DatingGod

Savage Mirror

I wonder how much of what I'm going through is real and how much is imagination, an attempt to create some sort of meaning or usefulness out of a hellish time in my living. But when I'm in that place that is neither hell nor heaven, when I'm just me sitting in my suburban apartment, I always think that way. 

It seems impossible to look back to see how far I've come, and it's very difficult to feel the progress, but I know it's there, simply from the lack of hell that was once there. 

Cubicleland is still incredibly unpleasant. It's such a savage place, peopled by savage beings, only savage because they don't know a better way, most likely because they've never known one. It brings out the savage in me, the savagery that still lingers inside of me, originally set into motion from the savagery of my childhood, my young adulthood, and of course all those many lives that have come before.  

I could blame cubicleland, and the lack of evolved souls that populate it, for how savage I often feel. I could talk about the rage and ugliness, the men who wave their fists in my face, the women who spit bile and spleen. Or I could tell you about how the bosses set things up for chaos, who have so little interest or training in the way of organization management or group dynamics that they believe in browbeating and threats, cracking the whip more fiercely, and then come back with outrage and blame for the chaos that reigns supreme.  

But what's really happening inside of me is that all of the savagery and chaos and ugliness that is still left inside of me, still needs to be burned off, is rising to the surface, so that I can see it, so that I can stop denying that it's not there, so that finally, finally, I can let it go, poof, and walk on to a place free of those ugly, aggressive, mean-spirited chains. 

The amazing thing though is how I continue to not be able to do it. How difficult it is to let something go when it keeps rising up in my face, and the defenses inside rise to meet it. And how Life refuses, absolutely refuses, to give me even one small warm hole to hide in from it. 

If I find a gentle flow of Yes at work, Life will change the rules so that the flow is disrupted: the bosses will say that we have to answer phones even if we have a client that we're sitting with, even though this ticks the person off that we're sitting with, and ticks off the person on the phone because we have to tell them that we'll call them back. So then, instead of having a pointed focused ten minutes where I can work on breathing and releasing, and therefor find the best, most clear way to genuinely be of assistance, even if the person in my cubicle is raging at their life situation by raging at me, there is now rage from the person in the cubicle, rage from the person on the phone, and neither one of them really gets what they need, which is for just a few minutes, someone to walk them through the thicket of bureaucracy while simultaneously not reacting to their self-pity and chronically impotent rage.

But time after time, I fail. Instead of staying grounded and clear, in the face of rage coming from all angles, I defend myself . . .  with rage of my own. I do it in the form of arrogance, or quiet, steely power-tripping to try and gain control of the situation, or the worst of all, blankness, shut down, impenetrable, closed-heartedness. 

I'd say it was all impossible, that I was doomed to fail, if I hadn't had a dozen or so moments in the past six months where it all came together and I got, really got, where I'm heading to with all of this. 

In these moments, it always goes the same way: a client or a coworker or a boss is standing in front of me, behaving very, very badly, speaking and acting from some reptilian place deep within their brain stem, the place that says kill or be killed, the energy radiating out from them that says it's either you or me and it ain't gonna be me, you f*cker. 

And in the face of all of that rage, that pointed aggression, I feel . . . nothing. Without effort, without trying, without thinking, there is simply . . . no reaction. 

I keep speaking normally, neither excited nor upset, answering their questions, even if it means telling them no when what they really, really want is to hear yes. 

And in the face of my own lack of movement, they simply . . . relax. The tension in their bodies, their face, their voice, releases, and a sort of astonishment takes over, like a sweet little bomb of Yes, of light, went off in their brains, rained down into their heart, and all of the poison they'd been feeling just a second ago was now just . . .  gone. 

So maybe it is imagination, maybe I am just trying to make up meaningful stories so that I can make it through the hell that is rising in my living. But those moments of Yes, they can't be denied. Those moments of sweetness, even in the full on burn of hell, are just so dang sweet. And I get that I will spend the rest of my life letting go into that, working and working and working so that particular flavor of surrender becomes the default, and I can walk thru hell without so much as a tailfeather getting singed, because in the absence of anything to burn, there is no fire. 

So thank you Life . . . thank you for such an excellent lesson in the nature of hell . . . thank you for such an intense crash course . . . because among so many other things, it is making me truly turn my face to the light, not the one outside of me, but the one inside of me, the one that is quiet and without movement and wants nothing. 

Cubicleland is my boot camp for the next war on my agenda, the one where I finally, finally turn and fight the war that needs to be fought . . . the one against the only true enemy there is . . . the one against myself . . . 

Feng Shui-ing My Life, One Digestive Organ at a Time

Turns out it wasn't food poisoning that had me so sick. How do I know this? Because of the last three weeks. Of throwing up a dozen times. Of waking up in the middle of the night in agony, night after night. Of feeling sicker and sicker. Of searching the internet for what might be going on, because without health insurance and without money, the internet and a curious mind are about as good a medicine as a gal can get.

It seems that my pancreas is no longer producing much in the way of digestive enzymes, which is why I've been unable to keep food down. Apparently I'd eat, and then ten hours later, there I'd be attempting to make wine or at least a rigorous ale in the cask of my stomach. And my body would rebel against being enslaved as a human still, and so up its contents would come. 

After that first night, when I thought it was food poisoning, I ceased putting anything in my mouth except for water, and then finally at the end of the day, a little brown rice. And in the wake of that I quit caffeine (3-5 cups a day), benadryl (every night), and ibuprofen (3-5 times a week). I also quit taking any herbs or multi-vitamins, any supplements whatsoever, including the things I took for my colon, my girl plumbing, and my energy levels. 

I spent entire days eating nothing but a cup of brown rice, or some sliced fruit with plain yogurt. Then I discovered digestive enzymes. And glory be! The pain released, and I began to eat again. But a few days later, the agony was back.

And so I am now on a total cleansing diet. A small bowl of grains in the morning, grain/beans with steamed vegetables and daikon pickles for lunch, fruit or chickpea miso for dinner. Lots of baths and vinegar/honey hot drinks and niacin flushes.

I still feel like hell on a biscuit, and am in a lot of discomfort, but it ain't pain, I ain't yakkin, and I'm deeply grateful.

And I'm not upset about this latest layer of ass-whoppin. Because it's the next layer of ass that needs to be vamoosed. As I've dealt with the chaotic energy inside of my body, I've found relief in deep clutter cleaning. I've moved most of the furniture out of the apartment, either back to the family member who lent it to me, or to the city dump. I've tossed dozens of boxes of things - books and clothes. I even tossed out a whole box full of things from my childhood that my mother left at my door, most of it I didn't even look at, just got a whiff of the nostalgic, empty decay of Gone, and put it in the trashcan. 

And so I'm now clutter-cleaning my body. For years I've been trying to get myself to a place where food stopped being a source of emotional comfort to me, where I stopped using my mouth as way to avoid my heart. No choice now. The gig is up.

And Wallace and Jacinta. They are very healthy. Both of them: radiant and sweet and hilarious and joyful and fierce and luscious and so dang snuggly. 

All is well . . .

Deity Freak

My favorite rock god, Stuart Davis, launched a new site: Sex, God, Rock'nRoll

And perhaps in celebration of the launch, a new video of Deity Freak, which incidentally, or Life being what it is, not so incidentally, is the song on constant replay (along with Wand) in my magic 1994 Saturn SL2 as I drive to and from cubicleland:

Deity Freak from Sex, God, Rock 'n Roll on Vimeo.

There Is No No

About a year ago, I wanted to change my rental agreement at the holistic center. Instead of renting my room as a half share with 3.5 days a week, I wanted to move to a 1/3 share because I only used the room for one day a week with a second every couple/few weeks. I was told no. And so for a year, I've paid for three and a half days a week, and only used one. 

Then a few weeks ago, the holistic center owner received an offer from a practitioner who wanted to rent my room, but full-time, and without me in it. I was given as ultimatum: either rent the room for the full week, or you have to be out. So of course I had to say no, not just because of the principle of the thing, but because it just made no financial sense. And so I lost the room. And it felt horrible. I felt betrayed and sad. The beautiful room that I'd filled with rocks and plants and candles and strong clear energy for the past year and a half was dismantled piece by piece and packed into my car. 

And the woman who rented the room after me was a no show on the day she was supposed to bring the holistic center owner a check, and hasn't returned her phone calls, and now the room is empty. As for me, I'm now renting another room in the center for two days a month, paying half the rent I used to, and laughing and laughing. I'm no longer a member of the holistic center regular crew, and somehow out of that I've been freed from the politics of the place, which have gotten more and more awful over the past few months. There aren't any bad feelings, just a gratefulness that I can now walk in, do my work, and leave. 

There are two fellow readers there that I enjoy being around. I've never seen either one of them outside the center, but when we are there, we always make time to sit and talk. It's never simply chat, but rather something that always feels clear and deep and true. They are both women who, like me, See and Know things, and it sets us apart from most people, if for nothing else but by the simple virtue that other folks pretend not to know what's going on, and we no longer have that option. None of us is really engaged in the world anymore, don't really have friends or socialize, although one of them is married with grown kids, one serving in Iraq, and the other is a single mom of a young girl, and they are both very involved in keeping clear energy with their families. 

They are both powerful readers, clear seers, and hilariously funny. Mostly we just sit around and laugh about stuff. Or cry as we tell the other about the latest layer of visceral tissue we're peeling off. And I can read for both of them, and can give them info about different things that are going on with them, but neither can read for me, though they have both tried many times. But they listen to me, in that clear-eyed, unsentimental way that gets a current of connection humming inside of me. It feels like healing work, and I'm grateful for it, for both of them. 

And so now, without the regular Saturdays at the holistic center, I'll see them once or twice a month. And instead of a healing space in someone else's business, I'm transforming my living room into a class and session space. Life moves on. Change happens. It's always Yes . . .

Quiet Blah Blah Yes

Mostly I'm not writing because mostly I'm going thru funk, then layers of joy, then more funk, then more joy. 

When I'm in the funk, it's so full of bile that there is no way I'm writing about it. It's just plain hateful. Possessions of such negativity, such rage and self-pity and doom and pointlessness that I'm no longer me, just some stain of hell left in a skin bag. I'm mean and withholding to clients, I want to pitch myself off a bridge, I grip the kitties so much they squeal, I eat bad food.

When I'm in the joy, it's such a quiet, gentle thing that I barely move, knowing that one false ripple sets the hateful jello jiggling again. I sit in the barcalounger for hours, watching the clouds, Wallace purring so gently it's like heavy breathing with sound as he snuggles around my neck like a living feline scarf, Jacinta curled up in my arms purring like the tiny love trucker she is. Or I clean my apartment like a benevolent tsunami, tossing out bags and boxes of clutter, of detritus from a life that is no longer mine.

What stuns me so much about my living these days is the lack of loneliness. I've spent my entire life lonely, longing for a best friend, a soul mate, a teacher. Working so hard to find them. Then working so hard to get them to stay. Then working so hard to stay alive after they left. Then the cycle starting again. I've spent my life searching for someone to tell me what the hell is going on, to show me how to save myself, to just give me The Dang Recipe once and for all, for happiness, and enlightenment, and how to have a really good time and not pay for it on the flip side. 

But now? Not searching for anyone, looking for answers from anyone, yearning for someone to be with. It's just gone. And it astounds me. I finally understand that no one has any answers. Get that there isn't anyone out there that "completes me". It's like I shed a really, really heavy coat, and now I'm just walking along a path, getting used to the feeling of so much weightlessness, like the law of gravity wasn't really a law but more like a choice. 

It's not that it doesn't come up. It does. It comes around in cycles. And each time I try and return to the world of chat, of talk, of sharing, of stories, of relationship. And it goes boom like a sad little bomb. And I feel sick. And I fail at it miserably. Or not so miserably. More just awkward, weird, simply not one of them anymore, so obvious, so clear. I go silent again, things lift, go gentle and quiet and clear again, until it cycles back again. 

But the real beauty is that Wallace is incandescently radiant with good health. No rashes. No snot. No lacerations. No funky eye or hindquarters or abscesses. Even his breath is tangy sweet. Jacinta is snuggly luscious, purring and purring, growling only when Baby W licks her head, then her ears, then her neck, and then bites her, or I grab her a little too quickly, a little too love-grippy.  

And even as huge change goes on. Lost my room at the holistic center a few weeks back. Politics of the New Age in the new economy and how I'm simply not the hottest game in town. Nowhere to do sessions anymore. (Not that it matters as the phone doesn't ring anymore. Which in spite of the repercussions of cash is actually awesome. Oh how I love it that the phone never rings anymore.) I'll rent a room here or there at different places probably as the need arises for sessions, though, as folks are bound to call sooner or later, though I cancelled my ad in the local holistic rag. I consider clearing out my living room, doing sessions there, maybe a weekly class, get together, healing circle. But I haven't done it yet. Why fight change? Things dying? So much death in my living the past few years that I simply open my fist and let the sand fall away . . . 

So that's it. Friday at 8:32pm. The neighbors are having a party. They laugh and howl and talk loudly. I was invited, they always invite me, but I don't go. I apparently don't do social anymore. Maybe I'm the scary loner chick with cats who is all fat and angry and stuff, or maybe I'm on to something. Maybe I'd do social if there were someone who wasn't utterly full of shit to talk to, but we're all so full of shit, myself included of course. And so I sit here with the kitties, writing, and later on I'll watch Slumdog Millionaire, eat some Quorn.

Blah blah, right? Blah, blah . . . 

But see:

Broken Beautiful

You'd think that cracking my tooth last month would have been a bummer, what with the initial pain and the $1000 price tag and having to take off from work four times to get it all completed and concreted into my head. But it wasn't. It was a blessing. Twenty years of excruciating pain from TMJ  (which is the nervous system equivalent of having a cattle prod going off in your head, off and on, 24/7, for days, weeks, months on end) evaporated overnight. 

The dentist was dubious when I told him, said it's possible, yeah, maybe, that the root canal I had done when I was in my twenties wasn't done properly and the cracked tooth and the removal of the shard somehow released some contact point, and viola, no more swollen gum, aching ear, and shooting pains all over my head and left arm. 

But whatever.

Cracked tooth: good.

And you'd also think that getting some howling form of food poisoning Monday night would be a bad thing, what with the howling and all. But it wasn't. I haven't been able to eat anything but fruit and a little plain yogurt since then, and it's made me high and shaky and headachy and out of it, and more than a little crabby at work. But it's forcing me to look at the inflammation that is wreaking havoc on my body, give it a rest with soothing foods, a few mouthfuls at a time.

One of the managers asked me at work how I was feeling and I said, "really good, actually, because I think it's god's way of telling me I'm too fat." And she laughed. And I did too. But I was serious. 

I've let go of sex, booze, excitement, "love", and chat. Food is the last stronghold of comfort for me. (Except for kitty snuggles of course, and yeah, sure, maybe Life will make me give that one up but I doubt it as the weasels are Jesus with fur.) 

So yeah.

Salmonella colonization: good.