#exact nature

[sandyaustin]

Feeling Mental

The definition of sanity is the ability to think and behave in a rational manner, and being of sound mind. On a daily basis I try to keep track of just how sound my thinking is. It’s important to me because I have skirmishes with mental illness. With the growing pains of the digital age, and the hypernormalization of the political landscape, I’ve had to work even harder to maintain sanity. I have acquired skills and support that work to restore my balance, but an awful lot of folks don’t. And that’s their business. However, it’s unsettling and arduous living in this new phase of existence full of unshared realities. The apple cart has been upset. It’s like saying, “the sky is blue and clear,” and the other replies, “the sky is a cheeseburger and spongy to the touch.” The pace of the bulldozing over our shared reality is at record speed. But for me, it did not start with Trump, it started in my childhood home between my parents. My father saw the world in a very different way than my mother. It wasn’t political or cultural or socio-economic. He had a thought disorder. My Dad is Schizophrenic and on many occasions believed he was Jesus Christ. My Mom who was Baptist was certain he was not. They fought often and violently, yet my mother did not succeed in controlling my father's thinking. In my not-yet-published novel, EXACT NATURE I explore the role mental illness played on the frayed fabric of the Thompson family. Sure, those Thompsons are an awful lot like my own family. But there’s a heaping helping of fiction given to their overlapping perspectives. My point being: every single member of a family is affected by another family member’s mental illness. The way sanity was restored in my family was when my father broke the law, and was consequently institutionalized. Law enforcement was our divine intervention. Whether your family illness is addiction, depression, anxiety or some fancy mix of thought and mood disorders, I wish you mental health. What I hope my novel achieves is more awareness, and opportunities for discussion on how we as individuals, families, and even a country move forward, hopefully together, while caring for the mentally challenged among us. Can we be sane and healthy? The answer for me has been yes. Here’s a new song by Aimee Mann from her upcoming album entitled Mental Illness. Enjoy a Goose Snow Cone. http://mentalillness.aimeemann.com

[sandyaustin]

I’ve cancelled my plans to run for President.

Dear Sandy, I’ve cancelled my plans to run for President. I am tired of trying to be important. And I have better things to do. Sincerely Papa Those three lines are as telling as a DNA test - I am undeniably my father’s girl. Just like my Dad, I strive. My ambitions are not as grand, but I do try to accomplish meaningful work. For instance, writing this blog to support my book, and submitting my novel, EXACT NATURE to literary agents and publishers, because getting this book into the hands of readers may have value to people who grew up in the 70’s or have a mentally ill family member or are interested in the Florida wilds along the Space Coast near Cape Canaveral. Vying for a home for my book is kind of like asking for votes. It requires a pitch and a platform, and it can wear a girl out. For as long as I can remember, my Dad had industrious plans, often thwarted by an array of obstacles that would plow most of us under and eventually did our family in. Yet, even with a debilitating mental illness, he managed to co-create four humans, hand-craft a working fishing boat, remodel our weird old house, and by himself, in a pair of waders and armed with a jackhammer, build a dock in front of our Cocoa house that spanned 30 feet over the Indian River. My “Papa” is exceptional, and incredibly important to me. Letters like this one gave me good reason to bestow the central character in my novel, Lyle Thompson, qualities of my father. And, it’s interesting just how sane this letter seems today, a five weeks away from a really important presidential election. He only attempted running for President twice, as far as I know. Currently, he is writing a book about his life and philosophy entitled, NO BEGINNING, NO END. Maybe we can team up on book tours.

[sandyaustin]

RIP Burl Mello

http://www.sandraaustinmello.com/blog/2016/8/27/chop-wood-and-carry-water

[sandyaustin]

What Kitty lIkes to draw.

[sandyaustin]

Today I sent two more queries to Lit Agencies.  I have learned something important:  it is demoralizing to write two query letters in the same session. I now need a massage, a blow job and some mac and cheese.  Oh, and several 12-step meetings.  A nap wouldn't hurt. I have no creative juices left and its only 2pm...

[sandyaustin]

Ayds Candy Appetite Suppressant.  Mom used to eat them.

[sandyaustin]

You Can Take the Girl out of the Fire

  I had a supernatural childhood. My family lived along the Indian River, across from Cape Kennedy on the Florida Space Coast. In the 1970’s, Cocoa was a sleepy, swampy town that had the flavor of not-enough salt in its broth. It had been a contender for housing NASA workers, but Houston got the big business instead. We were left with a launch pad, the Vehicle Assembly building and the sassy sit-com, I Dream of Jeanie, from a decade earlier. Living there felt like being somewhere overlooked, undercooked and subtropical. The town languished while my heart became more and more agitated.

  Two women, completely different in every way except for their love of polyester, stood like goal posts on either end of my pre-pubescence: Mrs. Nancy Black, a deacon at Frontenac Baptist Church where my Mom and I went every Wednesday for hymnal night and Sunday morning for weekly services. The other woman was Ms. Sue Cheney who beckoned me quietly from her tiny office in the Clearlake Middle School library where she taught my Special Studies class. Both sent tremors of influence into my shaky world.

  I was Sunday School pals with Mrs. Black’s daughter whose name I no longer remember. She was sweet, this girl. She liked to hold hands for much longer than I did. But I was intrigued with her strong mother who had somehow become a deacon, alongside her husband, and I knew that was an unusually important position for a woman at that time.  Already an emotional power vacuum - which makes a lot of sense coming from the family I had – I thought it was my duty to catch everything that fell through the cracks. But my small hands weren't up to the task. Too much was slipping by me.  And believe me when I say, the crawl space beneath our home was overrun with the creepy-crawlies. Sinking in the muck was my family’s reputation and overall health. My father’s schizophrenia, my mother’s migraines and over-reliance on prescription meds, my sister’s teenage pregnancy, my older brother’s learning disability and violent temper contributed to my festering insecurity. Stigma taught me my first and longest-lasting defense mechanism: “Fuck all y’all.”

  My little brother and I anxiously worked hard to make ends meet. I baby-sat, my brothers cut the neighbor’s grass; each of us cooked and cleaned the house while walking on eggshells around our ailing parents. I continued to dose my fathers’ food with liquid Thorazine when he wasn’t looking, and the others did what they did. We wanted to keep our family afloat, but that ship was going to sink no matter what we did or didn’t do.

  Meanwhile, at Frontenac Baptist church, the congregation was becoming friendlier with the Holy Ghost. We were transitioning from regular Baptist to Pentecostal Baptist. I was an energetic kid, and very, very earnest. I prayed for my family and my own dirty little soul. I lived in fear of getting caught, even when I wasn’t doing anything bad. One Sunday, after the church choir sang The Old Rugged Cross, our minister led us in prayer and the congregation felt the presence of the spirit. “Amen” and “Glory Hallelujah” were the first likely flutters of the angel’s wings. Then some folks starting speaking in tongues, including my pal whose name I can’t remember. I wanted to connect so badly. I remember praying so hard, “Please let me be filled with tongues of fire!”  But I didn’t become a speaker of tongues. Instead, I had my first episode of what I now know is called dissociation.

  I stood, unable to move from my spot in the second row of pews. The minister had asked us to “Please, have a seat,” but I could not. I was paralyzed. I could not control my body or think straight. In plain sight of everyone in the church, and especially to Mrs. Black and the deacons, it seemed I was willfully continuing to stand.

  Mrs. & Mr. Black lifted me like a plank of wood and carried me past the pulpit, out the back door to the inner sanctuary of the church. The deacons followed. They made a circle around me while Mrs. Black poured Wesson oil from a salad dressing cruet onto my head. They demanded that Satan leave my soul. Judging from Mrs. Black’s prayers, she’d thought I’d caught my father’s demons, the ones that made him crazy. She was determined to drive them out, to exorcise me. As I started to come back into my own, Mrs. Black’s demands of the devil grew more and more fevered. I got smaller, tighter and angrier. I knew something was expected of me.  I wanted these idiots to stop. I knew then and there they couldn’t understand me or give my twisted soul any comfort. So I faked what I thought getting rid of demons would look like. But I was too tired and worn out from disappointment to do much. I spat a little, and tried to cough. I started crying in earnest. It was enough. Mrs. Black proclaimed victory.

  Sadly, the exorcism didn’t work. I felt worse than ever. And I no longer wanted to go to church.

  Like Mrs. Black, Ms. Sue Cheney was a woman with an important role; she ran the Special Studies class for gifted students and I was fortunate enough to be in her class.  I remember her being very straightforward and smart. Basically, she encouraged her students to study subjects that intrigued – whatever they might be. I remember writing a paper about Opera. I don’t remember being all that cozy with Ms. Cheney. I was obnoxiously into being “teacher’s pet” with as many teachers as possible. This desire to be favored snaked its way into all my relationships, especially later with bosses and men, especially male bosses. But I don’t remember ever trying to sit on Ms. Cheney’s lap. What I do remember is that she sponsored me, actually paid for my participation, in a 10-day student field trip given by The Fellowship of Christian Athletes that went from Cocoa, Florida to Toronto, Canada and back. This gift came at a time in my life when my family couldn’t afford this kind of expense, let alone dream of it.

  That trip broadened my experience. I saw so many new places like Stone Mountain, Georgia, Gettysburg, PA, New York City, Niagara Falls, Toronto, Canada and then on the way back, the backside of the Playboy Mansion in Pennsylvania, a live Senate vote during Watergate in Washington DC, The Smithsonian, and Stone Mountain, Georgia again. It got me away from my family and our wretched situation for 10 whole days. That was longer than I had ever been on my own before. I got to participate in adult supervised situations where the only worry I had was how to stand being on a bus with 12 other kids, or whether I wanted cheese on my burger or not. It was my first glimpse of a world beyond the muck and mire of my life.

  So, in thinking about these women and their affect on it me, the differences are not as obvious as I had first thought. Both women were trying to help me. They were both dedicated and decent women. They were both self-assured and giving of themselves. They simply utilized very different methods. I was angry with one and grateful to the other, surprised by both.  The kindness that Ms. Cheney offered was so unconditional, so profoundly generous, truly free, it’s hard to express how much it meant to me. Her gift has had a gradual meaning that didn’t dawn on me until I was older and in therapy. She gave what she could to someone she had no investment in. I guess. There’s no way of knowing her motive.

The gift Mrs. Black gave me is also slowly dawning on me. It used to be a badge of long-suffering. Something I could drag out when I needed some sympathy, or an ace in the hole I could use to win a “who’s had it shittier” match. I’ve come to realize she did not make me turn away from the church. She was just the straw. What she really did was send me off on the furious journey I was bound to take - lit a fire under my ass so to speak. And the funny thing is, about halfway through this piece, I prayed real, real hard to the Big Reveal that I find something meaningful from writing this. The Big Reveal says that my soul is mine, and spirituality is an inside job. And that you can take the girl out of the fire but you can’t take the fire out of the girl.

Sandra Austin Mello is an Oakland, CA, writer whose as-yet-unpublished novel EXACT NATURE is based on her childhood on Florida's Space Coast.

[sandyaustin]

The beast within, je regard.

  The beast within, je regarde.

Every few years I pull out our cat’s records from the Berkeley Humane Society to see when we first brought Burl Mello home. I comb over the various veterinary reports trying to figure out how old she is.  (Translation:  how much more time do we have with her?)

As I open her file, I see a yellow sticky in her father’s stylish hand writing which reads: BLOOD WORK COMPLETELY NORMAL 12/29/11. A second note reveals DOB 12/2000.  That makes our kitty 13 years old. We got her when she was three, so we’ve only known her for 10 years.

Regularly, one of us will lament that we didn’t know her when she was a kitten.  “Oh, how cute she must have been!“ Brian or I will randomly exclaim while doing the dishes or watering the plants.  Whenever we pass the city of Pinole’s freeway exits, we shake our heads in wonder, recalling that once upon a time, our precious baby girl walked those mean streets before someone kindly put her up for adoption. We send each other pictures of Burl-like cats on FaceBook and Tumblr.  We have several nicknames for her: Peenie, Tappy (her nails click on our wooden floors) and Oprah. As we learn more about her possible breeds - either the French farm cat known as the Charteux or the Blue British Shorthair - we extoll her exceptional qualities like the Pacific Ocean coughing up California jade: 

“Charteux body shapes are referred to as ‘potatoes on toothpicks!’”

“The Blue British Shorthair is known to chirp rather than meow.”

“They watch television -- just like Tappy!

“What in the world is she thinking when she stairs at the wall?”

“Did you hear her grunting in her sleep last night?” 

You could say we’re cat people.

The Thompson household in EXACT NATURE has a good cat, too.

Here’s Kitty holding Jonathan Livingston Seagull up for baby Joey to appreciate.

Jonathan Livingston Seagull is actually a mama kitty. She gave birth to six sticky kittens in the bottom of Kitty’s Chester drawers. (I may have forgotten to put that bit in the novel.)  But never-you-mind, Jonathan Livingston Seagull saunters into the kitchen just in time to give Kitty the ammo she needed against her mother.  From Chapter 4 of EXACT NATURE:

     "What in the world have you been up to?" Tammy asked as she wiped chalk off of Kitty's cheek. "We've got to peel the whole blame bag for tomorrow – you got that? We're taking potato salad to the beach house. Wash those nasty hands of yours," Tammy added, scrunching up her face.

     "O.K., Mom."  Kitty went to the kitchen sink and washed her hands with the resident bar of Dial soap from the ledge.  The medicinal yellow soap had dark fissures running through it from all the dirty-hand-washing.    

     "Mom, can I use the potato peeler, please?"  Kitty asked.    

     "Well, of course you can use the potato peeler, silly.  What else would you use?"  Tammy shook her head.

     "Thanks Mom."  Kitty fished around the drawer that had various cooking utensils and doo-hickies in it.  She found two peelers, one much too rusty to use.  She dropped that one back in the tangle of the over-full drawer and shoved it almost shut.  Kitty dumped the potatoes into the ceramic sink and rinsed, proceeding to making a mountain range of paper-thin potato skins.  Her wild outward strokes became faster and faster, until the peeler sounded like bedsprings creaking in protest.

     "For crying out loud, Kitty!  You're going to hurt yourself peeling so hard!"  Tammy complained.  "Why in the Sam Hill are you in such a hurry?"           

     "I'm peeling potatoes, peeling potatoes, I'm peeling potatoes for my beee-ooo-tiful Mom!"  Kitty sang with gusto. 

     "Good Lord," Tammy grinned.    

     “Mom? Is Helen going to be at the beach house tomorrow?"

     Tammy exhaled loudly.  "I don't know. Maybe. Aunt Josie will be and all of the Thompsons as far as I know. Helen's always liked your father's family more than mine." 

     "Mom?"        

     "What Kitty?" Tammy said with less patience.

     "Will Helen still be pregnant?"    

     "Oh for crying out loud, Kitty!  Tammy smacked the wooden spoon she was using to stir hard against the counter.  “Of course she'll still be pregnant!"       

     "Wull, I just wondered if she'd had the baby, yet. That's all."             

     Where was Helen? Tammy was afraid to call the sheriff's department again. She’d had Lyle call them the day of the wedding, to report that Helen had run off, but Tammy couldn't bring herself to air her family's dirty laundryone more time. She thought about asking for the sheriff, himself, but couldn't bring herself to do it.       

     Kitty rinsed off the last of the peeled potatoes and put them up on the counter close to her mother who was cutting them into chunks and dropping them into a pot of boiling water.   

     "Kitty, climb up there and get me the dry mustard."    

     Kitty climbed up on the wobbly metal stepstool and stood up straight, avoiding the plume of steam rising from the boiling potatoes.  Inside the cabinet was dark and sticky. It smelled musty and peppery.  She rooted around, pushing the pickling spice and bay leaves to one side before finding the box of Schillings dry mustard behind the Knox Gelatin in the back corner. 

     "Here Mom," she said as she handed her mother the mustard and climbed down off the stool.  “What do you think Helen’s going to name the baby?”

     "Now, how should I know that? She wouldn't tell me, anyway. Sometimes I don't think you have a brain in your head, Kitty Thompson!"     

     Kitty pouted and went back to the sink, getting the white plastic garbage pail out from under it.  It was lined with a paper bag from Winn Dixie, and the sides of the pail looked like a Pollock painting in shades of brown.  She scooped the drippy potato peels out of the sink and dropped them heavily into the pail.  As she cleaned up, Jonathan Livingston Seagull glided into the kitchen mewing.          

     "Well hello there, sunshine!"  Tammy cooed at the cat.  She reached down and chucked the cat's chin. Jonathan purred and stretched out her neck for more. "What a pretty girl you are, yes you are," Tammy cooed.  

     Kitty stared at the cat and then at her mother.  Her throat tightened. Tammy looked over at her daughter who was staring back at her with pure hatred. 

     Kitty slammed the door below the sink and cried, "You love the cat more than me!"  She pushed past her mother and ran towards the stairs.         

     "Don't you dare get on your high horse with me, sister!"  Tammy yelled.

"If you don't stop that bellyaching, I'll come up there and give you something to cry about!"           

     Kitty threw herself onto her bed, and buried her face into her pillow. Her discontent started at the bottoms of her feet, rose up through her stomach where it gained gale-wind force as she screamed into her pillow. She never wanted to help her mother again.