Also, can I just share this super cute photo? I was at an outdoor karaoke event & fireworks went off so Slippers freaked out and started fleeing running onto a little corner onstage cause she was terrified. Then there was this male dog walking on three legs (a wild holler dog) and he went up after her to stand guard and protect her. He succeeded in making her feel safe to where she was smiling again after a few minutes. I just thought that was so sweet. Gallant male animals are so dreamy.
Why do people say hell is red and fiery? When really it is gray and icy with each person held alone under a cold metal bell. Pumped full of pain medication, they breath, feel no pain and think thoughts of their own well being. They are glad the bell protects them. They have 100,000 dollars plus a gold brick and they are glad no one will steal it. They know no one can lift the heavy bell to find them. They have won the game of life. Every day tasty meals are dropped into the bell. Anything they choose. They eat with relish. Winning! When they relieve themselves, the byproducts magically disappear. Hell is sanitary. People never cry there. They think they are smiling and maybe they are. Who knows? No one can see them.
Pain is when you go to Heaven. Looking down, you see everything you missed. St Fanci compared entering heaven to having both your legs sawed off with a rusty blade. Pain is the price of admission.
Stabbed in the chest by remorse. You never saw the beauty of everything until it was too late. And now in heaven you’re face to face with everything you wanted to avoid.
The people you least want to see are your greeting committee, standing there waiting in white robes. Those you wanted to impress stand behind you, noticing how you’ve shit your white pants.
Everyone you ghosted, neglected, abandoned, wait for you there with arms outstretched. They hug you and the memories of how you hurt them return. The clarity is excruciating because in heaven there are no clouds, fog or shadows.
And why did you do it? Why were you such an asshole?
Because there was some wound you didn’t want to feel and now it is probed with a million forceps and scalpels. Your mind explodes in an infinite sun of pain. In heaven there are no pain killers.
What is the relevance of this? I don’t know. In life, I am hanging in there. I got a job as a phone psychic and felt I was really in my element. Then I got fired. I was keeping people on the line for an average of 22 minutes rather than 35 minutes like they wanted. There is a bell that rings at 20 minutes and you’re sposed to keep people on for a while after that, because the rates get jacked up. But the callers want to hang up once they hear the bell so they don’t end up with a huge bill.
So money is hard.
And love is hard too because I don’t understand it. I feel like a retard in math class. A bunch of squiggles on the board and I have no idea what anything means. I was good at math but could never understand it which drove me nuts. I couldn’t figure out what numbers WERE. What the fuck is a one? A zero? Are they things themselves or ways of seeing things? The more I thought about it, the less sense it made.
Sometimes I read books about love and it makes things worse because there are always more and more things you aren’t supposed to do because they will emasculate men. Words you aren’t supposed to say- like can would but. Tenses you aren’t supposed to use. If you follow the rules he will love you forever! But if you can’t…. well, no one to blame but yourself for what happens next.
And I don’t want to emasculate anyone. Rip off their dick and leave them with a bloody stump. But following all these rules feels impossible, especially when one of the rules is to be yourself. And you are supposed to be vulnerable and show your emotions, the problem is there’s only one emotion you are supposed to feel- pleased. But the more bound up I feel the harder this mild & flavorless state is to achieve.
Somewhere I must find the strength to take a solemn vow that I won’t abandon myself for love anymore. Because I love romance so much. But romance comes from being yourself and feeling the chemical reaction of self touching the world. Romance comes from the beauty of your own emotions welling up to surprise you. If men need you to be completely colorless and drained of life just to be in their presence then what is the point? Money? Or just avoiding a wound- the infinite pain of being abandoned? Love is one of the bells of hell. Blocking the pain while keeping you dead inside.
I need to find the strength to choose myself but I don’t know how. I don’t feel that strength anywhere.
I lie in bed at night with the lights on not wanting to shut my eyes. Cause when I shut them I see that James is angry at me, really angry and that makes me scareder. I wish there was something I could do to change it but there isn’t.
And when I close my eyes I feel how heartbroken I am about my dogs. I want to see them so badly it’s unbearable. But if I start crying I’ll have to sit up to keep from eating snot so it’s best to just lie down with eyes open.
A bossy friend told me of a poor person’s clinic near me where I should go for fear medication so I can sleep. I went there. In the waiting room a man was scratching himself while mumbling about killing people. His voice got louder as he groaned about being burned at the stake. Finally he was just shouting “Steak! Steak!” I started to freak out so texted “Help me!” to a friend then in a girly voice the man said “Help me!” Once I realized he could read my mind I relaxed.
The clinic gave me an official looking bottle of pills in a white paper bag for absolutely free. I had just walked in off the street with no insurance or anything. But they said if I come back I will have to give them blood. A price I won’t pay. I would rather pay in money. The pills they gave me dried out my mouth anyway.
James had his hearing. He pled guilty and was sentenced to one year of parole. This meant I didn’t have to testify but the trial was still traumatic because I don’t like seeing James in trouble. And I don’t like knowing he will be mad at me and potentially punish me.
My lawyer recused himself on the day of the trial for which I had prepaid him. He said he had to because he had been telling the magistrate that I would plead the 5th in order to not incriminate myself. Basically he implied I was lying. He did this because I wanted him to help me keep James out of trouble & also to keep me from having to testify. However, I had made it clear to my lawyer- I thought- that I wasn’t lying and I didn’t want to be portrayed as such. So this was unnerving & left me with no one to look out for my interests or explain what was going on.
I had also hired James’s lawyer to protect James. Like a damn fool apparently. Before he was hired I asked if he would be defending James by throwing me over a bus. I wanted to protect James but didn’t want to be sacrificed. He said “Good heavens! Of course not! That’s not how it’s done!” But it appeared he lied. There was something about the way he treated me that scared me on a deep level. James has been telling my friends that he & his lawyer are now going to sue me for abuse. I don’t know what kind of abuse but I guess I’ll find out.
But Monday I was not on trial. It was the state vs James. After James was sentenced however, the magistrate- at the urging of James’s lawyer who we will call Shitindick- said I wasn’t allowed to go into my house to get my possessions or see my pets. He said if I did I would go to prison. I started crying hysterically. I had already been told that nothing could happen to me at a trial that was for James so this was confusing. Technically I didn’t have to even be there.
So the next day I returned to the magistrate’s office to seek clarity. Everyone in the magistrates office assured me the magistrate could not legally ban a witness from seeing her dogs or accessing her own possessions. They looked me up in their system but there were no orders against me. They said it just couldn’t happen without a hearing or a petition against me being filed, none of which had taken place. They had no idea why the magistrate would have said that.
So I went to talk to the magistrate himself. I said I didn’t understand the legal basis of him telling me I would go to prison for collecting my things or seeing my dogs when there had been no hearing for me. I had not committed crimes, been offered legal representation or had anything filed against me. I told him his office had looked me up on the computers & assured me no conditions such as these were in place. They said it was impossible to punish the victim in a trial, only the person on trial can be punished.
He didn’t answer my question but just started talking about how the courts had bent over backwards for me (referring to when they banished James from the home while I was crying hysterically & begging them not to.) He kept saying “You ALLEGE these things against your husband” as though I was some conniving cunt trying to get James in trouble when he knew I’d been attempting to get the case dropped for months. He said “You’re not dumb, you ran for office.” as though dumbness was a prerequisite for getting head slammed.
“You had you chance to call 911 when James came back to the house.” he said. True, but how did that magically turn him into a monarch who can issue commands with no legal basis?
On other notes, it’s not that easy to function at the moment. I hope this is just a phase but my beautiful apartment is turning into a crack den. On the plus side, I’m doing an okay job of learning poor people secrets. It’s not even so much about getting by with less, which I’ve done for years. It’s more about saying yes to free stuff and yes to other humans helping you. Being a mooch was always my greatest fear so being poor is good in some respects since it forces you to receive stuff.
Where I come from people offer you stuff, but you are supposed to refuse. “Oh please, let me run out in this blizzard to get you fresh bagels for breakfast!” “Oh no, please don’t! I’m on a diet anyway!” “You on a diet? Nonsense! I insist.” “No really, I couldn’t.” This goes on for a few minutes as a charming display of politeness & consideration.
So when someone makes me an offer now, like “Would you like this bagel?” I don’t know how to respond. Are they actually wanting to give me a bagel or are they wanting me to refuse it? I’ve been trying to say yes and see what happens but it is unnerving. If you said yes where I’m from you would be a social leper. But bagels are so tempting to the poor.
A song about a nun. I used to consider myself a nun, of sorts, though not in the spiritual or celibate sense. More in the sense of someone who practices restriction and self-torture (read more about it here.)
But now I am not a nun of any sort. I am a housekeeper. I make corn bread and other corn foods day and night. Corn is my life. It is the only world I know.
And in that way, I still relate to the feelings of the song. Limitation, confinement, repetition, Saturn.
“Yet in that dark street shineth the Everlasting Light.”
Because it is when life has become so still, so boring, so dull that you’re certain you’re going to throw up, that you begin to feel the Light that Lives behind Things shining through.
And for those who like lyrics…
I loved a man named Joe,
I loved a man named Joe,
but he became a confederate soldier & went to war.
la la la la la la
I became a nun; I became a nun
at the pink cross nunnery, the pink cross nunnery.
la la la la la la
Now every day I watch the sun & count my rosary.
Now every day I watch the sun & count my rosary.
la la la la la la la la la.
I used to say hail mary’s
for three years I said hail mary’s,
but then I stopped,
and now I count from one ten.
These days I count from one to ten.
I have me a husband now and Jesus is his name.
Don’t know what I lost with Joe; I just know what I’ve gained.
Don’t know what I lost with Joe; I just know what I’ve gained.
And Jesus is his name, y’all. Jesus is his name
Hi there, it’s me! I feel like it would be rude if I didn’t, every now and then, step out from behind my songs and say hi as a person. I know some people prefer musicians to “shut up and sing,” but personally I find it a bit uncordial if someone keeps singing at me and never says hello. As they say in West Virginia, “Handshakes before hugs.”
Perhaps that is why I dislike concerts, as a rule. Not only are they extremely expensive (I prefer spending money on tangibles), not only are they cold, smelly, and impersonal, but I find it dull to watch a person perform for hours on end without ever removing the mask to reveal their self, if only for a moment.
Since musicians are supposed to like concerts, it took me a long time to admit how I really felt. Finally the day came when I had front row seats to a Roseanne Cash concert, but I stayed home to watch Columbo instead. It wasn’t like anyone was going to get murdered at her show. A couple weeks later, I had front row seats to a Justin Townes Earle show, but once again I couldn’t bring myself to go. I tried to give myself a pep talk- he’s a heroin addict, maybe something exciting will happen. But I couldn’t budge myself. I knew he would probably be on his best behavior, singing his songs without a hitch and making witty comments about the wonderful audience. Perhaps I am a bad person, or maybe just a Scorpio, but I find it so dull to watch someone put their best foot forward. I always want to see their worst foot. But professional musicians never seem to fall off the stage or forget their medication. What is the point then? If I just wanted to hear someone sing, I could take a shower.
*
At any rate, here is what is going on with me- nothing. My life is so boring that I feel a pang of awe that I am able to survive it uncrushed. A testament to the human spirit. The most exciting part of my day is walking Slippers and saying hello to the rotating cast of semi-wild dogs that join us. As I’ve mentioned before, Slippers used to be one of these roaming dogs until she got hit by a car and was going to be ‘put down.’ Back then her name was ‘Nasty.’ Because “Keepin’ it Nasty” is the unofficial slogan of our holler. At first, I wasn’t sure what it meant. I thought country people were supposed to be square, with rigid morals. Boy was I wrong! If it isn’t illegal for at least three reasons, they won’t even touch it around here. Especially when it comes to love.
I sort of admire their krazy spirits, but only from a distance, watching with binoculars from my window.
So why is my life so boring? Personally, I think it has less to do with isolation and more to do with geography. There are hills on all sides. If you want to see the sky you have to look straight up. Giant walls of earth pressing in on me from all directions, vibrating my body with their cold brown waves. It is the sort of feeling you get in a library, being surrounded by heavy books, except it’s brown rather than gray. I like to think it is making me strong. Maybe wise too.
