Outside The Collective

Dan Hartman turns a frown upside down.

2010-09-30T04:08:00.000-05:00

I had a rather rough day yesterday. It was just one of those days that seemed like things just weren't going to go right in that 24 hours. I met up with a friend to hear him spin some sleazy disco and he laid down some tracks. I knew I was safe from the day when that bass drum kicked in.

Three Risilient, Beautiful Women

2010-08-19T00:26:00.001-05:00

Each of them took their own path twelve years ago and through all the difficulties and monstrosities that they faced they recoiled and sprang back not losing their charm, wit, and beautiful vulnerabilities. They are living proof that a mass of complications succinctly placed one after the other does not always leave you embittered and old. I'm so happy they are back in my life. I love my Chach, Ass, and Lo.

Sonnet 116 at 3:00 AM

2010-08-10T03:06:00.000-05:00

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose Worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom:
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

At times I find myself unable to sleep and I will wonder around familiar verse and script...mostly dusty books. I have always found that this is my favorite sonnet. It speaks volumes of truth and over the past year it has been a liniment for my own heart. If love has waned or sauntered off due to circumstances or differences it wasn't REAL love. True love is constant through any difficulties. True love is unchanging no matter what obstacles or hard trials that you will find throughout life.

Falling In Love With Julian Casbalancas All Over Again

2010-08-04T23:57:00.003-05:00

Food For Thought

2010-08-02T01:14:00.002-05:00

A long conversation with Yuri and I found that his humor and his perspective was a comfort. "Jonathan, only a masochist would love such a narcissist. He did you a favor by cutting you loose." And perhaps he is right. His voice is so mellifluous and he seems to have always gotten me even when I never really got myself. I cannot be more thankful for some honest to God truth delivered in a time when I truly do need a good catharsis.

In The Gloaming

2010-07-31T21:40:00.000-05:00

I spent my first night on a beach sulking and crying in a foreign land. The stars fell into the sea. I put this compilation together out of a few of the songs that were playing. My feeling, my emotions are what make me human but I find that they are what are keeping me from truly unraveling. My armor has fallen in a pile at my feet and I feel so safe to just let these feelings bleed out of me.

Summer Courses Over...Heading For Tel Aviv

2010-07-29T12:00:00.000-05:00

After what seemed like an intense think tank session placed inside a pressure cooker summer courses are over. I now get to relax and thankfully I have family that pitched in together so that I could go visit. It's been over ten years since I was last in Israel. This should be pretty interesting. Two weeks of sun and being in what I remember as one of the greatest places on earth. I will be in Tel Aviv-Jaffa for six days. I'm really excited to see the renewed Israel Museum. I'll be in Jerusalem for only a couple of days. I plan on making a visit to the Kotel, or as many know as the Wailing Wall or Western Wall, to lament losses over the past few years. I definitely intend to put a prayer in the Kotel about Eric and I. I will then be off to the kibbutz where I will see more family. Masada is beautiful and I worked there for a summer a long time ago. I plan on not doing much work this time but just dropping by the Sea of Galilee and maybe letting some of this grief just melt off of me. It has become a privatized kibbutz since I was last there so I guess I will see how the new take on socialism is now. I couldn't have asked for a better gift from family so far away that has been so concerned about me. Thank you so much Yuri for instigating this whole thing. I am happy that my distant family took you in when I left so long ago. I love you forever. Maybe this time we won't have to sneak around so much.

I Harbor No Doubts

2010-07-26T16:53:00.003-05:00

On this day I broke a fever bred by the love lost almost two years past now with the calamities elicited by the fates. I was sleeping to dream so that I could procure some solace in the meantime, and my slumber took most days and nights away to some place where I would not tend to my wounds. I acquired sleeping medications and benzodiazepines from my doctor. As of late, that fever was too much to endure. Thoughts of where he his, if thinks about me, if somewhere he still loves me was driving me to carnal sickness. I had gone days without eating or sleeping.

For a breathing I called myself "fortune's fool" partially to assuage my own guilt. In other words, I thought of the consequences of my actions as caused by fate or luck, and I was just a bystander or victim. For another moment's passing I took in the weight of the world and considered myself my own saboteur. I suppose the "fool" might be meant as a reference to a jester rather than just a patsy. Now, guilt permeates me like foul humors on capricious tangents. I don't battle it. At first, I was trying to find comfort in accepting such an axiom. Then it became pathological and took over my essentiality and my umbra. Such a device is love and loss, especially when done by your own hand. I was never unfaithful to him. I found myself unfaithful to myself by not giving reverence to my own needs. This festered to an abscess that was eroding my own humanity until it extravasated all over him. Just when I think I have moved on I am beset by a marauding of thoughts of him like the haunting of a dead lover in an Emily Bronte novel.

Now, on this day, I've gone back to where I was before I found myself much altered by paying so much heed to things that are etched into my history. Perhaps it is time for me to truly move forward as he so easily does. He always used to be able to drop things that happened and move on with effortless ease. I admired that and at the same time I loathed it. I felt like "HEY! I'm here. Did you forget that I even happened? Or is that the intent?" I felt so left behind. I felt given up on. I felt truly bereft. Now I am more atribilious. I am trying not to let it all spoil me just as he is trying not to become an embittered, aged cynic.

To listen to our senses and our instincts at all times would keep us from adventure. It also keeps us so inhibited with trepidation that we become shut ins inside of ourselves. I refuse to be that way. I learn from my personal history and I know that the only one that I want controlling me is me. I do not want to dictate my heart with the beckoning of a man that is not me. I've put myself first over this past year and a half and I am planets away from where I was. That does not swear off any future fevers of loneliness and heartache but it makes sure that I am fashioned with the mechanisms and armor needed to fend off such unhealthy habits like dropping the life you know for another man and relocating to a wasteland. I'll stay in wisemind as much as I can.

Closing and Opening

2010-07-22T04:17:00.000-05:00

Well, summer courses are coming to a close. For this I'm thankful. To cram all that studying into such a short amount of time was a little more intense than I expected. Lately, I find myself thinking about how I wish I could erase or fix things that are done and through. I find myself lonely at times and try to comfort or cushion myself with daydreams or just a really good cry in the bathroom....sometimes the only place you can be alone. It is taking more time for me to heal from this last attempt at trying to get love right. Maybe somethings are out of my control. Being one that likes to be in control it makes things a little more helter skelter. Sometimes it seems like when I finally get a step forward I'll get knocked twenty steps back. If I could erase and retract so many things I would but I can't and that really does kill when I allow myself to feel around in the past that seems so much like the present. I can remember, like it was yesterday, leaving for Austin or phoning Eric all the time. Pictures taken that truly are images of heaven that take me to hell. I can't say just how much I miss him and miss what we had before that December night because the void that is there seems like a bottomless pit at times. Oh. To have something so amazing and so visceral and so great screwed up because you fell so short on yourself. Beating myself up isn't doing any good but just picking up and moving on seems like I'm leaving so much behind. I don't like to be the one to leave anything. I know what it's like to be left behind. I am all too familiar with that. Perhaps that is why it is so awkward for me to leave anything. It's hard for me to give up on anyone....well I give up on myself a lot but sometimes I don't even consider myself for consideration. I'm ambivalent. I'm complacent. I'm idling by on a razor thin soundwave. It'll get better. I know. And I know this time alone will be really good for me. I'm making leaps and bounds in my life, career goals, and therapy. I'm far from where I was even a couple of months ago. I'm grateful for that. I just wish there could be a do-over allowed. Well a few of those would be nice.

Just When I Thought I Was Over It

2010-06-28T17:19:00.002-05:00

I find myself telling John that I can't be with him because it isn't being honest with myself. I am still in love with Eric and that wouldn't be fair to anyone.

Way to go K.C.!!!

2010-06-16T16:14:00.000-05:00

Way to go K.C.!! You've achieved over 143 HIV infections within just five months. That puts Jackson county over California and New York. We're gaining on DC and Atlanta. Watch out! BTW, the sifilis count is over three hundred since February.

Love, Loss, and Leaving

2010-06-15T13:55:00.000-05:00

After careful consideration, I finally came to terms with the fact that Eric is TOTALLY out of my system. It came to me when John, the new man in my life, was sitting across the table from me. Everything just comes so easy with him. There is no pressure or need to prove anything. I have never had anything like this before. Best of luck to Eric. I hope he finds what he needs but I am VERY glad that it is not me. That relationship was a crap shoot from the start. Relationships shouldn't be a crap shoot. If you're meant to flow through life with someone then you should be able to rely on them being there no matter what....that's if you're ready to have that kind of variable in your life. I guess some just never are. meh.

School is rolling on nicely. My instructors put everything on blackboard so I am kind of getting spoiled. It's cool though. It's good to be spoiled every once in a while.

Slipping Into The Mundane

2010-05-09T11:30:00.000-05:00

I'm slipping into the mundane. I'm enjoying it too. Losing weight, gaining muscle, and feeling great. I've had a few dates here and there. It's nothing too serious which is good. Summer courses start June seventh. Other than that...things are just rolling along.

Met a new dreamy guy and gearing up for summer courses.

2010-04-29T21:43:00.001-05:00

I just got back from a date with a dreamy guy. He's kind of got a dull life which is AWESOME. He also has drive and ambition. He's 11 years my senior but looks like he's my age. I don't know. We'll see where it goes from the first meeting.

Summer courses are around the corner and I am VERY excited. It's time to make some things happen in my life. Things never fall in your lap unless you're just one of the privileged.

Take Care,

Jonathan

Spring brings cherry blossoms and possibilites for love.

2010-04-18T13:37:00.001-05:00

After much time getting over my head trips spawned from my last heartbreak, I might actually be ready to proceed with a prospect that kind of fell back into an old love. I picked up a cello from a friend that isn't using one that he had randomly lying around his house. My new lover is very worn but age has always left a better taste in my mouth like a good wine. If I just keep up the capacity to completely honest with him we will make beautiful music together. At Millcreek Park we were playing and many people stopped to gawk. My hands were all over him.

There was a man that walked by and stood to listen to me play. He walked off to his car and retrieved another cello. We played together, the four of us. It was my first foursome. Later the guy and I had dinner at a gay owned and operated bistro around the corner. We've seen each other twice since, him and his wooden lover aussi. That is all I'm divulging at this point. Last night was my second Saturday with them. I hope there is more. This time things are so much different and by different I mean not as demanding in a pathological, controlling manner at the start. I'm walking into it all with clean hands and a newly healed heart. It helps that he's Greek....the land of a three day work week. They know how to take it easy.

In the heat of passion

2010-04-10T16:27:00.001-05:00

So, I finally had my super duper slut moment. I was in a restroom...oh this can't start out good with a preface like this...I was in the restroom at a shopping establishment and this guy comes in. He's a hot daddy type...early fourties maybe. Tight black shirt, greaser hair, tatted sleeves, tight jeans. I'm standing at a urinal and he gropes my ass. I turned to look at him in shock. I got all flushed with fever. I don't eat off the floor of a bathroom. He walks into a stall so I zip and shrug off my conscience and followed. The door closed and he lifted me up by my ass, my legs wraped around his waist, we kissed intensely, his hips grinding into me all hard, we're both tumescent, then I just start getting flop sweat, it's getting so hot and humid, his hands go down the backside of my jeans and cups my cheeks, then I get all scared. I pushed off and quickly walked out. This was such an unusual circumstance. I walked away with a hard on and a lesson. I'm just not the kind of guy that can get it on in a Nordstroms bathroom.

April

2010-04-03T15:01:00.001-05:00

Oh April. You're here. Please bring more promise with this new season.

Happy Birthday E.

2010-04-01T12:12:00.001-05:00

I hope that this year of your life is much better than any that preceded it. I hope it prefaces something even greater than you could imagine for yourself.

Jonathan

SHUT YOUR FACE WHEN YOU'RE LOOKIN' AT ME! THAT'S RIGHT. SHUT IT! SHUUUUT IIIIIT!

2010-03-23T15:06:00.000-05:00

Gag gag eww ra ra fagga fag la la......someone please gut Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta like a fish.

FINALLY!! It's about damn time.

2010-03-16T19:55:00.000-05:00

It doesn't hurt to look at you as much anymore. I see the scar over your left eye and I don't cringe. Yes. There is still that little twinge of guilt. I think there always will be. We both walked away from this with our own scars I guess, huh? Funny how I thought that you were the be-all end-all, the quintessential element that would keep the earth turning. I remember staying up for hours, sleep deprived, talking to you. Those awkward days that were riddled with distance and frustrating phone calls due to some great divide....I think we both lived out our time with each other rather passionately. For one time in my life I spent hours hyphenating and modifying my name with different styles of cursive. Now, I look at that and feel kind of silly.

I've got a body pillow named Eric.

2010-03-11T14:58:00.000-06:00

I've been staying out at my family's home in my hometown b/c my brother is going through a divorce and I really feel I need to be there for him....Nevertheless, I guess my mother found me cuddling with my over-sized body pillow in my sleep and muttering Eric and other loving terms of endearment to it...oh pathetic. If only I had the nerve to get drunk on a bottle of wine and go out to just jump into a meaningless bed to try to find my validity...oh wait..that's not how you do it if you want to live a life that is accomplished and meaningful. Alas, I'll kiss many men on the way to something more meaningful I'm sure. Meh.

Just can't get enough....

2010-03-10T17:31:00.000-06:00

Of that tainted Anita Bryant O.J.!! I actually had a nightmare that kind of rolled Anita Bryant, John Briggs (The Briggs Initiative), Sally Kern, Westboro Baptist Church, Prop 8, and boring Eastern Euro gay porn all together. I woke up in a sweat and had a bowl of Fruity Pebbles.

No Faustian Charmed Life

2010-03-06T16:30:00.000-06:00

03-04-2010
Ring Ring
“Momma. I made a bad choice.”
“Oh, baby. What’d you do?”
“I couldn’t help it. I had to look at Eric’s Flickr account. I had to see him again and it just hurts something awful and I can’t stop crying. I’m trying to pull it together in the library bathroom.”
“Jonathan, you’ve got to stop looking at him. You’ve got enough with battling the memories.”
“I just can’t stop the sporadic urges to take a peek. He looks so beautiful. He looks like some great, fuckin’ phoenix that has risen out of the ashes of some excruciating tribulation. I feel like such the bad guy”

She put her mother bias hat on and began to transmit complex babble that wasn’t really helping.

“Jonathan, you’ve got to understand that you are sick with a disease that you will fight for the rest of your life. You didn’t know what you were doing and when he had plenty of time to leave he brandished a knife and slit your throat. Following, he left you for dead. Someone that you are going to spend your life with doesn’t do that. You have got to focus on what you have right now. You have your family and their support and you will never be without that again. He wasn’t what you needed, clearly. He didn’t even stay around to find out what was wrong with you.”

“Well, of course not! He was frightened, mother and dealing with an eviction and beaten up. Mother, he has a titanium plate in his face. He’s almost fuckin’ bionic. Sorry. Excuse me.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s just that it’s been over a year now and it feels like such a fresh wound.”

“Honey, you have to give it time. This is what it is and you have to learn to go on from there. Love can’t be all about drinking and palling around.”

“It was so much more than that!! There was so much raw love and passion and affection and I felt so safe with him. I didn’t feel like he would take flight and I was just so scared to talk about what I was experiencing. And accepting it and just moving on? You sound like him.”

A rekindled sense of longing began to flicker into my voice again.

“Quintessential Eric: emotions held firmly in check, cold, clinical, and so accepting in order to just continue the flow of life without obstruction. I can’t help it. My heart is so tender and it always has been. I never loved anyone like I loved him. It scares me to think that I never will. I don’t know if I ever want to love anyone else. In fact, I know I don’t. I know that he was the one I feel I was born to be with. Now I’m just some bad guy. Oh, this pain is wrenching my insides out! It hurts so bad. I’ve lost loves to death in the past and it never hurt like this. It’s all on my hands.”

“Honey, you’re gonna hurt but you have to stop looking at him. This isn’t good for you and can just lead to more pain.”

“I just love him so much.”

I slid down in the corner of the stall I was occupying, convulsing in sobs that bounced off the cold, white tiled walls. The acoustics seemed to bounce the sniffles and sniveling hiccups on the swiftly taken inhales through the desolate weeping room.

“Will I ever feel a love like that again?”

“Honey, do you have an ativan on you? Take it and get home and go lay down. Summer and I are coming tomorrow and we’ll have a day. Go home. Take a pill and Momma will be by tomorrow to take you shopping and coffee and a facial. I love you so very much.”

“I love you too.”

Click

I went home and layed in bed exhausted by my public breakdown. I don’t have those often. I took the benzodiazepine prescribed by my doctor and cried myself to unconciousness. When I rolled over in the darkness of my room the clock’s bright amber light read 20:05. I picked up the phone and dialed Harry….my good friend that I’ve known for a great part of my life and knows about heartache and gives truth to me straight up with no chaser. I knew he would give me everything on the real without bias.

“Is this pain ever going to dull with time’s passing?”

“No. Probably not. You just learn to live with pain….those of us that haven’t evolved past feeling.”

“Why do I feel so abandoned in this situation? I mean, he didn’t even say goodbye or answer any of my letters.”

“Sometimes words don’t even really help. Tuxedo Moon’s “In A Manner Of Speaking” is just a song, Jonathan.”

“Oh, fuck, man! It just came over me today out of nowhere and it tore me apart.”
Torrential tears came down across the apples of my cheeks as the pain twist deeper every time I admitted the truth of the matter that was always churning under the skin of the gravy.

“I know. I know.”

His voice was an ointment.

“He is so beautiful. He is the most beautiful man in the universe and what he does to me nobody else has ever done. He made me want to be such a better man. He made me want to be some sort of quasar that was so big and huge just so that I could match what he did to me inside. I had so much love to give….I’m not done loving him yet.”

“Man, you never will be. This wound stays open.”

“I feel like the bad guy. He’s risen out of this and probably moved on with more grace than I could ever have. This is on my hands.”

“Jonathan, nobody can take 100% of the blame in this. Nobody can.”

“Maybe not. But I’m seen as some sick fuck that had a psychotic break. I just hope he remembers that that wasn’t all there was about me. I wonder what he wonders. I look at the stars at night and I still find comfort that he’s looking at the same sky. That comfort soon bottoms out to know or not know if he still yearns for what we had….could we have it again? Would it all be done so differently?"

“Nobody knows that shit. You just know that you’re hurt and if the powers that be lead you back to each others' arms then that’s what happens. It rarely ever does though. So, right now, you can be a glutton for punishment and keep looking at his flickr account sporadically when the spirit is moving and you’re feeling sentimental and you have your pain and you live your life with the pain. That’s all we can do.”

More tears.

“I know this is a pain you know about, Harry.”

“Oh I know. Fuck people. People fuckin’ blow. You can’t fuck ‘em. You can’t kill ‘em and there are so many trivial ways in which it is possible to commit some social sin ”

“Well, actually, you can fuck a few.”

“What? Like your therapist?”

“We didn’t fuck. We kissed and I told him that it was time that I get a female therapist. He agreed and wanted to know if he could see me after it wouldn’t be so obvious.”

“So, when ya’ gonna bone?”

“Not happening. I tried to have sex once already with someone else and it is way too soon to jump back in any sort of a intimate situation.”

“Porn it is, then.”

Harry parlayed the conversation away from Eric and into a funny little commentary on gay porn, the recession hitting the porn industry, how he finds it sick that I like the more mature, muscular, slightly furry guys in porn as well as some other favorites like Colby Keller, Jon Galt, and Adam Faust. Of course, no porn conversing would be complete without going into detail about Treasure Island Media and some of the Cobra movies and how NAB they are. The whole “your hole got so pounded that your asshole turned inside out “a pink sock” or drinking a huge martini glass full of cum from a bunch of different guy makes my skin crawl and some how creates a great diversion to talking about Eric and the exquisite gut wrenching pain that my love for him creates as it endures and refuses to show no sign of ever slowing down as it shoots through the ether and bounces off the plasmatic stars in the heavens.

The retail therapy the next day helped a bit. I forgot how exhausting it can be if you really put your all into it. Nothing takes out the pain mentioned though. I think that is why those of us that know love and loss are so apprehensive and trepidatious to let ourselves be vulnerable like that much, if ever again, in our lives.

Totally non sequitur, but I got my results of testing out of four courses for University of Kansas and their required courses for the nursing program today. I was pleasantly surprised. With the college courses and college credit courses I took in high school combined with the courses that I've tested out of I am going to be able to go straight into nursing school as of next fall. This is all paid for by Missouri's Vocational Rehabilitation program. Most other students are sophmores by the time they are excepted to one of the best nursing programs in the country at the University of Kansas and have completed all required courses pre entry. I kind of felt like hot stuff. I meet with a French professor next week to also see where I will place for a double major. This is kind of a really exciting thing. I'm going to be a professional one day. I will be an accomplished, independent man well before turning fourty and that is a lot more than any man I have fallen in love with can ever claim but that never made me love them any less. I've never loved someone for their status. I still close my eyes at night, on my way to the land of nod, and see myself looking into Eric's beautiful green eyes, them looking back into my whatever color you want to place them as, wrapping my arms around him always, and always telling him that he was the most beautiful man I had ever seen. This is something a previous mate of his NEVER did, yet did quite the opposite. Nobody will ever give him the kind of good love that I gave him. I know that and it hurts more than anything else. As long as time makes history I will always feel like I wasn't done loving him yet.

On a lighter note.....my Jayhawks slammed the Mizzou Tigers today. ROCKCHALK. JAYHAWK. KU!

Sleeping with your therapist.

2010-03-03T13:45:00.000-06:00

Sleeping with your therapist is a terrible idea unless you really want a different therapist. I thought I would just drop that brain nugget out there. By the way, the kiss was fun.

For all of you panting poppers huffers out there.

2010-02-25T12:54:00.001-06:00

Saving souls by breeding holes.

2010-02-23T16:42:00.000-06:00

Why am I suddenly getting kind of repulsed by how porn has desensitized so many things and kind of extracted so much dignity by becoming so everyday? I'm not jumping on some anti-porn bandwagon. I'm just wondering why we have such a focus on it and a welcoming acceptance to the revolting acts of hedonism. By all means, sex should never be taboo. I am not one for proverbial closets, either. However, what is civility without at least a few veils left untouched? I have posed a fashion of being sexual in the past but only in the name of art or just a good shot from the photographer's lens. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Porn is porn and as an ex, a wonderful man, once said "An orgasm is an orgasm." There's just some people you could never talk all filthy to. Take Jackie O. for instance. I wouldn't have been able to say something perverse and disgusting to her. Those people that are so classy and well put together....what about them? I wonder if they were really just sexual fiends in hiding. Meh. Just a random thought. I don't think that I could ever live to say "My hole is my livelihood." I'm not passing any judgement. It's' just a different angle, and not the coveted side shot. Recently, I met someone that claims his occupation as a "Porn Model". I, having no tact, asked "So which STDs do you have?" He chuckled and said "I don't."
I egged him on with part sardonic humor and part not and said, "AH, C'mon. You at least have to have a scorching case of herpes." We got a good laugh out of our meeting. He's a great guy but I can feel his low perception of himself. I could feel that somewhere in this man was a boy that was really hurt somewhere. I've always been able to pick up on hurt, sadness, grief in people even when they think that they've got their best guards up. There's something in the way someone talks, inflection, and their eyes. They also have an energy about them that I easily tap into. Me being a hurricane thundercloud a few times in my life it is no wonder why I am what some call a hypersensitve. Some think we can tap into supernatural things. I don't know about all that but I think my mother's mother put it perfectly when I was still in the womb.
"This one's gonna feel around life with his heart and not his hands."
So, tenderhearted as I may be, I am sitting across a table from a real life porn model and feeling very intrigued and at the same time really turned off. I don't know what makes them different from a whore. As far as prostitution is concerned, I say let people go and do what they want as long as it is not hurting anyone. They may be hurting themselves but that is totally on them to straighten their own shit out.
Ugh....chasing rabbits.
Porn, poppers, and prostitution....Trivial? Absurd? Sinful (when we place personal morality in the mix)? It's porn on film and I wonder...When these people try to live in the real world...Do they have a hard time being taken seriously? I'll admit it. When I was talking to the porn show pony I was having a hard time accepting the possibility that there was some substance to him. I believe that everything is equal in spirit. That is one of the things that Quakers, yes that's my chosen faith, follow. I may get pissed off at particular groups of people, say nasty things, or get upset with the choices people make but when it comes down to it, we are all equal on that level of energy.
Gads! I'm gonna stop now. I'm just transmitting complex babble now.

New Music Friday

2010-02-12T13:14:00.000-06:00

New music is usually debuted on Tuesdays. I'm giving myself a couple of days to truly listen and marinate on the new grooves released. Please note that if I did not cover a release it is more than likely because it is crap churned out by the music industry. I have no time to give any attention to work that does not come from an organic, authentic place. Auto tune is the enemy. With that out of the way, lets begin with Sade's "Soldier of Love". It is truly a great follow up to a nearly ten year hiatus with 2000's Lovers Rock. The debuting single is just the fringe of the intensity that this album has to offer. Your best bet is to purchase this album. It's a good investment that will pay out with some mellow feel that has a tinge of sexual undertones. If you are just now getting familiar with this velvet voice that comes from a sexy, 50 year old, Nigerian, mocha sound box this album is just the tip of the iceberg that has lasted a credible career in the music industry since 1980.

I cannot resist giving a bad review when it is clearly due. Hip hop has had a very successful metamorphosis from a hip underground appeal to a major money making scheme that required for the art to lose its authentic, organic appeal. Once in a while a hip hop/rap artist is rocks the mic with the pantyhose and this is not one of those occasions. Since said art has become all about marketing lets take a gander at DJ Kay Slay's single from "More Than Just a DJ". It is titled "You Heard of Us". Spitting out lyrics like "I'm StreetSweepin on the Deegan with this Puerto Rican mami
Long hair, the pussy like tsunami Gucci's on, hoodie over, tell them playas game is over. Soon as I step in the club they like.....(HO!!!)"
Leaves much lacked for any taste. The video is very cliche full of disco balls, skanks, and black men drinking passe high shelf bottles of alcohol. It's things like this that make me yearn for artists like The Beastie Boys, Diggable Planets, Peanut Butter Wolf, and Naughty By Nature.

From there we will travel to the single "You Make My Love" by Toni Braxton. I've always got a sweet spot for this artist. She exudes class and is smooth like a perfect ganache. This little piece of R&B ear candy is a little lack luster but it has the power to make my toes tap. The layered harmonies are quite nice and then you got that big brass reel playing in the background. Well done, Ms. Braxton. Well done.

Lets hop on over to the new single "Everything To Me" by Monica. It's a little slow jam that doesn't necessarily grab you but I've cleaned house listening to this soulful treat she gives us. I just wish she would grab me and shake me with something. This artist has been around for enough time now that she should have done something amazing by now. I really can't think of anything that really sticks out. She is like her vocal doppelganger Brandy.

I'll leave a couple up for you to decide. Check out the single by Alo titled "I Love Music" and the new album by Hot Chip titled "One Life Stand". I find them both very enjoyable and yes, another good investment.

Same Shit Different Day

2010-02-11T14:58:00.000-06:00

Other than finding myself listening to The Yeah Yeah Yeah's, Danielle Dax, and She Wants Revenge I am kind of digging the normal day-to-day tedium. Peace and quiet are totally underrated. The gym has kind of become my own little club house. I'll post my progress when I'm comfortable in doing so. Work has been just jogging along. Some days, actually most days I am finding myself thanking the master of the universe for such incredible provisions. Life isn't always sortid. Sometimes it's just a little monochromatic and that is just fine with me.

Big Fat Thick Fluffy Flakes

2010-02-06T13:46:00.000-06:00

More snowfall and it seems like we are tappering off with the white stuff with springtime mist. Tornado season is right around the corner. I hope that my life doesn't participate emmulating the weather. Spring is usually my favorite season, though. Nature's green is gold and spring always seems like it holds so much promise. I kind of feel like things are going in a good direction. The more I'm honest with myself and others about what I want, don't want, can put up with, and can't the more liberated I feel. Honesty may be quick and painful but hiding things just takes the same kind of pain that honesty has but it's an internalized, drawn out hurt. I found that I became my worst oppressor when I didn't just communicate the simple things like "This is who I am, this is what I'm feeling right now, this is everything about me". I'm not one for much mystery anymore. It just seems like some game. If it weren't a game then why would you apply sayings like "Don't show all the cards you're holding." to your life. I'm not afraid of being hurt by anyone anymore. It's just how I handle it from here on out that is the real deal. As far as "laying my cards on the table", I'm not afraid of being vulnerable. I do set my boundaries but I've never been one to close myself off and I never can be. I'm addicted to the human condition and taking life straight up with no chaser. I'm finding it much more visceral than building walls to make me less compassionate like some other people do. Meh. To each his own.

And those flakes.....they can keep on coming. I don't care if it so thick that I can't see in front of my face. I'm still going to dance and spin around in it.

Uh-oh. Homo no no!

2010-02-03T15:13:00.001-06:00

I met my new therapist today and I'm already having sexual transference towards him. Let's call him Hank, because that's his name. This could either be a real problem or I could just turn our weekly appointments reason to get into the best shape of my life. He walked into the office and I just kept saying in my head "Jonathan, you will NOT seduce this one." I don't need any repeats of Dr. Liqueur, yes that was his real name, when I was in high school.

Fashion is what you adopt when you don't know who you are.

2010-02-01T12:33:00.000-06:00

Unfortunately one cannot help but to eventually skim over a television program whilst bored on a Sunday evening or over magazine articles in the doctor's waiting room that critiques the trivial subject of dress on the red carpet durning "Red Carpet" season. It all drips with disdain and stupidity. Fashion has recently rocked a nerve with me and I'm really beginning to think that it's totally diminutive in the grand scheme of things. Hollywood is truly irrelevant when it comes to real people living in the real world. For some reason we use them as a form of escapism. Truly you might get better results using crack cocaine.

And in regards to those actors we put on pedestals, I think it's about time we see them for what they really are. These are people that are so wrapped up in themselves that they had to get into a profession that makes them their own best P.A.L. - personal ass licker.

Poignant grief cannot endure forever.

2010-01-27T15:53:00.000-06:00

It seems like that things that we want most are for some universal reason more accessible when we are not looking for it. Since I returned back home, Kansas City, Missouri, I've been approached on more than one occassion by an old friend or foe or even a former boyfriend or lover.

"Jonathan. I've always wanted you."

"Can we get together..say a date?"

"I really want to fuck you."

These are all nice little verbal treats that were lopped off the tree of hedonism and epicurian delight and thrown into my lap. Until the other night I hadn't even needed to think twice before declining. Maybe it was because I was with someone that I care very much for. Maybe it was because I know that this person is a true constant in my life and not just some fair weather friend. Henry and I decided to spend a night at his place watching two seasons of this terrible show called "The Lair". I've always liked Colton Ford. He makes most of my friends wretch. I had a hard on for him until I saw this show. Not only is the mostly former gay porn models that comprises the cast terrible but they made Mr. Ford, by the way use your real name when you're doing a legitimate acting gig, Grecian Formula his salt and pepper. He looks terrible without it. That silver really just added to the appeal. So script is badly delivered and if you are drunk, stoned, or just giddy from too little of sleep like I was it is like watching a terrible thespian moving disaster.

The night rolled on with one bad episode after another. I fell asleep as Henry rubbed my back and we sojourned through the next to last episode of the second season. His digits pressed harder into my back and yes one thing led to another and we were kissing and then we were fellating and then we were penetrating. It isn't the first time that I had sex with a close friend. In fact, sharing that with someone, even a friend, shows you in a different light and you are essentially sharing a side of you that most other people will never see. It's truly a giving moment. I had my reservations in the past, not only because it is such an intimate and beautiful and vulnerable and extremely personal thing to share with someone, but because of the grieving I was still enduring because of Eric and the love I still feel so strongly for and this strangely fading dedication I still hold vigilantly for him.

The other night, it was like I was for one moment breaking away from screaming and tearing my garment. The mourning shrouds dropped to my feet and I gave myself to something that seemed so true to the moment, mutually felt, and safe. I've heard the saying, "If you can't fuck your friends then who can you fuck?" I think that I've said that at one time or another. Maybe I'm just getting to the final stages of grieving or this has been ONE LOOOOOOOONG FUCKING SHIVA!!!

Make you feel my love.

2010-01-23T13:49:00.000-06:00

I went to a club last night with Michael, a very good friend that has made a very needed reentrance into my life. He always added an element when I was around him. I always just kind of adapted his confidence and self-assurance when I'm around him and I must admit that feeling of empowerment and knowing that I'm not some ordinary not so unfortunate looking gent that trolls the floors of discotheques and scouring the corners of dives to find someone to take home to feel validated. There is no part of ourselves that we ever felt the need to keep veiled. I was nursing my five dollar Diet Coke and getting examined by the local talent. I saw some old faces that I hadn't seen since I left for Austin in 2008 and they quickly disappeared into the crowd avoiding me. About thirty minutes after twelve I was making my way to the overcrowded toilets and saw a very familiar man making out with another man at the bar. My heart sank a little I must admit. I exhaled and walked over to them and tapped the familiar scoundrel on the shoulder. Rahim turned and presented a nervous smile.

"Hi. I didn't expect to see YOU here tonight."

"A friend of mine convinced me to come out. I took the opportunity since I rarely get it. Who's your friend?"

"Jonathan, this is Kevin. Kevin, Jonathan."

"How do you do?"

The guy threw me shade and then nodded his head. Typical.

"Well. I just thought I'd say hello. I didn't mean to interupt."

Total lie.

"Goodnight, Rahim."

I turned to go.

"I'll call you tomorrow."

I turned back around.

"I wish you wouldn't. Enjoy your evening."

I immediately walked back to Michael and requested that we leave. I told him everything on the ride home. I had once again put up expectations. I find that when I do that I am setting myself up for a let down. Eric would've never done that, I kept saying. I miss him so much. I finally purged out all of the heartache of not being able to even say goodbye to Eric or tell him that I loved him one more time or tell him that I wasn't given enough time with him..that I had so much more love to give. I broke down over the fact that I didn't think he even knew that I truly loved him and that I can never and will never love another man the way I love him. I might be a little broken up over him you could say. After nearly an hour of crying on my friend's shoulder he put me to bed and slept on the recliner in my room to make sure that I knew that I wasn't alone...out of his own volition. Rahim was a Mr. Right Now. I'm still dealing with the fact that nobody will ever be as powerful as Eric in my life. Nobody will love me so fully from a beautiful, vulnerable, authentic and organic place. I love you Eric....wherever you are.

Sex is the last refuge of the miserable.

2010-01-20T16:29:00.000-06:00

The consuming desire of most human beings is deliberately to plant their whole life in the hands of some other person. I would describe this method of searching for happiness as immature. Development of character consists solely in moving toward self-sufficiency.

-Quentin Crisp

I pushed off and rolled over to sit up and light a cigarette. I hadn't smoked in over a year and I had a pack of Lucky Strike in my nightstand that had yet to be utilized. My bare chest was dewy. I tugged on the cig off of a lit match. The sulfur scent filled my nose and entered my lungs.

"I didn't realize you smoked. May I?"

I flipped the cigarette around to have the filter face Rahim and passed it over.

"Thanks for taking me out to dinner. I've never had Ethiopian fare before. I would have never pinned it as a spicy type. When I think of Ethiopia I don't think of much outside of rice and raw vegetables."

"It was my treat. I like taking care of those I like."

He exhaled the blue cigarette smoke and passed it back to me.

"I don't like the fact that you pick up the bill. I've found that there is viscerality in self-sufficiency."

He chuckled and layed back against the wall of down pillows on my bed. His chest glistened with sweet sweat beads and black hair matted to a well maintained body. The room had gotten very heated and the windows had all fogged up. The thunder was still crashing and the lightening was very apres peau. The Thievery Corporation track was floating and bubbling around the base of the bed. His caramel colored meaty hands gripped my shoulders and pulled me over onto his chest. Chest to chest he planted more lips on my full moist lips and tugged slightly on my bottom lip with his teeth as the kiss ended. He groaned and slid his hands over my shoulders and down the slope of my sweaty back straight down to the tops of my cheeks under my denim sailor dungarees.

"I brought condoms."

"Oh. That's very optomistic of you."

He chuckled and I stamped the cigaretted out in the ashtray on my bedside table.

"Jonathan."

"Rahim."

"Are you one that attaches sentiment to sex?"

"It depends I guess. If I have the mind set of a lion on the Sahara during mating season in a Mutual of Omaha Wild Kingdom episode or if I have the mind set that I want to make sure that there is something more to me than a good orgasm to someone."

"You are an exceptional gentleman. There will always be more to you."

"Also....the variable of whether or not I'm hygienically clean is a very important factor in the equation."

"I've never thought that sex was an equation. I think sex is visceral....more so than self-sufficiency."

"Sex can be geometric given the angles and such. In Riemannian geometry, the metric tensor is used to define the angle between two tangents. Where U and V are tangent vectors and gij are the components of the metric tensor G."

He gave an earthquake laugh.

"You sound like Wikipedia is all stored in your head. I swear you know so much and all of it just kind of is crammed into that lovely head of yours."

"Actually, I read it on Wikipedia today."

We made out for a couple of hours and dry humped through denim then fell off into a slumber. When I woke up he was gone but I could still smell him on my pillows.

We are the sum of our decisions.

2010-01-19T15:09:00.000-06:00

We sat down at Matsu at 7:30pm sharp. I totally looked out of place in this party of four. Bald, porcelin skin dusted with cold weather inflicted rosy cheeks and nose and grey and blue eyes that use to gleam with beams of giddiness due to actually purschasing stock in sentiment and hope and flecks of quirky love sequences to fill my hope chest with. My portfolio is much more diverse these days. I draw the happiness more from the now rather than the what could be or should've been. I'm trying on the suit tailored by the mantra "I never look back, darling. It distracts from the now". I'm finding that it is something that you tailor yourself to...the suit is not tailored to fit you.

I've come to like my pointy, Nordic nose, pouty, full lips, and strong jaw. I used to hate my features. When I was younger I would sooth my emotional melee caused by angst and body dysmorphia by sobbing while stuffing my face full of fat girl food followed by Olympic purging. God then introduced me to Mini-Thins. God bless ephedrine. Oh. Speaking of eating.

We sat down...Noah,a former Israeli soldier now a father and in his first marriage to a full blooded Sioux. A Dr. Nathan Archer. I sat next to Rahim. The table was full of olive complexions and dark, chestnut or raven hair. They all looked so handsome and I felt like an albino but was far from the shame I would have felt before I got a spine. Rahim had been very touchy since I rubbed his back at the Warhol exhibit at Union Station earlier that evening. I'll admit it freely that I enjoyed getting the attention from him. His Persian features compliment mine and I love listening to him talk. He may be a Mr. Right Now. We haven't made it yet and I hadn't planned on going there. I try not to plan too much. Maybe if I just have fun and enjoy the moments the "Now" part will just kind of fall off.

We had gone to the exhibit and I have to say that it was refreshing to see some of Andy Warhols lesser known works. There is rumor of a Lichtenstein and Mondriaan exhibit coming....I just about wet my pants over that one. I love love love pop art. Now if I could see a Koons collection!! Hint hint.

When someone great is gone.

2010-01-12T11:11:00.000-06:00

The name January always sparks the thought of having great sentiment for starting anew. So far this month seems just like all the others. Not that that is a bad thing. I can't say that life has really been too eventful since the new year. I'm making a continuing effort to work hard at the gym and even harder on lowering my intake. I've found that sugarless gum comes in very handy. I went to a Greek restaurant the other night with friends and witnessed belly dancing and plate breaking at its finest. I deal with the heartache of wading through all the guilt and regret for so many past actions that hurt me and many others in the wake of an ailment that became a monstrosity. I do this sifting through of emotions rather quickly in the morning and gear my mind to fixate on the now and a little bit of the possibilities of the not too distant future.

I tend to zone out when I'm running, I'm up to two hours of running on the treadmill now btw, and think of all the wonderful things I can do in the spring once I get into a suitable shape. The pudge I've been sporting over the last year is beginning to melt off rather quickly and I can see the me that I'm more comfortable looking at in the mirror.

When I think about the last year I think about being in jail of course. I also think about all the great people that past away in 2009 that touched my life in one way or another. So...here goes..in memoriam:

Mary Travers

Patrick Swayze

Senator Edward M. Kennedy

Don Hewitt

Les Paul

Eunice Kennedy Shriver

John Hughes

Merce Cunningham

Frank McCourt

Walter Cronkite

Pina Bausch

Michael Jackson

Farrah Fawcett

Ed McMahon

David Carradine

Dom DeLuise

Bea Arthur

Natasha Richardson

Bonkers and Razzles were my favorite candy.

2010-01-08T16:22:00.000-06:00

After beating a hasty retreat back to where I came from, after the debacle in Austin had been put to bed, after spending a month living with my family in their FINALLY renovated Cape Cod/Colonial and rediscovering which idiosyncrasies drive me bananas, after getting settled in with my new roommate Calvin, a fellow chocolatier and pastry chef (it's so much easier to live with someone that goes to work at 3 AM too), I stood in our kitchen watching fat, fluffy flakes glide and dance their way through arctic zephyrs that stirred them up with zealous, syncopated blasts. I popped a couple of fudge covered espresso beans I made yesterday into my mouth. The flavor burst open an envelope of pleasure and indulged my tastebuds by coating them with sweet and salty chocolate rapture then flowered into a smokey air roast. The flavors poured down my throat as I took in the waltz of the snowflakes. It seemed like Tchaikovsky would've been inspired to use this moment to brew new concepts and melodies.

I got the idea to use lavender with chocolate and kept it to myself until I got to work this morning. I've got to address the weather situation we've had in Kansas City, Missouri since Christmas. We've had several feet of snow delivered to our doorsteps and many act like it is a curse. For the drivers I can understand the nuisance it brings. For those people that don't live in places that get white outs and ice storms I actually feel sorry for them. Winter is really kind of a magical time aesthetically. Watching a world trapped in a shaken snow globe get blanketed in a soft white glitter and taking in the fragrant, crisp air touched with the piquant smoke of active fireplaces is really an experience to behold.

So what if you get snowed in. Just because you can't drive in it doesn't mean you can't walk around in it. Ice storms can be pretty awesome to watch take place too and the acoustics outside when it is smothered in crystals and powder is so clear. All that white soaks up the noise like a heavily upholstered room.

"Coffee's ready."

Calvin spoke with a whiskey voice much older than his 28 years. Thankfully, he loved Chock full o'Nuts too. I refuse to drink anything else except for maybe some Kona from time to time. We clincked our mugs.

"Ch-yahs."

One whiff of the brew before it hit my lips and I was punched with the potent fumes of Jameson.

"Wha-ho-ho."

I pushed my mug at Calvin.

"This is totally your cup."

I don't like to drink anymore and Irish coffee has never been my thing anyway. Calvin chuckled at his faux pas and gave me my unadulterated coffee. I smiled and went back to watching the outside world.

It's not the destination. It's the journey.

2010-01-05T16:11:00.000-06:00

A good defense is the best offense? Do I really need to set up outrageous boundaries because I've been hurt too many times? Do we all need to do that at one time or another? Is the heart on the sleeve really just serving it up on a platter to be annihilated by someone's boot then covered with ants as vultures pick apart the morsels left over, scattered pieces across a scorched earth? Are we hurting ourselves by making ourselves too available or putting too much of ourselves into relationships? These are all valid questions when pondering what seems like such a terrorizing transaction.

I know that I will never love anyone like Eric. Nowhere as much or as passionately. I'm fine with that because it just means I've got a dedicated, undying hope and that says a lot to me about my spirit, drive, and capacity to allow myself to be human and fuck up. We both walked, or limped, away from our attempt to be with each other with our own injuries and malaties. It hurts something awful, but if he's not with me I REALLY hope that God delivers a person unto him that can make him happier than I ever could.

Question: When we joke about the painful things and the secret things we desire, like a gushy squishy puppy dog guts type of love, are we really just casting a veil to hide our vulnerability?

I found myself listening to this track for the first time since my freshmen year. Mazzy Star was kind of like my Annie Lennox or Torie Amos. She always took me to that vulnerable place that is sometimes so hard to keep from building a wall around. It's that vulnerability that is what I find most beautiful in all of us. It's part of the connection.

Still falling

Breathless and on again

Inside today

Inside me today

Around broken in two

Til your eyes share into dust

Like two strangers turning into dust

Til my hand shook with the weight of fear

I could possibly be fading

Or have something more to gain

I could feel myself growing colder

I could feel myself under your fate

Under your fate

It was you, breathless and torn

I could feel my eyes turning into dust

Into strangers, turning into dust

Turning into dust

Turning into dust

More fun than an E Ticket

2010-01-04T15:39:00.000-06:00

I have no doubt that my mother's preagnancy with me was an accident. Mostly because on several occasions, she told me I was an accident. She's also not known for her tact. when I was growing up I was a pretty sensitive child. I liked the term "tender heated". She called me out by calling me a limp wristed queen when I was three. I was also a VERY chubby kid. she would intentionally buy clothes one or two sizes too small to "mostivate me". And it did. I was motivated to start cutting and puke up everything I ate by the age of seven. My esophageal tears are weapons against getting fat according to her.

I was a puffy, fat, faggotty faggot growing up. I was also very short, almost runt like. I seemed to be equally wide as tall. My fingerts were little, nubbish Vienna Sausages. There's nothing more repulsive to me than a fat kid crying whilst wolfing down Little Debbie snacks. Perhaps it's because it directly links me to a terrible, yet at the same time comical, part of my childhood. As I got older I developed a healthy case of body dysmorphia so that I stay svelte and far far away from husky. I try to relate to the fat kids like I can with gypsy elvin folk. But fat kids are always so sensitive and with the tactless behavior I inheritted from my mother I can never tell if a fat kid is crying or if they're just greasy.

My mother also can micromanage someone into having psychotic features. Case in point, I was seventeen and carving a holiday ham I the kitchen and my mother was putting the last touches on all the trimmings and sending me into a nuclear meltdown with her verbose whirlwind of disaster which she cunningly unleashed with her big, fat trap. I had gained fifteen pounds since turkey day, I was breaking out, she was behind on all the bills and that was somehow all my fault, I was too homosexual, I was going to hell for that and that alone, my grades had taken a dive because of my "self- inflicted" depression.....Everything was susceptible to be torn into pieces and thrown into the fire that my mother loved to fan. As she rattled off her battery of critiques, her voice became4 a hum of incoherent keys and annoying pitches like if two MOOGes could make love. The all sound returned to her nasal high aural sting like a power saw gives as it runs through petrified wood...cutting me in half.

I turned and began screaming in a high monotone and repeatedly stabbing my thighs with the two tined carving fork. It was the only way I could get the crone to shut up. It was all soon made better when I got heavy doses of perscription pain killers and given the power to refuse my mother in my examination room at the local ER. That bill was money well spent.

The Damned Don't Cry

2010-01-04T15:02:00.000-06:00

And thus began the beguine.

2009-12-31T21:55:00.000-06:00

Time was of the essence as soon as I was popped out breach in a birth that required a crash cart for my mother. It was the proper entrance really.
"Here's your new baby boy. Now hand me the external defibrillator. CLEAR!"
I was God's version of an improvised explosive device. The pregnancy was far from planned and I sure as shit went BOOM! The family that received me was a thin Norman Rockwell skin over the top and a whole lot of bedlam underneath. Father was a Doctor of Theology, Dr. Larry Kennedy. He was also a closeted homosexual that kept old Casey Donovan, Al Parker, and Jack Wrangler mags in the same briefcase he kept his sermons in. My mother turned a blind eye convinced that she was called to be a preacher's wife and Florence Nightingale. I have an older brother, Lee, six years my senior. My sister, Renee, is just fifteen months older than me. There was one miscarriage of twins before my sister was born. Growing up, I thought that they were the lucky ones. In some ways I still do.
All, and I mean all three, of us kids turned out to be gay though my sister and I were pretty obvious. I had all the Rainbow Brite dolls and a Care Bear Big Wheel and could be seen on the front lawn practicing my Care Bear Stare. My sister got the Tonka toys and the G.I. Joe figurines, though I stole The Baroness doll because she was so statuesque. My brother was a tougher nut to crack. So my sister and I were two peas in a pod. I was brought home from the hospital and she wouldn't leave my side and alternated pacifiers with me consistently. We had each other and suffered the same trips of terror with our father. He was a deeply troubled, gay man trapped in a marriage behind a pulpit. He had a violent streak that kept life in the Kennedy household on constant alert. Everyday we were on code Orange. My sister received beatings that are now linked to her being developmentally disabled by the age of two. I was dropped from a grain silo in an attempt to sort of complete the sacrifice of Isaac. My brother was beat with log chains. Father could ignite at any moment and God knows what could detonate him. I remember always being in fear and finding hiding spots all over the Cape Cod I spent the first few years of my life in.
Mother had started working for a podiatrist in the early eighties. Her hours got longer and longer. She also joined the ranks of the fitness craze and flowered into a figure-conscious, Capezio lily. She stocked herself with a new found confidence. She had never been so svelte in her life. I can't recall anytime my mother has been happier ever since. She was also falling in love with her employer, a well-educated, eloquent black man. When first introduced to the first black man I ever met I set a tone of discomfort that would last until he left my life.
"I simply adooooore Denise Huxtable."
I was four, my favorite song was "Burning Up", and tangerine was my favorite Crayola.

Madonna - Burning Up
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Sport de sang

2009-12-30T14:35:00.000-06:00

I went to a cage fight with Rahim and a few of his friends. I hadn't ever been to a cage fight before. I used to box and it had been a long time since I had been to a match of any sort....tennis included. I'll admit that I was bit apprehensive and hesitated as we made our way to the entrance to the building. Extreme violence has a direct connection with vexatious memories of getting my throat slit and boxing the fuck out of Eric's face mixed with seemingly paranormal hallucinations. I lumbered through the experience like on a tumbrel on the way to some PTSD soaked guillotine. At first it just seemed like an albatross hanging around my neck....when we took our seats near the cage/ring I felt like I was conquering something.
I enjoyed the fight without having to parallel any of it to my managed illness rearing its head in my life or thinking about how I was left at the alter per se because of something that one could not forsake. Meh....if I'm to have a man in my life he needs to be made of pretty strong stuff and mucho compassion to allow some imperfections. I don't think love is treated with a clinical and cold set of hands.

This used to be my playground.

2009-12-12T22:25:00.000-06:00

The elevator stopped on the floor. A familiar penthouse loft that I ventured to so many times in the past lay on the other side. I could hear Mstrkrft's "Easy Love" bumping through the door. They parted to a world of twin sets, pearl necklaces, wool pencil skirts, Hermes scarves, heavy twill pants, shirt sleeves, herring bone, rich reds, deep blues, royal purples, dark, chocolatey mousse silk charmeuse, hues of iron and charcoal and silver/grey wide planked floor. It was the first time out since coming home. This world was exactly as I had left it. There were plenty of manicured vultures but there were the few well hidden jewels in the piles of bullshit that made associating with this pack a little bit worth it.
"Jonathan! Oh my...honey! I am so happy you're here."
Nikki ran to me on the balls of her feet across the room sloshing the beaujolais in her glass. Her heels clacked like a little clacker ball toys. She gave me salutations with a bise and took me aside to guide me through the group and give me all the latest gossip and introduce me to the new movers and shakers in town.
"Jonathan. Your neck! You look like a reformed bad boy. Sexy."
"Uh..thanks."
"Smoke?"
"No. Not anymore."
"Well now that you're caught up and we have you back from America's Wild Outback, why don't you go get a drink and meet me at my master bath?"
"No thanks. I'm straight."
"Well that's boring."
"Not really. I actually get to feel life. It's a visceral experience. So, um, hows life? I'm guessing good considering your father gave you rights to your old digs."
"Yes. Life is going pretty good. I took part of my trust and invested it in a couple of small businesses."
"What kind?"
"A chocolat boutique, a bodega, and a bakery. I wanted to invest in Boulevard Brewing company but I think I covered the basics for what seem to weather a recession, just minus cigarettes and the lottery."
We made our way to the frosted glass encased bathroom on the second floor. I watched her set up her lines and just kind felt sad about watching it. Just that sound of snorting was kind of vomitous on a spiritual level. It seemed like I was waxing bad nostalgia. Everything was still the same for her. She was dating an urchin she picked up in a club, her brother was still scoring tar in the parks, he parents only stepped in for funding, and she was still trapped in the same motley crew of the upper echelon.
After we exited the bathroom I made my way to a cheese and fruit platter decked out for the gods. I was right back where I was before just with sober vision and a palate for some of the world's best Gruyere. A new track from Vitalic, "Poison Lips" started to play and my heels began to lightly stamp to the beat. I found myself chewying to the syncopation and slowly made my way to the area where people were step touching. I joined in on the bouncing and weaving with the thumping group. It felt good just to move to something other than the treadmill. Vitalic had came out with a new album while I was in jail and I was getting a healthy dose of it. They'd been on my list of great "dance your problems out" music. As I let it just pulse through my center I was feeling something rub up against my backside. It wasn't a grinding. It was a grazing. I turned and he was beautiful. Dark, walnut curls and these honey eyes in olive skin. His name was Rahim. We had been introduced earlier. Now his hand was on the small of my back and pressing me into his torso. A small bead of sweat was slowly making its way down his brow to his Nordic shaped nose. It felt good so we stomped and stepped cutting up the rug.
I had a good time with him for the rest of the evening. He's a professor at a local university. It was nice just to listen to someone talk about themselves. I get plenty of time with my therapist to talk about me. I got to just ask questions and ask for further elaborations. Again, it was nice. We made different mixes with all sorts of juices and club soda and some Pellegrino with limes. The rest of the spread was nice but I stuck to the canapes. When it was pumpkin time I made my way for the exit along with the party that I came in and a new acquaintance that could become a new and interesting friend. I've come a long way from where I was on 10.11.2008.

“These three are the marks of a Jew, not a Zionist - a tender heart, self-respect, and charity."

2009-12-10T17:34:00.000-06:00

"Jack Kerouac was schizophrenic"

Nurse Mitchell brought up another cloth full of warm water and wrung it out over my head. The water cascaded down my body like bullet trains down to the tub full of water quickly soiling itself with crusty debris of what should have been a nightmare. Flakes of dried blood tossed on the surface of the water like clipper ships taking on white squalls.

"Brian Wilson is schizoaffective, too."

Her voice was like an ointment. She smelled like my mother. The tears and snot were so uncontrollable and unpredictable.

10-10-2008

"JONATHAN! WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS!"

My eyes closed and I could see his bloody face and those green eyes. My hands had doubled their size and ached. I didn't see my father in him anymore. Tears from fright spat out from both of our eyes.

"Larry! You're not gonna get him too!", I screamed out to the energy I could feel floating in the room.

"Baby, I've gotta get to the hospital.", Eric whimpered. Blood trickling down his lips. His face all rearranged and swollen.

This all echoed in the present, in the cold tiled bathroom of the hospital unit in the correctional facility I had been taken to.

"Eduard Einstein, Albert Einstein's son, was schizophrenic."

The water rushed over me. No matter how cold and clinical the place was I couldn't get clean there.

"Eric, we've gotta get you to a hospital. OH MY FUCKING GOD!! Look what I did?!! No. Get up."

We scrambled for one of the bathrooms. His left eyebrow looked like it had popped open. His orbitals were so swollen and red and his jaw seemed askew. Blood everywhere. It looked like some prize fight had taken place. Sprays of blood everywhere. Then I began to see Larry in him again, in his reflection. I came to believe my father was a demon because of the manifestations I had been witnessing over the last couple of months. Eric cried over the pain and his wounds. I did this and now Larry was coming back. The battle seemed emanate.

"Larry! You can't have him too! Dad get the fuck out of him! You're not doing this. Not to him!!"

"Jonathan! I'm not your dad."

"I have to end this. I've got to stop this."

My sobbing commenced into the tub. I didn't have to even shut my eyes to relocate and hear the screams.

"Syd Barrett is schizophrenic."

"Even Jim Gordon and President Lincoln's wife were schizophrenic. I have a son that is."

The hiccups to follow the quakes of sobs seemed to convulse my body. Something happened to where the tectonic plates in my life made a great divide between me and the rest of the world. Sadly, the great love of my life stood on the other side. It was illness that truly separated us and at that time I had no idea. I had yet to actually think that my world wasn't true. What was true was what I saw and what I saw were visions of a demon. I call him Dad. Given all the physical and sadistic torture, rapes, selling me off to like sick minded friends to satiate their needs for, in a draconian Greek sense, mentor me. My father's name is Larry. He's Dr. Larry Kennedy, a practicing Pentecostal minister of a church with a fold of 1500 misguided sheep. He teaches at a seminary and keeps twenty year old polaroids of my sister in I in compromising positions, solo and paired, under his pathologically organized, booby trapped bedroom. These aren't cute, bathing photos. In 2004 I found that he still had them during a short stay at the Kennedy farm. He had accumulated a collection that extended beyond just my sister and I.

I began to feel phantom pains in my penis. Piercing. I would endure these anytime I fought my father and his phantoms. Nurse Mitchel was cleaning my genitals off so gingerly. Her voice seemed to be like kid's gloves.

"There we go, darlin'. It's okay."
"GET 'EM OFF! GET HIM THE FUCK OFF! Fuck it hurts."

I could see the straight pins being plucked out of the tomato pin cushion and driven through my three year old acorn-like penis. This ability to transcend from past to future was becoming all the more commonplace for me. The tub filled with urine. I could only scream. Larry and his powers seemed to ascend on me like precipitous blitzes with needles. I could not hear my current cries. I could just hear that well-known blood chilling scream that toddlers give. I couldn't move but soon I was being taken from the bathtub by guards. The next thing was a pinch on a butt cheek and sleep. It was my first bath in over a week since the night of my psychotic episode, the one that ended not a chapter of my life but killed the chance at marrying, and the life with the man I love. That love does not die. Ever. It was the death of a world I saw as very actual, bona fide, ipso facto that I had known no other that was killing. When I woke up the next day the stiffness and shooting nerve pain up the side of my neck surged like rupturing powerline transformers.

"I've got to stop this. This..What is going on? Dad?"

I made my way to the entry/exit of our flat's kitchen.

"Stop stop stop stop...." under my breath.

The room spun around and around. Erratic breathing and flashes of light, auras, like the ones before one of my seizures. My mind said "knife knife knife knife".

My carotids seem to pulsate for the blade of Eric's daily sharpened, 7 inch Santoku knife. Some say it was even steven. I can't think in those terms. I turned and there he was. He did what I was setting out to do. 1st try...futile. 2nd attempt...profitless. 3rd attempt...YAHTZEE! We had arterial spray and blood pumping out with each pulse. I went into syncope. When my lids peeled back I could see him standing sideways by the frontdoor. I stood and stumbled while hot blood dropped in clumps onto my bare feet. I went to push him out and he ran. I shuffled onto the threshold and that was the last I could remember before the full spectrum light of a trauma room hammered out the darkness.

I guess I left a puddle on the landing of a two story flight of stairs outside of our residence because the emergency department staff were beginning a second transfusion. I had lost around three or more pints of blood.

"Adonai ro-i, lo ehsar.
Bin’ot deshe yarbitseini,
al mei m’nuhot y’nahaleini,
naf’shi y’shovev,
yán’heini b’ma’aglei tsedek,
l’ma’an sh’mo.
Gam ki eilech
b’gei tsalmavet,
lo ira ra,
Ki Atah imadi.
Shiv’t’cha umishan’techa
hemah y’nahamuni.

Ta’aroch l’fanai shulchanL’orech yamim."
neged tsor’rai
dishanta vashemen roshi
cosi r’vayah.
Ach tov vahesed
yird’funi kol y’mei hayai,
v’shav’ti b’veit Adonai

I could hear the my mother's screaming from a phone receiver.

"Where's Eric? Is Eric okay? WHERE THE FUCK IS HE?"

"Yes. He's at a different hospital but he's stable. You on the other hand..."

"Barux hashem! Tell him I love him. He's safe now."
"Mr. Kennedy! Mr. Kennedy, do you have a religious affiliation?"
"I'm uh..I'm Jewish. I need a rabbi."

I went unconscious from there and soon into surgery to suture my severed artery. Most of this has been gathered by talks with medical staff and at random recalls over the past year. My first solid memory was the bath Nurse Mitchel gave me. Before I left the correctional facility she came to see me. She had given very special attention to me over the year I was incarcerated.


              Jonathan,
              My Hebrewchaun, you hear the same voices that my own son does. You know, there's a certain songbird too pretty to fly with the crows, the grackles, and the starlings. The other birds attack it in flocks and tear it apart when it starts to sing. Nothing soft endures. Nature loathes meekness and goodness. You got hurt early and deep. Eric kept you from the bridge as long as he could. But you are the same tribe as my son. You're both so full of love it causes an imbalance. You fall over with the unbearable weight of it. The fall becomes what you do best. You grow accustomed to great odds. Love floods you , overwhelms you, and makes you almost impossible to be around. You need love in equal proportion to what you throw off. Everyone disappoints you. It may seem this way all the time. Don't ever stop fighting that desire to die in the cold thinking that you'll never find the right angel. You have the most tender heart. Nuture it because you nurture so many others. I've seen it firsthand, even in a county jail. That heart on your sleeve will never be ripped off if you don't let it and your unreturned attempts at trying to mend things, don't let that steal song. It all strengthens your steel threads of faith that that there is going to be a better tomorrow. As long as you take care of you life is going to be manageable. You may not approve of everything that happens but that may mean you need to lower your standards a bit.

I don't do this sort of thing for ANY inmates. I've had a year with you, five to six days a week, and a special part of my days were the parts I spent with you. Please go forth with a thicker skin, made of stronger stuff, and know that when the time is right, and you'll know when, the person that you were truly born to be with will be so much more, so much bigger than the loves you had before.

Love and Light,

J. Mitchel

How seamless seemed love and then came trouble

2009-12-08T18:30:00.000-06:00

That trouble truly began to surface as my symptoms grew more intense. Moments would flower with incompetence. My next suicide attempt was on a morning in November of 2008. Perhaps going to my online journal at the time would be more appropriate.

11-12-2008

I woke early this morning and watched Mr. A. sleep. I hear the others in the room and they get so incarnate especially when I wake up. I hear Larry, my father, speaking out in his old fashion that he gave those hellfire sermons. They were directed at me. Those loud tones that pierced so easy. I hear my childhood moans and feel the burn from him on top of me. Sometimes I wake up and the shadows or phantoms are in my peripheral field of vision.
I can smell my father. I could this morning. That cologne drenched preachers double-handed handshake. "I'm glad you were able to make it." I hear that. I heard that this morning.

I can see him more in reflection lately. If you could see the master bath in our flat you could see why I might be frightened. I take showers with the bathroom door closed. That's like a sanctuary for my father. I believe he is a demon. This concentrated terrorism can only be a discouragement. Just a little over a month ago my sister was diagnosed with a serious illness. I have this duty that I have secretly taken up. I must take honesty out of it's sheath and try to do something about him.

His congregation has to know who is trying to lead them. Last week I could see him behind the camera he filmed my sister and I with, the polaroids of us and other children in still in his chest of drawers under crisply folded underwear, the porn in the brief case he kept his sermons in, the piercing of genital tissue with bloodcurdling three year old boy screamed fanfare. I hear moaning and whimpering a lot lately too.
When I confront him by myself I get no answers but strong, verbose incisions.
"You'll be seen just like your sister. No one will believe you."
"He won't marry a boy who was his daddy's hole to cum in."
"You're nothing but mistakenly spilt seed."

This morning I could smell dust at 3 AM. I passed out a bit earlier and looked at my love cuddled up on his side. He looks so cherubic and I feel so full of filth. I went to the kitchen and began to drink wine. I didn't want to give permission to these demonic manifestation anymore. Why should my personal demonic Cimmerian get pleasure out of my life. I felt so out of control. Then that dust. Attic dust from an old house. The smell of that crumpled gray insulation and sweat, unwashed foreskin. It was in the attic that he took me. I still freeze when I see those drop down attic stairs and that string that hangs. I tried to soften all of my abrupt heightening of senses. I drink and drink. I took my bottle of phenytoin. By the time everything started to slow the world down I was by Mr. A. in bed.

He woke up in a panic. I can't say I remember much but I know that it was the first time I started to hear things when I was with another person. I remember asking him to just tell me he loved me over and over as I fell asleep in his chest after a huge ordeal. I was so upset that my father was taking that from me know. I used to be able to curl up next to my love and then everything was alright. Stress left, everything left. I found solace in him and he was my soft place to land.

11-27-2008

I layed down to go to sleep early around 7 PM. I had a big day ahead. Mr. A has spent a long week back home in Dallas because of his Bubbe had past and for Thanksgiving. I thought it was inappropriate for me to meet his folks for the first time when a funeral is what would bring me to meeting them. Emily Post thinks it's inappropriate and so it is in my book. I woke up around 9PM.
"They're here. They're here to get you. Just like your sister."
It was such a loud declaration I sprung out of bed. I ran to the mirror to see if I could see anything moving about in the reflections. No. But I could taste that salty, sapor saliva that preambles vomiting. I looked out the window and saw police lights through the trees. I began to panic. It looked like they were surrounding the block. I called my love and asked him to research it. I crawled into a closet until he came back with an update. He stated there was nothing as far as recent news in Austin that would affirm the base element for my sheer fright.

I called the police and Mr. A, first one then the other, repeatedly over the next hour. The police offered to come to me. I said "No no. It's not necessary."
"Do you feel the need to harm someone or harm someone else?"
"No. What kind of question is that? I called to see what is going on in my neighborhood. I'll just call my fiance and take my medication."

When I got Mr. A. back on the phone he told me to walk out of our gated community and stay on the phone with him. I made a trek from our front door through the oddly warm November winds. I'm from the midwest so I had three layers on and a coat. I walked with my slippers still on. As I approached the outside and the busy street and it's empty sidewalks I was so confused. I saw them. I saw police cars.

I went home and took my seizure medication and told Mr. A. I loved him so much and that I truly couldn't bear another day without him.

Present-

I still go to bed with that same look and feel every night. The look as forlorn as a sea-captain's wife waiting for the ships to come home. That ship will never return to my shore. It hurts, still, not being his harbor. But there is comfort in knowing that he will find it in a much better place than the one he left. Now is all about taking care of me. And I am okay with that.

Tous les peuples sont égaux dans l'esprit.

2009-12-06T15:31:00.000-06:00

I skimmed over today's headlines. We have once again made human life trivial, almost to the likings of Romanesque flavor though we lack the public indulging in communal executions. There are the exceptions like the lunatic fringe that publicly display a vigilant countdown for repellent murderers' deaths. When did we turn into such a revolting species that regards existence as passe? When did become acceptable to go outside civic duties and civil circumscription that we set up to make our species civil and different from the savage? Waiting for answers to such fundamental questions is not contrary to the wait for the Apocalyptic Horsemen. Suppose we justify a Robespierre reorganization of the dim, addle minded, greedy, contemptuous, degenerative, pathologically/intellectually defunct that lack the where-with-all to tie their shoes?
The sycophants that pollute our nation's capital? Would it be an acceptable form of eugenics? Are we setting up a rendezvous with the hangman of our sense and sensibility?

This isn't a simple giving up of the inclination to hid behind niceties or false modesty. It's a monumental disgrace of decency on the platform of global awareness. Is it just a lacking of manners or the clear statement that empathy is no longer in our playbooks? Only apathy. Where did we learn such grotesque behavior that lacks compassion? So impoverished of sacred clemency. It's hard not to tsk at it all. Benevolence shouldn't be a virtue. Shylock's soliloquy is universal yet it's only something taught in passing if one takes the elective Shakespeare Lit. class offered in some high schools. We must have depleted our sources. You used to have to drill too far to lift some crude compassion that once bubbled up outside of the holiday season as well as within. Guile, callow people just turn a blind eye I guess.

Entre bride et l'éperon, de toute choses gït la raison.

2009-12-05T17:06:00.000-06:00

I've started to journal on here because typing flows better than writing and I feel secure that this site will not crash and erase my journal. I am also too lazy to go out and buy an external hard drive to back everything up on. I don't consider this hanging out my dirty laundry. There is still a bit of anonymity though I really haven't kept much private since the world watched my maelstrom level my life as well as others'.

I started this without any preamble. My name is Jonathan. I am diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder as well as having acute PTSD. I have psychotic tendencies if I've gone unmedicated. This was all determined in the twenty-eighth year of my life, this last year. Unfortunately, the life that I had built up had to be completely annihilated in order for me to live life as it ought to be live. It was hard to have everything that I knew as my world be taken from me. My world was burned down quicker than General Sherman and a fleet could've singed it. When what you know as real isn't real you have to learn to be aware of it and it can be truly terrorizing. This journal isn't solely based upon my illness, my sexuality, my past, or even present. It's a therapeutic record and a safe place where I can be totally honest. My treatment team has quick access too. They check it at their discretion. Being that this is on the net it's not really all that discreet.

My days are not filled with pills and sedation. I'm quite functional and agile enough to navigate my life now with a little bit of intense help from my treatment team for the time being. I will not limit out the possibilities of a less vehemently chaperoned life. But this...the fables of my reconstruction, shows that it's a continuing effort, as is anything. This blog will be full of random editorials. I tend to have a knack for them. My vocabulary is extensive and may seem grandiloquent or even pompous and bombastic. I apologize. I was raised with certain principles. For instance, my momma had me sit on my hands if I began to gesticulate when I talked. She said it went back to simpletons only able to count on their fingers. She required us to paint with words and to be more verbose. Emily Post was very popular in our rearing. I speak French as well. Please don't think that I consult a thesaurus on everything.

In this entry I would like to pass on four pertinacious ideals that perfect adherence to may be impossible but I claim progress not perfection. They are my personal mantras that I recite in repitition to myself all day.

1. You do NOT have to fix anyone. Let them take care of their own crazy...it's a big relief this way

2. You only react to people and situations due to the power you give them.

3. Acceptance is VERY different from approval. This means that if you scald your crotch with coffee or the cuntface infront of you in the checkout at Whole Foods (AKA WHOLE PAYCHECK) pays for everything with an EBT card and 5 bastard screaming children in tow.......You have a blistered dick and some people find a GREAT way to scam the government for free food and the universe works itself out...don't fret it all to the point of going postal.

4. In the dawning of my age of grace I am witnessing a civil rights battle that parallels no other. Racial and religious minorities have shed nothing more than throwing us shade when it comes to unorthodox marriages. When we do cross the threshold we have one MAJOR promise outside of keeping our capacity to be totally honest....this promise I speak of is "FORSAKING ALL OTHERS". If you are not ready to stand by your mate through any form of illness or injury you probably do not have the capacity to be in a marriage. What you have the capacity for, I don't know. That's none of my business. This sort of sanctified, consecrated dependability I refer to equates with personal integrity. To eradicate that vow is more than just some sort of sin of omission. It's a broken promise and that makes you just another statistic. You can add yourself to the lexicon of unreliable, self-absorbed men throughout history. You have not navigated or circumvented the proverbial obstacles a man faces to claim that he is a gentleman. You are in no way authentic or aberrant of atypical smarmy behavior. If you are a victim of arrested development, as am I, you need to fix your shit...bluntness saves more time. I digress. You are nothing more than the common homo-lothario. Don Juans, Casanovas, Romeos, and Lotharios are fiction. Life needs to be lived in the raw. So, in closing, forsaking others is not some cumbersome albatross hanging around your neck. It's a joy to flow with because love is unconditional. There is no shame in admitting you are inadequate of fulfilling that promise beforehand. Honesty makes you loyal to yourself. A promise broken makes the promiser a liar. It's simple and should not cause a man to become addle-brained. None of us have time for regrets, self-recrimination, and kicking ourselves in the pants. If you're husband becomes incredibly disfigured, lies in a hospital bed in a coma, or, heaven forbid, is stricken down with a genetic or mental illness that he may or may not have been bequethed with from ancestrally predisposition...you must stick to the oath. Stay the course or at least be forthright on your wedding day and bring along counsel equipped with documents that are riddled with more cosmetic riders than Mariah Carey's contract templates. If you are on the receiving end, the promisee, forgive and forget. And be big enough to forget what it was that you forgave.

I've attached some art by artists that are schizophrenic. They've truly piqued the art world's interest as they have mine. The last is a photo shot of my neck. We'll broach that injury when I feel I've reached the point where I can process the event that detonated a blitz on two worlds.

Plankton

2009-12-04T15:16:00.000-06:00

2-15-09

No matter what the mix of medication I'm given I can't keep my heart from pumping love for that promise. For my lifesblood to be teeming for another one of life's broken promises, for rich or for poor, in sickness and in health, turns my humors into acid, disintegrating what is left of that magical kingdom built on faith in that promise you gave. My ramparts burst, were demolished, symmetrically collapsed when that promise was made into a lie. Witnessing such a clean demolition followed by a cold, clinical, wordless escape left me wondering around fallout thinking that this had to be a professional job. I have just started to take into account your perspective and I annihilate any emotion I can conjure up that would be resent related. I can't recriminate myself. I seek no exoneration. I know myself well enough to declaratively state that forsaking all others applies to myself and how I treat myself from here on out. I find that promises hold nothing but a lot of pork. Bien fait
Be grateful you didn't stick around to be in the forefront of these fresh battles clad with solecisms over all past transgressions. I am waging war on myself. And I battle myself continuously throughout my days. Most of them end in stalemates, the days that is. This fallout is gruesome and instead of shrapnel the air is fogged by skin and bone and flesh and blood. Sob born tears are baptized by echos of how I need another chance, how I am not done loving you yet, in my cell here. Still no words from the North. These cries fall with the weight which you might quantify guilt to have and hit the ground with a dull thud. What remains is a misty cloud of crimson spraying down and around. In a moment, blink, all the bones were removed from my body, fait accompli. This pool that remains lost its grip on an illusion, swiftly withdrawn, and began to sink deeper and deeper into the pit of catatonia, tomb silence, tomb darkness, and tomb sleep. At one time I declared I was born for something, that I was born to be with you, womb to tomb. Now I make every one of your senses revolt. This is a reality neither of us would approve of.
Life isn't always what you make it. Sometimes life makes you. This is something I learn each day in the tedium of this institutionalized living. A lot of these men are so processed that they are beyond repair. I can see how having a revolving door experience with trauma and the struggle to survive it can lead people to develop deadly routines. All these small vignettes filled with anguish and strange, frightening, ambiguous, palgues and malignancies brought about by critical exigencies helped us to create our coping skills, whether they are healthy or not, float around like plankton. We are microscopic as far as the big picture, as are our mechanisms that allow us the smallest space to function in. Some just do it better in handcuffs I guess.
I'll maneuver my way through this fog. The light at the end of a tunnel may not be you. It may be an oncoming train. I refuse to continue to be a perpetually flowering monstrosity, though.

The present-

I'm still shaken and hang-dog from all that both me and my better half endured. I figure the conditions are mutual. Still, for some reason I cannot shake the attachment for the that half. I feel like a subject that is fodder for the parvenu. I've prayed for castration of my soul/heart from this love in order to extirpate it. Those roots go so deep. I don't think that anything will grow in this soil anymore, no matter how much I till it. It may not be fertile ever again. I did not want this life and if I had an ounce of making it certain ways I would be finishing off a Red Robin dinner, then making love, taking a shower, then going to bed to go to work for the state of Texas the next day. What was fallible was so much bigger than making some wrong choice like too many scotch and sodas.

Still, across the length and breath of my being are these isolated explosions, traceries of fire, pinpoints of fire, great cavities, and narrowed channels plowed by pain, exploded in me, vomited forth from my heart. When I charred everything I was stripped down to an inchoate creature, a freak of the universe, a thinking animal that's just trying to see its way clear through this morass.

Am I an irrefutable anathema?
A plighted heart that perpetually agonizes and twists up a storm in my chest all for the priceless casualties?
The threads of my faith were once steel. Now my song is silenced.
This is more than some diatribe soaked in smarm and written with florid words pirouetting in well choreographed sentences. I could never be wanton if I'm honest with myself. Maybe this is just part of the process. Do we Kubler Ross everything until it is sand?

Macabre Gentilhomme

2009-12-03T17:38:00.000-06:00

I now live in a war torn country that is my mind. A year and a half ago I would've told you that everything was fine. I had a good job, a relationship with a gorgeous genius that resided in Dallas, and I was content with my physique, though there is always room for improvement for someone with classic body dysmorphic disorder from being gay. It had come time in the relationship for one of us to make the move and fate set its sights on me. The separation was becoming a great divide and hurting us rather than the absence making our hearts grow fonder. I had never left Kansas City, Missouri to live somewhere else. Sure, I had visited numerous places but the idea of leaving my stomping grounds was frightening and when it was put into action I took to the idea of it being a visceral, exhilarating, epic adventure to escape the dread brought about by going into the unknown. I was bound for Texas and a bright, shiny future with my then fiance awaited me.

Prior to leaving for Austin that July, I had some hang ups I had dealt with. You see, in 1987 at seven years of age I was diagnosed Manic Depressive. I had some catastrophic behavioral patterns starting at a young age. If the doctor had asked to get a BPS on my paternal side of the family he might have found a lot of answers there. Being that it was my father's side of the family they viewed themselves as so perfect that their imperfections were perfect. I never stayed on medications or in therapy very long because my single mother couldn't afford it. We weren't very educated on our, our being my sister and I, illnesses. It was always a recovery in a hospital for a month or two, a little bit of outpatient care, and then life would go on until there was another mental crisis. I lost faith in psychiatric medicine. I had ECT treatments, diagnosed bipolar type II, then borderline personality disorder, then clinically depressed, then a pathological liar with sociopathic tendencies. I got to a point where I could lie through a psych evaluation without batting an eyelash and getting away with it. By the age of 25 I had 20 suicide attempts. Most of them going unreported, like a failed overdose where you wake up in your piss and shit and vomit the next day and just clean yourself off thinking, "Fuck. I can't even do this right." There was always this great fear and pressure to not get hurt and getting hurt meant some sort of getting caught. I came to a screeching halt in my twenty-fifth year.

When I turned 25 I was around a few people that were enduring the same highs and lows that I was and not doing anything to help equalize them. I soon went inpatient after another failed attempt. I had been dosing myself with blow and alcohol to self- medicate my already wild and eccentric life with chemically induced zany behavior.
During this hospital stay my diagnosis changed from bipolar II to borderline personality disorder. I went from an Axis I diagnosis to an Axis II personality diagnosis. It simply meant that my illness was more of a programming than a chemical imbalance. Medication could treat the symptoms but dialectical behavioral therapy, DBT, would ultimately improve the quality of my life. I got all the strength I could muster and threw myself into it with holistic medication serving as an organic accoutrement. I religiously took my omega3 fish oil, 5htp, St. John's Wort, SAM-e, and nanotechnological vitamins. I started a grueling 2 hour work out six days a week and attended therapy twice a week while journaling every day. It did change my quality of life. I body was the best it had ever looked and I felt the best I had ever felt. I was learning how to cope with my symptoms with an easy to follow program.
After tragedy hit my life full speed with a failed relationship I soon found myself in another relationship. It was a little more comfortable. It budded from simple conversations over the net. Yes. The second healthiest place to find a mate to be chummy with outside of a bar. Right?
His name was Mr. A and he was just what I needed. I needed a passionate voice that was full of genuine care, support, wit, contagious laughter and intellectual ingenuity. To top the cake he was gorgeous. I would kiss the pads of his feet and did on many occasions. Some sort of a green eyed wonder mystified me. He was an addiction that I would gladly give myself over to anytime, day or night. He flew from Dallas and spent an incredible week with me after a year of correspondence. We knew it was time and that we wanted to share more than just a week or two with each other. I wanted, more than anything else, to be with him, wake him up with coffee ready every morning, satiate my sexual appetite, which he surprisingly did, and melt me into a pool with his warm, seductive, adorable presence. I thought I was born to be with him and he the same.
I was hauling a secret load. In March of 2008 my cyclothymic symptoms started to rear their heads in a very acute way. Now not only was my "inner dialogue" violently self deprecating but I had picked up darker passengers that became maladies visible only through peripheral vision. My olfactory lobe seemed stronger. I was have total recall of things that I didn't remember or didn't want to remember only to find myself in strange positions, under my bed for example, after the vivid memories filmed for IMAX. For a minute there I thought my mind was going into some sort of degenerative state, a sort of cerebral atrophy. My emotions had never been so erratic. My symptoms never so paranormal like or as acute. I bucked up on the exercise and tried to incorporate all that I learned in DBT.
Things, emotional things, subsided when I ventured forth down to the lonestar state. The first morning we woke up next to each other I woke up still in a dream. Things weren't right. Phantoms, or supernatural vagrants, in full view told a tale of an unhappy ending for Mr. A and I. He would leave if he ever knew the TRUTH about me. I was scared to do wrong and I was ultra scared to be off and abandoned in a foreign place like Texas.
I'm a born and raised midwestern man. Anything south of the Mason-Dixon Line is suspect for oddities. I amalgamated myself to Mr. A. That just made our intimacy even more intense. The dance started out on the right foot. I found a job with a decent wage that I could do with my hands tide behind my back. Mr. A had a generous friend that let us stay in a guest bedroom until we found a decent flat. We were doing it. The next step was nuptials. I laxed on my fitness regimen and spiraled faster than some cyclones. Instead of sucking up, I became a microburst.
We moved to Austin, Texas, me from K.C. and him from Dallas, at the end of July of 2008. By the end of August my inner battles started to scorch the earth.
On a weekend at the end of August that year the microburst that seemed to rush the pressure down upon me was going to run screaming across the plains leveling anything that was in its way...Mr. A.
We had a less than mediocre dinner that was only made wonderful by the company we gave each other. Anything was susceptible for witty, sardonic banter. I loved everything that came out of his mouth, his finesse, and every pore . We meandered over to Austin's more preeminent sissy bar, Rain. After we tripped the light fantastic a couple of times Mr. A went to go get our last cocktails for evening before we went home and did what soon-to-be spouses did. I went to drain the lizard.
While in dispose the scent of dusty, old attics full of old crumpled, grey insulation and sweat. Tactile sensations of hands rough, liked they'd been soaking in battery acid, were going up my thighs and down my ass. That combined with the sudden raise in volume of static, chatter rattling off into a hum and then the disabling sounds of moans and whimpers from a boy sent me spinning. The stall was moving like an amusement park ride that spins and then the floor drops out. I braced myself with my hands pressed into the sides of the metal cubical. I thought it must be the drink. Never had I had this type of reaction. I turned and opened the door to lines that had formed for a free urinal or stall. Panic started to pulse through the veins in my eyes and coursed through my body in an over exaggerated pulse that pounded in my ears with each drop and up beat of the disco house blasting to a loud white noise. Out of their mouths came the moans. I other men in the restroom acted surprised and some were a bit disturbed by my behavior it seemed. I scrambled for the door and out into a busy Friday night club I seemed to glide like on tracks. I felt riddled with torpid appendixes ready deploy my body with vicious consternation. A. I had to find Mr. A. The phantoms ascended into positions. I was plowing through people drinking, laughing, yelling, smoking cigarettes. Life suddenly goes to IMAX. The room was running out of air but nobody was having a hard time breathing. I received strange looks. I was wandering through rooms. The dance music loud so my heartbeat matched the pulse of the disco. I wanted to faint as the looks perforated me expecting me to vomit.
The sound of the party was larger than the party. The clinking ice cubes in the glasses carried by drunken parishoners, the sizzle and small crackles of burning cigarette paper taking large tugs from lips around the filter, the cash register opening and shutting, the buzz of the discotheque lights. Life became amplified. There was some missing variable to explaining what exactly made me the catalyst, the mercury switch for this Chernobyl.
I saw him and quickly beelined to him. He saw the panic and tossed the drinks. We took on a brisk pace and walked down 5th St.
"Where were you? I was looking all over for you. I couldn't find you."
"I was getting our drinks. What's the matter?"
"I asked you to never leave me!" I exclaimed through my teeth.
The conversation was consisted of minced words because physcial contact was soon to follow. We were outside and the world began to slow down a bit. I couldn't make sense of this and I couldn't possibly have anyone else carry my crazy. What wasn't working? The drink surely didn't help but keep me from breathing or pushing towards a scary form of syncope. This wasn't a soft malaise. I felt out of control of every single thing that had to do with me. And that smell, the dust, I couldn't get rid of it. I would inhale and almost become incontinent on the spot. Just fear struck through me like that of a caught rabbit.
"He was feeling on me again."
"Who? What the fuck is the matter with you?"
I answered with a lie. Stating that I was molested in the bathroom by the latino man that was all over me on the dancefloor.
"I told you to never fucking leave me. And then this."
"Will you calm the fuck down?!"
I couldn't explain what I was going through. I couldn't differentiate much. The words delusional and abandonment came quickly into my head which struck a chord of fear and more panic.
I pushed him. He flew back down on the sidewalk onto his ass. He got up and started to walk away.
"You're fuckin' crazy!" he exclaimed.
I pushed him again. He hit the pavement, bracing himself by skinning his palms and forearms. I start to calm down, noticing what I was doing. Mr. A. stood up and began to walk away with a look of terror on his face. I caught up to him at the car. With reluctance and trepidation he let me into the vehicle and frantically drove off. A yelling match ensued in the car. I was trying to express what I was going through and it was coming out it what was received as crazy talk. So floodgates opened and the sobs and tears came out. Mr. A. had no idea what I was going through. How could he? I opened my door on a bridge.
"Yeah. There ya go. Kill yourself."
My right shoe hit asphalt as I was swiftly evulsed out of the moving air back to the passenger seat.
"Get the hell in here." he howled.
The door slammed shut. More of my incoherent ranting and raving continued. When our bedroom door shut daggers flew from his mouth and heavy rocks were lightly thrown. He didn't understand. I had barely a grasp on it myself. The situation kept escalating. Trying to win an argument with an Italian is like trying to nail Jell-O to the wall. Soon I spat in his face. He tries to leave but I wouldn't get out of the way. The heat goes from spunky simmer to seething in seconds. The next thing I knew Mr. A.'s friend was prying us apart and separating us. A. took off and, smartly, would not answer his phone. I didn't talk to him until morning but endured the sounds and scents and repelling urges through the night. That night was my first attempt in Austin. I tried the old loop the belt through the buckle, put your head through the hole, toss the slack over the top of the door to the garage, stand on a stool, then knock it out. Well, tragically/comically, the old leather ripped in half on the slack and I went smack down on my tailbone on the concrete floor of the garage.
Now not only did I feel like a degenerate freak, but a fat degenerate. The idea of being alone with all that was happening and I didn't feel I could talk about frightened me. I was never in the closet when it came to being gay. At seven I coined the phrase "Closets are for clothes." But this? I didn't know which side was up. The morning came with a phone call and me reeling myself back in from a pool of drool around my face on the dirty, oiled stained cement on the garage floor.
"The only way I'll continue is if you find us a therapist."
I agreed and found and LGBT affiliated counseling center and set an appointment. I was frightened about what I was experiencing, Mr. A finding out, and if he'd stick around if I were ill like my sister, my father, my father's mother, and so on. I always told myself that it was not something that could happen to me. I show too much promise for a life full of piece and quiet. I could lie to a therapist and deflect it all to some trivial behavior caused by seeing as my move as a sacrifice and resenting Mr. A. for me making my own choices. Sure he twisted my arm by saying that the relationship would be over if I didn't make the move. All-in-all I had the where-with-all to make my own adult choices.
That's what I did. I deflected. I lied. There had to be more herbs or I could start more lifting and less cardio. Something had to give. With so much shit piling up all over the place there had to be a pony near by. I will not be my father. It was too late though. My father fought to accept what he was to where he fabricated his life to suit his taste.