tears on my pillow
of course they're not mine
alter that altar
make it a play
somebody just
somebody invent the telephone line
i'll take my chances
“alamo,” tori amos

i did clean the bathroom and make black bean soup but...we all learned a good lesson last night. i should not be left alone. at night. on a saturday. with internet access. and my thoughts. and a cute calico. no, strike that last one--if i’m home alone, there should be a kitty there. or doggies.

over the summer, karolyn used to talk a lot about what happens when two people connect but don’t know what they want from each other. this didn’t really mean anything to me at the time, but it’s become a large part of my thoughts lately.

k said that people often fall into romantic relationships because they don’t know what they want from each other. they don’t know what else to do with each other. i think that people who do this rarely figure it out--or if they do, it’s after a tragic divorce or some sort of trauma (in other words, by the time they figure out the reason that person is in their life, it’s too late for them to act upon it).

sometimes you figure out what you want from that person, but it’s not mutual or you’re nuts for wanting it in the first place. think back to every crush you had in high school. all that fantasizing, all this weaving of dreams about an actual person (with their own thoughts and motivations and passions) that you hardly knew! what you wanted was impossible...or possible, but how do you know that you will even react to such love the way you do in your fantasies? at that point, you’ve probably never even been loved!

it’s happier when you don’t question it. this person fits neatly into “friend” category, and what you need from them is simple, fairly concrete, and moment-to-moment. there is no overarching “pull” that pollutes your thoughts. or, this person fits neatly into “like/love,” and you need that person to fit somewhat into your idea of what a good mate is. there is a longing, but it is moment-to-moment.

these relationship situations are happier than mine.

i am talking about a “friend” of mine. i put that in quotes, because our friendship is long distance, and it hasn’t had much contact to feed it. it’s hungry. or i am, anyway.

i was in a long-distance (romantic) relationship for 6 years, and now i’m married to the person. i think that 75% of long distance relationships are based on fantasy. you see each other, and for years it has the bliss of infatuation. when you’re apart, you fill in the blanks with fantasies of how it would be if you were together all the time. you don’t really know each other. you love each other, but you don’t really know each other. often, your fantasies are not delusions--in other words, they do not hold up despite evidence that they are not reality. someone cheats. you meet someone else, and find that the novelty of having someone close by outweighs all the mood swings of an intense, long-distance relationship. or maybe the fantasies hold up until you are no longer long-distance, and the infatuation finally starts to fade. they’re difficult, and they often fail.

how about long distance friendships? typically, this is a friendship that dates back to high school (every day together), or even elementary school. there is a firm foundation of reality, so when your friend goes to school or work or whatever, you mind is more equipped to fill in the time with more realistic fantasies. when you get together a few times a year, it feels like you just picked up where you left off. well, you did. that connection was fed so well over the years that you are able to keep it going even when the relationship is in “fantasy” mode and you’re not hanging out anymore.

now, this fellow...i’m a huge fan of his. i didn’t know how to react to him. it probably would have been better if he were a girl, because i ended up acting like a 13-year old girl would after attending her first justin timberlake concert.* i didn’t matter, because it didn’t occur to me that he’d have any interest in being friends with me. i urged my hub to interview him, wrote him a longass, super-personal fan letter, and had the hubster deliver it.

and then i actually heard from him. nice e-mails. so i decided to go for it and go to this dorky convention in chicago so i could meet it. i headed up that whole project, and it was one of the happiest few days of my life. my hub, my girlfriend, and my hero all in the same place! i realized there that he was for real, and not just some too-good-to-be-true-emo-boy. and he seemed to like me. kept writing. short and not super-frequent, but always kind, sweet, and thoughtful.

so i went to another convention--very undorky this time. he actually started to become a real person to me. fun. silly. boyish. i’d say flawed, but i can’t think of any damn flaws (i am aware that this friendship is in fantasy mode on my side, thank you very much, and that no one is perfect). and then i got back, and we still wrote. the e-mails became shorter and more infrequent (because he’s busy, computer-phobic, and needs those hands for his work), but they are always so sweet.

i sent him a longass, psychorambling e-mail last night about this. i asked him if he ever wondered what i want from him. i think i’ve figured it out, and it’s impossible. i want a real friendship. we’ve met twice. we have very little upon which to build a friendship, let alone nourish it in the long run.

more importantly, i feel like an obligation to him, because he has a lot of fans, and he doesn’t actually enjoy e-mail. i thought “would switching to snail-mail help,” but then he still needs to rest up his hand and arm. my husband suggested phone (he gave me his number, but i only called once--when i knew he wouldn’t be home--and sung to his answering machine). i don’t think that’s the answer. having your inbox cluttered with one more e-mail to answer is one thing, but getting stuck on the phone with the author is a real pain in the butt. the more i push for this, the more i swing away from “dear friend” to “another obligation in work pile.”

i didn’t ask him what he wanted from me. i don’t think he wants anything from me. what the heck would i have to offer, anyway? well, no. maybe he’d want me to leave him alone and try to pick back up where we left off at the next convention. part of me would want to know that, so i can know what would make him happy (which would them make me feel like i’m doing an okay job of contributing to our friendship). but, of course, that’s not what i need. at all.

that’s where i am now.

*and craig, if you’re reading this: i am so, so, SO sorry for making even an indirect comparison between you and justin timberlake. please forgive me.

a conversation

sean: you're so weird!
me: what? why?
sean: the demands to touch your ass are constant!

it's beginning to look a lot like christmas

that title is about a month overdo, isn't it? tsk tsk tsk.

also overdue is a discussion (one-sided, of course, as no one ever comments here!!!) of the sleep that i got wednesday night. wow. i woke up several times, but wow. i soaked two pairs of jammies, but wow. i didn't take anything to help me sleep, but i actually slept. i had about six dreams. one was a nightmare. ghosts and objects moving and my parents' old house (sadness). i was trying to wake myself up, and it kept becoming a dream outside of a dream outside of a dream...but the next dream i had led into the most amazing dream i've had in ages. it was a period piece. vampires. love. sex. tears. does it get any better? i keep re-living it. maybe it's that gingko i've been taking. i think i love the dream so much because it has helped me realize some more weirdass things about myself.

you already know too much. the 1% of myself that is free from my emotional exhibitionism is better off that way. most of the other 99% is, too, i know. sorry. i have a date with a bottle of lotion now. (not true). please hit me.

and when i promised my hand
he promised me back
snow cherries from france

all that summer
we traveled the world
never leaving his own back garden
girls i didn't know
just what it could be
oh but he let me go sailing
"snow cherries from france," tori amos

i'm hanging out alone today...no not alone, with little miss kitty cat...feeling sorry for myself, but not nearly as depressed as i expected. last week was honestly one of the worst weeks in recent memory. i felt so burnt out, and i kept having what i called (when they started in the fifth grade) "flashes."

i'll try to explain what these are. i'll be walking down the hall, or looking in the mirror, or teaching, and it'll feel as if i suddenly came into my body. as if my body had previously been functioning mechanically, and my spirit just jumped into it. i'll look at myself as if for the first time (or the first time in a while), and i have to sort of remind myself of who i am and what i am doing.

that used to happen a lot when i was younger--it started in the fifth grade. i'll go through periods where it happens quite a bit, and it's pretty disconcerting. (is that the word? it seems like the word). it's annoying, too. that's been happening a lot lately, and it really adds the the feeling of being burned out.

so that's what "flashes" are.

might as well face it--you're addicted

i posted over 50 times on thursday. and i can't stop.

i'm sick. a cold. sniff. so i'm just laying around all day. i can't decide if that is just what the doctor ordered, or if i feel restless and gross. i always say i WANT to lay around all day, but usually i can't go through with it.

i just deleted the most inane thing i've ever written. i guess i don't have anything to say today. this has been a horrendous week for me. i've been discouraged, depressed, and full of despair. burnt out. beat up. it picked up at the end. and being sick has given me something to blame it all on...and a time frame for these feelings to lift. hey, it's better than self-mutilation (drum roll)!

IT'S DAY EIGHT

after day six of my period, i go into denial. stop wearing tampons and such. pretend it doesn't exist. act surprised every time i go into the bathroom.

i want to take you far away from the cynics in this
town and kiss you on the mouth
we'll cut our bodies free from the tethers of
this scene, start a brand new colony
where everything will change, we'll give
ourselves new names (identities erased)
the sun will heat the ground under our bare
feet in this brand new colony
everything will change
"brand new colony," the postal service

i keep running this over and over. on my blog, on my ipod, in my head. the closest i've come is a dorky comic book convention in chicago. i'm not saying all comic book conventions are dorky. actually, i'm barely cool enough for spx, and not nearly cool enough for mocca. at this point, i'd settle for totally-my-best-friend's tendonitis to go away so he'd be happy. and then write me. selfish lucy...

we've been putting aside some of my kitty's food at breakfast and dinner, and then giving it to her as a bedtime snack. i like to have her eat it out of my hand. she gets kitty drool all over me, and she's so soft and tickly. i think she's really starting to trust us. my husband didn't empty the dishwasher this morning, because she was hanging out on the kitchen counter and letting him love on her. she has been hanging out in places other than underneath the kitchen table. and she followed me around today after work.

and guess who just hopped up here on the bed?

and then jumped back down when i pet her?

i think my eating is trying to establish normal patterns. some days i eat more or less than my target amount of calories. for example, i ate at the cheesecake factory on saturday...and THEN got coldstone ice cream. sunday i ate a "normal" amount. monday i ate a bit less (to "make up" for it). you may think that's restricting. but today i ate a bit more. so there's the ebb and flow. i still loosely count calories (except when i eat out--i just assume it's a lot and leave it at that), but i'm not trying to lose weight. i don't want to gain, but i don't want to lose a couple pounds "just to have leeway" (that was how it started. i wanted to stay at 105, and i lost. i wanted to get to and stay at 100. then 95. you get the idea). so in some ways my progress has stagnated, but i seem to be improving just because i am less and less in danger of sliding down from this place (weight-wise, at least).

i still don't know why my psychiatrist doubled my dose of lexapro. i think it's a pretty high dose. when i was on prozac back in the day, 10 mg did it. when i started lexapro, it was 5 mg. then 10. now 20. and i'm not sure why. the answer to "do you think the medication is working?" is always "i don't know"--unless i've become obsessed again with planning out my death. i think it must be working fine. i'm functional, eating, and sleeping okay.

by this time last year, i was waking up at 3 am, unable to go back to sleep, and being tortured by replaying middle school chorus songs in my head. i know the concert will be fine. or, at least this year i'm selfish enough to not care more about that than i do about my own happiness. and rest. the two always have been inextricably linked...

anyway, "brand new colony" serves the same function that "let down" by radiohead did when i was 21. making up hope when there is none.

"one day i am gonna grow wings
a chemical reaction
hysterical and useless
hysterical and let down and hanging around"

if you can't make your mind up,
we'll never get started.
and i don't wanna wind up
being parted, broken-hearted.
so if you really love me, say yes.
but if you don't, dear, confess.
and please don't tell me
perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.
"perhaps, perhaps, perhaps" (the cake version)

i haven't watched dream for an insomniac in a very long time. too long, in fact.

i don't know if i even have anything to say today. i'm just looking for something to keep me multitasking, and my neck hurts from doing crossword puzzles while watching the extras on the two towers dvd.

i feel both "better" (as in cured) in some ways. my weight is above 85%, and i think i look pretty okay. i'm nervous about gaining any more weight, and freaked out about the fact that one of my favorite pairs of jeans fits me again, but i'm not restricting. i actually ate lunch at the cheescake factory and dessert at coldstone in the same day.

on the other hand, i also feel like i'm on the way to a relapse. hopeless, too. at this point, i have to feel like i'm on the fence between "cured" and relapse, because i'm terrified of accepting myself as i am: average-looking, normal weight, talentless, a barely-passable singer, and a mediocre teacher. i don't want to be all pro-lucy when all i am is okay.

well, poop. i haven't actually said anything yet, but law & order: criminal intent is on. i hope i haven't disappointed you. actually, the only people i'm disappointing are the people who are just coming here for the first time. those of you who've been around here already know to expect nothing tall of mediocrity from me.

love love love

i wish i could believe that this was about singing or running or something nice...

i checked my referrals this morning, and found the following:
Nov 16 05:37:54 2003 http://www.google.com/search?q=earliest age girl physically able

if this is what i'm thinking it is, i feel the need to spray lysol all over my blog. GET HELP BEFORE YOU RUIN SOME CHILD'S LIFE IN THE PURSUIT OF A WAY TO GET OFF.

oh what a world we live in

after my usual saturday morning "namaste america," i turned on the local news channel to catch up. there is some disturbing shite going on around here--and i'm not talking about the ridiculous windstorm we had this week. my former psychiatrist is much more than the schlubby dud that i took him to be. i really can't imagine who would be seduced by this guy. drip-o-rama. well, now he can take the time he needs to work out his own issues.

there is a possible serial killer out in suffolk county: four bodies in three years, all dumped in about the same place.

that poor kid, for whom police put out an amber alert, was found (a few blocks from where i used to live...when i lived in da hood) alone, in a parked car. something i didn't know until today: the guy had stolen his jacket, and left the windows open. great.

speaking of cruelty to children, i don't even know where to start about those people in new jersey who starved their children. everytime i hear the story, i just want to scoop those kids up and hold them and tell them that there islove somewhere in the world. (not to sound like rosie o'donnell or anything). anyway, apparently these monsters are working on some crafty excuses for doing the inexcusable. i'm sure that whatever crap they come up with will turn my stomach. oh, speaking of not eating, renfrew (the eating disorder center where i "vacationed" this summer) was contacted to give their thoughts about the bastards' claim that the kids had eating disorders.

back on the island, this douchebag was sentenced to one to three years for having sex with four teens. the sentences will run concurrently. that's right--he could be out in less than a year. for having sex with three girls and one boy--that were in his youthgroup (did i forget to mention that?). it's pretty appalling. think about this: how much time would he be serving for possession of marijuana, for example?

...which brings me back home to my own district (not where i work--where i live). the mepham high school scandal. i'm glad i haven't said much about it until now, because my opinions have changed somewhat. now it's time for my two cents:

i don't know how well this was covered elsewhere in the country, but it was decided this week that they'd be tried as juveniles. also, what they did was rape, pure and simple. we're not talking about truancy or shoplifting--they destroyed their teammates. so, before this week, i was 100% behind trying them as adults, and sending them to federal pound-you-in-the-ass prison. i don't want their sorry asses back out on the street in, like, a year. but then i realized that these kids could literally be killed in prison. at this point, i do value the lives of the victims over those of the rapists. still: if they deserve to die, well, that's not for me to decide. i do, then, understand why the judge would be reticient about that. i guess the ideal would be to either send them to juvey for a longer period of time, or put them in a lower-security prison.

anyhow, there are two semantic aspects of this case that are REALLY bothering me. please indulge me while i disappear into my own asshole for a while.

first of all, why is this called a "hazing" incident? i realize that it is, technically, but doesn't that make it seem less serious? when i think "hazing," i think drinking beer until you wet your diaper, dressing funny, pranks...this was RAPE. period.

second, if you've watched the news around here, you've seen a lot of man-on-the-street interviews in which people say that these asses should be tried as adults because "they did something an adult would do." (and that is an exact quote). they did not do something an adult would do -- they did something that a PREDATORY RAPIST would do. the whole "adult" issue, you idiot, has to do with how aware they were of what they were doing. and at 16, 17 years old, i was well aware of rape.

i would like to see these rapists rot in prison for a long time. i would like to forget about them, too, actually. beyond living, i'm not sure if i really care what happens to them. yeah, they're young and have their whole lives before them...blah blah blah...they did not have to do this. they were completely in control of their actions, and they ruined the lives of three of their classmates. those are the people that i care about. the three, innocent boys, who are probably tormented by all the people at their high school who actually support their attackers. the thought of writing them letters occurred to me at some point this week, but i don't know if that will be possible. i'm sick of all the emphasis being on the attackers--it's obviously "negative" attention they're receiving, and i'm happy as hell about that, but their victims are so much more important.

i'm done, honey. we can go grocery shopping now.

woke up this morning at 11:11
woke up this morning and it wasnt in heaven
those are the reason 'bout
where I was sleeping but I was alive
"11:11," rufus wainwright

i had a good dream about bobo last night...he had run into the room to greet my pretty niece, who started shouting "bo-BO! bo-BO!!" and i painted a picture of him while i counted in my head the days until i see him again (forty-four). i also put some of my pictures from this year into an album, but i got stuck in the summer, because i couldn't find any pictures from my june visit to colorado.

i'm pretty much obsessed with yessssforumz right now. yeah, obsessed is the right word. everyone is so nice. i feel like i have friends! i'll see you there.

therapy has this weird effect on me. every week, i sing in the car on the way there. and i get there and i'm fine. then i well up. then i cry. and snot. and blow. and get up and get another tissues. cry, blow, repeat. and then i leave and i'm sorta teary, but it goes away without me noticing.

i have been thinking lately that maybe i'm getting better. i feel so fat tonight, though. i ate two pieces of this super-high calorie frozen pizza, and then soy ice cream, and then a granola bar. and even though i don't think i went above my 1800 calories-plus-an-ensure-plus regimen, i feel so fat. and i'm not sure how much more comfortable i am gaining any more weight. i'm above the 85% mark, so i'm not in any danger. so i may cut out the ensure. or keep them around for desserts...the chocolate ones are so good. where was i? oh, i'm happy but also freaked out about my progress. being anorexic gives me something to talk about. it's something interesting about me. just about the only interesting thing about me...

i posted this on my other blog, because i haven't posted there in a while. but it really belongs on this one. it's all that's on my mind today, anyway.

this is the worst dream i've ever had

last night i dreamt that i was at my parents' house. only it was the house where i grew up--not where they currently live. it was a long, normal, elaborate dream, and i had been there for a few days before i realized that i had barely seen salma, and i hadn't seen bobo at all.

i've had dreams before where i was there a couple days before i realize the dogs aren't there, and then i find out that they're either at the kennel or they've been there all along, in the basement. in either case, i am devastated by the amount of time i've "lost" with them, and i end the dream vowing to spend every minute with them until i have to leave.

moving on: in this one, i was getting dressed and ready to go out somewhere. and it was very detailed. i tried on a few things, and even had to change my bra because it was to dark under the white-with-green-flowers dress i picked out.

my husband came into talk to me. i said "hey, have you seen the dogs? i feel like we've hardly seen them!" he said--plainly-- "well, salma's downstairs, and bobo had a heart attack last week." i was upset, because i wanted to visit him in the hospital. also, why didn't anyone tell me? oh no. i asked if he was alive, and he said no. i tried to cry, but it was like trying to drain a tidal wave through a faucet. so i just started screaming "my baby my baby" and spent the rest of the dream collapsed on the floor and screaming.

i couldn't sleep after the dream. i just kept welling up. bobo is almost 13 and he's my best friend. i haven't seen him since july. i can't go that long without seeing him. that's why i keep painting him--i'm obsessed with doing as much with and for and about him as i can. when i got home from work, there was a note on the latest one i'm working on (bobo in a santa hat). in sloppy writing, it says "dear amy, thank you for painting me. i am quite flattered. love, bobo."

my husband was very kind to deliver that note.

get nasty

today's post is going to be a response to both an anti-porn essay written by goddess naomi wolf and my hot husband's response to it. actually, more of the former. i agree with most of what the hub has to say, but i think that both he and ms. wolf missed out on a HUGE point.

okay, i agreed with everything that she said...but she lost me at the end. is she holding up a jewish orthodox relationship as the ideal? i don't think that there's anything wrong with that...for someone else. for me, it just reeks of "wife-as-property." a wide range of "normal" and "good" and "right" is the ideal. both people being genuinely happy and fulfilled is right.

porn, on the other hand, sucks--no pun intended. the idea of porn is fine: fantasy, getting ideas, stimulating you for solo sex or sex with your lover.

it's list time. how do i hate the porn industry? let me count the ways...

(1) it's UGLY. the women all look like freaks. because they are freaks. who ever thought that bleached-blond hair looked good?

boys used to be honored to have their testicles removed for the chance of making it in the music industry. now girls are "empowered" by the decision to mutilate their bodies (botox, fake breasts, etc.) in order to further their careers. a boy was no good with a changed voice, and a girl is less-than as long as they have a real/attainable body. female porn-performers are turned into shrieking, submissive, alien sexoids.

the men are just ugly. they've turned the penis into a side-show act. in actuality, i am not the least bit turned on by the thought of trying to accomodate a ten-inch penis. a ten-inch penis on an intelligent, creative, loving man with whom i never run out of things to talk about...well, i'd work on that. a four-inch penis on the same man would be no less appealing. but a ten-inch penis on a man who just came to check some barbie's plumbing or some crap like that...well, it's a novelty. nothing more.

(2) it's BORING. the women all have the same basic look, leading you to ogle their fake breasts rather than imagine how soft and wonderful-smelling their flesh is. the guys are all ugly.

here is the formula for a sex scene: they kiss. clothes come off. girl goes down on guy. guy goes down on girl. penis is inserted. they go for a while, and then change to doggie style. they continue. guy grunts. guy pulls out and ejaculates. scene over.

isn't that's 95% of guy-on-girl porn? what is your definition of vanilla sex? missionary position? well, mine is that-same-thing-everytime without any thought to any other options.

(3) it is ADDICTIVE, because it's safe. you don't ever have to worry about any real-life complications when you're masturbating to porn. it's easy and guaranteed to work every time--as opposed to the trial-and-error learning process of growing sexually with your partner (or on your own). it's safe because it's the same every time.

often, heroin users "overdose" not by injecting a bigger amount of the drug, but by changing their drug-taking ritual...which leaves the body unprepared to defend itself against the poison. a porn addict...and believe me, "the man" would have us all become such things...is unprepared mentally and emotionally for a change in ritual (i.e., sex with a partner and without porn). why wouldn't something that is meant to stimulate sexuality help prepare someone for sex?

(4) porn is a load of CRAP. if the pornography industry was a person, it would be the kind of abrasive person that everyone laughs at because they're somewhat funny...but also the alpha friend. porn would say "oh, c'mon i was just kidding! lighten up!" when it has hurt your feelings, rather than actually listening to you.

i don't want to flesh out the "degrading to women" aspect of this. or, i should say, i don't need to. it's been done by people who are much more articulate than me. porn degrades because all the women in it look the same (altered), the implication is that that is what is sexy (or at the very least, sexiest). all the women follow the man's lead. again, implications. you get the idea.

but what if i told you that it is degrading to men as well? oh yes, my friends. porn doesn't do men any favors in the long run, either...

(5) it is FULL OF MISINFORMATION.

most men don't have 10-inch penises. (thank god most men don't look like porn stars in general!)

most women don't look like that. men are taught to be turned on by a two-dimensional, airbrushed, altered, manipulative, false woman. a false view of sexuality. why are some men obsessed with breasts (the bigger the better)? is there anything inherently more sexual about them? on the woman's side, i can tell you that real, smaller breasts tend to be more sensitive than large, fake breasts (of course, this varies from woman to woman--as does everything having to do with sex. but the porn industry would have you believe that there is a formula).

in this sense, women have an easier time getting over this difference between porn and reality. ones sexual preferences, fetishes, hang-ups, etc., tend to be formed based on one's earliest sexual experiences. getting playboy and jerking off to porn is almost a rite of passage for boys. women aren't encouraged to masturbate, let alone look at porn. while most girls' first sexual experience is with a real human being (sweat and acne and braces and all)...most boys' is done furtively and with the help of some form of pornography (whether that be playboy or sis's victoria's secret catalog or scrambled green breasts after mom and dad are in bed). boys are CONDITIONED to be stimulated visually. girls will tend to masturbate imagining (in addition to all the actual genital contact) the feel of skin against skin, the smells, the touch of hair...boys masturbate with a great deal of focus on body parts. a frozen facial expression. it's no wonder that people look back on their first sexual experience as technically disappointing.

if my husband and i did a perfect reenactment of a scene in a typical (although, isn't that a little redundant?) porno, i would feel stimulated, but not fulfilled. and confused, too: "oops, you slipped out just as you were co--oh, you meant to do that? okay..."

i am sick of being made to feel that i am less sexual because that wouldn't bring me to orgasm. that's a load of crap. if that would do it for you, that's great. you probably have had an easier time getting sexual fulfillment. but if you're like me (and the majority of women), the guy can bang away as much as he wants, and it's just not going to get you there. the clitoris is THE female sexual organ. do you typically see porno guys stimulating it while having sex? or the girl touching herself while having intercourse? (on a related note, how much did your health teacher tell you about the clitoris?).

and when he does...specifically, during the 2.5 minutes he goes down on the girl, have you watched what he does? are you kidding me? OUCH. i'm prepared to believe that some girls can take that much pressure directly, but i can't. and i know i'm not alone. so how come it is always performed in the same way? well that's just it. it's performed. it's performed in a way that says to the guy "don't worry about talking to her and having her guide you. just lick away fast and furiously. and then take her from behind. guaranteed to work. no communication needed."

guys are led to believe that we, too, will become shrieking sex aliens as long as they go at our vaginas vigorously enough. so what is our first sexual experience like? not a gentle exploration of the clitoris...but dirty fingernails shoved into (and out and in) our vaginas. and us girls, also deluded into think that this is what sex is supposed to feel like, oblige by making more noises than we are actually feeling.

see what i mean? this is doing no one any favors!!! which brings me to my final point. i am in complete agreement with naomi wolf on this:

(6) it DIVIDES. to go with a simple, clear-cut example: the money shot. there is nothing inherently better or more sexy about a guy pulling out to ejaculate. and yet, that is the standard. the NORM in porn is the guy disconnecting physically--even before the sex act is over. that's pretty messed up.

the misinformationn that is transmitted through pornography alienates men and women. men are taught to treat women like objects and...maybe even worse...as if they are all the same sexually. women are taught that fake is sexy, and their self-esteem suffers from difference between fantasy and reality. (not to mention the fact that they spend too much energy trying to talk themselves into porn's narrow view of sexuality and sexual pleasure...and not enough time actually creating sexual pleasure!).

both sexes are taught that this + this + this should equal sexual pleasure. the man doesn't know (until a wise and somewhat comfident woman opens up a dialogue) that that is not right, and then he's insecure/pissed when he realizes that girls may have just been going along with what he was doing.

obviously, men are more good than bad, and they WANT sex to be pleasurable for both parties. most men would do whatever they could--pride aside--to become a good lover for their partners. but that's hard to do with they're not given the information they'd need to achieve that!).

both sexes would benefit from more realistic, more varied, less formulaic porn. better yet, shut the damn computer/tv off and go play together. children who watch less tv are more in shape and more creative...maybe couples who are "forced" to use their imaginations in sex are more in shape and more fulfilled.

i wanted to post today, just to post. i don't know what to post about, and i'm sitting here watching coverage of the green river murders trial. i can't talk about anything else, but i'm also pretty much speechless. i can't imagine sitting in that courtroom, listening to him respond to each and every charge. hearing each victim's name called, and hearing him say that he did indeed end their lives. sometimes i think that the worst part of these murders is that this monster is the last glimpse of earth that these people got to see. and sometimes--probably because i'm religious--i think that the real victims are the surviving friends and family members.

and of course i have to wrestle with the whole "death penalty" issue. well, i don't have to, but it's hard to not think about it. on the one hand, it may give the survivors closure. on the other hand, is there any closure for someone whose daughter or best friend or girlfriend was murdered? it makes people to feel safe that this kind of person isn't on earth anymore. but i believe that life is a gift, and that it's not for us to take it away (once a person is able to live and breath*). clearly, he deserves it. but (1), is this going to get him to change his ways?, (2) it is not for us to decide who "deserves" to live, and (3) the family of the murderer is not necessarily guilty...why make more parents lose children?

my husband and i watched this special that followed the last few days of a prisoner's life. while i was horrified by the man's walk to the death chamber, what really moved me was his mother. she was at home while he was dying, and her motherly instincts overtook her at the moment of his death. she screamed, wailed, ran out and collapsed in her backyard. the memory will probably haunt me for the rest of my life.

the pain in the victims' families eyes will, too. but this killer is not someone that we can get to. we won't get closure, vengeance. he is dead inside. he does not really know what he did. there is no explanation for this, no closure, and no peace. i just hope that these families have something else that they can cling to to get them through every long moment of their lives.


* i'm not getting into abortion now. access to good information and cheap birth control are the way. beyond that, it's none of my damn business what you choose.

my kitty is being much more affectionate today: very talkative, and even tolerating a good deal of petting.

i worry about how the first year of her life was. first of all, she's less than a runt. she's the tiniest full-grown cat i've ever seen. i know that she had kittens at a very young age (so young that she rejected them). maybe she had them so young that she was still growing, and it stunted her growth somehow.

second, i've seen cats beg for meals, once you're fixing them...or, in one case, when it's around mealtime. but my girl gulps down every bit the minute you put it in her bowl--as if she's afraid that someone will take it. we were hoping that we'd be able to feed her once a day, in the morning, so that she would just graze throughout the day. it doesn't look good.

finally, she's very snuggly and affectionate at night. she sleeps curled up to me. but during the day, she's super-timid. you have to approach her VERY slowly, or else she'll start and (probably) run away.

i just don't understand why someone would give her away. all i know is that whoever it was brought her and the kittens in. i can understand giving the kittens away, but lucy is good as gold. she hasn't caused a single problem for us...unless you could her loud jingle-ball-soccer playing at 5:00 a.m.! i have to wonder about a person who gives away a perfectly sweet cat that has gotten pregant too early (due, no doubt, to the owner's negligence...i say this because lucy has never tried to run out the door. she is so timid...she is barely brave enough to slowly sneak up to the front door, let alone make a run for it).

it makes me sad. it makes me happy that we've probably improved her life. but i get pretty pissed at whoever made her so timid and afraid.

i love my little lucy. i look forward to her nightly bravery--our dreamy snuggletime.

now if you'll excuse me, i gotta go smear mud on my ass

i'm watching the wet hot american summer. farts, people falling down, christopher meloni, and paul rudd. awesome.

if you e-mail me (lucyhoney23 at yahoo dot com) i'll send you a picture.

ugh this is just one of those days that i'm so bored i can't even think of song lyrics to put as the title to this post. my husband and i almost had a fight, so bored were we. we were going to get tattoos, but we're unmotivated. i wanted to go to target, and we actually were thinking about borders, but we're trying not to spend too much money.

okay, i need to come up with a topic for today, or else i'll just babble in an annoying way.

topic: my voice

i still have remnants of nodules on my cords. i was diagnosed in mid-december, and i went on steroids and voice rest (mostly because i was diagnosed just before vacation). i went back to the ent at the end of january, and the hard nodes were gone, but the cords were still not smooth (soft nodes). i started voice therapy in february, and made fairly steady progress over the next six months.

honestly, my cords don't look much better than they did at the end of january. and i'm not surprised, because i've noticed that i've (re-)lost the few high notes that i was able to sing this summer--for the first time in three years. i think that they did heal completely, but now the schoolyear is taking its toll. that's not good. i'd rather them take longer to heal and heal totally than heal and come back and heal and come back. also, i'm using my voice as little as possible when i teach...i feel kind of screwed right now.

the doctor was all "hm, that's MUCH better...they're getting better." but i think he's basing that on my december pictures--not the january ones. i don't think it's supposed to take a year for nodes to heal. anyway, i'm going back to the voice therapist this friday.

it just sucked. i was finally getting to the point where i was able to experience just a smidgen of the joy that music had once given me. i used to sing every day...i was missing something if i didn't do it. and i listened to music, and got lost in it...i completely absorbed into my life and my being. that day in 2001 when i realized my voice was completely foreign to me--well, i realized that i had stopped loving music. i didn't listen to any ("classical") music anymore, because it would just be too depressing to listen to music that i can't sing anymore. i used to listen with the hope of growing towards being able to do it justice. now it just serves as a reminder of how lost my "core self" is.

according to my "soul drama" group from renfew, the core self (what you were as a child...all hope and potential) never disappears. it just gets buried deeper and deeper underneath all the shit that you encounter, your reactions to and feelings about the shit, and the things you do to get away from all that shit. so i keep searching for that, even though i have no idea where to begin to find it. so far, i've been playing around with different talents that i don't but wish i did (writing, drawing painting, singing), in hopes that they'll lead me to a talent that i do have. my dietician says that my standards are too high--most people don't have such a clear gift. it seems that all of my friends have some creative ability that is so strong that the world would be a different place if they chose not to use it. i want that so badly. realistically, if i had it i would have found it (and kept it--because this kind of thing doesn't just go away) at some point in the last twenty-seven years. but i'd rather pretend that there's something amazingly special inside of me, and keep searching for it despite the lack of evidence. the other option is accepting my mediocrity. and i just can't love myself as i am now.

earlier today

4:18PM
k: i'm having such a shitty day and there's NO reason for it.
me: yeah, ME TOO! i'm in a shitty mood, i'm bored, and i am too lazy to go pee right now!!!

4:20PM
me: i still don't quite get my shadow. i think i'm all shadow.
k: no. you can't be. it doesn't work like that. it's just where we hang out. your light side is somewhere between puppies & vaginas.
me: how about butts?

4:35PM
me: sean is snoring on the couch next to me. and i am going to take the computer in with me to pee. is that rude?
k: naw.
me: i mean, isn't that what laptops are for?
k: well... only if you have photos.
(a little bit later)
me: ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

4:55P
me: i just pulled a scab off my forehead. i promised myself i wouldn't do it, but i was just lying so i could get some.
k: OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! you did? I LOVE YOU
me: no i didn't. well sean and i fooled around. we're still technically virgins. well, we would be if we hadn't had sex for years.
k: wow. i'm assuming there was a little assplay involved, no?
me: hee hee. no just hand things.
k: the amazing thing about hands is that they can make shapes.
me: i like to make a fist so that i've made a tiny butthole with my thumb and index fingers.
k: that's pretty hot.

calling my baby
calling my baby
calling my baby

i think i'm too messed up on sudafed to post. it makes my thighs feel good.

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.

kitty all better. kitty playing with plastic jingles balls even....after getting one stuck on the little pink pad of her right paw....OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH BABY. little schnookie is a big brave bear

OPEN THE WINDOW IT'S SO HOT IN HERE

i like seeing young kids and knowing what the others their age can't see: that they're going to be hot one day, or that they're gay. i feel like treats are in store for both. i feel like people who think it's a "choice" should take on my job for a couple years (that is, after they're done eating my butt).

more...more...MORE.....

today i woke up at 4 to pee, and kitty cat left me when i got back. slept until 7:30, fooled around with husband, ate breakfast and watched "namaste america" (also did crossword puzzles). hubby showered, we went to therapy. went to lunch with in-laws, went to pet store for litter and the toys that caused tonight's consternation, went to see student in a show...got a terrible headache. came home, showered, dealt with kitty debacle, ate two pieces of leftover pizza, caught up on e-mail. in the middle of three hours of law & order. so how was your day?

hands are your friends. primary tactile sensory devices. good.

i wrote three good things about myself on the yessss forumz thing...then a few bad things. i'm supposed to say one good thing about myself each day. that was an assignment on wednesday. i'll start with thursday:

THURSDAY - i am patient. the nodes will go away.
FRIDAY - even though i have turned up nothing after years of hoping for some special creative or artistic talent, i keep trying: i'm determined.
SATURDAY - i went to a student's show today. i care about my students. i would say "well big freakin' deal...wanna cookie?" but i have met teachers who care more about their ego than anything else.

check THAT crap out!