Grimalkin's Grimoire

A journey of the spirit.

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Stressful Dreams

Sometimes, I have really random, strange dreams. Other times, my dreams are so stressful that I wake up crying, or wake up with a headache, or my shoulders so tense you could bounce quarters off of them.

My stressful dreams used to be about dealing with my mother. Since the occurrence of that has gone down drastically in recent years, I think that's probably why I don't dream about her anymore.

Last night, I had a dream about G cheating on me, with two different people who were close to me. The dream was very vivid. I remember that these two incidents had happened some time before, and I was only just then finding out about them, and finding out that G had concealed these things from me for a very long time.

Naturally, I was upset. But even in the dream, I was a glutton for punishment, forcing her to reveal every tiny detail of how it happened, and why she didn't tell me. I knew, even as I forced her to reveal every single detail that this would be the end for us, that as soon as she was done explaining, I was going to break it off with her for good. Cheating is something that I can't abide, not in an open relationship, and G and I have discussed that numerous times - why would you cheat when you're in a polyamorous relationship? All it takes is honesty with both yourself and your partner.

I know G didn't actuallysleep with the people in my dream. It's not that I think the dream was prophetic or something, it was just one of those dreams where I woke up so upsetthat I was practically in tears, feeling depressed and in a funk, and feeling very resentful towards G, even though I know that nothing in that dream actually happened in real life. It did make me ask a few questions, though.

Why would I be feeling so resentful towards her for something that didn't happen? There are a few possibilities, and I feel it's important to consider them, and not just write this off as well, it was an intense dream, so that's probably why. When I had intense dreams about my mother, it was because I had very intense unresolved unconscious emotions about my mother that I needed time to get over.

With G, there are a number of things I can think of that could cause this reaction.

The first is that, ever since G's transition, she has become a totally different person. A person I'm unused to seeing, a confident, beautiful woman who is unashamed of her beautiful female body, and who is more at home in her own skin than I have ever seen her before.

Perhaps I feel so upset because I am exactly the opposite of that. I have very intense self-esteem issues stemming from the emotional abuse I went through as a child. I hate the way I look. I think that I'm ugly, that I'm fat, that there's no way anyone could find me attractive. These are ugly, hurtful thoughts that run in a circle, always repeating themselves. Sometimes, they are more intense than others. When I play derby, they seem to go away for awhile, but at other times, the voice is trumpeting so loud in my head that I can't make it shutup.

This voice makes judgments: thighs, too flabby. Even your ankles are fat. Your hands are mannish. Look at thatmustache, nowthat'sattractive. You have a double chin, your face is ugly and worse, you look like yourmother. Look at that acne, those bags under your eyes. Your stomach looks like a pouch, your tits may be big, but they sure look saggy!

Nothing is right, according to this voice. Maybe I'm jealous that Gwen seems to have worked past a lot of her issues. That's really unfair, because I know she's had it much harder than me, but there are times when we can't control these emotions we have, we just have them.

Or maybe it's something else - maybe I have let these self-esteem issues take over to the point where I believe that they are true most of the time. If Gwen is a beautiful, confident woman, and I am an unattractive gay ogre, why would she have a reason to stay with me? She's cute, everyone loves her, and I'm just there. People like me because I'm the workhorse they can depend on, and I overcompensate and become that workhorse because I honestly believe there is nothing else likable about my personality.

I've started wondering, lately. At what point, when you believe these ugly things about yourself, do other people start believing them? Couldn't it be true that even G, who has hung through the roughest parts of my life with me, might start believing these things if I cling so doggedly to them?

She and I have discussed, recently, the open relationship thing. We both agree that it would be fun to date as a couple. Even to the point of thinking about looking for people who we'd like to date.

This sets off more alarm bells in my head than I had planned for. It isn't that I consider myself to be not polyamorous, or forced into polyamory. Iampolyamorous, and have known that for a long time.

It's the idea of actually doing it that sets off that voice again.

What if G finds someone she likes better than you? Well, that wouldn't be hard, considering what a mess you are. Of course, she stays with you because right now, you're providing for her, but maybe that's why she's looking for other people - because you do a good job providing, but you're the most boring wife in the history of boring wives.

What a mess of ugly things to think. And I don't even knowwhereto start untangling them.

It's not that I'm not ready for a polyamorous relationship. It's just that sometimes, the depression and self-esteem issues wrap tight around my neck like a noose and choke until I'm talking through those issues, and not through me.

Sure, there are some things I'd like to change about myself, and sometimes I get frustrated that I don't know where to start to change them. But I can't be that horrible, can I?

I'm so insecure that the other day, I asked Gwen if she was looking for other people because she was bored with me. She told me that, after her transition, she wasmoreattracted to me than before. Apparently, I didn't believe her.

I hate having dreams like these, dreams that strip away everything about myself that I use to hold it together, dreams that force me to confront ugly issues that I don't have a solution to. What the fuck am I supposed to do about it? I say to myself.

I don't know. There has to be something. I'm making an appointment with a counselor today because my meds aren't working like they should, and because it's time I stopped putting my own health last. I can work through issues on my own all I want, but if that's not enough, then I need to use another option that is available to me.

Hopefully, even if I can't immediately solve the funk I'm in, I can at least do something proactive about solving the underlying problem. Underlying problems are sometimes a little too big for me to deal with on my own - there's a lot left over from those emotionally abused days. That little child inside me missed a lot of nurturing she should have gotten, and sometimes, you have to go back and take care of that inner child to move forward. We all have needs.

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Seidjourney, 5/6

As I arrive again on my path, I can't help but think of Dante - "I found myself in a dark wood, the path lost." Danger, I think. But then, I remember. Being lost isn't a danger - it's a new journey. We may not know where we're going at first, but it isn't necessarily dangerous. In fact, had Dante not taken his spiritual journey, he never would have known his paradise. Hopefully, I'll manage my journey with a little less fainting than him.

I notice, first of all, that my attire has changed. It's all dark brown leather. A brown leather midriff top, brown leather loincloth, brown leather sandals. Dark brown leather wristbands, short cropped red hair and a brown leather headband. It's not as ornate as last time, but then again, last time was my own projection. This time, I am beginning the journey down the path, and I am an initiate. One doesn't wear diadems unless one earns them.

In my left hand, I held a smooth yew branch formed with leather strips into the shape of Algiz, the shield rune. I thought it odd that I was holding it in my left hand, which is the magical receiving hand, not the magical giving hand, the right. On a practical level, though, in what hand would a shieldmaiden hold her shield? The left hand. Duh.

With that in hand, the wolfhound came to me almost instantly and was prepared to lead me down the path. He started off down the road and out towards the edge of the forest, towards that same altar that I wrote about in my last journey. This time, I let the shift to cat form happen automatically and envisioned myself, a large gray panther-like cat loping up to the altar alongside the dog. I don't know if this is a long-term form, or just a spiritual aid that helps me move when I am having trouble envisioning movement - time will tell, I suppose.

I sat down beside the altar in the thick, waving grasses with the wolfhound and reached out to touch its thick, white fur.

F. The name starts with an F. I was given that strong impression. A Gaelic word or name. But is it male or female? I don't know. The guide itself was evasive, as though it wanted me to figure that part out for myself.

I asked for three messages again, three things I could carry back with me as guidance on the path.

I would say that the wolfhound spoke to me, but it didn't - not out loud at least. It spoke through me,intome.

Focus, it said first. This made a lot of sense. I struggle when I do seidh work to keep any kind of focus. Today, for the first time, I was able to effectively take intruding thoughts and push them to the side so I could focus on my vision. This is the first time that visualization has worked. Focus, to me, indicates that I need to practice more meditation and guided visualizations. To do more research on beginning meditation and work harder at improving my concentration. That's definitely on the old to-do list.

Follow came next. Follow your spirit guide. Follow your instincts. Follow your teachings. Learn to trust in yourself, your visions, and what your interpret their lessons to mean. This is another thing that will take practice. More meditations and journeys will give me the chance to improve this skill. It also means that I should have confidence moving forward - following my guide down this new path, learning the lessons Freyja has asked me to learn.

Find was the last. Find out more information. Start learning about seidh, start studying the runes seriously, and find out my totem's name. Gathering information is such a big part of any study like this, and I have a LOT of preliminary information to sort through in several different categories. In other words, if I want to do this right, I have to be prepared to work hard, and to seek on my own, following my instincts to find the information that I need.

That gives me some distinct areas of focus: 1) daily meditation practice. 2) Research on runes and runic practices. 3) Research on seidh and seidr practices.

Once this was done, my guide let me know it was time to go. This time, I stood and followed my guide in human form back down to the path. The dog led me down to the doorway in the earth and opened the door for me. Inside the door was a small but cozy home. There was a bed cushion on the floor with some thin covers. A chair, a table, and a roaring, cozy fire, vented out to above. Reflexively, I set Algiz down. This, the guide told me, is a place where you don't need the shield. Your safe place.

The vision ended right on cue with the alarm going off.

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

First Seidjourney

Freya has been insistent lately. After my cat has gotten sick, it's kept coming into my mind to speak with her for advice and guidance about how to take care of him. Seems like a goddess who has cats as chariot-pullers (the picture is funny to me too, believe me) would know a thing or two about caring for them. But of course, you never get something for nothing, especially from someone in the Norse pantheon. Gifts come with obligations. The gift of guidance to heal my cat meant that, well, I had to be serious about seidr now. I've been hemming and hawing about starting this journey for quite some time, but Freya has been quite insistent upon reminding me that no journey can ever begin without taking the first step. I promised this week to begin learning her lessons. Seidr is something that takes a great deal of concentration. Meditation and trance-work is key, but both of those things are things I have always struggled with. A lot. As it turns out, anxiety disorder makes it difficult to calm your mind, and without a calm mind, it's very difficult to do trance-work. Vicious cycle, and all that. Lately, my work on my anxiety disorder has been teaching me relaxation techniques. I use at least one technique every single day. It has been helping - I can tell that my general level of relaxation has gone up, and my ability to cope with anxiety symptoms has improved. I've still been nervous about trying meditation, though- but Freya has been insistent, giving me just the sort of nudges I need to remind me that hey, I made a promise, and promises count for something. A woman is only as good as her word. So this morning, during the time when G and I normally have our 'just a few more minutes' sleep, I decided to try a meditation. Here's what happened: I found myself on an earthen path at the edge of a forest. The path seemed to emerge from a dwelling in the ground and was lined on either side by logs until it came up to level with the regular earth. When I looked down at myself, I saw bare feet, one silver Celtic scrollwork toe ring on the second toe of my right foot. A long, tan, tattered loose skirt, a midriff baring top of the same fabric. A silver Celtic scrollwork bracelet on my left wrist. Short, simply cut red hair and a diadem of some sort on my forehead - I didn't see the details of that. I looked down at my feet and moved them slowly up the path. With each deep breath in and out, I took a step forward. The vision at first seemed jerky and unfocused. I would jump back and forward on the path, and outside noises proved to be very distracting as I tried to hold the image in my mind and keep moving. I had difficulty moving and called on my inner resources for help. It was then that I felt myself change, and could see from the third person that I had changed into a long, panthery gray cat that prowled up the trail to the edge of the forest. I had read about seidr last night that it often involves transformations of the shaman into other forms, so I wasn't particularly alarmed by it, but it was definitely unexpected. I read last night that each shaman has a "frygja" or a sort of animal form - the "animal shape of your soul" is how I saw it described last night. The panther could perhaps be mine, or it could be just more symbolism that goes with my pseudonym, since I've chosen to refer to myself as Grimalkin. In other words, one of two things - a first meeting/sight of my frygja, or just symbolism that's familiar to me that helped me move past my block. As I got to the edge of the forest, I focused and slowly moved myself up the hill at the forest's edge. The vision I'm describing has recurred to me numerous times throughout my life. Up at the top of that hill, I knew I would find a gray stone altar, and there, I would sit, focus, and listen. Still, I had trouble moving. I attribute that to my being very inexperienced with trance-work, and something that I can learn, given more practice. I made it up to the top of the hill, part me and part cat-form, until I could see the altar 20 paces in front of me. I had a brief moment where I was stuck again and pushed myself forward gently. With each deep breath in and out, I took a step towards the altar until I reached it. At the altar, I seated myself and focused, asking for three messages that I could take with me out of this situation. Here is what I received as I sat down at my dream-world altar to listen: 1. "My son has been killed." I received this message very strongly. Oddly enough, in my somewhere between waking and asleep state, I received an impression that I had gotten a text message from my friend Kitty. More cat symbolism. After doing a little bit of research, I found that this may or may not be a message from Freya - she had no sons, but had two daughters. The obvious choice is Odin, whose son Baldr is killed as a herald of Ragnarok. Odin is a deity that I have long felt a calling to serve, so this may not necessarily be a message from Freya - but then, I didn't ask for specific messages from Freya, and I certainly owe Odin a debt for his gifts to me. This one will take some more meditation, and may perhaps be the subject of a meditation all its own. 2. As I sat, I was motivated to look around, and see what else was in the area. From behind me, I saw a large white dog approach. It came towards me at an easy trot, and as it got closer, I could see that it was an Irish wolfhound. After some of the warnings I had seen about the creatures you meet in trance-work, I was a bit wary as it approached. As it came closer, I called out to it 'Please wait, I'm not ready yet.' The dog sat down, and simply watched me quietly as I continued my work. Again, perhaps frygja, perhaps not. 3. Lastly, I turned to the altar itself which was dark gray and white speckled stone - Connemara marble, as I realized. I received strongly, as I cleared grass away and looked at the marble, the word TIME, in all capital letters. What does this mean? Take my time? The answer will come with time? I must devote more time to my studies? Be patient? There are lots of possibilities here, and further thought will obviously be necessary. Once I had received that vision, one of the dogs jumped up on the bed and bumped me rather hard, shaking me out of the trance. I did not feel compelled to seek a return to the trance world, perhaps because, as I read last night, trance-work can be dangerous, and I was working without the protection of a circle or anything else. I took it as a sign that I was done for the moment. Obviously, a great deal more investigation and meditation needs to be done on the messages that I've received. It's very strange - I've had visions of this dream-altar for years, and known that I would discover something important at that altar, but I have been frustrated at almost every step that I try to do so. But now, it's been easy. It seems like I was waiting for a door to open, and I have somehow recently found that door and pushed it open like it was never even there. What made this happen now, and not before? Another question I'll have to do some thinking on.

[autostraddle]

We [poets] may feel bitterly how little our poems can do in the face of seemingly out-of-control technological power and seemingly limitless corporate greed, yet it has always been true that poetry can break isolation, show us to ourselves when we are outlawed or made invisible, remind us of beauty where no beauty seems possible, remind us of kinship where all is represented as separation.

Adrienne Rich via Autostraddle — Adrienne Rich is Dead (via autostraddle)

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Ouroboros

There's never a reason.

It's just a feeling in your guts, the way they twist and tighten up, like someone's just drawn a rope around them and pulled it taut. Suddenly, you feel your heart beat, the way it shakes every bit of your body as it reverberates. There's a strange acrid taste in the back of your throat from stomach acid that refuses to go back down your esophagus.

Everyone hates you. Everyone is talking behind your back. Everyone else is loved, while you are merely tolerated. Everyone else is inside some magical bubble of happiness and togetherness, while you just drift on the edges. Looking in, but never truly inside the circle.

That's what it feels like, intense anxiety, and the depression that goes a long with it. It's a noose that tightens ever so slightly until you're panting, sweating, panicking. Even when you know it's just your mood, there's very little that can turn off an attack of it, aside from downing a pill. And that's just what we all want: for our brain to be chained to a pill bottle. For our happiness to depend on whether or not we have enough medication to get through the day.

Even when I know that my anxiety is just a mood, when I tell myself rationally that there's no reason for it, my brain does not want to listen. 'I know that,' my brain says, and I simply go back to being anxious, as though my brain simply doesn't care whether the mood is rational.

I've struggled with this for so long that I didn't even have a name for it when I was younger. I thought everyone thought the way I did.

Three years ago, a psychologist recommended to me that I purchase an anxiety workbook from a local bookstore and work through it. It's only today that I've actually followed through on that. I have no idea what I'll find out, or IF I'll find out anything worthwhile.

I want to say it's worth a shot, because anything is worth the shot if it will make me stop feeling like this.

But it's so unpredictable, I don't know if it will. And I think that, more than anything else, it scares me to think of a life where I never know when crippling anxiety and depression will fall over my shoulders like a mantle and I will become my own personal grim reaper.

Can we ever truly get away from these things that plague us? Days like today, I feel like I'm just chasing my tail.

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Understanding the Downslope

There's no reason I should feel depressed, right? I've got a full time job (at least for a year, anyway), a job for the summer, a great derby team to skate for. I've got a great spouse and partner, an active sex life, a chance to finally be as queer as I want to be without feeling weird. A spiritual life that's beginning to get back on track. A plan to lose weight and get fit by the time the derby season starts in earnest. A chance to improve, that chance we all have every single morning to improve our lives by the simple choice of a positive outlook. But at the same time, it's there. I've dealt with depression for much of my life, and I know that it's a matter of managing it, not disappearing it, but at the same time, this is not the nameless kind of depression. It's the kind that comes from something, is because of something, even though it's been difficult for me to get a handle on specifically what. I'm beginning to think it's more complex than I could have imagined at first.

My job is one thing that I've been both happy and depressed about over the six months or so that I've had it now. Happy because this lifts a huge financial burden, and makes life much more easy, even comfortable. The insurance is wonderful, the pay is a gigantic increase, and the bonus of just being here, being a real part of the behind-the-scenes university teaching profession has brought its own feeling of sanity. Being super busy has been exhausting, but it has been good for me. I have been throwing myself into my work, and, from all practical indications, been doing well at it. I enjoy my job, because I enjoy working with students.

Yet, on the other hand, there is the exhaustion, especially when papers come in. You begin to think of nothing but other people's work. Teaching tends to be a very self-effacing profession, one in which your own needs do not matter - in fact, if your own needs aren't tied up very intimately with the needs and desires of the students you teach, then you don't get much out of teaching. But very little is personally satisfying about it. I don't make things with my hands. I don't see, really, direct and tangible results of my hard work. I know when my students are appreciative and when my department head is pleased. That's about it.

I'm so exhausted that I don't really get to think about me. I feel guilt when I take time out to do what I want to do, or, hell, to not do anything at all. Intense guilt. Anxiety that I'm forgetting to do something that I should be doing. And nine times out of ten, I am, if only because, as I was warned when I started graduate school, "teaching will take up as much time as you let it." That can be very soul-sucking, especially when you're me. I am a competitor and an achiever. I am driven to be better, better, better, each time.

But I haven't created in months; not seriously created, anyway. I've written a handful of paragraphs to introduce a handful of stories. Scribbled down notes in a notebook about a possible memoir. Nothing comes together, and nothing progresses. A thousand projects on the table, and none of them scream for me to write them, none of them readily attend my every waking hour. The truth is, without that writing release, I have lost much of my identity. When I was younger, I wrote to survive, and I miss that feeling. The feeling that you wrote because you had to, because it's simply who you are and it's simply what you do. Simple as that. But I think I don't know who I am anymore, in a lot of ways, and so I back away from anything deeper than the occasional foray into surface-deep SecondLife roleplay.

I feel like there's a lot about my identity that is buried right now. I drew Isa as a personal rune not long back, and Isa is still holding me fast. Around me, every day, my partner is becoming a new person. Changing, developing, becoming more positive and happy and balanced. And me?

Well, I'm just here. Nothing new, nothing special. Just here. I've changed too! is what I want to scream at myself, but the truth is it just feels like no one's listening, out there or in here.

So maybe you call yourself queer-but nobody cares about my transition into queerness when my partner is trans. Nobody checks on me. Hell, I barely even know what I am, and I certainly don't feel comfortable expressing it yet. But how can I explore what it is to be a gay girl when I feel personally subsumed by other issues? It's not my partner's fault, but I feel like the people who know look at me as 'the partner to a transgirl' and not as 'a lesbian.' I'm scared that they will say I'm not an authentic lesbian. The people my partner has been out to have been good to her, but how do I know they would be good to me? How do I know it wouldn't just be an afterthought for me to come out? It's hardly fair to make myself the center of attention when my partner is undergoing MtF transition. It feels like it's pointless to say it anyway.

I don't remember what it is to dream big anymore. After this, then what? I used to have a million answers, a million fantasies about how awesome life could be, about how many possibilities awaited me.

And then, when I graduated from college, after this there was nothing - there was a shit-paying adjunct job for two years, and an intense period of psychological and financial struggle. There was finally a break in the clouds with this one-year full-time contract, but at the same time, I don't know where it will go.

It hangs over my head constantly. We want to move, but we don't know if I'll keep my job. We want to buy better food, but we don't know if I'll keep my job. We want to make certain longer-term investments on items that will last us forever, but we don't know if I'll keep my job. We want to make home improvements, but we don't know if I'll keep my job.

I feel like I'm drowning in uncertainty. I don't know if this job will work out next year, and that worries the hell out of me, because we need this money. I need this opportunity. I don't know how to be a lesbian, because I don't feel like anybody (myself included) is interested remotely in helping me explore. And I don't remember what it feels like to relax, dream, and create. I have lost sight of the horizon I saw for myself, with published novels, a house in the city, pets sprawled all over it, a witty and urbane existence polished with the sheen of peace, freedom from fear and anxiety that has plagued me for the past three years.

I wish I could find a buoy of some sort. I don't even know if I care what it is, as long as it floats.

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Thirty Days of Letters - Day Three - A Letter to Your Parents

Dear Mom and Dad,

The temptation is great, writing this letter, to just bitch and complain about what awful parents you were and are. I don't see the sense in that, honestly, because I'd just be telling you something you already know.

Many people feel like without their parents, they would be nothing. I do envy people who have had good relationships with their parents, but my experience was just... different. When it comes to values, ethics, morals, I mostly found my own. I certainly didn't take on the ones you would have given me through example.

Lucky thing for me, it worked. I was able to cobble together some semblance of a normal personality without your help.

It's strange, because most orphans don't have parents because they're dead. I have parents who want to pretend like they're my best friends, like there was never any problem when I was younger. Like the lies, the emotional abuse, like none of it happened.

What makes me the angriest is that I'm still suffering the repercussions of your actions almost ten years after I moved out of the house. I'm still in debt because of the loans taken out in my name. I'm still in debt because I had to take out another loan to pay for the college tuition you hung me out to dry on. The only reason I was able to finish college was because of that loan. Finishing college got me into graduate school, and my graduate school record got me a full time teaching job in a university.

None of it, not one single iota of encouragement, not one dime of money, not one drop of sweat, was because of you, or thanks to your help. I spent a long time wondering why you hated me, but you know what? I don't think either of you have the audacity to hate me, I think you're both just shitty people. Shitty, selfish, self-absorbed, and uncaring. Those aren't bitter epithets - they're truths that I've come by after nearly 30 years of dealing and being subject to your irresponsible behavior.

I won't say that I haven't learned anything from it. The major lesson you've taught me is this: If you point blank DON'T WANT CHILDREN, then there is absolutely no reason you should bring one into this world and then not care for it. If you bring a child into this world that you don't want, then for Gods' sakes, give it to someone who DOES want it. There are plenty of good people out there who can't have children, and it's frankly appalling to me that two people who obviously have no interest in kids would keep a child just out of ennui instead of giving it a chance to have a better life.

It's rare that I let either of you affect me emotionally anymore, and I'm perfectly fine with that. I can hold a conversation with either one of you and not feel a damn thing. And that's purposeful. I don't trust either of you, and it's only stupid people that allow abusive others to continue hurting them.

I can truthfully say "I don't care about you anymore" and be telling the truth.

Now if you'd just stop calling.

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Thirty Days of Letters - Day Two - A Letter to Your Partner

Dear G,

To say that we've been through hell backwards would not be an overstatement. Whether it's your ordeal or mine scarcely seems to matter, so long as we can take the journey together - and in spite of missteps, that's one thing we can say we have done.

It's all a bit unlikely, isn't it? This journey we've been through is bizarre, complex, agonizing and joyous all at once. It's a bit of a balance - the trials each of us has seen in our own lives have been varied and extremely difficult, yet at the heart of it, there is a relationship between the two of us, a commitment made before gods and goddesses, forces of nature, that at times we have scarcely understood. But the promises we made at our wedding, the promises we have been living since long before the wedding, are promises that we have clung to.

I have to admit that I don't always understand how things work. This tumult that we've gone through recently with your transition has been difficult for both of us, to say the least, and I've come close at times, if I'm honest, to being frustrated enough that I wondered if we were going to last. But the truth is that, at the bottom of it all, I have seen you grow into the person that I always hoped you would be.

Living as a man, I always knew that you were unhappy, that you could not identify your wants, your identity, but I never understood why. Now I do. And even in six, eight months, I have seen you change, and become a person who I did not expect, but had always wished for. Passionate, struggling every day for that goal that all of us want-happiness.

I have no doubt you'll make it there. I hope that I will still be a part of your life when you do. But whatever happens between the two of us, I know that you will always be the only person who really comes even close to seeing life through my eyes. You have seen things about me that I could never share with others. I make sense to you, or at least I like to think I do - and I doubt there are very many people who could see me the way you do. I'm perfectly alright with that.

"And all that's best of dark and bright // meets in her aspect and her eyes"

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Thirty Days of Letters - Day One - A Letter to Your Best Friend

Dear Z,

Before I met you, two years ago now, it had been a long time since I had been willing to discuss the term "best friends." The whole idea of girls giggling over gossip, sharing life stories and dreams, had put a really sour taste in my mouth since I was about 19. To tell the truth, I'm still uncomfortable around "girl talk."

But there was something about you that made it a little easier to accept the idea of being close with a woman. You were funny, sure, but you were also interested in more than yourself. A person who genuinely loved people. It's so rare to find that, someone who's invested in other people's problems almost more than their own. And it's not that you didn't have a full share (and then some) of your own.

You've enriched my life in ways that I sometimes find hard to quantify. I always know that when I have a problem, there's only one person to turn to. I always know that you're open with me. And I always know that if I ask you  not to say anything about something, you won't. There's an unspoken sort of vibe between us that all important things go spoken between one another, and never discussed with other people outside the circle.

And then there's that spirit connection. I'll never go back on the idea that there's just something about New Orleans, about New Orleans people. Even if I've never lived there, I'm one of them, and you've always known that. There's a certain amount of kinship about 'home.' Talking about it, going there.

The bottom line is that you've changed a lot of perceptions I had about women. They don't have to be catty backstabbers. There are those special cases where a female friend can be open, warm, generous and funny. Thank you for reviving my faith and teaching me that my own faith was good for something after all.

[reasoningwithvampires]

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

That's what I call short-term memory loss.

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Strangulation

It is a slow process, this crushing of words into dust. They are dust regardless, though, for the moment they are uttered, they become meaningless. Unheard. Unmeant. Unmattered.

I cannot speak the restless thoughts that are caged inside my brain. To write them is to give flight to packs of devils. I tire of being patient, and I tire of being nice. I tire of trying to find a way to blunt the claws of my emotions.

All I want is to be alone. But when I am alone with my thoughts, I can only acknowledge their ugly dingy veneer and their rotten core. This is black bile and bitter spleen that I must vent, but the cask has been stoppered, and the stopper glued in place. You are not allowed to say. Others may be too sensitive. Others will not agree. Always there is this other, and always, there is a void inside me that seems to grow with each thought that dies before it can be said.

My feelings are wrong. They are the object of sarcastic jibes and vicious denials. I should not feel them in the first place, but saying them is worse treachery than feeling them. What's wrong? What's wrong is that I am kneecapped, unable to escape what seethes inside but unable to voice it. Rock and a hard place. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. There are a hundred cliches and a thousand doomed heroes to express this position, but none of them offer any insight or comfort when it is your own weight pushing vainly against Sisyphus' rock.

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

New Project

I was reading a blog and happened across a project called Thirty Days of Letters. The idea is that each day, you're given a prompt about who to write a letter to... and you do it. Simple, right? Only until you look at this list. There are some real doozies on here, but it's challenging. This post is the seed of it all. It may take me more than 30 days, knowing how spacey I can sometimes be about finishing projects - but I will finish it. This, I think, is a wonderful opportunity to not only do a little writing therapy, but to simply be honest. To challenge yourself to say things that you haven't been ABLE to say. Day 1 — Your Best Friend Day 2 — Your Crush/ Partner(s) Day 3 — Your parents Day 4 — Your sibling (or closest relative) Day 5 — Your dreams Day 6 — A stranger Day 7 — Your Ex-partner/love/crush Day 8 — Your favorite internet friend Day 9 — Someone you wish you could meet Day 10 — Someone you don’t talk to as much as you’d like to Day 11 — A Deceased person you wish you could talk to Day 12 — The person you hate most/caused you a lot of pain Day 13 — Someone you wish could forgive you Day 14 — Someone you’ve drifted away from Day 15 — The person you miss the most Day 16 — Someone that’s not in your state/country Day 17 — Someone from your childhood Day 18 — The person that you wish you could be Day 19 — Someone that pesters your mind—good or bad Day 20 — The one that broke your heart the hardest Day 21 — Someone you judged by their first impression Day 22 — Someone you want to give a second chance to Day 23 — The last person you kissed Day 24 — The person that gave you your favorite memory Day 25 — The person you know that is going through the worst of times Day 26 — The last person you made a pinky promise to Day 27 — The friendliest person you knew for only one day Day 28 — Someone that changed your life Day 29 — The person that you want tell everything to, but too afraid to Day 30 — Your reflection in the mirror

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Spellbound

This past week, I've been reading Poppy Z. Brite's Wormwood collection. It's an old anthology, and when I read the introduction to it, I was skeptical. The reviews were glowing, calling her the voice of the next generation of horror writers. I expected some pseudo-Anne Rice.

What I wasn't prepared for was the visceral nature of Poppy Z. Brite's stories. The descriptions she writes simply dig. They dig until they have burrowed into the pit of your guts, and once they're there, it's difficult to tell whether or not this is nauseated horror or symbiosis with some higher being you can barely understand.

Her words are positively visceral. The way she writes of the South picks up on the gothic decay that I have lived among, steeped in for twenty seven years. I don't have to imagine what she's describing. I know those rusted out cars, those tiny abandoned towns, those abandoned churches with the crazed graffiti scrawled on the wall. I know them like old friends.

There is unmistakable eroticism in her descriptions, much in the way Anne Rice described her own vampires as haunted, erotic creatures. But Brite's are different. Rice's vampires are ethereal monsters, metaphysical philosophers and journeyers. Brite's characters don't seem to have time to worry about that. They are fueled by the best and worst in us. They don't need to stop to reason where they can simply feel. They are consumed by raw passion and viscous anger, manifested in blood and teeth and guts. Brite doesn't need vampires for horror.

I'd read a story or so before bed and wake up the next morning still haunted by her words. I love writers who write well, who paint pictures, who make me laugh with their unexpected turns of phrase. But there are still writers who manage to go beyond that, and though unexpected, Brite is one of them for me. Those stories swallowed me whole as I read them. Do you identify with her monsters? Or do you flinch away from them, pull your hand away from the bars of that cage? And if you pull away, who is more the monster - them? Or you?

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Anxious

My S.O. just came out to a group of our mutual friends as trans today. I was certainly nervous about it myself - I cautioned her to be very careful about when and who. Make sure you're doing it at the right time.

For various reasons, that right time has been put off. While I was in my afternoon class, she sent the letter.

I knew that I was anxious about reactions but what I wasn't prepared for was my instant, body-shock reaction. My stomach flipped. All of a sudden, I really couldn't think about much else.

Since she left for her afternoon lecture, I've sat in here swallowing the urge to vomit. Cold chills. No, hot flash.

Am I really more nervous about this than she is? How selfish am I to react in this way?

It wasn't a terrifically pleasant feeling, though. It was an anxiety like one I haven't felt in a long time. I almost had a panic attack. I can't stop shaking my legs under the desk. I'm having trouble focusing on my work. Time seems to be moving like maple syrup on a cold day.

There are days where no medication works to control my reactions to things. The anxiety sometimes swells up and over the flood-walls with little warning. I still have a lot to learn about what to do, how to manage, when this happens. Right now, I have no choice but to ride it out.

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Isa

Isa is supposed to be a rune of stagnation. It is ice, and it is winter, and it represents a lack of movement. Yet, it can also represent slow rejuvenation- a period of stasis that comes before new growth. Around me, people's lives are changing, but I feel trapped in ice. Six people I know are pregnant; their lives will change irrevocably, and they are able to feel that, as new life grows inside them. Four people I know have gotten divorced in the past year, leaving behind years-long relationships that simply don't fit anymore. My high school best friend has just gotten engaged to the widower of another friend of ours. My grandmother has passed from the living realm into whatever awaits us afterward, a change none of us can understand until we have seen it. My own partner is undergoing change so profound that describing it would to it injustice. I feel trapped in cold water. I'm exhausted from the responsibilities in my career. It's been a year since I've written more than a sparse page of anything creative. When I try to swim up to break the surface, it only seems to get farther away. Sometimes it just seems easier to stay down here, doesn't it? Where it's quiet, where it's peaceful, where nothing changes. Only that's not what I want. Change is not something I was made to fear. It is, in fact, something that I crave. And while I watch these massive changes around me, I feel like the world is speeding past. I can only describe my profound agitation as chafing. I feel like I'm struggling with shackles, only I can't identify where they hold me, what they're made of. Sometimes I wish I could be one of my friends, only I don't want a baby or a divorce. I just want to break this monotony. I feel like the old shell has become to small, too dull, too ill-fitting. The wheel of the year grinds slowly to a halt, and as Samhain comes to us, I can only feel that I'm ready for a new beginning. I am ready to shake the discomfort of stasis and find something new. The only problem is which way to go once the ice melts. North? South? Or do I skip the path entirely and head off on my own, whether I have a sense of direction or not? I am so eager to break free that I'd jump on the first path that looked good if I had the chance. But there is a nagging doubt behind all this that suggests, like Isa, 'perhaps you're not ready. perhaps you'd better rest a while longer.'

[grimalkinsgrimoire]

Naming Names

I can't put my finger on why exactly I've always thought it's so important to have a "craft name" or "power name." It's just something I've always felt strongly about.

I did some accidental dream work on the issue once, years ago. I couldn't have been more than about seventeen at the time, or maybe even younger than that. I dreamed that I was in an expansive green field with an open blue sky through which clouds passed like gentle combing fingers.

I walked up an incline and into the sun. Somehow I knew I was supposed to go up. Soon, something came into view - an altar. It was made of dark and rugged stone. As I walked towards it, I knew that it was here that I would receive my name. But the dream never finished. I was never able to kneel at the altar and receive it.

Lately, I've had a dream that I feel is somehow connected. In this dream, I am emerging out of what looks like an earthen bunker. The earth is moist and dark, and I can smell it as I emerge into a pathway that slopes upward. As I start up the incline, I look up, and I can see that I am in the woods, and that the branches pleached above me are thick and green. A light breeze sways them.

I knew in this dream that the altar was there. But I never saw it. I never made my way up the hill.

A nagging pull has come into my chest. Who am I, in relation to my beliefs? I am not simply Grimalkin, plainly. There is something mystical and tribal inside my spirit that goes into hiding, but will only be denied for so long. When anxiety and depression flare, the mystical, the generative, hides away. But as Samhain approaches, that wild phoenix creature is stoking fires inside me, asking me questions that I do not know the answer to.

All I can do, I suppose, is make a serious study of it. There's little sense in pretending this part of me doesn't exist for the sake of rationality, or for whatever other reason it's chic in this American society to pretend like you have no beliefs. Maybe it works for some, but I only know that part of me which refuses to be still and quiet for the sake of convenience.

Up on the top of that long hill, that dream slope, there is something waiting for me at the stone altar. Beckoning.