June 2nd was my birthday and we’ve been in celebration mode since March… it won’t calm down until July. All the outings and things have been fun, so I’m just glad to be enjoying it all.
I’ve also been volunteering my time at my church’s summer camp. Fridays are my day to teach cooking classes for the kids. And this Friday we will be going over kitchen basics.
I’m excited to teach and see the kids absorb everything and share what they know. Some rules will be laid down for safety purposes and the betterment of their experiences. I usually enjoy rule breakers but not when handling sharp objects.
We’ll be working in two groups. The younger kids will get to do stuff too. I’m not willing to put a knife in their little hands.
We’ve been enjoying ourselves. So it’s been a good time. I have a few kids that are on my “watch list” because their parents have told me to keep an eye on them. So I do exactly that. It’s just the start of summer camp so our group is relatively small so it’s easy to do. I’m just hoping everything remains cool as we grow in number.
Yesterday I managed to hurt my knee. Not the knee I’ve had surgery on. I don’t even know how it happened really. But I wasn’t the only one who was injured yesterday. We had a kid rolled his ankle during volleyball and a counselor get a blister somehow that burst. And another kid get a cut on his finger.
The Benny Hill music was in full force while we searched high and low for the first aid kit. One of the adults decided that since we couldn’t find it that she’d bring alcohol and bandaids until we got something together…which I added was more than we got at summer camp when we were younger.
We got soap, water, and a prayer for continued good health for the rest of the summer lol. I joke but it was close to that. I like to refer to the summers of my youth as the “survival of the survival of the fittest” if you weren’t a dodgeball victim, then you were definitely the cannon.
Hit or be hit.. thems the rules. We survived on bomb pops, candy, air, friendships, and yes… water from the hose.
Summer was everything… and still is everything to those of us that live for the warmth of the sun. It’s a brief reprieve to those of us that have issues with the cold in our joints. And for those of us that enjoy outside activities.. it’s the catalyst for our smiles. Garden lovers get it. Beach goers get it. Summer in the city dwellers get the nod too. Kids on bikes, roller skates, and skate boards… Summer is for you!
Kids at heart… fire up the grill, find a watering hole, and put an umbrella in a drink and relax…enjoy… breathe in the summer. I’d tell you …if you feel so inclined to do so… to pick a water gun or water balloon fight with the neighbor’s kid but uhhh… in the interest of your own safety… maybe not. I mean… unless you know those kids then …light their little asses up lol
Alright I’m off in search of ice cream. Y’all be good to yourselves and each other please. There’s so much ugly in the world… be something kind and beautiful.
I have a collection of pens. Of various ink colors, decorations, and sizes.
Why?? I don’t know. Truly. It’s a mystery even I cannot solve.
Every time I’m in the bank, I ask for extra pens and they give them up willingly. When I’m in doctors offices, I take a couple of pens with me… just in case I need one for later. And when I visit the dollar store and see the little bin with all the colorfully designed pens my heart quickens.
Ohhh and don’t get me started with businesses that like to hand out promotional wares… I will take everything they have to offer.
A large portion of my pen collection is a bin of assorted colors of gel pens.
Here are a few of my favorite pens.
My favorite pens to write with however are the Precise V5 Rolling Ball pens by Pilot and the Ink Joy gel pens by Paper Mate. Favorite colors of ink purple and blue.
It’s a sickness I do not wish to be cured of.
Second up on the list of ridiculous amounts of things… various types of papers. I am currently teaching myself to tea dye paper for a project I’m working on this summer with my daughter.
Collaging and scrapbooking have become a favorite past time when I’m not conjuring stories.
Lastly, Books. I love fiction but I will read creative non fiction. My collection of books does not compare to my pen addiction…but it is a work in progress.
Alright… special mention Music. When I was younger I had a bin full of CDs and mixed tapes …as I got older CDs were replaced with mp3s the mp4s and now we have YouTube and other streaming sites where we make our own Playlists.
Pretty soon music will be a thing seen and heard with the help A.I. I don’t doubt that at all.
Get a snack, a beverage and some tissue, we’ll be here for a while..
What is the earliest memory you have?
When were you aware of your own existence and consciousness? And how has that or those memories impacted the way you live right now?
I’m good with coming up with questions that kinda shake me… answering those jokers?? Mm mm smh..
One does not simply answer an existential question? Careful thought must be given, and then thought to the points made in your answers, AND overthinking the possibilities that almost always present themselves in the wee hours of the night when you’re trying to coax yourself to sleep after vivid nightmares and rocky dreams must be acknowledged.
Point I’m making is… there’s no simple answer to those things… not without stretching the capacity of the mind to get the answer you seek.
And THEEEEN… is that answer reliable and based on fact and not the fiction the mind seems to drum up to fill in the gaps?
The mind is a great, powerful, and terrible device.
Story Time…
In my 35th year of life, I was in the trenches of mental illness…effectively at war with depression, anxiety, schizophrenia, and something called borderline personality disorder and myself. And I was losing… the depth of loss I’ve discussed here before but to jog you forward, attempts were made.
My favorite pass times were journaling, writing, reading, and artwork… when my mind and body allowed it.
Journaling and writing stuck with me through it all. Trying to hush the voices in my head to be able to read proved to be one of the most nerve wrecking challenges ever. I developed a visible shake in my hands and a facial tick from one of the meds I was put on. And the voices, born of my own brain, told me that I didn’t know how to read. Artwork fell by the wayside because I no longer had the desire to do it.
The book I tried to read? Craig Thompson’s, Habibi. Banned book? Yes. Worth the ban? Absolutely. Am I gonna read it again, you bet.
It took me two weeks to get through the graphic novel, due to the chaos of mind, the pain in my body, and the deeply set depression. To the book’s credit, it’s as thick as my study Bible and dictionary. (Yes, I still have an actual dictionary. And a set of encyclopedias too!)
The book that took forever to read
Was it any good? The jury is still out on that. It’s definitely a work of fiction and I don’t think it should be considered anything more than what it is. Sometimes critics get in their feelings about authors writing on something that maybe they aren’t completely oriented with. It’s fiction. The artwork is dope, and the story is deep… however, you can see the cultural divide. Do writers need to have certification to write about other cultures? No. Should they have at least a basic working knowledge of said culture? Yes.
But back to the topic at hand…
That medication didn’t work so well for me and so I was taken off of it. The tick is still present but not pronounced. It’s a lip and eye thing. It’s worse whenever stress is high. It sucks and I’m convinced I look like a flirtatious, insane cougar when it happens so I hide it behind a masks and sunglasses.
No one knows or cares to know and I quickly become another masked face in a sea of people seeking to be safe from the Rona. Noticed or not…doesn’t matter. I’m usually off in the world my brain has created anyway. And if I’m honest, it’s not the good time it should be at times. I berate myself over intrusive thoughts, get lost in a sea of doubts, and overthink the simplest things.
Sooo I get put on new meds and find that while I can think a bit clearer, I cannot control the shaking in my hand. I literally had to do hand exercises anytime I wanted to write or draw to get the muscles in my hands warmed up, loose, and relaxed.
I wrote because it was as easy as recording all the craziness that spawned in my brain. I wrote poetry, think pieces, sermons (that’s what I called them – preaching to myself because I refused to share them), and worked on what was my third novel I had written in life and the 1st during the time of my break with reality… Of Flesh & Blood (in the Works section of this blog if you’re curious).
One night, while sitting home alone journaling I kinda zoned out while focusing on a moment from my youth that I had not thought of since the incident happened.
There’s Layers To This Shit…
12 years ago, I was sitting in my living room, criss cross applesauce (legs folded) on the couch with my journal in my lap and pen in hand when this memory just flooded my senses, it began with a lot cold chills racing up my arms and some tears… right down to the emotions I felt when it first happened.
All I could do was relive the things that unfolded before me. At that time, I was not in therapy and my prescribing psychiatrist couldn’t be bothered to listen, let alone care.
In this vision of my past that consumed my thought, I was 16 years old going through one of the roughest patches of life I’d experienced at that time. I was seriously trying to figure out my place in the world, who I was, and what I wanted to become.
Around this time also… I decided that Jesus was the answer. While I grew up and was raised in the church, I had not accepted Jesus Christ for myself. So I did this and I will admit, I did not feel the connection to my Lord and Savior as some did when doing this.
There was no flood of tears or shouting to the Heavens or even the feeling that I was and belonged to God like other people experienced and it bothered me a bit. I wasn’t sure it took, so I prayed at that moment for Jesus to reveal himself to me and I waited for this to happen. It didn’t. So I figured the Lord to be shy or otherwise occupied. Proof for me didn’t show up until much later.
In our youth group around that time we were discussing Spiritual Warfare, the thing that all holy rolling, Bible thumping TV evangelists warn you of at 2 a.m. while you lay in bed questioning the universe and everyone in it.
Spiritual warfare is what I focused on. One more thing to be stressed about and worry over. And the list was growing.
The Incident
My mom was rarely at home, military duties called her away, my 93 year old grandmother was in need of care almost all the time, my sister and I fought like cats and dogs, and I was not well. We, me and sis, actually had a physical fight in which she gave me a busted lip and I gave her a black eye. I had never hit my sister to hurt her before that moment and regretted it immediately. I apologized profusely…but she wasn’t having it and as the older sibling, I accepted the hell I was going to catch from my mom.
My best friend at the time didn’t want to be my friend anymore. She said I was changing…. I couldn’t help that, life was causing me to do so. One of us was going through some major shit and couldn’t be bothered to be worried about boys or whatever the other wanted to gossip about.
I had to be present for a sibling that resented me for growing up… for maturing and not letting her fk up her life with the crowd she ran with. It was fine, she could hate me as long as she was okay, and she was.
Plus there was this ridiculous crush I had on a guy that was sending mixed signals. I tried the forward approach and was shot down. When I began to pick up the pieces of my broken heart and move on, he showed interest. I didn’t have time for that. I don’t like games being played with my heart and my emotional state was a wreck. So, no boyfriend.
I was a junior and my grades were suffering and I needed to get my shit together if I hoped to graduate the following year.
My mind was a mess and so was my life. I had greatly under estimated the amount of disdain my little sister had for me. Me telling her what to do and how was getting on her nerves and mine. The child was a walking tornado and I hated cleaning up after her. (Karma is real: her son is now a walking tornado that she fusses at now lol)
My sister who was a freshman at the time was so fed up with me that she talked friends of hers into confronting me. I tell you, I may not have even been here today if a security officer hadn’t intercepted the girl who had a weapon on her.
Our relationship was strained after that. I didn’t talk to her or want to be around her. I kept to myself and let her wild out. It’s what she wanted. She tried provoking me into arguments and it didn’t work, most of the time I ignored her. She had to grow up and that was effectively forcing her to do so.
My youth leader caught wind of everything and I received the lecture of lectures about protecting my sister, FORGIVENESS, omg the sermon I got on forgiveness… the guilt trip, and I was told to reconcile my relationship with my best friend. I wanted to but she didn’t… oh well.
And then…the comparison. The spiritual warfare talk and the comparison to people in the Bible really upset me. I was asked if I was Judas or could I be like Jesus. I was neither… they lived their lives and at least one of those people wanted to love me for who I was, at least that’s what I was taught.
I was accused of not understanding… of purposely poking fun at a serious situation, and for paving my way to hell with my attitude. My mom was told what happened at school, stuff that happened with my sister, and with my friend. She wasn’t happy. She expected me to watch after my sister, to do all the things around the house that needed to be done, and carry good grades.
Yeah… okay.
I carried all of that with my to school the next day. It was sooo loud in my head. Voices were telling me horrible things. Things like everyone knows my thoughts, how ugly they were, how ugly I was. That I should take my life because no one cares. That I was the reason everyone was unhappy and I could make them happy if I died that day.
I walked around that big ass building with tears in my eyes. My heart was hurting at the steady mantra of hateful thoughts, hateful speech, and hateful feelings. And that no one even knew who I was or would remember me when I was gone.
For some reason that struck the most sensitive chord in me.
I was in a program called Probe Art, for gifted art students. My artwork was displayed sometimes in the school, in our newsletter, and entered into competitions. It along with the stories I wrote in creative writing is what I was known for. But that voice insisted that I was nothing and nobody.
The Battle Had Begun…
I walked around school, I went to four classes that day and the rest of the day I tried to do my electives, which was working as an office aid.
I remember walking up the steps to the office and hearing, “you’re nobody special, we’ll take you with us”. I looked around behind me, no one was there. I looked around the corner of a wall..nobody. It sounded like they were right beside me.
I cut through a walkway to the otherside of the offices that led to the commons and library. I heard it again… you’re coming with us. I asked…out loud… who are you?
I heard a mixture of voices all saying different things and when I looked up, I saw black masses with wings fighting what I took to be angels, in white and gold.
I screamed in the library commons. I ran down the steps and headed out toward the bathroom then hid in a stall. It sounded like someone was banging on all the stall doors. I cried and screamed for help. One of the foreign language teachers came in and coaxed me out. We walked by the big mirror where the sinks were and when I saw my reflection, it looked disfigured and distorted. I heard a voice say, we’re erasing you. You don’t exist, you never existed.
When we got outside of the bathroom, I sat on the floor and covered my ears. I couldn’t move, wouldn’t move because I was too afraid of falling apart. Like the slightest movement would cause me to fall to pieces.
My mom was called. Before she got there I was told to lay down in the nurses station. I ended up falling asleep. I hadn’t slept the night before…I was exhausted, my stomach was empty, and I was running a fever… why a fever? Because that’s what came with my menstrual cycles… almost all the time.
We didn’t talk much on the way to the E.R. She told me that I was going to be okay. Doctors checked me out, they asked their questions and I answered …selectively. I did not tell them about the angels and demons fighting it out in my school. Nor did I tell them about the voices. My mom knew something was up though…she knew and knows her daughter.
Doctors said the cause was stress coupled with hormones. The chemical make up of your average angsty teen. I stayed home from school for a few days. Was told to relax and get plenty rest and given something to help with cramping.
My sister told me I was crazy and was making her look crazy. Cool… payback in any form was accepted. But she didn’t stop there, there was a rant and it was painfully clear that the little girl that I protected from bullies, stood up for, taught to jump rope, ride a bike, and roller skate hated my guts.
All of that weighing on a young mind took its toll. I questioned why I needed to be. Why I had breath in my lungs if everyone hated the sound of my breathing and voice…and why live if I was just going to end up dying anyway.
Two days after the battle, I was up washing dishes when my sister walked into the kitchen. I was crying, couldn’t stop.
The events that occurred were of great debate between me and my sister for awhile until she decided she didn’t want to discuss it again.
I was crying into the dish water while washing a steak knife, the ones with the very sharp pointy tip. I held it in my hand and noticed my hand shaking. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. My heart was pounding in my throat… and a single thought took up the space of my mind. ” Do it”.
My hand shook, tears at this point were cascading, I was fighting for air, and I was not okay. I hear this voice in a whisper, “you should kill yourself”.
I turn around to look and my sister is standing behind me with this look on her face… I asked her what she said. She didn’t utter a sound. I turned back to the knife and I hear it again. This time when I turn around , no one’s standing there.
Was she even in the kitchen to begin with is the question I ask myself. To this day she denies having said anything close to that. But we both know better. I made a cut, not a deep or long one, right over my vein on the inside of my wrist.
I ran to the bathroom and watched the blood blossomed to the top of my skin and held my wrist under cold water…what they don’t tell you in the movies is that…that shit hurts and cold water makes it no better, isopropyl alcohol??? I could’ve died in the bathroom and the pain of alcohol hitting that cut would have revived me.
I rummaged through the cabinet for gauze and cotton pads to wrap my wrist. I cried. I needed to not feel worthless, to not feel unwanted, and to not feel unloved. I needed Jesus to show up.
In the midst of tears, pleading and bleeding, and wanting to die … a low calm , yet strong voice spoke. “Rest.” A voice I wouldn’t hear again until I was 35.
I was compelled to listen… when that voice spoke the noise stopped. I left the bathroom and went to my room where I locked the door and fell into bed… sobbing and praying. This couldn’t be my life. Not me. It was supposed to be better, I thought. Jesus was supposed to be my Savior and I really needed him … to save me from myself.
I was home for three days… went to school the following Monday. I get to school and all the faces are focused on their own issues. We were teenagers. Every one of us had our own personal hell to slog through. A few of my friends asked if I was okay. I would be but I couldn’t say that because I wasn’t sure.
I’m walking to my history class where I am met by my favorite history teacher who quickly sweeps me into the classroom to his office where I am asked if I harmed myself.
I read disappointment in his eyes and what looked like fear. My wrist was bandaged beneath a long sleeved shirt safely tucked inside my jacket. He asked again… Tyronica, did you harm yourself?
My eyes watered, I looked down, and I shook my head No. He took a breath, lifted my head and looked me in the eye and said, Glad you’re hear today. He told me that I had some stuff to make up. And we walked out where I seated myself. My best friend or former … looked at me with a sympathy that I found odd.
After class, she tells me that my sister told everyone who would listen that I tried to kill myself. My best friend wanted to know what happened… I didn’t understand why. I was not about to be her reason for gossip.
During our friendship, we wrote to each other in a notebook. Instead of passing small notes in class, we passed the notebook back and forth, so as not to get caught. It worked until it didn’t… During one of our arguments.. she wanted me to write in the notebook and I refused. Some ugly rumor was going around and she thought I knew who started it. I truly didn’t and I didn’t feel like answering her interrogation. I refused. It came to a head in history class and when the notebook was slapped on my desk, it got confiscated. He kept it… read it… talked to us about it… then returned it.
You talk about being upset. We both were. Private stuff was in there man. It was a crazy time. I believe that was the straw that broke us as friends. We blamed each other.
But back to the incident, I refused to write in the notebook and became adamant when she said something ugly. It was overheard by our teacher. More disappointment. And more hurt feelings.
I dealt with all of that the best way I could by not dealing with it at all. Other things happened that year that outshined what my art teacher called my little “petty drama”. And sure enough it did. We put DeGrassi to shame I’m the 90s lol.
So… I’m 35 and sitting on the couch reliving all of that and got to writing, snotty nosed and teary eyed. I wrote like there was no tomorrow…that night was all that mattered.
My handwriting has changed over time. The scrawl in that journal is compact and neat, my handwriting now is loopy and messy. I don’t know why it is, but it is.
I was writing and I hear, “heal”… in the same tone. I wrote about fears, hindrances, sins, and sickness. I wrote about how it happened…the vision.
If Your Reality Isn’t Working Properly, Unplug It, Blow On It, Then Plug It Back In
I don’t know if anyone else has experienced this but… when I dream, I can see from a first person pov and a third person pov. I’ve actually seen myself doing things and interacting with others in 3rd person. I’ve actually talked to myself in that way within my dreams. Dreams man… but that vision is the first time something like that happened where I was in 1st person experiencing it all and 3rd person seeing it all.
I can tell you what I thought because I wrote it down. I thought God was messing with me.. showing me my weaknesses and flaws, and how incompetent I was. Now I know different.
Life…amiright?
Some things just happen to us. This is life. It is as unpredictable as people. Where at first I blamed God for all of this because it was beyond my understanding…later I began to see. Not his fault nor mine. I’d blame the devil, because he definitely had a part in all this too… but it’s life. We’re here in the middle of it, trying to survive, trying to learn, and teach… trying to live and all of this takes a toll on the mind, the body, and the spirit.
I got lost in my mind when I was 35 and again when I was 37. I was at war with forces unseen and myself. And let me tell you, the war I waged against myself was a long campaign.
In and out of mental health facilities, in and out of relationships, a divorce… loss of friends and belongings. Whose mind can keep up or want to??
I got into therapy 10 years ago with someone who listened and cared and gave sound advice. My relationship with God got better than it ever had been. I was good ..am good. I have moments… have had some pretty deep ones where I wasn’t sure I wanted to keep subjecting myself to this thing called life. I was tired and am tired..yes. But there’s more for me to do, for me to see, for me to teach, and to learn.
My sister and I are good. We’re adults, I’ve been in therapy and have discussed my trauma(s). She’s doing what she needs to do as well. I’m actually proud of the woman she’s become. We do have boundaries… I have mine and she has hers. I can say that we’ve come a long way. We’re both still healing from things and even though we are, there’s still love.
I had to move on from it. I couldn’t and can’t live in the past. No one should… no one should….hm..
Yesterday… Sunday, May 7th. I decided to sit down and watch a movie with my mom on Amazon Prime.
Whose Matrix Fever Dream Is This?
🤯🤯🤯
I started this movie and almost immediately got sucked in. I love movies that are a mindfuck. It makes me pay attention to detail and makes me think.
And here we are… last night, we were on the back porch (enclosed) watching this movie and I was tossed back in to memory of being 35, reliving 16 year old me’s trauma and response to that trauma. I know I wasn’t an innocent party in that… I did something horrible and there was a consequence.
I had checked out of reality at the age of 35. Lost, confused, and convinced I was living my former life. For some reason this movie triggered me. Rather than end the movie, I sat quietly trying to keep my shit together.
It wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be. It was quite puzzling trying to figure out what the hell was happening and why.
I asked at the beginning…. what’s your earliest memory?
When were you aware of your own existence and consciousness? And how has that or those memories impacted the way you live right now?
The movie is one huge existential trial for the characters AND the audience. And it, in its own way asks us these questions. Oh, you don’t get to escape the fun, you’re a part of it too!
A day later I’m writing what might be the longest blog post I’ve ever written. I felt the need to share some of what life was for me when I was younger, what turned out to be a pretty good movie, and an attempt to answer those questions.
Earliest memory: an outdoor get together we had for my sister’s first birthday. She had a cookie monster birthday cake that I kept sticking my fingers in. Everyone was in our yard… neighbors, family, friends… I remember this because I got in trouble for picking at the cake. After that, just a few days later, was the 4th of July and I remember that because the fireworks scared me. I was 3.
Awareness of myself and life” when I was 7 years old, I had a really bad hernia… something happened and I passed out on my grandmother’s bed. I woke up in the hospital with a plastic bubble thing around my bed… oxygen thing. The doctor said something like… almost lost ya. I was high on painkillers and was convinced that I could see a tree in the courtyard with big juicy fruit hanging from its limbs… to be clear… it was the gum I saw, not actual fruit. My mom believes this might have actually been the very first hallucination I had. She said I argued with doctors about a furry purple thing in the hallway looking in the door. I apparently called the thing “old wiseman.” She said it was my doctor… who was Weizmann.
I didn’t know that till now.
Has any of that effected my life? Man I don’t know. I mean I do love birthday cake, fireworks set me on edge and give me migraines, and I love chewing gum… chewing some right now as a matter of fact.
Back to this movie… it really was good. I love weird, off kilter movies. They almost always get my creative mojo going.
Well alright…Watch the movie or not… I’m not your mom. Unless you’re into that sort of thing… in which case I can give you the name of a good therapist. Cuz uhhh… yeah lol you might need a lil chair time.
I’ve talked sufficiently… and long enough to bore everyone one. Good talk.
I’ve sacrificed so many hearts on the boulevard of broken dreams. I’ve waged war with peace and brought my fight with war cries and guttural screams. My church – sits atop a hill, a blood red sky in the backdrop of a city torn into – divided by one’s lust and hate, to live here amongst these, you must choose.
Who I am doesn’t matter to this story. I do what I do not for the fame but for the glory… of my name, spoken on the lips of my nuns – the sisters of the night. Spoken in prayer by the tributes who kneel before them receiving their blessings a room devoid of light.
No need to fight but accept what is and has been offered. We raise up our lambs to walk in our footsteps, not to be slaughtered.
Here at The Church of Hot Corners and One Night Stands where Dick is a prophet who spills his comings and goings and Johnny is the second coming with his all-knowing, we preach into the wee hours of the night… where the pews are as open as the legs that welcome you into the womb of woman to be born again and know your savior’s plight.
My altar is a raised bed of satin sheets, scented with musk of those whom I sacrifice to the flesh. Devouring every cell of their beings until there’s not one iota left. I bathe in the afterglow of moments come and gone – and adorn my walls with their relics, to show each and every one.
Climaxes as hymnals at the church of love and war are hummed in rhythmic time – while bodies sway, mingle, and miraculously entwine…
All at once and not at all, I become drunk on a power that has filled me for centuries on end. I take the wills of woman and those of men and cause them to bend…. at my beck and call they come in service, respect, and worship to give of themselves completely. I honor their time, talents, and gifts and display them for the world to see neatly.
His name at the bend of my thigh, her lips over my heart – his hands grasp the fullness of my ass and none of my faithful will ever part. The bodies that litter the floor beneath my altar were not worthy of the hereafter… where the glow consumes them all…some would call this sin or but we say it’s the Great Call…
Voices as a choir in their orgasmic delights, sail off on the waves with notes so high
To the spirit we say hello in this new dawn and to the flesh we say our farewell and goodbye
When the words begin to whisper their sweet nothings (which we always hope turns out to be more than foreplay), we stop what we’re doing to give them our full and undivided attention to get them out.
Because we know, like smoke on the wind – they’ll dissipate and leave nothing but traces of their being behind.
Writers, write like you have lucrative contracts lined up for your work…write like it’s the breath in your lungs and the pulse of your heart. Write…as if your life depended on it.
Readers… hang on to every word and sentence as if it’s free money. For truly…these things that you take in will greatly enrich your lives.
When all was red roses, sunshine, and rainbows… we were completely undone at collar and waist, ready to become a mess of hair and limbs on this altar. Ready to mix our fates.
Broken hearts mend and songs lend voice to the ever growing tune of emotion… we cruise as ships do in the night on this ever changing ocean… ready, always ready to drop anchor.
Love comes and goes as waves to shore. Basking in it’s life giving waters always wanting more. Forever rushing up to meet the drought of dry land where we take care to mold it to the shape of our own beating hearts. Imitating pulse for pulse… is how life starts.
The care we give to such is never afforded to another. Worth more than the love of our generous mothers… place value in all that seems to shine. When my heart broke, was it yours or was it mine?
Sure as we try to beat the crashing waves to protect our creation from utter destruction, we destroy… Out of love. Because to the winds, we threw caution.
We love until the truth hurts. Until life seems less like living, until we’ve gone bankrupt from all our giving. We love because it’s all we know how to do like lacing up our shoes. Forever tripping over loose strings but that’s just the way of the world it seems.
Time and practice for such things makes you a pro or… habitual. To be more than novice at something so sensual. Cutting the cords and heartstrings to float on…
“They’ve promised that dreams can come true but forgot to mention that nightmares are dreams, too…” – Oscar Wilde
I can remember a time when I slept peacefully and soundly. Without breaks in my sleep or…. dreams. But I wake at the same time every night in a cold sweat clutching my pillow and stifling my screams.
I used to wake refreshed and ready to take on the day. Going about my daily routine with little more than an inconvenience or trouble in my way. Those were simpler times of days long gone. All I want now is for the sun to shine on my face and peace to come.
When I talked to my friends and family, they’d tell me from time to time about the dreams they had. How awesome, edgy, strange, or erotic their dreams were – sometimes they were all of those things put together, but nothing really bad.
And I would think… how weird it is that people actually see pictures when they sleep… whole movies on a smaller scale. When my sleep was full of nothing but a void with no color or fantastic tales.
Sometimes I found the things people would tell me unbelievable. Some of those things were downright inconceivable. No way they were kings or queens of mystic lands or superheroes flying around the world or…my favorite, millionaires living their best life. Taken away from the true and real things we all deal with – the monotony, the grief, and even the loss of love with all the strife. All the things that’d make us want to cut up reality deep with a very sharp knife.
But something changed. I became envious… almost jealous of others’ ability to dream where I could not. It got so I grew tired of hearing other people’s nighttime exploits that I wanted to see for myself what dreaming was really like, to really give it a shot.
Not being like everyone else in the world who had those awe-inspiring things they saw when they slept made me want it too. I felt left out, one of the unfortunate few.
Outside of all that was normal. I tried everything. Sleeping pills that were known for lucid dreams, hallucinogenic drugs, getting into brawls just to be knocked into next week but nothing happened, no such luck. Save for the nervous ticks, the scrapes and bruises, and a nice concussion with a headache that stuck.
I even prayed to every deity I knew of and a few I didn’t know. I wish I could tell you that someone answered but no one did and I had nothing to show. What a story that would have been! Woman prays for dreams and Godanswers! No… sorry. But what I got was something of another story.
I read things. I studied what psychologists and philosophers had to say on the subject. About how dreams are the sum of our everyday experiences and how we decipher the information subconsciously. I took to doing everything I could during the day – even things irresponsibly.
So… I decided to set myself to work doing things that would result in lucid dreams or otherwise. What and how I did, you’d be surprised.
I did every mind-stimulating thing I could think of. I read loads of books, magazines, and blogs… ones centered around fantasy and fiction. I devoured that stuff. I watched full-on movies and short films I found on Youtube and was shocked to see that I had a channel for that in my subscriptions.
I was particular about what I fed my brain. Fiction, fantasy, sci-fi, and porn… as much of it as I could handle. And then…. I deprived myself of sleep and consumed massive amounts of caffeine to help keep me awake. Burning the wick at both ends of the candle.
I ended up spending the night in the hospital due to the heart palpitations from my efforts to ensure I’d sleep and dream the most interesting, fun, sensual things a girl could dream. What no one tells you is that you will begin to hallucinate shit. You will begin not to trust yourself and see that reality is not as it seems.
Did my efforts work? Yes. I had my first dream in St. Mark’s and I hated that for me.
It wasn’t the sexy fantasy heroic piece of awesome that I thought it would be.
The dreams came and wouldn’t stop but it was never different. It was never-ending and recurring.
Bringing with it horrors unimaginable with night terrors I kept incurring.
The dreams keep coming in the same way – always the same landscape, the same beach, the same rainbow, and the same storm. The winds and rain… always cold, never warm.
But tonight there was a difference, this time there was the shape of a skull in the clouds. Ominous and foreboding – I could feel the goosebumps rush over my skin as if I were really there and my fear and dread kept growing.
Now in my waking mind whenever I close my eyes I see the very things I see in my dreams at night. There’s no ridding myself of these things or even a way to fight – what’s been happening to me day in/day out. It’s gotten so bad that the only way to wake from these things is with a scream or shout.
Did I mention that I never know what day it is or whether I’m sleeping or dreaming and how the clouds have that face and the thunder sounds like continuous screaming?
Did I mention the deal I made with the gods that if they gave me peace, I’d worship them on my hands and knees? But I feel as though they are working against me like busy little evil bees.
I just want peace… anything to sleep a peaceful night and know that I’ll be just fine. But with the dread comes the paranoia that since I don’t sleep, my body’s clock is ticking and running out of time.
I’m unwell — if you couldn’t tell. My life might as well be a living hell.
The faces in the clouds are always there and the screen glitches and shakes… I don’t know how much more of this hallucination I can sit here and take.
They tell me that I’ll be monitored during a sleep study to see if they can help. But I’m not so sure I want to do this – I feel my days are numbered and I haven’t any left.
They never tell you that nightmares are dreams too – but you just keep chasing that rainbow and see where it gets you. SO much to be said of dreams, but never the things we need to say it seems.
I got what I wanted – I dream all the time now, even when I don’t to they come. I wonder if I’m the only one this happens to or if I’m all alone.
As stated in yesterday’s post, I finally got to watch Halloween Ends on Amazon Prime. *sigh* *scratches head* Ummm… where should I start??
How about with my feelings as those are pretty prominent and still fresh…
So… first I want to say that I’m disappointed. I think… Halloween Kills set us up for what should have been an epic ending but instead it was just like every other horror film on the market… lackluster and unfulfilled in its area of expertise.
I wanted it to be more than it was. Again, I expected more seeing as how Halloween Kills led us to believe this frikkin movie would be the end all be all. And honestly, Kills should have been the last one. Halloween Ends could have come before Kills and it would have made more sense… to me at least.
At the beginning we are introduced to a new character, Corey Cunningham, who is the “do good”, nerdy, sheltered by his mama, off to college beyond Haddonfield, bullied quiet type. Yeah, that’s about it…
The whole town of Haddonfield is on edge given that Michael Meyers has escaped once again and hasn’t been found. The people of the town reflect this in their attitudes toward each other. From the way they treat Laurie and her grand-daughter to the treatment of Corey later on.
Anyway, Corey is supposed to be babysitting a kid, Jeremy, whose parents are off to a Halloween shindig. Corey is given instructions on what to do with Jeremy and told some facts about the kid by his mom. After the parents leave, Jeremy lets his true feelings about his babysitter be known and proceeds to taunt Corey about his fears of Michael Meyers still being out there. Jeremy then tells Corey that everyone knows Michael kills babysitters, never kids.
Corey leaves the kid in the living room to watch the scary movie he shouldn’t be watching to go rummage through the fridge. He hears screaming and returns to the living room thinking it’s the movie making all the noise to see that Jeremy is gone and the front door is open. Corey goes looking for him in this huge ass house and finds a kitchen knife on the stairs while Jeremey is screaming from the top floor. Turns out the little boy is a mean lil brat and does something dirty to Corey by locking him up in an attic room?? Corey proceeds to freak out. And it was at this moment I thought Corey had some phobias that were surfacing with the way he was freaking tf out in that room. He’s screaming for the kid to let him out and proceeds to kick the door of the attic room which is a good 3 or 4 flights up in the house. Jeremy is outside of the door taunting him the whole time.
The parents pull up from their outing and Corey is still kicking the door while issuing threats. The parents enter the house at the same moment Corey successfully kicks the door open knocking the mean little shit over the balcony causing him to fall to his death.
Jeremy’s death is ruled an accident and Corey is a free man who has taken to working in the scrap yard in Haddonfield with his step-father. People treat the man like a pariah and some of the residents of the town even mention that they got rid of one monster (Michael Meyers) to end up with another (Corey Cunningham). And the townspeople are just as crazed as they were in Halloween Kills. If you remember, they pretty much mobbed together at the behest of one of its more outspoken residents to end the life of an innocent man they thought was Michael Meyers. Compared to the face of Michael, the people of Haddonfield are down right ugly.
Laurie has decided to write a book at the suggestion of her dear friend Officer Hawkins. She no longer lives sheltered away from the town but in it and is trying to live her best life. She writes her book, befriends Corey who is being accosted by a group of teenagers, and flirts with Officer Hawkins… all very different behaviors from what we’re used to seeing from the character, Laurie Strode.
Honestly, who knew high school band members could be a gang?? Lol
Corey, who has been catching hell since Jeremy’s death, also befriends Laurie’s grand-daughter Allyson. Allyson seems to take a liking to Corey and before we know it, they are an item. She invites him to a Halloween party at the local bar where he loses himself in the music and revelry, feeling like just another member of the town – momentarily forgetting his troubles.
Corey goes to the bar to order a drink and sees…. Jeremy’s mom. She has some words for Corey and asks how he can be enjoying his life when her son is gone, the son she believes he murdered. He leaves the party but not before having a few words with Allyson about how she can’t fix him. They have this little fall out and Corey storms off into the night.
I bet you’re asking the same question I asked during the first half hour of the movie… Where the FUCK is Michael? I was texting during the first half of the movie and was expressing my confusion as to why Mr. Meyers hadn’t yet made an appearance in the film.
In the next scene, the teenagers who were taunting, bullying, and harassing an able bodied grown ass man appear on screen to mess with Corey. It’s night time and they are on a bridge… the kids are messing with Corey something bad and Corey does nothing. I assumed it was because he was older than they were but still… All of the group save one girl are picking on the man and Corey puts a little bass in his voice telling the boy how his father hates him. Especially after catching a glimpse of their family dynamic at the salvage yard where Corey works.
Apparently, those were fighting words and the bullies manage to throw Corey off the bridge where he lands with a hard and heavy thud. They argue for a minute as to whether or not Corey is dead and someone should go check. No one does because the leader of the bullies demands that they get in the car and act as if they’ve done nothing.
Corey lays lifeless on the ground and then suddenly, his body is being drug off into a sewer… He comes to and Mr. Meyers appears… he proceeds to choke Corey for a good 2-3 minutes and during that choking Corey has flashes of the death of Jeremy and the events that had taken place 3 years ago… as if Michael could see this…. he let’s Corey go!
Corey leaves the sewers and is met by a homeless man who asks him, why Michael let him live when he kills everyone else. I wondered the same. Then the homeless man tells Corey to go back in and get the mask and give it to him because he is the real Michael Meyers and pulls a knife on Corey… they tussle around during all of that and the homeless man is stabbed several times after which Corey leaves.
He goes to find Allyson and they make amends… He confesses to killing a homeless man under the bridge but doesn’t tell her he saw Michael. They talk and he tells her that he wants to leave Haddonfield. Allyson glosses over the fact that he killed a man and tells him that she wants that too.
Later on, Corey returns to the sewers where he wrestles with a weak Michael Meyers for his mask and achieves his mission.
Yall… I’m gonna stop with the play by play because I was undone by seeing Michael in a weakened state living in a sewer with his mask hanging on a rock… Lol Several more things that don’t make sense to the franchise happen that had me shaking my head.
Corey becomes a killer, taking after Michael, wearing a mask and presumably later on working with Michael to kill the people that get in his way or have some how upset him.
Michael lives in a sewer where the homeless man lives but doesn’t kill him – when during the whole franchise anyone could get it. (everyone was game… teenagers, nurses, doctors, strangers… everyone!)
Allyson is so enamored with Corey that she can’t see the evil in him, she falls in love with the man that her grandmother, Laurie is telling her not to see.
Laurie is… so unlike herself at one point that she unrecognizable until… Corey comes issuing threats and then it’s like she wakes up.
This whole tag team thing that Corey and Michael had going on was weird. Allyson knowing that Corey is killing people and still wanting to be with him was just insane.
Then there was a scene where Michael made a kill and seemed to… uhhh… become charged or strengthened by it? I don’t know man… this movie just felt off.
I went looking for explanations for this thing and saw a pretty good article over at Screen Rant… so they wanted a more intimate film. Love stories, come backs, and final endings… only… they let Laurie leave it open ended with the line in her book… “evil doesn’t die, it just changes shape”.
So look, my feelings are pretty much what other critics have said so there’s no need to repeat it. I’m unhappy with this film and that’s that BUT here’s what I would have liked to see…
an explanation as to how and why Michael survived all the killings … like what supernatural power does this man possess that allowed him to learn how to drive in the first movie after being locked away most of his child and adult life, then be burned, stabbed through, and tossed out of a window… dude…
whether or not Laurie would be just as indestructible as Michael. Like she survived him but could she also be resurrected from the dead and live through all the crap that Michael lived through?
to see his actual face because that’s what we wanted to see.
why this franchise even needed a Corey Cunningham???
why Laurie wasn’t killed along with Michael. I feel like that is something they should have explored more. Michael lives because Laurie lives but if she were to die, he should too. Like there could have been some supernatural tie between the two of them.
Halloween Kills was really what should have ended the series. It had enough gore and death, it had a good storyline (to me) and it had the perfect set up for the ending. They could have ended Michael in that movie with the whole of the townspeople kicking his undead ass and then give him the send off that they gave him in Halloween Ends. Tossed into a metal grinder …no more Michael. Ground Chuck or Mike anyone??
Laurie said in the movie that Corey was infected with the same kind of evil that was in Michael – so does Corey get to come back from the dead and kill again… if evil doesn’t die, but changes shape?? Not gonna lie, I kinda thought she was referring to herself or Allyson with that line.
Well… whatever… the people of Haddonfield get to rest easy because the boogeyman is no more.
I wish it were a different movie. We didn’t want a love story or a redemption arc or an origins of a killer – we wanted the slasher we deserved and an epic ending. This one was kinda sappy. So many missed opportunities… it was just blah.
Michael living in a sewer still kills me. lol
Anyway loves,
I got some things I need to get done before bedtime. Just wanted to come and discuss this movie – watch it or not…. that’s up to you, but I warned you. It’s not even what you think it’ll be or should be.
I’m not a film critic …just a movie enthusiast that knows what she likes. Horror films actually need horror. LOL
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