the junk drawer

🌛moon child's place to store the clutter and extras.🌛

[write-my-words]

Book club

Had our first "book club" yesterday. We're calling it that, but it's really something more like a coven? Idk. The other two are such lovely friends. We all have trauma but we're able to talk about it. The other two have more issues stemming from past friendships that went poorly, so that's interesting. I think a lot of their previous issues come down to immaturity from others that just isn't a concern for anyone else.

It was fascinating how well the other two were able to clock some things. K told me that she could tell I'm in a time where I am specifically seeking to have what I have given come back to me. I had been thinking those literal exact words-- harvest what I have sown. L had some intuition regarding memories that was also pretty on the nose.

I sometimes find myself wondering how much of this I actually believe and then I think of what I "know" and I have to scoff at myself. Yeah, ok babe, you're going to question some harmless metaphysical stuff but you believe that? Get out of your head about it lmao. It's spiritual work as valid as any other. Believe yourself if nothing else.

[write-my-words]

Small music scene problems

Mood: don't play with me

Music: computer fans and a water fountain

Lol. Lmao. So I am just in a mood where I... haven't many fucks to give. Like, I'm not going to be mean or anything but my appetite for coddling other people is just not really there.

My partner's band put out a single today. I made the props for their visualizer video-- did a pretty fun job of it if I do say so myself. Hand-drawn. Took me a few hours.

The video gets shared in our group chat. Someone compliments it. My partner says that I made the props. More compliments. His bandmate, one of our dear friends (not sarcasm! Promise, I do love him) says "I feel like an asshole, I forgot to mention [me] in the social media posts with the video."

And I said "Don't worry, I'm used to it."

Bandmate: "That makes me feel worse."

Me: "Twas but a jape"

Him: 😟

Me: 🤷‍♀️

He (inadvertently I hope) did the thing I hate where he has done me wrong and then makes a comment about it and... I look like an asshole for not assuaging HIS feelings? Bruh.

I have been with my partner for going on 15 years. The band has existed for about 14 years. I have done SO MUCH for this band, from show posters to the logo they used for half of their existence to working the merch table for the whole show. The closest I've gotten to anything so much as "paid in exposure" is that sometimes they like the comments I leave on their posts on social media. I don't even always get into the shows for free. SOMETIMES this same bandmate even says shit about my work that comes across as a little degrading-- saying that he'd have his artist wife do it but "we couldn't afford her" or agreeing with criticisms of my work by other artists (that they are PAYING A WAGE to) who are making new art/logos/etc. One time an artist criticized my logo because it made their one-word name look like two words and they made a big show of being like "yeah, yeah, huge problem, gotta fix that" and THEN THEY CHANGED THE BAND NAME SO THAT IT HAD CHARACTERS BETWEEN THE TWO WORDS SO IT *WAS* TWO SEPARATE WORDS! WHAT EVEN.

I don't know why I keep doing things for their band. Part of it is that I realize that it's an excuse to pull out my craft supplies and do something creative. Sometimes it's just that my partner is begging me for help and I can't stand to see him look disappointed at the thought he might not get to see his dreams come to life.

Writing this all out is making me realize that, when put that way, it is a really shitty way to treat someone who has done a lot for you. God forbid, I would never.

And so I won't coddle or apologize. I might have made a quip that makes said bandmate feel like an asshole, and some people might see me as the asshole for making the quip, but fuck it, I guess.

And like, it sucks because I can't openly discuss my feelings about this or it could be taken as being unsupportive of or even trying to start shit for/"cancel" the band. I don't want that. I don't want any retribution. I care about these people and I want them to do well. I just want to vent to someone who isn't my partner who would be like "yeah dawg, that's butts".

So here, I'll say it for myself: yeah dawg, that IS butts.

[write-my-words]

thoughts to share, eventually

Mood: contemplative

Music: moisture

I've been imagining conversations in my head again, rotating them like a 3D rendering in my head. The threads of ideas stay the same, but the gossamer strands of conceptualization change a little each time I dive in.

So. Here's The Thing. I have spent so much time thinking about you, about me, about us. In the time of silence, here's what I found most devastating: through all the years, there were dozens of times that I was told there were things you had said or written for me or about me. I almost always found out about what you were feeling--especially the things regarding me, the most personally impactful things, the things that carried me through some very hard times-- by way of other people. Sometimes friends, often strangers, occasionally from a version of yourself that you didn't know existed. I was and am grateful and endeared to most of them for this gift of knowledge, and I kept thinking that one day if I could do enough it would form the key that would unlock a door to freer communication between us.

The problem with this is that when you aren't the one sharing things, you have no opportunity to add your own flavor to the way the messages come across to other people. For as much as I was heartened by the shared words of some, I was wounded by others. Because of the lack of communication between us, I didn't feel comfortable sharing these things. An example: on multiple occasions, the way that Jen phrased things made me feel like perhaps I was seen as a second-rate version of her, a handy placeholder for her eventual return to your life. I have enough problems with self-doubt that this was not hard to believe-- and, to be completely honest, with the way things ended up going from my view, to this day I have a hard time convincing myself that my feeling was wrong.

Why does this matter to me now, so many years and a different life later? Because I want to believe that all of the effort I put in meant anything to anyone but me. Because I poured so much of myself over so many years with such earnestness that a metaphorical pat on the head just doesn't sit right with me. Because I am trying to learn the valuable difference between being entitled and recognizing what you earned. Because I have to heal too. I want to know everything you ever said or thought or wrote about me or to me or with me in mind. I don't care if the words were imperfect or didn't capture everything. It would have meant so much to see the effort in the works in progress. I want to know that I meant something in some deeper way. I want to know that it wasn't as easy as it looked to let go of my presence over and over again.

You say you dreamt of a future where you would come across some means to repay me for my kindness. It sadly seems like you never really internalized that you've always carried it. Historically, it comes with mighty difficulty for you to part with. I understand that, but unfortunately, if you want to pay, that's the real price.

[write-my-words]

presenting with much commentary: my family

mood: exasperated

music: the line - mood rings

It was my birthday yesterday. I'm just on the other side of my mid-thirties and part of working on myself means understanding when the way I'm being treated is Abnormal and/or Not Okay.

My mom's side of the family are what I like to describe as Duck Dynasty conservatives. We're from the wrong part of the country for "true" rednecks but that's what they have always been, through and through, even though they live ten minutes out of a midsize city (that they hate). They are complete teetotalers-- they think that if you have so much as an airplane-size bottle of booze in your house, you're an alcoholic who will surely lose your job, your home, and die an early and miserable death. (In fairness we do have a family history of crippling alcoholism. For all her problems, my mom has never been an alcoholic and does drink very occasionally, we just never ever tell anyone else in her family.) They are also nosy and will open cabinets and drawers and refrigerators. My partner and I have a fair amount of guests over and we have a sizeable bar with a mini fridge-- some stuff we buy and some stuff is left after a party. I have not had a housewarming or even a casual get together inviting them to my house because it is A Lot Of Work to disassemble all that into boxes, hide it somewhere away from prying eyes, and make the remaining area look natural. My mom is pushy, thin-skinned and loves to assume the worst possible intentions so she has given me a lot of flak and guilt tripping ("after everything I and my family have done for you...") about me not having had them over.

So, in Saturday my partner and I had a birthday party with my friends. I had a great time showered with much love and care of a bunch of amazing people I know. My mother knew this was happening and did not come (she wasn't invited lmao). I woke up yesterday and busted ass to clean up the kitchen. My partner did a lot of tidying and picking things up. My mom pressured us to have people over for cake after our planned dual birthday dinner (hers is three days after mine). We had to do a full sweep to put away all the alcohol and all evidence of alcohol being present the night before. She drives but hates to do it to go anywhere but the grocery store or the doctor's office, so ON MY BIRTHDAY we were having to go pick her up and would have to leave our own house after everyone else left to drop her off afterwards. Do you think she offered to go to the store and pick up a basic ass cake, or to make one? Nay, friend, nay. WE HAD TO MAKE THE TIME TO DO THAT TOO.

Then, today. My father calls me. I have a fraught relationship with him too for different reasons. I didn't talk to him yesterday and I missed his call today. He had ignored that I had said I was going to make plans to celebrate with him and my aunt when I was available. He was annoyed that I hadn't answered his calls because he assumed we were getting dinner today although nothing of the sort had been agreed to. He answered the phone being snarky, then got mad that his public housing apartment was forcing them to report assets and income (YOU FUCKING VOTED FOR THIS YOU VOTED FOR THIS YOU COULD HAVE LISTENED TO ANY NEWS OTHER THAN BRAINROT YOUTUBE FOR THE LAST YEAR YOU WERE COMPLICIT IN THIS AND YOU THOUGHT YOU WOULD BE SPARED AS A WHITE MAN AAAAAAAAAAA). He also went on a tirade about meeting a guy who prays to Mary and the saints at his CATHOLIC CHURCH (YOU WERE BORN AND RAISED CATHOLIC YOU WENT TO CATHOLIC SCHOOL YOU HAD TO DO THE ROSARY WHY DO YOU GO TO A CATHOLIC CHURCH WHEN YOU REALLY JUST WANT TO BE AN EVANGELICAL PROTESTANT THIS IS CATHOLICISM THIS IS LITERALLY WHAT YOU ARE AGREEING TO WHEN YOU GO TO THEIR CHURCH AAAAAAAAAAAA). First time he has talked to me since my birthday and he didn't say happy birthday one time and just got mad about stuff during the half hour phone call.

Anyway my family is bananas, my friends are cool and I'm so glad I have them. Recording these memories because I've discovered it's vindicating when I have those moments where I'm gaslighting myself.

[write-my-words]

i collect the best people

mood: fond

music: gold guns girls - metric

Doing some thinking about various friends lately. Not just the one I keep talking about. I do so much thinking about the people I know. I'll spill my thoughts about some of them here even though nobody knows about this place.

G: I'm so glad I still know him. I almost didn't after he fucked up big time at one party. It takes a lot to piss me off that bad but he's the only person I know that got me to get in his face screaming at him. He's grown up a lot since then. He kept enough of his unpredictability to give his personality an edge but lost the parts that made me wary of him. He's very loveable and I do love the way his mind works.

Mugmug: She doesn't know how to be anyone but pure undistilled Her, and she is unapologetic about it. As she should be. Being around her is good for me and I'm glad I lived with her for a couple years even when being roommates wasn't easy. She can be opinionated but she's not a jackass about it... To me, anyway. Extremely good heart and laughs easily. She doesn't deserve any of the hardship she went through and it fills my heart to know she has many wonderful deep attachments that she deserves.

Sammi: She and I have clicked almost since the moment we met, there's parts of her that rub me the wrong way but I just don't feed them. I can tell that her insecurities run deep but she handles it by constantly bragging in a way that rings hollow. She's so good at what she does though, and she's gorgeous. I can only tell her that in the right moments because it becomes less significant if I say it at a time that just plays into her false bravado.

Kat: She's so pleasant to be around. She tries her best to handle things with kindness even though she's been hurt a lot too. I'm glad she's working on herself, because things looked concerning there for a little while. She still needs to get out more. I love talking to her, the conversation flows like water.

[write-my-words]

if someone asked me "why?"

mood: loving

music: clink clink clink

If someone asked me "why are you still excited to talk to him? Why do you still imagine meeting up with him again and giving him a big hug? Why do you still look for this after all the pain you carried in your heart? After spending the whole summer processing it? You're married with a house and job and surrounded by great friends? Why do you even care about him at all? After hearing nothing for almost a decade???"

I've thought about this. Contemplated it. I think it's because no matter what became of the evolution of our relationship, sometime a very long time ago, I accepted him as family.

When I accept someone as my chosen family: I don't give up on you. I try to avoid doing anything that I think would hurt you. For the most part we do things that would make each other proud. When you're not around, I keep you close to my heart. I will always have a listening ear and a big hug for you. If we do hurt each other, we don't walk away, we work it out. We can show ugliness, we can be honest about it. We can talk about things. I might get upset. You might get upset. When we don't have contact a piece of my heart is missing. We're still family at the end of it all. So yeah, I'm still attached. Always will be.

I hope he responds so I can tell him this myself. He might think I'm crazy. But I hope he realizes that I'm family too.

[write-my-words]

oh boy, here we go

mood: ?????????????

music: pennies - failure

Ah, the moment I've been waiting for. Why is it so nerve wracking? Like waiting behind the curtain to go on stage even if you've rehearsed a million times. I doubt that the one I've been seeking has any really hard feelings toward me but still I wait anxiously to see if he responds. I was very deliberate about choosing the least jarring way to go about contact even though I was given options. At least I know he's alive now. What reason for the years of silence? What will there be to say?

My adult brain now has a lot of big feelings and opinions about the way I was back then but also the way he treated me. I wonder if I'll ever get to voice those. It would probably be good and validating to do so. I want nothing more than to have him in my life again as a friend but to rekindle true friendship might mean I finally get to bitch a little.

Like... The thing that pisses me off the most when reviewing that period of my life is how much other people obfuscated things because they wanted to decide how I would get to react. Case in point I just found evidence from an old conversation log that he was involved with someone and told a friend of mine that he did not tell me because he was worried I would not want to communicate with him anymore. So instead I found out really really abruptly and it really did a fucking number on me.

All because he was selfishly concerned for whether I would choose to hold time for him? Bruh.

That person was donezo ages ago but that story is a drop in the bucket. In the circles that ran around him, everyone seemed to be like this except maybe one. I don't want that going forward. Even yesterday the conversation I had with this lovely person brought up more of that kind of thing. "You didn't know?" and "no one told you?" Deeply grateful to them and not upset with them in the least, but nah dawg, I have the receipts of people who came back later saying "I should have said more and I didn't and it's too late now" before disappearing.

So yeah. I'm an adult now. I have a better view of who I was and who I am and more understanding that comes with perspective. I deserve to get some shit and get told to make some apologies, hell yeah I do, I'll own it. But I also deserve to get some things off my own chest eventually. I deserve to have feelings too, I always did, and I've taken a while to realize that. It's also taken me a long while to realize that exchanging this level of honesty is what builds a healthy friendship.

I'm still doing a lot of "shadow work" of my own. I definitely have issues and I don't think anyone could be less kind to past me than me. (After all, anyone with criticism could at least say they loved her at one point.) I tend to look on my past self with disdain like she's a worm. Stupid ideas and embarrassing. That's unfair. I have to remember that I was a teenager in a deeply unhealthy family unit with interesting friendships navigating fucking puberty. Certainly there are criticisms to be had but I shouldn't be quite so hateful towards her. Maybe it's because I feel like she didn't do enough with what she had and with the benefit of hindsight I'm angry for any crumb which I am currently sweeping up that it seems like she squandered. (And on top of that she could be a manipulative impatient bitch.)

[write-my-words]

any seekers?

mood: hmmm.

music: pavement under tires

I wonder if you see me now.

Write-my-words on Tumblr.

[redacted] at Gmail.

If I have been unseen, I am peeking out from behind the curtain. I won't do it often or for long for reasons that may be obvious, but contact isn't unwelcome as long as you don't intend anything toward me that I would be opposed to.

[write-my-words]

and that, too, is the eternal dao

mood: like looking at a 3D movie without the 3D glasses

music: still distant trickling

I decided this line of thought deserved its own entry.

I don't know why-- maybe because of my sudden obsession with my past this summer. Wishful thinking? Manifesting? Serendipity? Synchronicity? The strings of ka? Fate?

The last contact I ever had with that one was an email from August 2017.

I keep getting these daydreams, these visions, of him showing up on my doorstep to hand me a package. Or his last known partner doing it, if he is no longer with us. Or opening the door to find a small unmarked plain package on the porch, or in the mailbox.

I was always eager for him to share with me and he did so sparingly. How many times over the years was this work mentioned, promised, alluded to? But it never materialized-- I sincerely don't think I was made to forget it. I don't think I ever received it. I don't know if I ever will. It's the only small stone wedged into my heart about him, if I'm being honest. If he showed on my doorstep this very instant I would not deny him a hug and a visit. If he messaged me out of nowhere I would reply as fast as my fingers and technology would let me. I mean, truly. I would not begrudge him any friendship. My heart is as open to him as it ever was, maybe even better now that my brain is fully-formed.

It's not knowing that kills me. Alive? Dead? In limbo? Should I grieve? Should I be seeking him again? What would he have written for me? What words was he so carefully selecting for me to have all those years? Were there words, or just pleasant thoughts of words?

And I too would have so much to share. Things he said that I understand now. Things about me that I understand now. I used to try to hide all of the bad and show him only the most perfect image I could carve out of myself. Now I am ready to say that having flaws does not have to be a failure of character, it's about how one handles them, and now I am just always imperfect and learning.

And you know? I'm ready to be honest about his flaws too. I'm ready to say that he did not have to be put on a pedestal to be powerful and I can tell him better now what he put me through and how it hurt me and how despite it all I still have the capacity for a huge amount of tenderness and caring toward him. I still don't want to forget him, I still want him in my life more than I can remember wanting anything, I still cry at the thought of pain coming to him. I still, I still, I still.

Things were handled so poorly because sometimes you don't notice everything is burning down around you while you're painstakingly sifting through words looking for the perfect ones. And I speak that for both of us.

[write-my-words]

even in a dead thing there's a testament to what once was

mood: heart's a-flutter

music: trickling fountain and muffled cicada

I'm feeling fucking weird the last couple of days. I was fine on Tuesday, very fine in fact, had a lovely day and met a few new coworkers. Ended up staying in the office over an hour late shooting the shit. Sometimes I see glimmers of my younger self in me.

Then yesterday I started feeling light headed and dizzy. Nauseated. Weird. I slept a lot and then ended up with a wicked headache. So: migraine symptoms, sez I. But then today I was okay for a time and now I feel like my breath isn't getting all the way to the bottom of my lungs and I feel floaty and shaky and brain foggy. Maybe too much caffeine from the Excedrin and a cup of tea. That could be all it takes these days I guess. A manufactured panic attack.

Last weekend I had a little truffle party, just my friend G and I. No one else knew. My partner was out of town with his friends. It's funny how it feels like doing something wrong but it's not like my partner would have tried to stop me if he knew, I suppose. There's nothing illicit or untoward hinted at between us, so I'm not doing anything to feel guilty about, this is just out of character for me.

The problem is I would have to answer "what? why G?" which is a question with an answer that only raises more questions with further answers and so on until at the end of that road is a question I don't know the answer to either.

I wanted someone sober who would ask me a series of questions to see what my responses would be while on a trip. I wanted direction, a "mission control" if you will. I could have done it on my own but I figured my mind would be liable to wander off topic and I wouldn't record the answers anyway. The questions would have been something anyone else would have pried into. He did a fine job, but it didn't end up really working out to any concrete answers so I ended up telling him he could take some too.

I'm entertained by the way G's mind works even when we're both stone cold sober. I'm very endeared toward his way of thinking about things. He is so very very clever. But when I was high and he was sober, I could have explored his mind palace for hours. I think for what I wanted to do, I should have taken a higher dose and probably should have done it by myself. Other people are very distracting to me. I don't mean that to sound harsh, or clinical. I still had a lovely time and wouldn't take it back.

I found myself idly wondering what a certain someone would think about me taking mushrooms. For what he was, he was what most people would consider straight-edge. He might have been disappointed? He wouldn't have hated me for it. Especially not the way I use them. I think he would have respected the way I've found meaning in it rather than some kind of party drug, even if he didn't understand or appreciate it.

[write-my-words]

Immortality by Clare Harner

Do not stand

By my grave, and weep,

I am not there,

I do not sleep--

I am the thousand winds that blow,

I am the diamond glints in snow.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain,

I am the gentle, autumn rain.

As you awake with morning's hush,

I am the swift, up-flinging rush

Of quiet birds in circling flight.

I am the day transcending night.

Do not stand

By my grave, and cry--

I am not there,

I did not die.

[write-my-words]

we're all just soup in sausage casing, if you think about it

"... Oh man..." *Looks down* "I'm delicious!"

"I've been working on my tender marbling too!"

Dinner with new-ish friends tonight. One of them I actually knew in passing way back high school and his partner who moved here from Cali not long ago.

They seem like really solid people. We vibe in all the same ways. My concern is that their schedules since meeting them have been more open than ours, which results in them offering to hang out and me having to delay it. I'm glad that so far they seem very understanding and not taking it personally. Tonight was a very good clearing and reset of my mental state.

I promise, the last few entries are not all my life is now. I have been writing from the center of a thorny patch. It's good to have a place to purge my feelings but I also think when I get stuck in them it is so easy to spiral deeper and deeper into a very negative place filled with doubt, self loathing, regrets on behalf of other people's choices (unhealthy!).

In other news: attempt 3 at some archives yesterday. The keeper of it was extremely stiff and formal but not rude. I'm dusting off my old skills in quickly learning to communicate with different kinds of people at different levels of standoffishness. I might have gotten somewhere but attempt 4 is needed in a while due to circumstances outside of either of our control. I did pass along something else though. Not sure if that was needed but it can't hurt.

music: seekin scott seekins - pink mink

mood: too full

[write-my-words]

a note about love

You can love someone with everything you've got and a lot of stuff you don't got AND ALSO be immensely frustrated by them. These are not mutually exclusive, you don't have to let it tarnish anything, and it does not mean you have hate in your heart.

music: happy idiot - tv on the radio

mood: ponderous

[write-my-words]

filtered those thoughts to get all the microbes out.

All right. I was writing my last entry from the murky depths of my feelings at the time. It's not that I said anything I don't feel but more like I didn't communicate it correctly.

I know that in some way you love(d) me.

Maybe not in the same way I love you.

Saying that I didn't know so would probably be hurtful if you could read it. It was said in anger and woe.

What I actually am angry about is that it feels like you took out a piece of me and never traded me a piece of your own so I had something to fill it with. It's like you found a way to pull off a piece of my spirit like taffy and keep it restlessly wandering the maze-like halls of your music box heart for eternity, looking for a way home.

What I actually am angry about is that you waited so long. What I actually am angry about is that I saw a few threads of your heart stitched onto your sleeve for other people and *I wanted that*. What I actually am angry about is that time and time again we had forces pulling us apart like flaky layers of a cinnamon roll, and while I was out there taking it seriously and acting like every time it happened might really be the last, you seemed to be acting like you had all the time in the world to gather your thoughts. That's why I always pushed to hear them, however disorganized and rushed.

I wanted other people who I had never heard of to know that I meant something to you, and I wanted to know that that was happening. I wanted you to leave me something so that I could look back and know exactly what I meant to you. Jen, intentionally or not, said things directly to me about how very very alike we were, in a way that made me feel that maybe you only liked me as a cheap "fan edition" of her, missing premium features. So the fact that you ended up with her (even if it wasn't your choice and I don't understand), and I never even knew what part of you I had, felt like it just reinforced that feeling of spending years and years being something good enough until your fate could afford her instead. Like maybe that's why these supposed long-labored writings and things you had to give me never materialized-- because you were hoping for a different day in which you didn't have to give them to me.

You would tell me that's not the case. I'm just saying that I never felt like I actually knew what I meant to you and I wanted you to give me evidence.

And now it might be too late for all that? I said "never too late, even in death" and I stand by that but you know what I mean. (Probably.) I'm angry that I might never get that closure *and I will never even know one way or the other unless it happens*, I'm angry that I've never had something to hold to while I'm hurting. I'm angry that you put something off that would have done wonders for my sanity and my heart and if it exists I don't know if it will ever find its way to me, complete or no. Per your last email you STILL said you were working on something for me. I've been put into stasis over this.

Most people would call eight years of complete ghosting a pretty definitive "no". You conditioned me to hope otherwise.

Oh if I could go back and sit you and my younger self down, I could explain to you both what she was actually feeling and thinking. I didn't have the words for it then and I'm angry about that too.

music: drip, drip, drip

mood: the clarity that daylight brings

[noirandchocolate]

‘Because she likes people,’ said the witch, striding ahead. 'She cares about 'em. Even the stupid, mean, drooling ones, the mothers with the runny babies and no sense, the feckless and the silly and the fools who treat her like some kind of a servant. Now THAT’S what I call magic–seein’ all that, dealin’ with all that, and still goin’ on. It’s sittin’ up all night with some poor old man who’s leavin’ the world, taking away such pain as you can, comfortin’ their terror, seein’ 'em safely on their way…and then cleanin’ 'em up, layin’ 'em out, making 'em neat for the funeral, and helpin’ the weeping widow strip the bed and wash the sheets–which is, let me tell you, no errand for the fainthearted–and stayin’ up the next night to watch over the coffin before the funeral, and then going home and sitting down for five minutes before some shouting angry man comes bangin’ on your door 'cuz his wife’s havin’ difficulty givin’ birth to their first child and the midwife’s at her wits’ end and then getting up and fetching your bag and going out again…. We all do that, in our own way, and she does it better'n me, if I was to put my hand on my heart. THAT is the root and heart and soul and center of witchcraft, that is. The soul and center!' Mistress Weatherwax smacked her fist into her hand hammering out her words. 'The…soul…and…CENTER!’ Echoes came back from the trees in the sudden silence. Even the grasshoppers by the side of the track had stopped sizzling. 'And Mrs Earwig,’ said Mistress Weatherwax, her voice sinking to a growl, 'Mrs. Earwig tells her girls it’s about cosmic balances and stars and circles and colors and wands and…and toys, nothing but TOYS!' She sniffed. 'Oh, I daresay they’re all very well as decoration, somethin’ nice to look at while you’re workin’, somethin’ for show, but the start and finish, THE START AND FINISH, is helpin’ people when life is on the edge. Even people you don’t like. Stars is easy, people is hard.’ She stopped talking. It was several seconds before birds began to sing again. 'Anyway, that’s what I think,’ she added in the tones of someone who suspects that she might have gone just a bit further than she meant to.

--Terry Pratchett, "A Hat Full of Sky"

[whitmerule]

the way i knew exactly who the author was and which character was speaking after just this:

I don't love her. She wouldn't want me to. But the amount of respect I have for that woman (fictional) and how deeply she and her anger and the way she handles that anger sit within me, and have done for the past three decade...

(maysherestinpeace)

[write-my-words]

scumbag with a heart of gold.

I had a dream.

I was staying alone for a few days in some kind of house that was being used like a hostel. I had the bed in the room I was in but had to keep stepping over a guy on the floor who was sleeping and occasionally woke up to try to move things out of my way. Definitely some kind of druggie but not a bad way. Someone told me his name was Keith and he was looking for a way to the major city very near my hometown (a fourish hour drive from wherever I was-- Fargo? Wisconsin?) and I was waiting for him to wake up so I could talk to him about it before making my own way home. I was instantly endeared to him before he was even conscious. I could already tell he was a scumbag with a heart of gold, one of my favorite kinds of people. (The real ones have an aura about them.)

Another person, rather boisterous, came into the hostel. He reminded me of some kind of Russell Brand character (from before we all found out how much he sucks) and I was cautiously enjoying his goofy affable nature but uncertain of him. Between the two of them they kept interrupting me trying to make my way to the bathroom.

Keith woke up and he was just the kind of person I expected. Reminded me of my acquaintance Chris (not that one ... No not that one either... How many Chrises do I know anyway?). Just to look at his movements made me smile. He spoke to me in that cautious way you do if you're smart when you're friendly but a little nervous and talking to strangers. He thought I was offering him a bus ticket and was happy for it but downright delighted that I was offering to drive him. He didn't say exactly where he was from, or why he was going the same way as me. I got the idea that maybe it was to get away from some things, but this was never confirmed. He started to gather his things and I woke up suddenly, mid-conversation with him and Good Russell Brand (Off-Brand? Heh.).

Upon waking I was instantly alert but immediately disappointed I didn't get to palaver with Keith more. For some reason I was excited to befriend him on the ride home.

music: whirring fan, thunder, restless cat movements

mood: wakey, wakey.

[write-my-words]

i did a ritual for you.

You once told Kristina that your birthday was a complicated question: there was the date others had picked for you and then a small range of possible dates you had narrowed down for yourself. So I went with a date in the middle of the date range you gave. I used everything red. Even some of the reddest part of myself.

It started as a happy birthday remembrance. Then it became a petition for some kind of undeniable sign or contact from you. Physically if you're still alive and spiritually if you're not.

I still love you and I would still talk to you in a microsecond. I value every memory of you I have and I'm still pissed about the ones that were taken from me.

But man, you really threw me for a whole ass loop. Every time I thought I knew something about where we stood I ended up finding out something that left me feeling that I didn't know jack shit. I was never really honest with you about how badly that hurt me. It still does, it can still make me cry myself to sleep almost a decade after your last email and now with a whole new life. Ask me, I've done it plenty this summer.

I always prioritized your feelings over mine. We can all can say what we want about that but it was one thing that consistently kept you coming back. The problem is, you either also prioritized yours over mine AND/OR never shared enough for me to know what was going on. Towards the end of my (ninja)rope I, taken aback, admitted to even one of the teeth on the hacksaw you put through my heart and you lost your shit at me. We never really recovered, did we. I admit my faults now that I have a fully formed brain. Sometimes I do have a touch of my mom's covert narcissism, where I have a bit of a hero/pedestal complex going on. I'm not proud of that and I actually frequently remind myself I'm not better than anybody. But I have also learned that I need to step up, be honest with myself, and be forward about what I've*worked for* and *earned*.

Just... Did you ever love me, at all? Like, really actually love me? You said you did. I believed you did. But, if I may be so blunt here, you were either one obtuse procrastinator of a dude or you were lying and using me. And the thing is, I guess I could be thankful that you didn't take me up on it because you and I both know I would have let you use me so much more.

You had practically a whole LJ about T and your feelings. You live(d) in a house with J and everyone knew you had countless memories with her. All that's fine. But, like... Did you ever even talk about me? Did I even exist in your sphere outside of our AIM messages and phone calls? A couple people said you wrote things about me. You said on probably at least a dozen occasions that you had things you were working on/writing *for* me. I never saw any of this. How do I know it ever existed as more than a pretty passing thought to appease the conversation at the time?

I guess writing about someone doesn't mean that you love them, or you can love someone and not talk about them, but I dunno. That just doesn't fit your pattern.

And guess what? I'm another Cuil abstraction of reality away from being able to talk to any of those people anymore, and I have NOTHING but hopeful thinking for what maybe was. If you're dead, all the things you waited so long to send me could be out of my field of perception forever. If you're not dead, where the fuck have you been?

I just wish to god I had beautiful cryptic words about me to look back on in my moments of darkness instead of jealously reading other people's leftovers and wishing it were my name in there like some kind of psychotic mad lib. I have one poem you wrote for me and otherwise the closest things I have are my old logs of Vega and a persona making me feel better. They were the placeholders for everything I needed you to be.

Yeah, I'm a little bitter about it tbh. Salty even. Yeah, it makes me so sad that I become angry and then circle back around to being sad because I'm so angry.

I wouldn't ever take back a single second of anything on my part, I just think we might both agree that I earned more from you than I got. If I were to receive an unmarked package left at my door tomorrow, a mystery link to a blog from a disposable email, fucking tarot cards falling out of my deck in such a way as to form a cohesive story, a goddamn love letter written in the post-shower steam on the bathroom mirror, it would save me. Never too late, even dead.

music: space - magic wands

mood: the energy under cover of darkness