Monthly Archives: November 1997

my body conveys my gender. my gender conveys me. but why?
i am not attached to my looks, my personality can not be viewed thru a mirror.

everyone else does not seem to agree.

i am labeled, stamped, degraded, classified, clarified, portrayed and forced to fit into a persona that someone created on an anonymous server and called by the same name that i call myself. it is not me. why don’t people realize this? and why do people continue to define people in such a manner?

i want to be free. free from other peoples’ perceptions and midjudgments. i want to be me, not some self-degrading, self-pitying incompetent whore.

Adrienne Rich said:

If you are trying to transform a brutalized society into one where people can live in dignity and hope, you begin with the empowering of the most powerless. You build from the ground up.

i turned 20 today but it did not feel much different- just another day if you ask me. why are birthdays so special? it is just a day that my mother was in agony- she should be celebrating the release of all that pain.. but then i am 20 years worth of pain.. odd how that works… regardless, another day passed and i became a year older…

another san francisco nite
turquoise lights implode
entwined women shimmer
long legs end in stillettos
Manic Panik Glitter- silver
tangy tangerine dress yanked high
i never did like crayola naming system
old man rolls his eyes in disgust
“the world sure is changing”
[to me it appears to be less dungeon like;
i have a lot to learn]
dalmation drools from ten feet,
pink crayon a showin’,
dog eyes a glowin’
lights from Golden Gate
make halos in the sky,
angel women

i lean back, nipples erect
frustrated that i never see Orion

sometimes i feel alone. i think i have superficial comfort in the fact that jon is around. although i have been trying REALLY hard to not depend on him, not be attached, i know that i am not succeeding. i am not doing well at eliminating that crutch that his presence creates. when he is gone from me, i sometimes feel this emptiness inside of me that i don’t understand. i try to not have that feeling but it just happens. his presence creates a glow that i enjoy. i like complanionship. i am bedridden right now and i don’t like being alone. i want my housmeates around, not even to talk to, just to be there. i wonder what my mother experiences at home; she is so mortally alone. sometimes i realize that i wait for jon to go home, so that i won’t be alone. i like having three roommates. i am never alone that way. this is unhealthy and i know that. i just have to kill my loneliness. this is my life goal- kill the loneliness, kill the dependency that i have on being with people.

uneveness bothers me. it is a silly bothersome but i was just thinking about it. it makes no sense. my body is even- left=right, symmetric. when one side hurts, it bothers me more than if both sides hurt. strange. if jon gives me a body message and focuses on one side, it bothers me. when my socks don’t match, it bothers me. somethings are not even about my body though- i write with my right hand (but i like typing better because i use both hands equally). i cannot stand being mal balanced. if my body is leaning, it bothers me. i cannot sleep on tilted beds (even slightly), it bothers me. i don’t like watches- i never know which hand to put it on (i used to wear two watches). when i exercise one half of my body, i must exercise the toher half equally. very odd. i never though much about it until recently but it is true. my mind always thinks of good thoughts with bad thoughts; a bad though with each good thought. i need to accept that not everything is balanced and flow with it, accept it. bringing my oddities to the surface is a good thing. that way i can think about them and not let them rule me. acceptance is good. realization is good. that is my focus of the week.

november 14 i cried tonite. in fact, i bawled. not because of some torment but because i finally understood. i came home for the weekend, for my mother, to take care of her and keep her sane. it is her birthday and i did not want her to grow another year old alone. she is so sad as it is. we talked about her life and the pain she went thru. for some reason, it made sense tonite. she has told me many of the same stories many nites before and i would listen as a dutiful daughter but tonite it hit home. i understood. the realization that i finally understood hit home just a moment ago and i started crying. tears rolled down my eyes and i did not try to stop them. i did not need to hide from myself. the truth was inside me

we sat there for hours, holding each other, talking about this and that. the important things, the important moments. there has been so much sadness in the family and it is devastating. i am sad for her. both of us sat in our living room, bereaved in pain over the recent deaths and past frustrations. then, we both breathed and we both knew and that knowledge was shattering. i hugged her and we sat like that for a long time, knowing that the pain was over, the time was over and the past was finally in the past. it was one of those perfect hugs. and the tears flowed, releasing all of the past with them…

i received an email today that made me contemplate some of my expressions. i have been known to use two expressions over frequently- and no worries. both have become part of my regular language- the former in email and the latter in verbal commmunication. no worries has a story in my history.

one summer i was at a program (one of those where you learn something). halfway thru the program many of my friends were paniking about their projects, concerned about their well being and sanity. i too had gotten that out of control enthusiasm combined with mental insanity that drives all of us nuts. suddenly, i sat back and questioned why were paniking. did it matter if we did not get the problem correct? no. the world would not end. if our attempts to understand something failed, rather than paniking we should seek out information. we started referring to the problem at a not worry problem.

not worry turned into no worries as the years progressed and the phrase has come to be of great importance to me. there is no need to drive yourself insane for menial tasks. it defeats the purpose. worry about what is necessary. forget what is in the past and don’t panik about the future. sanity will come from there.

recently, i have become rather good friends with a freshman (ie: newbie to brown). she mirrors me in so many ways that we have great discussions about what she is going thru, new to brown, dissimilar to many of her classmates. there is always something so majestical about looking back at your own past thru the eyes of someone else. having had most of those headaches and heartaches, i relate well and can give advice when she seeks it. but regardless of how much i can help her, i have been given the opportunity to reflect on my decisions from last year.

embittered by my unit mates horrid attitude towards college (stereotypical $30 grand party), i sought independence immediately. well, i found the opposite – the cs department. although neither group was me, i learned a lot about myself during my first year here- who i am, what i want in friends and how to treat friends. it was a good well needed lesson. i also learned the importance of accepting everyone even if you don’t agree. regardless, seeing myself has been interesting..

right attitude is important. i know that. or at least my mind does. it is not about sitting or what you do when you are thinking about being in right attitude. it is what is displayed when you are not thinking about right attitude. yet, that does not seem to hold true sometimes.
many of my thoughts are directed towards right attitude and “being good” but i am not always capable of keeping up with them… like when i am in pain. for some reason nothing good happens when i am in pain. all i want to do is crawl in bed until it goes away. i can comfortably overcome mental pain rather well and let it fly by, like when i am annoyed at something or angry with someone. but when my hands hurt, i am paralyzed from living. why? how do i make it better? that is my thought of the day.