i'm such a shit

when it comes to money. I try to forget that it exists all the time. i try to pretend like what i do with it doesn't matter. really, it doesn't that much- i do pretty much what i want to anyway.

but a whole day sans cell phone... i think i learned a lesson. things i couldn't do because i had no money:
- talk on the phone.
- call m back. :(
- buy coffee.

i guess that's not that bad. i need to buy my plane ticket to visit n too.

i can't stop thinking about sex. i'm fantasizing about ppl i shouldn't be. and should be. r and i have been fucking like champs.

i don't always know

what the hell i'm doing. i thought i wanted to date r again, and now i'm not so sure. he's rad, i miss him, but i *don't* miss the processing. perhaps i'm attempting to challenge myself. somehow. oh well. i now decide... to fucking stop needing to process with him on the stuff that he triggers with me. i know that i can do that, even if its
fucking hard. and it will be.

r and i have a pattern: we say things that trigger each other and whoever's getting triggered usually feels a need to address it with the other, rather than getting a fucking session. jeez already. so he said "addicted" a couple of times. so what. its annoying, because he doesn't really know what addiction is like. i wish he would find another word, but oh well. i don't need to process with him about it. goddamn.

on the other hand... my life is pretty damned good. i met a pretty girl last nite. she is rad. i called her to ask her out for Friday nite. we made out on the dance floor after a long time of dancing, touching, freaking, she's lovely.

yay for me.

and sometimes

things get a little too exciting. fuck.

tonite i wanted to buy a bike. i told a guy whose bike i was interested in that i couldn't see it until friday. he offered to bring it by. and take me to the cash machine. (perhaps that should have been a tip-off.) nonetheless, he brings it by. i test it out. i don't want it- the chain falls off while i'm riding. now, my bike may be old and tired but damned if the chain falls off. He puts the chain back on, i try it again- and the bike is just not working for me. so i tell him that.

he gets crazy, jerks the bike away from me, throws it back on top of his ice cream van (it's covered with good humor stickers) while cursing at me. i thank him sweetly, seeing as how i'm a good little co-counselor. he says something about paying him ten dollars. i ignore that, seeing as how i don't have ten dollars. and i'm not paying for him to bring me a shitty (stolen?) bike that i don't want.

So he sends me a threatening email (two, actually) demanding fifteen dollars. He says he's gonna get madder. hmm. i have a thing- i learned it from my family- if someone threatens to hit you, you don't wait for them to do it. you hit them first. if he sends me another email, i'll figure something out. i already called the cops. what the hell do police do, though? pretty much nothing, most of the time. i found his addy, and such. am i psycho now? i am tired of being threatened by psychotic fucks.

wierdos. definitely not boring, though.

things don't

really get easier, sometimes. sometimes they get much more difficult. sometimes they stay difficult.

i hate to say it, but i'm awfully bored. i don't want to go out to the same places i've been, i don't want to dance to the same music drinking the same drinks. i don't want to constantly read and write anymore. i don't want to get in bed at 9 because i have to wake up early, or worry about what to wear or take the same damn bus every fucking day, it feels sometimes like i've died already and here i am in hell, where everything is so fucking repetitive that it is driving me absolutely insane. It feels like i've done everything. i don't want to drink because its so fucking boring. smoking is boring. eating is boring. i'm goddamn bored.

or maybe i'm just numb. if you're open to it, isn't everything supposed to be illuminating? i must remember, boredom is a fucking coping mechanism, and if i really decided to be present every moment would be comepletely unique and amazing.

hm. right. i forget. processprocessprocess

i am still waking up at 4:30 am, every morning... ok, i actually slept through the night on saturday nite, i think because d was here, and i trust him pretty completely. last nite i was with r, and i woke up in the dark, smelling a familiar smell, laying in a familiar bed, but i didn't know where i was- it took me what seemed like a very long time to figure it out. for a little while i thought i was at j's. hmm. getting around, aren't i? nonetheless, i woke up to him later, as our alarm clocks sounded successively. he is really a pretty boy. i've missed him.

laying awake

has become a pattern. now it's four thirty instead of 6. i woke up yesterday and this morning at 4:30, almost on the dot, and lay in my bed listening to my head.

last nite i drank almost two whole bottles of wine. n watched me and attempted to have a conversation over dinner with me, and was very consoling, seeing as how i was beating myself up (again) and acting generally like an obsessive freak. "He hates me" "what's wrong with me" "i'm being punished for my youthful sins..." it goes on and on.

I got mixed up. I thought that love had to do with one person, again! I forgot that I am love, and that love is all around me. Duh. That realization woke me up.

yay for me.

the sun comes out

and damn do i wallow in these cynical days. i talked to my dad this morning- i'm not at school because i'm f-ing sick, i'm coughing and dizzy, generally out of it- and his response to my depression was "it seems to me that there are a lot of boys out there"- and i kinda stopped for a second. For all the people close to me, most of my dating is fleeting. and expectedly so. makes sense.

this morning

is covered over with fog and silence, besides t moving in the kitchen, cleaning, and cars passing in front of our house. j came over this morning, brought a bag of things i had left at his little apartment, i dreamt last nite about how i hated the decor there. hmm. seeing him was confusing; i felt far away and sad and a little bitter. i'm sure he could sense the last. i was doing my best, though...

what do you do when they bring over all your shit in a bag? smile? thank them? i did all that.

he's a nice boy. i'm glad we're not romantic anymore... and sad too. oh well. t says to stop digging myself a hole. that's no fun.

feeling broken

man, rejection is blowing my mind. i'm done capsizing, i'm freezing in the arctic waters. i woke up this morning at six, proceeded to lay awake forever, thinking about how i am not wanted by this man. for some reason that means something. with m, it made sense- i was astonishingly stuck in my stuff when we were making out. with r, we grew apart. this, i do not even know how it came about. it is very hard to not think that it happened because there is something wrong with me, that i am deficient in some way. its hard to remember right now that i didn't really want to be with him, either.

i am supposed to be studying.

my life is going really well, i have amazing opportunities streching ahead of me and man do i bust my ass for school and work, for writing and teaching, i am admired and respected, i have a fantastic community that is filled with people who love the crap outta me, and this man has such the ability to break my heart. that was a theme this morning, as i lay in my bed unhappily awake: my heart is broken and it doesn't seem like i can fix it very quickly. i think its mostly broken due to rejection, though; j wasn't very emotionally available.

really, the sex wasn't very good either. the last time we really went at it the only way he could maintain his erection was by continually choking me as he fucked me missionary style. i don't mind the choking, really at all, i am a more than willing sub, but if that's the only way you can stay hard.... that's kinda scary. fetish is ok, but damned if we had ever talked about that.

it seems as though i am trying to convince myself of something, huh? perhaps i just need to remember. I don't want my life to be about drinking and smoking and escaping and all that, and j did a lot of that. god. am i a catty bitch.

i hate valentines day. reed comes home from nicaragua that day. fuck all this shit. i am feeling, for the first time in a long time, completely turned off to dating. especially men. joel, like reed, left me in the dark with some empty version of himself, pretending like everything was ok. i am motherfucking tired of it. at least m was honest with me... i can't hate him for that. in fact, thanks, m. you're rad.

its february

this month has been suprisingly beautiful... hard, and beautiful.
so many things have happened. I had a crush, pursued it, started dating him, was very doubtful about the situation, was skittish, he seemed like he really wanted to "be with me," i decided to go for it, after a couple months we decided to "be together," and a week later he decides that he doesn't want to do it.
hmm.
needless to say, i'm reeling. like a capsizing boat. i commit, he runs away- my fears playing out perfectly. I hate it when that happens. Really hate it.
i made a mistake, though, i think... i told him that i didn't think i fell in love with him, and now that seems laughable. how could i have said that? i must have such a tenuous relationship with love, to need it to fit into a certain sort of box. i'm sorry for it now.

i really try

to love life and people regardless of the shitty things that happen. i'm sitting by my window and wondering why i still long for a boy who misses me, apparently, but "only because of the touching" that he is bereft of now. i didn't realize how much that hurt until today, because i miss all sorts of aspects of him, not just our physical interactions. yeh, what the fuck. i thought i had worked through my wierd funk of post-breakup whatever, but i haven't, i'm still hurting lots over it, and all i really want is to be up and over all of this. i hate thinking that i'm more cut up than he is. I wanna yell- I DONT CARE ABOUT YOU ANYMORE! YEH, I JUST MISS THE TOUCHING TOO! YEH, WHATEVER! but i would be lying to him and me. i do care. i do want him. i'm a little sorry that i gave up. i want him to want me. i want him to come over and hold me while i cry about having to work two jobs to swing survival. i want him to be nice to me and counsel me well NOT ANYONE ELSE!!! even though i know that the other folks in my life can do just as good a job...

hmmph. i'm feeling pouty.

over a month has passed

and i've been hiding from myself a little bit
running driving going as fast and far as i could
and now you're across a continent & ocean and i would love to hear your voice... just a little bit, some sort of comfort and affection and we're both moving on and i don't want to be with you but i want to be around you
folding my socks this evening i realized just how much i miss you
i'm starting a school year without you, and i've never done that before, you've always been around, asking me how my day went, telling me how yours was, showering as i peeked in the curtain at your wet body and we would goof off and laugh at each other and you kissing me all wet

come home, maybe a little bit to me, i wonder still- could we be together and happy somehow? could i tone down and accept you and you commit politically & emotionally and then everything would be ok, we would be fine, right?

i don't always miss you like this. sometimes i ignore it.

it's a little fucked up

that i know deep inside that our love for each other started to wane about a year ago, we hung on because the memory of true love was burned into our most tender flesh
there was a time that i was so tolerant
of all the shit i can't stand now
that's why it all died
i never gave in to demands

our arguments are so different now
because i've shut doors
and as soon as we approach them
i shut it down, turn away
i don't wanna go over the same shit
over and over and over
in the same damn way

i just want it to end

today i feel

better. i pounded out the work i had to do at work, i pounded at the stairmaster at the gym, i pounded out a curriculum on direct action with L. we're awfully good at developing curriculi. i pounded that uselessness right out of me- no more, hit it with a hammer, it shatters, i feel powerful until it comes shattered back to my belly. no, work out, work hard, think about the future. no no no.

nonetheless. no mopey hanging about the house for me. maybe next week.

there is a friend i have who i think is back on a wagon i left a few years back, and it scares me a little. i hate that wagon (loveit) and have been running from it (watchingitpullaway) for so long.... it's so hard for me to handle this person's indulgence when i never let myself go there, if i even got close i would hit myself with much larger and pointy hammers than those that i use against my hopelessness. i will increase my distance from this situation. i have saved myself and thats all i can fucking do, damnit.

fuck

all of it. today i feel fat and ugly and lazy and i got an email back from jw that essentially said "you're second on my list to house in ny" and damned if i didnt feel put off and fucked up and there was some sort of wierd assumption that i wanted to sleep in his bed when all i wanted was hospitality... this is the second blow off i've gotten in nyc and i feel resourceless and unhappy about it... i'm just out of cycle with that city right now.

i have some strange pipe dream that in n.c. there will be a person that will make me feel loved and ok even though he has traditionally not done such a thing, in fact has a bruised and battered track record with me, but somehow i still idolize and love him and expect that every time i see him he will be open and loving and ready. sometimes he is not but there is a comforting sense of belonging when i am with him and mimi, a sense that i am now with my people and i don't have to try anymore that i can just be.

hmm. time to work now. enough of my selfsorrow bullshit.

it's been a little while

and i get the feeling that it doesn't matter. i don't get any feedback from you voyeurs anyway.

today has been a hard day. after getting the house approved for t and i, after running after housemates & setting it all up & getting the money together i'm burnt on it. i can't wait to move but i want it to happen while i look the other way- i want people to pick it all up around me and move my life, make it better and whole again because in confidence i must tell you i don't know just how whole i can be for you all anymore. i am broken in the middle and all i can think is that if i build my physical strength- my muscle, my body, my stamina- that maybe i'll be able to hold myself together, that maybe i can still hold some semblance of myself in order for those around me.

and it's days like this, where i do not move like i want to where i have messed myself up too much to be the STRONG looking person i want to be, days like this where i lay in bed in pain of one kind or another and shuffle about the house in my blue terry bathrobe that i feel that broken part of me, cutting me up inside my belly the belly i must make strong and fit to withstand this internal assault

but its these days that make me wonder if i can even do the minimum to stay ok

and i think about those i have loved and wonder who next will run their fingers through my hair and tell me that i am loved by them that i am so much that i am needed that i am beautiful and who next will walk with me down the street and hold my hand and look at me that way and think of me well and when i am not around wonder what i am doing and if i am happy

i want to be happy again, and sometimes i kind of think that i am i mean i know that i'm not happy but i feel strong and different and Audrey somehow, even though the loss still rings inside me like a dull bell a bell i never wanted to hear but tolls the return of my life

i will pack my things i will go and i will stand tall as i leave behind so much i have known

including you
yes you

i stayed home today

and cleaned, and hummed, and was happy and me and together somehow inside all day. hank called, and i have to admit to myself that part of me is still so in love with him, i get so happy to hear his voice and when i think about his stubbly cheek rubbing on my smooth one something aches in my belly, back toward my spine. he called and sounded wistful and the minute i began to he got all hard- that's what's been happening, as soon as i show some inkling of regret he hardens up- but if i'm hard and tough he's soft and touchy and all "so how are you" "i miss you" "oh i love you so much" "what can i do to end sexism" oh god if i'm not fucking exhausted of that conversation. he's getting better, but it seems such slow going- i'm banging my head against a cinderblock wall and i'm bleeding you can see my brain through my scalp and skull and finally the blocks begin to crumble and dust but will i survive to see the end of all this

it's true, he was right, i do feel hopeless, i am convinced that i will never be able to interact with men in the same way, and i won't. it's true. i will never be that woman again, and i feel as though i need to grieve. i've lost so many people- so many bio males who decided that i was too hard to be around. i remember trying to lighten the blows with lots of encouragement and compliments but they hate me nonetheless. not all of them, but somehow i believe that as soon as they get a load of THIS they will run run run, fast and far and maybe send me a friendster from their new home in Jersey.

but in the end j is right again. i give thanks for my diverse community- and white men are a part of that. i love hank, it's true, and i believe in his change. it's been hard, but i've been through harder and much more hopeless situations. mmm, maybe a meth addiction? maybe poverty? yeh yeh, i have a roof over my head and a strong network of friends and i have fabulous skills that i can get money for and i complain about dude's behavior.

oh, yeh- I now decide to no longer attack men, but to attack their role. what does that mean for me? lots of great things, i think. i need to find a more sustainable way to negotiate male defensive stuff- and perhaps that can be through identifying them separate from their role and then going at the role. now, how exactly to do that...

i'm back

after a very trying week. family reunions, especially ones with aunts and uncles burdened with the histories thrust on them like the ones my dead dead grandfather perpetuated, are exhausting. my grandfather wasn't an evil man exaclty; he was a man, conditioned into a violent and isolating role, furthered by his involvement in the military, where he stormed the beach at Normandy
crawled over the bodies of his dead friends
his jaw blown off

he returned to the states a different person, now an irishman taken to his hereditary lust- alcohol. it drove him to all sorts of lengths, abusive lengths, a diverse abusive. let's not ennumerate. my mother, one of ten children, suffered at his drunken, angry hand.

wouldn't you be mad if your jaw was blown off? i'm not sure that qualifies destroying the lives of your ten children. and your wife.

he's dead. may he have found peace.

nonetheless, there are plenty of living people to gawk at as they play out the damage the dead have caused. my uncle, for instance, is scared shitless of love. and of being out of control. and of powerful women. he noticed my mother had some power- ok, so she was being a little ridiculous at some points, but she organized the whole damn thing- and he began to systematically attack her. she cried over and over but did not let down. i was proud of her. it was over a PHOTOGRAPHY session, for fucks sake, it was NOTHING- but he couldn't stand not having the power. couldn't let his little sister have photos taken of their elderly parents (my grandma remarried). he FLIPPED HER OFF in front of everyone. So, i pulled out the big guns...

and hit him where it hurts. he hates my father with a passion; i told him he was just like my dad, and that he was the reason Mama married Papa. he looked at me like he was gonna smack me and told me to be quiet. i love being able to get someone like that- you don't make my mama cry and not pay.

i love him though, and apologized later, he seemed to have almost more problem with my compassion than with my anger. i have pity for him- he feels so unloved, unloveable, unhappy.

I, on the other hand, am feeling a whole lot better about my life. i'm getting great support and feel as though my male centric behavior patterns are shifting... it feels good after a good two weeks of deep depression. yeh. fuck that. i'm still sad, but it's a happy sort of sad.

there is so much here

that i am afraid to know. i don't want to know that things that my mother has to tell me.

oh well oh my god

some things are much too crazy. my mother, at this moment, is puking off the side of my house, drunk after a long night of double irish coffees. i told you i was irish. deeply.

she told me many things about my father tonight- many things that hurt to hear. i love my papa more deeply than any of you can ever imagine- i would, in fact, kill you if you ever threatened him. really. tear your throat out and kill you.

tell you more tomorrow....

my mother

flies into town today. she is planning on moving here- i think, which is like a breathtaking blow to the chest as well as an exciting thing. When i was small my mother and I had a great relationship- she was always there, even if sometimes she was nearly *terminally* depressed, she would lock herself in her room all day with the blinds drawn, crying, and my little brother and i would microwave corn from the freezer so that we could all eat. i think my earliest memory of that was when i was five, and my brother was three.

nonetheless, she tried. she had me too young. mama never had a life- first it was taken from her by her incestuous, physically abusive veteran alcoholic father, then by my coke addicted, physically abusive draft dodger alcoholic father. men running, and somehow finding safety in my mother- where she was never safe. i'm so sorry, mama. she had me when she was 22. i'm 24 now, and i can't imagine living her life- married, two kids with a man more than ten years older than herself. a suprise pregnancy (me) that jerked her right out of college, where she had a 4.0. my mama is a smart woman. patriarchy was stacked against her.

i have it a little easier, i think, though conciousness of our oppressive society is perhaps a heavier weight. i don't know. it's hard to watch myself play things out, over and over, almost like i hover above my body doing these unhealthy, self-oppressive things and tsk tsk tsk. I am unhappy that hank and i didnt find a better way to deal with our relationship, and i have to say that I'm almost sorry we didn't break up earlier. i would have liked to be more emotionally healed before otis and i started doing whatever we were doing- we fell for each other quickly, and i transferred all my "shit" from hank to otis, almost purposefully. and therefore destroyed something, that perhaps, would have been really fucking cool. we just get along so well, and have so many corresponding interests and analysis- i feel like i went down the "psycho woman" path, but i know that that thinking i am also just playing out some shitty self-oppression. i'm not crazy- i just come from some fucked up shit.

what do i want? space. i want me back, i want myself to be fully in my power and prepared to function independently and powerfully in every area of my life. i want to distance myself from folks that can't hear me. no more silencing.