Crowe's Nest

Life, in a running nutshell

2012-01-03T14:30:00.001-08:00

Yeah, life is going pretty well at the moment. Got a new song recorded last night, though it’s a ROUGH recording. I overloaded the mic a couple times. It also took a TON out of me. This is going to be a show closer, not a show stopper.

WSPA-3’s first recital is in February, but she’s off to a dance workshop weekend in Minneapolis NEXT weekend. Eric and I will be going with her to that. Then she has a series of shows and recitals through the end of the school year, most of which happen on weekends, so our weekends are pretty well shot from here to June with a couple key exceptions. Jared has a meet coming up sometimes this month though I forget when. Then he also has those sporadically throughout the remainder of the school year until nationals in July in Madison. We may ALSO have a CM house concert in that area that weekend so that we can supplement the gas and hotel costs of being up there for nationals, but that’s not confirmed yet. Calendars exist precisely for this reason. OMG.

I still don’t have the Etsy store up because I ended up using some of my inventory for last minute presents. Not a big deal, but still, it cut into my time a bit as far as the launch. And we’ve got stores for Cheshire Moon in the wings on Café Press and Etsy, neither of which have anything in them YET but they will shortly. I’m going to design a couple exclusive knitted CM items and have a series of regular café press items with our logo and info on them in the second store, all available from our home website. It’s going to take some code time, but I can manage it once I have a template for the URL interface and the PayPal account. Which reminds me, I have to set that up, too. And we haven’t even started recording the album yet, most of which will happen thankfully in town. BUT we are supplementing the cost of that by my building the newly minted recording studio’s website. OY, busy busy!

Work is boring, but my boss doesn’t mind if I knit at the office, so life is good there.

How’re you?

GOP zit-popping is officially underway

2012-01-03T12:27:00.000-08:00

It’s primary day here in Iowa, and it’s become quite a circus out there. Between Ron Paul being his old disgusting self, Santorum being nice and Frothy by turning out racist propaganda for a few extra votes, and Newt Gingritch sagging (your mind went there to) in the latest polls because people are remembering who he is, the GOP primaries is quickly turning into a Cirque de Solei of rotten politics. Let’s see:

Michelle Bachmann is the dark clown of the show, the villain who hurts people but gets it in the end. Between using every pawn in the arsenal, including a few cut out of paper (Vaccines causing mental defects, gay people are Satanists, gay people can be ‘fixed,’ no one deserves health care, or way to negotiate their own wages and benefits within an organized union system regardless of how they are treated outside said union), she is indeed a clown portraying a villain. Anyone who still takes this bitch seriously is a fool, and she is surrounded by them. It’s just nice that so many are waking up from her lies.

Newt Gingritch is the Ring Master wannabe that keeps drawing attention away from the real leaders like any good narcissist does. The hypocrisy here is so rampant, it’s hard to pin it down to bullet points. I still can’t believe that his current wife stays with him considering she is the product of adultery divorce #2. Not once but TWICE before he has dumped his wife for a ‘better’ girl, one of whom was undergoing breast cancer treatment when he served her with the divorce papers. Using school children as janitorial staff in their own low-income area schools (and eliminating the job of the ADULTS who currently do the job), ranting about an adulterous president while he was committing adultery on wife #2 (you know, the one he cheated on his FIRST wife with), saying that the OWS movement members need to ‘get a job’… yeah, these are the things we need in Any public official, let alone a president. RIGHT. And after the wannabe we have…

Rick Santorum! Otherwise known as Frothy Mix! And does he ever live up to his name! His latest and greatest hit on the charts is pandering to the racist republican base by saying “I Don’t Want to Make Black People’s Lives Better With Other People’s Money” with a B-side classic of vowing to invalidate ALL same sex marriages regardless of state legislation. So much for state rights, eh GOP? But wait! There’s more! http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/758122/santorum:_states_should_have_the_right_to_outlaw_birth_control/#paragraph6 So basically states are allowed to do their own thing when Frothy wants them to, but when it’s something he doesn’t like, no can do. How typically GOP of him. Speaking of all things typical…

Mitt Romney! Ah, Mittens. The side show. You got quite owned recently, didn’t you? When President Obama comes out and SLAPS down your comment of pandering to terrorist threats (which was BEAUTIFUL, by the way), and when a gay vet decided to take you to task (oh yeah: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRN9Y5Nvdqk), or when you manage to get facts wrong even though members of the republican side CONFIRMED them (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57350334-503544/obama-team-exploits-romney-teams-birther-gaffe/), come on. You’re most likely going to get the nomination, but YOU are the best that the GOP has to offer? Why, exactly? Because Corporations are People Too (http://articles.latimes.com/2011/aug/11/news/la-pn-romney-state-fair-20110811)!! You are a tragedy.

Ron Paul… and speaking of tragedies! Let’s take one gem, JUST ONE, for this assclown since there are SO many to choose from. How about this: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150496272707722&set=a.10150108003162722.290341.281168802721&type=1&ref=nf this is a REAL quote from HIS newsletter, and it is one of many such statements that are mind-numbingly outrageous. One of two things happened here, both of which are a travesty. 1: he approved this statement outright and so it was published with his name on it in HIS newsletter. This is the more likely scenario since he has been known to say such things in the past. Or 2: He didn’t know about this quote, but allowed it to be published in his name anyway without retraction, apology, or even an acknowledgement of its existence. And if THAT is the case, anyone who is that easy-going with public-facing materials shouldn’t be anywhere NEAR the oval office. Period. Such a sad old lion in the ring, trying so hard to be relevant.

Rick Perry…. Hey, it’s the guy who keeps falling off the trapeze! Which is worse, I ask: Forgetting one’s own policies on which areas of government one wants to eliminate (www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTNjhcyx7dM), forgetting just how many judges in Iowa should be removed for their ‘agendas’ even though one is trying to win votes in THAT VERY STATE for today’s primary (http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/12/09/9335546-perrys-gaffes-continue-to-add-up), or the absolutely boggling pitch in New Hampshire to repair one’s damaged credentials on border security: "Those of you that will be 21 by November the 12th, I ask for your support and your vote," he declared to titters from those who recognized the voting age error. (Oh, and the election isn't on the 12th AND the voting age is 18.) THIS jackmonkey wants to be president. Because a Texas governor masquerading as a meaningful politician and leader was SUCH a good idea the first time around… OOPS!

I understand that Obama has work to do here, but seriously, all he really has to do is grill whoever wins the primary on THESE issues, stances, and statements. His work is being delivered to him on a plate. At least he can continue doing good work and not have to focus QUITE as much on keeping his job since he will likely NOT be losing it to one of these idiots.

Schedules!

2011-06-22T09:06:00.000-07:00

The remainder of the year:

July 16 – THE MOVE!
Aug 5-7 – MuseCon! (Chicago)
Aug 6th – WEDDING (breathing, breathing)
Sept 2-5 – SACC
Oct 21-23 – OVFF (Ohio)
Nov. 11-13 – WindyCon (Chicago)
Nov. 18-20 – SFContario (Toronto)

Not as bad as it could be but it’s going to be a slog come October again this year. Now then, about packing…

Duckon 20: the con that barely was (long, sorry)

2011-06-22T09:01:00.000-07:00

So, made it through Duckon without too terribly much gnashing of teeth. I got to see a whole lot of people that I wasn’t expecting, many I was, and it was overall a stellar time. I learned a great deal about the sound set-up for the filk room, as well as the highs and lows of being on tech staff. We managed our way through a handful of major and minor issues, Megan at the helm and Eric keeping the troops in line. The troops, mostly consisting of WSPA anyway, all managed to have fun, which is always a plus.

This con was also the first real time I’ve been in charge of making sure the family stayed healthy, ie slept, fed, didn’t overwork, kept up spoons, etc. it was both way more and not nearly as bad as I expected. Must remember to chuck expectations before leaving the house.

I got fitted for my wedding dress!!! SO happy! Just a reminder that the infamous wedding of Eric and Lizzie is at MuseCon, August 6th! Come join us!

Seeing Lee Darrow was also fantastic as always, and the hypnosis panel was tons of fun. It made for an interesting study in human response and acceptance as much as suggestion. And Lee’s just nuts anyways, which makes it worth it.

Then there was the concert. Cheshire Moon’s very first Concert EVER!! YAY! Here’s what we played:

Pronouns (Wimoweh parody, blame my sister)
Child of Stars
If I were the rain
Lighthouse
Out of the Light
Halley Came to Jackson (Mary Chaplin Carpenter)
Temple of the King (Dio/Rainbow)
World Walker
Follow That Road (Anne Hills)
Swamp Witch (Jim Stafford)
Bloodletting (Concrete Blond)
She Moved Through the Faire (Trad)
Widow’s Garden

Pronouns was SO much fun! Lexie and I wrote that when I was back in Middle school, and I happened to start singing it in the car with Eric one day coming home from work. He of course laughed his ass off, and then commented that we should perform it. After picking my jaw off the floor of the front seat, we worked it out.

Child of Stars fell out of the sky one day when Eric was working with the Bouzouki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_bouzouki). We’d just listened to Carly Simon’s ‘Woodstock’ a couple nights before, and this image started tinkling in my head. Once Eric started playing, this little gem found it’s rhythm and voice and the rest is now history.

If I were the Rain started out as a single line: “If I were the rain, could I reconnect the pieces of your broken heart the way the rain connects the earth and sky?” The rest was a call and response of wants and needs, wanting to need, and needing to want.

Lighthouse, like Child of Stars, came out of nothing to start. That seems to be a recurring theme in our music. Stories drift in that are ready to be told, and we find ways to tell them. I hope they’re happy in the telling.

Out of the Light barged in on me at work. I cannot begin to tell you how happy I am to have the Voice Memo feature on my phone, because this one wouldn’t wait. He wanted a melody line NOW (insert voice of Veruca Salt)! I ended up getting it down in three files between making copies and stuffing envelopes. First one that’s ever been that pushy…. I kinda liked it.

Halley Came to Jackson is one of the pretties things I have ever heard. Eric brought it out as a suggestion for us to do specifically at Duck, and once I heard it, I knew he was right.

Temple of the King has always been a favorite of mine. I admit that I don’t like ALL of Rainbow’s stuff, but this one had such amazing imagery to it that I couldn’t help it. The trouble was going from the deep thickness of Rainbow down to the two man crew of Eric and me. We settled on a 6 string and a Djembe almost as big as I am. Eric took the lead as I gave him a heartbeat, and this one might stick around a while to honor the former ringmaster of Black Sabbath.

World Walker is all Eric’s fault. He just HAD to pick up a new instrument and start noodling with it in my living room back in Chicago. He pulled out something interesting out of a wild tuning, and I scurried off for a pen. The character in it is from a Game I’m trying to pen down, and he’s an odd bird but worth sticking with.

Follow That Road was one of the first thing Eric and Worked on. Love love love Anne Hills’ work. We’d been moving this one around musically for several months, working with effects and sounds and echoes to get it just right. This is one that I wouldn’t mind putting on the album, but not sure yet. And yes, I did say album. Working on it.

Swamp Witch was just a good time. Nothing like a reclusive trad craft crone to bring out the cackle in a girl. Another one that will likely stick around to honor the deep-seated crone. Fire burn and Cauldron bubble…

Bloodletting is so much fun to do, especially at a sci-fi con. Vampires and witches and storytellers, oh my. These two right in a row should come with a warning label to hold onto something.

She Moved Through the Faire has been done and done and done and done and with good reason. I have heard more versions of this piece than most others, and I’ve liked almost all of them. It’s a wander, a tragedy, and a wonderment.

Widow’s Garden ended the set, but it’s the one that started it all. This piece was crafted in our hotel room at Strowlers in St. Louis, and was the first the Eric and wrote together. He’d just gotten something interesting put together on the new Strat, and I went diving for my book (Which he now calls my Tardis) and a pen. We swam back and forth between melody and verse, finding our way through a story waiting to be told. And as we came to the end at last, we knew. From a guest villain in Eric’s show 6 months before to partner in something new and wild, we knew. A beginning had been made.

I cannot express how gleefully thankful I am to all of you who made it to our show. We were so amazed at the response, and yes, I promise we will have an album put together soon, hopefully ready to go by next summer. To all those who asked: *squeeglompiloveyousohardthankyouforthinkingthatwedon’tsuck*

And now, here I sit, back in the office at someone else’s desk, getting Facebook updates from halfway across the country. I get to spend a week by myself in essence, save the occasional evenings with WSPA-3, waiting for Eric and WSPA-2 to come home. *sigh* The good and the not so good, but so far, still lacking the duck. I’m ok with that.

Now then, more Tardis adventures!

Job hunting. STILL. (Circa April, 2011)

2011-06-22T09:00:00.000-07:00

I realize now that looking back on this isn’t going to capture the moment. I spent 6 weeks looking for work in Des Moines, and for the first week it as nice to finally be able to relax. I had time to get laundry caught up, get the house in order (now that I had been shoe-horned into a space barely big enough to hold it’s current occupants), and it was nice.

After that first week, I was climbing the walls. I wanted to be working, if for no other reason than boredom.

After the second week, I started the gently despair. I knew it was very soon to do so, but here I was in my new life, with my new family, NOT CONTRIBUTING. Oh sure I did laundry and dishes and kept house and did absolutely anything and everything possible to do SOMETHING, but I had no income. My 401k came through as well as the security deposit for my old place, which helped, but I felt more than a little useless.

A couple interviews rolled through, coming to nothing. I tried hard not to get too far down, but it wasn’t easy. It never is, but this felt almost as bad as the 10 weeks back in 2008 where I went without work. Agencies were turning up sales jobs that I’m not suited for, Customer service that paid enough for gas but little else. It was awful.

Then a ray of sunshine. A job popped up at Office team in Des Moines for a maternity leave cover. I got a phone interview… and in 8 minutes they wanted me! YES!!! Back to the working world!

That was the nutshell of my first job search in Iowa. Second one is coming up July 5th. Wish me luck!

Dress shopping and Synning!

2011-06-22T08:59:00.002-07:00

So! The dress has at last been pilfer… er, purchased! Hey, after the haggling I did for this, pilfered is close!

The day started with lunch at this lovely little Indian place, Tiffan, with Xap and George, my shoppoing henchman, and Raven, because all us birds have to eat. George, former roommate and lovely in short hair which I’m still getting used to, was taken aback by Xap and I, which was adorable. Xap and IO were in rare form, gearing up for Pixie invasion the fiollowing Tuesday at Life Force Arts, then WisCon on Memorial day weekend.

Then off across the street to one of the many, MANY places to go Sari shopping, Taj Sari palace, recommended to me by Thistle. We walked in, and I wanted it all wrapped up in a bag to take home with me. ALL OF IT. We were surrounded by color and beauty and gorgeous embroidery and I wanted it ALL. We moved through the bargain wracks, finding things that were close to the necklace that my sister had purchased for me in New Mexico. Finally, the lady behind the county started bringing things out for us, and I looked up. There was one particular sari that was peaking out amongst the others in a stack, and I asked to see it. IT was the ONLY one of that color that caught my eye. She spread it out before us, and I knew. Right then, I knew that was the one I was going to be married in. Nothing else would do.

Then I looked at the pricetag. And it was ON. She cut the asking price in half because of a sale, which was great, but my budget was set, and I wasn’t moving (mostly because I couldn’t). In the end, the price dropped $500 (SQUEAK!). And off I went with what would soon become my wedding dress as soon as I got a hold of Amy Dostia, seamstress extraordinaire! Even now I’m still vibrating over it!

The afternoon was spent at Guitar Center, where Raven wanted me to try out a mic he thought would work for me onstage for Cheshire Moon. I was glad to, because I love Eric, but the SM58 is his mic. We tried a couple different, comparing Old Faithful (the SM58) to the Encore Blue 100 (decent sound but not as powerful as I need it to be. I couldn’t unload on this without it objecting), the Encore 200 (requires phantom power, which is a fowner, but also has a compression aspect that I don’t’ like. The main reasoin for having a unidriedctional mic for me is so that Eric’s acoustic instruments don’t get picked up by my mic. He plays hard enough, he doesn’t need to assistance), and one other that I can’t remember. Finally, we got to the Senhaisser e835. JOY. A Hypoer-cardiod with a solid range pick up, and VERY unidirectional. I come off that top axis, and sound pick-up goes AWAY. It’s glorious. I just have to keep it in line, and it’s also not as pop-prone as the SM58. Wheee!!!

After that, Raven and I flew off to Synphoria. Admittedly, a small crowd for a Saturday night, and more new faces than old, which was slightly sad. I was hoping to reconnect with more people, but got to meet people and forge new connections, which rocked out. Raven had aq good time as well, and I hope that he will continue to go to Syn without me so that he can continue to enjoy it. It’s a beautiful experience.

Got home Sunday despite headwind from HELL (insert echo effect here), and showed my findings to Eric, who squeed. Yes, I showed my wedding dress to my fiancé before the ceremony. I’m also getting married in a sari and I have no heritage connected to India at all. We’re getting married at a convention, and the real reception will be at another con where as many people as can attend can help us celebrate. You think I’m concerned about your traditional tradition? Off with you now, else you shall feel my wings! I may be small, but I am…. actually very small. As WSPA-2 has shown me recently by catching up to me in height. Oy, that child! <3

Minneapolis surprises! (Memorial Day Weekend)

2011-06-22T08:59:00.001-07:00

Huzzah! We have managed the stealthy missions, animal antics and free-for-all giggling of Memorial Day weekend! SO SO happy!

Eric and I got a Ton of stuff done on Friday. Running around to various offices and stores and other credenzas and dun, and it’s a good thing, too! Because Saturday yielded breakfast explosions and the ZOO! The kitchen spent the day in recovery while me, Eric, WSPA-2 and WSPA-3 traipsed off to the zoo, picking up a Shari on the road! I mean really, who could resist that face?

Otters! Peacock-like birds attacking! Lazy lions, tigers on rocks, animatronic dinosaurs, and micaks! I didn’t spell that right and I don’t care! It was a gloriously cool, lightly overcast day, perfect for zoo adventures.

And before Eric tells this story AGAIN (oy, dude, I love you but damn), I got to show Eric the mic that Raven and I scouted for Cheshire Moon. He can keep the SM58, but we’re likely going with the Sennheiser e835. SO much joy. Also, as I was showing him the range pick-up on the four that we tried, there was another guy trying out an amp on his harp. It was clear he was going to use it for stage performance, and he needed something that gave him a lot of sound, with the solid, southside of Chicago overdrive to go with it so he could cut through and be heard. Very sweet sound he was getting. Anyways, I started trying out the mics, and according to my fuzzy love, this guy looked up as I dug in, stunned. I DIDN’T KNOW THIS. He was standing behind me, and I thought he was changing settings, being polite, something. No, apparently not. I didn’t even find out about this until Eric told me later in the car. *FLAIL*

Next up, we had a lazy Sunday morning, dropped off the WSPA bunch and headed north to Minneapolis! The drive was lovely, I didn’t make Eric too terribly crazy with my driving, and we made it to Celia’s house with a but of time to spare. Eric brought out the Quattro, and we started a new song in her backyard. We recorded his riff, I got a bunch of lyrics written that so far make no sense but something tells me they will soon enough, and then off toi Everest on Grand with Celia. *swoon* Nepalise food for the WIN.

After dinner, off to Sacred Paths!! We surprised a Sooj and a Kay and a Betsy with Super Stealth Mission of hugs and love!

PLEASE NOTE: Leanann Sidhe. If you don’t know, you NEED TO. www.leannansidhe.com GO FIND HER. Her album, Fragile Dreams, comes out July 9th and is available for pre-order. I’m getting one, and so are you. Now GO!

Pixies and cellos and chainmail and love. Got to sing with a lovely bard, use my dicebag as percussion for her song D&D, share kitty pictures and stories and braid Kay hair and every good thing. We got to meet so many lovely people. Sacred Paths is a glorious place that we will have to frequent more often, most definitely.

Breakfast with Charles Monday morning was, as always, a fiendish delight. We dined in a normal restraint, with normal people, and managed not to scare them. Much. A storm kept us at bay longer than we’d planned, but we got to visit with Charles and see the Geek center, which was lots of fun. Philosophical debate and political natter and far too much cattiness not to love.

Our journey home was a windy one, but we arrived safe and sound. Now, off to a short week, a dress fitting, and swimming with the kidlets as often as possible as we move, despite all the rope I own, despite nerves and anticipation and trepidation and catty jabs at stupidly insufficient people, toward Duckon. Love to Xap and Megan. They are going to need it, I fear.

So much has happened…

2011-06-22T08:58:00.000-07:00

Ok, for the sake of being clear and being able to parse all of this, the next few posts will be out of order and chunked up by major event. I apologize in advance for those of you keeping score. Keep your cheat sheets ready, decoder rings out, and crash helmets at the ready, because here we go!

Capricon of SHINY!

2011-02-13T17:33:00.000-08:00

Vibrating!!! Eric Coleman asked me to marry him last night. He announced to the filk circle that he had a new song that he was only going to perform once, and he asked me to hold his lyric book. I did so, and he sang me a song. And there I was, holding his book, face to face with this man as he sang out his wish to spend his days with me, and when the song was done, I set the book aside and damn near knocked him over with a hug. Pictures exist of the look on my face when he was singing to me, because apparently I was a sight to see. I believe I was referred to as 'leaf quivering.' Yup, that's about the size of it.

So yeah, Cap was good.... but more about Cap in detail.

This was my first anniversary of meeting Raven, so we got to spend a bit of time together. Not nearly as much as I would like and we'll be doing something about that this week, but yeah. Happy making. His birthday party went pretty well, a quiet affair with people who care about him, uincluding the nutjobs who are in his band, Toyboat. He's very dear to me, and Cap marks a fun and special time.

Got to hear a bunchy of awesome music, and I also learned somethign very important. I CAN in fact handle on the ground con issues with style and flare. We needed volunteers, I rustled them up as fast as I could and got just enough to handle the problem we had and make it snazzy. We (Duck) had a decent party, and it all looked good in the end. I got flyers top hand out at the area cons, and I got so many wonderful hugs. Xap ran a helluva Cafe, and I got up on stage with Eric and a sparkly new friend, Andy, on fiddle and mandolin. Oooooh, so muc WIN. I think he's going to end up being a long-running Guest Villian just because this needs to happen more often. Oh my WOW.

Jan Magic has officially impressed me. For the record. Not because of her healing abilities, but because of who she is and how she gets things done. I'm a fan. Officially.

I look forward now to MarsCon, where Raven and I will be bussing the 8 hours up to Minneaplois, filled with shiny bits like a Charles and a Celia and a wonderful con I've never been to before.

Jan 12th: Freedom of speech has NEVER meant freedom from consequences

2011-02-09T13:57:00.000-08:00

Ok, so I’ve been a lurking a bit recently given the nature of my busy life, and especially given all the insane public events of late. However, as things have finally started to concertize, I find myself needing to get out a couple things regarding the recent shooting in my home town.

That’s right, I was born in Tucson. St. Joseph’s hospital to be precise, a place that accepted some of the shooting victims from last Saturday. I heard about this and immediately started gathering facts. News groups across the internet were conflicting as reports flooded in, and my mind kept running backwards to the many pages and words and actions of violence and violent incitation done by so many in the political spotlight these past few years. It’s as if a floodgate had opened and out poured a wide and colorful spectrum of suddenly acceptable target practice.

A few names spring to mind on the subject. For example: Sarah Palin, a disgusting, gun-toting, violent-minded, dimwit with delusions of grandeur who whores out her own family for the sake of attention; Glen Beck, and undereducated would-be Mormon with a sewage-spewing fear machine for a mouth; Rush Limbaugh, a racist, sexist drug addict who sees fir to piss on anything he chooses day to day and seems to think that by being anything other that white you are filth; Sharron Angle who feels that 2nd amendment solutions are just fine even though we are currently headed by a president who has had double the death threats of any other on record just because he’s brown and then turns around to defend such rhetoric in the face of these events.

I will say that this remarkable trend of using violence as a tool of fear is nothing more than a last stitch effort of a floundering political party that doesn’t know how else to rally their supporters. Frothing, seething, wild-eyed people that don’t really know why they’re angry because they’re only told that they should be angry. They’re lied to about their values being attacked, they’re lied to about children being harmed and they’re jobs being lost. They’re lied to over and over and over by the lying liars that they look to for comfort and answers (see previous list of names, adding others because it’s a LONG damn list). They’re afraid and they’re misinformed, or worse uninformed, and they want to do SOMETHING to try and make it all just go away. And these are the people that those in power would prey upon to do their dirty work, using slogans of reloading and sniper sites on lists of opponents’ names and defending every right anyone ever had to own a weapon simply because they know it’s only a matter of time.

That time came last Saturday. And these profiteering, fear-mongering fucks are ALL to blame.

It has to stop, people. We are supposed to be a country where we can speak freely and live as we wish, not live in fear of some maniac with a gun and a mission from a political mouthpiece. Anyone who uses violence as a political platform doesn’t deserve that platform, and politics doesn’t need them.

Yet there is a part of me that burns at this in a different way. I've been around guns my whole life. gun safety has been drilled into me ever since I was old enough to identify what I was looking at as an object. My father taught me well, and gave me both his great shot and his appreciation for the magnitude of what I was doing. We are a family of hunters, law-enforcement, and farmers. Yet deep down, this kind of thing makes me feel like I'm doing something wrong simply because I'm not viciously anti-gun. I know they're dangerous. I know they're weapons used for exactly one thing. I also know that not every hand that holds them wields them against innocent people. Does that make me wrong somehow? No. But I cannot say that I want every gun ever melted down, either. After what happened Saturday in my home town, that thought burns.

And do not even GET me started on those useless Westboro fucks trying to picket the funeral of a 9-year-old. They changed their mind at the last minute of course and decided to go beat on a Judge’s family instead, but these people are no church. They are the extended family of one man in Kansas who fancies himself important. He’s not. THEY are not. they are disgusting, misguided and need very serious mental evaluation.

Rape: the Definition STAYS

2011-02-09T13:56:00.000-08:00

I’m so incredibly disgusted. In case you hadn’t heard, the GOP has been trying to rewrite exactly what does and does not constitute rape. Specifically, they have been trying to say that rape is only when bruises and broken bones are present instead of the sane reasoning of a lack of consent.

Look, people, the entire reason that rape is defined as such it to PROTECT WOMEN. It is meant to protect women from being exploited and attacked without consequence. And now the GOP wants to not only try and take away those protections, they want to then use those changes just to reduce abortion funding: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/09/abortion-forcible-rape-language-hr-3_n_820846.html?ref=fb&src=sp

I’m vibrating right now. I barely have words for the level of rage running through me right now. I cannot fathom what kind of slime it takes to do something like this, but then I found out. It turns out that even after a huge public outcry and a whole lot of bullshit being flung by Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ), the bill STILL HAS THE SAME LANGUAGE ABOUT FORCIBLE RAPE.

So apparently, these guys have absolutely no interest in what the public wants. They are not their to represent the people as they swore to but their own interests. So why is it that these men keep their jobs while trying so hard to exploit some of the very voters that got them elected, ie women? And why are these women even supporting these fucks?

A very dear friend of mine, Sarah, used to be a councilor. She worked with the response unit that dealt with rape victims just outside of Chicago in Will County. She saw just about every kind of human abomination you can think of and a few you can’t. Trust me, I couldn’t either. the stories she came back with made me physically sick. And she not only saw them, she had to help get these women through these atrocities, right down to helping them cope with having to relive these horrific moments in court to ensure these fucks went to prison for as long as possible.

I would like someone like Sarah to take Rep. Chris Smith for a day. I would like him to see exactly what rape truly looks like, and why it is so important that these monsters get put behind bars for life and that these women get protected, not left in the dust. This isn’t about abortion, not really. This is about a specific section of people getting the shaft to further the agendas of the rich and powerful.

Not happening. NO VERY NOT HAPPENING.

WindyCon Wrap-up

2010-11-15T09:18:00.000-08:00

Wow, what a weekend! I don't think I've ever been so crazy busy at a convention EVER! But what a way to go!

First off, I was tapped for Filk Second about 3 weeks from the convention, which made me Pixie Wrangler in a whole new sense of the word! Tricky Pixie needed drums? We got them drums. They needed stuff before the con? We got them stuff before the con. And hugging a S00j anytime of the day or night makes for a very happy Lizzie. :)

However, I have to say, Xap was INSTRUMENTAL (no puns, please) in making things work for our Filk Guests this year on the ground. I can never thank her enough for all her efforts in keeping them safe and sane, to say nothing of taking care of me in my frazzledness. Thank you, sweetie.

Tomboat. WHAAAAAAAA, Tomboat! Combo of Toyboat and Tom Smith in the key of HOLY CHEESE AWESOME!! I really hope they got this recorded, because WOW, that was GREAT!!! And I got pulled up on stage to sing one number at the last second which only freaked me out ENTIRELY because I really don't feel like I'm on par with these maniacs yet. Yet...we'll see.

Also got to see Heather Dale, which is always such a joy. Heather's a dear, her beau Ben Deschamps is a treasure, and they called ericcoleman and I out on stage for getting them to come after Strowlers in St. Louis last September. SO glad they were able to make it. Currently in Super Secret ninja meetings with them to get them back to Chicagoland very soon. *CONSPIRING*

Then, of course, TRICKY PIXIE. Holy stick monkeys on fire, TRICKY PIXIE. Cannot thank Vlad enough for agreeing to have them as our Guests. The concert was nothing short of pheonominal, despite the early onset of pixies in the sound equipment. A situation handled BEAUTIFULLY by out tech guys, gundo, our Filk Head and fearless leader, dave_iversen, dracos666, lonotter, Jerusha, and everyone who helped out. You guys are the ones who made this whole thing happen. Thank you all so so much.

As for me, I'm only here because of the stellar works of Xap and ericcoleman and raven_ap_morgan. Those three kept me from falling to pieces on more than one occasion over the course of the weekend, even going so far as walking me into con suite Sunday afternoon and ensuring I sit my little tail down and REST for the first time really all weekend. You three have my undying gratitude. Love you all. I really do.

OH! And I supported the London Bid for the 2014 WorldCon. Did YOU?

So much love. So many wonderful people. SO much music. SO much sleep to catch up on. Worth it. SO BLOODY WORTH IT.

Moments of Mayham: the UGLY Hat

2010-11-09T07:59:00.000-08:00

I tried to tell myself it wasn't that bad. I really did. then I took a solid look at the hat I've been knitting for a couple days and realized, "Nope, this is by far the ugliest hat I have ever knitted EVER. See for yourself:

Sad, isn't it? but it's also found a home with Emily Klik of Synphoria, so that's happy making. she's fabulous, and this hat will simply be swept into her awesome and therefore BE awesome. I'm ok with that.

We're so fucked. Well done, America

2010-11-03T08:07:00.000-07:00

Friend posted this - "On my way home tonight I heard a woman interviewed at a poll in NC. She voted for O in '8. Since then she lost her job, draws unemployment, is going back to school & has no health insurance. So this time she's voting a straight R ticket. R's won't extend unemployment, didn't back increased Pell grants, want to repeal health care & have 0 ideas for jobs. So that's who she voted for."

That sums up last night pretty well. I’ve seen a few moments of American stupidity in my day, but this was a pure moment. And we have only ourselves to blame.

Those of us who dismiss the Tea Party and their idiocy are in fact correct. They are idiots. They’re also well-funded and LOUD. And that volume alone gets the attention of the sheeple, not the facts. Organizations like NOM and Concerned Women for America and Focus on the Family have raised their voices high in outright lies, and people believed. The facts didn’t matter because the people with facts didn’t wave their flags high and hard and fast. We have ourselves to blame.

Matt Yglesias has the best tweet in reaction to the networks calling teabagger Rand Paul as the Senate winner from Kentucky: "Finally we have a Senator willing to stand up the tyranny of the Civil Rights Act!"

And our fearless leader? Our fierce Advocate? Yeah, about him. Obama had the cards to play. He did something 2 years ago that made the world take notice. He took some of the lowest voting demographics in this nation and mobilized them not only to vote, but to gather together their not inconsiderable resources for one common goal. It was a firestorm, and it got him elected by a LANDSLIDE. That and Palin is an imbecile, but that’s a post for another day.

But where has our advocate gone? Where is the man I voted for 2 years ago? Where was he during the election season? Covering his ass and doing damage control in the last 3-4 weeks for his party AFTER barely lifting a finger to help those same demographics that made sure he got elected. *sigh* DADT will end on his watch, huh?

Iowa is where my main concern lies now. The judges who got ousted by Tea Party lies and who will be replaced by TRUE activist judges who will NOT uphold the laws? We're all feeling this one. We did you wrong and for that I am sorry. the tide has turned, and dark days are ahead for us.

Well done, Democrats. You had a powerplay in your hands, and you did nothing with it. Now you’re got a fight on your hands you weren’t ready for when you HAD power. These next two years are going to be very, very hard.

Frogs are falling from the sky... and other treasures of meteorology

2010-10-22T15:51:00.000-07:00

It’s been a roller coaster couple of weeks. Pythonacon = WIN!!! SO much win. Had a wonderful time with raven_ap_morgan and ericcoleman and xap and bunch of amazing people for the Monty Python-filled birthday of Gundo! I finally met WSPA-3. I have a FAN in WSPA-3. SO much mischief! Fairly certain ericcoleman is shaking his head right now wondering exactly what he’s done. Awww, it’s not so bad. He’s simply unleashed an unstoppable tidal wave of cute. That’s all…

P-con was incredible. Funny and heart-warming and served as the unofficial debut point for Cheshire Moon! We debuted ‘Widow’s Garden,’ the song ericcoleman and I wrote at Strowlers in St Louis a few weeks back. *shiver* We wrote a song. We’re a band. Breathing. Breathing. SQUEEEEEEEEE!!!!!

….and then I got sick. Violently sick. Sick to the point of considering a Dr. visit and I’m out of sick time kind of sick. It got better, but my tummy is still a bit fragile. Blarg!

BUT! So much happening soon! Duckon is on the move and getting off the ground. Very excited, and it’s meshing well. Getting to know a lot of really wonderful people in fandom. WindyCon is RIGHT around the corner, where s00j will be kicking Faerie into high gear with Tricky Pixie! You have to go. It’s a RULE.

And can I just say TOMBOAT!!! I’ve been going to rehearsal, and jumpin’ jeepers on a cracker with cheese, this is going to be GOOOOOOD.

Furr Fest is coming up as well. Belly dance Panda, GO! Vampires and unicrons, oh MY!

Then on to Thanksgiving and everything after. I look at the November calendar and cry a little…..

Duckon and everything after

2010-09-27T10:47:00.001-07:00

And a voice cried out from the fannish heavens saying, 'It is done.' I have been named Vice Chair for DucKon. 4 years attached to the first Chicago Scifi con I ever attended. What have I done?!! There, I've said it. I feel better. Except I also feel like I have a huge rubber duck on my back as opposed to the perverbial monkee. But whatever.

Furries are back, people! Working on an actual furry track, guests and all. I'm also trying really hard not to become a drill sergent. I know how I come off, and it's important to me that I don't come off as a dictator or too much of a hardass. I don't mean to, I just want to get the job done smoothly, on time, and under budget. That's the goal.

And can I just say, FILK!! A would-be filker is a stone's throw from the helm. I don't think this has been lost on a few minds. We'll see how this goes, but I hope to help rebuild a few bridges and forge new rivers, letting voices sing and instruments ring happily through the halls of Duckon once more.

And now I sit back and watch my free time burn like a Wicker Man on the Nevada Desert. *sigh* Pass the marshmallows?

Grinning Moonbeams

2010-09-23T09:54:00.001-07:00

Grinning Moonbeams

It’s been a BUSY few weeks.

Strowlers was incredible! So many new faces now so dear. Understanding and joy has with old friends. Roads braved and paths traveled holding hands with loved ones. So many songs and stories shared. And one song in particular still rings in my head and heart. As some of you know, Eric Coleman and I have started a band! We are Cheshire Moon (Thanks, Xap!), and Saturday afternoon at Strowlers, we wrote our first song: Widow’s Garden. *shiver* Still gives me chills to think about it!

Tricky Pixie was incredible as always, backed up by GB mojo for a HYSTERICAL rendition of ‘Alligator in the House’ (Eric didn’t know I could double as an air-raid siren. He knows now.) and a heart pounding ‘Firebird’s Child.’ Saying goodbye has never been so hard as to let go of so many new friends.

And now back home to more incredible lyrics running through my head. And these ones aren’t going away! Verse has in the past had a tendency to come and go so quickly I barely have time to get it down. Now the words wait, wait for the melody they need to set them free. For Eric and I to sit down together and set them free in song. Set them into the moonlight and starlight, into the sunlight and beating rain. Almost as if the world has gathered its misfit toys and surrounded us in their stories, waiting only for the breath and chord they seek to bring them to life.

And yes, there is a wondrous man in my life. And he comes with his own soundtrack! A partner is crimes musical and not, I feel almost bumbling in my giddiness.

But real-life has come calling, and brings with it more than my fair share of mundania. I still don’t know if I have a job at the end of next week. *pout* I hate the waiting. I’m also becoming more heavily involved in DucKon next year which has me freaked and excited at the same time. And on top of it all, we’re 6 weeks from WindyCon, which means costuming-palooza and last-minute prep for Windy and MFF. Whee!!!

Beck in the Saddle again....

2010-08-25T10:18:00.000-07:00

Ok, I know I’m a touch late to the table on this one, but I have to say I never thought I’d see this. After all the work, all the sacrifices of life and legislature, we’re still arguing about this. What. The. Fuck.

Let me take a step back. As some of you may know, I have a rather severe distaste for racism. Call it ingrained. And yet I stand absolutely aghast day after day at the constant blathering of this so-called ‘Tea Party’ and the sewage they use for said tea. Now, don’t get me wrong, the in-fighting currently being waged on the right about who is in fact right who’s a socialist librul-lovin’ commy pinko is delicious. But now we come to one of the icons of this movement: Glenn Beck.

Aw, Glenn. How you long for attention. Long for it so much you’ll say literally anything and cry rivers of tears for it, regardless of merit or taste or honor. And yet THIS is what you would tout as your motive for organizing a convention of hate in DC on the anniversary or the speech of a man truly worthy of a term like honor. Dr. Martin Luther King stood before a gathering of thousands to express a dream. Now you stand on that same ground and pile mountain after mountain of unchecked hate.

I pity you. I detest pity; I find it a font of weakness and insecurity that is not only unnecessary but loathsome. And yet you are all these things, and so do I pity you. Arrogance has never come in a more perfect package of self-righteous bigotry with a pretty little bow of unrepentant lies. You speak of people trying to silence your truth. You wouldn’t know truth if it hit you in the face with a wet fish.

But alas, Becky boy is only a swollen node on the groin of a much bigger problem: somewhere along the way we’ve managed to slink backwards. There is still a percentage of people in this country who believe are President is Muslim. And they care WHY, exactly? Oh wait, because ALL Muslims are terrorists, including the ones that share the vast majority of their beliefs and values with Christianity and Judaism. Namely ALL of them. Riiiight. Anyone ever notice that? 3 major monotheistic doctrine-based religions, one main (shared) deity, 75% the same rhetoric, and yet all they want to do is kill each other. Wait, what?

Back to my point, the state of Texas wants to change history itself to suit its purposes of fear-mongering and cultivated hatred, a tactic used by many an oppressive regime, right down to the Inquisition. Congressmen and women from all over the country are vying for power on the basis of fear of their own constituents. The Constitution is being put on trial because it doesn’t fit the self-aggrandizing agendas of the far Right (spelled ‘Reich’ for those of you keeping score. If you haven’t looked up the actually tenants of Socialism, you might want to. Note how closely they relate to the far RIGHT as opposed the Left. Just a thought.) Xenophobia has found a foothold in the ‘Land of the free and home of the brave.’ Unless your brown. Or not Evangelical Christian. Or anything other than starkly heterosexual. Then you’re just fucked.

How DARE you. As someone of Native American stock I can’t help but laugh hysterically at the gall of these people. Those whose heretical, religious-persecution-fleeing ancestors came to this land and then orchestrated the systematic genocide of indigenous people over the course of centuries are suddenly AGHAST at the audacity of anyone not like you in your midst. And simply because there was no law against it, it was fine to kill over hundreds of thousands of people just to further their own goals.

I grant you, some of my own ancestors came to this land in this way. But let’s take a moment, as a whole, and refuse to let history be our guide and not our warning system. History, not what they teach in Texas. History, that which is so soaked in blood and nightmares that it’s hard to look at most days. History, that which we too will one day be a part of. Is this the mark that we leave, a pock mark so deep it scars over to the point that a hundred years from now we too are scoffed at as short-sighted fools?

Nah, I like to form my own thoughts. But thanks for offering. Now FUCK OFF so the grown ups can something done.

MuseCon Musings (MuseCon 0)

2010-08-10T15:13:00.000-07:00

I was really pleased. The programming was non-pressured and I learned some nifty new things (although I need another hobby like I need a pig on my head). Of course, now I have an itch to teach a beginning knitting class next year. And Gundo recruited me for Filk next year (SO HAPPY!!).

Speaking of Gundo, Toyboat RAWKED!! Rawked in wrong and wonderful ways. Songs that break people are always such a joy.

Hotel is really nice and cozy, even with the atrium lobby and elevator setup (yipe, heights). Roomed with Eric Colemanand Xap which was loads of fun. WSPA-2 also roomed with us, which made for way too many hysterical moments.

But all kidding aside, that boy can PLAY. It’s going to very interesting to watch as he gets better because he’s already oh my wow musically. Shiny shiny. :)

Hung out with lots of great people, including, Adam and Michaeland a bunch of mega super awesome people.

Got a lot of good ideas for projects and neat stuff (Xap taught me how to do shuttle tatting!!), and I think I want to start my own beehive. I know, allergy, but still, attended a really awesome panel on the subject, and it’s really interesting. And I got a bee on my ankle at the train station and he didn’t sting me! I like when the universe sends glowing neon signs that say, “Yeah, this is ok. Relax.” Now all I need is a backyard and a garden….

Had a great time in filk circle singing with Eric, and Gundo joined me on “Follow that Road” by Anne Hills. JOY! “Swamp Witch” was so eerie and fun. Must do that one again. That and more. More, more, more…

Overall: B+ Quite pleased, and I can’t wait for Sooj to be there next year!!! I get to be Filk helper with Sooj as our GOH. And Eric and I will likely be singing together again. And and and and… My life is so fucking GOOD…

I did the right thing. So why do I feel like a swamp rat that ran over a garden snake with an alligator bulldozer on fire?

2010-08-02T07:47:00.000-07:00

I just told a guy I care about that I can't associate with him anymore. I illustrated why, as I have on several occasions before. He and I have gone over these points of contention more than once, and he has refused to change his behavior. He keeps professing to not understand what he's doing wrong even when I spell it out for him in crayon. I tell him no, he takes it at the time, then brings the subject up against mere days (sometimes HOURS) later to see if anything has changed when I SPECIFICALLY ASKED HIM TO DROP IT.

He's not a bad person. He's a wonderful man 90% of the time. Its that 10% that kills me, and I can't invest that kind of emotion in him anymore. I'm out of spoons.

So, we had that talk. he cried. I almost did, too, but I kept it together. I'm here trying not to feel like I just ruined his life by making the choice I had to make for me. Blarg.

Being a grown up is hard. Poly is HARDER. Let's go to the spa...

My First Rush Concert

2010-07-08T11:20:00.001-07:00

Base drum hits my chest like cannon fire. A voice like windswept brushfire scorches my very skin. Must be a Rush concert.

Every heartbeat a bassline echo, but I am not caged. Barefoot and half-deaf with liquid joy. At the foot on Monsters, I am free.

Rhythmic pulsing pulls at my throat, and from it spins words I know by heart and soul and spleen. Yes, spleen.

Intermission. My ears are bleeding colored lights. I stand at the feet of children sprung from the pulsating forehead imagination. Dreams made flesh.

Synthesizer fever dreams, smokescreen light show, and three men captivating the soul of air itself by lighting it on fire.

20-armed steampunk drum robot freak of nature! Wait, that’s Neil every day…

My hearing will come back when its not hung over. Worth it. Utterly worth it.

Duckon 19.... QUACK!

2010-06-21T10:35:00.000-07:00

That was different! Good different, weird different, but different. Sound checks and floor shows, and sight gags, oh my! And dang it people, what’s a girl in a red hood have to do to get a wolf around here?! ;)

Overall it was a lot of fun. I overbooked myself all to hell, but even that turned out ok. I get press ganged into a panel Friday, entitle ‘How to Pick Up Geek Girls.’ It was a basic explanation of do’s and don’t’s in thought process and action when it comes to girls at sci-fi cons. By far my favorite line of thought was “If I didn’t want you to look at me, I wouldn’t dress like this.” To say nothing of Anejo’s addition to the conversation from the audience: “Always stick the dismount.” Subtitle: How you break up with someone is just as important as how you pick someone up. Anejo, dear one, COME UP WITH A BETTER WAY TO SAY THAT. Thank you. 

Wydlekyttin’s birthday party was beyond fabulous. It was comfortable overall and gave a lot of people a place to relax as well as help celebrate the wondrous birthday girl. Who looked HOT in the Poisen Ivy dress I made her. Yeah. My life, it does not suck.

Tear down was… FUN. Closing ceremonies was a Blast if a bit less the spectacle that we’d hoped for. But we 4 pulled it off with usual con gusto and fun, and Deacon Drew has left the building. Go, Slayer!

This marks my second Duckon, and I must say, my love of filk has been fanned into a passion not only for the music but the plethora of wonderful people that make it. SO amazingly happy to have been able to share in the laughter and beauty and presence of these musicians and what they do.

The con chair is dead! Long live the con chair!

That was fast.

2010-05-21T08:40:00.000-07:00

Rand Paul is now saying he WOULD have voted for the 1964 Civil Rights Act after 2 days of ridicule. http://tinyurl.com/2df9vs6

You wanted to be important. You wanted to be a contender. Then you opened your mouth and managed to piss off over 80% of the people of this country. What did you EXPENT, Rand?

But oh no, poor sad panda, he’s trying to play the ‘victim of the liberals’ card now. Oh no, he wouldn’t ever do anything so heinous as say Civil Rights are bad and HE’s not a racist. Yeah ya are, Rand. If this is what you truly stand for, having NEVER READ THE 1964 CIVIL RIGHTSD ACT TO BEGIN WITH’ (See previous post for the video. He admits this directly and without provocation), you are a racist. A racist pandering to racists trying to be an almost entirely racist political party that no one is taking seriously because they are truly that batshit. THESE are your people. You are what you hang with. DEAL. You have only yourself to blame.

Really, Rand?

2010-05-20T10:41:00.000-07:00

Ok, this is just too much. So, Rand Paul (I refuse to use the title of ‘Dr’ here because any man of this nature needs to be ejected from any professional environment that ALLOWS for the title of ‘Dr’) just won the Kentucky republican Primary for Congress. G9od for him. He won by a landslide. Also good for him. He is also against the Federal government having say over private businesses not being able to discriminate thanks to the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act.

WHAT NOW?

Oh but it’s ok, because he DOES believe there should be no discrimination of any kind in GOVERNMENT jobs and THAT is what the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT should have say over, not local businesses because its going against the rights of local business owners. Yeah, couldn’t say that with a straight face if I WANTED to.

Ok, is it me, or was this ‘local business discrimination’ issue exactly WHY the Civil Rights Act and ADA were put into place? Restaurants not serving Blacks or any non-white skin color, separate but equal (HA!) school systems, public AND private (so there’s no distinction to be made for who does and does not receive state funds), to say nothing of treated by law enforcement, city zoning commissions (all governed locally), voting officials, and do I need to GO ON? ( I could. Unlike Texas, I actually paid attention in ‘real life, no seriously this happened in THIS COUNTRY’ US history class.)

Thankfully, I don’t have to. HE SAYS SO HIMSELF: http://bit.ly/cCux5w

Look, Rand, I appreciate you have a Tea Party to pander to, and that’s your choice. But you have now gone from ridiculous to advocating that discrimination should be LEGAL while your well-fed Caucasian self tries to get into elected office because you got endorsed by Fox (fantasy)News. People like you are the reason my parents had to change STATES OF RESIDENCE to get away from the shit they were getting for being a mixed race couple. People like you are the reason why I can’t go back to my home state of Arizona right now for fear of getting stopped by a cop to ask "Papiere, Bitte" because I look vaguely indigenous so I MUST be illegal.

Fuck you, you fucking fucker.

State of Shame

2010-05-09T09:05:00.001-07:00

I have never been more embarrassed to say that I was born in Arizona. I didn't think that was possible after having the walking dead John McCain, the governor of AZ at the time, walked into public and open his mouth during the 2008 election. That was bad. THEN to bring the idiot that is Plain into the picture? I was mortified. And NOW this. A law that basically makes racial profiling a legal practice for the 'enforcement' of immigration laws. Excuse me, AZ, are you sure you can hear me all the way back there in the 40's?!

I've been mistaken for Latina more times than I care to talk about because its both funny and a little weird, but I don't feel comfortable going back to my own home state for fear of being stopped on the street and having a cop ask for my papers. I'm pretty sure I'd send him to the hospital, and it may well be the same hospital that has my birth record if all this happen sin Tucson. I am sick to the teeth about this, but I must say I am proud to see Tucson and Flagstaff standing up and saying they want no park of this. Cities suing their own state over legislature. Let's see how long this law REALLY lasts. Constitutionality, go!

Of an evening stroll...

2010-04-27T22:34:00.000-07:00

I was on my way home tonight by foot, naturally, going the same way home my feet always take me. I don't know why I looked up, but suddenly a figure caught my eye. Catlike by round, a Racoon lumbered down the sidewalk. He stopped a moment and looked back at me, paying no head to the couple moving forward across the street and beyond. He watched me watching him, then wnet on his way, fluffy tail and glowing eyes daring me to follow as he waddled along. I did.

I followed the fuzzy bandit to an black iron fence alongside a rather nice looking apartment building. The kind you might nto associate with a racoon's hiding place, but to each their own, even in the animal kingdom. He paused one last time, watching me watching him. I told him I cold not follow him further tonight. a blink, and he was gone.

I continued down this new path, new architecture to take in in the quiet night, when silver light caught my eye. the moon, just coming into fullness, lay over my new path, leading me on, all but taking my hand for the journey. I wondered that She would take such time for me, but I smiled back at Her as I walked, content that she thought of me even if only for a moment.

and a moment was all it took to follow Her glow to a tiny house, gently situated back from the urban street, of no consequence to any but those who know to look. Lamplight on the cobled path to the door, the sound of running water heralding a starnge presence, palpable yet elusive. I wonder at seeing it again without the Moon to Guide me...

I wandered on only to have a black cat emerge from the streetlamp night, well-fed and fluffy in the last of his winter coat. He paused only a moment before rambling on in his sure-fotted kitty cat way.

A corner turned, homeward bound, I was caught enthralled, a garden of light. Tiny litted flowers, garish colors coming together in a goldwash of light, happily playing across dew-strewn grass, new leaves in colors only moonlight and streetlight can show.

Gentle intrigues all as the Moon rolls on, and the tides roll in, and the nodding night wind blows. But why the Lady fishes the streets, only the Lady knows...

Apple's Revenge: We all get it in the end

2010-04-27T13:23:00.001-07:00

As many of you are no doubt aware, an interesting story hit the news late last week about a blogger, Jason Chen of Gizmodo, who paid $5000 for a ‘found’ prototype of the 4G iPhone that was left in a bar by one of the researchers. His home was raided by police in san Mateo county and he could be facing felony charges.

This brings up a series of arguments and thought processes when it comes to bloggers. California does have laws in place that shield journalists from revealing their sources, but are bloggers journalists? What does and does not qualify as journalism?

As someone who was once bouncing around the idea of a career in journalism, this strikes a deep cord in me. Free speech is in fact protected under the First amendment, but how far does that really extend? There’s Free speech, then there’s threatening the life of the President (you WILL do Federal time for this, even if you don’t mean it. After Kennedy, the Treasury Department does not mess around). There’s free of speech, then there’s trade secrets, state secrets, and medical information. Even if you have access to this information, sharing it, regardless of free speech laws, incurs penalty by law.

So where is the line drawn? This is something people have been kicking around the past few years and the blogosphere has expanded into view-shifting territory. There’s a blog for quite literally ever palette, and that leads to many of the same questions that the internet has faced about free speech, privacy, and in the end, accountability.

My opinion, what Jason Chen did is stupid. Just plain stupid, to say nothing of questionable. I mean, whatever happened to finding something dropped in a bar and giving it to the bartender in a ‘lost and found’ type gesture? I appreciate iPhones aren’t cheap since I KNOW what I just paid for mine, but doing anything else is theft, by law. Taking an object, regardless of intent, and reconfiguring it for your own purposes is theft in the eyes of the law, as it should be. Can Chen then be held accountable for willfully buying stolen property? It’s entirely possible.

This is going to be an interesting story to follow, not only for the sake of bloggers, but journalists in general. Lines will be drawn by this criminal suit, even if a civil suit is not filed.

Convention Attention!

2010-04-23T15:07:00.001-07:00

Yup, it’s that time again. Con season, though it didn’t take MUCH of a break, it’s about to break me in new and wonderful ways. THIS is why you should never let anyone see that you’re responsible. They start putting you in charge…

Shibaricon – I’m really looking forward to this. A lot of good panels, some of which I’ll actually get to attend between security duties and making sure the heads of security do things like eat and sleep. It’s always so nice when my job is to make sure other people don’t fall over. :) I also need to pick up a ton of rope beforehand to make sure I have enough for later on in the weekend. Can’t show up to one of Midori’s panels without supplies. That’d just be rude. That and if a certain someone decides to do something stupid at this particular event, I need enough extra length to leave him strung up like a piñata, but that’s another entry entirely…

Duckon – Ah, Duck. The gateway drug of Chicago cons. I’m bringing in 2 newbs this year, which should make things interesting if Eric tries to pull me up on stage again. That’s also what I get for opening my mouth in front of Eric. Anywho, it’s all about the party. That’s right, it’s Kyttin’s birthday, and the resident 1920’s bouncer will be working the door of Speakeasy central. And all that only after I get 3 Batman villainess costumes done ala Sew-a-palooza 2 weekends from now. I love my life. :)

Faerie Worlds – honestly, it doesn’t look like it’s happening this year. With London next spring and everything else going on, I have to cut something I’m not actually responsible for facilitating, and I do believe this is where the line gets drawn. Shame, I was looking forward to it, though I do hope they get the layout fixed this year. Having performers in direct sunlight in the middle of the afternoon in August? Really, are you TRYING to kill these people? And now I’ll have to find somewhere else to get my costuming together for Windycon. Bristol, here I come!

Bristol – annual Ren Faire, always a pleasure, especially when it’s not hot enough to fry human brains in their pressure cooker skulls. The visual is interesting, but in practice it really just smells. I’m likely going twice and only twice this year. Once to scout and once to buy for costumes. We’ll see. I also HAVE to see Kamala. I’m out of several oils, and I need her to construct one for me. I’ll see about opening weekend to put in my thoughts for an order. Anyone care to join me?

Pixies in St. Louis – I have no earthly idea how I’m getting there OR getting back, to say nothing of where I’ll stay, but I’m going to try my worst! Pixies in October. What could be better? Besides, you know, lavender pudding and pillow fights in green wigs…

WindyCon – Oh, dear fandom, why do you keep trying to stomp me into oblivion? Tricky Pixie is the awesomesauce that got cooked up in the kitchen of Win and curry and fiendish siren bliss, but getting there may well kill me. I have 2 costumes to finish, Vlad’s and my own, and I STILL don’t have his wings prepared. I need an engineer for wings this large. I wonder is my cousins are Purdue are doing anything this summer… (evil grin laced with baked goods). To say nothing of the Con Comm juggling act being committed by the Con chair. I love getting ringside seats for a good slugfest, but not when it involves my boyfriend. *sigh*

Midwest Furrfest – Once again, responsibility rears its annoying little head. I got tapped for Dealer’s room, which is VERY good if I’m going to helping run things for WindyCon in the future. I dare not speculate, but I do love furries so. And it gives me an excuse to do more of what I love: keep the head of Security from falling over due to exhaustion or hunger. Whee!!!

Continental divide… and road trips

2010-04-22T14:38:00.001-07:00

So, as some of you may already know, my girlfriend, Kyttin (WyldeKyttin on LJ) has been going through a mess recently. Her older brother, Rich went into the hospital, and we were getting some very, VERY bad medical news. So we hopped a flight down to see what was what, and promptly got dumped into a Springer-worthy power struggle. Ah, the wonders of man (or in this case woman) and the need to never ever share anything with anyone even if what they are doing is the worst thing possible and people who know what the hell they’re doing aren’t allowed anywhere within range. (breath) Yeah, it was a bitchfest, but in the end I was happy to be by Kyttin’s side. I just wish driving over the continental divide hadn’t been quite so stomach-dropping. Felt so bad for Vlad…

And as these situations tend to, it brought up my own thoughts on medical need and what might happen to me if it was me laid out in a bed without means to dictate my thoughts. It always seems to take looking into someone else’s peril to recognize our own, so I’ll bite this hook and see where it takes me once I clear the water’s edge.

I’ve never wanted to be kept on life support. It just feels… without purpose. If I can’t get out a sarcastic quip now and then, there’s no reason to keep me around simply because heart and lungs are still going. I’ve also decided that my sister, Alexis, the perpetual pre-med who has more knowledge than most acting residents, is the best equipped to handle the task of corralling both our family and certain persons of fandom in a time of crisis. Gods help her, however, if she has to do both at ONCE…

Of course, all this is going on paper and being appropriately notarized and blessed and smudged and so on, but I figure a relatively secure public forum that very few people read of care about is a good place to archive these musings. Or let them putrefy, one of the two...

Once again, I’m far too tired for this kind of talk, so I’ll leave you with this tidbit that my dear Raven and the lost girls of House Cerulia inspired in me on my trip to Seattle recently:

“Are you all right?”

“Headachy with forgotten epiphany and heedlessness.”

Blink. Blink. “Cup of tea will fix that right up.”

“Have I told you how much I love you even though I’m an unspeakable horror?”

“Yes, but you’re MY unspeakable horror. Sugar?”

Lost girls. They are made of win and pie and pirate. Ravens are made of song and story and curry, you see….

So passeth a woman of integrity and grace…

2010-04-22T12:34:00.000-07:00

… who knew how to ROCK a hat.

Dorothy Height was a pioneer in the pursuit of civil rights for all, not only blacks but all oppressed peoples. "Civil rights are civil rights. There are no persons who are not entitled to their civil rights. We have to recognize that we have a long way to go, but we have to go that way together." - speaking to the Human Rights Campaign in 1997. She died April 20th at the age of 98.

A truly brilliant, passionate, yet understated lady of grace and charm who was more than willing to step up and fight for what she knew to be right. May we all be as brave, as fashion conscious, and as resilient in word and deed as this lady was.

Anne Coulter, put the crack pipe down....

2010-03-24T14:38:00.000-07:00

Excuse me? Since when does the walking hate crime herself get to call victim here? She was scheduled to speak at the university of Ottowa, and they had to CANCEL her engagement since the protest outside was bordering on riot. The entire reasons she’s calling foul here is because the University official overseeing her speech sent her an email stating that she should use ‘respect’ when metering her words because the hate crime laws are more strict in Canada than they are here.

Ok, so this guy is trying to be nice and warn her off of getting arrested and causing an international incident because of her inability to not spout lies, and she’s bitching? Classy, Anne, in your classic classy fashion, you hopeless degenerate scarecrow.

This is just one more symptom of the festering cancer that is what’s left of the GOP. They are in shambles as a group, fractioning off within the confines of the far right into varies grades of violence, lunacy, and bigoted hypocrisy. They honestly will fight long and hard against anything this President says or does, even if it is exactly what the people need/want. They care nothing for the people, they care about telling the people what they want and need, not letting them make up their own minds based on actual fact. It’s amazing to me the amount of abject bullshit these people will just make up on the fly and call it fact. From the birthers (wow, fail) to the Tea Baggers (still laughing) to the right wing in general, these people are dangerous. Their ideas are poison, and they sit gleefully steeped in their own hatred, refusing anything even resembling reason.

Then you have the riot inciters, the Rush’s and Glenn’s and Anne’s of the far right that love nothing more than being loud and obnoxious and spouting absolute shit, anything to get attention, money, and make people squirm. There’s a word for that: Bully. And we all know how I feel about bullies. I request no violence toward these people. I request only that they be held responsible for the words they say, for the hate they spread, and for the people who’s lives are trampled under the tiny but spiked heel that is the Wingnut Militia within the US. They were more than happy to let the government have full reign when it was their side on top. Now the tiny barking minority is crying out for justice. Justice, you say? Let’s put you on trial for the murder of abortion doctors, the erosion of the middle class, the protesting at the funerals of soldiers (Westboro is a whole other line of thought that I will not dive into this round. Way too angry), screaming hate while their families grieve when all these men and women did was DIE FOR YOUR FREEDOM. Fuck you very much.

See, this is why I'm not allowed to have Henry Rollins' children. Short, highly intelligent, foul-mouthed, ANGRY, tattooed children with no neck to speak of who would take over the whole damn planet. no one needs little clones of me running around. Humanity just isn't ready for that much bottled rage. Vacation blog to follow soon! :)

Here it comes again.....

2010-03-10T13:12:00.001-08:00

The sun has risen, the Fog has not. I listened in the Dreamtime to its rhythm and its rhythm, floating on its grey waves even as I stay anchored. A rock in a silver sea, the graffiti left behind a scar, a story, a memory, a song. It took me by the hand as it washed away the world. I wonder what else it has to share?

The sun is obscured, as if the day is merely and afterthought. The waterbeat rhythm still shifts my feet. I want to walk it back to its source. Not yet.

It hangs above the remaining snow and newly revealed grasses. It knows what we are coming to understand. All things end, and all things come back, and the stories between are worth telling, worth listening to, worth keeping. So too, then, are we.

Here it comes .....

2010-03-10T13:11:00.000-08:00

The Fog rolls in like dragon’s breath, thick and rich and sweet. In the short walk from the train it has cast over the streets and between the buildings, so dense its hard to know that stranger drifting out of the grey mist before me. Is he from around here’ Does he know where here is? Do i? Curious.

The dreams com slow and wild, drifting in and out of the moving grey like figures on strings, the silver curtain the only veil between our worlds. What becomes of the ones caught still walking when the Fog lifts? This is the kind of night where people disappear and reappear at will, though by their own or another’s is a matter of perspective.

Ashen and expectant, it rolls on, beyond and through me. Dare I follow, either to its source of along its journey? Nah, I stay behind this time, drinking in the newcomers and watching that which is taken drift along, freer than it will ever be again. Perhaps one day I too will join it, but this night is not for me. I close the door just to, letting the Fog roll in as it Will. What stories have you brought to share tonight, Old Wise One? What more have you seen in the wide Worlds?

White Ribbon, White Trees

2010-02-22T12:19:00.001-08:00

So, saw ‘White Ribbon’ yesterday. AMAZING film. It’s the kind that movie buffs will be analyzing for years to come. It’s about a small village in Germany just prior to World War I. a series of strange happenings, nothing of the supernatural, simply tragic and close together, spin the village into a quiet frenzy of suspicion and conspiracy. The film ends just at the beginning of the War, and many of the deep-seated tensions of this village mirror those of the region at the time. It’s a microcosm/macrocosm mirroring that is truly lovely. I just wish the damn movie had as ENDING.

This is the second time in as many weeks I’ve come across a story that has no ending. I’m currently torturing myself with the “Incarnations of Immortality” series by Piers Anthony. Book 3 , no freakin’ ending. Almost as bad as the movie “Sex and Breakfast.” It’s rash inducing how badly that sucks. The story (in the book, not the movie) is wonderful, the world he builds is exquisite in it’s simplicity laid over such a complex framework that is beautifully easy to grasp. It’s just such a shame about his writing…

But be that as it may, the company of yesterday was excellent. Intelligent and sarcastic in delicious ways, all while being warm and snuggly. Quite a pleasure, one I wish I could share more of, but alas, I longed for a social life and got one. Blast it all.

And yet, for all my doubts and worries and trials and schedules, all I can do is watch the snow dust onto the streets as I wait for my laundry to be done so I can sleep. Time passes so slowly as the white dances down from the sky. I wonder what its like, to live so short a life. To fall from the heavens to the earth in a single bound, carried to your resting place by the winds.

The Leaving

2010-02-22T12:18:00.002-08:00

And so begins another adventure. Balance is a thing of perspective, yet as perspective evolves, balance must be maintained. Or tipped entirely on its ear, one of the two.

So, regardless of practically untenable (and thankfully soon to be EXITING) roommates, I’ve managed to get settled. It took me almost a year, and the roommates didn’t help at all, but I’ve managed at last to settle in to what has become my own piece of life. And yet I’m antsy. Expectant. Wanting. As usual, the Leaving is creeping in again.

Catherine Valente actually articulated this better than I could ever hope to in her book, In The Night Garden. She spoke of a sensation unignorable, a calling of sea and adventure and movement, called the Leaving. It has followed me most of my adult life, this need to go, to see, to find, to move about. It took me across state lines, into the arms of various lovers, and yet always my eyes on the horizon, westward, wanting. And this is the first time in my life I’ve ever truly want to drop kick the Leaving. I don’t want to go.

I know where I would go, which doesn’t make this any easier. I’m visiting there next month, seeing friends and brothers and sisters, comrades in trickster mischief, set in the Pacific Northwest, 4 hours by plane away from everything I have built and know and love. And yet how much I would be leaving behind if I DON’T go. I’m leaving something behind either way, visiting instead of living. Yet which family do I cherish, and which do I allow to fly free? Part of me has made the choice, brushing aside illogical, irrelevant fancy, giving way to tenable joy, to tangible existence. And yet the Leaving hungers. It longs for the road, longs for the freedom of complete autonomy.

And this is where my being wants to say fuck it and go on tour. I’ve been considering putting an ad in Craig’s List for quite a while, something to the tune of, “Singer Seeking Songwriter.” My music has always been such an integral part of my life, and yet I don’t give it enough attention. I realized that at Capricon just 2 weekends ago, singing on stage with Eric Coleman. It made me realize how much I want this, to be able to share this gift, to let it warm the hearts of those around me, their smiles and laughter warming mine.

It’s a long way to find out who we are. The Waiting sucks.

Been a bit...

2010-02-22T12:18:00.001-08:00

Maybe its just been a while. Maybe it was the warning received. Or maybe I’m just being stood up for the second itme in my life. All are possible, which irritates me. But all are also possible in combination, which makes me stabby. And ramble. Another Tanlge. Shit.

I suppose I just need to relax. I’m nervous for a couple good reasons and a lot of lousy ones. The freakish paranoia set in a little while ago, my mind conjuring wild scenes of car acciednets and zombie invasions and alien abductions, keeping my friend from meeting me for dinner. Not a fan of my mind when it’s like this.

LATER:

So instead, I’m an idiot. Surprise! I love miscommunication. Makes for the first blog-like thought process I’ve had in months. Could be the start of something. Could also be exhaustion feeding insanity, but what of that?

Being silly has it’s good points. But lessons wrought of silliness tend to end either in zombies or strange tea parties. This one will end in music. Dirge or symphony remains to be seen.

Distraction Between

2009-10-31T01:55:00.000-07:00

It's funny how the sky is so rarely black in the city. I think e lost the night when we succumbed to the village being larger than we were. The lights have veiled the blackness into a deep blue that is beauteous in its own way, but distracts us from the primal night that we all know deep down lay just beyond. Every now and then, we have to go beyond that blue veil and into the starlit night because it is truth.

I had such distraction forcibly taken from me yesterday in a moment that very well could have gotten me killed. I fell onto the train tracks near my office. Listening to my iPod, completely not paying attention to the moment as I thought about my day, I tripped. Wet wood, high rails all prevailing against my complete state of unawares to send me into a face plant in the rocks. SPLAT. FUCK OW. The very act of falling was in severe slow motion, as if a part of me wasn't sure what was real and what wasn't, and then came the pain. I had enough presence of mind to brace myself for it, and thankfully neither head nor face ever touched the rocks or the rail. Something that very easily could have knocked me out, leaving me prey to the oncoming trains. No one would have known where I was. No one would have ever known I'd been hit until it was far too late. Between the two sets of tracks, I could have been missed by trains in either direction, or I could have been obliterated. Instead I walked away with four scratches, three bruises and a dead iPod. I got off LIGHT.

I allowed this to happen. It sucks even saying that to myself let alone writing, it, but I allowed this to be. I allow myself distraction because it’s easy. It's pretty and easy and time-consuming and fun and it doesn't serve me as much as I need but I don't care. That not caring almost got me killed yesterday.

And yet today, amid a flurry of distraction, I came across three very distinct and equally scary truths at the beginning of this night: I'm dangerously close to being in love, I'm dangerous close to either breaking someone or being broken by them from 2500 miles away, and I have no idea what I want in either case. That was the beginning of the story.

I will not use names out of respect. Lets us call them Jason and Eric and Dana. Jason is 2500 miles away and an enigma sight-unseen. Adrift in the wake of a very bad relationship, he has made the healthy choice to bunker in and heal before venturing outward again. And yet his agile mind and spiritual kinship latched onto me like an anchor tie, and I could not but hold it by my very nature. And yet now the boundary must be set. I cannot be what he needs, and I cannot help him heal in the way that he must. To do so would intertwine me in his healing, to make me a part of his whole that would be difficult if not impossible to disengage from without breaking again. Heals wrong, break the bone again and set it right. I can't be that wrong healing, and I will not be a part of any dependency situation. Not again. NEVER again. No matter how much I care for him, I cannot be what he needs in this way. I have to let go that tie and bleed as it pulls free, taking bits of skin in the friction.

And so to Eric, who all but fell out of the sky and into my existence. Esoteric and charming, intelligent and bold, yet a force onto himself in his silence and solitude, the lone tower in the storm. He keeps those around him safe while allowing them their own journeys. He takes apart the puzzles to know how to make them better. He pulls sci-fi from the heavens and makes it his own. Sound familiar to anyone else? And he is here. Before me. Interested. Just as scared as I am about how well our faults fit together. We have managed in a short time to find such a healthy balance of faults to compliment each other and become this understood thing that neither of us can name and yet we both already knew.

And then to Dana, who is a force onto herself, so fiery and child-like and potent even in her darkest moments. Forked tongue to cut the air itself, yet a laugh that could make the dead grin. So quick was our understanding, and so deep has out passion been that I have to wonder which one of us is more frightened: Dana, Myself, or Eric. Good thing they're already together, or this might be a very tragic story. Dangerous close to love in two corners, and perfectly content, yet allowing enough for distraction that it nearly cost me everything.

And so the night went on...

I have learned to ignore the obvious because it cannot possibly be so simple. It is in fact. And the simpler it is, the hard it is to wrap my head around. I bring complication where there is none, mathematics and numbers and words unneeded in the mere presence of simplicity. It is, and that is all there is to it. I allow things to get so complicated that distraction is the only way to deal. My own need for complication is the key. Why do I need it? Why must I have it? What purpose does it serve? My need to understand gives the expectation of complexity where none exists. It is this expectation that allows for the distraction to take root. No more of this circular nonsense. If it cannot serve the Will it is cast aside or cut clean, bloody and wet and lifeless at the roadside. And though I may bleed from the culling, I will heal in time, carrying the scar of memory as an understanding of NEVER AGAIN. and yet the path is not so lonely anymore, not so desolate and not so complicated, even withe the obvious change. Awareness is not complication. Awareness is just that.

So may basics understood for so long I forget how integral they are until one of them loses feeling. Like when my arms falls asleep and I try to move it. Always knew it was important. barely thought about it until I was without, and then it suddenly becoming vital in the way only an epiphany can. And yet it is not so grandiose. It simply is.

An evening of words and pictures and so much muck. Time to weed it out to the barest bits, in this time when the veil is thinnest.... oh, wait. I have all winter. Good, enough time to make sense of it all before I head west again…

Part the way

2009-10-12T08:16:00.001-07:00

And so now do the seasons change once more before our eyes, within our bones. Mabon has passed into the cool winds, the leaves fall like rainbow rain, and the frost creeps in from the rolling north to bid the beginning of winter. Samhain looms before me like a great gatekeeper beaconing me forward as the old hinges creek open, the way black as pit in the night. So now do I stand before that gate, hearing the voices of those past and those who have always been sight unseen. I fear not the dark, I fear not the messages. I fear only my own inabilities. Yet I step, for though I may feel unworthy myself, those who call to me see some worth in me. I only hope to make good on such sight. A breath into the night…

Whee!

2009-10-06T08:47:00.000-07:00

So, it’s been a bit for me. It’s been a very BUSY, BUSY bit. It’s amazing, really. I always wanted a social life, and now that I have one all I want is a break!

The wedding is now over. Thanks the gods. It was beautiful and wonderful and joyous and yes, I cried AFTER I did my section. Personally written vows. Get me every time. Aspecting Fire in fact did NOT set the altar ablaze NOR did it cause any enormous outbursts on the part of anyone, all wins in my eyes. But I did mange to let out my inner firebitch when I kicked out the reception crashers from the bachelor party next door. I’m sorry, no small horde of drunken rejects was going to come waltzing in and get a warm welcome, especially after one of them was eyeing my 16-year-old friend. It’s the kind of thing that makes a short chubby redhead into a demon who is going to EAT YOUR FUCKING FACE if you don’t do exactly what she says right now. Hee hee!

Stronghold is also now over and I am officially the talk of the social circuit of the Bristol crowd. JOY. What I get for being led around and introduced by an engaged man (known to be a shameless flirt) and his wife (who is a wench. No seriously, she’s in the Guild). I walked on his left while his fiancé walked on his right, which according to centuries of tradition makes her the wife and me the… Trying to find work for Faire next year just got INTERESTING.

I am now officially going to Kansas City without fail next weekend, which means that yet another weekend will be spent on the road as opposed to resting. And not just on the road, no no. DRIVING. 8 hours one way, and the first leg is Friday night after a full week at work. I get to bring all my stuff to work, get picked up, sleep for 2 hours, then drive for 6 so Sherry can get some sleep. The KC Ren Faire is going to ROCK, though. My Circle is meeting there, Tessa and the Yeomen (the King’s Guard) will be there, and I’m going to try and seek out a shirt for Windy Con. If I can find that and a skirt, Huzzah! But yeah, another whole weekend away from home. Without rest. My body is already objecting, and YET…

Syn in the weekend after. Granted, Saturday during the day is empty, and with good reason, but Friday night after work until who knows when and Saturday night until who the HELL knows when are booked so high and so deep I don’t even want to think about them anymore. Thankfully I get ONE DAY to myself that Sunday. Which means HOUSECLEANING. Oh my, we’re really having some fun now. But WAIT, there’s MORE…

Possible end of summer hurrah with two people I haven’t seen in literally YEARS. Canceling on them at this point would be not only insane and rude but also out of the questions, so another Sat gone. Then the next week is Halloween, which is going to be a nightmare, no pun intended.

Then November begins, and I get one weekend to myself before Windy Con. Thankfully. I get to complete my costuming and make sure I have everything I need in dangly bits and shinies for the Masquerade. Fun! Then one more weekend before Thanksgiving, and I haven’t bought my bus tickets yet. What’s WRONG with me, you ask? I haven’t got time to tell you about it, as you can see! Or can you see? Am I going too fast for you? I’m sure as hell going too fast for ME!! Whee!!

Obama, 1 and a 2...

2009-09-10T05:59:00.000-07:00

Ok, so again I'm late to the party on these ideas, but it works in its own very special way.

To open, let's get this out right now: Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) -- the guy who shouted "You lie" when Obama said the health care plan would not cover illegal immigrants -- is a putz. And given everything else that's come out of the state of SC in recent weeks and months, that man REALLY shouldn't be talking about liars. Enough said.

Speech to school children :: what the hell? What was everyone so fucking upset about? The entire Wingnut brigade was up in arms about how no president had ever done anything like this before outside of North Korea (laughing) and how he was trying to hijack the minds of America's youth. We could only be so lucky, but I was actually IN school when Ronald Reagan pulled out this CRINGE-worthy PR move in '88, so unprecedented is not the word I would use for this.

And exactly what is wrong with a black president telling children they really can be ANYTHING they want to be? He's a first in American history! Why NOT have him address our children as living proof that anything can happen given hard work and want? Work hard, stay in school, set your own academic goals because your country needs you. Right. He's brainwashing them. Right.

Next up :: Health Care. Cue the sighs, the groans, and the cheers. honestly, I thought this one had serious promise. He said a lot of things that I've been screaming for a long time, especially given the medical history of my own family. NO ONE should go broke just becasue they get sick. No one should be denied medical coverage by an insurance company because of a pre-existing condition. when I was 13, I had to take a specific medication to control a very serious internal imbalanace. It was prescribed by a dR., but my mother's insurance wouldnt' cover it. It took FEDERAL legislation to force insuracne companies to cover this particular med, but int he meantime my mother had to pay full price for my meds. Never hated being sick so much in my whole life as when I found that out. NO ONE should ever have to feel that way.

And I'm sorry, but when you get told by an insurance company that they won't pay to give your 17-year-old daughter a liver transplant because according to the bureaucrats who decide these things in their cubicles somewhere she's beyond help, regardless of the fact that a team of Dr. has said it would save her life, and you spend over a year lobbying to get them to pay, but when they finally DO AGREE with the original diagnosis and agree to pay she dies on a donor waiting list, you should have the right to take every single person who had a hand in that decision and hang them from the nearest tree until their feet quit kicking. But that's just me.

And do not EVEN get me started on pharmacists being able to decide what meds they will and will not dispense. As a pharmacist, you are a member of the medical community. You have issue with giving out contraceptives or AIDS meds? QUIT. Someone who actually gives a shit about helping people and saving lives will GLEEFULLY take your place.

The rebuttal by Dr. Charles "I'm Even Worse Than Bobby Jindal" Boustany, however...I'm shaking as I type. Someone needs to bleed this guy dry so the FDA can approve his blood as a narcotic because CLEARLY he has been smoking something hardcore and foul.

And so now do we end the most recent few memorable moments of the Administration. My question becomes this: the Dems have control. When are they planning on waking up to that fact and actually getting things DONE around here? One has to wonder....

What did you do today?

2009-09-01T21:30:00.000-07:00

I did dishes.

I’m one of those people that needs quantifiable, tangible accomplishment every single day, or I will go absolutely nuts.

I have worked at jobs in the past where I could work all day and I could explain to you exactly what I did, but there would no way for you to prove, no real way I could really prove, it, but I did it. It sucked. So I went home everyday and did dishes. I watched a sink full of dishes dwindle down to nothing and the stack of clean dishes piled up into this really cool pyramid thing, but I DID something. Or I’d clean the catbox. Or take out the trash. I accomplished something.

I mean, when I walk into my workplace every day, I don’t think, “Hey, I went to work today. “ No. Work is an opportunity to do something. With work for me, you have two options: you accomplish something, or you fuck off. What you accomplish isn’t always in your job description… My job title is in essence sales. I sell a product. What I DO everyday is grab teachers by the arm and say, “You gotta see this!” I help teachers get something they need, something they want, and something that will serve them. I put something in front of teachers and say, “This is where you are, this is what you do, this is what you WANT to do, this is where you WANT to go, and THIS program will help you get there. This will work for you. Why are you not already here?”

If I don’t accomplish something over the course of a day, I feel awful. I feel like I am wasting my life. Not just my time, but my life, because what is time but a part of life? Therefore my life get wasted when my time gets wasted. And that is completely unacceptable. So I go home and I do something. I finish something. If I get hit by a car tomorrow, my life is over, poof done, I will be able to say, “ I accomplished something.”

What did you do today? If you don’t have an answer right now, that’s ok. Continuing to not have an answer is not ok.

DO SOMETHING. Do something that you love. Do something that makes you smile. Do something that makes you proud to stand up and say, “YES! I did that.” But DO something. Even if it is as simple as dishes. Because at the end of the day it does not matter what you think. It does not matter what you intend. It doesn’t even matter what you say. Talk is cheap and I believe. I talk for LIVING, and I believe that. It is not what you say. It is about what you DO. What did YOU DO today?

You’ve got time. What COULD you do?

In Turn Sacred

2009-08-31T08:24:00.000-07:00

A writer's moment, after midnight and several episodes of Babylon 5.

The cold dark of winter has come. Stark white glows beneath the starless sky, covering the earth like a gray ghost. I walk between the ancient trees caught in icy slumber. I envy them their ability to turn inward, away from the cold. I find a space cleared of bark and brush, a circle of white untouched by the surrounding forest. I walk to its center and suddenly notice that my feet make no sound. I look back. No footprints.

“This is a sacred place. All those who venture here are in turn sacred. All others simply never find it.” The voice surrounded me, as if the air itself spoke.

“What is this place?”

“Not what nor where nor when. Only why.”

“Who are you?”

“I am as you are. Why do you need to know more than that?”

“I seek understanding.”

“Fact and truth are not mutually exclusive. Which do you seek?”

“Neither and both.”

“Then you are ready.”

Wanderlust

2009-08-28T07:51:00.001-07:00

I've gotten restless recently. I'm getting bored easily, opting for idle time-wasting as opposed to productive or creative pursuits. I managed to finish the first chapter of one project, a gift to its muse, and now...nothing. I'm not terribly motivated, which hasn't ever really stopped me before. I try to keep busy, keep moving, but I feel like I'm running in circles, not really looking forward to anything but still managing to get tired in the process.

My completely unacceptable physique got me working out again. bike riding is hit and miss considering summer decided to give way to fall after two freaking weeks, so I'm opting for indoor cardio. It's short and intense (shock), which works for me, but I still get antsy at night when I'm up and alone and wondering about the reasons for it all.

It took seven years to get established, and I haven't even been on my own a year yet. I have to wonder how much is loneliness, how much is boredom masked in exhaustion, and how much is truly a Calling, something somewhere beckoning my feet to the road.

And yet, every now and then, a literary gem still pops up to be heard:

"I have walked the streets of Faerie at night, knowing well their leafy lane, their log wood bridges. I have climbed the stepping stones to the house of my kin, and sat at their table, welcomed home."

So passeth a man worthy.

2009-08-28T07:41:00.001-07:00

It seems death is making a list not unlike Santa's this year. The good ones are getting checked off, and the latest was one we really couldn't afford to lose just yet. His work is left undone, and so it passes to all of us who thought well of him to carry on in his stead.

Edward "Ted" Kennedy had a way of ruffling feathers. He was much like Harvey Keitel in that you either loved him or hated him. But like so many, he knew where he stood, and he stood on the side of equality, of justice, and he had the guts to speak up even when every other voice on his side was silent. Would that we could all have such strength in the trying times ahead. Compelling and engaging, it took a brain tumor to slow him down, much like it took my own grandfather. I don't think of Ted in that way, but I do know what it's like to watch a good, strong man wither away into a mere shell before my eyes. My heart is with his family now as they grieve, much as I did two years ago.

So passeth a man worthy. Rest well, Ted. You've earned it. Your work will continue.

You can tell Fall is coming when...

2009-08-21T07:46:00.000-07:00

Hoodies and flip-flops suddenly become commonplace.

The cool wind catches the climbing ivy in waves like a vertical sea.

You can smell it.

It caught me again this morning as I awoke with the windows open to romping kittens and crisp air filling my senses with a need to burrow. I feel the sleep of the land creeping around the edges, my own want of hibernation just stirring.

The cycle continues. Feel it turn...

2009-08-21T07:45:00.000-07:00

Reflections in the tides

2009-08-10T09:01:00.000-07:00

I’ve been unusually sensitive recently. It started in the midst of my journey in the Pacific Northwest, but instead of being dulled or simply lessened by the return to mundania, this sensitivity has become sharper, more acute. It extends to all points and valleys of my existence. The very breeze vibrates through me like an echo. I feel like the crow perched within a willow seated next to a river, sunlight and moonlight reflecting from their sources but also reflected in the moving waters below me, further perspective, secondary impression.

And yet the time has come for such reflection. Though the leaves have not yet begun their color symphony, the wheel is turning, the time is coming, and the seeds are coming to their various points of harvest. Yet with eyes so forward and ears so perked to all that is so far out, could I lose sight of what’s in my hands? The barrage has been known to blind me, to clench my hands in shock and wonder, only to crack the fragile joys already within my grasp. To say nothing of the rather impressive backlog of things that I’ve been meaning to complete for years now. Delicate balance.

So many sign posts, so many wants, so many things left undone. A curious reflect.

Faerie Worlds Apart

2009-08-05T09:09:00.000-07:00

Flying always kills me. I’m still sleep deprived after my second night home. Pacific time set in on my system just in time for Central to kick me back over like a can on the street.

But worth it. So very, very worth it.

The heat was reminisce of the desert, not the Pacific Northwest. It was 106 on the ground. Walking out of the airport was like walking into truck backwash. I could practically drink the air, and it burned. Oh, how it burned. The drive down was filled with laughter and song and “Thirteen” (http://www.vixyandtony.com/music.html) and “Mythcreants” (http://www.trickypixie.com/merch.php), along with new friend, Foxy. Considering I went by Crowe for almost the whole fest, it felt good that others like me knew their names and used them as I did.

We got to Portland just in time for hair dying and SLEEP. Sleep with big cats and really awesome attics and bumblebees. We awoke in the Hive to happy belly goodness of bagels with lox and cream cheese. Then we hung out, packing cars and making lists, checking as many times as it took to hit the road running. After grabbing all we needed, we set out upon our journey to Eugene and everything after.

Camp held new faces and kindred spirits alike. Fire kindled, altars set against the greet evergreens around us, walking the circle of our tribe to ensure its protection and sanctity. And in the great conifers within our fortress of love, my laughing brother birds fluttered and sang, waking me the next morning to the sunlight, the waning starlight, and the readying for our trip to FW.

Surrounded was I at once by color and light and sound, pan flutes playing on the winds, Fae of every shape and size and manner prancing about and dancing, wings floating on the breeze. Blessed breeze. It’s the only thing that kept us all from falling over in the sunlight. There is no sun in Faerie, not really...but I disgress.

I fluttered about, a Gaselli at play, coin belt jingling my presence into the ethers. It was a day of watering can blessings and fanciful creations given life and light. Wood nymphs danced as much as stood still, children running and playing with the inner children of those grown tall. Stilt walkers and sprites sang out their joy, pirates and steampunk minions mingling with Jerith and Froudlings.

My only downward moment was under the shade tent in the late day, pulling my skirt wide to shield a friend from the harsh sun’s rays as he ate and tried to recover from overheating. He is well, thank the stars, but we were all quite concerned. He did get better, drinking plenty and resting much, his voice ringing out in laughter again soon enough.

And so the sun rose and set upon the first day at Faerie Worlds.

The next day was much the same, though Bad Faerie’s day was one of mischief. Instead of bad Faerie I just went with Baddass. I think it worked well…

But the day proved too much for me, so coyote and I headed back to camp for shade, cold drinks, and talk. Talk we did in fact, of socks and shipmates and storytelling, cabbage heads and kingdoms. We were joined by other of the camp, also seeking refuge form the sun, and bearing whisky and watermelon. The night rang out with our laughter as we shared the cool night. And so the sun rose and the sun set on the second day of Faerie worlds.

The next morning held a sigh for me. I was headed off toward the airport come sunset, but not before packing and making merriment with my new tribemates one last time. And so we did, Monochromatic Faeries, we!

We frolicked and played one last time to the winding ways of Gaia Consort, and then the brick hit me in the face. I got the message that lit the fire beneath my feet and set the tears to my eyes. Chaldean was dying. I had to get home. I talked with Thistle as best I could, not looking at my emotions until the phone was shut in my hands, crumbling onto the dried grass in the arms of my Coyote brother. I will never be able to thank him enough for that moment, that solace, that shelter. But he let me purge and set me on my way, fast feet carrying me home.

Home too late, but goodbyes still said. I’m so thankful for that much. Got home to the kittens, who were VERY happy to see me1 So happy they haven’t left me alone yet, but I’m not complaining.

Such an experience. I’m definitely going next year to ensure the transition is a good one. Selling out the old venue and changing locations a month before the event was not the BEST choice, but it happens. I’m willing to give it a second try to see if they can get their act together complete with applicable SHADE….

His Journey Onward

2009-08-03T19:00:00.000-07:00

the message was the first I'd heard in three days. My phone had been off due to low battery, and when I turned it on, Thistle's voice came to me in a tone I'd never heard before. "Chaldean is dying. Get here now." I called her back within seconds, keeping it together as best I could as she told me the what's and how's and why's. a dear friend, a coyote, stood by me as I listened, cracking with every word until I hung up, and held me as I crumbled. My precious fellow trickster. Will you ever know how much you meant to me just then?

And so I was on my way, 7 hours north to Seattle to catch a flight the next morning, the first one I could manage. The minutes flowed by like white water, rushing me forward, propelling me through airport, and train station and city street to the door of my friend and teacher. I called upstairs to be let in, but too late.

Chaldean, my dear friend and teacher, had died before my plane hit the runway and I hadn't gotten the message until I was at his door.

I first met his at Temple of the Four Winds. He was a lone figure of calm among so much bustle. He struck me as different, but I couldn't say why.

I met him again at Earth Day three years ago when we were in ritual together. I was among four dancers of the elements, and he was the embodiment of the animals world, the Green Man, the animal spirit given voice. Though deep and almost monotone, he called up a howl in me that echoed across the Circle. I knew then a moment of his power.

We met again and again over the years, moments here and there, each teaching, laughing, moving across each others' paths. He called me Faerie. He called me Sister. He called me sweet. I wasn't sweet, I was lucky. Lucky to have been in a place to have known such a man. And to that man I have this to say:

Dearest Chaldean, my teacher, my friend, thank you. Two little words that make up so much of what you mean to me. I will never forget all that you taught me, and all the laughter we've shared. I'm so grateful to have known you, and to have shared my journey with you even for such a short time. Rest in peace, and journey on, knowing you are loved.

Bringing the night to a close....

2009-07-26T21:05:00.000-07:00

I sit again by candlelight. The altars are closed now, the workings done for the night. The building and maintaining of temple space has been interesting. The feel of it is crystalline; its song a gentle echo within the self. I sing its place here; I bring it forth and let it be less in word and more in meaning. Some languages have no words, and this one lines my walls, inlays my floors, and weaves through every surface and breath of air, song and story without a word.

The painting is finally finished. It took three of them, fittingly, to complete, but it’s done now, sealed at last as it should be. Now I can step forward again onto the path once more and toward what is next, no matter the direction. Though I do direct, I do not dictate. I cannot, for though the way is mine, I do not always know the way there. I find it an interesting way to go about it, self-understanding given context. The tools needed have always been there, the skills always present. To learn them again is to become closer to the self of Will, not simply the self that happens to be.

So much to be done, yet I am unafraid. Does that make me brave or foolish? Both? Neither? I don’t know of any who could say for certain. The only certainty I have left is that when it’s all over, I will be as I always was and more than when I began. It is the same for all of our kind, and it is an encouraging thought.

Need to stop writing when I’m this tired…

Sleep deprivation and bomb making

2009-07-23T07:50:00.004-07:00

The guy sitting across from me on the train is muttering. No sound, but patterned, rhythmic. I want to know what he’s saying. Does that make me invasive? Curious? Lonely? Too tired to figure it out right now.

Just saw Hurt Locker. Still shaking a little inside. Makes mundania seem like a 50’s sitcom and a human interest nightmare had reality while on a bad trip.

It’s something that always in the back on my mind, the mindlessness. Violence begotten on strangers not because of wrongs done but because of ideals stood for. Fear. Fueled so much of man’s history for so long it makes me wonder if fear-based response really is the true governing body of our gleaming, progressive society.

I’m way too tired for this. That’s it, new rule! I’m not allowed to write when I’m so tired my eloquence filter falls off and I can’t keep from sounding delightfully unstable.

(This post is from several days ago, just catching up. Cheers.)

Tray of Fire

2009-07-23T07:50:00.003-07:00

A serving tray filled with flickering tealights, one by one making their way onto scattered tables as the sun lets in the night across the city. It instills a kind of forced romanticism onto already bleeding décor. Yet it still tickles me how fire is lit in the night even in this learned and electric culture, lending an air of the olden ways and the inherent mysticism of perceived safety in the night. There are still predators to be afraid of. The night is still prowled by those who would use its wiles for mischief. A world filled with bicycles races and play dates, super computers and yoga retreats. A world so lit it can be mapped from the moon. A species afraid of the dark, annihilating it as it has every other natural predator its ever known. And thus a traveling tray of fire, sprinkling safety onto the subconscious of a people who have forgotten what it’s like to be someone else’s dinner. Let the hunt begin….

Blot

2009-07-23T07:50:00.001-07:00

I’ve got ink on my hands again. If it’s not ink it’s paint, which I still find rather weird and fascinating. Two forms of creation in the same hands, both learning to breathe their own way. Writing has always been a passion. That and music, but there is nothing in this world or compare to music. Not laughter, not color, not chocolate. Seriously.

But I digress…

Writing is a passion long known while painting is a passion recently given light. Never been very good, mind you, but it still comes to be in its own way, its own voice. (More music references. Oy. ‘Me and my Arrow…’)

Plot on the page, blots on the canvas, and now blots on my skin. Ah, creation…it’s messy….

Fish gotta swin...or not (Woods Ramble, fair warning)

2009-07-09T06:39:00.000-07:00

Ah, boundaries. Gotta love walking into walls. Brick, cement, stone, I just love walking along, thinking everything is pretty ok and then staring up at the sky from the flat of my back, a bruise forming where my thick head made contact. And of course, the more important the boundary, the harder I make that contact.

But its the boundaries that have no walls, no warning bells, nothing to strike against that often are the most damning and do the greatest damage not just to me, but to the owner of that boundary. And when the owner is me? Boy...

Now, self-deprecation is something I excel at. I spent so much of my life getting my pitfalls and failures shoved up my nose that I eventually didn't need the help. But my sinus is clear as is my windsheild these days, but I can't help but notice that every now and then pieces of myself I didn't know I was missing come totting up to kick me. Things like WANT.

Not need, because need is elemental enough that it can't be ignored most days. Need to eat, need to sleep, need to breathe. Needs are easy by themselves. Want is hard. And there are those who disagree. That's allowed. Why comment fields were invented. But I've found that when need is in question, survival need, want takes a side-step. And when want is in question, that need comes in to decide. But it's when the boundaries of need and want blur that I end up inadvertently cloud watching.

I was asked this question recently, what I was looking for/what did I want, and I gave my usual nonchalance masked in sarcastic charm answer. And then I got called on it. I didn't get pushed, but the panic still boiled up my throat to sit on my tongue and make everything tingle in unpleasant ways. I didn't have an answer. I had an idea, but even that didn't have words yet. A writer without words. NOT a good sign.

And I didn't have it in me to fake it. I COULDN'T fake it. What I was being asked was beyond sarcasm, beyond charm, beyond the masks that I have built for so long and tried so hard to let go of recently. Yet my defenses still went up when I didn't know what to do or say. That much was understandable, forgivable. Continuing to run in the same direction not knowing (and being fully aware of not knowing), however...

Now, I'm certain there are many out there that feel this idea is childish. "Why haven't you figured this out by now? You're an adult!" Huh. Do YOU know what you want? What you really, truly, hardcore WANT in this life? Yeah, didn't think so. When was the last time you thought about it? Uh huh. Stop clearing your throat, stop straightening in your seat, stop acting like this doesn't phase you because it does. And that's allowed, too.

Now, in living without self-worth for so long, I look back and realize that I did learn how to own what's my fault. I screw up, I own it, it's me. I did, however, tend to take full responsibility when things go wrong, wallowing in my own shame of failure without really seeing that though I played my part, it was just that. A PART. Today I find myself in that seat again, at the end of a screw-up that isn't entirely my own doing, but credit where it's due.

I let myself go beyond my own boundaries. I set these walls in place because I KNOW me, and I know what I like to do as opposed to what I SHOULD do. I'm a Fish, damn it, I swim. But after years of bucking the current and/or just letting myself get swept under, it gets hard to find the balance of riding the wave while still steering. The water got cold fast and it's gotten hard to move again, but movement is imperative or I'll get eaten, not by fishermen but by my willingness to just let go the line without so much as a word. Can't do it.

This THING, this situation, this moment, this meeting is not something I WANT to let go of. I want to keep it, keep it close and safe and real. But I also know that suffocation happens that way, and I'd rather have the bear walking beside me because he wants to then try to leash him and get mauled, nor do I wish to walk away from the bear. But the bear has walked away from me, and I stand in the woods a moment, breathing in the air and the scent he left behind, remembering it, keeping that much within me and safe. I leave behind a ribbon on the stone next to me, knowing that the bear knows this spot. If he comes back he'll find it there, and with it find me. And if he doesn't, no one will know what that ribbon is, so they won't know to understand it. I'm at peace with that much, never forgetting the past, but placing this want into the paws of another, knowing now what the want is and what needs are attached to it. And now as I wait, the backstroke...

Ding dong, the bitch is dead!

2009-07-06T17:45:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I'm a little late to the party on this one, but it's been a long weekend, as many of you know. I knew this was happening from the beginning, and I have to say, I'm rather enjoying watching the circus unfold around the "Palin."

From tell-all books from the world's most famous baby-Daddy to making Engrish sound correct to Letterman, this bison-boffing bitch doesn't know when to quit. Oh, wait...

Yes, it's true, she quit. *Doing the Happy Dance of Joy in the background*

Now that that's out of my system, one has to wonder what the motivation is here. I mean, even as the republican party is finding new and inventive ways to commit ritual suicide over and over and over, this crops up and overshadows it all, not because she's a republican or even because of everything that's happened so far. No, this is because this bitch find new and inventive ways to get attention in the worst ways possible. I could start with her state and trickle down, but I'll stick to the ones that really got it for me this time.

I've covered this previous, and you may know, but it still amazes me that this botch is allowed to speak in public. Or at all, for that matter. the more I listen to her, the more I realize that the English language is something that pipes through her, but is never really understood by her. Sarah Palin going off script is worse than Dan Quayle and George W. put together, and for those of you who remember both these jokers, you realize how lucky we are not to have yet another speaking-impaired human in the White House. Joe Biden has NOTHING on these guys. NOTHING. One word: POTATOE. Yes, indeed...

Oh, but wait, she then has the unmitigated gaul to try and sue a blogger for making SPECULATION about a possible embezzlement investigation being made? Uh, honey, you've already proven that ethics mean simply that people do exactly what you want when you want or your army of minions go after them. This isn't a far stretch. Now, it may not be true. It is entirely possible that it isn't true, especially as hard as she has been campaigning for her PAC.

Speaking of which, HUH?! Not a week before she resigned, she was hardcore begging for money for this Political Action Committee, and then up and turns tail? If she's gunning for 2012, someone should tell her the story of Ross Perot...

But there's also the thought that she is leaving politics. She's sick of the media, except when they love her, she's sick of the scrutiny, except when she's using it against her opponents though heaven forbid the searchlight get shined anywhere NEAR her, and she's sick of having to constantly defend herself and her actions. It's politics, child. this is how the game is played in the REAL world, not just in your little head. There are no 'yes' men anymore, there are only people who seriously need you to get shit done. Since the only thing you can manage is to set women in politics back 50 years, I say don't let the door hit you where the dog shoulda bit ya.

On a side note, I have to admit to a boatload of respect for Sarah Palin's spokeswoman, Meg Stapleton. She has had to endure a great deal in the wake of this fiasco, and she has performed in a way that can only be called admirable. Especially since it seems like Palin didn't even TELL HER OWN SPOKESWOMAN that she was resigning. A truly rare showing someone who had to speak for a woman who thought Africa was a country. Respect, Meg, and lots of it.

Sooj in Waukegan

2009-07-06T08:30:00.001-07:00

Every 4th of July should be like this. Beautiful, sunny, and filled with music. and not just any music, oh no, not just any will do. no, this weekend was filled with the Siren calls and pirate brawls conjured by SJ Tucker(www.sjtucker.com).

Our Lass of Song and Story arrived before I did up in Almost Wisconsin country. After making my mother's infamous "Oh My God" cheesecake, we made our way North, Evan, Alyse and I, to their house and to the event of the weekend.

it was incredible. Faces that had never heard our Siren before lit up in delight and broke into hysterical laughter at her hands, including poor Phil who broke down not once but twice into red-faced lack of breathing. The second time was especially amusing not because of the faces he made but because of the recovery time needed (Please don't lick my toes...). Kay was at his Mercenary best, though there was not room to jig. *Sigh.*

Gypsies, Pirates, and a song circle filled with voices ringing through the house, with enough extra help that the host and hostess actually got to relax and enjoy the show itself.

And as the day drew closed and the night fell, the evening dark was lit in LED wonderment, swirling around the hips of our Gypsy siren, showing off her fabulous hoola hoop moves. a glorious end to an amazing day.

And now it's National Fried Chicken Day, and my boss had hats. Pictures exist. Gods....

Solstice Dawn

2009-06-29T21:23:00.001-07:00

The sky is on fire. Reds and pinks and golds over the underlying blue fading back from the determined dark of the shortest night. the dawn, a newborn seeking, fighting to burst forth from the known haven of the eastern horizon. Wave after wave of wondrous orange and copper bubble forth, the darkness bleeding away. the burgeoning crest of horizon shatters, and from it light, purest, deepest, brightest light breaks free and takes flight, and so begins the longest day of 2009. Welcome now the sun child, now become the king of the sky. and I, knee deep in waters set a blaze in his light, lose the words of writer. I stand at the edge of something words cannot touch, and I'm ok with that.

Duckon!

2009-06-29T16:16:00.000-07:00

Ok, so this is only my second con this year, but by far the better! I walked in to furry friends and faces I hadn’t seen in years. Several, in some cases! Flashing back to old relationships well-remembered, old stories that needed retelling simply to remember the laughs. Newer faces richly remembered, embraced for the third time in a year, which to this day is unmatched. Sooj and Vixy and Kay and Brooke and YAY! Hearing the voices of my loved ones in song and verse, storytellers all, and new voices now know and smiling faces cherished, laughter given new light.

And within that light, new connections forged. Unwittingly, unknowingly, elusive yet existent. I dare not to speculate, not to even expect. All I know is this: I'm coming back. For the people, for the merriment, for the FILK...

And oh gods, the FILK!! so much fun! singing with Sooj and Vixy over the open filk was beyond lovely! Sitting behind them, casting no shadow upon their light, I added simply harmony, low and supporting to these sirens as they rang out into the night. A night held in the warmth of summer with a breath of things to come, more concerts, more festivals, more cons, more life...

Side note :: TOM SMITH. http://www.tomsmithonline.com/ Tell your friends. Tell your mom. Tell your friends' moms. Tell their dogs. Tell EVERYONE.

Breathe deep the gathering gloom...

2009-06-19T08:21:00.000-07:00

The first storm has passed, lightning concussions fading into low rumbles at the sun’s advance. But the maple leaves are still turned over, aware in ways the cowan are not that this is only halftime. The dancing rage of a second wave is on the way. The lake is calm now, taking a breath before the harmonic cacophony of downpour turns it into a glistening minefield once more, a halo of light at the edge of the horizon. The animals remain hidden, taking no chances against that is coming. Can’t wait for the light show.

Homes of Whimsy

2009-05-28T20:11:00.000-07:00

Liminal space. Between day and night, I sit on a great rock, one of a pile put here to keep the tide out and small children in. the light races the sun to the horizon in wild swaths of yellow and pink, the blue veil of night just behind in silent chase. The clouds that float above and within the fray reflect all that they see, water table communities dancing, showing the world a glimmer of something ‘more.’

I am a part of that 'more,' I'm finding more and more recently. Separate, though not the cold, untouchable, museum kind of way. But in a dancing starlight, firefly in a field kind of way, knowing I've got one foot here and one there, caught between two worlds much like time in this receding twilight.

I was called 'bizarrely fascinating' today by a woman I find amusingly attractive. She'd watched from her car as I raced along a curb, trying to see how fast I could go without losing my balance, all before ducking under a tree to take the grassy, pine needley shortcut. As she put it, I "just didn't care."

I've been called bizarre before. I've been called fascinating. And I've even been called both a time or two, but it's rare that someone says that I don't care. It's happened twice now in as many months, and both times it was an outsider’s perspective of my reflection of simply being. It's not that I don't care. I simply care differently.

It occurred to me rather sadly that the world has lost the necessity of whimsy. The absolute requirement of existence the shove aside custom and pretense and expectation (read 'prejudice') and be willing to accept the ridiculous and fanciful as being. We have it as children, with our faerie tales and our knights and their dragons and pirate journeys in cardboard boxes. Yet somewhere along the road we let them drop away, these fancy, fanciful things. Not all of them, mind you, for they can cling to us tenaciously, drawing our eyes and hearts to these tales and treasures in the form of movies and books. Yet still do we succumb only a moment, letting fancy pass as amusement.

I cannot exist thus. I never allowed the fanciful to drop away. On the contrary I swept up these fancy friends and kept them to me in pockets and bags and song and verse, desperate not to let a single sparkling one escape my notice. I am not always successful, but what fun it has been! And discovering new ones, new moments of wonder, little glimpses of prose and color, alive and dancing.

I see now that so many of these children swirl and spiral on the winds. They are homeless, orphaned. Is it any wonder they cling to one such as me? Like cats, the whimsy eat well and live loved in my care.

The edges of the liminal fade as blue waters flow to black in the coming night. The waves crash upon the rocks below me, white foam waving goodbye as I climb back down and return home, the Moon growing stronger, showing more of her wondrous face with each day, keeping the stars company.

Moving, and other nonsensicals

2009-05-28T20:09:00.000-07:00

It’s been a bit, but it’s been a BUSY bit…

So, I moved. It went a lot smoother than it could have, but I have come to the point in my life where I will simply have to hire movers. Between the books and the piano, I’m not doing this again myself. Grant you it was a lovely day spent with my mom and my brother-in-law and my aunt and my cousin, cracking jokes and having a rather grand time between carrying crap-loads of stuff, this will be the last time I move myself.

Speaking of which, can I just say PIANO!!! I’ve been playing for about four weeks now regularly, and I’m getting good again. It’s an electric masterpiece, 88 keys, and it has sound-changing features that are too much fun to play with. Makes me SO incredibly happy!! Thanks, Mom!

I’ve also started painting regularly again. My walls are WHITE, staunch, stark, YOWZA white, and it makes me a little weak in the knees to look at how naked they are, so I’ve started creating work to hang. It’s going REALLY well, and I’m finding some interesting things popping up to be painted in colors I normally wouldn’t use. Give me 6 months and this place is going to be dancing off the walls.

Speaking of dancing, my living room is big enough to dance in. It’s also big enough to practice poi spinning in. I love this place. Can you tell?

And honestly, what I love is living alone. I was hesitant at first, being me and being afraid of being alone and forgotten, but in all seriousness, I fucking LOVE this. It’s less about responsibility and more about expression and self-revelation and being able to let loose and not give a crap because it s MY SPACE. I love people, I love being with people, and I love living with people, but it’s so nice to have my own space where I’m able to chill out and not feel cut off or shoved away.

I also live right down the street from Dominick’s, which means shopping is a challenge. I don’t like shopping at Dominick’s because they are expensive compared to Jewel which is about a mile down the road, but it has REALLY nice produce and their organic stuff is nothing to sneeze at and it’s 200 feet from my door. I can’t argue well against it. Although I did bike to Aldi’s then to Jewel and back home with almost a months’ worth of food about two weeks ago, which was very fun. Also being alone lets me eat exactly what I want, no more no less, and I’ve managed to lose almost 10 pounds already! Huzzah! 10 more and I’ll be set for July. What’s in July, you ask? More on that later.

All in all, life is good right now. I’m comfortable in a way I haven't been really ever, and I’m meeting my main goal without even trying: letting go the mask of reflection. Not entirely, mind you, because it has its uses, but for most of my life, I’ve felt like I was a mirror of all I see, reflecting back what I thought people wanted by mimicking and absorbing (to a point) who they were and showing them that image played back a la personal improv. It worked for a while, but I started noticing the difference between the mask and me. The more I noticed, the more the mask slipped or malfunctioned, leading to profound social awkwardness and leaving me not knowing what to do because I so rarely flew solo.

Now I’m finding that not only do I leave the mask at the door, I don’t always bring it with me. I have whole days outside my own little world where the mask comes up rarely, leaving me exposed. I do feel exposed much of that time, but not in the shameful, ‘I need to cover up’ kind of way, but in the ‘Here I am, world, worship my awesomeness!’ kind of way. Or something like that. Perhaps not the worship, though there are moments when I truly am worthy of it. And that understanding of self-worth is cropping up now as well, which is both new and exciting. It’s hard not to celebrate yourself when you hardly thought you were worth much and you come to find out, “Wow, I’m kind of a big deal.”

But anyway, I just came in from a walk and I have a second post to put up. It’s the result of Orion Foxwood and a beach walk sonnet, so prepare for Whimsy…..

Carrie under crass

2009-05-07T11:15:00.000-07:00

I never thought I’d say this, but I actually think this semi-nude photo thing for Carrie Prejean is a positive development. If nothing else, it has the power to inspire empathy on her part for being attacked publicly for a conscious display of sexuality. Now she knows what it is like to have her own sexuality attacked simply for existing. She knew it was against the rules of the pageant, so she hid it. Now she understands what LGBT individuals go through with their own families, with friends, with society at large when they come out every single day. Some hide it, knowing what consequences there might be, much like Carrie did when she hid the existence of these photos, but others don’t. We step into the world, and we come out as being who we are each and every day, fully aware of possible consequence.

Personally, this nudity stigma that the has been hammered into current thinking like an ice pick is unnecessary anyway. I think the image of Carrie Prejean, aside from the pink, is quite lovely, and in different context could be seen as almost artful.

Needs better lighting, though...

Home alone - It begins

2009-04-30T10:58:00.000-07:00

Note: Note sure why I didn't post this Apr. 30th... but here we go.

So I walked out the door yesterday knowing I was coming home to nothing. Theo and George were moving out ala hired movers about mid day, so I was going to come home to an empty apartment. It felt weird, and I thought it was going to be abrupt and strange, especially without Vivianne, resident kitty.

I wondered about it all, that changes coming and the changes happening, and in a fit of whim I pulled out my deck (alchemical tarot) and ended up with these three cards:

2 of Staffs (wands) – a joining of two flames toward a common goal. The sharing of passions, merging of actions. Whether between two people romantically, or between a teacher and student, one passing the flames of understanding to the other in emotional reverence.

7 of Swords – time to pick you weapon. Consider your options, and choose that which will serve you best in the future. The rest must be left to the wayside. Not necessarily cut away forever, but set aside for singular, appropriate focus.

Ace of Swords – The pillar of possibility in intellectual pursuits. The seeker takes the step upon the path to knowledge, discernment, and understanding. The time has come to dive in head first, and take in the beginning of a path that comes from traditional knowledge and the ways that have come before, so that your own way may become clear through interpretation via intellectual digestion and rumination. (Wow, run-on sentence, much?)

Whoa. Ok, I can do that. It occurred to me then that this was indeed a time of beginnings for me. I’m living on my own for the first time (I don’t count college), I have a solid job that is relatively secure, and I make enough money that I can squirrel away savings in case the unspeakable happens (commence wood knocking). Ok, that works.

Then I got a wild hair. I pulled out my rune bag and pulled out three of those as well, focusing on my personal journey as opposed to simply the environment in which events are taking place. I received:

Kenaz – the torch. Odin journeying into the cave to speak with the talking head oracle comes chiefly to mind. But in his hand, the torch to light the way. The way is set, and I have been given a Guidepost by which to know the way. Though I may not see the path, I can still see my feet, and that can be good enough.

Mannaz – mankind. To work for the community as whole, not simply my own existence. My community work is becoming more prevalent and more in depth as the weeks progress. I must make sure I understand what I wish to contribute and what I am capable of contributing. I’ve been known to downplay my gifts and strengths for most of my life, and though that leads to caution, it also leads to lack of confidence. I understand well my abilities as they currently stand. I know what I am and more importantly what I am not comfortable doing, alone or in community. The time has come to step off the ledge into the world, and build my wings on the way down if necessary. But even then, I may not need wings to glide.

Laguz – water. Not the tranquil waters of the element which most of us associate, but the turbulent, unforgiving seas on which the Vikings sailed. A storm is on the horizon, but I would not be forging toward it if I wasn’t ready for it. I know I can not only weather its trials and survive, but can I thrive. I fear it in a way, but it is foolish to fear that which cannot be avoided. I know the seas will rock and roil and throw me about, but I know well how to swim. I will swim and sail and ride the storm out, and know more about myself by its end.

So, I'm in for a fight. I knew that. Been feeling it for a while. I knew this summer was going to be hell, and I don’t mean the heat outside. I know now the time has come for me to start fighting for my life and battling for my community. Let the games begin.

Pt 2:

Home again, home again, jiggity jig. Home to… Open rooms. I actually forgot how much space we had in this place. It’s huge and echoic and all mine! For roughly three days, two of which will be filled with work. But last night proved lovely in its solitude. Theo and George left a couple odds and ends around (so not a big deal) including Theo’s speakers, so I got to listen to My Chemical Romance while working out a bit last night. Alone. It was beauteous.

And I actually slept with my door flung open last night. That hasn’t happened in YEARS.

My only dilemma now is how to plan out tomorrow’s time so all three things that need to get done can. Painting, getting my new cable modem/cable box, and finishing boxing everything up is going to take some doing, especially with a possible second coat needed for that one wall, but it should all work out in the end. And if not, whatever happens will work, too, so no worries. It is what it is.

Note: again, not sure why I didn't post this. Oh well....

Polyamory and Further Packing

2009-04-27T11:40:00.000-07:00

So it was a rather lovely Sunday. Headed out to the Occult Bookstore on Milwaukee ala a Blue Line that had exactly one track running. What is about soggy days that makes the CTA think that crippling a critical public transit artery is a good idea?

Anyway, the discussion was facilitated by the ESC (Earth Spiritualists of Chicago) on Polyamory. Some of you may remember a similar discussion in Chicago with special guests Oberon and Morning Glory Zell on the subject, but as much as I love Oberon Zell, he tends to sugarcoat the entire idea structure of polyamory. He speaks of smooth transitions, flowing relationships, and how none of the women he’s ever engaged in this way were ever mad at him or bitter or anything. Maybe not to your face...

With that thought, a word on the negative connotations of this word. Polyamory: This is not a cheap excuse to cheat. This is not a ‘free love, no responsibilities’ situation. Hells no. This is about balanced, honest, healthy relationships between more than 2 people. It can happen, it can work, and it doesn’t have to end in bigamy or nightly orgies or other such things. Well, the orgies, MAYBE, but only in private, safe circumstances involving consenting adults. But I digress…

That is not to say that the sordid reputation of the poly community as well as the censure therein is not wholly unearned. Unfortunately, like any group of people, there have been instances where stupid people doing stupid things got noticed, and the entire group got slandered for their actions, regardless of involvement. These people are remarkably fewer than one would be led to think, but their philosophies of irresponsible behavior are trumpeted by those who disagree with the concept as a whole and cast the rest of us in a bad light. Let me explain.

One of the greatest misconceptions is that polyamory is an easy, ‘no frills’ way to sleep with whomever you so choose without losing the stability of your everyday partner. Thought process: you get the normal everyday meal package but still get to go out for a snack whenever you want. Cut this thought from your heart. (Catherine Valente, “In The Cities of Coin and Spice”) Polyamory, to me, is about WORK. HARD word, honesty, trust, and sound judgment on the part of everyone involved, just like any monogamous relationship, with one big twist: boundaries need to be established, agreed upon, comfortable, and maintained. These relationships are in a lot of ways much harder to keep healthy than monogamous relationships because of how much goes into them.

Now, the opener for the discussion was “Why Polyamory?” It’s a good question. I’ve always felt, as you may have surmised, that it is practically impossible to find everything you are looking for in balanced, healthy companionship in a single person. I’ve tried it, repeatedly, and it just doesn’t function. Monogamy works for some people, and to them I say, “You found a good one. Fantastic for you! KEEP HIM/HER!” For me, it just doesn’t work that way. I believe whole-heartedly that you can have a stable, healthy relationship involving more than one partner and be fulfilled as a person while still fulfilling the emotional, spiritual, and physical needs of those partners.

The big thing for me, as it usually is, is balance. Finding someone to share a relationship with not only me, but with any other partner(s) that may be involved. Understanding needs to be had from the offset on what’s going on, what expectations are in the relationship, and to me, being able to have these people in the same room without it being heinously awkward is a serious thing for me. I WANT to be able to openly communicate with each partner, and be able to say the name of the other without getting daggers or drama queen sighs. Trust has always been the most important thing in a relationship to me, sex or no sex. Being able to be open and honest and not be judged, but also knowing that I am receiving that same respect in being forthcoming. Even if my partner and I are free to see who we choose on the side, I would still want mutual check-ins on how things are going. Not necessarily for approval, but for healthy updates and understanding. If I see that someone is not good for the person I am with, I am going to speak up, and I would expect that same respect and honesty in return.

Definitions, I’ve found, within the Poly community seem so crucial to establishing these much needed boundaries. I don’t use them, personally. I seek ideas and understanding, but words are not necessary to define and ‘box in’ those ideas. This lends itself in my head to my own pagan ideology, and the concept that words have power. These words in particular, at least for me, bring a kind of closed-minded compartmentalization to the relationship between two people in this context. Words like ‘Primary partner’ and ‘secondary partner’ bring to mind a hierarchy structure that can be both useful and destructive.

Many participants in the discussion shared my views along with others during the course of the afternoon, which allowed me to sit back and take in other thought processes. So refreshing. The open dialogue also helped me to truly concretize my own perspective. And the group therapy feel was only prevalent for a few minutes as a couple who were newly exploring this avenue joined us late, bringing with them their ongoing story of explorative newness.

Afterward, I hitched a ride home with one of the great minds of my acquaintance and packed some more. Packing the altars was a trip, but what’s funny is that the energy in the room has remained pretty constant with a pregnant pause about it, as if awaiting the new surroundings. It’s going to be quite interesting to get these things set up in the new place.

Kitchen and bathroom now being primarily taken care of, it’s down to the awkward time of ‘most of my life is packed and I’m living on the minimum.’ Fun. But it’s ok. My biggest concern is getting those two walls painted Friday morning. Home Depot, here I come!

Sociologist coming out, fair warning

2009-04-24T13:48:00.000-07:00

So, @theogeer brought something to mind today that decided to turn itself into a self-discussion. Blame him for this.

As I have said before, I tend to skirt the fence, or just plain stand on it, when it comes to a host of issues. That is not to say I am wish-washy, quite the opposite. I know where I stand, and generally I stand in the middle because I can see the validity of both viewpoints, but in the end, I do know exactly where I stand on 95% of the issues presented. The others I am still researching, because I like to be informed before I come to a conclusion. That said, spiritually I ride the fence of connection to the Divine and Deity, and that tends to perturb people. Let me explain.

I didn’t really have solid terminology for this until about three years ago, but in practice, I am a panantheist. The Divine is immanent in all things, touching all life, ingrained in every aspect of everything. It is also centered in beings, Gods/Goddesses, spirits, the transcendent beings that provide focus for the Divine.

But in my heart of hearts, I am a hardcore pantheist. The divine exists within all things, and the notion of ‘god’ is an abstract as opposed to an anthropomorphic entity.

The reason for this difference is two fold. First, and not the least of which, I recognize individual consciousness beyond my physical senses. I understand that a lack of consciousness that I am aware of does not mean that something does not have power, have energy, and have connection to the Divine.

Secondly, and this is a finer point that some don’t share, but I also recognize the deification of a person or idea. To give power to something is a heavy, hearty thing, and not to be taken lightly nor ignored. Concepts can be given power simply in their naming, consciousness in the thinking of those who ponder them. Angels, deified people, hell rocks in the ground such as the Blarney stone, are given power because of belief. Focused concentration giving energy to a concept, an idea given life through the light of those who seek it.

My own connection to Divinity becomes somewhat fractured at that point, because I recognize the validity of both views and exist within both viewpoints. I know that the Deity I connect with most readily, the Morrigan, is an entity onto herself (three in point of fact, but more on that another time). She is indeed a force to be reckoned with, the great howling form at the gate between, the guardian ushering the seeker across the threshold, keeping them safe but not shielding them from reality. The carrion crow flying down into the heart of battle to pull out the eyes of the enemy. The connection to death that all life has, whether they like it or not, and the lack of fear that comes at the moment of death, when all that exists is what lays beyond the veil. I know all this well, and yet I also know that is equally as valid and as powerful as the great geode sitting on my bathroom floor. It is no greater, in reference to the Divine, than a strand of hair upon the wind, holding the very essence of its owner even as it travels its own path. Separate consciousness, equal connection. Recognizing the Divinity of all creation, of all that is life, I see the differences between and yet know they are one, and through it all flows the essence of everything that simply is. By name, by sight, by scent, it simply is. And in so being, it is Divine.

And all this came from a notion by @theogeer that he had been experiencing a disjointation (Is that a word? It is today.) with Deity recently; a disconnection. Read here: http://tinyurl.com/d7bgme This really resonated with me because I have been feeling similarly.

Now this is not the severe, self-imposed feelings of utter lifelessness of past posting, but simply a wistful want of that connection, lost in the shuffle of mundania and most recently of moving. Nothing kills energetic equilibrium like trying to pack your life into a box or forty. I don't have NEARLY that many, but you get the point.

So tonight I’m off to the outdoors to get my head out of the crap I’m in and reconnect. I would do this at home, but it would simply be more of the same, and that won’t do.

I’m wilting. This day at work needs to be OVER.

Suicide at 11

2009-04-24T13:14:00.000-07:00

My heart goes out to the families and friends of those two boys, Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover and Jaheem Herrera, who both ended their own lives due to bullying. This comes not only from someone who is compassionate of the situation, but who has been there.

When I was in school, I spent the vast majority of my life in therapy because I was violent in school. My shrink said it was my fault; school administrators said it was my fault. The only people who knew I was being provoked into self-defense were my parents. I was being bullied, tormented from the bus to school right until I get back to my front door, and as the years passed, the forms of torment became more complex, especially since the aggressors had friends who would gladly lie for them. If no physical marks were left, nothing could be ‘proven.’

Well, the marks are left, laid at the headstone of two young boys who didn’t need to die.

The bottom line: children are cruel. They are cruel because they are not truly taught otherwise. They are taught that doing stupid, mindless, mean shit to other people is funny, not wrong. Yet they get angry when it’s done to them. Or worse, they themselves become indifferent to it, not knowing pain until it’s exploding in their face, then they don’t understand what to do with it.

Children fear what they don’t understand. Anything new that is not given to them in a format that they are used to makes them uneasy. And anything they don’t like, they try to knock over, including other children. They think it makes them better; they think it takes the attention away from them when they force others to look at someone else. I was the someone else. I was the target of whole school buildings because I was different. I was the reason they didn't notice (or could at least ignore) the differences in each other.

I recognize now that I was abused by my peers. There is no other word for it. I was used as an outlet for their emotional stress, without consent or regard. Children in my school who knew nothing about me beyond the fact that I was a target taunted me with everything they could find, to the point of physical abuse. I struck back, defending myself, and I was punished by the teachers and administrators set to give us a safe environment to learn, encouraging the situation. I was touched, I was pushed, I was cut, and I couldn't prove it beyond simple accident. Some of my teacher eventually found my constant complaints a nuisance, brushing me aside for my 'important' matters. I was called names I will not repeat, hair was pulled, even cut, because I was too light to be black, but the hair was still there. I was called troll by faces I never knew only because they could. They were told they could by those who had come before them, and they laughed because they thought it made them like everyone else. Short, fat, smart with bad hair, I was beaten down to the point that I didn’t want to burden my family with my issues. At 11.

I do not wonder why students have brought guns to school, unable to take the strain anymore. I too lashed out, biting, beating, breaking anyone and everyone who got close enough, wanting nothing more than to make it all stop. But even then, my abuse had no end. It knew no limit, my tormentors making a game of finding new ways to hurt me, hurt those like me, because it was fun. Even when I changed school districts, I was different, I was DARK, therefore I was a threat, and I was a target.

These two boys experienced that same kind of abuse, and they cracked under the weight of it. I did not, by the grace of powers greater than myself, and because of this hell that was my life, I grew into someone compassionate, understanding, and a defender of those around me. I can only look forward now, the scars covered but never gone, to a future where schools are safe again, safe from bigotry, safe from hatred, safe from abuse.

And is it too much to ask that the fucks who tormented these two boys get brought before their mothers to answer for what they contributed to? Find these children, and have them justify themselves to the mothers of these boys. Let them explain why they thought this was ok.

And in their turn, once they understand what they have contributed to and why this cannot be allowed to continue, let them be forgiven. They are children, after all. Let them learn, let them understand, and let them stand as lighthouses amongst the disgusting darkness that is socialization in schools. Let this be the last time.

Zero tolerance isn't the answer. Understanding of the situation and combating the lack of compassion and the lack of understanding IS.

It has to end.

Diss America

2009-04-23T13:12:00.000-07:00

Let me start off by saying I have to give her props fer speaking her mind. She said what she had to say on National TV, and that does takes balls. Good for her.

Now, about her being a misinformed, publicity-seeking, sore-loser of a bigoted COW....

I have to hand it to her, she's managed to get more publicity for herself and the Miss USA pageant than she EVER would have had she actually won. I'm sure the Pageant people were very happy about that, right up until the moment she said she might sue for losing. Seriously, bitch? You lost because you voiced a closed-minded opinion not shared by MORE THAN ONE OF your judges, and you're going to SUE? Really?

Honestly, she's nothing special. She's a California girl with an uninterrupted tan, perfect hair, a mega-watt smile, and cold stew for brains. But she opened her mouth, stupidity came out, and now she's an instant celebrity AND a loser? Remind me to get up on the mic the next time the Westboro Baptist Church morons come to Chicago so I can verbally stir-fry a few wingnuts and get my place on Larry King. Nothing in the world like getting arrested on National TV!

Oh, wait... I promised Mom I'd never do that. Damn...

Awkward Moments, Moon Jams, and Musings

2009-04-10T20:55:00.000-07:00

So I ‘m an idiot. Try to contain your shock. I blew off dinner with people I actually wanted to see (by blew off I mean I totally forgot about it) to have dinner and a movie with a quasi-ex I hated seen in a while. No, not THAT one, but close enough that it was quite awkward. Both of us not meeting the others eyes much, talking was stilted until we managed a neutral topic, neither of us bringing up the past. We always crossed that bridge at dinner, but thankfully not. I don’t’ think either of us wants to dredge that back up. And so to a movie we both loved to hate, and then a parting of ways where both of us were politely running. He did it to get out of the house, I did it to test the waters. They are toxic, though not hopeless. But no swimming or fishing here, ladies and gents. Not ever again.

The full moon jam was incredible. I wasn’t expecting half that many people to be there, but it was beautiful and moving and powerful and I got to see so many faces I hadn’t seen in a while, and few faces I didn’t associate with the Jam.

I love this community so much. It works so hard not to take itself too seriously and yet be open to the moment, and to every face within it. So many beautiful people, so much love of life. As I walked through and met up with one person after another, I realized something truly humbling.

I don’t have to be afraid anymore. I’ve never been good at making connections with people. I try too hard, wanting so much to share in the joys of life that I put people right off, making them uncomfortable. It was my existence for so long I didn’t think anything of it, so I never noticed when ti changed. It changed without my knowledge or say-so, and yet here I stand, in the glorious wake of it, wondering at this sudden embarrassment of riches. I never saw before the connection that were forged with people, and yet as I walk through the night, lit only by fire dancers, to the heartbeat of drummers, I realized that I have a community that cares for me as much as I care for it. I was sought out by face sint he crowd, held warm in their arms and hearts by their will alone. I never knew, but I do now. And I am honor bound to do right by them, and serve in the best way I know how.

By song and story I shall go, by brush and by note I shall show. I’ve always had so much to give, and now I have a place and people to share it with. I am humbled that I am so welcomed, and I open my own heart to them with everything I am. A perfect way to end a full moon.

RENT!

2009-04-05T23:12:00.002-07:00

Oh my gods and goddesses alike, there are no words. But since I am both verbose and waxing poetic, I’m going to anyway. No day but today, right? Wow, cheesy. Anyway…

It’s been a LONG time since I’ve seen live theater, so my expectations were honestly non-existent. I walked in only knowing the music by heart and the story through and trough, but not really knowing what my eyes were going to be seeing. Dizzy. Dazzling. And my ears were trying to overlay the music I knew to the show before me. Dreams lie so hard. What was before me was more than music and light and movement and message. It was soul. Pure, unadulterated soul. It still takes my breath away to think about it.

One room became a city populated by more people than I really want to think about. And within it, a family. A series of people connected, by choice and by chance, but connected none the less. It reminded me of something I’d set aside. Not forgotten necessarily, but definite put aside or buried or whatever. The whatever is the problem, but I’ll get to that.

Family. Friends. How they become intertwined. Intermingled, essential to one another. A family of choice becomes extended, fractured, sprained/strained, healed but by the grace of Will with a capital, “Look, man, I love you even when you’re a cunt. I love you even THOUGH you’re a cunt.”

Yet sometimes, the cancer must be cut away, for chemo hurts as much as it heals, which SUCKS….

But in the end, it is said, ‘you can’t choose your family.’ Fuck that. I got mine: George, Theo, Shivian, Frank, John, MeganRose, Tessa, Lisa, Kir, Treesha, Katie, Julie, Sherrie, Sarah, Lois, Karen, Chris, Taylor, Thistle, Chaldean, Little Buddaha, Emily, Preston … I could go on without even leaving Chicagoland. Love cannot be tamed, cannot be denied. And gods (pick one, hell pick several) damn it, I’m not trying anymore.

It took the end to show me why the beginning began. It’s not as it once was and truly never could be again, but it is not quite as fractured as I had once thought. Sprained, strained, but healable. Given time. Patience is not my best virtue, I recognize that, but at least I know it can heal even these wounds, if I back the fuck off and let it happen. I will not say the “O” word, but whatever. A healthy shift in view, slapped in the face of yours truly once again, in time for spring. If it ever stops FUCKING SNOWING….

Int’l Free Hug Day

2009-04-05T23:12:00.001-07:00

4-4, Int’l Free Hug Day

Ok, so I woke up this morning with a mission. I was going to hug for several hours. Random people on the street were going to be getting my hugs and sharing in the love and joy that is my existence for hours today.

I bought my poster board, made my sign, and headed to Boystown. And that is where the problem lay…

Now, being a nervous as hell drama queen, I made a PSA ON THE TRAIN about Hug Day, making sure people knew what was going on when they saw people hugging random strangers. It’s disconcerting, I admit, but I wasn’t going to let that stop me.

I held my sign out for the world to see as I walked to the corner of Addison and Halstead, right in front of the police station, and proceeded to announce my presence in my best Herald voice. That’s right, all those years as a Renaissance Herald, as well as vocal and theater experience, made useful to hug people. Broadcasting phrases like, “Int’l Free Hugs day! Free hugs for anyone and everyone!” “No hug will be denied!” “The hugs are free, but if not me, hug the people you love today!” Oh yeah, truth is stranger than fiction.

Anyway, I stood there from a little before noon to 4:10, laughing and smiling and joking, spreading love and joy one hug at a time. I even got a couple of the officers from the station behind me involved, which is awesome. That’s one of the two main reasons I picked that spot. Cops need love as much as anyone else. They have a HELL job. They are hated by just about everyone at one point or another, and that kind of stress needs to be let go now and then, even just a little, tugged free by a short little redhead bent on world-dominion ala “I love you, damn it!”

People were jumping out of cars, hanging out car windows reaching out for hugs. I had people on opposite corners from me hugging each other, which was so great! I passed a couple ‘air-hugs’ to people while laughing because it was silly and fun and beautiful.

But I know now why I was supposed to be there as opposed to Watertower Place where everyone else was. One man. It was about 2 hours in, and I turned, as I did often while waving my sign about, and saw his standing there. He was obviously upset, but he reached out for a hug. I gave him one, and he started weeping. Not enormous, ground-breaking tears, but he needed to connect, and there I was. The world fell away, and Int’l Free Hug Day was put on hold. This young man needed to go to that police station behind me for the same reason he was crying, and I was not about to let him ford that river alone. He explained what happened, and when he’d collected himself, I took him into the station. I emerged needing a hug myself, and I got one from a woman all too eager to share love with me as get it in return. It put me back on track to exchange my joy, and so I did. He emerged again, better but still hurting, so he got hug #2, and stayed near as things came to a close. Hug #3 capped it off, and though I never got his name, I know he was the reason I was supposed to be on that corner. I fulfilled the universe’s design for me that day. Can’t ask for more than that. And if he ever reads this, know that I will remember you always as a beautiful person that I want to see smile.

My hugs ended with aching legs and objecting shoulders, but I was high as a kite off the joy, so I decided to head to Give Peace a Dance for the first time. Awesomesauce, as Shivian would say. People I knew and people I didn’t, many of whom had Hugged as well, so we shared in that joy and some of those stories, ending our day together in companionship and community. What a day. What a glorious, beautiful, freakish, amazing day.

IOWA

2009-04-05T23:11:00.000-07:00

4-3 – IOWA

My day started out like any other when someone was coming to invade. Today, it was again mandated by the landlord, which always SUCKS, so I was in a small tiff about everything, which is a failing of mine. I get worked up about crap mid-stride, only to look back and think, “What was I on about?” So I’d gotten done as much as I could, ie had time for, and turned on my computer…

BLISS. There, in black and white all over my RSS feeds, was the state of IOWA BEING AWESOME. And EQUAL. And beautiful. Seconds later Twitter knew. About a minute later Facebook knew, and both had links on how to find out more. Iowa had declared UNANIMOUSLY that the ban on gay marriage was unconstitutional. Talk about a slap to the face of the opposition. A state least likely to do anything that isn’t corn-fed or served on a Collectible Jesus platter said, ‘Nope, not here. Us and the gays? We’re good.’

Good as gold and better. You guys rock hardcore. Now, about California….

UPDATE: just found a fantastic video about Religious Freedom vs. Gay marriage, illustrating why the two are actually related in ways the Anti-Gay movement doesn't talk about, and why they don't talk about it. It's lovely. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0dKMhYSX20

Trip to Indy Highlight Reel

2009-04-05T23:09:00.000-07:00

3-31 – Trip to Indy

Ok, so my trip to Indy just ended in a sunshine stroke of “you bet your ass.” Allow me to explain.

Me, Enterprise Rental, 7:30 am, 3/26. I pick up the car, opting for no insurance because funds really are that tight. They say the car has a ding, but we (the rental guy and I) can’t find it. We sign, I get the keys, and drive to work. I get nothing done. I’m far too excited. Work ends none too soon, and I hit the road with my lease, a series of burned CD’s, and a potted plant in tow. It’s a good time.

The trip takes both too long and surprisingly not long at all. I only go through one of my CD’s fully while drifting in the nebulous space of no decent radio stations between Chicago and Indianapolis. I get to Mom’s at 2, which is SICK, wake the dog thus waking the house, and crash out after the obligatory converse with Drew, my invalid stepfather. I haven’t killed him yet. Everyone should be VERY PROUD OF ME…..

Morning, 3/27, I grab Lexie, my sister the birthday girl, and we go have lunch with Mom. We’re late, which is my fault for being an idiot, but no matter. After lunch Lexie and I run errands before the party, heading to roll call to scare people with the ‘Lexie clone’ (me). Not many people there, but more on THAT later. We get booze and make 10 minute Guacamole that will make you weep with taste bud joy, and I manage not to get us killed TWICE on the road while driving through Indy (I swear that guy needs to be sidelined from humanity, to say nothing of the road), and we head out to Shelbyville for the party.

Amazing. Not a fan of using gasoline to start a bonfire, but then again, it took my hand to move the stick in place to get it going, so I guess the men need us little girl after all for their manly ways and means. What the fuck ever, these guys were sweethearts all around. A bunch of people I didn’t know, but worked with Lex, so they were righteously FREAKED when they had to look up see who was talking. Lex and I sound alike, look alike, speak in the same structure, so it’s always been difficult tell us apart without looking at us. I played the Japanese tourist with Lexie’s camera while she got brightly sloshed. She needed it, it was healthy. I stayed sober to keep watch and drive us home, both of which went off without a hitch. An amazing night under the stars, mapping the constellations with drunk people, and enjoying simple company without pretense. Made a couple new friends, too! Heidi… damn it all, she’s straight and married. Oh, well…

Morning, 3/28, I’m not lucid much, but we have cake and ice cream for breakfast. Lexie, Bert (her husband) and I took off to bookstores and things, just hanging out, then came back to Mom’s. I had wanted to see Michelle, but I was tired, so I opted for an evening with Mom. And the idiot man she married. I haven’t killed him yet. I’m proud. Aren’t you?

Morning, 3/29, and breakfast with Grandma. Note, I haven’t’ seen her in months, but she’s gone downhill. She’s getting thinner, and looking paler than normal. She seems to gain years as months go by. I don’t know that she’s long for this world. I also think she’s been here too long, but enough about her.

MY MOTHER IS A FREAK OF NATURE. I can’t believe I have this to look forward to in my Golden years. She uses colored toothpicks to make arms and feet for my cousin Josh’s sausage links at Denny’s every Sunday. EVERY SUNDAY. In public, and without remorse. While I admire her for that, JESUS, Mother…

But Sunday was relatively lazy, just me and Mom bumming around the house, making soup for dinner, and talking. Ti was so nice to just talk to her. I don’t get enough of that, I admit it, and when it happens, I try to savor it. Not that I’m planning on moving back for these talks, mind you, but I enjoy them, and I wish we had more of them. If we had more, would it mean as much? I honestly think it would…

Morning, 3/30, the day I go home. I head to Crown Hill Cemetery to visit my grandmother (my father’s mother, who died in 1989), and of course, I can’t find her. 3,000 stones in her section of the cemetery alone, and I can’t remember where she’s buried. I’m a bad grandkid. I’m going to find it, though, and make time to see her the next time I go, so help me. I drove to Broadripple for the hell of it…

And that’s when I realized I’d left my phone at Mom’s. Like a dumbass. So I drove back, managed to have very little further contact with Drew (he’s still alive. There’s pride here.), filled up my tank, and hit the road. I don’t remember much of the trip back, which is just as well, and I got back without much trouble. I missed having a car at my disposal before I had completed the walk home. SAD…

The 'you bet your ass' moment? The ding was found on the car, and they didn't charge me for it. Hotness.

So endith my trip play-by-play. Now that wasn’t so hard, was it?

NEW KITTENS!! News at 11…

The New Place

2009-04-05T23:08:00.000-07:00

3/18, the new place

I found it. I t took 2 hours and five flops, but I found it. I found my new apartment!!!!

Close to the old place, so that means I’m close to the lake, which is NECESSARY, I’m literally down the street from the grocery store, I’m close to the train, which is amazing, and I’m still close to the Synphorium, which is good because it means less walking time at 3 am. And people can crash as needed.

And it’s BIG. Big enough for me and my crap without stifling me, and small enough not to lose the two new kittens I hope to acquire in the coming weeks. Rooms are good sizes, I know what colors I want to paint for the most part (which means I need to go back and look to make sure) and I know where the bookshelves that need to be built are going!

What really gets me is the natural light. I saw this place close to mid-day on a sunny day, and this place was lit up. Almost every space was saturated in light, and it felt warm. The wood floors glowed with it, the white walls seemed sterile but malleable, and the place just sang. Even the guy from Chicago Apartment Finders walked in and said, “Whoa.’ Whoa, indeed.

Ketchup, blog style.

2009-04-05T23:05:00.000-07:00

Ok, everyone, it's time to play that insane brain-dump of a game called "Blog Ketchup."

The Rules:

#1: You can't play the same way twice. No, wait, wrong game. Let's start again...

1. All posts must be posted at the same time.

2. All posts must be dated with the appropriate date of the thought so people can follow.

3. Posts must be in order date so as not to confuse people by going backwards or out of order or some such hysteria. though hysteria is allowed as mood permits.

Strap in, folks, its a short but brutal ride.....

Shattering Dawn

2009-03-10T13:18:00.000-07:00

Ok, I admit I wasn’t sure what to expect in this situation. We all admitted that we felt disconnected from each other, i.e. Theo and George felt disconnected from me, but as the weight of reality has lifted slightly, the cockroaches of intention have started scurrying into the light.

It strikes me as odd, and by odd I mean hurtful, when I ask one of my soon to be ex-roommates how they are, or how their day was, I get monosyllabic answers and abrupt cut offs to conversation, yet when they ask these questions of each other, in front of me, they turn to one another and actively converse. Or worse, shut themselves away in another room where I’m just within earshot of their laughter as they dish to one another what they obviously think I’m not worthy of hearing. And I was labeled the secretive one of the group?

For months now, I have gotten looks in response to simple questions that said to me, ‘Why are you even talking to me?’ I thought it might be stress or fatigue, so I let it go, giving space where I thought it was needed because I respected that need for privacy. Now I realize that dismissal was willful, and I was being pushed away.

I guess I was expecting a little more class from this particular pair of elitists, but with the attitude comes the snobbery. I’ve felt for some time that I was being ‘granted’ attention grudgingly, but this is just uncivil. Uncivil, hurtful, and rude.

Perhaps it is because I came into my own more and became something they didn’t necessary feel connected to. Perhaps I simply became more difficult to lead. There have been moments in recent past when I stood my ground against one of my roommates when they were trying to lead me down the path to what they wanted, and it annoyed them greatly. Who was ‘right’ made no difference. The fact that they would stoop to trying to wave eloquence in my face to blind me from my own good sense is ridiculous and insulting.

A perfect example would be the naming of Circle and Staff. Theo and George had the discussion of the name of the group we had intended to start together within the Pagan community. Something queer welcoming, pagan/environmentally focused, and community present. This discussion was had while I was not present, then all but bullied me into agreeing when I walked in. Mind you, I like the name. I have no problem with it, but I had no say. I was put on the spot to come up with something else, having no warning that such a discussion was going to be had so of course I had nothing, and so the decision was made. To top it off, the domain names for the group had already been purchased before I was even asked!

Another most profound moment of this was our discussion to part company less than a fortnight ago. They both kept using the word ‘organisism' to express how they felt our mental separation had progressed. Forgive me, but I firmly believe that one of the lesser reasons these two believe in organisism is not because it is the allowance of natural process in a situation, allowing for the difference factors to germinate and mix as they are going to. No, for these two, it is simple sloth. They are both admittedly lazy, and I am not under most circumstances. This has caused us to knock heads more than once, from travel arrangements to extermination needs (see: bedbugs) to simple household chores. I don't care that things don't get done my way. I care that things don't get done at all. It is one of the things I won’t miss, but it is also one of the biggest reason I am so hurt.

In essence, it feels like my presence is either being ignored, or seen as little more than a necessary annoyance until we move. I feel like my voice holds no sway, and hasn’t for a long time. And the worst part of this whole thing is that I still care for these two so much. I want nothing but the best for them, and I get treated little better than dirt for walking into a room. I realize that we have our differences, but I haven't seen this kind of behavior out of the two of them since Josiah (see entry about former roommate's face exploding, one of the first two in the blog) was here. Is that how I'm seen now? A blight to be excised?

I was hoping this would not end up being a cat fight between the two of them and myself, but I cannot remain silent about this kind of dismissal any longer. I didn’t spend the last year being the responsible, forgiving, understanding one to be tossed aside like a used condom.

The more things change...

2009-02-25T08:54:00.000-08:00

So, it’s been a week since it all came to be. Theo, George and I will no longer be living together. Sigh.

I have to admit, I’ve known this was going to happen for a while now. Since November, in fact. I just didn’t know exactly when it would be manifest, but indeed it has. I’m at peace with it for the most part. And part of me is really looking forward to the change. I will miss living with Theo and George, but I have never lived alone before. It’s something I really need to do, as an adult as much as for myself. I believe it is something everyone should do at least once in their life so they can truly understand what the life is like.

I think the only hitch in this whole thing is something trivial that really should have been left unsaid in my opinion. Theo mentioned he was considering moving in with George for financial reasons, i.e. being able to get a bigger place than he would alone and being able to save. He was, however, concerned because such an idea might be taken badly by me, the only roommate then who would be on their own, to say nothing of outside onlookers. That’s all well and good, but the truth of it all is that there is no good way to take something like that. If that is their decision, so be it. I have no control over their actions. But is it me, or is there simply no way to look at that and not think ill of this parting?

I support them in all that they do. I love them both, and honestly, living alone is something I want. But to voice something like that, let alone doing it, is not going to be seen well, no matter the intent. It’s bad enough that I had the distinct impression during the main discussion we had about our parting that Theo and George had already come to this decision together and were simply trying to gently lead me to the same conclusion. I've seen them do it before, I wouldn’t put it past them. And honestly, I’d be offended by it if I hadn’t already had an inkling that this was the correct move.

Perhaps I’m over thinking things, but circumstances here cannot be denied. All I can do now is be of whatever aid I can to the two men in my life who mean a thing to me truly, and make this transition as smooth as possible. And in the end, that's what matters most above all the other mess. I love these guys, and if they decide to move in together, it makes it easier to partition junk and get things packed. It is what it is.

I GET A KITTY OF MY VERY OWN!!

Wringing out what’s left of my brain

2009-02-14T11:16:00.000-08:00

So, something is squeezing my skull. It’s called Sheer Force of Will, and I’m currently utilizing it to wring as much functionality out of my head as possible. Considering how little there was to begin with, it’s an undertaking.

Recap: Isis. Of all the Goddesses to research and do anything meaningful on, I had to be picked by one of the heaviest hitters out there. Worse yet, I have a month. ONE MONTH to get this whole thing off the ground. Makes me want to pee in fear a little bit. Brain usage: 30%.

Job: Going well, all things considered. We’re all performing at levels no one likes but can’t be helped thanks to the wonders of economic leavings. I still want out of here as badly as one can, but I’m good until June, so that makes me happy. Money isn’t as tight as it could be, so all is really pretty well in this arena. I just work ungodly hours, sleep poorly, and never see the two men in my life who mean a thing to me, George and Theo. Brain usage: 20%

Study, professional: Ah, Access. How you torment me. I’ve had this discussion with Theo already, but I am NOT a big fan of the new Office ’07 layout for Access. Part of its really great, other parts of it SUCK BIG HAIRY DONKEY BALLS. Maybe it’s me. Maybe because I wasn’t used to the old layout I don’t’ appreciate the new layout for what it was meant for. I appreciate and accept that. Doesn’t make trying to learn it any easier. Brain usage: 20%

Study, personal: Going SWIMMINGLY!! I am learning so much, and branching off, and doing weird new stuff, very, very exciting!! I have Theo to thank for that on a side note, having kicked me so I face the direction I couldn’t see because there was the big gaping SIGN in my way. But whatever, yea for learning! I can’t wait for the weather to be well enough (and the ground to be dry enough) for a Montrose beach romp. I get to practice! So happy! I’m also doing two things right now I’ve never done before, and they’re ongoing and require almost constant attention, one of hoodoo origin, the other not, so trying to keep that focused has been a labor in the jumble. Brain usage: 30%.

Love life: WHAT love life? Brain usage: 5%, out of want.

Writing: It just…won’t…stop…coming… For some reason, the stories have been SPILLING out of my head. Just GUSHING. Bits and pieces and parts, all jumbled together in this enormous spaghetti wheel noise of musings and muses all vying for attention. And of course, I’m cannibalizing old stories that will NEVER be finished to put in newer stories that have the potential to get done and published. I’m now glad I never deleted this stuff, because there are pieces that surprisingly don’t suck, and work well in completely different context, different characters, even different times. Brain usage: 25%.

So, that brings us to 130% of brain capacity currently being used, not including the french fried sections. Please excuse me while I tighten the clamp…ow…

...."love that casts a widening pool of light"....

2009-01-20T10:44:00.000-08:00

On this day, we begin renewed.

On this day we are joined with the voices of the world who cry out for peace, and we say onto them, “Watch us.”

On this day, we are jarred by the howls of those who oppose us, who say we cannot prevail, that we cannot be what we once were and strive to be again. To them we say, “Watch us.”

And on this day, a man stood before us as he did 40 years ago, again in the shadow of a great leader and glad to be there. He helped usher in a movement aside Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. that struck the heart of every American near and far. And today, that same man cried out to his god and called for a blessing upon a president he thought he might never live to see.

And now, I have watched a lame duck depart, and none too soon make way for a man willing to do what is asked of him, not make excuses, or feign grandeur in the face of things he knows nothing about.

I have cried, I have laughed, I have joined my fellow man in song. This day begins a new era in our history. And it is a history we make and shape and move toward together. The man has set the pace. Let us move together, making 'love' a word of strength once more.

Remembering a Friend

2009-01-06T10:32:00.000-08:00

Day started like any other. I got on a train, then a bus, then slipped and fell on the ice that had been dusted with snow overnight. Love it when my pride gets bruised more than anything else. Looked up to make sure no one saw that, and moved on. I got to my desk, got settled, and started writing.

Then my phone went off. And my world cracked at the edges.

“I made an appointment to have Raven put down tomorrow @ 8.”

Shock. Then I got mobile, and rang my sister, Lexie. Apparently Raven, the black beauty of the cat world, had had a stroke. She wasn’t eating, she wasn’t drinking, and she couldn’t walk. At 16, she’d finally lost out to time.

Raven started her stint in our lives a puffball hauled out of my sister’s leather jacket one evening in December. Raven and her siblings were being given away at a local vet’s office, so Lexie snagged one and walked her home. 3 miles home. In the cold and wind of an Indiana December. We already had a cat at the time, a big orange tabby named Winston. He was only 2, but he didn’t take kindly to having this new little thing in the house. That lasted about a day. After that, he was carrying her to the litter, carrying her to the food bowl, showing her all the sunny spots, and generally taking this skittish little kitten under his wing.

Raven became the streak of black lightning that would race through the house now and then. You’d never know she was a cat. You’d swear she was a small rocket. She liked to hide, she liked to burrow, but most of all, she liked TUNA. It was the only sure way to get her out was to open a can, and there she was, just around a corner, or under a table, ready to zip out, get her snack, and zip away.

She passed between Lexie and I several times over the years, first with both of us when Lexie and I lived at home, then sometimes with me, sometimes her. She wandered at night, prowling her domain, but loved hiding out on the towels in the linen closet. Open the door, and there she was, looking at you, wondering why you felt it necessary to disturb her nap.

As the years passed, she got ornery, though not mean, just a touch bitter about getting old. Then the beagles came, and I know she wondered what she’s done to deserve them. Though they learned quickly she was a force to be reckoned with, she still wandered about, though slower than she once had, hanging out more in plain sight now that everyone knew to fear and respect her.

We as a family had been making fun of her age for a while, though never in front of her, because that yielded sharp looks and destroyed items to be found later. But deep down, we all knew the day would come when we’d have to say goodbye to our little black beauty.

And now that day has come. The fiercely independent femme noir who submitted to getting declawed but never fixed now looks to those who always loved her to send her on her way. Tomorrow, Lexie will take her to the vet to be put to sleep, and then she’ll be buried next to Winston in my mom’s backyard. And every spring, the flowers will mark where the next point of her journey begins.

Farewell, my littlest friend. I will never forget you, and all you have taught me.

Vegan…Survivalist…Wabbits!

2008-12-30T07:37:00.000-08:00

Vegans are making me crazy. I appreciate that they have a strong standing on what they are and are not willing to tolerate when it comes to animal cruelty. And the fact that they make this statement with their very lifestyle is amazingly brilliant. I support that fully. What I can’t get behind is their being so disgusted with people around them who don’t feel the same way. Just because I wear leather and fur and eat meat doesn’t make me a puppy killer.

I don’t mind people wearing fur, but I’m sorry, if I take the time and energy to go hunting for rabbit and manage to bag a couple, I’m eating roasted bunny for the next week, using the bones for jewelry, and using the organs I can’t ingest for compost. That’s all there is to it. Then there’s the new hat I’d get out of the deal! Or gloves. Warm, soft, furry gloves…

See? I don’t have a problem with this. I do have a problem, however, with penning animals in tiny, unsanitary areas where they never see sunlight and are bred for the sole purpose of Prada, but if they’re out in the wild, munching away and they happen to get in the way of an arrow, I’m making good use of them, and honoring their sacrifice but returning a bit of the little critter to the land to make grass for future rabbit targets… I mean furry friends. Really, that’s what I meant.

Ann Coulter IS a hate crime, and sugar is good for you

2008-12-18T13:04:00.000-08:00

Well, it couldn’t last. Ann Coulter’s jaw has healed, and has subsequently been set free to hate once more. After going down a flight of stairs the quick and painful way, she has gotten back up on her leggy, reactionary self and now has the power of speech once more. Hear that? It’s hate. And it’s name is Ann. Joy. I mean seriously, anyone who is herself called a living breathing hate crime and answers, “Thank you” is a hardcore cunt. She calls out some supposedly questionable ballot-counting practices in Minnesota, and how Democrats have been ‘thieving their way to victory over the years,’ yet manages to completely dismiss how George W. Bush actually lost to Al Gore by over 500,000 in 2000. Huh.

Ann manages to be petty, whiny, uninformed, and remarkably vocal all at the same time. Granted, she’s pandering to the Right, which makes her blond ambition a great asset. All through the election she tried to label the now President-elect a Terrorist by highlighting his middle name all over the place. Granted she hasn’t done so since the election. I know I wouldn’t now that threatening him in any way will get you prison time. Not that I consider calling out someone's name a threat, but anyone else feel like baiting a stupid blond into an ankle bracelet and a numbered cell?

Kudos to whoever greased those stairs, though. Next time, make the flight longer. If you manage a major head or throat injury, it might silence her for good. Can we get a committee on this, please?

(For the record, it was never officially confirmed that she fell down a flight of stairs, or that she was truly injured at all. Nice thought though, isn’t it? I’m running with it for now. Correct me if you know different!)

And can I just say Rick Warren was a seriously off choice for the inaugural invocation. I nominate Matthew Ellenwood! No one does an invocation like he does!! Seriously, I agree that Obama wants to show that he is an all-encompassing figure interested in hearing and supporting the views of others even when he does not agree with them. I recognize that, I agree with it, but he could have picked someone who wasn't QUITE so incredibly homophobic. Just a thought.

In other, more personal news, I’ve finally broken down. I can’t stand it anymore. I’m changing my diet. ARRRGGG!!! I hate doing this. I am a creature of habit, as so many are, and changing something as fundamental as my eating habits is a trip for me. I mean, I’m not going Vegan or anything; I’m pretty sure I get homicidal quick. I’m just doing what most personal trainers tell you to do anyway: cutting way down on sweets, increasing fruits and veggies, cutting out most fats, and increasing protein.

But speaking of protein, George and I had a discussion about this earlier today, and he brings up a valid point; there are so many foods you wouldn’t necessarily think of that provide protein. Veggies, grains, dairy, all these are know as good protein sources as well as carbohydrate and vitamin sources. And I don’t care what anyone says, sugar is necessary for the body to survive. It’s VITAL. It’s BODY FUEL. EAT IT. Moderation is always best, but cutting it out completely will KILL YOU. Just so we’re clear.

Anyway, protein is good, sugar is good, fat isn’t horrendous as long as it’s moderate, and I vote that pecan pralines are made a food group so they can be eaten with impunity. Can we get a committee on this, please?

Catharsis

2008-12-10T14:26:00.000-08:00

So, I’ve been becoming increasingly introspective recently. I know, some of you are already bracing yourself, and those of you who aren’t probably should. I’ll wait…

There we go, everyone ready? Good, let’s continue.

I’ve been focusing a lot recently on my personal spiritual work. I got lazy, I admit it, and just didn’t do anything for about three months, and then complained inwardly about how vacant everything seemed. I walked around feeling hollow, unfulfilled, and then promptly kicked myself for it. Duh…

So, I’ve continued, forcibly in some cases, my journey, and I’ve come to a series of realizations about myself, a couple that are pretty neat, and a couple that suck.

The first came several months ago, before my laziness. It basically pulled me out of myself and forced me to look at everything I already had to work with. Much of it was raw, unrefined, but still very present, like a hunk of ore that had not been shaped into what it could be. I was using it as a blunt instrument instead of a well-made weapon. It still did the job, but crudely, and without skill. So, my first order of business was to work with what I had. Understand it, work with it, refine it into something functional. Realization: neat.

Another, and by no means in order, came in the form of a person: Michael. Some of you may remember my mental meltdown over what to do with this man a few months ago, but he also awakened in me the notion that this was entirely my own fault. Again. Let me explain…

I love to love. I nurture, I care, I worry, I want to be near it, I want to be a part of it, I want to see it, hear it, smell it, taste it, I LOVE love, but most of all I love loving. And that gets me into more trouble than I wanted to admit to myself. For years. Several of them. Anyone familiar with the parade of men (and women) in my life knows that my luck in relationships has been in waves. Everything starts out roses, and ends up in the compost heap. And it’s really my own fault. I choose my relationships based on my want to love, and historically I have attached myself to those in need of love. I want to show them how amazing and wonderful love and life can be, but this is the same problem women who stay with drunks have: I wanted to fix something. Even though I wanted to share my insane amounts of love for love with them and show them that life is this grand bazaar of love and laughter, I still wanted to fix them because I felt their lack of understanding of love was broken. Hence, my problem. Trying to fix people is bad. Basing whole relationships on it is worse. Realization: suck.

More recently, I realized something that evoked mixed feelings in me. I’ve been running on raw talent and ambition for a LONG time. Most of my life, in fact. I learn a little, work with my own deductive/organizational/energetic skills, and I’ve pushed forward, making my way on nerve, talent, and LOTS of sugar. Maybe not the best choice, but I’ve found that now to achieve my goals, both set for me and those I set myself, I can’t run on what I’ve got anymore. I have to go out and get the knowledge, hone my skills, and basically get off my ass and do something with myself if I want to get anywhere. I thought I was doing something. Apparently not. But I sure as hell I am now. Realization: jury’s out.

And then we come to my blog. My angry little soapbox, my dumping ground for stress, my moments of ‘what the fuck?’ This one hit me this morning, sparking this entry though not the need for it. I realized that this very space I was suing to hide in. I projected pieces of myself, the ones I wanted to world to see however true they may be, onto the screen in angry, opinionated, even poetic snippets, censoring out the sections I didn’t want everyone else to see. In truth, I didn’t want to see them. Thus I have come to the most profound and yet most painful realization of all: there are parts of myself I don’t like to the point that I completely ignore them, and that’s seriously unhealthy. Let’s face it, we all have parts of ourselves we don’t like, be it a nervous habit, a temper, a merchant not to stand up for ones self, poor fashion sense, something we don’t like about ourselves. But me, I just pretend they don’t exist, and that’s the worst habit of mine in existence. I rationalize them, I refuse to look at them, but I don’t’ deal with them. And I as I look back on my old entry, few of them as there are, I realize that even here, I am ignoring the pieces of myself I think others object to, or that are ‘unacceptable’ somehow. Realization: fuck that.

I’m sick of hiding in my own head. I’m sick of wanting people to know me, then keeping so many things to myself that people have nothing to go on. I feel like a failure for gaining 15 lbs in four months, I can’t stand public speaking, and I’m scared to death of being forgotten. There I said it. I don’t feel better. I don’t like it, but I said it.

I also love pandas and knee socks. Damn, that didn’t help.

I hate cathartics. I have a feeling this hate will grow before I get anything out of it. Bummer.

Divine Nation

2008-12-04T12:12:00.000-08:00

Since when did ‘Muslim’ become an insult? When did our fear override of common sense, our sense of decency, or our sense of self? ‘Give us your poor, your tired, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.’ Unless they’re Muslim. Then they get sent to Gitmo.

I’ve been hearing some serious shit on the street of late, and from what I understand basically the people I’m hearing want to turn this country into an extended version of Sarajevo. Anyone out there even remember the Bosnian War and what was happening? That entire conflict was Bosnian Serbs vs. Muslims, and the Serbs were killing every single Muslim they came across, unless of course said Muslims were being dumped into concentration camps where prisoners were tortured, sexually mutilated, then executed. Which, remarkably, is the kind of thing people are not totally against for Muslims in this country. People in this country, of various walks of life, talking in public about how we should just bomb the entire Middle East and have done with it, and how all Muslims should just be shot. It’s called Ethnic Cleansing, and you want to bring it to our home turf? Do they have meds available for that level of bat-shit crazy?!

Forget Muslim as an insult. There was a time when being Muslim was a death sentence, and in the not too distant past. Then again, so was being Jewish, being Pagan, being gay, being a woman and walking around with being covered in a formless black swath and wearing shoes that render every step silent. Need I go on? Give me a fucking break, people.

I wonder if any of the people spewing this filth have ever even seen a copy of the Koran, let alone read it. Some of the imagery is absolutely beautiful, and believe it or not it’s not a big book of ‘do as Allah says or we blow you up.’

Fanaticism is horrendous and ugly no matter who is spewing it or who its being spewed at, and it’s not necessary. We have enough shit to worry about right now; we don’t need to be killing people in our own backyard just because they don’t happen to worship the way we’re used to.

My mother, love her so dearly, actually coined a thought process that I subscribe to whole-heartedly: what if we’re all right? The Jews, the Christians, the Muslims, the Pagans, what if it’s all true? What if this great, amazing ‘force’ (No Star Wars references please, just stay with me) that allows life to exist and created it from what was before is so great and vast and incomprehensible that we simply can’t narrow it down to one form of understanding? What if it more like a diamond, with hundreds of thousands of facets, or faces? And what if each face is a different religious or belief structure, depending on the person or people looking up in wonderment? That would mean that this great ‘thing’ has the power to be whatever we need it to be, in whatever form we need it to take, to understand what ‘it’ is, and our connection to it.

The Divine is not something any of us has a right to narrow down beyond ourselves, because truly, the only point of reference we can ever have in full is our own. So who are we to say that someone else’s belief, or view of the Divine, is invalid? No one has that right, and no one has the right nor the obligation to give up their beliefs for the sake of government, society, or culture. We are individuals for a reasons, and there are as many faces of the Divine as there are each of us, because the Divine exists within each of us. It is our life, it is our breath, and thus it is our words. Are you speaking for the Divine today?

Hey, Hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today?

2008-11-24T14:26:00.000-08:00

The hypocrisy doesn’t end in death! What the hell?! Is this shit genetic or some such insanity?!!!

Ok, back-story: I was working today, as I am want to do from time to time at my desk at my office, but at the same time I was surfing CNN for the latest what the hell ever they see fit to print today. It’s amazing how much crap they manage to publish when we still have soldiers dying halfway around the world and we get stories on the news about dogsleds. But I digress…

I ended up on a commentary piece by the younger daughter of Lyndon B Johnson, talking about how she had campaigned for her father, and how he was so very for the Civil Rights Movement, and how he wanted to help people have all the opportunity that could be afforded to them regardless of their skin color or the size of their pocketbook.

That all well and good, LBJ, Junior (and I’m not kidding, her name is Luci Baines Johnson. Talk about a legend to live down), but if dear old Daddy was so hell bent on working for the rights of ‘Negroes’ as he himself put it, why did he allow for the continuation of a war that was sending so very many of them off to the front lines to die? Not only that, but wasn’t it President LBJ that pushed for further involvement in the Vietnam War after John F Kennedy was assassinated? LBJ was not a stupid man; he had to have known that because of the CURRENT situation at the time surrounding the black community and the war, young men in black communities had very little choice but to be drafted or arrested. So if he was so very in favor of the rights of these young men, why did he allow so many of them to go off against their will to die for a country and a leader who let it continue?

I appreciate that his views and the situation at the time was not this woman’s fault, or even shared by the woman so it would seem. I acknowledge and accept that. But how exactly can this woman stand there and call her father a man of the colored people and an advocate for their rights when he sure as hell didn’t seem to think stopping a war that was killing young men and women of all colors, creeds, and religions was a priority?

Oh wait, because the current administration holds the same stance. Right.

So yeah, I read this article, at my desk, at work. I'm still angry. I gotta stop reading CNN at the office; that’s all there is to it.

Oppression, uninterrupted

2008-11-21T13:11:00.000-08:00

Attention Black/Asian/American Indian/Female Communities of America: pick up a mirror and remember what life was like for us in this country two hundred years ago, the shunning by society, the silent consent of the slave trade by the church, the fact that we were seen as nothing more than property at best and animals at worst, then try to tell me that being queer is an affront to nature.

There, I said it.

Maybe it’s just me. Maybe it’s just because I’m low on sleep, it’s cold out, and I had something spicy for lunch, but could someone please explain to me how it is that a series of communities built on the back of oppression, subsequently freed of said oppression through hundreds of years of fighting, has the stones to turn around and oppress a completely different group of people based on the same criteria?

The criteria in question: how they are born.

Being queer is not a disease, it is not a abomination, and it is not a movement hell bent on destroying anything or anyone aside from the social stigma that got branded by fearful people who know nothing about what’s really going on. This is about people being allowed to live their lives as they are, not trying to fit into society’s view of what they are supposed to be. There was a time when women were seen merely as baby factories, unfit to work for the same pay, vote, even speak in public. American Indians were seen as nothing more than savages to be killed off to make way for white expansion, killed off by disease, warfare, and the willful slaughter of their food supply. Blacks were seen as nothing more than slaves, hard laborers kidnapped from their villages, born by ship stacked on top of each other like strips of animal skins, bought and sold like so much grain, then raped and beaten within an inch of their lives to keep them ‘in line.’ This is a community that was freed from one kind of slavery to be dropped ceremoniously into another: poverty. The laws may have changed, but the social stigma remained, and in the end, it took a second uprising, a second changing of the laws, and a second war to truly begin the road to equality, a war fought not with guns but with sit-ins, marches, fire hoses, tear gas, all on American Soil. I, an American Citizen born in this country, as a member of these three communities, have only one thing to say: All men are created equal as long as you look and think like land/slave owning, Christian, homophobic white men. Let Freedom fucking ring.

Yet, here we are, a melting pot of cultural diversity, spitting on one another every damn day. Yet this is a country built on one underlying concept: COMMUNITY. Families grow through neighborhoods, not just blood. Sisters and brothers are loved and cherished from states, time zones, even continents away not by the relevance of their heritage or how they live their lives, but by the common strand of humanity that links us all.

Which begs a further question: given that at some point in the history of this world, nearly every single culture that has ever existed has been persecuted, enslaved, or shunned simply for being who they are, how can any of us truly have a right to say word one about how someone else lives, let alone loves?

I'm DOOMED...

2008-11-18T12:50:00.000-08:00

I'm hearing Christmas music, and I want throw bricks at people's heads. And we all know what happens when I throw things!

So much doom upon my head...

I hate this woman

2008-11-13T08:42:00.001-08:00

Palin. Sarah gay-hating, Moose-fucking, maverick-coattail-riding Palin. I am so sick of this woman, if I can even bring myself to think of her as one of my own kind. I mean really, a woman trying to take away women’s rights? What the fuck is that? What next, voting, speaking in public? Fuck you, Sarah! She calls our President Elect all but a terrorist, then turns around and says she’s ‘proud of Barack Obama,’ as if to say, ‘Gosh, it’s so nice they let that black man into office.’ Cunt. And how she’d love to serve in his administration. Can we serve her as a snack tray? That’s the only job she’s fit for.

Then she has the stones to say she and other Republican Governors in their little club are ready to put aside "extreme partisanship" and act if Washington fails to provide the leadership America needs. Speaking at her first formal news conference since the Republican tanked last week, she croaked out that her fellow Republican governors "don't let obsessive, extreme partisanship ... get in the way of doing what's right." Since fucking when? She and the fuckers still listening to her are so far Reich (sorry, Right) they can't even see that moderates EXIST, let alone stand among them.

I had wished that we could just ship her back to Alaska like a bad case of crabs and never have to hear from her again. I also knew that was never going to happen. The Fundies like her WAY too much, and her ego has grown far too big for even Alaska to hold anymore. Surrounded by Yes Men, and not the kind that do fun things to the New York Times, she honestly forgot that she’s an idiot. A poorly spoken, raving loon who needs to be locked up and experience the ‘reprogramming’ her kind like to give to gays and unwed mothers in fundamentalist situation. Do they have programs for ‘not crazy’ by chance? If not, let’s develop one for this bitch. I mean seriously, given the choice, I’d take Hillary Clinton over Plain any day, and I am NOT fan of Hillary’s.

I’m just glad our country has been able to see through the bullshit that has been heaped over us in the past eight years, and brought forth a leader by our own hand, that has the fortitude to make things happen. Without Sarah Plain. Now, if we could just stuff her in a hole for the next twenty years or so, that’d be nice. Shovel, anyone?

Remember, Remember...

2008-11-05T10:33:00.000-08:00

Remember, remember the fifth of November,
The gunpowder, treason, and plot,
I know of no reason why the gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot.

Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes, 'twas his intent
To blow up the King and Parliament.
Three score barrels of powder below,
Poor old England to overthrow;

By God's providence he was catch'd
With a dark lantern and burning match.
Holloa boys, holloa boys, make the bells ring.
Holloa boys, holloa boys,
God save the King! Hip hip hoorah!

This will be a day for me that lives on forever for two reasons.

First, and not the least of which, is Guy Fawkes. Talk about your baddass human beings, he was ready to blow a sacred space to the stars to show the world that something was wrong. I got to share this day with people who appreciate it for the first time today, and for that this day will live on in my heart forever.

But also, I can say that I was in Grant Park, in Chicago, when the word came. And the voices shouted from the throng, “Yes we did!”

And half the world heard the orgasmic cry of, “Oh, thank god!”

I shared this moment with those self-same fellows, geeks, nerds, revolutionaries all, men who understood and appreciated not only what was happening just then, but what had happened on this day so many years ago.

And from our voices, through the night, came the chorus of sea chantes, sung in three different keys, no harmony, but as in motion as the sea itself. Wandering through the streets of a nation in the midst of a revelation, a city drunk with joy.

Palpable, seamless, unrelenting joy.

Happy Guy Fawkes Day. Fuck yeah.

The Great Debate...not so much

2008-11-05T10:32:00.002-08:00

I have to admit, I’m a little disappointed. Things turned out to be kind of whiny and accusatory for my taste. McCain all but telling Obama to apologize for those comments made about him by Lewis about connecting he and Sara Palin to segregationists of the 60’s and the bombing of that church was laughable. NO REFERENCE was made to link the current Republican candidates with that insanity. NONE. If you read the direct quote, that’s obvious, but to ask Obama to apologize for someone else’s statement was ridiculous, and McCain sounded like a little kid when he kept saying, “It’s not fair!” What are you, 5? You’re whining like a little bitch boy and you want to run this country?

And honestly, being in the field of education, I have to say there is NOTHING that eight years is going to fix. It’s a situation that’s going to take a generation at least to fix, and people need to come to grips with that. We need a solution people can agree on so it will remain in implementation for the 15-20 years its going to take to make the system function properly. McCain’s plan of competitive schools does nothing but isolate lower income families to mediocre schools, while the rich kids get fought over because their parents can afford tuition. Obama’s plan of college tuition reimbursement for every student every year with community service is a decent plan, but implementing it is going to be rough. And also, if the K-12 system isn’t supporting our children properly, putting college within reach isn’t enough when graduating above a “C” isn’t happening in the first place.

I must admit though, Obama side-stepped Sarah Palin like bubblegum on the sidewalk. When asked if he thought she was qualified, he said to let the people decide. A well-put answer if any, and if there is anyone left who takes that woman even REMOTELY seriously, let’s see a show of hands. Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?

I also want tog o n record saying Obama’s comments about that “$42000 income tax bill” thing McCain was squawking about was amazing. He goes as says everyone’s said that entire thing was fabricated, even Fox News, which doesn’t happen where he’s concerned. AND THEY WERE ON FOX NEWS!!! Glorious.

Overall, it was a mudslinging bitch fight that in the end means nothing. It was by no means a show-stopper as far as the campaign, and where McCain needed to be seen as calm and collected, he got more agitated and more personal with his barbs as the night went on, while Obama stayed cool. Though McCain has the passion of a fighter, he didn’t have the substance of a cool head to back it up. All bark, not enough denture-adhesive for bite.

10/16/08

Pangs of Consciousness

2008-11-05T10:32:00.001-08:00

I admit it, this started with me being bored to tears in a department meeting today. My eyesight faded, my hearing blurred, and for a moment, everything went gray. I popped back, slightly embarrassed but thankfullyno one noticed. No one noticed that my eyes were darting around to faces I suddenly didn't recognize. Names came a second behind normal, but I couldn't place "why" I knew these people. I barely recognized them as people. What are people? Chairs, what are those? Table? What's a department? What am I?! What the fuck?!

My mind started deconstructing how this meeting came to be, starting with society at large and the want of knowledge, funneling down through the want for mass education, thus the need for teachers, and their subsequent education... it still didn't make any sense, and I work here.

I felt like a caveman dropped into a staff meeting, trying to make sense of it all. A spirit that had never known a body flung into the physical realm without even a vocabulary.

I still haven't recovered completely, and it's been hours. I need sleep. And Cheetos. And Highlander. Not in that order, necessarily...

10/7/08

Not feeling worse

2008-11-05T10:31:00.002-08:00

Ok, so I yelled at a cripple Sunday. He asked for it. He’s my stepfather, and he’s an asshole, and he asked for it. My mother, sister and I were putting together this futon my Mom bought. We ended up with extra screws at the end, realizing that the directions didn’t tell us everything we were supposed to do. But being of relative intelligence and having eyes that work, we figured it out.

At least, under normal scrutiny we figured it out. My stepfather, who has sections of his brain actively decaying in his skull which is why he is disabled, kept saying we were doing it wrong. Every time he said it, all three of us, who had been following the directions until the point they were no longer useful, had to defend ourselves and our project, which we had under control. Eventually, he said it that one time to many, to which I answered, paraphrasing, “Well, Drew, what would you suggest? If we’re doing it wrong, what are we supposed to be doing?” so drew, being unable to walk sufficiently, crawled the three feet from his spot on the couch, looked over the area of the now assembled futon in question, realized we were right (not that he admitted that or anything), and crawled back to the couch. It would have been sad if I wasn’t so angry.

And while I am somewhat less angry, in the end, I really don’t feel bad. I’m sorry I upset my mother, I’m sorry my sister got irritated with it, but I can’t bring myself to feel sorry for yelling at a man I have hated almost since we met, disabled or not. Does that make me a bad person? Perhaps, but after 14 years of putting up with this man simply because I love my mother that much, I think I’m entitled to one ‘fuck off’ a year, don’t you think?

9/28/08

Speak to me! Let me speak to you!

2008-11-05T10:31:00.001-08:00

What is it about needing to be understood? Communication is one of the keys to our civilization, yet we shorten and abbreviate it to the point of whole sentences consisting of one word. The power of language is one of the most compelling ever formed in mind of man, and some of the most profound, most commanding words in existence are ‘if’ and ‘just.’ So few letters, so much conveyed.

And yet, it is still so difficult to be understood some days. And it is that need, that driving force of expression realized that brings about some of the most frustrating moments of our lives. Break-ups, for example, are steeped in lack of communication. Usually, there’s too much yelling, but still amidst the breaking waves of chaos, both want to be understand by the other. Both need to be understood, because it obviously hasn’t happened yet.

Or has it? What does constitute a lack of communication?

Certainly the speaker is to blame. Not concise or vague enough. Not strong enough, too nagging, not enough words, too many words. Surely the speaker is to blame.

Or perhaps the listener? Unwilling to hear beyond what they wish, the words float across their mind in flitting specks, only the harshest or most desirable buzz words truly gaining a foothold. And then they wonder why everything falls apart, why they are being accused of not understanding what has happened and how they have trespassed. “What do you mean? I hear every word you say!” Except the words didn’t all stick around long enough to be understood in context.

I do not pretend to be an expert on communication. I have my own issues with it, usually involving interpretation of vocabulary. I was once told by my roommate that I didn’t know what I was talking about because I didn’t use the right phrasing. Right. Like it’s impossible to say that same thing 40 different ways in the English language. And like we don’t have regular communication breakdown due to word usage. Different word use does not mean the point is not the same. But one has to listen in order to make that connection. Fancy that.

Communicate comes from the Latin root commūnicāre, to impart. But in order ‘to impart’ someone has to be taking in what is imparted. Speak and listen in equal measure. Recognize it, understand it, run with it. It’s all any of us can do.

9/2/08

Practice makes...

2008-11-05T10:30:00.002-08:00

Why is that no matter how completely you rehearse what you’re going to say to someone before hand, as soon as you get in front of that person, you’re suddenly ad-libbing? You meet this person in your head, ball them out, get your point across, it all works, you’re ready. You get in front of them, and every good point, every snappy comeback is suddenly GONE, and you’re stuck in the moment, winging it like you’ve never done before.

Welcome to my head. Job Interviews suck so hard…

9/2/08

Writing..for the love of frog on a stick

2008-11-05T10:30:00.001-08:00

Why is it the only place that seems conducive to writing is my desk at work? I'm supposed to be working, answering phones processing paperwork, all this stuff, and all I want to do is write. And it's not just the want of creation. It's the creation itself! It's happening in my head, right there at my desk, and I find myself flipping back and forth through windows doing work and writing at the same time, all the while trying very hard not to get caught. I get my work done to a point, but the verse does no ebb! From the time I sit down until the train taking me back home, my characters play out their scenes in my head, and I am but the observer, slowing them down just enough to bring their lives to life on paper.

but why at work? Is it the thrill of possibly getting caught? Is it the focus already in place that makes it easier for the ideas to come forth whole? Is it the unremembered dreams of the night prior coming back for one last moment of glory in the light of day? I'm not sure, really. All I know is I've gotten quite efficient at Alt-Tab-ing my way into looking busy. Let's see how long that lasts...

8/6/08

What to do...

2008-11-05T10:28:00.001-08:00

His name is Michael, and he’s driving me insane. We met at PSG, aka Pagan Spirit Gathering. The Fest was amazing, but in it, I met Michael. We hit it off relatively well He’s a nice guy, but he wants WAY more From this relationship than I do. He wants to marry me, and said so within two weeks of knowing me! AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!!

But how to tell him? I mean, I’ve been beating around the bush some, but now and then I’ve been dropping Iron Man strength hints about what I do and don’t’ want, but he just doesn’t seem to get it. The age difference between us isn’t that big a deal to me. He’s 22 years my senior, which is a lot, I know. And yes, it did sort of freak my out that he has kids only slightly younger than I am, I admit it.

He just so sweet! He’s kind and considerate and doesn’t understand why I’m not madly freaking in love with him. And if that was all he was I’d wonder, too. But he’s also moody, and jaded, and thinks he knows everything about the people around him and no one could tell him different. Everyone is out to get him, he has no one in his corner when it comes to Circle Sanctuary (the people who put on PSG), or his work (He just got fired). The world is out to get him because he can’t find a job. His marriage is falling apart (Did I mention he’s already married? Yeah, well, he is.). I’m his only hope for salvation or a normal life, so he’s pinning all his hopes and dreams and his entire future on me. I’m trying so hard not to run screaming into the night.

And just now, on my lunch break at work, he told me his wife is giving their relationship until Christmas. AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!

My time is running out to get out of this without destroying his world. But how to do it without blowing things to dust in the process anyway? What to do, what to do….

7/22/08

Pound of flesh

2008-11-05T10:27:00.002-08:00

I did something tonight that I'm not proud of. I did what I thought was best, and insodoing, someone I care about got hurt.

I admit that I allowed my emotions to overshadow my judgement. Tonight's events were something that could have resulted in a resolution of conflict, but instead brought pain to everyone involved. I did not draw first blood, but I drew final, that much is certain. Trouble is, I wasn't going for blood even if he might have been. I was going for peace. I was trying to find a common ground, and it backfired. I admit my methods were not sound. I admit that shock is not the best way to get someone's attention in some cases. But as I said, I did what I thought was best, and it blew up in both our faces. Literally.

A few words about my methods, flawed though they may be...

I don't believe in pity. I don't believe in coddling, and I certainly don't believe that violence is the answer to anything. I don't run from conflict. I may end it quickly to avoid serious issue, but running only delays the inevitable. The other side of that, of course, is that I don't seek conflict, either. I avoid it like the plague. I'd rather internalize the crap out of something than face it most days. Not the healthiest MO, but everyone has something to work on.

And thus, my problem. My conflict resolutions skills aren't the greatest, but tonight, I sought to try and resolve a long-brewing issue with someone I care about. Little did I know I was walking into a mine field of atom bombs. One I helped create. And one that detonated not because I did something wrong, but because I failed to do the one thing that was right: use discretion. They say it's the better part of valor, and I never doubted it. I will fall on my sword a thousand times for what I believe in. I will lie down before tanks for my loved ones. But tonight, unchecked, uncensored honesty was the forked tongue that slit my throat.

Yet his blood stained the floor.

As I said, I do not pity, and that includes myself. But in this wee small hour of the morning, I feel hollow. As if my failure has killed something inside me. Perhaps it was the last breath of this friendship. Perhaps it was the last hope that something good might come from something so long-suffering. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps. And just perhaps, it takes two people to make an argument. I know I have wronged, but I know that I was not alone. our loss is shared, as is our grief.

3/5/08

What's in a name?

2008-11-05T10:27:00.001-08:00

I've fancied myself many things over the years, from nothing to a rock star to a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle. But the one thing that has always defined me, from my view of the world to the very core of my being is quite simple: a name is only how you are cataloged, it is not, nor could it ever be, who you are. My name for example, Elizabeth, has so many derivatives and nicknames and available spellings that I have my pick. But at the end of the day, it's not the whole of who I am. It's what I sign my checkbook with, and given how rarely I use that, it amounts to what my parents came up with 26 years ago. I respect it, I love it, and I will answer to it freely, regardless of situation or consequence, but it is still only a word. One word. One identifying character amongst millions of others that encompass a lifetime of experience and chaos and simply being. A name is an important part of who I am, or who anyone is, but it is only the beginning. And beginnings beg adventure, and I'm always up for that!

3/5/08