It's true. I don't like to be told what to do. You could say that I'm somewhat anti-authority, although "anti-authority" might be a bit of a misnomer since I've never been rebellious when it comes to, say, a supervisor in a professional capacity. I never defied my parents, either. But, in general, I don't abide stupid rules or people who tell me what I can or can't do or should or shouldn't do. In fact, it usually has the exact opposite effect. I become extremely resistant. And the more pressure that is put on me, the less likely I am to do what you want me to do.
If you want me to do something for you, then just ask me nicely. I'll most likely oblige you. If you want me to do something that you think is in my best interest or "just because," then it's probably best to just keep your mouth shut unless I ask you for your support or opinion.
Unless, of course, you're slung up in bed with me. Then I might not mind so much.
~ the lady love
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
Breathing Room
This past weekend I undertook a massive re-organization project of stuff that's been piling up for the past couple years and that, likewise, I've been pushing aside for a couple years now. I've slowly dealt with it 'til it was whittled down to the confines of my room, but my room for the past four months has served as nothing more than a place to crash and a vault for all this... shit. And what I realized is how much I was being hindered by the maelstrom otherwise known as my room.
There's a whole list of legitimate reasons why it grew so out of control. Whatever. There's always reasons, right? So the real issue at hand was tackling the heap that was beginning to resemble the clay mountain Roy built in his home in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Ironically, I'm typically a very tidy person, and as long as no one peaked behind door number three, you'd still think it were the case. But in classic form, the steeper the mountain got, the more I avoided climbing it.
I'm not exactly sure what inspired me to dive into it with fervor this weekend, but I did - until it was all done. Now I'm luxuriating in my cozy space as if it were Inara's shuttle.
Interestingly, as I sifted and sorted my way through the clutter, 80% of it was stuff that I'd been lugging around for two or three years that I neither wanted nor needed, and I wondered why it was exactly that I'd held onto it for so long. Sure, a good deal of it was stuff I'd tossed aside with the intention of dealing with later until later became now, but some of it was stuff I hadn't touched or used or even thought about in years. And true, there was also the obligatory notion that some of it was gifted to me by my mother or whomever else, so I just couldn't get rid of it. You know what I mean. But what about all the other stuff? All that stuff that just took up space and created disorder in my life? How could I let it get to this point? I guess I'm human.
Coincidentally, I'm not even a packrat. I usually like to keep my possessions to a minimum (art is the only exception). I really don't even have a lot of stuff. Like Ani Difranco, I value my portability. Yet here I was toting around boxes of junk that truly oppressed me and prevented me from living the kind of full life that I want to live.
The good news is that it's done now, and that's what's really important. But I guess if I take anything away from my experiences over the past two years, then it's this: I will never again allow myself to be distracted from taking care of myself. It only makes life a lot tougher later on. And at some point we're all gonna have to deal with ourselves - whether we like it or not.
~ the lady liberated
There's a whole list of legitimate reasons why it grew so out of control. Whatever. There's always reasons, right? So the real issue at hand was tackling the heap that was beginning to resemble the clay mountain Roy built in his home in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Ironically, I'm typically a very tidy person, and as long as no one peaked behind door number three, you'd still think it were the case. But in classic form, the steeper the mountain got, the more I avoided climbing it.
I'm not exactly sure what inspired me to dive into it with fervor this weekend, but I did - until it was all done. Now I'm luxuriating in my cozy space as if it were Inara's shuttle.
Interestingly, as I sifted and sorted my way through the clutter, 80% of it was stuff that I'd been lugging around for two or three years that I neither wanted nor needed, and I wondered why it was exactly that I'd held onto it for so long. Sure, a good deal of it was stuff I'd tossed aside with the intention of dealing with later until later became now, but some of it was stuff I hadn't touched or used or even thought about in years. And true, there was also the obligatory notion that some of it was gifted to me by my mother or whomever else, so I just couldn't get rid of it. You know what I mean. But what about all the other stuff? All that stuff that just took up space and created disorder in my life? How could I let it get to this point? I guess I'm human.
Coincidentally, I'm not even a packrat. I usually like to keep my possessions to a minimum (art is the only exception). I really don't even have a lot of stuff. Like Ani Difranco, I value my portability. Yet here I was toting around boxes of junk that truly oppressed me and prevented me from living the kind of full life that I want to live.
The good news is that it's done now, and that's what's really important. But I guess if I take anything away from my experiences over the past two years, then it's this: I will never again allow myself to be distracted from taking care of myself. It only makes life a lot tougher later on. And at some point we're all gonna have to deal with ourselves - whether we like it or not.
~ the lady liberated
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Monday, July 10, 2006
Where I Come From
My mother is crazy, but in a good way. Sure, she drives me nuts sometimes just like mothers do, but I'm lucky to have a cool one. I was talking to my dad on the phone today, and he asked me if my sister had told me what my mother had done.
"No," I told him, "what'd she do this time?" I asked. It's hard telling. I've known the woman to do such random things as suddenly exclaiming, "Stop the car!" on a leisurely Sunday afternoon drive through the country so that she could fulfill the urge to run full-speed across an inviting field. Stuff like that.
So this time, she was telling my sister that she wished she could wash the car naked. It was so hot, and she was annoyed to have to wear clothes. My sister apparantly said, "I dare you. You wouldn't do it. I dare you!"
A short time passed, and my sister walked down to the basement where the garage door was open. She caught a glimpse of my mother's bare shoulder and spun around. There stood my mother fully naked in the driveway washing the car. Mind you, they live in a neighborhood with, well, neighbors.
"Mother!" my sister exclaimed. "What if Alan (the immediate next door neighbor) sees you? Please, put some clothes on! You're embarrassing me!"
My mother simply told her, "I don't care," as she proceeded to jump around the driveway in the buff so her breasts bounced around. Seriously.
That's not the only time I've known her to do something insane like that. When I was a senior in high school, our small town was hit by a legitimate blizzard. I know. Unusual for Georgia. Nonetheless, we were buried in 24 inches of snow and lost electricity, so we took our perishables to the patio and nestled them in the snow. I'm not sure whose crazy idea it was or how it even came up, but one of us dared my mother to strip down to her birthday suit and dive from the back door into the snow-covered patio.
And so she did.
~ the lady love
"No," I told him, "what'd she do this time?" I asked. It's hard telling. I've known the woman to do such random things as suddenly exclaiming, "Stop the car!" on a leisurely Sunday afternoon drive through the country so that she could fulfill the urge to run full-speed across an inviting field. Stuff like that.
So this time, she was telling my sister that she wished she could wash the car naked. It was so hot, and she was annoyed to have to wear clothes. My sister apparantly said, "I dare you. You wouldn't do it. I dare you!"
A short time passed, and my sister walked down to the basement where the garage door was open. She caught a glimpse of my mother's bare shoulder and spun around. There stood my mother fully naked in the driveway washing the car. Mind you, they live in a neighborhood with, well, neighbors.
"Mother!" my sister exclaimed. "What if Alan (the immediate next door neighbor) sees you? Please, put some clothes on! You're embarrassing me!"
My mother simply told her, "I don't care," as she proceeded to jump around the driveway in the buff so her breasts bounced around. Seriously.
That's not the only time I've known her to do something insane like that. When I was a senior in high school, our small town was hit by a legitimate blizzard. I know. Unusual for Georgia. Nonetheless, we were buried in 24 inches of snow and lost electricity, so we took our perishables to the patio and nestled them in the snow. I'm not sure whose crazy idea it was or how it even came up, but one of us dared my mother to strip down to her birthday suit and dive from the back door into the snow-covered patio.
And so she did.
~ the lady love
Friday, July 07, 2006
To You
This will be the last you know of me. And you really are a prick. I didn't think so before. But now? Now I really do. Like I don't even exist. Thanks.
Before, I mostly just felt sorry for you after we stopped talking - felt sorry for you being so detached from love, connectedness, and emotion, because it was so apparent that your detachment was nothing more than fear. Well, fear and lots and lots of practice at becoming a stone.
Shame on me for thinking that I could fill that empty space with light and love. Shame on me, for there is a difference between emptiness and nothingness, and you can't fill a shell wrapped around nothingness. And shame on me for playing the fool to lip service.
O, but poor, poor you! You've been done wrong before. Now everyone who comes after will pay the price.
Unlike you, I will not let the fact that you seduced me into laying down a healthy amount of caring before shitting all over it keep me from believing in the good in people.
Unlike you, I will not be beaten down and lose sight of my humanness - my ability to feel - just because some transgressor stole another shard of my innocence.
Unlike you, I will not become a zombie, carrying out a series of daily motions and calling it living. A constant cycle of wake, train, work, train, crappy tv, and sleep that keeps you from risking potential suffering that comes with really being alive.
Unlike you, I will not exist on fantasies alone, occasionally pulling someone else into them and telling myself that I'm keeping it real. Coincidentally, it reminds me of Giovanni Ribisi's character in I Love Your Work and his make-believe Christina Ricci. If only she could've been a real life dream girl.
Unlike you, I will not be trapped in the asylum of my own mind where the only gratification is deprivation. It's no more or no better than being trapped in a real institution, rocking away in a chair with the word "crazy" carved in its arm.
Go ahead and tell yourself that you're not so bad. That I was warned. Keep falling on that sword. Sleep easy at night knowing that you did it for my own good, as you rub yourself raw lying face down with it trapped between you and your mattress.
~ the lady love
Before, I mostly just felt sorry for you after we stopped talking - felt sorry for you being so detached from love, connectedness, and emotion, because it was so apparent that your detachment was nothing more than fear. Well, fear and lots and lots of practice at becoming a stone.
Shame on me for thinking that I could fill that empty space with light and love. Shame on me, for there is a difference between emptiness and nothingness, and you can't fill a shell wrapped around nothingness. And shame on me for playing the fool to lip service.
O, but poor, poor you! You've been done wrong before. Now everyone who comes after will pay the price.
Unlike you, I will not let the fact that you seduced me into laying down a healthy amount of caring before shitting all over it keep me from believing in the good in people.
Unlike you, I will not be beaten down and lose sight of my humanness - my ability to feel - just because some transgressor stole another shard of my innocence.
Unlike you, I will not become a zombie, carrying out a series of daily motions and calling it living. A constant cycle of wake, train, work, train, crappy tv, and sleep that keeps you from risking potential suffering that comes with really being alive.
Unlike you, I will not exist on fantasies alone, occasionally pulling someone else into them and telling myself that I'm keeping it real. Coincidentally, it reminds me of Giovanni Ribisi's character in I Love Your Work and his make-believe Christina Ricci. If only she could've been a real life dream girl.
Unlike you, I will not be trapped in the asylum of my own mind where the only gratification is deprivation. It's no more or no better than being trapped in a real institution, rocking away in a chair with the word "crazy" carved in its arm.
Go ahead and tell yourself that you're not so bad. That I was warned. Keep falling on that sword. Sleep easy at night knowing that you did it for my own good, as you rub yourself raw lying face down with it trapped between you and your mattress.
~ the lady love
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