Welcome to the latest iteration of my social media presence... Please call me Ember.
The Middle Layer began almost a decade ago when I decided that I wanted to do something else with my writing. I've done this since I could hold a pencil so my inner thoughts have gone from spiral-bound notebooks to word files and eventually online in a variety of places.
Blogging has been my journal, my sounding board... my place to publicly splatter my guts on the wall.
Before Tumbler, I was on MySpace where being wide open online was becoming the norm. I was completely, drunkenly, unfiltered there to the point where it filled with things I shouldn't have said at all. It was an ugly place in life but it's part of my story... I also made a lot of friends on MySpace, forming my social circle in Texas in my 20s and into my mid-30s.
When I shifted to Facebook in 2009-ish, I was still authentically myself but slowly I realized that the people who knew me in real life didn't need such an open window into my head. To this day the "memories" section makes me cringe, but it also reminds me of how far I've come both in the way I engaged online and in my real-life journey.
Things changed again when I got active on Twitter in 2020.
Initially, it was a place for me to promote my Ember Sparxxx content but it felt weird to post political rants and COVID stuff in the same place I was linking my adult content. That's why I started my 'nilla account: RylRed.
In general, I never hid the fact that I was getting naked in front of the camera, but I also didn't want people who knew me in real life to see it unless they explicitly asked.
I guess that's been a good way to describe how I engage with my various social media accounts. I don't hide anything, but I try to keep each account far enough apart that nobody stumbles into anything by accident.
Do I want my co-workers to know Ember Sparxxx exists? Nope. Would it be the end of my career if one of them put in the right search terms on PH and they recognized me? Also no.
Funny story there... that happened with my former spouse immediately after the first of my content went up. Ooops!
I have no political aspirations and the only politician I've personally encountered was a low-level city councilman who I turned down. Another story for another time.
With Twitter burning to the ground (along with our democracy... so many rabbit holes, so little time!) I decided to come back to Tumblr and just connect some of these dots.
I'd already changed the privacy on some of my Middle Layer content and will continue to use nicknames but because of the blog/sub-blog stuff, I'm going to end up re-blogging TheMiddleLayer & RylRed's Rants between each other while. I'm still figuring out how to re-establish my online presence without connecting too many dots to real-life places where I have to maintain a filter that I just don't wear in places like this.
Every day there's one more thing that feels like the drop that'll make the bucket overflow, but it's still raining and somehow I keep getting up and doing the things.
January 6th, 2020: I was working from home watching rioters tear the Capitol apart on one screen with my Teams app open on the other. I was supposed to be working on e-learning materials for new hires at the company where I worked, but I couldnāt look away. I couldnāt think about truck reservations or maintenance schedules. I couldnāt think about what I was going to do for lunch, or when Iād last gotten up to pee.
That was the last time I remember being so overwhelmed by the state of the world that I was frozen in abject horror at it all.
There were meltdowns over more things, of course. The day I tried to make my first cloth mask and collapsed on my office floor, sobbing all over my fabric scraps. The day I drove by Dennyās on the way to one of the last in-store grocery trips Iād take. Breaking up with my best friend over my COVID-cautious behavior while she was in Vegas, having flown through Phoenixā¦ all pre-vaccine.
Getting the call from my brother that my mother was hospitalized with COVID and declining rapidly.
Spoiler alert- she survived and still believes itās all a global conspiracy concocted by baby-eating Dems who secretly, are all lizard people running the āNew World Orderā.
Today as more details come in about the mass shooting in Texas I donāt feel half of the rage and sadness that I might have felt in the past.
If Iām being totally honest, I felt more rage waking up to a dirty kitchen earlier this week. More rage at the finding the scrubby sponge covered in cheese and at Metalhead interrupting whatever we were watching to ask Pirate for gas money. And thatās fucked up.
I've become relatively numbed from the rapid succession of major historical events and statistics of late: more than 1 million deaths from COVID, 21 weeks into the year and 213 mass shootings, 200 bodies found in a basement in Ukraine, formula shortages, the impending reversal of Roe, and on and on...
They have become numbers and headlines in a way that removes all of the horror and humanity.
At the same time Iām seeing interviews of a grieving father, the EMS who learned that his daughter had died while evaluating her best friend; videos of enraged parents screaming at officers to do something being pushed and yelled at by the bystanders with badges; interrupted press conferences full of rage. It feels perverse and exploitive, more voyeuristic and inflammatory than humanizing.
This is the world we live in.
Are there going to be protests? Probably.
More hashtags with variations of ACAB that will side-step the Zuc-bots designed to shut down that kind of āhate speechā while ignoring actual neo-Nazis? Of course.
Political action? New laws? Of course not!
Because weāve been here, done that again and again only to watch the Ghastly Old Party continue to bring their Bibles and guns into the statehouse without repercussion.
Pirate keeps saying that nothing will change until there is real violence... Violence towards the right people, not the poor, black, and brown ones who keep turning up in body bags and behind bars en masse.
Every time he says that part of me recoils in horror. That horror feels like the last piece of my own humanity clinging to the idea that we live in a world where we are still somehow safe.
Meanwhile, the rest of me knows we arenāt safe.
Itās become a statistical reality (not that Iāve dug up the numbers personally, but Iām sure between Pirate and MM they can find them) that life expectancy in the US is rapidly declining for so many preventable reasons.
Increased mental health problems turn into increased negative health outcomes, violence, and self-harm, all exacerbated by (if not rooted in) increased poverty across the nation.
Toss in the anti-vaxxer/anti-mask āwhat about muh free-Dumbz!?!ā crowd and here we are: barely halfway through 2022.
The sad part is that so many of the things killing Americans are things that other countries have solved: access to health and mental health care, restricted access to guns, vaccine and mask mandates.
It doesnāt have to be this way. But this IS the American Way now.
Whatever the case, Iām just trying to hang on to my humanity without falling apart and itās a delicate balance Iāve yet to achieve.
Yesterday I saw a tweet that said that providing mental health care right now feels like handing sunscreen to people who are on fire.
And what am I doing? Laundry. Doom scrolling, exchanging links and messages with MM and getting ready for a dental appointment.
Iām here writing about another example of all the ways that society is collapsing around us.
MM shared some articles recently that indicate a total collapse in the near future and just said āEnd of the civilized world within 5 years, all a downward slide to 2024, and then the Civil War and completion of the US's collapse.ā
And here I am at my desk Tweeting, blogging, fueling the fire, and thinking about what to make for dinner.
That last piece of my own humanity is clinging to the hope that thereās a better answer than burning it all down.
As far as I can tell the only way to truly get out of the line of fire is to leave the life and home Iāve been trying to build for myself. The house, a nice enough rental with a sectional couch and open floor plan; the job where Iām interviewing for a promotion; the health insurance that affords me the luxury of all of the medical appointments Iāve had without being afraid of the co-pays; the last bits of the American dream of middle-class life in a gated, cookie-cutter suburban bubble.
Running away to Mexico to live near the beach is not the fantastical dream it sounds like, and I know it. There are no good answers and it all exhausts me.
The rain keeps falling. The blood keeps pouring. The tweets keep coming. And my laundry keeps drying while the rest of the world is drenched in rage.
Iām still here. Iām somewhere new, a cookie-cutter gated suburb of Phoenix to be specific, but still here.
Pirate and I seem to be the last people on the planet to not get COVID and the isolation has been wearing on me. This weekend Iām going to brunch somewhere with a patio to catch up with my beloved Olive before she moves back to Canada. The one person in the state Iād care to share oxygen with is leaving the country this summer.
Another thing to grieve.
This chapter of my life might as well be titled āGriefā or more accurately āKummerspeck.ā That perfect German word encompasses the grief itself and the physical changes that come from settling into the sadness with a block of brie, a bottle of wine, and salted-caramel chocolates.
Youāve heard people talk about wearing their hearts on their sleeves? Seems Iāve taken to wearing my grief across a midsection thatās wider than itās ever been.
Iām a living testament to how weight gain is different at every phase of life.
At 19 years old and over 200lbs I had a smaller waist than I do at 43 and under 200 lbs. Whatever the case, Iāve given up āhard pantsā in favor of leggings and skirts for now. Athleisure wear is still trendy, right?
Why all the grief?
Byron is the obvious answerā¦ his sister has been tagging me in Facebook posts of memories of him. The one last weekend, Easter weekend, hit me square in my bloated gut. It was Easter weekend, 30 years ago, that he held my hand on the way home from church. That was the day I knew I loved him, as much as a 13-year-old girl can know anything.
It just happened that I finally unpacked my DVD collection on Easter. The same box held my old VHS tapes, one labeled āEaster 1992.ā I resisted the urge to dust off my VCR and watch it, mostly because I didnāt have the energy for that kind of deep dive into my own feelings.
No time to schedule a proper meltdown yet.
Instead of taking the time to process things and heal, Iām spending my energy explaining the logic behind why we run the dishwasher when thereās room for a few more dishes to a 22-year-old.
There have been daily arguments and the repeated question of āHow much of this is mental illness and how much of it is him just being an asshole?ā
Pirateās anxiety has spiked and his already-thin patience ran out before Metalhead deflated the air mattress and assembled his desk in the former gym-and-storage room.
Unlike the person with the patience of a saint that I once was, Iām finding myself short-tempered and struggling to withhold my own outbursts of frustration with things. Thatās a new layer to the grieving for who I thought I was thing.
Iāve lost that calm patience thatās allowed me to manage and instead find myself shutting down, too tired to even cry at times.
Iām over it. Iām out of spoons.
The brightest silver lining I can find is that there may actually be a medical reason for at least some of it.
Last fall, my labs came back with elevated calcium levels but my doctor seemed to blow it off, failing to put in the order for follow-up labs.
My new doctor personally called me on Friday night when my bloodwork came back with the same results. He mentioned the lab closure for Easter Monday but I told him Iād get in on Wednesday or Friday at the latest.
The more I read about hypercalcemia and hypoparathyroidism the less inclined I am to wait until Friday.
My mother was diagnosed with both last year but she insists it was due to COVID and has healed itself.
The bruise from last weekās blood draw is mostly healed, so Iāll get in tomorrow right after the training session Iām working.
In the meantime, Iām still here. Sometimes thatās the best any of us can do, right?
The pandemic has changed everything and lately Iāve been asking myself, āWhen did this become normal? At what point of the last 10 months did the idea of the ānew normalā fade into a new reality?ā
Someone I knew back on the east coast just shared the most heartbreakingly stunning portrait of loneliness that Iāve ever seen. The black and white image was shot from his elbows up as he held onto himself in a hug of sorts while looking down and away. McT said that he felt āalone, and adriftā¦.piloting a rudderless craft in a tumultuous sea of acquaintance, with no safe harbor in sight.ā
Iāve tried to figure out why we never managed to truly connect.
When we met, McT was the emcee at a burlesque show that MM and I frequented in DC. I remember feeling both turned on and a little afraid when I helped him take some things out to his car one night after a show. Alone in a dark parking lot with this man who sparkled with the most amazing charisma on stage but harbored self-doubt and insecurity about so many things about himself.
His introduction as an old Jewish man in an old Jewish body was part of the act at the time.
Since then, heās transformed into a literal strongman with broad shoulders, calloused hands, and an ever-growing resume of performances, festivals, classes, and encounters with the greats of the modern-day sideshow. On the outside, he still sparkles, but heās become more and more open about all of the things underneath his shine.
There was definitely a mutual attraction between us, but circumstances just never lined up and I left the east coast a few years after that night in the parking lot. For nearly a decade weāve followed each other on social media and had the occasional chat where I never know exactly what to say.
When I was single and we had a few video chats I counted him as one of my troupe of regular connections. There was a part of me that envisioned a visit once things were āsafe againā but when he mentioned he was seeing someone, a nurse working in a COVID ward, that bubble burst for me. It always felt like we wanted different things, so thinking of him as a friend was safer than trying to pursue a romantic relationship anyway.
Ā This was during the initial ālockdownā phase of the pandemic where extroverts like the two of us lost a lot of the things that gave us joy- live theater, comedy, sideshowsā¦ dinners out with loud conversation, and laughter, all of the human connection that extroverts thrive on. It energizes us.
During those few months alone in my apartment, I felt a different kind of loneliness.
I was re-building a life and trying to figure out who I was without a partner while battling some of the darkest parts of myself. I was truly afraid that something would happen and Iād die alone in that apartment. I envisioned falling and hitting my head or choking on a chicken wing and laying there rotting until the smell alerted the neighbors.
Worst yet, I was afraid Iād finally give up and test my theory that a memory foam mattress could hold all of the blood well enough that the carpet would be okay if I slit my wrists in bed. I combatted that with daily text messages and occasional video chats with people who helped me feel like I was still a person and not yet the ghost of a life that once was. McT was one of those people and I donāt know that I ever told any of them how much their presence in my life saved mine.
Partnered again, Iāve moved 3 times since that apartment.
The connections that saved me have all drifted away in one way or another.
I lost touch with the married firefighter who talked about running away and sharing a bottle of red wine with me; I knew I was just a fantasy to him. Cookie guilt-tripped me for not socializing with her pre-vaccines and her husband became increasingly uncomfortable to be around. Ninja finally got married to his finance sometime after his motherās suicide. Byron died of liver failure, unrelated to COVID.
Iām having brunch with Olive tomorrow at the same place where we had brunch on a patio last month. When she met me in the parking lot I burst into tears because it felt so good to be hugged. That was the first time Iād eaten out, since 2020. It was also the first time Iād really touched anyone but Pirate or a medical professional in that same timeframe. We are finally within a reasonable driving distance but sheās moving back to Canada next month.
My relationship with Pirate is more autonomous than any Iāve had before, despite being the first monogamous one Iāve had since before MM. Iāve been deliberate in maintaining my own money, my own space, and not being reliant on him to take care of me like I have in past relationships. I know that itās a safety thing for me after a lifetime of being so enmeshed in my partnerships that I never knew where āweā ended and āIā began. Iāve been deliberate to stay āmeā and not āweā because I know that I just donāt have it in me to endure anymore loss or heartache.
Losing Byron last winter broke me in ways that I donāt know how to fix.
He was the only person left who remembered who I was before. Before motherhood, marriage, divorces, loss, heartacheā¦ He was my first real heartbreak, but that meant that he knew what I looked like before life started piling up on top of the last of my genuine shine. The smaller that light gets inside, the harder we have to try to put on that face that says, āIām okayā when we arenāt.
McT has always felt like an invitation to tell the truth. Iām not okay.
On the outside, I still do my best to put on the sparkle and keep going. I applied for the promotion at work that my boss said Iād be perfect for. She went as far as telling recruiting and the heads of that department that I was interested and as soon as I told her Iād found the application, the posting disappeared from the company website. I also signed up for the classes I dropped this spring because of the move closer to Phoenix.
I did all of this with a gaping wound on my dominant hand because dermatology decided to biopsy the random itchy spot thatās been there for months. I did it knowing that Iām driving over an hour to see an endocrinologist on Monday. Best case they agree with my primary care doctor on his suspicion that Iāve got hyperparathyroidism and they move forward with surgery to remove the offending gland(s). I did it knowing that Iām scheduled for surgery next month that will have me out of commission for at least a week to repair my (literal) dragging ass.
Iām not okay in so many ways.
The isolation and loss have left me with neither the sea of acquaintance nor safe harbor that McT mentioned. Pirate is only that to a point, and thatās my own doing. Thatās me refusing to set anchor because I canāt believe that the storm is truly over.
While the loneliness I feel looks different than McTās on the outside, I know that itās bigger than that. Itās something thatās lived inside me for so long that when I had friends and a social life, the moments in my sea of acquaintances was enough. The loneliness would fade into the background so I could sit at the table and laugh along, forgetting it until the tearful drive home.
Leaving the party left room for it to swallow me up completely, but I still had the party.
Mine is the loneliness of a single-parented latchkey kid who was just expected to be an adult without ever being taught how to be a person. Itās the loneliness of the helper who doesnāt know how to accept help in the instances when someone offers it without being asked.
I learned early on that itās easier to just do it all myself than depend on anyone else.
Iāve managed to reinforce that lesson over and over as an adult. My loneliness isnāt one about losing that sense of home that oneās family of origin is supposed to provide, but one where I never felt at home with my family of origin. Home has always been this imaginary place that Iāve spent my entire life trying to build. But how do you build something when youāve never seen the blueprint and have no idea which tools to use?
My loneliness is one that I hide in places where I donāt show my face or use my real name. This is the room where I come to splatter my guts on the wall. Itās a place where the only people with the keys are strangers and people I used to know.
McT has the courage to expose his loneliness in public in a way I just canāt. I could never share this in a place where people that still know me might see it without deliberately seeking it out.
Pulling the curtain back on this kind of loneliness tends to elicit an outpouring of emoji reactions that just rattle around inside the places where connections stay missedā¦ Missed not for lack of wanting, or lack of trying but rather simply not knowing how to do it for more than a moment here and there along the way.
And maybe thatās why McT and I could never quite connect. Maybe his lonely and mine are both so big that putting the two side by side is a wider chasm than time and space could overcome.
One of my oldest and dearest friends is at the end of his very hard life. He has been in pain for so longā¦ physical and emotional agony beyond anything most of us could imagine. Iām trying to find peace in knowing that his suffering has ended.
His heart is still beating. His lungs still fill with air. But the morphine has already taken the last semblance of the man who I once knew. His sister shared a picture of a sad old man in a bed, not him. Not Byron.
Another childhood friend commented-
Thatās not my buddyā¦Doesnāt even look like him. My poor friend. Pure sadness in our hometown. It shouldn't be this way. He's full of energy and sarcasm. My friend... my dear friend.
My heart is breaking in ways I didnāt expect.
The first time I lost him, I was still very young. I moved away from home and simply didnāt know where heād gone or what had happened in his life after the phone call when I made a choice.
At 16 years old, I was living just a few hours away from where weād grown up together. I got that call the day after Iād gotten into a relationship with my first husband and father of my only child.
Byron said, āI love you. Iāve always loved youā and he asked me to come home and be with him.
I said no.
Easter Day, 3 years before that phone call, he held my hand on the way home from church. I knew I loved him then.
We shared some firsts and laid the groundwork in my mind and heart about what it means to love and be loved. Until that phone call, I didnāt know he loved me. Or even saw me. I didnāt know that I mattered at all.
I was young and in love and all poetry is bad poetry. These are two of the bad poems I wrote about him.
āLoveā
Love is a bottle of vodka
on a cold winterās night
It warms you
intoxicates you, then offers
Another drink
until youāre hooked
(At the time, I couldnāt have predicted that he would grow up to become an alcoholic.)
āThe Toyā
No happily ever with you
just the morning after
then youāre back in her arms
Fucked and forgotten and I was
the toy
Not the one playingā¦
Byronās nickname comes from a quote that I believed for so many decades.
āIn his first passion woman loves her lover; in all others all she loves is love.ā
~George Gordon Byron
For several years after that phone call, I would think about him and wish Iād said yes.
The song āYour Wildest Dreamsā by the Moody Blues played on the radio often back then. There isnāt a better way to explain that time without quoting that song. I wonāt try.
Almost a decade passed before we found each other again.
Iād married an active-duty soldier 6 weeks before 9/11 and we were living in Germany. Byron was married, unhappily, to the woman who bore his 2nd and 3rdchildren. I befriended her via MySpace, but life was pure drama for all of us back then. Byron was deep in his alcoholism, living the nightlife, running a comedy club.
There were always stories. He hung out with Nick Cannon. He dated Tonya Harding. He sang karaoke and was always the center of attention. Everyone knew his name, but the āhatersā were always trying to bring him down. Chaos. Pure chaos.
After Germany, I moved to Colorado alone, then bought a house in Texas where that marriage ended.
The ink hadnāt dried on my divorce papers before Byron moved in with me in an attempt to start over somewhere new. When I picked him up at the airport, I almost didnāt recognize him until he opened his arms and yelled āWassup Homette!ā or something equally cheesy and, wellā¦ Byron.
He waited tables at a restaurant where I worked, dated a girl who took my first college algebra class for me, and cheated on her with a friend of a friend of mine.
I kissed him exactly once in Texas. And I knew immediately that it was wrong. He wasnāt that man to me anymore.
The last time I saw him was when he came to get his things out of my house. The night before, weād gotten into a fight over him going out for more alcohol. I donāt remember if it was because he was trying to get sober or if he was already just too drunk. He flung one of my kitchen chairs across the room, narrowly missing me. I was devastated.
That was the 2nd time I lost him.
He was working on his sobriety when we re-connected again. He had a little girl and a new wife by then. He wasnāt allowed to see any of his 4 other children, but this little girl was different. He was getting sober so he could be a better father for her.
I was in Arizona with a different soldier when I got a āgoodbyeā voicemail from him. Heād been living out of his van in the parking lot of the restaurant he was working at. Getting fired from that job pushed him over the edge.
We were connected on Facebook where heād also posted something similar. I felt like Iād been kicked in the chest. After a few hours of watching the comments, I realized that nobody else was going to do anything to try to help him. I looked up the police department in the town where he lived and spent that night exchanging calls with law enforcement. They found his van but he was nowhere to be found.
I cried myself to sleep thinking Iād lost him again.
The next morning when he returned my call, he was mad that Iād sent the cops after him. But we still ended that call with āI love you.ā
From there on, he would randomly just call me to talk about whatever was going on in our lives. He posted āHappy Birthdaysā on my Facebook pageā¦ his daughterās birthday was the day after mine. We liked and commented on things we each shared via social media. He was listed as simply āfamily memberā on my āFamily and Relationshipsā page. We were as connected as we could be, despite the years and miles that separated us.
Three years ago this month, my life fell apart again. But it was still bright and sunny on the summer day that same year when the next big hit came. We were on a video call when he told me that heād been diagnosed with liver cirrhosis. He wanted to call me and tell me about it face to face before sharing it on social media. Talk about bitter ironyā¦ finally getting sober only to get really sick from years of alcoholism.
I began bracing myself for losing him again that day.
A few months later he would face an unimaginable heartbreak. That bright beautiful girl whoād inspired his sobriety was taken from him.
He and her mother had gone through a nasty breakupā¦ Iād helped communicate with her to help him get his belongings out of the house where she later moved a murderer in. Devastating doesnāt begin to describe it.
Thatās when the phone calls got harder. There were times when I could barely understand his slurred speech. Times where he would tell me something heād already told me on a call he didnāt remember. There were a lot of tears and reminders that his little girl would want him to keep going.
When my life fell apart, those hard calls still held moments where he did his protective thing asking me if he could come fly out and kick someoneās ass for me. Moments where he told me how much he loved me and how proud he was of the woman Iāve become.
His call on Valentineās Day, 2020 was right after Iād moved into my own home for the first time ever.
I sobbed when he told me how strong Iāve always been and that I deserved so much better than life had given me.
He gave me all of that love and support in the midst of his own agony, watching and waiting for the man who took his little angel from this earth to be sentenced.
When the first wave of COVID hit, he was making a living stocking grocery and pharmacy shelves. That meant he knew where those hard-to-find items were and had access to buy them before stores opened for the day. He took advantage of that, delivering care packages to people who couldnāt find toilet paper and hand sanitizer.
My care package was a bottle of Tylenol, an unopened thermometer heād bought for his daughter, and candy- a pack of nerds. That was one of his goofy terms of endearment. Before we could just say āI love youā it was āLove ya, Nerd! Lol!ā
That first lockdown was a scary period both because of COVID and because I was alone.
We talked often during that time.
He laughed at my crazy adventures in dating and said that he wanted to be my other boyfriend. The romantic connection between us was long gone but we talked about growing old together, watching Greyās Anatomy while he acted goofy and sang āOh-oh Ah-oooh Ahā¦ the right stuff!ā while hitting on the nurses in the old folks home.
I had to stop following him on Facebook back in late 2018 after he posted a particular picture from his daughterās funeral. He was holding her with her head (thankfully) obscured by his head hanging over her blond hair. Her little hands were in her lap with a tiny ring on her finger. She had a frilly white dress on with sparkly silver shoes.
When I would go check on his page, it had become a portrait of a life that wasnāt. There were the repeated cries for help- he was out of money, out of food, homeless on and off. He was sick, injured, in and out of the hospital in excruciating pain.
The happy images were bittersweet because that was his memorial to his little girl.
I sent money when I could and always did my best to pick up his calls, even if all I could do was tell him that I loved him but couldnāt talk.
These last few months he started calling me, telling me that he just wanted to hear my voice. He told me how tired he was, and I finally stopped trying to encourage him to keep going.
I just told him I loved him over and over and did my best not to cry until we hung up.
The first post about him accepting hospice care was back before Thanksgiving. I missed that one because I hadnāt been checking his Facebook as often. I wish Iād have known before he was too far gone to call one more time.
At this point, itās been a slow-speed car crash that I canāt look away from. On December 5th his sister posted:
My Brother is fading. Heās on 30 mg of morphine per hour. I canāt understand his speech it is slurred from the heavy sedatives. It is my hope to get up there within a couple of weeks. Praying he holds on til I get there. This is so hard.
The next day she shared that the nurses told her that she needed to come as soon as she could.
I reached out and I sent her a little money to help pay for her trip. Itās a 10-hour drive, so I was able to stifle the urge to check her Facebook page for most of the day she traveled. But that was the day I asked my partner to pull out the tub that had all my old pictures in it.
I sat on my office floor with a glass of wine and cried while I rummaged through my memories, looking for the ones of us from when we were kids.
Sheās been there for a little less than 2 days now and the images sheās sharing are heartbreaking. Every time I feel like Iāve cried all I can, the urge to check for an update hits and thereās another picture of that sad little manās body. Not Byron. Not anymore.
Last night, she sent me a direct message. It was a picture of my school ID dated 1992-1993. That would have been my freshman year. Heās held onto it for almost 3 decades through moves, homelessness, marriages, and divorcesā¦ a lifetime.
His was not one of those lives where home always had the same zip code. Neither was mine.
Today he officially moved from the hospital into a hospice care facility. He hasnāt eaten in 3 days and his sister said he hasnāt been able to wake up to talk to her. Another friend of his asked if he was going to pull through and she replied simply, āNo.ā
So now I watch and wait. The same mutual childhood friend just commented:
I'd make him wake up if I was there. Straight up !! I'd be having him singing and dancing right out of that place. Lol !! Play some NKOTB n I bet he'll wake up. Especially "Summertime!!" I sure do wish I was there to comfort my friend, my homie, my brother. Sure hope he gets a waking up. Remember, nkotb if all else fails.
Iām so fucking sad.
So I sent a message to that dear friend who Byron and I grew up with.
It's been a hard week.... thinking of you Dear friend ā¤ Here's a little smile for you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbIEwIwYz-c
I was āraisedā by people with one foot in the grave and one on a banana peel.
I vividly remember hearing over and over how āUncle Samā was going to pay for grandpaās funeral because he helped build the pipeline in Alaska.
The irony? There have never been any funerals.
Not for my grandfather whose Alzheimerās had him wandering off and having long conversations with dead relatives before lung cancer waltzed in and took him out.
Not for my grandma who grew up a ārich Oakie because they had 2 mattresses,ā picked cotton in the fields, turning her skin into papery wrinkles in her late forties. The family āupgradedā from the silver Twinkie by the river into the double-wide in a park in town because of 2 of my grandmaās car accidents. A police officer hit her and driving away from the courthouse, another one rear-ended her.
I couldnāt make this shit up if I tried.
Not for my father who spent most of my life drunk or high, hiding from me- the reminder of my mother that he couldnāt face. The woman who broke his heart that he never got over.
My father got custody of me and my younger brother in the divorce, so thatās where I was raised- in a house with my brother and father with his parents as the backup babysitters for the times we couldnāt be home alone.
I was raised in a house where, by the time I hit puberty, I knew I didnāt belong. I wasnāt one of them. I was like my mother. āA champagne appetite on a beer budget, riding my high horseā all over the little 2-bedroom condo where we lived. My fatherās bedroom was the garage.
When finally left and I moved in with my mother at 16, it became apparent quickly that our similarities were so much that she saw me not as a child that needed to be parented, but as an equal. An adult.
Someone that she didnāt need to protect from anything- not her lecherous husband who kissed his grown daughters on the mouth and talked about our breasts at the dinner table. Not the patients at the rehab center they ran where I was a staff member- the grown men whose beds I eagerly hopped in and out of under their roof.
Not her best friend who was threatening to kick my ass. She was the girlfriend of the staff member with who I was involved for several months. Her 31-year old boyfriend was 3 days out of San Quentin when we met. It took less than 2 weeks before we were exchanging passing gropes in dark hallways and love letters, carelessly discarded where my mother found one.
Funny story- Iām Facebook friends with Mr. SQ and heās popped up over the years. The last time we talked, I mentioned how young I was when we were together.
He remembered that I was young- too young to be sitting in a bar in the Haight with him, too young to be walking down Ashbury looking to score meth, too young to be talking about running away to Europe together. Too young to be the one comforting him in secret when his girlfriend miscarried their son.
He didnāt realize I was that young. He was shocked when I told him that I was only 16 when we were having those adventures together. Then he asked how I knew what I was doing. Then he apologized. Then I gave him the link to Twitter for my alter ego- a creator of BDSM leaning adult content.
For all our similarities, I had to unfriend and block my mother earlier this year. Between her dismissive anti-feminist comments during all of the āme tooā posts to her anti-vax stance during the pandemic and all the insanity in between, I just couldnāt do it anymore.
When I tried to talk to her about Iād spent my entire childhood being told how āsmartā and āmatureā I was for my age rather than being parented, she replied that I was always the one teaching her things.
More proof in her mind that when, at 3 years old I looked up at her, hands on my little hips, and scolded, āWhen I was your mommy thatās not how we did it!ā it was the truth. She managed to make that my reality, despite not being my custodial parent.
My mother was just released from the hospital where she was battling COVID.
She had been there a few days before my brother finally tracked her down. She was so disoriented that the nurse asked him to verify that she has 2 children and where she lived.
I had a video chat with last week her where she paused between each word to take jagged breaths as she described her lunch- seemingly the most amazing cheeseburger sheād ever had. Sheād been calling friends to tell them it had been āswellā and that she didnāt think she was going to make it.
Now, sheās in a rehab facility somewhere near my brother in Utah. She didnāt tell him she was getting out of the hospital or where she went.
He still seems to think that the stories about ICUs running out of beds are just media propaganda. He also had COVID last month, right after his wife had surgery. He went to work as a Walmart manager for a full week, thinking he had a cold before he lost his sense of smell.
These are the people I came from.
One foot in the grave, one foot on a banana peel. And no matter how hard I fight it, I feel myself slipping.
Work, couch, bed, repeat- the hamster wheel life of the pandemic.
Itās been 2 years since the quad blew up, as of next week. Two years since my entire world exploded over a 48 hour period during which time my then-family should have been celebrating Solstice together. Two years since I lost not only Nomad but his kids, Boy1der and Lil Hulk.Ā
Last night, dreamt about Nomad and the boys. It was a long, drawn-out dream with details that escaped me as soon as I woke up but I felt all of that loss all over again. I know itās a kind of grief, and as such there are unexpected waves of it that still hit me. They are fewer and farther between but no less painful when they happen.Ā
First, thereās the ache in my chest and flowing tears that I canāt talk myself out of. Next comes the anger in thinking about the way that I lost so much more than the rest of the quad when it all went sideways... anger at the way I was the one who kept trying to get us to sit down and work out our issues and accept that the individual marriages had ended.Ā
We had something totally new that we could have grown if we could have just let go of the way things were when we were just 1+1 and 1+1 making four. But MM and Nomad couldnāt stop chasing Gypsy. And Gypsy couldnāt stop running away. Ultimately, the love between me and Nomad was more of a trauma bond while the love between me and MM was more about our home and family, not us as a couple.Ā
When it all ended, I was sleeping alone while life went on for Nomad, Gypsy, and the boys for the most part. Gypsy and MM kept in contact through āsecret meansā so as to not upset Nomad but they āended thingsā at least twice. One of those times, MMās voicemail to his boss led to uniforms at my door at 6am for a welfare check. I had to basically cover for him and assure his superiors that it was safe for us to be under the same roof before I locked myself back into my bedroom.
I was sleeping alone while MM began the process of self-discovery that brought him to the identities pansexual and polyamorous, dating a handful of women at a time while coming to me for relationship advice.Ā
Last fall, after I moved out of the house MM and I bought, we were first trying to be friends again, and he told me that he invited Gypsy and Nomad to his going away party. He thought about inviting me but wanted to let me know what the guest list looked like in case they showed up.Ā
MM later told me that the three of them got together and talked through things, mending those wounds. He extended Gypsyās invitation for me to do the same, but my wounds were too deep. Apparently, they still are because itās the end of my workday and the ache in my chest that I woke up with is throbbing again.Ā
I never saw Gypsy after that Solstice weekend when I left her saying that if she couldnāt love Nomad and the boys the way they deserved that she should just leave them.
I only saw Nomad and the boys one more time, the day I brought their Christmas gifts to the house where MM and Gypsy had spent so much their time together. Boy1der was on the spectrum and wasnāt as affectionate towards me as Lil Hulk always was. That day, Boy1der ran to me as I was getting out of my car crying,Ā āDonāt leave us forever!ā and wrapped his arms around me.Ā
That moment only hurt my heart a little more than the look on Lil Hulkās face the last morning of Solstice weekend when he came into the bedroom expecting to see his mother under the covers and found me there instead. He still asked if he could make me a cup of coffee as his little heart sank. That was the moment I knew I had to make the choice to leave that home and go back to the one I shared with MM.Ā
I had to leave the home where Nomad and I cooked dinner together and helped the boys with homework onĀ ānon-nesting nights.ā I spent mornings in the kitchen in that home making the coffee, and sipping on my own mug while his mother and I chatted. I would pack up the boysā lunches and backpacks, then Nomad would drive them to the bus stop. Even when he was running late, Nomad always came back to kiss me goodbye as I handed him his travel mug in the doorway.Ā
It was as much my home as the house that MM and I bought together earlier that year. After Solstice weekend, neither address felt like home anymore. I stayed another 9 months at that address, then spent 6 months somewhere else trying to build a home... only to have that explode spectacularly when I was blindsided by another man. But those are all different stories...
Maybe itās just the time of year that brought this up. My biggest personal losses have all happened around the holidays- specifically late December. All the breakups, except the last one that happened at the end of January this year. The weather gets cold and my life falls apart so around the time I need to turn the heater on, I start drifting in and out of time in my dreams, feeling all of those feelings again.Ā
I remind myself that life is good now. Iām so very loved and appreciated by my partner, Pirate. MM and I are staying married on paper so that I can keep the health insurance and he can get the tax breaks. The three of us started a group chat where we talk about the shared phone plan, job opportunities and, the occasional non-business related stuff. They are both my family, and the bonus kid, Metalhead has come back around after a brief stint of closing himself off from the family time stuff weāve done regularly for the last 6 months or so.Ā
My bills are paid, my job is stable, and we donāt have to go out and risk COVID for any reason. My biggest worry is what to make for dinner, and how much it will cost in pet rent when we move into a house with Metalhead and all 4 dogs if we canāt keep the ranch. Either way, we can always go month-to-month in the apartment into spring if we donāt have that settled in time.Ā
On that note, Iām making taco casserole tonight and thinking about whether or not I should have a medicated cracker before I log out of work for the day. I wish I could turn off all of these feelings when they surface like this. I wish I could have just talked myself down this morning and did leg day. But I made it through the workday, accomplished a lot, and can go melt into the couch for the night soon enough.Ā
MM once joked that this is my theme song.. that my exes never really go away. He said that they haveĀ āorbitsā meaning that they randomly circle back into my life. Sometimes itās just to check in and update me on their life. Other times itās more. But was never bad until Tampa.Ā
The lawyer sent a cease and desist letter last week, to which he replied with the same ridiculous bullshit about me owing him money.Ā
Like, Dude... there is no such thing breakup tax and if there was, YOU would owe me for the emotional distress of being blindsided by discovering what youād been doing right under my nose the entire time. If I owed you money then why didnāt that come up right after I left in February? How about after I told you to not contact me again? No? Then randomly in September after I got pulled into a group chat where all your lies were exposed you decided that youād try that line. That in itself clearly illustrates that itās an invalid claim and is purely harassment.
Whatās next? Well the lawyer said that I can file harassment charges in FL where heās at. The letter is going to the lawyer and if he canāt represent me in that case then I guess Iām getting another lawyer to take care of it. Iād rather spend double what heās claiming IĀ āoweā him on lawyers than give him a single fucking dime.Ā
Iāve always been too nice. Too forgiving. Too understanding. And once again, Tampa is the one to teach me how to stand up for myself and not take it.Ā
You learn more about someone at the end of a relationship than at the beginning.
Unknown (via onlinecounsellingcollege)
Fitting. The lawyer just sent a cease and desist letter to Tampa. Fucking stalker wonāt stop harassing me. I also learned that gmail sends messages from blocked contacts to spam. There was yet another message from him there including a really low blow about my Kiddo... oh, and apparently heās been reading this. Maybe he will finally stop saying I just lied to him and used him, after reading about how I felt during and after the break up. But thatās probably asking too much of the delusional, narcissist he turned out to be. Ugh.Ā
Tonight I was added to a group chat on FB titled āTampaās Harem of Lies and Deceit.ā There were 6 other women in the chat including Tampaās best friendās widow and theĀ āpsycho exā who gave him PTSD and he got a restraining order against. Guess where this is all going?!?
BFās Widow had flown out to AZ to see him, at his request, several times. Sheād also slept with him a handful of times while he lived in AZ and flew back to Florida. She couldnāt recall the exact dates that he was there, but itās likely that he was in FL that week last September when he was out of townĀ āfor work.āĀ
PTSD-Causing Psycho had ended things with him when she found out he was lying about still being married on paper. None of us could say for sure if he was still sleeping with theĀ āexā wife but it was suspected, heavily.Ā
There were two in the chat whoād missed each other by less than an hour at his house, recently. He gave one a collar on his birthday and the other came over right after she left. He e-mailed me on his birthday (earlier this month) whining about how Iād broken his heart. One of the chicks said that heād told her I had messaged him.Ā
There were SO MANY things that came out in this conversation...he was talking to several of them while I lived with him. One shared a dated screenshot where they were talking about him flying out to see him but then he said he had to work. He never worked weekends. Another shared a dated screenshot where he said he was waiting for her toĀ āmake an honest man of him.āĀ
In the end, a couple of us mentioned that weād all had negative STI test results before and after being with him, which all BS aside was the most important thing. Iāve done the poly thing and know several people who have had other similar non-monogamous relationships successfully. But when someone lies like Tampa did, you canāt protect your own health.Ā
Universe just reminding me that I made exactly the right moves and I am exactly where I need to be now.Ā
The e-mail from the head of the company is still weighing on my mind. That meeting is next week. But on top of that, my boss randomly scheduled aĀ āquick chatā with me. I spent most of the day yesterday double stressed, and ended the day with medicated crackers and pizza.Ā
Boss messaged me this afternoon asking if I was free to meet early. I was sweating... on the verge of tears and then she said it: I put in a 4% merit increase for you last week.
I was expecting a lecture and instead I got a freaking raise!!Ā
Last night I was telling Pirate about Jersey. Iād said that I was worried about him given that heās a firefighter close to NYC, and his father had a stroke and was hospitalized when we spoke last.
I also explained that Jersey is one of the men who have, in a way, treated me like a fantasy. Of course, we have been chatting for over 5 years now and there have been very few of the usual sexy pics andĀ ānaughtyā talk and lots of deep intellectual conversations.Ā
The last time Jersey popped up I was starting to really feel something. I was imagining a life with him, but knowing that heās still married made it feel wrong. It brought up all of my feelings of beingĀ āthe other womanā and the pain of being someoneās dirty little secret.Ā
So I was sitting here, actually doing work-work and Jersey messaged me. I asked about his father... heās supposed to get out of the hospital next week, and his son and uncle had both been in the hospital and released already. He didnāt say if it was COVID and I didnāt ask.Ā
When he said he missed my smile... or was it my lips... I told him that my lips are off the market but heās always welcome to my smile. It was hard to say that. Not because Iām not totally happy with Pirate but because I knew it would hurt Jersey. Iām sitting here just processing these emotions.Ā
Iād spent 3 weeks worrying about Jersey and not messaging him because I was concerned aboutĀ āgetting him in troubleā with the wife and all that. Iād really been feeling something with him for a minute there, but the other side of that attraction, that desire for the fantasy to come true... that was the part of myself that hurts. A lot. Even to this day. Itās that part of me that hurt a lot of other people, even if they never knew the truth. The dirty secret.Ā
I told Jersey that Iām not doingĀ āstandard monogamyā and that itās no secret here that he is important to me. He replied that life is a journey and he still has hope.Ā
I said that it really is an amazing journey and that his next chapter will begin when heās ready to close this one. That was the best way I could say,Ā āUntil you leave your wife, thereās no way youāll have me or anyone else who you might actually be happy with.ā I think he heard me. I hope he heard me.Ā
I totally did not expect this kind of emotion so Iām just trying to sit with it and not judge it.Ā
Pirate Redbeard keeps saying that he just canāt believe this is really happening. He canāt stop telling me how amazing and beautiful I am and I donāt doubt any of it for a second.Ā
Friday night we did the domestic-ish thing picking up my grocery order then coming home and doing dinner. The rest of the weekend was much of the same comfortably ooey-gooey weāve been having.
I made pancakes for us on Saturday morning and we watched āGarden Stateā together. We had paused to talk when I got a message that Grey and his wife were in town and wanted to stop by. So, Pirate got to meet some of my friends. It went well, despite Pirateās initial anxiety.Ā
We finishedĀ āGarden Stateā and I decided to break down and get a new TV. The one I had was from the guest room at the house up north. It was only 32ā³ and the sound quality was crap.Ā
Turns out that Motherās Day is now a holiday that warrants sales on electronics. I got a 50ā³ Roku TV for $280 after all was said and done. Pirate set it all up while I made dinner and when we sat down for moreĀ āLetterkennyā it felt like the day I got my first pair of glasses.Ā
Sunday morning we fed Cookieās cat together then decided to do brunch in the park. COVID dates... We got take-out from a Mexican place then went to the drive thru coffee shop for my latte.Ā
We pulled up and I was literally sprawled across Pirateās lap to try to read the menu when a woman with a bucket of carnations approached the car. A local church was giving away Motherās Day flowers and the coffee shop was giving free drinks to anyone with the flowers. We chuckled about a āJesus flowerā getting me free coffee and Pirate sent his mom a picture of the two of us with the carnation.Ā
Sheās crazy religious... she and Pirateās father were missionaries in Africa when he was young... and replied with an exclamation about Jesus never leaving her son. That also made us chuckle.Ā
At the park, the picnic area where we first met was free so we sat there and had brunch. The weather was beautiful and the conversation easy. Another one of those moments I really want to remember.Ā
Later in the day Sunday, we went to pick up Pirateās groceries and fill water bottles. I waited in the car and turned just in time to realize that rather than putting the 2 full bottles in a cart, he just had one in each hand as he walked up. Iāll just say it... my boyfriend is sexy as fuck!Ā
Earlier in the weekend heād done the dishes. Shirtless. In my apron. I got pictures. Can we sayĀ āSwoon!?!āĀ
Pirate went home Sunday night to have dinner and watch a movie with his son but came back around 8pm and slept over again. When he walked up, he had grocery bags in his hands. Iād asked him about weekday breakfast stuff for when heās here so he brought a bunch of his microwavable egg cups as well as the black bean burger makings he bought so he could cook for me one night.Ā
Iād had a moment where I was thinking about how much more I was eating with him and how it might impact my grocery bill. His bringing groceries over was exactly the perfect thing to help ease that concern. The idea of him, like, giving me money for anything feels weird... despite knowing that he makes good money... but when he pulled up an entertainment center and said heād like to buy it for me it didnāt feel weird at all.Ā
I also told him to just put his laundry in the basket and that if he was concerned that he could always replenish the quarters. Itās not a financial issue, but more of an issue of balance. We need to keep the life stuff separate for the time being. Heās got stuff there that needs to be handled including getting rid of the ranch one way or another and him finding a rental property where he can still have the dogs.Ā
This morning when we woke up, Pirate went into the kitchen to make coffee and told me there was a puddle on the kitchen floor. Turned out that the AC had leaked all over the floor. The maintenance guy was quick to respond but I still need to put my tea rack back.Ā
Iām not sure what the plan is for tonight other than Pirate coming over again during my last hour of work. I think weāre finally learningĀ āthe danceā involved in sharing the bed with how fitful we both can be. He was having nightmares again last night so I spent a good amount of time comforting him in his sleep. He doesnāt seem to remember them but some nights he cries out, whimpers and shudders in his sleep.Ā
I wonāt try to deny that heās got issues... anxiety, PTSD, history of depression and multiple suicide attempts... heavy shit. But for as much as we talk about those kinds of things, I donāt feel like Iām trying to fix him or that Iām playing therapist. I donāt see him as any āless thanā for the vulnerability heās shown.Ā
Talk about a switching of dynamic came up today because while heās predominantly a top/D-type, he also likes to bottom sometimes. Iāve never given a proper spanking and only hit Nomad with the flogger a couple times. In the past, his relationships were more D/s based so he couldnāt really switch with his sub. Thatās not what this is. Iām his partner, not his sub.Ā
Itās all pretty damn amazing! Weāve been joking that we were so meant to find each other that even the plague couldnāt stop us from connecting. I donāt feel stupid in love. I feel safe in love. And thatās such an amazing difference!Ā
All things that have been peppered in my conversations with Pirate Redbeard these last few days. And it doesnāt feel crazy. I donāt feel out of control or overwhelmed by all of the love and affection. I feel safe. I feel loved. And I still feel solid enough that if somehow it all went sideways I feel like I would survive. Itās pretty fucking amazing!Ā
Pirate came for dinner Monday after work but didnāt sleep over. We had stuffed peppers, watched some Letterkenny and spent hours just curled up talking. Tuesday he slept over and Wednesday was a planned girlās night with Cookie.Ā
Our plan to sort through all of her bins of makeup, hair and skin stuff got set aside when they got the call that Faustās father was in hospice. I got there and found Rainy rubbing his neck on the couch. Cookie had been handling all of the planning... plane tickets, car rental, hotel room, etc.. and Faust was just sitting on the couch.Ā
I helped with dinner while Faust make his usual attempts to engage in conversation. He did theĀ āprotectiveā thing about Pirate but ultimately said that heād heard he was a good guy and as long as he was being honest with me thatās what matters. He admitted to just being jealous because Iām totally closed and thereās no longer a glimmer of hope that heāll get his hands on me beyond sawing me in half... something which I truly regret agreeing to.Ā
Pirate got a call back from the health department after reaching out about testing. He went in Tuesday and got his results back yesterday while we were on a fb video call. Iād established that the STI testing was more about trust than potential health concerns given our risk factors and the trust is there. Given the plague and all I was prepared to forgo barriers on Tuesday night but because he got in for testing Tuesday morning we waited for the results.Ā
Last night was downright amazing.Ā
Pirate came over during my last hour of work then we went to feed Cookieās cat. From there we grabbed pizza and came home. Things have already become domestic and comfortable to a degree, which I love... except that we are still in that phase of deep talks and non-stop ooey-gooey.Ā
The sex was awesome... as itās been every time, but afterwards we were lying in bed just talking and listening to music. A cover ofĀ āSend me an Angelā came on and I thought it was fitting given the things he had been saying to me. To say that it touched him is an understatement. It was just one of those super impactful moments that I want to remember.Ā
We spent a good portion of the day yesterday talking about music... sharing favorite bands and songs. The things we have in common and the little ways we have been in the same place, same scene... and never met... I get it when he says we were just meant to find each other.Ā
Learning how to share a bed hasnāt been easy, but itās been worth it. I slept like crap last night but waking up together again was worth it.Ā
This morning we fed Cookieās cat, had cereal and coffee together and took our first picture together before he went home for the day.Ā
I made it through my work day, so far, and got some actual work done. Pirate will be here for my last hour ofĀ āworkā then itās cat feeding, grocery pick up and dinner. I know there are real-life things to discuss if heās going to be here so much. And that we have to dial that back a bit just for the sake of moderation and because he knows he needs to take some time to get his house in order before I will spend any time there. Iām enjoying this.Ā
