Echo

You are too dangerous… he wrote. You really like the truth.

Ha. That’s as much as I needed to know.

I thought about my last conversation with Christian. I told him about how a lot of men think of me as dangerous…they say I have dangerous eyes. I know it says more about these people than anything about me. It’s not really my eyes people find dangerous, but what they’re afraid I might see. It’s usually people who have something to hide who are afraid of me. And these are the people that are actually the most dangerous to me.

A few weeks ago, I watched my first DVD of the show, Lie to Me. It’s another crime-solving procedural hour-long drama, this one starring Tim Roth, about a consultant who is very good at reading people and telling if they’re lying. In one episode, this FBI agent really likes this one female specialist who works for Tim Roth. He asks her out and she tells him that she likes him but it wouldn’t work out. When he asks why, she says, because he won’t be able to hide anything from her. She’ll know everything. He looks at her, amused, and tells her he’s up for it. That he has nothing to hide.

That was a really sweet scene. Hell, I wanted to date him when he said that. I would like to meet someone that open and honest. I remember when I told Christian about the eyes thing, his immediate response was that he didn’t think of my eyes as dangerous. He said he wasn’t afraid of my eyes. Maybe this is true, who knows. But it was a noble and sweet gesture, one of those moments that I always remember.

Truth is many things. You take any object, person, event–and you can slice it a million ways and come up with a million perspectives, all of them truthful. Truth is like atoms…it’s the basis of things, but it’s as much a matter of faith and intuition, as it is a hard reality. It’s the simplest thing, and it’s also the least simplest thing. As with everything that’s hard to swallow, step one is acceptance. I’ve gotten to a place in my life where I’ve said fuck it, whatever’s the truth, whatever slice, shade, angle of truth is available at a given moment, I would rather see it than pretend I don’t. I don’t claim to understand it, or claim that truth in any given moment or from any given perspective is the end-all be-all of the big picture, but I would rather see what’s really there than pretend I don’t.

And that has made all the difference in my life.

Blueberry Italian Soda

I lived with my friend Whitney for years. She’s a Scorpio. She’s where I came up with my theory that Scorpios have a way of making people do things and trying to convince them it was their own idea. She always calls me a Blueberry Italian Soda.

The story goes…

We went out to a cafe once and it was during a period of time when I was into trying different flavors of italian sodas. One day, I ordered a blueberry, and was confounded. I swore it tasted like carbonated milk. Whitney tried it and she didn’t get it. She said that there are some things in life that should be one thing, but just aren’t.

Whitney always swears I’m a Gemini who’s really a Scorpio. That’s why I’m a Blueberry Italian Soda.

And I have to say those Scorpio times (November), are my most creative.

This is a story in the Scorpio theme of restraint.

A couple of years ago, I had a good friend. I cared about him and felt a strong connection with him, but it was platonic. When I found out he was engaged, I didn’t think of him as anything but that. He knew I cared about him and was protective of him (the way I am of my brother), and he had really ambivalent feelings about getting married, so he would drop a lot of hints about being tortured, and resigned to this decision. I had been in a similar situation where a married lesbian friend did that, and soon was trying to use me to leave her wife even though she knew I wasn’t gay. That had been a very demoralizing experience. But I’d recovered and I sure as hell wasn’t getting involved in anything like that again. So I would try to be supportive, and his discussions would get deeper and more desperate. When he found out I’d quit my job and was going to visit Germany, he invited me out to lunch. We had lunch and it was civil, like two friends talking, but he calls me later to tell me he hasn’t gone out with a female friend by himself since he started dating his fiancee, and there’s just something about me. I’m getting that big red flag feeling, so I’m beefing up my boundaries saying that we really connect on a mental level. that’s the only level we should be connecting on, but it’s such a deep, rich level that I think it’s a great addition to our lives.

He hangs up and the next time I talk to him, he tells me he told his fiancee about me and how he’s really “intrigued” by me.

Great, I think. Now she wants to kick my ass.

I knew he’d thrown me under a bus. It was a childish action–he wanted me to be under his control, a tool for his escape if he couldn’t go through with getting married. He was also torturing his fiancee by throwing his ambivalence in her face. Neither is a respectful place to put someone, and it’s not nice.

So I always maintained my boundaries, but I had a soft spot, so I always listened, always tried to give him positive advice but without giving an opinion. He even called me the day before his wedding, telling me that he was convinced that we knew each other in a past life. I told him I agreed, and that we had it in us to be friends for a long time. I wished him luck and congratulated him. I really hoped to see him take responsibility of his own life and sort it out.

And so he went through with the wedding. And by then, I was living in Amsterdam with a ghost who was doing a dog and pony show to convince me that he was my life partner.

To be honest, did I think he was making a mistake? Yes. But only because of the way he was acting. But I am the last person who was going to tell him, and it was pretty unfair of him to try to goad me into a position. But I was still kind to him and positive, down to that last phone call. I did truly care about him. But I wasn’t going to get involved with his life outside of respectful friendship. It wouldn’t have done anyone any good.

And then our final conversation. He’d told me he really needed to talk to me, so I met him on Skype. He said he couldn’t sleep and weird things were happening, and launched into this strange metaphorical conversation that lost me a little. Then he started accusing me.

“People just want to know that you care about them, Julia.”

I was offended. He knew full well I cared about him.

The conversation got stranger.

“You like to fuck people. Your such a dude ;-).
Leave your seed and find the next bitch to fuck.”

?

To be honest, I laughed when I read this. It was so absurd, yet that’s how he sees me.

“You love being that tall dark handsome man that someone falls in love with and disappears forever…”

?

This is the first time I’ve ever been compared to a tall, dark handsome man.

The rest of the conversation, I tried to understand him, I tried to discuss, tried to defend myself against his analysis of me that just didn’t sound like me. He got really aggressive. And then i heard a line in my head from one of my favorite songs…

You can’t talk to a psycho like a normal human being…

I realized, there was no reason for me to even be wasting my energy in this conversation. It wasn’t going anywhere. He was leading it in circles. He had already shown me how he sees me, and even worse, how he was trying to get me to see myself. He was a little boy throwing a tantrum by breaking his toys, even though he was an adult who made his own decisions. If he doesn’t like where his life is, he should have a long, serious talk with management.

That realization was instant relief. I graciously and politely excused myself from the conversation, and all of a sudden he was nice again. I told him I’d talk to him later, even though I knew, closing the window, this would be the last time. This guy wasn’t my friend if he could feel he had the right to try to hurt me just because he was angry I didn’t “save” him from his own life. He was blaming me for his inability to stand up and be his own man.

And I don’t have time to waste on little bitches.

goddam this is bullshit. laying awake at night, wondering shit. worrying about shit. every time i see a missed call from my parents, i worry. every time the phone rings in the middle of the night, my heart jumps into my throat. i wanna throttle those wrong numbers…they have no idea the hell they put me through. but there’s nothing tangible there, no basis for the fear except that i know, one day, i will lose the ones i love.

is that any excuse to keep people away, because one more person let into my inner circle means one more person who will someday devastate me with loss when they’re gone? one more person who may or may not hurt when i’m gone? why am i so fucking sensitive.

you’ve gotta know though, most days i don’t think about these things. they’re programs that run invisibly in the background, and only hit my consciousness sometimes as faded fragments of uncomfortable dreams. but on nights like these, everything just crowds in and camps.

i could be great, or i could be so much wasted potential. i know what i need to unlock my potential, but these things remain elusive. i know that i’m learning how to be patient, to jump when it’s time to jump, to wait when it’s time to wait. but it’s the fear that gets me, the fear that finds me on the darkest of night and laughs from the corner where i can’t see him.

tonight, i’m thinking about someone from a long time ago. am i still burning a candle for him? every single other day i would laugh. but then nights like these…i can sit alone, hold my head in my hands and wonder, why…why would it even matter to me when i don’t matter to him, and in the grand scheme of things, our lives don’t even meet. we never even dated. we were never even romantic. it’s been over 10 years. but why, at the sight of his picture, does it twist a razor inside my stomach. maybe because it reminds me of a lost, angry pathetic me, one that was so lost in a world without punctuation or reprieve. maybe i’m still angry at myself for a wasted youth so adrift…always running, running, running like a scared little girl.

the last few months i’ve been at the peak of my power. stronger and more magnetic than i’ve ever thought i would achieve. and the price…loneliness. i am powerful because i am alone. left alone to my own devices, i thrive. but give me that distraction, that taste of human companionship, and i crumble. my knees shake. my insides quiver and suddenly…i have so much need. i have so much love i want to give. so much love i want to take. and then suddenly i’m going around in circles until my mind dies of starvation and neglect. but my heart is heavy and full with that push/pull of being fed but being left even hungrier.

i’m lonely. i’m so fucking lonely. i’m so fucking lonely i can barely stand myself. but sometimes, it’s being around people that makes me feel even more isolated. even more misunderstood. even more empty, like a black, expansive sky just waiting to be filled when everything that falls into it just gets consumed before it hits the ground.

what is this, god? what is this that i can’t find another person who speaks my language and can help me translate my own truth to myself? i need help. i’ve done everything you’ve asked me to do, and will continue to do so, every assignment, every illumination that others need, even if it relegates me into a reflection or shadow. but i need you to do one thing for me. i’m not a fucking martyr. i never signed up to be a martyr. it’s because the world doesn’t need it. it needs a leader. it needs truth. i’m not here to give to others until they bleed me dry. what good would that do anyone? i want to be a positive force, to help, to nurture and guide, but i have my own needs as well which i refuse to deny. i need to be understood. please, i need to be understood. i need someone i can trust to help me understand myself and the full extent of things, before i can understand the true nature of this world.

i’m sitting in the dark because sometimes it’s the only place i feel comfortable.

it was raining today and i stood out in the rain doing my job even though i was seething inside and didn’t want to be there. i didn’t want to be anywhere. i saw a black man on a bike, red baseball cap, sitting at the intersection watching me. he had a beautiful, kind smile. i smiled at him, an instinctual response to light, but i refocused myself because the last thing i wanted or needed was for him to come over. i continued scanning the crowd, picking out the english speakers and the ones i needed to draw in. i saw him ride away slowly, continually turning to smile at me, trying to catch my eye. i wanted him to keep going, keep going and not look back.

i am sick with darkness right now

the day continued, and while water kept falling, i wasn’t getting soaked so i stayed, scanning and scanning the crowds, trying to outlet the seething silently, careful not to let it draw attention. smile, genuine warmth. i will people to say thank you, because in a way, i dare them not to, and they do and i smile warmly, genuinely. i want the positive to outweigh the dark that i feel, the slow burning with emerging pools of blood, so fucking angry, like a razor cut that just won’t end.

the important players i met yesterday all appeared in the new chapter today.

i remember being stationed for work in the red light district yesterday, which is like sending a recovering alcoholic to work in a bar. the red light district repels me, destroys me, as strongly as it allures me and promises me more of my sickness that gives me that metallic taste of blood that makes me crave more and more and makes me so goddam fucking thirsty. i hate it, i want it. it destroys me. i want to burn the whole fucking place down if it weren’t made of so much goddam brick. i want to destroy it, turn it into blackness the way it does me. i want to fuck it, hurt it, remind it that we were all children once, every one of us, and a long time ago, that innocence meant something.

i want to mean something again.

i stood there, staring at the sky, sometimes a sky within the sky as it has a way of opening up the longer you stare at it. i wanted it, i wanted to confront whatever it is i have to confront to get it over with. its grayness draws me in, wraps me in its multiplicity, disorients me.

when i looked down, a man of absolute blackness walked by. black pants, black leather trenchcoat, black dreads, black skin, black hat, black eyes. eyes like an alien. eyes like a snake. eyes of darkness only someone with knowledge would have. he walked by, never breaking his stride, never breaking eye contact. he’s fixed on me. he knew i knew what he was, and he knew that meant he could try to scare me. i was prepared to take a stance against those eyes, but inside, it sent a cold surge of terror inside me. i would fight someone like that to the death if need be, but i wasn’t going to let him see me scared. i looked away, saying hello to an italian couple who was completely unaware of me. i didn’t acknowledge his existence anymore, though i knew he would be back.

i needed help.

i saw a dark-skinned guy with large eyes who looked vaguely familiar. i had seen him in the crowd earlier and remembered scanning his t-shirt in hopes it was a school in the us. i asked him if he wanted a free guide and he came over.

he listened to my pitch then he asked about me, wanting to know about me and why i was here. i told him about quitting my job and traveling to europe and he said he had a friend who did the same, got sick of america and traveled the world. he was a good energy, a safe energy, a familiar energy. i knew he wanted to connect with me positively and i needed it, especially out of the corner of my eye, i saw the snake man take a slow pass back, staring at me.

i talked with this guy who had gone to illinois, and told him that a lot of my cousins went there. i told him i went to michigan and we talked a bit, then he told me where he was staying and wanted to know when i got off work. i knew where he was going, but while i was thankful that he had been there for me when i needed him (i could feel the snake man’s energy was gone), i didn’t want to get in a complicated situation in real life, so i told him i had to go home and cook dinner for my boyfriend. i did offer to walk him back to his hostel which was on my way home, so he asked me if i spoke mandarin and i said yes. he said, i love you, in mandarin. i said, aww, that’s so sweet, in english. he said, i want to kiss you, in mandarin. i laughed. did you understand what i said, he said. yes, i said. you want to kiss me. that’s pretty good, he said. most people don’t understand what i’m trying to say.

did you actually study mandarin or do you just know a few useful phrases, i ask.

i dated a girl from taiwan for two years, he said. that would explain his fixation with me, i thought.

that’s the girl who took off and traveled the world, he said. you remind me so much of her.

ah, i thought. that definitely explains his fixation on me.

he invited me to the happy hour at his hostel and i declined again. he said he was leaving the next day.

well, i said. good luck with everything.

in hindsight, can i say that it felt like it wasn’t goodbye yet? in some ways, i feel like i should know better. but there is this blissful ignorance in those moments that later helps you realize that maybe life is in the plot after all. but back to the story.

i leave, walking away. i decide to try one more shopping area since promoting has been shit lately. i’m standing at a dark corner, again fixated on the sky and how the gray of the opposite building blends into the sky. i look over and i see three guys walking towards me. their clothes tell me they’re american. i offer them a guide and ask them if i can help them with any directions. they ask me where the nearest smartshop is, and i write out recommendations, as well as the best coffeehouse and wherever else they might be interested in. as i doodle on the map, i find out that they’re from florida, alabama and philadelphia. the outgoing one mentions he wants to get another tattoo, he already has 7, but he’s a gemini. my ears perk up and i say, really. when. may 29th, he says. i’m june 14th, i say.

the quiet one on the right suddenly pipes up. i’m june 3rd, he says.

i look at the third guy, the one on the left from philadelphia. he has a shaved head, smooth skin and clear, penetrating hazel eyes that are intimidating in their stillness. when’s yours, i ask him. april 1st, he says. good birthday, i say, but i think, aries. i just had a dream the night before about meeting an aries and having a conversation, but right after he left, i remembered something but realized i had no way of getting in contact with him. i take a closer look into his eyes, but his steely gaze unnerves me so i look away.

the outgoing gemini wants to know about me and what it’s like to live in amsterdam, and i tell them that it’s cool. a lot of americans come out here for a few days, but somehow meet someone and end up living here for a decade. it’s just what amsterdam does to you. he asks me what i’m doing after work but i tell them i’m working all night (a lie) and he asks me what i’m doing tomorrow night and i say that i’m going to be out in front of the theater promoting the show. mostly, i just want them to consider seeing the show because that’s how i get paid. they’re gonna go check out other things so they say bye, but the one from philly lingers back, taking a last look at me as he walks away. he wasn’t that friendly to me when they were talking to me in that he hadn’t really said much, and his eyes unnerved me, but then it occurred to me that some people hide themselves well even when they’re interested, when they’re connected. i put it out of my mind because i’m just really over standing out in the co
ld talking about a comedy show, and i just want to get home.

******

woke up today and was feeling bright. was feeling close to david. we had a serious and open talk last night. i wanted to talk about the red light district. i wanted him to know that it consumes me. he told me he doesn’t want me hurting myself anymore, but he also understands that i’m writing a book and he wants me to write a book, but he also doesn’t want to see me hurting myself. i know he understands my pain, but i also feel like he doesn’t understand my pain. because wouldn’t he have explained it to me if he knew so i could stop searching for its name? he’s afraid that i’m only going to find bad things there. that i’m only going to draw a bad experience to myself. will you still be there for me even if i did, i ask him. he has to think about it. yes, he says quietly. i think neither of us is sure whether when the shadow leads, if it’s a good thing or a bad thing. i remind him that it was the shadow side that urged me to quit my job, travel to europe and that ultimately lead me to him. that it was the darkness in me that was drawn by the darkness in him. so does that make the darkness bad? there was some intense staring on his part so we dropped the subject and had a beautiful night.

and the morning started the same way. i missed him as soon as he was gone. went to the gym, did the dishes, then surprised him at work with soup and his favorite candy bar. but then somehow, the other girl in the shop brought up anal fisting, and i brought up testicle weights and we were in a full-on, one-up battle of crazy sex shit. david started railing that these things weren’t real and just videos people made to shock people and we insisted that there’s a market for these things because people do get off on them. he kept saying he didn’t believe people were into this and i swore up and down that people do a lot of crazy things behind closed doors and they do it because they get off on it, not because they want anyone to know about it and be freaked out by it. i don’t know why the conversation upset me. i don’t know why his stance upset me. i felt like we had just talked about this stuff the night before, that people did some messed up things to each other sexually, and knowing that disillusions me. but i was angry that he was denying their very existence. when david walks away to help a customer, his coworker said to me, david’s so naive. no he’s not, i said. and i meant it.

i was quiet as i started thinking again. i started getting dark again. what are you thinking about, he asked.

you know, i said. the red light district.

he looked tense, like he wanted to say something but knew he shouldn’t.

i looked away. i decided i wanted to go write rather than spend time with him after he was off work. i was overcome by a sudden, overwhelming urge to leave. he walked me out and said goodbye. i knew he didn’t know why i was suddenly turned away, disappearing before his eyes. i’m not sure i knew why either. i said goodbye and walked away. i wondered if he knew. i wondered if he was conscious that i was walking in the direction of the red light district.

its energy both enraptures and repels me. it destroys me as it compels me. it feeds me and it breaks me down down down. this energy is the worst drug i’ve ever been on, the greediest drug. i can feel it like a slug slowly eating its way up my veins, burning, but giving me a satisfaction with no name. it makes me want to give it more of myself, feed myself to it. and the worst thing about it is that it’s familiar and i don’t unwelcome it. it’s something i’ve always known since my earliest meetings with darkness, a shadow i have met before, perhaps have known even before i knew myself.

i sit at the edge of the water, at the edge of the district and think.

i don’t want to keep hurting myself.

but there’s something here that i need.

there is something here i need to find, that i need to know.

i put my head in my arms, closing my eyes, needing the black to help me think.

it’s so hard to unravel, so hard to untangle.

what can’t i let go?

why is julia so angry?

it starts to rain again and i have an hour before my shift so i start walking. at the outskirts of the district, i see walking towards me the guy from yesterday, the guy who speaks mandarin. i say hi and he looks shocked. i ask him if he’s on his way out (he has his suitcase with him), and he says he can’t believe he’s seeing me again. he introduces me to the guy he’s with, some old dude from california who’s got a huge mustache and skateboard, and he comments again that he can’t believe he ran into me, that he had missed his train. we talk. he wants to know if i want to share a joint with them and i don’t. they start talking about the area, about the district, and i ask him if he’s tried it out. he says no like he would never do it and he makes a joke about if i’ve tried, and i tell him that stuff messes me up in the head. i tell him about the sex club in la and going there so i could write an article about it, and how it fucked up my head for a couple of years, how disgusted and disillusioned i was about sex and people. especially since while i was there, i’d run into someone i’d gone out with, and he was there fucking two girls. his friend leaves, and we’re alone, and he’s buying what i’m selling, even though i’m not sure what it is exactly that i’m selling.

i hate the red light district, i tell him. but i only write what’s true, and i’m writing something and i need to see what goes on in there. so i’ve been trying to get someone to let me go in with them so i can write about it truthfully.

even this is kind of a lie. he’s the first person i’ve broached the subject with. i’m winging it.

you should totally do that, he says. i’ll do it with you.

you would?

he has a train to catch in 45 minutes. i don’t mind because his energy is safe.

let’s talk while we walk, he says, and he’s excited about the idea. now the truth comes out, when earlier he was feigning complete innocence about the district. he wants to go to a specific alley where earlier one of them offered a blowjob for 30 euros. all he has on him now is 25. and he admits he’s gotten a blowjob in belgium before.

personally, i don’t think that qualifies him as a badass just yet. i tell him he should fuck her today since you get both for the same price.

no, i would just get a blowjob. a blowjob’s like nothing. you’re wearing a condom so it’s not like they’re even really touching you, he says.

secretly, i want to know if he’ll fuck her. i want him to answer a question for me. i need to know if he’ll fuck her. so i press on.

i say to him, you know though, one day you’re going to meet your future wife, the person you’ve spent your life looking for, and she’s gonna wanna know all of your skeletons. and she’s gonna find out you’ve had sex with a prostitute and she’s gonna freak out. so would you tell her or would you lie?

why would i tell her something like that, he asks.

because she’ll want to know about your past and she’ll want to know the truth, and you’re going to want to tell her. and if you lie, you’ll have to live for the rest of your life knowing you looked someone who loves you in the eye and lied, but to tell the truth means you have to face the truth. what if she straight out asks you, have you ever had sex with a prostitute?

but i haven’t had sex with a prostitute, he says. i’ve only gotten a blowjob.

well yeah, technically, you could say no because you haven’t actually had sex with a prostitute. but what if you had? would you lie and be able to live with it or would you feel you had to be honest? the knowledge could break her heart.

he considers this.

do you think she would just be happy that i’d gotten that stuff out of my system so i could completely be with her?

w
ho knows, i say. i think mostly she’s just going to wish you hadn’t done it. there was a lot of stuff i could have done in my life. a lot of things i had the opportunity to do, a lot of things i could have done just to know what it’s like, for the experience. but a lot of times i didn’t do it because i would think that one day, when i meet my future husband and he wants to know everything about me, i don’t want to have to lie about anything, i don’t want there to be anything that i’ve done that could potentially break his heart if i could help it. there’s often a choice.

that’s a really noble way to go about things, he says.

not noble, just idealistic, i say. but i get fucked in the head because of it. sometimes i wonder if i should have just said fuck it and let the outside world taint me. sometimes thinking life is more beautiful than what it is, thinking that devotion and faith could be more precious than what it is, makes me feel like my whole life has been a giant idealistic delusion. who the fuck did i think i was that i might be better than this.

we see girls in the windows and he’s asking them how much they would charge for a blowjob. i know they won’t go under 50. i tell him i’ll subsidize him 25 if he fucks a girl. he thinks about it, and i repeat it a few times as we talk to the girls, and he considers it, though he mentions to actually fuck a prostitute is weird. he says he doesn’t think he would be able to come, that a blowjob through a condom is barely touching but to fuck her is so much more and he doesn’t know if he can do it. it means he knows he’s crossing a line, and somewhere inside me, i feel a twitch of something pure that might still be alive inside hungry blackness. bleeding and dying on its knees, but possibly still alive.

he knows there’s a line.

while he ultimately has free will, i know that i’m willing to push him but if he goes through, i won’t be willing to catch him. a part of me has no idea how this would end, but a part of me is hoping that it won’t come to that. for the salvation of both of us, that it won’t come to that. he had asked me to add him to facebook and i will, because whatever happens, we’ll be friends after, because without any other choice, we’ll be connected. but the money is on the table. he doesn’t have enough to get just a blowjob like he wants, and we both know that, so he has a choice and i need to know what he’s going to do.

as he’s thinking about it, i have the strong urge to remind him what’s at stake. once you do it, i say, you’ve done it. it’ll be a permanent part of your personal history.

i really mean this. i mean this because as much as i’m his devil right now, i’m also his friend.

we stand there, on the cobblestone walk that connects to one of the oldest churches in the city a few hundred feet away, connects us to what this area once stood for–hope, faith, a belief in something bigger, better, more pure and holy than the darkness that human hands and hearts create. in a way, i think i know what i’m hoping he’ll say, but i know he has to make the decision on his own.

what time is it, he asks me finally. i pull out my phone and i tell him.

let’s just go to the train station, he says.

i smile, in some ways, proud of him. sure, i say. follow me.

i lead him back to the train station and he asks me about my writing. he asks me why i wanted to experience that and i told him because if we had gone through with it, it would have hurt me tremendously. so you were using me to hurt you, he said. that’s fucked up.

only because you were willing and only if you got something out of it. because it’s something i need to face. once i’ve seen it, i can’t deny it, i have to come to terms with it because there’s nowhere else to hide, i said. i would have had no choice but to look into it, to confront it, to live with it for the rest of my life. but it would have really hurt me.

i can understand that, he said.

it’s starting to rain again as we cross out of the district, back into the real world.

we’re quiet for a bit and then he says, sometimes when i’m mad at a girl, i’ll go out and sleep with three other girls. but it never makes me feel better. it just makes me feel sad about the first girl.

i look at him and smile, sad, happy, who knows on days when it all feels the same.

would you ever cheat on your boyfriend, he asks me.

i don’t know why but the question makes me sad, though the answer is strong and clear and as close to the truth as anything about me.

never, i say.

we get to the corner where we part.

it was really nice meeting you, he says. he holds out his hand but i tell him, i’m gonna give you a hug.

we hug, and it’s strong, like long-time friends saying hello and goodbye in one tight, drawn-out note.

thanks, i say.

good luck, he says, and then we walk away in opposite directions.

*****

the shift was bad. all the positive energy from earlier had dissipated and i was left with just me, my echoes and a feeling of not wanting to be there.

the kid behind the bar knew i was standing out in the rain and came out of nowhere, bringing me a hot coffee drink with a curl of whip cream. i was astounded and touched. it was so cold and miserable out there, it felt like the coffee was saving my life and i was so thankful to him.

the other guy on the shift, a japanese guy from canada with massive dreads, told me to come in and sit, that it was too cold out. so i sat and talked with one of the actresses who was from nebraska. i had half an hour left to go and i was anxious. i didn’t want to go home. i didn’t know what kind of energy i would be bringing home. i was talking with a couple i had talked to a couple of times earlier, and they wanted to talk to me about weed, so i gave them some recommendations. i noticed someone step out of the shadows to my left, and i thought it was him but i wasn’t sure…he had a hood on and was moving fast. i stared at him and then i said his name:

ryan.

how the hell did i remember his name. he put his hood down and smiled. it was the guy from philly from the day before. i was talking with the couple and he was waiting there, so i asked him if he was here to see the show.

what time does it start, he asks.

in 15 minutes.

i have to check with the other guys, he says. but he stands there and waits, and in a way, i’m glad he does.

i finally convince the couple to get their asses into the theater and see the show, and ryan asks me if i’m getting off soon. yes, i say, and i know for sure now that i’m not going home anytime soon. i ask my partner if i can leave and he asks if i want to stay and share a joint with him. i would like to, but i need to see what ryan wants, so i say no thanks and i leave with ryan.

as we walk, he tells me that he overheard me tell the couple that i’m a writer, and asks me about it. he mentions that he also likes to write. as we talk, he apologizes for not answering my questions faster because he’s on shrooms. i tell him that it’s okay.

he wants to find his two friends so i go with him back to their hostel. the outgoing gemini is on myspace and listening to his ipod, and he’s almost orgasmic over how good his music is. ryan informs me that his friend is on mexicans, and their other friend is upstairs on hawaiians. oh crap, i think. hawaiians are the strongest ones and most visual ones. they’re the ones most likely for people to freak out on.

so we go upstairs and indeed his friend is standing outside of their room, looking a combination of terrified and confused.

you guys left me, he said.

you were sleeping, ryan says.

i didn’t know where you guys were.

says he wants to get into the room but he tells ryan that he has to open it and gives him the keys. ryan opens the room and asks him what he nee
ds from the room and he just says, he’s really confused.

c’mon, i say to him. you have to get outside.

we go down the stairs and i’m asking them when they took the shrooms and how much. i’m worried about the kid on hawaiians. we get downstairs and the first guy is gone. i had loaned my lighter to the owner at the door and he lights up when he sees me again. did you see a kid in sunglasses talking about how good his music is?

he went that way, the guy points out the door.

the three of us go looking for their friend. i hand the guy on hawaiians 3 sticks of sugar that i happen to be carrying. if it starts getting too intense at any time, go buy a bottle of water, pour these in, shake it up and drink it, i say. it will help you come down.

he takes the sugar and nods solemnly. i think it’s funny that i sound like i’m an expert when i’ve never done them.

we search mcdonald’s and then the comedy club. they see a latin dance club and ask if maybe he went in there and i ask them if he’s maybe too high to be able to read at this point. finally we see him walking across the tram tracks towards us, giggling and almost skipping.

these guys don’t really know what they want to do so we just walk around. one of them wants to go to the red light district and i flat out say no. why, they ask. because it makes me evil, i say. but it’s because of ryan. there is something beautiful in him, a belief, a hope. a belief in innocence. and i don’t want him to go near anything that could threaten that. as cynical as the mind can get, as devastating as the eyes can see, they must never tell these things to the heart so that it becomes what the heart believes.

as we walk, philly talks to me about writing. he’s a little bit awkward and shy, and it makes me tell that he’s young. he reveals that he’s written a novel, and that he wants to take a dead writers trip across the country, visiting the graves of writers and drinking what they drank. he tells me about one of charles bukowski’s poems that made him cry, and i take out my pen and take down the name of it, because i really want to read it so i can understand what moves him. i tell him that i would like to read his work.

he sees one of the more majestic buildings in the city lit up against the night, and he stops and admires it. it’s beautiful, he says. i grew up in a bad neighborhood. i’m not saying the hood or anything, but it was an ugly neighborhood. so i love seeing buildings that are beautiful. he laughs, embarrassed, and walks away. i don’t want to lead them too far, but i don’t want them to go drink beer or smoke weed like they want to. again, i’m worried about the guy on hawaiians. so we double back and i lead them back towards the area where their hostel is.

philly asks me questions about what made me move here and i tell him it’s because i met someone. i tell him that it’s really true out here, that a lot of people come out here to visit for a couple of days, but then they meet someone and they end up living here. he asks me how long it took for me to decide to live in europe and i tell him a few months. he says that he wouldn’t mind living in europe.

i take them around, but it’s getting late and they’re still an hour away from when i think they should hit a dance club. before i go, philly wants to know if i like the same music as him, so i look through his ipod and see enough that i recognize to let him know that i understand and appreciate his music taste. he wants to add me on facebook so i promise him i’ll look him up tonight.

i had a question though.

i ask him if he happened to walk up to the theater and run into me, or if he had gone specifically looking for me.

i was looking for you, he says without hesitation.

that’s really sweet, i say, and i’m astounded by the honesty between us. good luck with writing.

he reaches out his hand but i give him a hug, then give the others a hug and say goodbye.

be careful, i tell them, and in that moment, i’m really happy for them, happy to have met them. i get to the tram stop just as the tram i need is pulling in, and i get on, happy for no complicated goodbyes today.

now in the dark again, i feel safe, but i am also afraid that after i sleep, tomorrow will be an entirely new, invigorated beast.

how to separate the head from the tail of darkness.

how to believe in innocence again.

i’m in fremont right now, preparing to celebrate my mother’s birthday before i leave for amsterdam.

the last few weeks have been emotionally tumultuous as i prepared for this trip, and on a greater scale, the actual embarkment on the rest of my life.

the last month and a half (since the day before my birthday) was marked by a version of myself i’ve never seen before and one i could barely recognize, but as they say, the night is darkest just before dawn, and now in hindsight, i see it as the necessary rite of passage into darkness in order for me to emerge, cleansed, so that i may enter the next stage of my life.

if you know how dismissively, condescendingly, cruelly, rudely i’ve been treating david, then i’m sure you’ve heard it from me, not him, because as much as it sucks at times for him, he keeps saying he expected this and has been pretty philosophical for the most part. but me…i’ve been more than happy to confess to anyone who will lend an ear as to how poorly i have behaved around this man, who is one of the most sincere and devoted people i’ve ever met. i’m reading the kite runner right now, and got to a passage today where the narrator is unnerved by his friend because he’s the kind of person who knows only how to speak honestly, and it makes the narrator want to be cruel. i know the impulse, know it more personally than i wish i did.

they say the only things that really hurt us are the thing we know to be true. and sometimes, you meet someone who can be so unabashingly vulnerable because they are sure that if they love someone purely, that love will be returned in unadulterated form. unconditional love, in reciprical fashion, where it regenerates into infinity–the holy grail of energy that can be exchanged between two people. we understand why we seek it, we understand why we want it, but sometimes what we never expect, is what it will be like when we finally encounter it. sometimes, when faced with someone who wants to give it to you because they truly believe it will be accepted, you realize the truth of yourself–that the anger and resentment and self-loathing in your internal closet make your hands too dirty and scarred to possibly handle something so pure from someone who has laid their trust in your hands.

so you soil it. you destroy it. you want to teach them a lesson to show them that boy, did they peg you wrong…that you should never feed a beast brooding in its cage. and then you remember an afternoon that one spring, when a lonely, misunderstood little boy who adored you beyond reason, walked into your bedroom with a handmade valentine because you were the only true love he knew, and you pretended to rip it in half because you couldn’t possibly believe you were worthy of being loved by anyone who wasn’t as ugly as you.

but who are you really trying to hurt? the people who love you?

or you?

that afternoon, michael, just 6 years old, took it like a trooper, telling me, oh well, like he had just asked me if i wanted to take him swimming. but he had tears in his eyes as he turned and walked out. i waited until i heard his footsteps fade, my entire body pulsing with disappointment and anger towards myself, why i was so fucked up that i would hurt someone to that degree who just wanted to love me. i put the valentine on the wall where it remains to this day, but i refused to let myself cry, told myself i would kill myself if i cried because i didn’t deserve it, just the same way i dare myself to cry when i take out this memory from the perfectly preserved box where i keep it so i can cut myself with it every time i try to think i might be a good person. that box is filled with all of my precious sharp objects.

******

it started to get to the point where i made david cry a couple of times a week. all i had to do was infuse every word with spite, every silence with raging passive-aggression, every response with cutting resentment. i would tell him that i had doubts he was “the one.” that we weren’t mentally compatible. that perhaps he should just find someone who was less complicated to be with because then he’d be happier. when i was feeling particularly cruel, i would tell him that i didn’t want to be with him, that i would rather be with someone else. sometimes he would get really angry and put his foot down, letting me know that this relationship was mine to fuck up, that he’s being patient but i’ve been acting completely out of line and i’d better start showing him some respect and start appreciating him. this would usually tone me down, so that on days when i was able to wrestle a bit of control of myself, i would warn him that relationships should make you the best version of yourself that you can be, but for some reason, i was turning into a worse version of myself that i’d never encountered before, and that he should find someone who could treat him better. but he would tell me that he knew he could find someone else, but he wanted to see me get a hold of myself and grow out of this so that i could get to a place where i could be with him.

we went back and forth, me being secretly terrified of every interaction, terrified of what i would do or say next. every unimagineable act of disrespect towards him would quickly be followed up by a confession to a close friend, so that my loved ones could know what a piece of shit i’d become. i was bleeding all over the place, and i didn’t know how to stop it.

why do you keep doing this, they would all say. always, why. and i didn’t know. i honestly didn’t know. i didn’t know anything except that it made me feel really good, the way cutting yourself to see if it bleeds feels good because a part of you doesn’t really think you can bleed, even though some nights, i would wake myself up crying.

*****

i believe in the hollywood bowl. that it’s magic.

i had told myself i would not go to amsterdam just to be a crazy bitch to david. especially when this person i had become was someone i couldn’t even recognize in the mirror, someone my friends couldn’t believe existed when i told them about me, even when i swore up and down i’d really said the things i’d said to this guy who’d been nothing but kind and generous with me. the level of rage inside me terrified me, and it only made me more thirsty for blood.

aubrey and candice flew in on saturday for the gnarls barkley concert the next day. we hung out and somehow, the conversation turned to the movie closer. i have it, i said to candice. suddenly, i had a desperate need to watch it that night, and was terrified that they wouldn’t be willing to since it’s a pretty dark, difficult movie. but candice agreed and we put it in.

the thing about the movie is the question of motivation–why does each character do what they do. dan (jude law) has a meeting of fate with alice, and leaves his girlfriend for her. alice (natalie portman), magnetic and muse-like, motivates dan to pursue his personal potential. once dan publishes his first novel, he leaves alice for anna (julia roberts), who simultaneously leaves larry (clive owen) whom she finds too simple for her when compared to the complexity of dan, the idealistic, closetly self-loathing artist.

when dan informs alice that what he’s about to say will hurt, that he’s leaving her for anna, alice tearfully asks him why he won’t let her love him, why he doesn’t think he deserves to be loved. but whether or not he’s convicted about his decision, she disappears.

when larry discovers that anna has been having an affair, he demands her to reveal every grotesque detail of the sex in one of the most emotionally brutal scenes ever committed to celluloid, until she’s given him enough details for him to destroy the part of himself that loves her. once he’s had enough, he thanks her and tell her to go fuck off and die. in the end, larry, who’s simple but not stupid, turns out to be someone who can command the game at will if he chooses to (and originally he had chose
n not to, trying to preserve the illusion and idealism of love, but reverted to his cold, hard truth, that women don’t understand the territory because they are the territory). alice realizes that truth for dan is not what’s important to dan, but rather the illusion of love. she realizes that dan will never love her because he can’t see her, the value of what she can truly give him, and that he is only in love with the idea of love.

watching this movie made me think of many things. aubrey noted that alice is a character who has an ambiguous relationship with the truth and is at the core, distrustful. yet, she offered the purest degree of devotion to dan, who didn’t understand or appreciate it. alice, who often lies, tells the truth to strangers because it doesn’t matter–they don’t know the difference and will never be able to use it against her to get close to her. they will only see her for the superficial things she possesses which have no true value. but to those who matter to her, she tells lies as smokescreens, almost to see if they will be able to get past them to see who she really is, the true value beyond all that is superficial that she can give–the ability to unconditionally love someone. i liken it to trading currency. if you are someone who possesses gold and you live in a world of bead traders, people who obsess with worthless beads, who fight and even murder for beads, you know that what they have has no value while what you have has great value. but you wouldn’t want to trade your gold for beads because you know that the bead trader will never understand or appreciate the value of your gold. you want to trade with someone who understands the value of what you trade in.

(by the way, it didn’t go unnoticed that natalie portman was nominated for an oscar for this role whose complexities and subtleties she played perfectly. also not unnoticed, was the fact she’s a gemini projecting into this character.)

i realized why i like strangers, why i always lay smokescreens to people who try to get close to me. i’ve always gone back to the sword in the stone analogy, how the right person can remove the sword even after being told it’s impossible, how the right person will have the key that turns the lock. why do people who are basically honest people lie? because they are protecting what they have to offer, if they know what they offer has great value and can not be given away to someone who can not understand the value of it. if you don’t trust people, you set things up so that only someone who appreciates the value of what they’re seeing within the illusion can reach it, thus by reaching it, you know they are someone who deserves it. no, it’s not the simplest way to go about things, but most people don’t really understand the value of what i’m capable of giving, so i have to be careful of only giving it to someone who will inspire me to give it.

then came the scene where larry demands that anna give him every detail of her sexual affair, even though it’s excruciating to him. i understood his motivation perfectly, the need to destroy something so real and honest within him. he needed her to cut him, destroy a part of him, hurt it so that it could never want anything real, honest and naive again. he wanted her to destroy his belief in something, his belief that love in its ideal, transcendental form can be anything real when it’s laid in the hands of fucked up fallible human beings. he needed her to kill it, to kill the part of him that ever dared believe that love could be real, that there could be any beauty between two people that transcends them beyond animals who somehow found a way to clothe themselves and convince themselves of the possibility of a god. if it’s true that it’s the loss of hope, not the loss of lives that determines the outcome of a war, then in the struggle to believe there is more to life than what is grounded by physical reality would begin and end in the idealism encompassed by our notions of romantic love. sometimes, we will kill our belief, so that we may never hope again, so that we may never again suffer the treachery of disappointment.

i went to sleep that night and awoke to what i thought to be a large spider descending towards my face. i rolled out of bed, screaming, and realized that where once i had a net above my bed that protected my dreamscape, now there was only me, surrounded by a hollow silence devoid of echoes.

******
we met up with friends at the hollywood bowl and i went through the motions of small-talking but i really didn’t feel like talking to people. lauren and pradeep came up and pradeep asked me how things were with david. not good, i said. i really have to get my head straight or i’m going to lose him.

the show was good and full of energy, but i was lost. i took a walk around the bowl, watching people, trying to find clues to help me unravel the thoughts and feelings tangled up so badly inside me that i couldn’t even get inside of myself anymore. i walked along the treeline at the ridge of the bowl, where the lights of the stage are unable to penetrate the darkness. in the sky, two large floodlights criss-crossed to form an X, as if to let god know that this is where he could find us all. in the distance, was a large cross blazing brightly against the hill, and above, was the moon. everyone was here, but for what?

i walked around, seeing people i actually recognized in my daily life, familiar faces of strangers i’d seen during my routines who recognized me, but none of them seemed like the people i should be talking to. i wandered back into our section and ran into lauren, and we took a walk. how did you know pradeep was the one, i asked her as we stood in the shadows of writhing dancers. she turned to look at me, seriously considering the question. i guess i always knew, she said. i just didn’t really trust myself, so i had to get to a place where i did.

i smiled at her and thanked her, thanked her for her truth.

i texted david on the way home asking if i could call him, and by the time i got home, there was really only one thing i could think of to say.

i’m really sorry for how i’ve acted and how i’ve treated you for the last month and a half, i said.

what was that?, he asked.

i repeated it and he asked me to repeat it again because he couldn’t quite hear me but started laughing. i was grateful for his forgiveness and his understanding.

oh, i’m so happy, he said. i was waiting for you to get to this point. you just needed to go through it all so you could get here, but i’m glad you finally got here.

i told him about watching closer and the things i understood. i admitted to him that i’ve been cruel to him because i was being cruel to myself, that there was a part of myself i was intent on destroying because it’s the part that wants to believe that people don’t always end up hurting you and disappointing you. that all this rage and resentment i’ve been directing towards him was just all the rage and resentment i had towards myself for getting me into a situation where i was going to get hurt.

i’m not going to hurt you, he said. i’m not going to let you down.

well, you can’t really say that. no one can really say that. but at the end of the day, sometimes these are things you just have to go through because there’s no alternative. punishing people who want to be close to you because you’ve been punishing yourself for a lifetime for thinking you might be anything more than something completely unloveable is not an alternative. i just can’t do this anymore.

i think we lock ourselves in our own invisible prisons. i don’t know what happens to us in our childhoods that cuts us the way they do, but some of us carry on the torture by reminding ourselves of those feelings and experiences in which we weren’t able to protect ourselves from the hurt, fear, anger, rage, guilt, helplessness or disappointment of our past, until we’ve built giant, formidable defenses around ourselves that tear e
ven the most gungho conquerors to shreds. and then along wanders one naked, courageous, well-meaning soul who politely knocks on your door offering nothing but unconditional love, and as you point all of your jagged edges and bloodied weapons at him, screaming that this is a bloody fucking war and threatening him with every intention to destroy him for the sheer audacity of walking into your battlefield thinking you could be tricked into believing in anything again, you suddenly realize, when the echo of your own shouting dies down, that you’re the one who’s completely naked, exposed for the scared, wounded child you claim isn’t you but whom you protect with an implacable savage vengeance, when the war is no longer haunting any other living soul but you.

it’s time to go home, kid.

the war’s over.

no rest for the wicked

gemini. when you are going around confessing your sins, finding them spilling out of you like a shot in the gut too massive and complicated to be contained with two bare hands, it means you’re bleeding.

when you make others bleed so you can have a mirror to see your own wounds, you need to understand that it hurts, but they do it for you because they love you.

whether or not you asked for this, if they’re giving this to you, then you better do the honorable thing which is to understand as much as you can from these reflections so you can start healing.

From 3/19:

In one of my dreams last night, I was hanging out on a lazy afternoon with a good friend of mine. I told her, marriages are like pancakes–you screw up the first one, but the next ones are better. You do it, you figure out your mistakes and the second time around, you know who you are, you know what you want, and you know what’s achievable and what’s not and it’s better. While there are plenty of first marriages that do work because they’ve been built on strong foundations, this learning curve is a major reason why so many first marriages fail and second marriages succeed.

I woke up amused. That was totally a conversation I would have in real life.

I think in hindsight, I was driven by that knowledge. As it neared the end, I secretly hoped my relationship with Reggie was a close enough simulation of a first marriage, because in a way, in hindsight, I did view it as a sacrifice in hopes that whatever came next would be the sum of efforts, knowledge and giving up something that was of great value to pave way for something amazing. Maybe it’ll turn out to be an idealistic pipedream. I don’t know. But I have to be open to the possibility instead of knowingly settling.

I’ve also learned that your history, your memories, your life as you live it now, not as you always imagined it would be…these are all yours. You own it so you have the ownership to do what you want with it. Your life is not perfect because there’s no such thing, but it’s yours. And as with everything, you can either choose to accept it or not. It’s much easier to make changes though, if you accept it. Everything that you’ve experienced, everyone you’ve known, every interaction and thought, belongs to you for better or worse. How you decide to cherish it or not, is also a personal decision.

Some days when I’m alone, I think about my life and I wonder if I’m a good person. I know my core motivations are pure. Nothing makes me happier than making another living person smile and feel warmth. I like protecting those who are not as strong as others, and I like reminding people of their hopes and dreams and personal potentials when they seem to have gotten sidetracked. But these are just these psychic hugs I give people that for whatever reason, seems to make them blossom. The sincerity is real, but the person isn’t exactly there. You’ve been touched by a projection. Because the only thing I ask for in exchange, occasionally demanding it when necessary, is for no attachment. I know that comes off badly sometimes. I know some people have gotten hurt. But the thing is, we had a positive experience together, you got something and I got something, but I can’t be in everyone’s life to the same degree as these interactions. I don’t like getting too attached to too many people because at the end of the day, caring deeply is a responsibility I take seriously.

I need the freedom to get out and meet a lot of different people, to understand human hopes and dreams despite disappointment and pain, and how to use my energy to bring about positive change. I care about people and I love everyone in a broad, spiritual way, the way someone admires the view of a sprawling forest without having to own the trees. But there are always individual people who I’ve accepted into my life, and whether they suspect it or not, to be accepted in my life means I’ve woven you into my emotional fibers. It means that I’ve accepted that someday, when death separates us, it will be a deep and sorrowful loss, but I’ve accepted that consequence, borrowed against a future debilitating pain for the pleasure of caring about you and having you close to my heart. I’ll take your well-being as personally as my own, and I’ll always see the beauty in you and want you to attain everything you want out of life, putting out my energy in ways you may not realize to move you towards that.

It’s important to me that I surround myself with people I truly care about, people I would go to war for, but it doesn’t mean I’m not sincere and genuine to everyone else. I just don’t want to be committed emotionally and spiritually to too many people. And the problem is that after one of these random connections, people don’t always want to let me leave and it becomes messy, sometimes ruining the positive exchange. In turn, that makes me not let as many people in. But if everyone promises to behave and not cling to me and pull me into weird little repressed dramas where I don’t belong, I’m going to try to get more involved with people. Just please…separate the message from the messenger.

Let’s make this a positive experience.

From 3/20:

alright.

i’m back.

like i said, i’ve been taking a final. it’s not so much an exam as a practical.

the good news is i found another one of my soulmates and as comforting and difficult as it was, i know that the experience changed me in a way that i know i can never go back to where i was. the flipside is, i have much work to do.

berlin was interesting, not so much as the city itself, as it was the place that allowed me to break open a side of myself that had previously been buried. it’s a wonderfully artistic, creative city and they’ve left remnants of its previous life and the scars it bears as a reminder of where they’ve been, and a place they hope to never return.

like me.

i look at it though, and i am not sure that my scars are things i can leave behind in the past, even though emotionally, intellectually and spiritually, i have dealt with my pain and left it behind. my body will never let go.

the experience that i have never talked about directly in a coherent manner, i relived, as a ghost in the room hanging over me, demanding attention. it brought me to my knees and despite the presence of a stranger, albeit one who felt like he’d known me his entire life, i wept uncontrollably as i grasped the way the shadow of my past has followed me throughout my adult life, even into this new awakening as i’ve harnessed my power.

i need you to know something.

secrets have secret lives. they burrow into you in ways that you can be consciously aware, even if you refuse to admit the extent of the universes they’ve established inside you. no matter how small or insignificant, a secret can sometimes carry itself to the point that all those around you who care about you can feel it, yet with an intimate psychic agreement, they’ve agreed out of respect and feelings for you never to touch it and bring it out into the open.

but you keep a secret in, and it will kill you.

I didn’t have a bad childhood or anything. It was okay, though I don’t remember much. I remember I ate plant food once because it was out by the sink. It was in this white plastic tub like the kind margarine comes in, and it had these little white balls like cake sprinkles that I thought might mean it was something sweet. My mom caught me putting a handful in my mouth and started yelling, but being scared just made me swallow. She grabbed my hand and slapped at it over the sink to make me drop the rest of it that was clenched in my fist. My dad was laughing as he walked in behind her. “Now you’re gonna have a little plant growing inside your stomach. What are you gonna name it?” he said as he snapped the lid back on. I think I started bawling. I’ve always been a bit of a coward. And the thought of having a plant growing inside of me was terrifying.

My dad had a big German shepherd for a little while. We weren’t very close. He was an outside dog and sometimes we played, but my dad warned me never to pet him if his tail wasn’t wagging. We ended up having to give him away after he bit the kid of one of my dad’s friend’s on the shoulder, but I don’t think anyone was sad. My mom was too busy to get to know him and I think my dad got tired of him. That dog never really seemed that excited about living with us anyway, more like he put up with us. Maybe he felt like he landed with the wrong family, a group of complete incompatibles with his personality type, the way adopted kids sometimes do.

The only interesting thing that I can remember was this one neighborhood kid, Jamie. He was maybe a couple of years older than me, about 8, and his parents were never home. He had Duck Hunt on Nintendo so I always wanted to go to his house to play. The game was in their guest room, so we would sit on the edge of the bed, a proximity that allowed me to hold the gun up and be only inches away from the screen for extra accuracy. The thing I loved about it was that he would let me shoot at those animated ducks for hours and he was content to just sit next to me and watch, never wanting to take turns. That’s something I always hated. The waiting part of taking turns.

I was at his house one day playing Duck Hunt when I looked over, and Jamie was staring at the screen, his face kind of zoned out. I looked down to see that he had zipped his pants open, and the tiny head of his penis was poking out, and he was twisting it idly with his fingers as he stared at the screen. I think he noticed that a lot of ducks were going by without me firing any shots, so he looked over and saw that I was staring at his hand.

“What are you doing?” I asked, confused with a tinge of panic.

“Watching you play,” he said, his voice flat.

“Don’t do that,” I said, jumping off the bed.

He got this evil little grin, the one that boys get when they’re running around with a spider or a snake outstretched in their hands, sending us girls into screaming hysterics.

He jumped off the bed and waved his little bitty thing at me, up and down, up and down, flop, flop, flop, laughing gleefully at me.

I stared at him, frozen, overwhelmed by how to proceed. Then…I was gone. I ran out the door, down his stairs and out his front door, ran….my legs pounding me all the way home.

He lived across the street then four houses down, and I ran the whole way with him in pursuit. I don’t think he let go of his penis the entire time. Our automatic garage door was open so I ran in, then hit the button to close it, but the thing was so damn slow that he slipped in underneath. He was cackling with excitement, something that scared me more as something primal inside was telling me to be terrified of what might happen if I let him catch me. He chased me into my own house, up our stairs, all the way to my room but I was able to slam the door and lock it just in time. He pounded on it for a while, laughing with a joy that I’ve since identified as simply a mental state of — “not okay.” He begged me, cajoled me, told me he was only kidding. That he’d put it away so it was safe for me to come out. But I wouldn’t answer him, my back pressed against the door with my feet grinding into the carpet in case he managed to figure out how to unlock the door (any ballpoint pen inserted in the hole under the handle would have done the trick). His pounding got more persistent, more aggressive. “Open the door!” he yelled. He seemed furious now. Personally offended. He got down and tried to wiggle his fingers under the door as I curled away in terror, but thankfully, the thick carpet of my room only let him get the tips in which quickly frustrated him more. After what seemed like a lifetime of assaulting my fragile panic room, he gave the door a last cowering kick and yelled, “You’re no fun!” followed by footsteps stomping down our hall.

I stayed on the floor in front of my door until the sun went down, until my room slowly turned into shadows, until I could hear night sounds fill the dark expanse outside my window. Finally, I heard my mom pull up in the driveway and into our garage.

I didn’t come out until she tried my door and found it locked. She paused, then knocked tentatively.

“Honey? Are you in there?”

I opened the door, looking around furtively behind her. I wasn’t convinced Jamie wasn’t hiding somewhere in the house, still waiting to catch me alone.

“Yeah,” I said, probably looking at her like I would disintegrate if she let me out of her sight.

She looked at me, then at my darkened room with a mother’s concern. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah,” I said.

I reached for her hand, and together, we went downstairs to the kitchen, and as I sat in one of the high kitchen stools in front of the counter, I watched her transfer vegetables and packages from the refrigerator to the sink to prepare dinner. She cut the vegetables carefully and with great concentration, then put them in a rinsed bowl as she washed the slime off the chicken pieces. She told me to open a window as she dropped the chunks of meat into heated oil, which I did obediently. A thick cloud of white smoke rose above the pan instantly as the room filled with sizzling. I could smell the cool fall air through the wire mesh of the screen as the warm aroma of garlic and cooking meat wafted by me, mingling, and I realized I’d been holding all the air in my chest the entire time, only taking shallow breaths.

“You have a good day?” she asked, her spatula scraping the pan at random intervals.

“Yeah,” I said, my face pressed into the screen, taking slow breaths, in and out, filling myself with these familiar smells. Because everything that was bad was now safely tucked in the past. And everything in the right now was finally okay.

last night i admitted to someone that i am a ghost.

i knew he was going to ask me out. it had been brewing for a few months. but i have been switching up my schedule so that people can’t find me, and i had been deflecting his feeler inquiries into my status because i’ve been working really hard lately on whatever it is i’m working on, focusing my energy, understanding personal power and my path. i have to stay focused. but he finally did it. he was polite about it, a little awkward. and his energy felt kind, so i never like to discourage anyone who is kind and positive by nature. so i agreed, looking forward to it as much as i was apprehensive. would i be able to act like a normal human being, not revealing too much about this other side of me? would i be fun and interesting and lighthearted, considering i’ve been intensely plumbing the spiritual depths for so long? would i come off like a sex-craved animal considering i’m going at least 10 months strong on withholding sex from myself? would i sexually assault him? is that necessarily a bad thing?

we went to dinner and had pleasant conversation. small talk. i was still safe. normal flirting, i was interesting, funny, letting him make tiny discoveries that i am full of surprises. remembering that i’m a very good first date. he surprised me as well. intelligent, cultured, a soothing comfortable energy. he dropped compliments that he found me attractive. then religion came up. i was cautious. said i was spiritual, but not religious, but i appreciated religion as a way for people to find their path to spirituality, the way some people didn’t need to go to college to be successful in their career path, while others used college to help them gain the knowledge to where they wanted to go. i didn’t believe in religion as the end all be all because i felt it was a method to achieve spirituality, and i definitely didn’t believe in any religion that spouted obedience by manipulating people’s fear and shame. but i believed that there is a greater power, and that we all belong to it as much as it belongs to us. he said that he believed jesus is the way. the subject passed.

we went to a piano bar. it was a really good time. he really wanted to get me drunk. 4 tequila shots, the only thing that doesn’t make me sick. defenses failing. true self coming out. i wanted to kiss him, even though i wasn’t sure if i liked him in a way in which i wanted to build anything together, where i could commit to showing up and consistently being the same person. it’s strictly chemicals coursing through my blood. like i said, sometimes it’s like that with me. born on venus raised on mars. primal mentality. almost a years worth of sexual energy pent up to force creative output, but still crafty about a more electric release. but it’s just about the release, the conquest. one and done. catch and release. never hunt and kill, but still…a loss of interest. leave and move on to another chase. cast a cheap pallor on everything else exchanged that had actually been sincere and real. so i withheld myself.

he is circling closer. he says he’s blown away, that he liked me before, but now that he’s discovered this whole other spiritual side to me, he’s blown away. uh oh. he sees. i might freak you out, i say. nothing you could say or do could freak me out, he says. don’t say i didn’t warn you, i say.

we go back to his place. turn down the lights. turn on some music. relax. he does not come on to me. he gives me my space so i am not scared. so the words come. the words come like a broken radio i can’t turn off because it’s not plugged in. he sat there, fixated, motionless. words going by that made sense to him, about his childhood, his life experience, his purpose. things that i didn’t know why i seemed to know, thoughts, ideas and observations that seemed to come from someone who knew him better than i did, and i was just a 3rd party listening in on this conversation.

i was explaining to him that he’s a special person, that he’s had a hard life but having gone to hell and back, having looked at utter destruction of the self dead in the face and facing a decision to give up on yourself or save yourself because you realize you care about yourself, you’re stronger. you’ve learned what true courage is, and that you have it in you. because you looked death in the eye and you said, i want to live. and after that, you know that nothing can hurt you, that there’s nothing in this world that you could ever be afraid of. don’t be afraid to stand up and be amazing. be amazing in your own unique way, because every single person in this world has a special talent. it may not look like mine, it may not look like other people’s that you admire, but you have something to offer this world that only you have, so you have to show people. in fact, i don’t know what it is, but i know you do. he nodded. don’t doubt yourself, i said. your path is to share your exceptionalness with those around you, so that they can also recognize their own power, and so they can pass along the knowledge.

these words. these words and phrases and ideas. they just kept spilling out from a place close to the right side of my head and out of my mouth. i was surprised by how wise and confident they were, considering i had no control over them and didn’t feel like i was making things up, performing a magic trick. this was making sense to him. what was happening in the moment, was completely unexpected, but we both could feel it was important. and i was learning from these words at the same time he was absorbing it.

when i was done, he bowed his head, processing. then he looked up and said, “thank you. i am grateful that you chose to communicate with me.” i said your welcome.

but then the other part of me got conscious, insecure. “that was weird, what just happened, right?”

he smiled and nodded sincerely. “yeah, that was definitely unusual and unique.”

i was a little embarrassed and a little terrified. “i don’t know how i do that. it’s like something is speaking through me and just using me to deliver it.”

“i think god speaks through you.” he was serious.

“i don’t know where it comes from, but i know it’s a positive energy that changes people’s lives.”

he takes his time to gather his thoughts before he speaks, slowly.

“i know that i will remember you for the rest of my life. i will remember the time you granted to spend with me, and the message you gave me. there are times when you realize you will always remember someone, and i know, in this moment, that i will always remember you, because this has been significant.”

i’m blown away. this man is so incredibly honest, and i’m grateful to him beyond words. he is looking at me in the way that i know he’s surprised to suddenly find that he’s in love with me, and i am suddenly feeling self-conscious, shy.

“be careful,” i say.

a tiny smile around his lips. “of what?”

“i can’t let anyone get close to me.”

“why?”

“because if i love someone, if i commit to someone, i will want to give all this energy to one person. and my gut tells me that this is selfish, to only give to one person. that i’m not living up to my potential of the positive changes i could help other people with, even though i hope that some day, this path will be complete so i can settle down and live a normal life with people close to me.”

my loneliness is radiating out of my chest, overwhelming me, almost a physical sadness. a part of me wants him to say, you don’t have to do this anymore…it’s okay.

“you’re of the wind. you’re like a gypsy, going where you’re needed. it’s very cool. what you do is a good thing that the world needs, so it’s important that you keep doing it.”

my heart sinks. i wanted to be off the hook.

he looks at me for a long time, and i get a little nervous. i don’t like it when people direct all their attention a
t me when it’s just me. because i am not it. he asks me if i want any water, any ice cream, anything to make me more comfortable. he’s very concerned. i tell him not to worry about me. he says, “i want to give you a present. i just don’t know what yet, but i want to give you a present.”

i say, “why? you don’t have to give me anything.”

he says, “i feel like you just gave me a lot, and i want to give you something back.”

i say, “it’s okay. you don’t have to give me anything.”

he asks me, “what do you get out of this? delivering these messages to people?”

no one has ever cared enough to ask me that. he surprises me.

“if these messages help people discover their true paths, they’ll find peace and contentment in their hearts. they’ll radiate love which will in turn, affect the people around them. it makes this world a better place by expanding awareness of our connections with each other, and this is important to me, because this is the path i serve. i remind people that there is a greater power out there, and not to lose faith in themselves and their own unique paths. in terms of just for me, it’s like if we didn’t have such things are mirrors, you would never be able to see what you look like. i have no accurate mirror. i don’t understand what this is, what happens, because it’s like i go into another room, but i can hear what’s going on, but i can’t see. i have no idea what i look like, how people perceive me, what i look like from the outside when this is happening. when i have this type of connection with someone, usually they’ll give me something, a clue that helps me understand who i am, what i am. because i honestly have no idea, and it tortures me to not know what i look like. i’ve always felt like my life purpose, i’m searching for an answer to a question i don’t even know. and i keep searching and searching. but then i meet someone and have a connection like we just did, and it’s like, unexpectedly, we find that i am the answer to their question.” he nods enthusiastically. “it’s unbelievable but it’s true,” he says.

“when i tell people these things and they realize that what is happening is the answer to something they’ve been searching for whether or not they were conscious of it, like a key and a lock, my hope is that they’ve gained enough understanding to explain to me, what is the question that i have just answered? because i seem to be answering the same question, because it’s similar people in similar stages of their lives that are drawn to me. that is ultimately what i’m trying to understand. it’s so mysterious and frustrating. but i think that a lot of us are like that. we are the unique answers to a lot of other people’s soul questions, and when we meet, the riddle is complete, even though each side doesn’t necessarily know which mystery was just given light. you are the unique answer for certain people’s questions, and you know this when you meet them and a whole other level reveals itself.”

he nods. “thank you. thank you for spending this time with me. what you do is almost like divine communication, it’s a power that comes from inside you that that is so positive and full of love, that a person who hears the message opens up and also responds to you with love. it’s an incredible and beautiful experience. there is a part of me now that truly and deeply cares for you.”

the me that is not fully developed hears this and gets scared, even though the higher part of me asks me to calm down. “you have to be careful. i don’t know how to let people get close to me because it’s terrifying to me. i try to live gently and carefully, but i’ve also got defenses that are not nice to keep people out that i can’t control yet so i don’t want to accidentally hurt you. just know that the message has nothing to do with the messenger, that i’m a fucked up flawed human being just trying to find my way like everyone else. i’m a kid…so know that what is happening is not me, but happening through me. i’m a ghost. i deliver messages and disappear. you might not ever see me again, but know that what was exchanged was real and for you.”

don’t become attached to me, is what i’m saying. from this point on, i can only disappoint you.

“so this may be it?” he says.

“i don’t know,” i say. because i really don’t. we stay up until 3am, like we know, as soon as this connection is over, as soon as day breaks, the magic will be gone. and then we are again, two people, on separate paths, serving our own unique purposes.

believe in magic, is the last thing i tell him. this world is full of magic. and if you believe in it, that we can change the world with our minds, our hearts and our energy, you will meet more people just like you and i to remind you that you are not alone. you will meet those who are also hiding, thinking to themselves that they are alone in their uniqueness. the ignorant who held power have taken advantage of us when we were young, manipulating us to believe we are the lesser minority that is inferior, broken, defective, because the truth was threatening and opened up questions that they had no answers to. the truth of our difference is that we are courageous, wise, powerful and more aware of our connection to the greater entity outside of our bodies. this awareness, once embraced, makes us the shepherds for those who vibrate at lower levels and have fear in their hearts. we have power if we can focus it, to make change, to heal. believe that there are others out there, and you’ll be drawn to each other, to teach and to learn, so you won’t be afraid to believe in yourself and your unique purpose. don’t feel alone, because you’re not.

he really is a lovely person whose receptiveness and kindness allowed me to listen and learn as well. i am thankful for having met him and spent time with him.

nevertheless, i woke up this morning, melancholy, feeling like i lost something i really loved.

It is hard to seduce a person who lacks imagination.

believe whatever you want to believe. that’s the beauty of it, because i am whatever you want to believe, and that’s all that matters. it has nothing to do with me.

but those who know me, know the truth, and that’s the beauty of that as well.

i am nothing
i am insignificant
just a whirlwind of half-materialized hopes and dreams masquerading as the shadow of an almost human being
borne of a seething loneliness that managed to grow itself a set of teeth.
but sometimes i remind you of something nagging
deep inside yourself just out of your grasp that you love or hate
but you can’t quite figure out which

just give it time.

you’ll soon find out there’s not much difference.

hahaha

it’s all bullshit.

this tearing myself down then building myself up.

tearing myself down

building myself up

tearing myself down

tearing myself down

tearing myself down

with practice, i am getting faster at it. soon i’ll be a new person every morning that i wake up.

it’s all a restart. new life, a new personality.

yet nothing really changes except your memory gets worse. and then people on the street are saying hi to you and recognizing you, but you don’t know who they are.

i think it’s like drugs, this process.

the more you do it, the more and more you lose a little bit of yourself, yet you’re compelled to keep going.

it’s like a snake. shedding. but instead of growing, something in you gets smaller. and the other voices get more distinct.

i tell you though. snakes are beautiful creatures.

colin told me that when a writer creates a character, that character stays with him for the rest of his life.

i said, i know. they haunt you.

i asked him if the characters in a person’s head are coming or going. do they only come in when you make them up because by imagining them you’ve invited them in, or are writers just crazy people who spend their lives desperately trying to exorcise these screaming tormented souls who were born into the world with them, demanding a voice, so that one day they can have the peace of a quiet mind? maybe we talk to dead people and don’t even know it. maybe we are the dead people, and don’t even know it.

i will say this though.

you can listen to us, but be aware. writers walk the edge of darkness like madmen along midnight train tracks. we are the quicksand that entices you with hypnotic promises of adventure, knowing full well that to accept us is to succumb to us. when we invite you in for a ride, you trust us not to lead you to someplace damaging, destructive. someplace so completely raw and overwhelmingly intimate as to destroy all boundaries. all sense of reality. but to be honest, that requires a lot of restraint. to not fuck with that trust. to not fuck with the fact that you trust us not to reach into your heads and fuck you where you’re the most vulnerable, where all that is logical is clutched tightly so that everything is in its place, a reality that’s compartmentalized and predictable. continuity is comfortable, isn’t it? yeah, it makes you feel like you actually have some control over your destiny. but you know it’s fragile. a person’s tenuous grasp on his perception of reality is his weakest link. admit it. we depend on the visions, ideas and inspiration of people who straddle the frail, frail line between genius and madness, hoping that what they project to us is the truth that could save us. there’s a 50/50 chance you’re following a madman into the abyss.

i’m just saying that every coin has 3 sides.

2 that belong to him.

and the 1 that is his shadow.

i’m going into withdrawals because i’m forcing isolation on myself and half of me is struggling. sometimes i have to bitch slap her and lock her in the dungeon. i never claimed i wasn’t a sadist.

yesterday i admitted to a complete stranger that i lie just to make sure that no one knows completely who i am. but maybe that’s a lie, too.

because sometimes i lie about lying, to distract you from the fact that i am by honor bound to express truth and vulnerability. but the rules don’t forbid the simultaneous projection of smoke.

how much do you hate an unreliable narrator?

they say that handwriting is very indicative of your personality.

i can’t even present myself in a straight line. is it any surprise that i’m completely motorly impaired in my ability to draw one?

anyway, like i was saying, withdrawals. and it somehow shattered my sense of self tonight, so it’s like looking at myself in a prism. this is good because it means the process has started. pretty soon, the characters will begin. how dangerous is it that i’m allowing pluto to lead me right now? i never said i wasn’t scared. courage is knowing you should be scared, but following through anyway. i guess you could say, so is stupidity.

(to be honest with you, sometimes i look at my words and i don’t know where the fuck they come from. it’s like a room full of people all crowding for the same videophone yelling things at it. and julia is just the mouthpiece).

i am a trustworthy person who can not be trusted? i am an honest liar? i am the smartest retarded person you ever met? or am i the most pathetic piece of brilliance to ever stick to the bottom of your shoe? perhaps i am just a lurking shadow of everything you don’t want to look at. just a ghost that got stuck in the spaces in between.

don’t anyone come near me right now. the weather today is stormy with an 83% chance of locusts.

I’m Starting to Get It

I remember in college, I was lamenting to a guy that I actually liked that no one is really interested in me. He said, you can have a lot of guys, you just don’t try. I could have probably had something with him, but it was easier for me to say that I couldn’t get anything, as sort of a nothing’s-ever-gonna-happen defense.

And I think it’s worse than the fact I don’t try.

I’m absolutely terrified.

Yesterday, I was at Amoeba Music, one of my favorite places in LA. I was walking down the hip hop section and turned to go around this black guy in a baseball cap when he moved in front of me, almost bumping into me. I was caught off guard and he turned around and was surprised because he didn’t know anyone was behind him. In that split second, I noted that he had really nice skin and kind of looked like Allen Iverson, but cleaner. I didn’t think I had any expression on my face, but when I was browsing behind him, I thought I heard him mumble something to this black girl next to him, “Shit, she actin’ like [something something]” I thought he was talking shit, like telling her that I had given him a dirty look, so I turned around and looked at him. He’s looking at me and he says, “You were looking at me like you thought I was gonna hit you or something.” I was shocked so I said, “What?” because I didn’t think I heard right. He said, “You looked at me like I was gonna turn around and smack you.” I laughed and he laughed too, and it disarmed the moment. That seemed like an absurd read on me, and I thought he was gonna say that I looked at him with disrespect. But then I realized what he actually did perceive.

Fear.

So I thought about what was going through my insides at that time when we interacted. He had almost bumped into me and I was instantly irritated, but that gave way to curiosity while I sized him up. I actually appreciated his looks, though he wasn’t the type of guy I would want to date. But I did think he was goodlooking.

So while I was doing that internally, I projected fear? Apparently such an intense projection of fear for there to be no misreading of that emotion, so much so that he was compelled to comment that I looked like I thought he was gonna hit me, an action which makes no rational sense.

I thought about it a lot last night, because it seemed similar to the incident in the gay bar with the girl. I thought I had been friendly, even leaning close to the girl so I could attentively hear what she was saying to me, yet she was kind of offended that I wasn’t welcoming, and Brian read my body language as one of absolute petrification and terror.

In thinking about my dream last night, I remember one incident with the guy I had liked, where he made a suggestive comment about giving me a massage, and I froze. I felt my senses go completely raw, the way they do when you get in a car accident and you feel like you’re completely exposed and your senses are stripped, and adrenaline bursts through your system. I must have looked absolutely terrified. And yet, I really, really wanted to get close to this guy and the idea of getting a massage from him just blew my mind in a good way. Yet my primal reaction was terror.

Fear. Terror. Petrification. Why?

In this year of fearless living, I have been tackling these little fears one by one but I know which one is the biggest of all.

Why am I so terrified of letting the very people I want get close to me?

I chase after people who are not available, or only make an effort once they have changed their minds about getting close to me. I present a super spiritual side that seems so big as to discourage anyone from being bigger or stronger than me to see through me, but really it’s a massive smokescreen. I’m so soft and vulnerable inside, and terrified that someone’s going to get in there with sharp weapons and start swinging. So my projection of myself is very tough and in control, but how many people can see that it comes from complete and utter terror of being taken advantage of or rejected? And who is strong enough and trustworthy enough to venture in and find me? Because it’s almost a matter of life or death, the way it feels when I get scared of someone. And it’s always stronger when I do want to let the person in.

I talked to a friend today when I made this realization about my fear. I told him that nothing scares me more than when I have strong feelings for someone and those feelings are reciprocated. When they give me a sign that they want to be close to me, I freeze. I freak out. And I kill the moment. Of course it’s safer for me to be one of the boys. What absolute terror I feel when they find out my secret, that the truth of me is feminine and beautiful and desirable. What if they decide to just take it? I’ve got no defenses, outside of my camouflage.

More and more, I’m wondering what the hell happened to me that I can’t seem to remember what it is that can make me so scared of people seeing me as feminine and desirable. It’s becoming really hard to ignore, but really frustrating, because I don’t want to make up a memory, but I feel like all signs point to something being there, but I can’t get it to materialize.

It’s like a black hole.

I’m Afraid of Americans Lesbians

I just got back from seeing Rufus Wainright at Stubbs in Austin. It was an amazing show with Neko Case opening. It was general admission so Robert and I got tired of standing, so we sat down for most of the show, but Brian was in hog heaven. One thing I love about Rufus is that he has a beautiful voice and he’s so passionate when he sings. That man gives it his all. We should live every moment of our lives that way. It takes a lot of courage, but I have a feeling it’s the free-ist way to live.

Earlier today, we had met some of Robert’s friends at Whole Foods for breakfast. He has this one friend who’s really nice, and I had heard about his history before I met him–he was in his early 20’s and met a 14 year old girl, and not knowing she was underage, he slept with her. Turns out her dad found out, and unfortunately, he’s the president of the Texas bar. So they prosecute him and he gets sent to prison and now has to register as a sex offender. He can’t get any kind of business license in Texas, and is on probation for something like 10 years. It’s unfortunate, because the sex was consensual and the girl led him to believe she was 18, but it didn’t matter. The guy was a law student and now he can’t even start any kind of business, and is a convicted felon and registered sex offender.

Anyway, I joked last night that since I was in Texas, I was gonna either fuck someone or start a girlfight (anyone who knows me knows that means I’m gonna have 1 drink, eat dinner, get sleepy and be in bed by 10pm). So Robert said that when I meet his friend, he would totally fuck me. Well, I met him for the first time today and he’s a good-looking guy and intelligent, but his eyes are incredibly haunted. It was hard to see, knowing how life can just throw these decent people complete wicked curveballs out of nowhere. I guess he was interested because he asked Brian and Robert to butter me up to him when I stepped out of the room, but I wasn’t serious about wanting to sleep with anyone. Later, at the concert, Robert pulled me aside and said, “You’ve been around plenty of decent straight guys and if you wanted to fuck someone, you would have already. So maybe you should ask yourself what happened with Reggie that’s making you like this, or maybe you just want to be alone right now.” I told him, “First of all, it wasn’t Reggie that did anything to me or messed me up inside, because I would have stayed if he was the one, but I didn’t and I’m very proud of that decision. But I’m looking for someone specific, in the eyes of everyone I meet, and I just can’t find him yet, or find someone who’s willing to explore these deep connections.” He nodded, then said, “I didn’t really want to introduce you to anyone. I was trying to save you for myself.” He was joking, but he gets what I’m going through. If anyone remembers him, Robert was Brian’s friend from UT who was the underwear model/actor. He moved back to Texas, and the thing is, the guy has a very healthy attitude towards sex, but he’s a serial monogamist and at the end of the day, when he commits, he COMMITS. He said that he has no problem with the idea of marriage and committing to one person for the rest of his life, but he worries about his partner cheating on him. He knows that for all my talk and all my fluttering around, I don’t mess around in the deepest parts of me. I’ve never given my heart away, and have only opened my heart to a few people, and got burned, but stood back up and am not afraid to do it again with the right person. I’m just looking for the one person that I can say with confidence that I want to devote my heart, soul and life to. And I think right now, I’ve dedicated myself to that search. I just have to figure out what he’s going to look like in terms of his energy, because we have so many soulmates out there, so even if it’s a deep connection, you still have to choose the right soulmate.

So I had already gotten hit on earlier today at Whole Foods by Robert’s friend’s girlfriend who blurts out that I’m gorgeous and how she’s figured out my secret…that I’m beautiful (I understood what she meant, even though I didn’t exactly. I don’t hang any self-esteem whatsoever on how I look because I recognize that in 10 years, if that’s how you’ve been measuring yourself, you’re fucked. So I rarely acknowledge how I look to myself…I just try to take care of myself and have a beautiful inner being). She kind of intimidated me because all through breakfast, she kept talking about dildos and sex and shooting pornos. So when she said that, I kind of hid behind Brian like a little kid and was really self-conscious. I think I made a half-ass gemini joke like, “Just wait til you see me without clothes.” But I wasn’t comfortable.

After the concert, Brian really wanted to go to the gay bar so I went with him. The place had a healthy mix of lesbians and I saw this blond girl check me out. Well, those of you who remember my fiasco with my lesbian chiropractor know that that whole experience kind of made me nervous around blond lesbians who take an interest in me. So a few minutes later, Brian and I are standing around and I turn around and she’s right next to me. She wants to tell me that I look just like a friend of hers, and wants to know my name. So I introduce myself, doing a handshake so close to my body that I accidentally press her hand against my boob. So Brian tells her that we just came from the Rufus show, and they’re talking and I look over at her every once in a while but she’s talking to Brian so mostly I look at the decor on the ceiling. So finally she says, well, I just wanted to let you know that you look just like my friend…sorry to bother you. And leaves. As soon as she’s outside of earshot, Brian says, “Dude, you had the most petrified look on your face.” I didn’t know what he meant so he did his impression of me and from that impression, I looked pretty terrified. I don’t know. I can’t handle being hit on by girls, sober. Especially ones who look like my lesbian ex-chiro who sicced her crazy aggro wife on me because I didn’t want to be with her. Yeah, that will always be a sore spot for me, something that always makes me sad, because even though I didn’t have romantic interest in her, I really cared about her and her welfare, and she betrayed everything that was sincere that I gave her in friendship. That whole experience made me really sad.

Anyway, apparently I’m terrified of lesbians. And probably men as well. I just don’t want anyone hitting on me and to have to feel bad about turning them down, because I’ve never looked for casual. Especially now, I’m looking for something specific. Not necessarily committed leading to marriage, but something specific that can help me grow at this time. And who knows where it leads. This road is completely open.

By the way, I knew this guy once, and he and I had a strong connection (fucking Pisces…I’m like a moth to a flame…), but I always had a feeling that he was waiting for his ex, and she was the one who really owned his heart. So I heard he got married, and I looked it up and sure enough, he married her. They posted their “story” in their wedding announcement, and apparently, they had met freshman year in college and kind of vibed each other. Throughout the years, they kept running into each other and finally went out on a date. They dated for a bit, then went their separate ways. He was in LA, she was on the east coast, but they kept in touch and she ended up moving out here, and they got married. The thing was that I know he was dating plenty of people while he was in LA, but when the time was right and he was ready, they found each other.

My favorite part of that Six Feet Under finale is that Claire’s lawyer boyfriend shows up randomly, unexpectedly, at her mother’s funeral and they get married when they’re like in their 40’s. A part of me is sad because I know I’m going to marry late, and I feel sad for my parents that I’ll never bring home that promising young man full of p
otential. I don’t know if they’ll be alive to see me get married, but I know that whatever I do will be right, because I’m willing to take risks, but I’m also cautious about picking and choosing where to take risks. I always wonder, with all these connections I’ve made with people, who’s going to show up out of the blue when I’m older, and what hadn’t been right before, is suddenly right…now.

My coworker told me on Thursday that he thinks we’re going to get married. According to him, we’re going to get married to other people (he said I’m gonna marry Baron Davis), then get divorced, and one day we’ll run into each other at Starbuck’s, realize that we have a connection, and now we’re older, wiser and have gotten all of the young stuff out of our system and are ready to settle down for real. And we’re gonna get together and get married, and he’s gonna let me run around, but he won’t care and he’ll sit at home, waiting for me to come home because at that point, he’ll be done playing around, but he respects me enough to give me my freedom because he knows I’m the type who always comes home.

I’m not really attracted to him, but I thought it was interesting that he had this whole scenario in his head, especially because he’s a player. But ever since we smoked out that night and he saw the core me, the me that’s exactly the truth of who I am, he’s been looking at me differently. He’s also cleaned up since then, and is getting less player-ish and more domesticated, working out and cooking (he always brings what he cooked the night before and will come into my office with a fork cuz he wants me to try it). Well, maybe I’m making him a better man, even though I don’t see myself with him.

Whoever you are that I’m looking for, I hope I find you soon because it’s tiring to radiate this energy and I only have so much red in my closet. But if you’re someone I know already but who isn’t ready, I hope when the time is right, we find each other again. Because that’ll be the happiest moment of my life.

I Pathologically Can’t Tell a Straightforward Truth

I decided I didn’t want to take piano lessons because I feel my instructor has become fascinated with me and it makes me a little nervous. Especially when he’s become fond of touching me and massaging my lower back in a friendly fashion during the lesson, and asking a lot of questions about my personal life. I’m also having trouble because he’s not teaching in a way that works around my unique sensory perception/memory issue. Our last lesson was very tense, with me being frustrated about the way he was teaching, and also freaked out that he was trying to get into my head.

So I dreaded Tuesday, the day of my lesson more and more, until finally last night I made a decision that I would not go to my piano lesson, even though I forfeit $70 that I’d already prepaid. I would rather lose the money than go. So I realized I had to cancel, but as I started writing an email to my instructor saying that work had just gotten busy so I wouldn’t be able to take lessons for a while, I realized that writing all this via email would make it seem suspicious, like I was just afraid of going because last week’s lesson was awkward. I knew I would have to call, but then I worried that an excuse of being really busy working overtime might cover not being able to schedule lessons in the short term, but he might ask me to schedule in a couple of months or he might check in with me periodically, thus delaying the ending of this relationship. So I decide that I’m going to tell him that I’m quitting my job which he knows I’m often frustrated with, and that everything is going to be up in the air from now on so I don’t want to commit to lessons.

So I call him and I’m so glad to get his answering machine. I start telling the machine how my work situation is really, really up in the air right now because I’m pretty sure I’m going to quit my job by the end of this month because I just can’t stand my boss, and so I’m working overtime to finish up all of my current projects so that I can get out of here clean next month. So I’m saying how I just won’t be able to make my lesson today or schedule more, he picks up and goes, “Julia? I want to talk to you about this but I can’t focus the way I want to because I have a friend here and have to finish up this conversation first. But I’ll call you right back.”

So we hang up and I think, “Shit.” Now I have to keep my story straight AND have to do this whole act from the beginning again.

So he calls me back and I go into my barely contained panic as I tell him that I just can’t stay at my job anymore because it’s become too ridiculous and how I’m probably going to leave at the end of next month, but I don’t know where I’m going to go and if I’m even going to stay in Los Angeles because I can’t stand this city either. He tells me it seems like I have a lot going on and I told him that I’ve been needing to quit this job for a while, and things just came to a head. And how I have two mortgages and I don’t know how I’m going to handle those, but I’m just going to do what I need to do, whether I get another job, do some traveling or move out of this city. He tells me that he hopes that I will revisit the lessons at a later time and not to hesitate to let him know if I need anything from him. And then he asks me, “I remember our very interesting conversation during the last lesson, where you divulged some private information about yourself.” Oh holy shit, he’s bringing it up (I had explained to him how my brain works. How people thought I had problems with my hearing but I realized later in life that I have trouble comprehending spoken word unless I can envision it in writing. So throughout the years, I’ve developed the ability to hear words, immediately translate them into text and flash them like subtitles so that I can read what was said. That’s why people with accents mess me up…I mispell words. Or that’s why if your name is something weird that I can’t spell, then I can’t imagine it as text and I’ll never remember your name. Because I never “saw” it and can’t retrieve the text when I want to say it. So we had a conversation because he teaches me songs by ear, but won’t write them down as sheet music which makes it had for me to memorize without a visual record to go with it). Anyway, I didn’t want to talk about it because that lesson had made me uncomfortable, and so I just started talking about how my brother’s autistic and maybe my brain is programmed differently so it processes things differently, and it got into this discussion I couldn’t get out of. So I would pause, hoping he would wrap up the call, but he would just let the silence hang, until I reiterated that I had a lot going and didn’t have room for lessons. This started up another conversation where he found out my age and was telling me that in Chinese, the character for “crisis” is made up of the character for “danger” and the character for “opportunity.” This is interesting because I had a feeling of deja vu. I feel like someone was just telling me that, but I don’t know whom. So I said again that I would be really busy with so many things up in the air, and then paused, hoping he would wrap up the call, but he just let the silence hang. This time, I as resolute not to be the first to speak and continue this conversation so finally he let me go.

Okay.

Yes, I admit, a stronger person would have just said, hey, I don’t want to take piano lessons anymore because I just don’t feel like it’s working out, or if you’re really daring, you can say, I just feel uncomfortable.

Yet, I create this whole emotional event that I’m going through that involves potentially a move out of Los Angeles, maybe some soul-searching, but definitely two mortgages that may or may not get paid but I just have to do this right now because I’m going to kill my boss if I don’t, and because of my life being so traumatic and up in the air right now, I can’t take piano lessons anymore.

Sometimes when I get really scared, this is how I hide.

I make up crazy stories that could be true in a future or slightly modified reality, just to avoid saying, you made me uncomfortable. You made me scared.

I wonder what’s so scary about openly acknowledging someone who has gotten too close to you and scared you. I wonder what happens when you acknowledge someone who is presenting unwanted intimacy.

Okay. I’ve been stewing about the paparazzi thing for a whole day now. I think it’s not so much that I’m mad at the guy, because I don’t give two shits about him. I think the incident triggered one of my deepest fears.

I grew up in a house where there was someone who could exhibit the most awesome, destructive, senseless violence at a moment’s notice. You never knew where it was going to come from, when or why. It would just happen. Like I said, over spilled milk. Over not eating fast enough. Over wanting to eat too much. Or for absolutely nothing or everything, because he was angry at our mom or overwhelmed by life’s stresses. It was like being caught in a terrifying storm that came out of nowhere, and it would leave you broken and wrecked when the sun came up, wondering what it was that caused this and how you could possibly avoid it next time. But here’s the thing. You couldn’t. You have no control over this force, and you can’t reason with it. You can kind of predict it by reading certain signs and making yourself scarce, but there was an inevitability to it. I was completely helpless.

So I have all these feelings in me, the fear, the rage, the anger at myself for not having protected myself and my brother. The helplessness, the vulnerability. Look how strong my body is–I have the body of a fighter, a warrior. I’m obsessed with keeping it strong because I guarantee you any physical attack anyone launches at me, I will fight back. And I will fuck some shit up. Look at how angry I get when I finally decide that someone is not on my side but is trying to do me harm. I have no qualms about using the words that will cut deepest and cause the most damage. Truth in words is my sword, and it is always at my side. And should I not be able to draw fast enough, I still have my hands for survival.

I have worked very hard to gain the spirituality which allows me to not get to a point where I feel cornered, where I don’t need to be on the defensive or need to be at arms. I’ve worked to make my mind incredibly strong, to analyze both instantly as well as continually to find perceived threats, to know very quickly who someone is (even their secrets and repressions), and where they’re coming from. I’ve learned how to be aware of my body, to relax myself when I’m feeling threatened, to know that unless it’s a dangerous threat of bodily harm, that I can handle anything else, that I’m not helpless. It works in that I have ways to consciously keep my heartrate down, I can keep my body relaxed, I can process everything logically so I don’t become overwhelmed by my emotions. I can get irritable but it takes a lot for me to become angry because I’ve got a lot of discipline, because I delineate everything logically and process information bit by bit rapidly rather than as a large chunk so I don’t become overwhelmed too quickly. But in those moments when I get overwhelmed and feel threatened too quickly, if my mind loses its grasp…I’m scared of those moments. Of losing control, of what might happen. I have the storm in me. I have stored in me the vibrations of my father’s rage.

My soul and my mind can say, it’s over, you aren’t in that place anymore, you’re safe now. You aren’t in that house anymore. Nothing can hurt you that way anymore because you are no longer helpless. And I absolutely know that. I’m completely conscious of that. But there’s a part of me that I’m scared of, the part that lays dormant in my unconscious. A part of me that has to take over when I feel backed in a corner, because it’s the last resort when my mind, which is always my strongest defense, becomes too overwhelmed to handle the threat. Then what? How deep is my rage and what can it do? How dangerous is my rage?

I meet certain people and I can see it in their eyes. It’s an intensity. We are drawn to each other because we know each other’s secret–that we are terrified of something that lays deep within ourselves, something that we did not ask to carry but we can not help. And even if we so desperately want to get close to other people, we are afraid we will someday lose control and hurt them. Razor hands. What if we hurt the very ones we’re trying to love? There is no forgiveness in our own souls for that. So we keep our distance from people. We go through life and we can learn how to be gracious, how to be kind, how to be wonderful jovial company, even how to give the good parts of ourselves unconditionally and nurture and protect others, because we give to those that which we always wanted. Sometimes we convince ourselves that we enjoy being alone, that it’s the ache of loneliness that truly reminds us that we are alive. But we are lonely, so wary of others and so afraid of ourselves.

What if someone gets too close to us and hurts us, if this thing could unleash and be so primal, that it could do things that would morally horrify us in the aftermath, where everything that we have built of ourselves comes crumbling down, and all that is left is one ruined, fucked up individual with blood on his or her hands. How could life possibly go on after that?

You don’t want to believe it. You don’t want to believe it could be so bad. So you have faith. And you hope. And you believe with the right kind of love, it will heal you from this burden. And you try to meet people like you, so scared but so aware, and you want to see how they can work through it, because if they can diffuse this bomb and extricate it, then so can you. That maybe if you can talk them through towards healing, that once they achieve it, they’ll in turn be able to help you set yourself free, because that’s the irony–the only way to free yourself, is to let someone get close enough to you to touch it, but that’s the absolute thing you’re most afraid of. You don’t want to believe that this is who you are, this darkness. You don’t want to believe that you are destructive. People tell you it’s just in your head…it’s just fear, trauma, but you’re okay. Look how gentle you are. But deep down, you worry. You always worry.

All I have in my life is faith and hope — that there is order to this chaos, that there is a reason behind what can not be explained, and at the end of the day, there is healing if you work hard enough. My greatest hope, is that there is light at the end of my journey.

okay. from the beginning.

i liked to wear red shoes. i didn’t like to wear clothes. things were usually really confusing to me. they weren’t home a lot so i didn’t have anyone to talk to. we had a lot of babysitters. some of them were just children themselves, because i would watch them fumble around with their responsibilities. the night my brother was born my dad’s cousin watched me. he wouldn’t tell me what was going on. i was gentle with michael. i didn’t understand him though and sometimes I would be aggressive, like bite him or put toys in his diaper. i could always get out of trouble. my mom didn’t have the attention span to dole out discipline convincingly. she only grounded me once in my life, and it was for something really, really stupid, because she thought that’s what parents are supposed to do (she said it like, “well I guess what other parents would do is ground you…”), but i blatantly went out the next day because I knew she’d forgotten. My dad was strict. He was like military. He was a drill sargeant. He kept you in check. I told him once that I wanted to play basketball. So he dragged me out to an outdoor court at 6am and made me do layup drills, screaming at me the whole time. I decided that I never wanted to play basketball because I’m a big pussy who’s too sensitive. My dad is a very very angry man. I remember that anger. It’s rage with a hair-trigger. I spilled milk on the couch once (I mean, it was literally over spilled milk) and he flew into a rage that went from the couch to me cleaning my room. He threw objects at me, including a binder that hit me in the leg and really hurt. I ended up getting really angry about it so I waited until he went off to bed and then I started crying until I hyperventilated and I freaked my mom out. I pretended to have body spasms so they took me to the hospital. I didn’t say a word but I think the doctor knew something was wrong. Because later, my mom whispered to me that the doctor told my dad that he had emotional problems. sometimes i would throw michael under the bus when my dad was angry, because even though michael was so vulnerable, he would still take things out on him. but the thing was, michael never let anyone attack me. If my dad would dare hit me in his presence, little autistic michael would jump in the way and scream, “NOOOOOOO.” he wouldn’t let anyone touch me. he would yell at my parents to stop yelling at his sister. but i never stood up for him because i was a coward.

ah, fuck. at what point can I make up for my cowardice in life? how much good can I do to erase the fact that I am a coward? what if all this strength I supposedly have gained is just something that crumbles into dust in the face of a real challenge? who am I really, if I built this image of myself on the foundation of “I am not a coward,” when I know deep down, I’m building my entire personality on a lie? What if it’s not a lie and I’m actually stronger than I want to admit, because I’ve spent so many years hurting myself out of guilt that I’m still not convinced that I deserve to feel good again. I wanted him to do the work when really I need to do the work myself. what’s so clear to others, you absolutely can not see. It’s the curse of irony. that twilight zone where the guy who loves to read and finds out that due to a natural disaster, he’s the last man on earth so he’s happy he can read all these books in peace…until he breaks his glasses. you spend your life begging for a mirror, because you can’t see yourself anymore and have no idea who you are. and that’s the thing. all you’ll really know of yourself, is reflection. but all that you can feel of yourself, is infinite.

i must be stronger than i realize, but i don’t know why i can’t see it. i’m so afraid of finding out i’m still a coward.

i want to say one thing though. i gave it some thought. i think i spent two and a half years in a relationship being an asshole. i mean, the funny thing is that people never feel like i was an asshole. like growing up and in college, i felt like an asshole all the time. this dark, gloomy cloud. but then i have people come back into my life and tell me how much i meant to them, even the sister of one of my friends came up to me at her wedding and thanked me; she said that i got my friend through her freshman year and she would have dropped out of school if it hadn’t been for me, and i think…what? when did this happen? where was i? and i honestly can’t remember. because all i remember was just feeling bad all the time.

so i just got out of a two and a half year relationship, where i’m finding out now from friends that they could tell i wasn’t happy, yet my experience didn’t involve that awareness. i asked why they didn’t tell me and they said, it’s not really our place. i find it incredible that i can spend two and a half years not realizing i wasn’t happy. because i truly thought i was. and it’s not for lack of respect and love for the other person, because i do sincerely cherish him, it was just me…i could be so unhappy, yet not even realize it, which made me feel like i was an asshole all the time. does that make me a dangerous person to be in a relationship with? do i get stuck in situations out of feeling obligated rather than balance and true contentment? i recognize the quality and elements of a person who would be on my level and what i deserve. but i haven’t met people like that. i also know that i’m not ready yet to meet these kinds of people. i know that once my career is at a certain level, once i have shown myself and the universe that i can put in consistent effort to follow my path and work hard at my ambitions, then it will move me into contact with these types of people–those who are ambitious, charismatic, confident, compassionate, successful…lucky. those whose upward momentum carry them to great heights even though their goals are more to have a positive influence on a wider scale versus a thirst for power. i want to meet people who are leaders and percentage-wise, leaders are a terrible minority. someone who knows the responsibility and loneliness that come with being extraordinary.

i guess this is what it’s like, working through your issues. you tell stories, you talk to people, and everything is just a reflection, because you are trying to build a mirror so you can see yourself.

yes, my parents made me feel bad growing up because they were so stressed, that it was hard to take care of me. they just didn’t pay attention. yes, i would say the crisis of my life came when my brother fell out of that tall swivel chair in the kitchen and cracked his head, and i thought he was dying on that floor because he’d hit it on a sharp metal piece of the chair, and i’ll never forget that sound.

crack.

so matter of fact, so unavoidable, so fucked. there was so much blood…so much blood…and my mom was screaming and someone had to call the paramedics, and she didn’t know what to do so she went and grabbed our next door neighbor who was a police officer. the paramedics came and they took my brother to the hospital. i don’t remember what happened after that, i think he was okay. but here’s the thing. one day, he climbed up there and he fell AGAIN. and he cracked his head again. and i thought, oh my god, surely he’s dying this time. and another part of me was screaming, WHO THE FUCK IS IN CHARGE OF THIS CRAZY TRAIN?, as he bled out onto white tiled floors and my mom screamed in the background and i went numb numb numb numb numb numb numb

that’s my crisis. imagine having that scene imbedded into your heart.

(did you know he fell into the deep end of the pool once, and he managed to cling to the edge until my dad finally found him? that boy has a deep, tenacious will to survive)

i realized no one could really take care of us, that everyone else was as lost and helpless as we were. no one fucking pays attention. and now my brother is autistic and has developmental problems and sometimes i wonder if those falls had anything to do with damage to his head, but we’re not allowed to talk about that. and it makes me sad because my little brother is an amazing human being.

FUCK.

why. why do these things happen.

and so i’m searching. for someone who has answers. because these fucking people on this planet sure as shit don’t know how to take care of themselves. and i’m so tired of taking care of everyone and i just wanna know…who has some fucking answers around here. because i really need to know.

by the way, i’m a crazy magnet. crazy people talk to me. i mean, this is the general exchange:

Crazy person: Are you an artist?
Me: No.
Crazy person: A musician?
Me: No.
Crazy person: What do you do?
Me: I work in an office.
Crazy person: What kind of office?
Me: A little tech company doing something that doesn’t contribute anything to the betterment of society.
Crazy person: There’s something about you. You have this energy.
Me: Thank you.
Crazy person: Are you Japanese?
Me: Chinese.
Crazy person: There’s something about you.

And then the rest of the conversation involves them staring at me. maybe they’re not crazy, but they feel a little crazy to me. and a lot of them tend to be homeless. so to be honest, this happens a lot. homeless people, taxi drivers, people in 7-11, starbuck’s, etc…people stop and talk to me like they know me. i think it’s an energy i give off. truthfully, what i think it is, is acceptance. i think i truly appreciate life and people, and so i’m attentive even if i’m creeped out and that’s what they’re feeling. i always look people in the eye, and that connection makes them feel like someone is really seeing them without judgment. i think it’s just acceptance. if you truly appreciate life, you accept all energy.

anyway, so today, i was cornered by a homeless couple who sat at a table next to me at starbuck’s. they didn’t look homeless, just…liberal. the woman came up to me and asked me if i was a smoker. i said no. she turned to the guy and said, see, you made an assumption and you were right. i asked her, were you two just trying to psychically gauge if i’m a smoker? she said, he has a theory that people who don’t smoke have an aura about them, they’re more sensible and stable. she said, you have an energy about you. i said, thank you. they started talking to me about how we’re in a frightening time right now, that our administration is about to make some grave mistakes. he was more lucid, but she started ranting with a story that was about george w. bush’s father and seagramm’s and wine and nazi’s and cuba and communists in china and socialist health care and selling communists nuclear reactors and deals for oil and iran and nuclear warheads and not being cuban american but being american cuban and some great instructor at ucla who did research on soil and the tyranny that makes up china and how our mayor cheats on his wife and lies while he goes off with his girlfriend to mexico where they really take care of their exports while starbucks uses union delivery men and the problem with the three supermarkets–vons, ralphs, albertsons–is they got together and make people work part time so they don’t have to give them insurance and every month and a half they want a union so see these jeans, these jeans are too small for me but i wear them because they’re not made by slaves in africa or china, and i mean, wtf? and i sat there and listened to it all, maintaining eye contact, nodding in agreement, asking thoughtful questions–the same way i would listen to my grandmother when she is lecturing, and the whole time i’m thinking how much i wanna get out of there. and meanwhile, during this rant, her husband would roll his eyes and shout, “LENA! YOU
NEED TO SHUT UP! CAN’T YOU SEE THE POOR GIRL IS TRYING TO WORK?” “I SAID LENA, I’M CUTTING YOU OFF. NO, YOU’RE DONE. STOP TALKING.” “LENA! YOU’RE GETTING OUT OF CONTROL!” i contemplated if i just got up and walked away mid-sentence, if these people would kill me. but seriously, these are the types of experiences i have when i’m out and about.

i got up to leave and the man took my hand and said, i’ve lived a full life and i’ve traveled the world. i’ve seen a lot of things, a lot of things…but i can tell there’s something different about you so i wanna say one thing before you go. you said something interesting, that what you do for work does nothing for society. you’ve got awareness. whatever you end up doing with your life, just take care of your connection with the universe and do the right things to help everyone. too many people have no idea what’s going on and they don’t know what a dangerous time this is because they’re not paying attention, but people like you need to honor the universe and do its work by taking care of the rest of the people. and with that, he let go of my hand.

i have to be honest, i meet a lot of strangers and it’s never initiated by me because i’m very shy about initiation and i tend to be self-contained. both men and women like to come up to me and talk to me and sometimes that’s a little unnerving. most of them are nice, polite but they always look like they’re trying to figure me out or figure out where they know me from, or they’re searching for something in my eyes. a lot of them like to casually touch my arm, shoulder etc which weirds me out sometimes but i try not to think about it. sometimes i like the instant intimacy. sometimes i’m wary. it’s always a mystery, why people approach each other out of the blue. what brings a set of people together while the rest serve as background. i don’t understand why people come up to me, or why people get so intimate so quickly with me. there’s always a struggle for what to do when it happens because there’s half of me that’s so timid and half of me that loves danger and the promise of adventure and is open to whatever clue or message i may receive, but usually i try to be a good judge of who not to let get too close. it’s always been one of the reasons i think i like to travel…i’m approached by a lot of characters, and through these experiences i learn. sometimes i feel like it’s crazy, but then i think maybe that’s my own projected fear, that when i talk to people and interact with people at this level and seem to know so much about them, that they think i’m crazy, too.

The Art of Spiritual Advising

I have a spiritual advisor I talk to about once every few years. Some might call her psychic, but she does about the same thing I do, but with more detachment. Basically, she can listen to me and gauge the place I am in my life, and where I’m headed by quick calculation of the most likely probabilities and what lessons I’m supposed to be working on. I know the way I do it, I open myself to be receptive to all that someone is communicating on various levels, then I can visualize likely futures. Like if a friend is saying that she’s in a great relationship but starts talking about her boyfriend, I can feel from her tone and the things she’s saying, if she’s actually worried that her boyfriend is unfaithful, even though all she’s talked about is his work schedule. So anyway, I talk to her once every blue moon because if you talk to an advisor too much, you’re basically talking about shit instead of living your life. It’s the same way I feel about therapy. It’s one thing if you’re trying to get advice on something, another if you’re talking instead of doing, fixing, improving, living.

She said she could tell that I was in a very good place in my life and to keep focusing on my career because good things will be happening very soon. We both felt that August would be a strong month. She advised me not too get too distracted by the things that tend to distract me, and to focus on being spiritually strong and not letting petty things bring me down, because at the end of the day, they’ll work out the way they’re supposed to, and to give people a chance.

I’m trying to do that. I know that 4 years ago, I let a bad relationship really get into my head. I let someone who was a weak but mean person hurt me, and the hardest thing was that my intentions were always pure and I was trying to be a bigger person and not play into games, and to help him out of his own personal hell. And I got burned. I guess I still remember that and sometimes it weighs in my head, that I can be kind to people, but then I worry that I’m giving it to people who don’t deserve it, or at the end of the day, they’re just laughing to themselves about what a fool I am.

When I was with my coworker that day and I opened up, I opened up because I didn’t care about what he thought of me. I just needed to be honest to someone. I don’t have any romantic interest in him whatsoever and still don’t, but in that moment, it felt really safe and platonically intimate that I told him everything–how hard karmic relationships are, how I recognize them when they happen, but it’s always sad, because when they end, it feels like dying all over again. And how lonely it is, to see these things and very few people understand it, but I know certain things to be true and so I follow it in hopes that it can help others relieve themselves of pain. Spiritually, I’m a specialist. I’m an expert at recognizing a person’s unique potential, and their specific spiritual obstacles, particularly those created by mother issues. In particular, my area of work is helping wounded healers, people who are cut off from their potentials as ultimate healers. When people come into my life karmically, it’s because they asked the universe for help and the universe puts me in play. I never look for them and they always show up when I’m strong, so in a way, it kind of drives me crazy because I feel like, fuck, I just got myself put back together again from the last one. I’ve been paying attention and it seems specifically, that my karmic connections come in intimate relationships and with people with mother issues. There is no safer person and careful person than me when it comes to this delicate arena, but just for once, I wish someone would stand up and fight through it so that they can taste freedom. Sometimes I wonder, if I can help a wounded healer set himself or herself free, if they in turn will be able to help me.

I think what I need most is someone I can truly trust, who can keep watch and protect me–my body, my mind, my soul–when I’m off exploring those dark recesses of the collective unconscious to bring back knowledge and enlightenment. I read that people with my placement that have this kind of karmic duty (Venus in the 12th house) tend to have an invisible guardian angel. Maybe mine is on a different plane, but I hope one day to find a partner who can take care of me, just as I take care of him. He doesn’t have to be strong now…I don’t judge and I don’t mind helping him. but I hope one day I can find someone who can watch over me while I sleep and dream.