Saturday morning on the BQE. 8am. 9am. 10am.~jshd2010

Sometimes, when I’m stuck in a never ending line of traffic.
When even though I’m pointed in the right direction, nothing seems to be moving,
– or at least not fast enough.
When the heat gets turned up just a little too high.
When it seems like I’m never going to get where I’m going.
When I start thinking about ditching it all.

I just need to look around.
XXXXXSee where I’m really at
XXXXXXXXXXRead the writing on the wall
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXAnd simply follow directions.

the burning bush ~jshd2010

I keep getting confused between Rachel Shukert and Jillian Lauren.

Both of them have hot books out now.

Both books employ colons : in their titles.

Both of them are pretty. Really pretty. Really pretty rock n’ roll girls who are now happily married hot moms. With hit books.

Both are dark-haired Jewesses who wrote memoirs about going overseas and having sex with foreigners.

I’m reading Shukert’s book, Everything is Going Great : An Underfunded and Overexposed European Grand Tour. I heard all about her hilarious Amsterdammed sexcapades while I was there recently, having my own less-than-hilarious depresscapades. Then, I heard her read an excerpt at a recent Literary Death Match . Which, by the way, I helped her win, even though I’d actually gone to support another writer. (Apologies to Melissa Petro . I can’t help it, I’m really competitive and the team assignments were random. You were Wonderful. But, not Jewish. Or brunette. So, more about you some other time). The New York Times loves Shukert.

I have Jillian Lauren’s book, Some Girls: My Life in a Harem, on the top of the pile called “Next”. I saw her read at a Sex Worker Literati event this past May. Wait, that’s a lie. I left before she read, but that is where I bought the book. And this morning I listened to a Rumpus Radio podcast interview with her where Stephen Elliott spends the first five or ten minutes talking about how smoking hot she is. She hadn’t even gotten to the studio yet. She is, apparently, so hot that her hotness precedes her like an entourage, announcing her imminent arrival. Impressive. And apparently a little intimidating to the ladies of the View.

By the time I got home today my brain had mashed up Rachel Shukert and Jillian Lauren to one over-the-top gorgeous, literary, funny, sexy Jewess.

Rather than figure out which I was reading and which I was about to read, which one was funny & hot and which one was hot & funny, I took the easy way out. I Netflixed Yentl. One more Jewess, yes, but after all, it is almost Rosh Hashanah. And I never confuse Streisand with anyone else. Well, almost never.

I’m not usually a big fan of weddings or anniversary parties or christenings or anything that reeks of well adjusted people having picture book walk happily ever after in the sunset family lives. But, the gospel choir sang “Kisses Sweeter than Wine“  and I cried, or rather, my eyes leaked.

They were two people, utterly in love.

I want to believe; in a small dark corner inside me lives the hope that true love is more than an illusion.  But it’s a struggle to believe my eyes and not the little voices in my head.

I think love is sex and wet your pants with laughter silly and comfortable silences and wanting to protect the other person and wanting to do that over and over and over again.

I’ve never had that, but I’ve seen it.
I’ve never been to the moon either, but I’ve seen that too.

Time came to toss the bouquet, I excused myself and went to get a cup of tea. I didn’t want to catch it or be pushed into the crowd of singletons. I don’t want to be in love, I say, it hurts too much. I’m afraid to be in love is the truth.

There was no tea to be had and when I get back to my seat, the bouquet is sitting on the table. It had landed on my empty chair.

I’ve been in love, twice. Once with someone who loved me back. And I believe, even if I excuse myself to get tea rather than risk staying and saying I want to be loved again, the universe will find a way to get it to me. If I live in a church that believes in all possibilities of love, Love will land on my empty chair and wait patiently for me to come back. I believe this because even though I’ve never touched the man the moon, I know he’s out there.

All my life –seriously, all my life, and that is considerable at this point, all my life I’ve felt like I was fighting dragons.

Picture me in a medieval princess gown, with a broad sword, fighting off dragons as they come at me from every side. Vicious, horrible things that would make grown men run and cry like little girls. Breathing fire and stank like raw sewage. Ready to incinerate me, roast me, toast me, eat me whole or tear flesh from bone if I take even one second to let my guard down and rest. I’m scared, my back is to a tree and that’s the best I can do, find a shady place to fight and something to lean on.

All I’ve ever wanted — seriously, all I’ve ever wanted is for someone to take up that sword and protect me from the dragons. Just for a little while. Just long enough for a nap. That’s not asking much, is it? I’m so tired, I think to myself. I’m weak and tired & this sword is so heavy. I cannot keep my arms up, not even one more second. Can’t you take it from me, take care of me, protect me, just for a moment? Just for one fucking moment? Then I’ll take the sword back, seriously, because I know your heart is not really in it. I mean, after all, they’re my dragons, not yours.

Today, for the first time, it occurred to me, it might be in my best interest to stop leaving food and fresh milk out for the dragons. Perhaps, I should stop offering them a warm dry corner of my mind to sleep in. Maybe I should stop treating them as if they were my pets. They are, after all, vicious beasts.

The beast inside looks at me, smiles and says “You knew what I was when you picked me up.”

I’m a shelter dog at heart. It’s not even well hidden. If you’ve never been a shelter dog, had a feral cat, never tried to rehab an abused animal, you have no idea how to love me and even less idea how to date me. How I got this way, well, there’s an entire other blog dedicated to that if you’re so inclined. But it doesn’t matter. It’s just who I am.

I am a shelter dog, a feral cat. Handle with care. Approach with caution

I used to think I just had bad luck, always finding men who were unavailable.  Then I started saying that it’s me who is unavailable, emotionally. I’m not the only one who’s said that, there’s been a parade of therapists who’ve said the same thing. But, being emotionally unavailable implies that I don’t want closeness, intimacy, romance, tenderness. That’s not actually true.

It just freaks me the fuck out.

I have a feral cat. We’ve lived together for over ten years. She waits at her bowl and doesn’t start to eat until I sit down to my own meal. She lays on the couch when I’m there, but an arm’s distance away. She sleeps at the foot of my bed, until I wake up and then she’s gone - like a shot. We lived together for two years before I was able to touch her and I still can’t pick her up. If I walk directly towards her, she disappears for one, maybe two days and we have to start all over from scratch, rebuilding the trust.

There is safety in distance. And there is comfort in proximity. The trick is in achieving the balance.

I’d known W for a while. We know dozens of people in common.

When W asked me out, he said that on our date there may be some hand holding, there also might be some kissing, but there would under no circumstances be any tongues or bodily fluids involved. He said he wanted us to get to know each other, that’s all. We walked, held hands, or didn’t. We rode the subway and sat next to each other, close enough to talk and not be overheard. We took the Staten Island Ferry, running around like kids, standing up front and enjoying the wind and I was free to laugh, relax, be silly, hold hands and cuddle. Or not.

It was the best date I’d had in a long time.

W lives 1000 miles away most of the time. I’ll always have a soft spot for him because he gave me a safe place just be the jodi. We still talk on the phone and he’s stopped telling me he misses me and he loves me because it makes me nervous, in that way one gets when a 138 fire alarms are going off in one’s head, simultaneously. It’s the equivalent of walking directly towards my feral cat, it makes me want to disappear for a day or two. So now he says, “I’m extremely fond of you.”

S is a man from in my neighborhood who I know nothing about outside of the fact that he’s handsome. There was something fishy from the very beginning.

After flirting with me for months I finally said yes to an late morning cup of tea. I’m not immune to handsome. He tried to hold my hand in the car, in the diner and again in the car after the diner. He held my hand even when I didn’t hold his back.  He said that was how we’d get to know each other, that now our hands knew each other. He told about himself and never asked about me. He tried twice to kiss me. I said no twice. The third time he didn’t ask, his simply tried to push himself on me. I got out of his car at 11am feeling the same as I have getting out of some strangers car at 4am, drunk. I haven’t been drunk in twenty years.

It’s lovely to be wanted. It’s not lovely to be pawed.

When he called an hour later I told him he’d crossed a line and I didn’t want to see him again. I didn’t feel the need to explain about the shelter dogs, about leaving a person the room to feel safe.

I saw him on the street last night. He still doesn’t understand. He thinks I’m angry. I’m not. I’m simply not interested in having to constantly protect the distance I need for me to trust.

Shelter dogs make terrific companions, if you’re willing to put in the time and the work. The longer they’ve been in the shelter, the more homes they’ve bounced around in, the more emotional baggage they bring to the table. But dogs, like people, are companions by nature. Neither of us are meant to live a solitary life.

Feral cats are partners in a whole different way than dogs. Some have been on the street so long, they seem beyond redemption or human touch. They’re lessons in patience and tolerance. Maybe one day a little soft paw reaches out, gently taps you on your arm before it turns tail and runs, hiding someplace safe, again.

They are both lessons in taking the time to learn to love a thing, in the ways it can be loved.

But I can look in a baby’s eyes and know if this is his/her first time around or s/he’s been here before. Score one for “something out there that’s bigger than me.”

They say there are no coincidences, it’s just God’s way of staying anonymous.  Believing in signs is just silly if you don’t believe in a God that has a specific detailed plan for your life. I know what God wants for me - Joy. I get that. But I don’t think s/he has a specific detailed plan. I’m cynical, a by-product of growing up with Fred. Oddly, I’m also superstitious. I believe in signs.

This morning I forgot my travel mug, so I stopped in Dunkin Donuts - the one near work where the snotty girl has to be told what I want a dozen times, especially if it’s complicated, like a bagel and a coffee, because she “can’t remember everything.” The one where every couple of weeks I take the manager’s name and ruminate about calling and telling her what shitty employees she has. That Dunkin Donuts.

There’s a new girl was behind the counter who doesn’t need things repeated. I buy a travel mug, bagel & a tea. Sadly, the new travel mug was not designed to travel, at least not in the cup holder of my car.  Luckily, new girl gave me a receipt (my first, despite the sign that says “If you don’t receive a receipt, please let the manager know”, adding fuel to my ruminating fire) so I can march in there all huffy and indignant on the way home and exchange it.

I pull into the parking lot after work and start rooting around for my wallet where I’d stashed the receipt. No wallet.

I empty my bag. Big bag. Lots o’stuff. No wallet. I put everything back in the bag, take it out again & still, no wallet. I remember putting it down this morning to add Splenda to my tea. I remember thinking don’t forget to take your wallet. Apparently, even I don’t pay attention to myself.

The Snotty Girl I dream about reporting was behind the counter, always stuck on the late afternoon shift. She’s the reason I stopped my evening donut-to-drive-home routine. Thank you, Snotty Girl in Dunkin Donuts. Thank you for saving me from myself.

She has my wallet. 8 hours after I left it on someone else’s shift, intact. I dwell in irate for a second that no one had gone through it and tried to call me, then I realized, no one had gone through my wallet. My cash was there, my credit cards and the receipt.

I exchange the mug, leave a $3 tip for a $1 donut and think, phew, I skated on that. Thanks again, Snotty Girl. Or maybe thanks Morning Counter Girl. Maybe just Thanks.

Half a block from my house I start rooting around for my house keys and the remote for the garage. No keys. I empty my bag. Still a big bag. Still lots o’stuff. No keys. I put everything back in the bag, take it out again & still no keys. (Why do I do that? Do I think they will manifest if I take things out in the right order? Maybe. Yes. Maybe that’s exactly what I think…).

How can I misplace two essential things in one day? I pull over, clear out the front seat, throw everything, one by one into the back. Down vest, sweater, sweatshirt (It was almost 90 today, but I like to be prepared), scarf. Nothing. I check the floor boards, under the layer of Trident Bubblegum wrappers. No keys. For no good reason I open the back door. My house keys are laying on the floor of the back seat. I have no idea. I don’t care. Maybe the dead people who don’t talk to me since I stopped drinking put them there. I don’t care.

Something is telling me something. I don’t know what. It’s like a message in a fortune cookie but it’s in Chinese. I know the message is for me, but I have no idea what it is…

I misplaced two things today. Then, like that, they were returned. No damage done. Maybe I need to pay more attention, stay more present, be aware where my feet are. Maybe I need to remember to look past the snottiness of strangers.

I've fallen & I can't get up

I have a bum leg. Actually, it’s a bum foot.

A motorcycle accident in  ‘79 banged up my right side pretty good. 1979 was not a year of a lot of doctors or self care for the jodi. It got better, but now and then it still acts up. My foot swells, or I can’t feel it at all, or I stop being able to anticipate where the ground is going to be on that side when I walk.

It was a bad week, the week of that accident. My husband tried to kill me, I got fired, I was locked in a roadside motel by a pimp, there was a fire, my apartment was infested with roaches, overnight. All that happened the week of the motorcycle accident. Thirty years later, when it acts up, you’d expect me to think about the accident. Or even one of the crazy things that led to it.  (Click on any one of those links if you want the gory details). Thing is, I don’t. I never do.

I think of the boy who walked into my life three years later, and how every time my foot went wonky he’d take care of me. I’d sit in the comfortable chair and he’d sit on the floor with a bucket, turning my foot in the warm solution, massaging it, drying it off and wrapping it — same way he’d treated the horses he used to train. Gently. Patiently.

When my foot goes wonky today, I think of how he took care of me then. How he took care of me every time, but especially when I was hurt.

It’s a precious memory, that feeling of being taken care of. While I love the warm feeling that still gives me, I can’t help but wonder, if my brain could have just managed to remember the disasterous choices that preceded so many of my aches, breaks & pains (physical, emotional & spiritual), maybe I could have gotten by with less of them.

In case you were wondering, I can be seduced by good music.

When the music is really good, you can just leave. Once you put the music on, your work is done. The music is enough. El Farol from Santana’s Superstition, for example. Take a moment to listen. Let it play while you read….

I hear that and I’m being made love to, slowly. Deliberately. Expertly.

The music you bring sets a mood, sure. But, it also tells me who you are, where you’ve been, where you want me to go. You choose something like Santana and I’ll overlook a lot of other things. The very essence of creating music is so sensual that when it’s beautiful, no matter what they look like, how they keep themselves, musicians are transformed by the music they make.

A dozen years or so ago, I was being seduced to Barbara Streisand. When I was a knock-around girl, the wiseguys spun the crooners: Frank, Dean, Tony. That music was campy, but those guys had a style, a certain appeal. But Streisand? For seduction? C’mon, I think Streisand, I think Yentl. Funny Girl. Babs looking like Juan Epstein in her annoying version of “A Star is Born.”

I do not think sexy. I do not think free. I do NOT think of your hands on me, making my body sing.

All I remember of that night is thinking “Streisand? Are you kidding me? I’m really gonna need a drink to get through this.” This was three or five years after I’d had my last drink.  I didn’t have the drink and maybe I can blame his crappy taste in music for distracting from, rather than enhancing, the experience; maybe he wasn’t a good lover ( I can’t swear we did or didn’t, but we probably wound up in bed despite Babs. “No” wasn’t a word I was particularly familiar with yet.); maybe I had no business being there and Streisand was the red flag I ignored (as I am wont to do with red flags).

I’m just saying, if, at the very least, you leave me with good musical memories I’ll have a reason to come back for more. And remember more than your bad musical taste.

The first time I heard Eminem was also the first time I heard the sound track to Heaven’s Gate.  Slim Shady was foreplay, it got my attention. That’s what foreplay is supposed to do. I remember every moment of the music. And every movement of the man. It didn’t work out for us, but I think of him and smile any time I hear a country waltz.

From the Night of Endless Streisands, I got nothing.

Music isn’t part of seduction. It is seduction. You should know that.
And, I will leave you for Van Morrison, Neil Young, Carlos Santana, Leonard Cohen. You might as well know that, up front, as well.

Thanks to Anna Pulley, whose tweet inspired this post.

Enjoy

Every child has known God

Every child has known God,
Not the God of names,
Not the God of don’ts,
Not the God who ever does Anything weird,
But the God who knows only four words.
And keeps repeating them, saying:
“Come Dance with Me , come dance.”

Everyone wonders what God looks like. People want to have some concrete vision of their higher power, some small box to put God in, some physical container or body. Museums are filled with paintings and sculptures of Catholic, Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, Egyptian, Greek, Roman gods.

I think if you want to know what God looks like, you just have to open your eyes a little bit. your heart a little bit. your ears a little bit. and then, get out of your own way and listen…

with your heart.

I took this picture of God for you, while I was driving:

I know, I shouldn’t have. But the law only requires a handsfree phone, no one’s said about a handsfree camera. We were stuck in traffic. It was 50 degrees out, my sunroof was open, my windows rolled down, the music was playing, the sun was shining.

I keep this feather in my visor. It’s from one of the  guinea fowl at the farm. In case wings and flight aren’t big enough convincers, if you look, you can see God in the polka dots.

I can’t even get the books on my bookshelves to line up evenly, but look at that. Polka dots. Home grown polka dots. How simple. How orderly. How impossible.

I did not take this picture of god:

This was taken by the Hubble Telescope (not to be confused with this Hubble, also at one point in history, sometimes confused with God). Amazing, no? Total chaos. Totally beautiful. The origins of the word, awesome. These are candid snapshots of the universe, dancing. The origin of the phrase “Dance like no one is watching,” no doubt.(Click here for a slideshow of more photos)

Another bit by Hafiz before I go. I carry this one with me.

Manic Screaming

We should make all spiritual talk simple today
God is trying sell you something but you don’t want to buy

That is what your suffering is:
your fantastic haggling
your manic screaming
over
price.

But I get it, I really do. That need to put a face to the concept of God. A long time ago I heard a woman say that when she thought of God, she thought of tag team wrestling. And that way, when life got too hard, she could just tag God, and God would take the rest of that round until the bell rang. And she could rest a bit. That way, there was always someone in her corner.

I can wrap my brain around that… and so, my dashboard Jesus looks like this, because God comes in a million colors, and so do luchadores.

The rape I wrote about was almost thirty years ago. I think I should be over it already. But, apparently, I’m not.

It was not my first. I was in a blackout the first time and only put the pieces together afterwards. It probably wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t been drunk enough to black out. But I was. It did. And I don’t remember the details. Blackouts are a mixed blessing that way.

And truthfully, the blackout is only the first time I can bear to think about. What came before are scattered puzzle pieces, each belonging to a different puzzle picture.

The rape I wrote about wasn’t even the last time I was attacked. Statistics show that once a person is raped, molested, assaulted, the chance of it happening again, rises. Here are some statistics.

Every 2 minutes, someone in the U.S. is sexually assaulted.

• 1 in 3 American women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime.
• 1 in 4 college women have either been raped or suffered attempted rape.
• 1 in 7 women will be raped by her husband.
• 1 in 12 males students surveyed had committed acts that met the legal definition of rape. 84% said what they’d done was definitely not rape.
• Only 16% of rapes are reported to the police.
• Only 6% of rapists will spend a day in jail.

FAIL: The United States has the world’s highest rape rate of the countries that publish such statistics. It’s 4 times higher than Germany, 13 times higher than England, and 20 times higher than Japan.

Survivors of sexual assault are:

• 3 times more likely to suffer from depression.
• 6 times more likely to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder.
• 13 times more likely to abuse alcohol.
• 26 times more likely to abuse drugs.
• 4 times more likely to contemplate suicide.

Stop it, okay? Just fucking stop it.

Statistics from: RAINN.org and Coalition Educating About Sexual Endangerment (CEASE)