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Blog started in Jan 2005: 1st entries for Write in Every Genre. Then the REAL ME begins |
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It Hurts When I Stop Talking Sometime in Fall of 1998, when a visit from Dad was infrequent, and primarily at the mercy of his 88 Toyota making the 50 mile journey, I was being treated to lunch. The restaurant was my choice, I think. Sisley Italian Kitchen at the Town Center mall was somewhere my dad had not yet tried, so that was my pick. Either I was being treated to the luxury of lunch and adult conversation without my husband and 5 year old son in tow, or that's just how the moment has lodged in my memory. The more I think about it, they probably were there, but enjoying the Italian food too much to bother interrupting. Daddy and his lady friend at the time, Anne, came up together and made a day of it with me and the family. We were eating together and talking about some of my scripts, stories, coverages, poems and other creative attempts that really were not seeing the light of day. I think I'd just finished a group reading of The Artist's Way and was in a terribly frenetic mood over my writing. I think I'd just given them an entire rundown on a speculative Star Trek script. My Dad asked me point blank, “Why don’t you write it?? Anne agreed. It sure sounded like I wanted to write it. Why wasn't I writing seriously? It's what I'd set out to do when earning my college degree in Broadcasting many years earlier. Heck, I should, I agreed non-verbally. “I will.” But, I didn’t. Blogs can be wild, unpredictable storehouses of moments, tangents, creative dervishes, if you will. I'm getting a firmer handle on my creative cycle. My mental compost heap (which is a catch phrase from Natalie Goldman or Julia Cameron - I can't think which, right now) finally seems to be allowing a fairly regular seepage of by-products. That may be a gross analogy, but I give myself credit to categorize my work in raw terms. It proves that I'm not so much the procrastinating perfectionist that I once was. Still, I always seem to need prompts and motivation. Being a self-starter is the next step. My attempt to keep up in the Write in Every Genre Contest at the beginning of the year seemed like a perfect point to launch the blog. |
| What an ego I have to let my personal life get away from me. I have headed the bow of my ship into the very force of the waves. A friendship can still crash deathly upon the sharp rocks near a calm harbor if everything is done "right." How our friendship remains despite the sense of being off course, is the main part of the question. Can you hear the wail of Sirens out to mesmerize my crew, and thus sabotoge me at the helm of my destiny? Will a mutiny at the core of my own heart defeat my desire to keep a long-time friendship pure? Only forty miles distance separates you from me. It is not an ocean. And I told myself nearly four years ago, the drive was hardly a burden for either one of us. What actions can I take now, my friend? What a long way our friendship's history has travelled! Having only pen and paper, phones and lockers available to us when we started this relationship, our communication was filled with an exhilaration of bounty. Multi-page notebook paper notes passed hands. Hours on the phone was snuck in while discussing homework assignments. Then, I think of that paramount trust, knowing each other’s locker combo. All that gives way to modern cell phones that slip into the pouch or pocket. The electronic media – email, web cams, instant messaging, smileys, avatars, etc. are now available, and nearly instantaneous. I think I suffer more loneliness because of each new option. It’s no longer, “Please be there – pick up the phone, as it rings without answer. Instead, I grow impatient with out even trying the old phone routine. My computer’s on – certainly your computer is too. There’s the email from yesterday that I sent, and I start to invent reasons you withhold a response. I could judge myself harshly – I have. Instead – I should be pleased that you are in my thoughts. How I love my ability, and that of my creative source when I can accept that our friendship lives, even if we do not tend to it meticulously. It’s a California winter and I know how easy it is to disregard the weeding and the watering. I so often think of you when I wake in the morning, after catching only a few hours of sleep. Children bicker in the distant deep of the house, but are quieted quickly. I pull blankets and pillows closer about me – I cannot intrude on the morning routine of my family. If I am up, it introduces a monkey wrench to the ferris wheel motion of the day. I am not prepared for attention to switch to me some mornings. Why are children almost always ready for a new day? Even if each chooses to show up unwashed and nearly naked, there’s joy for the new day. Counting up the blessings I have due to friendships causes such pleasure. There is good reason to recognize and be appreciative for counting you as a friend at every chance I get. I should not let it be a day of despair if I determine there are only a few friends there; maybe, only one available. It is a joyful day for me, like the children, whether an abundance of friendly comfort is apparent or is not. I will not downgrade my own social capacity on a spreadsheet of how many friends I list. When did this even become a competition? And, in this accounting folly, who am I really competing against? Can my reaching out to change the nature of our friendship be any violation of your wholeness and my truth? – Or is it the demonstration of the same? Where the energy of the universe is conceived, there, a space for my friend, and friends-to-be, is ever-expanding. I cannot control the indwelling Spirit’s desire for experiencing friendship in dynamic ways. The expression of enjoyment is a powerful component that I invite. Through a Source that needs expression, I am a child with friends at my beckoning, once again. This is how I envision it happening: There is a metamorphosis possible when I simply hold my hand out. It is more than an invitation - it is a fearful pleading when the monster is creeping ever closer. What happens when I cannot see either it, or you approach to pull me to safety? If I do not have confidence in the friendship and whether we are communicating on the most basic level, how can I be anything, but blind? Sometimes I want to strain the reach of that metaphorical hand when something beyond an innocent contact is entertained. The thought of extending that reach outside the paved areas we walk together does create a differnt path - is it still considered the one less travelled? The fork in the road is this: There will always be only what is – where lips only move air. It forms in thought as an ungiven kiss. Along this path lies a chastity and fidelity that has a special place. The other option consists of the fantasy that is fairy’s wing-thin. More than once I have drowned myself in a dream of experiencing a different body’s lasting hug. I dream, but live my life with honor in not moving on the desire. Much more content imaginings come when I can envision you as the friend I can call, "my confessional friend." In my confession, it is the friend that is capable of taking my shame, named or not, and placing it in a holy space – as a secret told and never spoken of again is placed. I trust this place of comfort that you hold for me. Do you know that I hold a place of comfort for you? Do you know it with certainty, as I do? Is Chivalry clearly understood between you and I? You think I’ve changed topics, but no. To be understood in what I ask is all – to be intimate but honest confessors of what our souls hold for each other. The lady’s virtue cannot be called into question when the purity and truth of fidelity vows are exactly what we meet to discuss. O’ friendly knight, simply fill my heart with your attention. |
 Not complete "Hmmm, uh... (papers rustling) The clinical approach on this one's going to be hard. (Clearing throat) TRANSCRIBER NOTE: I am a week behind on the documentation of this case. Sorry for the length. And going by notes. BEGIN RECORD. One, Hannah Simone, "slightly off her rocker" {Yes, that IS a professional's opinion, although not my own) In good health. Uses prescription glasses. Age forty. She has been under State care for one week. Whether she will be remanded to full incarceration for the period of my evaluation, or be assigned a release and return schedule for our sessions has not been decided yet by the court. I have been assigned to evaluate her over the next six months. Ahem, STOP TRANSCRIPTION. Excuse me?" (Barely audible) "_Cornell_have? _retrieved_from her." "Yes." (muffled conversation then a pop to the recording as if something has hit the microphone) "Hanna, you do know it's a Federal offense to steal someone else's mail? Good girl. Thanks. Now go along with the orderly! Connie? Are you at your desk? No more interruptions, please. TRANSCRIPTION RESUME." "Case folder should be labeled Idaho-Charlie, zero-one-four-eight; submission date January 24, 2005. Subject Simone, Hanna, middle initial D as in David, 'though it's actually Desiree; pretty names given, irregardless of the parents' early neglect...I will ask what she knows about who chose her names at birth. Criminal record: misdemeanor adult charges of harassment via U- S- postal. Progressive misdemeanor to felony charges in shoplifting as a teenager. No violence. No noted intent to harm in dropped stalking charge of two years ago." "Previous psychological evaluation from the Cantor Valley Health Clinic was uninformative. Hannah's reversion took the form of mute behavior. The act of choosing not to talk was recorded as having lasted for two months. Local case was closed after Hannah selectively opened up at the Social Services Department. Child Protective Services threatened removal of the children from her home. Her own early family structure, as I have determined, involved her as an only child in a sheltered home life. When I asked Hannah to describe her childhood to me (footnote as hour one), she detailed her surroundings as split between school interactions with teachers, rather than peers, and a chore-intensive home life. Playtime: solitary; Grooming habits: supervised closely by her mother; Perceived abuses: I will question further her frequent mention of 'closet playhouse.' Hannah only notes the father often sat up late at night, and that conversation between daughter and father was in stolen moments when she ventured out of her room after bedtime. Nothing has indicated inappropriate contact between Hannah and her father. Hannah's father is still living, however he suffered a stroke three years ago, and lost a good amount of mobility and all speech faculty. The mother left suddenly following Hannah's teen marriage in 1985. I have not questioned her further on the topic of her mother. It will likely be a deep source of emotional focusing, which, in my opinion, Hannah is unprepared to move toward. |
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