I am so, so, so SICK of myself.

Do you ever get to a point where you’re tired of your own thoughts, your own fears, your own self?
New things, new territory, a shift in…anything – I WELCOME IT IN MY LIFE.

I’m munching on a carmel apple, peanuts all over my chin, thinking about HOW bored I am with my fears, trying to combat the same shit everyday and I realized — OK, (chomp, chomp) I WANT SOMETHING NEW. It’s time to defeat these thoughts or change gears.

I have no idea what I am going to do with my life. I have no idea what really pleas for my attention and now I am sitting my life away, eating carmel apples in the meantime.

*sipping water*

Ok, I almost just choked on a peanut that slid down with the water into the wrong tube.

Unfortunately, I did not have a near death experience to where my life flashed before me with had a realization about what I should do with the next 70 years of my life.

Dammit!!!

**INTERNAL CRAZY SCREAMING**

A little 3 three old boy with developmental problems and placed in foster care was murdered here in Cincinnati about a month and a half ago.

After his own biological mother fenced him in a wall-covered feces room, he was placed with a family who tied him up with his arms behind him, put a blanket around him, and then locked him in a closet for two days while they went to a family reunion.

They returned to find him dead. The foster father, wanting to destroy evidence, burned his body in a rural part of town.

As if these facts weren’t enough of a nightmare to keep every souled person up in the middle of the night, these foster parents issued a missing child report. Claiming that the mother collapsed in a park and blacked out and then Marcus wondered off, they played the part of tormented parents, while the city of Cincinnati took to the streets, trying to find him.

All along, they had murdered him and burned his body.

What in the world could possibly be said after something like this? What do you think after something like this? Our inability to see humanity – to treat one another with equality, regardless of ability and all that other stuff we gripe about – is, literally, making me sick. When, when, WHEN WHEN will we organize our world so that we protect the most vulnerable, the elderly, the sick, our children?

*A N G R Y I N T E R N A L S H O U T I N G*

There are many ways to look at life, I’ve decided. I have as many options as I do pairs of shoes.

As I considering going back to school, punting out a baby, writing for my life…I have decided that I have no decision to make because I have no F*cking idea what in the world I am supposed to do. It’s not an absence of interest. Believe me, there is no lack of enthusiasm. The problem with too much passion is that there is lack of direction, no specificity. That, my friends, is the problem.

Education is in my future. The intersection of race, class, gender is in my future. Writing is in my future. Children is in my future.

That’s all I know. For now.

I just had a conversation with one of my old professors who asked me a million questions pertaining to my [lack of] focus toward my career. I felt like a prize idiot with my enormous head swimming with awkward answers. HELP ME, I wanted to shout into the phone. But, I got no help.

I’m in this alone.

My sometimes functioning radio actually worked this morning. Instead of my usual curse words that string through my mind when I think of the conniving Boston shitheads who poorly installed my radio, I had pleasant thank yous running out of my lips. I sat low in my seat during my morning commute, ready for some good radio waves.

The usual reactions to radio… A smile scratches the sides of my face when I think of the people who must record the promo commericial… [singing] Jeff and Jen in the morning….CINCINNATI [someone screaming/sings in the background]…Q102!! I want to be the person that yells CINCINNATI in the background, but then laugh sardonically, almost eating the microphone…

Anyway, after an ‘DJ APB’ is sent out for a stolen inflatable jack-o-lantern in Anderson Township, I unfix my eyes in their upward roll position, and wait until something entertaining came on. I didn’t have to wait long. We soon got down to business of discussing real issues concerning modern America and I was not disappointed: Mel Gibson’s alcoholism was next on the agenda.

After the locals called in, crying about their bout or relatives’ alcoholism, the DJ’s question came down to this: Does alcohol bring your true self out or turn you into a completely different person?

Oh, for the love of all things holy – anything you say or do – whatever comes out of you has to come from somewhere. It’s not like alcohol is injected with cells that alter your personality.

***

Last night Adonis and I temporarily descended from our usual throne in Bliss and found ourselves in a disagreement regarding a fundamental issue in sexuality. In the throes of debate I wondered to myself, “What is THIS coming out of him? Did I not know/see/realize this before?” I began to wonder, philosophically, how well can you really know another human being.

With Merce, my paid professional affirmer and challenger (aka therapist), I brought up my frustrations of our disagreement and she asked me a series of questions, not pertaining to any issue, but to the patterns of my beliefs, as any good therapist should do. She asked, “What do you think happens in marriage?”

Well, a barrage of answers came flooding in my head, but then one stood out, knocking all the other answers on their ass. And I realized, again, for the 19th time since June 4, 2005 that marriage, the tie between two individuals is a link, not a welding into sameness. Our lives are fused, but not our actual selves, not our core elements of personhood. And thank goodness for that. (“The cypress and oak grow not in each others’ shadows,” -The Prophet, on marriage)

Hand on forehead, still grappling with right-ness and *ahem* pride, Merce clicking her pen against her mouth, I blurt, “Seriously, though…how can I be wrong? I’m right on this.”

Is that what matters?

This unexpected hardness, absolute righteousness reared its enormous head. I did not see that sucker coming.

Merce sends me on my way, with another appointment in 6 days and I walk forlornly to my car, hating the awkward negativity when you know you’re -not wrong, but not exactly right – in the middle of something with no defining left and right. Awkward, awkward.

To know and love another human is to embrace a storm with no measure. The person is not the storm, but the act, the trying of the embrace, is the storm itself. A person’s roots that hold their basic and conclusive reasoning may be housed in this beautiful thing called the Unconscious (uCon). Not the subconscious, which is underlying and quiet, but the Unconscious – the comatose, unmoving, appearing dead and lifeless to the world.

The uCon is a reality that we all must accept. It is an essential characteristic of the truth that humans will never be and can never be fully known. I mean, seriously, we internalize, deny, and shove experiences and thoughts away at a rate we cannot keep up with. uCon harbors these ghostly ships of feelings and experiences we don’t even realize or let ourselves actualize.

I think that alcohol can call those ships to the sea of behavior and force itself into expressions that are sometimes hurtful and dangerous. I also think that sober fear, rites of passage moments, celebration, death, and starkly inane events all carry potential to conjure things in us we did not know existed – realizing depth of love or hate, unpassed grief, unsorted thoughts, and even core private beliefs.

We’re walking mysteries, waiting to implode. Lovely. Fan-FREAKING-tastic.

It’s nothing to be frightened of, I realized. I think I just forget that a lot in my quest to know everything and anticipate difference and hurt, (not to avoid it, but to know how to deal with it) this piece of inevitability slips my mind. These ships, we’ve all got ’em apparently, are beyond our tracing eyes and heart.

The unknown or unconscious, unpredictable elements of others/relationships should not move us away from one another. I suppose this is the part of my life where I learn to understand that the grey of life is not exactly about mixing two things into one, but being strong enough to stand the absense of black and white, right and wrong. I can’t see his point. He can’t see mine. Perhaps our ships are just too fogged up to be seen.

And maybe love can stand the fog.

So, upon arriving here, you may notice that my blogger address has changed.

It’s not that I am afraid, or receding. I’m just very aware of identity, claiming words as your own, the power of name, association. To continue to write clearly, sufficiently, and maintain the rage – I decided to forego my entire name in a blog address.

Remember, I do work with undergrads who, for varying purposes, would love to know more about my personal view sans professional attire, daily struggles, and other germane human characteristics. Also, the population I deal with is a frustratingly homogenous millenial generation with G*d complexes and listless hands. My thoughts, while I do not mind being circulated on the internet, cannot have such blatant arrows pointing to where little idiots can find and then terrorize me.

Most importantly, I don’t write for them or out of fear of them OR out of fear of being identified. I write from openness and with a hopeful attitude that those who do find me, seek me, accident me, or read me, know all they need to know without needing my (whole) name.
Rock on.

Adonis and I, married now for 16 months, recently went out on a date on Friday. He themed it Highschool. (God help us, I thought.)

Adonis and I met, fell in love, and youknowwherethestorywent, in college. He insightfully observed that we typically don’t talk about our pre-18yr. old selves. Sure we do daily blurbs about memories, families, funny stories when we were kids, but there’s still a lot about one another we may not know, he proposed. For instance, we found out:

and intimate details like that.

We talked about the things that embarassed us most and the light broke on our heads: highschool wasn’t about finding yourself (that would be college), highschool was about finding a way to survive. Neither of us attended violence ridden or gun controlled schools. I went to a private, college-prep-pretentious-people-go-here-becuz-we’re-rich kind of highschool. (I was at the bottom of that totem financial pole.).I was, uh, a cheerleader.

The idea of me bopping around in short skirt is enough to make me want to dive head first into my pillow and not resurface until I have muscle atrophy. My current reasons for existence are far more compelling, concrete, and purposeful than flipping around a grassy field for 18000 people in hopes BillyBob will run two more sacred yards for first down. But I didn’t know it then. I didn’t know a lot of things then and I don’t blame myself for subjecting my own body and reputation for something, I now understand, to be limiting, degrading, sexist, and misunderstood.

I loved the physical portion of cheering and the friendships I made then. It was about camraderie, finding mentors of how to survive highschool. However, the physical demand of a competitive squad also spent countless hours and money for gymnastic coaches, dance lessons, and forked the money over ourhighschoolselves. It wasn’t all for the boys, but it sure was a lot. Hard-work, flexibility, and fitness were key elements. But then, ultimately, it was pushed down a channel I now can’t believe I ever found appealing.

Last week, I ran into a woman whose face I knew thatI knew from the past. I just couldn’t place it. A short gasp later, I saw the former varsity captain with whom I cheered. Staring rudely for an inordinate amount of time at the side of her head, I remembered cheerleading like it was yesterday. I loved dancing, yelling, and sports. Now that I can still see in myself.

As Adonis and I tossed a football back and forth, musing about who we were 9-13 years ago, we came to many conclusions. We all wanted acceptance then, we still do now. We wanted to feel hot and desired, we definitely still do. At that time period of our lives, we tried to maximize our opportunities and gifts for what we were given. The difference now is that we can more clearly see what those opportunities are and for what gifts are made. For me, cheerleading is not that.

However, I do still shake my ass in the shower and holler more loudly than anyone else I know.

This week I realized how blogging is this underground world of free speech, torment, and glory under faceless anonymity.

I had zero exposure prior to this month to the wonderful and horrendous blogs out there.

I am under a thinking spell these days, wondering where my blog belongs in all this. Perhaps it is a symbol that I struggle with: Where does my writing belong? Where do I belong?

My writing is more than the look-what-I-have-for-lunch-today-and-
I’ll-show-you-all-my-pics-of-this-morning’s-sunrise blog. But it’s not quite up to par with I-have-indisputable-theories-about-the-world-and-it’s-problems-and
-can-argue-until-I-am-dead blog.

A carnivorous, idealistic mystic. That is who I am today. Where do I belong then?

I think I will start with not apologizing. Yes! No I’m sorry’s. None of that tomfoolery.

When I want to write about the asian diaspora, I will. When I want to write that McSteamy from Grey’s Anatomy is the freakishly perfect combination of Justin Timberlake and a pirate, I will.

I do belong. My writing does have a place, just as long as I try not to mimic anyone or anything that I am not.