i'm in love with him.  probably always will love him even if i never see him again.

what true abuse is or what it means to bare one's teeth as one's very last weapon.  I have felt life to be hard...especially these last few years...but what is that to homelessness?  to the flight for one's life?  to jumping at the breeze shaking the leaves?

their father had hands the size of tomes with fingers the thickness of a child's wrist.  their first memories are of beatings.  he was 10 years old when he leveled the gun at his father ready to kill if he didn't stop choking the woman on the floor with his boot.  the father forced them to box at age five.  he shot the brother when the brother was 18.  the brother left home at 12 and hitch hiked all over this country.  the father went on to have a whorehouse (i've seen it).  they grew up caring for dogs that were used for pitfighting.

the neighbor now.  the neighbor gets drunk and does strip teases with touching allowed on top of picnic tables.  her ex-husband killed her two babies and left her for dead.  she drinks like she's drowning....and she is.  she is full blooded cherokee.  she speaks wisdom with a squinted eye and stole another neihbor's husband and now sheds tears at his callousness.  i heard her one night low and gutteral in her sobbing...his voice even....male.

the lover.  the lover once stitched up his own hand at age 8 cuz his father told him to stop his whining and do it. at age 16 he started stealing cars and chopping them.  he would fight in school for those who couldn't stand up for themselves.  he is more dangerous than i would like to think.  he has friends from the chicago mafia.  another friend went to jail for slitting a man's throat from ear to ear who owed him money.  he spent whole nights lying in bed with me without sex cuz i wasn't ready (i take some time).  he was patient and sweet.  he reads people like nobody i've ever met. he really has a kindliness about him. 

there is more.

the most genuine people that i have met in chattanooga have been broken to bits.

the music of this world as i have gone deaf.

i miss
the green of the leaves and blue of the sky as everything looks like shades of gray.

i miss
the sweetness of his breath and the whisper of his southern drawl...all low and longing.

i miss
his arms and the maleness of his hands covered in grease...soiling my white scrubs.
now my hands are empty and body unmarred.

i miss
the luxury of sleep
the sweetness of the long moments stretched out like a summer's night.

i miss
the sound of the breeze through leaves and their gentle rustle.

i miss
myself just as i am finding out exactly what i'm made of.

i miss
simple respite
and the kindly smile.

i miss
the green glints of his eyes as he laughed.

i miss
not having to perform the impossible
and being under nobody's thumb.

i miss
the directness of authenticity
and the flow of life. i am surrounded by those governed by minutiae and tyranized by their list of "things to be done".

i miss
not being tyranized by that list of "things to be done".

i miss
reflection.

Yes, I still exist.  Clinic, Work, and Class time = 68 hrs. per week plus studying. on top of that. 75 hrs. per week this summer between clinic and work. 0 days off between labor day and mid-august.  0 days off between now and mid-december (literally). Nazi's don't even cover this program.  Unbelievable and often unethical.  However, 100% of graduates pass the registry exam. Last years class had an average score of 90.  you graduate a competant radiographer cuz we do twice what is required by the arrt to take the registry exam.  comping exams have to be more perfect than the radiologist needs.  hell they have to be more perfect than the textbook in some cases.  they play mindgames with you and if they know that they're getting to you...they poke all the harder. 

Dry shit I know.  sorry.  i will be back here someday, perhaps sooner than i would like as they are threatening to kick me out if i don't comp a barium enema by tuesday.  haven't seen any to comp so if someone just really needs an enema, and it just wouldn't be right without barium,please drop by my clinic site...please.  3 of us need one...

serious unbelievable bullshit has passed on all fronts this past year.  but hell, i've grown quite the thick skin.  it's boiling actually.  but hell...and bollocks to boot.  how does one spell bollocks?

still had time (even though i have/had no time) to see someone who happened to get out of the federal pen last march and have mindblowingly good sex all night long on more than a few occasions. went to work at 5 a.m. once while still drunk.  i now know what meth smells like (no i have not done it nor will i).  not seeing the guy at the moment and miss him (though i know its for the best---the meth and all).  sweet, intelligent, considerate, dangerous, bad-tempered man who kissed like deep water...made my knees weak.  you know how delicious that is?  he makes the best wine that i have ever had. he put air conditioning into my car for free. he also studied cosmetology and hair.  he is a renaissance redneck. but i probably won't be seeing him again...at least for anything lovely.

lost weight this summer cuz brother-in-law demanded money and had to live on breakfast bars that i had bought previosly for three weeks.  feel like i can take just about anything thrown at me unless i happen to be feeling like i just can't take anymore.  it jumps back and forth.  not liking most of my life these days....can't wait till the light reaches the end of that tunnel.  i see it though you know?  that glorious end when i'll wake up in the middle of the night going "fuck!!! what must be done?  what's due?"  and then realize that I can sink back cuz the next day I can watch tv, or take a hike, or see a movie....or catch up w/ ya'll who i miss ever so much.  i wonder about you...just wanted to let you know...

i feel it a wonder of rare magnitude that so many of you are still here.
i have missed the distinctness of your flavors and the trueness of your words...so like the half-moon....the scent of sweetgrass.

thank you for blessing me.

me.  gone from myself...but not entirely.

I checked out 18 books for the sale in New Mexico and was only able to read 5 of them or so.  beautiful low light turned the sand to golden and footprints to petroglyphs.  the cottonwoods sheddings floated languidly and the folks were so full of smiles and realness.

so i'm back but still reading my library books and not you folks.
and more has happened than i am willing to tell...but i learned the meaning of waiting...the lightness of it's language...the depth and weight actions can take.  nothing is ever frivolous and it would behoove me not to treat it so.

and tennessee is lovely this summer.  not too hot. but full of allergies. and nothing is frivolous. i shouldn't treat myself so.

perhaps i will be brave and breathe it.
but i am a bit ashamed.  and it affected me perhaps more than it should.

goodness knows. 

i am sensitive.
it's my strength...
and my weakness.

It looks like I will be in Los Lunas again.  Sand but no beach. Plenty of ants...black ants, red ants, flying ants...and stickers.

But the people...ever so sweet. The sun forgiving and golden in the evening.

Looks like my Dad has changed his mind since his fall regarding living in a plain regular trailer this autumn and wants to come back here.
This gives me great relief.

Don't know when or if I will be able to peruse the internet in NM.  So it might be a wee bit before I'm back.
And darn...I just got caught up and all.

I'll miss you.

me.

p.s.---counseling went very well. I think that I am meant to see this man at this time in my life. I think that it will help me a lot with myself...

I feel so frozen much of the time. So much to get done and I can't seem to start. Too much emotion...always. And at the bottom of myself, a hollow inadequacy. If I look at myself from a removed perspective...it just doesn't make sense.  There is nothing heinous about me.

It's the maintenance issues of life that I have trouble with. I am irresponsible. I let things go. And then guilt ensues.

My mother always felt the same about herself. And she was full of all things good. I need to see myself with a less critical eye.

Does anyone know a good place to look for educational grants? I am a little worried about how I will pay for this program.

My brother is going to help my sister in Arizona with my Dad and the 100 horses. Thank the Lord. This is a blessed relief.

Tennessee feels more docile with too cultivated a lawn for my taste. I don't feel any of the wildness here...no bird awing in the bright blueness of the pre-storm sky. It's all lazy in a white sundress kind of way with a distinct lack of butterflies and though there are myriad bugs...it still feels more like the gossip stinging around town than the dangers of the wild.

One big subdivision for the mind.

*the butterfly comment is metaphorical only. There really are plenty here.
I speak too often in symbols here.

so many of us don't think that my Dad's long for this world.

and B. carries a heap of baggage on her back and she might be up there alone with him when he goes.
I hope that we're wrong.
But it's a universal feeling.

talked to my sister J. Things are really hard right now. In fact, I don't think that I can talk about it right now...not details anyway. Suffice it to say...plenty of stress to go all around everywhere for everyone. And it goes on.

I got accepted into the program. Just blow me down.  Bloody hell...I thought there was no way...
So this makes me very very happy.

narrow streets and miles of ancient stone molded to these faceless blocks centuries ago now.  Even the sea is not ageless or unchanging. The Italians were entirely rileable...blond boy need not say a thing for close up stares and puffing of egos.  He had that effect on people. Even his best friend in college decked him at least once. Me and three boys in Torino (one channeling Marlon Brando beauty from his Street Car Named Desire days) and a drug deal going down less than a block away.  No one noticing that they noticed us except for me. Boys don't listen when you are trying to move them along.

Gin Rummy on the train through Austria.

Hungry in Germany all the way to Prague just to drink wine for two hours before a morsel of food.  So longing for the vine wine at 10:00 a.m. after only eating 1 potato in three days.

This is digressing to boring.

I wanted it to be a painting....an infusion of feeling that places have left with me.  Ancient places and peoples that I really wish to sink into like a hot bath. One day I will learn Catalan and I will see how the tree has grown that we planted in the back yard of the not quite as old house in Port Bou.  I wonder if the port there destroyed "La Dona Dels Vents"?  Does that beautiful lady still protect the cove?  Do the dolphins still visit?

And the places that I have not yet been.  Australia and New Zealand, Greece and Romania, India and Nepal and Tibet?  What will your stones whisper in my ear? Will your winds be wild and gentle all at once?  Will you heal my broken spirit?

I steal pieces of people that I've loved and they have broken me every time. All this brokenness cold and furnace hot...burning either way. My lungs aflame with the heat of passion lost.  I am left with the memories of their hands of differing hues light on my skin. Light and flighty as a butterfly kissing me with the breeze of her wings before poof...thinking of their touch becomes a hurricane of memory...violent with missing.

Would they still proposition me boldly on the streets? It was a trick not to seem too bold or too meek...dangers either way when ignoring the fuck out of them. Or am I too old now?  Whatever one's age there is power that you possess. I just need to claim it.  Why can't I claim it?

really is very pretty indeed.

Right now two bunnies are stalking the garden.  It is so darn cute I can't bear to run them off.

For the first 3 days, the fish would hide from me when I fed them...hee.

My cats remain totally pissed off...poor things.

I am feeling more myself with added illuminations recently. I have been researching verbal abuse a little bit online and it has opened some things up for me about my failed marriage...about some things that I have been holding on to.

I had my interview today for the Radiologic Technology program and do not think that I did very well at all.  Bummer.  But if I don't get in this year, I believe that I will next year.  They basically told me that even though I have an excellent record and high ACT scores, there are others that have the same that have higher points than I do. Damn it.  Fewer people applied this year and they are accepting fewer. 178 applied; they interviewed 46 of them and they're taking 25.

I talked to my Dad, he fell asleep on the phone in midsentence (I think that he was asleep...his sentence turned into "rrrrrrrrrr"). I am worried about him. He keeps talking about wanting to live long enough to do some specific things.

I want peace. I am not good at giving myself peace during stressful periods. I cannot soothe myself very well.

to call my Dad more often than I do. I need to call a lot more people more often but lately my phone feels like a stressor.

um.  What the bloody hell?

With my Dad I really feel as though I am separating myself from him a little...emotionally.  I think that it will be a matter of months.

I hope that I'm wrong.

how Quentin Tarantino has real women in his films.

real, beautiful, gorgeous women with fire...you know?  women with real beautiful bodies...not manufactured ones. i loved his half of grindhouse.  sorry... not liking robert rodriguez's half so much. but that's ok.

there has been nothing that quentin tarantino has done that hasn't resonated.

are like fruit on the tree.
full of longing and untasted flavor.

ripe with longing.

I'm watching Sopranos reruns where all the bad words are changed to approximations.  there is snow. and they offed somebody in the wild woods of new jersey.  i don't remember any wild woods in new jersey.  if there had been wild woods it would have made me blissfully happy when i lived in new jersey.

me.

drunken, drunken me.

that i would smell the sage in rain for two weeks this summer.

i thought that i would be berated by the hippy with the wild hair and long beard.  i really like this hippy.

i had hoped that i would see the man who fed his dog an ice-cream cone everyday and be surrounded by tourists (yuk!) and art (yay!) every day. i thought that i would lament how i couldn't attend the festival with the indigo girls.  yet alas, i will assuredly not be in taos selling fireworks this summer. i will be either in moriarty, nm or los lunas, nm.

both extremely deserty places. with no art...but very nice people (at least in los lunas).
damnit. i had hoped for wet sage and good new mexico wine and mountains.  i wanted to see if the aspens had regained their leaves. 2 years ago they were denuded by worms and i must say that a mountain hike is much less pleasant without dancing aspen leaves in the wind.

edit---and down right gross when squishing tent-worms between your sandaled toes.

is liquid velvet.  deep red and volatile and peaceful as a lake.
and god...indeed i'm drunk.



so on a more sober note (not really), how do ya'll feel about multiple marriages?

no big deal?

indicative of you know...problems?

i'm talking 3rd marriage by the mid-thirties.  though this is not me as i'm in my mid-thirties and divorced but once.

just wondering.

i miss and miss winter and snow and that cold cleanness in the air. i simply must move north.