I am, therefore I blog

On first love and getting your heart eaten out of your chest with a spoon

2007-03-04T02:53:00.000-08:00

I'm looking for a friend of mine. We have a complex relationship. I'm not writing about it anywhere else, so I'm writing about it here.
He was my first love.
We met in high school. He asked me out on graduation day, by chucking a note at me that said that I was a terrific person and he wanted to get to know me better. I had never gotten a phone number like that before, I was surprised. I had a lot of male followers, but too many of them were cocky-they tried to give me their numbers with a tacky pickup line and a grin. This guy was different. The night I called him, we talked for four hours. The better we knew each other, the longer it got. We topped at six. My mother was less than thrilled, but I was elated. Hell, it tingled. He was good looking, he had been a weight lifter in school and had big brown doe eyes. He also had good manners, the best I've seen in a teenaged boy to this day, and a faint Texas accent. He was sensitive-he had been sexually abused as a child and managed to turn that into a profound empathy. He was also hard working and very smart, even though his plans weren't for college like mine were. Both of us made a pact to, for once in our lives, love without reservation.
And we did. For a long time. Unfortunately his parents moved him back to Texas, he couldn't afford to stay alone. So we went long distance. Suddenly his voice was muffled and all of these other people started chiming in and telling me how to run my love life. Most of them thought that I should be dating a college boy, someone at "my level". My mother wanted me to marry my catch and bleed him dry financially (always the gold digger, my mom). A guy that liked me started showing up at random places that I frequented. Before I knew it I was spooked. I broke up with the big love and went after the guy that was actually on the scene. It didn't work out. I got back together with the big love, but it wasn't the same after that. He felt I'd cheated, and I suppose in a way he was right-at the very least I had betrayed him somehow. That snowballed-he was a nineteen year old boy with a case of hurt pride. Pretty soon he started dating women he met on the internet. Two weeks before we had scheduled a visit for him to come back to cali and shop for an engagement ring I got suspicious. He had given me his email password as a sign that I could trust him a very long time before, but I had laughed it off and never used it. Suddenly I felt the need to, and I found the emails from the other women in his inbox. Some of them talked about me-one woman talked about how she liked holding his hand at the movies and she wished that evil bad me would let him go free so that he could say he loved her. We broke it off. We tormented each other for a year in snippy phone calls, but eventually the tone of the calls changed. In spite of ourselves, we became friends. He briefly moved back to California, and we talked about getting back together. But I was seeing someone else and I couldn't do to them what I had done to him. It wasn't love that kept me in that relationship, but guilt. He later moved back to Texas. I dumped guilt boy and got together with mr. current. Last September I got mail addressed to him c/0 me from his ministorage. I called him, but his cell was dead and his mother flipped out because I had gotten the mail and neither of us knew why (he must have needed a second contact). I emailed him and never got a response. Then his email went dead. His myspace hasn't been touched since September. Even his parents number, which was in his name is now dead. I'm afraid for him. If something happened to him, no one would know to tell me. He insulated me and his life from his family.
I started looking for him in September. When I found his myspace and saw his picture, the oddest thing happened. I felt tingly and smiled involuntarily. I came to the sudden and shocking realization that after five years of thinking myself over him, I'm really still in love with him. The other night I went combing through old letters for addresses and other information and realized that this isn't just a temporary feeling or one that can be brushed away. My God, can I really be this illogical?

Blast from the past, or blasted past...either way

2006-12-03T19:55:00.000-08:00

I just got a call from a friend of mine in Germany. Not just any friend, the only remaining friend of the darkest periods of my youth. In one of my earliest posts I talked about all of the friends I had that I couldn't save. He was part of the same group, though a fringe part. He was the only one that didn't need saving. Except that now he's all wrong. Where he used to be kind he sounded bitter. Where he used to be thoughtful he seemed self involved, all pulled inward and out of shape. I read his blog; he seemed miserable. His skin doesn't fit him right, I could feel him struggling against himself even in the short conversation we had. Something isn't right there.
I've changed too. He wanted to know if I was still as ruthless as ever. I realized that maybe he thinks that now I'm all wrong. Last that we saw each other very often I was a teenager. To elaborate, I was a seventeen year old militant feminist. When he met me in my first year of high school it was the day that some guy walked up to my boyfriend and told him that he thought I was hot and he was going to steal me. Right in front of me. Without a word I walked up to him and punched him hard in the diaphram, leaving him curled up on the ground. Then I laughed. Not because I cared so much about my boyfriend, but because you only steal objects and I didn't want to be objectified. Another time I was walking to the mall down the busiest street in town. More to the point I was doing this in overalls with smart alecked buttons on them, a faux leopard skin lined bodysuit, four necklaces that were cross cultural courage emblems, ten bangles on my right wrist, five rings on my left hand, and blood red lipstick. A car slows traffic. Some thirty something guy inside starts screaming at me to get in the car. Full if piss and vinegar and teenaged arrogance I turn lazily to see if he has a gun. No gun. So I tell him to go fuck himself-direct qoute. He starts to get out and I hop a fence in under five seconds, giving him the finger on my way over (a miraculous feat of athleticism given the jewelry).
It was in part under the influence of this guy's habitual kindness that I grew up and softened. Now I am disturbed to see that I may have had the opposite effect on him. Either that or life has made him its bitch.

On multiples

2006-12-02T18:58:00.000-08:00

I was reading Dewy's blog, Dewy Knickers, and had some new thoughts I wanted to share about what I've learned about multiple personalities over the years. Dewy is a woman that lives inside of a man named Brian. Dewy keeps a blog of her own, and Brian keeps a blog of his own. In her last post Dewy wrote that she wasn't "some symptom out of a book" to be thrown in her face, or something to that effect. I then reread my last post about my sister, and I thought about how that might make a multiple feel. You see, I lumped having a second persona under my sister's various illnesses.
I shouldn't have. It really isn't an illness. Multiples have enough bad press, they really don't need more.
In general multiples develop when children within a specific age range are abused in ways that are beyond their means of coping. There are lots of different theories about how exactly this happens, but they read like psychobabble. It just does. Also in general, psychologically speaking, something is really only a problem if it keeps you from functioning. I've known enough multiples to know that "same great tv, 12 different channels" as one husband of a multiple put it, doesn't necessarily impede someone's functioning.
My sister is pretty uncommon as far as multiples go. It was never being a multiple that made her violent. It just complicated things. You see, from what I can tell, Savannah is a part of my sister that was frozen in place at about age nine. She is a hyper jealous bully who operates with the thought processes and moral code of a small child. Anybody who remembers the schoolyard can get the concept. From what I can tell, every persona of my sister's suffers from the basic chemical imbalance that she has, namely bipolar disorder. So basically, within my sister lived (and possibly still does) a small girl who is a bully, uses child bully logic, suffers from bipolar, and at the time was bigger and much more powerful than me in outward form. My sister has the only violent multiple that I have ever heard of, and I don't think that Savannah was inherently violent. For example, my sister at present quite healthy and happy, collects dolls, my little pony figures, and other toys. Whatever else I may feel about her, I like to think that this is Savannah, all settled down, presenting herself benignly. I haven't seen her openly present herself in years. I was thinking after reading about Dewy grappling with the issue of her existence that I hope this doesn't mean that she's gone. Savannah may have been the malicious bogeychild of my youth, and I may loathe her (she did try to kill me in all fairness), but she is still after all a child.

Forgiveness as the path of least resistance

2006-12-02T02:21:00.000-08:00

I am not the world's most forgiving human being. I am obstinate, and sort of surly on occasion, and I yearn for incredibly simple problems that can be solved by hitting someone or something with a large stick enough times. When I was younger I was violently inclined. Aggression was part of my personal program from birth, and it was channeled counterproductively by life in general. In my old age I've moved towards a more thoughtful, restrained approach to life. I am so restrained that by the time I am thirty I plan on grappling my way to Nirvana (yes, that is a joke, and I do know that grappling is highly un Nirvanan like ) (hence the joke). But in general I am more Baodaccia than Ghandi, as far as icons go.
I also believe in the fine art of writing people off. There are some individuals, no matter how well intended, who wreak personal destruction and emotional chaos everywhere they go. They can't be reformed because they really don't see the problem. They believe in what's known as the "mememememe" centered model of the universe. They also do not buy into occham's razor, and will attribute all of their personal flaws to someone else no matter how complicated a scenario they have to build to support this idea. Hence if they do see the problem, clearly someone else created it.
That said, you would think that I would write off the person who beat and tried to kill me when I was a child. The person so insane that I was convinced at one point that I had better learn to defend myself because the day might come when I would have to kill her or be killed by her. You would think that I would wisely do that. And I demand credit for trying. It didn't work out. It is hard, after all, when one is under age, to get away from your sister.
Yes, my sister. My nearly a decade older than me sister, who my mother was convinced despite all evidence was good child care. My mentally ill sister who as it turns out was bipolar, suffering from pshychotic episodes, and had multiple personalities. All of the above, or just enough of a combo to mimic the symptoms of all of the above. I knew that there was something wrong with her before the real fur started to fly-I saw an episode of 6o minutes on bipolar disorder and tried to tell my Mother. I thought she just didn't believe me, so I pushed the issue. I figured out later that no amount of pushing would get her to help, because she just didn't want to believe me. The sad truth is that my Mother is a stupid person. She thinks that things really disappear if you just don't look at them.
I got to be the target because in my sister's eyes my life was "normal". Parts of her, hateful, spiteful, child parts of her wanted to kill me out of pure jealousy. I owe some inner bitch named Savannah a doorknob to the gut and some shredded toes. It was a wild era. She was institutionalized not long after I called my Mother at work (as I had done to fruitlessly beg for help many times before) and informed her in a voice dripping with purest hate that my sister had just strangled my until I passed out, and that I knew that she wasn't a parent but that she was all I had, so she was GOING to come home and act like one even if she had to fake it. I was fourteen. My sister moved out, left town, and came back to live next door. I avoided her. She hugged me and I remember thinking that her hair smelled rank to me. My mother had to force me to invite her to my 15th birthday party. I ended up babysitting her kids to buy necessities, like a coat, because it was the only way to survive my Mother's less than benign neglect. The weird thing was, my sister didn't remember. Not any of it. And eventually I didn't want to tell her, because in spite of myself I liked this new patched up version of my sister and I didn't want to set back her recovery. It caused me more pain to try to NOT forgive her than it did to love her, so I went with what was easiest. Sometimes forgiveness is the natural state of things and you just have to go with it.

2006-11-28T02:31:00.000-08:00

My posts have been slow but I have been busy with school. Damn that school for always getting in the way of my hobbies.
Things have been pretty quiet around my place lately. Thanksgiving break was great. Food got eaten, and none of the truly annoying relatives showed up. I'd like to say that on a personal note I have evolved past all of my issues and concerns and am now a perfect student, good citizen, and social butterfly but I don't lie that well. I'm still wrestling with the unshakeable feeling that I do not belong in college. But since I already owe money I may as well make the best of it. I've got papers to write. Luckily semester ends in about two weeks. My best friend has temporarily forgotten that I don't want to cozy up to his new girlfriend, so that's been backburnered. My boyfriend apparently put a down payment on an engagement ring shortly before realizing that he only wanted to marry me out of a "strong sense of commitment" (how breathtakingly romantic...not love, but commitment, much like I am a new car). That is completely unresolved and can stay that way for all I care. My niece came to visit and has turned into a stunning young woman over night. We went to a bookstore and suddenly a couple of kids from the college who had to be sophomores started talking really loudly about all of the art that they knew (I remember doing idiotic things to impress guys and so kindly didn't point out that Primavera was NOT the Birth of Venus, and that they were by Botticcelli, NOT Rembrandt). I stood there, half tempted to lean over and whisper "jailbait" at them and half tempted to pat them on the heads and laugh. I did neither.
And thats life in a nutshell. Off to sleep.

2006-11-19T23:15:00.000-08:00

My best friend is a 24 year old man who weighs 280 pounds and dresses like Mr Rogers. He is, in a word, geeky. To elaborate, hopelessly geeky. At least, on the outside. But he's happy that way, so it all sort of works. Where it really bites him in the ass is in the arena of dating.
You see, my hopelessly geeky manfriend is also a magnet for crazy women. I know everyone sometimes feels like a crazy magnet. However, until you have dated someone that you report seemed perfectly normal only to find out that they believe that the dragons of Pern live in your dorm bathroom and communicate telepathically only with you (which is how you know they're there because they are invisible) you really can't compete. Another one thought that she was a changeling (as in the rpg) in a previous life and that her ability to turn into a cat in that life left her with residual magical powers that evil people called "hunters" pursued (which he laughed at until he was telling his Mom the story and some guy claiming to be a hunter demanded with great intensity to know where this "changeling" was). Yet another one claimed that they had to break up because she and her 36 year old exboyfriend were two halves of an angel and the world would literally collapse if they didn't get back together; afterwards every time he went to the dorm food line she chewed him out for stalking her.
So when he started seeing a 42 year old polyamorous woman I was pretty concerned. But I got over it, because so far she's brought him the least misery of anybody else. My manfriend is weird, so it fits that he would be happiest in a relationship that is out of the norm. The problem is that she lies compulsively to me. At first there was this whole drama where he didn't want to tell me that they were involved, but they actually were. So she kept cornering me pretending to be disturbed by her feelings for him to gauge my reaction. I actually understand this, because she was deciding what they could tell me without me freaking out. If it had ended there I'd get it. But instead, after I said I didn't care, she kept pulling me aside with all the histrionics of a Barnum and Bailey circus, carrying the charade to the max until she persuaded him to tell me the truth. And then even after, she kept pulling me aside with massive histrionics to tell me that she was disturbed by the age difference. Another lie, according to my friend, who said that the issue was always thoroughly hashed out. It seems like she just did it to make me think better of her, little realizing that the fastest track to my shit list is manipulating me.I've been keeping my peace because it's not my love life, and if she brings him some joy I'm not going to do a thing to stop it. But the fact that I avoid her is grating on his nerves. We talked about it tonight, because he wants to go on a trip, the four of us (him, her, me, mine)-its the annual trip we used to take together and she sort of commandeered it. There's a hint of jealousy there but I'm keeping it to a dull buzz (mantra: she makes him happy, she makes him happy). Bottom line, I can't trust a single word that comes out of her mouth as 90% of them are lies, and he's pretty determined that we should bump into each other at all opportunities. I sooooooo hate dating drama.

Youtube addiction gone awry

2006-11-13T02:40:00.000-08:00

Technically I am still supposed to be reading that damnable book on Mao. You can see how well that's working out. Instead I found myself surfing youtube for mvs of television shows that I like. I do this so often that I got hard up and ended up looking up mvs for the O.C.
Before I moved to the land with no cheap cable, I was watching season one on the sly, so that no one would know I had a guilty pleasure like the O.C. in all its teenaged drama splendor. Not having seen it in two years, I was learning some new things from the clips. Apparently the blonde that always made me want to feed her and slap a personality into her is dead. Okay, no big loss. Her poor bastard love interest needed more drama anyway because t.v. tortured souls are only appealing to audiences when they're good and tortured. Some guy fell off of a cliff. The Ryan character (token bad boy) beat the crap out of lots of people. Then he beat the crap out more people. Someone got shot. Someone didn't get shot. The annoying blonde had a trauma disorder. Then she didn't. She overdosed. Then she didn't. The slutty Mom slept with this guy; then with that one; then with another one off to the side of the first two.
And yet, in my two year absence, I really don't think I missed much.
Huh.
There's something about the pretty people with problems format that just draws you in, even if you cannot relate to the characters and are in fact from a seperate planet. For example, all of my friends when I was a teenager were Ryan Atwoods. Did we have a Summer? Nope. If we did we would have tormented her on principal. A Marissa? Heck no, a kid that nuerotic would have been in the county services nuthouse faster than you can say "eating disorder and borderline personality". And someone would have fed her, for God's sake. We would have shared a lunch or something.
I think that what really draws us to this type of programming isn't that we can relate, but that we can't. It's the sheer malicious joy of watching shows about people with lives more screwed up than our own. I would love to say that I am intellectually and maturationally above such sadistic rubbish, but that would be a dirty lie. I'm already putting it on my Netflix list. :)

THIS MUCH sick of being misunderstood

2006-11-10T02:45:00.000-08:00

SI has come up a few times in conversations with my classmates-one woman recently suggested that it was all media based, that the media is giving people ideas. Someone else confused self injury with cutting and treated the issue as though all people who SI were hoping to leave scars so that someone would notice them. A few other near and dear issues have been mentioned as well; the failures of cps and long term effects of childhood abuse.
What do I do when this happens?
I pretend to have researched it merely for term paper purposes and explain as politely as possible why their info is bad.
It's annoying. Next time it happens I'm just coming out with something to the effect of, "really, I began to SI when I was about 11 and I never saw any media on it and I have no scars and I told no one." Damnit. It would serve them right for buying into a crapline and doing poor research.
I've actually began to consider moving towards advocacy when I find myself in those situations. At least it would be a productive means of shoveling emotional shit. And if it drove someone off they wouldn't be much worth hanging around with anyway.

I am such a list fanatic

2006-11-09T18:08:00.000-08:00

But really, what's one more?
I thought that to close down this latest of my moody and broody blog sections and move onto somthing more shiny and happy (I hope) I would sum up some of the valuable life lessons that I've picked up so far.
1. It is better to be happy than rich, although if you're neither you're pretty much screwed.
2. Don't wish that you were someone else-you never know how many times that person has managed to humiliate themself in public.
3. Don't envy what someone else has. You never know what they had to do to get it.
4. If you go with greed and screw someone else over to get what you want, you will always have the taste of ashes in your mouth when you try to enjoy your ill gotten gain.
5. Friends come in all shapes, sizes, religions and sexual orientations. Collect them all; the world is a big place and there be monsters in it.
6. If you suddenly feel the need to send warm thoughts or prayers to someone else, do it. Trust me. The worst thing that can happen if you do is nothing.
7. When you get a box of chocolates, always poke out the middle-this is a shrewd move and will ultimately spare you the pain of coconut ickiness.
8. Violence is a single purpose tool- defense against other people who misuse it to cause harm.
9. The roommate who notices the dishes first always ends up doing them. Playing dumb is your only hope.
10. The law of Karma, however, dictates that whoever pretends not to see the giant hairball on the carpet is doomed to step on it. Barefoot.

life soundtrack

2006-11-08T23:14:00.000-08:00

entertaining myself by coming up with a list of songs that I could use to play as background music to my life
1. seether's broken
2. Hoobastank's crawling in the dark
3. Rasmus' in the shadows
4. three days grace's scared
5. sarah mclaughlan's fear (emerging theme!)
(damn am i broody)
6. billy joel's shades of grey
7. agent orange's everything turns grey
(since i was on grey anyway)
8. counting crows version of big yellow taxi
9. meredith brook's shatter
10. meredith brook's wash my hands
(okay, now i know i've been watching too many moody mv's on youtube)
11. twisted sister's we're not gonna take it
12. kansas' carry on my wayward son (because they don't have a song that says carry on my wayward daughter, but what the hell)
13. bon jovi's its my life
14. the theme song to the breakfast club- i think it's don't you forget about me
15. three day's grace animal i've become

hmm. i could say that i am inherently depressing and kind of a wet blanket, but the thing of it is that this is also the music that i listen to when i'm happy. i blame the genre. songwriters in the rock genre are all extremely screwed up people.

2006-11-08T18:13:00.000-08:00

Okay, I'm supposed to be reading this book on chairman Mao. However, Mao is not only dull in book form, but the writing sucks. It keeps making references to his "hooded eyes surrounded by shades of grey beneath the swiftly falling rain" or some such lyrical crap.
Oh yes, crap.
Why must I read this in an academic setting? If this were personal I wouldn't touch it. I would instead take the steaming pile of bad book to the used book store and trade it for the Rape of Nanking (which I wouldn't read because the photos make me throw up, but at least it would be a better textbook on China).
Instead I wandered around campus talking to people and working on being more socially open. This of course implies that I am usually not. Which is true-I like people and I like to hang out with them, but sometimes when I try my heart rate jumps and I experience the thrill of deep anxiety. I can't meet anyone's eyes, I stare down, I don't smile, I get nervous and babble, I respond to "how are you" with a strangled grunting noise. I've been this way since I can remember. It isn't a side effect of some horrible mistreatment-it's just me being me. It used to annoy my socialite wannabe mother way before I accumulated baggage. She would demand that I go out to the livingroom and do something cute for the company and I would hyperventilate, cry, or grab onto sturdy furniture and hang on (you haven't lived until you've seen a woman in pearls with done up hair try and pull a hysterical four year old off of the base of an enormous oak table-and I was a biter). Nobody started talking about social anxiety as a disorder or anything until waaaaay later (last five years or so); probably its what I would be diagnosed with, but my Mom couldn't know that.
I force myself to shake it off; I make myself talk to people, I make myself ask about them, I force a smile. I even made myself take drama, storytelling, and public speaking. I have a pretty wide circle of friends back home, but it was easier there because I could meet people through someone else, which helped because I could skip some of the preface bullshit I'm no good at. Here I only loosely know a few people. Recently it occured to me that my aversion to eye contact probably communicates a lack of interest in people-not true at all. So I walked around today practicing eye contact and smiling (which I don't do anyway; it just never occurs to me).
I hope I didn't creep anyone out.
It is aggravated by my personal baggage, like I have some kind of underlying suspician that I'm not as good as everyone else and that I'm not good enough to talk to them, but this is a problem of its own. And has an easier solution-smile, smile, force, avoid cringe, smile. Sometimes I don't pull if off, and people DO get creeped out. Sometimes there's even still hyperventilating. But if I let the anxiety win my social life whittles down to my WOW addicted couch ornament of a boyfriend. No thanks.
Smile, smile, smile..........
Ouch. Cheeks burning like flabby arms after pushups....
Recovery. Smile.

Just because I drank too much caffeine and now can't sleep

2006-11-06T06:18:00.000-08:00

Ten more things you didn't know about me (and maybe don't want to)
1. My favorite t shirt is red with a cartoon Klingon on it that says "Kapla Klingon!".
2. I actually know what Kapla Klingon means in Klingon (hangs geeky head in shame).
3. When I was actually out in the dating world all of my boyfriends were martial artists who were also math tutors (and I did this without trying, seriously).
4. One of my friends does metalwork and has made me really wonderful custom jewelry for my birthdays .
5. I was once engaged (gasp!).
6. My brother is an artist, and we always tried to pool our talent for a graphic novel but he was too possesive with the creative parts (my version of events-I'm sure that his is different).
7. I actually have three brothers and one sister- I am the youngest.
8. Everyone else in my family is tall; I am only 5' 5".
9. If I could date any celebrity as his television character it would be Jensen Ackles for Dean in Supernatural, because Han Solo with stubble is sexy.
10.Every Christmas I sneak out of bed while everyone else is asleep to commune with the tree and stare at all of the sparkly lights. Last year my boyfriend caught me and was deeply puzzled. Was I cheating on him with the tree? He had no idea what to do with that.

Inner Mayhem

2006-11-05T01:21:00.000-08:00

It is probably apparent to people that read this blog that I'm starting to lose my sense of humor. Mostly this is because I'm aiming for a 4.0, and it's that time of semester. But lately I've also been dealing with weird identity issues.
I was abused. I hate saying that. I was beaten. I was told that I wasn't human. I also got pulled out of school to take care of younger children and hence had to take care of my abusers and their offspring in between getting slammed around and told how worthless I was. And I won't say that it had no effect-anyone who has read some of my ealrier blogs would know that to be bs. I've done some SI, I've lapsed into eating disorder, I've learned to hate myself. But I also found redemption in taking care of people and on occaision I've used the survival skills that I learned in that home to take care of others weaker than myself. And my public face was always bold and sassy, even when it was two inches away from the flat of somone's hand. I taught myself to fight ruthlessy because I was always so certain that one day it would be that or die, although even when that day came I didn't have the heart to use what I knew.
Basically I aqcuired a skill set that is really only useful if you are training to be a mercenary or expect to be mugged often. Predictably, life turned out quieter. So I ended up in college, where I have been plugging along trying to tone down the badass vibe to fit in and pretending to be a clean cut all American slightly overaged college girl. There are days when it feels like I am wearing a tight costume. There are days when I am exactly what I pretend to be, and the other thing that I am feels like a tight costume or worse, a figment of my imagination. And the worst part is that the people close to me didn't know me when I was younger and...badder; hence they don't believe that I'm capable of much more than a little light bitching. And the people that did know me then stopped hanging out with me in disgust because I had "lost my edge".
It is a bad balance to have to strike.
Maybe I should take up martial arts. I'm not bad with a handgun either-maybe I could go target shooting. Anything to channel my inner mayhem before it leaks out during term paper time.

my breif but painful venture into girldom

2006-11-04T01:46:00.000-08:00

My idea of dressing up has always been to mix my denim with a tight black tank and slap on some red lipstick. Eventually I hope to add a nice stylish tatoo and get my nose repierced. I am not one of those people that has the skill and dexterity to wrestle with curlers daily and come out victorious. As far as I'm concerned, lipliner is something that you use to write phone numbers when you forget your ink pen. Last birthday my sister got me a nail kit. I was still using the cuticle pushy thingy to jab my brother in the arm repeatedly and referring to the hang nail removal device as and "eye gougy thing" when his girlfriend finally told me what they all meant. I forgot ten minutes later, but at least now I can say that I was once initiated into the complex world of self torture devices that is a manicure set.
Last week I decided that since I was now 24 and therefore finally a real live grownup, I should learn about these things in the hopes of looking more polished when I hit job interviews. As it is the best I can manage is a sort of refined scruffiness with an edge of punk rock white trash sexy, like maybe I might be good for a night out at the bar but not so much the help desk. Not good. So I curled my hair and put on eyeshadow (remembering what my bro's girlfriend told me about the smudginess and bicolor schema) and looked really good. For ten minutes. Then it deteriorated like sugar in rain. The makeup got smudgier than it was supposed to, the eyeshadow sweated off and got into the weird fold in my eyelid, resulting in a line of bold color against normal skintone. The hair fell flatter than it was before under the weight of all the hairspray it took to get it there in the first place. Also, plucking the eyebrows is not for wussies.
It became plain to me that all of the strength training and self defense practice I have engaged in over the years were not enough to toughen me up against a pair of tweezers and a set of hot rollers. I have a whole new respect for those women that can pull this off every day-looking good is a dangerous sport.

2006-11-03T01:40:00.001-08:00

The thing about always being made to take care of your family, even when they beat you, is that it breeds a certain steeliness of personality. I used to be very very steely. And I used to be pretty rowdy in a fight too. I was more decisive, because I had to be. And I was more determined, because I had to be that too.
I think I'm getting soft in my old age.
It wouldn't be soo bad- I think a lot of that tough bullshit was maladaptive anyway, it just kept me from looking normal which is why I tried to purge it in the first place-but the fact is that you don't go from certified badass to emoting wet noodle girl without certain consequences. Like periodic bouts of nostalgia accompanied by a strong but totally irrational urge to listen to Nirvana and put yourself through rigorous strength training as if in some weird televsion training montage.
I'm starting to workout again. For me its not about weight loss (though I wouldn't bitch it I lost say...thirty). It's about strength, and probably on another level its about reclaiming some of those tough characteristics that I worked so hard to lose because they may not have been so bad after all. And being a college girl who can throw a 200lb man over her shoulder and onto his back with speed and vigor is underrated.
This, and this alone could persuade me to stuff myself into a powder blue athletic outfit and run around my neigborhood in a large but ultimately fruitles circle. For no pants size do I attempt the dreaded pushups and the thrice cursed situps of doom. Nope-this is not the folly of girlish vanity. This is the folly of true fitness.
Wish me luck.

blah blah stuff

2006-10-25T00:23:00.000-07:00

So I'm continuing to mull over myself. I've begun to face up to something that I've long known, namely that I go out of my way to protect other people from myself. I don't tell people things about myself, not because I don't feel comfortable talking about them, but because me talking about them makes other people uncomfortable. I don't want to contaminate anyone with my own personal darkness. Like I am dangerous just to be near because me being what I am makes people sad.
I just thought to myself that I had better keep my boyfriend off of my backlist so that he doesn't read this blog and get upset by the things that I think, that I hope my father doesn't find it while out blog trolling for people with common interests because then he might feel bad about not being first rate father material if he reads some of my earlier posts.
I hate secrets, but they can be so necessary. Especially if I want to blend in with everyone else. I've written about that before.
Now that I've had my profound thought for the predawn hour- off to caffeinate. There are midterms in my future.

still here, damnit

2006-10-23T04:31:00.000-07:00

i do exist. my life has been in one of those peek change phases where everything reorders itself. i've been mulling it over. that's why i haven't written; because i was likely to change my mind so many times that this kind of honest blogging might be more destructive than constructive.
i've been thinking a lot about me, and what makes me tick, and what other people think of that.
growing up i had this friend that only ever wanted to be thin and beautiful, have long hair, and go to acting school in New York. She fought her way out of being the chunky afro haired freckly Irish kid and did all of those things. I told her how happy I was for her before she left, when we were about 18. She hadn't remembered ever saying that those were her goals, and when i reminded her she was stunned that she had obtained them all, that she had known what she wanted so young. then she said "all i remember you ever wanting to do was save the world and everyone in it".
it was weird, having someone clue me in to a basic fact about myself before i did. it was like the truth was written in the back of my mind and she had translated it.
i do want to save the world. i am most comfortable when i am helping other people. nothing else that i have ever done feels right. i am uncomfortable thinking of myself first; it makes my skin crawl.
when i was a kid i was always organizing kids for saving earth clubs and talking about the ozone layer and the plight of the manatee. whan i was older my mom started keeping me out of school and having me take care of my sister's kids-sometimes for a week at a time. i criticize her for this, it was hard on my grades and ruined my chance to matriculate directly to a four year college. her apathy to my needs was inexcusable. but the truth is that i was comfortable taking care of people. i needed to, after awhile. when my sisters kids no longer needed my intevention there were always school kids. i've talked people down from suicide and i've held male rape victimes while they cried (never bonded with women for some reason). i never minded a bit because doing that felt right and nothing else did.
i know that reduced to psychobabble this could be construed as a direct result of my abusive and neglectful upbringing, in which i was pushed into a caretaker role and taught that i was unimportant. but the truth is that taking care of people is the only thing i know how to do.
a few years back my mother went out of her way to fracture our family (an issue for another blog). what i remember being the hardest was the knowledge that there wasn't anyone to need me anymore; that i no longer had a purpose. i knew how to take care of everybody else, but i never learned how to take care of msyself, and thats pretty much where i'm at right now.

Absolutely Seething

2006-10-06T00:33:00.000-07:00

I was just reading the news stories about the man that barged into a school, sexually assualted six girls, and then killed one, followed by the story of the man who killed five, shot ten, and had ky jelly and an eyeletted bondage board.
Now the sons of bitches are giving each other ideas.
When Columbine happened I was in my junior year of high school a state away, hearing the news updates every class period. All day long there was pervasive panic and dread. What happened there was horrific, and yet it occured to me at the time that one day we might see people doing this to schools and commiting sex crimes as a matter of opportunity, or even motivation instead of sticking to the usual murder and mayhem. I was just becoming aware of how much more common sex crimes are than murder.
I hate it when I'm right.
Strictly speaking I'm not a religious person, but if I had a religion, it wouldn't be one of the forgiving ones. I very much hope that if there is a hell, these men go there.
I wish that I had something nicer to say tonight. I just really don't.

Insomnia....crap

2006-10-05T01:14:00.000-07:00

The sad side effect of pulling all nighters every week for a month is that eventually every night becomes an all nighter. And I've studied til I just can't do it. Obviously it is finally blog time.
One of my nieces is about to turn fifteen. This gives me an unpleasantly old feeling. In conjunction with my grey hairs, worry crinkle, and general old used uppedness I'm feeling damned near geriatric.
A few years ago my sister contacted me in the dead of morning to ask me if I would make some time for my neice and be the official "cool older relative" . I recall that I was lounging around in my best grungy rubber ducky pajama pants and that my greasy hair was plastered upright at attention. I was also gnawing on a little debbie snack cake and standing in front of the livingroom mirror admiring the carnage from my late night of watching internet cartoons. There were crumbs down the front of my shirt, which was also grungy and said "Deart Artie, hate you, hate Camelt, took Lance-Gwennie."
"I don't think I'm exactly cool older relative material", I told her with my customary morning bluntness. "You should ask Lee".
Lee is our new potential sister in law, who is a bisexual wiccan and dresses like every day is a renfaire or an excursion to Hot Topic. Bisexual wiccan versus greasy crumb girl? In this day and age I lose in the coolness area.
"Last time I left her with Lee I came back and she had the brat and four of her friends cursing one of the neigbors".
"Oh." Apparently Lee wasn't a particualry good wiccan. And then, because I had to ask, "what kind of curse?"
"The kind that got me phone calls from the other parents" she said darkly.
My sister is also Wiccan and tries to keep the little ones out of it. She lives in the only California extension of the Bible belt. I suddenly recalled that all of the cool older relatives that I had were extremely polished looking and had those cute matching shoe and purse sets; I looked down at my bitten up nails.
"Does this mean that I have to get shoe and purse sets?" I like starting these thoughts in the middle with my sister. It makes her so frustrated.
"Uhm....no."
"What do I do?"
"Just talk to her about stuff. Hang out with her. Give her an adult that isn't me to advise her."
Oh. That. "So pretty much I just buy her ice cream and tell her not to smoke pot or sleep with boys."
"Er..." I love frustrating my sister. It needs to be restated. "Among other things".
"I'm screwing with you. I knw what you want, and really, its no problem".
As it turns out, it really wasn't. All I have to do is let her play with my cd collection, wear my formals aroung the house and watch my Buffy the Vampire Slayer collection; it works itself out. I was just adapting to her being fourteen. Now she had to throw a wrench in my works by turning fifteen. How dare she.
Next thing you know she'll be sixteen.
Obviously this is a conspiracy against me personally, and not part of the natural ageing process.
And on top of the emotional trauma of suddenly finding out that I've gotten old, I have to think up a gift.

How to avoid being productive

2006-09-28T18:38:00.000-07:00

Play on the internet. Scribble in multiple blogs, then look up knitting patterns. It's working for me so far.
I don't want to do any of the things that I am supposed to be doing. See this? This is me not writing about the fall of Muscovy.
And this?
Check out how I cleverly avoid reading about Chinese factory workers.
I may have to restrict myself. Blog usage is way too much fun. And I am totally enamoured with Blogger's super adaptable design and friendly large print. Next up, user pick. I'm trying to decide on one that shows me off AND leaves me unrecognizable.
Aww...now I have a kitty. Another distraction. Hi kitty. You wanna write my midterms?
I didn't think so. You never earn your keep.
Off to do something unproductive.

YAAAAAAAAAAAAWN

2006-09-28T02:55:00.000-07:00

My sleep schedule got thrown sometime in the last month, and I can't seem to shake the idea that 3am is the new eleven pm. It's not, which I realize again every 3pm, in class, when I get extra sleepy. But I seem to have forgotten again.
I just felt like posting something lighter or more trivial after my last post, which was extra heavy. I don't want anyone coming to my blog and getting slit their wrists depressed. I have my moments of thinking dark things, but I really DO think other stuff. Honest. Like right now, I'm thinking about washing my clothes. The pile in my closet has reached take over the world proportions again, and I must stop it before it does something rash.
....
.....
......
Dangit. Brain not working. I bet if I try to sleep it will work overtime. Stupid brain.
I guess I'll have to aim for the extra fluffy, since my brain can't formulate complex humor right now.
I'll go with the ever popular ten things you didn't know about me.
here goes:
1. I'm a big sci fi geek
2. I am my cat's bitch
3. Once upon a time I could actually spell. That time has passed.
4. I have been known to dance in my underwear. To the Pretty in Pink soundtrack.
5. Once I tried origami. It was a disaster. That paper crane was laughing at me.
6. I used to write humor for my high school newspaper, and eventually I plan on doing it for a real live grown up one.
7. I also used to edit that newspaper. I agree with Mark Twain on newspaper editing. He said "I am not the editor of a newspaper and shall always try to be good and do right so that God will not make me one." Ditto.
8. I used to collect qoutes in a small black notebook; I am slowly resurrecting that habit.
9. I think that if I lined up this semester's required reading it could circle the globe three times (grumble grumble, bitch bitch)
10. I know from firsthand experience that in politics the word "frankly" roughly translates to "ahem, I am about to be an asshole".
Off to try and sleep. Maybe if I could just trick my brain into thinking that it IS 3pm, and that I am in class....

Trigger warning

2006-09-27T03:00:00.000-07:00

If you would rather read something light hearted I reccomend Killer Babies or How to love a Gamer. You've been warned.*************************************************

I've been stewing over a nightmare that I had the other night. It was graphic, and frightening, and based on the true story of my life.
I am a sexual assault survivor. It sticks in my throat when I say that.
I was fourteen the first time, and he was one of my friends. We had been friends for two years when we went out on a couple of dates and one night things went to hell in a hand basket. I won't say what he did exactly. He did not rape me. But he did do just about everything else. The only reason that I was not raped is that in the middle of it I froze with his hand clenched in mine and he couldn't get to the zipper of my pants.
There are a lot of things about that night that I regret. I regret not screaming, but the truth is that I had been trained not to scream by childhood physical abuse. I regret not telling anyone, but the attitude of my family towards my physical abuse gave me no hope that telling anyone would actually accomplish something, so I didn't. I regret willingly participating in sexual acts with this person afterwards because I was afraid that he would tell people what "we" had done. I finally got a backbone after about three months and told him off. That was the night that he walked another friend of ours home from my house and raped her. I had thought that he was obsessed with me; it never occured to me that she might be in danger. I am partially responsible for her rape. I never told her, but there were elements of what he did that were meant as a message to me. He raped her to get back at me. I made myself sick after that; I couldn't even look at me.
During my entire childhood I was saved in part by my faith. But my faith was of a devoutly Christian flavor, and by strict religious reckoning I was now used goods and had nothing to offer anyone. I eventually stopped talking to God. I have not spoken to he/she/it since.
When my next boyfriend came along I was just happy that somebody wanted me. Three months in he demanded sexual favors. I felt like I couldn't say no, that I had nothing left to hold back. I hated every minute of it, but a combination of force and coercian led to some of the most bizarre experiences of my life. As it turns out he was into things that I can only describe as sexual torture. I remember them all like they happened to somebody else; I spent most of that time dissasociating. He was also controlling and violent. I told no one; no one had listened to me before and I had no reason to believe that they would suddenly start. I was finally able to shake him just before my seventeenth birthday. He called me two years later, just to keep tabs. He asked if I was still a virgin, and then laughed. I had been with him for two years, maybe waiting another two was some kind of ritual for him.
I went to college. I never looked back. I can talk about all the beatings I got as a kid without batting an eyelash. This I cannot talk about except in spare prose on an anonymous blog. Maybe my dreams are telling me that its time to try.

Attack of the Killer Babies!!!!!!!

2006-09-26T18:42:00.000-07:00

All of my friends have reached that life stage where they are spawning babies faster than I can knit booties. Maybe I could pursuade them to try footbinding; sure its crippling and horribly painful, but if it gives me a leg up on my knitting....Just joking.
The latest baby got spawned over the weekend. My friend (the new daddy) sent my Best Beloved and I pictures. Very cute. The perfect bootie model.
It brought to mind the incident a few weeks ago where my Best Beloved and I suddenly realized that I was not just "late", but "very late" and began to fear that we too might add to the baby trend. We are not baby people. We like them when we can give them back. So it was with great trepidation that we bought a test (two, actually) and I took it.
How many college students does it take to read the results of an EPT?
Sadly, at least two. Neither of us could wait to see what was in the screen, so hearts in throats we stood around the bathroom counter ignoring the old adage about watched pots. It came out. Sort of.
"What the hell?" My Best Beloved demanded, grabbing onto the handle and turning it in a circle.
"Ew. Don't touch that!" I could not believe he touched that. Then I saw what he saw. "What is that?" I wondered out loud. "Modern art or something?"
We stared at it longer. One window had a blue line, like it was supposed to. The window next to it had one blue line for negative, and then a sort of hint of a swishy blue line in the background.
"What the hell?" We said it simultaneously.
"Does the swishy blue line mean positive?" There was panic in his voice. I sympathized; the idea of getting fat and having stretch marks for the rest of my life didn't thrill me.
"It had better not". I glared at him.
"Hey! You act like I did this all on my own! I do remember you helping."
I chose to ignore that. "Lets hope you didn't do anything".
"Me? You're the one with the whole baby making apparatus thingy!"
Panic makes people stupid. Would you believe he's a science major?
The directions called for a one week wait before retesting. It was an unpleasant week, while I wondered how to do childcare and classwork and he kept volunteering (way too readily for someone claiming to love school) to drop out for the good of all. I finally retested and got cleared. Thank the gods of my chosen sterility.
After we read the results, we were sitting in the livingroom on our respective computers playing on the internet and generally being not sociable. He finally broke the silence by looking over at me, smiling goofily and saying "you know, maybe I do want kids".
I threw a sofa pillow at him.

Family reunion hell

2006-09-25T20:06:00.000-07:00

Just when I think I've reached the limits of stupid things I could do in this lifetime I one up myself. What was it this time? Have I decided to experiment with drugs? Eaten laxatives like candy? Tried to bungie jump with fabric trim?
Worse, much worse. I've agreed to go to my family reunion.
If this blog had a soundtrack, this would be where the dunh dunh DUNH! sound came in. My family reunions ar the stuff of nightmares. I would actually rather bungie jump with fabric trim, but there seem to be an abundance of people who have their hearts set on seeing me that weekend and if I take the trim plunge they won't see me ever. The things I do for others.
To say that I am a pariah in an already Balkanized family is like saying that Antartica is a spot of ice on a speck of dust. Technically accurate, sure, but one hell of an understatement. Just my luck to be the only kid born into an uptight family that can't lie worth beans or blend to save her life.
Basically the break down is this: my Mother's side of the family hates my Father because his family was what they considered poor white trash. They were thrilled when my folks split up about fifteen years ago. And might I add, assholes to my siblings and I. So that would be strike one. Strike two is that my Mother is a former model, and though I am a dead ringer for her I lack the eating disorder to be that skinny and the patience for that much upkeep. They never tire of pointing out that I am too short/too fat/not polished looking enough. When they find a flaw, like my shortness, they attribute it to "that other side" (ironically Dad's family is tall and rail thin). Strike three is me myself. These people will never like me unless I go through total personality rewrite. In a family where a slight uplift of one eyebrow at a given time is a deadly insult and everything is about controlling the perceptions of others, I am cursed with a certain degree of directness. I've been that way since birth. And I was cursed with a degree of precociousness as well. If I had been a boy they would have found it cute. Unfortunately I was a girl, so there were apparently completely opposite standards that I was supposed to adhere to. I didn't get the memo, not that it would have mattered, because I can't unbe me, not even to fit in with my own family.
The choices I make just because they seem right to me strike these people as open rebellion. I used to major in anthropology. Half of this family is either ministers or their wives and kids; they thought that anthropology meant "heresy". I got a nose peircing because I liked them. They thought that I was "acting out". I drink very little alchohol; most of them are alchoholics who don't realize it yet and are upset that I don't join the noon happy hour.
I'm pretty sure that I'm fine and that there are things wrong with them. I am as certain of that as they are of the opposite.
Ironically my closest in age brother has the opposite problem. Where they think that I am a manish woman they think that he is a girly man. He is, in fact, the reason I am going to the annual family hellcapades. We'll be each other's wing man. I love my brother. If anyone screws with him they will be eternally sorry.
Since I know that regardless of what I do or how I dress I'm in for the weekend from hell as well as total familiar rejection, I'm going to have some fun with these people. I'm cleaning my tiny silver handcuff earrings and reglueing the soles to my dom boots from high school. Let them think I dress like this all the time; I will have the last laugh. Muwhahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sets fire to laptop in pure frustration

2006-09-25T02:23:00.000-07:00

I took up writing again. I was on top of the world with my latest piece, very satisfied and all of that, when I went to upload it to a web page and remembered that my laptop and my wireless service are not getting along and that I would have to move my latop to the livingroom for the upload, where I could plug it in to a cord. I had saved my doc four times, so when I went to shut it down and move it (as per my shiny new owners manual) I was unconcerned. When I went to open my file for the upload a minute later, it was gone. I immediately invented new swear words and had several minutes of contemplating throwing either myself, of the laptop through the window. Probably myself. This was the first peice I had been happy with in years, I felt like I was stepping back into myself as I wrote it and then it just...evaporated.
Why didn't I back it up, you ask.
It has no floppy drive, it won't save to cd for some unkown reason, and my portable drive was awol. I do know better than THAT for heavens sakes.
My boyfriend watched the anarchy from our couch, and then tried to help in that meddlesom male way of his wherein it is never enough to listen to the problem, they must attempt a solution (yes, I realize that this is a stereotype and many new age males are excellent listeners-I assure you that he isn't one of them). This led to a scuffle over the laptop, and then me yelling at him for rummaging through my blog documents. He has no idea that this blog exists. I like it that way. Fortunately he had his "I am 1950's male watch me tinker" game face on, so I doubt he noticed what he was reading.
He finally concluded, he thought brillantly, that I had simply saved it wrong. User error, end of story. As it happens, I saved it at least four times while I was writing it. Did I accidentally NOT save it right FOUR TIMES, I with my journalism background and depressingly long college education?
I think not. Yes, Occahm's razor demands that I accept the user error explanation, but I was there. I saved. It even asked me if I wanted to replace the previous document, and I clicked yes every time. I closed it, I brought it back up. It was there. And then it wasn't. Now I'm getting woman who saw aliens treatment, in the sense that my Best Beloved assures me that my document is not gone through technological breakdown, but because I was stupid. Though he is much too smart to phrase it that way. I've pointed out before that it's not good to piss of the person who sleeps next to you, particualry when that person is me.
For someone who knows his every secret and who he claims to trust with his very heart and soul, I get very little credibility. I don't think he fully realizes that a good percentage of the time he's quite the neanderthal. For example, soon after we hooked up I was saying something feministy (ie seperating me from a doormat-can't remember where I heard that but it's a qoute). He looked at me with genuine shock and said, "oh my God, your're a feminist?" like feminist was a dirty word. I pointedly asked him how pathetic the women in his family were to have let him grow up thinking that feminism was a bad thing. He took my point.
Another time he actually slapped my rear in public, and was truly appalled when I just as publicly whirled around and asked him if I was a hooker. He looked from side to side and said "no" before I told him not to treat me like one. He tried to explain that his Dad did it in public to his Mom as a sign of affection. I replied that that sounded like her problem, not mine.
When someone cracked a joke about the two of us getting married and he called me Mrs.hislastname I felt compelled to point out that I had no intention of changing my last name. In fact the thought that I would be expected to had never crossed my mind. I was just as shocked that he assumed I would as he was when he learned that I assumed I wouldn't. We had a hypothetical argument about our hypothetical marriage. It was silly, but I really hate losing. So does he.
Why am I still here and not on the prowl, looking for sensitive new aged guys?
I happen to like this one. He has his good points. For example, he looks like Albrecht Durher in his 1500 self portrait down to the green eyes. I always loved that painting. And he's terribly funny. And smart. And when you peel away the layers of his poor communication skills, he's actually very kind and well meaning. He's got the whole package, its just in an unexpected wrapper.
And then there is the fact that the first time we spoke I knew that I was talking to the other half of me, and he knew the same. Have you ever felt a pull to someone so strong that you couldn't ignore it? It was that pull. I have never felt anthing like it before or since. I knew within a week that he belonged in my life. I just didn't know in what capacity, and that limbo lasted three years.
And there is the added incentive that we make each other think. They say that you can't change someone, and this is true. But you can convince them to let go of an outmoded idea that is false and doesn't really suit them anyway. So far I've won on rear slapping and feminism, and he's won on me talking to his family (I hate families) and bedmaking (I would never bother). We're housebreaking each other slowly.
Now to work on the issue of my credibilty.....
Which begs the question, what issue does he have in mind to work on with me?

Kitty blues

2006-09-23T13:31:00.000-07:00

I had to wake up by the crack of noon today; my furry alarm clock wouldn't have it any other way. Pet owners will sympathize with this: so there I am, laying in bed, minding my own business when my boyfriend gets up to use the bathroom and leaves the door open just enough for a determined feline to sneak through. The feline hops up on the bed, glares at me with all his might, and says "meooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooow!"
I look up at him blankly.
Frustrated with my density he stands up straighter and says "mmmmmmmmeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwww!"
I have no idea what it wants at this unglodly hour, so I stuff my head under a pillow and try to go back to sleep. Suddenly I hear cat sized footsteps on the bed and feel something flop down against my back. And then it begins. The cleaning. Loud slurping, toe sucking sounds right by my ear. I peek my head out of the pillow and glare at him.
"You know that's very loud", I tell him pointedly.
He looks at me with the most hatefilled eyes I've ever seen on a cat and makes a strangled sighing sound.
"I imagine you want to eat", I say conversationally.
He reaches over and bites me. I decide that I am on the right track.
I roll out of bed and head for the door. "Fine, I'll feed you. But next time I get a pet its going to be a parakeet".
He looks unconcerned. He knows I'll never get a parakeet. He rises from the bed moving with arrogant grace, confident of his own superiority, and sahsays to the kitchen.
Darned cat.

Why I write this

2006-09-23T01:36:00.000-07:00

Finally I get to write in my blogs. School has been hell this week. It makes the loans I took out to go seem massochistic. They probably are, with my track record.
It was pointed out to me that so far a grand total of two people have commented on this thing, and suggested to me that I close it down. I'm not going to close it down. I like the anonymity too much. I have another blog that I cannot write in without alerting two of my three brothers, a sister in law, a potential sister in law, two friends of the family and this one girl I used to know who gossips too much. And their friends. My life is full of wonderful people and they love me. And they talk. A lot.
I hate secrets, but truth has consequences. People are fragile and unpleasant truths can drive them off, or push them into denial to protect their vision of the world. I know that rejected feeling too well to be completely honest in my other blog. But I also hate secrets. I hate them passionately. This is my compromise. I put things out in the open without risking the up close relationships that I've built slowly over years. And while there may have only been a couple of people commenting, it made my day every time. And I've been exposed to some neat new people, which is always nice.
So no, I'm not shutting this down.
I try to keep my blog light, but there are parts of my life that are dark, and this is the honest blog. I won' t apologize.
Last night I had a nightmare. It was shapeless, mostly because I can't remember what was in it. It wasn't bad because it had bad images or events in it. It wasn't the kind of dream I had when I was a teenager and a walking monument to PTSD. It was a feeling.
Most people go their whole lives without ever really knowing if their nearest and dearest would sell them out, would kick back and let bad things happen to them just because it would cost to much to aknowledge the truth. Most people (so I hear) grow up with some form of reliable adult around. Imagine being eleven and realizing that not only would your own parents sell you out just to keep up appearances, but that there are no reliable adults to take their place. Imagine your whole family; cousins, Aunts, Uncles, siblings, even Grandparents, collectively looking away while you get hurt over and over again. Imagine how you would feel if your life was like this for years at a time, and you were just waiting to be killed out pure negligence.
It was that feeling.
I have never been hung over, but I imagine that that is what my waking up felt like. I don't usually rise gracefully, but I couldn't pull myself out of bed until three pm. That's a record, even for me. I felt sick, dizzy, and somehow low. I thought the feeling would go away after I got up and moved around. It didn't. I caught myself snapping at my boyfriend. I like to think of myself as a person with good self control. I think that no matter what else may be wrong with you, you should be able to restrain yourself from hurting other people for emotional reasons. I try not to let the insubstantial realm of emotions control the concrete reality. That was blown straight to hell by 5pm.
By 6pm I was curled in the fetal position on my bed feeling worse than I've felt in about a decade. Sometime since I'd waken up I had argued with my boyfriend. I had a meltdown, I hit mysef, right in the middle of it, accutely aware that I must look ridiculus but so far over the edge that I really didn't care. He must have thought it was a manipulation tactic becase he tried to ignore it; he should have known better. It was actually a measure of how much self control I had lost.
It wasn't the last time of the day that I would hurt myself.
I'd like to think that it will be the last time this lifetime. It won't.
Even as I found ways to make myself feel pain I was accutely aware of the irrationality of it all.
It didn't stop me though. This was building for weeks; petty errors I made that I couldn't forgive myself for, things I remembered doing that were wrong from long ago, things that I did not so long ago. Logically I know that other people would not hold me as resonsible for them as I do, that this is my belief in personal responsibilty take to an unhealthy extreme. But there are really two kinds of knowing; knowing in your mind is easy. But its a shallow knowing. Knowing in your heart is harder. And your heart is not a logical thinker.

I live

2006-09-11T01:37:00.000-07:00

I haven't been on either of my blogs in a few days. Too many other things to do. And then that vegetative state that comes sometimes with the weekend, when I can't actually do anything because my brain is tired. I knit myself a funky scarf instead, blissfully mindless knit stitches all the way. And we had a Pretender marathon with our brand new season four. I love the Pretender. I love that the most salient characteristic about Jarrod is compassion, and that the dysfunctional family represented by "The Center" makes my family seem like like the Leave it to Beaver clan, and I love Ms. Parker's mean spirited Xenaness.
I also love tv. Its unfortunate that we don't have cable and can only watch this stuff when we buy it.
Speaking of things that I love, I thought it might be fun to compile a list of that sort of stuff for visitors to my blog. So far I've talked about my depressing childhood, my politics with regards to Plan B, and how I cope with my online gamer, but I haven't really talked about me, such as I am.
Here goes.
Favorite books: The Bordertown series edited by Terri Windling has a soft spot in my heart, as well as the beautiful anthology that she edited about child abuse (which includes her personal experience with it) The Armless Maiden. Although, warning, the anthology I mentioned will trigger the sensitive. I read a lot of Charles de Lint; there have been recent books of his that I thought lacked the depth of his better books, but they have a lot of heart in them and there is always a sort of moral beauty. Andrew Greely's Irish fill in the second word books (Gold, Whiskey, etc.) are fun reads. I'd better abbreviate into list form: the Barnard translation of Sappho's poetry, The Scarlet letter, the Anita Blake vampire hunter novels (even the later ones that get weird), Jennifer Roberson's Tiger and Dell novels (up to the last two), Yeats collected poems, Emma Bull's Bone Dance, some Rod Mckuen poetry and Herbert Mason's translation of Gilgamesh. Pant, pant. I read a lot.
Favorite movies:Empire Records (product of my era), Ten Things I hate About You (ditto), Hidalgo, Chocolat, and the Gladiator. I also have a weakness for old barbarian movies, and the classic Eric the Viking.
Favorite Music: very eclectic. Too eclectic. There isn't enough time. I'm especially fond of the Celtic and Rock genres though. Wicked Tinkers is a badass bagpipe and drum band that I listen to a lot. It's pipe music you could dance to.
Favorite tv: Firefly, The Pretender, Xena, Roar, Roswell, CSI, Dark Angel, the Gilmore Girls and Eureka. Yes, many of my favorite shows have had sadly short lifespans.
I think that the stimuli that we choose to surround ourselves with says a lot about who we are, and what kind of world we want to live in. I hope you enjoyed the crash course.
Back next time with more thought provoking material.

How to love a gamer

2006-09-06T03:17:00.000-07:00

The other night I was looking through old blogs from when my boyfriend and I were carrying on a long distance relationship. It was romantic stuff. I even got sugar shock a couple of times. After surfing the entries for awhile I turned to the smelly, unkempt man lounging on the couch beside me clad only in his boxer briefs.
"Honey, what happened to you?"
This was greeted with the standard grunt of recognition without intent to communicate. I lobbied long and hard for that grunt. It was a step up from the dead silence that I used to be greeted with if I disturbed him in his most sacred of rituals (playing online games).
I prodded him with a pencil. It was as close as I was willing to get considering how long it had been since his last shower. "Hooooney...."
"I'm sorry, did you say something?"
I changed tactics. "You've been sitting there for so long that the couch cushin has shaped itself around your butt and you probably have bedsores."
"I don't have bedsores yet", he answered in vauge, distracted sort of voice.
"And", I added reasonably, "the dishes that you offered to do three days ago are still sitting in the kitchen where they are getting progressively smellier".
"I'll get to them".
This mysterious I'll get to them phrase has burned me before. Every day for three days, in fact. I no longer trust it. "I want a timeframe", I told him in the same tone of voice shopkeepers use to tell college students that they won't accept their checks. "You used to be so responsible. What happened?"
Semi-audible grunt.
I always promised myself that I would not be that woman with the honey do list a mile long. Unfortunately, when "Honey" doesn't actually "do" anything, it does tend to lengthen. Now I promise myself no more than a very reasonable quarter of a mile.
It does beg the "what do I see in this man" question though.
Honestly, beneath that presently kind of stenchy facade beats the heart of a caring, well intentioned, supportive human being. This is the person who never once rolled his eyes when I decided spontaneoulsy that I wanted to learn how to knit and then spent the next three weeks having to be rescued from progressively knottier yarn messes. When the pattern for my grandmother's slippers proved to be a wash and I ended up with an object that looked like a cross between a purse and a deformed sock, did he laugh? Nope. He tried to help fix it. When I decided that I wanted to make yet another attempt at learning the guitar and spent three weeks stuck playing the song "Molly Malone" on an electric guitar (an effect not unlike nails on chalkboard) did he cringe visibly or ask me to stop? Not ever.
He always supports my endeavors, even when I'm really, really bad at them. Of course there is the occasional over helping, like when I misguidedly decide that I'm going to go on a diet and he puts all of the desserts in the top cabinet above the stove and I spend the next four weeks sneaking a chair over to pilfer from my own stash, but he means well. And truthfully, he usually showers more.
So I will take the lessons that I have learned from the past two years of his love and support. I will hold my tongue, and my nose, and occaisionally walk him so that the bedsores do not get too severe until he either comes to his senses or gets bored. Although I will still be adamant about the dishes.

Plan B is a Good Thing

2006-09-04T18:37:00.000-07:00

Recently I've noticed a lot of buzz about plan B in the media and in the world of blogging. Some people have come out in opposition to Plan B and made a lot of arguments that I think are flawed, so I'm adressing some of the more prevalent ones that I've seen. Maybe this will alter some viewpoints.
Arguments Against Plan B in general.
A lot of people have been sqeamish about Plan B because their feeling is that it will negate personal responsibility. A drug that allows for the prevention of pregnancy after sex would allow for people to get off with consequence free unprotected sex, so runs the general argument I've been reading. If you follow this argument to its natural conclusion, all people who realized the morning after that they had had unprotected sex should roll with the dice and accept any conception that should occur, even if they are not emotionally, financially, or physically prepared for it, because that is the responsible thing to do. Does it sound unwise now? I know that people are genuinely (and rightfully) concerned about the lack of personal responsibilty shown by people in our society. However, if one is sincerely not prepared for a pregnancy and makes a mistake that may lead to it, the responsible thing is to follow the only course of action left that may prevent a pregnancy, because responsibilty later is better than responsibilty never. In short, sometimes Plan B is the responsible choice.
In addition, I should point out here that Plan B is not by any means 100% effective. The old morning after pill (essentially a double dose of birth control pills) was only 75% effective if taken immediately, less so the later it was taken. I believe the new Plan B pill decreses in effectiveness as well, and the packaging I've seen for it only lists its effectiveness at 80%. This is not a get out of jail free card. It's a last ditch effort.
Another popular argument that I've seen is the old "only for rape and incest vitims" line. There are some problems with it. For instance, rape is an underreported crime. The numbers differ depending on where you go to get them, so think on this: how many rape victims do you know? How many reported the crime? How many were willing to admit publicly, within seventy two hours, that they had been raped? And here's one more; how many were initially believed? Blame the victim is alive, even if weakened, in our culture. Suppose the victim does report rape. Suppose that they are believed. Then the official channels would still have to verify it. Where in the 72 hour margin of effectiveness does that leave the victim when they've finished? Isn't it better to leave the availability open, even if one is taking the only for rape or incest stance from a moral perspective?
And some info about the over the counter purchasing and cost.
Doctors and Planned Parenthood clinincs are notoriously bad about being open on weekends. So if you made a mistake or were sexually assualted, and it was on a Friday night, you may not be able to see a physician in a timely fashion. Thursday, Monday, fine. But don't you dare have an emergency on the weekend. Yes, some doctors will make time to see you on an emergency basis. But a low income clinic like the Planned Parenthood in my hometown couldn't. They never even had a human being there to answer the phones if it wasn't a weekday. It wasn't malice, it was a funding problem. This left you at the local ER, where the average waiting period for a person without insurance to be spoken to at all was ten hours, the hope of preventing pregnancy getting smaller with every one of them. Maybe you have insurance. Maybe you have a relationship with a private doctor who will make time for your emergencies on his or her weekend. Lucky you. Not everyone has that.
And then we talk of cost. A doctors appointment can run from $60 to $80 dollars (without insurance) just to be standing in the room to get a prescription. I'm not sure how much the pill itself costs. A trip to the ER where Plan B is administered would run about $120. Again, without insurance. Planned Parenthood will give the stuff away, but that's assuming that there is one in your area and that you can get in early enough for the pill to work. For some people, over the counter is both more affordable and more timely.
That said, the concerns.
The only concerns that I have with the pill being made available over the counter are side effects and misuse. It was probably soundly tested, but I haven't seen the data personally so I really don't know about the potential for side effects. I can't say that there are no major ones until I've seen that. The other concern that I have is that women who are panicked and not firing on all cylinders will buy these pills because they think it will stop a pregnancy that they already know about. These drugs usually cause birth defects, so misuse could be dangerous.
Hopefully this was food for thought. There is one other comment that I wanted to make though. Both within the anti abortion argument and the anti plan b argument I've enountered the "you play, you pay" ideolgy. The idea is that if you've had sex and gotten pregnant you deserve to be pregnant, like its a punishment. This is profoundly sick thinking. Childbirth should never be a punishment. Children should never be a punishment. Becoming a parent should be a joyful occaision. I can't believe anyone actually needs this pointed out to them.

So, so addicted

2006-09-04T00:38:00.000-07:00

I love free knitting patterns, which in and itself is not so wrong. I think where I went astray was in looking at them when I should have been reading for class. Sometimes school just really gets in the way of my hobbies.
I was trolling blogs today and saw a lot of stuff about the release of Plan B, some of it negative. Tune in tomorrow if you want to hear why prescription free Plan B is great, and why this pill is great in general. I'm organizing my thoughts on it at the moment.
I am now out of things to say. Yay! Mindless filler.

Insomnia really, really sucks

2006-09-03T06:36:00.000-07:00

I hope my sleep is back on schedule tomorrow night. School and all.
Another blog I read really reminded me of the person who inspired the balconey poem on my last post. I haven't heard from that guy in awhile. I wonder if he's okay. I got his mother last time I called, but this is the woman who used to beat him with extension cords, so she's not a really great barometer of his health and well being. That he still lives with her gives me the heebie jeebies. She actually told him that she had cancer to get he and his bro to move two states away to be closer to her, and once they got there "cancer" was never mentioned again. Some families actually make me feel better about mine. At least their controlling sadism is usually blunt.
I hate that there are so many people out there that I can't help. I hate watching people that I really care about toss their lives and free will because they don't even see what they have. I hate that I can't show them. A whole montage of people that I couldn't help over the years flashes before my eyes every time I meditate on this subject.
I think of J. All of us fourteen, knowing his cop dad beat the crap out of him, yet not being able to stop it. I remember the time he came around bruised black all along his rib cage and three times as wide as a man's fist, a solid bruise. D felt his ribs, they were actually soft.
That reminds me of D. My first boyfriend. He had a solid heart but the beatings he took from his stepfather helped turn him into a crack addict. Last I heard he tried to strangle the mother of his children while she slept. I remember the time he vanished for two days. We all thought he was dead so we went to his house pretending to sell candy, just to check on him. And then there was A, whose Dad controlled her every move and finally snapped, beating her face with a maglite. She got raped not long after and couldn't tell Daddy, so she told her church, and they told her to forgive and forget. And K tried to call CPS about his uncle beating him. CPS said that there wasn't conclusive evidence, so his Uncle tried to kill him and K never reported again. C's parents told her that she would never amount to anything. She always said that I was the one with the crazy dreams that could make them come true. I still have wall hanging with the poem "Dreams" on it that she gave me two years before dropping out, pregnant and married to an abusive spouse at sixteen. K was that spouse, passing the cycle right along into his new family. They may have killed each other by now. This list doesn't even cover half of it.
I grew up with these kids. I lived like them. I was hated like they were. But I'm here (college, good relationship, etc) and they aren't. Like I knew something I should have taught them. It bothers me. In theory I know the difference. I was "gifted". I could write at a pro level when I was fifteen. I caught the interest of my teachers and they gave me the positive feedback that I needed to survive. But I don't think that kids should have to be regarded as gifted to get positive feedback and regard. They shouldn't have to be considered "smart" for someone to think that they are worth salvaging.
I would probably become a social worker, but that would be much too much like trying to save the world with no hands, a stance that works for some bicycle tricks but not for life in general.

blog blog bloggity blog

2006-09-01T23:28:00.000-07:00

Usually my life is pretty drama free. For instance, this week's big event was me discovering a new dessert. I like dessert. I want to go on the record as saying that. Also, I'm working on learning a new song. It sounds just as bad as the old ones, but it will be NEW, and hence, better. My knitting isn't coming along because school session started this week and I haven't had the time to get to that one project I've been meaning to do. And I haven't written anything, or gone to a poetry reading and read anything, which was the goal I had in mind this week.
However, I did find some of my angsty teen poetry this week, so even though I've been incredibly unproductive I can still subject others to my bad poetry, via the internet.
Bad poetry alert.

"Your Balconey"
Sometimes you call me and say:
"my balconey with its ten stories of viod looked especially good today"
And I want to take you in my arms and tell you
what a lonely place the world would be without you in it,
and how hearts were meant to break
just now and then
not every day when the sun comes up
and the world starts again without you.
But I don't think you care.
Your pain would be over,
it is mine that would be beginning.

Two entries for the night of one...

2006-08-31T23:18:00.000-07:00

I have insomnia. Insomnia sucks. I haven't been sleeping well since I read the Child Abuse blog Carnival I came across the other night. It stirred too many things up for me. On the bright side it drew my attention to this neat blogging service. On the dark side it was a poignant reminder of the fact that I will never be normal. Whatever that is.
I spent last night staring at the ceiling and attempting to comprehend the mind boggling fuckedupedness of me. I do this periodically. I interrupt my normally sunshiney life to confront my problems and it inevitably leads to insomnia and too many nights spent staying up watching moody mvs on youtube or doing dangerous self analysis. Once upon a time I would have written something. Once upon another time I would have found something sharp and done a little self soothing, aiming for minimal scarring because appearing normal was more important to me than my sanity. My boyfriend ended that when he bought books on SI and I fully comprehended what I was doing. I haven't felt the urge in months.
I actually tried to be proactive about this slump once and looked into support groups, but there are none in my area so it was back to self medicating with fanvids and introspection. Talking to friends is always an iffy proposition because there is a fifty percent chance that the person you are trying to confide in will feel akward and commence avoiding you, sometimes because they can't relate and sometimes because they can. Even my normally understanding boyfriend is difficult to talk to; the product of our times, he is convinced that the time we talked about it should have healed me and I should now be bouncy, happy, and functional because discussing these things once automatically fixes everything (thanks Oprah, for that load of crap).
I get tired of editing myself because my life makes other people uncomfortable. Yet another reason for the second blog.
My story is pretty standard really. Depressingly standard. Apathetic parent left me in the care of a relative who was emotionally unstable and mentally undone to the point of hearing voices that would accuse me of doing things wrong. Whackjob spent the next six or seven years alternately beating the crap out of me and threatening to kill me. Attempts to tell apathetic parent were ignored, and apathetic parent rapidly became emotionally abusive and neglectful parent. Eventually I became the family pariah because I was always vocal about the abuse and no one wanted to hear it. Then the whole family was emotionally abusive, because I had devolved into some sort of whipping girl for things no one wanted to take resposibilty for. Sometimes in my house there was no food, or even soap. No one bought me clothes for a period of four years. Unsurprisingly this did nothing to enhance my popularity at school. In high school I was sexually assualted by someone that I thought was a friend and developed a habit of freezing and dissasociating in sexual situations that left me vulnerable to more attacks and one boyfriend who specialized in sexual torture. A self injurer since age eleven I took to eating every other day, not only to preserve my attractiveness but because I thought that I deserved deprivation. Considered gifted by my teachers, I was flunking in school because I doubted that I would live to graduate. Both running away and staying home had their perils. All this before I was seventeen. At eighteen I had a medical emergency and should have died. The resulting procedure left me with scarring and was follwed by weight gain. The weight gain kept coming as I grew less confident about my looks. I have not lost it. I haven't regained my confidence about my looks either. At nineteen I was engaged. He was less than faithful. At twenty I was homeless and couch crashing. At twenty-one I ejected my more toxic relatives from my life and built my life around close friends, rather than family connections. I don't look back often, but the past follows me anyway. No matter how well I do something I am always convinced that it wasn't good enough; that I am not good enough. Compliments make me uncomfortable because I fear sounding arrogant in any way. Sex was a major problem until recently; I think I have a grip on my dissasociation now. People have told me that I am gifted but I always feel stupid. In my head there is a tape that plays every negative thing anyone has ever said about me or my work, and this tape goes back YEARS. I find it hard to make friends because I really don't know how to start that process, so I usually just hang around the people I like until its been so long that we are friends by proximity. I have this overwhelming desire to help people but my exterior is so hardened that no one would ever think of asking me.
Such is the fuckedupedness of me.
One good thing came out of the crap though. I started writing when I was eleven or twelve, because I was trying to talk about in metaphor what no one would listen to in truth. My first big work was a series of junior high novellas in which i divided myself into six flat characters based on aspects of my personality. It was a juvenile attempt to see how I worked. It also taught me how characters worked. I then put them in a concentration camp setting (before I knew that such things had really existed) because it was the best metaphor I could come up with for my life. Writing was my lifeline. I spent at least three hours a day at it until I was seventeen. My craft was pretty finely honed but I never sent anything off for publication becuase I was convinced that it was never good enough. I keep promising myself that I won't do that this time.

Yet another blog

2006-08-31T22:17:00.000-07:00

I started my first blog with every intention of writing with deep thought and introspection. Somewhere along the line I moved and it became a super advanced email communication system. That in and of itself isn't such a bad thing, but there are things about myself and my past that I do not normally share with people who can actually use them against me in person. I've been told that this is really quite paranoid, but I like to think of it as an unsual degree of preparedness.
I am a twenty something college student living in sin with her boyfriend and one very shifty cat. In my spare time (whimpers longingly) I write pulpy science fiction. Or wrote, until a few years back when other things got in the way. I'm still trying to rekindle the initial spark that got me in the habit in the first place. Sometimes, when I am feeling very massochistic (or sadistic towards my bf and cat) I play the guitar badly and sing worse. I also knit.