12.29

it's that lovely time of year again, where, regardless of how lovely the snow looks or how pristine it all is, inevitably my mind is tugged back to larry, and i'm reminded of how the pain really, truly NEVER goes anywhere, some periods go by where i'm stronger and more adept at managing it all... but then moments come where i remember things, like taking a shower and looking at the shampoo bottle and remembering how beautiful his hair was, and how i loved to touch it and sculpt it and smell it, and then i try to convince the universe to just have him be standing there when i open the shower curtain, and he'll say hi babi and we'll both know the truth of things but just to SEE him, to talk to him, to just be in his presence for a moment, more than what i get to experience within.

i mean there is always that secret realm within me that just contains he and i, perfectly preserved, where i can sort of escape to anytime... if i'm feeling disconnected from will, or from my life, or if i'm bored or particularly happy or just missing him, i go there and i can feel it all again. the emotions come back, the good ones, not the ones following his death, i feel connected to him again... but i miss seeing him, touching him, holding him, talking to him, all of those tangible things that probably don't ultimately matter, but i'm a stupid mortal.

i know that it's common for a person to remember very specifically the events surrounding traumatic events, but i've never had an event worthy of searing it permanently into my consciousness, most things just fall back and sort of surface now and again when or (more often) when they're not needed... but i remember EVERYTHING. i remember arguing the night before because he wouldn't let me play game boy, i remember sleeping separately for the first time ever, i remember the next morning when he left for work, leaving without hugging me, and i told him i wouldn't see him that day cuz i had to take care of my stupid motherfucking cable in kutztown, and he hugged me and kissed me and left... i remember going to kutztown and getting a huge hoagie from mark's, watching titanic and sleeping all day... i remember that my phone was dead till around 9 when i called him and he was leaving work and was being incredibly sweet and saying how he'd missed me so much that day and how he'd had to keep himself content by drawing a picture of me that he sprayed with special perfume and i got that feeling that he was going to visit me, tho he didn't say so... i remember drawing a picture while i waited for him, getting dressed so i looked nice and washing my face and putting on makeup and cleaning up and waiting... waiting... calling his phone and there being no answer, calling his house and mandie saying their mom had gone out searching for him cuz she was crazy... i remember the call, i remember bulk and rob coming to get me and take me to the airport, and john l and vern were there already, and i walked in the room and i remember big larry saying, we lost him, and grabbing me and it was all over, and screaming and not believing and then realizing that succumbing to denial was just ignorant and so i just burst into awareness of it all and... there aren't any words, and then i saw him, in that cold, sterile, death room. i remember calling meg, and my mom, and my sister, and meg and her mom came and my mom and sister got on a plane... that night at meg's house i remember how meg held me and she became larry, her embrace felt just like his, or was his, perhaps, and sleeping and knowing that when i woke up it wouldn't be a dream, that the most meaningful, beautiful, beloved thing in my life up to that point had been completely and irrevocably obliterated, for fucking ever.

i can recall it in much more detail, but i won't ramble on, the point is it's amazing to me that i can recall all of it, all the way down to the emotions (tho in their recollection they are much more subdued) and thoughts, at any time. always right there on the surface, like some massive iceberg, and once i start digging i get lost in its enormity.

i miss him more than i can possibly describe, and yet the only option is to just keep going, what else can i do

being here

living here, surrounded by all this wilderness and all the wild creatures, always has the benefit of pulling me back to reality and truth and beauty. all the societal shit is just in my head, i keep myself physically apart. when i enter into the realm of people, it's easier to cope with their bullshit, will and i are in our own world, created with the same purity that nature creates. everything is better. i'll never live in a city again.

the truth about animals and love

the title sounds scandalous, this isn't though.

several years ago, my mom and i were eating lunch with my sister in portland. i don't know how we got on the topic of it all, probably my mom launched into one of her incessant soapbox speeches about the sanctity of marriage and how the greatest love/priority should be your marriage etc etc, and my sister may have retorted with this, i'm not sure, but jane started talking about how much she loved her dog, scout.

she said that her love for dan (her now-husband) was this calm, serene kind of love, whereas her love for her dog was this crazy, anxious love... a constant worry that somehow scout would find her way out in the middle of the street in the path of an oncoming bus or vespa or something... and at the time, i remember thinking how crazy it must be to love an animal so much, i couldn't imagine it.

but that's how i love biscuit, and it's gotta have something to do with the innocence of them, and the loyalty and the love and all the adoration they give you (they being the animals in question)... it's like having a child, really, and that sounds silly, like 'oh look at that crazy cat lady', but it is. having a little sneaky toddler that loves you more than anything. i talk to biscuit like she's a person, and she goes everywhere with us, to the point that anytime we put on shoes, she's ready to go out the door to hop in the car... i hold entire conversations with her, it's as though she's talking back, and i know it's crazy maybe, or it sounds crazy, whatever. i constantly fear biscuit's death and how it will destroy me, i look into her eyes and feel like crying sometimes because i'm already mourning her death, even though she's still alive. it's terrifying. i don't worry about will like i worry about biscuit. something about that 'little child' sort of thing, will can take care of himself, but i take care of biscuit, she's my child, she can't die.

so the whole psycho-pet love thing is sort of bad and good. i guess most everything is, so, well, that's all.

an animal safehouse

our house is opening itself to nature. some people might say we're messy and lazy, but the truth is, i like my house to be animal-friendly... whether those animals are domesticated or feral. i leave the doors open all the time, mostly accidental, so all sorts of things get in. we seem to have a family of bats that live somewhere in the house, because often there will be one flying around downstairs... the other day it was roosting on a bear head that's on the wall. the "garden" outside seems to breed lots of treats that the deer enjoy, nearly every day now families of deer wander through the yard grazing. the other day, there were 6. 6 fucking deer, baby deer and everything, recently spotless. but the best part about living in the middle of the poconos, besides all the deer and bats and the bear cubs we see occasionally is the kitten i'm trying to tame.

there must have been a plethora of kittens born recently, all over the area you see cats scampering around. biscuit's taken up the job of cat patrol, running the circumference of the yard to make sure it's feline-free, which is disappointing to me, because of the whole plan to domesticate them. i mean, it's getting cold out, surely they haven't got a warm place to sleep... anyway...

so the other morning will and i woke up and were making tea/coffee downstairs when i noticed faint paw prints on the counter. very tiny, but definitely... well, actually, it could have been anything. but they looked like kitten tracks. maybe that's cuz i really want a kitten. i'd left the door open the night before, and that gave me an idea. i figured i'd leave a little plate of tuna fish out on the counter, and leave the door open, and then see what happened. well, i also had to put a bunch of flour underneath the plate, just to make sure it was the same animal that ate the tuna, and not, say, biscuit, who can sometimes be very crafty and leap onto tables for snacks. clever, clever. but the kitten is clever too, because the whole day passed with no tracks, no missing tuna. she/he knows about the dangers of biscuit while awake. the whole kitchen smelled like tuna fish, but that was okay, because of the animal safehouse thing.

THEN

in the middle of the night! i was sleeping, but i was awoken by a clanging downstairs. i knew it had to be my soon-to-be friend, and the next morning i went downstairs and yes! all of the tuna was gone and there were kitten tracks all through the flour, all over the counter.

so my next step towards a relationship is, i went and got some cat food at the store. i figure if i put the food in the same place on the counter, and leave the door open, the cat will get used to its little feasts. so now there's a bowl of cat food on the counter, no flour, i want a more natural setting. if it seems my plan is working, i'll move to phase 3, which is to implement a snuggling device, like a bed or a pillow or a blanket, and place it somewhere safe and warm. there's no way the cat can resist.

the best part about autumn

beyond a doubt, the most amazing aspect of this season is the sleeping. yes, i sleep a lot every season, but this is the best. last night, we left the doors open, with 2 down comforters and a flannel sheet, and slept until 8pm. opening my eyes to the sun setting with the breeze and all the warmth under the covers, well, that's the best part of fall. it could have been put so much more eloquently, but i'm drowsy.

today=8pm

i realized that everyone else has started school again, and for the first time since i started preschool, i'm not in that world. and the funny thing is, i'm not even done with school yet, but NOT going to school feels so natural. i have nightmares about going back, i know i will, i have to, if i want anything, but i hate the structure. i hate how behind the education system is. i hate following rules, and learning things that have no bearing on me. learning is fun in general, but something changes when it becomes a have-to.

blah blah

of course, don't be fooled.

i am, despite what some people think (or what i think some people think), very aware that i am making sacrifices for this lifestyle i'm currently choosing. see, that's the thing i don't think people really understand.
will and i understand it.
it's simple, it's this: nothing is objectively good or bad, or right or wrong, everything just IS, and everything that is has a consequence. no matter how big or small whatever 'it' is, there will be a consequence. and in saying yes to 'it', you're accepting whatever consequence (out of the countless consequences that exist for any given situation) may follow.
i don't have a job, and i'm not going to school, i'm surviving on the goodwill of others and my own delusions, or whatever you want to call them. i am aware of them, so they're not really delusions. half-assed aspirations, maybe, the way that i say, yes yes tomorrow i'll wake up early and go look for a job.

i'm in a process of ripping away all the layers to get to the simplest idea, concept, reality, truth, whatever. it can be called anything. this is, admittedly, a pretty selfish, or self-absorbed, period in my life. i know that. i sacrifice the quantity of friendships i may be used to in order to absorb the entirety of this intensity with will, with my little reclusive setting here. i'm exploring the depth of myself, the possibility of true, pure love, the unity in nature, the simplicity of Truth, and on and on. and no, i can't be bothered by all the dull-witted responsibilities most people haul around. i know that eventually, in order to satisfy my most basic needs (safety, shelter, nourishment, etc), i'll have to at least set a foot in the door leading to societal norms... but i'm not doing it yet.

the relief i feel in shedding all the guilt i've been collecting over the course of my life, for stupid, petty, superficial reasons. all of the shame and insecurities and uncertainty... i'm digging through all of it and finding out all that really matters. in time, well, who knows, i don't want to know. it's the future, not the present, and the present is all that really matters. the future is all just conscious speculation, which is to say, speculation borne of ignorance. i have no need for that. it's as bad as adhering to superficiality as some kind of saving grace.

so, whatever. not many people understand my choices or my lifestyle or my beliefs or value system, i wouldn't expect them to. i'm weird, a little fucked up, that's no secret. tra la la, eh? the important thing is not that i didn't conform, but that i found another person who fits into me perfectly, where there are no secrets, everything is in front of us, we're embracing all of it cuz we're in it together, well, on and on like that... that's the important thing for all of us. not to change ourselves to become like everyone else, or what everyone else says we're supposed to become, but that we can find another person that suits us, and that, in return, we suit. because then all the weirdness is okay.

biscuit is talking more.

my mornings begin at 6pm

this past week i haven't woken up before 6pm. my big goal of the entire week... well... the entire past summer... was to finish my resume and apply for a job. tra la la. instead, will and i sleep. we love to sleep. i love sleeping pills. stay up all night getting stoned, laughing, playing, talking, eating, and on and on, and then take a few sleeping pills at around 6am, sleep til 6pm, wake up, etc. the thing that's so great about it is how i've finally gotten past feeling guilty about sleeping late (super-extreme late), i'm working hard on really resisting the social boundaries that don't make much reasonable sense. i'm a night person. i like daytime, but i like night better, and i have to sleep sometime. being able to wake up late, snuggle for a few hours, both of us intent on not speaking so as to not break the spell, once you speak you inevitably start the process of getting up.... there's so much love, so much unity, it's incredible. how could i prefer spending those precious hours working at some goddamn desk, or sitting listening to some pompous professor preach, or bullshitting my time away with half-people, by which i mean, people i can't relate to and don't find anything interesting in. i'm not being superior, i'm positive there are people that feel as such about me, it's just one of the many truths about existence. sometimes you're built with more layers, other times you get some sort of thin composite.

so will and i wake up at the same time, we have seemed to merge into one person, i think much of it comes from the reclusivity of the two of us, we entertain each other so well that this is all we usually want. so, we decide to go to the store, which is fabulous, because there are more rednecks there than anywhere else in the world, and i love it. never a dull moment, especially when there are trashy magazines to read about britney spears' tragic MTV VMA awards moment (i don't have TV, so i had no idea about that fantastic situation)... we decide on burritos, and we're perfect, we can compromise on anything and it seems the planets are as well committed to serving our little entity-force, or whatever we've become. i say, no refried beans, black beans instead. he says, hmmm. are black beans good? yes! yes they are i say, blah blah and on, and there beside the black beans are REFRIED black beans. a compromise right in front of us. this happens more than you would think. we don't ever 'fight', one of us complains about this or that, and the other person listens and rarely ever gets defensive, and then we try to figure out together where it is we began misunderstanding or where our difference of opinions/emotions stem from, and we cry, and we hug, and we talk about loving each other forever, and everything is beautiful. there are no lies, or restrictions, or ideals. there is no competition...

the other night, we argued because of his WoW addiction, and he was going to sleep. i went down to do some laundry, and almost stepped on a tiny frog in the basement. we have a big buddhist-like thing with living creatures, stopping the car to rescue a toad in the middle of the road, always swerving around anything that could potentially be an animal... and i wake will up to take care of it, he comes downstairs and scoops up the little frog and places him outside in the bushes. he walks back inside without looking at me, because we were still semi-arguing, and i hug him, and he hugs me, and we nearly immediately see both sides of the disagreement. after that, there's no need to keep arguing, and all anger goes away.

i told him today that we should dispense relationship advice, at a cost. we'd be fantastic.