taking was ok, not too much, what's the game plan, all that stuff. I need to know if I have a little cushion of time in which to retrain myself. Pushing myself too hard and too fast is a problem of mine.

She reassured me that the amount was nominal, and that therapy could help me be normal again. I heaved a huge sigh. I can see why people would become addicted to it- if it makes me feel better, I think I AM better, right? All I have to do is just keep taking this pill.

But that's not the way it works, and luckily I know better. All the issues are still in there, waiting to be explored. God knows they seem to be pouring out far faster than I could possibly relate to you on paper (blog). A lot of it is sexual stuff, and to read that you'll have to visit the sex blog (the links in the side bar). I try not to throw the raunch at you unexpectedly, you know, so I tend to keep it over there.

My point is that I'm relieved the floodgates have been opened. I'm glad I feel calm enough to deal with a lot of the heavy shit that's coming out. I'm glad I feel supported by a psychiatrist who gets what it is that I am trying to do (instead of assuming I want happy pills). I am glad I have insurance to pay for a psychologist to tend to the really deep issues with, and who can train me to rewire my brain. I'm glad I have friends and a soon-to-be husband that gets it.

I am lighter.

There is some very rough painful road ahead, I know. Some parts of trauma are buried so deeply it'll be like removing my kidney with a butter knife, but it has to be done.

As I've said before, I finally feel strong enough to be weak. I finally feel supported enough to jump into the darkness and battle the dragon on my own.

That's a beautiful thing.

neighbors and deeds

There is a strange lady that lives across the street. I'm assuming there is something rather seriously wrong with her mentally, but it is also apparent that she is extremely obese.

Occasionally she will talk to me. Some of what she says makes sense, but most of it sounds like she is starting the same sentence repeatedly and then suddenly skips to the end of the sentence.

Being the lovely person that I usually am (barring PMS, panic attacks, and/or meandering bad moods), I talk to her. I realized the first time I did that it could turn out to be a mistake. I've had neighbors suddenly be friendly when I would rather they pissed off completely.

Example? Why, I'd love to!

One apartment I lived at in Asheville had a plethora of fucked up freakazoids. There was the fat lady who let her children, one of them a two year old girl, wander around outside by themselves. Yes, a two year old, out in a parking lot, just wandering around with her mother inside. Street nearby. Two years old. I think I have clearly expressed my horror, so we'll move on.

The neighbors across the way were Hispanic, and felt compelled to work on their cars (in this case, it was his minivan) in the parking lot at night, and all weekend. Ok, I can dig it. What I could not dig was that he would play music full blast the whole time, so loudly I couldn't hear my own TV over this guys music. And his weekly music of choice? Michael Jackson.

No. Not cool old Jackson 5, not even the Thriller album. No, all that crap afterwards that sucked total ass. We tried putting our stereo speakers in the windows and blaring Weird Al's renditions of Michael Jackson songs, but he never seemed to get the hint.

The neighbors downstairs were lecherous drunks. Each day they would come out as soon as I got home, and stand at their doorway, looking up. This would give them a great shot of looking straight up my skirt through the wooden slats.

They stopped when one of my friends informed them through the slats that if they ever tried it again she would squat and piss on their "mother fucking faces".

Classsy. I know.

They outclassed her by far, by getting in a drunken brawl in the parking lot one night. One of them had a fake leg, and he actually yanked off his fake leg and started hopping around on one foot and beating the other one on the head with it.

Awesome.

The worst was the redneck that lived two buildings down and across the parking lot. We never ran into each other, never spoke, nothing. I saw her and her mostly toothed husband out there working on the baby blue Trans Am every weekend, drinking beer, chain smoking, not paying much attention to their baby, which was usually left in the house somewhere while they hung outside.

One day she just walked over to my house to bum a smoke (I still smoked then.) I open the door to see this chick just standing there, leaning against my doorframe and say, "Hey, can you bum me a cigarette?" (which in redneck sounds like, "Heyaaayyyy, cahn yuh buhm me a cigreyet?") I just blinked at her, wondering what in the hell I had done wrong to make her think we were on friendly terms, and stupidly said, "Yes." I gave her one. "You got a light?" ("Yuh gotta lie-it?") I blinked. "Yes." I lighted her/my cigarette and looked at her. She made herself comfortable on my balcony and leaned on the rail, standing there ready to shoot the shit.

I stared at her, wondering what the deal was. I said, "Uh...so...where's the baby?" She just shrugged and said, "In her crib." I said, "Oh, she's sleeping, eh?" and she responded, "I don't know. She's fine in her crib." I started picturing the baby crawling out, cracking it's head open, the place lighting on fire, and calculating the amount of time it would take to run across the parking lot to get all the way to her apartment. The redneck chick seemed to ponder none of this and sat down.

Oh no.

"Ok, well, I gotta go get ready for work, I'll see you later," I say, and basically shut the door in her face. I hear her say, "Ok, bye" and walk away. Blech. I hoped I was rude enough to dislodge any delusions she may have had that I was friendly.

No.

A month or so later she showed up at my door again. She was upset, and obviously pregnant, and smoking. I cringed. "Can I.....help you?" I finished painfully.

She went into a tale of woe, about how her husband got mad at her last night because she told him her baby wasn't his, but that she just did that because she was mad at him. Then he got out the shotgun and threatened to kill himself. She called the police. They showed up and wrestled him to the ground while he screamed, and took him off to the loony bin.

"Can you give me a ride over there? It's only an hour away, and I'll give you gas money...." she begged. I stared at her, pregnant, smoking like a train, in horror. The thought of spending any time with her made me want to vomit my own spleen. Watching her smoke while pregnant made me want to smack her in the face.

Then she added the clincher, "And can we stop and get him a bucket of chicken? You know, on the way? He loves chicken..."

"No." She looked pleadingly at me for a moment, then said, "But..." and I said, "No. I can't." As far as I knew, she would probably leave her baby at home in the crib the whole time, too.

I closed the door, walked to the phone and called my landlord. "Who in the HELL did you get in that last apartment?" I demanded and relayed the whole story to him. They were gone by the end of the month.

Needless to say, I am very wary of making friends with neighbors, especially ones that seem insane.

But here was this woman at the bus stop this morning, telling me she missed her ride and had an appointment, could I give her a ride? She was locked out of the house, her daughter gone, thinking she was just going to wait for a minute outside.

It was raining.

What else could I do? I said ok. I wondered how in the world she would fit herself in the bucket seat of my truck, but I figured that was her problem.

She managed, I drove her, and made various seemingly appropriate comments and exclamations when she would pause in mid...speech? I dropped her off, after making sure she was in the right place and had a ride home.

It's my good deed for the day. Please, please, no more good deeds. I do not wish to become the good deed taxi.

Please.

sometimes I miss Asheville

the curse of the catty bitches

(Another repost from the sex blog- I know a lot of you don't read both so I try to pull the ones I can over here, too.)

I see my post from yesterday got a lot of reactions from you. Hmmm.
People are rather opinionated about the looky looky and none so much so as Jack, who read the whole post (and comments) this morning and went off on a twenty minute rant that started in the kitchen, went through his shower, and didn't end until he was dressed.

I told him I'm going to have to start tape recording him since I could never remember twenty minutes worth of high powered brain storming between the two of us. Maybe darling Jack wll come on and write...you never know.

The thing that struck me the most through our conversation was this:

Women are some catty bitches.

This came from me, not Jack, by the way, although he was fully agreeable.

SeaRabbits' comment struck a particular note with me:

"When you are out with your man, He should be looking at you... It is a matter of respect...
If they want to look around and indulge themselves, well, they have all kind of occasions for that...

...There is a world between being jealous and wanting respect... I feel this is all about respect..."

It got me to thinking...what is the difference between him looking while I'm there and him looking while I'm not there? Or, as Jack put it, "How is it respectable because you're NOT there?"

The light went off over my head: Because no one will see.

Specifically, no other women. Frankly, I don't give a rats ass what the guys think of Jack checking out chicks in the mall. Who gives a crap what they think about it?

What I do care about, is what other women will think if they see him do it. Particularly, what they will think of me.

Judgement.

I said to Jack, "I don't know if men understand just how catty women are. I mean, young girls are VICIOUS and cruel!" I thought back to middle school, to one girl in particular who did more damage to my ego with a few cutting remarks than other people could do with a well rehearsed speech about my Total Suckitude.

I would love to tell you her real name, because I hated her, but it is against my principal. I will call her B.B. (short for Billy Bob FuckingBitchWhoreCuntFacedDoucheBag.)

B.B. wasn't particularly pretty, certainly no prettier than I, perhaps less so. It was hard to tell, because she had The Perma-Sneer. You know, the expression of all FuckingBitchWhoreCuntFacedDoucheBag's everywhere. As if the whole world were beneath her, unworthy of her even crapping on it. I have the sneaking suspicion whoever invented the cartoon The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy knew B.B. She is like Mandy, but cuntier. Yes. Much, much cuntier.

The biggest difference between B.B. and I was that she was rich, and I was poor. (And the obvious: I was nice and she was a bitch.) Therefore, she was high up the Ladder of Financially Endowed Popularity, where I was just a geek with terrible clothes. Any interaction we had was me trying to suck up and be nice to her, and her doing her damnedest to destroy me with cutting remarks. Her remarks didn't just cut, they were usually aimed for permenent disability. Or at least a long slow death by multiple lacerations with blood loss.

She would tell me how stupid my hair was, how I should learn to put on make-up so I didn't look so ugly, she would sneer at my choice of clothing, giving me that once up and down look that displayed not only shock and disgust at my clothes, but utter repulsion. She rarely passed by an opportunity to use sarcasm in passing, "(snort) Nice shoes." Her and her snotty friends would stand in a tight circle and laugh in derision at the other people walking by, the worms of their society.

The day that sticks out in my head the most was the day she stormed up to me and angrily announced, quite loudly, "You wore that skirt last Tuesday!!!" as if that were some sort of obvious sin that I was both too stupid to comprehend and ought to be beheaded on the spot for such a crime. I turned red and felt ashamed, knowing damn well that I didn't own enough clothes to alternate them week to week like she obviously could.

At the same moment, I felt a kind of intrigued horror, a pity for her that her life was so small she would actually keep track of what I was wearing and chastise me for it. Did she not have more important things to think about? I couldn't have guessed what she wore yesterday, much less last week.

That was my first clue that she wasn't a Goddess, but a lunatic. A raving mad lunatic.

And that moment was when I decided to not try to fit in, but to go as far out of the bounds of "normal" as possible. If she was the epitome of what I was "supposed" to be, I wanted no part of it. I became "a freak". The funny thing about that is that being alternative is still only alternative when compared to being normal. It's still a pendulum attached to a base, like Satanism and Christianity. Satanism wouldn't exist without Christianity. The good, the bad. The normal, the freaks.

B.B. was the queen of 80's prep? Fine. I would be the queen of 80's punk. Fuck her and everything she stands for. Pretty hair? I'll dye mine and rat it and make it looked as fucked up as possible. Pretty clothes? I'll rip all of mine and those shoes will be held together with duct tape. Make-up to make me prettier? I discovered I could use cover up on my lips to make them look like skin and then draw jagged lines across them with black eyeliner, making my face looked stitched together. I created my own insane dance moves at school dances (if you're thinking Breakfast Club you're pretty close) and fuck all that slow dance shit. I'll get all interperative dance up on your slow dancing asses. Fuck you bitches that tell me I'm shit. I'll go out of my way too look shittier and throw it in your face. Shaved most of my head, wore clothes from garage sales, I would make mix tapes of 7 Seconds and Donny Osmond, just fuck it, fuck it all. The less sense it made, the more I loved it.

That was actually a rather beautiful time for me. Instead of trying to fit into the box, I let it all come out, mixed up and senseless and beautiful. I was an outpouring of pentup creativity, stopping to make sculptures out of rocks in the parking lot, my schoolmates walking by and muttering about my sanity. If I wanted to stand on a streetcorner and shout poetry into the wind, fuck it, I just would. They could call me whatever they wanted. I knew what I was and what they were not: free. I would walk through the halls singing, weave leaves into fences to make patterns, and they all called me "psycho". I quit speaking for most of my Freshman year. People would ask me why. I told them I had nothing to say. Period.

I didn't fix into their box anymore, and they stopped trying to make me. I rebelled. What I didn't realize until later was that they admired me for it. I gained their respect by not trying anymore. I became an enigma instead of a loser.

(long thoughtful pause)

I didn't care if people didn't like me, and I wasn't jealous. I was ME.

Perhaps I've lost a lot of that.

(pause)

The last few relationships I was in took so much out of me. The first one (my sons father) crushed me into near nothingness. During that time I had an ex boyfriend tell me one day that I seemed like a shadow, a shell of the person I once was. I knew what he meant. I felt like one.

I don't think I've entirely recovered from that. I've been jealous and insecure ever since.

I wanted to please him, I tried so hard to become that thing that he wanted, but he didn't know what it was. I nearly drove myself over the edge trying to morph into something impossible.

The box. I searched for the box. I wanted in. I wanted to be in the box. The box could be safety. The box could be familiarity. It could symbolize all of those things, but it was none of them. It's just a fucking box.

A big ole box of crazy.

So why does all that Looky Looky upset me so much?

Jack looking at other girls in the mall reminds me of being a teenager again, and the pain and agony of not being good enough.

It makes me feel jealous because I'm insecure.

I'm insecure because I've been trying to be someone else. Someone perfect. There is no "perfect". I am trying to be something unattainable, and thus I feel less.

The judgement of other women makes me feel like less, but only when I buy into it. I only buy into it when I am not being true to myself.

The moral of the story:

I need to remember that I am not just good enough, I am EVERYTHING. I used to know that. I bought into other people's realities and it crushed a lot of my spirit. It's time to rebuild.

>cue my whole-self singing to my fragmented-self "Superman" by R.E.M.<

looky looky

(A repost from the sex blog.)


You have a spy in your midst, men.

It is Jack.

He tells me things. Manly things. The way men tick.

I'm on to you, now.

Particularly, we've many times discussed why it is that men like to look at girls. Women. Both. Whatever.

I don't particularly enjoy going out with Jack, as I have a hyper warning alert system for The Roving Eye. I'm not sure that Jack's eye roves any more than any other man, but I watch HIM like a hawk while he watches other girls.

It is fear. I am working on it. These things take time, when trauma is involved.

I did notice that the mall was not so horrible this weekend. Jack had to be fitted for a tux, and I dread going to the mall with him. There are hordes of scantily clad little young things running about in small giggling packs, and it makes my blood boil.

Not their clothes, no. The way men look at them.

Now, before you guys get your feathers all ruffled ("What do they expect when they dress like that? Are we not SUPPOSED to look?"), it's not what you think. I'm not mad that men look. I mean, duh. Even I look.

What I'm angry about is this: when I was that age, I had NO idea what was going through your heads. Not a stinking damn clue. I dressed like the older girls dressed, wanting to be mature, wanting to be taken seriously, wanting to have the attention, to be treated like a Goddess, instead of a shit upon little girl.

It had NOTHING AT ALL to do with your wieners, I assure you.

When my mother would tell me not to dress like that, I thought she was an idiot. "Men will think things!" she would say, and I would argue back with the logic of a fourteen year old, "Well, then maybe they need to learn to control their thoughts!" What was I supposed to wear, a burqa? They would still wonder what was under it! Argh! I can't win, I might as well try to look "cool", right?

All those looks older men would give me, I soaked it up. I did. But here's the stinging truth- I thought it was because they saw the REAL me, maybe they were old enough to see the beautiful person that lay in wait under the teenage angst. And maybe some of them did. I don't know. My point is, it was never sexual for me. Not. At. All.

As you may have already surmised, when Jack looks at girls that way, I want to punch him in his stupid manly head. I feel angry, resentful, protective of those girls. I want to hiss, "It's not ABOUT you, stupid! Quit looking at her like that!"

He means no harm. He doesn't. I know. And I am superimposing the Me of Yesteryear over the Girls of Today.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Try giving some back, guys. These girls want validation. And while I know you cannot go up to them and say, "I think you are a beautiful woman waiting to blossom," or some such shit without security being called or her dad knocking your fucking teeth out, you can go for the occasional innocent compliment.

It's all in the phrasing:

"Excuse me, where did you get those shoes? My sister/neice/whoever wants those and I can't find them anywhere."

Girl will be flattered and feel cool. That's all she wants.

Warning: I suggest aiming for the shoes. That or a jacket. Asking about her pants or shirt will set off the alarm bells. Hats, also ok. "Who does your hair?" should also be safe, given a disclaimer such as "My neice HATES her hairdresser and your hair looks great. Can you tell me where she should go?"

If you're young enough you could get away with a simple, "Cool shirt" or what have you. "That skirt kicks ass." Keep it simple. Keep it cool, my brothers. And whatever you do, do not linger. Just picture yourself as Super Compliment Man landing, saving her ego's day with a well timed compliment, and soaring away. She will walk with a lighter step. Your good deed is done.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

All your fabulous good intentions aside (and lets lead the paving of hell out of this one), I have still been trying to grasp just what in the hell makes men ogle women so very much. I know, they're visual. Ok. But the amount that men scope out women seems to go past a visual enjoyment to a borderline creepy indulgence.

Poor Jack is on edge in the mall, knowing his eyeballs want to roam, knowing I'm watching him: it makes him hyper aware of how often he looks. As far as I can tell, it's constant. I'm not saying women are ALL he's looking at, but if I could vocalize the stream of conciousness it would sound like this:

"Where's the store we're looking for, nice ass, up the escalator, that is one tight shirt, oops too young, look away! Oh, I see the store now, and the girl in the reflection, can't believe her parents let her leave the house in that, coming up on the store, just got to get out from behind these, hooo, what's this? Wow, maybe I won't hurry so much, where was I going? Oh yes, the store..."

Whether or not this is ACTUALLY what it sounds like inside his head, that's what it LOOKS like to someone watching his expressions.

Guys, you ALL do this. This is the reason why women are world class champions of eye rolling. We used to just hoot angry ape sounds and throw shit at you, but our ancestors learned that eye rolling was easier and more ladylike. We adapted. Sighing also falls into this category. Hell, Marge Simpson has her very own distinctive catch phrase noise for female disgruntledness. I don't think disgruntledness is a word, but disgruntlement is. Whatever.

So, guys, what is the deal?

I asked Jack.

He tried to explain, but I lack a male brain and I have great difficulty translating man-speak into female-coherance. He basically said that looking at the female form wasn't always a sexual thing. It provides a sense of tranquility, a sense of pleasure not always associated with the groin. He said, "Well, it's kind of like when you look at a nice sunset, that contented feeling you get?"

I stared at him, squinty eyed. A sunset. I don't know about the rest of you gals, but looking at a hot man does not fill me with the tranquility of a sunset. It fills my loins with an explosive heat and makes my cheeks flush, and if sunsets did all that we'd all be outside when the sun went down, fanning ourselves and pouring mint juleps down our dresses.

"But it's more sensual than a sunset, right?" I asked. Jack looked confused, trying to figure how to explain it to my monkey-penis-in-the-brain lacking self.

This morning I tried again. "Maybe it's like flowers?" I guessed. "Girls love flowers, and they aren't just pretty, they are sensual, too. They make us feel all yummy." It was Jacks turn to squint at me, perhaps trying to figure out how the hell a flower makes a person feel "yummy".

How about flowers, chocolates and diamonds? Those make me feel good all over, and have nothing to do with sex. I can say with great certainty, at any rate, that if Jack handed me a pile of flowers, chocolates, and diamonds and then wanted to look at the girls passing us by on the beach, I might not notice Jack was there at all, much less what the hell he was looking at. I would be one very contented and happy puddle of tranquility.

Is this what looking at girls is like?

Is there any way to compare?

While we were still at the mall I told Jack, "I think part of what annoys me is that women are just more pleasing to the eye. I will look at hips and curves and boobs and shoulders on women, 99% of the time. When I actively try to look for hot guys, it doesn't happen. I think I'm just far too discriminating," I said, haughtily.

The difference is that I don't compartmentalize while checking out a man. He can have a hot body but a sneer on his face is a total turn off. Likewise, he can be scrawny as hell but if he looks intelligent and has a dimple, I might be smitten. Any man with a pile of jewelery makes me want to hurl. Men with fake tans. Loafers. Blank stupidity. I could go on and on. Really.

The thing is, I don't find him pleasing to look at unless he is The Complete Package. Looking at various wandering parts of packages does nothing for me. But it does a lot for men.

My conclusion? Men are alien. I will likely never grok them. But I love you all anyway. Well, most of you. Not so much then ones with flashy gold jewelery and mustaches, no...oh, too much hair gel...yuck...those ear piercings that are all stretched out really freak me out....let's see, what else.....?

Fuck You, H2

(I had to repost this after visiting FUH2- thanks to darling Hannoverfist for the link.)


[The picture has since fallen into the blog black hole, sorry...]

I saw this Hummer while driving today. Although I'm sure the owner was wondering why the person behind them was taking pictures, they probably just thought I loved their stupid vehicle so much I couldn't resist.

No, no.
I had to make fun of them.

Unfortunately, the picture came out blurry and you can't see the glorious details.
You CAN see that it's a Hummer! A vehicle invented for the military, now made popular by terrified rich men with small penises everywhere! You can use it in harsh terrain! Or you can paint ELECTRIC YELLOW and drive it around town.

It gets better! It also has a Florida license plate- you know how much rough terrain there is down there. I suppose you could drive it through a shallow marsh, but my guess is they frequently drive over alligators, and needed something heftier to really get a good satisfying crunch as they mowed them down. It seems to me that they could run the risk of ruining their electric yellow paintjob with such dirty little tasks, however.

Oh, don't worry, people! I know you may be concerned that this poor scaredy rich man with a teeny weenie may get lost out in the big bad wilderness while he's driving through marshes crushing the wildlife. Worry no more. The back bumper proudly touts an On Star system, so the gator mashing maniacs can find their way home with the simple push of a button.

Ah, the good life.

blast from the past

There was this guy in high school that hated me. I mean, really fucking hated me. I had no idea why, other than the fact that we seemed to be the antithesis of each other. While I didn't really give a rats ass about our differences, it seemed to cause him great rage-filled distress.

What was his name? We'll call him Polka Dot, PD for short. How about Pud? Ok. I like Pud. Pud it is.

Pud was a wanna be skinhead. He had the boots, the leather, the lack of hair, the general sense of hate towards other beings. He fit the bill quite nicely. We got along ok in the year before, when I was dating someone he knew and going through my I'm-so-fucking-punk-rock phase.

He even gave me a ride home one night from the GBH show in Detroit, and we mostly discussed being straight edge. I remember him giving me some lecture about not doing drugs, to not turn out like my brother (quite possibly the biggest stoner in school at that time), and I just kind of went along with the conversation. Honestly, I found him very intimidating and kind of scary. He seemed a little too close to the edge of murderous violence for my liking, but I also didn't feel like walking 20 miles home in 20 degree weather, so I just nodded a lot.

By the next year, I was heavily into the drug scene, and Pud hated my fucking guts. Apparently there was some confusion about me starting the ex boyfriend (his friend) on drugs, and Pud blamed me for it. In reality, it was that boyfriend who talked me into trying LSD for the first time. After hearing him go on and on about how incredible it was, my curiosity overcame my fear. Alas, Pud knew nothing of that, nor did he ask. He just assumed.

He tried to torment me every single chance he got. Every time he would walk by me in the hall he would tell me what a stupid bitch I was, or a slut, or whatever. Fucking worthless excuse for a human being, a curse to society, a mistake for having been born, you get the idea.

He would also frequently ask me, "Why don't you just kill yourself?"

Charming, I know.

What the poor dear didn't realize was that I had been so emotionally abused throughout the course of my life that his words had no effect. They had kind of the opposite effect, in fact. He was like a caricature of the rejection my family had been heaping on me for years, and because of that, I found him comical.

That infuriated him to no end.

Our usual exchanges can be summed up quite nicely by one day that I remember quite clearly. I was sitting outside on the pavement at school, eating lunch with my friends. We had been playing frisbee, and were just sitting and chilling out before the bell rang.

Pud slammed through the double doors, flanked on either side by his friends, all looking as disgruntled as usual, but none as poisonously filled with hatred as Pud, right smack in the middle.

My friends all kind of shifted nervously around, but I just watched him stomp up in those big combat boots and I smiled up at him. "Hi, Pud. How's it going?" I said sweetly, knowing damn well it would piss him off.

He actually turned redder at that. "Fuck you, bitch! You are such a piece of shit! Why don't you just fucking kill yourself?" he shouted.

I shrugged nonchalantly and said, "I don't know. It's really nice outside. Maybe tomorrow. You wanna play frisbee?" knowing damn well he did not.

He gave one look to his lackeys, who picked up my frisbee and whipped it up onto the second story roof of the school. I shrugged again. "Yah, that one sucked. Good idea. I have better ones at home." And I smiled.

He nearly started screaming. "God, I fucking HATE you!!!" I sat my ground and emanated the calm of one very stoned Buddha. It reality, I think I liked our exchanges. It was like getting to act out all the shit I couldn't get away with saying to my parents, and maybe I actually appreciated his straight forwardness. At least he wasn't trying to hide jagged knives inside tactless comments made for my "benefit" or some shit. He was just straight up.

I gave him my most loving (and sarcastic) smile and said, "You know, you really have some issues with anger management. You should get help for that. Do you wanna talk about it? How about a hug?"

At that point he did actually scream, and turned around and stomped back inside.

I laughed. My friends started breathing again.

The difference between their reactions and mine I think had a lot to do with the fact that I was a pent up ball of rage myself, and should he have actually kicked me I would have had a full excuse for going psycho and biting half his goddamn face off.

I found him weak for not being able to contain the rage to a simmering toxic brew kept under the surface, and he found me weak for indulging in drugs and not just screaming my fury at the world. He took the agressive approach. I took the passive and sometimes passive-aggressive approach. He preferred violent confrontation. I preferred clever sniper attacks in stealth.

It came to a boiling point. One day I was hanging out in the art room (probably skipping class and tripping, most likely) and there was Pud. He stomped up to my table and sat at the far end. I glanced up and barely acknowledged him, knowing full well it was a matter of seconds before he exploded like usual.

That time came. He started talking in a low, hateful voice, telling everyone at the table what a piece of crap I was and blah blah blah. Since I didn't really know those people it was harder to bear, because what if they believed him? They didn't know me.

He then stupidly informed me that he was going to get my brothers permission to beat my ass, to which I laughed. (My brother was older than Pud.) I said, "Permission? Are you fucking kidding me? He won't give you permission, you dumb ass. If you want to punch me, fucking do it and shut up already."

He stared at me, calculating. "I will!" he warned. I rolled my eyes and said, "You keep talking..."

He punched me. Right in the face. Hard.

I calmly walked to the other side of the room, just so no one would see me cry, since there was no way to stop myself from doing so, that fucking HURT.

But still, I felt vindicated. There I was, a girl in a dainty antique black velvet dress, and this retard just punched me in front of a table full of people. I mean, really, who looks like the asshole now?

He mostly left me alone after that. Why, I don't know. I don't remember telling my brother, so I don't think he said anything to him, unless word got back to him. Maybe the table full of people said something to him. Maybe it was because I stood up and fucking took it like a man, and it gained me some demented sort of respect in his eyes. Maybe it was because I didn't smile at him anymore, just gave him looks like, "Try it again, you fucking son of a bitch. I will fucking kill you." Maybe because I called his bluff, and forced him into proving himself. Perhaps he underestimated my own strength, seeing it as weakness instead.

Who the fuck knows?

I ran into him again years later. I showed up to work (at the very hippy health food store) and there was Pud, behind the counter in the kitchen. I stared at him through the window (I worked in the deli) and said, "What the hell are you doing here?"

He looked up at me, gave me a weird expression and simply said, "I don't fucking know," and left it at that.

About a week later he pulled me aside quite suddenly one day. "Look," he said, holding onto my arm, "I just want you to know that I'm sorry. I believe in karma."

I just stared at him. What the hell could I respond to that? "Oh?" I say, completely taken aback.

"Yah," he said, glumly, looking at the floor.

Well, after that there was still his old anger, but it was never directed at me. I left the job shortly thereafter, so I had no idea what happened to him.

Until a few days ago. I found him (via a friend) in MySpace. I clicked on his profile, and nearly choked. Straight edge no more, my friends. He's looking like he's more fucked up now than I was in high school (although profiles can be deceiving...maybe it's a joke?)

Well, you live and learn. And get punched in the face, and figure out what karma is.

Such is life.

When I think of really examining the traumatic events of my life, I think the soundtrack would be "Splintered In Her Head" by The Cure.

eye candy

being a daughter...

With the wedding coming up, and my stress spiking along with it, I don't seem to know my head from my ass these days.

There's a lot going on. I'm hormonal (always get blue after ovulating, yep, it's true), my darling Padoodles is out of town, plus is occupied by gooeygooeysuperlove, my son has been getting in trouble with not paying attention at school (can you say kiddie stress? I knew you could!), and then there's a wedding...

This is no wild and crazy wedding. It a wedding with a thousand dollar budget. As in one thousand dollars. That may sound like a lot to anyone who has never thrown a wedding, or would find it acceptable to invite three people and get married in the nude and/or a burlap sack, serving dainty Spam filled finger foods after the ceremony.

Throwing a thousand dollar wedding for fifty people with the kind of old school class I prefer has been a very interesting project in creative thinking. Creative brainstorming. Creative oh-fuck-I-just-realized-that-smoke-is-coming-from-my-brain-stem. I've been throwing around the idea of writing a book about it, but I am currently too busy pulling miracles out of my ass and putting out the fire in my brain.

I have been really moody. I hypothesize that it may be due to the Xanax, in that it is erasing the top level of my awareness, which is ensnarled with anxiety. Now that I can concentrate on something other than my seemingly imminent doom, I am noticing other things: I am heartbroken. Devastated. Sad.

Last night I think I finally hit on the reason why: my family.

Weddings are family affairs. Your parents, grandparents, uncles, brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts, even those people you don't really know but keep swearing they're your long lost second aunt twice removed, just so they can pinch your cheek, ALL those people come to your wedding.

My wedding? My mom is coming. The one person I get along with the least out of my whole family. She's being the nicest to me of all, in fact. I honestly don't know what to make of it. It's baffling.

She is coming with my step dad. My step dad and I hated each others stinkin' guts for years, but now I get along with him better than my mom. I mean, I guess that's not hard or anything, but still.

My dad? The, you know, biological one? Isn't coming. As a matter of fact, he told me It didn't matter when or where I held the wedding, he wasn't coming. I was thinking about holding it in Michigan, so I could be close enough for him to be there and to give me away. He said he wouldn't come even if I held it in Michigan.

He's supposed to give me away.

(long weighted silence)

For those of you who know nothing of my dad, let me describe him not shortly and not sweetly:

He's a recovering alcoholic. He's been depressed his whole life. He tried to kill himself a few times, once when he was home along with me. I was five. He blames my mother divorcing him as the reasons for everything bad, goodness no, his crappy life couldn't be the direct result of his own actions, oh no. My mother divorced him when I was six. He never drank again. He never even dated again.

He has chain smoked the last 25 years away living in the childhood home he grew up in, on the outskirts of what is now a rather ugly area of Detroit. He quit smoking at 62 (he's 70 now), and has grown fatter and is pissed off about it. There are so many things wrong with him his medicine cabinet is filled with various medications, none of which are antidepressants, fucking doctors.

His house is barely furnished, and generally filthy. Not rotting food filthy, but what-the-hell-is-a-broom filthy. He sits in one chair, watching TV, most of the time. He hates everything on TV. Other than his chair, the rest of the living room furniture are plastic outdoor chairs, those cheap white ones you can get at a drug store.

In complete contrast, but it makes perfect sense to me (having grown up with him) he's very friendly. He'll talk to you in the grocery store (people up North don't really do that. Ever.) He'll crack jokes to the cashiers, talk to the people's babies in their carts, "You gonna play football someday? What do you think?" He's even got a charming puts-you-right-at-ease smile, when he uses it. He'll sit out on the driveway on a hot night, and the neighborhood kids come by (they love him). He'll joke with them about stuff, ask them about their homework, and then he'll go in and bring them out some extra fried chicken. He likes to tell me about how most of those kids have never had home cooked fried chicken before ("It didn't come in a bucket?!?!"), and how most of them don't even know who their daddy's are.

I, on the other hand, do.

He talks a lot about dying, and about how he can't wait to do so. He's been telling me he was going to die since I can remember. When I tried to get him to quit smoking (I was 8) and he asked me why he should quit, I said, "Because it will kill you!" His reply was, "So? That couldn't happen soon enough." I have many times wished that he would, and just get it over with. I've been waiting for him to die (since he constantly reminds me) since I was born. It's hard to be attached to a man like that.

And yet, he is my daddy. I am getting married. He's supposed to walk me down the aisle and give me away.

(long weighted pause again)

Yah, well. (heaving sigh) That ain't gonna happen. I know this. I've known this for awhile.

Knowing something, and allowing yourself to really feel it are two totally different things.

Last night, out of nowhere, I started to cry while trying to fall asleep. Mr. Wonderful asks me what's wrong, and puts his arms around me. I tell him, "Usually I can understand people. Usually I can use empathy to see why people do the things they do! But this...he's my DADDY (sobs)...why wouldn't he come to his own daughters wedding?"

(Note: He went to my brothers wedding.)

I mean, if it were the distance I could understand. But I did offer to get married up there, and he flatly told me he wouldn't come. It hurt. No shit. But it didn't hurt as much at the time as it does now.

I just locked it up in The Fact Box. Yah, it's like the box in my head where I keep traumatic things. These things are immedietely dissassembled into their most basic components and filed away in The Fact Box. Yes, these things happened. That is a fact.

(You Star Trek fans should be hearing the voice Data right now.)


Lots of things go into The Fact Box. As a matter of fact, that fucking Fact Box is so full it is rotting. And now that I'm taking anti-anxiety medication, I am starting to smell what has been hovering just beneath the radar of my conciousness for a long long time.

I'm not just talking about the family stuff. The rape stuff, the molestation stuff, the physical abuse, the mental abuse, the oh fuck it, it's a long goddamn list.

I think the Xanax is making me feel the sadness that has been buried under the anxiety for most of my life.

And with my wedding a mere month away, the family stuff is coming up to the surface, bubbling trauma, resentment, and abandonment soup at a full fucking boil. It's spilling over. I can't keep the lid down. Maybe it's time to stop trying.

As I lay there in bed last night, my head on Mr. Wonderfuls chest, my tears covering him in water and salt, I sobbed, "My brother won't come! He hasn't even returned my e-mail, my phone call!" His wife sent me this tiny e-mail telling me how sorry they were that they wouldn't be able to make it, blah blah. I'm not close to her. I want my brother to answer me. I want him to call me. I understand they have a one year old and are busy, but fucking A! I packed up my three year old and traveled 500 miles to come to THEIR wedding so my son could be the ring bearer for them. The tuxedo fittings, we missed our plane, blah blah blah it was a huge hassle but I willingly did it for him.

And he can't fucking find the time to fucking CALL ME?!

(long pause spent sitting on top of The Fact Box, trying to stuff the screaming rage-filled parts of myself back in there, with as expression of vaguely numb, long endured annoyance all over my face)

I tell Mr. Wonderful, "I'm afraid it's going to be embarrassing." "What is?" he asks. "When people ask me where my family is..." I end in another sob.

Am I supposed to tell the truth? "They couldn't be bothered."

Do I lie, "It's a long way, no really, they do give a shit...."

~sigh~

At any rate, I'm having my step dad give me away. The symbolism in that is both painful and transformative for me.

I've been trying to be closer to him over the years. I try to act like a daughter. The fact is, I don't know how a daughter acts. I don't know how to be a daughter. I don't know what it means.

I know how to be the child of a fucked up mess. I know how to pretend it doesn't hurt. I know how to hide my dissappointment and my shame. These things I know.

What I don't know is how to trust.

That's a good lesson to learn before getting married, don't you think?