Again, the fucking stupidity of what people expect.

Why why why why why do I have to live in this fucking archetypal bullshit world created by other people with expectations ON ME to fill?

Love is NOT LIMITED. It's easy, and useful, and pleasant, and wonderful to love more than one person. Intimately. Why goddammit am I expected to fall into this man/woman marriage baby bullshit thing people do?

Everyone wants me to themselves. I have no choice, if I want to be with someone, then to fall into this stupid fucking thing that kills every cell of my being.

I don't want to do it anymore! I'll just be fucking alone. Small mind bullshit!

I've started kicking ass hard.

Working out, RPT, I feel like superman most days.

Quit smoking, quit drinking.

Just gym, and classes (5 of them!), and Therapeutic Drumming Instructor Training, and GRA, and meditation, and journaling, and repeat.

Badass.

Mikey

If you want to talk ever, here: jensoignier@gmail.com

Peace, safe travels.
Jen

Trouble.

 I think you start into trouble when you switch from years of wanting to watch music album vs live, to live. I want to see them now, look in their faces. See.

But what do my eyes know truly. Only projections of myself.
What am I looking for?

Something alive, some integration of art and sorrow and intellectualism that created something that came from an emotional human.

Seems impossible, most days. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0t0EW6z8a0


I just want this life. And this one: 8 1/2. And this one: Sula. And this one: Mine. Me. Mine.

I thought 8 1/2 was based on Jungian and Freudian psychoanalysis. I was right. I wrote a thesis on it, then forgot it.

Who cares.

I could disappear today and be fine with that.

Facebook, detox.

The strangest thing about the first couple days off of Facebook is wanting to post on Facebook about what it's like to be off of Facebook.

Ridiculous, but true.

My life for the past year and a half has been complex, insane, sane, simple, and trying.

My intention to live life in a different way than I have been starts with detoxing from the internet. I've set up my life this past year and a half in such a way that all I've been involved in is work, grad school, and lying in my bed. I've become spiritually sedentary. I've lost connection to nature, to time..to the simple act of being with myself without some interference or distraction. This has to change.

I deleted Facebook today, and won't go back. Next week I leave Georgia for Louisiana, and I will spend my two-three weeks there engaging with the world in a way I once knew.

My plans are to run at Audubon Park; to go to the sculpture garden; to explore the city with new it eyes; to revisit old friendships in person; to create some things. I will be on the internet as little as possible.

I have to detox and reset my way of being in the world before I start the next year and a half of my time in Georgia. And after that most likely will come a Ph.D; it's vital that I learn (relearn) a different way of existence.

Facebook for me became increasingly a place full of disconnection, where people presented themselves in facades. Even when we were being authentic, by the very nature of communication there it becomes a paradox. Authenticity does not live in a vacuum outside of an authentic relationship with someone/something else. There must be real communication to foster it and for it to exist. There is no such thing as authenticity on Facebook because a container for such communication can never be created. A person is not communicating there with any type of full human experience. It's impossible to be a humanist and exist in such a space.

That's all for now. It feels good to write again in such a container.

Jen

Are you my daddy?

It's so easy to feel so ridiculous. So childish. To go from feeling completely controlled for over a year, even when you were falling apart, to completely ridiculous.

Addiction is about wanting to lose control. To be swept away. That's why AA is focused on teaching people how to control their lives. Until you learn that, you'll always be chasing some impossible high. People don't want to learn that shit. They want the "swept away" to last forever. Why doesn't life work that fucking way. What a gip.

My addiction.

For me it's "Are you my daddy?"

I need to feel worthy. I need my dad to walk into my house and to see my art and to read my writings, to let me put on Bon Iver on my Klispch speakers (did you notice daddy I bought your favorite speakers?) and to say, "Damn Jen. You have it going on. You GOT IT. You are worthy."

I'm constantly looking for my fucking daddy. When will it end. When will it fucking end.

Instead I want to forget. I want the object of my transference to walk into my room with burning fucking eyes and to put out his strong, brown, middle-aged finger and swirl it around my eyelid. I want him to ask me, "Is this what you need?" and run his rough hands from my shoulders to down my arms, and hold my hands. And then I realize that's not what I want at all. Now he's holding my hands. Now he's asking me if this is what I need. Yes, yes it is. No, no it isn't. I need to be swept away, right? No, no I need my fucking dead dad to hold my hands and ask me what I need. Are you my father? Are you my fucking father??? Please be my father, if only for a few minutes..goddamn, can't you give me that?

I feel so ridiculous.

God damn Bukowski.

God damn Larry Schor.

God damn transference.

God damn dead daddy.

Fuck

It is what it is, always.

Posted here and attached (Same thing):

I never clearly understood the Id, Superego and Ego till today. Now I can’t stop thinking of all the people, and how I recognize all of this at play. I think about Bukowski, and how he seems to be at ease with his Id, and closer to it, yet the moments of special connection are found in the tiny bursts of shadow that live closer to his Superego. Larry said it’s not a continuum, and I understand that, but what’s fascinating to me is the shadow continuum that occurs as a result of the conflict between the two. I think about myself. I lived so close to my Id and Superego for such a long time. Now I’m closer to the in between. Shame is a good lesson, in that it’s almost never quite real or tangible, yet it teaches us about where we may be unbalanced. It reminds us of our scars. If we can keep that in mind, and recognize that it isn’t as large as it feels, but instead a teacher, maybe we can embrace it and not let it overpower us. This is a new lesson for me.

I don’t know how to do this on such an academic scale. This theory (all the theory we talk about) becomes so fucking important to me. It becomes so personal, almost instantly. I can’t sit here and say, “On page 22,…etc”, although I appreciate it and think it’s a lovely process when that occurs with others. Maybe I can do it tomorrow, or ten minutes from now. Now I’m somewhere else, somewhere between the halls of my childhood and the reality of my now. It’s full of Dire Straits and Abita root(beer) and chunks of rocks at the bottom of my brain breaking apart my façade: true and fake silver plates on my shelf….I’m trying to let them fall, and break on the rocks, and fall apart and not fall apart simultaneously. Does that make sense? I’m trying not to listen to Mazzy Star. I’m listening to Boytoy’s “Blazed” instead. I’m dreaming about being touched in circular movements on my eyelids. It feels good, sexual in a way, parental comforting in another, and worthy. I feel worthy in my dreams. The rift between what I wish for and what’s my reality becomes too wide at times for me. I feel the old pull, yet the old fix doesn’t work. It never truly did. It just prolonged the feeling of want, need…the feeling was the addiction. I’m practicing abstinence. It’s so hard not to hit the streets running from myself. I’m trying to do some work here. 

“There’s a difference between being judgmental and making judgments.”

I do not have an excellent history of making judgments. I could sit with this one for ages. I think I’m slowly getting better though. I see myself now in a way I didn’t before, and get that doing too much is a form of prison also. How important is freedom? We need first to be free before we can judge anything. I’m trying not to be a prisoner to my life scripts and habits and morality and differences. I can’t help you make the right decisions if I can’t judge anything with a free mind. What a struggle this is.

“We live in a time now where intimacy is repressed more than sexuality.”

How often do I give the invitation, only to have the game played instead.  I want to scream sometimes, “Hey! Do you see what’s happening here? I’m offering you something different…WAKE UP! Let’s do something different! Let’s be intimate with each other. It’s ok to be imperfect.” I’m guilty. How often do I turn away from the moment because it’s easier to play the game. Intimacy means being real. It means doing the work to not play the game, to not be lazy. Yeah. How often do I turn away from it because it’s easier for the person and I see that and I love them too much to make them aware of a painful past. Is it selfish? Maybe. Maybe it’s about love over intimacy. Maybe that gift is intimate also.

“This is a psychology of conflict. This is a psychology of ambivalence. This is a psychology of loss.”

What is lost, what’s the cost? What do we get to keep? How can I hold the ambivalence of my experience and accept that it’s the truth and there is nothing I can do beyond becoming blind to change that? How do I accept the suffering and pain of that? How do I simultaneously experience the joy? Now that I’m gaining the tools of understanding the conflict, how does that change my understanding of the experience of me and those around me? How can I use this to chip away at that rock of pain, to putty up with my hands some understanding and relief? I’m so grateful for the tools. Jesus. It seems overwhelming to even begin without them.

I want to give my ego a little medal and say, “Godspeed”. If it weren’t for you I’d be in big trouble.

“How would you live your life if it were up to you?”

Much like I am, with a few changes. It’s hard on nights like this. I remember what it was like to get swept up in something. That doesn’t happen anymore. Somewhere along the way I became too conscious. I’m mourning the loss of that tonight. Maybe what I want sometimes is to be swept up forever, because that feeling is so grand. It’s the swirling of a finger on an eyelid by a mentor that becomes a worshiping. It’s the dance of a dream. It’s wish-fulfillment. It’s worthiness.

Bukowski says,

“it will never

let go

with the women

you live with

or wherever you

go, supermarkets,

bazaars, hang-glider

meets, it will

find you, maul you,

piss over you, let

you know

about it

again.

and there will be

 nobody

you can talk to

 about it.

I hope that isn’t true. I hope we can talk to each other. 

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  Posted just now

  
  

  
  

  I sped read the rest of War All The Time by Bukowski after I wrote this and turned off my light and tried to sleep.

  I couldn't breathe because I kept writing, writing like him in my mind, and I had the thought that I will never breathe

  until I have a typewriter to type the thoughts that make me gasp this night.

  
  

  I suddenly hated him.

  I found a lighter, and Fiona is asleep so I couldn't ask her for a cigarette. 

  
  I've quit (but we never really quit)

  So I went outside with War All The Time and a lighter I still had and I smoked three buds I found in the ashtray

  and I hated him

  so I tried to burn the book

  but it wouldn't burn, 

  I was suddenly mad at the chemicals, and thought that some time ago books were made of PAPER

  and could BURN 

  and I was mad at the world I live in where I can't even get a book made of paper anymore that burns like a book should.

  So I burned the tips, the corners that I had folded.

  They had been folded before; it was a used book I bought.

  And I remember at the beginning of this night, thinking

  "Why would anyone get rid of this book?"

  Some reader somewhere folded the same pages as me

  and I couldn't understand.

  Now I understand why

  Because

  
  

  Sometimes I just want to live in a small white house

  and love not too much

  and feel not too much.

  
  

  I burned the folded edges for me and for

  the reader

  who did her own burning

  when she 

  sold the book to the bookstore

  when she had 

  her 

  own moment of

  wanting a little white house

  
  

  where we don't feel too much

  love too much

  where we don't

  
  

  too much

  
  

  
  

  I won't sleep tonight.

It's the feeling that is the addiction.

Bukowski says,

“it will never

let go

with the women

you live with

or wherever you

go, supermarkets,

bazaars, hang-glider

meets, it will

find you, maul you,

piss over you, let

you know

about it

again.

and there will be

 nobody

you can talk to

 about it.

Things are going to get bad. It's the old feeling, the addiction. The want to be swept away, the idolization, the wish-fulfillment that never leads to any tangible reality. How can it; it's not real. It's what dreams are made of and why love songs are written. God, I don't want to do this. It's already too late. Mazzy Star is on. I'm holding on with a fading grip to what I've built. Help. You can't help. No one can help. There is nobody you can talk to about it. 

I'm a big newblet.

FUCK THIS SHIT

A small gift.

Tobin.

Sharing.

A small gift. 

Did he know?

Discipline…what part does it have in freedom? Are they both necessary? Can one exist without the other or do we then cross the line into chaos?

Evolutionary arc is transformation at a cellular level. 

Blood

Today I traveled to Daughters of Charity for my second Hepatitis Shot. Apparently Georgia thinks that coming from Louisiana I may be ridden with every possible disease known to man.

For all I know they have it right. Walking barefoot down canal at 3 am on a Saturday night, contracting cuts on the bottom of my feet that turn into large purple welts that don't heal for weeks, probably constitutes a real reason for inoculation.

I spent twenty minutes waiting on a nurse to decide that what I told her was right. Too tired to describe the whole issue here but when I got home my pants were covered in blood. So I suppose everyone in the waiting room and everyone anywhere saw that. And I wasn't even embarrassed. That may be a luxury I miss when I leave New Orleans. The "no one gives a fuck" luxury.

I came home and thought about all the things I have to do this month. Decide if I want to pay rent. Decide when to move with no money. Decide what to do with my things. I'm of the opinion someone can have most of everything. It's not worth the hassle.

My boss is fazing me out of my job. It's just as well...she's toxic. I wonder how I got to this point, at 32 years old, where moving with no money to a town with no home from a job that is toxic to a possible homeless state seems is a decision I have made. I wonder that others don't live this matter-of-factly with as little panic about such a state as I live in. I see others my age on my Facebook with careers and families and mortgages and it doesn't faze me that I'm not at that point. I just wonder in an objective sort of way, looking into my life, that I don't panic more. I wonder if I'm completely sane. The answer is obvious though, I wouldn't know anyway so why worry about it.

Hey Dilek

Dear Dilek,

 You had me in turning chairs made of fake leather and unknown cloth, for the first time in my life having my "hair done" before work for five dollars, a ridiculous amount. But life was a fashion show there and I remember fighting myself when I told you "I don't want to meet any one else." "He likes American girls" was your answer and as if that was enough of an explanation I agreed, because I truly was in love with you, and being in love means saying yes. One love isn't enough to foster another, I learned.

But part of the show was dying my hair blonde, because yellow was an extraordinary color there. And sitting in the bar where I pretended I belonged, only because it was vaguely familiar when the Turks would nod in my direction, not enough to acknowledge I belonged (because I didn't) but enough to let me pretend, for which I was grateful. Because belonging there was something I never mastered.

So I sat, and I waited, and he came.

And if he liked American girls, it was something I never experienced. But he wore sweaters that fit him with no holes, and that was something I've never dated...I came from a world of torn shirt boys and loose fitting jeans and guitars that played Alice in Chains and late night fishing for change for a bottle of whiskey from Rouse's.

I was impressed by his jeans that were dark and perfectly cut above the brown striped shoes, and his hair that was washed on a regular basis.

Was a ridiculous thing to send late night texts (or sexts) that ended in our marriage. And it was the best sex I ever had. I've heard worse reasons for marriage.

And I still don't know if he married me for the move to America, or because of love, or maybe it was the sex...but that's beyond his ability for honesty.. if asked he'll say he loved me and it was a noble move on his part, full of pride and other emotions that help develop a persona of respect. And that's why it ended in divorce...he could never be honest. Or maybe he was, and I just could never accept his answer.

And today he says I'm part of his past and he can't go there again.

And I accept because it's what I do.

And it's probably bullshit on my part that I still feel so used.

Before there was that there were

                        Lights

                                    Kisses

                                                Thunder and rain.

I wondered at the fact that such a small child could know. “Please stop” she said to me, “you’re hurting me.”

            “What’s that?” I asked.

“The world, it’s painful.”

The rain fell down tumbling in torrents upon my windshield, the tightened shut windows and the roof. There was such a small space between us and no air, and that made it worse.

“Please stop.” She held still, and quiet. I couldn’t feel her breathe.

“Wasn’t there a time that I knew love?” she asked.

“Don’t you remember?”

There was only silence in the car.

So I told her a story. It started with a boy who never wanted to go to school. He never wanted to be anything but a writer. And so he lied where he could to write and he lied where he could so the world wouldn’t hurt. And so he never worked because working wasn’t writing and he never saw anyone who didn’t help him. And he never sent out his words because he didn’t want to hear such words like “no”. And so he sat at home and ate sandwiches when he could buy them and ate nothing when he could not. And after some time he said out loud to his lamps and his table and his carpet and his couch that he was a writer, because no one else ever did.

I asked her what she thought.

She sat for a while while the rain held its ground and we lost.

Then after a while she said, “didn’t he have any friends?”

And I said no, because people didn’t like him. Or he thought so, because life told him so, or so he thought.

“That’s sad” she said. A tear dropped from her eye and she reached out for my hand.

I held it in my palm and it was so small and tiny. There were bits of green and blue and gold, like a river holding slight treasure.

“It is sad.” I said, “and that’s also true.”

“Was it painful for him?” she wanted to know. “Like us?” she asked.

“Just like us.” I told her. “Just like us.”

“Why don’t we give up?” she asked me.

“For what?” I replied

And her body became light and her outline began to shine and fade and travel onto mine. She was next to me then onto me then we snapped together like pieces of a puzzle and I heard her voice inside me.

“Before there was this there were lights, kisses, thunder and rain” she shook my bones in remembrance. “Don’t you recall?” She pleaded. There was a flash of bright light and for a moment I thought—but it was gone.

“Yes--” I whispered, alone in the car, the dark everywhere and the rain. “--And now there’s this.”

            

A Katrina Story

A Katrina Story

Black wallpaper with a single red rose print unfolded slowly as the water rose and devoured. She watched it drown from the window of the old Holmes building. And the water rose. And she watched. And she thought it was time to go.

Five days passed as she waded from the building to her business and back again. The water was up to her waist. Still it didn’t bother her but the idea of not leaving (death) not escaping (death) did.  Her family was long gone in Houston now her two sons-and she with no working phone. Her white van was crushed under the roof of the Hilton hotel. That was two days gone and now she must go or something bad may happen. Something bad already had she said to herself out loud and giggled. Her giggle rose along with--

--with a gun her gun she grabbed she grabbed her gun.  She grabbed her backpack and she left with her accountant. A tough man, she thought before; one to have in a tight place she thought before: an ex cop. An ex cop and she was dragging him now through the street he was crumbling along with the buildings and cars and walls and everything was falling but her. It’s just another time she thought, like the time in Mexico when she was strong and the time she was living in the abandoned warehouse with her boys she was strong and it’s just another time she was strong. It’s just another unfolding.

She and he both had guns. “You can’t cross here” the cops said to them as they shrunk into the crowd of people, two streaks of wet white among a blanket of dark night, but it was day. “You can’t cross here” the cops said with their guns and their guns wanted to speak louder than they could.  There was a van a cargo load of dark eyed passengers and they jumped into a nook and sped across the bridge. You can cross if you can hide.

The van kept moving forward and now there were bushes and grass and woods. And woods and more woods and she didn’t know where the woods came from. She had lived her life not far and now there were woods from nowhere. She couldn’t think but:  “stop the van” she announced to the driver and instead he drove faster.  More woods and now panic and only two streaks of wet white among the dark. Now panic and she pulled out her gun and pointed it at the driver. “Stop the van now” she announced again and he slowed, but didn’t stop.

How slow does it have to be to jump and will I hit the truck and be run over by the wheels or will I hit a bush and tumble and she kept the gun on the driver and now “stop the van” and it slowed a bit and she jumped. 

“Jump down!” she calls to the unfolded man; the tough man the ex cop who is broken. “I’ll shoot any of you that follow” she calls to the dark eyed passengers and none do. The man jumps but leaves her backpack. Nothing can be done and now they are in the woods, unknown. They watch the van head down the dirt path and turn. Nothing can be done and they follow. It’s slow but they have their guns and she is not broken.

Everything is broken the houses the street—she crawls over downed electric lines and under caved roofs and torn tarps—she sits on the stoop of a dirty Fourplex. It, unlike them, is still standing. The woman inside accepts her twenty dollars to use her phone. One call to her boys in Houston. She is ok. She is also stuck, but not broken. 

“Is that Ms. Brooks?” She hears a voice say and yes it’s me. It’s me. She knows (me) the husband of the wife who leant her the phone; he’s an old employee and she has four hundred dollars. She has four hundred dollars and two twin sons in Houston. The old employee has a van and he earns the four hundred dollars over 400 miles, driving in stolen sunglasses with the stickers still on and stolen sneakers he took from the mall. And why not? Everything is broken and everyone and everything. But not her.  She isn’t unfolded just the world when the water rose.  Just the world when the water rose.

i should have died when i had the chance.

And there weren’t enough trees that night

And there were

Then there weren’t

And when I was ready there was nothing to crash into

              Only sky

And some would say it was your gift to me

But I say you weren’t there and if you were you would have brought more trees.

a love poem

I wanted to write you a love poem

            But I spend too much time surviving. Surviving isn’t living she said.

And I wanted to tell you about the softness of her round face, pressed against the glass looking at nothing at something making sounds like coo and goo and ah and oh. And how I couldn’t quite make out her mouth through the silk and chiffon.

 (she could have been our baby oh)

I wanted to drive a hundred miles to see you read this love poem

But instead I was old, a visitor in my life

And I saw you with your wife, and your son and daughter and you were all in a fucking prius.

I was there, behind the cold metal bench pressed hard against my loss with a grin wide and leering at the l o v e.

Fuck

I forget wh.y I'm like this. Every day I had someone who loved me beyond anything, beyond love even. Every day he was there and all I had to do was reach out to him, not even, because he would reach out to me. Every day for 14 years, If I need him he was there. Every day that we spoke was like the fucking sun shining through some dense ass clouds, warming my skin no matter how much rain had fallen.

And now I don't have that and haven't had it in years. And there is no one who can ever give that to me. I don't believe it. I can't. Shit like that doesn't happen twice.

I forget that that's why I'm like this. Because the fucking universe took the one person in my life who made me feel real, who made me feel loved, beautiful, creative, amazing. The one person who really saw me.


There was the possibility of another at one time but that will never come to pass and can't. He chose his life.

So now I'm fucking alone and always will be and I'll never have that sun shining on me again like it did. My fucking heart and soul was torn out. I should have just driven into the trees that night like I almost did. Occupational hazard of soulmates is that one is no good without the other.

This is where

I have suicidal thoughts frequently. It's just a part of my thought process. I have a degree in Psychology and I know the line is that if you have suicidal thoughts it's not considered natural. I think that's a crock of bullshit.

Anyway, I won't act on them because I care about my family and it would ruin their lives, especially my mother, who is already a depressed person naturally.

I've been thinking though. I've never felt like I belonged anywhere. At the core of my being I'm scared all the time because I don't have a home. I have a temporary, physical home, and I have my mother's home, which also seems temporary because they don't own their house. 

It started when my parents divorced the same year my grandmother died and all my uncles decided to sell the house. We moved with my mother to another house, then another, then another, then another, then another. They owned the last another then lost it to forclosure. So we moved to another then another, they are there now. I moved next door.

I've never felt like anyplace was home and I experienced a few times what it's like to have to move in 24 hours. The result of all this is that as a 31 year old woman I never feel safe, and I never feel settled, and I never feel anything permanent. It's a bit scary.

I also don't feel like I belong with my family. I love them dearly, and when I'm with them I have a natural place and role. But when I'm away I'm alone and I don't feel like they are a stable group that I belong to. I also don't feel like I belong with my friends. I have one very good friend who I love..doesn't even begin to describe how I feel about her. But I can't be with her always and we both need to be alone and I don't feel like I belong with her either. She's looking for a mate and that's natural too.

I feel like a visitor in my life. I move forward because days move forward and that's the natural thing to do. I work because it's good for my mental state but it isn't a permanent state. I may go to grad school because it's the next thing in my life and I'm moving forward. But I don't think I'll belong there either.

I sometimes wonder if I will belong anywhere and I don't think I will. 

I may be wrong, though.

I'm thinking of joining the Peace Corps because if I don't want my life, which I don't anymore, then I may as well give it to someone. I recognize that I have talents that could benefit someone else and if not, I have hands that can build. Since I can't die (on purpose) then someone should benefit from my life. 

My message to humanity

My message  to humanity:

It’s the idea of separation that kills us,

As if someone who isn't exactly like you could be wrong, could be worse, could be less,

As if not being you is a crime in itself.

The blame makes us blind,

And I watch you point with poisoned fingers,

In any direction, even at your own heart,

pointing with fingers that were made to hold your neighbor’s hand,

blind to the hurt you are causing yourself most all.

(There is nothing you can do that is wrong, except hate another)

I wonder if I’m the only one who knows forgiveness,

Who knows love:

Who knows that strength comes from surrender;

Affection;

Forgiveness;

Have you forgotten?

God made you in love.

The only thing you have to do is love.    Just love.

Love when it’s the hardest to love.

Then you will know what it truly is to be free.